Oh, she was just seventeen, and you know what I mean

Lauryn

p.s. I'm in the midst of doing a post about fab music finds, soon to come. =) (Edit: shown below)

Music of the Night

Yes, I have had Phantom of the Opera music stuck in my head all week thanks to my friends. I just need to watch the movie again. Speaking of music, I've been really trying to broaden my tastes with interesting finds and diving into some alternative/indie rock music. I don't know about you, but sometimes I go through short periods of time where I want to dye my hair a really funky color (like a bright orange or deep blue) wearing brightly-colored jeans and rock out to some loud indie music...must be an alter ego of mine. Anyway, whatever music you're into I just wanted to give someone a fresh taste with some of the music I've found in hopes that it broadens your tastes too, because sometimes we all have a thirst for a new great song...

1. The Decemberists - my newest favorite band, I highly recommend their song Valerie Plame, it has a very beatlesque "Hey Jude" sound at the end.
2. Of Montreal - they can be a little weird and may wear interesting clothes but everything on their 1998 album, The Bedside Drama: A Petite Tragedy is really awesome. I love listening to the lilting mellow tunes and the strumming of a guitar. (If you have iTunes be sure to look it up!)
3. Slavic Soul Party! - a marching-band-meets-european-flair sounding brass band in NY that has some great party music and makes you want to dance.
4. Belle & Sebastian -just a good band overall. They appeared on the Juno soundtrack.
5. The Apples in stereo - their song "Energy" was featured on American Idol. I think they also have a cd for kids.
6. She & Him - an awesome band consisting of Zooey Deschanel and M. Ward. They have great music with 60's sounding pop melodies.
I think this is it for now. Let me know what you think. :)
Lauryn
p.s. NTS camp is coming up in a couple weeks! We are Team Black this year. Woo!

Little trees with buzzing bees...

I took this last year on the wagon ride with the co-op group for apple picking. How I do love little trees...they just seem so whimsical to me. Anything miniature is way cuter in my opinion. Especially these cupcakes for Father's day. yum :)
love love,
Lauryn

Planned Reading

I came across one of my friend's facebook notes regarding her Summer Reading List. It made me stop and consider such a thing. A summer reading list? I thought that was only for kids in school - you know, a program put on by the local school or library where they offer incentives for the number of books they'll read over the summer. I think these are wonderful programs and agree that summer reading is a worthy time filler. If you know anything about the Ortlieb house, you know we've got plenty of books on our shelves to fill every bit of our time. If only! {sigh} I'm a constant reader, and I love books. It can be quite the addiction for us actually - a couple clicks on amazon.com and voila! But the thought of actually compiling a reading list for the summer had never occurred to me. I'm a whim-reader - someone who picks up books based on one's whims and reads the next best thing that looks interesting or valuable. So besides being part of a book club or something, the idea of planning what I would be reading was very foreign to me. But since I've got a book or two (or twenty) on my bookshelf that I have yet to read, I thought it might be a good chance to sit down and plan on reading the books I actually have rather than buying or borrowing more books that I don't have. So here's my list so far:

Helen of Troy by Margaret George (one of my favorite authors)
What's So Amazing about Grace? by Philip Yancey
So Much More: An Invitation to Christian Spirituality by Debra Rienstra (finish reading)*
The Ragamuffin Gospel by Brennan Manning
Ya-Yas in Bloom by Rebecca Wells
The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde
The Midwife's Song by Brenda Ray
SexGod by Rob Bell (finish reading)
Till We Have Faces by C.S. Lewis (read again)
The Shack by William P. Young (finish reading)
Much Ado About Nothing by William Shakespeare (one of my all-time favorite movies)
Age of Opportunity: A Biblical Guide to Parenting Teens by Paul David Tripp
Jesus for President:Politics for Ordinary Radicals by Shane Claiborne and Chris Haw (finish reading & summer book club book)

This list is only after I actually finish reading the library books I've recently checked out which are: My Jesus Year by Benyamin Cohen, Cool It: The Skeptical Environmentalist's Guide to Global Warming by Bjorn Lomborg, How to Fit a Car Seat on a Camel and Other Misadventures Traveling with Kids edited by Sarah Franklin, Trick or Treatment: The Undeniable Facts About Alternative Medicine by Simon Singh and Edzard Ernst, MD and The Art of Conversation: A Guided Tour of a Neglected Pleasure by Catherine Blyth . I don't have high hopes about completing these books, but so far I've enjoyed My Jesus Year and The Art of Conversation. I guess I'll be renewing some of these if I have half a chance at reading them.

I may have been a bit ambitious with my list; this may actually be my entire 2009 reading list as opposed to just summer. I'm not sure if I can stick to a list, but I'm certainly going to try. Wish me luck!

Do you have a reading list? Have I inspired you to do some planned reading for the summer? If so, please share! What's on your list??


*You'll notice I've marked some as "finish reading" since they're actually books I've started but for one reason or another never finished.

In the Sandbox

Edited with Picnik

Taken on Saturday at Bohdan's birthday party.

Lauryn

Landon's Swing

Edited with Picnik

Lauryn :)

Last Summer

Edited with Picnik

This was taken last summer after a trip to Gilley's. The family headed over to a park in Portsmouth where we sat and enjoyed the weather. Reagan finished off the root beer and was acting really silly, so I snapped some candids, and voila! here they are for you to enjoy. :)
Lauryn