Over to Nana's

We spent Sunday at Nana's (my mother's) house. It was a fun filled day for the children (although I doubt Emma will ever take a nap there again...more on that later).



My mom got The Jungle Book for the kids to watch. J'son watched the whole thing through, but my children were more interested in crawling over, around, and through everything they could find.



Case in point...



The boys thought it would be fun to play in my mother's new fountain. Fun and wet. But it did tire them out quite a bit.


I didn't get a picture of it, but Emma went down for a nap in my mother's room. I had left the door open but someone came behind me and shut it. A few hours went by and I was alternating between dozing off and watching TV in the den. I kept hearing the crying sound, but it was only for a few seconds. However, since it kept repeating, I went to investigate. Evidently, Emma had woken up in a strange environment and got a little freaked out when she couldn't get out of the room. It took A LOT of soothing to calm her down. I can chuckle at it now, but at the time I was worried that I had scarred her for life.

A Real Ghostbuster

This is Susie, one of my instructors (I actually have a pic of her on my hard drive that I took today but she forbade me to use it, providing this one instead). I've found that my instructors are some of the most unique individuals I've ever known, both in their personalities and their hobbies (more on that later). To be honest, Susie intimidated me for the first few weeks of school. I've described her to others as a very stern aunt, the one that brooks no nonsense from those around her and will tweak your nose if you step out of line. Plus, she is the only person I know (other than myself) that can silence a person with a glance (she uses this facial expression that says, "You're about two seconds away from bodily harm"). But after I got to know her, Susie is great (in fact, all of my instructors are great. If you are every considering entering the field of cosmetology, it really would be in your best interest to move to Enid and enroll at EBC). She almost always helps me with rolling my perms (quick isn't even in it...this woman can almost roll a perm faster than I can section the hair for said perm) plus she's always giving me tips that help enhance my haircuts.

As I mentioned previously, my instructors are a varied group of people. Susie exemplifies this in a very interesting way: she's a ghost hunter. Maybe you've seen that TV show where a group of people descend upon a haunted mansion or graveyard with scads of electrical equipment to look for signs of the paranormal. Susie belongs to a local group here in Oklahoma that does that very thing. The other day I got to work the front desk (basically I was the receptionist) and we had a very long and in depth conversation about what she does and some of her experiences (I'm working on a supernatural themed story and I needed some information to round out the corners. She not only gave me enough information to round out the corners but she also inspired an idea for another story). Then, the next day, completely of her own initiative, she brought some pictures that she's taken on her ghost hunting expeditions. To be honest, there are some very weird, not easily explained things going on in these pictures...however, there is one picture (it is a shot of the door of the hotel room that Stephen King stayed in, inspiring him to write "The Shining") that is just plain frightening. I'll try to get that pic from her to post it here as I just can't explain it properly (I told Heather about the pic later that night and I got goose bumps recalling it). Really scary.

Anyhoo, if you are interested in learning more about ghost hunting, check out the Eerie Oklahoma website: http://www.eerieok.com

Emma Pix

Of course, if we show pix of brother, we have to show pix of sister or she will get jealous (in this case it took three pix to satisfy her)

'Ghetti and Meatballs

Emery loves spaghetti. So much so, that he apparently likes to use it as a facial cream while he's eating it.

My Sister's Hair

Here we have a series of pix showing my sister's hair. The first one is what her hair normally looks like, the second is what I termed her "flying nun look", and the third is the finished product. The story of how this came about follows.

My sister wanted me to do something to her hair. So she made an appointment to come in today. I actually had no clue what I was going to do with her hair, even with several days to think about it. My sister is more of the conservative type when it comes to hair color, usually limiting herself to some highlights. As such, I was stymied as to how I was going to do something different yet stay within a more conservative framework (and it was strictly a color job as my sister wanted to grow her hair out). It turned out that I shouldn't have worried so much (Still, it turned out to be just south of a nightmare).

I grabbed the color palette of available colors and my sister was immediately taken with the SoColor 7RC (a light red copper color). After some consultation with Brandi (one of my instructors), I started in with foiling some blond highlights before I added the color deposit. I mixed all of my colors to get them ready and began foiling. When I was about a third of the way through, Brandi came to me with an epiphany (not the good kind). Turns out that SoColor can do some very bad things to blond highlights (which my sister had previously gotten about two months ago). So, we had to go with a demi-permanent color, in this case, Color Sync. The only problem was the Color Sync palette doesn't have quite the same color spectrum as SoColor. So we had to match as close as possible to the 7RC (we finally came up with a mixture of 6RC and 6R...red copper and red...the numbers refer to the level of lightness or darkness of a particular color...as a general rule, the lower the number, the darker the color and vice versa).

Okay, everything was back on track and I was ready to go, right? HA! If only. So I finish my foiling but since I foil like old people fu...um, I can't use that analogy, too vulgar...okay, I'm slow at foiling. It took the better part of an hour to foil my sister's hair (in my defense, she has long hair) and the first foils were beginning to lift extremely high (her hair was turning very blond...not a bad thing, but if I didn't pick up the pace my sister's hair could melt). So, I got a volunteer to help put on the red color deposit. Problem number two arose when I noticed that the red color was bleeding onto the blond highlights (if left alone, the color bleed would have turned her hair pink). At this point, several instructors jumped in to help. It was like major surgery as there were 3 people working on my sister's hair. Crowded isn't even in it.

We finally get everything back under control and Brandi and I are working furiously to finish the deposit because my sister has had blond foils in part of her hair for the better part of an hour and a half (you really don't want to leave bleach on hair for more than 45 minutes at the most) and we still had to let the color deposit sit for at least 20 minutes. However, we managed to pull it all off with a fairly high degree of success, as you can see in the above pix. My sister likes her new hair color a lot (she treated me to lunch) but there is a bit of an adjustment period since this is radically different than what she is used to. Hopefully, her friends will like it too and I can get some regular clients lined up.

It's all about the color

We had guest speaker from Matrix today. Matrix is one of the major cosmetology brands of color (as well as shampoos and conditioners). We almost exclusively use Matrix colors due to their ease of use and quality (I used Matrix's Color Sync on Heather's hair). Anyhoo, we were given an overview of what new colors Matrix has released as well as the proper procedure for mixing and applying the color. I've said this before in a previous post, but although your hairdresser makes coloring or highlighting your hair look easy it really isn't. One misstep in the process and you've got green hair (or worse, no hair). Still, it's extremely gratifying when you color someone's hair and their face lights up after they see the finished result (it also helps with getting a nice fat tip). Color is one of the more popular processes these days and I'm working hard to master as many of the intricacies as I can. The payoff, both in gratification and financially, is extremely rewarding.

Well, that was quick!

So, my re-emergence into the work place lasted about two whole days. I thought I would be able to manage school, work, and the gym and still have time for my family and myself (If you're wondering why I placed the gym on the same level as school and work, then you don't know me very well. I LOVE to work out. LOVE IT! Some people fish or play golf or whatever to relax. I lift weights).

Turns out I don't have the same energy I did 10 years ago. I was dead on my feet after my first day. After only 4 hours of work (plus 8 hours of school) I was TIRED! So tired, that I was asleep less than an hour after I got home. Saturday wasn't much better either. I was beginning to regret taking the job. I spent Sunday playing with the kids and thinking about the fact that I was going to be working for the next 6 days and not getting home until almost 10pm (actually it would be closer to midnight on days I work out). Then Heather got called back to the hospital Sunday night because they were short staffed. Which meant that she would need to sleep Monday evening instead of watching the kids. Her mother volunteered to watch them, but I just didn't feel right burdening with the children that much (they had already agreed to watch them on the nights that Heather was working, plus weekends). When I factored into the equation the fact that I would only see my children about 5 hours a week (for the next six months), I realized that I had made a mistake. Oh, I liked the job enough but not enough to miss out on the next 6 months of my family's life.

So I summoned my fortitude and told them that it would probably be in our mutual interest to part company (they were not happy, oh no, they weren't). It wasn't a decision that I made lightly. But it was just simply too much for me to not see my family but an hour each morning. And it's not as though our livelihood depended on me having that job. Oh, the extra money would have gone a long way but Heather has been approved to return to full time duty (she's been on limited hours since she hurt her back in April) and our parents have been graciously helping us financially. So it's back to the status quo, at least until school's out.