Stop & Smell The Flowers

You might already know, but Yes - this is my favorite time of year, when the  yard starts to look all pretty with blooms and sunshine and smells like a really nice perfume!

The first picture is a boquet I made my mom for Mothers day. The second is of the wild roses (which have such an unbelieveably sweet scent), and the last one is of the Lilacs by my drive way.  Every night when I come home I stop and give them a sniff!

Well that's all for now - I am so grateful for the nice 3 day weekend ahead! And it's Friday! Hope you have a good weekend too! 

Girl and Her Bike

A very long time ago my dad made an offer to me and my step-brother, I can't remember why it came about to be so lucky to get new bikes - but we got to pick from a store ad in the paper.  It was either a 10 speed bike or a 3 speed beach cruiser type.  I picked the 3 speed and he got the 10 speed.

It was creme colored with matching fenders and a navy blue seat and handle grips.  It had "roadster" wrote on it somewhere, if I remember right.  I wish I could find a photo of it.

Anyway, I really loved my bike and eventually my dad put on a speedometer thingy so I could count the miles and see how fast I ran around on it.  I have great memories of riding around on that bike - before we had mp3 players or ipods, I would take my little Walkman tape player or strap a mini-boom box to the handle bars and ride up and down the dirt road listening to "What a Feeling" from the Flashdance soundtrack or something along those lines. I had to be like 10 at the time and I thought it was just the most awesome thing to have a grown up bike and listen to music while I rode around!  Summer vacations were almost daily riding down to the lake, making lots of post office trips, or just round around on the elementary school blacktop in circles (black top was way better than bumpy dirt roads).  Sometimes I'd ride to the cafe where my mom worked and bring my sister and me back dinner. 

Years later, I discarded the old fashioned 3-speed for Mountain Bikes, but honestly I  never got into the off road biking and would still hop on my old bike.  After visiting The Netherlands for the first time, I fell back in love with the old fashioned bikes they ride around.  If I couldn't have one of theirs, I wanted to fix mine up.  I even bought a dutch bell for my bike the last time I was over in Europe.

Then I found out my mom had gave it away to someone.  She didn't ask, just assumed I wouldn't want it.  True, it had sat unused in a shed for a few years at her house, but it was MY bike that my father had given ME and was one of the few things I had left that connected to him (he passed away when I was 18).  I'll be honest, this still kind of bugs me and every once in a while I ask her if she can get it back from the person (a family friend).  She changes the subject every time.  So I guess that's a "no".  

I am almost obsessed to get this bike back now.  Even if it's all rusty and flat tired, I want my bike back!  If I can't, I guess there are some awfully cool ones out now.  Like the one below, I visit it at T.arget every now and then, imagining the fun places we could go...

from HERE

So, Yeah.

(pic is of my favorite wild flower that has just started to bloom around here)

~

Wish I had really exciting news - I don't... Sorry!  Infact this might not be the cheeriest post ever so reader, beware!

The good news: refinance snafu (knock on wood) is probably fixed. Although I've been warned that I'll most likely get junk mail and "offers" for quite some time since the banks evidentally sell your info to other companies.

Work will be getting better as my coworker who has been on leave since Feb is due back next week! I'll be so relieved to give her back her work. My very (un)sexy eyelid twitch accompanies me everyday now.  So maybe when my friend is back Ms. Twitch will go on vacation and stop driving me crazy. Ha.

I've been feeling really unmotivated lately. Looking back at my non progress on life goals and am feeling really stuck. It all comes down to $ and there's no way around it.  I don't have enough to do everything I want.

And then there's this: Today my sister had texted me at lunch saying she bumped into a mom of an old friend of mine. We were best friends in grade school and lost touch after Jr High. Anyway, my sister told me that this girl now has 4 boys and just got a masters in nursing. 

I was already feeling sorry for myself and know it's a no win situation to measure your life against someone elses but all I could do was dwell on the blurb of my life accomplishments would sound so pathetic... Like never married, no kids, has 3 cats & a dog. The end.

Anyway, my sister said she told her what company I worked for and that was it. I asked her next time to lead with I've traveled to Europe a couple times just to make me a bit more interesting.  In reality, I can't compete with higher education and children.

The sting is of course I wish that I was the normal one. I never thought this would be my life, and to top it off I'm going to be three-nine soon. Gah! How the F did this happen!?! I want to call a Time-Out!

Sunday and {a dream}

It's really beautiful weather here this weekend - finally!  I've yet to do any major yard work but can't put that off too much longer.  People are already out mowing at the crack of dawn and doing spring clean up stuff.  I guess I better get with the program before my neighbors start protesting!

I did clean & detail my car yesterday and then today stopped and got the oil changed and a wash - that feels like something productive.

Afterwards went to visit my mom and on the way picked up some yummy KFC, extra crispy! I took Tucker and my moms dog for a walk and thought, because it was so nice out, I'd walk a bit farther to the road.  Except we ran into a problem. Another yellow Lab (of course Tucker is waay cuter! ha).  Some neighbors at the corner moved in a couple years ago and their dog was loose.  It was kind of crazy for a few minutes with 3 barking squirelly excited dogs - I got a leash ribbon burn on my left hand from the dogs pulling as the other rogue dog ran circles around us (now typing one handed).  I kind of miss the freedom of when we could let the dogs run off leash out in the woods, but now there are too many other families/dogs running loose to risk mine running to the road chasing them. Scary thought!

In other news my refinance mix-up is still lingering.  Even though they say its all cleared up, last week I got a "notice" about my old loan being past due!!! I immediately called/emailed my contact person who assures me its OK and just needs to catch up in their different department systems. Its just getting beyond ridiculous.

My little lamb dreams are going to have to be held off for a bit longer.  I still have to pay off the dog dental surgery and get a couple new tires on my car before I can even think of saving up for any procedures.  It sure seems like lack of money is always an road block in life, you know? Never enough for what you want to do.  Anyway, I had a very vivid dream last night where I was in labor and then gave birth to a little boy with fuzzy blond hair and a little dimple on his chin.  The only complaint I had about his birth was that I had him at 11:50pm and I wished I had held out for a bit longer so he could have a cool birthday of October 10th (10-10) instead of the 9th.  What a strange thing to think, no? Anyway, in my "dreams" I have a cute little boy... which means I have until January/February to make that dream a reality!

A Quickie

(No, I didn't get lucky.  I wish!)

Finally got the letter from the bank about the refinance mix up. They threw in some hush money by way of a gift certificate which is nice but I just want to put this all behind me. It still sounds so improbable that there would be two accounts just digits apart with people with same last name!  I just wonder how bad this messed up the other persons account, or maybe they didn't mind.

little bees a buzzing

Signs of Spring are definitely here, lots of crocuses blooming and soon some daffodils and tulips if we can get some sunny warm weather.  Yesterday I took T-Boy to the a big park in the city for a nice walk.  I also took my cameras but the battery in the digital one died after taking the picture above and the film one jammed after I took one picture, and I didn't want to waste any of my instant film on a few crocuses.  So out came old reliable cell phone (below).  The worst part was walking around with a bag full of cameras I wished I hadn't brought if I only knew they would all crap out on me!

Had a quiet Easter at my moms and my elderly great Uncle J (88 yrs old and still driving around!). I hunted down the DVD of War Horse because ever since it has been advertised on TV he has always mentioned wanting to see it.  Went to five different RedBoxes yesterday to find an available one.  So glad we made that happen!  Though he couldn't really hear much of the dialog because he is a little hard of hearing, he still thought it was a good film and loved the horse (even though he fell asleep for a bit of it) 

Best news of all, I finally figured out how to add the reply to comments feature to Blogger. Yay!  If you have been wishing for this feature like me, you can find some helpful info here. It was super simple and I can't wait to start sending replies to you nice people who come by my little old blog.