December 28, 2003

Happy Hollidays

Too much to tell! This will have to be another of thoses long entries. now that it is winter and the dries around here cost $1.25 I have to hang clothes inside, which can be interesting.

On thanksgiving we went to Grandma's house to help carry stuff out becuase they have finllly given her the "ok" to knock down the house within a week. now it is sadly "Grandma's hole"

I had a tooth ake a little while ago,(the black part under the larger tooth is the infection) but no insureance or anythign we could to do about it, and dentists require you to pay on the spot. Which we couldn't afford.

But at a bible study at church i wanted htem to pray for my tooth, and a lady said "my husband will pull it for you" I thougth she was joking at first.. but no, it tured out her husband uis a dentist and would pull it that very day at 1:30.. the lady and her husband said it was a "Christmas present"

We saw Return of the king and then made some christmas cupcakes to eat as a snack. They were a half "quitocake" with fluuffy frosting and rare mint m&m's on top. Very tasty.

We had a good christmas. I knitted a scarf for my brother so he would be warm and gave my husband a beard trimmer becuase he wanted/needed one. iI got some art stuff..all wrapped seperatly to seem like a lot of presents, which was really nice.

Unfourtunatly my nice digitol camera broke! Now i can't just take pictures and upload them right away anymore. I hope to be able to have it fixed. It makes strange lines on all the pictures i take (Note the played games picture) and some weird thing rattles inside when i tilt the camera-- I'm sure that's not good. It turns off when put the batteries in so i can't even take outdoor pictures.

We got a 1000 peice puzzle and my brother and husband both got games for eachother to play.. so while they played games all day, I played put the puzzle together. when the puzzle was nearly done, i told them to some help get the last few peices together and see it completed.

Here's a picture of our tree. Picture of "a real" tree that city hall put up, but it blew over so they rpelced it with a tiny tree.

Some of the pictures this month were taken with my brother's digitol camera (low resolution)

Wish List

November 23, 2003

I made some cookies to take to Bible study with me but my husband wanted some too, so i had to make a double batch. They came out to be very tasty. But one thing i haven't make for biblestudies is pizza, which my hisband claims is better than any other pizza you can get and since i happen to be taking picturtes of food recrently i figure i might as well take one if that too.

In bible study somehow peopel ended up talking about fast fod and how peopel eat "onthe fly". this saying entered my mind and i ended up drawing flies for somone to eat "on".

I seem to be in a painting mode recently. First I painted some clothepins and glueed magnets on the back of them. Then i somehow desided ot paint some postcards and finnaly when i was done all that I desided to re-created one of my favorite board games "Settlers of Catan" with paint and posterboard. It is very difficult to draw, cut, and paint 37 hexagonal tiles. I wanted the game to look like a "real" version, so it took me a long time to get everything almost exactly right. Now, after all that painting, I'm going back to reading.

My husband still teaches French to his students, tryin to help them be bilingual americans and for some musical fun he played some dixy land clerinet music in church this month which everyone liked. I forgot that I never put a picture of his ring, and now that i have a pic of it, i thought i might as well put it here.

If you've never heard of UserFriendly amd like computers a lot, then you should read some. Here is a Dr. Who spoof I found funny.

October 21, 2003

The circus had a parade down the main street. circuses rarly ever have parades anymore, so my husband and i went to see it. the day was cold and it was snowing slightly, the parade wasn't very long but it was worth seeing--espicly becuase they had 10 very nice elephants1 elephants2and some interesintg cars and of course a band.

My relitives invited my husband and i to go up Cannon Mt. with their group of visiting relitives. I met some relitives of my relitives, and my husband said "i wonder if you have any absolutes". With his crazy puns and a cusin wanting to discuss politicks the ride was anything but boring. We took a tram up and down the mountain and then followed a path to the very top where there is a tower. The day was mostly clear, so I was able to take some pictures of New Hampshire Hills. Some make nice backgorunds for a computer desktop. I saw some strange metalic blue bettles and took a picture, but they reflected to much sun for you to see how blue they really were.

Here are are few pictures that might be interesting or crazy. my shadow, our feet, windows reflection.

Today I did a science expiemrnet with a cake recepi. While I was making the cake I accidetily put in 1 tablespoon of baking soda iinstead or 1/2 a teaspoon. I couldn't take it out once it was in the vat of other ingredients, so i desided to see what would happen if i just cooked it. It cooked--but in no way i've ever seen a cake cook. It looks crazy! More like a seething omlette or a weird cheese casorol. i desided to taste a tiny peice out of curioosity and found it to taste exactly like baking power with a hint of bitter vanilla. Sortof salty with a bitterness so you can't taste hardly any sweetness at all. Fourtunatly I only make a small small cake--about 1/4 a recepi so not much of my ingriedents were wasted. I made a new cake and threw the other part outside to see if mabye the birds will eat it.

I've been helping my husband update his website and tryinto to pass supermaroio64, so i haven't worked som much oon my own. But he now has a picture page and a my days page. His school took his picture, so i put it next to my picture so you can compare them.

I am running out or space in this geocities account, so I will proalby end up moving my backupfiles to somewhere else.

Sept 30, 2003

Moving into an apartment is always an interesintg tireing busness, but tha'ts what we did. we have a living room, a bathroom, a bedroom a balcony and a kitchen with a garbadge disposal in the sink.

Not really that interestinyl, but we both got bysicals from yardsales very cheeply and so yesterday we rode to the and cheked out some videos to watch.

I have been selling objects on ebay to make up for the stuff i've been buying on ebay. So far it's sucessful and I haven't really "spent" any money at all.

My husband and I went to the deerfeild fair and we both pet the sheep before they were sheared and cackeled at the chickens. i bought some peanut brittle and a sausage--usuall fair food. We sat in on the circus-ish show where peoepl did ballancing trampoline and acts and of course a clouwn and juggling.

Aug 31, 2003

Quito is an interesintg place to be. There are of course many buildings and somce nice fountins. The guard and the guard shack on our street helps keep our lokal neighborhood safe from theives and unwanted traffic. Here is a picture of the house we stayed in.

we met a nice woman name Lucy who has two friendly pet parakees. Lucy took us to the metropolitin park in Quito--one of the many place people go to get away from the poltion in the city. My husmabd had a chat to a park-dwelling llama and climbed a pole. I walked in the ditchs and mainly took pictures with my digitol camera like a happy turist.

my father and younger sister arived about the middle of august. While they were there we had fun standing around and went out to eat so my younger sister could show off her chopsticks skills.

we went to HCJB and looked around (ie had a tour) and of course got our pictures in the traditional spot. they seem to always be changing what the hcjb sign is made from, last i knew it was made of little purple leaves, and now it is stones, i guess that got tired of pruning the plants.

i found some old pictures of when i and my younger sister were younger, so i scanned them in along with some other pictures like my father's cart and our pet rabbits.

unfourtunatly we had to get up at 3:30 inthe morning to catch our plane back to the states amd to make it worse, the weather was cold and rainy, making some of our depature gates change frequently and flights late, so we got to know a few airports better then we really wanted. but we finaly arived saflty and slept until 11:00 the next morning.

The very nice family who owned some sheep let us stay at their house for a few days. with their house as a short home base, we had a few days to go swimming and sight-seeing in new hampshire. I sited a large hornets nest and some nice new hapmshire roads.

I had a chance to go visit my grandmother's garadge and look around. It is quite saddning look for surviving items from the fire. I was able to find a few things inside the house which was surprisingly nice.

Side note
I got the Wedding Photo Album done just before leaving Ecuador--so now it is done for all to see.

July 30, 2003

I've been to three police stattions, a commesary, the ecuadorian migration place the U.S. embasy and some backcorner fileing/documenting place and still don't have a new passport! So my husband and I get an interesintg tour from north to south of the city carring piles of paperwork and aquiring more at each stop. I'm starting to wonder if it has somethign to do with the heigth of papers when stacked. Mabye there is some rule somewhere that says: " to apply for a replacment passport, the applicant must obtain at least one inch of correctly noterized, signed, duplicated, and approved goverment forms." Hopefully I'll get my passport without having to fill out another few stacks of paperwork.

People seem to be always asking what I think about married life, so I might as well say somethign about it to keep everyeon happy. How about it's like having a brother or a dorm roomate but not exactly? Well... mabye it's not really a lot like that, but somewhat like it. For a bit of seriousness--one of the most important things to learn about married life (as everyone always says and knows) is learning a new form of communicaiton, figuring out how not to make each other mad over abserd things and then aquiring new methods of tickling tourture just to keep everything fair.

My grandmother's house burned down on sunday last week, along with all my possessions -- including all my paintings. Basicly, it started when a small animal bit a wire in the garadge, causing a spark, and then the heat of summer combined with the usuall garadge volitile fluids created a roaring furance that proceded to destroy the house. No one was hurt becuase everyeon was at church. but sadly, sink, bikes and everythign else. The newspaper cliping tells a little about it.

The colourfuly bright worlds that came to life on canvas are now nothingon but dark smoldering blobs of blackness. Years of carfuly detailed loving thoughtful work gone in one devistating hour of heat. So I have to say a sad farewell to all of my lost paintings and ask for a moment of silence to remember their horrible demise. At least I took pictures of some of them so I can remebered them fondly.

Here is a picture of the lab.

June 28, 2003

I doubt everythign that occured this month will fit on this page without having to change the name from "The misspelled, illustrated, and short newsletters" to "The misspelled, illustrated, and long newsletters". A daily journal or picture of the day like some people might be nice, but then this page would really be long!

on June 14, a like-changing event durring which many peopel took multipul pictures of me and my family and new family took place. Unfourtunatly at the moment I don't have acces to more than three of those pictures. Eventually I will upload a page about that event.

Durring our honeymoon, my husband and I strolled happily in a nice boston area to a nearby beach, which of course had lots of sand. Sand, of course is an unresistable art medium so I didn't resist and made a sculpture. The sculpture eventually turned out to be a face as you can see.

After a few days in boston we got on an airplane and flew to Quito, Ecuador. From the plane the air looked so clear and blue that the ground was visible.

We are staying at my parent's house in quito which is quite nice, even though all the vines fell off the tall white side wall. A local gardner will have to come and chop away at the thick organic mess until only one meter remains. I doubt anyone will mind what he does with the clippings, except mabye Ace, the dog.

I think my passports must be a desirable thing becuase it has been lost or stolen (again!). I need it and want it, and don't see why that is enough reason for someone to take it from me. This time it vanished in the airport or all places! It mysteriously dissapeared before aduanad but after imigration. Of course I called the airport, agravated the secruity guards into letting me talk to someone in charge, but naturally they all just told me they hadn't seen it.

Without gas in the tank connected to the water heater, nothink but cold waters comes out when you turn the hot faucet, so of course they make the gas tank valuve system very interestingly and slightly complicated so you have to think for a while before changing the tanks and getting on with your shower. So when the gas ran out, I wan't sure what to do. Fourtunatly some missionaries who understood the new interesintg valve system visited and demonstrated the gas-hook-up techneek.

One sunny say....My husband and I went outside for a while becuaseUnfourtunalty we had to do a laundry, but fourtunatly the sun was out and cookies baking in the oven. unfourtunatly cities are full of theives but fourtunatly the doors were locked and closed so theives could not break in. Unfourtunatly we left all the keys in the house and could not get in. Fourtunatly the enighbors had some keys to the house, but unfourtnatly they were the same one they gave to us when we arrived. fourtunatly they neighbord got the door open after only 20 minuintes of trying. unfourtnatly the nice choclate chip cookies that were inthe oven were completly black. Fourtunatly we were safe and the dog thought the cookies were crunchy enough for her.... I still feel sorry for the poor burned cookies..but at least we are back inside the house.

My husband and I went to a native textile outdoor market called Otovalo with a nice missionary family. At the market I bought 2 sweaters of a certain kind i really like so that i won't have to wear the same one all winter like i did last year.My husband bought a poncho a hat and some other interesting things.

In the closet, hiding under some old games. I found a pile of old paintings from middle and high school. Most of them I bearly even remember painting so I took pictures and added them to my art site. I also added some new desktops from the beach for you to download.

My husband and I took a long ride in a small bus to the beach called Atacames. I make some more sand art and got my hair braided intin small braids. We almost had a week of fun playing in sand and water but some scared drug-crazed theif pulled out a knif and stole all our bus money. We left a day early so that the hotel would refund a little bit of money so we could use it to get the bus back to Quito. The hotel was sorry we were mugged and nicly gave us a free chicken lunch which was very nice and tasty.

May 26, 2003

Today is the kind of rainy spring day that means i hang my clothes in the bacement to dry instead of outside on the line, which is fun becuase the bacemnt can be an interesintg place to take pictures and torment descent inocent clothes--but really, it's not cruel--they really like being hung!

A couple of weeks ago I took a long bus ride through many interesting places to see a graduation. The graduation itself lasted over two hours because the school presedent and chancellor had to shake at least one hand of 1628 graduating students. Some of those students wanted to have more hand shaking time than others. All that hand shaking must be tiring, so it's no wonder graduations usually take so long.

Out of all 1628 people, I only know one, but proably met a few others by accident. Just to make sure i woudn't miss anything exciting, I sat near the front and watched the sign language translator and tried sending notes to people who would be graduating so they woulnd't get to board waiting for their turn to shake the chancellor's hand.

Recently i had another birthday, and got a delisious icecream cake made from both both choclate and vanilla icecream. I shared it with whoever was around at the time, and they seemed to like that.

On june 14th i will have some sortof of ceremony at a church, and thought i'd better go see what the church looks like. the church happends to be a school, which makes it even more interesting.

April 29, 2003

Spring has sprung and with it the usuall burst of flowers popping out from the ground. Flowers in general haven't grown for a long time in thefront yard, but some sprouted and are visible from a livingroom wondow. For years they have been hidden by tall weeds and prickery thisles, but I chopped those weeds away last fall, not knowing that some flowers would grow as a result. I sat next to them for just long enough to have my picture taken.

the fantasyish painting that i have painted on here and there for a while, is finnaly complete! I added clouds and a few interesting flowers, along with a touch of glow-in-the-dark enamal which gives the painting a marvolously errie glow in the dark of the night. hopefully it won't scare anyone visiting.

i have a bit of vacaion next week becuase the school at which i teach has a school trio and all the students and half the teachers will be away, so i am going south again, becuase for now that sees a fun thing to do.

I cut my hand the other day while sawing/modifying some sandles...I liked the shoes and they fit nicly, but the heal was about 3 cm (1.5 inches), not really a "heal" but the flatish kind that are ussually found on sandles. but i like flat shoes--really flat shoes. so i sawed the heals off nicly with a nice little saw i use for various things. So while i was happily sawing away, I accidentily sawined into my hand and it cut deeply, but as if was a clean sliceing i just held it together for a while with some tape and now it is healing nicly. And of course, as usuall, it is something interesint gto show my students at school.

March 26, 2003

My computer now has a usb port, which means that it can finally read digitol cameras and optical mice... So, here i sit, playing with my camera, trying to make the computer read it as different kinds of input with no avail. The monitor is shaking slightly; i think it gets scared when i start playing with images, of mabye it is just unhappy that It couldn't have gotten an upgrade.

I suddenly realized that I have never been in new hampshire for the spring before (not that i can remember) I will now see what happends to the world after it has been covered with white snow for along time. Mostly it is becomeing very wet.. it is interesting how much brown grass i can see--i don't mind that it is brown. At least brown isn't white.

I'm trying to find out if it is possible to make a gift list online without useing a cgi.. but i think it might be impossible, so i'll just have to make one that changes manually.

I had a week's vacation this month, and i wanted some highway expienence, so i drove my little car in a southerily direction, stayed wherever i ended up for a day or two an then returned back to the coldness of New hampshire.

Febuary 24, 2002

Holding a painting isn't really as fun as painting it. Painting takes a long time, but what sometimes takes even longer is trying to find out what else i ought to paint to make the painting complete. Right now i am working on this painting and i want to find some way of making a more unified theme... mabye it already Is unified and that is why i can't think of anything else to do to it.

Snow came and didn't go yet...hail and sleet came.. and strangly, i liked that beucase i don't have to shovel sleet, and if it is sleeting, then it isn't cold enough to snow, and it means spring could be comming--though with the snow still everywhere, it might Not really be comming soon at all.

Today I called a few places and asked some normal questions. I have found varuous people here and there who may help me have a inexpensive weddding--relitivly, becuase in truth there may not be such a thing anymore..if there ever was.

Last week my car broke--or actually to be more precise, the starter broke. I think it zapped tiself for some reason or other, mabye it dosen't like all the salt on the roads. It took a few days and to much money, but now my car now works as well as it did before and if i watch where i am going, can get me to school and back.

Jan 30 2003

It is a new year so I sorted thoguh some old papers and found an interesting poem to add to growing poem collection on my ficion page. This poem is called Pianos Come Pianos Go. I habven't updated anything else..or i haven't gotten aorund to it.. becuase i have bene haivng to much fun maintaining some other websites.

I am now teaching a new HTML class at school! I have six intelegent students in the class, and they are quickly learning how to make webpages. Since I seem to like creating web-pages, I created a new web page for my class where anyone can read my HTML lessons online.

Recently I received a ring to wear on my finger all the time. Some people have told me that this ring directly relates to the amount of money I have been spending on phone cards recently.. and they may be correct in thier tihnking.

I took an interesintg lighting picture of my hand. I was trying to convey ideas and emotions directly through my hand positions. It was a bit difficult to get my hands exactly right.. but i think this one came out rather well.

My younger sister sent me a kolidascope for christmas and i discovered that when you put the kolidascope over the camera lense to take pictures, no one can tell what you are taking pictures of, (unless it's ovbious) and the resulting image is quite facinating.