Day 22 - Daddy's Hands

Day 22 - Hands

I love watching my boys play together.

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Day 21 - Faceless

Day 21:  Faceless Self-Portrait

This is from when we went to Woody's on the Wharf a few weeks ago.

Can you see my t-strap brown sandals in this picture? I bought them that morning, it was the only time I wore them and now they are missing! So sad!


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The Secret REVEALED

I feel like a jerk.

When I first announced "the secret" a few weeks ago I never expected to have to wait so long to reveal it. I just thought it would be a fun way to create a little intrigue and excitement; two words that I normally wouldn't associate with my method of storytelling.

As usual, things didn't go as planned and what I expected to be able to reveal at the end of June soon turned into the third week of July. Now that the third week of July is here I still don't feel like it's quite the right time to share my news. Thus, my feeling like a jerk.

However, against my better judgement, I'm going to tell you anyway. I promised something would happen on July 21st and I won't renege on that promise.

But first let me say how surprised I was that so many of you assumed that my secret had to do with being pregnant. I mean, can't a woman of child bearing age have a secret NOT related to her uterus? Jeez louise people!

So, let's recap shall we?

Clue #1

Tracy Byrd sings a song that goes something like... "We're from the country and we like it that way."

Clue #2



Grapes

Somewhere after Clue #2 I got a little bored with my clue giving because SOMEONE was spot on in their guessing and took the wind out of my sails. Hmpf!

Clue #3 was "July 21st"

Which is an important date that unfortunately is not going to go as we had anticipated.

The secret is...

We're moving!!!!

HERE!!!

to a vineyard!!!

Hopefully....

Long story short. We got an AMAZING deal on a foreclosure in Lodi wine country on a five acre vineyard. Crazy, right? The seller agreed to do some work on a few trouble spots. They did, but their contractor did a shoddy job (and when I say "shoddy" I mean it the way it is written as well as the way it sounds if you say it fast and it comes out like a bad swear) and now my kitchen looks like this and will continue to look like this for the indeterminate future.

(Not my kitchen, but you get the idea.)

So, we're still in escrow and the news of the delay kind of put a damper on how I wanted to share the news, which was by revealing my new blog! But, that will have to remain a revelation for another day. Gotta make sure my name is on that dotted line and the ink is dry before I'll be confident that THIS is going to be my new life.

Suffice it to say, it's beautiful and we love it and it gives us the perfect amount of house space for the needs of our current and hopefully future family. (But this isn't about my uterus people!)

Please excuse my son's ridiculously long bowl cut.

For the time being I'll keep fretting over paint chip colors and agonizing over my Pinterest inspiration boards deciding how to decorate my new digs. As evidenced in the photo above, we'll have our work cut out for us soon enough!

Thanks for bearing with me and my jerky secret keeping. More to come!

Photo Challenge Day 20 and the Fair

So, I'm skipping Day 20 - it's a little too fancy for my non-fancy camera. Instead I'll tell you about the time we went to the County Fair.

Let me begin by saying, I am not a "fair" person. As a matter of fact, I kind of hate the fair. Just the thought of it makes me feel hot and dirty and have flashbacks to my years in small town television when I had spend a lot of time at the fair filming pageant competitions and art shows. You will never look at "scholarship competitions" the same way after you've spent countless hours standing behind a camera watching 6-22 year olds perform (mostly) really bad dance/singing/instrumental/acting (for those who can't sing, play an instrument or dance) routines, all the while connected by headphones to the director's truck hearing rude comments about each girl made by middle aged men while you discreetly tell bratty kids to quit climbing on the 6-foot tall scaffolding you're standing on because it shakes the camera. There were also the years that I stood outside the fair in a parking lot for 5 days helping to park cars as part of a church fundraiser. (Did I mention we usually had to haul trash and dirt out of it a few days before hand.) Yeah, I hate the fair.

That being said, the Alameda County Fair may have changed my opinion of the fair in general. It was clean, held on sprawling grounds, and just generally pleasant.

Luke liked the animals.

There were lots of cute little piglets!

And a momma cow and her calf

We saw a glimpse of Luke's future here...

and here...

And this, as usual, remains the same. :)

Justin's dream is to be a pig farmer.



Double Ferris Wheel - almost as rare as the "double rainbow," but not quite.

Did I mention how enamored I currently am with the "vintage film" polaroid effect on my smart phone? It makes everything look cooler.



Even I look a better in "vintage film." I think it evens out my pasty uneven skin tone.

Not at the fair, but it belongs in the same weekend - we watched fireworks this year in a cute little Lodi neighborhood. The street was blocked off and everyone just pulled their chairs outside and watched. I love small towns!

Oh, and Luke rode a pony. This was taken as the pony ride operator told me "no pictures from inside!"

Photo Challenge Day 19: Orange

Day 19:  Something Orange

I was pretty excited about this photo challenge because I am surrounded by orange on a daily basis.

As you may remember, I recently moved into a brand new building. We have spent the last few years dreaming up, fundraising for, and watching the progress of this new building, so it has been pretty exciting to actually be in the space. Here are my contributions to the orange post and a "tour" of my new work station.

Before the boxes arrived with all of our stuff. AKA the cleanest this place ever has and ever will look again.

I sit on the end, so I get the orange wall. Hooray! Part of it has since been covered by a tag board, which made me a little sad. :(

My view. When school is in session I'll see people walking to and from classes. And the landscape isn't too bad either!

The boxes arrive! I purposefully packed orange and black poms on the top of this box. I thought it would make it more fun to open and subsequently unpack. It worked! :)

Getting all my orange and black/tiger themed knick knacks in order.

More color and more tigers. :)

I took all my pix of Luke home during the move so they wouldn't get broken and haven't brought them back. I miss his little face, so I better get them back over here ASAP!

One of my real life friends just started doing the photo challenge too!

You can check her photos and more about her fun life in Texas over at Kate Eva



Clue #3 - Getting Closer

For those still following along waiting for the revelation of "the secret," (not including the people who already know, nailed it, or couldn't take the suspense so I had to tell them privately - you know who you are) I haven't forgotten about you. Here's the 3rd clue:

Previous Clues:
#1
#2

Day 18: I love my Toms

Day 18:  Shoes

I'd heard of Tom's Shoes and, in general, thought the concept was pretty neat. For every pair of shoes they sell, they give a pair of shoes to a kid in a third world country who can't afford shoes. Something like that. I love that idea. But...at the same time, the cynic in me was thinking, "Really? You buy $40 shoes just so a kid in another country doesn't have to go bare foot? I'm pretty confident if you were really buying the shoes as a selfless act to help a kid in need it'd probably be better just to send the $40 and they could buy like 100 pairs of shoes."

But...then you wouldn't have a really cool pair of trendy shoes now would you?

I didn't really know I wanted a pair - partly based on principal and the aforementioned cynicism. Then my brother-in-law bought me these for Christmas. And...they make me feel really cool and trendy....and pretty great about myself because a needy kid has a new pair of shoes. How very Machiavellian!

Regardless of my cynicism, they're mine now and I love them.

My goal is to embellish them with some sparkles.

What do your Tom's look like?

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Day 17: The last thing to go

Day 17:  Technology

I'm skipping a couple of days just to keep this show on the road.  Today is our last day in what has been our temporary office building for a year. Everything is boxed up and ready to be moved into our brand spanking new building back on campus. The technology is the last thing to pack up and then we're off!

I'm still doing the 30 day photo challenge.
View the rest of the challenges - including the ones I skipped!