Bye Logan

I dropped Logan off at work this morning, 4:15AM is a quiet time on the roads... especially on Sunday morning of Memorial day weekend. We watched UFC 60 last night, a bunch of Logan's buddies came over. It was fun but only one was really rooting for the guy who ended up winning the main event. There were some good fights on the show and some dumb ones that lasted too long :P but all in all I liked it and I'm glad that it was done before 10 so Logan and I got a little time to just chill together and then SLEEP because we had to get up so early. So here we are, a few hugs and kisses, prayers, goodbyes and a lonely drive later *sigh* of course... only three months and I'll get to fly to Georgia and watch him graduate! :) As for today I'm going to sleep some more and probably drive to Portland, I was thinking about driving across Washington to Walla Walla but I think a six hour drive is a little much for my first long drive alone, but I think I might go to Walla Walla still... from Portland... maybe...

so pretty much separation pay = gas money

A little late, but only online

HAPPY BIRTHDAY DAD!!!
I LOVE YOU! I MISS YOU! I WILL BE BACK IN PORTLAND SOON!! RIDE FAST!! BUT NOT TOO FAST! DON'T RIDE IN FRONT OF ANY FAST MOVING FISH!

I DON'T KNOW WHY I'M YELLING, PROBABLY BECAUSE TACOMA IS SO FAR AWAY FROM PORTLAND!

ok.... I guess I'm done yelling. I hope you had a greatly and wonderful birthday, I like your new sweet pacman shirt.

Okay okay

geez, here's a post... man... :) just kidding. I just haven't thought of anything very exciting to post about. I've just been chillin with the puppy and/or the hubby lately :) fuuuun stuff. Today though Logan didn't come home, he's been put on a 24 hour duty *bleeeeeeh* so that means I have to wait to get him from work until tomorrow morning. Then he can come home and sleep. The up side is that he gets the rest of tomorrow off because of having to work so long AND he gets Friday off because... I can't remember why... for Memorial day I suppose. Though he'll be in Georgia by then. Yup he's off again soon. But it'll be ok I'm meeting people and making friends with the other wives. Anyway, today I kept myself occupied by playing with Mad Max, watching TV/movies (A League of Their Own is GREAT it made me cry) and drawing! Check out my barn :)


This one had the best (most true to life) color, the flash made a couple pictures I took too shiny. It's oil pastel and pencil. The lines are a bit off I think but it's ok it was just a whim to draw a red barn kind of skewed like it was in a children's book or something the sun was a way to sort of balance the layout since the silo is on the other side... yeah I'm an art geek. So what? :P My next picture is going to be AWESOME, I'll have to post a picture of that one too. Tune in next time! Same time... actually it probably won't be the same time... but it will be the same place.... so, SAME PLACE!











STEVE HOLT!

IIIIIT'S HERE!!

It's here! It's here! It's here!... well, not HERE here but here in the sense that it's in the U.S., not only THAT but it's in Washington and not only only THAT buuuuuuuuut it's in TACOMA!!! Oh boy oh boy oh boy! I'd tell you what "it" is but Logan may read this before he should know what it is and oh crap I just remembered I need to go to the store! Bread now!!! GO!

clipful pedals

Today Logan bought me some fancy pedals (they're called spd clipless pedals) that I can clip into with the fancy shoes he also bought me... which raises the question... why the crap are they called clipLESS pedals? They seem pretty clipful to me... anyway I guess I'm doing ok with them, better than others Logan's seen try them... or so I've heard.

I'm getting the hang pretty quick I only fell three times but the last time wasn't because I'm not very good at using my clipful pedals. The first time was on the grass and I just slowed down and kinda spazed when my feet seemed stuck to the pedals, the next time I was in too high a gear to go up the hill I was riding so I slowed again and fell down on a bit of concrete, that one hurt, just a bit of blood. The last time was the most impressive, I learned how to bunnyhop (jump the bike so both wheels are off the ground without the aid of a ramp) so anyway, I bunnyhopped up the edge of a driveway onto some grass, unfortunately a new sidewalk was recently put in next to the grass and there was a gap between the grass and the sidewalk, my wheel went into it and I didn't have time to even think about twisting out of the pedals. I hit pretty hard and got my knee cut up a bit more but it's all good.

Unfortunately all three spills were on my right side :P I'm going to be soooooooooore tomorrow.

crazy hotness

as my husband would say... well, that or wicked mega...ness ;)

Logan learned a new trick yesterday, it's called a suicide no hander... I think, yeah I'm pretty sure that's it. Anyway it's sweet, I got a few pictures of him doing it.

Check 'em out, he was definitely rockin'





















P.S. Brandon, check out the pics on pinkbike. Logan put another one, maaaaaaaaybe two up on there also including these. Under freeride/DH and dirt jumping/BMX somethin-or-other.

Mad Max! The road WARRIOR

Hey guys we got a puppy! He's a toy Australian Shepherd (should be about 12 or 13 inches mature) and we named him Mad Max. His namesake being a character in a series of three Australian movies made in '79, '81 and '85 (respectively) starring Mel Gibson as Mad Max. I've only seen the second, Mad Max the Road Warrior. Which turns out to be, I think, a cute coincidence since the day we got Max he rode with us to Sisters and within about a week or so will ride to Portland and then home to Tacoma a few days after that. He's totally a road warrior, or at least he will be :) At the moment he is crying in his kennel resisting naptime but he's calming down a bit. He's a good puppy.


Here are a couple pictures I took this morning. He's a bit of a hard chap to get a decent picture of, apart from him wiggling and jumping and being all-around adorable the flash makes his eyes look weird and no flash means any movement Mad Max makes becomes a reddish brown blur.

Praise report

This morning I prayed for Logan and thanked the Lord that HE is our strength, especially when we're feeling weak. And I am happy to report that Logan did indeed pass his PT test despite being sick yesterday. Praise the Lord!

:( poor bubby, new puppy :)

Logan came home sick yesterday, I felt sad because all I could do was go and buy him lemonlime sodapop (yes those are both words, they're compound words like doghouse and iloveyou) and also be nice to him but mostly I just sat or stood around being perplexed and sad. I wanted to help so badly but you just can't make a throwy-up person be better. So we sat and laid around enjoying our new cable TV service and calling people about puppies. We figure he just needed sleep because he didn't get much the night before last (my fault, I was watching a movie) but he was in bed last night before 8 so that was good and this morning he just felt a bit weak because he obviously didn't eat much yesterday. And he has an important PT test this morning, it's a good thing though that God is our strength when we are weak eh?

About the puppy :D :D :D we're going to get a toy Australian shepherd puppy in the next two weeks, I'm mailing the deposit today. He's a bit more expensive than I ever thought a dog would be but he's less than the $1500 one so that's good. Granted I had never researched getting a dog through a breeder, let alone a rareish one. I guess mini and toy aussies aren't too common. He's supposed to get to be about 12 inches high when he's full grown (I also never thought that I'd get a small dog like that) but I think it's good to get a small dog if you live in an apartment, cooping up a big dog inside is just mean. At least to our little guy it'll be huge ;) I'm super excited. I think we're going to call him Max but we'll have to see when we meet him if the name fits.

This is his mug shot from the website, I'll be sure to post some more pictures once we get him.

but isn't he just the CUTEST thing??? :D

Yay

I did it! I installed our cable modem and a firewall :D I guess I know a little somethin about computers after all eh? I'm excited because now we don't have to wait until whoever had the other wireless network in our building turned theirs on to check email and such. We got our TV cable too and better still we are getting our couch between 12 and 4! Huzzah!!

Or, huzzoo!! ...as SOME would say...

I'm a Washingtonian guys!

Hello friends! Logan and I now live in our apartment up in Tacoma. Yay us. We don't have much, a few pieces of furniture borrowed and a couple bought. I'm excited for my today project, I'm going to put up a rooster wallpaper border in my kitchen because we get to decorate and paint what we want :) We have to put it back to white when we move but that's ok with me. Here are a couple pictures, they aren't the best of my life but that's mostly because I can't back up far enough from anything to get a really good shot.






Here is our mantle with a shelf the wonderful Overstreets brought over for us in the background. And of course my candles that I'm SO happy with, being all decorative and stuff :) and there's a front shot for you with the wood we bought at Safeway. Logan was a bit miffed, this being the first time in his life he's ever had to BUY wood but we have a fireplace, I wanted wood and I think they'd be a bit upset if we went chopping down the landscaping around the complex. Oh, and the little ornament there has a buddy that will go on the other side of the pillar candle I just forgot it down in Portland. No worries though, we're headed down south today :D yay!





Hmm... well guys, blogger is being a weirdo so you just get fireplace shots today. I'll post again when we get our couch :D yay couch. Oh, I just remembered! I was going to post about one of the best labels I've ever seen. Logan and I were browsing around our local Goodwill, which, by the way is the tidiest Goodwill I've ever been in ever. I was relieved to see toys on the floor in the toy aisle or it would've been like Stepford Goodwill or something. Anyway, we were checking out the furniture and every piece had a white paper label taped on it. I was dumbfounded by one in particular for a while before Logan came by and pronounced it "trash can". I couldn't figure it out at all until it was said out loud, it was spelled C-H-R-A-S-H C-A-N. We assume that whoever wrote must've been told that trash is spelled the way it sounds. I had never seen is spelled like that... it was pretty amazing.

Jigitty jig

He's home again :D huzzah, and we have an apartment (huzzah x 2) or at least we will as of tomorrow when Logan fills out the rest of the paperwork, aaaaaaand the Army will pay for us to move so if we get any furniture this weekend we can rent a uhaul and get reimbursed for it :D (hip x2) + hooray!

Yeah I know I'm a dork

It's really exciting but at the same time scary because it's the first time I've ever moved that I can remember clearly and I haven't gotten my license yet. I wish making a behind-the-wheel driving test appointment wasn't so ridiculous. Oh well, I'll have it soon and then I'll be more freeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee! I think we're going to need another vehicle though... probably.

I will never forget you ghettobees

Tonight was pretty much my last day at work. At least I think so... I may be back in a while to work whilst Logan be away again. But we'll see, in any case all my coworking friends there got me a cake and a card and a couple of them even got me flowers. I didn't cry until right after they'd all cheered and presented me with my cake and card, then realized that we were still open and working so I was left pretty much alone at the table with a cake that said, "We'll miss you Alyssa" on it. Well that did it, I realized that I was really leaving and I cried a bit but didn't bawl because I was still working. In any case the cake was chocolate and yummy and I love all my friends at my Applebees (affectionately known as ghettobees) I told everyone not to worry because I would be back for visiting since my parents live right down the street and all... :) besides we have to have a montage party! Or at least I want to... we'll see :)

Good last night at work. Good friends. Good time to hit the sack. Goodnight all.

TWOOOOOOOO!

Happy Wyatt's birthday guys!
He's a good one!

A message to my favorite Walla Waller

HAPPY
HAPPY BIRTHDAY CHERISE!!!!

You're twody-two!
Way for you!

I get to see you tomorrow! Huzzah!

Diabolical really is a great word, don't you think?

I guess I should tell you all about that fantastic adventure that never did, but should have, happened at work. WELL, the whole tale sort of came together in pieces and not in order so I'll just share the fancier version first.

Hokay, so. First of all, we (being Rami, Allan, Bridget, Andy, everyone else I talked to about it, and me) would have tee shirts, and they say "rebel alliance" on them. Except Bridget's, hers says "Rubel allowance" and if anyone else other than Andy wants to know why, it IS the rubel ALLOWANCE, duuuuh. Anyway, so we'd have our tee shirts, then we'd tape a hokie to the ceiling to distract the eeeeevil. THEEEN we'd all sneak into the kitchen with our ninjaness and free the creature that had been enslaved by Applebees to clean the dishes, the one that'd been wailing for many-a-moon and release it into the wilds of Lloyd Center! And we would be victorious.

The reason behind this valiant quest was really nothing more than water pressure... or so I was told.... Our dishwasher at work was making this weird noise for at least a day last week, it sounded like a ship's horn or a moose or something. Actually the hokie on the ceiling came about first, before we (we meaning... me, rolling silverware at carside, waiting for someone to come pick up their order, having many more minutes to contemplate nonsense than I should have been allowed) even thought about rescuing anything. I just thought it'd be a good diabolical plan, and being as amused by the word "diabolical" as I was... I sort of ran with it :)

bored now... tired....

I went puddle jumping on my bike today :) fun stuff. If you're curious that's just me riding around and randomly stomping my front tire into puddles :D I want to go with Logan sometime, he'd probably think it was ridiculous but :P IIIIIIIII think it'd be fun! Rather I think it IS fun! :D I'm supposed to write out the fantastic adventure that should have happened at work tonight but I'm tired so I'm going to tell you all about it tomorrow. It's a great story, all about taping hokies and wailing creatures and a rebel alliance (with tee shirts!) :D oh yeah, that's right TEE shirts.

his name is Aaron Shust

I heard a song on the radio this morning, the chorus went like this:

My savior loves, my savior lives, my savior's always there for me, my God he was, my God he is, my God he's always gonna be.

It really touched my heart. So I went online to see if the guy had a website and/or a CD out, he does :) The three songs on listen page are good ones, you know, GOOD ones. Check them out!

http://aaronshust.com/v4/listen.html

HUZZAH!!!

I am done with winter term! :D yay spring break! My final projects turned out pretty darn well I must say. Check 'em out!

This is my ART 116 (color theory) final. I took a photo of Hayden, Cameron and myself and created an impressionist painting. Paying attention to the "temperature" of the colors, warm being foreground and cool being background. This photo had a GREAT lightsource so the shadows were pretty easy to figure out and that orange tank top of Cam's is fabulous. I could have gone a bit more abstract with this but I wanted to recreate the picture pretty faithfully, so I did.

Here's my ART 231 (intermediate drawing) final. The medium was open, I decided to use acryllic paint. We were given two guidelines 1) make a drawing based on a dictionary word (we were given a formula using our birthdate to find which word to use) and 2) don't illustrate it (i.e. if your word was apple you shouldn't literally draw an apple). My word was Galahad, which is "a noble or gallant man", it also refers to a knight in the stories of King Arthur, but you knew that ;) Anyway, in some stories Galahad had a white shield with a red cross, and of course, of all the men I know Logan has got to be the most noble and gallant of them all, at least to me. And of all the noble and gallant things Logan has done for me waiting to kiss me until our wedding is pretty much at the top of the list, right up there with being a soldier and protecting our way of life and our freedom. :D

Both my instructors said my projects were done well and everyone seemed to like them, I got a little bit of constructive criticism which is cool because it's good to get different opinions and suggestions. All in all I had fun and I learned quite a bit about drawing and color :) which is always a good thing. Now I get to keep myself busy with other things until my hubby comes home again :D Not too long now! :D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D

Pretty good night

carside went well tonight, the wonderful details definitely outweigh the not so happy ones. Not so happy was me forgetting to put in an order until the lady showed up to get it and not getting the phone number of my last order who was late so I stayed an extra half hour. Wonderful was Kevin pouring apple juice instead of pineapple juice on accident so I got to drink sweet appley goodness and getting over 10% tips for pretty much the first time I can remember on carside :D

Oh, another goodness was when a little family came in and the three kids had New Zealand hats on. When I asked if they'd been visiting there recently she said her children were born there (her accent made it obvious she hadn't been) and I thought that was just great! They're from the Taupo area which is a lake that my brother-in-law just spent his birthday at :D Although for about 30 minutes after they'd gone I was whining to my coworkers that I wanted New Zealand babies, that is, I would love to go to New Zealand, have babies, and if they happened at the same time that would be pretty darn cool as well. At one point I said I wanted kiwi babies, I got a strange look for that. I really wished that I could call Logan at that point because I could just imagine how the first words of the conversation would start

Logan: hello
Alyssa: hooooooooneeeeeeeeey
Logan: whaaat?
Alyssa: I want baaaaaabies, New Zealand babies

I'm not quite sure what he'd say to that but I'm sure it'd be an interesting conversation. One of my coworkers asked me what if they came out Asian, after a long hard split second of thought I told him that that just wouldn't do. (assuming of course that he meant what if I had babies while I was in Asia... Any other meaning for the question is just really weird...)