Skype and Picture Regret

Technology is such a wonderful thing, especially in this day and age when there are so many awesome capabilities, Skype being one of them. Last week my mom downloaded Skype on her new iPad and I helped her sign up with her own username. I showed her how Skype works and we tested it out to make sure it worked.

Last night my mom told me she was going to bed and went upstairs. I thought it would be funny to give her a call on Skype, so I did. She was upstairs in her bedroom and I was downstairs in my room and we were talking. I asked her to "show me around" her room since she's made a lot of changes in her room since the last time I was in there.

I haven't seen the upstairs in my house in more than nine years, which is kind of a weird feeling. It's like there's this whole other part to the house I live in that I no longer have access to or am a part of. I'm confined to the first floor of the house and the upstairs and basement are off-limits to me. After my mom finished showing me around her bedroom, I asked her to give me a "tour" of the other four bedrooms that are upstairs. She's certainly done a lot of rearranging and it's a whole new house up there!

My old bedroom is now the large guest room, and it didn't look nearly as large as I remember (probably because it now has a king-sized bed in it which takes up lots of space). It doesn't look as happy and inviting as it once was, either. The way I had my room decorated and organized was just so "me" (or at least the me I was at 19).

Why didn't I take a picture of my bedroom to document how I lived?! It would be so fun to be able to see pictures of the way it used to be. Pictures showing how I had everything arranged just so. Pictures of my two closets full of my nice clothes which were organized by category, separated by color and hanging just the way I liked them (with an even amount of space between each hanger). Or pictures of my desk, dresser, bed, bookcase, etc. There's no way I can go back in time to have a photo shoot in my room, so I guess my mental images will have to suffice.

While I'm on the topic of regrets and things I wish I would've done while I still had the opportunity, I really regret never taking the time to take a picture of my car before it was smashed. The only pictures I have of it are the ones that a family friend took of it after my accident. I actually treasure those pictures because I know I would've always been curious as to what my car looked like after the accident if I didn't have the evidence.

The other thing I wish I would've gotten a picture of was myself in my white student nurse uniform. Me, wearing my white scrubs, white nursing shoes and blue jacket complete with my name tag and Jefferson College nursing school patch on the sleeve. I remember thinking that I looked so cute the day of my accident as I left the house dressed in my uniform, ready to tackle another morning of clinicals. Ironically, dressing as a nurse was the last outfit I would ever dress myself in. By the end of the day I wouldn't be the one giving care to others; I'd be the patient receiving the care.

Taking my Skype tour of the upstairs felt like going home again. I know this post kind of veered off in a different direction than it originally started. I'll conclude by urging people to document their lives and take pictures of things that matter to them—even ordinary things—while they still have the opportunity.  Chances are you won't regret it if you do, but you will if you don't!

What a Dope!

For years there have speculations about Lance Armstrong and whether or not he's ever taken any sort of performance-enhancing drugs. He's always maintained his innocence, even when former teammates and other people close to him have come out and said that they've witnessed him doping firsthand. 

I'm a skeptic by nature, so when strong accusations started coming out, my suspicions started rising. That being said, I've always hoped that Lance was telling the truth because he seemed like a good guy.

At long last Lance's lies and deception finally came to light. (Doesn't he know that the truth always has its way of coming out?!) He recently sat down for a one-on-one interview with Oprah to air his dirty laundry. I've been hoping that he would agree to be interviewed because I wanted to hear what he had to say for himself. His two-part interview with Oprah aired last Thursday and Friday. In the interview Lance started out by answering a series of yes or no questions:

– Did you ever take banned substances to enhance your cycling performance? (Yes)
– Was one of those banned substances EPO (erythropoietin–a substance used by athletes to increase the number of red blood cells in their circulatory system used to carry oxygen)? (Yes)
– In all seven of your Tour de France victories did you ever take banned substances or blood dope? (Yes)
– Do you think it was humanly possible to win the Tour de France seven times without doping?  (Not in my opinion.)

His answers didn't surprise me. I've been growing more and more suspicious in recent years as more people have made allegations against Lance. I'm glad he finally told the truth and admitted to doping. Although, I didn't feel like he was completely truthful during the entire interview. It seemed like he definitely hedged on some some questions while refusing to answer a few of the others.

What really disgusts me about Lance is how he's treated the people that have accused him. Instead of just denying the allegations and laying low he would bully/intimidate those who told the truth. He even went as far as to sue a lot of them. He was really such a jerk to so many people, not to mention completely arrogant!

I feel so badly for Lance's family, especially his kids and mother. I'm sure finding out the truth has been devastating for her since she defended him for so long. I think it's difficult reconciling Lance the liar/doper/cheat with Lance the cancer surviving philanthropist. Way to ruin his reputation!

Last Few Thoughts on Christmas

I sure loved having these guys for Christmas! If they hadn't come it just would've seemed like a typical day here at home with Mom since Chandra had to work for several hours.

I got this Santa headband from my secret Santa and I gave it to Sarah since she loves headbands. I wasn't expecting her to seriously wear it for very long, but she wore it for two days straight!

The girls did some artwork one morning. I was especially impressed with Elizabeth's picture.

Sharon lives in a small town and is about 90 minutes away from decent shopping, so she decided to take advantage of being close to good shopping while she was here and went out shopping a few times. She went grocery shopping with Mom on New Year's Eve and they both came back with a pair of red shoes which they promptly debuted that evening at our party.

On New Year's Day Sharon, Chandra and I went to the mall. We had lots of fun shopping and being silly. We took these pictures in the outdoor section at JCPenney. I'm always cold, so when we came across these fur stoles I had to try one on (and Channie, too). I didn't buy it, though. I settled for a scarf.

 

A trip to the mall wouldn't be complete without going to New York & Company – one of my favorite stores. When we walked in we saw this beautiful, seafoam cardigan on display. Sharon and I were both drawn to it like magnets and I knew I had to get it. Seafoam green is my favorite color, after all! Sharon really wanted to get it, too, but she didn't want to pay full price for it. Heather to the rescue! Since I have a store credit card I get coupons all the time and I had a coupon for $70 off a $150 purchase. I used the coupon two days later when it became valid and got a great deal. I love getting a bargain! (The sweater looks extra blue in the first picture, but it actually is more green like in the second.)

I also got a bracelet and some earrings to go with my new sweater. I can't wait to wear it all in a few weeks!

Seafoam green must be a hot color right now because we kept seeing it everywhere while we were at the mall.  On mannequins, on people and in just about every store we went to. It's such a beautiful color! 

In December I had Linda and Kellie over to help me make some Christmas crafts I found an Pinterest–paper evergreen trees and candy sleds that I gave to the kids in my Sunday School class. 

Dodging a Bullet

I love having Sharon's family visit, but it seems like at least one of her kids is always sick when they visit. (She assures me that they really don't get sick all that often, but coincidently, they always seem to be sick when we see each other.)

Sharon's daughter, Elizabeth, was feeling poorly the day they are arrived, and then the next day she was definitely sick with the flu. I could tell she didn't feel well just by looking at her. That evening my muscles started to feel a little achy and I was really worried that I was getting sick. The germs started getting passed around and three of Sharon's other kids got sick, plus Sharon's husband and my mom. My sister Laura's daughter also got sick (which was confirmed as influenza A when they took her to the doctor).

Those that got sick got terrible coughs and there was a constant soundtrack of coughing playing the entire visit. I figured it was just a matter of time before before I picked up what everyone else had, but fortunately I was blessed and managed to the one of the lucky few who stayed healthy. All I can say is that I'm so glad that I got a flu shot this year!

My Highlights of 2012 Slideshow

Making my annual family slideshow for 2012 monopolized tons of my time in December. This was my fourth year making a family sideshow, and each year my slideshows have gotten bigger and better. I'm glad my skills have improved, but that means it takes even longer to put my slideshows together. I'm not exactly sure how many total hours I spent working on my slideshow, but I estimate that I devoted anyway between 50 and 75 hours perfecting it.

I usually get my slideshow done before Christmas, but this year it took extra long. I'm not quite sure why it took me so much longer this year, but I finally finished it. I decided that New Year's Eve would be the perfect time for my slideshow "premier" since several of my family members were around. Unfortunately, three of my sisters and their families weren't around for the holidays since they live so far away, but I sent them DVDs of the sideshow so that they can watch it with their families. Anyway, I think my slideshow was a hit with everyone that watched it because everyone seemed to like it. The slideshow really was quite a "show" as it was 30 minutes long. Hopefully no one thought it was too long. I find it really difficult to keep it short when I have so many great pictures to work with, especially when each picture means so much to me. I get really attached to the pictures because I adore the people in them and I love the stories behind each picture.

I had somewhere between 2000 and 2500 pictures to sift through as I was trying to decide which pictures made the cut. (I have a large family and most of my sisters take lots of pictures, so that's why I had so many pictures to choose from.) Narrowing down the pictures takes quite a bit of time, but that's okay. I like options and I rather have to sift through hundreds and hundreds of nice pictures instead of having to settle for mediocre pictures because that's all I have.

I uploaded my sideshow to YouTube to make it easy to share with my family and friends.  Sometimes when I watch videos on YouTube they can be sluggish/shaky in spots, so hopefully if you watch it it will respond appropriately and run smoothly. (I had to split the slideshow into two parts to make uploading it to YouTube easier since it's so long.) If you watch it, please let me know if you think!

Part 1: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aLR3QellodA

Part 2: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tpa7halj2NI

Once There Was a Snowman

My sister Sharon and her family were hoping for a white Christmas this past year, and so was I. I adore snow and there's just something about it that makes Christmas even more special. Sadly, we had a green Christmas this year, but we did get a little bit of snow a few days later. It wasn't much–less than 2 inches–but it was fun to watch it fall and it made everything very pretty. The kids were so excited about it and they went outside to play as soon as they saw it start to snow.

The next morning Sharon's husband went outside to clear the snow off their van and move it because Sharon, Chandra and I were going to the movies to see Les Misérables. The kids went outside and had a blast playing in the snow. When we came home from the movie there was a snowman in the front yard. The kids wanted to have it facing the house, so they strategically placed it in front of the big window in my bedroom. We nicknamed the frosty voyeur "Peeping Tom" since he was only a few feet away from the house and looked right into my window.

I was surprised that the snow stuck around for so long for as little as there was. It was fun to watch the deterioration of the snowman as he melted. The snowman stuck around for 13 days which I think is pretty amazing since we've been having such temperatures.

At church the kids sing a song called Once There Was a Snowman and it's a perfect one to sing in this situation:

"Once there was a snowman, snowman, snowman,
once there was a snowman, tall, tall, tall.
In the sun he melted, melted, melted,
in the sun he melted, small, small, small."

These are pictures of the snowman the day he was built, complete with charcoal eyes/buttons, a lei crown (it slipped off on one side), a newspaper hat and a carrot nose..

The snowman started melting not too long after it was built, and my mom documented the snowman's demise every step of the way by taking daily pictures of it with her iPad (and sometimes even photographing it more than once a day depending on how it was melting).

This is the snowman five days after being created. His carrot nose started out so nice and straight, but by this point it was starting to  droop.

After a few more days the snowman had lost both of his eyes, his buttons and his nose.

Here's my mom standing by the snowman who had gotten much shorter and thinner after eight days. "I'm melting!"

Another picture of Mom posing with the snowman. Later that day the snowman lost his head.

Here's a picture the headless snowman and the few lumps which is all that remained of his head.

The sun was much more direct on the snowman's left side, so it melted more quickly than the snowman's right side. About 60 seconds after my mom took the picture on the left, the snowman's middle [what was left of it] toppled to the ground. Mom had just walked inside, so she missed it, but I caught it out of the corner of my eye.

After a mild night where we got a lot of rain there wasn't much left the snowman (picture on the left). The next morning my mom took the picture on the right. All that was left of the snowman was a tiny fistful of snow in the upper left corner of the picture.

After 13 days all that was left of the snowman was the hat, the [rotten] carrot nose, the tree branch arms, charcoal buttons/eyes and the lei.

As Frosty says, "I'll be back again someday."  I sure hope so! ;)