Hurdles

It's a bright sunny day outside and I've been working on images for a new website. I've gotten ideas from different places: Urban Outfitters' catalogue, other websites...it's nice how you can find inspiration from different sources.

We've been tentatively planning for the last three weeks to drive down to Aunt Pam's and drop off Lanier's Crown Vic so Uncle Arnold can sell it for us, but something always seemed to come up. This week, my car had some health issues which finally came to a head and now she's going into the shop. Lanier's going to have her towed to the mechanic in San Marcos tonight. Two words: water pump. Two more words: timing belt. Well, it's about that time!

Lanier and Jake spent three days working on it themselves. They replaced the spark plugs and wires, a gasket which stopped oil from leaking into the gasoline, and the thermostat which wasn't working. Now the car just plain overheats but at least now we know, whereas before, the faulty thermostat was masking the trouble down below. Praise God I never blew it up!

Here's where I give kudos to Dave Ramsey and his "Financial Peace University"--because we went through his class, we had $1,000 in savings for our "emergency fund," so we're able to pay for the car without charging it! Woohoo!

Anyway, so it's been a hurdle to get over this week--sharing one car (translation: Lanier has to take us to work and school and then we catch a ride home), moving money around to pay bills and not stress over no time together because Lanier's been working on the car all evening after work. Good thing Jesse Blanco preached on Romans 8:28-30 last Sunday.

Meanwhile, I've been researching printmaking and scheming on how to assemble materials and sketch up designs to start relief printing at home and I bought another canvas to do a big painting of an ice cream sundae from TJ's Burgers for Hannah. I made a goal to do six paintings by the end of this year. I'm nearly finished with the first one and have begun the second. Hannah's ice cream will be #3.

Hannah's having a great week in school. She had her braces tightened yesterday so today she's in some pain. And they pushed back the date for getting her braces off to December. Rats.

Saturday I am hosting about 20-30 ladies for my friend Ginni's baby shower. It's a girl! Cynthia is the main one throwing it, I'm just letting her use my house. Ginni goes to Tree and has two delightful boys, Kurt and Kyle. Then Sunday we'll head on down to Aunt Pam's anyway for BBQ and hanging out with her girls and their children. I haven't even met Elizabeth's daughter, Marlie, and the child is a year old! (Mom I'll try to get photos.)

Monday we all have the day off. Maybe I'll finish my painting and get the other really rocking. One thing's for sure--we will NOT be on the Comal River! Everybody and their cousin will be there, tubing.

I'm reading "The Radical Cross" by A.W. Tozer right now. Good grief what a powerful book. Every Christian should read it; it cuts deep! Then I'll read "When Heaven Invades Earth" by Bill Johnson.

I watched more Olympics events this year than probably in the last 10-12 years. I was a huge fan of gymnastics and track. Watching the men and women run those 110-meter hurdles was amazing!! They barely had time to get themselves over those hurdles because they were running so quickly. Lolo Jones clipped that second last hurdle and it slowed her down enough for the entire pack to catch up and she finished in seventh place instead of the predicted first.

I thought about those races when Lanier, on the third day of car work, said, "Why is this happening to us?" I replied, "Baby it's just a hurdle. When you clip one you've got to jump higher the next time. And keep running!"

I hope you're doing well and enjoying life. We are, even while we're jumping hurdles!

Getting Creative

For the past few weeks I've been doing some creative projects outside of regular work. Since we went to St. Augustine this past July, I have had in mind to do 3-4 paintings based on sketches and photos I took there.

Yes, I did sketches. Aunt Evelyn and I went in search of a local art supply store which turned out to be nothing more than a custom framing shop (huge disappointment!). So we ended up at Hobby Lobby and I purchased a couple of pencils, an eraser, a pencil sharpener and a 8x10 sketch book.

What a blast, sitting on the beach, sketching kids as they ran around and did their kiddie thing on the sand! Why don't I do this all the time?? Because I don't live on the beach?.....

Anyway, painting no. 1 is nearly finished. Painting no. 2 is underway--I put the first wash of color on it after drawing it out. #1 is of seashells and measures around 20x30 inches I think, and #2 is smaller and is from a photo I got of Ruthie digging in the sand. She's three years old.

All of this is being done in hopes of having a small display of art at our local Starbucks. My sister-in-law, Bess, works there and can get me in. Hannah and I went by yesterday and got a banana chocolate smoothie (yum) and Bess told me she booked me for July 2009. That was the earliest date available. Well, no rush to get these paintings done, I guess! :)

Hannah and I worked furiously on a mural for River City Vineyard Church last week. We did a garden scene in the babies' room. There are two other classrooms and hopefully I'll get to them soon. It took longer to do sketches and come up with a game plan than it did to actually execute! Everyone loves the mural so I'm thankful to have made that contribution to our new church.




Meanwhile Hannah, in an effort to do her part in raising money to go on a mission trip, has begun making and selling notecards. Again, thanks to Hobby Lobby, we've found blank cards and purchased a few stamps and worked together in the evenings after work. You can see Hannah's blog about it on www.bananablog101.blogspot.com.



Hopefully I'll get photos of the paintings up early next week or this weekend. Tonight I'm going to Night of Worship, an informal gathering a various believers in the area at Landa Park. Hannah is going to a Girls' Lock In sleepover at Tree of Life tonight. Fun! And we'll celebrate Bess's birthday Sunday (actual bday being Monday). Lots of fun things to do.

If you're interested in Hannah's cards, they come in packs of 4 and they're $5. It's a variety of designs and I need to photograph her newest ones. Check her blog for updates!

--Rachael

A Letter from Hannah

Hey everyone! This may be my last blog on here, seeing as I have my own! To visit it just go to bananablog101.blogspot.com & check it out!

Ok, now what I've been up to this summer. Well, I was supposed to leave on June 13 for Georgia, but my mom put me on the last flight out of Atlanta, without knowing it, & Delta has a policy that doesn't let unaccompanied minors onto the last flight out of any city, in case it gets cancelled. So, we had to wait until the 14th for me to leave. Well, I flew to Atlanta with no problem & Mom had scheduled me a 2 hour layover, so all was fine, until I got to my gate.

Apparently, the pilot & crew were late coming from another flight, so we had to wait. We were originally scheduled to leave at 4:06PM, but the crew still hadn't shown up, so they kept putting off our time of departure. FINALLY, 4 HOURS LATER, we left. So I was on my way to valdosta. Yay!

I arrived in one piece, spent the night at my dad's parents' house & we (me, my Papa, & my cousin, Nicole) left the following morning to get to Crystal River. While at Crystal River, we swam in the pool, kayaked, went on the boat, snorkled in the springs, & I even scuba dived once in the pool. We didn't get to scuba dive in the springs. I wish we had, but there was only one set of gear, plus I couldn't find my PADI license so, no scuba diving. But we had fun anyway!

We stayed at Crystal River for about a week, then went back to my Meema & Papa's house for 1-2 days. I can't remember. Nicole & I spent the night with Aunt Jenny for one night too! She makes the BEST banana pudding!!!!!!!!!!!!!! After that, we drove to Savannah & stayed with Nicole's parents for one night. We went to my Meema's parents' house & stayed there for the remainder of our time.

We went shopping on one day, crabbing on another day, so we stayed busy. While I was there, my Granny taught me to crochet! I'm getting pretty good! The day we left Granny & Papa's house, Meema dropped me off with my Grandma (my mom's mom). My best friend, Megan, lives next door to my grandparents, plus my great grandmother (my grandma's mom) lives next door too, so i've been keeping busy. :)

My mom will get here Friday morning. We leave for family vacation on Saturday. Finally, after years of asking, Megan is coming with us! Yay!!!!!!!!

We'll stay at St. Augustine for a week, then come back here for a wedding. Remember, check out MY blog (bananablog101.blogspot.com) for a more detailed account of my "adventures with Meema & Papa". :)

I'm sorry that there are no pictures, but there should be on my next blog.

Love, Hannah

Hall Family Reunion, Part 2 Howdy again from south Texas! The party's over for 2008 but it was fun while it lasted. Above, you see Chuck and Mary Nell's 7 grandchildren in order of age (Hannah is the only one not pictured). Jade, Eve, Josiah, Sophia, Allie, Sara and Katherine (aka "Kaken Rose" as Sara calls her)
Here are the proud grandparents with their crew.

Then I thought, seize the moment and grab some family photos, no matter how rough we looked. So I did. Krissy yelled at me to go outside where it was prettier, but I retorted, it's a million degrees outside.
I'm a fan of candid pictures; the ones you don't see framed and hanging on the wall.

Jonathan and Lisa with Eve, Josiah and Allie

Ben and Krissy trying to get Sara to cooperate while Katherine sits complacently

And, the nice pose!

Jade's always ready for her glamor shot so there's no "before" pictures for them. Jessica and Alcoe with Jade.

The newlyweds! Aw, how special. I'm sad Hannah's not in the photo. :(

Bess, Jake and Sophie should have a photo here, but, Bess was actually home asleep when those photos were taken. She worked at Starbucks that morning.

Here we have the Last Night Together before folks started heading home. It was my favorite night! Here is Lisa, Krissy, Mary Nell and Bess.

Finally some pictures of me!! Krissy took these of me with the kids.

I bribed the kids all week with icecream and cookies. They like Aunt Rachael.

I wanted one picture with my sister, Jessica. I love Jessica! (Ben, galivanting in the background)

Sara wanted to play poker so they gave her some chips. It's around midnight, here.

I grabbed this quick one of Bess and Josiah.

The in-laws goofing off for the camera.

All the kids sacked out in front of a movie while the adults played poker or Scrabble.

The Last Day was Saturday, and Ben and Krissy were flying from Austin back to LA with the girls by 5pm. Jonathan and Lisa & Co. left around 6pm to drive back to Georgia. So, we decided to surprise Mary Nell with a late birthday celebration. I made Mom's German chocolate cake and it rocked!!

Mary Nell was very surprised and grateful for the never-ending birthday celebration (it's been going on for a few weeks now). Chuck prayed a blessing over the family and thanked God for the food, and we all dug in! Man what a meal.

So ends the week long Hall family reunion. Next year the plan is for Colorado Springs the first week of June. It's too dern hot to do it in Texas again!!

Guys, we miss you already.

Love, Rachael

HALL FAMILY REUNION 2008

This week Chuck and Mary Nell have all of their children and grandchildren with them (minus Hannah) for a week's vacation. Since Hannah is in Florida with her Meema and Papa, I promised to take pictures and send them to her. So Hannah, here's what we did yesterday!

We went around 6:30pm to Cypress Bend Park, where Sophie had her third birthday party, to grill out and swim in the Guadalupe River. It was blazing hot, even at 6:30. Mary Nell said her thermometer outside registered 111 degrees!

Above is little Katherine Rose, Ben and Krissy's 2 and 1/2 month old daughter. They live in California. Below is Sophie, Josiah and Eve, heading for the water.

Katherine sitting in her Aunt Jessica's lap.


Eve, complaining because Sophie pushed her.

A very serene Jade, hanging out on the swing. Jade lives in Colorado and she's sad that Hannah isn't here.

Sara, finally awake from her nap in the car, walking with her daddy, Ben. Sara will be two in late September.

About 30 minutes before I had to leave for a photo shoot, Lanier and Jonathan fire up the grill.

Here's Sara, asleep while everyone's swimming.

Grandma tried to blow up a float meant to hold 20 people. Esther showed up later with an air compressor.

Here's Jason, Esther's husband, and their adorable one-year-old baby, Evelyn. Hannah LOVES Evelyn. They go to our church.

Krissy with baby Katherine.

Sophie and Josiah having fun.

Ben swinging out over the water.

The boys were pretty enthusiastic about getting the rope swings going.

Lanier.

Sorry these pictures are in backward chronological order....that's how this site loads photos. Very irritating.

Lisa and Krissy.

Uncle Lanier helping the small ones into the water.

Tiny Allie, age two, squawking at me happily. I don't know whose shoes those are.

Best friends!

Sophie, Jade and Eve.

So, that's pretty much what I got yesterday. Today we're going tubing down the Comal and I really wish I could photo the faces of these kids while they go through the tube chute. It'd be priceless!

Check back later for more pictures of the Hall Family Reunion.

Super Aunt!

Howdy folks! Yesterday I took Hannah and my three-year-old niece, Sophia, to Aunt Pam's house in south San Antonio (where all the billboards are in Spanish). We spent the whole day with Pam and her two granddaughters, Zena, age 6 (as of Thursday) and Zara, age 2. Sophie had a great time!

She wasn't too interested in petting Lovebug, Aunt Pam's one-month-old filly, but she enjoyed looking at her. She asked what was Lovebug's mama's name and we answered, "Prita," and then she asked, "What's her daddy's name?" and we were stumped.

How do you tell a three-year-old that horses are bred, not married? Hmm....


I'd promised the girls that they would get to swim. Zena and Zara, my cousins, knew we were coming, but Sophie was a surprise to them. They thoroughly enjoyed playing with a new friend! Aunt Pam filled an old horse trough for them to splash around in. It was was pretty nice for such a hot day.

Here's little Zara, getting into the water. Brrrr!!

Sophie was ready. Goggles on!

She promptly took them off and Zena asked to borrow them.
It was a great day of visiting and eating fried chicken and pecan pie (gasp!) yes Mom, I totally forsook the Eat Clean Diet yesterday. And it was GOOD!

We stayed until almost 7:00pm and Sophie, totally worn out, slept all the way home. It was a great day.