Do the right thing...

OK, so I was good and I called wine.com. So yesterday afternoon I had posted a poll on 2Peas about this. The majority was for me calling them, but there actually was a decent numebr who were voting to keep it. However, those voting for me to keep it apparently all decided not to leave any comments.

So quiet today and then tomorrow off to Georgia.

To return or not to return...

So I came home today to find a package at the door. It's from wine.com. It was addressed to a previous tenant. However, I'm guessing this was a couple of tenants ago since I didn't recognize the name. We seem to get a lot of mail from more recent previous tenants. Anyway, the last time a package arrived not for us I called the company to have it returned. I had to be transfered about 5 times before someone finally took down my information so that they could send me a shipping label. And then the package sat around for about 2 weeks before I got the label and was able to return it.

So, the question is, do I want to go through with that again? I decided to open up the box to see what kind of wine it was. I only did this because I knew I could tape it back up again and no one would really be the wise. It's a $20 bottle of Shiraz. So part of me says keep it. If the sender really wanted their friend to have it, they should have checked the address in adcance. However, I also would know that if I were sending a gift and it went to the wrong address, I would prefer that it be returned so that I could make sure that the intended recipient got it.

So help be my counsious. Should I keep it or return it?

Peer Pressure

So vanessa got herself a blog! Woo hoo! In situations like this though, I am always reminded of a song from an middle school musical that our town put on. (I wasn't cool enough to get cast in it, but that's another story.) Anyway, I remember nothing else about this play except there was a song, with a line that went, "Peer, pressure, pressure, peer". I'm sure it works much better if you could actually hear me singing it, but that's not going to happen. Anyway, just had to share.

I won, I won!

Ok, so last week the guys at Chris’ work started what I have dubbed The Great iPod Challenge. Rules are simple. Create a playlist of 10 songs that are really crappy/bad. Whoever comes up with the best (Is it really the best if the songs suck?) list is dubbed the winner for the week. When Chris first learned of this contest he thought over his music and didn’t think he had anything appropriate, but commented to the others that I did. And then that evening he told me about the contest and his comments. I got very excited starting to think about what I could include on a playlist. He thought I would be upset that he called my music crap, but little did he know!

When I was in college, Darlene and I used to send each other various mix tapes. We even came up with a production label- FuT Productions. (FuT standing for Nucking Fut.) The mixes certainly were a mix. Some of the songs that we included had significance to us and our friendship, some were ones we thought the other would like, some were songs we liked, and others were there just to piss the other one off or were just so bad. We got really good at picking out crappy songs! There are probably about a dozen or so of these mix tapes.

So yes, I became very good at creating crappy mixes. When I learned of this contest I even wrote to Darlene for suggestions. She gave me some good ones, but unfortunately I don’t have many of her choices and not so sure I want to get a CD of songs sung by professional wrestlers.

Anyway, here was my first mix.
1. I want a Hippopotamus for Christmas by Gayla Peevey
2. Leavin on a Jet Plane/ Country Road by Judy Collins
3. Step by Step by NKOTB
4. I've Got a Thoery/Bunnies/If We're Together from Buffy Soundtrack
5. Bear Necessities- a capella version of the Disney Classic
6. I'm Ugly and I don't Know Why by Butt Trumpet
7. Who Loves Ya Baby? by Debbie Gibson
8. Somewhere That's Green by Mandy Patinkin
9. Hi At Hotel by Lost and Found
10. Achy Breaky Heart by Billy Ray Cyrus (We broke down and bought it since I knew it would be perfect.)

So Chris calls me this morning. By a toss of the CD (how does that work if you have more than 2 people competing) he was chosen to go first. Apparently I set the bar a little too high with my crappalicious selections. One of his co-workers declared that for next week he’ll need to put a bit more thought into it. And now I’m wondering if I will be able to continue this level of badness every week. So if you have some really bad music that you think would be appropriate, please feel free to send it my way for inclusion in future contests.

Vanessa, This One's For You

A follow up to my post from last week about the removal of my tongue ring.

If you are easily disgusted, perhaps you’ll want to stop reading. And blame Vanessa since she thought it would be entertaining blog material.

Ok. So apparently when I was a little I had issues with the fluoride treatments at the dentist. I had no remembrance of this, but a number of years ago the hygienist was reviewing my chart and noticed that there was a note not to give me fluoride as it made me gag. Like I said, I don’t remember having problems, but apparently once upon a time I did. I do know that I had since received fluoride treatments, so I guess it was back when I was really little.

Fast forward to modern day. From time to time when brushing my teeth I will start to gag. This will then make me start dry heaving. Not a pleasant experience at all. No idea why this happens sometimes and not others. Some toothpastes make this happen more than others, but again, it’s not really consistent. Sometimes I’ll even start to gag while chewing gum. I’ll be chewing away doing just fine and then all of a sudden I’ll start to get that gag reflex. I know I must spit out that gum right away.

So this morning I’m at the dentist. One of the things he needs to do is take impressions of my mouth. Next week I’m going in to have a graft done, and they are going to give me stents to protect where they took the cells from as well as over the graft. To do this, they need to make impressions. So, the hygienist loads up the little mouth tray with alginate and puts it in my mouth. I almost immediately stat to gag and dry heave. (Even just typing this makes me want to gag!) There was an extra blob of alginate that I was practically choking on. That comes out of my mouth. I continue to dry heave. And then I throw up a little. Luckily the hygienist was very nice trying to offer suggestions to make it better, apologizing for it taking so long etc.

So finally the mold comes out of my mouth. Apparently it was not a good impression. She takes it to the Doctor for him to say if it is sufficient or not. It wasn’t. He comes back to help. He verifies that the tray is the appropriate size and shows me exactly what he’s going to do and what he wants me to do to make it less painful. He loads it up with alginate. Into my mouth it goes. He has me tip my chin down and put my legs up. Breathe through your nose. I start to gag. I throw up a little. And then somehow it gets a little better. Maybe another small gag or two. He apologizes for the alginate taking so long to set up. Then time for the lower teeth. Again he explains the process. This time I really try to concentrate on my breathing. I only drooled a little. Much better!

And I am so glad that is done! After the first one and then the second one not going well, I was about to tell them to forget about the stents. (They were optional to have anyway.) I know I had to have impressions done when I had my braces and retainers, but I don’t remember them being this bad at all!

And that is the story of my visit to the dentist. I must say though, this was my first time going to this dentist (it’s a specialist) and I was very pleased with him. He did a great job of being sympathetic to my issues and he also did a great job of explaining what I needed to have done. And while they were taking the impressions, the receptionist had figured out how best to bill insurance (I have dual insurance only through the end of the year) and found me an appointment time that would allow me to have the work done next week.

Unexpected packages!

Unexpected packages are a wonderful thing! But I was very confused when I first came home and saw the box waiting for me. I had no idea who the return address person was. So I opened it, somewhat worried that I was opening a Christmas present that I shouldn't be and ruining surprises. And then I saw the tag saying it was from Christine and I got very excited. Yay! Thank you so much. I love it! So of course I had to put it on and have Chris take a picture of me in it for you. Thanks chica!

Apparently, I'm a grinch

So Chris got all pissy at me last night. He had gone out shopping for my Christmas gift while Lind and I were scrapping. (Well, I was working on Christmas cards.) He comes home, tells me to stay where I am and brings my gift into the computer room. Then he comes in to my room (where the wrapping paper is) and asks for some paper. I give him a roll. He comes back a couple of minutes later asking for wider paper. I tell him we don’t have anything wider and to just use an extra piece on the ends of the TV box. He starts to hit me over the head with the wrapping paper tube for guessing what the gift is.

Then later in the evening he tells me that in the future, even if I know what my gift is, I should keep it to myself. Ok, fine. I’ll try. But don’t make it so darn easy for me to guess! He knows I want a TV for my room and we’ve talked about what features I want. And I don’t see any of my other gift requests being so large there would be wrapping issues. He just set himself up for me to figure this one out! The only other thing it might possibly be is the iHome, and I don’t’ think that box is especially large. But he did say that he had thought about getting some fabric to wrap it in. That would have been kind of cute. :)

Glitter, glitter everywhere

Well I think I'm done decorating. All of my trees have something on them. And next weekend is cookie baking, so things need to be done by then anyway.

Snow Day

So I was supposed to have another craft party on Friday. I was going to take a half day of work so that I could have a bit of time to get everything together and head out to Westboro. However, in the late morning I got a call from the hostess. Due to the weather she was going to have to cancel. I figured I would go home early anyway. I had plenty of stuff to do and I had the time available. Well the roads were horrible! I was going about 40 mph on route 2. I oculdn't believe the number of people zipping by me! Then when I got to the apartment complex, they had hardly plowed. I almsot couldn't get up the final hill. Then I go to pull into a parking spot and I couldn't. I ended up having to dig myself out a bit before I could move. Around 3:00 the hostess called me back. After calling people to cancel, everyone had been so dissappointed that she decided to have her party anyway. After my previous driving experience I let her know that I wouldn't be able to make it. And it's a good thing I made this decision as they didn't start plowing the complex until around 5:00. It was interesting as people started to come home from work and there were no parking spots. Anyway, these pictures are from around 4:30 or so. The snow had stopped and I was really liking the lighting, so I made Chris go for a walk with me.

Bod Mod

My latest scrapbook page... (I think you can you can read the journaling a little better over at Two Peas.

Pink tree!

Ok, so it's no Heidi Swapp Christmas Forest, but I like it. You can't tell in the photo, but I also picked up the pink lights and wound them around the stem of the tree. These lights are special. They have 8 different settings. I went with the normal always on setting. Sorry, the epileptic seizure setting is not for me. My tree still needs some ornaments, but I apparently decorate in baby steps. And I do still need to find the appropriate place to put this tree. (I was thinking my room, but will I see it/appreciate it enough there?)

A tiring weekend...

So I just finished up the snowflake tablecloths. And then suddenly I realized it was 11:00 at night. Eek. Time to get to bed. So, got that all done. Also got the tree up and decorations up everywhere. Didn't get to any outside decorations, but maybe I'll get to that later this week or next weekend. Took some pictures, but they're still in the camera. Will have to post those later. I also got all of the shopping done for Chris' family. I still need to finish up stuff for my dad and possibly Andrew as well. At least I know that with Andrew I can get his done later since I'll have multiple Christmas celebrations with him. And we do have a few small things for him (moose socks and a moose ornament- It's a moose Christmas) so if we don't get a chance to get him something bigger until later, no worries. And in other progress, the cards are almost all ready to be assembled. All the components are cut out, just need to cut the cards and print them, and then I can start with assmebly. Chris was a huge help! We spent the past two afternoons/evenings in front of the TV watching CSI, Firefly, Holy Grail, and Life of Brian while cutting out letters and gingerbread people for the cards. Hopefully I'll be able to get them finished this week.

Decorating

I am really looking forward to doing some decorating. Yesterday I bought some really cute ornaments from Crate and Barrel. I'd show you a picture, but for some reason they don't have them online. Anyway, it's a set of 12 balls and each one has one of the 12 Days of Christmas depicted. Very fun. I also picked up some sheer snowflake fabric to turn into table coverings. Not sure if they will become runners or just an overlay. I hope to get those made this weekend. Also hope to get the tree up. (Thanks Mel.)
Also, this morning when I got to work I noticed it had been decorated for the season. Lots of blue and silver and very pretty. And I was inspired for an outside decoration. I just want to do a small white/silver topiary kind of thing by the door with white lights on it. And probably some fake snow. I'll have to see what I can find. If I can't anything I like I may just get some twigs, stick them in a pretty poa and cover with lights.

Appearing on January 11 at 1:30pm in room 1...

So back in late March when I was at CKU, our basement flooded. This happens every couple of years when it starts to get warm so all the snow melts and then it was also raining. Anyway, the water apparently flowed from the ground into our basement and into our neighbors’ basement. They called a service to come clean out their basement. This consisted of pulling out all of their carpeting, removing standing water, and then leaving some industrial fans and dehumidifiers for a week or so. The service also insisted on leaving fans and dehumidifiers at our place as they claimed that if they didn’t take care of our place water would keep going into the neighbors’. Chris told them we didn’t want it, but they insisted.

We never received a bill for this, but the neighbor did. I’m not really sure if their bill covered service for our place or not. I know the neighbor was fighting with the condo association to have their insurance pay for it as the flooding is partly due to poor construction. I’m not really sure of what all had happened over the past months. We put the neighbor in touch with my dad as we were renting from him.

Fast forward to last night. The company is taking us to court! The thing that bugs me about it though is that they got a lawyer involved. Are we going to be getting a lawyer? I didn’t think that was normal for small claims court. So by having a lawyer, they will have the advantage because he knows what he’s doing. I just faxed the notice over to my dad, so waiting to see what he has to say about it. Blech.

Grown-up furniture

We are now the proud owners of a brand spankin' new couch. Yes, you heard me. A new couch. Not one found on the street that needed to have plywood inserted to make it ok to sit on since the springs were broken. Not one given by a family member because it wasn't good enough for their home. A brand new couch. Yes, we'll be paying ot off over the next few months, but we get to enjoy it now. Yippee! Now we just need a new chair and our living room will almost be complete. The one that matches the sofa is too pricey, but we found one at Ikea that we like. They just are sold out of it right now. (And yes, that menas I went to Ikea for a third time- three weekends in a row.) So we went to pick up the couch ourselves. This is a nice benefit of having a pickup- not having to pay the delivery charge. However, this also means that my arms now hurt from having to lift the couch in weird ways to get it into the apartment, not to mention having to get the old one out. At least with getting rid of the old one we didn't have to worry about getting it messed up. But getting it onto our patio to get it inside was a bit of a challenge. Oh, and for the record, Chris is a messy eater. I found brownie crumbs between the cushions. I'd say we should institute a no eating on the couch rule, but I know that will never happen.

My Birthday Weekend

So, I never did tell all about my birthday weekend in the Big Apple. So here goes.
My weekend
By Chris Breecher

First of all, I drove in Manhattan for the first time. It wasn’t as bad as it could have been. Of course we weren’t near any of the big touristy places. However, while driving around Union Square trying to find a place to park both Liz and Andrew called me. Liz called to let me know that she was outside my work and wanted to take me to lunch. Sorry, nope. Then when Andrew called, I picked up the phone and said, “Happy Birthday to Me. I can’t talk. I’m trying to park in Manhattan.” He quickly let me go. Finding a place to park really wasn’t all that bad, just a few times of circling the blocks, looking carefully at all the signs to see what hours we would be allowed to park on certain streets.

After parking we went to Tonda’s work and then the three of us went out for a late lunch. After lunch Chris and I saw Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. It was a very good movie. I think I liked it better than the third movie. Maybe this was because I had just reread book three before that one opened and noticed all of the inconsistencies. With this one I was only a few chapters in to my re-read. Therefore I didn’t notice as many things that were changed. I was surprised though at the number of small children at the movie. It has some very dark moments and I don’t think I would have brought my young children to see it.


After Harry Potter we met up with Tonda again, but this time just to drop our stuff off at her apartment. We then headed to Times Square to go see Spamalot. Andrew had told me about this show and I knew I wanted to go. However, Chris was somewhat resistant. I had made him watch Monty Python and the Holy Grail at some point and he was less than enthusiastic about it. However, this past spring he borrowed the Spamalot soundtrack from a co-worker and he immediately liked it. I jumped at my chance to go see it and we booked tickets!

The show was an absolute blast. Much of the script was taken from the movie, but there also was new material. After the show we went to the stage door to get autographs. I was really wanting to get Tim Curry’s, but he didn’t come out. Instead I got autographs from David Hyde Pierce, Michael McGrath, Alan Tudyk, and Sara Ramirez.

After we had gotten all of the autographs that we could, we headed back to Uniopn Square for a late dinner. We'd had a hotdog before the show to tide us over, but by this point we were very hungry. I must say, one good thing about New York is that there is an abundance of eating choices at 11:30 at night.

The next morning we went out to brunch with Tonda. On the way there we passed by my mom's old high school. (It's across the street from her apartment.) She asked if we had ever been inside. After saying no, she decided we should go in,. Who knew schools were open on Saturdays! We only looked around the lobby an the auditorium, but it was still pretty cool.

After brunch we headed back to Times Square, this time to see Wicked.

I’ve wanted to see this show ever since I first heard of it, a year and a half ago. So when Chris and I decided to go to New York to see Spamalot I knew that we had to see Wicked as well. Unfortunately it didn’t quite live up to my expectations. Perhaps if I had been more familiar with the music I would have liked it better. However, it just seemed to be rather slow. There really weren’t as many catchy numbers as there usually are in a Broadway show. Now don’t get me wrong, I did enjoy it. It just wasn’t all that I was expecting.

After the show we headed over to Rockefeller Center. We wanted to see the Christmas Tree. We figured that although the lights wouldn't be on for another week, it still would be neat to see the tree. Well it turns out it was all covered in scaffolding. And one side had a giant advertisement for Swarovski since they make the star that goes on top. So much for photo opportunities there.

Our final stop was for some dinner before heading home. We had no idea where we wanted to eat, so after wandering around for a while we found a steak house. We perused the menu outisde, and although it was expensive, we decided to go in anyway. They were able to find a table for us in the back. (Most of the tables would soon be filled with people who had resrvations.) I mentioned to Chris that I felt really underdressed as the restaurant was a little swanky. He told me I shouldn't because the woman sitting behind me was in overalls. It turns out that everyone in the back room where we were sitting was dressed in jeans. Since we were behind a partition, no one would ever have to see the "rif-raf" that we were. After dinner we headed home, and the next day Chris went to work and I went to a new LSS with Mel for a class and to check out the store.

And here ends the tale of my birthday weekend.

Ikea, part two

So our home computer is temporarily operational again, which allows me to show you the second Ikea table. On it is a class project. However, it still needs photos. Maybe looking at it every day will inspire me to take some pictures to put in it. If only I had kids it woudl be easier. As it is, I'm not really sure what photos to choose.

I also talked to Chris about my grand plan to get a new couch and chair. We saw some that we liked at Jordan's, and depending on what financing is available and if we host the Family Christmas, we'll either be getting new furniture soonish or in August. Finally, I'll have a pretty living room!

I'm an Ikea Junkie!

On November 9th, Ikea came to Massachusetts. Last weekend we went and got this coffee table. We also got three baskets to put in the bottom row of cubbies. We're somewhat in the market for a new couch, so we tried them out but dind't find anything we like. So then we went to Jordan's furniture and found a couple of couches that we like, but decided to be good and save our money for a while.

So over the past week I've been looking through the Ikea catalog and looking around our house and I've decided I want a new side table for our living room. The one we had been using was really too tall and too small so it didn't work well. So I decided on the Dalom Pedestal table. (It's on page 122 of the catalog.) Unfortunately couldn't find a picture online except for in the online catalog. And while I was there I decided the next purchase will be the TV stand that matches the coffee table. Slowly but surely we are getting new furniture that all co-ordinates. And if we're really lucky, sometime next year we'll get a non-cat-scratched couch.

What's for dinner?

Here it is noon, and I'm already planning out what to order for dinner tonight. It's "almost my birthday" so I decided I want something more special than usual. I decided on Chateau and was purusing the menu. I couldn't decide what kind of dessert to order, so I think I'm going with the Family Dessert Combo. Is it wrong to order dessert for three when there will only be two of us? And what family only wants three desserts? These things must be huge! However, it does take pressure off of me trying to guess what kind Chris would want. So this way we get canoli, chocolate cake, and cheesecake. Yum!

A Successful Weekend!

The party went well. At first I was a little dissappointed. I didn't think I had made as much money as I was hoping. Not that I really had a goal, but when I did a quick count it seemed low. However, when I got home and recounted I was much happier with the figure that I got.
Unfortunately, there were a number of items that no one was interested in purchasing- paint cans, multi-holiday sets of cards, etc. So now I'm stuck with lots of merchandise. I guess I know what family will be getting for Christmas gifts. :)

In other news, it was a fairly productive weekend. Saturday Chris and I did a bunhc of Christmas shopping. We finished up about half of his family. If only I could get better gift lists from people in my family. Andrew wants money for his hike, my dad needs slippers, my mom wants more pants. That's pretty much all the info I've gotten from them. And then there are Hanna and Liz, and both of them have Jan/Feb birthdays so I'll need ideas for that as well. At least I still have almost 2 months left for shopping.

Then today I scanned some more slides and then watched Karate Kid with Chris. We both admitted to watching it a few too many times as kids so we could always say what was coming next. Then this evening I did a couple more layouts. Just a few more and I'll be done with January. It's official, I am very behind with my scrapping.

Another thought...

Aren't you lucky Mel? Two posts in one night!

Hi, my name is Chris, and I'm a Chapstick-aholic. I must have some with me at all times. As a result, I have a tube in pretty much every room of the house. Except the computer room. Very frustrating, as it is now when my lips need it and there is none close at hand. Damn, I'm actually going to have to get out of my chair and walk to the bedroom. Or the bathroom. Or the scraproom. 3 choices, and that's just on this level of the house.

"Entertain me"

So Mel says it's my turn to update my blog to entertain her. But I don't have anything to say? This is why i questioned getting a blog in the first place. So hree I am, rambling to entertain Mel. Sorry if it really isn't all that entertaining.

Well, in honor of Halloween and Star Wars, I bring you Martha Breecher, age 5 years 11 months (1983). Yeah, so you really can't tell that it's me at all. To make up for this, I give you Martha and Andrew from around the same time. No date on the back, but based on my hair length and Andrew's look, I'm guessing it was also 83.


And that, dear Mel, is my update. I hope you found it thoroughly exciting.

So much for good intentions

So back in September I had made a list of all the September/October birthdays, anniversaries, etc that I needed to be aware of so that I could make cards. I made about half of them, figuring I would get to the others later. Well, I just realized that today is Chris' grandmother's birthday and Monday was Darlene's. Needless to say, they aren't getting cards. Maybe I'll send them belated birthday cards. Bad me. I wonder who else I forgot. Must make new list and be aware of future birthdays.

And then there was progress...

3 sets of flower cards.... done.
5 men's dress shirt cards.... done.
Notepads.... 1 done, 6 more to go.
3 CBX Gallery sets.... started.
Pricing.... All completed cards and notepads have price tags.

And that was all just tonight! I left work 30 minutes early and by the time Chris came home I was feeling like I had gotten a lot accomplished. And then I did even more after Survivor and CSI. Go me!

Grumble, grumble

So Here I was thinking I had been all productive on my lunch break. I had called Andrew about where I should go to get loose tea. He sent me over to Tealuxe in Harvard Square. While there I picked up a tin of Gingerbread tea as well as a little tea pot shaped thing for putting your used tea bag/strainer on. So I head back to the T. While waiting I decide to see what the tea smells like. (I had picked it soley on the name- thought it sounded fin for a Christmassy type gift.) I then proceded to spill some of it on the station platform. Greeeat. I figured I hadn't spilled that much, no big deal. Still ok to put in the can. Fast forward to 20 minutes ago. I try to put the tin of tea in the paint can. Nope. Square can does not fit in round paint can. And it's only like 1/4 inch too big. Aaaargh. Also, the little tea bag holder thing is also too big, by only a smidged. Double aaaargh. So now I'll ahve to go back to Tealuxe to get more tea. They also sell it not in pretty tins but in boring paper bag things. Hopefully that will fit better in my can. And now that I know what it smells like, I won't have to open it and risk spilling. I guess I can just tie the tea bag holder thing on top with some ribbon.

And there was progress...

One small paint can done! (Just need to buy a couple of contents.) One large paint can done and filled! One paint can almost done. (Just needs ribbon, plus I need to shop for contents.) Let's hope people buy these darned things.

A semi-productive day

Well, at first I felt as if I hadn't accomplished anything today. I woke up a bit after 11, and then spent a few hours watching stupid tv (Filthy Rich on E!). Then I called 6 or 7 scrap stores in a quest for Bazzill library pockets. These must be super popular as most stores only had one color in stock. Finally I founf a new LSS in Sutton. (Or at least new to me.) They had a variety of colors. However, they sold theirs individually rather than in packs. I was able to get enough for one craft project, but I was hoping for enough for two. I also ran a bunch of other errands and finally got home around 7 or so. Then I was planning on being productive, but I started watching Twitches on the Disney channel. For some reason I seem to get sucked into watching the really bad Disney movies. That and the Suite Life of Zack and Cody. Don't ask, I don't understand it. However, I did finally break myself away from the TV and made a card display thingy. One down, one to go.

Oh the weather outside is frightful...

Rain, Rain, Go to Spain,
And never come back again.
-Mother Goose

It has been raining for a week now. I am sick of it. It doesn’t help that I’m tired. This adds to the feeling of gloom. I’m sitting here at my desk and every so often I realize that my eyelids are closed. I open them and wonder how long I’ve been like that. Not a good thing.

In other news, Andrew sent me a link about The Princess Bride being turned into a musical. Woo hoo! That’ll be exciting. For my birthday Chris and I are going to NYC to see Wicked and Spamalot. I almost wish we were seeing the touring company of Wicked since it has Carol Kane in it, but I’m sure we’ll have a splendid time seeing it on Broadway. Last year we had tried to get tickets, but it was sold out. The theatre looked really neat though. Great artwork in the lobby showing Oz and the neighboring lands. Here's a link to a layout I did about the theatre.

My grand weekend plans? Sleeping late! And doing some various craft projects. For my dad’s birthday I’m making him arm covers for a couple of chairs out at Secret Lake. I took measurements last weekend and got fabric on Wednesday. Now I just need to make them. I also got fabric to make display things for cards for the card party. Kind of hard to explain, but maybe I’ll post some pictures when it’s done. I also would like to get some scrapping/card making done. I think I’ll need to clean my table a bit before I can attempt this one. I have a 4x6 table, and it’s pretty much all covered with stuff at the moment. And finally, if time allows, I’d like to start making a stock of Toolbelts. I have dreams of sending some to “celebrity” scrappers, but first I need to get them made.

Chainsaw Weekend

So my dad has this house out in western Mass. He likes to try to come up with excuses to get us all out there from time to time. So, it seems that we now have a variety of "theme" weekends that we gather out there. This weekend was the annual Chainsaw Weekend. The first year we held this event there was actually quite a bit of chainsawing. Each year since there has been less and less. It should probably be called Brush Clearing Weekend, but that doesn't sound nearly as fun.


Anyway, this year it was cold and drizzly and not the best for being outside hauling branches and playing with power equipment. So Sunday we instead took a trek to the local apple farm. While we were there, I saw this tree which I thought looked perfect for climbing, so of course I had to climb it. (Actually, there were a number of great climbing trees.)






After apple picking we headed back to the house for some baking. We made a double bathc of Apple Brown Betty (dad's idea of a good breakfast) as well as a birthday cake (celebrating Dad's, Andrew's, and Chris' birthdays). It was a butterscotch cake with a streusal filling. Chris and I had found the cake mix as well as a really fun bundt pan while we were killing some time in Williams Sonoma last week. Chris pointed out that he seems to always be buying, ordering, or making hsi own birthday cakes.

Monday after sleeping in nice and late, we did finally make it out for a little bit of chainsawing. we probably would have done more, but the drizzle turned into rain. So, we finished up the tree we were working on and headed inside. After a late lunch we all headed off in our own directions.

Back fat?

So from the time I started wearing bras until about 2 or 3 years ago, I was a 34. Then all of a sudden they started to get really tight. I got 36s and all was better. Since I couldn't really figure out where I was gaining weight, Chris and I kidded around that I was getting back fat. Well aparently my back fat is increasing again. After about an hour of wearing this stupid bra this morning I was wishing I could take it off. Make it stop. So uncomfortable! If only bras were cheaper I wouldn't mind so much having to go out annd buy new ones.

15 and counting...

Wow it was a productive night! I made 15 cards for the upcoming card/craft party that Liz is hosting. I feel good that I was able to get so many done, but part of me wonders if it’s worth it. I’m spending all this time making these cards and I have no idea if anyone is going to buy them. Yes, I know this is the way business works, but I’m not sure what I’ll do with all of the cards if no one buys them. There are only so many that I can give away to friends and family as Christmas presents.



But while I was working I was burning one of my new Yankee Candles- Autumn Wreath. Very yummy. Reminds me a bit of Celtic Castle.

Jumping on the blog bandwagon...

So about half an hour ago I was commenting to my friend Mel how I didn't think I wanted a blog. Then, what do I do? I start this blog. I told her if she nagged me enough maybe I woudl get one. Well, one comment from her and here it is. (Is that really nagging if she only mentions once that I should?) So anyway, here it is. The Nook.