Shoveling, Days Off and Furry Friends

Hello, All!

Just sitting at the computer, at the end of a lovely day. It LOOKED lovely, from the inside, at least, ha. The sun was shining and it was so bright all around. Probably still right around 30 degrees.

We're supposed to get just a little bit of snow tonight. Little bits are okay :)

This is the beginning of our "February Break," in the public schools. I think it's mostly for people to get away if they want to, AND it's a time to let all those cold and flu germs in the school buildings die. There are LOTS of them! Bleh.

COUNTING DOWN. What did I do this week? Well I made it through another week of winter. And THAT is HUGE. No, really. We're down to 31 days until spring! No matter the weather on that day (March 20), I will be calling it Spring.

This week: Merlin

FLUFFY ENTERTAINMENT. This week Kara has another dog-sitting gig, and we have Merlin here. He's a little fluffy dog; I think Kara said he's 9 lbs. Very cute! I don't know what kind he is, but he likes to play indoor fetch with a little squeaky bone toy. And, if you're just sitting on the couch not petting him, he will move his nose over to your hand and remind you that you need to do that.

I just snapped this pic of Merlin with my phone.

Last week: Chrissy

BOATLOADS OF SNOW. Oh I just remembered that Wednesday's exercise was shoveling. Wow. A LOT of shoveling, like 2 1/2 hours worth, since the storm coincided exactly with Frank's trip to New York and he missed it :0 Kara did do the driveway. I tackled the porch, sidewalk to the mailbox, clearing off 2 cars, and the deck. (Thinking our next abode may be an apartment where somebody ELSE does the outside cleanup!)

this is us!

Then, the temperatures stayed in the 40s and even (gasp) 50s a couple of days, and it's almost all melted now. Kind of weird for February.

FAB CHRISTMAS GIFT. I don't think I mentioned our Christmas present from the kids, either. Waaaay cool! They know I don't want to get more "stuff," to fill our already overflowing house. I am constantly donating things, and asking them to go through their stuff whenever they are home. So they went in together, and got Frank and I tickets to Charlie and the Chocolate Factory musical! I didn't even know it was a musical, so that was a great surprise. It was so much fun. We went about 4 weeks ago, to a theater in downtown Boston. Fantastic date night :)

the stage before it started

I hope your week has gone well. David and Teresa have very few 'breaks' at BYU. This weekend happens to be one of their few 3-day weekends, getting off for President's Day tomorrow.

Teresa is camping, so hopefully we'll hear about that later. I have heard that southern Utah has had some beautiful weather, and the hiking and camping has been good :)

This Wednesday I head for Tucson for a few days. Looking forward to seeing some family members :) :) :)

Time for bed! Have a wonderful week.
Kari

Snow, a Dog and Good Music

The best kind of snowflakes: by a toasty fire!
These snowflakes decorated the big fireplace
in the lodge, at Mandy's wedding

Hello, and Happy Sunday!
I'm very happy to look outside and see grass on the front lawn. We have had some balmy days in the 50's this week, so almost all of the snow is gone!

Blast from the Past:
Kara, Dec 2013

I see that this Tuesday night, we are supposed to get 5-8 inches of snow. Of course, that is when Frank will be in NYC. So Kara and I will get to shovel Wednesday morning. Here is a "Kara shoveling" photo from 5 years ago.

DOGGY HOTEL. Kara has signed up to be a 'pet-sitter' on rover.com. It's an app that matches up pet owners with dog-walkers, or people who will otherwise take care of their pets. We have "Chrissy" here this week, a Jack Russell Terrier. She's a foster dog, in between owners since her elderly owner has moved, and can't take care of her anymore. The foster lady left for a week, and Kara is taking care of Chrissy for those 7 days. She focuses on food 24/7, and has to be blocked from trash cans. She is agile.

7-day guest: this is an
Internet photo, but I COULD have taken this
picture. Chrissy looks exactly like this.

We left dinner leftovers on the table, then turned our backs to view a 1-minute video on youtube. When we turned back around, she was ON the dining table, helping herself to our leftovers.

(Frank thought that would be his lunch on Monday, but suddenly he decided he'd have something else...)

The lady left us with a caged enclosure that Chrissy can stay in when nobody is home. And surprisingly, she does not shed. (I thought all dogs shed.)

GREAT SOUNDTRACK. I've been listening to music from The Greatest Showman on youtube. What a fun collection of songs! I found out that Hugh Jackman, whose passion is theater, singing and dancing, is going on a one-man tour this year, performing songs from The Greatest Showman and other musicals he's been in. (He was in Les Mis; THAT has an awesome soundtrack, too :))

WARMER TEMPERATURES. I am refreshing my Spanish skills in the car, with the Pimsleur language system, available in MP3 format from the library. I checked it out on my phone.

In April/May, at the end of the BYU semester, we'll take the fam on a cruise that is all in Spanish. It starts in Panama, goes to Colombia, then 3 islands but I can't remember all 3 islands. Aruba and Curacao are the ones I remember.

But before that, I get to spend some warmer days in Tucson, visiting Arizona family! A week from Wednesday I'll go visit Mom for about 5 days. I know, it's not balmy Hawaii, but definitely a nice change of scenery from the New England Arctic North. I'll be there Feb 20-25th.

Here is a hummingbird I photographed last time I was in Tucson. Hope these guys are still around! :)

NEW FRIENDS TO SUPPORT. Frank has been asked to work with the Spanish-speaking members of the church in our area. The group is small, so they overlap with our congregation for classes like Sunday School and youth classes. Then they have their own Sacrament Meeting afterwards. Both Frank and I will go to their Sacrament Meeting, to support and provide some more consistent numbers. (I still co-teach my Primary class, 8- and 9-year olds.)

David got to go to Texas for a friend's wedding this weekend...and it was cold in Texas! Insulting, yes, but I'm sure the ceremony was beautiful.

Hope your weekend has been refreshing, and you are ready for Monday!

Love, Kari

Artwork, Apples, Autism

Hello, Family!

Hoping you have had a productive week. It's a relative term, mind you :) :)

(Oh btw, if you click on any of these pictures, they'll get bigger.)

PATS DO IT AGAIN. Even if we're not huge football fans. The blog wouldn't be complete without saying that somehow, the Patriots pulled off another Superbowl win yesterday!

I have discovered the best way to watch football: YouTube highlights after the game is over! Never mind those 4-hour yawners. Watch the highlights only, on youtube after it's done! Action-packed, and you get the whole story in 10-15 minutes.

FEBRUARY NOW. The best news of the week is that we made it through January! Yes, we are now in February. January 31 is always a big milestone for me. As of today, there are 44 days until spring! 'Spring' is a relative term, too. But I still call it 'spring' on March 20, even if New England ignores that date.

Frank spent most of the week in London, going to meetings and also sightseeing a little. It was cold, and even snowed a little on him, and it never snows in London. But it was sunny other times.

A highlight was going to

UNIVERSITY of CAMBRIDGE. He toured some of the many college buildings that make up the University today. It's so amazing that Cambridge the town was started around 1086 (??!!) and the University of Cambridge was founded in 1209. They have many famous alumni:

Stephen Hawking
Charles Darwin
A.A. Milne (Winnie the Pooh author)
Robert Frost
Isaac Newton


Fun Fact on Isaac Newton: the apple-falling-on-his-head story did not happen at college. One semester in 1665, all the students were sent home because of bubonic plague. (They did not all HAVE the disease. There was a serious regional threat, and large numbers of people living together dramatically increased the chance of disease spread.) He went home to his parents' farm, and watched as an apple fell from one of their trees. Did it fall on his head? That part is questionable... The falling apple, though, made him ponder the force of gravity, leading to his study of the earth's pull on objects.

 BEST ARTWORK of the week: this is located in a Christian church in Jerusalem. One of our friends went there in January for his grandson's baptism (I talk about that in the next paragraph), and this beautiful mural was on the wall. This is by Daniel Cariola, a Chilean artist. It depicts the woman in the New Testament who touched the hem of Christ's robes, and was healed of her illness.

BAPTISM in the JORDAN RIVER. Funny, I hadn't thought of that possibility: actually getting baptized in the Jordan River. Yes, it's the river where Christ was baptized! But it's an actual thing people can do, and many people get baptized there, of various Christian faiths. People make the request, and you can sign up for a time and they assign you a spot on the river, with a sidewalk leading up to the river bank and railings to help you go down into the river.

MOVIE RECOMMENDATION. I read a children's book at school about Temple Grandin, a woman who grew up in the 50's and 60's with Autism. Then I found out they made a movie about her, so Friday night we pulled it up on Amazon Prime. (trailer on YouTube.)

She has a photographic memory, and a passion for cows. And it's really hard for her to be around unpredictable people (autism). She lived on her aunt's ranch when she was a teen, and just loved these docile creatures and studied them and learned TONS about them, on her own. When her high school science teacher said she had an amazing brain and she should go to college, he said "pick a topic! you can study anything in college" She said "cows? Are there colleges with cows?"

She studied animal husbandry, specifically the methods used to dip (sanitize) and slaughter cows (beef cattle), and found the flaws in the system. She designed a more humane, calming, natural method of herding them and going through the process. "We raise them for US to eat," she says. "We owe them respect."

Anyway. The movie is very well-done, plus great acting. The woman who plays Temple is pretty amazing...you can see the wheels turning in her mind as she goes through each challenge.

Today the REAL Temple is a professor at Colorado State University, and an expert advocate for autism.

Well, time's up! Hope your week ahead has some sunshine, literally and figuratively. We get a reprieve today and tomorrow, with temps in the 50's. YESSS!

KID JOBS AND SCHOOL. We skyped with David and Teresa yesterday, and their classes are rolling right along. They are also juggling 10-12 hours a week with part-time jobs. Provo seems to have milder temperatures than Massachusetts! Teresa, however, would like snow. Life can be so unfair sometimes. Really.

Kara has started taking care of dogs, as another part-time job to fill in her money-making time. This is in addition to her shifts at The Local (a restaurant closeby), and being an after-school chauffeur for a middle-school student.

Until next time,
Kari