Animal Quote Monday

"Love takes off masks that we fear we cannot live without and know we cannot live within."

-James Baldwin

Slipping Through My Fingers

I just layed in bed next to MD for a while because he couldn't sleep. He asked me to sing him an old song I made up when he was little. My baby boy is turning 8 in less than two weeks.

While I sang him his song another was playing in my mind. Remember that old ABBA song? Slipping through my finger...

*Slipping through my fingers all the time I try to capture every minute. The feeling in it, Slipping through my fingers all the time Do I really see what's in his mind. Each time I think I'm close to knowing he keeps on growing Slipping through my fingers all the time....*

It hurts, ya know?

New Years Resolution....really?

So it is that time of year again. Time to think about all the things we do not like about ourselves and our lives, and vow before God and the big ball in Times Square to change them.

Any gym will tell you that membership burst on January 1st. By March 1st their numbers are back to the same people who come year round. I'm not sure, but I bet church is the same way.

Normally I only set one goal. A goal I am happy to say I have reached for 2 years and counting, and that is to not use a Port-a-Potty for the entire year. This may not seem like a hard one, but consider the amount of cola consumed at your average 7 year olds soccer tournament and then judge me. I think I did pretty damn well.

This year I plan to do the Port-a-Potty thing again, but add one more. Which one to add though? There are those 10 pounds that mock me at every turn, the eyebrows I long to pluck but am too chicken to do, the house that could be much cleaner (save your smart remarks here).

Or I could tackle the relationship thing. Spend more time with kids/husband...but if I spent any more time with them they would beg me to get a life. The truth is there are just so many things in my life I would like to have more of, or less of (10 lbs). I guess that is true for everyone. So instead of a resolution to add to my life I have made my resolution to add to others.

Here it is. In 2009 I vow that I will be mindful of things other than myself and my immediate family. I will help those I can, pray for those I can't, and respect the earth and creatures that inhabit it.

That plus the outhouse thing and I should be in good shape when 2010 rolls in!

Winter Exploration!!!

I was getting stir crazy stuck in the house. There is still another week before the kids go back to school and the Christmas toys are all ready old news. So MD, Lou Lou, Dolly and I grabbed the camera, my i-pod (set to the best of Bonjovi ) and headed out to explore the desert.

Exploration is one of our family's favorite things. Whether its the pond by our house, a dried up canal bed, or the vast miles of Idaho desert, looking isn't good enough for us. We have to explore.

Explore, as we know it, means to get out, walk around, pick things up, sniff them, compare them to other objects close by and come to a conclusion of how we think they got there. This usually involves an elaborate story, millions of years and dinosaurs, but it makes us happy to imagine it all the same.

So without any further adieu.. I give you our most recent exploration.




It may be that I grew up in the desert.. but there is nothing more beautiful to me than miles and miles of open land.

Spring time is really the only season the desert has sharp color, but I think these muted browns and blues are wonderful!

It looks like home to me!






The European Starlings flock in huge numbers to grain fields here in the winter. They move as if one, and can take the form of a dark menacing storm cloud.

It's one of my favorite sights!









I wish you could hear the thunder their wings make as they all take off at once!











I have an obsession with old farm buildings...
I love the story that radiates from them.
























This old building just had "explore me" written all over it!





What trip to the great outdoors is complete without your proverbial cow making an appearance along side the road?














I think Dolly looks like a big fox here..
Mostly I am just showing off how well my new camera takes moving subjects.





We spent about 2 hours out exploring farm lands and the surrounding desert. No better way to spend a winters afternoon!

Animal Quote Monday

"In order to live free and happily you must sacrifice boredom. It is not always an easy sacrifice." -Richard Bach

Our Winter Wonder Land

Make a Smilebox photobook

Animal Quote Monday-a day late- again

Therefore all seasons shall be sweet to thee,Whether the summer clothe the general earthWith greenness, or the redbreast sit and singBetwixt the tufts of snow on the bare branchOf mossy apple tree. -Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Frost at Midnight