what did you say....

since i've been playing in my studio,

i feel the need to declare that "creativity requires a mess."

{umm...hi honey, i love you}

 do you ever wish you were a better listener? i do. all the time.

i swear that sometimes my thoughts are like a raging river in my head, flooding my ears and preventing me from grasping what is being said to me. 

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i can look you in the eye, watch your lips move, nod my head in agreement and yet my thoughts, that i must somehow believe to be more important then your words, won't cooperate. 

they won't wait. they have no patience whatsoever. 

and then they team up with my tongue in a "hey, what about me" kind of way and take off in a full sprint for a cross country run. it's rude. 

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i am working on being a better listener.

i don't care for silence. i consider it a void that has to be filled with something. 

music is the best void filler.

when i go somewhere that has a specific time for my arrival, i'm early.

i'm always early. i'm never late. ever.

just saying

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happy weekend everyone. i mean it. 

breathless....

when i walk into a shop, i expect to be greeted. 

a simple "hi" is perfect. but when i'm completely ignored, it's pretty much a given that i won't shop there anymore. this happened to me yesterday at "title nine." the girls working there just kept talking to each other about weekend plans and from where lunch was going to be ordered.

 now to be fair, i don't like sales clerks to smother me. believe me, i have left places just because i couldn't "breathe" due to some overly aggressive saleswoman hovering around me like a swarm of bees. 

but i do like to at least be acknowledged.

are you watching american idol. steven tyler is starting to drive me mad.

adjectives and sometimes even full sentences, don't always seem to get along with him, especially during the second hour, when he tends to look a bit bored. or distracted by the memory of the tight leggings the previous singer was wearing.

sophie is sleeping more and more during the day. i guess that's expected at 15, but today i have only seen her long enough for two potty breaks and a paul newsman's natural dog treat. but tonight, about dinner time, she'll run around the house crazy like a puppy, looking at us like "what?" 

i love sabrina ward harrison and have many of her books. 

yesterday i found out that her newest one that i had pre-oredered on amazon, was in stock at anthropologie. so i cancelled my order and took off to my most favorite store ever. i gently took the book off the shelf, fondling it and smiling all giddy, like a kid with a shiny new bike, forcing myself to not open it. i wanted to wait until i got home, so i could sit in the sun with my legs wrapped under me and savor it.

today i returned the book. 

it was awful compared to her other ones.

i like this:

the first to apologize is the bravest. the first to forgive is the strongest.

the first to forget is the happiest.

anonymous

friday ramblings.....

last week we were finally forced to turn our air conditioning on. 

that.doesn't.happen.in.wisconsin.in.march

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personally i hate air conditioning and would much rather have my windows open. 

of course, that's until bedtime when the windows must be closed. 

it goes hand in hand with needing a sheet over my legs while i sleep and 

monsters in the middle of the night. 

{remember when we talked about this not so long ago}

do you use walgreens. do you have their new app. where you can scan your prescription

to get a refill. i think i'm in love.

i bought a new bathroom scale. 

it weighs me 2.4 pounds heavier then the old scale. that sucks.

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are you thinking about easter. i am a little bit, but only because i think eggs are really cool.

and colored eggs. don't even get me started on how much joy those bring me.

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i'm still reading. i'm on book two and the story line has me intrigued. 

and you know what i want now. 

i want a driver. i want my very own version of "taylor." i want someone who just shows up every time i need something, before i even realize i need something. 

and if the occasion ever arises where he has to buy me a pair of underwear 

or pack an overnight bag for me...well wouldn't that be sweet.

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ride'em cowboy...

we're home

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after leaving florida just a bit earlier then planned

{my prayers and thoughts to all the families affected by the tornadoes}

we're safely back in wisconsin

have you ever driven seventeen hours straight through from point A to point B.

for some reason we pride ourselves on the ability to do just that. 

granted, we stop for gas and potty breaks and this time we even stopped to switch drivers,

but normally my hubby does all the driving {i think he's part truck driver} and we just go. 

i have to say though, that driving the last leg, which fell from midnight to 6am, 

{the first time we've done that and even took turns}

is brutal and produces zombies that slightly resembled us.

so we beat the storms and arrived home just hours before mother nature gifted us with five inches of heavy, white snow. personally, since i got to spend six weeks in florida, i think she did that just to play the na.na.na.na.boo.boo game with me.

today was over sixty degrees. freaky.

now i'm kind of in a nesting mode. 

cleaning, organizing, re-doing and decorating. an early "spring fever" perhaps.

so all of my beachside daydreams are put to rest for now

{i mean i'm still dreaming, just not with my feet in the sand}

and my smile, well that never really changes no matter where i am.

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i miss him...

i'm not sure about american idol this season. i miss simon. i mean i really miss simon.

i know some people felt he was too harsh. personally, i loved his honesty.

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i also love these kids. just being kids. on a beach.

i used to be really regimented regarding keeping my white loads, white and my dark loads, dark.

now i'm kind of lazy and mix a whole lot of anything with anything.

maybe it's just an "i'm in my late forties" thing.

back to american idol for just a second. is ryan really that short.

i have learned to be very appreciative lately for the foggy weather we've been having here this week.

it's not snowy or cold. that's my daily mantra.

meet our resident mrs. dove. i thought an introduction was necessary.

i didn't want you to think she was just an ordinary bird. oh, and mr. dove shows up with her.

he's just not quite as photogenic as she is.

for some reason, this building reminds me of italy. i've never been to italy

but in my mind, i think it kind of looks like this. but surrounded by french people.

sometimes i swear, the seagulls are just as fascinated with the gulf as i am.

remember when you were little and would spend hours building a sandcastle. me either.

but as an adult, i truly appreciate the imagination of children who get to play in the sand.

"what. you're surprised that i tore apart the bird feeder you hung in the tree out your back door.

give me a break. i'm a squirrel. that's what i do.

a S.Q.U.I.R.R.E.L. got it.

this is my hubby out there rocking the waves. no it's not.

{made you look}

happy thursday

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i carry randomness with me like a security blanket...

i watched the oscars last night and honestly i was a bit bored.

okay, meryl's speech was amazing. well she's amazing.

but angelina's leg, sticking awkwardly out of the slit in her dress. weird.

the other night, as i was getting ready for bed, i moved my jeans off the bed to put them away and a spider was on them. of course he jumped quickly off my jeans and onto the multicolored comforter, where he was impossible to see. so i hit the living daylights out of the comforter with my bare hands and felt confident that i had killed him. just to be safe, we took the comforter off the bed and shook it to death. 

next time god, give me a lizard or something else large enough to see, that i'll know for sure isn't still hanging around waiting to crawl all over my face while i'm sleeping.

tell me you have tried and fallen in love with the 

"no-bleed no matter how thin your paper is" 

fine point sharpies

since i've been here, i have fallen UP the stairs twice. once with my arms filed with laundry and the second time just walking up the porch stairs into the house. 

this is cd. he's one of those people you want to invite for dinner because you know, just from meeting him, that he is easily more interesting then the last ten or fifteen people you've met.

after i took his photos, he shook my hand and said "one love"

i have to admit that i LOVE stuff like that. totally love it.

non-drowsy claritin makes me drowsy...but not until about four in the afternoon, 

which is a good time to nap anyhow.

this is NOT the heart shaped piece of sand dollar with wings that i spoke about in my last post. 

no unfortunately, that piece is broken, spit out in little pieces and gone.

please consider removing your word verification from your comments area. please.

AND....if you have comment moderation on your comments, you do NOT need the word verification, too.

honestly, and i don't want to sound bitchy here, but it's a bit maddening when you have both. so please, take the time to see how your comments are set up and change what's not necessary. try to go without the word verification for awhile and add it back in if a creeper shows up. the new double word thingy is just so time consuming and i know some bloggers are really struggling trying to decipher the words.

thanks for listening to my little rant here

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{design/settings/comments/check registered users/comment moderation-never/save}

{the above will eliminate your word verification setting}

i'm so sorry....

well. i was planning on apologizing for all the beachy winter intermission photos. but then i saw this face staring back at me and decided you're stuck with them.

 i was using the bathroom at target the other day and while washing my hands, a woman about 60 walked out of a stall, passed by the sinks and left the room. she didn't wash her hands. okay. that's just gross.

have you ever eaten a twix bar and thought to yourself "this is the most delicious thing i have eaten in weeks" and the next day bought another one. and then another one. okay. maybe that's just me with a market practically right out my back door and a very lonely candy aisle.

i am hating the new word verification on blogger. like really hating it.

why the extra security all of a sudden. 

and why are they doing it now when my eyes aren't as good as they used to be.

tangerine and salmon are the new spring colors. i look horrible in tangerine and salmon.

but i'd love to have a pair of jeans in one of those shades.

how do people take great photos of hot food. when my food is hot i want to eat it. if i stopped and took photos of it, it'd be cold by the time i was done shooting it. 

or wait, maybe they just fix the food without eating it. well that's just silly if they do. 

i love emily blunt. just saying. i love emily blunt.

it's not summer, but i'm hooked again on mike's cranberry hard lemonade. hooked i tell you.

{kind of like the smoked gouda grits down here}

did you know you can eat key lime pie for breakfast or dinner. 

i mean all alone. without any other food with it. all by itself.

really. you can.

i really had no idea to what degree dogs are instant attention getters, until i've been down here. now granted, kids have always loved sophie, but adults are dropping like flies around her. like in a "i love her kind of way." i can hardly walk her without being stopped by someone. with or without a dog. they want to know what her breed is, shake their heads when i say a "cotton de tulear" and then they can't believe she's fifteen, completely deaf and slightly blind. oh my little miracle dog.

after a few huge rain storms, i'm more in love with the ocean then i already was. every day here is a new day. a different day.  the topography literally changes beneath my feet.

some of you are still a "no reply" on blogger. if you are, i can't respond to your comments and i'm sorry about that, as i love to write back. so please change your settings. 

make sure you are not a "no reply" blogger.

i'm anxious to see who the finalists are this year on american idol.

holy crap those kids can sing.

if you're bored with your camera skills, purposely shoot with your focus right or left or up or down, instead of in the middle. it's a great way to practice the rule of thirds. and if you're really bored, under or over expose your photos using the setting on your camera. you just might surprise yourself.

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happy friday everyone. friday's are a good day of the week.

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