Meet Me At The Fair

We came home from Leavenworth on Wednesday -- which happened to be the opening day of one of my favorite summer activities: The North Idaho Fair and Rodeo. While it was obviously not possible to go on Wednesday, I was able to spend a good part of the day at the fair on Thursday. This summer I did an internship with the children's department of the local library, and so I spent Thursday morning at the fair helping the library with a kid's booth. We had three crafts for the kids to do -- they could paint, decorate a treasure box and make a kaleidoscope. It was fun, but it would have been even more fun if the weather had chosen to cooperate! Instead of sunny skies and warm weather that should be expected at the fair, we experienced torrential downpours and hurricane-strength winds. Okay, so maybe I am exxagerating a little bit, but not by a lot! If you click on the picture, it will make it bigger and you can see all the rain pelting the fair! That's the library booth I took a picture of.

Instead of waiting out the oncoming storm under our little tent-sheltered-by-a-few-haybales, I ran over to the nearest building -- which happened to be the cow and pig building. So, I spent 20 minutes in the barn with the cows watching and listening to the sound of the rain, hail and wind. Oh. . .and it was pretty cold, too! But. . .it was fun to spend time with the library at the fair -- and I got in for free, so it was pretty awesome!

The weather stayed damp most of the day, but I went back to the fair in the evening anyway. This time I went with a couple friends from work. Which was awesome. Of course. :-) We walked around the entire fair, looking first at the Home Arts building (and admiring the amazing quilts and clothing items that had been entered). We wandered next over to the photography rooms so that we could see how my entries did. Yes, that's right. . .I entered six photographs in this year's fair. I did not place with any of them, but it was fun to see my photographs on display. :-) We got caught in a rain storm once or twice while walking between buildings, but it wasn't too bad. There was an amazing rainbow at one point. After looking at my photography we headed to the Culinary Arts building to check out all the cookies and food items my mom had entered. She got second place for her Rhubarb-Mixed Berry Pie. :-) And she placed with some of her other entries, too. There were lots of other things to see, too: chickens, roosters (the one in the picture practically posed for me to take his picture!), rabbits, horses (including some AMAZING draft horses), cows, pigs, and my least favorite: the reptile room. Ick. Look at this creature I got a picture of. The picture even freaks me out!! :-) There were also some beautiful flowers and vegetables on display. It was quite late by the time we finally finished looking at everything and walking around the carnival part of the fair (I refuse to ride those rides, though!).

I sure do love the fair, and I can hardly wait for next year!!!

Leavenworth, or Bust!

As I mentioned in my last post, I was able to go on two vacations this summer. . .in a one week period! It was a busy week, but I had an absolute blast. Of course, as you might have guessed, I took an overabundance of pictures on these various adventures, and I thought it might be fun to share some pictures with you all, as well.

The first part of the week was spent in Leavenworth, Washington with my mom and grandmother, who was visiting from Missouri.

Leavenworth is a small Bavarian village nestled amongst the mountains of central Washington. It is north of George, Washington (yes, that is a town!). It's about 4 hours away from CdA, so it was a decent drive. We arrived in town and promptly checked into our hotel room which featured a cute little teddy bear sitting on the bed. I immediately fell in love with said teddy bear, and being quite tired I promptly fell asleep on the bed.

Yes, I adopted a bear from the hotel as a Leavenworth souvenir. :-)

We did a little bit of shopping on the first day, but not too much -- we wanted to save some for the next day! See, Leavenworth is full of stores to shop in. . .and so it was great fun! Eventually we saw all of the stores on the main street in this cute little town. There were some interesting stores! One store was a nutcracker store. . .and boy were there a lot of nutcrackers!

We did a lot of window shopping, eventually buying a few things. We ate some interesting cuisine, and I tried Italian gelato for the first time. It was really, really good. I tried blueberry and pink guava. Yum!

On Tuesday evening we put on some warmer clothes, grabbed our blankets, and headed into the hills to watch an outdoor production of The Sound of Music. The show was excellent, with the cast singing from the hills as was appropriate to the story. The music was, of course, amazing, and the play was well acted and produced. They performed to a full house, even though there was a sprinkling of rain during the second half of the performance!

Do, a deer, a female deer.
Re, a drop of golden sun.
Me, a name I call myself.
Fa, a long, long way to run!
So, a needle pulling thread.
La, a note to follow So.
Te, a drink with jam and bread. . .
. . .and that will bring us back to Do!

It was a fun trip, and I was grateful for the chance to spend time with my mom and my grandmother. I think we all enjoyed the time away! :-)
On the way home we stopped at the Liberty Orchards factory to find out how Aplets and Cotlets are made. Aplets and Cotlets are basically a version of Turkish Delight. The process was pretty cool to watch!!!

Leavenworth is a beautiful town, and my pictures could not begin to do it justice. . .I enjoyed going there and seeing the town!!

What I Did For My Summer Vacation. . .

It's official.

Summer is over. School started on Monday.

Yes, it was a bittersweet moment to walk into my first class of the semester. On the one hand I am excited: this is my senior year in college, and if all goes according to plan I should be walking across the stage to receive my diploma on May 3, 2009 (which is in less than 250 days, by the way!). However, on the other hand, going back to school means that I have less free time, I can't work as much, and my life is consumed by something known as classes and homework. Now, don't get me wrong. . .I enjoy school (as much as I might whine, complain, and cry about it at times!). . .but homework gets frustrating (and sometimes boring!) at times. . .and I will admit it:

I am one of the worst procrastinators in the world.

(don't comment on that!)

Yes, folks, it's true. I, Laura, am a procrastinator. For example, I am writing this blog entry when I suppose I should be reading all about the wonders of communication research. Can you see why I put it off?! :-) Anyway, all this to say that one of my goals this semester is to stay right on top of things so that I don't maintain my procrastinator reputation. :-) (disregard the fact that I say that every semester!)

This semester I am taking 12 credits: Senior Research Project, Mass Media, Leadership and then I am getting 3 credits for being the Activities Chairperson for the Associated Students of Lewis-Clark State College, Coeur d'Alene. Pretty nifty, huh? That title makes me sound all official or something like that. . .anywho. . .

As I said at the beginning of this post-that-didn't-quite-go-the-direction-I-intended-it-to, summer is over. However, I am quite pleased to inform all of you wonderful readers that I did enjoy the summer a LOT! I was able to spend lots of time with friends -- I spent time with friends at the lake, at the park, at the fair, in the car, while eating ice cream, while playing Dance Dance Revolution and Wii Sports, and many other places with many other activities!

Of course, some of the highlights of the summer occurred within the last week! You see, that is when I was finally able to go on vacation. Let me point out that I rarely go on vacation, partly because it can be expensive, partly because I have to have a place to go and people to go with! Well, this summer it worked out for me to go on not one vacation, but TWO! The fun part is that they both occurred in the SAME WEEK! It sure was fun taking the week off work and exploring places I had never been before. . .but I won't share all the details. . .I have lots of pictures from my two adventures, and I will write separate entries for each trip!

Oh yes. . .I also entered six pictures in the county fair this year. I didn't place, but that didn't surprise me because photography is a highly competitive category with some AMAZING entries! It's mostly just fun to enter the pictures and see them at the fair!

Well, I think that is all for this update. . .thanks for checking in to my blog. . .and I hope I will be more consistent in my updates, now that school is in session and I might have something interesting to blog about! For now, it's off to the books, so that I will have time to spend hanging out with friends, hopefully in the near future! :-) See ya!

A Wonderfully Fabulous Week

Summer is a time for having fun and hanging out with friends. This past week has been full of fun times with friends!

It all started last Sunday. My friend Britney's wedding was fast approaching, and last Sunday we decided to surprise her with a little "bachlorette" party. Because Britney had several bridesmaids coming from out of town, we waited until they were all in town to have the party. We met ahead of time, carpooled over to Britney's house, surprised a very unsuspecting bride-to-be and took her on a scavenger hunt all over town. We wound up at her fiance's family's house where we played some games and made her bake a cake from scratch with no recipe. :-) That's Britney in the picture above, ready to bake that cake! Then, we ventured over to Dockside at the CdA Resort for some of their famous "gooeys." The night was definately filled with lots of laughter. . .and my car was also filled with the delightful strains of the Enchanted soundtrack. :-)

Then. . .last Monday I went to see Wall-E with some of my friends. While I can't say I particularly loved the movie -- I was disappointed and had expected better -- I really enjoyed the time spent with friends. Ironically enough, the evening ended with another trip to Dockside for more gooeys. :-) The picture is of the gooey that I shared with a friend. It was the Reese's Peanut Butter Cup gooey. . .and that's just the personal sized one!

On Wednesday some of my girl friends and I met for our weekly small group. This week we decided to meet downtown where we got dinner at the Pita Pit and ate our pitas overlooking the lake. We then headed to a friend's house where we sat in the hot tub talking for at least a good hour. Unfortunately, I did not take any pictures. Oh well.
On Friday night I went downtown with another friend and we walked around Tubb's Hill. It's a beautiful hill with some amazing views of the lake. Of course I was going crazy taking way too many pictures of the view. I guess I'm a cameraholic. . .I take entirely too many pictures (my apologies to anyone who is with me when I get on a picture-taking spree!). Anyway, I took lots of pictures of the water, and then we sat by the lake feeding the seagulls with leftover bread from work -- the seagulls thought they had died and gone to seagull heaven! :-) The picture above is a picture that I took up on Tubb's Hill. It's really a beautiful place. . .
Saturday was my friend Britney's wedding. . .and what a beautiful wedding it was. . .the ceremony was beautiful, the dresses were beautiful, the bridesmaids were beautiful, and, of course, the bride was radiant. It was a Cinderella wedding, through and through, and I honestly should not have expected anything less. *happy sigh* And, I didn't catch the bouquet *sigh of relief.* Catching it once is enough, thank you! :-) The picture above is a picture of Cinderella walking down the aisle with her father. :-)

So, yes, I would say it was a fun week. . .I made some new friends, and spent time with old ones. . .and that, my dear readers, is a wonderful thing!

So. . .how was your week?!

I Have Decided. . .

Well, okay, so I didn't just decide this, but I have recently confirmed my decision that. . .

. . .I love Josh Groban and Michael Buble. :-)

Seriously. Listen to their music. I bet you'll love it, too.

Listen Carefully. . .

Listen. . .very carefully. . .do you hear anything?

That's right. My blog currently now has music! I don't know how long I'll keep it on there, but for now, we've got sound. :-)

Comments?

God Bless America!

Oh, say, can you see, by the dawn's early light

What so proudly we hailed at the twighlight's last gleaming?

Whose broad stripes and bright stars, thro' the periolous fight,

O'er the ramparts we watched, were so gallantly streaming?

And the rockets' red glare, the bombs bursting in air,

Gave proof thro' the night that our flag was still there.

Oh, say, does that star-spangled banner yet wave

O'er the land of the free, and the home of the brave!

Have a wonderful Fourth of July!!!