Family Photos

Since I'm going to visit my family that I never see, I wanted to bring them a present! So Justin, George, Kaedo and I have been taking family photos. These are the best. I can't decide which ones I like best, so I would like some opinions please!! Please note none of these have been edited, I will do that after I decide which ones I'm actually going to print. Thanks!!

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Rambling thoughts

I'm starting a new section on my blog called Rambling Thoughts, and well, it's just that. Thoughts that I think randomly that make no sense. make me laugh or make me mad. I will be asking the hard questions like why is bread square and Bologna round?

My first rambling thought is why do the gas stations in Valentine only let you fill up to $75.00?
For all of you who have never been to Valentine let me paint you a picture. Most everyone drives a truck or a big SUV. Actually a Suburban has been nicknamed the Sand Hills Cadillac. There aren't many vehicles that have a gas tank less than 16 gallons. Now why on earth would the gas stations not let us fill our vehicles all the way up? I think they should make it a $75.00 minimum. So if anyone out there knows the answer please let me know, till then I will just sit here thinking. haha OK well maybe not, but you get my drift.

So this concludes Rambling Thoughts, tune in next time.

Haunted house

Just a few more days until Halloween and I'm getting really excited! I love Halloween you get candy, get to dress up and usally party with your friends. Also I love decorating for Halloween or should I say I love making Haunted houses. Growing up my dad and I would always build haunted houses in our in-closed front porch. I loved it! Actually I loved it so much I didn't stop there, my brother and I would make haunted houses in our basement then have our friends go through them. Some of them were pretty amazing, I remember one year I even skipped going trick-or-treating just so I could be a monster in our haunted house. Oh memories......

Sadly our house doesn't have a good haunted house set up, and we don't have the best neighbors so I didn't want to put a whole bunch of stuff up to have it stolen or ruined. So this is what I got, lol.

This is the Simmons Haunted House

 

Trip

You know how I said I wanted to take a trip a few weeks ago, well I just figured out where I'm going, yay!! So I'm going to Ohio to visit my family the first week in November and I can't be more excited. I started packing already! Don't have a lot of the details planned out yet, all I know is I get to see my brother and his girlfriend, my aunt, uncle, cousins and grandma. Also Ryan is going to take me to one of the places where the Man vs. Food guy ate. We both agreed that we would not eat the same thing he ordered though, don't really like eating food the size of my face...but that's just me. I think he might take me to a OSU soccer game too, or whatever sporting event is going on that weekend. The only sad thing is that I can't take Kaedo, the airline I'm flying with won't allow "big" dogs on the plane. But I said he is a medium size dog, but I guess anything bigger than a carry-on is considered big. So he will have to stay home with Justin, but Justin said that he might take him to work with him some days. So if anyone needs some OSU gear let me know before I leave. :)

Smoke on the Water

Now this next post is pretty good, not as good as playing the harmonica, which I don't know why we still don't have one....hmmm. But anyways still good!

Presenting Smoke on the Water

Justin on Guitar and Kaedo on Vocals

Ring of fire

 On Sunday night I went to a bon fire at my cousin's house, my first one ever and it was incredible!!
 A whole bunch of kids were back in Valentine from college on a fall break so we all got together and hung out. It was so nice to see everyone again, some people hadn't been home since August. We roasted marshmallows, made Smore's and sung songs around the fire. Including Ring of Fire, it was hilarious because the guy playing the guitar is the foreign exchange student from Milan. For English being his second language he did a pretty good Johnny Cash impression. After we sat around for a while we all played Four Square...ohh I wish I could do this every weekend!

This is what bored looks like

Wow it is a SLOW night at work, there was a grand total of 1 check out today. That means I had nothing to do, audit wise. So something that usually takes about 2 hours took 10 mins tonight........sigh. As of now I'm super duper bored. How bored you ask. Well so bored that I was looking at friends pictures on facebook and one of my friends has this app that creates your future babies and she had this whole album of baby pictures with different people. Made me cry I was laughing so hard, some of the people she chose to "make" babies with was quite funny. So here I am now "making" babies with friends.

Take a look at Justin and I's little girl

Now I'm off to make more baby pictures, maybe I will do two people who already have kids and see if they look like their real kids.

Time to change

No matter how much I want summer to still be here it seems to be fading fast. Every morning on my drive home I notice more and more things dying. Although the weather has been quite nice, I could get used to 78 degree falls from now on.

The one thing I do love about fall though is the leaves. It's so incredible that something that is dying could look so beautiful. And I've never seen the seasons change in the Sand Hills before, I had no idea that grass changed colors too! So pretty!! It's funny with all the times I've come to visit Valentine I'm still experiencing new things.

Craziness

Bananas!! I'm sure you've worked with someone who has driven you bananas maybe even multiple people at once. But this is my story about the old crazy lady that I now work with at the Lodge.
About a month ago my boss hired this ocl (old crazy lady) because there was only 3 of us working the front desk full time, that's 24/7 you do the math. So this ocl was just supposed to be someone who could sit there while the rest of us took turns sleeping, haha. But she has gone from yay! to argggg. It's to the point where I would rather not sleep for the next 2 weeks than to see her again, OK that was a little harsh. But she makes me want to scream! What's making me want to scream? Well I'll tell you, it's the overly motherly thing she tries to do to me. Hello I have a mom and 3 grandmas thank you. She's deaf, when someones says "huh?" more than any other word I think it's time to go get your hearing checked. She takes my reports and moves them to the weirdest spots or throws them away. She's throwing away my job!! That's my job to check and make those reports then send them to accounting, why would you throw them away? She's slow, takes her atleast 5 mins everyday, twice a day to remember how to clock in or out. Not 5 mins to clock out, 5 mins to remember how to get to the screen. And that is clocking in and out, the easiest thing to do, you should see her try and check someone in. She's horrible with computers, I can't believe the things she asks me to do for her. And she runs her own business!! I have no idea how and she has a computer at home, probably doesn't even know how to turn it on. I've shown her how to open up the Internet almost every night, double click on the Internet explorer icon. She doesn't listen either, you tell her something 6 times and then she comes up with the craziest thing and every time I'm like, "that's not even close to what I told you". She even writes down the things you tell her and she still comes up with the wrong thing. I'm just thankful I don't actually work with her, I only clean up after her. Life is always interesting and makes me laugh when I think about it afterwords. But in the moment I'm like argghh!! And you will be happy to know that she has no idea that I think these things and I have been patient with her..... every time I've shown her how to print a document. Smiling...Smiling is my favorite and it gets me through these crazy times. But do you know what also helps.....15 more days!

Pillows

So I've been looking at photos on our computer and I came across many photos of our dog Kaedo sleeping. I would now like to share them with you.

 This is one of my favorite postions to find him sleeping, he reminds me of fox when he curls up like this.

He is always stealing our pillows.

 I have no idea what he is doing here, I just walked into the room and he was upside down like this. So I ran and got the camera

 This is his normal spot, he likes to curl up next to us on the couch.

 Sleeping on a container of cookies, can't be comfortable.

 Cuddling with my "Kaedo" stuffed animal, in the back seat of the car.

 Daddy rocking his baby to sleep

Cuddling or eating his bunny, not quite sure

Best Buds

Sunday Justin and I drove down to North Platte ( 2 hours away) to go shopping and to see our cousins. That still kinda freaks me out that I have to drive at least 2 hours to do any major shopping, well besides online shopping. But you can't order paint online, well you probably could but I need to see the colors in person. Anyways we got down there had lunch and went to Menards then we met Dotti, Darbe, Davi and their friends at the mall. Ha, mall, I'm pretty sure it has a total of 10 stores but then again Valentine has no mall so.....yeah.

It was really fun hanging out with the girls, Darbe is hilarious well so is Davi too, just in a different way. We helped Dotti shop for a homecoming dress, she didn't find one that she liked in her size :( hate it when that happens. After we got done looking at dresses we went into Claire's and Davi bought Justin a best buds necklace. You know the ones that one person keeps the best and the other keeps the buds, when i was little I had one and it was a heart shape and the heart broke in half and on one half it said "Be Fri" and the other one said " st ends". Then when you would put the two halves together it said "Best Friends" awww. Well the one Davi picked out for them is a rainbow fluffy ball, don't know which one Justin would have wanted more a heart or rainbow fluffy ball? But I made him wear it the rest of the time we were there, I mean she paid for it and everything, way cute! After the mall we took them out for ice cream at Cold Stone, yummy. Then we went home because I had to work Sunday night, short trip but still really fun.

Video blog

Yay! I figured it out, with this new update it makes posting videos and pictures really easy. So this is Kaedo our 1 year old puppy, and yes he is still a puppy, doing what he does best.....singing.

Updated my blogger and learning how to use it

So tomorrow I'm going to post a video, well hopefully. I'm sure I can figure out, so be prepared to be amazed! Haven't decided what I'm going to post yet, probably Kaedo singing. I've been working really hard with him lately on teaching him how to talk. As of now he only knows 2 phrases, he's really good at saying "I love you" and I'm also teaching him how to say " I-O". But his "I-O" turns into "I-ooooowhoooooiloveyouoooooo" and if you know the chant you know that is all wrong and way too long. It's really funny, sometimes it's hard to be strict and train him because he makes me laugh all the time. Or if he's in trouble he knows how to come cuddle up next to me to make me forget, spoiled dog.
Maybe after I figure out how to upload videos on here I can figure out how to post it on myfamily too...because Karen asked me like 5 months ago to post a video and still have yet to do it. Sorry.

Is this a sign telling me not to leave my house??

Tonight Justin took me out for dinner to celebrate our 5 year anniversary and on the way out to the Prairie Club I thought we were going to die. The Prairie Club is 17 miles south of Valentine and when we left Valentine it was 80 something degrees and sunny. But about 7 or so miles down the road there was a nasty storm, that we didn't know about so it looked like it came out of no where. Anyways Justin was driving and I was in the passenger seat putting on my make-up when Justin said, "did you see that?". "See what?", I asked and he told me not to worry about it because it would upset me, so I spent the next minute or two guessing at animals that I wouldn't like to see on the side of the road. But then I saw it, lightning and dark clouds. Then the next thing I knew the wind picked up, dust and tumble weeds started flying past us and I started to scream. In a panic Justin tried to turn the radio to the local station, while flipping a U-y and driving 80 plus miles an hour. I was completely worthless, probably making Justin even more nervous, I couldn't stop shaking and picturing a tornado coming down and picking up our car and throwing us across the prairie. Some how through the hysterical screams I yelled out "Dodsons!", which of course means lets head towards the Dodson's house in case we have to take shelter. When we got to their turn off the radio had announced that it was not a tornado, but merely a thunderstorm warning. Oh yeah with strong winds. So we turned around and headed back to the Prairie Club and as I was questioning if this was a sign from God telling us not to go to dinner we looked to the east and saw a rainbow. After all of that dinner was perfect, we had a great time and as we were driving home another crazy thing happened. You know that girl who was breaking out windows in Valentine just to go to jail, well she was across the street from our house...breaking windows. We were 2 or 3 blocks away when we saw a police car do a U turn, and I told Justin that was right by our house. He didn't believe though and then not 30 seconds later the second cop showed up. Now we are 1 block away and Justin realizes it is right by our house so we are looking around trying to figure where or what the problem is. Then the third cop shows up and we see the girl standing by a car with a bat in her hand. Justin kept his distance so the police could handle it, he so smart when it comes to that stuff ( I wonder why). It wasn't after the fourth cop showed up and he saw them take the girl down that he pulled in to our parking spot and let me out of the car. I wasn't as scared with the cop thing as I was the tornado at first, but then I got to thinking about it and what if there was an accomplice hiding who jumped into our car or what if she had a gun or all of these other crazy things. I'm just thankful I have Justin and he knows what to do and to protect me.

A girl could get used to this

The last few days have been perfectly amazing!
Monday I got my test results from my mole, and no cancer, yay!! It was a long stressful two weeks waiting on the results, not only that but they had me on crazy pills, so thankful to be done with that. Also on Monday I got a lot of stuff done, it makes me feel so good when I have a productive day. I painted, did dishes, laundry, cleaned the bathrooms, went shopping, went to the bank, picked apples and got my hair done. Not only that but it was gorgeous outside, it has been all week. It's been in the upper 70's and low 80's and it's supposed to last until the weekend.
Tuesday I made lunch for Justin and took it out to the ranch and we had a picnic at Grandma's place. He found us a spot by the refuge overlooking a canyon, it was really pretty. I loved being out in the sun, when you work nights you don't get to see the sun a lot. Then that night I made tacos and Justin and I had an in-home dinner and a movie date night.
Wednesday Justin made me breakfast in bed, I know I'm spoiled. Then he went to work but it was special today because he was working in town so he came and had lunch with me. Also Kaedo and I went on a walk to go see him. And again weather was beautiful, I wish I could live in a place that was 80 degrees and sunny everyday.
So far great week, and it's only going to get better! Our 5 year anniversary is Friday and we have dinner plans at the Prairie Club, and after we'll go to the Valentine homecoming game. Then on Saturday we are going to the pumpkin patch at the fair grounds. I can't wait, and I can't believe it's already been 5 years!

Small town, USA

Today the whole family went up to Cody, NE for Cody-Kilgore's Homecoming festivities. It was a blast!! Cody sure knows how to throw a party!

In Lincoln we didn't not have this cool of homecomings, I mean sure we had the football game, the dance and spirit week but just check out what Cody, a town of 150, did to celebrate homecoming.

Petting Zoo

Volleyball Tournament

Bouncy Toys

And this was only one day! The other days they had a dance, a parade, a football game. and a powder puff game. Makes miss high school even more :'(

Easy goin'

The sun is in the sky and clouds are rolling by and today is gonna be one wonderful day.

 

 

Hand in hand together. We'll be friends forever. Sharing all the good times. Happy and free, it's gonna be so...

Easy goin', we'll laugh our cares away. On this easy goin', easy goin' day.

 

We're never in a hurry got no time to worry, we'll take it nice and easy singing a song.

There's never any trouble. We're floatin like a bubble. La La La La

Lighter than air. Why should we care? We're......

Easy goin', we'll laugh our cares away. On this easy goin', easy goin' day.

 

Easy goin', we'll laugh our cares away on this easy goin', easy goin' day.......

Today was a beautiful day!! Upper 70's, light breeze and best of all my day off! Kaedo and I picked apples from our apple tree in the back yard. George was there too, but she wasn't much help not to say that Kaedo was either but he was highly entertaining. He saw me picking apples off the tree so he jumped up on his hind legs and started biting the apples off the tree. After I stopped that he ran around with the fallen bad apples in his mouth, we're pretty sure he thinks they're toys because he never eats them. Then he saw me putting the good apples in the bowl, so he would bring over a bad apple drop it in the bowl and grab a good one and run way with it. I managed to save some and hopefully got rid of the bad ones, but it won't matter too much because I'm canning them. And a little dog slobber never hurt anyone. After I had picked all the good apples off the tree I put the bowl down by George  to take some pictures of her and Kaedo got all protective of his "toys" and chased her off. Never a dull moment, let me tell you. :)