Missing My Girl

Avery is in Hilo, Hawaii and she's having a great time. I spoke with her this afternoon and yesterday they had visited the volcano national park. She got to see lava and things she had never seen in person. Avery loves science so this must have been a great adventure. I am truly happy she is having this great experience.

She is growing up and I have to prepare myself for the many things she will be doing that don't involve Nana and Papa. We just have so much fun together and like any other grandma, I just want the best for her. I realize we have to share her with her other grandparents. I just hope she takes lots of pictures so I can see her having all the tropical fun. Of course, I will share them.

happy and sad

Avery and the baby ducks about 3 years ago
She boarded a big jet this morning from Atlanta headed to.......

Hawaii

This is exactly how her Nana feels

She is going to have the vacation of a lifetime. Almost two weeks all over Hawaii and why am I so sad? I should be thrilled. This is her first flight. She is going half-way around the world. Hello..6 hours time difference. She is nine years old. I miss my baby girl.

I want to be so happy for her and I didn't show my anxiety last night, but I had it. I pray she will enjoy herself and make wonderful memories with her other grandparents. They live all the way up in Boston and I know we need to share. It's just the first time she's been away like this.

Please help me pray it will be a wonderful time for her. Love you guys.

Let me say first that this picture is being shown only to let you see my new do. I hadn't realized how much I look like the housekeeper on The Brady Bunch. When did I get so old? Unfortunately, my office looks like a bomb went off, but this is me in my element. Another thing that tends to alarm me is that my lips are disappearing. The mirror seems to play tricks with me. I don't realize quite how old I look until I see a picture. Then I think to myself, "Who is that older woman?" Hello reality!

Now don't get me wrong...I am blessed. Many of my classmates have not made it to this age. In fact, I will get to meet up with one of my classmates from grade school tomorrow night at the airport. She is flying in for a layover on her way to Indiana. We haven't seen each other in 46 years. She was such a cute bubbly girl and I can't wait to see if she's kept that spunk. Kyla and I would hang out at our friend's house in the morning before we went to school. Our friend lived across the street and her parents left for work before the kids started streaming in. I remember hearing "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" and other early 60's tunes in their living room. I think when I see her I will be transported back to that house and our tangerine nail polish, Dr. Kildare and Casey shirts, gum wrapper chains, and super teased hair. Wonder if she'll be thinking, "Gee, Patti, you really got old!" You know what, I pray I'll get older and older before the Lord calls me home.

Bobbie Pin Torture

I have been thinking so much about hair lately. I am loving my short do. I feel so much better. I was thinking today about how my mother loved putting bobbie pins in my hair. That was the big thing in the 50's. Every Saturday night I would sit on the floor and my mother would sit in the chair and wind my hair up with about 5 thousand bobbie pins. I have always been tender-headed. When she would start wrapping my hair around her fingers and pulling it tight to insert the dreaded bobbie pin I would feel like she would was pulling my hair out of my head. I would groan and moan and my daddy would tell her to stop with the hair. I feel tears welling up in my eyes as I remember him fussing at her about the bobbie pin torture.

My parents hardly ever fussed about anything. They were in their fifties and back then that was sooo old. They would sit on the screened-in front porch and drink coffee and it was all so peaceful and it made me feel so loved. I was blessed. They adopted me when many of their friends told them it was not a very smart thing to do at their age.

If you wonder how my hair looked after sleeping on those horrid bobbie pins all night. Well....it was sticking up all over the place and didn't look a bit natural. If I could figure out how to use my scanner I would show you. Maybe this weekend I can try and figure it out. Thank heaven the bobbie pin look faded away! Hooray!

memories from the 50's

As I near my birthday next month I am caught up in so many memories from when I was a little girl in Indiana. Summers were so sweet. I'd wait for the milkman and hope that he had some chocolate milk. He didn't always have it and it became such a special treat. My granddaughter has always had chocolate milk. It's not really anything special.

This time of year we would be getting ready to go to the Indiana State Fair. I loved seeing all those farm animals. I lived in the city and only saw animals like that when we would go out to the country and visit relatives. The kids that brought the animals always seemed so proud. Here I was a city girl and couldn't imagine having cows and pigs. There were some stinky smells around the farm animals, but just go down the way and there was food with heavenly aromas. I thought cotton candy was so pretty and actually I still do. Especially pink.

The day after Labor Day was the first day of school. Mike Albertson, a neighbor from down the street, always would walk me to school those first few weeks. Then we would walk home together and he wouldn't come down to walk to school with me until the next new school year. He had red hair and freckles and he lived with his grandparents. He was a kind little boy and I always wonder what happened to him. When it would snow my mother would walk to school and bring more warm clothes and we would go home at lunch and eat homemade vegetable soup. We didn't worry about kidnappings or scary people lingering around. It's a different world now. At least it is where we live now and here in Atlanta.

I loved new pencil holders and fresh school paper. I felt like it was a new clean slate every year. I loved school and would go now if I had the time and money for tuition. I love learning new things and cracking open the new school books has always been a thrill for me.

Avery has started her new school. She is liking it. She has gone from a class of 8 in private school to a class of 22 in public school. She is excited about her new friends and I'm so happy for her. She leaves for Hawaii Saturday and I will ask everyone to please keep her in your prayers. I'm so thankful she is getting such a nice opportunity. I guess seeing her with her back in school takes me back in my mind to Roy Rogers, Mickey Mouse Club, Howdy Doody, hula hoops, Old Maid cards and my sweet dolls. It was so long ago, but I am thankful I have such sweet memories.

a guilty pleasure and a new friend

Hello world. This is one of my guilty pleasures. I am so happy Project Runway is back. I enjoy watching the designers throwing their clothes together. The fabrics, the design, the drama. This is so fun for me. I always like to imagine that I could be on there and create some magnificent line. Okay, this is something that sounds so bizarre, but......when I was a teenager I did some runway modeling. I know believe it or not. I am so overweight now, it's hard to believe I was ever skinny. It was fun for me. I guess it will always be a neat memory.

Now I must tell you about my new friend. Brenda is Dustye's cousin. Dustye is Knitting Mania and In A Garden's friend. Brenda now lives about an hour away from me when I'm at home. She is a fun, interesting person. She just moved here about a month ago and she has a beautiful home. She's brave to come that far and start a new life. I believe God has something very special in store for her. We talked tonight and she has an interview next week. Please help me pray she will get the job. Oh yow, she got her hair cut really short too. I'm going to encourage her to start a blog. I think you would really be in for a treat.

Well, the All-Star Project Runway is almost over and they will pick a winner that will win 100K. Not bad I'd say. Then the new season on Lifetime starts. Woohoo. later T

Our Crowning Glory and Mary E.

I recently got my haircut short and I have been thinking a lot about hair. I told my daughter that if I had all the time and money back for my hair I might be a wealthy woman. I have spent untold hours thinking about the next style, whether to cut or not to cut, bangs or no bangs. perm or not perm. My mother used to always tell me how important having neat and clean hair was. She said that it was your "crowning glory". I thought that was such an unusual statement. But, like most things my mother told me, it was so true. When I don't feel good about my hair you might as well hang it up. I am really enjoying my new pixie cut. I have product in it and it's kind of spikey. I feel like a different woman.

In 1970 my husband and I went to London for a week and we saw the play HAIR. It was delightful and the music was timeless. I have been a redhead, blond and my natural color, brunette. I haven't colored my hair in several years. I got tired of coloring a few gray hairs. I'm thankful for not much gray. I think my hair is much healthier now. I believe I have a genetic thing going on. I certainly remember the days of hair dryers like the one below. It was almost like torture.

I have stopped paying big money for haircuts. Here in the big city haircuts are many times $100. and then they try to tag on lots of other stuff. For several years now I have been frequenting the Great Clips shops. Yes, $14.00 haircuts can be just fine. I have tried cutting it myself, but I found pretty quickly that it is NOT one of my gifts.

I just had to show the hair dryer. I used to have the ones with a plastic cap that covered my great big rollers in the 60's. We didn't have blow dryers and the whole process took so long. See what I said about the great amount of time devoted to hair. I have always had to wash it very often so the whole rollers and hair dryer project took a chunk of my day.

Now I am switching subjects. I love Mary Engelbreit. I can remember the day my girlfriend from Seattle told me about Mary. We were here in Atlanta in 1990 at a medical conference and she showed me her work and told me that she had cards and cute stationery. Since that day I have collected Mary's wonderful art. She is so talented. She had the most wonderful magazine, Home Companion.My friend, Stevie Wren of a little birdie told me so told me it had stopped being published. That was a very sad day and I didn't want to believe it. Sorry Stevie. It was earth shattering for me. Am I a drama queen or what? Now I wish I would have saved all the issues. I have quite a few, but not all. She has great calendars and I never get tired of her work.

This is jumping all over the place, but that's how my brain does sometimes. What about yours?

Mary Engelbreit

all pictures were from posters.com except Mary and that's from her site
BTW Mary is on the cover of one of my new favorites, Where Women Create magazine. Try it, you'll love it.

A Sad Anniversary

On August 16, 1977 we lost a great talent. I was always fascinated by Elvis. I, of course, am not saying I have velvet Elvis pictures, but he has always had a special place in my life. My daddy brought me a pencil holder with a picture of Elvis on it when I was around 6. He had heard he was a new popular singer. As the years marched on my husband and I were based at Ft. Hood, in Killeen, Texas where Elvis had been based a few years before. We went outside the house he had rented while he was there. I used to dream I was married to him. Now that's a hoot!

The year before he died he was coming to our local auditorium for a concert. The tickets were going on sale starting Saturday morning. My husband came home from work Friday and that night the factory he was managing burned to the ground. I knew I shouldn't be going to a concert with my husband losing his job. So I didn't. That would have been my last opportunity to see him. I suppose it wasn't meant to be.

I pray he was at peace with the Lord. I feel his death had such a tremendously sad impact on Lisa. I lost my daddy as a little girl and I know you always wonder what your life could have been like if he would have lived.

When I was at a conference with my job in the mid-90's I met the man that embalmed Elvis. All the crazy stories about people thinking they have seen him all over the country in K-marts and various places was just their imagination.

May Elvis rest in peace!

Nana's Believe it or Not

You see a picture of South America and you ask yourself, "What is Trish doing with that map?"

Well, folks, I have a port wine hemangioma (birthmark). It is on my chest and when I was a little girl my parents took me to the doctor and asked about it. The doctor said that it would go away. Bless his heart. He must have been at the bottom of his class. A strawberry birthmark usually goes away, but port wine birthmarks usually don't. Mine is the shape of South America. No kidding. Stay with me. This is an educational post.

I tried to take a picture of my birthmark and I couldn't get it on the post. Maybe that's a good thing that it didn't work. Here's why this is an educational post. All my life I have had this lovely birthmark in the shape of South America. As a child it didn't bother me, but when I got in junior high people starting saying it looked like a hickey. Yes, folks right on my chest I have this natural tatoo. When I started working at the hospital a little over twenty years ago I decided to have plastic surgery and have it removed. The doctor told me that the laser system would remove it and I would be free of it.

I had the surgery on a Friday afternoon and I was the last patient. When I went for my follow up I found that I had been his last patient ever at that hospital. Yes, he moved on to another facility and he hurried through my procedure just to get it over with. I had deep burns and it looks worse now than it did before the surgery. Now I not only have the birthmark, but I have deep red burn scars from the laser. Months later I still was going for shots directly in the area to relieve the pain.

I used to tell kids that my father got mixed up with some mysterious people from way south of the border and a woman put a curse on him. It eventually showed up on me. Yes, I had an imagination. But I was so excited about it being removed. Don't ever let someone set you up for the last OR slot of the day. The doctor is tired and who knows, it may be his last day of work.

You ask, "Why didn't you sue?" Remember I told you earlier in the story that I was employed by the hospital. It would not have been very wise to try and sue my employer. I also wasn't in a place financially when I was divorced to sue anyone. My one and only experience with plastic surgery was not very pleasant. I titled this 'believe it or not' because it sounds bizarre, but it's true. I can't wear anything low cut or I find people staring at my birthmark. I wouldn't wear anything very low anyway, but going years with people in the stores turning and whispering to their friends and then the friends looking back at my chest has made me self-conscious.

I shouldn't whine about this. Plenty of other people have much worse than a birthmark, but I just wanted to share so none of you would put so much faith in some of these procedures.

P.S. What do they call a doctor that was at the very bottom of his class?
Answer: A doctor

Night Shift

The last few nights I have worked all night and for half of the day in meetings. I am not saying this to hear, "Poor Trish". This is my job and I am blessed and appreciate to have my job. We launched a new program and I was there all night to be supportive. I had somewhat forgotten the toll it takes on a body to be awake all night. For me being on call and answering questions over the phone is not that difficult. I have experienced it for over twenty years and I usually just go right back to sleep. Working all night is different.

I found myself wanting to eat more than usual. I got lots of things cleaned up and thrown out. When it's quiet and the phone isn't ringing off the desk I can get a lot done. But once I hit my threshold I realize I am just not productive. I have to reread and my mind starts to wander. I understand that you must get more used to it when it's your job and it becomes a familiar routine, but I need to sleep at night.

Speaking of sleep, I am on call and need to sail off to sleepy land for as long as I can. All you third shifters out there....you have my respect. Nite Nite

DREAMS

I have been thinking a lot about dreams lately. I have had a huge project that I have been working on and we launched it this week. So this weekend I dreamed Atlanta had a huge earthquake and I was caught up in it trying to survive. I was arm in arm with Courtney Cox and we were trying to use our cell phones and they wouldn't work. I kept worrying about my husband and daughter trying to communicate with me. Of course, all my anxiety got this all stirred up, but isn't it amazing how real it all seems when you are dreaming? I just wonder how it all processes in your mind.

I used to have dreams I was able to lift up and look down on everything. It's just so interesting. I know the Lord used dreams and dream interpretation through the Old Testament and it just intrigues me how the dreams had such deep meanings. My husband dreams he is driving fast cars and motorcycles.

Well, obviously Courtney and I made it out okay. I love purses and always have. When I was little I would dream I was holding a new purse and when I woke up I would be holding my hands like I was clutching the purse. I remember feeling so disappointed that it was all a dream.

Maybe it's just me, but.........

Dear Paula,

The word is on the street that you weren't happy with the $2 million a year they offered you. No, so they offered you $10 million. No, that was such an insult. You demanded $20 million. Well, Paula, I just don't get it. It must be very difficult living on $2m and then knowing you would only be getting $10m. Wow, it's a disgrace. How do they expect you to live on that little tiny amount of money? You work hard!!!! Getting all dressed up and having to worry about your hair and makeup. OMG. You are very sweet to the contestants, but my goodness, honey...10 million dollars. They called me and offered me the two mil and the producers told me they are looking for a real person to judge. I, of course, turned them down. I wouldn't have time to do that gig and all the exciting things I'm already doing. Paula, bless your heart. If you're ever in Atlanta call me and we can go to lunch. It just won't be the same show without you. Your friend, Trish

Maybe it's just me, but what is this world coming to?

Our Next Food Network Star

Melissa vs. Jeffrey

I am sitting here watching the Next Food Star Finale. I really enjoy watching this week after week. It's down to the last two contestants. Melissa has four little girls under 4 and Jeffrey is a realtor that was a former restaurant owner.

Alton Brown helped them with their final challenge. Avery is crazy about him and she was really looking forward to this last episode. They are ready to announce the winner.

Melissa won and I am so happy. She seems so genuine. Her mother was a single mother and died when Melissa was 20. Her friends took her in and she got into the corporate world eventually. She's bubbly and has a special charm about her. I'm so thrilled for her and I can't wait to see her show on the Food Network.

I hope you had a great weekend. I'll now get ready to watch HGTV's Next Design Star. Okay, do you see a trend here? I just love these shows.

Do you enjoy these shows?