With stargazing on our minds lately - this weekend we went out to a local Astronomy get-together to look at the night sky. There were telescopes ranging from 2” apertures to 14” apertures - so there were lots of celestial objects to look at - if you knew what you were looking for. 
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During the evening we saw (1) Jupiter and the 4 Galilean Moons (Io, Europa, Ganymede, and Callisto), (2) Mizar and Alcor - two stars that form a double star in the handle of the Big Dipper (aka Ursa Major), (3) the "Double-Double" stars of Epsilon 1/2 and Delta 1/2 in the constellation of Lyra near Vega and (4) even a low earth orbit satellite zipping by. Although we did not take any direct photos of the planets, moons and stars that we saw - here are some representative pictures of what they looked like.

​With the days getting longer lately we’ve found ourselves at the shooting range as the sun starts to set. Because of this we decided to add a small flashlight to our range bag. Because we wanted a small light that was bright and durable we purchased a UST Brightforce LED flashlight. 

You can find the details about the Brightforce LED flashlight on the Shooting/ Range Items and Tools page.

​Lately we’ve been at the range shooting with other people when someone got a cut or other small scrape that needed a Band-Aid. Although we had a small First Aid Kit in the trunk of our car we didn’t have one with us on the firing line. To remedy this situation we added an Adventure Medical Kits Ultralight/Watertight Medical Kit.3 to our range bag.
 
You can find the details about the Medical Kit.3 on the Shooting/ Range Items and Tools page.

​If you have a 9mm S&W M&P Shield and are looking to extend the magazine capacity from 8 to 10 rounds then you might want to check out the magazine extension that Hyve Technologies is making. The Hyve extension replaces the footplate on the stock 8 round magazine and increases its capacity to 10 rounds while retaining the lines of the Shield’s grip. 

You can find the details about the Hyve 9mm magazine extension on the Shooting/Magazines page.

​This weekend we spent two days at a United States Practical Shooting Association (USPSA) course. The USPSA is one of the premier competitive shooting organizations in the world and a member of the International Practical Shooting Confederation (IPSC) that conducts shooting matches around the world. The USPSA has nearly 400 clubs all over the United States.
 
Practical shooting, also sometimes known as dynamic shooting or action shooting, is a shooting sport where the competitors try to unite precision, power and speed, by using a firearm of a certain minimum power (caliber) to score as many points as possible during the shortest amount of time, with penalties for inaccurate shooting. The courses are called "stages", and are shot individually by the shooters. Usually the shooter must move and shoot from several positions, fire under or over obstacles and in other unfamiliar positions. There are no standard exercises or set arrangement of the targets, and the courses are often designed so that the shooter must be inventive, and therefore the solutions of exercises sometimes varies between shooters. Although the weather was a little iffy on the first day it was a great course and everyone seemed to have a good time in the range pits.
 
You can find out more about the USPSA at their website: https://www.uspsa.org/
 
Here are some photos of the stage layouts and outdoor shooting stages from the USPSA course that we attended.

If you work on your firearms (to either clean, modify or enhance them) then you need the right tools for the job. Luckily most of the tools that you need are common everyday tools like screwdrivers, punches, Allen wrenches and small mallets. But if you work on an AR-15/M4 platform there is probably one unique tool that you should have – an Armorer’s Wrench. Even though it is probably the most expensive wrench on the market we bought the Magpul Armorer's Wrench since it also seems to be the best and most useful wrench out there.

​You can find the details about this Armorer’s Wrench on the Shooting/ Range Items and Tools page.