thirty-three

it's funny the things you care about. i've always gotten a card from my parents on or before my birthday. for some reason, i was a bit disappointed that it hadn't come and i kept telling aaron it was freaking me out. "well, you got cards from everybody else," he told me. it's just not the same. so after dinner i called brian to find out what was going on. emailed my dad saturday night to inquire. then comes sunday morning and the e-card arrives, an explanation from my dad and the snail card arrived today. all is back in sync and i realize how much i enjoy tradition. also, one good thing about getting older...got 33 bucks in my card! thanks dad!!

sleepy hollow

unfortunately the weather has put a damper on our zipline plans. it's about 20 degrees colder today than it has been all week. plus it's rainy and just a little foggy. just a tad.

a rude girl

urban dictionary defines a rude girl as a dedicated ska fan, with a sense of history, style of the ska scene, also known as rudi, roody, rudy, etc. traditional of the "rude boy/girl" is clothing similar to that of the swing dancers of the 1940’s or that of the historic gangsters akin to al capone.

just to clarify the blogger name. i'm not impolite, just a fan. i guess i should also define ska.

ska: three different types: "traditional", "2-tone" and "3rd wave". traditional came about in the late 1950s as new dance music straight out of jamaica. 2-tone is named such because whites and blacks came together to form ska bands to spread unity in the 1970s. 3rd wave is when ska hit america in the late 1980s, and added a bit of punk flair.

you say it's your birthday

i admit, i have somewhat of a handbag fetish. luckily i've kept it in check. keeping the bags and the pricetags to a minimum. i was searching ebay for some craft supplies. looking mainly for paddle punches, to be used for my felt creations. after finding a few, i went off on a tanget and typed "tattoo" in the search engine. (i occasionally look up tattoo-inspired artwork, another fetish.) and i came across this handbag. *insert me drooling here!

i can't remember what the bidding was up to when i first came across it, but i do know that it sold for $400. definitely too rich for my blood. i had never heard of the designer, isabella fiore, so i started doing a little research. i thought it might be selling so high on ebay cause it was hard-to-find. that was the case, that and the fact that most of the bags retail between $600-$800. i actually like most of the bags i've seen in her collections, so i'll be on the lookout for a reasonably priced bag. i think i'll be looking for a long time. my birthday's tomorrow, if anyone's still looking for that perfect gift! ;)

in my research, i came across this site: bagborroworsteal. where you can rent a designer handbag for a week/month at a time. i remember seeing this on the big idea and thinking how ridiculous a concept it was. i guess if you're really trendy and have to be seen with all the latest, it's perfect for you. paying $100 to borrow a bag for a month, not gonna happen here.

yes, tomorrow is my birthday. yesterday aaron told me he actually has something planned. drum roll....and this is what it is! all i can say...i have an awesome husband!

feedburned search of the day: "how do you like my balls in your face?"
and this is what they found. i should probably be a little more careful with the titles of my blogs. ha, ha.

feedburned

i added feedburner to my site a few days ago, mainly to give people the option of subscribing to my blog. i like having all the blogs i read on my front page, that way i don't have to click through to know if they've been updated. luckily, gmail lets me grab feeds without subscribing, but i wanted to have another option for those who don't use the program.

as an added bonus, feedburner also keeps track of the traffic that comes to your site. where visitors are from, how they got there, what they looked at and what they clicked on. i even know the operating system they used and the screen resolution of their computer. it's my mini form of "big brother." i'll share a few of my stats.

stats for yesterday:
wednesday, march 26: 15 visitors (73.3% new), 26.7% direct, 33.3% searches, 40.0% other sites, average time spent 2:15 on site
visits from: severn, mountain view, pleasant grove, ferndale, london, san francisco, jakarta, auckland, saint louis
what they searched for to reach my site: "site:rudegirl.blogspot.com," "westphal family blog," "nautical star tattoos," "sweet wiis"

it's always interesting to see how someone reaches your site.

bottlecap craft

it's been awhile since i actually posted a craft project. and since i need to get back in the swing of things i'd thought i'd start here. i found this tutorial online a few weeks ago and went to town collecting and making bottlecap pincushions. the caps are the ones you'd find on a 16 oz. plastic bottle of soda. yet another recycling craft.

easy, fun, and a small help to the environment.

most valuable pet

a few weeks ago i entered marley in the bissell most valuable pet contest. i kept seeing the commercial on tv and thought she'd be a perfect mascot. i guess thousands of other pet owners thought the same thing. well, i just got a email letting me know it's time to vote. here's the photo i cropped as her entry. vote for miss marley today!

facespace

i've been avoiding facebook, mainly because i don't see the need for another social networking program. i'm pretty happy with myspace as my social hub and occasionally i'll check my facebook account to get an update on friends who don't myspace. yes, i have one along with a hundred other miscellaneous accounts out there. i also found that facebook is not-so-user-friendly. at least for me. i really don't like all the "bling, bling" facebook has. giving people gifts, the wall, the super wall, comparing everything. it just seems more annoying to me than anything. but alas. i'm starting to convert. i've got a stack of friends only on facebook and ones that are only on myspace. so i find myself spending equal amounts of time at both. why can't we all just use one...and we'll call it facespace. i found this pic on facebook. too funny.

long week short post

i've been meaning to post about the rest of our disney weekend but with company in town i just haven't had the time. now i'm playing catch-up. i think i'll just summarize the rest of the trip with photos. disney photos.

we both had a lot of fun. it was a bit chilly the first few days we were there. i wore my app. state sweatshirt pretty much the whole time. we found that hitting the parks early and using the fast pass system we didn't have too long a wait for most rides. i think the longest we waited was for splash mountain only because we had a fast pass for space mountain and we really wanted to get in as many rides as possible so we stood 45 minutes in line. it's funny cause i thought disney had more rides than they actually did, at least adult rides. maybe cause everything is spread out over four parks with three or four major rides at each park it seemed sparse. my favorite was the new aerosmith rocknroller coaster and aaron's was the tower of terror both at disney's hollywood studios. we'll have to go back again, we weren't able to spend much time at animal kingdom. with spring training games in the middle of each day we had to plan accordingly and we only had a morning to spend there. our main objective was to ride the new everest coaster, but when we got there it seemed like it was everyone elses plan too.

spring training was a great experience. cardinals weren't looking too hot though. they played the atlanta braves and lost both games. they've practically got a whole new team. i found myself asking, "who's that and where's he from?" a lot during both games. unfortunately with our new location the only time we can see the redbirds play is if it's against cincinnati. aaron was contemplating getting a satellite dish just to watch games this season. i think he might just wait til the team is in better shape all-around.

the day after we got back from disney, nate and katie arrived from illinois. it was their first trip to the high country and i have a feeling it won't be their last! we got some fly-fishing in. katie actually caught a rainbow trout in the first 20 minutes we were out there. aaron, danny and i have been fishing a countless number of times and none of us has ever reeled in a thing. so kudos to katie for her catch. to sum up the rest of the weekend...wii, shopping, hiking, drinking and tapas! we all had a blast. matt, kristin, max and grandma westphal are heading up here saturday. we've got a little bed and breakfast going on here now!

yesterday we took bosco in to get a little snip-snip. yes, i decided in order to curb his pee problem we had to be a little aggressive. i quickly regretted the decision when we had to drop him off, but he's home now and doing great. i decided to post a pic of the two of us from a few months ago. hopefully our problem is solved.

blogging molly

we actually had a direct flight from charlotte to orlando. i don't remember the last time we didn't have to transfer planes to go anywhere. that put us in florida at 2 p.m. friday. we checked in at our hotel. a doubletree suites close to downtown disney. hung out there for a little while then decided to walk the 20 minutes to downtown disney.

aaron had looked up shows before we left and saw that flogging molly was playing at the house of blues. what a great way to start our weekend we both thought. luckily he bought tickets online because when we headed over there we saw it was sold out on the marquee. we both were surprised at how popular they had become. danny had mentioned they would be signing autographs at the virgin megastore across the way from the show so we stopped by there to check it out. there were two members still there when we arrived. just chatting with fans. we had planned on getting one of their new cds signed for dan but we thought it was a little cheesy to walk up to one in the middle of his conversation and hold out a cd for him to sign. plus we had no clue who the band members were. we know who the singer is and that's about it. and he certainly wasn't one of the two standing there. we decided to just head over to the show and get a bite to eat before it started.

unfortunately, aaron had a bit of a stomach bug and really wasn't feeling the flow of food or show. it's really unusual for him to get sick, especially while on vacation. he stuck it out and ended up having a good time. i had decided not to bring a purse, so i had had my i.d. and camera in my back pocket. little did i know, there was a restriction on cameras at the venue. i tied my sweatshirt around my waist to disguise the fact that i had it. metal detector found it and i ended up having to pay $2 to check my camera at the door. otherwise i would have had to go all the way back to the hotel to drop it off.

once inside the first band was already playing. "i think the flute player is japanese." aaron said. "i think the whole band is asian!" i said. it was the cherry cokes. it was very weird seeing japanese people playing irish music. they rocked it though. next was the reverand peyton's big damn band. they were okay. they sounded like primus but with a washboard. finally flogging molly took the stage and they absolutely brought the house down. it was so great seeing a show with so much energy. both of us were bouncing around, chanting and singing along. it was an awesome show to start the weekend with. since i got my camera confiscated i had to use aaron's cell phone to take pics. being it was a dark club, none of the photos came out but this one. yes, i have this strange desire to take photos while urinating. it's my thang. i might have to continue my toilet obsession gallery.

back from madness

we're back from our disney/spring training/flogging molly jam-packed weekend. i thought i'd be blogging nightly after we returned home from the day/evening activities. unfortunately, we didn't have internet access in our hotel room, or at least free internet. plus i was completely drained to even "blog now post later." hopefully i can update tomorrow before nate and katie arrive. yeah, we're both excited about their arrival. even more photos to come.

another interpretation

i got a sweet tin in my last swap. it's always interesting to see how different people interpret the same theme. i'm slowly acquiring a little "day of the dead" collection to add to my craft room decor. i love the detail in this one. i'm always amazed at the different things you can do with polymer clay. always learning and feeding the mind's eye.

i also loved all the content she included. i'll have to figure out a way to incorporate all the cute little charms into a unique and different necklace. some nice eye candy. i'm still searching the net for some inspiration. i don't want to start a new hobby, but it's always nice to look.

i'm in a bit of a funk lately. hopefully our trip to florida this weekend will get me back in the groove. aaron is completely pumped. disney and cardinals baseball = his dream vacation. we got our spring training package in the mail a few weeks ago. they only promised tees, but they delivered so much more. it had cardinal t-shirts, hats, baseballs, messenger bags, pins...and so much more. i was quite surprised that they sent so much. i need to get a pic of aaron sporting all the gear. maybe i'll do that tomorrow.