Picture Update

Congrats to my buddy Becky and her new husband Greg. I wish I could have been there to celebrate with them!

I miss my friends. Attending the training conference in Orlando was also a great time to socialize with my pals. I'm already looking forward to next year.

"Funny Face". Scott is such a ham. If you say "funny face" he makes this same face every time. He makes a long face and sucks his lips in. It looks like the mask from Scream without dentures.

This is totally my kid - cheesy grin, hard hat, tonka truck and an ISU outfit. He is such a doll. In the last few days, his eye teeth have poked through on the right side and are about to poke through on the left side. Once again, in a short period of time, he'll have 4 new teeth. He did the same thing with his 4 front teeth.

Where Am I?

Things are definitely wild around here. Honestly, I feel like I say that a lot but sometimes it just seems to be worse. Work is BUSY, BUSY, BUSY. We're swamped. They've even called in help. I like it though, it keeps me on my toes. Most days fly by with a quick 5 minute pause to stuff some food in my face. It's been great working with the landowners and seeing their hard work pay off. I wish I was farming so I could add the big bucks to my bank account :) Things are really hopping around here and I'm enjoying the work load although I'm trying really hard to find a balance with work and home lately. Last week was the girls night out. This week I've spent a fair amount of time with my two aunts who are in town for a week. I even took Wednesday off to "play". I worked on this cute little wall hanging for baby Elizabeth who was born on Monday. I still have to finish that but I must say that it is absolutely adorable!!!

Tonight is the first football game. It's a scrimmage actually. I wasn't planning on going but I think I wanna go to support a few of the kids. After that, we're headed to a friends for the 9pm Mariners v. Red Sox game. Jake is pitching again tonight so I'm excited to see that.

I was totally blessed the other night when I talked to one of my child hood pals. I miss being able to run home and see those people. I almost wish that I lived within a few hours driving distance so I could connect with some friends and family back home. It totally made me want to go home. Home is another issue too. I was hoping to get back to CA to surprise my dad for his 50th bday but that's not happening. Funds are tight right now and work is crazy so I'm here in Iowa for my dad's bday. Hopefully though, I'll be able to head home next spring to meet my new neice/nephew. My sister-in-law is pregnant and I'm super excited for them.

Blah, blah, blah. Busy week ahead. I better enjoy my weekend before it is over!

Atta Boy

As mentioned before, one of my child hood buddies, Jake, is playing major league baseball. His first year was wearing an Angels uniform. This year he went to the Mariners as a relief pitcher. And last week, the Mariners moved him into the starting rotation. I'm not sure who was the most excited about it. When we visited with Jake over the Memorial Day holiday, he said that his goal was to be in the starting rotation. Woo hoo buddy, you made it! Below is a clip from an aritcle that I found on the Mariners website today about his first outing as a starting pitcher in the big league:

Actually, it looked like it had, thanks in large part to a guy making his first Major League start, left-hander Jake Woods, and a two-run home run off the bat of Richie Sexson in the fourth inning.
Woods, the chosen one to replace a struggling Joel Pineiro in the rotation, guaranteed that he will have a second Major League start based on a performance that saw him tie his old team in knots with a dizzying arsenal of curveballs, changeups and well-placed fastballs.
"He's been here, but we have never actually seen him as a starter and that's tough to do when you haven't seen him as a starter," Figgins said of Woods, who made the Angels Opening Day roster in 2005. "Sometimes you pitch different. It's tough when you face somebody for the first time like that."
With Seattle's bullpen thin after rookie Mark Lowe went on the 15-day disabled list with right elbow tendinitis, the one thing the Mariners needed from Woods happened to be the one thing they weren't sure they could get.
Innings.
Woods, a long reliever who has worked three innings or more in 10 different games this season, worked ahead of hitters and worked fast. He threw his curveball for strikes early in the count and let his defense -- six groundouts, nine flyouts -- do the rest.
"I threw [all pitches] for strikes, and when you do that right out of the gate, they know you can throw that pitch for strikes at any time," said Woods, who pitched in front of about 45-50 friends and family who made the drive from his hometown of Fresno.
Woods carried a three-hit shutout into the sixth inning when Orlando Cabrera started the inning with a double down the left-field line. Vladimir Guerrero then lofted an opposite-field double down the right-field line to score Cabrera.
Woods then got Juan Rivera on a comebacker to the mound and Garret Anderson on a routine ground ball to Jose Lopez at second base for the second out. But with a right-hander in Robb Quinlan at the plate, Hargrove went to his bullpen for Julio Mateo.

ABC's

According to Cori, I need to fill this out so here’s the quick and dirty version:

A is for age: 26
B is for booze of choice: Booze, what’s that? I don’t drink alcohol.
C is for career: Currently, working for the USDA and enjoying it. Who knows where I’ll be in 5 years.
D is for your dog's name: MY dog is Keller. He’s a mini australian shepherd. He’s gorgeous!
E is for essential items you use/love everyday: I wish I could say my bible. Bad me. Everyday… allergy pill, water bottle.
F is for favorite song(s) at the moment: I don’t think I have one
G is for favorite games: Battle of the sexes – because I rock at this game!
H is for hometown: A cute little town in Northern Maine. Just kidding, I live outside a tiny town in the NE corner of this corn growing state.
I is for instruments you play: I’ve got a cool lap harp that I mess with when the girls are over.
J is for jam or jelly you like: I love Gma B’s strawberry jam but don’t eat it much.
K is for kids: Yes, mine is the cutest little guy ever!!!!!!!!!
L is for last kiss: Cori’s is such a cute story. Mine, not so much. I kissed my hubby on the way out the door this morning when he was all sweaty after working out. Ick, I don’t like kissing a sweaty face but I love my hubby!
M is for most admired trait: about myself??? I admire that I care about other people and like to help them.
N is for name of your crush: Duh, of course it’s my hubby. But my eye-candy is Gary Allen.
O is for overnight hospital stays: 2nd grade: kroup, last summer: childbirth.
P is for phobias: hmm, not sure of that one.
Q is for quotes you like: I like the one that Cori saw on the side of a Nike shoebox: "You run like a girl. Good for you"
R is for biggest regret: Maybe not appreciating the lessons in life. Honestly, I don’t sit around and think of regrets. I suppose one would be not honoring others.
S is for sweets of your choice: Grasshopper cookies (aka Girls Scouts mint cookies)
T is for time you wake up: I wake up 5 million times during the night. And last night I had a YUCKY dream about someone killing me and my family. So, I watched the clock until I fell asleep. Then woke with Scott before the alarm went off. Finally at 515, I got up with the alarm and went to work out.
U is for underwear: I just bought new ones at VS. Just cute cotton ones.
V is for vegetables you love: I love veggies!
W is for worst habit: Lately… not cleaning my house
X is for x-rays you've had: Who cares? Broken thumb in HS, jacked up thumb after getting married. That’s all I remember.
Y is for yummy food you make: Cooking, what’s that? I like my enchiladas, wild rice soup… don’t get me thinking about food, I’m stuffed!
Z is for zodiac sign: who knows. I don’t pay attention to that stuff.

Fun moment

Okay, so the other day was L's birthday and I was making her a card in publisher. And I was making it as a card from all of us girls. Meg sent me a few pictures from the fair and there was one of several girls that would be perfect to use. Except, L was in the picture and so was Trevin and M and I were missing. So, I took several other pictures and inserted them. The end result was not that great. This picture was one I made to put myself in the picture. I opted to use something else but this picture still makes me laugh when I see it!

Theactual picture that I used - it's horrible. And I must say that I'm no artsy-fartsy person. I don't have photoshop or anything fancy, I just use what I can to make things work.

Have a good day everyone and enjoy the little kid inside of you!

Girls Night Out

I'm so thankful that my hubby supports me in wanting some girl time. There were apparently a few husbands who weren't so supportive about the idea. Half of these girls also come to our Thursday night small group so the guys were wondering why we also had to have a girls night out by ourselves. My answer to that: we're girls and have to use up a lot more words each day!

It was a fun night. Several of the girls I'd never met. Not everyone knew each other and there were 12 of us which made it a bit more difficult to talk to everyone. L has been part of our small group for a while, we've adopted her into our family and now she works out with us too. It was her 18th birthday and we celebrated with her and Miss Voice who turns 18 on Saturday. First stop was chinese buffet [so didn't help me eat healthy]. Second we headed to K's apartment which is located above a store front on Main Street. Very fun place. Thanks to MB for bringing Shirley Temple stuff and making us fun drinks. Thanks to Miss Voice for singing to us and entertaining us with your beautiful voice. We sat out on the balcony thing for a quite a while and chatted before we had cake and ice cream and gave the girls gifts.

Profile

Yay!!!!! I finally changed the picture on my profile. The last one was taken when small fry was 6 months old so it had been 7 months since I updated the picture. Yippee

Rural America

You know you live in rural america when you stop several times for animals in the road and have to dodge the dead ones that haven't been scooped up or carried off by other critters. This morning's adventure to work included about 4 dead animals in the road. I also had to slow and get in the opposite lane for 5 geese that were out and about. Just a few miles later, there was a young deer crossing the road too. I love the scenery here. It's gorgeous. And lately the weather has been great too. Low 80's for a high and the humidity isn't too bad either.

Last night we joined Ms. Maxine for supper. She's an elder lady in our church and adores children. My folks and grandma went too. Hubby and I met at my folks house after work, put small fry in the stroller and walked to Ms. Maxine's. She's such a sweet lady. We had a great meal and then played in the floor. Small fry didn't have his afternoon nap and was quite the cry baby if he wasn't being entertained. He also threw a fit at the table. He wanted bread and I wanted him to eat his vegies first. It was tempting to give him bread to keep him quiet but I didn't want him to win. So, we dealt with the fit until eventually Ms. M went and picked him up and innocently made things better by feeding him the crescent roll he wanted. SHe was so cute that I couldn't tell her no.

Tonight we have no plans. Well kinda. I'm headed into town after work for the city wide garage sale and hope to pick up some things for the kiddo. But other than that, we're home tonight. It will be the first night all week. I think we ate supper on Monday night at home but I was feeling like crap and had gotten home late. So, tonight I'm hoping to get the kitchen clean, laundry started and the folded stuff put away. I have lots to do around the house. TGIF!!!!

Am I old?

Thanks to Ashley for reminding me about being so young yet being considered "old". I think of that occasionally now that I'm doing grown up things - a career, married, mother. We often spend time with the high school and college age kids associated with the contemporary service at our church. And multiple times, we've been asked to be the adult chaperones for hanging out afterwards. More recently, this past school year, we've hung out with Lil-R at our house, invited her to our small group, etc. She' s been a great addition to our family life. One particular small group night, she brought her "boy" with her. Now let me just say that our small group is young adults, all done with the college age scene. So, here's L and her boy who's still in high school. I'm sure he left there thinking that we were a bunch of old farts. Seriously, do you remember when you were 18 and around people who were in their mid 20's to 30ish? Did you think they were old? Friends, if you're feeling old, just think of your grandma and that should help you feel young again (but to be honest, I think we're getting "old")

Family Pictures

One Year Pictures

I am alive and updating today...

[Orlando, Florida]
I just spent 4 days at a training conference in beautiful Orlando. Only I didn’t see much of the beauty. I arrived on Sunday night at midnight but saw awesome landscapes on a few of the hotel properties while heading to the hotel. During the 4 days of training I went outside twice. Once was for a tour of a beef cattle farm. I was surprised to know that there are cattleman in Florida. The second time I went outside was a brief but good visit with Cori.

[Hanging out with Cori]
Spending time with Cori is always a blessing because she’s a good friend, makes me laugh, she knows me, she accepts me and because I don’t get to see her very often. We both work for the same government agency and she was at the same training conference. We were actually in different training sessions but had the same breaks, lunches, etc. On Thursday afternoon we were both done a little early and met downstairs to go lay by the pool. Our plans were thwarted when the pool area was closed because of lightning and T-storm warnings. So, we sat outside and chatted until it was time to get ready for the banquet. We hung out at other times too – some of those times requiring us to be adults and not college buddies but it was fun either way. I was just thankful to hang out with a buddy while someone else picked up the tab.

[training more]
Because the training sessions were organized by the Hispanic Organization, there were other activities scheduled beyond the training. Monday night was the annual business meeting. Tuesday was the scholarship auction. Wednesday night was a retirement party for one of the guys. Thursday night was the banquet. Each of these nights have fun stories but for sake of time and length, I’ll share two brief stories: one fun moment was as the scholarship auction had just ended. One of the girls thought that rum was wine and was quite surprised when she gulped down the shot of rum. Another moment was at the banquet. Because I gave the invocation, I was asked to sit at the head table. Only I didn’t want to sit there, I wanted to sit with my friends. Sitting at the head table made me feel like everyone was watching me. I like being the center of attention but only when I’m being funny, not the rest of the times.

[Flight drama]
I opted for crappy flight times for two reasons: to save the government money and to get more time with my family. I flew out on Sunday afternoon and arrived at my hotel in Orlando at midnight. Heading home, I took a 720 flight, which meant that I had to leave the hotel at 445am. A bit early but I wanted to get home to my family. Unfortunately, things didn’t work out so easily. My flight to Chicago was good. My flight to Cedar Rapids went downhill in a hurry. Due to thunderstorms and tornado watches the night before, Chicago O’harre had been closed down and flights were all backed up and delayed. My flight to CR was delayed while we waited on a stewardess to arrive from another flight. Two hours later we boarded the plane only to sit at the gate for 30 minutes while they found a mechanical problem and eventually cancelled our flight. We were placed on stand by. Fortunately the employee at the gate informed us that we’d never get on a flight since everything was backed up and a million others were already on stand by status. I suggested getting a rental car and driving. A man in line suggested we hurry since it was a Friday and traffic would be a problem soon and it would also be difficult to get a car. After calling all companies and waiting for a shuttle, we ended up at Budget waiting in line for a car.

[CR, here I come]
I ended up in the car with two kick boxers who were headed to CR for the international KB finals. I was a bit nervous to be with strangers but didn’t figure they bought airline tickets to dinky CR to kill someone. So I figured that as long as I didn’t make them mad, I’d be safe! After being stuck in traffic for an hour, we finally got off the toll road and were headed home. There was still traffic but at least we were moving! Teri drove 85-95 the whole way since she had to weigh in by 6pm. I was starving and had only had a few hand fulls of cereal but wouldn’t ask them to stop since we were likely to be late anyway. We pulled into the kick boxing location at 645pm.

[Getting home from CR]
Ryan had to head back home. He had several surgeries to do and was on call Friday night so he took the kiddo and headed back home when my flight got cancelled. In the time I was driving, Ryan worked out the details for me to get a ride home. Joel (one of the young adults that grew up in my church) lives in CR and was considering coming home for the weekend. He waited around after work, picked me up at the hotel and gave me a ride home. Joel was one of my new BEST friends that day. I got home a little behind schedule – at 9pm vs. 130pm. I’m just glad I didn’t have to stay in Chicago over night!

[home again]
So I got home and my family was glad to see me which I expected. But, my poor kiddo must be scared that I’ll leave again. He won’t let me out of his sight. Even today, 5 days after being home, he’s still clingy! Anyway, today I feel yucky again. Mom called me this morning to tell me that my kiddo was puking up massive chunks. I’m afraid we have a touch of the flu at our house. Yipee!