In which Green Bay provides some good news

My co-worker is getting the car this trip, and since I got into Green Bay about 7 hours before he did, if I was going to get groceries it was by people power.

I came to Green Bay with a check in my pocket that needed to make it into my checking account this weekend. It's the upper-midwest, where US Bank is based. I figured that I'd not have any trouble finding a US Bank, and the good news is that there is one on the corner about a block from my hotel. Check deposited.

But wait, there's more. I don't think I've ever used my Yellowstone card in ATM before. I had to memorize my PIN, which meant that I had to get my PIN before leaving the house this morning. And when I punched it into the ATM, I had the option of my account or the joint account! Very cool! What's more, the receipt gave me an accounting of how much money the Yellowstone card had donated to the Yellowstone Foundation. I am so impressed.

Moving along on my walk to the grocery store. I was amused that the ladies at the hotel's front desk thought it was too far to walk. Well, it was, once I was laden with groceries. But the trip over there was a good walk, and it went past a garden center, which had tall bearded irises on one of the benches out front.

Like a moth to the flame, I had to go look. And they have Before the Storm, one of the iris that I've been wanting. And Batik. I'm trying to figure out how to get them home. I suppose I could just wait till summer and order them, but where's the fun in that?

Next to the garden center is a cemetery, established in the 1860s. Had I known that was there, I might not have slept this afternoon, and gone photographing cemetery art instead. There are four more evenings in Green Bay, after all. And maybe the light will be better later this week. Looking at the map, I see that the Catholic cemetery is a block or two south of the hotel as well. This is gonna be good.

It's gone.

Here's a picture of my grandparents' house. It's the white rubble in the picture on the corner just to the right of the grain elevator. I have drawn a circle around it.


It's taken me awhile to blog about it - it was really a blow to me. Greensburg KS is kinda like my ancestral home. Both of my grandparents were born there. (You're looking at their families' farmsteads at the top of the picture.) We went there every summer for family reunions. I have a lot of family there - great aunts and uncles; second-, third- and beyond-cousins. Thankfully, no Unruhs or Koehns were on the list of the dead - at least not the last time I checked.

My memories - as recently as last summer - are of tree-lined streets; of the hospital where my eye was stitched up after the cousins' dog bit me at a reunion; of the nursing home where we said goodbye to Grandpa for the last time; of the house, both different and the same as the Grandma's and Grandpa's house of my childhood; of the Big Well where Grandpa bought me the Kansas plate; the water tower now crumpled; the Senior Center where their 75th anniversary party was held. (I still have the pack of sunflower seeds with their picture on the front.) Pictures of the town show that what I remember is all gone.

All that is left for me are my pictures from Greensburg and my memories.

In which Evan picks it up and starts over

I have the only child who falls off a bike when he's walking it. I suppose he tripped over it, but still....

We rode bikes to school today for the first time. His training wheels are too high, and he's wobbly. Turning corners is often a disaster. And this morning I failed to put pads and helmet on him on the way out. Of course, the tight turn in the park spelled disaster. He did OK - only a scrape on the back of his calf. And he got back on the bike. As he was rolling down the sidewalk, he told me how much he loved riding bikes to school together.

We had just arrived at school and dismounted (school rule: no riding on school grounds), when he tripped over his bike and went down again. It's not going to curb his enthusiasm. We can learn something from five-year-olds.

In which I am missing something

I guess I was a pretty boring kid. Never broke a bone, didn't loose any digits or teeth. Well, not until I had to have braces. I still have my appendix and my tonsils. Didn't have any alterations during my c-section.

But at my physical last month, the PA noticed that I have a mole on my shoulder. Not that this is remarkable; I have more of the little buggers than I'd prefer. But this one was was weird - odd shape, not well-defined. And she said that it had to go. So on Friday I went in to the doctor's office.

I suppose my lack of experience with medical things makes me approach these things with trepidation. I took Chris as my support. He's good at it; he's got lots of practice.

After the area was deadened, the PA took a divet out of my arm which contained the mole. It's off to the lab for analysis. I'm left with a 3/8" hole in my arm. I haven't had a lot of pain, and so it's good.

Chris took "before" and "after" pictures. I'll post them eventually.

In which the Summer of Harry Potter is almost upon us

If the reader will kindly direct one's attention to the right, a countdown to some very exciting dates will be apparent. This of course means that there will soon be a flurry of sewing and planning to be done.

It's bittersweet of course - the culmination of the saga is also the end, and HP fans will miss the reading, the parties, the anticipation. Perhaps the merchandising wizards will come up with something to maintain the buzz. I'm not hopeful, just cynical.

It's exciting, yes, but also a lot of work. It begins with cleaning up my studio. The winter has pretty much featured hiding away things on my worktables which more rightfully belong in cabinets. And there is much lint, dust, and etc. to clean up. Much of the fabric on the shelves needs laundering.

But not until next month.

In which we have a family day

Evan, Dad and Mom planned a Family day on Sunday. It went (pretty) well.

We started out by telling him that we were going to surprise him with the day's activities.

We went for lunch at Sweet Tomatoes, and then to the nearby Putt Putt course. It is a nice one, near the intersection of I-25 and I-470. I was really impressed. Nice landscaping, cool challenges. The guy behind the counter was very accommodating. The cost was steeper than I'd remembered Putt Putt, but playing both courses is a substantial discount over playing one. And so it was a good value after all.

Chris loves Putt Putt - he played it a lot in high school and had considered going pro. I think he really loved being able to introduce his kid to the game.

Evan needs a lot of coaching, however.

The first course (there are two) held Evan's attention pretty well, but then he kinda got wild and crazy on the second course. But he had a great time, and wants to go again. We had told him that there was a second surprise. The funny thing was that he had whined about wanting to go to Club 4 Kids as we'd gone by on the way to lunch - Club 4 Kids was the next surprise!

A surprise that didn't go so well.

Club 4 Kids is a drop-in child care place near the house. We buy chunks of time for when we want to have a dinner out without parental duties, or a movie that's not Evan's speed. He loves going. And we thought we'd drop him off for the afternoon. But no - they were closed. He was devastated, sobbing in the back seat. Poor kid. So Dad rented him a kid's movie instead, and he got that as his "kid's time" for the day.

Still, a pretty good family day. We'll have to do that again.

In which Christmas is finally over

For those readers living in the Denver area, or who have been keeping up on Denver weather this winter, you can probably understand how we got to mid-March without getting the Christmas lights from the front of the house taken down.

We're not alone.

The neighborhoods that have (and enforce) covenants in the Denver area are beside themselves. The rules are that holiday lights must removed by a certain date, usually January 31. This of course would have been impossible with our snowy January. Enforcing the deadline would have exposed the neighborhood associations to quite a few lawsuits as rule-abiding folks slipped off the snowy roofs that have characterized most of the weekends since Christmas. They pretty much gave up.

So here we are; March 10. Chris got up on the roof (Melanie being somewhat wimpy about heights),. Melanie rolled, rolled, and rolled up strings of lights. Evan picked up plastic clips for a penny-a-clip reward.

The house looks rather plain.

In which I assure the gentle reader

I suspect that folks have been wondering at the lack of posts lately. Rest assured that I am still alive, but dealing with some overwhelming life issues. No worries, mate!