Updates and more

So here I am, writing this post on my brand new laptop! Many thanks go out to the folks at Just Solutions who helped get me online and mobile.

Quick update: my Beliefnet.com blog may be up and running in just a few short weeks. Right now, we're trying to come up with a nifty name for the blog. We've gotten some input from friends and colleagues and so far have come with a few contenders: Joyful Noises, Christian Beats (not a fan of those), Backstage Pass (my favorite but needs a more faith word in there), and Faith Unplugged. Any ideas, please share them!

Scout and I are starting training for his Good Citizenship test. Four classes, then the test, and then, if he passes and they think he's an extra special dog, we get to join their pet therapy program. A half hour ago, he came in the house after chatting with Kona and Killian in the backyard (read: ran up and down the yard for 10 minutes) and he was covered from his belly to hit feet in mud. Yes, he's a special dog who required a quick "wash your paws" before school. He may not be the smartest in the class but he may have the cleanest feet now.

So here's the deal with this laptop. It has no mouse touchpad. Instead, there's this little red stem in the middle of the keyboard that I have to learn how to stop hitting while I type. All this new technology. I'm such a dinosaur.

Family photos

The only thing better about finding boxes of family photos is realizing that someone took the time to write - in pencil! - the names of everyone in the picture. Dates would be nice, too, but the ability to look at a photo and say, "Those are my great great grandparents in the front, and my great grandfather on the left." Super cool.

Family tree in bloom

I took an unexpected and last minute trip with my step sister Rene yesterday to my dad's house in the Southern tier to get some boxes. He's got movers coming this weekend and we're going back on Sunday to pick up some furniture he's giving us. But since our trip last weekend was cancelled due to the weather we took advantage of the super nice day yesterday to haul down there and pack up some stuff.

I don't know how much help I was, because in the basement I found boxes and boxes of old family photos, letters, hand written recipes, journals and other memorabilia and so spent quite a bit of time pawing through that instead of packing.

My father finally said I could take some of the boxes home this weekend and go through them and then give them back when I was finished. I don't know that he actually wanted me to take them, but I think he evaluated the fact that there was a lot of packing to do and he really wasn't going to do anything with them in his new house (at least not for a while), and figured I'd get more done and he'd have less to move if I borrowed them. All six boxes. I'm also "temporarily" taking the 10 cases of slides and the projector so my sister and I can start turning them to digital files. My darling husband is on family tree overload.

There's nothing like an old picture to give you a glimpse of reality while it also creates mystery. For example, my maiden name is Keltz. But just two generations ago, it was spelled Kelce. It's written like that on letters and photos and then one day, it changed. Why? Who made the decision?

I found some pictures of my father's great aunt Mae, when she was young. What is so cool is that instead of those stoic humorless pictures I'm used to seeing, she and another young woman named Euphemia are hugging and laughing, very much like my own daughter and her cousin do in their own photos. Who is Euphemia?

We found an old marrige certificate from 1866 for my father's great grandfather. Except the bride's name was wrong. Was he married before? Is this a different relative with the same name (not uncommon)?

I could only take 2 boxes with me yesterday and I can't wait to get my hands back into the one big box in particular that I had to leave behind. There's a fantastic 8 x 10 of my grandmother looking like a model, and a whole box of stuff she wrote. I did glance through a journal she made of a trip the family took back in the 50s, where she mentions a stuttering priest in the country church. She giggled as she wrote it, I did as I read it. (Who knew she had such a sense of humor? I always remember her loving but quiet.)

Anyway, back to the daily grind. My reward for finishing this month's entertainment column? I'm going to dive back into the box I brought home.

Let the GMA games begin!

The first interview emails for GMA 08 started rolling into my mailbox in January, which is a little earlier than last year but not by much. I kept putting them aside and last week started scheduling interviews. Right now, I am officially covering the event for my regular work with the Christian Examiner, Minnesota Christian Chronicle, Ozarks Christian News and the Christian Voice Magazine.

Today I got a very swank invitation (addressed to me as a writer for Beliefnet.com ... interesting, b/c I didn't say on my GMA app that I'd be covering GMA for them ...) in the mail for the BMI dinner honoring the best selling songwriters and artists of 2008.

This looks like quite an event if they're sending engraved invites and offering valet parking. The invite says "business attire." For a freelancer like me, that's sweats or pajamas. I wonder if they'd let me in dressed like that ...