I need a vacation.......

I know, I just got back last week but we were only gone two days. It has taken me a week to get everything caught back up. Plus I had to finish working on my instructions for the beaded Chinese Lantern which are now posted! It is my first pattern uploaded to the site by me! Totally exciting!
On to other news, our trip was hit and miss. We had to switch hotels. Mike called before I made reservations and asked about pets. They said no problem we are pet friendly. I booked online for a better deal, nothing about pets on the site except it says pet friendly. When we got there to check in, $20 extra a night for Gizmo to stay with us! Now since we called and they didn't say that when Mike was talking to them about it, we didn't stay. Went down to Motel 6 where it was cheaper to begin with and Gizmo stayed free. I really wouldn't have minded paying if they would have said so on the phone before we booked but hey, I guess I won't make that mistake again. The things you learn being first time pet owners.
It was rainy and stormy on our first night. We went down to the beach at sunset and got to see some lightning from the car over the ocean after dark. That was pretty.
Went back to the hotel room and ordered pizza and played games. I am the new Yahtzee queen in my house. 6 (yes 6, S-I-X) Yahtzee's in one game!
Tuesday morning Colby woke up sick but after throwing up only once, wouldn't stay home so we trekked through the Monterey Bay Aquarium.
My favorite part is seeing the jelly fish.

The sardines that made Cannery Row famous.

My little mermaids.

The penguino's that JoJo is crazy about.

My little trooper.

He made it 3/4's of the way before he started to feel sick again. He slept for a while and felt better so we headed back to the beach. This time we got some great sunset pictures.


Then back home the next day.
I also made a decision to start selling my jewelry online. I decided to go with freewebs because they have the best options for the online store for the free sites that I looked at. Really thought about using ETSY but I am still a little anxious about posting there. I will make my official announcement of my "store" being open once I get a chance to photograph my merchandise.

Packing to ship... and a bald dog.

I am so excited that all of my winners have gotten back to me for OWOH. This was such a great experience. I am already looking forward to next year!
3 of my 4 winners are overseas so I wanted to make sure I found something I could send their prizes in that would keep it nice and safe for the long journey. I went to Target with the goal to find some cute little Valentine's heart tins.

I found these cute little padded jewelry boxes instead and had to get them! So now everything is packaged and addressed and will be sent Tuesday since Monday is a holiday here and post offices are closed.

I also finally got my Bead a Day Calendar from Tower.com. Not impressed. Their 5-15 days shipping took over 30. (I ordered a cell phone battery from E-bay the same day and the guy shipped from China, I had it in a week!) Couldn't get a live person to talk to and my e-mail response said they needed me to verify shipping address before they would look into anything. Considering I copied and pasted the shipping info into the e-mail I sent them, don't you think I would have noticed if the address was wrong?


On to another note. We have been having a problem with fleas. Gizmo's hair was so thick we couldn't get the stupid little bugs to die with flea shampoo. Flea collar was no help and the drops on his back were just not getting through his hair. After a few flea baths, we ended up with mats in his hair. Deciding to get 2 birds with 1 stone, we took him in and told them to shave him down. He hardly looks like himself!



This is him saying "Mama, how could you do this to me?"

Now what are the consequences of shaving a long haired dog? He shivers, constantly. Not good when we are planning a trip to Monterey Bay on Monday for a few nights. Off to Petsmart we went. Second time he has been in there, the first was the day after we got him when he was still a scardy dog and he coward in the cart. OMG he went nuts with all the smells in that place! We even managed to find him a jacket on clearance that is adorable!



I even found a flea bomb to set off for when we are gone. Die you stupid, biting little buggies! Ha Ha Ha Ha!

OWOH Winners!

Ugh sorry for the delay, our internet provider had an outage, at 11 pm on 2/11. My internet is finally back up this morning and I am racing to post before I go to work so here are my winners.

Random Integer Generator

Here are your random numbers:

101
171
86
91

Timestamp: 2009-02-13 15:53:13 UTC


First prize, pink flat spiral bracelet.
#101
Blogger Pike said...

So cute! Please enter me in the drawing!

Pirjo from Finland
pirjo.kallioniemi @ yahoo.com

#171 2nd prize, name badge holder.
Blogger Ellen said...

I love your earrings and the name badge very unusual. ( I'm not a pink girl)

thanks for your visit to my give away

February 11, 2009 2:13 AM

#86 3rd prize chain earrings.
Blogger Cheryl said...

Great giveaways! Please enter me and thank you for visiting my blog.

January 28, 2009 5:00 AM


#91 4th prize, purple earrings.
Blogger Sarah said...

These are very pretty!
Thanks for visiting me too.
Sarah :)

January 28, 2009 2:52 PM


Thanks to all who have participated! I had so much fun with this and can't wait to spend more time checking out all the great blogs!

Life getting in the way

It seems like I have had a lot going on in the last week or so. This has really shown here, where I haven't been in a while. Part of that is I have nothing new done so nothing new to post.
We are having some issues with my oldest daughters real father. He doesn't even deserve to be called that. He was out of the picture for 10 years, I never once said anything bad to Tori about him. For the last two years he has been in her life, all I have heard is how awful I am and how I ruined his and his wife's life.
Everything I did, I did with my daughters best interests at heart. I never did anything to be vengeful of him. She has been angry at me for years for him not being there. She held him on a pedestal, thrilled that he was back in her life.
He disappointed her on her birthday and Christmas this year, she didn't call him till Mike forced her to the other day. He made her feel guilty and I called him on it.
All the lies he told her and the blame he lays on me came out again, thrown in my face but this time in front of Tori. Up until now and even through all of this, I let her make her own decision of how to feel towards him. But what I won't do is stand idly by while he makes her feel bad.
His last words to her were you can look me up when you turn 18, he took her off his friends list and won't return her calls. His and his wife's inability to get over the past means he can't move forward to have a relationship with Tori. It disgusts me that someone can make the conscious choice to walk away from their own flesh and blood because he didn't like what I had to say when I stood up to him for my daughter.
It breaks my heart, not that he is out of the picture, but that he hurt her in a way she will carry with her for the rest of her life. She is hurt beyond measure and I can't fix this. I can't make him see that part of being a parent is sacrificing what we want for what is best for our children.
He has made it clear to me that he is also blaming me for this, I told Tori lies to make her hate him. Too bad he won't even hear Tori out to find out the real reason she is angry. No matter where he places the blame, he did this to himself. Tori is broken hearted and it will be Mike and I picking up the pieces. I hope she chooses to take this as a learning experience and that she will be a stronger person for it instead of being bitter and blaming everyone else for what bad things happened to her.