Tuesday, April 24, 2012

April is for Authors & Library Sidewalk Chalk Festival on the same DAY! What??

Firstly, my first wedding anniversary was quiet. A freak front coming from the gulf cancelled Turtlefest 2012, postponed the drift seas fishing boat to go out to sea, and the guy teaching the self-defense course went on vacation. :/ Really???

My husband and I did enjoy our weekend. We still went out for a nice dinner and just did errands together. The point was that we were together. Next year! :)

This week I am not looking forward to all that much. I cannot believe that by some coincidence that my library is hosting their sidewalk chalk festival on the same day as the April is for Authors event this Saturday, April 28th during the same time! It smells fishy! Or it does to me because I wanted to attend both events.

I met the organizer of April is for Authors event at a technology seminar back in February and I have volunteered to (OMG! Book nerd fan girl scream!) pick up Kat Falls (author of Dark Life, a very good post-apocalyptic book about an underwater world - call number YA Falls) take back to the airport both Kat Falls AND Sharon Draper!! (Whose book titles includes Copper Sun and the extremely well written and excellent Out of My Mind - look for both under YA Draper or JF Draper).

The organizer of April is for Authors emailed me yesterday wanting to know if I was coming to the event. Oh, the calamity! I have yet to email her. It kills me!


Saturday, April 28, 2012
9am-3pm
Palm Beach Gardens High School    
Palm Beach Gardens, Florida
FREE ADMISSION
  "A fun filled day for families and teachers to meet their favorite authors....author panels, book signings, and author presentations."

April is for Authors is a great event, this is it's 2nd (don't quote me) year. Its a way for children, teens and their families to meet the authors and illustrators their kids read. It's set up like a mini writing convention where the kids can attend panels and ask questions and learn about writing/illustrating.There is a big list of authors attending, including: Alex Flinn (Beastly), Lisa Graff (Umbrella Summer), Harvey Oyer (The Last Egret) and James Preller (A Pirate's Guide to First Grade)...Just to name a few!

Take your kids/teens and go! .....and do me a favor and tell me how it was :(




Wednesday, April 18, 2012

2012 Bookmark Contest Awards Ceremony

I am so proud of the kids who won from grades K-8 for the Bookmark Contest for the library this year. What a great way to celebrate National Library Week! (I know, a few days late). The ceremony had apparently outgrown the library meeting hall and was moved this year to the main Village Hall.

The awards were their bookmark original drawing matted, the image as a bookmark and their book of choice. 1st place got a hardback and 2nd place got a paperback. It was surprising to see the choices in titles. Not what I expected (my thoughts were surpassed).

The Mayor handed out the awards and I took pictures. Afterwards was cake and "punch" (cranberry juice + gingerale).

It was just wonderful to see the kids with their families, encouraged to read and praised for their success.

Congrats to all!

Damn, I should have gotten a picture of myself with the mayor! LOL! :)

Sunday, April 15, 2012

The War Over Breathing

Ugh, what a busy weekend! Somehow, I still had time to rest - don't know how but it happened.

Everything began Tuesday. My husband and I went to go and buy an air filter for the livingroom for my father. Well, my awesome car (and I'm not being sarcastic!), still running after 12 years doesn't have AC. You get used to it here in Florida. Normally, I do not venture onto I-95 because my car vibrates like a cello string after 70mph but we figure, it's not for a long distance - no big deal. Lo and behold, traffic stopped completely and we sat, stuck, unmoving for 40 awful minutes. Surrounded by diesel spewing semis and delivery trucks on blinding asphalt in 100degree car...I became sick. Had to call of work to spend the rest of my day vomiting and the next day sicker than a dying animal. Luckily, by Friday, I was back to myself.

What does this have to do with breathing? A lot. Since December, I have been dying of allergies. We found a good home for Tiny (our guinea pig. She is now the best friend to a brain-damaged dog ^_^) and the allergies lightened up. but I was still dying. Last week, while I am trying to rest and unable to breathe, I realize something was wrong. The shedding animal is gone what could it be??

Last night, around 2am, after being so completely clogged that i wanted to claw my face off, I started thinking. "What is new in this room?" Nothing. Think...think...think...then my mind wandered to a week prior where I was dusting and I found it weird that the dust was burgundy.

Then it struck me. The damn burgundy blanket I am using is made with wool. And I am highly allergic to wool. I grabbed it from my mom's closet back in December and I now see I had been suffering ever since. Well, the culprit is gone. Washed and will be donated - hopefully finding a new home with someone who can be around wool.

So my husband and I spent our day shopping for an air purifier for the room. Small and quiet and will do its job. We picked up a Honeywell....something...it was on sale at Target. we have it running now. We'll see if there is a change in 24 hours.

Saturday was spent working on my wedding scrapbook. It's been almost a year and I need the shelf space. Took half a day but I finished! Now I cannot wait to review with my husband as we remember our wonderful day next Sunday.

I took next Monday off and even though we do not have the money to spend overnight somewhere, I was able to snatch some almost free activities for us to partake in. (Hey, you gotta do what you can!). Since we got married on Earth Day, we will be attending Turtlefest at the Loggerhead Marine Life rehabilitation center! I'm still working on the rest!

Until next time.

ps: yes, I did change my blog address. Sorry for the confusion. 

Saturday, April 7, 2012

Bargains and Word

Well, first, I have to brag about my savings. :) So last Saturday and today was rather enjoyable. Enjoyed a massive discount on food we eat around the house, things like cereals, beans and rice was the highlight of these past two weeks. Today's highlights (mostly for mom) was Claritin and vitamins.

 The highlight of last Saturday was the tampons, beans and rice. The tampons, I ended up donating half of them to a nearby domestic abuse shelter - thanks to the recommendation of a friend. :) Honestly, I rather they have it because I know it will be appreciated.

Today was fair, the best savings were in the vitamin and OTC allergy pills which come in handy.

I don't have much to report these past two weeks. Mostly caught up in working. I am realizing that even though OpenOffice is a really cool smaller and cheaper version of Word, it does not compare to Word. Now I am in the market to find maybe Word 2003 for a cheap price. There are quite a lot of pros to OpenOffice but and just as many cons. The spellcheck makes me want to kill something. It will suddenly just crash if you spellcheck for a certain number of words. I doesn't help you out much with your grammar goof-ups. After reading 100,000+ words, my mind gets tired. It becomes harder and harder for me to find my goofs. And the one thing I miss from Word are the grammar recommendations. I don't always use them but sometimes, it makes you consider that maybe you did not word something correctly.

Last week my husband and I enjoyed 13 Bedar with a lovely picnic. It made us think about doing more little morning outings - no cell phones, no internet, just the both of us in nature. It was definitely a very awesome day.

I hope everyone is having a great weekend!