JULY 22nd : What Makes You Laugh & What Inspires You

WHAT MAKES YOU LAUGH

Laughter is amazing thing... Lets discuss all the benefits of laughter ....

20 Health Benefits of Laughter

Laughter is a bodily expression displaying happiness of the soul. It is said that laughter is the best medicine and rightfully so. With many scientific studies showing the positive impact of laughing on the human physiology, we all need to incorporate laughing more into our lives.

The benefits of laughter can be immense in dealing with sickness, the pressures of everyday life and coping with stress at work. Laughter can greatly improve the quality of life for all who choose to laugh. Read on for 20 benefits of laughing.

1. Helps to reduce stress

Laughter cuts down the levels of adrenaline, cortisol, dopamine, epinephrine and growth hormones, and increases the level of endorphins and neurotransmitters – the healthy hormones.

2. Helps eliminate distress

When the mind is distressed, it becomes hard to think clear, positive thoughts. Laughing builds more confidence, improves behavior and helps leadership abilities and boosts a confident image.

3. Works out the muscles and organs

Laughter exercises a number of organs by boosting oxygen absorption, that helps your heart, lungs, and muscles. It raises the level of endorphins released by our brain. Having a good laugh tightens the abdominal muscles and exercises the diaphragm and shoulders. It even helps the heart workout.

4. Weight loss

Laughter burns calories stored within body fat and you can burn as much as 40 calories by laughing for 15 minutes. So laugh hard until you feel it in your abs!

5. A positive mind

Laughter helps to focus on positivity. It helps in creating and maintaining a cheerful outlook on life.  It diverts the attention away from a negative feeling of anger, guilt, stress, and worry.

6. Laughter connects

Laughter is infectious. Laughing more increases the chances of making those around you laugh more too. By lifting the mood of those near you, you also help to minimize their stress levels and it can also help improve the quality of the social connections you experience with people!

Laughing creates a “halo effect” because it lets us remember other happy events, feel more positive, ultimately leading to more motivation.

7. Builds immunity

Laughter helps to strengthen the immune system. People who laugh more tend to be healthier than those who do not. Laughter also raises a number of cells that produce antibodies and helps the efficiency of T-cells (the fighter cells). The implication of this is a stronger, more robust immune system, and a less physical impact of stress.

Research has shown that there exists a link between laughter, a positive attitude, and good health.

8. Lifespan

In a research published by the Archives of General Psychiatry of 65-85 year-olds, those who laughed more and were most optimistic were 55% less prone to dying from all the causes than those who were the most pessimistic. When researchers adjusted the results for age, smoking status, alcohol consumption, physical activity and other measures of health, the optimists were a whopping 71% less likely to die than the pessimists.

9. Laughter is free!

Yes, it costs nothing to laugh but the dividends are immense and highly contagious.

10. Laughter is an enjoyable medicine

No one likes the taste of drugs but there is one that we all enjoy – Laughter.

11. Conserves energy

Laughter creates a positive mood and atmosphere. It eases out anxiety, doubts, and fear. Distress is the number one enemy of a healthy body. Laughter dissolves emotions of distress resulting in conservation of mental and physical energy. You focus and achieve more physically and mentally.

12. It’s enjoyable

Regardless of our differences, laughter is something we have in common. It just makes us all feel good – old or young, rich or poor, weak or strong, healthy or not, male or female, good or bad, we all enjoy laughing.

13. Laughter works like this

When you are exposed to something funny, within half of a second, electrical waves move through the Brain’s cerebral cortex. While the left hemisphere of the brain analyzes the words and structures of a joke; the right hemisphere simultaneously gets it most of the time. Images are created by the visual sensory region of the occipital lobe; the emotional or limbic system makes one happier, and the motor sections make us laugh.

14. Raises mental alertness, creativity, and memory

Stanford University’s humor guru, William Fry, M.D., says humor and creativity compliments each other, thus by creating relationships between two separate things, all of the brain is engaged.

15. Eases life’s burdens

Life is a journey of ups and downs. We face challenges on a daily basis, but laughter helps to water down these problems. It also helps to express feelings of happiness and relaxes us when the emotions have been released.

16. Forms strong family bonds

Couples that laugh together stay together. They forgive easily and interact better. This has a spill over effect on the children who learn mostly by observing their parents. Parent-children bonds are also strengthened. This leads to the formation of a healthy and strong family. Making conscious efforts to create an atmosphere of playfulness, humor and laughter in a family will improve the love life between couples and bring parents closer to their children.

17. Facilitates blood flow

Laughter helps to circulate blood flow in the body. It stretches our muscles and blood vessels and thus makes blood flow smoother throughout the body.

18. Great for team building

Organizations, where the atmosphere includes laughing, helps the structure from the CEO to the newest intern. It creates a feeling of security when you laugh with your superiors every once in a while. It also helps to realize that a tense situation is just temporary and hard feelings won’t last when you can laugh together even when you disagree.

19. Benefits social behaviour

Laughter strengthens every kind of relationship, it makes us more attractive, neutralizes conflict and has a positive impact on group bonding and teamwork

20. Benefits the body

Laughter initiates healthy physical responses within the body. Anytime we laugh, endorphins – the good feeling hormones, are released. Endorphins help general well-being and are also temporary pain relievers.

This article was written by Factual Facts

What makes me laugh?  

That's a good question.....  

My family makes me laugh,... 

My friends make me laugh.... 

The internet makes me laugh ... 

TV & Movies make me laugh .... and cry ..... and ..... feel things I don't want to but need to? 

Life makes me laugh .... cuz I would rather laugh at it then cry .... 

So once upon a time .... there was this guy.... 

Seriously though ... if DB couldn't or didn't make me laugh on a daily basis ... I would be pretty miserable... LOL ....

I make him laugh .... too....  with my quick wit and sarcasm ...  cuz I am awesome like that ..... 

WHAT INSPIRES YOU

Inspiration isn't a "what" that can be pinpointed - at least in my opinion.  It can be a place, a smell, a feeling ... it can be a person, a situation, another story ... it can be any number of things and sometimes everything at once....

Inspiration can come from anywhere - or no where at all....

Sometimes I need a kick in the pants in the inspiration department ... I like having someone reading as I write to pick their brain and so they can tell me how awesome it is - and lie if they have to - in order to keep me going. 

Okay okay .... not LIE to me ...   sometimes I wonder though ... 

I have a hard time.  Like, I'm writing my newest book and - I am REALLY proud of this one - like it's GOOD ... I have spent so much time on the backstory ... over the last year I've been working on the backstory, but I've had the prologue for years... it came to me one night and I wrote it up and saved it.  Sometimes the idea presents itself when I'm not ready to write the story... 

And this prologue is dark .... very .... very ........... very dark. 

It's not my usual. 

My usual is ghosts and psychics and family curses ...  but not this time.  This is more "normal" but it starts out really dark.  The rest of the story isn't as dark but ... yeah... 

So after I spent so much time (and recently over the past year) ...  on this story and the back story, my husband says to me that I should make it a trilogy or a series because of the time and effort I put into it.... 

At first I was all....  "nah" .....

........ and then I started to mull it over and .... I thought, yeah.... maybe I should. 

At this point I'm 5 chapters in and once I decided to make this more than one book, I thought - I need to go slow things down (I wrote sloth things down .... bawahahahahahaha - truth though) ....  and so I went back and did revisions and re-writing ... 

Once I did all that ... you'd like I would just pick right back up to where I had been ...  keep that ball rolling .... 

...... but I was suddenly stuck.  I just couldn't see to push myself forward ....

So I started begging my sister, my sister-in-law, everyone I could think of that might do it - I started asking them all to read it and tell me what they thought of the NEW chapters ....

...... suddenly no one had the time, and I literally wanted to just curl up into a ball and stop...

But I kept telling myself that I can't just stop.  Why stop something that I'm sooooooooooooo PROUD of .... I just didn't have the same momentum at the moment. 

So I stepped back from it for awhile....  continued to bug people, but it never happened ...  no one ever read the new chapters ....  So yeah .... 

But I kept rolling things around in my head and all of a sudden ....  it clicked.  And I managed to bang out a couple pages...  and this was after about a month of writers block .... but I was so thankful to kick those damn bricks down ....  and I don't know, exactly, what it was that got me the break through ....  except ...

When I write, I watch stuff...  like Castle (the TV show) was my show of choice for a long while.  I would watch at and listen to while I wrote...   sometimes, I would need actual silence in order to get some things written, but usually I don't have issues....

So ...  I watch a lot of murder shows (ID, Oxygen, those types of channels and shows) ... half the time it really doesn't matter what I watch .... 

.... but if you are writing about murder - a little inspiration isn't bad.  ... so murder is what you watch ... lol... 

Anyway - I took a mental break - watched some chick flicks ...  just gave myself a break from all of it and ... bam!

YAY ....

.

JULY 15th : Inspiration & The Best Part of Summer

INSPIRATION

See ... I imagine this as "what inspires you?" and the honest answer is everything has the possibility to inspire.  You never now when or what will come along to inspire you.  It could be a piece of barbed wire with photography.....

or it could be how two people interact for writing ... 

One of my favorite short stories that I wrote ...  I was walking down the hall to my apartment building ... it was one of those halls where your "front door" was inside the hall .... and I was going back to my apartment from the laundry room holding my oldest son when he was a few months old...  and I was wondering, what's behind all these doors?  What kind of lives are being lived.  So I wondered...  what if this is what the soul of a child goes through, to pick what kind of life it'll have ... which life would the soul pick.... 

And that is how the idea of "Hall of Life Choices" came about....  and it's still my favorite short story I've ever written ....

The first book that I really started writing, I was inspired by a house....  I literally sat in the nursery of this Victorian Mansion (museum) writing out the beginnings of this story plot ... 

So yes, inspiration is wonderful....

THE BEST PART OF SUMMER

Lists of things I like about summer.  THE HEAT IS NOT ONE OF THEM.  LOL ...  I can't stand the heat...  I would rather be cold and bundle up until I'm comfortable then be hot, you can't take off your skin, it's not gonna go back on the same after...  LOL ... 

I Have Managed....

... to write, 3 days in a row....

I deserve a GOLD STAR!!!

Thank you ....... thank you very much....

I am not writing a lot a day, but I am making an effort.  Little steps.... 

Today's Theme: I'm Tired ...

If it's not my liver hurting, it's my Pancreatitis, both of them spread around into my back. My head has been very mean. My foot hurts.  Hurts to walk, hurts to move.  Just hurts.  It all hurts.  My body betrays me.

Oh, and I have a sore throat...  from the post nasal drip.

I played a little bit of SIMS today.  I downloaded a bunch of custom content.  Got the annoying invisible body shirt... which means I get to remove everything and start all over :: slams head on desk ::

Nathan - however - has a "Mom's laptop takeover" again today.... as is probably going to be the case tomorrow because there is no school.

He's taken from having the laptop on the side, on my laptop tray, to actually having it in his lap now.

ha ha ha ...

The boys and I hung out upstairs.  There was a Packers party going on downstairs.  Mom, my Step-Dad, DB and whoever else was down there were watching the game.  I ended up taking a nap.

I was up last night, couldn't sleep ...  I ended up falling asleep at my laptop writing a blog ...  and I woke up and found

"aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa" 

being quoted ... ha ha ...

It happens.  I started the blog, I wanted to finish it when I finally got tired and - well, when I get tired, I crash - I can't fall asleep unless I'm tired.  I literally go "I'm really tired" and then ZZZZZZZZZZz, I'm out.  Done.

That's just how things are when I am having a CFS/Fibro flare and as such has been my life for the last several years.  I am either wide awake, or dragging ass tired.  Once I hit that certain level of tired, of exhaustion, that's the only time I can sleep.  I can be tired all day, but it sucks because I have to hit a certain point to even sleep.

So I was up until about 6am before I started to pass out at the laptop.   I'd sleep a tiny bit and wake up to rows of some random letter.  Delete that - write another word or two - pass out ..... wake up to rows of some random letter.  This happened several times before I finally just shut my laptop, put it away, and vowed to finish in the morning.  I ended up sleeping only until about 10:30, so three and a half hours.  And then I had - I think - an hour or so nap today?

Then when I wake up I have to work through the fog, the feeling misplaced, almost.  It's weird.

Regardless, Bubba is feeling a ton better today.  And lucky me... there is no school tomorrow!  There was a Ghost Adventures marathon again today, probably will continue tomorrow.

But Alyvia was on me today.

During our Ghost Adventures marathon ....

Funny thing.  So - one of those big interests of mine is murder, serial killers, etc and so on.  I am not obsessed - know every detail - but I like crime novels, I like mystery stuff.... I like channels like Hallmark Channel, Lifetime, I like to watch I.D. and stuff like that.  I have always been drawn to shows like Criminal Minds, CSI, Rizzoli & Isles, NCIS...  Forensic Files... all the True Crime shows... I watched the JonBenét specials that just recently aired.  And I am one who has always thought that O.J. Simpson was guilty as sin.  More recently - I thought Casey Anthony was guilty as sin and I'm still sure of that.  I literally cried the day she was found not guilty.  I cried for that baby.

Anyway - so I knew about the new O.J. special going on - re-examining the evidence and such.  I looked it up tonight, and found out the 2nd episode aired tonight. To my shock and surprise, I find out Derrick Levasseur is one of the hosts/new investigators ...  Derrick, from Big Brother - who won Big Brother... (BB16 in 2014).

I find these things interesting and they make you think.  There is always several ways things could happen and sometimes the media does really only give one side.  Sometimes the cops are not always the "good guys" and sometimes they are more pressured to close a case and put someone on the coals to burn.  Now, I am not saying I believe O.J. is innocent.... and I don't think I will ever EVER be convinced that Casey Anthony isn't guilty as hell, but I can say that it does pose some questions (about OJ not Casey).  So I'll be watching it ... mainly because it's Derrick!

I also watched .....

Yes, that's Jewel .... yes, the singer Jewel...  and yes that is the Maytag Man, also known as Sheriff Carter from Eureka ... (Colin Ferguson) ...

I like these movies on Hallmark.  Especially the series movies...like...   Mystery Woman with Kellie Martin is one of my favorites.  I wish there had been more (and I enjoyed that marathon on yesterday!) ... I was trying to talk my sister into watching them but she doesn't have cable and it wasn't on Netflix or Amazon Prime (boo!) ... but I like her new one Hailey Dean Mystery, I love the Aurora Teagarden ones with Candace Cameron-Bure ...  and the ones with Alison Sweeney, Murder, She Baked ones.

Anyway - the movie was good :)

I am going to probably watch Love on Ice .. while I can't sleep tonight...  but I haven't yet.  (I am currently watching tonight's episode of Worst Cooks.)

(note on the graphic:  Tonight DB was commenting on how he thought some football player looks sketchy as hell and could totally be in an episode of Criminal Minds.  I laughed (really hard) and said, "Wait!  As a profiler or a killer?" and then it dawned on me....  on a show like Criminal Minds, there are only four types of characters ....  profiler (or law enforcement support), killer, victim or a witness.  LOLOL.... so yeah.  Then he had to show me a picture of the killer sketchy footballer and I didn't see it.)

Anyway - I have this new character rolling around in my head.  Marinating - you can say.  I know her name is Emerson aka Emma.  I have an idea on what she does... but it's still forming.  Plus I want to get the last book I finished actually finished and not somewhat finished - I want to get it a bit more polished.  It's about time I start getting these things published.

Yep.  My sister says so ...... (Don't you Heather?) ....

It's a little weird though.  Most of my characters are either parents or pregnant or whatever, but this one isn't.  This one just ... is... not.  

So .... something is happening this year that I am definitely NOT excited about.  In all honesty, I am rather scared, actually.  My lying cheating horrible ex husband is getting out of prison.  He keeps saying that I want him dead or in prison forever, and the latter is true.  I don't think I could ever truly wish ANYONE dead, except some of my characters.

He is a really bad man, REALLY bad.  If you don't know who he is, what he's done, I'm not going to get into it.  Let's just say that he couldn't have done something worse.  He can't seem to tell the truth about anything.  During our marriage he cheated on me twice, I have cheated on wife syndrome.  Only - he never actually cheated on me (I found out later after we split up).  The first time he "cheated" on me, it was only a "test" for me to prove my love and my devotion to him.  I told him if he ever did it again, I would leave.  So fast forward years and he tells me he cheated on me with my (at the time) best friend.  Only that never happened either.  But it pushed me into divorce court, which is exactly where I needed to be.

1: I was in an abusive relationship and didn't realize HOW abusive it was until I got out and opened my eyes (and grew some balls.)
2: I wanted to leave 5 years prior when he was accused of something horrible and he told me he didn't do it.  He literally screamed at me until I told him I believed he didn't do it, and I did believe he didn't do it - because who wants to believe that their husband, the person they are supposed to be closest to in the world, the person they are supposed to be able to trust with every fiber, could do something horrible? But after we split up - he admitted he had done what he was accused of and the floor fell out from under me.  I carry guilt for not protecting the people I was supposed to, including my own son.  I would have never thought I would have to protect them from the person I was supposed to be able to trust the most.
3: He was not a good father.  If I ever said he was, I lied.  I did everything. I had to basically throw a fit for him to spend time with Calahan.  He favored Noah over Cal.  Even his own mother took me out to lunch one day to talk to me about the way he treated Calahan.
4: Find out (so many years later) that pretty much everything I ever knew about him (or thought I knew) was a lie.  It's hard to realize that ten years of your life was based on lies.  Including the fact that he probably never really loved me at all (I don't even think he's capable).

So .... besides the fact that he's crazy, a horrible man, who has nothing to lose but his freedom again and most likely he doesn't even care about that .... is getting out this summer, and I'm slightly terrified.  I'll get more and more terrified as time draws closer... but ... I am terrified he's going to try to come out here and find us.  He may not have ever truly loved me but he has said over the years that he still thinks of me as his wife and wishes things were different and that we were still together.  He even went as far as to tell his childhood best friend that we realized that we made a mistake (by getting divorced) and plan on getting back together when he gets out.  That would mean that I would be leaving DB, which - would never happen.  That would mean my leaving my kids, which - would DEFINITELY never happen.  That would mean my moving back to Wisconsin - which, over my dead body.  I love it too much out here.

It scares me that he says stuff like that.  I mean - really - really - scares me.  Luckily, I am a victim of his.  Not only abuse during our marriage, verbal & mental ... a tiny bit of physical at the end, but he also raped me while we were separated.  The rape is one of the reasons he was in prison in the first place.  If it weren't for his mom, I would have been stuck in WI - still.  I am - and forever will be - extremely grateful for running defense on the moving issue and helping me get him to agree to let us move.

I wish I could have changed the boys last names though.  I hate, hate hate hate, that they have to carry that.  Thankfully no one really knows what he did here, and no one takes it out on the boys.  Because it is a scar on them, the sins of their father.  And it shouldn't be.  It never should be.

Anyway ..

I think I'm done now....  done with this blog that is....

It was a loooooooong night ...er morning?

Today started with .... well, last night.  When I say last night, I mean O'dark-thirty.  Just kidding.  About 1:30am-2am Nathan's feed finished.  This is usually my bedtime, cuz Dennis and I aren't waking up for Nathan's pump beeping (when it's done or blocked)...  so I stay up until it's done.  I stay up because Dennis has school all day during the week, and all the kids (but Noah, who homeschools)

Anyway ...  Nathan woke up shortly after I disconnected his feeding tube and closed off his Mic-Key button.  He was breathing rather loudly, and his nose was congested, you could tell.   He didn't feel warm (feverish) but you could tell he wasn't feeling well and once I got a good look at him, his eyes were puffy too.  So I ended up rummaging through my medical drawers.  Found my small booger squisher (the nasal bulb thing you get for newborns) ... and some nasal saline spray, my allergy eye drops, and the Vicks to slather on his chest and neck, and Albuterol inhaler with the pediatric spacer.  I attacked him with all of them, much to his dismay.  But he didn't fight me too bad on it all.  He was breathing better after. But he was thoroughly awake.  I stayed up as long as I could with Nathan, and at some point Kaedyn woke up...  so they were both up for awhile.  When I woke up to help get the boys ready for school, Kaedyn was sleeping and Nathan was still awake.

There was some talk of if we should keep them home - or send them to school.  School is such a struggle with Nathan ANYWAY - we didn't want to send him the message that staying up all night means you get to stay home.  So we figured we'd try out seeing out things went and send them both off to school.  Kaedyn got some sleep - we don't know HOW much but he at least got sleep.  Nathan on the other hand got ... 6 hours, but at that point was up for about 8 hours and was going to do 6 1/2 hours of school.  (so awake 14 1/2 hours at the time Daddy picks him up from school when he's done with college.)  ...  that's kinda a lot when it's not your normal for a kid who is Autistic.

Well - when DB took the boys in, he dropped Cal off at the college so he could get to his 9am class on time, and Nathan was sleeping in his carseat.  So he called me and we discussed what to do, again. Even though as parents, even though it's not ideal - we wanted to keep him home because he needs sleep.  However, since Nathan is a "special needs" child and has already missed a lot of school - he is at the point of needing a "doctors note" when he stays home from school for it to be excused.  Same for Kaedyn (because a lot of time, when Nathan has appointments - Kaedyn has to go with us because we either can't get him to school because we're not there or can't pick him up because we're not there.)  So DB decided he would go talk to Nate's teacher.  So they got there and he went and talked with Nathan's Inclusion Room teacher Mrs. R.  We looove Mrs. R.  She told him that she'd let Nathan take a nap if he decided to, and not to worry.  So he called me back and relayed the message.

I slept this morning.  I wanted to get some stuff done, I have a new character rolling around in my head who needs a story.  I have a book I need to go back in and add some book fluff, some more details, connect some lines I need to connect, etc and so on.  And a book to read.  Well, so ... I slept instead, somewhat.  I folded clothes, got them put away, and slept.  I have a shelf I need to go through and re-organizing.  But I slept for a good chunk of it.

But I got to eat today!  Yay for that!

Oh - and this is what I got to deal with ....

So.. after DB was done with his classes, and him and Cal went to go pick up the Littles at school... he comes home and tells me the following.

Mrs. R says that Nathan had a very bad day and he was a very naughty boy today.  He was very disagreeable and he got in trouble - LOL - so the Principal took his hat (his winter dinosaur hat) away from him and got it back at the end of school because they know much he loves his hat.

Now - I started laughing and I couldn't stop when he told me this.

Only Nathan.  Only .... Nathan....

No other child could you take away their winter hat as a punishment!  I mean, you take Kaedyn's hat away from him and he's like.... soooooo, I don't care.  You take away any other child's hat, they are all "guess my head will be cold then!" and not care.  But Nathan, only Nathan will throw a fit if you take away his dino hat and it actually upset him to the point of changing behavior.  Not even kidding.

This is the hat in question ^^^^

Okay so today has been sorta rough - foot is hurting, the un-injured foot hurts, the upper body hurts.  I just ....... H.U.R.T. and that's all there is to it.

That's all I'm gonna say about that cuz I just .... don't want to talk about it.

Okay.... so the family gets home and chaos ensues, because it always does.  Before I knew it, I was getting meds ready and bedtime done.

Nathan got his bath tonight and I told Bubba, "If you want a bath tonight you need it before six."  LOLOL .. he says "I'm okay being bath-less."

(rolling eyes) ... going to end up calling that kid "Pigpen" let me tell you.

I was talking to my sister Heather most of the afternoon. She gave me the dates she's going to be here over the summer.  I cannot WAIT.  Not even kidding, I can't wait.  She's going to be here for her birthday, my birthday and the 4th of July!  So we're going to celebrate her birthday, my birthday and DB's birthday, which are all in June.  I know we need to take a trip to the Zoo (Point Defiance) while she is here this time. I think we need to go to the Glass Museum this time.  I promised her we'd take her to Menresa Castle which is haunted.  Also wanted to take her to the Rose Red House aka Thornwood Castle until I read this on their website; "Visits: We regret that time demands and our neighborhood setting do not permit us to show the Castle on a walk-up basis. The Castle is a private residence and located in a private neighborhood. It can be seen by a guest only when coming for overnight lodging or an event." It's in Tacoma which isn't far away at all, and I'd say - hey lets just stay there for a night, but it's $300 at the least.  Oye...  but it's also supposed to be haunted.  I am sure we'll have to do a few things again, like more of Pike's Place Market, and this time find the Gum Wall.  We need to take her to the U.S.S. Turner Joy. And also to the two free Naval Museums here. I don't remember if we made it to the Bug Museum.  I don't think we did.  Need to take her to The Brothers Greenhouse that has a "Hobbit House" set up.  We are probably going to go back up to Forks and La Push to take some more time there.  But that's just the thoughts for now...

I've been thinking about my BFF J all day, hoping she's getting sleep right now.  I know that she is going to have a lot of mixed days, a lot of bad days with some good days peppered in, but I worry about her a lot.

I got to end my day talking to my favorite little girl!!  I mean seriously - this little girl stole my heart from day found out she was hiding in her Mommy's belly!  She waved to me, jabbered at me - she had to talk louder than her Momma when Momma was talking to me cuz Elly must be heard, I got to see her run, we were sticking our tongues out at each other, and when she saw me she was all smiles!!  She hung up on me and I guess she got really mad when I didn't call back because Poppy (DB) was going to sleep at that point.  I miss her so much!  (I miss all of them) ...

She has grown up so much in the last year....

I promised I'd call her tomorrow when her Bubba is here (home from school) to talk to her too.

The weather today was nice.  There was a nice blustery breeze coming though the window, I love it.  DB calls it the Pneumonia Hole ... LOL ...  there was supposed to be a chance of snow last night and/or this morning, but I knew we probably wouldn't see anything and didn't really.  However school was delayed 2 hours for one local school district today (they bus Nathan and Kaedyn to their school in the morning) .. so they called to say they wouldn't be busing the boys .. we assume because there was icy roads? ...  but so DB drove them all the way into school today.

But now the boys are sleeping ..... whew - and they better sleep through the night.

That is all for today.