couple of interesting activities

In an effort to do something I love AND earn money at it, instead of merely doing something I'm good at to earn money, I went to a workshop in Spokane to learn about the Why Try program that helps at-risk youth find know how and confidence to make a good life for themselves. Anyone who wants to can look up the Why Try program on the internet, so 'nuff said, but I also enjoyed Spokane a bit, I checked out the cathedral at Gonzaga University. I am such a sucker for stained glass windows and soaring architecture that points to God.














Also fun was visiting Missy and her menagerie -- husband, five boys, 1 exchange student, chickens, ducks, turkeys, goats, and a stray turtle. Isn't it funny -- I almost (not quite, but almost) see Missy more often now that they are living near Spokane than when they were next door. Sad that it should be so...




Ali seems to have enjoyed his stay at our home, and couldn't resist giving Dad a card with a sinking canoe on it -- he's not sure he ever wants to canoe again, but he sure appreciates Dad having taught him to swim!














Father's day turned out to be windy, so we went and flew a kite! Two actually. What a pleasant way to spend a few hours on an afternoon!














Ali tells us this is a favorite activity in India.

Ali also likes to tease Benny , but Benny is getting harder to fool!







There's nothing like wide open spaces, a brisk breeze, warm sunshine, and kites! Ephraim loved it too -- and showed off his new walking skills, staggering like a little drunk all over the field -- so proud of himself!

Busy, as usual.

Being an exchange student coordinator is a mixed bag. I was sad that Ali's placement with his host family didn't work out. On the other hand, it's nice to have a student in the house again. Ali is an awesome cook, although he claims he's never cooked before. We are liking Indian cooking more and more. He's working on teaching Benny soccer. He enjoys sharing jokes and has the quick wit and sense of irony that is necessary for survival in our home. His mom in India has very good taste and for Mother's Day Ali gave me this outfit she had sent, saying now I look like a real Indian mom. Nice! But this embroidered tunic, pants, and scarf are way too beautiful to clean the kitchen in!





Speaking of cleaning the kitchen, I now have TWO helpers! Benny is busy emptying the fridge door for me, and the baby is checking out the vegetable drawers. It only took me twice as long as usual to tackle this chore!

But Benny is adorable and sweet and just too cute for words. He has a way of waking me up too early in the morning, calling "Amu, Amu" (his variation on the German word for Grandma - Oma, that we've taught him to call me -- Dad is "Apu"). When I finally answer him, he looks at me earnestly with his shining innocent eyes and whispers confidently, "Chocate samidge". What can I do. He gets his Nutella sandwhich before I do anything else!

He MUST be involved in all we do -- to be left out is unendurable. Look at his deft little fingers helping his Uncle Ben fix the radio controlled airplane. Ben worked fast to keep Benny from taping the wrong thing together!

In the meantime, his little bother is starting to walk. 5-10 steps before he crashes back to the ground, or does a controlled sit -- all the while looking at his for the cheers and smiles we so willingly give!

I watched in horror the videos all over the internet of the Tsunami in Japan. What can one do in the face of such overwhelming disaster? But the Japanese community in our area came up with the idea of making origami paper cranes to aid in collecting donations for the Red Cross in Japan. One of the sisters in our ward is Japanese and got the Relief Society involved in making these cranes. They are so pretty -- and after they fulfill their role in raising money, they will be sent to Japan with our names (anyone who helped) on their wings to give hope to the people as well as financial assistance. Anyone want to know how to fold a crane?


Anyone who knows Bruce, knows that a large part of him is a water rat. Every year he wears out a batch of exchange students with his enthusiasm for canoeing, and is always glad for new victims.
This photo ---> is the final end of one of his canoe explores. They got across the Columbia once, but the current was so strong they didn't want to risk being swept too far downstream recrossing the river, and I got to rescue them. There wasn't opportunity to unload the branches and torn up linoleum before I picked them up in the borrowed pick-up. Hey Ho! A riding through town we will go!


But for all that, this was really Zixu's month. Finally, after four years of hard work in a language that is still not completely comfortable for him, he graduated, cum laude, from his University. As the elected and hard-working student body president. He made the front page! The local news came and did a story on him, and his family that came to be at the commencement exercises. So exciting. To our surprise, a lot of people recognize US now after this article.

It WAS exciting to have visitors from China! Communication was just as frustrating for us here as it was when we visited them there last summer, but it was good to feel their spirits, and to show them OUR home and country. Alas, we have nothing comparable to the Great Wall or Forbidden City! But Pike's Place was nice, and the Space Needle, and a few other places in Seattle.




At home, the whole family got to learn how to make dumplings, and we at lots of Chinese food. I had hoped they would enjoy American food more, but when they didn't even like food from restaurants a whole lot, I was grateful at least the problem wasn't my cooking. Of course, Zixu's mother really is an excellent cook! I don't blame them for preferring her meals!




The whole purpose of coming was to see Zixu graduate, and seeing as they came such a long way, AND their son was Student Body President, they, and we, were invited to several dinners and receptions. We are so happy to have been able to be part of Zixu's life! We are so impressed with everything he's accomplished, and in a foreign land at that. The downside for him is that now he has two sets of parents. Very different sets of parents. That can't be easy!




Congratulations,
Zixu!





After all the hustle and preparation for graduation, we planned to go camping but got rained out. So instead, a relaxing two days at home before Zixu took them to Las Vegas, San Diego, Los Angeles, and San Francisco. Afterwards, two more days back in Washington, where we joined them for deep sea fishing and some relaxing time in a beach house near Sequim. They didn't catch any fish by the way -- much like the whale watching tour I took the exchange students on. Maybe I shouldn't plan boating trips! The fishermen, however, blamed the lack of fish on the bananas I had brought to snack on, for some reason, bananas scare the fish away. It was a lovely day for being on the water however, and a gorgeous sunset. One last shopping trip in Tacoma, and they caught their plane back to China. I hope their memories of the visit give them as much happiness as it does us.

Easter

Its always interesting to see what the newbies think of our strange customs....

The baby obviously has the right idea, but his inexperience is keeping him from full enjoyment of this holiday.







Big brother, on the other hand, seems to be with the program, and actually, is adept at finding candy at many other times of year, and in many places besides the garden!





Then there's Ali. He has joined our family for the last 2-3 months of his stay in America, and I'm sure that he doesn't know a whole lot about Easter either. And the relationship between Easter eggs and the Resurrection is fuzzy at best for this Muslim from India. But he knows a good thing when he sees it! Welcome to our family!




The extended family keeps growing. The nice thing about that is that there are always young folk to make the egg hunt fun and drag us oldsters into peeking around tree trunks as well. Of course, the seniors are just helping out the juniors....













Just so there is no confusion -- rabbits don't actually produce Easter eggs. Our small flock of hens (names, "Extra Crispy", "Deep Fried", and "Miss Bossyfeathers") maybe had a little something to do in that department. Although the real reason I included the photo is because I am amused that the three chickens are totally in charge of the three cats (one is camouflaged as dirt) who are looking longingly at all that tasty meat walking around.

Took my students whale watching! I was so excited, and I think my enthusiasm was contagious, so we were all disappointed when this was the best we could see. Still, it WAS a wild whale, and we DID smell his/her foul breath, and I am grateful. The boys made sure I knew how much they enjoyed this opportunity and wanted to do it again -- yeah, right.




So we went to the zoo. They seemed to like it a lot more and I got to people watch. Interesting...










Having Nina and Nathan around leads to interesting activities. Nathan started this brick path to our front door just before our one and only snowfall last Thanksgiving. In February I finished the last little bit of it, and made the one flower bed nice. It looks so good! The front yard is going to be really pretty one of these days!








So happy Albert could visit! Unfortunately, with two new jobs, I couldn't very well take a lot of time off, but Albert is resourceful. He decided he wanted to try squid and octopus for dinner. The squid dinner turned out pretty good....








The octopus, on the other hand, well....












We took Benny shopping with us -- it made shopping much more fun, but it took a lot longer. He's a good kid -- in the final analysis, he did, in fact, obey us and not take the candy -- but it wasn't an easy decision.







We took Albert camping at camp Zarahemla. If you double click on this photo you will see that it was snowing! (so nice to have a heated cabin!)










But it was beautiful!












We dropped by Fort Simcoe -- the history buffs among us thought it would be a neat experience, but in early April it's not. Closed. Cold. Old porcelain and furniture seen through the windows. And no spiffy updates from 30 years ago (or whenever it was) that Dad took a school trip there. But we were happy to spend time with Albert. This may be the last time we see him for years, since he will be graduating from RIT soon and returning to Kazakhstan.

Good start for 2011!

I was so pleased to have a birthday lunch with my sisters-in-law, mother-in-law, and one of my daughters. I also enjoyed sharing some other cultures by suggesting we eat in an Indian Restaurant. Now everybody knows what a Mango Lassi is, and loves them!

This area needs a German Restaurant!






Two adorable grandsons! Benny's personality is growing day by day and his vocabulary is exploding, with some interesting results. Ephraim is sitting up, has the biggest smiles, and talks with his hands. The two of them get a kick out of each other, and are going to team up on a lot of mischief in not too much longer!




Feeding the missionaries sometimes leads to unexpected activities. Elder Denny from Australia was smitten with the fabric of my pillows and commented that a tie made of that fabric would be awesome. So I made one. There wasn't quite enough fabric, and I have never done this before, so parts of the back of it look *interesting* and the smaller end had to be quilted together, but it turned out amazingly well. Elder Denny was delighted, and I'm going to make more (different fabrics as well) and see if they will sell.


Chinese New Year. Of course, we don't celebrate it as lavishly as they do in China, but we decorated the dining room and invited some of Zixu's friends over and had a fun evening making filled dumplings and lots of other food. It was, all of it, totally delicious! The symbol to the right means "happiness". But, not realizing, I hung it on the wall upside down. Not to worry, however, when it's upside down it means "coming." So it's actually a good way to hang it (upside down it means "Happiness Coming" -- at least in the context of New Year) . Just the same, I'm glad I didn't hang it sideways!

I have a lot of fun taking exchange students around. For them everything is new. We made our annual trip to Seattle in January this year (the roads over the mountain passes were not too snowy) to take advantage of Muslim Day, when the Muslims in Washington State march on the Capital and speak with representatives, for the purpose of showing the positive things Muslims do in this state. My Indonesian and Indian students were excited and enthusiastic about the energy. My Macedonian student was not. There are problems between Muslims and Christians in his country and he did not feel at all comfortable and kept his distance. At least he saw some of the process. Since the march on the Capital was our last activity, he did enjoy the other things we did, as did they all, including the Palestinian girl I invited along because I know her host mom. We visited the Space Needle, the Science Center, the Museum of Flight, the Aquarium, and took a tour of the harbor. We would have done more, but after watching a 3D IMAX movie with them (something about "extreme waves") I realized I didn't feel so good, and when it got worse after we left the theater, I realized that it wasn't the movie, it was me. I was sick! So the group was forced to slow down a bit! But they still saw a lot and had a good time. I was able to leave the two Muslims in the care of a lady from the local mosque, and took my unhappy Macedonian home early. My achy body was glad to get away early too!

The students are also supposed to do at least 20 hours of volunteer work during their year here, so I took them to serve food to hungry people at the Union Gospel Mission. Being who they are, they boys (and their friend who joined us) had a great time. I'm getting a pretty good education too -- there are so many people who help others and in such a variety of ways.





We got to host our monthly extended family gathering. I was pleased and impressed that we managed to fit 35 people into our home, with (almost) adequate seating (a little less than half are in this photo). It was good to do something together! I am glad everybody got to see how nice our remodeled home looks, and I am especially happy we are keeping our comittment to get together more often!

December

After the fun of building the snow fort, it seems nobody ever entered it again. I did, however, document its demise as our White Thanksgiving melted into a green/grey/brown Christmas!























The warmer weather did give us some beautiful fog some mornings!






Inside was a merrier scene. The rest of the Christmas decorations went up! Christmas music streamed off the internet.

<-- Tree 1






Tree 2 -->











And we mustn't forget gingerbread houses. Sadly we were having too much fun doing other stuff when family was around (like cooking really yummy food) that we never did make them. These delectable samples were created by exchange students!

Finally, Christmas day! The stuff leading up to Christmas gets more and more fun every year, but opening presents with family around is still something to look forward to.

God bless us! Every one!