Hurricane Jenna .....

Jenna sporting her tutu I made her  

The new guest room is coming along...my first guest arrives on October 4th.  Yahoooooo!  My niece Jenna is coming to stay with me for a week...originally she was going to stay a month.  She took a year off from college to move to Mammoth to snowboard all day and waitress nights.  It was a good experience for her, and it made her realize that she wanted to go back to school.  Sooooooo I guess school is more important than spending a month with your crazy aunt.  I owe Jenna.  Jenna is the reason I quit smoking.  I spent a week with my oldest brother and his family many years ago.  Jenna was maybe three.  She would say things like "how about we go out in the back yard and have a nice cup of coffee and a cigarette" (or spoken like Jenna "how about we go out in the back yard and have a nith cup of coffee and a thigarette") "I'll just hold the thigarette I won't thmok it"...  "maybe I'll justh put it in my mouth a little"..... All I could think was "what the hell kind of a role model are you."  Jenna has always been very special to me...she is the youngest of 3 girls and her older sisters were 5 and 6 when she was born.  They were always enough older than her that she got left out...not their fault that was just life.... when they were in high school she was still a little kid to them.  It's nice to see the 3 of them together now that they are all (God help me I'm so old) adults. 

So I quit....quitting sucks... I went 4 years without a cigarette and then my dad was killed in a car wreak.  My brother Jim still smoked at that point and I made him give me one that night.  A month later I had another and so on and so on.  This second go around only lasted 2 years and I never smoked more than maybe 5 a day but I coughed so much, my body just can't handle it.  So I quit again....quitting sucks.  That was maybe 11 years ago.  Last Thursday I smoked a cigarette.  My friend Donna said I looked just like Chandler Bing on the 

"Friends" episode where he was sneaking cigarettes.  I have been thinking about smoking a cigarette since March 23.... so I did it ....I'm not proud of it and I couldn't stand the smell of it in my hair and had to take a shower to get the smell off of me.  But it's out of my system.....another rule broken...cause I break rules now.....

So this was the empty room....I choose colors and painted it.  I refinished the twin beds of my childhood. Bought mattresses and bedspreads and my mom gave me a gift of new sheets.  Put up some new curtains and Bobs your man!

I have an antique dresser that my friend Donna gave me and I am refinishing it. It's in the back yard covered by a tarp and if it ever stops raining I'll be able to finish it.

The dresser is almost done and then I'll bring it in and my bookcase that I got in Italy.  Today I dropped a frame off  to have a mirror installed, it was a gift to my parents on their wedding day... the mirror broke the day my mom moved into her new house.  I'll put that over the dresser.  I'll need to make a painting for between the two windows and  then it will be done.   I just hope I get most of it done before Hurricane Jenna blows into town.....she recently reminded me that she is of legal age now....Oh Lord.... holy hangover Batman!  She is still cute and very pretty!