Week Three. Exercise Three.
I found it interesting to see all of the possibilities for using Flickr -- and the various mashes. I went to the Chris Tomlin concert on Sunday night at the Event Center and took a picture with my cell phone. I'll have to see if I can upload a photo from my cell phone to my blog.

Sarah

Lindsay, Christy and Debbie

Lindsay, Christy and Debbie, originally uploaded by Journal Keeper.

After we had dinner we had a chance to sit around and get to know each other before we played some Party Rook.

Jeffra and Nadia

Jeffra and Nadia, originally uploaded by Journal Keeper.

Here's Jeffra and Nadia eating a bowl of chili with cinnamon rolls.

Week Two. Exercise Two.

Well I've successfully created two blogs - one is more personal, one is more work. I had the personal one before but didn't use it much. This week I've explored linking a post on my work blog to my personal blog -- that seems to work pretty well. And I've changed my settings so that Kevin will get emailed when I add a new post. It'll be fun to see if he decides to comment. Next, I'll add some photos.

Girls Night Out

We had so much fun last Thursday night. Twelve of my friends from work and church came over for chili and cinnamon rolls (an old Seattle Public Schools tradition) -- we also had salad and corn bread for the non-experimental folks. We chatted and laughed and had so much fun getting know each other. And then we got out the cards and played Party Rook. Everyone had a great time. Christy Wold won and Debbie Dills lost -- which meant she won as well. Unfortunately a couple of folks got sick, so they couldn't come. Can't wait to do it again.

Lotus Notes doesn't have to archive everything!

I just talked with Don Baker and found two new ways to make Lotus Notes work better for me.

1) Select the folders that I don't want Notes to automatically archive (eg. "Action" and "Waiting For" folders). Then, emails in these folders won't go to "Archives" but will stay in that folder until I move them which is exactly what I want.

2) I should be using the "Junk" folder and have Notes automatically identify "junk." This should eliminate a lot of the spam that I'm receiving.

I also learned that if we want to use Outlook as a client - we can have our Notes Domino server send our email to Outlook. Interesting!

Relational approach to Rapid On Boarding

I enjoyed our first Work Lead training and discussing Rapid On Boarding for new employees. The biggest insight is that we almost always think that what is most effective for new employees is a huge information dump; however, the research shows that strategically helping newcomers to develop relationships with the people who know the information they are going to need is essential. It's also important to think about how introductions, initial projects, and weekly one-on-ones help newcomers to prioritize their learning and get up to speed quickly.

Life Giving Moments

Kevin and I have started concluding our day by lighting a candle and sharing the most life giving moment of our day, and the moment that was the least life giving. It's been wonderful. This is a version of Examen. Remembering these life giving moments has enriched my life. It's interesting to me how they have been the very simple experiences like a friend who seemed genuinely happy to see me and came over to sit with me, a colleague who popped in my office to say "hi," the graciousness of a grand-daughter showing her grandfather how to do something. Over time I think that this practice will help me to recognize the moment as it happens and be more fully present to it. It also fills me with gratitude for all the good things the Lord has brought into my day.

Week One. Exercise One.

I just remembered why I so dislike online tutorials. I don't like my learning to be so totally confined to a one size fits all curriculum. Lifelong learning, determining what I want to learn, setting goals, figuring out obstacles and finding the resources I need is not something that I needed to have read to me. I turned off the sound and read the tutorial for myself and still found it really annoying. Please!

It's funny how I was so looking forward to this opportunity to learn 23 things and how the initial tutorial really irritated me.