Category Archives: Personal

Personal stuffs

July 17, 2007 · 5:34 am

Breaks & Blocks

I feel like I’ve been absent from most everywhere for weeks.  I think I forgot to check into Flickr for something like 2 weeks straight.  I only go to Etsy once in a while to convo a customer or relist expired items items, and I haven’t posted on here forever.  The only thing I’ve kept up with is PoshPoints, because dang, I’m getting some awesome stuff through there :P

I had my brother’s youngest girl (13) for a week the week of the fourth, and started a new part time telecommuting job.  Once my niece left, I think I slept for almost a week straight.  I finally made a phone call to a friend:

Me: “I’ve been tired for a week straight, I can’t get ANYTHING done, and I can’t figure out why!  I’ve been taking my pills regularly (I got that new daily pill box thing and have been using it) any ideas?”
Him: “Uhm, how many muscle relaxants have you been taking?”

So yeah, I felt like an idiot, because even though I’ve been taking muscle relaxants for years, and even though I’ve been measuring out my pills into my daily pill organizer, and even though I have been actually remembering to take the pills I put out for a change… I somehow managed to FORGET to put out ANY muscle relaxants for an entire week! 

My muscles stay spasmed if I don’t take the relaxants, which uses way more energy and zaps my strength, so that’s why I’ve been sleeping all day,  and been more sore than usual.  Sheesh!  So I’m finally back taking ALL of the pills I’m supposed to, and I feel much better.  I’ve started getting stuff done again, and my brother’s middle girl (15) is staying here this week.

Today we painted.  All day.  I think we used every paint brush I had out, and something like 20 different paint colors.  I finished some NameBlox™, a couple of Birth Announcement Blocks that were ordered for twins, painted 4 sets of 8 1″ colored cubes, a pair of 1″ color dice, a set of “painted yahtzee” dice, 4 pairs of standard dice (stained, not painted), a set of dice with 18kt gold pips that look awesome!, and uhm… oh yeah about 6 NameBlox™ benches.  Whew. 

Elizabeth painted animals and designs on every little piece of wood she could find, I’m not quite sure what’s she’s doing with them all, but I’ll try to upload a pic to flickr of her creations sometime in the next few days.

I also found time to fix an awesome dinner of Zataran’s Herb Rice (with pieces of chicken breast instead of the hamburger it called for), sauteed zucchini and homemade cole slaw.  And we spent about an hour trying to get Elizabeth into a maple tree with a hand saw so she could help get a couple of limbs down that’d been hit by lightning (she got up there, but dropped the saw, and by the time we got it back up to her she was too tired to fight with the limb that refused to come down lol).  We’ll probably try again tomorrow because she really liked the idea of being that high up in a tree.  The limbs have been dead for a year or so, but they twisted funny and are hanging on by a bit, and refuse to want to come down the rest of the way.

How’s that for an update? lol

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June 21, 2007 · 5:37 pm

There are times when I love VistaPrint

Product Total Before Discounts: $215.32
  You Saved: ($205.32)  
  Product Total After Discounts: $10.00  
  Shipping & Processing (Slow 21 Days): $8.05  
  Total: $18.05

This total is for
10     Sheets of Custom Letterhead (my graphics)
250   Premium Business Cards (my graphics)
100   Post Cards (their graphics, my text)
10     Flat Invitations
25     Brochures (my graphics, both sides)
25     Business Card Magnets (my graphics)
10     Calendar Magnets (my graphics)
10     Folded Note Cards W/Envelopes (their graphics, my text, plain envelopes)
1       Custom Stamp – Fragile/don’t bend/keep cool  (for my crayon shipments)
1       Note Pad (my graphics)
1       Pad of Post-It type Notes (my graphics)
1       X-Large T-Shirt (my graphics, front AND back)

This is today’s order.  The other day I got 1500 business cards, a sticky-note pad, a custom address stamp, and 25 business checks for $27.27 shipped. 

If you’re looking to score some promo stuff, this is a good time to get it, use the link: http://www.VistaPrint.com/minicatalog then go through and look at each one of their products.  Every single item above would have been completely free had I not opted to upload my own graphics — with that link, graphics uploads are still half off though, and you can use any graphics you’ve already paid to upload in the past, for free.

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· 1:11 am

Special UPS Pricing for PayPal Shippers

If you sell (or have sold) on eBay, and still have a current account (actuallly, I think it will work even if you don’t), and you ever ship via UPS through PayPal, you might wanna really look at this:

http://www.upsdelivers.com/ebay/

UPS is pleased to offer eBay Sellers the opportunity to save big – up to 31%* – on U.S. outbound ground, air, and international shipping. You’ll start saving with the first package you send. Then, the more you ship, the more you save.

*Savings when compared to UPS Retail Rates.
Offer is available to US-based UPS account numbers for US domestic and international shipments. The UPS Special Pricing Program for eBay Sellers is brought to you by UPS and is available for packages processed on eBay or PayPal. Savings begin 1 to 6 business days after sign-up.

A few days after you sign up you’ll be enrolled for “UPS Daily Rate” pricing, instead of the retail pricing, which appears to be the same discount that high volume shippers get.

This works for current UPS accounts, as long as you’re not already setup for the special Daily Rates, just imput your current account number on the signup form.  If you don’t have a UPS account you’ll need to create one.

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June 16, 2007 · 12:47 am

Suggestions Welcome

Okay, so Etsy is driving me nuts. If I had to take my StoryBlox™ shop off of etsy tomorrow it wouldn’t be a problem, as a lot of my sales come through my main site, or elsewhere.

The tmbmt shop is another issue though, because it’s odds and ends and stuff that I don’t really want to bother with selling more than one place.

So, does anyone have any good suggestions for a place to move to? It’s mainly for paper beads, random crafts, and odds-and-ends supplies. I don’t want to make a custom store just for the tmbmt stuff. I won’t merge it with StoryBlox™ stuff, and I can’t afford ebay.

Problem is, I’m not sure there’s an alternative to eBay, other than etsy, that has much traffic sales-wise. Someone please let me know if I’m wrong.

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June 14, 2007 · 2:04 pm

New Etsy Listings – Paper Beads & Bubble Mailers

Since etsy’s search and category functions have been screwed up for a couple of days (at least) I figured I’d drop a note here.

I just added a number of new paper beads, and I’ll have a few more to list over the next couple of days. 

   

I also got a shipment of bubble mailers, if anyone needs any (size #00, listed in packs of 10 on etsy). 

** If you can’t get to etsy, you can check my flick account for photos, contact me for purchasing info **

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June 10, 2007 · 8:26 pm

Bizarre Evening

So I went to church this morning, and the family that does worship on Sunday mornings made the following announcement: “Not this next Sunday, but the one after that, we’ll be singing at such-and-such church and would love it if ya’all wanted to show up and worship with us.”

The church I go to doesn’t have Sunday evening services, which I hate because that’s the service I’m most likely to be able to attend on a regular basis… so, I’ve been kind of going to different area churches every Sunday evening just to fill the time. Hearing this I thought, great! A place to go.

Once I got home I lost my mind and convinced myself that they had said they were going to be there *tonight*. I couldn’t remember what time tonight though, so I tried to call the pastor, who didn’t answer his phone, so I figured it had to be either 6 or 6:30 and off I went. I got there at 6, and no one was there, and the sign said service was at 7, so I went wandering around town to blow time, and got a big shake at UDF.

Here’s where the evening got interesting lol. I went back to that church around 6:30, and decided to just read some while I was waiting… 6:45 came and no one was there yet, but this is Ohio, so I figured maybe it’s just one of those churches where everyone’s always running late instead of early.

At around 6:50 one car pulled in. Two old guys walked up and peeked around the back of the car towards my open window and one said “can we help you?”. This seemed like a rather odd question at a church on Sunday evening, but I just told him I got there early and was waiting because so-and-so was supposed to be singing there tonight. To which he answered “Uhm, I don’t think so”. I explained better who it was, and he said “Oh, they’re supposed to be here on the 23rd I think”.

Me: “Oh. uhm. well… are you sure?”
Him: “Well you might as well join us anyway”

So I went in. I’m not all that observant, and didn’t realize until I shook his hand that he only had half of his right hand and a hook on the left… shaking three fingers felt a little strange lol. He had to be in his 80s. The other guy is (I found out later) almost 87.

They were the ONLY two people there! Had I not been there, I imagine they would have talked a bit and went home or something, but since I was there.

Him: “Well, I wasn’t going to preach tonight, and the guy that normally does on Sundays called to say he won’t be coming. You don’t preach do you?”
Me: “Uh… no. I can sing but I don’t preach (literally lol).”
Him: “Oh, you sing?!?…”
Me: “Uh, yeah, some.”
Him: “Well, you wanna sing? Morris sings some…”

So I spend the evening singing random hymns (thumbing through hymnals and song booklets trying to find songs that we all (or at least two of us) knew. Most bizarre, but it actually turned out to be fairly fun. I’m always up for singing, and since there were only two of them I didn’t really feel on the spot…

I think they appreciated having someone else there, especially since, as it turns out, they had to drive over 45 minutes to get to the church tonight.

So they’re hoping I come back lol

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June 9, 2007 · 8:34 pm

Yay!

In between bouts of completely irrational hormone-driven tears I’ve been almost giddy for two days. I’m FINALLY feeling better. The doctor gave me some super strength antibiotics and although I’m not 100% better yet, I’ve been about 20 times better than I was, and having energy after being sick for so long is enough to make me want to jump around lol.

Yesterday started out with a huge storm:
Stormy Day

So, when the power went out, I figured it was the perfect time to make a trip to the Amish store. It turned out to be a very beautiful day, between rain.

I got some good food, then went to take some pictures at the church camp I went to as a kid (nothing worth posting really). It’s funny how much things change — they’ve added tons of buildings, and all of the trees that were just getting started when I was a kid are taller than the buildings now… which made the place look completely different. I did get to talk to an old friend while I was there, who, surprisingly, remembered me and most of my family even though I haven’t really talked to him for at least 10 years.

I took some pies I got at the Amish store and left some for my aunt and uncle, then shared some with my grandmother (who lost a big tree in that storm, and had been stuck at home without a working phone all evening).

All in all it was a great day. I came to a call from Mom saying she was coming down today and then made some beads (some of which will be posted on etsy this weekend) before going to bed.

Mom came down today and we had lunch with grandma then did a bunch of yard work. The flower beds are all finally finished, and I think we finally have the property to a place where I’ll be able to keep it up without much work (yay!). I also have my garden going well, we planted some sunflower seeds and the last of the tomatoes today, and a pumpkin decided to sprout. So I’ll have corn (if it makes it), beans, tons of onions and garlic, pumkin, tons of zucchini (yay!), cucumbers, sunflowers, tons of tomatoes, some hot peppers, and some cabbage. Quite a bit more than I was planning on, but I can’t complain. I also took some big rocks I dug out of an old flower bed and made a real ring around my fire ring so it actually looks safe now lol.

After mom left I got thinking about the trip to camp, and decided to see if I could find a number for another old friend, Tim, who just happened to be home today! He remembered me too (I’m not sure why that always surprises me), and we talked for about an hour I think. It’s always great catching up with old friends, and this is a guy I have looked up to as an inspiration since I was about 8 (don’t tell him that though, his head is big enough).

And I just did all that rambling to say, I think I finally have a good friend in the area! For whatever reason I always thought calling Tim would be awkward… it so totally wasn’t. We caught up quite a bit, he’s disabled as well, so we actually have quite a bit in common in that area. He’s married with a 4 year old kid now, so doesn’t have much time, and neither of us have much spending money, but hopefully we can get together once in a while at least.

I can’t even count the number of prayers that have been answered in the past few weeks. Yay! :)

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June 5, 2007 · 7:40 am

Gah!

I *hate* mornings like this.

I’m awake at 7:30am.  Anyone that knows me knows that I’m NEVER awake at 7:30 am unless I just haven’t gone to bed yet.

But I woke up this morning with the same dang throat infection I’ve had for an entire week now (dang antibiotics aren’t helping one bit! arg!) and the overwhelming sense that something is wrong.  I can’t go back to sleep.  I hate this.

I can’t stay up either, cuz I’m too dang tired and sick to stay up, and I can’t call anyone because seriously, who wants a call at 7:30 in the morning?!?

Gah.

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May 26, 2007 · 1:25 am

Answered Prayers

If you know me you know I’ve been having a hard time lately. I’m in a crap-hole financially; I’m insanely lonely as I haven’t made any friends here and have been having a hard time finding a church; my arms have been giving me a lot of problems lately (and my legs are already messed up); and to top it all off I tried to slice my thumb off with a box cutter the other day.

BUT this week is suddenly looking up.

A few weeks ago I got a call about a job (out of the blue, I wasn’t actively looking for a job because I figured it was impossible to find a part-time remote job I could do with my disability anyway), but after talking to him and finding out the job would be perfect for me — he called me back a week later to tell me they found someone else. That same week I got another call about another job (no idea where all the calls were coming from suddenly) but that guy hadn’t even looked at the ‘part time only’ stipulation. Two false alarms that close together just exasperated me.

Anyway, in the meantime I started going to this new church I found (see previous post), and at least that was looking promising.

So this week on Monday the guy that called about the first job called back… I guess the other guy didn’t work and the employer wanted an interview on Tuesday! So Tuesday’s interview went pretty well. Tuesday I also got like 3 sales on Etsy and had the bright idea of listing some stuff on eBay again.

Wednesday I sold another couple of things and went to church… where I had the most awesome conversation with the pastor!!! So I can officially say I have a new church now, and the people are actually friendly (so I might *gasp* finally make some friends here)!

Thursday morning I got a call saying I got the job! And it’s more money per hour than I thought it would be! He didn’t know when I would be starting though…

Thursday afternoon I FINALLY got in to see the hand therapist who made me a freakin HUGE cast-splint for when my arm is acting up (ugh, nothing like a full arm cast to show you how fat you are lol) — hopefully this’ll mean faster recovery next time it goes out.

I spent all day with the brace guy (long story)… when I got back there was a call from the recruiter wanting me to come for a drug screen and paperwork because the employer wants me to start as soon as possible. So I ran up there today, and filled out everything. It sounds like I might be starting as soon as mid-week.

Plus, my CRAYO-Names (see my

[info]storyblox

profile for details) are selling like hot-cakes on ebay!

Oh yeah, and my thumb — which is barely hurting any at all for some unknown reason (NOT that I’m complaining) — is starting to heal lol.

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May 9, 2007 · 1:43 am

Ever had a knife thrown at you?

I almost forgot to blog about this, but it was so bizarre I just can’t pass it up.

At the craft fair this weekend I was sitting there talking with a customer and the lady from the booth across the way, and a KNIFE came flying at us!! It came within a foot of my customer’s calf, and ended up landing underneath my wheelchair (thank God I was using my solid tires that day). Apparently the guy in a booth about 25 feet away THREW it our direction… we didn’t believe what it was at first, but after my customer picked it up and we all realized it was, indeed, the knife it had looked like, our jaws dropped and we stared in the general direction it had come from.

When I said “uhm, did someone just THROW a KNIFE at us?!?” some lady said “uhh, I think he was trying to hit a fly”. A FLY?!?! I know I’m in hick country, but good glory.

I’m still astounded.

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