Flying today..

Okay this is being posted via cell phone so bear with me on the typing/texting.
Today I fly to Phoenix, Arizona.
I am meeting Stephenie Meyer tomorrow.
Yes. I. Am.

Holy crow! I am just beyond breathing. I have been so busy getting ready for this and everything else (I have traveled lately for work & that always messes with my entries).

But I just had to quickly post.
Yes I am meeting her & about 11 other major authors. Tomorrow. In Arizona. 7 states away. OME! I will post about this when I return!

Love to all!

OME!!

today is March 21st 2009. TWILIGHT the movie has been in my home. Not on television in a commercial promoting the film, but actually playing in my home. I saw Edward & Bella. I watched the story unfold as I did months ago in a theater. Only this time I felt like an industry insider. The DVD has special features; director/actor commentary, extended scenes, production notes and of course.... deleted scenes. These deleted scenes just might end up being the bane of my current existence. I was worried about these scenes & when I watched them among Twilighters I discovered a truth to my worry: the scenes should not have been cut. 2 scenes that were deleted are "give or take them" scenes. But the rest, the rest are pivotal to the heart of the story. The depth they could have given... I could hear the collective sighs of Twilighters around the world as a scene with Carlisle & Esme was shown, I could feel the shared aggrivation as a simple caress in the meadow was lost, and I could see how a few added seconds would not have 'upset the flow of the movie' but would have actually made it more cohesive. I know it is easy to be an "armchair director" alas! come on people! I truly feel that these segments were removed due to they wanted to portray a more 'thrill' type movie rather than a 'romance'. Even after all of the above lines have been expressed I am still giddy beyond doubt due to the entire experience. I happened to have invited a close knit group of Twilighters over for a viewing party. Now if anyone knows how much I love to throw a party then they know there was cake, yummy cookies, games and of course thematic decor! A shoutout to Mary at Mary's Cakes in Northport - that woman makes a delicious cake & she also made me a Stupid Shiny Volvo and Danger Magnet cakes without too many questions or a call to Bryce Mental Hospital. Might I add that she has no idea what Twilight is, but her assistants did. My menu was simple but relative to the book: Pizza (Bella dares Edward to eat a bite in the cafeteria), Lemonade (the drink that Bella is drinking when Edward keeps her cap), Mushroom Ravioli (do I really need a description? The restaurant Port Angeles), Veggie Pizza (those vegetarians :o) ), Doritos (Jacob & Paul fight over these in Breaking Dawn), Apples (hello?), Diet Coke (she drinks one) and cake (Bella's birthday party). I also had goodie bags & prizes! It was so much fun! We laughed, we critiqued, we ate and we swooned! Thank you Lori, Stephanie, Tabitha, mom & Nina. For a wonderful afternoon of Twilight. Marcus kindly took Anna & Jessica to Chuck E Cheese for the afternoon & it sounds like they had a blast.

Before I leave you my wonderful readers, I wanted to give a small moment of reflection: It was a March afternoon when I discovered Twilight for the first time. That day will forever press into my memory. It is fitting that on a March day I enjoyed the movie at my home for the first time. This series is so much more than books. The friends I have made, the bonds I have developed are priceless. So please enjoy the pictures & I cannot wait to see some of everyone elses... happy Twilight weekend everybody.

Note: my sister pouts as she is forced to have her picture taken before she can open the prize she won being the fastest at putting Twilight puzzles together! lol

Rushing sights & sounds outside my window...

It is already March 12th, 2009.

My mind wrapped around this yesterday. Not only is it 13 years that Marcus & I have been a couple but also almost Spring. The year has already begun to fly by, the weeks are passing like hours and the weekends are full of activities that make my mind go haywire.

I find myself with so much going on lately. It seems at first like little activities or plans but then I realize that we really have full weekends. Last weekend was supposed to be a lazy weekend, but we found ourselves at a charity bowling event for 5 hours for Junior Achievement. Sunday Marcus had to work and I finished loads upon loads of laundry.

The weekend before was the snow & even with the crazy weather we were busy. I am supposed to attend a bridal shower this weekend (in Camden), a movie outing, Marcus needs to work, I need to finish cleaning and also getting ready for a party I am throwing NEXT weekend, and then I also want to scoot to Camden to see one of my brothers who got into an accident late yesterday evening! SHEESH!

I feel like I am 6 years old, we are driving to Nebraska and the windows of the van are filled with these quick glimpses of different landscapes. There is noise at my back of my siblings talking, my parents are driving and music is playing, my mind is imagining all the people outside the window. I am wondering what their lives are like and my own mind creates a fairytale ife of my own. I know that being a little kid I cannot control the direction of the car or the length of the stay so I just settle in and watch the scenery flash by. Yet as my vision blurs with the sounds of my reality and the imaginative world my head has created I still feel like I am moving in slow motion. That if I just roll down the window and reach my hand out I will feel the breeze but also slow it down. That is my life right now. The craziest thing is that no longer am I in the car being driven by someone else, I am the driver; I am the one with my foot on the pedal against the floor. Only this time I KNOW that I cannot slow the actual passing down but I can slow down the car, ease along the curvy roads and TRY to take some of the beauty in...

SNOW? SNOW? Really. LOTS OF SNOW!!!

(Early this morning)

Okay - um we are talking like 4 inches! IN ALABAMA!!! IN MARCH!!! WHERE IT WAS 77 DEGREES FIVE DAYS AGO!!! WHAT THE??? OME!!! OME!!!

I woke up around 5 a.m. and found my backyard was covered in soft white flakes. The sky was full of swirling white mists it was magical. Now mind you I love how snow looks & how it alters the landscape - beyond that it is wet, cold and messy. Well it is now 11:20 a.m. and my yard looks like this:

All of these pictures are from around 7 a.m. until now. In some you can really see how big & fast the flakes are coming down. It is just now beginning to slow down. I am just in awe. IT IS MARCH PEOPLE!!! I mean heaven forbid we get this for one particular day in December?! No we get it on a Sunday in MARCH!! *shakes head* Peanut is not a fan of the snow - except from his window seat. We opened the window and let him put his nose against the screen & he loved it! He took about 3 steps on the deck before we did this & turned around with a whimper. Yeah - wet cold long hair - not so fun for Nutter!

So our day is planed out thusly: Stay warm, eat, watch movies, drink cocoa, watch it snow, read and repeat.....

Hanging, Hammering, Nailing - laughing, crying, enjoying...

I have been working for the past week on a large number of shelves, frames, paintings and all out odd-end home improvements. Yes the girl who cannot choose a wall color can really redecorate or rearrange any room quite quickly :)
Marcus & I went to Atlanta last weekend to see Nina, Keith & the kids. It was so much fun! Friday night we got in fairly early = around 10 EST. Not too bad; it is normally later. Keith had grilled some awesome cheeseburgers so the late dinner was great. On Saturday we split the groups: all girls - all boys. Us girls went to some shops that I had not visited in quite sometime as well as a HUGE designer fabric store - Tracy you would freak out. It is like THE place the area designers go to get fabric. Like HGTV fabric store, crazy. Then we went to this place call Rustique in Marietta. Okay they had a like a 30 foot iron giraffe & rooster for your yard. YES you read correctly. But they also had the most beautiful outdoor fountains, arbors and benches. Mind you they also had furniture & home decor, but really they did not want to sell that stuff. A BASIC pewter cake plate (not Arthur Court - no design) $130.00 Yeah, we just told the girls not to touch anything - neither did me or Nina:0)
Then we snagged Marcus. Me, Nina, Marcus, Anna & Jessica headed to downtown Atlanta to IKEA. Okay Marcus & I have gotten the catalog but this was our first store experience. That place is HUMONGOUS! They sell EVERYTHING!!! We now understand why people shop there. It was like house Disneyland! We will definitely return. We bought 4 awesome floating shelves (they are big by the way_ and an eight foot tall solid wood bookcase. I was almost crying I was so happy to have gotten the book case. I have TONS of books that are kind of stashed everywhere. Because I collect antique/vintage books, displaying them is important to me. Now they have a home.
Also this week we have daily hung a shelf or had a picture framed. We had tons of prints that need frames. Some Daniel Moore Alabama prints, some artwork we bought from a gallery, some photos and a Twilight poster. Got them all done! WOOHOO!!! Marcus was so thrilled about one of the big Bama prints we had framed. It turned out quite a bit bigger than we expected, but it looks awesome beside Stevie the TV.
Anyway, the weather is crazy but we have really enjoyed doing all these little projects all week. I look forward to finishing some of the organizing I now have to do! :)

OME! Madeleines, Sourdough bread, a great friend, and Peter Facinelli...

So Saturday for Valentine's, Marcus & I went to see a movie & had a nice lunch. BTW you should always choose Valentine's LUNCH. Still busy, but not as bad as trying to go to dinner somewhere! We hit a few stores for some simple things then after that we basically just were lazy. We watched a little television but mostly we talked. You know those long discussions about everything in your life....if you don't know, well I won't say you are or aren't missing out. It depends on the depth & the emotions that are riding the discussion. This one was pretty in depth so we hashed out a few ideas, theories, dreams and mistakes. The night ended well. It has been quite a while since we have had one of those talks and there were a good many new changes & expectations in our lives that we needed to share.
During all this I was up and down in the kitchen making Madeleines. Madeleines are these wonderful little temperamental French cookies. They are delicate and OH SO YUMMY! My favorite thing about Madeleines is that they don't really store well - you can put them in an airtight container overnight but that is basically it. One night or day. SOOOOO that means you get to eat them all!!! MUAHHAHAHAHAAHA :0) Well thankfully they are tiny little cookies and the recipe only makes like 40 total. I mean tiny cookies. You can dust them with powdered sugar or dip them in chocolate! So good. Marcus & Peanut both were in heaven.
Sunday we slipped down to Camden to see our parents. We had not been there in a while & I wanted to see for myself how mom was after surgery. She looks like she got walloped on both sides by a vicious bat! But I am told that it is SO much better than it was four days prior. We had not told Marcus' mom that we were coming to Camden - we wanted to surprise her. Boy did we! I dropped Marcus off at 10:45 a.m. at her church. They said she almost fainted when he came up behind her then gave her a hug! She was floored & so glad we surprised her.
I spent the afternoon just chilling out at mom & dads. Due to when we come home mom usually cooks or does something special, well since she cannot really chew she figured major cooking was just silly. She did however surprise us with a loaf of the softest, sweetest, mouth watering SOURDOUGH BREAD loaf! She baked 3 and gave me & Eric each a loaf... OMEOMEOMEOMEOME! It was heavenly. We took it home & had chicken salad on that bread... I could have slapped somebody it was so good!
Monday night I got a wonderful gift in the form of visiting with my best friend Stacie. She was spending a week in Camden & took her brother David to the airport in Bham. Well BHAM is too close to not have dinner & shop a little!!! So we met up and enjoyed some Mexican and a little shopping. It was so much fun. We talked and talked. I never tire of being able to visit with my friends and Stacie is no exception. I am reminded each time how lucky I am to have her as a 'sister'. On the drive home last night I thought about 28 years. I have known her sincerely for 28 years. She has been a constant in my life, someone who knows my secrets and still loves me! lol. I am so glad we get to have these sporadic visits & it is about time that I pop up to NC to visit her....
Also, I stumbled upon this clip of Jennie Garth & Peter Facinelli on Chelsea Lately - I think they are like my new FAVORITE celebrity couple so cute! Have a watch!
just click on this link: http://www.eonline.com/videos/v38856_Chelsea_Lately_Garth_and_Facinelli.html
Anyway, I know this post was more of a rambling update, but right now my life is rambling! So bear with me for a little while.

Working for the weekend... oooo....Everybody's work'n for the weekend... :)

So we have made it to Thursday! Woohoo! This week has been quite the eccentric week. My brother in law, Keith, traveled through on business Tuesday night. It was great to see him, have some dinner & catch up. He spent the night with us then was out yesterday morning. I also had an early morning & headed over to Mississippi to work on a new flavor I am developing for a customer. It is a good thing I am a Foodie. I taste some weird stuff for my job sometimes!
Oh yeah - got a speeding ticket while returning from Mississippi. Don't these troopers know that I was ready to get out of clothes that smell of a chicken plant/lab! Geez, I was speeding with the windows down to cover the scent... just kidding. I did get a ticket though - Sumter county. Yuck! But oh well.
Once I got home - my dog & a new yoga pose awaited! The Chair pose - um, hello, do I really need to feel every centimeter of my butt & hamstrings???? Seriously, just knowing they are there is enough. It is challenging, but worth it.
Okay... so I am going to cop to watching a Pop Culture phenom = American Idol. Granted we are not addicted & watch every show, but we do kind of scan the episodes. We really only like to watch it once they wheedle them down to 12 singers total. Then it gets interesting. Anyway - um that girl Tatiana??? I did not know that certain octaves could be reached - in a bad way - until she was on the show. It is not even her singing voice - this is just her...laugh, voice, crying - existence. Marcus has to mute the TV.
oh on a totally different message - keep my mom in your thoughts. She had some extensive surgery done on Monday when they removed her wisdom teeth. Hers was not one of those easy extractions due to her gums were having problems and the roots grew all weird. It is a painful recovery. She is doing well, just it will take awhile & I hear she is pretty bruised from the experience. So readers, please just keep her in your thoughts.
As I head to dinner this evening I pose the question: Any big Valentine's Day plans???? I am always intrigued by the various celebrations/non-celebrations this time of year.

Adapting my vision...

What a week. Nothing of major note occurred but I can feel this shift in my life. I promised myself at the beginning of January to be an 'eyes open' person. You know the ones, those people that seem to truly see & appreciate their lives. I mean who doesn't appreciate being alive, but sometimes it is hard to see the greatness in the chaos of our own every day.
I felt the shift probably the most on Tuesday night. Nothing major, we were just watching Privileged on the CW (great show by the way), and a background song came on. I have been following Priscilla Ahn for awhile; waiting for her to hit mainstream music. As Megan (character on show) sits in a restaurant/bar waiting for her best friend the song Dream began to play. This song is a snapshot of me. It is very simple in its lyrics, but the melody will sweep you through childhood flashbacks, current excursions and a contentment you may hope for in the future. Marcus looked over and said "Hey! That's your song." Yes it is. I found myself humming the lyrics for two days after that. I also found myself smiling at the oddest times & even just laughing out loud when I was driving with no one else in the car. Those little spurts of positive energy make the whole 'eyes open' thing like breathing.
As for my physical attention to being eyes open & am taking a practical but really fun approach. On Friday, after an EXTREMELY stressful workday, I came home and did 30 minutes of yoga & 30 minutes of aerobics. I know - aerobics??? But the yoga. I have found a real love for this. Yoga makes me breathe. I calmed down and was a much nicer person than I was when I had first arrived home. As I got ready for dinner I told Marcus how much those 30 minutes of Sun Salutation, Half Moons, Palm Trees & Warrior movements made me feel good. He grinned for a minute, then puffed up his chest and said: "yes my flower child wife - it seems all the new agey stuff makes you nicer." He quickly kissed my cheek ready for a smart return or smack :) Instead I asked: "Can you tell a difference?" The smile stayed as the answer of "Actually yes. The last few weeks have been really different." He could not explain how but I was pleased that he informed me it was a pleasant different.
You see, I am actively trying to see myself, my surroundings and my actions with more clarity. For the first time ever, I am actually doing something about my vision. I don't mind if the aerobics makes me healthy, if the yoga makes me more flexible, I am honestly doing it because I am enjoying it. I found a way to not make it a chore. Nothing spectacular, no miracle movements, no major jewelry at a certain point - I just decided to open my eyes and give something a whirl. If I stop enjoying it, I just have to not get defeated, maybe I will try something else. No matter what - I matter & my view of my life matters. To be honest the view from here is pretty good......(sore, but good :) )