Like Father Like Daughter...

So obviously Rhea is not a human but we still think of her as our daughter...the other night she laid down is a perfect spot and then proceeded to end up in the following positions.  Good thing I had a my camera on hand to capture the moment!  I did not pose these pictures...believe she wouldn't have let me :)

So I have taken the liberty of sharing and also putting some captions for your reading pleasure! If you have a better more clever caption be sure to share!

Oh hello...

Hold on...I'm reading something (this is what Todd always tells me)

What is wrong with this thing?

Damn this technology...

Meet Rhea...3 1/2 months late...

So I have been very bad at posting lately...I apologize.  I have lots of things I would like to blog about so I may be bombarding the blog with posts over the course of the week.

First things first....WE GOT A DOG!

Meet Rhea, pronounced RAY-UH, our blue merle great dane puppy.  I use the term puppy lightly...while she is a puppy she is growing VERY fast!

From the time we went to visit the breeder when she was 3 weeks to when we picked her up at 7 weeks she had doubled in sized and weighed about 14ish pounds.  Now she is about 3.5 months and weighs approximately 45 pounds!  I know pictures don't do size very well but here is a little montage of photos!

Rhea at 7 weeks

 Rhea with her bling collar

Rhea with Papa Todd

I wanted this in as a size reference

 Rhea at 10 weeks

Rhea at 10 weeks on Todds lap...clearly she has grown since the earlier picture

 This is the reason I wanted the size reference...you can see her head has clearly grown

In motion at 12 weeks

 12 weeks with her brand new corn toy...of course it squeeks

 There is plenty of room in the back of her kennel but this is how she wanted to sleep...

She loves leaning against anything...couches, legs, etc....

Playing Catch Up...

I realize its been awhile since I posted on the blog so I will give you a quick run down....

We have been getting crafty around here!  Todd and I decided that the floor next to our bed was no longer working out to keep stuff on so we built (well he built, I painted) some new bedside tables.

Our garden has definitely not been as good as last year, we planted it later this year and with the super hot weather a lot of stuff didn't make it.  After mowing today, I discovered that our cucumbers are doing quite well!  I didn't notice earlier because the vines are pretty thick, but oh man did I find them today!

Lastly, I am in the process of getting an Etsy shop up and going.  I finally made myself a little sewing area down in the basement which has been working out pretty well.  I have made a couple things for family members and today I had my first paying customer!  Once I have more clothing items made and my shop up and going I will blog more about my sewing and crafting endeavors there!

This was a dress for my niece Memphis.

These were dresses for the daughters of a teacher I work with! SOO CUTE!

Italy

As a lot of you know, Todd and I just returned from our belated honeymoon in Italy.  It was wonderful to say the least and we had a wonderful time, and met some really fabulous people!

Well we are slowly sifting through the thousands of pictures we took but it is a slow and hard process (especially since most of it has been left to me :) )  I have printed a lot of them off, filling up four albums that hold 300 pictures each.  I have embedded one of our albums with pictures from Rome that we will add to periodically. We will also be adding other albums from all the places we went.  We really love night photos so if you see a lot of those that is why.  Enjoy!!



I have linked this from Picasa, if you have any trouble looking at the pictures in a larger format please let me know!

How I Know My Husband is Older than Me...

Every so often Todd and I watch regular (digital antenna) tv. There was a commercial for a singing show called The Voice it has four judges one of which is a large black man. Todd sees this man and says....

"Is that P Daddy? He's gotten huge!"

To which I reply
"Todd its P Diddy...and no that isn't him."

The man is actually Cee Lo Green and I've included a picture of him anecdote  P Diddy so you can compare if you aren't familiar.

P Diddy aka Sean Diddy Combs aka four other dumb names

Cee Lo

I guess when they are both in white suits its hard to tell the 200 lb difference haha!

Kindergarten Zingers...

So anyone who works with or around Kindergarteners or anyone who has young children know that crazy things can come out of their mouths at any moment in time...and more often than not they aren't related to anything that is going on at that moment.

I call these Kindergarten Zingers...

Today I was reading this great book called Yucky Worms by Vivian French that is great for any kid who likes things that are slimy and gross...and little do they know it they are learning about worms while they read or listen.

At the end of this book there is a section called "How to Be a Wormologist"


So I ask the kids "Who wants to learn how to be a wormologist?"

To which a young African American boy replies...

"I don't! I want to be a Chinese boy!"

And in true Kindergarten form a conversation begins...



STINKIN HILARIOUS!

My Life in Eleven Tubs...

While I have not been living at my parent's home for quite some time, a lot of my "stuff" has been living there since I have been gone.  Well my mother has drawn the line and I am now officially moved out.

Yesterday my very organized, borderline OCD sister called me several times to ask if I wanted some things that were in my room including some track medals, a photo album with senior photos of my high school friends, a campfire Winnie the Pooh with my name on it (my mom got us these for Y Girl's Camp when we were younger) and sadly my reply was no I don't need them or have a place to put them.

While at work today, I was told that my mom would be making a delivery to my garage of all my things.  To my surprise there was nothing in my garage, rather it had been taken down to my basement.  There I found my life organized into 11 labeled turquoise tubs.

The stuff sticking out is a print from one of my printmaking classes and the other stuff is mostly art supplies

What I found interesting was that if you know me at all or even a little bit, the labels on these tubs really do sum up some of the highlights of my life....here is what they said

1. Sewing/Fabric
2. Dolls/Cinderella
3. D.M. (Dance Marathon)/Miscellaneous/Hills Bank Papers
4. Shoes/Bags/H.P. (Harry Potter) Scene It
5. Children's Books/Library
6. Childhood/Fragile
7. Books
8. Chi Omega/U of I
9. Book Sets
10. Art Books/Draw
11. No label just extra stuff that a lid wouldn't fit on

My life in just a few short labels.  

• I am a sewer and have been since the age of ten when I learned from my grandma in 4-H.
• I didn't open the tub, but I can guess that these are my American Girl dolls Molly, Kirsten and my "look alike" doll.  I am also a lover of all things Disney, especially Cinderella! (I featured one of its songs at our wedding)
• Dance Marathon was and is still a huge part of my life/Hills Bank is where our home loan is/ and someday I will open the tub to find out what the Misc. is!
• Shoes are my life, Bags are almost as much funny and I love all things Harry Potter
• Children's books and library sum up my life as it is right now...
• I did peak in the Childhood box and saw a wind up musical dolly from when I was little, I can also guess that this includes my Minnie Mouse tea set, precious moments and more
• Books...enough said
• Chi Omega is another big part of my life and still is and my wonderful undergraduate years spent at the U of I are some I will never forget and also where I met my wonderful husband
• Book sets including the Harry Potter series house in the trunk of Harry Potter, The boxed set of The Chronicles of Narnia, and the Little House on the Prairie Boxed set
• Art books and drawing stuff--while I don't do as much Art as I used it was my focus as an undergrad!

Well if you didn't know me before...I'm sure you have a little more insight into the life of Jenahlee...

A look into the future...

So Todd and I have trying (key word there, TRYING) to get rid of some clutter.  There were a couple of tubs in the garage that Todd's mom brought and we found some great things including the entire Goosebumps books collection that my students have been asking me to buy! Thanks for your donation Todd!

Along with these books and others, we also found some of Todd's old scout stuff and a notebook from eighth grade.  Well in the back of this notebook was a little look into what Todd's future will look like...or so he thought at the time :)

So we jump ahead to....

 For your sake I will decipher Todd's lovely handwriting for you!

 Not only is this his wife but they will meet in Paris...good thing I decided to take Paris off our list for the honeymoon in June...I'll have to keep that in mind in the future....OR there is serious plastic surgery in my future.

Show me the money....Jerry Maguire anyone?  Hopefully this will be the case by then...as for now we are getting by :)

I went to college at Notre Dame...well we better be rich by then to pay for that education!

 Yes this is sideways, I was too lazy to change it, you get the gist!

 This is his house with his wife in Florida, it has 25 floors and a 25 car garage....not saying I wouldn't take it!

 Well these kids are somewhat blonde which according to Todd probably won't happen with our kids because blonde is a recessive gene....I've seen it happen...either way they WILL NOT have these names!

We eat some healthy food I guess...we cook almost every night so that is better than take out!  Note: WE cook not our maid Helga....hey not saying it wouldn't be nice!

Well check back in 24 years...we'll see how we're doing :)

100 Push Ups? I think yes!

So I have just completed Week 1 of my 6 week program to doing 100 pushups!  I found this FREE online program a while back....actually before our wedding but for some reason I didn't have much time to do it....it's pretty well laid out and easy to follow and as of right now I totally recommend it! (Ask me again in a few weeks)

Hmm now how can I not make this a blog post about my work out plan....well today was my first day back from a week long Spring Break, let's just say the kids were a little crazy.

I found myself asking the kids on several occasions....Do you think I'm dumb?  Do you think I can't hear you talking right in front of me while I'm trying to read?  I usually tend to add something along the lines of I'm not that old, and my hearing is still quite good (actually I had a couple students once say that I had super sonic hearing, so clearly it's good)  This usually follows with a how old are you?  Today someone chimed in, "she's like 35" to which I replied I am not 35 and they continue to guess and eventually get closer...I will say 5th graders are much better than kindergarteners who usually guess something like 80.

On another note, my Master's thesis is basically complete, with a few minor corrections needed, printing on some fancy paper and binding!!!

Anywho, that's all for now....off to stretch before bed!

Around the Neighborhood

So I really love the neighborhood we live in, the Timberline Estates.  Its pretty much like living in the country but with more houses around....I just thought I would share some photos form my walk today around Peaceful Drive and Deer Run....I was doing a little practice with Photoshop CS5 also...what do ya think?

Our house on Peaceful Drive

Down Deer Run

Over the "bridge" this same creek runs right behind our house....in the description of our house it called this a "peaceful brook" I'll have to post again when it starts to rain in the spring....more like a raging river!

This isn't where our mailboxes are but I thought it made a good picture.

In the pasture where this windmill is there are two of the most beautiful horses I have ever seen! They are a very interesting color, but I didn't get a picture because they were eating and I couldn't get a good angle. Maybe another day...

Powerlines....

An extension of the creek, there is a tree is this picture is growing horizontally, pretty neat!

A touch of old school in the neighborhood

This big lady lives right across the road from us with two other horses....she is BY FAR the biggest as she is a Clydesdale.  It was funny because as I was walking back to my house she followed me the whole way....we had quite the stare-down!

Needless to say I think she won.  I really need to ask our neighbor if she has a name, because Todd and I have been trying to come up with some of our own.