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 1/5/2007 Bryce and I had gotten quite accustomed to our 5 days per week of scheduled activities so it was a bit of a jolt when December 20th rolled around and we had no school for the next couple weeks. My sister, mother and brother were all here for Christmas, as were Dory and Dory's parents. I am ashamed to admit that during this time we seem to have fallen into the habit of letting Bryce watch cartoons. In fact, as I write this, Dory is in Florida and Bryce is sitting watching television. It's just so ridiculously convenient to let him do it that I can't resist. I've been taking care of winter chores with my bonsai. I dug a couple trees out of my front yard which I planted there to fatten up three years ago. One is a Amur maple and the other is a Bald Cypress. The cypress went from something the size of a pencil to somethng the size of a baseball bat in that time. But the maple barely doubled in size. I'm not sure I'll keep either tree, but it was interesting to watch them grow. I also dug up a juniper that I planted as part of the landscaping in the back yard. I had been eyeing it for some time and decided that it was easy enough to just plant another juniper to replace it. It should make a nice small tree, probably ready for show in about 4 years. I also have been hard at work wiring my trees, it takes a few hours to do a medium sized tree...and by a few I mean anywhere from 4 to 20 depending on the branching structure and the amount of foliage. I just have to do it though because the trees look so much better when it's all finished. This fall and winter I wired my large pine tree, and now a large juniper. In the spring it will once again be time to wire my oak...something that took me 20 hours last spring, and I didn't even finish it. Winter chores also include repotting of trees already in bonsai pots. This will be my first opportunity to start using all the pots that I have been making over at Ron's place. Dory ran another half marathon in Las Vegas in December. I was there at the finish line to watch her cross, but she finished right before the Elite runners for the full marathon so I was a bit distracted and missed her again. She finished well, a bit faster than the San Francisco race that she ran. The next day I went up Mt. Charleston, just north of Vegas. The peak is about 12,000 feet, but I never got anywhere close because there was a fresh blanket of snow on the ground up there. I started hiking through about two inches, but as I ascended the side of the hill, beneath the trees there were sections where I was posthole-ing up to my knees. I was wearing lightweight trail running shoes, so I decided it would be best to turn around rather than trudge through. I was a bit dissapointed but I met a nice guy on the way who works for the Las Vegas newspaper as a photographer. We hiked together most of the way up the hill until I decided to turn around and he kept going. My feet were soaked for the majority of the hike, and a bit cold, I was concerned about frostbite on my toes but the temperature was in the high 40's so I should have known better...besides, if my feet were wet, then they couldn't be frozen. But better to be cautious than sorry. 10/1/2006 9/1/2006 7/20/2006 5/30/2006 5/20/2006 4/25/2006 3/22/2006 2/22/2006 1/25/2006 12/20/2005 11/17/2005 10/27/2005 10/8/2005 9/11/2005 8/26/2005 8/9/2005 8/1/2005 7/20/2005 7/5/2005 6/17/2005 5/27/2005 5/1/2005 4/15/2005 4/5/2005 3/24/2005 3/13/2005 2/5/2005 12/28/2004 11/29/2004 11/3/2004 10/2/2004 9/10/2004 8/23/2004 8/8/2004 7/21/2004 7/2/2004 6/8/2004 5/4/2004 4/20/2004 3/28/2004 3/10/2004 2/10/2004 1/15/2004 To reach entries prior to January 2004 click on one of the older entries on this list and scroll down to the bottom of that entry. e-mail Eric |