Thursday, August 30, 2007
Random thoughts.
August is almost over--can I get a HUZZAH?!
We had a cool, dry night last night for the first time in weeks and weeks...I had some iced tea on the porch in the evening, and we had the windows open all night. Heaven! I think I see a light at the end of the tunnel of enormously hot and humid days. August sucks!
I dragged home an enormous bag of books from the used bookstore today, after cashing in the last of my trade-in credit. It made me think about the conversation I had with my grandma a few weeks ago, when she was talking about her overloaded bookshelves and the stacks and stacks of books around her house.
Grandma is afflicted with a very large dose of the "can't-throw-it-away" virus, which I have made a large effort to avoid inheriting, but I have to say I can totally relate to the satisfaction in her voice as she mentioned the stack of books by her chair. Having a giant pile of books waiting to be read is like having a fully-stocked pantry: you know you're prepared.
Coming out of the bookstore, I saw a sign for the restaurant down the strip mall, which calls itself a "tortilleria." Talk about your bastardized hybrid words! But it's very pleasant to say out loud. Try it!
Although I am eagerly awaiting fall, the earlier nighttime is bugging me a little. We try to go walking when Todd gets home from work, but it's almost full dark by 8:00 now. On nights when he doesn't get home till 6:30ish, and then we have to eat dinner, and then drive 15 minutes to the park...well, it's cutting into my walking time!
I guess I'll have to switch to the mornings, but evenings are so much more pleasant. It's something to look forward to, whereas morning walks are like a chore. And it's nice to have Todd with me, too. Monday and Tuesday nights, he roller-bladed while I walked--the first time he's been on rollerblades in about five years. He wanted to get more of a workout and get his heart rate up...let's just say he succeeded!
It's so weird to see Senator Larry Craig's name in the news...he was Senator when we lived in Idaho in the mid-90s. I feel sort of bad for these closeted guys who are so trapped in their own sexuality. How much healthier it would be if they could just safely express who they are. Maybe someday...
I got a scrapbook page picked up by Simple Scrapbooks...it's an oldie of Todd and his buds fishing for striped bass. I'm happy they wanted it, because the pictures are just excellent.
I've lost 13 pounds. It's hard-fought sometimes, and it's also hard to be patient. But overall, the healthier living process is going well.
Now that I'm ready to break out of my summer silence, I'll try to get back to my blog. Seems like summer just isn't a writing time for me.
Wednesday, August 22, 2007
Friday, August 17, 2007
Thursday, August 16, 2007
100 degrees today.

I am so ready for fall!
There's a chat about fall crafts at Two Peas this afternoon...I'm putting up my Halloween sampler here so I can link it there. I stitched this about ten years ago, and I just love it...wish I could have it up more than six-eight weeks out of the year!
I think this sampler is my favorite thing I ever cross-stitched...and I cross-stitched a TON of stuff back in the days before scrapbooking took over my life!
Monday, August 06, 2007
Weekend pictures.
We met my brother and his wife and two of their friends in Charlottesville on Saturday for a Nickel Creek concert at the Charlottesville Pavilion. The Pavilion is at the end of the Downtown Mall, which is a several-blocks stretch of the old city that has been bricked up and planted with trees and turned into a wide pedestrian mall. There are lots of shops and restaurants in the old buildings along the mall, and the pavilion is down at the far end, sort of sunk down in a little ridge so lollygaggers on the mall can't see the stage and get treated to free concerts.
However, this placement of the pavilion ensures that not a breath of fresh air can penetrate the tent on hot, steamy nights. And it was hot and steamy Saturday night!
Here we all are, looking pretty good for being extremely overheated:
It just wasn't really what the fans were expecting. This tour is called "Farewell for Now" as the band members are ready to move on and try out other paths, and it seemed to me that the set list should have been chock-full of all the songs the fans want to hear one last time.
Here's a mediocre shot of the stage...Sara Watkins on violin, Chris Thile on mandolin, their tour bassist whose name I can't remember or find at the moment, Fiona Apple, Sean Watkins on guitar:

We ran into my cousin Alan, who lives in Charlottesville, at the concert, and had breakfast with him the next morning. Then the Harrisonburg contingent departed around lunchtime to get back to their assorted kiddies, and Todd and I strolled around on the Downtown Mall for a few hours, buying books and eating burgers and the best fries I've ever had--piping hot, salty, doused in malt vinegar. Yum.
Here's Todd at the burger joint, Five Guys:
Here's a shot of part of the mall:
As I said to Todd, "It's fun to do stuff with people." You can tell we don't get out much.
(This week I'll be doing double walking to work off the ice cream, chorizo, cheese, burger, fries, risotto and brownie pie that entered my mouth this weekend. It was worth it, though!)
Wednesday, August 01, 2007
Monday, July 30, 2007
Questions.
I found this meme while reading the wonderful Red Molly Picayune-Democrat--I left a comment, she asked me five questions (thanks, Molly!):
1. What did you see on your walk?
We walk the same two-mile loop at the park every day, so what we see is mostly other people running, walking, rollerblading, biking, and sweating. And playing soccer in the field. Walking in Virginia is very different from walking in Ohio...you have to smile and say "hello" to every person you meet. If you meet them more then once, then a wave or smile only is acceptable protocol.
2. What's your favorite dessert?
Anything with cream cheese in it. Or chocolate. Or both. Cheesecake with chocolate sauce would be ideal. But I am in "no dessert" mode and not allowing myself to think such thoughts.
3. Which grade in school did you enjoy most, and why?
The last half of twelfth grade was awesome. I was good at playing the school game, but I never really enjoyed it. But the last few months, with all the college and end-of-year hubbub and slacking off and hanging out with friends...that was a fun time.
4. How's your garden doing?
Overgrown and leggy! I need to cut a lot of things way back, esp. some of the herbs. It's so funny how you plant these tiny plants and then turn around and they're three feet high and taking over. We have a morning glory that is making us both nervous, it seems to grow a foot every night. I think it may creep in the window and strangle us in our sleep one night.
5. How did you get into papercraft design?
I fell into it through scrapbooking. I had a bunch of friends at the time who were really into submitting their work. For fun I submitted a few pages to Creating Keepsakes and Simple Scrapbooks, and ended up on the designer e-mail list for Paper Crafts magazine, which was just being launched by the same company. So I branched out into cards and paper projects, and I've had periodic but semi-regular success with that for four or five years, mostly magazine related, but also a few projects here and there for specific companies.
Soooo...leave a comment--any comment--and I will ask you five questions. Copy and answer them in your blog and keep the fun going!
Swept out to sea.
I'm having a very peculiar time with my glasses this summer.
A month ago, we went to Ohio for a week. The first morning we were there, I got up, went to the kitchen for breakfast, took off my glasses at the sink to polish them, and the frame snapped right in my hand. Snapped in the round eyehole part, so no way to fix them. Talk about panic! I sat around blind till lunchtime when the Wal-Mart vision center opened, we went in, and miracle of miracles, they still had the frames in stock at that store, 18-20 months after I bought my glasses at the Wal-Mart at home. $40 later and I was good to go, they just popped my lenses into the new frames. SUCH a relief! I usually have to wait at least a week for new glasses, with my prescription and the extra frills like featherweight lenses; I still can't believe they had my frames right there. Thank God for Wal-Mart, and I never thought I'd say that! I honestly feared I was going to have to be blind for my entire week's vacation.
Because I am blind without them. I can make out blurs, that's about it.
So we went to the beach last night and the tide was coming in and the waves were high. I was standing in the shallows getting pounded with piles of sand, which hurt, so Todd told me to come out further past where the waves break. He was hanging onto me because I can't swim, and we would sort of jump and float as the waves came in. We've done this plenty of times before, but this time the waves were a little bigger, and a huge one came in, broke over us, knocked me loose and sent me crashing.
And it swept my glasses right off my head.
If you've ever dropped anything in the ocean, you know what your odds are of finding it again! So I was totally blind, coughing up seawater, and now I have NO glasses.
The whole long drive home we tried to think of what we could do, because I knew it would take days, at least, to get new glasses. The last time I got glasses I took my Rx to Lenscrafters, and even the "new glasses in an hour" people told me it would take more than a week to get the glasses in.
And I was sure I'd thrown out whatever old pairs may have been lurking about, when we moved. I always purge drawers and toss out old stuff when we move. I had this vision of myself sitting in a chair staring blearily into space for who knows how long.
We got home and I felt my way straight to the tub to wash off the sand...I'd really forgotten about even the possibility of old glasses in the junk drawer. And in came Todd with not one, but two pairs of old glasses!
One was a pair I'd gotten four years ago and stopped wearing early on because the shape of the lenses distorted everything too much. But who cares about distortion when the alternative is blindness? So that's what I'm wearing now. They're giving me a little headache, but I am just so, so thankful I held onto them. So grateful to be able to see!
I'm off to Pearle Vision this afternoon for an exam and new glasses--hopefully they can get them in soon. (Sadly, Wal-Mart isn't covered under our new insurance...this is one case where I would gladly keep going to Wal-Mart!) But I've definitely learned that it pays to have a back-up pair. I've worn glasses for more than 30 years, but I've never needed back-ups twice in one month before!
Saturday, July 28, 2007
Study pics.
After six months, I think I can finally say my study/scraproom is pretty much done. Done enough for pictures, anyway.
Walking in the door:
Looking at these, I think the only thing left to do is to replace those UGLY brown doors with white paneled doors, which we will do as soon as humanly possible. So, say...three years from now? Heh.
Thursday, July 26, 2007
All about me.
Well, how is everybody? Life has honestly been so uneventful here I feel like I have nothing to talk about!
I've begun working on losing a whole pile of weight. So far, I'm down three pounds as of my last weigh-in. The tip of the iceberg of fat, I assure you, but it's a start. So my main topics of thought lately are food: what to eat, what have I eaten, and what should I eat next. Part of what I'm trying to do here is keep my blood sugar on an even keel, which requires stopping to eat pretty regularly. But eating GOOD things rather than bad, of course. I'm avoiding empty carbs, cutting way back on sugar, and looking for lots of protein and veggies and whole grains and nuts. And drinking a veritable ocean of water. And working on finding a good pair of walking shoes. But these are not vastly interesting topics of conversation, however much of my own time they do consume.
My neck, shoulder and arm are feeling much better, although I'm not sure it's due to the painkillers and semi-regular heat I've been applying or if it's merely due to the fact that I haven't been out and about much or using my arm strenuously. I'm doing some very gentle weight work to try to strengthen those muscles a little bit.
I read HP and the Deathly Hallows in seven hours, from 10 am to 5 pm last Saturday. I was desperate to get it done before it got spoiled for me somewhere, somehow.
I liked it! I won't spoil it as I'm sure there are still people who haven't gotten to it yet, but I was mostly satisfied with how things came out in the end. Now I need to re-read at a more sedate pace and really form an opinion, but not until Todd reads it. He's finishing HP and the Half-Blood Prince as I speak, to refresh his memory before going on to the last book.
That's absolutely all that's going on here. How are YOU? Leave a comment and let me know!
Saturday, July 21, 2007
Got it!

We went to a great Harry Potter party at Barnes and Noble last evening, from 8:00 to 9:30, with my friend Cheryl and her son Matthew. They had lots of crafts (make a wand, make a monster book, make a snitch) and most of the kids and many of the adults were in costume. I have some pictures but I'm having a computer issue, so I'll have to post those later. But we had a good time and then it started to get just a little crowded for my comfort, so we took off.
I headed over to Wal-Mart at about 11:30, thinking I'd just waltz in and grab a book, but the line was out the door and across the front of the store! The ladies in front of me said they'd been past the two big bookstores in town, Barnes and Noble and Borders, and there were hundreds and hundreds of people in line, so I just stayed put at Wal-Mart. I think we had maybe 200 people there at the most.
Once midnight hit, they started moving us through pretty quickly, so I only had to spend 40-45 minutes in line, and it was pleasant. Nice and cool outside, and I chatted a bit with the people around me. Everyone was happy and excited.
I took pictures at B&N, but I wish I'd thought to take my camera to Wal-Mart and get a shot of the promotional poster, and the HUGE pallet stacked with books behind the register!
Now the book sits downstairs, waiting for me to come down and crack it open. Part of me is dying to, and part of me doesn't want to start the journey to the end of the series. Silly, no? It's just a kids' book.
But obviously it's more than just a kids' book to all the people standing in lines last night. I know people who aren't interested in the books are sick of the hype and can't understand what the hoopla is about. And even if they could possibly understand why little kids are excited, they certainly can't see why grown adults should act so silly about the whole thing.
I figured out what the reason is, for me, anyway. It's not very often, as an adult, that you get to re-live the good feelings you had as a kid. For me, many of those good feelings came from books and from being swept away in a story and feeling like what I was reading about could really be real, somehow. It's hard to describe that feeling, but if you were an avid child reader, then maybe you know what I'm talking about. Maybe it's similar to the feeling some grown-ups get at Disneyworld--the wonder of looking out through their childhood eyes, if only for a little while.
That, to me, is the joy of the Harry Potter books, and I'll never forget reading the first one, on the porch of a bed-and-breakfast in Maine in 2000. Since we didn't have kids and our only nephew was just a toddler, we weren't clued in to the Harry Potter phenomenon until midway through the series. We were on vacation and just starting to hear the excitement about the fourth book coming out the following month, so I picked up the first two books on a lark for some light vacation reading.
And I was hooked!
Anyway, I guess I'll go down and have some breakfast and get started reading. I don't want to, but I can't wait!
Thursday, July 19, 2007
Update and pics.
I don't know why I feel so un-chatty! I'm not in a bad mood or anything...it's just that there's so little happening in these hot humid summer dog-days.
Todd and I are working on our diet and exercise levels, but that's not terribly exciting. I'd like to lose a big old mess of weight, but it's early days, so nothing to report on that front--yet!
My neck/arm/shoulder problems finally drove me to the doctor...I asked about a breast reduction, but he wants me to try some anti-inflammatories and muscle relaxers first, and apply heat several times a day. If that doesn't help, then probably physical therapy. This is all to show the insurance comanpy that I do indeed have a problem and have tried other treatments, should I need to go the breast reduction route. I wasn't 100% positive I wanted to try surgery, but on the other hand, it makes me so irritated to have to jump through hoops to prove to my doctor and my insurance company that I really do have a problem.
I just got a mini book and a card picked up by Paper Crafts, so I guess I've got my toe back in the designing/submitting waters. Just my toe, though!
How about some Ohio vacation pictures?
Here's my brother and my dad with my brother's little Marissa.



Now for the other side of the fam...these are pics from Todd's folks' house at the lake. Todd's parents live about 25 minutes from my parents, so we spend a lot of time on the twisty country roads between homes when we're in Ohio.
We were blown away by how grown-up Todd's sister Julie's kids are--we hadn't seen them in a year, so the change was dramatic.
Here they are, Gianna and Angelo:



As you can see, I have plenty of pictures to scrap now. But then there's always the shots I missed that bug me forever after. I mentioned below that I never got a pic of myself with any of the fish I caught...I also neglected to get any pics of the girly outing I took my niece Kylie on, where we got mani/pedis and had lunch. And I had some quality time with my aunts that was great fun--but again, no pics. It is so hard to find the balance between enjoying the event and getting the pictures! For the past few years I've definitely strayed more toward just enjoying myself without having to worry about the camera...but then I always have these little regrets. Ah me!
Sunday, July 08, 2007
Home.
We are back from nine days in Ohio...I didn't want to mention we would be out of town here since you never know who's reading, but now we're back in lovely 100-degree Virginia. How I missed it. Uh...wait a minute, no I didn't.
We had a great visit with a large assortment of family members, rode in my father-in-law's pontoon boat, played cards with my niece and nephew, played badminton, pushed various nieces in swings, had lunches and dinners with some of my various aunts, swam, read, fished and otherwise vacationed. It's tiring to try to cram a year's worth of quality time with many people into one week, but I did my imperfect best, as usual.
One major missed photo op: my very first fish ever, caught with my niece Gianna's Barbie fishing pole. I ended up catching and releasing 12-15 little bluegill off the dock, quite a milestone! It was certainly the perfect fishing situation for little kids or impatient adults--you basically dropped your hook in and reeled in a fish!
Anyway, we're home and I'm tired. I'll check in later, hope everyone had a super holiday.
Monday, June 25, 2007
Saturday, June 23, 2007
What I've been up to.
Heh heh. Well, I haven't really been that lazy, but it's most assuredly summer mode around here.
I've been scrapping a ton, too much to post here, but you can check my gallery at Two Peas if you have any interest (scroll down a little to see pictures.) You or someone you know may be featured on a layout, you never can tell...
Look how pretty my bee balm and coneflowers and tiger lilies are getting. My blue birdbath is buried somewhere in that mess, and you can see our next-door dog Socks' hinder at the top, too.
Is this a butterfly or a moth?
If you need me, I'll be on the front porch having a glass of sun tea.
Tuesday, June 12, 2007
Wedding pages.
I'm trying to get the last bits of previous years' albums caught up. These are pictures from my cousin Janine's wedding almost two years ago. I had a ton of pictures we took outside the church, and I wanted to use most of them, so there's a lot crammed onto this two-page spread:


And here's my niece Kylie in her flower girl glory. She was obsessed with the little bottle of bubbles we all got to blow at the bride and groom when they came out of the church:


Monday, June 11, 2007
Tagged.
I'll stop itching (and bitching) for a couple minutes, since I was tagged by Lora, who has a lovely little blog called Sketch Shak with some great sketches for scrapbook pages--and incidentally, she's running a RAK challenge over there right now, so go check it out. Thanks, Lora! This one's been making the rounds of the blogs, I think...
Seven Random Facts about Me:
-I love old (pre-1965) movies. Some of my faves: Casablanca, The Manchurian Candidate, Laura, To Be or Not To Be, Rear Window, Strangers on a Train, Shadow of a Doubt, and The Day the Earth Stood Still.
-I can't curl my tongue.
-Spelling and grammar mistakes drive me nuts, especially in published books or magazine articles.
-I have the same middle name as my mother and my grandmother, and I asked my brother to pass it along to his daughter when she was born, to keep it going.
-I love to sing, absolutely love it. I still have those fantasies where I stand and sing into a mixing spoon and pretend it's a microphone and I'm on stage in front of an adoring crowd!
-Part of me secretly wants a really old fifties car to tool around in, a convertible with big fins.
-I am dying for the next Harry Potter book to come out, yet I don't want to read it and have the whole thing be over with.
I won't tag anyone else, but if you haven't done this one yet, do it!
Itchy.
I don't know why, but every couple weeks I just ITCH. All over, but especially on my face. It's not a rash, it's just a general feeling of being itchy and uncomfortable in my skin.
I was sitting here rubbing at my itchy face just now, thinking how it fits perfectly with my mood this afternoon. We have to go to dinner at some friends' house, a farewell dinner for another friend, and I don't feel friendly toward ANY of these people and I don't wanna go!
I don't talk about people I know in real life on this blog very much, and I definitely don't say negative stuff about anyone I know here, but today's the first day I've ever been tempted. I know I'm a bad friend, I don't put forth much effort even with people I like, but why do I have to put forth effort for people I only know through my husband's job, a job he doesn't even have anymore? People I've socialized with sporadically but been irritated by every step of the way. And now they're in my life and I can't eradicate them. And I feel bad about myself for feeling this way about them. I want to be a fun person with dozens and dozens of friends, but instead I'm a crab who's crabbing about spending a couple hours with a few of the small handful of people I even know.
Then my depressive mind turns this mood into a recitation of everything that's wrong with me, and every failed or dissatisfactory relationship I've ever had...oh yeah. It's an itchy day. Hope my new shirt and some hoop earrings will perk me up for the evening ahead.
Saturday, June 09, 2007
Flip-flops.

Okay, so I lied, I've got one more post in me...this is the challenge at Two Peas today:
Are you a leather sandal/flip flop kinda gal?
Are you the type of person that collects flip flops?
Blog about your summer shoe collection!
I was always a leather sandal person, for years and years. I have a wonderfully comfortable pair that I got at Bass Pro the first summer we lived here, but they fell by the wayside once I discovered the comfortableness of flip-flops.
Flip-flops were called "thongs" back in my childhood/teen days, and they were extremely uncomfortable: 1/2 " thick foam soles with rigid plastic straps that rubbed the tops of your feet raw and wore a blister between your big and second toes.
But somewhere along the way someone realized that flip-flops could, and should be comfortable and cute, and once they became that way, I hopped right on the bandwagon. In the summer of 2005, I bought umpteen pairs at various stores, and ended up doing a scrapbook page about them.
Now I have a whole huge Sterilite box full of 'em, but my stand-bys are my J Crew flip-flops: they have wide grosgrain ribbon straps, and super-thick foam soles. I bought two more pair this summer, and if they go on sale later, I'll probably buy more, I love them so. I wore them the whole summer when I worked at the scrapbook store and was on my feet a ton, and they were so comfortable.
So the leather sandals languish in a corner of the closet. Maybe someday I'll pull them out again.
Weekend ketchup.
The air conditioner man made it to our house late Friday afternoon...the good news: a silverfish stuck between two contact points was the only thing wrong with our air conditioner. The bad news: it cost $140 to ascertain that. Talk about mixed emotions--do I feel relieved that it wasn't more serious or mad that I paid a small fortune for a 5 minute quick-fix? Hmmm...
Anyway, we're living in the cool again, hallelujah!
We took a morning trip to the beach today and watched three little boys in the spot next to us, having the time of their lives boogie-boarding, splashing and digging big holes with their dad. They were such nice kids, and so well-behaved...I was sorry to see them go, because it was so entertaining to watch them.
I don't think I ever, even as a kid, had that "bursting with joy and energy" quality. I can't remember ever feeling that joyous. The smallest of the boys, who was about two, was standing watching his brothers dig a hole, and every couple of minutes he'd just jump in the air. He could only make it about four inches off the ground, but you could sure tell he was happy and full of life. It made me think of this Garrison Keillor line about how kids are always bursting--they burst five, six times a day and think nothing of it!
I had a bright idea after we left the beach in search of lunch--I need to make a "beach supplies" checklist and post it inside the downstairs closet, so I can be sure to bring everything we need. The two things I missed on this trip were bug spray and a hairbrush. Oh, and the glasses-cleaning kit...they get so salt-covered!
One final Saturday thought as I drain the dregs of my cool drink...if you like lemon, be sure to seek out this Sierra Mist "extra lemon" that they've brought out just for the summer. I've never really cared for Sierra Mist or Sprite, because they seem too sweet, but this version is really tart and puckery, especially if you fill up the glass with lemon slices (and ice cubes) before you pour. I think it would make a killer mixed drink, too--maybe with some vodka and peach or cranberry juice. Yum!
That's all I got. We're officially doing nothing this weekend. I find I don't mind a bit!
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