Journee's Critters

Yesterday evening my family hosted a nice little cookout in our backyard, and we invited the Broach family to come over!

And they came! Woot!

They stayed for several hours, and we all had a great time. We made hotdogs, and s'mores. We rode the go-cart, and shot one of our potato-canons off a few times.

That's Kayleigh and Quinn. Barely a blur.

(They had weeds!)

Indy was a raving maniac as always. ;) Lol.

 Then there's Willow--also in a purple bathing-suit.

Zeb had a great time eating chocolate. But then again--I believe we all did.

(He just wouldn't look at the camera!)

 That's Regina Broach, David and Kayleigh's mom. She's also our safety officer at CAP.

And her husband, Ron. He's a Major at the TN Wing in CAP; but also used to be our Squadron Commander.

Then there's David; who maybe-kinda-almost-sorta proved to me that he's not scared of chickens. ;) He's our new Cadet Commander in CAP. Which means he's over all cadets. It frightening, really. Lol.

My Mom and Dad. :):):)

Although the Broachs missed it: right after they left my Dad picked me up and ducked my head in the ice-water bucket we had sodas in. It was all quite dramatic...and cold.

And wet.

We had fire!

And in short we all--or at least I--had a great time; and I hope we can do it again sometime soon. Thanks for coming, guys! It was great to have yah.

~

Journee.

Well, I have some bad news. Both Gus and Shawn have died: of what I believe in internal injury...must have been when their Momma was killed and their sibling were too: they could have easily been crushed, or shocked, or something...it's really sad.... But that's not all! No, also: Cottontail's egg hatched, and the little chick was pecked to death, by the other hens.... So all in all, not much luck for my little birds...I am quite depressed about it. Not much luck at all....

My updates for what's been going on lately:

I have two new baby gamechicks!

Though under rather sad circumstances. These two little babies are siblings: the only survivors of a large clutch that was attack by some critter during the night...maybe a fox, or a coon. Their Momma was killed too.

They were my grandparents' birds, and my grandma and grandpa decided to let me take the two chicks to take care of. I love baby chicks, and was very pleased: though I am sad about the Momma and all her other little 'uns.

I named the two little birds Shawn, and Gus. named after the two main fellas from Psych, which is one of my new favorite shows. *Alien!*

They are still just babies, and are quite young still. They don't have many feathers, and still have those splayed legs that mean they haven't been walking real long. I've gotten them drinking, though they haven't really started eating yet: but they'll get there, I'm sure. Shawn and Gus have a box and brood-light in my bedroom. They must keep warm, of course.

I've been holding them often today, and now and then I'd need to use both hands. So I'd move them around a little: and they'd squirm, and cheep. Not real happy to be woken up. So then, being the total genius I am: I put them in my bra.

Took care of that problem. It actually worked pretty good. I mean, they were warm, I had both hands, and they could sleep. No big deal.

Mom thought it was pretty funny. She took some pictures, and I figured it would make a--um--different blog post. I mean really; oddly enough people don't normally carry baby birds in their bras.

Must be the southern in me...

That's Gus watching the camera.

Aaand there is Shawn.

Sweet chickens. They're messed up for life: but still sweet.
Lol.

~

Journee

Yesterday, my family went up to the lake, where my grandparents live. :)

And we got out the jetskies! Yes! I'm been dying to get them out forever, and I rode them quite a lot, as did everybody else but my aunt, my Mom, and my grandparents, and my uncle.

 

 That's Garrett and Indy, by my Dad's awesome jetski. It is way faster then my grandpa's, which is much easier to double up on, and is much, much steadier. 

I drove my Dad's most of the time, but much to my Dad's disappointment: I wasn't doing donuts.

He kept telling me to try some, and I was saying, "no, I don't want to toss myself off." I've never really fallen off of my Dad's 'ski before. I wanted to keep it that way, but Dad had other ideas. He told me, that if I didn't fall off and swim, I wasn't driving it right.

Hm.

And so, he told me to get on with him, and we were going to ride.

At this, I got pretty wary: I knew he just wanted to make me swim. And, I've always thought you couldn't double on my dad's 'ski. Apparently you can: it's just hard.

So we got out there, and he had me climb up first, then told me what to do. What he was going to do was hang onto the handles on the back, and then have me idle it forward a bit. Then he would say "go!" and have me gun it, and climb up real high on the steady, keep it steady, and he was going to climb on.

It didn't sound real easy--and it turns out: it isn't.

We did alright the first time, and after a moment Dad had us zipping across the lake. Which wasn't the bad part: the bad part was him trying to do donuts. He'd turn and lean real sharp, and I would just be sitting there yelling, "I'm NOT a happy PERSON!"

He was just a laughing. Lol. I wasn't really that scared, but it was very exhilarating. I was laughing half the time too.

And he'd try and turn again, and he kept saying, "you've got to lean!"

And then there's me hollerin', "I don't want to LEAN! I'm trying to SURVIVE!"

And so of course, when I yelled 'survive," we went flying off the 'ski and into the water.

It took us a while to get back on, but I was laughing my head off, choking on water. When we tried to get back on, the jetski would tip back when Dad tried to climb on, and we'd go falling backwards.

And according to Dad I wasn't doing a very good job staying up on the jetski when it was going backwards, apparently my butt kept hittin' him in the head. Lol.

After a while, he got on first, and had me climb on behind him, then hold onto him. That went okay, and we ended up doing some donuts, and going over some waves that made me bounce up, and down, splashing water in my face til I couldn't see and was laughing and screaming. "I'm still not happy!!!" We went off again, but it was all quite fun. After Dad got off, I went and tried to do some donuts by myself, though I never could get the right speed. If I went to fast, it would skid out from under me, and I would go falling off. If i went to slow I would just turn normally...

I just need more practice.

 

After a while, Sierra tried out my Dad's 'ski, and she did pretty good. :)

Quinn also got pretty good at donuts on my grandpa's 'ski.

Her and Sierra rode together quite a bit.

Then!--Garrett decided to have a go on my Dad's jetski.

And you know--naturally he turns around and does a few perfect donuts.

But he did flip the whole 'ski after a few goes. Lol.

 

 

His hair was lookin' pretty nice by the end of the day. Lol.

 

So was mine.

Observe:

 

 

Sierra's evil.

Evil, I tell you!

Indy did a lot of driving and riding also. She's getting pretty good.

In fact, the only people that can't drive are Justin, Zeb, Rose, and Willow.

 

 

Quite a few of the doggies were there.

Like Zelda's momma, Heidi, who's in the picture above.

 

And Pebbles, the long-bodied sweetie.

And of course: Magnum.

(You see the drool?)

Zeb and Justin had a good time playing on the Mule.

Grandpa kept trying to give Gran some bunny ears.

 She did not want bunny ears.

 

 

I can't even explain this. 

So, just look at the pictures. Lol.

  And I have more. Lol.

 

~

It was really fun. We all had a great time. though today--I am very sore. My butt, my legs, my arms, my butt, and my neck.  It was great though. :)

 

~

 

As for today's updates: first off...the O-Flights for today were canceled due to the rain. Go figure.

Cricket is doing great.

He's a fat, playful, and sleepy kitty.

 

Just look at his belly!

Tomorrow, I'll be going to see the A-Team!

Here are a few pictures that I took the other day.

Arwen, our pretty hound dawg.

Ghost. That second one is a bit blurry.

 And that's Cricket, our newest kitty. He's still a little, baby thing. But has already grown into his ears.

He doesn't like me trying to take his picture.

Yesterday I candled Cottontail's two remaining eggs. She did have three, but one has disappeared.

They are both very much fertile, and I believe will be hatching around the 22nd-24th. I can't wait! Though I'm sure my parents will not want me bringing one into the house. :( Shame.

Tuesday, the 17th, I'll be going up to the air port for more O-Rides with CAP. That will be fun--hopefully I'll get to actually fly this time. Lol.

And Wednesday my Dad's taking me and Quinn to go see the A-Team, woot! Finally, I've been wanting to see that 'un.

I figured out how to use Color Burn on Photoshop Elements 5, which is quite a bit different then my Elements 7, which got lost on our old computer when we got our new one. :(

But Color Burn is cool, you can use it to make pictures look evil. Observe:

(Of course I used a cat as a example. I have a lot of cat pictures, but this'll work on humans too. Lol.)

So here's the original. black and white, fluffy cat.

After I edited it:

It's much darker, (probably hard to see,) and has different colored eyes.

Another example:

 The original.

(This was cruel of me,) The edited version:

 Hm. Apparently I have issues.

Poor kitty. :(

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One of the best things about Photoshop is how easy it is to alter colors. Such as the blue fire horse that is the header for this temporary blog template of mine. It was a red-ish/orange.

Then I got a hold of it, and made it blue.

It's neat both ways, though. I'm a just a color blue geek.

This cat's eyes were more of a hazel-ish, and her fur was more brown then gold.

I quickly changed that.
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So anyways, I'm looking forward to the movie, and the O-Rides. It should be fun. :) And as I understand Andrew, Michael, and Chris as going for the O-Rides also, though I don't know who else is....

Hello! Yes, it's me, Journee...alive and kickin'.

This poor blog, I let it die, didn't I? I haven't posted in eons!

Well, I'm back and breathing now. :)

I added a new template, and while I'm talking about it: I have no idea where the Lorem Ipsum thingy beneath my header came from--I didn't write it, just so you know. Lol.

I did write this, at my grandparents' house, while babysitting their sweet doggies Dolly and Jill.

 It's pointless, and about my favorite none-real critter ever: a dragon! Woot! Lol.

~

A sinister flower out of the waves: the black dragon leapt from the ocean in a cascade of cold crystal water. The beautiful she-beast spread her wings in a beat that caused a mighty whirlpool to bloom in the deep, sucking at her tail as she blasted into the skies, tossing her head back in a howl that ripped from her throat with a fierce splendor that clawed at my heart. Rain leaked from high above as the she-dragon powerfully thrashed her massive wings, closing her jaws with a sound akin to the snapping of bones. Streams of freezing water dripped of her smooth scales, and she soared into the dewy, depressing clouds: her second cry breaking the thin air in a heartfelt shattering of glass.

~

Like I said, pointless...but yay for that, eh? Lol.

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So anyways, I'm back, and I had to let y'all know. :)

~

Signed, Journee.