Number 7 [Sesser-Valier Baseball]

SV junior high boys baseball is under way. The season is going okay - we're 4 in 9 and have won the last two games! Below are a few quick pics that I took. Unfortunately the games are all at four o'clock and since I don't officially get off work until five, I don't get to attend many of the games.

You need to keep your eyes OPEN to see the ball Johnathon!

.....and somehow he caught it anyway
ready to bunt
....prepping to steal a base (batter hit a pop and both Johnathon and the batter were out - Johnathon didn't have time to go back and tag up since he was to second when it was caught)
Diving to catch a ball.
Look how happy he looks here.

Also notice the runner on the right, it was a force out - all he had to do was TAG the base but instead he threw it to first just a split second too late. In his defense, this was the first time he'd ever played third base - not that the rules are different from second to third base.

Needless to say, gum was ban during ballgames after these pictures were taken.

Oh yeah that's during the middle of the game when he blowing bubbles attempting to throw out the batter at first!

If you live in the area and want to catch a game, here is the schedule for the rest of the season (all of the games are at 4pm and home games are at the VFW):

8/31 (Mon) at Unity Point

9/2 (Wed) Home v. Johnston City

9/8 (Tue) Home v. Hamilton County

9/10 (Thur) at Carterville

9/14 (Mon) at Zeigler

9/16 (Wed) Home v. Christopher

9/21 (Mon) Home v. Benton

Weekend Plans

I'll be headed out the door in a few sec's to take pictures. Three sessions throughout today, great news - beautiful weather - a little hot for me but anything over 80 is hot to me. Met with a new bride last night, now I need to get a quote together for her and make sure everything is in order for the three upcoming weddings in September/October.

Johnathon and the SV Junior-High Baseball team are in a tournament today. Don't know that I'll get to make any of those games, but I'll try if they win the first game which just got underway as I start this post.

Sometime this weekend I need to get the basement put 'back together' after the air conditioner/furnace became plugged up and LEAKED, soaking the basement carpet (just on my side of the basement of course). That job could take an entire weekend since I needed to organize and clean it before the carpet became saturated and dad/I had to quickly get everything up off the floor - which by the way is a lot of stuff. You don't realize how much stuff you have crammed into such a small area until you have to quickly move it all! Lost some of the paper products I had on the floor along with at least one of my shelving units (one of those cheap pressed wood ones - they soak up a lot of water and swell!)

Well, my clients are here so I must go now.
Have a great weekend, I'm off to shoot pic's.

Last Christmas

I was organizing my photo files, making disk copies of raw files, and starting the process of working on everything I need to edit.

Right before I went on vacation I downloaded all of the pic files from my many, many camera cards into a huge file - basically I just dumped everything there to deal with later. Well it's now later - I was moving these into their appropriate file location based on what the picture is of and ran across these, someone must have taken my camera to the nursing homes for the Christmas party in 2007.

Little did we now how much the world would change after this Christmas.....

Check out Dreanna

Be sure to check out Dreanna's pictures on my photography blog!

Book Review: Sookie Stackhouse Series

I've finished reading books 1-8 of the Sookie Stackhouse - Southern Vampire Series by Charlaine Harris. The first book was a little slow getting going as is with many books when the writer introduces the characters and the history that pertains to the upcoming plot. I must admit, upon reading the first book I was disappointed and almost didn't continue the series but since I bought the books in a set I figured I had them already and could muster enough strength to read at least one more.

I'm not disappointed in the decision to keep reading the series, things started picking up when half the book wasn't about the who and what aspect but rather the story in general. After the third book I was able to somewhat predict the general plot in the remaining books though. There were of course things that happened while reading the books that I wasn't expecting but the general flow of the book was predictable, more so in #7 and #8. So I was able to read them quickly.

I'll buy and read the 9th book, Dead and Gone, when it becomes available in softback. My interest isn't peaked enough to pay the cost of a hardcover book - I buy a lot of hard cover books if that tells you anything. Had I not read the Twilight Saga I probably would have found this series more interesting, but in comparison this series just doesn't stack up. Twilight was the first vampire series of books I'd read, I was surprised at the similarities in vampire traits between the two sets of novels.

In all I'd give this series 3.8 stars out of 5, it just wasn't 'enough' to warrant more stars. But on the up side it was a quick, easy read that was entertaining enough to get me to read 8 books in a short period of time. I would recommend reading the books, I just don't think it'll knock your socks off (you won't be calling me saying they're the best books you've ever read).

My other blogs

Be sure to check out my photography blog and decorating blog.
I was able to get a few new posts up today!

Here's a sneak peak at the photography blog!

I see the light!

The past two, rather three months have been a little hectic (all my own fault of course). I'll now admit, working full-time and decorating three weddings in two weeks was just a little much :) I have table decor for 12 tables to do for a 50th anniversary party this weekend and two photos sessions next weekend and then I think I'll have a couple of weeks off! I think I may take a few days off from work without having a reason to be off - ME days, I think I've earned a few of them.

My plans for the next month are to get a new dvd burner for the ole computer and start burning the heck out of disks with pictures so I can get them off my computer. It was brought to my attention a few weeks back that I'm OUT of hard disk space on my computer (and I have an 80gig hard drive!) I've been saving the raw pic file along with the edited pic files and I take a LOT of pictures and well my computer is completely full and bogged down with pictures. So I'm going to do some much needed maintenance to clean up the computer so I can edit all of the pictures from this summer.......I'm literally talking about several 1000 pictures - I told you I take a lot of pictures.

And while I'm not sitting on my butt in front of the computer, I've decided to 'make-over' the middle/big section of the barn. My decorating inventory has grown too large for the little garage in front of the house. I've considered renting storage space uptown or purchasing a pre-built storage shed but then realized that I'd spend just as much if not more on those two options and end up with much, much less space.

So I'm going to fix/replace all missing and or broken boards, build some shelves for storing vases/fabric/tablecloths/flowers/etc..., level the ground and pour a concrete floor, run some electricity (someone else will have to do this part - Dad), build a door, and possibly build a loft. The middle section is the tallest, as is with most barns, and there will be a lot of wasted space if we don't have a loft area - well, unless we hang things from the rafters - don't really see that as a option. I'll be sure to take before and after pictures when this project gets started. I love to remodel/redesign and build things and can't wait, of course once it gets started and feels like it will never end I doubt I'll be as excited about the undertaking.

Johnathon starts practice Monday for school junior high baseball. Which means that another series of baseball games (and pictures) will begin in a few weeks - about the time school starts.

My above to do list needs to be done before my next busy time which starts with a wedding on Sept 19th to decorate along with all floral, my 20th reunion (which I'm decorating of course) on Sept 26th which is also the Wine & Art Festival so I'll have to help at Mom's shop some, a wedding on Oct 3rd to photograph and help with some decor, and a wedding to decorate on Oct 10th along with all floral. Of course the quarter ends in September so in October I'll have to have the quarterly financials done once again also.

I have a feeling it's going to be 2010 very, very quickly!