K's Café: The 30 Second Blog

Trying a new blogging method

I've spent a while investigating posterous.com today, and I think I'll give some of its features a try. For instance:

- posting by email, as I am doing now (MUCH easier to add multiple photos)

- apparently it makes a photo album thingy out of my multiple photos? We'll see about that, I guess! *Update: so it only makes a special album on posterous, but just posts all the photos in a row on Typepad*

- autoposting to various of my networking sites, like Flickr and Twitter (which I "never" use), and my regular Typepad blog page (where you are likely reading this, though I wrote it in an email and then it went out via posterous)

- it's sort of a back-up of my blog, really, as well

BY THE WAY: in the process of backing up my blog on posterous, I discovered that I had hit 1,001 posts this week! This makes post # 1,002! In case for any reason it is better for you, at the moment you can also access my blog here at posterous, with a bit of a different format. Not sure how things will end up, but I'll let you know.

So here, for testing purposes and your delight, are some favorite old photos from England and France, including flowers from outside Buckingham Palace, and Stonehenge.

See and download the full gallery on posterous

Posted via email from K's Café

Seasons of a Blog

It must be winter for my blog. It's been hibernating. In the meantime:

David, Emily and I learned how to make mosaics in metal cases on our dining room table (David's intriguing idea).

Jason made a tall domino tower.

Emily built a large model of the steep, hillside town of medieval Cortona, Italy, with her classmates, based on a field trip they enjoyed together.

We've enjoyed a couple of roaring fires.

And a friend of a friend treated us to a complimentary family photo shoot outside.

We also visited Mürren for the 2nd time, but those are photos for another post...

I'm Thinking Maybe My Blog is Dead

Or maybe just dormant? Hibernating for the winter?

The muse seems to have left or been anaesthetized. She only comes up with one-sentence snippets suitable for Facebook status updates.

I'll give you a few links here to add some content to this post:

God's Pharmacy - a kind of cool description of how some foods resemble the bodily organs they help with their specific nutrients. And this is apparently a version with some scientific corrections and references.

Very cool idea of a sports team to bless another.

Don't Waste Your Cancer: ten ideas of John Piper's. I hope I never have to put these ideas into practice - but since both my dad and my husband's dad died of cancer in their 50s, it's not beyond imagining. Interesting, profound thoughts.

While I'm not blogging, I am living life. I am enjoying God. I am enjoying my husband. I am enjoying my children. I am learning German (slowly). I am liking being in Switzerland. I even like the long, cold, freezing, icy, snowy, cloudy, foggy, gray winter here. It feels right. I know spring will come, and it will be all the more glorious for the prolonged suspense and the contrast. So spring flowers came in February when we lived in California - whenever they surface here, it will have been worth the wait. In the meantime, I am super-thankful for a heated house.

I am cherishing God's Words to me between the covers of my Bible daily, thanks to accountability with ladies from our church. I am delighting in conversing with Him in (brief) daily, dedicated, focused prayer times for the first time in many years (thanks to new accountability this year via a small private Facebook group). I am getting my feet wet in some leadership roles (merely because I want the groups to exist). Life is chugging along and I am so thankful for so many blessings.

Maybe this is why I don't have much to write about lately - I am savoring the daily, the regular, the personal. I am immersed in waters that don't feel right to share just yet - waters of prayer, of insecure but thus-far functional leadership (I sweat when I have the floor), and of waiting patiently for spring.

First post from iPhone

Just figuring out other neat things I can do with my new iPhone, like take a photo of it (in the bright pink case my man got me) in the rear view mirror while parked waiting to pick up Emily, and "moblog" (mobile blog) by posting it directly from my phone. I had already worked out how to post directly to Facebook, but hadn't thought of it for Typepad (my blog hosting service) until I noticed a photo someone else had posted remotely on their blog. Typing is sure a lot slower on my iPhone than on my laptop! Here comes Emily now!

Blog vs. Facebook

It seems to me that Facebook is taking over the world of email and blogging. That is, so many of my friends are on Facebook and do a type of micro-blogging with the "status updates," which are remarkably similar to Twitter's tweets, that one hardly needs a blog anymore. Everyone who's on Facebook already knows what you're doing, if they care to look. Plus people upload their photos, post notes or links to videos, etc. People message each other on Facebook rather than sending regular email. But then I suppose a weblog provides a much larger and more individual space for thoughts and stories, with fewer other distracting elements.

It's been 5 days since I last posted here, but I've been posting little status updates on Facebook, and keeping up with lots of folks on there. Since I last accessed Typepad, which is my blog hosting company, they have made a lot of changes. I am just taking in the different look of this post composing page and the options. My main issue so far is that the typing speed in this window is really slow! Annoying when I make typos and have to go back and it takes a long time, so I press delete too many times, etc. Ah, that's better - I discovered the new "light editor" which works like the old one. Much less frustrating. Apparently I have a "slow" computer. Hmmmph. I didn't think I did. Other problems are arising from the changes in the way it does links and the preview...

In any case, I highly recommend you join Facebook if you haven't already, and if I know you personally, we can keep up there as well :-) I'm not saying I'm stopping blogging after these 4.5 years, but it's making me think.

* * *

But on to actual words about us:

Friday night was really busy - Jason got home from his 3-night trip to Wengen (hiking, biking, high ropes course, bonfire, cooking...), Emily went off to a birthday sleepover, and David and I went to the opera in Zurich (Aida). It was intriguing watching an opera sung in Italian (operatic Italian, keep in mind), and supertitled in German (literary German, keep in mind). If it hadn't been for the excellent synposis we received ahead of time from a local British composer, I'd have been lost. As it was, we followed well enough. Three words I should have looked up ahead of time: Ehre, Schicksal, and Verräter (Honor, Fate, and Traitor) - these kept coming up on the supertitles, and I knew they were something of a central theme...I eventually figured out the last two by context, but the first I found out in my purse dictionary on the way home.

Jason is home with a sore throat today. He also seems to be the editor-in-chief of the high school newspaper, as a 9th grader. Fascinating. He is getting things more organized for the 2nd edition of the year, now that it is clearer that it will be his job to do so. I pray blessings over his cheerful efforts.

Emily's been doing much better adjusting to her headgear...in time for the next orthodontic visit on Friday...we'll just keep praying her through!

Sunday afternoon we met for the first time with our new "K-group" from church (in England they called it "small group" or "cell group," in Rhode Island "kinship," in California, "home group"  or "Growth Group" and in Illinois, "housegroup"). The K stands for Koinonia (= "fellowship" in Greek, I believe). We have members from Lebanon (who are Armenian and now have a Swiss passport too, and speak Turkish, Arabic, French, English, German, and Swiss-German), Malaysia (who speak Malay and Mandarin and English), Russia, and America. Quite the intriguing mix. We plan to study Max Lucado's book 3:16 - The Numbers of Hope every other week on Wednesday nights.

I baked pumpkin cookies and zucchini bread this morning, as it is my turn to bring the treats to our ladies' study tonight - and of course I'm leaving some for the family, too :-)

It's rainy and cold here in Zurich, and foggy, too. We might even get some snow on Thursday through Sunday, as the temps are meant to be hovering right around 0-3°C Thu & Fri (that's 32-37°F). We are excited. I picked up our skis yesterday, so we're all ready for the occasion to arise to use them.

I'm really proud of my mother and her husband, who just celebrated their 10th wedding anniversary - congratulations again, you two!

Well, I'm going to hit publish and see what happens, whether there's any change in format...blessings on your day.

Wordle

Thanks to Jon Reid for the pointer to Wordle.net where you can make pretty word pictures like this by just sticking in your blog url (or any text you want):

Click to enlarge. Of course the choice of colors is my favorite part.

Anyone for Delurking?

Who are you? Do I know you're reading along? I'd love to; it would encourage me :-)

If you haven't commented before (or emailed me) or not in years, maybe you could think of delurkifying yourself and saying hello in a comment below (or on any post).

If you are concerned about privacy or spam, you could make up a fake email address or fake website url to enter with your (polite/friendly) comment. Did you know that is possible?

Or if it is okay for just me (and no one else) to have your email address, you could put in a website url that isn't yours but you like (e.g. http://www.google.com, what a great site), and then whatever email address you put in will not show up for other readers of the blog, only I will see it and be able to reply to you. Your entered email address only shows up for everyone if you do not enter a website url as well. The website address will show on the page for everyone to see.

Who's reading from New Mexico and Wisconsin? Hello to you!

Would really like to be a blogger

Oh look, I have a web log! All I have to do is type into this window and hit "save" and voilà, a blog post!

It's just that I have hundreds of other more urgent matters to attend to.

Like the feet of stuff on my desk (God truly knows what all is in there, but I don't). And the pages of items on my to do list (ditto).

I would like to tell you all about last week's trip to Normandy (with photos of Omaha Beach, Juno Beach, Mont-Saint-Michel and the Bayeux Tapestry and Cathedral), but....oh look, my thirty seconds for the day are up.

You Know you Went to an International School When...

I am a very susceptible person when it comes to fun or useful things suggested by people I really know and love and trust and like.

Take my mom, for instance. She and I had both worn clip-on earrings (or magnetic earrings, etc) forever and ever, and then one day when she was 52, she decided to get her ears pierced (thanks to my sister-in-law, who took her). Within a month, I had gotten my ears pierced as well (at age 25). I have never looked back and am so glad I did. But I never would have if my mom hadn't paved the way (which she didn't know she was doing).

Take my husband, for instance. When we were dating, I told him I didn't like salmon. He encouraged me to try it again when he took me out to a restaurant in Providence, Rhode Island. I did, and have been joyfully eating it ever since. It turned out it's only SMOKED salmon I (still) don't like. Poached or grilled or sautéed is fabulous.

Take Julie Leung as our final example today. She began blogging in 2003, and I loved reading her blog. She began encouraging me to start one of my own (I think maybe I was taking up too much room in her comments! ;-)). I finally founded this blog in June 2004. Hmmm, it's been just over three years now.

Then earlier this year Julie blogged about Twittering. So I began Twittering too (but that was short-lived).

The chain continued as Julie recently Twittered about Facebook. Now there's a website that can make a lot of hours disappear. Julie, I'm happy to report that I am now up to 13 "friends." ;-) Still waiting for someone from my college a cappella group to make an appearance, though. Maybe someday.

I found an interesting list on Facebook's You know you went to an International school when..." group. Below are the ones I particularly identify with (or have in the past):

You know you went to an International school when...
1) You can't answer the question: "Where are you from?"
3) You flew before you could walk.
4) You have a passport, but no driver's license.
7) Your life story uses the phrase "Then we went to..." five times (or six, or seven times...).
8) You speak with authority on the quality of airline travel.
12) You don't know where home is.
15) You realize it really is a small world, after all.
16) You feel that multiple passports would be appropriate.
17) You watch a movie set in a 'foreign country', and you know what the nationals are really saying into the camera.
23) You think VISA is a document stamped in your passport, and not a plastic card you carry in your wallet.
24) You automatically take off your shoes as soon as you get home.
28) You know the geography of the rest of the world, but you don't know the geography of your own country.
34) Your high school football team had to play against itself.. if it had one
40) You are a pro packer, or at least have done it many times
46) When you return to the States you are overwhelmed with the number of choices in a grocery store
53) You are never content in one place, be it city, state or country for long. You're a mover.
56) Class reunions.. are not at your old school.. not even close
59) Your passport has more stamps than a post office
61) When you carry converters because you actually realize there are different types of outlets
65) You wake up in one country thinking you are in another

Cats, Geeks, Silence, Tears and Helpless Love

Coolest half-upside-down cat photo.

Coolest way to put the "Geek Gospel."

Tears rolled down from both eyes to my chin and onto my shirt when I watched this 5-minute "Remember Me" video made by a high-school student in support of military people.

Hope from Here at the Mission:

...we talked about how God came for us when we least deserved it, and how he just keeps coming for us, and he never leaves us and he never forgets where we are, and he never has something more important to do or someone he likes better. We talked about how our story isn't one of salvation lost and salvation found, it's a story of God being with us through all the uncertainty of life, through the rebellion and doubt and fear and outright panic, because he knows who He is, and He knows who we are, and He can't help but love us anyway.

When God goes silent, by Steven Furtick (a pastor in North Carolina):

One of my mentors told me that the reason God seems strangely silent at the times when we need Him the most is that the teacher is always quiet during the test.
Here are some steps to take when God goes silent:
1. Keep doing the last thing He told you to do.
2. Examine whether there’s any sin/pride in your heart that would prohibit you from clearly hearing His voice. If so, come clean and move forward.
3. Read the simple stuff in the Bible and obey it. You can’t go wrong there. Maybe God isn’t showing you His concealed will because you won’t even obey His revealed will.
4. Be very excited. I’ve learned that when I can’t hear my 22 month old son upstairs, it’s because he’s up to something. It’s usually not good. If God isn’t making much noise in your life right now, it might be because He’s up to something. Something good.
5. Always remember in the darkness what God told you in the light. If God promised, He will deliver.