I crossed the finish line

I just finished writing my very last paper for school. All assignments are done and submitted. All class meetings are over. Now what?

I walked at the graduation ceremony in May which helped motivate me through the last few classes I had, but now I'm left with the feeling of crossing the finish line after everyone else has gone home. I don't think the finality has set in yet. Perhaps it will next week when I find myself chatting with my mom and NOT asking her to edit a paper or be my human thesaurus. 

Thanks Mom! It wouldn't have been nearly as much fun without you. :)

Don't Mess with the Teacher

Woody got a new "hog-killin' gun" and Stephen's cousin Melanie jumped at the chance to try it out. Posting this photo on the blackboard the first day of school should keep all of her students in line!

More photos can be seen in the 4th of July album on my shutterfly page - including some great pics of the kids!

view Shanda's photos

Grandma Pat's 90th Birthday

This past Saturday Stephen's family had a surprise 90th birthday party for his grandmother (Dad's side). Glynda and Woody's house was full once again with about 60 people this time! Grandma Pat seemed to really enjoy the party. She visited with family and friends that she hadn't seen in a very long time and reminisced over some old photos that we had displayed on the TV screen for her to see. As the day began to wind down, the family gathered around Pat to share stories. Somewhere in the conversation she thought she heard someone say they saw a mouse. Daryl had been video taping portions of the conversation and the video below is the hilarity that ensued. You can view the entire photo album of snapshots from the party on my shutterfly page.

Hawaii Photos 2008

I finally got all of the photos from our Hawaii trip uploaded to my shutterfly account... in no particular order. Enjoy!

view Hawaii photos

She Who Swims With Turtles

I just picked up my underwater photos from Walgreens and am pleasantly surprised that a few of them turned out. Photos from my last turtle encounter turned out blurry due to my panic in avoiding being eaten. This year's swim was much more peaceful and the photos I have show the true, graceful beauty of these creatures.

Sun and Sand in Kauai

Aloha!

Today I awoke with the realization that in less than 48 hours we will begin our travels back to real life. Kauai has been wonderful - gorgeous weather, beautiful scenery, and soft sandy beaches... until you hit the water. We have a few battle wounds to show from snorkeling, but nothing more than burns and scrapes. The injuries were definately worth the experience. We have seen a ton of fish right off the beach and I was fortunate to swim with a couple sea turtles yesterday! I had a quick flashback to our trip to the big island in 2005 when one bit me, but these proved to be friendly.

Besides snorkeling, we have visited Wailua Falls, Opaekaa Falls, Spouting Horn (blowhole), and the Kilauea Lighthouse. At the lighthouse we spotted a monk seal on a nearby island and were visited by a couple nenes when we left. Today we are headed out for bannana macademia pancakes followed by some time at the beach and shopping. We've made reservations for a luau tomorrow that looks awesome! You can see a video preview of it here.

The boys have been enjoying the resort. We are just a short walk across the property to the beach. The beach there is too dangerous for swimming, but the boys are happy to just play in the surf and sand. Each morning we are awoke by crowing roosters (not one of my favorite highlights) and ducks waiting on the patio for breakfast. An especially friendly cat has found us and we've adopted him as our vacation. Grandpa Woody was thrilled. In fact, the cat got his name from Grandpa Woody... the first night we were here the cat snuck inside when Woody opened the back door. Stephen and I were out getting groceries, but the boys informed us of the fiasco when we got back - "The cat snuck in and ran in the bedroom and Grandpa Woody was cursing! He was mad!!!" For this, the cat was named "Sneak."

We leave Kauai early Wednessday morning (afternoon for most of you) and will be spending the day in Oahu before the 8 hour plane ride back home. Below are a few photos for now. I'll have an album to post later.

Why did the Nene cross the road?

Missing Tomatoes

The tomato plants have continued to grow and are now too tall for me to reach - I will need a ladder to pick them. Of course, based on what they have produced, that may not be an issue. I've gotten a few good-sized cucumbers, but only a couple cherry tomatoes. It seems that all of their effort is going into height. The plants are flowering, but most of the flowers are falling off without producing fruit. Any ideas?

Giganto Tomato Plants

Last year my excitement at finally having a salsa garden died a quick death. Even with fertilizing and regular watering, the plants didn't grow much larger than the initial planting, then quickly turned yellow and shriveled. My luck has changed this year! I added a couple bags of good 'ol cow compost to the bed before planting and now I have tomato plants as tall as I am! Stephen and I joke that we will be picking tomatoes from the staircase windows shown in the photo below.

Besides the standard salsa ingredients - tomatoes, peppers, and onions - I also planted a couple cucumber plants. They too are growing like weeds and I'm hoping to have a few fresh cucumbers ready to eat next week. Stephen waters the garden for me every night and I'm certain that these are the healthiest plants I've ever had - including the gardens I had in Mankato. I've become obsessed with my success and even have nightmares about waking up to dead plants!

Keep your fingers crossed that my green thumb last through harvest.

Air Travel: Checked Baggage Policies

I just checked in for my flight back to Houston from Minnesota and discovered that Continental has changed their checked baggage policy to only allow for ONE bag checked at no cost. Checking a second bag will now cost you $25! I'm already paying increased fares because of gas prices and now they want to charge for baggage? This new policy is going to result in everyone (including me) trying to bring their second piece of luggage as a carry-on, increasing the time it takes to go through security and the hassle of gate-checked bags. Anyone want to make predictions on how long they keep this policy?

View new Continental checked baggage policy

So, I'm a bit odd...

I still have to finish my business plan for my undergrad degree and I'm already thinking about grad school. (Don't worry fam, I'm not planning to jump into anything soon.) I have an absolute fascination with why people act the way they do. I suppose this is what attracted me to marketing and advertising. With my job I get to develop marketing pieces and monitor consumer reaction - my own sort of experiments I guess. Anyway, this fascination has created a desire to do graduate work in social psychology.

I found a story on cracked.com today that recaps experiments I saw a while ago in a documentary. The author puts his own spin on the interpretation and has used a bit of creative license in his writing, but you get the basic idea and its a fairly entertaining read. The article covers the exact types of experiments and research that I would like to do - though some of it would not be possible today and would be considered unethical.

The Miligram Experiment is one of the most fascinating. I saw video of this experiment in the documentary and you get a much better understanding by watching it than reading about it. I hadn't heard of the puppy version and don't approve of it for multiple reasons.

Click here to read the story.

Graduation and the Size of Things

After $1,027 in books, 54 formal papers, and 1,350 hours in front of my computer, it looks like I might actually graduate!

My cap and gown arrived in the mail today, which I immediately tried on. Graduation is only a few weeks away, but if I gain 300 pounds before then my gown will still fit. Why in the world do they make those things so big?

The highlight of my little dress rehearsal was finding that my honors medallion was included. Unlike my gown, the medallion is a little, tiny thing. For how hard I worked, I think that I should get to wear something resembling Flavor Flav!

Seeing myself in my cap and gown made me realize how close I really am to being done... and I can't wait! I miss having time to read, cook, garden, and even clean. (Yes, Mom, I did say clean.) Freedom is so close I can almost taste it!

More Texas Hockey

Neighborhood street hockey has become a daily after school activity. Tyler is really enjoying it. He will even pull himself away from the video games and computer to play!

Hockey Season in Texas

As I sit here counting the hours until the Wild playoff game, Tyler is outside playing hockey... Texas style. This is the time of year when the neighborhood is full of kids playing outside - the three weeks between too cold and too hot. I live for these weeks when...

Tyler spends his afternoons outside playing and building friendships...

Magoo spends afternoons sunning himself between chasing squirrels...

Stephen finds some time to spend outside - even if he's working...

And I get to take out the camera and record it all :)

on a side note... finding a hockey stick in Texas is not an easy task!

Air Travel: Big Tall Guy in the Center Seat

I have a bad habit of forgetting holidays when booking travel. Tonight I found myself battling my way through airport security among families of infrequent fliers. I knew that my flight from Houston to Minneapolis would be completely full because of the Easter holiday, but my outlook became even more grim when I realized I would be spending the next 3 hours scrunched against the airplane window with a big, tall guy in the center seat. Halfway through the flight I found out that I was sitting next to Sidney Rice; a player for the MN Vikings.

Now... I'm sure a few of the guys reading this immediately recognize this player, but I had no clue. This man could have been the MVP from the Superbowl and I wouldn't have known any different. The woman sitting on the other side of him was just as clueless. It must have been a bit of an ego bust to him, but he took it in stride. The in-flight conversation was typical of any other... are you married? do you have kids? where are you from? When he found out that I was from Mankato, the grin on his face clearly told of training camp memories.

I've never really followed NFL football and I don't have any plans to start, but the next time I'm stuck watching a Viking's game with a die-hard fan I'll at least have a anecdotal tale to share about the time that one of the players was stuck sitting next to me on a cramped flight from Houston.

Oh... and for the rest of you that have no clue who I'm referring to... view Sydnie Rice on the Vikings' Web site

Da Boyz

All 3 of my favorite boys... all in one spot. :)

Giddyup - Rodeo 2008

Stephen and I spent the afternoon yesterday at the Rodeo. What a fun time... and a great opportunity to try out my new camera. :) We didn't wait around for any chickens to hatch this year, but we were getting close to seeing piglets born! I also watched a sheep be a mom to her new babies. She would pat them with her hoof to make them stand up and then push them with her nose to make them walk.

As for the rodeo itself, you could definitely tell it was opening night. There were a few technical glitches, but the animals made for the most excitement of the event. Two longhorns are saddled and ridden out in the arena before each show. One of them decided that he wasn't having too much fun and kept bucking until his rider flew off. It took a while to get everything calmed down, but the show went on. The other animal related event was during the bucking broncs. One of the horses fell shortly after the gate opened and pinned the rider under him.

The entertainer for the night was Tim McGraw. He rocked! The show went by too fast - I wish he would have sang more. No surprise appearance by Faith though... she is performing tonight.

Christmas Song Quiz - Link

Click here to view the song list.

The Halls Have Been Decked... kinda

Working full-time and doubling up on classes has proven to be a little much to tackle during the holidays. As many of you know, I am usually knee deep in creating handmade gifts and creative Christmas messages by now and the Christmas tree would have been set up right before Thanksgiving.

Well, I finally found a few hours of time a few weeks ago to put up the tree. At this rate, the house should be in full Christmas spirit by Easter.

I do love my tree this year. I found a slim 9 foot tree that would fit in the front room without having to rearrange and remove the furniture. I added a few more berry and twig things this year, but the big change is the spanish moss. I collected a bunch of spanish moss during one of our hiking adventures at the ranch and used it as garland for the tree. I love it! - plus, it helps fill in all of the bare spots in the cheap tree.

Now... I wonder how I'm going to get all of that moss off the tree...

(click photos to view larger)

Poster Child for Pet Insurance

I think Mr. Magoo should be the poster child for pet insurance.

$1,200 knee surgery... $250 candy bar... and now this...

I've always known that Magoo has "selective" hearing. Over the past month or so it has seemed to get worse. He stopped waking up when we walked in the house, he started barking at nothing, he wouldn't come inside when you called him unless he saw you standing there, etc.

So... I took him to the vet on Wed. just to have them look at him. I figured it was just old age and there wasn't anything you could do about it. The vet confirmed that thought but when she tried to look in his ears he freaked out and wouldn't let her. He's never done that before with an ear check. They took him in back and tried again, saw some gunk, and tried to swab it. Then he REALLY flipped. She said that it looked like there was something in his ear but it could just be dirt and gave me the option of having them sedate him to take a closer look. I gave my o.k. and now I'm glad I did.

After they got in there she saw a chunk which she thought was just debris or a piece of glass. When she removed it, it turned out to be necrotic tissue with pus below it to his ear drums. BOTH ears were like that! She was able to fully flush the left ear, but the right ear had tissue that wouldn't come out. I've had to tackle him for the past two days to put drops in his ears and then took him back this morning for a follow up appointment. They ended up having to sedate him again and to try to flush the right ear again and see how his ears are healing.

The vet said that his eardrums are damaged, but hopefully they will heal. We are seeing a minor improvement in his hearing already. He met me at the back door yesterday when I came home - he can hear the garage door again. :)

As for what caused it, the vet suspects that he had ear infections when he was younger that never quite cleared up, causing a blockage that built up in his ear canal and eventually led to the necrosis. In her opinion, this has probably been years in the making.

If Magoo's hearing does considerable improve, I may take a few other people to the vet and see if it helps. ;)

Gone Country

Stephen, Tyler and I spent this past weekend with Stephen's parents at their ranch. What a wonderful weekend! We didn't leave until after dark on Sunday and Stephen had to drag Tyler and I out of there - we didn't want to go home! Tyler had fun just being a country boy, and I felt like a kid again. :)

Tyler has shown an interest in bow hunting, so Grandpa Woody got him a bow and gave him lessons. We found yet another use for the "Texas Grape Pickin' Machine" when Tyler wanted to try out the new bow and it was already dark.

The rest of the night was spent laying in the backyard looking at the stars. There are so many more stars in the country! Tyler, Mimi, Magoo and I had to cuddle together to keep warm, but the chilly air was worth it. We even saw a few shooting stars! We were all surprised at the interest Tyler showed and how long the stars kept his interest. He even made us go outside again on Saturday night. We'll be back laying in the grass in a couple weeks to watch the meteor shower. It should be amazing!

Sunday morning after breakfast Tyler was back out practicing with his bow and arrow. Both Stephen and I tried it as well and ended up with matching bruises on our arm where we snapped ourself with the string when releasing the arrow. During all of the fun, Goo was in his favorite element - bathing in the sun.

In the afternoon we all put on our hiking clothes and headed deep into the woods. Tyler and I climbed mud covered cliffs, crawled across downed trees, caught a baby frog in the creek, and hunted for the perfect walking sticks. (Yes, that is me in a John Deer hat.)

And, if I had any doubt left in my mind after all of the weekend adventures, I knew Tyler was a true country boy when his first experience driving a vehicle was driving Grandpa Woody's tractor out into the woods!