Friends and funny weather

We hosted Community Meal at our place yesterday and enjoyed some delicious spaghetti, salad and bread with amazing ice cream for dessert. Here are Mark, Megan, Goose, Greg and Lora:


It was the first time we had hosted in a while and always enjoy the excuse for cleaning up and--of course--the great company!

The weather lately has been so shifty, though I'm not sure why I am still surprised when things change. A week ago, the temperatures were below zero, the wind chill was even lower, and the snow fell and fell. In the past few days, we've had temperatures in the 40s (up to 49 today!), and nearly all the snow has melted, save for a few dirty went lumps here and there. Then today it began to rain. Eric said that the northern suburbs had a thunderstorm this afternoon.

Here's a shot of the rainy weather in our "yard":

An alley I passed today on my walk back from the Y:

And now, in these past few hours, the temperature has dropped to 9 -- a change of 40 degrees!!!! The wind chill is -12 and the forecast is for a low of 2 degrees overnight!

Here's another shot out the same window that I took just a few moments ago:


What you can't see is the force of the wind. It looks like a blizzard out there! I think I'm going to go curl up in bed and read.

For the Bible Tells Me So

On Saturday, Eric and I met Kristin and Carrie for dinner at Ada's, this great Jewish restaurant downtown where we had great food (mmm...potato pancakes!) and a great waiter--Piotr--and then walked to the Gene Siskel Film Center to see the documentary For the Bible Tells Me So. The film tells the stories of several families who espouse conservative Christian views and have a gay or lesbian child. Two families feature public figures, Dick Gephardt (former House Majority Leader) and Gene Robinson (an Episcopalian bishop in New Hampshire), but all are families who have struggled with how to reconcile the reality of their child's sexual orientation with deeply embedded teachings from their church traditions. The stories reveal the deep love that parents have for their children, and the way that loving relationships with individuals have incredible power to transform, as well as the very real damage that has been and continues to be done to GLBTQ folks by the Church in the name of God. While the film follows the personal journeys of the families, it also explores the Bible passages that are used to support the conviction of many that homosexuality is a sin.

One of the few critiques I have is that too much time was focused on the extreme right (Jimmy Swaggart and James Dobson) and not enough on churches and leaders who are more inclusive but still restrictive in the beliefs about the level of welcome that gays and lesbians have in the church. For example, the United Methodist denomination's stance is that gays and lesbians are "people of sacred worth" but it maintains that homosexuality is "incompatible with Christian teachings" and does not permit openly gay leaders to be ordained as clergy. This position has been a source of pain for so many. Many other traditions teach people to love gay and lesbian people, but maintain that homosexuality is a sin from which people need to be saved and healed. I wish that these kinds of teachings had been explored further in the film.

Overall, this was an excellent film and I highly recommend it, especially if you believe that the Bible teaches that homosexuality is a sin.

One of Eric's camp videos

Eric here. Here's a nice little video I made for camp (I know it may appear as if I am trying to sound ironically cute, but it really is a nice little video).

A New Road: Immigration Education Night

Sunday before last, while Eliser was here, we participated in Holy Covenant's evening of education and conversation focused on the immigrant experience in the US. There was a great turnout--around 45 people in all!


Eliser shared a bit about his experience of leaving Mexico and coming to the United States 3 years ago. Behind me is Hugo, who also shared his journey with us.


Jenny, from the Chicago New Sanctuary Coalition, talked a bit about how current US immigration policy impacts families.


Partway through the evening, we shared a delicious meal. Here is Caroline with the spread:


I love that people at Holy Covenant just love being together--lively conversation is never lacking!


After dinner, we gathering in small groups to reflect on the evening and brainstorm about next steps. I'm so excited to be part of this process in this community.


I believe that being in relationship with the "stranger" is such a gift and helps us to understand who we are--individually and as a human family. I truly hope that the next months will pull our small faith community into deeper relationship with our immigrant brothers and sisters, and that those relationships will be transformative for all of us. As people of faith, as fellow sojourners, we have an opportunity to be a voice and presence of grace and love in this twisty, often polarizing conversation.

Ski Retreat

This weekend was the first of three youth ski retreats that we will help lead this winter through the United Methodist camping and retreat program (this is one of Eric's jobs).

The enormous main hill at Alpine Valley in Wisconsin--ha!


Saturday was our day to ski and it just happened to be the coldest day in the history of earth (a high of 5 degrees). Thankfully, everyone bundled up well and people who wanted to got lots of time on the slopes. Faces got the coldest--fleece masks and scarves became crusted and cold with frozen breath and cheeks turned red and rough with windburn.

Eric and I snowboarded. It was the second time for me and about the 5th for the Gooseman. We experienced improvement from last time and progressed throughout the day, but we both had falls that banged up knees and butts a bit. We are both a bit sore all over today. I've heard that something called stretching can help with such soreness, but it did not occur to us to do it either before or after snowboarding.

Between falls, there were glimpses of mastery--those moments were so fun! Thankfully, we will have two more opportunities in the next month to get some more practice.

Back at Wesley Woods...

Here is Eric talking with the youth:


Danny (who Eric has known since his time at Twinlow camp in Idaho) and Rachel provided the music for the weekend. They were really great!


It was amazing that the air was so cold that the lake was giving off steam! This picture was taken through the front window of the building we stayed in:


Danny got this tiny old hat from Eric many years ago. Eric displayed the Conklin way to wear it:


The retreat went really well, I think. The youth were excited to be there and enthusiastically participated in everything, the adults were engaged and helpful, the music was great, everyone had fun, and people may have even gotten something out of it that will impact them in their lives at home. I have really enjoyed getting to know youth and their leaders through these retreats and have been happy to see some of those folks back from past retreats.

On our way home today, we stopped in Evanston to meet Erin and Matt and lots of other folks at the Firehouse. Skylar was baptized today (we were sad to have missed it) and their families and friends gathered to celebrate her, and for several family birthdays.


Andria and Justin came from Grand Rapids, and we were excited to meet Felicity for the first time! She is seven weeks old and slept for the entire meal. Here she is, not excited to be awake:


A long nap this afternoon made the weekend complete! Now we just need groceries and clean clothes!

Eliser's visit

Our good friend Eliser came this past week from Oregon for a visit. The second evening he was here, we went to a place we've been wanting to check out for a while: Decima Musa. It's a Pilsen bar and restaurant that has been around for 25 years. It's name, which means, "Tenth Muse," comes from Sor Juana Ines de la Cruz, a 17th century Mexican nun who was criticized at the time for her participation in the intellectual world and is known by some as the first North American feminist (I did a *very cool* report on her in one of my college Spanish literature classes). Anyway, the nachos and wine were spendy but tasty, and the live trova music was amazing. I will definitely be back for more Luis Badilla (the guy who plays every Friday night). Here's another example of good trova.

Goose and Eliser on the walk home:

It was chilly:


A picture of the Chicago landmark that Eliser took on one of his downtown adventures (while we were both working). Unfortunately, the day we went to the Sears Tower observation deck, the weather was nothing like this-- a snowstorm was coming in and visibility was about 2 1/2 feet. The next day, the sun was out.

Eliser cooked for us two times during the week. Here is the first meal, with Mark and Julie. We had amazing cheese empanadas and homemade salsa.

In front our Christmas gift: some brass bamboo from the company where he works. His specialty is making iron gates, but he thought that might be difficult to fit in the overhead compartment.


We got him Cometas en el Cielo (The Kite Runner in Spanish) and he made quite a dent during his visit.

Dinner #2: potato tacos...mmm.... Mark and Julie and Sonja joined us that night and I drank orange pop for the first time since I was 12.

We are so thankful for the lovely visit.

Conklin Family Christmas Picture

Ann and Brody sent us this nice group picture from our Christmas visit and I thought I'd share it here. Brody, Ann, Mike, Tanya, Emmy, Scott, Hilary, Goose and Mira:

Happy New Year!

Rebekah and Mike, lovely friends from Holy Covenant, hosted a New Year's Eve dinner party, which was fabulous! Here are the hosts with Al (left) and Amanda (second from right), Rebekah's sister.


The big table--Craig, Cindy, Maria, Goose, Matt, Lisa and Diane.

Mike, Jove and Meg.

Sara and Maria, who was very much enjoying a homemade chocolate truffle.



Local New Year's traditions include measuring wing spans to see if they match the person's height. Eric was found to be "the perfect man."


I, on the other hand, have the wing span of someone who is 5'3'' (at least 2 inches shorter than my height). Who knows what he is doing with a freak like me.


Then the measuring spread to head height and circumference. Apparently, Eric and Matt have the exact same measurements.

Jove and Meg:

Happ and Jove, about to usher in 2008:

Maria and Diane:

And the clock strikes 12:00.

Sara and Rebekah:

Just to show you how crazy the party was, here are Meg and Jove cutting a rug:

Time to head out. We had to be sure to catch the last Pink Line home. Thanks to CTA's longstanding New Year's Eve tradition, we rode for free!


Snow had been falling all evening and looked so pretty on the trees.



Happy 2008! Hope this year is full of great people and meaningful work for all of you.

More Spokandyland Pics

Emmy in her cute bow.

I don't know why, but Emmy always seemed to be the center of attention.

Christmas day. I love that guest rooms come equipped with fluffy white robes.

Christmas breakfast was a yummy strata with eggs and mushrooms and bready stuff.

Hilary and I got in a nice walk most days. Here is the view from Ann and Brody's neighborhood, looking over Chewelah.

Mike and Tanya came up from Spokane in the afternoon and we opened gifts and hung out. Christmas dinner was crab, which meant that the lone vegetarian got to hold Emmy for much of the meal while everyone else was occupied with cracking and jabbing those little forks around.

The music-note crowns are from the traditional British party crackers (noisemakers). Inside each one was a numbered whistle and music to some traditional Christmas songs. See two posts ago for a beautiful rendition of The First Noel.

More Emmy.

I joined the Conklin boys on Wednesday for a day at 49 Degress North, the beautiful ski area just 15 minutes outside Chewelah.

Mom, you might notice that we are both wearing helmets. Safety first.

At lunchtime, we drank mochas and devoured the largest tray of nachos I have ever seen.

Full and content.

On what turned out to be our last run of the day, Goose and I accidentally exited the downhill area and ended up below the lodge on the cross-country trails. A shuttle had to be called to take us back up and we missed the last chair lift ride. It was still a great day of skiing.

Ann and Brody sporting their new matching Emerson (College) sweatshirts.

We tried out another gift of Ann and Brody's: a wine tasting party kit.

On Thursday morning, we headed back to Spokane for brunch with grandma.

We visited the historic downtown Davenport Hotel which was displaying gingerbread "houses" that had been designed by local architects. Here's my attempt at an old-fashioned photo on the balcony overlooking the lobby.

Hanging out with Emerson: