Harbinger

It looks like spring may be coming eventually!

Justice

(Street people, Florence, Italy)

Micah 6:8
(NIV)

He has shown you, O mortal, what is good.
And what does the Lord require of you?
To act justly and to love mercy
and to walk humbly with your God.

Leisure

(Several of my beloved older books.)

This last week, with no student teaching or other gainful employment to occupy my time, I have been reading heaps and mountains of books in between doing small organizing projects, baking, and going for wandering walks. It's been fantastic!

Cold snap

Although the days have been fairly warm this January, the last few mornings have been rather cold and foggy. Soon the sun comes out and starts burning off the mist and frost. I caught some of the transition yesterday morning on my way to the library.

Morning

Dew on the way to the Springfield Library.

Afternoon walk

(Ferns on tree at Dorris Day Ranch, Eugene, Oregon)

Translucent

I love the sunlight that comes through our dining room curtains on sunny afternoons!

Looking up

Another day with sunlight! Now that I am done with student teaching, I can arrange things more to my own schedule. After my walk to the library, I wandered around our apartment complex for a bit trying out different camera angles.

Woods

(Dorris Day Ranch, Eugene, Oregon)

Open

Matthew 7:7-8
(NIV)

Ask and it will be given to you;
seek and you will find;
knock and the door will be opened to you.
For everyone who asks receives;
he who seeks finds;
and to him who knocks, the door will be opened.

Momentum

(Along the Nile, Eygpt)

Goodbye

(Riffa Fort, Bahrain)

...to student teaching.

Alas that we cannot stay

(Sahalie Falls, Oregon)

Oregon is a truly beautiful state, with mountains, waterfalls, and ocean all within a few hours of where we live. We've really enjoyed living here the past few years!

Echoes

(Restored portion of Bahrain Fort)

One thing I loved about taking pictures in Bahrain is that the sky was so frequently blue!

Ramble

Definition:
1. To walk about casually or for pleasure.

2. To follow an irregularly winding course of motion or growth.

3. A leisurely, sometimes lengthy walk.
4. Yesterday's afternoon plans.

After several days of cloudy, drizzly, grumpy weather, yesterday was sunny, clear, and cheerful. The 50 degree weather made it feel like a Michigan March or April, even if the trees are still bare. Clearly it was a good day to go for a walk.... so I did. Happily, I remembered to bring my camera with me and took a number of pictures along the way. Here are a few of them:

Wet

(Rhododendron bud outside our apartment, Eugene, Oregon)

Yesterday afternoon, Ben opened the door of the apartment to watch the heavy rain that had just started. Hearing the rain, I immediately snatched my camera and scampered out the door crying, "My blog! My blog!" since this is the first heavy rain I've had time to take pictures since I started this whole blogging adventure. Despite having lived in Oregon for over two years, my rain pictures are non-existent. Usually when it rains, I curl up on the sofa with a book, an afghan, and possibly cocoa.

Once outside, I looked around our fairly boring apartment complex for something to photograph, when lo! there were some rhododendron bushes. My neighbors probably thought I was nuts as they watched me looming over the plants trying to get an interesting shot while getting rather wet, but now I have a real, legitimate picture from a rainy Oregon day.

Time

(National Evangelical Church clocktower, Bahrain)

James 4:14

(International Standard Version)

You do not know what tomorrow will bring.
What is your life?
You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes.

Light

(View from the a bed and breakfast in Theale, England, 2007)

...because it's January, and because sometimes you just need a bit of sunlight!

Unexpected inverse

(Skyline in York, England)

Janus

I love taking pictures of interesting doors. They are everywhere!

Old Bahraini house, Bahrain

Arad Fort, Bahrain

Bayreuth, Germany

Florence, Italy

Gypped!

(4th grade MKS students during a basketball tournament)

This picture quite handily sums up my feelings about the anticipated snow day that failed to materialize yesterday.

Mist

(Trees outside our apartment, Eugene, Oregon)

Yesterday started out clear enough, but as the ice on the roads evaporated, the day got mistier and mistier. It wasn't as thick as it often is, but it still showed up well against the trees in our apartment's courtyard when I adventured into the cold to get the mail after school.

January rain

January is rainy season in Oregon. Just like October, November, December, February, and March.

Puddle Adventure

I found five dollars today,
hidden in a murky street puddle.
Now everyone races from puddle to muddy puddle
like hyperactive ducks...
every disappointment creating another hope.

(Yes, all you literal-minded people, this is a waterfall, not an

actual rainy day. But it is an Oregon waterfall, and I don't have
any real rain pictures...yet.)

Glorious

(Crater Lake, Oregon)

Psalm 104
(ESV)

Bless the Lord, O my soul!
O Lord my God, you are very great!
You are clothed with splendor and majesty,
covering yourself with light as with a garment,
stretching out the heavens like a tent.
He lays the beams of his chambers on the waters;
he makes the clouds his chariot;
he rides on the wings of the wind;
he makes his messengers winds,
his ministers a flaming fire.

He set the earth on its foundations,
so that it should never be moved.
You covered it with the deep as with a garment;
the waters stood above the mountains.
At your rebuke they fled;
at the sound of your thunder they took to flight.
The mountains rose, the valleys sank down
to the place that you appointed for them.
You set a boundary that they may not pass,
so that they might not again cover the earth.

You make springs gush forth in the valleys;
they flow between the hills;
they give drink to every beast of the field;
the wild donkeys quench their thirst.
Beside them the birds of the heavens dwell;
they sing among the branches.
From your lofty abode you water the mountains;
the earth is satisfied with the fruit of your work.

You cause the grass to grow for the livestock
and plants for man to cultivate,
that he may bring forth food from the earth
and wine to gladden the heart of man,
oil to make his face shine
and bread to strengthen man's heart.

The trees of the Lord are watered abundantly,
the cedars of Lebanon that he planted.
In them the birds build their nests;
the stork has her home in the fir trees.
The high mountains are for the wild goats;
the rocks are a refuge for the rock badgers.

He made the moon to mark the seasons;
the sun knows its time for setting.
You make darkness, and it is night,
when all the beasts of the forest creep about.
The young lions roar for their prey,
seeking their food from God.
When the sun rises, they steal away
and lie down in their dens.
Man goes out to his work
and to his labor until the evening.

O Lord, how manifold are your works!
In wisdom have you made them all;
the earth is full of your creatures.
Here is the sea, great and wide,
which teems with creatures innumerable,
living things both small and great.
There go the ships,
and Leviathan, which you formed to play in it.

These all look to you,
to give them their food in due season.
When you give it to them, they gather it up;
when you open your hand, they are filled with good things.
When you hide your face, they are dismayed;
when you take away their breath, they die
and return to their dust.
When you send forth your Spirit, they are created,
and you renew the face of the ground.

May the glory of the Lord endure forever;
may the Lord rejoice in his works,
who looks on the earth and it trembles,
who touches the mountains and they smoke!
I will sing to the Lord as long as I live;
I will sing praise to my God while I have being.
May my meditation be pleasing to him, for I rejoice in the Lord.
Let sinners be consumed from the earth,
and let the wicked be no more!
Bless the Lord, O my soul!
Praise the Lord!

Endings and beginnings

Yesterday was my last teaching day with the three periods I took over for student teaching, although I will still be at the school for another two weeks, observing and grading. The kids were incredible and asked if I would be coming back to sub for them.

I'm really glad that I don't actually have to say goodbye yet! I'm terrible at goodbyes. I'd much rather just disappear one day.

I am excited to be getting closer to whatever it is Ben and I will be doing when I am done with school, though!

A dream fulfilled...

Ben and I discovered after we were married that we actually met on a field trip to a hot air balloon company in fourth grade (there is photographic evidence to support this). Both of us remember being keenly disappointed that a hot air balloon ride was not part of the tour. We rectified this tragedy together years later in Egypt, when we took a balloon ride over the Nile River and the Valley of the Kings in 2007.

There will be order!

(German market display)

Sometimes you just have to leave it to the Germans to be properly organized... I am definitely needing to channel some of my Germanness (Germanhood? Germanity?) to finish my work sample and final paper for class. My last day of actual teaching is tomorrow. Then I'll just have two weeks of observation and grading left... Crazy!

Comfort food

Shawarma Xpress... One of the two restaurants in Bahrain we miss on a very regular basis.

I remember why...

...I want to be a teacher. Right now the paperwork part of teaching seems excessive. And then I remember my students in Bahrain and how wonderful it can be. Just think, next year, mostly likely, I'll have my own classroom again!

Back at it

I'm off to prepare for my last four days of actual student teaching... followed by two weeks of grading and observing other teachers. This feels like much more of a hurdle than it actually is. At least I have an exhaustive to-do list. That means I can do it, right?

I'd much rather be here....

(Rebecca and me at Lake Michigan in 2008.)

Possibility

New year, new experiences, new perspectives.