Name

I am thinking my blog needs a better name. Initials just aren't cutting it anymore. Yesterday I stumbled across a blog named something like "Pink Cookies" and there was a picture of a big plate of pink cookies. While I in no way wish I had come up with that name first, it did make me long for a name that is more hip and/or intriguing. Sean's blog is also way better in the name department than mine... Notes From The Self-Absorbed... While I do not think my friend Sean is self-absorbed, I do think he has a catchy title... So what is my blog about? Pretty much random crap I decide to spout off about. Or perhaps it is about me... which leads back to the initials... which are boring. This is quite a conundrum.

Invitations

Last night I spent an inordinate amount of time making invitations for my mom's 50th birthday party. I begged her to let us throw her one and she finally gave the approval and then she got all panicky about the invitations being completed in time to invite people from out of town. I understand the urgency, but it sure was a lot of pressure on me... So instead of packing for the trip tonight, I stood at our long kitchen counter and assembled invitations. (Yes, I admit, I made them WAY too complicated for myself -- each invitation must have two rubber stamps applied in two different colors and then each stamp must have a different colored sparkly powder dumped on it while it is still wet. then the powder must be tapped off so the powder only sticks to the lines of ink ,similar to glitter and glue, and THEN each stamp with the powder on it must be blow-dried with an embossing gun until the powder melts and the stamp looks like a shiny raised image instead of a stamp. What was I thinking?)

So, my parents had to make an emergency trip from Santa Fe to my house in order to deliver and all-important rubber stamp of a cowboy boot that no craft store in Albuquerque seemed to carry. Then my mom made a salad out of everything in my refrigerator and some items from the pantry as well.... it included lettuce, red bell pepper, apple, raisins, walnuts, havarti cheese chunks, celery and garlic crackers and amazingly, it tasted pretty good. I would have NEVER combined all of those ingredients in a salad or anything else, but my mom is apparently a bit more fearless in the kitchen than I.

My dad sat on the couch and counted M&M's (4,307 of them) for some contest that my mom gets roped into every year where kids have to guess how many M&Ms are in the jar and then they win the jar. (I don't know if I'd want to win a jar of M&Ms that had been counted and therefore touched by someone... but oh well.) My mom addressed envelopes and I performed the aforementioned procedure and completed 36 invitations... or was it 38. These were the out-of-town batch which means I get to do it all again when we get back from California.

When the insanity subsided last night and my parents went home and I had cleaned all the glittery powder off the counter and floor and I finally got to pack, I was too exhausted to make decisions so I ended up just throwing half my closet into the bag, zipping it and calling myself packed. I am bound to get to California and a) realize that I packed way too much and then get mad at myself and b) realize that I don't have anything appropriate to wear despite having half my wardrobe with me. This would probably happen even if I had put more time and effort into packing. I think clothing is my biggest travel hangup... get me out of my routine and I have no idea what to wear... It doesn't help matters that I am not the kind of skinny I had hoped to be by this point. Despite my exercise fanaticism so I still don't fit in the majority of my cool warmer weather clothes. AAAUUGGGHHH...

But, despite all of it I am a) excited that my mom is letting us throw her a 50th birthday party and b) excited to get on the plane tonight, even if I may have to go shopping for some nice make-me-feel-good clothes when we get there. :)

Till Wednesday...