My Family Is Super Attractive, Pt. 2

Ok... so... not so much attractive as... weird. Insane, perhaps.

Here is a video in which we discover Auntie Dear's webcam and find ourselves compelled to use it in whatever way we think of first.

my Grandmother is the coolest.

Here's one of my favorite facts about my wonderful Grandmother:

She was the first girl to wear a ponytail at her highschool in the 50's. She actually started the trend there.

DEElightful!

a true white Christmas

Cecil and Percy were delighted to look out the window on this Christmas Eve to see SNOW!

SNOW SNOW SNOW LET IT SNOW!

White Christmas, anyone? Um... YES!

Brother spud Dan was being a silly and not going into the snow...

...making sister spud very sad indeed.

Cecil and Percy love snow even more than I do! They've sat in the window watching it ALL day.

I hope you are all tucked by a fire with your family this Christmastide.

(also hope you don't have a cold like I do)

This is our 200th post, and how lovely that it should be about my favoritest things of all... snow and Christmas!

Happy Christmas!

steam from a cup, snow on the ground

For my birthday my parents gave me one of those lovely ipod nanos such as may be found in those delightful tv ads with the colourful dancing people!

Though its name is still pending, I think for now I may safely call him Fred. Who knows.

Anyways, he is golden-yellow and the back says "look at the stars, see how they shine for you" because my mum knows my Coldplay love. And he records video, plays movies, has a speaker and calendars and timers, and does this fancy flippy thing in the cd menu. I feel a little sentimental about my old first-gen soapbar ipod, but... Fred is so awfully fancy.

As birthday dinner my family and I had a living room picnic in front of the fire (all the furniture is moved out because of carpet cleaning) with soup and cupcakes.

And then when I got on facebook later that night, I had not one, not eleven, but a grand forty-five birthday notifications. Yeep! It was a rather grand moment.

i thank you God for most this amazing day

This past week I've been in Graham at my grandparents for Thanksgiving! Our whole branch of the Pyles family was there (except my sister, wah. MISSUMS!) and it was loud and crazy.

The cousins have a weird tradition of playing charades (we call it "transmography" actually. think calvin and hobbes) Thanksgiving night - and I say it's weird because our charades cards are just... crazy.

Some of my favorite things that were (unsuccessfully) acted out over the weekend:

Man Sitting Down On Meatloaf

Minnesota Forests

Woman Drinking Tea While Running A Marathon

Oz Tries To Catch A Moose

and my favorite, which I tried very very hard to get them to guess...

Sarah Palin Assembles A Bookcase While Eating Cake

That one was super interesting.

Also, while we were out at the farm I attempted to learn how to drive stick, in my grandad's 1975 pickup, and let me tell you it is SCARY! Way scarier than it looks! I killed the engine so many times. By the end I was doing a little better, I think, but I think I'll stick with automatic for now.

Ooooh also, I was down at Fireman's park and a goose tried to bite my face! It was scary, and I felt tiny and completely unintimidating, so... maybe, just maybe I pulled over on my way back to the farm to scare a herd of cows. And maybe it was thoroughly satisfying to see a herd of big animals running en masse Because Of Me.

Sunday after church, on our way out of town, we met the Lunsfords for lunch, which was super fancy!

It really bugs me when I forget to take pictures when I'm out of town or with cool people, because afterwards I want to throw pies at my feet. So... I need to work on that, because I can't imagine pie between the toes would feel... oh yuck that's ... really gross.

Sorry this is so rambly. I don't like big conglomoratory posts like this, but hadn't posted in a while!

Feeding the Mental Chickens and the Real Sisters

Yesterday morning, as I was studiously skipping breakfast for lack of time, my sweet brother showed up at the door with a plate full of not 1 but 3 delightful kinds of breakfast, apple juice, and cocoa.

What a sweetie. My mental chickens and I thank you.

(i am currently hobbiting it with a fire, rookmaker's 'modern art', and large socks, and do not plan to stop until the weather gets warmer)

to the carnival with you, away!

Tonight sister and brothers and I went to a street carnival! It was ever so much fun... we rode scaaary rides and ate slightly scaaaary food and had a delightful time!

I love how many things are happening here.

I was scared of this, but rode it anyway and it was amazing! ... so there's another thing off the I'm-scared-of-this list!

Inside the wonderful spinning bears... we spun that thing faster than anyone else, so we WIN!

Sceeered!

The view from the very top of the Ferris Wheel.

Dan took this from the seat in front of us... I love how you can see how tiny the roller coaster is, and yet we're freaking out! We're wimpy wimpersons!

Franklin Trip - Thursday

On Thursday we packed up our bags and went our merry way to Memphis!

The view out the window the whole way to Memphis.

I decided to be annoying trip photographer and scare the driver... and this is his delightful road trip face.

Dr. George (the owl) and I in the back seat... we played I spy. He won. He was so awfully excited to meet his doppelganger and to go to Franklin!

And it seems I was rather excited also...

We stopped in Mt. Vernon for lunch... at this awesome place with a huge rooster on the roof. On the menu they had not a vegetable of the day, but a "Fried Vegetable of the Day", which of course I ordered. Fried okra, yum. And by the way, dear father wasn't spitting his roll out, though it sort of looks that way.

"The Hidden Language of the Soul", Pt. I

After attending a ballet a few weeks ago, I was feeling particularly inspired to dance, so when I visited home-of-sister-and-brother a few days later... this is what happened.
(note: these are also due in part to a viewing of "Silk Stockings"... we are convinced that this movie was made directly after some tragedy in the Cole Porter household, as that is the only explaination for the glittery disaster that is the music of this movie. yeep.)

First, we tried the art of the Grand Jete:






Dan's is our favorite. We believe he captures the essence of the jump.

time to dress up as giant cats!

dadaw and i "polishing our boots"

hehe... i think this picture explains itself. its funny, caitlin and i still make all the exact same expressions we made when we were little.

elliebird and brother and my cousin and i playing in the mud.

don't look at me that way E, we both were. yes all those adjectives you are applying to how you look in this picture... we both were.

quothe she, AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

and then she jumped up and down. like a little girl.

my parents just gave me my suprise senior trip.


wait for it, wait for it....

I'm going to Franklin to meet DR. GEORGE!!!!!!!!!

after 6 years of listening to him teach with all his brilliant teaching skills, I'm finally going to meet him!!!

we're going to the film conference, yeah yeah yeah (please hear this in a Bee Gees singing voice).

if this trip was a superhero... it would be

The Super-Spider-Wonder-Aqua Hulk Bat-Captain

with a little wolverine thrown in there for fun.

.

i have this really silly recurring dream, where i finally meet dr. george and i completely freak out like i'm at a rock concert, and then suddenly i am. and it's the 60's. and dr. george is on stage singing, wearing .... white pants, pink shirt, leather jacket, rhinestone bowtie and really funny 60's hair!!! so me and my awesome long flippy 60's hair become a roadie for dr. george (as if i'm not already) and travelled all kinds of places. he played a gig in Walter Scott's house, at Buckingham Palace, on a hill in Germany where people were making sausage...

.

it was the worlds best tour.

.

and now i get to experience the realistic equivalent of that. on october 30th.

oh jack... how i love you. really. aunt(ish) claire wants to play in the mud too... but perhaps not with these exact results. i'm feeling the distance between here and austin rather horribly this week! the greatest thing of all would be a good talk with jamie and jason.

- the photo is Jamie's, by the way

Kite Day - 3/10/09

we human ships, caught by wind

breezing us through shining clouds

fingertips breathe

lifting feet off daisy blossoms

7 items

item 1: to see some incredible art, go here. so beautiful. how i would love to be the one coming up with these wonderful ideas and being behind the camera creating such uniquely beautiful art.

item 2: i know i've been neglecting this blog of late... just so much life happening, so much to do! i'm rather swamped right now under a literal mountain (and no, i'm not using that phrase hypothetically like dr. George does, it is actually a mountain. on my desk. making that room look horrifying all the time.) of books, all amazing, all brilliant, all a rare glimpse into a peculiar, brilliant mind, making it maddening to be so speedy going through them.

item 3: right now i've one of those terrible behind-the-eyes headaches that feels like someone dipped a carrot in wasabi and rubbing alcohol, lit it on fire, and punched you in the face with it. yeow!

item 4: already formulating my plans for the distant-future christmas break from school... they involve many cups of tea

filling boxes with sketches of all the gnomes and dancing

mushrooms and sparrows and ill-mannered oaks and possums that

want to spill out of my head all day long but never get a chance

making headway on my woodland-creature quilt (i'll post fabric pictures soon, promise!)

yuletide cupcakes

turning 18 and becoming an adult overnight (look, a christmas miracle! ;)

item 5: last night i dreamed it was my first day of college, and i had an amazing outfit, and for some strange reason sally field was my philosophy teacher. she was a good teacher, very smart, and she invited me to a coffee-making contest. that very night my home was invaded by alien-robot-coyotes... the details were very clear earlier in the day, but now i forget. there was great danger involved, though. yeep!

item 6: the office is back. yay! it was sorely missed. nearly forgot how brilliant rainn wilson is!

item 7: helped dan and caitlin move in to their wonderful, lovely home this afternoon, and going back tomorrow to help some more! it's wonderful, and feels like a home.

ah whiteboard, how we love thee.

very attractive face there, justin.

the farm

...do you remember...

now i shall post some of my pictures from our family's trip to santa fe




















all the doors and windows are painted blue because of the superstition that it wards away evil spirits. plus its really pretty ;)