Dark-eyed Junco

Dark-eyed junco/slate-colored junco 

I'm still experimenting with my new camera, and a tiny camera like mine isn't intended to take closeups of wildlife, but anyway--you can at least tell this is a bird, I hope. I haven't seen many birds today--the homeschoolers' football game that has been going on all afternoon in my backyard might have something to do with it. :-) The weather has been beautiful today--mid 70s.

"You did a good job..."

Just as I was about to leave for work this morning, David phoned. He was at the Presidential Inauguration, calling to brag a little and to tell me he had purchased a new coat yesterday so he could stand to be out in the cold. He had found some Taylor friends with whom to attend, and by the giggles in the background, they must have all been girls. He said someone wanted to tell me something, and then a stranger's voice came on, "Hi, my name is Lisa. I just want to tell you you have a wonderful son. You've done a good job raising him,..." I thought this might be a joke, so I asked her how old she was, as in "Are you old enough to make this judgment?" She assured me she had children older than my children, so yes, she was qualified to say. When David got back on the phone, I asked him if he had paid her to say that and he said, "No, I just saved her place in line."

A week and a half ago another person said something similar. We were attending an open house in the neighborhood, and one of the older gentlemen there looked over at Rachel and said, "Wow, she's come a long ways. I remember when you came to Dallas and she was just a toddler who had some problems. You've done a good job with her, you've been good parents." It was kind of him to say so, in spite of times when I don't feel like I have done a good job.

I do give thanks to God for his work in the lives of our children, and I pray for them every day, that they will "see Him more clearly, follow Him more nearly, love Him more dearly, day by day."

Bird Watching

It is bird watching season again, where are the birds? 

I have rebooted my computer about 15 times today.

I'm playing around with my camera too, trying to figure out if I can take bird photos with it. Stay tuned.

Holiday and Dinner Out

We had a day off work today so we spent it wisely: slept in until 9:30 (of course I was up several times putting the cat out, letting the cat in, feeding the cat, turning the faucet on for the cat, shutting the faucet off--but I digress!) then Gary and I each started separate cleaning projects. He worked on cleaning up his office, as he promised me he would do. Now it is 12 hours later and it hardly looks like anything was done, but he assures me it is all about infrastructure, or something like that.

I moved two bookshelves, two cupboards, and stuff in two closets, continuing the domino effect that started before Christmas when we gave Rachel's bed away. The result is now we have a music room with piano, dulcimer, guitars, African drum, flute, French horn, and lots of music and music books. (There is also a corner cupboard with toys for the two little African boys to play with when them come to visit me.)

And now Rachel's old bedroom has been converted to MY room--my computer (plus two other computers seldom used) a futon for guests, a dresser now being used for sorting stuff that comes for David or Andrew and the closet with off-season clothes. Eventually, I may move my rubber stamping stuff in here too, or even my desk for doing the family finances, but I'll have to think on that for a while. My computer is now situated in such a way that I can see the TV in our bedroom, so I can do two things at once :-)

We worked hard on all this today, then went out for a late dinner at Outback Steakhouse. Why did we go there? Because we had a $20 coupon, of course. Gary had steak and I had shrimp. Nice change from Taco Bueno :-)

Rachel made it safely back to school last night but couldn't get her computer to work. Late this afternoon she phoned the computer services guys, and they came to her dorm to check out the problem. And indeed there was a problem, something about a blade in a server for rooms 1-6 in the dorm. They fixed it, and now she's happy. She had her first day of teacher seminar which lasts this week, and tonight stared her once a week class on The Exceptional Child. (That's what I had--a pile of exceptional children.)

I've still got a couple hours of stuff to do to complete my house rearranging, but tomorrow it is back to work, now that Christmas vacation is finally over.