She Was An American Girl

She Was an American Girl: 

TMI-too much information. 

Bargain Basement:

Things I have for sale.

West Coast Scrapper:

My creative side

 

My son's tattoo, updated.

Garage Sale: 11/14/09

Garage Sale this Saturday, November 14

10 a.m. to 1 p.m. No early birds! Turkey Fryer $15 Camp Chef Stove $150 Bird House $3 Greatland Camping Tent $30 Radio Shack AB Switch $7 Sleeping Bags $5 each Options Rolling Scrapbook Storage $40 and more......

(this is NOT a scrapbook yard sale) 533 San Miguel Dr. Corona 92879

I was able to get about 30 minutes to clean my garage this afternoon.  I'm very excited to get it ready for my scrapbook classroom, but YUK, so much dirt and icky garage crap in there.  I have a lot of work ahead of me.

I'm only able to work out there when Ryan is home and if he's downstairs watching television or something, so he can keep an eye on Mom.

If no one were watching Mom, she would get into everything.  She still manages too, even if we are 'watching' her.  She'll turn burners on and cook forks and knives, or like the last time, she put the coffee maker carafe on the burner and the handle melted to the burner.  She'll turn water on full blast and then leave it.  She'll lock the dogs in a room so they can't get out to go potty and they scratch at the doors.  She'll glue things together or take my paper craft projects apart, feed the dogs food they shouldn't have, cook a meal in the oven of ketchup cheese and straws.

I knew this was going to happen eventually, but didn't know where or when.  Yesterday, Ryan had a girl over from school.  They were working on homework in the kitchen when Mom went in the kitchen and took her top off.  Poor Ryan.

I have no money to hire someone to watch her so I can get things done outside. 

If you haven't read already, in one of the many places I've been trying to post, I'm trying to sell some of my stuff.  I have come up short on money for my bills.  So, if you could please pass my blog address around to anyone who might be interested, I would greatly appreciate it.

http://robinredd.typepad.com/bargain_basement/

I know I'm beginning to sound annoying with this (because it's annoying me, too!) but I am trying to do everything I can to not have to pay my bills with a credit card.

Obviously, this also means I get no respite care, so please excuse my rants as I have a nervous breakdown before all this is done and over with.  I know it's going to work out totally fine but it'll be at least a month until I see some relief.

Thanks so much for listening to me!  Writing is quite an effective therapy for me and it's even better if I can publish it for anyone to see.  I do have some therapeutic journaling done that I cannot publish but it's just not the same.  This way, I feel like there might be someone out there listening to me.

Peace Out!  

When Adry came over to stay with Mom while I went out on that photo shoot, she cleaned my floors spic and span.  I get up this morning...okay, more like afternoon than morning but still legally morning, to find all the floors a huge mess with clumps of dirt all over the place.

I get up to make mom her medicine sandwich and find the coffee pot melted onto the electric burner on my stove.  I came to get on the computer and I see my beads are spilled all over the place.

I realize the dogs are tracking in all this muddy dirt but I don't understand how.  We only have a small patch of dirt in the back yard.  The concrete is wet like someone had been watering it.  Who?  How?  When?

I had to re-mop all the floors, pick up the tiny beads from my table and on the floor.  Still need to figure out a way to remove the coffee pot from the burner.

Mom is a spit-fire today. 

I can't wait for Ryan to get home from school so I can take the dogs in to get groomed, then go outside and clean up all the dog messes.

Night shoot in old town Orange

Tonight I met up with the The Corona Nature Photography Hiking Group in down-town Orange.  This was the first time for me with this group, the second time with ANY meet-up group.  So far, two out of two meet-ups were a lot of fun!  I hope to get to do more.  Everyone is so nice, friendly and helpful. Even though my shots weren't that great tonight, I did learn a lot.

 

 

 

The photo group.

 

The homeless.

Note to self:  Give small bills in exchange for taking photos.

Bad News, Good News

Good news is that the nurse came from Home Health to determine what kind of help mom needs, if any.  Bad news, she was 4 hours late and I had to stand up my dinner date with my friend, Becky.  We will make up for it SOON!  Hopefully, Sunday!

Good news, the nurse is going to request that a nurse come in three days a week to give mom a shower, dress her, feed her, take her on a walk, etc.  This will give me time to take a shower as well!  I will be able to pick up dog poop and keep the yard looking and smelling nice.

I don't know how much longer it will be until this service starts.

Bad news, Mom is getting up and getting ready for the day but it's midnight and I want to go to sleep.

Good news!  Roger has started transforming my garage into The West Coast Scrapper's Scraproom!  It should be done by the end of the week.  At that time, I'll start to see how many people we can comfortably fit in there.

(i feel like life is passing me by)

As Mom paces back and forth all day long, she calls out people's names.  I think they are people we 'work with.'  But I think it's funny the names that she comes up with.  Names I've never heard her say in my life, Dennis, Megan, Nancy.

Sometimes they are mean to her and make her feel bad, so I don't really like them.

Another thing Mom does that is interesting is that she calls for her mom.  But she calls it like she must have when she was a little girl, Mama', with the accent over the second syllable. 

I'm sorry.  I can't put her in a home.  I just can't.  Maybe later.  For now, I'll put her on more meds and me on more meds and then we'll be fine.

Ghost Walk

Last night I went on my first 'hike' with this Palm Springs & Inland Empire Hiking Meetup Group.  It was a walking tour of Haunted Riverside.  The 'leader' of the group is an avid hiker and boy, can he walk!  It wore me right out, but that's no surprise as I don't get out often.

We started at The Mission Inn.

 

We walked past this cute taco stand.  Most of my pictures turned out really bad.  I need a major lesson on shooting in low light.  So, I'm asking you, now, to please excuse the blurry images.

 

We went through some BEAUTIFUL neighborhoods.

 

 

At this point, they went up to Mt. Rubidoux.  The hill was too steep for me to go on after the huge walk we just made.  I stopped here, along with a few others, and made a detour.

 

We continued on to the cemetery just as a classical band was finishing up.  Who would have thought?!

 

Me with my sopping wet hair!  Look, sleeveless.  And, it was a chilly night.  But not for this hot mamma!

 

There were about 70 people on the walk.

 

We ended up at Tio Taco for dinner and drinks.

 

I had TWO of these 32 oz watermelon juice drinks.  They were so, so yummy, and really quenched my thirst.  It left no room for actual food.

 

 

I'd like to take that route sometime during the day to take better pictures and to have a better look at the beautiful homes.

After going to the doctor, yesterday, and changing Mom's meds up a bit, I thought today would be better.  Everything is still the same.

I'm not ready to put her in a home.  At the same time, I can no longer handle taking care of her by myself.  Maybe there will be a place that can take her half the time.  Like one week on, one week off, something like that.

I'll start making calls to see what options there might be.