More Earrings

In the past couple of months I've started making earrings. Sometimes I make something because I can't find what I want in stores, and sometimes it's just a matter of wanting to do something creative that is also practical. It's also a cheaper way to feed my addiction.

Getting to the point: I gave earrings to all the girls in my family, as well as my friends, for Christmas.

Here are some of the earrings I've made in the past little while:

Hope you like them!

Flashback: Missionary memories

When I was 21, I left to serve a mission for my church.

I didn't have a digital camera on my mission, so I just recently had all of my negatives from that 18-month period scanned onto CDs. Going through them brought up some great memories. Two of which I will share with you today. They're not very specific, and they're not long, so don't be afraid.

Memory 1: In my last area (Spencerport, NY), while at a dinner appointment with an older couple, the husband gave me this awesome hat. I'm sure you can guess why. Isn't is a great hat? I wish I could say I still had it, but it probably didn't make the cut to come back in my two suitcases. It's amazing how much stuff you can accumulate, even as a missionary. I'm pretty sure I mailed two or three boxes home, too!

Also notice my super-classy plastic watch.

Memory 2:

In my second area (Fairport, NY), I was put in a companionship with two other sisters, both of whom had been called specifically to serve at the historic sites in Palmyra and the surrounding area.

This is a picture of me at the E. B. Grandin building in Palmyra. This was one of my favorite times on my mission because I got to spend the entire day bearing my testimony of the truthfulness of the Book of Mormon and Joseph Smith's role as a prophet of God. Most days I spent tracting, knocking on doors, hoping someone would take just a moment to listen. This was a nice change of pace for just a few weeks.

Many of you already know...

... that I'm a bit obsessed with earrings.

Well, a week or so ago I counted my earrings, just out of curiosity. I discovered that I had over 175 pairs on my earring storage/display racks, and if I'm going to be honest, I tend to wear the same 20 or 30 pair over and over, if that.

So--shallow as it may seem--I decided that I would challenge myself to wear every single pair of earrings I own once before I can wear any of them a second time. I'm also not allowing myself to wear any newly-purchased earrings until I've gone through the existing stash.

Some of you may care, some of you may not. But I started a blog about it so I wouldn't end up posting them all here. It's called the Earring Appreciation Project, and it's all about earrings: the ones I own and wear, the ones I wish I could afford but can't, and the ones I discover in different places (on people, online... wherever).

If you're interested, hop over and take a look. If you're not interested, feel free to mock me. (I'll only be somewhat offended.)

Blogger is annoying

and won't publish my posts when I tell it to. So, I'm not going to bother reporting on the summer in chronological order. When I find pictures, I'm posting them. I know the dates are irrelevant to you, anyway.

Cheers.

I've been home

from Paris for as long as I was there. It seems like it was a really long time ago and it's so far removed from my daily life now.

So... I'm getting ready to post about some of the things I've done since I've been home. Some you've already seen. Others... not so much.

Later.

Roberts family reunion!

I don't remember the exact dates, but pretty quickly after I'd arrived home, the Roberts extended family had our annual festival of fun, food, and fire.

Well, the fire part isn't really annual unless you count a barbecue grill. But this year there was fire.

Anyway.

In what seemed like no time at all, I went from this to this:

And I'm not gonna lie... If I had to give one of them up permanently, it would be a pretty tough decision. I love the mountains. The trees, the crisp air, the wide open feel.

The reunion was at the Heber Valley Camp, and they had a lot of different activities that we could participate in, as well as a huge pavilion where we could hang out and enjoy each other's company. My favorite part of the reunion was the zipline on the challenge course.

I love the mountains, I love the rolling hills...

The End

I have to double and triple check my picture files, but it looks like we've come to the end of my Paris pictures.

Sad. It's like re-living the end of my stay there all over again.

Dancer in the St-Merri Cathedral

Remember this cathedral?
I visited it on one of my first nights in Paris.

It's on the west side of the Pompidou Center, next to the Stravinsky Fountain.

The Tuesday before I came home, a small group of friends and I were walking around and decided to stop into this church for a second. This is what we saw.

This particular parish seems to really encourage participation in the arts--they often have different installations hanging overhead. And it seems like almost every cathedral in Paris offers free concerts (as well as some concerts you have to pay for).

Eglise St-Eustache by the Forum des Halles

I had never heard of the Eglise St-Eustache until some friends took me there after Institute one night.
I think it's really beautiful.

The cathedral is behind Les Halles. If you explore back behind all of the trees near the Chatelet-Les Halles RER or the Les Halles Metro stop, you'll find the church.

And the best part?

The cool little plaza out in front of the church that houses this cool sculpture.

You can't see it in the pictures, but to the right and behind where I was standing there were tiered rows of grass where people would lay out and read, make out, walk their dogs, or have a smoke and chat. I think it's a great spot.

Also Seen at Hotel de Ville: IUFM of Paris protest

The plaza in front of the Hotel de Ville was also used several times as a "call to action" center for manifestations (protests) and collecting signatures for a variety of petitions.
The students below are professors in training (I don't know if they are in training to teach secondary school or at a University level--my guess is the former) who were protesting some changes to the way the teacher training programs at the University were being organized and administered.
Protests are not very effective. They happen way too often in Paris to have much of an impact.

Musee D'Orsay: The exterior

I think the Musee D'Orsay is really pretty on the outside. Like many, many buildings in Paris.