giving my all.....one day at a time

Miles, Cupcakes, and a New Ride

I'm beginning to wonder if taking a long weekend is really worth it.  Four days after returning from a very long five day weekend I'm still trying to catch up, both at home and at work.  Truthfully though the long weekend was fantastic.  Dean bought a few RVs in Phoenix for the dealership, and we flew down Thursday the 3rd to drive one back.  It was so nice to spend some time just the two of us. 

We got to Phoenix and is was blazing hot of course.  If one more person had said to me "you're so lucky, it's way cooler today", I'd probably be calling around begging for bail money.  104 is not cooler, Dean and I were miserable.  Especially when we ran the motorhome out of propane and had to sleep the first night with no air conditioning.  Anyway, first we picked up the motorhome.  Not a bad rig, especially for the price.  After waiting what seemed like forever for the wire transfer to show up we were on our way.  First stop, Uniq Motorsports.  The day before we left a buyer showed up and drove away my X5, so I was without a vehicle.  Aaron found a car at this dealership that he wanted me to look at, and it was just down the streetfrom the RV lot, so what the heck.  I didn't really think I'd like the first car I looked at, especially somewhere called Uniq.  Boy was I wrong.  It was love at first sight for me and this~

Not very practical or mature, but a whole ton of fun.  I just love it.  It makes me so happy and it's just impossible to be stressed or crabby when I'm driving it.  Definitely the first time I ever bought the first car I drove.  Also the least expensive car on the lot.  If you check out their web site you'll understand why that was a pretty easy thing to do  So we spent the first night in Phoenix to finish up the car deal, rented a UHaul trailer the next morning, and headed home via Vegas.  From experience I can tell you this is not the funnest way to get your new Mercedes home~

After leaving Phoenix the one thing Dean wanted to do on the trip was go to Hoover Dam.  I'm not sure if he more wanted to see the dam or the massive bridge they are building.  Unfortunately because of the bridge construction they aren't allowing RVs or trailers there so we were out of luck.  We drove on to Las Vegas and enjoyed some fabulous In-N-Out Burger.  Wow do I love the stuff. 

I actually ate 2 Double Doubles in Vegas.  Not a good idea.  Did not feel well after.  I highly recommend that you never try it no matter how hungry you are or how long it has been since you last ate.

We stayed the second night in Mesquite, Nevada, and learned what real rain is.  I had no idea it rained that hard in the desert.  I thought the flash flood in the parking lot was going to carry the RV away.  I was hoping it would cool things down a little.  Keep dreaming.  Just made it muggy.  Another night short on sleep.  It might have been partly the anticipation of getting into Salt Lake the next day.  I had so many things on my list to do there.  First my fabulous husband somehow maneuvered that huge motorhome pulling that trailer into the parking lot of a strip mall so that I could so to The Sweet Tooth Fairy .  I heard about it on this wonderful blog and have been wanting to go for so long.  It was well worth the wait and the contortions it took to get in.  These were all as delicious as they looked ~Flavors like Raspberry Lemonade, Strawberry Shortcake and Peanut Butter.  One of my favorite sweet shops ever.  You should definitely put it on your list if you're ever in the Salt Lake area.  Next it was on to Archivers.  I was mostly going to get the new Tis the Season Collection from Bo Bunny that I'm using on my Christmas cards this year.  I just love this line.  Such gorgeous colors.  Still no embellishments in stock though.  Not sure what the hold up is with those.  Next I FINALLY got my Wienerschnitzel.  I'd been trying to have some since we got to Phoenix but something always got in the way.  Still my fav.  

Did you know there is a pound of calories in the food in this photo?  Just might be worth it.  Final stop was  Gardener Village.  Another place that if you haven't been you should put on your list.  A collection of adorable little shops in the setting of a historic mill village.  I went there to go to a shop that specialized in cross stitch supplies called Pine Needles but had my heart broken to pieces when the gal there told me they were "getting out of cross stitching".  Apparently it isn't cool anymore. I felt like my husband had told me he didn't love me anymore.  Not cool!  What!  Anyway, they had most of what I wanted still and I also bought my first fat quarters with which I plan to sew on my scrapbook page.  After Pine Needles we had a fantastic dinner at the restaurant there called Archibalds.  It was the best, from the food to the service to the atmosphere.  Very relaxing.    

After dinner we hit the road again.  We got into Idaho Saturday night before stopping.  I could tell we were close to home because it was comfortably cooler, with a nice breeze.  Still no sleep though.  Not sure what the deal was on this trip.  We got up in really good time Sunday morning and headed for home, which put us in the driveway around 3:00 in the afternoon.  I was so glad to be home.  I learned a few things on this trip.  

1.  I'm not really an RV person.  To much to think about/remember/do.  Propane, water     levels, don't hit this, can't fit there.  I prefer the fly there, rent a car, stay in a hotel thing.

2.  I'm not so keen on the move to Phoenix idea any more.  Especially if that was cooler.

3.  We spend a lot of our vacation time looking for food.  Explains the size of my behind.

4.  I really like cars, and I need to love my car.  When I don't it effects everything else about my day, and when I do it makes everything just a little better.

5.  My husband is terrific.  Truly one in a million.  He has all of the patience I lack, does everything in his power to make me happy, and really can do/fix/figure out just about anything.  I am lucky, and I know it.

6.  There's no place like home!

More tomorrow about my new scrapbook space!!  

Simple Pleasures

I thought I was done for the night, but I really liked this over on my friend Tracy's blog.  I forget sometimes to appreciate the simple things that make me happy.  So here's my list for the moment~

Dinner I don't have to cook  A really handy husband  Really good coffee 

Sports on TV  Fun scrapbook supplies  Modern technology  Air Conditioning

What are your simple pleasures right now, at this very minute?

Catching Up and Keeping Up

Not to state the obvious or anything, but it's been a while.  I'm not even going to make any long drawn out excuses.  I'll just skim over the good (and bad) from the last two months and try to do better from here on out. 

Last post was graduation.  Within about two weeks Amanda broke the news to me that she was moving out and into an apartment with Steve.  At first I was sad and upset and more than a little worried.  Strange thing happened though.  As soon as we started to move the mix and match furniture and hand-me-down wall art into her apartment I remembered.  I remembered how exciting it was to move my own things into my own space for the first time.  How great it felt to decide for myself where to hang every picture and put every plate.  I still worry, but I understand. 

Aaron has spent nearly the entire summer working for his aunt Paula in Killdeer and grampa Dennis in Wibaux.  I've missed him horribly but he came home with so much coin I'm thinking of applying next summer. 

At the end of July Dean and I celebrated 19 years of marriage.  It's so funny because 19 years is really a long time if you think about it, but it feels like no time at all to me.  I can vividly remember standing in the basement of the church hearing the music start and how excited I was.  How sure I was.  All this time later I'm so aware of how lucky I was to meet Dean, how perfect he is for me, how fortunate we have been.  I look forward to 19 more.

Work has been even crazier than usual.  We had our first round of layoffs, which upped the stress level and work load and seriously lowered morale.  Not a lot of jobs out there though so I do my best and try not to think about the things I don't get done.

As for now, I've enjoyed a very nice, if too short, weekend.  We (ok, mostly Dean, but I supervised) took care of a couple home improvement projects that had been much dreaded.  I revamped my blog a bit, and babysat this little cutie~

This is Steve and Mandy's dog Chevy.  Barkley loves it when Chevy comes over to play.  I got to watch some Charger football and some drag racing, and took care of the usual 7 loads of laundry.  Now I'm enjoying this~

a cup of my favorite coffee and homemade oatmeal chocolate chip cookies that I made using a recipe May F gave us in her class I'm taking at Big Picture Scrapbooking.  You really should check May out, she and her classes are terrific.  Very real and doable and authentic.  She has one coming up next month with ideas for using premade kits and making kits of your own with supplies from your stash.  Can't wait.

Moving forward....looking back

It's absolutely amazing to me that this adorable tiny little baby~

has so quickly become this still adorable but much more grown up and self sufficient young woman~

I just don't understand how it happened so fast.  

We had an Open House to celebrate graduation.  In spite of a torrential rainstorm that hit just as we had finished setting things up outside, the party went very well.  Credit for that certainly has to be given to some wonderful friends and family who came early, stayed late, cooked, cleaned up, decorated, and basically helped me stay as surprisingly calm as I did.  My friend Kelle designed these fabulous candy wrappers~

The scalloped ones are York Peppermint Patties and then some Kisses and Hershey Miniatures.  Kelle & Kee came over the night before and wrapped hundreds of candies.  I just loved them (both the candies and Kee & Kelle).  My sister Paula did the lion's share of the cooking.  She came a day early and made her famous sloppy joes and a huge ham with scalloped potatoes.  Everything was delicious, she is a wonderful cook.  Good thing since she owns a restaurant.  One other thing I was pretty pleased with were the centerpieces.  I think these were super cute~

Her cake was pretty awesome too.  Shelly's Cakes made this from a picture I took her~I did freak out a tiny bit when Dean got all the way home with the cake and realized that it said Congratulations Tatum.  Who's Tatum?!  He ran it back across town and they were able to fix it though. 

All in all it was a great weekend.  Well, probably more for Amanda than for me.  I'm still sorta hoping I wake up and find out it was just a dream and she's really 12 again.  My heart hurts when I think about her growing up and moving out and facing everything the grown-up world will throw at her.  Then I think about how mature and responsible she is and I realize that no matter what comes her way she will just decide what she wants, make a list, and make it happen.  Nothing will stop her. 

 I gotta tell ya though, this picture of my "babies" makes me cry.

Everyday Things

Right now my work situation is just about unbearable.  Things that I usually do pretty well with, like heavy work load and lots of change, are being taken to such an extreme that the stress is starting to wear on me.  I have, however, been reminding myself over and over that we work to live, we do not live to work.  So this past weekend instead of going in to the office to try to catch up (which will never happen), I said yes to a few things that I have been saying no to for way too long.

First I went and watched my son ride dirtbike with his friend Robby.  He has been wanting some good pictures to blow up and put in his room, and I kept saying to myself "next time, maybe next weekend, there will be time for this later".  I traded time spent doing something that makes me and my son happy for more work and more stress.   I never claimed to be a fast learner, but I do finally catch on, and I did get some great pictures.  

 

Boy can the kid ride.  It scares me a little to watch, but he loves it and he's really good at it so I smile and pretend not to worry.

On the way home from taking pictures I stopped at the Special K Ranch flower sale and made a fabulous find.  I got this~

 an antique wheelbarrow full of beautiful flowers...for only $75.  it would have been at least a couple hundred dollars at Gainans.  What a find, and every time I drive up to my house it makes me smile.  I love it.

Lastly, here's a page I did at Scrap.It.Up but just finished last weekend. 

Originally it just had the pink felt scallop border along the edge, but Mandy didn't like it.  (So much for "your kids won't care about the product Stacy!)  She thought it was too wide, too much pink, so I added the bling and we both like it better this way.

Do you like the new look?

I love it, very fun I think.  Good thing too because for the amount of time and curse words that were involved it would have been a sad state of affairs if I had been unhappy with it when all was said and done.

Far too much time has passed to try to catch up, so I'm just going to hit on the highlights of the last while.  

On the scrapping side of things I was so fortunate to be able to go to South Dakota to an event called Scrap.It.Up    I wanted to go because two of my favorite scrapbook personalities, Stacy Julian and Wendy Smedley, were both going to be there.  Not only did I get to see and hear them and take their class, but I was lucky enough to spend time at the Denver airport and on the 2 hour drive from the Sioux Falls airport to the venue and back with them.  I was a bit afraid they would be annoyed with my presence, but if they were they hid it very well.  Instead they were warm and friendly and genuine.  I had such a great time talking to them about the scrapbook industry and all of the changes that have been taking place and where they think it is headed.  It was like the conversations I use to have with store owners and manufacturers back when i owned The Scrap Shack, and I miss that sometimes.  They taught a super fun class called Play where we had to break all of the rules.  We had to free hand cut, and make things without knowing what we were going to use them for.  It was crazy, and way out of my comfort zone, but there was bubble gum and Fun Dip involved so I played along.  The best part of the weekend is that I really did have a...I don't even know what to call it without sounding corney.  Sitting there listening to these fantastically creative, fun, busy women talk about something they are as passionate about as I am, I realized that it really isn't about the paper and stickers.  I've made it about the paper and stickers and matching everything ever available for sale ever, but it's not.  If I continue to do that I'll never be happy with my pages.  There will always be something brighter, cuter, a better match.  Thing is the people who matter don't care.  They want to see the pictures and read the stories.  If it makes me happy and tells my stories that will be enough for me from now on.   Here are a few photos~

From Stacy's Twitter

Half of the crop area and vendors in the back.

 Three of us who are taking Stacy's Library of Memories class.

 

  It's fun to travel with other scrapbookes in case on your trip you pass through Mitchell, SD home of the Corn Palace.  No begging or complaining.  We all saw the obvious need for photos of the Corn Palace and souvenirs from the gift shop. 

One last little "you might be a scrapbooker" moment.  You might be a scrapbooker if after the plane you are on "loses" an engine mid-air and limps back to the airport and you land to see emergency vehicles lining the runway on either side, you don't panic or freak out, you just take a picture so you can make a page about it later.

 

I'm too old for this!

I use to be able to stay up late night after night and still get up and go to work the next morning no problem.  I remember wanting to make the very most of my leaves when I was in the Air Force and driving back on base as the sun was coming up, taking a quick shower and heading to my post ready for a full day of work.  Not any more.  For me it's not beauty sleep, it's happy sleep.  Being tired, so exhausted physically and mentally that it takes greateffort even to lift your feet high enough to take a step and forming enough words for intelligent conversation is just totally out of the question, makes me cranky.  I am at least that tired right now.  I picked up my road warrior friend Kee about 1:00 Sunday afternoon (Easter) and we hit the road for Salt Lake City.  We had a very uneventful and painless trip down, and made really good time.  I did cause us to waste about an hour going out of our way to find a Wienerschnitzel that ended up being closed.  Don't people know that hot dogs are the other white meat?  They taste just as good on Easter as turkey!  What's a road trip without a detour anyway?  Kee's fabulous in-laws Wayne and Joan were kind enough to put us up for the night.  Thanks Joan!  Hug Fozzy for me!  We got up Monday morning and enjoyed (at least I did, not so sure about Kee and Joan) a delicious chili dog and chili cheese fries for brunch.  Then we were off to Archivers, seriously on my short list of favorite stores.  One of the few I will drive all the way across a strange city to get to.  It was Kee and Joan's first time there, so I wasn't all that surprised when I though we had been there an hour but it had been three.  Totally worth it though.  We stopped into Pebbles In My Pocket really quickly on the way back by, and then dropped Joan off back home and headed out to take care of the purpose for our trip.  One quick detour to speak to a handsome highway patrolman who took issue with my lack of respect for the speed limit and the long way around when my navigation turned blond all the sudden, and we finally found it...

My new ride.  After two years, the second longest I've ever kept a vehicle, we traded off the Lexus and got this.  The jury is still out on what I think of it.  The dealership frustrated me to the point that if there hadn't been a salesman with a Super Bowl Ring there I probably would have taken the Lexus and left.  The roads on the way back were terrible, we hit three or four really bad rain storms, I almost hit a gigantic elk in the middle of the road and we didn't get home until 3 am.  It could have been a Ferrari and I still would have wanted out of it ASAP so I'm going to give it a few days and then see what I think of it.  All things considered it was a good trip and I enjoyed getting out of town with Kee.  I'm leaving early today to go home and take a nap, and I'll be back when I'm in a better mood to show off some of the fun stuff I got at Archivers.  Good Night!

I'm Happy, I'm Sad, I'm Happy, I'm Sad....Oh Hell!

I don't honestly know what I am.  The bi-polar weather the last couple of weeks alone has been enough to cause major mood swings.  Wednesday I was in capri pants and sandals, yesterday I woke up to snow.  Good grief, in January that's fine, in April, not so much.  Fairly nice today though so I guess I'll enjoy it while I can.  This is what has really set me off though~

Amanda picked up her graduation stuff the other day and brought it to work to show me.  I sat in my officeat work and cried like a baby.  I just don't know what's going on with me, this isn't like me at all.  I should be happy.  We've managed to raise our daughter to the age of 18 with a high school diploma and without a juvenile record.  What in the world am I crying about?  Any mother whose daughter has graduated probably knows why I'm crying.  Even though she's 18 Amanda still lives with us, we still see her every day.  She still follows our curfew and runs most things by us.  She still asked me if she could get a tattoo (I said no). As soon as she graduates she can, if she chooses, move out.  I may not see her for days on end.  She can get her life motto tattooed on her fanny and elope to Vegas, and I won't even know it until I read it on MySpace.  Yes, I know, she probably won't, but she could. 

Funny, something just occurred to me.  Just now, while I was typing.  I just realized that now I'm going to have to prove to her what I've always told her.  I've always told my kids that I love them no matter what.  That I'll be there for them and support them no matter what they do.  Now I'm going to have to start proving it.  I will no longer have any real control over what Amanda does.  I'll have to support decisions that she will make that I won't agree with.  I'll have to love her just as much while I disagree with what she's doing as I have while she's done exactly as I told her to do.  These are all things I can do.  For sure.  And if I haven't seen her for a few days I'll just bribe her with a new pair of jeans or some Chinese food.  That will work every time!  I do feel a little sorry for poor Aaron though.  I'm afraid the number of times mom embarrasses him with public displays of affection in front of his friends is going to go way way up in the next few month.  Sorry Spud Bud!

Boycott Barnes & Noble!

Something happened last night that really aggravated me, and the more I think about it, the more annoyed I get.  I went to Barnes & Noble looking for the new issue of ESPN Magazine.  There's a write up about my second fave drag race driver, Ashley Force, in it.  First I find out that Barnes & Noble no longer carries ESPN Magazine.  WHAT!  No ESPN Magazine!  They have Cosmo Girl, a magazine that will, in a single issue, do its best to turn your 15 year old daughter into a slang talking, cleavage flaunting, money wasting tramp with too much makeup, but they don't have ESPN!  To find this out I had to go to the magazine section of the store, and there I found something so unacceptable that I will be unable to enter Barnes & Noble ever again.  At Barnes & Noble all of the magazines about cars and racing are displayed under a plaque announcing Men's Interests.  OMG!  Strangely I didn't see anything marked Women's Interests.  Apparently men are allowed a wide variety of hobbies and pastimes, but the little ladies need to steer clear of the real horsepower or power tools.  Grr!

I have a recurring dream in which I am able to make things explode just by thinking it.  Usually this dream follows some furry inducing traffic encounter with someone either elderly, infirm or unemployed.  Last night I was actually glad I didn't have that unique ability as there would have been chaos and carnage. 

Always Sunday Night

It feels to me like it's always Sunday night, always the end of the weekend and time to go back to work.  Add the fact that there is a heck of a snow storm going on outside and it's not hard to figure out why I'm already dreading getting up in the morning.

It was a very nice weekend though.  On Saturday we had our monthly Girls Lunch and celebrated our friend Tracy's birthday.  We had a great time at Grains of Montana, and then went on a tour of our local scrapbook stores to see if we'd missed anything in the last week or so.  I didn't buy any scrapbook supplies, but I did find a new favorite.  I've always loved candles.  I use to buy almost exclusively Salt City Candles, but they've made a lot of changes recently that I haven't liked.  While at Raffia I found this new candle that I love.

It smells fabulous.

I also finished a layout this weekend.  What's more, I used all supplies I had on hand.  In fact, stuff that I've had for quite a while.  Not my favorite layout by any means, but I'm happy with it.

   

My second favorate driver, Ashley Force, won the drags today, which was very exciting.  All in all it was a nice weekend.