Awkward and Awesome

Awkward: 
- my affinity for quoting Far And Away movie lines, to which next to no one understands the reference. (My favorite and most watched movie from 1993 until 2000, when it was temporarily eclipsed by Bring It On... a circumstance that I can not explain except to say that I was a high school cheerleader. I'm sorry.)
"He's keeping himself to himself, that one"
"Ah, very wise, very wise"
"all chests are equal in the eyes of the Lord"
"Tell me ya like my hat!"
"That there was the oldest horse I ever saw in my life"

- the number of pictures of Miley currently on my computer since getting my new camera... mostly because she's my most willing (and present) subject. Seriously though, it's ridiculous.

- when this happens to your new $20 phone charger that you were so excited about because 1. it was 5 ft long and 2. it was pink, after only one week of use: 

LAAAAAME. I'll return it, but still. What a pain. 

Awesome:
- Kendall and Cooper are finally done with their basketball seasons. I loved watching them play, but this is the first time since last summer that I have ZERO kids to run to practices several times a week! This brief period of glory is only going to last a month however... Cooper just signed up for baseball.

Hash tag: glutton for punishment.

- the upcoming state playoff games for our Varsity boys and girls teams this weekend... it's the first year both teams have a really good chance of making it to the finals in Baker City... one of our favorite family trips! (I know this seems conflicting after the previous paragraph. That's because I'm a conflicted person.)

- realizing that it's basically spring here in the Willamette Valley and we somehow managed to skip winter all together. No snow! No ice storms! No huge freezes! Weird!! (I loved it.) I wore sandals today. 

What I Wore No. 230

No. 1

Maurice's shirt, Old Navy top, American Eagle jeans, Matisse boots

No. 2

Maurice's top, American Eagle jeans, Famous Footwear wedges

No. 3 

Dress Barn flannel shirt, Target jeans, Etsy scarf, old LEI suede shoes

And three's it for this week. Things been hectic, yo.

On a barely related note... did anyone watch the Oscars Sunday night and pick a favorite dress?

Here's mine.

LOVE. IT. Nicely done, Cate Blanchett.

Happy Wednesday!

Monday Confessional: the bad wife

Friday night Russell coached his basketball team to victory in the District Championship game to secure the #1 seed berth to State from our league. He also was awarded league Coach of the Year, and many of his players (including my niece) were named to all-league teams and the all-tournament team (including league player of the year!)

{Picture courtesy of the Molalla Pioneer}

Basically, awards and honors were being handed out left and right.

And where was I?

AT BURGER KING.

(Massive wife fail times ONE MILLION.) 

What happened is that we were beating the other team quite handily and so Jana and I, who had ridden up together with our kids and arrived at the district site early enough to secure good seats, decided to run get dinner for our crew at the end of the 3rd quarter so that we would be back in time to make sure no one took our spots for the boys game that was going to follow, forgetting ALL ABOUT the awards part of the evening. What kind of veteran coach's wife (we are talking 15 years here, people) makes that kind of mistake?

This goofball.

Thankfully, Russell was so busy being congratulated by everyone else that when I came back and immediately found him to give him a hug and a kiss he didn't even know I hadn't been there the whole time! 

AND WE'RE GOING TO KEEP IT THAT WAY FOLKS. Wink, wink ;)

Friday Photo Dump

It's Friday, it's Friday! 

The weekend plans: District championships for russ's basketball team - woop, woop!

Spa outing with a friend who is treating me... TRIPLE woop!

Mexico missions trip meeting for Russ and Kendall who are going this summer - I'm so excited for them!

And here's what's been going on lately...

Hey, I think daddy is comfy too. 

We took the family bowling for the first time in eons and yep, I'm just as sucky as ever. Fun times. 

Kendall's face after seeing "Into the Woods", which she was NOT a fan of after everything took a turn for the worse 2/3 of the way into the film. Hehe. 

We finally got our new trampoline up (Christmas present for the kids) - yeah!

And then Windageddon happened... RUDE. 

The trampoline is fine but two of the poles holding up the enclosure bent horribly so we had to take it off. Again, RUDE.

The Valentine's treats I made for my kids' class parties. 

(And for myself, because who doesn't love a sweet chocolate hug mixed with a salty pretzel?!!)

The result of my "quick trip to the store" that I wrote a list for and then forgot to bring with me. 

Came home and checked off what I remembered... WINNING.

Kendall singing on stage with the youth praise team for the first time for a special Youth Sunday service... you bet I marched on up to the front and took pictures!

We have been having some glorious spring-like weather so Russ decided to start tackling our apple trees (we have 14) that have been sadly in need of a good pruning for the past couple of years. Nine down... five to go! 

So this is a funny story. 

Kendall drew this picture and showed it to me this week. I had no idea who it was but was super impressed... and when she said "It's Peeta from the Hunger Games" I was all, 

OF COURSE! 

Obviously it's not exactly right, but hey, she's thirteen!

So I posted it on facebook and instagram and asked for people to guess who it was. 

And the overwhelming response was, "Kendall's Grandma!" 

HAHAHAHA. (Sorry Mum ;)

Mirrorless

Russell pulled off a huge surprise for me this past Christmas by buying me my first ever dslr camera, something I've been wanting for years. Except he didn't quite get the dslr part right, which made for a very hilarious Christmas video (see Jodi's face go from shocked jubilee to confusion to, "oh honey... it was a good try!"). It's a family classic.

Anway, Russ told me to return my "almost a dslr" camera and pick the one I wanted, and me being the research nerd that I am, I immediately embarked on a very involved camera investigation with the help of my even-more-of-a-research-nerd little brother.

Jamin was the one who told me about the newest mirrorless cameras, a camera type I'd never heard of before. I was very sceptical at first but youtube and online reviews won me over (just like he promised they would), and a little over a week ago my new Sony a6000 finally arrived in the mail!

I am OBSESSED with it. Obbbsesssssed.

So, in case you are wondering, mirrorless cameras use new technology that removes the mirrors that make dslrs bulky, so they have the same (and even better) capabilities in a much more compact size. They still have interchangeable lenses, and with an adapter you can actually use your nikon or cannon ones. Sony is leading the pack right now in this technology and many professional photographers are switching over.

Not that I want to be a professional photographer. I just want to be able to take better pictures!

(my first picture... of course it had to be of my beloved vegemite ;)

(playing around outdoors)

I'm still in the very early stages of learning how to use it, but I'm just in love and can't stop talking about it... so in case you're curious, here are a couple of video links that helped me make my decision:

And my favorite... (it's kinda long but fun to watch  - I love weddings!)

Have you heard of mirrorless? Very few of my friends have... it's kind of fun to be on the front end of something new and pretty awesome! Merry Christmas to me! :)

Hello again, and Hey Valentine!

Hi, friends. I've decided to reenter the blogging world... as awkward as it feels. Awkward because blogging feels like real life and the last few weeks have not felt real at all. But my blog is important to me and I think therapeutic for me as well, and I've missed it.

I am not going to write about the accident. It's just too tender of a subject, and I don't have the distance of time to be able to see the full outcome, let alone reflect on it with any amount of proper perspective. More importantly, if the family of the man that lost his life were to by chance come across this little space of mine, I would never, ever want to cause them pain by discussing ours.

So I will write about the everyday, and the fun and the funny, and hope that people will not take me as flippant. Just protective.

I'm going to start with Valentine's Day because, well, I love Valentine's Day.

This year called for a low-key celebration and that's what we did, a casual date night out to dinner and the movies with Russ's brother and sister-in-law.

We gorged ourselves on Olive Garden pasta and breadsticks, group played Trivia Crack while waiting for our theater to be seated, and saw Taken 3, which was as predictable as can be expected of any film's third installment. What I'm saying is that we enjoyed ourselves immensely.

And in case you were wondering just how romantic Russ and I are these days... this is what I asked for instead of a card or flowers:

That's right. Mirror #4 is the one, guys. The one that's not going to fail me like all the rest that have fallen and shattered (my heart). Russ was like, "You realize how permanent this is, right?" And I was all, "I AM ALL IN."

Which, coincidentally, summarizes how I feel about that guy of mine.