Posted by taneya on October 31, 2005 under Uncategorized | 
Happy Halloween!!!
Happy Halloween everyone! We had several trick-or-treaters tonite and I have enjoyed it. This is the first Halloween since I have been in TN (5 yrs — but have only been home for 3 of them on Halloween) that I have had trick-or-treaters. I guess where i used to live they just didn’t do it??? And though we did not take Kaleya trick-or-treating, she helped us give out candy (okay — well, watched us as we gave out candy!).
In stitching news, I have a report!
On Kaleya’s birthday, after I finished Mt. Fuji, I started Teresa Wentzler’s Egyptian Sampler. 
Then, this weekend, I put that down to start another project – Michael Powell’s Handmade Houses of Provence. I am going to do all five on one piece of fabric. I hope to get a WIP picture of that up soon.
Posted by taneya on October 27, 2005 under Uncategorized |
We are back from San Juan, Puerto Rico!! I had to go over the weekend to San Juan for a job conference (Southern Chapter/Medical Library Association for those who are interested) and was able to take Kalonji and Kaleya along. We had a great time. Not only was the conference well worth it, but we even had time on Monday afternoon to do quite a bit of sightseeing and I took a ton of pictures of course.
We left on Friday morning and the airplane trip went well – Kaleya had absolutely no problems with the flight which I am very thankful for. She slept most of the way and back. I unfortunately experienced problems with the pressure in my head not equalizing out and it was so painful. I ended up resorting to breathing (as in the breathing techniques i learned for labor) to get through the pain. I usually don’t have this problem, so I was a bit bewildered. This happened both on the way there and the way back.
But, we arrived safely and stayed at the Intercontinental Hotel on Isla Verde Island. Me and my sketchy spanish did fairly well through the weekend and though english is spoken there, I did run into people who spoke no english, so that made for interesting times. It rained every day we were there (except Monday) at least a couple hours a day. So, we only ventured out for a couple hours at a time. Then, Monday afternoon after all the conference activity was over, we took the public bus over to Old San Juan 
and walked the whole area. It was nice to see the old city and just have some time to explore. Then, Tuesday morning, we got back on the plane to come home.
So, of course I have pictures — there are two sets so far – general pictures and then those pictures taken in the Old San Juan area.
I was able to get some stitching in and plan to post a picture of what I’ve been working on sometime next week. Tomorrow, I am heading back to Nashville for a couple of days as we are having a special colloquium at work so I am reporting back in to attned that. So, until the weekend enjoy the pictures of Puerto Rico!
Posted by taneya on October 19, 2005 under Uncategorized |
wow — telephone service over my DSL line. I have just finished installing my Vonage service and I am truly impressed. With Vonage, a Voice over IP program, I do not rely on my local phone company for phone service. This is so cool!!!
Here are some of the features of Vonage:
- I can listen to voicemail messages online
- For $24.99 month i get phone AND unlimited long distnace
- I can get a number in a different area code that will be routed through my number meaning, since my mother lives in florida, i can get a number that is a local call for her so she is not charged long distance
- i can get a 1-800 number if i want too
this is so cool. Now, there is a disadvantage. Since the phone is through my DSL, if DSL goes down (or no power), I have no phone, therefore, I will be keeping the 911 service on the landline as just in case backup. I can deal with not having a phone. However, I need to be able to reach emergency if I need to.
Posted by taneya on October 17, 2005 under Uncategorized |
Yesterday was a wonderful day — we had a nice family day with Kaleya on her birthday. We did not have a birthday party for her. Our original plans were to go see the boys but Kalonji had to work, so that did not work out. So, we stayed at home. We took her to Wal-Mart and had pictures made. We are insane – we bought a package of 7 different poses. This girl is going to have more pictures! We then bought her a few toys, bought her a stuffed bear that we named Pebbles and went out to dinner. I have some pictures already up but will be adding a few more later this week.
If you would like to see more pictures, you can go to her website.
In stitching news, I have a milestone also – I finished my first project since Kaleya was born! This is the Mt. Fuji design I have posted about, but have not yet posted a picture. I started this September 1st and worked primarily on this the past seven weeks. This is again, of Mt. Fuji in Japan and I think the colors are brilliant. I’ll get it framed next month and I’ll have to find a place to hang it. HAPPY DANCE FOR ME!
Posted by taneya on October 15, 2005 under Uncategorized |
Thanks everyone for all the comments on the kitties! They really are so much fun to have around 
Tomorrow is Kaleya’s birthday! Hard to believe it has been a year already. This time a year ago I was in the hospital laboring. Oh, the memories!
Posted by taneya on October 12, 2005 under Uncategorized |
We have new additions to our family! Say hello to Horus, Osirus & Memphis!
So, would you like to know how we ended up with them? Well, Kaleya’s babysitter’s cat had them about 8 weeks ago now. We have had them with us for almost one week. The babysitter couldn’t keep them (this is the whole litter) and Kalonji and I have been contemplating getting an additional cat for awhile now and when we met them we just could not resist taking all three. So, Isis (who is 3), now has some little ones to run after.
The names? All Egyptian!
- Isis – the Queen mother – in Egyptian mythology she was wife-sister to Osirus and mother of Horus.
- Osirus — husband-brother of Isis, and the god associated with death and the afterlife
- Horus — son of Isis & Osirus — associated with the sky and kingship.
- Memphis — she is the only girl in the litter, so we had to find a girl name. However, we didn’t really like any of the remaining goddess names. We came close to calling her Nephthys (who was the sister of Osirus and Horus and would have been quite fitting) but I find that so hard to pronounce. So then, having recently discoverd that there was a Memphis, Egypt (we are on this Egypt kick lately) and given that we are currently living in Memphis, TN and we got the kitties here, I kept pushing to call her Memphis. Kalonji caved . Also, Memphis, Egypt was the earliest capital city of Egypt so it has some prominence in the country’s history.
These kitties are wonderful! Let me tell you. They are such a contrast to Isis as they play all the time, follow us around all the time and just are so funny to watch. However, this is bringing about a transformation in Isis too. She finally has “someone” to play with, she grooms them, they sleep together sometimes, it is so cool. She still keeps her distance at times, but I love watching them follow her around. There was some initial hissing back and forth, but that lasted all of a few hours.
I of course, have more pictures up so please feel free to look.
Posted by taneya on October 11, 2005 under Uncategorized |
I have some more progress on Noah’s Sub — I think I am about to move on though. I really have to finish Mt. Fuji and then after that I think I will finish my third Joan Elliott geisha.
Here is the area I worked on:
And, here is the overall picture:
Posted by taneya on October 6, 2005 under Uncategorized |
I did a little stitching on Noah’s Sub last night. One day, when I finish it, this will be for Kaleya but I know it will be awhile before that happens. But, last night I picked it back up and did some stitching on the rams and the camels – so here is a pic of just that area as well as a picture of the overall piece so far.
I will continue on this for the next few days I think. Over the weekend, I have another project that I should be able to finish. It is a design of Mt. Fuji. I’ll post it when I’m done.
Oh, and have I posted yet that I am going to Puerto Rico! I am going for business purposes in a couple of weeks for about 4 days. Kalonji and Kaleya will be coming along with me, so we are looking forward to it. I’ve not been to PR before, so it will be fun I know!
Posted by taneya on October 5, 2005 under Uncategorized |
We went to the fair this weekend for a few hours — mostly just to say we’d “been there, done that” I of course had to check out the cross-stitch exhibits and was very pleased. There was some beautiful work displayed. My favorite was the Taj Mahal Watergarden by Chatelaine Designs — I can’t wait for the day when I can purchase this for myself. And yes, we’ve got pictures!
On a different note – I’ve spent the last few days discovering many neat things you can do online as I have been reading blog after blog after blog. Here are some of the applications I like the most so far:
- Taneya Google — look! it’s my very own Google search engine
- BlinkList – my overall principle when it comes to data management is to have it ONLINE! That way, I can have access to it no matter where I am and I can just make backups to store on my computer. Blinklist is an online bookmarks application — I just put my bookmarks here and then I can access them anywhere.
- XmailHardDrive – an application that lets you use your Gmail account like an online harddrive. It is a simple application and an interesting idea
- Ta-Da List — same principle as above — put it online. This free service lets you put to-do lists online
Yes, I confess, not only am I a cross-stitch junkie, but a tech freak as well.
Posted by taneya on October 3, 2005 under Uncategorized |
I have just finished reading an excellent book – it is by John Batelle, and is called The Search: How Google and Its Rivals Rewrote the Rules of Business and Transformed Our Culture. I think most people who read my blog know that I am a medical librarian, and you probably know that I am a self-confessed Google-freak! I am practically obsessed with Google.
The framework for this book is more about search technologies and uses Google as the primary case example for how internet searching has evolved over time. As a libarian, my career is all about organizing, locating and retreiving information and I do think Google has such ambitious goals in this area. Of course, many other search companies do as well and I do keep up with what other major players (i.e. Yahoo) are doing too. But I particularly enjoyed this book because I learned quite a bit about the history of Google and other companies and how they developed their current business model. A great read.
