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presby2
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Name: Cindy
Birthday: 6/26/1959
Gender: Female
Interests: Family. Chocolate. Friends. Chocolate. Theology. Chocolate. Reading. Chocolate. Crafting, specifically with polymer clay these days. Chocolate.......
Oh, really, that makes it sound as though CHOCOLATE is the most important thing in my life. It's really not. That would be..........
My family. All of 'em. You know who you are!
And first and foremost, Jesus Christ.
Expertise: My expertise - well, let's see. I can type like a madwoman, most of the time with very few errors. I can cook. I can sew. I can make small children laugh hysterically. Princess Rachel says that everything I do is a craft, and lately, most of that has been with polymer clay. I'm pretty good at computers and spend a lot of time on my laptop.
Occupation: The World's Very Best Auntie.
Industry: Family
Message: message me
Member Since:
8/23/2004
 True  Lifetime
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| I've opened an Etsy shop! |
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| What's an Etsy shop?
It's a place where, for a small amount of money, crafters, artists and artisans can offer things they've produced for sale. If you haven't checked it out yet, you really should. Great handmade items of all types and quality and prices. Truly amazing.
And I've entered the fray.
I'm selling one of a kind polymer clay purses and jewelry - and who knows what else? on Etsy. The items above are the kinds of things I have for sale.
PLEASE feel free to add a link to my Etsy store on your site. Thanks! I need all the publicity I can get. It's hard breaking into this gig. ;-) |
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| Just in case ya'll missed the news...I'm FIFTY - get it? FIVE OH - years old now - as of Friday. And there were a variety of celebrations. Here's the run down, complete with photos of each.
First, but without photos, but just as appreciated, were the dozens of emails and Facebook messages and forum messages wishing me birthday felicitations. So much fun to read and respond to - I have so many friends and so much family. It's wonderful! I don't need an angel to show me how great my life is - I already know and I'm very very thankful.
Friday evening was for The Sisters. First, we went to Sam's Club to see Rachel's debut with the Williamsport High School's marching band. She plays clarinet and is now officially a freshman member of the band. (Rachel's in high school!!!! Aaaaaaaaaaaaaagh!) I knew that they were only doing a few songs (she'd practiced here) and that if I was uncomfortable, it would only be for a short time. Turned out there was a chair brought out Sam's Club employees who were serving hot dogs and drinks to the kids (and selling them to others.) So I was able to sit where I was able to see Rachel from the side and kind of behind. Robin and Hazel used my camera to get shots from the front.
That's our Rachel, tall and straight, just about in the center of the photo, with her clarinet. She's the one with her hair skinned back and with black high-tops.
She said it went really well - there were only two of the four songs where she wasn't sure about her play - there's a whole new octave she's working with now. Considering she's only been practicing with them for a month or so, not too bad.
At rest - the director is speaking. 
 \
This was my view. It was pouring rain, and I was under the roof part, so I wasn't complaining.
The video is of the last song, from my view. "On Wisconsin." What is cute is watching the heels of the band members, including Rachel - they're already learning how to keep time in preparation for the actual marching. Just caught my fancy.
Then we went to Orlando's in Muncy, since we were already in that end of the county. (Muncy's about 20 miles from us, and that's where the mall and Sam's Club and such are located.) We've tried unsuccessfully to go there for a few birthdays in recent years. I guess we've had a few Monday birthdays, since they're always closed then!
We had a very tasty meal (Scampi for me, filet mignon for Kim and Haz) and got giggly over nothing and wonderful desserts. (Well, Haz and I did.) Here are the obligatory sister photos:
Good shots of both Hazel and Kim.
I'd had one of Kim where she was making a dopey face, but I'm being a good girl...
And me, with my oh-so-delish-dessert:
Banana cake with chocolate chips, and rich - RICH - chocolate frosting. Those rosettes on top were like eating a Hershey's Kiss. And ain't complainin'!
Haz gave me a nice surprise:
It's actually a five and a twenty. 
And Kim got me a very um...well, you be the judge!.. card:
And here's the inside:
That's one birthday wish fulfilled!
Saturday Jason and Tiana took Faron and me to the "Chili Poblano" restaurant (it's not really called that, but it's Tiana's favorite thing and the other Mexican place doesn't have them on the menu.) We had a great meal and a fun time. Before we left, they gave me this beautiful potted plant for the porch:
Isn't it gorgeous? It's HUGE!
And then we came back here to eat the apple dumplings they'd gotten Saturday morning at the Farmer's Market downtown. Warmed up and topped with vanilla bean ice cream. Mmmmmmm...
(Faron had gotten me a Pepperidge Farm Coconut cake, in lieu of the one I love from Rosencrans that's not available after Memorial Day. We indulged ourselves with that, just the two of us, whenever we weren't partying with someone else. )
And Sunday afternoon, Robin, Ethan, Rachel, Stacy, Magaly, Zoe, along with the newest family-import, Caitlyn (granddaughter of Dcotor Cooper, whom Hazel cares for, and who was hospitalized on Friday) and Terri, Duke & Darla came with lots of goodies and gifts and we had a lively party on the porch.
Maggie delivered these beautiful wildflowers that she and Zoe and Caitlyn (along with Stacy, I'm sure) had picked that afternoon.
Blowing out the representative five candles. I was to blow out another set on the dessert Robin brought (these were Darla's delish brownies) but Rachel baked a dump cake, and it was fresh out of the oven. The candles Ethan was shoving into it were melting into nothingness from their wicks having been lit and being shoved into a very hot cake! So that didn't work out so well. And in typical Xanga contrariness, I uploaded a photo of the drooping, flaming candles three times and it was never visible, so, sorry about that. The look on Ethan's and Rachel's faces as they watch Robin fish out the candles was adorable.
There's the two desserts - the hot one, sans candles. Both were yummy!
Robin and the kids got me a little book called, "young at heart," by Tom Burns, "keeping a youthful sense of fun." It's one of those books with pics of various animals and funny captions. Robin left a sappy note in the front, but then went through and made comments throughout the book where she thought they might apply. For instance: "Old age is 15 years older than I am." Rob's comment: "See you are old enough to have Jason for a son!"
She passed it around and had everyone sign a page at least, or make a few pithy comments. The book is a hoot, and is now priceless.
Here's Terri lookin' it over for her spots:
And here are the two grandpas on the other end of the porch, rockin' away...
Finally, here's Ethan, getting a drink:
And that's Caitlyn, beside him on the porch, seated. She's a sweetie.
Is it necessary for me to add that Ethan would "gleek" those sips of water from the porch roof after he captured them? And do you need an explanation for "gleeking"? I do hope not.
We had a great time. I am so blessed with friends and family - I know I started with saying that but it's so true and I so appreciated it, Lord!
Today is cleaning day. Kelly's here doing her thing. "Kelly Cleans," is her mantra, although she's learning to cook, "Kelly Cooks," is going to be added. She just helped me to empty my suitcase, as it's not really something I can do alone. This was my major task for the day, so finally it's done. Hopefully tomorrow I can get back to the Minnesota trip and document the reception there.
me<><
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| Sightseeing...We went to Minnesota, of course, for the "family and friends of Tiana's family," reception, but we were there for 3 days. :) We actually did some touristy stuff, starting with the Runestone Museum, in Alexandria.
This is a neat little museum, basically a county effort to preserve the history of the Kensington Runestone, a large runestone found near Kensington, MN in the late 19th century, and the fascinating story of not only the Vikings who so incredibly sailed across the Atlantic and through the Great Lakes to Minnesota in the 14th (yes!) century but of the man who, with his children, found the stone on his farm long before the true significance of such finds was understood. We enjoyed that visit very much. The museum also preserves the history of the first settlers to the area, with a small church, general store and school, among the several other buildings which have been moved to the site from other locations in the county.
Faron was excited to see this among the early pieces of farm equipment:
Know what it is? It's a potato digger - a piece of equipment Faron and Peter are going to wish they had once the half-acre of potatoes they put in comes ready!
Also, here's the local's tribute to the Vikings who visited the area so long ago:
We'd planned to snap pics of each of us standing in front of Olie, but by the time we dragged ourselves out of the museum, I was hot and tired and ready to take a nap, and Faron had heard that Fred was home from work, and he could think of nothing but hooking up with him so they could "play," so we contented ourselves with this shot through the car window.
So, we went up the road and registered at the motel and Faron got directions to Tiana's folks' house, while I got comfy for a nap. A nice long one! When I got awake Faron was there to take me back to have dinner with Fred, Alaine, Jason & Tiana, on their beautiful patio. Lovely evening. Don't know why I didn't take any photos, but I didn't. But you'll see it all in the account of the reception...
Another entry!
me<><
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| Driving and driving and driving!For the rest of my life, I know that's what I'll think of when I hear the name of Tiana's home state! Minnesota - at least from our house to the motel where we stayed, is 18.5 hours when driven straight through, as we did on the way out. That's a lot of riding. I was made aware of every lump in my backside, including a few I hadn't realized were there before last Thursday!
All in all though, it wasn't bad. But we were very happy to see this sign:
It was about 6 their time when we saw it. A few hours more took us through the Twin Cities, and up into the real deal of the Midwestern prairie country. We were amazed to see these flashing lights off in the distance, just as it started to get dark.
Ignore the light tracings, although I think they're kinda cool - it's the sky you should notice. At first, we thought maybe it was airport lights. Then we thought maybe it was fireworks. By the time it was full dark, we knew what it was.
But despite several attempts, and really funky tracings from lights on cars and along the road, I never managed to really capture lightning with my camera. There was cloud to cloud and cloud to ground lightning, but we couldn't hear any thunder. We drove toward the storm for more than an hour, fascinated the whole time. I eventually took some video. We had the radio on, so you'll hear that in the background. Sorry about that - but focus on the pictures. We found it so amazing!
The background song to this video is very ironic...
Pretty cool, huh?
We finally made it to Brandon, Minnesota about 12:00 am our time, after leaving home at 5:10 am. Looooooooooong day. That's where we had reservations. Thankfully, we'd driven by a larger town 12 miles before that had many hotels and motels, because when we got to the motel where our reservations were made for Friday and Saturday nights, it was closed. It wasn't as though we'd been expected. So we got back on I-94 and went back to "Alec," as it's called and stayed in the first place we tried. Turned out it was quite a bit more than the place we'd stay up the road a bit, but hey, we were too tired to care!
Next entry, I'll tell you what we did until we could hook up with Jason and Tiana and her family. And maybe about them, too.
me<><
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| Another quicky!Kael was up the other day with his Mommy and Grandma, and Hazel came later. We had a good visit. That kid is so sweet!
He's also the silliest wee thing! In this video he WANTS something, and his way of expressing that is so funny! Stick it out, please. The kicker is at the end.
:)
We leave for Minnesota on Thursday. We're very much looking forward to visiting with our new relatives, and getting to know more.
me<><
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| Just a quicky to share this adorable photoMy computer is behaving very badly when it gets warm and today's not quite warm enough to have our A/C kick on, I guess. I keep stopping and fanning the computer every now and then, but I can't do one of my long entries like that! :)
Anyway, Amy just posted this on Facebook. 
Doesn't Jared look like he must have tied one on last night? Poor kid. But I love the photo - too cute!
Maybe it's because I love the boys so much? Perhaps. You can't really see it, but Derek has a nasty scrape and bruse on his right cheek, which is actually the combination of injuries from two separate booboos. Poor little toddler guy!
me<><
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