Distilled Water

The other night Austin was getting ready to charge his new motorcycle battery and needed distilled water to put inside once it was fully charged. I asked him if he wanted me to run to Wal Mart and grab a gallon for the few bucks that it was. This is how the conversation proceed from there...

Aus- "No, I will just make some."

Me- "Do you know how?

Aus-"No"

Me- "Would you like me to google how to do it?"

Aus- "Sure."

From there we watched a few videos on how to "catch" steam and let it become distilled water. Once we were done youtube-ing the different approaches I looked at him and asked again if he would like to run and get some. Again he was set on making his own.

Attempt one : Austin decided he wasn't going to follow any of the ideas we read about but instead he created his own idea. He was going to hold the tupperwear above the boiling water and let the steam turn to water and drip into a separate bowl.

Used ice in attempt to speed things up.

Attempt 2- Capture steam and wait till it becomes water

Attempt 3 - What he liked to call "making rain"

If you are wondering how this ends you are probably guessing not so well. And if that was your guess you are absolutely correct.

Come to find out, the following day, he didn't even need distilled water.

Hutchinson -- Kid shoot

ME

I am....

Happily married

A college student

A photographer wanna be

A craft love

A scrapbooker

Flip flop by day, speed walker by night

A daughter and a sister

Fishing

With all the heat lately we haven't been fishing much. Finally it cooled down this last week and I was eager to go catch some cat fish. We went to Sedgwick County park. I decided to go for a walk before I began fishing, Upon returning 25 minutes later Austin had already caught one! After that there was a dead period and nothing was really biting. I later had 4 bites but was unable to hook them :(

Austin caught 2 more before we left.

A baby and a rather rowdy one

We always use Hog Wild Stinky Bait
It's the best

FIF

I recently found a site called iheartfaces and I definitely heart this site!

On Fridays they post a photo SOOC and let you play with editing it.

Here is today's photo and my play.

Let me know what you think and head over to this site to check out many other takes on the same photo.

I looked through about 40 of them.

My World

Both of my sisters recently had birthday.
Emily turned 17 and Brooke 20

Since school has started I have actually been able to sleep in. Instead of having to be at work at 6:30 -7, I wake up at 7! This has been a nice change and I am not drinking as much coffee as before. I might, however, have taken the lazy dinner route a FEW times this week.

(I actually like this stuff)

And because school has started my evenings are filled with this fun stuff.... Homework

Austin sold his CBR this week and is working on fixing up an old Honda Cafe Racer

My newest nephew is set to be here in weeks and I can't wait to meet him

I have my first family session tomorrow morning and I am excited. I am actually photographing someone other than my sister and it's a whole family. Wish me luck.

Coffee Filters-Myth Buster

 

I read a few weeks ago that using coffee filters to clean glass will leave the glass streak free. Lately I have noticed how every time I wipe anything glass off there are streaks all over. When I was growing up we used newspaper to clean the glass and it worked like a charm, however Austin and I do not receive the paper. I decided to try the coffee filters approach.

I sprayed the glass with Windex Multi Surface (my new favorite product).

Wiped down with the coffee filter and WHA LA. No streaks.

Myth no more.

Biker Man

Austin put his motorcycle up for sale last week. It has some "problems" and wasn't running. He decided he was ready to sell it and find a new style bike so he put an ad up on Craigslist completely explaining the problem and how to fix it. He asked a very low price since it needed some work. 

All week he had plenty of calls from interested guys, only problem was when they came to look at the bike the first question they ALL asked was, "does everything work?" Of course not, did you not read the ad? 

Finally fed up with nobody wanting to put any work into the bike Austin worked on fixing the problem himself. After a few hours he found out how to fix it and make it run. He ended up spending under $100 for the fix and can now sell it for $600 more than he was asking, which makes me a lot happier.

In My Yard.......

For lack of anything better to do, I wondered around my yard last night (feel free to call me a dork). I found some pretty interesting things I never noticed before along with some of my favorite parts on my backyard.

My favorite things included:

This old bench. I love having a swinging bench in our yard, even if it is older than I am

Our tiki torches. When ever it is not blistering hot out we like to light them up and sit outside

Clothes Line. Always love to hang clothes out and get the fresh sunshine smell. Austin, however, hates the smell :(

New Findings.... This plastic turtle. I remember it when we moved in. Austin loved it, thought it was the coolest thing. I had completely forgotten about it.

Two rusty, old paint cans were tucked far away in the corner of our yard.

A wooden wind chime hangs from our shed. A neat little decoration.

A sun.... plaque? I am not sure what to label this but it adds a little something to our small fence along the porch.

And finally this guy. He hopped right in front of me and almost made me pee my pants. Austin said he has hung out by the shed, in the same spot since we moved in.

Beautiful Outdoors

While the weather was cooler this afternoon and I was feeling photo-y, I took some pictures of the flowers we randomly have growing in our backyard. Aren't they beautiful?

Emily and Roela

This morning I was able to take some photos of my sister and her friend Roela. It was nice to get two beautiful models to help me with my photography and editing.

Happy Friday

May your weekend be as relaxing and carefree as Rockie's everyday!

Relaxation

It has been a long and HOT past few weeks at work. The temperatures in the warehouse have reached 110 + each day. This makes for a tedious 7 hours of work. On the weekends I like to stay inside and cool as much as possible. The ultimate relaxation would be a Saturday massage but that doesn't fit into my budget very well so my mom and I like to get pedis in the morning. Its nice to sit and relax while chit chatting with my mom.

Saturdays are my favorite!

Hunter's Blanket

I really wanted to get Kelli something special for her baby shower so I decided to make Baby Hunter a blanket. I knew it would mean a lot being as I made it. Since I recently took back up sewing I decided this was the best way to go. Although the steps were simple I was hesitant because my last attempt at applique was a failure. I gathered my patience and went to work. I started by cutting out the letters of his name from fabric.

Next I sewed them onto the top layer of fleece. From there I combined the top and bottom layer of fleece together and added a blue silk binding around the edges.

Done.

Or so I thought; in my last stretch of binding I ruined a corner that I couldn't redeem. After much thinking of how to save the blanket ( not only had it taken me a few hours but this was the night before the shower) I saw my left over fabric from his name. I cut pieces out of the remains and placed them over each corner.

The blanket looked amazing and I was proud to give it to her.

Although the gift was for Matt, Kelli, and Baby Hunter I was as happy as they were to receive it. The feeling of giving a homemade gift not only touched their hearts but mine and the accomplishment of finishing the blanket when I had my doubts and concerns was rewarding to me.

Explorers

This weekend we headed up to Manhattan to visit our friends; Kelli and Matt.

While we were there the four of us stopped by this beautiful waterfall.

The second we got there shoes were off and the boys were in the water exploring.

They found a small cave under the waterfall and headed in!

Down the way we found a tree swing which they spent a good 30 minutes jumping off of.

The whole trip was a nice get away for the weekend and we enjoyed spending time with our friends. The drive was short and smooth. We were lucky to not have any car troubles this time :)

I can't leave that like THAT!

Maybe it's my OCD but this morning I had to laugh at myself.....

I was caught up in blogging my previous post when I realized it was time for me to head to work. I went to the kitchen to grab some graham crackers to snack on at work when I noticed I had not cleaned or put away the pans from last night. Original thought was I can't leave that like that, so I washed and put away the pans. I grabbed my crackers and headed for my keys only to see two pairs of my shoes under the side table in the living room. Again, I can't leave that like that, so I put down my things and picked up my shoes to put away. After throwing them in my closet I turn to see my bed isn't made. Now on most days this would not bother me but for some reason today it did.... I can't leave that like that. I made the bed, and turned to finally leave, or so I thought. There right by the door of my bedroom is a huge pile of laundry needing washed. I picked up what I could grab and threw it in the washer. Realizing this could continue for another hour I decided I HAVE to leave. On my finally attempt to get out of the house and to work I see my camera on the counter and with a quick glance at the clock I think to myself... What would any blogger do in this situation??

Take a picture and blog so others can laugh along with me of course.

Notice the time of 8:15
My commute to work is roughly 25 minutes and I am due there at 8:30. Dang my OCD!

My World

Want to know what has been going on in the world of me?

I know you are all so interested so here is a bit of what's been up lately.

*I ordered a new backpack for school. Although my excitement was not overwhelming I am ready for school to start, or should I say I am ready for the first 4 weeks; the following 12 weeks of the semester do not excite me

*Austin's truck brakes went out so we have been down to only one vehicle. This has been a problem since we have such different schedules.

*We continue to pray for the start of growing our family. It has been 15 months of no luck

*I have been working/playing around in Photoshop. I really like seeing the different things I am able to create. Most of the time I just do a lot of random things till I like the outcome :) I have been reading and learning actually techniques as well.

*I haven't been sleeping much at night, I just lay wide awake. Austin says it is because I always have too much on my mind.

*I have been considering losing the 8 pounds my doctor made me gain; they just don't fit into my lifestyle or summer clothes or swim suit for that matter.

*I want to get highlights in my hair, the only problem is I only like them for the first 6 weeks. After that I don't want to pay to get them touched up and I hate the look of growing them out.

*I put my first item to sell on ebay up yesterday. I don't know if it will sell but I thought I would try.

*Lastly I am hoping the change in my change jar is enough (or more) to pay for my school books, which is exactly $358.54