Saturday/Sunday shopping spree

I went a little nuts this weekend. Really, it had nothing to do with the whole bottle of wine and no food, I swear. I just, I don't know, have decided to start about eleventy million projects all at once. So.......please, enjoy:

My camera does absolutely no justice to the beauty of this orchid. I have been coveting this particular one for 2 weeks, but in general, I have been wanting one for awhile.

This was one of 3 purchases at one of my favoritest places EVER-The Funky Monkey. This shirt is made of silk. The ruffle continues around the back, and goes up the back. Upon seeing me in it on Saturday night, my husband said, 'It looks like a stitched up plastic bag'. Oh, gee, thanks.

Purchase #2 at the Funky Monkey is a beauteous amber and pearl bracelet. I could not resist. It is so unique.

Purchase #3 is this adorable little monkey, whom my girl named 'Cookiebutt' in about 2.5 seconds. He is soooo living the good life: he sleeps in a comfy bed with 14,000 other stuffed animals and 4 blankets every night, and then hangs out in my jeep every day (literally, since he has little suction cups on all 4 of his hands/feet/appendages?). Then, at the end of the day, he gets swung around by his skinny little arms at warp speed, until he crashes and burns.

Here are 7 of the 8 books I ordered off of Amazon (AWESOME sale-they were all under $8 each!!! And free shipping!). Most of them are for my mom for Christmas, but hello? I can't let them go to waste, collecting dust...so I will be reading them between now and say, July 31st? Shh, don't tell my mom.

And this sweet mess on my dining room table? Ooooh, these purchases are all the way up there with the excitement of my Funky Monkey purchases. Fabric, fabric, and more fabric! You get to guess what I am going to do with all the snazzy-ass fabric, canvases, and yes, that is a big-ass pillow. About half of my readers (meaning, 2 of my readers!) know what I'm doing, but the rest of you...guess away!

Huh? Who are you, and what have you done with my crab cake??

I have been a bit whine WAH WAH WAH woe is me about the fact that my girl has been acting, well, ahem, like a 3 year old. The whole independent thing, mixed with a little 'hold me hold me HOLDME', sprinkled with some 'Why? Why? Why?'. Most evenings, when I put her to bed, I quickly tiptoe down the hallway towards my living room, and it is not until I settle on the couch that I realize I have been holding my breath. And it takes me a good 20 minutes to relax, to unwind from the non-stop chatter of 'Why are you doing it that way? Who bought that for me? Can I have a snack? No, I don't want water.'

Each time I think I am on the brink of losing it (it being what is left of my sanity), I remind myself to take a deep breath and count my blessings. I know that she is such a good little girl. I know that I want her to exert her own little independence. I know that I want her to be outspoken, strong, and opinionated.

But does it always have to be with me? (in a whiny, sniffling voice)

Over the past several days, my girl has been so accommodating, so obedient, so pleasant, so.....not a 3 year old. At the store today, she asked for some cookies, and I told her we still had cookies at home. Her response? 'Okay, next time we get cookies' and that was it.

When she asked for a little Polly Pockets thing with 4 bazillion little fricking plastic pieces, I said 'No, it's too close to your birthday for you to be asking for all this stuff'. Her response? 'Okay, I get it next time. Or I will ask my grandma for her to buy it for my birthday party, okay?'

WHAAAAA.....??????

Last night was bath time. Usually, this is a stressful time in our house. She does not like water in her ears or her eyes, yet she refuses to put her head back so I can run water on her hair without it getting in her ears or eyes. Since she was about 5 months old, bath time has been such a love/hate situation in our house. She loves to play in the water, splash the hell out of me, play with her little squirt toys, but hates having her hair washed. Most baths the past 2 and a half years have ended in tears (usually hers, but a handful of times, mine too).

Last night? My girl said 'I put my head like this' and proceeded to put her head back far enough that her hair was in the bath water. My mouth fell open. She closed her eyes and said 'Okay, momma. My eyes are closed. You can pour water now.' I just sat there, and after a few seconds, she cracked open one eye, looked at me and said 'Momma, are you gonna do it or not?' So I did it, and she actually laughed.

Would it be too good to be true that my girl is getting past the tantrum stage? Probably. I won't fool myself into thinking my crab cake is gone for good. But this? This is a wonderful time for me.

Keeping hope alive

Three years ago, I was suffering from some pretty bad pregnancy-induced insomnia. It could have been that my left hip was screaming approximately 23.75 hours a day. Or it could have been that my dear little wee girl liked to kick the living crap out of the very top of my ribs on my right side. Or it could have possibly been that I was so damn thirsty, drank a ton all day, hence, peed about 12.58 times a night. Eh, either way, I was up.


One night I caught a show on the Discover Channel, or some such educational non-sense that I watch non-stop. It was about 5 American contractors working on an aerial anti-drug campaign with the Colombian government in February 2003. Their plane crashed in the middle of FARC territory, where the FARC immediately killed 2 of the Americans, along with a Colombian contractor that was with them.


The show went on to show the 3 remaining Americans finding out that not only had their employer been bought out by another company here in the US, but that their 2 co-workers had been shot and killed.


The show was gut-wrenching. I sat curled up on my couch, biting the inside of my lip until it bled, tears streaming down my face. I was absolutely livid that these men were being held hostage by some very scary people, and our government was doing nothing. Yeah, yeah, I know-I'm sure there were various under-the-table deals going on, that the public isn't privy to. However, this showed in 2005, about a year and a half AFTER they had been captured. How the hell could the US do nothing to save them?


After watching the show, I sat up another couple of hours, surfing the 'net for information on the men, their families, the history of the FARC, and any possible updates on their conditions. I wrote my Senator and Representatives. I ranted and raved about the show for weeks after I saw it. I had long conversations with my father about the military, our government, and my feeling of utter helplessness in this situation. And I prayed.





I have prayed for those men for the past 3 years. There have been countless sleepless nights where I have stared out my window at the stars, and wondered if they were still alive, and if they had any hope left. Not like I've prayed non-stop, but they were definitely on my list of people to pray for.



Saturday night, after a bottle of wine, I turned on CNN at about 3am. And there were the faces of the three men: Marc Gonsalves, Thomas Howes, & Keith Stansell.



They were rescued by the Colombian government. After 5 years. I was speechless (and not because I was both drunk and stuffing my face with fries). I found myself saying 'Oh my God' over and over.



See, I am one of those people who prays, hopes, and worries, but sometimes I don't have much faith in my own ability to hope. I was letting logic take over--after so many years, and no updates about those men, it seemed pretty logical to say that they were probably dead. Yet, I continued to pray for them, whenever their faces entered my mind, trying to keep just the slightest bit of hope alive, for them.



And for me. I was hoping that 'the powers that be' would do something. I was hoping that they would be able to escape. I was hoping that God was hearing all of the prayers whispered in bedsheets. I was hoping that if they were freed/rescued, it would prove to me that having faith and hope actually means something.




And it did. They are alive. They are all about 30-40 pounds skinnier, but they are well. They are back in the US, back in the arms of their families.



They are alive.

Pay It Forward contest results

I intended to put all the names in a cute hat and have my girl draw a name, but then I went to the neighborhood party, drank a whole bottle of wine by myself, ate like 2 crackers, got so drunk that I couldn't see my neighbors' faces clearly, went to Wendy's at 1:45am, only to find that my hubby's wallet was at home, watched CNN while he went back to Wendy's with his wallet, ate my Wendy's fries and little burger in approximately 4.52 seconds, drank 3 glasses of water, attempted to remove my eye make-up with something that apparently does not remove eye make-up, and.....passed out.
And dreamt about drinking huge glasses of water.

Soooooo. Yeah.

The random number generator was much easier.

That being said, commentor #18 is the winner! Dynamita, from London! I can't tell you how excited I am to get to send something to London! Fun!! Dynamita, please email me at dlwinkler@msn.com so I can get your address and all that other stuff.

More on the embarrassment of getting hammered with snooooooty neighbors after I go eat a whole watermelon and drink a few gallons of water.

Happy 4th!

No time for a snazzy, snarky, silly post today. Off to stuff my face and try to float in a pool all day.


Hope everyone has a safe holiday! Or weekend, for those of you Canadian-type-people.





Don't forget to enter my PiF contest! It ends at 11:59 central time this evening! Good luck to all of you!




"You! Hey You! Enter my mom's contest, or else!"

Tying up some loose ends

I went on vacation well over a month ago. Yet, I have not told you anything fun that I did, or showed you pictures of the adventures. Please, grab a cold beverage, and get comfortable....

First: We stayed at a hotel that was a stone's throw away from the filming location of this movie. It was beautiful (the hotel). The filming location-not so beautiful, but still very intriguing. I love to go to very old places, and walk around all the history. So, we went. And it was all fenced off. A local told us that when the owner of the land passed away, it was sold, and someone turned it into a restaurant for awhile. Then it was closed down, and now it is in shambles and all fenced off. It is rather sad. I was hoping to do some exploring, but the best I got was a few pictures and a short walk up 3 or 4 of the steps.

Here's the movie location from my hotel. And here:

And here's the hotel from the movie set, after the hike along the shore, where we saw huge iguanas (imagine that), tons of black scary-looking crabs all over the 4.5million rocks along the shore:

Second: I mentioned that the beach was a huge disappointment. It was like kitty litter, and the undertow was unreal. So, we paid for 'a trip to the beach' on an island about 30 minutes from our hotel. The guy was really good at selling the damn 'excursion': big beaches, delicious lunch, free drinks, monkeys, maxin' and relaxin'. He failed to mention: we had to take a little boat from the shore (not a dock b/c they don't have one), with the unreal undertow and huge waves, with no life jackets....we had to take this boat to a big party-style-boat out in the middle of the ocean, and transfer from the little boat to the big boat. That might not sound like a big deal to you, but we are not the most in-shape bunch. My FIL had back surgery about 8 months ago, my MIL is as light as a feather, my mother is, well, a klutz, and HELLO??-My daughter is a toddler!!! To say the least, it was stressful.

So, we survive the transfer, and make the 30 minutes trip to the 'island'. It was beautiful, but I have no pictures of it. Don't ask.

We got to the island, which conveniently had a dock (Thank goodness), and we sought out some comfy chairs. The sand was much more like real sand,and even had shells! My girl played in the sand until her swim-diaper was so full of sand she could barely walk. The drinks were weak, and I was somehow voted 'designated parent' again, so no loss there, I guess.

It was pretty obvious that this was not a natural landscape, if you get what I mean. It's not like the monkeys, parrots, and sea lion all lived there on their own. People could go snorkeling with a sea lion that they pulled out of a cage, put on a small boat, and brought out to a group of snorkelers a couple of hundred yards off the shoreline. I was a bit miffed that they actually had it in a cage.

Then came the little 'whistling ducks'. They were cute, and we were able to hand feed them little meal worms. But were they in their natural habitat? No. The guy with them, the 'trainer', said he had raised them since birth, and they lived with him in his home. Cute, but again, not really authentic, ya know?:

Then, the monkeys. Or should I say monkey. On a leash. That they took out of a cage. Sigh. He was adorable, and had such beautiful colors, but it bothered me that he wasn't just hanging out in his own habitat. Here's the little guy, that chattered, and spent 5.2 seconds on my arm before smacking my girl's hand and jumping back to his 'trainer'.

(The look on my face comes from my noticing that he had a bright green butt).

There was also this beautiful owl named Frida (again, not in her natural habitat), but by then, my camera's batteries had bit the dust again. My mom has a picture of me with her. I love owls. Not enough to collect little owls or get an owl tattoo, but they are gorgeous, and I've got a Springtown story or two involving an owl (or two).

Here's the normal-looking crab that I pissed off because I followed him around trying to get a decent shot for my girl:

And here's the teeniest, tiniest little hermit crab ever, that my sister tried to pull out of his shell because 'his shell is pretty'. That went over well, let me tell you. :

(Sorry it's blurry. The little guy was smaller than my pinky nail, but he moved like a bat outta hell!)

So, that was the beach excursion.

Third: (I told you to get comfortable)

My mother, sister, my girl, and I decided we wanted to go horseback riding. We all love horses. The same dumbass that sold us the beach trip sold us this one. He told us several lies: a--we would go into the hills/mountains, and also along a beach; b--my girl could ride on the horse with me due to her age; c--my sister could ride on the horse with my mom, due to her nervousness; d--it would be fun.

So, we wake up early, and we go down to the lobby, where the bus is supposed to pick us up. No bus. So after about 30 minutes, they call a taxi for us, which will supposedly take us to the bus. We get there, have to pay the taxi (when all transportation was supposedly included in the price), and there is no bus. NO.BUS. So then we have to get in another taxi, to another bus station, where holy hell, the bus actually exists!

About 10 minutes into the trip, the AC on the bus stops working. No problem-it's like 86 degrees, and the bus has windows. Yipeee.

Then the exhaust starts backing up into the bus. So we all get high and light-headed. Weeee.

Here we are on the bus, getting high:

We are almost there when the 'guide' tells us to look to our right: 24 hour, all-inclusive hotel, ahem, PRISON. Did anyone watch Prison Break this past season? (Helllooooo, hot men on that show!) This prison was a spitting image of the one on the show....lots of guards, next to no roof, lots of sand, and no hope.

And guess where our 'horse ranch' was?? Yeah, you guessed it: next to the prison. Damn sure didn't see that in the brochure.

When we get there, we find that there is no beach, that my girl cannot ride with me, my sister cannot ride with my mom, we all must wear helmets (they actually gave a motorcycle helmet to one guy with a big head! WTF??), except my girl, because 'We don't have any small enough for her'. WTF?

The upsides: The food was awesome. The horses were sweet. The scenery was breath-taking.

The downsides: My horse didn't want to listen for shit. The 'walk along the river banks' was really a walk through small, muddy puddles. The 'hike through the mountains' contained climbing on rocks at a 45 degree angle. The fear that there was a prisoner on the loose, trying to hide in all the damn rock and dust and spindly trees.

(Oh, and my camera had to be shoved into a plastic bag with a water bottle, since there was nowhere else to store it on the horse. Let's chat about that a second: I had to hold the bag in the same hand that I was holding the rope. And it kept falling in my lap, between my woo-ha and the saddle. So, if you don't see where this is going, you haven't read enough about my lack of luck...with the constant trotting, the water bottles um, exploded, um, all over my woo-ha area, and um, I looked like I pissed myself. Oh, and um, the camera? It sorta stopped working for a bit. )

My girl got her 'very own cowboy' because she was so small. She had to ride with one of the ranch hands. Which, I was fine with, because I had watched him with the horses prior to us getting on, and it was obvious that he knew what he was doing. But, my girl was a bit uncomfortable at first. Thankfully, my sister got the dumbest horse ever, who was quite literally bringing up the rear, and my girl and her cowboy were right next to her. My mom's horse was a lazy ass (ha!), so she was back there too. Mine? She didn't give a shit what I wanted. She kept trying to get ahead of the same 2 horses, come hell or high water (or low water, in this case), so I didn't really get to ride next to my girl. She loved galloping. So, here's my view:

Notice the dust? Yeah, that's my horse's fault.

And my girl? On the way back to the 'camp' for lunch, she fell asleep on the horse. No, really. Proof:

She was OUT. Poor cowboy had to hold her for the last 20 minutes of the trip, because she was leaning. He got a good American dollar tip from me. Contrary to the look on his face, he was so kind-hearted about it.

So yeah. That was the horseback riding trip.

Fourth: The contest! Don't forget to enter my contest! It ends at 11:59pm, central time, on July 4th. And go to Swistle's site and enter everyone else's PiF contest.

Fifth: My lovely pre-eval for boot camp is next Saturday. Torture, I tell you, torture. I will be weighed, measured, pinched, prodded, and I'm sure I will leave feeling like a damn cow (with a cute haircut).

Sixth: Fourth of July plans, anyone? I will be sunning myself at my in-law's on Friday, watching fireworks with my girl and my dad Friday night, going to lunch with Kristie on Saturday, going to a neighborhood party Saturday (woohoo! Just what I need-alcohol and new neighbors who are my parents' ages and older! That oughta give me some blog material, huh???), and a girl's trip to the fabric store and maybe dessert on Sunday with Jill. I'll probably end up the designated parent at most of these things......

And SEVENTH: This is the best thing of all!!! I got my very own 2008 Jeep Wrangler Unlimited 4 door, 4x4 this weekend!!! It's dark blue, it so pretty, and it only had 72 miles on it! I am soooo excited! And? I got a 4 inch lift on it today!! Woohoooooo! I have wanted one of these since I was like 17! Only took me 13 years. My girl? She loves it! She says she likes 'her' Jeep. I promise I'll have pictures soon. Yipeeee!

And on that note, I shall end this novel of a post, and take my lazy ass to bed. Happy Wednesday everyone!

Meme whore (damn it!)

So, I read Mooooooo all the time, and awhile back she posted this meme, and I found it intriguing. I love photography, but I'm not an expert. I registered for a photopgraphy class in college, and then dropped it because my dad didn't want to pay for the 'required camera', and I damn sure didn't have the money at the time. I think I got this love from my mother, as I did my love of writing, poetry, and silliness. So, it's apparently meme month, or something.



The rules:

a. Type your answer to each of the questions below into Flickr Search.
b. Using only the first page, pick an image.
c. Copy and paste each of the URLs for the images into fd’s mosaic maker.


The questions that inspired the photos:



1. What is your first name? (And let me tell you, if you go put my first name in, there are SEVERAL neeeeked pictures of women! What the hell? I thought briefly of using one of them, because the first one made me giggle. Click here if you dare.)
2. What is your favorite food?
3. What high school did you go to?
4. What is your favorite color?
5. Who is your celebrity crush?
6. Favorite drink?
7. Dream vacation?
8. Favorite dessert?
9. What you want to be when you grow up?
10. What do you love most in life?
11. One word to describe you.
12. Your flickr name (I don't have a flickr account or name, so I put in a nickname my family uses for me).


My result:




Fun, huh? Go. Do it. Now. I dare you.