Laugh with me

Interesting stats

According to LifeWay Research, the top reasons young adults are dropping out of church these days:

1. They simply want a break from church (27%);

2. They felt church members are judgmental and/or hypocritical (26%);

3. They moved to college and didn't find another church (25%);

4. They have work responsibilities that keep them from attending (23%);

5. They moved too far from church (22%);

6. They just got too busy, even though they’d still like to attend (22%);

7. They didn’t feel connected to the church in the first place (20%);

8. They disagreed with the church’s political/social stance (18%);

9. They decided to spend more time with friends (17%);

10. They were just going to church to please their parents (17%).

(Thanks for sending along cousin Chad. These are interesting, slightly depressing and good food for thought.)

Sliding Rock & Mint Mango Mojitos

Up through the Pisgah Mountain is the Davidson River featuring the NC-famous Sliding Rock. Although not caught on camera, I did go down - yeah for me. The water was FREEZING so I let the boys go another time to take a picture.

The Davidson River also has a number of waterfalls. This one was specifically popular with kids looking to cool off in the freezing water.

Mint mojitos after a wonderful afternoon!

The Lost Sea

After our trip to Big Creek, we kept driving to Ten Mile, TN to visit Zac's grandparent's and their cabin on Watts Bar Lake. On Wednesday morning, we drove to Sweetwater, TN to tour the "Lost Sea" - the world's largest under ground lake. Zac and cousin Ben in the tunnel into the caverns. 

Great Smokey Mountains National Park

On Tuesday morning we drove just over the NC/TN border into the Great Smokey Mountains National Park to the Big Creek area. Big Creek includes campgrounds, hiking and some pretty good river walking. The reason for the trip was the famous Midnight Hole - a collection of big rocks perfect for jumping into the (freezing cold) water below.  A few natural water falls were also found on the trail. 

In the mountains, the air temperature was just about 70 degrees - the water - as you can imagine was quite cold. Aster didn't seem to mind. 

Zac didn't seem to mind, but quote "holy crap, that was so so so cold". Both dog and man shivered like babies afterwards. 

Looked like paradise in the mountains - with blue water all the way to the bottom. 

Nature dog - back at it! 

Dupont State Forest

Dupont State Forest, the largest in NC, boasts some of the state's best waterfalls. Today, we hiked up to Triple Falls and Hooker Falls. On the way down the mountain we grabbed some fresh S. Carolina peaches in Hendersonville. Good day all around. 

On a side note, Aster Pup woke up last night vomiting on the bed. Yeah, that sucked. Zac managed to catch a large portion of the dog barf in his HANDS (gross!) but we had to change sheets around 1:30 a.m.. Another round of barf at 6:30 and then at 10 a.m. - the pup looked so hangdog through the morning it was sad to watch. After a low-key day at the house and a small bowl of rice and chicken, he seems to have snapped back. Hopefully nature-dog will be back at it in the morning so we can hike up to Big Creek and continue on to Tennessee. 

Black Balsam

Black Balsam, one of many, many sections of mountain off the Blue Ridge Parkway was our first vacation adventure. Up to an elevation of about 5,000 feet, the views were amazing! Obviously, the pictures speak for themselves. 

One of many places just to watch the clouds go by. Uncle John & Aunt Marty to the left - our expert tour guides. 

Zac and Aster (nature dog) - who loved every minute of it! 

The climb up the mountain and across the ridges included sandy trails, wooded areas as well as sparkly rocks like this one. The rocks and all other sandy/dirty areas sparked with minerals. I'm not sure if the picture does it justice, but the whole ridge top sparkled as if it were dusted with glitter. 

 

Vacation Day 1

The drive to North Carolina went well yesterday. Leaving at 7:30 a.m. put us in N.C. around 4:30 in the afternoon. The drive was beautiful through OH, WVa, Va, TN, NC. Aster pup appreciated the anti-nausea medicine and did well through the trip. He most especially enjoyed when I sat in the back seat with him so he could sit on my lap and stare our the front window.  We figured that since they don't exactly design back seats to help dogs from sliding back and forth through the winding mountain highway, he would at least like something to hold on to. 

Vacation ...4 days and counting

Zac, Aster and I leave for our trip to North Carolina in 4 days!! I promise to TRY and start this blog back up while we're relaxing in the mountains. ; )

What do you do?

I often don't know how to answer the question when my family or friends ask what I "do" at work. This video is a bit extreme, but oh, so true.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wac3aGn5twc

And the agency-client relationship, so true.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R2a8TRSgzZY

Blog Loser

To the one person out there (LeAnna) who actually checks my blog....I do apologize. Been so busy at work that I haven't had time for much social media of any kind. Hopefully some day soon I'll pick it back up. Don't loose hope. : )

Tulsa

We arrived in Tulsa around 10 a.m. this morning after a rather painless 15-hour drive. Not bad, a bit of rain, but it wasn't terrible. 

We're relaxing now, but I can't help but wonder why this sign kept popping up on the Oklahoma Turnpike - "Don't drive into smoke." Seriously, there was a sign every 10 miles or so. I could understand maybe "don't drive into tornado" but what the heck? 

Trying

Trying to get ready for vacation. Trying to pack. Trying to detach from my work responsibilities. Trying to delegate. Trying to be okay with leaving Aster for a week. Trying to prepare myself for a 15-hour car ride. Trying to figure out what the weather is like in Tulsa.

Insulation

Pictures are actually backwards - this was the finished project.
R-49 - almost 2 feet of insulation!It's fiberglass, but felt like cotton.

20 bags that expand to 8x their size when agitated in the machine.

Levi's job - slice, stuff, wait. Slice, stuff, wait.

Getting the edges first.

This past week, was home improvement at its best. On Thursday night, Zac installed four mini-cans in the dining room. Finally there will be enough light to actually see your food! On Friday, Zac began prepping the attic for the blown-in insulation and finished it up with his brother's help on Saturday. Prep work was the most time consuming because it involved crawling around in the low spaces of the attic to install the soffit vents...not his favorite part of the weekend. On Sunday, we rented the AtticCat fiberglass insulation blower for Home Depot and bought 20 bags of insulation. That part of the process went surprisingly smooth and quick - 15 bags in 2 hours. We ended up not even needing all 20, so we even got some $$ back.

The sunroom seems warmer already! hooray!

Big Nick, Little Lucy

I can't help but share this picture with the world. That is my big brother...and that his his little doggie. Manly, huh?

Lazy Sunday

Yesterday, I enjoyed a wonderful lazy Sunday. In the morning, I went to church and then came home around the same time that Zac got home from his band show overnighter. He was feeling a little under the weather, so we spent most of the day on the couch. After a brisk walk with Aster after lunch, I stopped by the library to check my email and grab a few books. My afternoon was spent reading The Lucky One by Nicholas Sparks. I love his books because they are so entertaining and I got sucked in right away. The rest of the day was spent on the couch with Aster sleeping on my lap just reading. With the snow falling outside, it was the perfect thing to do on a cold winter Sunday.

My Boys

Lake, rivers and a whole lot of digging.

Due to the recent melt-down, we now have a lake in our back yard which extends over to the side of our house. In addition to a bunch of other back yard issues, our dear neighbor (not his fault, he just moved in) has bricks stacked up on his side of the fence to keep the water from running through his yard to the drain. Great. And because said lake is putting so much pressure on our foundation, we also have a million little rivers running all over our basement floor. Awesome.

Last week Zac called the city of Stow and the engineer came out to access our situation. From just poking around, he doesn't think that we have the required 2-acres of fall to have the city fix our drain problem on their dime. But he said that a survey team would come back out in the spring to verify, and then he would work with us to set up a plan to fix our problem. Not the answer we were looking for, but its progress. So all you friends and family out there, bring you shovels because this very well may be the summer of dig. ; )

To combat the basement rivers, Zac and I are having a handful of basement waterproofing companies come out to give estimates and advice on what to do. We've got everybody from Ohio Waterproofing to an independent contractor who might be able to work with Zac to do it. We'll see what our best options are to get a dry basement and not break the bank.

Oh the joys of home ownership! It may be expensive and stressful, but we wouldn't trade it for the world.

Chasing Chariots Show

"I'll be up in the gym just workin' on my fitness..."

I'm not really sure how the rest of that annoying Fergie song goes, but I've got that part stuck in my head because I joined a gym. (For real!) I've been wanting to start a workout routine for some time, but I just couldn't find the motivation to work out at home and the weather has made it fairly impossible to do much on the road. So last Saturday, I signed up for an 18-month membership at FitWorks in Stow-Kent. Of course I didn't go in looking to lock myself into a contract, but they make it so expensive to do a month-to-month membership that it was my best option to sign up and pre-pay for the entire time.

Its my goal to work out three days a week and participate in the yoga/pilates classes in addition to that. Zac is not convinced that I'll stick to it, but I'm going to show him! Right now, my arms/back/chest hurt so bad that I can barely brush my hair, but it feels great to actually do something again!

Baby Girl Whitmire ... Katelyn Elizabeth

I have a niece! Stats 7lbs 13oz 21 inches long, arrived on 2/9/09 at 5:16pm.
Zac and I can't wait until March for our trip to Tulsa to see our niece and nephew (and Sarah & Noah, too.)

(p.s. Sarah made me delete the picture of her! haha...)

My dog, the genius

What are we supposed to do on a cold winter night in Ohio?
Make home movies of course.


Aster's vocabulary also includes "popcicles", "Where's Zac", and a number of other treats and commands. : )

Ode to a snowplow driver

For as much as I've been complaining about the weather lately, if it weren't for these guys...I'd be going NOWHERE! Have you ever seen the snowplow drivers in a tiered line (five or six trucks!) one behind the other plowing the entire 4-lane highway? It's quite impressive. For all those plow drivers out there - THANK YOU! If I have to go to work in a blizzard (darn you school teachers!!) at least the roads have been cleared (sort of).

Happy Birthday!

Seems like just yesterday we brought him home.










Tonight, for dinner, we're going to make banana pancakes and let him have some! (because bananas are his fav!)

facebook

I've been a member of facebook since 2003. And, I'd like to think I was one of the first adapters of this new technology. (Yes, I'm that cool.) So why did I just yesterday realize that they've added an instant messaging function to the site? Man...I'm so out of the loop.

Aster the Disaster

Our dog, although extremely well-behaved and generally not destructive, has had some "puppy moments" in first year of life. A fine example occurred this Sunday when we came home from church to find that he had eaten half of a full bag of Twizzlers Pull-n-Peel. Now, I'm a big fan of candy, so I know where he's coming from, but that's a LOT of heavy sugar for little doggie stomach. He did have a sugar high, and then a pretty big sugar-low but managed through the day just fine. Crazy dog.

But that's not all. Over the past year, he has eaten
- An almost-full bag of yogurt raisins.
- An ant trap (not eaten per say, but fully chewed to oblivion)
- Red Apple-Cinnamon Votive Candle (yes, they come out just as they go in.)
- Frozen poop cookies (no, these are not treats you buy at the store, rather real poop found in the back yard!) Gross.









He's also managed to destroy:
- 2 area rugs and a handful of throw rugs during the house-training and teething stages.
- 1 Novel, 2 magazines and any other piece of paper he can get a hold of
- At least 6 pairs of shoes
- Jackson's Batman-Scooby toy
- Numerous stuffed animals and other dog toys

But how could we possibly be upset when our dog is this cute? And, hey, he's just a puppy. : )

Note: All destruction occurred due to owner's lack of proper doggie proofing, and in no way should be blamed on the puppy.

Ouch, that hurts.

Observation: being a grown-up, sometimes sucks.
Yeah, we can do whatever we want. Stay out as late as we want and all that fun stuff. But ... we also have to pay our bills. Specifically, our completely outrageous heating/gas bill. I know it's been a cold winter and I know we could have a better insulated house, but this past month's Dominion bill blew my mind. Almost $300 dollars for a 1200-sq. foot house. Ouch.
Step 1: Pay the damn bill.
Step 2: Insulate the attic.
Step 3: Close off the sunroom with an energy-efficient door.
Step 4: Set our thermostat a few degrees lower. (Hello wool socks)
Step 5: Install new exterior doors that are better insulated.
Step 6: Cry like a baby because we've just spent our entire tax refund.

Being a grown-up is overrated.

Surprise!

This past weekend, we threw a surprise retirement party for my Dad at Silver Park in Alliance. He had no idea we had been planning for months! It was fun having this party in a log cabin in the middle of a snow storm. Thank goodness it had a furnace, plus a fireplace. Conrats Dad - we're glad you finally get to rest. Now, get a job! haha

Opening some gifts. Boy, did the Frank family
have some tricks up their sleeves!

The cake ... John Deere of course.

Cutest dog in the whole word.

The family, minus Laura & Blair who are in Louisiana.

Chili, chili and more chili. Perfect for a snowy, winter night.