Wildlife at Bob Sandlin State Park along its Shoreline

We visited Bob Sandlin State Park last Saturday and Sunday, with our camping group friends. We paddled along the shoreline on lake Bob Sandlin. Cloudy sky deprived us of the blue sky, white cloud background, but the surroundings revealed their true color and great natural contrast.

Paddling left off the boat ramp, we passed a fishing pier, and spotted a great heron right then. When the heron saw our bright yellow kayak Emma, it flew away, but landed a short distance ahead of us along the shore, and showed us its elegancy and grace in various poses. Then some red flowers brightened the green world. A cardinal couple were courting in the trees, also add the accent to the visual.

 Just when we were talking about that we did not see the typical scene of turtles resting on logs, with a small turn in the shoreline, two small turtles appeared on a log, and then a couple big turtles, as we got closer, one jumped into the water, the other lingered and eventually ready to jump as well :)

After that we turned into the park cove, spotted another cardinal couples, and snags in the lake. When turned around, a black bird with white throat greeted us, and the cloud broke up, blue sky behind the cloud appeared! It was beautiful, but the shade of the green in the surrounding just changed a bit. A big bird, likely blue jay, was in a bush in the water, chirping.

A white tent, a red shamrock and a grey canoe on the shore provided perfect accents to the otherwise world saturated with green! Quite a few tiny birds were chasing each other around a snag ahead of us, and I caught only one on my camera.

Then another beautiful tapestry appeared in front of us on the shore. 

By now we paddled 2 miles, time to turn around.

We saw a couple bird nests in the snags, and Lily wondered if those were abandoned long time ago. On the way back I saw a double crested cormorant standing by a nest, looking around.

On land or in water, Lake Bob Sandlin State Park is a great place to visit.

Lawn Repair DIY

Despite decent maintenance of our lawn -  regularly mowing, watering, fertilizing and occasional aerating , the quality of our lawn deteriorated to the point that I decided to do do something about it.

There are two main reasons for the deterioration: particles washed off the roof, rabbits sitting on the lawn. The shingle wash off accumulated near the foundation, or later when my roof is guttered, near the downspouts, the surrounding grasses just die. On the other hand, rabbits like to sit on dryer part of the lawn, eating new grasses, which leads to double whammy, no new growth, and their body heat kills grass under them.

Additionally soil erosion where lawn was barren, was serious. 

The worst part of my lawn was at the northeast corner of the garage where there is downspout, and a favorite spot for rabbits to rest. 

NE corner of my garage - barren lawn with serious soil erosion

 Initially I planned to have a service contractor to install sod for us: 1 pallet of Bermuda sod, delivered and installed would cost about 700 dollars. Not too expensive. Since I would repair patches of the lawn, not replace the whole yard, it would be challenging to have the sod placed at the locations I wanted. So I eventually decided to have it delivered to my house at a cost of $295, and we install the sod ourselves.

The pallet of sod was delivered to my yard on Friday morning, March 26th. I bought 11 bags of top soil from home depot at noon for leveling/filling eroded part of the yard.

A pallet of Bermuda Sod

 The portion of the yard that needs repair was along the south and east of the foundation. The south side, is along the flower/bush bed, where the lawn damage was primarily due to gutter run off, and to a lesser extent due to rabbits. The east side damage was primarily from rabbits, and lesser extent from gutter run off.

That afternoon when Lily got home, we started our project lawn repair.

We first fixed the eroded part of the yard along the east wall, using up all 11 bags, 440 lb of top soil. Then we started to lay the sod patch by patch. I patch of sod is not heavy, but it was not easy to carry it. To carry them from the sidewalk to the location was tiring.  After a few trips, we switched mode of transportation, using wheelbarrow to move two patches of sod at a time to the location. 

It took us 2 and half hours to lay all the sods, and it was getting dark when we finished. 

Laying the sod is hard labor. We had sour muscle the next couple of days! The charge of $400 for sod installation is a reasonable price :). 

We turned on our sprinkler to water the newly installed sod and the yard  as a whole. 

 

repaired lawn near NE corner

As one could see from the picture, the grass in the sod was dormant, we need water the sods regularly till the grasses are back to life and start to extend their roots into the ground. Sprinkling is a lazy man's way to do the job, but the sprinklers have blind spots for the sods we laid. We actually used nozzle to hand spray the sod daily for 2 and half weeks.

After three weeks grass on the repaired lawn is greener than existing grass in other places!!

the sod after 3 weeks

NE corner after 3 weeks of new sod

Note - the procedure to DIY lawn repair

1. look sod supplier online using keyword  - sod  

2. buy a pallet or pallets of sod of your choice - a standard pallet of sod covers about 450 square feet

3. buy top soil from home improvement stores (HomeDepot, Lowes etc) or from whole sale supplier

4. have the sod delivered on the day you will work on it

5. fill/level eroded portion of you lawn

6. lay sods at places you need new grass

7. water the sod for next 2 - 3 weeks 

 

Parachutes for Skydiving

 Last Saturday April 3rd, Lily and her friend went to skydiving at Ennis, Texas. They had an experience of their life times. I went with them, but as an chauffer and photographer. When I was at the tiny airport, I observed how the staff preparing the parachutes, the most important safety device for skydiving. 

the parachute

Looking at the photo carefully, you will see there are actually two parachutes, the colorful big parachute, and a tiny light color parachute, which is called pilot parachute, on top of the big parachute. The pilot parachute is, I believe, for initial jump off the airplane, to avoid entanglement between parachute and the aircraft.

The deployment of a parachute timely is critical for the safety of skydivers. 

How is parachute packed into the pre-deployment configuration? How does the parachute deploy?

The following is my observation and interpretation.

a deployed parachute is brought into staging area

a staff, typically skydiver himself, will pack the parachute, via folding and rolling

squeezing air out of the parachute: note that there is black pocket - it is the deployment bag (D-bag),
a white tiny white parachute (pilot parachute) at the top, and the carrier backpack (i.e. the container) is at the other end of the floor and the strings (bridle)

  

the parachutes are rolled and packed into the bottom of the container (backpack). the main skydiver in the tandem diving carries this backpack

note that there is silver handle with a orange ball at the end, which I believe controls the release of the main parachute 

For tandem skydiving, an equally important device is the harness on the second diver, which is connected to the main diver. There are five connection points between the main diver and the secondary diver, two on the shoulder, two at the waist, one at the back. The hook on back is used for initial jump up to keep the two divers tied to each other. Once the main parachute opens up, the main diver will disconnect this hook.

The main diver carries the parachute container, and connects to the secondary diver on the plane.

a hook at the back

two connectors at shoulder, two at waist

in the sky

mission accomplished

The thrill of skydiving

Note: after the write-up, I check internet for the sequence of parachute deployment . My observation and interpretation is pretty close.

Skydiving - A lifetime experience (by Lily)

 Skydiving has always been something I’d like to try some day. 

Last year we did a lot of bird watching, watching the birds spread their wings gliding in the air only intensified my desire. As my birthday was looming close, I decided to treat myself with the adventure 😊 And my best friend Haibo decided to join me and signed up with me together. Allan graciously agreed to be our chauffer and photographer of the event.

On Saturday, we headed to Ennis where Dallas Tandem Skydiving resides in the early morning. The sun flirted with us for a few minutes then decided to hide away. We arrived early enough to go through all the paperwork and watch the service guy roll up the parachute and get the backpack ready. Weeks of anticipation was almost anti-climax, I stayed very calm.

before boarding for skydiving

boarding

A couple of groups went up and came down, then it’s our turn. Fully equipped with harness, we followed our instructors to cram in the tiny airplane. As we took off, we saw the airfield surrounded by green grass, bluebonnet flowers, and orange Texan paintbrush. While we were enjoying the view, our instructors methodically connected all the tethering between us. A steep climb pulled us to ~2 miles above ground, we could see a few clouds by the window. Without much warning the door by my side was lifted up, strong wind blew in. my instructor Imre lifted his left leg out, monitored the location for a while, then signaled me to move out. That was it! I dangled my legs out and waited. With my head up slowly and silently we were out of the airplane and started to fall. I felt the wind, I saw the green field and small lake spread in front of me, but I didn’t feel the speed, it was soft, gentle, almost floating. Then all of a sudden, a sharp jolt woke me up from the dreamy feeling, our parachute opened and our fall speed came to a halt. Imre removed my goggle, detached some tether, then he started to make a summersault by controlling the parachute, we went tumbling around. It was a lot of fun! Looking up I saw Haibo’s parachute opened up above us and soon she’s summersaulting too. I asked Imre to spin again but we only wiggled a few times. Soon he told me to lift up my legs and get ready to land. Looking down I saw Allan on the ground with camera in hand. I started to wave and lifted my legs at the same time. In no time, we were safe on the ground.

in the sky

get ready to jump

 

jump - I was required to lookup and put my head on instructor's shoulder

flying in the sky before the big parachute opened up

Flying in the sky!

Exciting!

It was such a fun experience! I’d love to do it again in a sunny day!

I jumped first, my friend a couple minutes later, she was above me

    

                                            

landing

                                        

mission accomplished