Kicking Grass and Stuff

Well hello there. Just checking in. This is a pretty busy week. I say that and it’s only Tuesday! This is how September goes. Super busy trying to get all the school sports shot for high school and middle school yearbooks and the district website, etc.

So last night was 4 hours and a crazy amount of pictures of middle school, JV and Varsity volleyball. Went through the varsity images and then went to bed since it was almost 11 p.m. Way past my bedtime when I had to get up early!

Had to work early today so I could get out this afternoon and head down to Sand Valley. Sounds like I’m a regular there now. But still NO golfing. This time for tennis. What? Yup, they have one of the largest public grass court facilities in the U.S. Who knew?

So today Assumption hosted the Marshfield Catholic school and played on grass. Their version of Wimbledon in Wisconsin, I guess. Very cool to shoot. And what a treat not to have a fence in the way. I only got hit by the ball once! And that was on my backside when I turned to chit-chat with the crowd. My bad.

Naturally, since I was at SV, I had to venture up the hill again to Craig’s Porch with some girlfriends and yes, had one of their famous ice cream sandwiches. Hey, a girl’s gotta do what a girl’s gotta do. Plus, if you can believe it, it was hot out. And I was hot from climbing sand mountains to get between the courts.

Justified.

I also earned this beautiful Sand Valley sunset. I think we all deserve that!

Bye Bye Birdies

In our house, we got to kick off the 2019 NFL season today. And it wasn't your typical Sunday. As I've mentioned before, being on a purple island in the middle of Wisconsin comes with more than its share of challenges. One of them is rarely televised games since the cheeseheads get first dibs. So I was glad that Green Bay team and that Chicago team already did their dance on Thursday night. That meant ...

Yup. Purple on. Feet up. Game Day!

It was good to put my feet up after a busy non-sitting day yesterday and a full morning at church for the God's Work, Our Hands community work day. It was pretty successful. We had enough teams of volunteers to make a difference at 10 different sites – from scraping windows and painting for the elderly to sprucing up our neighborhood school entrance. And lots of projects in between.

I got home at almost 1 p.m. but was able to "rewind" to the beginning of the Vikes-Falcons game (God bless technology) so I didn't miss anything. And there was a lot to see! SKOL! I didn't even mind that my fantasy football QB was performing horribly – because he is Matt Ryan and was playing against the Vikings. Ha. Vikings win: 28-12. Bye, bye, birdies!

Although I got a walk in at halftime and was doing some laundry, I felt pretty comfortable in my recliner under my Viking blanket. Sort of set the stage for my productivity the rest of the day. Which was... slim to none. I was sitting there when hubby came home from golfing and didn't even have the energy to make up a good excuse for being lazy.

It's called Sunday. Football season. Let's SKOL!

Getting Steps and Clicks

Today by the numbers went something like 10,000 steps and 1,000 clicks. Yup, I had two senior photo shoots today so it was a whole lotta of clicks!

It was a workout! Here's me doing my ab workout. Ha. The mom of this boy took some photos of me in action. Sometimes I just can't get the right angle and I have to burn some calories. Usually doesn't last more than a minute!

It was a fun morning getting to be on two golf course – even without golfing. This afternoon was a hoot because I got to shoot my friend's daughter. We had a whole fan club with dog, sister and grandma. Since Cassidy and her baby sister are both softball players, I did a "sister session" of sorts.

Can they be any more adorable? They are sweet girls. And serious catchers!

I decided to go through the pictures this evening since hubby was up in Marshfield watching our nephew race. Now I pretty much need to give my right hand a rest. Especially since Sunday morning is our big work projects at church – and guess who's taking pictures? Ha.

Good thing I love this hobby o' mine! I really, really do.

Friday Night Lights

Definitely football feels tonight! Had the very cool temperatures – at least sweatshirts required – and early darkness so we could play under the Friday night lights!

Assumption was playing host to Thorp, who I thought were the Thorpedos but I guess they're the Cardinals. For the first half, our Royals answered every score. Going into the lockers at halftime, it as 22-14 with the torpedoing Cardinals in the lead.

Then the second half, they really were like torpedoes and somehow crushed us, ending up taking a 48-20 victory.

For my own small victory, I was testing out a different lens on my camera and I conclude it will work well once I get used to its focusing behavior, etc. That's boring talk for you. I need sleep so I can use it on a few seniors Saturday!

Time to turn out my Friday night lights.

Just Chill Out

I realize just about everyone is watching some football game this evening, so I'll speak randomly about the weather.

Despite a 44-degree start to my morning and the fact NFL (and Fantasy Football) are underway, it's still technically summer, according to the calendar.

So chill out and enjoy the good sleeping weather... after the game. Or for us non-Pack and non-Bear fans, whenever we're ready to go to bed!

Back to your regular programming...

The '90s Called... Marie Kondo Answered

Despite some momentum in the spring, I sent my tidying guru Marie Kondo on a long summer vacation. I mean who wants to be inside doing anything in summer – let along tidying, as she calls it.

Well guess who's back trying to spark joy in my life? I should say, guess who's back in my head reminding me to keep what sparks joy and toss or donate the rest? Yep. Front and center. Well somewhere in my head anyway.

I purposely left my Labor Day weekend calendar open to force myself to stay home and "do stuff" around the house. Yes, I was interrupted by fun at Sand Valley, a picnic with friends, and an afternoon at the racetrack. Still, intermingled with that was a start of something MK (I'll call her that now that we're bonding) would approve of.

After consulting hubby, the basement was my first target. I realize I am breaking all MK's rules. She wants us to examine categories of items like clothes and books – not go room by room – but the basement gets so humid and yuck in summer, it's just begging for attention.

There's certainly more than one elephant in the room down there – unused stereo, unused weight machine, etc – so I walked down the stairs and started with the sound machine at the left and worked clockwise.

I know. The '90s called. They want their big-ass stereo back. Well they can have it! Oh everyone had to have big one back then. I actually purchased this one 29 years ago this week. I remember because I had just moved into my apartment in Marinette for my first newspaper job and I needed to "furnish" it with something! The radio, double cassette tape deck, and 6-CD changer still work. The phonograph, though, is inconsistent.

As luck would have it, my next-door neighbor was having a garage sale. I texted her a picture and asked, "Do you need a big-ass stereo on your sale?" She said, "Sure!" So I took out the plastic containers of some 50 or so cassettes, unhooked the wires, got a little help from a friend, and hauled it over. "Sell it for what you want or give it away. I'm not hauling it back," I said.

Well, apparently there's a '90s fan born every minute. Someone bought it for $5. And I am so fine with that!

Now, what to do with all the tapes? I worry they've been sitting unused so long that they'll break in any machine. Not that I have another cassette player around. (I don't think.) There was a cardboard box of "cassingles" – yes kids, it was a cassette with a single song on it – that seemed a bit mildewy so I just tossed that whole darn thing. I'm sure MK was dancing somewhere over that major tidying move. No music required. (Or available without the stereo.)

To prove, though, that I've always been a fan of all kinds of music, I did snap a picture of a few of the cassingles before I discarded them.

Quite the mix, right? Definitely the late '80s and early '90s vibe. And I have a slew of mix tapes to prove there's more where that came from. Not to mention the CD tower. (MK should give my extra points for having all those in alphabetical order.)

Hopefully the music will inspire me to move and groove AND move stuff out of the house! Fall cleaning, er de-cluttering, er Kondo-ing, here I come!

My Next Paid Holiday is Thanksgiving

I don't just think of Labor Day as the end of summer, I think of it as the last paid holiday until Thanksgiving. That's 86+ days or 12-ish weeks. And that's why I get everything I can out of this three-day weekend!

Today, I got a walk in, some de-cluttering/discarding done, visited my hair artist (because some people do work on Labor Day), then joined hubby and whole bunch of fans watching our nephew Colin race at Golden Sands Speedway.

Our weekend schedules didn't match up to well this summer so I'm glad we got to see him compete today in the last race for the Tundra Series. There were 28 cars in the marathon feature. It was 108 laps and took about an hour thanks to all the cautions. I was surprised no one ran out of gas. Or maybe they did since they only had 21 finish.

So proud of Colin. He had fast qualifying time today. Then during the feature, he started in 11th and worked his way up to finish 5th! That was a very good finish for a crazy race. So glad he and his car are in one piece and avoided all the "mishaps."

It was a glorious day so I did take a ton of pictures. Since I had time and all. I won't post one from each lap or anything! Just a few.

Now it's early to bed and back to reality tomorrow. Work for us and for Mr. College, it's back to school! Sleep tight, everyone!