Noteworthy Events

1. I bought a new duck!!!

I didn't say it was a real duck now did I?
We got our pool set up literally 2 weeks ago, and it's not been quite hot enough, or dry enough at the same time to swim.

Tanner said "screw that crap" (ok, maybe not quite like his mom would) and decided he was going swimming.

I bought ducks last year for each of us. I'm pink, Gene is blue, Tanner was green. Tanner ran over himself with the lawnmower last fall, so I found a cute silver one to replace it.

Gene's duck is half light blue and half bright blue from laying on it's side in the pool. It's a bi-racial Gene duck.


2. Gene and I were featured on Offbeat Bride! No, not as photographers, as a friggin couple! How cool is that!? Right on our 2nd anniversary too. Not a full feature, just one of our pics but we were pretty stoked about it. I submitted in fall of '08 so it took a while!

3. Speaking of that rotten good for nothing kid of mine...

How dare he go out and win an award for being so committed to an organization. Sheesh. What nerve!

There's an organization that's been around for quite some time called "Upward Bound" It's a federally funded education program that prepares kids for the road to college. I believe they said that around 90% of the kids that go through the program, go on to college.

Now, I totally expect Tanner to go anyway regardless, but I expected me to go too.. and I didn't! I really wish I had done the program when I was in high school. I think it would have helped me tremendously.

This program has 60 kids in it from 4-5 different schools in the area. In fact, Maryville school seems to have the least amount of kids, which is very odd to me. During the summer, they spend the week at NWMSU attending classes. Some subjects they may never have in their own school. This year Tanner had astronomy as one of his courses and really liked it.

In the evenings they have activities that range from BBQ's to going to dinner theaters in Kansas City.

They learn a lot, and at the end, they have college credits - for *free*. Tanner wanted to get a summer job, but after I explained he'd be saving so much money by taking courses, there's no way he could pay for those by working at McDonalds, I think he kinda understood. Plus they do get paid a stipend for each week they are there. This week, the last week, Tanner will be traveling to Wisconsin. They will do fun stuff of course, but along the way, they will tour universities too.

So ANYWAY, their move out date was Thursday, and Thursday night they had a banquet for all the students. There were about 12-15 awards given out, and Tanner was one of the winners! I'm so proud of him! There were times it was hard to tell if he wanted to be there or not, but I do believe he had a good time, AND I think it benefited him greatly.


4. Going to be a long hard week! I have wedding this weekend (and next weekend). My goal is to get everything I have done by this Friday. I can't seem to get Gene to understand that I have work to do too.


5. I'm so excited! We got the nesting boxes for the coop about 3/4 done! It looks so different in there. I had a temporary nesting box that was nothing but an old shelf on it's side with a partition. It wasn't fancy, but it worked. I wanted something nicer, and we needed more boxes since we have 20 chickens. Soon the younger ones will be laying eggs, and 2 nesting boxes are not enough!

Tanner did most of the work! Is that cool or what? I sensed he was getting frustrated, so I went out to help him and we knocked it out fast. The boxes are getting built in 2 sections because otherwise it wouldn't fit through the door! First 4 boxes are built and the next 3 will be done sometime soon I hope. In the next couple weeks probably. For right now it's a good start. I will share pics soon.


6. I have listed a ton of new stuff on my etsy, and a few new things on Gene's etsy. Sadly we have about 50 more things to add! PLUS, we're adding a new etsy shop soon too! It's all cowboy kitsch! Very excited about that! It'll take a little bit of work to get it ready so I have not started it yet.

Now, aren't you sorry you asked how I was?