Avatar blues??? Are you serious?!

Ok, so get this. I just read on yahoo how people are reporting that they are suicidal after watching the movie Avatar because they want so badly to be on the unreal planet with the unreal characters. Really??? That's like saying you're suicidal after watching Willy Wonka because you'll never be able to visit the chocolate factory. Really people? Some people are calling it "Avatar Depression Syndrome." Once again I say ARE YOU FREAKING KIDDING ME?! If you can't distinguish movies from real life and just enjoy the imagination and creativity of writers and directors then maybe you shouldn't be going to the movies or maybe you should be seeing a psychiatrist. There are more important issues out there right now and I'm pretty sure the families of people who have lost loved ones in Haiti right now would be appalled that that even showed up as one of yahoo's headlines.
It's absolutely ridiculous.....check it out http://www.theweek.com/article/index/105003/Avatar_depression_syndrome

Fill your friends love buckets...

My friend Jordan's little boy, Carson, the other day came home from preschool and said "Mommy I filled Kenzell's bucket today!" She responded "Really?! How?!" and he told her "I told him I liked his new haircut!"

Why is it so hard for adults to fill each others buckets everyday?? Come on people! We're constantly getting shown up by 3 year olds and yet we never learn! All it takes is one compliment to make someone's day and the more you do it the easier it gets! Buckets will be overflowing and people will be in better moods if we start sharing the love. 

Challenge (which shouldn't even have to be said): Pay someone a compliment today. Not someone you're bffs with or someone who expects it, and mean it! People can smell fakeness. Continue doing this everyday and I bet you'll see a change in the air around you. :-) Have a great day!

I wanna tell Princess bye!

Everytime Jeremy has called me today, Landon, who is 2,  always sneaks up in the background and says "I wanna talk Natwee!" So Jeremy puts him on the phone and he tells me hello and tries to show me pictures on the other cell phone, not understanding I can't see him, I can only hear him. I love when he tries to show me things he's excited about. :-) The last conversation I had with Jeremy repeated Landon's wishes of wanting to talk to me. He mumbled a little bit, tried to show me pictures through the phone again and then told me bye, only this time I could hear him with urgency in the background saying "I wanna tell Princess bye!" So he gets on the phone and tells my miniature poodle, who isn't even with me at the moment, good-bye. 

I love that kid ;-) Ah the little things in life that make your day...

Brandi's Maternity Pictures

I did some maternity pictures today for my friend Brandi. I wasn't really prepared, but these are some of my favorites!!! Her belly in this picture is amazing!
My favorite pictures are the unposed ones that just happen. :-)
Carter Bugg wasn't really cooperating, but you could tell he's excited. Kept saying baybay! So cute!
Loving how Carter's little fingers found their way into this picture....perfection <3 Thanks Brandi!!!

Who am I really?

Ever censor your thoughts or actions because it's not what people you know would expect from you? Not that it would be anything bad, but because people have learned to know you a certain way and have held on to that for the entire time you've known them, always being that one person they met instead of letting you change? Not letting someone change is the same as trying to change someone if you ask me. Everyone grows and continues to grow their entire lives. Why do we continue to let people stunt our mental growth by continue playing the roll they expect us to play? What if the neighborhood bully has an awakening and decides he doesn't want to bully people anymore, that he wants to make friends instead? People won't give him the time of day, they just automatically think its a ploy to get something or a joke. What if the class clown decides that's not who they are anymore and wants to be taken seriously? People will think they are joking and eventually they'll go back to being a clown even though it's not what they want. People change. It's not always a bad change, but it's different and a part of who they want to become, so why do people hold on to what they knew instead of embracing the fact that theyre watching a flower bloom right in front of them; watching light bulbs go off; witnessing someone improving themselves and becoming a better person. Are we really that shallow that we refuse to support this change and degrade people into playing the roll of the grouch or the role of someone who always fixes everything? What if the go to guy is weary and needs support and is tired of fixing everyone else's problems?? Who does the go to guy go to? I think one of the hardest parts about transformation and showing the people you live and work with everyday the change, fearful of what they might think that you will be judged. I came to a realization today that may be why I didnt clean off that car I wanted to yesterday. Someone I knew was very close cleaning off theirs and I was afraid I may be judged? But why? Why is that such a big concern. I usually don't care what people think and I do my own thing, but as I see myself changing, I realize how hard it is to break out of the shell people have known me as. One of my lifelong goals, the first of them, is to be who I want to be and quit fearing the judgement of others. No one's opinion matters more than my own and if I'm not living up to my standards because I am afraid of someone else's I will never be happy.

Never let life become just life

Always live your life with one dream to fullfil. No matter how many of your dreams you have realized in the past, always have a dream to go. Because when you stop dreaming, life becomes a mundane existence.
-Sara Henderson

Wake up, go to work, complain that you want to be at home, go home, eat dinner, watch tv, go to bed and wish for the weekend.

Unfortunately I see this as a pattern for most peoples lives nowadays and I've notice that I fall into this trap when I don't have anything to look forward to. Life shouldn't be about just getting through the day or just making it to the weekend. We should all have a little higher hopes for ourselves considering we only have this one life to live, so why live it miserably with mundane schedules that just get you to the next day or to the next paycheck to pay your next bills? I don't really fancy new year's resolution because I think we all should be setting higher goals for ourselves every step of the way in life, not just once a year. Challenge yourself to sit down away from everyone and all of the noise and set personal goals for yourself for the week, month, year and beyond. Find things to look forward to to motivate you to live a more exciting, fun filled life than just going to work to pay bills you have to. It takes some time, but its worth actually using your brain again and getting fired up over something! Everyone needs goals that lead to a bigger dream, and once you reach that dream keep going! I'd rather dream my way through life than just exist in it.

Mobile Blog

I created a mobile blog so I could send pictures directly to my blog since at the moment I have no internet at home and have to use my phone for all the pictures and uploads. :-) It should be under my profile where you can see both this blog and the mobile blog. I just posted two pictures to start off with, but I'm sure there will be more to come in no time! enjoy! :-D

After a weird day at work and being released early because of the weather I go out to my car ready to go home and go to bed only to find that apparently it is impossible for people to park next to each other when there are no lines. i could barely open my car door to squeeze in and reach my snow scraper. My first thought, strange enough, was "I'm so mad at that idiot who can't park I should clear off his car after I'm done scraping mine???!" Yea. Exactly. I was completely confused by this thought and thought about it the entire time I was scraping snow and ice off of my car. I thought to myself...is this a breakthrough with my personal goals to be a more understanding person and not judge people? Though most of my day consisted of greedy selfish or just plain dumb people the person who parked next to me couldnt in my mind be placed in any of those categories. What if their baby ran out of formula or their mother they were caring for forgot they needed groceries and couldnt get out of the house? All kinds of different sob stories came to mind instead of the story that I had been observing all day...but you know what? Though I contemplated doing a good deed instead of being angry at this person I left without touching their car. I havent been able to stop thinking about it. I know no one is going to condemn me for not cleaning a strangers car off but it really bugs me that I had the thought in my head and turned it over and over in my mind and just left it be. What other things in life would I, could I do that to if I did that to a small simple task that could have taken me 2 minutes to complete? Why didn't I just clean off that persons car and possibly make their day a little brighter??

What a wonderful life!

Man is fond of counting his troubles, but he does not count his joys. If he counted them up as he ought to, he would see that every lot has enough happiness provided for it. ~Fyodor Dostoevsky

What a wonderful life I've had! I only wish I'd realized it sooner. ~Colette

Loving these quotes this morning! Just going to start listing the first 20 things that come to mind....(no particular order btw so remember no judging)

1. A warm house to go home to every day.
2. A sweet, even if she is slightly not all there, cuddly puppy
3. A paycheck
4. winter coat
5. supportive family
6. amazing boyfriend
7. Silly friends
8. dependable car
9. books
10. snuggies
11. kings size bed
12. long weekends
13. budgets
14. facebook/blogs
15. lots of snow
16. extra paychecks at the end of this month!
17. hot showers/baths
18. cheap groceries
19. understanding, competent people
20. hair gel

Not really in a blogging mood today! My mentality is light and playful at the moment so I don't think I could get into any deep discussions like I was planning today. Maybe later. Have a great day!! :-D

test one two...

trying to see if i can blog from my cell phone at home...if youre reading this, refer to first entry titled cell phones ;-)

Dear Residents of Marion, Indiana

The end of the world is not here yet. It is not necessary for everyone to run out and waste a bunch of money "stocking up" for less than 6 inches of snow. You live in Indiana and have been through this year after year and know everything is going to be okay, so why make it a stressful day for everyone by packing the roads with unneccessary trips and clogging up the Wal-mart parking lot increasing the chance for accidents?
On a silver lining note, it is very entertaining to see you all run around like beheaded chickens and have to wait in line for 20 minutes just to buy milk, water and bread, so thank you. :-)

Continuing with the Wal-mart topic, do you realize how much money people waste in that vaccuum??? It's the most genius store to ever swindle your money without doing anything, but sitting there looking pretty. You walk in for one or two things and end up having to get a cart because of all the things you didn't even know existed that you can't live without! It's ridiculous. I never shop at Wal-mart unless I absolutely feel necessary, then I force myself to put my head down, walk right to the section I need and keep my tunnel vision until I'm out the door half way to my car. More power to them for their profits of junk, but do people realize what they're doing? You go into that store and come out with worthless junk or food that you could get 5x cheaper at Aldi's and waste all that money, and then have to go to cash advance stores to survive until your next paycheck. Something just isn't right about that. I think it would be a fantastic idea for the government to set up free mandatory classes for Americans that teaches them how to manage their money and especially how to balance their checkbooks. Yea I know. They have accounting classes in high school, but most students are just wanting to get through the class and don't really care how debits and credits work and most of them don't have jobs or their own money to manage so it doesn't affect them until they're thrown in the real world and start blowing all of their money, like I did, on useless junk and eating out all the time. If we were a smart country, finances and real world situations would be top courses in every year of school instead of gym, which obviously isn't helping the obesity in our country anyway or home ec since people don't cook anymore; they just eat out or do easy instructed box meals.

Save Money. Live Better. It's a lie.

Dreams

Most nights I can't remember what my dreams are about, but last night was just too odd. I have a dream book and when something stands out I usually look in it for fun, but it's getting to the point of there are too many coincidences and I should probably start listening to my dreams and what my mind is trying to tell me. Last night throughout all the wackiness of the dream, I kept seeing the number 48 over and over. Huge numbers every place I went. I remember thinking to myself, man that has to mean something, but I have no connection at all to the number 48 and was racking my brain all throughout the dream and all morning after I woke up. I finally gave up and decided to sit down with my dream book. I looked up numbers and it instructed me to reduce the number to a single digit, which is the bases of all numerology. 4+8=12.....1+2=3. My number was three. So I then flipped to find what the number 3 symbolizes and it said the number I saw was telling me it's time to express myself creatively through public speaking, acting, or writing.....I just started this blog yesterday. Coinsidences like this happen too often to me now that I've opened myself up and am listening to myself more, so I'm not holding back anymore. Everything I write from now on is unedited from my brain to the keyboard. They are my thoughts and my beliefs. If you don't agree with them or have only negative things to say, please keep your mouth shut. I do love debate though, so if you have other ideas or think another way I would love to hear your thoughts too. I'm just tired of being ridiculed for not thinking the same as everyone else. Although I do believe we're all connected in some way, it just doesn't make sense to think everything in the universe came from a different place, I am my own person and have my own thoughts so here they are for the world to see....

Cell Phones

Ah Yes. Cell Phones. One of the most addictive man made items to ever attack the human race. We're all guilty of it. Checking our phone over and over for new messages or missed calls (though they would never be missed with how insanely attached we are to them). Not being able to drive even a mile without seeing someone driving with their phone to their ear. Do me a favor and next time you're in the mall or Walmart, pause for just 30 seconds and do a slow 360...I bet you'll find at least one person texting or talking on their cell. I can see two from where I'm sitting right now.
I'm not saying I hate cell phones. Complete opposite actually. I love mine! Sharing photos with friends and family, letting people know throughout the day you're thinking of them, and having long conversations with that special someone when they're three hours away is great. :-) They're nice if plans change last minute or if there's an emergency where you can't reach a landline. All in all I think cell phones are great, but I think society has learned how to abuse them and in turn put a wedge in human interaction. One of the most ridiculous uses of cell phones I've seen is working at the bank inside Walmart. People are constantly on the phone while the cashier is checking out their groceries not paying attention to anything around them or if the cashier has a question. People are always acting like there's not enough time in the world. Rushing around and trying to get in line first, but if their phone rings you can bet your bottom they answer it and hold up the line. Or my favorite is when they come to my teller window without their deposit slip filled out, talking on the phone and half way ignoring my questions of what they're wanting to do, then tapping their pen as if I'm not going fast enough, then talking to their friend on the line while I'm trying to count their money and then asking me to count it again because they wouldn't hang up the phone for 30 seconds while I did their transaction.
On the other side of it all, I've been in stores and other service places where the workers were on their phones and you can tell they are personal calls instead of doing their job and helping the customers right in front of them or their phones go off and every customer in the building can hear their conversation about telling their kids to do their homework or asking them what they want to eat for dinner tonight. I'm pretty sure we'll all do ok if we all turned our phones off for a 6 - 8 hour shift considering the only reason you get to have a cell phone is because your job and cell phones just recently surfaced. Is it really that hard to not answer a call or to say hey I'll call you back when I get home or in 2 minutes. I'm also pretty sure it's not a life or death situation to not know what you're having for dinner until you get home and see what food you have to cook.
What's going to happen if terrorists get smart and attack our communication and everyone has gotten rid of the landlines and replaced them with cell phones? Mass Chaos. We are now a country dependent on these evil battery operated midgets. Enough Said.