Merry Christmas!

This isn't going to be my "official" post with pictures... this is just something I saw whilst I was messing around on the internet.
I am a christian, and have no problem saying happy holidays, I feel that encompasses Christmas and New Years all in one breath. I think this lady is just mad she lost her job.

Winter Wonderland

This is what my house turns into the day/weekend after thanksgiving. I was ready to put up Christmas decorations in September, but my roommates told me no. So I waited until the first possible day to decorate, the day after Thanksgiving. I had to work thanksgiving night so I was a little bummed out that I couldn't decorate during the day, but I did need to sleep.
On Saturday we watched Elf... and I got some decorating ideas from that movie... If you haven't seen it... all the paper snowflakes and paper chains.

Movie Reviews

Carrie's Movie Reviews

I have decided that I need to pass on my movie knowledge to the rest of the world. I mean I watch and own enough that other people should benefit from my obsession.

This month is December... and it is the holiday season. I LOVE the holiday season. No joke. I will post pictures of my house later on... think winter wonderland.

I have a huge stack of movies that I watch at christmas... and a couple of them are ones that I watch year around.

Elf is one of the movies that I watch over and over again, year round. It is simply hilarious. I actually didn't watch this one in December... It was the Saturday after Thanksgiving... so anytime after Thanksgiving is okay.

I can quote this whole movie... and yet it all still makes me laugh.

This is a movie that you can watch with your kids and not have to cover their eyes.

5 stars

This isn't a Christmas movie... just general reviews.

Penelope was VERY cute. It was in theaters for maybe a month... I saw about two commercials for it, and then I forgot about it because of the lack of ads. Reese Witherspoon is in it, and has a very small role, but did produce it.

This is about a girl in a "blueblood" who is born under a curse with a pig nose... and legend goes that she can only get rid of it if she marries another "blueblood" man. The costuming and set are very whimsicle, and keep you wanting more. It is very clean, and fun for girls of all ages. My roommate and I watched it and I was hooked from the very beginning.

There aren't any cover your children's eyes parts, there is one part where an affair is suggested, but not confirmed, and it is easily missed.

5 stars

It's been a while.

So, since I last posted....

Here are a few things that I have done.

1. Got a new job! I know- super exciting.

That is pretty much all that I have done and since it is full time now, I have no time to do anything but work and sleep. Did I mention that it is at night? Yes, my job is the night shift at the hospital... but I really do like it because that means I don't have to get up in the morning... Which I hate beyond hate. So I sleep through the day, and wakeup around the time when my roommates get home and socialize with them for a bit then watch some tv, then go to work. Its great.

2. I also had to get a new car... my old one died and had to go to the car graveyard. I almost cried... it was a sad day.

These are some pictures of the past month or so.

Kaci's birthday dinner at Hickory Park.

This is what my closet looked like for a while because I didn't have time to do anything but sleep and work.

This was my way of getting rid of the mess... closing the curtain.

R.I.P. My dear sweet old car. This was the one that I got when I turned sixteen.

I ordinarily make my bed everyday... this was what it looked like for about a week.

Nick and I in the car on Thanksgiving.

Standing around waiting for people and food to get there for the Thanksgiving meal.

This was my contribution to the meal... Oreo Truffles. Quite a hit.

Emma eating one of the aformetioned truffles.

The place we go to on Thanksgiving is a park with a sort of lodge and it has a "ski" hill that we always walk down, and then up. This picture is looking up. The snow you see on the ground is the most that had ever been there in all the years that we had gone there. I was way behind Dad and Emma because my shoes didn't have backs on them and I kept stepping out of them.

I think that catches everything up!

Power plant open house day

We went to the power plant open house yesterday. It is always a bunch of fun because you can see the stuff that lights your house, and we all drive past it and wonder, what is going on in that big building.

Esther and Philip were both able to light up all the lightbulbs. I didn't try, mostly because otherwise, who was going to take the pictures?


This is looking down nine stories. Kinda crazy, because all the floors are grates.


Esther and I went up in the bucket thing that they use to fix power lines and the like.


Esther and Philip 50 feet in the air.


Esther and Philip again.



Nine stories above Ames... Pretty cool.

Above the train tracks....

Still nine stories up...






This one is my favorite. Have a nice day!

A morning at the orchard

Our outing this week was the apple orchard. It was a ton of fun!!! They had a "corn pool" that Carsten played in for hours... well not hours, but quite a while!

Christina was freaked out by the corn, so we sat on the edges and watched.

Esther loved it... at least it looks like it!

So cute!!!

A tractor... every little boys dream!

Esther's Birthday Dinner

For Esther's birthday we went to Hickory Park for supper after a movie that she picked out. I was fun, and we made them sing to her.

Her birthday ice cream.

What can I say?

Dad's chin is balding!!!


The end.

My roommate sent me this... I agree with most of this... to an extent.

To the citizens of the United States of America from Her Sovereign Majesty Queen Elizabeth II

In light of your failure in recent years to nominate competent candidates for President of the USA and thus to govern yourselves, we hereby give notice of the revocation of your independence, effective immediately.

Her Sovereign Majesty Queen Elizabeth II will resume monarchical duties over all states, commonwealths, and territories (except Kansas , which she does not fancy).

Your new Prime Minister, Gordon Brown, will appoint a Governor for America without the need for further elections. Congress and the Senate will be disbanded.

A questionnaire may be circulated next year to determine whether any of you noticed.

To aid in the transition to a British Crown Dependency, the following rules are introduced with immediate effect: (You should look up "revocation" in the Oxford English Dictionary.)

1. Then look up aluminum, and check the pronunciation guide. You will be amazed at just how wrongly you have been pronouncing it.

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2. The letter 'U' will be reinstated in words such as 'colour', 'favour' and 'neighbour.' Likewise, you will learn to spell 'doughnut' with out skipping half the letters, and the suffix '-ize' will be replaced by the suffix '-ise'. Generally, you will be expected to raise your vocabulary to acceptable levels. (look up 'vocabulary').

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3. Using the same twenty-seven words interspersed with filler noises such as "like" and "you know" is an unacceptable and inefficient form of communication. There is no such thing as US English. We will let M*crosoft know on your behalf. The M*crosoft spell- checker will be adjusted to take account of the reinstated letter 'u' and the elimination of -ize.

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4. July 4th will no longer be celebrated as a holiday.

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5. You will learn to resolve personal issues without using guns, lawyers, or therapists. The fact that you need so many lawyers and therapists shows that you're not quite ready to be independent. Guns should only be used for shooting grouse. If you can't sort things out without suing someone or speaking to a therapist then you're not ready to shoot grouse.

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6. Therefore, you will no longer be allowed to own or carry anything more dangerous than a vegetable peeler. A permit will be required if you wish to carry a vegetable peeler in public.

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7. All intersections will be replaced with roundabouts, and you will start driving on the left with immediate effect. At the same time, you will go metric with immediate effect and without the benefit of conversion tables. Both roundabouts and metrication will help you understand the British sense of humour.

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8. The Former USA will adopt UK prices on petrol (which you have been calling gasoline)-roughly $10/US gallon. Get used to it.

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9. You will learn to make real chips. Those things you call French fries are not real chips, and those things you insist on calling potato chips are properly called crisps. Real chips are thick cut, fried in animal fat, and dressed not with catsup but with vinegar.

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10. The cold tasteless stuff you insist on calling beer is not actually beer at all. Henceforth, only proper British Bitter will be referred to as beer, and European brews of known and accepted provenance will be referred to as Lager. South African beer is also acceptable as they are pound for pound the greatest sporting Nation on earth and it can only be due to the beer. They are also part of British Commonwealth - see what it did for them. American brands will be referred to as Near-Frozen Gnat's Urine, so that all can be sold without risk of further confusion.

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11. Hollywood will be required occasionally to cast English actors as good guys. Hollywood will also be required to cast English actors to play English characters. Watching Andie Macdowell attempt English dialogue in Four Weddings and a Funeral was an experience akin to having one's ears removed with a cheese grater.

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12. You will cease playing American football. There is only one kind of proper football; you call it soccer. Those of you brave enough will, in time, be allowed to play rugby (which has some similarities to American football, but does not involve stopping for a rest every twenty seconds or wearing full kevlar body armour like a bunch of nancies). Don't try Rugby - the South Africans and Kiwis will thrash you, like they regularly thrash us.

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13. Further, you will stop playing baseball. It is not reasonable to host an event called the World Series for a game which is not played outside of America. Since only 2.1% of you are aware that there is a world beyond your borders, your error is understandable. You will learn cricket, and we will let you face the South Africans first to take the sting out of their deliveries.

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14. You must tell us who killed JFK. It's been driving us mad.

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15. An internal revenue agent (i.e. tax collector) from Her Majesty's Government will be with you shortly to ensure the acquisition of all monies due (backdated to 1776).

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16. Daily Tea Time begins promptly at 4 pm with proper cups, with saucers, and never mugs, with high quality biscuits (cookies) and cakes; plus strawberries (with cream) when in season.

God Save the Queen.

Busy, busy, busy...

My friend has been working on a HUGE garage sale that was today. She had a garage full of stuff from over 40 families that had to be sorted and priced and the like. Some people dropped off stuff that was not even worth 50 cents. We ended up throwing away a couple van loads of stuff, but still had PLENTY left over. I spent hours at her house, and therefore have had no time for blogging. I will soon though.

Another trip to the zoo...

We spent another morning at the zoo this week. It was way better than the last time because school has started, so there was practially no one there. We got to spend a ton of time at different exhibits that are usually full of people. It was a great time all around!!

The classic cheesy smile!!

There was a green frog there.. you can kinda see it.

The "swinging" bridge. This was the first time that he went on it, and then went about ten more times when he figured out that its not that scary!!!

This is a cayman... they are also found on Diego, and are bad... but they were cool to look at in real life.

The really big fish...

I love this one because it looks like he is in the tank!!

This trip was so much fun because Christina was was really interested in the animals around us!

We were feeding the goats... I had to keep a pretty close eye on her because she wanted to eat the goat food herself!

Hungry goat!

First... and Last time...

I shaved my brothers head a couple weeks ago... I will never do that again. I don't think he will have it shaved again, but not because I did a bad job. I did a pretty good job I think, but he has a weird divot(sp?) in his head that looks funny when he is bald. Lesson learned all around.

I also cut Emma's hair... I did a pretty good job if I do say so myself... She didn't even go to get it fixed, so she must have liked it.