March 27, 2008
October 28, 2007
Halloween Harvest
We've had such a mild fall, I didn't bring in even 1/2 the red cabbage, and I left the two sunniest tomato plants standing as they must still have 50 green tomotatoes growing between them. Looks like my area might be free of frost until Nov 6th right now, so I'm hoping for a little more yet.
But today was the weekend before Halloween, when I try to close down my garden for the winter. So all the trellises and pots are in the garage. The few plants I'm overwintering are 9/10's inside. The rest are torn down.
Still to do:
Drain hoses - Jeff.
cut lavender and thyme to dry for 'winter happiness' baths. (maybe try to do an oil).
Get gerber daisies inside (where to put them I don't know!)
take down hammock.
cushy chairs to garage, plastic crappy chairs back on front porch
July 4, 2007
June 30, 2007
He and Fiona sing to one another
Yes, she sits in a chair back there and sings, when she stops, he sings a bit, when he stops, she sings. It's... wild.
June 24, 2007
Behind the Garage We Grow Things
Picture (because my father lost the pictures) that this all starts out as grass. A square grassy area behind the garage.
By Late May, it looked like this:
And this is mid-July. It is even bushier now. Down past the flower boxes on the left is a strawberry patch. Yesterday, I moved my potted tomatoes into bare spots because they weren't getting enough sun on my porch.
June 22, 2007
A 3way Lillie
In special honor of my friend in Arizona this morning:
From Anne to you to me and back to you...
And less traveled fish, no one has expired yet, much to my amazement.
June 16, 2007
October 27, 2006
Racist, Sexist, and Pink
You can say I'm no fun if you want to, but really! Really! And it doesn't even come with the tomohawk to help you with anyone who thinks wearing this outfit means you're asking for something.
With love and thanks to my friends, the Kunkels, who think of me whenever they see racism against Native Americans now, and are only sad they can't see the righteous indignation on my face.
October 9, 2006
ConClave 2006
The kid, gaming at a con:
The kid, putting on a play at the con:
J, who you can not see, because of the camo:
Letterboxing, Redux
reposting with pictures.
Today Fiona and I went out letterboxing. This was my first experience, and her second. It's the first time either of us have ever really used a compass.
The first place we went was to the big tire by I-94. There was some tromping into woods there that made me slightly nervous, but we both had on long pants and long sleeves and socks so I hoped no poison ivy got us (so far so good.)
It was very cool. Seeing the stamps in their book from all over the place was cool too. Fiona wants to put our own out now, and I know just where to do it, but I need to check it out to see if it'll work.
Being down under the big tire was real cool too. I'd never known there was a way to get back to it.
We looked for 3 more after that, but they were all on private property. This made me nervous, so I probably didn't look as thoroughly as was needed, and we didn't find any of them. I wouldn't be surprised if they've all been removed.
There are a ton in Ann Arbor, and a bunch out by another friend, and it's a great mother/daughter thing to do with her age (and he interest is keen) so we'll be doing this most of the winter, locally, I suspect. Then we'll have to start making daytrips to get the further ones out, and I'll have to start printing off ones for us to do individually on our vacations.
Oh, and we need to make our own stamps. I'm looking to do 2"x2" - any advice would be great.
July 23, 2006
Mackinac Island Trip with CMA's 3rd-6th grades, 2006
More pictures on flickr.
So we took a ton of kids up to a lodge on Lake Higgins, and then up to Mackinac for a day. It was a great trip, and I'm glad the grownups voted to take our chances with rain.
Fiona enjoys a smore at the lodge.
Fi and I with our tandem bike out by the water on the Island.
My cabin-mates. We were the party cabin.
June 28, 2006
Proof for Fiona "My boyfriend lives in Pennsylvania"
Our company left about noon today. Fiona is currently being distracted from their leaving by spending time with her Pappaw, who she hasn't gotten to see for a few weeks. I hardly saw her, she was so busy being with the other kids.
We had a good, if somewhat action-packed and tiring, time. We didn't mean for it to be so action packed and tiring, but it turned out that way.
And in 2 weeks we see them again. Sometime in there I have to drag out the camping box and clean up and inventory and all that, so I'm not crazy at the last minute.
Oh, and KK, he loaded Photoshop on my computer before he went. Yeah. First attempt coming soon.
May 6, 2006
January 23, 2006
ConFusion 2006 Pirates
We started early this year - we should have not gone out til 10. Nonetheless, it's always fun. If you have pictures of the party please send them to me at liz dot trumitch at gmail dot com. I have some video, but it's too big to post here.
Pirates Like Cake:
December 25, 2005
"Alex, look at the camera."
On Christmas Eve we spend a chunk of time trying to get my severely autistic brother to look at the camera. I almost never works....
Until Fiona gets behind the camera - he'll look at her!
Her GuardFather Wraps His Presents in Tin Foil
See the feeding of her addictions:
Yugioh cards and a freaking Pokemon dvd box set.
December 23, 2005
Holiday Post
Fiona at her Winter Recital, Age 10
(stupid light from the window did this no favors, but my photo editing software isn't good enough to draw her features out.)
I said I'd put up pictures of our solstice symbols - we've got 3 trees here (you can't see them real well) and ribbons and lights. Well, and presents. The tallest tree holds the gold ornaments, the next tallest holds things we made or that were made for us, and the smallest holds our fandom.
As you can see on the fandom tree, it looks like Frodo's trying to take out Hedwig, while Harry's down at the bottom. The Hogwarts ornaments are slightly obscured, but what you're really missing out on is the Death Star, which has light and sound effects.
I'm making my and Jeff's mother's presents this year. This is my mother's necklace, bracelet and earrings. Keep in mind I'm still a beginner at this. I currently have my mil's necklace done, and I need to finish her bracelet and earrings tonight. Per request:
December 14, 2005
Santa and His Helpers
artistry via Lunakate - santistry via KitK - 2005.
November 30, 2005
November 20, 2005
Cooking Sundays
On Sunday afternoons my mom comes and takes Fi to spend the night. I usually then do laundry or cook - today was cooking. I made my version of Chicken Paprikas, and then I made the motherload of chex mix.
Chex Mix, you see, ain't cheap unless you make it yourself. This pile of cooling chex mix (24 cups worth) will be gone before 3 weeks are over, but at least I know it's much healthier to eat than chips.
November 11, 2005
Feast Of Crows
Up at 5am.
Out the door, 6am.
Jeff to work, 7am.
Liz to work, 7:15am.
Liz leaves work 4:30pm.
Dinner, 5pm.
Get to Borders 1, 6pm.
George R.R. Martin talks and Q&A, 7pm
Line up for signing, 8pm.
Books signed 9:30pm.
Home, exhausted but worth it, 10pm.
Sad I missed Jim Malcolm, but George was wonderful to hear and very kind.
Me and B with George.
To give you an indication, just a glimpse of the crowd of well over 200.
Can you find me in the crowd?
November 8, 2005
Scene 2: The Explosive Mannequin-Carrying Armored Traincar
Me, leaning on a bmw, shiny in E's audi.
November 6, 2005
Judging by the screaming wind, autumn is about to end...
Happy Autumn, here comes Winter.
September 17, 2005
Just Another Brick in the Wall
Click here to sign my Graffiti Wall! (Powered by
PicLibs.com)
September 7, 2005
August 6, 2005
At the cost of only one bloodied finger, the shelves are up
Floor to ceiling shelving via IKEA. Already looks lived in, doesn't it? Please note, only about half the books are up there and the ones that are up are stacked double thick. The kid has too many books. Must convince her to give all those darn 2nd grade level books she likes so much to the school library.
There are also double this many toys waiting to go up. Luckily we have one more shelf pretty much like these next to her closet. And when we run out of space, it becomes time to make HARD DECISIONS about what's staying and what's going.
God, I have a headache.
August 2, 2005
July 20, 2005
When I went to NYC...
...I went to the NMAI at the Customs House...
...where I smiled pretty for Croft...
...and then to the Met where I fell in love...
July 10, 2005
You Say It's Your Birthday...
You'd never know it was late June from the looks of us! Happy birthday to my mirrorgirl.
July 3, 2005
Dearest Phillip
Dearest Phillip,
Patrice and I were wandering about dockside and visited with this tall ship. I'll try to keep her out of trouble, darling, but you know how she is.
Always,
Juliana
June 28, 2005
Friends and Family Days at Borders
Click on the pretty picture to get the coupon.
June 19, 2005
WIPED OUT FROM THE ROLLAR COASTER WEEKEND
But it was worth it.
June 12, 2005
Garden Tour - Pictures from 6/4/05.
This is my humble house.
You can't see much of the flowers from the road, but up close they're popping. I put in the box the roses are in in 2000, I think.
I've been doing various things with the flat to the ground area marked off by the concrete border things for years. It gets overwhelmed with weeds - and the last 2 years school has left me with no attention for the garden. Last fall I spent a day yanking the biggest weeds and throwing down all the seed I had saved - sweet william and foxglove - in the hope that I'd be done with school this spring and I'd be able to garden.
This worked real well, as you can see.
This year my mommy (who can not stand to shop to herself, much to the pain of her checkbook) needed someone to go to the nursery with her. I dug out one old dead rose by the neighbor's driveway and planted a bleeding heart and an azalea.
Over by my driveway I have these blue things Jenn gave me years ago that always spread and do great (she'll have to remind us what they are) and I'll filled in some holes in them with dianthus from my mother's garden.
On the porch I planted the herbs I netted in the nursery trip as well. There is a gerber daisy in the corner, and some of the herbs are not herbs but romaine lettuce and some other salad green. On the side of the porch there, peaking over the pots are lillies. They haven't bloomed yet.
This is my humble, postage stamp of a backyard.
Fi used to have a swingset in the area in front of the siberian iris's, but it died, and we've never replaced it. I'd like to replace it with a fort of some kind that will still be useable as 'escape space' when she's a teenager, or a pool, but it's a 16' across by about the same space, and just not much fits there. Not much we can afford, anyway. If I was confident in my ability to build something it might be different, because I have all kinds of ideas... but I'd probably get her killed first high wind.
The black round thing is the composter gifts from my 29th birthday bought me. It rolls in a circle. Love it. Behind that are raspberry bushes that have overgrown their bounds (cut them back today) and dutch iris that... well, it got too warm and then refroze. About half of them got flowers, but you can see they're real overgrown and it's embarrassing.
Today I spent hours out there weeding, but then about halfway through I discovered there is an injured bird hopping around in the growth. It wouldn't let me near it, and I decided I'd better leave the cover there so the roaming neighborhood cats can't see it. (Although, it was probably one of them that took it down to begin with.)
Back in the corner (very dark in the picture) is the big strawberry patch. It's overgrown too. More hours today cutting the tree overhanging it up, and weeding around it to find the paving bricks again. It needs a ton more work. I'm not sure why I'm growing the strawberries. I never get out to pick them in time, and I'm just feeding the birds. Who sit in the tree and poop all over the strawberries. I hope those fat birds are eating the misquitos too.
The birds also eat these berries in this tree - anyone know what this is? I'm thinking, since it's too much trouble to scare birds away, I'm going to put some birdhouses out there. Anyone know *real* birdhouses I can make or buy cheap?
Immediately to the left of the humble backyard picture is my 2.5 car garage. There's a little former-alley behind it. Behind the garage are the columbine.
Since I took these pictures I weeded and mulched and put down newspapers and filled my flowerbox I made with 14 bags of top soil and 3.some compressed cubic feet of peat moss. I stuck an old bed headframe in there for a trellis and planted my clematis, 4 varieties of hot peppers, a tomato, bush beans and some on-sale flowers. I also did something I swore I'd never do - I paid for rocks. I put down plastic and stuck them over it making a little dry river bed between the lillies and my azalea in the front. The porch dumps water right there when it rains, and it always sent the dirt flying everywhere.
When I recover some energy (it may be months from now) I'll take pictures of the new work too. Prolly when the lillies bloom.
June 10, 2005
June 6, 2005
May 30, 2005
Back from Memorial Day Camping
Yes, our kids are geeky. They are our kids, of course, and they know references to the Princess Bride, and they play Star Wars and Yugioh, and we couldn't be prouder. Actually, I loved meeting 'the lightsaber kids' and thought they were wonderful.
May 14, 2005
May 11, 2005
May 9, 2005
Cape Cod 2005
More pictures (but not all, yet) from the trip can be found here.
April 28, 2005
And If You'd Like To See Me Kiss A Penguin
My Penguicon pictures are here.
My Vacation Project
So I hope to get a good start on a blanket for Fi's room while we're in the Cape. This is one of the few activities I can do while in a car, since I can crotchet by feel, so I may even be able to get some done on the way there and back.
I thought I'd chart my process, because I'm just that anal.
The beginning of the granny square blanket.
The yarn. They only had five skiens, so it will be however big that ends up being.
It's A Small World, And I Was Only 2 Degrees From Fierce
Me and the Fierce's Sister:
Me and the Fierce's Sister's Man, the Penguicon Chairman. This one was taken for the Easter Egg Hunt (which I won, thank you, thank you; I still owe people back their rubber duckies and thongs...) before I even knew what a small world it was.
April 24, 2005
April 23, 2005
John Scalzi, Handsome, Intelligent, Nice Guy.
No, he did not pay me to say this, but he did pose pretty. It was nice to meet you John. Now I think I'll have to check out your books.
April 22, 2005
With The Square Hat
More of these later, but I couldn't resist putting one up! Thank you J&L for bringing me a cap and gown and taking pictures.
April 17, 2005
The Birthday-Graduation-Birthday Party
Pictures in my cap and gown via J and L (the other J and L) to come later.
For now:
The Diploma
The beautiful cards our friends made
The Birthday Boy and Friends
The Birthday Girl/Graduate and Friends
Sadly, most of my other group pictures are fuzzy. The camera works best inside with the flash - except then people look 'caught' in the flash, or without the flash the lens is just open way too long and there is no holding that baby still that long.
The party was an incredible time and the thoughtful gift-combination is going to lead to something ultracool, if we can just decide what.
I love my friends. Thank you all for brining me a night of laughter and good stories and excellent food and wonderful gifts.
April 10, 2005
And, Those Sunsets I Was Talking About
The bright line through the trees caught my eye:
And about 15 minutes later, with the pinks and purples
Mombasa Elephant Society
This was the view as Jeff and I left the April Meeting of the Mombasa Elephant Society last night. WOW, Dominos, Munchin or socializing... we had it all. Also, a beautiful sunset. It was nice to see everyone even if I only did the socializing part.
April 6, 2005
Community, And Sense of Humor
So this is PA, and a crop of his sign. He did an interview with a certain author that will be in a certain fanzine, and this was a wonderful expression about how the community conflict over the issue of these books falls out. Everyone who saw this laughed - some of us took pictures. As far as I know, no one actually tried to aim for that target.
March 27, 2005
Medium Auburn to Light Auburn to Reddish Blonde
For Christmas I has Dark Auburn. For Melcon, Light Auburn. For ACUS, I will be Reddish Blonde.
So one more shot of Light Auburn before I go start applying dye.
March 25, 2005
March 24, 2005
Shopping For The Duchess
While Juliana understands budgets and stretching a dollar to make ends meet, she still demands quality. In this case, she'll have to settle for whatever comes in the mail, since we did not get to try it on and feel it, or see if it is lined, or its fit and so on.
But I have slapped down my $60 for the year, and if it sucks, everyone will pretend it's pretty, right?
March 18, 2005
I've Been Thinking...
About patterns and cycles and layers in gaming and in reality.
I can see and define many things, but many more are still a mystery to me.
March 17, 2005
Act Your Age
At 11:59am, I will be 31 years old. I have also now officially been with Jeff for half my life. (On March 4th, I think.)
I'm feeling remarkably younger than 31, so I guess I had been wrong about what 31 would feel like. Example: Spontaneous movie-going last night. "When does it start? - 13 minutes - Let's do it. We can do it!"
Fiona was happy and we got there in time and it was a fun movie (National Treasure.)
March 16, 2005
March 15, 2005
I Started Writing Hannah's Patternwalk Today
(image clearer via Croft!)
March 14, 2005
Pimms
Share and share alike. We liked the Pimms, but T and I kept it under control, because we're a little too fun after a few...
March 13, 2005
You Know You're No Longer In Embassy Suites Or Marriot When...
I was much much more amused than offended. Our room didn't have this sign - I took a picture of the one in H's room - ours must have been STOLEN. Which is exactly what I would have done, had there been one in the room. As you can see by the charges listed, the "Dear Guest" sign is complimentary, obviously.
March 12, 2005
They Allow These People To Elect Senators?
Note how J's sideways head looks disembodied. Cool.
March 11, 2005
The Group Shot
Mel put this on lj - I'm guessing it came from G? Someone let me know and I'll credit it the right way.
March 10, 2005
March 9, 2005
I Had A Great Weekend
Kris manipulated my crazy picture to this, which I'm just in love with.
February 7, 2005
New Old Car
So, we bought a 97 Sunfire. It's got a dent on the driver's side, but otherwize, we think we got a deal. We'll find out in time.
January 3, 2005
December 23, 2004
Winter Driving Adventure 2004, in pictures
Behind the cut, for those who like visuals.
5:45am, I shovel a path from the back door to the garage. It's dark, but I'm hoping to beat traffic.
6:50am, I am five minutes from my house. It has been over an hour since I left the house. The last 30 minutes I have been stuck, because of this. What you see in this blur is a SUV trying to get off the entrance ramp to I-94. Blocking the entrance ramp is a broken down double-loader semi. Coming the wrong way down the entrance ramp for some unknown reason, a plow. I decide not to wait, and move on to the next disaster.
7:10am, I am now four minutes from home. I have gone one minute past the previous picture in 20 minutes of time. We are stuck again - although you can't see it, ahead there is another semi, sideways, blocking our path. We will shortly escape this trap by going over a short median into slow moving, but moving, highway traffic.
7:15am, I am 3 minutes from home as I exit the highway onto the street I live off of and turn away from home, toward Michigan Ave. I don't get to the highway again until 7:50ish, when I hit I-275, for 10 minutes down to I-94, for 20 minutes toward Ann Arbor. I am just before the exit I decided to take in Ypsi when I took a picture of the trees - they were pretty; you can't tell in the picture. Note, the sun has now risen. It is approx 8:20am.
I get off the highway, and eventually turn onto Ellsworth - right behind Carla! Isn't her car adorable. But check out the scene. It was beautiful. I pulled in next to her in the parking lot right around 8:30am, 2 hours and 45 minutes after I left my house (a journey that normally takes me 35-45 minutes.)
February 26, 2004
Please, look at the panel
Senator Ben Nelson, Democrat of Nebraska, voiced concern that senior Pentagon leaders had not sufficiently addressed the problem. "I don't get a sense of outrage by military leadership," Mr. Nelson said.
Am I saying these men haven't done their best to prevent female troops being assaulted? No. I'm saying - look at the culture to find out why this problem keeps happening again and again in the military ranks. Policies don't change culture.
August 10, 2003
(Cross-posting) Photos
Photos from
my childhood mostly now up with commentary.
(Huge file - maybe too big for some folks.)