Julie sent me this…

Too good not to repost 🤪 🐈‍⬛

Close to two guns for every person in the US!

Peeps try and marginalize the numbers, but they're impossible to ignore. It's the majority by a really long shot! 

One more pic I deleted by mistake

I forgot to post this post ride pic from my January trip.  It was a slippery day for sure.  But everything went well, and I headed home after dinner.  It gave me more time with Jewels, and kept me from spending the night camping when it was going to be 10º in the morning.  

Speaking of Dinner, the bottom pic is Zoe just sitting at my feet while the group of us ate Mexican dinner.  A lot of the restaurants have "outdoor" so they accommodate the dogs and off-roading that seem to go together so often 🐶

I decided to start over again with my Jeep build 🤪

Julie got me this cool Lego set for Christmas. I decided I better get busy over the winter so it's ready for the spring rides, hahahaha.

Let’s try out this little guy

CRKT made a bali that takes queues from their classic M16.  As a bali, it's less then meh.  As a knife, it's a nice blade, easy to open one handed and feels good.  Hmmmm.  maybe just part of knife history that you have to keep in your collection?

Overdue for a replacement

The Pentastar 3.6 is famous for developing a leaking oil cooler around 80-100,000 miles.  Mine was at 110K and leaking.  So, this past weekend, I dug into the engine and replaced it.  Wasn't too hateful of a job.  I had a mechanic friend help me out.  He knew the shortcuts we could take, what to be careful with, and was an extra set of hands.  It took us about an hour and a half.  Then I did an oil change, tire rotation, lube job, and inspection.  

Cool new race car coming…

This is the concept for Matt's next vehicle.  It's cool that they sketched up his new desert racing concept.  

A big fight broke out 🤪

All the Cincinnati area mascots played a game of broom ball during one of the period breaks.  A big brawl even broke out.  The crowd loved it!

how big they are…?!

You don't realize how big these wheels are until you try and fit one in the back of another vehicle!

Doesn’t look quite right?

I have a new spare on order… In the meantime, I'm running around with a missing wheel on the back end.  Julie doesn't think it looks quite right, in fact, she thinks it looks naked, or incomplete.  I tend to agree, hahaha.  It is lighter on the back end and tailgate for sure.  

We were speechless at how great the rings turned out!

John planned it out, thought through what Savannah would like, and mocked it up for Thuan.  Then he planned how he was going to pop the question too.  It was hard to have the necessary patience!

In the end it all worked perfectly.  Savannah was surprised, pleased, and the ring was "exactly what she wanted and better than she imagined".  Welcome to the family "officially" 🥰

We even managed to have some gold left

Thuan goes through a laborious process of melting, purifying, and casting the heirloom gold to maximize the beauty, durability, and value of the rings he makes from it.  Most shops just give you the street value and send it out for melt.  They don't actually use it in your rings, or give you the full value. We have a couple stones from Steve's wedding band for future use too. :)

A few weeks later, Julie joined us.

Another lunch date with John.  This time to pick up the rings 💍 It was fun to be scheming around behind Savannah's back 🤪 All the time, she thought Johnny was dragging his feet and not making any progress on their plans.  He did a good job of playing it cool. That was until he actually had the rings, then he wanted to run home and propose right away! But he knew he had to stick to his plan and make it special. 

Early January

John and I made a lunchtime visit to our favorite jeweler at ACT.  He's a fun guy and can craft whatever you'd like! By the time we finished deciding what he wanted, and came back to put it in motion, Thuan was hugging John since we was happy to see him again and excited to be part of John's plans.

Back in July and August…

You might remember me posting some pics of past wedding bands and such.  That was about the time that John had starting asking questions about getting married, discussing options, planning for the future, and wanting to see the rings we had offered if they decided they wanted to go that route.  It was a fun summer of coffee and food dates, walks, and discussions.  This is my current band Julie got me.  Johnny has always liked the row of stones, and wanted a pic as we was thinking about what he might want in a ring.  ❤️