Jan 31, 2012

Announcement

A little poem...

I do not have a face to see or put inside a frame.
I do not have soft cheeks to kiss; I don't yet have a name.

You can't hold my tiny hands, nor whisper in my ear.
It's still too soon to sing a song, or cuddle me so near.

But all will change come October 6th, when they say I'm due.
For I'll be your son or daughter when I finally meet you.



Ok there it is, I can't hold it in any longer.


Baby Jones is due this fall :)

Jan 27, 2012

I LoVe ThE sKy!!

DAWN
 
 
 
 
DAYLIGHT
 
 
 
 
 
DUSK
 
 
 
 
NIGHT
 
 
 
 
NATURE'S FURY
 
 
 
 
 
 
No matter if it's light or dark, quiet or loud....the sky is amazingly beautiful
 
 
 

Jan 25, 2012

Happy Birthday Trevor!

At 12:15am 16yrs ago, a little baby boy by the name of Trevor was born, my very own little brother (of course he was Michael's little brother too). I couldn't believe it, there he was just a few ounces shy of 6lbs and perfectly healthy.

The years passed and my admiration for this cute boy continued to grow and grow. Although he would annoy me sometimes when I had friends over - he was determined to get in my business, he was always my buddy. If we weren't watching Thomas the Tank, we were watching Toy Story (and even sometimes Teletubbies). Trevor and I were closer than Michael and I ever attempted (although we are close now and I'm very thankful). Trevor followed me around and annoyed the heck out of me, but deep down I always loved him and I still do.

I was of course happy to be present during his first trip to Disney World, I think I may have even been more excited for him than I was myself. It was during our trip to Disney that he broke his fear of roller coasters and rode every.single.one.


Happy 16th Birthday to the best younger brother, ever! I love you Trevor ;)

A heavy heart

A friend of mine from work had some horrible news yesterday. 
 
She went in for her routine 16w check up, but when the nurse hooked up the heart monitor she couldn't find a heartbeat. 
They found her little baby on the ultrasound, but he/she wasn't moving, just curled up sleeping soundly. 
They scheduled her to deliver today. 
 
I can't imagine experiencing a miscarriage, and I certainly can't wrap my head around having to deliver the baby as if you were 9mos along. 
 
 
Good luck today Kristin.  You are in my thoughts.
 

Jan 24, 2012

Unbelievable

Here are some photo's of houses that were destroyed in yesterday's EF3 tornado.
 
 
Location: Clay, AL
 
Storm damage-2, 1/23/2012
 
Storm damage-2, 1/23/2012
 
Storm damage-2, 1/23/2012
 
Storm damage-2, 1/23/2012
 
Storm damage-2, 1/23/2012
 
 

Jan 23, 2012

Thinking of Alabama...

I got a text from my mom early this morning saying they had a tornado. I thought it was a joke, because this IS January, right?!? Unfortunately it wasn't a joke.

Luckily they had mild damage compared to other places even as close as 1/2mi away. There are roughly 35,000 without power and a lot of people are even without homes. My mom lives in Jefferson County which is where the worst of this seemed to occur.

Currently the death toll is at 2, and many injuries have been reported.

Please keep my family and all of the other families in Alabama in your thoughts and prayers today and the weeks to come as they rebuild.

Jan 22, 2012

This girl rocks

Hardy found this video last week from one of the music websites he frequents (he's a huge metal-head). 

I think this might very well be the cutest/coolest 8yr old EVER.  This is a short video of Juliet singing about her dog, Robert and her stinky fish.  I think my favorite part of the entire clip is her "mosh" pit composed of stuffed animals on a trampoline while she jumps.  This girl has got some cute faces!


Jan 20, 2012

Instakitty

Tinker Bell was in the mood for a photo shoot and I was happy to assist...with the camera needs of course

Weekly recap

This is going to be a sour-puss post...sorry


- I hate income taxes, so much. We might end up canceling our trip to Disney :(

- I have a zit the size of Stone Mountain on my chin and it has a 10mi radius of pain.

- Our house payment increased for the escrow fluctuation....never fun

- I've been crampy the last two days and it's making me ill.

- I think all of this rain is to blame for sadness and overall depressed feelings. You know with snow everyone smiles (almost everyone).

- I'm behind on laundry.

- Flower keeps trying to dominate Tinker Bell and it's driving me nuts! I hate hearing them wrestle in the night and howl/growl.

- I feel bad for complaining because I know somewhere someone has it nug worse. I should be more thankful.

So bla bla bla. And wah wah wah

Oh yea :)

Breaking Dawn Part 1 comes out on dvd/blu ray Saturday February 11th!
 
What a great Valentine's gift to myself ha ha
 

Inspiration

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Jan 19, 2012

SOPA/PIPA

Did you happen to notice yesterday several websites were "down".  Google's logo was blacked out, Wikipedia would let you search, but then quickly turned to a blocked page. 
 
What these two websites and many others were doing was protesting SOPA (Stop Online Piracy Act) - this is a bill that if made a law, would give the U.S. law enforcement and copyright holders ability to fight online trafficking in copyrighted intellectual property and counterfeit goods.
 
The original proposal would allow the U.S. Department of Justice to seek court orders against websites accused of enabling or facilitating copyright infringement.  Depending on who makes the request, the court order could include barring online advertising networks and payment facilitators from conducting business with the "allegedly" infringing websites.  It would also bar search engines from linking to such sites, and further require internet service providers to block access.  The bill would grant immunity to internet services that voluntarily take action against websites dedicated to infringement.
 
If this bill is passed to censor the internet it would be a direct violation of the First Amendment.  This would highly effect user-friendly sites such as YouTube, Etsy, Flickr and VimeoThis would also mean legislation would enable law enforcement to take down an entire domain (such as blogspot) due to something posted on ONE single blog. 
 
How does that sound??  Punishing an ENTIRE community for 1 minority??  Nonsense.......seriously what is our country coming to?
 

Jan 17, 2012

Disney fever

To say I'm excited for Disney World is an understatement...
...I'm antsy
...thrilled
...anxious
...impatient!
I'm ready to go NOW and possibly never return.  I was thinking I could show up in a Pocahontas costume with my hair in braids and see if they would just hire me on the spot as an actor?!  I doubt it...I'm not nearly slender enough for Pocahontas.
It doesn't help that I torture myself at work and listen to the Walt Disney World soundtrack we bought a few years back.  It's a two disc set with songs from all of the parks. 
Some of my favorites:
Soarin' (theme from Soarin' in Epcot) 
One Little Spark (theme from Journey Into Imagination w/ Figment)
***I absolutely love this ride and sing along when we ride it!
Swisskapolka (theme from Swiss Family Robinson tree house)
Yo Ho (A Pirate's Life for Me) (theme from the obvious, Pirate's of the Caribbean)
Grim Grinning Ghosts (theme from The Haunted Mansion)
***One of my top 5 favorite rides from Disney
It's a Small World (theme from It's a Small World)
***You have to love this song, I don't care who you are!
Star Tours (theme from Star Tours at Hollywood Studios)
***They recently updated this ride, I'm curious to see if the soundtrack is the same
Indiana Jones (theme from Indiana Jones stunt show)
There's A Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow (theme from Carousel of Progress)
***This ride, even though not as thrilling as a roller coaster, will always be one of my favorites and it's another one you can sing along to.
Energy Adventure Medley (theme from Ellen's Energy Adventure)
***Another one of my favorites! 

Jan 16, 2012

Yummie food

One day last week I was at Publix after work and passed the seafood section, normally I keep on walking because I can't stand the smell, but that day I decided to stop and get 1/2lb of peeled/de-veined shrimp. I took it home and asked Hardy to try and make shrimp scampi, I figured it would be easiest. I've never cooked shrimp myself, unless it was in one of those frozen dinners (Voila, Contessa..etc).

In my opinion, the outcome was better than Red Lobster and that says a lot considering that's the only place I'll eat shrimp (I hate cold shrimp and fried shrimp). Since I found it so tasty, I thought I'd share the ingredients...he added all of these without measurement, so feel free to go over or under.


Hardy's Shrimp Scampi

-Shrimp (peeled/de-veined)
-White wine
-Paprika
-Parsley
-Melted butter (we used 2 tablespoons)
-Minced garlic

He mixed all of this together in a bowl with the shrimp while heating some oil in a pan on the oven. Add shrimp to pan (remaining juices and all) and cook till opaque/pink.

We ate a salad and baked potato with it and that seemed perfect, but I'm sure it would be tasty on some pasta too.

Jan 15, 2012

Golden Globes

I don't generally like award shows except to see some of my favorite actors/actresses/musicians.

Within the first 20mins of tonight's awards I saw the beautiful (in my opinion) Johnny Depp :) so my night was pretty much set!

I was also so excited, the one and only award I was crossing my fingers for was Jessica Lange for best supporting actress in American Horror Story - and she won!!

Screenshot of Jessica Lange playing Constance Langdon on AHS.

Jan 13, 2012

A little Journey to get you through the day

 
About 6yrs ago I bought Journey's Greatest Hits after hearing Separate Ways almost every day on a local radio station.  Most people only know of Don't Stop Believing, but Journey has a ton of great songs.  I can listen to this album from start to finish repeatedly.  It is an especially GREAT listen while I'm at work, it's soft enough to play throughout the day without interrupting anyone else.  So if you're a fan of "soft-rock" so to speak or 80s' music in general, if you don't own this CD you're missing out.
 
Just sayin'
 

Its a blustery day

Winnie the Pooh: Happy "Winds-day", Piglet.

Piglet: Well... it isn't... very happy... f-for me.

Winnie the Pooh: Where are you going, Piglet?

Piglet: That's what I'm asking myself, where?

Jan 10, 2012

I wonder...

While driving home from work today I all of the sudden had the urge to write a fictional story. I can't get it out of my head and the more I think about it, the more details come to light.

I have no idea if I'm even capable of writing something I or even others would want to read...but as soon as I get this virus off my laptop, I'm going to start typing away and see where it takes me.

Bullying

There has been so much in the news lately about this topic. Mainly pertaining to sexual preference, but truth is....it happens to most about anything.

Bullied for having glasses
Bullied for having braces
Bullied for being a little heavy
Bullied because of your siblings
Bullied because of the clothes you wear
Bullied because of the clothes you don't wear

I was bullied in school....and I can still remember it like it was yesterday. I am so thankful for having the friends I did and accepting me for who I am. For those who never gave me a chance, you missed out. I'm not perfect, but I certainly tried to extend my bubble out to those who may not have gotten spoken to often. I didn't care if someone had dandruff on the collar of their tshirt, or acne on their face, or if they couldn't spell. I tried my best to be well rounded. Occasionally I would be nice to someone who didn't care and quickly found out some people just don't like company.

I got over the people who bullied me and decided it was their loss for not treating me with respect, but I can still flip through my elementary/middle school yearbook and point out a few people who weren't very nice.

Kids these days are even worse than when we were in school. It's hard to believe, but very true. My younger brother Trevor has told me some things he's been called in school and it makes me want to go beat the kid(s) up, but who does that make me?? Then I hear Trevor making fun of someone else and I'm reminded of what a vicious cycle it is. I think the root of bullying is that the bully is insecure and they're trying to impress a group of friends. With Facebook I've seen names come across asking for invites and I'm scratching my head wondering why. You never said anything nice to me when we were growing up, what could you possibly have to say to me now?

We live in a world where everyone is trying to 'one up' the next and in the process we beat others down. We need to realize being our true self is what matters most. If you have to call someone ugly or fat or gay to keep your circle of friends, then I'd say you need new friends.

One day when it's your child/children being bullied....maybe then you'll realize how mean you may have been growing up.

Think about it. Is there anyone you would apologize to if you had the opportunity. Can you remember the mean things you said to someone as well as they can remember being bullied?

Jan 9, 2012

Geez Louise

Well pat me on the back and give me a blue ribbon!

I managed to give our laptop a virus this evening. I was minding my own business updating the haunted house website...went looking for a decent logo of McDonald's and whaddya-know, it caught a virus.

So beware...

I ran a complete virus scan and the crap was still on there. Don't know what I'll do now...but I'll tell ya trying to diagnose and fix the problem using an iPhone is not my idea of a fun Monday...

Weekend movie-thon

This weekend we had a free preview of Showtime and we took full advantage of our DVR with DirecTV.  We recorded about 10 movies between Sat/Sun and when we weren't watching one of those, we hooked the TV up to the internet and watched instant movies via Amazon (they're free with Prime membership).  There are hundreds and hundreds of titles to choose from, new and old movies.  I'm amazed at technology....really.
 
 
A few of the movies we watched...
 
 
Faster
Starring: Dwayne Johnson & Billy Bob Thornton
**Guess you could classify this as a guy movie, but I enjoyed it.  It was a story of revenge, so it was easy to follow.  Not to mention I love movies that kind of keep you guessing until the last 20mins...they're good exercise for the brain.  Interestingly enough, I don't even think "The Rock" had 100 words in the entire film.
 
Remember Me
Starring: Robert Pattinson & Pierce Brosnan
**Yes, believe it or not...I a Twilight fan did NOT see this movie upon its release in theatre's or even on DVD.  I had heard decent things about it though, so I decided to watch it.  It was a good movie with great acting...had depressing undertones through the entire film and unfortunately ended with heartbreak.  If you like a good cry, this is a movie to watch.
 
Vertical Limit
Starring: Chris O'Donnell, Scott Glenn, Bill Paxton and Robin Tunney
**This is a few years old and is basically Cliffhanger  on Mt. Everest.  The story isn't as dramatic, but still good.  I enjoyed it.
 
Tidal Wave
**This is a Korean movie and even though it was dubbed in English, it still had sub-titles.  Hardy is a huge fan of Godzilla movies, so I'm used to reading subtitles.  It followed several characters/families leading up to a Tidal Wave hitting Korea dead on.  Definitely sad ending, but probably a true depiction of what would happen, certainly makes you appreciate life more.
 
 
We bought these and finally watched them:
 
Contagion
Starring: Matt Damon, Kate Winslet, Jude Law and Forest Whittaker
**Holy moly, if you don't use hand sanitizer now, this movie will certainly make you want to purchase stock in Germ-X.  I don't even know how to classify it....drama or horror.  It wasn't a big scary monster or zombies, but it was spooky in its own right to disease.
 
Super 8
Starring: Kyle Chandler, Noah Emmerich, Ron Eldard and Elle Fanning
**Filmed in the "80s", I felt like this was slightly a reboot on E.T., but in a good way.  The youngsters (most new comers) were excellent actors and made the story believable.  Elle Fanning (Dakota Fanning's younger sister) was absolutely fabulous.