Well, I do know - it was school which completely took over my life as I was working on big homework/projects. As a result I not only neglected writing on this blog, the house chores were not attended to and so now I get to spend time cleaning, doing laundry, and getting the place back into a good clean condition.

In review, the semester was very stressful and having assessed the situation I think, for me, taking 3 art classes while trying to take care of a house, a cat, and all the other adult things in life is a bit to much for me. I am scaling back to 1 or 2 classes per semester and this will allow me to enjoy things more and not stress.

As for my grades - I am certainly getting A's in Core 2 and Studio 2, and in Beginning Drawing it could be an A or a B... so I wait.

My plans for the summer are to clean and even purge more stuff. There is still stuff I never gave away last year and having not used lots more things over the past year I feel it's time to pass it on.  There is a second reason for all of this too. I would like to move into New Braunfels. There's several reasons - the first is that the house is now just too big, there are several rooms that aren't being used; secondly being in NB would cut my commute distance to school in half; third I would then be closer to my friends; and lastly the new house would be a single story which is important as we get older and live alone... and being in NB puts me closer to a local hospital IF something would require the use of one. 

I also plan on sewing 2 quilts, one for Elisa of Scotland as she's not been gifted on in over 10+ years. The second quilt will be for my niece's son who turns 1 year old soon. 

Finally I will be doing stuff in my studio - some metal work, possibly some more drawing and coloring.

Here's the last thing I drew and colored for my beginning drawing class - an Amonite​

I have thought long and hard <grrrr> about this new year.
The 2nd Yahrzeit (anniversary) of Erich's passing was last weekend; I this point it's a given that he's not coming back (yes, that's a joke). Boots is pushing 19 years old and at night I wake up and touch her just to make sure she's still breathing; I don't know how much longer she has left but let's hope it's until 2026.

School's going good and even though it's just the first week I am enjoying the classes and the teachers.  Last year I took the bus from the parking lot to the LBJ Student center and then walked to the Art building for my morning classes. My afternoon class was on the quad so I would walk there and usually have lunch in one of the dining areas and after class then walk back to the car. On average, per my Fitbit, I was walking 2700 steps, 1+ miles, and 7 flights of stairs.  I plan to walk both ways this year unless I am carrying too much stuff, it is brutally hot and/or humid or freezing or raining. I did this Monday and I walked 3+ miles, 24 floors, and 8+ thousand steps.  I am also NOT going to each lunches in the dining areas... I am packing a sandwich, fruit, veg, snack, and water. I might each lunch or dinner either in a dining hall or nearby restaurant if I forget or stay late on campus. I am also planning on going to the Rec Center on Friday mornings to get in a weight workout; I shall get my walking in as mentioned in the prior sentences. My GOAL is to drop another 10+ pounds, at least. I lost 20 pounds last year.

The rental property is having work done on it. The floor in one room needs fixing, the inside and out needs to be painted, and the entire yard needs work too. Then it will go up for sale. The sale will then fund the purchase of a new, to me, home in New Braunfels. It's after I move in the the new home that I will do some fixes on this home and then sell it. I am in no rush and I have a list of requirements such as a good space for my studio; this could be a home with a workshop, a 3-car garage or a game/media room that would hold the tools and equipment. Another requirement is to NOT be in a flood zone. Realtor.com and Homes.com display the flood risk to I want a 1 of 10 but a 2 or 3 would be acceptable too.

Last year my sleeping was OK but below my goal of 8 hours per night, it was 7.75 hours. During the winter break it was less than that. I have set an alarm on my phone for bed-time with an hour earlier notification to take my meds, fill Boots's bowl with food, freshen her water, push shit in messenger bag for the next day if needed, etc. 

Lastly I am organizing my Things-I-Want-Make list - some things are make a baby spoon, make a new quilt for Eliza of Scotland, master making/soldering pin back, more drawing/coloring/painting, and make stuff to sell through the metals guild on campus to just make and get some pocket *mad* money. 

I started to plan this trip back in April or May when I decided to attend my 50th High School reunion. 
Day 1 - Drive to Memphis, Tennessee
Day 2 - Drive to Roanoke, Virginia
Day 3 - Drive into Pennsylvania and scatter some of Erich ashes on his father's grave site; continue into NJ. Have dinner with Liza Nechamkin.
Day 4 - Drive to Tom's (H.S. friend) in N.J and hang with him and his wife.
Day 5 - Drive to Long Island and go to the informal get together in town and talk to friends who were not going to the dinner
Day 6 - Pick up Pam (another H.S friend). Visit our old houses, visit with another friend I have knowns since 3rd grade and her mother, scatter some ashes on the beach. Attend reunion dinner and see lots of people I never knew in H.S along with many I did.
Day 7 - Drive to my parents gravesite and scatter more ashes and then take Tom back to NJ and head to D.C
Day 8 - Hang with my sister and go the the Cryptologic Museum at the NSA and a quilt exhibit
Day 9 - Hang with my sister and go to the FBI Experience at the FBI headquarters and another exhibit at Smithsonian which were fiber arts and quilts
Day 10 - Drive from Washington D.C to Williamsburg, Virginia
Day 11 - Hang with my brother-in-law John and take a side trip to Colonial Williamsburg
Day 12 - Drive from Williamsburg, Virginia to southern North Carolina
Day 13 - Hang with my cousin Amy, her husband Andy, their daughter Jen, and her son Conner.
Day 14 - Drive from southern North Carolina to Memphis, Tennessee 
Day 15 - Drive from Memphis to HOME!!
Day 16 - PICKUP BOOTs
Some pictures are out of order; I think you can deal with it

I missed writing in June, sorry about that. 
Here's a recap of the month - 

• The grief hit me really hard last month and so I spent a lot of time just sitting, missing Erich and crying.
• Other times I spent on the cleaning/purging/reorganization of Erich workshop which is now done. 
• I went to the Tobin Center to see a lecture by Neil DeGrasse Tyson, my second time, and treated myself to a nice dinner beforehand. I paid extra to attend the after Q&A session; there were some very good questions and of course answers too.
• I took the quilt I made in May to the quilter and got it back; it's now on the couch to snuggle under while watching TV. Then I made another quilt which is now at the quilter. I have been collecting Asian themed fabric for 20 years and I thought that since I need a new quilt for my bed why not use ALL the fabrics. I went with a scrappy pattern called Turning 20 which uses 20 fat quarters but I had not only fat quarters but YARDS so I used fabric from all of it and ended up with a King sized quilt.  See the pictures below 

Now I cleaning my studio which has been sitting idle since the start of the pandemic. It's important this get done NOW - see the news below.  Before and after pictures will be posted when it's done. 

Now for the big news. 
I am now in the Class of 2028 at Texas State University - San Marcos.
I am going back to school to get a Bachelors of Fine Arts (BFA) in Studio Art with an emphasis in Metals.

I investigated this when we moved here, for when I retired, but of course some much has happened over the past year it just got delayed. I started to pursue it at the beginning of the year -I I filled out the application, I wrote 2 of the 3 optional essays, and then had my H.S., B.S., and M.S. transcripts sent in. Then there was a delay because the M.S. transcript never arrived and I had to have it sent again with verification of receipt.  Three weeks later I received the email that I had been accepted (now you can understand why I am getting the studio in order).

I will be a 3/4 part-time student with 3 classes in the Fall/Spring semesters and 2 classes in the Summer so I can still finish in 4 years but have more free time to take care of me, my hobbies, and the house.  

​I start classes at the end of August. 

Well February was a crappy month, how about we start again in March!!
After my accident in January I went to see the ENT and I finally had my nose fixed. 
Besides having issue with breathing before the surgery, I could not breathe for another week afterwards due to the splints shoved up my nose, so things could heal in the correct position. After they were taken out I could kinda breathe due to crusty clots in my nostrils. That is now resolving itself.

Yesterday I went for my first walk, no a hike, in over a month around the community. It was only 2 miles but with the sun shining, birds singing, and deer lounging in the woods it was a very enjoyable outing. 

Here is a deer doing said lounging by the house. They were there when I left and came back.

Nope, that the motto for the Olympics.
What I am thinking of is:
   "We can rebuild him. We have the technology. We can make him better than he was. Better, stronger, faster."

​The other night I came across the Six Million Dollar Man series on Peacock. I saw it when it first aired but did YOU know that this is one of the shows that influenced by career path???
Go, go on! Go get a cuppa and sit back and enjoy the story!

Let's start with my father. A self-made engineer who said I could be anything I wanted and gently pushed me into STEM because I could tell him how to take apart, put together, improve and fix things​ since I was a wee lass.

Then Star Trek came along (1966-1969). Most women in STEM might say it was Nyota Uhura who showed them that not only a woman in space was possible but they can be very smart too. But for me it was Montgomery "Scotty" Scott. I could see myself as an engineer who could fix anything and I really really wanted to go to space.

Fast forward to the early 1970's I am in high school and I am now pondering what I want to do with my life - should I become an engineer, nurse or doctor; teach science or home economics; become a chef, or..?? I could not decide.

In 1973, I was starting to look at engineering schools and ABC aired a made for TV movie "The Six Million Dollar Man" and I realized it was possible to combine engineering and medicine.  My parents were so confused when I said I wanted to do THAT! 

I went to my guidance counselor Mr. Clarke, who was fantastic in his position, and asked him what sort of engineering program would I study to make medical stuff - prosthetics, equipment, and tools for medicine and he said he would look into it. Sometime later we had a meeting and he said that ANY field of engineers except possibly Aeronautics or Marine, could go to work for a company that researched and made items for the medical industry BUT there was a new field called Biomedical Engineering which was focused on just that - teaching medical science and engineering specifically for the research and development of medical equipment. He handed me a brochure from the Society of Biomedical Engineers and I was ecstatic.   

Mr. Clarke then did more research and passed along a list of schools where I could get an engineering degree but only ONE, at that time, had an accredited undergraduate program specifically for Biomedical Engineering and that was Case Institute to Technology, later to be the Case School of Engineering at Case Western Reserve University. 

Eventually my father and I did tours and took interviews at the schools I was applying to: Case and as fallback schools Carnegie-Mellon, Northeastern, Boston College, Wooster Polytech and a SUNY just in case. I wanted to apply to Rensselaer Poly Tech or Rochester Institute of Technology but they did not accept women at that time.
I was accepted at Case and Carnegie-Mellon but there I would be in a general Engineering program and then use electives to take other medical science courses.

So Case it was and that is where I graduated from. My undergraduate thesis was on the Impedance layers for Ultrasonic Transducers. From there I went to work on Ultrasonic Medical Scanners, Silicone Medical devices, Intravenous Pumps and IV bags, Angioplasty devices, Intercranial Pressure Monitors and Transducers and then I moved into Engineering consulting.

And that ,dear friends is how I became a Biomedical Engineer.

Today I attacked cleaning Erich's car - a 2006 Subaru Baja that we used for rock hounding and road trips.
I started by emptying the glove compartment, door pockets, the front and back seat consoles, then under the front seats, behind the read seats, and in the flat bed area that has a shell on it.

Here is what I found (the big items have been put away and are not in the picture above. 
And if you are thinking, what I am thinking - "You could knock someone out, kill them and bury them with all of this" - then go right ahead!

• The compress air tank with no air
• 2 pick axes
• 3 shovels
• 4 crow bars
• 3 tarps
• 2 dozen bungie chords
• 5 flat tire repair kits
• Bleach
• 2 tie down straps
• 1 package of Industrial strength Duct (cable) ties
• 2 two gallon gas containers, no gas
• a pipe wrench
• a lead mallet
• a funnel
• an empty bottle of engine oil
• 2 - 3 dozens of Power/Energy bars that are so old they could be used for bricks
• a Geiger Counter
• 7 Dosimeters and 2 calibration units
• 2 different types of can openers (but no canned food)
• 2 cans of bug spray 
• 8 magnifying lenses
• 1 dozen roller ball pens
• 3 sharpies 
• 3 screw drivers
• a crescent wrench
• 5 heavy duty pocket knives
• 4 pairs of reading glasses
• 3 tire pressure gauges
• a roll of duct table
• a tape measure
• 5 mylar emergency blanket
• 2 lasers (red and green)
• 2 flashlights in assorted shapes and sizes 
• 7 cigarette lighters
• a fork, knife and spoon
• 2 calculators
• 2 AM/FM radios and 2 weather radios all double wrapped in aluminum foil
• batteries in all shapes and sizes and most are leaking
• foam ear plugs
• a socket wrench set
• and hundreds of pieces of nicotine gum and most so old they too could be used for bricks.

But NO guns or ammo <whew!>
And the icing on the cake - $300 in 20's!!!!!

I came to realize that my life is kinda divided into 30 some-odd year increments - like mortgages and T-Bills but I can't refinance or invest more.

Let's review why I think this.

• I lived life as a single person for 32 years before meeting Erich. Yes, I hade my parents, my sister, various roommates, boy friends (live in and not).
• Then I met Erich and we got married and lived a wonderful like together for 35+ years

That's TWO 30+ year segments.

I plan on living at least another 30+ years and with luck maybe (??) 40 as I would like to live to be at least 100.

​So what's instore for me, over the next 30 years??
I have my arts & crafts, I read, I have my friends, I would like to take long trip to Japan but what's hovering just over the horizon that would be new to me?? Only time will tell

.."being a Prepper"?  I am going with the first one since it sounds nicer and the second makes the Shop Elf sound too weird and out there.

Note: Erich was born at the end of the Great Depression and grew up during WWII so I am going with that as the reason why.

Back in late October 2022 I started to do a full house cleaning; we had been here 5+ years and I knew there was lots of stuff that we really didn't use or need despite having done a major purge for month before the move.
By New Years I had done all the big rooms - living, dining, kitchen, bedrooms, family and it was time to move onto the pantry, hall closets, the loom room, my studio and the shop elf's workshop. 

Then IT happened and everything ground to a halt. In between all the arrangements I am slowly addressing the OTHER stuff that has to be done like TAXES, grocery shopping, laundry, dishes, gassing the car, cleaning the litter box, getting the mail; it is amazing all the stuff he did for US, around the house.
Plus I have to change account names, cancel services and credit cards, etc.

In-between that I will occasionally look in his desk, closet, the pantry, or workshop and here are the things I have found that has stocked up on: (I know there will be more)

• Nicorette Gum (Coleman Ice Chest Full!!)
• Pasta (Coleman Ice Chest Full!!)
• Rice and Beans (Coleman Ice Chest Full!!)
• Batteries (Coleman Ice Chest Full!!)
• Spam
• Coffee
• Salmon
  
• Paper goods like TP and towels
• Plastic bags of all shapes and sizes
• Water - bottled and a Jerry Can
• Protein Shakes
• Protein Powders
• Vitamins and Mineral Supplements
• Geiger Counters - yes we have THREE
• LED Flashlights
• Other emergency lamp/lights
• Propane Tanks (I can use this up in the studio)
• Electronic Components: Resisters, Capacitors, etc..
• Glad ware (disposable plastic tubs)
• Stamps
• Permanent Markers
• Light Bulbs
• First Aid Items - band aides, gauze pads, tape, rubbing alcohol, hydrogen peroxide, iodine tablets, Neosporin, old antibiotics cause you never know!
• Other Bathroom items - bars of soap, toothpaste, toothbrushes, disposable razors, Mucinex, and more.

Update: 2023-February-06
I have now found a hoard of

• Magnifying glasses and loops
• Staples
• Post-It notes
• Solar calculators
• Highlighters
• Pentel Rolling Ball pens - red and black
• Push Pins

I might not have to buy these things for months if not YEARS!!

Well, I had my "GwtW" moment the other night.

I was watching Finding your Roots on PBS.  I won't go into the details of exactly what the episode was about but suddenly I found myself mad, crying. upset, and saying out loud - WHY NOW !!!

Coincidently my sister texted to see how I was doing, which as you can tell wasn't great, so she called and we had a great chat.  Somewhere during this Boots came into the room and settled on my lap so that also gave me comfort.

I know this will go on for a while but now I feel like I can start to move forward and take care of business.

Enjoy these pictures of the Shop Elf that were taken through the years during various trips we took