Thankful

Thanksgiving is just behind us, but the thankfulness I feel for what I have in life goes on.

I'm thankful for my husband of 47 1/2 years. Our marriage was anything but calm and peaceful for many, many years, but after 20 years we finally came to a tentative truce in our fights and disagreements. After 30 years we became good friends and lovers. After 40 years? It's a wonderful life and I'm so glad I have spent so much of it with him.

I'm thankful for my children, my grandchildren and my great grandchildren. I can't imagine a life without them! They fill me with joy every minute of every day, whether I'm physically near them or not. I love all of them so very much.

I'm thankful for my husband's family - his mother who is 100 years old and all of his siblings - Judy, Roger, Valerie, and Larry (his half brother). Since all of my family is gone now except for cousins, it's a real blessing for me to have sisters and brothers by marriage, at least. And I couldn't be closer to them if they were my own.

I'm thankful for the health that I do have. No, I'm not thankful for the health problems I endure, but I'm VERY thankful that at least those aren't cancer problems.

I'm thankful for our homes - we own two of them, now, free and clear and can spend summers up in eastern Washington - just two miles from Idaho - where the weather is absolutely perfect and winters down in Arizona, where we are out of the snow and freezing cold.

I'm thankful for all of my writing friends. I have so many! Some I met through SCBWI (the Society of Children's Book Writers & Illustrators) and many I met through the internet and my message board.

I'm thankful that after way too many years of my creative writing self being "dried up" and "too busy" and "worn out" I am finally actively writing again. YAY! At this point, I'm in a Creative Writing Class in the RV Park where I live in Arizona and we are meeting once a week. Each week we write a story based on a different topic. This week we picked ten random words out of my Apples to Apples game box and we have to write a story using three of those words. Belly Dancers, Ghosts, an Insane Asylum, a Dark Alley, a Swiss Bank Account, Caffine, Having an Operation, a Divorce, Predictable, and Pathetic are our words to pick from for this week's story. This should be an interesting writing week!

Today we are driving 8 hours to return one of our granddaughters to her house. She came to visit for a few days. It's been a great week!

Moving, Cancer, Diet, Termites, Stories, Falling, Big News, and Life

We are getting settled into our lovely mobile home down in Arizona for the winter. It's so nice to be running around in shorts and sleeveless shirts and sandals instead of bundling up for snowy, cold days and nights.  The park's pool heater has been fixed so now the water in the pool is not cold... it's just refreshingly cool again.

The giant basel cell cancer I had removed from my nose a little over a month ago is finally beginning to heal. It's still a lumpy, bumpy scarred, not-quite-healed spot on the side of my nose, but at least it's not pitch black and grossing everyone around me out anymore.

I've been trying very hard to work on my diet, to change it to conform in a way that will help get my diabetes sugars under control - at least part of the time. They've been totally out of control for far too long and my doctor has been "on me" pretty strongly to get my act together. Along with the diet, I'm starting to walk around the park once or twice a day, and some days I even go swimming for a lap or two. Some days I manage to stick to my regime and some days I don't. Some days it works, some days it doesn't. But at least I'm trying!

Our house has now been sprayed not only for termites (it took 40 GALLONS of pesticide to eradicate the infestation under our mobile home!) but also for all other bugs. We should be very "bug-free" now, which suits me just fine. I do NOT like bugs in my house. Actually, I don't much like them outside of the house, either, when they are biting me, buzzing around me, or even slithering, slinking, creeping, or crawling near (and on) me.

My agent has sent out my newest picture book manuscript and I have two more manuscripts ready to be looked at by some of my peers. Once I get the okay from them that these two new stories are ready, then I'll send them to my agent so she can send them out.

This has been a tough week for me. I've been super busy and the other day I tripped over the 2 inch high threshold between the mobile home and our add-on Arizona room. (I've been trying to get my husband to fix it ever since we bought this place. It's a VERY dangerous tripping hazard!) I pitched forward, flopped down the brick steps (three of 'em) and landed on the floor at the bottom, spread-eagled out on my face and stomach. My little finger on my left hand was sprained and has been hurting for several days now. It's finally getting a bit better tonight. I have multiple bruises all over my body. When I go for my checkup at the doctor's office next week, I hope they have faded... otherwise she might be asking me who beat me up. LOL!

On the writing front, BIG things are coming in the near future for me! I have exciting news that I can't quite share... yet. But soon, fairly soon I should be able to spill the beans! What I CAN say right now is this... Never underestimate the value of what you do to help other people, even when you don't get any compensation for it. You never know when it might turn around and pat you on the back and give you a giant hug.

Life has a way of sneaking up on you behind your back. When I look around me at the world right now, I see many people who are so busy "making a living" that they have forgotten to live their lives. It's important to take a few moments to remember what is really important in life and make your life count for something. I have a plaque in my bathroom that I look at every day. It says:

"I asked God for all things that I might enjoy life. He gave me life that I might enjoy all things."

Have a wonderful day, Everyone. Life is precious and every moment is special and will never, ever come again. You only have one chance to make your life good. Make it good today.

Major Life Update...

SO much has happened in my life since my last blog post... I'm almost embarrassed to post on this blog!

The highlights of the past few months are the arrival of a new great grandson, Jaidyn, moving back up to Washington state for the next six months, and the summer SCBWI International Conference in Los Angeles, California.

When we got moved into our northern home, we discovered we had left most of our tax papers (needed to do our deferred 2011 income taxes) down in Arizona. So... we drove the 33 hours back down, found them, and drove 33 hours back up with them. Now we are trying to do taxes... and it looks like we might still have left one file down there! We can't find any of our income papers... 7 of them... six of which are 1099s. I can NOT believe it....

And I see I never posted this! Sheesh. It was still sitting in my drafts folder on my computer. Good thing my head is attached or I'd probably forget it, too.

And yes, we did leave that elusive tax folder down in Arizona. Luckily, the manager of our park has a key to our home down there and was gracious enough to get the file and mail it to us. Our taxes are done and we are waiting for our refund to arrive.

We're moving back down to Arizona for the winter in less than a week now. I can't believe how fast this summer went! We spent a lot of time these past few months at Silverwood Amusement Park with our family and close friends. We had purchased Gold Passes last fall, which allowed us to go as often as we liked and to take four people with us (at no charge) all summer long. What a great time we all had! If you are ever in the Coeur d'Alene area of Idaho, do be sure to go to the park. They have all the fun rides, as well as a wonderful water park that makes for a very wonderful time for people of all ages.

Today I'm headed for our local SCBWI conference and I can hardly wait to see everyone again. It's been a long time....

I finally got my "writing head" back on this summer, and wrote a fun and (I hope) terrific new picture book. My agent is shopping it around right now, so I'm waiting to hear what editors will have to say about it.

My new great grandson is now 4 months old, and my oldest great grandson just turned 4 years old. I made each of the boys a quilt this summer... and I'm so pleased with how they both turned out. They are very special quilts for two very special little boys.

A little over a week ago I had a very large basal cell cancer removed from my nose. The cancer is all gone (thank heavens!) but my nose leaves a LOT to be desired as far as looks go. They had to do a skin graft (from behind my ear) to cover the very large hole in the side of my nose. It's now pitch black and looks... well... let's just say it doesn't look very pretty and leave it at that. I HATE going out into public, but I finally found a bandaid yesterday that will stick to my nose, so at least it's covered up and I shouldn't offend anyone anymore who sees it.

And now... I'm off to that wonderful SCBWI (Society of Children's Book Writers & Illustrators) conference! Bandaged nose and all....  :-)

I Not Only Have A Kitchen, I Have Floors, Too! Oh, Joy!

It's been a very L-O-N-G winter for me. I just knew when we decided to become Snowbirds, and spend our winters down south in Yuma, Arizona, where it's much warmer than in our snow-crusted, freezing (and often below freezing!) little town in Washington state that our winters would be filled with fun activities. After all, we bought a place in a very active RV Park, with shuffleboard, horseshoes, swimming, games, cards, bingo, golf, music, movies, exercises, dances, darts, karaoke, jam sessions, crafts and you-name-it-they-probably-have-it activities going on every week from November through March.

Uh, huh.

(Nods head)

Yep.

Winters were definitely going to be FUN!

HA!

What I didn't expect was for us to spend our entire winter remodeling our mobile home due to that horrid flood we had right after we bought it. Yeah, I know. Arizona isn't supposed to have floods (except for the occasional flash flood, of course). But that doesn't take into account the fact that hoses under sinks can spring pretty substantial leaks when the water is left on and you go away for a few weeks. (Uh, huh. We won't ever do THAT again!)

So...we spent our entire winter renovating our mobile home. We found scary wires in the walls (a future fire just waiting to happen!), potential leaks in the washer hookups and garbage disposal, (both now replaced or in the process of being replaced) and very shaky construction in walls and other places.

But now the renovation work is almost done and we can finally turn our attention to participating in all those fun activities the park has to offer....

But WAIT!

The activities ended in March.

This is APRIL!

SCREECH!

We missed it all.

Wah!

Well, there's always next year, I guess.

(Mumble, grumble, groan)

But now we're nearly done and we can finally turn our attention to FUN things! Like packing up to move north again for the summer.

AWK!

Moving AGAIN?

NOOOOOooooo!

(faints)

Okay. Tantrum over. I will now focus on the positive side of things.

Today it's supposed to be around 95°. I'm going swimming!

Today I'm going to work on critiques for the mentorship program I'm participating in next month in Nevada.

Today I'm going to write another chapter in the WWII book I'm attempting to write.

Today I'm going to work on preparing some new themes for the message board so they can be used by the membership.

Today I'm taking my broken laptop to a repairman, who will hopefully be able to reinstall the operating system that I somehow broke last year so that now it won't boot up at all.

Right now I'm going back to bed. I'm exhausted, just looking at that list of things I need to do today! LOL!

One thing I do know, though... it's going to be a GREAT day, today!

I hope all of you have a wonderful and productive day today, too. :-)

I HAVE A KITCHEN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The guys (hubby and son) just got my kitchen sink hooked up and working! I have a countertop! I have a working stove and dishwasher! I HAVE A KITCHEN BACK after a LONG, long, L-O-N-G month!

I am definitely doing "the happy dance" tonight!

Thank you, guys! Thank you, thank you, THANK YOU!

Notice the glass tiles laying on the countertop? That is what I will be installing as a backsplash behind the countertop and stove. I can hardly wait to get it up. (As soon as hubby tears out the ceramic tile behind the stove and puts something solid on the wall behind the countertop so there's something for them to stick to.) Note the "beautiful" wallpaper that was on the wall at one time. They had it covered up with a piece of the leftover countertop and the ceramic tiles behind the stove. The new cabinet isn't quite as high as the old one was, so the backsplash that used to be there no longer fits the space. Rather than rink-dink around with it, I'm going to install this beautiful new glass tile instead. I think it will be gorgeous!

(Hurry, hubby! Fix that wall back there so I can get started putting up those glass tiles!)

There's still a lot to do. The new garbage disposal hasn't arrived yet. I ordered it online because the old one was rusted all the way through and was going to start leaking any time. (ANOTHER FLOOD? NO, NO, NO!) Also the new reverse osmosis drinking water system we bought to replace the one that caused the flood and all this mayhem to begin with has yet to be unpacked and installed. My new flooring was shipped yesterday and we should have it sometime next week so I can begin laying the floors in the entire house. It will be a massive job, not one I'm looking forward to doing, but one I am definitely looking forward to having "done." :-)  Here's a picture of a floor in the exact same color/style/pattern/material that we have coming for our house.

https://www.floorstoyourhome.com/addon/popup.htm?/images/vinyl-flooring/vinyl-flooring-full6781.jpg

I think it's absolutely beautiful! We sent for a sample and it's exactly what we wanted. Guaranteed against scratches, defects, etc. for life, 100% vinyl, so water won't hurt it, even in a flood. Yeah! It snaps together and cuts with a razor knife, (you score it with the razor knife, then just "snap" the piece in half, just like cutting glass) so we won't even need a saw to fit it into the nooks and crannies in the rooms.

A house, a house, a house! I may have a real honest-to-goodness house (that doesn't feel like a storage warehouse  workshop) to live in yet, one of these days. Yep. It just might happen yet.

:-)

A Kitchen, A Kitchen… Oh, Where Is My Kitchen?

So I've now been without a floor, kitchen sink, counters, dishwasher or a stove since Feb. 2nd, almost a full month. For those who know me well, and know how much I love to cook, this has been pure torture. I could be certified insane any day now. (LOL!)

One good thing is that we are getting all new flooring for the entire mobile home out of all of this mess. The lower kitchen cabinets had to be replaced with new custom built ones. The new ones are made of solid wood and are much stronger and better than the old, chipboard ones that the water destroyed. I bought all new pretty chrome knobs for upper, lower, and both glass cabinets in the kitchen and dining areas and they look terrific.

Hubby, son and I are doing all the restoration work on the house to save money. It's allowing us to do far more, with much higher grade materials, than we could have done otherwise. When we bought this place, we planned on doing only four things to it.

1) Recoat the roof to stop all leaks. (Not yet done.)

2) Replace the heater/cooling unit with a smaller, more efficient, new model. The current one is three feet tall, four feet deep, and six feet wide. It takes up half our back yard!

3) Rip out the wall-to-wall carpet (YIK! Filthy!) in both bathrooms and replace it with clean, washable linoleum. (Done. Yay!)

4) Replace the toddler height toilet in the main bathroom with a taller one more suitable to old folks with stiff joints that don't bend so easily anymore. (Also done. Oh, joy!)

Instead, almost the entire house has been gutted and is being rebuilt. Sigh. Renovations should be our first names.

I'll be posting some photos soon. Hopefully, I will have a working kitchen again in a day or two. Perhaps I'll even have a working mind again by then, too. LOL!

Good things/progress:

Gorgeous new glass tiles have been purchased for the backsplash wall behind the sink and stove.

Extremely durable, totally waterproof, grayish, weathered barnwood look/feel new vinyl plank flooring has been ordered for the entire house (except the bathrooms which already have lovely new linoleum) and the flooring was all shipped yesterday. I will be able to start laying the new floors in about a week! Oh, joy! (Or perhaps I should say, "Oh, pain!")

New kitchen cabinets, countertop, sink, the stove and dishwasher are all in place, ready to be permanently installed, and the new garbage disposal has been ordered and it should arrive in less than a week. (The old one was rusted horribly inside. It would have caused another leak later on so we are replacing it now...before it leaks!)

I look forward to a day when we can live in this house and just enjoy it, with no renovations necessary. Please tell me this day will come! At this point, I have serious doubts. (Ha, ha, ha!)

Yoiks!

Good grief. It's been two full months since I've posted on my blog and what a super busy two months it has been! We got moved into our "new" (1977) mobile home and sold our smaller trailer to another couple from the park. All looked great! We drove up to Washington and spent two weeks digging a lot of our treasured things out of our storage unit to bring down and use in our nice large mobile home.

Much to our dismay, we discovered the reverse osmosis water filtration system under the kitchen sink had been shooting out a stream of water onto the cabinet doors and the floor, flooding the kitchen, dining room and living room for apparently much of the time we were gone. I immediately called the insurance company and they had me call the Service Master water control people to come in and minimize the damage.

The next week was total mayhem, with big water drying machines placed all over the kitchen, dining and living room floors, as well as underneath the house. After the insurance adjuster came, the carpet, pad and linoleum in those rooms was all removed from the house, along with the wall between the kitchen and living room and all of the lower kitchen cabnets. All needs to be replaced with new, along with the lower half of the wall behind the dishwasher, stove and kitchen cabinets as well as the full wall behind the refrigerator.

As if that weren't enough, before all this happened, we had planned on removing the wall-to-wall carpets from both bathrooms. (WHY do people put carpet in bathrooms? UGH!) Since the house was in a total state of chaos already, we figured we might as well add the bathrooms to the mess.

Big mistake!

It is NOT fun living in a state of complete mayhem. The insurance company sent us a check to cover the needed repairs, but it was to restore everything back to the way it was originally, which was very shoddy, weak, low quality construction on the kitchen cabinets and the two walls, which were made of chipboard and flimsy paneling, respectively. So...we are doing all the labor ourselves and are using the insurance money to purchase higher grade construction materials. So far, it's been a good decision, except for the extra time it's taking for the repairs to happen.

We are still without a kitchen, making mealtimes less than enjoyable. Today I have some $2.97 a square foot vinyl plank flooring samples arriving via UPS that I ordered via the Internet. We hope they will be comparable in quality and color to the extremely expensive flooring I fell in love with at our local flooring place. It is $9.33 a square foot regular price, on "sale" for $5.25 a square foot. Still way too spendy for our budget. I'm crossing my fingers and am eagerly awaiting the arrival of the samples today. If they are good, we will order them immediately, as we can get free shipping if ordered within the next week.

In between the chaotic mayhem all around us, I've been slowly catching up on my backlog of critiques. While we were gone, the park decided I was the perfect person to audit the Association's books, and that needs to be done by the end of this month, so I've been working on that, as well.

And so goes the saga of my life! I've been posting nearly daily on my Facebook page about all of this, and in retrospect, it's been pretty funny. We even had The Evil Toilet follow us from our little trailer! I had posted a link here so you could follow this drama, but then I made the gynormous mistake of trying out Facebook's new Timeline. I wanted to know what it was all about. Unfortunately, once you try it, you are stuck with it. Like it or not. And apparently on March 1st, everyone has to use it. So in protest, I deactivated my Facebook account totally. You will need to come here in the future to interact with me.

No rest for me, for sure, but I have to admit that I'm certainly never bored! And that's my crazy life so far.

Christmas greetings

Tomorrow is Christmas day! It came so very fast this year. (But then, I say that every year!) for all of you who celebrate this holiday, don't forget the true meaning of this day - the birth of Christ - and put Him into your day of celebration.

As for me, I am moving AGAIN, for the third time in three months. I'm not sure I'm going to survive this last move. (lol)

I wish for everyone to have a blessed day, no matter what your beliefs.

:-) Verla

Just One Life to Live

Sometimes life becomes overwhelming and it's hard to feel happy and relaxed. Sometimes the work piled in front of you looms so large you feel crushed. At times life seems to be zooming by on a fast track that leaves you breathless and limp with frustration and regrets.

When that happens, it's time to slow down and smell the roses. Only YOU can make your life full, happy, relaxed and meaningful. Only YOU can determine if you will enjoy the journey of life or not. Each of us has many choices to make every day. If you choose the right ones, your life will be full and meaningful.

When you are lying on your deathbed, with only a week or two left to live, what will you wish you had done differently in your life? Would you have spent more time with your family and friends? Would you have simplified your life so you wouldn't have had to work so hard? Would you have said, "I love you," more often?

What dreams do you have that aren't being fulfilled? We only have one chance to live a wonderful life. That chance begins today, right now. Make sure you are living your life the way you want to. Don't let what other people want or need overpower your own wants and needs. This is YOUR life. Make it count for you.

Framed!

After ten long years, I was finally able to afford to have the original piece of artwork framed that was given to me by Ted Rand (from our book, Homespun Sarah). I love how it looks, I just wish the "non-glare" glass that I paid for was really non-glare. It isn't. I was very disappointed in how much it glares in the light.

I'm REALLY happy with the frame my hubby and I picked out for it, and the colors of the mats, though. They did a great job of framing it, it's just the quality of that glass I'm disappointed about.

This picture certainly looks beautiful on my wall. It warms my heart to see it. I just wish Ted were still alive to celebrate with me. (He died in 2005.) He was a most amazing artist! His watercolors jumped right off the page and pulled you totally into the stories. Thank you, Ted. You were an amazing man and a fabulous artist. I'm so glad I got to meet you in person, and that you illustrated this book.

Ted and I together at a booksigning event, before our book, Homespun Sarah came out. We had a wonderful time that day and I treasure our time together.

Happy memories are a great thing to have. Here's hoping everyone reading this blog post remembers something wonderful from their past today, too. Let's make today a "happy memory" day!