Topic : Is This Normal Social Discussion

Here's wishing you two the greatest wedding ever!! Wish I could be there for sure. I was just reading that 07-07-07 is considered one of the luckiest days in history, so there ya go!! Tells me you starting definately on the right foot!!!

Hugs to you all,

~Ami

We have been celebrating our Independence Day here yesterday on July 4th. Lots of fireworks and picnics!!

Am I the only one that still has basically everything I ever owned? Well it isn't quite that bad, but close. I have tons of stuff from when I was in grade school even. Many, many moons ago. My heart kind of did this lurching thing when I read that Neecie planned to throw things away. Eeek!!!!! It is acutally painful for me to throw things away that have memories attached to them. I have letters from my grandmother that are 30 years old, pictures from when I was in grade school, a doll collection from when I was a child, my boys toys and beanie babies they had when they were little, I even have my favorite pair of spike heels from when I was in high school!! My 30 year class reunion is in a couple of years!! I also have things that were my grandmother's, both of them lol. So I have their memories too. Hmmm, wonder what that is, why people are so different in what they keep and what they throw away? It is a curious thing to me, Raj is at least as much of a packrat as I am, I have had great fun going through his toys he still has from when he was little too!!

Music is also a biggie with us, we do the same as you Kelly, we go back in time with oldie cds and it is so much fun. I have been known to spend all day just listening and reminiscing! All these years the boys have grown up with music of my age! Funny thing is they are great at old music trivia! hehe I grew up with 50s music that was the music of my mom's age and what she had, so it seems only just that the boys grew up with my music and her music! Maybe that explains why we all love music so much!! Be sure to teach Stephanie about your music and show her your pics and things. When she is old enough to understand it will be a great history lesson for her to know how mom and dad looked and what they liked when they were young!!

Of course there is that fundamental part of a child's life that makes it really hard for them to understand that grown ups were once children too. John-boy finally grasped the idea that his Nana was once a little girl. He thought that was so cool! So cool in fact that when he was in 1st grade he asked his Nana (my mom) "what was it like when you were a Pilgrim girl Nana?" Ummm, ok so he didn't quite get that she didn't live as a little girl in the 1600's!!!!!! zOMG! It was too funny! I guess old is just old when you are a kid!!

Hugs,

~Ami

Believe me, sorting and tossing is very difficult for me.  I do have stuff that goes way, way back, and I've been carting it around from garage to garage for 20+ years!  But the thought of moving all that stuff one more time, let alone trying to get my house and garage in shape to sell in a difficult market gives me some incentive.  I kept many things, but mostly tossed tons of old Christmas cards, most either from people I don't remember, or Sean's friends.  Should I have tried to sort that out and give it to him?  He would have tossed it before he left my block.  But I kep lots of things that WERE highly significant to me, or that I thought might be to Erin.

It's been interesting at my Mom's -- believe me, you'll hear the details later.  Mom batters her keyboard SO much, that most of the letters are worn off, and I'm just not that good a typist!  Main event was our suitcase taking a side trip to Seattle for a day.  That was stressful and quite inconvenient, but we managed.  Great day at the family cabin, mostly.  And a realization.  I really have almost no feelings one way or another for my mother.  She used to really, REALLY get to me, but now I just don't care, and my only concern is protecting Erin and sadly enough, teaching her how to anticipate and avoid problems.  Not always possible, but maybe it can be minimozed.  [I can't tell the dofference between "o's" and "i's"!]  The behavior I'm mostly seeing this time, is "what should we do tomorrow, we could go to Old Sac..?" "Sure, Mom, Old Sac would be fun" "Well, I just can't walk all around like that!  The gout in my toe is excruciating!" ir... "What else would you like for breakfast, Denise... toast... cereal?" {She asked this at least twice} "Well, sure, I guess, maybe some toast"  "Uh, you're going to have toast AND a cinnamon roll???"  I said to her -- Look, you offered, I saod yes, then it's clear that you disapprove, what's the deal?"  Well, {huff} you could have said NO"  She does the exact same thing to Erin.  IOt goes on and on like that.  We almost went to a movie, and I had to tell Erin... "If Nana asks you if you want any snacks for the movie, say no, that's OK, I don't want anything.  Because if you say, sure maybe some candy and a soda, she'll say, 'OMG, all that sugar!!?"  She sets traps, and just waits for you to fall in, then pounces to let you know what a degenerate you are. 

I suppose it's really just typical "mom" stuff, and I'm glad that it's not making me freak out, but I feel sad that I have come to the point, where it just means nothing to me.  Ami, you are right, Erin and I are here together, and we love each other, and we're going home soon, and nothing else really matters.  With any luck, I can aviod coming here again for another couple years at least.

Thanks for the opportunity to vent, it's hard to fond other outlets.  I hopw you are all well, and O'll write more once I'm home.

XOXOX

Neecie

Like when my "m" gets stuck! I'm so glad you've settled down with your Mom. Really, really glad. It's a blessing for sure. Life IS what you make it. And it can only hurt if you let it. Good for you!

Keeping stuff? Are you nuts?! No way for this ol girl. If I don't use it in a yr it's gone. Pics? Yep. Journals? Yep. That's all I need. My family and friends tell me I have an empty house. Why? Cos I gotta clean it! lol

We all know our little V is now a married woman. I'm coming in to see if'n she's posted yet. Married! Our little VnoE!!!!! Congrats sisterfriend! And I'm sure Kathy will have a report. AND we'll get to hear about Neecie's trip. Gosh guys. We're talking yrs of friendship here. I do love you guys.

Am going to Cancun on Wednesday. Can't believe it's here already. And I've already gained weight. And this place is all inclusive. Oh well. Maybe they like fat people! lol My friends don't care that's for sure. Just don't wanna buy new clothes! lol

You know that feeling nothing is a HUGE step up!!!!!! YAY Neecie!!!!!!!!

I can't help but laugh at your mom, it really is funny Neecie (probably not to you because you are too close to it) but oh I could have so much fun with your mom. I would tell Erin, "Now if Nana askes you if you want candy at the movies, you tell her yes two boxes and popcorn too cause Grandma's are so cool!!!" And if she came back with the "all that sugar?!" answer, Erin's reply would have to be "but of course!! going to the movies is a treat who wants to be stingy with a treat!!!!" And she would have to giggle and prance and be sooo confident that mom was speechless!! You know the result would be mom would have to find  new method of course, but oh the fun I could have with your mother is endless!! LOL!

My mother was what I like to call Hint Queen. All my life I was expected to read her little hints and know that meant do something. Like "there is laundry in the dryer" = go to the basement fold the clothes in the dryer and bring it all up and put it away. It took me forty years to learn her language and realize what she was doing and why she was so pissed at me all the dang time. I could never do anything right it seemed. (My mom could be very critical and I would just stand there in a stupor wondering what the devil I had done now to disappoint her). I finally realized I wasn't reading her mind...doh! In reality I didn't speak her language at all. "There is laundry in the dryer" to me is a statement of fact there is actually laundry in the dryer. Irrelevent to any required action on my part at all. To her it is a subtle hint to get off your arse and get it and fold it and put it away. I was a slow child obviously, lol, which exasperated my mother no doubt. I can still see the smoke spewing from her ears when I think about all the miscommunication over the decades. Finally one day it hit me like a ball bat between the eyes what she meant. Then I was pissed off. And I was pissed off for a long while there. How dare she expect me to read her mind?! What kind of pompous presumptuous person does that?! Oh let's see....my hubby, my inlaws, my mother, my boss ......sheese lot's of people I know. I decided they all needed to know me better and I so let them all know that I did not now and had never owned a mind reading machine and that should for the future clear up any misconceptions that I do. They were certainly welcome to use theirs, they must have them as they all seemed to think everyone else does, but I would not be participating. In fact I didn't even want to know where you get one frankly. The responsibility of reading minds is enormous after all! I delighted after that time intentionally ignoring my mother's hints!! She would say "wonder what is on the other channel on the tv"  which = get up and change the channel and see what is on the other channels. I would just look at her and say to her "if you want me to change the channels say so". Which peed her off, but over time she has learned not to be so damned passive/aggressive with me. It is idiotic for people to expect people to know what you are thinking. If you can't clearly say what your desire is, you can't be pissed that someone doesn't get it. I told mom it was her own fault she was always disappointed in others, and it was. She is much better now and it is great! DP helped too, one day he had this show that pointed out that it takes a pretty self centered person to think that way. HAHAHA!! So true! Anyway she finally got it, thank goodness!!

You know Neecie, it can get better it really can...just look how far you two have come already! lol And like I said there always what I call the Oz-out. "There's no place like home, there's no place like home"....and soon enough you will be there! Oh and if you clean out your garage it might soon be a new HOME to boot! =)

Hugs,

~Ami

I knew this about you without you telling me, don't aske me how I just did!

Hugs,

~Ami

How are you all? Would have thought we would have heard from Vicki by now to give us the whole 9 yards of the wedding!! Just hope that she and Ron are two very happy and in love people, good on them, I say!!

Not too sure if I had told you all that Mark is away again, this time for 4 months, well it's now 3.5 months. He has been gone two weeks tomorrow. This is to do with his work, yes he is still in Australia, in another state of Australia!! We miss him heaps of course and while I'm not happy about him being gone for all that time, atleast now Mum and Dad aren't that far away.

Stephanie, the dog and I will all be going down to Mum and Dad's next Tuesday, as Stephanie's 5th birthday is on Wednesday the 18th. So, we going down there for afew days and will do something special on her birthday!! Can't believe my little girl will be 5 this time next week!! To think that this time 5 years ago, she was still in my belly and I had one week to go, till I gave birth to her!!

Well you all Take Care and hope to see you all here sooner than later, Bye-for-now, Love Kelly.

Had a good time in Las Vegas but it was very, very, hot --- 110+ every day. But 100+ temperatures in Oregon today so there is no escape!

We did get to attend Vicki & Ron’s 7-7-07 wedding -- after standing outside in the heat with a little shade for 2 ½ hours with a hundred or more other folks. Seems the Garden of Love was running behind. A few newly arriving ladies complained when they discovered that they might have to wait in the heat – like the rest of us – OMG! Their tune changed quickly when it was pointed out to them that the rest of us had already been doing just that for quite a while already.

We were Vicki & Ron’s only witnesses.  I was so afraid that we would miss the event since I hadn’t seen Vicki’s picture lately, but she was a beautiful bride and as wonderful as I had imagined. Her new husband is a doll and we really enjoyed their company! After the nuptials, hubby and I got to ride with them in their stretch limousine back to their hotel and we had a couple of drinks together before we returned to our hotel.

I’ll share the few good pictures with those of you for whom I have email addresses. Unfortunately, hubby was over-enamored with the night time setting on our digital camera and most of his shots were blurry, so we got what we got but hopefully, their CD from the Garden of Love Chapel turned out well.

We saw comedians Bobby Slayton on Friday night and Louie Anderson on Sunday night. Both were good but our seats at Louie’s show were in the front row and hubby was one of the audience members that Louie spoke to.

AND… we won money! Played 7 or 8 quarters in one of the few machines that took coins and when hubby gave me four more quarters to play while he went to get a beer, the first one in the machine won $2.50 so I played a couple more spins and won $4.00 at which point I quit because we were ahead! I think hubby must have been the jinx! ; D

Hubby has been sick today and finally attributed it to a bad bag of Sun Chips from the airplane on Monday. I must have gotten a fresher bag since I am feeling fine except for a cold sore that just developed on my lip . L It’s so good to be home!!! Bitsy really missed us – and we did her, too.

Did you see the show on messy houses and what it says bout ya'll? lol It said you'e mental deary. Now see. I knew this about YOU! LOL! Honestly. Did you see it? I took notes cos a friend called while I was watching and she wanted me to call her and tell her what it said about her. It's so much better the way I am Ami. I swear. No chaos. Calm. There was a time I was OCD but when I turned 50 I changed. Calmed my little butt down and I am so much more chilled. Gosh what a difference.

You guys I don't have my airline tickets! I'm hopeing my friend has them, cos of the other two girls going one has the other's. As in Mary Jo has Patricia's. Keep your fingers crossed!

Kathy thanks for telling us about V's wedding. I just knew one of you would be here today. Glad you could make it and wish I coulda been there. I didn't even realize it was 7/7/07. That's supposed to be the luckiest day ever. So it seems someone upstairs delayed the wedding just for her! Yea!