Hey everyone!
Boy, I feel like such a slacker when it comes to updating this. Needless to say, things have been busy!
Let me see if I can correctly start this post to correlate where we left off last time.
Two weeks ago, Mike and I headed down to the Springs to sign on the house there, to close. Mike and I got to the Springs early enough, that we decided to grab something small to eat, as we had dinner plans with a very dear friend of mine and her boyfriend. As we entered into the Springs, Mike and I were trying to figure out what we wanted to eat, that we don't have here in Craig. Even though the selection choices in the Springs far surpass those choices in Craig, we were struggling to come up with something that we both could agree on. After Mike finished his business in the bank, he came out and said that if we could find something at that end of town that we were on, we could swing through Entertainmart and pick some things up. I mentioned what I could remember being down there for food. Fast food, Black Bear Diner (gag), Olive Garden... And that was it. We went there, and had to wait for, what they claimed to be 15 minutes, but felt much longer than that, to get a table. Once we were seated, we decided to just grab an appetizer and share a salad. I ended up eating the salad primarily, as I didn't really like the appetizer. I'm not sure if it has something to do with how things were cooked, or if I haven't had fried foods in a while, and my body has started to reject them, but I didn't eat much, but that was okay with me, that just meant that I would have more appetite for dinner at our sushi place!
After our pseudo lunch, we walked over to Entertainmart. We began looking at the movies, and to my utter shock, Mike points to a movie and begins to sell me on the reasons that we should buy it. "The price is good, and it was Heath Ledger's last movie and he was really talented, and I think it was a great movie...you don't hear me say that very often!"
With a huge grin on my face, and agreeing with him that he doesn't say that often about movies, as the roles are reversed, I told him that if he really would watch the movie again, then sure. I liked it the movie, and if he is that sold on getting it, why not?
We ended up, after spending some time at the store, leaving with three games, four cds, and a movie. Not too bad, as we most likely would have found a ton of other things that we most likely would have wanted to get.
We ended up going to our dinner date, and we were in heaven! The food was so good! It had been too long since...of course, what do you expect? We used to eat there every other week or so, and now, if we want sushi, we have to travel to Steamboat Springs for it...that's like leaving the Springs to go to Denver for whatever.
The next morning, Mike left the hotel to grab the remaining items from the house in the Springs, and then go to the title company to sign everything over. As he was out doing that, I was at the hotel, grabbing some breakfast. The man who was making eggs, asked me if I had been out for breakfast yet. I shook my head no, so he directs me to the plates, and begins telling me everything on the menu, each item on each table, and as he continues to talk, I started to smile. Once he was done, I told him," Boy, you've been a busy guy this morning!" He laughed, as though I had told the funniest joke, and I left to grab some food. He eventually talked me into having some eggs, so I told him that I'd like some scrambled eggs with cheese. After getting my mediocre waffle from the iron, he calls me over to collect my eggs," Here you go, cheesy scrambled." Awesome.
After eating for perhaps ten minutes, Mike texts me, and tells me it's all done. He asked me if I'd like to go with him to get his hair cut or stay. I told him that I was eating breakfast now, and he decided to come and get me. We left the hotel and headed to a Sports Clips for his hair cut, where I wandered next door to grab some much needed coffee and water for him, since he was adamant about not having anything to drink...I'm left thinking that it would be a long drive with nothing to drink...but he was happy with water.
Once we got home, I realized how utterly exhausted I was. I also knew that I would be even more so, because the next weekend, I'd be heading back to the Springs for a cemetery walk with my mom, and then a girl's night with friends. It would be a long weekend, but so worth it.
The day that I left for that, Mike was telling me to stop and take pictures along the way, weather permitting. My luck would have it, that it was so hazy from all the fires, and nothing would have turned out. I got to the Springs, and was going to get my oil changed in my car, since Mazda gave me a free oil change on my profile. I pulled into the dealership, and asked to have this done. The girl shakes her head, explaining that because of the construction, they are down to only 4 bays, and once they finish with their 4:30 appointment, which was ten minutes from now, that they would all be going home for the day. She then tells me of all of the other places that I could go instead. I shook my head, politely saying that I would try again at another time. Inside, I was kicking her. Brutal, but honest.
So, I left there, and headed to grab something to eat. I hadn't eaten much so far, and was so hungry. Then I got to thinking. I'm down in the Springs to see my mom, and friends, but I wouldn't see Willow at all. So, I texted my brother, and asked if he could do dinner that night. Being that it is my brother that I am talking about, it took him a while to get back to me. When I arrived at my mom's house, she was talking to him on the phone. He did manage to ask me what time, and where, before the silence began. I had replied to him saying that 730-8 would be ideal for me, and because I don't have the gluten issues that he and our mom have, I told him that he should tell me where. After I got to mom's house, she asked me what my reply was. I couldn't help but laugh as she told him, numerous times that I said 730...What is so hard to understand that time? 730....was it the 30 or the 7? My step-dad joked that there was a 0 in there, and maybe that was the problem. After my mom got off the phone with my brother, she told me that he said he would have to talk to his wife, Sarah, before making any arrangements. Okay, I thought, that shouldn't take long. By 630, I had to text and ask if we were still on for dinner. After he suggested a rather gross place to eat, I vetoed it. He then put it on me to suggest something. So, I rattled off three or four places, and told him, if he didn't like these places, to pick something else. This is where things get confusing. He said that we could go to the Cracker Barrel. Okay, I thought, I haven't been there since college...sure. Then he made a reference about not having one here in town. My eyebrow raised, and I tell my mom what he said. Why would you suggest something to someone, if you think there isn't one in town. Did he want me to drive somewhere, like Castle Rock? I told him that there was one Cracker Barrel in town, on North Academy. He kept saying things that made both my mom and I wonder if he knew about this location. Eventually, he called me to clarify. What he said, and what he texted where as though it was from two different people. So, now we have a place to eat, and a time to meet up.
When I got there, we sat down, started to order drinks, and Sarah, who is usually really quiet, was asking me all sorts of questions about the move, about the new place and town that we are in. It was a nice conversation, something that usually doesn't happen that often, and it was rather nice.
Each time our waitress came to the table, my brother would speak uber quietly. She kept leaning in to ask him to repeat himself, and once he did, and she still didn't know, I would tell her. I thought it was funny. Mom thought that maybe if the waitress was cute, that he thought so too. I just had to smile at the thought of his shyness, but come on...speak up! I know you have a voice! Anyone who knows you, knows that you do!
Willow had lemonade, and sucked her cup dry. It wasn't long after, that she immediately began to quake from being cold. Of course, she is dressed in this jumper, with arms and legs exposed, and she's shivering so hard, it looked like she was going into shock. I pointed it out to my brother, and Sarah mentioned that Willow is like her mother, getting cold at random times. My first thought was," If you know this, why don't you plan for it? Pack a sweater or jacket?" Then I remember who I am with. After asking if she had a jacket, and being told "probably not", I asked if I needed to grab my sweater from my car, though it would be extremely big on the child, at least she'd be warm. It was after I asked if I had to do that, they pulled out a long sleeve shirt, which Willow willing accepted. Face meet palm....and again.
During dinner, we ended up on the conversation of the age difference between mom and us. Josh somehow believed that our mother is only 11 years older than him. I about spit up my water. This is how the conversation went....
Josh: And of course, mom is only 11 years older than me-
Me: Josh! She is not 11 years older than you!
Josh: Yes-
Me: She was not 11 when she gave birth to you!
Josh looks at me, and thinks about what he is saying.
Me: She was 21 when she had you, and 24 when she had me. (Now, after telling mom this story, turns out that I am, in fact, also wrong. However, I am only one year wrong. I think that she is older than she is, apparently, but much closer to the truth, than my brother)
Josh: Oh, I thought she was only like 46 or something-
Me: She's 50. (really, 49, but still I'm closer...)
Josh: What? I missed the black balloons and everything?? I mean, I'm only 27.
Me: You're 28, almost 29. So, how old am I? (knowing he'd get this wrong)
Sarah: Yeah, how old is she?! (Sarah is only a couple months younger than me.
Josh: I'm not playing this game any more.
Dinner was nice, and Willow was happy to see me. I honestly think the hardest part of being away is missing her. After we paid, we walked around the little shop that Cracker Barrel has, and Willow kept asking what things were, so I would hold her, and explain. When we headed outside, Josh and I point to this old ringer washer that they had set up on their porch. I asked him if he remembered having that when we were kids. So, we laughed and joked about how life was back then. Sarah, feeling awkward, as she has no idea what this thing is that we are laughing about. I explained to her that this is an old washing machine. I said to her that the scariest part of the whole machine, was the rollers. I explained that it would pinch your fingers if you weren't careful, and if you got your hair or clothes caught in it, and you weren't paying attention, it was rather scary for a kid.
This is where Josh starts to tell me that they were listening to some cassette tapes and the one side ended, and Sarah blankly stares at the machine. Josh tells her that she has to turn the tape over. She claims that she knew that, so Josh asked her if she was even old enough to remember cassettes. She sighs and nods, then he asks," Vinyls? 8 Tracks?" Now, she drew a complete blank with 8 tracks, had no idea what Josh was talking about. I told her, don't feel bad, most people our age, have no clue what they are. The reason that we know what they are, is because our first stereo system was a record player, 8 track and radio combo. I had that for years, before cds started to make an appearance, and we upgraded to that. The night was getting late, and we went our separate ways.
The next morning, mom and I get up, get ourselves ready for our trip to Cripple Creek for their annual cemetery walk. I was so tired, because it was a late night, and an early morning, that I told her that I would like to grab some coffee before making the trip there. After grabbing something to drink, we headed up. Mike had texted me to tell me that he has read a few Facebook updates that said the colors were really popping on the highway to Cripple Creek. Upon driving through, mom and I couldn't understand what people were looking at, as most of the trees were still green. Yes, there were some patches of changed leaves, but they weren't at the "Peak" as everyone kept saying, not this year, at least!
Mom and I pull into the parking lot, and head over to buy our tickets for the ride to the cemetery. People in town really go all out. They are dressed up in costumes, shooting six-shooters and everything. We got our tickets, so we climbed into the trolley, that used to run through the town back in the day. They drove us through town, explaining what some of the buildings used to be, which ones are the original from the fires, and which ones had to be rebuilt. They pointed out the museums and the history of some of the buildings. They even pointed out to us the wild donkeys that roam freely in town. We got to see most of them, but not all of them.
In the cemetery, we pull up, and are directed to a tent where three men wait for our group. We sit under the tent, and they go into their act. The first one, played by the mayor of Cripple Creek, was portraying the role of the cemetery keeper from the mining days. Apparently, this man is still alive, in his 90s, and is still seen heading to the local bar, to have his morning whiskey. The story was intriguing, and they introduced the next man.
The next man talked about how he tried running for Congress, and lost, so he became a lawyer. He talked about his infamous case in Cripple Creek. The story goes like this...(From what I remember)
A man sitting in the bar, in Cripple Creek, had gotten drunk, and had a huge argument with the barkeep. As the drunkard stood to leave, during the fight, the barkeep decided to show this man that he doesn't take this behavior lightly, took his colt 45, and "tapped" the man on the back of the head. The drunk started to fall to the ground, but hit his head on the cast-iron stove, and lay on the ground of the bar, bleeding to death, for a few hours. Once someone finally called in a doctor, he was pronounced dead.
At the court, the lawyer explained, that his client merely "tapped" the man on the back of the head, and in his drunken state, failed to fall in a straight line, therefore, hitting his head, causing him to bleed to death. The lawyer showed the jury the exhumed skull of the man who died, showing the damage to the back of the skull, and stating that, this man's skull had a weak spot, as you can clearly see, and there was no way that his client would have known about this weak/soft spot. He just merely wanted to get this drunkard out of his bar.
The jury ruled his client "not guilty" of murder, and the barkeep left town, changed his name (so they assume, as there is no record of this man ever since). They tried to put the skull back with the rest of the body, but the cemetery had a mass grave for the poor who could not afford a plot, and that is where the body is. Instead of burying it, the skull is on display in their museum so that you can see it for yourself.
The married couple. I wish I remembered more of their story.
As we left to head to the next actor, and as we waited for everyone to catch up to us, I turned around, and was gaping at the headstone behind me.
RIP Fred E. Krueger
I told Mike that I wondered if there was an Elm street in Cripple Creek, as that would explain everything... =)
Now, I should explain before I continue with people's stories...The actors research and portray real people who lived and died in Cripple Creek, some are buried there, and others, are not. There is one horse buried in the cemetery, which is marked off, and several thousand children in their own section of the cemetery. The whole cemetery was a gift from two Realtors back in the day, to accommodate all of the mining deaths. The downside to this amazing gift, is that this mountain is solid granite. It makes digging rather difficult. Anyways...on ward!
The next actor, was portraying Pearl, the town's...um...Mistress? Basically, she owned and ran the very popular brothel...that is still standing. She came from Indiana, but followed the money West. Her family didn't know about her "profession". She found herself, single and pregnant, so she married her friend, who also had a wife and child at the time, so they moved to Cripple Creek. After she gave the baby up for adoption, which, at that time, was much much different to now. No one knows what happened to that baby. Eventually, her 'husband' left, to do, who knows what, and she found herself at the bank, getting a loan of $3000 to open her own business, the brothel, and decorating it. If you wanted to be a client there, you had to have clean health, a credit check was performed on you, and the application that had to be filled out, also had a section for permission from your wife, mother, or other relative, before you were 'serviced'. During a very lavish party, her 'husband' came back, and she was happy to see him, but realized shortly after, that he was only there for money. She wrote him a check of about $200-300 and he was gone. Now, this is where people are not sure what happened, but that night, whether being upset over his visit, or from being drunk, she took morphine (which was common then) to help her sleep, took too much, and died in her sleep. When they called her family in Indiana to come and identify her body, they saw her dressed up in her brothel outfit, and the people explained to her sister, who came, what she really did for a living. The sister's nose went up to the ceiling, and said that this hartlet was no sister of hers, and left. Because Pearl owned money to the bank, they began to auction her things off. They had one of her designer dresses, that was pink silk, and the next day, there was a mysterious check in the mail, no one knows who it came from, but the stipulation was that they were to bury Pearl in that dress, and give her a burial to remember. There were six black stallions to pull her black chariot down the town's streets, music blared, police were called in to keep the peace and order, as things were getting out of hand. People to this day, still leave her money, alcohol and flowers on her grave. The old lady who currently is working the brothel's museum, from what I understand, knew Pearl, and people still miss her.
Pearl, the lady of the town!
The next place we headed to, the man portraying his character, made me laugh. Not because of his story, though it seemed like such an interesting one that could be made into a mystery movie, but because this man looked like Richard Dreyfuss!
Here is the man's story...
He got up in the morning, early, as he always did, to start the fire in his stove for warmth for his wife and her daughter. He was having difficulties getting to start, so he went outside for more kindling. When he came back inside, his wife and step daughter were up, and by the stove. He tossed the kindling inside the stove, heard a lot of commotion out back near his shed, so he stepped onto the porch to see what was going on. While he was out there, the fire had started, causing an explosion the blew the oven through the floor of the house, blowing his six year old step daughter out the front door, killing her instantly. His wife, lived 15 minutes after the blast, and her last word was her daughter's name. The police tried to find him, and found him blown across the backyard, under debris. They took him to the hospital, and waited to question him, until he was conscious. Newspapers from New York were covering the story. Investigations were made, and when this man woke up, the sheriff asked him if there was anyone who wanted to harm him or his family. The man stated that he had received some threatening letters from someone, signed by The Black Hand. When asked if he still had the letters, he said that he destroyed them, so not to worry his wife. The sheriff then tells him that they found a bottle of nitroglycerin in the remains of the stove, and asked him how it got there. Well, because the evidence was against this man, they arrested him and put him in jail. During his time there, he had asked for a knife to help get rid of his hangnail that had been driving him crazy. The deputy handed the pocket knife to him, and the next morning, the man was found in his cell, with a cut from his navel up to his chin, bleeding out. They took him to the hospital, where they asked him who did this to him, and he said one name. It was the name of the sheriff's brother. No one knows what happened after the man died, whether there was an investigation or not...but that would not have been a fun life to live.
Richard Dreyfuss-look alike...
The next man, was portraying a drunk, who had a good father, and childhood, but ended up blowing all of his money at the gambling tables, and women. After losing it all, and being completely drunk, he walked outside in the middle of Winter, and fell asleep...of course, he ended up dying in the snow. He did explain, during his story, about the boxcars that would come to Cripple Creek, full of bodies to be buried in the "Poor People" section. He pointed out where it was, and then where the kids were buried. He explained that the reason they did that was so that they could look after the kids...The actor did a great job portraying a drunkard, and lightened the mood, which was sad at times.
The drunk.
The next stop was a woman who, I don't remember much, other than her fiery spirit, and after her parents' deaths, the town took up a collection at numerous stores, to send her to college at Colorado College and then she became Dean at several schools across the Nation, and founded a couple as well. Mom and I both agreed, after looking at her real portrait, that she was a beautiful woman.
The Fiery Dean.
The next character, I knew was going to provide some interesting story, as he was wearing an eye patch, and was trying to make us believe that he had no arms. As we gathered around, he went straight into his story. I thought this was one of my favorites, as well as another one coming up. He said that he was called Armless, and he didn't think that it was very original. When he was ten, he was like any other ten year old boy, looking for adventure, looking for fun, and he had heard from numerous miners about this powder stick...dynamite. He ended up getting his hands on a couple, and didn't know how it worked. He remembered something about a fuse, but didn't know what a fuse was, so he grabbed his sticks of dynamite, a hammer and headed to a tree stump. You can guess what happened. He woke in the hospital, with no arms. People kept telling him how lucky he was to be alive, though he didn't feel that way. A few years later, he found some bullets, and started to toss them into open fires....he lost an eye. I couldn't help but laugh, as I was hearing a quote from the movie Christmas Story, "You're gonna shoot your eye out!". After a while, his parents gave him up, as he was getting into all sorts of trouble, and they dumped him at the local hospital. Well, he got bored, and ended up finding some more dynamite, but they were soaked. "Can't have any fun with wet dynamite", he said, so he went to the basement of the hospital, and started to lean them up against the stove. Someone caught him, and immediately turned him in, stating that he was trying to blow the hospital up. They sent him to a psychiatric hospital, where he stayed for most of his childhood and adolescent life. Eventually, someone accused him of rape. "How is a person with no arms, supposed to rape anyone?" he asked us. He was tried, his brother came and bailed him out, and once that was over, he was taken back to the hospital in Cripple Creek, where he died. No one knows who, but someone is taking great care of his grave marker, keeping it clean, painting it, and everything.
Armless...the one who loved dynamite.
The next woman, I don't remember much, aside from her disdain from learning about the brothel's women, and that she was married to a miner, and was a painter.
The painter.
The next actor, portrayed a woman who was one of the first female doctors. Of course, back then, being a doctor in those times, was especially difficult. She had standards, and people didn't like that she wouldn't hand out whiskey for any aliment. Her first patient was a horse, not the same horse from this cemetery, but in a different city. She eventually came back to Cripple Creek, after learning of her brother's death, which struck her hard. She moved back to Cripple Creek, because she was in the early stages of tuberculosis, and figured that the altitude would either kill her or heal her. It cured her, so she stayed. She wanted very much to be buried next to her brother, but when the time came, they couldn't find her brother, so they placed her, where is lying now, and the story goes, that she is still seen wandering the cemetery at night, searching for her brother, her best friend. Apparently, during this woman's life, some hot shot actress of their time, wanted to play her in a movie, but she never agreed to it, however, there was a TV series based on her life...Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman. Now, the whole time we were listening to the story, you could hear several people, mom included, whispering about how this actor looked familiar. She was an actor on the famous soap opera Guiding Light. Once our guide said that, everyone was like," Oh yeah!"
Dr. Susie, Guiding Lights.
The next, and final person that we saw, was a woman, called Emma Ward, who was half native American, and talked about her struggles with her husband and kids, keeping their business afloat as the trains started to become more popular. I don't remember a lot of her story, either, but I remember that it was still a good story to hear.
Emma Ward
After we finished with the cemetery walk, we waited for the trolley to pick us up. Back on board, before we headed back into town, they had a raffle. They handed us our tickets, and started to call out the numbers. Mom won two meal tickets to the place that she and Roy eat at when they stay, and I won two tickets to the railroad, that is a four mile trip, to see leaves and abandon mines. Mike and I are going to use those this weekend! I'm hoping that the trees are still showing colors!
Back in Cripple Creek, I bought a cute stuffed donkey, as it was to help support the wild donkeys in town. I'm such a softie when it comes to stuffed animals and real animals...Even Mike said that it was a cute donkey. Mom and I started to head down the pass, and stopped periodically to take pictures of the leaves.
Leaves!
Not quite "Peak" season.
When Mom and I finally got back to the Springs, we headed to King Soopers to grab some things to make lunch. I also had to buy some windshield fluid, as my car was telling me that I was low. I ended up buying a gallon, and using the whole thing! That's crazy!
We had our rotisserie chicken and baked potato, then I talked her into going and getting some frozen yogurt at YoYogurt. That really hit the spot! I miss that place! I wish we had something like that here in Craig. We do have a frozen yogurt place, but Mike and I went there once, and Mike got a full cup, and tasted good, mine on the other hand, by the time the kid figured out how to operate the machine, as well as the manual scoop, mine was half full, charged us full price, of course...and he was so slow, my half full cup, had melted into a nasty soup....shudder.
After having a fun day with mom, I headed out to the girl's night. There, we had dinner, which was really tasty, and then learned how to do our own facials and practiced french braiding each other's hair. I finally asked my best friend, who's idea this night was, and she told me. It just seemed like such an odd thing to get together and do. I still had fun, and ended up perfecting my french braiding technique, but still....usually we do dinner and movie, or dinner and games, but this was a nice change of pace. I stayed at my friend's house that night, and the next morning, we got coffee and talked for a while, and then I went to get gas, and car wash, before attempting the trip home.
My french braid handiwork!
I didn't get very far... I jumped onto the highway on the Woodmen exit, heading North towards Denver. Once I passed the next exit, which was North Academy, everything was a standstill. After being stuck in traffic, for 30 minutes, I finally reached the North Gate exit, which if traffic was normal, it would have taken 5-10 minutes from when I got on the highway, to where I got off. Instead, it was a painful 30 minutes. I took the exit off and headed back into the Springs, away from Denver. Traffic was bad because of the Bronco game...silly fans.
I made a detour to mom's house, for a bio stop and to refresh on drinks. As I was making my way to mom's house, Mike texts me. Now, before I tell you what happened, I should say, that I had printed out a recipe for a crock pot coconut chicken curry...I was hopeful that he would put everything into the crock pot so that dinner would be ready when I got home, and at the rate traffic was, who knows when it would have been, so when I saw his text, I opened it. This is what he said," Oh my God! I just broke the crock pot!" Mind you, this is the G rated text. The one I got, was much more colorful, and rightfully so, as I understand why he was so upset. The crock pot we had cost over $150.
I wanted to laugh, and I think I did, and I tried to tell him that it was okay. I tried to lighten the mood by telling him that if he really didn't want to cook, all he had to do was say so, not go breaking our appliances...that was poor timing on my part, as he really wasn't finding the humor in the situation.
The damage has been done.
He said that he washed everything, and placed them in to a pot, to cook on low, on the stove top. As I stopped at mom's for a bio break, and drink refill, I got to see Willow and Josh once more, before heading out. As I did, the traffic in Woodland Park was slow moving because of their Octoberfest. Once you got out of town, traffic was fine. I stopped halfway to Silverthorne at a visitor center to use the restroom...now, each time I stop here, there are no cars. This time, the parking lot was packed full, with people circling around numerous times for spots to stop, and do what I was trying to do. The line for the bathroom was crazy. My first thought was wondering why no one was using the stalls in the back of the building...oh, look at that...there's a sign that says they closed it for the off season...if they were to look at the lines, it's not off season yet. Once I wasted my 10 minutes there, waiting to do a simple and natural human thing, I took off for Silverthorne. I was planning on driving straight on, but Mike had asked that I grab him some of the flavored coffee that I used to buy when we lived in the Springs. How could I say no, especially after the morning he's had. So, I stopped in Silverthorne, and grabbed the coffee. I was going to get something to eat, as I had only had coffee all day, but the line just to get something to eat was so slow moving, I got frustrated, and I left.
By the time I got home, it was late, and people were driving like morons, so it seemed to take me even longer to get home than usual. Mike came out to greet me, and of course, I snapped, not so much at him, but just because I was exhausted and hungry. When we got inside, Mike's quinoa attempt had boiled over onto the stove top and had burned. This was just not his day. His mood was pretty bad, but understandably so. He cleaned up what he could, and began making rice. I wanted to laugh, I mean, I felt at a loss of what else to do, but laugh. However, I chose not to.
The next day, Mike woke up feeling absolutely horrible...sick with a cold. Coughing, blowing nose the works. He ended up calling in, not going to work, as he had a fever too. Mike said that if he didn't have that fever, he would have gone in regardless. Of course, this was the day where Direct TV was coming out to move our cable jack, and my package for the pseudo craft show was supposed to show...Direct TV did come out, and was done within about 10 minutes. I had been making a chicken soup for Mike, to get better quicker, and at about 600pm, we still hadn't heard from UPS. I checked my email, to make sure that they were due to deliver my stuff, and it said that a delivery attempt was made, no one was home, and another attempt would be made. I was livid! No one had tried to deliver, unless the UPS guy knocked on the mailbox, and not the house. So, I got online, talked to someone online, who forwarded me to the supervisor in Steamboat Springs, who explained that perhaps the driver made an error, and gave me a number to the distribution center here in Craig to talk to the driver and figure out what happened...the problem was that I had to wait until 830 in the morning...great. I was still fuming, as I paid a two day delivery fee to make sure that I would get this package before the craft show...The next morning, Mike was feeling better and headed in to work, and I called. They handed me off to the driver, and he explained that the city was paving our road, and he couldn't get up there to deliver my package. He did apologize, for which I was happy because I don't think that I would have been as polite to him, had he not apologized. I explained to him that I run my own business, and needed this stuff today! He understood, apologized some more, and he left. I set to work, opening the box, sorting things, and pricing them. The things that we ordered looked amazing!
We ordered several prints, coasters, puzzle, magnet, stickers, mug, mouse pad, a keepsake box...at least one of everything that I can make on my site!
It was finally time that I had to get things together and make it over to the location for this pseudo craft fair. I set up my computer, and merchandise, and it did take me a while to get the Internet to work on my computer, and I was freaking out! I need my computer, and website to make this work! This is how I would be able to make money, and without it, I'm just a random person with a handful of things to sell...ugh! Finally, I got it to work, and noticed that my hands were shaking so badly, that I looked like I was having a seizure. Several compliments later, and several cards handed out, my name was starting to spread. One small step at a time.
The people who made out the best was the Scentsy woman, and a woman selling tools...that's right, tools! Who knew?!
So, now, I've enrolled in two more craft shows, and Mike and I are going to go to Cripple Creek to go on the railroad, and then do some shopping that we can't get in Craig. Another eventful week, and weekend to come! I'll keep you posted with the events that will be coming!
We have had a huge swarm of these bugs, that I believe are called Boxelder? They are freaking everywhere! Mike talked to his co-workers and got some ideas on how to get rid of them, as well as some links on how to kill them. They are such a nuisance!
I also was able to unpack most of the remaining boxes, but still have a couple of things to do. We are hoping to get things in order to be able to send out invites to our house warming party, so be on the look out for those as well!
Also, look for more recipes! I'm going to be making some different entrees, edamame, and a frosty copy cat recipe! I'm looking forward to it! So be on the look out for new posts! I'm trying to be better at updating, but you can clearly see, that we have been super busy!
Well, I think that about does it.
Until next time!
