Quick update....

Ok, here is short and sweet for all of you out there who don't think I can do it! :P

We are home..... it only took an extra 6hrs but hey, we made it.... I cannot tell you how grateful I am to be writing this post from home as opposed to the angry and bitter one that I was prepared to write while stuck at the Denver airport (even though, now that I think about it, it would have been rather entertaining....after a month or so ;) )   Our luggage may or may not be on the way..... how is it possible that we checked 3 bags in, at the same time, and only one of them made it?!?!?!? sigh....  But at least the bag with all the presents in it made it!! woot!!!!  who needs clothes and toiletries when one has presents!??!? Not me!!

I have now been up for about 36hrs total, with a few quick and uncomfortable naps in between.... it is not a pretty sight... I have been casting longing and suggestive looks at my pillow... thru the wall, cause I am too tired to get up and look at it thru the door opening....  it knows what's coming.... oh yeah, that's it, 12hrs of sleep coming my way!!!!!

Must end the post now to remain within the short and sweet parameters afore mentioned!!

will check in again once I have had my way with the pillow, mhuahahahahah!! (in a totally non creepy way!!)

Corinne ;)

The Missouri trip... written while stuck at the airport.

Ok, so here are the highlights of our Missouri trip...  please beware that this post maybe slightly skewed and a bit angry due to the fact that I am sitting at the Kansas City airport after having been delayed for 4hrs and not knowing whether or not we'll actually make it home once we get to Denver as we are on standby..... so we ask for you forgivness and understanding :)

How could have 9 days gone by so fast?!?!?!  well I guess once  you count in trip time and all, it only adds up to 7 1/2 but still.... I swear we just left Seattle 2 days ago!! So, let's start at the beginning....
After an uneventful airplane trip of about 6hrs give or take (that includes wait time) we landed in the very weird Kansas City airport. Upon exiting the gate area we almost walked past Toby and Jill, don't ask me why but we did.... we were grateful to them for coming to pick us up and for being there when we landed, you guys rock!!  Then we had to wait for about 1 1/2 hrs for the Utah crowd to land, we had a good visit and ate some spectacular ribs generously provided by Toby and Jill.  Some Angry Birds was played..... gotta love that game, easy to play and it provides hrs of entertainment for all age groups!  Once the Utah crowd landed.....about 10min early (which was not reflected on the arrivals screen.... silly airport!!) we all loaded up in the great van and headed home......3hrs later we were there!  Our arrival woke everybody up... sorry guys, I know it was early.... I think it was around 3am?!?! somebody correct me if I am wrong...  We had a good if short visit and then people headed to bed.

What followed that first day was and array of delicious food, hilarious children comments and conversations, more food, trips to town in multiple vehicles, crying/screaming children, more food and general pleasantries.  The time flew by way too fast, we got way too little sleep and ate way too much food, pretty much what you would expect from a vacation :)

Food Highlights:

• breakfast sausage balls (Provided by Michelle)
• breakfast cookies (Provided by Vea)
• bread, yum!!! (provided by Vea and Natalie)
• Turkey noodle soup (provided by Vea)
• Chinese buffet (provided by nameless chinese people)
• Lasagna (provided by yours truly)
• Delicious barbeque pulled pork sandwiches on homemade buns (provided by Vea) FAVORITE MEAL :)
• Sweet and savory crepes!!! (provided by Vea with an able assist from Michelle)  still digesting those as we just ate them 5hrs ago... oh how we love food
• Scrumptous chocolate mousse (provided by yours truly)
• Chocolate scones... yum!! (provided by yours truly and Michelle, supervised by Vea)
• Awesome cheese night!! 6 or 7 cheeses were present, plus an array of crackers, pears and grapes. Thank you to all the ladies that sliced, diced amd arranged everything in a beautiful and inviting composition; is there ever such a thing as too much cheese!??!? I think not!!

On the not so positive and exciting column one must mention the horribe sickness that went around..... a few of us were deathly ill for most of the time, I am glad and sad to report that I, for once, was not the most sick, except for the day I spent throwing up which made us miss the Silver Dollar City expedition.... however we did get some awesome Christmas decorations from Vea, thank you so much!!!

A shout out goes to all the fun stuff we did:

• shooting guns, always a favorite
• Hollis' baptism, thanks for arranging to get that done while we were out there and could be a part of it :)
• watching rift tracks.... yes Eclipse was THAT bad!!
• opening presents with the children, even though we had to wait till 1pm to start, what torture!!!
• driving around town with the ladies
• driving to the smallest post office ever known to man
• checking out Toby and Jill's awesome new place
• Checking out Lynn and Dallas' new place, Lynn's workplace and his new swanky car... go Focus!!  :P just kidding, I know it's a Taurus! :P

So, as I sit here at the airport waiting for our flight I am very grateful to be able to remember all the good memories we made and the great time we had, it was worth a little airport drama to see everybody.  All of the children have grown so much I am starting to feel even older than I alread did.

We desperately wish we lived closer and that moving closer would be an option, but it doesn't look like we'll be able to do that anytime soon; so for the next little while we'll just have to make trips back and forth as often as we can. 

A shout out to Emma and Barrett who due to inclement weather related issues didn't make it out there, you were sorely missed and we wished with all our hearts you could be there. We miss you guys and hope to see you soon, maybe in Montana somewhere??!! Hugs and kisses to you both and to your adorable dogs! :)

I am sure I am forgetting a whole lot of things, but seeing how I haven't really slept yet you can't really blame me... I may have to edit this later but for now I am happy as it is......

Till next time.....
Corinne

The Utah trip!!

Finally I get a moment to jot a few things down. (and yes, sorry folks, this may turn into another extremely long post... sigh.. ) When last we saw our heroine, she was buried in orders and stressed out about having to go on this short jaunt to Utah..... fast forward 2 weeks, give or take a few days, and we find our heroine still buried in orders but with tales to tell....

So, we managed to get the orders out that we needed in order for me to be able to go on my trip without being smothered in guilt. It was however madness and chaos trying to get everything done, I was packing my suitcase and packaging houses until the time we had to leave to go to the airport, whew, that was close!  One long but uneventful airplane trip later and I am in Utah, at Migeys house, cunsuming a large helping of delicious homemade beef pot pie, yum!!  We had a nice visit and then technology took over, amid Ipads, laptops and PCs it was a geeks paradise!!  What followed was a binge of fun, relaxation, large amounts of spectacular food and general sillyness (how do you spell this word?!??!) .... (oh wait, that's what spell check is for!! :) )  There were several shopping trips, one of which netted us a ridicuolous amount of sweets:

• Chocolate covered pretzels
• Yogurt covered pretzels
• Chocolate covered almonds
• gummy bears
• chocolate covered something, can't quite remember what....
• some other gummylike substance

All this to equal way too much junk food, but oh so tasty! We watched several movies, including "The Sorceror's Apprentice" and "Unstoppable" both of which were pretty enjoyable, I mean who doesn't like Nicholas Cage and Denzel Washington I ask you?!? On to the list of delicious foods that were comsumed in a relatively short amount of time:

• Awesome sausage and eggs
• Delicious Beef Pot Pie
• Scrumptuous Rhubarb Pie
• Icecream!!  need I say more?!?!?
• Suppli
• Sweet potato fries and cheese sticks
• Tiramisu!! yum!!
• Delightfully savory Texas Roadhouse outing, steak and potatoes FTW!!
• Delicately fried fish
• Chili dogs!!
• Pan Di Stelle - oh how I miss my italian cookies!!
• and other foods, can't think about food anymore I am already hungry!!

You may wonder if we had time to do anything else besides eating with this impressive list of offerings, but indeed yes, we actually did other stuff, true we kind of had to roll from one place to another but we still made it! There was one epic night filled with the sounds of Rock Band, kudos to Migey and his amazing Rock Band skills, also a kudos to Ben for conquering the dreaded and awfully hard to play drums ( I tried it once... on easy..... got a 65%, bah!) To my comrad in Bass playing, we did the best we could, I salute you and bid you success in your next endeavors. Even though, and this is for you Rock Band makers, why dont' you have any Celine Dion or Whitney Houston songs available?!?!?? or even Faith Hill?!?!? and what is with your pitiful Country songs selection?!?!?!?  what? you mean country songs aren't rocking enough for you?!?!?!?  sigh.... oh well

Then there was the unforgettable afternoon spent in the magical world of Quelf, where things like taping a piece of paper to ones head, asking permission to speak from your foot and paper airplane races are only a few of the hilarious things that happen whilst visiting there. A word to the wise, if I may, do not drink at the table whilst playing Quelf!  There were battles of Smash Brothers Brawl, cuddles with the adorable Bella, computer gaming (really?!?! I would have never thought!! =P ) A rush against time to make 48mini cranberry bread-muffins... barely managed to get that done in time and what is it with stores not carrying cellophane loot bags?!?!?!?

A huge shout out to Mindee for putting up with me all that time. It was an amazing trip and lots of fun!!You guys are amazing and certainly made me feel important and well cared for!! I would rate your facility as 5 stars!!

I am sure I am missing something amazing that we did... I'll have to post it later as it comes to me.. It was great to have been able to go, big kiss and hug to my wonderful husband who helped me make it happen and who stayed behind holding down the home front.  It was great to be able to spend time with Migey, Mindee, Ben, Bella and Mom. I love you guys, hugs and kisses!!!

Only thing, I wish I would have had more time to visit the other side of the family while I was there, Michelle, Tyler and kids, sorry I didn't make it out to see you, but I will see you soon for the McDonald's Christmas Extravaganza hosted by your amazing parents in Missouri!! Are you all ready for this??!?!? Can't hardly wait!!

Until next time.........
Corinne

Not another long monologue!!

So... looking back over my other posts I noticed that I write a lot...... verbose to the max..... So I thought I would keep this one short and sweet to show versatility!!   And so people stop falling asleep at their computers trying to get thru one of my posts.... yes I have had complaints! :P

We just got more orders - STOP - there is no way I can get all of this done before Utah - STOP - maybe not even before Missouri - STOP - I QUIT -STOP

Whew... I thought that might be harder.... and now, what to do with all this free time I find myself having?!?!?

Why me!??!

Ok, so it always happens this way, don't ask me why but it really does!!

There I was, just minding my own business, dreaming a little, playing a little, working a little, packing a lot (I think cardboard box and tape fumes are partially to blame for what happend next) ..... and then I thought "well, Corinne, looks like there is not going to be much to do once December comes, the move is done, Custom Kingdoms is always dead, you don't have a church calling, it would be the PERFECT time for a little extra trip!!"  (what was I thinking even then?!?!? It's not like I haven't taken enough trips already this year!! Case in point:

• Barbadoes for a month - February/March
• Barbadoes again for 6 weeks - April/May
• Utah - June (or maybe July, who can remeber!!)
• Christmas trip to Missouri

Anyways, my little brain (and with the influence of Corinne #3, more details on the different Corinnes to come) decided another trip was just the ticket. Yeahy!! so exciting!!   And yes it is!! It is going to be awesome. Five days in Utah next week, I leave on Thursday and come home on Tuesday, one very long fun filled weekend. Woot!! Must remember to bring party hats!  (too bad Dana couldn't come with me, I'll have to party doubly hard to make up for that! ;) )

But here is where it all went terribly wrong!!!  (maybe it's punishment for leaving my husband at home alone?!?  Isn't all the cleaning and laundry/dishes that I will have to do when I get back punishment enough?!?! ) So,here is what happend: one of our lovely customers (bless his beady little heart!!) forwarded our website onto Blue Table Painting, second time he has done that. However, this time they took a look and liked what they saw and decided  to order some stuff and promote it on their youtube channel!! So far so good, you might be thinking, WRONG!!!

What that has spawned, during a time where we are usually dead (I have 3 yrs of records to document this!!), is  a flood of interest and orders. Once again, the thought here might be GOOD! WRONG!! not good, at all, how am I supposed to fill all these orders when I am only going to be home for 2 weeks in December?!?!?!? And to top it all off, we have had to change the plastic resin we were using and are still playing catch up!!  sigh..... Here I am on Friday morning, looking at the VERY long next 5 days..... 18 houses to go.... possibly more, we have one customer that contacted us wanting to place a $1200 order.... that's 24 more houses, 4 of which are custom orders. I ask you... what am I going to do??!!? 

I see a new relationship developing between me and my paint brushes.... there may have to be a break up after all, too much constant companionship might be just enough to break our already strenuous relationship!!
Checking our email has now become a nightmare..... I cautiosly approach my computer, timidly I launch the internet browser..... I debate, should I?!?!? or maybe if I ignore it, it will all go away... biting my nails, with a sense of impending doom I enter the url for our email, I spell it all out "www" included, anything to put it off a little longer..... there, the evil log in box wants me to conciously make the decision to enter "Tell me your password, ye that are doomed to slavery by orders!! Mhuahahahaah" my trembling fingers enter the password.... "wrong password" it yells at me in that embarassing shade of red that makes me think of grade school and all those papers I turned in all black and were returned to me mostly in red!! ...sigh, now I have to psych myself up all over again... there, finally got it right........ WHAT?!?!??! there are 6 unread emails?!?!?   ..... after coming to, how did I get on the floor?!?!?, I muster up the courage to check the inbox....... click, I close my eyes... cover them with my hands... and peek thru my fingers .....WHAT?!?!? all of this trembling and trepidation and it's all stupid Post-post-post BlacK FRIDAY ADVERTSIMENTS?!?!?!? ..... If I drank, this would be the time to grab a little something......

I am grateful for the added income and the success that we are having, but really?!?! all at the same time?!?!? and when I have little to no time to get this done?!?!? 

Oh well, I guess I'll take what I can get..... and I better get back to it!!

Corinne
P.S. Have you been ridiculed by the ugly and mocking red font?!?!? Join us in abolishing that color on the internet, TCFNMRF!!! (The Coalition for NO MORE RED font) Sign up today and make a difference!!!