Happy Halloween

In the beginning…

Then there was man with a wicked smile and a knife…

His son (you could tell it was his son, they had the same smile)…

His son had guts…

Now I could lie and say Hunter carved this pumpkin… but I suck a lying. I don’t know how long it has been since Kev carved a pumpkin, but I can tell you, the last time for me was a pumpkin carving contest at a bar… I’m sure I was drunk. And? It was easily over eight years ago. With all this preamble… I give you … our pumpkin:

In it’s full lite glory…

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November is NAtional BLOg POsting MOnth… so you can look forward to me posting everyday in November. This will be my third year participating. I have found many amazing blogs that I still read regularly through NaBloPoMo. If you’d like to participate, just wander over to www.nablopomo.com and register.

Diamond in the rough

It’s been kind of a rough couple of weeks. I’ve been sick with a head cold for the second time in a month. Work has been busy and basically, I’ve just been tired.

And when that happens, I feel like everything suffers. I feel as though I have been lacking motivation and that makes me uncomfortable.

The weather yesterday was bizarre. It was windy, chilly and raining off and on and then all at once the sun would shine brightly. I noticed the clouds at lunch time and it seemed there was every type in the sky. Big fat black ones, that looked like they were carrying snow and wispy white ones just free floating along. All intermingled with blue skies.

As I was driving home from work I saw it… a full on rainbow… end to end.

I thanked God for the show of beauty, as I always do.

Rainbows will never cease to amaze me. I was sorry Hunter wasn’t with me. I can’t wait to show him his first rainbow. I can only hope he will have my fascination for them.

Of course, I had stopped carrying my camera. I’ve been tired and busy and just haven’t been making the time for the hobby that I love so much. However, I wasn’t far from home and I knew exactly where my camera was. When I got home I practically ran for it.

I was able to get out the back door and snap a couple of pics of the fading beauty.

Greemblepix - October

Well, it’s Greemblepix contest time again.
(crap… wordpress isn’t letting me add the badge. I’ll try again tomorrow. )

Here’s my entry:

You can click on it to go to my flickr page and view a bigger version.

I’ve posted it here before, so I apologize for the lack of newness. But the contest is about captures you are really feeling. And while I have a few of Hunter that I haven’t posted yet that I am lovin’ right now, I know I’m biased. So I went for this nature shot.

Be sure and check out the other entries. There are some AMAZING pictures.

Don’t forget, NaBloPoMo is just around the corner.

12 of 12 October version

Here’s the deal: Chad Darnell is the brain behind 12 of 12. Click his name to get the details.

I was north in mid-Michigan this weekend so my 12 of 12 is almost exclusively outside. And honestly, for the first time in a long time I had a really difficult time picking only 12 pictures. So please forgive me, this is really a 14 of 12.

Oh yea, by the way, all of these pics are SOC (straight out of the camera), they haven’t even been cropped (it’s been a long day, what can I say). Please enjoy anyway.

8:27 am Hunter eating peaches for breakfast.

8:34 am I could look at these trees every day. I love the fall colors. This was taken off of my in-laws front porch.

11:25 am Walkin’ the dogs

11:27 am A Hunter in the wild … hehehehe

11:38 am Tyler will play ball ANYWHERE.

3:07 pm Leaves I spotted while on another walk.

3:20 pm Another walk. If this was always the view, I’d walk 3 times a day!

3:31 pm “Caught ya”

3:59 pm & 4:03 pm Sadly, we start the trip home. This one is a twofer. First the tree at the end of the street where we were and the second is Hunter’s sad little face as we head home.

4:09 pm A view of the drive. This makes it so easy to drive.

4:24 pm Leaving behind…

4:44 pm and 4:50pm… this one is a twofer. The road home, but it wouldn’t be a Michigan road without some construction.

This is weird…

Ok, this is just weird.

Kev left for his weekend hunting trip yesterday afternoon.

He took the dogs.

And he took Hunter.

It’s just me and the cats in the house.

…weird

I’m going up today. That’s right. A nice long drive, by myself. I can roll the window down, blair the music and drive. Talk about relaxing.

Hey Cindy Lou, when are you leaving for Georgia? I will be pretty close to you this weekend.

Hey everybody… um… okay… hey, you there…. Lol

Don’t forget, Sunday is the 12th… it’s 12 of 12 time again.

How to fight the frumpies

Before:

Here’s one with sunglasses to make the comparison fair:

After:

My Mom gave me money for my birthday and told me I had to spend it on myself and then I had to report back what I bought. Well Mom, here’s my report. I bought myself a new do.

Weekend in review, plus 2

Sunday’s are really best for naptime.

After naptime we went to Spicer’s Apple Orchard. Lot’s of things to play on here.

The Zip line is his FAVORITE!

Inside the train. I love the effect the light through the slates has.

Hunter never has a good time…

And the plus 2 are from today. Its’ Spirit Week at school and today is bandage day.

Already picking the band-aids off. For the record, he is the one that wanted a band-aid on every finger.

Too cool for school!

As always, more pics over on flickr.

They say it’s your birthday. It’s my birthday too–yeah.

In honor of my 45th birthday, I put together a list of 45 things that I believe are the essence of me. These words finish the following sentence about me:

I am (a/an)

1. Mom
2. Wife
3. sister
4. daughter
5. optimist*
6. realist*
7. lover of photography
8. generous
9. bean counter
10. introspective
11. easy-going
12. sensitive (overly)
13. smart
14. nature lover
15. animal lover
16. ocean gazer
17. thinker
18. reader
19. drawer (as in one who draws, not part of a dresser) lol
20. curious
21. over-thinker
22. voter
23. skinny on the inside
24. not-so-much on the outside
25. food lover
26. specifically, ice cream lover
27. teacher (to my son)
28. listener
29. peaceful
30. go with the flow kinda gal
31. Libra
32. coffee drinker
33. focused*
34. sarcastic
35. passionate
36. Mona Vie drinker
37. tree lover
38. independent*
39. silly
40. calligrapher
41. perfectionist
42. cooker
43. baker
44. young at heart
45. 45 years old, today.

*words I got from my hubby.

In the beginning

Kev and I were sitting on the couch talking and Kev motioned to me to stop… he was trying to listen to Hunter.

Hunter was standing on a plastic tote, reciting something. He was saying it over and over again. Kev thought it was the pledge of allegiance. As soon as he brought it to my attention, I knew what he was saying…

{in his best 2 year old dialect}
“In the beginning
God created the heabens and earth”

I think he also said something about Adam and Eve, but honestly I was trying to decipher the look on Kevin’s face and I was kinda shocked at what I was hearing.

Honestly… I was feeling fierce feelings of pride too.

Kevin said obviously Hunter doesn’t have any grasp of what he was saying.

True, but I’m guessing he also has no idea who Old MacDonald is and wouldn’t know a farm if he was standing on it.

But still…. I’m having a hard time containing my amazement.

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This is not my planned “45 things” post… that’s tomorrow.

Happy Birthday Bill!! (9/26)

Last Friday, September 26th was my brother’s birthday. My Mom always tries to take us (my brother and I) out to lunch on our birthday. Last Friday was no exception. Since Hunter’s daycare was closed, I didn’t work so I went with them.

Why wouldn’t Hunter even say Happy Birthday to Uncle Bill… but then continued to sing it all weekend, when Uncle Bill was no where to be seen?

It was so nice to have a family birthday lunch with all of us together. And of course I took my camera… and yes, I took some pictures.

This is my brother and my Mom. Now my brother is going to be mad that I didn’t’ post the pic of my Mom making a face, but since my Mom reads my blog, I didn’t want her to leave a nasty comment – Hi Mom!!

This is my brother and Hunter… two of my three favorite men in the world!

My brother and I have an amazing relationship. I was the baby of the family and I’m sure they will both tell you; I put my all into being a “little sister”. I know I drove my brother nuts… it was my job.

Since it was only the three of us (Mom, Bill and me), my brother often had to take on a dual role… big brother and man of the house. And he did that with grace and patience. He seemed to know when I needed a brother and when I needed more of a father figure.

My brother protected me, guided me and whether he knows it or not truly helped mold me into the person that I am today.

I wouldn’t change our family for anything in the world. I’m so glad I got to see you on your birthday. I love you Bill!

You are still my favorite brother. lol

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Tomorrow: 45 things…