christmas with the kooks

we had a great christmas with n's sister the feebird visiting us. hils wanted to greet her with a prisitine, little tree nesting a few vintage ornaments. ha! look what i talked her into! victory! i don't have a photo of my jimi hendrix outdoor tree, but just try to imagine it glowing in our snowy front yard. what would i do were i left alone to decorate?

next photo: wally has some problems with her ACL in her back legs so fee came up with this nifty idea for hiking. clearly we did not go with her plan, but we were impressed with her ability to get flora into the living room.

here is our kiva fireplace decorated with mini-luminarias (paper bags with sand and candles- they also have plastic electric ones) which people love and hate here. they are beautiful, but not many people put them up because they are a lot of trouble. you do get the craving for some fun Christmas lights twinkling up and down the streets, but hardly anyone does that either. but nothing, nothing is like tacoma with its inflatable elves, snowmen, revolving santa sleighs and reindeer, carols pumping from loudspeakers, and whatever else you can fit onto a roof above a manger scene. when i lived there i even bought a giant frosty at a lawn ornament garage sale once with the hopes of eventually leaving it on tim and abby's lawn, but it never happened. yes, meag. you can most certainly mark the holidays in t-town. franco (my momma) made these stockings.

our tree on Christmas morning.

n opening his gift from fee- a book about an irish country doctor. excellent choice, lassie!

materialism takes over...

....followed by a feast: when fee was 4 years old she attended a dinner at a friend's home and when served her plate she promptly asked, "where's the sauce?" we had a christmas dinner potluck at our neighbors' richard's and stacey's house, and when richard, who roasted the turkey, was asked by fee about the gravey he said he was over it. well, she wasn't. stacey tossed her an apron and she got right to work separating fat and reducing stock. she is her mother's daughter after all. you can't escape those norman bloodlines no matter what they tell you!

after christmas day, fee and i went on a beautiful hike in glorieta which is about 20 minutes from lamy. the snow was deep so we pooped out quickly, but the highlight was stumbling upon a clearing with horses feeding without the fences which normally hedge them in.

it was wonderful to pet these majestic creatures and run our fingers through their wiry winter coats. it was sad at the same time because they obviously associated us with treats of which we had none, and they were all out of food. i will definitely go back to check on them... with a backpack full of carrots to be sure!

here is fee bird with, yolanda (our pick), the pony who wanted to adopt us. at first we thought she was a boy and named her alfonso. she ran right up to us when we first came into the clearing and tried to eat our coats, pants and even slurped up my backpack string which i had to pop out of her chomping horse teeth. we were cracking up. on our way back she was very excited to see us again and tried the same antics. we were so touched by her we were giving her kisses and i reached up under her perfectly colored, femme fatal bangs and did some massage on her forehead and around her ears. well, after that she proceeded to follow us down the trail. fee had to push her back 3 times and the last time she stood at the edge of the clearing and watched us until we were out of sight. and my camera battery was dead! you know i'm going back to see her! God's creatures are exceedingly special and i can't wait for a day when they are all treated right!

therapy pool and other rejoicable things

here are some pictures of n in the therapy pool with his physical therapist, donna. nathanael is a water person and i love to see him move around in a setting so comfortable for him. these pictures are precious to me.

n's blood pressure got low after a few exercises. the pool is 95 degrees so he has to be careful as his b.p. runs low in general. i opened some windows and doors to let in some snowy air and donna led him in a break doing some acupressure on wrists which helped.

i absolutely love the way donna works with n. she has a gentle voice interrupted by a contagious, bellowy laugh which errupts at anytime. however, when she does watsu she looks like a serious mother lullabying her son.

there is grief in these photos, too. hilary always said that one of her worst fears was to be in the place of one of those all-too-common african mothers we see photographed cradling a gaunt and starving child in a refugee camp. when we look at the pudgy, baby pictures of n on the fridge in her arms with carrot juice all over his face, we can't believe how things have turned out.

even our most wonderful african friend, damaris, who has seen such things in africa as described above, burst into tears upon meeting hilary (having known our story beforehand). she was as shocked and upset as we have ever been about nathanael's condition.

thankfully we are not in a famined state in africa. we have above and beyond our share of comfort and privilege in this trial. this we have in terms of physical and heavenly provisions. but nonetheless, there is heartbreak about nathanael's ongoing condition, and damaris, who has seen the real thing, weeps with us as do many of you. especially all of n's mothers and fathers and aunties and uncles out there.

n turned 31 this month and we rejoice! moreover we rejoice in knowing the source of eternal life, JESUS, whom God sent into the world, "not to judge the world, but that the world should be saved through Him. He who believes in Him is not judged; he who does not believe has been judged already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God." John 3:17. wow. Jesus said that to nicodemus, a jewish leader. it's certainly something to think about this week and beyond.

MERRY CHRISTMERRY!

let it snow!

i woke up early to take johnny to the airport shuttle. and being the non-coherent morning person that i am, i didn't think clearly about how he was going to get to albuquerque, let alone how we were going to make it to town to catch the shuttle. i did see a flurry of white rushing horizontally past every window and piling up on the porch and sticking to the windows, but was still stunned when he said to me, "you know i'm not going home today." "what? huh?" duh. of course not. i happily went back to my cozy rollaway bed in my walk-in closet (that is another story) and lay in smiling semi-conciousness for another 2 hours. then i awoke to hilary folding egg whites into a small batch of batter ... "i'm making lemon ricotta pancakes." olympic cheer! score. try to remain calm. this is after she made morning stir fries for her, johnny and n and before cooking a chicken dinner later on. maybe it was the relief of having j.d. around for a few more days because this doesn't happen everyday, folks. i was in momentary...the recipe calls for honey on top, but dude, pancakes without syrup?! and all we had was this specialty stuff aged for years in bourbon casks etc. um... incredible... yes, you can taste the liquor though none is in there. yummmmmm. and it went, perfect with the lemon zest ricotta flavor rolling all over your tongue with a side of bacon. as lauren would say: i was jealous of myself!

they don't look like much, but that is hardly the case!

kimmie, do you like my hat?

it's beginning to feel a lot like christmas. i can't wait to see fee! i will try to put my inordinate love of food aside for a few days and derive outdoor adventures for our beloved sister in the new mexican tundra... just give me a good meal and i can do almost anything.

wally power! isn't she a fierce, winter beauty?

celebramos

this past week i had the pleasure of taking my conversation class on a field trip to the state capitol. the halls were full of beautiful, new mexican art while behind closed doors legislative committees were busy trying to figure out our state budget crisis, i presume.

here i am with 6 of my 10 "lucky ladies" as one student has called our all female conversation class. these women were all very shy 12 weeks ago. each week i had the honor of watching their timidity unravel as they bravely shared stories of survival from their homelands, confessed their loneliness and problems in the u.s., and cracked jokes about themselves and each other. we discussed everything from politics to homemade noodles. it was such a joy to meet with them twice a week. here we are learning about how a bill becomes a law in the land of enchantment. it seemed frightenly/delightfully simple???

here is the final celebration with my other class. we always tie up our semesters with a no boundaries pot luck filled to the walls with posole, tamales, taquitos, pasta salads, pizza hut boxes, sushi, gallons of sunny d and fresca, costco sized, but local tres leches cakes that are gone in an hour etc. this prefaces an informal ceremony of shaking hands and rowdy applause as completion certificates are handed out one by one to all of the classes in each section.

here i am with my life skills 4 class. they are intermediate students who are waiting to see if they will move up to the next session of esl classes...grammar classes. i can't even express what a delight it was to teach this marvellous group. this job is truly a blessing to come to each day. it's just what my family and i needed.

here i am with hector who was very appreciative of our class and my teaching. our class was very bonded, but i was shocked in one of the last classes when he came to the front of the room and they all raised one hand and said in deep voices: "how." thankfully he smiled right back and raised his hand: "how." this led to a great student led talk about first impressions, native cultures and families. it's so refreshing to forget political correctness and get to the point:)!

adios, kimosabes!

turkeylurkeyhobo time

it's long gone to the dogs around here...

thanks to all of you for your gracious comments from my last post. i am most definitely inspired to write on and provide pictures and tales of the day to day. above you will note a bad habit completely instigated by yours truly. it has been condemned by many visitors, yet upheld by certain family members so can everyone stop blaming me already!? by the way, she does like the sweater. we were also visited by some pilgrims recently...

and here's one just in case you forgot what i looked like. i feel like lauren taking pictures of myself in the bathroom. miss you, lor...

today i got to take n to his physical therapist who works with him at a residential therapy pool in town. it was great to see him moving around in the water-- one of the places he has always been at home. they keep the temperature at 95 degrees so he was plenty warm and it's ozonated not chlorinated so that is wonderful. and best of all, it's mostly covered by insurance. praise the Lord! his p.t. is a wonderful woman who gently challenged him with lots of arm and leg reps. with kickboards, floats, and her own resistance against his. she finished up with a really cool aquatherapy technique called watsu... something like water shiatsu. she helped him strap into leg and neck floats then buoyed him up on his back. i watched a marked relaxation and relief wash over nathanael's tired and unbelievably frail body as his head slipped into her hands and the floats upheld the rest. i wanted to cry and fall asleep a the same time watching n float like an angel with no pressure on his joints nor anywhere. there was just the sound of water echoing off concrete as she softly zigzagged him through the water making sure to keep his eyes from the refracting sunlight that was dancing off everything. we both felt better afterwards. the other great news is that she said we could pay for facility use and come on our own time if i could remember her techniques and practice them with him. this really blessed us, since she didn't have any ego involved and just wants n to get exercise. this would be a wonderful activity for us so i'm just praying we can make it work with our schedules.

here is n a while back before it got chilly. wally is surely a nice companion dog for him.

and here is our pretty girl whom everyone we meet on street or trail calls: "Buddy! Hey, Buddy!" come on, people. doesn't she look like a florabelle?

and here is her sci fi debut in tent rocks not far from area 51...

thanks for reading. i surely appreciate it. i hope all of you wonderful family and friends are well. thinking of you much on this thanksgiving weekend.

one more thing...george washington? fraggle? or lucy? let me know.

tired

it's been a while. most of you know that n is not doing well. his legs and feet are in much pain as the tendons, ligaments and bones are deteriorating in his knees and ankles. the best we can do right now is to try to get him to a therapy pool. we so appreciate all of the prayers and phonecalls. we had to get n a walker. it's been pretty sad around here.

we had a visitor, our friend jeff, who loves n. he is a treasure hunter and adventurer who brought over some old weaponry and tales from the past to cheer n up. they get along famously and j.d. was greatly impressed, too. we are blessed to be here in NM with so many kind folks who want to see n well.

and of course there's wally. she is the queen of the lamy frontier and keeps us smiling. if anyone is still reading this here blog, will you do me a little favor and leave a comment so i know if it's worth my time to write these here updates? peace and love.

weekend wandering

these daisies get more and more plentiful as winter approaches. here it comes...

in light of the current economic crisis, and other problems, cho (hilary) and i decided to escape, that is, take leave of the house this weekend and ponder lighter things. on saturday we went to the randall davey audubon center to tour randy's not-often-opened house and check out the property. it was lovely and fun to see things of the past in another picturesque high desert landscape. on sunday we attended the first in a series of lectures at the museum of spanish colonial art. it was about the origins of the plaza and pal. it was kind of boring, but hils thoroughly enjoyed it. i did like the story about the guy who broke into the palace of the governors by scaling the wall, cruising the place, picking up what he wanted, leaving out the front door, burying loot in a timber pile right out front, and then passing out in an adjoining ditch... all with footprints left in the snow. nice one, dude. he was readily apprehended. here's a wall at randy's audubon center. photo courtesy of cho!

and this one, too. bar maiden in randy's private cantina.

randy's pastels. kinda blurred.

mr. davey's beautiful house.

we also went to an open house for kindred spirits animal sanctuary. they take care of disabled and elderly animals.

this was my favorite dog. he is ralphie. it was a little depressing to go here because i was thinking about n the whole time and creatures who suffer and have no one to help them. it's amazing when you find people who dedicate their lives to helping creatures like this.

autumn will come

"He will give the rain for you land in its season, the autumn and spring rain, that you may gather in your grain and your new wine and your oil." Deuteronomy 11:14

the fall is absolutely gorgeous here. the changes are subtle- the monsoons and lightning are less frequent, sharp, little purple daisies are replacing sunflowers on the roadside, it's easier to find a parking place downtown, chapped lips (a bain of winter in NM) are beginning to creak for moisture. i've been quite busy at work and haven't had much time to enjoy scenes like this one for a while, but when i do chance to look up, i am very grateful to be here.

above is apache plume, below is a lounge lizard. i looked up from the computer one day and there he was. and then about 10 minutes later, there was a king snake slithering through the courtyard. it's a jungle out here.

autumn has always marked changes for us. mostly in N's health. i remember the fall when we began dating and how i watched a decline in his cheerfulness and hopefulness, and increase in his discomfort and symptoms. i thought he would be supernaturally healed by our april wedding 4.5 years ago, but instead, since then, we have learned to walk by faith and not by sight. it has been a tough journey, but each year, the Lord has provided grace. Grace to keep going and grace to believe He is who He says He is. Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today and forever. He does miracles in our lives everyday, and these are not just coincidences or resolutions to press on. Nope. I know some would like to credit our strong personalities or sensible attributes, but if you witnessed the challenges and breakdowns from within our hearts, if you talked to those who have to put up with us, you'd have to admit that there is something else at work here. And that something is Jesus in our hearts, living and moving as we invite Him. I know it sounds strange to many of you, but if you really want to know what I'm talking about, I suggest you ask Him yourself who He is, if He's real, and see what happens. If He's the way, the truth and the life like He says He is. What does that mean? I would ask Him. I'm not kidding, knowing Him, not just knowing of Him has changed my life.

"Ask and it shall be given to you; seek, and you shall find; knock, and it shall be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, and he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks it shall be opened." Jesus-Matthew 7:7-8