Friday, May 26, 2006

And a Baby in a Sink



Although she is not Jewish, Chessie (Joy) was wed on Tuesday. It was a lovely ceremony in a lovely country church. This is one of the pictures that I (Melody) took. Matt's pictures (from the real camera) will come later. I love this picture of Chessie because it has an essence of antiquity and dignity. She is quite the beautiful bride. The wedding was all so perfectly planned. Everything, from the items carried to the food at the reception, held significance. One thing that I found amusing, which I will ask Chessie about later, was during the prelude the pianist played Don McLean's "Vincent." It's a beautiful song, but I'm not sure how a song about an artist genius who committed suicide is relevent to marital bliss.

We are mostly moved into our new dwelling space. Matt and the wonderfully nice guys who helped him carry all the boxes and furniture up the 25 stairs started to question if the renting of this space was just an elaborate ploy to drum up business for the chiropractor downstairs. I find it quite refreshing to have walls that are not attached to anyone else's. Eleanor is enjoying the new and abundant space. My prayer was that she would remain immobile until we were able to move out of the closet we were living in. We've been here less than a week, and she has already taken great strides (pun intended) in mobility. Today she chased the cell phone about six feet across the floor. She hasn't quite grasped the hands and knees crawling, but she's on the move. I'll post the video soon.

This picture is of Eleanor in her play area, or the baby nook. She keeps it well organized thanks to colored baskets donated by my mom.



Eleanor loves the new big mirrors in the bathroom and vanity area. It's Matt's toothbrush she's playing with by the way.

Monday, May 15, 2006

Syllamore Creek






From the Mountain View trip. More from this series in the album on our Yahoo Photos Page.

Sunday, May 14, 2006

Friday, May 12, 2006

The Big Day






Tuesday, May 09, 2006

Caption Contest


Monday, May 08, 2006

Bach Party

Sorry, things get a little fuzzy here for some of the guys.







By the end (3 am), lil' Benji was all tuckered out.

Saturday, May 06, 2006

Photo of the Day - (Yet Another) Rehearsal Dinner






Last weekend I had the pleasure of being one of Ben Utter's groomsmen. It seems all my friends are getting married this year. If you're my friend and you're not yet getting married this year, watch out for suspicious women with cake samples.

To Ben and Brandy: I sincerely hope you're not spending time checking our weblog on your honeymoon, but if you are, you should know that I have a CD with your names on it with all the images I shot for you to claim when you wish.

Friday, May 05, 2006

Photo of the Day - Arkansas Stream

This is from a stream I visited with some friends outside of Mountain View a few weekends back. They were fishing for fish, I was fishing for photos and found three snakes. More later.

Wednesday, May 03, 2006

Happy 3/4 Birthday!

Today marks Eleanor's ninth month in this world. She's pretty happy about that.


She now has five teeth-three on bottom, two non-front teeth on top. Eleanor's favorite thing to do these days is roll around. I'm hoping that she can hold off on the crawling for about two more weeks. That's when we move into a bigger apartment.

Eleanor also likes playing in boxes.

I guess it runs in the family.

Monday, May 01, 2006

The Hat



Fifty bonus points to anyone who can guess who this hat belongs to.

Sunday, April 30, 2006

Something Old, Something New


This series of photos is of Matt and his dad and a dulcimer. (You can click on it to make it bigger for easier viewing.)




These photos are of Eleanor and Matt and a dulcimer.

Monday, April 17, 2006

Easter Sunday


Easter Sunday
Originally uploaded by bendblock.
Look, we are wearing pretty clothes. I have to admit that I conformed to the culture and dressed Eleanor up in a lacy dress with lacy socks and shiny shoes. My only consolation was that her dress was in the style of Jackie O.

In other news, it's hot. When we were in Indonesia, it was hot. I probably complained about it more than I remember, but I don't remember complaining that much. We expected it to be hot. Cars didn't have "air cons." When we got too hot, we would retreat to our nice climate controlled bedroom and watch movies on our laptop.

Now it's hot again. This time we didn't expect it. Not because it's April and in the 90's, but because we live in a climate controlled world. Our lives consist of moving from one cooled box to another. The box where we eat and sleep is at this time not cooled. I've been complaining about it almost non-stop. Last summer I complained to the management no less than ten times about the lack of coolness. Each time the (insert adjective here) maintenance man would “re-charge” the unit, meaning he refilled it with some form of Freon. That ozone-depleting chemical would leak out into the environment, killing small woodland creatures in its path and make its way up into the air where it would eat away at the ozone layer. I’m sure that’s why it’s 92 degrees in April.

Eleanor now has four teeth, but not the four you would expect. She has her bottom front teeth that have been there for three months or so, and two top non-front teeth. She is toying with the idea of mobility. Strange baby. She’s been reading quite a bit lately and is a pro at turning pages. She really likes to turn the same page back and forth. We took her to an amazing Good Friday service featuring Waterdeep (or at least Don and Lori Chaffer). Eleanor sang along with Lori on one song and thoroughly enjoyed the music. We did too.

You can see more pictures of our darling and other people and things of interest by clicking on either the picture in this post or on the "Flickr" link on the right side of the page.

Thursday, April 06, 2006

Pod ----------------------------------------------cast




Matt's Favorite Podcasts (in order of most anticipated and listened to):*

They Might Be Giants Podcast
Everyone's favorite Nerd Rock band discovers the ideal venue for their blend of creative sounds and paranoia. Don't miss an episode!

Electronic Periodic
30 minute mix of new, interesting, ambient to trance music, great for studying, writing or chilling, and the host is a robot!

Religion and Ethics Newsweekly
Audio of the weekly PBS program reporting on religious and ethical issues in the world. A little dry and a little detached but nobody else is really doing this kind of journalism well.

Digital Planet
BBC World Service radio programme on technology stories from around the world. Tech isn't just for the rich anymore. Interesting stories you won't hear on CNet or ZDTV.

Various NPR Podcasts :
NPR: All Songs Considered
All Thing's Considered's Director, Bob Boilen, sifts through the thousands and thousands of CD's folks send him to use as between story music "buttons." An abbreviated version of one of the web's best source of "new" music from a myriad of genre's.
NPR: Music - Stories about music.
NPR: Religion - Stories about religion.

The White House Presidential Podcast
When he speaks, they podcast it. Great if you need audio samples of religious rhetoric invoked to support political and military action.

What are some of your favorite Podcasts?

*Note: I've provided the url addresses for the respective sites about these podcasts. You'll need to find and click on the "XML" or "Podcast" buttons or paste the URL ending in .xml into iTunes or whatever podcast aggregator you use in order to subscribe.

Monday, April 03, 2006

Happy 2/3 Birthday!


Rice
Originally uploaded by bendblock.
Today Eleanor is eight months old. We celebrated by going to the library. We met a librarian named Eleanore. Eleanor chatted with all the books.

Eleanor prefers feeding herself to being fed. She joined in the Chinese food with us. All she ate was steamed rice, but she enjoyed it quite a bit.

Thursday, March 30, 2006

Q U

Eleanor made her first music video today. They Might Be Giants, one of Matt's favorite bands, has two children's albums: No and Here Comes the ABC's. They have ingenius songs like "Alphabet of Nations" and "C is for Conifer." "QU" was Eleanor's song of choice for this video. We hope you enjoy.



Video Sharing at DropShots.com

Tuesday, March 28, 2006

The Banana

This morning I left innocent Eleanor in her booster seat for a minute while I stepped into the kitchen to mix up some oatmeal for her breakfast.



She clearly had other ideas about breakfast. I didn't realize this was within reach.



Since it was requested, I broke off some bite size pieces for her to try to eat.




It took awhile for her to catch all those slimey bits, but the reward was sweet.



And a totally unrelated picture. Eleanor loves licking mirrors. We don't know if she is trying to kiss herself or taste herself.

Tuesday, March 21, 2006

Toy of the Day



Eleanor discovered Ralph.

Saturday, March 18, 2006

The Take Things Out of the Basket Game

Eleanor's new favorite game is taking things out of containers. She has a basket of small board books, a basket of toys, and a mixing bowl full of ducks. All are emptied (and refilled) numerous times a day. She has begun to show preference for a certain toy (a giraffe) and will work with the agility of the toy claw at an arcade to get it out.

Tuesday, March 14, 2006

Graphic

A few days ago I picked up Frank Miller's graphic novel/comic anthology "Batman: the Dark Knight Returns".



It was great. I couldn't put it down. If you liked last year's Summer film, "Batman Begins," then you might want to pick it up and see where a lot of the ideas came from for fleshing out Batman's psychological depth.

It reminded me how much I used to love comics. Last year I read a graphic novel entitled "Blankets" by Craig Thompson. It is perhaps the most powerful use of the graphic medium for narrative purposes I've ever seen. Beautiful. It got me thinking that I might like to try again at my childhood ambition of drawing a comic (if not a 600 page novel). And I did have hundreds of minutes to kill working at the clinic. Below is what happened.

***





My problem is that I never finished it, and I'd like to. So I'm taking creative input on what should happen next. You, our loyal readership, must help me finish what I started. What should happen next? I'm trying to stick with the theme of no dialogue, but I can be swayed. Let me know what you think and I promise I won't leave you hanging. But in the mean time, I'll have to find that legal pad again...

Sunday, March 12, 2006

Daffy Dills

We took Eleanor to Wye Mountain today to see the flowers.



She looked at them,


felt of them,


and, of course, tasted them.


Our good friend Chessie sent Eleanor this adorable outfit months ago. Thanks Chessie!