CSA Time again…

This year we signed up to participate in a Community Supported Agriculture plan again. Last year was our first and a very positive experience overall. I admit though to being challenged as to how to cook or what to do or even identify properly some of the goods in our crate on occasion. I questioned our signing up again this year but opted to do so because it just seems like you can’t go wrong exploring with food that is grown so well and is so good for us. I determined I would need to be prepared each week to properly clean and store the goods and then be sure to try new recipes. I also determined that if we can’t get through all of the produce that I cook and freeze what can be.

This week was our first pickup which included salad mix, spinach, baby cooking greens, radishes and oregano. I used to love radishes as a kid but can’t eat them anymore. A recipe was provided in our newsletter for a radish dish so I tried it thinking that maybe cooking them might take away whatever it is that gives me problems. It worked and was tasty! It was also very easy to make. The kids didn’t like it so much but Nick and I enjoyed it along with a little bit of garlic chicken, fresh fruit and a salad from more fresh greens.

Hawaii Five-O wherever I go…

Recently I have been reminded of some of my favorite memories of college days. I went to BYU in the early 80’s. It is by far a conservative school and is always #1 in the Stone-Cold Sober Schools list that comes out each year. When my sister first attended BYU in the mid 70’s the dress code had loosened to allow girls to wear pants or pant suits. Just before I arrived on the scene in the early 80's they had just started to allow jeans on campus.

I remember rushing to my M,W,F morning class in the fine arts building. Depending on what time I left I might in fact be stopped for a daily tradition. The national anthem would play and the flag raised by the ROTC. I believe the same happened to lower the flag in the evening but I rarely remember being on campus during those hours. Everyone within listening distance would stop in place and wait for the anthem finish.

Another tradition happened late at night sometime shortly before the library was to close. A different anthem would play – the theme song from Hawaii Five-O. In such a quiet place that was still laden with card catalogs, it felt odd to hear such upbeat music playing over the loud speaker. We would joke that it was to wake everyone up! It was the anthem for library closing time. I cannot hear the song today without thinking of those late nights at the library decades ago.

Last week CBS announced that a new “reimagined” version of Hawaii Five-O will begin to air fall 2010. I’m not always fond of classic things being reinvented. Time will tell if this remake of the series will live up to its legacy.

Two nights ago it was Nick’s pick for movie night. He chose a fascinating show I had never heard of before called “The Dish”. It is all about the Apollo 11 mission but from the perspective of Parkes Australia (with some license to make the story better than the real one) where they housed the southern hemisphere satellite dishes that produced the first images of men on the moon. I recommend it as a good movie. But here is a spoiler. In a scene where the town was welcoming the US Ambassador, a teenage band was asked to play the Star Spangled Banner. When it was time to play, the song that came out was the theme song to Hawaii Five-O. I'm guessing it didn't happen that way in reality but to me it was classic.

Becoming a Maker [Geek Warning]

I've always been interested in electronics, but have never been very good at it. Lately I've gotten into working with the Arduino microcontroller system and I was looking for a project. Here my work life and my hobby life intersected:

This project was born out of necessity. We needed a way to interface our DriveSafety DS-600c simulator to our MindWare Technologies BioNex system.

While the BioNex can receive TTL signals via a 9-pin D-sub-miniature connector, there was not a good way to get at the serial port of the simulator's host machine while it was running. At least, not one that I could work out in a reasonable amount of time. However it was very easy to open a TCP socket from the simulator while it was running. With that socket open, we could send commands.

This suggested writing a program to run on one of the existing computers in the rack (there are eight of them right now). However, they are all pretty taxed during a simulator run, and space and temperature constraints suggested not adding another computer. This project, therefore, suggested finding a solution which met the following requirements:

1. a small footprint
2. low power consumption
3. easy programming
   
4. easy to interface with components etc.

Enter the Arduino: For this project I've used:

1. Aruino Duemilanove
2. Ethernet Shield
3. a small proto board (Radio Shack)
4. project enclosure (Radio Shack)
5. PCB-mount 9-pin D-sub-miniature connector
6. 6 resistors (5 22kOhm for TTL pins, 1 560 Ohm for the power LED)

Currently, this is *very* primitive. There is no acknowledgment of a correct or incorrect command. Also, after powering up the system from the USB connection, you have to hit the reset button or the network connection won't work. I understand this may be common to the Ethernet shield.

On the other hand, it seems to work very well.

If you're a geek, read the full post here.

This is what happens when you go the extra mile

Nick asked me to make him a list of what I wanted for Mother’s Day. He knew it would include cleaning because the reality is a clean house put s me in a good mood. Doing the cleaning myself does not put me in a good mood. Getting it cleaned and then having everyone else undo the work puts me in a bad mood. So keeping with the saying “if momma ain’t happy nobody’s happy and if daddy ain’t happy nobody cares” he took my list.

Well Nick and the boys did most everything on my list on Saturday. Ahh it felt great to wake up to a cleaner less cluttered home! Then Sam had to stay home from church as he threw up again early Sunday morning (oh that part of waking up wasn’t so nice). Nick stayed home with him. Upon returning home with Dan we found Nick had cooked up a nice lunch (but more like dinner as it was a big meal). But he strayed from the list and tried to go the extra mile. He decided to turn on the self cleaning oven while we were gone so the oven would also be clean. As I’m looking at the good food he has cooking on the stove I notice my cute Tastefully Simple collection of various spice mixes that sit across the top of the stove ledge. They looked like they had fallen down and not been put back carefully. But on closer inspection they were melting! OK I know it’s just spices but they look so good lining it and honestly there aren’t any other good places to keep them all. The bottles don’t stand up right and some can’t stand up at all.

I was a little sad and trying to resolve what felt like unnecessary sulking about spice bottles -kind of like don’t cry over spilled milk. I didn’t cry but knew I couldn’t replace all of them as some of the spices are no longer available. Then purely by accident I ran across a solution online. I found this cool set of glass spice jars and they were on a great sale. Even though I really didn’t feel a need for a mother’s day present where money was spent I still ended up with a little gift. I can’t wait for it to arrive so I can transfer my spices and come up with some way to label them.

So sometimes when you go the extra mile things don’t quite turn out as planned. We never had a problem with the bottles melting in previous uses of the self cleaning…or when was the last time we did it? But it all worked out. I’m now getting an extra present.

Autism Awareness Month

So I have so many things I want to blog about but I guess this one will trump the others for the time being. Hopefully a blog of some spring break activities will come...if I can make the time.

So I posted several things on Facebook today which makes some of this duplication. A year ago we knew relatively little about Autism. We knew some and weren't totally unaware. However it really wasn't where we expected Sam to fit in. Honestly we had observed some odd behavior for a long time. He had even been observed at the daycare to try and figure out why he had biting issues. The only thing that came of it was that he loved using his entire body for play, would lay his body over a table for things, etc. If I knew then what I knew now about sensory issues! I remember pulling out the play dough one day, having to leave the kitchen for a minute and coming back to find he had another full-body experience with it. Play dough was everywhere, in the clothes hair, floor and anywhere it could stick. WOW I wasn't going to try that again!

Finally in Kindergarten his teacher knew he would benefit from Occupational Therapy. Yeah, someone who wanted to pursue what she observed rather than brushing it off. Now a year later we still have plenty to learn but feel like we have such a better picture of autism. We understand Sam better and even after 19 years of marriage, I'm beginning to find validity in many things that explain behavior I have long ago accepted in Nick. I'm convinced that if he were put through the battery of evaluations that he would be on the spectrum.

April is Autism Awareness Month. I feel motivated to share in part what we have learned. Autism Speaks hosts Autism Awareness day on April 2nd. There are many groups who bring awareness to autism. Its hard for me to comprehend the estimated statistic that one in 110 children are on the autism spectrum. The question in my mind is, have we simply gotten better at recognizing it or is there really an increase in rate of occurrence?

I decided that I don't have enough filling my time (that is a joke) and that it would be fun to post a tidbit about autism daily on Facebook. Not sure I will go so far as to post daily on the blog. However I will post the notes I'm including on Facebook with resources we have found to be helpful. That will come in a later blog. Below I have included just a few of the many symbols people have chosen to represent autism or efforts to increase awareness or promote research. I hope you will learn something about autism this month that you didn't know before. I learn things all the time that are fascinating.

Peacemaking: an outward expression of Choosing The Right

When the mail comes it is always exciting to get something different than junk mail, solicitations and bills! Last week when a surprise envelope arrived from the school superintendents office addressed to Dan and his parents, I wondered what was up. We were pleased to learn that Dan had been nominated by his teacher to receive a Peacemaking Award. The letter indicated there were approximately 200 awards being given and we were invited to attend an event where the awards would be presented at the High School. Tonight we were in good company with many people we know. As we began to look over the program we found 9 children from church. There were also many other great kids we know from simply being a part of this community. One of the 4th graders assigned to help Sam at the beginning and end of each school day was also nominated. What a significant moment for each of these students. I think it is a fantastic way to reward noteworthy behavior.

At our church when the children are young they learn the acronym CTR for Choose The Right. I couldn’t help but think of that tonight. It makes me happy to see so many students who are making great efforts to live that concept at school when there are pressures to do otherwise.

A day for good luck...

My shortest blog entry to date! This is how we started off St Patrick's day.

Museum open for business

Some people have asked what the bright yellow sign on our front door is all about. (yes I know its crooked)

Last week on Wednesday it was a snow day. Before moving onto a new activity I wanted Sam to pick up some of his toys off my bed and his bedroom floor. At the time I was in the middle of working on something for the Mt Pleasant Discovery Museum. I knew just saying Sam clean up your toys would result in a meltdown because that task is not specific enough. Creativity can be important at this point. The first thought that came to my mind was “Sam I have this great idea, why don’t you take all of these creations you made with the kid connects and turn your bedroom into a museum!” Then I suggested that all of the pieces on his floor could be piled into like piles so that customers (probably a poor choice of words in hindsight) can easily locate the pieces they want to use to build new creations. He totally bought into it – IMMEDIATELY! I have never seen someone clean up so quickly. But he played for real. “Mom now we need signs – 2 of them, one for the front door (he placed this one and I don't want to ruin his careful placement) and one for my bedroom door”. Our front door now has a sign that reads “Sam’s Awesome Building Place of Fun”. I was the first “test” customer and later that night Dan’s friend became the first real customer. Sam decided though if Dan's friend had fun, his first visit was free (instead of 5 pennies). The next morning the first thing he said when he woke up was “did we have any customers?” I have also been told I need to work on coupons good for 4, 3, 2 or 1 penny off getting in.

I was in a seminar with his teacher the next day and I told her about Sam’s new venture. Two days later Sam had two more museum customers, his teacher Mrs Auker and her daughter. He was so excited to see them come to the house and I had fun observing. He is now considering a second exhibit with space in the basement…Hmmm what a creative kid.

I never thought I'd be working on two children's museums at the same time.

Drawing on other's words - updated links

Because of the deep impact I have felt over the passing of our dear friend's husband Phil the brave I have wanted to write something and share it on our blog. I have been contemplating this but nothing seemed right. Then I gratefully noticed several other blogs with tributes and other feelings posted. Some share much more personal experiences with Phil and others share the feelings I too am experiencing. Because of the sweet friendship we have had over many years with his companion Heidi, Phil has become important to us as well. Our children enjoy listening to Voice Male CD's and thus enjoying Phil's great voice. Hearing his voice always makes me think of Heidi and her beautiful voice that I admired so much when we were mission companions. Then I think what will Eden's voice be like. She is one lucky gal to have such gifted and talented parents and more importantly parents who love her so much. I pray for her to always feel that love but have no doubt Heidi has enough love in her for both.

Because I love everything that has been shared by others including Heidi I am sharing links to these posts as well.

Obituary
Prayer and Peace
Phil the Brave
Shared Tears
Another Angel
It Stays With Us
Remembering Phil
Sing Out Strong
Voice Male In Memorium
Jacksonville State University News (and a poem "FAITH"by Phil)
Forever
Each Life that Touches Ours for Good
Utah Services
Phil's Testimony
Testimony of a Friend
Phantom Pain
Answered Prayers

This is where peace comes from knowing that families are eternal and that all will be together again.