rock crawlers

Sunday, May 31, 2009

Today was my first weekend day off, in a while. So it was really nice to be able to spend the entire day with Mike. There was a WEROCK rock crawling competition at Hannibal Rocks this weekend. Mike had called a couple guys to go, but they were out of town. Since he didn't want to go my himself, I decided to go. It was my first competition, so I didn't really know what to expect. I didn't realize people were pros in this and they actually came to Hannibal to compete. Mike was telling me some of teams spent over $80,000 on their rigs....I told him not to get any ideas. :) It was a pretty good time. I got nervous for the drivers when they teetered on 2 wheels.

How do they get the rig out you ask???


This is how!


Look at this guys axles....that's some flex!

I did get a little sun burnt while were were out there. I was actually surprised, because we were only out for about 4 1/2 hours AND I applied sunscreen 3 times. Oh well, it's really not that bad and my freckles came out and I love it when that happens.

delicious

Friday, May 29, 2009

I found this website back in January, and I love it! It's called delicious. It's basically place to bookmark websites you like online. One of the things I love about it, is you can access your bookmarks from any computer. So for instance, you computer just dies on you, you don't lose your favorites. I mostly use mine for recipes and it lets you categorize your favorites; so for mine it's like main dish, beef, chicken, dessert, etc. But you can use it for any kind of website you want to save. If any one is interested in starting on, here's mine so you can kind of see how it works. Another neat thing is you can see who else has bookmarked the same thing as you and then look through there stuff. I've found many a good recipes that way. Let me know how you like it!

I posted about a month ago about making my table runner, and it's still not done yet. I've been doing some research on quilting, since I've never done it before. Well, I figured out I need a walking foot for my sewing machine, so I finally ordered it and hopefully it will be here in about a week. I really want to get this table runner done so I can start on my next project, a purse!

day off cut short

Thursday, May 28, 2009

So I just got a call from a co-worker; he needs me to switch shifts with him, so I'm working tonight. The joys of retail; people think you don't have a life outside of work. I'm so ready for a Monday-Friday, 9-5 job!

Enjoy your night off of work everyone! :)

day of baking

I have today off work, but not off of doing things. It's going to be a day of baking for me. I have to make cookies for Mike's lunches (and for me to munch on during the day....) and some granola bars for his breakfasts. I truly believe I have a spoiled husband! I do something nice for him like making homemade granola bars, and he will probably never let me buy pre-made ones again. :) With all joking aside, I do truly love to make him things. It's a great feeling when someone you love enjoys what you cooked for them. I love it when he tells me stories of him bragging about my cooking at work, it's the best.

I started a new book on Tuesday, "Julie and Julia" by Julie Powell. It's going to be a movie later this year, so I wanted to get it read before. It's about a woman who blogs her way through "Mastering the Art of French Cooking, Vol.1" by Julia Child. This memoir is more about her life (Julie's) not the recipes, and how it changed her. I'm really into, hopefully I get it done within a week.

red roses

Saturday, May 23, 2009

Aren't these gorgeous?! These are the roses in our backyard. We have another rose bush, it's white; I'm sure I'll have a picture of it up soon.

We went out to the cabin last night. It was a pretty nice time. A few people we still on their way, which was a good thing so we could meet everyone in stages; easier to remember names that way. I had a few Long Islands last night as well. Can I just say how much I LOVE Long Island Ice Teas!! I don't really get them that often, because I don't really get drinks out when we actually do go out. Well, we found a premixed bottle by Captain Morgan....oh so good. We even had a fire last night, and I'm sure it's just the first of many this weekend.

Mike's already back out to there this morning. I'm staying at home and then heading to work. I guess Bill (Mike's Uncle) always has a big project to do on Memorial Day weekend, since there will be a lot of people there to help. So I'm kind of glad I have to work today. :) I was thinking about it and I kinda like that I have to work during the hottest part of the day this weekend, so I'm in air conditioning. I'm still a city girl; probably always will be.

it's a three day weekend for some people

Friday, May 22, 2009

This weeks been a pretty boring one. Nothings really happened; I guess this is good and bad. I would rather nothing exciting happen, than have a bad week.

Yesterday was a gorgeous day! And I was lucky enough to have it off of work. :) So I decided to walk down to the library. I spent about an hour there and couldn't find ANYTHING to check out. I hope the next place I live will have a library like in Lafayette. I was looking for a grilling book, and they had some, but they were very outdated. We have a few grilling cookbooks at home, but we've used them for the last 2 or 3 summers. Time for some new inspiration!

This weekend is going to be a busy one. Hopefully I'll actually take some pictures. Mike's aunt and uncle (Pam & Bill) have a cabin with some land about 20 minutes west of Hannibal. (I'm sure I've talked about them before). Anyway, they are having a big weekend long party/cookout. I guess people bring their tents or campers and just hang out all weekend. And what makes even busier is I have to work as well. UGH! I want a new job!!! So Mike will probably spend almost the whole weekend out at the cabin, while I'll be going back and forth between it and work. Luckily I won't be working really late and I'll be able to enjoy the weekend for the most part.

So Happy Memorial Day to all, and I hope you have a fabulous and safe weekend!

tornado alley

Saturday, May 16, 2009

We've had a very strange last couple of days.

Wednesday night, there were 4 tornadoes that touched down about an hour or so from us in Kirksville, MO. Three people were actually killed, which just makes the situation even sadder. Kirksville is where Mike goes from some training that is only going to last a day. He also goes there for meetings because it's the regional headquarters (I think..). I'm not sure if he's talked to the foresters he knows that live up there, but I hope everyone is okay. We only had rain and high winds on Wednesday night.

Yesterday, Mike and I both had the day off, so we went to Quincy to get his drive shaft fixed. It only takes about 20 minutes to get there but the temperature dropped 5 degrees while we were driving, and the sky went completely black. We had to turn our headlights at noon! We dropped off the drive shaft and then went to the grocery. The sky lightened up a bit but not too much on our drive back to Hannibal. On our drive, the weather came on the radio and just talked about flash flood watch for Quincy, IL and Palmyra, MO (both are north of us). So we kind of thought we were in the clear. We were wrong..... About 5 minutes later (we were still on the road home) a another weather alert came on changing everything to tornado warnings and included southeastern Marion county. THAT'S US! We get into Hannibal and we hear the tornado sirens going off. It's still not raining and it's not windy at all. We get home, drag the groceries in and I say,"You know, I think we should just go hang out in the basement for a while." Mike just looked at me but then agreed with me. So we grabbed some snacks and drinks real quick and went downstairs. The warning was only for about 30 minutes, so we knew we wouldn't be down there for very long. We flipped on the T.V. and the weather channel was covering our storm system and even had a correspondent in central Missouri. Then all of a sudden, it started raining HARD. We have a walk out basement, so Mike went to the door to see how bad it was outside. I know, probably wasn't the smartest thing to do, but we got to see and you could hardly see through the rain it was coming down so hard.

In the end everything was fine, but I'm still glad we went downstairs. It stopped raining and it was actually a pretty nice rest of the afternoon/evening. I don't think there were any tornadoes yesterday. I am glad Mike was off work, because I probably would of got a little scared if I were home alone.

lost in lost

Wednesday, May 13, 2009

We've made it! Mike has completed all of his training. For the most part anyway; he will continue to train one or two days a month. I'm so happy to have him home for good.

We've been kind of bored with television, so lately we've been watching Lost on hulu, and we are obsessed! We started about 2 months ago and we just started season 4. It's just an addictive show, especially when you can just click and watch another episode. The cool thing about it, is Mike has hooked his laptop up to the T.V. and we can watch it on the T.V. even though it's coming from online. I'm sure we will be up to speed when the show starts next fall, and it will be so hard waiting a whole week for another episode.

song birds

Monday, May 11, 2009

We've been sleeping with our bedroom windows open, since it's been so nice out. Well, aside from the trains and barges I've addressed earlier, we have so many song birds around our house. Every morning I wake up to them just singing their heads off. I guess it's just their way of telling me to get up and start my day! Mike said something yesterday about them, and we both can't remember living somewhere with this many birds. We aren't sure if it's Missouri or just our luck.

We have a little birdhouse on our front porch, and guess what.....we have a tenant! :) It's this itty-bitty bird, I'm not sure if he's the only one. But late last week I caught him cleaning the house out, one beak full at a time. It was so cute! Then, yesterday morning, I saw him taking tiny sticks in, well attempting. It was just so neat watching this tiny bird work for a purpose. When he dropped a stick, he went down and picked up the same stick, flew to the power line, turned around to get a better angle, and flew back to the house to put the stick in.

I will get a photo of the bird eventually. And I don't know why I call it "he", because it's probably a lady bird.

Obviously, he still has some cleaning up to do....

This is what I woke up to, so he was very busy at work while I was at work yesterday.

down by the river

Friday, May 8, 2009

We are going to an event downtown tonight called "Down by the River". I think the best way to describe it to everyone back home is a scaled down version of the Taste. It's food, drinks and bands playing. It's going to happen every second Friday of every month this summer (through September). This is the first one this summer, so we don't really know what it's all about yet. One of the really good things is we live within walking distance of the festivities. So we won't have to worry about parking and we both can have a few drinks. I say this because I'm always the one who doesn't drink a drop so Mike can, so I'm excited to just have the option of a drink.

Before we go downtown, we are grilling ribs tonight! We are thinking the food will be marked up for the event, so we'll save some money by eating at home first. Maybe next month we'll eat downtown. We've been grilling like crazy this week, a sure sign of summer. I love grilling out, and I think it's mostly because of the sides. Cook-out sides are the best; corn on the cob, baked beans, pasta salad, I could go on forever!

cinco de mayo

Tuesday, May 5, 2009

Well, crap! I got the call this morning, I didn't get the job at the bank. She was really nice about it and said they were hiring a teller at another branch in town, so she would pass my resume and information to them. I don't know if that is really going to happen, but one can hope! Things at my job aren't getting better, my hours are just going down the tubes. I just hope something comes along soon.

We are going out with some of Mike's coworkers tonight to celebrate cinco de mayo. Since this "holiday" is less than a week after my birthday, I've always enjoyed it since turning 21. We haven't had authentic Mexican food since last November it seems. I've been trying tide us over by making it at home, but it just doesn't compare.
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