The accused...

Sure, she looks innocent enough, but don't let that fool you. She tried to kill me this morning.

A little background: For as long as I have owned this house, (going on 5 years now) Chelsea Grace has had this game of trying to figure out where I'm walking in the house, and beating me there. It's really adorable.

Except when she's wrong.

Which brings us to this morning. I was walking back to my bedroom after being at the front of the house. My hallway kind of "forks" at the end; my bedroom on the right, my scraproom on the left. Chelsea Grace must have thought I was going into the scraproom to check my email or something because she took off that way. But when she realized I was zigging while she was zagging, she whipped herself around and ran right in front of me.

And then she just....

STOPPED!

Right as I got to the doorway she stopped dead in her tracks. Now I always sucked at physics, but the one thing I did learn was that an object in motion tends to stay in motion.

Which is what I did.

In order to not step on her, I tried to take a bigger step to step over her. Well this freaked her out, so she took off running again. And that totally threw me off balance, because once again I was about to step on her! I ended up grabbing the door frame to stop from falling, which jammed my wrist, and as my leg went down I hyperextended my knee. Good grief.

And what does Chelsea Grace do while all this is going on? While I'm trying to not only save her life, but my own?????

She bathes.
@@

I guess when you have 9 lives, using one up isn't such a big deal.

Hot Springs, Virginia

This is a shot I took as we were coming back down the mountain the day after the wedding we were hired to shoot. There were so many picturesque farms, and beautiful landscapes. This scene looked like a painting to me, so I tweaked it a bit to make it look like one. You can click on the picture to see more detail. I took the shot pretty fast because the road was littered with dead snakes, and as we later found out the place was crawling with ticks! ::shudder::

Just playing around

Things are finally settling down a bit around here. All my spring weddings are shot, edited and uploaded for client viewing. All my work is done on the extra job I picked up for a little extra money, and that has been turned in. My house is still a disaster, but hey...baby steps.

So what's a girl to do with a little free time? Find a new endeavor, of course! My sweet friend, Melinda, and I are pairing up on a new project, I'll keep you posted as new details emerge. I think it will be fabulous, and creative and FUN!

I have so many pictures that I've taken in all my traveling in the last year. With everything so crazy, I haven't had time to work on any of them, I've done all our "paid" work first and then there never seemed to be time for the other stuff. This morning I forced myself to pick just one picture I would want in my house, and play with it. This is the picture I came up with.

This is a tree in Bay St. Louis, MS. I love this tree so much. I adore photographing trees, anyway, almost as much as I love photographing feet! ha! The older, more gnarled the tree, the better. Imagine the stories they can tell. This tree especially. This tree survived Katrina. As you can see it's right on the water, and that bridge behind it is a bridge that didn't fare as well. When I was there in December, they were rebuilding that bridge. Everything around this tree was demolished, there was so much damage. Concrete was ripped from the road; a tree trunk the size of a Ford Expedition was uprooted and lay in the middle of the street, roots and all. And this tree saw it all happen. I know I'll never know the reason this beautiful tree still stands there.

But I'm so glad it does. :o)

Only 2 weeks later!

Ok, so most of you know I won tickets to see Billy Joel in New Orleans a couple of weeks ago. At long last, some pictures from the Billy Joel Concert! Oh my gosh, it was such a great show!! I never thought I'd ever say this in all my life, but he bumped Elton John off the number 1 spot of greatest concerts I've been to! He's my new number 1. Can you believe that???

My friend, Cindy took these fabulous pictures. I was afraid to bring my big camera to the concert, thought it might get confiscated. I borrowed my mom's small digital, but Cindy's pics turned out much better! She had a pretty powerful zoom going on! She took some video of the concert too, but I can't get it to upload to photobucket to post it here. I'll keep working on that!

Since then I've been doing a bunch of spring cleaning, and re-organizing. I'm trying to declutter. Ha. Good luck with that.

I also got a new mattress last weekend. I really like it, it's so comfy! I'm hoping it will help my back. It will be nice to be able to sleep all night and wake up in the morning pain free.

I think that's all I have to add right now. I'm sure I'll think of something else as soon as I log off, but you'll just have to wait until next time! Have a great night!

I'm very sad. I killed a bird today. I'm a bird murderer. A Burderer!!! :o(

Craft day with mom was fun, I didn't get as much accomplished as I would have liked, but that's ok. There's always next time. Some friends are supposed to come scrapbook at my house Saturday, so I can get some work done on my books. I'm tired of all this stuff just accumulating. I'm ready to get it all where it belongs...in the scrapbooks!!! Then I can accumulate MORE STUFF! ha. just kidding.

Kinda.

The brisket turned out pretty good, if I do say so myself. I took it to the family tonight, they seemed very excited. But I found out the mother is back in the hospital in ICU. She's having such bad pain, and a high fever and fluid in her abdomen. They are running tests to see what it could be. Right now they suspect gall bladder. That has to be hard. She's away from her new baby, and in ICU, the husband is home from the Marines on leave, and the whole time she's been in the hospital and ill. He's running back and forth between the baby and his wife. Keep them in your prayers, please. Sounds like they really need them!

I think that's all I have to blog about today, happy Monday everyone!

Look at my new lamp! I got it tonight at Hobby Lobby, and I just love it! It looks so cute in my den on the bookcase. I wonder how long it will take Chelsea Grace to notice it and decide to "play" with the little danglers?

Tomorrow my mom is coming over and we are having a craft day. We decided we are going to get a head start on Christmas this year, and each month to 6 weeks we will have a craft day, and work on our projects. I hope it helps me at Christmas this year so it's not as hectic as this past Christmas. I'll let you know how this plan goes. ha.

After we finish our craft day we are going to see a movie Mom has been wanting to see: "Because I Said So". Should be a fun filled day!

I'm also attempting to make a brisket tomorrow. If it turns out ok, I'll have dinner for mom and me, (HA!) and then I'll take some to a family from choir that just had a baby. Cross your fingers for me, I've never made one before! Then Sunday I have church, and choir orientation (I'm the choir photographer, so I have to be there to take everyone's mug shots) and then, the rest of the day I may sit on the couch and catch up on my Tivo playing list!

Have a great weekend!

WOW! I can't believe it's February already! Before I know it, it will be Christmas again! Guess I better start shopping! ha.

I decided to put a couple of pictures of my mantel on this blog, because it makes me feel cozy. I change it up every so often, it's an easy way to redecorate without a lot of money or effort. I do the same with my kitchen table, I change it out with the seasons or occasions. I have discovered I'm addicted to dishes, glasses, candles and placemats. Expensive addiction, and it also takes up SO MUCH SPACE! ack!

I've been working on the blog for the business. It's shaping up, but still needs work. I have to input all our information, and also have a TON more pictures to add. It will definitely be a work in progress. I surprised Meredith with what I have done so far, and she was so excited! It's great to work with someone who's so encouraging. Of course it never really feels like work with her, we are usually cracking up every time we are together. We think so much alike, we've decided we share a brain. Sucks for her, ha!

I have so many things on my to do list, that blog being just one of them. I decided this weekend would be a productive weekend, but tomorrow I have church, a baby shower to attend, plus it's Super Bowl Sunday, so not much work will be done tomorrow. So that leaves today. And what am I doing? Blogging. HA! I'm such a procrastinator lately.

Well I'm going to get busy, wish me luck! I'd like to knock at least 2 things off my list today. Hopefully that's not too ambitious! Here I go.......but first I need some breakfast. :o)