Saints & Relics

I have a dear friend who writes these wonderful blogs. She lives in Albuquerque, NM and has many family stories she shares with us. The latest one was about her aunt who was visited by St. Theresa, however, I'm not sure which one, St. Theresa of Avila or St. Therese, the Little Flower.

Personally, my fav is The Little Flower. She was a ballsy broad who lived into the late 19th c. She was a cloistered Carmalite nun who never performed miracles, a must do if your on the saint list, and died very young at 24 years. However, as a children growing up in Catholic schools, we read many biographies of the saints, Therese being the "rock star" of little girls, we all wanted to be like her, or at least try. I never came close...remember the spitting into my sister's milk incidents and having to go to confession every time I did that or other little "mishaps" my mother found out about...my siblings ratted me out many times!! LOL Well, the closest I came was choosing her for my confirmation name.

So the story goes that she never performed miracles, but she did, right in our cathedrals' shrine to her. My Dad would drop us off in the morning at our school, St. Patrick's, and we would play outside till the Boss nun would ring her brass bell for us to stand still and perform the Pledge of Allegiance in the play ground, then into our classrooms for prayers then work.

One particular morning, my friends and I were playing a game before school was called to order, and these kids came up to us and told us the St. Therese statue in the church was crying. Being the skeptic, I just told them they were crazy and how could a chunk of plaster be crying (I was really bad about that stuff). Ok, so I caved and went inside the small shrine already filled with other students. I used to visit that shrine plenty of times because I liked her story...like I said, she was ballsy. There was also a small glass enclosed "relic" on the stand. That just fascinated me; I imagined people taking chunks of her liver or spleen after her death to distribute to all the churches who wanted a piece of her. Morbid, yes, but I would just let my imagination get the best of me!! LOL

Back to the miracle: so there we stood, watching her and waiting for her to do something. As I was ready to turn away, heard the Boss Bell, there were sounds coming from the crowd...she was crying and she moved her cross laden with roses. She smiled at us and I she spoke to us, telepathically. She told us to continue praying for the world and peace...that we were going to be the generation of many changes and there would be much evil from these changes. Wow, after we all calmed down, we compared what we heard in our brains, and the messages were all the same...spooky huh??? We were told to get our little butts into school by the nazi nuns and pretty much of the day, was buzzing about the little miracle many of us witnessed. Of course, the fish stories began...she handed one of the students her cross, she threw her roses at us, her lips moved, she did cartwheels, you know how that goes??

We were told by the faculty and staff not to speak of it ever again...yea right! And that it was a case of mass hysteria...whatever!!! Later on in the morning, we all lined up for daily mass and as we passed the little shrine on our way into church, there was the principal nun, a Franciscan monk and a Jesuit priest standing there just staring at the statue. So mass hysteria, right??? Me thinks there was more to the story, but again, we were told during the short sermon that we were to discard everything we "imagined" that morning.

So do I believe that saints talk to the humble masses, yeppers...been there, saw that!!! My mother has a 1-800 # to St. Jude...he's done all kinds of wonderful things for her and us. When I was going through my divorce, one night I was crying out of sorrow, fear, you name it, I was crashing. All of a sudden, I felt this peacefulness coming from within me...almost like a warm light. I smelled roses, this lovely fragrance coming from no where. I continued crying, but out of joy and love...that's how I felt. Funny, I had experienced this before when I was desperate to get help for my autistic son, but I didn't realize it then.

I went to the shrine the next day. By then, St. Therese was moved out of her little room and into the main church where she's stuck in a corner in the back...oh and no relic...that's gone too. So I laid a single rose on her little alter and thanked her for being there for me.

So if I'm asked that I believe in all this stuff, I'll vote a beg YES!! So you're saying, "Poor Georgina, she's finally lost all her gray cells to menopause," and yes, I've lost a few here and there...my cells are spread all over as a matter of fact, but I'm not hysterical, a religious zealot (on the contrary, I'm not religious at all), or smoking the the little glass pipe, I'm just one of those lucky people who was visited by a great lady who I needed at the time. She's still around, watching, intervening for me and messing with my scent of smell, but thank God she is!! Peace out.

Whips

So this is what a girl can do when there are -0- distractions. These are my newest creations in the making. I love the little busts I've made in the past and thought I'd make a series of them. The Moonies will be set on to boxes or candle holders...haven't decided yet. I have some polymer stuff ready too, but will wait to show you those later.

It's wet and about 50 degrees outside. They, the weathermen (not the radicals of yesteryear!!) say snow maybe...I say snow, impossible. The thermostat needs to drop a lot before that happens. Anyway, enjoying my time alone, but miss my honey like crazy. Going to have another bowl of my Caldo de Res for lunch and then head back into the studio. Don't worry, Tristan, it's actually just a Mexican version of a beef soup with veggies...no anti-Christ ingredients in there!!! LOL I think you'd like it, with corn tortillas and homemade guacamole and a bit of chopped cilantro...yum...got to go, am hungry all of a sudden!! Peace out.

What is a Dork

Howd-y-do, fellow bloggers. Hope you're having a nice weekend. We've been hit with that front from CA and it's wet and very windy but all this should "blow"out by tonight and we're back to clear blue skies and are mid 50 degree weather, till the next storm hits next week.

Ok, so much for the local weather report. You're probably wondering why such a strange subject matter to blog about, yea, me too!! LOL So I went to my trusty Funk and Wagnall (remember Laugh-In?) and I found no definition for a dork, then I went to my Websters and nothing...not even in my Webster's New Universal Unabridged Dictionary, still no site of the word , "dork." It's not even in the Webster's New World of Roget's A-Z Thesaurus!!!!!! Where have these people been all these years??? So I went to the Wikipedia on Google and here is there definition:

* USA pejorative slang for a quirky, silly and/or stupid, socially inept person, or one who is out of touch with contemporary trends. Often confused with nerd and geek, but does not imply the same intelligence level.

So there you have it. Personally, I disagree, I've known many intelligent dorks in my life and nerds who are geeks and geeks who are dorks and nerds!! I mentioned the "dorks" that I saw at the Celtic Women performance I attended a couple of months ago. They had their official shirts, notebooks and signs to display during the performance...oey vey!! Big dorks!!

Actually, what inspired me to write about this is due to my daughter, Andria. She asked me a couple of weeks ago to send her some pics of herself when she was little. It seems to be a thing on Face Book to display wall photos of oneself as a child, so I scanned and sent them to her. She texted me back and said she "was" a dork. Now I take exception to that, because Georgina did not give birth to any dorks; now after they grew up, that's something else...I take no responsibility for that! I sent her some adorable pics of herself when she was little...take a look:






Now tell me if those are dorky pictures?? Of course not, she was an adorable little girl, a royal pain in the arse, but adorable....as a matter of fact, at 31 she's still a royal pain in the arse, but one of the funniest people I have ever known so I keep her around for comic relief! I don't understand how she can look at these pics and call herself a dork...I just don't see it. Now I look at pics of myself as a child and lordy, that was a dork. I had buck teeth, a cross eye and wore Cinderella brand dresses under "Chubbets!" label. I wish I could show you a photo of myself as a child, but my blogger couldn't read the file, so no pictures of me at this time.

When I was 13, my mother took me to a diet doctor and he put me on all types of pills. I remember it was the middle of winter and I was sweating outside (hmm, still do as a matter of fact!! LOL), I lost 15 lbs. in 2 weeks and my mother decided it was not worth my health to continue...I also hadn't slept for 2 weeks...I wonder why, Mom, could it be that you had me on "speed!!" So as I matured, the weight came off, I had surgery on my cross eye at 9 and then again at 15 and the braces came off around the the same time. I remember walking into our high school dance, wearing my new doo, the Sassoon cut, no braces and no glasses....the dork or in this case, the ugly duckling had turned into a swan. I recall I danced a lot that evening. The whole make-over cost my parents a goodly amount of $$, but it was worth it.

As for my weight, well, menopause took care of that...where's the speed when I really need it now!! LOL My mother, who is 87, still complains about my weight and shows me pics of myself taken about 8-10 years ago and tells me how beautiful I "was!" I tell her I was thin and gorgeous, but I was extremely depressed and on the brink of suicide because my husband of 25 years left me for someone else and I was scared witless about my and my children's future, but hey, I was gorgeous!!! I'm now very happy, life is great, my sweet man is the best, my kids are ok and I'm still on good terms with my siblings, so I'm very fortunate. I'm fat and happy and no longer the dork of years past, even though, my daughter still calls me a dork sometimes for some of the things I do or get into, but she says it with love, "Mom, you're such a dork!" and proud of it!! Peace out.

Cool Giveaway and other Stuff

Above is a pic taken the 26th before my 3 boys were picked up by their father to spend the rest of the holiday with him here in El Paso. We were just fooling around since many of the pics had been so serious...time for a goofy pic. L-R, Sean 9, Me ?, Baby Sammy 5 months, Zach 5, and Ryan, 7.

As they used to say on Monty Python, "now for something completely different." My dear blogger friend, Tristan Robin, is having a wonderful giveaway on his blog. Go over and sign up for the great stuff listed in his contest...you'll love it!!! Also, take the time to read Tristan's blog for those of you who have never visited, he's a great guy, and makes unbelievably wonderful things...fit for royalty!! http://tristanrobin.blogspot.com.

It's been a slow week for creating, I always start out with good intentions to go into the studio, but something always comes up. I think I'm avoiding my happy place and I don't know why. I already have things in the making, but for some reason, I just don't follow it up. I've had quite a few days to create, but not happening. It's not a block, got lots of ideas in my head and on the table, it's almost intimidation on my part. So weird, but I know this too shall pass. I'm not going to say I'm going in today, because I'm afraid I'll curse it, so better to just say, I'll be busy today somehow!! LOL

My grandson, Zach, is a master philosopher and he's only 5 years old. My daughter has been collecting many of his sayings for the past year and they are a hoot. His latest one, well, it wasn't acutally a saying but his answer to a challenge. My grandsons love "Build-A-Bear" and have many animals from said store. He won the grade contest, having the best grades out of the 3 boys, so off to B.A.B. for his prize. He selected the new Valentine dog and as they were printing out the adoption papers, oey vey, he decided he wanted to call it Fluffy. My daughter expressed that was a "girlie" name, yes, she said "girlie." When confronted with this, he pondered for a second then said, "Ok, mommy, I'll call him Mr. Fluffy!" Problem solved!! As they were walking out of the store, he noticed one the dogs, a black Lab, was dressed in a "girlie" outfit. He was shocked since his Lab, Buck, is a boy and told his mother that he didn't know Buck was a girl....she pondered on his reaction and then told him it was Buck's sister, Buckalina!!! Hence, the problem solvers in the family!!!

Well, going to run now and get ready as soon as the princess comes out of the room to start his day (my sweet man can be so "girlie" when it comes to getting ready). I have plans to stay busy most of the day (wink) and later make dinner...enchiladas, red and green. My mother gave me some of homemade red chile sauce and I'm making green ones with the left over tomatoes and green chile. BTW, here's a pic of my menudo, or as my friend, Tristan, calls it, stomach stew!! Was the best menudo I've ever made! Peace out.

Birthday Parties

Yesterday we went to our grandson's birthday party. It seemed every 7 year old in the world was there, but we're glad he's very popular and has many friends...oey. I sat and watched with amazement at these young mothers and their children and thought to myself, "Yikes, that was me at one time!" It seems like a million years ago, but I can recall the excitement of the planning and buying little trinkets for gift bags, and the gift bags...wow, I was one of those "stupor"women that made my own bags...yep, sewed them up and even stenciled them or did some really cutsie thing.

My kids had themed parties....yes, I was that kind of crazy Mom that everyone hated (I can feel and hear you all rolling your eyeballs and saying to yourselves that you knew mothers like me and despised their perky little selves!!). Well, I wasn't that perky.... I decided one year that I would engage the two teenage girls up the street to plan my two kids birthday party (Ian wasn't even a gleam in his father's eye yet), since I didn't want to bother. They planned the whole thing; we went out and bought favours, picked the cake and everything 5 and 7 year old kids would like. At the time I could still get away with teaming the parties up since they were both born in September and just their birthdays were just a couple of weeks apart (Ian was also born in Sept...seemed December was that extremely magical, fertile time for me...I was the Christmas Ho..LOL). It was the best idea I ever had, but there was one flaw, I served wine to the adults...bad, bad, bad decision!!!

I don't remember much after the pinata, but I was told everyone had a great time, thanks to Mickie and Michelle. I recall my neighbor was holding my head as I extracted M&M's, nuts, birthday cake, hot dogs, chips and wine from my body. Now that's a true friend!!! LOL What was really embarrassing, so I assume, was that many of these children, the kindergarten variety, were from my daughter's school, a very nice Southern Baptist institution!!! It was the mother's of the public school variety that really enjoyed themselves!!! Let's hear it for public schools and the wonderful adult volunteer program!!!! Oh well, never did that again.

Then there was the slumber party that I had for my daughter, age 12. OMG, NEVER AGAIN!!! I kept my word on that one. Get 10, prepubescent, premenstrual females and put them in the same living room while the birthday girl's mom and dad are dying in their bedroom with food poisoning...makes for a great time!! Of course there were politics prior to the party. Not all the little girls in her class were invited, especially the popular girl (major brown noser) and she was very upset. My daughter asked me if she should invite her and I being fair told her not only no, but hell no!!! The kid never gave my daughter the time of day but now wanted to be part of the BFF club!!! You know the type. Well, she invited her anyway and the girl brought her some really lamo gift....big surprise...looked like a royal re-gift to me.

Anywhooo, the night was filled with all kinds of drama, my daughter running to her room and locking herself in because someone said something nasty about her and someone ratted on this kid, another little girl ran out of the house in tears, running home, and yet another came down with her period, first time too....Lord, what a night!! The next morning after everything had calmed down including my stomach (cleared that Little Caesar's Pizza in no time) I took orders for McDonald breakfast meals. You should have heard these little be-atches...especially the so called popular one!! I finally told them they were going to get plain meals and if they didn't like it, to enjoy breakfast at home when their parents came to pick them up. So the party came to an end, praise God, and I was never so glad to see them leave, including my daughter who stayed in her bedroom with her loot for most of the day. It was months before I cleared the living room of M&Ms hiding in small, dark corners and under cushions.

So as I watched these brave young mothers tend to their precious little ones with Cheeto laced smiles, mustard stained party clothes, listening to little girls talking about which boy they liked, and wiping tears away due to lost hot dogs that hit the ground before they could get a bun and pinata remnants in their hands and all over the backyard. I told these mothers to just let the kids take the papered parts home and then disappear during the night...with a little note, "Gone to pinata heaven...xxxooo, Sponge Bob's Eyeball." Is humour dead among these mommies or are they taking this all too seriously...the only one that laughed was my honey!! They looked at me as if I were growing lobsters out my ears!!!

Again, I was amazed at all these little stories developing around me and what a great blog it would make for today!! Hence, the topic and subject matter about children's birthday parties . You ask if I miss it, NO WAY!!! Glad to be the observer and story teller of such tales. Oh this is just a side, and totally off the subject, but my stepdaughter's ex-boyfriend is on the most wanted list in El Paso. Glad she broke up with him!! Peace out.

New Screen

So far I love our new computer...has lots of bells and whistles I'm still getting acquainted with. When the sweet man purchased it, they had no more of the screens that came with the computer, so it was ordered. It came 2 days ago and hubby installed it yesterday. Looks like a television set on my desk!!! It's 23" and quite a change from my little screen from my last computer.

Well, the problem is that it's hard to get accustomed to it...it's so friggin' wide!!! I also bought new glasses, after 3 years of looking through glass/plastic. The bifocal is very strong but I know I've been operating with an old prescription and by old bifocal was being used for usual vision...now that's bad!! oey vey! So here I sit squinting at this mega screen, using the new bifocals and wondering where that little arrow is...it get lost in all this wasteland of space and I'm constantly moving the keyboard to make room for the mouse in the search for the arrow.

I know, I'm complaining and I shouldn't...I've got more important things to complain about!!! Today I should go into the studio, but I still have to self-clean my oven. I waited till the temps fell in order go turn it on. It's blowing right now and in the 40's, probably colder with the wind chill...thank God, no snow!!! I know many of you are digging your way out the door every day while we bask in 60 degree weather most of the time. I usually don't even wear a sweater when the weather is like that....t-shirt, jeans or sweats....that's my winter wear. However, it's funny to see all these people wearing gloves, coats, woolly scarves, boots, you get the idea, just because the calender says it's a winter month. To be fair, I'm like my wonderful maternal grandmother, she was always hot, no matter what the temps were outside, so I've inherited that...made for a very miserable menopause....no more hot flashes, just hot!!! LOL When I was in school, I recall all the cute coeds wearing their winter clothes in the Fall semester....it was still 90+ degrees outside, but they had to wear their new clothes. I don't remember dressing like that when I was in school the first time around, in the early 70's. My wardrobe in the summer and fall months were t-shirts, cut-offs and clogs, of course we were in that hippie stage of our lives. I remember some people wore no shoes...ma-roons!!! You can fry on egg on the sidewalks during the heat....I know because most desert kids have tried it in the summer!!! LOL

Well again, I've gone into a tangent....first about the hu-eg screen that shines before me, my new glasses that are forcing me to see better and now the weather and fashion...my English profs would cringe if they read my blogs!! Oh well, time to get the beans on and fire up that oven then go into my happy place and stare at the walls!! Peace out.

Ideas

Wow, I'm really impressed with some of you who are already creating for Valentines Day..where do you get the energy...or I want what you're smoking! A few weeks ago my son and I were at our nearest Dollar General looking for ribbon for our Christmas wrapping and when I went to the other side to see if there were anymore, really picked over, there they were, those horribly tempting, heart shaped little candies and other heart ephemera. Of course here we were buying the left-overs for Christmas and there was Valentines staring right at us...my first reaction was "big-ass eye roll" and the next thing that came out of my ever moving lips were, "Give me a friggin' break!!!"

Valentines is no biggie for me or da hubby...we exchange the usual serious then funny cards, buy good steaks and sides for our meal at home, have a few drinks then sit down and watch a movie or our favorite television programs...yep, we're really very romantic!! LOL But we really love being together in our own living room. I remember when I was younger, Valentines was a very big deal, however, it lost it's luster (literally) after my ex and I split up. I remember Valentines wasn't so important to me. I wasn't one of those women who stayed in their homes, curled up in a fetal position in a corner, rocking too and fro for lack of love. If my kids wanted to do something, we did, if not, I would just treat it as any other day. I remember one Valentine my daughter and I spent it by going to Barnes & Noble...she thought she was a total loser by going to a book store on the night of love and hanging out with her mother, however, I was in hog heaven. Put me in a music or book store and I'm a very happy little camper!!! Another one was back in the late 90's when both my sister and I found ourselves with no hubbies (they left us a mere 2 weeks apart) and really quite happy without them. We spent our Valentines going to one of our favorite little eateries outside the city limits where they served a mean Top Shelf Margarita and tender steak tampiquena!!! We had a blast and speaking of blast, we had lots of margs and got blasted!!! Now that was a fun night!!

Well, I don't know how I tracked to that, I was going to talk about ideas for the upcoming celebrations. I suppose I need to just sit and just let my creative juices flow...so far it's been a parched leetle stream! Need to go to B&N today and start looking at some magazines or craft books to get that spark going again...better yet, stay home and look at all the gazillion magazines and books that I own...now there's a thought. Well, time to run and take my son to buy his father his birthday gift. I'm going to suggest a Play Boy calendar, the perfect gift for the immorally self-righteous!!! hahahaha Peace out.

Happy New Year

Well, here we are, another year, opening windows of opportunities to create and accomplish. This last decade was filled with lots of good stuff and of course, sad stuff too. I got married again in 2001 to a wonderful guy, I graduated from college in 2005, I began my little business in 2008 and got a new computer in 2009!!!! LOL Also, I have been so blessed in meeting new and wonderful people as yourselves, my blogland buds.

I've also been able to reach out and talk to some of these wonderful people via the telephone. Last night I called my buddy, Linda, in Albuquerque, NM. I'd say she was surprised to hear from me, but when you send me your phone #, be sure I'll be calling you "once in a blue moon!!!" I also talked to my other crazy friend, Bernadette, in IN...she was staying in and celebrating with her cats having chips and dips!!!! Nutty lady!! These are just a couple of people I've met through blogging and I can't be more blessed...have a wonderful network of friends, family and a few strangers I've met along the way.

So my friends, I want to let you know how much you mean to me and how you've brought much laughter, fun and sometimes, a bit naughty posts and responses!!! Hope your New Years Eve was a fun one or restful. We spent some of it talking to my step-daughter-in-law and consoling her broken heart. Her mother is not accepting of her stepson who is a little on the active side, but the reason more being he's not her blood, so she takes her blood-related grandson and neglects to to anything with the other. Told her my own son was rejected many times when he was a child by his own flesh and blood due to his disabilities...they just don't get it, and don't want to. So it was quite a heart felt conversation. We've accepted her son as our own and my husbands grandchildren as my own...we may not have much in the way of material things, but we have lots of love...lots. My family also adores our brother's girlfriend's daughter (did you get that??). She is part of our family, but there are those who just refuse to open their hearts to others based on bloodlines...maroons!!

After that, I opened up a bottle of champagne and we celebrated, by then, my stepson came over and we chatted till it was time for them to get back to the house, they live across the street from us. I did some last skimming of the menudo and put it on low and checked on it during the night. I added the chile sauce right before I got on this thing and now I'm ready to get serving. Having a few people over today...told them to bring their own containers to take back this stew of the Aztec Gods to enjoy in their house!! LOL So take care, rest up and get ready for another wonderful year of creating, laughing, and meeting and making new friendships. Peace out.