i'm getting old and forgetful...

How could I have forgotten??? So the other night I got a phone call from Kansas... in the middle of a singing.... and they were singing Pull for the Shore. Which I love.

Definitely saved it on my phone. :D

rambling

so there's not really anything going on in my life... (HA!) or maybe there is too much... anyway.

Kate got married last weekend. It was a real nice wedding. (wow, that sounds like my grandma) They all looked cute in their 'Katelyn dresses'. My arms are still kind of sore from lugging around a tray of glass coffee cups at the reception... but it's worth it for the piece of cake, right?

My eyes are all better and I even have my new contacts in today, which I'm not used to yet and I'll probably get a headache from. O well.

Piano is going fairly well. I should practice more. :)

YG committee is ok... Apple River is this weekend! Woot woot! I'm excited. Then we have a very, very busy October. It'll be good for us though... I guess.

I need to start conditioning my Christmas cactus... I just don't have a good spot to put it.

Blessings.

avast ye lubbers!

so today was talk like a pirate day and I totally forgot about it until one scurvy knave reminded me. Which probably isn't all bad, because I don't think my boss would have appreciated it very much. *grin* and I'm not very good at it.

I like this weather a lot. It's perfect for eating lunch outside. And yesterday Kaleigh stopped on her way home from work and we went on a walk at the lake. We watched the sunset and the stars come out. And I got lots of mosquito bites, ergo a great evening.

Today I went to the eye doctor... for the first time in, oh, 3ish years. Yeah, I know, he definitely gave me a lecture. Oh well. My eyes haven't changed at all really. I'm still pretty blind. :)

I have an interesting and colorful eye doctor history. Maybe colorful isn't the right word, definitely interesting. The one I went to when I was little (who gave me my first glasses in 3rd grade) scared me. A lot. I don't know why, I just thought he was weird. And his office was scary too. But then he had a massive heart attack and died on a fishing trip in Canada and so I didn't have to go to him anymore.

Then we went to Dr. F, who is somewhat of an odd duck. As my current doc described him, "he's the big fish in a little pond." His appointments took entire afternoons and he asked crazy questions like if I thought his clothes matched. Sooo.... right before I moved to champaign I needed new contacts quick... and I.... gasp... went to some guy in walmart. He was nice, but he doesn't even work there anymore and it was weird that his office was in walmart. It just felt cheap or something. Last week I used my last pair of contacts so it was definitely time to find a new doctor. He's pretty nice. My dad goes there (mom always seems to pick the weird ones). But... he's not really on my insurance plan so I may never go to him again. So anyway.

Blessings.

i'm so proud

I actually made dentist and eye doctor appointments all by myself. Over the phone. I know.



... we won't mention how long it's been since I've been to either of those places...

wet

I'm tired of rain... although, it was nice to wash my houseplants in.

I spent Saturday afternoon in Champaign for no particular reason other than I haven't been there in a long time. It was really good. I stayed at Hessel house so I got to chill with Amber... we didn't do anything super exciting. Other than catching a mouse. And bailing approximately 798 gallons of water out of their basement. By hand. (ok, maybe not by hand)

Saturday evening we bought some mousetraps because they keep seeing mice in their basement and went out to eat with Natalie and Heather. Nat wanted to buy dog treats so we spent some time at Petsmart.... it was fun to look at all the animals they sell. Over all though, mega pet stores disturb me- people spend so much money on their animals and there are people sleeping on the streets in C-U. And starving. But yeah.

Champaign church was good. Good to see people again, it's been a long time! They had a shortened service in the afternoon because of all the rain and when we got back to hessel house there was four inches of water in the basement. It was coming through the walls and definitely sounded like a waterfall (or at least like someone was taking a shower). So I borrowed some rubber boots and we went wading. We found the mouse peacefully floating in a trap. The floor drain wasn't keeping up and two girls and buckets were not making a dent... so we made a trip to home depot for a sump pump. It was powerful. So powerful that the first time we didn't get the hose in tight enough and it came out and I might have gotten slightly wet. But it took care of all the water pretty quick... we only spent about 2 hours down there. :) And moved approximately 798 gallons of water. (figuring 16'x20'x4'' on average and approximately 0.00432900433 gallons to a cubic inch) Go us.

Then I came home. And our basement was dry. Hooray for good drainage and great-grandparents that did quality construction.

Anyway, now it needs to dry out so I can do important things like plant the bulbs I just got.
Blessings.

piano

I started taking piano lessons again yesterday. It was fun/ awkward... it's so nerve wracking to play in front of somebody who is really good at it. But she's really nice, so hopefully the nerves will pass and I will be more comfortable.

My car has a U of I sticker in the window. Hopefully Bradley students won't take offense... haha.

Blessings.

plants and pie and pork

So Friday I was talking to a coworker about how he's in an orchid society... and he mentioned that ICC Landscape and Garden day was on Saturday.... so I went. It was cool! When I went to ICC I didn't even know they had a selection garden and an arboretum; I didn't really ever explore much outside the main building. :) I bought myself a Christmas cactus. We'll see if I can keep it alive. One of my other plants died suddenly this week- it dropped all of it's leaves and shriveled up. And I know I remembered to water it. *sigh*

My poor dad has problems with customer service... maybe he needs to learn to bat his eyelashes... haha... not really, but I think wood front kitchens (they did our cabinets a long time ago) is pretty great. A couple of weeks ago someone might have accidentally pulled one of the drawers in the kitchen out too far and it might have fallen and the porcelain drawer pull broke. And I looked at a couple of hardware stores to find one that matched... no luck. So I stopped after the plant sale and they gave me four replacements for free!

We have apples so I made apple pie. It's really good.

Matt and I and Amy (I dragged her along) went to the TYG hog roast Saturday evening. I'm glad I went there instead of Lau's wedding reception... it was probably more gooder. It was a beautiful night to be outside, and see Nic and Bob and Mary and baby Max. :) And I rarely get to do anything with Amy anymore. So yeah. Good times.

Blessings.

Labor day weekend

So it was another busy weekend...

Friday night we had a singing shower for three of the four w-ton weddings. It went pretty well. We had plenty of food and Marcia and Michelle were in the kitchen with Jody and I so that all worked out great. I wanted to sing Pull for the Shore, I knew that Matt would glare at me, so I didn't call it.

Matt and Shelly and I left Saturday morning for Latty/Junction... typical invite. It was enjoyable though. I might have gotten a text in the 'greeting line' and tried to reply during the prayer, but they have terrible cell reception out there so it was all in vain. Amusing though.

The sista stroll down the road after supper was funny.... I felt sorry for the people trying to drive on it.

We sang Pull for the Shore- I was excited. Shelly wanted me to wink at Nic during the singing but some girls hair was in the way. Probably a good thing. :)

After church on Sunday we headed to Leo to my aunt and uncle's house and got there just in time to head out on the river in their new boat. We got to ski... I got up every time... I was pretty excited. We went out again after supper, but it got dark really fast. Monday morning Abby and Shelly and I got up early and went out. It was a little bit chilly! I tried wake boarding just to say I did and I got up for about two seconds and then I face planted and swallowed half the lake and decided that it was Shelly's turn to try. (Abby said it was longer than two seconds... I dunno though, it was pretty short)

We chilled by the pool for a while before we left. We stopped at the store because Matt had never been there. And then we came home. And I'm very sore today. And slightly sunburnt. woot. :)