You may call me Monet

Last week I got a little bored, and someone told me about a 50% off sale that Hobby Lobby was having.

Hobby Lobby always has such good sales, I'm not sure what made this 50% off sale so exciting since they have one every other week, but I went anyway.

I was walking around looking at pretty things and dreaming of how my house someday could be decorated when I passed the paint section. This section has never before been a section of my desire, only a section of admiration and wishful thinking, but the little voice inside that usually says "golly, I wish I could paint" said "hey, you could totally paint! It might not look good, but who cares!"

So, I did it. I called Danielle for some paint advice and made my purchase. I also got some chalk board paint (which you can paint on a canvas to make it like a chalk board).

After a couple days of toiling over what to paint, how to paint, and wondering if this was going to be something that I would look back on and think "Now Allye, did you REALLY think you could paint. Now, come on", I finished painting.

And guess what! I'm pretty dern pleased. I'll admit that I am no natural born arteest, and I most definitely don't have the talent that can make someone say "oooo ahhh", but maybe "hey, that's kinda cute". I think that if I thought about someone saying "hey that's kinda cute" to something I painted before this experience, I would accuse them of lying or "being polite".*

Anyway, you can be the judge:

This is the "chalk board", I got this idea from Danielle, she has one in Jameson's room, minus the swirly green design.

I'm happy. I even might paint again someday.

Here's some art humor to brighten your day:

A guy in Paris robbed the Louvre, he got past security but got caught when his van ran out of gas. When asked how he could mastermind such a crime and then make such an obvious error, he replied: "I had no Monet to buy Degas to make the Van Gogh."

*I realized after writing this sentence that I have used a ton of quotation marks, and am not sure how grammatically correct that is. Also, I think it might make me look like a crazy person that talks to myself a lot. That may or may not be true.

Ohhhklahoma

This past thursday I got the privilege of visiting my friends Danielle, Lance, and their baby Jameson for the weekend. It was so good to see them. We had a lot of fun together riding the Vespa (and meeting the egg man from Napoleon Dynamite), eating gelato, chilling with the kid and watching Willy Wonka. Jameson is getting big, and is still so stinking adorable.


It was a fun trip. Seriously, how could you not enjoy staring at that precious face and pouty lips all day long?

Me and My Monkey

It's been a good couple of days.

Lauren's home, and we're all happy 'bout that. Sad that she's leaving again.

We went and saw a pretend Beatles band called me and my monkey at the park one night. They were good, and it was fun.

My Algebra teacher is quirky and old.

My first history test is tomorrow. We'll see how good I am at teaching myself things.

I just downloaded the new Leeland album, and I love it.

:)

Have a happy week.

Sweet Ukraine

My computer's screen saver is set to run through all my pictures. Today I came into my room and saw 3 pictures in a row from Ukraine. It prompted me to go and look through my whole file of about 300 pictures, and made me miss it. Just this past week we received an update from Oleg, the man who founded Radooga (the ministry that runs the camps in Ukraine). This update was explaining all the new, exciting things happening there. You see, Oleg's vision was to change his country (Ukraine) by impacting children of important people in society (politicians, wealthy business men, etc.) by having camp where kids can come to learn english. Not only english, but the gospel. This ministry has had a huge success, hundreds of kids have come to know Christ every summer. Not only do they minister during the summer, but also do retreats and such during the year to help build the church...it's really awesome. Anyway, things have changed. Radooga is now doing camps for orphans. Equally awesome to what they were doing before, just so different. I'm not sure why I have felt the need to tell you about all this, I think it's because I am so excited about the future of Radooga, I'm excited about all the lives they have touched, all the people they have helped lead to Christ and SO excited that so many children who have never known love will get the chance to know a love like no other! It's so awesome. If you get the chance go check out their website and read about what's going on there ( http://www.radooga.com/ ). Pray for them.

Ukrainian chicken heads anyone?

wahoo

On Thursday, me and the 15 people I have grown to love and depend on took our final Chemistry test. Even after finding out that I didn't do that well on it, I experienced a sense of relief that I can only describe as pure joy. I'M DONE! And not only that, I actually survived it...I am still alive! Although, now I am plagued with the thoughts that come to my mind when I read the ingredients in yogurt, "Tri Calcium Phosphate"..."I wonder what that empirical formula would look like" or "hmmm, I bet that had a nice Lewis dot structure". I'm sure that will stop in due time. The day that I hear the word mole and think of a furry little creature, I will know that I have returned to normal.

Monday, I start my next two classes, history and algebra. I think (and hope) that these will be less of a challenge.