Sunday, July 31, 2011

lovely, yummy, cozy memories.


take that for example. june 2. yummy.

quiet. cozy. i never got around to blogging those days of nannying sam and reese next door while anna [their regular nanny, lol] was away at . . . sarah and justin and eliyah's? getting ready for little zechariah's arrival.

bristly. contemplative.

sigh. textures. june 7.

cool. rainy. curling hair. sweets and folger's coffee. strangers. laughs. sister. no, i'm not posting the picture of me kissing the dr. pepper can with thor's picture on it. uh, no. hahahaha.
ladies of the family date. tiny town up north. one more coffee shop i'm in love with.
what they said.

three days old. warm. tiny. cozy. july 8.
july 12 sunset through a van window.
standing on the highway.

love this music.
the darlingest photo album EVER on flickr.
love the simpleness. the love. the....yeah. from this blog: jen hammer.
i'm grateful for all of the above.
and, even though brothers and everything else were not mentioned in this post, i'm quite thankful for them too.
that's the end for tonight.

Saturday, July 30, 2011

no title is good enough for this subject. :)

yoga pants: check. no, i did not do yoga today. they just happen to be the comfiest thing i own.
comfy grey tank: check.
tea: check.
crazy hair w/no mousse: check.
yay for one more outfit post on the net. ;) just. kidding. 
it's funny to do them once in a while, though. 
i've been gone from the blogging scene for two days.
i have a slight cold; mostly it's a stuffy nose. it developed sometime wednesday early morning.
on and off liveliness so i don't come off as a complete zombie to the family and whoever sees me --oh, wait, there's a family get together with dad's parents and grandma t's side of the family tonight . . . should be interesting.
anyways, about the cold: in the back of my mind, i can blame heather for sunday night --girl's night we had with her and steph-- she had a cold over the weekend from her younger siblings . . .
on the other hand, a very cute newspaper guy just walked by outside.
back on the other hand, late nights contribute to a general weakening of my system . . . shoot. :P

now here i am with a gorgeous day, sun shining.
anna gone on 3 meetings--one, a possible client due in december; one, a doula she's getting to know; one, a mom-friend of ours whose 3rd baby is about 3 or 4 months old.

it's 11:33am, and the tea water is boiling.
ginger peach it is, then.

so.
recap on my week?
er....last few days?
thursday morning: farmer's market. love that place. we also walked to caribou coffee--i got a large regular brew. dark roast. i swear caribou has the best regular brew out of all the coffee shops i've been to and tried.

thursday evening: swing dancing for the very first time. i will forever bless the night and friends who got us hooked on it.
 me and anna, posing in our shabby apple dresses before she came:)
a lovely friend, anna a, picked us up, and from there we drove through country

and more country to her friend martha's house.
♥ gorgeous.

then, on the way to the
[i dropped off the face of the planet for a sec half an hour here to procrastinate just a wee bit and laugh at a site i just found thanks to kelsey: how to be a dad. go ahead. go laugh. go learn. now back to the story.]
on the way to the place for swing dancing, we saw this stupid guy:
both hands holding the gadget phone. 70mph or more road.
the sight made me go weak in the knees.
and i was sitting down. dangit, how obvious is that.
i obviously don't get into the larger cities that much; people in our small town are just a tiny bit smarter than that, i think.
the freaky thing is, the idiot is practiced at it.
practiced.
or we'd all be history.
anyhow, back to the story again.
we got there in the middle of the lesson; kinda late, but oh well. martha taught us the basic steps on the side by the pool tables while a pretty big circle of couples practiced random things around the instructor and his partner.
then, the lesson ended and music started. 9pm. they go till midnight or something, but we didn't stay that late.
it was mentioned that anna and i were first-timers, but we dressed like we knew what we were doing.
oi.
well, when you have vintage-inspired dresses on hand, what do you wear to a swing dance?? exactemo.
so here we go.

an overview of the most of the room: lights were dim, so i had to use the stinkin' flash...
now for a slideshow, then a ramble from some notes i managed to take in my journal afterward, and . . . yes.
Photobucket
the grand thing is, the men step out and ask the women.
heck. yes.
and it's a good thing to wear flats. only near the very end, before we left around 11:15pm, did my left shoe start rubbing. nice little blister i acquired. but let me tell you this: it was so worth it. anna got several blisters from wearing low wedges with a nice securing strap; she says it was worth it. [uh, with a beaming smile, too.]
so if you ever have a chance to try swing dancing, do it. search it online, go. if that interests you at all.
because you will fall. in. love.
at least, i know i did.

notes:
12:02am
smiling. speechless.
in love.
swing dancing. ♥
1:30am
home.
there's something about spending the night with a whole bunch of people being alive, enjoying themselves.
[this was followed by a list of observations on the men i danced with through the evening.]
let's just say--my third dance, i was breathless after. that guy knew how to twirl you. and the dip at the end? only ever seen that in movies. it's been years since we've been stupid enough to try to dip each other as young siblings trying to reenact that amazing dance move. el oh el.

then, on the way home [after turning down a dance, darnit; never thought i'd say that...], we stopped by mcd's. 
they made the coffee on the spot; i ordered a small decaf.
for the record, i'm never doing that again. it didn't taste a cinch like coffee, and the non-taste plus the heat [though i waited and waited for it to cool] semi-burned my tongue. a blanket of numbness for the next few hours was the really nice outcome.
waiting . . . waiting . . . waiting for the mcd's dude to get our order and, hopefully, have a handful of sanitizing wipes to give us. no dice. they were out. wth? i needed that; i had forgotten to scrub my hands in the lady's room before we left the dancing; hands slightly tacky with sweat: not the best. i survived and washed twice with lots of soap and time when we got home.
it was almost 12:30 when we got home.
but again: so worth the loss of sleep. even though the past few days i should've gone to bed at like 11pm every night to get rid of this cold. :P


if you were thinking of trying to youtube it, i already did. i found this user {adelineness} to have the best videos; not the best high-definition, but the best instruction and visual learning from them. so many other videos i viewed sucked at bringing it across. those are my candid thoughts, anyways.

all in all: dancing is addicting. it's a whole new experience for me. a very good one. a very enjoyable one. i love learning new things. and stumbling along the way. [no, i didn't step on anyone's feet; but always staring at his feet is what i had to do to get the mirroring down. i'm getting better. :)] it's what makes life meaningful. it keeps you on your edge. keeps you thinking there's always more.
and i can't believe it's nearly 2pm. maybe eating something would've 
brought me energy and contributed to a faster post. oh well.

Wednesday, July 27, 2011

artistic endeavors: a face.

first of all,
the civil wars is amazing live.
back in ____ we went to see them with heath, steph, and a few others. amazing, i tell you.
and i'm in love with this song.

on the evening of july 2, something exciting happened.
i was shocked, okay? one my most favorite authors ever [lisa samson] liked a status of mine.
mhmm.
yep. i was psyched. :)

this canvas stretched me.
well, it was more like going back to my roots.
when i was a younger kiddo, faces and sunsets and houses and dresses were the only thing i drew.
i'm posting this just to document it and narrate. i didn't know what i was planning when i tried painting a face.
hah, i wasn't planning anything; i bet that's pretty clear.
i loved working with black and white, though.
well, it's 5:27pm, cloudy, breezy and rainy . . . i'm off to church.
i may write more later. who knows.

9:09pm
it's storming.
but the areas above and below ours seems to be getting the worst of it, according to the radar weather map...
on nights like these, with a cup of decaf by my side, those sites are always interesting.
back to early july, though.
this was the morning sky on july 3.
breathe in a morning sky and coffee. ohh dear. :)
yesterday had a clear sky...this morning i woke to thunder and rain; went back to sleep for a few hours.
tomorrow night has something interesting in store. i'll probably have to write about it. :) but honestly, i don't think i'm taking my camera. oh wait. maybe i do want to....
and here's danny, fresh from a shower [because, you know, little boys need to bath or they won't smell good ever] with his barney. :) 
his cheeks are just yummy.
see? yummy. he's such a part of our family it's not even funny. we've been watching him several times a week since he was 10 months old. he's going to be 4 in november. dangit, he's so big now! even just in the past month, his imagination and vocabulary and everything has skyrocketed. it's crazy.
alright. well, i've got a few other things to read, so i'll say g'night. :)
yay for catching up one canvas post at a time. ;)

Tuesday, July 26, 2011

pasta bake by pwc.

it's easier than lasagna.
ya know, instead of handling big long lasagna noodles, it's just normal pasta you have to worry about.
and....it's amazing. 
butter + mushrooms = love.
pasta water. isn't that obvious? ;) 


pasta sauce from a glass jar, added to that is cooked ground beef, etcetera...

seriously so good. and, did i mention, easier than lasagna. no fussing with those special noodles.


happy sigh.
and here's the link for it:
sour cream noodles bake.