I Love Faces - Joy Theme

For the category "Joy" I picked out a couple of pictures from my vacation at Lake Anna in Virginia with some of my close friends and their familes. This first pictures is my adult entry. I just love how tubing behind the boat brings out the kid in all of us. The joy(or maybe fear) definitely shows on Kathy and Tonya's faces as the tube seems to leap off the water and tries to fly.

The second picture is my buddy Justin. He's 10 and this was his first time getting up on his training skiis. You can just see the joy in his face to know he did it. By the end of the week he was an old pro going in and out of the wake.

Brrr! It's Cold Outside...

I was in Illinois last week and one evening it was 34 below zero and that didn't include the wind chill. Wow! I don't think I have ever been so cold. I'm glad to be back in Virginia but it's still been very cold for this area but nothing like up north. My friend Adrienne and sister in law Andrea both posted pictures of icicles so I decided to join in the fun and post this picture that I took when I was in Ohio for a visit.

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I heart Faces - Week 2

My entry for the kids division is my niece Jubilee. She is such a little cuttlebug.

For the Adult Division I decided to use a picture of my friend Rachelle and her 13 yr. old niece who was here visiting from Ohio for a few weeks.

All my pictures so far are Straight Out of the Camera but I can't wait to start the photo class I'm taking tomorrow night. I'm hoping to learn some basic photoshop techniques among other things.

Christmas Morning 2008

All is quiet around the Christmas Tree after everyone went to bed on Christmas Eve.

The quiet wouldn't last long though. On Christmas morning we all got up early. My sister's family with her 6 kids were staying at Mom's house and they had church later that morning that is why some of them are dressed up. They don't usually wear suits and ties to open gifts. My brother's family just brought their kids over in their PJ's. This is the boys opening a gift.

Jared with a gift he just opened from Aunt Cori.
Chad and Jubilee with Curious George.
Jesse with his new sled from Grandma and Grandpa.
Laura Lee and Family singing a song, "The Twelve Day of Christmas with a Large Family" She very creatively let us know that number 7 is on the way and due around Labor Day.

Here is the video of the Plattner's sings The 12 Days of Christmas with a large family. Enjoy!

I Heart Faces

My friend Angie just started up a new photography blog "I faces". Each week there is a photo contest for Kids faces and Adult faces. For the kids face I'm putting a picture of my oldest nephew Jesse. What a ham!

For the adult post I'm putting a picture of my cousin Angie. She asked me to take some photos at her wedding in addition to what the photographer was taking. I was lucky to be in the dressing room with her and got some great shots of her as she was getting ready. She was a gorgeous bride.

Catching up with Friends

Sunday evening before Christmas I went and visited Mary (Bishop), Brian & Evan Warner. Evan was a cutie. We played with his playmobile dophin set and watched Dirtiest Jobs.
He also showed me his candy train that one of his Aunts had made him. I think my nephews that love trains would like this idea of making a train you can eat.



Mary made wonderful potato soup for dinner. YUM! Going home that night was not pleasant. It was 0 degrees with a -22 degree windchill. Brrr.... Thank God for electric seat heaters. I needed it that night.

Monday night I went to Canal Fulton to visit Sandy (Scaffidi) Zdelar. Chrissy was supposed to join us but one of her sons was sick and needed medical attention.

Sandy and I went an got something for dinner and then went back to her place and talked well into the midnight hours.We could have talked until sunrise but work awaited the next morning. It was fun talking with everyone. I look forward to seeing a few others before I leave Ohio the weekend after New Year's

Shopping with Grandma

I've been so busy with activities that I haven't kept up on everything this week. The Saturday before Christmas Mom & I picked up Grandma to go do some errands and shopping. After we got her hair done we took her to Bob Evans to eat. For our longer walks into the stores we borrowed a wheel chair for Grandma to use. Everytime we got it out for her to sit in she made funny noises and asked if one of us could have warmed it up first laughing the whole time. It was bitterly cold that night.

Once in Walmart Mom parked under the heaters in the doorway to get them warmed up. Then we headed toward the Christmas Tree for some last pictures of our shopping trip.



We had a good night of shopping and by the end of battling all the crowds everyone was very tired and ready for bed.

It's A Wonderful Life of Riley

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Fun Friday with the Becker's

While I've been in Ohio, I've been having a great time catching up with many friends. It started with a reunion of sorts with many of my high school friends that have found each other on face book. I've had dinner with one friend and have others scheduled. Tonight I was invited to attend a christmas party with my friend Janice (Pierce) Becker and her husband Andy. I had a great time of fellowship with Janice & Andy as well as other families in their Bible Study group.

Of course there was loads of food. The wedding soup that someone made was incredible. Janice led us in singing some Christmas carols accompanied by an awesome violin player.

Later we played some games and watched a video of pictures from their activities throughout the year.

Once everything was cleaned up, packed up and in the car I think Andy was ready to be the class clown since he probably ate alot of the candies that he made for the party and was on a major sugar high. It was great seeing them and I look forward to getting together again soon.

Meats & Sweets

I went to Norton tonight to have dinner with my friend Chrissy. We had a great time catching up on everything. On the way back to her house I noticed this sign on a store at the end of her block.
It just caught me as funny with this very strange combination. "Would you like some cookies, strudel & fudge to go with your pastrami & sausages?" Just thought I'd share.

Snowball Fight w/ Jared, Justin, Sebastian, Sandra & Me

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Thanksgiving at the Beach

I spent my Thanksgiving at a friend's beach house in Fenwick Island, DE. We had a great time with their family from DE, PA and some of the cousins that came down from Boston. Instead of Brenda cooking for everyone we went out to a nice restaurant for dinner. We had quite the crew.
After dinner some of us went over to the beach to play football. Well, I didn't play this year because my knee isn't up to it yet so I took pictures.
I was a brisk 50 degrees for game time. The water was very, very cold - no swimming today.
We didn't have alot of time to play since we didn't get home from lunch until 4:30.
Here's the crew as the last of the sun was setting behind the houses.
After the game we enjoyed visiting and some of us girls rested up to hit the outlets for Midnight Madness. I have more pictures to post of our fun time shopping.

Skywatch Friday

Angie sent me this link to post on Skywatch Friday http://skyley.blogspot.com/. These photos are from my trip to Vegas. The sky that night was beautiful.

Where has the summer gone?

I can't believe it's almost Thanksgiving. I'm glad I had time to enjoy some sunrises and sunsets over the summer. This first sunset is at Lake Anna in Bumpass, Virginia.

This is the sunset at Norfolk Harbour Days taken off a friends sailboat.

I need to get out and rake leaves and do last cleanup in my flowerbeds. Uggh! Anyone want to help?

The Long, Long Wait.....

Well, I thought that I would go vote mid-morning between the morning rush and the lunch rush to try and not get stuck in line. It didn't work that way. I ended up standing outside, in the rain, for 1 1/2 hours. The picture above is down the side of the school building. I turned the corner and could finally see the entrance. Maybe, just maybe, I'm getting close.


Oh, the disappointment. The lines wound around the hallway for another hour before alas I finally got to cast my ballot.

It was frustrating to be in line and people with names starting with I thru O were in and out in 10 minutes. They only had three tables A-H, I-O and P-Z. Guess which line was the longest? Of course the P-Z. I hope they come up with a better method of using their resources next time.

I complain but I would do it again to excercise my right to vote as a citizen of this great country. Don't forget to go vote today!!!