first time blog

Hello. My name is Tammi Watkins and I am new to the world of blogging.  I am hoping to help out by providing information about topics that I find interesting.  These include and are not limited to archaeology, historic preservation, museum studies and other conservation issues.  These are the topics I will mainly stick too.  I promise no child raring stuff, as I don’t enjoy reading my own friends’ blogs about their kids and their accomplishments.  I will spare you all from that. 

I will also try my best to avoid all religious and political debates, as these can be sources of frustration for a lot of people.  The only time I will mention anything political is if it is a law or an issue that pertains to one of the above mentioned topics.  I am very open minded but if I don’t participate in a political discussion please don’t take it personally. 

Here in the next few months my husband will be participating in an adobe restoration workshop.  He and co-workers will be restoring and stabilizing a 100 year old adobe ranch house.  I hope to get step by step photos and some documentation to share with others of such a great preservation (pro-active) project.  Currently, the crew has made over 1000 adobe bricks by hand and they are drying.  They take several months to dry before you can utilize them.  I believe the project will begin in April or May.  More to come on this project. 

Currently, I work as a curator at the local museum here in Kingman, AZ.  It has been a very interesting experience and a lot of work.  I am still trying to figure out how everything operates and functions.  The person before me left and took pretty much everything  with him.  So I had to learn everything on my own.  Is it correct?  I hope so.  I am just following what other’s did.  Copying how they accessed artifacts and how they filled out the appropriate forms.  This has lead me to my project for Bucks County Community College as a museum curator.  I am going to create and try to enact a manual of “how to’s” so that when I do leave the person filling in behind at least has half a clue.  The director didn’t even know what was going on in the curation area.  I will keep you posted more on this, too, as time prevails. 

Thank you for letting me be a part of this project and I can’t wait to see what others are going to share.