june 24

~what a good day~

weeds

in the last few weeks our yard has really gotten out of hand. i'm talking 3 ft monster thistles and a variety of waist high weeds. we were looking a little white trash, to say the least.

we went from in-over-our-heads....

to light-at-the-end-of-the-tunnel...

to a huge-sigh-of-relief.

i know, i know... we never should have let the weeds get out of control in the first place. we could have spent the day putting in a sprinkler system instead of plowing weeds and getting our yard to the point it was when we first moved in. moral of the story... don't let weeds overtake your life. it'd make a great church talk if anyone wants to borrow it. ;)

hopefully we've learned our lesson and can keep the weeds down until we put in sprinklers and grass.

thanks family for sacrificing a fun day of hiking for a hard day of work. b-don and i never could have done it by a our little 'ole selves.

appreciated

last week was teacher appreciation. i've heard rumors about the gifts some teachers get during this week... gift cards to their favorite clothing stores, certificates to restaurants, expensive soaps and lotions. i wouldn't know. teaching at a low-income school does not produce such gifts. we get something even better.


such as bars of soap....

and dirty, hair-covered, stuffed animals...

i can just see "J" remembering it's teacher appreciation week and searching his house for a proper gift. {he gave me a dirty stuffed zebra for christmas.} i would love to know his thoughts when he saw that bar of irish spring and knew it was the right gift for me. maybe that "shower everyday with soap" lesson actually stuck with him. {at least something did}

and poor "S". she's as dirty as the scorpion she gave me. maybe smellier though. this year she has pushed my already low patience to the brinks of losing all control. {i've had to take lots of deep breaths} but she gave me her scorpion. even if it was covered in pet hair... she was thinking of her teacher and that was nice. it made me want to be a little kinder and a lot more patient with her.

sisters trip

this week millie, abbie, and i drove down to arizona to visit our sister annie and her family.

it was so nice to get away and relax.

we celebrated easter together by watching conference, eating lots of food, hunting for eggs, and soaking up a little sun.

{highlights}

sun, sun, sun
coloring eggs
dinner with millie's sister-in-law's family
almost killing their hammie
annie's ultrasound.... girl... yes, another one
duck pond
hiking... it's getting hot in here...
dinner & movie with guillena's
peanut butter m&ms
freddy's
would you rather.... (such an entertaining game)
speeding tickets.... 2 of them
spending time with the girls i love... big and little

thank you abbie and millie for coming and making the trip entertaining. thank you ellery and aayla for being SO good in the car. thank you annie for letting us visit. i miss you guys.

just call me fred.

i feel like i've been cursed. cursed with a love of ShOEs. tall shoes, with a skinny toe. the love of shoes is not so much a curse as is the shape of my feet. they don't fit into 90% of the shoes i love so much. whoever designed these beautiful shoes did not design them for my feet. if you have seen my feet, you understand... if not, well, imagine fred flintstone... visualize his club feet. then attach those to my ankles and you've got my feet.

the other day i went shoe shopping. i started upbeat and excited, ready to find a fabulous new pair of pumps. i tried on pair after pair. each pair deflated my excitement until i was left completely frustrated and defeated.

i decided i should shop online. surely someone has a line of wide-width shoes for club-footed-girls like me. what i found depressed me even more.




i am cursed to have bunions or g-ma shoes.

it's back baby

when i told people i was going to put WALLPAPER up in our new house i got a variety of responses.

couple of excited comments about how cute it would look. a few even mentioned they'd love to do the same.

more often then not, my idea was met with a face of shock, confusion, doubt, and even a hint of disgust. these initial faces were masked with an "oh... uh, cool"... sometimes a "really??? wow you're braver than i am." or... "neat. my mom has wallpaper" even... "eww! why?" i would just chuckle inside when i was met with these responses. then i kindly informed them...

wallpaper has official made a comeback, and i have welcomed it with open arms.


p.s.
do not fret. it's not plastered on every surface, just one accent wall.

iron chef -- oranges!

for those of you who know my father, you know that he loves his tv entertainment. specifically, iron chef. when we eat at nice restaurants he pretends he is a judge and critiques the food with the same confidence the true judges possess. for quite some time he's been talking about having our own family iron chef competition. well, it finally happened. this year for my mom's birthday, my dad surprised us with white envelopes holding a secret ingredient and the rules and regulations to iron chef - roper style.

jacob and brandon were the chefs and the rest of us drew teams...
team 1: jacob (bro-in-law), millie (sister), and myself
team 2: brandon, abbie (sister), and danica (abbie's friend)

the secret ingredient, oranges! each team had $100 and 1 1/2 hours to shop, plan, and create three courses and a drink.

the competition was fierce and stressful. my team had several mishaps and i worried that we would have NOTHING to serve the judges (my parents). brandon's team was calm and collected (shocking, i know). they finish with plenty of time to spare, which they used to laugh at jacob, millie, and myself running around like wild cats, yelling orders back and forth, and cursing under our breath. (ok, that last part might just have been me.) it came down to the last second of the competition, but we were able to finish our dishes. i must say, i was very impressed with the end results. not only did we have all our dishes, but they tasted pretty amazing.

TEAM JACOB MENU: (and yes, we came up with the names ourselves)
drink: orange strawberry sunrise smoothie
appetizer: chipotle orange shrimp kabobs with a fresh spring mix salad and orange vinaigrette dressing
entree: top sirloin medallion with zesty orange sauce topped with grilled asparagus
dessert: orange cream tart

TEAM BRANDON MENU:
drink: orange-lemonade
appetizer: fruit salad with an orange yogurt glaze
entree: shrimp with an orange tomato and thyme sauce
dessert: orange dream smoothie

in the end, the title of iron chef went to the most deserving team.... my team.
unfortunately, winner or loser, we still had this waiting for us in the end.