Thursday, August 26, 2010

94th annual Firemen's Muster...

It might be the 94th Muster for this event, but for me.. it was the 50th!!! I have never missed one Firemen's Muster since I was born.. and this year was no exception. In some ways, it's the same old-same old... but in other ways, it's tradition and a "big part" of my life, and I am so happy to always be involved. The day began with the unloading of "Protection II"... an old hand tub that is owned by the "Red Shirts".. and a piece of fire apparatus that Ed is in charge of keeping and storing. Each year, she is rolled out of her protected home, the Red Shirts come and polish her brass... she is pulled threw the parade, and then she is tuck away again until the next year.
This year, however, she will make a second appearance on September 11th for another event, which I will blog about when it gets here.


We all met at Kassy and Nate's and then walked up to watch the parade. I brought Chester and Camille along. I wasn't sure how either one would "do".. this parade is LOUD!!! Just imagine.. firemen "playing" with their trucks and you can pretty much figure how quiet this parade isn't!!! But they both did very well, and Chester was quite interested in the candy that folks were throwing out to the kids...







Here we all are.. waiting for the parade to begin!!!!













And - as usual - the Red Shirts and Protection II lead the parade... followed by a whole line of all sorts of fire equipment!!!!











Year after year, the trucks seem to get bigger and fancier. Technology has certainly kept up in the field of fire fighting.






After the parade it's on to the "field" for the firemen's games. Things like how quickly a team can get a hose hooked up.... and then run water threw it and hit the target. This is not as easy as it looks, and more than once, if the hose is not hooked tightly.....









broken connection and water every where. (we like to start the kids young... that's where good fire fighters come from!!!) "don't give up boys"












Now, the "old timer's team".......













maybe not as quick as the younger ones....














but experience pays off!!!!!












Just one question... when did "we" become the old timer's team???? Used to be the day when we were the young ones that were running. Time goes way too fast......









Burley!!!!! If there is one other person that probably hasn't ever missed a muster (other than me... and my Dad!!!) it would be Burley. Burley is amazing and back in the day, he was the one guy that you could always call on to "make up a team". Some musters he ran on several teams!!! Now at about 70 years old.. he still shows he has it... maybe not as quick as he once was... but in the ladder competition, he still showed us all that he can do it!!! Wishing you many more musters and running events - Burley!!!!









The day always closes with the firemen's clam bake!!! Such a fun time, lots of good food (LOBSTER).. time to visit with old friends, and meet some new ones... Here Abbie gets to meet Andrew!!!!











All the girls!!! on the left.. Kadee, Jen, Diana.. and then Kas, Sadie and Abbie. These gals grew up together, with Daddies in the fire department and living on the same street. They are certainly life long friends!!!








And all too soon, the day was over, and another field day is tucked away into the list of memories and blogs!!!





"the" beetle.....

I fear that the summer has been zipping by so quickly, and we have been so busy with "other" things, that we haven't even thought about our little beetle, until the Firemen's Muster was just a few days away. Often the beetle has the honor of carrying the "Firemen's Queen - Miss Flame" in the parade. Being an convertible and red, it fits perfectly for this event. So, we took it's "blankie" off, dusted it off, and rolled it out into the sunshine. Like it does everytime, it started right up and seemed to be "ready for fun".

The beetle has it's own little story (as does everything I have!!!) and it goes something like this. When Ed and I first married, I told him that someday I would love to have a VW beetle - yellow in color and convertible of course. Every once in a while, we would go and look at one, but they always needed a lot of work, or didn't run well, or whatever. Since this was totally a luxury, we continued to look knowing that one day, we would find just the right one.

Early one spring, I was home with two little girls, running about the house and doing a million "mommy things". I don't remember now exactly how the day was going, but I do remember it wasn't great. Nothing awful, just typical trying to run a house and manage two small children. The phone rang.. it was Ed... "what color beetle were you looking for?" he asked. Thinking that was a silly question on a day like this, I said "YELLOW"... and he replied.."not red?, I found a really nice red one, maybe you would like to come and see it". Come and see it? that meant, pack up the kids, drive to where ever he was.. stop what I needed to get done, it seemed like "too much to do"... "No, I can't come right now". He was disappointed, "it's a nice one, good price, I don't think it will last long, you really should come and see it". I told him no again, and ended the phone call. Going back to vacuuming, I began to think .... "are you foolish, your husband just called and offered you a car that you have been wishing for, you're going to pass this by???" I called him back, "that didn't take long" he teased me. Needless to tell you, we bought the car, and no it wasn't yellow, but the red suits me fine.

It's a 1978, had only one owner before us, and was (is) in extremely good condition. I am trying to remember what year we bought it, and we think it was in 1996, so we have had it quite a while. We have had some fun with that little car. We always loved loading the kids in it, and taking rides on hot summer nights. Course the girls complained about being "cold" riding in the back with the top down. So, I made two quilts (one for each) that had "beetle bugs" all over them. We still keep the quilts in the beetle, just in case anyone who takes a cruise gets cold!!!

As I said, earlier,we pulled it out a few days ago to get it ready for the Firemen's parade. I wanted to get it down ahead of time because I actually needed my truck for the day of the parade. So, last week, I popped Abbie's car seat into the back, put Camille in the front, and we headed out. Abbie's first beetle ride!!!!! and another generation for the little car to give rides to.







Camille had as much fun in the beetle as Abbie did. Actually all our dogs love riding with the top down. The cockers ears flap in the wind, and they spend the whole time sniffing.











I am glad that this car has seat belts!!! Car seats weren't the things back in 1978. Fortunately Abbie's seat has a place for use with a lap belt as it's all the beetle has, but it worked. I will tell you, I just hoped that she wouldn't throw that "binkie" out somewhere along the ride, and she didn't!!!!








Even Chester has had a few rides. He seems to greatly enjoy them as well. And now that we have it out and about again, I hope for some warm sunny fall days, where we can still run around topless before the winter winds return.