Things I love about Brooklyn

1. You can walk nearly anywhere
2. Walking to church
3. Walking to the subway
4. Walking to the Deli
5. Walking to Nola and Ta's school
6. Walking back home with the girls
Yes, walking is a big part of what I like in New York.
7. You can find great food just around the corner
8. I mean just about any corner
9. There is water everywhere.
10. I like being by the New York harbor
11. and the East River, and the ocean and. . .
And
12. I like the taxi drivers. They are like a huge united nations contingency that seems to actually like the US and they all love NYC
12. And every one I met was friendly

On the other hand I hate hate hate:
1. The freezing cold weather in the winter
2. The price of an ice cream sundae at the Regis Hotel
(Yes, we paid $60.00 for 4 icecream desserts. And the ice cream scoops were not the size of baseballs as we had been led to believe. They were the size of ping pong balls)
But the atmosphere was elegant and snooty--which list should that be on??

But mostly I love seeing our kids: Ariane, Alon, Morris, Seung Hee, and Steven. And especially I love seeing Nola and Talia.
Which overall makes NYC a pretty wonderful place!

Home again, home again, jigitty, jig

Hey, that's not how you cut the cake!!

The handsome groom. . .

Seung Hee in her Korean wedding dress

Morris's new family in their apartment in Queens. Everytime I said smile they all laughed. Hmm. . . .do you think smile could have another meaning in Korean???

Thanks Alon for most of the pictures!! Here is the happy couple with parents and brother Jake.

We have been home for 3 days. And I am finally sitting down to blog. Morris and Seung Hee's wedding was beautiful. Everyone was happy and had fun--thanks to Steven!!

We met most of the people that Mo works with. We met professor's who had both Mor and Seung Hee in their classes. We heard that they were wonderful, fabulous, incredible. We already knew that!

Seung Hee wore a dress designed and made by one of her bridesmaids who was/is a student at Parson's school of design. Her dress looked like a gorgeous flower with petals cascading down to the ground.

Then, at the reception she wore a traditional Korean wedding outfit. It was so beautiful. We ate Korean food. The entrees never stopped coming. Such a meal you can hardly imagine. Finally when the happy couple walked up to the Roosevelt hotel, Mo in his tux, with his traditional Korean bride, the staff immediately comp'ed them a suite for the night!

Seung Hee's mom and brother were great. Despite any language barrier we had lots of fun as you may notice in the pictures that I posted on Picassaweb. Jake designs interactive games. He has to be fun, right?

Ari and Alon were absolutely incredible. We invaded like barbarians entering Rome. Mike and I, Megan, Maren, Graham, Elysee, often Steven, Melia, and Taryn all camped in their home, coming and going on different schedules, disrupting life. . . .but life went on. Nola and Talia went to school, Ari ran the business, Alon and Steven worked; and all the while they made us feel welcome and happy.

We nearly missed our flight coming home. But Southwest was great. If only they flew into NYC instead of Long Island. Their airport is in Islyp, but they pronounce it Iceland. Freezing! Thanks to Alon's driving and his persuasive personality they let us on the flight even tho we arrived 15 minutes before take off with luggage to check and no computer check in.

Now that we're home things seem pretty quiet. We were planning to go to California to celebrate my sister Merrilyn's birthday next Friday. But, Merrilyn decided they couldn't manage such a crowd. Since we had just spent a week in the thick of it we totally understand!!

Happy Birthday tomorrow to Becky. Time keeps on slipping, slipping into the future. Lucky thing too. We aren't ready for it to stop! Well. Monday we'll be in Phoenix for a hearing with the Veteran's Administration. Always something.

Have a nice weekend. We will too!

Leavin' on a jet plane

Big head, Great brain

Well tomorrow is the day. We are heading into the mouth of the beast, or should I say the cold in New York City. Lucky this isn't a Pace Picante ad. Somebody would get strung up.

I am getting excited. Mo is getting married. So, we're goin' to the chapel and he's gonna get married.

Let's see, what other old song titles can I work into this? We are all packed, with more than 12 hours to spare. A first for me I think. Of course since I was getting ready to go on a trip I also decided to completely clean out the garage this week. I should post a picture. But I didn't take a before picture. Bummer.

I could take a picture of our newly inventoried and organized food supply. Nah. I think I'll save the picture taking for New York. Can't wait!!

Good morning sunshine

Well, it is another beautiful day in Rio Rico. The missionaries have moved into the guest house and seem to be settling in. Elder Matute is from Honduras, and his companion is from Boston. He arrived here and moved in on his first day in Arizona. It is definitely not Boston. Saturday he knocked on the door and asked me if I could identify the cool little insect he had found on the floor and which he was holding out for me to see.

It was a little scorpion. Very cute. I told him it would be better just to step on those cuties. And yes, When Elder Matute put on his suit coat Sunday morning there was a lizard in his sleeve. Such is life in our guest house. But they think they have a much cooler apt than the Elders in Nogales.

I don't know if they have figured out yet that the howling you hear at night are the coyotes in the wash. One of the sounds I love.

In another month we'll have to start planting a garden. (Battling rabbits, birds and squirrels. . .)

Happy New Year!!

Well, 2009 is really well and truly here. Party animals that we are we stayed up late enough to wish all of our kids a happy new year across the country. We figured that once the New Year had arrived in NYC at 10:00 pm we could go to sleep, but then went on to greet the year in Central and Mountain time, toasted with pomegranate juice and promptly fell asleep.

It seems that 2009 has started with a bang. Especially if you are in Gaza. Refer to the Joel Rosenberg blog for details and updates. I can't believe Israel will try another ceasefire with Hamas--a 3 hour cease fire that has already been violated 3 times with rockets into Israel in the first hour.

Give peace a chance???

Want more bad news--well maybe it all depends on how you look at it--check out the Prepare Today blog. It looks like the post is 8 months old, but it actually updates every couple of days.

Ford car sales were down 32% this month, ditto GM. Think they'll ask for another bailout when they can't make any money selling over priced cars??

And then I do have a link to the border news blog M3. In the first five days of the year there were 63 organized crime related deaths in Mexico. And today there were 20 more bodies found in one spot. That doesn't count yesterday's count or Tijuana today. What a country!

Well to top off the evening a good friend just called. At the end of work today his boss called him in and told him he was terminated immediately. I think he was in shock. I know I was.

Have a great week. It's all uphill from here.