Hilarities

A little taste of Pictophone. One person writes anything, the next person draws it, the next person writes what they think it is a picture of, the next person draws what that person has written, and so on. So just like in the childhood game Telephone, what you end up with is rarely what you begin with. This was the case with these pictures:

Luke wrote: "Who Let the Dogs Out?"

Deb drew:

Charity wrote:
Good job Charity!

Sarah drew: ("I didn't." "Did you?" 2 people looking out the door at 2 dogs.)

Micah wrote:

Sarah drew: (Someone standing near a pet store saying, "Whew! Is that the dogs or that guy?")

hahaha! This was the best one of the night. Something about flatulence makes everyone laugh, right? The funny thing is that I can totally see why Micah thought Sarah's picture was two guys passing gas outside a pet store.

Props to anyone who can guess what this picture started out as. In the bubble: "I love to recycle!" Anyone?

Our New Year's Eve happenings

We started the night with some Rock Band and eating.

Maverick the cat looked so cute in his sweater.
Gev did such a good job just staying in the landing.

I guess Julianna wanted to play Battle of the Sexes.

We went to the church party too. We saw Rick's new girlfriend, Amy.

Grandpa and Grandma Demarest just celebrated their 50th anniversary on December 28th.


Micah and Sarah. I think Micah is laughing at Julianna.

I asked Luke to show what he thinks about the new year, and to be silly.

Man, I hate it when you take a picture and the other person is doing something stupid. Thanks, Luke. Also, I've got that really excited look down!

Happy New Year!

Also, I played the funniest party game ever on New Year's Eve. It's called Pictophone. I wish I could go back home soon and introduce it to my side of the family. It makes my top five list of party games. Also on the list: The Insult Game (2 adjectives and a noun), Catch Phrase, Psychiatrist, and Peanuts. Ahh, there are so many other good ones.

The Day the Music Died...Z2K

I woke up this morning to find that my Zune is dead. Oh, tragedy. It's a worldwide catastrophe that was reported early on Wednesday morning. Apparently there are hardware issues that will not let the Zune power on...as a result of the new year. I thought it was funny that people are calling it Z2K. I think it will be fixed, but it sure makes for a boring day doing chores. Oh, Zune, how long will you look like this?

We always knew Zune was the Steven Baldwin to Alec Baldwin (Ipod) when it comes to portable music devices, but did we have to make it so obvious?

This one's mostly for Liz

Hey Liz!

I thought of you a lot when I was planning this post in my head.

I got in the mood to clean tonight and get rid of stuff. (Consequently Luke will have the job of removing all these things from the house tomorrow.) But before I could let some things go I had to take pictures of them and talk about how clothing carries memories. I think most of my memories will be remembered by Liz too, so that's why I thought of her.

So...Remember this:

This first one is the first skirt I bought out of a catelog called "delias". I bought it specifically to wear the day that I graduated high school. I still love this skirt, I just haven't worn it in like six years and it doesn't fit quite the same, so it's time to go.

The next one isn't clothing, but I'm getting rid of it just the same. It's the wall -hanging I made in eighth grade home ec. I never know what to do with this thing. I'm just going to be rid of it once and for all.

Next one is a bridesmaid dress from my wedding. Not sure why I have this, but I think it's Liz's. Hope you don't want it back, Liz.

HA! Remember the next two? I loved getting new Easter dresses. These were two that I especially liked and really looked forward to wearing on Easter Sunday. However, both these dresses were worn by other people either on the same day, or soon after I wore mine. I was a little peeved when I saw Emily Smith wearing my dress on Easter morning. I got to wear the tan dress in college too. I loved this one the best! Charity Bossman/Lyon has this dress too...I wonder if she still wears it? She's got good taste.

The next picture is a picture of the coat Mom bought me for my birthday one year. I didn't wear it nearly enough, and now I have a new coat, plus this one has stuff on it.

Remember these sheets and curtains? I do. I'm getting rid of them. Sorry. Bet you still have yours, Liz, since you had an identical set for your twin bed. BTW I thought for a while that we had special beds just for twins when we were growing up. It was later that I realized that's just what they called that size of bed.

Next one is the bridesmaid dress from Liz's wedding. So pretty, I just haven't worn it since the wedding and I can't think of a time when I would need to wear such a dress again. Unless...do we sisters have any singing engagements coming up? Never mind, we usually go for a black theme.

Next one is my beautiful pink dress. Sorry Mom, I'm getting rid of it. It's gone people, let's not mourn it. I love this dress. However, I cannot foresee an occasion that would call for a pale pink prom dress, especially for a person my age. I did get to wear this once in college too, so that's good, right?

Next is my other prom dress. I'm proud to say this one was worn twice! Paige wore it too. I'm glad you liked it enough to wear it, Paige! Did you feel like you were dancing with Jesse Barnum when you wore it? Because that's who I went with. Nice.

Next one is the bridesmaid dress from Erica's wedding. Beautiful dress! I think I could probably still wear it....it's just that it's taking up space and I can't think of a time when I would need to dress up this much. Same story as the others... Anybody want a beautiful purple dress worn only once?

And now we come to a striped top I bought in college. I was at a stage when I could walk into a store, try anything on and it would look great! At least I thought it did. I wore this shirt to Tonya and Ryan Miller's wedding. Part of the reason I'm so fond of this shirt is because I have a lot of pictures from that wedding, with me in this shirt, and I like them all.

Well, there's more that I got rid of, but I think this is enough.

***Post update: I started this post a couple weeks ago, went home over Christmas and my mom convinced me to not get rid of my prom dresses. So, I'll be keeping them with the hope that someday there will be some time to wear them, or someone to play with them. Also, sorry about all the spacing issues with this post. They probably could have been fixed.

This provided a good laugh for me today

Putting up the tree

Couldn't help but notice an absence in our tree decorating tradition this year. One might think that since her presence was never really there to begin with, it shouldn't be that hard/different when decorating this year. However, there are tons of memories of Christmas last year. Not sure if I voiced this to anyone last year, but I was really looking forward to forming our own family traditions this year for Christmas. I remember last year thinking that this would be the last time Luke and I would decorate the tree as a family of two, the last time we would carelessly steal away to Marshalltown for almost a week with no thought of how that would affect anyone/anything else but our cats.



Well, as we decorated I thought of Grace. As I hung her ornament on the tree I remembered her and cried for her all over again. And then as I thought about the almost full year that has passed I thought about all that God has done in my heart. He has been faithful. I thank the Lord that He is patient with me and everyday He helps me. Not a day passes that I don't feel a little sad about it, but those days don't pass without a reminder of the Lord's care for my heart.





We will always remember you, Gracie. We are so thankful for those months of carrying you, and the hours we got to be with you and hold you.

Playing

I don't feel like a teacher today.
I feel like a little girl playing pretend.
Are they buying it?



I just like this picture.