We can't always get what we want....

And that's especially true today!

Back in June, I started a project for a craft get-together I'm attending in August. I've seen all the supplies I needed in various stores all year long. As I got 3/4 of the way finished, I ran out of one of the supplies. Off to the store I went and could not find it. I searched online. I searched in local stores. It was as if every supplier in the US knew I would need it, and ran out and jerked them all off the shelves!

So I scapped the incomplete project and started a new project this month. Got all of it done except for an inexpensive $0.25 box! I just needed 25 of them. Can I find them anywhere? No, not unless I pay $1.79 each for 25. Or I can pay $0.50 each by ordering 100! Now, what in the heck am I going to do with 100 little 1" x 8" boxes?!?

So while I was at Hobby Lobby today, I got a FREE instruction sheet for this really pretty little candleholder/paperweight: http://www.hobbylobby.com/site3/pdfprojects/HL-511.pdf

EUREKA! I'll make some of those for August! So off I trotted through the store to find the little stackable crystal candle holders. I couldn't find them. So I asked a store employee to help me. They don't have them! I asked where I might find them. She said she didn't know....had never seen them anywhere! **AARRGGHH** So I went one block down the street to Michaels, then to Walmart, then to Target, then to Pier 1. Nobody had anything even close that I could use!

While I was in Michaels, the girls reminded me that we needed some more dollhouse bottles and palm trees for our Christmas projects. Oh yeah! Let's get those while we're here! Nope, they don't carry those anymore. So we went back to Hobby Lobby so that we could at least get those to work on next month. Hobby Lobby no longer carries the miniatures that we needed.

I think for Christmas we will go to the dollar store and buy something ready-made from China or Taiwan. For my craft get-together, maybe I'll just bring everybody a bottle of water with a pretty ribbon tied on it. But I bet I can't do that either. All the stores will stop carrying bottled water and ribbon before I can get there!

Back home again, with aliens

We all arrived safely home Sunday night. DH and I have both returned to work; and the girls have resumed their "get ready for school routine" of leadership meetings, band practice, schedule adjustments, and the ever challenging task of "choosing the new look" clothes shopping for this year.

It's amazing to me how much the girls change each year, as if they are dropped off on another planet each summer only to return as a new alien when school starts again. Last year, the 15 yr old wanted only black converse tennis shoes to wear with EVERY outfit in her wardrobe, a few navy blue sweat pants, a handful of t-shirts and a pair of jeans. She had still not outgrown her tomboy stage and refused to buy/wear skirts or dresses.

This year, that same child wants the "sophisticate look" and has obtained 2 pairs of black slacks with satiny trimmed waistbands, a couple of lacey blouses and a blazer. She has always worn her hair short to shoulder-length and now wants to grow it out long. She has picked out 2 gypsy-type skirts and wants a jean jacket to wear with her skirts over white camisole-like tank tops. While in NYC, she bought 2 striped oxford-type shirts and a yellow watch. (Who would have known?!? I still haven't figured out the bright yellow watch; but she LOVES it.) But she certainly seems to be growing out of some of her tomboy ways, even though she still swears she'll wear black canvas Converse with all these outfits. I guess some things just don't change! *LOL*

My 14 yr old, the "southern belle" of the family, had the bright pink and lime green look last year. I swear, everything that child put on her body had bright pink or lime green in it. And when she wasn't wearing it, she was carrying it. She loved her dresses, shoes and purses. This year, she's changing her "style" too. She has always worn her hair long and now wants it short. While in NYC, she bought a plain black purse and has attached pins all over it. She's in the process of making a can-tab purse and claims these two will be all she will carry this year. She's still into her beads. (I swear that girl could find a way to string beads to ANYTHING or anyone standing still long enough for her to attach them!) And she's still into her can-tab and bottle cap creations, everything from belts, to purses, to jewelry. But she's not picking out any pink or lime green nor dresses this year. Instead, she's choosing whites...solid whites, stripes on white, florals on whites...for all of her tops. For her bottoms, she seems to prefer denim, everthing from jeans, to skirts, to jackets. And it appears that she is preferring jeans to dresses and skirts, since she has only picked out one skirt and no dresses this year. She says "they just don't appeal to me anymore." She can find NO shoes she likes and has decided that she'll just wear her tennis shoes and clogs all year.

Maybe their switching identities for the year? Or maybe, despite the bricks I keep tying on their heads to slow them down, they're still growing up.

Hotel Review

We were not impressed with the Hyatt on Capital Hill, DC, but we've had nothing but good experiences with the Embassy Suites in NYC. This hotel is located in the financial district, within walking distance of the World Trade Center, in the Battery Park area. The area is wonderful, right on the Riverwalk, and is a great area for strolling, walking, jogging and watching the harbor skyline at night.

The hotel rooms have plenty of breathing room. The four of us stayed in one room and never felt cramped or crowded. A complimentary made-to-order breakfast is included along with a complimentary Manager's reception of free drinks and snacks each evening. The linens were great (at least a 450 count sheet set) and the beds very comfortable.

The staff here are very helpful and often even entertaining. My DD's consider Soloman who works out front to be not only funny, but their NYC friend. The concierges have been a great resource and have even been instrumental in getting Katelyn over her fear of NYC. She's now roaming around like a NYC native! :)

The girls enjoyed having 5 restaurants and a GIGANTIC movie theater on site during the rainy times of our stay. They also enjoyed watching the boats come in and out of the harbor each morning and night. And of course, they have drank more "Shirley Temples" each night during the Manager's Receptions than they've drank in their entire lives! *LOL*

If and when we return to NYC again, we'll definitely be staying here.

mid-week update

I attended my Capital Hill meetings as a State Delegate Captain for Georgia. The weather stayed hotter than heck the entire time we were in DC. I have lots of pics to upload when I get home. (Can't get my USB and camera to cooperate with this laptop.)

We headed to NYC Thursday and are staying in a harbor view suite at Embassy Suites. We all like this hotel much better than the Hyatt on Capital Hill. And the people, even the law enforcement officers, are so much nicer in NYC!

Katelyn had some trouble adjusting our first evening in NYC. In fact, she was pretty freaked. It was so much more "busy and crowded" than what she felt DC was. She has already decided that she will be forever grateful for spending most of her life in a small town in Georgia. Codah hasn't yet decided what she thinks about NYC, but has voiced a love for subways.

NYC Mayor Bloomberg

Mayor Bloomberg spoke at a conference meeting I attended Monday. It's interesting to hear how NYC has come to the forefront in homeless programming and services. I especially liked his philosophy on goals: If you're given a 10 yr plan and we're in office for 5 years, then our only choice is to change our activities to fit a 5 year plan and just get it done! I'll comment more on this later.

I met another woman, sitting next to me, from Georgia who must have gotten a surge of "power" from his speech. During the break, she announced that she would be spearheading activities from Georgia and would delegate to the rest of us from our fine State what we would and would not be doing the remainder of the week. I sat there and listened, didn't offer any comments until she turned to me and asked if I had understood her instructions. I paused for a minute and then said, "No, I'm not sure I did; can you please explain again who is to give me my marching orders while I'm here?" I then reached down to my name tag and pulled it out for her and flashed that little "State Delegate Captain" ribbon. She had nothing else to say and excused herself to get a coffee refill. What is it with people who feel the need to be "in control" of every situation, everywhere they go?

What a small world!

While sitting in the lounge relaxing Sunday night, a couple asked if they could join us at our table. What a delightful couple! The woman is a retired RN and the grand daughter of Dwight D. Eisenhower, and looks very much like him. Her husband is a Cardiologist in Texas. They were here for another function and after some discussion found that their daughter lives in Gainesville, right down the street from my office! We ran into them again several times on Monday and spent Monday evening with them. They'll be coming to Gainesville later this year for the birth of their third grandchild and plan to get with us then. She wants to spend a day at work with me; he wants to go fishing with my husband.

Sunday

We spent most of Sunday walking around, taking pictures and looking at all the awesome sights. If you get into architecture, this is the place to be! So many old, unique buildings and so little time! When I have a time to USB the pics from the camera to my laptop, I'll post some of the pictures we've taken.

The weather is incredibly hot and feels so much hotter than our hottest Georgia days, probably because of all the cement around here. There are MANY homeless people, lying on sidewalks, in building entryways, even in the street sometimes. I do believe the homeless population is much higher here than in NYC.

The people here are far less friendly than NYC also. People don't smile, nod, nor even look at each other as they pass on the sidewalks, corners and streets. Even police officers are unfriendly. Katelyn stopped to look at one on a horse, and commented to him "what a beautiful horse" while his horse was drinking from a fountain. He didn't even acknowledge Katelyn was standing there outside of going around her when the horse was finished drinking.

Officers really do have BEAUTIFUL horses around here. But it's very sad that the horses have more beauty and personality than the officers do.

We have arrived!

We arrived in DC, finally. It's a good thing that we arrived at the Atlanta airport almost 3 hours early because it took 2.5 hours to get to the terminal and board the plane. I opted to do the "quickie" online check in which was far from "quick." Even with printed boarding passes, we had to completely redo the entire scenario because Airtran had somehow crossed our seats from the time I did the online check in to the time we checked our baggage.

Poor Codah was seated in a completely different section of the plane that the rest of the family. After almost 20 minutes of debate about this, DH finally said "just get on the plane; she'll get over it!" Maybe HE thought she should just get over it. But I was far from being "over it" about the fact that nobody seemed to be able/willing to do anything about it, despite that our boarding passes listed us as sitting together. And of all our seats that could have possibly gotten messed up....it has to be Codah's?? ~sigh~

She was pretty brave about it but was obviously fighting the tears. I offered to switch out my seat and hers, to heck with what the airline said; this Momma's temper was starting to hit the boiling point. Then DH had to say three times too many, "Honey! Stop stressing over it....she'll be fine. It's no big deal!"
Me: It's no big deal that the child of the family who is most fearful of new situations, is fearful of plane crashes, the most emotional child we have, is seated 11 rows away from us, by herself, and NOT in the seat that I paid for and confirmed?!? And you see no problem with this?!?

While they were attempting to board passengers, I kept walking back and forth up the aisle "to make sure my baby is ok." But I think what really made the difference was when I told Codah to open up the window shades and watch outside...

"...try not to think about your fears honey, and when you feel the need to vomit, look away from the window. We don't want to dirty up the glass, do we?" Codah tried not to chuckle, and said her "Ohhhhhh Mommmm!" But it wasn't 3 minutes before they were changing my seat with the seat next to her. *LOL*

She did fine. And we arrived in DC without further incident........at least for Saturday.....

Flight Day morning

Our luggage is packed and smartly identified by adorable doghouse luggage tags, with a picture of our Bubba, that my friend Elizabeth made us. These things are just too cute! Both girls are up and somewhat ready. Katelyn is so excited that she can't stop spazzing. According to her, "that plane just can't fly fast enough to get me to DC!" Although we have all flown multiple times before, Codah on the other hand, is very somber and fighting back the tears. When asked what was wrong, she denied anything for the first hour she was up. Then she finally admitted that she is "not afraid of flying but why can't we just take a plane to the edge of Georgia and take a car the rest of the way?"

That's a rather odd question from a teenager, especially one who has flown since she was four, has never had any traumatic experiences on planes, and has never before shown a fear of flying. After processing some of her feelings and thoughts with her, we finally determined she has "a fear of plane crashes", doesn't fear one crashing in Georgia "because we're home in Georgia." But if the plane should crash, she'd rather not crash away from home. What a fine time to find out about this!

After some discussion, she finally agreed to talk to Grandpa, "the plane expert" about it. Grandpa's are such wonderful resources! I expected him to give her the typical "planes are safer than cars talk" he used to give me when I was a kid. Instead, he gave her a comparison of total number of flights per year divided by total number of crashes per year equals virtually zilch. Then he went into his "let's stump Codah game" and consoled that if her flight were to crash, it's not going to be like the recent crash on the American/Canadian border where nobody could decide where to bury the survivors. Codah didn't even bat an eye and immediately chuckled her typical "Ohhhhhh Grandpa!" and told him that nobody buries survivors! *LOL* And Grandpa's ever-reliable and predicable response was "Well then, there ya go; what are you afraid of?" She seems to be feeling better now.

Now the immediate concern is whether or not we'll have time for the girls to get a cup of java and bowl of "bread soup" at the Atlanta Bread Company at the airport. I don't care if we were flying at 3am, they'd want to stop in the airport and get "bread soup and coffee." This is a ritual DH unintentionally started years ago; and it just won't die! So for now, we must be going so we will have time for them to splurge on their favorite airport treat before we catch that non-American/Canadian flight from GA to DC. I'll keep y'all posted how it goes.

The Great Capital Hill Adventure

Well, I'm leaving on a jet plane in the morning, headed for DC. After all the excitement of our recent vacation, I'm hearing y'all say that you can't wait for me to get home and tell you how we do on Capital Hill. So I'll try to make some time each evening to touch base here and post pictures so you can follow along live time. Hopefully, this trip will be less eventful than our last. But if not, you can sit back and LYBO or bite your nails. And when all else fails, come bail us out! *LOL*