Terra's Christmas

Terra made out like a bandit this year. She was so happy with all of the gifts she received and spent the rest of the day playing with them. Shopkins, My Little Ponies, clothes, a "Launcher", Legos, and Pierced Ears. She was so afraid of being on the Naughty list that when she found out that she was in fact on the Nice List, she wrote another letter to Santa asking why she was moved.  We Skyped with Paul and were pretty lazy the rest of the day. Played games, watched movies, and took Sammy to the park. Mom and Tony are visiting and I am so glad to spend this time with family. There was only one thing missing but overall it was a pretty great day.

Pickles and Tanenbaum

Here is Terra during the school's Holiday Performance. Merry Christmas!

The Adventures of Murkey: Week 3

I got really hungry and ran all out of snacks in my room, so I had to find somewhere else to eat. Lucky me! There is a HUGE room with tons of people eating and they let me have a few things too. There is ice cream (chocolate, vanilla, strawberry and pralines and cream) along with lots of water and juice and cereal. Today they had chicken tenders and a big salad bar with olives and chickpeas! It was super yummy, just what a growing murloc needs.
I noticed that some of the people were very nicely dressed in smart uniforms, and some were walking around in what looked like pajamas and flip flops! It was a little strange to say the least, I didn't want someones feet near my food, so I sat near the back and chowed down. Lots of nice people from a place called the Philippines serving food and cooking. They were generous with the helpings of food, and I used my best manners to thank them. It looks like a tough job.
Well, now I have to figure out where to go next! Until next week.

The Adventures of Murky: Week 2 - into the MWR

This week, after spending far too much time in my room. I decided to go and see what else was out there. I found a HUGE building with tons of people in it that had couches, and TV's and pool tables, and Ping Pong, and darts and movies everywhere. It was great because I got to relax and use my computer to talk to some Family that I was missing. The funniest thing was that there were people playing World of Warcraft in there, thats where I am from! I was tempted to jump on their computers to surprise them, but I decided I had better not. That would have been rude.

Until next week brave adventure seekers!

The adventures of Murky: Week 1

I've arrived in a strange place! I popped out of my box and into another box. Its a room but it has no windows and it smells sort of funny. Kind of like ham! I can see that there isn't much to do in here, so I had better figure out things to do so I can keep busy. Someone has left some knitting lying around, so maybe I can work on that while I wait for the next chance to go outside and see what sort of world I am in!
I miss my family back home, and being able to watch Terra play in her room. I hope I am not out here for too long!

Halloween

Halloween without Paul was not very exciting but here are some pictures from the day. Starting with the costume parade held at Terra's school, on to her class party that I organized, and finally with Trick or Treating that night.

Gardens

The butterfly garden has been a source of frustration and passion for a while now, I believe that I started work on it some time last year. After hours of moving dirt, mulching tree limbs and researching plants, we now have a garden space at the fellowship. It's hard to really put the amount of work into perspective, but some pictures will help.

This is a before shot, that large bush is where the spiral shaped bed is located, to give you an idea of placement. I will say that it was a day long process to pull that bush out.

Here is a great after shot, you can see the spiral bed, and the start of the brick path.

This is a befor shot, its of the middle / back half of the garden.

Nice after shot, this is the middle, you can't see it but the rosemary in the picture before is just to the right of this. You can see though how wide of a space it is.

This is a great before shot, here is from the bottom of the hill looking up, you can see the wall that was in place that we eventually dug up and used to make the spiral bed and the bottom bed. 

And here is an after shot, the bottom bed was raised a bit and you can see all of the other beds we made as well. The bottom bed is a raised hugelkultur bed with rotting wood under the mulch and dirt, and it has a large drainage pipe that you can sub-surface water into with buckets.

Spiral bed, growing a desert willow and some yankee point lilac for now. It also has a sub surface watering point. Lots of earth moved for this bed, and it is a huglekultur as well.

You can't see it, but behind that log is a Palo Verde sapling that I planted from a seed while I was in Twentynine Palms, and finally transferred it to the garden. I hope it thrives!

Photographic proof that we touched the Stars!

Well not really, that would be creepy.

Reading Rainbow, Star Trek, and Hollywood

After a long wait, we were finally able to cash in on the kickstarter package we contributed to sometime last year for Reading Rainbow. We planned a nice trip up to Los Angeles to attend the Live event and to also go and have a little bit of Hollywood. It was a fun time, but we definitely were glad to be home at the end. Ate at a nice little local diner for breakfast on both days, (Dinah's Diner has huge waffles, good lord) and regretted a decision to eat at a french crepe bistro that was in a mall, haha. We also took a tour of the Le Brea tar pits, and Hollywood Blvd. It was a nice check off of the bucket list, but skeezy enough to not want to really do again. We did find the walk of fame Stars that were important to us though, and got to see the China Theater handprints. Oh and a live show from Battle of the Bands School of Rock at the House of Blues, can't complain! Now we are back home and getting ready for next weekend, when we go to the local Viking Festival! I have my mead horn at the ready!

La Brea Tar Pits

Saber Toothed Tiger ate mah babeh

Huge Mastodon. However, the best part was learning that Camels originated in North America, how crazy is that?

It was HOT waiting for the Reading Rainbow event.

The Men and Women of Star Trek read two children's books for us!

They also did a Trivia game

Brent Spiners team did not win.

I have a feeling that Kate Mulgrew was able to come since the Emmys were the very next day.

Saw the Jim Henson Company building, it was neat.

Queen!

Lucy!

Star Trek original cast

The Governator

At the Hard Rock

Haha Peter Frampton, Terra feeeeels like he doooooooo.

The tallest man in the world, the animatronic dummy would stand every now and then.

They had lots of Star Wars characters made out of Auto parts at Ripley's.

Judy Garland! Terra was pooped at this point.

Terra is SIX!

Today was Terra's birthday. We had some neighbor kids over as well as her best friend from Kindergarten. Overall I think Terra had a good time. There always seems to be some ups and downs with getting kids together. "No don't squirt me!" at a water gun party was kind of strange for me to hear. Plus no one wanted to play in the sprinkler. Coming from the South this was a foreign concept for me. If there was a sprinkler anywhere, it didn't matter if it was yours or not you wanted to go run and play in it. I do suppose that Californian kids are used to swimming pools and the beach more than sprinklers. I have food for days because I over prepared. Luckily it all freezes beautifully. With that over I suppose 1st grade is the next big thing on our radar. School starts in just over two weeks. YIKES!