Tiny Treasures

A few weeks ago my mom showed me this framed picture with some fabric inside of and asked me if I recognized it. I said yes, it used to hang in my bedroom throughout my childhood and hadn't seen it in a few years. It turns out that it was a baby's bonnet that my Grandma on my dad's side had made for me. She made it for all the Granddaughters (which is some amazing number as my dad is one of 10 kids and everyone has at least two kids beyond that). My mom had framed the bonnet, and attached the card on the back of the frame that read this; "A tiny square of linen and a dainty edge of lace, designed into a bonnet to frame your baby's face. After baby's warn it fold and tuck away, and it becomes a hanky for baby's wedding day." Well, it brought a tear to my eyes and I am so thankful for the sweet gift and my mom taking such great care of it, and believe me I will have it with me on the big day in less than four months away!

freckle face

I drove to Wichita for a work conference and although it was about 98* out, the drive was full of sunshine and great clouds like these. The conference was about juvenile justice and all the things wrapped up in to that category (gangs, sexual exploitation of youth, jail, and intervention programs like the one I work for). It's an under appreciated field, and there's not a lot of money in it, but the work is pure, tough, and life changing. There was a priest there that works with ex-gang members in LA and started his own Homeboy Industries (they have a cool website if you're interested) and the work he does is so intense and he left us with a great feeling of passion, and if you enjoy what you do every day (or at least most days) than that's a great thing. And the hopeless need hope.

I had spent two nights in a hotel by myself with no dogs and no books, by the end of the day I had little energy to write or read anyways. So some mindless t.v. and a few pictures documenting my state of mind. I think our connection to our body is very interesting. How some people are consumed with clothes, and hair, and whatever else. Don't get me wrong those are all nice things, but they are not who we are as people. And the things people notice about your appearance because we are a very visually driven society. Recently, someone told me I looked like Lindsay Lohan. Now at first I may have been a little offended, but then it hit me that this woman has rarely seen another person with freckles so she just equated the fact that we both have freckles. Like me and Evangeline Lily both have dark hair (someone also told me I looked like her, but we were in the process of possibly buying his house so I think it was just a good selling tactic). Believe it or not, but I sometimes forget that I have freckles. And that every year I have recieved more and more freckles, and to see a home video of me when I was eleven, I had set up the video camera on the edge of the table so I could run through the list of impressions I was learning... true story. But at the time I did not have one single freckle on my neck or chest, just emerging all over my face. It's interesting how some days I can feel so connected with my body and every move that I make, and other days I feel I live more through my mind and the idea of "living from the inside out". I want to accept my body for all that it is and all that it is not but also that feeling of just living and not getting wrapped up in those little things.

Chicago!

My good friend Megan and I went to visit her sister Ashleigh in Chicago over the weekend. We got not so cheap tickets last minute because Ash's friends were throwing her a bachelorette party in town and we just had to crash the party. We showed up at Ashleigh's door and she was so shocked that we were there she just kept saying "What?!" It was very cute and completely worth the trip.
We did lots of dancing throughout the night, here we are impersonating an SNL character.. actually Kathy Lee... really it's too long of a story if you're not familiar with the character, but let me tell you we cracked ourselves up with this one. :)
And on our last day we took a boat tour of all the cool buildings in down town Chicago. It was a gorgeous day, interesting tour, and overall just a great trip.

a dog's life

Okay so a few nights ago I noticed that Jaxon's haunches (sp?) were lightly blond in color and basically hanging off his sides. So, I started to pull at them, like any normal person would do, right? And it became a scene from Edward Scissorhands when he first trims the bushes in Diane Wiests' backyard... it just gets faster and faster and more and more leaves (hair) fall out/off. And yes this would have been a great job to do outside but I just couldn't stop, I was so amazed and actually grossed out at how much hair was falling off of this boy. I get that it's the season for shedding and really that just comes with the territory of dog ownership but I have never seen this much come off of Jaxon before. And secondly, as I was doing it he was kind of in awe as well and slowly sunk to the floor and just layed in his shedded hair.
He seemed to kind of enjoy it. He is a little weird, but also very sweet.

Zoo part 2

Kestan was a great road tripper, but by the end I think we were all ready to get out of the car and run... and Kestan makes that clear in a very cute way in this video (also couldn't figure out how to turn it, so enjoy sideways for now).

Omaha Zoo!

Last week my dad, sister and I went on our second annual father-daughter road trip and this year we added my nephew Kestan to the mix which turned out to be a great decision. We spent a full day at the Omaha Zoo on it's biggest day of the year -25,000 visitors that day. It was definitely a little crowded when we first got there, but the zoo is so fun, and they have some great additions (like the butterfly house) I highly recommend taking a day to check it out. Not only did these freaks charge the fence.. but they make a pretty awful sound. I mean, I am sure they are beautiful creatures at some point in their life... but really, I barely wanted to stop to take the picture, but had to because I was on the phone with Matt at the time and I had to document where that loud sound was coming from.