This afternoon my whole family went on a delightful little excursion to one of our favorite spots in the world. The breeze greeting us was very appreciated because it was hot outdoors and even with the breeze I was much too warm.
Diane and I found many clumps of frog eggs in the water so we stopped to look at them. If you have never seen frog eggs you'll just have to take my word for it when I say that they look extremely disgusting. After we had gaped and gagged for a sufficient amount of time, we moved onward eagerly, awaiting all the other treasures we were sure to find on our walk.
For the most part, Diane and I stuck to the tiny winding trail but we did take a detour when we spotted a giant lilac bush that we wanted to smell. After wading through knee high grass we arrived at the lilac bush. It smelled so good, delightful, and scrumptious, like the stuff a dream is made of.
At the end of our trail we arrived at "The Elf's Mirror" (the name I gave to the rippling lake that resides beside the trail.) Diane and I paused and tried to catch the newts that were warming themselves at the shallow parts along the bank.
We gave up on catching a newt after a few minutes and then we began a trek around the lake. We passed two beaver dams and chatted the whole way until I passed a little shrub growing in the water. Something shook the dry grass blades in that little shrub so Diane and I stopped to investigate. We noticed a few more newts but nothing in the shrub. I gave up on my search but a few seconds later it shook and rustled again. My curiosity was piqued. I bent down and shook the bush.
A slimy, orange and brown snake popped it's head right out in my face. I don't remember what exactly Diane screamed, but whatever it was I joined her and we went shrieking away. I might be able to squish spiders, trap stink bugs, and crush snails without even flinching, but I absolutely do not claim any wits around snakes.
Our walk ended soon after the snake episode and we all left with delightfully rosy complexions. (Also known as sunburns.)
Showing posts with label Sisters. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Sisters. Show all posts
Sunday, April 30, 2017
Tuesday, February 21, 2017
Of Books and Bugs
There are certain times in my life when I am a mighty warrior, one that is so strong and fierce that nothing can stand in my way. I had just such a time a few days ago.
It all started out quite innocently. There I was, sitting unsuspectingly on my bed, snuggled under my covers reading a terrific Louis L'Amour book. I have never told you before, but I love the Louis L'Amour books and so my leisurely time spent reading those books in the evenings is quite normal and nothing seemed amiss.
It was dark out and I was savoring the softness of my favorite blanket and the terrific tale being told in my book. Now my super warrior instincts were quite alert and my eye twitched. I thought nothing of it till I felt this great big black shadow hovering over me. Slowly I lowered my book and looked to see what it might be.
My heart was ridden with terror when that great black shadow turned out be a most hideous brown scaled, large, bow legged bug perched primly on the tip of my big toe! Diane (she had been reading a book on the bed too) shrieked and flew out of bed. As she trembled by the door I bravely yanked my toe out from under that armored beast.
My eagle like eyes scanned the room in seconds and with the aid of my dear comrade in battle I attained a most fearsome trap for the beast. The trap of which we are speaking was a lovely flowery stationary box. With lithe feet I approached the beast and with all my strength I fought a gag as I approached it. My breathing was labored and my heart was beating frantically, but nevertheless my nimble fingers scooped up that abomination into it's trap. Diane is not by any means a strong-hearted warrior so she fled the room as I delicately perched that box containing the monster on the top of my little waste basket and with a magnificent leap I flew under my covers feeling courageous and worthy of every medal that could possibly be bestowed upon me.
My night was fitful because since I had not actually, dare I say it, squished, that bug it was still very much alive and all throughout the night I tossed and turned to the sound of the great bow legged behemoth clacking it's scaly shell against the sides of it's trap, trying as it might to escape.
Now when morning arrived, rest assured I found a warrior reputed to be one with a strong heart, to put that monster to sleep. (Thanks Dad if you're reading this.) And that concludes the tale of my awesomeness.
It all started out quite innocently. There I was, sitting unsuspectingly on my bed, snuggled under my covers reading a terrific Louis L'Amour book. I have never told you before, but I love the Louis L'Amour books and so my leisurely time spent reading those books in the evenings is quite normal and nothing seemed amiss.
It was dark out and I was savoring the softness of my favorite blanket and the terrific tale being told in my book. Now my super warrior instincts were quite alert and my eye twitched. I thought nothing of it till I felt this great big black shadow hovering over me. Slowly I lowered my book and looked to see what it might be.
My heart was ridden with terror when that great black shadow turned out be a most hideous brown scaled, large, bow legged bug perched primly on the tip of my big toe! Diane (she had been reading a book on the bed too) shrieked and flew out of bed. As she trembled by the door I bravely yanked my toe out from under that armored beast.
My eagle like eyes scanned the room in seconds and with the aid of my dear comrade in battle I attained a most fearsome trap for the beast. The trap of which we are speaking was a lovely flowery stationary box. With lithe feet I approached the beast and with all my strength I fought a gag as I approached it. My breathing was labored and my heart was beating frantically, but nevertheless my nimble fingers scooped up that abomination into it's trap. Diane is not by any means a strong-hearted warrior so she fled the room as I delicately perched that box containing the monster on the top of my little waste basket and with a magnificent leap I flew under my covers feeling courageous and worthy of every medal that could possibly be bestowed upon me.
My night was fitful because since I had not actually, dare I say it, squished, that bug it was still very much alive and all throughout the night I tossed and turned to the sound of the great bow legged behemoth clacking it's scaly shell against the sides of it's trap, trying as it might to escape.
Now when morning arrived, rest assured I found a warrior reputed to be one with a strong heart, to put that monster to sleep. (Thanks Dad if you're reading this.) And that concludes the tale of my awesomeness.
Tuesday, January 10, 2017
Tea for Two ~ New Year's Goals
If you have read my list of new year goals and aspirations you probably knew that I wanted to have a tea party this year. As it so happens, I have just recently had a positively splendid tea party with Diane. Both of us loved every bit of it and had the most wonderful time.
I spent all morning prepping for the tea, between folding napkins into a flared fan and trimming them with lace, to making sure my scones were light and flaky, I had a pretty busy time of it.
Then, once we were all dressed and everything was ready we were quite positive that you couldn't possibly have such a tea party without having appropriate names, so in a short manner of time I created place cards with new and improved names to go by. I was Countess Esmeralda DuPont, while Diane was Lady Arabella Grindelwald.
We had a positively smashing time. Naturally we had to have English accents and spent our whole tea party discussing our imaginary maids and footmen, we boasted about our excellent stable masters, and deprecated our carriage men. Not to forget we gossiped heartily about the Dutchess of Buckleberry, and easily passed snide comments concerning Americans. Naturally we almost choked laughing over our cucumber sandwiches when we realized that we were Americans, not actually Ladies and Countesses.
Such pleasantries lasted for well over an hour and then our tea turned to a close. That was most likely one of the most fun things I have done so far this year.
I spent all morning prepping for the tea, between folding napkins into a flared fan and trimming them with lace, to making sure my scones were light and flaky, I had a pretty busy time of it.
Then, once we were all dressed and everything was ready we were quite positive that you couldn't possibly have such a tea party without having appropriate names, so in a short manner of time I created place cards with new and improved names to go by. I was Countess Esmeralda DuPont, while Diane was Lady Arabella Grindelwald.
We had a positively smashing time. Naturally we had to have English accents and spent our whole tea party discussing our imaginary maids and footmen, we boasted about our excellent stable masters, and deprecated our carriage men. Not to forget we gossiped heartily about the Dutchess of Buckleberry, and easily passed snide comments concerning Americans. Naturally we almost choked laughing over our cucumber sandwiches when we realized that we were Americans, not actually Ladies and Countesses.
Such pleasantries lasted for well over an hour and then our tea turned to a close. That was most likely one of the most fun things I have done so far this year.
Tuesday, March 22, 2016
Why a Human Hamster Wheel is Never a Good Idea
Everyone in my family knows that when someone gets into a scrape it was usually caused by me, and they are right of course. But I simply can't help it, my imagination and ideas always get the better of me. They always sound like solid, good, ingenious ideas at the time but more often than not I find myself in a predicament. Which brings us to my latest and greatest idea that landed my sister Diane and I into "a heap of trouble."
On March 16th, Wednesday, in the year 2016 another great idea came to mind on a beautifully sunny afternoon in our back yard. While Diane and I were wandering around outside I noticed an old, rusted, hay feeder propped up on a small pile of old logs in our back yard. Well, since I love to put old things to good use, I came up with a brilliant idea for the hay feeder. Why let it rust away all lonely on that pile of logs when Diane and I could just simply hoist it off the logs and roll across the yard on it like a human hamster wheel, have an adventure, and then put it back where we got it.
Well, we did have an adventure all right, a hilariously horrible one. First, moving the feeder off of the logs was a lot harder than I had expected because it was really heavy. Our creek was right behind the feeder so if we weren't careful we were all going to crash right into the creek with the hay feeder on top of us. The whole time while we were heaving and pushing Diane was very busy muttering "all of your crazy ideas" and, "why do I always get dragged into your crazy ideas."
When we finally got the feeder lifted off of the logs we almost met our doom when the feeder decided it would be nice to hurtle towards the creek, Diane and I shrieked and tugged and finally managed to drag it over to a flat spot in our back yard. I climbed into the hay feeder thinking that all of our hard work was just about to be paid off, I grabbed onto the feeder's rungs and started rolling, but instead of the effortless carefree fun I had imagined the feeder insisted on rolling backwards when I wasn't rolling it forward. Diane was quickly behind me propping up the feeder as I rolled and stumbled onto my face in a forward progression.
Even after seeing how my turn had been Diane took a turn too, but this time it was down the hill towards the pile of logs where we were going to hoist the feeder up again after Diane had finished her turn. But goodness! Her turn was horrifying, we went flying down that hill with my heels digging into the grass, leaving ugly marks behind us while Diane screeched at the top of her lungs, all of that time of course, that feeder was intent on rattling along making an exuberant amount of noise as the rusty bolts hit the ground. When I finally stopped the runaway "Hamster wheel" Diane and I slowly turned to face each other, with both of us fearing that Mom would stick her head out of the living room window any minute now to find us trying to casually hide the massive hay feeder behind us.
It was time to put the hay feeder back where we got. Naturally, it was not anywhere near as easy as I had expected, I had forgotten to calculate the tree that was hovering over the log pile in the first place so instead of rolling the hay feeder onto the logs we smacked it into tree branches almost decapitating ourselves. I burst out laughing at the hilarity of the situation while Diane questioned my sanity. Eventually we got it dragged over beside the logs where we decided we should just hoist it side-ways onto the logs and push it on the rest of the way. That impossible hunk of metal was even heavier than we had ever imagined it would be.
After extreme exertion we managed to lift it onto the pile of logs and we hurriedly propped it up and almost collapsed with exhaustion. One thing we had completely forgotten though is that the hay feeder was extremely rusty so when we looked at our hands they were completely covered in thick, crusty, layers of orange filth.
Two things I learned though from this adventure. Number one, rust washes off of hands moderately easy. And number two, A human hamster wheel is never, under no circumstances, a good idea.
On March 16th, Wednesday, in the year 2016 another great idea came to mind on a beautifully sunny afternoon in our back yard. While Diane and I were wandering around outside I noticed an old, rusted, hay feeder propped up on a small pile of old logs in our back yard. Well, since I love to put old things to good use, I came up with a brilliant idea for the hay feeder. Why let it rust away all lonely on that pile of logs when Diane and I could just simply hoist it off the logs and roll across the yard on it like a human hamster wheel, have an adventure, and then put it back where we got it.
Well, we did have an adventure all right, a hilariously horrible one. First, moving the feeder off of the logs was a lot harder than I had expected because it was really heavy. Our creek was right behind the feeder so if we weren't careful we were all going to crash right into the creek with the hay feeder on top of us. The whole time while we were heaving and pushing Diane was very busy muttering "all of your crazy ideas" and, "why do I always get dragged into your crazy ideas."
When we finally got the feeder lifted off of the logs we almost met our doom when the feeder decided it would be nice to hurtle towards the creek, Diane and I shrieked and tugged and finally managed to drag it over to a flat spot in our back yard. I climbed into the hay feeder thinking that all of our hard work was just about to be paid off, I grabbed onto the feeder's rungs and started rolling, but instead of the effortless carefree fun I had imagined the feeder insisted on rolling backwards when I wasn't rolling it forward. Diane was quickly behind me propping up the feeder as I rolled and stumbled onto my face in a forward progression.
Even after seeing how my turn had been Diane took a turn too, but this time it was down the hill towards the pile of logs where we were going to hoist the feeder up again after Diane had finished her turn. But goodness! Her turn was horrifying, we went flying down that hill with my heels digging into the grass, leaving ugly marks behind us while Diane screeched at the top of her lungs, all of that time of course, that feeder was intent on rattling along making an exuberant amount of noise as the rusty bolts hit the ground. When I finally stopped the runaway "Hamster wheel" Diane and I slowly turned to face each other, with both of us fearing that Mom would stick her head out of the living room window any minute now to find us trying to casually hide the massive hay feeder behind us.
It was time to put the hay feeder back where we got. Naturally, it was not anywhere near as easy as I had expected, I had forgotten to calculate the tree that was hovering over the log pile in the first place so instead of rolling the hay feeder onto the logs we smacked it into tree branches almost decapitating ourselves. I burst out laughing at the hilarity of the situation while Diane questioned my sanity. Eventually we got it dragged over beside the logs where we decided we should just hoist it side-ways onto the logs and push it on the rest of the way. That impossible hunk of metal was even heavier than we had ever imagined it would be.
After extreme exertion we managed to lift it onto the pile of logs and we hurriedly propped it up and almost collapsed with exhaustion. One thing we had completely forgotten though is that the hay feeder was extremely rusty so when we looked at our hands they were completely covered in thick, crusty, layers of orange filth.
Two things I learned though from this adventure. Number one, rust washes off of hands moderately easy. And number two, A human hamster wheel is never, under no circumstances, a good idea.
Saturday, June 6, 2015
Never Trust Pinterest with your Face
As a teen I am trying to accept the fact that I struggle with pimples. Everyone knows how evil those swollen little lumps of red are. I have tried different things that didn't work and my Mom got some things, but they also didn't do anything for my condition.
Then one day while browsing through Pinterest I found this supposedly "wonderful" home remedy for pimples. It called for apple cider vinegar, honey, and egg whites, I was set, I had finally found the perfect pimple solution. I planned the treatment for early the next morning in hopes of having a pimple free face to go to church on Sunday.
When I awoke the next day I hurried downstairs, skimmed through the recipe and the instructions and set out to make it. I started mixing my ingredients together and making sure to measure them properly I got everything ready and since I have a sister that I am really close to, I had told her about it all and we decided it would be fun to do this together, so Diane met me by the bathroom and we carefully applied the slimy goo to our faces in circular motions, after fighting back a few gags we washed the sticky, slimy, egg whites off our hands and went to our room to relax for ten peaceful minutes.
"Ooh I can feel it working," I said excitedly.
" Oh I know, and I hope we look really pretty and our faces smooth" agreed Diane.
Once the timer rang we hurried to wash our faces with the recommended "warm" water. We giggled excitedly then scurried to the bathroom to look at our faces in the mirror, after one look we turned to face each other and both screamed in horror, our faces were completely red, blotchy, and puffy.
"Oh my goodness tomorrow is church" I squeaked frantically.
" We need to hide, we can't be seen" Diane said while tugging at certain parts of her face.
We decided that would be the basement. We were hoping it would wear off if we waited long enough, so after playing various games, like hopscotch and jump rope for about an hour we crept upstairs to look at our faces again.
"I look horrid" I whispered hopelessly.
"So do I" Diane said encouragingly.
After looking at each other again we burst into gales of laughter, pointing and laughing at each other we walked into the living room and started laughing again since somehow everyone was sitting in there reading and immediately looked up at us. Of course their feeble attempts to cheer us up were marred by the fact that they had to laugh every time they looked at us.
So that is why you should never trust Pinterest with your face, that is unless you think this whole experience would be an absolutely marvelous bonding experiment for you and your sister, friend, or Mother.
Then one day while browsing through Pinterest I found this supposedly "wonderful" home remedy for pimples. It called for apple cider vinegar, honey, and egg whites, I was set, I had finally found the perfect pimple solution. I planned the treatment for early the next morning in hopes of having a pimple free face to go to church on Sunday.
When I awoke the next day I hurried downstairs, skimmed through the recipe and the instructions and set out to make it. I started mixing my ingredients together and making sure to measure them properly I got everything ready and since I have a sister that I am really close to, I had told her about it all and we decided it would be fun to do this together, so Diane met me by the bathroom and we carefully applied the slimy goo to our faces in circular motions, after fighting back a few gags we washed the sticky, slimy, egg whites off our hands and went to our room to relax for ten peaceful minutes.
"Ooh I can feel it working," I said excitedly.
" Oh I know, and I hope we look really pretty and our faces smooth" agreed Diane.
Once the timer rang we hurried to wash our faces with the recommended "warm" water. We giggled excitedly then scurried to the bathroom to look at our faces in the mirror, after one look we turned to face each other and both screamed in horror, our faces were completely red, blotchy, and puffy.
"Oh my goodness tomorrow is church" I squeaked frantically.
" We need to hide, we can't be seen" Diane said while tugging at certain parts of her face.
We decided that would be the basement. We were hoping it would wear off if we waited long enough, so after playing various games, like hopscotch and jump rope for about an hour we crept upstairs to look at our faces again.
"I look horrid" I whispered hopelessly.
"So do I" Diane said encouragingly.
After looking at each other again we burst into gales of laughter, pointing and laughing at each other we walked into the living room and started laughing again since somehow everyone was sitting in there reading and immediately looked up at us. Of course their feeble attempts to cheer us up were marred by the fact that they had to laugh every time they looked at us.
So that is why you should never trust Pinterest with your face, that is unless you think this whole experience would be an absolutely marvelous bonding experiment for you and your sister, friend, or Mother.
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