Jilly's Pottery Classes 2.17.09

One of my (Jill) 2009 goals was to use creative outlets, so I decided to sign myself up for a pottery class through Arlington County. I was pretty apprehensive considering the last time I sat behind a wheel to throw was in High School. On my first night of class I thankfully found out that my small class consisted of newbies, some who have never touched clay before, and others who are quite seasoned. I also quickly found out, due to my U of M sweatshirt that my instructor graduated from the University of Minnesota as well, small world! He took the long road to become an artist and pottery instructor, and is now quite the artist. His name is Jason Alexander, he has a local business of his work. Check out some of his website (and work) at http://www.alexanderclayworks.com/

I can only hope that one day I will be able to create pieces as great as his. Right now my goal is to create functional pieces, bowls, plates, and mugs.... Hopefully in a couple months I can share some pictures of my work.

Mamma & Pappa Hansen Visit to DC 2.4 - 2.9.09

It was nice having the opportunity for Alan & Jolene to come visit. They were able to make it out for a nice long weekend. Since they've both done quite a bit of site seeing in DC, the only touristy thing on the agenda was a tour of the capitol building.

Stu had Friday off and took his parents around the Clarendon area for a bit of shopping, errands, lunch and note taking on possible new woodworking projects from Pier 1.

The rest of our weekend together was spent buying & eating food & wine... which is just what the docter ordered. The weather was great so lunch & happy hour on our deck was quite a treat in February. Alan made sure all had plenty of spice in a shrimp dish with excessive chipotle & adobo. A couple of nice meals out as well, just to mix things up. We were able to introduce Alan & Jolene to our favorite hole-in-the-wall Indian for take-out.


It was an aggressive schedule with some tirps to the dog-park, coffee sipping out in front of the Shirlington Library, re-stocking at Harris Teeter along with some other shopping in Pentagon City. All in all a very good visit, we're hoping to have them out once more this year in the fall sometime.

Brock Needham! 2.2.09

This morning I (Jill) got the following text from my dear friend Erin Needham, who I call Dunst (her maiden name).

Text: 11:30am "Having a baby today, we'll let you know then we know more :) doctors are very positive about everything."

Considering she was pregnant this wouldn't have been an alarming message other than she wasn't due until March 22nd!! Turns out that 'baby' was ready to come out, so they went forward with the delivery. After a long day Erin finally gave birth to a HEALTHY baby boy weighing it at 4lbs 11oz and 17 1/2 inches long. Happy Birthday Brock Allen, welcome to the world and Congratualtions Mama and Papa Nedham!!!