Grandma's Birthday

Well, Grandma's big birthday is coming up and I am wondering if there are any special plans for her or what is going on. There is a chance we may be able to make it up there to visit so I would love to see anyone there.

I hope everyone is having a great summer!

Bees and the Hum

Hey Hey Hey!

I am back in town and off of the Colorado River. The Grand Canyon was an amazing trip; it was great family and friend time and much time.

I know that I don’t show up much for the family blog but to my defense I am really busy doing a lot of cool things!

Outdoor Discoveries is doing fantastic! I am having a one week summer camp in June where I will be hanging out with a group of kids from 9-4. I am still having a weekly hike with kidos and its still super fun. The flowers are coming out in Portland and I am going to be taking my hikes to see all the trees unfold into color. The magnolias are in full bloom and beautiful right now and I have a pink dogwood that is outside my bedroom windows that is perfect! I am also planning a weekend camping trip for families, I don’t know where to go yet in the Portland area but if any of my family knows of any great areas to car camp with young kidos (5-12) I would be open to ideas. I would like there to be access to a river and to nice walking areas but a bathroom would make my life easier (I have some kids who don’t want to pee in the woods).

Danse Joyeux is doing well last weekend I am doing my first art/craft fair in Portland. I am excited to see what happens with tutus! I would have never imagined that making and selling tutus would be so much fun. You can check out my tutu at dansejoyeux.com

Something exciting has happened… I picked up a package of bees for my new bee hive! I got the crazy idea to rise bees some time this winter and now it’s all coming together! I picked up a box of bees that has somewhere between 10,000 and 12,000 bees! It is wonderful, when they are buzzing they make real wind and the way they smell is cool too. I check on the hive every day and my bees are doing so well, I have lots of new baby bees emerging and I have light honey that is already capped!

Kelly

Off to float the Grand Canyon

Hi All -

Ginger, Kelly, and I are launching March 20 for a 14-day raft trip down the Grand Canyon. 16 of us, on 5 rafts, 230 miles! We were invited to join a trip by our friend Greg Crockett who has been on the wait list since 1995. We took Greg on our Middle Fork one-week raft trip last summer - "Pay it Forward" works!

So - I get to check off a major item on my Bucket List!

Oh - Eric made this same trip last spring with his class so he is babysitting our llamas, new lambs, wild cats, hot tub, frig, etc.

Love All, Bill

Belated Best Wishes

Happy Birthday Belva & Harold!!

Yes, I know it's a few days late for both of you but Happy Birthday anyway! And I realized that I really don't know everyone's birthday and the only reason I know Harold's is because it's the day after my Mom's. :) Anyway, I hope it was good for both of you!

Potential get together for Mom's 95th!!!

So what do you think? Should we try planning something for our mom's/grandmother's 95th birthday party? This will happen in late August this year. Any ideas/support or less support/interest or less interest/location/time?

Something to consider....

Where's Belva?

Hey Belv - I have called several times over the holidays trying to talk with you before the big trip. Where are you? When do you travel to Europe? Call your brothers before you go.

Love Ya - Have a memorable 2-years,

Your Brother Bill

Inauguration Day

I am most excited about our Nation's new start.

I spent the day in the high desert with beautiful clear skies. much snow, still winter air. I could see mountains in Idaho, Wyoming, and Montana over 50 miles in all directions. As the sun appeared, 2 coyotes hiding nearby sang a few notes. We live in a beautiful land.

Tonight, Ginger and I attended an Inauguration Party downtown by the falls. We watched the ceremony on a large screen - most of us with tears of confidence and hope.

A good day for this country ...

Love Ya All, Bill

Where would you time travel to?

Hi Everyone!

Well, finally settled after moving. We love being here so far! It's so great to be close to Nick and Emily and have an adventure on the east coast. Very cool!

So I love the question of the week thing. And it looks like we haven't had one in a while so I'll start one up.

I like the time period that I'm living in. I don't think that I would want to live my life in a different decade but I would love, love to have a month or so "vacations" in many times and places. Amoung many things:

*I would like to meet Jan Vermeer, the Dutch artist. Not much is known about him and his work is so lovely and touching. I would like to get to know more about him.
*I would like to meet my parents when they were in college. It would be such a riot for me to see them in the 60's.
*Selfishly, I would like to see what I was like as a little girl, pre-teen, and teen.
*I read a book called The Doomsday Book (have any of you read that? Pretty interesting.) It's sci-fi but not too sci-fi. It's based in the future where students from an English university time travel to the 1300's, with the plague and such. That would be a interesting thing to see for me. When everything that you do throughout the day has to do with your basic survivial. Very interesting.

Okay, so my question is: Where would you like to time travel to?

Hope all is well!
Kathy B.

Topic for the Week: Dec 15

With Christmas in the air, I have been feeling nostalgic, so here is a question in that line:

What is a favorite memory of your childhood? Or, what was your favorite toys or thing to play when you were little? Does not have to be Christmas.

DC daytrip

We went downtown yesterday for a Christmasy day trip of DC. Here is a hit list of what we saw:

Walked up to the CAPITOL BUILDING to see the platform being built for the inauguration and the christmas tree. Max's hat has Mickey Mouse ears if you can't really see it.

Went over to the BOTANICAL GARDENS to see their beautiful trees and this really cool MINIATURE TRAIN EXHIBIT- if you have kids this is a MUST SEE! Even if you don't have kids I'd say GO SEE IT! There are also replicas of the Smithsonian, Capitol building, and all these little villages made out of natural materials- acorns, leaves, cinnamon sticks, etc. This was super cool- maybe my favorite of the day.

Then, over to the NATIONAL GALLERY OF ART where they have put up these really cool lights in the tunnel between the two galleries. Emily was also tricked into seeing some art as we had to walk through an exhibit- I saw that famous painting of George Washington, a painting by Whister (not his mother). We were moving fast as I wanted to keep Max on the move.

Then, to watch the ICE SKATERS while we waited about an hour for Nick to go get the car and come back and pick us up. Highlights and lowlights included Max falling and hitting his face on a stone bench, hot chocolate that burned your tongue and Emily dropping and losing $40. I hope it was a great happy surprise that was found by someone in great need.

A REALLY WONDERFUL DAY!

Garfield Minus Garfield

My kids showed me this site www.garfieldminusgarfield.com where they have taken Garfield out of the Garfield comics. It totally changes it- and sometimes it is funnier. Which isn't that hard to do because sometimes the original isn't all that funny either. It is a lot of Jon talking to himself. Kind of sad. Funny in a sad way.

Topic for Week of Nov 29: The New National Security Team

So I think it is interesting to have watched both the process and the outcome of the new National Security Team for the new Obama White House. I don't know if I have ever seen more experience and a bipartisan approach in the formation of such a team. Both Republican and Democrats are there, both with lots of international experience. So I would be interested in hearing from others (on both sides of politics) regarding your thoughts.

It seems that Gates was a very good pick for now as he has really helped stabilize things out of the chaos in Iraq (still bad, but better than it was). There has been some criticism about bringing the Washington folks in when Obama implied otherwise...but I believe it is about leadership and the provision of strong advice so that very informed decisions can be made about very difficult issues (for example, Middle East and Israel, Russia and its more aggressive behavior, Pakistan and India and instability there, Al Qaeda and how do deal with issues related...can the leader be found?, making the UN a much more effective entity, engaging with Iran, N Korea and Venezuela rather than ignoring their rantings, dealing with America's lower stature in the world which resulted from decisions of the Bush White House, issues about the Geneva Convention, cell phone tapping of Americans, undocumented workers from the Central and South American countries, the immoral prisons in which so many people are still held without charge, some for over five years...lots of issues).

So I am very very impressed with the new team at this point. Lots of experience, lots of motivation to do well... What do you think?

What about Hillary (I know the Republican side of politics has not really been in favor of her in the past). But what about for Secretary of State? Also we now have a third female Secretary of State out of the last four...wow and no white males there since 1992, I believe...is this saying something (or not)?

See the following news items regarding the team and their backgrounds:

Obama Introduces Clinton, National Security Team

Obama taps Clinton, Gates for US 'new dawn' abroad

Any thoughts are welcome as long as they are respectful of other's comments...

Cheers...

We live in wolf country and have seen or heard several on our travels. Even once exchanged howls with a pack.

Here is a thought for this Thanksgiving Day. Love to All, Bill

Tale of Two Wolves

An old Cherokee chief is teaching his grandson about life:

“A fight is going on inside me,” he said to the boy. “It is a terrible fight and it is between two wolves.

“One is evil - he is anger, envy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority, self-doubt, and ego.

“The other is good - he is joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility, kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion, and faith.

“This same fight is going on inside you - and inside every other person, too.”

The grandson thought about it for a minute and then asked his grandfather, “Which wolf will win?”

The old chief simply replied, “The one you feed.”

fun art

patrick dougherty recently came to iowa to create an outdoor art installation on a lake near us. i took my kids there on a freezing cold day, but we had so much fun! i loved the concept and the construction of the installation. my kids loved the tunnel-ness and hide-ability. we were all happy.

i've never done a panoramic collage of photos, so this might not be the most graceful, but i love seeing the whole thing. it was really a U-shape, but i'm not so fancy with the panorama. (hurry & click it to see it big!)

Kai Richins wanted to put this Joke on the Blog. I added a category for future ones called "JUST JOKING." Click on the "RICHINS LABELS" under "Categories" for further categories and my suggestion about using them.

(Cathy, could you give Kai an invite at richinskai@yahoo.com and also Jonathan Richins at jonnierichins@yahoo.com).

Here is the joke:

I saw the weirdest thing on Wall Street today.
There were these little green arrows pointing up.
What are they for?

Trip to Bali

Aloha

I thought you might like to see some photos of our trip to Bali. Now where, you might ask where is that place? It is one of my favorite places I/we have visited in Asia...in Indonesia (Obama spent some time in Indonesia, you might remember). I/we have been there twice - for our 20th and 25th wedding anniversaries. I will put more on later when I get a chance to go through some other files.

Cheers...

















This is an beautiful cliff area in the southern part of Bali.


These are amazing creatures found in various places in Bali. But you have to watch your hat or sun glasses, as they steal them for food. Just after the above picture was taken of us, one of the monkeys tried to steal that hat of Kathy's. She just grabbed it in time...



This is the fire dance...which is a famous male dance in Bali. We saw this at sunset overlookiing the cliffs...really something to watch...also the sounds were quite amazing.



This is a most amazing rafting trip where anything goes, including going under a waterfall, getting stuck on rocks, going backwards over rapids and jumping off into the water to float down through a canyon, running into other rafts (on purpose) in the middle of rapids and also going to these hand carved rock cliffs which were incredible and covered an area ten times what you see here.

I will add more in a while...but must go now.

Cheers...

Topic Categories - An Idea

Aloha

I noticed that you can identify your topic when you do a blog post by putting a label in (see the box at the bottom right when you create a new post). So I suggest the possibility of the following (if you are interested):

I have created a topic area for the week of November 15 called "New President" where we can possibly have postings and comments about the politics of the "44th" president. This is under the "Label" - THE WORD.

So I have put this first one in THE WORD category, which I invite comments or other postings.

Label categories might include:

TRAVELS - Richins Travels (any of our amazing travels including explanations and photos)
EVENTS - Family Events (showing us what we are going to do or what has been happening in our/your families, for example Halloween or a B-day - explanations and photos)
THE WORD - This can be a discussion topic for the week...anyone can start one and it is OK to have more than one in any particular week (starting on Saturdays for the week...see the one I have put on for the week of Nov 15)
THOUGHTS - This about any thoughts you may have about anything (see the one Bill put on about wolves) 

NEWS - Exciting Richins family news (like a new job, or announcing that Belva and Carl are going to Denmark)
THE PLAN - Discussions on planning things/family events and get-togethers (planning aspects, for example planning Margaret Richin's 95th birthday this next year...if we want to)
MY ACTIVITIES - Individual activities and updates (for example, the recent note from Kelly on her new business - explanations and photos)
JUST JOKING - This is for funny jokes we know, hear or see (this is Kai Richins' idea so it should be fun!!)
Others (please suggest)

Another example, for Bill's trip to Finland, that would go under the "Label" of TRAVELS. This way we can click on TRAVELS and see all the exiting travels that we do or on other labels to see other activities and then they don't just get lost in the blog over time...If you want to - each of you can go back to some of the posts you have created and put the appropriate category label in under "Labels for this post" and it should show up under the category created...So Bill you might put your Finland trip under TRAVELS.

Now I am not suggesting we eliminate the normal way we do things, but it might be good to label things as we want to - so that we can go back to areas of relevance, read them and/or add comments to them...

I am not sure it this will work...but worth a try.

Cheers

Finland Photos

Here's a few photos from my recent Finland trip. Ice breakers in Helsinki, Cobblestones in Porvoo, Sandwiches in Helsinki, Water Front Property in old town Porvoo.

Enjoy, Bill

Wow! People really are talking on here!

I had no idea that people talk so much on this blog!

I didn't know that Eric put the article about Outdoor Discoveries on here! I have a sweet brother!

About Outdoor Discoveries. I started my camp in May and it has been thriving and it is my dream job. The article that came out last week was the first 'advertising' I have done since starting the camp-it has all be done by word of mouth and I am constantly wowed by the amount of families I have signed up each week. I send out an email each week and they sign up!

Tonight I was working with one of my families who just started coming in September and the child asked me why I didn't have a camp last Sunday-it was so wonderful to hear that a child missed me-I am making a difference in her life. My favorite quote was from this summer when we spent the day creating hula hoops and playing in the grass. Ryan's (almost 7) nanny had arrived to pick him up and he looked up at me and said "but I'm not done"

I am also working with a few families on how to raise their children and it's brilliant. It makes me giggle to see parents trust me with their children and the process of helping them help their children grow into compassionate responsible human beings. I am working on creating some sort of blog for families-I want to share my knowledge of how to work with children correctly and easily so that both parents and children are understanding one another and working with rather then against.

I am also starting a new experiment with a few 'dance moms' on creating dance clothing-the past few weeks I have been making tutus! I love it! I think that I may have to start wearing tutus everyday because they are so pretty! We have a website that is in the making and is just waiting on pictures to show off our creations. If anyone would like to special order tutus for the holidays let me know-I will come up with a family discount!

I do have a website for Outdoor Discoveries and I am looking for someone to help me make one way cooler but for now it is great.
check it out
outdoordiscoveries.org

Hope you are all well
movin fast and speedin up
kelly

Topic for week of Nov 15 - The New President

Aloha

My first try of putting a post on the RFN blog didn't work so well...so I am updating the first post with the following...

I have created a topic area called "New President" where we can possibly have postings and comments about the politics of the "44th" president. So I have put one in which I invite comments or other postings.

Just a few more thoughts on the new directions our country may be taking. There were many many articles written in this last week's Newsweek on "44." I thought a few captured quite well the sentiment. I also thought the Richins Blog might be interested in these. Any thoughts would be interesting to hear. See the following:

An Epic Moment, Yes. But Transcendent? No.
Which discusses the important message Obama offered to the voters.

Bring On the ‘Reality- Based Community’
A key article articulating the importance of science vs creating our own reality.

With a Little Help From Our Kids
Which talks about the changing demographics and shift in the makeup of America and its people and the importance this had on the election.

Obama's Third Way

Which discusses how most "Americans still identify themselves as conservatives than as liberals" but that there is a shift of how this is viewed toward the future.

Cheers...