After threatening all day Saturday we finally had rain last night late.  Started out as sprinkles and by late evening was thundering.  We had a great rain most of the night.

Then rained this morning,  stayed gloomy all day and after dinner rained good and hard again for quite awhile.  During the lunch news today they told us we got 5″ of our 8″ shortage over the weekend.  The rain tonite should have brought another inch or two.

Maybe we’ll get off water restrictions now.  Let’s hope so.

I have started a new blog for my Noah’s Ark Animal Workshop business.

This one will be a little different.  I’ll have pictures, an animal of the week, stories I’m hoping my Dancer and Gym Girl will write for me, history, contests.

I am thrilled with the quality of the animals and the softness and softness of the stuffing even. 

Each animal is handcrafted and comes with a birth certificate and wishing star.   Clothing optional. 

We have several being retired this year.  Look for a list on the blog.

Visit often

 

 

WE finally had the first measurable rain since May 25.  All of the Atlanta area is under drought conditions now.  Some counties can’t water, wash cars, etc. at all.  Our county is on a mon/wed/sat  or tues/thur/sun  and no water outsideon  fridays .

Last night we got the clouds but no rain as other parts of the state did.  Tonite we finally got the lightning and it rained for about 10 min.  Better than nothing but not enough.

And some kids from the apt. complex behind us start a fire in the brush up behind one of our townhouses.  The kids ran away, the firemen which fortunately are just at the end of the street put it out.  They know who the kids are but I don’t know if they caught them yet.

On an upside, with all this heat the pool is finally warm enough to stay in longer than 15 min.

 

She came back Sunday night after a long day of traveling and no food.  Airport food was expensive and lines were long.  So she had one nutrition bar with her and that was about all she had until she got home.  She connected in Charlotte but just barely had time to make her plane, so there was no time to eat there either.  But you can see her pictures on her blog  Flitting Here and There.

She had a great time, learned a lot and was able to fit in some sightseeing. 

I’m glad she’s back.  Being the selfish mom I am I’m glad I have her to talk to again in the daytime.

My daughter Tink is flitting away again.  There’s a conference in San Francisco that her boss was supposed to go to but can’t so they are letting Tink go in her place.  A flights, 3 nights in a Westin with a room to herself and a little time to go sightseeing.  Should be fun for her.  Except the getting up at 5 am  to get to the airiport and find parking.

NOw i have no one to gripe to for 4 days.  Thurs is our housecleaning day and I usually come in and report about how I dislike certain aspects of housecleaning.   When things happen during the day, good or bad we talk about it.   So there will definitely be a void for 4 days.

Have fun Tink!

 

Well I guess it’s time to tell you about the businesses I have.  That’s right, more than one. Why more than one you would ask?  Well,  back in 2001 I just had one, the travel agency.  Then Bush was inaugurated, we had a recession and 9/11 hit.  By the time 9/11 came people weren’t traveling much.  They couldn’t afford it.  And 9/11 just kind of finished it off for the small agencies like mine.  And as I saw my income dwindle without any hope for it to grow again I decided I needed to diversify.

So over the years I’ve been looking for something I could really fall in love with.  And as a result I have joined a few companies.

My passion has always been travel and since I couldn’t travel I thought it would be neat to arrange it for others.  My agency Class Act Vacations has been open since 1993 and we just barely weathered the storms of 2001.  But we hung in there and are picking up new clients.  We specialize in UK/Scotland tours and cruises and travel for women, but we can do all travel except domestic air unless it’s on Airtran.  I’m working on a source for domestic air but it hasn’t come through yet.

A department of Class Act Vacations is Dream Wedding Boutique  .  I have combined wedding attire with destination weddings and honeymoons.

I am a Crew Member for Noah’s Ark Workshops , selling Noah’s Ark Collectibles, an exclusive line of plush animals, outfits and accessories.  We offer the highest quality products in a range of lovable Collectibles, enriching the lives of children.

As  I was looking for a way to stay healthy, a friend led me to Nature’s Sunshine and my site Nature’s Herbal Health was born.  Here I have the wonderful herbal, aromatherapies and homeopathics of Nature’s Sunshine along with a no preservative low fat beef jerky and Millenium Soil(TM) an artificial soil which replaces potting dirt with crystals that turn into a gel and make having indoor plants a delight.  I will be adding a few more healthy products as I come across them.

There’s more but it’s late and this is enough to start with. 

 

I have a new business and a new website.  Actually I have several but tonight I was working on one of the new sites.  Nature’s Herbal Health      Well I couldn’t get it to FTP.  My webhost and I worked for several hours trying this and that.

One of my other friends suggested I do it thru the file manager in the Cpanel.   I mentioned to the webhost that the folder wasn’t opening like it was supposed to.   So she checked it out and saw that the ‘permissions’ (whatever they are)  weren’t right.   She reset them and everything is fine now.

I was just about ready to delete everything and start all over.  thank heavens I didn’t have to.  

 My webhost is absolutely terrific.  She has great hosting packages and has great customer service.  She also has a great domain service.   If you are looking for a new webhost, give her a try.

My ‘babies’ are coming! In July!   I’m so excited.   Dancer and Gym Girl are flying by themselves in July.  They’re excited and so am I but I’m also terrified because they will be flying into the big Atlanta Airport.

  I’ll be leaving home over 2 hours earlier than I need to avoid rush hour traffic to make sure I’m there on time.

We have to be early on both ends to get gate passes so Gentle Hands and I can go right up to the gates.  We also have to stay until the plane takes off.  No biggie for us as we planned to anyway. 

The way this works is that I made the reservations online as an adult.   And fortunately I caught a sale. Then I had to call the airline and tell them it was for unacompanied minor children (UMC).  Then they charged me an extra $25 each way for the services of the fight attendant.

They have to be at the airport 2 hrs early and I have to be 2 1/2 hours early so we can get checked in and get the gate passes.  Then we get to go right up to the gates.

No special documents are needed other than our ID’s and our names have to be on their records the same way they are on our IDs.

Then we put the girls directly in the hands of the flight attendant, hopefully they’ll be sitting up by them and a flight attendant is supposed to escort them off into my loving hands.  

It’s been a year and a half since we’ve seen each other.  We are all so excited.

Gentle Hands says she doesn’t know which they are more excited about.  Seeing me or flying by themselves.

 

 

 

 

I have been trying to find a way to talk on the computer.  So I bought a headset.  It works well, but I can’t leave the computer speakers and the headset plugged in at the same time.  So it means pulling the CPR out, sitting on the floor and trying to find the holes.

I broke down and bought a microphone and finally plugged it in while Tink was here to make sure I didn’t blow up the puter.  And Gee whiz, it works, beautifully.   It has an off/on switch but I don’t have to hit a talk button. 

A friend and I were talking on the new Yahoo voice messenger and she could even hear me typing.  I don’t have to have it right at my mouth. It’s on the desktop and she could hear me fine.

I love it when something works the way it is supposed to!

Well, Tink has come and gone.  We had a blast while she was here.  We cooked, we shopped, we talked, we played. 6 days is just not enough time when two of them are taken up with arrival and departure at the airport.

We found a great outlet mall with over 140 stores. Premium Outlet of Georgia in Dawsonville.  It was about an hour from here and Mapquest had us on scary back roads. We spent a bit of money there.  Found the Ricky Nelson CD I had been looking for.  We covered all the stores and found a lot to buy.   Wound up with a dress from Coldwater Creek, books from the Borders Outlet store.  Loved the Bass shoe store but it didn’t have the sandals I was looking for.

We went to the Kennesaw National Battlefield Park to see if it is something Dancer and GymGirl would be interested in.  The visitors center was great but the actual battlefield is about 15 min. away from the visitor center and a hike into the woods.  So we decided that maybe another year or so and they’ll be more interested.

We also had lunch at Longhorn’s Steakhouse and saw the DaVinci Code movie afterwards.  Lunch was great but way too much for one person.  We split the beef tips and a fantastic slice of CookieDough Cheesecake.   Mmm-mmm good.  I had won a giftcard from an open house at our complex.

The movie was very good.  Almost exactly like the book. Director Ron Howard didn’t stray too far from the book. It was 2 1/2 hrs from the start of the ‘coming attractions’  to the end of the movie.

I didn’t even cry too much when she left.  I had to talk to an Airtran customer service person about Dancer and GymGirl flying as unattended minors and I couldn’t do that crying.

We’re hoping Tink will be able to come back in October in time for the Stone Mountain Highland Games about an hour from here.