I saw this over at Marmite and Tea and thought it looked like a lot of fun. I copied in my last 10 or 11 posts out of curiosity, and viola. I don’t know much. If you want to see which words you use the most go see Wordle.

Wow that's a little thumbnail, let's see if I can. . .

Yay, I did it!

I’ve never had anything bad happen on a Friday the 13^th, have you? In fact, the only Friday-the-13^th memory I have is finding out I was pregnant with my first child September 13^th, 1985. What’s your Friday-the-13^th memory?

I always fear when I need to let out some steam, that you all will go away, or click away with thoughts of, “There she goes again. Can’t she just get over it already?!” I’m always happy to find understanding and comfort in the words you leave me.

And I always hope to share words of hope and normality to fellow cancer victims. Baby steps, it’s much like AA, One day at a time. Through cancer I really learned how to enjoy the now, not looking forward or backward but loving the moment. I don’t much love the moments of laundry and such (that’s probably why I’m still trying to get caught up afte vacation), sometimes those things seem beneath me. Like why, should I be wasting the precious moments I have doing chores? But they are part of life and when I wake up still kicking the next day I decide they won’t do themselves and accomplish them. Uh, sometimes, but sometimes I have a wonderfully understanding husband wake up before me and do them first.

So really, I just wanted to let you know, that I appreciate you. I need you and I love having you in my life.

Maybe this is a good time to tell you that there’s something in the works here. You’ll be seeing some changes, although slow, it may be a month or so before everything’s done, but if you like, you are welcome to start reading and commenting over here. Right now the surroundings are just blah, basic, no-frills, but all the posts are the same, same content there and here until the change is complete. I am hoping the change makes it easier for you guys to comment. You’re the reason for the change, so I hope it will be worth it. I know many of you have had difficulty commenting on blog-city and although I’ve sought support several times nothing has changed so I guess I have to change hosts. So for now, feel free to read me here or here and I’ll let you know when the full change has been made.

 We're taking off this morning and headed towards home.  See ya'll soon!

 I'm leaving the heat of Misery Missouri for the cooler days of Wisconsin.

 SO look for me coming your way for a virtual visit as soon as I get unpacked and start some laundry.

My parents live in southwest Missouri and this time the tornado hit about a half mile from their house.  That's just a little too close for comfort.  And, from what I have heard on the weather channel that tornado has been classified as an f4, about a mile wide.  Scary stuff.

Mom and dad got lucky and the only damage they sustained was one down tree and a few branches.  Some of their very close neaighbors weren't so lucky.

This guy was trying to get his car a little protection from the golf ball sized hail.  Guess that didn't work, but he's ok.

These people lost 47 trees in a storm 5 years ago and now the remainder are gone.  But their house is still standing, which is actually saying a lot considering two of their immediate neighbors lost their homes.

Photos are courtesy of my mom and dad.

PS - Would you believe that I am still sick?!  Please tell me that the coughing will end soon and I will once again feel alive, cuz right now I feel like Picher Oklahoma.

So, here is our favorite camera store, The Camera Casino. Their storefront is not being changed but if you just walk out their door, over half of their block and beyond definitely looks different.

All of the businesses are remaining open during these preparations and filming (April 10-20). You just cannot be on the roads in front of the businesses while filming is going on. Oh, did I not tell you why there were changes being made? My bad! Have you heard of John Dillinger? How about Johnny Depp? Well the filming of Public Enemies (bank robbers John Dillinger, Charles Arthur "Pretty Boy" Floyd and Lester "Baby Face Nelson" Gillis) has started.

There’s just a little bit of chaos downtown. For instance, you see that “Lucky’s Men Clothing” sign? You might not be able to read that white paper sign beneath it, but it’s “Streets of Fire” - a skateboard store. You can only find the real names of stores on those white papers. Now let’s move down to the corner (see that blue lift by the streetlights?)

The New Moon is a coffee shop but for the movie it’s Skalsa Restaurant. Where according to a rumor I heard, via Sassy Mama Bear (who lives there and may be brave enough to spy on Depp for us), there will be a shoot out. It does appear that the crux of the action will be happening on this corner. See that wall across the street from the Restaurant? It’s fake. Well, it’d hurt you if you ran into it but normally that corner is a kind of park with a fountain.

A couple of days later the wall has old ads.

You can see the fountain hidden behind the wall of ads and diagonally across the street is the bank. The First National Bank, built it 1926, although the words have all been taken off or covered up.

See, to the far right is that fake wall, and far left Restaurant, with the bank on that other corner. We ran back over today and it appeared that filming was happening inside the bank today (I’ll be posting today’s photos this week). If you look above those 3 arches of doors and windows you can see the long board covering up the name of the bank. If you look really close on either side of the door you can see two lighter spots. Those are the places the metal words were taken off. And in rolls on the ground and even in the intersection are the “cobblestone” tiles.

So, we’re only missing one of the corners. It is a huge CD store, although you can’t tell it now. Our first trip there we saw. . .

Wooden Walgreen sign ready to be hung.

And glass being covered with boards. This building normally has huge windows.

And two days later.

Let’s look at some other changes. See those papers on the door (faux front) with blue painters tape holding them on? Many doors have them, they are photos of the area, showing how the buildings did look and should look.

Do you want to wash dishes for .10 or .15 cents an hour? Cook for .15 cents an hour, or $3-5.50 a day or $250 a month?

Sidenote: You can read an article from when he was in Manitowoc last month and see where else he'll be after Oshkosh and see a few photos of him in Columbus, Wisconsin.  And when I twittered about being on the news it's because we were interviewed while taking photos in Oshkosh.

You guys have given me a lot of pleasure this week.  If you need a laugh you might want to go read the comments in "My Warped World", especially acaligurl (I've lost your link please send it again?) or "Scary Stuff", you guys crack me up!  I wonder if Joy is mad at me now. . .

First I cut, well I cut the crotch seam, to separate the legs.

Then I cut the inside seam from the ankle to the crotch. I laid the tripod on it to check of length and on the beige pair I took the hem out. I was starting to get concerned that the area where the pocket had been might get in the way. But it worked out great. I’ll show you here in a sec.

I used an overlock stitch to make the seam for the bottom and side of the bag.

After I used the overlock stitch to make sure the top doesn’t fray, I folded the top down, stitched and made the pocket for the cording. Now this is where the old pocket came in handy, it was finished really neat and I used it for my opening for the cording.

Voila! Tripod bag almost complete.

Now, I did things only slightly different on the brown bag. I left the pants hemmed, that hem made a pocket and I was able to slide the cording through it. Two bags almost done.

Tape quickly solved any issue of getting the cording through the cord stop. And a few seconds later I have two completed bags. Sure, they are not fancy and beautiful, but they are extremely easy to make, serve their purpose and gave a doomed pair of pants a new life. What I liked most about it was that if I messed up I still had another leg I could try again.

A few days ago, I told you that I've joined a gym, and I've been going to the gym and actually working out. I generally bike/walk 6 miles each time I go, then do some of the weight machines. On some blog (it hadn‘t been updated since sometime last year and although I commented, I never heard back), somewhere out there I saw a button that said, "I exercise for comments, 1 comment=1 sit up" and I thought it was a great idea!

So in addition to my workouts at the gym I will be doing 1 sit up, crunch, something for each comment I get. I like that you guys can help keep me motivated simply by talking to me.

It took me a few days to come up with what I wanted for the button to represent this endeavor, but after a few little drawings, Dennis went into Photoshop and made me the button you see at the top of the post and on my sidebar. Isn’t it cute!? And even though he laughs at my hair choice (he’s says it looks like an onion head), that is how I wear my hair to exercise, when it’s long enough. The musical note is because I listen to my mp3 player while exercising.

If you want to join in, I welcome you. Go ahead, steal the button and leave me your link and I’ll add you to the bottom of this post. In the future I’ll be adding a link to track my progress but we’re just starting out so, let’s go!

Fellow exercisers:

Martha

Lori

Dennis and I have been contemplating buying the Canon 50mm f/1.2L lens, but we hadn’t been able to decide if we would be just as happy with the 50mm f/1.8. I don’t want to get lost in the lenses here but there’s a huge price difference in the two lenses.

In our search we found a place where we can rent lenses and other camera stuff, BorrowLenses.com. This would have been even more convenient if we lived in the San Francisco Bay Area, where we could have gone in and picked it up ourselves. Since we don’t (and while it looks like they have other stores in California, there‘s not one in Chicago, hint-hint), we put in our order and got to try the lens for a week. With the cost of some of the lenses we think we want, I imagine we will be renting from them again in the future so I put a link in my sidebar so I don’t lose them. My memory you know.

We’re really excited about this because we can also rent another camera body if we need to. Maybe even take a Nikon out for a spin, shhh, don‘t tell Canon. I think their prices are really reasonable and can‘t wait to try something else out. Just thought you might want to borrow a lens or sample a digital SLR. The experience we had with them was easy as pie. I placed my order on Thursday and was promised the lens would be delivered on Monday and it was. The lens was packed so well that I think a tank couldn’t have hurt it. The shipping time didn’t count in my week, I just had to ship it back yesterday and I did, but it was hard to pry it out of Dennis’s hands.

Dennis and I were able to make it to the Milwaukee Public Museum to tour the limited exhibit, Gunther von Hagens' BODY WORLDS: The Original Exhibition of Real Human Bodies. We were not able to take cameras inside so you’ll have watch the video at the previous link, or enjoy the few photos I have here, or pop on over to one of the exhibits.

The bodies are real human bodies, plasticized. You can pick up a donation card while you’re there if you want to donate your body. I think it’s kinda creepy but I found it very educational. It was more interesting because I knew they were real bodies, people who once walked around like you and I.

We’re hoping to go to Union Station in Kansas City, to see the Bodies Revealed when we go to Missouri in May.

Sometimes I find it hard at the ages they are to find materials or to help them out. So I was looking for something that would help me explain Math. I was in Math League in High School, but let’s face it, that’s been a few years ago.

In my search I found Microsoft Student with Encarta Premium 2008 and since the price was right (about $38) I decided to give it a go. We had a little problem with the download, I think Haden let his laptop shut down prematurely and I was frantic for a bit trying to figure out what to do. After I got over chewing his butt (nah, mom’s never do that) I discovered that my receipt provided me with a download link. I was able to get it up and working with that.

It is so much more than I hoped for! Like I said, my main reason for wanting it was for math so that’s the area I looked at first. It has an awesome calculator in it! You know how much just the Trig/Calculus calculators can be. If he really gets stuck on a problem he can plug it in there and it not only gives him the answer but shows him the solution. But I really like how it explains the concepts, so when he gets stuck and my brain has cobwebs I think we can find a good explanation.

I peeked at looking up something like “platypus” and found it gave tons of information. Encyclopedic and photos. But then I wondered, what if he doesn’t know how to spell the word, maybe he types “platipus” and I found that it gave him alternate words, in this case, “platypus”. I, of course, had to check out the photo search so I typed in “woodpecker”. Wow, I got a lot of hits for that word. Did you know there is a Woodpecker Finch? I didn’t, but it looks cute, I may have to find me one. :)

And because I’m curious, I checked out the foreign language area too. Hubby speaks Spanish and is learning French. I found that you can type in the word you want to know like “coffee” and it told me that in Spanish it would be “un café” (literally a cup of coffee). There’s also an area of tutorials. I bet Dennis wishes I had this for his Valentine’s card but I’ll explain that tomorrow.  :)

There’s a lot more in there that I think I would actually use but if you’re curious you can go look at their website, you can see a screenshot of that calculator there too. I did notice that it gave some tools for writing a novel, I feel a new assignment coming on. Don’t tell hubby that there’s tips on improving my writing or he might insist I stop ending sentences with prepositions.

Hey, maybe if I poke around in it enough it will tell me how to lose these extra pounds without diet and exercise. You can bet I’ll be looking into that. 

No, Kiwi, you cannot come out and play!

I need to thank Candid Karina for a wonderful award she bestowed upon me.  She said such beautiful things about me that I'm still blushing!!  Thank you from the bottom of my heart Karina!

I finally have Tristan birthday photos on his blog.  You know you want to see them. :)

I told you guys that Dennis and I were on the road for a few days last week and I wanted to show you how "light" we travel. Now keep in mind this was for three nights, we would have taken the same amount for one night, can you imagine how much we need for a week or more?!

Now let’s look closer. Obviously, we each had a suitcase for clothes, 2 people = 2 bags. We each have a computer bag, 2 people = 3 computers, but only two bags. The bright pink bag was a new addition to hold all the stuff I normally am trying to stick in my pockets, like books, GPSr and the six-pack Diet Coke that is difficult to juggle. Our coats were on our bodies and our pockets were still full, with 3 cell phones and 2 PDAs, etc. . . Oh you’ll notice a couple of new additions to the rack, we were in Lake Geneva and had to browse the shops. We got some great truffles and popcorn from Constant Cravings and I got a pair of Minnetonka Clogs ~ they are so cute!  I'll have to show them later. . . 

So, that leaves three bags for camera equipment. We never leave home without it. So, nothing really happened, but we were prepared. We did take some photos of our friends’ kids. Dennis posted some of his and here a couple of mine.

Aren’t they cute! We’ll call them Fred and Ed to protect their identities. They’re pretty interesting kids. Their parents are from France and Fred was born in France but since he’s so little, 2 years old, he understands French and English. His mom says he speaks with an American accent and she kind of laughs because while Ed was born here(about 4 months ago), they will be returning to France and even though he is an American (dual citizenship) he will probably not sound American.

Fred was a little fish, wanting to swim the entire time we were there. I call him my little fishie now. He thought I was playing peekaboo each time I came out from the camera so I quickly learned to “click” while the camera was away from my face.

Sorry for the crappy photo, it was one of the first I snapped while trying to master the lighting in my lightbox.  Anyway, Earthcaches are a recognized cache on Geocaching.  They're a LOT of fun as they as showing off a feature on the Earth, such as fossils, artesian wells, etc.  If you go to the earthcache website you'll find there is a Masters Program:

• Bronze Earthcache Master - Visit and log three (3) or more Earthcaches in two (2) or more states/countries.
• Silver Earthcache Master - Visit and log six (6) or more Earthcaches in three (3) or more states/countries and have developed one (1) or more Earthcaches.
• Gold Earthcache Master - Visit and log twelve (12) or more Earthcaches in four (4) or more states/countries and have developed two (2) or more Earthcaches.
• Platinum Earthcache Master - Visit and log twenty (20) or more Earthcaches in five (5) or more states/countries and have developed three (3) or more Earthcaches.

Our trip to Missouri over Thanksgiving helped us complete the platinum level, that one is a toughy!  Even though we have completed the masters program we will still being doing earthcaches, they're just to fun to pass by. :)

On someone's blog, hey if I could remember I would tell you where, I read about a magnetic bookmark.  Well I had to get me some of those!  I was amazed to find that Barnes and Noble had several different choices!  It was hard to choose, I was tempted by the coffee ones, but I ended up getting worms.  Aren't they cute?!  I got 3 magnetic worms for $3.95.

Can you believe that we grabbed coats, gloves, boots and ran out into the cold to attempt getting photos of the lunar eclipse while mother nature was sticking us in the freezer. We broke the old record low of -20, set in 1963 on February 21st and created a new one, -25. Spring is how far away?

Unfortunately, that’s as good as I was able to get. Those were all handheld, I tried using the tripod and lengthening the exposure but everyone of those came out bad due to the mirror causing camera shake and by the time I realized they were doing it I was in fear for losing my nose to frostbite and decided whatever I got would just have to be it.

Did you go out and watch it? What was the weather like for your excursion outdoors? Are you sure Spring is coming?

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If you are looking for photography tips I have stumbled upon a site that gives tons of information and tutorials.  From point and shoot cameras to digital SLRs to Photoshop Tutorials.  I venture to guess it all can be found there.  Just in the last three days there have been tips for shooting photos at night, Cloning people and using Photoshop to whiten teeth.  Let's learn together, as I think they know the proper terms for that f-yield-thingy, light/dark/balance dealy and acupuncturer. . .DPS: Digital Photography School.

Weird searches:

• Pictures on my environment - How will the Internet know where your environment is if you don't tell it?
• Dogs in heat - yep, they do.
• "jump drive" washing - I still have it, and it still works!

I was jumping up and down and running round and round when I discovered I was one of the Rocking Grandmas!  I am so proud to be part of this crew!  Now to find some more grandmas to pass it on to.  ♥ Thanx Chris!

I've spent a few extra hours with my grandson this week and while it means a few extra cobwebs have popped up around here I can't say that I regret it.  I put some photos of him up on his blog.

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I saw this little accent thingy over at MP's and well I just had to do it.   I'm still laughing because I spend a good portion of my life answering the question, "Where are you from?", due to my accent.

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I'm working on a huge group of photos but they aren't quite ready yet so I'll leave you with this one.  I think you can tell how cold it is outside just by looking at this woodpecker.

My heart leaped into my throat and all reason flew out of my head when I read the return on the envelope. Although it was addressed to my 18 year old son, he wasn’t home, I took it to my husband and told him I was tempted to open it. He reminded me that there’s not a draft and it was just a confirmation letter, that Mikal had received one when he turned 18 too.

But for a moment, before reality was spoken to me, all I could think was, “No, not my son, he’s too young.” And I thought of all the sons, the ones who have been drafted in a time long ago and for a moment it seemed I was one with their moms, feeling what they must have felt and I hope I never have that reality. You can think I’m evil, un-American, etc. But in that moment, I was simply a mom.

Thanx to Carrie, I just discovered a little contest over at Oh My Stinkin Heck.    Hurry, time's almost up!