A family affair

Goofing off as our parents' pictures were taken.

My sister Libby and I gave our mother a family photo session for Christmas last year. She had talked about having family pictures done for a while. Well, the session finally occurred some 10 months after Christmas. It was a perfect morning. We used our favorite photographer β€” Ernie Rice Photography out of Jonesboro β€” and the pictures were taken at my brother-in-law’s best friend’s farm. Continue reading “A family affair”

Country Concert

My sister and her husband often remark how they can’t believe I’m from Arkansas. My sister is super country while I’m pretty much a city girl. It’s a remark that I’ve actually heard from a lot of native Arkansan friends, however, if there is one thing we have in common, it’s country music.

Two weeks ago I attended a country music concert with my sister, her husband and their friends. It was the last stop of the tour for Miranda Lambert with special guests, the Randy Rogers Band and Justin Moore. It was a blast since I was able to hear some of my favorite songs from both her (such as White Liar and Baggage Claim) and her new group, the Pistol Annies (such as Hell on Heels and Takin’ Pills).

Here are some pictures from the event.

Miranda Lambert singing White Liar.
Justin Moore, who my brother-in-law absolutely loves to listen to. In fact, all we listened to on the way to and from the concert was a Justin Moore CD.
Pistol Annies.

A little magic

My aunt and I took my two little cousins to see Disney on Ice this weekend. We met at a family member’s house, who has gorgeous sunflowers blooming (see above) and then drove to Memphis’ FedEx Forum for the event.

It was fun watching the different classics: Peter Pan, Mickey Mouse, Lion King, the Little Mermaid and Lilo & Stitch. While I hate the Lion King as a movie, I do adore its characters, Timon and Pumba. My cousins loved it. Continue reading “A little magic”

St. Peter’s

St. Peter's Catholic Church has just received a new sign that is adorned with a 152-year-old bell. The church has had the bell since late 1970.

This weekend I was able to attend mass at my church back home, St. Peter’s Catholic Church. I enjoy attending church there and comparing how the church has changed (and not changed) since I attended regular mass there as a youth. Continue reading “St. Peter’s”

A Taste of Faith

I recently attended my first “A Taste of Faith” event. It is a fundraiser for Diocese of Little Rock’s seminarians. I went with my aunt to support my cousin, Stephen, who is in his fourth year. It was a great event and I enjoyed watching him play the harmonica with a seminarian music group.

Go crazy

There are several photographers that I love to follow. I treat myself to a few minutes of looking through their updated blogs once, OK, maybe several times a week. The pictures are awesome though.

One of the websites I like to look at (usually through Facebook) is by Ernie Rice. Ernie was my photography professor at Arkansas State University. He also took the pictures at my sister’s wedding.

I was super excited to go on Ernie’s website today and see not one, but two pictures of my sister used as headliners. I thought they were amazing, what do you think?

Home Sweet Home

I am finally back home in Wynne, Ark., after four months in DC completing an internship. I checked out of my Rockville, MD, apartment at 9:30 a.m. yesterday, and had just enough time yesterday to buy a pink ‘Washington, DC’ hoodie at Union Station as we passed through DC to get to BWI Airport.

Out of five suitcases, four suitcases were mine and they were heavy and a pain to get to the airport. Luckily, none of the suitcases were overweight. Well-one weighed in at 56 pounds, so the check-in attendant asked me if I wanted to just take out 5 pounds in items so I could avoid the $90 overweight fee. I took out both a blanket and my winter coat and still weighed in at 51 pounds. The attendant kindly said she would overlook the extra pound and let me go on without paying the extra fee. Thank goodness!

Security was another issue for mom and I. Mom’s carry-on was searched because she had an item that looked like a “fishbowl.” Turns out, it was a plastic green flower that was in a little bowl of fake water that mom gave me during her last visit.

I stupidly said as she pulled it out, “oh, it’s fake!” The security guard was sarcastic answering me, however, she still had to call her superviser over to check that it was okay to allow to pass. It was fake water for crying out loud! The superviser gave her approval so we were soon back on our way!

Cindy was on a separate flight than mom, Elizabeth and I so she made it to Little Rock 30 minutes after the rest of us landed. It was fine with me, however, since it gave us enough time to put our luggage in the car and talk to my dad-who met us at the airport.

Dad and I watched Cindy’s plane land on the real time flight tracker and it was pretty cool to track Cindy’s progress on the digital map and guess which plane-hers or a Houston plane-was landing first based on their altitude. While standing there, man waiting for the Houston plane said the plane, scheduled to land at 5 p.m. that day, had been delayed due to a malfunction in the landing gear-it would not go up once they started to leave the runway! The plane had to turn around and passengers had to board another plane. However, to further complicate the flight-they had to wait for weather to clear. I’m glad I was not on that flight!

Once Cindy’s plane landed, we were quickly on our way and only stopped once to grab some food. We arrived home around 11:30 p.m. and I had a pleasant surprise once there!

I am the new and proud owner of a Toyota Corolla S car!!! I am so excited. I was too out of it to do more than look at the car and accuse everyone of lying to me (jokingly of course).

This morning, however, was a different story! I drove it to church and everywhere. I love it!

Taking in the sites one last time

Mom, Elizabeth and Cindy love Thai food.

We ate dinner at a Thai restaurant in Silver Spring, and they enjoyed the food despite their earlier misgivings. I was pretty excited! The meal was a welcome change to our day. After a late start, we visited the Smithsonian National Zoo and I was finally able to see Happy the Hippo and the baby gorilla. Afterwards, we set out to see the Hope Diamond at the Smithsonian Natural History Museum and stopped by the Smithsonian Castle. I must admit the jewelry at the Natural History Museum were my favorite items of the day (after the zoo of course!) and they were simply breathtaking!

We also visited the White House one last time since Cindy has never seen it. I do not think she was all that impressed-she kept saying she expected it to be bigger! πŸ™‚ We tried to find the perfect hoodie for me after visiting the White House, but to no such luck.

Oh well, I always have tomorrow. I have to check out of my apartment at 9:30 a.m., and our flight is at 5:15 p.m. We are planning to take in a few more stops before we leave for the airport. However, I have so much luggage that we are going to be packed when we leave the apartment tomorrow! 😦

Well, I’m off to finish packing my luggage and cleaning the apartment!

A bubbly mess

My last roommate to go, Ever, made a mess in the kitchen tonight by putting Dawn dishsoap in the dishwasher. Cindy first noticed the bubbles flowing freely out of the dishwasher around 11:30. It is a huge mess, and it just had to happen on our LAST NIGHT here.

Mom andΒ I did most of the cleaning though Ever helped here and there before she left to go out with her boyfriend and other interns from Mexico. I freaked out that she was leaving without helping clean up the mess-which could overstay us in the apartment and ruin the floors-and went to talk to our RA, Ann. I just wanted to make sure I would not be fined for anything she caused this close to check out and did not adequately clean up. She assured me, along with my younger sister Elizabeth, that I would not be fined for Ever’s messes. Thank goodness!!

To top it off, I fell off the bed while talking to Cindy, Mom and Elizabeth. One minute I was on the bed laughing and the next minute I was trying to catch myself on the glass doors leading to my small balcony. No such luck. I fell hard between the bed and the window.

We are still working on getting it cleaned (mainly mom) and I am also close to 90-percent packed. We are waking up early in the morning to clear out the rest.

Final Visit-Thursday

I picked my mom, younger sister Elizabeth and my best friend Cindy up at BWI airport this morning, and we began the first day of their visit right!! I made it to the airport just in time to meet them at the baggage area and we were quickly able to pick up their luggage and hop back on a metro bus to DC.

We started off the visit by going straight to eat since we were all starving, and ate at Red Lobster in Silver Spring! Tonight we completed a three-and-a-half bus tour of the DC monuments which was fantasic. Our tour guide was hilerous, however the only downfall was the heavy rain during our visit to the Lincoln, Vietnam and Korea memorials. We were still able to have some fun though. πŸ™‚ See below: a picture of the group at the WWII Memorial.

Elizabeth, me, Cindy and Mom
Elizabeth, me, Cindy and Mom

After the tour, we decided to show Cindy Chinatown and stop at the McDonald’s there so Mom could get a burger. Ha, we got more than we bargained for after we met two cops who were more than friendly with us. They joked and scared Mom with scary stories about not eating the food-after we already ate the food-and pretended that they had a call to detain us. Mom actually stood up, put her hands on the wall and said “Frisk me!!” It was hilerous!!

It was after 1 a.m. when we finally got home from this, and we are all pretty worn out! However, there will be no sleeping in for us. We will be leaving bright and early for another day in DC!! First up: the zoo!