Don't Buy Painted Old Navy Flip Flops

They may look cute, but don't let that fool you... I put a pair on today since I was helping Mom clean the back porch, and I was also helping clean the pool, and get it ready for summer. They were red, aqua, yellow, and black striped, and I'd never worn them before. All it took was a little water, and the next thing I know my feet start feeling slimy. Oh well I was busy so I kept doing my thing. Then when I took a break I discovered they had dyed the bottoms of my feet a really horrible dark maroonish color. I had to soak, soap, pumice scrub, repeat for about 30 minutes tonight to finally get them descent. The bottoms of my feet are still a little dark pink, but I couldn't completely scrub my feet to death my pumice stone is now maroon. The upside is I did change my nail polish, and so I'm ready for Yellow Box flip flops, at least they never have dyed my feet.

Sping is in Bloom

Our Rose bushes are turning out bouquets right and left. They may be prettier this year than they have been since we planted them 4 years ago. Roses are a lot of work, if you don't want to ended up with a complete mess, but I really do enjoy working in my rose garden. My neighbor across the street Kevin Thompson is an Ag man, and he always has the most breath taking rose garden, so I have gotten some tips from him to keep the bugs, fungus, and pests away from them. This year, thanks to the pine needles we added around ours and the epsom salt I added about a month ago they are fabulous. I made a bouquet today, and they have made our bedroom smell devine. :)

The Art Show

We had the spring art show up at the college last week. I just thought I'd post some of my entries. I'm almost finished teaching for the semester. There has been a lot going on around here. I am so glad it rained the other night, it has helped the allergies a lot.

Southern Fun

Regardless of wealth, age, gender, race, religion, or orientation there is one thing that all Southerners can agree on.... MOSQUITOS... they are the bloody devil! There are people who make fun of us Southern people with our OFF and Bug Zappers. Anyone that thinks we're crazy has obviously never dealt with anything like the attack we had last summer. We had to get out of our cars and run to get in the house before we were carried away! I had several friends in college from Australia that would rant and rave on and on about how they had never seen so many dang mosquitos, and we oughta sleep inside of "those nets you see on movies about Africa."

With all this said, I must add that there is something rather gratifying about zapping the rotten little beasties. A couple weeks ago I bought Jon a tennis racquet mosquito zapper from Ross's dress for less, then he went and found some more cheaper and more powerful out at Harbor Freight Tools. We have been like two kids with a great new toy! Tonight we turned on the front porch light, and the back porch light, and we waited for the sun to go down. Then one of us would shake the azalea bushes while the other swatted the ones that flew up out of them. Between the two of us we cooked about 100 of the little blood suckers tonight. I feel like we both made our own small contribution to humanity :)

3 Cheers for the White Fireplace!

In my recent Pupitre you can catch a glimpse of the fireplace in its former brickiness. We've lived in our house for a little over 4 years, and it has nagged me, "Should I paint it, Should I leave it alone?" Saturday before Jon came home I decided "This is it, no turning back, I'm painting it."

I didn't tell Jon that I was about to start on this venture. I'm fiercely independant, and I love being able to do "Man" things around the house. I single handedly tiled and grouted our formal dining room, I laid the tile in the kitchen and laundry room, I broke out the old tile in the bathroom on my own, I ripped the carpet up in several rooms, and hauled it to the street. So Jon is no stranger to walking in on me in the midst of an extreme home makeover. I was a little worried about this project because in the past Jon had been a real advocate for leaving it alone, so I was happy when he walked in and said, "That's going to look good!"

I'm happy, now I'm just trying to decide what color I want to repaint the living room. Word to the wise- "a lovely buttery yellow" will wear you out! I promise for some reason everyone I know that has painted a room or two yellow agrees it's just not a color that you want to be stuck looking at for the rest of your life.

Isn't that a cute skinny couple in our picture of Jon proposing to me? I thought we were going out to Timothy's for a nice dinner, so Mom was taking pictures, I had no idea he was about to pop the question, and I'm so glad he'd told Mom so she could be there to take pictures as it happened! Mom also painted the rose I have over the fireplace. She's so talented!

Caio for Now!

For the Love of Ray J

Girl, I do not know what my Mama was thinkin' when she went to get her toenails did, and had them paint 'em YELLOW! So Wednesday I pull up at my Mama's house, and she comes walking out to ask me what do I think about her new pedicure. My thoughts went something like this, "Oh gosh, they look like they have a bad fungus or something, gag, why on earth did she pick that color, what am I going to tell her?" I really don't like to be mean and hurt peoples' feelings, so I just knodded and said, "They're ok." That was it, discussion over.

Fast forward about 3 or 4 hours later. Mom- "My toenails are bothering me. I think I messed up. They look really bad." Me- "They're pretty awful, it looks like you have a fungus and your toenails are rotting off." Mom- "I look like someone with cerrhosis of the liver!" Me- "Why on earth did you pick that color?" Mom-"Seriously since last November I have wanted to paint my toenails yellow or chartreuse. I don't know why, but you know how it is when you get something in your mind, and you just can't leave it alone. I guess I was going for the Shrek look or something." Me-"Shrek is not exactly a fashion icon."

Then she took a picture on her phone and sent it to her sisters and my sister. Well Jordan calls, and has no problem off the bat telling her they look disgusting, and go change it. In our family, if you want an HONEST opinion about how you or something you are wearing looks you ask Jordan. She never steers you wrong, and because of the brutal honesty she has expressed towards me in the past, I have no problem with telling her what I really think. However, she is probably the only person in the world that I can say mean stuff like that to. She recently sent some pictures of herself and Josh in an e-mail, and my first reaction was to pick up the phone and tell her to ditch the skirt she was wearing, and here's the awesome thing she replied, "I'm putting it in the Goodwill bag right now, although I don't think anyone else should make the same mistake of wearing it." Don't you love that!

Anyways the story has a very happy ending, Mom went, and had her polish changed to a beautiful shade of red, with a really cute tulip on her big toes. :)

Chicken Feathers with a hint of Lime

Everybody that knows me knows I don't want anything to do with the sun. I Xnayed tanning right when I graduated high school. It's always easy to find me on the beach: I'm the one with the long sleeves, hat, big sun glasses, loads of SPF, towel draped over my legs, under an umbrella.

When I walked into class to teach this week it looked like EVERYONE had been laying out or in a tanning bed. Ugh! Yes I started to really feel like the pastey old professor. So ladies & gents I went to the sto, and got me some Banana Boat tan in a can with a hint of lime to supposedly keep one from smelling like chicken feathers. I hope you can all appreciate that I am smelling very much like Tequila Lime Chicken, but not in a yummy sort of way. It has been almost 3 hours since I applied the stuff, and I think I can barely notice my legs looking a little bit darker. I used Neutragena Tan in a can last year to get all brown for Jordan's wedding, but as soon as the wedding was over I quit because I couldn't stand the smell. Another Ugh! Is there such a thing as sunless tanner that actually doesn't smell?

Pupitre

Pupitre- if you were in Senor Houff's Spanish class at PG, then you know what it is without me telling you, but for the no habla espanol group out there it means "a student desk." I bought this baby for a whopping $5 at the Salvation Army one day. At the time I really had no idea what in the world I would do with it, but I thought... When I was a kid I would have killed for one of these things to play with because I was one of those kids that wanted to play with the real stuff (I swiped countless syringes (needle less of course), tongue blades, and band aids from Dad's office to play doctor) I had a real typewriter to play office (which is actually what I first learned to type on), and of course there was everything in the kitchen to play grocery store. I'm almost certain that the one thing missing that would have made my childhood fantasies come true would be a real school desk. For $5 how could I pass it up? At the very least I could keep it for when we have kids one day. However, this week I have found a spot in the corner of the living room, and have set it up for me to be able to do art and watch TV at the same time. As with any new piece of furniture it has created quite a stir among the feline/canine members of the family.

Thursday night is a good time for a Date

Why limit yourself to the weekend? Especially when there is much less in the way of crowds on week nights. Sometimes you've just got to put on something cute, and get out of the house. I realize that compared with a lot of couples we haven't been married all that long, but I will tell you this... we are almost 5 1/2 years into our marriage, and if you don't work and put something into it... you will feel like you are getting nothing out of it. This has to work both ways. It is too easy to say, "We'll just stay home tonight, and save the money."

A date does not have to be expensive, but our preacher Russell Wilkins once said this at a wedding, and it has completely changed my mindset: "Your wedding should not be the biggest financial investment of your relationship together. All the tuxedos and dresses will go into a box and age. The flowers will die. No one will even have a clue what flavor the punch was. Your Marriage is the thing that is worth spending money on. You have to make eachother a priority every single day. If you need to take a vacation together, do it. If you need to get counseling, do it. If you just need to get out of the house and go back to the way you were before you were married a few hours, then do it."

Well that's my soapbox for the day. Now the big decision is Outback or Johnny Carino's, hmmm......

Oh, and the picture was taken at Jordan's (my little sister) weddding last May on Isle of Palms, SC.

So we all have a "Type"

I think it's safe to say that everyone has a "type"or a particular "look" of guy or girl they are attracted to. Some girls can't help but go weak in the knees for the whole blond hair blue eyed kind of guy. I have always had a thing for the Italiano: black hair, black eyes, very intense. Is it any wonder that I married a man that is more than likely part Italian? (Jon was adopted, so we aren't 100% sure, but he has that look. When we were in Italy last spring they all came up and started talking to him like he was one of them, so I'm just going to say he is.) I was looking through some pictures tonight getting some ideas for art, and came across this picture of Jon reading a letter I sent him on our wedding day, and I thought there's my hot little Italian husband. The other guys are Nathaniel Parker, Al Pacino, and Andy Garcia who are all total hotties, although my old buddy Al isn't looking so hot in his old age.

Just Another Reason

Why EVERY animal wants to be a Trammell animal, and why Jon and I are perfect for eachother. The stupid memory card kept erasing itself so I lost the pictures of us painting this thing. As any cat person will know... cats love boxes. We have had this cardboard box sitting on top of our big red chest in the living room since January, and Jon has wanted me to do something artsy to it since Mom brought it over for our big o' baby boy Zip. There are 3 reasons for this: 1. I think being fellow OCD person the cardboard just bothered him. 2. Zipper is his cat- they have "Man Time" together watching the Rangers, the Cowboys, and any sort of OU Sooner Sport we can find on TV. So he wanted to pimp his little buddy's box. 3. He's always encouraging me with my art- if I had a notion to paint the ceilings like the Vatican he'd go get me a scaffold. He's also always pushing me to paint this or paint that (I'm just a couple hours away from finishing the mural in the entry way, and I will post pics when it is complete, but I need the pollen to settle down so I can open the front door, and sit there to finish it).

No it is not the most ornate thing I've ever done, but hey it's a cardboard box, and the cat is going to sleep in it. It was a lot of fun getting Jon to help me with it. We each painted two sides of it. When Mom called me tonight, and asked what we were up to, she died out laughing when I told her. Yes, we are crazy, but that's what makes life fun. You never know what we're going to do next.

I am so Proud that I had to post this....

I have been on top of the Trammell family laundry situation for a full two weeks! Yes, this is huge. When you have flat sheets covering every piece of furniture you own because of the 3 dogs and 2 cats, plus it is shedding season, and we all know how much I HATE doing laundry this is a major accomplishment. I am discovering that one or two loads a day is not half as bad as doing 6 or 7 loads at a time.
Oh and on the laundry note I saw inside the Fun Wash (yeah right how could wash be fun???) which is a new huge washateria beside the Dollar Store on Stateline. They have got a couple of the BIGGEST Washers and Dryers I've ever seen in my life Seriously I think you could put at least 3 king size comforters in them. This got me thinkin.... I wonder how much those babies would set me back? Where would I even go to look for something like that? Don't you know you could do a full week worth of laundry in one of those things! Seriously Cool!

Sundays at Tiffany's

I decided to pry myself away from my Inspector Lynley books for a night and read Sundays at Tiffany's which I had downloaded to my Kindle one day when they were having a special. Kinda good, kinda strange, pretty much on par with The Time Traveler's wife, but instead she falls in love with her childhood imaginary friend who's kinda real, and kinda imaginary. He never ages. I guess the author thought "Hey if the whole father figure falling in love with the woman he watched grow up worked a hundred times before, maybe it'll work again." And ya wanna know what... It did. But it doesn't hurt that James Patterson's been crankin' out books like popcorn for years. I give it three out of five stars.

I just had the most scathingly brilliant idea

Now all I gotta do is get a hold of the head people at Burberry, and get them to love it as much as I know everyone else would. I'm thinkin there just isn't enough Nova Check in the world, and if you left it up to me there never would be. I'm thinking about my bathroom. I've had the same shower curtain up for the past 5 years, and this morning I decided it would be the coolest to be like Tinker Bell and turn it Nova Check. I'd also like for the little curtain on my bathroom window to make this transformation. Hmmmmmm...... I'm going to let this little idea simmer some. It would look great with my bathroom wall which is a bunch of butcher paper put up in torn pieces with wallpaper glue by the previous owner (who happens to be the head hancho at our local pier 1). I thought about ditching it at first, and then it kinda grew on me, and I decided it's kinda cool and different.

The Great Closet Caper

In the past two hours I have managed to cook dinner, fold two loads of clothes, and change out my winter clothes for the spring and summer clothes in my closet. This changing out my closet routine has been going on for entirely too long. Since I was a little girl I remember every spring and fall I would have to help mom do this swap. It is a lousy tradition that for some reason I have continued to do still. Why is it that no one builds homes with proper closet space?? Maybe I should be asking myself "Why wasn't I paying close attention to the whole clothing to closet ratio when we were looking for a house?"

I'm thinking lack of closet space might just be the key to a lot of problems in America. I wish I had a the closet like any of these pictured above. I'm asking myself..."Why don't I have a great closet?" hmmmm..... If I had one of the above closets I just might refer to it as my happy place. At the moment I'm not finding a great deal of happiness in mine.