Iowa

(Are you sick of photos yet?)

So we’ve been tossing around moving back to Iowa – long convoluted story that’s not important to the post – but that means we’ve been running up there quite a fair bit in the last few months to look at houses. We actually have one lined up again to look at in late March or April (it’s a private deal, the owner is in no hurry and neither are we, so that’s a good thing).

But trips mean more crappy cellphone pictures. Enjoy 🙂

Callie

Jen

Harlie

FIRE!

Putting in some new plumbing…

The Catholic cemetery in hamburg

this was in the yard of a house we looked at…

Dad in Mondos

The adorable Chucky

A truck stop

Yes, I put a pin in for us

this stuff is awful

this was good, though 😉

random iowa landscape

bridge

cool shot

Chucky and Mel

Harlie has quite an imagination

drink time!

no idea if this is true but it was interesting

Callie

rain

cool clouds

Okay, gotta go have lunch. At least I got a few posts set up. Go me.

Song playing at the moment – Lorelai – Fleet Foxes

Trip Slideshow

(originally from June 2008)

Though this says Video it’s really a slide show. Warning: there is some bizarre blank space at the end that was not there in the movie maker files, but appeared when I exported it to a video. No idea.

As you can see lots of useless pics of crap. I was shocked at how hicky Mt Pleasant seemed – back  when I first moved there from Coin, Mt. P seemed so sophisticated; so “modern”. When I was a junior I had seen “the internet” once and couldn’t figure out what this “yahoo” thing was. Four months later I moved to Mt. P and everyone wanted to know my email address. At old South Page we wore jeans and sweatshirts to the Homecoming dance – at Mt P they wore almost formal wear.  But, either MO is way ahead of Iowa or it is from living so close to Springfield, but the whole place was like hickville – and Yarmouth was like an episode of Hee-Haw. I laid awake one night and listened to the country street dance because it was one block away and very loud. Not to say I don’t LIKE hicky, hill billy stuff, as I have discovered I do, but I never realized just HOW rural all of that was, you know?

I also noticed some other differences between southern MO and southern IA- for instance grain bins. There are pretty much none of them here, but up there almost every house in the country has their own set. Of course I also noticed how much rustier everything is. I think maybe it’s because there’s a lot more metal going on with all the sheds and bins and such, but I now know where I got my inherent love of rusty metal things from :p I admit, I like the rundown, derelict, weedy, rusted look of the countryside: the collapsing barn, the faded house, the water streaks… what can I say? But I wonder: do I like it because I was surrounded by it OR was I surrounded by it because I was drawn to it as I already had a natural liking for it?  Kinda like which came first. Hmmm….

Poor Dad is having a time with all the rain. His roof has sprung a leak so he’s pulled all the front room carpet up (which made for some horrible pictures!) and he can’t mow most of his yard as it is a lake, LOL! Chris thinks he should turn it into a pond and forget it :p Otherwise Coin was the same as usual, though the pay phone was gone 😦 I spent many happy hours on it – it had something wrong with it so all the calls were free.

But anyway, that was my big excitement! to see more trip pics go to my June Collection on Flickr (yeah I have everything in albums and collections there – it’s almost crazy!)

Fav song of the moment – Halos of the Sun – Fuel

Photos: Arizona Trip Home

(originally from January 2008)

 

My mother and I were invited to Arizona for a week to visit my cousins Theresa and June. It was the first time I was ever out of the midwest (not counting babyhood trips), as well as my first time on a plane. I went berserk documenting it and, though I won’t share all the photos, there are some fun ones.

And, after a long and fun filled week, we headed home!

Phoenix Airport

Getting dropped off. Bye-bye, Theresa!

The plane in the Phoenix airport

Waiting at our gate

We’re in the plane and check it out – it’s a wing! Again!

Taking off!

Phoenix is tiny

Camel Back Mountain maybe? Dunno

bye bye Phoenix

Okay, one more coz this is cool

A tiny town in BFE

Snow capped!!

Near El Paso

random Texas

Not sure why the water is all milky. Looks like a different planet.

The circles are kinda weird, too

Oh no! Back at the Dallas airport!

Mom did not get stuck in the doors this time! What doors, you ask?

These doors.

Tralalalala. riding the skybus.

It is soooo much less crowded this time!

Waiting at our gate

Proof people DO read those magazines!

weird

Bye bye Dallas!

Clouds over Arkansas

Clouds. That stretch all the way home. Where it is…. you guessed it. Raining.

Hello Chris! We’re Baaa-aaaaack!

And that’s it! Yay! Now, back to Random Blogs again 😀

Fav Song of the Moment – “All Fall Down” – One Republic

Photos: Arizona Artsy

(originally from January 2008)

 

My mother and I were invited to Arizona for a week to visit my cousins Theresa and June. It was the first time I was ever out of the midwest (not counting babyhood trips), as well as my first time on a plane. I went berserk documenting it and, though I won’t share all the photos, there are some fun ones.

Just some cool photos

At the zoo

Just one more….

Photos: Arizona Trees

(originally from January 2008)

 

My mother and I were invited to Arizona for a week to visit my cousins Theresa and June. It was the first time I was ever out of the midwest (not counting babyhood trips), as well as my first time on a plane. I went berserk documenting it and, though I won’t share all the photos, there are some fun ones.

I have a tree fetish, and I don’t just mean the palm trees. check my Flickr and you’ll see hundreds of photos of trees. Trees are just awesome. So, here are some more.

OMG! It’s a lemon AND an orange tree!!!!!!!!!!!

Nice mix

I never did get to pick an orange 😦

More tomorrow! (yeah, I milked this!)

Photos: Phoenix Arizona

(originally from January 2008)

 

My mother and I were invited to Arizona for a week to visit my cousins Theresa and June. It was the first time I was ever out of the midwest (not counting babyhood trips), as well as my first time on a plane. I went berserk documenting it and, though I won’t share all the photos, there are some fun ones.

These are some random photos of Phoenix. Almost all were taken from a moving car, so it’s a testament to the kodak camera. Unless labeled, I have no idea what anything is.

The University of Phoenix

Baseball field

The whole world looks like Taco Bell….

I eat bagged dinners by these guys, now! 😉

Just a cool retaining wall

Cheap apartments

Even McDonlads looks like Taco Bell

Downtown Phoenix

I love the palm trees…. or date trees… or whatever they are

the picket fence amused me.

How do these people find Taco Bell!?!? Seriously, even Pizza Hut looks like it!!! LOL! 

More tomorrow (aren’t you excited?!?)

Fav song of the moment – Angel – Within Temptation

Photos: Trip to Arizona

(originally from January 2008)

My mother and I were invited to Arizona for a week to visit my cousins Theresa and June. It was the first time I was ever out of the midwest (not counting babyhood trips), as well as my first time on a plane. I went berserk documenting it and, though I won’t share all the photos, there are some fun ones.

Here’s the trip there:

our very, very heavy carry on luggage *hint – it started out light enough but by the time we got to Phoenix it was like lugging bricks!*

The Springfield/Branson airport (though it’s nowhere near Branson…)

Our happy boarding passes. We almost lost these once. It was not cool.

Inside the fort plane. Can you feel me freaking out?

Looking out the window, trying to stay calm….

OMG! we’re in the air! *panic*panic*pan- hey. Missouri looks kinda boring from up here.

I think this is Arkansas. it’s swirly.

Wow. Texas is tidy. And flat.

This was a fascinating sculpture in the Dallas airport.

I wish I’d taken more photos of it. Call it aggravation that I didn’t. *hint – we RAN across the airport to catch our plane, then found it was delayed for an hour… yeah…*

Looking cheerful despite the fact that we were herded onto a plane, left there for forty-five minutes, and then taken back off because it turned out they couldn’t fix whatever had caused the original delay.

Finally made it onto plane number three and, though it flies, there is nothing to take pictures of…

Yay! We’re only four hours late!!

Ha ha! And it’s cloudy! (secretly I was glad, as I like clouds, but there is an irony when you visit sunny Arizona and get rained on, just sayin’)

More coming tomorrow!

Fav song of the moment – Wicked Game – HIM