oh yeah! you know you missed it. 
i think my top tens have been dead for about a year now…that’s long enough.
top ten reason why i love coming to visit my parents in tallahassee (in no particular order):
- seeing my parents’ handwriting all over the house (i know this is wierd, but i just like seeing it on grocery lists and post-it notes and what-not)
- mom makes fruit jello waaay better than i do.
- my kids think this place is a theme park
- love that i still know where everything is (batteries and a screwdriver, for example)
- the “hidden” key (that everyone knows about)
- the dogs (big, hairy, loud, slobbery. love them.)
- being here means that the car trip here is over (i barely made it).
- i’m 30 years old and this house still very much feels like home (mom & dad, please don’t ever move!)
- fridge/pantry/freezer is always full of yummy stuff (most of which is probably meant for my kids…but i don’t care)
- i always sleep GREAT
i’ve had these pictures on my computer for a few years, but have never thought about posting them on my blog. thought some of you might get a kick out of them.
first day of 1st grade (Seminole Presbyterian in Tampa)
senior year...i have no words for this.
first day of seventh grade...shirts were for some evangelism thing we were doing. believe it or not, this day was the turning point in me going from nerd to semi-popular.
the morning after the circus
this isn't dorky, it just brings back good memories...a helicopter ride in hawaii (cue jurassic park soundtrack)
easter get-up (circa 1990)...i seriously wore my hair like this every day for a year
that’s all for now…although there’s lots more where these came from…
Filed under: family
my nephew owen is almost 3. he’s a pretty average toddler boy…eats alot, likes to run around and yell alot, etc. however, one thing sets him waaay apart from his pint-sized peers: owen is OBSESSED with golf. i asked my sister-in-law (and great friend) julie to write a guest post for me about her sweet son:
Hello, BLESSED readers! This is Julie Buerke, sister-in-law to Katie. She asked me a while back to do a guest post on her blog, so I’m finally here. My almost 3-year-old son, Owen, has a very unique love (or maybe obsession is the better word) with the game of golf. After spending a week together at the BFR (Buerke Family Reunion), Katie was quite amazed to hear and see firsthand how Owen’s love of the game plays out in his daily life. So, here are a list of the quirky ways Owen expresses his love of the game.
owen and my brother bob in matching Titleist hats
-Hands down his favorite activity to do with Daddy is go to the driving range, golf course, or just hit balls in the backyard. He asks for this the second Bob comes home. [note by katie: you have to understand that owen isn't even three yet and he rides along with bob in the cart for 9 holes, getting out at each hole to pick out a club, hit his shots while bob takes his, and then get back into the cart...usually without even being asked]
-He turns random objects into golf clubs, sand, tees or flags (see picture). His favorite makeshift golf club in the flyswatter, though any long and thin object will do. One day while at my parent’s house, I couldn’t figure out what he was doing on the area rug until I realized he was putting from the “sand”. The rug doesn’t look anything like sand (it’s bright and paisley) but he still decided it was a sand trap. Lately, he’s been using coasters as “tees” to hit off of in the living room.
the little putting green my brother made for owen
-He can identify the different types of clubs by name (I can’t even do this). He can also identify Tiger, Phil, and a few other famous golfers. (Funny story: we live in Springfield, MO which unfortunately is not a very diverse place (aka, very white). On more than one occasion, Owen has seen an african american person and said, “Tiger!”)
-Though he loves PBS and Noggin, he would just the same prefer to watch a golf tournament on t.v. He often asks Bob to turn on the golf channel (we don’t have it at our house-only at my parent’s-and I’m kind of glad).
this is owen at camp popanan making a golf hole out of a stool, a fly swatter, and a walking stick
-If left up to him, Owen would choose the Golf Digest magazine as his bedtime reading of choice, probably most nights. Of course we read real books to him most of the time instead, but looking through the magazine is a really exciting thing for him.
So, these are just a few of the funny ways Owen loves golf. I’m sure I will think of more later. We obviously want him to maintain some balance in his life, so golf is not something we talk about all the time or even let him do 24/7. He definitely has other interests too, so I’m not too worried that he won’t be well-rounded. Who knows…maybe we have a future Tiger on our hands?
[another note by katie: i swear every word of this is true. NO exaggeration. it is hilarious and just...well...special!]
this is us on a walk around the “neighborhood” where the house was. it was a paved road with huge steep hills. layne LOVED riding in this carrier thing (thanks, charlene!). i think harper was a little jealous, although she was piggyback on me for much of the walk…she even ate a snack while she was riding. here are a few more of the same walk/hike/whatever:
the next one is a picture of my toes after harper painted them for me. can’t remember if it was her idea or mine, but she had fun. the excess came off after like 2 showers. looking at this picture, i’m thinking: my feet are SO different than they were before i had kids. why does pregnancy change EVERYTHING?
this is ryan trying to pull a huge splinter out of harper’s big toe. she was absolutely hysterical…i’m sure it hurt, but it was her first splinter, so i think she was more scared than anything. look how white her little knuckles were…i told her to squeeze as hard as she could and it wouldn’t hurt so bad…i was trying everything to get her mind off of it. i pinched her arm (which just made her madder), shoved a popsicle in her face, and something else that i can’t remember now. when he finally got that thing out i burst into tears. it was so hard to see her freaking out and being held down like that…i have so much sympathy for moms with sick kids…i cannot imagine watching doctors work on my kid all the time.
this picture is pretty self-explanatory. i love harper’s new carseat, but it’s one disadavantage is that it doesn’t recline unless the seat it’s sitting on does. this one didn’t. it hurts my neck just to look at her.
the house we stayed in was great. it was fairly secluded, cozy, roomy, and had everything we needed and more (there was a ping pong table in the basement that we really never got around to using). here are some pictures of the happenings at the house and of the views from the house.
first, a pancake breakfast. we ate GOOD while we were there.
next, a smokey mountain sunrise.
sunset from the deck
another view of another sunset
this picture didn’t really come out (why can i still not figure out what ISO to use when?), but it shows another view from the deck…
the girls had fun watching the sneaky squirrel…he was alot more persistent that i think i’d be…that birdseed must be really good.
harper’s tent and the awesome porch swing (looked out to the lake). i miss that swing!!
shooting gordon’s pellet gun. they set up some “targets” in the yard (mostly trash…pizza and cereal boxes). it was alot of fun to shoot…even harper tried it.
playing with some “shooters” (water guns). i think this was one of harper’s favortie things we did…maybe because when her clothes got too wet i let her take them off. she kept telling erin and i to get naked too.
“exploring”. she really did figure out how to see through them. i think in this picture she’s trying to look at what daddy and opa are shooting.
one night as we were going to bed there was a crazy lightning storm. it was so cool because we went out on the deck to watch and take pictures and it took a good 20 minutes for it to reach us…after that we went in a turned off all the lights and watched it from inside. i’ll never forget that.
i like this picture. i think he looks like a little garden statue.
this is one of the wierdest places i’ve ever been (in america, at least). yes, i am a christian, and yes, i love God’s word. however, to see the 10 commandments written in 4 foot tall concrete letters and laid out on the side of a hill doesn’t move me to feel…anything, really. we stopped here on our way home from the waterfall (that’s why, you’ll notice, harper is still only wearing her Jane Fonda getup).
(at the bottom of the hill there was a replica of the tomb that didn’t look AT ALL like what i think the real tomb did, a hill with 3 crosses, and a pathway up the other hill that was lined with Psalms monuments or something…we didn’t go over there)
there were stairs inside the big “book” at the top…we climbed up on top of it, but you couldn’t get close enough to the edge to get a picture of anyone looking down.
this place was called coker creek falls. it took us about an hour and a half, two stops, and some time on the internet to find it, but when we did it was well worth it. these types of places are pretty much ideal to me…running water, big rocks, and no crowds. it was so fun to get to share it with harper…she loved it (as you can tell from the first picture).
ryan told her to stand on the rock and not to move. she obeyed.
the girls on the trail…this place would’ve been cool even without the water…the trail was very well worn, but still a little challenging…parallel with the side of a hill.
wedgie. 
coming in from testing out the current speed for us. (yes, i’m kidding)
thursday morning i woke up still not feeling so great. gordon, erin, and ryan had been gone since 7:00…we’d rented a pontoon boat for the day and they were trying to do some early morning fishing. didn’t catch a thing. the rest of us joined them for lunch and we rented a tube to pull behind the boat. we cruised around and stopped at a little waterfall that we’d been directed to on wednesday (by the marina staff). harper hated riding on the tube…she was scared to death…surprised us all. we parked the boat and all went back up to the house for a nap/rest. after naptime and an early dinner, sherry stayed home with the kids (thank you) so the rest of could go back down to the boat. we tubed and rode around until 7:00 when the boat had to be back. it was alot of fun…very relaxing to just sit in the front of the boat and feel the wind on my face. after the kids went to bed that night, we played uno spin.
on friday morning, the guys stayed with the kids so erin, sherry, and i could go into town (about 30 minutes away) to some antique stores. we had a good time browsing, but made no major purchases…i got an antique postcard for ryan (monkeys riding a tricycle) and erin got harper an adorable pair of slip-on keds at a consignment store. as soon as we got back to the house, ryan and gordon and i all threw some sandwiches in a bag (thanks once again to sherry!) and took off for the nantahala river. erin decided not to go because she did something to her knee on thursday and it was really hurting her. we missed her, for sure, but i think she made a wise decision. we went rafting for about 2 hours (great time…wish i’d have risked taking my camera because we never got wet above the waist) and then headed back through town to pick up some zaxby’s for dinner.
saturday was the drive back to orlando. i hardly slept on friday night because layne was up alot and i was coughing all night so i was TIRED and grouchy, but the trip went pretty well. we got back around 6:00, had some pizza, and harper got in the pool for a little while. ryan and i headed home on sunday morning. my house is a disaster, still, and i really shouldn’t be blogging, but layne is asleep and harper’s watching a movie…
next post: pictures!
Filed under: family
brad paisley has a song out called “i thought i loved you then“. it goes through the stages of a relationship, essentially a marriage, and talks about how i love you so much more now than i did then. really sweet and, in my case, really true.
ryan’s birthday was yesterday and i’ve been racking my brain trying to come up with a memorable post to “dedicate” to him since he reads my blog every night. i really have nothing super cool to say about him, so i’ll just say this to him:
this was the 10th birthday of yours that we’ve celebrated as a couple. i don’t remember what we did to celebrate you turning 21, but i do know that i thought i loved you then. little did i know how amazing of a life we would have together and how blessed we would be. you are an amazing encourager, hard-working provider, solid Believer, and the perfect father for our children. you are truly my best friend and i can’t wait to look back in 50 years and say, “i thought i loved you then.”
happy birthday buddy.
so strange. look where i was a year ago. i hate the speed time seems to be on these days…although i’m pretty glad i’m not pregnant…it’s more fun to have a chubby baby than to feel chubby yourself.
one of the craziest things to me about being a parent is experiencing things with harper that i totally remember doing myself when i was a kid. today was one of those times. my sweet step-dad neal was in town today. he’s a truck driver (as in semi-truck) and has been for 30 years. today was the first time that harper saw his truck since she’s been old enough to really know what it is. when she sat in that driver’s seat and honked the horn today it was seriously twilight zone for me. even though it was a different truck (many trucks ago), i SO remember reaching up to that huge steering wheel and honking the horn (i think it was a pull-chain then) and sitting on the bed in the back of the cab thinking it was THE coolest thing ever…harper thought so too.
(sorry about the blurry picture…no idea why the flash on the little camera wasn’t working, but this is the only shot i got of her “steering.)
