Caregiving Co-ops

      1 min read      Rural Issues

My good friend Margaret Bau is doing some innovative work for USDA in Wisconsin helping groups to set up cooperatives for the purpose of providing home care to seniors. She’s currently got a great write-up on the Agri-View web site describing some of her projects.

The 7-hour sunset

      1 min read      Ireland

Well we survived our trip back to the States for the holidays. We started off with a 1.5 hour delay out of Dublin. The good side of the delay was that it had us taking off right into the setting sun, which we chased most of the way across the Atlantic, giving us a nearly 7-hour-long sunset to watch out the plane window. We had good luck with the weather as the midwest was having unseasonably warm and snow-less weather.

Leavin on a Jet Plane

      1 min read      Ireland

Well the time has come to head home for the holidays. We leave Wednesday for a couple of weeks visiting the midwest. There probably won’t be any updates here until we get back to Ireland. Thanks so much for stopping in and keeping up with us. We appreciate all the emails we get, it helps us feel connected to those we’re far away from. We wish you all the best for the holiday season and the new year!

Germany in November

      4 min read      Ireland · Photography

One of the great things about living in Ireland is the easy access it gives us to most of Europe. Flights to almost anywhere in western Europe can be had for less than $100, in many cases significantly less. Our first adventure to the continent to take advantage of this was a trip to Germany to visit an old friend of mine from Belmont. Jill grew up in the house next to me, and was always another big sister to me.

John & Kat Come to Visit

      2 min read      Ireland · Photography

The weekend before Thanksgiving (that’s deer-season opening-weekend to you Wisconsinites) our friends John and Kat from Menomonie arrived in Cork for a week-long visit. Kat was here to do some training at Dunhill, and John tagged along to work on some business connections here for UW-Stout. It was good to have old friends around this week, as it’s usually a big family week for us - deer season with the Deery family, then off to Detroit for Thanksgiving with the Saura family.

Thanksgiving 2006

      1 min read      Ireland · Photography

In Ireland there is no Thanksgiving… Well okay, they may give thanks, but they haven’t built a ridiculous shopping holiday around it. Thankfully, they’re willing to celebrate it on our behalf. We had friends from the States visiting over the holiday week. Since they were here to work, Thanksgiving Day was a work day for all of us. But, Thanksgiving night we went out to dinner with the board of the Dunhill Multi-Education Centre, where Kathleen works.

Ceifin 2006

      8 min read      Ireland · Rural Issues      Ireland · RuralIssues · CommunityDevelopment · Professional

Shortly after we got to Ireland, we of course began haunting the local library. On my first trip there, I found a great book called Working Towards Balance that explored the changes in Irish society due to the booming economy. Reading the book, I learned that it was actually a collection of the papers presented at an annual conference in Ennis, Ireland. The conference is put on by an organization called The Ceifin Centre.

Cheeseheads in Dublin

      2 min read      Ireland · Photography

On November 4, Connie Loden, from the Heart of Wisconsin Business and Economic Alliance in Wisconsin Rapids, arrived in Dublin with a group of people from the Wisconsin Rapids area. Their purpose was a tour of Ireland looking at regional branding and marketing initiatives in communities, and other types of small-community and rural-area economic development. I’ve known Connie for some time through my involvement with the Wisconsin Rural Leadership Program and Wisconsin Rural Partners.

Christmas in Ireland

      1 min read      Ireland · Photography

We’ve been making the rounds doing a lot of sightseeing and Christmas shopping the past few weekends. As you might guess, the lovely old downtowns with so many historic buildings are quite lovely when decorated for Christmas. I’ve been doing a lot of night-shooting, and I can tell you walking the streets with a tripod after dark certainly attracts a lot of attention - see the drunk pic below. Many thanks to our friends John and Kat, who on their recent visit lugged my tripod over here so at least some of my Christmas pics wouldn’t be fuzzy.

I Know, I Know - I'm Behind!

      1 min read      Ireland

I’ve heard from a number of folks that they’re eagerly awaiting updates to this site. My apologies, I’ve not been keeping up with it as well as I’d hoped. We’re spending so much time out doing things in our spare time that I’ve just not taken the time to write much (unless you’re a client reading this - in which case I’ve been so busy working on your stuff that I haven’t had time to write!