Pretty dress for a special little girl

I work as a special education teachers assistant in a classroom for mentally and physically handicapped middle school kids. Most of the kids in my class are pretty poor and don't have the resources for proper clothing. One of the teachers at the school runs a clothes closet that collects clothes and gives them out to the kids when they need them or come to school in clothes that are just not acceptable or functional. One of the little girls in my class is graduating to high school and she and her family do not have the means at all for her to get a nice dress for the occasion. A dress for her was found in the clothes closet but it didn't fit her properly nor was it very clean as it had a lot of stains. I took the dress home and with the help of my mother we cleaned it up, took up the hem a few inches and made it fit all around better for her to wear. I went to JoAnn's and bought some pretty rose ribbon trim and sewed it on some places. I also made her some jewelry and accessories to make the outfit complete so she will look very nice for her special night. I wish I could post pictures of her in the dress but I don't think that would be proper so I just have some of the finished dress and accessories. We also bought her a little white jacket to go over the dress as the thin straps are not "dress code," and also put a few pretty roses around it for trim to match.

Jewlery Class fun

Today I took a jewelry class at one of the local bead shops and it was a lot of fun. I made a garden inspired necklace that I think turned out pretty nice if i do say so myself. Looks really pretty on me as well, now I just have to figure out how much I can either sell it for or what dress I will buy now to match it, think it will be the latter choice =). Took a long time to make, almost five hours of straight work but I think it looks really cool. There was really no instructions to follow just the basic idea of how to weave the beads together. I made up the design as I went along, and think now that I have the idea how to make them will make a few more to keep for the day I open my business.

Swimming to the Light

Well today we put Tourky out of his misery, or most likely put Tourky out of our misery. Tourky was a beautiful blue Beta fish that more than likely lived longer than he should have. About two months ago he developed this weird spot on his side that quickly became a horrible infection. There was really noting we could do for him and he seemed to be doing fine till about a month ago when he could not swim any more nor keep himself up right. He has been floating sideways for over a month now and every day we tap the glass to see if he was still alive or not. Well today he looked worse than usual and it's been torture for us to look at him. We thought about doing the "humane thing" weeks ago but could not bring ourselves to do it. I mean if your cat or dog was really, really sick you would take them to the vet to be put down where there was no hope, so today we gave Tourky his opportunity to swim to the Light and at least make us feel better about not watching him float and gasp for life anymore. Feel bad about helping him but I do believe that all creatures feel some kind of pain or discomfort so think it was best to help him let go.

R.I.P. Tourky.... hope you find a bigger bowl to swim around in when you get to fishy heaven.

Oh my....

Hi!

Hi to all my friends who will be reading this, as those of you who know me I'm super busy so I don't think I will posting here daily but will try to keep the site up to date. Mostly I wanted to start a blog for my friends who I may not get to talk to very often or see on a regular basis to know what I'm up to. As a disclaimer, my English grammar sucks and my spelling is even worse so if you see a few faux pas in my posts don't be overly shocked, I won't be =P. I will be posting here the progress on my many hobby projects and hope to add pictures of finished pieces.

For those of you who don't know I belong to a group of super funny ladies who meet every Tuesday night in a bar here in Las Vegas to crochet and socialize, we call ourselves the "Las Vegas Hookers." We have a lot of fun together and I just got home tonight from our group and I'm super proud of myself that I was actually reading a pattern and able to crochet, which for the past oh 20+ years I have not been able to do with crochet. My Grandma taught me, along with my sixth grade teacher Miss. Longo, how to crochet but I have never learned to read a pattern with much success. I just want to say thank you to Mindy and Angie and everyone else who has shown me a lot of patience while I ask a million questions on pattern reading. I'm not done yet with the pattern I'm working on, Seraphina Shawl, but I have progressed now beyond having to ask questions every two minuets about what the (expletive deleted) I'm supposed to be doing.

Aside from crafting, which I have little time to do, as most of you who know me already know I have three jobs and go to school, so I'm a little tired all the time. My main job with the school district will be ending soon in June so will just have two jobs after the 7th. I have been working hard to lose a few lbs and that has been going well. I have not been able to get to the gym much (lol I typed guy instead of gym before I corrected it....must be some sort of Freudian slip =P) but I really need to start going as I still want to lose a few more lbs to be happy with myself again. I have other altered motives for losing some of me but then don't we all when we want to look just a little bit better.

Just as an update, The Parasite is still in my life. /cry....... can't seem to get rid of him no matter how hard I try but this can't go on forever so hopefully soon he will be GONE. After this is done and over I so feel like I should go out and party......I think I deserve too either that or get a medal for putting up with his (expletive deleted) for so long! Everyone needs to come to Vegas for a Divorce Party when it's official!!!

My little man needs to go to the vet, as most of you know Sir Feedsalot was sent to the vet for a Lion Cut because he has trouble cleaning himself properly and I was tried of running after him with a wash cloth to clean what he would not or could not. The poor little guy lost his dignity when he got shaved down and was not too excited about his new hair cut for a while but I do think he feels cooler with the 500 lbs of hair he was lugging around gone. While he was at the vet they found a lump near his shoulder blade that they want to put him out and remove and then biopsy. I really don't have the money for the procedure but I can't not do it for my little Goober so in he will go soon. I so hope that it's nothing and I don't have to worry that he has Cancer or something else. =( he is getting older, he is around 11 years old now so things are bound to start happening that he is getting older.

When I'm more awake and can figure out how to post pictures I will post one of Smokey to this blog.