However Although Thus Several Several

I think it's neat how

1) Because he's still just as precious as ever, I'm not embarrassed to say that I had the BIGGEST most ridiculous crush on Donny Osmond when I was a child.

2) Taking a class or two can make me forget (for a moment) to dread going back to work the next morning. 

3)  Acquiring a MacBook Pro can make life so much easier. Oh, Apple. Sigh.

4) The snake on our porch knew better than to show up when I was around.

5) There are college kids around here (mostly male) who impress me daily with their wisdom, intelligence and maturity. (Maybe a total of 3?)

6) I haven't killed any of the ones who don't fit in the above category - yet.

7) Smucker's Uncrustables now come on whole wheat bread.

8) Macy Gray doesn't give a flying rat's ass what anyone thinks about her.

9) Kelly Osborne can even get out of bed - much less ballroom dance.

10) I have so much free time I can spend my evenings watching such nonsense rather than reading the 75 chapters and 92 articles I've been assigned to read.   

That's all for now.

Lordy, Lordy

Where has all the time gone? (My grandmother used to say that. She started lots of sentences with "Lordy, Lordy.")

Quick update from my fabulously exciting life:

We had a grand time at the beach last weekend. If you sneak over to the 365 blog (I finally updated it!) you might see some photos from the quick trip.

I'm back in school. I saw you roll your eyes. I'm taking two classes this semester - one infinitely more interesting than the other - in pursuit of a PhD in Higher Ed. Again, I saw you roll your eyes.

I survived the back-to-school book rush at work and so far (knocking on wood) I don't have swine flu. I'm actually off for the three day weekend, and I had hoped we could go visit Hank, but Smudge has flu and mono (She never does anything half ass) so I'm staying as far away from that house as possible.

Football starts tomorrow. It's a strange feeling to simultaneously dread and love something so much.

I'll be back one day soon - assuming my Cultural Psychology professor does not succeed in his plan to make me throw myself off of Bibb Graves Hall.

Winners in my world

Random Integer Generator

Here are your random numbers:

2

Timestamp: 2009-07-20 22:00:30 UTC

And so here you go - winner of the book is the second commenter, Melinda Wilson:

LOL!!! I am very guilty of this. Do you remember back "just a COUPLE of years ago when we were in our early teens" (lol) and we would ready those harlequin romance books? If the guy looked dorky or "too proper", I wouldn't read the book!

Posted by: Melinda Wilson | July 17, 2009 at 01:43 PM

Melinda, email your snail mail address to me at mandyj318@aol.com and I will get the book in the mail to you as soon as possible. And yes, I do remember that very situation a time or two.

Thanks, y'all, for playing, and for admitting that you've done the same thing (judged a book by its cover).

I also wanted to mention that Jimmy Carter is a major winner in my book. Click here for details. Amen, brother.

I come by it honestly

My dad is retiring from his longtime news anchor gig this month. I'm having a hard time believing he is old enough to retire...but he insists it will be just fine. As part of the celebration / remembrance of his career at the TV station where he works, the evening news has featured stories lately on his favorite things. Naturally his dogs won the "Who are Daddy's favorites" competition. Even though my human sisters and brother and I aren't even mentioned in this story - I like it.

Father's Day

The baby birdies have hatched! I can see the very tippy tops of their heads through the front door window. If the mama weren't so scary looking I might try to get closer, but I can tell she would kick my ass. And I have a long standing fear of birds.

Another bird comes to visit every now and then. I'm assuming he is the daddy because all he does is stand beside the nest looking very uninterested while the mama flies off to run some errands. As soon as she comes back, he takes off. Interesting.

Speaking of mama / daddy stuff - I'm supposed to be in the delivery room with my sister when Hank is born so I've been preparing myself by watching births on YouTube. Oh my. Just when you think you have seen it all. Today I watched a woman giving birth unattended in her home. UNATTENDED. Meaning only her husband was present and she was in this kiddie pool looking thing screaming like a wild animal and out comes a baby. Sweet Mother of God. It was unreal. Whyyyyy? Don't get me wrong - I'm impressed, but it was more like the kind of impressed you are when you see someone bungee jump. I'm not sure all that's really necessary these days. Granted I've never had a baby, but I'm thinking I would choose another option. And I'm also thinking I would have kicked that useless husband with his video camera to the curb a long time ago.

Not much else has happened around here. Well, even saying that makes me laugh because of all of the DRAMA that seems to be floating around my life these days. Lots of nonsense. There's none of it I particularly want to discuss at this point. Simply because discussing it all might interfere with my plan of IGNORING it all. Denial is a beautiful thing.

Two more cards and a WINNER

I used random.org for the first time ever to select a winner for the Cards For Heroes Memorial Day Blog Hop contest I ran this past weekend. That was helpful! I just need to learn how to copy the screen to here...maybe later. Anyway, the winner is comment #19. See?

Here are your random numbers:

19

Timestamp: 2009-05-26 16:43:31 UTC

And this was comment #19:

great card; thanks for supporting Cards for Heroes.

Posted by: Loni | May 23, 2009 at 08:25 PM

Congrats, Loni! You've won two handmade cards...by none other than moi. Thanks for hopping by. If you will email me with your contact info and what type cards you would like (birthday, Father's Day, ???), I will get right on it.

I enjoyed the hop so much that I made a couple more cards in the red, white and blue theme to show you:

 

You can still hop from blog to blog and check out the work. And Cards for Heroes needs cards all year long, so even if you are reading this next year - I'm sure they would love your help. Read more about the organization here: http://cardsforheroes.org/

Thanks again for stopping in and for all of your comments. I had such a great time finding blogs and looking at beautiful craftiness all weekend...a bright spot in an otherwise rainy and dreary weekend.

Things are hoppin'!

If you have landed here as a result of the Cards For Heroes (CFH) Memorial Day Blog Hop - Welcome! If you've landed here because you are my pal or regular reader and just wanted to see what ill fortune had befallen me today - you're in for a surprise. So far it has been a good day complete with breakfast at Waffle House! YES!

So on to the blog hop...Cards For Heroes is an organization that supports our nation's armed forces by sending them blank handmade cards to write home on as well as cards of gratitude to encourage them. CFH has sent over 140,000 cards to troops so far, and you can read the messages and see the pictures on their website that demonstrate how grateful these troops are for this. Here's a link to their site: http://cardsforheroes.org/

CFH is hosting a Memorial Day Blog Hop this weekend. I encourage you to hop from blog to blog to see all of the lovely cards that have been made to send to our troops. You can start anywhere in the chain, but if you want to start at the top of the link list- it can be found here: http://cardsforheroes.org/bloghop/ 

At the end of each blog entry there's a link to the next person's blog. Make sure you keep hopping and commenting because CFH will be giving away prizes all weekend to those who leave comments on our blogs. I will give away two handmade cards to one commenter via random drawing Monday evening, so be sure to leave me some love. I will even let the winner tell me what type card they want (i.e. birthday, anniversary, etc.)

Our theme for the hop this weekend was red, white and blue. I rocked a little Jenni Bowlin love and created this one:

 

Here's the inside with some room for writing home:

I plan on making several more as I've decided this is one way I can use my papercrafting to show the men and women of our armed forces how much I appreciate them. I have been so inspired by reading the stories on the Cards For Heroes site. I hope you will take a moment to learn more about their work and then hop from blog to blog to meet some AMAZING people and see some AMAZING talent.

So now it's time for you to hop on to the next person. Cindy is up next. I had so much fun looking around her blog last night. Clearly she has been making cards longer than I have. And I loved her creative style (Check out those artsy cards she made just last week. Awesome!) I can't wait to look at the over 100 other blogs participating in the hop, too. Always fun to meet new folks, and add more feeds to my Bloglines!

Thanks for stopping by and be sure to leave a comment for a chance to win prizes from CFH and a chance to win two handmade cards from moi. Here's Cindy's address: http://kodiakstamper.blogspot.com/2009/05/memorial-day-celebration.html

Hop along now.

Remedy

I have a suggestion for you. If you ever want to be reminded of your blessings or of the good things in your life, write a blog post about how bad your life sucks. I've spent the last couple of days thinking that I'm a big baby and that I need to get over myself. I'm sure I'm not the only one who has thought that about me lately.

Truth be told - lots of good and downright wonderful things have happened over the last twelve months as well. Just to name a few:

My little bro, Matt, and his girlfriend, Shannon, got engaged! Remember them? We're really excited for them...big wedding and lots of Chattanooga fun coming up the weekend of July 11th.

PJ's parents celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary. We had a fun weekend away at Callaway Gardens with the whole family at the end of the summer to celebrate. I'm supposedly working on a scrapbook about their marriage, but I haven't had the time to finish it yet. I'm so looking forward to spending some hours putting it together this summer. I love looking at their photos from over the years. They've got a sweet story that needs documenting.

In other travel news - I got to go to the Scrap, Etc. Event in Nashville last spring. We took a really fun vacation to our favorite beach spot in July. And I was able to attend Blissdom'09 this past February. There I got to meet Jen Lancaster along with hundreds of other amazing women. It was also there that I met and discovered the music of the one and only Chris Mann.

In crafty news, I made the Scrap, Etc. Design Team after creating this rocking (if I do say so myself) album all about me. (Narcissistic much?) BTW, I just got the word that Scrap, Etc. is closing. I'm really sad about that, but totally get the decision. I can't imagine the stress of trying to run a retail operation in this economy and with such competition. Oh wait, yes I can. It's what I do. And as I said, I totally get the decision. Lucy, I wish you nothing but the best - and lots of time to play tennis and love on Emma and John Connor and hang at the beach. You deserve it.

I also started a blog of photos. I'm taking one photo every day and then posting those to However365. Not only has it been challenging and fun, but watching our days in photos has made me more aware of the little things we have and do that all come together to make one big life.

More times than I can count over the last year, we have heard some kick ass music live and in person. I blogged in October about our experience at Kentuck, but there's been more...like hearing Emmylou Harris sing at Phill's memorial service and then chatting with her about the brownies at the reception later. Just last week we had to chance to hear Robinella again. She always blows me away.

I count the time I get to spend with our nieces and nephews as some of the best days of my life. And because so much has happened in our family this year, we've been together a whole lot more often. I like that. Nothing makes me feel better than snuggling up to that precious Addison and breathing in her baby sweetness. She, Koo Koo, Smudge and Banana have made dealing with my mom's death easier and have reminded me more than once that this is not about me. And of course, I can't wait to meet Hank. As worried as I have been about my sister and her life and how in the world she is gonna pull this off, I'm filled with giddy anticipation. I cannot wait to have this little man to love and spoil. BTW, Koo Koo, Smudge and I are hosting a baby shower this weekend for my sister. It's going to be over the top with cuteness. I can't wait to post photos and a recap here next week. Meanwhile, take a look at the invitation. See? I told you. Cute.

So I would venture to say that what I have lived over the last twelve months is called "life," and I'm sure I'm not the only one who has ever experienced its ups and downs. Through all of this good and bad I've had PJ and amazing friends to pick me up, push me around, and love me. There's no way I could have made it without them. Maybe becoming more aware of that is what the last year was supposed to be about...who knows. What's any of it about?

In the words of Robinella, "Life is beautiful and sometimes grim. But it's now and forever. Amen."

Amen. Can I get a witness?

Heartless MANN

I've mentioned Chris Mann here before. I saw him perform at Blissdom'09and LOVED his sweet voice and piercing music, his precious personality, and his sense of humor...not to mention his complete over-the-top handsomeness. So needless to say - I'm a MANNfan!(That's what he calls those of us who follow him on Twitter.) @IamChrisMann (Chris) recently asked his MANNfans to tweet him back with the one word that described heartbreak to us. And then he used these words in his latest video - a cover of Kanye West's "Heartless." So you simply must check it out.

If you watch closely you will see my word, "coffee," near the beginning. Coffee. That's my word. Because once I was really in love with someone and that someone broke my heart. That someone said one of the reasons he had to break up with me was because I didn't drink coffee.

He was serious.

I drink coffee now, by the way, and I am so glad that relationship didn't work out.

You can read more about Chris Mann and his growing popularity here and you can visit his very slick website and blog here. MannBlog Mondays on his site are especially fun.

This just in

Thought I would let you know that However365 is updated now. I know you've been worried about that.

And guess what? I won a prize in this Photojojo giveaway on I Heart Faces! How cool is that? If you have never experienced Photojojo, then I suggest you go there now and sign up for the newsletter. And then once you get all the tips and tricks and schtuff to take some boss photos, head over to I Heart Faces and enter one of the contests. It's a really fun site.

OK - gotta go watch Idol. It's Motown night!