Book # 8

It feels like it took FOREVER, but I FINALLY finished this book:

It’s just a small story really, about among other things: a girl, some words, an accordionist, some fanatical Germans, a Jewish fist-fighter, and quite a lot of thievery. . . .
Set during World War II in Germany, Markus Zusak’s groundbreaking new novel is the story of Liesel Meminger, a foster girl living outside of Munich. Liesel scratches out a meager existence for herself by stealing when she encounters something she can’t resist – books. With the help of her accordion-playing foster father, she learns to read and shares her stolen books with her neighbors during bombing raids as well as with the Jewish man hidden in her basement before he is marched to Dachau. This is an unforgettable story about the ability of books to feed the soul.

It sounds really good huh? And it is a pretty good book.... It just took me a long time to get into it.... Like 200 pages!! I have trouble with books that take that long to get going!

But I am really glad I stuck with it because there is a great meaning behind the story and it really makes you think. It wont ruin the story for me to tell you that this book it told from Deaths point of view. Death talks about collecting souls.... especially those of the Jews killed in gas chambers. There were many part that made me cry. This was one of them:

"They watched the Jews come down the road like a catalog of colors. That wasn't how the book thief described them, but I can tell you that that's exactly what they were, for many of them would die...The suffering faces of depleted man and women reached across to them, pleading not so much for help - they were beyond that - but for an explanation. Just something to subdue this confusion."

If you read this book, just go in with an open mind and just keep going.... even when you think it is SO boring!!

Quote Wall Monday

Happy Memorial Day!

Everything's Coming Up Poppies

I have had the same favorite flower for a really long time.... the Gerber daisy!

They are just so big, fun and bright!!

They are just a happy flower in my opinion!!

My roommate loves them too and often buys them for our apartment!! She was so sweet and bought all of these beauties a few weeks ago.. just because!!

 And she gave me these wonderful pink ones for Easter!!

{Looking back at these pictures I realize that some of them look really sad!! I should have taken pictures when she first gave them to me!! They were gorgeous!! The Easter ones were at least 10 days old at that point and the other ones were at least 7}

But I think there is another flower that may just take the daisies place... Poppies!!

I don't know what it is about these little flowers, but I love them!!

I don't think I had ever paid much attention to the poppy until I went to Italy. The hillsides were covered in them and they were growing everywhere!! I think that is when I decided I really like them!

I brought that flower home with me!! Fortunately I was carrying a book with me {Twilight......} and after I picked the flower for the picture, I put it between the pages of my favorite book to dry and press it! I still have it in my Europe journal!!

I was at the store the other day buying potting soil and seeds and saw a flat of beautiful white poppies already in bloom! I wanted them so badly! I just think they are beautiful!

Some day I want a garden full of poppies! Right next to my cherry blossom tree and palm tree!! My yard is going to be sweet!!

{P.S. I got The Book Thief back from the library yesterday! I am bound and determined to finish the last 171 pages this weekend!!}

Must.... Keep..... Reading.....

Have you noticed that "The Book Thief" has been in my "Currently Reading" spot F.O.R.E.V.E.R?!?

I don't know why it is taking me so long to get through this book! I think it is just short of 600 pages and I finally made it to page 379.
It was a book club book and I was supposed to have finished it on May 18th so I could go to the discussion, but that obviously didn't happen!
For some reason it is taking me so long to read this book!

It was due back to the library on Monday and I still hadn't finished! I considered just giving up and reading a plot summary on Wikipedia or something..... but I just cant! I have put way to much time into this book to give up now! So I put it back on hold on and hopefully I will get it back soon so I can find out what happens!!

This is the last thing I read:

"'I couldn't help it,' he said...'I could see outside. I watched, only for a few seconds.'
He had not seen the outside world for twenty-two months...
It was Papa who spoke.
'How did it look.'
Max lifted his head, with great sorrow and great astonishment.
'There were stars,' he said. 'They burned my eyes.'"

It kind of brought tears to my eyes.... but Holocaust stuff will always do that too me!
More to come soon... hopefully!

Happy Birthday Little Bro

I'm terrible.... this post is a month late!!! I don't know what my blogging problem has been lately..... I'm behind on so many posts!! Now its catch up time!!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY DALLIN!! My little brother.... who has been taller that me probably since he was 12!

He turned 19 this year which seriously feels so crazy!!! His last year as a teenager!! Man, that makes me feel old!!

My whole family got together to help him celebrate! We went to dinner at Sweet Home Chicago Pizza {Or maybe its called Down Home..... shoot.... either way its a pizza place}! The food was yummy and it was great to have everyone {including my grandparents} there together!

Dallin got his dog Bandit, and that puppy loves him so much!! It's awesome to watch them play together!! It doesn't really matter who else is in the backyard, if Dallin is there and starts to walk away, Bandit will always follow!!

Dallin is seriously an awesome brother! He may be 7 years younger than me but he has always stood up for me! He likes to go shooting and play XBox and I know that I can trust him to fix my car when it has problems! Happy belated birthday little bro!!

Behind The Mask

Confession time:

I watch The Bachelor/Bachelorette!!

Yes, that is right! I actually just barley started watching it last season when it was Brad was on his second go around on the show!! I wasn't necessarily going to watch this season, but one of my favorite people from last season is the new bachelorette, Ashley!

There is a guy this season named Jeff and I think he might be one of my favorite guys. He got out of the limo wearing a mask!

Why? Because he wanted to prove that it's what on the inside that counts! How awesome is that!!

A lot of the other guys seem to be really freaked out by him....I guess I can kind of see it..... But as someone who doesn't have the most awesome outside, I am all about people that look at whats on the inside!

Or maybe it's just because I have a crazy fascination with Venetian masks and masquerade balls!! Remember?

Quote Wall Monday

I'm sorry for the lack of posts in the last 2 weeks!! The Internet has been down at my apartment for awhile which makes it hard to blog!! Hopefully that will be fixed soon and I can get back to posting!!

P.S. Isn't that wall fantastic?!?! I would love to have a wall like that in my house! I wonder if my landlord would go for it.....

Red and Yellow and Pink and Green

Ever spring Utah has a Festival of Color and I have always wanted to go!! This year I finally made it down there!! What is the Festival of Color you ask?! It's awesome, that's what it is!!

It's a Hindu {I think} festival to welcome in spring! There are bands that perform and Indian food and the burning of a huge stick witch {still not sure what that had to do with all of it...}. But the best part is the colors! Everyone walks around with bags of colored flour {it might be cornstarch actually...} and you get to throw it at people! That is right, you get to walk around, throwing things at complete strangers and it is totally acceptable!! People come up to you will color on their hands and touch your face and put hand prints of your back!! It's awesome!!

Here are some before pictures:

And the afters:

Fun huh?!? I think I need to make this an annual tradition!! Next year I will be wearing white though!! And I will probably keep my sunglasses on!!

See that pink dot on my forehead? A stranger just walked up to me with pink on his thumb and dotted me!! And see all that purple in my EYE!! Yeah, that was from little kid that chucked it right in my open eye and in my ear!! He was pretty excited to throw color at me and I of course got him back!!  

See? I was cleaning purple out of my ear for at least 3 days!! Haha!!

That is what the inside of my hood looked like after only about 30 minutes of walking around!!

Every couple of hours that had a mass throwing of colors! Everyone gets together and throws their color in the air at the same time!! I don't think this picture does justice to show exactly how many people were there!! We were getting squished big time!! There is a guy on a microphone counting everyone down and when he gets to one everyone is supposed to throw their color. Well, do you see that spot in the picture above where there is a bunch of color going? I was down in that section! For some reason our little area started throwing early!! Oops!! And this is what it looks like when everyone throws at once:

Crazy huh!! Stacy got this picture for me and it's perfect!! It doesn't look like that for long.... the wind starts blowing, mixing the colors and making it look like brown dust!

It was SO hard to breathe down there.... I was chocking on powder!! Yuck!! I don't know if it would stand in the middle of the crowd like that again!! I don't even want to know what my lungs looked like after that!!

And here we are at the very end! Stacy stayed up by the temple most of the time because she didn't want to get covered!! She got off easy!! Haha!! Cant wait to do it again next year!!

I'm Dreaming Of A White Summer

At the rate Utah is going we could seriously be having snow in June! You think I'm lying?! Well, for anyone who is not in Utah, and may currently be enjoying some fabulous spring like temperatures, let me just show you what we are dealing with!  

This was the view from my bedroom window at the beginning of April! I was pretty ticked at Mother Nature because, seriously, by that point be should have been enjoying temperatures somewhere in the high 60s maybe even low 70s!!

Maybe I shouldn't have said so many mean thing about Mother Nature.... because this is what she sent next:  

Look at all the dang snow!! This was towards the end of April!! Not even cool!! I'm not good at guessing how many inches were out there, but it was a lot!! WAY To much for the end of April!!

Look at that poor tree!! There was so much snow and it was so heavy that it was weighing the branches down!! Needless to say I was not pleased when I had to dig my car out that morning!!

For a few days after that I was scrapping ice off my car windows in the morning before I could leave for work!! I had to dig my stupid scraper stick out of my trunk and crank up the heater!!

It is the the middle of May and it has been raining for 4 days straight! Aren't the showers supposed to be in April so we can being enjoying the flowers this month? But I shouldn't complain! Rain is much better than snow! Guess what I saw on the news this morning though? SNOW, in central Utah!! Sorry all you people down by Beaver!! I hope it melts quick!!!

I need the weather to get sunny soon!! My car needs a bath pretty bad and I have lots of things I need to spray paint!! The rain is killing my craftiness!! So here's to hoping that the sun really will be out on Saturday!!

And anyone who is currently dealing with flooding... I am SO sorry!! I have seen so many pictures from the Midwest and they look awful!! I'm crossing my fingers that things will start to dry up for you soon!! And anyone that is walking around in 70 degree temps..... we're all jealous!! Soak up some sun for me!

Quote Wall Monday

Coming Soon To A Post Near You

I need to do some serious catch up blogging! I finally took the pictures off my camera and remembered all of the wonderful this I need to post about! So look for posts like this coming soon:

A Belated Birthday Post 

A Tribute To Mom

A Craft-tastic afternoon!

A Colorful Saturday

A White Easter