more flower pictures

Here are the photos just like I promised. Enjoy! I know you will.

Acting normal in Normal

Late Sunday night we left for Normal, Illinois which is two and half hours east of here. My Uncle Dan and Aunt Lynda live there with their teenage daughters Jessica and Lyndsey. It was a mini family reunion. My grandparents were there along with another aunt and uncle, Sandy and Walt. It was a fun mini vacation. We laughed a lot, slept a lot, ate a lot, sat around and did nothing a lot. Yeah that's pretty much it. Oh yeah I relaxed in their above ground pool and got a sun burn. That is always fun. Here we are playing Monopoly. I won of course. Can't you see the big pile of money?

My Grandparents

We got back late last night. Today I took Jonathan to see the botanical garden so he could enjoy the beauty too. Don't worry I'll post pictures later! If you are tired of looking at pictures of flowers and plants then that is just too bad.

Botanical Garden

I went to the Botanical Garden yesterday with my friend Karen and her two darling little girls. Annika is two and is my sunday school class. Lauren is a baby. Until babies are at least one year old I don't pay attention to their age so I couldn' tell you how old Lauren is. It was very hot, but it was so beautiful. Karen goes there at least once a week so she is the perfect tour guide. She showed me these Lotus blooms which are just gorgeous right now-

Some Lilies

Ooooh this is a pretty flower... oh wait that's Annika. Isn't she cute?

I'm FREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

Yea! summer time here I come. Finally. Summer school was officially over at 7:43 p.m. last night. Although it was a quick and easy way to get six credits over with I do not think I will be taking summer school again. Every night I was sitting in class listening to my instructor talk about himself instead of sitting out on the step listening to the cicadas and watching the fire-flies. Now that it is the end of June already the nice weather is quickly dissipating. Soon it will be too hot and muggy to enjoy. So even though summer school only took away one-third of my summer it took the best one-third. Oh well.

So my birthday didn't turn out to be so bad after all, for those of you were wondering. I skipped my second class so that I could go home and enjoy my birthday if only for a few hours. I came home to a vase of flowers in the living room and my husband scurrying around to feed me a delicious dinner of pork chops and mashed potatoes and chocolate cake. Also my birthday present came- on my birthday! Which I wasn't expected so that was kind of cool. Here is my birthday present-

Isn't she beautiful?
And here is the cake Jonathan made all by himself from SCRATCH. It is decorated as a turtle in case you couldn't tell.

Anyway- I hate to cut this off short but I have a lot of summer goofing off to catch up on. Since I was so busy with school this past week I haven't even gotten the chance to play with my new toy so I've got a lot of baking to do! But check back often because I will be updating this thing daily now that I am school free.

Summer School

I have been a very bad blogger. What fun is a blog if you never update it? Anyway the lack of posts lately is due partly to the fact that I am in summer school. I am taking two classes (two intro classes- sociology and computers- that I want to get out of the way) that are Monday through Thursday from around 5pm to 10pm. So I have been going straight from work to school. Which I have come to find out, is not necessarily a good idea if I don't want people to think of me as that girl who stinks. I found this out a little late though since I often went straight from work to school during the spring semester. The way I found out is like this... Jonathan got a summer job (thank the Lord) at a local coffee shop. I won't go into the details because 1. he hates it and 2. he doesn't want anyone to know that he, a sophisticated philosophy phd student is stooping down to the rest of the working world's level. Anyways... this coffee shop serves food and the sort, and when he comes home from a long day of working in this coffee shop, he stinks. Mostly like old syrup and I am not sure what. So I thought about it- I work in a kitchen with food all day long; I am bound to stink when I come home. I asked Jonathan for the honest truth, and he told me straight up, that yes actually I do stink when I come home from work. Bad. He doesn't specify what I stink like, however. We were arguing about who stunk worse though so we smelled our dirty work clothes. We did not come to a conclusion but Jonathan did say that my work clothes smelled like a twelve year old boy (i.e. similar to my little brother's room). I reluctantly agreed. So here is my question- if I went all this time without knowing that I stink like a sweaty adolescent boy, then does everyone who stinks not even know or notice it? That seems weird to me. So think about that the next time you are like- wow that guy could use a shower. Give him a break, he can't smell himself.
P.S. I know what you are thinking- Sage, that is disgusting- But don't worry too much- I don't go to school in my work clothes. I change into clean clothes and spray a bunch of body spray on. Who knows if it does any good.
P.P.S. For your information my birthday is tomorrow. If you do not have my address or e-mail address to send me presents and the sort, just let me know by commenting and I will be happy to tell you where to send them.
P.P.S. Are there woman taxi drivers or limo drivers? I think I saw one today, but I wasn't sure if they even existed.
P.P.P.S. In case you are wondering- I am having the most pathetic 22nd birthday ever. I am going to work at 8am. Then after work I will head straight to school until about 10 pm. Exciting.
P.P.P.P.S. Am I even doing this right? I never could figure out if you were supposed to add more p's or s's to p.s. Does anybody know? If p.s. stands for post script like I think it does, it would make more sense to add more p's. But in actuality I have no idea which is correct.
P.P.P.P.P.S. For goodness sakes cut this nonsense out, I am in the middle of class!
One more thing- I wanted to spice it up a bit by adding a picture. So here is proof that my little brother is a hunk even though his room stinks. Besides it probably doesn't stink any more because after all he is almost thirteen years old!

I apologize for the delay...

On Memorial Day we went to the confluence of the Mississippi and Missouri rivers. It was pretty, as pretty as the Mississippi and Missouri rivers can be. You will see what I am saying when you look at the pictures. There was a path along the river that Jonathan and I walked, which was fun, but it was hot and humid and buggy. Here are a few of the pictures Jonathan took.

The absolutely best thing about this mini day trip though, came near the very end when we were leaving, was this-

The CUTEST little turtle in the entire world. Right there for me to pick up and kiss and cuddle with. For those of you who do not know I used to be somewhat of a turtle admirer. Although this has worn off for the most of the part (I have only about 10 turtle collectibles now opposed to the original 60 or so) I still think this darling thing rivals kittens for cuteness. I wanted to keep it and love it forever, but.... well that wouldn't have worked out so well. So I just had to say a tearful goodbye. I will remember him forever (Jonathan don't you dare change our desktop picture!)