Just checking in....

Been having some problems with my signal for my internet since I am on a router to Vincent's modem. He seems to have fixed the problem now. We'll see. The days get better as far as the co-worker. I have too much other junk on my plate than to worry about her. Just found out we are going to be grandparents again. Natasha is 6 weeks, due date set for December 25. Too much to think about coming from my experienced mind, 3 kids, 3 of everything, daycare is sky high, no social life for them any more...but she is an adult by age, sometimes I don't think her mind has quite grasped the concept yet, she is always doing things backwards. I'll write more tomorrow, time for me to get in bed so I can get up after the snooze button goes off the 2nd time and not the 3rd or 4th or for that matter not hear it at all and then Vincent has to wake me up and ask me if I am going to work. What I would like to say is no, no, no, don't make me go!!!!!!!!!!!

What happen to the weekend?

When you work on Saturday, the weekend goes by a lot faster than normal! After work, Mom and I went to The Happy Scrapper in Greer, SC. A change from the stores we had been going to on Saturday. Was not in too much of a spending mood, a good thing, I think! Bought some paper and a background stamp from the Stamp of the Month club that Great Impressions does each month. The difference of buying the stamp of the month from the happy scrapper is that you don't have to buy another stamp at the original price to get the SOTM stamp 1/2 price. You get it 1/2 price anyway. That was a good thing! Of course, it is still in the bag sitting on my desk. Vincent and I finally got my tv he gave me for Christmas hooked up in my scrapbook room, only took 4 months! My internet has been acting stupid lately that is why I have not been on line in the last couple of days. Chrissy, I will get to the "tag" later this week I hope. Kimberly that is a hoot that your mil name is the same as mine. There are a lot of women out there with the same name! Still having problems with that co-worker of mine. It is down to her not speaking at all, the very one who always says "God don't like ugliness" needs to take heed of her own advice!!!!!! I have apologized, for what I don't know, I did not do anything wrong, but being the person I am I did. What's up with that? Had a friend who sent me a flyer to send in for a free ticket to the Herloom's rubber stamp and paper arts festival in Greenville, SC September 15 and 16. Always some good stuff there. That was so nice of her. Granddaughters are doing fine, the rest of the family is too. Well, I guess that catches everyone up with me for the last couple of days. Need to head to Walmart and pick up some shampoo, etc. before it gets later in the evening.

Long week...

It has been one long week and it is not over yet! I have to work on Saturday from 6:00 am til 10:00 am. Work, work, work...i feel that is all I do anymore and sleep. By the time things get settled down after coming home, it is time for bed....the time change really messes me up. I like the getting dark later, it just takes me a little bit to get in the groove. Hanzo is doing fine, although he is still clumsy and wants to be right under your feet everywhere you go. Vincent was going out the back door yesterday and the glass door has a strong spring so it does not take long for it to shut. Well, Hanzo decides at the last minute he wants to go out too and guess what? The door smacks him really good. I think it bruised his right front leg. He was limping on it a little bit today when I came home to let him out of his kennel. As the evening went on, he was running on it and putting more weight on it. He has run into the coffee table, the swiffer mop when I was mopping the bathroom floor, been stepped on several times because he wants to be right under your feet, no tell what else he is going to run into. Well, gotta go get ready for bed, rest for a little bit and it is off to work i go again! I am exhausted!

Monday,,,,,

These pictures were taken in August of last year. Dakota was not too sure if she wanted both of her feet touching the grass and Allyssa is waiting for the ball that Papa had kicked up in the air for her. I really miss these two girls since I am not getting them as often as I had been due to my health problems. It just exhausts me to try to keep up with both of them at the same time. It is not that they are bad, they are just little girls and they can need so much usually at the same time....! I am so tired right now that I am getting ready to take my shower and hit the bed. Hanzo is doing pretty good on his house and potty training. Aggravates the hound out of Miss Kitty and with her two front paws being declawed she cannot smack him with a "I mean business, bud" attitude. So she just tries to hiss at him and show her "big" teeth. Like that is going to do any good with a 7 week old german shepherd who looks like he could be 13-15 weeks old. He just looks at her and goes right back to chasing her! She jumped up on the back of the couch this afternoon and gave him the evil eye and believe me it was an evil eye. I thought at first she was looking at me, but then I seen it was him....like he could care! Right now Vincent is outside with him so Hanzo can do his nightly duties and get ready for bed. Vincent is finding out how tiring it is to have to get up with a baby at night...I have to chuckle at the thought of him getting up! Well, gotta go for now...

Sunday ride...

After we got home from church and lunch, vincent and i to a motorcycle ride up through Ceasar's Head to Brevard, NC, then through Cashiers to Highlands, NC. We stopped in Highlands, took a bathroom break, which by then was a needed thing. I got a Frozen Mocha drink and vincent got a strawberry-banana smoothie. We walked up to the Bear Mountain Outfitters store to see if they were open so I could get a sweatshirt. The wind was a little chilly for me; then we left Highlands, NC, and went through Dillsboro, NC to Hendersonville, NC, and grabbed dinner at the Cracker Barrel and then we came home. We left about 2:00-2:15 and got back around 8:30. It was a very good ride, we basically made a circle around the NC mountains about a 321 mile ride. We had a good time and I needed the relaxation of just sitting on the motorcycle and looking at all the sights. We seen a beautiful waterfall as we left Highlands, NC, riding through the Natahala Forest. Next time I want to stop and get some pictures.
Well, guess I had better get off, gotta get ready for another week of work and then get to bed! Wouldn't it be nice if we worked 2 days a week and was off for 5????????????????

Thursday........

Thought I would put a picture of Natasha and her family here, since I don't think I have done that yet. These pictures were taken about 2 months ago, I think. The one of Natasha was when they went to Gatlinburg, I think, it was and the one of Randy, Dakota and Allyssa was taken after that, I am not sure where they were getting ready to go to.
Today was a pretty mellow day. The co-worker I have been having problems with was not talking to me so that made for a pretty mellow day, although a long day. We have to work Saturday then it is off to the church for a scrapbooking play day with small group of women, some who are just that a small group of women who want to get together to scrap or make cards, talk, fellowship, etc. We used to have this each month, but it did not go as we had planned, so we stopped going. We are now trying to get it together again with different outlooks every 3rd Saturday in the month. Hopefully, it will turn out to be a good thing. I am not sure what I am going to work on, but I should be able to find something in my stash!!!!!!!! Well, I guess I had better end this and get to bed, since my night owl husband has already beat me to it and I like to be the first one in bed. Since he started his new job, he goes to bed usually right after I do and that is about 10:00 pm. I hear him already snoring in there, so I guess it is time for me to go.............................and he says I snore loud :-)))) he needs to hear himself!

Is it Friday yet....

This is such a pretty color and it being on a rose is more spectacular. Had a pretty rough day at work today, mentally exhausting, came home and did not feel like doing anything that required a whole lot of effort or thinking on my part. So I stayed outside for most of the afternoon with Hanzo, the new puppy. Of course, he did not have a problem with that :-). Vincent and I took Hanzo over to Natasha and Randy's for Allyssa and Dakota to see him. Then we came home and I checked my e-mails and my blog (of course) and now I am getting ready to head to bed. Not much going on other than that!

Monday....

Easter pics. Aren't they the cutiest little angels? Not that I am biased or anything!!!!!! There are 2 other poses that I don't have yet. Been a tough day today. Dealing with childish behavior from adults at work for 9 hours is enough to make you go over the edge, it is sickening when you cannot even work peacefully without dealing with a bunch of children. It is exhausting. I am going to go now and devour my new Creating keepsakes magazine that arrived in the mail today.

Weekend over already.....

How do you like Dakota's Easter basket "purse"? She was so cute trying to carry this basket around without any of the eggs dropping out! And the other picture is the new addition to our family of 2 adults and a cat, a full-bloodied registered german shepherd. He is 6 weeks old as of this past Thursday and big, big, big....his paws are bigger than the middle of the inside of my hand. His name is Hanzo Von Haus. Vincent has been wanting a german shepherd pup for a long time and now he has a new friend!

Been a pretty nice weekend, yesterday morning I worked til 10:00 am, then mom, my sister Deborah and I headed to lunch and then to A.C.Moore. I was going to get some Prisma colored pencils, but AC Moore did not have a coupon in the paper last sunday or on line last week, so I am going to get them sometime this week. I have coupons for Hobby Lobby, AC Moore and Michaels, woo-hoo! I wonder if I have any hidden $ anywhere!!!!!! It rained yesterday evening and then all night, cloudy this morning, sun came out for a little bit and I do mean a little bit, then it started raining again and then the sun came out again and it has gotten really windy outside and cold. Where is the spring weather?? I am going to try to finally cut my grass (with a riding lawnmower of course) tomorrow if weather permits. I thought there for a while that my yard could be used for training missions my grass was getting so tall! I finally got a battery for it and I am sure that my neighbors will be shouting with glee when I finally get it cut. I love doing the grass cutting, weedeating, etc. outside as long as all my equipment is working. The weather is suppose to be sunny tomorrow.....

Well, guess I had better go get ready for bed, 4:45 am comes awlful early!!!!!

Thursday!

I almost can't believe that it is Thursday, until I think, omg, I have had to get up at 5:00 for the past 4 mornings.....and have 2 more to go before I get a 1 day break and start over again...not much going on here right now.
Vincent and I went to grab a bit to eat, (we were going to Mythos, a greek restaurant in Greer) when we were going by Texas Roadhouse and he said do you want to eat here. "It don't matter", I say. So he whips in on 2 wheels, b/c when he asked me that questions were were nearly on the driveway into the restaurant at the time. We wait for about 15 minutes and the hostess starts to take us to a table when all of a sudden I hear people hollaring Nana, Nancy, Vincent and I turn around and it is our daughter Natasha, Randy and the two darling little granddaughters, so of course, we squeeze all of us, except Dakota of course, in this 4 person booth. Good food, good fellowship and then we head to Walmart spend time there, I check my b/p 138/77 and my heart rate 120 and then I am ready to go home. B/p not too bad but I think the heart rate was. So I will check it again in a couple of days and see what it is. Have to go back to Dr. Hammond next week anyway for the 3 week check up from my heart rate jumping up so high 2 weeks ago. Well, guess I had best get in bed!

new friend

Chrissy, here is some of my extended family. First picture is yours truly with Vincent, next picture to the right of us is Mom and Dad in the front (of course), L-R my sister Deborah, b. 1963, her going-through-his-second-childhood husband with his long hair not to be confused of course with their daughter Asheton, then me, Vincent and their son Zachary. The next picture is my sister's family together, called them the Griswalds, because we tried 3 times to get a decent pic of them and we always got something like this. Zach and Ashe are 13 months apart. I will put more pics on later. I actually have 2 brothers, I am the oldest, then my sister, and 2 brothers. They are all married and have 2 children each, the oldest of my brothers has 2 girls, the rest of us have 1 girl and 1 boy, respectively, except Deborah and her boy was first. Follow that??? I am the only one with grandkids, woo-hoo for that. My 2 kids were the first grandchildren and my granddaughters are the first great granddaughters for our parents. I will try to send you the scrapbook page I did with Dakota shrieking it is quite humorous. I used the journaling strips to tell the story some from my view and some from Dakota's view. I have to said I was laughing pretty hard when it hit me how I wanted to scrapbook that page....

Worked moderately today, did not try to out do anything today, just took it easy. Ran a couple of errands when I got off and then came home to RELAX before the hubby got here. I am getting ready to goggle old saw mills of greenville county, sc, in a minute. There are several and I need to get pictures of them. I already got pics of one of them "Edwards Mill" which is close to where we live right now. Guess for now I am going to go...l8tr!

Back to Work today....

Silly Dakota. She is just a giggling here because she "found" the Easter egg that Deborah just "hid" under the sliding board for the egg hunt at church. She was going behind Deborah and picking up or pointing to or giggling at the eggs that Deborah was hiding! She is a hoot! She was not too much interested in hunting though. She found a little bit of them and then she was done. Allyssa on the other hand was running to beat the band looking for all the eggs she could get. I think she ended up with about 50-75 which were chocked full of candy. Woo-Hoo, just what she needed. Went back to work today after 5 and 1/2 days out per doctor's orders. Went to the doctor Thursday the 29th when my heart rate was high, put me out of work til today. Felt pretty good for the most part other than another series of pain under my ribs radiating around to my back, another "non-professional" opinion from someone at work that it sounded like my gallbladder. if the pain don't subside I don't know if I can eat much. Everytime I eat the pain comes back, sometimes when I am just drinking something. Great just what I need with everything else going on in my health life!!!! Maybe all of this is happening at the same time and when I get it all taken care of I won't have any more problems. Wishful thinking on my part. Been sitting here trying to get my Epson picturemate printer to work again. It has a mind of its own when it comes to printing lately, but I play around with it and I guess it feels sorry for me because it starts to work again. I am going to get me the upgraded one in about 4 months, hopefully. Have had an unusual thirst for water. Can't get enough of it and then of course I have to stay close to the bathroom. Didn't make any Easter cards although I had the paper, stamps, ribbon, etc. to do them with. But there were a couple of other stamps I "needed" to go with the other stamps and I did not get down to Eleanor's to get them and now I am out a paycheck for 2 weeks. I am trying to keep my head up though because I know things are going to start getting better for us financially, since Vincent is now working a full-time consistent job and right now he is working on jet-skis in his spare time. We had lunch at mom and dad's yesterday. Me, Vincent, Mom, Dad, Nick (was so glad to see my baby-boy, miss him so much), Deborah, Zach and Asheton and of course the new addition to mom and dad's family, Dixie Lee, their shih-tzu! She is so sweet, but don't hug your dad good-bye, that is her man!!!!!!! (and to think she has only been in the family 1 week!) Well, guess I had better go and hope I can get all my pictures printed out!

Fun Day

New crayola crayons, hmmmmm, can't you smell them, new crayons, nothing like a new box....just look at them, fresh points on the end, no broken ones, pretty colors, I love it....seems like I have a memory of going shopping before Christmas when us kids were smaller and getting a new christmas coloring book, (not the ones like nowadays that have the pictures to color, puzzles to do, etc.), real coloring books with pictures of santa claus, reindeer, christmas trees decorated, presents wrapped, and we could choose the colors that we wanted the tree and presents to be. When we were kids they were called presents not gifts as we call them now. And we would also get a new box of crayola crayons. Could not be anything but crayola. Heck Mom and I still by new boxes of crayola crayons every time back-to-school time arrives.....although I don't do it alot now, I love to color, it is so relaxing to lay on the floor and color. Ask Vincent, he colored for three days a year or so ago when we ha the big ice storm and everybody (i think) in Greenville County was out of power. He colored by kerosene lamp light. Oh how I miss those days of childhood (sometimes!).

Mom, Alpha and I had a good time today. We signed up (some 2 months ago) for a Tombow Marker Watercolor class at Stamps and More and today was the big day. We had such a good time, then we went to Pizza House in Powdersville, (yes there are two of them now, brothers!) and then Atlanta Bread Company for a Kona Mocha Cafechillo (Alpha had straight black coffee). We had such a fun time. Then I left there and went to Wayne and Tina's for Courtney to highlight my hair. Got home around 6:00 p.m. It is now 11:00 and I am tired....Hope I sleep better tonight!

Thursday's here...

The weather took a little turn toward cool today and down right chilly tonight! My teeth were actually chattering at one point. What's the deal with the weather...it is suppose to be getting warm and staying that way. Of course, I don't really care for the jump right into hot summer weather, I want some spring weather. Got my plastic eggs candy-filled and ready to go for the Easter Egg Hunt at church. Natasha is bring Dakota by here in the morning on her way to work and we are picking up Allyssa from Vickie's at 10:00. Last year Dakota was too young to even consider "looking" for eggs, but this year she is going to look!!!!! Still have dizzy spells, found out that to qualify for short-term disability you have to have worked at least 7 days and since I worked a 1/2 day on Thursday the 29, out from Friday, March 30 through Monday April 9, I have not actually not worked 7 days, since Friday, (tomorrow) is a holiday. So I won't paid at all for last week, except maybe my holiday pay. Since I was out on a doctor's note, it might fall under the FMLA (family medical leave act) and I will get paid for the holiday. So now, it is going to be 2 weeks before I get another check. Great, as if we were not struggling already with Vincent just now getting back to working a full time job. Finished a total of 5 scrapbook pages the past week. Pretty good, I should say!!!! Well, it is 10:52 pm and I am getting ready to hit the sack, after I go and get me a good cold glass of water, I am craving it for some reason.....

Spring-like Wednesday

Don't ask me what Dakota thought was so interesting about Papa taking off his work boots when he got home that evening. But she was all into it! The fist picture of her laying down just cracks me up. He sit down to take off his boots and she just lays down in front of him watching the process....she is soooo cute! Today the weather has been so pleasant. Seventies with a breeze blowing, partly cloudy. Beautiful.....So far this week, I have finished 4 scrapbook pages....a record for me since sometimes I cannot even get one done in a 2 week period. I guess being home all week and not being able to do anything that would require alot of excess work manages to allow you do being able to do that. Haven't even been able to drive in the last couple of days since I got dizzy driving on Monday to the store. Went for a little walk today and took some pictures of different flowers around the neighborhood. I guess some people who see me hovering over a flowering bush or looking keenly at a flowering dogwood tree probably think I am a little wacko, but who cares. If they think you are wacko, then they don't expect much from you, right?????? I finished one scrapbook page with the pictures taken of Dakota and Allyssa with Santa in Hendersonille, NC, this past December. I have looked at this pictures several times trying to decide how the relate the "goings on" on paper. When I looked at them this morning, I just was laughing so hard. One of the pictures shows Dakota turning around seeing Santa and the next one shows her with her mouth wide open cry up a storm, so instead of making a serious page I made a funny page. You would have to see it to understand. I will try to scan it and post it. Well, gotta go for now. Later...............

Monday already

There she goes on the run to find the easter eggs!!!!!!! This was Allyssa's egg hunt at school last Friday. She had so much fun. Each student could only leave with 12 eggs each. She had so much fun looking for them. I am still having the dizziness. Call the doc back today and told him. He said I should be feeling better by now, give a couple more days and if I am not feeling better he wants to see me again. Revised my time off through the week. So here I am at home not being able to do much of anything. I even got dizzy driving today...not good. Scrapbooked two pages yesterday, nothing today. Maybe tomorrow.......