amy rocks, okay?

December 12, 2013

This! More of This!

You've no doubt been privy to this video already, but I'm putting it here to share with you now and to keep in the chest of awesome for all time. I had a really rad explanation of this video and what it means to me, to you, to marketing and business. We're all aware of why it's so wonderful for the same reasons Love Actually is one of the greatest movies of all time. Because it makes you feel! And gives you hope! And inspires you to remember that life CAN be that wonderful, full of crazy love, be it friendship or soul mates, and it's only us that stand in the way!

Golly, I love this stuff.

For the sake of time, I'm going to barf out the resonating inspiration I took from this gem from WestJet Creative/Marketing team (you know, after the obvious happy tears, laughter and "gotta watch that one more time cuz I'm a hopeless romantic" phase) - I HAVE TO GET BACK IN THE GAME. This is my place! I love this stuff! I am so ready to be at that table creating these kinds of ideas, working on a team scribbling those crazy concepts on the board, crossing them off, dialing down on them. Conceptualizing. Fantasizing. Strategizing. And burning midnight oil to finish it off. (That sounds like the beginnings of a nerdy rap song.) No, I'm not claiming inside my head lies the next greatest holiday viral video, I can't even say I have a rad email tagline stored in there for next weeks promotion (okay, I'm sure I could come up with something after a delicious Americano), but I KNOW, that this is what I want to do. Creating. Invoking. Inspiring and building. Growing. The bottom line and people's capacity to care. Isn't the goal to do it all at once?! We're creating change in mankind and in the economy. One builds the other, it's no shame to claim that's ones motivation. I'm in! Growth and change are GOOD. All it takes is a group of people and some elbow grease. Thank you to those who are doing this on a bigger level than myself at this moment. I'm coming!

10 Sizes That Day

It's Christmas. The holiday season. And so many wonderful things are happening and worth celebrating, toasting, laughing and cherishing. For example, this year we welcomed a new sister in law into our family who is now blessing us with ANOTHER new member to our family. Joy abound! My life alone has gone through some drastic changes in the last 12 months and I couldn't be more happy with where I am in the grand scheme of things. My home town took every state title they competed for this fall. A dear friend performed in a choir all on her lonesome. A best friend brought their first child into the world and after a rough birth, the family is happy and healthy enjoying the sandy beaches in Hawaii. Another landed a great job in Bend allowing their family to move to a place they've always dreamed of being. I could go on and on.

So what is it, the healthy balance (?), with all the pain? Here we sit on the edge of the season of cheer, and I find so many wonderful, and I mean WONDERFUL, people experiencing pain. Those that I speak of are phenomenal individuals that represent the goodness in the world, the pillars of strength that the rest of us look to, and they are living in the thick of thorns that life can throw at us. Some in the same capacity, others different, but no less of an arduous time. I find myself torn between being blessed to live in this with them, but upset that these challenges are coming to them at such a wonderful time of the year. Perhaps that's best - all of the joy and energy that surrounds us in the holiday season is giving the strength that normally doesn't exist the other 11 months of the year when most are caught up in their own issues.

What am I getting at here? Prayer. Giving. Freely. When your cup is full, someone else's is empty. Take time to not share, but to give. GIVE. Please give. Give in thoughts full of strength, give in hugs, give in cookies or casseroles. Time. An ear. A shoulder. Be open and be willing. Put yourself out there in strength and bravery. Fight the fight for those who are too weak. Stand strong when others can't. Man, how lucky are we to provide that for others?! HOW LUCKY! It's the beauty of life to live to the ends of the capacity to which we can feel, all the way, to the unknown places, we are capable! Go there! Not only for yourself, as a way to enhance your own life, but to help others in an exceptional capacity! This doesn't require last minute plane tickets with $800 prices, but to feel, to empathize to that uncomfortable extent. That's where the good stuff lies people. Get uncomfortable for someone else. You never know what it's like to give until you give so much that it hurts.

Let your heart grow ten sizes today :)

Leave the Labels.

Be the YOU that you are meant to be. You owe it to yourself. Go.

It don't feel like butterflies, it feels more like fireflies…

Aaradhna, a New Zealand vocalist, won a handful of awards in Kiwi land and was in Portland at the NPR studios recently when this was recorded. I immediately was drawn because of her origin but then, the lyrics of this simple, beautiful song, just stole my heart. *enjoy*

"Despite all of the ghastliness in the world, human beings are made for goodness. The ones that are held in high regard are not militarily powerful, nor even economically prosperous. They have a commitment to try and make the world a better place."

YES! My kind of trend!

When you want to succeed, as bad as you want to breathe, THEN you will be successful.

Beautifully put.

Adam Brown sent me this tantalizing number. I've shown it to practically everyone who will give me the time of day to see it because the message is so wonderfully powerful and speaks to people in their own way! There's nothing like a little perspective now and again and one that only offers up the information and allows you to digest it however you see fit, is my kind of inspiration. I'm in love!

I also need to create more.

Liberating and Petrifying

Nothing like I just pulling the rug out from under your own two feet.

Moms really are the best.

A New Perspective For Moms from Elevation Church on Vimeo.

Inferno

... the worst kind of loneliness in the world is the isolation that comes from being misunderstood. It can make people lose their grasp on reality.

Religion

I just thought of searching for Buddhist speeches on TED Talks. Mind blown. Heart aflutter. Perfect medicine for the soul at this moment. Only enough time for one tonight, but here's a taste of the goodness that lies in TED Talks library.

http://www.ted.com/talks/joan_halifax.html

How.

So, I'm luckily going to get to be back in the retail management side of things and I am a basket of emotions. So completely energized about the endless opportunities available yet completely petrified I will fail or be a disappointment. Obviously these are normal reactions to a new job, but these consume my mind daily! Partially because I can't get it out of my head that those passions and fears will be a part of my wandering mind for quite some time. I suppose, the only way to get around that overwhelming despair is to tackle them head on.

Which I am doing. Partially.

I have been reading endless articles on topics like what makes a strong leader and how to be an effective manager. I mean, I'm not starting tomorrow with a team of 10 employees, but I am obsessed with being an awesome leader/captain, and if I am standing at the gates down that path, I want to come prepared.

One thing I read that discouraged me and is the reason for writing this post, is that just because you were told you were a natural born leader at a younger age, doesn't mean you are capable of effectively leading others as an adult. Most likely you were a bossy student who took control when no one else did.

You guys. That's me.

Start crisis in my head.

I wasn't... well, wait, I mean, I did so much more than that! Right? I cared! And I cheered! And I made the good/hard decisions! And I was told I was a natural leader by some really admirable, leader-like people! I was the president of multiple clubs and organizations! I gathered people together! I got shit done! I am a leader! I'm not that person they are saying has a skewed idea of true leadership because someone told them they were a leader in a past life, right?

You see, I've always dreamed of changing lives through work ethic and customer service. Seriously. Even since being a kid. That's how our family found success and I wanted to pass on that mentality. I believe so much value lies in working hard and being kind, and can be applicable to any part of any life in any profession. I also think there are some really great tools people can use to incorporate those into their life when you may not be a people person. In short, I'm overfilled with compassion and in my own small way, I'd like to put that out there for people to see and perhaps pick it up in their own small way.

How do I do this without being a bossy boss? Or, am I really even a bossy boss? The way I see it, as long as I practice what I preach and provide guidance as we go along, all should work out in the end. I only learn by doing something myself, so I'll start with that. There is certainly an element of training in the beginning, as well as continual coaching (checking in, keeping communication open), but at the end of the day, how will you ever learn to walk on your own if I'm always holding your hand? To me leadership equals empowerment, inspiration, and motivation. Empower through independence, inspire by example, and motivation through recognition and high fives. Obviously. I want to practice compassion to my team because their success is my success. When I coached those kids in track, it all stemmed down to achieving a level of individual success for them. The winning moment was seeing those grinning faces as they set personal records and realized that they could do it. That they did do it! I. LOVE. SEEING. PEOPLE. "WIN".

I'm going to have to work on letting the little things go with handing over certain tasks and having faith that I can trust in them. If I've done my job correctly, of course I can trust them. And in the end it's to my benefit to hand over certain tasks because that will allow me to focus on other things, every growing our little store and making us all feel like bigger and bigger rock stars.

Baby steps. Lets do this.

$200 and lots of other changes.

I just pushed purchase on a set of two tickets to New Zealand. For two hundred bucks. That'll never happen again! Last time I purchased tickets with a NZ destination it cost me more than $2,000 and that was..... 5 years ago? Hot damn. Lucky. In every way. I learned that I am a girl that doesn't have the "let me spend your money for you gene". David gave me his credit card info a few days ago to buy the tickets and I have been sitting here for 3 days unable to punch the numbers in. It took him getting on the phone tonight and repeating that it was okay for me to go through with it, before I could hit "purchase".

What am I even saying? Have you jabbed your eyes out yet? There is just something about spending someone else's money that just... HURTS. I can't do it! Guilt and more guilt. It's not fair? They put the time in to earn that, out of their day that could have been spent doing other things and I don't care if they work to pay for fun later in life - then they should be the ones spending it on the fun! Not me! It's not MINE. And is it just me, or is there an empty hollow feeling when your traveling or buying things on someone else's tab? Don't get me wrong, I am absolutely thrilled to be hopping across the pond and exploring a long loved land, but there is something about not using your own hard earned dollar bills that keep it from meaning MORE. Ugh. I'm stoked, but it doesn't have that same pinge as it did the first time I visited. Because the first time I went it was of my own accord after weeks of 100+ hour work weeks in Nome, Alaska. It was my loneliness of days on end far from friends that was allowing me to explore another part of the world. My own hands, heart, soul, mind and head had put in the time in a less appealing environment and I was exploiting every individual right to relish in my hard efforts. And I did. On my own time in my own way. It was my trip and I fucking loved it. I'm an egotistical bastard at times like this. I love the suffering, the sacrifices that one can subject themselves to in order to reap the benefits later on. It's like, how do you win a race if you don't spend countless hours suffering, huffing, puffing, puking on the track beforehand? Don't all those hours and hardships make that damn trophy even more golden and HUGE? You bet it does.

Anyway, the beauty of this story, is that my own heart, mind and soul have brought me down here despite it all, with this man, in this place where I am able to enjoy a ticket to New Zealand for a few days at rock bottom prices. It may not have been my account #'s I was punching into the payment field, but dammit, it is my hands doing the punching, my body that lies in this bed now, alone and far from home after all that's happened and it's my own gumption, pride, and being, that is happy to be here. I've done it. We've done it. WE ARE DOING IT. But, thank you for the tickets, David. I absolutely can't wait. Truly. And I couldn't think of a better place I'd want to spend those last few days in and with you. Thank you. I feel more a part of your life than ever and it's rad.

I will never be someone with the rich husband that shops and plays tennis. I'd be sick with myself in a matter of months. That lifestyle provides no real value to my life - unless I'm kicking ass at tennis and my tournament winnings paid for my latest downtown splurge. Seriously. It just doesn't sound like any FUN to me. I hope my future holds a joint business with my hubby where I may have more time to commit to things like school boards and town council, but yet allows me to contribute in my own way, investing in the future, taking stock in our life. THAT sounds like the perfect, happy kind of life I'd love. Well, that and endless $200 plane tickets to New Zealand. :)

Dirty Little Devils, Down in Tasmania.

No Tasmanian Devil spottings on this trip but we did see one of these little guys!

A Quoll. A skitterish little creature we spotted jetting across the road in the evening causing two Americans to squeal/yell with excitement because HAVE YOU EVER EVEN HEARD ABOUT ONE OF THESE?! "White with black spots!" "No! Black with white spots!" Thankfully it gave us something to talk about the rest of the drive and even though we have smart phones and could have settled the issue, it was much more fun to debate.

I think this story will be best told with pictures. And the occasional video. Mostly because I'm exhausted and have a few other important things on the mind :) HERE WE GO!

Clockwise was the theme here. Starting down in Hobart and working our way around and back down again!

A couple weeks ahead of the trip we were spending our nights reading all the Lonely Planets that litter our bookshelves and set about finding what exactly we wanted to see in Taz. I think we pretty much did it all! Minus Port Arthur, but it's close enough to Hobart that if we ever go back we'll be able to skip over there pretty quickly. Not knowing if we'd ever be back there we set an itinerary that everyone told us was too ambitious but we wanted to see it all!

Our plane landed late and we luckily caught the end of Dark Mofo, an event put on by Hobart to get the city buzzing in the dead of winter. It was awesome! First up was this GIANT beam of light shining high into the sky! 10 miles or something, folks! Anyway, rad stuff so we drove the car directly towards it and figured we'd go from there. Totally worth it:

Dark Mofo = rad, small community event, with a lot of tasteful sponsorship. Good stuff, folks.

I'm beginning to wonder what I was thinking putting the entire trip into one post. Le' sigh. I'm now writing for myself at this point! ;) Anyway, off to Chris' parents house (one of David's coworkers, and thank you for the hospitality!) for a chat and rest before kicking off tomorrow.

Our first day we headed to MONA (The Museum of Old and New Art) to get a taste of what everyone was talking about. Some people go to Tasmania JUST for MONA. Seriously, they'll fly into Tasmania in the morning, visit the museum, and then fly home. Nutso. At any rate, a quick 1:30 of some of the neat/weird stuff we saw. The bit at the end was our favorite exhibit :)

THIS IS A KITTEN. Made into a rug. And that's a man enjoying himself on an indoor trampoline that plays music with every bounce! And what follows is some art.

Where's the Lorax?!

Standing in a dark room looking up into a mirror.

We sell Moo Brew in the bottle shop, and David and I had a DELICIOUS porter of theirs the night before, so when we saw that the brewery was out at MONA, we did our civil duty and had a tasting. YUM. Then I fell in love with an all too expensive cook book and was advised by our server to take photos of my favorite recipes to avoid being sad for never being someone who spends $50 on a cook book. Done and done, thank you sir. And thank you David for your phone :)

With two breakfasts, a beer tasting and a museum under our belts, we headed out West to begin our tour of Tasmania! The roads are small, just like New Zealand or Montana. Two lanes and WINDY. Not wind, but wind. No whipping currents of air. Just curves in the road that cause you to drive incredible slow making what looks like a 3 hour drive = 5. Anyway, all the sudden we spot these HUGE pipes and decided to follow them to THIS:

See the ones across the canyon as well?! By the time the water in these pipes reaches the bay it has generated power EIGHT times. Awesome stuff!

I can't believe I'm not out of the car. It was freezing and I was content taking in the scene from my warm pilot's chair. A captain must never abandon his ship!

The sun was hitting the horizon around 4:30 because of the Winter Solstice and luckily we just happened down a small road that led us to Lake St. Claire. Holy hell, we cashed in on some karma here! Either that or I'm just ridiculously good at noticing small roads and deciding to drive down them because David likes water and a sign said something about a lake. Either way, BIG WIN for us!

We spent the night in Queenstown, rolling in late and finding ourselves in a TINY, old mining town. Talk about hanging on by a thread. You can see how it would be a bustle in the summer, but middle of winter this place was a graveyard. Anyway, next morning we zoomed back up the mountain the way we came because we had a feeling the view would be rad. It was! :)

Back into town and off again on our way to Cradle Mountain. Only one wrong turn that caused us a 40 minute delay, but the radio was on and we managed to find dried bread and cold bacon sandwiches at a small "cafe" along 200 miles of road. SERIOUSLY.

Cool mining carts!

Our first Tasmanian mountain range!

Still on our way to Cradle Mountain and the frost was THICK! You could tell the sun hadn't hit some sections for days causing this man to look like it may as well be a Christmas scene! It's the shirt. :)

We see signs for "Cradle Mountain", but we aren't sure if we see Cradle Mountain...

However, pretty soon, we don't care because we got to see a WOMBAT!

And then we found Cradle Mountain :)

It was a wonderful little hike around the lake that borders the mountain and we spent the afternoon toodling around making silly noises and dreaming of bigger mountains :) Nah, it was actually really neat and more than once talked about how lucky we were to be there and how much we missed you guys. So here's a homage TO YOU:

Back in the car on our way to Launceston, a town which turned out to be my favorite of the trip and one of David's as well, we drove through some of the most beautiful countryside not unlike Montana and New Zealand. There seems to be a reoccurring theme there for us :) I wouldn't have minded camping up in this neck of the woods for the remainder of the trip one bit!

After that blimp, we happened across a beautiful gorge that was not unlike the Spokane river and Columbia Gorge all in one. Of course we must hike up it! At the top of the river is a huge swimming hold complete with a suspension bridge and the original gazebo put there by the community way back in the 1800's. All the pictures of the original garden parties are on exhibit there and you can feel yourself step back in time...

Next up, going in to our last full day, we hit Wineglass Bay. Rated in the Top 10 Beaches by CNN, we felt pretty stoked to be there and spent the night in the nearest town just because.

Had a run-in with the local riff raff in the parking lot....

That night we cleaned out the snacks in the car with a sunset picnic on the beach and wondering what we were going to do the rest of the night because it was only just 5 o'clock and the town is ASLEEP!

I'm pooped! It's sort of lame to leave you with nothing for the best part of the trip, but I have got to get some shut eye! We woke up early to make sunrise down at Wineglass Bay and were treated to an amazing moon-set and rad sunrise clouds. The hike down to the beach took about an hour and we spent at least 2 just enjoying ourselves collecting shells, putting our feet in the water and watching the kangaroos hop around. ROUGH! :)

I touched my first piece of coral. It was awesome! And squishy. Night kids!

A Philosophy For Life

Life is an opportunity, benefit from it.
Life is beauty, admire it.

Life is bliss, taste it.
Life is a dream, realize it.

Life is a challenge, meet it.
Life is a duty, complete it.

Life is a game, play it.
Life is costly, care for it.

Life is wealth, share it.
Life is love, enjoy it.

Life is a mystery, know it.
Life is a promise, fulfill it.

Life is sorrow, embrace it.
Life is a struggle, accept it.

Life is a tragedy, confront it.
Life is an adventure, dare it.

Life is too precious, do not destroy it.
Life is life! Fight for it!

(Found on a wall in Mother Teresa's convent in Calcutta)

Should Have Paid For That

In the beginning I set out to find a Bible study group and kept coming up empty handed. I even checked out on of the main churches in the city but to no avail. In time it fell off my priority list (shame, shame) but has since worked its way back up. Especially in this moment. But, yet again, I'm unable to find a group to join, or any type of group that exists at all! I am sad at this. Where are the people who gather once a week to read and reflect and relish in the community of others who would like to develop themselves holistically, religiously. I miss it. I miss it bad. I had just begun to find a place in Berk town when I was leaving and now, as well as for many other reasons, I wish I wouldn't have left. In time I'll find it again I suppose. But right now, all I want is to read my Bible or other assigned readings and reflect.

Onward!

Balls.

What happened to me? I used to wake up with an idea in my head to open an ice cream store in Helena and went to bed with the rights for a Coldstone franchise in my hand. Okay, so it took longer than one day but I didn’t sit there waiting for someone else to make the move. I just went for it and wrote the emails myself, made the phone calls figuratively reaching down where a man should and going for it. Graphic. A little. I’m sorry. I just can’t figure out where my “balls” went!?

I’m sitting on the cuff of something potentially exciting with a company and a new client and instead of just going all in and turning it from potential to realistic, I’m sitting here watching the emails going back and forth and feeling sheepish and shy. SHEEPISH and SHY. If you know me, you would be shaking your head – Amy? Sheepish? Shy? My Mom would get it. But she knows me. What has rocked my confidence and outgoing mentality? Where are you? Hello!!!! WHERE ARE YOU?! I pitifully yell into the dark cave of my soul, frowning when the only response I hear are the sad echo’s of my own feeble voice.

EW.

Get ballsy, Amy! Harness your confidence! The quality of your brain and the value of its output! How? Start by doing. Prove to yourself in little ways that you do know what you’re talking about and the experiences you have had are worthy of drawing from. For instance, sitting here banging my head on the table trying to think of a blog post to write for a digital agency, feeling like I need to spend at least the next 36 hours reading marketing articles to boost my own marketing encyclopedia, when all I really need to do is think about what I’ve done at Title Nine or Sparkhell and the lessons learned there. What did I do that someone else could find useful? Wait, I did useful things? Yes, you dolt. Why is it when you’re in a job and things are going well, you’re seeing change, you feel like you’re doing really great, then when you’re out of the job and having to pull from your responsibilities to show your skills and achievements, you feel like you come up empty handed? Deer in the headlights, can you please ask me the question again Mr. Interviewer? It’s like, I know I did alright, but why can’t I write down what it is that I did that says that I was doing alright?

Lesson learned? Set some goals for yourself when you start out. Then reflect on them in a month. Are they still in line with what your responsibilities and what you thought the job was going to be? Remember to build your foundation. Are you looking to increase social media traffic? Email click through rates? Well, how? What things can you do to get there? Write those out and get set to accomplishing them. Found something else entirely is more effective? Write that down and get to growing that channel. Refrain from looking at that experience as a failure of your first notion – it’s a success in learning about your community. That’s heaps! And now you’re immediately an adaptive creature. Golden ticket, kid!

Long Weekends for the Queen

Last weekend we had Monday off (well, David did) and we actually got round to doing quite a lot! The original plan was a trip to Tasmania or something fun like that, but with everyone going out of town the prices sky rocket and it makes us cringe and sink back into our Melbourne hole where we find ourselves having plenty of fun! (And also saving enough money to score Tasmania next weekend!)

In short, we headed out to Yarra Valley to do some wine tasting (beautiful country, wine's not so much) and met an awesome dog (obviously!) and enjoyed cruising around. Luckily we had a snazzy rental, thanks to David's corporate rate, and I drove all day while he did the "tasting". Worked quite well! Then the market the next day to pick up groceries for dinner that night (having friends over from Ireland and another one of David's coworkers). Luckily David remembered the Cellar Store (beer shop) was open so we hopped over to buy some hops and supplies to brew our first... brew. :)

OH! Coming home Friday night we stopped in at the bottle shop downstairs that I work in and landed ourselves a couple of free tickets to the Essedon/Carlton footy game, and while I was beat and sort of looking forward to renting Finding Nemo (DAVE'S IDEA) he convinced me that you never turn down free sporting event tickets and dammit if he wasn't right. That game was bloody awesome. Our tickets were from a member of the Essedon club so we were in the thick of the blue collar fans and the team had been down the whole game - well, wouldn't you know, incredible comeback and we win it in the last few minutes! The place was going NUTSO! And you guys, ITS HUGE!!!!! I need to get the video from his phone and put it on here of the song they all sing when the team wins. Awesome stuff. Really awesome stuff. We are lucky enough to have been to a sporting event practically once every month we've been here and it's a pattern I wouldn't mind seeing continue!

Notes of the weekend that I didn't manage to work into the stories above - the dog we met at the first winery that made you feel like you were in Tuscany? I WANT ONE. She was wonderful. A cross between a dingo and collie, short hair, quiet temperament and just an all around sweetie. Big enough to run and go places but not so big you can have her on your lap for a cuddle. Upon declaring she was the perfect dog, David gave me the look of "how are you going to get it back to America? You aren't. Let the idea go and we'll talk about it in 2 years" to which I responded with the look that says "Huh-uh mister. That doesn't work anymore. She is what I want and I will find a way to bring one just like her back to America with me. And her name will be Joey". We can really do a lot with our looks. ALSO, when Dave told me the two buzzed gentleman offered us the footy tickets, I suggested he go and have fun with the boys and get rowdy blah blah blah. BUT, all anybody heard in the shop was that I DIDN'T want to go and was making him go alone, to which they proceeded to reprimand me and the entire female race for not ever wanting to have fun and go to sporting events. YOU MESSED WITH THE WRONG GIRL, PEOPLE! So, I went and it was awesome and I am thankful for the gene in me that says I'll prove you wrong. Thank you David for taking me along for the ride. I need that person that says "lets go!" :)

May 27

What do you think? More? Try something else?

Are you ready to rock BK Broiler?!

Or maybe just take a gander at some photos? :) After my entrepreneurial duties of waking up early to bake fresh spiced chai muffins (complete with maple syrup glaze and all credit goes to Miss. North for finding the recipe) for the shop downstairs, I whipped up my BEST batch of scrambled eggs. For serious. All other scrambled eggs I have made were failed attempts at what I achieved today, you guys. They were glorious. David kept asking if I put cream cheese or something in them to make them so fluffy. Nope. That's just 8 years of trying right there. And now, I'm never looking back.

Slightly dramatic, but you know me, so we're square.

Anyway - after muffin delivery, breakfast, a bit of cleaning and David realizing if you don't wash your shirts regularly this will happen....

I try to get to them before this happens, but sometimes, you just can't win 'em all.

.... we ventured to the Botanical Gardens for a gander at the cacti. And by ventured I mean walked across the road and over the hill, through the woods. I said "MAN, how lucky are WE!?" at least five times today!

Paying attention. As always!

The place was beautiful. The sun peaked out from the clouds often enough to ignite some of the fauna and warm our skin, making us hang around a little longer ever exploring another unknown area. The place is fantastically huge and spotted with families and couples enjoying the day. And while we explored, I realized I have a new hobby. While it's as about as sexy as a grandma, I feel like this has a lot to do with where I've been in life and the people I've connected with. It is.... drumroll... observing nature. ZING! Thanks Mom and Dad for movin' us to the country! :) Anyway, it doesn't matter what or where - the young deer tiptoeing her way through the woods, crisp orange leaves falling from the tree, or patiently awaiting the one shooting star streaking across the glittering black night. I love it.

That said, I soaked up every bit with my photo taker today. Ladies and Gentleman, may I introduce to you, some of my favorites from today (hot tip - clicking on the photo makes them bigger!):