Incredibly Hilarious Story with a Very Important Moral

Chris and I have made it a tradition to get a couples’ massage on our anniversary (massages side-by-side at a spa). We signed up for massages a few weeks ago (late from our anniversary in July, but better late than never!), and at the time they asked if we minded if one of our massage therapists was a male. I said we didn’t mind, and volunteered to have the guy (figured it’d be less awkward for me than for Chris!). When we went in for our massage, it was great – the guy was friendly but not overly so, nondescript, and very professional… what you want in a masseuse! I didn’t think of it again until the following Monday, when I went to my 10am class. I noticed a guy who sat in the front of the classroom, thinking “man, where have I seen him before?” I realized, with a very unfortunate shock, that he was my masseuse. Yeah.

Moral of the story: get to know every member in your classes, because one of them may end up rubbing oil all over your scantily-clad body. SERIOUSLY awkward. o_O I have never been so grateful for a well-placed sheet...

He and I sit on opposite ends of the class, and have never spoken. But maybe if I had made more of an effort to make friends, I might not have been in this predicament! Luckily, his professionalism carried over into the classroom, and we both pointedly ignore each other. I suppose he’s probably encountered this situation before, probably even more awkward – giving massages to professors, church members he knows, etc. Ech.

But seriously… AWKWARD!!!! (and hilarious too, I know)

frustrated.

lately i've been thinking a lot about body image - a few days ago i found a non-so-old picture of myself where i was a good 30 lbs lighter than i am now. my first thought, when seeing this picture, was "wow - i looked SO beautiful. i hate that i don't look like that any more." and then i stopped to think - why? why was my first inclination, seeing that thin picture of myself, to be envious and hateful?

living in america, we are constantly confronted with the media telling us that to be a beautiful woman, we must fit a certain image. we must be tall (but not too tall!), thin and in shape (but not too muscular!), have beautiful shiny hair (but only on the head - anywhere else is considered "unfeminine"), flawless and tanned skin, and attractive, feminine features. our bodies should be curvy (but not too curvy!) and our legs should be long and thin.

i am only 5'2". i am at least 30 lbs over a truly healthy weight for my height. sometimes i forget to shave my legs. i have acne on my less-than-delicate facial features. i have broad shoulders and a large chest. i lack a defined waist or hips even when i am at a healthy weight. my legs are short and muscular. by these standards that our culture sets, i am incredibly ugly.

why do i feel the need to conform to these cultural standards when it is impossible to attain all of them without the aid of plastic surgery or photoshop? why, when i look in the mirror, do i see the flab, the blemishes, the bump on the bridge of my nose? how have i gotten myself in this deep? when i was a little girl, i was too busy playing - it didn't matter in the slightest how i looked. but as i got older, society started to tell me that i needed to be careful - or i might be fat. be careful, or my face might not be perfectly smooth. be careful - or i might not look like those beautiful, plastic women on the covers of magazines. i was drowning in bullshit and didn't even notice it.

i hate that when i see pictures of myself when i'm thinner, when i see those impossibly skinny women on magazine covers, that it makes me hate myself. i am so frustrated that my own perception of myself as it should be - a beautiful and loved daughter of God created in His image - is tainted by this disgust for my perceived physical imperfections.

my first inclination tells me i'm shallow for caring so much about my appearance, but it goes much deeper than that. this belongs in the realm of self worth, of self control. why, as women, do we do this to ourselves? i used to tell myself, "it's a choice. i can choose to have good self esteem. i can choose to feel beautiful in my own skin." but now i don't know if i believe that anymore. i have tried for years to make that "choice" - to convince myself that my body is beautiful, regardless of my weight. but right now, i am tired of trying. even when i was at a truly healthy weight, i still felt ugly - no matter what i told myself - because society continued to whisper (and i continued to listen) that there was still something "wrong" with my appearance.

so i wonder if we really do have a choice - when we are surrounded by a culture that is screaming at us from every side to lose weight, to fix your skin, to fix your hair, to fix your face. how do we make that choice? how do we overcome years of conscious and subconscious brainwashing to be able to look at our God-given faces in the mirror and say "i am created in God's image" and feel good about it?

my favorite website, right now, is called theshapeofamother.com, where women take photos of their bodies to celebrate what God gave them - distorted by childbirth, scars, stretch marks, and cellulite. they bravely show their bodies pre-, during, and post-pregnancy. it is beautiful to see women celebrating their natural form without photoshop.. there is nudity on the site, but i have yet to see a photo that is erotic or remotely inappropriate.

i know there are so many women that can relate to my feelings... and so many that cannot. to those that can, i'm sorry that you have to feel this way too. i hope you find confidence and control sooner than i do so you can teach me where to find it.

latest photo shoot... whew!

Well, we got home at about 11pm last night from my very first official, paying wedding... and WHEW. I'm pretty sure I'm dead. I was on my feet for nearly all of the 8 hours I was there, and took almost 3,000 pictures!!!! Crazy, eh? Chris was nice enough to come with me as my assistant/associate photographer - he was nervous to take pictures too (we had two cameras there), but did a great job!

This wedding was in Jackson Hole at the top of one of Snow King's ski lifts - it was really incredibly beautiful. I haven't even LOOKED AT all of the pictures yet (maybe a third of them!), much less edited them, but I wanted to post two that I've seen thus far of which I am particularly proud! The first I took on the way down from the wedding - we had the bride and groom behind us, and I just managed to snap this quick photo that actually turned out really cool!



The second is at the top of the lift shortly after the ceremony - you can see the gorgeous view of Jackson and the Tetons. :) (I know it's kind of light... hasn't been edited at all yet)

really, really belated...

I am soooo behind... there have been TONS of things going on here, but I've been too busy to blog at all lately. Unfortunate that my only diary/journal keeping consists of a blog... which means that rather than cheerfully blow it off, I feel guilty. >.< Therefore - a short and sweet list of recent events, which will be expounded upon in later entries.

1. The Awesomest: Chris has graduated!! As of July 23rd, Chris is a graduate of BYU-Idaho with a B.S. in Computer Information Technology. Real celebrations to commence upon the arrival of his actual diploma... :) 13 semesters, 2 schools, and a heckuva lot of hard work = Chris' brain being melted into a puddle of goo. But I've gotta say... I've seriously never seen him in such a good mood. Ever. :)

2. The Wildest/Nicest: Big fat party to celebrate Chris' graduation... lots of food, lots of family... lots of cleaning. :) Thank goodness for generous families who are willing to help out!! Having all of my family, and just about all of Chris' family in town for the graduation (we missed you, Julie and Natalie!) made for lots of Transformers geekiness, and lots of games of Munchkin! We loved having so many people around, but finally kicked them out with threats of walking around the house naked... :)

3. The Most Surprising: I'm actually making some money with this photography thing. Seriously. I know that's probably not something appropriate to blog about, but I'm just kind of in shock that my occasional fun-but-probably-useless hobby has turned into a real live business (I have business cards, a business account, and a mileage book. Doesn't get any better than that, eh?). I just got home from shooting a family reunion in Island Park today, and go back for another on Friday... then to Jackson Hole for a wedding on Saturday. crazy, crazy!

4. The Most Inconvenient: Stupid Kathryn... I lost my wallet. o_O As much as Chris loves me and is willing to help out with getting things replaced/cancelled, he refuses to take my driver's license photo for me... damn. The saddest part of all of this is that my wallet was holding my last bit of Kinjo identity... my student ID card. For the last two years, I've refused to change my student ID to Kathryn "Duncan." Sadness. I feel like a part of me has died...

5. The Most Relieving: For the first time, since we moved into the house in April, EVERY SINGLE ROOM in our house is CLEAN. i can't believe it. up until now, we've had to just keep the trafficked areas clean, and closed doors to the office and our bedroom. but i finally got the chance to deep clean both rooms (which included unpacking the last MILLION or so boxes in the office, as well as reassembling our massive Ikea desk all by myself!)! hallelujah!! I'll post pics sooner rather than later...

6. The Even More Surprising: Chris and I celebrated our 2 year anniversary on July 27th! Surprising because I can't believe he's put up with me this long. :) Kudos to him for his patience, long-suffering, and talent for putting up with simultaneous play and torture!

7. The Most Annoying: I hate that we have discovered a bunch of awesome TV shows on Hulu that fuel our procrastinating, sleepless nights... to find out that every. single. one. of them has been cancelled in the first or second season. whyyyy?!?!

8. The Most Illegal: I discovered bittorrent. Enough said. *wicked grin*


Wow. Well, my short list turned out to be long... no surprise there, right? And I'm sure I forgot a few things... Just shows how much of a slacker I am in my blogging duties......

lovely house!

We've had lots of friends staying with us and lots of parties the last couple of days, so we've been working like CRAZY to get our house put together! It's still not done (there are still a few rooms that need a lot of work!), but we're doing pretty dang well, I think. :)

To see BEFORE pictures of the house, check out one of our old entries:

http://dailyduncan.blogspot.com/2009/03/new-house.html

And now, the AFTER pictures!!




I decided to follow an Asian sort of theme, so you'll see the rice paper lanterns and umbrella, as well as lots of bamboo. I also wanted to tie the dining/living rooms together with shapes, so there are circular objects everywhere (umbrella, lanterns, mirror, cast iron decor, vases, etc.). I'm still looking for a glass circle coffee table and end tables, but since we're on a budget I'm waiting for something to turn up on Craigslist or DI (where I got almost all of my decor stuff anyway!).

P.S. We put lightbulbs behind the umbrella and in the lanterns, so it looks awesome at night and makes up for the fact that there's no actual light fixture in the living room. :)



Thanks to mom and dad for the awesome couch... there's no way we could have ever afforded something so pretty and comfy! Most of our big furniture is from either of our parents... we're very, very lucky. :)



This little wall thing was a fun project... I found a clearance display bookshelf at Ikea, painted it cream/white to match everything else, and mounted it on the wall. so it's this fun wall/shelf/box display thing now. :)



You can see the little shoe bench thing hiding behind the chair by the door. That was the first furniture we bought for the house - Ikea, of course, and we put it together the first night we got to sleep in the house! This is our compromise... I hate putting shoes away in the closet because you only need them at the door.. but Chris was tired of tripping over my *cough* excessive number of shoes... :) So the shoe bench keeps us both happy!



I know you can't see it well, but the picture on the wall is pretty awesome. We decided we needed a good picture of Christ in the living room, and so we went through our handful of gift cards. Turns out, we had a Deseret Book gift card for $40 in there!! So instead of paying $48 for the picture/matte... we paid $8. :) woohoo!



Sorry the picture's kind of dark... our curtains are really cool - they're this awesome olive greenish pattern. :)





I know it's hard to tell what this is, but we found really cool vinyl wall stickers at Ikea. They're these pretty gray/silver cherry blossom branches, and then I mounted pictures (in DI frames, of course!) in the branches. Right now we just have lots of our engagement/wedding pictures up (narcissistic, right?), but will fill in with others as we have time to print more.



This is the random china hutch thing built in the dining room... since we obviously don't have china or any expensive little trinkets to hide away in here, I tried to make it a little more useful and personal to us! Maybe I'm crazy, but I think violins are absolutely beautiful... so I put our three on display! Yes, the one on the right is my awesomely sexy electric violin... mmmm. :)



Yes, this is a picture in our bathroom, but it shows one of Chris' newly acquired talents! This bathroom was terrible at first... no mirror, no light fixture, and two gaping holes where lights had been - one in the ceiling with wires, and one empty one in the wall. Chris figured out how to rewire from the ceiling hole to the wall hole, and put in this lovely fixture all by himself! We're going to patch the ceiling hole eventually, but for now we just enjoy having a well lit bathroom and mirror. :)



Yes, this is a chicken coop. Yes, this is our backyard. :) Yes, my dad is crazy!!!

So here's the story: my dad has always wanted to have a farm... something about the American dream that his Japanese heart just warms to, I guess. :) So, after listening to him try to convince Mom for years, my sister Kristen just bought him a couple of baby chicks for his birthday! He loved them, but wasn't sure what to do with them... I think he kind of assumed they would just die, since baby chicks have something like a 90% mortality rate in their first few weeks of life. One even had a blocked vent - which is as nasty as it sounds (basically, its poo got stuck on the way out, which made a big chunk of dry poo stuck to its little bottom... which blocked other poo from getting out... ick), although we did some 'surgery' and fixed it! - but they both lived by some miracle. Dad kept building progressively bigger coops for the growing chicks, but they really didn't fit so well in their house. :)

Since their neighborhood covenants don't allow chickens, Dad convinced me to adopt the chickens! He's been in Rexburg a couple weekends a month, building this amazing coop all by himself - crazy guy! He finally finished it a few weeks ago, and now we have chickens! They're really beautiful... one is a dark gold, and the other is red. They'll start laying eggs in a few weeks, so woohoo - fresh eggs for breakfast every morning! :)

We haven't named them yet... any ideas? I'm leaning towards Sodom and Gomorrah, but no one else likes those names. :) Oh well. Dad still calls them "Red and Goldie", but that's no fun!


Anyway, I know this has been a ridiculously long post, but I wanted to share pics of our little house. :) There are other rooms where we've done lots of work (including our lovely kitchen which is now painted an awesome shade of RED!), but this is the part of the house that is totally done! whew!

please read this!!!

if any of you reading this post love me at all, please read THIS story. joshua bell, stradivarius-playing extraordinaire widely recognized as one of the top musicians in the world, stood in a d.c. subway station in regular street clothes for 43 minutes and played some of the most beautiful music written for violin on one of the most incredible violins in the world. PLEASE read the story - you'll be so glad you did.

what i would give to be at that station that morning.

injured in the line of duty...

well, lots of stuff going on here... what i'm most excited about, however, is that my photography business is finally taking off! after several weeks of doing free shoots to get more experience, i decided to start charging a little bit. my shoots still are really, really cheap - but i figure i'm catering to the locals (poor starving students!) and i still don't have THAT much experience, so it's okay. :)

i just finished my second paying shoot, and it was great! i'm feeling much more confident about photography now... and i still just love it! actually having a little bit of extra cash around certainly isn't a bad thing either. :) now we're just in the process of covering all our bases in the legal aspect of starting a small business. if any of you have any suggestions or helpful advice, we'd be happy to hear it!!!

if you want to see my latest stuff, go to www.earthlensphotography.com and check out my galleries!

speaking of photo shoots... funny story: so tonight i'm in waist-high wildflowers, taking pictures of this couple. after i get in a few shots, i start heading back to the edge of the little field, kind of leaping around trying to miss all the big flower patches. unfortunately, there's a little edge thing that i don't see... and so i hop down with all my weight on my left ankle... immediate sprain. *sigh* idiot kathryn, i know. figures - it happened just ten minutes into the hour long shoot, so for the next fifty minutes i have to grimace and pretend not to limp and climb around taking pictures still. o_O and then, on top of that, i had to drive home (clutch!!) with a sprained left ankle. ech. i'm just trying to keep it elevated so i can be useful for the rest of the week. :) i guess it's a little better than the last time i sprained my ankle - i was about 11, and was playing laser tag in these awesomely clunky 90s ankle boots with the big chunky heels... and you can imagine the rest. :)

also this week: chris officially has TEN more days of classes (he goes Mon/Wed/Fridays) before he GRADUATES!!!! woohoo!! he's definitely got a horrible case of senioritis, but is super excited to be FREE for awhile. he deserves the break - i think he's going to just work full-time until i graduate (in another few semesters). then he'll go back and do his masters! there is an end in sight....

by the way: we're totally stoked for this new movie, G-Force, to come out. it's a kids movie 100%, but it has secret government spy guinea pigs! *laughs* we're probably going to be the only childless adults in the theater, but who cares. :) when we saw the preview, we were both cracking up because we could totally see our guinea pigs doing the same things. :)




Hershey, the commander of our in-house spy agency. :)

Love you, Grandpa Russ...

On Wednesday my Grandpa Russ passed away after a battle with cancer and a multitude of related complications. He was the only grandpa I've ever known (my paternal grandpa died before I was born), and even though he wasn't my biological grandfather (my grandma divorced my mom's dad many years ago), he never treated me like a stepgranddaughter. He was the kindest man I know, and took care of anything that couldn't take care of itself. Grandpa Russ always had at least ten bird feeders out in the yard filled with a variety of seeds for every kind of bird imaginable. Even after his retirement he drove a van where he picked up/dropped off disabled people and loved them like his own children! Every time we came to visit, he'd make his famous coke roast or t-bone steak... he was an INCREDIBLE cook!! :)

I love him so much, and I'm so sad that he's not with us any more. But it brought a great deal of comfort to my heart to know that he's free from the pain and suffering of his mortal body. It also reminded me that the Lord is merciful, and has a plan for all of us that extends far beyond our time on earth.

I created this slideshow for Grandpa of lots of pictures from his family. I always kind of felt like he was one of my biggest fans when I sang, because he always listened to the tape I made him a few years ago with some of my songs on it. His favorite song was "Homeward Bound," a piece in which I did the opening/closing solos for an all-northwest women's choir. In honor of him, I re-recorded the song to an existing accompaniment track I found (by William Joseph) on itunes. I find great comfort in the lines "if you find it's me you're missing, if you're hoping I'll return, to your thoughts I'll soon be listening - in the road I'll stop and turn. ..." As I was recording it a few days ago, I distinctly felt Grandpa's presence as I sang these words, and felt that he had taken a moment to "stop and turn" on his path homeward bound to bring me his comfort and love.

logo!

so i now officially have an official business name and a logo. what do you think? it technically still isn't done - i realize that by virtue of the name, people will think i'm a scenery/landscape photographer, so i'm in the process of deciding on/finding a little tagline thing that explains something about how my photography is to document and capture our time on 'earth.' we'll see what i come up with... i'm open to your suggestions!

so what do you think of the logo? yes, i created it myself - i LOVE Adobe Illustrator with a passion! :) really. :) i found a free tutorial online that showed how to make the lens, but i modified it for my own purposes. i have the above center-justified version which i'll use for my website and for copyright, and then i have the following left-justified version that i'll use on my business card, letterhead, etc.

i'd love your feedback!

photography business...thing?

so i think it's pretty fun that i'm sort of starting my own pseudo-business!! a friend of mine saw some of the pictures i took in alaska, and wanted me to do his engagement photos for his upcoming wedding. i told him that i had no experience, so i didn't want to be paid, but that i did want to be able to use the pictures in my small-but-growing photography portfolio. for the last few months i've been thinking about how fun it would be to start my own studio, but didn't really know how to go about it since i've had no formal training and have just enough talent that every once in awhile i get lucky and take a good picture.

well, the engagement shoot went surprisingly well (the pictures weren't absolutely phenomenal, but they were better than i expected - and i learned a LOT about working with people!), and it got me thinking.

i ended up posting an ad on our school's 'bulletin board,' where anyone can advertise whatever they want. i advertised free photography services for weddings, engagements, maternity shoots, etc., as long as i could use their photos for my portfolio. i posted a hastily created weebly site to show what portfolio i did have, so i didn't expect to get many hits... i assumed that i'd maybe get one or two people vaguely interested.

instead, the ad has been up for only a few days - and i've had about ten people email me who are really interested! i've got three people scheduled for next week, and twice as many who are just deciding what day to do it! sheesh - when it rains, it pours! i haven't gotten so many emails for a LONG time. :)

i'm SOOO excited, because this is my chance! if i can do enough free photo shoots to get the experience i need, i can actually build a decent portfolio! if i have a decent portfolio, i can start charging for shoots and actually get something out of the time besides experience! i'm really happy, and super excited. :)

so, chris, being the techno-geek/adorable husband that he is, built me a website that looks a heckuva lot better than my makeshift weebly thing. we're working on putting a calendar and survey in there, but i'm really happy with the result! if you want, take a look at it and let me know what you think - i'm always looking for honest criticism (seriously - be harsh. i don't care - i just want to learn) of my photography, and for ideas on how to improve the site! kmduncanphoto.com.

wish me luck in this little endeavor. :) even if it doesn't go anywhere, it's still really fun, and a good way to keep me busy while i'm looking for a real job!!

WHEW!

So I know it's been WAY too long since I updated the blog, but in my defense, we've been crazy-busy!! The last finals were on Thursday (April 9th), then we had to be packed for Alaska, moved out of the apartment and into the house, and have the apartment SPOTLESS by Monday morning at 7am. Needless to say, we slept very, very little that week. :)

Monday we left for Alaska, and it was pretty much one of the coolest experiences we've had together. I'll probably blog about it a LOT in later posts (yes, with lots of pictures), so I'll spare you now. :)

One unfortunate result of Alaska is that my sleep/awake clock is completely screwed up. In Fairbanks, the light made it look like it was 7pm when it was really 9pm, but with the time change it felt like 11pm (Idaho time). Because they gain 7 minutes of daylight every day during the spring, in the two weeks we were there, we gained almost a full hour and a half of daylight! It was crazy.

SO, annoyingly enough, my body hasn't figured things out yet. The light and time changes threw me off enough that for the last week I've been staying up until 3-4am and not waking up until 11 or noon. *sigh* very annoying. Pretty sure I'm turning nocturnal. Good thing I'm off school for the next few months, and still looking for a job!! (And yes, it's 5:46am right now, and no, I haven't gone to bed yet.)

Anyway, more later! I'll throw in a couple of Alaska pictures, just for Dad. :)



YES. i am wading in the (literally!) FREEZING Alaskan ocean waters.



This is of our friend Brandon... one of the cooler pictures I took. :) You can see the incredible mountains behind him... yeah. the scenery was breathtaking!!



This one's for dad. :)



Mt. Redoubt! We ended up being about 60 miles from it when we went to Homer - pretty cool. :) This is the view from our host family's deck in Soldotna.

Please come to our concert!

I just wanted to invite you all to watch Chris and I in a great concert at 7:30pm on Friday, April 3rd. This is the Collegiate Singers Tour Concert - we'll be singing all of the repertoire that we're taking on tour to Alaska on April 13th! You can even see me play my electric violin with two of our songs... it'll be very cool! We'd LOVE for you to come... if you're coming from out of town, you can even spend the night in one of the extra bedrooms in our new house!! :)

Details: It'll be in the Barrus Concert Hall at BYU-Idaho - seating is reserved, so get your tickets now at http://www.byui.edu/tickets/. I think they're $6 for the general public, but if you let us know you're coming we'll get 'em for you at student price ($3/ticket) and you can pay us back later.

We're crossing our fingers, hoping you can come - let us know!

xo.

our general craziness...

yup - we're crazy. we spent the night at the new house on wednesday night on our air mattress/sleeping bags. :) soooo fun!

we also just spent a little while tonight bringing over a couple of carloads of stuff. we have several people coming to look at apartment tomorrow so we're trying to get as much stuff over to the house so it'll be easier to clean. :) if we're lucky, we'll be able to find someone who'll be willing to move in to the apartment on april 1 so we don't have to pay april rent and can move to the house sooner rather than later! woohoo!

p.s.

p.s. by the way... i just realized that, reading the last entry, that it sounds like we've got all this money floating around to move into houses with... *laughs* which is most definitely not true! :) we managed to come across an awesome deal where we are paying for the house rent basically what we pay right now at our apartment! yup... we're still a poor starving married student couple... *laughs* but we enjoy it anyway... makes us be more creative in our dates. right now, our newest cheap date idea is to move stuff into the house on Friday nights. :)

new house!

We received the keys to our new house today! Technically it's not OUR house... but we're renting for a long time, so it practically is, right? :) It's a BEAUTIFUL home, and we are so blessed to have the opportunity to live in such a nice place!

I decided to re-start this blog because we'll need lots of advice and ideas for house-fixin' ... and also because I've been meaning to start a blog for a looong time... :)

Here are just a few pictures (mostly bad angles so you can't really see how cool it is... sorry...) to give you an idea of what some of the rooms look like until we post more pics:


This is the kitchen... obviously... :)


This is the front room... aren't the floors beautiful?!? (and the cheesy stuff in the room is left over from the previous tenants)


This is Chris's favorite part of the house. :)


Here's the front of the house...


... and the dining room!