Random Facts

I get ear infections easily, a trait I think I inherited from my father.  Johnathon had two baseball games yesterday and the high temp while we sat there from 11am until almost 4pm was only 50 degrees with a strong northern breeze.  I didn't feel well when I get up yesterday and should have stayed home/inside, I woke up this morning with an nasty ear infection - YUCK.

Johnathon made Varsity baseball, we (Sesser-Valier) co-op with Waltonville in football and baseball.  They play football at SV and for baseball we're the Spartans.  Here are a few pics from this season, when Johnathon gets to play it's typically in center field.  He's gets to pinch run most games (he's fast and likes to steal bases).  He can throw the ball from dead center to home without the ball hoping, meaning no bounce before it gets to the catcher.  He's #27, this is his freshman year and he's a 1/2 an inch shy of 6 feet tall.  We're not sure he's actually hit his growth spurt yet either!

His batting has improved this year.  Pretty sure the major part of the problem he had batting last year was due to an incorrect prescription in his contacts.  Amazing when you can actually see the ball, you have a much better chance of hitting it!

If I'm flipping through channels and find the movie Armageddon is on, about 97 times out of a 100 I'll watch it.  I always cry at the end.  I know Bruce Willis is going to die, but I still cry. (oh, it was on today and of course I watched it)

I HATE folding white socks.  Let me repeat that, I HATE folding white socks.  They tend to sit in a pile on the couch for a few days before I fold them.

Finding men's jeans in 28x33 is darn near impossible - Johnathon needs to gain a little in the waist!

I made blueberry muffins for breakfast this morning and shared one with my puppy.

I order from Schwan's about once a month.  If you haven't tried the "Roasted Baby Bakers" give them a try next time you place your order.  They're probably one of my favorite side dishes from there.  They cook up in less than 20 minutes in the oven on aluminum foil so clean up is quick too.

I think that's enough randomness for one day.  Hope you have a great week!

2011 Outdoorsman Handicap Deer Hunt Banquet

Around 30 years ago Gene Morgan and Dale Miller started the SV Outdoorsman Handicap Deer Hunt with the help from the US Corp of Engineers at Rend Lake.

In order to join the SV Outdoorsman each high school student has to participate in a number of activities that enhance both the community and the outdoors. They have to recycle 50 pounds of aluminum each year, get to go on the Walden Solo their junior year (have to camp by themselves for one night with only a pup tent and trail mix) and get the opportunity to help with the Handicap Deer Hunt each year. Both of my brothers and myself are proud alum of the Outdoorsman Club.

Johnathon was told he was joining the club his freshman year and 'if' he didn't enjoy it he didn't have to join the other three years.  I'm pretty sure he'll be an Outdoorsman all 4 years of high school.

On the Thursday night before the first weekend of shot gun season, the SV Outdoorsman throw a banquet for all the handicap hunters. The students (SV Outdoorsman) get the opportunity to meet their hunter, dinner is served, raffle tickets are sold, prizes are given away! While it's a banquet, it's casual dress - most are in either orange or camo.

On the picture strip the top picture is of senior Anthony Acosta showing Johnathon the ropes on raffle ticket sales - it's a complicated process!

When the banquet starts, all the Freshman are introduced. They're required to quote the Outdoorsman pledge in front of the packed gym and receive their orange hat - inducing them into the club.  The numbers in the club have been dwindling over the last couple years, but the Freshman class came on strong with 31 members!  There are only around 60 students in his whole class.  I hope they all stick it out through their senior year.

Multiple prizes are raffled off through out the night & a slide show of past hunts is shown.  Sesser-Valier is probably one of the only schools in the country that not only allows a gun in the school, but gives at least 3 of them to a student!  I think they gave away 5 or 6 guns this year at the banquet.  The big prize was a $2000 Benilli that the kids sold $5 raffle tickets for.  I've bought these tickets for approximately 25 years now and have yet to win.

Each student was required to sell at least 5 tickets, for each ticket they sold over that their name went in a hat.  A 22-caliber riffle was given to one of the students by a random draw for selling raffle tickets.  Some kids names were in the pot only 1 time, thanks to Johnathon's Aunt Amy and Uncle Michael - his name was in there about 60 times.  He was the top seller this year!  And as luck would have it....his name was drawn for the riffle!!

When I was in school, as long as you had your FireArms card with you then you could take the gun home.  Of course times have changed and in the state of Illinois I think you have a 48 hour wait and the gun has to be 'sold' by an authorized dealer.  Johnathon has never shot a gun, not because he wasn't allowed but simply because he never showed any interest.  When his name was called,
1 - I think Poppa Deaner and I were more excited and
2 - he was a little naive as to what was going to happen
 
On the picture strip above the first picture (on the left) is of he and Mr.Sample posing with 'his' new gun.  In the middle picture he attempts to walk back to our table with 'his' gun and you can see Mr.Sample telling him to hold on.  The last picture is Mr.Sample trying to explain to a confused Freshman why he can't take 'his' gun!  The crowd laughed, not sure Johnathon truly understood what was going on.

The Handicap Deer Hunt:
A couple weeks before the banquet, the Outdoorsman kids meet up early one Saturday morning and build ground level blinds for the hunters.  They carry bales of straw and use whatever they can find in the surrounding area to camouflage the blind.  The day after the banquet they have to be at deer camp at 3:30am to help pack up their hunter and get them to their stand. Most of the hunters are in wheelchairs or have limited walking mobility. Getting them across a field to a stand is sometimes quite a challenge. Once the hunters are situated, the Corp representative gives them their unloaded gun (hunters are not allowed to have a loaded gun while students are present).

The hunters call deer camp when they get a deer at which time the kids head back out, track the deer, field dress it and load it onto the hunters car for them. Being tired from not sleeping and then experiencing the sheer joy of seeing a hunter kill a deer for the first time since being handicap (thinking they'd never get to hunt again) is quite overwhelming on the emotions. The Handicap Deer Hunt is an experience they'll remember for the rest of their lives.

A season ending

Anyone who knows me, knows that I spend a lot of time at sporting events. When I was younger I enjoyed participating and playing sports but I attend now to support & cheer for nephews and nieces.

Another season of school-fall baseball is nearing an end. The last home game was earlier this week, one of the fathers gathered all the 8th graders after the game for a group picture. This group of 7 boys have been playing sports together since they were old enough to play organized sports......flag football, summer baseball, basketball, school/fall baseball, track....you name it, if it's considered a 'sport' they'll play. While I'm looking forward to watching them play football, I can't believe they'll be in high school next year! Front Row - Luke, Kaleb, Nick

Back Row - Johnathon, Jacob, Zach, Steven

They won some and lost some this year, but supported each other no matter the outcome of the game - they really are a great bunch of kids. I think the fact that they all attend church has something to do with it, but that's just my opinion.

We only have two more regular season games (one tonight, one Monday) and then the regional playoff's. Good Luck on the rest of the season Boys!! Of course I'll see you in a few weeks on the basketball court......oh, basketball starts Saturday, Oct 23rd. I wish there was a way to attend basketball without having to sit on bleachers, those things kill me by the end of the season - I know I'm getting old.

If you like to see some of the pictures of Johnathon click the link below:

CLICK HERE!!

There are galleries of the other players also or you can click on an individual game and watch the progess of pictures from that game on a slide show (shorten version of the game!). I only have about 1 1/2 games posted so far but hope to have more done this weekend - we'll see how it goes. Check back often, as soon as I get the baseball ones done I'll start in on basketball......a BIG THANKS to the coach for allowing me to sit on the field during the home games!! It's great not having to shoot through the fence.

Magazine Covers!

Katie's softball coach contacted me about creating magazine covers for the girls on her team (I'd been to several of the games and she knew I had pictures of all the girls). While making them for Katies team I also did one for Matthew.

You can see Katie's team HERE!

Thankful to those who have served

I hope everyone had a safe and happy Memorial Day. I started this post yesterday but the upload speed on the internet at home last night wasn't what it should have been and I therefore didn't get this post done.

We went to Maple Hill Cemetery in the morning for the annual Memorial Day ceremony. The SV Band march into the cemetery and play a couple tunes and then the VFW held their short ceremony with the presenting of the wreaths, 21 gun salute and taps.

You'll notice in the pictures below that the band is wearing bright yellow tee-shirts. I'm pretty sure my junior year in high school was the last year we wore uniforms to the cemetery on Memorial Day. Our uniforms were 100% wool and it was over 90 degrees that year with high humidity. We had either 6 or 7 kids pass out from the heat, even though the band director told us not to lock our knees - they did and down they went. The last to fall was the guy holding the cymbals who was over 6 foot tall. Once he fell (face forward with cymbals to his side - kind of like a nestle plug to the ground), Mr. Taylor made the rest of us take the uniforms off and I think that was the last year they wore them there.

For those who haven't been back to Sesser since my grandparents headstone was placed, here it is. My grandfather served in the US Navy!

Uncle, Shane Wheatley - US Army Front of the cemetery, entire frontage is lined with flags.....

Johnathon on the baritone.

Delmar Jones presenting the wreath.

21 gun salute (the little black specks are the shells flying in the air).

Stay Tuned....

I have a big announcement coming next week so stay tuned!!
After this announcement I'll be posting more to my blog too.

Life's been hectic as usual. Junior high track ended about a week ago, of course summer baseball has already been practicing for a month now. Every Sesser team kicks off the season with a home game next Saturday, May 29th. So if you're in the area, drop by the new fields you're bound to find at least one relative of mine there (oh yah, Sesser has 4 new ball fields wooo hooo!!!). I'll be the one behind the camera if you have trouble locating me! I have two nephews (Johnathon and Matthew) and one neice (Katie) playing ball this year. Have absolutely no idea how many cousins, if I happen to see them there great - but don't plan to hunt them all down.

I'm determined to get the pictures from baseball edited quickly and posted to my client viewing website.... http://pfphotography.zenfolio.com in the sports section. Be sure to check out the 1st grade basketball if you haven't seen them already. I'll have this years school junior high baseball posted on the client viewing website soon along with the basketball pictures from this year. Next year I'm not going to take 8000 junior high basketball pictures, they take FOREVER to edit. Speaking of that I've been checking out a few seminars that teach more efficient post editing procedures, I need this training in the worst way. If anyone that reads my blog knows of a good seminar to attend pertaining to this let me know.

I'll get pics posted soon from the Steak & Jazz night (Johnathon plays baritone), Chorus Spring concert and Band Spring concert. Tonight is the junior high awards banquet. I thought about skipping it but was specifically asked if I was going to be there to get pictures of him accepting his awards, so I guess I'm going after all. Sunday night is baccalaureate at the high school and graduation is Thursday. I have a cousin graduating and I'm decorating a party at the church for the 9 seniors from Hazel Dell (one of which is my cousin).

Well, I think that's about all I have to report right now. Burned my thumb on hot glue last night making silk floral arrangements for headstones. Since today is Grandma's birthday I did arrangements in none other than PINK for the two urns on her headstone and did matching arrangements for my dad's parents. Grandma's is getting one of the pink flamingo yard stakes from her birthday party that I still have. Also did red,white&blue arrangements for Shane Wheatley and Grandpa Shurtz for next weekend (Memorial Day). Johnathon will be marching with the band from the 4-way stop in Sesser out to the cemetery. I'll be sure to take pictures of the headstone for those living away from here who haven't seen it yet.

Sesser-Valier 1st Grade is Undefeated!

I got to rise and shine early this Saturday morning to attend a basketball game/tourney for the Sesser-Valier Devils 1st Graders and I thought my bleacher days had ended for the season....well, here is the events of the morning.

If you like to see more pictures from the game (there's only about 300 of them) be sure to check out my photography website - just click here.

Matthew had stole the ball from Waltonville (he's #2 by the way)

Oops, he doesn't quite have that dribble thing down yet and ran past the ball.

Defense, Defense

The one smiling in the front is Matt's buddy Michael E. Not sure what Michael found so amusing but he smiled through most of the game.

What more is there to say?
He was running so hard he couldn't stop and ran into his own player :D


Rebound....
Go Matthew Go

If you remember the pictures of Johnathon playing basketball, well I guess the tongue thing is an inherited trait - notice below that Matt's is sticking out.
Stole the ball

Wild dribble and lost the ball....
Give it to me, give it to me
They are only first graders and can't dibble well therefore they let the kids literally carry the ball. The ref's were really only there to make sure they're going in the right direction. Yet Matthew managed to get multiple fouls called on him.....hmmmmm

Not sure what this move is called
Celebrating Michael E (one of his best buds) breakaway lay-up. Good Job Michael!

......and the awards - each child received a metal (Sesser won both games!!)
Your victorious 1st grade Devils!
Great Job today Matthew and congrats on your two wins!

Outstanding Display!

So a few weekends ago I spent literally the ENTIRE weekend on Johnathon's Science Fair Project. I didn't have the pleasure of doing one of these in school so I spent an hour researching what he didn't know about the project online. Then several hours researching what he was suppose to research to write the paper and so on and so on. After helping him write the project paper, we got to start the fun part late Sunday afternoon - the display board!

His project was the effect of fertilizer on bean plant growth - exciting stuff!

The prep work....Johnathon planting the bean seeds and measuring the plant growth.

Just in case you were wondering the final results of the experiment......granular slow-release fertilizer grew the best. Which by the way was his hypothesis (pure guess on his part), I would have guessed the liquid fertilizer after reading all the research since we only measured growth for 4 weeks.

The planting, growing, measuring of the beans wasn't really my cup of tea. But once that was done and I got involved, come on -that display board is just a really big scrapbook page! Wish I would have got involved sooner and his display board would have really rocked! This was the best I could do on short notice.

"The Display Board"

Love the header that I hand drew a bean plant on???? You know you love it!

I was a little disappointed that I didn't take into account that the header slipped down on the board and I drew the one bean plant behind the board fold - won't make that mistake again next year. You can't see the roots of the plant on the right and the roots were the best part of the plant drawing.

.....and the results of our hard work - Outstanding Display!!!

When Johnathon called me to tell me how he/we did, after saying congrats my first question was "is that the highest reward given". His answer was nope, so-and-so got Best of Show. My response was that next year we're going for Best of Show then....Johnathon's response - "that's okay, outstanding display was good enough". Way to set goals there Spiff!

He was given a trophy and $20!

If you're friends with me on Facebook you've already seen most of this.....sorry for the repeat, but I had to share the great news again!

New Business Cards

New business cards I designed yesterday for my decorating company....

three design - front & back (info on the back is the same on each design)

Johnathon's last basketball game was Thursday night! Yeah!! My rear is ready for a break from the bleachers. Either I'm getting older or those bleachers are getting harder, pretty sure it's the latter and two to three games a week can really wear a person out. I created the business card below to hand out to all the basketball parents Thursday night. Now I need to get the 7000 plus pictures taken this season uploaded to my website so they can view/purchase them.
Johnathon informed me he doesn't like the picture, says he's making a retarded face. Oh well!

I decorated a Golden (50th) Anniversary yesterday - congrats to Bill & Judy Rea. Should have those pics up by the end of the week. It was beautiful needless to say. Aunt Eileen and I have done two bridal shows this month and I decorated a quarterly VFW Auxiliary meeting in DuQuoin the weekend between the bridal shows.

Good News - I don't have anything scheduled for this weekend!!! WooHoo! I don't think I have another decorating venture until May (it'll be a BIG one though) so my mother gets her living room back as soon as I get everything completely put away - needless to say she's happy for the break.

The first of the year is always a blast for accountants, not only am I trying to get 2009 financials completed I also have to get all of my spreadsheets redesigned for 2010 and do I ever use a LOT of spreadsheets! Plus our banks & company owners are requesting a forecast income statement for year-end 2010. Which means I have to look into my crystal ball and interpret the sales forecast into a working P/L, forecasting how much profit we'll have in 12 months based on what they 'think' they'll sell.

So after working late every night this week getting the accounting chores done, I'll be working on finishing Lindsey & Ben's wedding pic edits (better late than never....right?). I have all of the actual wedding done, just working on the formal/after-wedding pictures. I tried to up upload some tonight but my internet is running super slow.....

While editing basketball and Lindsey's wedding pics, I also need to get oh three or four afghans crocheted. I haven't crocheted much since having the carpal tunnel surgery. Hope I still can, time will tell. At some point in time I have to find time to SCRAPBOOK. I haven't been in the basement for 'ME' time in soooo long. If you didn't tell my mother happy birthday Thursday, you missed it - oops for you. Also, very happy to report that my Aunt Helen had a successful 4-bypass heart surgery week before last and is now at home and recovering. Well, I think that's all I have to report for now.