I wonder

After blog stalking for sometime now, I find myself suffering from a case of blog envy, if you will. How does everyone else have such exciting/cute/unique blogs/lives? Doesn't anyone else have days where you come home from work and sit around in your pajamas folding clothes? No new and fabulous trips, purchases, renovations or crafty ideas--just regular folk type stuff like, you're tired and all your makeup wore off hours ago but you're glad you got at least a few things done.

Where is all the regular stuff? Am I missing it? Or does nobody post about real stuff anymore?

AAA Wedding

Is it a sign that I shouldn't have a blog because I would rather do anything than update it? I can never pick a theme and stick with it because I hate them all but am too lazy to actually customize things and make them cute. So if you're bothered by the fact that every time you come to my blog it has a different background but no new posts, I'm sorry, but it's your fault for looking!

Now, without further ado, a few shots of my terrible photography from the Abi and Ammon Ayers Wedding.

Problemas.

Internet is sucking. Loads of pictures tomorrow. Two weddings, a tulip festival, lots of Bobbie/Dave pda, and with some luck, headband photo shoot pics.

See you tomorrow!

I love cookies.

I've been so busy watching old seasons of ANTM and making oatmeal chocolate chip cookies I haven't really had any time to blog. I have to make cookies every week because I take them to work and when nobody is looking I eat them. That way, I don't have to share.

Quick rundown of the Rexburg life you've all been missing:

- Planting foxgloves and asters... in pots because we don't have planters...or a yard. I hope a green thumb is genetic because it seems like everyone else in my family's got it.

- My sister calls me a "scum sucking piece of trash douche bag" on Facebook.

- Got rave reviews for my work in our magazine dept (phew!) . But El Presidente won't let me change departments, and I might have to work through both of my cousins' weddings this summer. Boo!

- Bought makeup behind Danny's back. He just can't understand why you would ever need more than one eyeshadow.

-Monthly round of swollen tonsils is back. My body is trying to give me strep throat again. Traitor.

- Photo shoot. Pictures to follow. Oh and I've got to post pics from AAA Wedding too.

- An annoyed Danny who is waiting for me to watch Modern Family with him. What a hard life we lead.

Welcome to the 21st Century

After months of watching movies and TV (streaming online shows) on a 21 inch computer monitor, we finally purchased a TV. I don't want to rag on the monitor, it treated us very well for being used as a TV, but it was frustrating to be peacefully watching 30 Rock and then have to leap to the edge of the bed to see whatever detail was on the screen. Does that make sense? Anyway. 

We haven't gotten satellite or cable yet, so we kept Danny's old computer there so that he can download shows and movies using the TV as the monitor and then just popping the USB into the TV. What a great little contraption! I just love technology.

What a beaut! You can see I still have a long way to go design-wise...like maybe hiding those cords and movies for starters. Doesn't that candle look like a glass of milk?

Ha ha! Too much TV, all tuckered out.

Now next time Dave and Bobbie come to visit we can pile on the bed again and actually be able to see what we're watching! 

Trouble

Conversation about joint bank account.

Danny: This would be so much easier (sputter) if you (angry sputter) just.... 

Jane (makes innocent eyes): Hmm. What?

Danny (all angry sputters): If you could just put your name! Your REAL NAME! TOONE!

Uh oh. I think Danny's remembered I haven't changed my name yet. Can't it be Jane Elizabeth Sroufe Toone? I know Sroufe isn't the greatest last name ever (nor is Toone) but I identify with it! I had to wear frumpy, mannish clothes and be called 'Sroufe' for 18 months--doesn't that count for something!?

Shouldn't I be able to scrunch my maiden name in between my middle and married name? It's not even dignified to scrunch it in there, 'Jane Sroufe Toone' doesn't have some wonderful ring to it but I just want it. I need it. Is that so bad?

Desert Flower

Has anyone heard of the Somalian supermodel Waris Dirie? She was discovered in London and became insanely famous in the late 1990s. We just finished watching the movie about her, Desert Flower, and were in tears by the end.

It came out in 2009, and chronicles her life--from being born into a nomadic clan, genitally mutilated at age 3, running away when forced into marriage at 13, ending up London, discovered by a famous fashion photographer while working at a McDonald's, and finally becoming a UN Special Ambassador for the Elimination of Female Genital Mutilation (FGM).

I remember reading her interview with Marie Claire in 1997, her first about being mutilated. I was in seventh grade and lay curled in bed with that magazine, sobbing and thinking about this woman and the other millions like her that had been disfigured due to cultural superstition. I prayed that night and thanked God for being born a woman in the United States.

We hear stories of atrocities that go on all over the world and I always feel helpless to do anything. The least I can do I blog about it.

Somalian women are mutilated because they are thought of as unclean. The only way to ensure cleanliness and virginity is to scrape away some or all of their genitalia, leaving a tiny opening, and then stitching the surrounding area closed (often times with thorns or whatever is handy). This is done without anesthetic or sterile instruments on girls ages 3 and up. Most girl become infected, many hemorrhage, bleed out and die, almost all are affected the rest of their lives: loss of sexual pleasure, inability to bear children, incontinence, etc.

On the wedding night, it is expected that the new husband cut the girl open with a blade before forcing his way into her.

Female circumcision affects 130 million women world wide, with 6,000 girls mutilated daily. Ninety-eight percent of somalian women are mutilated.

Honestly, I had to take a break while typing this because I thought I was going to throw up. Think of this happening to your daughters or sisters or any woman at all and try not to be sick.

Click here for more information, but be warned - very graphic images
Click here to read about the foundation Waris created. You can donate to her foundation to help stop FGM as well.

New Hair

Today I went and got my hair did. I like it for now. Cabello liso, mmm. I almost never have my hair straight, so it's a big change. To me, straight hair just feels so, I don't know, contrived. Like it's too polished or something. I like to have my hair imperfect, air dried and a little mussy with some character. Is this so anal, to talk about hair this way?

Anyway, I went to The Defining Line salon for the first time, it was great! Getting my hair cut generally makes me kind of nervous because you never know if they're going to listen to you or brazenly hack away. But Marci was fantastic, I got a trim (half an inch?) and a glaze.

I wish my hair were longer--it's been so hard to grow out ever since that cank Hermana Montenegro chopped it to ear length. Argentines definitely don't know what an A-line is, and so she thought she helping me by "evening out" my hair. Boo. July will mark two years since the day she sheared me.

I had Danny take pictures of my hair (I'm bad with the camera timer) but none turned out to be a straight shot of my hair. So here's the Myspace style shot for your viewing pleasure.

Oh, and we made strawberry shortcake. And yes, that's it sitting on our bed. I like to eat in bed. A gross guilty pleasure.

Runway Friday.

Is it bad that I sometimes think of the long hallway at work as a runway?

Occasionally, I'll find myself strutting--just a little--and I have to take a step back and say to myself, 'Whoa. You're at the work place. Tone it down.'

Speaking of runways, is anyone watching ANTM this season? I really liked Ren at first but then I realized she's really boring behind all that red lipstick. Glad she's gone. And Anslee? I can't wait for her to get voted off. She's such a know-it-all.

Shouldn’t we all be a bit more like this?

There is a kind man at work who always greets—and chats with— the janitors, listens patiently to anyone who addresses him, and in a gentle, non-creepy way says things like, “Hello there pretty lady” to the women whom he passes in the hall. 


On another note, today I found out that accidentally lint-rolling your hair really hurts.

Happy Easter! It's a Gang Fight.

Turns out we did get in the mood to stage a gang fight. Yellows vs Pinks. I even posted individual fights at Danny's request. Enjoy!

Danny did a great job with the mini weapons. You know I couldn't fashion such a variety of guns all on my own.

Machine gun: 1 Baseball bat: 0

Meat Cleaver: 1 Unarmed Yellow Peep: 0

Both dead.

"Brick, where did you get a hand grenade?"

General carnage.

Up close and personal.

Lastly, a lovely aerial view of the carnage.

Who do you think won?

100 Ways To Kill A Peep

In honor of Easter, we killed a peep. Actually, we killed several because I couldn't resist eating a few while we took pictures. Mmm, fluffy. Our inspiration came from the blog 100 Ways To Kill A Peep. I think I'm going to submit our train scene and see if it gets posted.

I love the mustached pink bandit peep. You wouldn't believe it, but it's kinda hard to draw a mustache on a peep. We were going to do a gang fight between the pink and yellow peeps, but Danny hasn't finished making mini weapons yet and I don't know if we'll still be in the mood tomorrow.

Isn't peep a fun word to say?