Schreiben in German

Today I have learned that technical support with a language barrier is best performed with someone that speaks both languages.

I have successfully helped Patricia (our new foreign exchange student) setup a blog. My first mistake was dropping myself as an administrator. For every modification of her blog was now through her localized version of windows.... in German. We were successful but there were a few translations that were a challenge.

I have added a link to her blog below. She has some pictures of her stop over in Washington DC prior to her arrival in Spokane (a few hours late from being bumped from a flight).

Her blog is located at www.Trici-USA.blogspot.com

Here is a link to a small gallery. These are mostly black and white photos of Carrie and David's wedding

Gallery - Black and Whites

Carrie & David's Wedding

8_9_08 A day in history where Naomi and I took a step into professional photography. We managed to pull off the insane photography role at Carrie and David's wedding. Ok.. perhaps not exactly professional. However, with a little money prior to the wedding to purchase a nice flash and other goodies the night ended with a successful bitload of imagery. All said and done I am happy with the results. There are some good shots, some bad shots, and a few amazing ones. Please enjoy!

Gallery - Wedding Photos by Caleb & Naomi
Gallery - Wedding Photos by Jan Dormaier
Gallery - Wedding Photos by Elliott & Whitney

I have uploaded the better pictures of the day into this gallery. I am also uploading the original resolution (highest quality) images onto Costco.com. My hopes are that you will be able to purchase any pictures online from their site.

Garden & Gun

Tonight I gathered our mail and began to rifle through it. As usual, most of the pile was junk so, in my fury of mail shredding I nearly destroyed something with some value. It was notification about my Delta Airline miles expiring this September, GASP! Unfortunately, I am quite familiar with this airline mile expiration thing and Caleb and I have, on a few occasions, dealt with this (Delta miles blow fyi). So, in lieu of lost miles we get to buy magazine subscriptions. It's really too bad how giddy I get at the thought of ordering anything for free, especially before I have had a chance to survey the loots. The selection is disappointing to say the least. However, one magazine piqued my interest, Garden & Gun: Southern American Living. It was all I could do to not write down the magazine code and begin receiving this marvelous magazine right away. Don't you just want to peruse the articles about your garden and how your Winchester M1887 shotgun can help your Virginia Blue Bells grow? Well, I came home and googled it to find out more. If you are interested here's a link.

http://gardenandgun.com/

One article was entitled, "The Plant Hunter." Take a moment to savor that heading. The imagination certainly colorizes that title quickly! Anyway, I realize the randomness of this post, however, it was too good to pass up. Enjoy!

A Wedding in Denver

Yikes! What a crazy few weeks. While we are genuinely excited and happy for both couples and their nuptials, we are mildly exhausted. The first of August was the date for Lauren and Haden’s wedding down in Denver Colorado. The weather was hot and venue was beautiful. Seriously, you couldn’t pick a better spot to say, “I do.”

What you can’t see in the picture is that it was 100 degrees that day but thankfully breezy. When it came time for the ceremony the sky clouded over a bit, diffusing the sun for us and for some nice pictures. The ceremony was beautiful, I think. Annaka kept me so busy hushing her and chasing her that I missed bits and pieces. Her favorite part was walking back down the isle at the end of the ceremony. She walked the isle like a true pageant queen, waving to everyone and saying, “hi” as loud as she could. How friendly.

A little bit later at the reception, Annaka was cutting it up on the dance floor. Unfortunately, I don’t have a picture of her dancing right now. I’ll post one when I get one from some one else’s camera. In the meantime check out the link to Haden and Lauren’s Wedding photos.

Blowing Bubbles... and Bubbles... and Bubbles...

In the last few weeks Annaka has developed a penchant for bubbles. It seems I am unable to get anything done if she has made up her mind to get the bubbles out. So, I take her out on the back deck of Grandma and Grandpa’s house to blow bubbles until I feel dizzy. Annaka chases the bubbles around in circles and up and down working on both her agility and speed. She often has to quickly maneuver around Jindol as he is a huge fan of how the bubbles taste. See below.

Well, grass needs water and Annaka is ready at the gun to quench it’s thirst. During this time she started playing a game with Grandpa with the hose. She had him locked in the garage for quite a while. It was all fun and games spraying everyone else until she accidentally grabbed the sprayer backwards and squirted herself in the face.

Kimchee Jars?

Welcome to our blog! Caleb and I are making an attempt to keep this blog going for the enjoyment of friends and family. While blogging has been something we have enjoyed in the past, we rarely find time this last 19 months to keep up with any online postings due to the precious little imp running around in our household. We are excited to connect with you all, provide snapshots of our happenings, and most importantly, keep you posted with the growth of Annaka.

As many of you know, I am half Korean and therefore must eat ridiculous amounts of kimchee to be able to function. Unfortunately, I am quite terrible at making the stuff. I do, however, intend to keep trying much to Caleb’s chagrin (he and Annaka are the only ones to help me eat my science experiments). So, I rely heavily on my mother’s expertise in the art of kimchee making and have jars of it delivered whenever she makes a batch. You can imagine the number of jars that end up collecting in our basement “tainted” by the smell and no longer considered acceptable for anything other than kimchee. They are the “kimchee jars”, commissioned to contain only the stinkiest of foods. I thought glass was supposed to be non-porous, resistant to the penetration of odors. Perhaps kimchee has incredible glass-etching powers unknown to most civilized nations of the world.

So, stop by sometime for some delicious kimchee, which in my opinion can be eaten with anything (Caleb seems to disagree). Just don’t come by this week. I’m currently out of it. Gasp! Mom!