Amber waves of grain ....

A few weeks ago, I drove through rural central Kansas ... to go visit some friends. Living in Salina ... well, I never considered it "the big city." It's certainly bigger than anywhere I've lived in the last 10 years, but it's not small-town either.

So, driving along the backroads of Kansas ... driving faster than both my husband ant mother would be comfortable with ... but it was almost like I had wings. Driving along the backroads was absolutely freeing. :) Anyone out there know what I'm talking about?

Grabbed a few photos ... it doesn't quite encompass the feeling, but here you go:


Beautiful. Just beautiful.


And now check out the stunning saturation of the sunset.

It's in the freezer .... v. 2

After I posted about the class to help prepare meals then freeze them, I got to thinking about what I know that I could make and freeze.

Last week, I made pot roast, but instead of doing just one roast, I made two. I love letting my slow cooker do all the hard work! So, I took the meat from the second roast and used my trusty Betty Crocker cookbook to make beef enchiladas.


Um. Yum. I shredded the beef, made an extra pan of enchiladas and they're in our deep freeze, just waiting for a day when I'll be to busy to cook a hearty dinner, but want something economical, tasty and healthful.

Let me take a minute to profess my love for this cookbook.


When I was in college, in an apartment, I'd frequently call home with basic questions such as "what temperature do I cook a meat loaf at?" and a variety of other questions. After several such phone calls, this book was wrapped up under the Christmas tree for me. An extremely practical gift!

Where have all the hangers gone?

Seriously! It's like the case of the missing sock .... only with hangers!

I did laundry on Friday (hanging it on the line to dry!), and we were at least 12 hangers short when it came time to put things in the closet. WHAT GIVES!?!??!?!?!????


Hmmmmmm....... like missing socks, I have no answer. Anyone else have this struggle?

Oh, but my remedy to the ever happening missing sock .... mismatch them so it won't matter anyway! ;)

We're going to have to break down and actually purchase hangers. I don't remember EVER doing that in my lifetime....

# 98 — Get that tree taken care of in the backyard

... CHECK!!!!!!!

Boy howdy am I happy about this one.

Erik will say I've "had it in for the tree since the moment you saw it, Karen" ...

Well, Erik .... the tree was almost half dead. It eventually would be dangerous. I didn't want it to be a liability.

We called basically everyone in the phone book. Well, the quotes to take the tree down ranges SO VASTLY. Well, we kept going until we got quotes from just about everyone .... and let me say, our persistence paid OFF! The last quote was about half of what the others were. SOLD! :) Some things, I'm willing to pay more for ... like a pair of jeans that make me look smokin' hot. Other things ... well, in the end the price wouldn't mean a job better done. So away we went.

Here's the before and after photos:


You'll see that one branch was already cut ... yeah, I did that. I attacked the tree with gusto, trying to take care of some of the dead branches myself, but it was getting dangerous.


I also have photos/videos in progress, but wanted to share that I've checked something more off of the 101 in 1001 list. :)

We opted to keep the trunk of the tree around so we could hang our hammoc swing. :) I'll be sure to share those photos soon!

Oh, and a few more items coming up to check off of the list ... #46, 71, 72 and 90. But I am having space issues and will download the photos and share them as soon as possible! :)

How are you staying cool?

Ugh! It's HOOOOOT outside!

I realize I'm no longer 6 years old, but this is the perfect weather for freezer pops. You knoooooow. Those colorful popsicles that come in clear plastic bags.


I picked them up on a whim at the grocery store, but man are they nice to have around. I've had them on the way to the YMCA or even to the store. :) Yummie! :)

Anyhow, we are trying to not turn our AC down to a very low temp, so I want to hear how you other frugal, clever people are staying cool as the mercury climbs! Tell, tell, tell!!!!

# 36 — Hit the 1 gallon mark for blood donation

.... CHECK


Well heck. For whatever reason I didn't realize I had ALREADY hit the one-gallon donation mark. Probably several years ago.


But today, there was a blood drive across the street from our house, so I headed over there. It was then I realized today was the 19th time for me to donate. That means the next time I donate, it will be 2.5 gallons of blood donated

I'm copying the following list right off of the Red Cross' Web site.

1. Every two seconds someone in the U.S. needs blood
2. More than 38,000 blood donations are needed every day
3. One out of every 10 people admitted in a hospital needs blood
4. Total blood transfusions in a given year: 14 million (2001)
5. The average red blood cell transfusion is approximately 3 pints
6. The blood type most often requested by hospitals is Type O
7. The blood used in an emergency is already on the shelves before the event occurs
8. Sickle cell disease affects more than 80,000 people in the U.S., 98% of whom are African American. Sickle cell patients can require frequent blood transfusions throughout their lives
9. More than 1 million new people are diagnosed with cancer each year. Many of them will need blood, sometimes daily, during their chemotherapy treatment.
10. A single car accident victim can require as many as 100 units of blood.

If you are eligible to give blood, please consider doing so!

And here is my short list of why it's great to give blood.

1. It helps others.
2. Free t-shirt (at some blood drives)
3. Free cookies, drinks and snacks

(see a pattern w/ items 2&3?) ;)

Crossover — Cristina + Josh's Engagement

I almost sweat my face off Sunday night while shooting Cristina and Josh's engagement session!!!!


But they were super-cool and it was worth it! Check it out HERE


Closing w/ one of my favorites from the day!

Cooking for Engineers

Oh.my.gosh.

This morning we harvested a foot-long zucchini from the garden. I was reading my Betty Crocker cookbook looking for interesting ways to cook with the veggie and came across the Ratatouille recipe. Since I saw the movie earlier this year, I figured "what the heck?" :)

But being curious, I went online to look for more options on the recipe. AND THEN I FOUND IT. A Web site called "Cooking for Engineers" and had a good, long laaaaaaaaaugh. C'mon. I'm the daughter of an engineer and my baby brother is in school to become an engineer. I KNOW about analytical minds! Anyhow, Baby Paul, check out this site if you need some inspiration this summer! :)


And for anyone interested, the Ratatouille recipe is HERE.

Kaley got HITCHED!!!!

About a week ago, my buddy, Kaley, got maried!


I LOVED her vintage-ish dress. SO classic .... very Kaley.


Check out us being dorks! Who'd have thought when we met we'd both be married within the span of a year of each other. Crazy talk!


Lastly, check out these awesome "reception shoes!" I fully advocate for reception shoes. Especially BLUE ones! :)


Also, check out how they sway together ... they both had this internal song only they seem to hear ... throughout the wedding ceremony AND reception, they were .... just swaying together to their own rhythm.

Un-short shorts

Any other ladies out there have trouble finding DECENT shorts? You know, the kind that don't ride up the leg ... and that you don't have to constantly tug down.

A few weeks ago, we were at the mall in Manhattan, and I poked around .... but it was either the crack riding shorts, school marme-ish shorts or leg-hugging bermuda shorts. NOTHING in between. :(

But last week, I got the Victoria Secret sales catalog. And .... TA DA! Who'd have thought I'd find modest/decent shorts at Victoria's Secret? ;)


Since it's been at least 5 years since I bought shorts, I picked up 2 pair! Heck, even if they're more than the normal sale reck or Goodwill, I'll probably won't buy another pair of shorts for 5 years, so it was worth it!

If you're interested in your *very own* pair, CLICK HERE.

SIDE NOTE: YES I'm up awfully early. I had a great idea and now just can't go back to sleep. Unfortunately, there are 5 hours until Erik's normal wake up time, so I can't tell him about it. :( My idea ... is involving the rain barrel. I know, I know .... I need to get a life. But we're constantly evolving ideas for our back patio .... and I recently saw how to make an overflow barrel. This is key because ours BOTH have overflowing issues. But for now, I'll just make an overflow spout.

Back to my idea. I think we could line up maybe 3 or 4 barrels in one spot on the patio. THEN get some sort of hard surface/countertop to put over them. This would serve several purposes: 1) cover the tops where we'll have to cut them open. Covering the top is important to mosquitos don't start breeding. 2) It could serve as a side buffet sort of thing where we could put food, drinks, etc. on the patio.

I have this idea in my head, and am not sure if I'm describing it well (it's 6 a.m., after all, and I'm not usually awake at this hour).

So .... if any of you Wichita (or even KC, we could get it when we visit the in-laws) people have an idea where I could get some countertop for "on the cheap" .... I'm basically looking for something at least 2 feet deep ... and I'm not sure how long. If you have an idea where I could acquire this, please leave a comment!

Cat nap

I think Esse hears me getting the camera ready .... see the eye on the right, almost open?

On top of the couch ... one of the popular locations for her napping. And during the day, she can often look out the window.


Giving me "the look."

Erik's fellas

Sorry for all the horticulture-related blogging of late .... I'm going through photo folders, and all my garden-related photos are in the same folder.

At some point, I thought Erik and I were the same when it came to retail shopping. But ooooooooooooh nooooooooooo. This realization hit when we were at the local garden center. I wanted basil plants. They didn't have any. End of story. In my book, we leave.

Not in Erik's.

Garden veggie plants were buy one, get one free. Well, Erik fell hook, line and sinker.

We need cherry tomato plants, Erik said.

But we don't NEEEEEED any more tomatoes I reasoned.

No. We need cherry tomato plants, Erik said.

But we have 8 tomato plants in the ground in the backyard and another 8 on our front porch.

No. We need cherry tomato plants, Erik said.

What did we walk out with?

• 40 pound bag of soil
• 2 cherry tomato plants
• big plastic pot

Sheesh. We could have gotten off scott free, but nope. We didn't.


Starting w/ rocks + soil in the bottom


Sup, plants?


I have to admit, they're cute. AND there is no weeding involved, which is a BIG plus in MY book.


Filling in around the fellas. Erik is responsible for watering them. I take no responsibility.


I think Erik likes having "his own" patch of earth to "work."

Greek Salad — remixed

Last week, we picked some salad from our garden and mixed it in with some store lettuce to make a tasty Greek Salad. Instead of marinating, I opted to just use the greek feta dressing ..... yummie!!!!!!! This is one of our favorite meals!

Strawberry Harvest?

Weeeeeeell, let's just show you the evidence.


Initially, Erik didn't seem to believe me that the birds like to hang out in our strawberry patch. Well, almost every morning when I go back there, at least two birds flutter out of the patch.

But as you can see, there ARE berries growing, which is awesome!


I need to rig up some sort of netting system to foil their efforts, but don't think it will happen this season, so next year ....

Absentee blogger returns!

Check out what my awesome husband got me for my birthday!!!!! Yes, it's a RETRACTABLE clothesline from Target. :)

HERE and HERE.

One end will attach to something in our yard (currently, we think it's the tree trunk). Anyone who wants to come and help me dig the hole for the end that retracts, DO let me know! ;) Oh, and yes, we had the dig safe people come out, so we won't run into anything we shouldn't.

Let me also add I'm excited b/c there will be 170 stinkin' feet worth of hanging space. I picked up some clothespins at Target for about $1.50 last week. But I only got 150, so I might need to score a few more ....

Crossover — Fr. Josh

I suck.

Ok, I said it .... I've sucked lately at updates. I have a BUNCH of photos to download from our point and shoot, but have not the space on my laptop to do it .... so I'm close to being able to do so. Ok?


But I've been WORKING people! Cruise over to the Heartland blog for some tasty treats.

Making nice

After being so harsh on literature yesterday, I tried to make up for it by going to the library and picking up an armload of books.

I added a widget on the right side of the page, which tells what I'm reading ..... if anyone wants to join me on GoodReads.com, that would be cool! Sort of like having a book club .... but we're all over the place!

I had to pick up one from the large print section. And as I was checking out, I told the lady I really enjoy large print books b/c I look really brainy when I'm reading such a THICK book at the pool. ;)

Raising the white flag ....

It's not often I put a book down in the middle. In fact, I can think of only one other time I've done it. But yesterday, I finally admitted defeat. For more than TWO MONTHS I'd been trying to power my way through this book on MP3 and I finally gave up on "Reading Lolita in Tehran."


Of the 120-some-odd "chapters" of the MP3 player, I made it to 79. So about 2/3 of the way through. Not BAD ... but I just couldn't finish.

The thing that gets me is ..... this was a bestseller. I'm not sure HOW, but it was. I'm not saying the book is bad by any means .... it's just .... slow. It starts in the present, then flashes back to her book club, then flashes back more and then flashes back even MORE. Um, confusing. And rambling. There was a point when she introduced a student, then went on for a chapter about the student's favorite book. I groaned OUT LOUD while I was on my exercise bike at the Y when this happened.

I feel like SUCH a jerk. Because the material is interesting. It's just SO SLOW MOVING. I told Erik I'd make a good person to abridge the book. Get out my butchering knife, because there was a lot of fat that could have been trimmed from the 2/3 that I read.

Just as a point of comparison (because I'm a dork like that), Harry Potter book 7 is about 21.5 hours in audio form. This book was 18.5 in audio form. Does that give you a feel for it? I couldn't get ENOUGH of HP7, but this ... zzzzzzzzzzzz.

Ok, I'm officially a jerk. Azar Nafisi, if you're reading this, I'm sure you're a lovely author ... your writing style is so lovely ... but it was just too long!

I feel like I need to make up for my literary meanness, so I'm going to head to the library and see what I can find today that tickles my fancy.

Crossover — Baby Kara

The last week has been fairly busy. Yay! I'm thankful to have sessions and assignments coming out of my ears. But then it begs the space question on my 'puter and external hard drives. Sheesh!

Anyhow, aren't Baby Kara + Mommy Michelle ADORABLE?!?!?!?? I think so.


And I LOVE it when I go to do a session and the nursery is awesome! I have to say, I've seen quite a few with the baby's name on the wall, and I rather like it.

For more visual treats, head on over to the Heartland blog by CLICKING HERE.

Easter 2009

Don't you just love these as place markers? :)

So, when we knew we'd go down to Wichita for Easter, I asked my sister if she'd be there. She said she wasn't sure ... why did I ask?

"Because I want to know if I'll be sitting at the kids table this time." I said to her.

My sister thought I was NUTSO, but c'mon! I'm a married woman!!!! I SURELY deserve to not be at the kid's table.

So when we arrived at the Sheldon's for Easter, this was what we found. Our OWN LITTLE table.


*sigh*


So sad.


But it was just a joke .... we got to sit at the big kids' table. Actually, we decided it was the "young adults" table ... because there were 2 set of twin girls under the age of 3 sitting at the "adults" table. ;)


And .... it was RAINY so the regular egg hunt was cancelled ... and so I hid eggs inside.

Chaos, pure chaos! :)

Allison's Kidd-O

Check out this looker! My friend and CCD-teaching partner-in-crime, Allison, had a baby this winter, but it wasn't until about a month ago when I could get to see the new little fella.


We got along rather swell!


I've NEVER seen a kiddo smile SO MUCH!

And here's a video clip .... ignore my chatter and being a dork! ;)

Esse's Hideout :)

Boog LOVES a good hiding spot. ;) This is what I made of our back tree awhile ago ...

My dad made this house for her about 4 years ago. Esse doesn't go into it much, but she sure loved on it for quite awhile.


See how good she is at hiding?


Silly kitty!

#59 — Go to the Grand Canyon

... CHEEEEEEEECK!!!!!!!!


But when Paul and I got to the Grand Canyon, this is what we saw .... clouds, clouds and more clouds.

Sheesh!


But we EVENTUALLY found some blue skies!


This is probably my favorite image from the day .... sort of .... my younger brother looking out, wondering what the future holds. Or it could be me being sentimental and reading WAY too much into things! ;)

Oh, and I have a TON of photos to share from our trip to San Diego .... but I'll share them once I have time to sort through them.

It's in the freezer ....

Every once in awhile, I hop over to the Riley County Extension's Blog. I like that they have a blog ... and THIS CLASS sounds so uber fun/practical ... but I'm not able to go. Too bad, so sad.

But I LOVE the idea of making dishes and pulling them out of the freezer. Yeah, I KNOW they make frozen dinners in the freezer aisle, but folks, those are FULL of extra sodium, not to mention they're 4x what it'd cost to make from scratch.

The idea behind the soup exchange was to have something I could freeze, then use when in a pinch. We've even got some of Erik's yummie chili in the freezer ... and some of that not-so-yummie potato soup. Erik's still looking for suckers to pawn it off on. ;)

VOTE!!!!!!!!

Ok, so I entered a photo of be being goofy into a contest (well, 2 photos). The idea was to take a photo of you doing a crazy exercise. WELL ....


Photo 1: yoga in the garden. Me doing the side plank. Ok, so truthfully, it was the first time I did the side plank, but the other positions wouldn't look too good in the visual sense, which is why I went w/ this pose. To the left is my strawberry patch. Directly in front of me is the lettuce, and at my feet is the zucchini. :) Oh, the ground is green b/c I mulch w/ grass .... I hug a LOT of trees. ;)


Photo 2: Me weightlifting paint cans atop a chair that is on my "to do" list of projects. So, the can's aren't really full, but it shows painting CAN be a workout! One day, my right arm was all sore and I couldn't figure out why. Well, I remembered I painted walls the day before .... which was probably why I was sore! Interesting, no?

I get a lot of duff from the "Move it Monday" crowd, but my comment is ANYTHING can be exercise. I go mow the lawn, that's 45 minutes worth of pushing/walking. I want to rent a movie? We walk to the Redbox .... anything can be made to move the body in good ways! :)

I realize I might be splitting my vote by having 2 photos, but GO HERE and vote ... I'm voting for Yoga in the Garden!