I had to cancel a lunch date today because I have done absolutely NOTHING to contribute to the house cleaning in the last two weeks (well...except to mess it up by THINKING I was going to reorganize and then getting called to a different reorganizing project in the middle of the first one and THEN getting called - and when I say "called", I mean...like...visions and inspirational thoughts and such - to another project).
Needless to say: I go back to work tomorrow and the house is in worse off shape than before I started break 2 weeks ago. Good thing I like to organize.
P.S. As I was doing the dishes, I noticed that the medicine cabinet above the sink could certainly use a re-organization, so that is what I spent the morning doing. Is it a sickness?
D.
Tuesday, January 3, 2012
Sunday, January 1, 2012
Happy New Year
Happy New Year to all. I feel happy. I feel excited. I feel energized. I think it's going to be a good year. I am working on a new venture this year that I am pretty nervous about. It has to do with selling some of my stuff - stuff I make and stuff I find. It has to do with video blogging. It has to do with trying to make my way on this journey of life. It has to do with making choices that I alone will be responsible for. I'm moving forward. If I had to pick a word for the year of 2012 right now, it would be that - "forward".
I'll keep you posted if you're interested in how this all progresses.
I made a video this morning about something that I wanted to sell, but as Katie Rose was filming and I got to the part about how much I wanted to charge, she snickered. That scared me a little. I'm going to edit the video and add some stuff to it and then we'll see what happens.
My prayer is that you, who are reading this - especially you, Dad, are filled with a peace that knows know bounds. That's one of the reasons we are here taking this trip, so that we can know peace.
My love to you all.
P.S. (Speaking of prayer - see paragraph above, if Gracey doesn't wake her butt up for Mass in exactly 3 minutes, the wrath of her father will be upon her. Pray for her.)
I'll keep you posted if you're interested in how this all progresses.
I made a video this morning about something that I wanted to sell, but as Katie Rose was filming and I got to the part about how much I wanted to charge, she snickered. That scared me a little. I'm going to edit the video and add some stuff to it and then we'll see what happens.
My prayer is that you, who are reading this - especially you, Dad, are filled with a peace that knows know bounds. That's one of the reasons we are here taking this trip, so that we can know peace.
My love to you all.
P.S. (Speaking of prayer - see paragraph above, if Gracey doesn't wake her butt up for Mass in exactly 3 minutes, the wrath of her father will be upon her. Pray for her.)
Saturday, December 31, 2011
I Appreciate a Man With a Good Sense of Humor
The other day, I posted on facebook, an invitation to my family members - Honey, Johnny, Gracey, Katie Rose and Mickey. I invited them to a party in our kitchen from 10am to 11am on Dec. 31, 2011. I promised them loud music, games and some snackin' foods.
Well...word got out that it was a ploy to get them all to clean the house for one hour - to bring in the New Year with a fresh, clean start. Needless to say, no one showed up this morning. I wasn't surprised, really. I sort of had a plan in the back of my head that whoever showed up, I would take out to lunch when we were done. So I guess I saved myself a few bucks.
As I was going on about my business this morning, I walked into to the laundry room and was greeted by a HUGE pile of laundry. I thought I was talking to myself, but apparently I said out loud, "Wow! That's a big pile of laundry."
From the man cave, I hear John reply, "Don't think of it as laundry. Think of it as party favors."
Touche.
Well...word got out that it was a ploy to get them all to clean the house for one hour - to bring in the New Year with a fresh, clean start. Needless to say, no one showed up this morning. I wasn't surprised, really. I sort of had a plan in the back of my head that whoever showed up, I would take out to lunch when we were done. So I guess I saved myself a few bucks.
As I was going on about my business this morning, I walked into to the laundry room and was greeted by a HUGE pile of laundry. I thought I was talking to myself, but apparently I said out loud, "Wow! That's a big pile of laundry."
From the man cave, I hear John reply, "Don't think of it as laundry. Think of it as party favors."
Touche.
Friday, December 30, 2011
Thursday, December 29, 2011
Thursday, July 28, 2011
The Tattoo Post
I LOVE my tattoo...I just want to get that out there. I am going to post some pics here of the experience.
First off, I found this piece of work I did several years ago and thought it would be fun to post it here.
I have been thinking of getting a tattoo for at least a year and maybe even longer. I didn't know what I wanted but I sort of knew that I wanted it on the back of my neck. I had been to my brother-in-law's tattoo parties in the past and never thought I'd even consider it. I can't remember now why I was opposed to them, but I guess I was...at least on my body.
There is a Dolan family history of tattoos...John and his brothers all have a shamrock on their buttocks, with Patrick's being the largest for some reason. (Side note: now that John is getting older and a bit...well...you know...bigger...we joke that his tattoo is now the largest of his brothers' tattoos.) Anyhow...as each of the children of these brothers turn 18, they, in turn, get their own shamrocks. In addition to his shamrock, my son, Johnny, also got a huge kairos cross on his upper right shoulder. I thought it was totally cool and realized that tattoos weren't as taboo as I had previously thought.
I love my "married-into-family". I really do, but I didn't want to copy them. I wanted my own Whalen identity to always be a part of my soul. I needed a remnant of my own self, aside from my husband and children. That's why it wasn't a shamrock on my butt that I wanted. I wanted something special.
My sisters and I get together for a "retreat" each year, as some of you already know, not just because you know me, but because I talk about this special time for weeks and weeks and weeks before and after one takes place. Every other year, we invite husbands and children and we call it "Cousin Camp" intead of "Sister's Retreat". The year 2011 was a "Sister Retreat" year. We met in Nashville, TN. I was the first to arrive this year and as my sister Jeanette lives nearby, she picked me up at the airport and we went to lunch.
This is my sister, Jeanette. Here, at this very table, the tattoo thing started to become a reality. I said, "Hey, let's get tattoos this trip."
"YEAH!", she said.
We immediately called up the other three, who were in various airports across the country...
"Hey, you guys want to get a tattoo this trip?" (Around our little lunch table, Jeanette and I made bets on who would want to and who wouldn't.) Much to our surprise, the idea was well-received.
As these retreats go by, our spontaneity tends to take us in directions we hadn't planned, so it was toward the end of our trip when the tattoo idea sort of fizzled a little. There were more important things to do...we are a "play it by ear" sort of group at times. On Friday afternoon, we headed to downtown Nashville to eat and try and grab some crumbled stone from the famous theater (can't really remember the name now, but it starts with an "R" - the Top Ramen Theater?) for Margie's husband, as well as some photos from some famous place for that same husband. We stopped to eat at a Jimmy Buffet restaurant (we almost had a repeat of the previous day's lunch, but I nipped THAT in the bud real quick.)
As we were walking back to the car - it was H-O-T and we thought we'd go back to Jeanette's for a swim - IT just appeared, IT being the coolest tattoo parlor in town. We looked at each other. Let's do it! Mom was really tired and if we had all been good daughters we would have taken her home so that she could rest, but that tattoo parlor was calling to us.
"I'll just take a nap in the car," says Mom. "I don't mind that it's 110 degrees outside and that the car that I'll be sleeping in is black and in the sun. You girls go on ahead and get your tattoos."
I had to ask, "Mom, are you sure you don't want to get one with us?"
"No...I'm too old and the tattoo would sag."
So we left mom in the car, making sure that the windows were open and entered the most awesome tattoo parlor ever. It's "hook", if you will was that it was a Christian tattoo parlor, run by good Christian people. It even had one of Jeanette's husband's gold records hanging on the wall...although the word "gold" here is deceiving. It looked more silvery to me.
We spent a goodly amount of time looking through the pictures of tattoos we could get. As I said before, it needed to be special. We looked at flowers, butterflies, crosses, all kinds of things, but there wasn't any one, special thing that we all agreed on.
"How about a word?" someone suggested.
Great idea! We had the tattoo parlor people look up the word "sisterhood" in Hebrew. There were about five symbols for the Hebrew version of "sisterhood". We wanted to keep it small and simple, so we kept looking. Someone looked up "sisterhood" in Kanji (an eastern Asian language). It had two symbols - one for "sister" and one for "tree." Together it meant "sisterhood".
After signing our lives away and making multiple copies of our Drivers Licenses and insurance cards and birth certificates, we were ready to begin. They assigned us to our tattoo artists, placed mock-ups of the actual tattoos on our bodies, let us take a look at them and then went to work.
Here is a photo of me getting mine on the back of my neck:
Here is the finished tattoo:
Here is a photo of all of us with our tattoo artists - a great bunch of guys:
I LOVE my tattoo. I LOVE my sisters and I LOVE our adventures together.
D.
First off, I found this piece of work I did several years ago and thought it would be fun to post it here.
I have been thinking of getting a tattoo for at least a year and maybe even longer. I didn't know what I wanted but I sort of knew that I wanted it on the back of my neck. I had been to my brother-in-law's tattoo parties in the past and never thought I'd even consider it. I can't remember now why I was opposed to them, but I guess I was...at least on my body.
There is a Dolan family history of tattoos...John and his brothers all have a shamrock on their buttocks, with Patrick's being the largest for some reason. (Side note: now that John is getting older and a bit...well...you know...bigger...we joke that his tattoo is now the largest of his brothers' tattoos.) Anyhow...as each of the children of these brothers turn 18, they, in turn, get their own shamrocks. In addition to his shamrock, my son, Johnny, also got a huge kairos cross on his upper right shoulder. I thought it was totally cool and realized that tattoos weren't as taboo as I had previously thought.
I love my "married-into-family". I really do, but I didn't want to copy them. I wanted my own Whalen identity to always be a part of my soul. I needed a remnant of my own self, aside from my husband and children. That's why it wasn't a shamrock on my butt that I wanted. I wanted something special.
My sisters and I get together for a "retreat" each year, as some of you already know, not just because you know me, but because I talk about this special time for weeks and weeks and weeks before and after one takes place. Every other year, we invite husbands and children and we call it "Cousin Camp" intead of "Sister's Retreat". The year 2011 was a "Sister Retreat" year. We met in Nashville, TN. I was the first to arrive this year and as my sister Jeanette lives nearby, she picked me up at the airport and we went to lunch.
This is my sister, Jeanette. Here, at this very table, the tattoo thing started to become a reality. I said, "Hey, let's get tattoos this trip."
"YEAH!", she said.
We immediately called up the other three, who were in various airports across the country...
"Hey, you guys want to get a tattoo this trip?" (Around our little lunch table, Jeanette and I made bets on who would want to and who wouldn't.) Much to our surprise, the idea was well-received.
As these retreats go by, our spontaneity tends to take us in directions we hadn't planned, so it was toward the end of our trip when the tattoo idea sort of fizzled a little. There were more important things to do...we are a "play it by ear" sort of group at times. On Friday afternoon, we headed to downtown Nashville to eat and try and grab some crumbled stone from the famous theater (can't really remember the name now, but it starts with an "R" - the Top Ramen Theater?) for Margie's husband, as well as some photos from some famous place for that same husband. We stopped to eat at a Jimmy Buffet restaurant (we almost had a repeat of the previous day's lunch, but I nipped THAT in the bud real quick.)
As we were walking back to the car - it was H-O-T and we thought we'd go back to Jeanette's for a swim - IT just appeared, IT being the coolest tattoo parlor in town. We looked at each other. Let's do it! Mom was really tired and if we had all been good daughters we would have taken her home so that she could rest, but that tattoo parlor was calling to us.
"I'll just take a nap in the car," says Mom. "I don't mind that it's 110 degrees outside and that the car that I'll be sleeping in is black and in the sun. You girls go on ahead and get your tattoos."
I had to ask, "Mom, are you sure you don't want to get one with us?"
"No...I'm too old and the tattoo would sag."
So we left mom in the car, making sure that the windows were open and entered the most awesome tattoo parlor ever. It's "hook", if you will was that it was a Christian tattoo parlor, run by good Christian people. It even had one of Jeanette's husband's gold records hanging on the wall...although the word "gold" here is deceiving. It looked more silvery to me.
We spent a goodly amount of time looking through the pictures of tattoos we could get. As I said before, it needed to be special. We looked at flowers, butterflies, crosses, all kinds of things, but there wasn't any one, special thing that we all agreed on.
"How about a word?" someone suggested.
Great idea! We had the tattoo parlor people look up the word "sisterhood" in Hebrew. There were about five symbols for the Hebrew version of "sisterhood". We wanted to keep it small and simple, so we kept looking. Someone looked up "sisterhood" in Kanji (an eastern Asian language). It had two symbols - one for "sister" and one for "tree." Together it meant "sisterhood".
After signing our lives away and making multiple copies of our Drivers Licenses and insurance cards and birth certificates, we were ready to begin. They assigned us to our tattoo artists, placed mock-ups of the actual tattoos on our bodies, let us take a look at them and then went to work.
Here is a photo of me getting mine on the back of my neck:
Here is the finished tattoo:
Here is a photo of all of us with our tattoo artists - a great bunch of guys:
I LOVE my tattoo. I LOVE my sisters and I LOVE our adventures together.
D.
Friday, July 22, 2011
Before the Tattoo Post
I know you all want to hear about the tattoo. I am surely getting to that, but I need some photos from the actual event and I have requested those from the designated sister historian, Nancy. So until I can get those, I'll postpone the tattoo post.
It was hot in TN. These photos are from our thrift store day. When thrifting, you have to understand that you may not find yourself in the best areas of a given town. From about 1pm to 4pm, we were in different stages of hunger, with the need to eat in the forefront of all of our minds. I say 1pm to 4pm because that is how long it takes five women to decide where the best place to eat is. So we're driving for about 3 hours looking for a place to eat in Nashville...yes...a big city where you'd think you could find a satisfying "restaurant" on every street corner.
Sister #1: How about Cracker Barrel...
Sister #2: Let's save Cracker Barrel for another day...
Sister #3: How about Denny's...
Sisters #4 and #5: It's too late for breakfast...
Sister #2: I know there is a great place right around this corner...I think...
Sister #1: Let's just go to Taco Bell...
Sister #5: Taco Bell would be fine with me, I'm so hungry...
Sister #3: Naw, we can get Taco Bell any ole time...let's go for something unique...and so on and so on and so on for three hours.
Finally, one of us, let's call her Sister # Smart says:
"We have not eaten all day! I am starving! Pull over the damn car and let's eat!
It was quiet for about a minute as we all processed what to do with this outburst. Most of us get really uncomfortable with tension, so there were some attempts made at laughter at the outburst, some staring out the window at the run down gas stations, and some just explaining why we needed to find the "right" place to eat.
Sister #2: Hey, there's a Fat Mo's. Do you want to go there?
Sisters #1, #3, and #5: YES!!
Sister #5: I had a cab driver who knew the owner of Fat Mo's! (We LOVE serendipity)
So we pull into Fat Mo's, hop out of the car into the sweltering heat and welcome the air conditioned space called "Fat Mo's".
We are the ONLY people in the joint...well us and the Indian cashier.
Sister #5: Are you the owner?
Indian Guy: No.
Sister #4: Are you Fat Mo?
Indian Guy: Nope
Sister #5: Do you know a guy that drives a cab?
Indian Guy: (Just stares like he doesn't understand the question)
As our food is ready, we eat and think it would be fun to mark this moment with photos of each of us...so here we are.
Me
Kelley
Nancy
Margie
Jeanette
And there you have the Fat Mo story.
It was hot in TN. These photos are from our thrift store day. When thrifting, you have to understand that you may not find yourself in the best areas of a given town. From about 1pm to 4pm, we were in different stages of hunger, with the need to eat in the forefront of all of our minds. I say 1pm to 4pm because that is how long it takes five women to decide where the best place to eat is. So we're driving for about 3 hours looking for a place to eat in Nashville...yes...a big city where you'd think you could find a satisfying "restaurant" on every street corner.
Sister #1: How about Cracker Barrel...
Sister #2: Let's save Cracker Barrel for another day...
Sister #3: How about Denny's...
Sisters #4 and #5: It's too late for breakfast...
Sister #2: I know there is a great place right around this corner...I think...
Sister #1: Let's just go to Taco Bell...
Sister #5: Taco Bell would be fine with me, I'm so hungry...
Sister #3: Naw, we can get Taco Bell any ole time...let's go for something unique...and so on and so on and so on for three hours.
Finally, one of us, let's call her Sister # Smart says:
"We have not eaten all day! I am starving! Pull over the damn car and let's eat!
It was quiet for about a minute as we all processed what to do with this outburst. Most of us get really uncomfortable with tension, so there were some attempts made at laughter at the outburst, some staring out the window at the run down gas stations, and some just explaining why we needed to find the "right" place to eat.
Sister #2: Hey, there's a Fat Mo's. Do you want to go there?
Sisters #1, #3, and #5: YES!!
Sister #5: I had a cab driver who knew the owner of Fat Mo's! (We LOVE serendipity)
So we pull into Fat Mo's, hop out of the car into the sweltering heat and welcome the air conditioned space called "Fat Mo's".
We are the ONLY people in the joint...well us and the Indian cashier.
Sister #5: Are you the owner?
Indian Guy: No.
Sister #4: Are you Fat Mo?
Indian Guy: Nope
Sister #5: Do you know a guy that drives a cab?
Indian Guy: (Just stares like he doesn't understand the question)
So we order. We order gyros, burgers and spicey curly fries. Two of us are very health conscious and try to clean off the table as we sit.
As our food is ready, we eat and think it would be fun to mark this moment with photos of each of us...so here we are.
Me
Kelley
Nancy
Margie
JeanetteAnd there you have the Fat Mo story.
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