More of the choir

Emma and Grace are on the far right one behind the other. Don't ask me which is which, as I have to be up close and looking at their smiles to tell them apart. The other little girl in the front row next to them is a twin to the boy in red vest at beginning of front row. We have a small congretation but lots of them are kids, and there have been 4 twin pairs born in the last ten years. One twin died and one is disabled in the fourth set. But just such a large number of twins in such a small group sems unlikely to fit the normal statistics.

This is a picture of Ian in the Children's Christmas Choir the Sunday before Christmas. The twins were in the choir also, but unfortunately, they were either behind each other or were just bad shots, so I am not including them. The two boys in the upper left are twins. Actually there were three sets of twins in the choir. One set is a boy/girl combo. It was a very nice concert and all the kids did well, many having speaking parts from Scripture.

Night time surprises

Last night I went to my grandchildren's Christmas concert at our church. Afterwards I enjoyed two cups of coffee and some delicious cookies and other desserts. It was really exciting and lots of fun. I was still pretty wired when I got home, but I thought it was just the excitement of all the great music and the crowd of people who stayed to visit and talk afterward. When I got home (fairly early) I took care of some little jobs in the kitchen and caught up with my e-mail, all pretty routine, and went to bed. It was really hard to get to sleep, but I finally nodded off. However I woke up about 3:30 WIDE awake. Okay, I thought, maybe all I have to do is go to the bathroom and try again. No Luck. So I decided to just stay upl I made a pot of decaf and emptied the dishwasher, cleaned up the kitchen and made lists of what I needed to do. I decided to check on whether the newspaper had come so went out the front door and there I noticed two packages right there on my doorstep. Those UPS folks are really working overtime, as I know that there was nothing there when I went to bed. Oh lucky me, it was two packages from Wanda with two of my favorite things: cashews and WILD RICE! Christmas is now complete. I stashed the wild rice for special treatment, but started right in on the nuts. Even though I had by then switched to decaf, I was still energized, so I had breakfast over by 6 am and a batch of bread started. I guess last night's jolt of caffeine really had me going all day. It is amazing what I got done. What is funny is that I really never wound down. And I can only hope that I have a normal night tonight. Anyway, Wanda, thanks for the goodies! They are heavenly.

And this is the beast which I somehow have to keep in control, lest it leaps from its lair and starts chopping and slicing. I think it could probably slice a bowling ball!

Year of the Breakdowns

In the past year I have had to replace a washer, a dryer, a garbage disposal, a microwave, two cell phones (one broke and one was faulty, as was its replacement), a standard telephone, and (the latest) a food processor. One item still pending is an answering machine, but that can wait to be replaced because I do have voice mail on my cell phone. God only knows what item is next in line. I am beginning to feel jinxed!

Re the food processor: I had bought a bag of oranges from a roadside vendor for my annual marmalade production, and after the first two oranges my food processor broke and I had to finish the rest of the batch using a knife and slicing my hand. This is not easy, as I like the slices paper thin. I decided that I would never do another batch by hand, so I went shopping. Fortunately, I found a discount store and got a beautiful Cuisinart machine, a combo blender and processor for less than half price (but still costly for my Christmas-challenged budget). It is POWERFUL. In fact, it is so powerful that I doubt I will ever have to use the "high" button! It sits on my counter like a powerful beast that knows it is heavy, strong, and beautiful, and ready to leap into action. Needless to say I treat it with great respect. The first orange went through in a nano second and produced "microtomed" thin slices. Amazing. I love it. I will try to send a picture of my final product along with my (I hope) faithful friend.

Antarctica, Relative positions of my ship and Explorer

Deception Island was my first stop in my trek to Antarctica, The other end of the yellow line shows where the Explorer went down, about 113 miles NE near King George Island. I feel I can identify with those passengers to some extent, having been in such close proximity to the spot where their ship went down and having some familiarity with the weather, etc. I was lucky of course to having had milder weather in the late Antarctic summer, and calmer seas once in the lee of the Shetland Islands.