dvi silkes

I know, I know…it’s been a while since I have blogged. There are, of course, the obvious reasons for the lack of blog activity; most of which are associated with the relentless movement of the calendar towards Christmas (and the accompanying frenzy that increases as the days left in the year decrease). Even more critically, however, is the fact that my brain seems to be suffering a word drought. I am fairly certain that the cause of this condition is the perpetual barrage of homework assignments. These greedy, word-gulping projects drain my vocabulary well dry, and leave me with little more than bubble-blowing gurgles by the end of the day. Still, I’ve wanted to blow the dust off of the blog, so I came up with a temporary solution to the word crisis. While a photo essay would undoubtedly be returned with an ‘F’ in my graduate classes, I thought a few pictures might suffice as a blog entry, and hope that they will tell our stories well.

One of the most important words in my vocabulary is “cookie.” When we had a meeting over at Darlene’s apartment, she graciously allowed me to use her oven to make these…

Winter came to Klaipeda in its usual frosty dampness, though we did enjoy some lovely white snow for a while. (We’ve had plenty of rain dumped on us since this photo, so we are back to enduring dingy grey ).

Though busy with work, Nathan was able to enjoy a day at the church’s annual retreat. He wishes he could have given his devotional in Lithuanian, but he had a great time relaxing with the people who were there.

While Nathan was curled up next to the fireplace at the retreat, I was busy sorting food at the Salvation Army. As workers collected donations at a local grocery store and then lugged them back to the hall, I unpacked the boxes and organized everything on the shelves in the storage room. Though it was a long, exhausting day, I have to admit this is one of my absolute favourite things to do. Somehow, I just sleep better knowing that all the brown-labeled tins of pork are separated from all the pink-labeled tins of pork, and that the bags of spiral pasta and macaroni are neatly stacked in their own place.

Well, I think I have used up my allotment of words for the day, and I still need to work on my assignment. Perhaps a little cookie inspiration will help me scrounge up a few more syllables…