as promised, pictures

 As promised, pictures :-)

 Fairy-like tea party I picked up in Disney World for a song.

 Found these very awesome flower pots and so bought some flowers to put in them. I realized the majority of my plants are edible and while nutritious and the foliage is nice, I kind of want some colors to break up the green.

 My tea party with Lavender!

 The big pots have 'bush beans' which are very stalk-y but don't have the tentacle whoojingles to climb anything so I know they aren't pole beans; and the big big pot has broccoli in it. It used to have beans but some critter at them :-(

 All together now! And finally, I loved this sign. Didn't buy it but may paint it on something in the near future ;-)

BEACH TIME!!!

My boyfriend totally needs to learn how to do this:

 Amber and I went to New Semerna beach today!!!

 I haven't been to the beach in about 10 years, so it was SOOO nice to be back!

 We got these glasses-straws at Graduation so decided to bring them and use them :-)

 Voila

 Ok here's me looking happy on the beach but rather blurry

 here's me in the water on the beach not blurry but with the sun in my eyes so squinting and messing up my poze and sticking out my tummy... lols but you get to see my way cool swimming suit :-)

 not happy at all... TOTALLY JAZZED!!!

Amber's way of enjoying the beach

Able to dream again!

 Yesterday we went to the Magic Kingdom. Amber's mom is paying for all of this as her graduation gift. Amber keeps looking at me saying, "Thank you so much for coming with me! This is so much more fun with you here!" and I keep telling her, 'you keep making it sound like I  am doing the favor to you! You've got it backwards! Thanks for bringing me along!!'

 We were ridiculous. We spent about an hour and a half just on Main Street looking at stuff and shops and the little hidden surprises Disney has hidden everywhere you look. And we kept looking at each other going, 'Hey! We're GRADUATED! We're ADULTS! We're in DISNEY UNSUPERVISED!!!' and reveling in the freedom, acting like little kids when we wanted and mature adults when we wanted and it was AWESOME. Speaking of little kids, there were plenty of those and we spent a good amount of time just watching them - trying very hard to do so in a non-creepy way of course ;-)
(can you see the ducklings in the picture below?)

 We found Graduation-hat-Mickey Ears. They were overpriced, of course, but we wore them ALL DAY LONG and random people would shout "CONGRATULATIONS!" at us so it was worth it. We are totally wearing them the rest of the week. We made friends with this little girl and her dad in Tomorrowland at the Monsters Inc laugh floor - which was actually very well done and funny. It was a stand-up comedy show. We made her smile while we waited in line by pretending that since she was dressed like Belle from Beauty and the Beast she really WAS Belle and her dad wasn't sure if he was the Beast, Gueston, or just her Bodyguard. So we had fun with that :-)

 We did Tomorrowland last, (my pictures are all out of order. Sorry) and did the Buzz-lightyear ride and I creamed Amber in the shooting competition. Then we went to Space Mountain. Its an indoor roller-coaster almost completely in the dark. I screamed the entire three minutes. I'm usually not a screamer or whatever on rides - I bottle everything in until I explode - but we got off and I turned to Amber and said, 'Man it felt good to just scream for three minutes.' She had screamed occasionally too but mostly just laughed at my squawking and howling. "Dude it feels good to be EXCITED and happy about something!" she retorted. Yeah ain't that the truth.

 Its funny because people will say, 'Wow! You are graduates! you are adults! Time to step into the real world, right?' and then we'll all laugh and say, 'Yeah thats why we came to DISNEY the week after Graduation!!!' But its been awesome. Going to rides I remember and seeing all the fun old characters I used to love and dream about from the Disney stories and remembering the old games my sister and cousin and I would play with our dolls etc. And remembering what it felt like to be carefree and happy and young again. I know Disney is the cesspool of materialism, but quite frankly its been a huge relief to just relax for a couple of days and get my dream-machine fixed up and re-tuned.

 Another funny story: yesterday we went to dinner at Disney Studios and one of the security guards asked if I was a character. I said know but I wouldn't mind being one and then there was this huge crack of thunder from one of Florida's obligatory daily rainstorms. The security guard laughed and said, 'that was God giving you your cue: GO work at Disney World!" We all laughed. I think I would LOVE working as a character for a summer. No plans to pick up an application or anything though ;-)

 Amber has been an amazing tour guide, pointing out 'hidden mickeys' and explaining the histories and back stories of certain rides etc. She keeps asking if she's boring me or ruining things for me and I'm like, 'are you crazy?! No! This is awesome!' My own private tour guide :-D

 The other thing that is so dang AWESOME is that I'M IN FLORIDA AGAIN!!! Grandma used to take me and my sister in the summer to her Condo for about a week per summer but I haven't been in about 10 years due to her focusing on younger cousins which is fine. But I didn't realize how much I missed it. Just the weather, the way the water tastes, the exotic wildlife EVERYWHERE (like we saw a cool lizard at the bus stop and the herons and ibises perching on all the outside vendors) and the way the air is just wet but in a unique humid sort of way. We are planning on going to the beach on Thursday if it doesn't rain us out. Shoot I don't care if it does rain, I haven't been to the beach in 10 years I want to go!!!

 The nice thing about going as an adult is that there is no one to tell you 'no' to things that make amazing memories but aren't technically worth it 1. financially or 2. nutritionally. Like Mickey Head Ice Cream. $3.50 worth of pure goodness, however its about the same amount of money as I usually spend on lunch. Not to worry, simply substitute the mouses head for lunch. You eat a huge breakfast with characters and a huge dinner in a 50's cafe and play play play in between stopping only for ice cream!

 Not sure that this will be our plan of attack every day but for our first day in Disney World it was totally an amazing idea ;-)

 This breakfast was awesome. The food was amazing and the characters did a great job. It was so fun to see the little kids and their reactions to the characters. The babies especially were fascinated and just could not figure out why these huge stuffed animals kept trying to kiss them and hold them and why mom and dad kept wanting their picture taken with them. The characters did enough to keep mom and dad satisfied but not freak the babies out. Then when they got to our table they would kiss our hands and dance with us while the picture was being taken :-) Our waitress was SUPER friendly and nice as well. Did I mention the food was amazing?

Thats all for now. :-)

Final stretch of Summer Break

Summer break is drawing to a close; a fact made all the more real as I begin pulling out textbooks to finish my Theology J-term and start moving books from last year to make way for incoming schoolbooks for this year. On the one hand, I'm excited to get back into a schedule, to know what my week will generally look like, (to be able to post on my blog regularly again lol), to be forced to inhale knowledge & be challenged by new idea's and developed philosophies and alternate explanations for things I had always taken for granted, etc. etc.
On the other hand, I'm not looking forward to getting back into a rote schedule of my nose to the grindstone, trying to find that balance between schoolwork, work work, and having a social life; of trying to find the balance between taking advantage of living in such a christian-saturated environment and resenting being in a God-bubble that gets claustrophobic sometimes; of being constantly reminded that I am different no matter where I go and my non-conformist tendencies throw people into a conundrum in every setting I am ever in - which sometimes endears but usually just throws people for a loop.
There's a fine balance between owning the fact that as Christians we are to be set apart, but not elitist. How exactly one accomplishes this balance is not something I've solved yet, and I really don't think anyone ever does.
But I digress. I was really getting stressed about starting my Senior year, as I still have yet to solve this problem of completing a 3-5 month internship. To further complicate matters, my car won't stay on, and I don't have the resources to fix it just yet. However, no car = can't do an internship stateside. However, to do the internship overseas, I would have to either take a semester off, or 'graduate' but not receive my diploma until next fall. I kinda want my diploma when I walk.
So I called my friend in a crisis the other night, and she did a good job listening to me and then said at the end of my rant, 'Sounds like you are trying to make God into an 8-ball."
"What?!"
"You are so concerned with what to DO. But I don't hear you relaxing in God's Truth. Calm down. Has God ever let you down before? Doesn't He always pull you through? The question isn't 'will God come through' but 'how much are you going to panic before He does.'
Conviction. Wham.
So the last few days have been me see-sawing between externalizing my anxt about what is to come, and being constantly reminded through friends, a womens retreat, and music to relax and wait on the Lord.
Which sounds wonderful, but is a lot tougher to actually DO. My boyfriend said humorously that one of his biggest challenges so far in our relationships is trying to get my brain to just STOP and relax for a while, as it is always going! Yeah...
Anyway. Its been a great break, although entirely different from the other two summer breaks. The first one I spent in Romania and last summer I worked at a Christian camp. This year I bee-bopped around the Country, helping here and there, visiting, working, but not staying in the same place for more than a week at a time. Glorious to be able to travel around like that, and I'm not sure I'll ever be able to do it again so I'm glad I did it when I could.

Anyhoo I'm sort of rambling right now. I'll close with the final quotes from my J-term last week. Enjoy :-)

To protect the identities of those involved, I will preface this story this way: Long ago in a galaxy far far away, I was an interim pastor…

And I wanted to say (something mouthy) but I had a brief moment of sanctification and I didn’t.

Any of you want to go into the ministry? Teach six-grade boys. Student: Does this apply to girls? Prof: YES, teach six grade girls! It will make you or break you!

This kid kept throwing fig newtons at whoever walked out of the bathroom, and I said, ‘Dave, if you throw another fig newton at someone, I’m going to stuff one up your nose.’ Kid threw another newton, I threw him on the bed and stuffed one up his nose.

This woman said she was going to pick up some stuff from my store, and I knew that her father was the spitting image of Henry Kissenger. So I had very LOW expectations. Well, I was pleasantly surprised. And I looked at her and said, you know, tomorrow’s my birthday. I just moved here, you’re from here. Do you know of anything fun? And she said, well that’s funny the next day is my birthday.’ Now, I’m not very good, but I can do something we that! So my now-wife and I celebrated our birthdays together...

We were meeting as a youth group at a YMCA pool because that’s the only place with baptismal facilities for the youth group. But I thought we were just meeting for youth group, and so I forgot to bring my baptismal robe. The only thing I had in the car was an oversized LedZephlin t-shirt…

If there’s ever a nuclear takeover, only two things will survive: Cockroaches and Baptist Communion wafers. And ultimately the Cockroaches won’t survive because they won’t eat the wafers.

If you look at the Catechism, Purgatory is a place of burning. Most Catholics don’t know that. They think its dark and shadowy… not someplace you want to be. Kind of like Detroit. And the idea is that you gonna be there a while. Bring a lunch.

If I said, ‘honey I’m on my way home.’ And it took me 2 weeks to get home, I’d come home and find my books out in the front yard. Because she knows that I love my books the most, after her. I love my grandkids too, but they don’t live with us. Of all the things in my house, I love my wife first and then my books. Student: More than your cowboy boots? Prof: oooh…. Okay it’d be my books AND my cowboy boots. I forgot about those.

Chapter 19 is the Second Coming of Christ. When you read this chapter, this is like the Battle before the gates of Mordor! Mount Doom is about to fall! Gandalf and Aragorn have lifted up their swords, only there’s only ONE sword here, and that’s the Sword of the Lord!

I have granted my wife the privilege of disagreeing with me on any 3 theological issues of her choosing at one time. They can rotate, but they can’t be more than 3. Its very kind of me, I know. I’m just a kind-hearted guy.

Busy busy summer

My apologies for being a horrible blogger and not posting in about a month. But I have some decent excuses, if you'd care to bear with me. :-)

First, my buddies Chris and Patrick came down the weekend before finals week. lol. That was fun.



Then a good friend of mine named Kyle and I with fear and trepidation decided to move our friendship 'to the next level' and now I have a boyfriend :-)


That Friday I flew to California with a friend's baby and stayed there for a few days to help out with the kiddo while the mom and dad drove out with all their worldly possessions.



I was supposed to be there to help, but they decided to play tour guides a little :-)


My good friends Stephanie and Andrew got married :-)



I drove to Tennessee with my dear friend Allison to get some stuff for mom (sorry, didn't take any pictures of that)

Kyle and his parents drove up for Memorial Day and we bummed around with my room mate and took pictures


I worked like a fiend interspersed between all this (yay paycheck yet minimum sleep/rest)


Kyle drove up and got me and I was able to get a tour of small-town Kentucky and meet his best friend that he grew up with and said friend's girlfriend.



Then this last Friday we had the wedding rehearsal for Chad and Olya's wedding, and it was quite the international affair, let me tell you. The bride was originally from Ukraine, and her parents who spoke NO English were there :-) The maid of honor was Ukrainian, another bridesmaid was Cameroonian, another was from Georgia and then there was me - your all-around USA-ian. ;-)

(In this picture, there is an American, a Romanian, Cameroonian, and a Korean)

Then on Saturday we had the actual wedding, and we were doing wedding stuff from 10 am to about 7 or 8 pm. *whew* Needless to say I was EXHAUSTED by the end of the day.


And then finally, today Kyle and his parents had a funeral to attend in Lousville, so I went with them. I ended up distracting Jonah, the grandson of the deceased, in the playroom off to the side of the viewing room, for half-to-most of the time we were there. The rambunctious four year old was tired of being in the same room, so after Kyle said hi to the kid I let him and his parents to the greeting and consoling and scurried off to a side room to play with four-year-old toys and chalkboards. :-)

Anyway. Thats why I haven't been posting. I've plenty to post ABOUT, just no time to do it. lol. So. I am going to go to bed before heading to work AGAIN tomorrow. :-) I hope you enjoyed the visual depiction of my summer so far.

real live missionaries ...?

See, I didn't consider this a mission trip at all. #1 I'm getting paid. #2 it's in the USA for crying out loud. #3, Missions is 101 ways you realize exactly how much you lack. Working as a camp counselor is one of my top ten ways to get my ego stroked. These kids have star struckedness all over their faces from the second we leaders walk in the room till the second we walk out.
However, the sunday school leader (yes the same one who needed steel-toed boots) confessed at one point in her lesson that she had asked for extra prayer. "I jest had chill-bubs (goosebumps)all over my arms when Pastor announced I'd have real live missionaries in class on Sunday. I mean, who am I to teach THEM anything?" She was referring to camp staff. We all looked at each other like, 'what?'
"Oh don't act so surprised. I mean several of ya'll are in SEMINARY, right?" Anna and I nodded, guilty of the charges, but still didn't see any need to be intimidated.

Out of a cabin of seven girls, ONE knew the story of Esther.
In my cabin of six, none knew the story of Ruth.
Most kids can't tell me the difference between the Old and New Testament. However one little boy explained it this way for me this morning:
"You know. The New Testament is in the Bible, and the Old Testament... is.. well... the other one."

When we tell the kids they must ALL participate or else in the games, at least a handful won't, just because they 'don't wanna.' We tell them their whole group will get punished and they shrug. Doesn't matter. They 'jest don't wanna.' My brain fills with long rants about how our culture has gone down the tubes into individualism and selfishness but I'll spare you at this moment.

So anyways, all that to say that while I still am getting paid and my ego stroked and don't get a stamp in my passport, I'm definately seeing huge needs here in the States. Not that I didn't before, but my brain is wrapping itself around the concept more and more. Kids don't know the difference between the Old and New TEstament. They just know there's "The Bible." HELP!

I still feel called overseas, but I also see huge needs here. So I'm praying about how God wants to use my passion for various cultures, gifts with languages, and skills in making things cross-culturally relevant alongside my burden for my own country.

One more day of camp here, then on Saturday four of us are going to run the 5K (3.1 mile) race with the town and Church. Hehe. Have never run in this kind of race before, although the pastor assures us that we can walk as well as run. Anna and I have been jogging and stretching every night since we signed up. The Pastor wants us to try and come in second place, however I hardly think three days of light jogging and stretching will do much to bring that goal into existance. :-)

~PrincessOuch~

Amongst the hillbillys

I'm not sure if I'm violating political correctness by having that as my post title. However, as the Sunday School leader announced, "I need steel-toed boots when I speak. I'm so busy steppin' all over my own toes, I'm sure I'm stompin' on ever-body elses." I chuckled a hearty Amen to that.
We spent last week in a small town located about five minutes from the Cumberland Gap National Park. Can't post pictures right now but hope to soon. It was GORGEOUS. Although one of my teammates who is originally from Oregon and I kept looking for Lundy Taylor, Fairlight and Miss Alice from the "Christy" book and movies. She (teammate) and I also wrote down "Southernisms"- words like "Chillbubs" (we say "Goosebumps") and cute little phrases one wouldn't hear spoken west of the Mississippi or on the other side of the Mason-Dixon line. My favorite was when a little boy was telling me a story about his red cowboy hat. Apparently a friend of his put his Bible on his head then the hat on top of the Bible. "And that thar hat popped off his head jes' like a chicken's does afore you stuck it in a pot pie." Gruesome, yet humorous. We did a three day 'camp' (glorified VBS) and then went exploring during our extended weekend. We saw Cumberland Gap, Cumberland Falls, and I was able to make a quick two hour visit to my Grandpa and his wife Corrine in Knoxville on Saturday evening. The visit was really nice and ended in several invitations for me to return and go hiking in the Smoky Mountain National Park, which was visible from their kitchen window on clear days. My room mate and I discovered that we have no plans for fall break besides work, and as she's from India, I think it a very important cross-cultural necessity that she come hiking with me. :-) Can't wait for October :-)
We are currently staying at a disaster relief center whilst putting on a five-day 'camp' in a more flat area of Kentucky. It is still beautiful, although the way our previous hosts described it I was sort of prepared to enter desert-land. The hill-folk still sniff with some disdain at the 'flatlands' I guess. Anna (Oregon friend) and I have been trying with little success to eat healthy but brownies, homemade cookies, coffee, and noodles have been bombarding us every time we turn around. We had hot dogs two meals in a row yesterday. The potato salad at dinner seemed a healthy alternative. Don't get me wrong, I'm thankful for the food. However, Anna handed me a chunk of raw broccoli for breakfast and I ate it. LOL never thought I'd be doing that.
Well, must run.
Thanks so much for your prayers and supportive notes etc! Our Internet accessability is slightly greater here, so I MIGHT be able to post more often. But don't hold your breath. :-)
In Christ,
Princess Ouch.

brief update

Well, once again I must hurry with the update. My apologies. One day I shall return to the blogging world.
In brief, the last three weeks have been amazing, exhausting, inspiring, depressing, energizing, and bewildering.
It shocked me how little so many of the campers knew about the Bible. Most didn't know what the difference between Old and New Testaments was, out of a cabin of seven only one girl knew the story of Esther, out of a cabin of six none knew the story of Ruth. One girl asked what kind of mother would name her son Ruth. I said well, Ruth was a girl and then they became more interested.
The last camp of kids was the most challenging but the most spiritually rewarding. A girl came forward on the last day when I caught her eye and told me she wanted to receive Christ as her Savior but didn't know how. She started crying when she told me she knew she was doing bad things that made God sad. So we prayed together and I asked her if she recognized she was a sinner, there was no other way to be saved except for Christ, and if she wanted to ask Jesus to be King of her life. She said yes, and I told her once she became a Christian her life wasn't her own anymore; it belonged to Jesus. She was a soldier waiting for orders from now on. She nodded and I told her to go ahead and tell God everything she just told me. After she prayed I said "Guess what! Now we're sisters. Did you know that?" Her eyes lit up and she shook her head. "How?" she asked, her tears drying. "Because once you become a Christian you join the family of Jesus, and I'm part of that family. So we're sisters!"
After the service she ran around asking people if they were saved and then joyously proclaimed, "Then we're sisters!" or "So we're brother and sister!"
It was really cool because one of the leaders had led FOUR girls to Christ the first week, and I had prayed, "Lord, I've never led anyone to You. I don't need to if that's not what You have for me, but I'd really like to if that's Your will while I'm here." And the last week my prayer was answered. Yay!!!
Tomorrow we hit the road as a team traveling to various Southern Baptist Churches in Kentucky who have requested that we run day camps for their kids. I've been told these are a breeze compared to the campground camps.
I should have more regular internet access. Hope so.
Happy Independence Day, by the way!!! celebrated by going to church, drinking tea with my Indian friends, exercising in my apartment, then my good friend picked me up and we watched x-men 2 and Hogan's Heroes whilst drinking milk and eating fresh brownies. She is knitting socks and I'm working on a cross stitch. Yeah, we're nerds. :-)

~Princess Ouch~

apologies

to my faithful few adoring fans: I am in the left side of the middle of nowhere braving saber-tooth horseflies and guiding little people through the dangers of a camp with 'no running' policies and air conditionings that are apparently set too high (oh the woes of camp in the modern age).

I promise I will one day return to the blogging world, however today is not that day.

But please keep me and my team in your prayers. We have had several high ups and low downs, including girls getting saved and staff members suffering sudden painful injuries (myself not included so far, praise the Lord).

Updates and pictures to come, I hope. :-)

~Princess Ouch~

The bird

(above picture is not the bird in the following story)

I like birds. Always have. My grandpa used to raise canaries to sell at pet-stores, and my great-aunt had two cockteils that she used to let me carry around on my shoulder and play with the few times we were able to make it to her home in Wisconsin to visit.
So I know a little about birds, but not a lot.
Last week going back to my apartment I saw a bird in the grass along the sidewalk. It was a little odd because usually birds hop away when that close to humans. Being in a bad mood, I made sudden movements, seeing how much guts the bird really had and if it would fly away. It didn't. Instead, it ruffled its feathers and gave a very odd chirruping scream. Intrigued, I walked towards it. The thing ruffled its feathers even more and screamed faster. So I got down onto my haunches and apparently I wasn't as huge and terrifying because it quickly calmed down.
There was a large tree right above us and I saw some birds flying around in it like there was a nest, and upon closer inspection of the bird in the grass I noticed that while it was getting the smooth, glossy feathers of an adult, it still had the fluffy downy feathers of a chick.
I poked it with a seedy piece of grass and the bird nipped at it, trying to get at the seeds.
Got some water and oatmeal which the bird nibbled at and then sort of let it fall out of its mouth and I determined when it looked at me (with its head at an angle) through one eye that it liked oatmeal even less than I do.
For all intents and purposes, it seemed fine, it just wouldn't move. It did sort of hop away at one point, but not very far. So I tried scooping it up with a plastic lid I had brought back to feet the oatmeal on it and tossing it not very high into the air. The bird would flap but only enough to keep from falling, not really flying. It couldn't get a stable grip on the lid. I found a stick and amazingly the bird very cooperatively climbed onto it. I then stood up. Its legs started shaking a little and I let it catch its balance. It started squawking again as if to say, "This is a very bad idea!" I slowly started moving around in a wide circle to create a sort of wind, which had the desired effect: Bird started flapping, fell off the stick, and landed gracefully back on the grass, and let out a rebellious chirping scream. Back onto the stick it went and again we started spinning. This time the bird seemed to understand what the point was and after it started flapping it let go of the stick, tucked its legs under, and flew away into the trees.
A few minutes later I heard a bird flying around give a call very much like the chirruping scream the bird had given on the ground.
I turned around and saw a Seminary Wife staring at me. I did look a little odd: stick in hand, oatmeal box on the ground, water bottle a little far away, staring at a bunch of birds. I smiled and waved, she nodded a greeting back and went on her way.

I suppose I should have done the normal thing and left the bird alone or called animal control. But the lawnmowers have been out in full force, and I didn't want the thing to get run over. And I didn't know Animal Control's phone number, and besides where's the fun in that?

But mostly I think I identified with that bird a little too much. Trying to learn how to fly but for whatever reason have become grounded, and not really sure how to jump back up into the air and start flying again. But God had brought people who have poked and prodded and tossed me up into the air. While I certainly don't feel at all like I'm flying again, I don't feel left alone terrified in the grass anymore waiting for a lawnmower to run over me or a cat to come nab me.

The trouble is I have flown before and I love it, but recently I feel as though I've made some running jumps and become airborne for a few moments, but ultimately end up back on the ground. Plenty of people have reassured me that I will fly again, which I know and have known and have never doubted for a moment through this last year. It hasn't been the future at all that I'm worried about. Quite the contrary; I'm excited about it. Its the present that I'm frustrated with.

~Princess Ouch~

Back home

Well, I am back home with the family. It's been nice but I'll admit I was hit with 'culture shock' yesterday and Mom, Dad and I ended up staying up LATE last night talking. It was good, but we're all pretty bushed today. :-)

So anyway, since my higher brain functioning abilities are at a low right now, I thought I would see if the computer would act counter-cultural to it's species and cooperate with me to post a bunch of pictures. Not sure that it will, as it's taking FOREVER to upload pictures onto here AND facebook, but I was having that problem back in Sinus Valley too, so... maybe it's blogger and Facebook, not me. Hehehe.

In the pool at the hotel on our way back from the eastern midwest to the WEST midwest. Sorry it's so blurred. :-) Me with tweedle Dee and tweedle Dum. Or Flower and Cub as Mom calls them on her blog. :-D

Cub and Flower looking out the window so it appears. But in actuality, they are trying to determine if they should leap into the door between the worlds and go visit Aslan and Narnia while no one is looking. ;-) Or at least thats how I think this picture looks. ;-)

This is me and Flower attempting to be tough and G. I. Joe-ish. Not sure we quite attained our goal of looking lean and mean. :-)

Da boys doing a better job looking military-ish with the picture of the "real army man" from WWI or something. Can you tell they are all related (not the cardboard guy, the real dudes) ?

Flower and I trying on plastic army hats. Not sure they are quite the right style. Whadaya think, should we try these at the Kentucky Derby next year?




Cub playing soldier on the mock-cannons on the river-side. He REALLY got into it.

This is how I play soldier on the cannons. Hehehe. More on the melodramatic, Celtic-warrior-maiden side, less on the G.I. Joe side. :-D

Fashion and cannon-balls. A winning combination, no?

"Viking Man" Dad and his dear 'lil brother, with MY little brother in the background, DETERMINED to be a part of this photo. :-D

Cub and Flower looking cute as they check the dams out along the river.

Just playing. :-)

A wittle bit sweepy maybe?

Miss Elizabeth eating a banana on the way home from Church. Yeah I'm gonna be in trouble for putting this online, but isn't that what older sisters are for? To cause consternation, irritation, built character and funny picture posts to appear on blogs? :-D

The countryside, on the way home from Church.

See, he was all bragadocious that he is FINALLY taller than me. However, Feche boy did not realize that with great gain comes great responsibility. Thus, it is now his duty, honor and priviledge to not only be my lacky but horsey whenever I get lazy and want/need a ride. We have determined that it will do him good rather than harm, as well as benifit my picture collection, to have him carry me everywhere. J/k, but I had fun jumping on him and having him carry me around. ;-)

Love you Bro!

Self Portrait. :-)