Making Fairy Gardens with Mom and Other Stuff I Did Last Week

I think I'm doing pretty good with my renewed blogging efforts, considering I'm coming back from a two year stint in no-blog land.

My mom was visiting until yesterday so instead of blogging, I was busy making fairy gardens, watching movies, shopping, looking at old pictures, and getting our eyebrows done at Ulta. In short...having a grand 'ole time with me mum.

So, busy week with no time for blogging and now I'm going to cram it all into one post and tell you about it. Go refill your coffee (or cocktail)...I'll wait.

Three Things I Never Thought I'd Have to Do as a Parent

Being a parent is hard. Even if you go into it, expecting it to be hard... it's harder than you ever imagined.

Oh sure, there's joys and rewards and in the end, you wouldn't trade it for anything, blah, blah, blah.

But there are some things you end up doing, as a parent, that you never, ever, EVER, thought you would have to do.

A Fuller House Of Our Own

It was the summer of 2005. I like to call it The Summer of Us.

Fred and I had bought our house in 2003. We closed escrow just a couple weeks after our wedding. It was our dream house. Five bedrooms, a pool, big yard. It was perfect for us and our three then pre-teen kids.

And, as it turns out, for my sister.

And my brother and his wife.

And my mom.

And an assortment of pets.

By 2005 we had nine people living in our house. It was our very own Fuller House. Our kids went to their dad's every two weeks, so those weeks it was just Full House.

My brother and sister and I have always been pretty close, but we each had our demons to battle and sometimes that led to struggles with one another. We led very different lives and lived in different cities and that kept us apart somewhat.

Then our dad died in 1999 and our world changed forever. We spent a week together in my brother's little apartment in California, making arrangements and planning services and grieving together.

Philip T. Mikkelson 6-23-1937 to 9-11-1999

When it was time for us all to return to our regular lives, we knew we needed to hang onto that closeness we had gained in that short week. That new found understanding that it can all fall apart in a moment, and any one of us can just...be gone.

A couple months later my brother and his wife moved back to Vegas, where I lived. It took a few years, but in 2004 when her long-term relationship ended, my sister moved back to Vegas too.

Which brings me to our full house in 2005. I have to admit...full or fuller...I loved every minute of it.

There was always someone to play cards, or drink, or dance with...or any combination of the three.

My sister and I would put on our dad's old record albums and dance and sing around the living room. One winter night we got hot and opened the front door to let some cool air in while we danced. My daughters were mortified and fretted that one of their friends would walk by and see us.

I guess we were that bad. Apparently, there's video.

My brother had my back though. He and my son liked to tie a string around a cicada bug and put it under the bathroom door while one of the girls was in there.

I would hear the shrieking from my home office at the other end of the house and couldn't help but smile.

Bet their cicada bug dance wasn't so hot either.

Parenting was easier too. As you know, it takes a village to raise kids - taxi driver, cook, nurse, investigator, entertainment committee - the list goes on. I had my village all in one place!

With so many people in the house, you never knew what you were going to find in the fridge. My brother would go out hunting in nearby areas where it was allowed.  One time he brought back a rabbit and made a stew out of it. Fred opened the fridge and was greeted by a rabbit skeleton floating in a stew pot.

Source: Cartoonsonnet.com

After that, any meat without a bar code was banned.

It was during that summer when I realized we really were the neighborhood Clampets. With each of the kids in a bedroom, and my sister and mom in the guest room, we didn't have a spare room for my brother and his wife. That didn't phase them though -  they parked their RV in the backyard and lived in that, although it didn't have a bathroom.

From their upstairs window, our neighbors behind us would often get a glimpse of my sister-in-law walking from our house to the trailer, wrapped in a bath towel.

Source: Gratisography.com

Looking back, I see why we weren't the most popular folks in the neighborhood.

If the trailer park in our backyard didn't doom us to unpopularity, then the drunken pellet gun battle between me and my sister and Fred, surely did. One night, my sister and I chased Fred down the street, us on foot and him racing to outrun us on a Razor scooter. He kept turning around to shoot at us with his pellet gun, like he was the Lone Ranger and we the wild Indians.

Good times.

My husband truly lived up to his name as Mr. Wonderful that year. He put up with all the crazy antics of his in-laws with nary a complaint. Except for the rabbit skeleton.

But all good things must come to an end. My sister bought her own house in 2006 and later that same year, my mom got married and my brother and his wife moved out.

Of course, it wasn't too long after that my other sister moved in with her three kids, and a few years later my daughter's boyfriend moved in, then my brother and his wife again. So I guess we've always had a full house.

But that Summer Of Us in 2005 will always be a special memory to me. We came together because we needed one another. It was for various reasons - a relationship ending, financial hardship, emotional strain - but we were there for each other. Just like when dad died.

Us and my dad in 1974ish. I'm in the dress. I think it was before church.

Today, my brother and sister and I still have a close relationship and we live just minutes apart. There's the expression "You can't choose your family but you can choose your friends," but when you have both in the same people, it's truly a blessing and not something to take for granted.

Every once in a while... I miss our full house.

Source: Relatably.com

P.S. This post brought to you my Mama Kat's Writer's Workshop and her prompt: Write a post inspired by the word "Full."

Amelia Bedelia, Mr. Great-Ass, and the Wino

I just realized how much that title sounds like a porn movie.

My sister is a very capable woman. I've mentioned before how we call her Amelia Bedelia because if there is any household project she wants to tackle, she googles it and just does it herself.

This works out well because her husband isn't much of a handyman. He has a great ass though, so there's that.

This weekend however, she decided she needed a little help to install a bigger doggie door in her wall because her dog, Buddy, suddenly won't go through the old one.

She asked my hubby to help her.

I may have mentioned a time or two how my husband doesn't care much for yard or household projects, but he couldn't say no to my sister because she's always there for us. When we moved, she helped me unpack and when that awesome house party that we weren't invited to happened at our old house, she was there with her boombox and rags to help us clean up.

So of course, the hubs said he'd help her with the doggie door.

Apparently though, my sister didn't clear the whole process with Mr. Great Ass, who wasn't keen on the idea of having a hole in the wall big enough for a small man to crawl through.

I can't say I blame him, but when it comes to a choice between her pets and her man, my sister has always made known that her man would get dogged, no matter how cute his hind quarters are.

She and Fred were crouched on the patio, examining the existing doggie door and trying to figure out how to make the hole in the wall bigger to accommodate a larger one.

My sister starts a whispered conversation with my hubby:

My sister (whispering): I just think I really need to do this to make it easier for Buddy.
My hubby (picking up on the fact that Mr. Great-Ass might not be on board): And I assume you had a family meeting and all are in agreement to this?
My sister (still whispering): I AM the family.
My hubby: Then why are we whispering?

Despite Mr. Great Ass's misgivings, the door was going in. While my hubby and sister, and my brother (who stopped by to see how things were going and ended up down on the floor, sawing into the wall, much to his dismay) were working on the hole in the wall, I was helping...

By sitting on the nearest chair having a glass of wine. Or two.

I may or may not have posted video of a home birth to my eldest daughter's Facebook page. And a video of a horse giving birth on my own page.

My daughter's face when she sees my post. This is why she fled to India. (Source)

In my defense, I had just returned from a bridal shower in our old neighborhood. My daughter's good friend, whom we met after moving to the neighborhood and have known for thirteen years now, is getting married in April.

I was feeling a little melancholy about how time marches on and things change and kids grow up - you know how it is, right? And my own two girls being away from home didn't help either. Plus, I drove by our old house for the first time in three months and that just added to my melancholy.

Throw in the wine and you've got a real menopausal nostalgia-fest going on.

And now my daughter's Facebook friends probably think she's pregnant. Meanwhile, she's in India with sketchy Internet access and has no idea whatsoever.

Ooops.

Sorry hon.

Don't ask me what a horse giving birth had to do with any of this.

So that was my weekend, how was yours?

P.S. Linking up with Mingle Monday today! Hop over and check out the other posts if you can.

My Girls and Their Journey

I think I should just start a series called "Another thing I didn't blog about last year was the time..." because I want to start every post these days with that line.

How interesting that must be for you. "This one time at band camp..."

Anyway, both my daughters left the country last year. My youngest in May and her older sister in December. I'm missing them both right now and I wanted to write a little bit about their journeys.

The Girl's Story 

The Girl is my youngest child, who struggled with addiction since she was 15. We thought she was on the road to recovery after a thirty day drug rehab program when she was 18, but she returned home only to relapse and disappear three days later.

It was jail that actually helped her get straight. Well...the things she learned in rehab contributed, but jail made her realize what her life was going to be like if she continued the way she was going.

After jail, her father encouraged her to start attending his church. She seemed to have found what she was searching for there, and faith and hope filled the void inside her that drugs could not. She has stayed on her recovery path for almost four years now.

She decided to pursue a career in Christian counseling in hopes that her experience could help others. Her church operates Bible Colleges all over the world and she left in May to attend one in the Philippines.

My beautiful little girl.

It took some getting used to for her. The school is in a rural area with limited Wifi access. It's self-sustaining, so the students take turns doing chores like taking care of the farm animals and working in the garden. She washes her clothes by hand. Despite the lack of modern conveniences, she loves it there. She spends her days learning Scripture, going on short missions, working on the farm, and exploring the area.

She commented on Instagram that she can't stop laughing every time she sees this picture. Her sister said, "Is it because you and the goat are making the same face?" 

The mountains near Dumaguete in the Philippines

Sunset over the water near Dumaguete in the Philippines.

She's experienced more in her 22 years than the average person. So many things that I wish she hadn't. But sometimes we have to walk the wrong path to find the right one and she's found her right path now. I'm so proud of her for the courage it took both to change her life and to embark on this adventure so far from home.

Sissa's Story

Then there's my hippie girl. My free spirit. She's always gone her own way and when her mind is made up about something, there's no talking her out of it.

She and two girlfriends backpacked all over Kauai for ten months, during which time I read all about her cringe-worthy escapades on Instagram. When she returned from that adventure, she went on tour with her boyfriend's band. The five of them toured through the U.S., living out of their van most of the time. She loved it.

Now she's in India. She left December 1st to attend Yoga School in Rishikesh, a town located near the base of the Himalaya mountains and known as The Yoga Capital of the World. Her course lasted thirty days but she stayed in India to see other areas of the country.

My Adventure Girl in Rishikesh, India

She became well-known by the locals as The Hula Hoop Girl. Below, she's hooping on the Ganges River.

Yes, she brought her hoop with her all the way from Vegas. Fortunately, it comes apart for easy travel.

Pushkar, India. Just look at that water.

One of her Instagram posts was this:

"Change is the only constant. We can try to resist and hold on. We can attempt to stay and keep, but it would only be making the natural flow of the universe feel hard and unnatural. Not knowing is something to embrace. How beautiful is it to not have a thought about when, where, how, or why? All we have is now. All we can do is be."

That's her heart in a nutshell. She lives to just be. She lives for now.

Sissa with a fellow traveler in Pushkar, India

The paths of my girls are very different, but their journey is the same. They are finding themselves and their place in the world. The places they go and the things they see and experience will help shape them into the people they were meant to be.

I know it was partly the roots we helped them plant at home that gave them the wings to take these journeys now and that makes me happy. But I still can't wait for them to come home.

Both my girls.

Happy Travels,

Lori

That Time My Sister Was Ready For a Fight

Linking up to Mama Kat's Writers Workshop today. The prompt is to write something inspired by the word "fight."

That's an easy one for me. But I have to warn you that there are a few F-bombs in this post. I thought about watering down the language a bit, but that would mean watering down my sister and I just can't write her any different than she is.

I started to write this, then realized this was a story that required some wine to tell. So now I'm back with my third glass and can begin.

As a matter of fact, this story all started with a bit of drinking. Mostly by me. A little by my sister.

It was about 9 years ago and my youngest sister (not the one I was drinking with) was pregnant and asked me to be her birth coach. She was having a home birth and my second child was a home birth so I wanted to show her the video tape of my experience.

I remembered that my ex-husband had mentioned a long time before that he had the tape. I have no idea how he got the tape. I doubt in his hurry to leave me to be with the girl he met on the Internet, that he thought, "Oh yeah, let me just grab that birth tape and bring it with me for movie night with my new girlfriend."

Maybe he asked one of the kids for it years later, I don't know. What I do know is that I wanted it back. So I called him and asked for it. He said no, he wanted to make a copy of it first and he didn't know when he would get around to it.

Why in god's name would he want a copy of it? He was barely in it. I was the star of the show. I'm the one walking around butt naked in it. It was my sweat and grunts and tears and...naked ass in it! Why would he need a copy?

Really, what bothered me wasn't so much that he wanted a copy, but that he wouldn't give it back to me when I asked for it. He was just being difficult. So we had some heated words back and forth and he made it clear he wasn't giving it back to me anytime soon.

I was HOT! It takes a lot to make me angry, but I was over the top with frustration, anger, and outrage. I knew I was overreacting a tad, but there it was.

"Give me my birth tape, dammit!"

But there was more to the story. There is always more to the story when emotion is involved.

You see, we had been married 12 years and for at least the last 10 of them, I suspected my ex was having affairs. I would straight out ask him and he would deny it. Again and again. We finally divorced with him never admitting to all those years of suspected infidelity.

Fast forward to a few days before the birth tape conversation with him. We were having another telephone conversation about something to do with the kids and I don't remember how it started, but he admitted to me that he was not a model husband when we were married. He "had some fun". That's code for "boinked everything in a skirt."

So I was hurt. Oh, I knew deep down (in that place inside you that you try never to go), even while I was still married to him, that he wasn't faithful. But to hear him finally admit it brought back all the misery and heartache I felt when we were married, with the added bonus of newly confirmed betrayal.

And for him to add to all that hurt by not doing me the simple favor of handing over the birth tape when I asked for it was just too much to take.

Like Goldie Hawn, I was having ALL of the feelings.

It was about that time I brought out the wine and called my sister. The non-pregnant one.

My sister had been there for me through all the ups and downs of that marriage, and everything else in my life. She's younger than me, but has always been protective of me. Maybe because her personality is stronger than mine. She's not afraid to say what she thinks and stand up for what she believes. She was and still is, my hero.

She came over and listened to my sad tale and the more I whined (and wined) about it, the madder she got. She was ready for a fight.

After listening a while, finally, she said, "Let's go."

"Go where?" I said.

"That no-good-f*cking-motherf*cker is giving you back your birth tape tonight."

"Ok." I said.

And off we went to my ex's house.

I don't remember what time it was, but it wasn't too late. Maybe 9:00 or so. I knocked politely on my ex-husband's door. No answer. His car was in the driveway so we knew he was home and him pretending not to be infuriated my sister.

"Oh, HELL no," she said and proceeded to pound on the door with her fist. BAM BAM BAM BAM BAM! "I know you're in there, you motherf*cker, you better answer the door!" she screamed, as she continued to pound BAM BAM BAM BAM BAM BAM BAM BAM BAM...

He answered the door.

I don't remember the exact conversation but it went something like this:

My sister: Give her the tape!
My ex: No.
My sister: Give her the f*cking tape!
My ex: No.
My sister: Give her the damn tape you no-good-f*cking-motherf*cker!
My ex: No.

You ever watch the show Cops?  You know those crazy people on there that call the cops for the stupidest reasons and you watch them and think, "Man are you stupid. Get a grip."

I was one of those people that night. I saw that my sister was getting nowhere with him so I actually called the cops. I at least called the non-emergency number, but still. I'm embarrassed by this fact now.

Here's how that conversation went:

Cop: Hello, Metro.
Me: I need to report a theft.
Cop: Is the theft ocurring now?
Me: Yes. Well...sort of. My ex husband took something of mine a while ago and won't give it back.
Cop: Uh huh. What did he take?
Me: My birth tape.
Cop: Your birth tape?
Me: Yes, a video tape of me giving birth to our daughter.
Cop: Were you married at the time of the tape?
Me:Yes.
Cop: Then it's half his.
Me: But I'm the one naked on it! The tape belongs to the one naked on it!
Cop: (Bitches be crazy.)

The officer was clearly divorced and had something against his ex-wife (I thought, at the time) because I got no sympathy whatsoever from him.

I realized I was not getting my birth tape back that night. Tired and emotionally drained, my sister and I drove home, birth-tape-less. Our only comfort was knowing that we pissed off my ex enough that he wouldn't be getting any sleep that night.

Two days later, my ex sent the tape over with one of my kids.

So what did I learn from this whole sordid story?

This:
Wine is liquid courage.
My sister is a bad-ass.
When you're angry and hurt and upset, doing something stupid feels better than doing nothing at all (I said FEELS, not IS).
And hide any video tapes you don't want to fall into the wrong hands.

And that, my friends, is what I think about when I hear the word "fight."

Embarrassingly,
Lori

***So...I just want to add something here. Every tale is told from the side of one person. I'm sure if my ex were to tell this story, he would tell it differently. I would appear much more insane and unreasonable in his version and he would have a good reason for not giving the tape back immediately. And his version would be right too - just from a different perspective. I'm only sharing my side of this story because in retrospect...it's pretty darn funny. It's not meant to put my ex in a bad light. We have both grown since we were married, and are different people now, happily married to the persons we are supposed to be with.

My Adventure Baby Turns 23

23 years ago, in the middle of the grocery store, my labor pains began.

Many...many...many hours later, at 2:38 in the morning, I held my beautiful girl for the first time.

It felt like I'd known her forever.

She was an intuitive child, even in the womb. When I was upset, I could feel her restless and upset too. When I was calm and happy, so was she. She was the same way as a baby. Always in tune to how her mama was feeling.

She loved to dance since about 3 years old.

She's lit up my world since the day she was born and I'm so proud of her.

Happy Birthday, Sissa!

I'm proud of your adventurous spirit, your empathetic heart, and your hippie soul.
Continue to be who you are and be a bright light in this world.

Love you and miss you,

Mama

How to Pretend to Be Retired

I didn't do a Friday Frag post last Friday, but I have a very good reason. They hubby and I went up to Hesperia California to visit my mom and her husband for the long weekend.

We love visiting my mom because she lives in a semi-rural area in Hesperia and has a large yard filled with a garden and birds and squirrels and other wildlife. We like pretending we're old retired people with nothing too terribly important to do.

So, what do you do when you're visiting your mom for the weekend in a somewhat small town? Well, I'll tell you:

First you get mani/pedis, of course. I forgot to take toe pictures.

Then you visit a bakery called Bodacious Buns ( I know, right?) and look at the cute cakes on display and wish you knew how to do cake decorating.

It's a couple in a hot tub. Isn't that adorable??

Then you split a scrumptious lemon bar with your mom and talk about how delicious the shortbread crust is and the lemon curd filling and the cream cheese frosting. And you and mom chat with the shop owner about Garden club and organic food and religion.

Then you move on to an antique store that just opened up that your mom's been wanting to go to. And you ooh and aah over all the cute vintage-y things like these jars that have been decoupaged and embellished until they're just too cute for words:

Decoupage, beads, lace, tiny flowers and a glue gun. Couldn't you see your makeup brushes standing up prettily in this?

Love the shape of this one!

After browsing for an hour at the antique store, you go back to mom's and take pictures of her garden:

An old ladder with a few old, worn birdhouses sitting on it makes for cute garden decor, don't you think?

I love Mexican Bird of Paradise. Mom has several of these bushes in her yard.

Then you take pictures of mom drinking wine in her garden:

My beautiful, happy mom.

And you can't resist taking pictures of the sky at dusk because it's so beautiful and every single dusk looks different:

Dusk from Mom's yard

The next day you sit in mom's garden again and you and mom decide that the side of the chicken house needs some paint. You have no mural painting skills whatsoever, but decide to start painting then and there:

Planted myself in the dirt and decided to paint me some flowers on the chicken house.

Then you make your husband take pictures of you and mom painting the chicken house and you make sure and pose like an idiot.

Add caption

By then it gets hot, so you go inside and decide you want an agave margarita (of which my step-dad makes delicious ones), but he gets out the blender and you say, no, they were on the rocks last time he made them and he says no, he blends them and you say no, you're sure they were on the rocks, and he says fine, you make them.

So you do. You mix tequila, lime, agave, ice, and a little water in a cocktail mixer and shake it up real good and oh, they are delicious. Then you all laugh about how you bickered over how to make them. Then everyone takes a nap because you made them too strong.

After passing out napping, you finish painting the chicken house:

You can't see it real well, but the left side and the right side are painted tree trunks. Those green things on the top are leaves. Mom had a bunch of old birdhouses, so we nailed them up like they're hanging on the branches of the tree that you can't tell is a tree.

After another beautiful dusk, you help cook dinner and you have delicious homemade ice cream for dessert. Ice Cream made with homegrown figs and peaches:

There's fig ice cream with bourbon sauce, peach ice cream, strawberry ice cream, and carmel ice cream. 

Of course, you have to get up early the next morning to head home and you must take a picture of the pretty sunrise which you can see from your bed:

No filter on this one. Can you see the little sliver of white moon off to the right?

 On the way home you must take pictures of the cloud formations because they are so clear and white:

No filter on this one either. Doesn't it look like a swan, with the neck to the right and the body on the left?

I did put a filter on this one. The sky was just beautiful on the drive home.

And that's what you do when you visit your mom in a small-ish town over the weekend and pretend like you're a retired person.

I can't wait to retire!

Fishing Lessons So I Don't Embarrass the Family

I think I've mentioned that we're going camping next week. So, preparations are in full swing over here. This is the first year in a long time that my brother won't be able to go with us due to his work schedule. That's a shame because he's the expert fisherman and I almost always catch fish when I fish with my brother. I've never caught anything when I've fished without him. I wouldn't tell him that though.

No fish means I have to pack stuff for dinner and that's just more work for me. So, when he insisted on giving my sister and I a lesson in fishing pole rigging, I was all about it, believe me.

Of course, in true big-brother fashion, his reasons for giving us a lesson were so that we don't "embarrass the family at the lake."

Pffffft. Whatever. I just want to catch some fish so I don't have to lug extra food.

So my sister, her 15-year-old step-son, and I gathered on our patio for our pole rigging lesson. We were a motley crew, the 3 of us and my sister and I were in full wise-cracking mode, so my brother was in for a rough ride. Here he is, making pole preparations:

See the pink poles on the right side there? Aren't they cute! Those are the poles my sister and I are fishing with.

I think the "embarrassing the family at the lake" ship has sailed, people.

So here's how the lesson went:

Brother: "So your poles will be taken apart like this...and you'll want to slide the top part into the bottom part, like this."

Sister: "And we want to make sure the little loopeys are lined up, right?"

Brother: "The guides. Yes, make sure they're lined up."

Sister, me, and nephew, in unison (not unlike the alien squeekie toys in Toy Story who always said "The Claaaawwww"): "Guiiiiides."

Brother, after rolling his eyes: "I'm going to show you a slide-sinker-rig for floating cheese."

Me: "A-who-and-a-what-for-a-what?"

Brother, slightly exasperated: "Just pay attention! Get a sinker and a swivel from this tackle kit. I made this for you to take with you."

Me: "It's all dirty. What is that, fish guts on there?? Ewww. Why is it so dirty?"

Brother: "IT IS WHAT IT IS AND THAT'S WHAT YOU'RE TAKING!!"

Me: "Ew."

At this point, my nephew gets up from his chair, holding his pole upright, which then gets hit by the ceiling fan that was on, surprising him so that he tripped on the chair, and spilled his cup of ice water all over the place.

My sister and I started laughing. My brother was not amused.

Once my nephew got settled, my brother launched back into his lesson.

Brother: "Thread the sinker on the line, then you're going to tie the swivel on with a fisherman's knot and I'll show you how to tie the knot."

In case you didn't know, a sinker is a silver oval shaped weight and a swivel is a tiny gold thingy, like a necklace clasp, that has a loop at either end.

Me: "This is like making jewelry."

Brother, rolling his eyes for the 900th time: "Right."

My brother shows us how to tie the fisherman's knot to the swivel, then a leader line to the other end of the swivel, then a hook at the end of it all.

Didn't think you'd actually learn something about fishing here, did you?

My Sister, handing her pole to my brother: "Did I do this right?"

My brother tugs the hook and it falls off.

Brother: "No."

Sister: "Oh, I guess I need to pull the knot tighter."

My brother, burping his answer: "Riiiiiiiight." (Actually, it was more like, "BRIIIIIIIPPPE")

My sister rolled her eyes and I gloated that MY knot did not come undone and my hook was dangling prettily at the end of the line like it was supposed to.

Surprisingly, I ended up being the star pupil, seeing as my hook didn't fall off, so maybe I'll catch the fish while my sister can build the fires with her dryer-lint fire starters.

We'll see how that goes.

I'll tell you one thing - I can't wait to get out of this heat! Where we're camping, it't 8400 feet up, so it should be about 30 degrees cooler than here. And down here, we are melting! It's supposed to be 115 this weekend. Gawd. That's friggin hot. Record breakingly hot, actually.

So, I can't wait to camp! Look out fish!

Fisherman Lori signing off.

An Evening with Gracie Lou

I've always wanted to participate in Mama Kat's Writer's Workshop, but was always too lazy busy to fit it in. But thought I'd give it a try today. The topic: (drum roll please.....) Introduce a Pet

Oh! Hello! I guess I'm supposed to tell you about myself. Was that today? Well, I really don't have time for this nonsense, but since you're here, let's get on with it. I'm Gracie Lou.

For starters, I don't get a moment to myself around here, because I live in some sort of freakin dog commune.

I've got my humans trained pretty well. If I stand up on two legs (like we never walk around on two legs or something!) they get excited and give me  treats. They never seem to notice the bored look in my eyes. They don't know me.

This is my boyfriend Scooter. He may not be much to look at, but that pooch has a heart a gold. Pure gold, I tell ya.

Really? You just had to bring up that Playboy shoot, didn't you? Well you know what? I'm proud of  my doginess and I'm not afraid to show it!

Seems like we're always lining up for something around here.  For walks, for treats, for licks at the cat, for humans to get home and scratch our bellies...always something.

This is my best friend Lucy. Here we are in the car on the way home from the spa. I don't mind the bathing, but can do without the squeezing...if you know what I mean.

Well, it's time to wrap it up now. As you can see, I have a very busy schedule. Basically, I'm just a misunderstood beauty trying to sniff my way through this crazy world. I'm amazing, yes, but I'm fragile, and I need loving, just like everybody else.


Aaaaaand Cut.

If you'd like to participate in Mama Kat's Writer's Workshop, go to her website, read the fun topic choices, and link up!