Wouter Weylandt Part 2

Here is a tiny follow-up to Part 1.
I got my awesome Road ID in the mail today and absolutely love it. Road ID is donating all proceeds of these bands to Wouter Weylandt's family. If you would like to order one or make a donation to the family, please go to Road ID.
You will also get a nifty little keepsake box. =)
For those of you who aren't familiar with Road ID, I urge you to look at their website. They carry various bands that you can customize with your contact information. This is especially great for athletes because there may come a time where you will need help and you are unable to speak for yourself. Whether you are a cyclist that has been run off the road or a runner that has collapsed, your ID will speak for you. Personally I think these are great for children too, in case they get lost. You can either choose to have the information imprinted on the metal plate OR you can make it available online or over the phone. The band will just show the website and a 1-800 number that people can call to get the information....this is great in case you aren't comfortable to with everyone seeing your personal info.

If you are interested in ordering in the next 28 days or so, you can use this coupon code to save $1 on your order: ThanksVikki5704390.

Wouter Weylandt Part 1

Honestly, I can't quite explain why I have been so affected by the tragic accident that happened in Stage 3 at the Giro D'Italia this past Monday. I am feeling saddened and heart-broken for the family and friends of Wouter Weylandt. Sorry and full of sorrow at this life that was cut short so unexpectedly. I have been following cycling for over a decade and there have been losses before this one, but for some reason this one has touched me much deeper.

I have been moved by the out-pouring of love and support that everyone in the cycling community has had for the family, friends and teammates of Wouter. Through this time of mourning one is able to see the raw emotion that people are feeling, which has been heart-wrenching. The tribute ride during Stage 4 was difficult to watch because of emotion that was felt as you watched, from the Bugle playing to that image of Team Leopard and Tyler Farrar crossing the finish line together. Seeing Tyler's face at that moment just broke my heart and wrecked me.

It doesn't make sense because I am simply a fan. I am not related, have never met him and did not follow his career as closely as I have followed other riders. Why does his death seem to tug at my heart-strings and bring me to tears so easily?

The only explanation I can think of is the sense of family that cycling seems to have. I have met fellow fans both in person and over the internet. I have also had the wonderful opportunity to meet several riders, which has been amazing! In the US it's kind of like our own special club because there aren't as many fans as say....basketball or American Football.

I do think that social media, such as Twitter and Facebook have enabled me to form my own group of friends who understand my need to follow this sport. That overwhelming need to wake up at insane hours to watch a race online or read race reports as reported by teams and riders on Twitter. Giggling as I read Tweets that riders make to each other and seeing the respect and support that they have for one another. Twitter has made the riders much more accessible, including pictures of some pretty harsh injuries, road rash and surgeries. Ya gotta love it!

I'm not quite sure why I'm even writing this but....there it is.
RIP Wouter Weylandt. Love and hugs to all those that knew him and to anyone else who has been affected by his death.

Mother's Day

Happy Mother's to all the women out there! I hope everyone had a wonderful day today!
I got this nifty little gadget for Mother's Day. I was eyeing it in the Brookstone Catalog and saw it in pink on Amazon so...seeing as it was in pink....it HAD to be added to my wishlist. =)
The Boogie Board is basically a glorified White Board....ummmm, except that it's black. I love it! I wish you could save files and erase specific things as opposed to the entire page , however, I knew it's capabilities ahead of time so I'm happy. I mean c'mon! It's a gadget and it's pink, what's not to love?
This is the case. Works great so far.
For Mother's Day our family went to Mom and Dad Hughes' house for dessert. I decided to make vegan cupcakes. UNHEALTHY yummy vegan cupcakes. It took me twice as long because I accidentally forgot the sugar in the first batch. DOH! I seem to have a problem with leaving out ingredients lately, salt in bread and sugar in cupcakes. They actually didn't taste too bad...basically fluffy biscuits. Because the frosting was made with powdered sugar and orange juice, it was sweet enough to put on the "biscuits". I packed 20 normal cupcakes and 4 frosted fluffy biscuits.

Isn't my carrier cool? We bought it a few years back in a breast cancer awareness display.
NOM!

5/6/2011 Garden Update

We have finally started to plant things in our garden this year. YAY! It all started with my stalking Starbuck's for their coffee grounds. I now have a nice supply to use for our garden this year. I'm hoping that it will help boost our plants this year. We can't make our own compost in Pointe Royale so I am mixing the Coffee grounds with egg shells in 2 small tubs to later use as fertilizer. Mushroom Compost is still our staple that we use for our squash and tomato plants.
As some of you have heard, we had several major storms in our area, which caused a lot of flooding. The second bed in the picture is the one that has our spinach and lettuce. We lost a lot of the spinach and 5 out of 6 of my cabbage plants. Grrrrr
This is the size of the remaining spinach plants as of now. I'm hoping that they will start taking off now that the sun is finally coming out.
Here is a picture of the Mizuna lettuce. It is doing great! This has a slightly bitter taste so I'm not quite sure how we will be using it. I got this as a sample seed and decided to plant it to see how well it would grow. AMAZING how easy it is to grow.
So...this is how the sugar snap peas and the snow peas looked after a couple of weeks. Unfortunately, the rabbits decided to snack on half of the plants. A lot of the plants were eaten down to the ground. I don't think those ones are going to make it. We have since put up chicken wire around the outside of the plants to keep them out.


SO...the plan was to plant everything from seed this year, including the tomatoes. However, the tomatoes will be from Home Depot this year. The seedlings were doing great. Granted, I was 2 weeks behind schedule....but they were growing well. Too bad Kahlan decided that she wanted to taste them. As you can see, she decimated them all. Argggg. Not cool.
This is the Rocky Top Salad Mix. I am loving the variety in this packet. I think we will be harvesting this in the next couple of weeks.
This was a nice surprise that I found today. Apparently my basil seeded from last year! So far the biggest leaves are almost 1/4 inch.

We are planting the tomatoes, squash and herbs tomorrow.

George's Mustache

Meet George, one of my many nephews out here in Branson. He is 3 years old and so adorable. This was filmed after our night show tonight. He was telling us about his mustache and shaving. When he refers to James...that is our new brother-in-law. Ya gotta love kids. =)

Oh...I had about 5 little kids behind me making comments throughout the entire thing. His Mom, Mara, is the other voice you hear. She's the one that asks him to show us his push-ups.

Finally starting our 2011 Garden

We have finally started working on our garden. YAY! This year we are changing a few things around....again. It's always fun to try a few new things. If you look closely at the picture at the top, you can see some wire arches. We used cattle panels for that. We decided to hold them in place by using stakes as opposed to concreting them in place, just in case we change our minds later. The plan is to plant Sugar Snap Peas and Snow peas next to the trellis until things heat up in the summer. When those start to die back I am going to replace them with the Chinese Red Long Beans that I planted last year, and a green Asparagus Bean that is also a long bean. I'm hoping that the arched trellis will work because it will look better than the trellis that we had leaning against the house.

As for the 3 beds next to the trellis, I will number them starting from right to left...the first being the structure.

1. Tomatoes
The plan is to remove the chicken wire from the structure. We initially put that on there to keep out any animals. Well, the only critters that seem to steal the tomatoes are the birds and the squirrels. Seeing as they can still get in through the top....no need for the chicken wire. We are also going to remove the structure itself, except for the vertical posts; those are concreted in.
We purchased some flexible wire to make cages. The cages will be 5' tall and around 2.5' in diameter. I am hoping to start the seedlings soon. As for the types of tomatoes, I finally narrowed it down to 8 varieties: Aunt Ruby's German Green, Kellogg's Breakfast, Ozark Pink, Black Cherry, Old Italian, Riesentraube, White Tomesol and Yellow Mortgage Lifter.

2. Spinach, Leeks, Celery and Daikon Radish
Because our beds are all 8' x 12' we are splitting this one in half. It's always better to not stomp on the soil so....we are going to prevent that this year. We still need to go to Home Depot to pick out a simple stone to make a path down the middle of the box, lengthwise. Half of the bed will have Spinach: Giant Noble and Bloomsdale Longstanding. The other half will have the Leeks, Celery and Daikon. Of course, after I had already ordered the celery, I read about the planting instructions. The first article that I read stated that homegrown celery doesn't taste much different from store-bought and it is really hard to grow. They also said that most gardeners just plant it as a challenge. Looovely. JUST what I wanted. Arggg

3. Squash
We are going to plant Butternut Rogosa and Blue Hubbard Squash. I'm hoping that we can keep them nice and healthy and that the vines and fruit will take over the box. The other hope it that we won't have any problem with borers as per usual.

On our deck we have 2 big planters. I will be planting Carbon Tomatoes in one and the other will have herbs again.

Our watermelon crop will be limited to 3 types this year. We planted quite a few last year but there were definite favorites as far as flavor. I have so many types of watermelon seeds in my collection so only doing 3 is killing me. We both love the Crimson Sweet and the Missouri Heirloom Yellow Flesh. This Year we will be trying the Cream of Saskatchewan. It has a cream colored flesh! How cool is that? Hopefully it will taste yummy!

Normally we try planting cantaloupes or cucumbers next to the melons. This year we will be doing a Long of Naples Squash plant.

There are 2 other types of squash that I want to plant: Lebanese White Bush Marrow and Benning's Green Tint Scallop. I am trying to decide between 2 locations. One is where we planted the radishes last year and the other is the planter that is below the watermelons. I'll let you know what we decide.

I realize I keep interchanging "we" and "I" as I type this. It's a little hard to keep track of. Adam is the manual labor for the most part. I try to help when I can but hey, I'm not as strong and can't last as long. I do love planting the seeds though so I usually do that. =)

Here are a few pictures of our nephews helping us clean out the garden. My allergies started attacking me that night.

Getting rid of the tomato vines that I removed from the structure.

The Netbook Story comes to an end

Well, it's finally over. The Netbook is gone. Here is what has transpired as of January.

A few weeks later my Netbook, once again, had to be brought in. All of a sudden it would not power up. I believe it was my 5th time using it since I had gotten it back from Best Buy.

When I got to the Geek Squad desk I was greeted and asked how things were going with the Netbook. By this point most of the Geek Squad recognized me from my previous trips. They said that they thought it was the motherboard and had to send it in to be fixed.

A week or so later I got a call saying that they would do a "junk-out"....very telling phrase, "junk-out". Yes, you did sell me a piece of junk. They told me that I could get another Netbook that was the same cost. Of course, they don't normally carry that model so....I was told I could trade it for something comparable. I asked if I would have to pay anything additional since I had only used it a whopping 5 times since Black Friday because it has been in their possession most of the time. I was assured that I wouldn't have to pay as long as it was basically the same model. I was told to wait for the salesman so I did....for literally 35 minutes. Apparently the only guy in the computer department was also working the customer service desk. Thank goodness for Netflix on my iPhone. Woot! He showed me three models that I could choose from and helped me decide. We got to the paperwork part and then I was told that I owed $109. Ummm, huh? I thought I wouldn't have to pay anything additional. Sorry, not paying around $300 for a Netbook when I already have a laptop, desktop and iPhone. I was ok spending $170 + tax but not another $109 for something that I really didn't need. It was more of a convenience so...I got store credit instead.

With that credit I decided to get a Kindle to add to my eBook reader collection. I still have credit left to spend but I think I'll just hang on to it for now.

Pictures of our frozen/defrosting pond

Here are a few pictures that we took of our pond while it was frozen and also when it was slowly defrosting. Some of the pictures were taken with our phones so please excuse the quality.
It was kind of neat watching the pond defrost because the icy layer would remain intact, almost suspended in air, while the water level lowered beneath.
If you look closely you can see one of our fish.