Category Archives: Natural Happenings

February 6, 2013 · 2:22 pm

Happy 2nd Birthday Simplywe!

I’m supposed to be doing my homework, so naturally I am using this time to check my email, fb and simplywe.  And though I wish I was still doing my homework and didn’t have the attention span of a gnat, I’m glad I checked because I almost missed Simplywe’s birthday!  SW came to be 2 years ago today!

I have been so busy with everything else in my life, I didn’t plan anything.  This should be where I put a montage of some of my favorite photos, but if I get lost in looking at old photos now, I’ll never do my homework.  I must fight the procrastination…clearly I am not as successful as I would like.

So instead I will share hiking photos, and a few from my solo trip to Prescott.

I took all of these with my iPhone, as I sent my Canon to Keegan in Germany.  I think he will get more use out of it than I will, since I haven’t used it in months.  The iPhone is so much more convenient.

These 1st 3 are from my trip to Prescott.

It rained and rained and rained the whole time I was there, mostly misty rain.  It was beautiful.  The fog was intense.  This fog was at 4 in the afternoon.

This one is from the hike we took at orientation.  How many colleges go on a hike as part of orientation?  I think I have chosen wisely.

The other weekend Der and I took a 5.2 mile hike in Tucson Mountain Park.

These are from our new favorite part of the park.

I don’t know why this one is so grainy, but I sure do love that guy!

The small upcropping of buildings, in the far off distance, is downtown Tucson.

Der and I make a good hiking team.

The rest of these are from various hiking trips.

Bug loves her hikes.

I’ve painted several batches of rocks and left them in random places on the trail.

I like to imagine the finders curious smile when they wonder who did that.

Happy Birthday Simplywe!

I heart Tucson!

 

5 Comments

Filed under Adventures, Amazeballs, Celebrate, Everything else, Making Memories, Natural Happenings, Petz on Parade, With Gratitude

Tagged as , , , , , , , ,

January 23, 2013 · 9:52 pm

Random Photos, that took me forever to finally share

Even though I wish with every fiber of my being that we had grass, or the time/money it will take to create a lawn, I still dig our backyard, especially on a cloudy day

I love our trees.

From a sunny, rainy day.

Playing in the rain is so much fun!

I adore it when they are sweet to each other.

I love my sister!

This is the volume knob on the headphones in the library.  All I see is a happy monkey.

This is what I look like when I accidentally lock myself out of my house, but am lucky enough to have my phone to call hubby, and to amuse myself with by taking photos until hubby saves me.

This is what confused wuppy looks like, when she just wants me to come in already and pet her.

This is a real, live caterpillar that looks like bird poop.  It turns into a Swallowtail butterfly.

An instagram collage.

Some lovely butterflies at the Desert Museum.  I want to get that kind of milkweed in our front yard.  It was COVERED with these beauties.

Until next time

3 Comments

Filed under Everything else, Family, Making Memories, Natural Happenings, Rodents aka kids, So Random

Tagged as , , , , , , ,

January 10, 2013 · 10:00 pm

Simple Kindness

Back in October I got a lovely email from a woman, Celeste, who had just discovered Simplywe.  She said she shared a love of heart rocks and wanted to send me a little something.  I shared my address with her and eagerly awaited my mail.  I love getting fun mail!…who doesn’t?! Shortly after I got a small package and was thrilled to see the most beautiful gifts.

The boys and I investigated and discussed these gorgeous shells for a long time.  My favorite is the orange one.

Apparently where Celeste and her family live there is a beach that is covered with sharks teeth.  They have jars of them!  The boys were thrilled we could add these to our “natural oddities” collection.

And finally, she added these beauties to my heart rock collection.  I love them so!

Do yourself a favor and go check out Celeste’s super cool, fun, and beautiful blog www.thewelchfamily.org you’ll be glad you did!  She home-schools and does fantastic things with her kids…like the other day they dissected sharks!  I want to go to that school!

2 Comments

Filed under Family, Natural Happenings, With Gratitude

Tagged as , , , , ,

November 6, 2012 · 1:18 pm

Sunflowers, Cornbread, and Apple Pie…Oh My

Sunflowers!

Sunflowers and cornbread!!

Derek made his first apple pie from scratch!  YUM!!!  Just one of the MANY reasons we’ve been married for so long…he bakes!  I don’t bake, I cook.  We make the perfect pair.

Seriously delicious!

3 Comments

Filed under Amazeballs, Get In My Belly, Natural Happenings, With Gratitude

Tagged as , , , , , , , , ,

October 25, 2012 · 12:37 am

I Dub Thee, Gigantor!

Gigantor! with and exclamation point because he was easily the largest grasshopper I’ve ever seen.

He was seriously huge.  And super handsome.  The undersides of his wings were vibrant pink!

Der, Conrad, and I took turns holding him, I don’t think he cared for it.

I love Conrad’s expression, when the grasshopper leapt off of his shoulder.

He was super excited and also a little freaked out.

Leave a Comment

Filed under Amazeballs, Natural Happenings

Tagged as , , , , , , ,

October 22, 2012 · 8:55 pm

The last of the Pinetop photos

We were playing a cool monster/dice/drawing game while simultaneously enjoying the beautiful Pinetop weather.   You roll a die 6 times and draw the corresponding monster body parts.  I know this is where I should show you the finished monsters, but I don’t have photos of them.  I do encourage you to go draw your own though.  Find the printable here.

Boy that sun sure was bright!

Two things you should know about Ami are he loves ducks, and he almost always has food on his shirt, face, or both.

Ignore the glaring sun and smile boys :)

No trip up north would be complete without roasting marshmallows for s’mores.

Or as Ami likes to call it, “fishing for marshmallows”.

Notice the food on his face, but to be fair, I think we all had food on our face at this point.

This photo made me do a double take when I downloaded it.  Even though I took it and I knew Keegan wasn’t on our trip, I thought this was Keeg at first…and then I realized it was our man-boy Jeremia.  No matter how much you think you are soaking up your kids when they are young, it’s never enough, they still always grow too fast.

Leave a Comment

Filed under Adventures, Entertain Me, Family, Feeling Fartsy, Making Memories, Natural Happenings

Tagged as , , , , , , ,

October 15, 2012 · 11:09 pm

Hidden Hearts

I love hearts, more specifically, I love finding hearts.

Here’s a heart I found in my sandwich a few weeks ago.

Thanks to Instagram for helping me commemorate the awesome pepper!

A while back I discovered that dried out Yucca seed pods look like hearts when separated, so I took to fiddling with them.

The one in the middle is my favorite by far.  Not pictured are the 20 others that I varnished and glittered and one that I turned into a necklace.  I know I’ve said it repeatedly, but there just isn’t enough time to experiment and create all of the things that are bouncing around in my head.

Finding “hidden” hearts make me positively giddy and I have been known to squeal like a little girl, when I see one.  It has caught on with Der and the boys, for whenever they see one they point it out, because they know it will make my day.

2 Comments

Filed under Feeling Fartsy, Natural Happenings, With Gratitude

Tagged as , , , , , ,

October 13, 2012 · 12:22 am

Trail Riding In Pinetop

Trail riding together as a family was so much fun.

Der taught the boys to skip rocks at a little watering hole.  We saw bear tracks right at the waters edge.

Conrad and I missed the memo telling us that is was green T-shirt day.

2 Comments

Filed under Adventures, Amazeballs, Family, Making Memories, Natural Happenings, On The Cheap, Rodents aka kids

Tagged as , , , , ,

October 10, 2012 · 11:08 pm

On the way to our Pinetop adventure

We rented a cabin/house in Pinetop/Lakeside last week.  Here are some photos from the drive there…sorry if you’ve already seen some of them on FB.

Is this some sort of rose?  They look like baby apples with green crowns.

 

The shot below is a closeup of the flowers in the above shot.

Ahhhhh….nature, how I love thee!  Oh and Instagram, I love thee too!

4 Comments

Filed under Adventures, Amazeballs, Family, Making Memories, Natural Happenings

Tagged as , , , , , ,

August 23, 2012 · 5:20 pm

Natures Gifts

Derek and I have taken to collecting beautiful bits of nature.  We call them gifts.  Gifts that have been put in our path for us to find and adore.  I like to think of them as little cherished messages from Benny.

Der has a knack for finding dead butterflies intact.  Recently, he brought me the most beautiful one of all.

The poor thing had been stuck to a grill on one of the rental cars at Der’s work.

Isn’t it beautiful!?!

Other gifts.

At first glance I thought it was a piece of poo, but no, it’s a GIANT empty cocoon.  Now that I know it’s not poo, I think it looks like something out of a scifi movie.

We found these feathers at the zoo, but I have no idea what birds they are from.

Polka dots are just cool!

Every time I see a butterfly I say “hi” to Benny.  Before he passed I told him he could send us messages with butterflies and rainbows, and so he does…and hearts too.

This is a piece of bark.  I found on the ground just waiting for me to see it.

Leave a Comment

Filed under Amazeballs, Natural Happenings, Rodents aka kids

Tagged as , , , , , , , , ,