Being away from my Children

  As the mother of four Children, I have NEVER been far away from my Kids. Oh sure, I took about 3 different trips with my X without the Kids, but for the most part of the 22 years, I have not spent anytime away from them. Unit now.
  Living only a little over an hour away from my 3 boys and a half hour away from my daughter now, has been the hardest thing I have ever done!
   I moved out of the small town I had grown up in and raised my kids in because I desperately needed a change in my life that I knew would never happen if I stayed!
  I do not get to see the kids much now. Occasional visits if I drive down, or my youngest comes up here to stay for a few days. It is tough!
  Because they are older, it is a choice we all made as to where they stayed. My youngest is 15. He loves his High School, and his friends, and so he couldn't part with them. My second youngest has just turned 18 and is hoping to move out of his Fathers house to live on his own soon. My oldest son is 22, and works with his father. As for my 20 year old daughter, she moved this way just before I did, to live on her own in the big city of Portland.
  So Mom is on her own now.
I made the choice to move away for several reasons. One, knowing my X, I would never actually be on my own. Control and little "Dramas" are a way of life for him. Two, having closed my store, I felt a loss that would only deepen each time I passed the old place. And three, I had met some great new friends up here. I had never had the pleasure of having friends while I was married, and I wasn't about to stop. And most of all, four...I had reunited with a old Boyfriend I had 27 years ago. Our friendship grew with each time we spoke. I have never been happier, nor have I ever felt so much love and compassion from someone as I do from him. I needed that.
 My Children are happy for me. They see how happy I am. They understand. Amazingly to me, when I announced my intentions to divorce their Dad, they never seemed surprised. I thought I had done a good job keeping my emotions to myself, for the sake of my family. I guess not.
  This Christmas will be the first time all four Kids come up to visit me. The first for my oldest. I can't be any happier!

Merry Christmas!

Bright Eyes - "First Day of My Life"

Change is great!

While I was married, I kept my home in a way that appealed to my Husband. I kept the "Girly" out. But, after the divorce, things changed! I had the home for sale, but allowed myself to let the colorful me out. Here are some before and after shots.

Living Room before. It was sooooooo plain and not colorful! This is how it looked while it was on the market.

Living room AFTER the divorce and I took the house off the market. Loooooove color! The pictures above the Fireplace are collections my children have done over the years.

Master Bedroom before. It was actually painted before this. I can't remember the name of the color...just think, dark brownish green pea soup. UGH!

I took out the big chair, and replaced it with this bench I had at my store. I loved it! It fit perfect here. The view was incredible and this bench made a great spot to sit and enjoy it! The little table to the right has a hand painted flower on it. The company that mad the table and the Bench, is Decorize.

Master Bedroom after. I added a rug from Pine Cone Hill and two nightstands with color! One Orange and one Yellow. The Gerber daisy print was never in our home. I brought that to color up the wall when the house was for sale, and decided to keep it to play off the nightstands. The red flower lighting on the back of the headboard was left after Christmas. I did finally take those down! I just love Christmas lighting! The sunflower picture on the right Nightstand, was painted by my daughter. She is an amazing artist! Maybe someday she will let me post some of her Artworks!

Just another look from the other side.

Not a favorite pic with the light, but it gives a bigger view of the whole thing. As you can tell, I am always changing the bed coverings!

Family Room. Can you say...Ewwww?? My X insisted we didn't spend the money on a nice area rug. So we got this indoor/outdoor thing. It would have been great OUTSIDE, but the texture for indoors? Bad BAD bad!

Family room after. I DID add a rug! You can't see them very well in this photo, but my big pot of Sunflowers is just behind the side table. More color!!!!!!

And a few favorites from my store again!!!

Here is where that indoor/outdoor rug went. OUTDOORS! There is a small pond just off the porch on the right. At night, I lit my candles and relaxed with my coffee and fish!



Well........if I new how to fix this I would. Looked fine when I downloaded it! Anyway....if you turn your head, you can see this outdoor room in the day time! Sorry!!!



Ready to get moving along

I closed my store, Express Your Home, in Corvallis Oregon back in April/May. I still have A LOT of stuff left over from the closing Sale!  It has taken me months to figure out EBay so I may try to sell some of it through there.  I think I have tried to learn too much about EBay that my brain is fried! I got the book "EBay For Dummies", and WOW, that's a long book.
 I am just taking the plunge. I took a few pictures of some of the things I have here, and I will attempt to post them today.
When I was preparing to close the store, I thought I would open another up here. But, I have not gotten to that point yet. My Daughter was moving out as well and up to the Portland area which is only 20 mins away from me. Originally, we were going to find a place together in Portland, but because I was in this whole divorce mess and trying to figure out store things AND my home was on the market, but not selling...I was stuck in Corvallis. She got tiered of waiting and ended up finding herself a house that she could rent a room in and share the home with four other people. I guess at 20 yrs old, that's better then living with Mommy.
I never did sell my home, so I opted to rent it out instead. Still trying to figure out if that was for the best..?
I moved up to Washougal because I had friends in the area, it was near Portland, and I found this great house in the Country on 10 acres! I only rent by the month, so no long term lease, which I love. Unfortunately, I can't have Pets (I miss my cats, but left them with the X), but I can have "Barn" animals. So, I got myself some Chickens! I have always wanted Chickens! Yeah!!!

Just another pic from when the Store was open

Finding what used to make me happy!

This is one of the first trips I took in my new life. An old childhood camping spot!
I have never been more relaxed......even if it was kinda cold! Clear Lake, just outside of Sisters Oregon. My parents brought my Brother and I up here almost every summer as kids for camping and fishing. Something I had not done again after getting married. Now, I'm back on track for visiting here again EVERY summer! (And probably a few times in between) This place holds some very special memories for me, for which I will tell about in another post sometime soon.

Express Your Home

 This was my Store. Express Your Home. Just a few sample shots of some of the rooms we had. I love rooms with Themes. I beleive no matter what your taste, your rooms in your home, should reflect the things and places you love.

The "Coffee Room"
This was where our Customers could sit down, enjoy some free coffee and visit. It was really neat to watch women sit and visit with friends here! The Tiki bar that sits to the right inside the room, served as our Coffee bar. That piece, although not for sale, was a hit for the Men that came in.



Our Candles.
Our most popular were the Pacifica brand. I highly recommend trying them. When this picture was taken, we were just getting the Christmas out and ready to decorate.

The "Country" room
If you liked Chickens and anything Country, this is where you found it. I loved the green Island in the center. Rustic! The rug on the floor....it ended up coming home with me when we closed. And the Chicken Rug just off to the left rolled and standing upright...it is now laying in my Kitchen. I loved it, so when it was one of the pieces left at the end of our closing, I couldn't help myself!

My Favorite
Pine Cone Hill bedding and Rugs. My other favorite, Chandeliers! I had them in every room possible in that Store.
I believe the right Chandelier can add so much to room. These were all available in plug ins. No wiring needed!!
The pink table was just an old table I found made of Oak. It needed some help. So my daughter and I painted it this Salmon Pink so we could use it for a table to sit down and show our Catalogs to our customers. It worked great with the colorful wicker chairs.

Mattresses!
We did carry a few, choice ones. I preferred the more Natural "Organic" choices.

The "Cabin" room
I love the Cabin and Lodge look. This was a popular place for our customers. For the walls we simply took some thin sheets of lumber....making sure to get knot holes and imperfections, then stained them with a light stain, cut into strips about 12" each and hung them. We did the same for our "Lodge" room. There we stained them a deep dark stain and hung them vertically. It created a Lodge feel that was another favorite hangout for our Customers.

Tiles
We sold these babies nonstop. They are Ceramic Tiles. Great for Gifts or yourself.
You can hang them, use them for trivets or as coasters. Anything! The colors were amazing, and the Art work stunning.