Etsy Project Embrace

Check out the new blog for Team Etsy Project Embrace

Etsy Project Embrace (EPE) is a Universal Coalition of Artists whose main purpose is to create awareness and support for people who have been diagnosed with cancer and I'm proud to be a team member!

Please browse through their very cool items and enjoy the mouthwatering colors they've combined in their new Treasuries and vote for your favorite!

My niece, Misha, who's one of our MiShel Designs models, is beating up cancer in her life and you can read her touching (and sometimes quite humorous) blog called "Lymphomania" by clicking here.


Until Next Time,
Cheers,
~Shel~

Turning Wrinkles into Petals and Ruffles

Etsy Project Embrace - Turning Wrinkles into Petals and Ruffles!

Our Petal Pearl Swirl Earrings are featured here.

Check out all the wonderful finds the folks at ESTY have found for you to browse through and help those with Cancer at the same time!


Until Next Time,

Peace, Love and working towards a Cancer Free World!

Cheers,
~Shel~

Arkansas, Kansas, Nebraska and Home Again!

Okay, I know, you're thinking, "How did you skip over Texas and Oklahoma from New Mexico and end up in Arkansas?" 

Well, we really didn't see much of Texas (actually that's not true, any drive through Texas and you see A WHOLE LOT of Texas, but you know what I mean!) and we were only in OK long enough to be told by the nice highway patrol officer that 2 miles over the speed limit is WAY TOO FAST for his state and so I'm thinking that TX and OK can just be breezed over with this short note:  They're windy, flat, smell like cow poo and the storms can be harsh!  Enough said! LOL!! (Actually there are parts that are very pretty, but I'm not sure we saw those places!)

However, Arkansas - the portion we saw (Viola, AR) - was AWESOME!  We were on our way to see "Aunt Fawn and Uncle Tony" as Logan refers to them. Fawn's really my bro-in-law's sister,....so that makes us,...???,...well family actually, since we've spent every Christmas and Easter together since 1985 and even several Thanksgivings until they moved to Arkansas about 4 years ago. (boo hoo for us!!)

Fawn and Tony own "Fawnsberry Farm" and they have peach trees, blackberries, rasberries, these cute little horses and lots and lots of tree lined land with natural springs on it!  Fawn baked the most delicious blackberry pie for us the first night we arrived - it was scrumptious!! 

We had so much fun with them and with their friend Maggie, who was visiting from Oklahoma (I'm sure Maggie lives in one of those pretty places in OK that we didn't get to see!). We played cards (to their dismay afterwards, I'm sure!), went to Mammoth Spring State Park and Museum (the worlds 10th largest natural spring) and toured Banchard Springs Caverns (Waaay Coolio!! We liked it better than Carlsbad, actually).

Logan got to mow their grass (hey, we don't have much of that in Glendale, AZ) with the riding mower and he also drove their tractor and tilled their field for them - getting ready for more delicious, organic fruits and veggies for Fawnsberry Farm to produce!  It was so much fun we didn't want to leave!  And, it was great seeing family, too! We're practically ready to move there,.....just not sure how cold it gets in the winter,...after all, we're wimpy desert landers, ya know!

After saying our good bye's to Fawn and Tony and Fawnsberry Farm, we headed up to Wichita, Kansas to see Mike's sis, Sara, and hubby Roger for a couple of days. 

Due to break downs, we stayed a few more nights than planned - but ya see, they have this awesome yard, wonderful pool and relaxing hot tub, not to mention the nice, hot sauna!

I think they're catching on to our whole "We broke down in Concordia, KS (translation: the Middle of Nowhere) and had to have a new starter put in the RV and now it's too late to get to Dad's so we're coming back to stay the rest of the weekend with  you guys, okay?" 

But either way, they were super sweet, even coming to follow us back into Wichita and let us stay the weekend and help out with their huge garage sale - we had a blast! 

We got to visit with them, play with their grand kids and re-connect with our niece and nephew.  We viewed slides of Mike and all his family as kids, went through 'treasures', cooked some fantastic meals together, introduced them to Green Tabasco sauce and Mike made all the neighbor ladies (all in their 80's mind you!) the best Bloody Mary's they'd ever had! Oh yeah, and we forgot about the RV and all our breakdowns for about 72 hours!!

Leaving Kansas, we traveled north into Grand Island, NE but not until Mike's brother Pat and nephew James came down to Sara's house to 'get' us and take us safely up to Mike's dad's.  Worried about another break down and us threatening NOT to come home and Mike already missing his class reunion, Pat decided if he didn't come and get us we'd turn towards AZ and head home! (he was right, we WERE ready to head that way!)

So, we traveled to Grand Island, NE and Pat got us hooked up with "Ken's Auto", the best mechanic and auto garage in GI so they could get us a new mechanical fuel pump (the electric one that the Roswell crew put in wasn't doing the job - sorry guys - we should have listened to Jody and waited an extra day for the mechanical one!). 

We were able to spend time with Mike's Dad, his sister Teresa and hubby Jerry, nieces Elizabeth and Emily, brother Pat, wife Anne and nephew James and we even got to see his brother Marc, wife Colleen and nephews Adam, Austin and niece Allison, too.

The boys all floated down the Loup River, Mike and Logan selected a new "Tree" for another Famous Tree House they hope to build on Marc and Colleen's new property, the boys worked the back hoe and we fed the horses on Dad's property, chased his peacocks, Logan watched old westerns with his grandpa and we had a great time hanging with family  - it was LONG over due!!

We have safely traveled back to AZ from Nebraska in 2 days (yep, that's a long drive!) and are now at my sis's cabin, cleaning out the RV and loading up the Subaru so we can make our way back down into the Valley of the Sun (And HEAT!).

We have had an adventure that will not soon be forgotten. We spent some wonderful time with family and friends renewing bonds and making new ones and are so grateful that, despite the funny breakdowns and all, we are safe and happy with loads of pictures, stories and memories to last a lifetime!!

Until Next Time,
Peace, Love and may all your travels be Adventures and not Ordeals!!
Cheers,
~Shel~

Final Travel Quote:  "What's the difference between and adventure and an ordeal?"
Logan:  "Mom!"
Mike:  "Attitude!" (and money to fix the RV!)
Shelly:  "A well running RV!"


Another Day in Roswell!!

Up early, getting donuts and coffee for the folks at Express auto garage in Roswell so they can get the RV fixed (again) so we can get on down the road to visit family and friends!

We've changed our RV route and have decided, due to our multiple day delay here in Roswell, that we'll just bypass Texas and LA and head straight for Fawn and Tony's in Arkansas.  They own a farm - FawnsBerry Farm - and have peaches, blackberries, rasberries, small horses, and lots of land to roam on! We're hoping to enjoy some good times with them, eat some blackberry pie and let Logan mow the yard and possibly disk the field for them!!

Since our travels haven't allowed me to have internet access to the extent that I wanted, I am going to have our next few entries of just the "fun" things we enjoyed - like our fun time caving in Arkanas w/family, picking berries, riding tractors, caving in Arkansas, hanging out with Mike's sis and bro-in-law in Wichita and all those great things!

I will try to humorously post our little 'adventures' along the way - as we have had to have another new fuel pump put into the RV,....this one while we traveled in NE,......the one they put in in Roswell just wasn't doing the job!!

Until Next Time,
Peace, Love and all things working - finally!!
Woo Hoo!!
Cheers
~Shel~

Travel Observation: When you pull up in an RV that's approx. 23 years old, be ready for funny looks. I think people think we're poor or something,...or maybe this is our home! LOL!!  It's a hoot! 

Fixing the RV in Roswell

It's Monday morning (the 19th) and we're up bright and early to get the RV into Express Auto in Roswell to get her fixed so we can continue down the road on our fantastic summer adventure.

I follow Mike and Logan into the auto garage and meet all the nice folks at Express auto,...Cort, Jody and the whole crew are super friendly and ready to help (they've already heard about us from their friends Freddy the tow truck drive and Stever the cab driver).

We leave the RV in the good hands of our new friends and Mike drops Logan and I off in downtown Roswell for some Alien watching and great shopping so he can go back to the RV park and get some work done in their club house.

Logan and I instantly spot the footprints along the sidewalk and follow them to some great little places and find some wonderful treasures, like "family vacation" playing cards which feature a family of three aliens - the mother is wearing pearls, of course - complete with broken down spaceship in the back ground!  We also find Mike a cute T shirt with the logo "Ship Happens" with three aliens crashing their spacecraft into a tree in Roswell - how appropriate for our extended "Pit Stop" in Roswell!

Around 4:00p.m. Mike tells us the RV is done and we can take her back home (to the RV Park) and head out first thing in the morning for the beaches of Texas! Woo Hoo.

We gather Coco bird - who's been hanging out in the lobby at the auto garage - and thank the good folks at Express Auto Care and jump in the RV (with me following in the rental car) and head on out to the RV park.

We get about a mile down the road and then Mike and Logan pull over into the city municipal building and I follow, wondering why they feel the need to stop there - and then I realize the awful truth,.....the RV has decided to quit running AGAIN!

I head back to the auto shop, grab one of the guys and get them to follow me down the road to where Mike and Logan are.  After over an hour or so, they get the RV back to the Auto Garage and tell us they're going to completely redo the fuel pump (tomorrow) that they just put in today and they're so sorry for all the inconvenience.   My question - where are we staying tonight? I've already checked out the hotels and the good ones are full (in Roswell??) and the bad ones are filling up fast and I'm thinking I want to just stay in my RV back at the park - but they can't get it there.  So, they offer to let us stay the night inside their lot,...yep, inside their lot,....complete with many autos and Cujo,....I mean Jager (Jägermeister),.......the doberman w/the spiked collar on! (He's really a sweetie!)

So, we stop by the store in the rental car to pick up doggie treats and head back for a fun night of luxury in the back lot of the auto garage - very private, exclusive place, by the way!

As we fight to keep the mosquitos and potato bugs out of the RV, we settle in with the doggie watching over his new chew toy and us,......wondering what new adventures tomorrow will hold!

Until Next Time,
Peace, Love and still broken down in Roswell!!
Cheers,
~Shel~

Travel Tip #3: Always follow the RV,...don't pass it in traffic, since you may not see it turn around in your rear view mirror as quickly as you would hope!