TOM'S SHOES

Just wanted to share something neat that happened. On our way home from Peoria, AZ we stopped at the outlet mall in Cabazon, CA. I just wanted to run into the Tom's store. 

I am a Birkentstock person but when my knee was bad I couldn't wear them. So I have gone almost two years without wearing them. I ended up starting to wear some Tom's shoes. 

I'm just trying out my Birkenstock shoes again and they seem to be okay now with my knee. This is important because the Birkenstock kept an old ankle injury in control. So since then my ankle has given me some issues. Nothing terrible but a few pains occasionally. 

Anyway, I wanted to stop and get a newer pair of Tom's and since it's about an hour from our house this was a good opportunity to stop there on the way home. I like to try them on. I have ordered them online but they can ran a little different with each pair and I want to make sure they are snug to begin with because they do stretch out. 

I went to get my normal navy blue which they had and everything in the outlet store was an additional 30% off. I also wanted to get another pair since I was there. Why not?? I saw a pair that were grey/ash and when he checked the computer there was one pair in stock. However he wasn't able to find it. 

So I decided to just pick up a brown pair. The ones I tried on were a little loose so he went in back to check to see if there were more. He brought out another pair, they felt great and I was ready to go.

So I'm walking out to the car and I notice that the box says ash on it. That's right, the pair he brought out were the ash ones and I hadn't paid attention enough to notice the color. So I ended up getting the pair he couldn't find the first time. I really am happy about that because I do like the grey a lot. 

THERE IS A REASON I DON'T GO SHOPPING

I have no will power, then you add Amber to this and it's a lost cause! You should see the two of us together and the "OMG that is so cute" that you hear out of our mouth dozens of times. I was never good at saying no.  I had a very hard time punishing her when she was younger. I think I'm a little better at it now. When I would punish her on a night that had a favorite TV show I would tape it on our VCR so she could watch it the next day. So I have a hard time saying no when we shop and I'm pretty sure she knows that by now :o !

So after our delicious lunch at The Cheesecake Factory we shopped at the Tyler Mall.  We found lots of things we wanted.  Besides owls Amber collects Matryoshka dolls. Sometimes they call them Babushka dolls.  Of course we could not pass up the cute little pillow or the cabinet with colorful drawers.  It's funny that we seldom go shopping for clothes, we are always into the nik nak kind of stuff!

I got myself two new pieces for my Pandora Bracelet. I wanted to start adding some color to it and I'm really happy with what I bought.  Then I found some cute S&P shakers that I just had to have. Then we hit up Bath & Body Works which is never a good idea. They have so many specials all the time that you just get drawn into it. We found a Lemon No 1999 Eau De Parfum from C.O.Bigelow that we both liked. Well Amber said we could share it and I thought she could just get it. So we are at the checkout counter and we were told that they were buy two get one free. Well how can you pass that up? So of course we went for it and we gave one to Tristen.

Speaking of Tristen we meet her and Adam at Panda Inn. Wow, the food was as awesome as we remember it.  Honestly they have the best Mandarin Cuisine ever.  We had a wonderful birthday celebration for Amber.

Then on Sunday I really had to talk myself into going to the mall.  Outside the mall they have a Farmer's Market each Sunday. I have heard about it for over a year now but lazy always wins. Well I didn't let lazy win last Sunday! I went and it was wonderful. There were about three ranches that were there that had the most wonderful selections. I'm glad I went and will definitely be going again. I bought some zucchini, green beans, asparagus, avocados, celery and strawberries.

 

I'm excited that my cumcumbers are growing.

Isn't it adorable?

Hope you all have a wonderful weekend!

SHOW & TELL

I thought I would share a few miscellaneous things with you today. When we went to The Flower Fields I did a little shopping in the nursery attached. They have some really cute gift items and their prices are amazing. See the flower vase? I paid $12.95 for it and it has that cute little top that you can use for something like long stem roses.

The little lavender planter was $6.95 and the two little potted artificial plants inside were $3.95 each. Are they not adorable? The 3 bottles I ordered through the mail from Decor Steals. I just love the little crowns. Actually I have some wall decorative crowns arriving in the mail any day now. I am working on putting kind of a French Country Royal theme on my fireplace mantel. I will show you when it's done!

Next up is this plate. I have to tell you the background to this plate. See the platter in the top right corner. That platter belonged to my husbands Nana, her name was Mable. I always keep this platter on our hutch, but now our hutch is filled with my Jim Shore pieces. One day many years ago I came upon this collectible plate.  Mark's grandmother had a hutch in the hallway by their kitchen that looked so much like the picture on this plate. See the platter in the background.  I know the platter is different but I just could not resist buying this collectible plate which is called "Mable's Kitchen."

The crowns arrived! I just set them on the mantle to show you.

This is a work in progress!

See this cute wire wall thingy.

I use clothespins to hang cards on it!

Hope you have a great week ahead.

A LOT ABOUT NOTHING

If you haven't seen me around it's because I am just in a funk! I'm just not in the mood to read this week. So please make it easy for me and just post pictures. Let's make it wordless everyday!

I have random stuff to share. (now only if I could remember what it was) If you read my post it notes about "strikes here I come" well that didn't happen! A dear friend of mine at bowling took them all away. Yes she stole them from me so she could bowl her 300 game! Oh yes she did and it was awesome!!!!!!! I was lucky to get 345 for my three games. Yes, I sucked! Well I can only go up from here, at least I hope so.

Traffic was bad so it took me almost an hour to get to bowling, was late for the meeting. I live 25 miles away since I moved into our new home 4 years ago. I may not be a good bowler but it's so much fun to go each Tuesday and spend time with friends. Especially Headless Mom! We went out to lunch which was a nice treat.

After lunch I headed over to the DMV. Couldn't get an appointment and wanted my new license before my next trip. I could have just mailed it in but I wanted a new picture this time. It's been like 10 years. (I also had them add some numbers to my weight, it's not accurate but don't tell them that) So 45 minutes of standing outside in line and another 2 hours inside waiting in a chair I was finally taken care of. I am glad that is over!

Then it was another hour home. Normally I can get back and forth in about 30 minutes each way. No that didn't happen on Tuesday but it's all water under the bridge now, isn't it?

So how is your week going? I plan on going out today to do some shopping at Hallmark and maybe a run to Costco to pick up the steaks for our son-in-laws birthday dinner. He arrived home safely from his 10 day trip to Yellowstone Park and he bought me some awesome gifts.

Now these belong to my daughter. She collects the smashed pennies and so does a blogging friend of mine so I posted these for Kristin at The Goat to see.


Something I realized the other day is that I have to shop for some pants and shoes. I have a trip in late October to Chicago and I don't think my uniform will work. See I wear capri pants and Birkenstock sandals 24/7/365. The only other shoes I wear for long days like Disneyland are a pair of weird green born shoes which are awesome but don't go with anything. (I bought them years ago at QVC on their Shoes for Sales event 1/2 price) So I think I better find some born shoes to wear. I do have two closed toe Birkies that I could maybe wear socks with.

So as you may have noticed I obviously didn't listen to what I just told you because I didn't just post pictures. Do as I say not as I do!

P.S. Skye's recheck tests all came back great.

VACATION ~ MAMMOTH LAKES, CA

We headed North on Sunday the 8th of August. Trip is always a bit stressful because of the many sections on the 395 that are two lane roads and my husband must be first! So lots of passing going on and many prayers sent to God from me in the car! I always tell him "it's vacation, we have all day!" We made our usual stop in Bishop, CA for bread at Schat's Bakery, then over to Mahogany Meats for jerky. My husband let me stop and gamble for an hour also :) at the little casino in town. Also we went to a small art fair in Mammoth Lakes that was ending that evening. Did our grocery shopping for the week and got all settled in for the evening in the cabin and our daily games of scrabble.

Crystal Craig Eastern Sierras

Because I am now a blogger I wanted to stop so many times to take pictures. Well you know who didn't want anything to do with that! (he was nice Wednesday when we went out for a ride and stopped several times for me to take pictures)

It was a perfect week, a little cooler then usual which was not a problem. Because of my extra weight and my asthma I don't do too much anymore. I mainly stay around the cabin and read. My husband did some hikes daily. Many bear warnings this year but none showed up at the cabin which was fine by me.

We are in cabin #6 off to the left.

Wednesday we went for a ride to Lee Vining, CA which is only about a 30 minute ride. That is where Mono Lake is but we didn't visit it this year. We have been coming up here annually for maybe 16 years now so we have seen a lot. We go to Lee Vining to stop at Mono Lakes Cones for a nice frozen custard. Then we drove around the June Lake loop to see the beautiful scenery. We did however see something new this year in Lee Vining. It's the upside down house.

Our son and daughter came up Thursday. (thank you for the prayers) We had a nice evening, they picked up pizza in town on their way to the cabin. Then we went the Minaret Summit around 11pm to see the meteor showers. OMG the stars are unbelievable! I knew that from coming here each year but when you really get away from any type of light source it was amazing. I had never seen the Milky Way Galaxy before. I am going to post a picture of what it looked like, I couldn't take a photo. (I will do a short post about my kids drive in a few days)So we hadn't seen any wild animals all week and our kids are here for like 4 hours and saw 3 deer, a bear and the meteor showers!

That's my cowboy!

Friday my husband , son & daughter went horseback riding. Husband was on Midnight, son was on Jr. and our daughter was on Bailey. I decided not to go because of my asthma and extra pounds. (it's not going to happen next year because I am going on a life change diet because I can't take it anymore) They showered when they came back and we were off to town to shop at the small outlet of shops. Mainly Van Huesen, Coach, Bass, Ralph Lauren, and a few shops with all kinds of goodies. Then it was off to a nice dinner at the Chart House.

This is prosciutto wrapped salmon and it was delicious. We had a bottle of wine + a few glasses and some great desserts. (this is with my cell phone and I am still not comfortable taking pictures of my food in restaurants) It was a wonderful day! This trip was filled with love and laughter. We stayed up late playing games and just having a ball!
Sunday we headed home and as you know we arrived safely. More to come about the ride home and a first for me!

This is just an overview of what we did, I have a lot more pictures to show you. I will work on some mosaic pictures and post them hopefully next week.

I KNEW YOU WOULD LIKE TO SEE THEM

So in my post it notes on Tuesday I mentioned that I bought some tops at Lane Bryant at 50% off. Except for one of them they were all brand new $45/$59 tops. Three of them are hooded tops and one is a thin cardigan sweater. I am so excited. I love having new tops to wear. I almost always wear denim carpi's on the bottom. I also had bought a few of the tank tops at Old Navy at their $1.99 sale and they match perfect to wear under a few of these. (Didn't know that when I was buying them) Also got a grey pair of leggings at Old Navy for $4.00 which will also go with one of the longer tops.

I should be in good shape for bowling this year! (well not good body shape but I will look cute!) I also received a pkg. from Woman Within with some casual tops that I bought to wear around the house. They had a sale that was buy 1 get one for $1.00 so I also have 4 new tops to lounge around the house in. I am a happy camper although I prefer a cabin :)

I have started to collect colander's in different colors. I would love to hang them on a wall, but haven't' figured that out yet. The silver one belonged to my mother and my dad insisted that I take it home. I am so happy to have it in my collection.

For some reason I have a boat load of posts this week. I appreciate you stopping over each time.

Hope your week is going well.

P.S. If you out and about Home Depot is clearing out their Martha Stewart laundry detergent and it now 50%. Huge jug for $9.99 after sale and so far I am liking it.

NOT MUCH GOING ON.....

When you feel the need to post a picture of the toilet paper roll that showed you it's heart when you went into the bathroom that is pretty sad don't you think?

This are the cutest little plates. I love leaf design plates. I got these for something like $2.00 each from Coldwater Creek. They are appetizer plates so whenever the kids are over and I put out snacks we will use these. LOVE THEM!

Look at these pretty little pebbles. I bet you can't guess what they are? If I were guessing this on someones blog I would guess candy. I have seen candy that looks like little pebbles. These are soap, can you just picture how cute they will be sitting next to the bathroom sink!

A few shots of the tulips I received from my husband as they opened up and the bouquets that my children gave to me. I love having flowers in the house. Thank you to my husband and children for giving me these beautiful flowers for Mother's Day. Also one of our climbing rose bushes is blooming like crazy right now.

That's all folks! Hope you have a wonderful weekend. We are celebrating our daughters 29th birthday on Saturday. Her birthday is actually on Tuesday the 18th! Her and I have plans to go to lunch on Tuesday and hit a few stores along the way.

THIS IS TODAY / CAN'T SPEAK FOR TOMORROW

So Brandy who was nice enough to make my button a few weeks ago went and sent me this adorable little scrapbook with pictures of Skye inside. Do you know how much time it took to print the pictures and do this? She is the sweetest friend and has an adorable son named Grayson who keeps her very busy. You should go over and see some pictures of him. She felt bad that it was blue and not pink since Skye is a girl. Yes she is a girl but you would never know it. She is a fearless daredevil and very much a tomboy!!!

Speaking of this little daredevil you should know what she did last weekend. Beside running outside at roadrunner speed, bumping into, knocking over and doing somersaults after hitting one of our path lights ~ she chewed a wire! So over on the side of our house she likes to chase the lizards who show up. One of them always goes over and hides behind the electrical box for the path lights. See there doesn't even have to be a lizard there, she will sit and watch this box just assuming one is behind it! She must have gotten impatient and chewed a wire. Thank God (and believe I have) that she didn't chew one of the other wires which were not low voltage. We would have found her dead for sure. So a wire box has been made around the wires.

Well we didn't have any mozzarella cheese and I forgot to use the mushrooms I had but after we decided to buy this garlic bread at Trader Joe's we thought little pizza's would be good on them. We didn't even put sauce on them. I use to make English Muffin pizza's all the time when the kids were growing up. Do you remember making those? My mom use to make us these cheese things in the broiler when I was young. She would butter a piece of bread, put on a slice of American cheese and then put cooked bacon on top of the cheese and they were so good. Anyway these little things were pretty tasty the other night.

I am kind of caught up with my reading. (well that is right now at this very moment which is 3:21 on Friday afternoon) See having my daughter here does interrupt my day with more talking but that is a good thing. We even went out to Kohl's this week for their great sale and saved $174. Well actually you have to spend money to save money ~ funny how that works. We had a great time shopping at Trader Joe's too! So being behind in reading when it means I am out of the house is a very good thing! (and in case you were wondering, everything seems to be working out pretty well with them living here with us) I am sure I couldn't have done it without your prayers and support.

BUT GOD KNOWS MY TOMORROW AND I HAVE COMFORT IN THAT,

WHEN ALL ELSE FAILS GO SHOPPING OR HAVE A GLASS OF WINE

That's my story and I'm sticking to it. I have been fairly current on my blog reading because I can't do much else. So I was thinking that maybe there are some really great sales going on at this place called "Tender Heart Treasures" who have been "Warming Hearts & Homes for Over 20 Years" and they grabbed mine right before Christmas. I don't remember who posted it (let me know if it was you) but I shopped at this store and had so much fun. So BEING BORED, I jumped over to see what was on sale. Head on over and check them out and do the Winter Clearance and have some fun.

No I don't need anything but it did make me feel better..... :)

I bought close to $350. in items for $100.85 !!!! Some things are even 81% off. (Honey, if you see this post just move on past it to the next one and I LOVE YOU!)

Okay now on to the wine, oh I just looked at the clock and it's not time yet! So I will go over and make me some nachos, watch "All My Children", grabbing my thermal jug of 1/2 ice, 1/2 water & 1/2 Minute Maid Lemonade Light. Bye......