Hot Trends--No It's not Vanessa Hudgens or Brittany Spears

I mosied on over to my favorite auction website and the future secondary home of my handbags. I stopped by because I had to leave feedback for a seller. I was greeted with the the what's hot page that has the current featured items. Much to my surprise the advertisement was for one of this Fall's hottest items: Animal Print. I guess I should not have been surprised, as this was forecast to be a hot item this season, as it has been for quite a few seasons. In fact animal print seems to be timeless! You can pick up this season's fabulous handbags, jackets, skirts, blouses, and dresses in a variety of animal print colors and skins. There are some really cool and interesting looking animal prints this year for all ages and trust me you won't find these animals roaming at your local zoo either!

*Click on Post Title and highlighted words for links to access some of this season's animal print choices.

Decisions, decisions and acting upon those decisions--Back To School

Well I have decided that I will try to return to school in January for the spring semester, (with the summer semester being the latest) at just about any cost. Whatever it takes, I will try and go back GOD-willing. I have to give myself a deadline now or it may never happen. I made this decision after I had to go and apply for a second, albeit seasonal job earlier in the week. I said to my mum, "I can't do this anymore, I have to bite the bullet and figure out how to get back in school." I am just sinking further and further into dead-in jobs and even though I can't really can't afford the tuition right now (I was trying to work more to be able to afford going back), it is not helping that I am taking on these dead-end jobs that are not even able to cover most of my expenses.

Besides that every night I go into work at Wally World it is just depressing. I hate the way the management talks to the associates; they talk down to us. They feel that their position gives them warrant to treat people like crap, and they think you don't know much, if anything at all. Sometimes I want to remind or inform many of my overnight assistant managers that I too was once in their place at my previous retail job. I was an assistant manager, and a darn good one if I do say so myself. My old boss and many of my old co-workers would vouch for that. I didn't make the associates feel like peons either. I was always willing to get down in the trenches and do the same work that the regular sales clerks did, as well as keep up with my other managerial duties. My main reason for leaving was because I was paid crap for all my hard work. At Wally World some of the management are some of the most laziest, conceited, and corrupt people working there. It takes everything for me to have to go to work some nights.

On another note, I have an interview with the seasonal job place on Monday, and it is a strong possibility that I will get the job, considering I passed the 2 assessment tests and the fact that they would probably hire a monkey if given the opportunity. This is mainly because during the "holiday season" they are overwhelmed. So I will be back into my mode of working two jobs again...aah it was fun having some free time for the past 2 months, but it is back to business. The good thing about it is that it will only last through the end of this year.

In a way I could kick myself, because my progress with my bags has slowed down, and I am somewhat confident that if I just complete my first round and market them a little, I can have a little success. Not necessarily on a grand scale, just a small humble one is fine with me. I have a few people who have been waiting for quite some time for me to launch the project. I can be such a procrastinator at times. I have to speed the process up back again, but time will be even more scarce now if I get the second job. I just have to re-evaluate and re-focus myself. I feel like I desperately have to get my situation in order.

I can't stand the fact that I am not able to repay my parents and do something big for them. I hate to see my mother not doing exactly what she loves to do, or my dad who has been in a position where he could not work for the past couple of years (he has an respiratory illness which makes it hard for him to go back into the construction industry). My mother has her degree in a field that she is interested in, but her job was not completely fulfilling her passion. She would love to open up a youth counseling center, and or her own restaurant as she loves to cook. I really wish that I could be able to fund her dreams. That would make me extremely happy to know that I could do something for her, that would not be able to compare to her efforts in raising me and my siblings, nurturing us in her womb and giving birth to us, but hopefully it would express my love and appreciation in a small way....Wow I am getting teary- eyed just thinking about it. That is one of the moments that will go into my list of moments in my life that will make/or have made me cry tears of joy. You know maybe I don't show it enough or express it enough, but I really love you mum. She still has not seen or read my blog, but one day I hope to let her read it, so she can understand how I feel.

It's all relative really

I received an email from my cousin the other day; in it she was trying to convince/encourage me to press forward and do the things that could turn me from worker bee to employer or at the very least successful employee. I told her I was not quite decided about the financial advisor thing and she asked me what was I working on right now, that I could not give the program a try. I told her I was trying to work on my handbags (even Vera Bradley* started small), so she emailed me back and told me to get started and she wanted to buy one so that she could help promote them and give me feedback. I was actually going to give away a few of them to some family and friends so that I could get word of mouth advertising. My cousin thinks she is being persistent, and she is right she is. I am glad for that, because I actually have someone to encourage me to do better and finally pursue my goals, because sometimes I get mentally setback and discouraged when I think about everything I need to do and how I will pay my bills etc. Growing up I never really had any direct first cousins who I grew up with. My cousins were second and third cousins; my mothers cousins and their kids. I was raised around my mother's sister (my aunt Deborah- didn't have kids) who she spent most of her life growing up with. I always knew however that on my Mother's side I had two more aunts; one on her Mother's side and one on her Father's side. My Mom's Mother died when she was still a kid and her other sister by her Mother (My Aunt Janice) stayed with their Mother's relatives, while my Mom and my Aunt Deborah lived with their Father. When they became adults my Mother and my Aunt Deborah did not keep in good contact with my Aunt Janice and my Aunt Darnelia, not because they had bad relationships or anything, but because unfortunately sometimes when relatives move away they are bad at keeping up with other relatives once they start their own families. So I never really had contact with any first cousins. A few years ago my cousin through my Aunt Janice, got in contact with my Aunt Deborah and we have been able to meet each other after all these years. She is a really sweet person and loves her relatives. It would have been nice to have grown up with her. Now she is trying to persuade and encourage me-that's cool. I think I do need to get back on track because I have put the production process off to the side for the past week and I really do need to get back on track...Press forward, keep moving, race towards the finish line! *Note: Vera Bradley handbag designer-signature style= quilted handbags of paisley and floral persuasion