Monthly Archives: January 2007

How about some photos?

Sure, we’ve got photos! But they’re all of Catherine. Isn’t that just terrible? I know that most of our readers simply *hate* seeing photos of her. Oh well, here you go. 😉

ppp|Peter and Catherine|ppp

[From the photo shoot: A dad, a baby, a camera, and a mirror.](http://prwdot.org/gallery2/v/baby/dad_baby_camera_mirror/)

ppp|Mom and Catherine|ppp

[From the photo shoot: Catherine and Mom.](http://prwdot.org/gallery2/v/baby/catherine_and_mom/)

ppp|Ick, spoon!|ppp

[From the photo shoot: Catherine eats sweet potatoes.](http://prwdot.org/gallery2/v/baby/catherine_sweet_potatoes/)

Real Life-Virtual Friendships?

Does having a blog strengthen or weaken one’s friendships?

I was talking to a friend of mine (Jill from theholtsite.com) recently. Although we hadn’t spoken in a while Jill commented that she felt like she knew what I’d been up to. This blog had done a pretty good job of keeping her up to date. She also said that another friend of hers had likewise made a similar comment about her blog while they visited at a wedding.

“Did you hear that Dan got married?” Jill asked. “Yes,” I quickly responded, “I read about it on your blog.”

After laughing about these comments our conversation suddenly became quiet. We were already caught up on each other’s lives! What more could we talk about?

This got me thinking about the purpose of blogging. I often tell people that we blog in order to keep our far flung family and friends up to date on our comings and goings. For those that we don’t talk to frequently it works well. When we do get to talk with them we can skip past the daily stuff and go onto more personal matters.

But, what about people we see frequently? I’ve brought up topics with family members who look at me and say, “yeah. I read that on your blog…” and I’m stopped in my tracks. Quickly, I try to find a new topic of conversation. It isn’t so much that it is difficult to find a new topic, just that I’m still surprised when others already know the story I’ve thought to share with them.

Have you found this happening in your relationships? Are you able to balance your online relationship with your real life relationship with your friends and family?

Personality Commentary

A while back, I [posted the results](http://prwdot.org/2006/12/19/personalityhis/) of a [personality test](http://www.perex.com/). The results were remarkably accurate, highlighting most of the important aspects of my personality. Now I’d like to offer my commentary and analysis of the results.

Continue reading

S

The Fruit of Stone by Mark Spragg

A modern day Cowboy story. (No, not that modern day cowboy story!)

Spragg allows his readers to slowly discover the characters in his book. Each short character vignette builds upon the previous one and each gives new insight into the lives of McEban, Bennett, Ansel, Gretchen and others. Spragg explores the decisions made in life and how those decisions are influenced by past events and trusted loved ones.

I’ve never been to Montana or Wyoming but the descriptions in this book make me want to pack my bags, find a dude ranch and saddle up.

[for those of you just tuning in: this is the eighth book in my series Authors: Z-A. Next up, R]

Winter Winds

There are a few places in our apartment that allow the wind to whistle through. Normally it is no big deal (and it saves us from the risk of Carbon Monoxide poisoning!) but during this cold snap we’re having it has been very noticeable.

I mentioned to Peter last night that the windows seemed particularly drafty lately. He looked at me and said, “maybe we should put the storm windows down”.

Well, duh! It has been so warm this winter that we hadn’t even swapped out the window screens for the storm windows. What were we thinking!?!

I went around today and put the storms down. We still have some wind that sneaks in, but the place seems much more air tight. Sometimes the easiest solution is right under your nose and you don’t even know it!

Calendar Girl

I have finally gotten around to “switching over” my calendar from last year. It is an easy task of copying over birthdays, anniversaries, and other important info from last year’s calendar to this year’s. Simple as it is, I always put it off until after the craziness of the holidays. It is never as bad of a project as I make it to be in my mind.

The best part of this project is revisiting all of my events, appointments and schedules of the past year. Usually the past year is similar to the current year, but this time around the changes have been huge. It was interesting to see my old work schedule dominating the calendar pages. I could see all of my OB appointments and finally Catherine’s birthday. Wedding dates, cookouts, vacations and even baby milestones (first teeth!) remind me of all the fun times we’ve had with people we love.

As a sporadic journaler it is awesome to have this daily record of our lives. It reminds me of so many good times (and even some not so good) and events and gives me a marker of how much our lives have changed in such a short time.

Weekend in PA

This past weekend, Becky, Catherine and I drove down to [Schuylkill Haven, PA](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schuylkill_Haven) to visit with my Mom’s side of the family. We don’t get to see them very often, and when we do, it’s usually in the midst of Christmas festivities… not leaving a lot of time for any one-on-one interaction.

We stayed at the home of Mom’s sister Christine and her husband John. We relaxed at their house and were given the bed and breakfast treatment by Christine. We had a great time getting to see them, along with the rest of the Keefer clan who came over on Saturday evening for subs and high-stakes Uno. 🙂 Since I was enjoying spending time with my family, I didn’t take too many photos, but the ones I did take can be found [here](http://prwdot.org/gallery2/v/events/2007/pa_visit/) (family access is required to view the gallery).

Go Bucks!

ppp|Go Bucks!|ppp

See the [whole photo shoot](http://prwdot.org/gallery2/v/events/2007/go_bucks/). 🙂

Sadly, it doesn’t look like Catherine’s team spirit has helped the Buckeyes this year. There’s always next season!

A Midwinter Walk

So here we are in the middle of winter. On what might normally be a cold day, we went for a stroll in jeans and t-shirts. Why?

ppp|67.5?!

67.5 Degrees Fahrenheit!

|ppp

ppp|She likes it!

She likes it!

|ppp

We all enjoyed the warm weather, as weird as it was! You can check out [more pics from our walk](http://prwdot.org/gallery2/v/events/2007/unseasonable_warmth/).