Ahhhh... It feels soooo good to sit down!!!! I've been flying solo on the parenting scene today. Honey is helping out some friends. He's been gone all day. But, what are you going to do? I think he may have been hoping to be home just in time to put the girls to bed, but... well, just one of those things that didn't happen.





So anyway... thinking of a tune to post for Saturday night, I found this neat little video on YouTube:



The following comes from the video's page regarding the video:
"Sometimes, a hug is all what we need. Free hugs is a real life controversial story of Juan Mann, A man whos sole mission was to reach out and hug a stranger to brighten up their lives.

In this age of social disconnectivity and lack of human contact, the effects of the Free Hugs campaign became phenomenal.

As this symbol of human hope spread accross the city, police and officials ordered the Free Hugs campaign BANNED. What we then witness is the true spirit of humanity come together in what can only be described as awe inspiring.

In the Spirit of the free hugs campaign, PASS THIS TO A FRIEND and HUG A STRANGER! After all, If you can reach just one person..."





So, being a curious mood, I went to the website that was attached to the video - www.freehugscampaign.org. And this is why it started:
"I'd been living in London when my world turned upside down and I'd had to come home. By the time my plane landed back in Sydney, all I had left was a carry on bag full of clothes and a world of troubles. No one to welcome me back, no place to call home. I was a tourist in my hometown.

Standing there in the arrivals terminal, watching other passengers meeting their waiting friends and family, with open arms and smiling faces, hugging and laughing together, I wanted someone out there to be waiting for me. To be happy to see me. To smile at me. To hug me.

So I got some cardboard and a marker and made a sign. I found the busiest pedestrian intersection in the city and held that sign aloft, with the words "Free Hugs" on both sides.

And for 15 minutes, people just stared right through me. The first person who stopped, tapped me on the shoulder and told me how her dog had just died that morning. How that morning had been the one year anniversary of her only daughter dying in a car accident. How what she needed now, when she felt most alone in the world, was a hug. I got down on one knee, we put our arms around each other and when we parted, she was smiling.

Everyone has problems and for sure mine haven't compared. But to see someone who was once frowning, smile even for a moment, is worth it every time." ~Juan Mann

I guess this movement has spread across many parts of the world.





So would you??? If you saw some stranger holding up a "Free Hug" sign.... would you give them a hug?????







Song from the Video by Sick Puppies entitled "All The Same"

I dont mind where you come from
As long as you come to me
But I dont like illusions
I can't see them clearly
I dont care, no I wouldn't dare
To fix the twist in you
You've shown me eventually what you'll do
I dont mind
I dont care
As long as you're here

[Chorus]

Go ahead and tell me you'll leave again
You'll just come back running
Holding your scarred heart in hand
It's all the same
And I'll take you for who you are
If you take me for everything
And do it all over again
It's all the same

Hours slide and days go by
Till you decide to come
However long you stay is all that I am

I dont mind, I dont care
As long as you're here

[Repeat Chorus] x2





Cheers! ~MacKenzie

You Are a Centaur

In general, you are a very cautious and reserved person. However, you are also warm hearted, and you enjoy helping others in practical ways. You are a great teacher, and you are really good at helping people get their lives in order. You are very intuitive, and you go with your gut. You make good decisions easily.

Quoted from Wikipedia:
In Greek mythology, the Centaurs (from Ancient Greek: Κένταυροι - Kéntauroi) are a race of creatures composed of part human and part horse. In early Attic vase-paintings, they are depicted as the torso of a human joined at the (human's) waist to the horse's withers, where the horse's neck would be.

This half-human and half-animal composition has led many writers to treat them as liminal beings, caught between the two natures, embodied in contrasted myths, and as the embodiment of untamed nature, as in their battle with the Lapiths, or conversely as teachers, like Chiron.

The centaurs were usually said to have been born of Ixion and Nephele (the cloud made in the image of Hera). Another version, however, makes them children of a certain Centaurus, who mated with the Magnesian mares. This Centaurus was either the son of Ixion and Nephele (instead of the Centaurs) or of Apollo and Stilbe, daughter of the river god Peneus. In the latter version of the story his twin brother was Lapithus, ancestor of the Lapiths, thus making the two warring peoples cousins.

Centaurs were said to have inhabited the region of Magnesia and Mount Pelion in Thessaly, Mount Pholoe in Arcadia and the Malean peninsular in southern Laconia.

Female Centaurs~
Though female centaurs, called Kentaurides are not mentioned in early Greek literature and art, they do appear occasionally in later antiquity. A Macedonian mosaic of the C4th BCE[5] is one of the earliest examples of the Centauress in art. Ovid[6] also mentions a centauress named Hylonome who committed suicide when her lover Cyllarus was killed in the war with the Lapiths.

In a description of a painting in Neapolis, the Greek rhetorician Philostratus the Elder describes them as sisters and wives of the male centaurs who live on Mount Pelion with their children.

"How beautiful the Centaurides are, even where they are horses; for some grow out of white mares, others are attached to chestnut mares, and the coats of others are dappled, but they glisten like those of horses that are well cared for. There is also a white female Centaur that grows out of a black mare, and the very opposition of the colours helps to produce the united beauty of the whole."[7]






All photos found on Photobucket~

Just gotta love a good mythical "tail" every once on a while!!!

Cheers! ~MacKenzie

Still can't get my email and I admit, I'm getting frustrated. I know that I should be happy and content that I have the limited connectivity that I do. Trying to move inbetween internet "pages" is most tedious as it feels like frozen molasses moving up hill. I can sit here and read at least three pages of my latest book before the page loads. I've just started reading the book "Chosen by a Horse" by Susan Richards. It's one of those ~for me anyway~ "You had me at hello" type of book. I'll probably be done with it in a day or two.



Actually, if all goes well, I've already got myself a part time or perhaps full time job in about a year or two depending on how things develop. I expressed interest in the therapeutic riding program that Pumpkin's riding instructor is trying to get going. She plans on making it reality only she and her husband can't do everything alone. The timing works pretty well. By the time the girls get settled into school and I have a bit of time to myself, time to breathe, hopefully I can either step into the job or even help with the final process. She's already said that if I'm still interested when the time comes, I'll be a welcome addition to the team. EXCITING!!!!

As I told her unfortunately the bad news is that I'm unexperienced with horses. BUT, the good thing from that is that as I learn from her, I learn her methods and her way of how to treat her horses. Once I understand the how and why of a process, I'm pretty good to go. Even now I'm gathering information on both how therapeutic riding is a valuable way in assisting others but on general horse care and what not itself.



I feel a little like I'm being tugged in all directions at the moment. I feel a little like I'm standing in the eye of a hurricane and if I'm not careful, I could get swept up into it.



Honey decided to give me a late anniversary gift on Monday. He came home on Monday with this old 1943 sewing machine claiming he had been to a sewing dealer and although old, it was a good quality machine. He thought the nostalgia of sewing beautiful quilts on an old machine would appeal to me. In actuality, the sewing machine had come from the children's program offices upstairs. He used that first and then brought in my real surprise of a new sewing machine with literally all the bells, whistles and stitches a quilter could ever dream of. This thing pretty much does it all except embroidery and the actual quilting process itself. It's actually slightly overwhelming and daunting to sit in front of this thing. You don't even need a foot pedal if you don't want it; it has a start/stop button!!!! It has a fast or slow speed setting so no matter how hard you press the foot pedal, it won't go faster than you want. This thing can even sew labels... you program a word into it, line up your fabric and press start....

He told me that over the past several years he knows I've seen him go from hobby to hobby to hobby spending ungodly amounts on supplies, etc. and I've never said a word. Now that I'm exciting about this, he really wanted to encourage me as well as make things as simple as possible for me.

I had to laugh because originally we agreed that the sewing room was going to come first and the really awesome sewing machine would be next. He just never listens!!!!

I was able to make several 4 patch squares (think of a checker board with a white square, then black and on the bottom a black square then white) for a table runner that I am making as practice. I won't mention the fabric before that which I REALLY messed up on, but hey... learning here!!!

So anyway, I have an absolutely amazing sewing machine now that just makes me want to play and create SOMETHING with fabric. Who knows.. maybe I'll just end up doing an art quilt.... Have you seen these things????



This is an art quilt by quilting artist Ann Fahl. It's 61" by 62" and is going for close to $8000. She does offer a lay away plan....


This is by quilting artist Christine Bell.


and this one by Debbie Bates. Interesting, huh!!!!

In some ways, they aren't really quilts per se, but at the same time they are. Honey brought home 6 quilting magazines for me ranging everywhere beginner basics to some of these art quilts. There was one quilt that had just a black background, was quilted and had funky buttons and ribbons sewn into it.



Tomorrow is the full moon. I can feel creativity and see the images that I wish to create not just in quilts but in a lot of different areas of my life. If I could only harness it and put it to work for me.....
I hope soooo much that the clouds clear off so we can see the lunar eclipse tonight..... We told Pumpkin that if it's nice, we'll let her stay up so she can see it, too. She's excited, but I think it's more to stay up late than anything!!!!



Cheers! ~MacKenzie

Oh sure... NOW at nearly midnight the Internet decides to work properly.

So much to take in and process over the last few days. Change seems to be sneaking up from behind and just knocking my feet out from under me. Some good, some bad.... all life.



I don't quite know exactly how I get myself into these situations. Cautious acquaintances begin to turn into something more, a friendship, I think, I hope... but then suddenly red light comes screaming out of no where. Suddenly I become a ghost, a footnote, an after thought. The pattern seems to stem even from early childhood on. Obviously at this point in my life, one has to wonder, is it me???? I try to be open and honest, I try to be myself as much as I can. I try and accept others for who they are as each person is unique and has their own story. It sure would be nice to receive the same because I know I'm not perfect, never pretended to be. But I am trying my best in the only way I know how. Sometimes I do take a step back, sometimes scared to go forward because I'm tired of trying to put myself out there past my fortress only to stumble and have no one catch me on the way down. Why would one only want to walk a moldy rope bridge when there's material all around to build something solid, steady, sure?

Perhaps it's just too late in the night for thoughts like this...

Transported back in time to the beginning of February 1993.... I was in my last semester of college opting for an Associates Degree rather than continuing on. Going right from high school to college, I wanted OUT. Honey by then had dropped out of college as he had secured a good job in broadcasting just as he wanted (which is not what he's doing anymore.. but anywhooooo) He was trying to get settled and there was the question of who was going on his insurance and a lot of other things that as an engaged couple ready to get married in June has to deal with.

I don't know... it was just time. It was right and although we had all of these other plans.... we discovered that we just wanted to get married... right THEN. We got a marriage license we found someone to marry us. But something was missing. On the 11th or 12th of February we called our parents and said... Hey... guess WHAT! We're getting married and if you can make it.. we really want you to be there!!!! ummmm... to say we SURPRISED our parents would be an understatement. Well, actually... Dad said somehow he knew it. And actually I still have the letter he wrote to me back in January of 1993 hinting around that I needed to follow my heart.

It's weird to think that most of the family doesn't know that we actually got married February 16th. We basically renewed our vows in June in a church in front of the family. And our annivesary is celebrated in June. February 16 is our own special day just for us.

I can't tell you how thankful I am that Honey found me. He gives me what I need even when I don't even realize that I need it. He accepts ME ~all of me~ good and bad. Somehow he turns parts of the worst I see in me into something... better. I feel his encouragement, his understanding, his frustration sometimes, and more at some of the things that I do. We can read each others minds at times. We can almost ALWAYS find each other in a crowd. We've had terrible, terrible fights and not once did I ever feel afraid for my person. I mean, I even threw a book at him once. As it was leaving my hand, I was trying to grab it because I was doing the unthinkable. To say that we took a breather and then hashed things out in a more reasonable manner is an understatement. Even when I've shared some of the deepest darkest secrets that I've told no one else, he's handled it with calmness and just went with the flow. Never on purpose has he made me feel bad about myself. When I really needed him the most, he stepped up and helped me above and beyond what was called for.

The past 15 years have brought so many changes into our lives. He's weathered every single one with me. wow.... to really feel the impact of that.... I can't even begin to express what I feel because it is too big, too overpowering for words tonight. It's just...WOW!!!



Cheers! ~MacKenzie