News from the Jacobs family in Saudi Arabia
Christmas day 2010 and the events leading up to it. Enjoy the pictures!
In an attempt to inject culture into our vacation we traveled to Minneapolis for a day at the Children’s Museum and then an evening of theater. The Children’s Theater put on an excellent production of “Christmas Story” that we all enjoyed.
Back in Danbury! In the few days we’ve been here we’ve managed to stock the fridge, visit Santa, put up a tree and weather a snowstorm. The second day back was Christmas at the Fort — a historical site called Forts Folle Avoine hosts a holiday event with Santa, a wild rice cafe and sleigh rides. That same day a snowstorm hit but thankfully the Fort is just a mile away so we were able to make it. Later we were able to hang lights on the deck and get the tree up. Being unpracticed at judging the quality of Christmas trees our main criteria was “can we get it on the car”. It turns out you want to pay attention to whether the trunk is drastically curved. By the time the sun was going down the snow was still falling, the wind had picked up, the temperature plummeted and Crystal and I were out on the deck trying to lash down an 8′ tree. Plenty of rope, ratchet straps and some frozen fingers later the tree was anchored!
I enjoy cooking (this is Ben talking here). I enjoy collecting and selecting ingredients and putting them together into a passable meal. Of all the things I enjoy making in the kitchen though bread stands out. For most meals the quality of the ingredients is the controlling factor. If you start with some great produce you’re going to get a great salad. The act of good cooking is essentially creating a pleasing mixture of quality ingredients. Baking bread, on the other hand, works at the chemical level and a biochemical level at that. The vast majority of my breads have flour, water, salt, yeast. Nothing else. Not only do these simple ingredients transform so substantially but the possible outcomes starting from such simple input is staggering. With less dependence on the ingredients the final loaf becomes a more accurate reflection of the craft of the baker.
Anyway, here are a few pictures. Enjoy!
Now that we have been back for a week I have the pictures off the camera and processes. Here is the first batch with some of the sights we took in when we had some free moments from the conference.
What do you call a Mom who is not particularly into Star Wars (and honestly she can’t tell a Wookie from a Sith) but nevertheless engages her artistic ability to make amazing star wars cut out cookies? I’m not exactly sure but the force is clearly with her.
A week after we arrived, Forts Folle Avoine held their annual Rendezvous where they reenact the fur trade from the early 1800’s. On that same weekend we a visit from Aunt Lea Ann with Cousin Nina and Cousin Sarah along with Uncle Paul and Bev. Both sets of Grandparents also attended and it was a real treat to have everyone together. Kai and Nora enjoyed having a full house and especially having some other kids around to play with. It was a great weekend!
Our big project this summer was getting a fireplace installed in the house. We really like the way it turned out. On a warm humid day it doesn’t seem like such an accomplishment but when winter rolls in we are really going to appreciate it. Here are a few photos of the install process.
At the end of this last week was Kai’s Kindergarten day. It was a small event just for the parents in his class to come in and spend a half hour to watch some pictures of the school year, thank the volunteer Moms and impress parents with some of the work they’ve done over the school year. Not only is that a pretty special day but it also coincided with Kai’s turn as student of the day which meant that he got to check the weather and lead the class in songs. He did a great job!
Last Wednesday was the Kindergarten Science fair at Kai’s school. I like the way it was set up–a selection of experiment stations that contained explorations the children had completed. They got to lead their parents through demonstrations of the types of explorations and observations they had been making in science. There was no competition, no tri-fold boards and no stunning displays of how gifted the parents were at completing science projects for their children!
