This is what happens when I have wine while posting....

I have been MIA lately...from everything.  We've had so much stuff happen in just a short period of time that, well, I didn't want to talk to any of you.  I know, rude, right?  I'll leave out the drama & just say that the Universe thought that I was made of money for a couple of weeks.  And I am not.  It was flat out rude how much we had to pay out.  Made me grumpy during a time when I should have been thrilled (Kendall was on the river).  I'm sure my husband was wondering what he signed up for.  Good thing he's the one I married & he just takes it in stride...

Last weekend I got to go to Starr Pass Resort in Tucson with a couple of my girlfriends. 

 Beautiful resort!

Right outside our hotel room...where the God damn doves do not shut up!  I have dove issues (they coo down my chimney at home...all day & night...my husband thinks it's lovely...drives me bat shit crazy!)

Just another angle from our room...

My friend Vickie thought it would be a great idea for us to go to the Making Memories Unforgettable Candy Shoppe Retreat.  MMU is a scrapbook store in Tucson & the retreat was a scrapbook retreat.  Sounds like fun, right? Well...I told Vickie from the start that I had no intention of scrapbooking.  I am burnt out.  Nine years of creating on demand & no way did I want to "waste" my weekend scrapbooking.  I'd go with her, I said, but only to share the room.  Vickie encouraged me to invite a few of my friends.  Mindy & Bridget jumped at the chance to go.  And that meant that I had to sign up for the retreat part too...damn it! 

I took exactly enough stuff to  make two, two page layouts (ones for the store I used to own) and what I thought were 36 cards I was making for my friend Kim (ended up that I left 1/2 of them at home).  On Friday when we got there we got right to work "creating".  I think I created more of a disturbance than anything else.  But after much bitching about the product I had to use for my page I created my two page layout.  (I hate yellow...and this paper was full of yellow).  I didn't like it.  But I guess I never do...well crap, now I think I need therapy...  Anyway, they talked me into entering my ugly page into the hourly page contest.  And I won.  Can you believe that?  Me...who didn't want to scrap at all...with paper I hated...won the damn contest.  Go figure.

One page was all I had in me, quite honestly.  I was there for cocktails & the pool.  I wanted to see a sunset & a sunrise (too lazy to actually follow through on that).  I worked out with Bridget & Mindy on Saturday & some how we lost Mindy...and then went and stared at everyone else working on their scrapbook stuff. 

1.  I have never seen so many cricuts in my life.  

2.  I have never seen so many pregnant women in my life.  I think Mindy counted 22...out of 50 scrappers.   No shit.  

Some how we got to talking about Smash Books with my best friend Darci (an inside joke!)

and how we haven't seen them in any scrapbook stores & they're out of 'em online...hint, hint if you own a store & you're reading this, they're freakin' awesome!

And that got me to thinking that I should make my own for this totally random road trip that my husband & I are taking tomorrow (I'll show you photos of it from the road...it's so cool!)  Which led Mindy & I on a trip to MMU. 

Just a cool church on the way to the scrapbook store...at a stop light.

 

$60 & some seriously cool scrapbook stuff later, I had found my mojo!  I made our road trip book in no time flat!  I took a 8x8 We R Memory Keepers "Travel Light" scrapbook & bunches of coordinating paper, cut them funky sizes & punched holes in them to make my book (no page protectors here!) and wahlah! my book was done!  I'm not kidding...it was done in like, 1 hour.  Then Mindy & I headed to the pool for sun & cocktails.  Some little 10 year old boy floated behind us in the lazy river & dumped water on Mindy every time he passed by...so fun!

We had dinner at the hotel...lovely burgers & cactus fries...they tasted like zucchini.  I took a walk with Vickie & her daughter, Allison, in the dark, mind you, in the damn desert, where there had been a bobcat sighting...just sayin'...  I'm sorry, but yes I screamed just a little when we saw a bull frog...gross!  Then back to scrapping for just a bit before bed time.  I was certain I was going to get up and watch the sunrise.  I put clothes in the bathroom, got my stuff ready...then sometime around 2 am I thought to heck with this & shut off the alarm.  So no sunrise for me....

My Uncle Bob lives in Tucson & met me at the resort for breakfast.  We had such a nice time talking about all sorts of things.  So many things that we were just finishing up three hours later!  I had Bridget snap a photo of us:

Seriously have to work on standing up straight (me, not him)

 

When Uncle Bob & I were done, it was time to head up the hill. 

All in all, I had a fabulous time!  I have some pretty fabulous friends!  I scrapbooked two, two page layouts (I fogot to mention that I couldn't make the cards because the dang ink kept running...grrr...) & I made a book for our random road trip.  I count that as successful!

Vickie, me, Mindy & Bridget

 I am so glad I went...thank you ladies for a fabulous weekend!