http://www.studiobead.com/events.php

This is pretty much all I have time to say right now, and it pretty much explains why I haven't been around here much lately! Must go to bed. I hope you all have a lovely Fourth of July weekend-- this is one of my favorite times of year. I still miss the endless supply of fireworks and hanging at grandmas and grandpas and riding my bike out to the firework stand.

Le sigh.

We got back from camping earlier today, and I feel accomplished in that I unpacked and put everything away already-usually I have at least one bag that remains unpacked for days. This was my first camping trip where I wasn't in a KOA campground complete with showers and restrooms, so my fear of outhouses and the dark woods quickly subsided based purely on necessity.

One of the guys bought lightsabers for the three guys. Here Brandon smugly shows off his new toy.


"Sweet! I haven't been this excited since Christmas 1989!" says Brandon.


Bran expresses his happiness through a dramatic re-enactment of Scene 83, Star Wars: Return of the Sith

Sometimes I like to pretend like I'm posing for senior pictures.

Some handsome guy posing for a picture in a cowboy hat.


The pine cones on the dead trees look like they should be part of a black and white photo- I was fascinated by the color and shape.


It was my friend Cara's birthday. I learned that cupcakes and camping coolers are not a great combo. In spite of the messed up frosting from the upside-down cupcakes, they still tasted good.


Justin, Brandon, Nicki and Cara. Justin and Cara are married and both work with me at ADP. Cara is from Florida, and makes fun of me for saying "Yeah" in true mid-west drawing out the vowels style. In turn, I make fun of her for saying "Y'all." Justin and Brandon like The Lord of the Rings and Star Wars and quote Will Farrell lines.

I recently did two Saturday markets in Denver on back to back weekends, being more used to doing one event every 3 months, so I feel like time has stopped and I've got a to-do list 3 miles long! We're going camping with friends this weekend, so I'm currently procrastinating packing in order to update my poor neglected blog. I think the last time I camped was probably nearly 4 years ago, so I'll probably take lots of photos and enjoy one too many s'mores.

Some randomness:

Coming upon my 29th birthday soon. I feel at peace with being a year before 30, mostly because 40 is the new 30. The only part I regret is the whole metabolism slowing thing- otherwise, I say bring it on, babe.

I am strangely fascinated with the whole Tom Cruise/Katie Holmes fake relationship. It bugs me, yet I've spent hours researching the faux PR stunt they're spewing. I wanted to boycott both of their movies this summer in protest, but my sweet boyfriend helped me with my jewelry booth at the market the past two weekends, so I owed him bigtime. I can now add Tom to my list of celebs I loathe. Tom joins J-Lo, Paris Hilton, Catherine Zeta-Jones, Ashley Simpson. Oh, I could go on- but alas, I must do some more packing.

Ahh, I ove thugs who wear manclaces.

take me out to the ballgame...

We had a great time at the Rockies game last night. The Rockies won, which always makes attending a game that you as a general rule care little about more exciting. And what a great excuse to indulge in footlongs with the works, peanuts, and ice cream sundaes. Viva la whipped cream!

Here's Brandon, enjoying his footlong bratwurst, complete with saurkraut and onions/peppers.

Here's me enjoying my ice cream sundae in a mini plastic Rockies baseball hat. This thing had to have been topped with an entire bottle of Reddi-Whip.

Here's me and Becki taking post-game photos, much to the chagrin of the a-hole on the right-hand side of the photo. He kept glaring at us as though we were going to count to three and each take a side and make a run for the field or something. Or maybe he thought we were drunk like 90% of the adult crowd there were. In any case, I didn't appreciate the stares, buddy, and mostly didn't appreciate when you told my boyfriend to "Just make it snappy" when he asked if we could go down field and take photos with the Rockies purple dinosaur mascot Dinger.

P.S. We didn't get to take photos with Dinger, and thank you for runining my life.

I'm working on some manklaces today.

I've only made about 3 guy necklaces out of the few thousand I've made, and I'm suddenly inspired to create some after seeing how dashing Brandon looks with a necklace on. I'll take pictures if they turn out.

Today's flying lesson was cancelled due to rain, so instead, Bran and I are going to head down to the Silver Grill for warm coffee and the best cinnamon rolls in town. I think mostly all of my friends and family who have ever visited know the Silver Grill in Old Town. They were supposed to have an old time car show down there, but are probably rained out. I have this new appreciation and empathy for those folks. There was also supposed to be the first-ever Fort Collins renaissance fair along I-25, but I'm thinking that it's probably pretty cold and muddy out there as it's not the normal on-and-off sprinkles of rain we normally get- it's full-on pouring! If I was nice I'd grab a garbage bag makeshift poncho and go out to the renaissance fair to give hugs to all the booth owners, because sometimes you just need a hug when you've planned for months and Mother Nature has her own plans for the day.

Okay- must dash, because I'm not ready and Bran's supposed to be here in about 6 minutes. Happy Saturday!