Rockin' it out!

Check out how our rocking chair came!

Project manager Esse the cat. :)


In progress ...


DONE!!!!!


My parents' friends, Kathy and George, gave us this item off of our wedding registry! :) Now I'm more anxious than EVER to get the back patio area done, so I can rock and read with a little more privacy.

Reese's Peanut Butter Pancakes :)

Sunday after Mass, we caught Fr. Nick and asked if he wanted to come over for brunch. Originally, I intended to use the waffle maker b/c we've never used it. BUT I know how much Fr. Nick adores pancakes, so I broke out our awesome griddle and made Erik's favorite Peanut Butter Pancakes.


Since my family can't leave well enough alone, I had some mini chocolate chips I thought I'd throw on top, to make 'em look cute.

Standing in the kitchen doorway, Fr. Nick quickly piped up, "Peanut butter pancakes with chocolate? It's like a Reeses pancake."

And he was right! :)


Afterwards, he hung out and we played a MEAN game of Uno. Erik LOVES to play Uno ... and we have great house rules: such as if I play a draw 2 to Erik and he has a draw 2, it is draw 4 to Fr. Nick. Only it bites me in the backside when Fr. Nick has a draw 2 and it's draw 6 to me. It gets REALLY wicked when it's a wild draw 4 on top of a wild draw 4. At one time I had to draw 12 cards.

But, we don't have the "draw till you can play" rule I grew up with, which makes it a *little* easier.

# 77 — Donate my portrait photography services to 2 auctions/year

CHECK!

Did one earlier to raise money for my friend's wife, and did another for the Catholic Schools here in Salina. :)

As a donor, they invited me to see the big event the night before. I was IMPRESSED with their decorating. Seriously!


One of the volunteers was telling me they had less items to auction this year than in years past, but I told her I'd been to charity auctions around the state, and by and large, they had the MOST items at this one. I've seen some big auctions before, but this was a MONSTER project!

Almost 1/3 of the way through this 101 in 1001 project.

ps-WHY DID IT SNOW LAST NIGHT????? It's April for goodness sake!!!!!

Wife beater

Check out my leg .... or the back of my left leg, more specifically.

Erik? A wife beater?

APRIL FOOLS!

Ok, just foolin' about being beat. :) Not fooling about that ugly bruise. :( (Erik thinks it looks like doppler the radar of a storm).

How did I get it? Well, sit down because you wont' believe this. Or those of you who know me well might actually believe it.

Last week, I wanted to get the sun tea jar off the very top of the cabinets. It was pushed back into the corner, so I couldn't get it by just reaching. No problem, I've climbed on the counter 100 times, so this should be cake. Right? Um, not so much. :(

The counter was a little slick, and so I slipped off, scraping the entire back of my thigh on the way down. :(

I have to say I'm really self-conscious about it. I wore long pants to the Y the one time I went last week. Monday, I worked up the courage to wear shorts ... but just don't want people to think my hubby beats me. One of my college roomies had a similar situation. She fell into a table in the middle of the night, landing a black eye. She said she got a LOT of looks. The heck of it is she's all buff and muscly, so it's silly to think her hubby could actually injure her in that way.

But, this isn't the first time I've received a bruise and had people think ill of my domestic partner. A few months ago, whilst removing tree branches (that's a post for another day!), I got a big, bad bruise on my right bicep. AND almost 2 years ago while cleaning out the trunk of my car, a BIG gust of wind came along and smashed the lid on the middle of my back. :( There was a really ugly bruise then, too. Today's lesson: Karen bruises easily ...

Oh well .... the bruise is slowly going away .... and I learned my lesson. I now get a chair or stool when I need something off the top of the cabinets.

My rain barrel runneth over!

WOOHOO!!!!!!!!!!! The rain barrel is UP AND RUNNING! :)

Yes, I'm a big, fat dork. Ok?

The best part was it was finished before our 10-inch snow. Before the roof even started melting, the thing was FULL. And it's 50 or 55 gallons. I can't remember.


I can't count the number of hours I worked on this darn thing. Seriously, a week ago, I spent the ENTIRE day running around town looking for pieces/parts.

Above is a moveable rain gutter. This was a fantastic tip from one of the guys are the hardware store. :)


After much trial and error, I finally ended up with this design option. There were LOTS of options on the table, and after a lot of trying things, this just worked best.

I wanted to have a spout where I could attach the garden hose ... and put my soaker hose at the other end. I'm excited to get my garden planted and try this thing out! :)

I'm also getting VERY interested in using "grey water" .... but there are all sorts of "issues" here in the U.S. Check out what Colorado says HERE. And they have awesome looking systems, but you gotta go to Australia. Check them out HERE.

So, for the time being, I'll just be content to collect rain water for my veggie garden (and strawberry patch!).


If you want one of these bad boys, I'd be happy to make one for you for $30. They retail for $40 at Orscheln or almost double that in hardware/garden stores.

If you're picky about color, I can get the barrel in black or blue.

Bricks/blocks to raise the barrel off the ground & moveable rain gutter are NOT included.

Diabetes

A friend of mine sent me a message, asking for some resources for a friend of theirs whose child was recently diagnosed w/ diabetes. Growing up in a family of diabetics, I'm happy to help. :)

The point I made to him was it's a VERY livable condition. I also like to point out you can still be a rock star if you've got it. Mick Fleetwood of one of our favoritest groups, Fleetwood Mac, does.

So I checked out THIS article online ... and the list of celebs is ASTOUNDING.

Here are a few:


Halle Berry


Larry King


Mary Tyler Moore


Mike Huckabee


Mick Fleetwood


Aretha Franklin


Nick Jonas


Andrew Lloyd Weber


Jay Cutler

And the list truly continues ... CLICK HERE if you want to check it out.

I'd also be remiss if I didn't include some informative links.

Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation
American Diabetes Association

Visiting "Baby Paul" .... take 2

A few weeks ago, dad picked me up and we hit the road to Champaign, Illinois to go to Engineering Open House at UIlli. It was one of those BYOA events (bring your own abacus). ;)

So, check out my co-pilot. A month or so ago, I found a photo of dad after my college graduation and found a photo of him "co-piloting" between Manhattan and Wichita.


Here Paul explains something vastly complex and above my head to Dad.


Yeah, this sign is hanging at my bro's workplace. Should I be concerned? ;)


Part of the open house was this demo-derby sort of thing. The engineering students made these robots to pick up balloons and put them in boxes, among other things.


This video is a little long ... just a warning. It's several clips spliced together.

There was also some robot bashing! Maybe I'll post some of that later.


Isn't this painting lovely? I wanted to bring it home with me. My pocketbook didn't (but it was TOTALLY a steal for the size it was!).


Ok, now THIS is interesting. It was a 3D copier. Yes, you read correctly. There are engineers in Illinois who can make a color copy of something in 3 dimensions. What WILL they come up with next!??!????!?


On Paul's frat wall .... not sure if I'll get him in trouble for posting this .... but .... :)


This is great. I slept at Paul's frat house the first night because *someone* snores like a grizzly bear. I am happy to report a few things. 1) ear plugs helped. 2) Tylenol PM helped knock me out before the bear started growling. 3) I was told I was allowed to poke any snoring parties if they needed it to shush up. ;)

I also have a new appreciation for how quietly Erik snores.


Check out the card catalogue at this place!!!! And this was only ONE wing of it!


Of course ... we photogs couldn't leave well enough alone. It was like the dualing point and shoot cameras!!!


I think my macro wins! ;)


Also ... check out this photo! I LOVE this image. It feels like an Edgar Allen Poe poem to me. Am I nuts? Oh, cruise on over to the Heartland Blog to read about me taking this photo ... and the dualing cameras that took the photos.


The sunset the morning we rose early to return to Kansas. It's been quite some time since I've seen so many sunrises. :)

And, I truly did visit Paul a few months ago, but it was such a crazy trip. I was SO TIRED and truthfully rather cranky. It was also an immensely short trip. It was such a treat to be able to spend some time on his stomping ground.

Thanks for hanging w/ us, Paul!

In the news

For Erik's paper, we're highlighting the stories we read and where we stop reading them. Management wants to know ... whatever. In truth, it's creating a bit of a false positive from me. If I read the paper, it's usually a few days later ... and maybe one or two stories. But give me a highlighter and tell me to mark it up? I pushed through 6+ inches of snow on the porch this morning to retrieve the paper. Go figure!

So .... headlines that caught my attention this morning.

1. Jury finds George Tiller not gilty
(CLICK HERE to read the story)

REALLY??????? I was shocked. Especially after earlier this week he said "When she was working for me - correction, when she was providing consultations for the patient ..." in THIS article (the trial was over if his "second opinion" doctor was an employee or not). I thought after that slip, it was all over. Evidently not.


2. Kathleen Sebelius signs Kansas right to know abortion bill
(CLICK HERE to read the story)

I have to admit I was a little surprised, but not really. She's trying to get confirmed to a cabinet seat.


3. Law cuts cell use by teen drivers
(CLICK HERE to read the story)

I'm not sure if I feel safer or not .... what about passengers in the car? Oh well, I guess I'm not a teen anymore (thank God!). I'll be interested to see how this 'hands free' device while driving thing goes. It was in effect when we were in California ... but that's not to say we stuck to it. But I'm told they DO ticket people for it.


These next two are for Erik:
4. Kansas falls late to Spartans
(CLICK HERE to read the story)

Thank GOODNESS! KU was really messing up my bracket. (ok, not really. I just don't like them and their 'we're God's gift to basketball and we're entitled to win b/c we did last year' attitude).


5. Mizzou battles UConn for right to move to Final Four
(CLICK HERE to read the story)

A surprising event, but Erik's excited nonetheless. If they win tonight, maybe he'll go outside and roll around in the snow shirtless. Or not ...

Bracket update

I seem to be faring better this year in the Journal pick 'em .... but not as good as I'd like.

Oh well, for someone who knows squadoosh about the college basketball teams, I could be doing much worse!

# 101 — Pray night prayer every night for a month

... CHECK!!!


I'm SO excited to cross this one off my list!

It's a bit embarrassing to admit, but since I had mono and my sleep schedule got all turned around about a year and a half ago, I've been a SLACKER when it came to my prayers. So, I decided Lent would be a good time to pick up the practice again.

The heck of it is it takes about THREE MINUTES to do it by myself. THREE MINUTES. It's seriously a drop in the bucket of time.

How easy it is to fall out of our good habits, and how hard it is to resume them!