Baby Shower = Success!!!

On Saturday, my sisters, great aunt and I gave a baby shower for my youngest brother's wife, and it turned out to be a GREAT SUCCESS!!! Not to "toot" my own horn, but I did do most of the work, and I organized everything, although... had I not had my sister, D & her daughter, J, along with our great aunt, JC, we couldn't have pulled it off. Now I see why my old friend encouraged me to open a party planning business so many years ago. We'll have to wait & see on that one, because I have been in excruciating pain for the past 2 1/2 days, but I thought I might share a few photos of the amazing cake & cupcakes one of my best friends made. She just started her own business, as a fluke, and we can't stop talking about how talented she is. Not only does everything look wonderful, but it takes even better than it looks, and how often does that happen? So, take a look.



This is the entire presentation; the 3 layer cake with 3 dozen cupcakes


This is 3 of the 5 types of decorations on the cupcakes. By the time I took the individual pictures, these were the only ones left, and everything except the wrapper is edible


A baby with a blue blanket


A baby with a green blanket



A baby will make love stronger, days shorter, nights longer, bankroll smaller, home happier, clothes shabbier, the past forgotten, and the future worth living for.
~ Anonymous

QOTD

I love Twitter!!! I've written several posts about this, but have yet to post one of them. Soon, I will post my "Top Ten" Reasons for loving it, although there are many... MANY more. But, one of them is the number of quotes I get in just one day. It's amazing. Most of them are things I've heard before, or very simple, although, sometimes some of the most simple are the most profound, but every once and awhile, I see one that really means something to me, gives me goosebumps... leaves me speechless.

This first one doesn't really fall into any of the categories I explained above, but it is one of my absolute favorites. It is, however, something I strongly believe in, while I also believe that you have to learn to pick your battles. It's amazing how much you learn as you age. I've always been told, "You're very mature for your age and very wise," and hung out with women much older than myself, so I guess that's where I got it. I can also remember being 25 and telling a 40-something year old man I worked with, "I've already figured out I don't know anything, and my parents know everything." He said, "Well, my friend, you're the smartest 25 year old I've ever met." Unfortunately, it took a horrible boyfriend who took everything I owned from me, except my car, thanks to my dad disabling it, for me to learn that lesson. But, other than that, I think the other two most important lessons (for living life, at least) I've learned are that finding balance in EVERYTHING is imperative, and that "forgiveness is a gift you give yourself." (Suzanne Somers) By holding a grudge and not forgiving, the only person you're really hurting, is yourself. Sure, there are exceptions to that theory, but more often than not, if you are that angry at someone for a legitimate reason, they don't care one flying flip!!! So, let it go!!!! The best revenge is to go on and live a happy, constructive and successful life!


Never, "for the sake of peace and quiet," deny your own experience or convictions.
~ Dag Hammarskjold

A time comes when silence is betrayal.
~Martin Luther King Jr.

To forgive is to set a prisoner free and discover that the prisoner was you.
~ Lewis B. Smedes

You cannot shake hands with a clenched fist.
~ Indira Gandhi

Forgiveness begins where blame ends.
~ Leo Bucaglia

All blame is a waste/time. No matter how much fault you find with another,and regardless of how much you blame him, it will not change you.
~ D. Dy

Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle.
~ Plato

You have to give up all your excuses. 99% of all failures come from people who have a habit of making excuses.
~ George W Carver


Things turn out best for the people who make the best of the way things turn out.
~ John Wooden

Winners never quit and quitters never win.
~ Vince Lombardi

We don't have to be friends, but we don't have to be enemies.
~ Teri Willingham (my super duper good friend who ALWAYS cracks me up & can put me in a good mood NO MATTER WHAT)

This next one, I REALLY need to try to put into action, is something a friend told me several years ago. Funny guy, that Kip, eh? Oh, and much props to him & his speedskating team, SWIFT Speedskating. As I told a mutual friend a few months ago, Kip is far too talented & knows way too much about the sport to not still be involved. Good for him. I'm just a "tad" jealous (in a good way, tho) that he beat me to the punch with the first REAL US team that works like pro teams in the Netherlands. I wish he and Inge the best in EVERYTHING they do. No matter what it is, I know it will be successful!!!


Don't think, Tex. That's what I do, and it works.
~Kip Carpenter

I believe that peace will start with the children, and that if we can get the children to lose the hate we can get the world to stop hating. And with that, we can make the world a much better place.
~ Greg Smith, who entered college at age 10

Think of all the beauty still left around you and be happy.
~ Anne Frank

Never allow someone to be your priority while allowing yourself to be their option.
~ Unknown

Don't let the darkness of the past cover the brightness of the future.
~ Unknown


I think that's enough for today.

Blog Things - Keys to My Heart

I TOTALLY forgot blogthings existed until I just saw this one on a friend's MySpace. I'll have to say, for a quiz that asks questions ONLY about animals, this one is 100% spot on!!! I don't know who makes these things up, but this one is muy bueno!!!

Your Heart Takes Love Seriously

You are attracted to good manners and elegance. In love, you feel the most alive when your partner is patient and never willing to give up on you. You'd like to your lover to think you are loyal and faithful... that you'll never change. You would be forced to break up with someone who was emotional, moody, and difficult to please. Your ideal relationship is open. Both of you can talk about everything... no secrets. Your risk of cheating is zero. You care about society and morality. You would never break a commitment. You think of marriage as something precious. You'll treasure marriage and treat it as sacred. In this moment, you think of love as commitment. Love only works when both people are totally devoted.

What Are The Keys To Your Heart?

QOTD

I am sooooooo tired. Between trying to watch the Tour de France, finish the final plans for the baby shower, get things ready for when I have surgery & just take care of my general health, I am beat!!!! In addition to that, we had a dinner party last night, and the fresh halibut my dad caught a few weeks ago in Alaska did not sit well with me. It was so tasty, but even the smallest piece was no bueno minus a gallbladder.

With that, I'll share a couple of quotes I've heard in the past couple of days that have touched me.


To love is to risk not being loved in return. To hope is to risk pain. To try is to risk failure, but risk must be taken, because the greatest hazard in life is to risk nothing.
~ Leo Buscaglia

You may be disappointed if you fail, but you are doomed if you don’t try.
~ Beverly Sills

When the character of a man is not clear to you, look at his friends.
~ Japanese proverb

If you have made mistakes, even serious ones, there is always another chance for you. What we call failure is not the falling down but the staying down.
~ Mary Pickford


You always pass failure on the way to success.
~ Mickey Rooney

The minute you feel like giving up think of all the reasons why you held on for so long; fall seven times… stand up eight.
~ Source Unknown

We should not feel embarrassed by our difficulties, only by our failure to grow anything beautiful from them.
~ Alain de botton

And, on the flip side.....


I will permit no man to narrow and degrade my soul by making me hate him.
~ Booker T. Washington

Hating people is like burning down your own house to get rid of a rat.
~ Henry Emerson Fosdick

A Rattlesnake, if Cornered will become so angry it will bite itself. That is exactly what the harboring of hate and resentment against others is - a biting of oneself. We think we are harming others in holding these spites and hates, but the deeper harm is to ourselves.
~ E. Stanley Jones

Hate cages all the good things about you.
~ Madrianne Arvore

The price of hating other human beings is loving oneself less.
~ Eldridge Cleaver, Soul on Ice, 1968

I have decided to stick with love. Hate is too great a burden to bear.
~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

We hate some persons because we do not know them; and will not know them because we hate them.
~ Charles Caleb Colton

You lose a lot of time, hating people.
~ Marian Anderson

And, one of my favorites, because I believe it is very true, as sad as it is....

I imagine one of the reasons people cling to their hates so stubbornly is because they sense, once hate is gone, they will be forced to deal with pain.
~ James Baldwin

QOTD

It's no secret that I LOVE quotes and find a ton of inspiration and meaning in them. I had another sleepless night, mainly due to the fact that I slept most of Friday, so I did a lot of reading, and I found some quotes I wanted to share. I'm pretty sure I haven't posted these, yet.

One thing that is extremely important to me is my integrity. I don't have any children of my own, but I have 25+ nieces and nephews and a God daughter who I've had a great deal to do with her raising. If there's one thing I have tried to teach all of them, it's how important integrity is.

Webster defines it as:
1 : firm adherence to a code of especially moral or artistic values : incorruptibility
2 : an unimpaired condition : soundness
3 : the quality or state of being complete or undivided : completeness
Synonyms- see honesty

To me, I'd much rather live an honest life and deal with those consequences, than be dishonest and have to deal with living with my conscience. I'm sure you've heard the saying, "He/She has to look at himself/herself in the mirror every morning and live with what they've done." That saying is talking about integrity and character, and if you ask me, those are two of the MOST IMPORTANT things for a person.


Character is doing the right thing when nobody's looking. There are too many people who think that the only thing that's right is to get by, and the only thing that's wrong is to get caught.
~ J.C. Watts

The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but at times of challenge and controversy.
~ Martin Luther

There is no pillow so soft as a clear conscience.
~ French Proverb

Don't try to be different. Just be good. To be good is different enough.
~ Arthur Freed

The right to do something does not mean that doing it is right.
~ William Safire

Or, as my parents used to tell us growing up, "Just because you CAN, doesn't mean you SHOULD!!!"

When I do good, I feel good. When I do bad, I feel bad.
~ Abraham Lincoln

Every job is a self-portrait of the person who does it. Autograph your work with excellence.
~ Author Unknown

I could go on and on with the quotes, but I'll leave it at this for now. I'm off to watch the Tour de France. I feel sure that I'll fall asleep now that there's something on TV I'm actually interested in. hahaha

GO LANCE!!! LIVESTRONG!!!

#10

I've been so busy planning, shopping and making everything for my sister-in-laws baby shower on the 25th that I haven't had time to post a recent update on my "illness". Since I'm awake, at a God forsaken FOUR AM, I'll give it a whirl.

I went back to G.I. #2 once I got a copy of the study from the pain management doc, which took almost a month. Don't ask me where the foul up was, but after FIVE requests and being told each time it was done, I FINALLY had to yell at someone and then get transferred to "medical records" to get it. As if I wasn't upset enough for that craziness, once I saw the G.I. he did NOTHING...AGAIN!!! He tried to be funny by saying, "Well, what are we gonna do with you," and "Why are you causing so much trouble?" but I wasn't in the mood. If I don't qualify for disability, which I can almost guarantee I won't, I will lose my medical benefits on August 31.

This doctor told me, on April 9, that he couldn't do anything for me, because he thought I pulled a muscle in the lumbar region of my back and needed to see and pain management doctor, even though I was still exhibiting classic gallbladder symptoms with pain in the FRONT, right under my rib on the right side, and in my back under my right scapula (shoulder blade), which is not near your lumbar back region, relatively speaking. Well, I did what he said, and that doctor said I needed to have an ERCP, the same test I've been asking to have since the end of February & that the nurse practitioner in G.I. #1's office said I needed. But noooooooooo, what does this guy (#2) say now? He wants me to have every test run... AGAIN, and then he wants me to see a 3rd G.I. "Are you kidding me?" was all I could think. I am in pain almost 24 hours a day, and some days I can't even get out of bed, or even sit up, because it's so excruciating. I take narcotics just to take the edge off, and now I'm developing the side effect of itching uncontrollably 2-4 times a week. And let me tell you, that ain't no fun... no way, no how!!! My mother has an itching problem from an allergy to NSAID's that has taken over 10 years to diagnose, and I don't know how she's done it. I would have gone insane by now.

I left G.I. #2's office more pissed off and frustrated than anything else, but I had my six week follow-up with Dr Miracle Worker, aka the pain doc on Tuesday. He's going to do another block on July 30, which will be surgery #10 since May 2, 2007. Again, it's only a short term solution, but right now, I have no other choice. I did, however, see my sister-in-law that's a nurse in Houston tonight, and she said she knows a great G.I. at her hospital, so I may just drive the 4 hours to have things taken care of there, since it doesn't seem like doctors in this city seem to take care of their patients in any sort of responsible way. The day of my surgery, it will be 6 months since I had the original surgery that caused all of this, and in 2009, NO ONE should have to suffer like this. Just think, I have full medical coverage, and at the time, my Cobra plan was still in effect as well as my new insurance with my job, so I even had secondary coverage. By mid April I had already met my out of pocket expenses on both of them, and I don't have to pay anything else. I'm only 36 years old. Am I the poster child for Universal Health Care, or what?

Another FB Quiz

Since I am bored and can't sleep, I've been taking some more quizzes on Facebook. The latest one is called "Who are you... really?"

So, I took the quiz, and this is what I got....

Philosopher

You constantly analyze the deeper meaning of all that occurs in your life. You are on a never-ending journey to find your purpose in life. You are able to see through the surface of situations and the facades that people often carry. You are observant and non-judgmental. Your creative and thoughtful mind enhances your chosen and natural talents. You feel deeply and passionately about everything that you do. Your life is about the pursuit of knowledge, understanding, and answers. You have a great depth to your heart and mind that some may find intimidating and others will be drawn to.

It makes A LOT of sense. I am ALWAYS over analyzing things, which isn't always a good thing. My good friend, Andrew, can attest to that, but he's far worse about it than I. Well, it's WAY past my bedtime. I'm only up this late, because I received a phone call from Israel & had to work on my sister-in-law's up coming baby shower I'm hosting. I'm so excited that I can hardly wait. Did I also mention that I strayed from BRAT diet, and I had 2 breakfast tacos this morning, and I've been paying for it with pain under my right scapula and ribs since about 1230 this afternoon???? Oh, if I could go back & do it over again.... I would keep my gallbladder. And with that, I'm off!!!

Yalla, bye!!!

GO AWAY!!!

I am being kind by not posting your name, but you know exactly who you are. Just so it's clear, the person & persons who have been harassing, libeling and slandering for the past 6 plus years who are affiliated with a specific African-American speedskater who hails from Chicago need cease and desist ANY and ALL contact with me, and any of my friends, family and former relatives. This is an OFFICIAL REQUEST before it is escalated to authorities. Enough is enough!!!

I have not had anything to do with anything speedskating, in more than 2 years, or anything having to do with you, EVER!!! You caused my marriage to fail, for me to leave speedskating, and for me to lose clients. What else do you want? I don't care about you, so why are you so interested in me, unless you are crazy? As I have said before, "Do the world a favor, and seek psychiatric help." You will be much happier.

QOTD

I know I've been slacking on my blog lately, but I've been away from home for a week with my Blackberry as my only access to the internet. Unfortunately, I can only post blogs about 15% of the time from there, so I didn't even try. It's too frustrating when I can't make it work after I have a really good post. Call it the perfectionist in me.

This week, I know I'm going to be in A LOT of pain, which equals more pain killers, which means me being A LOT more out of it, so I want to post the following quote to inspire me. If there's one thing that really, really irritates me, it's when someone simply "doesn't try", so I need to hold myself to the same standard.


It is common sense to take a method and try it. If it fails, admit it frankly and try another. But above all, try something.
~ Franklin D. Roosevelt


**I realize this quote doesn't fit "exactly" what I was talking about, but I NEED to keep the thought "try something" in mind.

By the way, I've already taken some pain killers which may account for the "misconnect" on my thinking with the quote!!! ;)