Been so busy!

Sorry I've been out of touch again. It was just a really busy couple weeks...

Mario is re-grouting our kitchen/laundry/small bathroom. The grout had become funky and it was time for it to be re-done, but no one really wanted to do the job... because, apparently, it's shit work. Well, yeah, it turned out to be a knee, wrist and back breaking job, as well as a really dusty one! Mario tried it first with a dremel that Home Depot sold him. It took him hours to get the grout out of a few squares. He then got a more suitable vibrating drill type tool and that was faster, but still grueling. And it literally coated the entire inside of our house with a fine dust. Mario looked like a coke head with the dust that settled around his nose from the mask. In trying to clean as he went, he almost broke our beloved Dyson vacuum. It took days to clean it back out and get the filters in working order again. Then he tried the wet/dry vac, but they blow so much air out the bottom as they work that it was practically making matters worse rather than better. He eventually got the new grout in and the old dust off. Next step is to finish the last little bit in the laundry room, and then seal the hell out of it. (suspected problem with the first grout was that it wasn't properly sealed) So far, it looks *awesome* and I am so excited to see the finished product!

He did this while we worked 6 days this week and did a mentorship with a guy from the southeast. He's a nice guy (kid! he's only 21), he is the one we've referred clients to in an attempt to lighten our load. He was doing his final mentorship with us before submitting his final case studies for certification. Teaching trimming is, in some ways, more exhausting than trimming in itself! I can't remember being that dog tired in such a long time.

During the last week or so we've had on and off Santa Anna winds, which wreak havoc on my sinuses and make trimming challenging. This particular wind was primarily a northeast one, and it was COLD. One day when we got to our first stop it was in the 30s. Brr! I can handle the cold, rain, and heat, but I don't like the winds at all. My nose was stuffy yet runny for 2 weeks, and I had a nagging headache. I was tense and cranky, too, part of which I blame on the birth control pills. I had the same reaction to them on my last IVF cycle. And it seemed to follow that last one with a few stressful client situations as well... The timing was such that I was seriously questioning why I want to be a trimmer at all. With the "help" of the BCPs I feel kind of dark and negative, and I can't see the bigger picture very clearly. Luckily it only lasted a couple of days, and seemed to markedly improve when I started taking my acupuncturist prescribed herbal pills (the ones that look suspiciously like bunny poop).

This coming week was supposed to be a bit lighter and I was looking forward to being able to get some things done that normal people do at this time of year ... shopping, wrapping, shipping, cleaning. But my friend who is a trimmer just north of me lost her beloved mare. The mare was quite old and they had spent their lives together, and she is just leveled by the pain. She is grieving her loss in a very hard way, but I have to say I think it's better that she allow herself to feel and mourn, because I really don't think I gave myself that opportunity. And I think that was a mistake. Two of her clients are desperate to get their horses trimmed and I agreed to step in for her a little bit while she is unable. I plan to have the clients write the check to my friend and mail it to her, because how can I take that money? I know how hard it is in a job like this, where no work = no money. In addition, Mario's delivery guy for the detailing world hurt his back and can't work for a week, which means Mario needs to step in and do it for him. Yeesh!

Speaking of hurt... I managed to hurt my neck. I call it "clinic neck" because I really did a number on it two different times while watching horse clinics. I think it's from sitting in a terrible position for long periods of time? This time I don't know how I did it, but it kicked in while I was trimming a young stallion. Ouch! It got better with a bunch of Advil and The Arnica Rub (best thing evah, and yes that is the brand name) and I felt up to making chocolate chip fruitcake cookies last night. (quick shout out to the fruitcake lovers out there, we must unite because there are so precious few of us!) I had plans to ride with my friend Jill in the morning. Instead, I barely slept all night from the pain, and had to cancel my ride. :( I went and had the most ass kicking massage to date (owwwchhhh!!! I could barely breathe and think I will probably be even more sore in some ways tomorrow...?! but it was still awesome). My massage lady, Claudia, admonished me for not stretching or drinking enough water. She's right! Why is that so hard, especially when both are good for me and I like them? Weird little human traits that I don't understand.

We are also preparing our house for a change-up in layout... what was designed to be the "dining room" has been my office for the last 15 years +. We decided it was time to get a real dining room, so we moved my desk into the "green room" (our sort of catch-all room which most notably stores my beloved iron and board). Right now the green room is housing various items from the kitchen, including the table, while the grout is worked on, so it looks like a big mess in there. But it's exciting and weird to see the changes slowly coming about... The dining room table was ordered weeks ago, and may arrive as early as this coming week. I am so excited to see it in the space!! For now the Christmas tree is in that area, which felt empty and small without all my desk, printer, files, etc. in there. Over the next week or two I think everything will come together a bit more, and I will post photos to share for certain. One of the goals is to have it all done in time for Mario's big 4-0 birthday party!

I ordered delicious healthy horse cookies for my client gift this year - they are home baked by an awesome woman in Oregon. Her website is http://www.skodeshorsetreats.com/. The cookies are made with human grade and organic ingredients, my horses LOVE them. They are certified low sugar, too, which is really important to me as a natural hoof care provider. I got "coconut macaroons" and "ginger snaps" and repackaged them in pretty little baggies for handing out over the next couple weeks. :)

I've ordered my Christmas cards, too - the pugs are the models for this year's card. :) Some of you saw a sneak preview with my silly picture of Santa Bogey that was on Facebook (above). Cracks me up! I did my December newsletter for Wild Hearts today. I love doing them, but every single time I am *amazed* at home time consuming they are to do. The biggest challenge is working within the program the email manager provider provides. It is painfully slow and makes me insane with issues like alignment of text and photos. I have been told that publishing type products like this are extremely memory intensive for computers, so I am sure that's a huge part of it. A little bit of synchronicity here - literally as I was typing this out, I got an email from one of my clients that got the newsletter today and it said, "Thank you so much for taking the time to create your informative newsletters. I learn something helpful with each one. Merry Christmas to you!" Ok that just made all those hours WORTH IT! :-D

I am very slowly starting to do some Christmas shopping... oh, how quickly the days are flying by. I want to savor the minutes, but they seem so fleeting!

Hope you are all doing well and taking some time to enjoy the season ~