RANDOM RECENT

FUN EVENING BIKE ride.

SHELBY BEING SILLY during the DNC. Her opinion is obvious. (Disclaimer - We never eat dinner in front of the TV but this night was a bit of an exception so mommy's brain could grow).

YOUNIVERSE

CHECK THIS OUT, it is cool! Its called your 'visual DNA'. The one below is me, but I think you can do your own from it.

Youniverse - the new home of Imagini - Personality: Feedback

P.S.

WE DID IT! Cold turkey! No more pacifier! Her last day was Thursday(21st). OH MY GOSH, Friday was hell! But I was still glad to be the one with her all day. No joking, it was a struggle for her.

IT CONTINUES...

YOU ALL RECALL 'the strawberry shoe' from a previous post right? Well, I thought that was a one time quirky and hilarious little thing.
I guess this is going to be an on going thing! I love walking in to a room to find a Shelby filled something. This behavior comes so naturally to her, I love it. You just cant buy this kind of entertainment.


She has a definite thing for shoe filling.

AND...


Keep up the good work Willy!

GOOD OL FASHION SLUMBER PARTY

COMPLETE WITH JUNK food, secret hidden rooms and talk of boys. Some friends and I spent the night in a beautiful mansion in Biltmore Estates, all in the name of Slumber Party!

This picture was taken at 1:30am and was only a quarter of us left still there and awake. My good friend Ruth(front left on the leopard) and I shared the guest house bed and stayed up talking until 4am(what girls do best), man that felt good, its been awhile!
Thank you to the Robinson's, what a fun night!



Moses, a.k.a. 'the butler' (at least thats what I call him), he is always at the door or around the foyer when I go. LOVE HIM!

A 'MINI SERIES'

SOME PICTURES OF Shelby. I could not stop clicking! Here are only a few...

GYPPED!...A BLESSING IN DISGUISE

LAST WEEK I perused Craigslist in search of the first bike I would have ever bought for myself. This is the one good thing about living in a city; running errands on a bike is possible. Saving gas, fun with Shelby, and getting some exercise, a perk. With a limited budget I found the perfect bike for me; a sweet black beach cruiser all decked out for only $75. All the way in North Phoenix, I call the guy, get the address and tell him I am on my way and that I would be there in an hour. Shelby and I grab a snack and head out the door only to pull up to this dudes house with my bike driving away in the back of someone Else's car. AAAahhhhhhhhhh!!!!!! I was pissed! SO, I knock on the door bottling up all my anger as to not scare the crap out of sweet Shelby. The guy playing dumb says "oh, man, I totally thought that was you", "OH REALLY!" I reply "because I am pretty sure that who ever that was also needed to get directions to your house, which you gave to them unless they are PSYCHIC!"..."What, nothing to say to that??", that's what I thought. So finally he opens his garage with 8 more cruisers in it and offers me a much crappier version of a bicycle for $50, I gave him 40 and took 'my' bike and left.
I'm not to bad at making lemons into lemonade so I stared at my old bike long enough to see it in a new sort of way. Ill just fix it up with the left over money from my cool bike that I didn't get. Enlisting the help of my friend and neighbor Nick (the BMXer), this is how it went.

THE BEFORE...

NICK TAKING IT apart to paint it

ONE OF THE freakiest moments of my life. A little token waiting inside the 'petal chamber' (my own terminology, don't quote me) from Joe the jerks garage.

AND THE AFTER...

I HAD SO much fun working on this bike. Thanks for your help Nick, and thanks for taking my bike, people with the car. I like mine better.

RECENT OF SHELBY

BY SOME MIRACLE

FINALS ARE THIS week and I, formerly in anticipation for a carefree night of study, dropped Shelby off with Josh to come home and get as much done as I possibly could in one night. Unable to predict my dis-ease, I have found it harder to focus without knowing that Shelby is peacefully asleep in the next room squeezing tight her Milhouse in pale pink 70's style bird print pajamas, breathing sweetly and softly. Every night before I tuck myself into bed I peek into her room to see her innocence at rest, almost unable to shut the door and turn away from her direction I find myself with perpetual night time butterfly's remembering in that ritualistic moment that by some miracle I am Mother to a Daughter.

OUR VERY SPECIAL bed time poem dedicated from me to her..

A Child's Thought of God

They say that God lives very high!
But if you look above the pines
You cannot see our God. And why?

And if you dig down in the mines
You never see Him in the gold,
Though from him all that's glory
shines.

God is so good, He wears a fold
Of heaven and earth across His
face-

Like secrets kept, for love untold.

But still I feel that His embrace
Slides down by thrills, through all
things made,
Through sight and sound of every
place:

As if my tender mother laid
On my shut lids, her kisses'
pressure,

Half-waking me at night and said,
"who kissed you through the dark,
dear guesser?"

Elizabeth Barrett Browning

INTELLIGENT DETACHMENT

I HAVE BEEN reading 'Eat, Pray, Love' lately and I just cant send enough thank yous out into the universe to Elizabeth Gilbert for publishing her book the year of my divorce. She is brilliant but skips over the use of $1,000,000 words (you know the kind of book that makes you keep a dictionary next to you). As impressive as that is, it is just trying to hard sometimes. This book is insanely entertaining, honest and rather insightful.

On page 173 is a passage that leaped off of the page and slapped me in the face. Leaving behind so many people, things, and places this year, and only keeping around a select few without feeling an ounce of loss or grief for (not all) those tossed relationships. I could understand my own feelings for the need to incorporate this practice into my life, but trying to explain those feelings to others was impossible for me...until now.

"Still, I can see where cultivating a measure of intelligent detachment in your life can be a valuable instrument of peace." "I got to thinking about how much time I spend in my life crashing around like a great gasping fish, either squirming away from some uncomfortable distress or flopping hungrily toward ever more pleasure. And I wonder whether it might serve me (and those who are burdened with the task of loving me) if I could learn to stay still and endure a bit more without always getting dragged along on the potholed road of circumstance."

Now it seems so easy to explain...it is when the need for Peace trumps all.

NAME {?} {!} {.}

WEDNESDAY EVENING I took Shelby down to PetSmart to pick out a fish. She liked the orange goldfish but I liked the bubble free maintenance of a beta, so I convinced her that the bright red beta was SOOOOOO cool! She discussed the matter with Milhouse then collectively they agreed.


After we got home I asked Shelby what she would like to name her new fish(promising myself to accept whatever she would like, I prayed to avoid such names as Nemo and Bubbles) she simply replied..."Name". Granted it was more of a.."name?" emphasis on the question mark or, "name!, because Mom I just repeat everything you say".

Personally, I love it! Shelby has her first fish and his name is....Name!

HONKY TONK BADONKADONK

4TH OF JULY in Prescott!

Dave...mounted!



Sarah, the snails advocate!

TOYOTA!


I realize how unoriginal this is but you cant visit Prescott without photographing the court house.

Just a couple of all American boys.


Fireworks at Embry-Riddle, Bens Alma Matre.

Anthony . Brandon . Me . Ben . Emily . Dave . Daisy


The tightest wranglers in the west! Dance ready Brandon and Ben.

PARADE

Kinda sad..


26TH ANNUAL BOOT RACE

The planets most annoying announcers! We get it - Ariat boots rock, your obsessed with beer and women are complete idiots! Gentlemen..."there's your sign"!

Ben came in second! We are so proud!


Lunch at The Palace, this is the ceiling.

"THE" IPOD / POLITICS / TOILETTE PAPER CREEK / TARP SURFING / CAR CIRCLES / 2 STEPPING...CAN YOU CALL IT THAT? / MAN MULLET, WOMAN? MULLET / VERY GRACEFUL DOGS-A.K.A. DEER / PUNCH THE DOGMAN FOR $50 / SSSHHHH, QUIET! HAVE A PIECE OF CAKE.

"GIRLS HAVE MUSTACHES TOO YA KNOW"

FRIDAY NIGHT A couple of my friends and I went camping out at Bartlett Lake. I sit down to blog this but cannot begin to know where to start. It was one of those trips that "you just have to be there"...but ill do my best!
SORT OF A last minute invite from a friend of my friends, we left around 7 Friday night and got to Bartlett just in time to watch Jaws projected onto a sheet on the shore with the other groups. After the classic production intended to scare us, we decided to go swimming..go figure. But back it up..this request came from Brandon! Brandon is not what one would necessarily call a camper, in fact he genuinely dislikes it. So with Brandon in rare form Dave and I quickly agreed.


I believe this was the only moment in the last 7 years that I was grateful for the 115 degree weather that had so brilliantly warmed the lake. Followed by a dozen others we got to talking about the last time we went swimming in a lake at night. Since high school! That is way too long. This discussion led to another coveted high school era "activity", Truth or Dare! skipping right over the details we got out an hour or so later, dried off and played some poker before turning in and talking/cracking up until 3 something in the morning. But not before one more solicitation from Brandon offering a bit of his pot pie...8 hour old CHICKEN pot pie. We declined and threatened Brandon with warnings of what a chicken pot pie might do to a person after 8 hours in an Arizona desert.


The next day

TAKING PICTURES THROUGH a floaty raft thing???

FOOTBALL

VOLLEYBALL

CHILLIN IN THE car playing with the camera waiting for Gina to get in. Happily filthy dirty, tired, and ready to go home.

BENBLUBALLS . MANGO STRAWBERRY FRUTISTAS . POT PIE . TRAUMATIC BONDING . DAVE SHARK . PARTY CRASHING . DEBBIE DOWNER . BENS SLEEPING BAG PILLOW . GIRLS HAVE MUSTACHES TOO SAYS THE BANK TELLER . SPF 60 . BLUE SHORTS GUY . BLACK SHIRT GUY . RED SHIRT GUY . MARRY DATE DO . DAVE SAUCE . RED CHIP . STEELY DAN . LETS GO TO CALIFORNIA...I AGREE!