Happy Canada Day!

I've been slacking off in the blogging department.
Since the last post we have...
-seen the Love Guru, loved it, it was stupidly funny, rated PG, but definitely not appropriate, in my opinion for under 14. Lots of male anatomy jokes and visuals.
-swam everyday for 3 days. The pool was a whopping 27 degrees today. Got some body boards to float on.
-went to the Greek House for a very good dinner, too bad Tara's tummy decided there wasn't any vacancy for Greek food.
-realized the chlorine is way to high in the pool, burned Kerry's eyes out.
-made a very yummy Sesame Pasta Salad, ate it outside in the heat.
-took pictures of icky butterfly on weird flowers. Ran when it dive bombed me. Dislike butterflies.
-went to the dog/nudist beach. Stayed at the dog end, saw some nudists, had nightmares.
- realized the circle punch I bought at Michaels last week is a dud, have receipt, just not packaging, hate HATE taking things back to Michaels. They always harass you until you think you just might be better off keeping the broken item.
-got lots of sun. It's hot, 38 in the shade of the deck. Thank goodness for a/c and the pool.
- tried 4 times to upload pictures for die hard blog readers, but alas, blogger hates me and my pictures.
-going to a BBQ. Will eat my miseries away.

Sew Crafty part 2

I promised to teach Emily to sew, and in doing so acquired a very basic Janome sewing machine. My first one, if you don't count my Grandma's antique treadle machine.

I used Donna Downey's pattern from her new book, Fabric Scrapbooking, to make an apron. It's not perfect, I definitely need more practice, but it's an apron, it looks like one and it fits like one. I'm thinking I could make some for Christmas presents if I start now. I went with wild colours, well, as wild as I can get. I'm pretty happy with it, but now I don't want to wear it and get it dirty.

I decorated an American Crafts plastic container for a gift holder for Emily's teacher's gift. I wanted to keep it.

I made this baby book for Connie's new baby girl. Her husband sends out pictures and a tear jerking email with each kid, so I kept it and used it to make both books I have given her.

I got an old filling replaced in my mouth today, replaced with a nice shiny white substance. My jaw's sore, my gums are sore, but I have one less silver filling leaking toxins. Whatever...

Educational Road Trip Turns Ugly

Emily and I went with the Ways on a home school fieldtrip to Vernon and the Science center that we didn't even know existed. But if you look back many posts, you will see some photos of E. up against a red wall, oddly enough, this is the Art Museum that is joined to the Science center. I never said we were observant.

It might have been something she ate or her usual car sick self, but Emily didn't have a good time, she learned about the science of vomitting out the side of a van. A few very old Gravols later and a short nap and she was better than new! We picked up some Copics at the scrapbook store in Vernon, hit the store in Winfield and came home very tired.

We didn't get to spend much time doing the tours of the center, but I did take a few pictures of the creepy crawlies.

Caymans...disgusting mini gators. Turtle looking at his reflection, not bad, kind of swampy smelling.
Gross and hairy tarantulas.
Very sticky polka-dotted lizard.
And the weirdest 'toys' on the market...Germs...this is Emily with Rabies. They even had herpes, the gift that keeps on giving...who comes up with these things?

Out of Whack

What does that mean? I'm out of whack. My car's out of whack. My balance is completely out of whack. It doesn't make any sense if you think about it.

I think I put my something out of whack while packing too many groceries in the green box yesterday. I've got a bit of a headache, not much, not one worth taking anything for really, but I'm also extremely tired. And to top it off, I've tripped on the stairs twice today, that's right, I've fallen UP the stairs two times. I just don't feel right. Maybe I need a good whack.

On the exciting side of my life, I got to see and hold CR's new baby S., she's adorable and little J. is so very well spoken, we had a very good conversation. Very tiny. I did see TB's baby, and he slept the whole time, so no one got to hold him, that stinker. I will probably see PO's baby tonight, she's the oldest of all the babies that we know. She's a great card maker too, starting young.

JW had a comment about my SAH dog mom situation, she was explaining it to Emily and said in a very matter-of-factly way that I am homeschooling the dogs. So if that's the case...Today, we learned how to share strawberries, we used the old fashioned method of 1 For You, 2 For Me, this worked better than the All For Linus method, and the Linus Trips Mom and Eats Whatever Lands on the Ground method and even better than the Sally Steals Linus's Berries. Tomorrow we might get Kelsey and Teya to come down and teach us trigonometry.

And because I know that Kerry might just be reading this...He had a lightbulb moment...You know when someone says "I got DIBS on that"? Kerry says it means Dogs In Bed, because once the dogs are in bed, you don't move them, (let sleeping dogs lay), so once a person yells DIBS, you don't move them.

Monday's Defining Moment

I run a daycare for dogs. Well, really, it's not a daycare, they are my own dogs so I guess I'm a SAHM to 2 dogs. Of course many of you knew this, I knew it in the darkest, deepest, dustiest corners of my mind. I know it when I'm asked to work 2 shifts, I can't, too many hours that the dogs are alone. Or when we plan trips, we can't all go, the dogs need someone to look after them. But for some reason it hit me today, really hard.

I was playing with my camera, like any other day. But when I took a look at my day, documented in 1/2500 of a second snapshots, I realized that I went from having 2 kids in school full time and some free time to raising the equivalence to another teenager and a 2 year old. I'm sure you can figure out which is which.

Check it out a day in the life of a Stay-At-Home-Fur-Mama.

We play in the pool...

We play with the dumb bell on a rope...

We rest...

We snack, today we had two kinds, grass and strawberries...

We learned that we planted 3 zucchini plants and 2 spaghetti squash instead of the other way around...check out my baby zucchini

And that poppies are pretty and keep the weeds under control...

And then we came inside for some air conditioned nap time.

Yesterday....

In B&W, because no one wants to see the Lil' Tykes car, or the car washing bucket and sponge. Seriously, who has time to move these things when 4 of the most unphotogenic people decide to pose for a photo op?

The Early Bird Learns Something

I have been up since 6 am. and outside in the mosquito/bear filled wilderness for 3 hours. I drove the GRT(Generic Red Truck) down from Myra Canyon or somewhere just as far away with 2 wet, smelly dogs all by myself. I don't really know where we were, just that I could see all of Kelowna and Straight Thru To Vernon from the mountain side.

I drove Kerry and my Dad to the Top so they could ride down, I took pictures along the way. I served 3500 mosquitoes fresh Love Spell scented Kelli flesh for about 3 hours. I only killed one, and that was in the truck on the way down. I did the mosquito shake while taking pictures and the Squirrel Dance which I am sure to never ever live down. This rabid squirrel jumped out right beside Sally and then ran across the wooden track Dad built and then across a log. It scared the crap out of me, Dad thought I'd seen a bear or a snake, but I thought the squirrel was going after the dog.

I took pictures, worse ones than the ones I took before Photography Class. But I have come to accept some things...it's dark in the forest, the lighting really sucks, my wimpy ass flash won't work for burst mode (so it's a trade off - lots of so-so pics or 1 well lit but possibly missed the jump one), I'm not great with my long lens, I shake and twicks and stigs really scratch your legs up when you are stomping through the bush to get the right angle. So now I might have to go out again tomorrow.

I took this picture last time....SOOC

Note the back of a dog head in the bottom of the frame. It's not the best one, I did have better, this one is kind of dark.

18-200 mm lens ( I might have had my short 50 mm on)

f 4.5

1/320

It was an overcast day, so we had nice diffused light a little later in the day, like maybe an hour.

And this is from today...SOOC

Blurry, yucky, drab.

18-200 mm lens

f 11

1/20

Bright, sunny day, harsher shadows, but early.

Linus has little fear, so he gets to ride in the back of the truck. Sally has issues and gets to ride shotgun. I snapped a few shots of the Big Guy in the side mirror hanging out the side of the truck.

Sally, surveying her minions and all her vastly surroundings. She has that "I thought I saw a Dingo" look.

I'll definately need a nap today.

Fear Itself

We watched this last night, with Eric Roberts, it was scary. I had to hold a blanket up to my face at one point, just incase...I was that scared. And then the ending...Shaun and I were "WHAT?" Kerry had long since fallen asleep.
It's like Twilight Zone meets Tales from the Crypt. Remember the Crypt Keeper? So this is what we discussed just before turning out the light to go to sleep. I thought for sure I would have nightmares. I can freak myself out pretty easily all by myself. If someone (Kerry) turns the lights out and I'm not in front of him, I can usually be found flat on the floor or against a wall when the light is turned back on. And don't jump out of a closet and try to scare me, I will punch you, in the solar plexis because you might be a zombie (true story) and don't pretend you are getting attacked by a werewolf, I will push you out of the car and drive away.
So anyway, I liked the show, it was scary in the good sense, not the super gross, unrealistic way. By the way, we gave up scary movies years ago, right after watching The Ring (the scariest movie I have ever seen). I have seen all the Scream movies, but will never ever see The Saw. Oh, I have seen M. Night Shyamalan's movies, good scary, but his new one...The Happening, it's rated R. I don't think I can see an R rated movie.

Speaking of movies, I want to see Kung Fu Panda. Maybe for Father's Day.

Rayman Raving Rabbids TV Party Ubodays 08

Rayman Raving Rabbids TV Party - Ubidays 2008: Trailer

NEWS FLASH

Those Nintendo people!!! In the Nintendo magazine there is a new game...Rayman's Raving Rabbid TV Party and it's played using the Wii Fit board!!! How fun does that look? My birthday is coming!!!

My opinion, and I do have one...

and if I like something, you will hear about it, and if I don't like something, you'll know that too.

First...photography class. The last class was last night...I'm not going to rant about it, I'm not going to be super negative but I will say a few things, and you can decide for yourself...that's fair.

1. I believe a photography teacher should have a portfolio, a pile of photos, an album, whatever, to show the class, to say "Look at me, look at my pictures, look what I can do and if you have an open mind, you can do it too." I also believe that if a 'teacher' is going to bring a photo to class, it should be a good one, printed on photo paper, and taken in this century.

2. When the Rec. center advertises "Photography Class for Digital or Film" the teacher for this class should not be a digital naysayer. He should know how to use, and maybe own a digital camera or any camera made in this century. He should NOT tell you repeatedly that digital cameras are obsolete, putting stores and Disney animators out of business.

3. Photography classes are not "Show and Tell" or "The Prices is Right". A student should not have to guess how much was paid for a 130 yr. old camera, and it should be a given that the camera we come to class with and want to learn on is the camera we plan on having for a few years. We want to learn to use what we have, not what film Sex in the City was filmed with.

4. It's Photography Class, not Cinematography Class or How To Buy An Antique Camera Class, or Let's Look At Japanese Camera Catalogue Class.

So there, that's off my chest. If I have offended anyone, say the person teaching the class, or anyone related to that person, oh, well, I think that person should be teaching "The History of Photography" or "Buying Antique Cameras on Ebay".

Secondly...I went to a Beauticontrol spa. I got a jar of Miracle Manicure for booking a spa. I have used it 3 times on my feet with their foot lotion and I have to say, the last time my feet were this soft and smooth I was in a diaper and a weighed under 100 lbs. I reallly like the stuff. My heels get pretty beat on from wearing sandals and it's been a life long dream to have smooth, soft heels. Today, I have fulfilled that dream!

Thirdly...One more baby! The end of July will bring a new member to Kerry's side of the family. The first Great-Grand Baby! We are all very excited to meet the new member!

And...I made 3 batches of cookies, the weather is finally warming up and not because I had the oven going, Shaun just finished Culinary Arts, has an offer for a part-time job at a major golf course, he just has to decide if he wants it, gas is going to kill us, it's too expensive to drive my gas hog of a van, I have a small kids scrapbooking class today, my Grandpa turns 91 this weekend, Father's Day is in a few days and I'm not ready, I've lost a few pounds, and this is what the best son ever looks like...

Oh, whoops, that's a Grande Chocolate Mint Frapaccino that the best son brought home for me today! Notice the camera shake...that's me jonesing for the caffeine...Did I mention I went 2 days without diet Coke and almost died from the Ice Pick Behind the Eye withdrawl headache? And those few pounds I said I lost, I just gained them back, they came in the form of CHOCOLATE WHIPPED CREAM!!! sigh.

Close Call

Every morning, I walk with my friend and yesterday, we almost got hit by a woman backing out of her driveway on to Rutland road. J. and I had dressed extra brightly, she had on a bright yellow t-shirt and I had on a bright orange one, we had commented on this when we left her house, on how no one would miss us. We were wrong.
This lady in her van was looking the other way, I kept my eye on her, and then as we were right behind her, she just starts reversing and didn't stop, so I hit the back of her van, her bumper was almost touching my leg, and scared the shit out of her, and us. A landscaper was just across the road and saw what happened and was shocked that the woman didn't see us, and commented on it. J. told him the driver was too busy looking at him because he was cute and couldn't be bothered with us.
We had a little laugh, but my heart was racing and then I got mad. What if I was a 3 ft. tall kid? There's no way she would have noticed that. And it was just after the kids had walked to school, so it could have happened. I hope she sat in her van for a few minutes and thought to herself about how lazy she was to not look both ways, or in her mirrors.


On another note, Shaun's grad is tonight, he graduates from the Culinary Arts Cooks program. He says graduation ceremonies start at 6pm and end at 11pm, it's grad for all OC students. He says he's not going because he has to be up at 4 am tomorrow. Oh, well, the lighting would have been poor and my pictures would have sucked.

And...I still love getting my veggies on Thursday! We all love it, even the non-veggie eaters. Tangelos are our new favourite orange. I might take a break when the garden starts producing something edible, not my garden but a garden somewhere.

We are trying to find something to do with Emily, we were discussing her amazing drawing skills with Shaun and it was decided she needs a better outlet. Although all the classes we have checked into are for 15 years and up. Shaun says she does better artwork than some of the manga books that they read. I'm taking them to the Anime Convention in Aug. and the Van. Art Gal. has a comic/manga exhibit that we will check out while we are there. Kind of scary, I can drive to Vancouver, but haven't ever driven in Vancouver. So look out!!!

I'm so excited

I took a chance and stopped at Zellers on my way to 'The History of Photography" class. It's not really what the rec centre calls it, but that's what we are being taught, this is a whole other blog post. Anyway, I stopped at Zellers, realized I forgot my iced coffee in the fridge in my new drink cup, and I forgot my most beautiful scone that I was bringing for Tara. But it was so worth it, and worked out in the end. I found hot off the press copies of Scrapbooks Etc., you know, the one with my work in it!!! So I bought a bunch for family. Then I bought a diet Pepsi, gotta get that caffeine in me some how. And Tara didn't show up for class, so I didn't need the scone. I'll let her tell you that she was sleeping.

Here it is, my little bird family tree. My first published thing, well, actually my 3rd, the others were in a mountain bike magazine and a wood crafts magazine.

Here is the front of the magazine just in case you want to run out and buy it, Zellers only had 2 left when I was done. And here is the fattest, busiest bumble bee ever. He was in every flower on my wegilia, and as he flew away gobs of pollen were falling off of him. Definitely an over achiever.Today, I plan on being half as busy as that fat bee. I have become a terrible procrastinator and now have 2 weeks of photo home work and 5 classes to prep for. But I only have myself and Zuma to blame for it.

Numb What? Spelling Bee

Bwhaahaaaaaahaaaa

The pitfalls of owning a Retriever.

I love my puppy.

I love my puppy.

I love my puppy.

Wait! Why is he being so quiet on the deck? What's that in his mouth?

The following was said through clenched teeth...

I (as I sneak up for a closer look)...

Love (as I pry his vice like jaws open)...

My (as I pull a Pokemon toy from his clenched jaws)...

Puppy (as I picture one 12 yr. old that will be not chanting along with me)

Then it was said again with different words in place of LOVE and with a few pirate ARGS added for theatrical effect.

What do I love about owning a Retriever? Not much right now.

I love the fact there's no tail to knock things over, and that Linus has the softest baby fur ever, and can have the sweetest dumb dog face.

But I detest the hair, the block headedness, the always having to chew factor, the way he is so jealous of Sally, and his soft belly that results in heinous gas (loud farts and burps), his selective hearing, and his never ending need to eat things. And add the built in alarm clock he has recently installed, goes off 4 minutes before my real alarm does.

As you can see, the cons out weigh the pros. But along with chanting "I love my puppy" we also find ourselves saying "When he grows up, he's going to be a good dog". Why would he? Because he has lots of good dog traits buried under that baby fur and brick hard head and super sized incisors. We do a lot of self talking when it comes to Linus.

I wonder what Dr. Phil would say.

I'm special.

The other day, Tara gave me this beautiful Starbucks drink container. What's so special about what looks like a used frapaccino cup? It's hard plastic, it's not to be tossed into recycling, it's to be washed and refilled again and again this summer and the bestest part, it's insulated! No melting drinks with sweating glasses for me! I'll be chillaxing by the pool with my iced coffees and perusing magazines in search of names I recognize!

Speaking of SPECIAL...I had to explain something to Emily yesterday...it wasn't easy as I have just freshly been introduced to the term "the short bus". Her friend told her that because she was short, she would ride the short bus. Makes sense. But I know from some more worldly people that back in the days of my elementary school years, there were kids that road the other bus, the shorter one, I'm not entirely sure why, but I do know they were usually educationally or behaviourly at a disadvantage. Anyway, and I didn't know this until wiser people told me a few weeks ago...this is where the saying "He rides the short bus" comes from. So in a very round about way, with lots of the term 'special friends' floating around lately, and of course, special is associated with 'slower learners', the term 'rides the short bus' has come up, and that's why Emily asked about it when we saw a short school bus. It triggered this very interesting conversation

All I want for Christmas is a Canon Speedlite 430

That's all I will need after the last couple of days. There is nothing, NOTHING, I will NEED, you can't make me buy or want another camera related item. NOPE, you can't.

After buying all the ink they had in stock for my printer at PW, and my other camera goodies, I went back today, I HAD to get a Crumpler bag for my camera. I mean, at 50% off, I'd be stupid to not get one. (If you didn't get one, I'm not calling you stupid, really, I'm not.)

So this is my camera's new home, it's compact, everything is snug as a bug in there and it's not huge. It also doesn't resemble a camera bag, therefore, I will feel safer, because I know everyone wants to steal my camera. And since they were also half price, I bought 2 of the cell phone pouches, one for the phone, one for the ipod, or for snacks.

My bag is black with brown, instead of blue like the picture. And my little pouches are black and brown, but not quite this brown.

And this baby...I borrowed the picture off Etsy, but it's the exact same fabric my mom picked out for me and made a camera strap with. I love it, now more sweaty, hair pulling Canon strap for me. It's long too, fits diagonally across my body. Which brings me to an interesting comment made by Kerry...In one of the Harry Potter movies, the Weasley's and Harry are travelling by the flue network to Diagon Alley. When Harry does it, he says "Diagonally" and ends up somewhere bad...Kerry just got it when I was showing him my strap and how it fit me "diagonally". Poor guy, we're talking years about not getting a major part of a movie!

And Mom's taking orders for straps.

So Tired

We had a very busy Saturday. We aren't really known as social butterflies, but yesterday we had 3 'parties' that we were invited to. We only went to 2 of them, and this was after a morning of walking the KVR with Shawn, Tara, and Harley. I'm very glad we had a good walk, I think I was pre-burning all the calories I would eat later in the day. It was such a great day!

The weather was perfect, I got a bit of sun but it wasn't so warm that we were sweating(cause that's gross).

We had a good time at Kerry's co-worker's 40th birthday party and then we went to JW's birthday party and ate and laughed soooo much. Yet again, we discovered that no matter how 'big' Kelowna seems to be getting, it's still really small. There was a lot of "You must know so-and-so" and "We met at so-and-so's place a few weeks ago" at both places. Small world.

And the best part, well, one of the best parts...Tara got me the bestest frapaccino cup from Starbucks, it's insulated and looks just like their cup but it's not disposable. I'll have to take a picture of it when I have my coffee drink later.

Today, we are tired.

You can see the airport, a couple of lakes, like Duck and Woods. This was taken with my 50mm and my new polarizer.

This is Caninious Escapius in his unnatural habitat trying his skills at being an alligator. Not one of his strong points.The cute couple. 50mm and me, I mean, Shawn and Tara.