January, February, March 2009

I can't believe it's been nearly three months since my last post. Oh dear! That sounds like people going to confession "It's been ____ since my last confession." I'll try to catch up on a few of the things that have happened. In January I went to Austin, Texas to be one of three assistants to Wendi Friesen as she spoke at a seminar. I was really excited to be asked to go and help - that meant I would not only meet Wendi, but several other people I had become friends with online in Wendi's chatroom or perhaps twitter. I shared a room with Maggie and Shelly - two wonderful people that I absolutely connected with. Just "picture if you will" :) three women, one hotel room/one bathroom, LOTS of suitcases, and three laptop computers. We stumbled over each other,and around each other, but worked like a ballet in action as we set about getting ready for the day. Somehow we all managed to take showers, do our hair and makeup, and never really be in each others way or have a cross word to one another. We had a blast, bonded as if we'd known each other forever, stayed up too late, drank too much wine, laughed ourselves silly - and just generally had a great time. Some of the people we met were: Joe Vitaly (one of the stars of the movie The Secret), Bruce Muzic, Joe Sugarman (inventor of the Blue Blocker sunglasses), Mr 2020- and his sweet wife Carol, Mindy Audlin - loved her, Jon Biel (Jennifer Biels father), and Miss America 1962 - Maria ? can't remember her last name right now. There were many others, but right now the names are just not coming to me. I had a fabulous time, made some new friends, and was really glad that I went.

Katie has moved back to Portland - is looking for work in the graphic design field - but in the meantime, working as a barista at Al's Garden Center. She's working on her website to showcase some of her graphic design work - and hoping to land something permanent in that field - sooner rather than later.

It's March 15th - and we are still experiencing snow on a fairly regular basis - like today! So much snow this year - I think every week we've had at least one day with snow of some sort - usually more than one day. We're all getting a little tired of the snow and cold at this point - and we're ready for sunshine and nice weather!!!!!

We have decided to get another dog - a black lab of course. We went to visit two different breeders to check the dogs out. The first one we did not feel good about at all. We didn't like the owner nor the dogs themselves. We found another place thru a recommendation from someone Dave works with, that used to raise labs - and where Larry and Edna got their dogs. Tim, Lou, and I went out to Sauvie's Island to see the dogs - and instantly fell in love with the mother dog. We put our names on the list for two female black labs - to be born mid April, and ready to bring home the end of May.

I started this two days ago - but never finished it. Today is March 17th - St Patricks Day. Lunch with my good friends Lynda, Lynda, and Lou - at Gustav's. That's a great place to go for lunch - the booths are large, there is a wide variety of food, and they are so nice about letting us sit there for hours on end and just visiting. We always leave a large tip :).

I'm thinking that the best thing I can do, is to get this finished up and post it right now before I get sidetracked again. So, here goes. I will try to be better about posting on here more often.

Happy St. Patrick's Day!