Sunday, May 15, 2011

The project vacation

I started to find Estes catalogs and rocket magazines all around the living room. 

Old catalogs, new catalogs...


Old magazines, new magazines. 
Then rocket model kits started showing up in our work room.
Big models.

And suddenly, E's evenings were quietly spent working on these models. 


It doesn't take long for me to put 2 + 2 together.

Vacation time is coming up soon. Without a word expressed, I know vacation time will include launching rockets out in the country. 

Any smart rocketeer knows that rockets can get lost. You shoot one off - and it goes 'haywire' without a warning. One second your rocket is sitting on the launch pad, waiting for you to push the 'GO' button. The next instant, the rocket is sky high - and you never see it again. 

So you build spare rockets. Lots of rockets.
You build and build and build. 
You sand, you paint, you apply sealant.
You add decals. 

And if you are me, you go on the offense. 
I don't want to be left in the dust rocket exhaust. 
So I start building too. 

My contribution is a little Alpha III. It is simple. Plastic fins, no paint. Lots of decals. And it is very short. 
My Alpha III is the little orange rocket is on the right.
The masked rocket on the left is E.'s project, a missile.

Our goal? 
FUN. 
(I made this one... a Ticonderoga Pencil rocket!)

And isn't vacation all about FUN?

8 comments:

Pat MacKenzie said...

Cool. I watched a program on tv a week or so ago about the rocket launching competition held annually. Serious stuff. Looked like lots of fun though.

MadSnapper said...

you got some really good shots of the launch. we don't have rockets, we have radio control airplanes, a garage full, at last count, not sure i found all of them, 42 planes, and they don't go up and get lost they hang out in the hangar.

Kathy said...

One year my grandson had his birthday party at the Science Museum where he and his little friends got a lesson in how to build rockets. It was so much fun to see them shoot their rockets off outdoors after the lesson and the building session. Maybe you should schedule E's next birthday party there!

Banjo52 said...

My, what a lot of rockets. I see the appeal.

(That was me taking the high road and NOT dragging Dr. Freud into things).

Thérèse said...

I love it! I hope you will post more about your rockets. So much fun. I know there is so much more than kids rockets, something I experienced very seriously with our kids. Good pictures but I am wondering: you were speaking about vacations?

Anonymous said...

We never built beautiful rockets like you have shown but during the WWII, we cut the tips off wooden matches and packed them in a nut half screwed on a bolt. Then we screwed in a matching bolt until it just touched the packed in match heads. And we tossed it (either end) up again the side of a curb and the explosion would shoot the end of the bold clear across the street, stripping the threads. It is a wonder we didn't get killed but we didn't.

Anonymous said...

You made me laugh.

WV: undolce. No, dolce far niente with rockets.

Pasadena Adjacent said...

that is so super cool