Facebook Friend Friday

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I love that little photo collage at the top of my facebook that highlights eight friends. Since all of the people on my facebook are “real” friends, I decided that I want to tell you about the collection as it appears this Friday.

First is the fabulous Brookie. Brooke was our first Mrs. Oklahoma International. I learned the ropes with her and we became so close. David and I refer to her and her equally fabu husband, Teddy, as our middle child as they fall in between Brandon and Geoff in age. Not only did we have a really fun year with Brookie, we got to know and love her guys: Teddy, her husband, and her Irish twins, Corbin and Ian. One of my very favorite memories of the Good family is when Brookie was giving up her crown at the 2008 pageant. Teddy escorted her on the stage and Corbin and Ian were waiting, each with a rose, backstage with Teddy’s sister. She was going to let them join Teddy and Brooke on the stage at the appropriate time. One of the boys, I can’t remember which, got ahead of the game and went out to join his parents on the stage. Teddy’s sister tried to get him back but I told her to let him go. Then the other boy got away and joined the rest of his family. He then took the hand of his brother and the Good’s did a ring around the rosie on stage. I have goosebumps while typing this. Sometimes you can’t script moments as good as that one was.

Next is Sara Sosnowski. Sara is an amazing cosmetologist who does my facials and pedicures. She also cuts David’s hair when we’re in Bartlesville. I’ve been seeing Sara since before she was married and now not only is she married, she’s having a baby! I can’t wait. I’m so excited for her and her husband. If you need spa services in Bartlesville, I cannot recommend Sara enough. I’m glad I can stay in touch with Sara via facebook now that we’ve left the ‘ville.

Oh Shannon Gallagher. How can I tell you how much she amazes me? I met her at the Bixby Heartlink women’s networking group. I was immediately fascinated and drawn to her because of what she does. Shannon is a Nutritionist/Phytotherapist (a modern day herbalist) who specializes in endocrine health which in turns controls the reproductive system. She’s been working in fertility for almost the entire time she’s been in this line of work. I am completely convinced that we should look at our health issues from a natural viewpoint instead of just dumping drugs on top of them as a bandaid. When I see that Shannon has helped another lady become pregnant, I want to cry with joy. Shannon is a positive and amazing woman with three cute little kiddos and a terrific chiropractor husband.

Mike Sheats is my cousin. It’s so funny because I believe the last time I saw Mike, he was 11 years old and David had to help get him off the roof of their house in North Carolina. We were 18 so you know how many years ago that’s been. I’m so happy to have connected with Mike on facebook. Now I can share in his life and the lives of his two super cute kiddos, Madison and Kyle. Yummy blonde goodness. They are CUTE!

I met Heather Dutcher when she was Mrs. Cleveland County International 2010. I was immediately drawn to her passion for her platform which was to help find a cure for pancreatic cancer. She called me to tell me that her dad had died of pancreatic cancer about the same time my mom’s ovarian cancer had re-emerged after the seven years which usually indicates an all clear diagnosis. I could totally relate to Heather’s loss as I was in the middle of something similar myself. Heather took her local title and ran with it. I was always amazed to watch my titleholders and see what they would do with their local titles and Heather’s path was impressive. The following year, little social media queen that she is, she did all of the social media for the pageant, relieving me of the responsibility. I love this girl so much and am so glad our paths crossed!

Well, Nikki Rottmayer. She’s the mother of our glambaby and beautiful wife of our son, Geoff.  I love her. She and I have had some good times living through the weird careers that our husbands have. I liked her from the first minute I met her and knew she would be perfect for Geoff. I’m glad he thought so, too! Nikki is fun, friendly and fabulous. 🙂

Jon Fisher is one of my very first twitter friends who has become an in real life friend. Through Jon, I met his amazing wife, Afton, and watched their little boy Cecil grow through the photos Afton posted every day on facebook. It’s always so funny to me how I love Cecil so much but have only seen him a handful of times. I think, “Oh Cecil! I’m so happy to see you!” and his look says, “STRANGER DANGER”. LOL! Jon is terrific and so funny. He’s a designer and I love that part, too. I’m so glad to know Jon and I love him and his little family.

Finally, there is Marilyn Davidson. I met her through the association the International Pageants has with the American Heart Association. Marilyn works at the capitol on issues that are important to the AHA. Through Marilyn, I met her husband, Myles, who is fabu. They are truly fun and friendly folks and now they have a cute little boy, Gibson. While I thought he was the image of Marilyn when he was born, the older he gets, the more he looks like his daddy. I love following his growing up on facebook, too.

Facebook kind of freaks me out at times. Because of this, the people who are my friends are really my friends. I hope you enjoyed this peek into my friends list. I love them. 🙂

Color my world

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I’m not sure if I can adequately convey what color means to me. It’s important. It makes me happy.

I do my graphic design work on a word of mouth basis. This limits my opportunities, perhaps, but it’s like I tell people, “life is too short to argue over color”.

My computer melted down yesterday and I’m not sure what’s wrong with it but the trouble shooting I did according to HP’s website said it needed to be seen by someone who knows what they are doing.

So I took it to the computer doctor this a.m. It’s going to be in the hospital for 10 days. Wowza. 10 days without my computer and the ability to design anything.

Initially, I was so glad that I had finished up the three projects I had been working on so I’m not leaving anyone in the lurch. But as I drove around doing my errands, I grew sadder and sadder at the thought of not being able to design anything for so long. I started hoping that Westgate Computers is a place that under promises and over delivers.

As I drove along in my colorless fog, I saw Dustee’s Fashion Accessories. The sign was pink and it looked fun. I crossed three lanes and pulled into the parking lot.

When I walked into the store, I was greeted with color and sparkle. The jewelry, arranged around the outside walls, was separated by color. While I do not think I will ever wear orange jewelry, it made me happy to look at it. All the colors made me happy, especially the blue. Oh, especially the blue, which I had to go back and gaze upon for a second time.

I just walked around that store soaking up the color and the joy. ::contented sigh::

To the other people inside the store, I probably looked like an alien being who had landed unexpectedly in the Land of Sparkle but I don’t care. That store is full of fabulous and I just wanted to soak it all up.

I’m not a shopper and I’ve never experienced such joy in a store before. I finally left, happy, content. I know I’ll go back there. 🙂

She ain’t heavy, she’s my…

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…well, she is me.

And how would I really know how heavy I am? David persuaded me to leave my scale behind when we moved to Amarillo. His justification was that the RV isn’t so big that we have room for every little thing and he thought the scale would be better off in our bathroom in Bartlesville.

Well, it’s not JUST a little thing. How am I supposed to know if I’m gaining tons of weight here?

True confession time: I will admit that I’ve been addicted to the scale for many, many years. I have a history of disordered eating that I like to think I’m finally past. There are two things I can’t seem to let go of, though, and one of them is the scale.

Last weekend David had to attend some meetings in Dallas and I made plans to visit with my friend, Denise. I had a brilliant idea:

So I got there and even though I had eaten breakfast, had coffee, was in clothes, I was still 5 lbs less than I was when we left Bartlesville. My day was so HAPPY!

While I realize that basing my happiness on a scale number is ridiculous, I can’t tell you how terrified I was that I was just gaining weight hand over fist.

One of the things we decided prior to moving was that we would never have sugar or flour and anything “bad” in our RV home. There have been days when it’s been tough, usually David is gone and I’m missing him and a nice slice of chocolate cake sounds like a good idea.

But I haven’t given in. David almost did. And it crushed me.

When we were shopping on Saturday, all of a sudden, I saw a package of flour tortillas in the shopping cart.

Me: Are you really going to buy those and bring them into the RV?

Him: Yes.

Holy cow. I was crushed. I mean seriously, I felt betrayed. It must have been on my face like my emotions are a lot and he eventually put the tortillas back on the shelf. I thanked him.

We have been eating mostly Paleo since November of 2010. What I know about that is that we feel so much better when we eat this way. But I have a big sweet tooth and an incredible ability to follow a bad idea (foodwise) to it’s hurtful (oh my aching joints!) conclusion. I knew that if those tortillas got into the RV, it would be the beginning of the end.

David travels and I know he doesn’t eat as healthfully when he’s on the road. He really needs to let that be the only time.

We are heading home for Labor Day weekend. I will visit the scale and it’s very likely I will bring it back with me. I can always store it under the mattress. 🙂

Rock me, rock me, roll me through the night

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It rained last night. I figured that it had since it was so windy I felt like I was on the Titanic. What if the RV tips over?

The wind blows from the west most of the time so if the RV tips, it will tip onto the door. Then Boo Boo and I would have to climb out a window.

This is the exit window. It would be easier to climb out of it if was across from the island so I’d have something to stand on to reach it.

And of course, it would only tip while David was away so I’d have to figure it out myself.

And live tweet the event.

Someone would probably still have to send help. 😉

These are the things that I think of when it’s super windy. And it’s windy here a lot. 🙂

 

Life on the loop

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We’ve been in Amarillo since Saturday. After some initial problems with the delivery of our RV (that we purchased sight unseen),  we’ve started to settle down here on Jewels Loop.

I love it here. I really do. 🙂

While it’s been extra hot in Oklahoma, it’s been hot here, but not that hot. I love it when the heat index (what it really feels like) is lower than the actual temperature. And that’s most of the time. 🙂

I have almost everything unpacked and put away and I think this RV will work just fine for us. We still have a little trouble getting Boo Boo to understand that he can’t sit right on top of us but I think he’s still a little confused about what in the heck we’re doing here.

One habit he grabbed hold of right away is coffee outside in the cool morning.

We go for our walk. Three laps around the park gives us the equivalent mileage to what we used to do back in Bartlesville with him. Then we come back, I make more coffee, and we sit outside. He practically stands at the door waiting while the coffee is brewing.

I like waking up and seeing who pulled in overnight. I’m absolutely amazed at the number of Class A motorhomes that are parked here every day.  Especially when you consider that they cost more than our house in Bartlesville!

The people here are SO nice. There was:

  • The unknown man who helped me heave-ho the extra a/c into my car at Home Depot. He didn’t work for them, he just happened to be going into the store at the time I was wrangling that bad boy into my back seat while trying to keep it upright.
  • Vanessa the server at Ruby Tequila’s who offered to give us any recommendations or answer any questions about Amarillo that we had. As a lifelong resident, she felt she could help us with doctors, churches, etc. But what she really did that was special was save us from having to sit by a table full of unruly kids with inattentive parents. I will always love her for that. 🙂 I filled out the compliment card that came with our bill and gave her mad props.
  • Haley the cashier, also at Home Depot, who helped me to use the remaining balance of of two of those awful debit rewards cards that AT&T gives you instead of a plain old check you can deposit into your account. I wanted to kiss her! I wrote to Home Depot corporate to sing her praises.
  • Jacob, the guy behind the meat counter at Amigos (the Mexican grocery store where I am always going to shop). He was so friendly, telling me how to use the carnitas meat I had just had him get for me. We talked about barbecue sauce and I’ll be bringing him my recipe when I go back to the store.
  • Matt, the RV fixit guy. We had to call him because the Co2 alarm started going off for no apparent reason. David was halfway out the door to San Angelo so he called and then I waited for Matt to arrive and save my life. We were talking and I told him we are RV virgins and know virtually nothing about what we are doing here and he basically gave me what amounted to an RV 101 class. He didn’t have to do that and I appreciated it so much! Oh, and also appreciated him being able to replace the Co2 sensor and stop the beeping. 🙂

Can you see why I like it?

People in RVs smoke. Not all of them but a lot of them so we still smell smoke a lot. And I still get irritated at the people who speed through here when the speed limit is 10 mph (hello there are kids on bikes!) but for the most part, I love living here.

It’s quiet. We see plenty of dogs but not a one of them is outside barking 24/7. I love the constant breeze that blows. I LOVE that we can sit outside, even when it’s still in the 90’s, and be relatively cool in the shade.

I’m happy. 🙂

I’m a dork

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LOL! Sometimes I just have to shake my head at myself. 🙂

Since we learned we are going to be moving, we’ve been trying to use up the food and supplies we have in the house. Before we went to the store the last time,  I noticed that we were almost out of Cascade dishwasher action packs.

We got one of the big plastic containers one time because it keeps them better but, since we’re moving into the RV, I was hoping to get the smaller plastic container that wouldn’t take up too much room.

I was ready to grab the smaller box when a lady in the aisle said, “I have a $2.00 off coupon for this one” pointing to the one in the plastic bag.

Well, I really wanted the smaller plastic box but a $2.00 off coupon is pretty good stuff. So I accepted her coupon and bought the bag of action packs.

I just opened that bag and as I was loading it into the dishwasher, it occurred to me that I really didn’t need to worry about the smaller box at all since THE RV DOES NOT HAVE A DISHWASHER!

LOL! Shaking my head. 😉

RV crazy?

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We very well may be but we are now proud owners of an RV. Believe it or not. And I know plenty of people who will not believe that I am going to live in an RV.

David had been interviewing for a position in West Texas. We talked about it a lot and finally decided that buying an RV would make more sense at this point in our lives when we are ready to downsize and head towards our retirement goals. (10 year plan, folks, don’t freak. ;-))

It took me just a little bit of time to wrap my head around the idea but then I realized it could be fun.

Thus began our five state tour of hundreds of RVs. We drove to Arkansas, Missouri, Kansas and Texas. Of course we looked around Oklahoma, too, even if it wasn’t the first state we looked in.

We wound up buying an RV from Georgia. LOL! 😉

RV crazy? Um, yes, most assuredly. 🙂

We had pretty much narrowed down our search when we drove over to Amarillo to check out the RV parks to see where we would park this RV we couldn’t make our minds up about purchasing.

We’ve decided on the Oasis RV Park in Amarillo. It’s on the west side of town just past the Cadillac Ranch and before New Mexico.

Photo courtesy of thisoldcampsite.com.

I like it and the lady we met, Gail, was so nice and helpful. I think it’s going to be nice to be her neighbor. As we were pulling out of the park after taking a tour around Gail came out of the office and flagged us down. She said that if we bought an RV locally, they could deliver it for us and set it up. Oh? Hmmm. And all of a sudden we weren’t sure we had a first choice. It opened us up to getting a bigger trailer and having someone pull it for us. David has a 1/2 ton pick up and it’s not big enough to pull everything so basically we’d been looking at lightweight bumper pull trailers. Now, we could expand our search. Hallelujah! Like we hadn’t already looked at 893 RVs.

Immediately, like in the hotel with the slowest wi-fi ever, we started looking at other options.

So what did we get? We got a 5th wheel Sportsman by KZ. It’s a 2005 model because I detest the inside of RVs and part of my fun is going to be pulling everything out and replacing it with tragically hip and incredibly cool alternatives.

Our biggest concern, of course, was Boo Boo. He’s a big guy and he sleeps with us so a standard RV queen size bed was just not going to cut it. This one has a king sized bed. By having the 5th wheel we’ll be able to have a bigger living area that is not only taller for us, but it will allow us to have two chairs and a couch so the three of us can all sit on furniture.

Here is the floorplan:

It’s going to be different to live this way but I’m excited about it. I think it will be an adventure and it will be fun. I always have fun with David and I’m looking forward to this.

So anyway, West Texas. It’s flat. And there’s not much out by where we’ll be living. The road is paved at the RV park but at the next intersection it becomes gravel. When I look out, all I see are amber waves of grain. I am about to become Little Trophy Wife on the Prairie. Except I’m not little. 😉

Note: If you are planning to buy an RV in Oklahoma, I can highly recommend Ralph Gray at Deans RV in Tulsa and Big Steve at Dave’s Claremore RV. Both of them listened to us and didn’t try to sell us something we didn’t want to buy. Thank you!

Blackberry breakup

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So if you know me at all, you know that I have been firmly on #teamblackberry since the dawn of time. I loved it!

When the iPhone came out and I started seeing all the cool apps that I couldn’t get on blackberry, it only minimally tempted me and I loved my blackberry.

Yesterday, foursquare came out with a new version. For the past week or so, we haven’t been able to access blackberry app world and so I couldn’t get the updated version of foursquare.

Well, if you know me, you also know that I love foursquare almost more, no, more than my blackberry. So it was time to make the change.

I got encouragement from my twitter friends.

And after I actually had the phone in my possession, Dwana sent me a Welcome Basket.

At first I was frustrated. Typing on the screen with fingers as big as mine has been difficult. Especially with the Rs and Ms. But I’m getting used to it.

I downloaded some apps that I hadn’t been able to have before like instagram and Runkeeper. We used Runkeeper this a.m. and I LOVE it!

Also, checking in on foursquare is super easy on the iPhone and we don’t have to slow down on our walks to check into the buffaloes. Woo hoo! 🙂

All in all, I really like my new iPhone. I miss the keyboard and I may always miss the keyboard but there are so many other things to love.

RIP blackberry. 🙂

Sitting here being cool

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It’s hot outside. I mean really hot. And it’s only June.

This morning, we walked Boo Boo and, completely melted, we then walked over to the church to vote. Throwing all caution to the wind, I figured I’d just melt a little bit more and walk down to the library before it was a billion degrees.

Yesterday, it even smelled hot outside. When I went out to get the mail, it was like the Rapture had happened. There were no birds, no animals, no people, no cars, no nothing. Just hot.

On the upside, last year when it was so hot, I drank a lot of beer. That could be reprised to get through this summer if this week is a foretelling of things to come.

I am fervently hoping that this is the hot spell. The one and only hot spell of the summer. And that the rest of the summer will be in the low 80’s, cool and breezy.

Dreamer. 😉

For now, I’m just sitting here being cool. 🙂

Paleo Barbecue Sauce

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Since we started eating paleo, I’ve been looking for a good barbecue sauce recipe. If you look at anything you can buy on the grocery store shelf, you’ll see they’re loaded with sugar or high fructose corn syrup. Or both.

I finally found a FABU recipe at the Paleo Table blog. It’s really good and we love it. You don’t miss the sugar at all.

I do modify the recipe by using chicken broth most of the time instead of beef broth mostly because I usually have that handy.

Paleo Barbecue Sauce

Ingredients

1 6 oz can tomato paste

1 to 1-1/2 cups of beef stock (no salt added)

5 cloves garlic

1/2 medium yellow onion

2 Tbsp Dijon mustard

2 Tbsp apple cider vinegar (I use Bragg.)

1 Tbsp extra virgin olive oil

1 tsp sea salt

2 tsp chili powder

1 tsp cumin

dash liquid smoke

Preparation

1.  Place onion and garlic in a food processor and pulse until very finely chopped.

2.  Add all ingredients except beef stock in a medium sauce pan. Stir to combine. Add beef stock until sauce reaches your desired consistency.

3.  Warm mixture over medium heat until it reaches a slow simmer. Cover and simmer for 20-30 minutes, stirring frequently.

4.  Store sauce in the refrigerator in an airtight container.

The Paleo Table says that this lasts for quite a while in the fridge but ours never lasts too long. 🙂