Not Dead

Yes, I am still alive.  No, I didn't fall off the face of the earth. 

It has been one heck of a week, and I don't have the energy to talk about it. (Nothing bad happened.)

Maybe next week.

New Lights

First of all, do any of you still have a bracket that is not busted?  If you read my picks from my last post, you would know that mine has been busted since Friday.  Sad.  I guess I can hold out hope for the random prize, because I am in 18th-ish place now, with no hope of getting any more points.

This weekend, my brother came over to mow my yard and to install some new light fixtures.  A lady at my mom's work gave them to me.  I have already changed most of the light fixtures (using the term "I" loosely) in my house since I moved in, but I still had these lovely old creatures hanging around in my laundry room.

There are two lights in my laundry room, and these old ones just were kind of outdated.  They also only have one light bulb, so they didn't put out a lot of light.  We traded them for these, which have 2 light bulbs and give out more light so I can see better!

My friend Lyndsey just posted on my facebook that her husband calls these the boob lights.  ha!  Anyway, I'll take the free, bright boob lights over the ugly, dim 70s lights any day.

Oh happy day!

Yesterday was a pretty good day for me.  My church is doing a 24/7 Prayer thing that started last week and will go for 40 days (until Easter).  Everyone is supposed to sign up for an hour or two (or however many you want) to pray.  There is a website that is used for the scheduling so that everyone knows what times are available.  It is pretty neat.  Anyway, yesterday was my first time.  I signed up for an hour earlier than I normally get up to get ready for work.  I actually was able to get up when the alarm went off.  I was pretty scared that I would oversleep or turn off the alarm (which happens almost every day) and leave my hour unattended.  I'm pretty sure that this was the first time in my life that I have ever prayed for a solid hour.  It was a good way to start my morning.  I'm not sure that I could do that every morning as I have a hard enough time making it to work on time anyway, but it was good and refreshing.  I also had the same 6-7am shift this morning.  It was a little harder to get up today, but I made it in time.  Yesterday was such a good experience that I also signed up for 2 hours next week and 1 more hour the following week.  I don't want to steal all the good times!  :)

So when I got home last night, I had 2 surprises waiting on me.  My Realtor sent me a happy "house-iversary" card!  I love getting things in the mail that are not junk or bills!  The second thing was that there were some railing parts and pieces in my front yard.  Now, normally I would not be excited that there were random pieces of metal in my yard.... but this one is a long time coming, so I figure any progress is good news.  I was actually thinking that maybe this guy took my deposit money and ran off, never to return again.  I actually hired him a little over 8 weeks ago (and gave him $250), and he has had excuse after excuse for not coming out.  I was just about to call him today if I didn't hear from him.  I did take some "before" pictures (although they are from a long time ago when it was snowing!), and hopefully I will have some "after" pictures soon!

How's your bracket holding up?  I'm not doing so hot.  So far I'm in 18th place in my 28 person pool.  I only have 2 teams left in the final four, Ohio State and Florida.  At least they are the two I picked to be in the Championship game.  Here's a picture of my bracket.  The highlighted ones are my right picks and the scribbled out ones are my wrong picks.

I heard the Marquette coach on the radio this morning and he seems like a really nice guy.  Too bad I'm going to have to root against him.  I really need Ohio State, North Carolina, and Kansas to win tonight to somewhat redeem myself in my bracket group!

Blogging Challenge: Post 2

DAY 02: A PICTURE OF YOU AND SOMEONE YOU USED TO BE CLOSE WITH

This is my second post in the blogging challenge.  I am going to try to post one of these everyday unless I have something better to post about that day.  :)

So here we go.  Some people I used to be close to:



This is (from left to right): Stephanie, me, Lyndsey, Melissa, and Diane.  Judging by the looks of the place, this was taken at the bowling alley and from the date it looks like it was the summer after we graduated from high school, but I guess the date could be wrong... (Sorry the quality is not that great.  I swiped this from my facebook where it was scanned in.  Besides its really old! haha)

We were the best of friends (most of the time) in high school.  I met Diane and Stephanie in junior high school, and I met Lyndsey and Melissa in high school.  Lyndsey was my first high school friend.  We met at band practice the week or so before school started my 9th grade year.  The only one in this group that I still keep in contact with is Lyndsey.  Too bad we live so far away from each other.
It is funny to me to look back at these old pictures and see how my life is so much different now than it was back then and where I thought I would be now.

And because I like to embarrass myself, here are a few more pictures from around that same time:

Um, a pyramid.  Obviously.  I think it was a sleepover.

Lyndsey, me, Louisa, and Stephanie going to Riverfest

Lyndsey, Louisa, and Me before the N*SYNC concert.  haha.  The best part about this is that they were Backstreet Boys fans and I was the N*SYNC fan and they still came with me to this concert at War Memorial Stadium.

A fun little trip down memory lane.

It's Baseball Season!

Last night, Arkansas played Memphis here in North Little Rock at Dickey-Stephens Park.  My brother is home from college on Spring Break, so we went to cheer on the Hogs to victory.  Here we are just after getting there:

Oh, how I love Razorback baseball.  It was interesting though.  It took us about an hour to get there and find parking, where it would normally be only about 15-20 minutes.  If we would have taken my brother's truck, we might have been able to park a little quicker because there were some spaces on the curb, but I was afraid that my little old car would get stuck if I tried to drive it up a curb with 2 people in it. haha!  (And the curb spots were free!  We had to pay $10 to park in a shady parking lot a couple of blocks away.  It was only $5 to park right next to the stadium in their parking lot.  I guess we should have gone a little earlier.) There were 10,065 people there, and it was sold out.  This is the same stadium where our Travelers play, and I don't think they have ever had a sold out game?  I bet there were 3 times as many people there last night as at a typical Travs game, and they doubled the ticket price.  All of the actual seats were sold out when I got our tickets, so we ended up with berm tickets.  I think I may have expressed my feelings towards the outdoors on here before.  I don't like to be outside really, and I especially don't want to sit in the grass. :)  As luck would have it, even though we had berm tickets, the whole Freaking berm was stuffed full of people.  We couldn't even find a seat unless we wanted to sit in a stranger's lap.  We ended up standing behind one of the seated sections because we could see better anyway.  A family left about halfway through the game, so we were able to snag their seats. Score!

Blogging Challenge- Post 1

So my friend Lyndsey is starting a blog, and she isn't sure how to get started.  I saw this blogging challenge here and I thought it would be a good way to get into blogging.  So, I'm going to do it too (and whenever she finally writes her first post, you should go read it- and follow her.)  However, I can't always blog everyday, so I'm going to be a little lenient with the schedule.  Feel free to join in with us!


Here is the schedule:

DAY 01: A PICTURE OF YOURSELF WITH FIFTEEN FACTS



DAY 02: A PICTURE OF YOU AND SOMEONE YOU USED TO BE CLOSE WITH


DAY 03: A PICTURE OF THE CAST FROM YOUR FAVORITE TV SHOW


DAY 04: A PICTURE OF YOUR FAVORITE DAY


DAY 05: A PICTURE OF ONE OF YOUR FAVORITE MEMORIES


DAY 06: A PICTURE OF A PERSON YOU'D LOVE TO CHANGE PLACES WITH FOR A DAY


DAY 07: A PICTURE OF YOUR MOST TREASURED ITEM


DAY 08: A PICTURE THAT MAKES YOU LAUGH


DAY 09: PICTURE OF YOUR FAVORITE FLOWER


DAY 10: A PICTURE OF THE PEOPLE YOU DID THE CRAZIEST THINGS WITH


DAY 11: A PICTURE OF SOMETHING YOU DON'T LIKE


DAY 12: A PICTURE OF SOMETHING YOU LIKE


DAY 13: A PICTURE OF YOUR FAMILY


DAY 14: A PICTURE OF SOMEONE YOU COULD NEVER IMAGINE YOUR LIFE WITHOUT


DAY 15: A PICTURE OF SOMETHING YOU WANT TO DO BEFORE YOU DIE.


DAY 16: A PICTURE OF WHERE YOU WANT TO LIVE OUT YOUR DAYS


DAY 17: A PICTURE OF YOUR FAVORITE SUPER HERO


DAY 18: FIRST 10 SONGS ON YOUR iPOD SHUFFLE


DAY 19: A PICTURE OF YOU AS A KID


DAY 20: A PICTURE OF SOMEWHERE YOU'D LIKE TO TRAVEL


DAY 21: A PICTURE FROM LAST SUMMER


DAY 22: A PICTURE OF YOUR FAVORITE FOOD


DAY 23: A PICTURE OF SOMETHING YOU WISH YOU WERE BETTER AT


DAY 24: A PICTURE OF YOUR FAVORITE BOOK


DAY 25: A PICTURE OF YOU AND YOUR SIBLINGS


DAY 26: A PICTURE OF THE LAST MOVIE YOU SAW IN THEATERS


DAY 27: A PICTURE OF A TRADITION YOU HAVE


DAY 28: A PICTURE OF YOUR FAVORITE PLACE TO SHOP


DAY 29: A PICTURE OF WHERE YOU LIVE


DAY 30: A PICTURE OF YOUR FAVORITE SPORT
 
So today is a picture of me with 15 random facts. 
 
This is what I look like.  Please ignore the pile of presents in the floor of my bedroom behind me.  :) 
 (p.s. when I was looking back over this post- I noticed that one of my eyes looks bigger than the other.  I think it is just the angle because I'm pretty sure both of my eyes are the same size?) 

 

1.  I don't like meat.  Except for bacon.  I love extra crispy bacon!

2.  Pink is my favorite color.

3.  I like to make lists.  For Everything.

4.  It bothers me when I don't do the laundry all at one time.  It shouldn't sit in the washer or dryer for any amount of time.  :)

5.  I like to look for coupons and get good deals even if it is a lot of work!

6.  The giraffe is my favorite zoo animal.

7.  My joints pop a lot.  If I don't pop my neck or my back, it hurts and gets stiff.

8.  I just got texting on my phone in November.  I'm a slow techology adopter.

9.  I don't like to be barefooted.  Even though I live in Arkansas, I do wear shoes. :)

10.  My car is a piece of junk.  It has had a long, rough life but as long as it will go, I'm going to keep driving it.  I see a new car in my new future though.

11.  I really like polka dots.

12.  I also really like shiny things, so if there is something that has polka dots and glitter- I'll probably buy it. haha

13.  I am afraid of getting into the ocean and the lake.  I'm totally cool with swimming pools, but I am afraid of the creatures that live in those other bodies of water.

14.  I like to cook weird and random recipes.  They don't always turn out very well.

15.  I like to be busy- all the time.  I don't like to sit at home with nothing to do.

Well, there ya go.  15 random facts about me.  I tried to tell you things that I haven't talked about on here before.  We will see if I can keep up with this blogging challenge.  I'll try my best!

Spring has sprung.

Two things.

First- the weekend.  It was crazy.  I spent practically all my free time watching basketball.  But that is the second thing, so we won't talk about that now.  :)

Saturday, Heifer Village had a family fun day called Spring Celebration of Life.  They had alot of different animals there to pet and look at.  There was a scavenger hunt and lots of fun things to do.  Here I am with half of the sign in front of the building because my little sister took the picture....

While we were downtown, we went with some friends to Riverfront Park for a picnic and to play at the park.  Then we ran home really quick to plant the stuff that we got from Heifer Village.  We got a bookmark that had wildflower seeds in it that you planted and then the bookmark would decompose.  We planted that by the front steps to my house.  She also planted some cucumber seeds in a toilet paper roll, and they told us that we could just plant the whole thing in the ground and it should grow.  That was pretty hard to do since my yard is so rocky.  We will see if any of the seeds actually grow.  Then I went to an Arbonne party, and Sunday was pretty laid back- just church and basketball and cleaning.

Now on to the second thing- the NCAA tournament.  Do you have a bracket?  I made one and there are 28 people in my pool.  I think I am in 18th place.  boo.  Yesterday was a bad, bad day for my teams.  I was doing pretty well until yesterday.  I only have 7 teams in the sweet sixteen, and only 3 of my teams are left in the final four.  I don't think I even want to know how much of my weekend was consumed by basketball...  However, there are prizes at stake, so I am trying to somehow redeem my choices and cheer my (few) teams on to victory.  I guess it is a good thing that there are not any more games until Thursday so that I can have my evenings back for a few days.  :)

This is why my brain is not functioning today.

So this weekend has sufficiently worn me out.  Friday I left work early because I wasn't feeling so hot.  I think it was just because I was already tired.  No fever or anything.  Then Friday night my church had a 24-hour prayer retreat, but I was assured that we would have plenty of sleeping time, so I went ahead and attended.  It was a good time.  However, I was even more tired by the time we left.  Then Saturday night my friend Karen was having what we have lovingly come to call a Glee-A-Thon, where we eat and talk and watch an episode or two or three of Glee.  I only stayed through 2 epidsodes because I was so tired.  Then of course Daylight Savings Time had to happen on the day that I had to be at church early (like 2 hours early- so with the time change 3 hours early) to play handbells.  Let's just say that caffeine was most certainly my friend yesterday.  I was trying to not take a nap on Sunday afternoon because usually I can't sleep at night when I do that, but I accidentally fell asleep for about an hour and a half before my Sunday night Bible study.  Luckily though, I was able to sleep last night. 

Also my washing machine kind of went on the fritz yesterday before my nap.  It decided to randomly stop working twice yesterday on the same load of laundry.  I have done one load since then without problems so I am hoping it was just having a temper tantrum.  I don't really want to have to deal with getting a new washer right now.

So onto today.  This has been one disaster of a day.  Nothing really bad has actually happened, it just seems like nothing is going smoothly.  I actually got out of bed when my alarm went off this morning (WHAT??!  that never happens....) and left for work about 20 minutes early with the thought that if I went in early, then I could leave early.  Well... considering that it took me an hour and 10 minutes to get to work and I was 10 minutes late, that sure isn't going to happen.   The traffic was absolutely terrible!  Apparently some fine gentleman put some briefcases on the overpass onto the freeway right beside my neighborhood.  Basically it was a bomb scare and the bomb squad had to come take care of things.  I mean seriously?  Who does that?  People are crazy.  Then there was another accident on the freeway.  And then finally when I was almost to my parking lot, some genious bicyclist (who I couldn't even see- did I mention that it was dark and dreary and raining this morning?) decided that he shouldn't look to see if the person driving the car (me) saw him going through the intersection without even slowing down, and he drove right in front of my car.  Of course when I saw him, I slammed on my brakes and then because of the wet roads, my car skidded across the road.  Oh man, I almost had a heart attack.  I was half mad at the guy and half glad I didn't hit him.

Also I am a Tuesday juror, so I have to call every Monday to see if I have to report to the courthouse the next day.  I have to call between 10 am and 1 pm.  Guess what time I remembered?  12:50.  Seriously. 

Also, in case you have been living under a rock, today is the finale of the Bachelor.  I am excited to see who he picks, but I sure hope it is Emily.  Chantal is crazy and I do not like her.  I have handbells practice until 7:30 (show starts at 7) but I'm going to see if we can somehow work a deal to get out early since we just performed yesterday.  :)

From Hogs to Flowers

Well, last night the Hogs lost to Tennessee in the SEC Basketball Championship.  That pretty much ends the season for us, so I thought I would change my front door decorations.  The Diamond Hogs (baseball) are of course still playing, but I don't really keep up with that too much since the games aren't on tv.  But my brother and I are going to the game when the Diamond Hogs come to North Little Rock for a game!  From the beginning of football season until last night, my front door looked like this:

A Razorbacks sign that I made with two of my favorite things: The hogs and polka dots.

And now it looks like this:

Pretty spring flowers instead of a Razorbacks sign.  Maybe now the weather will warm up more quickly?

Cupcakes!

On Wednesday nights, I hang out with a bunch of 5th and 6th graders at my church.  Usually we go out to eat somewhere together and then come back to the church for a lesson and some kind of fun games or activities.  Tonight is a little different because it is Ash Wednesday, and we are going together to our church's service.  Since we will have to eat quickly, the other teacher and I decided that we should bring some food and eat it at the church.  So she is bringing pizza, and I made cupcakes:

They were supposed to be fudge marble cupcakes, but I was too lazy to actually do the marbling in each of the cupcakes, so I just mixed it all together.  So basically they are chocolate cupcakes with chocolate icing.  I hope those kids like chocolate.  I put less icing on them than usual because I used store-bought icing since I didn't have time to make any and I was afraid that I wouldn't have enough.  Since I used less icing, I have some leftover chocolate icing in my fridge calling my name!  And although I can make some that tastes better, it is pretty darn good!

Laid back weekend

This weekend was pretty slow.  Friday night, I went to the card ministry meeting at my church where we stamped with bleach.  I may have killed a few brain cells that day.  Then we went out to eat dinner at Tropical Smoothie, and I got to use the last of my Groupons for that place.  Then we wandered across the parking lot to Starbucks to hang out for a while.

Saturday was my cousin's 13th birthday party and then afterwards we went to eat at On the Border with the world's slowest waiter.  The Hogs lost again in their game that day too.  We still have the SEC tournament, but I'm thinking it is not going to end up well.  I guess there is always next year....

Sunday, I went to church and then went to McDonalds (yuck) for lunch because my sister said that we should let the kid tastes choose the place for lunch.  Then I decided that I wanted some new shoes, so I went to the mall because I had a Dillard's gift card.  I ended up with these:

They kind of hurt my feet a little, but the people in the store convinced me that they will stretch a little.  I sure hope so because I love them and can't wait to wear them when it gets a little more spring-like outside!

I will try to do better about taking pictures... I know I haven't had a post with real pictures in it in a long time.

Weekend Wrap-Up

I have been lacking in the blogging motivation lately!  I feel like I still have not recovered from my super busy weekend.

Friday night, my Sunday School class had a girls night.  We went to eat at Macaroni Grill and then everyone came back to my house to hang out.  Some of the girls even made some coasters with my leftover materials.  I am glad to get some of that stuff used, since apparently when I bought the supplies, I intended on making coasters for everyone that I have ever met.  :)  I still have about 30 tiles left, so if anyone needs any, let me know.

Saturday morning started out bright and early with a trip to Lows Bridal in Brinkley, AR to look at wedding dresses with Cherry.  She tried on some really beautiful things, but I think her heart is still set on this one from David's Bridal.  I wish she would have chosen my favorite!  :)  Then we made a short side trip and then had to get back to Little Rock because our friend Louisa who came with us had to get back to work.  Then Cherry, Stacy and I went to my fav restaurant, Pei Wei, for lunch.  I even branched out to try a new thing, but I think it is not as good as my old stand by, Pei Wei Spicy chicken.  At least I tried something new.  I was proud of myself haha.

Then on Saturday afternoon, we had a joint birthday party for my brother and dad.  I had to run and pick up the pottery that my sister painted for our dad on the way to the party and wrap it in the car.  It turns out that a chip was knocked out of it when they were firing it or whatever, but it still turned out cute.  I was too rushed to notice in the car.  Then we went out to eat after the party, and they chose Macaroni Grill.  Seriously I ate there two nights in a row.  Good thing I like fettuccini alfredo.  :)  My aunt and uncle also gave me a bed that they don't want any more, so my brother and I had to move it from their house to mine after dinner.  I just put it in storage for now, since all of the rooms have a bed.  But my roommate has her own furniture, so whenever she moves out, I will need another bed.

Sunday morning I went to church and then had a quick pizza lunch with my sister, and said goodbye to my brother who was going back to college.  Then I went to Stone Soup, which is a soup kitchen ministry put on by many of the Methodist churches in the area, who take turns serving the meal at Quapaw Quarter UMC.  My church has the 4th Sunday of every other month, and I try to go as often as possible.  We always have a good time.  This time we made chicken and dressing and fruit salad, and fruit and cake.  We served 114 people, so we had a good turnout.  Then I went straight from Stone Soup to the Bible study that I help lead at my church.

It was a good, but very busy weekend!  Today happens to be the birthday of 3 people in my family!  I hope the basketball Hogs pull out a win in honor of their special day!  :)