Horoscope

My Horoscope for today says:

"You might not be able to rationalize your optimism today, for your uplifting mood doesn't necessarily correspond to anything specific in your life at this time. Nevertheless, your thoughts have more power than usual, enabling you to use them to positively impact your future. Just be careful that you're not avoiding an issue that must be faced. Exerting control over your life is a smart idea as long as you aren't trying to escape from the truth."

Sort of sounds like Lucy telling Snoopy that he'd best be careful cuz he is in for a "Happiness Let-Down".

It's not so much that I'm optimistic. I just know that the sun is going to rise each day with or without me. So I may as well be present to enjoy it best I can.

The Bowling Ball

I started a project.... It began as a Bowling Ball sitting atop of a Jello Mold that I found at a thrift store.
It sat on my porch for the longest time. I would walk past it often, even sit beside it as each day it would ask "Is it time yet?' "No," I would say, "Today is not the day."

But then, Sunday, it rained. And it rained some more. And I said "This is a good day for a Rainy Day Project!" So I brought in the bowling ball and the other necessary items to begin this project. I started with Tile Glue and a broken mirror. It was fun breaking the mirror, and it didn't create nearly as many slivers as I had feared. I glued the mirror pieces to the ball, mixing in some blue stone for interest.



After letting that dry, I decided that I wanted it to be purple. So I mixed paint in with the grout.
When the glue was dry, I grouted the ball. I wasn't happy with the texture or color of the grout once I got it on the ball. So I got out a paint brush and I painted the grout a deeper purple.




It looks okay. I like it. It will look good in the front yard garden. But maybe I should have left the background white? Ah, too late now! But I can always keep an eye out for spare balls to do more in the future.

Right now, I have a protective poly coating drying on it. Then, I'll give it one more coating, let it dry, and set it free in my front yard.

My friend Toni said I ought to take it to the bowling alley and see how long it takes to freak out the manager! Ha ha! Great idea!

Don't Rain on My Parade!

I am feeling quite hopeful lately. The tides are churning and I think things are starting to flow in my direction.

I am getting a clearer vision of how I want my life to be. After all, it IS my life! And it is mine to mold as I see necessary.

I don't let rainy days get me down. I embrace them. I start a cool project. I think happy thoughts. I make my own sunshine!

Of course, I am ever mindful that this is Hubby's month. He would have been 46 on June 29. And yes, that sucks. But you know what? He doesn't want me sitting idle pining away for him. He wants me to move forward and be the strong woman I have been all of my life - only even better.

I'm making lists and starting plans. I am going to reach for my dreams.

To some, who are too afraid to reach for theirs, this may seem as though I am out of control. But in reality, I am simply continuing to produce magic in my universe. Get over it!

Hooray for weekends!

I tell myself all week that come Saturday, I can sleep in. So Saturday comes around, and, oh boy! I slept in a whole 30 extra minutes! Of course, it doesn't help that my little girl kitty decided she wanted to cuddle at 6AM and promptly decided to fart when I was snuggling her! NOT a good way to start a Saturday!

SO, I have my dishes washed, and my shower is scrubbed. I'm thinking I may get myself together and head on down to the Farmer's Market. I need to stop at the hardware store again any way!

While at the Art Show last week, my sis fell in love with these little bird houses that a vendor had. They are for decorative puropses only. I said "Why would you spend $30 on something that I can make you for free?" So.... I am obtaining supplies and getting ready to start manufacturing decorative bird houses. But first.... I must complete my other pending project!

I work with a gal named Anna who is purely magical! She only works part time with us because her REAL job is that she is an Artist. And a fabulous one at that!

She knows I love doing mosaics and such, and had mentioned a while back that a gal in the booth next to her at an art show was taking old bowling balls and broken mirror bits and was mosaicing the bowling balls as yard ornaments! What a brilliant idea! It'll look just "Trailer" enough to work in my yard, and will annoy the neighbors!

My only dilemma is breaking the mirror. If you break one by accident, you get 7 years bad luck. What happens if you intentionally smash one? Hmmmm.

May the Heavens Rejoice!

One of the hardest things about my job is that I get SO attached to my patients.
I walk their journey with them, and most times, the outcome is good. And then, sometimes, the coin is flipped.

Barbara would come in twice a week on the pretense of having her blood pressure taken - when in actuality, she just really loved coming in to see all of us. And she really brightened our day when she came in. When Jim was walking his journey, she was my cheer-leader, always sending up a prayer and ready with a hug any time I needed one. I am sure she knows how much she helped me get through that most difficult time.

I have on my work desk a little praying bear whose name is Hope. And when the time came when management told us we could only keep one personal item at our workspace, I insisted on keeping two - my current picture of Jerry, and Hope the Bear because it was a heart-felt gift from Barbara when she knew I was at my lowest threshold of strength.

Barbara was SO amazing! She became ill not long after my Jimmy passed away, and was eventually diagnosed with Lymphoma. And she fought a very brave fight right up to the end. At one point, we thought she was winning this battle, even though the statistical odds were so stacked up against her. She was feeling well enough to come in like old times for a blood pressure check and was smothered with hugs from all of us.

Some of our patients need love, while others share their love. Barbara was such a beautiful lady with the purest of hearts. And I really hate that I received this news on a Monday - the busiest of days, when I am forced to keep going and pretend I am cheerful, when inside, I really just want to lock myself in a restroom and cry for my loss.

My last conversation with her was on June 2. She called to say she wasn't doing so well, and was going to spend some time in the ICU. And instead of dwelling on her own issues, she asked me how my baby is doing. And when I told her that he is doing very well these days, she sounded so happy to hear that. And then she said "Can I ask you a question? You don't have to answer if you don't want to, if it's too hard for you"

I said "Of course you can ask me a question, Barbara."

"We're coming up on the one year anniversary of losing Jim, aren't we? How are YOU doing?"
My response was "Well, we've just passed that anniversary at the end of March. But we got through it. I have wonderful friends and family, and I am very blessed."

She apologized for missing the date, and I said she had her own battles to fight, and I would never feel slighted if she forgot such things. And I told her to hang in there and to know that I love her.

The hard thing is, I had Friday off, and thought "Hey! I could go visit Barbara today!" But it just never happened.

And just yesterday, I FINALLY found the perfect gift at the Art Fair to give to her - it is a beautiful poem:



But she does know that she was and will always be in my heart and in my thoughts. I am very blessed to have had my life touched by such a wonderful lady. And I can just imagine, once she is finished hugging all of the loved ones she knows up in heaven, that she is going to stop and say "So now which of you Angels is my Brenda's Jim? I need a hug from you too, Buster!"

Pandora

I'm a bit late in jumping on this train. I always knew it was out there, but Hubby was always so afraid of web sites like this, fearing that it was loaded with spam and viruses. But, DANG! I really wish we had downloaded this when he was still around.

We shared many a night listening to Jazz music and drinking wine and talking about whatever was on our minds. And I loved those nights - except when he would play Ole What's His Face Experimental Jazz Dude's stuff.... his name escapes me right now....

But with Pandora, all you have to do is choose a few artists and genres, and it grabs others like it to compliment the set. And I have a pretty groovy Jazz Channel going at the moment. I started out with George Benson - whom I adore, and Sting.... and Pandora added David Sandborn, Quincy Jones and many others. Jim would have loved this!

And although this makes me miss him, it also helps me to remember the good times we shared. And that makes it all worth the trip.

Is it REALLY summer?

As it turned out, I needed to take the day off work for The Child's first day of summer vacation. DARN!

He had said over a week ago that he wanted me to make him French Toast for breakfast for his first official day of summer. I said "No can do!" But as it turned out, he got his wish!

It's too cold and rainy today to be out working in my yard, so I have been plugging away at random housework tasks as the day goes on. The house is nowhere near clean, but looks MUCH better than it did when I woke up this morning!

For motivation, I turned on Pandora Radio. It's fun! Not every song is one I would have chosen, but many are old favourites.

I did some shopping on Overstock.com last weekend and most of my shipment came in. This is the first time that I am really not happy with my purchases and will likely return them. Wow. What was I thinking?

Any way, I now have a camera that works, so I am able to post pictures of my front yard landscape job. I wish I had taken a Before Picture, because it really looked like hell!
Note there is a new rose bush off to the left. There has always been one on the right side of the house and has always looked unbalanced. So now, there are two. Hopefully, they will bloom at different times each year. The original one usually blooms in the fall. The new one was blooming gorgeous yellow roses when I bought it. It has to establish itself yet. We shall see how it fares in its new home.


I created a little walking path so that I can water my potted plants without trampling all of the ground plants. Of course the hyacinth plants were all done blooming and ready to go away by the time I got to start this project, so even though they are all in the ground, they look quite peaked. But next year, it will look quite lovely. I was able to break up the larger bulb groups and spread them among the other plants. I hope I have random blooming plants all through spring, summer and fall.

So there you have it! Now, any hot young Blog Stalkers who worship my blog can simply search my city for this awesome landscaping job and drop by to worship me in person. Um.... yeah. That'll happen.


Tomorrow is the third annual Aurora 5K Walk/Run for Cancer. I love that they always choose a date somewhere around the anniversary of my Father's death. It makes it a bit more meaningful for all of us as we do the walk. Our group is smaller this year, but that's okay. It's not an easy trek.

Sunday is the Art Fair at South Park! Yay! I love that! And the really nice thing about this, is that I was stressing on the dilemma that I should really be making arrangements to go visit my #1 son on Sunday. But I saw him today instead, so all is well..... well..... okay, they could be better, but I can't fix all of his problems. He is a grown man after all.

I swear I have the attention span of a gerbil these days. I need to get back on task! Hope you all have a wonderful weekend as well!

Weekends just end far too soon!

This was such a nice weekend!
Friday night, I finished up my landscaping, and had a nice relaxing evening.
Saturday morning, my sis and I went to the Farmer's market in the morning where we found a guy who makes metal flowers. I just had to buy four of them for my new landscaping.

Saturday afternoon, The Child and I went shopping. We were both low on summer clothes.

Then, Saturday evening, we went to Gallery Walk. Or was that Pub Walk? We didn't see much art, but it was an adventure! And after that, we went to the home of my sister's friends for a fire.

Yesterday was a fairly lazy day spent beading and doing light housework. And then my friend Rick texted me and said he was really in the mood for whiskey. So he came over for a few cocktails and we watched the movie Christine! I haven't seen that in forever! We topped it off with dinner from Niko's Gyros which is always spectacular.

Alas, it is now Monday. Sigh.

If only my camera worked!

The front yard landscaping is COMPLETED!!!!!!
I just love it!
It took 12 bags of lava rock and 83 bricks and I don't even want to think about how much I spent on plants, but it looks very nice at the moment! My new rose bush is adapting to its new home and flowering once again, as are the clamatis shrubs! YAY!!!!!

Rebooting solves everything!

At work the other day, our computers kept crashing.
I notified Tiff in I.T. that we were having issues, and she said to try re-starting our computers and see if that solves our problems.
I messaged her that Candy was in the process of doing just that, and I will keep her posted.

A moment later, I sent her this message: Re-booting seems to have solved all of Candy's problems! Her hair has never been shinier, she has received an increase in pay, her kids have never been more behaved, and her co-workers are now off fetching her chocolate! I have GOT to TRY this!

So I re-booted as well, and then sent her another message: Rebooting has also solved all of MY problems! Our Troops are on their way home, and Brad Pitt just proposed!

Her response: Yeah, Brad called me too!

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! =)