Questions and Answers

I have a new Special Ed. student in one of my art classes. A para-educator accompanies him to class everyday and helped him fill out this questionnaire by writing his answers for him. How could you not love this kid?

Memories

I got the chance to spend some time with my two oldest friends, Michelle and Rachael, this last Saturday and it brought back a few memories. It has probably been several years since I have been with them both at the same time. I've known these girls since I was 4, Rachael was 3, and Michelle was 5. Their family lived across the street from mine in West Jordan. After about 25 years in that neighborhood my mom moved to Sugarhouse and their parents moved to Erda- truly the end of an era.

Rachael is married with 4 little ones and Michelle is getting married in just a few short weeks. It's so comforting to feel such a strong connection to the past. There are so many people who have been a part of my life in one way or another that I know I will never see or cross paths with again. Those parts of my past seem to fade away. Seeing old friends like Michelle and Rachael, even if it's not very often, seems to refresh my memories and keep them alive: The "drug free club", selling candy we'd bought at the Holiday Oil in front of my house for a 5 cent mark-up, playing every sport possible with the sports fanatic boys who lived next door, riding our bikes up the dirt hill, decorating the whole house in ribbons to make a My Little Pony castle, and a million more, of course.

Me, Rachael, Michelle

In 1989 my parents got brave enough to take my two friends to our Flaming Gorge cabin for the weekend. You gotta love how all three of us are wearing those horrid pleated pants that were so popular back then.

Even back then we were total babes.

The weekend we took them to the cabin we were visited by a black bear who walked along the railings, eating little pieces of pancake we had left out for the birds and chewing on the corners of our American flag. If I remember correctly Rachael was pretty scared.

It's always nice to be re-visited by such fond memories.

Christmas Video

I tested out our new camcorder that we got for Christmas, Enjoy.

Aven's First Christmas

I am finally getting around to posting some pictures from Aven's first Christmas . . .

Wearing a gold bow and a darling white outfit given to her by my Aunt Ann.

"Performing" at her daycare Christmas pageant. She was mostly interested in eating the garland hung around the edge of the stage.

Opening presents Christmas morning.

Eating presents Christmas morning.

She made out like a bandit.

Ian made me delicious dairy-free cupcakes as one of my presents- yum!

The day after Christmas we drove down to my dad's house in Redmond. Here we are standing in his backyard. It was very cold but very beautiful.

We certainly enjoyed having a baby to share Christmas with this year- what a joy.

Christmas Surprise

No harm done!

Park City

Desperately wanting to escape the awful inversion in the Salt Lake Valley, we headed to Park City for a family outing:

We took Grace to an off-leash dog park and then went for a hike.

Other than having a runny nose from the cold Aven did well and enjoyed the ride.

Aven experiencing snow for the first time.

A happy Grace dog shaking after burrowing her head into the snow.

Happy Christmas

From Ian, Cara, Aven, and Grace

Christmas Cactus.

In 2005 the year we bought our house, one of Cara's friends gave her a Christmas gift. a plant called a Christmas Cactus, or Zygocactus truncatus. It's a plant that blooms only when the it gets cold, i.e. in the winter i.e. around Christmas. The plant was flowering when we got it in 2005, but there was no flower in 2006. We doubted that we would ever see it flower again, since flower shops routinely use hormones to make flowers bloom in the store which sometimes ruins the plant for any future flower's. So we were very excited when we saw our first flower in 2007. I didn't get around to taking a photo until the flower was on it's way to the grave so it's a bit droopy, but this was our holiday flower in 2007.

And in 2008 we were greeted with another flower.

Finally the end of my story, this year we have had one blossom already and another 2 that might bloom here soon. Here's my photos from this year.

Stone Cold Santa Killer

You better watch out, you better not cry, Gracie Dog is coming to town . . . on a toy killing rampage!

Color Wheel, An Artistic Interpretation

My 7th grade classes have been learning to mix colors. The end result of their color mixing experimentation is supposed to be an accurate color wheel similar to the one below (some of the colors look dark because the pictures were taken with the camera in my Mac).

I explained complimentary colors and in exactly what order the colors should be assembled.

Apparently my lesson and the multiple examples hanging on the board were lost in translation in this case: