Strawberries as Spiritual Food

The Pomo and other North Coast tribes in California considered strawberries as a spiritual food (as well as acorns). They had many plants that they considered to be spiritual. Because strawberries were native to this area they had ceremonies pertaining to eating these delicious native foods. In May you can visit Anderson Marsh State Park and they have a strawberry festival, with dancing and ball games. They invite the public to these ceremonies and it is interesting. The Southestern Pomo have another game that they play by using halves of black walnuts filled with pitch and small pieces of abalone shell. The women played this game for several days and night.

Srawberries were eaten during special ceremonies and there were a variety of species in northern California. The strawberry festival occurred in the spring as the bessing of the first fruits.

Traveling makes You Feel Like You Are a Child

I have been on many trips with my family and I have always felt as if it was a reward for my accomplishments. As a coach I learned that people should take a small trip at least two times a month. When I went to Mexico as a teenager I felt as though I was entering an entirely different culture - and I did! It was very relaxed feeling and they have so many nice markets and such a variety of different artistic towns. People are very much down to earth and they are very crafty.

When I visited the Carribean I again felt like a child. We were given a challenge to use a jeep type vehicle and locate various places on a map and once at the destination we picked up another clue as to where we needed to go next. I guess the first couple back won a prize. Many people had flat tires on the dusty roads. It was just like being a teenager again.

We have traveled many times to Hawaii at different islands. We enjoyed Kawaii the most. It is the most primitive island I have been on. We tried to sleep on the beach but the huge noise of the waves kept us awake. I enjoyed Maui as well. The killer whales we saw during February were very intersting - They appeared to be a large as some of the yaghts. It is a very fragrant island that has many tropical gardens and wonderful smells.

I have travelled most of my life because I am an explorer and enjoy meeting a variety of people. I have lived in about 15 states and have travelled throughout the U.S. by car and bus. As I said I went to Mexico and decided that I would go back there again. I went to Graduate School in Arizona and we had own honeymoon in Baja Mexico.

Being an archaeologist has toughened me to withstand many types of weather and different elements as well. Most women who work in offices have no idea how difficult it is to be an archaeologist. However I still enjoy working outdoors even after having met up with a variety of animals by myself.

When I worked in the Klamath National Forest I enjoyed being a small player under these huge redwood and pine and Douglas fir trees. I worked by myself the first year and it felt as though I was not accomplishing enough since the acreage I had to cover was huge. But being among the trees in the forest made me think that I was just like an ant. The biomass is so amazing in Nothern California. This is where I decided to have a strategy for surveying in dense forests and I made this quest my Master's thesis.

Healed of Arthritis

I have been healed of arthritis by a process coach. This happened about 3 years ago when I started to see my coach. I began to heal my past lives and I cried so many tears when I thought of all of the Native American wifes that have had to live with their drunken mates. I had applied as a coach to the Indian Health Clinic on Stonypoint Road here. I began to wonder why so many Native Americans drink beer and liquor. I heard from my coach that it suppresses their past lives that have tremendous feelings in different parts of our bodies. We are just spirits here healing on Earth. Many people do not believe that they have had past lives. But we have all had past lives - many thousands of years. I believe that we reincarnate as people or animals or insects or reptiles.

Luckily I am able to hike for many miles. I am interested in attracting clients to my website and we will have fun and ecoadventures at Bishop's Ranch. My arthritis in my knee and in my toe has been healed as well as my frostbitten toes. I am grateful of that!

How to Be Prepared for a Long Hike

As an archaeologist I have supervised numerous crews in fieldwork, both excvations and surveys. I have trained people from cities who have had no expience in hiking outdoors. They had to bring sturdy hiking boots when we walked for over eight hours. They also had to prepare their lunch as well as carry about a half gallon of water since we worked in the forests and deserts. Another essential is to wear layered clothing since you never know how the weather may change - and it does change rapidly in this county. I suggest that you bring a light weight cotton shirt during the summer, as well as sunscreen and a hat for protection from the sun. It is important to know where you are walking and bring a map of the territory or a topographic map.

It is very important to either know the territory where you are walking if you go by yourself or to preferably bring a friend. By bringing a map you are less likely to get lost. If you are a little unsteady with your feet it is essential to bring a walking stick. And if the weather looks as if it may rain you should also carry a raincoat in your back pack. If you come on one of my hikes please remember to bring a remedy for poison oak as it is unpleasant to have. You may also want to bring something to protect you from ticks - I like to use tea tree oil around my ankles and my neck.

On my hikes I have experienced some people that have tripped and fallen. So I recommend bringing some band aides as well as guaze. We usually go to Bishop's Ranch where there are well groomed trails and we stick together in a pack so no one gets lost.

I have been in the field for years and even with maps and compasses we have gotten off course at times. It is important to follow a leader and be respectful of him or her. Children on my hikes ask all kinds of questions and I try to answer them the best way I can. We tell each other our stories and I give them interesting lessons from nature.

I take people on hikes if it is sprinkling out - however if it is pouring we select another day. If you wish just bring an unbrella and carry it along the trail. I bring large plastic bags for us to sit upon at various stations and relax for lunch. We enjoy our group of community and share our knowledge of environmental
issues as well as information about natural history.

My recomendation is to walk about 3 miles per day in order to maintain your stamina. My hikes can be uniquely designed for slow walkers or for those who want to get more exercise than learn more about Native Americans and their ethnobotany. I can also have groups tellme what they are most interested in and I play it by ear and focus on the information they want to know.

In all cases we have fun and enjoy our ecoadventures!

Farmers Market on Jan 23

On Saturday I went to the market downtown to promote my business and visited many people and various boothes. It sprinkled a little and we all got a little wet. Many of us tasted the samples handed out from dried fruit, organic cheeses, and various seafoods from Alaska. Another man sold glazed pottery in multiple units that was very beautiful. We watched the clouds roll in and we saw so many rainbows that day.

The boothes included people of various ethnicities and they had large breakfasts made from the vendors. People were constantly tasting some cheeses, mushrooms, dried fruits, oranges, grapefruits and other fruits as well as vegetables.

The atmophere here is very positive and people seem to enjoy going here on a weekly basis. I meet some of the same people each week and enjoy visiting with people and asking them if they go hiking around the area. It is amazing that I meet people who have just moved to town. I guess the county attracts people who are nature lovers. The beauty of the terrain is a blessing to this area and fortunately the earth is very fertile here. That is why Luther Burbank called this area the richest area for agriculture. He had an experimental farm in Sebastopol where he tried to experiment with various hybrid seeds from various countries.

Annie Oakley's History

Annie Mosley was born in Darke County, Ohio. Her father died of pneumonia when she was 9 years old. To support her mother and their 6 other kids she began to shoot various kinds of animals. In Cinncinati she entered a contest where she met her husband, Frank Butler. Annie married Frank Butler and their relationship florished for their entire life. She kept her maiden name and Frank had been divorced before.

She became more famous than he and Frank became the manager of their team. She was a trick shooter and became a better person on stage than Frank - he decided to manage their acts. She was such a good shooter - she shot a dime between Frank's thumb and forefinger and she shot clay pigeons as well. In another event he threw cards in the air and she shot holes in them and gave them to the spectators. She was a small woman who people respected by her symbolic femininity. She resisted the traditional women's role during her time by working outside of the home.

During her career she was thought of as a surrogate mother to Indians, cowboys, orphans, and school kids. The Wild West show was known as a respectable family entertainment.

hey joined the Buffalo Bill's Wild West show run by Buffalo Bill Cody. They worked 17 years there and she became the star attraction. She showed great compassion to orphans, widows, and others. They madea famous show called "Annie Get Your Gun".

Sitting Bull entered the Wild West Show and called Annie "Little Sure Shot". She retired from sdhooting acts in 1913. Her next journey was in acting and benefit shows. She died in 1926 in a car accident that fractured her hip and Frank died within three weeks.

Native American Spirituality

The North Coast Range Native Americans were very spiritual people even in prehistoric times. Each time they picked a plant or dug a root they gave thanks to their creator. The acorns and other plants were very spiritual to the prehistoric Indians throughout California. They prayed each time they went to gather acorns or seeds or nuts and berries. The Pomo people believed that stawberries were their most spiritual foods. They are found at Bishop's Ranch where I have taught and lectured for over ten years.

The shamans were the intermediaries between the people and their creator. People discussed their issues with the shamans and the shamans gave them various healing herbs as well as counseling. The shamans in the Coastal Native tribes were mostly women who were over 50 years old. They became a shaman by being able to heal people with their language as well as with herbology.

They also change the weather and have a control on bringing rain and fertility to the earth. They bring good feelings to their tribe and are good orators as well. They heal people's mental and relationship problems. They can also draw rock art in higher mountain tops in order to communicate with their Creator.

Shamans are highly regarded to their tribe and can be spirits in the night. They know how to find their wat through various trails in their regional area.

Yesterday' Farmer's Market

Yesterday's Farmer's Market I visited the Farmer's Market in Santa Rosa. It had a booth where the lady was selling various kinds of sprouts - some were from popcorn, some from alphalfa, some from corn, and other seeds. Another booth had various seafood and crabs. A man was playing the guitar and asking for donations. There were people having huge breakfasts there with tortillas and eggs and rice. There were booths selling jewelry, selling sage, and selling various organic vegetables and some plants. They had cooks demonstrating how to make some salads. They also had a man who sharpened tools and knives. Another man made antique looking wooden cages. Another booth was selling pastries from Healdsburg, others sold knitted garments, and others had orages, grapefruits, pomegranates, and other fruits.

The Prehistory of the Pomo

The prehistoric Pomo people were in Sonoma County at least 10,000 years based upon dating the obsidian tools found at archaeological sites at SSU. There are many midden sites on the coast that have been recorded with shells, human and animal bones, as well as lithics (prehistoric tools and remains), and groundstone tools. Pomo translates into Red Earth People.

Originally there were about 10,000 Pomo in Healdsburg in prehistoric times. They gathered around a pond that is now the cetral square where there is a fountain. They had dances aqnd they woreTurkey and flicker feather headdresses. Animal hides were worn around their waist and they had flutes and whistles as well as drummers in a circle. The dancers were singing songs in different languages. The dancers were dancing as if they were birds - a connection to their Creator in the sky. They wore earings made of abalone shell and they passed around a pipe which had a native tobacco in it. The dancers were spiritual people and they sang in a very difficult language.

The men and women had very different roles. The men hunted and fished in a group, rarely alone. They built the wikiups and they built the round houses. They also spent their time making baby baskets. They did some of the fire making to keep the fires going all the time. They told stories to each other in their round houses which were off limits to the women. They also knocked the acorns down from the trees so the women could pick them up.

The women were the chiefs of the tribes as they raised the babies and wove medicine baskets. They obviously were the ones who wove the most intricate baskets and they made decisions as to what to do during different seasons and how their children should be raised. Their baskets were for medicinal purposes, for gifts, and for weddings. Grace Carpenter Hudson recorded and collected their baskets. Her husband John spent many years building a house in Ukiah and making friends withe the Pomo. He spent time examining them as his first profession was a dentist. He was then hired by the Smithsonian Institute to record many of their social and medical conditions. He found that they had many problems eating some of the native foods as they could not digest some of them. For instance, the berries of the manzanita were often eaten in quantities and this caused some of the Pomo to die as they clogged their intestines. He also found that their teeth were affected by eating too much ground up acorns with clay and some of the fine dirt used in making acorn soup.

Their house types were wikiups with willow branches and thatched tule which were about 10 X 10 feet for one family. They had separate wikiups for women in their menses. Their lodges were also made of willow and thatched tule and they were about 70 feet long for the gathering of various tribes to dance in in all seasons. They also built semi-subteranean earth lodges about 20 X 20 feet which were the men's ceremonial sweat houses.

Pomo Plant Collection During Seasons

I have walked at Bishops Ranch for over 10 years during all kinds of weather and various seasons. It is in the Lytton Tribal area. During different seasons you can notice a change in what is in the air and what types of plants are blooming and have seeds. The Pomo had a strict pattern for their children and they had various ceremonies during the four seasons. In the Spring the Earth was awakening - clover was a ceremony, and we ate miner's lettuce, cattail shoots were eaten like celery. In the Summer we ate Pinole, a mixture of parched seeds and berries as well as grass seeds. This was a time to hunt deer. In the Fall it was called Big Time and we gathered together as tribes and made a big pot of acorn soup. We also fished for salmon and steelhead trout with a weir made out of willow rope. Deer was also caught in the fall. The acorns were the staples of all of Califonia Indians. In the Winter it was called Buckeye Time. The buckeyes were thrown into a campfire till they roasted and then they were processed just like acorn - the tannin had to be leached. There were hazel nuts to collect and there were Bay Laurel Nuts tp roast that perked people up like coffee does today.

Pomo Basketmaking

The prehistoric and historic Pomo Indians made many types of baskets. Even their wikiups were like a basket made of willows and tule. The native baskets were primarily made of black willow, sedge root, and redbud roots and wood. Most baskets are coiled baskets and have 3 colors at most. The designs Are reprentative of geometric patterns and some have snakes on them. The women would fast for three days before maling a baskets - this would purify the women so that they would receive help from the Great Spirit. There was a definite mistake made in the baskets called a dau. The dua allowed for good spirits to come in as well as bad spirits to come out.

The interesting thing about the baskets is that they used a deer bone awl to make 42 stitches per inch. Some of the baskets were made for a womens birth, her first menses, and for her death. Some baskets were burned with the crematiuon of a woman.

Men made willow baby baskets which were woven from the young shoots. They supported the babbies and were carried by the women who collected roots, grass seeds, and berries. It kept the babbies calm as the women worked during the day.

The Pomo have become internationally famous for making bird feather baskets with feathers from larks, flickers, quail, finches, wood peckers, ducks, and blue jays.

Farmers Market

I love Farmers Markets since they offer organic foods straight from the farmer's gardens. I have been to the Cotati, Healdsburg, and Santa Rosa markets. They offer an opportunity to be more healthy and find plenty of local fruits and vegetables.

There is usually some musicians and activities for kids at the Cotati market, and Santa Rosa Market has a group of guitar players.

I tasted some fruits there that I had never seen before. This season the crabs are plentiful and cheap; unfortunately the salmon now comes from Washington state or Alaska. The amount of cutting timber in past years has increased sediment in the rivers.

I respect the farmers in the markets as they are working the land and keeping Sonoma County a healthy place to live! I love growing my own vegetables as well, and have had many gardens in various states.

My Nightly Walks

I make it a habit of walking at night in order to keep myself physically fit. I walk at least 6 miles at night in order to keep myself physically fit. It helps keep me focused on the environment and the changes in the weather. I am sensitive to the smells and the wind. The nights here during the winter can be cold and rainy. Last night there was a terrific storm and I got soaking wet. The prehistoric Indians must have had many fires burning in their wikiups during the winter! I see many flocks of birds here and listen to the spirits of various animals that I have seen at night.

Night time is also a good time to walk since it keeps your skin from burning in the sun. I bundle up and know that there will be no harm coming to me that I cannot deal with even in the city. I used to walk around towns even after I had done many miles of surveys during the day! I was quite an athlete and guess I will still be one as I give tourists lectures outdoors even during the winter.
I have retreats where we go on visions quests and at other times we walk at a moderate pace with planned stops so that everyone can hear my lectures. I enjoy being a kinesthetic teacher.

My Background

When I was in fourth grade I started getting interested in Indian mythology at the library in Troy, Ohio where I was born. At this age the Native American stories interested me greatly. During the summer from 7th grade through High School I attended classes at the Dayton Museum of Natural History. This greatly influenced me to become an archaeologist. I then went to High School in Dayton, Ohio and studied various subjects. I excelled at art, biology, geometry, and english.

During High School I had a job as a counselor for teens with problems. I also worked at the Dayton Museum of Natural History cataloguing artifacts from the mastodon site and from a Hopewell village site. It was this experience that gave me incentive to major in archaeology at Wright State University. At this university I minored in art and I majored in archaeology. We had a club that was a survey group designed to locate sites. We learned how to use a theodolite and how to map out the prehistoric sites we found on private land.

After receiving my BA I decided to go to a field school near Cuautla, Mexico. Here about 30 Americans had a camp and we excavated a site with about 3 pyramids. We learned some Spanish and spent weekends traveling to nearby archaeological sites. This was an excellent way for me to get acquainted with another culture. Many weekends I traveled by myself exploring small villages and viewing various markets full of a variety of medicinals, vegetables, beans, corns, and squashes. I also visited Teotihuacan site and Tula as well as Oaxaca. All of these travels made me think of how different we live in America. Mexico seems to be so laid back compared to our rushed schedules in America. Three of us traveled together to markets and villages to get acquainted to the various Mexican tribes. We spent about 3 months there and we became very friendly. One of the places we visited was Guanajuato where there was a museum of mummies found in nearby caves. How weird it was to see these mummies. The city however was beautiful with narrow winding streets and hilly paved walkways. I also really enjoyed the city of San Miguel de Allende.

I then entered graduate school at Arizona State University where I majored in Archaeology and Anthropology. Here my future husband and I went hiking in the Superstition Mountains as well as in Sedona and other wildernesses. We both entered graduate school and made many friends. I enjoyed viewing rock art sites and I recorded (with the help of other students) the rock art covering Tempe Buttes.
Of course I studied Mesoamerican archaeology and found it fascinating. I researched the social hierarchy at Teotihuacan as well as the different types of workshops, the physical layout of the rooms for farmers vs. the priests and rulers of the city. I also had photographed the various limestone sculptures on the pyramids and other buildings.

In Phoenix I worked for the BLM as an archaeologist where I primarily became a leader of a District for protecting historic and prehistoric sites. I was a sole archaeologist on many surveys and traveled to Kingman, Tucson, the Yuma River and to northeastern Arizona. I was part of a multi-disciplinary team that wrote a large Resource Management Report. I also worked on contracts for preserving a solar observatory built by an astronomer from the Smithsonian.

I then was employed by California State Parks and Rec as an archaeological technician where I supervised a team of archaeologists to record and survey lands where underground installations were planned. I traveled throughout northern California.

I then worked for the Mendocino National Forest also as a District Archaeologist where I supervised a couple of crews doing surveys of 1000's of acres for timber sales and for tree replanting as well as for various other projects. We found hundreds of sites since the forest had a large fire the year before I arrived.

In 1999 I became a Freelance professional anthropology lecturer entertaining a number of retired people at rest homes, the public at libraries, people on retreats, and at nature preserves.

I became enlightened by watching a PBS special on Barbara Sher who spoke about her work as a Professional Coach. I had an "aha" moment and decided right then that I would take classes in life coaching and lead retreats outdoors using these skills.
This became my devotion for 3 years as I also demonstrated Alvarado Street Breads in four counties. I began to speak in front of a wide variety of audiences and gained more self esteem. I was hired by a number of clients who I attracted through trade fairs, speaking, and having a website.

Dayton Museum of Natural History

My parents took my brother and I to the Dayton Museum of Natural History when I was in the forth grade. We studied a variety of courses and explored the natural world all summer. The courses included native plants, directing a planetarium and learning about astronomy, archaeology of a mastodon site and a hopewell village. We also dissected different animals, cooked a variety of roots and made salads from native plants. These years instilled in us a great value for the land we live upon and provided kinesthetic learning opportunities. I went there with my best friend who also remembers building an exhibit about marshes and forest soils - we won first place. This experience gave me the idea that I should become an archaeologist - I thoroughly enjoyed being outdoors and I enjoyed the game of excavating prehistoric bones and ancient tools.

Our summers seemed to be too short as I always learned more about nature at that museum than I did in school. We also went on fossil hunts where their were trilobites and ancient mollusks and sea creatures. It was always a challenge that our teachers gave us. We were given a list of edible plants to collect and off we went to find a specimen. Then we prepared the foods and had an interesting lunch. One class was on ornithology as well and our teachers were from the local colleges. I became acquainted with many bird species in the area and again our teachers took us on hikes to identify different birds. What a difficult task when they fly so fast and are soaring high in the air. We also collected butterflies and had collections of them.

The museum also had a neat collection of wild animals, a owl,a tarantula and other spiders, a bee colony, butterflies, a vcariety of insects, a fox and an incubator for chickens. There was a large house associated with the museum where we viewed a collection of insects and beetles from Africa which were brought from an instructor who studied there.

As an undergraduate student I worked at the museum part time and labelled and cleaned some of the mastodon bones and catalogued the artifacts from that site. I also cleaned and catalogued artifacts from the Hopewell village site. I worked to design an exhibit for the Mastodon site. It was through a work study program that I got paid for my work during college.

My Family's History

My Dad got his Master's in Psychology and he enlisted in the Navy for about 2 - 3 years. His brother, Vernon, had a large store in Troy,Ohio when I was born. They sold harnesses, western boots, shirts, and various types of children's wear.

My uncle Vernon got his Phd in child psychology and he worked back east as a professor at Bowdoin College in Maine as well as in the Navy at a job with airplane instruments. Since my father passed away when I was sixteen, my uncle became our father image. After their store was closed, my father and uncle had their own businesses in sales. My father sold shoes, vitamins, and watkins products. My uncle sold children's toys to a wide variety of markets in the Dayton area. They made an adequate living in their sales jobs and enjoyed them. My mom met my father in Milwaukee at the YMCA. They both were health food nuts - and I learned how to cook and bake at an early age.

My Mom was working in her twnties at a furniture store. She went through High School and had some acting lessons at one time. She was in plays and on a TV show. She worked st my Dad's store as a bookkeeper. She also worked for the Bureau of Entomology in Milwaukee as a secretary. This agency dealt with tree diseases from pests. She became a secretary and worked for government agencies after raising us.
She worked at the IRS, as a County clerk, and at Wright Patterson AFB. She was an excellent cook and many of her recipes were passed down from her mother. Our family enjoyed playing tennis, going to historical sites, and camping in a trailer.

My brother Fred studied biology in college and decided to go into medicine. He studied at various colleges and universities including Stanford. He got his MD and PhD from Case Western Preserve. He completed various internships from various schools, and landed a job at the NIH.

THE MEANING OF ROCK ART

Many Native American tribes have used rock in a wide variety of ways. In Southern Arizona rock art is found on most mountain buttes. The Native Americans believed that high butte tops were spiritual places. And they believed that crevaces in the rock were where spirits entered the real world and went into the underworld. In Arizona there are both petroglyphs - pecked into basalt,limestone, and sandstone - as well as pictographs - painted rocks in caves, on cliffs, and mountains with charcoal, red ochre, and other paints.

The new theory by David Whitley is that the rock art is only several hundred years old in the US vs. other debates that thought it was a thousand years old. One archaeologist from UCLA interviewed several southern Californian tribes to determine rock art is not that old. However most shamans use it to communicate directions to a water area, places where they have vision quests, and special rock art is drawn for fertility of the earth and for their crops and for more babies.

In California there are only about 200 such rock art sites. I have discovered only several as an archaeologist. Many still lay beneath the moss on rocks. I have visited many of the rock art sites in northern and southern California and have recorded many in South Dakota where the Plains Indians lived. Many of the paintings are throughout the western US. I used to belong to the ARARA and gave a paper on Sears Rock site - one of the largest ceremonial sites in the US.

Many rock sites are ceremonial sites where people danced and sang- we definitely found dance floors with shrine sites at Sears Point. In South Dakota where I worked with the Archaeological Research Center we found many rock art sites at the southern edge of Hot Springs. We did not include them in our research but we photgraphed some. I also went to the Coso Range rock art when I gave a talk on Sears Point. These drawings are of large ceremonial figures that represent shamans and are painted with red ochre. It is a very interesting place to visit. Fortunately the Coso Range site is protected within a Naval Weapons Base so you have to have permission to visit them.

Petroglyphs can be assigned as stylized, naturalistic, or geometric. Stylized are a design pattern based according to a particular region. Naturalistic are designs that represent animals, people, fish or reptiles. Geometric are designs that are concentric circles, scrolls, diagonals, or mazes.

Asian Art Museum in Washington DC

One day we visited the Arthur Sackler Museum. My Brother had been there years ago. We took the metro there on a very chilly day. The artifacts were from all regions of Eastern Asia. Many were made from jade, bronze, gold, and silver. They had some artifacts classified as ceremonial. And an interesting group of intricate watercolors were on display that the ancients used to foretell their next goal or announcement. There were many carved jade jewelry pieces. The museum began it's exhibit by a collection made from Mr. Sackler who apparently had traveled abroad many times.

This museum was adjacent to the Freer Art Museum as well and we had time to visit it. It showed much more recent paintings and we moved quickly through it.

Visit to Catholic Church on December 27

My sister in law and my mother in law attended a Catholic church only 15 minutes from their home. It had a modern look inside the church. We sat by the choir and everyone seemed to enjoy the singing of the hymns for Christmas. The priest drank some wine and with his assistants broke many pieces of bread for the communion. It took about 15 minutes for everyone to come forward. It was very similar to the Episcopal church I have attended in Cotati. We greeted each other "Peace be with you" and shook hands with our neighbors. We sung very familiar hymes responding to the Priest and ended with the Lord's Prayer. There must have been several hundred people attending this Sunday.

Winter Wonderland

Yesterday my family (brother and Mom) visited a huge resort,Gaylord National Resort near Washington DC. It was like visiting Disneyland. We wore our long underwear and heavy boots as well as winter coats, caps, and goves. Our main destination for the day was the Ice Sculpture Park. My mom is in a wheelchair and she enjoyed the trip. My brother said the ice sculptures were in a park cooled to 9 degrees! We came prepared and they still gave everyone parkas. There were ice sculptures that were colored and chiseled by over 40 international artists. Pointsettas, a colored santa with animals; a sleigh pulled by a horse; a children's slide; an igloo with reindeer; a manger scene with Joseph, Mary and baby Jesus including sheep, cows, and shepards.

There were many children there enjoying the majic of a slide made out of ice at this North Pole like fairyland. I enjoyed the tunnel of ice blocks and multi-colored penguins. Another tent nearby had ice skating for the children. The outdoor temp had about 20 degrees with wind chill. We decided to head to the main hotel for warmth and something to eat.

They had a huge enclosed city with shops of all kinds and restaurants surrounding a latge plaza. The huge building was 19 stories tall and had a large 60 foot tall glass Christmas tree in the center. There were long strips of fabric hanging from the ceiling that had 1000's of lights. A large fountain in the center of the ground floor had dancing waters to a Christmas tune. Another event was the lighting of the glass Christmas tree. The small lights on hanging strips of fabric changed colors with the use of a computer. At the same time small flakes of snow fell into the center of the village.