FLORIDA HERE WE COME!!! (If I could only get packed!!!!)

Well, it's the most wonderful time of the year!!!

Tomorrow we're going to Florida! And since I've already packed the camera I can't take pictures of the daunting task of packing. But to help motivate me to get it done, I've been browsing through last year's pictures. . .


beautiful strolls on the beach . . .

fun rides on the golf cart with Aunt Ann . . .


finding a gorgeous hunk at the pool who adores your children as much as he adores you. . .


the majesty of the sky and sea as a storm is rolling in . . .
and let us not forget the view of sunset from the deck . . .
Paradise Found.

"Will You Be My Valentine?"

"Will you be my Valentine?"

"How about if I try to smile?"

"What if I really smile?!"

Happy Valentines Day!!!

Blast from the Past: Twins

I came across this picture from three years ago and had some observations.

1. I could tell right away which twin was who because they still make those faces. (Caleb's is usually sans the mac & cheese coming out of his mouth).

2. How was I expecting them to eat that food with the look I had on my face?!

3. I wonder if Luke's wearing of a pink bib is going to affect his pyche for the rest of his life?

4. Weren't they adorable?!!!!

5. I do NOT miss hand feeding.

6. Who would have thought they'd have curly hair?!

7. This is one of only about 9 pictures I have that show me with both twins (in 4 years) (And don't I look so cute?!). It's pretty tricky to get the twins with mommy shot because I'm usually the one with the camera and getting Luke and Caleb both in the frame is a challenge for only the truly perseverant. Seatbelts on highchairs come in real handy.

Redneck Reality: Video Store

So my mom wanted to watch a movie one night and instead of heading into 'town' (10 miles away) my sister-in-law and I headed up to the local one.


We get there and I see that the older movies are 5 movies, for 7 nights for $5. Great deal. Especially because I missed almost every movie from 1998-2001 and 2003-2005. (Seminary and babies cramp the movie-watching style). Anyway so we pick out 5 oldies and 2 new releases.Then we go to check out and I say I want to open an account. The clerk informs me I can only check out 1 movie when I open a new account. hmmm. . . bummer. . . but my sister-in-law has a great idea to use our other sister-in-law's account! So we give her name, and no problem we can now check out all 7 movies.


So the next time I go up to the store to return the 7 movies I decide to check out only 1 movie so I can open an account for myself. Here's how that went.


Me: I'd like to open an account


Clerk: All I need is an ID.


I show her my TX drivers license (Yes, I know I should have gotten an IL one by now, but I thought we'd be moving into a house and I would just wait until then, but that process had taken longer than expected and now I'm in a little rebellion about not getting a new one until I can put my permanent address on it.)


Clerk: I need a local ID, don't you have anything with a local address on it?


Me: Um, no. All I've got is this TX drivers license. Is there something else I could show you? Credit card? Bank card? Insurance card? TX library card? Great photos of my children?

Clerk: No, I need something with an address.

Me: Well, I can give you an address. I'm a Rodie. We're living with my parents. It's like 7 blocks from here. My dad was a schoolteacher in this town for 20 years. I grew up here all my life, I've been gone since 1994, but now I'm back.

Clerk: Oh, I already know who you are, I work with your brother at the bank.

Me: (silently) Are you kidding me!?! 1. You already know who I am! 2. Last week I checked out 7 movies based upon my sister-in-law's account! Why in the world do you need something with an actual in-town address? 3. What about homeless people? Can't they check out movies? This has got to be some kind of weird small-town discrimination--or perhaps a cult. Maybe you have to give a local address and sign your name in blood to check out a stinkin' movie from 1999!!!!!

Me: (outloud) So could I give you my brother's address?

Clerk: That's okay, I'll just open your account without an address.

Me: (outloud) Thanks so much.

Me: (siliently) Seriously?!!!

LifeSavers: Baby T.

Baby T. is out of the hospital! Praise God. Sharing his room at the hospital was another baby with pneumonia, urinary tract infection, and ear infection! Yikes! They were thankful to be able to leave. They're hanging out at the Rodie houshold for a while to recuperate fully.

Thanks for praying!

LifeSavers: Things to Pray about

Generally, this blog is going to be upbeat and fun to read because it's mine, and I can do anything I want to-- I mean, because it gives me a creative outlet to express the mundane which makes me smile, even if it means nothing to rest of you.

But you know somedays just aren't like that. Some days I need a little help. So if you've ever laughed at one of the silly realities that is my life, or thought , "Preach it, girl" or were just a tiny bit distracted from your own daily trials while immersed in my blog, this is where you can give back. So when you see the LifeSavers topic, start talking to God. Get all your own issues delt with so you have a clean conscience when you ask Him for the help I need. :)

So here's the first one. . .

My nephew, T. is in the hospital with RSV. He's only 2 months old, born 3 days after Lydia. Please pray for him. He was transferred last night to a bigger, better hospital about 45 miles away.
His older sister, M. is fighting the same thing. Pray they both recover without complications.

See how easy that is? Thanks!

As Promised . . .

Lydia is learning to smile. These photos are of the earlier smiles. She's beginning to master them now and doesn't look quite so awkward getting those facial muscles to do what she wants them to do.

Now onto business. . . some of you may be wondering why several of my photos have a putrid-greenish cast to them. I am a photographer, I do understand white balance. It's driving me crazy, too!

Here's the deal. Some well-meaning person invented a fluorescent light bulb that fits into a regular bulb spot. You know the ones. They look like a twisty kind of thing, and people think they're great because they save money.
I loath them.
I have never been a fan of fluorescent light in general. I've never met a person who looks good in fluorescent light. Remember what trying on swimsuits in a store looks like -- fluorescent light!

Fluorescent lights can give off many different hues. Pink, blue, yellow, green. It's really annoying if you're in a room with lots of them and someone put in different bulbs. Digital cameras have white balance settings with which you can compensate and adjust for different types of light. However, these new-fangled fluorescents are tricky because they made them to resemble hallegen light--but it doesn't work in giving off the same kind of light. So neither setting the camera for hallegen or fluorescent gives a natural feel. (Someone out there more into the science of light than I am, may comment to their hearts' content to explain this better.)

Yes, I know I could do a an individual white balance setting each time I'm in a room with those lights. But by the time I run and get a solid white piece of paper, my dear baby girl will be all done smiling, or the tea party will be over, or the dress up party will have decomposed into a pile of costumes on the floor.

So hang in there with me. Enjoy the photos because of the beautiful sign of intelligent life inside my 4th born and ignore the haunting greenish cast behind her.

Seriously?! NOT the Same

Though I was never a "Daily Starbucks" kind of gal, I've really come to appreciate good coffee. The problem is everyone's version of good coffee is not the same thing.

On a date recently, Mark and I were leaving (the one) Starbucks (within 50 miles) and he said he had heard that McDonald's coffee was just as good as Starbucks. Seriously. Who makes this stuff up?!?!

This from the man who doesn't normally enjoy coffee without a 50/50 ratio of cream to coffee with 2 sugars. I love him desperately, anyway.

With a look of utter disdain, I quickly informed him, No, they weren't the same.

And though I don't drink gourmet coffee daily, a dear friend, J., from Texas sent me a Starbucks mug so I can pretend to enjoy it every morning.

SNOW DAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

We had 3 inches of snow and the wind blew to make some great drifts. It was the perfect day to go sledding. So my mom watched Lydia --literally watched her swing in the swing for an hour while she and my dad played Settlers of Catan. Thanks, Mom! :)-- and I took the other kids sledding.

Finding a great sledding hill in central IL can have it's challenges. Especially when you're looking within a 5 mile radius from home, so if your happily swinging baby should start to squawk, you can go right home.

Soooo . . . I remembered as a child we would go fishing at this great little place called the Clay Pit. I don't know why it's called that, but it is. And I remember having to ride my bike back up the hill when we were finished. I don't remember ever riding down the hill, but if I had to ride back up it, I was supposing there was one that went down, too.
Now, if you're not local, you don't yet know that the Clay Pit is located at the back of the cemetery.

Yep, we went sledding at the cemetery.




And oh! what fun it was.
























Caleb has lately been marching to the beat of a different drum. Singing to the tune of a different song. Silently screaming to be a little different in this world of being a twin and having two sisters. I'm not quite sure how to categorize my children according to the Birth Order book, but Caleb has recently been attempting to monopolize the middle child place.

So after sledding down our great cemetery hill once, he wanted to explore the headstones instead of join the rest of us careening with glee. And in retrospect, I'm very proud to say I just let him do that. I didn't try to convince him that Mommy has not been sledding with him ever in his life and he should be enjoying this super fun activity. Or point out that he was missing the fun his other siblings were having. I just let him wander around the cemetery and find all sorts of treasures none of the rest of us will ever know anything about. We were all happy. . .





Until the children started to rebel against the photographer mother and started throwing snow at me and my lens. They obviously have no regard for their own lives.