New Things (Random Post)

Last week, I got the latest and greatest design tool, Adobe CS3, which has everything I'll ever need...at least until the next upgrade. I put it on my computer yesterday, but I can't bring myself to uninstall the CS2 programs. For some reason I'm afraid CS3 will be full of bugs or something. CS3 includes Dreamweaver, the gold standard of web developing programs. Dreamweaver used to be owned by Macromedia, which Adobe bought last year. So now Adobe has Dreamweaver. Adobe's web program, GoLive, is no longer available. GoLive is what I learned and used for my own website and anything I've done so far on the work website. I'm not very good at web stuff in the first place, and the learning curve just got a whole lot steeper! I'm going to have to find a Dreamweaver class pretty soon, or I'll be lost.


This past weekend, I got to play with my mom's new iPhone. It's pretty neat! Some people bristle at all the hype, but you gotta admit, it's a well-thought-out phone. Things like seeing all your voice messages, and being able to pick which one to listen to (and fast forward and rewind) is brilliant. Also, simple changes like having a button on the phone to record your voice mail greeting solve the pain-in-the-neck problem of punching through options to finally get to record what you want. ("Press 1 if you would like to....") And then, beyond the phone functionality, the rest is pretty cool, too: iPod (of course), camera, widgets, internet. Everything carries the signature simple brilliance of Apple design. I only had a couple of problems: 1) you can't pick a song on your iPod for a phone ringtone. What's up with that?? and 2) there was one design element I thought should have been different, and I was really surprised it looked the way it did.

Last night we had some friends over for burgers, so we bought some flowers for the occasion. This huge vaseful of flowers was only $4.50! And I set some aside for the table arrangement:


Along with burgers, we served Caramel Frappuccinos, a new concoction Jon put together. We froze coffee in ice cubes, then added about a pint of cream (yep, whole whipping cream...yum...), and some caramel in the blender with the coffee ice. Top with with RediWhip, and you've got a good thing going!

We had some cream left over, so I did something I've wanted to do for a long time...made butter! Do you remember making butter in class? I was in 1st grade maybe, and I remember passing a jar filled with cream along the rows of desks. We each got to shake the jar a few times, and then we had to pass it. That was so fun! So, I made butter last night, and used it on my waffles this morning. :)

I found that the best way to shake cream to make butter is while playing Dance Dance Revolution!! Yep, Jon got the XBox fixed that Cliff gave him, and we headed to GameStop yesterday for some used games. I came home with DDR, something called Corvette (how could I pass it up??), and a racing game. Since the controllers are still in the mail, we couldn't play anything but DDR, since it uses a separate dance pad as a controller. I totally stunk it up, but it's still fun. And it passed the 20 minutes of shake time I had for making butter!

In other news, I have my curtains up! Leanna and I have hemmed two of the panels, but the two shown here aren't hemmed, yet. I love the new colors in the house! I've also added a new welcome mat in the entryway, which Friday promptly claimed as his own:

So, that's pretty much a recap of what's happened lately. It's been a busy week! But I'm so thankful for the blessing I have: a good job, family, friends, and a home that makes me happy.