More Than a Thousand Words

Where were we? Oh yeah, so I went back to work regular-like in September and it's been interesting. Some weeks are better than others - field work wreaks havoc on our schedule. Weeks that I'm in the office or working at home are much easier to manage. But here's the thing. I can't do it all. That's the bottom line. I am still knitting and doing a little painting. Still cooking from scratch as much as possible, still taking care of the chickens (they're well). Still keeping up with physical therapy, ballet and other necessary appointments (Maia has been in much better health so far this cold season). One thing that has changed is that I have no time for this blog. Maybe we're still working out the kinks, maybe it'll still happen. I'm going to try. When I said to Chris recently that I'd all but given up on the blog, he said he wished I wouldn't - that it was a good journal to have. I agree. Moving on.
I love this photo. I love this photo because I love all the people in it and they all look so content but I really love this photo because it represents how so many things are different from just 2 and a half years ago.

We took our sweet time driving up to the Bay Area for an after Christmas rendez-vous with my family. We stopped at Oso Flaco Lake on the first day. It's funny, I just went back through my blog to see if I had mentioned this place before, and I hadn't. We went here back in summer of 2008, when we were headed up north for my cousin's wedding. We stopped for a night in Los Osos and someone told us about this place (Oso Flaco Lake) which is at the southern end of Pismo beach. It's about a mile walk from the parking lot through some trees, onto a board walk that goes over the lake, and then through the dunes to the beach. It is just beautiful.

At this time in 2008, we were struggling with Maia. We knew in our hearts and minds that her doctors were wrong about her diagnosis but we were getting nowhere with them. She had a terrible time doing this walk. She was in pain and Chris carried her quite a bit. We were beside ourselves. Didn't know what was going on. This time she did great. Granted she complained about a spot on her foot where her orthotic was rubbing but still, she ran, she skipped, she played. So much better now. I don't have any photos from our first visit because our camera was stolen out of our car after my cousin's wedding (several large errors on our part) - we lost some great photos from that trip, but as you can see, we replaced the camera and that great 50 mm lens and all is well with the photography in our family.

I have so much to share but drat! have to go - Ponchos for one. I knit furiously through December two ponchos for the girls. Love them. I'm knitting another sweater. I finished one Brougham painting and started another. I scaled back Christmas cards this year (boo!) but hopefully will get back to that Gocco some day soon. Happy New Year - hope to post more soon.