Kline Falls~Part One

(The posts showed up in the wrong order, but that's okay! This is just a warning, about what I'm not sure. It's not like your brains will explode reading them on the wrong order.....or will they?(hehe))
My family went for a picnic to Kline Falls on Sunday after church. My parents had gone during an anniversary trip and we've been saying that we should go all summer. We finally got there and boy was it b-e-a-utiful!

I love the reflections in the water!

The dog had lots of fun going in the water then rolling in the dust!=)

A pair of swans visited us, very cool

A crawdad that we found

This is a shoot of the river where we ate lunch, isn't it purdy?=)

That is part one of our trip, we then took a hike over to see the falls. Pictures and post coming soon!

Kline Falls~Part Two

This is part two of our trip to Kline Falls.

I love the dark rock with the blue water!

It almost looks man made doesn't it?

The falls aren't one big sheet of water, it's a bunch of little cascades like these.

The river was ow and we could hike around on the river bed, which I love doing!

The old power station at the falls. It was very properly run down with out looking to bad you know? It made for a very nice view!=)

Well there is our trip in a couple nut shells! I would definitely recommend going yourself, it's beautiful!

Life is Just a Bowl of Cherries

I have had the same apron for three years now and it was literally falling apart. So, I had to throw it way after putting up with the foot long holes and the skirt falling off of the waist band. The burn marks on the front made me realize I need to watch my self a little closer when I'm by the stove! Yikes!

I morned for a little while then set about making a new one! It's from a pattern my Mom and I made from another apron we liked. It was narrow and because I'm a "butt wiper"; my term for wiping my hands on my rear leaving finger smudges on an area I don't really want any attention brought to!(hehe) I made it a fuller skirt by adding another panel. The bodice is a double layer to prevent spills from soaking through and the edging is double fold wide bias tape.

I love cherries!

My Life as the MOHO

My sister and I had always said that we would be each others Maids of Honor. Whoever got married second would have to find some one else to be the "maid". In movies and books the list of duties is long and rather varied, here are the ten duteis I have as MOHO!.

1: Wedding dress(check)

While I didn't get to see Megan on one of those pedestals in a mirrored room, I still helped out with the dress. It's all done now, all sewn and hanging up in her room. That was an experience! Beads flying everywhere and all the machines that touched it throwing up and breaking!

2: Helping her make decisions(check)

She got really annoyed during this one, when ever we'd mention something she'd just say I don't know! Then I'd tell her she has to know, she'd get mad then she would come up with a choice. This one was kind of hard to marry(hehe, marry!) with the next one......

3: Be happy and cheerful about everything the bride wants(kind of check!)

What if the bride won't make a choice and you have to a little mean to get her to make a decision? What if the bride gets cold and you were honestly worried about her being uncomfortable? I did try to be as nice as possible, but I am only human after all....=)

4: Look unfortunate in the "beautiful" dress the bride has chosen to make her look even hotter then usual(check! But, it's not the dress, I achieve that one naturally!)

The dresses she picked out for us to make are pretty and the look good on all of us! Score one for Bridezilla(she calls herself that, I'm not being mean here!)

5: Throw her parties: shower and bachelorette(check)

The shower and the bachelorette party went off rather well. All had a good time and we even got embarrassing video for Shawn to see after all is said and done!

6: Help with favors, flowers, buying decorations etc etc etc(check, check, and check)

The favors are finished as of Sunday night, the flowers are being ordered and the decorations are all bought. Now we just need to set them all up, and we can't exactly do that part yet!

7: Wedding Day duties(no check yet!)

I will fluff her veil, take pictures during the bride prep time. Stand next to her as she begins this next chapter in her life, tearing up and holding her flowers. I will pose for countless pictures even though I look rather odd on film, though that will help with number four!

8: Reception speech(not sure about this one yet!)

I'd never heard of the MOHO giving a toast; at all of the countless wedding I've attended of coarse............ If she wants me to give a speech I will, but I am not the type to make people cry, so it would have to make them laugh! Not about her in a mean way of coarse, but I just can't be sentimental; it comes off as weird when I try. I was told no and received shudders when I mentioned this before, so I'm thinking she doesn't want to hand me a mike!

9: Participate in the bouquet toss

There are some real contenders at this point, so well see If I even get close. I was never good at 500!

10: Cry buckets and throw rice(or bird seed in her case) at her and Shawn as they leave. Help decorate the "get away" car

I will be all over this one, I might even throw in a shoe for good luck! So far we've been told to keep it pretty tame with the car decorating but when Mark gets involved........who knows(hehe)

Gullible Ol' Me

If you look the word gullible up in the dictionary you will find my picture there! My first remembrance of that word was when a cousin told me that the word gullible wasn't in the dictionary. I was about 11 or 12 at the time and had to ask what gullible meant. She told, and I still was all confused as to why they wouldn't have a word in the dictionary. As I was puzzling this out the others in the room started laughing and my older sister took pity on me and told me the joke.

That was when I first realized that I was pretty much the definition of that word. I used to get upset but over the years I've gotten used to it. It's fun to make people laugh. Besides I'd much rather be over trusting then cynical and not trust anything anybody said. Here a a few examples of the things I've been lead to believe over the years.

I was sitting in a Mexican restaurant with some friends; we'd jut gotten done singing at an old folks home. We were talking about sweet and sour sauce and how they made it(why we were talking about sweet and sour sauce in a Mexican restaurant, I'm not sure!) and one of the older guys said that he knew! "They make it by grinding up whole kumquats. The skin is sour, the flesh is sweet and the whole things is orange so there's your color!" I was amazed and started going on and on about how neat that was. When the guy over heard me going on about it he turned bright red and started apologizing all over the place. "I never meant for you to believe me, I'm so sorry........." for about 3 minutes. Sorry about what? That I'm an idiot? To this day the sight of kumquats makes me and my sister crack up!

At a collage group the leader and a couple of the other guys were talking about a performer who was coming to Bend the next Thursday. One guy was saying how neat he was and that he could play the guitar really well. I was half listening to the conversation and stopped following it at that point. The when I heard one of the girls start to say,"Really? No way! That's so cool!" I started listening again. "Yeah," the leader said,"there are Siamese twin brothers that play the guitar. They only have two hands so they one guy strums and the other guy does the cords!" Now me and two of the other girls were trying to picture this in our heads, the other guys were all agreeing saying how cool it was and so on and so forth. Then they could no longer hold it in, they all started laughing and wheezing and us girls were left feeling a little foolish. Though I totally think that would be awesome, the whole Siamese guitar player thing!

And the latest, a friend posted on his blog about the new church he's going to. He'd gone to help out at their MS(middle school) group and had meet Honis Jonas, the oldest Jonas brother. He'd lead a game, something about chocolate pudding and diapers(not something I'm thinking about to hard!) I thought that that was very neat! I knew that the Harris's had lived in Sisters(the I Kissed Dating Good Bye author and his family) so an older not famous Jonas brother didn't seem out of reach. I was telling my family about what this friend had posted on his blog and when I got to the Honis Jonas part my Mom stopped me and said,"What? No way! Honis? Who would name their kid that?" "Yeah, I said. Tim said he met him!" "No!" older sister says, "There's only the three Jonas brothers....." This conversation went on for a while until I finally went down stairs to prove them wrong. I goggled Honis Jonas and guess what came up first? Yep, you guessed it, Tim's blog! There is no older Jonas brother named Honis.

Oh well! Life goes on and I will still believe most anything you tell me! As our music pastor Mark Sue put it," It's not gullible, it's trusting." His wife was one of the girls trying to picture the Siamese guitar player along with me!=)

YouTube

Like all of the other computer things in my life YouTube is one that I really try to limit. I could very easily get lost in there for hours! So, I usually try to limit the cruising around to about 15 minutes. Here are some of my favorite finds!

I found this one while looking up how to do a Bayou accent for a VBS drama!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=obT_ZXh-D1w&feature=related

This one is from one of my favorite singing groups ever! You should really check out some of their other videos while your at it!=)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iWfIoAFUhCM

This one is the product of little kids wanting me to look up random things. It's a little scary but you can't help but laugh!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tv3Tm2mEL3o

This one was found and shown to me by my churches music director/pastor (they can't decide what exactly he should be called!) I have a friend who can also do this, but he declines to do a performance. I'm still waiting for it, I just need to catch him at the right moment.......maybe cruise Tim will come out some time!(hehe) Also check out Nicks other videos, this ones the best, but the others are good to.=)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t9-CS2v8wcc

Th-tha-tha-that's all folks! I hope you enjoyed your travel into the land of YouTube may you always find your way back out again before to many moons are lost!

Remember

I'm admit to completely forgetting what today was besides the Friday before my sisters bridal shower for 30 people! Then when I logged on this morning I was cruising around the net before the hectic day begun and when I got here and saw a good friend's posts about 9/11. I was very surprised. What? The radio DJ didn't say anything, the news paper didn't have anything, the websites I had gone to hadn't said anything about it.

Have we really forgotten what happened that day? Have we forgotten the lives lost? The sacrifices made? The promise we all made to our selves to help our government make sure nothing like this could ever happen again? Have we forgotten the God we all turned to in our country's hour of need? The answer to these questions is a resounding yes!

Some haven't forgotten, but their brave voices are being drowned out by the cries of, CHANGE! PEACE! Bring our troops home. Why did we even start this war in the first place?

Um, hello!? Why!? Why did we go over there in the first place? Remember where you were when you found out what was going on. In school? At work? In the car? In bed? How did it feel to turn on the TV, hear it on the radio, get a call from a panic stricken friend. Remember how you felt, the thoughts running through your head," This can't be happening! We live in America, things like this can't and don't happen here!" But, my dear friends it could and it did.

The best thing we could do to honor this day is to remember and pray. Remember how we felt and what we said we would do, and pray that this country would get back on track and rally around each other and our God like we did after this day 8 years ago.

Life According to T-Shirts

~I feel like sharing something silly! So, here is a small sampling of my favorite t-shirt sayings! I know, I know, I have remembered far to many of these, you would have thought I could remember important things better. It's all about priorities I guess(hehe)!~

Do not anger the dragons, for you are crunchy and taste good with ketchup!

Real Men use duct tape

When I want your opinion I will remove the duct tape from your mouth!

Inside every old person is a younger person wondering what the hell happened!

Growing old is mandatory, growing up is optional

Sarcasm just one more service I provide!

I belong to the national sarcasm society

(Like we need your support!)

I used to care, but I take a pill for that now

I've got a fever and the prescription is more cowbell!

I started out with nothing and still have most of it left!

I do not have ADD! I just...............

Hey look a bunny!

I'm so confused........

Wait, maybe I'm not?

Never go to bed angry, stay awake and plot your revenge!

I have multiple personalities, and none of them like you!

I'm not stubborn, my way is just better!

I have the body of a god. Unfortunately it's Buddha!

Irish Diplomacy:

The art of telling someone to go to hell and having them look forward to the trip!

A friend is some one who will come and bail you out of jail, but a true friend will be sitting next to you in the cell saying, "Damn that was fun!"

~One last one, it's not funny but it is one of my favorites!~

Life is not measured by the number of breaths we take, but by the number of moments that take our breath away!

La-Dee-Da!

Isn't funny how after weeks of feeling down all of the sudden you feel better? All of your problems are still there, in fact some new ones have cropped up, but you just feel like you have a glow inside? As anybody who had read my blog in the last; hmmmm, lets say month or so, could tell I was going through a hard time.

My sister getting married is a biggie on the stress scale. My little green eyed friend had taken up permanent residence on both of my shoulders and was constantly whispering in my ear. I found out other things; some involving this sister who is getting married that totally threw me for a loop. As of Sunday I was still feeling like everyone one was out to get me and that I had the weight of the world on my shoulders. I was in some kind of funk! Nobody likes me, everybody hates me, guess I'll go eat worms! I came home from a collage group, watched Penelope(great movie by the way, a definite must see! I love the costuming, very excellent!) then went to bed.

Monday, I woke up at 5:30am like usual(I don't really like getting up quite that early, but exercising is good for you. Blehk!) I realized as I was getting ready for the day that the usual heavy funk hadn't settled and I was humming(rather badly, but what's a girl gonna do? Sometimes you just gotta hum) Wedding problems happened but I didn't feel the stress like I had been. I just dealt with them and my poor very stressed Mom, no hurt feelings or depressing thoughts on my side! The things that had previously been so mountainess(that doesn't appear to be a real word!) now took on their true mole hill appearance.

The days have been blustery, and very fall like. I love fall, the sky is so blue, the wind is scented with promises and it's just some kind of wonderful; don't you know?=) I don't know what changed maybe it was the weather, maybe it was the fact that I read a wonderful book, the movie I watched the night before, the fact that a very annoying person has left Bend for a year(hehe)

But, I have a feeling that God just placed His peace in my heart because I finally accepted what He had been trying to give me. It was there the whole time for the taking I just had to get tired of my own complaining and want to change. One of my favorite quotes of all time is from Ol' Honest Abe himself; Most people are as happy as they make their minds up to be. Tru Dat, Ol' Honest Abe!

So, for now I am making my mind up to keep this glow, I'm going to try my very hardest to not lose this peace. I hate it when I'm down, but it's so hard once you've sat yourself down to sulk to haul your sorry butt back up. Good bye for now dear readers, there is a wild-beautiful-wonderful-exciting and most of all God breathed world out there that He has given us to enjoy and I'm going to go and do just that!=)

Munch N' Movies

I finally made it to one of the movies in the park! The first one I was gone and the second one it rained and they cancelled it! It was Twilight, yes I am a fan. The books are way better but they did an okay job on the movie.

Hmmmmm, kettle corn!

Ummm, what can I say about this?=)

Frozen banana, yum! But very, very messy.

Trying to throw and catch popcorn. I've got the throwing part down, now I've just to work on the catching. Becca (pictured) is the best at it!

The screen, and it appears I caught Megan in mid chew. Smile Megan!!

Next week is the last one, Kung Foo Panda. So, sad it mean summers officailly over.=(

Flowers

This bee has the fullest pollen sacks I've ever seen! I was a little nervous taking the picture, the macro feature on my camera you have to be pretty close to the thing your taking a picture of!=)

A Mid Summer Nights Dream, it smells heavenly

I couldn't capture what this flower really looks like on film(or memory card I guess, they don't even make film in the USA any more!), but it still looks pretty neat!

A Joker sunflower, my personal favorite

Doing the Dirty Work

This morning I went over to a friends house and helped them with some yard clean up and pulled up some old carpet staples. She kept apologizing about the amount of weeds, about the work just about all of the things that we were doing. She didn't quite believe that I was having a good time!

Weird as it is, I've always enjoyed that type of thing. Some of my fondest memories as a child are of tearing up sod, leveling patios, digging countless holes; for trees and bushes etc, painting rooms, ripping up carpet, all of those kinds of things. At the end of the day I was tired, sweaty and usually very, very dirty. Those days are looked back upon with much fondness.=)

There is something so gratifying in doing the dirty work, afterwards you stand up and stretch then look back at the yard, room, hole, whatever you've just done and just have to sigh in intense satisfaction. At least I do!

One of the things I am looking forward to in my future is being able to do all of these things in my own home! I have never wanted to buy a new house, give me an old fixer upper, the more work needing to be done the better. I do feel a bit of sympathy for my future husband, he has a hard row to hoe if I get my dream house! Though hopefully he will also enjoy that type of thing, it will be fun to learn along with him how to dry wall, fix plumbing, lay different kinds of floors and all of those kinds of things!

But, for now I have to be satisfied in helping others making their dreams come true. Which come to think of it, makes me feel pretty happy too!=)