"" cuz its gonna be wilder then any 8 second ride! ""

the country weekend that was!

we've been gearing up for the Wapello County Fair for a month now (and i'm sure everyone is sick to death of hearing me talk about it!) it was a joke at first. then Adam decided that we all NEEDED to go! so, we did. we planned it, we got tents, we got food, we got beer.... and we WENT! i even prepared myself by downloading and listening to the artists we were going to see!

and then Saturday finally is here! we got the truck and the car packed in and headed out for Eldon, Iowa. for those of you who dont know, Eldon is just past Ottumwa (so about an hour and a half from Knoxville) and it has 1 major attraction. the American Gothic House!.... please tell me you've all heard of that!!


American Gothic is a painting by Grant Wood from 1930. we were told its the second most recognized house in the world-next to the White House!

somtimes we just assume that people know these important historical paintings and landmarks.. but we happen to meet a gentleman at the house that hadn't ever heard of the painting... it was odd to us. he was from Florida and a real estate agent. him and his wife were headed to somewhere around Des Moines, saw the sign for the house and decided to check it out. he also thought Matt was Adam's dad.... so he was a little off his rocker i think.


Matt and i AS the painting!


All of us outside the house!


after our educational tour and some American history we headed back to the campsite for... pizza. what else?! okay okay, we DID bring hot dogs to cook, but couldn't have an open fire.. so we opted for quick and easy Casey's pizza!

sometime around 7 we headed up to the grandstands. the "pre-opener" was some american idol type contest of country music. only 6 people sang and only a couple were decent. after that the opener was on, David Nail! he was great and was really happy to be playing in Iowa! after him came our headliner, Jake Owen! he was GREAT! (sshhhh, don't tell anyone but i'm a closet country fan because of Jake Owen!)

(the picture isn't great... we were pretty far away. but we could hear perfectly!)

all in all we had a great time! oddly enough, the Wapello County Fair is a good time!!

"" yeehaw! ""

doing: trying to figure out how my laptop will work out for me today.
feeling: tired, but happy that its finally friday!
listening to: Jango, a new online radio station i found. we'll see how it works out for me.

this weeks been kind of long. long, but then when i look back it seems like Monday was weeks ago! there has been rain, which never makes anything go fast, and heat, and more rain and now more heat mixed with possible rain. i really think noone knows whats going on!

yesterday was a busy busy day here at DI. we had 4 appointments between the 2 of us. i had 2 1year old sessions that were a blast! and they both brought cake which is about my favorite messy thing to photograph!! Jeff had a senior in the morning and a family in the evening. and between it all we had the normal phone calls and such. but to make it even more intersting my computer decided that it needed a porn virus. yeah, i was thrilled. and the funny thing is that i think its a ANTI virus software that gave me the virus! wtf?!!? so my computer was unusable from lunch on yesterday and then Jeff took it to our super duper computer guy last night. so i'm working today on my laptop... which is okay, but everything is wrong. my wacom tablet doesnt sync right to it and some of my photoshop actions arent there.

its just going to be a long day i think.

but,....its FRIDAY!

Adam told us about 3 weeks ago that we were all going to this country concert. naturally we werent too excited about it. but once we all realized it was just a day away to relax and hang out together with nothing else to worry about, we were all on board! i've even gone so far as to download and listen to some Jake Owen and David Nail music (which are the artists that will be there!)
so our last minute planning - which is the only kind that boys know how to do-started wednesday. everyones getting tents and sleeping bags, lawn chairs and outfits/cowboy hats ready to go! i think it'll be a good time! i think--think--i'll be able to handle the heat, but i'd like it if it didnt thunderstorm on us, espeically when we are sleeping in a tent. rains okay, rain cools things off... but not thunder. either way i think we'll have a good time!

the good part thats come out of this rain is pictures. puddle splashing pictures to be exact! Jess and i had the idea to take Livy out to spash in some puddles for her birthday pictures! it was so fun that i decided that Ethan needed some too! he didn't need any prompting, actually he was already spashing before i even had my camera put together!



and, hes such a boy... he found 2 dead worms. had to bring them out of the water to put on the pavement... and then asked Matt if he could take them home! Matt just laughed at me because he knows i'm too much of a girl to handle that stuff! i fear the day i find dead worms or something in Ethans pockets.

another Ethan story. he never stops amazing us! we were at Ann and Adam's last night for dinner and Avery has a toy that plays different classical music. Ethan was pushing the buttons for her and looks up at Matt and says, "this on is like Uncle Ben's graduation!" Matt had to ask him again what he said, it was so funny! Ben's graduation was at the beginning of May, AND ethan slept through most of it! how he remembered that that song was played is beyond me! but also awesome!!

love that kid!

well, off to work!

"" i think possibly maybe i'm falling for you""

doing: debating what to start on first at work.
feeling: tired. this whole week i've been almost exhausted throughout the whole day!
listening to: haven't decided that either...

the past week has been fairly uneventful.

Ethan's been doing better about sleeping in his own bed the whole night! which is nice for us, cause we dont have to share our bed! also because, well, he just needs to sleep in his own bed!

he's gotten his potty trainging down to a T (sure we still have occasional accients). but now i'm just waiting and hoping that he'll start sleeping through the night without having any. since you can't really teach that its just a waiting game. of course he HAS to have juice before bed. we've been giving him just a little bit, but he still manages to pee everywhere! we have had a couple nights though that his pull up is still totally DRY! this morning was one of those times! i try to make a huge deal out of it, because it is, and so hopefully he'll get that into his brain.

Ethan's also still growing and learning every day. sometimes he'll say something and i just stare at him and wonder where in the world he learned that! i love it though, he's so smart - sometimes too smart. he's figured out that Matt only listens to me half of the time... so if i tell him no he'll just turn around and ask Matt the same question, and half the time Matt tells him yes. we're working on that - with Matt not with Ethan......

he likes watching IPTV in the mornings, which i love because all those shows are so educational! he loves loves Super Why - which is how he learned his alphabet so well! and he knows like every big machine known to man because of the Mighty Machines videos. thanks Canada for those..

in other news. today is friday - thank goodness! - our June has been slowly filling up and getting more busy. i'm almost all the way caught up on wedding albums (yeay) and as of right now our sessions are almost all caught up. i need to get back in the flow of session - edit - pretouch - print/send ... becuase once seniors start up full swing its all me, and i'm out of practice!
we've booked 3 weddings for June 2011! which is odd to us because we only have 1 wedding this June! but also good that we have dates booked out this far ahead! makes us feel good! now we just need our Seniors to start calling for this year and we'll be set!

well, i suppose i should do some work...
have a happy weekend!

"" i can't be changed - i can't be saved "'

doing: blogging and laundry
feeling: sore and exhausted!
listening to: VH1

this weekend was great! sadly, it wasn't any different for me than it usually is except for the fact that everyone ELSE had monday off as well!

we had a great wedding on Saturday! the weather all weekend was just awesome! i wanted to cry a little bit every time i went outside just because it was so lovely out! but our wedding was good! we werent out too late which is always a plus in our books! but the day went quick and everyone had a good time!

when i got back to town on Saturday i changed and we got right back in the car and headed to Pleasantville. there was a UFC fight and we were all invited to Hans and Patty's house to watch. i could actually care less about those fights... but i wanted to go hang out for awhile. Ethan and i came home about 10 and passed out--both of us!

Sunday we went over to my parents house to grill out with my moms side of the family! the Heckman's were up from MO and some more family came over. it was really fun! plus we got to see all of Ben's pictures from Ireland! he has lots....
Ethan took a good nap and then we packed up again and headed over to Nancy's house for her annual Memorial Day cookout/yard party/this year Caleb's Grad Party! we played lots of games of volleyball.... and my team lost all of them (sorry Adam). at about 8 Ethan and i headed home once again while the guys stayed over and played bags.

aanndd Monday! lovely weather again and nothing on our schedule! Ethan wanted pancakes for breakfast so we made those. Jess told us she was going to the beach and that sounded excellent! so we packed up, got Ben and went out there! Ethan had a blast playing with Daniel and Olivia. Matt and Livy made a sandcastle (yes everyone, Matt went to the beach... with sand... and i didnt even force him to go!!) about 2 we headed back home. we got to the top step and Ethan tripped and scratched from about his ankle to about his knee on the concrete. great. and then i had to put him in the freezing shower to try to get the sand off of him! poor kid, i'm sure people thought i was beating him. when he gets a scrape like that and especially if it bleeds he freaks out if you even look at it! so i had to wipe it off secretley... and look at it once he fell asleep in the car!
naturally he doesnt like bandaids... but he let me wrap it up with some gauze - because i called it a blanket for his owie! sometimes you have to get creative!

we were basically just lazy for the rest of the day. we went to my parents house for dinner. yumm steak! then ended the weekend with a fire in our overgrown fire-pit in our backyard! i decided that i like it down there and we'll have to start stocking wood now.

in other news. my garden is growning good! i took some mint from it and made some "adult" lemonade. SO good! and Roby picked a radish and we tested it out. radishes will be first to be harvested... but most everything else is growing good too! pretty soon we'll have veggies galore!! :)