Artists

Yesterday, almost on the spur of the moment we decided to go and visit Brandon and Serene. We had a few items left to take up to them but that was just an excuse. Alex had a birthday party he wanted to go to so we left him behind and Mom, Sarah and I headed to Malibu. I never thought I would have a kid living in Malibu. It was really good to see them again. It seems that all of Brandon's hard work is beginning to pay off. He has always had hard classes and has always been in difficult programs so he has always struggled with his classes. He's always done well but he's never been the star. He's still being cautious but as far as he can tell he isn't working nearly as hard as he did in Biochemistry and he is understanding everything. The problem is that his entire grade is the final exam so he has no feedback on his performance until after the final. That is just a little too late to make any changes so he'd better get it right now. He is still putting in long days but nothing compared to last year. Serene also has their little home looking like a little home. At the Y they lived in a closet. I'm serious, that is about all it was. Their living room was a small bedroom, their kitchen was in the hallway and their bedroom was in the basement and was so small that they had about a foot of space on either side of the bed. This is a real treat for them to have a real apartment and it is actually a good sized apartment by any standard. The best part is that Sydney has her own bedroom. We visited with Brandon and Serene for a while and then we went for dinner. We decide to go for a pizza but I guess being Malibu we should have known better. They didn't have a "Pizza Hut" or a "Domino's" or anything like that so we stopped at what looked like a nice little pizza joint. I started getting nervous when we stopped and saw a couple of the waiters on their break. They were decked out in their white shirts and black pants with their aprons and little white towel over their arms. We go inside and this place is a suit and tie place with the fancy little table clothes and the works. It turned out to be a very swanky restaurant and we were just a little under dressed with out denim shorts etc. For such a classy restaurant it was actually still reasonably priced so we had a very nice meal with out too much of hit in the pocket book. I really enjoyed it. We stayed as long as we dared and Brandon and I had solved most of the worlds problems so we decided we'd better head for home. We got home much earlier than the last time we were in Malibu. It was a good weekend. Tomorrow is a holiday so I guess I will be making up for all the work I didn't do yesterday.

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Rosemary is blessed with a surprisingly large number of talented artists for such a small town. I'm sure there is a lot of talent that I'm not aware of but we did leave Rosemary with some items that are precious to us. This painting was done by Dan Crapo. We made the decision to buy one of his paintings and we finally decided on this one for a number of reasons. The first reason is because this little stream is a place that Kira played quite often. It is on the Martins farm but after the Martins moved some friends of ours from Brooks moved to the farm. They were the Kaufmans and they had a daughter Kira's age and they used to play out there quite often. In the distance you can see Leonard Dressel's farm. The final reason we chose this picture is because of the snow. We really wanted a winter scene. This painting still hangs on our wall and the snow scene is even more appreciated right now. This is how I like my snow, in a picture. One interesting footnote about the Martin's farm. After the Kaufmans moved out, the house was rented to some people who grew marijuana in the basement. It would have been bad enough if they'd just grown the stuff hydroponically but they actually hauled a bunch of dirt into the basement to grow it in. They were eventually caught but they had destroyed the house. I understand it cost a lot of money to fix it up. This vase was made by Susan Lindved Jensen. It has a very unusual glaze on it. I don't know what it is called but it is made by removing the vase from the glazing oven while the glaze is still molten and then sitting it in some combustible material like straw and then it is sealed so air can't get to it. The straw is a reducing agent and reduces the glaze to the metal. The little flecks of metal give it a very unusual look. I think it is quite beautiful. I'm not sure who made this other vase. I know that one of these was given to Lisa by a friend and the other one she bought. I guess you'll have to ask Lisa for the details. All I know it is that I love to have a piece of Rosemary with us.