And we went hiking...

So this is how we began our hike:


And then we got to the top:


Nicki tried to kill herself:


Some of us got really stupid for the camera:


And Ammon cooled off his painful sunburn:


Just us sisters:

Jennifer's Wedding

Since I seem to be the only bugger in this family that gives a damn about this blog (just being funny, of course), I will be the one to post photos of our weekend with Heather and Andy--all broken up into parts, of course. Blogger can only handle so much at a time.


This is Heather and I just after the ceremony was performed. It was outdoors with a string quartet, two horrible female soloists, beautiful colors and a quiet backdrop, two doggies dressed in wedding garb to walk down the isle, a lovely, lacy wedding dress that must have cost a fortune, and cherry blossoms to throw at the wedded couple. It was exquisite. We took a photo by the giant waterfall just before cocktail hour. We had booze and sushi galore.


This is Heather and her friends at the reception. The bride is the one in the middle. At the reception, they had horrid live music, we ate a salad of spring greens, local buffalo cutlets that one could cut through like butter, Utah trout with some type of yellow and tart sauce on the side, all served on fresh asparagus and blue cheese risotto. Then, they served us wedding cake--beautiful looking, but no much for taste. The flowers had tall, dried branches jetting out of the middle with tea lights hanging from the tallest twigs. Just lovely. Later in the evening, they had fire pits on the patio with everything appropriate for making the most amazing smores.

These are our photos from the photo booth. I'm sorry, Nicki, that we didn't know about this for your wedding; it was the most novel thing to have at a wedding. All the guests could take as many photos as they wanted, and it didn't cost anything.

Another Harry Potter

This is a half leather binding. The leather covering the spine stops at exactly one quarter of the width of the board. That same distance matches the measurement from the corner to the end of the corner-piece. Those little corner-pieces are especially hard to pare because there is so little to hold on to.

These are the faux raised bands. To make this binding a true library binding, the signatures must be sewn on four tapes rather than the usual three. Of course, the tapes add very little definition to the spine, so I added these bands cut from binder's board:


The spine must also have a hinge. Today's bindings all have a hinge because it reduces wear on the binding, but earlier bindings do not. The paper covering the remaining half of the book is hand marbled in Italy. It looks so delicious, I just want to eat it. It's my favorite part of this book.


Here is the opened book:


This is my lovely silk endband and the leather headcap. I do such a lovely and uniform job on the sewing of the endband, if I do say so myself.


Here is a photo of the staining so beautifully modeled by the title page:

Another Hobbit

I'm quite proud of this one. This one looks a little more antiquarian than the others. Notice the bumps on the spine. Instead of sewing the signatures on tapes, I used cord. The raised cords on Mom's, Nicky's, and Mikey's books are regrettably faux raised cords. These are real. Here is a close up of my headcap and endband:


You can also see some of the fly sheets and the pastedown. That lovely marbled paper is hand-marbled in Spain. Here is another look at my raised cords:


They're charming, aren't they? I hated sewing on cords. There has to be more attention paid to evenness than in sewing on tapes. But the end effect is lovely. This is the book opened:


And a nice little close-up of the staining on the paper:

The Girdle Book

This is the girdle book, made from a historical model. See the hemp cord tied around the end bottom gathering of leather. That's the part that monks would tie around their girdle/belt/waist so that an important book could be referenced rather easily like this:


Here is another view of the opened book:


This sort of feature (commonly called a "yap") is essential in a girdle book. It protects the pages from dirt/dust/spillage. This is a view of the top edge that would hang toward the ground:


I really didn't take a very good photo of the back side of the book. Here is the best one I have that shows the fore edge and the cross of thorns lightly burned into the back cover:


The girdle book must have its own cover besides the outer leather. Here is a view of the leather covering the boards of the book before it is then attached to the outer covering:


A view of the endband. I am a bit disappointed with myself that I did not take the time to sew a more historically accurate headband.

Just writing

Oh my goodness, how precious mother looks in that photo with the P51! We should set up a rule for this blog: no one can post any photos unless at least one of them has one of our lovely parents in it.

Writing is hard. In this day, we write out of necessity--not out of pleasure. When we write our thoughts down, who would it benefit? Ideally, it would benefit everyone. But does anyone really take the time to consider? When we get especially philosophic, I'm afraid we get impatient and skim until we "get to the point." The journey is the point. We have to follow the process or else we cannot especially appreciate the outcome. I feel like this is how I get in conversation. I think, "Let me explain to you every particular so that when we both arrive at the conclusion, we can marvel at such a conclusion. Otherwise, there is nothing particularly striking about it." But people lose focus. Somewhere along the line, eyes divert, minds wander, and people grow impatient. Let me be frank: If you cannot travel the road with me in my thoughts, there's no point in me telling you much. You just won't appreciate it.

Writing letters is even more uncommon. It's becoming a lost art--mostly because there seems to be no point. Think of our "family home evening" letters: they sometimes end with the phrase "though you will have heard all of this by the time that you receive this letter. Why send a letter when you're just going to talk to someone on the phone? All of that information will have already been thoroughly canvassed. It would seem that letters are a waste of time.

But I love them. Apart from being happy to receive some mail that isn't a bill, it's so personal. It can be read and reread with more joy than an email. You can keep the letter in your pocket for comfort and happiness--a kind of talisman for protection against loneliness and negativity. Rereading the letter can provide momentary respite from the stress of separation. And writing a letter gives opportunity to reflect. We can better define our own feelings and come to terms with our lives. We move so fast these days that every feeling, thought, and interest becomes pooled in amoebic ambiguity. Nothing can be appreciated, acted upon, or changed because it's just one big mess that we don't like to deal with. Writing, when appropriately practiced, is a release.

I write most of this diatribe for myself, as I often lose interest in writing, whether it be a blog post, a letter, or a journal entry. I get tired of writing because of my own expectations.

So, what am I doing lately? Since I have no homework to fill in the gaps of time at work, I'm practicing my handwriting. Sounds boring to all of you, huh? It would to me as well, were it not for the pain in my wrist. Tension is killing my right wrist, and I need to rework my method of using it for the purpose of longevity.

Apparently, most people who learned handwriting after 1955 or 1960 has learned the wrong way. We draw out the letters with our fingers. This causes overuse and misuse of the tendons that power our fingers. Inflammation and pain is the result. So what are we supposed to be doing? We should have been using the muscles in our arm and shoulder. Those muscles can work for a long time without pain and fatigue. Have you ever had writer's cramp? It's because you used your smaller muscles rather than your larger ones. Before computers and typewriters, people wrote everything by hand (we're talking about everything pre-20th Ct.). Because one had to write so much and be able to write it without getting tired, they wrote with their arm and shoulder.

And so, my handwriting now looks like a jock's handwriting--very scratchy and illegible. But, my wrist feels great! Other than being frustrated because my letterforms are indiscernible, this method of writing provides no discomfort at all, and I am excited for the opportunity to improve myself in such a small way--a way that will help me be able to do the things I enjoy for longer periods. The only fatigue that will require me to take a break will be mental.

I got the most amazing grade in bookbinding. 100. The only perfect score for a college class that I have ever received. I'm proud of myself, most especially because I taught myself all of the new methods I learned this time around. While everyone else in the class learned the basics of bookbinding for the first time, I was given the opportunity to write my own syllabus, to choose my own projects. Well, I had some idea of the techniques required for working with leather, but I had never tried them as they require special tools. I bought the tools, I bought the leather, and I spend some substantial portion of the semester researching leather pairing, sewing on cords, and constructing a true "library" style binding. The results of my work were better than I could have hoped for. I'll photograph them this afternoon so that I can post the photos for you all to see.

I love you all. And those that don't keep up with the family blog can all go to hell! (Just kidding, of course.) And don't be upset if I copy and paste some of this for my own blog. Just know that you all got it first.

April 26th, 2009 Mom had a very memorable flight in the P51 Mustang a week ago. First I nearly cut off her toe with the rudder pedal (no blood it just felt that way) and since I forgot to bring her a headset it was like sitting behind a top fuel dragster for 30 minutes with no hearing protection ( I did a runup without a headset once for five minutes and my ears hurt all day). Perhaps she is smiling because the ride was over. None the less mom was the first I took for a ride in the Mustang. Thanks mom, I love you. I have a lot of other experieinces and travels but this is my first with a picture.