The United Nation's Way

It is my day off of work, and I get to watch Sesame Street with Blue and A. Last Monday when I was off, Norah Jones sang "I Don't Know Why Y Didn't Come." (I love that song.) I was hoping today would be another classic, maybe Martina McBride singing "Let's Pretend."

Alas, today is Kofi Annan teaching the monsters to solve their problems the "United Nation's way." GROAN! What exactly is the "United Nation's way"? Funding terrorists? Raping girls in the Congo? The United Nations is not an organization I want my kids to look up to.

Nerds

I admit it; we are nerds. Blue and I, on separate computers just spent a large portion of the evening working on this test. In the end, he got more than I did. I'm glad we gave up when we did, because there is NO WAY I would have ever gotten all of them. It was a nice break from Sudoku, though.

Newest Must-Read

I am enamored with BigMamaDoc at Fat Doctor. I arrived at her blog from Shrinkette, and I couldn't stop reading until I'd read every post. She is a primary care physician, pastor's wife, mom, and is a great read. Check her out.

Stocking Hat

This is the hat I knit my dad for Christmas. He loved it. He wore it to work to show it off, and enjoyed the teasing that ensued. He had a black one as a kid, and has hinted a couple of times that he would like another. I took the bait this year, and found the pattern here. Unfortunately, I don't have a picture of him wearing it, but Z was happy to model it for me. Dad, if you see this, I would love it if you would send me a picture of you modeling it so I could share it with the world :)

Tamales and Alpacas

We really enjoyed seeing our friends Anne and Wesley in Santa Fe. When we lived in Santa Fe we went to every high school soccer game we could and cheered on Wesley and his friend Stubbs. It was always fun to sit with his mom Anne. She is a very enthusiastic spectator. (Her enthusiasm has even been known to earn her a red card on occasion!) I spent many an afternoon learning the finer points of NFL football (Go Packers!) with Anne while Blue and Wes played PlayStation games in the basement. They are dear friends, and although I am a terrible correspondant and have not kept up with them, I love them dearly and was delighted that we could spend some time with them while we were in Santa Fe.

We met them at Posa's for lunch. Posa's makes the best tamales anywhere. As we ate, we chatted with Wesley about photography (the latest major in his ongoing college career). I am really glad we got to see him. He looks happier than I have ever seen him.

Anne shared with us her latest passion. Raising alpacas. She talked about them the way a brand-new-grandma talks about her grandbaby. It is fun to listen to someone talk about something they are passionate about. When we said we would like to see them, she called work and ditched for the afternoon. We headed out to the farm to see her babies. They were really cute, and the girls loved them. They were really sweet, and I could totally see why Anne loved to raise them.

Here is Anne with award-winning Vito.















Here is Anne with a bunch of alpacas interested in her yummy pellets.














Adorable!















And of course the Wonderful thing about alpacas is their awesome fleece. Here is some fleece and yarn for sale from her alpacas and the alpacas who live with hers. When I come up with a knitting project worthy of such an excellent fiber, I'm going to order some.


Here is Anne's website for more adorable pictures.

Cousins

It was great to be back in Santa Fe and see blue's brother and his family. Here are the cousins playing with PlayDoh. They love each other, and I wish we all lived closer so they could play together more often.

Skateboarding

Here are some pictures of Uncle Sam helping Z out with her skating.

The car trip

Christmas Eve

Here are some pictures from the Christmas Eve service our church had.

I'll probably get in trouble for this one..... but here's red fish singing Christmas carols.



And here is one from the children's program. Z is on the right hand side in the black and red plaid dress. It was funny. She and the girl next to her kept fighting over the microphone.



After the program they had all the kids come up and a grandfather-type read the Christmas story to them.



I was quite impressed with how well everything was put together. The place was pretty full and everybody seemed to have a good time.

Back to blogging

Time to catch up.

After opening presents on Christmas day we spent the rest of the day packing stuff up and loading the car and all that stuff and then we left for Santa Fe, New Mexico with my parents. They have a house there and they like to spend some time there in the winter and since red got the whole week of Christmas off from work we decided to drive down with them. My brother and his family live there also so it was bordering on a family reunion.

Visiting New Mexico is fun. We lived there for 6 years so it feels kinda like home. We always have places to go and friends to see. And the food is great! I haven't found anything that even remotely compares here in Iowa. Green Chile..... Sopaipillas..... Mmmmm.....

I'll post some pictures.