Christmas 2009

Last year for Christmas we had few presents but went on a big trip. Part of the trip involved playing in the snow. Along the way back we ate at a wonderful Thai restaurant. This year we took a step back from that and had few presents and stayed home. Here's our Christmas tree, it's not really crooked, it just looks that way from the picture.

We did however decide to have a different kind of meal for Christmas. We ended up deciding the main course would be sushi (home made). We also got a Thai cook book for Christmas, and at the last minute decided to have thai crab corn soup. Everything ended up tasting quite good. Below are just a bunch of pictures of the meal.

Notice Sonora's dreadlocks. Here is the sushi and soup all laid out.

Here's Julie making the sushi

Soup being cooked.

Merry Christmas!

Julie's painting class Fall 2009

Julie took 2nd semester painting at the University. Below is what she painted during the semester. Some are just practice and skill building works.



In this painting - the assignment was to abstractly express emotion - this one is NIGHT TERRORS

This is a Fresco that was a color study - not actually part of the class.

A self portrait using black, white and one other color.

color study with boxes

The assignment was to paint two related paintings that expressed abstract spirituality. This one got hung up on the wall in the University - several of the faculty expressed how much they liked it.

The next two are landscapes that were meant to be non-traditional, with the first one being warm colors in the foreground with cool colors in the back ground. The second one is above the usual line of sight.

Color (gray scale actually) studies.

Below are 5 related paintings - kind of variation on a theme. The first picture is a piano The next paintings become progressively abstract.

The assignment was to make an imagined landscape.

Julie also took print making and had an assignment where she showed a cat having a dream. She made a lovely print of it - which ended up winning best in show (and got $50). She further explored the theme below. You may not see it, but in the second painting it was supposed to be the same subject but from a different perspective. If you look hard, you can see a little tiny cat and octopus in it.

The assignment here was to paint something from a new article in black and white. Here is a woman going to vote in Afganistan, wearing a burka and showing her picture ID.

The class had an assigment to coordinate paintings with a poem or short story. One of the class members was leaning towards the Twilight vampire series, but Julie convinced them Jabberwocky would be a better topic. Below is the poem, if you've never read it.

`Twas brillig, and the slithy toves

Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:

All mimsy were the borogoves,

And the mome raths outgrabe.

"Beware the Jabberwock, my son!

The jaws that bite, the claws that catch!

Beware the Jubjub bird, and shun

The frumious Bandersnatch!"

He took his vorpal sword in hand:

Long time the manxome foe he sought

--So rested he by the Tumtum tree,

And stood awhile in thought.

And, as in uffish thought he stood,

The Jabberwock, with eyes of flame,

Came whiffling through the tulgey wood,

And burbled as it came!

One, two! One, two! And through and through

The vorpal blade went snicker-snack!

He left it dead, and with its head

He went galumphing back.

"And, has thou slain the Jabberwock?

Come to my arms, my beamish boy!

O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!'

He chortled in his joy.

`Twas brillig, and the slithy toves

Did gyre and gimble in the wabe;

All mimsy were the borogoves,

And the mome raths outgrabe.

Thanksgiving day hike

Well - if you come on vacation with me, you usually get suckered into going on a hike. This time we went on a trip to Land Between the Lakes to a path around Hematite Lake - it was 2.2 miles trip.

Garrett admiring a beaver's work.

I like the way the light casts shadows through the trees on this picture.

This was kind of a neat little path across the front of the dam. Little squares to jump over. Howdy and Garrett fell part way in a one point - but it wasn't very deep. After the hike we stopped by the local tourist trap - Patti's settlement. Here is a turkey that somehow survived the festivities.

They had a nice Christmas display, here is Christopher

Thanksgiving 2009

Once again, Thanksgiving time.

This year we arranged for more of our family to be together. We rented two cabins on Land Between the Lakes (it's the slow time of the year) and 22 of us got together. All of Brian and Julie's family, Matt and Julia's family, Paul and Allene's family and Mother and Father.

What would thanksgiving be without pies?

Adam and Suzannah argue over who gets to sit in the chair (the answer was neither of them, they got their own seats at the kids table)

We're all glad that Trent could bring his good attitude and appetite to the meal.

Julie had surgery on her arm right before Thanksgiving, it was a bit rough on her.

Lots of us gathered together.

Jesse's first Thanksgiving. Only a few weeks old.

Kids table

Aubry

Parents table

Load of fun overall. Paul's children got a little sick and had to leave earlier than planned. Julia coordinated most of the cooking and did a super job despite running out of her allergy and asthma medicine. Mom just got to play with grand kids mostly.

Back to real life

Happy Thanksgiving!

Halloween race

Well,

Today is Halloween. The girls are off with friends - still pretending they are young enough to trick or treat. Sonora is a hobo and Katie is a kinda boar thingy with long silver and black hair. She made the mask out of latex - sculpted the thing and made a cast etc. I'll post a picture eventually.

Noone comes trick or treating where we live - so it was quiet here.

Today was a 10k race in the area (that's 6.2 miles). I set a goal of doing this race. In addition to just being an ambitious goal, there were some major side benefits. One was that prior to race day - the medical center was hosting a free fitness test and the other that there were $10,000 worth of door prizes (I didn't win any - but hey - I had a chance - right?). The free fitness testing thing was OK - but nothing real special.

Anyway, I've never run a 10k race before - and I was a little nervous that I could run that far. 2 weeks ago - I did a 4 mile race - and finished it - but was real tuckered out by the end. I took a vacation day on Tuesday and went running at Mammoth Cave - I like to do that each year. This year has been really rainy - and not conducive to hiking. The leaves changed real rapidly and now they are all falling off unfortunately. I ran for 90 minutes at Mammoth Cave and did maybe 8 miles. My legs and knees were sore the next day but recovered well enough. I figured that if I could run 8 miles on a bunch of hills on a gravel trail, I could do 6 miles on the streets.

There were LOTS of people in the race - my number was 1411 - and I saw some people that had numbers as high as 1700. All I know is that after they fired the starting shot, it took me 30 seconds just to get to the starting line and that it was constant people all the way across the street for a huge part of the run.

Some people ran in costume (not me - I would really overheat if I tried that). The guy right behind me was dressed as frankenstein - green painted face - wig - costume the whole thing. You can see him from the back a few seconds behind me in the video. Everyone erupted in cheers when he ran by (I wasn't under any illusion they were cheering me on - though we were so close it seemed like it)

I finished in just under 60 minutes which was my ambitious goal (I would have been happy with any thing under 65 minutes and thrilled with under 58). I got real tired after about mile 5, and was worried about making it, but got a second wind as I saw we were getting closer to the finish line.


5k season is about over until the spring, so no more races for a while.

Happy Halloween.