Deep In The Heart.......

Blacksheep

2012-02-06T11:50:00.003-06:00

I'm tired of being the blacksheep of the family. Little sister had nephew's birthday on Saturday. No invite. Brother told me that they were all going to see Dad. I wasn't feeling good so I didn't ask to go with them. Good thing cause he lied to me. They went to my sister's house for nephew's birthday party. Never said a word to me. It hurts so much that we weren't included. It's not fair. I've tried so much to get it all settled with sister but she won't meet me half way even. You can't settle something just from one side. I'm going to take the kids to her house tomorrow evening to drop off a birthday card for nephew with $10 in it. What's really bad is I'm sick and on two different antibiotics and my physical and emotional state is not good to start with. I won't be going to the door because of it. Don't need any little babies catching this from me. I just want to have my sister back. How does that make me out to be the monster that I must be in her mind for her to not want me to be her sister back? What's really bad is that my Mom and them won't even try to help get us all healed. I mean they lied to me about Saturday. I would rather have not known and found out the way I did on Facebook alone. My sisters Mother in Law posted pictures of my Mom holding the new baby. I have only gotten to see him in pictures. My heart is broken. I've got to realize that she doesn't want me and that I don't matter to the rest of the family either in the long run. At least that's the way it feels right now.

Happy New Year's Eve

2011-12-31T12:38:00.003-06:00

I hope everyone had a wonderful and merry Christmas. The kids enjoyed theirs and have been enjoying the break from school too. They each got one big present and then 3 small presents so they really enjoyed it. We had Christmas morning on Christmas eve morning so we could have breakfast with my Mom and siblings. I made an egg casserole bake that was really good and a different take on fruit salad too. I got the recipes from Northpole.com. I'll post the recipes at the end of this blog. We also had monkey bread but it was frozen not homemade. We exchanged gifts with them. Jessie got one of the Glee soundtracks and a Bruno Mars CD. Nicky got a $25 gift card from Game Stop and so did Chris. They gave me a $25 Amazon card. I finally got to spend it last night. I got a book in the Remy Chandler series by Thomas E. Sniegoski that both Chris and I like, a movie called Gabriel that stars Andy Whitfield of Spartacus fame (he passed away much too young) and a cookbook I've been wanting forever called What Can I Bring? written by the Cake Mix Doctor cookbook lady. I just had to put about $5 with it to cover it all so that wasn't too bad. We headed to Mother in Law's house after breakfast and got to Marshall around 3 p.m. We had a really good visit with her and for the first time ever got to have Christmas dinner with her and Brother in Law and his family on Christmas day. It wasn't a long visit with him because he had to go back to Oklahoma where he's working temporarily while waiting for a job to come open at Eastman Kodak in Marshall. I hope that job comes through soon. I can't stand the idea that they might move to Oklahoma and we won't get to see them anymore. But anyway, that's not my business. We went to his house on Monday and hooked up on wifi there. Jessie got a tablet and Mother in Law got a Kindle (from us) so she was downloading free books through Amazon. Chris and Nicky went to Game Stop to spend their Christmas gift cards and cash while we played online. After that we went to McDonalds and treated everybody. They have the free wifi there so Mom kept downloading books there too. LOL. She loves her Kindle. My Mom got a Kindle from my sister and them and she loves it too. I just don't know if I'm ready to give up my real books yet. We left on Tuesday and got home around 1 p.m. It was a nice trip and good to see family but it seemed really fast. We're celebrating New Year's with my Mom and them tomorrow. We're grilling steaks and my sister Cheryl is making the sides (mashed potatoes, cabbage and black eyed peas). It should be a really good and tasty dinner. I hope everyone has a wonderful and Happy New Year!

Christmas Morning Casserole

From the kitchen of The Huthers

Ingredients
2 pounds hot bulk sausage (mild can be used) (I used Jimmy Dean Reduced Fat and didn't need to drain it)
8 slices bread, crusts removed (Left the crusts on)
3/4 pound grated sharp cheddar cheese
8 large eggs, beaten (I used the equivalent amount of egg beaters)
3 cups milk
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
1 1/2 teaspoons dry mustard (Just used the jarred)

Directions
1.In a large skillet, brown sausage, crumble and drain.
2.Butter a 9x13 inch casserole dish.
3.Place bread (torn into bite-sized pieces) in bottom of dish.
4.Place sausage on top of bread. Sprinkle cheese over top.
5.In a large bowl, mix beaten eggs, milk, salt and dry mustard. Blend well.
6.Pour over other ingredients. Cover and refrigerate overnight.
7.The next morning, bake at 350 degrees for 45 minutes uncovered.
8.Slice into squares.
Copyright 2011 Northpole.com, LLC

1-2-3 Fruit Salad

Makes 1 huge bowl •

From the kitchen of Veronica Spears

Ingredients
1 can Comstock peach pie filling
1 can pineapples, chunks, drained
1 large can sliced peaches, drained
2 cans tropical fruit salad (Del Monte), drained
1 large tub frozen sliced strawberries, thawed
1 small can mandarin oranges (optional), drained
1/2 cup - 1 sliced bananas (optional)

Directions
1.Mix all ingredients together. Chill

Broken

2011-12-20T22:09:00.002-06:00

Today should be a joyous day. My sister Kelly is having her baby boy Andrew today. Because of a family dispute she's disowned me and the rest of us. I wish she'd just disown me and still be in the good graces of my Mom and them. My heart is broken. I'm giving up on her ever being back in the family with us. I never thought I'd feel like I wasn't good enough for family but that's how I'm feeling. She's an orphan now with only her husband and children and her husband's family. Grudges aren't worth broken hearts that's for sure.

Monday

2011-12-19T16:14:00.003-06:00

I took my Mom and sister Cheryl to see my Dad yesterday. All he could do was sleep while we were there. Looks like it'll be another long winter for him. He mostly slept through last winter too. We stayed almost an hour. They probably gave him a pain pill. I know he has more pain in the winter than in the warm months. It was a short visit but we went at least. Hopefully he'll be "there" the next visit I get to make with Mom and them.

Happy Thanksgiving

2011-11-25T12:29:00.002-06:00

It's been a really good holiday for us. Chris's Mom made it in on Wednesday and the kids have been all over her like white on rice. We only get to see her 3 times a year so its always a joyful occasion for us to see her. We had a huge dinner with my Mom and them. Turkey, mashed potatoes, sweet potato souffle, corn casserole, green beans and rolls. Desserts were fruit salad, Pineapple Goo Cake and a butter pecan cake with cream cheese frosting. We had a good visit with my Dad too and took him dinner also. He had a little of everything but seemed to enjoy his turkey leg best. Cheryl brough both of them for him so they're supposed to give it to him today along with the other leftovers we brought him. He was in a good mood and we had a really good visit with him. Today we're being lazy but we're going to see Nature in Lights tonight. It's a drive through light display on lake Belton that's sponsored by Ft. Hood and other businesses. That's about it for our holiday so far.

Last Saturday

2011-11-22T09:52:00.002-06:00

Nov. 18th was fun. I took my Mom and sister Cheryl Christmas shopping that morning. We went and saw my Dad for lunch. Took him Church's chicken and he ate it up. It was a nice visit and he was in a good mood too. After that we went and shopped some more. Then my brother Patrick called and asked if my husband would co-sign for him a truck. I told him no so then my sister Cheryl ended up co-signing for him in spite of not having a driver's license. She was so upset because he only had a year to go on his Durango and now its all back to square one. He got a Chevy Silverado quad cab so at least he can still have room for them all in it. The reason he needs a co-signer is because he's on disability and has no other income. I doubt he'll ever help pay the bills or for food but I don't live there so I'm keeping my mouth shut on this one. The last time I opened my mouth and gave my opinion I lost my little sister Kelly. I haven't seen her since mid-March or spoken to her since April 1st. Its on her though because I've been trying to get a response from her each month but all I ever get to do is leave a voice mail on her cell phone. I took Amanda to her doctor appointment yesterday. She's contracting but still not dialated. Unless she has the baby this next week they'll be doing a c-section on her on Nov. 30th. While I was waiting for her in the waiting room my sister Kelly came in. I just happened to glance up from the magazine I was reading and saw her. She saw me and gave me a look that looked right through me and sat down. I waited a couple of seconds and then went over to her and told her I just wanted to say hi, I love you and bye. Then I went and sat back down. I put the magazine up where she couldn't see that I was close to tears. A few minutes later I glanced in her direction but saw that she moved where she couldn't see me. I finished the magazine and was looking up at the TV when her husband came through the door into the reception area. Kelly must have texted him about seeing me because he didn't come through the waiting room but went in through the reception door to wait for her. I've tried to make amends. I've railed at her. I've apologized. I've cried but after the look she gave me yesterday (Monday) I'm done. I know that I've tried the best I can and now its up to her. The bad thing is she's pregnant and due at the end of December with a little boy. She told my Mom about the baby in an email. :( I found her registered on Target so I was able to send her a baby gift for him but haven't, of course, heard that she got it or not. Last I knew it was on her front porch. They're naming him Andrew Cole. I can just hope and pray that she'll come around and let us know him and get to know Phillip all over again someday. Til then our family feels broken when we should be having a wonderful, happy time expecting two new babies into the family.

Yeah!...Updated...

2011-11-03T07:06:00.003-05:00

I'm so excited. Chris doesn't go out to work until Tuesday, the 8th so I get to go and see my Dad with the family on Sunday. Usually I have too much to do and am worn out on Sunday from all the running around I have to do on the weekend to go and see him. I just hope nothing happens to change my plans. Well, lets say I have no plans for Sunday and it should turn out okay.

We had a wonderful visit with my Daddy. He ate his small hamburger and fries from Wendy's and also ate his lunch plate that day too. He's gained a little weight back. He knew who Jessie was and that she was his granddaughter and that really made her day. I can't wait to get to go back. It won't be this weekend but the weekend before Thanksgiving and then Thanksgiving day we'll be bringing him dinner that evening. I hope he will have a good day then too.

Last night I didn't really sleep. My mind wouldn't shut down. My sister Kelly still isn't speaking to anybody especially me. I call her once a month on her cell phone. I don't know if she listens to the message or not but I refuse to give up on her as my sister. I don't think I did anything bad enough for her to disown me much less the whole family. I finally broke down crying and realized I'm grieving for her. She's not dead and that's what hurts so badly. She was born when I was 19 years old. It's like I've lost my own child almost. She was spoiled by all of us older kids but she was never a brat. I thought that chat we had back in April went both ways. She was griping about our other sister Cheryl so I was trying to tell her how special she's always been to the family but I overstepped and brought in some personal stuff about how my kids were never allowed to spend the night at my Mom and Dad's when they were 2 like her little boy is. I shouldn't have gone there but if she can't handle the truth what can I do. I've apologized several times and I've also gone off the handle too. Mostly I've tried to be nice. I went off the handle on her on my 50th birthday in June. Well, it was a few days after. She never called or emailed or even snail mailed a card to me. It was an important birthday to me and for her to totally ignore it really hurt. I called her in October to invite them to Jessie's 13th birthday but her anniversary is on the 6th and Jessie's birthday is the 8th so since she's been married she's always celebrated her anniversary by going away for the weekend. That has hurt Jessie's feelings to no end but this year she didn't even ask about Aunt Kelly. :( Nicky's birthday is coming up on Nov. 11th. I'm really excited for him to celebrate it on 11/11/11. He'll be 15 and I've been waiting for that date since the day he was born. I'm going to call and invite them but I know they won't come. At least I'm trying to make up and be good and get her back in the family. Oh yeah, she's also pregnant and due with a little boy on Dec. 30th. She sent my Mom an email when she found out she was pregnant. We heard it was a boy through the work grapevine. My sister Cheryl and niece Amanda both work where Kelly does. They have friends in common and I have a couple of them as friends on Facebook. It's really sad to see pictures posted by them of her on there. Also, I have her Mother in law as a friend. She's a nice lady. Not saying anything to her Mother in law when I've seen her around town is really hard. Her Mother in law posts picture of Phillip, my nephew by Kelly and it breaks my heart that we're not seeing him anymore. I can only imagine how badly it hurts my Mom to see his pictures. What makes me feel really bad is that my sister's husband was estranged from his Father and she made sure to get them together. I guess we don't count. I feel like all the years never counted sometimes. Anyway, that's where my heart and head are now. I'm grieving. Maybe someday I'll have my baby sister back.

Happy Hump Day

2011-10-12T19:49:00.002-05:00

Today has been weird. I'm feeling disjointed and out of sorts. Not mad out of sorts. Just like something is going to happen out of sorts. I hate this feeling. Doesn't help I had a family dream last night. My oldest first cousin was in it and she came for a visit and brought her grandkids. We had a really good time. She mentioned somebody was pregnant so that means there might be a wedding for that family in the future. I think if I remember our family dream interpretations correctly. It's been a while since I've had one of our family prophetic dreams. So its either the dream throwing me off or the fact that I got my flu shot on Monday that's left me feeling this way. I never get sick from the shot but do feel worn out usually and this time I've got that worn out feeling too. LOL, who knows though. It could just be my diabetes and carpal tunnel working against me. I just hate this feeling of impending doom. Maybe I'll sleep better tonight and wake up feeling a whole lot better tomorrow. Just wanted to post since I haven't in a while. I'm glad I don't have really anything to talk about. Love when its just boring and routine stuff going on. No need for drama when I've got TV and movies that can handle all that. :D

Happy October

2011-10-03T05:51:00.003-05:00

Another month started and days being counted down......by my daughter Jessie. She turns 13 on October 8th and can't wait. She wants a kitten for her birthday and while I was not considering another pet it turns out that it is a good idea. Our cat Skylar is also 13. We rescued her 11 or so years ago from Fuzzy Friends which is a local rescue center in the area. She's a wonderful part of our family. We did have another cat a few years ago but had to take her to the pound because she went crazy on us and started attacking Chris and then she started attacking me. It was all out of the blue and because the kids were still very little it scared me. Both of our dogs are fine with cats too. I'll be looking on Friday to see what fits with us. Jessie's not being choosy either. My choice is female. She's okay with that. Then I'm to try to find her a striped kitten, any color and if that can't be found her next choice is like a Siamese coloring and then it doesn't matter if either of those choices can't be found. So Friday can't come soon enough for her. LOL.

Happy Hump Day!

2011-09-14T19:01:00.002-05:00

Nothing much going on. Chris's partner finally (since the 4th of July he was off) came back to work. Now maybe I won't have to finagle the bills so much anymore. It does make a difference having a partner team drive and there won't be any lets see if we have anything for you as to where he'll be going. Also there won't be in one day and back out the next day either. We shouldn't be using so much gas anymore. In January Chris will get a dedicated single line run which means he'll be by himself and know exactly what he'll be doing every week. He's going to try to be home on Friday and Saturdays so he can go to the band stuff and have a weekend (sort of) with the family. That's the news on his job.

I took my Mom to the eye doctor today. Her eyes are about 20/40 or 20/50 and everything is all good on there not being any diabetes in her eyes. They're also really good on pressure and the nerves and muscles so no cataract surgery until she's uncomfortable and wanting it. She was scared they'd want her to have it now.

Band is going well for Nicky. He's been excited about marching at the football games. Their first home game is this Friday but I won't be able to go. Chris has no idea when he'll be home and my luck would be he'd come home when I first got there. I'd rather not plan to go just in case and if he gets home in time then yeah we get to go. School is going well for Nicky. His grades are good except for Algebra but he's brought it up and I'm pretty sure he'll have it somewhere in the 80's by the time he does the test for the first six weeks of school.

Jessie is doing well in school so far. She decided not to do Volleyball after all. She's already failing math but that's her disability coming into play. As long as she passes the class is all that matters and right now she's just 4 points below. I think she can do it as long as she doesn't get frustrated. Her other classes are all 80's and 90's. Poor girl is just not math efficient. Ask her to read, write a story, spell or enjoy Science and you wouldn't know she had a disability. She's well rounded and that's all that matters to me. Math was never my strong point either and I'm not going to have her so frustrated that it ruins her school years.

That's about all thats been going on for us. Summer was ruined because of how hard Chris had to work and him being home only 1 day a week if that. I'm just hoping Carl doesn't have anything else happen between now and Christmas.

Labor Day Weekend

2011-09-02T18:06:00.002-05:00

Nothing much is going on. Thekids have had a good couple of weeks of school so far. Nick is really enjoying band too. They've had two football games away from home so I've yet to see him march. Its too hot for me to go to an away game. The heat really kills me and makes me hurt really bad. Stupid nerve damage. I do plan on going to the home games and we're supposed to finally be getting cooler weather starting Sunday or Monday. Still no rain. Tropical storm Lee is scared of Texas and stopped off in Louisiana to go to New Orleans and party instead. He will be causing us cooler temps so that's a plus. They said we should have temps in the 80's next week. Can you believe it? Do you know how much different it feels between 100's and 80's? LOL. I want to say a big thank you to Kathy (Bags, Books and Bon Jovi) for sending Alyce to me to do some graphic work. Hopefully I can figure something good out for her. I also get a really good blog to add to my blog list to read. Speaking of which I really need to catch up with everybody. Bad thing is I can't leave comments again. :( Just know that if you're on my list I read your blog. :D Off to play with some fun stuff. Hope you all have a wonderful Labor Day weekend!!!

School Days, School Days....

2011-08-23T05:46:00.003-05:00

Not much going on here. School started yesterday and the kids actually enjoyed going back. This morning not so much but they'll get there. LOL. Jessie started 7th grade and was worried she wouldn't be in classes with her friends but she said she was in mostly the same classes with them and she had a really good day. I hope it stays this way for her. She stresses over math every year because of her disability but otherwise she has good solid grades. Nicky started his Freshman year of high school. He said it was no different in high school than in the other years of school. My laid back teenager. LOL. He had Art 1 as an elective but the band director asked him to give it up to join Jazz band so that's what he's going to do today. I think he'll enjoy Jazz band a whole lot more than art. Poor boy can barely draw a stick figure but that's okay. Not everybody can expect to be an art on paper artist. Maybe that's why he's good with music? :) I had a good first day of no kids at home too. It was weird and so quiet and nobody to argue with about having to wake up late in the afternoon. That's what I'm sure my kids are missing. Their late nights and later sleep in times. They'll catch up eventually.

Busy Tuesday

2011-08-16T19:21:00.001-05:00

My sister made it through her gall bladder surgery just fine. The polyps still need to be checked out but so far so good. She's miserable but she's alive and didn't have any problems with anesthia this time. Thanks everybody for prayers and good thoughts for her.

Thanks and an Update

2011-08-09T10:53:00.002-05:00

Thanks everyone for the comments you leave on my blog. Unfortunately I can't comment back to your blogs or even post a comment back to you on my own blog. So I'm plugging along reading everything on your blogs but I wish I could leave comments. Oh well, maybe eventually I'll be able to again someday.

An update on my sister. She saw the surgeon yesterday and is set up to have her gall bladder removed on the 15th which is next Tuesday. The surgeon said he's not worried about the polyps since they'll be removing the whole gall bladder anyway. That was a relief to hear for sure. Now she has an appointment with her ob/gyn on Friday the 12th. Hopefully that's just follow up and there's still nothing going on with her for that stuff. Her biopsy came back clear that he did a week or so ago so that was a relief too.

Unreal!

2011-07-31T11:55:00.002-05:00

My sister Cheryl has been having female troubles for a few months. It started back around the beginning of the year. Then right before Easter she had a strep infection in her blood and had to have surgery on an abscess caused by it and was in the hospital for a couple of days. In the last few weeks she's had several ultra sounds internal and external and a biopsy from her cervix too. Her last 2 ultra sounds were done on Friday the 29th. Her 42nd birthday no less. She found out that she has polyps on her gall bladder. She'll have to have surgery to remove it but she hasn't found out if its cancer or not. From what we both have read gall bladder polyps are rare. They're not neccessarily cancer but with all the problems she's been having and the way her body has been acting since early in the year she thinks it probably is. Also, she's a lot more clumsy, can't sleep on her tummy anymore and is nauseous too. We'll find out on August 8th. She's scheduled to see both her ob/gyn doctor and a surgeon. I don't want to lose her. She's the person that holds our family together usually. It'll be weird if she's so sick because she's the caretaker usually. I was 8 when Cheryl was born. I was so happy to have a sister! I couldn't believe it. I still remember that we had pancakes with blueberry syrup for breakfast the morning she was born. The only bad thing was that my Mom went into labor at 2 a.m. and we had to be woke up to go across the street to the neighbor's house to stay while waiting for her to get here. My Mom barely made it to the hospital. Cheryl was born at 2:30 a.m. and the hospital didn't charge my Mom for the labor room. I'm rambling so I'll close this for now. I'm at the point of worry for the worst and hope for the best and we'll have something to laugh about later on when she gets the all clear.

Freshman?

2011-07-29T06:26:00.002-05:00

I can't believe my son Nick (no more Nicky) has started his high school life now. Band started practice for the summer yesterday. He's a freshman this year and will graduate in 2015. They had a half day of practice marching in spite of the high heats. Next week they start full 8 hour days. He said he had a lot of fun. I hope it continues to be fun. They got fitted for their uniforms and he looked just so grown. I don't know if I'm ready for this yet but ready or not here it comes!

Arghh!

2011-07-26T08:52:00.003-05:00

Blogger isn't letting me leave comments on blogs I follow or in reply to people who comment on my blog. I hope everyone is well.

Today's the day for my sisters biopsy. My Mom is going with us. I knew she would. I don't think my sister will be up to it but if she is we might stop by and see Dad afterwards. No other plans today except to make No Bake Cookies. Recipes follow.

Original recipe....

Chocolate Peanut-Butter No Bake Cookies

Ingredients:
2 cups sugar
4 tablespoons cocoa
1 stick butter
1/2 cup milk
1 cup peanut butter
1 tablespoon vanilla
3 cups quick cooking oats
Waxed paper

Directions:
In a heavy saucepan bring to a boile, the sugar, cocoa, butter and milk. Let boil for 1 minute then add peanut butter, vanilla and oatmeal. On a sheet of waxed paper, drop mixture by the teaspoonfuls, until cooled and hardened.

Tip:
Melt the peanut butter into the butter, sugar, and milk mixture before adding the vanilla and oatmeal. Seems to help the cookies harden like they are supposed to.

No Bake Vanilla Oatmeal Cookies
Ingredients:
3 cups quick cooking oats
1 cup flaked coconut
1/2 cup nuts (I used Pecans)
2 cups sugar
1/2 cup milk
1 stick butter
2 teaspoon vanilla

Directions:

Cook sugar, milk and butter. Bring to a boil and boil for 2 minutes till good soft ball stage. Add the vanilla. Pour over all other ingredients and stir until well mixed. Drop by teaspoonfuls onto waxed paper to cool.

Good Morning!

2011-07-24T08:46:00.002-05:00

I hope everyone is doing well this Sunday morning. Not much going on here. Making plans for my sister Cheryl's birthday on Friday. If anyone needs celebrating its her. She has a cervical biopsy to be done on Tuesday. She's so worried about it but tries to act like its nothing much going on. I just hope they figure out what is going on with her soon. I'm taking her and I'm pretty sure my Mom will want to go. Mom went when I had a lump removed from my breast so I can't see her not going on Tuesday but we'll see. Everybody's pretty much the same. Well, my brother Terry found out he's diabetic but he can easily take care of that with diet for right now. I'm hoping when he finds a doctor that they'll not go straight to medication for him. I was able to keep mine under control with diet for about 3 years before I finally had to go to pills for medication for it. We'll see. My kids summer is just about over. Jessie has volleyball camp starting tomorrow through Thursday. Nicky starts band camp on Thursday and Friday from 8 to Noon and then the next week is 9 to 5. The heat is going to really get to him I' sure. I need to have Cheryl cut his hair before all that starts. That's about all for my ramblings today.

Happy Birthday!

2011-07-12T08:11:00.003-05:00

It's my Dad's birthday. He turns 73 today. I'm taking my Mom, the kids and my brother Terry and sister Cheryl up to see him after my sister gets off of work this afternoon. Patrick isn't up to it today. He took them on Sunday to see Dad. Patrick has been having a lot of problems with feeling sick. He has a very bad heart so it stems from that. Mostly its because he's just been driving too much we think. We're hoping that's all it is and since Terry has been driving Amanda and Cheryl to and from work it seems to help Patrick with the swelling. The only bad thing is that the A/C at my Mom's has been hit and miss. Hopefully they've gotten it all fixed now since the repair guy replaced the motor. It's only been around 104 down here since the beginning of June. You don't need A/C for those temps right? Okay that's being sarcastic. I have them come down here when they've needed to so at least with their (Mom and Patrick) breathing problems they're not dying from the heat down there. I haven't been able to comment on blogger lately. I'm hoping since I was able to leave a comment earlier on a friends blog that the problem is over and I can leave comments for more friends now. That's all for now. I can't wait to see Dad today. I've got to remember to take my camera with me today for sure.

Edit: I feel so sad right now. All Dad could do is sleep while we were there this afternoon. My Mom said that's all he was able to do the last two times she's seen him too. He just doesn't look like himself anymore either.

Facebook Question

2011-06-24T10:56:00.003-05:00

One of the pages I like is Coca Cola. They posted this question yesterday.
If red represents Coca-Cola what color represents you? My answer is orange. It's bright and cheerful but not as vibrant as yellow. I asked my kids this question too. Jessie said black at first and I can see that. Of course she's 12 going on 13 so she's all about moody right now. I told her I see her as yellow. She's usually happy go lucky and just pulsing happiness except for those few days a month when to me she's not black but aubergine. She asked me what color aubergine is and I told her dark purple almost black but that she always bounces back to yellow. Nicky tried to be smart and answered blue, orange and green. I told him no he's a blue. Blue is airy and Nicky definitely has moments where he doesn't think things through that's for sure. I think he only mentioned orange because that's my answer. Green? That's always been his secondary answer for his favorite color. Just a side note....these are my interpretations of colors, not neccessarily what the actual interpretation is for them. So, if red represents Coca-Cola what color represents you?

Father's Day

2011-06-24T10:03:00.002-05:00

We made it Sunday to see Dad for Father's Day. Mom didn't make it. She was a little under the weather. While it was weird to be there without her Dad handled it a lot better than I thought he would. We brought him a burger and fries for lunch. He ate them really good. He said he didn't think he was hungry at first. We visited for about an hour. It was me, my sister Cheryl and brother Terry. Then we went to Books a Million and I got a couple of books. The next in line for Sookie books (True Blood) for me and a Star Wars book for Chris. Speaking of True Blood I can't wait for Sunday to get here for the season premiere. It should be a great season. Witches are coming to HBO. LOL. It's been a quiet summer for us so far. We've really done nothing. We did make it to the drive in and got to see the latest Pirates movie and Thor. Both were really good. The great thing about the drive in is its only $10 a car load and we can bring in our own food and drink. The bad thing is its soooooo hot even at night that its a sweaty movie experience. Good thing was there weren't any mosquitos when we were there. Well, that's enough of my rambling for today.

Thanks!

2011-06-08T10:55:00.004-05:00

For the birthday wishes and thoughts on grudges. For some reason I can't reply on here to comments. Weird. I guess something changed and I don't know how to fix it. I took my Mom to the doctor today and she's doing well. They upped her insulin a little bit for her evening shot to help and lower her morning numbers but other than that everything else seems to be going well for her. I called my sister Kelly but she didn't answer her phone of course. I told her we needed to get this settled and then started rambling and said more than I meant to say but oh well. She's the one that called me first about the whole mess so its back to her and I've got to let it go. My Mom told me this morning that Kelly is pregnant and due December 30th. :/ Another thing she didn't want me to know I'm guessing. I miss my sister. I should have just told her that and let it all go but I was hurt and let my mouth get the better of me. Maybe, hopefully, she'll come around soon and contact me one way or another. I don't want to lose her like Chris did his Dad. I refuse to let this go on for 8 years like that has with his Dad. :( I feel like I've lost half of me. I never thought we'd have words come between us. This is how our cousins act with each other. Not us. I guess time will tell.

Meet Me on Monday in Texas

2011-06-06T08:39:00.002-05:00

Meet Me On Monday!!

Welcome to the 47th edition of
"Meet Me On Monday!"

Blogging is a funny thing...we tell our most intimate thoughts for all to read and yet most of the time I find myself sitting and wondering, "who is this person!?" I know them...but yet I don't know them! I want to know who the person is behind all those words so I thought of a great way for all of us to "meet" each other!

Every Sunday http://nevergrowingold.blogspot.com/ will post four get to know you questions that you can copy and paste into your own Monday post and we can all learn a little more about each and every one of us!!

Java will add a linky so we can follow who participates and get to know them better!! Be sure to link the POST and not just your whole blog!!

If you have a question suggestion please email me at: nevergrowingold@hotmail.com and if I use your question I will give you a shout out!

I have decided to change the meme to four questions this week...I will probably change it back to five next week!

Questions:

1. What is was the last piece of candy that you ate?
2. Do you "read" in the bathroom?
3. I can't stand when someone _________?
4. Do you do daily, weekly or monthly grocery shopping?
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1. What is was the last piece of candy that you ate?
Peanut Butter M & M's at the drive in Saturday night.

2. Do you "read" in the bathroom?
Yes, I admit it. I read in the bathroom. I know I'm not the only person in blogdom who does it but I'll be the first to admit it in black and white. I blame my Mom for her potty training technique when I was a toddler. She gave me a book every time. So its all her fault that I love to read and read in the bathroom.

3. I can't stand when someone _________?
Holds a grudge. My sister is still holding a grudge from April. I even called her in May but she never returned my call. Yesterday was my birthday and she didn't even call me. Broke my heart and kind of made me feel out of sorts in a very sad way.

4. Do you do daily, weekly or monthly grocery shopping?
I go bi-weekly with a couple of trips in between for more milk or odds and ends I forgot.

Hello Summer...Almost...

2011-06-02T10:16:00.002-05:00

Hello Summer. Well, almost. One more day of school tomorrow and that's it for us until sometime in August when Nicky starts marching band practice. He's looking forward to it I think. We did get to go and see my Dad on Memorial day. It was a nice visit. He wasn't in bed this time. We watched Patton with him. That was one hard ass General for sure. I told my sister Cheryl she needed to go to Fort Hood with us sometime and see the museum that is there for Patton. I don't think we've been to it yet either. That's about all we did for the holiday. Chris went back to work on Sunday so he didn't even get to grill for us this time. Oh well....we've got plenty of summer to look forward to for that.

Happy Memorial Day Weekend!

2011-05-28T07:44:00.004-05:00

We had a busy day yesterday. Both of the kids had awards programs. Jessie got an award for Language Arts and Nicky got several awards too. One for A/B honor roll and I can't remember what the rest were for now. Jessie would get the A/B honor roll if she didn't have a math disability and keep to a C average in that class. I'll take the C average though. She's not failing it at least and its beyond her control too. She has improved a whole lot that's for sure. After the awards for 8th grade there was a luncheon. I don't know why I thought it'd be more than pizza and soda for some reason but that's what it was. I guess because I had to pay $20 for Chris and I to attend. It was held in the local Baptist church's fellowship hall and it wasn't big enough at all either. Well, I'll know now what to expect when Jessie has hers in a couple of years at least. My Mom and them went to see Dad yesterday and wouldn't you know it was a good day for him. Just my luck that I didn't get to go this time. My sister Cheryl said he was even able to feed himself. He hasn't done that in a while. Must have been something really good. I'm taking everybody up there on Memorial day (Monday) to see him again. The kids are out of school that day and everybody that works is off so it works out for us. We have no bbq plans and no plans to go anywhere this weekend because Chris has to go back out for work tomorrow (Sunday) but next weekend we should have a long weekend with him and its the first weekend of Summer for the kids too. Mostly we'll be staying home for the summer except for a few days at Mother-in-laws house in July for the 4th. We hope to maybe take the kids to Corpus Christi one Saturday if we can find the money to do it. No big plans at all otherwise.

Blogging Blahs

2011-05-18T06:48:00.003-05:00

That's what I've got. Nothing much is going on. My Dad is the same. My family is the same. Haven't heard from little sister Kelly since the blow up. I wish that wasn't the same. She doesn't return phone calls to my brother or sister so I haven't even tried to call her. Going from what my Mom said to me I'm guessing I'm the blame for that. She told my Mom I was cold to her and that she only called me cause she had nobody to talk to about it all. Well, I told her straight up she was being selfish and yeah, I didn't like that niece was pregnant but couldn't change it so why be negative about it all. Definitely what she didn't want to hear I guess. What my Mom doesn't know and never will know is what Kelly said to me about them. She called them lazy asses, said she was tired of giving them money and was wanting to know what other sister did with all my Mom's money. Well, Mom and Dad barely get $1500 together from Social Security. Mom has a lot of meds she takes plus Cheryl uses her paycheck along with whatever is left over to make the rent and utilities not to mention the cost of food and gas either. Cheryl is definitely not spending any money on herself. Maybe Kelly needs to walk in Cheryl's shoes and then she'd have a different attitude about everything. So I guess I did have something to chat about........just not anything new really.

Sunday Stealing

2011-05-01T18:07:00.003-05:00

Sunday Stealing: The "18 Questionable Questions" Meme

Cheers to all of us thieves!

1. If your lover betrayed you, what will your reaction be?

I always tease Chris and tell him bring her home to do house work but honestly its definitely a deal breaker. He couldn't stay here while with the other woman but we'd definitely have to have marriage counseling before we could go on with our marriage. I know it won't happen though because he was cheated on in his first marriage and his mother was cheated on by his father and he saw what it did to her.

2. If you can have a dream to come true, what would it be?

A family vacation at Disney. That's a dream that will probably never come true though. The other one I have would be for my husband and father in law to reconnect and father in law's wife not be in the picture at all. She's pushed away my husband and us and all of father in law's old friends. :(

3. What is the one thing most hated by you?

I hate liver and cancer and I can't stand father in law's wife. I don't want to say I hate her but its very close to it. I think that I'm just sad by that situation because my children and husband are losing out.

4. What would you do with a billion dollars?

Fund a few charities and build a family compound so I can take care of family members that are ill and can't get the help they really need.

5. Could you fall in love with your best friend?

Yes because I did. :D

6. Which is more blessed, loving someone or being loved by someone?

I think being loved by someone is more of a blessing. I came late to the love game though. Never crushed on anybody til I met Chris. Then I felt like a dirty old woman because I was 10 years older than him. Who knew I was starting the Cougar rage. LOL.

7. How long do you intend to wait for someone you really love?

Well, I waited 34 years so I'm guessing forever isn't too long.

8. If the person you secretly like is already attached, what would you do?

Just be friends with them.

9. If you'd like to act (movies, stage) with someone, who would it be?

Hmmm.....lots of people. If I could sing I'd be on Glee in a heartbeat. As for acting of course I'd have to say Johnny Depp. All the people in the brat pack and shoot I'd love to act with Shirley MacLaine.

10. What do you expect of your loved one?

Nothing and everything. Love isn't a 50/50 relationship. Some days you give 110% and others maybe 20%.

11. How would you see yourself in ten years time?

Mother of a college graduate and one on their way. Hopefully my children will be able to do whatever they want the most in life. Right now I just want them to play and be children for a little bit longer.

12. What’s your fear?

Cancer. It's the one disease that scares the crap out of me.

13. Would you rather be single and rich or married, but poor?

I'll take what I am right now. Married and not quite poor but definitely not rich.

14. What’s the first thing you do when you wake up?

Use the bathroom, wash my face, brush my hair into a ponytail and brush my teeth.

15. Do you ever hold back in a relationship?

I've only had one relationship and no I'm pretty sure I didn't hold back.

16. If you fell in love with two people simultaneously, how would you pick?

That wouldn't happen in a hundred years.

17. Would you forgive and forget no matter how horrible a thing that special someone has done?

Forgive probably. Forgetting is the hard part.

18. What are your three most important expectations in love?

That its always and forever and goes without saying. Yet, we always tell each other I love you in every phone call and every time we leave each other. Even after 15 years I can't get over that he always says it.

I'm Excited!

2011-04-30T16:21:00.002-05:00

Not about anything important but it was exciting to me. LOL. We made a library run today to our little 2 story library. It was me, my sister Cheryl, niece Amanda and my daughter Jessie. Girls fun day sort of. They finished the renovations on our little library. It's still just 2 stories but they've rearranged the areas and added a little coffee nook and separated the teen books from the children's books and now my kids don't feel like they're in an area just for the little kids. Jessie got 3 books and we chose 2 books for Nicky. I can't remember what they are right now but Nicky did tell me one of the ones I got for him was the second in the series. Unfortunately, he's like me and hates to read a series out of order. I told him maybe next time he'll just go with us then. I got three for me. The first one is Under the Dome by Stephen King. I've been wanting to read this one since it came out but it was never in when I was there. Its a huge thick book so I hope I'll be able to hold it okay. My luck will be my carpal tunnel will be acting up. Hopefully not. The second book is The Face by Dean Koontz and the third is We Ain't the Brontes by Rosalyn McMillan. I've never read anything by her but the book flap sounded really good. Its about two sisters who are both authors but one is a Sci-Fi author and at the top of her game and the other can't get her contract renewed and is jealous. Good ol' sibling rivalry at its best. There's more to it than just that so it should be an interesting read. I'm hoping that we'll get my Mom to go with us next Saturday. They've put in a lot of seating areas and since she uses a cane and can't stand for very long it will be a great help to her. I'm keeping my fingers crossed. Maybe I should cross my eyes too. LOL.

Royal Wedding Watcher

2011-04-29T09:48:00.002-05:00

Yes I am! I watched 30 years ago when shy little Di married her (so she thought) Prince Charming so there was no way I was going to miss Prince William marry his waity Katie. Yes, they've been together 9 years and lived together a long time already but a wedding should always be a joyous occasion. With the terrible tornadoes that went through the South this past week it was nice to have something wonderful to celebrate. While I think we should have more coverage about what is going on in Tuscaloosa the wedding was shown here starting at about 4 a.m. I don't think any breaking news about the storms that happened were being updated at that time anyway. On to the wedding.....I loved her dress. It was simple and I think it was very close to Grace Kelly's from when she married into Monaco royalty. I loved that she wore her hair down and then hearing that the Queen loaned her the tiara that her Mother gave her at age 18 was so sweet. I'm glad to see that there is some tradition still left in the world. I think this marriage actually might have a chance to make it. I hope it will. We need some happiness in this world.

Nice Easter Weekend

2011-04-25T05:36:00.002-05:00

Our weekend started off nicely. We (Mom, Cheryl, Amanda and my kids) went and saw Dad on Friday morning. We got to stay about a couple of hours. He was in bed though because he was in some pain that morning. He chatted quite a bit with everybody. Jessie was a little upset that he didn't remember her that morning but I explained to her that at least he knew she belonged to him somehow and that the next time she gets to go he might know her. After that it was time to pick up Chris. We got him and went to Denny's for lunch but I think we all got breakfast except for him and Nicky. Nicky invented a new drink. Tabascoke. Yeah, it is what it sounds like. Tabasco and coke mixed together. I swear my son is going to turn into a spicy spice before he's 18. We went to Home Depot and picked up a new thermostat. Chris is frustrated with it because its programmable and he doesn't want to take the time to follow the directions to set it. I'll get it done sometime while he's back at work this week hopefully. If not, we'll just have to go and get a simpler one. LOL. Brought everybody home and nothing much for Friday. Saturday morning got up and Cheryl and I went to the store before it got really bad. Came back and went down later that evening for a dinner of chili dogs and chips and dying Easter eggs. Sunday came and I went over to Mom's house around 10 that morning to help get dinner ready. We had too much of everything but it was so good. Ham, corn casserole, potato salad, deviled eggs, cabbage, salad, rolls and tomato, cucumber and onion salad. Desserts were earthquake cake and banana pudding. I think Cheryl was hungry when we bought groceries. LOL. I'm glad we only eat like this on special occasions and that those are far and few between. We had a little Easter egg hunt for Wyatt. He's one and the only grandchild small enough to really hunt. My two hunted but the eggs really weren't hidden for them. One reason is there's no hiding places where we live really. It's all flat grassland since our area was once a hayfield. We went home after that. Its so nice to only have 3 blocks to go home instead of 30 miles or more. We're back to work and school today. Not me of course but still I have to get up at 5 a.m. with the kids everyday so I think I'm looking as forward to summer vacation as they are. LOL.

Daddy Today

2011-04-18T18:36:00.004-05:00

We went and saw Dad today. Just Mom and me. I had to take Chris into work because they're redoing and adding on to the parking lot where he works. He doesn't want to leave it parked on the street while he's on the road this week. Hopefully it won't take too long for them to get it all done. Anyway, Mom went with me this morning to drop Chris off. We got up to the VA and there was no parking in the building my Dad is in. I dropped Mom off at the front and went and parked across the street from there until someone moved. Mom uses a cane and I have neurapathy in both feet so its too far for either of us to walk from the parking lot to the front door of his building. It doesn't help that most of the parking is for doctors and vans for patient use but they really do not get many visitors in his unit anyway. Still its nice to be able to use handicap parking when we need it which we usually do. :(

Dad was in a good mood this morning. When I finally got upstairs they were in a visitation room watching an old Dale Robertson movie called Blood on the Arrow. He kept saying off and on through the movie..That's Dale Robertson. I wonder what happened to him? We'd talk about other actors in the movie but he always went back to Dale Robertson. We had about an hour visit and he started in with saying he had to go to the bathroom but couldn't cause I was there. I left for a little bit (10 minutes or so) thinking that would help him settle down. He's in diapers but can't remember sometimes. We saw the doctor while we were there and she said he was doing very well. After the scary pneumonia episode a few months back he's recovered pretty well. They've reduced some of his meds too she said. The only thing going on is he hollers help every few minutes and when asked what he needs he doesn't remember saying help. Not a long visit but nice. He knew I was a daughter today too. He might not know my name but at least he knows my face.

Meet Me on Monday in Texas

2011-04-18T18:24:00.002-05:00

Blogging is a funny thing...we tell our most intimate thoughts for all to read and yet most of the time I find myself sitting and wondering, "who is this person!?" I know them...but yet I don't know them! I want to know who the person is behind all those words so I thought of a great way for all of us to "meet" each other!

Every Sunday Never Growing Old will post five get to know you questions that you can copy and paste into your own Monday post and we can all learn a little more about each and every one of us!!

Java will add a linky so we can follow who participates and get to know them better!! Be sure to link the POST and not just your whole blog!!

Question #2 compliments of Helen at A Crafty Kind of Truffle!!

If you have a question suggestion please email me at: nevergrowingold@hotmail.com and if I use your question I will give you a shout out!

Questions:

1. Caesar Salad or Garden Salad?
2. Will you be watching the Royal Wedding on April 29th?
3. Last thing you spent lots of money on?
4. Window seat or aisle seat?
5. Do you know your blood type?

My Answers:
1. Caesar Salad or Garden Salad?

Garden Salad but I vary my dressings. I like Ranch, French, Italian and all the good balsamic/vinegar varieties I can try.

2. Will you be watching the Royal Wedding on April 29th?

Yep. I watched Charles and Diana get married so I'm going to follow up with William and Kate.
I have to get up at 5 to get the kids up and getting ready for school anyway so I'll just get up the hour earlier. I also watched the burial of Diana when she passed away. Royalty fascinates me but I'm not a fanatic about it.

3. Last thing you spent lots of money on?

Down payment on our Dodge Journey and before that we had to buy a new central a/c unit. Both were pretty pricey.

4. Window seat or aisle seat?

I don't fly but if I did it would definitely be an aisle seat.

5. Do you know your blood type?

Yes, I'm O positive. My kids and husband are A positive.

Sunday Stealing in Texas

2011-04-17T09:08:00.006-05:00

I found this on a blog I just started following and followed it back to this button. It seemed like a fun steal to me.

Sunday, April 17, 2011The 65 Questions Meme
Welcome back to Sunday Stealing which originated on WTIT: The Blog authored by Bud Weiser. Here we will steal all types of memes from every corner of the blogosphere. Our promise to you is that we will work hard to find the most interesting and intelligent memes. You may have heard of the expression, “honor amongst thieves”. In that age-old tradition, we also have our rules. First, we always credit the blog that we stole it from and we will “fess up” to the blog owner where we stole the meme. We also provide a link to the victim's post. (It's our way of saying "Thanks!") We do sometimes edit the original meme, usually to make it more relevant to our global players, to challenge our players, sometimes to select that meme's best questions, or simply to make it less repetitive from either this new meme or recently asked questions from a prior featured meme. Let's go!!!

Today we ripped off a blogger named Doug Spencer from the blog Songs of Innocence and of Experience. Doug does not credit where he got it. But, it was probably stolen there as well. So, of course, that will be as far as we go. Tracing back our theft's thieves might take some time. Link back to us at Sunday Stealing!

Sunday Stealing: The 65 Questions Meme

Cheers to all of us thieves!

1. Tell us who the last person that you took a shower with.

It's been a while but it would be my husband Chris.

2. Tell us about your favorite tee-shirt. Extra points if you show a pic. (We know. What can you do with freakin' extra points?)

No favorite here really.

3. Has anyone ever hit on you even though they knew you were taken?

If they did I didn't know it.

4. Do you plan what to wear the next day?

Sometimes. Depends on what we're doing that next day.

5. How are you feeling RIGHT now? Why?

Okay. Pain as usual but that's normal for me.

6. What's the closest thing to you that's black?

My computer.

7. Tell me about an interesting dream you remember having.

Can't think of anything right now.

8. Did you or might you meet anybody new today?

Nope.

9. If you could be doing anything right now (or perhaps after you finish this ridiculous meme) what would it be?

Reading probably.

10. Can you think of a meme question that's never been asked?

Not really.

11. What comes to mind when I say China?

Peking Duck.

12. Are you overly emotional?

I can be. I know I'm a worrywort of the worst kind though I try to not be worrying about something happening when everything is going well.

13. If you could listen to just one rock album (CD, vinyl or mp3) which one would you pick?

Probably something by Queen. Loved them when I was a teenager.

14. Do you bite into your ice cream or just lick it?

Both.

15. Do you like your car?

Love my car. We just bought a 2010 Dodge Journey (new) in January. It's silver.

16. Do you like yourself?

Mostly though there are things I wish I could change of course.

17. Would you go out to eat with Charlie Sheen?

As long as he's paying I wouldn't mind it. I'd like to ask him a question or two.

18. What was the last song that you listened to?

Something by Lemonade Mouth since we just watched the Disney movie the other night. I can't remember what was on the car radio when we went out and about.

19. Are (or were) your parents strict?

I thought they were at the time but now I know they really weren't. As long as we let them know what we were doing and who we were with they were usually okay with just about anything we wanted to do.

20. Have you ever wondered what attending a wild orgy (if only to watch or...) would be like?

Nope, can't say I've wondered about that.

21. I say cottage cheese. You say:

Ricotta cheese

22. Have you ever met a celebrity?

I met Chris Adams the wrestler way back when. Sorry to hear he passed away.

23. What was the last movie that you watched at home?

Beverly Hills Chihuahua 2

24. Is there anything sparkly in the room you're in?

Not really. It's too early to be sparkly this morning.

25. What countries have you visited?

Mexico and The Bahamas

26. Have you ever made a phone call while you were drunk that you've regretted? If yes, do tell.

Nope. Never been drunk.

27. Where were you going the last time that you were on a train?

I was going home back to Dallas after visiting my Grandparents in Brenham.

28. Bacon or sausage?

Bacon

29. How long have you had a cell-phone?

About 10 years

30. What other memes do you do regularly?

I just started Meet Me on Monday and like to do First Line Friday when I can. My friend Kathy's blog is all about Bon Jovi, Books and Bags and she asked me to make her a button for her meme there. I just haven't really done it lately.

31. Who is the craziest meme host?

I have no idea.

32. Who invented chop sticks?

Again, I have no idea but I bet an internet search would have the answer.

33. Who are you going to be with tonight?

Hubby and the kids.

34. Are you too forgiving?

I don't think you can be too forgiving.

35. When was the last time that you were in love?

Were? Still are. LOL.

36. Tell us about your best friend.

I have no one best friend. Mostly I have family that has been there for me. Now online I have a lot of friends hopefully one day I'll get to make the ultimate road trip and meet them all.

37. What was the stupidest thing you learned in high school?

High school was too long ago to even remember the stupid stuff.

38. What was the last thing that you cried about?

Family drama.

39. What was the last question you asked?

What was the last movie we watched?

40. Favorite thing to do this time of the year?

Get ready for Easter.

41. If you had to get a (or another) tattoo, what would it be?

No tattoos here but if I were to get one it would be an old fashioned Santa head without the hat but with an Ivy wreath instead. I'm married to Chris and have Nicholas as a son. Our daughter's middle name is Ivy so it would cover all 3 of them. (Kris Kringle, St. Nicholas and then the Ivy wreath on the head)

42. How would your best friend describe you?

I have no idea. Hopefully sane would be in there though.

43. Have you ever seen all three Twilight films?

Yes, we have a tween and a teen so there's no way we could miss those movies. Though I've read the books and would have seen the movies anyway but don't tell them that. LOL.

44. Ever walked into a glass door?

Who hasn't?

45. Favorite color on that person that you are attracted to?

Burnt Orange. He looks good in blue too.

46. Have you ever slapped someone?

Probably but I don't remember it.

47. What hair style (for you) would you like to see return?

I would say shag but its really just a woman's version of the mullet right?

48. What was the last CD you bought?

Troubador by George Strait

49. Do looks matter to you?

No.

50. Could you ever forgive a liar?

Depends on the lie.

51. What's the hardest bill to pay every month?

The one for our new Dodge Journey

52. Do you like your life right now?

Pretty much. There are a few things I wish were different but that's beyond my control.

53. Do you sleep with the TV on?

No.

54. Can you handle the truth?

It can hurt but usually I can.

55. Do you have good vision?

Not without my glasses.

56. Do you hate or dislike more than 3 people?

I only hate one person and I can't think of any I dislike really.

57. How often do you talk on the phone?

With my husband - a lot. Mostly I leave the calling to other people calling me.

58. What celeb would you like to come home to?

Johnny Depp.

59. What are you wearing?

My housedress. I plan to be comfortable all day today. Let's see how long that lasts. LOL.

60. What is your favorite wild animal?

Lion. I don't ever want to meet one though.

61. Where was your facebook picture taken?

I have a graphic up right now. No idea where I got that one from though.

62. Can you waltz?

Probably but its been a long time.

63. Do you have a job?

The best in the world. I'm a Mom.

64. What was the most recent thing you stole?

This meme.

65. Have you ever crawled through a window?

Not that I remember.

Meet Me on Monday in Texas

2011-04-11T06:19:00.003-05:00

From Java's blog... Welcome to the 42nd edition of
"Meet Me On Monday!"
Blogging is a funny thing...we tell our most intimate thoughts for all to read and yet most of the time I find myself sitting and wondering, "who is this person!?" I know them...but yet I don't know them! I want to know who the person is behind all those words so I thought of a great way for all of us to "meet" each other!
Every Sunday Never Growing Old will post five get to know you questions that you can copy and paste into your own Monday post and we can all learn a little more about each and every one of us!!
Java will add a linky so we can follow who participates and get to know them better!! Be sure to link the POST and not just your whole blog!!
If you have a question suggestion please email me at: nevergrowingold@hotmail.com and if I use your question I will give you a shout out!

Questions:
1. Who would be your dream celebrity date?
2. Do you have any food restrictions?
3. How much time do you take to get ready in the morning?
4. Sausage or bacon?
5. Do you Google, Bing or Yahoo?

My Answers:
1. Who would be your dream celebrity date?
Johnny Depp. We have a lot in common I think. Of course I don't speak French but I wouldn't mind him speaking it to me at all.

2. Do you have any food restrictions?
Yes but the real question is do I follow them. I'm diabetic and carb sensitive so I need to watch everything. Most of the time I do okay but there are times when its just not possible. I did manage to somehow lose 8 pounds in 3 weeks. I think I was eating more regularly is why. Now that I know I lost weight I'll be subconscious about it and probably gain it back. LOL.

3. How much time do you take to get ready in the morning?
It depends. If I'm going to be home all day I just put on a house dress, pj's or sweats that nobody will see so there's maybe 5 minutes for that routine. If I have to go somewhere maybe 20 minutes and that includes a shower. I think the last time we had to get dressy for a wedding it took be 45 minutes and that included wearing makeup (mascara, eyeshadow and lipstick).

4. Sausage or bacon?

Bacon and more bacon.

5. Do you Google, Bing or Yahoo?
Google baby!

Insomnia I hate you!

2011-04-11T06:05:00.003-05:00

I had about an hour's sleep last night. I wouldn't let myself get out of bed though because I kept thinking that if I could calm my mind down I'd be asleep before I'd know it. No luck though. This whole stupidness with my sister and niece kept going through my head and worrying about my other sisters health didn't help either. I want to patch everything up but I really think that its up to my sister to make amends. The whole trouble with that is she works with my other sister and the niece in question so I'm sure its going to be a long feud. I'm sick at the thought of never getting to see them again. When Cheryl first got sick she called and was griping about how much Cheryl and Amanda miss work and how bad it makes her look. Really?! It's crazy that she thinks that way. She must be very insecure about her job to think what they do will reflect back on her doing her own job. I used to work for the same company and they don't judge people and how they do their jobs based on the people they're related to there. My sister Kelly is just a huge drama queen and if its not all about her then its just wrong. @@

Sunday

2011-04-11T05:54:00.003-05:00

I took Mom to see Dad. It was a short visit. He wasn't up for much company. He's even skinnier if that's possible. He was in an okay mood. He asked if I was the only daughter that came to see him. Cheryl is still ill and I have no idea if Kelly will come and see him on her own or not. I hope she will. We told him about Cheryl being ill but he still asked for her again during the visit. That's to be expected since she's the one that did the major care of him before his dementia got so bad. We were there maybe 30 minutes and he asked us to leave. I know it kills my Mom's soul when he does that. He was sleepy though and that's why he wanted us to go.

Family Drama........Take It Away!

2011-04-07T18:47:00.003-05:00

My sister Cheryl has been very, very ill. She started feeling horrible on Friday but the symptoms started on Wednesday. She said that she felt like she had hurt her tailbone that day. She thought that she had just plopped on the floor too hard when she was playing with the kids in the family. They had planned to go and see my Dad on Friday but while she was at work she had a knot come up in a very akward area and was in extreme pain. Patrick and my Mom were just leaving to go and get her after work anyway so they took her to urgent care. Turned out they thought she had an internal staph infection between her hoo and her haa. Yeah, TMI but not graphic at least. They sent her home with a RX for an antibiotic and Vicodin. Come Saturday evening she's crying and crying and the Vicodin isn't working very well for her at all. Get her to the ER around 7:30 p.m. and they put her on an IV drip and stout antibiotics. They decide she needs surgery to drain the knot and do a small incision but deep. She feels a little relief and we get sent home at 4 a.m. with the same RX's she got from urgent care. She gets through Sunday and said she feels a little better but come Monday about 6:30 she calls an ambulance to come and get her. I finally get up to the ER and she's losing her mind from the pain. The first doctor to look at her basically says suck it up about the pain and that they'll give her stronger stuff in the ER and more antibiotics but she'll probably be sent home again. Well, she really loses it after that. She's laughing histerically and mumbling to herself and scaring the crap out of me. I marched my not too happy but pain free butt up to the nurse's station and told her my sister is out of her freaking mind from the pain she's in and I really need to speak to her doctor. They call him and he comes out and says that either the culture they took from her on Saturday/Sunday was no good or was slow growing because they still weren't positive if it was staph or something else. He said they'd definitely be keeping her because her white blood count was at 20 so something was definitely wrong. It finally got as high as 23 before the night was through. They did another CT scan of her pelvis and groin and found out that the infection had grown since Sunday morning and was into her muscle and that's why she was in so much pain. They decided to give her morphin that night and do surgery the next morning on it. She did okay in surgery but when they tried to wake her up they had to get very agressive with her. Finally they had to slap her awake. She said she didn't see any lights but it was really quiet and peaceful wherever she was and that she was pissed when they finally got her out of it. This was Tuesday morning. She finally got out at lunchtime today (Thursday). Her white blood count was almost back to normal and she was finally fever free. She said that if she hadn't have had that bad pain she would have thought she had the flu. Turns out she has some kind of long winded STREP infection. Thank God Cheryl was healthy because if my Mom or Patrick who aren't that healthy would have been the ones that caught this I'm sure we'd be planning a funeral. I just hope God is through playing with Cheryl right now because her stress level is off the chart. My stupid family wouldn't even let her be sick this week and she's been in the hospital. My niece found out she's about 3 to 4 weeks pregnant. It's not a happy, happy situation because it was basically just a couple of days romance that got her that way. While I'm not happy that she's pregnant from it this way I've decided I'm not going to be a negative ninny and worry what brought her this baby. She'll be 26 when its born and was told she only had a 30% chance to get pregnant anyway. She has a tilted uterus and only one kidney so who knows how her pregnancy will go. I'm still holding my breath for her. My Mom, Cheryl and Patrick handled the news better than I thought they would. They're like me. We can't change how she got that way so there's no use being hateful to her. My sister Kelly is another story. She's so upset that she's pulled Phillip from being kept by my Mom and brother and put him into daycare. The thing is she was going to put him into daycare anyway and is using Amanda's pregnancy as an excuse to do it now. She took Amanda to work this morning but called her a "stupid bitch" about getting pregnant. Okay, that's fine but don't express your opinion on the way into work. Time and place Kelly. I mean I basically told Amanda the same thing but since I was a "stupid bitch" too I can get away with it. Kelly has been trying to get pregnant with her 2nd baby for about 5 months now. She's jealous pure and simple. She told Amanda that there was no way MOM (my Mom) could keep Phillip and a baby. Well, gee, she didn't even ask Amanda before saying that because I had already told her that I would keep her baby in exchange for her coming and cleaning my living room and kitchen once a week. The girl can clean and likes to do it so I felt it was a fair exchange. Besides, Amanda's baby isn't even due til early December so pulling Phil from my Mom is nothing but spite on Kelly's part. I'm trying to stay out of it but I'm guessing we won't be seeing Phil or Kelly and Anthony (her husband) anymore after this. Kelly holds grudges and she definitely will not be bringing Phil to see any of us any time soon I'm sure. Hopefully she can get over it because while she was calling Amanda a whore to me I'm thinking gee, she probably thinks the same thing about me because I wasn't married when I got pregnant either. But yet its okay that Todd (Amanda's youngest brother) has not only one baby mama but two and has two kids from each of them and he started at 17 having babies. Yet, Kelly doesn't have a problem with that. Hypocrite is such an ugly word but I don't see any difference in a boy getting a girl pregnant and not being a slut than a girl getting pregnant and being one. A slut is a slut no matter boy or girl. :( My family is broken. I'm just glad that Dad isn't aware right now. This is one time that dementia is good for him.

P.S. Cheryl told me that when she finally woke up in recovery she was on the floor and heard the doctor say well, lets call it. The nurse said wait she's back. She said where she was before she came too was an oblivion and nice and quiet. I told her of course since it wasn't her time to go. She said she was pissed they pulled her out of there. As of Sunday, April 10th, she's doing much better. She's maybe 50% right now and has home healthcare coming to take care of her wound so hopefully she's mending like she needs too. She goes back for a follow up on Wednesday.

Meet Me on Monday

2011-03-20T22:58:00.006-05:00

Borrowed from my friend Kathy's blog. Kathy has a wonderful book blog but its also about her fave bags and Bon Jovi. Like I said its a WONDERFUL blog. Gotta love that it has Bon Jovi and books and because of Kathy's influence I actually bought a new bag last week that wasn't made out of denim twill or blue jean material. What do you think Kathy? It's not leather and just a cheapy brown slouchy bag from Walmart but I really like it.

Java at http://nevergrowingold.blogspot.com/ has some of the best Blog Hops. Here's an early edition of Meet Me on Monday!

From her blog... Welcome to the 39th edition of
"Meet Me On Monday!"
Blogging is a funny thing...we tell our most intimate thoughts for all to read and yet most of the time I find myself sitting and wondering, "who is this person!?" I know them...but yet I don't know them! I want to know who the person is behind all those words so I thought of a great way for all of us to "meet" each other!
Every Sunday Never Growing Old will post five get to know you questions that you can copy and paste into your own Monday post and we can all learn a little more about each and every one of us!!
"Its a great way to to meet new friends and for others to get to know me better....one Monday at a time!!!"....as quoted by the Chacogirl!! I will make this SIMPLE and FUN!!!
Questions:
1. What jewelry do you wear 24/7?

I don't wear any jewelry because I'm allergic. My husband has only bought me a wedding ring and we went to a pawn shop and got that cause I knew I'd never get to really wear it. It was weird but while I was pregnant both times I actually was able to wear it. Gotta love how hormones and body chemistry play on you during that time. Now my dear daughter is 12 almost 13 so its been that long since I wore it.

2. Do you twirl your spaghetti or cut it?

Well, when I make spaghetti at home I break the noodles in half before cooking them but I do twirl them after its on my plate.

3. How many siblings do you have?

There are 5 of us total. I have two sisters and two brothers. Now that said let me just say that my parents really had 3 sets of family to raise. My two brothers and I were all born within the first 3 1/2 years they were married. I'm the eldest, then my next oldest brother was born when I was 18 months old and the baby brother was born when older brother was 14 months old. After 6 years of him being the baby little sister was born. Then when I was 19 years, 9 months and 12 days (yeah, I counted) my baby sister was born. We're all extremely close in spite of all the various age differences. Baby sister was about 4 when she became an Aunt from baby brother. LOL. Of course in our family that wasn't weird as my baby Aunt on my Mother's side became an Aunt at 6 weeks old to my oldest cousin and is only about 3 years older than me. Okay, I got off base and went back into the family a bit. Sorry.

4. Were you named after anyone?

Yes I was named after my Mother's sister. I'm Karen Jean named after Bobbie Jean.

5. Coke or Pepsi?

Always Coke or Dr. Pepper unless I don't have a choice of those two. Pepsi I will only drink if its a fountain drink. I just can't stand the aftertaste of it in a can or bottle.

Sheba

2011-03-16T10:59:00.005-05:00

We got a new furbaby last Saturday. We adopted her from the Humane Society in Waco. I didn't really want to get another baby right now but Jessie was missing Perdy so much that she talked us into going and seeing what they had for adoption. Sheba is an Anatolean Shepherd. She weighs about 50 pounds and her birthday is October 17, 2009. We only had to pay $50 to adopt her. I thought it was going to be $95 like the website said but I'm thinking because she was already adopted once and returned that is why it wasn't $95. She's a wonderful dog. Barely barks. I'm thinking that'll change. She was kept in the feral cat room at the Humane Society so she tolerates cats very well and she loves our little dogs too. The little dogs though are jealous of Sheba and the attention she's getting from Jessie so they're having to be pandered to a little more to try and stop them from fighting each other. I'm sure once the pecking order is firmly in place that everybody will calm down. They need a few more days and the more they're made to be together the easier it should get. They've already started settling down so hopefully it won't be much longer. You'd think with Sheba being the big dog she'd be Alpha but its Ginny our bigger little dog who is. She won't mess with Sheba though since she's so big. The first night home when she came in to sleep in Jessie's room she sniffed our cat Skylar and Skylar did the cat thing by hissing and climbing up to the top of my filing cabinet. Her fur was on end for about 2 hours. Sheba just looked at her and walked away. Cats do not bother her a bit and Skylar is getting used to her too. Oh and she was returned to the Humane Society but the reason was unknown. I'm thinking maybe she got too big for them to handle or they didn't have a good enough yard to keep her in because there's nothing wrong with her that we can see. So far so good and she's a great fit for our family.

Skylar after meeting Sheba the first time.

Charlie Sheen is a GENIUS!

2011-03-16T10:34:00.003-05:00

After watching the trainwreck of his life for the past few weeks it finally dawned on me that he's a genius. Getting fired from 2 1/2 Men was great for him. He's getting the rest of that paycheck plus if the show stays in production next year he'll still get paid. Now he's got a tour going (donating $1 from every ticket sold to the Japan Earthquake Relief) and selling stupid t-shirts for $19.95. The man is golden. The best thing he ever did was to ACT crazy and get fired. He's an actor people and is putting on a great SHOW. Do I like that he left people in the lurch on 2 1/2 Men? No, not at all but I can't change it. I watched the show for Jon Cryer. I've loved him since he played Duckie on Pretty in Pink. Hopefully the producers and writers will be able to get 2 1/2 Men back in production. I don't know how they'll be able to bring somebody in as Alan's brother but surely there could be another relative for the Harper's out there somewhere. We shall see I suppose. If its not figured out I hope John Cryer and Angus Jones (Jake) will be able to find another hit series somewhere in TV Land. Here's to Charlie and all of his Sheen genius.

Hello....

2011-03-08T21:58:00.002-06:00

I'm alive. I haven't had anything to post about lately. I wasn't able to go see my Dad this past couple of weekends because of being sick. I caught some crud from my niece. See if I take her to the ER again. It wasn't quite the flu but really close and it knocked me for a loop. I have a leftover cough and just enough congestion to bother me. My Mom and them got to go this past Sunday and see Dad. She said he was in a good mood and quite talkative. Hopefully when I get to go and see him next he'll be in a good mood then too. We've been doing pretty good. Chris has become a single line driver now and is home every other day for about 15 hours or so. It's a weird schedule but at least it'll pay the bills. Well, I think it will. We'll find out soon enough. I know it'll pay the bills better than just working the extra board will. He told his partner that he wanted to stay single line and he was okay about it. They'll probably keep pulling the ex partner into the office anyway so its better for us that Chris gets this dedicated run while he can. He's pretty far up on the seniority list so he can get an even better run in a few months hopefully. One that he'll have a couple of days off in a row. Right now he leaves out on Sunday night at 9 p.m., comes home on Tuesday morning around 5 a.m., leaves Tuesday at 9, comes home on Thursday morning around 5 again, goes out Thursday at 9 again and comes in on Saturday morning around 5 and then doesn't go back til Sunday evening at 9. Weird schedule but it works and we're actually seeing more of him than we're used to. I can't seem to get anything accomplished with this schedule and I'm doing a lot more laundry for him than before. LOL. Also, doing a lot more cooking too. That's not a bad thing but I'm used to having sandwiches or TV dinners most of the week. Anyway, that's what's been going on down here deep in the heart.

Not Much...

2011-02-14T17:41:00.003-06:00

to post about. We survived the great Texas freeze. I swear Sonic should change the name of the Route 44 drink to that. LOL. My Mom got to go and see Dad yesterday. She took him a valentine card to hang up on his bulletin board. I didn't go this time. Definitely need to go the next time though. We met them afterwards at Logan's Steakhouse. Cheryl bought everybody lunch. I knew there was no way I could go and make sure Chris and the kids got ready while I was gone. Chris does his best but he's like his Dad and brother and slow unless there's somebody whipping them along to move it faster. They wouldn't have made it on time at all. We had a nice time. It was good to get together with the siblings and Mom. Cheryl said Dad was having a good day but he fell asleep on them. He's doing that more and more. I don't know if its his meds or just his body slowly giving in. Probably a combination of both. We took over my Mom and Dad's little dog Suzy. She's a full sister to our dog Ginny but not a litter mate. Ginny (on the left) is about 6 months older and they're both 6 now. They've had a couple of little tiffs but that's to be expected. They mostly get along and its helped the kids to get over having to have Perdy put down last month.

:::BRRRRR:::

2011-02-01T19:13:00.003-06:00

and I mean cold. We're in central Texas and boy, oh boy, is it cold! I think the high today was 25 degrees. I'm not sure of the wind chill but I sure didn't go outside. Thank goodness for a fenced back yard so I was able to put our little dog in and out as she needed. They're saying our low tomorrow will be 9. Yes 9! A single digit temperature! I don't think we've ever been that cold here where we are in forever. I know for the last 10 years we haven't been anyway. Another day of staying inside for me at least. The kids are wanting snow and for school to be out but I don't see either of those situations happening. We're cold but that's it. I sure don't want our 3 digit summer temps but give me back our 40's and 50's please!

Dad Update

2011-01-31T06:49:00.004-06:00

The picture above is from April 2010. The picture below is from Jan. 29, 2011

You can definitely tell a difference in how well he's doing. People always say he looks great but he's not great. The infection he had a couple of weeks ago really wore on him. He's so sunken looking to me in his face and he's very moody and lost. That's the only way I can describe his mind. Lost.... He was more like a little boy this past weekend. I hate dementia. He's cheery (a little) when we're up there with Mom but when we leave them alone he always gets angry with her. While I think they need a few minutes alone together I think she's reaching a breaking point where we won't be able to do that anymore. She's so sad after we've seen Dad too. She puts up a good front but you can tell if you know her like we do. So he's better physically, not great, but better and mentally I think he's definitely worse.

Goodbye Girl

2011-01-30T18:23:00.002-06:00

I've been putting off writing this post. Last Tuesday (25th) we took our sweet Perdy (Perdita Marie) to be put down. She was the most wonderful dog in the world. We got her from a farmer 12 years ago when she was only a couple of months old. She was half black lab and half blue heeler. It wasn't until she started graying that you could see the blue heeler spots on her at all. She loved water of course and never wanted to be anywhere but her backyard. She only barked when someone or something came into our front yard. My kids can't remember a time without her and I don't look forward to a time without her either. She's spoilt us to having another dog. I'm sure we'll get one eventually and we do still have our Ginny who's 6 but she's nothing like our Perdy of course. Ginny is a little dog. She's half chihuahua and half Carolina dingo. She's a great dog too don't get me wrong but I always felt safe knowing that if Perdy barked I could check outside if needed. It got to the point that I could tell her different barks apart too. No need to check if it was just a cat bark but when she would let loose with a long string of barks I would know that someone was going to be knocking on the door in a minute. I'm going to miss those warning barks. I'm going to miss that dog so much.

So Far...

2011-01-24T21:10:00.002-06:00

So good. We found out that Chris will be getting a new partner. One closer to him in age, married with children and he wants to be home on weekends too. Whew! What a relief. It'll be next week before they start up but that's okay. Fun day today. We spent most of the day at the car dealership. Great people there. We were never bored that's for sure. We ended up with a Silver 2010 Dodge Journey. It's very similar to the Dodge Durango but a little smaller and lower to the ground. It's like the Dodge Caravan and a Dodge sedan got together and had a baby. LOL. It's very nice and only had 150 miles on it when we left the lot this afternoon. I sure don't want the car payment but my peace of mind is well worth what that is going to be. :D

Nothing to See Here.....

2011-01-21T16:50:00.002-06:00

It's just another craptastic Friday. Chris's partner called and wow he's being sent to the office to work until April while one of the people is out. He's acting like he just found out but I don't believe it for a minute. Chris is supposed to get another partner til then and hopefully it'll be a good match and he'll tell this guy where to go finally after 10 years of missing 2 or 3 months every year. I'm in a dilemma though because we were supposed to see about getting a new to us (used) car but I'm not sure I want a car payment with this thing hanging over our heads. We definitely need a newer vehicle with our KIA being 10 years old especially but I sure don't want a car payment if its going to be hard to make them. I'm guessing I'm going to end up with a hoopdee but as long as it runs and I don't have a huge car payment it might just work until next year. I'm pissed and I still don't believe that this guy just found this out. @@

::::shhhhh::::

2011-01-18T22:47:00.002-06:00

LOL. Sorry. Couldn't resist. There's not much going on. My Dad is doing well. He's pretty much over being ill but of course he'll never actually be well really. Anyway, there's nothing much to post about. Today was my Mom's birthday. She turned 69. She didn't really want a celebration but we had a small family party for her at her house. Chris and I gave her a new blanket for her bed last weekend when he was home. I don't know what else she got because I forgot to ask today. We had hamburgers and birthday cake and they were both really good. :) Oh, I made a few tshirt quote graphics. You can go to my graphic page to see them.

Update

2011-01-09T09:40:00.002-06:00

We got a call on Thursday that my Dad was very sick. They wanted to know if my Mom wanted my Dad left in a hospice situation or sent to the Temple VA for more aggressive treatment. My Mom will not ever tell them to take my Dad to Temple for treatment after last year when the doctor there told her that he only had 6 weeks to live. Come to find out that doctor does it a lot when it comes to dementia patients because they do not know how to take care of them there. So the Waco VA just did bloodwork (no way to do xrays) and said he has an infection and it was probably pneumonia. We finally were able to get up there on Friday afternoon and see him and considering how sick he was he looked pretty good. Now looking good doesn't mean he's doing good and I wish extended family would realize that. Anytime my Mom posts on our facebook family page about him or somebody asks if she says good they think that means he's doing great. Like with my brother Patrick he's very ill yet they think he's lying or playing up his illnesses. Yes illnesses. He's had major heart problems since he was 38 years old and now has all kinds of other stuff that goes along with that plus diabetes. Anyway, my Dad looked good but when asked how he felt he said pretty good but that's because he doesn't remember being sick. Just a few more weeks and we'll hopefully have a second car and I'll be able to take my Mom about twice a week to see Dad. I hate having to get into another car payment but with the KIA being iffy I'd rather Chris have to deal with it at work. Hopefully next year we'll be able to use the tax refund to fix that wiring harness and a few other problems it has. It only has about 120,000 which isn't bad for a 2001 KIA and if we can make it last long enough it could be Nicky's first car.

Long Time, No Posting

2011-01-06T09:44:00.002-06:00

Christmas vacation was really good. It went by way too fast though. We went to my sister Kelly's on Christmas eve and then spent a couple of hours with my Mom and other siblings on Christmas morning. We gave my Mom Chris's old laptop for her to get online with now. She's loving it so far. It's easier for her to sit at the table than to sit at a small computer desk like she was doing. Cheryl and Patrick and then Kelly and Anthony got an XBox 360 with a game and extra controller for each set of them. Chris wanted to do it and we already told them there won't be big presents for any of them again. LOL. My niece Amanda got a $25 phone card for her phone and we gave my nephew Todd and his fiancee a $25 gift card to Denny's. He said they ate burgers there but got chinched on the fries. I told him they should have eaten breakfast instead. We gave Chris's Mom a $100. She finally cashed the check yesterday. Our other nephew John came down on the 29th (his birthday) with his fiancee and her 4 kids. They're really good kids and all 7 and under. They're cuties too. He could do worse but I think he'll be a good stepfather for them. There'll come a time when they probably won't even remember he wasn't there. We gave him $20 and a fancy gun shaped cigarette lighter that has a laser light in it too. The littles got zoo pets which are like pillow pets but less than half the price. I gave Chris a Magellan GPS which he's been wanting and he got me a Nikon Coolpix. I knew I was getting a camera but never expected a Nikon. I thought it'd be a Kodak of some kind. Jessie got a laptop. Yeah I know but it'll be of use when she starts having to write reports and look stuff up for school online. Nicky got a PSP and a bunch of games. They're both happy with it and that's all that matters. I didn't intend to get on here and write about what we got/gave for Christmas. The kids went back to school on the 4th and they haven't been griping about having to get back in the routine of a 5:30 alarm. At least not yet that is. LOL. It took me a few days to get used to it but at least I have the option of a nap if I want one. My Mom went a few more times and saw my Dad after the Christmas party. He was still moody. I know it comes and goes but I hope he doesn't have bad days even when we don't get to see him. Our car is being iffy or I could take my Mom up there like planned on Mondays when I take Chris to work. We're going to have to take some of our tax refund and use it for a down payment on something. I don't know what yet but I know it won't be brand new. We'll see what we get when we get it.

Christmas Party

2010-12-20T17:47:00.002-06:00

I took my Mom up to the VA last Wednesday (12/15) for the Christmas party for the residents where my Dad is living. He was so very uncomfortable. I know my Mom doesn't think we'll have him much longer but I already told her I don't want to go next year. Dad just wanted to be in his room. He's always been a loner and while I know it wouldn't be good for him to be alone a lot they do have him in activities where he's not alone. I know I'm not making sense. I just can't get into words how difficult the party was for him. They only allowed 2 people to come to the party and Dad kept asking about everyone. It was just too many people and too noisy for him. I'd rather he not know me than be so ill at ease and saying help every 5 minutes like he did before we finally left.

Why?

2010-12-13T06:32:00.003-06:00

I can't figure you people out at all. Why wasn't my family ever good enough for you? You haven't seen your son or your grandchildren in 8 years now. I hear how wonderful you and your wife treat brother in law and his family and it breaks my heart. You got them big boucoup presents for Christmas this year. Why were we only given re-gifts when we got gifts at all? Why couldn't we have Christmas with you on Christmas instead of in February? Why were we only allowed at your house when you could show off for the neighbors? Why did you throw my son over on his 5th birthday party after begging to give it for a gun show so we had to have his party on a Thursday evening? Why did your wife say my kids are YOUR grandchildren like she did? Not only said it but in front of me and the children.

Backstory

Father-in-Law and my husband's mother are divorced and have been since he was around 11. He's been married about 5 times overall. His latest wife and he have been married 14 years now. She's only about 4 years older than me. I have never been left alone in a room with my Father-in-Law. His wife is very insecure and I guess she thinks I'll go for Daddy. The thought of that makes me sick. I have a great husband and thankfully he takes more after his Mom than his Dad. Brother-in-Law is more like Dad but with enough of Mom thrown in to not be too bad at least. Three days after my husband and I married Father-in-Laws wife showed up and proceeded to inform me did I know why Father-in-Law and Mother-in-Law divorced? I told her no I didn't know and didn't need to know. She told me that they divorced because Mother-in-Law was a LESBIAN. Okay. Well, she's not and I never thought she was either. This stupid lady is so insecure that she thought I'd be scared of my husband's mother for being a lesbian. Nope. No way, no how. I did tell her she was insecure and that it wasn't her place to tell me about Mother-in-Law. This lady and my Father-in-Law weren't even married yet. Definitely none of her business. Father-in-Law loves to tell tall tales come to find out. He told current wife that he came home and found Mother-in-Law locked in their bedroom with her best gal pal and that he had to break the door down to get to her. Okay big lie. I've been to that house. The door is still in the original door frame. There's no damage around the door latch/lock area. He told that tall tale because he didn't want to look like the bad guy. The bad guy he is. He's a big time cheater and had cheated on Mother-in-Law since the first year of their marriage. He cheated so badly that he married her cousin by marriage after he divorced her. Guess what? He cheated on that marriage too and I have no doubt that he has cheated on his current wife either. I just don't get why he would want to label Mother-in-Law with the Lesbian label and then leave his 8 and 11 year old sons to grow up with her and have to live down those lies. I just added this part of the story so you could see I've been listening to the lies from both Father-in-Law and his current wife since my husband and I were married for only 3 days. Now they are taking stories we told them about stuff our kids did and saying they happened at their house when my kids were little. They said our kids colored on their TV and threw a set of keys at it too. We set those stories straight with Brother-in-Law. Those two things happened at our house and they weren't even there. I guess they feel better about lying about us than telling the truth that we're not good enough for them. It makes me so sad that my Dad isn't really here anymore so my kids don't have him as a Grandpa but the Grandpa they have won't be there for them. The kids have a band concert coming up on Tuesday (14th) and I would love to have Father-in-Law come and see but until my husband straightens out a few things with him it won't be happening. This is one fight that I can't settle. Father-in-Law has told Brother-in-Law that its more or less my fault. That his wife hasn't done anything wrong. Yeah, that's what he thinks and I never set him straight because I was taught to respect my parents and not go tattletelling on somebody when they lie about me or mine. Of course, my Mom and Dad never had Father-in-Law and his current wife as their in-Laws either. I might have been taught different if they had.

Moved

2010-11-27T10:17:00.003-06:00

My Mom and siblings got moved in down the street and around the corner from me. Now to get the odds and ends from the old place and get everything unpacked. I didn't do any of the moving of the stuff. They hired a small moving company but I can help with the unpacking and that's what I plan to do today after my Mother in Law goes home. Here's a picture from Thanksgiving day of almost the whole family. We're only missing my Dad, my brother Terry and nephew John.

:)

2010-11-21T08:12:00.001-06:00

Finally got to go and visit my Dad again. Between the small paychecks and gas prices I wasn't able to go anywhere very much. He didn't get out of bed this time and looks so small. He called me 'her' and didn't know me really but that's okay. I think he knew me by the end of the visit. As long as he remembers my Mom is all that matters anyway.

Mixed Emotions

2010-11-18T06:56:00.002-06:00

I'm really happy because my Mom and siblings are moving not far from us. Walking distance except I can't walk it of course. They'll be about 3 blocks from here. I'm sad though because her house is going to be foreclosed on in December. They were supposed to get a modification loan and the bank strung them along for about 7 months before demanding money and then informed them that even though they paid the money it didn't mean they would get approved for the mod loan. Rather than paying up and taking a chance of not having anywhere to go they found this place to rent not far from us. My brother has been getting sicker so it's a blessing just in case something happens with him. Really the only bad thing is my Dad is still in the VA in that town but still we'll be visiting him the same and I'll be able to take my Mom on Mondays too when I take Chris to work. The mobile home they'll be renting is huge and my sister will finally have a real room with a door instead of an alcove area. I'm hoping we can get them moved by Thanksgiving. We'll find out soon enough. The lease will be signed today. There's a window to be fixed and the deck railings on the front and back porch and a few cosmetic things. Some cleaning to be done too.

Wide Awake

2010-11-13T03:43:00.002-06:00

I woke up and the clock read 3:33. There's supposed to be a spirtiual meaning when you wake up at that time. I'm wide awake. I will make myself go and lie back down in a little bit because we have a long day ahead of us and I don't want to crash and burn too early. We're celebrating Nicky's birthday today. It was on Nov. 11th but we're getting together with extended family to have cake. It should be fun. Also, my Mom's house is going to be foreclosed on so my sister is looking for somewhere to rent and they are going to try to get over here where we are. They'll be a couple of blocks away from us so it shouldn't be too bad. My brother had an episode when he went to pick up my sister from work yesterday. Thank God my little sister was with him because she ended up having to drive them all back home. He said he got really dizzy and then sick to his stomache and threw up something that looked like blood. Hopefully it was just his blood sugar being too low or his blood pressure being low too and nothing major to worry about. He's very sick anyway and has major heart problems so it worries me this happened. I think them being closer will be a godsend for us all. Both of my sisters work and if something happens this way I'll be right there and not have to travel 30 miles to get there. Selfish? Yes. But still I would worry less with being closer to them. My sister said she would worry less too if they get out here by us so that made me feel less selfish at least.

Catscan Results

2010-11-09T11:32:00.002-06:00

I went for a catscan yesterday and got the results a little bit ago. I have diverticulitis and have to make a major change in my diet. Need to add a bunch of fiber and the doctor wants me to take miralax every day to see if that'll help also. Goodbye meat and ice cream. I'll still have meat but definitely cutting portions in half. At least its nothing major and can be controlled by diet but wouldn't you know its almost time for the holidays when we have all our good food. LOL. I'll still enjoy the food just not so much. Chris better get in the mood for a food change for himself also. It won't hurt him or the kids for that matter either to have a diet change. Thank goodness it wasn't something worse than what it is. Oh, I added a nifty little fiber counter way at the bottom of my blog so if you want to keep up with certain counts you can. I read that women are supposed to have at least 21 grams of fiber a day. I sure have a lot of catching up to do with that count for sure. One good thing about fiber is it does make you feel full longer and it keeps your colon happy too.

Famous Last Words

2010-11-07T10:37:00.002-06:00

Late August 1995 I told my boss that my Grandfather was not expected to be around much longer and that I would be taking the 3 days off that our company allowed for a grandparent passing. She then informed me it was only one day with pay and that I could only take that one day. I told her that I would take 2 vacation days with it then. Without batting an eyelash she blurted out these famous last words at me.

Work comes first, then family.

I don't think so I thought to myself. About a week later it was Labor Day weekend so my sister, brother and I went to visit our parents in Waco. Had a great time with them and heard even more how badly my Grandfather was doing. I came back to work that Tuesday and called my Dad and told him I wanted to quit my job and move to Waco. Can I stay with ya'll? He said okay so that day I gave my notice. My boss was flabbergasted when I told her I wanted to quit and was giving my two week notice. She kept demanding a different reason for quitting than the one I gave. I told her I wanted to quit because I wanted to move to Waco. She never took my answer as the real one. Oh well is all I'll say. I had been working for this company all my adult life, since I was 18 in fact. I loved the company but the current boss was wearing thin on my nerves. Once before I had tried to leave that department and go to another one but she more or less told me that I couldn't handle working anywhere else in the company. I wish I hadn't have let her intimidate me like she did. She had an employee spying on me but what made it really bad is that employee was a really close friend. I finally had enough is why I quit. I was 33 years old and about to make the biggest change and the best change of my life. More to follow tomorrow.

Weepy

2010-10-28T18:14:00.002-05:00

but not crying if that makes sense. Today is Chris's 39th birthday. I met him shortly after his 24th birthday 15 years ago. We've been married 14 1/2 of those years. I'm used to him not being home for his birthday but for some reason this year I'm all sad about him not being home. Maybe its more hormonal for me this year because I'm in the start of menopause or maybe its just because my blood sugar is low and I should eat dinner. LOL. I don't know but I sure wish he was home. Normally he'd be home tomorrow but since he didn't go out to work til yesterday that's kind of impossible. He might be in Sunday morning but he won't be home to stay so he'll miss out on the kids as Zombies this year. We don't have very many Halloween years left either. Our kids have always gone for scary and gory costumes except for the one year we got them to be Drew and Mimi from the Drew Carey show. Also being broker than broke doesn't help either. I got his gift ahead of time and gave it to him back when we had money but I had wanted to get him something else when it was closer to time for it but that flew out the door. I hate being like this. It'll pass. It always does. Stupid hormones.

and again

2010-10-20T06:36:00.004-05:00

Another crappy paycheck. The person who is screwing up my husband's paycheck better be glad I can't get ahold of her. She'd definitely know the right way to get it done if it were me training her. We can't afford these mistakes. At least I don't have to figure out how to buy tires or a water heater this time but still money I was counting on being in the bank isn't in the bank because of a mistake made in the payroll department. All I know is that if Chris screwed up more than once he'd have been fired or demoted at least. Hopefully it'll get straightened out but still there's no cash in our pockets in the meantime. At least I don't have a huge grocery list this time either but it sure would have been nice to pay all the bills that I needed to pay.

Update: Duh...I forgot that Chris's partner took off an extra week instead of just two. He was out one of the two weeks on this check because he thought his Mother was going to pass but she pulled through. So, this check is that week and the next week Chris did only drive the first shift. The next check will be another week of first shift but should have this week with 2nd and 3rd shift on it too so it'll be closer to being normal. I just will be holding my breath on the 2nd check of November. It's Thanksgiving and we've got to have gifts for Jessie and Nicky for Christmas at least and travel money to go to MIL's house then for sure. She's coming here for Thanksgiving. We don't get to see her very often as it is and I'd hate to not get to go for Christmas and she be without any family then. She does have somewhere else she can go but as long as we can physically go to her she shouldn't be alone for that holiday.

Long Time

2010-10-18T19:47:00.002-05:00

gone. I haven't had much to say lately. We finally got a new water heater and Chris put it in really easy. I know I should have more faith in him but when it involves electricity I get the heebie jeebies. My Mom said I got shocked when I was 6 months old from putting a bobby pin in an outlet. I, of course, don't remember it but every time I have to plug something in or mess with electricity the hair on my arms stands on end so somewhere deep down inside I remember it I guess. LOL. We're planning to go and see my Dad on Saturday the 23rd. Chris is going too. Don't know if the kids will go or not. They love seeing Grandpa but its really boring for them to sit up there and listen to the same old stories over and over. The company Chris works for is changing our insurance over in January. So far I think our family doctor accepts the new insurance but I'll find out for sure once I get the info on the new plan. I'd hate to change now because she's been our doctor since Jessie was a year old and knows the whole family inside and out literally. My sister Cheryl has even started going to her. I think she's that good or it could be I'm just that comfortable with her. She's about 4 years younger than me and her 2 kids are right below mine in age so when I call up and say I need this or that she usually just sends me a prescription. The kids did great with their first report cards of the year. Jessie seems to be getting Math a little more this year than in the past. So far so good. Dad is doing okay. He's so skinny but he's hanging in there. He has a ton of stuff wrong with him and nothing has happened lately so I keep waiting to hear something about him. I've been having lots of dreams about him too. Not comforting ones but not really scary ones either. My brother Patrick isn't doing well. He and Dad seem to take turns with their health except Patrick doesn't have dementia at least. We survived the last three months financially somehow. I don't know how we did it and managed to have food but it worked out somehow. I hope that part of the year is over for a long while. I can handle one crisis at a time usually but 3 in a row was a little much for me. Chris just lets things roll of his back but I guess since I'm the one worrying about it he doesn't need to. Hopefully I'll be back sooner than two weeks this next time.

Happy Fall Ya'll!

2010-10-02T16:13:00.003-05:00

The weather has been gorgeous here in central Texas. Lows in the 60's and highs in the 80's. I'm loving this weather. I went with my Mom and two sisters to see Dad today. He was having a really good day. He's even skinnier than he was before. My sister Kelly brought her son Phillip and Dad really enjoyed watching him play and run around the unit. After we visited with Dad for a couple of hours we all went to Souper Salad for lunch. It was so good. I haven't been there in forever. I forgot how good their gingerbread can be. Then they opened up a new branch of the library in Waco. It's so nice and huge. I can't wait to go back with my books I really want to read but not buy list. I picked up one by Diane Chamberlain called Cypress Point. Its one of her older ones so I don't know how I haven't read it before. Then I got a sci-fi read too called The Devil's Alphabet by Daryl Gregory. Then I came home and we're just going to laze around the rest of the day. It's been a weird week for me. Lots of driving and I'm not used to it so much anymore. I'm very swollen from it. Chris has been having to be picked up every other day this past week is why. Next week he's going to be gone all week so it won't be so bad on me. I hate him being gone but its what has to be done so we can live in all our glory of a doublewide mobile home. LOL. It'll be all ours in 10 years. Not much longer at all.

Kissing Papa bye bye.

The boss with the grandparents.

Strayed Much?

2010-09-28T18:49:00.004-05:00

I've pretty much strayed away from how I wanted to use this blog. I wanted to talk about my Dad and the family and how we are handling how life is with someone who has dementia like my Dad has. I guess life just got in the way or should I say a string of bad luck? I did go and see my Dad a couple of weeks ago with my Mom, sister Cheryl and Jessie. We had a nice little visit but I haven't been back to see him again yet. Hopefully this weekend we'll get to go again. I forgot to mention that I ran into a friend from when I worked at KMart. Her Mom had Alzheimer's and was in her 80's and finally passed from it. I hated to hear it but its got to be better than not knowing anybody. My friend was lucky though that her Mom was able to be kept in a family home and be taken care of by family. We can't do that with my Dad because of how violent he gets and also he can't walk at all anymore. I know she didn't mean to make me feel bad but only forgot that my Dad is in the VA and that we can't just stay up there with him overnight and such. He does good to handle us for an hour or two at a time when we go up there. I wonder if its just a male/female thing? It'd be interesting to find that part out. My Mom and Cheryl went this past Saturday and visited with my Dad and Cheryl said his hands are starting to curl up from him not using them so much. I'm wondering if he has rheumatoid arthritis? His Mom had it and her hands got like that too. There's not much to talk about on my Dad right now. He's hanging in there. I can't believe its almost a year since he's been in the VA now.

These were taken the last time I got to go up and visit Dad.

CRAP! *Edit

2010-09-21T20:41:00.004-05:00

Yeah! Somehow I finagled the bills and was able to get the new tires and 4 wheel alignment. I didn't want to spend the money but the tires were really that bad. Choosing between them and hot water wasn't easy at all.

Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap! The paycheck is screwed up! I don't even think I'll be able to buy groceries this week. Hopefully, I'll be able to get just some basic stuff. No tires for the car this time and I'm not even sure we'll be able to squeeze a water heater out of it either. I'm only going to pay the bills I have to but still I hate just getting by. We were doing so well and now its been just one thing after another. I told Chris he has to say something to somebody about the obvious mistake on his paycheck. If I can see it I don't know how they didn't see it when they were doing the accounting stuff. I'm just tired of all the bad luck we've been having lately when it comes to money. I'm not a money hungry person either. I don't mind just getting by usually but having no hot water really sucks. I just can't take another 2 weeks of none. I'll lay low a little bit and then get over it. I just don't want the kids birthdays to get screwed up. They never ask for anything big. I know a lot of their friends have huge parties and get gifts like its Christmas morning but we've never gone overboard on birthdays but we had wanted to do a little bit more since they're getting older and wanting more adult things. Hopefully the next check will be right cause that one has all the major bills coming out on it. Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!Crap!

Well,

2010-09-20T19:15:00.002-05:00

it's been a quiet week. Still no hot water. We thought the water heater was working again but it wasn't. We did get one last hot shower out of it each at least. Thursday we have to get 4 new tires and an all wheel alignment so there goes $400. The water heater with installation will be another $600. Just hoping the paycheck will be big enough to cover both. We might have to wait another week or so on it anyway cause Chris might be out til next week. I have a phobia about workmen/workwomen being in my home when my hubby isn't so if Chris isn't home I'm not having the water heater done. Its bad enough I have to go and get the tires done. I don't think its a man's job or anything but I do so much of the home stuff on my own and have for the past 10 years I like to have Chris do what he can when he's home. He always does the yard work of course because I refuse to use his riding lawnmower. If something happened to that baby I'd never hear the end of it. I don't use his upright vacuum for that reason either. Every one I've ever touched has gone to the vacuum graveyard. We have a quick stick one that I use that's batter operated. I don't have a good record when it comes to vacuum's is all I can say. I've been waiting for House to come back and it finally has. It's off to a great start from what I can tell so far. Don't forget to breathe when you're watchign it tonight Diane!

CPAP Stuff

2010-09-09T06:10:00.002-05:00

Well, Chris got his CPAP machine and I must say I haven't ever slept so good in my life. I guess it's been about 8 years or so that he's been snoring and then in the last 2 years that he's been snoring so bad that it effected my sleep. At first Chris got the nostril mask. It looked really uncomfortable to me so at his appointment to get the equipment I asked him if he really thought that was the one for him. He said yep. It is the one that just goes into the nostrils. It looked painful for sure but it actually worked. For about 3 days...on the 4th and 5th day he actually knocked or took it out towards morning. His doctor appointment went well. He actually was stopping breathing for up to 30 seconds for almost every minute he was sleeping that night during testing. No wonder bells and whistles went off. The first night he used the machine after he got it was wonderful except it was so quiet I had to turn on the fan in the bedroom for white noise. He POPPED out of bed on Friday at 5 a.m. I couldn't believe it. He hasn't popped out of bed in years. He went and got the regular mask that just covers the nose before he went back out to work on Tuesday and said that this one is definitely the one. LOL. He has 2 more times to trade in that mask in the next 30 days so we'll see if we need to make another trip to trade it in or not. He'll be in early on Saturday morning so I can't wait to sleep with him again and see if it was just a fluke or not that I slept so well also. All I know is I didn't need a nap like I usually do when he's home. So........what's good for the goose is definitely good for the gander (in this situation at least).

Oh, the Weather Outside was Frightful......

2010-09-09T06:02:00.003-05:00

yesterday. I've never been scared of rainstorms but yesterday we had major RAAAIIIINNN and it was scary even for me. Our little bitty town didn't flood but the rest of our county apparently got a good bit of rain and the flooding was everywhere. We're not far from Ft. Hood (about 35 miles) which is a good thing because the soldiers were definitely needed to help. There was a mobile home park in Nolanville that flooded and a mobile home floated away with a lady inside of it. Very scary for me since that's what we live in too. We're on a hill so I don't have to worry about floating away but maybe sliding down the hill instead. LOL. Temple lost power for most of the day but I heard this morning that almost everyone has it back again. It's just too hot and wet to have to suffer sitting around in the dark too. There was one fatality where a car tried to drive across a flooded roadway and the driver drowned. Remember, if you come across a roadway filled with water to turn around, don't drown!

As If.........

2010-08-28T06:53:00.002-05:00

I don't have enough to worry about. Chris went for his sleep study last night and it was determined he does have sleep apnea just like his brother and dad. We don't know official results but he said they woke him up and put him on a CPap machine because all the bells and whistles went off. We don't know if its because he stopped breathing which is the major reason for a CPap machine or if he's like his brother and just snoring so loud that its waking him up. I didn't doubt he had it but while waiting for him to get tested it was almost like he wanted to have it. I'm glad its all figured out that he needs something. Now we just gotta wait and find out. I guess we'll both be learning this together.

Woohoo!!!

2010-08-26T15:06:00.002-05:00

We now have wonderful cold central air conditioning again. Once the techs got here it only took about 45 minutes to get the new unit installed and running again. Yeah!!!! The kids are going to be so happy that there rooms aren't like ovens anymore.

Ode to Air Conditioning

2010-08-22T07:12:00.003-05:00

Central air conditioning is swell,
Central air conditioning is great,
Central air conditioning breaks
and now I ache.

Window units are swell,
Window units are great
Window unit will be in my living room window
Before too late.

As if you can't guess from my really bad poem our A/C went out last night. We found one online at Home Depot for $99 and are on our way there early this morning to pick one up. I just hope they have one. We were only able to scrap up a little over $100 to buy one so if they don't have that one I don't know what we'll do. We get paid on Thursday otherwise and I'll figure out where I can go during the hottest part of the day if I have to. Let's just hope we can get the cheap A/C window unit they had online.

School...Yeah!!

2010-08-21T18:00:00.004-05:00

The kids start back to school on Monday. I think they're as ready to go back as I am for them to go back. LOL. They'll both be in the same school again. I can't believe I have two middle schoolers this year. Next year I'll have a Freshman in high school. Yikes! The years have just flown by. It seems just like yesterday that they were this little and more worried about how they looked for Halloween than anything else.

This was the last year I got to choose their costumes. They went as Drew Carey and Mimi from the Drew Carey show and they won second place in the costume contest at the Mall. They were 3 and almost 5. Now its just about the pumpkins and they don't like to trick or treat anymore.

So who knows what this school year will bring? I'm hoping they'll have a wonderful time being back in the same school together. I guess we'll find out soon enough.

This, That and Weird In Laws

2010-08-20T20:42:00.002-05:00

Miss Emma got out of the hospital yesterday. Boy what a relief! I was so worried for her and the whole family. It's going to be a total lifestyle change for everybody but they're going to be good at it when they get it all figured out..

If you've read my blog for a while you know that we have had a falling out (7 years now) with my father in law and his wife. Quick backstory on it. My mother in Law and he divorced when hubby was about 11. He was a cheater from year one she said and why she stayed with him and his cheating ways is her story to tell. He cheated with a cousin by marriage to her so it was really bad. They married and I guess he continued to cheat on 2nd wife. They divorced and he met his current wife after that. He told her all kinds of lies about my mother in law and she proceeded to tell them to me 3 days after hubby and I married so she definitely has been on my bad side forever. She's about 20 years younger than him and only a few years older than me so she's never really called me her daughter in law and I'm definitely not her style of person. She picks and chooses her friends as to how they will benefit her life. I can't imagine just having friends like that. I would have missed out on a lot of wonderful people otherwise. Anyway, she's a loudmouth and thinks everyone should live like she wants them too. She was always saying things about my kids, about how big my daughter was at the age of 4 and how they were her husband's grandchildren. Finally, we stopped seeing them after hubby's father came to our house to see if we had heard anything from hubby's brother. Not to see us, the kids or to even see how we were doing but to ask about brother in law. Oh and to show off a new car they wanted to buy. Anyway, long story, and I could go on and on about them but that's plenty for now. If father in law wasn't with his current wife I have no doubt that he'd be in my children's lives. He also doesn't have any personal friends left from before they married. She's driven them all off with her attitude. Okay stopping that story now. What's really sad is they only live about 20 minutes from us. My kids are definitely missing out but I guess "Grandpa" doesn't think about them since he's got the two younger ones in his life now. :(

Anyway, they went down to see Emma while she was in the hospital. Okay that makes sense. Go and see her, make sure she's getting better and come home. Nope. They're staying until Sunday. They're not staying with brother in law and his family. They're staying at the Hilton. My mother in law told hubby that they've been at the Hilton more than they've been to see Emma or the family. I guess father in law decided he needed a vacation. Just doesn't make sense. His stupid wife had the gall to ask that they let Emma come home with them. I couldn't believe hubby when he told me that. Emma just got out of the hospital yesterday. She barely saw an Endocronologist today. They're just getting her started on the right dosages of insulin and they don't know what all everything will do to her yet when it comes to food and exercise. My father in law is diabetic but its type 2. Type 1 is a whole other ballgame especially when its in a child. Father in law's wife has been begging for Emma to come and stay a few weeks throughout the summer is what my sister in law has told me and she's told her no. Emma's not ready to spend the night with my mother in law who is local and maybe only 10 minutes from home. This was way before she was diagnosed with diabetes too. So can you imagine how she'd be being 4 hours from home with a Grandma she doesn't really care for? When Emma was in the hospital they brought a stuffed animal and balloons and when they left they told Emma they'd see her tomorrow. She told them she didn't want to see them unless they brought her another toy. Wow! Out of the mouths of babes for sure. Kids can see through people. Mine saw through her but because my Mom brought me up correctly I took 7 years of abuse from that woman before I finally said no more. It took her downing my children and finally my father in law before I said no more. Anyway brother in law said no way and now father in law's wife is mad at him. Maybe brother in law will finally get it and talk to his Dad about everything that she has said to my sister in law. My hubby never would but he did finally have enough and we stopped seeing them. I just wish father in law knew why we pulled away. I'm sure his wife has lied about a lot of stuff. Going by stories brother in law and sister in law have told me I know she has because she took stuff that happened in our home (kids throwing keys at tv and coloring on tv) and said they happened at her house. @@ (that's an eyeroll) Anyway that's the backstory on father in law and his wife or part of it anyway. My children are worth more to me than having to live UP to her example of life.

Wow! (Edit)

2010-08-16T19:13:00.004-05:00

Just found out that our niece Emma (4 on Sept. 12th) has been diagnosed with Type 1 Juvenile Diabetes. Shock, dismay and a lot of OMG's muttered over the phone to my sister in law Mellodie. She's in the ICU in Shreveport right now for a couple of days at least. I'm so worried for everybody. Mellodie is upset cause she can't be there at night with Emma cause of the baby. My brother in law Alan will be up there with her at night but still if you know how it is to be a Mom you want to be there 24/7. Mellodie said that is what her brother has but he didn't find out until he was 24. That was way after Mellodie was married and gone so she doesn't know anything first hand about it but I'm sure she'll know everything she can as fast as she can too. I wish I could be there for them but its just no way. School starts Monday and we're broke from buying school supplies and clothes. I'm going to research and see what I can find out about it all too. I'm diabetic but its Type 2 and they're different from each other. Emma's always been really healthy so its just so shocking to find this out. I'm sure she'll be fine and healthy again just dealing with diabetes for the long run.

EMMA IS GOING HOME TODAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!! YEAH!!!!!!!!!!!

All Because Two People Fell In Love

2010-08-10T18:09:00.001-05:00

Ya know to me it's all so clear
Every one of us is here
All because two people fell in love

Thanks Mama and Daddy. I wish we could really celebrate it this year. Happy 50th anniversary.

Except for the heat....

2010-08-07T22:21:00.002-05:00

we had a really nice day. We went and got chicken and sides for my Dad and went up to the V.A. to see him. He was able to be out of bed today so we weren't all crowded in his room. He looked good for him. He had on his World's Greatest Grandpa shirt that my sister Kelly gave him when she found out she was pregnant with Phillip. It looked good on him but you could definitely tell he lost even more weight than what he has already. He didn't want to eat at first but once he got started on the chicken there was no stopping him. He got weepy a few times when we would mention some of the people from his family like his Aunts and Uncles but he never came to full blown tears at least. I forgot my camera today. I really need to get a good shot of him and my Mom. Hopefully I'll be able to get up there next Sunday. We need to drop the kids off then to spend the night anyway so it'd be a good day for Chris to go and see him too. We'll see what happens. I've learned I have better luck if I don't plan on things.

My Mom and Dad's 50th Anniversary is on Tuesday, August 10th. We won't be celebrating it though because it would just upset my Dad that he couldn't be home. I know that my Mom is really upset. She's trying to be strong but she's gone through so much this year of not getting to be with him. I kind of wish she would break down but then again I sure don't want to see her lose it. I know she would feel better because when I finally broke down about my Dad a few months ago I felt a lot better. It's really weird for me, almost like I'm grieving my Dad, but then he'll have a good day like today and I feel a little guilty for the grieving. Okay, enough of the maudlin stuff.

I was thinking that for Chris and I to be married 50 years I will be 84 and him 74 and Nicky will be my age of 49. Really weird how that works out like that. I hope we make it. :D

Yeah!

2010-08-06T23:39:00.002-05:00

I finally get to go and see my Dad again tomorrow. I haven't seen him since his birthday so I'm really looking forward to it. We're going to take him up some Church's fried chicken, french fries and coleslaw for his lunch. I know he hasn't had any fried chicken in a long time. If he eats it great and if not we'll just take it to my brother to eat. I was going to cook some for him but I don't have any dark meat and that's his preference. Church's is right by my Mom's house and on the way to the V.A. anyway. After we see my Dad I'm going to see if my sister wants to start on my Mom's room and getting it rearranged or at least get started on taking stuff out of the dressers my Mom wants to get rid of. They'll be put out for the trash to be picked up or drive by pickups for people who need something that's better than nothing. That's the plan anyway. Let's see if it works out.

First Line Friday...early...

2010-07-29T17:55:00.003-05:00

My friend Kathy hosts First Line Friday. You can find her at the link below. Check her out. She has a wonderful blog of lots of reviews of books. You can't go wrong by checking out her blog and a Kathy Recommended Read.

http://bagsbooksandbonjovi.blogspot.com/2010/03/first-line-friday.html

FIRST LINE FRIDAY...First lines have always intrigued me since I heard an author
say that writing the first sentence is, by far, the most difficult part of writing a novel.
The reasoning was that a first sentence can make the reader continue reading or
cause the book to be tossed aside. So, go to your To Be Read Pile, choose as
many books as you want and share the first line. Be sure to include the title and
author so that if your reader also finds it intriguing, they can find the book. Also,
share your thoughts about the first line. Does it draw you in? Is it...exciting...thought
provoking...scary...funny?

I've been on a sci-fi kick still but have switched to Vampire stories. I guess because we finally did get to go and see Eclipse and we've been watching True Blood on HBO also. I love this series. My friend Heather finally told me I should read the books and that she'd send me hers to "borrow". LOL, I don't borrow books except from the library. I'm afraid a friend might send me a "borrow" and I'll want to keep it so if someone says I can borrow I usually just say thanks but I'll just see if I can find it on paperbackswap.com first and if not there I will buy it.

Anyway, I read Dead Until Dark by Charlaine Harris. It's the first in the Sookie Stackhouse novels which True Blood is based on. I loved it. The series really stuck to the book. They had a character called "Bubba" that I would have loved to see in the series but they left him out. Let's just say he was based on a well-known Memphis singer and referred to in the book as the Man from Memphis. Got it? I knew you would figure it out. Now I've started the 2nd book in the series called Living Dead in Dallas. Of course, I know what's going on since I watch the cable series but still to read it and see the little changes makes me love it more. Here's the first line.....

Andy Bellefleur was as drunk as a skunk.

Woohoo! What a first line. For one thing this character doesn't get drunk so it makes you wonder what's going on with him. I found out of course because as soon as I got the book in the mail today I couldn't stop reading it. The character Sookie being able to read minds doesn't hurt either. While it was out of character for Andy it made sense after Sookie read his thoughts and found out how why he was so depressed. Oh and before I forget to tell you Andy is a detective on the small police force in Bon Temps, Louisiana where the book takes place. You can just imagine what it would take for someone like him to get as drunk as a skunk. By page 6 I find out that one of my favorite characters in the cable series is found dead in Andy's car which had been left overnight at the bar since he was drunk. I am so glad that there was that slight change in the character not being killed on the cable series. Probably if I had read the books first it wouldn't have mattered to me because I wouldn't have known anything much about that character to start with but now after watching him for two seasons he's a very endearing character. I'm glad for that little twist but since I plan to read the rest of the books in the series (in order) I'm sure that if there are some future characters that are out of the cable series and vice versa it won't make any difference to me then. It's like with all book to movies stories......the books are always better.

Hmmm.....

2010-07-26T23:13:00.002-05:00

It seems that with Bloggers new design changes there's not too much that can be done with backgrounds. So far I've figured out a little about the dimensions needed but I can't get it exactly. I made another blog just to try out the different backgrounds without changing my everyday blog and graphics blog but I just haven't had any real inspiration yet. Oh well, any excuse to play right? LOL.

If I Owned A Bookstore...

2010-07-18T21:23:00.003-05:00

I was just sitting here wondering what I would name a bookstore if I owned one. Would I tie in my name with it? Would I give it a quaint/quirky or cute name? I think it'd be fun to come up with a name. I don't think I'd ever own a bookstore but maybe if I ever win the lottery I'll get the chance.

The reason I got to wondering is that a friend on Facebook has posted a link to a bookstore in California called The Horse's Mouth Bookstore and Coffee Shop. I thought that was a really cool name for a bookstore. Then when I was looking at pictures on their site they had posted a picture of another bookstore in California called The Booklegger. Love it! We don't have anything but chain bookstores around here. You know Barnes and Noble, Books-A-Million, etc. Yeah, I really think if I ever win the lottery I would definitely build a little bookstore in my little town. We don't even have a local library but still I think I'd really like to do something like that. Gotta dream right? Of course, by the time I win the lottery, books will all be on Kindles and I have the perfect name for that bookstore. Karen's Kindlestore. LOL.

What would you name your bookstore?

I'm So Tired!

2010-07-17T17:30:00.002-05:00

Well, we were supposed to go and see Eclipse this weekend but........

Chris had to go to the east coast and won't be home til Wednesday now. I am so tired because I had to pick him up from work this morning and I had a bad night trying to sleep. First mistake I made was eating a tuna sandwich for dinner last night at 9 p.m. I didn't want cereal or peanut butter. I ended up waking up about 1:30 with indigestion really bad. I took an otc med for it and tried to go back to sleep but ended up getting out of bed at 2:30 because I was miserable. I took a nice hot shower and went ahead and got dressed because he should have been calling for me to come and get him anytime by then. He finally called at 4 to let me know to go and get him so off I went. It's really weird being online and not another person I'm friends or family with not online either. LOL....Lori wasn't even online and she works nights. Of course it's weekend for her so I didn't expect to see her there anyway. I went and got Chris and we came home and he got all cleaned up. I got the kids up to go to town so I wouldn't have to drive back and forth too much. Driving just kills me if I make too many trips to town in a row. Yesterday I did errands and walked almost all of Walmart so I'm wiped out from that too and just more driving today really did me in. Anyway, we dropped Chris off and went to IHOP for breakfast. I thought they were going to get Minions stuff (from the movie Despicable Me) but they got regular breakfast stuff instead. Then to my Mom's to visit with her for a few hours and then we finally went and saw Toy Story 3. We loved it. I guess we weren't moved to tears during the movie since we knew about it. I kept waiting to get really teary eyed but nope, nada drop out of our eyes. Then we came home and Nicky okayed something on his computer that made my modem disappear so I had to figure that out. Thank goodness for System Restore. Now I'm catching up on emails and Facebook and I plan to go to bed really, really, really early tonight. LOL.

Mom and Dad

2010-07-11T10:29:00.003-05:00

This video broke my heart yesterday. It sucks my Dad has to be in the hospital but we don't have the means or money to take care of him at home. My Dad's birthday is July 12th and then they're 50th anniversary is August 10th. They shouldn't have to be apart but there's no reason for my Mom to be in a home. We're just lucky that my Dad is a veteran. Not of any wars because he was too young for World War 2 and Korea and too old and too many kids for Vietnam but he still served his country for about 7 years or so by being in the Navy in the late 50's and then the reserve during the early 60's. If he hadn't served I don't know how we could get him the help he needs now that he has dementia so badly. Anyway, at least we have him at a local VA and can go and see him when we want but still its hard to see him like he is now. I miss my Dad so much.

First Line Friday

2010-07-09T19:54:00.002-05:00

My friend Kathy hosts First Line Friday. You can find her at the link below. Check her out. She has a wonderful blog of lots of reviews of books. You can't go wrong by checking out her blog.

http://bagsbooksandbonjovi.blogspot.com/2010/03/first-line-friday.html

FIRST LINE FRIDAY...First lines have always intrigued me since I heard an author
say that writing the first sentence is, by far, the most difficult part of writing a novel.
The reasoning was that a first sentence can make the reader continue reading or
cause the book to be tossed aside. So, go to your To Be Read Pile, choose as
many books as you want and share the first line. Be sure to include the title and
author so that if your reader also finds it intriguing, they can find the book. Also,
share your thoughts about the first line. Does it draw you in? Is it...exciting...thought
provoking...scary...funny?

I've been on a sci-fi kick this past week. I grabbed one of the books in my TBR pile and its one of the sci-fi books I got through www.paperbackswap.com last week. If you haven't checked out this site you're missing out on a great way to exchange your old read for new old reads or slightly new old reads. I love that site. I've saved nearly $400 in the past 3 years on just books I want to read there alone. I still get books from other places too but if you're looking for an out of date book or an old read chances are likely you'll be able to find it there.

My book is called The Way It Wasn't: Great Science Fiction Stories of Alternate History. I admit I'm a Sci-Fi geek. I love reading short stories from this genre especially. The first short story in this book is called Lion Time in Timbuctoo by Robert Silverberg. Here's the first line....

In the dry stifling days of early summer, the Emir lay dying, the king, the imam, Big Father of the Songhay, in his cool, dark mud-walled palace in the Sankore quarter of Old Timbuctoo.

With all those titles he must be some Emir. It'll be interesting to see where this story goes. I have no clue except that I can figure its set in a jungle setting. That's one thing about short stories is they're the best of a long read condensed for those days I just can't get into a huge read.

On a side note, I almost bought Stephen King's Under the Dome. Talk about a huge read. With my carpal tunnel I doubt I'd be able to hold this book very long. Even with a softback cover. Seriously, this book only has 1088 pages. I do want to read it so I'm sure I'll see if www.paperbackswap.com has it yet and if it doesn't then I'll go to www.amazon.com and get it there. It's only about $10 so that's better than what I would have paid for it where I saw it.

Anyway, off to check for the book while I'm thinking about it. :D

Happy Hump Day!

2010-07-07T17:48:00.002-05:00

A nice Wednesday. That's what we had. LOL. After running around all weekend at my Mother in Law's house we needed just an easy day. Well, sort of easy. Chris had a doctor appointment. He's been having a few things going on with him. Not bad but come to find out it might be from the cholesterol medication he takes. The 3 things he complained about match up for side effects with what he takes. I knew it had to be something easier than the hernia he has. The things he's been complaining about came around way before the hernia too. My hubby is just a wee bit of a hypochondriac at times. We've got good insurance though so better he get checked out. It was time for a follow up with the doctor anyway. He's gained 7 pounds since October 2009 so that's not bad but he really needs to cut down again. He's done it with controlling not eating red meat or fried foods but we were kind of lax lately so its back to the basics again for him plus portion control. We're going to go and buy him some resistance bands so he can do the exercises for them while lying in the bunk of the truck. That plus walking should work for him. We're also going to finally get some money saved to get an exercise bike at home. I can't go walking with him because of my neurapathy. It sucks because I used to walk all the time before they got bad but I will be able to do the bike at home. Anyway the doctor told him to start taking a Prilosec or the generic of it every day and we'll see how that goes. If it doesn't help then we'll have to see about it being the hernia. Also, he's going to get a sleep apnea test done. His brother and father both have it so better safe on that also. I don't think he has it but we'll see. After we went to the doctor we had a late breakfast and took lunch back to the kids and my Mom and brother. We had left the kids there so we wouldn't hear how bored they were at the doctor's office. We finally got to go and see Shrek too. I loved it! It's a nice finish to the story of Shrek but I still want more. LOL. We finished up the day with some wonderful Chinese food for dinner. Like I said it was a nice Wednesday. :D

Happy 4th of July

2010-07-01T20:39:00.002-05:00

early. We'll be at MIL's house this weekend. We haven't seen her in about 6 months so we're really looking forward to seeing her and brother in law and his family. I picked up an outfit each for the kids. I know the baby's will be too big but he's growing so fast it won't be long before it'll fit him. I hope you all have a fun and very safe holiday on Sunday.

Weepy

2010-06-29T22:16:00.003-05:00

I'm weepy tonight. A good online friend of mine is going through a struggle with her Mother right now that's similar to what we're going through with my Dad. She doesn't have dementia but some other problems that have caused her to just snap at once. We watched my Dad go down hill over the last 3 years and I can't imagine how hard it is to just see it happen almost overnight. I'm just crying over the last email I read from my friend. I don't wish anything like this stuff on anybody much less a good friend. I'm praying for my friend, her Mom and their family. I hope her Mom will be okay and its just a short period that she'll be unwell. I just wish I had words of comfort to send to her.......heck, I just wish I could give her a big hug.

Another thing that has me weepy is that my parents 50th wedding anniversary is on August 10th. We had a huge party for my mother's parents when they celebrated the same anniversary. We should be planning a huge party for my parents. Also my Dad's 72nd birthday is on July 12th. Both of his parents passed away shortly after their 72nd birthdays. His Dad within a month of his and his Mom within a few days of hers. I'm definitely going to be holding my breath for the next month or so. My Dad always says he'll never live longer than his parents did.

Doctor, Doctor

2010-06-29T10:46:00.003-05:00

I love my doctor. She's fantastic and has never steered me wrong on anything. She became part of our family when Jessie was a year old so we've been seeing her for 10 years now. I know its weird to say she's part of the family but since she sees all 4 of us and is a family practitioner we consider her ours. LOL. Of course in our family anybody we like becomes part of our family. One reason I like her is that when we first met her she was very pregnant with her second child. We just barely got to see her before she was on maternity leave but that's okay cause we were all healthy back then. The other reason is that she's only a couple of years younger than me and her kids are right behind my two in age also. So when I go in there and say hey Jessie is this or Nicky is that she knows exactly what I mean. Now she knows I know what some stuff is so all I have to do is just call in and ask for something and she will prescribe it for me usually. Of course the most I've ever asked for is ear ache medicine and maybe antibiotics for an ear infection. She's very easy going when you go to see her too. Now I finally convinced my sister Cheryl she needed a family doctor instead of going to the ER or one of the walk in clinics and got her to go and see our doctor. She liked her a lot and the doctor thought that my sister was me for a minute. Cheryl said she was in the hallway getting weighed and blood pressured when a lady walked by and said hey girl to her. Cheryl said she thought it was just a very friendly place. Then the doctor went into the room and asked her if she knew she had a twin? LOL. We've gotten that a lot since Cheryl was about 20 or so. I can see similarities but I sure don't see twinness when I look at her. So anyway she got her initial visit over and liked the doctor. She goes back for a chick test in August and the doctor wants fasting blood work from her too since we're all diabetic and have a few things in family history that would show up too. She'll just have to go in anytime that's good for her and just do lab work not a visit. Oh and she said she's going to do an EKG on Cheryl too and wondered to her if she had done one on me yet. I guess when I go back for my next visit I'll get asked that one. LOL.

Blog Background

2010-06-28T22:23:00.003-05:00

So....I found out the hard way that they changed how the blog backgrounds are done now. I like to make my own so I had a couple of frustrating days playing but finally got it all figured out by reading how to install at Dotty Dot Dot Design. You can find Dotty's blog here
http://dottydotdotdesign1.blogspot.com/

Thanks for unknowingly helping out a fellow graphic geek. Now I know what I'm doing I'll have to figure out something better eventually.

First Line Friday

2010-06-25T19:47:00.004-05:00

My friend Kathy has this wonderful meme on Fridays. You can find her here.

http://bagsbooksandbonjovi.blogspot.com/2010/03/first-line-friday.html

FIRST LINE FRIDAY...First lines have always intrigued me since I heard an author say that writing the first sentence is, by far, the most difficult part of writing a novel. The reasoning was that a first sentence can make the reader continue reading or cause the book to be tossed aside. So, go to your To Be Read Pile, choose as many books as you want and share the first line. Be sure to include the title and author so that if your reader also finds it intriguing
, they can find the book. Also, share your thoughts about the first line. Does it draw you in? Is it...exciting...thought provoking...scary...funny?

I started this book late last night based on the first line so its my choice for First Line Friday this week. I'm pretty sure Kathy sent me this book. From now on I need to put post its on books sent to me by friends and given to me by family so I can remember who gave me which book. LOL. So this book is

The book is Scarlet Feather by Maeve Binchy. The cover art on this book is of a scarlet door and really catches your attention. Kathy always finds the best cover art books. You should do a coffee table book of your favorite covers Kathy.

Here's the first line.

New Year's Eve

On the radio show they were asking people what kind of a New Year's Eve did they really want.

I've never thought about it really. We usually stay home. Chris isn't one to drive out and about when he thinks there will be a lot of drunks at home. Some years we make it midnight and sometimes we don't. One year we went to Dallas because my brother had congestive heart failure. We left the kids with a babysitter the day before so that we could take my Mom and sister Cheryl around to turn in his car and get his last paycheck from work because he was going to be in the hospital a while and we found out later that he wouldn't really ever be able to work again because of it. That was the start of his decline of good health and it was the year of Y2K. Everybody was predicting doom and gloom and stocking up on water and beans. LOL. Anyway that was a really different New Year's Eve for us and ever since then we just usually stay home. We got home a few hours before midnight and I didn't make it. Chris did but not me. We all survived that year too. I think I'd really like to go out sometime with Chris for New Year's Eve especially now that the kids are older but I really doubt it'll ever happen. It doesn't help that he drives for a living so I can't blame him for wanting to be home when he's home.

Off

2010-06-20T22:23:00.002-05:00

Feeling off or lost today. I really enjoyed seeing my Daddy yesterday and loved how it seemed part of him was there with us. But today I've been feeling lost. I always sent my Daddy yellow roses for Father's Day but we can't give him flowers in the hospital because he might throw the vase at the nurses when he's having a bad day. My sister took a couple of stems of daisies up to him yesterday but its not the same thing. It's just been bugging me so much today how much I'm missing my Daddy and he's not gone, but, then again he is gone. Its hard to explain these feelings I'm having. Chris should get it since he hasn't seen his Dad in 8 years but he doesn't. Maybe it's a girl thing. Maybe its hormonal. I don't know. Looking at the pictures we took makes me realize how tiny he is looking again and his skin has that translucent look to it again too. I know he's not eating much anymore and he's taken to staying in bed more too. I know this is part of the process we'll be going through but its hard to stay light spirited but I try to do it for my Mom. She's been a rock for all of us and is very strong hearted. I did get to have a happy moment today. My brother did get a good picture of all 5 of us so I was very happy.

Happy Father's Day!

2010-06-20T09:37:00.003-05:00

We had a good day yesterday with my Dad. I came into my Dad's room after everybody else but my sister Cheryl said that his face just lit up that we were all there. Even my brother Terry made it and brought his partner Jack. We had never met Jack but he's a good fit for the family and for Terry for sure. He's older by about 10 years than my brother but from seeing him yesterday he's exactly what my brother needs. I'm just glad that my brother is settling down and allowing himself to love and be loved. He never had any kind of relationship when his kids were growing up and he was a single Dad so its about time. We stayed with my Dad for about 2 hours. He doesn't walk at all anymore and my Mom said that he's been in his bed the last two times now that she's been up there to see him. That's not good but it's to be expected. The only thing that ruined my day was when I looked at all the pictures I took and the one I wanted the most to turn out well was horrible. I'm so disappointed and I'm really mad at my nephew John since he took it. He was playing around with the camera and being goofy so I knew I should have had somebody else take the picture. The picture in my header of my brothers, sisters and I is the only one of two pictures that we have of us all together where my sister Kelly is not a baby. I had wanted a new picture of all five of us but nope it didn't happen. My brother Patrick's face is half blocked behind my sister Kelly's head and John never even said a word. I should have looked better at the pictures but because I have the older Kodak digital camera the display area is small so I couldn't tell that his face was blocked. John was looking at us though so he should have said something. I hope my brother Terry will be able to get down again and we all get another one made soon. It was before Christmas last year since the last time we saw him so I just hope its not another 6 months. :( Yeah I know I'm being stupid about it but I just love my pictures so much and wanted this one that badly.

Currently Reading

2010-06-18T11:27:00.004-05:00

I'm currently reading Wild Swans by Jung Chang. It's the story of a family during China's cultural changes from being dominated by the Japanese in the early 1900's through the Communist reign of Mao and through the current times. I love reading generational stories and biographies about women and their fight with their families for a better life always draw me in. This one is no exception. Here's the synopsis from the back of the book because I'm no good at explaining what its about much less giving reviews. LOL.

Blending the intimacy of memoir and the panoramic sweep of eyewitness history, Wild Swans has become a bestselling classic in thirty languages, with more than ten million copies sold. The story of three generations in twentieth-century China, it is an engrossing record of Mao's impact on China, an unusual window on the femal experience in the modern world, and an inspiring tale of courage and love. Jung Chang describes the life of her grandmother, a warlord's concubine, her mother's struggles as a young idealistic Communist; and her parents experience as members of the Communist elite and their ordeal during the Cultural Revolution. Chang was a Red Guard briefly at the age of foureen, then worked as a peasant, a "barefoot doctor," a steelworker and an electrician. As the story of each generation unfolds, Chang captures in gripping, moving---and ultimately uplifitng---detail the cycles of violent drama visited on her own family and millions of others caught in the whirlwind of history.

And to boot, I found it at Books A Million in their cheap book section. As I've said before I love going there and finding these little cheap treasures.

TBR Pile

2010-06-18T10:34:00.004-05:00

or should I say box. It's overflowing so I decided to see what I have in there now and list them here. LOL. Plus I need to check them against my Goodreads bookshelf of to be read books too. If you don't know about Goodreads.com its a great site. It helps you keep your books organized into what you've read, are reading and have to read. I love that site. If you want to be my friend there here's a link to me. Just remind me that you found me there from my blog post.

http://www.goodreads.com/karenintexas

Here's my list in no particular order.

1. The Divine Husband by Francisco Goldman (Dollar Tree find)

2. Revenge of Innocents by Nancy Taylor Rosenberg

3. Delicious by Sherry Thomas

4. Killing Floor by Lee Child

5. Reading Between the Lines by Linda Taylor

6. To Save This Child by Darlene Graham (Harlequin Romance)

7. Killer Weekend by Ridley Pearson

8. Strange Bedfellows by Kasey Michaels (Harlequin Romance)

9. Bucksin Shotgun! by Kit Dalton (Western [Don't know if I'll read or not])

10. Careless Whispers (Harlequin Romance wannabe book)

11. Pieces of My Sister's Life by Elizabeth Joy Arnold (I've already started this
one but I have no idea how it got back into my TBR box. Putting it back on
nightstand.)

12. The Girl with the Golden Spurs by Ann Major (Western Romance)

13. In Care of Sam Beaudry by Kathleen Eagle (Harlequin Romance)

14. Remember When by Judith McNaught

15. The Texas Twins by Tina Leonard (Harlequin Romance)

16. Home to Eden by Margaret Way (Harlequin Romance)

17. Someone To Turn To by Marilyn Cunningham (Harlequin Romance)

18. The Bone Parade by Mark Mykanen

19. Loving Evangeline by Linda Howard (Harlequin Romance)

20. Harrigan's Bride by Cheryl Reavis

21. A Baby Between Them by C.J. Carmichael (Harlequin Romance)

22. The Midwife and the Lawman by Marisa Carroll (Harlequin Romance)

23. Renegade Millionaire by Kristi Gold (Harlequin Romance)

24. Marriage by the Book by Joan Johnston (Harlequin Romance)

25. Counting on a Cowboy by Karen Sandler (Harlequin Romance)

26. Luke (The Cowboys) by Leigh Greenwood (Western)

27. Fully Engaged by Catherine Mann (Harlequin Romance)

28. Lone Star Legacy by Roxanne Rustand (Harlequin Romance)

29. On the Line by Anne Marie Duquette (Harlequin Romance)

30. Here and Then by Linda Lael Miller (Harlequin Romance)

31. Forbidden Love by Karen Robards

32. Scarlet Feather by Maeve Binchy

33. Guardian Angel by Julie Garwood

34. The Scroll of Seduction by Gioconda Belli

I thought I was below 30 by now but Kathy just sent me a box of books recently and also got a few from my Mom and Cheryl so I'm back up there again. LOL. I didn't realize there was so many Harlequin Romance in the box but I love to read them too. As you can tell I'm an eclectic reader. I'll read anything. :D

First Line Friday

2010-06-18T10:14:00.002-05:00

http://bagsbooksandbonjovi.blogspot.com/2010/03/first-line-friday.html

FIRST LINE FRIDAY...First lines have always intrigued me since I heard an author
say that writing the first sentence is, by far, the most difficult part of writing a novel.
The reasoning was that a first sentence can make the reader continue reading or
cause the book to be tossed aside. So, go to your To Be Read Pile, choose as
many books as you want and share the first line. Be sure to include the title and
author so that if your reader also finds it intriguing, they can find the book. Also,
share your thoughts about the first line. Does it draw you in? Is it...exciting...thought
provoking...scary...funny?

It's been a while since I've participated in First Line Friday. I just grabbed this book last week at BAM in their cheap book section. I love cheap, obscure books. Some of my best reads have been from that section. LOL. I can't remember if I picked up this one for the back cover synopsis or the first line but its all good right? The book is The Scroll of Seduction by Gioconda Belli and its about Queen Juana of Castile and her devotion to her husband King Philippe the Handsome. I think Kathy's period piece reading is rubbing off on me. I've really been enjoying them again lately. Thanks Kathy. Anyway here's the first line from the Scroll of Seduction.

Manuel said he would tell me the story of the Spanish queen, Juana of Castile, and her mad love for her husband, Philippe the Handsome, but only if I agreed to certain conditions.

Well, of course, this grabbed my attention. First, royals never seem to be madly in love in books or history. There's only one example I can think of...Victoria and Albert. I'm sure there are more if I think about it. Second, why is Manuel using the story to get the girl narrating to do his bidding? What's in it for him and then her too except a good story? LOL, time will tell when I get to read this book I'm sure.

Plans Changed

2010-06-18T09:55:00.003-05:00

Well, my plans got changed. Chris isn't going to make it in until Sunday morning sometime. At least he'll make it in for Father's Day. He'll just be in on Sunday and Monday and have to head back out on Tuesday. So my plans to see my Dad today are changed til tomorrow but that's okay. We'll go and see him earlier in the day and hopefully he'll be up for a good long visit. I found him a Father's Day shirt to give him. It says 'This is how a cool Dad looks'. Its a tradition for me to always give him a Tshirt for Father's Day and he always liked them too. The kids are going up to see him this time too. My sister Cheryl said that he's very skinny looking but still I want them to see him cause you just don't ever know what might happen. Besides it'll make him happy to see them too. Chris is going to make out like a bandit this Father's day. I had already given him a tshirt and 3 books for it. It was two Star Wars books -Omen and Outcast- and then the 1st book in a series that he's starting to read called Amber & Ashes by Margaret Weis. He had already found the 2nd and 3rd at a truckstop. They're Amber & Iron and Amber & Blood and it seems like it'll be a series I like too. It's part of the Dragonlance storyline but separate if that makes sense. We went to the Russell Stover factor outlet store in Corsicana yesterday. I remember why I don't go there very often anymore now that I spent $83 there. LOL. We got Chris a nice plaque to hang on the wall from his favorite college team. Hook 'em Horns! The plaque reads....A Texas fan lives here and has the horns icon and UT symbol on it and of course lots of burnt orange color on it. That's from Jessie. Nicky picked out a black coffee mug with the word Texas on it with their version of orange M&M's in it. I got him two huge Smore's candies the make there also. This morning at Walmart I picked up his Father's Day Tshirt too. His says Dad Rocks and has an electric guitar on it and also got him two bags of Lifesaver Gummies cause they're his favorite. He'll be having his favorite dinner Sunday night too. Spaghetti. He can never get enough of it but I get tired of it so I don't cook it very often for him. We plan to get to the movies on Monday to see Shrek and then to AAFES for him to spend his gift certificate after that. That's about all of our weekend plans now so lets see if they work out.

Visiting My Dad

2010-06-16T08:12:00.002-05:00

I haven't gotten to go and see my Dad in a while. With school ending and year end things going on there and then not feeling well and getting strep the month of May and first half June just slipped by me. I'm going to take the kids up Friday evening hopefully to see him. I need to wait for my sister to get off of work though because for some weird reason my Dad gets upset when I'm there and she's not with me. My Mom will be there of course but I'd like a good visit again since its been a long time. We have to go on Friday evening because Chris will not probably get home until late, late Friday or early Saturday morning. That just leaves him having one whole day off and that's Father's day on Sunday and with all I have to do to get him back ready for work on Monday I need Sunday for that. Also, he'll be driving in home so that means he'll need to sleep when he first gets in. He wants to go to the movies to see Shrek on Saturday but I don't want him going on no sleep even though he says it'll be fine. I'm thinking we'll just spend Friday at my Mom's and I'll leave the kids sleeping there with them and bring Chris home and sleep a while and then go all the way back to my Mom's after he sleeps and we can see the movie at the theater there. After the movies he wants to go to Ft. Hood to spend the gift certificate they gave him for 10 years of service at work. I have no idea what he'll get but its for $200 so we'll see what he does. Will he be selfish and just spend it on himself or will we get a new TV for the livingroom? LOL. We'll see what happens on Saturday. I told him wasn't it nice that work thinks he's worth $20 a year to them? Breaking it down doesn't make it seem like so much but I never got anything for 10 years of working (when I worked) so its a whole lot better than nothing. Okay so I planned the end of the week and weekend. Let's hope my plans don't go awry. They usually do so that's why I don't plan ahead too much.

Bunny Hop

2010-06-14T11:39:00.003-05:00

http://droppedstitches72.blogspot.com/

Hi. If you found me through the Bunny Hop link thanks for coming by. My blog isn't anything special. I just pretty much post my feelings and thoughts here as I need. Whether there are things going on healthwise with my parents or brother or just fun things. I try to get here at least once a week sometimes I do get here daily. As you can read in the post before this one I mainly write about my family and the things that are going on with my Dad and his Dementia. Sometimes though we do have good things going on and I try to remember to post about that stuff too. Welcome to my blog and I hope you enjoy reading it.

Meet and Greet Monday

2010-06-14T11:15:00.005-05:00

http://southernloves.blogspot.com/

Kathy led me to Meet and Greet Monday. It sounds like a lot of fun. I've never done any blog hopping.

Welcome to my blog. I put my heart on my sleeve here a lot. Hence the title Deep in the Heart. That and the fact that I'm a native Texan made the title seem appropriate. LOL.

My family has had its ups and downs in the last few years with my parents health. My Mom had congestive heart failure and then a blood clot on her brain and finally a stroke that left her with not much use on her right side. She can walk still and use her right hand somewhat and speak clearly so that's a blessing in disguise. In between her bouts in the hospital my Dad would be in for different things too. He has a bad heart and had a stent put in and then also he had a really bad staph infection that had him in the hospital for 20 days. Either one parent or the other would be in the hospital or my brother who has a bad heart would be there. It's been a rough few years and now my Dad has been diagnosed with Dementia and its really hard. Things are going well right now so I'm on edge waiting for the other shoe to drop since its been going well.
I found out that typing out my thoughts and feelings here helps me to not go crazy when things aren't going so well. Also when they are going well its fun to put the great stuff going on too. Anyway, here's my blog. Enjoy the ride!

Blog Hops

2010-06-14T11:07:00.001-05:00

I'm not much on doing blog hops but thought I'd give a couple a try because Kathy recommended them. She's never led me astray on anything in the blog world. Bear with me and I'll get them both posted soon.

I'm Back!

2010-06-11T18:34:00.002-05:00

Not that I was gone anywhere but my internet was iffy. I hope that doesn't happen again anytime soon. Nicky was having fanfiction withdrawals. LOL. I gotta admit I was having withdrawals of my own too but not as badly as I thought I ever would have. I was able to get on here and there as the wind blew. Literally! The wind out here where we are is always blowing but the last week we've had some really strong winds. I guess the storm that blew in Tuesday morning finally did it in. The tech guy said the setting on the dish was at 85 and it was supposed to be in the 150's. Wow! What a difference. Now I'm trying to catch up with what I missed online. Hopefully I'm not too far behind.

Happy Birthday to Me!!

2010-06-05T10:10:00.002-05:00

I turn the dreaded 49 today. Hmm....I don't know how I feel about that. I wasn't planning anything but my siblings decided we'd get together at my sister Kelly's house and celebrate it. So, we're going to get together and play Karaoke on the Wii and eat hamburgers. My not so subtle sister Cheryl (say that 5 times fast) came right out and asked me what kind of cake I wanted so I told her an ice cream cake. White and chocolate and it doesn't matter which is the cake and which is the ice cream as long as its white and chocolate somehow or the other. We don't have to be at Kelly's house until around 12. The kids are staying with my Mom and them until Monday. It was nice to wake up to no alarm and no kids this morning. I woke up to a very nice husband this morning...::wink::wink::and colored the gray out of my hair. I'm not sure what shade its going to be since my hair is naturally dark brown to almost black but at least the gray is covered...mostly. I still have a few silver strands here and there but its the best I can do without my glasses on. It might have some auburn/reddish tint to it when it dries. We'll see. Yesterday Chris took me out to eat for my birthday. We ended up at a joint in Killeen cause we thought we were going to go shopping at Ft. Hood but changed our minds. We went to a place called C&H Hawaiian Grill. The food is fabulous. They just opened another one in our next town over so we'll definitely go and try that one too. Chris had the pork ribs and I got the mixed plate. Mine had kahlua pork, terriyaki chicken and brisket and they both had two scoops of rice and macaroni salad. They use this sauce on everything that tastes fantastic. It's slightly sweet but not overpowering. It was on the rice too. I hate white rice so I never eat it but their rice was delicious. I don't know if it was the sauce or that it was like sticky rice maybe. I just know I'm going to be starving the next time we go so I can eat everything. My plate was $7.95 and Chris's $6.95 and we both couldn't finish everything. I definitely would like to get a plate for my Dad from there and take to him at the VA for lunch one day. He was stationed in Hawaii for about 3 years when he was in the Navy in the late 50's. They have some more traditional dishes listed too so I'd love to try some of them. I was surprised though that I didn't see anything with Spam on the menu. LOL, maybe its because we're in Texas and not Hawaii huh?