"Groundhog Day"

Today was an unusually interesting day at the office. Someone left the the front door open to the main building, and as I was walking toward the bathrooms, I saw a groundhog running down the hallway. It made its way to the other end of the hallway, where it was cornered. Of course, I didn't get closer than a few feet from it, since it was scared and might become defensive. Eventaully, a maintenance worker came along with a broom to get it to leave through the door that was propped open for it. Of course, since I don't take my camera to the office, I don't have any cute pictures of the groundhog, but happy "Groundhog Day" anyway! Lol!

Working Woman

I'm now a working woman again, at least for a month. I have the opportunity to do temporary data-entry job for my mom at her office. I really enjoy staring at a computer all day :) Anyway, it's great to some normalcy in my life, meaning getting up every day and going to a job site like a "normal" person, lol! Anyway, I'm still getting used to waking up at 6:00 every morning. Speaking of which, I need to get off the computer and go to bed so I can be well-rested tomorrow morning, bright and early! Well, that's it for now everyone. Don't let the bed bugs bite :)

Pictures of "My Baby"

There will be some pictures I took of Arden while Allison was in town visiting this past week.

"Oh Deer!"

This summer, I have seen 2 fawns come into my backyard at least once a week or so since mid-July. They are fairly good-sized but still have many spots on their bodies. This evening, they came very close to the house and were eating the grass on the hill in the backyard. I went outside, but the deer heard me coming and bounded away. However, I was lucky enough to get a decent picture of one of the fawns, which I will post here soon. There were also 2 bucks lingering on the edge of the woods close by, probably from the same herd that the fawns are in.

"Going to the Temple"

Yesterday I went to the Raleigh Temple with some friends to perform an endowment session on behalf of a deceased person. Although you might have questions about teple ordniace work, I am not allowed to share details about it because of the sacred nature of temple work. However, I can tell you that it is a wonderful experience that Mormons enjoy. I have 2 pictures that I will post eventually: One of which has my friends in it and the other with me in it. Of course, one of my friends took the picture with me in it :)

It's A Scorcher!

Today was the hottest day of summer yet for us! It was almost 100 degrees! Well, that's it for this post :) Have a good night!

It's A "Relative" Thing for the Daniels Family!

This summer, we had a family reunion that I planned and organized for my dad's side of the family. It's been at least 20 years since some of my dad's cousins had even seen each other, and so it was a very rewarding experience for all my relatives and myself to have such a great event. The attendance was good and everyone had a really good time. The pictures I took will be posted below eventually. There aren't too many since my camera battery died during the reunion.

Playing "Catchup"

Today, I finally finished catching up with posting pictures for my previous postings, going back to Thanksgiving of 2008. So, check back to those postings and enjoy the pictures!

Happy 4th!

Happy 4th, everyone! Today was an interesting day for me. I went to the pancake breakfast that my church has every year.











"Frisbee-Football"

After breakfast, some of the young men played ultimate frisbee, which is a sport I like to call "frisbee-football" because it's a frisbee version of a simple football game. Even the missionaries were playing, which was fun to watch since they were running around in their suits and ties.






I took a couple of pictures of some families that were at the breakfast. The one with Gina and Scott Tucker's family is my favorite because they all wore matching Independence Day shirts.





Fun Fourth Festival


After the pancake breakfast, I went to my mom's house without any knowledge that she had gone out of town to New Bern for the holiday weekend to see Allison, Adam, and Arden. However, soon after I got back home, I was invited to spend the afternoon with Ryan and Kayla Allen at the Fun Fourth Festival in downtown Greensboro. The pictures are posted below.







The man in the picture below was singing to the people standing around his area. Notice the many CDs on the table!












Waterfalls Galore!

We got to see the waterfalls at this new park in downtown Greensboro. The picture above is a close-up shot of the water flowing down one of the waterfalls.



The picture below is that of Ryan and Kayla after getting all wet from running through one of the waterfalls, although they don't seem to look as soaked in the picture as they did in person, lol!



Kick-Boxing

While at the waterfall park, we saw some people kickboxing. Actually, they looked like they were pretending to fight, because they never made actual physical contact with one another. It was really cool to see!










Although it took forever to find a good parking spot, the festival was a lot of fun. Ryan and Kayla, thanks for taking me!

TTiimmbbeerr!!

This morning, I finally had a big dead white oak tree cut down. it was leaning really badly and would have broken a power line if it had fallen on its own.

.....BEFORE









.....DURING









.....AFTER






A couple of weeks later, some friends of mine from church brought chainsaws over and cut up as much of the wood as possible so that it could be piled up neatly. Good work guys!

First, the bishop and his family, along with the missionaries, came to cut and take some to burn for an upcoming church activity.

.....Cutting some wood

.....Cutting some more

.....Cutting some more

.....Finally, all done!






Then, a week later, the rest of the group came to clean up some more. One of the guys brought his Jack Russel-rat terrier mix with him. he was such a good dog except when he got in the road.






Good Job Guys!

Communing with Nature

The statement above is powerful to me because, for me, it is about God and Jesus, the 2 people who created all natural things.


My new friend Kayla Allen and I went to Bicentennial Gardens and the Bog Garden yesterday. We started out with a picnic lunch and then strolled through the park. Kayla made some really good sandwiches with ham, cheese, lettuce, pickles, mayonnaise, and whatnot. She enjoyed the chocolate that I brought along for dessert. Below is a picture each of Kayla and me at the picnic table. Of course, Kayla took the picture with me in it.










I took some really good pictures of the wildlife, pretty flowers, and statues.

Bicentennial Gardens



















"All Ducked Out"

The Bog Garden was my favorite because we were out of the hot sun and there were a lot, I mean A LOT, of mallard ducks and geese to watch. There were also tadpoles, chipmunks, and bowed trees. I even got a picture of a tree standing in the middle of the lake. The picture of the chipmunk that I took was taken in the Bicentennial Gardens, and so it is shown above.



This picture is the one with the tadpoles in it. They are the dark spots under the water.

This is my favorite picture with Kayla in it.









These are juvenile male mallards.






This is a goose family. The baby blends in with its dark surroundings.

A close-up of the baby. By the way, a baby goose is called a gosling.






A "floating" tree.


2 pictures of a yellow-eared slider turtle in the water.
This is a good picture of a stork.
A mother mallard with her baby. I was so close that I could have reached down to touch them if I wanted to!

A juvenile female mallard.


A full-grown female mallard sleeping.










Thanks for a fun time, Kayla! I look forward to doing this again with you sometime.