Yellow Fresia And Lavender

"Love isnt all flowers and candles, and dancing midgets.

 No, it is much, much taller than that."

~Jarod Kintz

Love Quotes For The Ages

Specifically Ages 18-81.

Look, See, I made it! Two postings in a row! As I ease back into life anew, Mondays seem to be the day for getting caught up! I was so thrilled to hear from my friend Kat! Lovie, I wasn't sure if you might have given up on me and moved on, so to get a comment from you just made my whole day! And yes, I am taking your suggesstion and I will be doing a video walk through of the house when we are done decorating it! The living room is almost there, we just need to finish the fireplace and get something for the red statement wall! I am learning a lot about color as I move along through the decorating. Next up will be the bedroom, which I am doing in Cornflower Blue, soft lavender and mineral. After that it is on to the hallway, bathroom and finally the kitchen next autumn! I want to let the house show me the way, if that makes sense.

 I want to stay true to it's energy, which from our experience in her the last 6 months, is mostly embracing, gentle and very kind. It's a house that brings you in and gently holds you. It's got such a nice vibe. I felt it from the moment we pulled up in front of it! I hadn't even seen it in the MLS listings. Our real estate expert just decided to add it into the house list for that day! We learned the day we signed the contracts that the previous owned listed it on my birthday! It was meant to be. It was just sitting quietly, in that cute little neighborhood waiting for us, and when we pulled up on the curb in front of the house, Alan and I both immediately remarked on how adorable it was and when we walked in the door the house just seemed to say... 

"Well, what took you so long?"

We have started landscaping the yard. 

Yellow Freesia and Lavender. 

More photos to come soon.

Stay Tuned!

Mood: Happy

~Me :)

Now I am Home!

"A gift can never be cheap or insignificant because of the heart and love it carries."

~Munia Khan

Alan and I and the boys moved into our house, officially, on September 2nd 2015. It's never easy to move, and when you add moving your cats to the stress, the stress becomes at least twice as bad, because now you aren't just moving lamps and beds and computers, you are moving living, breathing, thinking, and sometimes plotting, individuals that if you are lucky may be open to some negotiation about their stress level, but who will always, always come out ahead of any begging, pleading or simple request made of them from their humans. It was a back breaking, migraine inducing, fear-fest getting my 3 boys into their kennels, for the ride to Turlock. It was something I would never want to relive... ever... but from the first day in Turlock, I knew that we would eventually have to relive the drama, because Turlock was merely the waiting room of our new home.

Thank goodness the boys never found out that the place we were originally moving to was a stupid scam! It was bad enough that they felt our stress, let alone feel it and fully understand it in human terms! But when Alan and I picked ourselves back up, and finally found our house, we knew that it wasn't going to be fun to move the boys from the hotel, but when it was over we would finally be home. In our forever place. Fortunately, we had a much easier time getting them pack in their kennels, when we left the hotel, because we did something different... we tricked them! We did it on the spur of the moment, with NO time for them to pick up on our stress! A laser pointer, some treats, and some new catnip mice proved to be the best friend of this stressed out fur-baby mommy!

We left the hotel in Turlock at 11:30 PM. The drive to Stockton took about an hour. When we got to the house, we immediately took them out of their kennels, poured them some food, filled their water fountain, and put some toys out from them to play. Hendrix did well! He is my brave boy. Dylan came around in about a week. Joey... not so much! He got acquainted with the house very slowly, room by room was conquered, with the exception of the master bedroom. No amount of playing, begging, manipulating, crying or begging some more could get him to go into the bedroom! He would stand in the hallway, and cry for me, but wouldn't step foot over that threshold. Nope. There was NO discussing it! It was hard to hear him cry, and want to be next to me, and not be able to make help him come in the room.

Joey, and I cuddled at night in our old place, and we cuddled together at the hotel. It was one of the things that made this whole nightmare tolerable. But it wasn't happening here, and I didn't know what the problem was! Then one day I noticed he was eyeing the LARGE ceiling fan that hangs over our bed! We didn't have one of those at the cottage, and there wasn't one at the hotel. I think, when Joey saw it moving around and around, he thought it was a bird, of which he is terrified! So, I stopped using it, and just let it sit still. He didn't make any progress after a month, but the cold weather had moved in, so it remained off. I didn't think he would ever come around, then on Christmas Eve something amazing happened!

I woke up from a fever induced nap to see his little body sitting in the window sill, The night before I had mentioned to Alan that all I really wanted for Christmas was for my boy to cuddle with me in the bed, and the next day he did! You can't buy that feeling folks! My Joey had finally come back. My silly, funny, considerate, kind child found his inner lion, just in time for Christmas! It was, and always will be, one of the best holiday gifts ever! Any day he came back to me would have been special, but the fact that it happened on Christmas means even more! I love that child! And now, when I go to sleep, I have this warm little pillow right next to me again, and Alan doesn't even mind that he sometimes cuddles between us! 

He is our Joey. He is the little brother. 

Happiness!

Mood: Happy

~Me :)

Where The Love Is

"Shit happens. Doesn't mean you have to step in it.

 But if you do, I would buy a new pair of shoes."

~Kilburn Hall

Stuff happens in life. Sometimes stupid, meaningless stuff. Stuff there is no excuse for or understanding of. I don't think I will ever fully understand what all has gone on this year, so I am learning to live with it. Isn't that what they say to do? If you can't change a circumstance, try to change how you feel about it? Well, for me, it means simply learning to live with it. I am trying my best, but it's a matter of taking one step forward, and away from it, every day. I think I have moved passed the panic and frustration. I am moving past the depression a little more and more with each passing "normal" movement, like fixing a meal or making the bed. In other words moving on. The depression began to scare me a bit... well... a lot... but I think it was the depression that helped me come to terms with all of it. I experienced the full five stages of grief, which from what I have read, is a perfectly normal response under the circumstances. I am now in the acceptance stage, and while I have a blue day here and here, and I am still a little worried being able to swing the ability to own a home, I go to bed at night incredibly grateful for whatever time we end up spending here.

 A year, two, maybe five years... it's all good. If we should find that we need to sell and go a different route I am okay with that also. But in the mean time, this new house has taken me in somehow. It has a wonderful nurturing vibe to it, in fact both Alan and I felt it from the first moment we saw the place. We looked through a lot of houses, and none of them made us both smile the way this one did! The house was meant to be ours, for however long it is meant to be, and it takes good care of us. I have been reluctant to feel love for the place, but it's wearing me down. I am pretty much in love, and I don't even know when I let the emotion in, but I did. Stockton, California has it's challenges, but it has been getting better in the last couple years. The neighborhood is Lakeview, and it sits in north Stockton. It is the third best neighborhood, the best neighborhood is about 2 blocks west of us. LOL. So it's in a stable, reasonably safe part of the city. Stockton is a big city, so yes there is crime, but it's all about knowing where you can go, and any given hour of the day, and being aware of your actions and surroundings.

We all have to do that anyway. After the terrible tragedy in San Bernadino last week, the point was driven home that one can't be too diligent. We can't live a normal life if we dwell on stuff, but being aware of your surroundings just makes sense. So, I am no longer "just making the best of it" I am settling in. We are making the house ours, and it feels good. Any place Alan and the boys are will be home for me. They fill the place with so much silliness and love that it would be impossible to not love the place. I think that's how we made it in the little Berkeley cottage for so long. It wasn't the cottage, it was the love inside. Alan and Elvis, and then Hendrix, Dylan and finally the little brother Joey. 

Our house is a home, no matter where we are, 

but I am kinda digging the new place!

Now, if I could just motivate myself to get the unpacking done! 

Leaf Of The Day

December 6th 2015

Mood: Relaxed

~Me :)

That's No Ghost Lady, That's A Raccoon

"Can you imagine life without the horror genre? 

There would be no monsters, only assholes."

~Michael A. Arnzen

Alan and I bought a new house. Well, it's new to us, but in reality it is 53 years old. The same age Alan and I are. And as a 53 year old it has some problems with plumbing, and waking up in the morning, and remembering. Yes, I said it, remembering. The automatic timers are a bit eccentric. We moved in on the 1st of September, and all seemed normal, then one night, a couple weeks ago, we heard it. That sound. That strange, disembodied sound of something wet... and terrible...moving around the house.

Glooop, GlOOPY GLOOP GLOOP.

Me: Alan! Did you hear that?

Alan: Hear what?

Me: That Gloop sound.

Alan: No, honey, I don't hear a gloop... snore. SNORE!

Me: ALAN! LISTEN!

Alan: SNORE. SNORT. I will check it tomorrow.

Well, tomorrow came and as you might guess, no gloop sound. Then three days pass without even a peep, when once again, GLOOOOOOOOP. GLOOOP. Bubble, bubble, bubble. Like a witches cauldron. Only this time it happened on a night when Alan was working the graveyard shift. Perfect! It was absolutely perfect. There was a gloop, gloop ghost, or witch, and I was home alone! So what could I do? I did the only thing I could do. I turned on every single light in the house, and 3 TV's! The ghost/witch was so frightened, it gave up and went wherever wet ghosts/witches go. 

The gloop sound came and went over the next few weeks. Sometimes in the daytime, but mostly at night. Late at night. Now, fast forward to a couple days ago, when the whole spooky situation came to a logical and embarrassing conclusion. You see, that is when we had the first visit with our professional pool person. He explained that the gloop, gloop sound was nothing more than an ill timed pump, that was on a timer, because, you see, Stockton has certain days of the week, and times of day, when you are allowed to water plants and add water to pools. 

Alan: HA HA HA. A ghost? Ha Ha Ha.

Me: I don't know, it could still be a ghost, look at what I caught on camera!

(See Above)

Pool Guy: Um, that's not a ghost lady, that's a raccoon!

Alan: HA HA HA HA HA.

Me:*?%#^^%!@&! (Censored)

Thanks A Lot Alan!

Leaf Of The Day

October 3rd, 2015

Mood: Happy

~Me :)

The "Off Market" Anniversary

"Real love stores never have endings"

~Richard Bach

Love Story

Today is a big day for me. It is the anniversary of my blogging on Ellipsis... yep... it was 13 years ago today that I began sharing my life on the World Wide Web! Well, on AOL at first, then on Blogger. It's been a wild ride, and if you asked me back then if I thought I would be buying a house in Stockton, California one day, I would have laughed and laughed and laughed. 13 years ago today I had just come in from a swim, and Elvis was tickling my knees as I toyed with the idea of blogging. Would I have enough interesting things to say? Would I enjoy sharing my thoughts with total strangers? How would my photography fit in? LOL. The answer to all the questions seemed to be positive, so off I went... into the big pond of AOL blogging. And here we are today! Now, not only do I blog, I mircoblog on Twitter, and share my photography on Flickr and Pintrest and I have made some amazingly supportive friends on Twitter and even flirted... OUT LOUD... with Dylan McDermott, before Maggie Q of course! I know, I know... the flirting was minor and I wasn't keeping Dylan McDermott awake at night, but it still feels creepy to flirt with another girl's fella... right? Didn't Alan mind me flirting with Dylan McDermott? You ask.Well, no, he found it amusing, especially when I would blush with each little alert that beeped on my phone that told me he had just favorited something stupid I had just said. LOL. I don't know who enjoyed my flirting with Dylan McDermott more, me or Alan! I would like to think I at least made #Mcdillet smile a little too!

But like I said, that was before Maggie Q.

Sigh.

But here we are. I will be explaining what happened this summer soon. Probably this Autumn when I get back to blogging daily, but for now here is a look at our new home. We get the keys either late this week or early next week. Until then we are still in Turlock, or as I like to call it...

THE LAND THAT TIME FORGOT! 

Home

Yeah, I know, I have a "Mad Men" styled kitchen, complete with a PINK oven. LOL. But that's just temporary. We need to get moved in and all the utilities put into place, and some painting done, then we are going to renovate this fall. Probably in October. You'll see... it's going to look amazing. I am going for a Tuscan theme, so give it some time. You'll see! But until then, how completely cool is a PINK oven? I am tempted to leave it for nostalgia sake, but I miss my stove and oven Alan bought me a few years ago. Shrug. Still... it's kinda cool to have Barbie's Dream Kitchen!

In Real Estate terms the words "Off Market" are AWESOME!

So much has happened in the last 13 years!

Thank you so much for supporting me, and coming along with me for the ride! I love you, my friends!

"There is no mystery... that's the beauty of it. We are entirely explicable to each other, and yet we stay. What a miracle that is!"

~Kamila Shamsie.

Broken Verses

Mood: Happy

~Me :)