5 Days until Christmas!

Hola--

The days are swishing by, getting us closer and closer to Christmas Day.  One good thing about living far away from people (??!?) is that you "have" to get your Christmas shopping done early.  Our frantic buy/wrap/package/tape days were 10 days to 2 weeks ago.  By now, the things that didn't get done?  Won't get done.  And that's okay!

I was browsing articles on http://www.usatoday.com/, and they had a whole album of Christmas at the White House photos.  Most of them are from this year, of course, but the last 10 or so were of U.S. Presidents of the past.  Almost every president had a dog, it seems!  Let's see if I can get this one loaded of President Kennedy and Jacqueline...  

I also liked this one of President Reagan and Nancy.

Well, we are also counting down...we get to go on a Christmas cruise this year, to take advantage of HP's "mandatory shutdown" between Christmas and New Year's Day.  My mom will come with us for a week visiting Cozumel, Belize, Honduras, and Costa Maya, then we get to visit for a weekend with Frank's parents, the Whitesells in Florida before we return.

We've had a mild November and start of December here in New England, but now the cold temps are here!  I look forward to the 70's and 80's.  I never get tired of that weather.

If I don't post again this year, Merry Christmas and Happy 2012!

Kari

Caroling, Decorating, Selling

December is here!  I love this month!  This time of year: the music, the festivities, and focusing on our Savior's birth.
Here are a few highlights of this past week:

CHRISTMAS TREE.  We did end up decorating the tree last week.  The Christmas music was playing for a little bit, then Frank remembered that Virginia Tech was playing.  We turned off the music and had football in the background.

Here we are in front of the mall entrance, downtown Boston.  They had these giant ornaments all over, inside, outside, hanging from the ceilings, stacked on the floors.  Who knows where they store them the OTHER 11 months of the year?

CAROLING.  The conductor for the Boston Pops was downtown (Boston) on Saturday, welcoming in the season with caroling and other various Christmas-y activities.  We went to listen and sing carols with them.  A sunny day, a little cold, but very nice.  (Kara's friend is in the middle.)

CHURCH TOUR.  And since we were RIGHT there, we walked next to the plaza where they were singing, to take a tour and learn a little about the Christian Science Church, also referred to as the First Church of Christ, Scientist.

(Just so you know, this is different than Scientology.  Tom Cruise was not there.)

Their church has its headquarters in downtown Boston.  Very beautiful, very large complex of worship buildings and administration buildings.  Now we know a little about how Mary Baker Eddy founded that church.

KARA SELLS.  Who knows where this came from, but our daughters like to sell things.  No, really.  For the past few weeks, I have been driving Kara to different neighborhoods in Wayland to (gasp) sell raffle tickets!  This is to earn money for "field trip scholarships:" So everybody can go on the Middle School field trips, even kids who can't afford the extras.

Since neither Frank or I have a single "Selling Bone" in our bodies, I am still shaking my head.  But she sold ONE HUNDRED and ONE raffle tickets!  Amazing.

She helped her class get the pizza party for Most Tickets Sold, AND she got 2nd place of top sellers in the school!  Very fun.

PRIMARY NATIVITY.  And lastly, Kara got to be the Angel Gabriel who told Mary that she would be the mother of Jesus.  Sunday the kids went to an assisted living home in a neighboring town, to sing Christmas carols and act out the events surrounding the birth of Christ.

Hopefully I can download some photos to go along with these.  Have a wonderful December week!

Kari

Married to a Black Friday Junkie

All families have a few skeletons in the closet.  Secrets they would be happy for the neighbors never to know.  There's always some habit or event that is a little sad and embarrassing, or even tragic, that has no real resolution, but just IS.

Our embarrassing event happens annually.  My husband doesn't really think he has a problem.  But he does.  I know it's coming, the end of every November.  I hope each year that he won't do it again.  But it's inevitable.  He can't help himself.  My husband is a Black Friday Junkie.

It starts on Thanksgiving Day.  He wakes up and says he's going out, to find a newspaper.  Normally we don't get a newspaper...we read our news on the Internet.  He has to find the Thanksgiving morning issue.

He comes home with the local newspaper, 25 pounds worth because of all the ads.  He spreads them out on the dining room table and starts perusing.  He circles the outrageously good deals, possible gifts or items of interest with a pen.  He knows the stores only have 3 of them.  He knows they are out to catch the consumer, to suck them into the store to just buy more.  He circles them anyway.

Then he plans out his route.  What time do the stores open?  Which stores are close to each other?

This year, the Target and Kohl's ads are extra enticing.  Instead of opening at 4 a.m. the Friday after Thanksgiving, they open at MIDNIGHT THANKSGIVING NIGHT.  What??  You don't have to go to bed at all.  Just stay up, and then go to the store for the deals.

After Thanksgiving dinner and socializing with friends, we make our way home.  The ads are still out on the table.  He peruses again.  I am so tired by 10:00, I go upstairs.  By 10:30 I am out like a light.

I open my eyes at 2:53 a.m.  The bathroom light is still on, like I left it.  His side of the bed is still empty.  I walk downstairs, hoping against hope that he just started a movie late, and it is about to end.  No such luck.  The basement is dark and quiet.  I shake my head.  He's gone shopping.

I go back to bed.  At 6:15 I open my eyes again.  Still no Frank.  At 6:30 I hear the garage door open.  He is back.

It turns out, Kohl's and Target pulled a trick and while the ad said midnight, they didn't actually open until 1a.m.  He waits with the crowds.  Then after shopping those 2 stores amongst the ridiculously large masses (at 1 a.m.-- literally hundreds of shoppers at 1 a.m.), it's after 3.  Home Depot opens at 4, and he's already there, right?  This is the warped rationale of an addict.  Get a yogurt and banana at Target, and there's only 30 minutes until the next store opens.

I wish it was different.  He decided not to go to bed when he got home.  He hasn't slept now for 36 hours.  I do my best to cover up this insane behavior to the neighbors.  I would get him professional help, but like I said, he doesn't think he has a problem.  I sigh and shake my head.

It's over.  Until next year.

Sprucing Up a School in Costa Rica

Hola!

Frank was in Costa Rica for work (Hewlett-Packard) a few weeks ago.  Part of their week was spent painting and refurbishing a school.  It was awesome!

They put together a short video of the day.  I'll see if I can load it.  I think I saw him 4 times during the video: painting, or in the group shots.

(If you watch it "full screen," it's a little grainy...)

squirrels, bruises, Babylon

Hola!

Here's a hodgepodge week for you!  I have a few photos which have nothing to do with each other.  But I'm going to post them anyway.

FAT, BOLD SQUIRREL:  Kara and David did such a good job carving our Halloween pumpkins this year...sorry no photos of the finished product, but one was a witch and the other a werewolf.  They were nice and detailed.  We put them on the front doorstep.

Then one morning I notice that they are all chewed up!  "SOMEone has been eating MY Halloween pumpkin," I can hear the little bear saying.

The next morning I open the front door and see this fat furry guy, sitting on top of the pumpkin chowing down.  He stopped chewing a moment to look at me, then went right back to chewing.  Even when I moved to get the camera, returned, and started snapping pictures, he kept on eating, giving me an occasional side glance.  "Are you still here?  You're kind of interrupting my breakfast."

YELLOW, GREEN, and BROWN.  These are the colors of my bruise on my face.  I set up the tripod and took these pictures so Frank could see.  He missed it, with his conference in Las Vegas last week.  The swelling went down a little in my cheek (caused by the mini surgery skin graft I had done in my mouth), to be replaced by awful colors and bruising on my cheek and jaw!  So, here's the proof that it really happened.  I didn't notice until I looked at the photos, that even under my eye looks yellow and bruised.  Poor me. (??!? It's almost all gone by now.)

HANGING GARDENS of BABYLON.  Kara is studying Messopotamia in Social Studies, and her current project (due Tuesday) is to replicate these Hanging Gardens.  Frank took on this one (bless you, thank you, thank you), by mapping out the project details with Kara, and taking her to the craft store yesterday.  Today he put in a full afternoon of coaching, while she drew the patterns, painted, used the carpet knife to cut, glue-gunned, decorated and put on finishing touches to this masterpiece!

So, that's last week in a nutshell.  Now we have a short week, a long weekend and time to be thankful, all mixed in between!

Happy Thanksgiving in 2 more days!  Kari

You Live, You Learn

Hola!

WARNING: TOOTH STORY.  (A little gross but not terrible.)

I hosted a Pity Party on Facebook yesterday.  But for the benefit of those who don't visit Facebook, and for my own record, I will tell the story here.  :)

PERIODONTIST.  Did you know they could do a skin graft in your mouth?  I know, it sounds WAY too gross, and it is!  But I had it done yesterday.  Why?  Well, long ago, I habitually brushed my teeth way too hard.  Something about thinking the harder I brushed, the cleaner my teeth would be.  NOW I know, that you really need very little pressure on your teeth when you clean them, to get them clean.

But there were a few years there, where I brushed really hard.  To the point of pushing my gums back a little, and now I have a few teeth where the root is slightly exposed.  This is bad.  Your gums support and hold your teeth in place.

So.  Yesterday my periodontist worked on the worst 3 teeth.  She took a tiny bit of tissue from the roof of my mouth and stitched it to the gum where it was receded the worst.  Now my own gum skin will mesh with that graft and make its own new tissue.

EEEeeewww!  I know.  Today my cheek is swollen and bruised a little, even though I have been icing it.  She put this putty stuff on the roof of my mouth to cover the strings of the stitches.  In a few days they will dissolve.

Enough of that!  But I haven't really been in a happy-skipping mood.

TERESA is FOURTEEN!  Happy Birthday to Teresa, on 11-11-11!

**Notice the candles on the pie: they make "11-11-11"**

November 11, 2011.  She had a sleepover last night, with pizza and candles in her Birthday Dessert Request, Butterscotch Pie.  I think they ate another 3 pounds of our Halloween candy.  (And there was much rejoicing.)

VETERAN's DAY.  Always sharing her birthday with her fabulous Aunt Pam, and the soldiers we honor on this day!  She's in pretty good company, then, for her whole life.  :)

LATE, QUICK AUTUMN.  The leaves have changed, now, and most are falling or have fallen.  Yes, in roughly a week's time (last time I said they were green and still on the trees), fall happened and is just about over.  Very strange this year.

Happy (long, in our case) Weekend!  Kari

Weird Halloween Week

Hola!

It's been a strange week, kind of an upside-down week.  We had the seemingly not-so-bad storm last Saturday, that left 700,000 people in the state without power.  It was a "perfect storm," of sorts.  A combination of circumstances made for optimal conditions...branches and trees came down on power lines.

(Actually, in central and western Massachusetts, there are STILL 85,000 people without power!  It's been a week now.  Wow.  We missed 2 days of school, and some of those districts are still out.  A whole week they've missed, and winter hasn't even started yet.)

One of the "strange circumstances" was that we have had a pretty wimpy fall, this year.  I usually look forward to October, for all the leaves changing and all the color.  But THIS year, either warm temps, or lots of rain, or something...has made it so that most of our leaves have NOT changed color!  Just still green, and some brown.  And, the leaves are still on the trees, mostly.

So, for the new header photo, I had to use a picture from a year or two ago.  When we had pretty leaves.  Not this year so much!

Another strange part: usually the branches are bare by now.  If they had been bare by now, that snow that fell last weekend would not have weighed down the branches and broken off so many.

So there you have it.  A weird storm.

We had Halloween anyway.  Lots of sugar-trading going on.  Here is Kara with some friends that went out all together.  She wore that great dress her Grammie D made, and it was tweaked with accessories.  She started as "Laura Ingalls Wilder" and added a hat and a tooth on a necklace: she became the "Tooth Fairy."

We also had David's 16th birthday.  He and I went down to the RMV and he took the test for his Driver's Permit.  He passed!  He was very excited, and we went straight to the empty school parking lot and he practiced for the first time.  Since 3 days ago, he has driven us home from the school, and Kara to soccer practice, and all around the neighborhoods close to the elementary school.  (And you thought that my hair was grey before.)
I'm kidding.  He's doing a good job so far.  "Practice, practice, practice," is what one person's advice was.  That means I have to grit my teeth and let go of the car keys.

Teresa is sad to have finished up volleyball.  She really learned a lot and had fun this season.  Here are a few photos of her serving.  She has a pretty good serve.

Here is a photo of David (over the summer), since it WAS his birthday last week.

Well there you have an update on life in New England--WITH electricity, I will add in gratitude.  WITH heat.  WITH hot water for showers.  All it takes is one day without those things, for you to say Whew!  I am sure glad I have electricity!

Happy Rest of the Weekend, Kari

Driver Requirements

Hola!
It's been way too long, and so I need to post.  We are ALIVE!  (Ok, there's no real reason we shouldn't be.  It just sounded dramatic so I started that way.)  I thought you could read some details from the Days of Our Lives...

David is down to his last 3 Driver's Ed classes coming up next week.  Did I mention before that Driver's Ed is REQUIRED here in Massachusetts, for all wannabe drivers under the age of 18?  Yes, REQUIRED.  And it's also REQUIRED that the parents take a 2-hour class!

As a matter of fact, it is stricter here all the way around.  These kids can get a permit at age 16.  (After the required 30 hours of Drivers Ed classes)  Then they have to drive with the teacher for 6 hours, and also 6 hours as an observer.  (They sit in the backseat while another student drives with the teacher.)

(Here is the driver's ed car the teenagers get to practice driving...)

Bwaa-haaa!  Just kidding.

The earliest they can get a license is at SIXTEEN AND A HALF.  For 6 months they can only drive family members around.  At age 17, they can take non-family members places.

These are actually not bad rules.  I'm just saying they are stricter here than in many other states.

In other news, we've had rain-rain-rain!

In other news besides that, I had my eyes examined and fitted for contact lenses.  I think I bruised my eyeball, trying to get them in and out this morning at the clinic.  But it was really cool for a little while, to see as clearly as I can see with my glasses, withOUT my glasses!

They assure me I will get the hang of it.  I'll keep trying.

Have a fabulous weekend!  Kari

September is Back

Hola!

Funny how we get into the groove of summer...and it seems busy at times, or we take a little trip here and there, or we mix up activities just to have some variety.

But it's different.  WE determine the schedule, whether or not we get up early or go on field trips or mow the lawn or clean the house.  We fill in the boxes of the calendar with things we want to do.  Summertime WE are in charge.

Turn the calendar over to September.  Suddenly, almost without warning, the CLOCK and the CALENDAR are again in charge!  Schools send emails by the inbox-full.  Sports practices and games fill in those calendar boxes daily, weekly.  Teachers send updates and assignments, even homework for parents.  "Fill in these four THOUSAND emergency forms, please, and send me a million-words-or-less about your child."  Don't forget multiple back-to-school nights and early-morning seminary for the high schoolers!

Did someone forget to write in an activity on the calendar?  Then guess what...it DOESN'T EXIST.  I am driving and shuttling to and from sports, after-school clubs and programs, church activities, and evening classes (Driver's Ed for David--6 weeks, 2 or 3 times a week) all afternoon, every afternoon!

So a couple of weeks ago, I posted on Facebook that I was feeling a little melancholy that summer was over.  Don Henley's "Boys of Summer" was on the radio and he sang, "...I feel it in the air...the summer's out of reach.  Empty lake...empty streets...the sun goes down alone..."  Decidedly, the saddest lyrics I've heard.

Now I remember why those lyrics make me sad.  With the turn of the calendar page to September, I handed over my peace, my control and my sanity...back to everybody else!

Here are the kids on the beach on our Canada trip.  These are some fond summer memories--

Happy Saturday tomorrow!  Kari

Exploring Eastern Canada

Hello!

(Reminder: you can click on the photos to enlarge.)

This post is a little late since we were interrupted by Hurricane Irene.  Stormy weather made us cancel church.  Instead we watched sheets of rain come down, with some wild winds...enough to blow down branches and entire trees.  These branches and trees fell on lots of power lines, so our neighborhood lost power from Sunday to Wednesday.  Kind of made me realize how much I enjoy and depend on electricity!

But BEFORE that.  We took an exploratory driving vacation to visit the Maritime Provinces in eastern Canada: New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, and Prince Edward Island!  Kind of a send-off to summer, I suppose.  Since then we have started up again with school, seminary, soccer, volleyball, ultimate, homework, and the whole rest of the hamster-wheel routine.

HIKING.  We started the trip at the northern tip of Nova Scotia, at a place called Cape Breton.  It rained on us the whole drive up there, but once we arrived the rain tapered off a little so we could hike, then the next day was even sunny.  They have some beautiful national parks, and some pretty amazing coastlines.  If you time it right you can watch the sunset right on the ocean horizon.  Hmmm...actually the Gulf of St. Lawrence on the one side.  That's where we were.

WHALE and SEAL WATCHING.  We also took a whale-watching tour--always so much fun to take a boat ride out on the waves!  We saw two whales, and then he took us to some caves along cliffs, where there were quite a few seals.  They played in the water for us, and when we started to leave, they lined up next to our boat and "raced" the boat for about a minute.

MOOSE SIGHTINGS.  There are huge moose wandering around in these national parks.  We saw a mom and her calf off to the side of the road at one point, and then at the end of our hike this one was grazing on leaves, pretty nonchalant that we were even there.  We watched her, then walked slowly by and got within about 10 feet of her, I'd say.  Here are David and Teresa walking by her.

RVers and MOTORCYCLES.  It is certainly popular to see Canada via RV and motorcycle!  Even in the rain, you see the motorcycles in groups or just 2 of them, taking in the beautiful scenery.

FERRY OR BRIDGE TO PEI.  "Prince Edward Island" is too long to keep writing and spelling everywhere, so the abbreviation is "PEI."  PEI is a very manicured, neat little island.  We took an hour-long ferry across, then upon return we took the (get ready for this) SEVEN-MILE-LONG BRIDGE.  Whew!  It was such a long bridge!

PEI LAWNS AND MUSSELS.  Everybody takes care of their lawns and grounds--funny that I remember that so well.  All the lawns were groomed and well-taken-care-of.  Otherwise it is a fishing island where they grow mussels -- betcha didn't know you could actually grow those??!  They have ropes strung out across the water with boxes hanging from them.  It takes 22 months or so for them to grow to maturity.  They space out the timing so they can harvest them for the restaurants every month or so.

BIKE RIDING.  One thing you "have" to do on PEI is rent bikes and ride.  Anywhere--everywhere!  You can actually ride across the whole island, all 115 miles or whatever it is.  That would take 5 or 7 days, and sorry but my rear end would be way too sore.  So we chose a beautiful 6-mile stretch and stopped on the bridges to watch marine life and birds.

ICE CREAM.  Another thing you "have" to do on PEI is eat ice cream, since there is an ice cream place on every corner of every little tiny town.  We stopped after our ride and ate our obligatory ice cream.  One of the kids even got a banana split.  Yum!

BAY of FUNDY.  After PEI, we drove to the next Province over, called New Brunswick.  (It's like driving through states here.)  This is where we saw the Cape Fundy rock formations and cliffs.  Cape Fundy has a low tide and high tide difference of about FORTY FEET.  It's true!  At high tide, you see these cool rock formations, and at low tide you see the same formations, only twice as big because you see that there is another 30 or so feet of them below where you could see before--the bottom was just covered in water.

People can walk on the sand around their bases, but as the tide comes in the park guides walk through and usher people out.  The water rises and fills in and upward, pretty high and pretty fast.  It's really cool.  Here are 2 photos of the same rocks.

It was educational for me to find out there are 10 provinces and 3 territories in Canada.  Embarrassingly, in my university Geography class, we had a quiz at the beginning of the term and (gasp) I could not even name 3.
Now, we can say we VISITED three: Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island, and New Brunswick.  Other provinces are Quebec, British Columbia, Newfoundland and Labrador, Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Alberta, and Ontario.

Three territories are: Yukon Territory, Northwest Territories, and Nunavut.  Nunavut was established in 1999!  Yes, only 12 years ago, they formed the territory of Nunavut, governed and managed by the Inuit people--native people of Canada.

Well I have indeed spent more than my allotted time on this week's blog!  Hope you could make some sense out of your rather quick tour of the Maritime Provinces.

Have a great week!  Kari

Braces Off!

Hola!

Well it has been a little while since I posted!  I was all ready to post about our vacation, then hurricane Irene hit and we were out of power for a few days...then school started and I am back on the hamster wheel again.

I do plan on giving you the Eastern Canada update.  But here's a quick post on David's Big News: he got his braces off yesterday!

I also have fun with "before/after" photos.  So here he is without braces, and here is his before/after teeth shot.  He has had them on his teeth for about 18 or 19 months.

Going to bed now.  Happy Week!  Kari

Martha's Vineyard outing

Hola!

Hmmm.  This week.  It seems to have flown by, but that's not new or different.  Dentist appointments, inviting kids' friends over, bike-riding, swimming.

Did I tell you we took our bikes to Martha's Vinyard a week ago?  You can drive to Oaks Bluff in Cape Cod, park your car and then take the ferry across to Martha's Vinyard.  Somehow the day we chose was just beautiful.

Frank also found a way to fit 4 bicycles in the back of that minivan!  Who knew there was so much space.  David was not with us because he was at a Leadership Camp in Rhode Island.  Similar but very different from the one he went to in Phoenix last summer.

But with only 4 bikes (actually we only HAVE 4), we could remove the back seats and still fit 4 passengers.  I only didn't feel bad about David missing it, because last summer the church youth group did this same trip!  So David, Teresa and Frank had done it a year ago.

JUMPING OFF THE BRIDGE.  There is a bridge along the way, that we biked to.  A 12-foot bridge over a waterway, that feeds into the ocean.  People walk onto it, just to jump off of it!  Right by the sign that says "No Jumping Off Bridge."  Crowds of people walk up, stand on the railing and jump.  Even I did it--I couldn't be the only one who didn't, right??  (I'm in the dark blue suit w/white stripes: yes, holding my nose...)

SHORT FERRY RIDE.  Yes, only about 100 feet across to the next mini-island, Chappaquiddick, part of Edgartown.  Ok, so I only found out this weekend about the details of the scandal with Ted Kennedy driving his car into the water in 1969.  The car sank and the girl in the car died.  That all happened on this little bitty island off of Martha's Vineyard.

Besides that, it was a really beautiful place!  Mostly flat, we rode our bikes the full length of that little bitty island, which ends in a wildlife sanctuary and a beach.  The water was not even too cold!  We all got in the water and I got to walk along the beach some.  I love doing that.

We had to "hurry" back, having miscalculated the time a little.  "Last ferry leaves at 6:45!"  We went pretty fast on our bikes, and the girls kept up with Frank really well.  We made the last ferry back, with 10 minutes to spare.

It was a lovely outing.  The ferry ride was even peaceful for me--I can't get enough of the ocean, and boat rides.

(Teresa also found some "Moon Jellyfish," along the edge of the water.  No tentacles, just these blobby clear things.  Here is a photo of her holding one.)

Dinnertime.  Have a great week!  Kari