I Feel Pretty

She feels prettier than she looks

What do you get when you mix several months of 100+ weather, narry a drop of rain (not a real word but if Kate Gosselin can make up words than so can I), 175lb English Mastiff who likes to waller (yep, another made up word) a 60lb English Bulldog (much like one does a rubber ball) around the dirt in Oklahoma?? You guessed it, A Red Dirt Bulldog. When I got Riley, She had a perfect Mickey Mouse fawn outline on her white background. I nixed all Disney names and went with "Oh Riley!" because she tended to be a handful. That was a smart choice because as she has grown (out, not up) her little Mickey Mouse outline looks more like a Hydrocephalic Mickey Mouse. It reminds me what probably happens when a 20 year old girl who is a size 0 decides to get a sunburst tatoo surrounding her navel.... Three

kids and several pant sizes later, it probably doesn't resemble anything akin to a sunburst (not speaking from personal experience here).  Last night was bath time and she was one red dirt mess. After towel drying her off, she zipped around the house at warp speed snorting like a rabid pig. My husband remarked that she sure was wound up! He doesn't speak Bulldog so I had to interpret... "Nope, she's just singing I Feel Pretty." "I feel pretty, Oh so pretty" Oh, wouldn't it be nice if every woman's body image could be cured by the simple act of taking a bubble bath.

Chain Reaction

My husband left the house this morning with a kiss and instructions not to over do it so I'd feel like doing something fun when he got off work. I proceeded with my Saturday housecleaning routine. It all started innocent enough.... I just got the idea to move a piece of furniture which required me to move another piece of furniture and before I knew it and several hours later everything was in a different spot, my knees hurt and there was still a couple of areas I wasn't completely satisfied with. The thing about being an impulsive person is when you get a notion to do something, patience doesn't exactly come into play. Once I moved one piece of furniture, there was no way I was waiting until my husband got home to move everything else. The furniture we have now, isn't exactly light weight and when I took a notion to move a sofa chair upstairs, the only way to get it there

was to manhandle it. Thank God for old hardwood floors. It's easy to scooch furniture around from hither to yon without having to pick it up... mostly. Granted it takes a lot of pushing, pulling, tipping and pivoting, but it can be a one woman job if you're impatient enough and woman enough to do it.  Yea, I fit that bill. I was lounging in our newly arranged living room when he walked in the door. He liked what I had done with the place and commented that he really liked the fact that I had done it when he wasn't home. When I grilled him as to why, he simply stated that I "got in a zone" when I was doing stuff like that and it made him nervous. I thought this was just his polite way of saying I was cranky or something, and I was totally prepared to defend myself. I may become focused and zoned, but I'm not cranky when I'm decorating (as long as you don't try to talk to me and

break my zone). Finally, after continued questioning he rephrased it and said I just became very driven when I'm doing something creative. I totally agree. This is why I prefer to  fly solo on creative projects, my creative juices have a tendency overflow leaving others in a flood of confusion. I  move, unmove, shift, flip and rotate until I get it right. I talk to myself, answer myself and reason things out loud. When other people are around they make the mistake of thinking I'm asking their opinion and Oh, that could not be farther from the truth. Anyway, there is a few minor tweaks that need to be done, but I'll be able to sleep on them tonight, it's not something I'm driven to finish today. It's just funny how moving one little thing to a different spot will start a chain reaction that leads to big, unexpected changes.  There's something very satisfying about a chain reaction like that.

Labor Day Weekend

The Labor Day weekend brought a much needed and appreciated cool front to Oklahoma. By cool front I mean it actually dropped below 100 degrees for the first time in 3 months. This has been the longest, hottest summer I can remember. This is one of those summers that people will say 40 years from now.... "Remember the summer of 11?" It actually felt a little weird being outside and not wanting to turn right around and run back to the house. I was able to take my dogs for a nice walk and enjoy a cool breeze. I've always loved Fall, but I'm looking forward to it more than usual. This summer has been just a tad claustrophobic for me and being outside in the wide open space is sounding mighty good.

Celebrated

Oblivious

How you take things, just depends on your perspective.For instance, to celebrate the 50th birthday of my boss, we decorated the office with pictures from his past. I sneaked over to his house in the dead of night and posted "Honk at me I'm 50 today" on his pristine truck. My co-workers and I went to the daily yard meeting and surprised him with a breakfast pot-luck and a beautiful birthday cake. Later in the day he mentioned that he felt a little picked on. I had

People were extra friendly

to explain to him that he shouldn't feel picked on, he should just "feel the love":-) We hadn't picked on him all day, we had celebrated him all day... Wink, Wink. It would have just been rude to ignore him on such an important day. Okay, so maybe the OSU cake was a little bit of a dig, seeing how he is such a die hard OU fan, but, well... I just

Smile till it hurts

couldn't resist. In all of the celebrating that was done, I think the cake was the hardest bite to swallow. LOL! But, he did indeed swallow it in the best spirit of a good sport... (Which is so very unlike a Sooner).

Cooking a Cat, Yes! System Failure No!

I was being so careful... Well, by my standards I was being careful, by others, not so much.I was playing in the makeup again, having a big ole time painting my nails. The bedroom looked like a paint ball factory had exploded. I was trying out my new gel nail polish system, my toes were wrapped in foil and all of my nail paraphernalia was strung out all over the bed and the bedroom floor. I had spread a towel over the bedspread just in case I spilled the acetone I was using. Did you know that acetone will eat through just about anything (except gel nail polish) in 3.5 milliseconds flat? It will! I have proof! Although I had put protective covering on the bed, I didn't think to use a stinking tarp or something over the bedroom furniture. Of course I accidentally dribbled a little bit of acetone on the night stand and wiped it up immediately... TOO LATE! Boy howdie, why I didn't use that stuff when we were removing the paint from the kitchen cabinets is beyond me. It's probably the best kept secret in the

restoration of old houses. If it's not, then it should be. The thing that really ticks me off (besides my inability to do anything without making a mess) is my bedroom furniture is pretty new. I went downstairs and Googled "How to Remove Acetone Stains From Wood?"... Yeah,it's going to require some sanding and stuff. I went back up to finish my toes and my husband comes in the bedroom, walks over to my of the bed and looks at the mess I've created on the floor(nail sparkles), looks at the nightstand, then looks at me. I just smiled, cause that's what I do. Then he tells me that he just happened to look at our Internet history and saw "How to Remove Acetone Stains From Wood" and figured that I had

another "Lucille Ball" moment. Stuff just happens! Today he emailed me and asked... "Lucille, were you cooking a cat when you were home at lunch?" Apparently I left my straightening iron on and it was smoking when he came home for lunch... Deep sigh. To

top my week off, our I.T. guy comes into my office today to try to figure out why every time I attempt to get into one particular program, it shuts down the HR system:-)"Oh, Jackie... What have you done now?" Hey! I'm happy to take the blame for something that I've screwed up (Lord, it seems like that in itself is a full time job), but I shouldn't have to take the blame for an entire system failure. I admit that I have a knack for.. uh, demolition work, but system failure is a whole other thing. I totally plead innocent of that charge.

Remarkable

Saturday night was girls night out for me and the Girlfriends. You

would think with our kids mostly grown and gone, we would find it easier to spend time together, but actually it seems to have become more difficult. We do try to do dinner for our birthdays. As we ate and chattered through dinner I was just very thankful to have each and everyone of them in my life. When you start listing the life changes we have gone through together it is a remarkable list. Not all of the things we've been through have been happy, fun or exciting, but the important thing is... We've done it all together. It's been an interesting journey. I spoke with my daughter yesterday. She had spent the weekend in New Orleans with a friend. For kicks and giggles they got their palms read. When the fortune teller told her that she saw a wedding and a baby coming to her family within the next year, my daughter immediately thought of her extended family. One friend has a son getting married, and one friend is looking forward to her first grandchild. That's how much our friends mean to us, my kids actually consider them family without

hesitation. I would say that my very best parenting skill (and I'm not one who really brags about that) would be my desire to surround my children with people who can add to their lives in a positive way. People whose strengths far outweigh my weaknesses. I believe 100% that my relationships have shaped and molded my children every bit as much as their relationship with me and my husband. I have some remarkable kids because I have some remarkable friends.

Africa 2011