Boldly go(*)

Posted on May 11, 2009 by Suzanne

Stuff sitting on the coffeetable:

Books being read by the boys (Journey to Cubeville (yes, a Dilbert book…) and a book by Andrew Clements (Lost and Found)
Inkheart, which I read and enjoyed and need to return to the library
Two notes from school, one of which is from the band teacher: it’s time to start picking out band instruments. Additionally, this is the most well-written letter we’ve ever gotten from one of their teachers, with no typos and excellent grammar. I find it sad that the band teacher is the one that writes the best letter. In fact, I find it sad that the letters we’ve gotten have been so bad that a good one is actually remarkable.
A pile of replacement yo-yo strings.
The $5 one of the boys earned this weekend picking up rocks in the fields.
A monster truck.
A pack of colored pencils.
A trick wallet.
A tennis ball that Katie got for Christmas. She’s not much for balls, though, she prefers the stuffed creature that she pulls apart, spilling their fluffy guts allover the place.
The mother’s day card the boys signed, but which still needs to be given to it’s recipient (not me…), and the pen they used to sign the card.

Oh, and hey, there’s a quilt in that picture, too. The letters are just sitting on top, being contemplated.

Happy Monday!

Suzanne

(*)No, I did not get to see the movie this weekend, but I really, really wanted to.

Ouch

Posted on January 14, 2009 by Suzanne

For the millionth time my memory card and my camera are in two separate locations. And it has just dawned on me that the pictures that I THOUGHT I was taking earlier actually went off to la-la land because the memory card probably wasn’t in the camera at that point either. Duh.

I’m going to blame it on my newest head injury. NEver mind the fact that the head injury was this evening adn all of the camera nonsense occurred earlier in the day.

I opened the microwave door, bent down to get out a potholder and then stood back up — in the meantime the microwave door and actually swung back partway and naturally my head connected with it. Almost instantly I could feel the muscles in my neck seize up, so I just stood there and cried for a minute. I might have said some bad words out loud, first.

Which is all by way of explaining why I’m going to just go crawl in bed and not come out again until April. Because it is FREAKING cold here in Iowa, and in bed I don’t think I can hurt myself.

Unless I fall out.

TTFN-

Suzanne

p.s. My Mom. She is dredging up even MORE pictures from the past. One of her holding me when I was about a year old, and then one of Mark and me the first Christmas we knew each other. Look at the glasses! What we were thinking!

Every single day

Posted on January 13, 2009 by Suzanne

ice crystals Every single day

I got caught up in a quilt yesterday, and didn’t spend much time at the computer. The fact that my two helpers were here using the computer kept me away as well. I’m not sure how much snow we got, but it was a fair amount, followed by that nasty, nasty wind. School was out early, and then delayed today.

And I’ve heard that another storm is on its way tonight. Yippee.

The ice crystals above are on the front windows of the shop. Isn’t it pretty? I don’t know if that’ll be today’s photo or not, but I imagine I’ll be doing some weather related photos this winter.

So what it is with the daily photos? And is she going to get through the whole year?

Two years ago, I tried, and only made it through day 50. I don’t even recollect why I quit. I’m not harboring any delusions that just because I’ve managed to get 12 days in this year, I’m magically going to make it through all 365, but I will say that I have different attitude about it this year.

I realized that EVERY DAY I get out of bed. I brush my teeth and take a shower and eat breakfast and check my e-mail and do a whole bunch of other things that I don’t even think about. EVERY. STINKING. DAY.

So I said to myself “Self. You are an idiot. If you can do all of THOSE thing EVERY DAY, why can’t you add in something else?”

Why does it have to be so hard to find a way to exercise every day, or to be creative every day, or to write down a note about what happened that day or to take at least one photograph every single day?

It doesn’t have to be rocket science. Pick the camera up, take a picture of something. I’ve been keeping up with Photoshopping the pictures every day, but I’m not going to insist on that of myself as the year goes on. Though, I won’t let myself get too far behind, or I know I will quit.

What am I going to take pictures of? Well, the boys (all 3) for starters. Myself, occasionally. The dog. I plan to pick a tree or something else in my yard to take monthly pictures of, to show the change in the seasons. Quilts on the bed, little stuff around the house maybe. I have some ideas for what I’ll do if I don’t manage to pick up the camera — I might even fake some pictures (i.e. take a picture of something that hasn’t changed from one day to the next, like the piles on my desk…). Sometimes it’ll be places or people or other random, inanimate objects (like quilts!).

I want all of this in hard copy, too, and I sort of think I know what I’ll be doing with them, but I’m still debating.

The idea of a photo a day for a year is the latest HOT thing in the scrapbooking world, and there are tons of people giving it a whirl. Lots of ideas and scrapbooking products being shared. Lots of photos on Flickr you could go look at. It can be really complicated or really simple.

I’ve got quilts calling my name, so I better go heed their call.

TTFN-

Suzanne

Back in the saddle again

Posted on January 5, 2009 by Suzanne

One Tall Guy back to work: check!

Two Short Guys back to school: check!

One Mom ready to get back to normal: check!

(What is normal, anyway??)

I was a bit worried by the ice yesterday, and some parts of the state are still icy enough that school is either delayed or closed, but not us! Back to the grind we go!

Any minute now I’m going to step away from the computer and go accomplish something.

First, though, I’m going to share this picture that my Mom found yesterday and scanned. She was looking for something else, but found some gems that she decided to share with me and my siblings.

mickeyears Back in the saddle again

I have no recollection of this, any guesses Mom as to the vintage of this one? I’d take a stab and say I’m somewhere around Will and Joe’s age (or younger?), but don’t remember what event this was.

This one is actually cute, you should see the doozies she uncovered of my siblings. LOL

Have a wonderful day!

Suzanne

Over the river and through the woods

Posted on January 2, 2009 by Suzanne

OK, so we didn’t go to Grandmother’s house, but I did go away — did you miss me?

I missed all of you, and I’m back now, and Wow! It’s 2009! How did that happen?

When last I posted, I was lamenting the fact that the boys weren’t going to get to go skiing. Well, turns out they did go skiing that day and had a marvelous time. And then Suzanne tried not to have a cow because they drove home in the dark and in the snow, and took about an hour longer than they should have.

Mark’s 25 year old ski boot cracked and he said he thought about calling me and saying “Guess what got broken?”

I told him that if he HAD made that phone call with that kind of question right off the bat, I might have had to kill him.

Our little mini-vacation took us norht (yes, it was colder there, but…we were inside so it was OK). We went to the Mall of America, shopped on the way up on Monday, spent Tuesday at the amusement park in the mall, then came home on Wednesday. We actually had a nice time (and I scored some pretty good stuff on SALE).

Joe discovered how much he really loves roller coasters, and Will discovered that one of the roller coasters wasn’t that bad and that it was really fun to make MOM go on it and sit across from her and watch her face (and listen to her scream). It’s kind of a weird coaster — you sit in a 4 person car that spins as it is hurtling along the track. No big dips, no loops (I do NOT do upside down…), and so Will thought it was OK.

One of the highlights of my day was meeting up with Mary for lunch. I had met her in person before, and when I knew we were going to make the trip, I e-mailed and asked her if she was available. I actually thought I was going to go downtown to meet her, but then our plans ended up changing, and she was willing to take the light rail out to the mall to meet me. It worked out nicely and we had a great time. She MADE me buy some stuff at the bead store. I didn’t even know there WAS a bead store.

penguin beads Over the river and through the woods

Over the river and through the woods

It’s too dark in here to get very good pictures, but I think you can see how (a) adorable the penguin beads are (they stand about 1/2 to 3/4 of an inch tall) and (b) how pretty the glass beads are. I might try to take better pictures tomorrow in the light.

Don’t know what I’m going to do with them, probably just look at them for awhile.

I was going to babble about some other stuff tonight, but then I got sidetracked looking for something in my browsing history and…it’s now midnight and I really ought to be in bed so…

I’ll babble more tomorrow!

Suzanne