Ahh, Spring!

In the spring a young bird's fancy lightly turns to thoughts of nesting. (My apology to Tennyson.)

Our comfortable home here in Coshocton County has not only sheltered our family, it also is a bird house. Each year, birds have made nests in the eaves and once they get started on their family I don't have the heart to shut them out.

This year I beat them to it. With strategically placed hardware cloth I blocked their access. On the East end of the house I had to borrow a ladder tall enough to reach. Jason dropped by to help me set up the ladder and stood by to make sure I didn't hurt myself.

Birds seem to think the doors at the MMS Aviation hangar are condominiums just for them. This year Dave, the facility maintenance manager, saw some very coarse push brooms in a catalog. Realizing sections of the broom could be placed in the primary bird entrances, he ordered and installed some. The idea is proving to be a good one because we have far fewer birds in the hangar this spring, and we don't hear them nesting in the doors either.

Friday Wrap-up

It's been a busy week and a good one. You've seen from Wednesday's blog and the MMS Blog what the team from LeTourneau University did during their week here. Here's a couple personal observations you won't find elsewhere:

Among things we have in common, LeTourneau University faculty member, Matt, and I are graduates of the University's aviation maintenance program. Matt gained experience in the aviation industry before joining the faculty of LeTourneau's School of Aeronautical Science. I enjoyed getting acquainted with Matt. Aviation students there have excellent instructors.
For many years, students doing technical studies at LeTourneau have been known as "Techos" (pronounced "tek ohs" - it just occurred to me that techo is the word for roof in Spanish). Anyway, Here's an old red-headed Techo, a somewhat younger one, and several young Techos. It was a joy to meet each one and have them help at MMS Aviation this week.

LeTourneau Team

Rachel, Pete, Kevin, Ben, Eli, Julia, Matt, and Ken

This has been a full week so far and it is only Wednesday! A group of college students from LeTourneau University have been volunteering in the MMS hangars this week during their Spring Break. We appreciate these young people and their staff sponsor who have come all the way from Longview, TX to work alongside our MMS mechanics. Our MMS families have been boarding them and feeding them this week. We had three of them (Kevin, Ben and Ken) over for supper on Monday evening and it was a joy to get to know them. Dwight has enjoyed reminiscing about his LeTourneau days. For more pictures of the team in action feel free to go to the MMS blog at www.mmsaviation.blogspot.com

Last night, Dwight was busy at an MMS Board mtg. Tomorrow he and several others will be going to an Aviation Maintenance Symposium in Columbus.

Adoption Shower

On Saturday, Jen and I attended the shower of a good friend, Amy Mozombite. Amy and her husband, David, will be adding to their family, a little boy from Ethiopia. We are thrilled for them and anticipate meeting little Asher next month. Big brother, Isaiah and big sister Lily are very excited. David is an apprentice mechanic at MMS and will be finishing up very soon with plans to serve in Bolivia.

Lily helps her mom open gifts

All the moms who have adopted

Little Wrestler and Pizza at Work

Our son-in-law, Jason, was an excellent wrestler in his jr-high and high school years. If my memory serves me well, he placed in Ohio state tournaments. There's a new generation on the wrestling mats, so look out!

A little over a week ago I attended a tournament with Javin and Jason. It was held in a high school gymnasium where four matches were happening at once. It isn't a secret that the cardinal is the school mascot there.

Javin is in the center of the picture with his dad kneeling at the edge of the mat to offer encouragement. Javin's opponent won this match on points, not being able to pin Javin and end the match early.

Meanwhile, back at the hangar, there was a veritable smorgasbord of pizza for lunch last Friday. The owner of a plane we're working on instructed Tim, our Production Manager, to order pizza for the MMS crew.

Thanks to Focus Aviation we enjoyed a variety of pizza, in moderation of course.

Around the Town

Our daughter Jen and I (Rena) don't often get the same day off of work and other commitments, but today was an exception. We spent some time at a local home decorating store to look through wall paper books to find a suitable border for our living room. Javin, who had a day off from preschool was our critic and photographer. In fact he came near to photographing everything in the whole store! We had fun.