In Niger, a tax hike of nearly 20% on basic commodities has the population in an uproar. When people survive on less than $1/day, that sort of hike is crippling.
The toll from the Sumatra earthquake and aftershocks is still rising with about 600 confirmed dead at this time. The roads are destroyed, there is no power and aide is having an impossible time of getting to the damaged areas. The death toll will rise as people continue to suffer and those lost under the rubble will perish before help can reach them.
Terry Schiavo has died. Honestly, there's not much to say about that. I am relieved she finally has peace.
Thursday, March 31, 2005
Sunday, March 27, 2005
A Blessed Easter to All
We spent the day with my parents and I found myself sealing today's emotions into my memory because it was such a significant day.
Easter, of course, is pivotal to the Catholic faith and while there is much to be considered spiritually from the past 40 days of Lent, the past 3 days of the Triduum and over the coming Easter Week, all of this does occur every year. While I battle through my own issues of religion and faith, the subject of family came into very clear focus. It's the first holiday we have spent together, the eight of us, since Christmas of 2002.
I adore my parents. This is nothing new. I didn't just realize this and they haven't done anything in particular to draw the statement out of me. It's a simple fact that along with my own nuclear family, my parents mean everything to me. From them I have been blessed with a love of music (and have always known I could never be as accomplished as they are), a love of languages (the same as above), a love of travel and a love of knowledge in general.
Music. My father learned to play the organ when he was a young boy. Since then, playing the organ in church has been integral to his life no matter what corner of the world he was in and for the past 15 years he has been organist and choir director at St. Michael's parish. It was a second full-time job to him with rehearsals, Masses and untold hours to meet his high standards. But playing the organ wasn't about "job" and "hours". It was about his passion for the instrument and his form of worship.
This Easter was a somber celebration for him as today was his last day as parish organist. For his own reasons he is taking a hiatus and I grieve for his loss just as he does. The organ is an extension of who he is and it will be an adjustment for him and for us as a family. The kids always look forward to going to St. Michael's. Nicholas conducts with grandpa from the balcony. Katherine just joined the choir, singing next to my mom with the altos. Rebecca was talking about how when she was 9 she would able to sing with the choir as well. Jonathon loves the pipes and going to the choir room where the water dispenser is. When we were in Manila, nothing was ever as good as "grandpa's church". Attending "grandpa's church" was a family gathering, a time to share, a way to connect.
We don't regularly say Grace, but when gathered together it's common to say a small prayer over our meal. At Easter dinner, Jonathon bashfully insisted on adding his own: "Thank You for us being at grandma and grandpa's house." No thanks for candy or chocolate bunnies or colorful eggs. Just simple joy for being with family.
As I kissed Nicholas tonight and tucked him in, I asked him if he'd had a fun Easter. He sleepily hugged his stuffed dog and settled his head into his pillow. His brother was snoring quietly next to him, too tired from a busy day celebrating, and in that quiet moment Nicholas told me "Yes, the most fun was being with grandma and grandpa."
I couldn't agree more and I'm so thankful to have children who treasure the blessings of family and togetherness. That's a gift no Easter bunny could every give.
Easter, of course, is pivotal to the Catholic faith and while there is much to be considered spiritually from the past 40 days of Lent, the past 3 days of the Triduum and over the coming Easter Week, all of this does occur every year. While I battle through my own issues of religion and faith, the subject of family came into very clear focus. It's the first holiday we have spent together, the eight of us, since Christmas of 2002.
I adore my parents. This is nothing new. I didn't just realize this and they haven't done anything in particular to draw the statement out of me. It's a simple fact that along with my own nuclear family, my parents mean everything to me. From them I have been blessed with a love of music (and have always known I could never be as accomplished as they are), a love of languages (the same as above), a love of travel and a love of knowledge in general.
Music. My father learned to play the organ when he was a young boy. Since then, playing the organ in church has been integral to his life no matter what corner of the world he was in and for the past 15 years he has been organist and choir director at St. Michael's parish. It was a second full-time job to him with rehearsals, Masses and untold hours to meet his high standards. But playing the organ wasn't about "job" and "hours". It was about his passion for the instrument and his form of worship.
This Easter was a somber celebration for him as today was his last day as parish organist. For his own reasons he is taking a hiatus and I grieve for his loss just as he does. The organ is an extension of who he is and it will be an adjustment for him and for us as a family. The kids always look forward to going to St. Michael's. Nicholas conducts with grandpa from the balcony. Katherine just joined the choir, singing next to my mom with the altos. Rebecca was talking about how when she was 9 she would able to sing with the choir as well. Jonathon loves the pipes and going to the choir room where the water dispenser is. When we were in Manila, nothing was ever as good as "grandpa's church". Attending "grandpa's church" was a family gathering, a time to share, a way to connect.
We don't regularly say Grace, but when gathered together it's common to say a small prayer over our meal. At Easter dinner, Jonathon bashfully insisted on adding his own: "Thank You for us being at grandma and grandpa's house." No thanks for candy or chocolate bunnies or colorful eggs. Just simple joy for being with family.
As I kissed Nicholas tonight and tucked him in, I asked him if he'd had a fun Easter. He sleepily hugged his stuffed dog and settled his head into his pillow. His brother was snoring quietly next to him, too tired from a busy day celebrating, and in that quiet moment Nicholas told me "Yes, the most fun was being with grandma and grandpa."
I couldn't agree more and I'm so thankful to have children who treasure the blessings of family and togetherness. That's a gift no Easter bunny could every give.
Wednesday, March 23, 2005
CafePress Anyone?
I'd like to hear from people who've used CafePress to print a book. Did you use spiral or standard binding? What did you think of the quality? Etc Etc.
Sunday, March 20, 2005
Pizza and French Fries
What a fun weekend. The kids are off for spring break this week, but I think we've used up all our "let's do something fun" tokens already.
At school Friday, the boys and I went to see the 2nd and 3rd graders' performance. Katherine, being a 3rd grader, was up there playing the recorder and xylophone with all the other 8 and 9 year olds. It's not nearly as bad as it sounds, the kids did a great job and ended with Beethoven's Ode to Joy. Seriously. They were followed by the 2nd graders who had put together a musical (of sorts) about Matter. What can I say, it's a science school so even the music classes are science related. "I'm matter, you're matter, we're all matter..." "There are 4 forms of matter... solid, liquid, gas, plasma! solid, liquid, gas, plasma!" Music you can really tap your toes too. Jonathon found it so interesting he fell asleep on my lap. He's 3, plasma ditties are a little over his head.
The program was at the end of the day, so we went to the school playground for a while and once we arrived home and met Ian, we were off to the nearby theater to see Robots. A film I liked better than the Incredibles, but honestly it dragged in parts with a little too much angst mixed in. Robin Williams made the show.
Saturday was the morning for trout fishing. Bon Air park had an open fishing time solely for kids with newly stocked trout or that was the idea at least. Fifty kids were there by the time we left, and for the hour we spent a single person had caught a single fish. I have one pole from my own childhood that we used and rotated through the kids, but it seemed as though there were a half dozen fish available and those were not at all interested in being caught. One would attract 4 different poles, and while bait was flung at it, tossed on its head and one inventive fisherman tried to wrap his line around the immobile (no, not dead) fish.... it just floated. Oh sure, once the line had gone around a couple times it squirmed a bit and swam a foot to the side to take up a new position, but that's all it did. Kids were commenting on how they'd have better luck walking into the stream and just picking them up.
Oh well. We came home and stored the pole for some other hopeful fishing adventure and started a game of Life.
Afternoon and we hopped on the Metro to the Smithsonian. There is an exhibit at the Sackler gallery on Asian games, with an ImaginAsia program for kids and at 2 p.m. an expert on chess, go and backgammon. Again, this didn't turn out as I'd hoped. The exhibit was interesting, Katherine was able to hold her own against a 14 year old chess opponent and Jonathon didn't fall asleep through the chess guy's talk (though he desperately wanted to). But we'd really wanted to learn about Go. Which isn't until next week. And I hadn't looked into the ImaginAsia program enough to get the kids involved in it, which was a mistake. And there were three tables set up for people to play games... two chess and one, uh, some other game. The chess expert was drier than a desert and was confusing beyond that. The exhibit was interesting and geared for kids to a degree but wouldn't it have been great to have game tables set up throughout the rooms? Where there were a six hundred year old dominoes, why not have a dominoe game table? Made sense to me. So yeah, that was a bummer. We'd also had the goal of getting a Go set and thought it would be easy enough to get one at the museum shop. They had one, and it wasn't even nice.
We left the Sackler and went back to the apartment. The trip downtown wasn't a total loss though. The weather was amazing, we got in a great game of freeze tag on the Mall and the kids took loads of pictures. Jonathon is not at all shy about taking pictures of complete strangers. And, perhaps because he's 3, perfect strangers don't seem to have a problem with him taking those pictures. They think it's really really cute. Over the past 2 days he must have taken a half dozen photos of strangers and sometimes their dogs.
Jeff was with us at the Sackler and just as determined to score a Go set. We looked on-line... $70 for a nice wooden board and plastic pieces? Ian really wanted to try at either Pentagon City or Landmark. We ended up at PC where the guy at the Discovery Store said "What's that?"
We had dinner at Ruby Tuesday's and left. Jonathon had fallen asleep in my lap, Rebecca hasn't eaten anything in a couple days and had barely touched her food, Katherine's meal had been forgotten and she ate half of it when it finally arrived. It was time to go home and just forget about the loser of a day we'd had. Jeff stayed for a while as we drowned our sorrows in Ben and Jerry's and MST3000. OK, the part about sorrows isn't true but the rest is.
So we come to today. Passion Palm Sunday, which means reading a really long Gospel while trying to keep the kids from poking each other with palm fronds. Jonathon has taking to ticking down the time in church by the number of songs that are left. He counts the ones that are on the board (four songs) but doesn't consider all the little pieces in-between like the Responsorial. We'd sing the Gospel Acclamation and he's whisper "Only three left?" and I'd have to truthfully say "No, lots more" and he's heave a huge sigh. They were all well-behaved though. A blessing to be sure.
My parents are both not feeling well, but mom still provided a yummy lunch before we hit the road to Ski Liberty. One our way up, it poured. It hasn't rained since we've arrived; snowed yes, rained no. But today of all days it was soaking outside and we plugged along because we have been talking up this ski trip since before Christmas. We weren't leaving unless the resort turned us away.
We pulled into the parking lot and sat. The rain stopped. The sun came out. It was gorgeous. Oh sure, parts of the slopes were pure slush and everything that's still white is machine made but it was so worth sticking to the plan to see Katherine, Rebecca and Nicholas don their snow clothes and hit the slopes. Since it's the second to last ski weekend at Ski Liberty (and in my opinion, it shouldn't really still be open!), each kid had his/her own instructor. By the end of the two hours, Nicholas was going down the green slopes sans poles as little kids do. He asked when we could go skiing again. Katherine was swooshing her way down and even Rebecca seemed to be having fun. She was skiing without falling or crying, so I'll call it a success. Jonathon and I hung out, took lots of photos, colored, played a game and munched on snacks. For an hour he was in the child care center to break up the time and had the whole room and two teens all to himself. Ian enjoyed himself too though he's questioning his ability to walk tomorrow.
So this week the girls are off school and we'll keep ourselves busy with Easter activities. Tomorrow is errand/clean-up/chore day which reminds me, I'd better make a shopping list.
At school Friday, the boys and I went to see the 2nd and 3rd graders' performance. Katherine, being a 3rd grader, was up there playing the recorder and xylophone with all the other 8 and 9 year olds. It's not nearly as bad as it sounds, the kids did a great job and ended with Beethoven's Ode to Joy. Seriously. They were followed by the 2nd graders who had put together a musical (of sorts) about Matter. What can I say, it's a science school so even the music classes are science related. "I'm matter, you're matter, we're all matter..." "There are 4 forms of matter... solid, liquid, gas, plasma! solid, liquid, gas, plasma!" Music you can really tap your toes too. Jonathon found it so interesting he fell asleep on my lap. He's 3, plasma ditties are a little over his head.
The program was at the end of the day, so we went to the school playground for a while and once we arrived home and met Ian, we were off to the nearby theater to see Robots. A film I liked better than the Incredibles, but honestly it dragged in parts with a little too much angst mixed in. Robin Williams made the show.
Saturday was the morning for trout fishing. Bon Air park had an open fishing time solely for kids with newly stocked trout or that was the idea at least. Fifty kids were there by the time we left, and for the hour we spent a single person had caught a single fish. I have one pole from my own childhood that we used and rotated through the kids, but it seemed as though there were a half dozen fish available and those were not at all interested in being caught. One would attract 4 different poles, and while bait was flung at it, tossed on its head and one inventive fisherman tried to wrap his line around the immobile (no, not dead) fish.... it just floated. Oh sure, once the line had gone around a couple times it squirmed a bit and swam a foot to the side to take up a new position, but that's all it did. Kids were commenting on how they'd have better luck walking into the stream and just picking them up.
Oh well. We came home and stored the pole for some other hopeful fishing adventure and started a game of Life.
Afternoon and we hopped on the Metro to the Smithsonian. There is an exhibit at the Sackler gallery on Asian games, with an ImaginAsia program for kids and at 2 p.m. an expert on chess, go and backgammon. Again, this didn't turn out as I'd hoped. The exhibit was interesting, Katherine was able to hold her own against a 14 year old chess opponent and Jonathon didn't fall asleep through the chess guy's talk (though he desperately wanted to). But we'd really wanted to learn about Go. Which isn't until next week. And I hadn't looked into the ImaginAsia program enough to get the kids involved in it, which was a mistake. And there were three tables set up for people to play games... two chess and one, uh, some other game. The chess expert was drier than a desert and was confusing beyond that. The exhibit was interesting and geared for kids to a degree but wouldn't it have been great to have game tables set up throughout the rooms? Where there were a six hundred year old dominoes, why not have a dominoe game table? Made sense to me. So yeah, that was a bummer. We'd also had the goal of getting a Go set and thought it would be easy enough to get one at the museum shop. They had one, and it wasn't even nice.
We left the Sackler and went back to the apartment. The trip downtown wasn't a total loss though. The weather was amazing, we got in a great game of freeze tag on the Mall and the kids took loads of pictures. Jonathon is not at all shy about taking pictures of complete strangers. And, perhaps because he's 3, perfect strangers don't seem to have a problem with him taking those pictures. They think it's really really cute. Over the past 2 days he must have taken a half dozen photos of strangers and sometimes their dogs.
Jeff was with us at the Sackler and just as determined to score a Go set. We looked on-line... $70 for a nice wooden board and plastic pieces? Ian really wanted to try at either Pentagon City or Landmark. We ended up at PC where the guy at the Discovery Store said "What's that?"
We had dinner at Ruby Tuesday's and left. Jonathon had fallen asleep in my lap, Rebecca hasn't eaten anything in a couple days and had barely touched her food, Katherine's meal had been forgotten and she ate half of it when it finally arrived. It was time to go home and just forget about the loser of a day we'd had. Jeff stayed for a while as we drowned our sorrows in Ben and Jerry's and MST3000. OK, the part about sorrows isn't true but the rest is.
So we come to today. Passion Palm Sunday, which means reading a really long Gospel while trying to keep the kids from poking each other with palm fronds. Jonathon has taking to ticking down the time in church by the number of songs that are left. He counts the ones that are on the board (four songs) but doesn't consider all the little pieces in-between like the Responsorial. We'd sing the Gospel Acclamation and he's whisper "Only three left?" and I'd have to truthfully say "No, lots more" and he's heave a huge sigh. They were all well-behaved though. A blessing to be sure.
My parents are both not feeling well, but mom still provided a yummy lunch before we hit the road to Ski Liberty. One our way up, it poured. It hasn't rained since we've arrived; snowed yes, rained no. But today of all days it was soaking outside and we plugged along because we have been talking up this ski trip since before Christmas. We weren't leaving unless the resort turned us away.
We pulled into the parking lot and sat. The rain stopped. The sun came out. It was gorgeous. Oh sure, parts of the slopes were pure slush and everything that's still white is machine made but it was so worth sticking to the plan to see Katherine, Rebecca and Nicholas don their snow clothes and hit the slopes. Since it's the second to last ski weekend at Ski Liberty (and in my opinion, it shouldn't really still be open!), each kid had his/her own instructor. By the end of the two hours, Nicholas was going down the green slopes sans poles as little kids do. He asked when we could go skiing again. Katherine was swooshing her way down and even Rebecca seemed to be having fun. She was skiing without falling or crying, so I'll call it a success. Jonathon and I hung out, took lots of photos, colored, played a game and munched on snacks. For an hour he was in the child care center to break up the time and had the whole room and two teens all to himself. Ian enjoyed himself too though he's questioning his ability to walk tomorrow.
So this week the girls are off school and we'll keep ourselves busy with Easter activities. Tomorrow is errand/clean-up/chore day which reminds me, I'd better make a shopping list.
Tuesday, March 15, 2005
Walter's PhotoJournal
I was looking through Walter's photos from his latest escape from Iraq. He did a whirlwind trip into Thailand, China and India.
I want to go to India.
I want Vinay's house in New Delhi (Vinay was in Ian's A100).
And I want to stay in Neemrana.
Is that too much to ask?
I want to go to India.
I want Vinay's house in New Delhi (Vinay was in Ian's A100).
And I want to stay in Neemrana.
Is that too much to ask?
The perfect meal
Some of our kids don't eat brussel sprouts. Some don't eat lima beans. One doesn't even eat peas. Some eat corn but only on the cob, others eat it any which way. One doesn't like fish unless it's a fish stick. Some tolerate squash, one likes eggplant, sweet potato is hit and miss. Regular potatoes are welcome in french fry form but half won't eat it boiled or mashed. Carrots are accepted raw. The list goes on and on.
That's not to say that I don't make these foods. I make it, which ever child is forced (yes, forced) to eat a bite of the offending food and we go on our merry way after the discussion about Change of Food Tastes Over Time.
But what will they all eat?
Spinach. I thank Popeye for Nicholas's affinity for it but the rest... I can't explain. They just all like it.
Thank goodness for small miracles.
Pot Pie Dinner:
2 Pillsbury pie crusts
1 - 1/2 cups cubed cooked chicken
1 can cream of chicken soup
1/2 cup cooked couscous
1 pkg frozen spinach, thawed and squeezed "dry"
1 cup shredded cheese
Set oven to 400
Put 1 pie crust in pie pan
Mix all other ingredients except cheese
Dump into pie pan
Top with cheese
Lay other pie crust over top, fold edges, flute, vent top
Bake for 15 minutes
Cover edges with aluminum foil
Bake for 30 minutes
Let it rest for 5 minutes
Eat
That's not to say that I don't make these foods. I make it, which ever child is forced (yes, forced) to eat a bite of the offending food and we go on our merry way after the discussion about Change of Food Tastes Over Time.
But what will they all eat?
Spinach. I thank Popeye for Nicholas's affinity for it but the rest... I can't explain. They just all like it.
Thank goodness for small miracles.
Pot Pie Dinner:
2 Pillsbury pie crusts
1 - 1/2 cups cubed cooked chicken
1 can cream of chicken soup
1/2 cup cooked couscous
1 pkg frozen spinach, thawed and squeezed "dry"
1 cup shredded cheese
Set oven to 400
Put 1 pie crust in pie pan
Mix all other ingredients except cheese
Dump into pie pan
Top with cheese
Lay other pie crust over top, fold edges, flute, vent top
Bake for 15 minutes
Cover edges with aluminum foil
Bake for 30 minutes
Let it rest for 5 minutes
Eat
Saturday, March 12, 2005
Firefox Friendly
Our site is now Firefox friendly, if anyone cares. There was some wackiness with our stylesheets. After a pretty aimless process of deleting things until it fixed itself, I located the problem.
So now you can use Firefox to see the site. Try it at www.mozilla.org.
So now you can use Firefox to see the site. Try it at www.mozilla.org.
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