I just love sunny, plant-filled windows
The back yard: a blank slate for Sean's desert oasis ambitions...
A bit of LUMBER + SOIL + SEEDS + SIX months =
Here I am in front of the garden that supplied some of the salad greens for the restaurant. With my wwoofing experience, I became the main garden person for the kitchen, harvesting greens and heading up the spring planting.
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Sean spent the past year as an assistant arborist, getting to know the trees of Tucson and learning the ins and outs of keeping them healthy and trim. On the side, he pursued his interest in bookbinding, a craft that Wolfgang had introduced us to in New Zealand (here). He arranged an apprenticeship with a master bookbinder in Tucson and learned all about different binding and repairing techniques. This interest led him to the letterpress studio at the University, where he was brought on as a community volunteer. Below is a shot of one of the machines in the lab, all set up to print the invitations for Nate and April's wedding.
Sean created the invitation, setting it all by hand before printing and cutting them. Below is the final version, all blocked and ready to print.
One of the highlights of the year was a week-long visit from our friends and surrogate New Zealand family, Sue and Richard and their daughter, Ava in October. We stayed with them many times during our travels...you might remember them from this post. It was wonderful to spend time with them and show them around our hometown, which is so radically different from their own in the rain forest west of Auckland.
The back yard: a blank slate for Sean's desert oasis ambitions...A bit of LUMBER + SOIL + SEEDS + SIX months =
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With the house taken care of, finding jobs moved to the top of our priorities. I decided that I wanted to see what it would be like to work in a professional kitchen, so with zero experience I applied to join the opening crew of Janos' new restaurant downtown. An interview with the executive chef yielded a Friday night trail at Janos and to my surprise (and, I think the chef's surprise as well), he then offered me the job of prep cook. So began my eight month stint as a COOK -- a job I had dreamed about for a long time. As it turns out, I loved it and learned tons, not to mention becoming quite handy with a 10-inch knife :)
Here I am in front of the garden that supplied some of the salad greens for the restaurant. With my wwoofing experience, I became the main garden person for the kitchen, harvesting greens and heading up the spring planting.*
Sean spent the past year as an assistant arborist, getting to know the trees of Tucson and learning the ins and outs of keeping them healthy and trim. On the side, he pursued his interest in bookbinding, a craft that Wolfgang had introduced us to in New Zealand (here). He arranged an apprenticeship with a master bookbinder in Tucson and learned all about different binding and repairing techniques. This interest led him to the letterpress studio at the University, where he was brought on as a community volunteer. Below is a shot of one of the machines in the lab, all set up to print the invitations for Nate and April's wedding.
Sean created the invitation, setting it all by hand before printing and cutting them. Below is the final version, all blocked and ready to print.
* * *
One of the highlights of the year was a week-long visit from our friends and surrogate New Zealand family, Sue and Richard and their daughter, Ava in October. We stayed with them many times during our travels...you might remember them from this post. It was wonderful to spend time with them and show them around our hometown, which is so radically different from their own in the rain forest west of Auckland.
At Sunday dinner*
*At the end of March, Nate and April moved to Bend, Oregon and Sean helped them make the drive up north.
Nate and April happy in snowy Oregon
In our room at the Copper Queen
On one of our long walks through the narrow streets and stairways of Bisbee*
Later that week, our friends Chrislyn and her kids Nora and Rory came to visit us for a few days on their most recent cross-country camping trip. You may remember that we met (here) on a beach in on the South Island of NZ, thanks to a happy accident of locking our keys in the car. The last time we saw them was when we went whale watching all together just before New Year's Eve 2009.
We took the kids to the Snake Bridge, the mouth of which is a few minutes walk from our house. Here we are about to be eaten alive!*
The next big event was hosting Maya's graduation party to celebrate the end of nursing school. Woohoo! Somehow we ended up without any pictures of her at the party, but we did get this crucial shot of me putting the finishing touches on her eight-inch tall, three-layer, strawberry cake!
*Our last couple of weeks in Tucson were graced by perfect weather and lots of parties with friends and family. We had the gang over before we left to say goodbye to April and Javier and Annetta -- all of whom will be moving away at the end of the summer.
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And there it is, our year in a nutshell. We ended up loving this time in Tucson and will return in the fall to continue pursuing our varied interests and spending time with people we love. Our immediate future, however, will find us on the road again, this time making the West Coast journey from Mexico to Canada and back again. We got the Red Dragon a tune-up and new tint job, and while it may not be as spacious as Miss Murple, it's outfitted with a mattress and ready to roll!
I am RIDICULOUSLY impressed with the garden. I miss that warm sunny house, but think you've done a beautiful job with it...good to know what a little elbow grease and maybe having a little Sean-strength around can do for the place! I can't wait to hear more about your adventures coming up...miss you both dearly!
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