Getting Ready to Leave. Again.

I am getting laundry done and ready to pack up and go come Monday.  I'm leaving for Colorado Springs for a 3 day photography workshop with two wedding photographers I love --> The Parsons.  I am so excited to meet them in person and to learn from them.  I've heard their workshops are life changingly phenomenal and I'm expecting no less.  My flight gets back late Wednesday night and I will pull into our driveway early Thursday morning.  Only to turn around a few hours later and head back to the airport to fly up to Jersey for a work meeting.  I am excited about meeting this customer and other phone company folks in person for the first time.  Always so nice to put faces with voices.

And while I am traveling, I will be missing my kids' whole first week of school.  I have threatened Mr. Wenzel within an inch of his life if he doesn't take pictures of the kids every morning.  I have missed my children for the last three weeks and I can't get through another week without pictures.  Every day.  Hoping for good wi-fi while I'm gone so we can Skype, too.  That makes the distance soooo much more bearable.

So this also means my beads shop will be closing from Sunday, July 31 through Friday, August 5th.  If there are items you have been keeping your eye on, you better get them now.  The beads in these pictures were a custom order, but I have other similar ones waiting to be cleaned.  Hoping to get the rest of the beads cleaned this weekend (and possibly photographed) so I can get them listed next weekend.  It's about time for a shop update, don't you think?

I hope you all have a FaBuLoUs weekend and I will be checking in with you in another week!

Digging Out

We have been home for over a week now, but I am still digging out from underneath my long To Do list.  I have been busy, but haven't felt like I have accomplished much.  Yesterday was different.  I did some major cleaning in and outside the house.  We washed both our cars and I said a final farewell to the Minnesota bugs gracing the front of mine.  I wasn't sad to see them go.  Following up that burst of productivity, I awoke rejuvenated this morning and finally pulled almost 500 pics off my camera before starting my work day.  I got through most, but didn't have time to set up a blog post until now.  Because five o'clock somewhere has finally reached five o'clock here.  Yay!

While we were in Minnesota, we jumped.

We ran.  Or rather, Todd ran and I rollerbladed next to him.

We enjoyed the view.

I enjoyed watching my boy grow up a little bit more as he was allowed to navigate.

We enjoyed some fabulous sunsets.

Did a little kayaking in the wannabe kayak.  I wasn't brave stupid enough to bring my camera in that.  Especially with a girl child on my lap.  We did not tip, but water coming in from the oar got us a bit wet.  Made a note-to-self to not be brave next time and leave my camera on the shore.

And we put our feet up.  My feet were up a lot, actually.  The kids were off and running with grandmas, aunts, uncles, cousins and new friends.  They were wound up and high on life, stretching the days well past darkness (and boy did darkness come late Up North) and playing volleyball or basketball until they could no longer see.  I caught up on some reading, as well as cleaning out my computer of photos that were not needed which freed up close to 20 gigs of space.  So even though my feet were up, I still managed to be productive.  Yay me.  :)

I have been on the torch twice since coming home (once each weekend) and have made a total of 40 beads.  With the exception of four, they're all sitting in the sink waiting to be cleaned.  I'm not sure when my next shop update will be, but not setting a date so I don't have to offer up lame excuses later.  Getting the beads cleaned and then photographed would be helpful.

And on a parting note, I had a Sally Field moment of "She loves me, she really really loves me!" this morning after I read Mallory's post.  Mallory has been in my thoughts a lot over the last few months as she has stood by her daughter's side fighting off cancer.  Her daughter was just declared 100% cancer free last week.  After living through multiple cancer battles in my own family over the last two decades, I rejoiced with Mallory like she were my own family.

Back Home

Todd and I arrived home late yesterday afternoon after driving 450 miles (we conquered 850 miles on Wednesday after leaving Northern Minnesota!) to a broken AC unit and a car that wouldn't start.  Plans that we thought were going into effect this month have been delayed.  So in the meantime, I am listening to this song again.

This weekend I hope to upload the 400+ photos I took over the last two weeks (really, that's it?!) so I can share a bit of our vacation with you all.  What I can tell you right now is that there was plenty of relaxing, not enough fishing and too many desserts!  My belt is really not happy staying at the same notch and thinks it should be loosened one.  I'm fighting that and vowing to eat nothing but healthy now that I'm back home.  Somebody come flog me tonight if I touch the desserts at my husband's tennis match, ok?