Home again

These last two weeks have been insane. Colorado feels like it was a month ago. Oklahoma is a distant memory. Crossover taxed my body and my brain.

But, now I'm home. Sitting in my own bed with my husband passed out beside me.

Colorado was an exhausting delight, except for the rafting trip.
Falls Creek was an exhausting delight, except for the wi-fi being at the bottom of the hill (and not free) and the cell service being at the top of the hill. Made it hard to get business done.
Crossover was an exhausting delight, except for a few things that will not be named. I do want to say that Daphne and Kathy once again rocked hospitality and merch.

I feel completely out of the loop on so many things.
I've got to get back in my zone.
I've got to get all the weight I packed on off again.
Daphne made a spinach lasagna that was so good I almost cried.

I did get to share my convictions about slavery and Wal-Mart and Nestle and Mars with a few people and that felt good. Helped me feel I was in my real world.

Think its time to crash. I figured out that I've been driving or riding in a car for a total of 50 hours these past two weeks.

But I didn't sign up for that!

So, for those that don't know, I'm in Colorado with the 2010 Seniors of LCA. They asked me to come with them. I think it's so they can make fun of me when I'm shivering to death on the side of a mountain above 10,000 feet. Maybe they just hate me. I'm not sure yet.

Tonight we found out that we have to be on the road by 6:50 AM. We were on the road this morning at 6:30 AM! I think they might just hate me.

AND we found out tonight some of the rapids we're doing tomorrow will be Level 5 with the water at 34F. Yeah, they must hate me.

Oh, we will be on the river for 6 HOURS! SIX HOURS! In 34F water. It is definite. They hate me.

The other female sponsor and I looked at each other and said we were sure we did NOT sign a waiver that said anything about Level 5 rapids and 6 hours of ice cold melted snow.

Even the guy sponsors were looking a little green around the gills. In fact, I'm pretty sure Chrasta's eyes just about popped out of his head a couple of times.

So, think about me tomorrow as I'm freezing and bouncing and holding on for dear life.

And then think about me while I'm up on a mountain at timberline freezing in my little tent due to the fact that a bunch of punk kids hate me.

Supposedly I will get to come back down the mountain to warmer weather Wednesday evening if that bunch of punk kids who hate me will shove my aching body into the van.

My cousin is having a party!

My cousin, Lezlee, is having a party over at her blog. She does a great job repurposing stuff into beautiful useful stuff. And she's asked others to show their stuff.

Okay, that's enough stuff.

So, the following are a few things that we've repurposed around here.

When my oldest was moving into a dorm room, we took cork trivets and turned them into tiny bulletin boards. Then she took another set and turned them into art.






















































Then, there's the cat I made awhile back. I like my cat a lot. It is the only kind of cat I can have. My husband and two of my kids are allergic to cats and my dogs would probably have heart attacks if a cat entered the scene.




Can you tell it's made with all found objects? That's a pop top thingy from a can for the mouth. The whiskers might be telephone wires. The Blue Jay feather is from our yard. The Texas rabies tag came from one of the dogs. A copper pipe forms the tail that is attached to an old Mexican vanilla bottle. I found a broken beer bottle in the park which became ears for the muchly abused baseball.

Prior to this I didn't know...

I stumbled across this amazing blog called Prior. It is soooo cool. And what really freaked me out was it is my cousin's blog. I didn't even know she had a blog! I love it! Her work is beautiful. I knew I was out of the loop on a lot of stuff, but apparently I didn't even know there was a loop. So, if you love really creative, fun, unique, one of a kind type of decorating, you will really like Lezlee's site.

15 in 14 for 8

Today I was glancing through USA Weekend. Yeah, I know, it's Wednesday. Anyway, the headline about the Mayo Clinic diet book caught my eye. Apparently, if you follow the plan you will lose 8 pounds in the first two weeks.

What you need to do in the two weeks is:

1. Add five healthy habits.
2. Break five unhealthy habits.
3. Adopt five bonus habits.

I'm not great at math. I'm not even good at math, but I'm pretty sure that comes to 15 things I would need to remember to lose 8 pounds. Wow! I have trouble remembering one thing, like don't eat fat stuff that tastes wonderful. I'm pretty sure I would have a lot of trouble keeping up with 15 things in 14 days.

It's all good stuff. It just made me laugh.

Conversations with Clay

"Happy Holidays" from the old movie, Holiday Inn, came on when we were in Subway.

Clay starts grumbling about having to listen to it, because it reminds him of when I used to force him to listen to John Travolta.

I stare at him like he's grown another head.

Me: What are you talking about?!
Clay: You used to play John Travolta over and over.
Me: WHAT? I can't even tell you the name of one single John Travolta song.
Clay: We're listening to one right now!
Me: That's Bing Crosby.
Clay: No it's not. It's John Travolta!
Me: The guy who played the mom in Hair Spray?
Clay: Oh...no, not him.

He meant Frank Sinatra. We then had an argument about if it was Bing Crosby or Frank Sinatra singing "Happy Holidays."

How Rumors Get Started

Corinn: I think we should get rid of the dogs.
Me: We can give them to Micah. He likes dogs.
Clay: Micah eats dogs?!
Corinn: Yeah, they're his favorite.

Wandering In The Wide Blue Yonder

So I find myself in the Atlanta airport waiting for a flight to Philadelphia. It is extremely dreary. When the planes take off they immediately disappear in the clouds. Just sucks them up. There were over twenty planes lined up waiting to take off. I'm glad The City of Brotherly Love is my last stop as long as flying goes. I don't have to worry about catching a connecting flight, just a shuttle to my hotel and I'm not too worried about that.

The flight here was wonderful. Smooth all the way. I had the row all to myself and I took full advantage of it. I even slept. That's something I rarely do on planes. I can never get comfortable enough. I doubt this next leg will be as empty. Oh well, one out of two isn't bad. I'm hoping there is room for my carry-on. I'm in the last boarding zone. We do have free wi-fi on the flight. YEA!

The flight isn't full! I have a row all to myself! Once again I am spread across all the seats. I'm usually on rides that have so many people we are sitting on top of each other.

It has been nice to have free wi-fi on the plane. I've been about to get some work done. And, this has nothing to do with wi-fi, but Delta also has Coke Zero! I did a little happy dance in my head.

People watching is my favorite thing to do in airports, but Atlanta was a little boring in that area. The strangest thing I saw was a really tall guy dressed in black western clothes, boots, hat and pulling a case painted to look like a holstein hide. Oh, and he had long brown hair. See, pretty tame on the weirdness scale. Maybe Philly will be different.

We've moved away from the clouds and the ground is getting closer. I'll pack it up for now.

P.S. Spell Check doesn't like the word "holstein".

Loved This!

Kristin, from This is Kristin had this on her blog. It made me smile! Thanks Kristin!

The Sometimes Annual Family Campout

I’m at the Sometimes Annual Family Campout in cool, breezy Tyler State Park. If any of you have been to Tyler State Park in June you know that I am full of it when I say cool and breezy. We are all sweating like crazy, but that's part of the fun. Along with swimming in the lake and the little kids getting as dirty as they possibly can. There was the time Phyllis’ grandkids found the delightful cold fire pit full of black ashes. Then after a rainstorm my niece and nephew discovered a hill of slimy red mud. This year it is a plastic wading pool full of sand. Poor Faith got her undies completely inundated.

When the sun goes down the young'uns become terrors with their flashlights. No one is safe from their beams. Today someone gave the toddlers a huge bottle of bubbles which kept Trace busy keeping refilling the dipping pan. Then tiny little water guns that had to be refilled after about ten shots appeared. No one was complaining about getting hit. It was that hot. No one complained either when the water balloons came out for a girls against guys fight.

This Sometimes Annual Family Campout usually includes 50 or so people. We don’t call it a reunion because most of the people here reside in the same town and see each other on an almost daily bases. But a few of us that live other places join in.

Then there are the people that aren’t really related by blood or marriage, but by love, sweat, and tears. It can get real confusing for a newcomer trying to figure out how we are all connected. Some of those “related by love, sweat, and tears” are more involved with the family than the blood ones.

One thing about this family is that we are all crazy as loons. There are some individuals that say they are crazy, but deep down they believe they are the sanes ones. Hah! Those are the craziest of the bunch. They’re also usually the ones that stay up all night playing 42. Or the ones that decide to swim across the lake and then spend the rest of the evening wishing they hadn't decided to swim across the lake.

The 42 game wrapped up early this year. Seems to be all the players are getting a little long in the tooth. Meaning, they're getting too old to pull all nighters. We did notice it is a lot quieter with them not playing the night through.

And I have to say that one of the members of this family is a big wimp. Trace brought three fans and a window unit air conditioner for his screened in cabin.

I'm a Great, Great Aunt!

I didn't even know I was a great aunt, but my 10 year old niece has announced that she is a grandmother. I know! It's a miracle!

Her horse, Buttercup, had a foal. No one knew she was expecting. Well, I guess Buttercup knew. She just didn't tell anyone.

Shelby is SO excited about being a grandmother. My mom won't admit to being a great, great grandmother. She doesn't like animals. She did buy one of my dogs a gourmet treat once. I think heat stroke or shopping fatigue or something like that was involved 'cause she really doesn't like animals.

But anyway, Buttercup is the proud mother of Buttermilk and has been lovingly sharing her new baby with Shelby. She doesn't mind Shelby's petting and playing with Buttermilk.

I didn't realize I was old enough to be a great, great aunt. My sister was shocked to find she was a great grandmother. But, we are all taking it in stride. Except for the great, great grandmother.

No pictures yet of Buttermilk, but I've been told she is a real beauty.

"Atentive" Listening

I took this picture in a local high school. Apparently attentiveness only applies to listening, not spelling.