Our porch garden

Chase and I planted many flowers in pots on our porch.

This is citronella :) It's supposed to repel mosquitos!

The tomato is doing quite well! We should have a nice harvest this summer :)

July can't come fast enough...

Here are some random layouts. Credits in my Sweet Shoppe Gallery.

School is school right now... I'm so ready for break! Because of my studies, I've had to miss a handful of weddings I wanted to go to. What a drag! Classes are going pretty well so far - I think I have my sterile techiniqe mostly mastered (although my technical surgery skills and suturing need improvement). I have a test in Equine medicine this Friday that I'm a bit worried about. Hind limb lameness still looks like a normal gait to me... or even worse I consistently choose the wrong leg!


Peace and love to all! Congrates to Leah and Gabes and also to Jonathon and Kristen! It's wonderful to have another girl in the family to help balance it out :) I miss everyone and I'm ready to come home for a visit!

Cria - new life

Latest Layouts

I've been working on scrapping our honeymoon. Oh, did you notice the new layout and title? This is now OUR blog instead of just my blog :) Credits for the layouts are over at Sweet Shoppe or just ask!

Birding Adventures - Eagle Bluffs

Chase bought me a new camera lens so we went out to play with it this weekend. :)



I know they are common birds, but I really like the red winged black birds.

We ended up joining 2 moer vet students and two "Steves" One of which is the uncle to one of my high school buddies!

Favorite shot of the evening!

Honeymoon Scrapbooking

I've started scrapbooking again ^_^ Ask me if you want credits...most of the stuff came from Scrap girls

How to Trade Your Dragon and other musings

"How to TRADE your Dragon" is my lastest swap. It's only my second swap to host so it's limited to 20 participants. But it's already got a waiting list! I can't wait to see what everyone comes up with!


Chase and I are currently reading a book on marriage called Love and Respect. Although it might be one of the most redundant books I've ever tried to read, he has a lot of observations that I think are very true. It's centered around Ephesians 5:33:

However, each one of you also must love his wife as he loves himself, and the wife must respect her husband.

Men need respect. Women need love. Of course that's not to say that men don't need love or women don't need respect, but respect and love are the primary needs of husbands and wives (respectively). For most couples, it appears to be a lack of these that cause conflict. The husband doesn't feel respected so he reacts poorly to his wife. The wife feels unloved so she disrespects her husband...and etc etc into what Dr. Eggerichs calls the "Crazy Cycle." Anyway, it's been interesting. I've been sure to tell Chase how much (and in what ways) I really respect him. Ladies, if you have a significant other, try telling him in what ways you respect him ^_^ It'll really brighten his day!


I hope everyone is well! Haha, school has been tough lately, but I'll saving the whining for another day! Love and blessings <3>

Hope on the Horizon

Good news! 2 of my 4 exams next week have been moved to the following week! That will make next so much more manageable. I think my blood pressure went down just thinking about it (it was a bit high today when we measured it - that could have been the shots and blood draw).

I had blood work for my rabies titer drawn today. Apparently my veins are tiny - the lady was really embarrassed she had to stick me twice! Haha - the vet students that went before had no problems. I also got my tetanus and H1N1 vaccines today for a grand total of 2 pokes per arm!


Anyway, I'm hosting another swap at ATCsforAll called "How to Trade Your Dragon" It's full already and has a bunch of talented artists signed up! Yay! My first swap went really well - only 2 people (international folks) haven't received their returns yet, but those that have really love the cards they got!


Hopefully I'll have some pictures soon.

Mini-Spring Break

The last couple of days have been a part of my "mini spring break" - time given off for vet students to attend a conference. Which of course, nobody decided to go to! Who wants to go to more lectures when we've been given a small break from them! AND we'd have to pay for a hotel..pay for the conference...pay for gas to get there! You could not pay me to go to more lectures! So what did I spend my free time doing? All the artwork I could, cleaning, lots of online Netflix movies, and a couple of jogs! One could argue I should have spent more time jogging, but hey... happiness is not the same thing as being skinny!


So here's some artwork...

This is for the Outrageous Hats swap ^_^

These are all mermaids I've done over the last week. The one that looks like Ariel is for an 8-year old girl I'm trading with ^_^ I hope she likes it!

I've been asked a couple of times "How's married life?" Well it's been pretty good!

Chase has been working on his car. He cleaned out an gas efficiency thingy... but as he was putting it back on a bolt broken off in the underside of the car! He's still figuring out what to do about that.



Hehe...we've been trying to cook more dinners at home. Today we had a well-balanced, nutritious meal of sausage, mac-and-cheese, and black eyed peas. Yesterday I got a haircut and got my brows waxed :) It's amazing how refreshed a new haircut can make you feel! Anyway...It's been a pretty good week, and I definitely don't want Monday to get here! The only thing that could have made this weekned even better was if I could have seen my friends back in AR too! Having one functional car means I have to stay here, because Chase needs the car to go to work.

God Bless!

I miss you Megann and Brooke! *hugs* Love you, mean it!

Whimsy and Mermaids

I've been doing a lot of sketching and doodling to try to improve my drawing skills. I think I've improved quite a bit at drawing figures from different angles. It's been a lot of fun! I can see improvement! I guess practice makes better (maybe not perfect)! The two classes I take with Art Trader are super fun and relaxing!

Mermaid Practice sketch page #3

#2 - these might have turned out a little better than the #3 page!

this is a whimsical sketch of an angry cook! Maybe someone left a mess in the kitchen!

The top row have roughly the correct propotions a face should have (draw a circle-ish shape put the eyes half way btween top and bottom, ears a little lower, then nose and mouth). The bottom row has really wonky placement of features- eyes too close together/too far apart, eyes too far up on the head. Haha - a good exercise in whimsy! I'm still looking for my distinct style! Tell me when I find it :)

Ruby Wedge Maneuver!

As finals rapidly approach, Ruby has developed a new attention strategy. She runs around the house and then jumps bewteen me and the couch...and then just stays there. It's super cute!

This is Gary trying to identify a bird call Chase played on the computer. Could it be this knitted thing?

Whimsical and color scheme practice.

Whimsical practice! Exercise: stylization. :)



Finals started today! So far so good :) I'm hoping the rest of my finals will go just as well. I'm confident I'm going to pass with flying colors in the rest of my classes. I've got nice cushions in almost all of them. ;)

Good luck everyone!

Smile!

No nudity in this post! Promise!



Doesn't this guy just make you smile? He kept sticking his head through the fence for pets. I bought some suri wool from an alpaca with a similar coat color that I can't wait to knit with! I've got a pattern that I want to try as soon as I figure out the stitches...it's been awhile since I tried knitting! Did you know that camelids (such as an alpaca) have oval red blood cells. Most other mammals have the biconcave, disc shaped cells. ;)


We had bible study again today. I still feel a bit shy, but it's getting better as I get to know the girls better. Today's chapters were on worship and the mind. Worship shouldn't be just a Sunday morning thing but an every moment thing. How enriching would it be to have a constant attitude of worship! ...instead of my whiny/busy/distracted state of mind. I've had a lot of negativity in my life lately, and I really want to end that. After all there is always, always something to be grateful for - I just have to get out of my narrow-minded view of things. So maybe this week will be the fresh start I need! I think I might start taking part of lunch to take some quiet time to get focused. I hope my friends will understand. Another thing I can do to worship God is plan ahead - that is make lunches and set up the coffee machine the night before. Then I can get up and read some psalms while drinking my coffee and enjoying the birds on my snow-laden porch. That sounds like a good way to start the day. As for the mind part...the author states that the Christian should constantly be reading the bible and good, wholesome books - in any subject you like... For example, on her suggested reading she listed the James Herriot books as well as Jane Austen and an assortment of other classics. She also talked about reading gardening books ^_^ It's important for you to actually challenge your mind by learning new things and reading good literature! This chapter also talks about focusing on the positive things in life. Paul says "whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever admirable-if anything is excellent or praiseworthy-think about such things." Philippians 4:8.

Disciplining my mind to be renewed and worshipful are lofty goals so pray for me this week.

Finals begin next week so it's important for me utilize time management, focus while studying, and maintain a godly attitude.

Peace out!



Ps... whimsy mermaid class starts tomorrow!! Maybe they'll show me some ways to clothe my mermaids :)