Christmas Letter 2012

This has been a year of great changes for us!  As many of you know, Tim finished his PhD in electrical engineering at the University of Washington in May.  His research focused on surgical robotics.  I was privileged to help edit his dissertation and see him defend it.  His work found that the expensive way that surgeons evaluate trainees' surgical skill is no better than a guy with a stopwatch -- the new approach that Tim is working on is better.

After a huge amount of work and an especially challenging last six months, Tim (we) got his (our) reward.  As one friend put it, we gave birth to a PhD.  Oh, and during this time I continued to teach English as a Second Language, which I really enjoyed.

Tim had already landed a job in Minnesota, and they were eager to get him out here, so without much of a break, we moved here at the beginning of June.  You can read about our road trip if you like -- it's the first post in this blog.  Tim started as a professor of Mechanical Engineering at the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis in mid-June.  We rented a lovely duplex unit in a lovely neighborhood in lovely St. Paul.

Tim was thrown right in and his job has been demanding and rewarding ever since.  He enjoys teaching and working with students.  He is also continuing his research, so he had to find students to work in his lab and has to apply for grants and lots of other fun stuff.

He was surprised at the....interesting lab facilities when he arrived.

BEFORE:

AFTER:

As for me, I figured I would take a few weeks to settle in and then look for something in ESL.  Wrong!   About a week after arriving here we found out we were pregnant!  After over three years of prayer and everything we could do to achieve pregnancy morally and naturally, it really is a miracle.  If I haven't said this to you all before, thank you so much for your love, support and many prayers for us!  They worked!!

Our baby boy is due in early March.  We have been taking some wonderful birth classes and are doing our best to prepare, at the same time realizing we have no idea what is about to happen.  We're very thankful that Tim will not be teaching any classes next semester.  I've had a very good pregnancy -- "morning" sickness (really all-day sickness) was very intense, but everything else has been going well, for which we're very thankful.  Since you can't see the baby yet, here's his adorable coming-home outfit.

Other than that, we have been getting involved a little at church and trying to meet people, now that I'm feeling better.  I play piano for a little inner-city Catholic church in Minneapolis and we really like that community.  At the same time, there's a church closer to us that we like as well, so we'll have to decide which one will become our official parish.

All in all, it's been a very significant year and we're growing a lot, as well as feeling very thankful for the many blessings.  Marriage seems to get better with each passing year - especially with this new baby chapter of our lives beginning.

We wish all of you and your loved ones much peace and many blessings this Christmas season and New Year!

Snow!

This is a little belated, but I wanted to share our snow happiness.   A week ago we got our first real snow of the season - 10 & 1/2 inches in one night.

The Mississippi is starting to freeze over.

The roads have been...interesting.  We were impressed with the armada of plows - everything was plowed very quickly.  However, with that much snow at once they can't get it all off the road, so instead it became incredibly compact snow that was pretty slippery and wouldn't melt.  It's finally off the roads now, a week later.

Halloween Street

I like All Hallow's Eve, more for the holy day we Catholics celebrate - All Saints' Eve - than the weird yard displays.  However, it turns out that the street on the other side of our block is known as "Halloween Street," and it's pretty cool.

We heard that people over there socialize with neighbors on Halloween, but we didn't have the whole story!

On the afternoon of the 31st, I walked up the street and was amazed at what was going on.  People were putting up huge displays - I think some people actually took the afternoon off work to do so!  I talked to a neighbor who was putting up the "Hollywood" display.  He informed me that the street gets 800-1,000 kids, and they have street performers come in!

I got pictures in daylight since I figured my phone wouldn't take good pictures at night.

Where the Wild Things Are

????????

The Woman Who Started it All

One Night Shot

Hollywood - Elvis is in the chair

Nothing like a guillotine and Mrs. Frankenstein lighting Your cigarette

Zombie Voting Booth - Kids could "vote" by putting a sticker  inside

We checked it out that night.  Everyone was out in their front yards with fires going.  We missed the Morris Dancers but saw some great costumes - one kid was dressed as a spaghetti dinner, complete with table around her neck.  We also met some more neighbors.  Including a young couple with a new baby!  I'm so thankful to finally have a new friend/walking partner close to my house.

Our neighborhood is cool....

Mushroom Madness

I joined the Minnesota Mycological Society.  I am now an official foraging nerd.  I went to one of their meetings, where I learned about easy-to-identify fungi like "Chicken of the Woods" and "Hen of the Woods.  There were a mix of people there; mostly older but a few young.  It was a fun, educational and random activity.

http://www.minnesotamushrooms.org/

Then a few weeks later, Tim and I joined them for a Foray at a park.  BUT NO MUSHROOMS!!  I think it was because there has been so little rain all summer and fall (until now).

I, however, found a number of too-old Chicken of the Woods.  We should go back earlier next year.

Specimen #1

Specimens #2-12

It was disappointing not to find anything, but it was a nice walk in the woods.

Tim likes hunting for mushrooms because he's Polish.  Half of the people on the foray were from Slavic countries.

A few weeks later, we found this specimen at a park right by our house!  It's an oyster mushroom.  I also found my finger in the picture.

Here I am cutting it off the log....like a maniac!

I made it into a soup, but I didn't get a picture of the soup.  It was delicious.  Although Tim was a little nervous (despite my careful research to I.D. it) we became neither sick nor poisoned.

I keep seeing those flying monkeys, though...

Duluth Adventure

We took a weekend trip to Duluth.  For those unfamiliar, it's 2.5 hours north of St. Paul, on Lake Superior.  It used to have the highest percentage of millionaires of any city in the world!!  ...who must have really liked cold weather.

The fall colors were peaking.  Apparently, everyone and his brother went to Duluth!  I started looking for a hotel room a week before we went, and the fifth or sixth hotel I tried, I got the last available room.

This is at Birdwatcher's Ridge Observatory, where you can observe birdwatchers, as we are doing here.  Actually, it's Hawk Ridge and it's a big place for migrating raptors.  We saw several hawks and a bald eagle very high in the sky when we first arrived.  Then they disappeared, so we got no amazing close-up shots.

The birds get counted every day.  All these people with fancy binoculars stand on a special platform to do the counts, yelling things like, "There's a goshawk on the ridge!"

I commented that it's funny how people get so into certain things, like birds, followed by a comment about how excited I am to go on our mushroom hunting trip in a couple of weeks.

We went to Gooseberry Falls State Park, where everyone else went.  The falls were much smaller than PNW waterfalls, and I think smaller than usual because of the drought, but still nice.

Lots of kids and families were playing all over the rocks.

Our new home.

We kept noticing how similar Lake Superior is to the ocean; it's huge and had big waves, due to the wind.  But no tide, tidepools or normal beach creatures.  It felt strangely like something was missing.  I guess we're coastal people.

Next we went to Split Rock Lighthouse State Park, which seemed prettier and where there were hardly any people.  A nice beach to walk along and get free views of the lighthouse.

Our last stop on Sunday was a lovely rose garden on a bluff overlooking the lake.

They have to do all sorts of crazy things to allow the rosebushes to survive the winter here.   Dig a trench next to it, bend the bush into it, cover it with dirt.  Lots of work for a few months of blooms!

Here's the happy couple again.

We had a really nice weekend -- a welcome respite together in the midst of Tim's very busy new career.

Pickled Rhubarb

Apparently, as soon as I start feeling better, the first thing I do is start canning.  We have a huge rhubarb plant in our backyard in the wasteland - I mean garden.  I hate to let free food go to waste.

So I made pickled rhubarb last weekend.  Probably something that was a little more popular 100 years ago.  But canning is back in style so I'm sure it's really hip.

I consulted several different recipes on-line and used elements of each.

Here's what I did:

Cut the stalks close to the ground.

Here's the recipe I used -  originally for 6 jars.  I increased the ingredients a little (that's what the plus signs mean) to get 7 jars, since that's how many you can fit in the canning pot.

• 3+ pounds of rhubarb
• 3+ cups water
• 2+ cups white vinegar (5%)
• 1 cup white wine vinegar (6% or slightly more is best for this one)
• 3+ cups sugar
• 1.5+ teaspoons salt
• 1 teaspoon pickling spice per jar

Pickling Spice Mix:  I made my own, without exact measurements.  It went something like this:

Greater Amount:  bay leaves (torn up); peppercorns; mustard seed
Smaller Amount:  cinnamon bark, cardamom, ground ginger, dill seed, dried dill, cumin, red chili flakes

You could also add whole cloves and allspice; I didn't have any, so I left those out.

I wanted to experiment with the flavor, so for some jars I used only pickling spice; in one jar I also put slices of fresh ginger, and in one jar I included a star anise (available at Asian grocery stores).

Next, I got the canning pot boiling, which takes forever!  I put the jars in while it heated up so that they would be sterilized.  I put the lids in a small pan of water to simmer, to sterilize them and soften the rubber seals.  (Actually, I started this stuff before I even went outside to pick the rhubarb.)

The water, vinegar, sugar and salt I put in a large pot on the stove and heated it, not to boiling.

Then I set out to cut the rhubarb.

I worked a lot on the first slice, to make sure it was the right height for the jar, leaving about an inch of  headspace. Then I used that slice to cut the other slices.  I made little piles based on how many I could fit into one jar.  (I used an extra jar I didn't actually can with for the measurements.)

I took the jars out after they had boiled for a while, and put about a teaspoon of pickling spice (and fresh ginger and star anise) in the bottom of the jars.  Then I filled them with their rhubarb slices.  Since there were a lot of left-over pieces, I cut these up small to make a relish in one jar.

Next I filled each jar with the hot pickling liquid.

**Important Step I Forgot!**  You're supposed to jiggle the jar or use a knife to get out the air bubbles.  I forgot to do this.  I looked it up, and it sounds like it won't make the food go bad, but it may discolor more because there was extra air in there, so not all of the air at the top was forced out during canning.  We'll have to eat them soon!

After wiping the jar rims with a damp cloth and drying off the lids, I put a lid and ring on each jar and tightened - not too tight.  Then I lowered each one into the hot water bath.  Enjoy your bath, guys!

After 10 minutes processing time, I lifted them out and left them alone overnight to cool and seal.

I don't know how other people end up with such nice-looking jars.  I thought I squished them in there pretty tight, but I think it wasn't tight enough, since they floated up and left all that space.  Oh well.  The important thing is whether they taste good.  We will find out in a couple of weeks, after the flavors have some time to infuse.  Next project is jam!

It's Fall....

...and it's cold!   The days have been sunny and often warm, but we've been surprised by how chilly the evenings are.  Tim and I keep commenting to each other after we come inside, "What have we done?"  You can feel that winter is coming.  Northeastern Minnesota already had a light snowfall, and we almost had frost last night!

One nice thing is Minnesota is very pretty in the fall.  Yesterday we visited the nearby dam and locks on the Mississippi.

We thought it was funny that they operated the locks to let some canoers through!

Then we went to the Minnehaha Falls area.  The Falls was a tiny trickle, but I bet I can get an impressive photo after we have some rain.  It hasn't rained for a long, long time.  I actually miss it!!!

There's Tim among the fall foliage along Minnehaha Creek.  Great name, great park and trail --  it felt like we were out of the city.  Now that I'm feeling better, we can resume our explorations of our new environs.   Next weekend it's Duluth!

Goin' to the Fair

Saturday we attended the Minnesota State Fair.  It's held right in St. Paul, everyone goes and it's a really big deal.  Tim's assistant head of the department, at a meeting, stressed how important it was for people to attend these meetings, "unless you're going to the fair or something!"  He thought she was joking, but she was serious!  Couldn't imagine that happening at UW - Tim's advisor saying, "It's really important that you all attend this meeting - unless you're doing the Puyallup, of course."

We got a lot of pictures of awesome animals - I'll keep the narration to a minimum.

Goat judging:

Crazy chickens:

Ah, the antics of young goats.  Hilarious!

I love goats.  I would like to have a couple some day, along with chickens.

Two-day-old piglets:

I don't like pigs very much after some...interesting experiences on the road during my youth ministry year, but the really little baby ones were sort of cute.

We saw other baby aminals, cows in labor(!), bonsai and amazing handicrafts, and Tim had some delicious fair food.  It was exhausting but fun.  Apparently we missed the butter sculptures.  Next time....

The weekend before, we saw our friends the Fergusons at their family cabin, but this is the only picture we got:

Oh, and this one.  What a great family!

Goodbye, Washington

It's so official now.

Notice the man taking off the Washington license plate.

Notice the man putting on the Minnesota license plate and looking at the camera.

Now the man is putting the front license plate on, so as to be legal.

Now the man is finished.