Reclaiming Roots wins a 2007 Radish Award

December 27th, 2007 | beauty, big news, friends, good stuff, good work, reclaiming roots | chris | 2 comments

our home grown group, {reclaiming roots} has won a radish award from the eastern iowa based radish magazine.

Reclaiming Roots is a new eastern-Iowa based organization dedicated to beautifying neighborhoods and bringing communities together. Three friends were inspired to create the group after a living room conversation about things they wanted done in their own neighborhoods.

thanks to all the volunteers that came to help out and support your local community!
check out the article and visit the {reclaiming roots} website.

taylor the dog

December 25th, 2007Tags: ,
| dogs, family | chris | 2 comments

a few of you have been asking how taylor is doing. thankfully my parents are still tolerating her.

looks to me like she’s a happy dog. you be the judge.

merry christmas from portland

December 24th, 2007 | beauty, christmas, life, portland | chris | 2 comments

portland was beautiful today, with sunshine and showers it was very refreshing. deeann and i will be celebrating later in the day tomorrow, since she is working the night shift tonight. we’ll be having a delicious christmas dinner and hanging out with sasha, our neighbors dog that we are watching while they are with family.

i hope you all have a very merry christmas, full of hope and love.

the rape of europa

December 19th, 2007Tags:
| art, documentary, movies | chris | 0 comments


monday night deeann and i went with our neighbors to a documentary called the rape of europa. the film takes you through the violence and greed the nazis brought to europe for 12 years while focusing on the looting of classical and fine art.

when you think about world war two images of violence and murder come to mind. it has an unforgettable chill that impacts the world. i really had no idea how much the world of art was threatened by this war. adolf hitler and hermann goering had massive collections of art not only from those looted homes but those of museums and monasteries. taking literally tens of thousands of masterpieces, robbing people not only of their art but of their culture and heritage.

the lengths the nazis went to to get their hands on these pieces and the lengths the museums and common people went to to keep them safe are astonishing. this is probably one of the greatest untold stories of world war two and this film is an outstanding and notable retelling of it.

biking portland

December 17th, 2007Tags: , ,
| bike, good stuff, green, portland | chris | 0 comments

the business of biking.

video and story by the new york times.