Love Me Some Ladies

Had day 19 of the challenge fallen on day two when I was still a very new blog-owner-virgin my list may have been a little different. My love for this greatness has grown immensely and I am blessed with all the new found blogs I am enjoying.

My entrance into the world of blogging started out in a little way, with a pretty big blog (though I didn't realize how big she was until later).  I started reading The Pioneer Woman back when I had some down moments at work.  I am not sure how I found her but I loved her instantly! It may have been early blogger romance or the fact that I like to live somewhat vicariously through people.  A huge bucket list, pipe-dream of mine is to turn Babe into a cowboy and move out to the middle of nowhere and live on a ranch feeding chickens and raising babies "away from it all".
Ree is a city turned country girl (whose above man hunk rides a horse, 'nuf said) and lives on a huge working cattle ranch way out yonder. Now she has a show on the Food Network and books galore.  I only stop by once a week now but still love her for, among other things, what she opened my eyes to... Blogging. 

Somewhere along my searching for other blogs I found Fairy Tales are True!

The title jumped out at me in an "Oh, really? This thing I am in is nothing like they told me it would be growing up." But Sarah's definition and words and beautiful pictures quickly showed me that it is all a matter of perspective.  The way she embraced life (even the though moments) helped me realize that our "fairy tales" are what we make them. I did a little more vicarious living here as she was an ex-pat when I first started following.  I was thinking "girlfriend, you got guts" but her story and the pictures (oh the pictures) made this weary international traveler almost want to pack her bags and say "hey I think I could move over there, Babe let's go".  Now she is back in the US of A and I still find myself living somewhat vicariously watching her hubs bring her breakfast in bed while her gorgeous little man sits cuddled in her arms. She is still a blog I read daily and also how I think I found this girl...

Jenni, whose gushing on you can read here, quickly became my go to gal! Sometimes you live vicariously through another's stories and then sometimes you find one that just seems to fit your soul.  The girl speaks to me! End of story.

I also frequent Carolina Charm because 1.) I went to high school with her and it is kind of fun to see where people end up and 2.) she is another blogger that is a lot of things I am not.  She is organized, her house stylish and immaculate and she has great projects like this one and this one.

Someday I will make this book wreath but mine will include pages from Harry Potter (yes I am going to deface him but it is for a good cause and I have been collecting torn copies from thrift stores). 

Since this challenge though I have found other greatness to love on!

Shay is becoming a true 'head-over-heels, I'm-in-blogger-love' read! I am loving the beauty in her writing. Sharing her story and her journey is a gift that she willingly opens to us.  It draws me in and there are so many times that I read a post and come away with chills.

I am also loving Ashley at Piloting Life.

The changes that go along with her lifestyle and the hubs job are enough to give me the willies but she is embracing the moments as they come. I love her insights and am growing quite fond of her.  And dude?! She saw a whale off Florida's east coast.  I have practically grown up over there and never in all my years seen such a sight! Jealous! 

Ok, so that's six and I feel like this list could go on and on but what can I say?! I am me; I am indecisive and I can gush about people I am loving until I am blue in the face.  Hoping you have a wonderful end to your weekend! Any greatness come your way these last few days? Even just a little great relaxation? That's what I took part in! 

Disney Dreams and Runaways

It's Day 18 and we are to share a vivid childhood memory.  There are quite a few I can think of and for the most part they are good and blissful and filled with childhood wonder.  The following story is in no way a direct reflection of any of that.  Instead you will read a tale of a runway, an interstate, and the police.  You have been warned! And no the reason for running away had nothing to do with the fact that my mother decided to dress me as her twin in the above picture. Bless the dear daughter that I will probably end up doing the same to as some point in time.

This is a story that has been told time and time again.  By me, by my parents, by pretty much anyone who has heard it to anyone who hasn't.  The story has not changed once in all it's many years.  It needs no embellishment.  You see as a young child I had a flair for the dramatic.  I tended to run away on occasion when I felt as if my poor soul had been violated.  This is the beginning of all of that (or at least the beginning of me running away to some place outside the neighborhood).

The scene starts like this: I was right around 8 years old.  I had this neat bicycle with pink and purple glitter writing.  My older sister was staying with us for the weekend (she lived with her mom during the week) and I idolized her.  I can't remember everything leading up to it but she called me a rat or something of the sort and I thought that she liked my friend more than me (because my friend was just kind of cooler and a lot more like my sister) and so I was upset.  I got on my bike and decided that I was moving to Disney.  I knew the general direction and so off I set.  Me, my 8 year old self, and my bicycle.

En route to Disney I passed a neighbor as I was leaving the neighborhood and told him where I was headed.  He seemed to have no intention of stopping me as he assumed - I'm sure - that I was just some kid playing pretend.  Crisis averted, it was meant to be that I should live at Disney.  I took the long way around (by mistake) because I went down a one way exit from the airport going to opposite direction (yup, riding against the flow of traffic).  After about an hour I finally arrived at the Bee Line (now called the Beach Line) that takes you towards the beaches or Disney (even at 8 I knew how to make my way to the land of magic and happiness).  However, the Bee Line is a toll road highway.  I 1.) did not have change to pay the toll and 2.) did not know if they would allow me to pass through on my bike.  So, as any 8 year old would do, I stopped my bike on the side of the highway to try to figure out how I would solve this problem.

As my young brain is processing this dilemma, the following occurred.  My mom has realized I am missing and called the police.  An off duty cop who was taking his step-son home saw a young kid on the side of a highway and thought, "hmmm, maybe I should see what is going on." Said cop (really nice guy), in his uniform, pulls over and comes to talk to me.  He asks me what I am doing.  Oh man, now I have to process quickly.  So I tell him that I am just out for a bike ride and I live in the apartments that are right off the entrance to the highway (good gracious was I stubborn and persistent; I just freaking lied to the Popo).  He says that I should not be on the highway and to wait where I was.  This side of the story I know from my mother.  Cop gets on his cop radio and calls into dispatch, who is still on the phone with my mom, he relays that there is a young girl on the highway at least an hours bike ride from our house (my mom didn't know I had been gone so long). The dispatcher tells this information to my mom who answers "oh there is no way that could be her." She was wrong! After a detailed description of the child and the bike my mother realizes that her child is on a highway.  I am then loaded into the car with the cop, who offered to take me home (a ten minute drive), and his step-son. And that pretty much sums up my daring escape to the land of happiness.  In hindsight it is a fun story to tell, but let's pray my future daughter has less of my tendencies and more of her fathers.  

Needless to say I didn't really go anywhere for a while... until the next time I ran away, this time at night and with my younger brother, when we had our Gameboys taken away.  How I am still alive to tell this tale I have no clue but thank the heavens above that I was found by the right people.
What about y'all? Any other fellow runaway aficionados out there? 

Freezing Moments

It's Day 17 and Jenni is really not doing this indecisive girl any favors.  I have quite a few favorite pictures; I like them all really.  And no, this is not in a "toot-my-own-horn, I-think-I-am-a-looker" type of way.  Pictures to me signify memories.  Some of my favorite pictures are ones that I look horrible in but I love them because the memory behind them and knowing how I felt the moment the picture was snapped means so much more than whatever type of mess I might look like (like when I shared this memory).  So you get two pictures for today and can expect to see the rest of the ones I came across while hunting for these in day 28's post. 

The moment I saw this picture I was in love with it.  I know you can't see my face and no it is not just me.  Typically my favorite pictures never include just me, they always include some of my people and having my little people in them is just icing on the cake.  I love my little people.  It is so crazy to believe how much he has grown since this day. 

There is one that includes just me that, while not the best picture of me, pretty much sums up the feelings of my wedding morning for me and stops me every time I see it (it's also just pretty me in general).  I was anxious and curious. I wanted to see Babe before he saw me, I wanted to see how and where people were sitting and I wanted to know what I could expect to find out those back doors before I even thought of venturing out into what would be the rest of my life.  

* Photos courtesy of Nu Visions in Photography

I really enjoyed going through old photos as I made sure these were the ones I wanted to post.  I can't wait to see everyone else's.  

I Need Botox!

Hoping this picture of the waters of the Pacific helps bring me some peace before publishing this post...

It's day 16 of the challenge and I was going to go all deep and into big areas of my some of my "lots in life" but since I did some of that in this post here I thought I would go a little lighter. You now get to be let in on a big "secret" of mine. I am sharing this mainly because I am currently sitting with Wally (my person) and her sister and I told them they could pick my lot in life (who ever said trusting your friends was a good idea?!). Now that the issue is the only thing on my mind I probably won't be able to focus enough to write on anything else. So, the following is what you get! Though as I type I am seriously now sweating bullets thinking about posting this. It's not as if people I meet in public don't know that it can happen. On occasion, my "secret" can be pretty noticeable. This is not a secret that I am totally excited about sharing and something I try (in vain) to hide in public. 

I need Botox!! No, it is not what you're thinking (though as this thing called aging seems to increase wrinkles, I may need it in between the eyes soon too).  I need Botox in my armpits! I sweat glisten, A LOT!! It is embarrassing and horrible and total suckage (yes I said suckage).  It goes somewhat hand in hand with the clothes I can and can't wear and the fact that I stick very closely to my comfort zone of "fashion sense".

Though I will probably never get Botox because I have no idea how my body may react to that stuff and I don't want some foreign toxins floating around in my body I consider it all the time.  I have pretty much self diagnosed myself with hyperhydrosis (because I'm a doctor and all that).  Right now I am working to overcome it by the awesome deodorant regiment that I honestly think is just in my head, but hey, it seems to help.  I shower and immediately coat my armpits with three swipes of Clinical Strength Secret and then in the morning when I wake up (or when I dress if I am leaving right after I shower) I coat each pit with 5 swipes of Degree.  Yes, this is a science people and, yes, I do count! When and why and how it seems to happen has no rhyme or reason as one moment all will be perfectly fine and the next moment it's as if someone has turned a faucet on full blast.  I am waiting to try the new Stress Induced Secret stuff.  Fingers crossed that it rocks and drys these puppies up like the Sahara. 

Until I have figured out the exact science for getting this whole thing under wraps I will continue to constantly wear tanks or t-shirts, baby powder those suckers when needed, and learn to embrace the fact that my underarms will always be just a "tad bit" moist.

*As I am sitting here freaking out and reading this post aloud to Wall she asks "Do you feel free now? Maybe, you will feel better the more you share it." Well, here's to hoping I guess.  Right now I am just sweating!

Ten Happy Things for Tuesday

It's day 14 of the blog everyday in May challenge.  Below is a list of things that put the above smile on my face and make me happy!

1.) My friends make me happy.  The ones who, despite knowing all the grizzly details of my life, have stuck by me through thick and thin.

2.) Babe makes me happy. He has this knack for making me smile even while he is pissing me off! He is just this calming, constant force that seems to keep me at peace.

3.) My little people make me very happy!! I could spend all day with them and smile through it all, even the tantrums and the defiance and the dirty diapers (or better yet when they decide to take said diaper off during their nap so that I walk in on a naked bottomed baby asleep with a dirty diaper at the foot of the crib, yes even through that I will smile. I mean how could I not with a face this cute?!).

4.) My family makes me happy, though this one does tend to have its conditions.  Happiness will ensue but so will "pull-my-hair-out, your-making-me-nutso" chaos.  Sometimes chaos seems to make me happy (though not necessarily in the blissful way; more so the familiar-old-friend way). Product of my environment?... I think that might be so.

* If you haven't noticed people make me happy! Sometimes people also frustrated the heck out of me, but I tend to look towards the optimistic when it comes to people, so... happy, people make me happy.

5.) Blogging (and blog people... see more people?!) makes me happy.  I am loving this niche I have found.  This little (or not so little, really) world inside the big world we live in.

6.) BOOKS!! These treasures make me happy.  Content, happy and at peace.  Add a hot bath into the mix and this girl has found herself a little slice of heaven on earth.

7.) Disney makes me happy! I told Babe on our trip that I sometimes think to myself that Disney really isn't the happiness ensueing place I think it is and that I make it happier in my mind when I am not there.  Nope, that's a wrong assumption.  It truly does make me happy and blissful and full of life-loving-gaiety when I am there.  True story! Catch me at Disney and you catch me happy; like kid-in-the-worlds-biggest-candy-shop happy!

8.) Tennessee makes me happy! I don't know what it is but Tennessee has always kind of just been my peaceful, happy place.  Maybe it's the people?! My Tennessee people rock! Life there just seems a little more laid back, a little more at ease, and everyone just seems to take life's punches and let them roll.  They don't really seem to sweat the small stuff.  Maybe it's all a matter of perception or the fact that we go in the summer and life is usually a little different in the summer anyways but Tennessee and it's people?! They know how to live well.  It is the one other place I would live if I didn't live here.

9.) Traveling makes me happy.  Granted this too has it's conditions because if the set-up isn't just so (as in takes place within the U.S. or on a cruise boat and I know where I am going) then I get a little anxious.  Road trips especially excite me! I could road trip it all day as long as I have a good book in my lap (and I'm sitting in the front seat or have had a Bonine, otherwise this traveler is an unhappy mess of car sickness).

10.) Happiness!! Happiness and contentment make me happy.  When I am happy or even just at peace I try to soak it in, fill up my happiness meter like it's a solar panel, because I'm going to need it to call upon when the seas get a little rough.

I loved today's topic. It is nice to think that I could keep going and that the list could do on and on (sunshine, sweet iced tea, fire in the fireplace on a cold night, God, Harry Potter).  It's nice to focus on all the things I have to be happy and thankful for.  My wish for every soul out there is that their list is long and that it grows everyday.