oh hello there

This is my brother Bobby, his oldest Danny, who's holding his little one TJ and my dad! My sister took this pic, btw
don't know if posted this but this: http://www.flickr.com/groups/1039153@N21/ is where I worship my love for her
do come join if you're a fan, mmkkaay?
It's 430 pm Saturday, finally done working, at least until Monday:). I desperately need a vacay, but am kind of worried my hours are going to get limited because we've got some new folks working. I hate to give up hours then be short later. Oh well, one day at a time

used to be

I used to be so much more fun than I am now. It's really sad. I was always making people laugh, being nice, and I prided myself on that. It makes me happy to make someones life a little easier, or nice. Now, I just labor through the days.
My fear is I'll never get back to that other person. My husband doesn't get my sense of humor, he thinks I'm silly. Plus he just looks right through me a lot of times, doesn't even see me.
I think it's from aging, and getting jaded and bitter, just don't see what the point of everything is. Not really a bad day , but not great either

spring cleaning?? yikes

not a fan of the housework here. And I'll tell you why: it doesn't seem to matter how hard I clean or what I do, the place is just a pig stye! Sure, I don't leave dirty dishes around (for long) and we have clean clothes to wear, but the dusting, vacumming MOPPING scrubbing, not so much.
But yesterday it dawned on me I'm looking forward to doing spring cleaning. I'm looking forward to clean windows, that's for sure. And warm enough weather to leave the doors open during the day :)

conversation

phone rings
Husband: Hi
Me: Hi
Him: what are you doing?
Me:putting on my bra (we been married 15 years almost,so we're pretty comfortable!)
Him...silence pause. "oh....does that... turn you on?"
Me: no!!!! why would it??
Him: I've never heard of that. Sitting on your bra!
me: I said PUTTING on my bra.

My nephew

This is Danny, my brothers oldest son and the first grandchild in our family. He just finished boot camp for the Air Force. He graduated in the top 5% of his unit/class, which was 800 people. We're so proud, but honestly, none of us are surprised he did so well. Something about growing up on a farm where it was just assumed you worked from sun up to sun down and then some. And I never have heard him complain.
He looks so much like my brother Bobby. Those piercing eyes. If Bobby looked at me like that I'd just want to run and hide because I knew he was mad! If Danny is ever in war and has to fight face to face w/ someone, I think they'll back down just based on those eyes!
He's a dad and a husband, too!

Picture heavy alert

I've been an Elise Blaha fan for a while. Here's her blog. (ps today or tomorrow is her b'day, go by her blog and give her a happy birthday!) She made a 'dear elise' book, you can see it here. Something about that mini book and her fabulous journaling resonated with me. A lot of her work does actually. Anyway, this is what I made from that inspiration. The journal on the page where you can't read it (lol) talks about it being ok. All of it. It's OK.
The cover of the book is actually the page with the little boy (Dick I guess) with the dog. I got that image from the book Dick and Jane, which there's a picture of. The second picture has a twill ribbon with quote from Christopher Reeve that says "when you choose hope, anything is possible."
There's one quote directly from Elises' book that says "I have more than enough to look forward to."
I'm not totally done with the book yet. And sorry for the crap pictures.
But you know I think it was Wednesday night I started on that book and I think that's why I woke up feeling so good Thursday. Just getting out some creativity.
I found myself censoring myself when I made the book a lot. Like "oh that won't look right. That doesn't match". So I tried to make a special effort to uncensor myself and just go with it.
THANK YOU ELISE. You really helped me this week. And Happy Birthday!

ways today might not suck

I actually woke up feeling good. You have no idea what a big deal that is!

blogger

It's so easy to change the background, thanks backgroundfairy.com, and the header, I'm really addicted to it.
I decided to make the 'ways I don't suck' category more regular.
So today the way I didn't suck, was that I worked my whole shift, and didn't drop any hours! and boy HOWDY, did I want to.

gonna be a good day, Tater

Back when I didn't work from home, I had to get up about 6am to be at work by 8am. But since I work from home, and get paid by the call and we don't get many calls before 830, I usually don't get up until 730 now. And because of my depression, I like to sleep. I have a hard time sleeping though. But today, I was supposed to have a health screening for insurance at 645, about 25 miles away from me. So of course I couldn't sleep for some reason. and I had to get up at 530. So I had about 4hours of sleep. Which wouldn't have been a big deal except when I got to the place the screening was supposed to be, one of the branch offices of my husbands job, there was no one there, no signs of life. I drove around some. And we don't have our cell phones anymore to save money. Which was fine normally since we got some pay as you go phones, but time had run out on them too. So I had no way to call (have you tried to find a pay phone lately. They don't exist!). So gave up and came home. soooo sleepy. but my day is nearly over, and I hope to get a good nights rest! I used to get up on my days off pretty early. I didn't want to miss anything. And I didn't want to burn daylight. But a function of my depression is sleep. Sometimes I let myself give in and sleep late, but not often. But I think I'm too hard on myself. Always have been. Maybe I'll just let myself be.

Goodwill story

A few weeks ago I went to a local Goodwill store. I saw the funkiest skirts made out of fabric w/ owls on it. Very 'in' now at least in scrapbooking. I passed it up though. And of course when I went back a few days later they were gone! Today though, made up for it. I went to another Goodwill and found this beauty.

It's a real Lilly Pulitzer skirt. I've been drooling over her preppy pink and green goodness for years. Here's her website. . It was always way out of my budget. Now there's some good news, some bad news, some good news and some bad news. The bad news is it's a size 14. I'm 5 feet tall and about 20lbs overweight. But the good news is this is too big for me. Which I was so hoping it would be. I mean, I was wearing a size 6 pair of jeans at the time, size 14 had better be too big!! I bought it because it was just too good to pass up. It caught my eye because of the funky colors. Before I realzied it was a Lilly P, I thought I'd cut it up and use it to make something else. Like a fun tote bad.
When I saw the tag, I immediately thought "eBay!" and $$$. The bad news is I looked on ebay and it looks like Lilly Pulitzers sure aren't fetching much these days. In fact, I've paid more for a no name brand at Kohls. But I think I'll try it anyway. As soon as I can get some decent shots of it. These pictures make it look really wrinkled but it's really not. Her clothes have some stretch and are meant to be worn. They're comfortable.
If anyones interested in this one by any chance, make me an offer! Email me at lisamk@tds.net. If anyone has any ebay advice, let me know. I'm a buyer not a seller! lol

Valentines day

Husband took me to White Castle ( my choice) for Valentines Day. It was quite yummy. We walked in and there was a hostess stand like in a more sit down restraunt. The hostess said "do you have a reservation" and I think my husband thought she was joking! There was a little party going on at this WC. It was cute. They took our picture and everything.
Oh and I almost forgot, for lunch he made and served me, turkey manhattan sandwiches. Are those a national thing? It's an openfaced sandwich, w/ mashed potatoes and gravy and turkey on it. I'm normally a don't-let-my-food-touch-each-other kind of girl, but these were wonderful

It's chilly here, and just a tiny sprinkle of snow.

when I grow up

You know how I don't know what I want to do with my life, or be when I grow up. After 40 years, I think I've figured it out.

click here:old old woman

craving

I'm craving sweets and chocolate today. Which for me isn't the norm. I'm usually all about the salt.

today

Today was a little better. I survived, and some days that's the best I can do.

I just found this receipe via the long threads blog. click here YUMMMM
I really want to try these.

prayers vibes etc

I'm having a really bad day today. I'm so so so sick of the worry and stress. I'm whining I know ; but it's not fair to work as hard as we do and have to stress about making my house payment and every little thing. so if you're so inclined, please pray for us that we'll have patience and maybe a little more luck.

sicky sick a little

I've been feeling super rough since Friday night. Too much rum and now a bad migraine. I did get out to see my best gal pal today,Debbie. I haven't seen her in probably 3 or 4 years and we only live about half an hour apart! We've been friends since about 1990-91 or so.I'll post more soon.

storing stamps

Michaels has a lot of $1 stamps, including alphabet stamps in different fonts. They're really tiny, and the boxes they come in don't leave a lot of wiggle room for getting the stamps you want in and out of it. I wasn't using them because I always felt like I didn't want to mess w/ getting them in and out of the tiny box. Finally I had a brain storm and put them in these little baby food plastic containers. They were slightly different sizes but wokk perfectly in either. My granddaught has out grown this food but I'm hope Stepdaughter saved more of these containers. They're very handy.

Do you HEART these vintage patterns??!! Some are from 1940's! I got them from eBay a coons age ago and they've just quietly been sitting around for a year and a half or more!

And the top picture is out my front door a few days ago when it snowed!!

A little spin the bottle to pass the time.

cooking

I love to eat but I don't like cooking. I think the reason I hate it is because I constantly feel like I'm trying to piece things together. I never seem to have everything for a recipe that I need, and I feel like I'm short changing the dish by substituting. The other day Posie Gets Cosy was saying she wasn't feeling good, and she just wanted to be in the kitchen cooking. It made her feel better. Suddenly, an epiphany. Maybe I could like cooking?
I saw a recipe on the can of chicken broth for pot pie. I had everything it called for!! It was chicken, broth (duh) any veggies you wanted, self rising flower and milk. And a whole stick of melted butter! normally me likey like that, but it was too much even for us! Half a stick would have been good. But it turned out good. Even husband liked it.
At Madisons birhtday party my husbands first wifes sisters husband was asking everyone what their speciality of the kitchen was. He asked me and I was like "umm, martinis?" And I asked Husband what he thought it was. He said "making something out of nothing". I thought that was awesome. He specifically was referring to scalloped potatoes I'd made the week before. I think he thought I made the recipe up! lol Anyway, maybe I can start looking at some other things in Life like that. Like maybe I don't suck? In fact, I've always been super self conscious about my teeth. I call them my hillbilly teeth because they've got so many spaces. A friend said she thought they were cute. They made seem vulnerable and were just a part of me. She was complimenting me and it felt so nice because it wasn't "oh you've been working out and you look good" or "your new haircut looks good" it was something that was a part of me like height!

Happy Groundhogs Day!!!

Ahhh,, Groundhogs day! I felt so much pressure as a kid to root for seeing the shadow vs. not seeing. I could never keep it straight.
Did I ever tell you about the time in probably first or 2nd grade when we were doing our coloring. Let me go back further than that to see one of my very very earliest memories is of wanting to be a painter. Oh how I wished for talent to capture beauty. Sadly, in first or 2nd grade we were doing coloring /drawing. And I specfically remember the teacher (stop me if I told you this one!)holding up Sandy Tracy's drawing and declaring it the best in the class. For some reason,and I don't know if she insinuated this or I took what she said to mean everyone else should give up. This teacher was a little weird. She seriously once asked us to write ona piece of paper if we liked her or not!
Anyway, ever since then there's been a huge creative block for me. My aunt Mertice (prounounced Mer-tes) is an awesome watercolor/artist. I'll upload pictures of some of her prints soon.