What I do in my Spare Time

Josh has been overwhelmingly busy during this semester with a full schedule and teaching two classes. He has been staying at school most days until 6 or 7 at night grading papers or doing his class assignments (often involving looking through microscopes for hours on end). He has also been staying up until 3 or 4 in the morning to get all his homework done. In addition to this, he has had field trips for a couple of weekends (including this weekend) where he leaves on Friday or early Saturday and I don't see him again until Sunday night. So I have had a lot of extra time to myself. It has been nice in some ways but it gets boring after awhile and I am always glad when he finally comes home. So here is what has occupied my many solitary hours.

1. Girl's Nights Out: wait a minute, all my girl friends that I used to hang out with move away! Scratch this one.

2. Chick Flick Movie nights: Josh isn't a fan of chick flicks and since most of my girl friends don't live her anymore (see #1) I have to content myself with watching them on my own when Josh is out of town. I still love them even if I do watch them alone. Some of my favs:

3. Baking Bread: In 2007 one of my goals was to learn how to make bread so Josh gave me this fabulous book for Christmas. It has taken awhile to get into it, mainly because most of the recipes take about 8 hours to make, but they are worth it. Everything comes out looking like it is from a bakery so you can really impress everyone. I even fooled my sister-in-law who is an amazing cook when I took them dinner a couple of weeks ago.

Today I made rye bread and it looks pretty good. I just hope it tastes as good as it looks!

4. Sewing: I had a baby blue trench coat that I absolutely loved and somehow hanging in the closet it managed to get rust on it. I am completely perplexed because nothing next to it or around it had anything on it, so I have no idea how it happened. Since I loved it so much I decided to pull it apart and make a new one. After about a month of working on it (intermittently) and sewing almost everything twice, it is done. Well, almost. I tried it on and realized my hem isn't quite lining up, so I will post pictures when it is really finished. ;) My Mom taught me how to sew a little bit when I was younger, but I have never made anything this complicated before. I am quite impressed with how it came out.

5. Reading: I have been reading quite a bit over the last year. For some reason I just have the desire to read all sorts of things. Here is a list of the books I have read so far this year:

Atlas Shrugged ( It's worth all 1069 small print pages of it)

Pride and Prejudice (I think I have read this ten or more times-it is definitely a favorite)

Persuasion

Anna Karenina (Hated this one, the only way I got through it was to tell myself I couldn't read The Fountainhead until I finished it. Tolstoy is a good writer, but I couldn't stand Anna)

The Fountainhead

The Birth of Freedom (Haven't finished this one yet-it has all the previous documents that formed the intellectual background for the American Constitution)

The Three Musketeers (I am almost done with this one- it is a much more mature book than I expected)

6. Oh, and one more thing that I am ashamed to admit:

It is so much fun. I never thought I would like playing video games, but I love this one. The cut scenes are hilarious.

Snakes and Horny Toads

WARNING-IMAGE OF FOOD CHAIN IN PROGRESS!

This is a sidewinder rattlesnake we found in Yuma yesterday. I think it is a horny toad he is eating. It seems too wide for a lizard. He was really upset that we were spoiling his lunch! I have never seen one in the wild before. It was really neat. We let him eat his lunch then found him again on our way back. You can kind of see the bulge in his stomach.

We scared him and he was getting as far away as possible.

This is him getting really angry at us. You can see the rattle just going to town!

Safford, Arizona

My work sent me out of town for a night this week to the lovely town of Safford. I checked every hotel in a 30 mile radius and none had a single room so I checked the local bed and breakfasts and found the cutest only house to stay in. If you are ever in Safford, I highly recommend staying in the Olney House in downtown. It was so much fun to stay at. Have a look (http://www.olneyhouse.com/). I stayed in the fireplace room in the main house. I wanted to go explore the city but I was so tired that I fell asleep and never made it. I guess being tired was expected since I had to get up at 2:30 in the morning to make it out to Safford on time (6:00 a.m.). Ah, the joys of travelling for your job. I do have to go back for another day next week but I probably just drive out and back in one day rather than staying overnight.

I also took some pictures of the railroad that goes through the area just for fun. I like the look of old railroads with sepia tones. It makes it look antique.

The Best Things in Life

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Need I say more?! It is the most delecious Halloween candy in the world and I found some this weekend! WooHoo! Too bad it is fast Sunday today. Oh well, I can look longingly at the candy jar and wait.

Ty's New Do!

My nephew Max has always know his dad as a Mr. Clean look-alike. Last weekend when we went out to breakfast Max decided that it was time that he have a new do. Gathering supplies (i.e., pipe cleaners he found on the ground). This is the brilliant result. I think he has potential as a real hairdresser as long as he can get his models to make poses like Ty's!