Hurricane Ike = Have power, but no Internet!

This hurricane has really thrown me off. We just got our power turned back on this past Sunday (this was the 16th day after the storm). I return home a week ago Sunday because I thought the power was going to be turned back on the following day. Little to my surprise, we did not get power restored for practically a week after my return home. It was not as bad as you may think though. Walking around the house with a flashlight at night freaked me out a little and it sucked having to use an ice chest to keep Dominic's milk cold, but it's really not that big a deal. It did get pretty hot during the early afternoon and our house gets very little breeze. That was the worst part. We also slept on a pallet in the back den because that was the room that did get the most breeze.

Okay so yes, having no power sucks! We are still without Internet and home phone. I'm at a local tea house called Fioza



I know I should be thankful that we received no extensive damage. I'm just dying to get back to normal. I want to list things for sale. I want to blog, I want to participate with all of my online things. Ugh! Very annoying. I have so much to blog about. My trip in Austin, then to San Marcos, then back to Austin, then to Houston. I am going to save all of that for my desktop computer. I hate my laptop, although, it has been good to me thus far! More to come soon!!

Hurricane Ike = Vacation (not by choice)....

Most of you know that I evacuated from Houston to Austin for hurricane Ike. I packed my car over a week ago with my dog Hana, my son and myself and we headed to stay with my step-sister Lori in Austin. I never anticipated the storm was going to be as bad and devastating as it was-and I never thought we would be gone from home this long.

We arrived at Lori's house a week ago Thursday evening, after driving a nearly six hour trip that typically takes 2.5 hours. I know it could have been a lot worse than 6 hours and I'm thankful it did not take any longer than that length of time, especially have Hana and Dominic in my little Mini Cooper. We stayed at Lori's all week and I just felt horrible for our extended stay. I should tell you that Lori is 37, and she has not been around small children much. She did seem to really like Dominic though. He's a great little guy, most of the time. Last Sunday, we all met up with Lori's friend Jenn and a restaurant in Austin called, "Freddies Place". This pic is of Lori and Jenn and if you click on the pic, you can read about Freddies Place (Lori, my step-sister, is on the right and Jenn is on the left):

More about hurricane Ike: I'm still not home

As most of you are aware, Hurricane Ike hit the Texas gulf coast this past weekend. This storm was a category 2 storm and left mass destruction on the Texas gulf coast.

As I posted previously, I evacuated to Austin with my son and my dog Hana. Justin stopped by our house yesterday (I think) and said the only damage that occurred was that water got into our sunroom and one side of our back fence is flat on the ground-oh and a part of another side of the fence is missing. Most of city is still without power, the sewer/water is not working properly, several grocery/drug stores/gas stations are open however, the lines are incredibly long. I was going to return home today, but city officials are urging those people who evacuated to stay gone if you don't have to return home. The only reason I would have to return home is that I have four items (three eBay and one from my own vintage site) that need to be shipped, but I don't even think our post office is open and/or delivering mail. I was getting a little stressed out about these packages because my customers have already paid me for them and I typically ship the day after receiving payment, but I am sure they will understand. I've emailed all of them and explained my situation. I even printed out their shipping labels from Austin/here yesterday just in case I went home today. I just don't think it would be in my best interest to return home. How would I keep Dominic's milk cold without power?

I know my issues are only inconvenient and I'm really fortunate that nothing really happened to our home. Thank God!

Hurricane Ike: The Saga Continues....

I wrote yesterday or the day before about contemplating evacutacting for hurricane Ike. I know Houston is not right on the coast and I probably would have been safe had I stayed but....you never know.

One of the main reasons I decided to leave is because I have a 19 month old son. If something were to happen and we would have stayed, I just would not have wanted to have to deal with taking care of my son, my dog and myself. I don't think I could handle that type of stress.

I decided to leave yesterday afternoon. My step-sister lives in Austin and I called her to see if we could stay with her. She was like, "Of course". So, I put Dominic down for his nap and packed our things while he was sleeping. We ended up leaving my house around 1.30pm. We got on I10 West and headed out toward Austin. Traffic was pretty much stop and go from Houston all the way to Highway 71 (the cut off to Austin). Once we were on Highway 71, traffic was heavier than normal, but I was still driving approximately 75-80 mph. To make a long story short, I ended up arriving at Lori's (my step-sister) house around 6pm. It definitely took longer than normal (typically takes about 2.5 hours), but we made it. Yea!

Today, the Houston news has been on the television here all day. All I can say is that I am very happy that I decided to leave. I'm really not concerend for my house because I am fairly certain it will be fine (we live in a mid century modern brick house and we're not right on the water).

I'm just curious to see what type of devastation there will be when we return home. I'm also praying that our power is on when I get home because I just went grocery shopping (idiot) on Tuesday or Wednesday and I don't want our entire stock of food to spoil. I'm also concerned for all of the people who were also supposed to evacuate and did not-and now they are stuck with the rising water. Ugh!

Hurricane Ike: Ugh!

Okay, so it's late and I need to go to bed, but I wanted to post about hurricane Ike. This storm is coming right to the Texas coast (basically the entire Texas coast from Brownsville up to East Texas). This is totally insane. I don't typically worry about these storms because the news usually hypes everything up way more than necessary, but I feel afraid for some reason. My intuition is usually right too! I mean, if I evacuate, I need to leave tomorrow. The other thing that sucks is that all hotels in Austin, San Antonio (basically the entire Texas Hill Country), Dallas-everywhere I can think of-the hotels are booked, except for hotels that cost $300+ a night-no thank you! My parents live out near Marfa, Texas and I know I could drive out there, but that's a 10 hour drive and I really don't feel like sitting in my Cooper for 10 hours. Ugh! What to do? What to do?

I emailed a couple ladies in my Sunday school class and they said they are staying. At least we are not right on the coast. Houston is approximately 60 miles from the cost, but if this storm reaches category 4 status, which they are saying is just might, we will certainly feel the effects of the storm. I'm really scared.. :-(

Sick and tired: Literally.

I'm not sure how many of you have children, but if you do you'll understand where I am coming from. Everytime my son gets sick, I know I'm going to get sick-whether it be the next day or a few days after, I know the sickness is coming. Ugh! Dominic started getting a runny nose this past Saturday and I knew the cold was right around the corner. Sure enough, I started to feel sick on Sunday night. Today was the second day of my sickness and I'm tired and really ready for this cold to pass.

I think I posted a few days ago about how I was contacted by the Artisans of Houston (blog http://artisansofhouston.blogspot.com/. They meet once a month at a random restaurant here in Houston and talk about places to sell their items, etc. It's kinda like show and tell in school, but you're not in school. Anyway, it was sort of neat to meet other local artists here in Houston. Most people actually made many different types of things. There were a few sellers who made jewelry out of beads, there was a girl who painted and many other crafters. I just think it's nice to learn how other people market their items as well as to see the items up close. I wished I would have felt better, but I managed through dinner just fine.

I also keep relisting my old eBay inventory items. If you want some vintage clothing at discounted prices, please check my eBay store at Lone Star Vintage Clothing/. I'm offering a lot of great vintage clothing for really cheap prices and will continue to do so for a long time. I have so much stuff!

Beliefs....

I'm really bothered lately. Bothered by the fact that I am 36 years old and constantly struggle with my beliefs. I am Christian (I don't struggle with that). I guess my struggle is with the fact that I know as a Christian we believe when we die, we either go to one place or another. I would like to go to Heaven. What if I'm not good enough to go there. I guess I think about this more now than ever because I am a mother. What if something happened to me? What would happen to my son? I know he would be well taken care of, but these thoughts often consume my mind.

We started a new book in our Sunday school class today which basically talks about Methodist beliefs, etc. One of the first questions in chapter 1 was about evolution and how do Methodists view evolution. Oh and the message in church today was about "blessed hope". Blessed hope gives Christians hope to look forward to after this life. At least that's the interpretation that I got from it. It was almost as if God was speaking directly to me through our pastor letting me know that I don't need to be afraid, but I am. Does anyone else ever feel this way or think about things like this?

Okay, so I guess I will write about crafts..I've spent the majority of this evening making greeting cards. I made 5 Halloween cards and a lot of Thanksgiving cards. I'll post some pics tomorrow.

Sorry if my post seems a bit negative. It's just that I am confronted with this fear quite often and I'm just scared. I really don't know why.

Favorite colors: What I like to craft with

I really like the colors black, white and pink together. Just look at my banners from both of my sites:

and

Not only do I like these colors in my banners, but I also like to make crafts with these colors.

I have posted before that I contribute a weekly project to http://www. athenamagazine.wordpress.com/. My craft this week was a greeting card made with a felt applique on the front. I used a blank black card. I took two pieces of felt, one pink and one red. I made an applique out of the felt and added it to the front of the card.

The final result was really cute:


I also placed a white label on the inside to give the sender of the card a space to write, since the card is black.

Etsy Blogger's brillante blog award

So yesterday, I checked my inbox and had an email from Designs by Nora. You can also visit Nora’s Blog here.

Nora makes really cute little items from polymer clay. Like these earrings:


She also makes cute little cards like this one:



In her email, she said that she had nominated me for the Brillante Blog award
.
Yea for me!

Now it's my turn to pass this award onto 7 lucky Etsy Bloggers:
Here are a 7 of my nominees...

1) Sugar Honey Love.
2) Poor Robin.
3) Joey and Aleethea.
4) My Aphrodite Jewelry.
5) A Keeper’s Jackpot.
6) Pumpkinhaus.
7) Heaven’s Blessings.

Here are the "how to's" for those who were nominated!

Here are the rules for the nominees:
1) Add the logo of the award to your blog
2) Add a link to the person who awarded it to you
3) Nominate at least 7 other blogs
4) Add links to those blogs on your blog
5) Leave a message for your nominees on their blogs

Lone Star Vintage Clothing on Stylefeeder

Visit http://www.stylefeeder.com/.

Hurricane Gustav and Joey & Aleethea

I live in Houston near the Gulf coast. The news media hyped up hurricane Gustav like crazy. I guess it was better to have everyone prepared than to have something bad happen and not have had enough time to deal with everything. Of course, I could not sleep last night because I was concerned about the storm and the possibility of devastation and destruction. I finally fell asleep and woke up pretty early this morning. The first thing I did was turn on the news, only to find out the storm had been downgraded to a category three storm. Not much of anything happened the last time I checked. I finally turned off the news because I was tired of hearing about things that did not happen, thank goodness for that!

On another note, if you are searching for an amazing children's gift, you should stop by http://joeyandaleethea.etsy.com/.

Not only is she our Etsy Blogger team leader, but she makes very adorable baby as well as toddler garments. She's got a six week waiting list however, I assure you her items are well worth the wait.

Look at these cute little pants:



or this cute little plush throw:



What else?? I prepared some packages for shipping today. I made some really yummy tilapia fish with sauteed mushrooms, onions, cilantro and lime. I really enjoyed dinner. I'm going to make a few crafts tonight. I'll post about some vintage tomorrow!