Dress Shopping for Assistant to the Bride

I am seeing a pattern. Bridesmaid dresses all seem to be for much younger females than I. As in, ones with perky small non-childrearing breasts, a 'sleeker' waist and let's just face it, overall YOUNGER. The clincher was when I tried on a dress and had to manually pull parts of my anatomy up about 6 inches (I am not kidding) to smoosh in those parts of my anatomy into the too small breast containment zone. I could not figure out what the lumps were above my belly button. They were my boobs flattened. That was a very sad realization. Not a good look. (But hey, I would really make the lovely bride look good, wouldn't I?) And really, spaghetti straps? Those won't even hold my .... well, we are running a family style blog here. I am thinking the whole strapless concept is a danger zone for me unless this is a 'clothing optional' wedding. And it is not. What if I had to jump in the air with my arms up for some strange reason?

I think I will start looking at the mother of the bride/groom dresses.....

Habitat for Humanity - training

I have written before about my extreme love for the re-use building supply store. And craigslist. The reason I basically have close to $7000 worth of never installed bathroom materials sitting in the garage waiting to go in my "new" bathroom, and what did I pay? Kohler, Restoration Hardware, American Standard...ah yes, I paid just around $900.
There was an article in the paper yesterday about training for women on construction basics with then the ability to help build a house nearby. I am going for it. I am master at painting, but construction has me looking to the kids dad, friends or neighbors. It would be nice to know how to do it. Way way in my faraway youth I was trained on what I consider huge equipment for art school.... which had a masterful shop, but I recall none of that. Other than the saw was really big. And would take your finger tips off lickitysplit. And that the art piece I produced got good reviews and a killer story from a classmate at 4 in the morning the night before it was shown.
Such a long time ago. But I still remember that story!

Junior Bridesmaid Gowns by Alvina Valenta - Style 507

Now that I wonderfully thrown a fit at my gal pal 3 months before her wedding.... Rose has found her bridesmaid dress. We still need authorization from the bride for color choice, but it was grueling getting the daughter to pick a dress! There was one that she and I both Loved, but I figured the bride would not want two gals standing by her side dressed like classical roman slave girls ala 2010. I do have a wee bit of sense.
Junior Bridesmaid Gowns by Alvina Valenta - Style 507

About said personal fit: when longtime friends no longer keep in touch or share their lives with you the way they did, it sucks. I am just realizing how much it sucks and able to recognize it and no longer take it personally, but it is hard to lose that link in communication. When your lives are woven together by history, familarity, love, longevity and stories... I am torn between "I should have just kept it to myself since she is getting married in three months" and "share." I chose share, and we shall see where that goes. There is so much more wrapped up in this conversation... but the bottom line for me nowadays is trust. I suppose that will be my mantra for the rest of my days of living. And that squirrel-y word 'truth' which I used to believe was so concrete and black and white, and it is nothing of the sort. Where are those hard black and white words that we can solidly build upon? Which ones are written in stone?

Fort Worden Port Townsend

We took a quick trip over spring break up to ol' Fort Worden. These were built as WWI and WWII security for the entrance to Puget Sound, one of three such batteries. All that are left are echo-ey huge cement blocks buried in the hillsides. Remnants of the cannon supports, ammunition rooms and narrow hallways abound. The rockin' thing is that you can climb anywhere in, over, through them. The hidden tunnels are the creepiest. There are no lights other than our own weak flashlights brought from home.

Whirlwind of Anger and Bad Parenting

Today is the first Easter in my life spent alone. Yes, yes, I suppose I am feeling sorry for myself. I am still at heart a spoiled only child. And therefore, what did I do when the kids arrived this evening from their weekend at dads? Called their father to the carpet for not even registering it was Easter (still a big deal at my house) the importance of his involvement with his son, and my extreme desire not to have to tell him these things since I am not in that wife role any longer. Then I moved on to our son, who was procrastinating about school work. Then I nailed Rose about her brothers hair. (can you see this is starting to become non-sensical anger?)
Rose came downstairs after the lights were out to have a heart to heart with me about how inappropriate and mean what I said was. And that she thought I should apologize. And she was right. When I think about what I said it makes me cringe. So not like me, but so very like me to attack in that manner when I feel like crap. I apologized. And she shed her traditional "tears of frustration" at me. Funny when a 14 year old can switch maturity level with a 45 year old.
Then to top off the evening I sent a volatile email off to a good friend that the timing is very inconvenient for her stress levels. Or mine for that matter. I suppose that is another post.
At age 45 I have finally figured out that when I am angry, it is actually fear. That is so difficult for me to claim, since I would always define myself as fearless. Cautious yes, but fear, no. But fear is very present when I roll into this sort of erratic nastiness. So I suppose my next 45 years will be finding out where this fear comes from and how to not make those I love miserable when I am threatened. Sigh. Well, that does give me some time....

Rainbow - Must be Shamrock Shake time

Strange but true. When we were coming back from Rose's piano we saw this lovely vision of brightness in a crappy weather day. But look... look where the end of the rainbow rests. McDonald's. McDonald's was enveloped in the wide array of rainbow tints, all lovely and glowing.

Seattle Viaduct

The Seattle waterfront has a two-level freeway running next to and above it.
Sometimes when things have always been there (ya know, within your own lifetime) you get used to seeing it and cannot imagine anything else.

The unfortunate truth is that this is duplicate to the freeway in San Francisco that pancaked and fell during the 1989 earthquake. Seattle has been ignoring this fact and dealing with it at the same time. Local news reports after the SF earthquake reported--the Seattle viaduct is NOT like the San Francisco viaduct -- and then proceeded to tell us it is not long for this world and sinking and placed weight restrictions on it. See, the freeway is built upon fill. That fill is supported by wood pilings that date back to early Seattle. When where I was standing in the photo was water and docks. And those pilings have been chewed by piling eating worms. So those pilings really are not supporting the pillars any longer. Hence, the freeway sinking. Hence, the metal supports added in pic #1. I think all that temp work to shore it up was over 14 million. Here is the possible replacement that our governor,

Gregoire, and our former mayor, Nickels were in a pissing match about. Well now Seattle has a new mayor, god help that city, McGinn, such a perfect Seattle can't make a decision, let's make sure we all feel good about it, let's have absolutely no leadership experience or budget handling experience but get people to vote for us because we are not the other guy, let's have endless pointless expensive time wasting meetings about it and then still not make a decision Mayor McGinn. I don't know what his opinion is about it other than he may want half the lanes dedicated to walkers and bikers... which the day I see semi trucks from the waterfront hauling cargo all across the US by bicycle is the day I will stop drinking coffee. This simulation of the viaduct replacement by tunnel under Seattle is brilliant. I did not add the simulated viaduct in an earthquake that is also on youtube... that is the sort of thing that makes people paranoid. (And I think my car was represented in there...) but you can google that in your own time. I will not contribute to american paranoia. Except through my own children.

Under Seattle by car.... : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rgtOTMJt-AI (note, I can't get this to work, if it works for you, let me know)