Ziti with Sausage

Boil ziti noodles until reaching al dente. In the mean time, cook 1lb hot sausage and then add garlic and onions. Add 1 24oz can crushed tomatoes, 1 14oz can italian style diced tomatoes (drained), 1 can kidney or black beans. Toss with the cooked pasta and top with parmesean cheese.

Leftovers can placed in a glass dish and covered with mozzerella cheese and cooked in the oven at 350 to make an impromptu casserole.

Nature Walk

I was able to come home early on Saturday and I wanted to give Tricia some time on her own since she does not often get much, so I took Jeffrey out for a nature walk. We did not have to drive far at all to get out into the country side where I was able to park the car and take him in the stroller for a walk in the shade of the trees on a well maintained path. Along the way I took these photos of plants just off the edge of the path.

Coins

While at the awards luncheon I was given a few coins by attending guests.

New Toys in Reach

New toys are in reach for Jeffrey. We have four drawers in our kitchen that he habitually gets into to find some fun object to entertain him. Until now he has been limited to the bottom three because he could not reach the fourth, leaving us with a safe haven for our eating utensils. Yestarday, I found Jeffrey reaching happily up into the fourth drawer and making a withdrawl of all of our spoons for his own enjoyment.

Scott Kelby's 7-Point System for Adobe Photoshop CS3

Before
After

I purchased several books about photography a while ago. The one that stands out the most to me has been Scott Kelby's 7-Point System for Adobe Photoshop CS3. While there are many books that show you how to use the many tools of Photoshop, this is the first that I have come across that presents a system of what to do and when. The most clever part of the book is that there is a website to visit to download the intial photos that the books is working with so that you can use your own Photoshop to go step by step with those same photos.

There are 21 lessons, each presenting the same seven steps so that by the time you get to lesson 21 all seven steps are ingrained. The above photos are from the first lesson that I went through this morning.

The Blue Planet

Our AFN station was playing a nature series that we became interested in and found out later that The Blue Planet was available on DVD. This is a great documentary series about the oceans featuring some incredable cinematography that rivals that of National Geographic. The companion series is Planet Earth.

We watch these shows as we fold clothes together in the livingroom as an incentive to get that bit of work done. We also have a DVD player in the kitchen that we use to view them when making dinner.

NCO of the Year Competition

Looking back over the last several weeks of training for the USAREUR NCO and Soldier of the Year Competition I am glad that level of training was intense and constant. From Sunday 10 August to Thursday 14 August the competition events were physical and required a good base of knowledge to perform the tasks.

10 August began the event with a short briefing and then loading onto a bus which took us to a local Grafenwohr restaurant where we had a great Bavarian meal and got to know each other a little bit around the table. Once we returned to the NCOA it was back to the barracks to get ready for the next day and go to sleep.

11 August started off with physical fitness test. I broke my record for the two mile event coming across the finish line in 12:10. After a quick breakfast we were given one hour to write an essay on the challenges we face daily in the Army and then one hour for a written exam. The board proceedings in my class A uniform went very fast. With only 15 minutes allotted to each competitor we followed on each other’s heels into the board room and skipped all introductions in order to go straight into a fast line of questioning. After exiting the board room SFC Newman was obviously pleased with my performance. I had answered the questions so quickly and moved onto the next that he did not have time to write down any of the questions or my responses. The evening ended with a qualification shoot at the skill trainer with the electronic M4 and range along with a roll over drill in the dark in the M998 that turns over.

12 August was the most physically intense day. With a 0230 wake up we took all the naps we could throughout the day to make up for our loss of sleep. Busing out to a training area we went through rapid fire lanes, vehicle search, and hands on weapon knowledge. The highlight of the morning was going to the urban terrain site where we encountered a group of German soldiers that a mission to complete in the city before they could be extracted. With the leader wounded it was upon the competitors to take charge of the mission and the German soldiers. The scenario takes everyone into the tunnel system below the city where an escape route has to be found in complete darkness carrying a full ruck sack and leading two Germans, one of whom is closterphobic.

After a day M4 range it was onto the highlight event of the day, the 15km ruck march. With full gear, ruck and weapon everyone knows it is not just a march - it is a race. On go, I took off as fast as I could and pulled ahead. It was not easy to stay ahead, but that is where all of the training I have been doing paid off. At the 9km mark a soldier caught up and pulled ahead at a pace that I could not keep up with, but I did manage to push through and cross the line as the first NCO. The day was topped off with a night fire range where the range was lit by parachute flares.

13 August spent nearly the entire day at the situational training lanes. There were eight tasks to complete, from observing enemy movements and making a report, to taking charge of a three vehicle convoy to conduct a route recon. We conducted triage and first aid, lead a team on chemical hazard recon, threw grenades, lead a team on a dismount patrol in search for weapons cache and installed a claymore mine. At the end of each task we were given the grid location to our next task and 45 minutes to get there. The 15km road march left my feet hurting which made my movement difficult, but I made it to each station. By night fall my feet felt better for the night orienteering. Given several points in a nearby camp I set out at a run to find each one in the dark. I was so excited to return first that SFC Newman and I decided not to wait for the others to return and left the bus behind to jog back to the Academy and go to sleep.

14 August was our out briefing and after action review. As soon as I arrived home I met the Brown family that had come over to see us and have a vacation and got to work on my homework so that we could start our journey together.

On 27 August I drove the three and a half hours down to Kaiserslautern with SFC Newman for the award banquet luncheon practice. After spending the night in our hotel we had a quick breakfast and got ready for the ceremony. When the names of the winners were finally called the soldier of the year turned out to be my training partner, SGT Stanley Black. SSG Higgs was called as the NCO winner and will move on to compete in Washington. It would have been great to move on and up, but I am happy with what I did and had a great time doing it. I still get to go to Washington with all the other competitors to work in the USAREUR booth at a convention there. That will give me an opportunity to get out some and see the nation’s capitol and some of the monuments in the area.

NCO Competition

Doesn't he have good posture for someone who'd had to walk 15 kilometers wearing 40 extra pounds? I would have passed out after the first kilometer.
Way out in front. The training seemed to have paid off big time!

Cory will probably post his favorite pictures later, but I'll post these ones first. I'll also let him tell you all the results. We didn't know until yesterday.

Vase and Book

The Brown family vacation included a trip to the crystal making factory. To our surprise there was a glass blower in the store doing a demonstration. Scott was called from the audience to open and close the molding which helped to form a vase just like this one. The hot crystal has to sit for 24 hours before someone can purchase it, but we found this vase just like the one Scott helped to make and bought it.

It was a lot of fun to see the blower take the glass in and out of his kiln and watch the glass glow orange hot. With metal tong like tools and wooden rolling devices drenched in water he the blower spun, twisted, pulled, pinched and stretched a hot glob of glass into a vase.

Phil gave me this pen to write in my knock off moleskine note book which I purchased after I had seen how clever and convenient his own genuiine moleskine notebook he carried on the trip with him was.

die Nahrungsmittel

Germany has a very distinct culture when it comes to eating. A typical breakfast consists of all types of breads with jams, cheeses and sliced meats, along with a soft boiled egg and a small glass of juice. Many meals are eaten outside of restaraunts and cafes in the summer time. Pull up a seat and stay for a while. There is no rush in the German culture to eat and get out.

Pflanzen

My IT 235 class taught me how to put photos together on a single document page when I made my calendar project. I have thought about how to use this newly gained skill with Photoshop and make some more fun projects. On our vacation I ended up taking some good photos of plant life throughout the city and decided to collect them together in this collage. Pflanzen is German for plants.

A Few Photos From Our Trip

This is a detail from the Hohenschwangau Castle We had a great time with the Brown family during our visit. It is amazing to think of all of the materials that had to be hauled to that place for construction. It is all of the small details of craftsmanship that add up to an amazing peice of work. Since I had already seen the castle once before I took more time to concentrate on and appreciate the details that make it all up.




It was suggested to me that cropping a photo to a square dimension would allow it to stand out since almost all cameras, from the very cheap to the extravagantly expensive, take a rectangualar photo. I got a few glances from passers by as I stopped to take this photo, but that reminds me of how photography has made me notice the otherwise unnoticed.

Jeffrey can be a lot of fun to photograph when he is asleep. He did very well riding in the car on our trip. Once in a while he would get tired of his car seat, but generally he had a fun time with us and behaved himself quite well.

I took this photo of Jeffrey outside on a cloudy day which gave great light, but I found that turning the flash on helped to freeze his movements and gave some more depth to his skin tone. In order to difuse the harsh flash on my camera I put one of Jeffrey's white socks over it.

Photos from Our Trip

I was excited to try out a photo technique of making a very long exposure in a dark area in order to catch the flowing water as a silky look. On our way to the Linderhof to see the summer residense of King Ludwig we passed by a tiny stream on the grounds and I went back alone to get a few shots in the shadows of the trees.

There are many flower stores all around Germany as it is very common for the people to have well made yards. Even in the city it is quite common to see windows full of plants and hanging plants around the enterance to homes.

I thought this leaf told an interesting story about green trees growing up in the middle of a cement and asfault city.

Day Two

Cory just called and said he'd finished day two of the competition. He was beat! They did a 15 km ruck march in the dark and had to do a night range (shooting targets with nothing but flares as light). He came in first at the end so he was pretty pleased with himself. Earlier today they had to do a vehicle search...and a mission with the Bundeswehr (German army) in the tunnels of the training city. The hard work and the long hours of training seem to have paid off.

Good story...I am claustrophobic and about have a panic attack when I'm in elevators or underground parking lots. So part of the mission today was to lead these two German soldiers through the tunnels and one of them pretended to be claustrophobic and the goal was to keep him calm. Back in May when we went to Salzburg, we parked in a mountain and had to walk forever to get out of the mountain. I nearly hyperventilated, but Cory was there and held my hand, so I pretend that I contributed to the training, though I don't think he held that soldier's hand. That would be creepy.

Tomorrow is the lanes (I'm praying for no more combatives, who wants to be punched in the face for ten minutes?) and the land navigation and then they finish up Thursday. We're almost done with this one.

Sugar and Bampa and Aunt Jen and Uncle Scott are on their way here now. I'm so excited to see them. I can't even stand it. I don't know how I'll be able to sleep tonight with my husband gone and Christmas day coming early tomorrow!

An Ode to the Musical

They do not make movies like they used to. Musicals these days, as good as they are, just can't hold a candle to the classics. I love, love, love Gene Kelley! I love to watch him dance on screen. I love, love, love Singin' in the Rain. It's one of my favorites and imagine my surprise when I made Cory watch it and he liked it too! He went on and on about the cinematography, I was just happy the man watched it. So many classics that he's never even seen! Like...

Hyacinth Bouquet...spelled B-u-c-k-e-t...oh PaigeLove, can you remember the hours and hours we spent watching that show perfecting our British accents? Oh mercy, good times! If someone really loves me and wants to spend $100 dollars on me, they could buy me the series on DVD, I think the library might enjoy that since I've got their copy out every other week!!

Send good vibes Cory's way...he's almost done with day one of the USAREUR NCO of the Year competition. He said his board went really, really well! He got a new low time in the two mile event...12 minutes something, and he's really excited about it!

Never Go To Work

So Jeffrey displays two of his talents there...shaking his head when the "Never go to work" song comes on and yelling at the end. I personally wouldn't be too proud of the shouting, but I guess in a pinch it could come in handy.

The Latest...

Yesterday the Academy had a 'party' which was just basically people eating and talking. We just went for the food and then pretty much left, but Jeffrey had a good time playing.
He kept walking across the grass, quite often tripping in a hole. He's a trooper though, didn't complain once and kept getting back up.
It was a little harder when he tried to climb up the hill. He, like Jack and Jill, kept tumbling down. He thought the feel of the grass on his head was a little odd.
Yesterday, Jeffrey's friend Haedyn came over to play while his mom made jewelry with me. Jeffrey followed Haedyn around all day and when it got quiet I found them in the bottom drawer of Jeffrey's dresser. Silly kids!

Quick Chicken Dinner

We had some thawed chicken we needed to use for a meal and were not sure what to do with it until we came across a rice and bean mix we found in our pantry. We cooked the rice and beans at the same time as we cut the chicken into small bite size pieces and added both together in the last minutes of the cooking of the rice. Some corn and a hot roll make the meal complete.

It is more Fun to Eat from a Bear

We usually feed jeffrey using his kid size bowls, but Tricia found that he reacts even better to his meal if you put it in one of these bear shaped cupcake forms.

A Boy and His Spoon

Jeffrey loves to take his stick around the house with him, but if it ever becomes misplaced a spoon can takes its place. I took Jeffrey out for some time on the grass and to the playground and he insisted on having his spoon with him the whole time. He walked with it, he crawled with it, climbed the stairs to the slide with it, and we even played a game handing it off to each other as he swung in the swing.

Hyperbole

–noun Rhetoric.
1. obvious and intentional exaggeration.
2. an extravagant statement or figure of speech not intended to be taken literally, as “to wait an eternity.”
—Synonyms 2. overstatement.
—Antonyms 2. understatement.

As I was studying this morning I began to think about some of the hyperbole that is employed at times to add a touch of drama to our expressions of testimony, adoration and thanksgiving. A tipifying example is a statement such as, "Every time I read the scriptures I feel a burning sensation inside me that what I am reading is true." For other users of hyperbole there is an understanding that this is not to be taken literally. Of course there are many instances for all of us in which daily reading of the scriptures is as mundane as vaccuming the carpet. Any one taking the statements at their face value may be left to feel that something is wrong in their own lives; something is preventing them from achieving or recieving the amazing results that others so off handedly report, as though dramatic spiritual experiences were a daily routine and to be expected by the faithful.

Wanted: Keys

Jeffrey has learned where we hang our keys beside the front door and he will at times stand below them and slap the wall with his hands to get our attention and retrieve a set of keys for him. Not wanting our own keys to come up missing we have tried to console him with his own set of plastic keys, but plastic does not make the same noise nor have the same weighted feel. I had thought about purchasing some keys from the local hardware store, but I found out that keys are very expensive. If you can find any old and useless keys in the back of your drawers, please pass them on to Jeffrey. He will enjoy them very much.

Oreo Cupcakes

Tricia came across a great recipie for Oreo cupcakes. Following the directions for regular cupcakes made with a vanilla cake mix, we simply added a bag of Oreos that had been crushed in a plastic bag to the mix. We also added part of the smashed Oreo to the frosting for the top.

Sunday Afternoon Lunch

We were invited to the Morris home for lunch where we also met the Roberts, a new family in the ward. After a great lunch of steak, salad and home made bread sister Morris shared with us a great desert called a strawberry triffle.