Seasons

I have to say that I loathe summer. I mean it -- I hate heat. I have something called Graves' Disease, which basically means that I'm hot all the time, among other things. So as hot as a normal person is in the summer, I'm like, twice that. I hate it. I sleep with a fan blowing directly on my naked ass. It's terrible. Poor Mike always needs a space heater.

So I'm not looking forward to it being here. I don't like the 4th of July, and I'm just too fat for a bathing suit. Mike won't have vacation time, so we can't go on a family-type vacation. What the heck is the point of summer?

I love the fall. I love the smell of the leaves as they decompose. I know it sounds gross, but it smells wonderful. I love the colors - they're great redhead colors. I love the coolness of the weather, and Samhain. I feel like my whole being wakes up during the harvest season. It's the most beautiful time of the year for me. I wish it could be like that all the time, but then I guess it would lose its beauty.

I don't really have an opinion on spring or winter. Mike is one of those people who gets depressed through the winter months - he hates the cold. I don't care about it. As long as I don't have to drive on ice, I'm cool.

But man, I am so not ready for summer.

Survey

I got this in my email, and I try not to send them back cause I just don't like sending junk mail around, but I figure, if you're reading this you want to know anyway, right? =)

So here goes..

1. What time is it? 8:11pm

2. What is your name? Sara Nichole Reno Mabin

3. Where do you live? Kansas City, Missouri

4. Mothers name? Tracey

5. What is your Favorite drink? alcoholic: Vodka/Tonic w/lime; Non-alcoholic: Pepsi or Coffee

6. (a) Tattoos? someday -- Mike and I want to get matching Pisces tatoos
( b) Body piercing? just my nose

7. How much do you love your job-scale of 1 to 10? 8 -- it's a pain in the butt, but I get to scrapbook, so I guess it all works out.

8. Birthplace: St. Luke's Hospital, Plaza, Kansas City

9. Favorite vacation spot: Scotland; Mustang Island, TX; what used to be New Orleans

10. Ever been to Africa? I left my brains down in Africa

11. Stolen any traffic signs? Not that I remember, but my teen years are pretty much a blur. It seems like I remember relocating some garden gnomes, but I wouldn't swear to that, either.

12. Ever been in a car accident? oh yes.

13. Croutons or Bacon Bits? Croutons

14. 2 Door or 4 Door car? Wishing for: two door; Currently have: four door

15. Salad Dressing? Ranch

16. Favorite Pie: Heath Crunch from Perkins

17. Favorite Number? 8 (dunno why -- it's just a number I always use)

18. Favorite Movie? This one is hard. I'm currently all kinds of into "Elizabethtown." The LOTR trilogy changed my life forever. I love "The Saint." I can't even come close to accurately answering this question, though.

19. Favorite Color? Purple

20. Favorite Food? Fried Chicken (my father-in-law's especially -- it's phenomenal)

21. Favorite day of the week? Monday (it's when my weekend starts)

22. Favorite brand of body soap? I like to have stuff custom scented at Perfect Scents on the Plaza -- ooooh, do I sound stuck-up or what? It's an indulgence.

23. Favorite TV show? Fraggle Rock, if we're talking EVER. Currently, I guess The Boondocks.

24. Toothpaste? Vanilla Crest -- or is it Colgate? I don't know. It's something Vanilla flavored.

25. Most recently read book? The Witching Hour by Anne Rice

26. Favorite Smell? Lilacs, laundry in the winter (like when you walk by someone's dryer vent outside)

27. What do you do to relax? coffee and a book, or scrapbooking

28. Fast Food? Chipotles is pretty good for fast Mexican food.

29. When was your last hospital visit? Giving birth to Zion.

30. Message to your friends reading this? Hey -- you're the one who came to read my blog!

31. How do you see yourself in 10 years? Still married, playing taxi-driver to Zion and (hopefully) his friends.

32. What do you do when you are bored? Bored? Do people have time to be bored?

33. What presents do you enjoy receiving? I love presents that people put a lot of thought into, especially homemade stuff.

34. Furthest place you will send this message? Not sending it -- blogging it. =)

35. Who will respond the fastest? I dunno.. whoever happens to leave comments about it, I guess.

I just realized that #36 is missing.. dunno what happened to it. Someone must have deleted it from the email.

37. What time is it now? 8:24pm

38.Who is your best friend? Gina Wagner

39. When is your birthday? March 6, 1980

40.Been arrested? Yes. They took my shoelaces and it pissed me off.

41. Got a speeding ticket? Many.

42.Ever smoked? No.

43.Rent or Own? Rent-to-own.

44.Pen or Pencil? Depends what I'm doing -- sometimes I prefer a pencil, but most of the time pen.

45.Any animals? Clover (calico kitty), Thor (long-haired black kitty), Storm (demon-possessed black kitty), Loki (Maine-coon kitty), Rufus (stray mutt that we picked up at my work) and Isis (beagle/pitt-bull mix)

46.How many pairs of shoes do you own? not many

47. favorite song? Cooling by Tori Amos

48. Ever cheated on a test? no
Boyfriend? yes, when I was a teenager.
Husband? no
Race? no

49. Favorite actor? Orlando Bloom and Viggo Mortenson
Favorite actress? Liv Tyler and Kate Hudson

50. Do you attend church every Wed. and Sunday? Saturdays -- afternoon mass.

51. How old were you when you lost someone close to you that u remember? My Mommom died when I was 11, and my friend Shelley died when we were 19.

52. Did you graduate? Yes.

53. College? A little.

54. How old were you when you got engaged? To Mike, 23.
Married? 24
Children? 24
Divorced? Hopefully never.

55. Ever snuck out of your parents house? No, but I certainly snuck some people in.

56. Credit cards? Nope -- they're the devil's tools. =)

57.1st date? 14 years old -- Brett Spring. We saw Demolition Man at the Blue Ridge Movie Theater (it's closed now - I feel so old).

58. Every one has one? A super embarrassing story..God, these happen about once a day, and usually involve falling down stairs.

59.Basketball, Baseball, Football, Hockey, etc? I hate sports.

Whew, that was fun, and it took up an hour of my time. Now I gotta go find something else to do...

I'm Losing My Mind Again

It is so freaking sad when you're excited that the cable company is on the phone telling you that your bill is late. I miss adult interaction. I'd pretty much take anything right now. It's not that I don't adore my son and my sister, but sometimes, I just miss talking to grown-ups.

My friend Darryn that lives in Taos, NM, is the BEST for adult conversations. We talk about different religions, philosophy, books, naturalist stuffs.. I miss him so much. When he calls, it brightens my whole world. The problem is that he doesn't have a phone. He's my hippie friend. He just kind of drifts, so he doesn't really have a permanent address, either. If his parents didn't live here, I don't know that I'd ever see him. But I miss him.

The last time he came to town, he brought us this really cool drum that he made. It had some Native American symbols on it, and he said it was a "marriage ceremony drum." We hung it on the wall. I wish he would come back soon. I have so many books to share with him, and I've learned so much about Hinduism recently.. Mike just doesn't like to talk about that stuff.

So anyway, this lack of adult time is driving me nuts. I think I may have to go lock myself in my room and watch something artsy. Maybe even with subtitles. Just to make me feel superior. =) I'm just in a mood.

Elizabethtown Soundtrack

Everyone should own this. It's phenomenal.

Kerry's Banner

This is the banner I made for Kerry-bear. I think she liked it. Could these kids be any cuter? For real..

Road Tripping

My dream, for like a gazillion years now, had been to drive from here to Alaska. I'm kind of sad that John & Debbie are moving to Pennsylvania, cause I always figured I could just drive up there to see them -- that would be my excuse for making the trip, right? But now they're in Pennsylvania, and I'd be driving to Alaska just for the sake of driving to Alaska. And that wouldn't be a terrible thing. I'd just have to do it by myself.

The one time I mentioned driving to Alaska to Mike, his response was, "Yeah, and after we get done doing that, let's go ahead and swim to France." In case you missed it, he wasn't very positive about the idea. At one point in time, I actually had a trip-tik thing planned. I picked out the little towns I would stay in, and I knew how long it would take me to get where.

I just keep thinking how beautiful it would be, driving through the mountains and all the rugged terrain, and there's just not anything up there. No big cities, no people -- just moose. =)

Maybe one day I'll actually get to do it. A girl can dream.

Busy Weekend

So this weekend just started out wrong. The week wasn't good to start with, and by Friday, we had only partially fixed one car, I still had no mini-brads, and our budget was looking worse and worse by the second. Enter Creating Keepsakes. Ok, people. This is an actual scrapbooking convention. Until recently, I had no idea such a thing existed. How exciting is this, right? (Well, ok, not very, if you're not a scrapbooker)

Friday, I get an email from my former youth pastor. He's driving from Alaska to Pennsylvania, moving his family to his new position, and he'll be in KC Saturday evening. Now, bear in mind, I haven't seen him in over a decade. This is big stuff, right? I pretty much gotta go. So now, there's CKC, two broken cars, and John coming from Alaska. I can handle this. I'm a mom. Moms multi-task. It's what we do, right?

Well, I'm sure you've deduced by now that I didn't get any sleep at all. We headed to CKC -- Zion was actually having a worse hair day than usual. This is noteworthy because as I was wandering around the KCI Expo Center, people kept calling, "Sara! Oh my gosh, I recognized Zion and just assumed that was you!" He's apparently very distinctive.

At one point, Kristin spotted us and called us over. This was actually excellent timing -- Zion wanted out of his stroller. Of course, as soon as I unfasten his safety belt, he takes off running. My brain tells me that the logical reaction to this is to run after him. Here we are, both of us running across the KCI Expo Center, me in my moccassins (they don't have soles -- just leather on the bottom). I catch up to him and skid to a stop while I'm making a grab for him, only to find that my feet don't quite skid to the same stop my body and mind are telling them to. My feet fly out from under me and I land flat on my boo-tay (yup -- concrete floor). Zion's cracking up while he's running even further away from me. The lady staffing the booth in front of me is yelling, "Mom, are you ok?" and from behind me, I can hear Kristin (whom I've officially known all of about 3 minutes) yelling, "Hey Sara! Zion's supposed to do the falling, not you!"

The rest of the day went better. I just really need to go to bed now.