Silly Felines

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I took Verona to the vet last week for her annual check-up. The vet said we shouldn't leave dry food out for her all the time because she's starting to get on the heavy side. I feel like she looked at the chart, "Hmmm, fat dog, fat cat, fat owners - oh yeah! I remember you!" Venus is so petite that I honestly thought Verona was just a normal cat. Besides black is so slimming! Seriously, I thought if she got any heavier, it might be a problem, which is what the vet meant, I guess, she said defensively.

The vet said to put one cup of dry food out per day, for both cats - in 1/3 cup increments; morning, dinner time and before I go to bed. If it looks like Venus isn't getting enough food, close her in a room with some canned food to make sure she's getting enough calories.

Oh my God. Venus, that skinny little thing, is acting all freaky about this new system! She races me to the cat food bowl three times a day, rushing around in a panic. "Oh my God, the food bowl is empty! What if she forgets to feed us? Where IS she?? What if we starve to death? Oh my God, oh my God! What if we never eat again? Where IS that woman??"

It's hard to tell but the times we observe, it looks like Skinny Venus is eating all the food and Verona is getting none. Verona has never been interested in treats or snacks. It's the funniest thing, how these two are acting - the exact opposite of how they look.

We've been giving Venus a bit of canned food every morning, on top of Steve's tall dresser, where Verona can't jump. We were hoping that would fill her up so she'd leave some dry food for Verona. Not sure that's working but I do know it's driving Reggi out of her mind when I open the cat food can. She's never had canned food a day in her life but it sure must smell good to her. Maybe all that leaping about will cause her to lose weight. I know I've dropped a few, what with all the back & forth between the cat food bin and their dish three times a day.

Pets. Gotta love 'em. (Unless you're Mom, and the pets are feline, of course.)

More Spirella

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You're welcome, everyone, for the New Year's cards - I'm happy you're enjoying them!

Funny sidebar to that. I knew I was going to make those cards flat, not folded. I thought about making them 5" x 7" because I hear this a lot, that people are going to frame them. But I felt they really needed something else on the front, thus the Best Wishes for 2006, which possibly barred them from being framed unless one cut that part off. You know how I ultimately decided what size to make the cards? I had a surplus of envelopes in that size that I ordered by mistake! They are just slightly larger than the A2 envelopes I normally use. (Bought these on eBay, as I recall.) They are perfectly usable for my cards, but prefer the A2 for cards I sell.

I made a ton of those Spirellas at one time. I started out using variegated thread which looked really cool but was not easy to find in quantity, that was thick enough. I ended up standardizing them with the DMC floss, red and green. Recently I made the other Spirellas into cards - I just love these colors! Here are a few of them. (With a couple of exceptions, these are each one of a kind. These are all 5-1/2” x 4-1/4”, folded cards.)

They are next to go up on the Pine Tree Designs website but if you are interested, these sell for $4.50 each, plus tax for New York State residents, no shipping; $4.00 each if you buy 5 or more. Email me if interested.

End of shameless self-promotion, er, I mean wonderful opportunity of sharing!

I'm This Guy

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Sewing, Cards, Theatre & Food, Oh My!

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I bought this little sewing machine months ago when it was on sale. It's for sewing on paper, but probably in my case, mostly for making holes through which I can do hand-stitching on paper. It runs on 4 AA batteries.

I used it the other day for the first time. It was fun!

Here are bunch of copper trees I embossed using Rusty Penny embossing powder. These are for Christmas cards - some for an order (hi Stephanie!), the rest for inventory. I've noticed that I've gone from making 10 cards at a time to 20. Except as I counted out the paper for these, I thought, "Aw heck, might as well make 40 cards."

I bought another Tivo on Friday - this one for our family room. We've been waiting for 5 weeks for our Time Warner DVR to arrive, which is 4 weeks longer than they said it would take. Driving to work Friday, it occurred to me to check the Tivo site to see if they offer a discount for multiple units on the same account. Yep, they sure do! So now I'm paying $15/month for 2 units versus the $14/month I was paying for 1 unit! Such a deal. The Tivo has more features than the cable company's DVR, as I understand it. I know I sure love it. Steve was thrilled to be able to set up a wish list for his beloved Buffalo Bills and Buffalo Sabres.

I arrived home from work Friday to find the Time Warner DVR arrived that very day. We'll send it back.

Steve and I had to run a phone line up from the basement to accommodate the new Tivo. Eventually, we'll add both Tivos to our home network so I can send Tivo'd shows from my studio Tivo to the family room Tivo. Sure would have been handy to have that set up when I was home for three weeks with my gall bladder illness and spending lots of time on the couch in there.

I realize Time Warner was doing the best they can in getting these backordered DVRs to their customers because it's in their best interest to do that, so they can start charging for the service.

Blogger? I'm not so sure. Remember when I screwed up my template on Jan 1 and emailed their support people, asking for help? They responded. On January 27. ("I see your blog is okay now, you must have fixed it yourself. Let us know if there's anything we can do for you.") That is totally unacceptable customer service! Thank goodness Ann suggested I pick a new template, which solved my problem. And of course I now keep a backup copy of my template, updating it every time I change something. (I added the list of journals and blogs I read, at the bottom of the sidebar. I've checked and rechecked the links, but let me know if you find something not right. I'll be adding any I've missed.)

I went to Geva Theatre Saturday afternoon to see Vigil with Lynn and Linda. It was good, okay really - until the 2nd act pulled it all together. I even got a little verklempt at the end! So now I'd give it a quite good. After trying numerous restaurants afterwards (around 6:30), we ended up at The Elmwood Inn for dinner. We drove by a few other places, which were all too crowded to be conducive to conversation. Food is food; we wanted to be able to converse with each other.

Lynn and I split a Chicken Bacon Ranch Wrap and Chicken Quesadillas and French Fries. They were loaded with cheese, with which I didn't have a problem. I ate greasy Chinese food for lunch last week, French Bread Pizza for dinner and this morning had a piece of Steve's leftover pizza from yesterday. No problems! I'm still a little scared to try the big kahuna - fried mozzarella sticks. My final check up with my surgeon is a week from Monday, so after that, I think I'll give them a whirl. I'm doing great!

Sauce

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These Blik wall decals are cool.

I must find a way to use these knobs on something for Steve. They're pricey but cool, found at Cool Knobs and Pulls.

I found these links on Saucy Dwellings over at LiveJournal. It's mostly kids posting but there's some cool stuff sometimes. I just like seeing how other people live.

Squidoo

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Last year I started reading a few business/entrepreneurial type blogs, to help me learn about how to promote Pine Tree Designs but also just because I find that stuff interesting.

Seth Godin's Blog

Buzzoodle

Tom Peters!

Worthwhile Magazine

It's from Seth's blog that I learned about Squidoo.

We have built an online platform that makes it easy for anyone to build lenses on topics they are passionate about. These lenses help you find a unique, human perspective on things that interest you... fast. Not only can Lensmasters spread their ideas, get recognized for their expertise, and send more traffic to their Web sites and blogs—they could also earn royalties.

It seemed like quite a neat idea so it's been percolating in the back of my brain for months. I've poked around a little bit on the site and found some very cool lenses.

Then last night I read that Carol Ross, a personal coach whose blog I enjoy reading - built a lens over on Squidoo.

You see where this is going, don't you?

I went over to check out her lens and found myself building my own lens, All About Paper.

This is good because I figured I didn't really have my hands full enough with trying to keep this blog updated on a regular basis. Turns out it's a little addictive, or at least until the new wears off. Today I was perusing other lenses and found one that a guy built all about Tivo. He mentioned, as one of the benefits, "no more commercials". I've heard that's true but haven't found anything in the User's Guide about how to avoid commercials. Fast forward, and I mean fast - yep, got that down. So I emailed him to ask him about it and he answered me immediately. Turns out that's what people mean when they say no commercials - fast forward through them in about 10 seconds. I feel better now.

Anyway. Squidoo. A nice place for me to keep all the cool paper links, products and techniques that I find.

Check it out. There's something over there for everyone - and will only get bigger and better as it catches on.

Ten Years

Aren't I all Mz Thang, with my pen set on my desk, commemorating 10 years of service? The CEO gave a bunch of these out at this week's Monday Morning Meeting (something the ESOP Communications Group started, by the way - the meeting, I mean). I think it's kind of weird he had the trophy company put our old company name on them instead of our new company name, which is over a year old now. :::he can't quite let go:::

It's a nice gesture. I didn't even know he was still giving these things out, to tell you the truth. And not to be too practical about it, but I'm really a gel pen kind of gal. I tried jamming my favorite gel pen du jour in one of those holders. Not gonna work. :-)

I've kind of had the work week from hell this week. The twice/year auditor has been here this week so that's about 2-3 days of extra work for me, proving all her tests. I have sales tax returns for 5 states due tomorrow; I've done one. I usually do these a week in advance. I'm not even remotely caught up from being sick for 3 weeks in December.

And just to keep things interesting, my Accounts Receivable counterpart took today and tomorrow off. She does all of our daily processing (invoicing and cash receipts entry are the highest priority) so I'll try to get all that done, but there are only so many hours in the day. What gets done, gets done. And she learned this week she's going to be having a third surgery on her eyes sometime in February. Since she's already had two surgeries (2004?), I didn't feel the least bit guilty about her covering for me when I had my gall bladder removed. Not that I should feel guilty anyway, I'm just saying. We cover for each other.

And I decided today that when she learns the date of her surgery, I'm going to take the previous Friday off to make a long weekend - and paint the family room. I'm thinking something in the burgundy family. I hope to get to Home Depot this weekend to scope out the paint colors.

The good news is - in an unprecedented move, the auditor is leaving a day early! That's mostly because she's having trouble receiving some files from her company via email. I offered her the services of our technicians but she said it's on her company's end so she'll email me the last testing exercise from her office. The other good news is my boss asked me today if there's anything he can do to help me. Guess my frazzledness was showing! That's another unprecedented move - though it should be unprecedented. I'm there to help him, not vice versa! I spent the last hour of the day organizing my paperwork which made me feel tons better. I made big piles into more specific piles.

So tomorrow I'll get to work at the crack o' dawn again, get the sales tax returns filed, do as much as I can, delegate where possible and feel good about things again. That will make going to work Monday a whole lot better. Next week I'll have to work on preparing our 1099s for some of our vendors. Last year was my first time doing that and I found it highly frustrating until I went to Staples and bought $25 software that included forms. So this year should be a breeze because I've been through it once and a lot of the names are already in this software. The hardest part is we don't have a clear way of keeping track who should get a 1099. I'm working on fixing that next. In my spare time.

Today I received my first paycheck in a month - damn, that feels good! I know my disability paperwork has been submitted so hopefully I'll get a check to cover the missing 2 weeks. I received my W2 today too but I'm still waiting on other paperwork. My goal is always to file my tax return in February - think I've been successful once. I'm never one to wait until the last minute though so it usually ends up being March. I don't even like to file in April. I'm like that.

Simon received his A&F W2 today too. He's getting antsy, wondering when he'll get one from the pizza place. I explained they have another 10 days and if it doesn't come, I'll go deal with them. "Cool! Mom's gonna have a throw-down with ____!"

Paper Alert

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Chris Natrop

landscape blossom pop, 72 x 84 inches
one piece of cut paper suspended by wire in front of orange painted wall with cast shadows

While I have worked in many different forms, my current medium is cut paper. Using a utility knife, I cut directly into the surface of paper, slowly drawing, delineating form by subtracting negative space. I draw from mental imagery, direct observation, and subconscious vagaries.

Nothing is patterned-out beforehand or extensively predetermined. My process is direct and free-flowing. While I do guide myself with a general strategy, the essential method for creating both expansive- and intimate-sized work is always the same, yielding especially to the influence of the unknown.

At times, I intentionally punctuate the surface of the paper with aspects of color by affixing fluorescent-hued tape, or by applying iridescent watercolor.

(Thanks to Paper Forest for pointing me to all kinds of cool paper-related websites!)

Random 1

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I received the following email today from Kathy, my friend in HR:

Notice:

Due to increased corporate responsibility there will be only one drink per person allowed at this year's picnic. Please see attachment.

Human Resources Management

Gretchen told me about Random 1 on A & E Television a couple of weeks ago and I immediately begin Tivoing it. I can't stop thinking about it and wish it was on every day.

John & Andre travel around the country in their beat-up pick-up truck, finding people to help, one at a time. They have no money to offer but they do have 3 very resourceful people tucked away in an RV that seem to work miracles in convincing the community they are in, to donate goods and services to help these people. Gretchen and I would both love to be those people!

In little ways, they change lives big-time. They found two guys to fix a dryer belonging to a woman and her son who were down on their luck. They convinced a gym to give an overweight former bad-ass a year's membership to work with a personal trainer and nutritionist, to get his life back on track.

The real tearjerker was they found an organization willing to donate a $20,000 prosthetic leg to disabled man who was either homeless or near homelessness, I can't remember. Even they didn't think they could pull this one off - and were in tears when they did. John was in tears and couldn't even get the words out to tell the guy. They hooked him up with a construction employment agency for when his new leg was built for him. Outstanding!

From their website:

What we believe
We believe in the power of grassroots philanthropy, defined as people helping people one at a time. Random 1 advocates for individuals who are ready to better themselves. We ask the question, “What can we do to help you help yourself?”

How we work
We are a part of a much larger network of people who want to make a difference for themselves and those around them. We are the spark of energy that connects those in need with those who can help. Random 1 tackles problems and opens initial doors for those in need while utilizing help from donors and an on-line pool of suggestions in real time.

Please watch this show - you won't regret it! You'll thank me even. (And I thank you, Gretchen!)

Ribbon & Movies

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Check out these cool ribbon storage ideas. The good thing about most of these ideas is that each spool is accessible by itself. If I use up one of the blues in the middle, for instance, I have to pull off half of the spools to get to it to replace it. Fortunately, I don't use ribbon in my work all that much so it's not often an issue. I can see me moving to the slack rack idea though. I'd have to buy a new one because we are using two for decorative flag storage right now.


I'm mailing the New Year's cards today - 95 this year, which includes family, friends and customers. I spent most of yesterday assembling them - had the best day! I watched lots of Tivo'd HGTV shows and worked on the cards. Lots of fun!

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Steve and I went to see the Glory Road matinee yesterday. We were originally going to see Munich, but I suggested we see Glory Road instead. It's a sports movie so Steve asked me why I changed my mind. "Because, duh, I'll be able to get some tears out of it." That he understood.

It was very good as most of those sports movies are - and we see a lot of that based-on-a-true-story type. We talked about how they've been doing a good job of making sports movies into "date movies". It's still the same ol' underdog triumphs but it doesn't feel manipulative. Steve's very aware of the artistic license they sometimes take in telling the real story, for dramatic purposes. To me, it's just a good story. If you see this, be sure to stay through the credits where they show the real players interviewed and what they are doing now. Love that stuff. We always stay through to the very end of all credits - we're usually the last people out of the theater. You learn some interesting stuff. Not that I can think of anything now, of course. Oh wait - in this movie, one of the real basketball players played the bartender in a scene. Stuff like that is cool.

We saw 5 previews yesterday, another favorite part of the movies for us:

Take the Lead, with Antonio Banderas & Alfre Woodard. It's a dance movie that I'll probably see on Netflix someday. I hate when previews are lots of very quick hits of the movie. I suppose it's to make you want to see the movie more but mostly I find it annoying.

Akeelah & the Bee, with Laurence Fishburne and Angela Bassett. A feel-good movie that I know we'll see someday, about a girl from South Los Angeles who tries to make it to the National Spelling Bee. More underdog stuff.

Eight Below, with Bruce Greenwood. Oh my God - take the hankies!! I had tears in my eyes from the trailer! "Brutal cold forces two Antarctic explorers to leave their team of sled dogs behind as they fend for their survival." The poor doggies were left behind, just watching the helicopter take off. The owners were insistent about going back to rescue their dogs, their family. This thing damn well better have a happy ending. It's a movie, it will.

The other two trailers were for movies that Steve and I couldn't decide which one we hated the most and wouldn't see if we were paid! Disagree if you must. The Pink Panther with Steve Martin and The Shaggy Dog where Tim Allen turns into a sheepdog. I'm sure they are fine films but we're just not into silly slapstickish movies.

This is the first time in my life, ever!, that I've remembered all the previews seen at a movie - the next day even. We can never remember the previews on the ride home half the time!

If Only

If this was my studio, I'd have a connecting bathroom, a futon and a fridge and never, ever leave. It would be my own personal clubhouse and I'd invite all my paper-loving friends over to play.

When I replaced this template recently I decided to leave that comment verification thing off. About 10 minutes later I had comment spam on two different entries. So it stays.

What's really bugging me though is I have it set, as I always have, to have any new comments emailed to me. I've checked and rechecked that setting and my email address - it all seems right. Yet just now when I peeked at some recent entries, there were comments there I'd never seen. Here I thought nobody liked me anymore! :-) Reading comments is one of my favorite things. Bummer. I'll have to keep an eye on this.

Not much news - just glad it's Friday. This is the first full week I've worked in a month. Doesn't feel like it though - feels like I never left.

Have a great weekend!

Punched

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More card parts! Making good progress.

Kathy and I had lunch today at Boccacinos, our favorite place to go. I always get a pasta, asparagus and chicken dish that I know would be too olive oily for me to eat today. I literally mean I always get it - never even look at the rest of the menu. But today I ordered a wrap that held white beans, mixed greens, roasted red peppers, fresh mozzarella (which I pulled out) and prosciutto with Parmesan peppercorn dressing. It came with seasoned fries, which I didn't realize or I probably would have ordered soup and or a salad or something - but that stuff can be fatty too.

Oh my God. This food was soooo good!

Damn, those fries were good. Just the size, shape and doneness I like. I don't know what they season them with, but they were outstanding. I'm not usually a major fan of fries. Like them, don't go nuts over them usually.

The wrap, which was fantastic too, was quite large so I only ate half and not even half of the French fries, though it wasn't easy to stop eating them. So far so good, no wacky stomach reactions but it could hit later yet. I've been telling myself that if I have some gall-bladder-less reaction, it will have been sooo worth it. I'll totally be singing a different song if that happens though, I guarantee.

I was smart enough to give my leftovers to Simon for dinner and had myself a nice, very low fat dinner. No point in tempting fate. He couldn't finish the last 4 bites of the wrap so I ate it. That worked out perfectly, I got another taste but not too much.

Man, I can wax on about food, can't I?

Good Things

.Between yesterday's chocolate cookies & brownies and last night's paper cutting session, life just doesn't get any better. These parts will be assembled into my (eagerly anticipated) New Year's cards for 2006. I expect to mail them this weekend.

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As I'm working on these cards, I've been watching Monday's Martha. (Love my Tivo more every day!) It must be the emotional rollercoaster I've been on lately - but these bloopers are making me laugh until I cry. Simon came in to see what my problem was. He just shook his head and walked away.

Horn Tootage

You just never know.

I used to bake brownies for each employee on their birthday, about 50ish employees at the time, I think. I did it for a couple of years. Then it wasn't fun because they weren't unexpected anymore. A few people never even thanked me, which I found quite rude. (I typically leave them on their desk first thing in the morning for them to find when they arrive.) So I stopped.

Late last year I declared (to myself) 2006 to be (among other things) The Year of the Birthday Brownies. It felt like it would be a fun thing to do again. I mentioned it to a couple of people this morning and they smiled happily. When I returned to my desk from my morning meeting, there was a brownie waiting for me with this note. It was written on one of our Employee Recognition Certificate forms but I was glad the writer wasn't really giving me an "ERC" because I'm a stickler about the program being used only for truly work-related above and beyond behavior.

Although you won't see $10 from the company on this ERC, your treats are worthy of recognition. Thank you so much for bringing them in for me. You are famous in the building for making them. Everyone smiles when they see this special plate.

I must admit last year I felt like I had fallen out of the graces of being treated to your specialty when I did not get them. But I feel special again this year and would not blame you a bit if you skip me with the tradition again next year because I realize this is a lot of effort on your part to do this for all of us.

I can tell you, the faces light up and I actually sense smiling and laughter from (some) people who usually don't - and that is all as a result of your treats. Thank you.

Made my day, that note.

Let it Out

This was my night. Stopped at the store on the way home for flour I ended up not using. Had a minor mental breakdown. Made chili. Ate dinner. Read the paper. Made cookies to replace disaster cookies from yesterday. Posted an entry. Time to go to bed. Where does the time go, I ask you?

Oh, the breakdown? I'm a tad stressed about money, due to that one missing paycheck (covering 2 weeks) while I was sick. I'm fine financially - but it feels yucky & weird. I've covered my responsibilities. I'm living below my means. (Hi Dad!) Still, it stresses me out. I've told myself to chill the heck out (I'm doing all the right things, I'll get a paycheck next week, probably a support check for Simon and the disability check will come eventually). But today I decided I needed to release this stress. Steve always has a way of making me feel better so I picked him to unload on. He's used to it.

Stefani: Can I have a hug?

Steve: Sure? You okay?

Stefani (sobbing in that Laura Petrie/Oh Rob voice from The Dick Van Dyke Show): I'm just s-s-soo stressed about money! I hate feeling this way. I've been feeling this way for days and tried to control it but I could tell today that it was time to leak the stress out my eyes so let's just get this out of the way so I can go make dinner.

We laughed, I cried, Steve said all the right things and hugged me lots. I mostly feel better. There's no cure but just have to wait it out till the income rolls in again regularly. I just figured I should get that cry out of the way so it didn't leak out at work or something equally embarrassing.

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Speaking of embarrassing - I made peanut butter cookies last night for a work birthday. They oozed out super thin and look so stupid! They are just as moist and delicious as can be, which is weird, considering how thin they are. This is a new recipe I found online - and it doesn't call for baking powder, I don't know if that's the problem or what. I scraped them off the cookie sheets and wadded them into a plastic container. Guess we're stuck eating them, oh darn. Oh, I just thought of this! They are so thin and pliable, I bet I could roll them around a bit of ice cream or chocolate or something! Actually, I'm trying not to eat very many because they are full of butter and peanut butter - probably won't agree with me just yet.

So I made these no-bake cookies tonight. Did you know there's a Special Dark cocoa powder out now? It's probably been out for ages but I don't go through it very quickly so I just had an opportunity recently to purchase some. It was breathtakingly beautiful in the package when I opened it tonight.

This is Jen's recipe; I've probably posted it before but here it is again. So easy and so very delicious!

No-Bake Oatmeal Cookies

2 cups sugar

¼ cup cocoa

½ cup milk

¼ cup margarine

1 tsp vanilla

½ cup crunchy peanut butter

3-1/2 cups quick oatmeal

pinch salt

Mix sugar, cocoa, milk and margarine in saucepan. Cook until it boils. Cool for 1 minute.

Add vanilla, salt, peanut butter and oatmeal. Stir well.

Drop onto wax paper. Let set.

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The other part of my stress is how overloaded I am at work. Part of it's catching up from being out for 3 weeks; the other part is that's just how it is. I'm finding it motivating and depressing at the same time. The good news is tomorrow is an ESOP Communications Group meeting, of which I'm a member. Our company became an Employee Stock Ownership Plan company in 2004. I was sort of drafted onto this committee several months ago but I'm totally loving it. Or rather loving working with these people I should say. We're all on the same page and want to get things done. I missed the December meeting so I'm quite looking forward to tomorrow's meeting.

* * *

Gretchen has a new entry up - I think you'll really like it. She now has a notify list too. Go join - you know you want to.

All Gretchen, All the Time

Finally! Gretchen gave me permission to post a link to her new blog! She doesn't have a notify button (hey, wait, I don't either - must fix) - but I use changedetection.com for the majority of my journal and blog notifications anyway. So go read the entries she's posted so far. I'll wait.

Isn't she funny? And smart? I just love her writing. She's got a juicy entry coming up but I'm not telling what it's about. (How's that for a tease??)

She's a very nice person too. Check this out. One of the women in her writing group had her house burn down recently and she lost her computer and all the stuff she'd been working on, among everything else. The women in the writing group email each other their projects before they meet so they all have a chance to review them before they get together to discuss. So Gretchen gathered all the poems and stories this woman had emailed the group and I put them together in a book. The group is going to present the book to her when they meet on Tuesday, along with letters of encouragement each of them has written to her. They'll send her the pieces electronically too once she gets up and running, but I thought this was a sweet way of showing their support for her.

It's a split cover book, meaning the front is in two pieces so it opens at the split. I scored all the pages inside so they should bend easily too. It was a lot of fun to make and hopefully no one will notice that the pattern on the paper is upside down. I swear I was keeping an eye on that - and still screwed it up. It's such an abstract design, it's not that noticeable that birds and butterflies are flying upside down, she said hopefully. :-( Hey, at least the front and back cover are both upside down.

Ann is so smart.

Still no response from Blogger support. Ann suggested I choose a new template - and voila - here we are! Meanwhile, this morning I posted my problem on a forum for Blogger users (that Ann found for me) and, after installing the new template, I read the answer.

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Secondly - and most importantly - what did you do with the template?! It's not there! All you have is the style sheet and even that isn't complete. Looking at your source code this is all you have...

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So the solution would have been the same - start over with a new template. I lost my customizations but that's okay. I'll probably redo them the way I had them - or maybe it's time for a change. The one thing I learned this morning when posting my problem - every question about the template, resulted in an answer that ended "Back up your template." Stellar idea! I'm certainly understand the concept of back up - why didn't I think of that??

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I feel better. I missed my blog!

Back in the Saddle

Work went really well today - no fatigue, just a normal day. Lots of people stopped by to welcome me back. I was very adept at saying I felt great, good to be back . . . and turning the conversation back to them: "How was your Christmas and New Year's? Did (insert kids' names here) have a good time?"

Oh! Check this out. Here's what I found on my desk this morning, in terms of Christmas gifts: a giant holiday 3 pound bag of red & green M & Ms, a box of Russell Stover chocolates, a bag of chocolate truffles and a dark chocolate Santa on a stick. Do these people know me or what?? I'm sharing the M & Ms and the Russell Stover chocolates but the truffles and Santa will be coming home with me. I'll be savoring those in the not too distant future!

In our office, sent to us by one of the financial vendors we deal with, was a 15" x 15" box of dark and light chocolates shaped like computers and mice - the majority of those have been eaten though. There were a few cookies and there had been another gift basket that was consumed last week. That was mostly cheese and crackers and cookies. More stuff a newly gall bladder free person shouldn't eat!

Out by the coffee machine is one of those big tins of 3 kinds of popcorn. I live for Christmas because typically one or more of our vendors sends our company those tins. It's the kind of thing I would never buy myself because I'd eat it all - but it's nice to dig into those things for a little snack at work. I'm not sure I'll try any of that this year though. Hopefully it will all be gone soon, making my decision easier.

I opened my desk drawer today and saw the partial bag of dark chocolate covered pretzels I'd left there. I actually ate two today with no ill effects. I ate some of my Chex Mix too, cashews included, with no ill effects.

And I took in breakfast as I mentioned in a previous post and everyone liked that. I had my nice poppy seed bagel with jam on it. Delish!

See how we are about food around there?? That second week, leading up to my surgery, I was feeling the best I'd felt and felt kinda guilty about not working. I know it was best I stayed home, but part of the reason I didn't want to be there was because of all this fat-laden food that I knew would be around.

I'm getting pretty annoyed at the blogger.com support people. It's been four days with no response, other than their immediate auto-response. Not very good customer service, I'm afraid. I fired off another email tonight, upping the nasty quotient just a tad. I thought I would have at least gotten a please-be-patient acknowledgement of one of my emails. My friend Ann looked at the code of another Blogger blog and it seems I'm missing the header info. I copied and pasted code from another blog into my template, changing the blod ID and blog title - but that didn't fix it. (Ann, I'll send you a screenshot of my template because it looks different than what you see on the screen. Maybe you'll be able to see something I missed.)

It felt so good to sleep in my own bed last night. The animals seemed happy that we were all back in our routine. By the time I left this morning, they were all in their usual sleep-the-day-away spots.

I mentioned buying some fabric yesterday but I'll hold off telling you about it until what I'm making is done so I can show you. It's nothing fancy by any means - it's the fabric that's cool. Two words: Quilters Batik.

I finally, yes finally, put away all that cardstock I ordered - that arrived about a month ago. I put it away yesterday because I was not going back to work without having done that. I had told Jen I would bring in one piece of each color and she could decide what she wanted and I'd sell it to her at cost. But! As I was putting the paper away I decided to go one better. I gave her 5 sheets of each color. That stack had to be 3" thick. I was so excited to give it to her - it made me so happy! Sometimes when I give her my old magazines or something, I'll just leave it on her desk but this time I wanted to see her face light up when she saw all that colorful cardstock. It lit up, alright! She loved it, needless to say. That was fun.

100%

This is Day 3 of my blog not being available. Guess I'll keep posting anyway. I did email the blogger.com support people again, just verifying that they received my 1/1/06 email and I'm in the queue to be helped.

Steve went with me to the surgeon's today for my follow-up appointment. We couldn't remember if I wasn't supposed to drive until I saw him or if it was just a week after the surgery. I wanted to drive last week and felt fine so we're saying it was a week - seems reasonable. The surgeon was very busy and running at least 30 minutes behind - standing room only in the waiting room by the time we left. My time spent with him was about 5 minutes. Removing those staples and that drain was fast and easy! I asked to see the staples - they were tiny! I was envisioning longer staples. Can't tell you how glad I am to have that drain out. I'll be sleeping in my own bed tonight, on my side, spooning with Steve. (And Reggi, no doubt!) I have to see him in a month for follow-up. Seems ridiculous, but whatever.

I asked about when I can eat fattier food just to see what he'd say. So far he's given me 3 different answers: 2 months, 3-6 months and 6-12 months. Pretty big range! I didn't even care about the answer anymore because I realized that I'm the only one will know at what pace I can introduce fattier foods. The consequence is diarrhea which ain't no big deal. If the consequence was that familiar gall bladder pain, I'd be extra cautious, for sure.

He said I really made him work to get my gall bladder out. He said it was really infected and he was this close to giving me the big slice, rather than being able to do it laproscopically. Thank goodness he didn't have to. He said he's surprised I didn't have more symptoms and more pain - the same thing Gretchen's doc said to her. Guess we Stahlmans are stoic.

I'm all set to go to work tomorrow - and very happy about it! That will probably last about 30 minutes, then I'll slap my forehead, "Oh yeah. Work." I have a batch of Chex Mix in the oven that I intended to take in around Christmas time - bought the ingredients before I got sick. I'm going to bring in bagels, donuts and muffins - to thank my group for covering for me while I was out these 3 weeks. (I can eat a bagel without a problem - either plain or with jam, not cream cheese.) I've been staying on top of my work email this whole time so at least I'm somewhat caught up on that. Should be okay - and heck, it's only a 3 day work week for me! It will be nice to see my friends. We've been in touch via email this whole time but in person will be nice.

On the way to the surgeon's this morning I said to Steve, "So what the heck are we going to talk about now that we don't have my gall bladder to talk about?" You know how it is, heck you've been reading this journal - it's been the main focus of my existence for 3 weeks. After we left the surgeon's, I said to Steve, "Well. Now we don't have to speak of this ever again." To which he replied, "Is that really a promise you think you can keep?" "Hell, no!' I said, and continued to talk about - how I can now take a full, deep breath, now that the drain is out. But when he came home after work, I have not mentioned it once to him - wonder if he noticed?

Back to craft talk tomorrow - and fabric talk! I celebrated my last afternoon of freedom by visiting JoAnn Fabrics, after visiting with Mom and Dad for a while.

Charity Begins at Home

Since 2001 I have set up a budget for myself, in terms of monetary donations to charitable organizations. I've written of this before, a couple years ago I think. My actions kind of petered out mid-2005 but an article in Sunday's paper got my attention. I want to do this again.

Every month I donate $10 to wherever I want. I've had the most fun figuring out where to give my money. (It also helps me know my limits in how much I can afford to donate per year. And Suze Orman says it's good karma to keep money flowing in and out.)

This article is the one that got my attention Sunday, about this woman who fosters and places tiny kittens in new homes. Now admittedly, this thing has a huge awww factor - but she's doing incredible, time-consuming work. Our newspaper frequently features individuals doing great work and that's what I'm going to focus on this year - keeping my dollars local, preferably for "the little guy". At first I just saw the phone number the reporter gave if one wanted to help. Upon closer inspection, I see this woman has set up a website, which puts me on much more familiar territory. (I'm not a big phone person.) On her wishlist page, she offers PayPal donations. Perfect - fast, easy and a push of the button.

As I've mentioned, Mom, Dad, Gretchen and I made part of our Christmas gift to each other this year, a charitable donation. It worked out really well, we all really enjoyed it. I printed up a little slip of paper for each of them and put it in a handmade envelope. I split my donation up between three charities that I knew were meaningful to each of them. Dad loves The Heifer Organization for it's hand-up, not hand-out policy. Mom is very fond of Habitat for Humanity and I know they've been doing a lot of work for the people of the gulf coast. And Gretchen and I love our pets, so my donation in honor of her was to our local humane society, Lollypop Farm. They are an excellent organization that has also been doing a lot of work with animal rescue in the gulf coast.

Gretchen had not yet made all of her donation because she was still thinking about where she wanted to do this. Here comes my point. She wanted to give something tangible to some place local, not just money. She mentioned a youth organization that promotes fitness and boxing I think. She wanted to give hand wraps and whatever else they needed, to really be connected to this place, not just write an easy check.

That really stuck with me, what she said. I volunteered at the Ronald McDonald House for 9 years and since I left there, have never really found an outlet for my volunteering. Part of that is that my life has changed since then. There are only so many hours in the day and so much energy available. I have Steve and Simon in my life, we bought a house, I got a promotion at work and I devote a whole lot of time to developing Pine Tree Designs.

I'm really rambling now but another point is I've always thought it would be cool if the company I work for could align itself for one non-profit for a full year - or more. And do more than hold fundraisers, though those are important too. I'd like to see us fulfill wishlists. I've thought about this for years but have hesitated because, I don't know why, because I wasn't sure I could adequately devote enough time to it. And probably more to the point, I don't feel like I'm a joiner anymore. I worked with Habitat for Humanity for one day, building a house. Not my thing. If I could have painted or done inside finish work, tasks I'm better suited to - but that work is mostly done by the families for their sweat equity. (I did volunteer for a year at the office of the Wayne County Habitat for Humanity. It didn't suit me either unfortunately - very small, very outdated, inefficient office. Sounds petty, doesn't it? Just not the right fit at the time.)

I'm going to give this some more thought. One of the things I worry about is intruding in fellow employees time - maybe they have their own volunteer work they do. But you know what? This doesn't have to be an all or nothing proposition, does it? When I figure out the right thing, we could just do the best we do. Something is better than nothing.

I've got some thinking to do.

The Good and the Bad

The good is starting, appropriately enough, as of January 1, I can honestly say I feel 100% healed. Tuesday, the staples and drain comes out and I can't imagine the doctor not allowing me to return to work on Wednesday. I've been ready since Sunday, have my black bag packed, thinking about packing lunches - and I'm very excited to return to work. Mostly, it will be nice financially and socially!

The ugly is that my blog has been unavailable since Sunday. If you are reading this, you know it's been fixed. I decided to keep posting entries anyway. It appears as a page of html to Firefox users and a blue screen to IE users. Saturday afternoon I changed one thing in my Journals I Read section of the sidebar - no problem. I went back to change another thing and that section of my template was missing, yet it looked okay published on the screen. (Unless it was reading the screen from my cache and not the live screen. Am I using the right words?) I read all the help screens I could find, then emailed their support desk. I did everything suggested on their auto response with no change, so I emailed them back for individual help. As of this writing, I'm still waiting for a response, but being a holiday and all, I probably won't hear for a couple of days yet. I'm trying to keep things in perspective. This is only a silly blog, forcryingoutloud! However I miss it and it's stressing me out!!

Like I said, if you are reading this, however, you know it's been fixed and all is right in my world again.

I have joined two new (to me) Yahoo Groups recently:

Fold It. This group was created to discuss Karen Thomas' work in her new DVD and from her appearances on the Carol Duvall show. I posted a picture of the photo pocket in yesterday's entry. I love her work.

Die Cuts All. I just joined this one today, membership being approved as we speak - but it's all about die cuts, of course.


I finished Mom's blue and green paper quilt. Again, I'm trying to use up some frames I had on hand. I think in both this one and purple & teal one I posted yesterday that I made for Gretchen, the colors of the quilt co-ordinate better with the frame in real life than they do in these photos. I can't wait to make more!

Origami and Kirigami

This is the page-a-day calendar that Simon gave me for Christmas, with my first practice piece. Kirigami is the art of paper folding and cutting. Here are some amazing examples of this art! And here is more along the lines of what I see myself doing. Cool huh? (I asked for this calendar, having heard about it from a Yahoo Kirigami group I belong to.)

I learned to make this origami photo pocket from Karen Thomas on a recent Carol Duvall show. She actually made six of them and held them together in a cube with paper tabs - and had photos in each one. I put this piece of teal cardstock where the photo would go and thought I'd build on that design and use it on a card.

I finished Gretchen's framed paper quilt! I'm trying to use up some frames I had - and Gretchen likes color - hope she likes this. Now to finish Mom's, in blues and greens.

Steve and I were wild and crazy last night - stayed up until 11:00!! I know. We totally rock. And we ate appetizers for our dinner. We had shrimp cocktail and I made deviled eggs. I made White Bean Rosemary Dip for me and Steve picked out a couple of frozen appetizers at the store for himself. We went nuts with dessert - fat-free Snackwells and Fig Newtons. We be livin' the high life, for sure.

We watched our Netflix Supersize Me. I enjoyed it even more than I thought I would. Steve found it "interesting". Let's see. He eats fast food, I do not. Hmmm. (I do indulge in Arby's a couple of times a year, I'll admit.) Made me feel pretty darn good about all the low fat food I've been eating.

I spent a few years writing actual goals for the upcoming year, printed in a nice font, I kept them posted in front of me at my desk. But I haven't done that in a couple of years and it doesn't feel right anymore. But yesterday something that Carol Ross wrote resonated with me. So I'm declaring 2006 "The Year of Successful Craft Shows". And so it shall be.

Happy New Year!