Pages

Recent Posts

Thursday, September 19, 2013

Just like Belle

I haven't had time to read at all for many many months actually more like a year. During the 6 week break for school I started out being too busy to read. I had a wedding to plan and whatnot. The week before the wedding I started reading a book....I can't even remember which one now! Since then I've started rereading the Harry Potter books because they will always be my favorite. I've read
Blackmoore which is the 2nd book written by a wonderful author, Julianne Donaldson who wrote one of my ultimate favorite books, Edenbrooke. I strongly recommend both books. It's hard for me to recommend books because there are books that are 'mostly' good but may have a few iffy parts (nothing scandalous but maybe not appreciated). These books are really clean and just fun, Jane Austen like books.
I also started reading, Dear Girls Above Me by a comedian Charles McDowell. This is an example of a book I wouldn't recommend.
It's a true story about Charlie's life in an apartment living below 2 obnoxious women who have the most ridiculous conversations. He can hear almost everything they say or do and he started tweeting the things they would say for example;
"Dear Girls Above Me, "How does Google work? Is someone hired to look up your search and send it back to you?" Yes, and they search for it on Google."
"Dear  Girls Above Me, "I'm blanking, who discovered the world was round again? I mean flat--wait, did he think--yeah, flat--wait--" Christopher Columbus."
"Dear Girls Above Me, "All I want in life is a strand of Justin Timberlake's hair so I can make his babies." DNA doesn't produce children."
"Dear Girls Above Me, "Okay, I honestly just noticed that keyboards aren't in alphabetical order." This is a quote from you and my two year old cousin."

So he starts off with the bit of their conversation then adds his 2 cents at the end. There are some that are hilarious and some that aren't so...
There is some language that isn't great so this has been kind of a skimmer book, finding the funny (and appropriate) topics of his tweets and reading them. So not a book I would recommend to my friends for those reasons. There are so many good books that have just a couple things that ruin it :(.

I also want to start reading all of Roald Dahl books. I have his boxed set collection and could get through them pretty quickly. He's one of my favorite authors but I think I'll finish Harry Potter before starting those. I have some Jane Austen and Bronte sister books on my list as well- Jane Eyre is in my top 5 books--Fictional books that is-- Harry Potter books all are lumped into one also in my top 5. Edenbrooke and Blackmoore are lumped into one. Angels and Demons/Davinci Code are next, and I think Hunger Games is on that list... but I know I have more from my past I'm just not remembering.  Those are in no particular order

I have also checked out so many library books that have been pushed to the side because of time, but I've really enjoyed reading again. It's such a good part of my day and I don't get as sucked into other mindless activities (pinterest, TV, etc....).

So go read Blackmoore and Edenbrook if you haven't already. Just buy them because you'll like them and want to keep them :) My copies are loaned out and I love spreading the joy!




Monday, September 9, 2013

"I Resemble that Remark"

 (Three Stooges anyone?....)

Have you heard about the new 'words' Washington State has passed as gender biased and banned from our vernacular? Take the word 'freshman' for example, now we must refer to 'freshmen' as first-year-students. If you know someone who fishes, you'd better not call them a 'fisherman', that's sexist, you must call them a 'fisher'. How about penmanship? Nope, that's called handwriting now.
I cannot even believe that over 40,000 'gender biased' words were changed in our state. We are the fourth state to change these words.
I really don't understand it and it makes me upset to know that our tax dollars, time, energy, money, energy, money....is being put into this kind of ridiculous effort not to offend anyone. Our society is becoming too 'politically correct' trying not to offend anyone.
It's upsetting to me that saying the word Christmas is no longer acceptable and we have to say Holiday instead. At my old job they told us we had to answer the phone and say Happy Holidays. I always said Merry Christmas and nobody ever had any complaints, in fact, 80% of the people I talked to thanked me for saying the word Christmas!
Taking out the line "under God" from the pledge of allegiance is especially saddening. I won't get into it anymore than I already have because I could go on and on, but I wanted to let the universe know how ridiculously infuriating these changes are to me.
I'm offended that it's now legal to smoke marijuana in my state, let's ban it. I'm offended that school buses are yellow, I want them to be purple. I'm offended that more and more curse words are allowed on the radio and on TV. 100% of the population will EVER be satisfied, I would like to know when they will stop focusing on those unimportant things and focus on the REAL issues plaguing our state/country.


Imagine all the paperwork that will have to be thrown out and updated because of these word changes. I'm offended that it produces so much waste.

Another CRAZY bit of news is the fact that some young soccer teams in Canada have removed the soccer ball from SOCCER. Really? Wanting everyone to learn teamwork and how to have good sportsmanship (or should I say, sportspersonship?....huh...I don't wanna offend anyone with my sexist language) is a good thing. Removing the ball from soccer, not a good thing. It's allowing children to become entitled, creating a very false sense of accomplishment. What's going to happen when they start working at a company and they don't have instant success? They actually have to have responsibility and work for something? If they remove the proverbial ball from their ambitions, what's there to show for it? I want to read this book and feel accomplished, but I don't want to work for it so I'll just cut all the pages out, leaving only the covers. The only good that comes from removing the ball from soccer is that a few less kids will leave with bruises on their shins. Our society has started creating very lazy and self-important generations. This is just no good. It's ok, actually, it's more than ok, to lose a game. It's ok to win a game. It's ok to tie in a game.

I pledge to always say Merry Christmas, to speak a little louder when reciting the Pledge of Allegiance especially the "Under God" part, I pledge to encourage good teamwork and not encourage complacency, I pledge to build confidence and character in those around me without eliminating all possibilities of failure, I pledge to use failure as an opportunity to teach, I promise not to apologize for any of the above.

 Not learning how to lose would create chaos. Allowing yourself to become offended by the word 'freshman' would be chaos. PLEASE stop the madness.

 like my use of '  '  's ?


This probably doesn't even make sense at all. I'm SO tired but got on a bit of a rant. Sorry if I offended you ;)

Sunday, September 1, 2013

S Reception

I haven't even posted pictures from my own brother's reception in June yet, I'm awesome! I've actually been having issues with the computer all those photos are on and haven't gotten to transfer them yet. But someday soon I will post them, I promise!
Last Saturday I got to be in charge of a childhood friend's reception (open house shingdig). I've known the Pratt family my entire life and they're such amazing people. So generous and helpful and kind, and just awesome (plus they're my bosses!). So when they found out Haley was getting married in August they asked if I would be willing to help them. Summers are crazy busy for them and I knew with everything else in life right now, trying to plan a reception would be really fun for me, and not as much fun for them. Of course, I said YES! haha
I believe it was mid-June that we started the planning. Now I'll be the first to admit, I'm bossy and like to get things done my own way, which I think can be good, sometimes....but not all the time. So once I got the OK, I was off! Her parents took care of the food, cupcakes, chair/tent/tablecloth rentals and I got to do the rest. I seriously LOVE this stuff ok.
It was so fun looking around for ideas and inspiration and I had a really good time pulling it all together. It's hard to know someone else's taste (even if you have known them your entire life:)) but I did know she wouldn't like diamonds dripping from the tree branches and peacocks wandering around so I crossed those off my list (I kid, I kid).
It was a backyard reception and I think it went wonderfully! Everyone seemed to really enjoy themselves and lots of people came out to congratulate the happy couple. I was so glad to have the chance to help them out.

Here are some pictures (all from my phone-high fives for attending a reception that I didn't have to take pictures at! I can count on one hand the # of receptions I've been to that I haven't taken pics at since I was 17).

Others have better photos but I only have access to my own for now.

I made several of these planters for succulents! I also made this chandelier out of wax paper for the gazebo.

Some silly details. Water bottle labels and wrapped silverware...intriguing! (These types of pics are mostly for myself so I can refer back.)


Tree branch bubbles! Some of my ideas are a little over the top to some (cough, mother, cough) and it's probably true but if it's something that I WANT to do and LIKE to do then it's all good.
Amazing HEIDI and her amazing aunt did the flowers! Heidi and I ordered flowers online about a month ago and they arrived two days before the wedding. So they were hard at work all day Friday and half of Saturday working on the beautiful flowers. They made 10 table centerpieces, 6+ ball jar arrangements, lots of corsages for moms/grandmas, 3 or 4 mini bouquets for the sisters, two head crown things for the flower girls (nieces), lots of boot-in-ears (never can spell that word)
for groom/brothers/dads/grandpas. Seriously so amazed. We had lots of flowers left over so just before everyone got back from the temple, I put some baby's breath into a couple bird cages to put around.


 This was the gate where people walked in. There was a guestbook table....


 A birdcage card table, a favor table.....



The favors were mini succulents that I made mini cement pots for. Kind of fun, kind of a pain, but it was fun to make the pots!
 I made 500 paper cranes to hang from the trees but it was a pain to hang them and I didn't have time to worry about it so only some of them got hung up. But it was ok.
 More centerpieces (and BBQ sauce)


 I had some amazing help the day of to get ready for this. I would still be sitting huddled in a corner if they hadn't come to help cut fruit/veggies and make trays, help decorate, set up, take down, etc....
 This is the buffet table. Bare Bones BBQ catered the dinner. Really we just went that day to pick up all the food from them and handled the rest ourselves.
 The drinks! We had a little mishap with the lemonade dispenser just before the family got back to eat dinner....the seal was broken and juice went evvverywhere! 
 The flowers were just so pretty!


 The tent where we put all the food stuff was really cool and handy. This is the dessert table.
Some more flowers Heidi made




 As the party was winding down.....


The end of the night. I loved the gazebo in the dark! The chandelier is now hanging in my room :)


 The cutest flower girl I've ever seen!




 And the last pics of flowers.

Wow I congratulate you if you actually made it through that mess of words/pictures! Yikes.

Overall it was so great and while it's a lot of work trying to prepare for it, seeing everyone come and enjoy themselves was awesome.

Promise to post Ty's reception pics sometime hopefully soon.

Chyla's wedding this Saturday! Literally 15 wedding invites in the mail in the last two months...cray cray.

LinkWithin

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...