Seven 7-and-unders

I went medium-sized photos this post, only because I think my nieces and nephew are so cute.

Here's the older three of the Seattle set calmly reading together. A lovely thing.

The middle two goofin'

The youngest playing with rubber kitchen gloves.

Nephew with his Play-Doh creation complete with ears!

Nap time...

Every is dressed up as princesses. And prince!

Violin recital.

Six days you shall do all your work

For me, the fourth commandment begs the question: does taking care of kids count as work? Well, after seven days of watching my Seattle set of 4, I am very ready for today's rest. I left Tucson last Saturday and arrived to Seattle in time for a three-hour briefing on the week's activities from my sister. She and her husband left for Paris in the early hours of the following day and I became in charge, along with my mom who was official Meal-Maker and Keeper. I have no photos to post today because I left my camera at their house and now am at my other sister's house in Bellevue.

What to say about the last week? I can liken it to working on a pitch for Deutsch: all hours, many hours, lots of surprises, few rules, high impact, stressful, constantly short on time. I can also liken it to touring "Flicker" with Big Art Group in France back in 2002: go-go-go, corralling several rowdy and obstinate humans, lack of sleep, barrage of questions--sometimes in a language I couldn't understand, and an abundance of body fluids.

But fun, oh, what fun! Rolling around on inflatable tubes with my nephew waiting for his little sister to finish her soccer session was exhilarating. Doing the youngest's hair with no screaming on her part--I learned to laugh and she would follow suit--was a great accomplishment. Figuring out she was saying "helmet" and "yogurt" from "heh-meh" and "o-gur" was as good as telling the bus driver, in broken French, to turn down the heat. Walking the older two to school, hand-in-hand, "SQUEEZE!"ing past the overgrown shrubs along the sidewalk was hilarious. And plenty more.

Even after they were all tucked in at night, I got the bonus to chat with my mom about my grandparents and her family history. Great great stuff. Yes, I'm tired. But it's a sweet fatigue.

Happy Thanksgiving, all. I am thankful for you, my family and friends.

Guns & Noodles

This is Elegua, Olivia's pitbull mix puppy. We took him to Bad Dog training class yesterday and it was educational. For me. He got a lot of treats and got to pee indoors. But I think he'll grow lots.






On Saturday, we went to the gun show!








They don't allow photographs inside so here's the one I got caught taking. The rest you'll have to use your imagination if you haven't already been to a gun show yourself. Olivia owns an old Beretta that she was looking to get a magazine for. But no one had one that fit her model. I amused myself by practicing apologetics with a nice lady whose father has self-published literature asserting the King James Version of the bible is the only one we should be reading, because it's "the best".

Guns of all sorts.











Later that evening, we went to Lee's house in the desert. We took the scenic route for my benefit.






















The stars were beautiful and the fire nice.











Lee's dinner. Yum.








Sunday I went to church with Peter and his family. Here he is with his sons James and Joshua. The family, who used to live in Richland, are friends of my parents.
Ellen cooking my favorite veggie.











As promised, this is the scarf Lynn knit for me!











Monday, yesterday, after a busy day of pilates and puppy training class, Olivia was exhausted. Luckily, Peter called to see if I could come over for dinner in fact their in-laws were waiting for me in a van across the intersection. I've been watching lots of forensic TV shows with Olivia and Lynn. This was funny.

Ok, so this photo is only funny if you have a Chinese mother. Who saves Styrofoam trays that meat comes on for future use. These are powdered and ready for noodles.




Peter and Ellen's parents have been friends for a long time having lived in the same village in Beijing. Peter and Ellen have known each other since elementary school. But Peter was only able to get Ellen's attention after college when there was less competition. ;) This is their moms.








Ellen's dad is making noodles (chang sho = long life and is homonym for long and thin, thus birthday noodles are long and thin)










Fresh off the press.

Fresh out of the pot and freshly dressed with mushroom egg sauce.








The whole clan including cousin and Kathy, their daughter, and her boyfriend Ethan, who works at the hospital where Olivia will be receiving treatment.

Bloomin' Desert

So this is kind of like when I was staying with Karen in Turkey: lots of posts and lots of photos.

This is Olivia. My friend from college and NYC. She reminded me that she lived with me on the Lower East Side for a few weeks back in 2000 when she was between apartments. It was grand. Now, after a bit more than a year in Ecuador, she's living in Tucson. I was going to visit her and her parents' farm in South America but things changed. She got sick and now is awaiting treatment back in the States. Aside from diminished energy, startling weight loss, and sensitivity to germ/bad people exposure, she is the same rambunctious intellectual that I've always loved.




Here, Olivia and her mom took me to Tohono Chul Park for lunch and a walk. The gallery was my favorite.







Olivia and her cute mom Lynn.








Desert flora.












Lynn and her sister Lee. Lunch at Roma Italian Imports. Almost like Chelsea Market except for the large seating area and freestanding-ness. I joked with Olivia that the guy there who recommended the strawberry tiramisu is her boyfriend...





Lynn is knitting me a scarf too! :) Will look similar to Lee's.











Yesterday, we went to Bisbee, an old mining town, and took a tour of Queen's copper mine. We were going to have a stroll about Tombstone but settled for a drive through Wyatt Earp's town instead.






















Paella before cooking. Olivia and her mom whipped this together in about five minutes.
Cook at 500 until you can 'hear the rice boiling' and then reduce to 350 for another hour or so.

Table for 2, 3, 4, and 7

Four days in New York City allows me plenty of time to dine out. Autumn, lovely smell of leaves and cold air. Refreshing.

Table for 2: Juanita, my perennial hostess, and I went to Brooklyn, the borough of our early friendship. This is at Amorina from where I catered my last birthday party in Prospect Heights.




Table for 3: at Otto, a Mario Batali establishment. Lower end than Babbo where I go with Olivia. But yummy nonetheless. With Karen who's preggers with #2. You may remember her from my Turkey trip. And Anna who graced us with her company as she hurried between freelancing for Anthropology and physical therapy for her knees.










Table for 4: Tiffany introduced me to her friends Sewi and Gbemi. They're all TSC connections and we had a nice meal and fun, long chat at Cafe A in Harlem. Barbara, our server, almost made it table for 6 with her excitement over her "10 years younger!" boyfriend but contained herself. It was Oct 31.

Table for 7: Quasi-reunion of a team that went on mission to Burundi in 2007. Here's Nancy, Sandra, and Jacques Daniel--the main reason we got together is because Jacques Daniel is a pastor from Gitega, Burundi. I spoke at his church (under corrugated metal roof and bamboo pole 'walls') during our trip and he hung out with Sandra's team a lot. He is now an ambassador to Nigeria and has amazing stories of God's faithfulness and provision.


Edith and Lawrence.

Lawrence and Paul.

All of us at Maria Pia in the Theatre District.