Oh blogging how I've missed you

When I was little the summers seemed to last forever. The weeks seemed to drag on. How come when you are older the days weeks and years just seem to fly by? My mom constantly reminds me of that this must be an age thing. When she is retelling an event or telling me a story and the bomb is dropped..."oh it just happened the other day" now we kind of look at each other and laugh, because I know her just the other day is well lets just say could mean anywhere from 1-6 years! My how time just flies by.
So I finally ran through the checklist of things in life that I have put on hold or neglected and saw that I hadn't rambled on about life's occurrences since July! With being back in school and the to and fro of keeping pace with the worlds of people around me. My painting and blogging have definitely been on the bottom of my list, but oh how I missed you old friend.
I wonder if the person who invented blogging ever thought that many of peoples postings would go unread or be read from people all over the world? I love to pop in and out of blog pages to read whats happening in other peoples lives. Sometimes I am happy for them sometimes I am sad. I think blogging is a way to vent really. Some people are very witty in their writing and keep the emotional level very playful, others are very straight forward and you can pretty much tell how they are in real life by their words. Even those who hide emotions in their writing I often wonder if they hide their emotions or their true selves in their daily life? Thats what saddens me the most I guess. When you run into people in life that refuse to be real, refuse to open up and let you in, see the real person. In the end we all struggle with the same things in life, wouldn't it be nice to know that you have someone who has been there or going through the same things to help you through it. That its ok to reach out and tell someone "hey its been a real crappy week, I could use an ear, or advice" whats wrong with that? I guess its just a cultural or social thing, the "I'm fine, fake smile" pat on the back thing. I just want to know the real you. If you're around me for very long you know I'm not good at faking it. Often I say to much and am pretty much known for having my foot in my mouth.
I only say this after talking with an old friend of mine out of the blue the other day. First I sent a check in thinking of you text to this friend, and the reply text I got signaled me that my friend was struggling with something. You know when the wipersnap humor wasn't full snap or something was a lil different? So I immediatly called and said whats up. Unfortunately we had to do the song and dance of oh me I'm fine, world is daisies and kittens(for 12 minutes) before the friend would finally get real and open up about what was going on. Even though what they were struggling with was minimal it was still bothering my friend. I often wonder how many of my friends play the song and dance with me, and then I wonder do they ever open up to anyone?
I mean think about that, if your friend never opens up to you or anyone else what happens to that friend? The relationship becomes a drift I think, because its like your friend is keeping a secret. The secret of whats really going on with them. So my goal is to make sure I am checking up on all my long lost buddies and I too want to make sure that I am being open with my friends.
Ah I hope you have enjoyed my ramblings. I just think we all need to reach out to those around us. So many of those around us could use a friend (and a hug). Now that I have that out of my system I'm off to paint!

Congratulations USA

Just wanted to congratulate all US citizens, today we reached our 1 TRILLION dollar deficit! YIPPEE

Well as much as the media has been talking about it today no one really likes to hit on the hard hitting thought of the day....so how in the heck are we going to start paying this off?????

I say we hire some financial goo roos and get this country on a freaking budget. This time lets actually think about hiring someone who isn't over their head in debt and actually pays their taxes!

Arkansas Diamonds

Last year my neighbor in Savannah, Georgia came over after her Christmas break to show me her latest adventure find. She had went diamond hunting in Arkansas during the holiday and found a 2 carat diamond! After living most of my life in Arkansas I couldn't believe that I had never been diamond hunting.

It sounded like so much fun. Sun, mud, and shovels...plus the possibility of finding diamonds. What could be more fun. So over spring break I talked my sister Casey into going with me. So we drove to Murphysboro, Arkansas in search of the sparkly girls best friend..our in hopes of finding our kids college fund!

We rented the whole shabang, bucket, shovel and sifter. They had a great set up with several places to sift dirt, wash yourself and tools and of course a gift shop full of refreshments.

We search and sifted for about 3 hours while our kids played off in the distance throwing mud and burying each other in the dirt. We never did find anything that looked worth anything, but someone from Bentonville, Arkansas found a 6 carat black diamond!

It only cost about $35.00 and we all had a great time and I am glad I drove my husbands car because after spraying off Cristoir and Justice they were still covered head to toe in dirt and I couldn't convince them to ride back in their undies so his car had to have a major bath when we got back.

I guess better luck next time.

Summer Days

This summer is the first summer I get to spend with Cristoir without working, so I decided that if we were going to spend the summer together I needed to get myself a bike.

Last week we hit all the local thrift shops in search of two second hand bikes for Chris and myself. Within a couple of hours we found JUST what we were looking for. One of the bikes was in mint condition and a very expensive bike...we got it for $20.00! It even had the stickers on it from the bike store in town where it was originally purchased. I could hardly believe our luck. The second bike needed new paint, tires, and chain...price $6.

So we rushed home and immediately went to work taping things off and started painting the second bike. After it was all done my husband decided that it didn't look very good, so we took the whole bike apart, and sanded it down. The next morning we headed to wally world to pick up new tires, paint and new chain....total cost 50.00. While I was there I strolled down bike lane and found a 10 speed on sale for 65.00! After all that work and it was going to cost about the same amount to buy a new one. So we bought the new one instead.

For the past two weeks we have all been enjoying our daily bike rides. I even bought a little basket for mine (I am a girl you know!) and our little dog Natalie gets to enjoy the bike rides too.

The total cost for our new bikes , and basket was $103. The daily rides together as a family... priceless.

What your passive president does for you

Maybe I am a little hard on our newly elected president, as I read the articles on fox news tonight and can't help but shake my head in disbelief.
One of today's articles was over North Korea who is planning on shooting a nuclear missile. Every country knows that this missile launch is just a decoy for a future nuclear warhead. Unfortunately the leaders of our country right now seem to be hell bent on turning the other cheek, and pretending that North Korea who is led by a communist dictator would have no such desire of becoming a dominanting country.
So maybe I am wrong and I am reading too much into this...and then I read another top article saying that our Secretary of State Mrs Hillary Clinton has been globe trotting and letting everyone know that the Obama administration is no longer using the phrase "War On Terror" because our pansy European allies think the phrase sounds too militaristic. Yeah it's supposed to! That phrase alone should make a terrorist drop a log as he/she enters an airport or enters our country, or any country we have troops in.
I just got back from living in Germany for four months and traveling to the Netherlands, France and Spain. This was something my husband and I had been dreaming about doing for almost ten years. While we were there we learned the media in those countries are all one sided, in the newspapers you will most likely find a nude woman on the front page. I understand that different cultures and countries have different values and ways of life, but I will say that the police and laws in other countries are frightening. Those countries have a very passive military style when it comes to defending their own countries and any other country that begs for their help. Which could explain why my ancestors lost lives and left everything they owned and loved to flee to America. It could also explain why their countries are the size of our states.
I read these things about some of the stuff our government says and I sit in disbelief. Are these really the officials that the American people wanted to elect to speak for us. Is our country going to become a country that shrinks their military, and defenses and quit helping weaker countries so we don't look threatening to our European allies?

If people (and this includes myself) would pay more attention to what the leaders of our country say between the lines maybe we wouldn't keep these officials in office.

"You can fool all the people some of the time, and some of the people all of the time, but you can not fool All the people all of the time"-Abraham Lincoln

"America will never be destroyed from the outside. If we falter and lose our freedoms, it will be because we destroyed ourselves."-Abraham Lincoln

Momma Dangerously

Tonight I was out walking through the neighborhood and tracking down toys and boxes my son had strewn throughout a few of the neighbors houses when he finally decided to help and whizzed up on his bike. After we put everything back where it belonged we realized we then had to go and get the bike that we had left several houses down. It was getting dark and he is a bit scared of the dark still so I told him I would walk with him to get it.
This was not the first time I've had to jog along side of him as he rode, but tonight I decided I would talk him into riding on the handle bars on the way home. I know it probably is not the parental thing to teach your child to ride on the handle bars, but I remember doing it all the time as a kid, so I figured why not let him have a little fun. Besides this time I can fully touch the ground.
He was a bit surprised at my request of him sitting on the handle bars."Mom you really are going to let me ride on the handle bars? Is this really smart?" he said. I laughed of course. I mean I am usually a stickler for safety and and here I was telling him to do something that could really harm him if we wrecked.
"Come on" I teased. Then he hopped on and we pedaled toward the house.
We were having so much fun we decided to ride around for a bit. I have never laughed harder. First at the thought of what I probably looked like on this dwarfed bike, and second at how good it is to just being silly sometimes.
As we headed inside I started thinking back to all the summers I spent riding the bike that my grandfather had put together for me. It was just a plain ol' blue bike with a banana seat, and if that bike had an odometer I'm sure it would read well over 100000 miles. I'm not sure whatever happened to that thing, but I hope some kid somewhere is making many new memories on it.

Right of Passage or spoiled

My son had a group of friends from the neighborhood come over and play for awhile. Like all kids they were in and out all day. I am usually not bothered by a bunch of kids running through the house, heck I am even known to jump in their games of nerf war or football every now and then. When something gets broken or someone is mean I usually send everyone home.
Today a couple of the boys had broken some star wars toys of my sons so I sent them all out side.If you have ever sat down and put those stupid legos together you know it takes an architectual degree and some engineering work to make it look like the model on the box. My son was imbarrased that he was crying over legos and hid in his room till everyone left. After a few minutes he immerged with a forgiving spirit and followed everyone down to the next parents house.
As I was about to let the cat outside I noticed all the boys gathered around a storm drain. A bit worried that one may fall in or get trapped I walk over to warn them of the dangers of playing near them and all of the kids start freaking out that one of the boys had dropped his phone down the drain. A bit confused as to why any of these kids even needed a phone I take the lid off the drain and lower one of the kids down to retrieve it none the less. As he hands me the phone and I lift him back up I couldn't help but notice that the phone this kid dropped was his Iphone!
I mean I understand that if parents are divorced and they want to make sure little Tommy is able to talk to mom or dad at anytime needed they get the kid a phone but this kid's parents aren't divorced and he is nine years old. I just have a real problem with kids having cell phones.
Maybe I am a bit old school and back in the day when cell phones and beepers were getting hot my parents still wouldn't let me have one. I was sixteen with a car and my parents still wouldn't let me have one. I had to call in every hour on the hour and let them know where I was and I had to use a pay phone. I am pretty sure kids now days don't even know what a pay phone is, I'm not even sure there are any still around.
So to me a cell phone is a right of passage kind of thing. When you can pay for it then you can have one. Why does everyone need to be on a phone all the time anyways?
So I asked the kid why he has an iphone and he let me know it was so his parents could reach him at any time. Anytime...he lives three houses away and where is this kid going that mom and dad or some adult won't be? Maybe I am over reacting and kids with cell phones is just the fad but buying your kid a four hundred dollar phone? I thought we were in a recession?
So later when my son came in from playing we had a discussion about cell phones and the responsibility of having them, the cost etc. He could really care less about having one right now, but I did inform him when he was older we would be happy to get him a prepaid cell phone.