Squares from the H family

Our good friends, the H family, gave us these squares last night when we met them and several other friends for dinner. I met mom B about 10 years ago when volunteering for a youth program at FLC. Daughter S, now a senior in high school, was only about 7 or 8 at the time and was one of the kids at my table every Wednesday night for dinner. They also have a son, A, in college. We've become great friends over the years, and we also need to extend a big thank you for being one of our references during our home study process!

Here are their contributions to the quilt. First, this cute cat and dog print. E always loves playing with their pets when we're at their house!


Next, in honor of their vacation home in Maine, lighthouses and sailboats. Yes, it always nice to have friends with a vacation home (and a boat to go with it) in Maine! Did I mention it's waterfront and on an island?!?! They were kind enough to invite us up for a weekend last summer and we had a great time!


Next (to compete with my dad's Corvette fabric) is this car fabric. Gee, I have no idea what kind of car this is, but I know that D has one of these cars that he's been working to rebuild. D, if you read this, maybe you can add a comment about what kind of car it is?!?!


And finally, this one of a kind square! Daughter S has a friend who helped out with the calligraphy on this one. It says "Child of God" in Chinese. Very special! Thank you all so much! How do you feel about having a baby in Maine later this summer?!?! :)

Treasure hiding in China

We have applied to participate in the Infinity Project while on our trip to China. The Infinity Project is a project sponsored by glass artist Josh Simpson. This is an involved explanation of how we came to meet Josh, so try to follow along.

Many moons ago, K's family lived in Morgantown, WV while his father was working on his Ph.D. They became friendly with a man who made Shaker furniture. They purchased a beautiful cherry rush-woven rocker from him. When K and I first got married, we really wanted a rocker just like that one, but alas, it was not in our budget at that time. By the time we could afford to splurge on it, the price had risen considerably again, but throwing caution (and budget) to the wind, we ordered one anyway.

Anyway, by this time, the chairmaker was living in California. When we called to order the chair, we asked about shipping arrangements, which of course added to the cost significantly. He said that if we could wait until the fall, he would be in New England for some furniture shows and we could pick it up from him.

When he came to New England, he invited us to meet him at the home of a friend of his, Josh Simpson, where he was staying for a few nights. "Josh is a glassmaker," he said, "and he's giving tours of his studio this weekend, so come out, take a tour, grab your chair..." So, out to western MA we drove for a beautiful fall drive. When we arrived, our chair was sitting out on the lawn under a big tree. It was gorgeous! Here's a pic of it today...

Now, imagine our surprise when we take a tour of this PHENOMENAL studio - very impressive! Josh is known for making "planets" that look like this one:

Some of them are as small as quarter-diameter marbles. Some were larger than softballs. And a few approached the size of a basketball. They are truly stunning and no two are alike. It was fascinating to learn how he even makes the little threads of glass that make their way into his planets.

After the tour, we are invited into their house to eat. We eat in their beautiful dining room chairs, all made by the furniture-maker, who bartered them for some of Josh's work. We meet Josh's new bride (they had only been married a week at the time). They tell us that she flies, and they had their small plane over near our place a few nights before for an evening flight. I notice that she's wearing a NASA golf shirt, but hey, a lot of people visit the Kennedy Space Center on vacation, right? She talks about flying for her job. I ask her what she does for a living, and I never expected to hear what came out of her mouth next...she said, "Oh, I'm a space shuttle astronaut!" How cool is that?!?!?! Her name is Cady Coleman, and she's been on two missions thus far. (No, she is not the astronaut in the news this week!) Here's a picture of her, and this is a link to her biography.

Anyway, Josh has been the subject of at least two PBS specials. You can see his work here, and you really should take a peek...it's amazing stuff! We have two of his planets, a medium-sized marble and a larger one (maybe 2/3 the size of a baseball).

The Infinity Project was something that he did for the year 2000. He asked people to apply to get a small planet from him - actually, you get two planets - one to keep and one to hide. You are supposed to hide it in a cool place. We thought that we could put one in somewhere in the Great Wall or in Tiananmen Square or the Forbidden City. We sent an application and heard back today that the committee meets regularly and we should hear soon. You can read more about the Infinity Project on his website and see a photo scrapbook of places where people have hidden their planets.

And speaking of the travel packet...

...we have been in contact with several CAWLI families with the same LID as us, as well as a few that are a day or two earlier or later than ours. Apparently, one of the families asked that a separate newsgroup be set up for those of use with late-October LIDs. There are 34 families, many of whom will be in our travel group.

Someone posed the question last night about traveling to Beijing a day early. This is something that K and I talked about a while ago. It gets you an extra day of sightseeing, as well as one extra day to recuperate from the jet lag before getting a potentially cranky baby handed over to you! The downside of this plan is that you don't travel with your group, which we think is an important thing to do.

Anyway, a few of us in the newsgroup mentioned that we might be interested, so I emailed the agency today just to get an idea of the extra cost, which it turns out, may only be about $100-$150 per person. So, I think this is something that we would seriously consider. There was another CAWLI family that traveled early last summer and they spent the time at a silk factory and at the Beijing zoo.

My motivation at the gym

Here is the picture that I keep in mind when I'm on the stairclimber at the gym. It is the section of the Great Wall of China that we will be climbing, about 90 minutes north of Beijing. It is a very steep section of the Wall. This photo was taken by another CAWLI family during their trip about a year ago. They took a few shots from the bottom looking up the mountain, but somehow they don't seem as intimidating as this shot from the top down. And, "down" is back to the parking lot and buildings in the upper left corner of the shot, not that little guardhouse on the right! I get dizzy just looking at this photo.

According to the travel packet we received earlier this week, you only get about two hours at this location, so that means I have about 40 minutes to get to the top, 40 minutes to recuperate, and 40 minutes to get back down. Hmmm...thus far, I've only been training on level 4 (of 20) for about 20 minutes at the gym. Time to kick up the training a bit...

Xin Nian Kuan Le!

Happy Year of the Pig! Yes, this greeting is a bit early, as Chinese New Year officially gets underway on February 18th. Our adoption agency is having its annual Chinese New Year party tomorrow, but we won't be attending this year. We did go last year and had a great time. There's lunch (Chinese food, of course), entertainment by singers, musicians, and dancers, and a wonderful raffle to benefit CAWLI's Rainbow Fund, a charity which donates every single penny collected to helping China's Center for Adoption Affairs find homes for children with correctable medical conditions and to help individual SWI (social welfare institutes, aka orphanages). Our agency consistently donates more than $50,000 each year to these causes. Here is a link to more detailed information.

Here are a few photos from last year's party. It's absolutely enormous - 1800 people (include 700 beautiful children, almost all dressed in their Chinese silk dresses).





K and I will be going to EJ's 2nd grade classroom on Tuesday to do a program on Chinese New Year. We have a book to read and a lantern craft to make with them. We'll show them a map of China and point out the places we'll be visiting. And we're taking oranges with us for snacks (a traditional CNY treat - notice the lion eating them in the photos above). I'll try to post some pictures.

And finally, I picked up these stamps at the post office a week ago. I think I'm going to have to go back for more, since I can stock up and use them for the adoption announcements! Aren't they cool? There is one for each animal in the Chinese zodiac.

Progress on E's desk...

Yes, that new table saw is being put to good use building the desk for EJ's room. So far, he's only been back to buy two more pieces of lumber--one that he cut wrong, and one where he decided to use something other than 2x4s because he wasn't happy with the way it looked. And, I think he's only had to correct one mistake so far. Anyway, here's what the desk is supposed to look like when it's done. I'll show you the finished product as it gets closer and you can judge for yourself.

Fabric from the last few days

I know, I know...I haven't posted in THREE WHOLE DAYS!!! Sorry, it's been a bit crazy. I've been busy doing other things (including washing and drying all of the fabric I've received thus far), and I've ignored my blogging responsibilities!

Here are the few fabrics I've received over the past few days. First up is a square from F. and R. C. at FLC. Thank you very much!

Next up is more FLC fabric - from the U. family! Mom C sent this cute print along with this note: "...the pattern, Memoirs from China, might be just the right square to complete Baby H's quilt. May it serve as a reminder that her roots will always be an integral part of who she is as her past becomes woven into her future." If memory serves me correctly, C also took the Quilt in a Day class many years ago. She and I also had fun last winter at the FLC cooking club. Thanks to Dad M, Mom C, and daughters S and R (both of these names are on our list of potential names!)

And finally, remember a few weeks ago when my aunt sent a square that had been from something of my grandmother's? Well, that got me wondering whether I had anything of my mother's that could be included in the quilt, but I don't think I have anything made of fabric that I am willing to cut up! I called my dad, who dug into the cedar chest in storage and found a few more things that I'm not willing to cut up!!! Well, not quite. He found a baby outfit of mine (he believes I wore it the first time they took me out after I was born) and a hand-embroidered dresser scarf that he thinks she made. One thing he did find that I think will make its way into the quilt is this fabric, which was from some curtains in the house. Thanks, Dad, for sending all of this to me!!!