What an Honor!

I have won quite a few awards with this photo (pictured above), which I titled "In Memory" but the greatest one came today......

I'm being inducted into the 2008 Class of International Photographers Society Hall of Fame

this is also the same Society I have won 3 previous awards with in 2001, '04 and '07. The '01 and '04 awards, they gave me an all expense paid trip to the awards ceremony. Too bad that's not going to happen this year :( I've already talked to them. Since I can't afford the trip, I decided I will just submit a video tape of me accepting this honor. But still this is so freakin cool!

Never Argue with a 2 1/2 yr old

You'll never win an argument with a 2 1/2 yr old because in the end all they will do is leave you laughing. Case in point today, my daughter insists in calling our space shuttle magnet an airplane. It was a really silly of me to argue with her but it drives me crazy to think she is identifying something wrong. So it went like this...

K: Momma look airplane
M: No, that's the space shuttle.
K: No, it's an airplane
M: No sweetie, it's a space shuttle or rocket ship
K: Rocket Ship? Nope it's an airplane
M: No it's a rocket ship (since obviously she understood that word). It goes into space to look for aliens (she is really into aliens).
K: Aliens on airplane
M: No Aliens fly rocket ships
K: (leaves room) Grandma, airplane.
G: No I think Momma called it a rocket ship or space shuttle
K: No, Airplane! (comes back into see me) Momma this is airplane (making sure to show me the magnet)
M: No it's a space shuttle
K: airplane
M: space shuttle
K airplane
M: rocket ship
K: rocket ship
AH HA, Reverse psychology!! Doesn't always work on someone so young.
K: FINE! It's a rocket ship
She then starts to walk in other room, stops and turns around and puts the magnet up to her ear like a phone. And then I hear this pretend conversation
"Hi YeYe this K. Momma say rocket ship has aliens. Mmhmm. Yeah. I know. Momma wrong it airplane. Mmhmm. Ok. ByeBye. Love you."
At this point I'm laughing so hard. I can't believe she pretends to tell on me to her Great-Grandpa. You just got to love her.

What have we been up to?

1. working on folk art items for the show which is next weekend
2. playing with K
3. K's first pony ride
4. visit with Great-Grandma
5. 2hr drive to attend a visitation of a man I didn't know
6. hugging someone who carried a burden of guilt for over 5 years and watching that burden lift from her after we talked
7. realizing how much time has passed by and how I barely know my Little Cousin's anymore
8. realizing yet again how angry my Uncle makes me
9. realizing yet again how frustrating my Grandparents can be, especially driving up to the visitation of a man they do not know and wasting the money because they didn't think we would represent the family well enough.
10. trying to arrange services so K can start therapeutic riding
11. realizing my life is not leading in the direction I want it too and realizing I need a life makeover
12. pondering if C's adoption is really going to happen from China
13. staying off the computer not for lack of time but just not enough energy to get on
14. praying for K's godmother who had a relapse and wishing I could be there to help

15. Trying to create meals with only the food we have in the house, it's been a great and really fun challenge

Our blown out window, if you look out the window, you can see all the flooding

K laying on the floor, actually she is protesting since I was working on some stuff and not giving her my full undivided attention

Dinner tonight, Enchilada Pie, all the ingredents only cost me $5.29. I need to have a show, how to feed a family of 4 on only $30.00 a week or less.

K pretending to be a Kangaroo, she is trying to jump

I decided to try this since it was on my friend, Sara's blog I have always been an Independent when it comes to voting but have also leaned a little more towards the democratic side but per this it says I'm more republican. It all has to do with the questions they asked because I'm totally on opposite sides of the spectrum on alot of these issues that they mentioned.

Your Vote Score: 56% Republican, 44% Democrat

You are truly an independent voter, and you don't fit well with either party. Maybe you should choose one issue to vote on - or look into third parties!

Should You Vote Republican or Democrat?

BOA Club

Wow, oh, Wow!!! Well my Cousin did come through with the tickets. I cannot even begin to tell you how awesome our night was. It was so great to pretend that we were super rich and could actually afford to buy these tickets, which cost $115 a piece. The other thing that was awesome was there was no hassles that we only had 2 tickets (one for me and Mom) and K didn't have one (she is 2 yrs old or younger and gets in to the stadium for free but we weren't sure how things would be when it's an exclusive area). They even gave her a drink cup and the special bracelet that said we belonged to this particular club. It was so cool because we saw parts of the Stadium that unless yo have access to BOA you don't get to see it. Plus all the attendants were so nice, they opened doors, wiped off your seats, etc. Sorry I just keep repeating myself because we had so much fun.

New Creations

Well this week, other than waiting to hear about callbacks from jobs, I also worked on hair bows since we were accepted into a local folk art show to sell our wares. The competition for the shows around here are rough to get a spot and we were lucky when they choose us as 1st time people.
So I've been toying around with lots of different methods of hair bows and I made these, Minnie Mouse Ear bows. I think they are adorable but I guess my question is, would you buy these? I mean seriously I don't want to waste my time if there is no market for them, so please let me know what you think!

Oh yeah, please disregard all the crap in the background, we are using our front room as our craft area so the place is an absolute mess. Otherwise, we initially thought we would visit Great-Grandma this weekend and have lunch/dinner together and attend the Festival of Nations. Then the plans changed to just having dinner with her since we have so much crap to do in the morning tomorrow. But then I got a call this evening from one of my long-lost Cousins and in some weird kindness act, he offered to give me 2 tickets to tomorrow nights baseball game, not only that but they are luxury box seats with all you can eat and drink privileges. So we will see how this pans out tomorrow. We have to meet up with him to get the tickets, so I hope this works out because how freakin cool is this going to be.

Labor Day

Well this weekend we spent working on stuff for a craft festival. I feel like I made no progress at all on building up my inventory for my bows. I mean I got alot done but I guess not as much as I had hoped to do. Otherwise we didn't do much of anything else the entire weekend, we ducked our heads outside for a few minutes here and there but it was too hot to be outside. The whole month of September for us is suppose to be hotter than any other month this year. Which honestly makes you think more and more about global warming and going entirely green. We have done really good about cutting our energy costs this year and especially this summer. We have been keeping the thermostat at 80 and using fans to circulate the air and keep us cool, which resulted in cutting our energy use by 75% from last year (we had our thermostat at 76 last year) at the same time. It's amazing what those few degrees on the thermostat can do, I mean yeah it's a little hot but at least the air conditioner isn't running 24/7.

Well here are 2 pictures from last week, I haven't downloaded my camera from the weekend, not that I took many pictures. I've really been slacking in that department.