talk to me tuesday, linked up, and a preview.

Hi.

I'm wiped out,

but it's good for me to write, despite not having cleaned the kitchen yet.

it shall get done soon...i hope...tonight.

So here's what's on the docket:

a preview of news I'll document* this week. 

*I almost said "share," but i used "document" because most of you know about this news.

a link so i can win a dress (but probably won't!),

and TtMT,

Preview of news about the big news i've sort of mentioned previously:

 Link: I like these dresses in this giveaway , and I don't have anywhere to wear them yet, but maybe someday! :)

Talk to Me Tuesday #3

What would you say to your teenage self?

Laura, you're 13.

You do have friends, and they will be better friends later in life.

Don't worry about being popular - it doesn't make a difference.

And stop, turn around, and walk back into that church and ask about how to get to Heaven.

They said they had the answer, so go ahead and listen.  

You don't need to be afraid of finding out; you'll never regret it.  Just go. 

that's all.

"Talk To Me" Tuesday #2

Hi all!

I guess this TtMT Heidi's got going can guarantee a post from me once a week.  

How lucky you all are! ;)

The question is: 

If you could relive one day of your life, what would it be and why?

Welp, there are a lot of days I would relive -

Some I would relive as a do-over,

some I would relive exactly the same. 

So, really...I will just pick one of the many!

Near Silver City, New Mexico.

Well, this picture was taken on a day full of craziness and beauty at the same time.  John and I visited a small town called Truth or Consequences, New Mexico, in the summer of 2009 for our 1st anniversary.  We had a TON of fun - I'd suggest that place to anyone.  On this day we went west to check out a national park: Gila National Forest. It was gorgeous, fascinating, and a lot of fun hiking and catching the views!  

It was also a little crazy: a map (and the hostess) from a T or C travel office made this place look like a 1.5 hour straight-ish shot to the forest.  

What it ended up being was a beautiful but incredibly lengthy 3+ hour, twisty-turny trek through deserts, hills, mountains, and - of course - one thick forest.

The views were gorgeous, so we had no problem on the way there. 

What ended up being our problem on the way back was the fact that a tank with enough gas for a easy 3-hour road trip did not amount to the necessary fuel needed for a mountainous 6-hour voyage.  Also, tiny little villages in a mountain surrounded by big trees, desert, and the nearby Mexican border doesn't equate to ample gas supplies (or any gas supplies at the end of the day).  

So we stopped at a restaurant in this village 

(where those migrating humming birds were hanging out),

and we decided that we'd coast (in neutral most of the time) down the mountains and into Silver City for gas.  

There was no way we'd make it back the way we came, especially with the sun about to set and mule deer bounding everywhere.

This trip resulted in lots of great conversation, and unforgettable time in the hiking the cliff dwellings at the forest, and lots of little details that made me wish I had a better camera.  

Aside from the gas situation, I would do this day the same way...

                                        

  ...especially because we came back to this. :)

favorites

Flowers
Colors
Celebrities.

Theme song
Food and 
Matte/Glossy.


Magazine and
fall is great.

Favorites, favorites,
List all eight! 



1. My favorite flower is...no, my favorite flowers are:
Dahlias and roses for sure.  Ranunculus (the orange flowers) is also a flower I really like, which were in some of the decorations at my wedding.

Green pic photo credit here, the other two are mine. 

2. Favorite color combo.

gray, spring green-yellow,  and black accents... 
                                                    for now.  
My favorite color is green, so often i come back to a semi-saturated, bright green, bright and somewhat warm-toned pink, and soft orange...aka, wedding colors and the answers to question #1 

3. Favorite Celebrity Couple.

Will Smith and Jada Pinkett-Smith!  
Definitely one of the most loving, grounded couples in the business. 

[photo credit]

4. My Theme Song.

this:  

Sure it was our first dance song, 
but it's been the theme for since well before day one. 

oh, and another theme song for us, which I HIGHLY recommend you listen to: 

see, it was worth it, huh?

5. Favorite "terrible day" food

  CHOCOLATE

     CHIP

        COOKIES 

Story time: 

When I didn't get the lead role in my senior-year musical (Wizard of Oz), I ate almost an entire row of Chips Ahoy once I got home.  When I looked down at the four cookies left in the row, I had a thought similar to "well, the damage is already done" and ate the rest.  Not my most shining hour...  

         maybe it was my most shining 20 minutes. ;) 
 Thankfully I got over it and got to be in "Dorothy's" wedding about 8 years later!

6. Favorite lipstick or lip gloss

Burt's Bee's pomegranate lip balm and my Mary Kay pink lip gloss, which I cannot find at the moment...  

7. Favorite Magazine 

Real Simple.  Saying it's my favorite is a gross understatement. 

8. Favorite thing about fall.

Apple Cider!!!!  

[credit]

I could drink a gallon a day of this stuff.



Ok, I now tag Kate (Brian, too, if he wants), Kaitlyn, Jen G., Heidi H., Heather, and Kristen (again, Heath, too if he would like)!

"Talk To Me" Tuesdays!

Well, my friend H.-the-hottie called me out in her blog to reply to her 

quest to let us bare our souls for all the interwebs to see.  

(Hey, I just discovered my "stats" page for this blog, and by golly, 

I've got people in Lebanon who have stopped by...

well, 2 people... meh, not bad...)

But realistically, this is going to be fun.  I have trouble deciding what 

to write on here sometimes, and even more difficulty with putting down words

in a simple, concise (ha!) way.  

H. will post a question, then we (her readers/family/friends/all of the above)*

will answer it in our own blog or in a comment on her blog. 

*Holy parentheses, Batman!

Easy enough, right?  

Oh, and all my readers -

yes, you faithful 12 followers

and some other behind-the-scene followers 

and visitors from Lebanon -

can partake in this lil' adventure, too! 

And if you don't?  

Well, I'm going to have to tag you in next week's post to call YOU out!  

                                                                                             Maybe...

                                                                                                      probably...

So here's my answer to the following question: 

Talk To Me Tuesdays #1:

What's your spouse's best quality?

Well, let's make this short and sweet.  

John loves me! 

Yes, there's more to it than that.  But the long and short of it is that 

there are simply sides of John that I only get to see.  He's definitely loving 

toward his family and friends, 

but there are more "little things" than I can describe in a non-novel format.  

The best way to say it is that John loves me,

and only I really get to see it, which I like! 

Oh, and I never know what he's going to say next.  That's fun!   

Ok, your turn.  Go for it.  Do it.  Go.  Now. Type!  Enjoy! :) *  

p.s. Allie - I'm still working on my 8 favorites post.  I know, I know...soon!

fall in sherman hill...

Fall in Sherman Hill, where I currently live,

has been quite the ride. 

More later, although I'd rather tell you all on the phone 

(and no, I'm not pregnant), 

but here is a semi-pretty picture of what 

is so pretty about being here.  

i'll write more later. 

welp.

we had a great vacation last week.

2 state parks in iowa, a few days way up north in mn. 

fall was gorgeous in mn.  

it's hard to understand why the trees are on fire with color now up there, and it's not the same down here.  

of course northern areas change first, 

but sometimes it just doesn't seem like we're far enough away for such a dramatic difference.

don't get me wrong - i'm not complaining at all. 

it was awesome to see all those colors on the trees in MN,

and i'm very happy that fall has yet to completely hit down here.

hopefully the tree varieties will pack as much of a punch in IA. 

oh, and our vacation pictures will be up someday soon. 

we used disposable black and white cameras for most of the picks, and 

they just aren't developed yet!

 

a couple things - one awesome, one not.

first, congrats to my friends Katie and Bret!  They are having a...girl!

they will be awesome parents,

and i'm sure they'll raise their little chica to be as big of a cyclone fan as they are.

it's only right -

especially in hawkeye land. 

second, my home town is under water, shut down, and...stranded.

9 inches of rain today alone - maybe more.

i know it's nothing different than what people just a few miles away from here went through, both in Colfax and up in Ames.  this definitely hits home, though, both figuratively and literally.

i know what floods, where it floods, and how it floods in my home town.  it's just hard - really, really hard - to see people who i've known since i was born have their houses flooded. even though it's much farther away, somehow it's a lot more intense for me.  the floods are worse than i've ever seen in my 27 years, and that's saying a lot considering the town has rivers flowing on almost all four sides of it (N-S-E-&-W).

so here's to praying to God that He

1. continues a very healthy pregnancy for Katie and her little bambina,

and

2. delivers my hometown from this flood.  a divine ark wouldn't be such a bad idea, really.

romance.

i think the only male reader i have is my husband...

so be prepared to be embarrassed, mister!

not really. :)

just a quick note before i go to bed.

i am thinking as i write, and i want to reflect on something.

it is so, so easy for me to give up on being lovey-dovey.

there are a lot of factors that lead to that, but

nothing is more happy-killing in any circumstance than

bad news.

it can be news from around the world,

news that i hear from a friend or relative,

or "news" i let circulate - or spin - in my head, which consists mostly of lies and

self-disparagement.

so today, in a preemptive move to banish the

self-perpetuating bad news i was about to fall into,

i decided that it was more important to pretty-myself-up (inside and out)

in order to to get myself in a better mood for when i got da hubs from work

than to have completely cleaned the apartment 

i have to say that while i can see things fairly clearly in real life (although

what i see clearly does range from both common-sense matters to abstract concepts),

i definitely have been constantly learning when it comes to this whole marriage thing.

there's always something there to remind me that i don't have

this whole wife thing together,

such as a not-remotely-completely-clean apartment.

but today,

I rediscovered [AGAIN!] that good romance needs effort from my behalf, too

                 (even if it's just a quick shower and putting on a dress).

and that effort?

it counts, and

it's worth it.

i still like it when he brings me flowers*, though! :)

*i'll show you those later.

where i was on 9/11

i read a couple blog posts tonight where the women described where they were on 9/11. 

i suppose that sometime in the future i will forget some of the details of that day, 

so i suppose i'll recant it here...

                                            not that it's anything particularly remarkable.  

                                                        at least not to me right now. 

what better place than electronic form, right?  

9/11/01

I was sitting in my humanities class 2nd hour, 

looking up something for a research project in the computer lab.

there weren't many of us in that class (all seniors, I think), 

and our teacher pretty much let us do what we wanted. 

someone said, 

                "Hey...a plane went into one of the Twin Towers." 

I tried finding it on a news site, but

so many sites were bogged down that I couldn't get more than a 

small snap shot of the burning building.  

Did I think it was a terrorist attack?  I couldn't find anything on that.

The picture was pretty small, so it seemed like a fire coming out of a window, 

not an inferno caused by a jet airliner with thousands of gallons of gas aboard. 

We went back to class for a bit and then headed to 3rd hour - choir.

People were starting to buzz about this, but with the 

small little picture stuck in my head and a moment's lapse in 

my typically over-serious view on the world, I jokingly and moronically said to a friend, 

"We're all gonna die!!!"

That friend...it might have been Audrey...said to me,

"No, Laura, it's really bad."

Having the guilt complex that I possess, I went to choir wondering what exactly was going on.

And there we sat,

somewhere between 70 and 80 of us,

almost silent (which almost never happened),

watching

watching

watching.  

We had missed seeing the planes hit the buildings in real time.

I'm thankful for that: small town classmates who've 

                                           known each other since we were in kindergarten 

                                                      do not hold back their emotions, 

and every instance of murmurred horror and whispered confusion would have 

turned into shouts of shock and cries filled with flood-like tears. 

Everyone stared as the buildings burned, then crumbled, then collapsed. 

We watched the TV all day,

talked about what might happen,

silenced our friends when Bush came on to speak,

and,

except for 8th period, when my prob&stats teacher made us learn (I was mad)

wondered if anything would be the same again. 

Nothing really was the same again, 

and that's the case for any major event in one's life.

An important factor about this date, among many other factors,

is that it affected all of us. 

Not just one town, one state, or one country,

but - the world. 

More about things that happened after 9/11 later.

i like this:

i like this dress (so i'm entering)

Vivat Veritas $50 Guest Giveaway

 

 

 

 

 

 

i like hugs.

i like friends.

i like knowing what's going to happen next, which i don't. :-/

i like dancing - Paso Doble is on my list of what to learn next.

i like knowing German, but i'm losing my knowledge of it! aah!!!

i liked going home last weekend.  i hope to see my family again soon.

and that's what i like.  for now.