Doesn't that just look like a gorgeous day spa?  I wish I'd had more time to sit by the pool and just chill out and enjoy all the pretty scenery, but we are usually just hit and go when we are coming through town like this.  Grandkids are waiting....


But at least I got to have a little peek at her closet. Yeah, it's a little odd that I didn't know what my sister's closet looks like, but with such an age gap between us, we aren't all that close.  She was married and having her first child by the time I started Kindergarten - seems to be something of a trend in our family.  But obviously, she likes a lot of beige. And sand. And taupe. And cream. 

Our Mom could always tell us apart just by the colors we were wearing. I'm like Mom - lots of bright color, although I don't have quite the wild gypsy taste that she did. But Karla is all about the neutrals. I just had to laugh when I saw her closet and saw that she had at least a dozen pairs of khakis and another dozen or so matching beige tops and blouses with hardly a color to be found. I don't even have a pair of khakis to my name!



If we didn't look so much alike, I'd sure be wondering if we were even related, 'cuz we're so different. (Pssst. She's the one in the NEUTRAL colors!).

We have an interesting family dynamic.  My two oldest sons at ages 27 and almost 20 are clearly adults (though they don't always act like it!), but we also have this "caboose kid" hanging on at age 10.  Normally, this is just business as usual for us, but when we come and visit the grandkids, it gets a little strange.  

Here are some of the projects from the Holiday Extravaganza this weekend. This was an event put together by several of my demonstrator friends. I was originally supposed to be one of the organizers, but I took a look at what they were planning and decided that I was just too slammed with everything else in my life to take on this large a project. Instead, I volunteered to come and cheer them on and bring a few customers to round out the numbers.

It was such a fun day! I went with four of my friends for a whole day of stamping, literally. I thought I'd finish the projects up in a few hours and be on my merry way. Instead, I showed up half an hour late and ended up being almost the last one to leave! Of well, I was having fun yacking with all my friends and eating the delicious lunch they provided. Hey, I got most of the projects done!

Although, now that I look at how many projects we did, I'm kind of amazed that I got them all done in a mere 7 hours. How's that for a die-hard stamper?

Just wanted to wish you all a very Happy Thanksgiving.  We had a very nice Thanksgiving surrounded by all our kids and grandkids and some new friends.  Our daughter-in-law's family invited us over for dinner and we enjoyed a lovely meal along with some pleasant conversation. 

Pretend there is a wallet-sized picture and a name on here. This is a great Thanksgiving placecard holder I copied off of Tip Junkie. But I found an old pic of my stepson for the picture for my ornament:



Aren't these cute? They are from our new Ornament Kit that is being featured in this month's Country Living Magazine. It's kind of cool. It comes with several sheets of various chipboard shapes and pieces of designer paper that are laser cut to fit them exactly. Even comes with some mini ink pads, glue, ribbon, pretty much everything you need. This is another one of the ornaments for it.



This one is a lot cuter in person. I just love these cute little treat jars. Now that I've learned how to do glass etching, I figured out how to do these. It's actually pretty easy. You stamp the design in Versamark, add any kind of embossing powder, and cover the whole thing in etching cream. 5 minutes later you just rinse off the etching powder (carefully, it is acid based) and scrape off the embossing powder. Very cool.

This is a card designed by my friend Melissa.


I thought this one was super clever and very practical. How often do you bring these Pyrex dishes to a potluck and then scrounge around to figure out which one is yours? This resolves the question instantly and everyone will be dying to know how you did it. The answer, some cheap Contact paper, a Cricut, and a sand blaster. Yep, really a sand blaster. One of the husbands did it. 

But I know where to get some etching cream and that should work just as well. I'm going to have to do this for an upcoming class. It's just too cool!

I know I haven't been posting as often lately, mainly because my Crazy Life has been a little crazier than usual. Work has been insane lately and I've been trying to cram lots of extra stuff into my already crammed schedule, so I've really been burning the midnight oil lately just trying to keep up.

Today it will have been 4 years since my Mom died. I really can't believe that I've gone four long years without seeing her. It just seems strange, even after all this time. I saw her every day for the first 24 years of my life and pretty much once a week or so after that for the rest of her life. The only time we were ever separated was when she and my Dad retired and moved from California to Utah for a couple of years and then we would talk on the phone every week and visit every few months. But then she talked us into moving here to be closer to them and we bought a house less than 5 miles away from them. So four years seems like a really really long time.

My Mom and I were very close and I feel like she was the only person who ever really loved me and supported me 100%. When I was growing up it was pretty much just the two of us. I didn't have my grandparents or aunts and uncles around very much and even my father never even lived with us until I was an adult (long story). So, we were closer than most mothers and daughters. We were also a lot alike, so we got along really well. We're both Libras so we both had that laid-back, accommodating personality. We both feel that family is very important and we are never happier when we have a whole house full of company.

She wasn't great shakes around the house - she wasn't much of a cook and dinners were usually Banquet TV dinners which she thought were the greatest invention known to man. And I definitely get my housekeeping skills from her. She loved her "stuff" and lots of it, particularly furniture and cleaning up was not a huge priority. Her living room alone had about 11 pieces of furniture in it and it wasn't a big room. She had her Egyptian corner, her Chinese pictures, and chicken stuff everywhere else. But she knew how to have fun and how to care about people and make them feel at ease and I think that's a lot more important than cooking or cleaning.

She had a rough life. She was nearly poisoned by a quack doctor at age 21 and spent almost a year in the hospital. It gave her a lifelong mistrust of doctors that basically shortened her life because she was afraid to take the medications she needed. It's funny how something like that can stick with you, even 60 years later. 

Her parents split up when she was a teenager and she was left to take care of her Dad and her 3 brothers and sisters. My grandfather owned a mine, so at times she had to cook for a whole crew of miners as well. She wasn't ever very lucky in love, so she was on her own for most of her life, although she managed to raise my sister and I pretty well. She worked from a very early age until she was about 70, mostly as an insurance agent, so money wasn't plentiful, but there was always enough, although we lived in some very rough neighborhoods at times.

Books were a big part of our lives - she taught me how to read when I was six and I was never without a book after that. We always had cats and she was always knitting or sewing or painting something, almost always for someone else. She loved to put together big care packages full of all sorts of stuff for anyone who was struggling in any way. She was generous to a fault and always had these crazy ideas for the latest and greatest business idea. I guess that's where I get my entreprenurial spirit from. 

Her biggest hope for me was that I would become a writer, so she would probably be thrilled that I have this blog. She'd probably have read it every day, although I would have had to print it out for her because she hated computers.

This is the last picture I have of her with my sister and I. It's a terrible picture of her, but I don't have any other digital pictures of her. I need to get busy and scan the paper ones I have. This was in the nursing home on her 80th birthday. We had a dozen or so family members there plus a few of the residents and nurses and she had an absolute ball. It wore her out so much, she never really regained her strength after that, but she had a great time. Her body was failing, but she was sharp as a tack and we were grateful for that. So, here's a mooch for you Mom - we love you and we miss you.

Why does he look like this? Well, one of the kids in his class, who is about 6 inches taller and about 25 lbs heavier, decided to chuck pinecones at him - hard. This kid was apparently held back a year (or two!) and he's the only 5th grader I've ever seen with the beginnings of facial hair. Blake has always had problems with other kids bullying him and it turns out that there are about 4 or 5 boys and even a few girls who are giving him a hard time this year. This just makes me sad - and angry! What the heck is wrong with all these kids?

Naturally, I went the rounds with the teacher and the principal. They talked to the kids and the parents and even offered to bring in a police officer, but it still hasn't stopped completely. He says that its pretty much an every day thing - teasing, name calling, excluding, just little nastinesses going on all day. It's hard to say because I never get a completely straight story out of him. I usually find out that things aren't exactly the way he says they are, but he definitely isn't having a great time at this school.

I've never had to deal with this kind of thing before and I don't really know what to do about it. I got a couple of books about it, but that just depressed me. Apparently, it's going to get worse in a couple of years when he hits Jr. High - a lot worse. Isn't that just delightful?

I mean, I can see why he's a bit of a target for these bullies. He's always been the smallest kid in his class and he has a way of acting that is much more innocent and immature than these other kids. Really, he's more like a 7 or 8 year old in a 10 year old's body, so I can see why that makes him stand out from the other kids and kids this age have exactly ZERO tolerance for anyone who is different. But what can we do about it? Give him growth hormones? Send him to boot camp to toughen him up? I don't think I want him toughened up - I rather like him the way he is, even if these little turkeys don't agree.

I'll tell you, home schooling starts looking more and more attractive in these kinds of situations. But I would stink at it. Plus I already have a job. I don't know. I guess we'll figure something out or hope it just blows over. But I'm sincerely glad it's Friday and tomorrow, I get to go with some of my friends for a fun day of stamping all day. And maybe I'll find a Margarita or two in there somewhere. Mommy's had a rough week!

I haven't shared anything about my Messy Mom's classes lately, mainly because I've been a busy bunny, but I am now halfway through my fourth class. I just can't tell you how much I am enjoying doing these classes. I think I really am a teacher at heart and I just love sharing all these good tips and new ideas I've accumulated over the years.

The nice thing is that I've seen some of my students (I'm not sure whether to call them students or clients?) have made some real progress. One lady removed 3 truckloads of "stuff" from her house. Another student finally created a place to sit and relax in her home. She literally did not have a square inch of her home where she could have some relaxation and privacy. One of my other students gives me a hug at the end of each session because she's so appreciative of the new ideas I am sharing with her.

The only downside to it is that I am terrible about the advertising end of things, so my classes have been tiny. Like really tiny. Three people in one class is my record. Not only am I not making much money this way, I feel like the classes aren't as good without all the sharing that would go on if I had six or more participants sharing their point of view and ideas.

I'm taking a bit of a break after this class finishes, so I can enjoy my holiday. But then I'm going to kick it into gear after the first of the year. I'm thinking I'm going to get someone to help me do some additional advertising and see if I can't beef up my classes. I figure the first of the year is a great time to catch all the New Year's Resolution traffic.

PS: For those who are new to my blog, I started these classes a couple of months ago. It's a four week series of classes I teach to help women who are "domestically challenged" to empower themselves to get their houses clean and organized. It's similar to the Flylady system, if you're familiar with that, but I also bring in a number of other sources.  It's almost like Weight Watchers for your house!  

Too bad it wasn't real money! We have something we do at work that is like a stock market game. I think it's really clever and it could be a real force for progress in my company. What they do is have employees submit ideas - all kinds of ideas. Some of them are very specific ideas that relate to a specific department or process, but other ones are very general ideas such as recycling paper or changing the way we run our ATM's. In case you don't know, I work in the back office of a large bank (which shall remain nameless for blog anonymity).

What they do is set it up like a stock market. Each idea has a starting price of $25 and each trader in the market is given $5,000 in play money to invest. As people invest in each idea, the price goes up, so if you can buy an good idea real cheap and hold onto it for a while, you can really score big. For instance, on Friday, I bought 150 shares of Solar Power for $40. It turned out to be the winning idea and it went up to $263 by the end of the day, so I made a ton of money.

The markets usually run for a week or two and the ideas that make it into the top rank get passed up to upper Management for possible implementation. Then every day, they post the top 10 traders out of the 400 traders and how much they earned. I'm very competitive and I usually like to be in the top 10 so I can be on the list.

This week, I was smokin' hot! This was the playoff market where they took all the top 16 ideas from the previous markets and did them kind of like basketball playoffs where they pit them against each other in brackets. We had to predict which ones were the winners in each brackets and place our trades accordingly. 

Luckily, I managed to pick EVERY single winner, so I tied for first place in the predictions. The guy I tied with was the creator of the whole stock market, so I think he had a bit of an advantage and I was pretty proud of myself for tying with him.

Then I managed to get into the market early enough to catch most of the winning ideas really cheap, so I was averaging about $5,000 a day in dividends. Sure enough, by the end of the week, I was the #1 trader as well as the winner in the predictions. There should be a prize in there somewhere for me, but I deleted all the E-mails, so I don't know what the prizes are, but I sure had a lot of fun. (PS: 10% of my dividends would be nice! I'm just saying....)