 “Life is what happens to you while you’re busy making other plans.” -John Lennon
Profound coming from a Beatle.
We can get so bogged down in getting through our very important schedules that we forget to simply enjoy right now.
Ecclesiastes can be misconstrued as a real downer,
“Then I looked on all the works that my hands had done and on the labor in which I had toiled; and indeed all was vanity and grasping for the wind. There was no profit under the sun.” Ecc. 2:11
It could be read as, “work your little heart out, who cares, you die in the end anyway; vanity.” But I don’t think so.
Rather we are given the blessing to go ahead and work but in the end do not forget to enjoy life.
When was the last time you sprawled out on the sofa with a good book for an hour or more?
When was the last time you took your children and blew half the day doing something for the shear fun of it?
When was the last time you let your house fall into the least bit of disrepair and chaos to enjoy the moment?
Recently, smack in the middle of our school day, Taite, Matthias and I set out to see the fort that Matthias and his buddies have been building. The fort was a sight to behold. I could not believe the planning and detail that went into it; Oregon Trail folks would have been proud to call it home. Its lumbered walls included shelves with found objects of glass, a window with a hub cap for closing, and a door with brass hinges. Right outside was a fire pit where they cooked potatoes and onions.
The unusual warmth of that sunny day in February as the three of us walked through the sage brush, truant will be remembered longer that any old grammar lesson. The countless hours spent at our little table will have its own reward but the blessedness of knowing my dubious effort is not the last word in smart children is total freedom. That is why I totally get it when Solomon says,
“Therefore I hated life because the work that was done under the sun was distressing to me, for all is vanity and grasping for the wind.”
Solomon understood that when we think our work is the ultimate say in a matter we are doomed to a life of constant worry, hustle and defeat.
Mostly it is good to work, work hard and God will bless that. But we need to beware lest we think it is our working, our planning that matters most and makes things happen.
“A man’s heart plans his way, but the lord directs his steps.” Prov. 16:9
terri, February 22nd, 2010
Taite had piano adjudication on Friday at 8:30 A.M. in a new location for me! So, naturally I was up late Thursday night studying the google map to chart my course. I decided to play fast and loose and only allow myself twenty minutes to be lost. Naturally on Friday morning at 8:15 A.M I was heading east when I should have been heading west, and sweating. Yep, here I was again behind the wheel and lost. Well, not entirely lost; I knew if we could just leap over the school and baseball field and reach the road on the other side we would be in the general area, but I just couldn’t find a street to take me there.
It just isn’t enough for poor Taite to have to be thinking about doing well on her piano pieces, she has to wonder if we’ll ever even get there!
I called Meghan, and if you know anything about Meghan and her ability to navigate, you will know it was a call of absolute desperation. I had called Andrew but he had already left to go haul yard stuff to the dump at our other blessed house and because he feels that cell phones are a ball and chain around his ear, refuses to own one, so there I was calling Meghan.
When I told her where I was, she exclaimed, “Oh no, mom, you can’t get there that way! You have to go behind Safeway, do you see Safeway?” She carefully meandered me there and we arrived a full seven minutes early.
After adjudication Taite and I went to get a different birthday present for Canon. The day before, because I was going to be sooooo on top of things I had bought Canon a gift and when I walked into the house with the super sized Tonka truck, Matthias took one look and said, “Canon already has one of those.” Taite later confirmed it when she walked in and saw it laying there, “Canon already has one of those.” ”So I’ve heard.” So, Friday morning after adjudication, we were going for something else.
Friday was going to be a full day. Meghan and her four and Caitlin and her two would be spending Friday night at our house Matthias had basketball practice, Taite had dance, Zac, Eric, and Matt B. would showing up to leave for Caitlin and Zac’s big move, making a grand total of thirteen for dinner. So as soon as I got back from my little adjudication and gift exchange excursion, I changed the sheets on beds and made a plan for dinner.
As evening arrived I was feeling pretty much on top of the situation, Matthias ate early and ran off for basketball practice, the moving truck arrived and those guys were ready for dinner so they could get going to Seattle and Taite was finishing her dinner. In the midst of all that shuffle, Taite and I left for her dance.
Now in the driver’s seat, I noticed the other garage door was open and pushed the ‘close’ button. The door started down but soon started back up and the light above the opener started f-l-a-s-h-i-n-g. That’s odd, but I continued to back out and then in a split second glancing over, I realized I had crunched Matthias’s scooter in the door and continued backing out and then, B-A-M! I backed into Meghan and Eric’s car. DANG! Pulling forward just a bit and turning left I s-m-a-c-k hit a bike in front of me.
I continued down the road and then called Andrew to tell him of the havoc I had wrought and that I’d be back in an hour.
terri, February 7th, 2010
If you say it long enough, and loud enough, it is so.
Global Warming is real, global warming is real, global warming…
Immunization is bad, immunization is bad, immunization…
Whole milk makes you fat, whole milk makes you fat, whole milk…
I was amazed to hear our President during his State of the Union address speak of global warming as though it is fact:
“I know that there are those who disagree with the overwhelming scientific evidence on climate change. But even if you doubt the evidence…”
“Even if you doubt the evidence…” Doubt the evidence, good heavens, is he really that out to lunch!? The evidence was obliterated and proven to be a total joke. Even in light of the overwhelming number of emails and data pointing to the whole global warming thing being a contrived hoax believers just can’t let it go. We’re talking one thousand emails and 72 documents! that were brought to light. That’s an awful lot to fake.
Or take the newly reported hoax concerning the link between immunization and autism. God has supplied for us a way to protect our children from once deadly diseases and because of a deceptive study, many today refuse to immunize their children. Try undoing that lie.
“This retraction by the Lancet came far too late,” said Paul Offit, chief of infectious diseases at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia and a coinventor of a vaccination for babies against a gastrointestinal virus, Rotateq, that is marketed by Merck & Co. “It’s very easy to scare people; it’s very hard to unscare them.”
“The withdrawal (of the supposed link between autism and immunization) supports the scientific evidence that vaccinations don’t cause autism, but isn’t likely to persuade advocacy groups that believe in a link.”
Just like global warming, this lie has been chanted so often that it has become a fact.
Or how about something as obvious as milk, whole milk. Somewhere along the way we were convinced that whole milk makes you fat. There aint no undoing that!
Imagine: “Scientists discovered a difference between overweight children who drink full-fat milk every day and those who do not. Children who often drink milk with a fat content of 3% are less overweight. But wait there’s more. And yet it doesn’t matter. Since you believe whole milk will make you fat you will continue to buy the fat free.
And so, we hold fast to our beliefs and pretty soon they become convictions in spite of revealed truth and I wonder why. Is it because we want to think that the world is doomed to being ever warmer ’til we burn up? Do we want to be afraid of something that will keep our children from serious illnesses? Are we afraid of the fat of the land?
aileen, January 24th, 2010
 
If you are looking for a good way to get outside during these long winter months, I would highly recommend snowshoeing, a sport whose glories I was just introduced to this weekend. I am more of a snowboarder when it comes to winter sports and the thought of trudging through the snow on over-sized metal shoes didn’t thrill me at first but I decided to give it a whirl anyways (mostly as an excuse to not have to run around Greenlake instead). I dragged myself out of bed at 6:20 on a Saturday morning (a miracle in and of itself…) and we made it to the trail head by 9:30. After spending some time fiddling with the snow shoes and figuring out how they work (I am still convinced I was wearing two right foot snow shoes) we headed out into the fresh snow. Imagine all the joys of hiking in a winter wonderland minus the sinking thigh-high into snow then floundering to get out again with every step. Instead you trot right across the surface and bravely forge up mountainsides all thanks to the snow shoes.
One of the most important parts of snow shoeing is picking a good trail. The MOST important part is bringing a good trail mix. But of course everyone knows that. We took on Skyline Lake trail up at Stevens pass and the views were well worth the initial uphill climb. But I understand that not everyone is blessed enough to live here in God’s country (that’s Washington state, by the way) so check out trails.com to find somewhere near you. Happy hiking!
meghan, January 19th, 2010
 Anwyn at work. The kids love doing projects and sometimes it sounds like too much mess to bother with but once in a while I let them do something besides coloring in a coloring book. So the other day I let them cut up magazines and glue the pieces on paper. For Anwyn, I made a house that she had to decorate. She cut out lights and beds to put in the rooms and wallpapered the the upstairs in pink. It was just the kind of house Anwyn would love to live in complete with a glittery chandelier in the foyer. The boys had ponds they had to fill with fish but did not stick with the project quite as long as Anwyn.
 Here is the front door and some lovely landscaping.  Here is the house but as you can see not all the rooms are filled. It is a work in progress.  This is the upstairs bedroom wallpapered in pink.
terri, December 18th, 2009
The time Meghan and I got together for a big Christmas baking spree, we began with all kinds of great ingredients and family recipes… and then Meghan decided to go all healthy on me and leave out half the sugar.. out of a cookie!? I mean, isn’t that why you eat cookies because of the sugar!?
So those didn’t turn out too well.
But we persevered.
At the end of our very long day of disasters I thought maybe just one more recipe. I had a craving for macaroons. Bucers in Moscow, Idaho has the best macaroons in the world but the proprietor will not give me her recipe so I found one on my own. It used sweetened condensed milk and lots of coconut, so much coconut that I needed to get another bag out of the freezer.
They came out of the oven and I was so craving the macaroons that I ate one right away and.. well, it tasted funny. Maybe because they were too hot. I let them cool, no, they still tasted bad. I thought I’d add more sugar and at that point Meghan was telling me to abandon ship what with adding more sugar, “Throw them out, mom, why waste more ingredients.”
Then I thought, maybe dipping them in chocolate would help, “No, mom, throw them out.”
I relented and in the end out of about twelve recipes we had one good batch of cookies.
After Meghan had left for home, I opened the freezer and it was then that I realized I had used parmesan cheese instead of coconut in the macaroons.
So this year I thought I’d go easy on myself, a recipe with about four ingredients to start with AND I would not attempt to double the recipe or anything.
  
- roll a ball, pat stamp in sugar, gently press on cookie
 And KABOOM the cookie explodes on the cookie sheet! OK, I have made this recipe before and this never happened, ever. So, I went back read the recipe very carefully to see if I was missing something or over did it with the flour or left out some liquid or didn’t add enough liquid or… Nope.
So, I scooped up the little mess and smashed it back into a ball and forewent the cute little pineapple print on the top. Just balls, maybe that would work. Not to be.
 Baking did not help these poor things Everyone will be home for Christmas and I think that cookie baking will be first thing on the ‘to do’ list.
meghan, November 10th, 2009
 Eric thought the knife looked a little creepy. I don't know, I really like the knife. 
Have you seen potatoes more beautiful than these? For our Sunday dinner, we bought a small bag of heirloom potatoes and they were well worth the extra money. They taste like normal potatoes but the fun I had photographing them and their exquisite color on a white plate is not to be rivalled. Perhaps they will be a must have for Thanksgiving dinner. I wonder what purple mashed potatoes would look like?
caitlin, October 20th, 2009
Aileen has always been the one to take on the yearly gingerbread house construction, my wedding cake, or any other project that requires the patience of Job and will just get eaten in the end.(Actually the gingerbread houses usuallyget blown up sometime in January by Jarrett and Matt’s collection of small explosives, but anyways…)
So it was a little more up her alley when we decided to create mini chocolate cupcakes, topped with a cream cheese butter-cream frosting, decorated with hand-painted, hand-cut fondant flowers and sprinkled with shimmery rock sugar. But it sounded fun to me and I thought it would make a pretty dessert for my friend Becky’s baby shower.
We found everything we needed at, where else? A store completely devoted to cake decorating (gotta love a big city for that) Home Cake Decorating Supply Co. located in Maple Leaf. The store is quite a little mess of a place, but the gruff, nice lady in there has everything you could ever need and there’s something charming about not being able to find a thing you are looking for while she knows the exact location of every Bambi cake topper or clover leaf shaped baking pan in the store.
When I asked about fondant and said I needed just a little bit, she said, “Oh you know, this stuff keeps forever.”
“Oh, that’s good to know,” I said.
“Oh yeah, just throw it in the back of your baking cabinet and you can pull it out any time you’re bored and just turn on the TV and make things out of fondant.”
Sometimes, people you’ve known for all of 2 minutes say something that gives you a ridiculously vivid peak into their life. But anyways, back to the mini cupcakes…
So with our supplies assembled we began.
 sugar, dyes, paint brushes, fondant, and flower shape cutters galore. We found this super yum recipe for the frosting, and used the Hershey chocolate cake recipe.
I got kind of grumpy when the paper started getting a little soggy and peeled away from the little cakes. But Aileen kept with it.
 We flipped for these retro looking green cupcake papers. In the end the pink and purple dyes weren’t the subtle, pretty shades we’d hoped and we went for an all white color scheme. The end product was really pertty cute looking. And most importantly they tasted tasty.
In many places it is said that you know Spring is here when you see the first robin. For Washingtonians, Spring has arrived when you see the first sear-sucker suit, sun hat, or man sporting salmon-colored pants. All that and more comes out at Gold Cup– the horse race that takes place in The Plains, VA every year. People show up with their blankets, sunglasses, and mixed drinks, fully decked out to see and be seen…. and maybe watch a little of the steeplechase as well.
This year, a group of us reserved a spot at the fence, brought our lawn chairs, food and drinks, and tailgated (in the most elegant sense of the word).
Some people take unnecessary license with the “dressing up” part of the activities. I started snapping pictures of some of the most outlandish outfits. This was a random guy who was more than happy to pose with Tim. 
A few more willing subjects.
Women vie for the title of Best Hat.
   
 
Is has been a year now that our house has been up for sale and on February 14 we moved into our new home. We became the owners of two homes. There was a reason we never owned two homes before, there was a reason we never bought a vacation house and it’s because we can’t afford it!
We kept believing that as the time drew nearer to move, our home for sale would miraculously sell; we thought somehow we deserved to have it sell so we could move on with our lives, we thought we deserved not to have to worry about weeding or cutting the grass fifty miles away, we thought we deserved to have money to pay the bills, we thought we deserved to live in ease and comfort, we thought God understood all this. We wanted to be looking back at how everything just fell into place and sweetly smile and say, “Isn’t God good.” We’re not there yet… but I have learned some things along the way, good things.
Make no mistake, I do not have my act together on trusting God; I was about ready to cry a puddle of tears when the library told me I had a $15 dollar charge on overdue books. Do I sound like I’m whining? It is so much easier to display peace that passes understanding when you have money to back it up.
Some time back I came to the conclusion that I do not need to be God’s public relations gal; He doesn’t need my help to make Him look good. I did not need to put on rose colored glasses and exclaim everything perfect. I did not have to pretend something was wonderful when the reality of it was that it, well, it sucked.
And yet, I was not off the hook. I don’t get the go ahead to wallow in self pity and despair. I don’t have to like the trials I’m put through or pretend to be glad for them but I am called on to trust God, not money, not health, not intelligence, not talent. And it is very easy to say I am trusting God and another thing altogether when I have to live that I trust God, when God throws a monkey wrench in my very lovely ordered life and says, “Now trust Me;” that’s when we are revealed.
A few verses in Jeremiah 17 suddenly become crystal clear:
“Cursed is the man who trusts in man
And makes flesh his strength,
Whose heart departs from the LORD.
For he shall be like a shrub in the desert,
And shall not see when good comes,
But shall inhabit the parched places in the wilderness,
In a salt land which is not inhabited.
Blessed is the man who trusts in the LORD,
And whose hope is in the LORD.
For he shall be like a tree planted by the waters,
Which spreads out its roots by the river,
And will not fear when heat comes:
But its leaf will be green,
And will not be anxious in the year of drought,
Nor will cease from yielding fruit.”
And shall not see when good comes… (dagger to my heart!) We can become so focused on the trial, ruminating on it from the moment we wake up until we go to bed, making sure we wake up in the night to put in a little more time, that we can’t see any good- ever and consequently become like a dry piece of sagebrush… in a salt land. That’s pretty dead. We can be so overly focused on the trial that we miss the innumerable blessings. But when we shift our focus from dwelling on and being consumed by our trials and instead hope in the Lord, we become like a tree planted by water, thriving.
We are not asked to be idiots thinking that the trial is a load of laughs, but neither can we let the trials be the focus of our life. That’s hard. No, we don’t need to be God’s PR man but we do need to trust God without being anxious. Doing so in the small things will make it easier when big things hit; the tree planted by the waters will spread out its roots and thrive.
”If you faint in the day of adversity, your strength is small” (Ps.24:10) And really, it is just a house, I mean two houses, really not all that monumental in the way of adversity.
Remind me of this tomorrow…
 Like a tree planted planted by waters
Tim surprised me with an early birthday gift and flew me to Argentina this morning. It was an over-night flight and we got up-graded to business, so after a night of flying/sleep we hit the ground running this morning. I love Buenos Aires!! They call it the Paris of S America and does feel like that! Like a Paris you can do on the cheap while speaking Spanish– so much the better!
Today we checked into our hostel, took off on foot, visited the Presidential Palace Casa Rosado where Evita addressed the throngs from her balcony, explored the different barrios, stopped for lunch at a cafe, went to the most amazing cemetery I have ever seen (and saw where Evita is burried), toured the National Museo de Bella Artes which has some incredible masterpieces including Degas, Monet, Picasso, tons.. I wonẗ bore you.
I plan to eat a lot of beef while Iḿ here. A couple just started doing the tango behind me. Are you kidding me?
caitlin, April 23rd, 2009
 - Freyja takes UV protections seriously.
Seattlites have a little trouble containing their joy on one of those rare occasions that the sun breaks through the almost ever-present cloud cover and we all get a pathetic percentage of our required dose of vitamin D.
People greet one another, they walk with a little spring in their step, and they don’t honk if you cut them off in the middle of an intersection. Peace and goodwill reign. That was the case for the last three glorious days.
On such a day, you have to be quick about your wits and get your rear outside PRONTO before the sun is gone. I’ve found my favorite spot to visit is Volunteer Park. Here’s what it has to offer:
 The Observatory full of orchids and lovely things. (North end of park)  Fish ponds  If it does rain on your parade, take cover in the Asian Art Museum.  Tennis anyone?  I stumbled upon a really good performance of "Love's Labor's Lost" . It's going on this weekend as well in the park. (North East of the main enterance)
 No one does confused-love-relationship-comedy like Shakespeare.  The incredible look out tower...  If you can make the strenous climb to the top, you will be rewarded with 360 degree views of mountains, water, city and park.  View of Bellevue from the top.  Last of all, take a walk down 14th and see the beautiful mansions of Capitol Hill. Most of the surrounding area has lots of homes to look at.  I try not to covet. Other great things at Volunteer Park:
Kiddie park and wading pool
Lots of picnic areas
Bike and walking trails
A history display at the top of the tower telling about the origin of the park and Seattle.
 Me: “boy, I shoud really do my taxes.” This was a good two weeks before the day that you absolutely must have your taxes done though, and it was a Friday night, so of course they didn’t get done. Unless you consider going to H&R Block online, signing in, and putting my name and address in as doing taxes. It just wasn’t last minute enough. It didn’t feel right. Besides, I was missing a W-2 and some other piece of paper from last summer.
Fast forward to Tuesday, April 14th at about midnight and you’ll find me sprawled on my living room floor with my laptop and a pile of papers that were totally unrelated to taxes but had been stuffed in a drawer and looked important. Me again: “I’m missing a W-2. And some paper from last summer. I think I should just do this tomorrow. I can do that right? That’d be ok and I wouldn’t get in trouble for doing it tomorrow, right?” My boyfriend just shook his head. “I think you really should do it tonight.” He had already finished his weeks ago. Ok, ok. Me to my roomate: “I think I can claim you as a dependent. We live together and sometimes I make dinner. Man, I’m tired and I’m missing that paper from last summer and a W-2 so I’ll finish this tomorrow. I promise. What do you have to do to get an extension, anyways?”
April 15th at about 3PM I’m sitting in my car in front of our apartment with my laptop. We didn’t want to pay for wireless so we snoop it from neighbors and for some reason this is the best place to get it. I had found the W-2 and the mystery paper from last summer, which turned out to be a 1099-MISC, whatever that is, and was working away busily. I just couldn’t find a home for the numbers in the 1099. I called a friend, made some things up, hunted down my 2007 AGI (who actually keeps tax information from the previous year, anyways?), and E-filed my taxes right on time.
I wasn’t really surprised when both my federal and state tax returns were rejected the next day. How long do I have before I have to fix that, anyways?
 Lots of choices.
At the end of a cold windy day of shopping today, Michelle, Joey, Freyja and I, stopped in at Vital T-Leaf, on First Avenue.
I figured we’d grab some tea, maybe sniff a couple in the jars and take off.
Instead, a lovely, friendly woman named Tikka beckoned us inside, told us to sit down at the long table, and placed tiny cups on rectangle saucers in front of us. She poured tea and we all sipped, asked questions and chatted while an hour slipped by. She told us about life in Taiwan and China, about the flavors of the tea, how they are made, and how each tea benefits health.
“Lavender can take away headaches,” she says.
“You are getting a cold, aren’t you? Drink this,” she commands Michelle.
“This is the best tea for iced tea. I always keep a big pot in the summer. No calories, you don’t add sugar, your friends can come drink it all day.”
We left warmed and happy, refreshed after a hectic day downtown. And I walked away as a brand new tea lover.
 Art tea, or flowering tea looks as beautiful as it tastes when steaped.
 Black Lychee tea has been aged 10 years and is good for the stomach after a large meal.  I'll never go back to tea bags.  MIchelle and Joey drink it all in.  Siberian Rose Tea freshens the breath, Tikka says.
 Freyja missed out on the tea, but made a new friend.
 I arranged about 40 dozen roses for a spring wedding about a week ago
 I also used tulips which were perfect for this time of year. I'm always excited to work with all the different flowers and colors.  I'm so excited for spring. Here is my fireplace ready for spring. The kids and I go out to get the branches for the tree which is almost as much fun as getting the Christmas tree.
 I think that kids' thermostats are always a bit off. While it has been warmer, I don't think it warrated a swim in the pool.
Eric has been making me read poetry with him and I found out from reading another blog that it is actually national poetry month. Neither of us knew and while it is a chore for me, I’m happy to say I’ve been participating in this celebration.
Eric said it is like a good wine, you have to start somewhere in order to appreciate it. But we have been reading T.S. Elliot which I think is a rather heavy red and would like to start with something more grapejuicy. I think Cat in the Hat is some kind of poetry. It rhymes right? And I read it on an almost daily basis.
We are actually so bad at it still that, Eric was reading one poem, accidentally skipped two pages and we didn’t even know it. We had no clue that the poem was making less sense than when we started it.
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