For a proper entry.  Don't you agree? 

I'm been doing alright up until about 5 minutes ago.  My little girl Mandy has recuperated well from her surgery.  In fact, I had Mandy and Chili groomed on Saturday.  But, I was just holding Mandy and I fear that I have found another tumor on her.  <sigh>  NOW WHAT DO I DO?  This is so heartbreaking.

Onto other things.....on Friday night there were some fires going on in the area.  When I left to run an errand on Friday evening I was SHOCKED to see the skies full of smoke.  The sun was gone, I swear I thought the world was coming to an end!  Check this video out:

 

The sun was such a bright orange color too.  It was WEIRD!

 

Here were my activities on Saturday:

• WW meeting at 6:30am


• Went home to pick up my babies to bring them to the groomers


• Back to my house to pick up Sue


• Donut shop for a bagel


• Picked up Jessica so she could hang out with Sue and I for the day and then spend the night


• Garage sales galore!  That was until Jessica pooped out!


• Back to Jessica's house to drop off a KICK A$$ bargain that I bought for Matthew:  A Rescue Heroes Firestation for $12.00!!  Pierce and Peyton are playing with it below:

         

• Grocery store to pick up a few items


• Ross


• Lunch


• Payless Shoe Source


• Picked up my babies from the groomers


• Back to my house to drop Sue off and change so Jessica and I could go to a my Goddaughter Nazzy's graduation party.

Mind you, this was all before 2:00pm!! 

Here are Nazzy, Jessica and I:

My sis Debbie and bro-in-law Robin were also at the party:

Look at what Nazzy got for her graduation from her parents:

I LOVED the bike - it is so retro!

After the party Jessica and I went back to my house and played with the $2.00 Connect Four (BRAND new mind you) game that we picked up earlier in the day.  At 8:00pm we headed out the door AGAIN to go see Jenny and Chris do a march at a Portuguese club.  It was so cool to watch the young people do the march and embrace their culture. 

Here are Jenny and Chris after the march:

Jessica and Jenny:

The next morning Jessica and I went to Mass and then to her house for a Housewarming Party/Father's Day breakfast.  Sue and I went to Walmart after breakfast and guess what I did when I got home.  If you guessed that I took a long nap, then you were right!  Dinner was at Denise's house and that was my weekend.

My tattoo is healing quite nicely.  I like how the crucifix peeks out below the sleeve of my shirt:

OK, time to get back to loving and hugging my little girl.  I hope you are all doing well.  Be sure to hug your families.

"She is your friend, your partner, your defender, your dog.  You are her life, her love, her leader.  She will be yours, faithful and true, to the last beat of her heart.  You owe it to her to be worthy of such devotion".
~Unknown

YES, I DID!  "THEY" say that tattoos are addicting.  I said that I would never get another one again. 

Well........."THEY" were right:

The rosary is for my mother.  The idea came to me on Mother's Day when I was really having a bad day missing my mother.  Mom would pray the rosary everyday after my father passed away up until 3 days before she passed.

I was following a VW bug yesterday after getting the tattoo and the license plate had "ADA" on it and I believe it was a sign from my mother saying that she liked the tat.  In case you didn't know, Mom's name was Ada.  So there ya go! 

Now onto designing my NEXT tattoo.  Never say never, right??

I hope you all are doing well.  I've been absent, kind of down and out.  Mandy's pathology report came back from the last tumor the vet removed and now my little girl has another kind of cancer.  Some type of sarcoma.  I'm taking Mandy to the vet after work today for a check up and I'll get more info then.  Breaks my heart as I love that little girl so much and she had a rough 1st part of her life.  I can't think about that, I've got to think of the positive and the life that she has had with me.  <sigh>

Last, but not least........Here is a photo of Taylor that Kathryn took that I JUST LOVE:

OK, onto work stuff.  You all have a wonderful day and be sure to hug your families, human and furry.

Tattoos are like stories -- they're symbolic of the important moments in your life.
Pamela Anderson

Thank you all for your comments from my entry yesterday regarding my little girl Mandy. 

I decided to have the vet do the surgery today.  All went well, thankfully.  Now let's hope and pray that the tumors don't return EVER again. 

I took the video below of my nephew Matthew when we were at the vet on Saturday.  Mandy was roaming the room, checking it out while we were waiting for the doctor to come in.

(Thank you Bonnie for putting the video on my site).

Was that cute or what?!  Matthew will be 5 years old in one month, I have no idea how he memorized that.  Amazing, eh?!

I feel like saying I hope you all have a Happy Hump Day tomorrow but that was today!  I'm out of sorts because of it being a short week.  Wahoo to that! 

Unfortunately I am going to a funeral tomorrow for a neighbor that passed away.  It was weird that I picked up the paper today to read the obits and lo and behold, there was an obituary for our childhood friend's mother that passed away last week.  I haven't seen these friends in YEARS.  Maybe 20 years ago when I got married. 

Now then, you all have a wonderful Thursday and be sure to hug your families.

Each contact with a human being is so rare, so precious, one should preserve it.
Anais Nin

Conflicted:  having or experiencing emotional conflict.

Howdy Folks - I hope you all had a good, long weekend.  Let me share with you how mine started.  Friday night I was bonding with my little pooch girl Mandy and I discovered she had another lump in the same area where she had surgery less than two months ago.

So, when the vet opened on Saturday morning I called to make an appointment for her.  I brought her in at 12:45pm and I left her there while they took X-rays.  The Dr. said to pick her up at 3:15pm.  So I brought Jessica and Matthew (remember I was babysitting them on Sat/Sun?) to eat lunch and shop.  We were at Payless Shoe Source when I received the call from the vet that I was able to pick my little girl up. 

The good news is that the cancer has not spread to her chest area.  SO the Dr. scheduled surgery to remove the lump for this Wednesday. 

Now then, the conflicted part of this entry is.....do I put my little girl Mandy through this surgery again?  What will that give her?  Another two months (or less) without any tumors?  She bounced back from surgery really good last time but will this be the case again this time?  <sigh>

My little girl is doing good right now.  She is eating and taking care of her business like normal.

So, what do I do?  What would you do? 

I'm so confused............ <sigh>

"No matter how little money and how few possesions you own, having a dog makes you rich." - Louis Sabin

 

HAP HAP HAPPPPPY FRIDAY!  A THREE-DAY Weekend at that!!  Woo hoo!

Here we are with a video of my nephew Pierce.  He was in a choir (volunteer) at school and they had their Spring concert on Wednesday evening.  I was so thrilled when I saw that the 3 boys that were in the choir had a little solo.  Scuse the shaking of the video, I was standing up and watching them without paying attention to the camera.  DOH! 

I love the action that is going on in the background - girls fidgeting, yawning, chatting it up!  Gotta love the wee ones!

PET PEEVE:  What the freak is wrong with people these days?  When I had drivers training, back in the day, I remember learning that when you hear a siren whether it be a police car, fire truck or ambulance, you get the heck out of the way.  You PULL over to the side of the road.  Nowadays a lot of people JUST DON'T DO THAT.  It really P's me off when I see people just going on their merry ways when a siren is BLARING in their ears. 

Now for some photos from my visit with Taylor two weeks ago:

 

Here is Taylor at her music class:

 

If you look close enough, you can see me in the reflection of the ball:

Taylor was SO tired when I brought her home after going to a park.  She couldn't even climb up the stairs, I had to carry her!

My little Taylor Bug is growing up, isn't she?

SO, weekend plans....My niece Wendy and her hubby bought a new home so I will be taking care of Jessica and Matthew tomorrow and Sunday while her parents and grandparents remodel their kitchen.  YEAH!  What fun!

You all have a great weekend and be sure to hug your families.

"True heroism is remarkably sober, very undramatic. It is not the urge to surpass all others at whatever cost, but the urge to serve others at whatever cost."
-- Arthur Ashe

 

Gosh, when am I going to get used to that question?? 

This is a real conversation that happened a couple of weeks ago when I was taking care of Taylor:

        Little girl at park (LG):  Are you her grandma?
        Me:  No, I'm her Godmother?
        LG:  Are you a Fairy Godmother?
        Me:  Yes, I am.
        LG:  Fairy Godmother's have a wand.  Do you have one?
        Me:  Yes I do.  It's called a credit card and it's in my purse.

The next day I was at Emily's birthday party and TWO, not just ONE, but two little girls asked if I was Emily's grandmother.  YIKES!  WHEN am I going to accept reality and realize that I AM IN FACT old enough to BE a grandmother??  Maybe it's because I don't have human children that I don't think that I can be old enough to have grandchildren.  My mother became a grandmother at the age of 46 when my sister Debbie married Robin and he brought Wendy into the family.  She was four years old at the time.  Two years later my nephew Shane was born and the rest is history.

Onto another subject.  As I mentioned in my previous entry - we had our church fiesta over the weekend.  We had a new game booth that was kind of interesting.  At first I thought that the booth was selling garage sale type items.  But in fact, it was a Portuguese game.  What they did was roll small pieces of paper about 1"x1".  On some of the papers there was a number on it.  If you got a piece of paper with a number on it then you won a prize.  It was fun playing the game, kind of like a raffle.  I won a few (weird) items that were donated to the booth.  One of them was a package of 3 different sizes of potpourri.  It barely had any scent to it so I turned it over to see if there was a date on it and lo and behold, there it was.  It was from 1983!  WHAT THE FREAK was the person thinking donating that to the booth?  Would the person that donated it want to win it herself/himself?!  Weird!

Doggone it, it's time for me to begin my workday.  You all have a Happy HUMP Day and be sure to hug your families!

 

     Hey Folks - Are you LOVING my new look?  I've got to thank Bonnie for making my site pretty.  I swear, she should go into business doing this!!  She is SO creative, isn't she?

     Ok, the splainin' I've got to do is regarding my old name, "Loseryesyouare".  When I first started this Xanga site I only did it to spy on my friend's daughter.  It was actually the daughter's friend that I was spying on.  At the time she was 12 years old and she was "seeing" a 16 year old boy.  I was disgusted with the young man so I made up the name as if he was the "loser".  BUT, I found out later that the girl was lying and told him that she was older then what she really was.  By that time I had already started making friends here on Xanga and it was too late to start up a new Xanga.

     So there you go, now you all know how the name, "Loseryesyouare" came to be.  Also, thank you ALL for the comments regarding my new name.  You are all so sweet!

     And now for my weekend activities......This past weekend was our church fiesta.  It was SO FREAKIN' hot this weekend.  I didn't know if I was going to make it on Friday night.  It was horrific.  Thankfully by Sunday it wasn't too terribly unbearable.  I was just glad that we didn't have rain like we did two years ago.

     I took today off as a vacation day because I am usually beat the day after the fiesta ends.  SO, Denise and I went out for lunch and then shopping afterwards.  I'm going to be doing a lot of work to my house (tile in the entire house, a/c, re-piping under the house, new appliances in the kitchen and painting the inside of my house.  I've lived here for almost 20 years and have not done a doggone thing to it, so it's overdue.  LONG overdue in fact.  Denise and I went to Home Depot to check on some items. 

     OMG - You are all NOT going to believe this.  My family and I are BIGTIME reality TV fans.  SO, when Big Brother ended a few weeks ago my sister found out that some items from the Big Brother house were put on eBay.  Since I'm remodeling my house I needed a new sink so I decided to bid on the bathroom sink that they used on the show.  And, I won!

My sis Debbie also got a piece of Big Brother too:

     These items are located in the same town that Brianna lives in so she will have them picked up and then we will get down to So Cal sometime to pick them up.  I am SOOOO excited!!  I know, I'm weird!  Heh heh........

    TIme for me to hit the sack as it's back to reality tomorrow.  Back to work.  You all have a wonderful Tuesday and be sure to hug your families!

"Each friend represents a world in us, a world possibly not born until they arrive, and it is only by this meeting that a new world is born."
- Anais Nin

     I had a bit of a rough Mother's Day.  At Mass our priest did a special blessing for the mother's, stepmother's and grandmother's.  He forgot to mention Godmother's.  SO, being that I was an emotional wreck as it was, I was teary after the blessing because I was feeling so left out.  After mass I told the priest that he forgot to mention Godmother's and then Sue said, "Will you give this Godmother a blessing?"  So he did.  And I broke down.

SO, that brings me back to the subject of the title of this entry, "WHO AM I"?  Well, I am not a mother.  I've been pondering the reason why I was never blessed with children.  I do not know why, at the age of 47 that I have been thinking about that, but I have. 

I am an aunt and Godmother and I take that job very seriously.  I LOVE children (as some of you might have noticed).  SO, I have decided to change my Xanga name to what Taylor calls me:

T I A _ M A D R I N A

Some of you may not know that Tia_Madrina is spanish for Aunt_Godmother. 

THAT is who I am.    Loseryesyouare is no longer in existence.  I hated that name anyway!!

I hope you all have a great weekend, be sure to hug your families and remember to keep our friend Jill in your thoughts and prayers.

 

Hello Xanga Friends & Family - Please go to my Xanga friend Jill's site and give her your love and support.  She just lost her son Michael today to the same disease that her son Bob passed away from (Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy).

My heart hurts for Jill as burying a child (LET alone two children) is just wrong.  Please go to her site and give her some support.

 

My nephew Shane is here from Wisconsin!  YEAH!!  He just got a new job and will start it next week so he decided to come out to SJ to visit with family and friends before he begins the new job.

Scuse my absence people.  I have no idea what has happened and where I have been.  I think I was abducted by aliens.    I can't believe that it's been over one week that I have done a proper entry.  DOH!

Last Saturday our family got together at Debbie's house to visit with her former foreign exchange student Kenichi from Japan.  The last time we saw him was in 2002 when my mother was terminally ill.  He got to see her before she passed away, thankfully.  He really liked and respected my mother.  Anyway, he finished college in Australia and decided to visit friends here in the U.S. before he has to join the real world and start working.

Kenichi originally lived with my brother Richard and his family before he lived with Debbie.  My brother was going through marital problems so Debbie offered her home to Kenichi so he could finish out the school year and not have to go back to Japan.  Here are Christopher and Kenichi when he first moved into Debbie's house (taken in 2000):

Kenichi could not BELIEVE how big my nephews Nick and Jon had gotten since the last time he saw them.  I wish I had a before/after photo to show you - Unfortunately I just have the pic from Saturday:

Here are Sue and Kenichi (Kenichi asked if Sue was still crazy.  Psst...yes, she is!):

Kenichi with my niece Wendy and her family:

Kenichi's American parents Debbie & Robin:

My brother Richard and his family (my brother David is on the right):

Kenichi, Pierce and I (Kenichi was going to school here when Pierce was born.  Pierce was the first baby Kenichi ever held.  He said on Sunday that at this time he is the ONLY baby that he has ever held!):

Breakfast on Sunday morning - Saying goodbye to Kenichi:

On Sunday afternoon I became a Godmother to Giada (Sue's grandbaby), so now Sue and I are officially related!!  Remember, she claims to be my mother's daughter and her favorite!  I was so honored when Kari (Giada's mama) asked me to be her daughter's Godmother.  When I told my nephew/Godson Jon that he was going to have a new Godsister on Sunday he said, "ANOTHER ONE"?!  Yep, I'll take as many as I can get!!

Here is Giada:

OK, maybe I'm partial but is she the cutest thing in the world or what?!  Heh heh.......

I started writing this early this morning and it is now 8:30 p.m. and I haven't finished it yet.  I am babysitting Abbie and Emily right now.  Their mama is in the hospital having a hysterectomy and she will be home tomorrow.  Her husband Paul starts his radiation on Monday.  Hopefully Dora will heal without any problems. 

Right after Dora and her husband left for the hospital I took the girls shopping.  I bought them matching dresses:

Survivor is on, I must catch up with what is going on.  You all have a GREAT weekend!!  On Saturday Sue and I are going to garage sales in a citywide sale that is going on.  Sunday is a get together with Shane.  YEAH!!

Ciao for now!