Photo of the Week--11/30/09

... aaaand the latest in our series, "Boy chases the pigeons of Europe," features a really BIG pigeon. Actually, it's a chicken. We took a short weekend trip (made shorter by the cancellation of our flight on Friday night, making the prop-plane flight the next morning a little nerve-inducing) to Jersey, one of the Channel Islands between England and France. It's a very interesting place, as it has a lot of French influences (it's closer physically to the mainland) but a very British culture and history. It was actually occupied by the Germans during WWII, and it was interesting to see the traces left by that part of history.

Jersey is a pretty small island, though, so we had plenty of time to explore more pastoral places. This working farm attraction had plenty to observe in the fall harvest season (including a really big horse-drawn cider press), and Boy was fascinated with the chickens. Because they were big enough to fight back, we didn't let him chase them, so we had a peaceful scene to photograph this time.

The Quilt Files, Episode 16

Grandma edition!

It's almost Thanksgiving, which of course makes me think of family and family gatherings and PIE! (Sorry, no pie with these quilts, but I'm already salivating at the thought of pie right now and I get distracted easily.) In addition to getting ready for Thanksgiving, I'm trying to collect photos from all my cousins of the quilts my grandmother has made for her 11 grandchildren and 11 great-grandchildren. We were talking about quilting a while back, and I mentioned I had finished a quilt and this time I remembered to take a photo of it before mailing it off. She sighed and said she'd wished to do that with all her quilts, but it was too late to bother with it now. I thought, ooo! Christmas idea, and have been steadily collecting photos from my cousins ... not all of them, I'll have some arm-twisting to do this weekend, but maybe I'll have the album ready for Christmas if not Thanksgiving. With all the thoughts of family and Grandma and quilting, I thought that this month I would feature the two quilts Grandma made for me and Boy.

This quilt, the Star Spin design, wasn't actually made for me. When TSU and I got married in the summer of 1987, Grandma hadn't taken up quilting yet. She spent a lot of her years after retiring practicing oil painting (I have some nice ones hanging up in my workroom), and when she got tired of that she decided to try quilting. Grandma started quilting around 1988 or 1989, and soon afterward my cousins started getting married (3 in 1990 alone) and Grandma started making quilts for wedding gifts. (We did get a quilt from Grandma and Grandpa for our wedding, but it was made by a church guild and has not lasted as long as our marriage; it's seriously frayed. And it's pink.) She eventually realized that all her grandchildren except me had a quilt from Grandma, so she told me I could have this one when she was done with it. After my grandfather passed in 2001, Grandma moved out of her house into assisted living, and this quilt moved into my house, where it keeps us warm all winter long.

After she finished making quilts for all her 11 grandchildren, Grandma could have taken a well-deserved rest. But the next generation started making an appearance, beginning with Boy in early 1994, so Grandma went back to the fabric store and started over. She's now got 11 great-grandchildren, and a grand total of 22 quilts. This is Boy's Twin Star Quilt, which for now just hangs on a quilt display rack, since it's a queen-size and too big for his bed. You can probably tell that by now Grandma had discovered the fun of using cotton batiks for the fabrics, and she found some really lovely ones for this quilt. I'm sure when he finally gets to the age where he has his own house, he'll really appreciate this lovely remembrance of his Great-Grandma. She's still quilting at age 93; after all, you never know when another great-grandchild might arrive!

No fair! How come I have no trouble posting embarrassing pictures of Boy, but I never make myself the target of my photo posts? Well, the main reason is that I'm the family photographer. I'm the one who drags the camera and batteries and film (now flash cards) to all our destinations. I'm the one who says, "let's climb a little higher" so I can get a really great photo. I only end up in the picture when TSU says, "Hey, why don't I take one with you in it." At which point I hand over the camera, bemoan the state of my hair, and smile like a fool.

So here's a photo from a trip we took to Lucerne, Switzerland in fall 1999. This particular shot was taken atop Mt. Pilatus, and those are the Alps you see in the background. Luckily we didn't have to climb the mountain to get the shot; we took a steam train across the lake, a funicular railway to the top (worth the trip in itself for Boy, who was mad about trains at the time), and a cable car back to the city. Although it was cloudy, it was still extremely beautiful. Unlike my hair. (Sigh.)

I'm with the band ... um, where'd they go?

I'm pretty much recovered now from my long weekend chaperoning the marching band at Nationals Competition. It was exhausting, but amazing to see how hard the kids worked. They had a great run in prelims, getting one of their best scores of the season and one of the top ten of 91 bands at prelims. They were pretty tired for their semi-final run Saturday morning, though, and barely missed out on making Finals. Still, 13th in the country is pretty damn good, especially when some of the competition has half again as many musicians in their band. And no one had as cool a show as PCMB this year: watch the video below, and the last 60 seconds will have you shaking your head and wondering, how in the world did they do that? (Click the square box in the lower right to see it full screen.)

More lessons from NaNoWriMo

As you can see by the progress bar at the top of the page, I've officially reached the halfway point in my NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month) goal of writing a 50,000 word novel. I've learned a few more things about writing during these first couple of weeks:

1. It really helps to have some quite "thinking" time before you get started writing. I've tried starting each day by taking my pretty journal book and making notes before I get started. It gets me set up for what I want to write, and gets me in the mood as well. It also invariably attracts the cat, since I sit in the front room which rarely gets used otherwise.
2. It is possible to write 2000 words a day and also work on assignments. It's a lot easier when the assignments are copyediting (ie fact-checking and review) instead of original writing, because it's two different types of thinking and it's a relief when I give up on the business articles and get back to my novel.
3. I'm loving my whole "encyclopedia article" structure, because I just make my list of words and write. Not having to think about plot (except during early morning thinking time) sure makes the writing a lot easier.
4. One can fit in writing while one is sitting outside watching kids practice the marching band show, or inside waiting for them to finally get ready for bed to turn lights out. It's not easy, but it is possible. One must avoid skipping ahead, though; although this is usually a great technique to avoid writer's block, if one is extremely busy one tends to forget to go back and fill in the holes.
5. One cannot fit in writing when one is sleep deprived. Actually, you might manage to fit it in, but you'll just end up staring at the screen as the cursor blinks hypnotically and your nose ends up typing "hjkjhkjhjkhjkhjkghjkhjkjhkh" when your head hits the keyboard.

I've gotten a bit behind my target of 2K a Day, but I'm close to the average of 1667 words a day, and hope to get further ahead as we get to the end of the month. I'm almost done with the "M" section (letter 13 of 26), but I figure "O" and "Q" will only be half-sections, so I'm still making progress. We'll see if I last with Thanksgiving coming up; I hear there are already pies to be eaten.

Photo of the Week--11/16/09

You know this look, don't you? The one that says, "I don't care how cool the ocean looks in the background, I'm tired of climbing stairs and just want to get it over with. No, I won't smile for the camera, because I know in ten years you'll post this photo on the internet, and everyone will think I was a Harry Potter wannabe, even though it the first book was barely out and I hadn't read it yet. I don't care about King Arthur and whether he really lived at this castle, just get on with it!"

Oh well. Maybe you guys will appreciate the Cornish scenery and the poetic ruins of Tintagel despite the grumpy looks.

Confessions of a Marching Band Mom

Marching Band has taken over my life! At least, it will for the next few days:

• Tuesday: make sure I have all the supplies I need for our Nationals trip. This means trips to the bank (Boy needs cash!), the store (Boy needs socks!), and the vet (cats need daycare!), although since the weather's nice I can make the trip by bicycle and get my daily exercise, killing two birds with one stone. Then I have to do laundry and collect all the things I need to pack, in case I missed something and have to go back to the store. This evening, I have to drop off the boys' bedrolls for the truck, and deliver craft fair signs to people who've agreed to help put them out this weekend. Somewhere in there I have to fit in balancing the checkbook, getting some copyediting done, and not getting behind on NaNoWriMo, before I head to flute choir practice.
• Wednesday: deliver Boy and his luggage to school by 6:30 am. Do my own packing, get in one last TKD training session, maybe some writing work, gas up and wash the car, and meet the boys at school before driving down to Indianapolis in the evening. Arrive by 11 pm and get the cabin ready for 22 girls to arrive around midnight.
• Thursday: Get the girls up before 7 am. (Gack, but at least I'm not on breakfast duty today.) Ride with the kids to the practice field, hang out, maybe get some writing done?, hang out some more, help cook dinner, go back to camp and supervise cabin full of teenage girls.
• Friday: Oh God, why did I volunteer to do this? Up before 5:30 to help cook breakfast, then accompany kids to rehearsal, back to camp, and then out to Lucas Oil Stadium for preliminary competition. Watch most excellent show, maybe a couple others, then accompany kids to mall for the evening. A break! At a mall! Where 98 high school bands will probably be! (Imagine my exclamation points wilting here.) Back to camp and lights out.
• Saturday: More chaperoning, plus more competition—hopefully both semi-finals and Finals. Accompany band back to camp at 11 pm for pizza celebration. Lights out by 1 am if I'm lucky.
• Sunday: Leave camp early (7:30 or 8) to get back home in time to prepare for flute choir concert in the afternoon. Get home and crash. Hopefully, I'll have enough volunteers to put out signs so I won't have to place any myself today.

If you don't hear much from me on the blog this week, you'll understand why. I'm not sure I'll have internet access, let alone time to post. I'm with the band! At least, whatever part of my brain still working is.