a little Ugandan to cheer you up!

This makes me smile :)



You should also check out Arlington Academy of Hope's new website.

Sisters are different flowers from the same garden

My sister is one of my favorite people in the entire UNIVERSE.
I made her this gift.

I love her.

Look what I did last night?

If you are my friend and you are having a baby any time soon....

This one is for Mama Hollie! I tried to match her nursery color scheme of apple green with red and black accents.

This is a simple rag quilt that takes about 4 hours to make. It might be faster if I started before midnight. That's when I get my spare time!

Catching up

Tonight we've been snowed in and I'm experiencing some major jet lag so what better thing can I do than blog at 2 am?

Why the jetlag, you ask? Well before I explain, I want to preface this blog post by fully acknowledging that my life is awesome and I'm spoiled. I've done a lot of cool things in the past few months. Here are some pics and details:

1. I went to Tanzania last week for work. Who would have ever thought that I would go back to Africa so soon? It was a busy and productive trip. I spent a couple days in Dar es Salaam and the majority of the trip was in Dodoma and Singida, which are in the central region of the country. I was there doing a site visit to one of PMI's Malaria Communities Program grantees.

I just had to take a classic mzungu surrounded by African children photo. They're SO beautiful!

Sunrise on the Indian Ocean

2. I won the lottery! I won tickets to the National Christmas Tree Lighting.

Yes, that's the First Family at the exact moment Pres. Obama flipped the switch for the tree.

There's the tree! And that's Amber, Me and Ben

3. Mom for the weekend - I took care of my co-worker's kiddos for a weekend. 2 boys and 2 dogs. I have a whole new respect for single moms now.

Playing cowboys and trains

4. Ward Service Auction: This year, I helped to organize the Colonial 1st Ward Service Auction. We raised $7500 to provide Christmas to families in need in the Arlington/Alexandria area. Unfortunately, I didn't take pics of the auction, but you might be wondering what I donated...

This is just a sample.

You guessed it! The infamous men of the ward calendar. We went with a "what women like" theme. The guys were good sports. The calendar is awesome!

5. Mustache Bash and silly co-workers: My friend Wendy is so creative. She threw a mustache bash for a birthday party and we all dressed like boys and wore a 'stache... well sort of.

Playing the part.

Sometimes we just get a little silly at work. That's all.

6. Anime sightings: Each year, the National Anime Conference is held in Crystal City. It's fun to see how into that stuff some people can be. The first night of the convention, my friend Scott and I drove around the neighborhood looking for Anime sightings. People everywhere were dressed up in their favorite character (or just dressed up).

There's a few!

7. Thanksgiving in West Virginia! I am especially grateful for wonderful friends. This year, a bunch of us went to a cabin in Canaan Valley. We feasted for 3 days and enjoyed snowfall, Rock Band, games, puzzles, exploring, turkey trotting, hiking Seneca Rocks, and just plain good ole times. Niki and Leanna - props for the fantastically planned trip!

Grateful Group - Dan, Richie, Pete, Jenny, Cobb, Ben, Niki, Leanna, Charity, Joni, and Kim (Brandon and me are behind the cameras)

8. Family time - My sister in law joined our church a year ago! In November, our family got together in Dallas where she and my brother and their son were sealed in the Temple! It was beautiful. Please enjoy this video/information on temples.


9. Veteran's Day - Old Rag rained out. The long time planned event for Veterans day was to hike Old Rag Mountain in the Shenandoah. However, rain spoiled that plan and we opted for the Billy Goat Trail at Great Falls instead.

Hiking!

10. Dog sitting: I'm the kind of person who just does things for people. I took care of my boss' dog for a week while he was traveling. I stayed in his place downtown. Living in the District is cool. I never thought I could be one of those people who lives alone and has a dog, but this made me second guess that assumption.

Pepper really grew on me!

11. Fojol's: I had heard about this phenomenon several months ago and always hoped it would show up in my neighborhood. To my absolute delight, the Fojol Brothers were parked on the corner of 13th and G, NW - right near my work! Believe it or not, it's street food.

When I finally had the chance to order, the first thing that came out of my mouth was "I've been waiting for you all my life."
Fojol Brother: "You had me at hello."
Me: "I didn't say that yet."
haha! The exchange cracked me up.

Sold in a hippie van by mustache wearing men.

12. Dutch Bike Dutch. It's a tradition. Rain or shine (the weather is always fine), biker enthusiasts and casual followers get together for a lovely ride through Amish country near Lancaster, PA. This was my first time attending this semi-annual event. I must say, I will make it a priority from here on out!

This was a Hallween activity so some people dressed up for the ride.

Beautiful country side!

13. Apple picking: This area is soo amazing when the leaves change. This is one of my favorite fall activities.

14. Finally, I just have to throw this in here... my nephew is the love of my life! He's 4. He's so cool.

on the upswing

What do I do when I'm sick? Well, I stay home. I've been home from work all week and I've probably slept at least 75% of it. I ate chicken noodle soup, sipped on theraflu (btw, it tastes icky, but it's the wonder drug), and knocked myself out on day/nyquil. A few friends have braved my illness - I'm in good hands!

Photo from http://www.cdc.gov/H1N1flu/qa.htm

I woke up feeling a hundred times better today. My aches are gone, my cough has subsided, I no longer feel chills and feverish. I just feel really weak - like my body is recovering after being hit by a truck or something. I took my car in to be fixed and cleaned my house - deep cleaned it. Yes, that's a sure sign I'm feeling better. My boss, who is a physician, told me it sounds like I'm on the upswing and if I keep feeling good all day I can probably go back to work tomorrow (as long as it has been 24 hours since I've been feverish ... so far so good).

For the record, this flu actually isn't too bad to endure. I mean, I've felt way worse than this before. Like when I had strept throat as a kid or when I broke up with a boyfriend. The good thing is now I'm immune. I thought I would take advantage of herd immunity this year, but now I get to contribute to it. Here's to being one more person in the human population who can't get H1N1 ever again!

H1N1 = ICKY!

An email I just sent to my mom...

Hi Mom,

How's Paris?!?! I'm sure it's wonderful there!

I think I have the swine flu. YIKES! Aches, fever, cough, chills, fatigue... icky icky icky. I stayed home from work today and went to the doctor. I didn't end up seeing him because my insurance card didn't have him listed as my pcp. After an hour of trying to get in touch with my insurance company, I just went home. I'll try again tomorrow if I still don't feel well. Icky!

My friends are taking good care of me and Wendy has been in touch. She said that if she were here, she'd take me to the doctor and make me soup. It's probably a good thing I'm not in Europe with this icky virus, but, oh boy, I wish I were there (and healthy) and wish I could have a mom hug.

Love you so much!

Charlee

So much going on

Hey, how are you?!?! I hope you're well. I've been good. It's been such a long time since we've chatted. I'm just so curious about everything that's been going on.

I've been super busy with work and school and life in general, but busy is good. Here are a few highlights from the past several weeks:

1. Old times' sake: I was in a wedding a couple weeks ago. My best friend from 3rd-7th grade until she moved, Jillian, had the most beautiful wedding in Prior Lake, Minnesota. My sister was in it too. The three of us were the kinds of friends who could wipe buggers on each other and fight and still be best friends. We would play and play for hours and hours. It was delightful to see her and to catch up with people from home. I forgot my camera, so I'll post pictures when I get them.

2. To the motherland: I went to Utah to see family. My grandparents are the best sort of grandparents. I realized that their home and particularly their backyard is one of my happiest places. My grandpa likes to tell us stories about our ancestors and my grandma makes the best chocolate chip cookies ever.

My sister bought a house. Kinda strange that we're adults now and she's a home owner. My favorite memory from this trip: making bum prints on the pool sidewalk with my sister and brother like we did when we were kids. Oh, and seeing Laura. Hi Laura!

3. I made a baby quilt for Mama Noelle. I'll post pictures soon. I've also started my next project - a cool garden inspired quilt for my sister.

4. Horsin' around: I have made friends with some good people who have a farm near Leesburg. I go there whenever I can to ride horses and enjoy the country. These trips always require my cowboy boots and kettlecorn from the farmer's market on the way.

5. Rope swinging: I swam in the potomac. Yes, you heard me, the Pot o mac. There's a rope swing up river (well, at least up from the water treatment plant). A few of us ventured out to check it out and I took the plunge. The water was that nasty warm bath temperature. But it made for a fun time.

6. Puzzling: it's official, I'm a nerd. I love to do puzzles. One friday night when plans for the county fair got rained out, a small group of my friends decided to build a 1,000 piece underwater mystical lion with fishies puzzle. We were obsessed. Finished in a weekend.

7. Great Texas: My brother and sister in law and my one and only stud nephew live in Dallas so I paid them a visit over labor day. My dad was there too. We had a grand time bowling, eating, swimming and water-sliding, and exploring the city. AND yes, I went to the BYU v OU game!!! Dallas stadium is unbelievable - especially whent he Cougs win!!! I can't explain the euphoria I felt when it became clear that we upset the number 3 ranked team in the country! It was bliss.

Those are just a few of the fun highlights. I'll keep you posted on everything else that goes on. It's great to catch up!

Charlee

I submitted

I did it - I'm one of those people who submitted a story to the average lifer's website MLIA. Here's my submission:

Today, I passed a man on my morning run. As he jogged toward me, a white towel-like object fell from his backpack. When I passed the towel, I saw that he actually lost his underwear. That's going to make for a free and easy day. MLIA.

Watch for it. :)

The silly things I sometimes do...

I just sucked the remaining helium out of a balloon that I was given for my birthday. Too bad nobody is around because my voice sounds SOOO funny! hahahah! I love simple joys.

On another silly note, I dressed up as a super hero this week. The event was a friend's birthday party. Everyone was invited to wear a super hero costume. I'm not usually one to get dressed up, but for some reason I got really excited about this one. Thanks to my sister, I had a rad costume including a cape, bandit eyes, leotard, tights, boots, and to top it off, a super-power belt with a C on it -- C for Charlee Amazing. I crimped my hair and layered on the super-hero-ness make up (about 20 more more dips in the powder than usually).

I showed up at the party Elle Woods style. All dressed up, but somehow I missed the memo that "super hero costumes" mostly consist of people's favorite super-hero t-shirt or silly hair and make up with little boy spider man tighty-whities over tight pants. hahaha! Let's just say, I won the prize. Check out the costume:

Being in this costume made me feel some sort of transformation - it made my imagination go crazy! Think of all the super powers you would want to have. First of all, I would want to be able to go invisible. And, it would be so cool to have lasers that came out of my eyes, or to have an iron fist, or to be able to scale buildings and run from roof top to roof top. Or imagine being able to breath under water or make everything freeze - that's cool. With all of these possibilities running through my head, I was not finished when the party was over.

Sooooo...

My roommate drove the get away car. We rallied around the neighborhood, stopping at random houses of friends. I flashed through their back doors and ran through the house, exiting into the night without a word.

The crowning moment of the night: the soccer fields! There's a park near my house with stadium lighting. Rain or shine, day or night, there are games going on.

We pulled up and I sneaked off into the trees so as not to be seen. I watched carefully as the get away car rolled into position. I scanned the vicinity looking for the best approach.

Then the moment of glory - With my arm triumphantly pointing ahead, I bolted like the speed of lighting (well, as fast as lightning could go if it were wearing three inch healed black go-go boots that sunk into the grass like a cleat) across the field mid-game. Heads turned, gasps were heard, and flash - then I was gone.

The next day at work, I had a strange recollection of the night before. hahah! Seriously, did I do that?!?!? Can anyone say, Nacho Libre?!?!

BABiES?!?!?! I LOVE BABIES!!!

Just over a year ago, I was an African explorer. Ahhh, that was a wonderful time. When you're traveling, certain things can be much more exciting than they really are - like babies (although let's be honest, anyone who knows me knows that babies are almost always exciting to me).

The Impenetrable Forest in Uganda is one of the oldest forests on earth and let me tell you, it's thick and tropical. It's also the natural habitat for the mountain gorilla. One weekend, I took after Jane Goodall and trekked that mountainous forest to see those incredible animals in the wild.

Upon arriving at our campsite in Bwindi and as our host graciously showed us to our bungalo down a green winding path, he casually informed us that a couple families of the gorillas just had babies. My instant reaction was an overly enthusiastically elated exclamation: "BABiES?!?!?! I LOVE BABIES!!!" It took everyone off guard - even myself. The host didn't really know how to react, so he just started to laugh at me. My friend, Scott, who had endured my obsession with interacting with the kids wherever we would go, stopped mid step, looked at me with an unbelievable look on his face, and just busted out laughing. It was funny, but as I'm writing I realize that this might be one of those stories where you just really had to be there. But for me, it's worth writing down.

So the reason this story came to me today is because while we were on that mountain trek, (which was extraordinarily hard - we hiked up and down 5 mountains before we found them and had to hike those mountains again to get back home. That doesn't sound too bad, but we were in the rain forest. The ground was probably 8 inches deep of composting matter and was slippery. To add to the slipperiness, about a half hour into our trek the guide stopped and sent one of the porters back to camp to get a few pangas. Pangas are like machetes and Ugandans use them to "slice grass" and stuff. Up to that point we were walking on a nice trail. I didn't think I would need a walking stick and started to regret having to hold it the whole way. However, when the porter returned, to my surprise, we turned off the path and started to go straight up the steep steep hill side next to us on a path that our guide was forging with the newly arrived panga. We didn't exactly know where the gorillas were yet. So we wandered over mountain after mountain. The first mountain was no sweat, by the third, I was glad to have that walking stick. Finally, a radio call indicated where we needed to go. When we found them, they were absolutely amazing and all the pain of the trek diminished. Boy are they stinky! They're really beautiful, but STINKY. A couple times, I was only a few feet away from them, but usually, if we got too close, the guide would tell us to "extend back." The babies were SO cute! and the silver back was huge. They were eating a ton and swinging around in the tree tops. When our hour was up, we started the trek back over mountain after mountain. Eight hours later, I could hardly hold my balance on that slippery ground. My porter, Benard, walked closely behind me and would pick me up by the armpits when ever I slipped down the steep slippery non-existing path. It was amazing and worth it!)

Apologies for the tangential and long parenthetical statement, I'll carry on... while we were on the mountain trek, I met a cool lady who was starting to work for a safari company and for her job she just had to go on all the safaris in order to help her customers. Rough life, eh? She took tons of pictures and even some video. We exchanged emails and sent a few back and forth to share pictures. Oh, by the way, DON'T ever forget your camera when you are doing something like this!! Yep, that's what I did. So today I opened my email box to find a note from her. She finally uploaded a video she took of me looking at the baby gorillas!!! What a rad person to remember a flighty tourist who, over a year ago, forgot her camera when she was doing something really really cool in the wilderness. Here, check it out:

I finished a project!!!

Over the past few years I have started countless crafty projects. I never finish them. I usually get busy, bored, or bothered by the way it's turning out so I just start another one.

So I'm proud to announce that I actually finished the summer quilt I started (only 3 months ago)! Here it is:

I love being creative and really love the feeling of accomplishment. I'll have to finish projects more often. If you're looking for a relatively painless project, I highly recommend this one. If I can do it, you can do it!

Mel, thanks so much for helping me tie and bind it. Emily, thanks for helping me pick the fabrics.