in medias res

If you want to try this out, follow the directions below, and let me know! We can compare out mosaics!

Type your answer to each of the questions below into flikr search. Using only the first page of returned images, choose your favorite and copy-&-paste each of the URL’s into the mosaic maker (3 columns, 4 rows).

The questions:
1. What is your first name?
2. What is your favorite food?
3. What high school did you attend?
4. What is your favorite color?
5. Who is your celebrity crush?
6. Favorite drink?
7. Dream vacation?
8. Favorite dessert?
9. What do you want to be when you grow up?
10.What do you love most in life?
11. One word to describe you.
12. Your Flickr name

Here are a couple pictures from our week. Halleigh and I have been making great use of our new ride. Visiting various parks has been Halleigh's favorite part and it has been really fun to ride around Durham seeing it from the biking point of view. I have yet to go to the grocery store on my bike, but I am excited to try that out soon.

We had an hour to kill the other day and so we went over to the Museum of Life and Science. We LOVE this museum. Miles' grandparents gave us a membership and we have used it A LOT! Halleigh ran for an hour straight from exhibit to exhibit. She had a very good time, and slept VERY soundly for her nap. I had to go in and wake her up after 2 1/2 hours so we could pick up Mary from the airport.

Oh by the way, I took these picture with my phone. Pretty good, I'd say!

So today is my birthday party, and since I am banned from the kitchen, I am stuck in the living room.  My birthday, as many of you already know is actually Monday, but since people work... we are celebrating today.

Which brings me to the point, I am really freaked out by being 28. People laugh when I say this, but I really do feel impending doom. Okay maybe it's not doom, but maybe trepidation. ha ha ha

I think that this hesitation is caused by Taryn (my step-mom). Sorry Taryn, but I think it's your fault. :)   When my dad and Taryn got married (16 years ago) she was 28! Totally an adult, responsible and old enough to be married to my dad!  He was OLD, or so I thought; really he was in his mid-thirties, in the best shape of his life, had a totally awesome bachelor pad and drove the "fine German touring car". Really, he was a catch! :) But that isn't the point... the point is that I am rapidly becoming my parents' age. 

Where has my life gone? It is a slippery slope to 30 from here!

If you read Miles' blog you know that we went to see the Dead Sea Scrolls a couple weekends ago. It really was one of the most interesting exhibits I have ever seen.  Though expensive, it is totally worth the money!

Along the lines of the "coolness" of the scrolls, here is a list of 25 fascinating things you may not have known about the Dead Sea Scrolls.

1. The Dead Sea Scrolls were discovered in eleven caves along the northwest shore of the Dead Sea between the years 1947 and 1956. The area is 13 miles east of Jerusalem and is 1300 feet below sea level. The mostly fragmented texts, are numbered according to the cave that they came out of. They have been called the greatest manuscript discovery of modern times.

2. Only Caves 1 and 11 have produced relatively intact manuscripts. Discovered in 1952, Cave 4 produced the largest find. About 15,000 fragments from more than 500 manuscripts were found.

3. In all, scholars have identified the remains of about 825 to 870 separate scrolls.

4. The Scrolls can be divided into two categories—biblical and non-biblical. Fragments of every book of the Old Testament have been discovered except for the book of Esther.

5. There are now identified among the scrolls, 19 copies of the Book of Isaiah, 25 copies of Deuteronomy and 30 copies of the Psalms.

6. Prophecies by Ezekiel, Jeremiah and Daniel not found in the Bible are written in the Scrolls.

7. The Isaiah Scroll, found relatively intact, is 1000 years older than any previously known copy of Isaiah. In fact, the scrolls are the oldest group of Old Testament manuscripts ever found.

8. In the Scrolls are found never before seen psalms attributed to King David and Joshua.

9.There are nonbiblical writings along the order of commentaries on the OT, paraphrases that expand on the Law, rule books of the community, war conduct, thanksgiving psalms, hymnic compositions, benedictions, liturgical texts, and wisdom writings.

10. The Scrolls are for the most part, written in Hebrew, but there are many written in Aramaic. Aramaic was the common language of the Jews of Palestine for the last two centuries B.C. and of the first two centuries A.D. The discovery of the Scrolls has greatly enhanced our knowledge of these two languages. In addition, there are a few texts written in Greek.

11. The Scrolls appear to be the library of a Jewish sect. The library was hidden away in caves around the outbreak of the First Jewish Revolt (A.D. 66-70) as the Roman army advanced against the rebel Jews.

12. Near the caves are the ancient ruins of Qumran. They were excavated in the early 1950's and appear to be connected with the scrolls.

13. The Dead Sea Scrolls were most likely written by the Essenes during the period from about 200 B.C. to 68 C.E./A.D. The Essenes are mentioned by Josephus and in a few other sources, but not in the New Testament. The Essenes were a strict Torah observant, Messianic, apocalyptic, baptist, wilderness, new covenant Jewish sect. They were led by a priest they called the "Teacher of Righteousness," who was opposed and possibly killed by the establishment priesthood in Jerusalem.

14. The enemies of the Qumran community were called the "Sons of Darkness"; they called themselves the "Sons of Light," "the poor," and members of "the Way." They thought of themselves as "the holy ones," who lived in "the house of holiness," because "the Holy Spirit" dwelt with them.

15. The last words of Joseph, Judah, Levi, Naphtali, and Amram (the father of Moses) are written down in the Scrolls.

16. One of the most curious scrolls is the Copper Scroll. Discovered in Cave 3, this scroll records a list of 64 underground hiding places throughout the land of Israel. The deposits are to contain certain amounts of gold, silver, aromatics, and manuscripts. These are believed to be treasures from the Temple at Jerusalem, that were hidden away for safekeeping.

17. The Temple Scroll, found in Cave 11, is the longest scroll. Its present total length is 26.7 feet (8.148 meters). The overall length of the scroll must have been over 28 feet (8.75m).

18. The scrolls contain previously unknown stories about biblical figures such as Enoch, Abraham, and Noah. The story of Abraham includes an explanation why God asked Abraham to sacrifice his only son Isaac.

19. The scrolls are most commonly made of animal skins, but also papyrus and one of copper. They are written with a carbon-based ink, from right to left, using no punctuation except for an occasional paragraph indentation. In fact, in some cases, there are not even spaces between the words.

20. The Scrolls have revolutionized textual criticism of the Old Testament. Interestingly, now with manuscripts predating the medieval period, we find these texts in substantial agreement with the modern text as well as widely variant forms.

21. Some of the Dead Sea Scrolls actually appeared for sale on June 1, 1954 in the Wall Street Journal. The advertisement read — "The Four Dead Sea Scrolls: Biblical manuscripts dating back to at least 200 BC are for sale. This would be an ideal gift to an educational or religious institution by an individual or group. Box F206."  They were put in the paper after Duke University declined to buy them.

22. Although the Qumran community existed during the time of the ministry of Jesus, none of the Scrolls refer to Him, nor do they mention any of His follower's described in the New Testament.

23. The major intact texts, from Caves 1 & 11, were published by the late fifties and are now housed in the Shrine of the Book museum in Jerusalem.

24. Since the late fifties, about 40% of the Scrolls, mostly fragments from Cave 4, remained unpublished and were inaccessible. It wasn't until 1991, 44 years after the discovery of the first Scroll, after the pressure for publication mounted, that general access was made available to photographs of the Scrolls. In November of 1991 the photos were published by the Biblical Archaeological Society in a nonofficial edition; a computer reconstruction, based on a concordance, was announced; the Huntington Library pledged to open their microfilm files of all the scroll photographs.

25. The Dead Sea Scrolls enhance our knowledge of both Judaism and Christianity. They represent a non-rabbinic form of Judaism and provide a wealth of comparative material for New Testament scholars, including many important parallels to the Jesus movement. They show Christianity to be rooted in Judaism and have been called the evolutionary link between the two.

(This list came from http://www.centuryone.com/25dssfacts.html)

This weekend we started using our booster chair and let Halleigh sit up at the table with us. She has really enjoyed sitting at the table and we have liked it too.  She has been much more interested in eating like we eat, the same things (which is great!) and the same way (which has been VERY messy).

But, we had a light bulb moment today! Halleigh was eating breakfast and started refusing her apple sauce, only when I handed her the spoon and bowl did she continue to eat. She fed herself the whole container of applesauce without dripping any of it anywhere. I ran and got a bib so the mess would be contained, but it was totally unnecessary. She got a little on her face, but not a drop on herself or the table. She was concentrating so hard on the task at hand she jumped when the flash of the camera went off; she had no idea I was taking pictures of her. She did GREAT!

I am going to pick five projects and each day of the week I am going to work on one them for one hour. Everyday I will have one hour to get as much of one project done as I can. And at the end of a couple weeks, I will start to have finished projects that I am happy with.

I started today but I think that I am tweeking it a little this week and I am just going to work on my first project all week and then start the others next week. For my first project, I am making an apron, I know, how June Clever of me. But actually, I have found that I could really use an apron... the other day I was frying some won tons for supper club and I got oil all over my shirt... if I had had an apron, that would not have happened. :)

So here is to my mid-year resolution... sew more. What did I get done today? After washing and drying the fabric, I ironed, and cut out all of the pieces. Tomorrow I will start to sew and put it together. When it is done, I'll share a picture!

Other projects on tap:

1. cloth grocery bags (on my quest to be more green)
2. comfy pj type pants
3. dress for Halleigh
4. reusable lunch bag for Miles (also on the go green quest)
5. chefs jacket (to wear when I am delivering cakes)
6. ladybug blanket
7. duvet cover for our bed

Some of these are long term projects, but I hope to work through them as my time allows, and if I squeeze and hour in everyday, some of these items might actually be made.