Splish Splash

Splish Splash, originally uploaded by torri_g.

This picture was no easy task, and has been in the making for several weeks, if not months now. Puff has an absolute love of taking showers in the kitchen sink. When she is out of her cage flying if she hears the water on she is right there on whoever is standing by the sink. The problem has been getting her to stay there while I have the camera in hand. Last night however I got Puff to do her thing and show off for me, because she just loves to show off for her Mommy. Puff is the only bird in this house that loves shower time. She is the only one that will do it daily. The other birds seem to prefer to bath in their water dishes, but not my Puff. She has standards of you don't take a bath in the dish you are going to be drinking from. The only problem with taking pictures of her taking her shower is the amount of water she was splashing at me. A lens covered with drops of water is not such a good thing.

It is Friday again, and that means time to head over to visit Steve and Pickle and all of the great feline's, furball's, and any other wonderful animals that show up. If you want to play along just post your own and leave a link in comments. I hope everyone has a great Friday, and a wonderful weekend.

Even the Injured Must be Cute

IMG_2138, originally uploaded by torri_g.

Oh look someone is injured in my house. WAIT! It isn't just someone, it is Little Bug! Wow what a huge surprise! NOT!
Alright I'm done with the sarcasm for this post. Little Bug isn't broken, just kind of bruised, cut up and sprained. There is a split wrap under the tape, but the tape is the cutest stuff I have ever seen. Of course since pink and purple are Little Bugs favorite colors she isn't complaining about it. What she is upset about is that she was in reading class and learning about irony today, and her best friend is on crutches for a tendon injury, and Little Bug was trying to get up to help her to the next class when her foot got stuck in a bar and weight of backpack tipped to far. Through her tears of pain in the nurses office she kept telling me that she protected her head with her left arm to keep from taking a blow to the head. We have agreed that she probably should have used both arms to cover her head and maybe that right arm of her's would be in such shape tonight. Instead her right arm went out to try and stop her fall. In the process it got smashed down on a desk and then into the floor with all of her weight coming down on it.
Not to sound sick or anything but my happy moment of the day was finding out about a new clinic in town for urgent care issues. Instead of a 6-8 hour wait in the local ER which we have spent far to many hours in. We were sent to the new clinic and were in and out in less than an hour! I don't think I have been so happy about something in a long time.

I hope that everyone has had a good Thursday, and that tomorrow is filled with good things. Now excuse me while I look at finding bubble wrap to wrap my little girl Crash in.

Another Sunrise

IMG_2101, originally uploaded by torri_g.

I don't think I have ever photographed as many sunrises as I have in the last couple of weeks. Every time I'm standing outside in the morning chill the thoughts going through my mind are either I'm crazy, or please let today be a better day for the people I know and care about. The last couple of weeks seem to have been filled with stress, anger, self doubt about doing the right thing, hurt, disappointment, and good grief the list goes on. At some point in time I lost it yesterday. I snapped because I just couldn't take it anymore. I know it happens to everyone, and sometimes it can be the strangest of things that finally sets us off, it happens though.
I'm a very simple person at heart. With my eye's and camera I view the world with all of it's wonderful colors, but when we talk about morals there are but a few options. It is right or wrong...Black or white...there is no room for any gray. Be it family or a stranger that you meet on the street.

I think it may be best to just leave it at that, because this could turn into on heck of a long post otherwise. The basic thing that I want to say here is to anyone that I snapped at yesterday, I'm sorry for it. I just finally hit me level of enough. I'll take the day and regroup, and then be that ear to listen without screaming out my opinions because I think I said more than enough yesterday.

Just simple

IMG_1568, originally uploaded by torri_g.

Let's all just sit and look at the pretty colors today. Besides if anyone else is having a week similar to mine, it is about all the brain power that is left. Ahh...what pretty colors!

I'm hoping that tomorrow finally moves off of Monday and that the rest of the week just calms down.

Dawn's very early light

IMG_2034, originally uploaded by torri_g.

If it is possible to predict a week based on Sunday night, then this is going to be a very strange and long week, that is going to leave people in my house very tired. By 10:30 pm on Sunday nights, everyone but me is sleeping. Last night was not an exception to that, till Army Guys cell phone rang. The reason doesn't matter, but what it triggered was nothing short of comical. Army Guy had to get up and dressed and head into work, and with the opening and closing of the front door it triggered girls waking up but of course they didn't come out of their rooms at the same time. As I stood in the hall way and explained twice that;

"Yes, Daddy just left to go to work."

"No, it isn't morning yet"

"Yes, you should climb back in bed now."

"No, I'm sure it isn't morning yet."

"Yes, it is okay if you go back to sleep"

I'm just glad that I didn't have to to the comical routine three times in as we neared 11:00 pm. This morning knowing that he was up very late, when his alarm went off I woke up. I'm not really sure that he was understanding the questions that I was asking him at 0430, but I'm hoping that at least one answer I got from him was correct. "What time do you need to be into the office this morning?" I have tried to keep girls getting ready for school as quiet as humanly possible here this morning. Bigger issue is keeping animals quiet at this hour of the day. Hopefully his reply of by 10 is accurate, because I have no intentions of waking him till about 0900. If it was wrong...well I guess they know how to get a hold of him via his cell phone and wake him up yet again.

I hope that everyone has a good Monday, and that this week isn't one that leaves us all drug out tired.

Sibling Sunday Insanity

IMG_1980, originally uploaded by torri_g.

Back to beautiful weather here in Arizona this weekend, and we have been getting a lot of packing up stuff to head to donation done. But of course since it is Sunday we had to take some time to goof around and what better way than to head out to the back yard with Mom's camera in hand. Alright, so I'm pretty sure the girls would have preferred if I had not come up with the idea at all, but they tried to do all the things that I asked them to. Okay, okay, okay...so I didn't really ask them I kind of just told them that they were doing this for me. Geez! They did have fun though and that is what counts most, and now I'm not the only female in this family that looks insane doing strange things in the back yard.


This month is flying by and so is the school year since we are within a week of progress reports coming home. Binky Sue has college and financial aid work shop this week, plus the studying for the February 7th ACT continues. Sweetpea and Little Bug just seem to be in relax mode with school right now, which is always a good thing. We never need them all three stressing at the same time. The reason for the pictures for today's entry...well this weekend has kind of been just like this with them. Kind of a mild bouncing around, running at me from all directions, and jumping up and down trying to be the one that I focus my attention on. I can honestly say that I'm looking forward to them returning to school tomorrow.

Anyway, I hope that everyone has had a weekend filled with time spent with those you care about the most. Oh and I hope that this is a week filled with good things for everyone.

Simple Saturday

IMG_1832, originally uploaded by torri_g.

Rain has finally moved back out and clear blue skies are here again. Other than some stuff around the house that needs done, there aren't to many plans for this weekend. So I think just chilling out will be the name of the game here. I hope that everyone has a weekend filled whatever they want.

Peek-a-boo Puff

Peek-a-boo Puff, originally uploaded by torri_g.

Normally I don't make two posts for Feline & Furball Friday, but I'm going to this week. In the birds cages they have something called a "cozy". They hang up and give the birds a shelter of sorts to sleep in and be surrounded by the warm fuzziness that it is. Puff is on her second one since June. Her first one she just had to chew an escape hatch in the side of it and of course chew through the hangers on top. It was funny to see her running through her cage and using the side escape hatch to cut through even quicker. With her second one though I'm laughing even harder about the antics. She has chewed a hole through the top of the two layers that make the bottom of the cozy. Why? Well so she can crawl in between the layers and sleep in there like she is tucked into bed. She also seems to like playing peek-a-boo with me from inside of it. Today I was calling her name and I would see the cozy bouncing around and hear her making sounds. Call her name again, and hear chirping. Call her name a third time and out her head would pop from the hole in the bottom real quick with a chipper squawk, and then real fast back in the hole to do it all over again. When I would stop calling her name and walk away she would come out to give me her typical birdie scolding of "how dare you". When I would walk back over to the cage calling her name, the game would start all over again. My Puff loves playing peek-a-boo and I'm just glad that I was fast enough with the camera to capture her sticking her head out.

Smile Mia

Smile Mia, originally uploaded by torri_g.

I think I have mentioned that in this mini zoo that I have, Mia is the biggest photo ham of the two dogs. There is only one issue taking her picture with the new camera and it has to do with using auto focus. It makes a sound that only she can hear, and if I hold it just right I can feel it. So it makes for an interesting time trying to get her to calm down since she seems to think that the camera is going to attack me in some way. Since finding, and rescuing Mia and her liter mates out of the back ravine during monsoon 2007, she has been Mommy's girl and defender. Which sadly has caused a bit of a problem in the last month between her and Trinity. Throw in a sneaky Trinity doing things adding to the problem, and this Mom was close to ripping her hair out. I'm happy that in the last week though that we have been issue free.
Mia is a Mama's girl that wants to please. She can be found at about all points in time during the day not to far away from me. She always wants to help with cleaning, cooking, or whatever the chore may be. She wants to comfort when I'm upset, she smiles when she is being praised, she cry's and pout's when she has done something that maybe she shouldn't have. Although I'm sure in her one year and so many month puppy mind there is nothing that she isn't supposed to do at least five more times. Last night while shooting the pictures of her every time I said smile Mia the look on her face just got bigger and bigger finally ending up with this picture. Little miss Mia, my very happy puppy girl.

Alright it is Friday again so that means time to head over to visit Steve and Pickle for this weeks Feline, Furball, and Feather's Friday. If you want to play along all you have to do is post your own and leave a link in comments. I hope that everyone has a great Friday, and I will try to remember to post the link over to Steve's once he posts for the day.

Wishing the sky was this clear today

IMG_1698, originally uploaded by torri_g.

Our beautiful clear skies have given way to very gray clouds and rain. I'm talking some really dark skies here too. When with every blind open in the living room I still have to turn lights on to have any kind of light in here during the day, the sky is dark. I'm not complaining about the rain because living in the desert I know that any rain we get is a good thing. I was just enjoying the sun filled days so much. However, I do have pictures that were shot during the last week that scroll across my screen saver to look at while we go for or couple of days of dark cloud filled skies.

I hope that everyone is having a good Thursday so far, and that the weather is isn't to bad.

Because Tomorrow is a New Day

IMG_1778, originally uploaded by torri_g.

This is proving to be on heck of a week for some people I know. I keep finding myself at a loss of words to say that will either help, or at the very least cheer them up. But I have tried anyway and will continue to try this week. The best and possibly the corniest thing I have is "Because tomorrow is a new day, and another shot at a good day." My week overall has been good, and I like being there even if it is just the other end of a phone line. The best of my week though came last night talking Mama Bee up in Alaska. Anyone that read my old AOL journal would know the name because while she was pregnant I was always asking for prayers and good thoughts for her for...well for I think just about everything under the sun. Little Man was born in May 2007 and what a journey he has had in such a short time period. The short story is he was born with Spina Bifada and withing just days of being born was flown from Alaska to Childrens Hospital NICU in Phoenix, where at just 8 days old a surgeon did major surgery on his spine. Anyway, over the last year I have posted short quick updates about him. Had lots of times of asking for prayers and tonight this update is just to say thank you to anyone who has read before about him and said a prayer for him and his family. Little Man is just shy of turning two this year, and last week at his Shriners appointment he was given the ultimate 2 year old set up of equipment. A stander, which will allow him to stand and start working on strengthening those little legs of his. A walker to...well I think you can figure that one out. A wheel chair that is just his size to make him mobile and of course in true soon to be 2 year old fashion I'm sure to give Mommy and Daddy a more difficult time of keeping track of just where he is. Little Man also got a new pair of custom tennis shoes to be able to wear with his leg splints. I had a moment while looking at pictures of Little Man today with just about all of his new equipment that made me cry. Not because of all the stuff that he has to use though. Because of knowing just how very much things have changed from what Mama and Dada Bee were told about their unborn Little Man and then in the days just after he was born what they were told. I don't care what any one person believes, or if they believe at all...but there are times in this world you get the chance to see things that are nothing short of miracles. Now they still are not saying that Little Man will ever be able to walk with out aid of some type of equipment, but this little guy has already done more, and gone further than anyone ever thought. He moves things he wasn't supposed to be able to, he feels things that no one thought he ever would. He is learning and growing like any other "normal" child born on the same day as him even though there was talk about a possibility that he wouldn't. So from Mama Bee, Daddy Bee, Little Man Bee and myself...Thank you for any prayers, any good thoughts, any hopes of swift doctors hands or whatever the case maybe. I don't think Little Man is anywhere close to being done yet though, and I'm sure that we will all be blown away by just how far he goes.

Tuesday Morning Sunrise

Sunrise, originally uploaded by torri_g.

Another beautiful start to the day here in Arizona. I'm hoping as the day goes by that maybe I can get my brain to kick back in from it's vacation. After all there are things that I need to get done, and having a functioning brain would be a good thing. My most major thought for this morning while looking at the picture's I shot of sunrise is that I finally got the dirt/lint/whatever in the world it was out of the pictures!! I can now shoot with the 17-85 mm lens and not have to do editing clean up! Which for me is a good thing, because when I'm shooting landscape pictures I really prefer to not do any kind of touch ups. I like to just shot it as I see it and leave it alone.

I hope that everyone has a very wonderful Tuesday.

Mindless Monday

IMG_1667, originally uploaded by torri_g.

Ever get that feeling that your brain stepped out for a break and didn't bother to tell you about it? Well, that is the feeling that I have had going on pretty much all day. I'm happy to have a day of doing little to nothing, but I'm going to need my brain to come back from it's vacation.

Since I don't seem to have all that much brain power here today, let's just all look at the pretty picture of the desert, mountains, and sky. Ohh...so pretty!

I hope that everyone had a good Monday.

Super Bowl Bound!!!

After a game that had me holding my breath, yelling at the television, and jumping up and down. The ARIZONA CARDINALS ARE GOING TO THE SUPER BOWL!!!!

Alright now that I have that out of my system time to get back to watching football to see just who they are going to play. I hope that everyone is having a wonderful Sunday!

Cane Cholla Cactus

Cane Cholla Cactus, originally uploaded by torri_g.

I'm going to skip my usual Sibling Sunday post today since it really has been a slow week for new things with the kids. Well, other than Little Bugs report card arrived in house this week. All A's...oh and a very quiet D. She is proud of her all A's...oops have to do the very quiet D thing here again. Why a very quiet D? Well, that was what she kept doing. Little Bug would be very loud talking about her A's and then get really quiet to mention the D every time. At least she knows what she needs to do, and she did listen to her Mother give her the talk about the grade. Even with the D I'm proud of her because this report card is her strongest in about 4 years. Basically being viewed as a real sign that life with Little Bug is really moving back into more normal place.

The picture is another from the batch that I shot while out with Army Guy on Friday. These and the prickly pear cactus are just about my all time favorites to photograph. Now that I know there are tons of the cane cholla up in the look out area of Coronado, I may have to include that in my once a week check for flower blooms once the season for it arrives.

We are still enjoying a beautiful weather weekend here. Yesterday was just about as perfect as I could hope for. Cleaning with windows and doors open made the chores just get done quicker because of wanting to be able to have today to just enjoy the day. Long sleeve shirts in the morning gave way to short sleeved ones in the afternoon as we got up to 70 degrees. Another perfect day is forecast for today and I'm sure that two of my three girls will be looking to get outside as soon as they possibly can.
I hope that everyone is having a great weekend, and if you happen to live in any of the current Arctic freezing zones, stay safe and warm.

How to spend a beautiful Friday morning

Montazuma Pass Look out area, originally uploaded by torri_g.

Yesterday was a beautiful, perfect day here in my part of Arizona. Actually I think all of Arizona probably had a beautiful day yesterday, Army Guy had the day off, so we started with some small errand running. A stop at the only camera shop in town to talk about lens, and possibly camera cleaning. Got some great suggestions about things to try and what to do next if those things don't work. Army Guy wandered the shop while I talked to the owner and found caps that I needed. Again YAY for my Army Guy! Then off to the feed store to pick up food for kitty cats, which was then the end of the errands for the day. So what do you do next? It is a beautiful day, and who really wants to sit at home doing either chores or nothing at all? So we headed out towards the canyons. Some how in the four years of living here I have never been up into Ash Canyon. Wait a minute that isn't all that surprising because there are lots of canyon area's here that I have yet to make it up into. I spotted a lot of new area's to head out to for photographing come March, April time frame when our desert area starts it's yearly bloom, and maybe a trip back out before then because of all of the different birds that I saw up in the area. After Ash Canyon, we headed out to the Coronado National Monument, and up the mountain to the Montezuma Pass look out. Took lots of pictures of the view looking back into Arizona and the the side that looks down into the not so distant Mexico. Lots of cane cholla cactus pictures, and just about had a picture of a persistent bee that just would not leave me alone. Only bad part of the day for me was having to clean up pictures in editing because of using the lens that I swear I just can not get cleaned up. Tried for the first time a C-P-L filter and loved the blue effects of the sky that I got from using it. Darkened up the rest of the landscape a bit to much, but I'm happy with my first time using it. Best thing is I now have some new outdoor picture's to share here.

I hope that everyone has a great Saturday, and let's do some major cheering for the Arizona Cardinals because I so would love to see them make it to the Super Bowl this year.

Sister cats planning their escape

Angel & Eclipse, originally uploaded by torri_g.

I'm pretty sure that Angel and Eclipse are now planning either how to get the camera out of my hands, or how best to escape the house. To tell the truth this picture was shot a couple of weeks ago, because today neither cat, nor dog will stay still long enough for me to get a picture. That would be the sign that they are tired of me and my camera. Guess I'm going to have to see about pictures of the birds for a couple of weeks to give them a break.

It is time for Feline & Furball Friday again. So don't forget to head over to visit Steve and Pickle. If you want to play along all you have to do is post your own and leave a link in comments. I hope everyone had a great Friday.

Parasitic or helpful?

IMG_1610, originally uploaded by torri_g.

Sometimes I will shot a picture that I think I want to blog, and then once I look at it downloaded, for the life of me I can't think of why. This is one of those pictures. Why in the world did I have to take the picture of the mistletoe that lives in the tree in the backyard? I thought tonight maybe if I did a little reading about mistletoe that I would be inspired...well I'm inspired but not quiet in the way that I thought I would be. Reading about mistletoe being a parasite and viewing the picture of it growing in my backyard tree, some how my brain made a leap to a phone call conversation that I had with my Mom. It was a family related conversation and usually I keep those conversation to myself and off of my blog. I'm probably still going to keep most of it off of my blog here tonight, but just the thought of a parasitic thing living within the branches of the tree is to good of a thing for me to pass up on. A family tree would be the comparison, filled with all different sized branches. Some growing out strong and high, some twisting and turning a bit in places but strong and thriving. Then the parasite is introduced. Taking, and taking from the host and having little to no concern about how it is affecting the host in the long run. In time it is so much a part of the tree that you just can't remember how it got started. That is where the real danger lies when talking about a family tree. By the time you realize that the family member is a parasite, you have been used up. You have helped feed this thing to grow to a size that just is no longer helpful for anything. So what do you do? I have my own thoughts on what to do...but they are just that...my own thoughts which I will keep to myself.(Mostly because I'm sure talk of any kind of violence is still not a very accepted thing.) Maybe the best course of action is to cut the branch that the parasite has grown on, maybe there isn't a good course of action to fight it's further growth. Maybe it is time for the rest of the tree to say enough already. I'm happy that the roots of this tree are standing in solid ground, and don't worry about being taken down by the parasite there are enough branches strong enough to catch hold and keep the tree standing.

If I were willing to share more this would make more sense possibly, or maybe not because I have never claimed to be the most sane person in this world. The good thing is I'm no more insane than half of the people I have met in my life and I'm far more sane than a certain branch in my family tree.

The start of a new generation

100_3801-1, originally uploaded by torri_g.

Last night brought the phone call that my niece was in labor and heading to the hospital. The wee hours of the morning brought the phone call that little baby boy C was born at 2:18 am, weighing 8 pounds 5 ounce, and 21 inches long. My niece and her baby boy are both doing well, and new Great Grandma K is so very excited and can not wait to make the trip to the hospital this after noon after work. Her camera batteries are charged up and she is more than ready to take a million pictures of the new little guy. My sister took a quick picture with her cell phone of baby, which I'm sorry I'm not sharing on my blog here, but I try to stick with making sure I have permission or it is one of my own photo's. Take my word for it though...he is beautiful and just oh so very perfect!

Listening to my Mom for a good hour this morning as the ups and downs of all the emotions of this next generation from her starts has left me feeling so very thankful. There are so many things about my Mom that admire, and on days like today listening to her it seems like there is even more. Life has been hard on her since she was a child, and to hear talk about it sometimes makes me want to cry. No child should ever wonder if they are loved, and no child should ever be told that maybe they weren't. Mom you made the choice to be better, to try harder, to love more than anyone probably ever showed you how to be. From you a fourth generation is started, and I don't think you have to fear that this baby won't know that he is very loved. I think just the story about everyone being up in the wee hours of the morning talking about his arrival would be a good start of telling him just how much he is loved. If he were to be told about his great grandmother falling asleep while praying for his safe arrival, and saying prayers for a life filled with love upon hearing of his birth...this little guy would know he is loved.

I know this entry may be rambling and just painful for anyone to try and get through. Just my way I guess of sharing little bits of things without going to far into any real detail about those things. Plus my brain is working on an hour and a half of sleep right now which is just never such a great thing. So I think wrapping this up with a big welcome to the family baby boy would be the best thing to say. Oh and to point out how very much we all love you little one.

The winner is...

Leave me alone, originally uploaded by torri_g.

Binky Sue is the winner of the title "First one home sick" for 2009! In typical tradition with her, last night I had to give her the reminders about just what temperature she had to be below to be able to leave this house for school today. I still find it strange that I have to lecture this child about the fact that she needs to stay home when her temperature is over 100. I'm sure she would have loved for me not to grab the camera and take a picture, but it seems like the yearly thing to have at least on post of a sick child and since I haven't had many opportunities this school year, she is the one. It is a generalized blah feeling that is taking Binky Sue down for the count here this week. Mild soar throat, congestion, cough, body aches, fever. Hopefully it will not stick around to long, and my bigger hope is that even though Little Bug and myself seem to be showing signs of coming down with the same thing, that maybe it will just move on out of this house. That may be very unrealistic, but I can hope anyway.

Something I don't miss

Photo by Grandma K a.k.a My Mom

I may have moments when I miss being home in Nebraska, but getting an e-mail with pictures of today's weather reminds me that there are some things that I will never miss. Snow, frigid winds, those are things that I just don't miss. I'm sorry Mom but I'm not secretly missing the snow, and just looking at the pictures gave me a cold feeling. I think I will stick with my weather here in Arizona. We maybe getting down to 27 degrees overnight tonight but at least we will have 60 something come tomorrow.

If you happen to be in one of the area's looking at weather like what's in the picture, stay safe and warm. Oh and thanks for the pictures Mom and for giving me permission to post them.

Monday morning randomness

IMG_1394, originally uploaded by torri_g.

The girls helped me with yet another Sunday night camera test. They may not like me pointing the camera at them, but they sure don't seem to mind if I point it at glass filled with water or sparkling cider that they get to then drop other things into. Last night though my little artist Sweetpea got right into Mom's choice of camera and light testing, but colors and anything dealing with the blending of colors is so right up her alley really. Food dye being dropped into water makes some very cool looking effects. We learned last night that the warmer the water, the quicker the dye would drop and spread. The cooler the water the longer it would take, and the dye would do more of a almost hover. As you add new drops of dye the colors will only blend in the bottom of the glass. The streaks of color in the top of the glass will swirl as if to avoid blending.

Alright so maybe no one really is all that interested in reading about this, but I now have till next Sunday to come up with the next one because the girls really liked this little test. Besides it is better than talking about the fact that I'm now dreaming about things that I need to organize, get rid of, or clean in this house. I'm thinking it is going to be another week that my family should beware of returning home in the afternoon. Anyway, I hope that everyone has a great Monday, stay safe and warm where ever you are.

Sibling Sunday

IMG_1271, originally uploaded by torri_g.

The first week back to school and a quiet house for me. Well, we already know just how I spent my week, so let's talk about the siblings. Binky Sue had to go to student services because some how over the two week break, she forgot not only her combination but just which locker was her's! Yet another trip to her counselor was made to make yet another change to her schedule, and I'm pretty sure that the counselor now has Binky Sue's picture up with a do not allow in office sign. Binky Sue come Friday had the report card that Sweetpea really dislikes her for. You know the one with all A's! Sweetpea tried to talk me into giving a lecture for all A's, but for the life of me I just can not come up with a good reason for it.

Sweetpea's week was pretty good for the most part. At least she could remember her locker number and the combination. Her report card was not bad really. Her final semester grades looked better than her end of second quarter grades. It was kind of like singing " A, B, C, D..." Semester final grades at least stopped at C, so she got the look and a little bit of a talk. Mostly for asking Binky Sue for help in French class, which since Binky Sue has never taken a french class, really makes no sense to me at all.(Why Binky Sue would help with French makes even less sense to me though.) Lecture was light for Sweetpea basically though, just a reminder that the teachers really do like to have that homework stuff turned in no matter what she thinks about it.

Little Bug probably had the best week of the three. No report cards this week, they come out on the 14th. Accorrding to her 8th grade is the best grade to be in because it is just so easy. Hopefully after we see report card this week, she will still be saying the same thing. On the health front for Little Bug, she has been depakote free for 18 days now and is doing great! We have seen some real changes with her in the last couple of weeks since the final dropping of the medication. I have even seen less headaches/migraines with her so seems like the perfect right choice was made.(Excuse me while I happy dance around the house a time or three!!) I will say this though...when you get a phone call from the school nurse about mid week just because she is missing talking to you, it might be time for both of us to get to a support group for some help.

Alright that is about all for this Sibling Sunday. I hope that everyone has had a great weekend.

Bargain Hunting

IMG_1245, originally uploaded by torri_g.

I know some of my pictures this week are either boring or just strange, but hey it is my blog and what comes to my mind on any given day. Today is my bargain deal of the day. Binky Sue needed several packages of 3x5 lined index cards for an up coming English project which has me running up to the PX to get. There seems to be an unwritten rule that no matter what you go into the PX for, you must make a trip through the power zone otherwise known as the electronics department. It is a good way to kill some time doing some dream shopping most of the time, but today it had me finding a great deal. How great of a deal? Well this Duracell compact flash card usually sells for $39.97, today $7.97. The 4 GB cards were marked down to $9.97. I swear if I would have had more money I probably would have bought every 2 GB card that they had in there today. However, since I still had to get the index cards and make a quick trip to the commissary for odds and ends that I forgot to pick up this past week, one card was all I figured I would splurge on. What a great buy though! It brings my card count for the new camera up to 2 CF cards with 3 GB of storage, and 1 micro drive with1 GB. I'm a huge geek! Thank you I'm very much aware of that, but a great cheap deal is still a great cheap deal!

I hope that everyone is having a great Saturday, and see you back here tomorrow for the Sibling Sunday post.

A week with Angel

Angel, originally uploaded by torri_g.

While doing the archiving of photo's, I noticed that Angel was the least photographed animal of the mini zoo. So of course that made it clear to me that I needed to see about changing that for this year. So last week I made sure that when I had camera in hand, I was pointing it at her. Angel wasn't so happy with me about that, but I'm sure that with a bribe of a little bit of ham and cheese I can be forgiven. So about my three favorite pictures of Angel from last week. The first one is just Angel being Angel. Laying on the top back of the couch watching the birds outside as the land on the brick wall. She has this wonderful ability to pick the one spot with the least amount of light so she can just blend in with her black fur. The second picture is Angel trying to use her kitty ninja powers of mind control to get Binky Sue to share those chicken wings. Binky Sue sadly had a moment where she lost the battle and wanted to submit to the kitty ninja powers, but Mom thank goodness was there to stop her. The third picture is Angel doing her second most favorite thing...spending time with her girl Sweetpea. Angel can not resist a good snuggling up with her girl on...well on any day for any reason.

It is time for Feline and Furball Friday again, which means time to head over to visit Steve and Pickle and all of the weeks wonderful pets. If you want to play along all you have to do is post your own and leave a link in comments. I hope that everyone has a great Friday.

Don't everyone fall to the ground at once, but I'm actually getting the link here to take you over to Steve this week. Steve & Pickle's Feline & Furball Friday

Fire Sunset

Firey Sunset, originally uploaded by torri_g.

With as busy as I was today with day two of the clean and purge of the house, I managed to look out the window at just the right time to see a beautiful sunset coming together. Mad rush to find shoe's...oh wait I had slippers on my feet. Locate just where I had put any of the camera's...of course there isn't a card loaded in so that is another quick search. I finally got out the door into the back yard to shot pictures. Lot's of golds, orange, pinks, and then this fire looking sunset. It ended up being one of those times down loading pictures that I was amazed at what I saw and what I captured with the camera.

Beware

IMG_1194, originally uploaded by torri_g.

The sign about says it all right now. My attack on the house continued till about 10:00 last night, and I'm proud to say that I finally got my desk put back together! Today will be a day of going through shredding, and filing of stuff. One of these years I will remember that if I do it on at least a monthly basis, the stack of papers I'm looking at won't be such a mountain. To bad the odds of that happening are just oh so very slim.

Since as I'm sitting here trying to type and my mind is moving quickly through a list of things to get done here, I will end with I hope everyone has a great Thursday!

Approach carefully!

100_8292, originally uploaded by torri_g.

Only in my head can a simple task like cleaning my desk turn into a full scale tear apart, scrub down, rearrange, deconstruct an entire room, and still have a desk to clean, happen.(Not real sure about that being a proper sentence but right now it will just have to do.) I'm debating stopping for the night, but I really would like to see my desk at least in a finally clean state before bed time tonight. It wouldn't take all that long since I'm just to the point of needing to put everything back in place.

This is probably just the start of this wild woman clean and purge that seems to come after the holidays are over. Just hope that the rest of the family can hang on for the ride of this. I have already heard the comments about "So what will we find here tomorrow Mom?" "Oh No! She is doing it again!" The list goes on and on but I will spare you all of them. It is full scale spring cleaning in January...I don't like waiting till the last minute to start working on it. So while visiting here the next couple of days just be careful because who knows what all will end up getting moved in this massive clean and organization spree that I'm on.

I hope that everyone has had a good Wednesday, and that visiting my blog didn't cause to much of a sneezing attack because boy is there some real dust in the air in this house tonight.

Great thing to have!

Great thing to have!, originally uploaded by torri_g.

My new and probably going to end up being my most favorite piece of computer related equipment...an external hard drive! Oh I'm so very happy! No more having to sit for what feels like days on end burning pictures to disks, no more complaining from my main hard drive in the tower about how much space I'm using. Oh and most importantly...no more having to try to find space the the million burnt cd's. I got started with transferring files last night and got 17 GB moved and am working on the remaining 16 GB this morning. If you are doing the math that is 33 GB total and is about a year and a half worth of pictures. Since I had already backed up all of these files by doing the major burning of cd's I debated moving the files to the hard drive, but figured what the heck a back for the back up is not such a bad plan. I have lost far to many pictures over the years and am a firm believer in there is no such thing as to many back ups of the files.

Alright enough of me and my geeky rambling. Since the subject is being talked about though I'll ask the question...Have you backed up your photo's lately? I hope that everyone has a great Tuesday, and hopefully later this week I will manage to get out an about taking some pictures of things not in my house.

Another day of winter weather?

IMG_1188, originally uploaded by torri_g.

Dark clouds, light clouds, and some small patches of blue skies is what we have here today. Our winter weather advisory expired this morning at 9:00, now if the dark clouds would just roll on out of here. Cold and rainy is how the early morning started off with girls heading off to school. Oh boy they just so love mornings like that! NOT! It is strange having it be so very quiet in the house this morning, but I have been able to get lots done around here without having to answer questions or break up fights. I have had text messages from Binky Sue today about forgetting her locker number and combination though, guess two weeks off was maybe a bit to long.

I hope that everyone is having a good start to the week, stay warm and hopefully there is some good weather ahead for everyone.

Sibling Sunday End of Winter Break

IMG_0892, originally uploaded by torri_g.

The last two weeks have just gone by so very quickly. Who would have thought that after having Binky Sue and Sweetpea start fighting 4 minutes into their break, that I would find my self today with the feeling of not ready for them to have to be heading back tomorrow. It has been a wonderful winter break with the girls, but they do have to go back. They start the second semester tomorrow, and come Friday report cards will be in hand. I know that Little Bug is excited about going back, but not so sure about Binky Sue and Sweetpea.

I don't have much of anything else for the sibling post this week, so I hope that everyone has had a great weekend.

Closing notes

Post it notes, originally uploaded by torri_g.

Well, 5:00 am has finally rolled around here in Arizona. Both of the big girls are off to bed for their two hours of sleep before having to be woke up to do one more round of testing. Army Guy is up early to assist Little Bug in the wake up process.(Yeah I'm a little worried about the safety and well being of Little Bug right now.) They made it through though and without me really having to wake them at any point in time. Not without A LOT of complaining and plotting on their parts though. I don't think there is a topic that I haven't heard a complaint about since midnight.

Hmm...since my own brain just completely stopped mid thought, I think before I collapse it is time for me to head to bed and avoid the 7:00 am complain athon that I'm sure is going to take place. Everyone have a great Saturday and I'll be back once I have recovered from playing my role in the science fair project.

Why siblings shouldn't make siblings a science project

Upset Siblings, originally uploaded by torri_g.

Wee hours of the morning here and things are getting a little touchy in this house. Binky Sue and Sweetpea are Little Bugs science fair project. Sleep deprivation is the name of the game here tonight, with hourly tests being given. To save Little Bugs life Mom is taking the late night shift since I have practice with doing sleep depriving of children.(Four years of sleep deprived EEG's for Little Bug and the epilepsy.) Both of the girls are doing pretty good and the count down till they get to get two hours of sleep is on. To help kill the time instead of hurting their baby sister I'm going to get them to draw notes letting everyone know how they feel about this. We are also taping them up to Mom's computer desk so that it will be very clear to Little Bug just how the night has gone. I think come 5:00 am I will post a picture of the next couple of hour's notes before heading to bed myself finally.

Keep Little Bug in your thoughts that she makes it through this weekend. I have heard some talk from the big girls about suffering and pay back.

Mini Zoo 2008

Picking just a few pictures for a slide show of the mini zoo has been a difficult task here since the animals seem more willing to let me point the camera at them. Some I have posted over the year for my Feline & Furball Friday posts, others I haven't. I'm not about to post all of my favorites because that would probably make a slide show that would be never ending. Going through to archive the mini zoo photo's though left me with the thought that I really need to get more pictures of Miss Stand off Angel kitty, and the evil wonder pair of lovebirds Honey and Mango. I'm looking forward to another year with my mini zoo and all of the antics that I'm sure will happen with them.

It is time once again to head over to visit Steve and Pickle to see all of the great animals of the week. If you want to play along all you have to do is post your own and leave a link in comments. This week I will try to make sure that I get back to post the link over to them once the Feline and Furball Friday post is up.

I hope that everyone has a great first weekend of 2009!

Happy New Year!

IMG_0852, originally uploaded by torri_g.

Most people will give kisses and hugs at the stroke of midnight...not my girls though. They do a midnight dog pile! Because you know nothing shows a sibling how very much you love them better than piling on top of them and making sure you bounce around a lot if you happen to be at the top of the pile. It may look painful, but trust me...there was tons of laughter going on during this.

It was a perfect night here for the last hours of 2008. Lot's of snack type food, lots of sparkling cider, and lot of Mom with her camera seeing just how many times I could get Binky Sue to throw me a dirty look and ask "MOM!! Why do you keep taking picture of me?" Oh...because I can Binky Sue...because I can! Last night as midnight hit Binky Sue had a moment and a look on her face of being sad. It is 2009 and the months are ticking down till she turns 18 and graduation shortly after that. But today is just the first day of the new year and there will be time enough to think about what is coming.

I hope that everyone had great night last night, and that this first day of the new year is a good one.