Margarita Winter

Last Friday, Pilot Boy and I went to try out another Mexican Restaurant, La Hacienda. It was a hopping place, for sure. But, tragically, not the cheap, great, awesome Mexican we were looking for. It had the right atmo to be our favorite joint and was techically in walking distance of our house, but the prices and the quality were not up to par. After I stopped laughing and yelling, Pilot Boy told me we would not be heading back there more than likely.

Why was I laughing and yelling?

I had a margarita. Just one. And I was flying. I haven't actually had a hard drink since....I can't even remember. The last time I had a margarita was when I found out we'd be going to Alaska, and I am pretty sure there wasn't much a liquor in it to begin with. This one must have had a lot because, man, oh, man, was I hopping. I guess I talk loudly. And I laugh a lot when I'm hopping.

Today, this great spring day, we got five inches of snow. And it is still snowing and it suprised the weather folks once again. We have a winter weather warning. Shouldn't it be a Spring weather warning, seeing its spring time?

The Earth is Moving

Felt a rather large earthquake this morning. I was in bed. It was a 4.6. I felt the house shake and things move. I heard things moving around. However, due to the nature of my sleep state, I simply thought the heater had turned on. Or Pilot Boy had built another fire...which was what woke me up yesterday. The loud popping of the fire place. I thought the house was exploding. My dog, Basil Bea, did not make any noise during this earthquake. Though, when I got up about a half hour later, she did not bolt out of her crate as she has been doing.

In other news, I have allergies. For a few years now, I have been trying for the life of me to figure out why I am forever purple under my eyes. When I was in college, I figured it was due to lack of sleep. However, since we moved to the Dirt Hole, I know for a fact I get enough sleep most nights. But the dark circles are still there. So, I began to try eye cream after eye cream. Nothing worked. I had tried DHC's Eye Bright, which honestly did nothing at all. I liked what the Q10 Eye Cream did, but the dark circles were still there. I then bought Burt's Bee's Radiance Eye Cream and used it for almost three months. Nothing. At all. Recently I have been using a sample of Ole Henricksen Visual Truth that I got with my Oily Skin Sample set I received with my last Sephora order. I like the fact it smooths that area of my eye and the little lines I have been noticing seem to be going away. But the dark circles are still there. I had tried everything I could think of, even using buying concealer to put on the dark spots.

But even using Boi-ing by Benefits (which I LOVE AND ADORE for covering up pimples and as an eye shadow base), they were still there. I know this because yesterday I went to see the doctor about my sinus issues and he announced, right away, he could tell I had sinus issues because of the dark spots under my eyes. Something about the blood vessels that are under there and their relationship to my messed up sinus passages.

Thus, I guess I should hold off on buying an eye cream until I get these allergies taken care of. I do have enough eye cream samples to hold me over a while. It is amazing how long I can eek out of a sample.

In shop news, I still have to fill out the form for the shop for Alaska. I have been trying to get back into sewing. So far almost all my projects have gone haywire. I have a feeling the universe is out of order or something.

Spring is here! It snowed!

It snowed last night. And this morning. It is still actually snowing. So I wore a sweater today. I was actually getting rather suspicious of the lack of crazy weather.

I got out the sewing machine, bought material and made something yesterday. It was a minor fail, though I think I have saved it. It turned out too short for the window I was making it for. Oops. Also, I concluded I wanted to see something else on that window. So, today, I'll start again. After I run some errands. In the snow.

I am reading a booked called "Man Walks Into a Room" by Nicole Krauss. It is pretty good so far. Rather interesting concept as well, as the main character has lost all his memories for the past 24 years due to a brain tumor and seemingly has no desire to get them back. Then he seems to go a little nuts after he meets this odd ball doctor.

Well, time to get ready to run those errans and figure out why I can't see with my new contacts in.

Coffee House Meeting

I met with other wives this past week. As part of military life, one must randomly meet with strangers to obtain information on everyday life in a new place. Usually, these sort of meetings I dread and avoid at all costs.

Before we moved, I got a call from one of the wives. We chatted. Then we emailed. Then we met for coffee. And oddly, I did not dread it. I actually looked forward to it. It was almost like I was broken or something. Recently, I have just been doing things without much thought. Moving to Alaska, check. Not getting nervous or sick on the trip, check. Randomly driving across town on my own to meet with two people I have never met before, check. It was not very awkward either, which was surprising. I felt like a fool half the time, but I have come to accept this is perfectly normal.

Anyways, we met at a Kaladi Brothers Coffee. They wanted to introduce me to this great Alaskan thing, only I had been introduced to it in the Dirt Hole of all places. Seriously, some custard shop in Del Rio brews this stuff. Anyways, we had coffee and chatted then left. Next step will be to see if I will actually go to the wife club meeting or not.

I finally called Illinois and closed my business account there. Now I have to open one in Alaska and then Ireland Scott Designs will reopen! Whoo hoo!

Moving Sucks

I can't decide what I hate more: Packing or Unpacking.

We'll start with packing. I hate packing. Mostly because I'm not one for change, but also because I have no patience for it. I just want it all to magically PACK and be done. The two MAJOR moves I did over the past two years, I haven't done much packing because I simply SUCK at packing. I know what you're thinking: How hard can it be to put things in boxes? Well, for me it is hard. Do not ask me why, but it is. When I went to Scotland, my mother packed my bag for me. (I had packed it first but it was horrible, so she re did it, like she did each time I went off to college. You'd think I'd learn. I am made of fail when it comes to packing.) When I left Scotland, my friend J packed my whole life into two suitcases. I had packed it into two suitcases, and maybe ten boxes and there was still stuff everywhere. So, I suck at packing. When we left the dirt hole, we had like five people helping us pack up, and they are all almost professionals because they move so often. When I left home before coming to Alaska, my mother once again aided me in packing. Because I asked. And this time I paid attention and managed to keep myself packed.

Unpacking sucks for various reasons I have concluded. First, everything arrives and is in boxes, so your whole house is covered in boxes. Next, because you suck at packing (as did the movers who re-packed the boxes from the storage unit) nothing is in order. Actually, we were pretty good at packing the boxes in order of the important things, like kitchen stuffs. However, the movers repacked EVERYTHING and there was no rhyme or reason to their packing methods. I color coordinate my clothing in closet, so I packed it in the order. Today, I got to the boxes of clothing...not in any order and there were SCRAP BOOKING SUPPLIES mixed in with it. I know I packed those in the SCRAP BOOKING BOX. They unpacked my scrap booking BOX! As well as my fabric box. I am so pissed, but that isn't why I hate unpacking. I hate unpacking because I simply want it to be done. I want to move onto the more exciting aspects of moving: decorating. I want to paint, I want to get things moving, but you can't do anything till every random item is unpacked. And let me tell you, every random item was packed for us. Even the crap thrown into garbage bags, which I figured we'd just throw out.

In other news, I will be donating a TON of clothing. I have at least three years worth of stuff that we broght with us from our first move to the Dirt Hole (Dirt Hole had no where to donate stuff...can you believe that?) plus the stuff I bought in the dirt hole that I do not want/won't fit my fat butt. God, I thought I had a lot of clothes in Chicago with me, but I had a lot of stuff in storage. Mostly summer stuff, so I am getting rid of it. In all honesty, I did not wear most of it in the Dirt Hole, so why would I wear it in the Tundra I now live in?

I won't, so off it goes!
I guess that is one positive thing of unpacking. You realize all the stuff you can live without.

A Slow Alaskan Night

Tonight Pilot boy is working, so Basil Bea and I were on our own. Nothing remotely exciting happened and at 10.30 I find myself wide awake and bored. Basil Bea all ready went to bed. So, I opened a Twitter account (@IrelandScott). That only took up maybe ten minutes of my life.

So I turned on iTunes and fired up Doctor Who. A throw back to the winter days when Doctor Who ate my life and that was all I did: watch Doctor Who. It is highly addictive. I blame my mother. She gets me addicted to science fiction shows. First Star Trek: The Next Generation, then Stargate and now Doctor Who. Though, the only one who ate me alive was Doctor Who, but for that I blame the glasses and the suit. Oh, and the hair. I'm a sucker for crazy guy hair.

The weather here is pretty much remained the same since it "got warm." The snow has begun to melt away, revealing layers of compacted snow. It is like looking at rock formations. Layers and layers of varying shades of dirty snow. The whole place has reverted into a dirty, rocky mess. The roads are in varying states of disarray due to the rocks all over the road. Pebbles really, all over the place. Some parking lots are fine, void of pebbles while some are full of pebbles. Others have neither and are just icy sheets of mess. That is how the flat parking lot is. There is still at least five inches of ice on the parking lot. There are holes where one can see the actual parking lot. Pilot Boy and I had a bet on what the parking lot was made out of. Its asphalt. We were both wrong. He thought it was just rocks, while I figured it was paved with concrete.

I am pretty sure Basil Bea's days of snow swimming are numbered. She really sinks through now, except at night when the melting snow freezes. She actually broke through a muddle tonight. Man, that was funny. She was so surprised.

Blizzard conditions

I grew up in the Midwest. I lived most of my 26 years in the Midwest, some maybe 20 miles from Lake Michigan. Every winter it snowed, usually after Christmas. No one freaked out, and usually nothing was closed. Growing up, school was maybe canceled due to snow maybe once. School was more likely to be canceled due to cold than snow. I went to college in Wisconsin. We had some big snow storms and some really freezing days. Nothing was ever canceled school wide. Sometimes a professor got stuck, thus they could not show up, but the school itself never shut down due to snow or cold. Or anything for that matter.

My first winter married, we were living in St. Louis. EVERY time it snowed even a tiny bit, they whole area FREAKED OUT. Schools closed, business closed, I got sent home from work twice due to snow. Once, I sat waiting for the others to show up for almost an hour before anyone showed up, and I was late that day. (not due to weather, but due to the fact we only had one car and I had to take the train from the base, and my husband didn't seem to think we'd have to leave early because everyone would be freaking out.) The weather St. Louis had that did freak me out, rain and thunder, no one seemed to notice. I was worried the whole area was going to flood and float away, or the building was going to fall down due to the thunder and lighting, but no one noticed. Snow they freaked out about, but lighting they didn't seem to notice.

This past year I lived in the Dirt Hole. It never snowed. It rained maybe four times whilst we were there, and both times the rain created flooding, as there is no where for rain to go in the Dirt Hole. The first major rain storm, it rained for five hours straight and the back yard was a lake, the front road was a river and my driveway was a waterfall. The spring didn't bring many storms, but the few we had, were not that impressive, compared to the spring storms we had in St. Louis.

Since we've arrived in Alaska, they have had all forms of weather. It was 40 degrees the week we arrived, spring came early! Then, it snowed. And snowed. And some some more. My husband and I didn't think much of it till we watched the weather and they were FREAKING OUT. They were SURPRISED it snowed. They kept saying, from the radio people to the news people, this was the worst snow storm this season. Pilot Boy and I exchanged looked and though, "They think this is bad?"

What makes it bad is the fact they do not salt the roads and I am not sure how they snow plow things here, but most of the roads (even the well traveled roads) seem to be covered in snow. Packed down snow, which almost always turns to ice. Since we have arrived here, we've had two major storms. The first one, we went out in thinking it wasn't so bad. I saw more cars on the side of the road than I had ever seen. I kept thinking, don't people in Alaska know how to drive in snow? Why are they all driving off the side of the road?

It must happen often, as they all seemed to have orange tape to tie onto their cars.

The second storm happened while my husband was going to work, and one side of base was on a two hour delay. The side of base he worked on just said road conditions were red. This translated to show up at ten if you wanted and then go home at one. He didn't go in, as what he had to do that day, no one showed up period. It was like St. Louis all over again. Only this storm of snow was at least ten times worse than the stuff they got in St. Louis and we were in Alaska, so we figured like Minnesota , they'd know how to handle snow.

We're thinking they really don't. Or they just get so tired of it by this point in time, they forget how to deal with it.

The past two days, since the storm ended, its been FREEZING. Single digits cold. Plug your car in cold, the sort of cold we thought we would have driving up here. They do not seem to be phased by that sort of thing. Just snow.

freaking fanstastic

On Saturday morning, Pilot Boy and I got up earlier than we wished in order to eat, dress and be bundled up in order to go see the Iditarod. Having never been to a dog race before (of any kind) I did not really know what to expect. I did though, expect the race to be all the dog sleds taking off at relatively the same moment. Like they do at most races. I expected to see dogs running by me, barking and shouting.

I got the barking.
I got the shouting.
But there were no mass of dogs running around.

They do a "ceremony" start on Saturday, the real start of the race the next day at someplace called Willow Lake. This is due to something about permits to run along the highway out of town. Or something. Anyways, so the dogs run around town just for show. And they do not run at the same time, they run every five minutes, so it takes like four hours to get all the sleds "started."

Pilot Boy and I got to the race track (which was piles of trucked in snow packed down in the street) about an hour before the actual start. We got pretty close to the start point and moved into a spot right along the fence. I remained relativly excited till about 20 minutes before when the a boy showed up and made a comment about being cold.

"I'm cold, so I only want to see the first three start. You know they wait like five minutes between sleds," he told the woman he was with.

I looked at Pilot Boy and was like, "I can't feel my toes."

Wearing warm socks (SmartWool, ski socks) and Bog boots do not keep your feet warm. In the least. They might be rated for below freezing, but my feet, since leaving Chicago, have ALWAYS been cold when I go out for extended periods in them. By the time the "race" started, I could not feel my fingers in my super duper gloves. Why pay so much money for super gloves and after an hour you can't feel your fingers? I was warm everywhere else simply standing around except in the fingers and toes. So the long johns work.

The race finally began after much fanfare I could not see, but I could hear. Then, the dogs began running by. Every five minutes. We stayed for the first two and before the third one appeared, I was like, "I can't feel my fingers or toes any more. And this is sort of boring."

Pilot Boy agreed, so after seeing a Scots man run by in a kilt (I bet he was a lot colder than I was in that kilt), we headed back to the car. As we walked along the track, we saw a few more sleds go by and got to stand right next to the track after we got off 4th Ave. That was pretty cool, much cooler than standing right near the start point.

We finally made it to the car and tried to get warm before heading to the store for some food. We spent a lot of time waiting for Chinese food from Carrs (oddly, pretty good), then came back to our home for the time being. Basil Dog was over joyed to see us and we actually got to watch the last hour of the Iditarod race on TV. While it was cool to say I went, I think next year I might just remain home in a cozy shell to watch the start on TV.

It snowed all day yesterday. And it is snowing now. I talked to my dad yesterday back in Chicago, and he said the snow back there was melting and also an icy mess. I think, after seeing snow since October, snow might be getting old by now, but for me, I still like the snow. I like the cold, I only wish I had more clothes. lol!

I'm Here.

I have arrived at my final destination. Whoo. Hoo.

The trip up here was rather uneventful.
1. We did not die.
2. We did not drive off the road.
3. We did not freeze to death (it was "warm" most of the way).
4. There was no "weather" to speak of at all.
5. We arrived a whole day early.

So, I am here. We have a place to live, but can't move in for another month. During that time I can get my stuff together to launch the shop back up. I've been trying, via the slow internet, to research how to "close" the shop in Illinois (of course its not as clear as opening, or as clear as closing in Texas), so I will have to call them. This gives me a sinking feeling because, alas, Illinois can't do anything right it seems. Case in point, we're still waiting on plates for the new car. For two months. We have a temp plate, but seriously, why does it take so long to process and application for plates? It is not like I'm trying to transfer my pharmacy license. (I processed those applications at one point in my life.) Anyways, then I need to set myself up here. Fun will be had. Someday.

So, there is another mini update.

long time no post, huh?

I am in the mists of moving. Again. This time it is like the end of college, when it comes time to pack up your dorm room and move home for the summer. It is like the room I live in is a dorm room. And I have no clue how to pack what is in it. I did not think I obtained much while I was here for five months, but I guess I did. I managed to pack up all the clothes I can live without yesterday into one large suitcase. It is not full yet, which is good.

Today I went through various things that have gathered under the bed and to the side. I'm not sure how to pack those items. Things that are not clothing, I am not sure how to pack. I am trying once again not to take much, which the last time I tried that failed. The items did not fit in the car, the dog was sitting on top of my purses and her head was against the ceiling of the car. I wound up taking a bunch of things out (like all her toys and the car cleaning stuff and the sheets and pillows). This time that is not an option. The dog will need her toys and I cannot leave any behind as I am going to Alaska. No one wants to mail me anything in Alaska. Or bring things to me.

Being in the mists of getting ready to move, I have not been sewing at all. The sewing machine was put away for Christmas and was never brought back out. I had all ready packed away all the cloth when I cleaned up for Christmas, so I figured it was easier if I just left it packed. Thus, I have been sort of ignoring my shop, which is bad. I shouldn't ignore it, but I do. I have re-newed a few thing, but nothing new posted. Mostly because the few purses I hadn't posted before Christmas, I never got around to taking pictures of to post.

But, once I get settled, I plan to begin sewing again (husband has been instructed to get the sewing machine out of storage, so it will be on hand in case our belongings take forever to reach us). So, hopefully, I will be rolling out the summer line soon after I arrive at my final stop.

So, that is your update.