A Sad Day in Upstate NY

Today many of us woke up to the news that a local sheriff's deputy was shot in the line of duty. I didn't know him and I don't know his family but his death affected me as it also affected many others in our area.
His name was Kurt B. Wyman. He was age 24 and left behind a wife and child and a child on the way. He was active in his local church and had served his country in the marines. His wife went into labor this morning so his child's birthday will be the same day his or her father was killed. It's a tragedy all around. He had so much going for him.
Wyman's death reminds us all that life is short. It sounds like Wyman lived his life to the fullest which is what we should all take from this.
Officer Wyman will be missed. Please keep him and his family in your prayers.


News Link: 
http://www.wktv.com/news/local/Law-enforcement-community-comes-together-following-shooting-death-of-Deputy-123394848.html

This Tom Cat Thinks He's Ours

Meet Ivan. Ivan started hanging around our house the beginning of March. It was a very very cold day so my mom put him in our garage with a sign on the door for the kids not to let him in to keep him separate from our other cats. He stayed for a few days and then was ready to go back outside.

When he came back a few days later my mom tried him with the other cats but he just plays too rough and a few of the males don't get along with him at all. The males gained up on him but Ivan could hold his own. To keep the peace and for the cats safety Ivan went back outside. Ivan continued to come and go for the next few weeks. Beginning in April he's been around everyday. He is a real talker. When it was still chilly at night we would still put him in the garage at night because otherwise he would sit outside my brothers window and talk all night. Now that its warm he has no desire to come in but if he sees a light on late at night he'll talk to you.

 He's really friendly. He follows us around the yard. He waits for the bus with my siblings. He also keeps our couple male cats that can jump the cat fence in line because he will walk around the cat yard. When he's not there the boys will try and Ivan will seek up on them and be quiet till he's right beside them and all he has to do is meow once and the cat  jumps and climbs right into the yard. It's hilarious as I've witnessed it.

He's a great cat!

Spring Photo Shoot

Photo 1: Aaron has a chocolate egg in his mouth.

When my siblings were younger they used to walk in the Memorial Day parade with boy scouts/girl scouts. After the parade I liked to get a picture of the three of them together. Easier said than done. Every year a single shot turned into a photo shoot in the attempt to get one good photo. Now that they are older they no longer walk in the parade but I still wanted a Memorial Day picture of the three of them. Let's just say somethings never change:

Photo 2: Self-explanatory

They do this out of sheer sport as they know it drives me crazy.

Photo 3: Aaron is being ridiculous and Ben won't smile.

                                                                                       

Photo 4: I'm now reduced to pleading. Please guys just one good photo.

Photo 5: This is the best shot I could get of the 3 of them. Constance looks great in all of them but Ben and Aaron are jokesters.

Photo 6: I then let them go a little crazy :)

Hurray for Warm Weather!

I love spring because of the warm weather and how pretty everything looks. My cats feel the same way. Unfortunately when we first moved to where we now live we had a problem with our cats not staying away from the road and lost a couple. To solve this problem my dad built my mom a yard for the cats.

It is constructed of chicken wire and garden mesh that prevents the cats from being able to escape while they still get to enjoy the outdoors.

They love it.

 

Even if sometimes they want to get out ;)

Fun with the Housemates

This year as a senior at college I chose to live in a townhouse with 7 other girls. Though we had our disagreements at times overall it was a good situation. We had a lot of fun this year.

 

For Halloween we hosted a party for the other people living in the townhouses and flatts. Here we are with some of our friends. 

 

 For Christmas we did Secret Santa and had a house party where we made cookies, pizza, and watched movies.

 

During Spirit Week there was an 80's dance that a few of us went to together. 

For Valentines Day a few of us took pictures with the campus store mascot Willard J. Houghton.

 Five of us eight girls were seniors on the track team. Here we are after our final athletic banquet.

 Last weekend a bunch of us went 'glow bowling.' Here we are glowing. ;)

 This week we finished our finals and have a few days off before graduation. To celebrate being done a few of us went to the Cheese Cake Factory. Here I am with my cheesecake, it was delicious.

So there is an overview of our year as a house. As crazy as it could be sometimes, I'll miss them next year.

 

Cake Fail

So funny story. My mom had to have back surgery so to celebrate a successful surgery we decided to bake a cake. Mind you my mom is the only one in the family to ever have successfully made a cake from scratch so I decided to make a cake from a box. Easy enough right? I mean you have to add 3 ingredients, mix, and bake. Well sometimes I surprise myself how I can mess up the most idiot proof things.

This is how it went down. We have a big family so I was using 2 boxes of cake mix. Still easy enough you just have to double the ingredients. This is where the trouble started but you see I didn't notice it until the cake was baking. You see the outsides were cooking nicely but the inside was a wet mess. I was afraid of it burning so I mutilated the middle to expose the liquid cake mix underneath the cooked layer so the cake would cook faster. When the cake was finished it hit me. I think I actually tripled the water. It called for a cup but instead of 2 I think I added 3. I will never know but that would explain why the batter looked off (I thought it might be the brand at first) and why it cooked so funny. Well leave it to me, maybe I should go back to kindergarten, lol.

Anyways the cake was good but had more of a pound cake consistency then a sheet cake consistency here are my fail photos:

Here it is right out of the oven

To make it easier to frost I inverted it into a plastic dish since we don't have a cake plate

I guess it wasn't a total fail since the cake was still edible and mom's okay so its the thought that counts right?

 

Well I hope so since I obviously need to also work on my frosting skills :+P