• I’ve had some wonderful photo sessions in the past couple weeks and I have even more coming up in the next few.  There’s nothing more satisfying than smiling back at the faces in the images while I’m editing and getting excited to share them.  There’s plenty coming up, I promise!
• But if you can’t wait, there are a few sneak peeks on Facebook.
• I have fallen victim to peer pressure this month.  First in the form of hosting a jewelry party at my home.  Second… well… there’s thing called Twilight that I’ve never really cared about…
• Twilight Lunch [twahy-lahyt luhnch], noun - A midday meal that involves watching the Twilight movies with fabulous co-workers in an effort to relive vampire-werewolf-teenage-love-triangle in time for new a movie.  May span over several days due to limited one-hour lunch breaks.
• Yes.  That happened.  Never read the books (although I want to now), never cared to watch the teenage angst unfold with fangs and fur (but it’s been quite enjoyable) and never thought I’d admit that I like (but I kind of do).  Gah.  What is happening to me?!
• More peer pressure: I’m attending a midnight showing with said fabulous co-workers tonight.  I have two fears.  One is that I won’t be able to stay awake.  The other is running into someone I know.
• I seriously just took up four five bullets to talk about Twilight.  I must be ill.
• On a completely different note, I have discovered the best boots in the world.  I actually discovered them on another lady’s foot and asked her if Frye boots were really worth the money and then she told me her secret.  I bought them and have been wearing all the live long day.  I have fallen in love with a pair of shoes.
• I also fell in love with an L-series lens.  A friend let me borrow his Canon EF 24-70mm f/2.8 L for a wedding and man, they don’t call it luxury for nothing.  I’ve started a little piggy bank in hopes of purchasing my own L-series lens.  But I’ll probably go with a prime because I have the hots for them.  And I’ll probably have to wait a while as the piggy bank will have to grow a lot first.
• I also fell down.  Again.  On the deck.  I had the BDD on a lead early Saturday morning and she saw something she had to get.  With the deck frosted over, homegirl had her feet slip out from under her, slippers flew off and banged my head.  This is not the first time… and I’m seriously contemplating that helmet now.

My pal Omawarisan over at the Blurt Blog has started his own philanthropic endeavors through an action figure – we call her The Jolie. And she travels.  Between states, between countries and between friends in the blogosphere.  Bringing people near and far closer together through her Jolie-ness.

I hosted her.  And though our time together was not the most entertaining, The Jolie was definitely in Louisville.

{CLICK HERE TO GO TO BLURT}

What all is going on?

I have no idea yet.  But there will be a giveaway.  Because I’m celebrating over here.

You want to know more?

Well, you’re just going to have to wait until next week.

Like I said, I ain’t got it all figured out.  But I will.

Stay tuned… and Happy Friday.

The hubs has been working hard on making our backyard usable again.  Which is necessary on account that the BDD pushes my blinds out of her way to look out the window which then not only shortens the life expectancy of said blinds but chips the paint off the window’s trim.  No amount of shooing can keep her from doing it either.  So you see, the hubs’ hard work will pay off once I can just let the beasts free in the backyard again.

And since he’s been hard at work, so have I.  I’ve put in hours with him pulling nails, getting rid of trash and what not.  But this past weekend, I did the biggest favor of all.  I mowed the grass.

This might not seem like a big deal, but to me it is.  I’ve never mowed the grass.  The men in my life have always done the mowing so there’s been no need to.  But if I wanted to take that picture up there, with my feet standing on a new cedar deck floor, I was going to have to mow.  And since the hubs was fine letting me near the pushing mower (I might have lowered the deck on a riding mower once resulting in a fresh, curvy go-cart track through a yard.  Maybe.  It could be myth.), I put in my husband blockers and I went to work.

Husband blockers = Skullcandy earbuds.  Believe me, you can’t hear them calling your name at all.  It’s pretty fantabulous.

How hard could it be?  It’s like vacuuming the yard, right?  WRONG.  It’s nothing like vacuuming.  It can’t be done one handed.  It’s so easy to leave a small strip of tall grass.  It’s impossible to guide that machine over to that small strip to clip it.  I did what any smart person would do: I started behind the garage where no one could see me.  After about 20 minutes, I started getting the hang of it.  But it’s definitely not like vacuuming.

I walked away with a sunburn (how I manage to miss sunscreening body parts, I’ll never know) and a nice-sized blister on my thumb.  Trying to explain to the hubs that I have delicate lady hands was wasted breath.  But after spending so much time outside, there in the open yard, I had another concern.

When I work outside, I like listen to music.  Thus, the husband blockers.  It makes the time go by faster and I’m not as bored with the physical labor as I would be otherwise and I don’t have to overhear any conversations that may include my name or hissing.  I sing along quite often but I have perfected my earbuds-in singing voice as I usually do this at my desk at work.  I have no worries about that.  My random bust-a-move dancing, however, has not been perfected.

I skip through the yard, snapping my fingers to Madonna.  I do my own rendition of Rhythm Nation from the shed to the house.  I shake it like a Polaroid picture behind the mower thanks to OutKast.  I’m a one-woman show, dancing for 15 seconds at a time, parading to a tune that cannot be heard by anyone else. I thought nothing of it until I locked eyes with a neighbor.  Who was watching me.

And so now I’m concerned they think I’ve lost my marbles.

Last week I did nothing but sneeze and blow my nose and sneeze some more.  It’s a small price to pay for spring weather in February.  Today, the allergies have seemed to back off – the temps have also seemed to back off and it may be rainy all week.  Boo rain, boo… but it’s so much better than more snow right now.

With the change in weather, I’m glad I got outside with my camera last week.  I took an outdoor lunch with Mac and walked the Waterfront in hopes of seeing something new.  I’m here to report there’s nothing new.  Nuthin.  People were out and relaxing in the breeze, ducks were swimming and dipping, trash was floating around the outside of the fountain… yep, nothing has changed.  I had a boring photowalk.  But I tried to make something good of it.

I searched for things that were “white” for the challenge, I tried out new perspectives, sat down on my butt a few times, even tried shooting at some people.  It felt like I hadn’t gotten anything.  After I pulled the images up at home, I was right.  There was only one I kept going back too.  The one of the fella fishing.  With his three poles and grocery cart.  Every time I look at it, I tell myself I should have gotten closer.  Maybe even struck up conversation and asked him if I could take some shots.  But I didn’t.  I’m a scaredy cat.  So I have to live with what I got.

Maybe one day I’ll overcome this fear.  The stranger danger fear.  But what I know for sure is it ain’t today.  Or tomorrow.

St. Kitts – The Atlantic Ocean is on the left.  The Caribbean Sea is on the right.

I haven’t let it go.  I still yearn for island time again.  For warm breezes and sunshine galore and people with fantastic accents.

I’ll have to settle for current forecast – it’s warming up here in Kentucky.

According to the weather guy (which he’s been wrong before so he can most definitely be wrong again), Louisville is supposed to hover in the 50ºs for the next week.  This makes me do the happy dance.  I hope my happy dance isn’t a snow dance because that would be the most disappointing thing since the final episode of Lost.

I need to shoot something.  Other than a knitted hat.  Something outside.

I smell a photowalk in my near future.  I think me and Mac… or maybe the kahuna… are going to have to take a lunch together downtown.  To see if anything has changed since winter holed us up.  I doubt anything has but to see it with fresh eyes is promising.

So, Mr. Weatherman, don’t let me down.  I need this defrosting we’ve got.  You can toss in rain for a day or so but give me clear skies for the most part.  I need that up there.  I need a play date with my camera outside.  Yeah… I need.

Pink Suede Shoe has a delicious crafting blog.  This week she shared a Valentine’s craft everyday building up to today.  So crafty.

Who doesn’t love Bakerella?  Lip-shaped cake pops are a win in my book.  And a want.

And while we’re still on the subject of sweet treats, Wendipants at Bon Appetit Hon has the best Food Memory post today.  Puffy Hearts… I want so bad to put my face in one.

Denise at Once Upon A Time has lists of random facts on Tuesdays.  I like Tuesdays.  Some may have been Valentine related.

And because I can’t help myself, an oldie from Listverse.  A list of miserable facts about V-Day.

It was either this or show you another hat I knitted… I thought you might like something different.

Love on, folks.  Love on.

• Have I mentioned I want to go back on vacation?  I believe I need to stop thinking about it (sunshine and warmth) and quit sorting through photos (water, sky, piña coladas) and focus on the here and now.  Here and now includes cake so it’s really not that bad.
• Speaking of cake, I had cake for dinner last night.  The hubs had traffic school (he thinks he’s Mario Andretti), so I enjoyed a moist slice of yellow cake with chocolate icing and two glasses of milk.  I’m thinking the milk counters the cake somehow.
• I completed my All-Day Beret and blocked it and it is adorable.  I haven’t been able to snap a “finished” photo yet but it’s on the to do list.
• And I’ve started and completed another hat!  Just have some finishing touches that have seemed to confused me.  I don’t know what is up or down when trying my hand at a pompom.  (It wasn’t pretty, folks.)
• I think it might be time to part ways with my ultra-wide angle lens.  It’s an awesome lens but I haven’t used it much and it just sits in a bag.  And that’s sad.  I just can’t decide how or where I want to sell.  Advice?
• Been thinking the same about my Crumpler bag.  It’s a great bag but that Canon 7D does not fit in it.  Well, it does but it’s an extremely tight fit.  I’ve been eying one little number for months now – I think it might be time to start a “Bring Lola Home” fund.
• I need more coffee.  Stat.