You know it's bad when you forget the password...

Yep, I forgot the password to this blog because it's been so long since the last post. How bad is that?!? So to recap:


November:
-Ran the Turkey Trot in Dallas. 8 miles in about 1 hour 21 minutes, which is about 10 minute miles.

This is where I DIDN'T line up! I think I would have died if I ran that fast!

-Celebrated Thanksgiving with our friends the Brasfields. Once again they didn't disappoint with the most delicious turkey, gravy, stuffing, and everything. I'm usually a canned pumpkin fan...I know, I know. However I'll have to get the recipe from Celia because her made from scratch pumpkin pie was delicious! And I'm a changed woman!

December:

-Got a bad case of flu and strep, all at once! YUCK! (And as I type this I'm fighting off a sinus infection. If only the weather would not jump from 19 degrees to 70 degrees it would be fine!)

-Friends took me and my friend out to Sprinkles for the most delicious Chocolate Peppermint cupcake ever to celebrate our birthdays. Thanks guys!

(Ate cupcake too fast to take picture. Sorry!)

-Celebrated Christian's birthday. It was the big 3-0 but we didn't mention it...and he only got one candle on his cake.
I made this big banner for him. It says:

Yadhtrib Yppah!!!!
Christian asked if it was Hebrew....nope, you can laugh now! It's Happy Birthday except it's backwards! I set the alarm for about 3 o'clock in the morning to wake up and decorate for his Birthday to surprise him. I blew up balloons, hung up crepe paper, and made a banner. I was a little tired!
Try printing out a banner, then fighting off the cats who just wanted to walk away with the string that you're attaching the letters to. I stapled every letter to the string so the spacing would stay put....as soon as I finished I realized that I had laid it out backwards. I was too tired by this time to fix it and I figured Christian would get more of a kick out of it anyway if it was like this....so now you get a laugh too!

He had yummy banana crepes with cinnamon cream sauce for his Birthday breakfast! First time I've made crepes since French class in high school and they turned out really well!


-Went to the ICE exhibit at the Gaylord Texan. VERY cold...like 9 degrees F cold. But very fun! Here are some of our favorite ice sculptures:
This is before we went into the exhibit. Notice the penguin hat of mine Christian is wearing... His name is Mr. Tuxedo. I wear him for fun sometimes!
High five the penguin. He doesn't look too happy!
Ice ornaments. These things were huge. About twice my height!
This extremely large ice cupcake looks delicious!
Huge "gingerbread" ice house. That's Christian in the window to the right.
Me getting stuck in the ice slide. Not enough momentum I guess.
Christian NOT getting stuck in the ice slide.
Ice covered branch walkway....This was soooo pretty!
And our favorite, a life size nativity completely out of ice!
I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas!

Hopefully I'll post more soon, now that I know the password....and my only other excuse was that I hated resizing all the photos to post them. But I learned all about actions in Photoshop and now all my resizing is automated, so I have no excuse now!

Erin

Cake Wrecks

Ok, I know I've mentioned this website before...Cake Wrecks, but in case you don't check it often, they had a great post here today. So go check it out!

Halloween Roundup

Here's the scary monster cupcakes that we made for Christian to take to work. I think they turned out a little more cute than scary... He added all the antennae.

Then we went to a Halloween party with a little mix-up. We had to bring costumes, but then we drew names, and someone else had to wear our costumes. The stick figures below are the costumes we brought, and in the front of the picture you can see Christian and I. We were Japanese tourists at Disneyland. (See the Mickey ears?)
Thanks John and Diane! We had lots of fun!

Seriously, I'm a blog slacker!

Ok, so my dad sent this to me today and I really liked it:


Weekend Recap:
Saturday morning: Helped with Make a Difference Day. Oversaw 30+ people and made 2000+ cards for Meals on Wheels and other organizations. That was a lot of fun! It was held at the Stake Center but is for the entire city/community. I have to say that I was a little disappointed that out of the 100+ people there, there were only about 10 from the stake. Everyone else was from other organizations outside the church...anyway...

Sunday morning: Primary Program-went well overall! Made a mental note next year to figure out before hand what size stool each class needs to stand on so that the older kids don't have to stand around the stool because it was too high, and to make sure the younger kids don't get the shorter stool when they needed the tallest. All you could see was there hair. Sorry parents! I tried my best!

Erin

Have you seen it yet?

Can't wait!!!

Two posts in one month?!?

Haha, so I'm already doing better than last month when I had a grand total of 1 post! Thanks Laura for handing out the Brillante Weblog-Premio 2008 Award to me.
Here are the rules: I have to answer the following questions with one word answers and one word only! Then I must pass it on to seven others.

Here are the questions:

1. Where is your cell phone? found
2. Where is your significant other? heart
3. Your hair color? brown
4. Your mother? creative
5. Your father? germany
6. Your favorite thing? crafts
7. Your dream last night? ?
8. Your dream/goal? entrepreneur
9. The room you're in? office
10. Your hobby? designing
11. Your fear? aliens
12. Where do you want to be in 6 years? europe
13. Where were you last night? celia's
14. What you're not? clutter-free
15. One of your wish-list items? traveling
16. Where you grew up? kentucky
17. The last thing you did? eat
18. What are you wearing? stripes
19. Your TV? old
20. Your pet? friendly
21. Your computer? cute
22. Your mood? happy
23. Missing someone? nope
24. Your car? accord
25. Something you're not wearing? watch
26. Favorite store? (seriously!! One word!!) um... schlosserdesignshobbylobbyjoannsmichaelsanntayloranycraftstoretargethalfpricebooks
27. Your summer? hot
28. Love someone? sure
29. Your favorite color? white (it has ALL the colors!)
30. When is the last time you laughed? today
31. Last time you cried? cat-funeral

OK, so if you want the award, it's yours!

Erin

All a matter of perspective...

Lately at work it's been crazy! So crazy in fact that I had very harsh words with a co-worker today... (It's ok, it was justified. And if you know me, you know it takes a very LARGE amount of anything to make me mad. I pretty much NEVER get mad...) So I've been in my own little funk of life....you know, the I don't like my job, and why am I spending 2 1/2 hours everyday driving to and from my job... Today put everything in perspective. I am SOOO thankful for everything I have!

My good friend and co-worker was diagnosed with breast cancer about 3 weeks ago. She took it very well and was actually looking forward to a breast reduction. Then the rest of her testing came back... the cancer had spread to the lymph nodes. That moved the cancer from Stage 1 to Stage 3 in a matter of a week and a half. Once the cancer moves into the lymph nodes it can spread a lot easier because it's now in the blood stream. Yesterday she got some more test results back, and they are pretty sure that the cancer has spread to her liver. That moves the cancer to Stage 4. There is NO Stage 5 cancer! I just feel awful. She just got divorced a few months ago and shares custody of her 4 year old daughter with her ex-husband... Then on top of everything this happens. I feel so helpless, like there's nothing I can do.

Anyway, sorry for such a sad post, I just felt like I needed to get that out! I'm so thankful for the perspective of the gospel! I am super thankful for the healthy body I have, even when it aches after I go running! I promise I'll try to post more, I just feel like our little family is pretty boring right now!

Erin

Sprouts in McKinney!?!

Ok, ever since my friend Emily introduced me to the grocery store/farmer's market Sprouts I've been in love. They have awesome produce and great prices, especially their sales. Unfortunately, the only one is in Frisco, which isn't too far away, but since I hardly ever go there it's kind of out of the way. So imagine my delight when I saw a teensy, and I mean teensy, sign on the Northeast corner of Hardin and Virginia in McKinney. I even had to ask Christian if that was actually their logo. He confirmed that it was. So, to double check, I went to their website and found this! (Click on News and Announcements, then Coming soon.) Woo hoo!!!

Another Linky Link:

This is a website that I've watched for a while, it's kind of like Flickr, but for food. AND, when you click on the image, it takes you to the recipe! You'll be SUPER hungry when you're done visiting Tastespotting because all the images are mouthwatering and delicious looking! Tonight I found a recipe for Carrot Cake Cookie Sandwiches, Baked Apricots with Almond Paste, Vegetable Enchiladas, and tons of other yummy looking recipes!!! Have fun!

Coupon Mania

Ok, so people are going coupon crazy. For me, it takes too much time so unless it's a great coupon like FREE I don't even bother.... So I thought I'd share this one with you... Malt-O-Meal Cereal Bags (Smaller ones) are 10 for $10 at Kroger which makes them $1.00 a piece. I found a coupon for $1 off here. So go get yourself some free cereal! Christian and I will be there tomorrow getting ours!

Usually don't do this

...but you have to check out this link. This is one website that you'll have to go and read EVERY post. It's hilarious! Basically, the author has put together very funny commentary along with cakes that didn't turn out too well. Hence the blog name Cake Wrecks. So go there, check it out, and tell me how you like it. :) I hope you find it as hilarious as I did!

I'm here, in case you were wondering...

I am still here, and alive. I've just been super busy... I know, not a good excuse, but that's all I've got. I can't believe it's been the beginning of July since I posted!
Here's a little of what I've been up to:

Christian's Brother visited us for a week so we headed to Fort Worth with him. We visited the Kimball Art Museum. (It's free!) These were some of my favorites:

Then we visited the Amon Carter museum. (It's free too!) It has all American artists. I really liked the silhouette of this statue.
They also had lots of western art. Can you believe all that detail is cast into bronze? Amazing!
Then to top of our truly Texan day we headed to the:
We ate at a cute little outdoor place called the Love Shack. They had a great band playing and we ate hamburgers and hotdogs. They even had a vegetarian burger! After dinner we headed over to the stockyard building for a good old-fashioned rodeo! Yee-Haw! (It was in this building. I didn't realize it was going to be air-conditioned...it was FREEZING in there!)
I will have to say, it's not a PG event by any means! If you have young children, I recommend the Pawnee Bill's Wild West Show. It's earlier in the day, and doesn't involve cowboys getting stepped on, and horses getting mauled. Yep, my rodeo experience was truly one of a kind, because I probably won't be going to see one again, EVER! (Yes, the previously mentioned DID happen when we were there....it was awful!)

One of the first bulls out of the gate was extremely MAD! Even after the cowboy fell off he didn't want to get back in his pen. They have other cowboys in the ring to herd the very mad bulls back into their pens. This particular one did NOT want to go and was charging everyone. One of the herding cowboys didn't get out of the way in time and his horse got a huge bloody gash down the back of his leg. Our entire half of the stadium was just in shock and we all had our hands over our mouths... They took the horse away to treat it. I asked Christian if he thought the horse would be ok and he figured they had a vet in the back to help out in instances like the one we had witnessed. I figured he was right and continued watching the rodeo, though I still felt really bad! Of course, about 5 minutes later the emcee gets on the speaker and requests that any veterinarians in the audience, please come as they needed help. (Apparently they did NOT have one on hand. Isn't that awful!) I will say that my favorite event was the cowGIRL barrel racing. That was very non-violent and fun to watch!

Anyways, these are the only non-blurry pictures I got.

I especially liked this one because you can see all the guys getting up on the fence to get out of the way of the angry bull! They are much more brave than me. Well, maybe brave, or maybe they don't have a whole brain!
So ends our trip to the rodeo. (It was really long too! The rodeo started at 8 and didn't end until almost 11PM, then we had to drive back from Fort Worth. It made for a long day!)

Cake for me please!

(cake photo here. These are cakes done by a friend, Audrey Ross. They are gorgeous!!!)

Ok, so I FINALLY got all the results for my interior design licensing exam I took way back at the beginning of April! (Yep, it took that long for them to grade and compile the scores from the two day exam!) And...


I PASSED

I am super excited! I can't believe it!

The test I took is described here: NCIDQ (this stands for the National Council for Interior Design Qualification) It's not the easiest thing to pass. The pass rate if you take all three sections at the same time, which I did, is just under 50%. This test is similar to the bar exam for lawyers or the NCARB for architects.

Now, as soon as I get approval from the state of Texas, I can officially call myself an Interior Designer (without getting fined massive amounts of money!)

(Sorry for the large text, I usually think that it's a little much, but hopefully that conveys the sense of "jumping up and down, yelling "yes, yes, yes" because that's exactly what I was doing when I found out!)

Erin

As promised...

Christian and his new delicacy: Enchanted Broccoli Forests!

Close Up:

All in all it was pretty good. Basically a cheese and egg casserole with broccoli stuck on top. Then you drizzle lemon butter over the top of the broccoli. It was pretty good, especially the lemon butter!

This is a picture I snapped of the sunrise late last week. It was especially colorful. Of course the camera didn't do it justice. It was MUCH more vibrant than the picture... Enjoy!

Updated Favorite Places Links

Check out my favorite places links! I've updated them with some of my most favorite blogs and craft websites. (It got a LITTLE longer...)

Enchanted Broccoli Forests!

You're probably thinking as you read the title that I'm absolutely crazy. Well I'm not:

It's an actual recipe that Christian will be making in the next few days! Looks kind of cute, huh? (I'll post real live pictures when it's finished.)

A co-worker of Christian's lent this to us and I have to say it's pretty cute! I've got some more pretty funny images from the book I'll post shortly. It's a mostly vegetarian recipe book printed in 1982. (Get your own copy at half.com for $.75 before shipping! I just ordered our own copy!) Enjoy!

Don't use!!!

Palmolive Eco Dishwashing Detergent

This is what it looks like! I thought I'd give it a try and it left permanent white, filmy, nasty residue on lots of our glasses and most, if not all, of our plastic ware. I left a fairly nasty comment on the Colgate website (That's their parent company) They said they were sorry with what happened and said that they were mailing me something.... I waited and waited, hoping it was good...
Yesterday in the mail I got their reply which basically said:

We're sorry it left white stuff on your dishes, just wash them again without any detergent and some vinegar and they will be fine. (If I wanted to wash my dishes twice, use twice as much water and electricity this would be a fabulous idea, totally negating the fact that it was an ECO friendly product!) Also included in the letter was a $4.00 check, (I didn't pay this much to begin with.) and a bunch of $.50 and $.75 coupons to different items.

All in all: At least I didn't lose any money but it won't be finding it's way into my house again.

The winner is:

Thanks to the Random Generator:

"Here are your random numbers: 4

Timestamp: 2008-06-12 10:48:05 UTC"

Which means Jeni is the lucky winner! (Email me Jeni and let me know your favorite stamp set and I'll get that to you!)

Thanks for all your comments and concerns about my possible new blog! I've got some ideas that I want to incorporate into it, and I'm having major trouble coming up with a name, so, don't look for it, say, next week, but give me a few weeks to get it all settled down and then we should be good to go!
Thanks again everyone! Erin

New idea!

Ok, so I've been mulling this over for a while, and I'm thinking that I'm going to be starting a new blog without my name... (You're thinking I'm switching because of stalkers right!?!)

Well, I'm thinking of starting an interior design blog....one where people can submit pictures of rooms and I'll choose one a week to "make over" and give design tips...and post little mini design lessons. Does this sound interesting to anyone? Would there be other things that you'd be interested in? Let me know what you think! And for those who leave a comment I'll put you in the drawing for....

A New Stamp Set!!! Value of $12.50 and free shipping! (Also, if you'd like to join the mailing list while you are there that's great too! This will be my last post about my stamp sets on this blog, as I don't want to hound everyone with advertising anymore! My craft/stamp blog will have more information about my stamp stuff.)

Leave me a comment by Tuesday, June 10th 2008 to be entered!
Thanks!

I don't know why...

but I tend to go a week (or two) without posting... It's not that I'm not thinking about it because I find myself pretty much everyday saying to myself: "I should post that!" so here are a few of the things over the last week or so...



I went to Hobby Lobby the other day and was confused. They are putting out their Christmas stuff. (I thought maybe it was clearanced and they were still trying to get rid of it, nope, it's the new stuff.) So buy it up quick before everyone else does..... just kidding!

Any guesses as to what this lump in my sofa is?

That would be scaredy cat Percy. We finally had the roof redone this week from the hail storm in February, or maybe it was March, can't really remember for sure. Anyway, he totally hid under the blanket for the entire 7 hours they were here pounding on the roof!

Also, I had to borrow a can of mace from a co-worker of Christian's. I had a stalker at the bus stop. I even had to park somewhere else for a few days...fortunately I didn't actually have to use it!

I'm sure there's plenty more....just can't think of them right now, but when I do I'll be sure to let you know!

Ok, one more post today.

Don't forget to check out my craft blog: Schlosser Designs for previews of my new stamp line and a fun giveaway!

Check out this book!

I just got finished reading this book and I have to say that it's awesome!!!

The Boss of You: Everything A Woman Needs to Know to Start, Run, and Maintain Her Own Business


It's women writing about women owned businesses. It's essentially written with the fact that women start up and run businesses for different reasons than men. There's all kinds of great tips and resources and very witty writing on top of it! I borrowed mine from the library, but am liking it so much I'll be buying my own copy now. They have a blog too that I've been reading for a while: The Boss of You. So anyway, check it out!

I got tagged!

Ok, sorry Laura it took me so long to realize it! Here goes!

The Rules are....
1. The rules of the game are posted at the beginning.
2. Each player answers the questions about themselves.
3. At the end, the player tags 5 others and posts their names. Then goes to their blog and posts them a comment to let them know they've been tagged and asks them to read your blog to find out the details.

What I was doing 10 years ago....learning how to drive...

5 things on my to do list today.....which 5? the high priority 5 or the others?
Put together a window treatment invoice for my current interior design client, sketch the custom piece of furniture for my client that I'm getting built for her for my meeting tomorrow with the custom fabricator, finish product labels for my stamps, email those that responded about help with my other website to sell the stamps, dinner (maybe) Is this my typical to do list when I get home? Yep...it's pretty close.

If I were a billionaire I would.....pay off the house, invest, make MORE stamps :) build/run a non-profit crisis intervention center for children and their parents

3 bad habits.....Taking care of everything except for housekeeping. Making piles (just ask Christian!), crafting ADD (I have a billion projects to do, and not enought time to do them in!)

5 places I've lived.....Alabama, Tennessee, Kentucky, Utah, Michigan, Texas (That's in order from birth to current! Oops, that's 6.)

5 jobs I've had....Floral arranger, taught preschoolers computer lessons (yes they really can start using the computer when they are 3!), early morning custodian at BYU (hey, I got paid well!), secretary for an advisement office, interior designer

Now I've got to tag 5 others....Who wants to be tagged?

Un-Bummer!

Have I mentioned that I hate buying cars? All that haggling over prices, value of trade-in, etc... But it finally paid off! (Mostly thanks to Christian...he's a hard bargainer!) We became the proud new owners of a newish car today. It's a 2005 Honda Accord. We actually walked out on them twice before they called us Saturday afternoon and said that they would go down on the price of the car and actually offer us what our trade-in was worth. So...Happy Anniversary, Christmas, and Birthday to us!! (And christmas and our birthdays are still 6 months away!)

Outside of the car.
Inside of the car.

Bummer

We decided to get a car for our anniversary present so we found a car online that we loved and went to look at it this morning.... We called, to make sure that it hadn't sold. Usually I'd just go, but since the car was at a dealership West OF Fort Worth (notice that it was west of fort worth, not west fort worth) I just thought I'd make sure that it was still available before we drove all the way out there to pick it up. Well....We're, I'm serious, no exaggeration, 4 miles from the dealership and we get the ill-fated call...It sold. Yep. What luck! (we also had a few others to look at but they sold too...) I guess used Camry's are a hot market right now! So, we'll keep looking but I can't tell you how excited I am to:

1. roll down the driver's side window again
2. see number 1, and add "go through the drive thru"
3. not be embarrassed that our car is always smoking burnt oil because of the massive oil leak
3a. not having a huge, and I mean HUGE oil spot on our driveway. (when we get a new car the first thing I'm going to do is go buy the oil cleaner stuff for driveways and get rid of it!)
4. not worry about if the car will shift from neutral and actually go when I want it to. (this just started happening within the last week)
5. not have to open the trunk from the inside of the car every time. (when we bought the car they didn't have the key for the trunk that someone had changed the lock on, and we don't have the fancy key chain button that let's you pop the trunk)

I'm sure that I could come up with more...
So wish us luck that when we actually find a car, it's not sold right out from underneath us...

All for this...

I had to find the Title to our car tonight. (We're going car shopping tomorrow, yippee!!!) We need the title if we're going to trade it in. So I had to dig into the "To File" pile in order to find it. While I was digging in, I decided to sort out everything not needed since it's been 4 years since a good file clean out (YIKES!). The big pile in the upper left is at least 12" tall. The little cardboard box is what is being kept...(and the title). Everything else is off to the shredder!
It does feel better to get that taken care of though...it's been on my "To Do" list for at least a year!

I will admit...

I'm a fan of New Age music including Yanni, Enya, and other artists similar to them... It really helps me to concentrate when I need to... and helps me design better I think... But, I need your help! Does anyone know of some Newer New Age artists that I could check out? I'm getting a LITTLE tired of the same songs...and after a while all their songs kind of sound the same.... Thanks!

And the winner is...

I used the:
Random Integer Generator

And this is what it gave me:

Here are your random numbers:

1

Timestamp: 2008-04-27 22:26:22 UTC

Which means that comment number 1: ZIPPY is the winner! Yea! Let me know how you want me to get those to you!

(For those that didn't win this time, here's where I ordered them from: Troyer Farms . If you get together with a few people and buy the box of six bags, it's a pretty reasonable price.)
That was fun! I might have to do these more often! Thanks for playing!

And Christian is...

this was pretty true of him too....amazing!

You Are An INTJ

The Scientist You have a head for ideas - and you are good at improving systems. Logical and strategic, you prefer for everything in your life to be organized. You tend to be a bit skeptical. You're both critical of yourself and of others. Independent and stubborn, you tend to only befriend those who are a lot like you. In love, you are always striving to improve your relationship. You have strong ideas of what love should be like. At work, you excel in figuring out difficult tasks. People think of you as "the brain." You would make an excellent scientist, engineer, or programmer. How you see yourself: Reasonable, knowledgeable, and competent When other people don't get you, they see you as: Aloof, controlling, and insensitive

What's Your Personality Type?

Usually don't post these things...

...but it was very true... It even says I should be an interior designer....(I was beginning to wonder...)

You Are An ISFJ

The Nurturer You have a strong need to belong, and you very loyal. A good listener, you excel at helping others in practical ways. In your spare time, you enjoy engaging your senses through art, cooking, and music. You find it easy to be devoted to one person, who you do special things for. In love, you express your emotions through actions. Taking care of someone is how you love them. And you do it well! At work, you do well in a structured environment. You complete tasks well and on time. You would make a good interior designer, chef, or child psychologist. How you see yourself: Competent, dependable, and detail oriented When other people don't get you, they see you as: Boring, dominant, and stuck in a rut

What's Your Personality Type?

Yummy Giveaway!!!

What could I possibly do with all these unwrapped Hershey's Kisses and Hugs you ask?
When I place them on parchment paper and put one candy inside each pretzel circle...


Melt them in the oven at 225 degrees F for 7-10 minutes. (The hugs melt faster than the kisses.)
Add one little M&M on top and presto: Little chocolate filled pretzels.

So here's what I'm giving away...(sorry not the chocolate...I need LOTS of that right now!) I'm giving away a whole entire bag of the circle pretzels! (Unopened too!) Why the pretzels you ask? Because you can't find them anywhere! Trust me, I looked! I actually ordered these online and had them shipped to me, and since it was cheaper to buy in bulk I thought I'd share. One batch only uses about 1/3 of the bag.... so I'm going to give one whole bag to the winner! Leave me a comment and tell me what your absolute favorite candy is. I'll randomly choose from the comments. (And, if you live out of town...I'll even ship it to you free of charge!) Why? Because I like games, and free stuff, and giveaways! I will choose a winner Sunday evening April 27th! Good luck!
Oh, and my favorite candy has to be homemade fudge with plenty of walnuts in it!

I feel sick to my stomach...

You know how when you're so upset it makes you feel like you have the flu? That's how I feel right now. Yesterday at work they "let go" about 1/3 of the employees of the office I work for.... (not me thankfully) but still, I hate that all those people lost their jobs, and I hate how the company doesn't seem to be doing all that well financially. I was/am so upset that I couldn't sleep much last night and then I haven't felt like eating anything since then. (And on top of that they said not to come into the office until 11 today so they could restructure?!?) I was able to get a few things done around the house though. Anyways, sorry, just had to vent...

How quaint is this?

My dad and soon my mom and sister will be moving to the lovely town that has this in it. It's the post office.


It's in Illesheim, Germany. Population 4,ooo. I'm so excited for him and can't wait to visit! My mom and sister are staying in Utah for both of them to finish school and then will join him there. He will be training military personnel how to fly. (Did I get that right Dad?) How cool is that!?!

Why I USED to like Mini Coopers

I thought they were really cute! Until today... My co-worker has a mini cooper that we drove around in today while shopping for my other co-worker who is having a baby shower on Friday at work. We were unloading all her gifts (courtesy of the generous donations of my co-workers) from the back of her Mini cooper when I felt a large "sting" on my leg. I looked down to see my leg leaning up against the exhaust pipe of the car. It was sticking out like 3" past the bumper so of course I leaned against that instead of the bumper. (After the fact, I looked at other cars, and none of their exhaust pipes were sticking out past the bumper...) Man oh man it hurts! It still hurts and it's now 7 hours later... Sorry, I'd post a picture, but you really don't want to see it! It's got a huge blister now, so I guess it's officially a 2nd degree burn. It's a lovely 3" long, half moon shape directly on the side of my leg. Lovely...

Gardening

Well, I finally got my strawberry plants planted, all 50 of them! I sure hope they work! I'm so excited for fresh strawberries in my back yard! On another gardening note: Here is a little skit from Saturday Night Live about gardening! Enjoy!

Windy with Bugs!

Ok, so I was mowing the lawn the other night, Thursday I think, and it was really windy. Christian came to the backyard to ask me something about the weedeater. I stopped the lawn mower so I could hear what he was saying. As soon as I did, it felt like something was crawling/flying around inside my shirt. It was the front top part of my shirt if you get my drift. I proceeded to look down my shirt to find a moth stuck between...well, you get the idea. I then proceeded to do a little dance as I tried to get this moth out of my shirt. He got out safely, I think...but this story reminded me of some pictures my dad took at the Washington D.C. Temple after our marriage. It also involved wind and bugs.

It was insanely windy, as you can tell by the first picture:


Here my mom is trying to fix the train...obviously still windy!

Now my mom is laughing at me, because, sure enough, the wind blew a bug right down the front of my dress. Of course, my dad really starts clicking the camera now!

Yes, that's exactly what you think is going on!

Laughing at the incident.

The final picture, after wind and bugs!

Thought you'd enjoy the story! Has anyone else had this happen to them? This is at least 2 times for me now! (And did I mention that my Dad takes really good photos?)