Where have I been?

My life kind of turned inside out for a lot of years.  A lot of death...a lot of heartache...and a marriage that was slowly falling apart.  

It seemed at moments like the marriage could be saved, and then something would happen and great sadness would come over me.  I couldn't seem to shake it.  It seemed the more I became independent, the worse things were. Mr. Finn and I were always very different in how we handled most everything.  I became weary and I believe I gave up. Not a very heroic thing to do, but I feel it saved me from losing myself completely.

On June 10th, I moved out with the children and there is peace.

On September 11, the divorce was final and it surprised me that I felt great sorrow. Not that I don't want the divorce, but that it became what it did.  We were together 22 years...it's part of me and there is a mourning that comes with that.  I wouldn't change it, I have two wonderful children that keep me youngish.

Would I go back and change it?  Who wouldn't if they knew the outcome would be different?  I don't believe that "my" changing would have fixed it.  I believe we would still have reached this point...maybe not at this moment, but it would have come.

I haven't handled everything well.  I want time to breathe and I am not being given that and so I react  negatively sometimes and pull back.  I will figure it out...it will take time.

A day of memories

Feline Mania

Heaven help us but we have added another animal to this household.  Have I lost my mind?  Well, that's possible.  With menopause raging through my body and mind, it's entirely possible.

I never meant to add to our animal population.  I was rather hoping that when the kids left the house, the animals will have departed or would be soon departing around the same time.  No such luck now.

Meat Macchi (short for macchiato) and he is a whopping 1 year old.  Yep!!!  One whole year old.

Rose (Miss Boo) needs an enormous amount of affection.  We got our original cat for that purpose to quickly realize that we had been bamboozled by this cat.  She pretended to be sweet and lovable at the shelter but the minute we brought her home and she realized she would be the Queen of this castle, she promptly became Queen Victoria.  And she acts accordingly. 

She looks so sweet, but don't let that fool you.  She is MEAN!  I am not kidding.  She lures you in with her sweet purrs and that adorable face, but the moment you are petting her and thinking how sweet she is.  Bam!  Out come those claws and teeth.  Beware as they can take out any part of your face or body.  Miss Boo almost lost an eye to that precious face.  She got the eyelid and we almost had to take her to the ER because we weren't sure if she had cut through the eyelid with her glorious claw.

Now, this guy...completely different story.  They minute you start petting him he rolls over to have his belly rubbed...kind of like a dog.  You would think he is one except for his need to climb and jump on every single thing we have in this house.  Even picture frames.  There is no stopping him.  But with that face....You're forgiven.

But, the Queen does not want this dog cat thing living here.  The picture below sums it up.  She is slightly evil and tries to keep him in Miss Boo's room with her growling and hissing and ofttimes spitting.  She has no manners at all.

We are not surprised.  After all, she did trick us into bringing her home.  I hear her malevolent laughter in the form of a hiss, somewhere in this house, mocking me.

At least the dog is happy to have another creature in this house that doesn't terrify him.  But that poor dog has incurred the wrath of the Queen by his very acceptance of the new cat.  Our apologies Palmer but at least you have a friend now.

Sad Last Day

   

I never dreamed I would send the following letter to my son's teacher.  To be honest, I didn't really like her or appreciate her methods for teaching my son.  Bu then this happened and I realized, maybe I don't know everything...what a surprise.


Today as I waited for Ryan to cross the street after exiting the bus, I couldn't help but notice that there was something wrong.  When he got closer I realized he was crying.  I hugged him and asked what was wrong.  To my surprise, he said he was going to miss all of his teachers and it was making him very sad.

Thank you for making my boy cry.  I truly mean it.  That means he loved school...his teachers and that is a gift.

He has grown so much this year.  Thank you for making his adjustment to public school a successful one.  

With sincere gratitude,

Robin Rogers

The Harry Potter Party Bash

This party was so much fun but a lot more work than any other party I have done.  There are a lot of details that go into it and since my daughter wanted it to be authentic, we did the best we could.  I am grateful to all those Pinterest people out there that made my job easier.

Hobby Lobby sells background rolls of this brick.  It comes in a roll with two sheets the length of each door with a little overhang.  You can get a 5 foot wide sheet but it is in a different section, but it was around $10 or so.  (Very affordable if you wanted a much bigger wall for the Platform.)  With the coupon I paid around $5 and did both sides of the door.  I created the Platform 9 3/4 on my Silhouette using the font "Pistilli-Roman".  I am willing to send the file for the Silhouette but you will still have to download the font in order for it to work with your software.

To make the potion books, I downloaded a picture from google and glued it onto the front of a black journal from the Dollar Tree.

I borrowed graduation gowns from friends and made ties using felt to complete the look.

 Felt squares are you best friend for making these fun ties.  I downloaded a silhouette tie file and then sized it for the felt square.  I am willing to share that file if requested.

Dowels and hot glue are your best friend for the wands.  I watched a video on youtube and then winged it.  I don't think you can go wrong with whatever you create.  If you use a dowel instead of chop sticks you will have to sand them down so they taper.  I liked that the dowel was longer so I went with the sanding.