nothin' but blue skies

Ah, the joys of a Kansas winter.
Today's predicted high is 71.
Tomorrow's? 37 + a chance of snow.
Lovely.

Nepomuk

Saturday a package arrived from Germany. Christmas and birthday presents from Elisabeth plus lots of yummy Lindt chocolates. My personal favorite is this:
It's a 4 inch tall dragon that happens to be an oil lamp. The wicks come out his nostrils so that when he's lit up, it looks like he's breathing fire. Too cute. I love it! Now if I can just find some lamp oil...

Older and Wiser

I’m another year older now. We can hope wiser as well. Saturday night friends gave me a little party at my house. As is usual, we all ended up hanging out in the kitchen/dining room talking and laughing. I don’t know why I bother cleaning the living room when people come over because it never gets used.

I drove up to Lawrence Sunday to spend my birthday with my family. I don’t typically do that, but it worked out that my parents have my youngest nephew for the week while Hannah & Jonathan move. I have to get time in with him when I can. I arrived at church to find both JT and Marshall sitting in Grandpa’s lap. Marshall loves “Ba-poo”, though JT tried to inform him he’s “Grandpa”. Speaking of name-calling, Marshall called me “Sin-ser” – the first time he’s been able to say my name. JT’s always called me just “Jen-fer” and Grandma stresses “She’s AUNT Jennifer”, so JT has started saying “Jen-fer… AUNT Jen-fer”.
Mom made a delicious meal as always. And I spent a lot of time playing with the boys. It was a circus between Mom, Dad, Sharon & David, me, and the boys. The boys didn’t cooperate for pictures very well but we got a few good ones.



Also in the mix was Barkley – Hannah’s beagle-mix that my parents have inherited in the move.
This is JT’s Christmas present from Grandma & Grandpa – in his words “a jumpoline house”. Marshall watches his bigger cousin and squeals with delight. The boys have such different personalities, yet are so precious for who they are individually. It was the best way imaginable to spend my birthday.

Remind me why I do this?

I had a good reminder of why my job’s cool today. Up until then, I was near tears in frustration. Let me go back a little ways. For the last 2.5 months, I’ve been loaned out to different programs while decisions are made about the proposal team I’m on. I spent over a month in the test lab writing a desperately needed test plan. I spent a month on the 787 helping write structural repair manuals. And last week I was told to report to the 747-8. It’s not been a real fun week. I spent a day addressing computer access issues. Then I was given work to do but no clear direction. Between that and the continued computer issues, every time I think I’m making progress, something happens to put me back at square one. It’s been increasingly frustrated and there’s pressure to meet a very tight schedule. So it was a nice break when I was asked if I wanted to go out on the factory floor to look at part of the airplane. I found myself in the upper lobe of the 747 forward section looking at the parts I’m helping analyze for the new plane. For you non-enginerds, that’s basically the cockpit area – the upper deck of the 747. I have not been wandering around on the factory floor & inside airplanes in awhile. It’s easy to get frustrated & bogged down with the details of my job and forget that the end result is kinda cool.

That’s obviously true in life too. We get bogged down in the day to day details and forget that there’s a bigger picture.

So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.
2 Corinthians 4:18

A Conglomeration

First and foremost - Happy 3rd Birthday to my sweet nephew JT!

Christmas was a low-key affair at my parents' house. JT helped me unwrap my present. "You got a box, Jen-fer! You got a box!" Hee. I was more excited about the food processor and loads of attachments inside the box. I've already put it to use. It was a nice few days hanging out with Mom & Dad, Sharon & David & JT and seeing a few friends.

When I returned to Wichita, I got somewhat busy and finished the kitchen. I managed to cut the tin tiles and glue them to the wall without hurting myself to finish the backsplash. And I got the final quarter-round trim cut, painted & stained as necessary. After 3 hours of crawling around the tile floor hammering it in place, my knees are quite sore & bruised. I was pretty proud of myself for getting the miter cuts correct. Only 1 out of 21 pieces had to be redone. It's so weird that the kitchen is now done. I cannot believe I finally finished it. What in the world am I going to do next? The list is percolating.

The Pathways New Year's Eve party was a lot of fun. We were at the Old Cowtown Museum Visitors Center for dinner and dancing. It's always fun to get dressed up. I only have a few pictures.

Heather, Amber & I

Jeremy crashed the Jennifer M club.