What's on My Pointy Sticks?

Well, it has been a long time since I posted anything about knitting. So here it is. This is in honor of Colleen who told me she has taken up knitting! I taught her!!!
This sweater if for Mary. It's going fast. I started it just last week. It's fun. I like cables (bubbles).








Next is Marco's sock. This is the famous Grumperina Jaywalker sock.

.

Getting Ready for Easter

Katie and "Grab-i-elle" went and talked to the Easter Bunny the other day at the mall. From what I hear, he did not talk back. I am not sure where Mary was. Perhaps she would have been too scared.

Costa Rica Pfun

Saturday, we were off bright and early for the volcano. Just last week, it erupted, and we were among the first to be let into see it again. After a Costa Rican breakfast, we were off to LaPaz Waterfall.....


There was a butterfly pavillion, a hummingbird refuge, and a snake exhibit. There was also this typical cart and "oxen". They weren't really oxen.








We next hiked to the LaPaz Waterfall. It was beautiful.















The last part of the tour was a boat ride down the Sarapiqui
River, where we say monkeys in the trees, lots of interesting birds, a couple of iguanas, and other such things. It was really a nice tour.

Sunday, we went canopy leaping. You glide from tree to tree on cables......

Kinda SCAREY but definitely pfun!!

Unfortuanaely, we're rule followers and didn't take our cameras (I have the good camera!) on the first part of the tour.... the really pretty part through the trees.

KUBA!

Well Jay FINALLY had his dream come true of getting a male German Shepard... and here he is! He named him Kuba, and Jay can't wipe the smile off his face for anything. He is so excited.


He's just a little guy... and he's having a hard time since today is his first time away from his mom and brothers and sisters. He was in a litter with 8 puppies.





Gracie and Greta are really good with him - Gracie just kind of smells him and backs up, but Greta is a little more interested.















He likes Jay's feet...



and his new toy frog. :)

Office Remodel

Derek and Mary Kay decided to update the house, The couches in the den needed to be downstais. Once that was done, why not move the office? So that's what we did...



Don't think that getting those monster things out of there was easy!!! We then put them in the garage, which for me was maybe even more of an accomplishment than the office. (Pics coming soon)





This is Mary Kay's new music room. She's going to get a piano when she gets tenure. Wish her luck. Publish! Publish! Publish!!! She is in two minds if she should get the new digital baby grand, available at Costco, or the traditional string piano.


Finally, the new office!!!

You can see Derek's new Mac. It's fancy. You turn it on and it's ready to go. Virtually no boot time. Amazing. The walls look great. (Mary Kay is doing taxes.)

Christmas in March

Here is the long awaited photo of my new bike. I love it. I like to think it makes people smile when the see me riding it. On one of my rides, someone even told me, "Nice bike!" Probably the drivers who have to go around me in the morning on the way to work don't like me very much, but that's ok. I don't like cars much on my bike, either. So that works out well. I had to buy new lunch containers. The old ones' lids would pop off and when I got to work my lunch was in my bag. :( Now I have locking lids. :) But my basket is a bit too small for the new lunch containers. It's still a work in progress.

New furniture!

Here are some pictures of our new furniture! We got cherry, so it will darken over time... it's a pretty color now but will get quite a bit darker in the first year, then slowly darker for pretty much ever.

Cake decorating class

I forgot to take pictures of my cupcakes AND my last cake... but here are some pictures of Shandi and I finishing our cakes from our cake class. Unfortunately I have to wait until June to take part 2, so stay tuned...

The Pete cake is mine...

The star cake is Shandi's.

Here we are in Costa Rica......

This is San Jose's version of San Marco.



This picture is on one of the ceilings. The Italian artist had never been to Costa Rica, and he didn't know that coffee plants are over 6' high, and that a bunch of bananas this large would weigh over 100 lbs.
Most of the paintings and artwork is Italian.

Here we are in San Jose. Yesterday, we went to the Teatro Nacional. It's a lovely old building, built in the late 1800's. After the Teatro, we found a nice bakery and had some coffee and delicious pastry.

Happy Birthday, Mary!!!

Mary had a great first birthday. We ate hamburgers, beans, carrots, and cucumbers. All chosen with Mary's 4 teeth in mind!


Then she had TWO cupcakes! Katie also had cupcakes while the rest of us enjoyed an ice cream pie.






Finally she and her daddy went swimming. Tonight was the last night of lessons. Don't worry, the new session starts next week. Happy Birthday, Mary!!!

Gymnastics

Here are some pics



Katie was pretty excited to have someone else there taking pics. She did really well. Jumped over ropes, has good balance, lots of things...

Ogni riccio é un capriccio

In Italy they still use curlers!!! And not electric ones!!! I had to try it.

It took a while to get them rolled.

Marco and Gabriella gave me a magazine so I could be very Italian.

Getting them out took an act of congress!!! They were all tangled in my hair.

Look at the result. I was hoping to be beautiful, but instead I thought it was just goofy. After 6 hours. And they didn't even last so that anyone on the plane the next day could see me with curls or people in customs could think I wasn't me.

Santiago

I am back from my Spain Italy tour and here are a few pics. I wanted to post some from over there, but I only had access to dial up, so no thank you for uploading pictures. More will come soon
This is inside the cathedral. If you bump your head on this (the statue of the person who created it, Mateo) you will get some of his genius.

This is a picture of the tapas bar where we had lunch everyday. It was YUMMY!