It's a girl!!

Heather and I are thrilled to let you all know of the safe arrival of the latest little Swanson!!! As with most things, there is a bit of a story to tell, but that can come later!

We thought we were ready to have the baby on the due date (24^th June), but God’s timing is always perfect, and Eilidh Rose Swanson (pronounced like Hayley, but without the H) arrived exactly when she was meant to! 4^th July is a big day in America, and now our family really have something special to celebrate on 4^th July also!

Eilidh weighed in at 7lb 15oz, and both mother and baby are well.

Once things have calmed down a bit, we will get some pictures posted and tell some more of the story, but in the meantime, thanks for all your thoughts and prayers.

God is good!

A

Still waiting!!

Little Swanson number 3 was due on Sunday, but as you might expect with someone who shares my genetics, he or she is a wee bit late! Abi was 8 days past her due date, and Matthew came the day after his date, so we're not too concerned by going  a little over with this one too. The biggest hardship is with the weather; the first two were both born in Tummel Bridge, where the weather wasn't quite so much of a chore as it is here! This afternoon saw the temperatures hitting 99 degF (37 degC) so Heather is understandably keen to not be pregnant anymore! We will keep you all posted when he or she makes a grand appearance!

Hopefully the last pregnant Heather picture!

Life in the hangar is carrying on as usual. The summer months see quite a few people disappearing from the hangar for a week or two at a time, taking vacation time to visit friends and family, time to help with some of the many "Vacation Bible School" programmes run by churches across the States through the summer, or making "deputation" trips to share about what they are doing with supporters and at their home churches.
The 206 project has still been moving on though, and the last few weeks have seen me focussing on more of the painting related jobs. I have had good opportunity to spend some time in the paint booth painting the many small parts that have been removed from the plane over the last few months. Painting is one of those things that is 25% science, and 75% art, so once Josh had spent a bit of time going over the theory of it all, the best way to learn is just to do it! It is also one of those things that is incredibly satisfying when it all works out, so the last couple of weeks have been good fun for me!

Painting the 206's engine cowls

Wire brushing one of the rivet heads!

With painting, one of the key things to getting a good finish is to start with a good base. We are now coming close to getting the fuselage rolled into the paint booth for painting, so this week has seen me spend quite a bit of time "detailing" in preparation for paint. The majority of the old paint was stripped with a chemical stripper a few weeks ago, but there are still little flecks of paint stuck in nooks and cranny's and around every rivet head on the surface of the plane. My job this week has been to spray thinners onto every rivet head  and rub it all down with a wire brush! I have to admit I am starting to go a bit cross eyed focusing on one rivet at a time, sitting a few inches from the side of the plane, but it has to be done, and it is a good job for someone who is hoping at any minute to drop everything and rush home for the birth!!


Thanks for all your prayers for the safe arrival of the baby - we will let you know when it comes!!

Tick -Tock.......

On June the 2^nd some of the women at our church along with myself organised a family fun day at a local park near our church.   Some people from the church have had a youth outreach programme going on there for a while building relationships with children who live around the park.  Our goal was to try and reach the parents as well and get to know them a little more.  We had super weather – not too hot!  Lots of volunteers from the church helped with the BBQ and with crafts and games and face painting etc.   The children enjoyed games like watermelon rolling, ( which Andy tried to duct tape together after it became a “watermelon throwing contest” :0).  Lots of local children came by themselves to the park and we were able to meet some parents who ventured out for a free hot dog.  It was a super success and the committee are planning another one in August.  

Rolling a duct-taped watermellon...

The next thing I had planned after the park party was to play at an outdoor wedding last Saturday.  Although 39 weeks pregnant, the wedding was in the morning and I was in the shade at the keyboard and all went well.  Our Pastor’s eldest daughter was getting married and it was a privilege to be a part of the wedding.   The ceremony was over in an hour and we did not stay for the reception as the temperature was getting up to around 85 degrees F.   I came home and Andy and I took the kids swimming.  It was so nice to get into some deep water to take the weight of the baby and feel lighter again!   There is no indoor public swimming pool near here, the public pools are outdoor and just opened at the end of May. 

A week ago Debbie Baisley arrived from North Carolina to stay with us until after the baby is born.  Abi and Matthew are loving having their American “mimi” to stay  and needless to say – so are we!  I am able to get more sleep in the mornings and uninterrupted afternoon naps and the house has never looked so good! : 0) Debbie is a home birth midwife and has known me since I was 10 years old.  I am really excited that she will be here to help deliver our new arrival when the time comes.   I have another midwife who is local who will assist Debbie with the birth.   After having two home water births with Abi and Matthew I am not too worried about having a third.  The major difference this time is the lack of gas and air for pain relief.   It is not standard in America and not available for births anywhere here.  I never used much at all with Matthew as it was quite a quick birth so I am hoping for another one like that!  Whatever happens I know God is always in control.   

Abi and Matthew have been quite humourous trying to make sense of all that’s going on.  After watching a facebook video of my sister’s dog licking her new born puppies, Abi asked Debbie “will mummy have to lick the baby’s eyes to get them to open?” lol! Matthew knew that the baby was going to come out when Debbie arrived so he is a little confused as to why it is not out yet and Debbie has been here a week.  He asked me again today if it was coming in June or July – I think he is getting a little impatient ;0).   Last week they both went to a local vacation bible school based on Ken Ham’s "Answer’s in Genesis".  They really enjoyed it and Matthew informed me on the second day that “if the bible says it, then that settle’s it”!  This week Abi is away every morning to an art class.  They are designing the set for a local Jungle book production in July.  I think she struggled today as there was a lot of talking and planning and she likes to be busy with her hands.  Hopefully they will get painting soon and she will settle into it.   Next week is vacation bible school at our own church.  As they get three months of a summer holiday it is nice to have a few things organised to keep them busy.

Andy is still busy working on the MAF 206 from Haiti.  They are starting the process of painting the plane and Andy is busy painting landing gear parts.  He is awaiting the call home any moment for the birth.  He is looking after another MMS'ers garden and animals while they are away for a week, and got a call at the hangar today to say that their cow gave birth to a calf... not the delivery he was hoping for!! He will get two weeks off when the baby is born which we are all excited about.

My parents are due to arrive in Ohio on the 10^th of July for a month so I am feeling very blessed to have so much help around this time and in the coming months.   The baby is due on Sunday 24th of June so I am counting the days! Health-wise, myself and the baby are doing fine although I am getting very uncomfortable and probably a lot more short tempered than usual.  The weather has been very hot and I am preferring to stay indoors and so thankful for our big old air conditioning window unit in our living room.  It spouts out black dirt which we can't seem to find the source of, but that's a small price to pay for the relief of some cooler air!   Our next blog post will hopefully be about our exciting news! God bless x

Not quite retired....

Although we work with MAF, while I am training at MMS I spend most of my time working on aircraft that serve with other organisations. For the last wee while though, we have had an MAF plane in the hangar, and I’ve enjoyed working with Chuck and Phil on this project for the last couple of weeks.

Hard at work in Haiti

N-6MF is a Cessna 206 that came back to the States at the end of 2010 after a busy missionary career. It started with MAF in the 80’s, and served in Nicaragua and Venezuela before spending four years between 2006 and 2010 flying as HH-PTL in Haiti. It looked like it might be retired from MAF work, but it was decided to give it a bit of a make-over, fix a few problems and return it to MAF’s fleet. It will be used in America as a training aircraft for pilots looking to serve overseas, and also as a demo plane that will be seen at air-shows across the country promoting the work that MAF do.  

Most of the work that needs to be done to this plane while it is here in Ohio is just the result of being a 31 year old plane which spent its last few years by the sea. There have been quite a lot of little bits of corrosion that we have been dealing with, and lots of parts that are just worn and tired.

Since I started working on this project I have been involved in a few different jobs on it. I disassembled the landing gear legs and the nose gear strut, then stripped them of the old paint and inspected them to ensure that they are in an airworthy state and good to be reinstalled. They are now ready to be repainted when we get to that phase of the project.

I then moved onto the gear box for the main landing gear. This was the same area as I was working on this time last year, on the Gabon 207, but this time the only damage that needed attention was one cracked casting that we have to replace after the years of landing on rough grass strips had taken their toll. I removed the old casting, leaving the rest of the gearbox in place, and cleaned up the corrosion that was underneath it. We are now just about ready to get the new casting prepped and installed.

Repairing rivets on the engine mounts

Another issue that had to be addressed was in the engine bay. Over the years some of the rivets that hold the engine mounts in place had started to work loose, and had to be replaced. As with many areas on aircraft, a lot of rivets are in awkward places, and give a bit of a challenge in getting them drilled out and then driven again. Also with “working rivets” like these, the holes that they are in have worn that little bit bigger, which gives its own set of problems when you are installing new rivets. Some of the holes we had here were ok and could be filled with the same size rivets as before, but some holes were a bit too worn and had to be filled with rivets of the next size bigger.

Bucking rivets for Phil

In between times, I helped Phil when he needed another pair of hands for some riveting jobs. He has been kept busy replacing a stringer in the cabin roof and the pilot’s door sill, among other things. In the picture above I am bucking rivets in the pilot’s foot-well as Phil drives them from the outside.

Last week had me working on the side skin below the co-pilot’s window. When the plane first arrived at the hangar it had been decided to pull that skin off to attend to some corrosion beneath the frames below it. When we pulled it off we found a section of channel that had quite a bit of damage, as well as some corrosion on the skin itself. We managed to source a new channel for a reasonable price, and I set to work fabricating a new skin.

Starting the skin removal...

Skin removed!

I used the old skin as a template to work from and drilled all the rivet holes to match where they fit on the plane. Then I cut the skin to the size of the original, dressed the edges, primed the inside surface (the outside will get painted with the rest of the plane) and checked to make sure it all fit together properly! 

Transfering rivet holes into the new aluminium sheet

Dressing the edges of the new skin ready for installation.

Last Friday, Chuck and I got started on riveting it in place, and by the end of the day on Monday we had pretty much finished installing the new skin on the plane.

I thought you might like to see this video of one of the more unusual flights this plane was involved in while it worked in Haiti.

  

Thanks for your interest and support as we train here in the States on planes that are having a real impact around the world. 

(The video link for those who get this blog-post by email is http://youtu.be/Fk_ls9WNpwM )

First visitors of the year!

It’s hard to believe how fast the time seems to be going by just now! I had planned to write another blog-post weeks ago, but between working to finish my theory chapter tests, getting ready for the arrival of “Little Swanson #3” and hosting our first visitors of 2012, time has just run away on me!

The first visitors we had this year were my mum and dad, who have never been to the States before. As this was their first trip across the Atlantic, they were keen to check off as much “tourist stuff” as possible, as well as seeing our home here in Coshocton, spending time with the kids (and me and Heather!) and visiting the hangar to see what we are actually doing here in Ohio!

Their tourist trail started in New York, where they spent the weekend while we were driving back from North Carolina (see the last blog post!). After a few days in the Big Apple, they flew to Columbus, where Matthew and I met them at the airport. Dad had planned on doing some driving while here, but when they saw the traffic on the Interstate I think they were glad that they had their own team of chauffeurs for their stay with us!! It was good to be able to give them their first taste of American life, and Abi and Matthew enjoyed showing their Granny and Granda around our home here. (Think demonstrations of “The Pledge of Allegiance”, “bug tour’s” of the garden, peanut butter milkshakes from “Earl’s”, and reading bedtime stories at the end of the day.) A great time was had by all!

Bedtime stories

The other tourist thing on the list was a visit to Washington DC. As most of the things to see in DC weren’t really of interest to Abi and Matthew, and a 7 month pregnant Heather didn’t fancy another 6 hour car drive, we decided that I would drive with my folks to the capital, and get my fix of museums and memorials without the rest of the family! We had a great weekend there checking off as many of the iconic landmarks as we could in the short time we were there! We also managed to squeeze in a Gettysburg battlefield tour visiting one of the most important Civil War sites in America, and learning a bit more about what happened there.

Climbing the steps outside the Jefferson Memorial with my mum.

When we got back to Coshocton, we had a few days to relax here; I was back at work, and my mum and dad were able to visit Abi at her school. They had lunch in her class room, saw some of the work she has been doing, enjoyed some “recess” time in the play ground, and met the rest of Abi’s class. We were also able to give Heather a “home day” to herself when the kids and I took granny and granda through to the zoo in Columbus. As it is still off-season not all of the displays were open, but it was also much quieter and we were able to have a good look around the zoo at our own pace.

Abi showing off her classroom

Abi and Granny meeting the shark at Columbus zoo

Matthew helps with some shopping at Miller's Bakery

Mum and dad went back home at the end of April, and then I had just enough time to finish off all my chapter tests before our next visitors arrived! The chapter tests are done to ensure we cover all the theory we need to know before sitting our FAA exams; even though I have finished those now, they did a great job of confirming how much I still need to learn, so the studies will continue!!

Last week we had our good friends Mitch and Elizabeth, and their wee boy Robert, visiting us here in the “north”. Although Elizabeth has been here before, Mitch hadn’t, so it was good to be able to spend time with them here, and show them around the hangar. They had a great time exploring Amish country, letting Robert have some time playing with his “Scottish cousins” and sampling the compulsory cheese tarts from Miller’s Bakery! It was also a good chance for them to relax away from their daily routine’s as Elizabeth is expecting their second child in August.

Mitch, Elizabeth and little Robert.

Thanks for your patience since the last post – we really appreciate your interest and support as we train here in Ohio. Up at the hangar I am working on a MAF Cessna 206 just now, and will hopefully have a post about that coming up soon!

Vacation time!

Andy has kept you well up to date with the PNG trip and a few of you have been asking what myself and the kids have been up to lately. I am almost seven months pregnant now and my days are a lot shorter. Sleep/rest takes up part of my afternoon and early to bed is also high on the list of priorities. I am managing to keep on top of life here but definitely more tired in this pregnancy and yes, I am feeling a lot older! : 0) Everything seems to be going well with the baby and my focus is trying to make sure the baby is in the right position towards the end to allow for a straightforward home birth. Having a summer baby here in Ohio means a lot of the clothes i.e. long sleeved new born vests etc. will not really be needed. Abigail was born in October and Matthew was April in Scotland so they were well equipped with thermals! I have been trawling through second hand shops looking for bargains and purchased a few very light items in pink and a few in blue. Andy and I have decided on possible names and everything seems to be falling into place with the midwives and prenatal care.

The parent and toddler group is going well and I am really enjoying meeting the new mom's. Each week brings a different group of mothers/grandmothers/children. I am also co-leader of the women's ministries commitee in our church and we are at present organising a fun day for local families in a nearby park for the 2nd of June. I have also been busy helping with events such as "party like a princess". Our Church organised an event for over 250 girls teaching them about the meaning of real beauty from within. I was incharge of eight girls for the night and it was busy but fun.

Abi and I recently attended our first bridal shower - our pastor's eldest daughter is getting married in June. Abi was thrilled to have yet another 'ladies only' event and the chocolate dipped strawberries were the highlight for her!

Last week we went to North Carolina to see our friends and then on to South Carolina for a few days at Myrtle beach. We had signed up to a time share deal where we got a fantastic price and accomodation and only had to attend a 2 hour presentation on why we need to purchase a time share! The presentation was gruesome and lasted three hours but we survived, managed to avoid buying a time share, and did not let it spoil our little break away. We spent two afternoons at the beach where the kids had tons of fun in the sand and in the Atlantic Ocean. Matthew turned 4 years old on the 11th so we let him choose a special trip out and off we went to the Aquarium. He was able to spend his birthday money on a collection of sharks (attached to a truck) and these little toy sharks have kept him entertained ever since. He loves to talk you through all the different types of sharks and the great white is the current favourite! He is enthralled by any documetary on sharks on the TV. It makes a nice change from monster trucks - which we have had for many months.

We returned from North Carolina last Friday and experienced our first flat tyre ever two hours into our journey! I am so blessed to have a practical husband who managed to sort it all out and it was great we were only ten minutes away from a garage to enable us to get the wheel fixed before we drove for another six hours.

Abi is back at school this week and is loving her extra homework she has to do to make up for the four days she missed of school! Matthew and I have been unpacking like crazy in order to get ready for Andy's parents who arrived yesterday. This is their first visit to the USA so they have been in New York for a few days before arriving in Coshocton. Andy is driving them to Washington DC on Thursday for a four day trip. Then they will spend some more time here in Coshocton before flying back to Scotland in a few weeks time.

Springtime, annual inspections and helicopter flights

We are enjoying an early taste of summer this year - the last week or so has seen us digging out our shorts again, the birds are singing and the grass is growing.

Since I got back from PNG I have been working on an annual inspection on a local plane that has been a regular at MMS for quite a few years. It is a 1959 Piper Comanche, and although it is in pretty good shape, it is still 18 years older than me, so it has a few wee jobs that are needing attention. Part of any annual inspection is a documentation review. This is where we make sure that airworthiness certificates and registration documents are valid, and that the Airworthiness Directives that are applicable to the plane are being dealt with. Airworthiness directives are mandatory requirements issued by the FAA to ensure that specific issues on airframes, engines, or accessories are handled correctly, so that they remain airworthy. These can be for anything from checking a specific part of structure every year for cracks, to ensuring that a particular engine component is changed within a certain time-frame. At the moment we have the plane up on jacks; we had an AD to work through on the landing gear, which involved checking tolerances on the bushings that the landing gear pivot on as they fold into the aircraft, measuring the “over centre” dimensions that lock the landing gear down, and replacing some time-limited parts. The main gear is all now back together, but the nose gear had some parts that had to be sent out to a specialist for repair. Once the parts come back, we’ll reassemble the nose gear and the plane should be just about ready to be returned to it’s owner.

The Comanche on jacks waiting for it's nose gear.

While I have been getting back into the swing of life here in Ohio, I’ve finally managed to pull together some of the video I took in PNG. While we were there we were able to take a short helicopter flight out to a village in the Finisterre mountains, where a Swedish Bible translator was working on translating the Bible into the local language. I thought you might like to see a bit of the kind of terrain around where we were. It really shows how much aviation is relied on for accessing remote parts of this difficult countryside.

(If you get this blog by email, here is the link to the video.)

http://youtu.be/B3zGtZChsak