Maine | The Sadder But Wiser Girl

I haven’t forgotten about the blogger challenge through A Little Unhinged. I’ve just been really busy with stuff like, receiving AWARDS (yes, people like me for some reason), not sleeping, and getting ready for the holidays. Now I’m back to finish it up. Today I’m answering all of the questions that I know won’t take a whole blog post to answer. I realized that after we started the challenge that the questions were changed a little, so I may be answering some that aren’t on the list any longer!

What are your fears?

I also hate things that pop up suddenly-I can relate.

One of my biggest fears is something happening to my children. I have lots of dreams where I’ve lost them. I mean, like I can’t find them. Dreams for me are so strange anyway. I also dream about losing my husband. Now as an ADD person, losing things is highly typical. Just not children.

My other fear is natural disasters-specifically the more weather related ones. I probably am afraid of these because it is something totally beyond my control. My whole life seems beyond my control these days! I actually have legitimate fear of tornadoes. As a child we traveled home to see relatives during tornado season. We were held up during one part of our route, and that turned out to be a good thing. If we had been on schedule we would have been smack dab in the middle of a horrible tornado. It was a scary night-I remember it vividly to this day. The eerie cast to the sky, seeing all the destruction as we drove-telephone poles in the road. And the radio broadcast-the stories they told. One woman got in her bathtub for safety and took a little ride in it.

A few years later when we were living in Maine my mother and I went shopping an hour and a half away from where we lived. On the way back, a fuse went out and we were left in our Toyota in the dark, waiting for my dad to come help us. It was a night of horrific weather with spectacular electrical storms. This was very scary for me, even though we were probably in the safest place that we could be. A lot of it probably had to do with that night in Iowa, but in Maine, thankfully tornadoes are very rare.

I can’t watch those shows about the super volcanoes or about the giant earthquakes or about giant asteroids smashing into the earth. I just can’t! They scare the bejeezus out of me.

What are your hobbies?

I scrapbook. Or at least I used to. Then life got in the way. It was my release. I am hoping getting my printhead ordered tomorrow so I can get back into it. Much like my blogging, it takes up a lot of time because I am a perfectionist about it!

It’s true! (ignore the typo)

The last couple of questions I saved for last. This is because I am not real technically savvy when it comes to blogging. If I hadn’t hooked up with A Little Unhinged, I’d probably still be walking around like a blindfolded person!

What are a couple of your favorite blog tools that you use?

Top blog tools that I use? Ummmm… a laptop? Maybe I should just say Bonnie Franks, she’s awesome at answering questions and helping you get things figured out on your blog!

Social Networks/Blog Communities that you want others to know you’re a part of.

Why cats are lousy with social media

Social Networks that I am a part of? I have a fan page on Facebook, I use Twitter but not as much as I probably should (it is fun to do what I call “Twitterdropping”, where you read conversations that other people have on there.) I have a Pinterest account that I’ve had for a long time, I just haven’t quite figured out how to link up to it yet. I’ve joined SITS. I’ve done a couple of Blog Hops. I have an account on BlogHer and Networked Blogs. I’m a member of the Bearded Iris’s #PMSClub on Twitter, does that count? I created an account on Circle of Moms, but haven’t done anything else with it. I have an account with SparkPeople through my other blog, Aluminum Girl, that I NEED to do more with but haven’t. If you know of a social community that I SHOULD be a member of, or you WANT me to be a member of, please feel free to tell me about it!

And that’s all I’ve got for this challenge. It’s been a lot of fun sharing. It has also really helped me out-I’ve been inspired to change my blog to work better for me, and am trying to implement some changes that will help all of us connect better. I have icons to load on there, and I am trying to make a blogroll on my sidebar that includes the blogs I read every day, not just the WordPress ones! I like giving credit to people who have great blogs!

If you haven’t been participating in the challenge and want to, there’s plenty of time! I couldn’t get the button right on my blog, but you can click on the link to A Little Unhinged and it will take you to the page where you can get going on it.

I hope you have enjoyed reading all of this! 😀 I leave you with this:

ALL THE CHALLENGE POSTS RIGHT HERE!:

This Could Be Fun: I’m Doing The 15 Day Getting To Know The Blogger Challenge, Where I Grew Up, Favorite Childhood Memories, School, Work, Life, Friends, Family, Goals, The Why and the What, The Top Posts, The Blogs I Visit

Ah, my little princess. Don’t grow up too fast. Being a grown up isn’t much fun a lot of the time.

A couple of times recently Princess Confident has announced, “When I grow up, I will get to do whatever I want!”

I replied to this, “Ok honey, you just keep thinking that.” And maybe she will, being the confident little thing that she is.

I sure can’t say that’s necessarily true for me. In the last year with all of this unemployment stuff, I had several people ask me what I really wanted to do. The truth is I don’t know. I have no idea what I really want to do when I grow up. I’m 38 years old, and let’s face it, I don’t feel like a grown-up.

I wanted to be a teacher most of my life. That didn’t pan out well, now did it? I guess being a published writer is my next goal. HA HA.

She has told me on several occasions that she wants to be a doctor when she grows up. Or a cowgirl. They’re so close, don’t you think? The Professor thinks he wants to be a baseball player. This is new, because up until this announcement he has wanted to be a racecar driver. But then again, he has also informed me that he will take over for one of the school’s fourth grade teachers when she gets too old to teach. Hmmmm… that easy, huh? I must admit that I admire my husband in the fact that he has always known he wanted to be an engineer, even though it took him a long time to get there. I guess that’s how you know you’re a grown up, you know what you want to do?

A lot of grown-ups have bucket lists. Someone recently asked me about my bucket list. I guess I really don’t have one. I have joked about taking pictures of different buckets and putting them on here. I guess I don’t really have one because the things that I really want to do seem so out of reach. I’m horribly, horribly practical. Lack of money can really do that to a person. No wonder I have been depressed. If you can’t have dreams, then what is worth reaching for?

Isn’t the bucket list what you want to do before you kick the bucket. Well I don’t necessarily have a bucket list. I just have some things that I would someday would like to do. Horribly impractical and probably will never happen. But here goes.

I would like to learn to play the cello. And the guitar. I’ve tried to play the guitar on my own, but I really need lessons for a grown-up.

I would like to see another Broadway musical. Or two.

I want to see mountains. I just want to drive to see mountains. I don’t have to stay. I just want to see them. But then again there are so many places I want to go. I want to see Seattle. I just want to go there. I think it would be cool. For that matter, I have never been west of Nebraska, and I have been in a lot of places! I would like to go back to Maine (where I am from) with my husband so he can see it too. I want to go back to Chicago (where I lived nearby for a short while as a child) and see all of the museums and Shedd Aquarium. I would love to go back to Disneyworld, but this time with the kids. I’ve been there several time, I just want to take them once. And the biggie-I want to go overseas. I have never been out of the country except for Canada. I want to go to Australia and China.

I want to go back to school. But of course, I have to figure out what I really want to do. Therein lies my problem…

So that’s really it. I don’t want much, do I? I’m hoping that once our little situation gets straightened out that perhaps we can start going places. Right now, I’d just like to be able to occasionally buy myself a frapuccino.