Generous Monkey

They are celebrating the beginning of a new year in China. I know very little about the Chinese New Year except for the way it affects my business. All of the wedding dresses and special occasion dresses are made in China. Each particular brand has a factory in China where all of the dresses are made. Depending on the individual factory, each one is closed for 1 or 2 or 3 weeks to celebrate the Chinese New Year. So the bottom line is that right now the time it takes to order a dress and have it made is longer than normal. This only happens once a year and makes life very difficult for those brides getting married in February, March, and April. I usually still "make the sale" because they have to have the dress, but their choices are limited to what I have in my store or what is available at a warehouse here in the USA. (I had a girl and her mom in my store for 4 hours yesterday trying to work out this dilemma.) The other thing that I know very little about is the Chinese astrology/horoscope. I decided to read mine the other day just out of curiosity. According to my birth year I am a "Monkey". My horoscope for the up coming year said that I will have some opportunities to go far with my talents. Great strides can be made in my career. I will be in the right place at the right time. But the Monkey's generous nature may leave me stretched in several different directions. This could be a great year for the Monkey financially- possibly make great gains throughout the year, but do to the Monkey's generous nature I may have a difficult time refraining from giving to others. So we will see what happens- I guess it would be good for the store if I stop giving things away :) Oh, am I supposed to be making money? :)

All of His Ducks in a Row

Oh, did I say "ducks"? I meant, "peas"...all of his peas in a row! The garden is starting to sprout.
Stay tuned...to be continued.

Ron thinks that with 26 inches of depth, of loose soil, he should be able to grow huge carrots.

Mom has some ice cubes sprouting on the picnic table, on the porch :) Actually she has tomatoes planted. I guess she thought ice cubes was "easy water".

I Did It

The Christmas decorations are finally put away. :) :) Just to ease your mind, it didn't really look like they were still out because most of them were stashed in the two extra bedrooms, upstairs. The biggest tree was still on the back porch. The tree needed to be boxed up and sent to the garage. Everything else needed to go back in the attic. My continuing saga of the attic... last weekend I sorted through things to see exactly what was in there. Micah you win the prize- Alison has the most stuff still there. Ashley has some and all of Audrey's stuff is in one of the bedrooms now. I figure that is either going to the trash or going in Sam's car next weekend :) So, now the attic is rearranged and the Christmas decorations put away- the two upstairs bedrooms actually look like bedrooms again. Yes! Good thing because it's almost February!

Comments on Blogs

I have been thinking about "why blog?" (which was a recent post on "Redsdirt"), besides the obvious reasons- these things are addictive! Not only do we need to check in often to see the new posts and pictures, but then we also follow the comments. We have to keep going back to see what new comments are there since we last looked. It is amazing to see who checks in and what they have to say about a particular item. What an awesome way to stay connected, not only with family but also with friends. And what a great way to find out what other people are thinking. I also love the sense of humor that shows up. As for the recent comments Mike gets the prize, when he said "all the A's have B's"! That doesn't sound like much at first, but when you really stop to think about it, that is a comment with multiple layers of meaning. (In case you are thinking that I'm speaking in code- look at "The Sisters" on "Past The Moon". All of our girls names start with A, so we now have A1, A2, A3, A4, and don't forget M) Now that all the A's have B's, our family is complete. (it's about time Sam showed up :) When Alison commented on her hair cutting experience, I could hear her words in my mind- her "Oh geez, what's going on here?" sounds just like her! The comments on that post gave new insight into what might have really happened with the barbies and the scissors :)
Another interesting thing about the blogs is that, depending on which computer I'm on, I usually don't care for the music that automatically starts playing. It's not that I don't like the music, but some times it's distracting and I usually go turn it off right away. Then each time I leave that blog and come back, there the music is again, and go turn it off again. But... every now and then the music is a very touching experience, like when I clicked on "Redsdirt", looking at cute pics. of Annie and the boys and "Ordinary Miracle Today" is playing. Or click on "Petes", looking at a cute picture of Jaden kissing Ashley, and "Don't Give Up" is playing. These blogs are creating some magical inspirational moments. It's some of these little things that keeps us smiling all day long. I told you they were addicting :)

That's News To Me

When we were at Annie's house for Christmas, we were all sitting around one evening talking about the adjustments that two people make when they get married. The most recent newlyweds were asking Ron and I questions about how we adjusted to each other over the years. Ron made some comments "that were news to me". I never realized how he felt about some things. It's funny how two people can be married and especially be married for almost 33 years and still not really know what the other person thinks, or how they view particular situations. It's no wonder people have misunderstandings on various topics. Recently Audrey was at our house and noticed that one of the toilets had not been cleaned for a while. She asked me when was the last time that Ron cleaned a toilet. I replied, "never". I have never expected him or asked him to clean a toilet. That's not his job. That's my job, along with lots of other various chores inside the house. (To all of the guys- if that duty is on your job description- don't take it off just because Ron has never done that. Each couple work out your own "chore plan" :)
This morning, Ron had no clean long sleeve shirts in his closet. They were all still hanging downstairs in the laundry room. So he grabs one and takes the rest of them upstairs. I'm sure he thought he was helping me out by putting his shirts away. (His shirts were still down stairs waiting to be ironed.) So I retrieved them from the closet, ironed them, and put them back. Ron has worn ironed shirts to work for most of 33 years. (except for today)
"That's news to him" :)

Ron lets me do all of my little decorative stuff

around the house- pretty much, I can do whatever I want inside the house. He takes care of the outside of the house. (By the way...

I decided that my little Christmas frog ornaments have found a permanent home with my Valentine decorations- they look much cuter now!)

Speaking of inside and outside, here is what Ron has been doing outside!

You have heard of an 'above ground' swimming pool- here is an 'above ground' garden. You walk through the middle- no bending over to plant or to weed. It wraps around the corner, behind the shed in the back yard. It took many hours of sawing, hammering, hauling, shoveling etc. The lumber and dirt had to be bought, and the sprinkler system repaired and adjusted. (we won't talk about what the total bill was :) Already, things have been planted. Every now and then, I will post new pictures. I'm sure they will look much better with "green stuff" growing there.

For The Lovely Sister

I have a daughter that decided to cut her own hair. In the top picture, notice how very short her bangs are- in fact, pretty much no bangs at all. The only good thing here is she looked better than the barbie dolls that were stashed behind the sofa with the scissors :) I know that Aud was in on this whole hair trimming experience, but some how her hair was untouched. I wonder who actually did the cutting? :)

There is hope for your aspiring young hair stylist. Al's hair turns out great now, when she does it herself. In fact we are usually amazed and wonder how she does it! She is the chosen hair stylist for Aud's bridal pictures and also for the wedding.

Happy B Day!

Happy birthday to Nathan and Daniel. Nathan on Friday and Daniel on Saturday! We love you both- D&R