Athens- Finally

I finally had a much anticipated trip to Athens this weekend.  I haven't been there since June so I was pretty excited!  As usual, my picture taking was pretty sporatic and unpredictable, but I did manage to get a few.  Things I did not get a picture of:

Hanging out with Devin on Friday afternoon, carb fest at Mark and Bekah's Friday night in preparation for the next day, stopping by a former student's football game to say hi Saturday afternoon and supper/games with several church families Saturday night.

 

Things I did get pictures of:

 

Running (well, I walked half) a 5k Saturday morning.  Two people in our group got first in their age group (not me- I got 11 out of 12 in my group), and one got fastest overall for the 40+ age group!  I had a time in my head that I wanted but I (insert excuses here) and got two minutes longer than that.  So not terrible, but I have a ways to go.  Oh, and for me to place in my age group I would have had to shave 12 minutes off my time.  Probably not gonna happen next time either:) 

 

 

The race was fun, but afterwards we were sooooo tired.........

 

Saturday lunch- using napkins as bibs in preparation for a Mexican feast!

 

Sunday lunch after church.  I was bummed that I forgot to take pictures on Saturday because we did a lot of fun stuff.  So I quick snapped a few pictures of the people sitting closest to me at lunch.

 



Awww...... the happy couple.

 

Bummer about the glare in this one- me with 3/4 of the Edelman girls.

 

Cass, Bekah and Natalie cheesin'.

 

In a nutshell: GREAT weekend!

Mini Farm

So, not to toot my own horn or anything, but I'm kinda excited about the little project I made.  I made it for an article review I'm doing for school on Farm Therapy and this is my prop:  a mini farm! 

My favorite parts are the corn in the chicken pen, the mud in the pig pen and the hay in the horse pen.  I just like it:)  I can't take credit though- found it on pinterest.

 

 

Culture In Peoria

Awhile back my Spanish teacher offered us a chance for extra credit.  Turns out there's a real mexican bakery in Peoria!  It's fairly new and she was really excited about it.  In order to get credit we had to show her a receipt and a picture to prove we went and bought something.  It was fun!  It seemed real enough to me- just like the ones in Morelia.  I'll probably go back again at some point.  Word on the street is that they have tamales.  I didn't see any while I was in there but I was too nervous about taking the picture to really notice what all was there.  I felt SO awkward asking to take one!  So I snapped it as quick as I could and called it good enough.  But I love me a tamale so I'll have to go check it out sometime.  Yummy!

 

 

By the way, if some of my posts seem lame it's because I'm just so excited about my 500th post giveaway coming up so I'm trying to get there soon.  Only about 4 more posts.  Keep watching!

Kinda Purty

A fall evening rainshower = a double rainbow = beautiful spacious skies o'er amber waves of grain:)

 

 

And also a gorgeous sunset (of course with the sillouette of a combine in the background).

 

*sigh....* I love fall and harvest!

Glory Days Gone By

I'm sure I've mentioned it several times on here, but the long standing joke in my family is that I'm going to be an Olympic gymnast someday.  Well, the other night I had the opportunity to take my 6 year old cousin to her gymnastics class- at the very same studio where I once practiced my skills:)  Her mom told me earlier that the teacher had pictures up of her old students so I went prepared with my camera.  Lo and behold, there in the picture frame labeled "1993" was me!  So for anyone who doubts my abilites or laughs in the face of my Olympic dreams, here you go.  There IS a gymnast inside of me!  Just look at that physique!  Maybe I should drop out of school and start training for Rio 2016???

 

 

 

 

What an outfit.  And those bangs!  My mom always said I looked like a sheepdog with the bangs in my face like that.  She might have been right.  But an 11 year old girl has to express herself, you know! 

Actually, while I was watching the class I found myself thinking "I bet if I practiced I could relearn some of this stuff...."  I mean, I can still pull off a pretty sweet cartwheel.  So if you see me in the near future and I'm sporting an ace bandage, a sling, a cast, crutches or a wheelchair, you  know why!

Meet Haarrrvey

Haarrrv

Last week in class we made puppets!  I kinda like mine:)  We were split up into groups and had to make a puppet show with what we all had created.  Everyone in our group except one made something different than just a regular "person puppet".  So we ended up writing a play where we were all residents in a nursing home attending a costume party.  We also had a princess (who was suffering from severe alzheimer's and thought she was at a Christmas party the whole time), a doctor (who also suffered from dementia and thought he still was the doctor) and a crochety old man dressed as a worm because he liked to fish when he was younger.  Then there was Lula, the activity aide for the evening.  She was extrememly chipper.  Here's Harv's story:

He lost his leg in the war and just a couple months ago his wife (Evelyn) passed away.  She took really good care of him but once she was gone his kids thought he should move into the nursing home because they all lived a couple hours away.  He didn't hate the home but he was still adjusting.  He misses his own home but one perk of the "Old Folks Nursing Home" is the cute nurses!

Good ole Harv.  Just an even-keel guy with the slightest bit of depression, but that's to be expected in his situation.  My favorite part about Haarrrvey's attire is his doo-rag, eyepatch and jingle bell earring:)

I'll spare you all the details of the therapeutic value of puppetry.

Aaaannd Life Goes On

Well the last four weeks have consisted of spending ample time reading these books.  Fun fun!  School has been going really well.  I'm liking all my classes but I kind of forgot that studying outside of class is part of it.  And I'm sooo not in homework mode.  Well, I guess I'm getting there finally.  Last week when the teacher reminded us that there would be a test in two days I was like "Oh no!!  I forgot all about studying!!"  So after cramming for a couple of days all was well and I did good on my test:)  Now, if you notice the book on the bottom- Crafts and Creative Media in Therapy.

I mean, how fun is this class?!?!  We sit and do art projects!  I have a small needlepoint thing that I did too but I forgot to get it out of my bag for the picture.  But really- putting together a journal, yarn projects, personality collage, soda straw painting, oragami.... although what you don't see is the oragami  project that I nearly crumpled into a tiny ball because I was so frustrated with it:)

So school takes up most of my time.  And as of last week I'm back at the elevator for harvest.  Only part time this year (obviously) but still loving it.  Why is weighing trucks so fun anyway?  I've even been spending most of my weekends at home doing homework but last Saturday I met up with Katrina at a park and we caught up on life over a picnic.  It was so fun and quaint:)  And so good to sit and chat with her too.

So that's my life right now.  Nothing too exciting!  I'm coming up on my 500th blog post.  I have a giveaway in mind that I want to do.  I think I need 7 or 8 more posts so I don't know how long it will be but keep your eyes peeled!