Storm Damage

Shortly after we moved into our house last summer, we had lots of rain and some strong storms. One of those storms played musical chairs with the trash cans and split off a large section of our willow tree. A few weeks later, another storm took another big branch. We thought the tree was doomed and we started doing research on the cost of tree removal and went back and forth about buying a chain saw etc.... Well the tree seemed to be doing ok; it survived the rest of the summer and came back all green in the spring. We thought we would just need to trim some branches to balance it out and call it good. Cue Sunday night and a storm with strong winds. Our trash cans got blown over again (but not rearranged throughout the neighborhood this time), and our tree lost another big chunk. There is just one lonely little section left. So, we bought a chain saw. Pictures of that will come later (the forecast for the next two days is 95 with heat indexes around 105...so the the chopping up part is on hold).

So, take a moment of silence for our tree. We hardly had a chance to get to know you whole. Rest in Pieces.

Camping!

For Rob's 29th (for reals, not his second or third...his FIRST 29th birthday) we went camping out at Saylorville Lake with Kris and Marie. The weather was about as good as it gets...it rained lightly a little the first evening we were there, but it stopped in time to light a fire, and it stayed dry and in the 70s the rest of the weekend.

The weekend passed by quickly. We walked to the Saylorville Marina, visited the dam, grilled lots, and played a couple card games. The photo below is of Molly trying to find a cool spot after our walk on Saturday afternoon. It was a beautiful weekend, but the sun was warm--so warm that all of us got a bit burnt. I missed putting sun screen on my neck all together. :( You can find the rest of my photos of our weekend here.

The Bridges of Madison County

My mother and sister came down for a visit last week, so we decided to go check out the covered bridges in Madison County Iowa (yep, the ones from the book and movie). It's about a 25 minute drive to Winterset, IA where we posed at the birthplace of John Wayne and explored their neat city park. After lunch at a local diner, we went to the rest of the covered bridges. It was a beautiful day and a fun little day trip.

I posted pictures which you can find here:
Bridges of Madison County Set

Saylorville

We decided to get out of the house this weekend by driving out to the Dam at Saylorville and checking out some of the campgrounds around the lake. Of course it was cold and windy and a bit drizzly, so it wasn't quite the spring day that we'd all hope for on the weekend, but we hadn't really been out to the lake aside from driving past it and we had no other pressing plans...so on we went :).

We were both surprised by the intensity of the water flowing from the dam out into the Des Moines River. So I took a video:



I posted a few pictures of the dam on my Flickr Page.

The area below the dam has been turned into a campground. After our drive around that campground, we proceeded to check out the other two Army Corp of Engineer parks on Saylorville (there's a 4th, but it doesn't open for another week). There were lots of campers bundled up in sweatshirts....some huddled next to fires wearing stocking caps. I was happy that I was just out for a drive instead of actually camping this weekend. Brr. But we'll be back ;).

Mystery Trees

In our front yard we have three trees alongside our driveway. When we moved in to the house they had dark brown--almost black--leaves. They were pretty and got a little redder before dropping their leaves in the fall. To my surprise, as they sprouted leaves this spring, they came in bright green, and soon after, pretty white cones of flowers began blooming. So now I'm really curious...what kind of trees are these? The previous owners of our house were adventurous with plant purchases to say the least (there are odd plants all over the yard--so this may become a regular installment on my blog :)), so I don't even know where to begin.

Are any of you out there familiar with this tree?

In the spring it looks like this:
And it looks like this in late summer/early fall:

The leaves were dark when we moved in to the house in June (but last year's spring came a bit earlier than this year's).

*Update* My current guess is that these are ornamental plum trees.

Grandma Esther Turns 90!

(Grandma at her birthday party with her nursing school buddy Eris--Photo taken by Kris)

Over Easter weekend my Mom's family all got together in the twin cities and celebrated my Grandma's 90th Birthday. We had a great time chatting with out of state relatives that we don't get to see nearly often enough.

My brother took some really nice pictures from the weekend which can be found here.

The pretty lousy ones that I took that weekend can be found here.

...nearing the end

Next week is the last week of regular classes at DMACC and the week after that is finals week. I have their last essays to grade and then their final portfolios to grade before I'm done with the semester. I feel a lot like the girl in the comic.

...I just spent the last 20 minutes dinking around looking for a comic to post....so clearly...I should be grading papers.

Molly's Tricks

Here's a little video I took while working with Molly on some of her basic tricks. I had given her the "down" command as I started recording. It's hard to run the camera and shake her paw and give her treats at the same time, but you get the idea :).

She also knows how to roll over, turn in circles (but only going one direction--she has a hard time switching), jump up, beg, and stay. Her fetch is hit and miss. She doesn't like to give the ball back.

Spring has Sprung

Downtown Des Moines recorded a high of 90 degrees yesterday. It was not a record high. Today was a much more seasonable 65 degrees. On Saturday they are forecasting a rain/snow mix. Even with the crazy yo-yo Iowa weather we're having, it is feeling much more spring-like. Daffodils are blooming, the trees are sprouting leaves, and our Lilies are starting to come back up. Spring is the best time of year in Iowa. Here's to more 70 degree days (but the 90s can wait until July)!

A Geeky Teaching Moment

A few weeks ago I had a special moment as a teacher. A moment when the stars aligned and created an instance of great geek-i-tude. I'll try to recreate it for you. But, like all amazing moments, it loses some of its brilliance in its retelling.

I'll set the scene. It happened during my Comp II class. We were discussing fallacies of reasoning. My lessons on reasoning are my favorite part of the semester in Comp II. There are always a few students who seem to really understand (or "grok" if you prefer) and relate to these lessons. At any rate, we had already gone over the basics and I was on to providing more elaborate examples.

And so it began.

Me: "Did anyone see last night's episode of the Big Bang Theory?" [two-thirds of the class raised their hands] Well on last night's episode...

Student in the Front Row: WAIT! I haven't seen it yet!

Me: Don't worry, this won't ruin it. ...In last night's episode, Sheldon used the Appeal to Tradition fallacy when he insisted that they eat supper at Sheldon and Leonard's apartment instead of at Raj's apartment because they "always eat supper at their apartment on Thursday nights." [Some nods and smiles of recognition spread across the class.]

Student #1: Hey, didn't they mention post hoc ergo propter hoc in an episode of the Big Bang Theory?

Student #2: I remember that. It was on the one where they all got back from Antarctica.

Student #3: The one where they all came back with beards?

Student #1: Except Sheldon, he just had a goatee.

Student #2: Yeah! He looked like evil Spock!

Student in the Front Row: Khaaaan!

I smiled and told them they were all awesome. A good half of the class had no idea what they were talking about, but it didn't matter. For that moment, I felt like I was in the company of a great group of geeks.