I've been working on trying to embed a slideshow into this journal, but so far have been unable to do it. The slideshow is from Picasa2, a downloadable photo editing and file storage website. By downloading Picasa2, I'm hoping to be able to post more pictures than what I can on Flickr. On Flickr, another free site, I'm limited to the number of pictures I can post to 200. Picasa2 allows you to embed slideshows. At this point, I'm still having trouble doing it, but hope to have it worked out in the near future, so bear with me.

   In the meantime, heres the link to photos from the Balloon Festival. You can also access my other albums by clicking on My Photos at the top left of the page.

      http://picasaweb.google.com/addiesgranddaddy/2008BattleCreekBalloonFestival

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    I've had to delete some pictures from the Photofile website. Since it's a free website, I am limited to the amount of the file sizes of pictures I post, so that limit has been exceeded. I'm trying to find ways to maintain that site and still post photos. If I can't, I'll have to shut the site down.

  I hope you understand my predicament.

     Hope everyone enjoyed the day. Plenty of activities out there for everyone to partake in. Patty, Howard, and I drove down to Hartford for breakfast at the Panel Room, and the place was crowded, so I wasn't able to get any shots of us. We enjoyed a nice hot breafast. Next time we go, I'll have a certificate for them.

    On the drive home, I was able to stop and get some pictures of a place I'd been wanting to shoot for a long time.

         This place is located on the outskirts of Mattawan along Red Arrow Highway, and looks abandoned, although there's a sign in the window showing the hours of operation.

    We didn't have our family cookout, as Katy had some other party to attend, so we put that off until today. Around six o'clock though, Patty and I headed to Battle Creek to see if we could see the Balloon Festival which was going on. We got extremely lucky. Opting to follow the direction they were headed, we ended up getting some rare and up close looks.

I'll be processing approximately 100+ pictures, and will post some of the better ones later.

Of course, fireworks came later all around the neighborhood. I tried to get some shots of those, but I suck at fireworks.

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It's Air Zoo day today, and I've got a tour with a family reunion group, so that should be pretty interesting. There are approximately 40 in the group, and I'll be getting about 20 of them.

Later today, we'll be celebrating the 4th a day late with the family. Hopefully, I'll be able to get back to Battle Creek for more balloon shots.

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 I volunteered to work next Saturday's Air Zoo table at the Kindleberger Park Festival from 11-2. We'll have a "Make and Take" table set up. I don't know exactly what that involves, but it sounds like something the kids will enjoy. Hope to see some of you out there. Kindleberger Park is in Parchment.

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Have a good day.

      Add another name to the list of former Battle Creek minor leaguers to the Major League roll call. Reid Brignac, shortstop on the 2005 Southwest Michigan Devil Rays squad, was called up yesterday by the Tampa Bay Rays. He joins Andy Sonnanstine on the Rays.

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     Happy Birthday America.

     We hope everyone out there enjoys the 4th of July. Watch those fireworks. Don't blow yourselves up.

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 Here are a few photos I took last night during the storm, and this morning of some of the damage on my street.

     The view from my front porch

         Five houses down heading West on Woodlea

      Downed wires

         About seven houses down the block, North side, heading West. This family has a huge hole in the roof above the bedroom where a branch fell in.