Spring...Where Are You???

I know, I know...it is only January 31....I have lots of winter left here in Illinois. So, what does an old lady like myself do when it's still winter and you are so sick of it that you want to cry? Well, you shop of course!

I headed to the DSW this morning and to the mall. On the list of things I need was something to wear to the next wedding shower, girls night out and the very casual rehearsal dinner oh, and shoes for the wedding.

I found no shoes I liked at DSW, in fact, they only had about 6 pairs in silver, so I headed to the mall. Get this.....I'm in Ann Taylor Loft looking at all of the new stuff when I found that great pair of pants. $59.....wasn't sure if I wanted to spend that much, but they were cute, they can be worn most of the year and I can wear them to work. So, what the heck! I get to the check out, the lady scans them and they come up $10. Okay, that would be really nice, but these were up front with all of the new arrivals. She went and got a different pair and scanned that one and same thing. She said, "I guess they are $10!" Then she says, "And everything that is on sale today is another 50% off, so they will be $5.00." Are you kidding me? I was like that lady in the IKEA commercial..."Start the car, start the car!" as I ran out of the store with my bag!!!

I also got a cute kelly green sweater, an ivory cardigan and a moss colored cami. Not sure what I will wear when, but it's a start.

When I got home, since the trip wasn't as successful as I had hoped, I decided to shop online. First I went to zappos and ordered two pairs of silver shoes for the wedding. When I first started looking at shoes, I was going to wear pantyhose....but that really limited the kind of shoes I could wear and I really wanted cute strappy little things. So, it will be bare, very pale legs for me, but I'll have some darn cute shoes. The wedding is at night, so no one will see my legs...right? Zappos has free shipping and free returns. Can't beat that! I love them both, but I'm also looking for comfort. This is a stand up all night wedding and reception so they have to be comfy.

Next I went right to Gap and ordered my skinny jeans. Now these might end up going right back, but they are just so darn cute! I looked at them in every store I went to, but they either didn't have the dark color I wanted or they didn't have my size or they had the dark color in my size, but they were $140! So, I should have them in a few days. I saw tons of people in the mall of all ages in them today. Some had on boots but others had on the little flat ballet slipper type shoes. Some had them rolled up at the bottom. I can't wait to get them! I ordered my usual Gap jeans size, so hopefully they are sized like their other jeans and I'll be good to go!

Tomorrow I will tell you what an old man that absolutley hates winter does to pass the time until spring gets here. Rest assured....he doesn't shop....at least not for clothes! Can you say "seeds"?

Straight Or Not Straight?

Jeans! I have been looking on line for a new pair of jeans! Tresa's Bachelorette Party or Girls Night Out Party or whatever you happen to call it is the end of February and it's casual. We're meeting at a place called Think Cafe on Western Avenue in Chicago. The party is hosted by Tresa's matron of honor.

Anyway, I've been looking at jeans. I'm a 57 year old Gap girl. Gap jeans fit me really well so I tend to always shop there when I need jeans. Looking at their website, I saw mostly flare leg jeans like I've been wearing for years now. They did have a few of the skinny straight leg styles so I assumed that style must be making a come back. Next, I went to the J Crew website.......not that I buy much at J Crew, but they seem to be more of a trendsetter than Gap so I wanted to see what they were showing. Yikes! They had almost all straight legged jeans. I have seen some people wearing them, but not a lot yet.

So, I ask you.....straight or not straight?

Suddenly I am having these flashbacks to my teen years. I can see myself sitting on the edge of my bed, struggling to get my heel through the tiny little opening at the bottom of the jeans leg! I'm wiggling my foot up and down, up and down, point, flex, point, flex....as I ever so slowly inch my foot through the whole a little millimeter at a time. It's hard to fit a Size 7 foot through that teensy weensy hole! Once I finally got my foot through the hole....I got to repeat the entire process again for the other foot.

Next, I'm standing up and pulling on each pant leg to get the jeans up to my thighs. I started down by the ankle where the jeans were sitting and little by little pulled them up my legs to my thighs. Once I could get a good grip on the waist, I would jump, and jump and jump as I pulled and tugged to get the jeans over my butt and hips.....and I had a pretty little butt and hips back then.

Oh no...not done yet! Now I had to fall back on the bed and take a wire hanger and put the curved top of the hanger through the hole in my zipper. I would lay on the bed and hang on to the hanger with one hand while trying to pull the two sides of the zipper as close together as possible. Once I got the zipper moving, I would use both hands on the hanger to pull the zipper up the rest of the way. Now my hands would be dented and sore from the wire hanger, but I still had to button the button.

Ah....success!

So here I am lying on my bed, jeans on, zipped and buttoned, but guess what? I can't get up. Really! My jeans are so tight that my body won't bed to allow me to sit up.

If I am lucky enough to have a friend in the room, they brace themselves against the side of the bed, reach out a helping hand and pull me straight up to a standing position. If there is no friend in the room, I roll to my side and very carefully wiggle my way off the bed into an upright position! Tah dah!!!!!! I did it! I put on my jeans and oh they are so darn cute. They actually look like someone took a can of denim spray paint and sprayed my legs!!

I don't think the straight leg jeans of today are quite as tight as ours were back then, but still...the thought of purchasing a pair is making me a bit queasy!

So, I ask you again....straight or not straight?

Yoga On The Beach

Right before Christmas I received an order in my etsy shop, FourDogDay, for my Yoga On The Beach photo from a really nice lady in Australia. She was purchasing the photo for her "sister" in Arizona for her birthday. She asked if I could send it directly to her sister with a note describing the photo.

Yoga On The Beach was taken by my son Matt when he and his best friend Brett were volunteering at a bio dynamic farm in Costa Rica. The photo is one of my favorites.

The customer told me that her sister is very into yoga and is hoping to move to Costa Rica in a couple of years. She and her fiance already own some property there, so the photo couldn't have been more perfect!

I took the photo and wrapped it up in pretty tissue paper and tied it up with ribbon. Then I took one of my photo greeting cards and wrote Happy Birthday from Michelle in it. I included a description of the photo including exactly where it was taken.

I received a wonderful e-mail and really nice Feedback from Michelle telling me how much her sister loved the photo and that she commented how nicely I had wrapped it for her, and then the other day I received an awesome convo from the recipient of the photo. She said that she cried when she opened it and read the description. She said that she featured the photo on her blog and plans to hang it in her studio. Then one day it will come full circle when she hangs it in her studio in Costa Rica.

It made me feel so good to know how happy one of our photos made someone else. It was also so nice that both of them took the time to let me know. They really made my day!

Dream a Little Dream

First of all, I am bouncing off the walls right now! I did have french toast with syrup for dinner, so it could be that....or it could be the fact that I found the beads I wanted for Tresa's wedding necklace and started playing around with it....and it is going to be so freakin' cool! That's all I can tell you right now because Tresa reads my blog. Once I have it done, I will ban her from my blog and I will show it to you. I haven't put it together yet, but I will!! I am so excited!

Now to today's post....

What do dreams mean? Have you ever tried to figure them out or bought a book that analyzes dreams? I know they say that everyone dreams, but for years now I haven't been able to remember my dreams, until this past week.

The other night I dreamed that I was in the house and I heard a kitten crying in pain outside in the backyard. I ran outside and there was my tiny little kitten lying injured on the ground in front of this big mean ugly cat. The big cat was trying to kill my kitten and I was horrified. (No idea why my little kitten was outside by itself)

The big cat looked like across between an ordinary house cat and a bob cat. (I live in Illinois and we don't have bob cats here....or mean giant sized house cats either)

As soon as the evil cat saw me, it grabbed my little kitten and ran into the back yard. I kept yelling at it to drop the kitten, but it wasn't listening to me. (Go Figure) I ran after it, screaming and then it jumped over the chain link fence and stood in the neighbor's yard taunting me with the kitten hanging lifeless in it's mouth!

I quickly climbed over the fence. (As quickly as a 57 year old not very limber old lady can climb a chain link fence) I had a dish towel in my hand (Can you believe that?) and I started snapping the towel at the cat. About this time Matt came running out of the house. He had a little box in his hand (No idea why), but he easily jumped the fence and started stomping the ground trying to scare the cat.

The cat finally dropped the kitten and ran away. Matt carefully picked the poor little injured kitten up and put it in the box and I woke up!!

So, what on earth does that mean? Here are my thoughts:

1) A hairy beast is trying to steal one of my "babies"?

2) There is a hairy beast lurking in my "backyard"?

3) I shouldn't leave things I love in the backyard unattended?

4) I want a new kitten?

5) I'm just really weird and dream some really weird things?

I'll go with #5!

The Wedding Shower

The wedding shower was wonderful! I think everyone had a nice time. If I had to pick one "glitch" it would be that my niece was sick and couldn't come...and she was the "talker" for her end of the table. I was very careful with the seating so that every area had someone that would keep the conversation going. That is always a concern when you have a number of people that don't know one another. So, with her absent, we had a quiet end of the table....and a loud end of the table.

We had a wonderful waiter named Andrew. He even helped Bern carry things in from her car!

The room was magnificent! It's was called the wine room with one whole wall lined with bottles of wine. The long wooden table was gorgeous. We place our menus, place cards and little jewelry gift boxes at each seat, and Bern set her five cake stands down the center of the table. She made ones like I sell in MyOtherShop, but she used plates in Tresa's green and did them different heights. On them we put the wonderful little pastries we had purchased from Deerfield's Bakery. It looked awesome.

When everyone had arrived we found our seats and Andrew took all of the orders. At that point I gave our guests permission to eat dessert first if they liked and most of them took me up on it! My fear was that everyone would be way too full after lunch for dessert, and I didn't want them to miss out. So, we ate dessert! Then we had bread and then we ate our lunch...and was it ever fabulous! We had plenty of great things for people to pick from. Good food, great conversation, a bit of wine and some fantastic desserts....what more could you ask for?

After dinner, Tresa and Chris opened their gifts. She told me later they were overwhelmed with everyone's generosity. They registered at Crate and Barrel and Pottery Barn. The gifts were so cool that it made me want to have a shower...for ME!

I had to laugh a few times when they would open a gift and Chris would look at Tresa with raised eyebrows and a questioning look because he didn't remember registering for that item. Tresa would just say, "Oh, I added that to the registry!"

After they opened their gifts, someone asked them how they met. Chris stood up and told a very funny story about how they were actually at a couple of the same parties, but Tresa was sitting in the corner with friends and wouldn't give him the time of day. Finally, the third time he was able to talk to her and also spilled his beer all over her! He said the spilling of the beer gave him a reason to "follow up" with her so he could offer to pay her dry cleaning bill. During that conversation he asked if he could take her out to make up for the mishap and she said yes.

He wanted their first date to be very special so he took her to this place that said they had entertainment. The entertainment was people speaking and reading their poetry. The very first guy that got up started doing his "share" I guess it's called and it happened to be about his father's genitalia! Not exactly what you are looking for on a first date. Needless to say, they didn't stay long. Other more successful dates followed and now here we are planning a wedding!

Tresa said the shower was perfect! I'm so glad she liked it.

Now, it's on to that necklace she asked me to make. I'll keep you posted!

Sent To My Room

Okay, my husband just told me to go to my room. (That would be my workshop) He told me I am rude and that even the dogs don't want to sit by me right now. What would drive him to say something so mean to me?

WHEEL OF FORTUNE!!!

Yep, that's right! Wheel Of Fortune!

It's just the two of us, so we never eat dinner sitting at the kitchen table. In fact, I think we stopped doing that years and years ago when the kids stopped showing up for dinner. We enjoy just taking our plates and plunking down on the couch and chatting and eating our dinner. More often than not, we end up eating at 6:30 p.m. which is Wheel of Fortune time.

Irv keeps telling me that he is signing me up to go on the show. I just laugh at him. Anyone can sit in the comfort of their living room and solve puzzles. No stage lights, no audience, no competition, no Vanna or Pat....sure it's easy then. I would never, ever go on a game show! I just wrote the other day about being shy and not liking people to even look at me. Like I said, it is something I would never do nor would I have a desire to do even if I wasn't a bit shy.

What caused him to tell me to go to my room was when I asked yet again....why in heavens name does Wheel of Fortune make the other two contestants clap and cheer for their opponent when they take their turn? I think that is truly the dumbest thing I have ever seen in my life. This is a GAME. It's a COMPETITION. You want to WIN. You want the other guy to LOSE. Why the hell are you cheering for them?

Irv told me that they are cheering to be nice and to keep it a friendly game show.

Is he kidding?

If I were on the show, when the other people spin the big old wheel I would be yelling, "Bankrupt, bankrupt, bankrupt"! Why would I yell, "Big money, big money"? It makes no sense at all! When they hit a bankrupt, I would let out a giant size, "Woo hoo!!!" I sure wouldn't feel bad for them. I WANT them to LOSE!

At about this point, Irv told me I was obnoxious! Then I told him I was going to blog about it and he said that all of the people that comment are going to say that they use to like me, but now they see what a b----- I really am, and they don't like me any more.

The final straw for him was when I said, "Okay, here is a fine example. Could you see the Cubs, when the other team is at bat, CHEERING for them to hit a friggin' home run? I can just see the Cubs sitting on the bench in their dug out, clapping and cheering and yelling, for the other team..... come on big hit, big hit! Come on, hit it out of the park buddy! You can do it!"

That's when he told me to go to my room!

Honey.....can I come out now?

When Peanut Butter Falls From The Sky

I just got home from the wedding shower and it was wonderful. I will write about it either tomorrow or Tuesday. This one will be quick because I have a million things to do this evening.

(Don't forget to leave a comment for an entry into my very first Giveaway. It runs until Valentine's Day. The prizes are one of the little birdhouses from MyOtherShop and three cards of your choosing from FourDogDay. You can get an extra couple of entries if you visit my shops and comment on your favorite items. Just click on the Giveaway birdhouse picture to the right for all of the details.)

Anyway, Irv was standing in the doorway to my workshop yesterday talking to me while I was working. He was eating a toasted bagel with peanut butter and jelly on it. Wrigley was standing right in front of of Irv, just waiting like dogs tend to do, for a little crumb to fall. Then all of a sudden....kerplunk...a glob of peanut butter oozed out of his bagel and went plop!

Wrigley was searching the floor for whatever fell and couldn't seem to find it.

Then she turned to look at us and we both started laughing! The peanut butter had landed right on her face next to her eye! She could see it and wasn't quite sure what to do about it. Her tongue didn't reach and she kept trying to wipe it off with her paw.

I couldn't help snapping a couple of pictures before Irv came back with something to wipe it off. Poor thing, she almost looks embarrassed!