Thankful (Squared)

My Amsterdam gal pal, Sara, hosted Thanksgiving this year, and I just loved the intimacy of the evening.  Her blog post covers all of the action, so please, please click on the link below to witness what a creative hostess she is! 

Sara forgot to mention that she gave LL and me the cutest gifts . . . memory games with photos on each of the pieces that capture moments our families have spent together here in Amsterdam.  So cute. So thoughtful. 

http://portlandsunshine.blogspot.nl/2014/11/thankful.html

The kids and I were worthless by the time we got home.  Missing Doug, we decided to stay up late and have a slumber party in the living room watching Cars. We woke up there this morning.  Love.

No, that's not the hangover throw-up bowl on the floor between them. 

Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy Thanksgiving!  Miss you and you and you and you  . . . 

It's strange to celebrate Thanksgiving abroad.  It's my absolute favorite holiday (what's not to love about the BIG 3 of Food, Family and Friends), and I'm grateful that we will be spending it with good friends on Saturday (even if my heart pitter patters for the familiarity of home).

My list of things I'm grateful for is too long to spell out here (and boy do I mean that), so I'll stick to the top and most immediate.

First, I've had the grand pleasure of watching Peanuts with Abigail and Reese over the past couple of weeks.  It started with "It's the Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown," just before we left for the US, which of course was followed by "A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving."  When the latter sparked belly laughs from both my kids (Snoopy and Woodstock are actually pretty funny), we bought a whole series of them on our Apple TV.  Since then, the kids and I have been binge watching Peanuts, a childhood relic of mine.  They were intrigued with the same parts, like how the teacher talks in that funny voice.  Hard to have envisioned this day, when my babies are old enough to appreciate Charlie Brown and the gang.  And young enough too.  Thanks, Abby and Reese, for sharing this with me.

Secondly, it goes without saying how thankful we are for Doug. 

But maybe I'll say something.  His journey to Rwanda is inspiring.  It's hard to plug into a country and its needs, and to find a productive place as a solo volunteer.  Doug found some amazing organizations and people to connect with, and his time has been productive and rewarding.

Everyday we miss him, and while certainly there are days when I'm mad and frustrated that he's not here, the truth is I look at his twitter post from today and recognize how happy and thankful I am that my husband chose to do this with his time off from work.  xxxx

Here are some of Doug's words from text messages he sent me earlier in the week.

"I had an amazing day.  Really learning so much about people.  human nature and real problems (officially 3rd world).  So many don't complain, stay optimistic and grateful for what they have.  I have listened to several unbelievable stories in private settings that really provide a view into the human spirit."

 "Didn't mean to disappear.  Was planning to catch up with you tonight, but ended up in a deep conversation with a Hutu on private perspective of genocide.  after earlier learning private perspective from Tutsi earlier today. Both heart wrenching.  Truly amazing journey that this country has been on.  So difficult and so inspiring."

Abby and Reese stocked Doug up with some of their toys to give away in Rwanda.  The toys had to be small to fit in his suitcase, but the process of giving something up to help someone else was really rewarding for them when they saw these photos today (taken from a "Reconciliation Village" implemented after the Genocide, and something I'll follow up on later). Truly the spirit of Thanksgiving.  To think outside ourselves.  

Very proud of our little sprouts (quote from Doug's text).

 May we all carry a smile.  Happy Thanksgiving!

Gorillas in the Mist

There's so much to catch up on with Doug's trip to Rwanda. It has been an amazing and rewarding experience for Doug so far.  He'd love to be able share all of it directly, but for now I'll get it out there while he stays "in the moment."  Most of his time and work has centered on youth and/or business coaching, and I promise to pass along some of these moving and inspiring stories and pictures very soon.

But I couldn't wait to share these photos of Doug in the Virunga mountains of Rwanda, where Dian Fossey conducted her research on the Karisoke area gorillas.  This is one of a few wildlife excursion/eco-tourism outings that he's doing when not working. I thought he'd gotten this out of his system early this year, after cage diving with sharks.

Dian Fossey was controversial, and in fact murdered in 1985. But her efforts to protect gorillas from poaching and conserve their habitat still go strong today, despite the interruption of the Rwandan Genocide during the 90's, which destroyed much of this gorilla mountain area.  The movie "Gorillas in the Mist" depicts her story.

These are just the pictures from Doug's phone. Can't imagine what the good camera picked up.

Stompin' Around

It was pretty cool to chase autumn across the US this October.  Western Massachusetts is stunning in fall, and it happened to be the second stop on our trip across the States (after a wonderful visit in New Hampshire with the nana's and the papa's).

I was fortunate to be able to visit two sets of friends from two very different chapters in my life . . . dear friends who now happen to live five minutes away from each other in Massachusetts.  Five minutes!  Within a two hour drive from my Nana's in NH, we arrived to visit them both in quaint New England towns outside North Hampton.

Our visits were brief, but super sweet.

Here's our sweet treehouse in NorCal!

We spent the first night with Bill and Jayne, our former neighbors in Mill Valley, CA.

Marin County is paradise. End of story.  Doug and I moved there in the fall of 2004, one month after we got married.  Doug had been promoted to a new a position at Starbucks, and I had also taken on a new role at Starbucks, albeit based in Seattle.

We lived in CA for four years. Four years among the redwoods, on the hills of Mount Tamalpais, equidistant from Stinson Beach and Saulsalito, just over the Golden Gate Bridge from San Francisco.  It was amazing.

We had 120+ steps up and 120+ steps down, and we loved every single climb we made during that time.  Even when carrying an infant Abigail in her car seat to-and-from the carport above . . . way above. 

Jayne and I immediately connected in lots of ways, not the least of which was over literature and writing and walks in the woods.  Oh, did I mention she's fluent in French (another small hobby of mine)?  And that she was the head speech writer for Apple back in the day?  And that she makes superb French toast and paella?  I consider her a friend, a mentor, and an inspiration.

Somehow I failed to snap a photo of all of us together, but maybe better still is this link to some of Jayne's poetry in the Illanot Review and, below, their summary of her professional career.  If she looks interesting and smart, it's because she is.

Jayne Benjulian’s poems appear in Zone 3, Verdad, Sequoia, Spillway, and The Seattle Review and are forthcoming in Barrow Street. Her essays are published in The Atlanta Journal and HowlRound and are forthcoming in the Los Angeles Review of Books. She was Director of New Play Development at Magic Theatre in San Francisco and Fulbright Lecturer in American Language & Literature in Lyon, France. In another life, she was chief speechwriter for Apple.  She lives in Western Massachusetts.

I hope our chat about doing a writing retreat together materializes someday.  Excuse me while I fantasize about the cool places we could go and all the cool work we'd produce . . .

We spent Day Two with my also very interesting and smart college friend, Sara.

She and I are now forty-somethings with (little, little) kids and husbands and dogs and all that comes with that.

We were in each other's wedding and her parents hosted me for more college breaks than I can recall.

Her parents have been some of the best listeners I've ever known, and one wink or look from her dad and I know exactly what he means and that he gets me.

They gave me one of the best gifts of my life by making the trip to Washington DC to attend my wedding.

Here's a few highlights and learnings from our trip to visit Sara, Nick, Magnus and Rowan:

1. Sara is very creative and I love her hand-built ceramics (sadly, I didn't take a photo of the shelves above her stove filled with oodles of her pieces).
2. Sara is very creative and insightful (sadly, I didn't get a photo of the two of us together).
3. Abby fell in love.  With a dog named Edwin.
4. Reese loves to wrestle.  He doesn't get much of a chance to get his wiggles out this way, and now I really understand the benefit.  We need more boys in our lives!
5. Fall in Western Mass is beautiful.
6. Dogs are hard work.
7. Boys love sticks.  Girls love sticks.
8. Magnus and Rowan are "so cool" (Reese Satzman, October 23, 2014).
9. Fallen leaves are fun.
10. Reese and Abby want a lego room (yes, room) just like Magnus and Rowan.
11. Abby and Reese need new, bigger bikes (we live in Amsterdam for crying out loud).
12. Who creates a BMX bike trail in the woods behind their house?  Very cool grandparents, that's who.
13. Speaking of those grandparents, we love your new place Marsha and Dave!
14. Sara makes a mean butternut squash soup.
15. We were all sad that Lisa and Jeff couldn't join us this time.  We hope your knee is feeling better, Lisa.
16.  It's unbelievable that Sara and I have known each other more than half our lives.  27 years!
17. We love you and will miss you Bressem-Harrison's.  Sleep tight.

The lego room.

Lovebirds.

Halleluiah.  For old friends and stompin' around in the leaves.

Olympians!

No time to smell the roses, these munchkins had a race to run!  Children's fun runs are so much more fun when you run it with your best buds.  Last Sunday, these excited runners ran a 1K race at Olympic Stadium in Amsterdam, all finishing with beaming smiles of pride.  Way to go!