This week has been a time of reflection

This week has been a crazy whirlwind for us. I got over those sick hives I had. It only took 4 days total to get rid of all of them. I had some residual for the next 2 days, than they went away for good, and I was so thankful. Still no cause or reason for them, but I just have a feeling it was a one time deal, and I will never find out.........
We had our annual 2 times a year garage sale. We live in townhomes with very strict codes. They will allow us to have a garage sale 2 times a year, and all on the same day. It's like a flea market. You just walk down the row in people's garages, looking at all their crap, then moving on to the next house. It was amazing. All of the crap you would not normally be able to sell, went like hotcakes here. People I guess like junk and lots of it to store in their houses, cause they bought all of ours.
We went to Durango later that day to have my hair done. I have a story about that in itself. Well... I wanted to get my hair done because it was getting stringy at the end, and the color was just awful with half the orange in my hair growing out. I didn't like the cut either. Shawn had his hair cut from a guy named Jay here. He is a native, probably 300lbs. and very very gay. I decided to give it a shot. It is right across from Costa Vida, and I figured that they couldn't be that bad since they eat Costa everyday, and would have to face Shawn everyday. Well, to get your hair cut and colored (one color) down here is around $200 anywhere you go. I told Jay that I could not spend that much, so we agreed that I would pay $75. Well, he called me after I made an appointment to inform me he was too drunk from the night before, and could not do my hair, and we needed to reschedule. I should have taken that as a warning sign. Well, we rescheduled for later that day, so he will be sober. I went in, and he said it would be after-hours, which it was, but then I had to wait for an hour, even then. He got me in the chair, and started putting stuff on my hair right away to see what it would do. All I told him, is that I wanted the orange in my hair gone, and I wanted blonder hair (since it was darker, all sorts of colors, and sort of yellow) I basically wanted to go back to my natural hair color. I brought in pictures of the color I wanted and the cut and just said do that. He told me that I needed 2 tubes of color for my hair, but he only had one, but he would have to use it conservatively to go over my whole head. I was thinking to myself "Well, that should cut the cost down even further, since he is using hardly any hair color at all!" Well, I trusted him anyways. Going back on my story. LaDonna is the owner, and she is African American. The only African Americans in the town seem to be there all the time. There is probably only a few. Our town is mainly white and natives. They mainly do African American hair, and that should have been another warning sign. LaDonna said that her salon is very classy. Personally, when I walked in the door, it was one of the trashiest salons I have ever been in, and a complete mess. They prided themselves on being classy and professional?!? IS THAT WHY MY HAIRDRESSER CALLS ME TO INFORM ME HE IS TOO DRUNK TO DO MY HAIR!?! Ugh...... you could tell I was definitely perterbed about the situation. Well, anyways, I told Jay what I wanted, and he did about the most opposite thing you could do, and did not listen to me at all. He colored it, and it was not more blonde. In fact, IT WAS DARKER!!! He had colored my hair this silver-grey, kind of like the color you see on a woman in her 70's or 80's. He told me that my hair will not go blonder, and that it was extremely blonde, and he was so proud of himself. Not wanting to be rude, I told him that it was darker, and it still had all of the orange in it, but it had turned pink by this time. He then informed me (because his friend was sitting by us watching the entire time) that "Would it be okay if I finished your hair some other time? We will do a lot of foils with a ton of highlights and lowlights, and a cute cut. But I want to go out with my friends tonight." I told him I guess I didn't have any other choice. He said at least it was all one color (which was not true) I was totally flabbergasted! I told him I would pay him the next time when the work was done. He was really hesitant, and said I had to pay him that night. He would not let me go unless I paid him. I did not want to, but could not really fight with a 300 lb. dude with a 200 lb. friend. Well, needless to say, he would not answer his phone for almost a whole week, then called me to schedule me. He said it would be extra cost for the highlights and lowlights. I asked him how much extra. It would be $120 extra on top of the $100 I paid him the night before. $220 to do a crappy job!?! I told him no, and that he never told me that before, and he was just trying to scam me out of more money, and he never even did the cut that was included in the price, and I did not get anything I wanted, and my hair was darker. He told me tough beans basically. It sucks. I lost $100, but the worst thing I could have done was to go back there. He called Shawn with a completely different story whining to him, and Shawn, of course was on my side. I have not seen or talked to Jay since though. I learned my lesson to take warning signs beforehand.
Going back to my Durango story. I made an appt. immediately after that whole ordeal with a gorgeous salon there. My hair was done beautifully, and they took great care of me. That whole day at Durango was a fantasy. It was like, the best date day I could have ever asked for. We visited a bunch of little shops on main street, and went to my favorite Honeyville Farms. We ate at the most delicious restaurant. All around it was a great day.
Well, at this moment, Shawn and I are babysitting my bosse's children. He went out of town for a week, and we are new parents of an 11 yr old, 9 yr old, 6 yr old and 4 yr old. They are really good kids, and very smart. It is very tiring, and even though Shawn is in the same room as me, it feels like I have not seen him all day, because our attention and time are with the kids and making them happy. Is that how it always is when you have a ton of kids? We are going to be happy when it is over though. We are very excited to go to Moab at the end of this week with Gary and Nat and Kip. That is the light in the tunnel for us.

Worst allergic reaction I have ever had!

This is what my whole body looked like

I had hives so bad from some unknown reaction that my hand swelled up so bad, that I could not move my fingers
This is what my back looked like
This was on the other side of my back
back of my legs
My upper arm
My leg. It was so itchy. I can't even begin to tell you
My lefs when they were getting better
I know. horrible awful picture, but they were all over my face
My leg after I had taken medication. Much better than before


Okay. I know this is kind of a weird post, but I just want to show you guys how bad I reacted to something unknown, that I still have not figured out. My foot and elbow started itching, and it wouldn't stop on monday night. I didn't think anything of it. I went to bed. I kept scratching all night not knowing it. I woke up the next morning, and had those gash welts all over my body. I had welt hives over my entire body. It was so extremely itchy, than after I would scratch them (I tried not to, but sometimes it got too intense to not) it would feel great, than get really big, and burn and sting! It progressed to a burning rash after awhile. It felt like a severe sunburn and just burned and itched like crazy. The Urgent Care doctor said that I was reacting to something. My pictures seriously do not do justice to how bad it was. My camera almost made the pictures tame. Well, the doctor prescribed me a really strong form of Benadryl. I had to wait at Wal-Mart for 45 minutes for my prescription to get filled. I sat there, not wanting to walk around, or do anything, because I felt like such a freak. People kept staring at me, and I could not hide it. I know how it feels to have a condition, and have people stare at me. A lady behind me in line starting freaking out and talking to the Pharm. tech like I wasn't there, and kept saying "Look at her arms, her face, everywhere!!!! It's everywhere!" I just kind of hung my head and left. The door greeters at Wal-Mart stared at me and just hung their jaws. After I took the medicine, it took a lot of it away, but I still had alot. The next day was a little better, but the same thing. I went back in to Urgent Care, and they said I have such a severe reaction, that they gave me a hydrocortizone shot in my hip. It finally worked. I woke up this morning with no hives. Throughout the day, I had little breakouts of them, but they disappeared pretty quickly. Still doing good. Hopefully it will never come back. The weird thing is, that even though the hives are gone, my body is acting like they are still there, because I am still itchy the same. The itch has not gone away. I am still slathering anti-itch cream on everywhere. Hm.......

Good to see my family

This log is original when Chaco Canyon was built. Most of the wood is. It is so cool!

Pottery shard I found in the ruins hidden in some dirt and leaves. I left it where I found it
I have never seen a bug like this
my mom and sister in some ruins at Chaco Canyon
If you look close, it looks like an Indian. Eyes, nose, mouth, chin, plus, the feather headress behind him
My sweetheart and my nephew in their "Chief chair"

Pinkerton hot springs
runaway goats at the Honeyville Honey store. Their owners were found
Us girls with our hot turquoise jewelry we got at the flea market
Chaco canyon ruins

Chaco canyon ruins









I was so excited to see my family. They came down on Sept. 18. It took them a whole day to get here, and they were too tired to do anything the first day, so we all just chilled. The second day they were here, we went to Chaco Canyon. We drove 13 miles on dirt, bumpy roads to get there, but it was really cool. Chaco Canyon is where the Aztec Indians went after they left Mesa Verde. It was so interesting. There are a bunch of ruins all in a row down the road. Not just one. I really wanted to find something cool, so I would dig in the little cubby holes in the ruins, and I found a shard of pottery. I thought it was so cool, but I didn't take it, because you can't take artifacts if you find them. It was so huge, and we got to go inside most of the rooms and climb all over the ruins.
The next day, we went to Durango, and went to HOneyville farms, and just played around up there. We arrived and saw some runaway goats that Shawn corraled. It was a mom goat, and her 2 babies. They were so cute. The owners were finally found about an hour later. Good thing. We had a really good time.