What Gates May Come

What Gates May Come

My mother's day gift to my wife is nearly done! I've finished installing all of the white pickets and the post caps. The only thing left to do is build and install the gates! So, now you know what I'll be doing this weekend.

Just so you know... those post caps are solar powered and illuminate at night. They look so beautiful once the sun has gone down. I'll try to get a picture of them at night. Needless to say, my wife is pleased.

Random Dove Though: The Message

There are times when I've gotten a little frustrated when what I want to say to someone isn't really related to their current post. Sometimes I just want to say something nice about them, their lives, their family, or what they do for a living.  And I've come to learn from trial and error that not everyone is keen on getting random private messages from people they don't know well. Heck, some people have turned off that feature altogether.

It's like this... sometimes I read things on someone's blog and it really strikes a chord with me... and it has more to do with the evidence of their personality, than necessarily what they posted. And it's those times that I wish there was a place on that person's blog to just share comments about the author... and the "chatboard" section just doesn't seem fitting to me. It's like Xanga's no-man's-land. I can't even remember the last time I checked or received a not on my chatboard. Ideally, I think it would be cool (and better) to actually chat with some of these people on Google, Yahoo, or ICQ maybe.

Maybe.

WORD TAG GAME

WORD TAG GAME

Got tagged by @olwd for this little challenge. Took me a little while to finally get around to completing it, but here it is.

BACKGROUND: There are certain words that we use and waste. The loosest and most prominent one is literally, which we say when we don't actually literally mean something. The word awesome has stepped down from being something great and terrible and powerfully and poignantly shocking to being synonymous with the word cool. And we are wasting the best words in the language so when we do mean awesome we cannot express it and say "speechless" which has lost it's meaning too.
In an effort to keep our small talk interesting and our anecdotes captivating, we have taken to using hyperbole. This is innocent enough in the execution but sometimes, to exaggerate, we do no exaggerate the events themselves but the adjectives around it, to make it seem more heartbreakingly tragic or brilliantly witting and exciting.)

CHALLENGE: So I have been challenged to find six words that I am destroying by trivialising their true meaning and then tag three people to do the challenge as well.

Here are mine:

1. ABSOLUTELY: Sure, I'll use this to express agreement. But most of the time it's simply a substitute for the word "Yes", which is not the way the word is to be used. For example, HER: "Would you like some candy covered kisses?" ME: "Absolutely!"
2. CLASSIC: I'm not sure how I managed to get this word's definition modified to include "a humorous retort or example". I'll shout, "Classic!" if someone gives what I might consider the best comeback line to an attempted insult, or if they call out a funny rebuttal to someone's bad attitude. Also, if I see someone getting out of a small car wearing a rainbow wig, I might chuckle and say, "Oh man, that's classic!"
3. NOTHING: I don't think I'm the only one guilty of using this word when I really should be saying "Nevermind." I think it just comes out when I'd rather not continue with a particular topic or conversation.

Okay, I won't tag anyone. But feel free to do this if you so desire!

I should have a post with more depth tomorrow... hopefully. I've been spending a lot of time completing the white picket fence for my wife. So, maybe I'll post an update and photos.

Before I Die...

Before I Die...

Has anyone ever heard of a global art project called "Before I Die..."? What started off as an experiment in New Orleans, has now grown global! Apparently, over 200 Before I Die walls have now been created in over 15 languages and in over 40 countries, including Kazakhstan, Portugal, Japan, Denmark, Australia, Argentina, and South Africa.

I admit that I didn't know anything about the project until I happened to drive past a wall on my way home from church on Sunday. My wife actually spotted it and said, "Hey! That's one of the Before I Die walls!" I said, "What?" and looked to see where she was pointing. And that's when I saw it... I was so moved by it that I turned the car around and parked so that I could get some photos of it.

If you are interested on the back story, check out the website HERE.

What do you want to do before you die?

Mother's Day (Updated)

For Mother's Day, the children made personalized Mother's Day Photo Booklets! <--- that link is to the website from where we sto... borrowed the idea.

Here's what the inside looks like...