Summer is finally here

The calender may say that summer starts when we have the longest day, but when my son has the last day of school and high temperature for the day is over 100 degrees, it is Summer.


 

Course/Section and Title	Grade	Credits	CEUs	Repeat	Term
GIS-25 S7392 GIS Projects	B	1.00			2012S
GEOG-5 S3904 Digital Planet	A	3.00			2012S
GIS-22 S3905 GIS Data Creation	B	2.00			2012S
GIS-23 S7390 Raster GIS	B	1.00			2012S
GIS-94 S2430 Geographic Info Systems WSL					2012S
SL-92 S3192 American Sign Language II	A	4.00			2012S

 
My grade have been posted for the semester. This has been an amazing semester of discovery and enlightenment. My email this morning is a taste of how I am feeling this morning.

Linkin Two lists for everyday

    List 1: Your Focus List (the road ahead)

    What are you trying to achieve? What makes you happy? What's important to you? Design your time around those things. Because time is your one limited resource and no matter how hard you try you can't work 25/8.

    List 2: Your Ignore List (the distractions)

    To succeed in using your time wisely, you have to ask the equally important but often avoided complementary questions: what are you willing not to achieve? What doesn't make you happy? What's not important to you? What gets in the way?

Followed by:

Proverbs 31/ Devotion of the day "I am really afraid"   

"The angel of the LORD encamps around those who fear him, and he delivers them." Psalm 34:7 (NIV)

Holy Experience  had a great example from Max Lucado :

How a white stallion had rode into the paddocks of an old man and all the villagers had congratulated him on such good fortune.
And the old man had only offered this: “Is it a curse or a blessing? All we can see is a sliver. Who can see what will come next?”
When the white horse ran off, the townsfolk were convinced the white stallion had been a curse. The old man lived surrendered and satisfied in the will of God alone:  “I cannot see as He sees.”
And when the horse returned with a dozen more horses, the townsfolk declared it a blessing, yet the old man said only, “It is as He wills and I give thanks for His will.”
Then the man’s only son broke his leg when thrown from the white stallion. The town folk all bemoaned the bad fortune of that white stallion. And the old man had only offered, “We’ll see. We’ll see. It is as He wills and I give thanks for His will.”
When a draft for a war took all the young men off to battle but the son with the broken leg, the villagers all proclaimed the good fortune of that white horse. And the old man said but this, “We see only a sliver of the sum. We cannot see how the bad might be good. God is sovereign and He is good and He sees and work all things together for good.”

That is to say that: I am afraid, the Lord is with me. He has a purpose and plan and I need not fear.
When I go flying down the ramp of life the Lord will bring people like Mr. Googins to catch me at the bottom of the ramp. I just have to take the leap of faith.

                                        Mom and Mary at Graduation: Shasta College 2012

         Mr. G catching me at the bottom of the ramp with the first hug and congratulations.

                                                          THANK YOU MR. G.
             Mostly Thank you, Jesus for healing Mr. G of cancer so that he could be there.

Finals Season

Today is my last intern day for the semester. I will continue my internship through the summer on other projects, but this is the last High School Outreach day. This has been a most challenging assignment. We have had 20+ students in each class, showing them all the different resources we can squeeze into 45 minutes. (32 in the last class of the day!)
We start out with Episode 1 of the Penn State Geospatial Revolution Videos. This is like a hook in the lip of a wide mouth bass. I love looking at their faces as they watch the movie. A fast pace depiction of all the technology at their finger tips today and the things to come in the near future.
  We have a list of map apps that they can use on the computer:
:http://nationalmap.gov/ , http://www.openstreetmap.org/ and my personal favorite: http://www.wildlifecrossing.net/california/.
In the national map they can learn to create maps for reports. In the Open Street Map they can add to an online resource for others and in the wildlife crossing map they are able to help conservation services to map the habitats of migration that is effected by people traffic.
   These are the kids that we worked with on Wednesday using GPS units with a Geo-caching set up in a lot near their school. We bring up Google Earth and show them the points they were searching for on Wednesday. I hope through this exposure they will engage their parent this summer and  do something different on the internet. It is an amazing opportunity to reach kids with positive tools they can use in the future.
   I am not sure where the Lord is taking me in the GIS world. I just want to take every opportunity available. Today a Linked-In article stated that: projects are the new job interview.
We had 4 great projects that we presented to the RAGU meeting Wednesday night. I hope they will be featured on the Shasta College GIS Facebook Page. RAGU is the Redding Area GIS Users. Once a year they meet at the college to see the student projects. We had one group that created an App for wild flowers and trees along the Sacramento River Trail. Another group mapped all the fire hydrants in a rural area of North West Redding for Cal Fire. The third group worked with the College physical plant folks and updated the maps for use in maintaining the 1500+ trees on campus. In the process they also made a nature trail guided tour of special trees on campus. My group had Rick Bonetti of http://reddingvoice.com/ as our client. He wanted a handheld, fold-able map to give homeless people at the Project Homeless Connect  this next Tuesday. My teammates did an excellent job putting together what Rick wanted. The information from all of our maps will also go into the database for ESRI ArcGIS server.

Tomorrow my daughter Johanna will be Graduating from High School. She earned the diploma in December and actually took 20 Shasta College units this semester. I am very proud of her accomplishment. She is an amazing young woman.

 A photographer, a ballerina, an honor student, and a Godly woman in a very cute package.

Shalom,
GIS εїз

Graduation Season

This week I picked up my cap and tassel for my Graduation on May 25th. Today we picked up Johanna's cap, tassel and honor cord for next Saturday, May 19th. It is amazing that it has been 3 years since I started my journey as a returning college student. I had no real idea of what I would be doing with my education. I just knew that my skills for the work force were needing improved upon and I could use the FAFSA money to support my family.  

    Now, I have a much clearer view of the work force and I see that I have gained some amazing skills that I did not even know existed. I have always love the subject of Geography. The California High School system has all but removed Geography from the curriculum.  I insisted that my children all take an entire year of Geography. I did not know that I was doing something radical at the time. If we are to live on a "digital planet" the children of today need to know what the planet is like and not just the technology that makes it all digital. 

     My daughter, Abbie, has an interest in Archaeology. What would an Archaeologist be without her map? My son, Ian, want to be in the Coast Guard and go around the world (with hopes of time spent in Madagascar), how would he succeeded or even know of all this without his Geography studies? One of my cousins has two children. Her husband traveled the world before he got married and has encouraged their children to do the same. Their son has been traveling abroad for almost a year and has settled down in Eastern Asia for a season to teach English as a Second Language. 

     I am reminded of the phrase: "Bright hope for a new tomorrow". Well, first of all I have never heard of an old tomorrow, but the "Bright hope" part is what is important to me. Yes, there is the hope in salvation in trusting Jesus as my savior, but there is also the hope to see my grandchildren graduate from college. In the next 25 years while that dream is materializing, I want to be helping people with the "information highway" to navigate the maps of the world. 

    That is going to be the objective on my next resume. I want to help people navigate the information highway with the use of GIS.

Meanwhile, I have a lot of running around to do in the next three weeks. In the upcoming week I will assist Dr. Kashuba with two workshop in a local high school. We will be teaching the use of GPS and how to map things out using tools that are free to anyone on the internet. I also have a challenge for the students to get involved with the California Roadkill Observation survey.

The kids can identify and map out wildlife crossing patterns which will help CAL Trans and wildlife biologist to protect animals and humans alike.

I found these as sobering facts:

       The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration estimates there are approximately 1.5         million auto deer collisions per year, resulting in damage losses of around $1.5 billion USD, which works out to an average cost of $1,000 per accident.  State Farm Insurance Agency also supports these statistics, and goes on to report that, in the year 2004, there were 150 human deaths in the United States that were directly linked to car deer accidents. 

      Along with the two workshops I will have a project presented on Wednesday night with my team in GIS 25. We are working on a map that will aid disadvantaged people to the services in the community. This has been a project I have been involved with all semester in my Digital Planet class and spilling over to the GIS 25 - project class. Tuesday (May 22) I get to go to a Trimble workshop. That will be finals week and my graduation week. 

     This summer I will continue as an intern with the GIS department at Shasta College. I am excited for what awaits me in the next season.

Busy, exciting days ahead. I will be excited to hear about Abbie's trip to Humbolt on their Oceanography Research Vessel when I pick her up tomorrow evening. Mary work with the first Shasta College  NEW workshop. (Nontraditional Employment for woman.  Johanna got an opportunity to photograph a car show/ swap meet that Mary's Diesel 4x4 club sponsored last week .  She did an excellent job and both the Welding club and the Diesel club got pictures. Last night Ian was awarded the Physical Education Outstanding Student Award at his school. Not for the best athlete, but the best student. The PE coach gave a speech explaining how Ian helps her, encourages other and is her number one helper. "Someone I can trust to do a job and I don't have to worry if it will be done correctly." The have an award for each teacher to give out and his was the only PE award. There was outstanding Tennis Players.

                                                     http://www.sbdcsc.org/navigation/new-/

    Each child so different, but outstanding in their own special way. Proud mom this mother's day. As I reflect on Mother's Day I think of that grubby little boy hand full of dandy lions. That is what makes a mother's heart melt.

 

My baby boy is 16 today

 It is amazing that the time as gone by so fast. Every day has 24 hours the same as always. The only way I can explain it is the  last 16 years my life has been very full. When I say I have 3 daughters and... a son I get these funny smiles from people. Some think I am crazy to have had 4 kids in 5 years, other have been asking me for year, "What were you thinking?"
   No response to that one. I have asked myself that very question on the sleepless night since they all became teenagers. When I see a mom stressed in the store with 4 little one I try to encourage them with, "Enjoy them when they are small." I enjoy them now, but I know I was too up-tight back then. It is easy to have hind-sight.
   Only time and God's grace can mellow a mother. So, now it is a week from Mother's Day and I am celebrating the birth of my "Cinco de Mayo baby boy." I have let him know that he will always be my "Baby Boy". Once in Ann Landers Column I saw this poem:
   

~ A MOTHERS LOVE ~

Dear First Born:

I've always loved you best because you were my miracle. You were the genesis of a marriage and the fulfilment of young love. You sustained me through the hamburger years, the first apartment (furnished in Early Poverty), and my first mode of transportation (feet).

You were new, had unused grandparents, and enough clothes for a set of triplets. You were the original model for a mom who was trying to work the bugs out. You got the strained lamb, the open safety pins and three-hour naps. You were the beginning.

Dear Middle Child:

I've always loved you best because you drew a tough spot in the family, and it made you stronger for it. You cried less, had more patience, wore faded hand-me-downs, and never in your life did you get anything first. But it only made you special.

You were the one I relaxed with, and realized a dog could kiss you and you wouldn't get sick. You could cross the street by yourself long before you were old enough to get married . . . and you helped me understand the world wouldn't collapse if you went to bed with dirty feet.

You were the child of my busy, ambitious years, and without you, I would not have survived the job changes and the tedium and routine that is marriage.

To The Baby:

I've always loved you best because while endings are generally sad, you are such a joy.

You readily accepted the milk-stained bibs, the lower bunk, the cracked baseball bat, the baby book that had nothing written in it except a recipe for graham-cracker pie crust that someone had jammed between the pages. You are the one I held onto so tightly. You are the link with my past, a reason for tomorrow.

You darken my hair, quicken my steps, square my shoulders, restore my vision, and give me a sense of humour that security, maturity, and durability can't provide. When your hairline takes on the shape of Lake Erie and your own children tower over you, you will still be my baby.

. . . from a mother . . .

- Author Unknown -