YT in KC, getting to know you...

[LuvMySissy]

Howdy all!!!

I'm so very excited to meet everyone. I will be rooming with Des (Tiger's Mom), Lisa (Sukoshi's Mom) and Cyndi (Izzy Princess). Cyndi and I will be driving together. I'm coming from the Detroit area and she's coming from the Cleveland area, so we're meeting up in Toledo and having fun from there!!!!!!!

I'm not sure I have any fun facts. The only thing I can think about that I don't think anyone knows I will have to save and send to Lisa. I am 46 years old, married to Gerry for 27 years, Cory is our 25 year old son and Erika our 23 year old daughter. I am the oldest of 5 kids with two sisters and brothers. I basically grew up in SE Michigan, though I was born in Lansing, lived there, in Detroit, in Toledo OH and Lakawana NY for a year each, and settled in Trenton MI when I was 4.

I like to sing (watch out Cyndi - I'll sing the entire 12 hour drive), read, and sew. My furgirls, Sissy an Angel, have an entire closet full of clothes. I shop waaaayyyyy too much. I hate cleaning and cooking (cause hubby is very picky eater which means I can never try recipes). Neither of my kids live at home. I love flowers and have hundreds of perennials in my backyard. I love to plant, but hate to weed. I also love, love, love the sun.

I am a yoga and pilates instructor as the majority of my "job" as well as working part-time as an administrative assistant along with my sewing doggie business. Although I am not a drinker, I'll probably join you all for one since I'll be staying at the hotel!!!!!!

Okay - I think that's enough for now. Can't wait to see you all soon!!!!!

[patty58]

Originally Posted by tmatherly

I have enjoyed reading everyone's posts!....I don't think I have anything near as interesting as you guys! I may have to make stuff up....just kidding!!

I am 39, red-head. I have three kids: Wendy 16 (coming to the meetup with me!), Ben 19, and Alyssa 20. Three fur-kids since my skin kids are too old to need much nurturing (I have to have something to nurture). I am a Registered Nurse and coordinate clinical trials. I love research because it never gets boring and I feel that it is a noble cause and brings life saving treatments to people.
I have several "crafty" hobbies, including scrapbooking and sewing. I have one "secret" hobby that I stumbled into accidently but I can't get out of it. People know I can do it, and ask me to do it all the time. Especially for babies.I learned how to do it with my oldest daughter when she was in 4th grade and ended up having to teach several classes of 4th graders how to do it too. Since it is my secret fact, I won't say anymore.
I live in Northwest Arkansas, so I have about a 4 hour drive to the meetup. I was born in California(Bakersfield), but I have lived in Hamilton, OH, Springfield MO, Petaluma CA, Rockholds KY, Fayetteville, AR and now Bentonville, AR. My favorite place to live in my life was Petaluma CA...Bay Area....went to a private school in Napa...drove by the vineyards everyday on the way to school (Gallo!). Whew...guess that's enough for now! Can't wait to meet everybody!!!!!!

My parents used to live in Rogers Ark. so know right where Bentonville is.

[patty58]

I think this needs to be bumped up since there are some who haven't posted any info....

[labrown]

I agree! There are so many more members coming that I don't feel like I know very well!

[patty58]

We may just have to call them out

[Suzy]

Originally Posted by LuvMyPrinceKobi

Hey Suzy---aka my fellow Minnesotan I'm so thrilled to get to meet you and your furbaby, whoever it is you decide to bring I am actually kind of similar to you---I have WAYYYYYYYYY more tools in the house than my bf, and much "handier" than he (SHHH...don't tell him!!) I hope you get around to telling some great jokes at the meet-up...I'll be sure to laugh---hopefully WITH you and not AT you (just kiddin')

What else should I know about you? Do you have any other pets than Emma and Milli? What is your profession? What do you enjoy doing on weekends/time off? Give me the 411, girl, I wanna get somebody's right!!

You're too funny, Teri! Milli will be joining us at the meetup-Emma hates the car too much, and I don't want to put her through that if i don't have to.

Emma and Milli are our only pets right now...DH wants a Newfie but I'm just not ready for that yet. That's too much dog-plus too much hair, slobber, and POOP! My job title is Commercial Interior Designer-I do mostly corporate work, and stay as far from residential design as I can, however, I have helped out some friends with their homes here and there. On weekends and time off, hmm let's see...I like to cook-both for me/my DH and for the furbabies, and I love hosting little get togethers at my house for groups of friends. My favorite thing to cook is appetizers-I love trying funky combinations but there's always classic stuff as well, and then I love the presentation of it too. I am a wine-o. I think I said that already...? I will go to the wine stores and do tastings or order flights at restaurants to try new wines. I also paint-mostly abstract, but I tried painting small sections of my friend's body last weekend and they turned out surprisingly well, at least I think so. I used to be a shop-aholic, and I LOVE shopping, mostly for clothes and gifts...since I got married 2 years ago, I've come a LONG way, and really cut down on my shopping and am now on a budget that I try really hard to stick to. Now my shopping addiction has transferred to groceries and I'm a "grocery-snob", (according to DH) but at least he can't say a lot about that since he eats too It was harder to justify clothes that he couldn't wear...

Does that help? Tell us more about you!

[Suzy]

Originally Posted by Sukoshi's Mom

LOL! Speaking of drinks...if you gals are really up for it, maybe we should consider having a cash bar at dinner??? We'd originally nixed the idea as we have to pay for the bartender if we don't spend at least $250 in revenue, but we're still short on our minimum food and beverage expense, and any drinks you buy (soft drinks as well as alcoholic drinks) would count toward that minimum. Would you guys be interested in that? I'm not a "drinker", so it didn't really appeal to me, and my contact at the hotel agreed it would be easier to just go to the hotel bar and buy drinks there so we didn't have to worry about how much we spent, but if you ladies really plan on having a drink or two (or three, or four, or ... ), then maybe I should do the bartender after all and help meet our minimum that way? If you divide the $250 by the 47 people currently attending, that means each person would need to spend about $5.50 on drinks. I know some will be fine with the coffee, tea, and water provided with dinner and won't buy anything from the cash bar, but would enough of you be interested in having the open bar that I should talk to the hotel and see if we can still do that? I think they charge $3 for a soft drink, and the alcohol is obviously more than that...

5.50 isn't that much to spend on drinks-I would probably have two drinks, if everyone else was up for it too!

[Suzy]

You're right-we need more posts! C'mon everyone!!!

[tmatherly]

Originally Posted by patty58

My parents used to live in Rogers Ark. so know right where Bentonville is.

I live right on the edge of Bentonville, in fact we do alot of shopping and eating in Rogers

[Sukoshi's Mom]

Originally Posted by LuvMyPrinceKobi

*clears throat* I know I'm not Sunnie, but LISA---we need some info on you, lady!!! You haven't even posted yet on your info. I think whoever gets Lisa's crazy conundrum fact correct should get an extra special prize

I'm sorry you can't participate in this because you already know everybody's---that stinks! But, girl, we still gotta know yours so get to typin'!

LOL! OK! First off...here is a pic of our 240-gallon fish tank, which some of you asked to see. This is an older pic I found, and we're no longer living in this house, but the fish tank looks the same basically (other than I think we have a better rock formation now and more fish than show up in these pics...I need to take a pic at feeding time when they're all out). Unfortunately, we moved from the house in this pic to a different house last November, and then we moved AGAIN in March (hopefully we're staying put for awhile), so we lost a couple fish in those moves, and then in replacing those fish, we got ick in the tank and lost most of our population . We've been replacing them a little at a time, and we have a pretty full tank again now. To give you an idea of size, the tank is 8 feet long...

Fish Tank 1.jpg

As for me...I'm 27-years-old (just turned 27 on April Fool's Day), and after living in Kansas City, MO for 23 years, I moved to Los Angeles, CA (technically, I currently live 42 miles EAST of LA) about 4 years ago to be closer to the beaches, palm trees, ocean, and mountains (much to my family's disappointment). I come from a family where everyone lives about 5 minutes from each other in various directions, except for a couple people living 20 minutes away and a couple people living about an hour away ! (And no...I didn't pick the meet-up location because I'm from there. The location was chosen before they ever asked me to be on the committee...which was then passed onto me). I met my husband online via Match.com, and we got married on 7/31/06 - our 1-year anniversary from our first date. I've never been into big weddings and spending all that $ for one-day of your life, so I chose to take a cruise instead. I wanted to have the wedding on Magen's Bay in St. Thomas, and when I found a cruise that would be at Magen's Bay in St. Thomas on our 1-year anniversary and saw the name of the ship was the Carnival Destiny...I knew that was the perfect choice for us. We only had 9 people in attendance (including him and me), and it was perfect. The wedding was on the first full day of our cruise, so we hopped back on the ship and continued with the cruise as our honeymoon. We followed it with 2 minimal receptions (one at my old church Fellowship Hall in Kansas City, and one at our home in Los Angeles area) for our family and friends to help us celebrate...

Lisa & Matt.jpgWedding Pic.jpg

I'm a senior auditor for HUD's Office of Inspector General (worked for them for 6 years now), and I audit anyone who receives HUD money to make sure they're spending it correctly. We don't audit the individuals receiving the money, but rather the companies who distribute it (i.e. Housing Authorities that distribute low-income Section 8 vouchers, mortgage companies that handle FHA loans, companies that receive HUD grants, etc.). I don't really enjoy my job (or the commute to LA), so I always look forward to the weekends! My hubby and I haven't decided yet if we want "real" kids, so in the meantime, we enjoy taking our trailer and quads out to the desert with the girls and going riding on the weekends. We also have 2 cats, but they stay at home. I organize the monthly SoCal meet-ups, and I always look forward to those, while I also enjoy spending the weekends reading, shopping, hiking, and hanging out with my family watching movies. My hubby and I have over 600 DVDs, and we're currently working on installing a projector system in our family room to turn it into a "movie theater". I've always loved country music (from growing up in the Midwest I presume), and it was always a lifelong dream of mine to meet Reba McEntire, which I did on July 22, 2006...

Reba with Lisa.jpg

We got Sukoshi when my bunny rabbit died suddenly in November 2006, and I couldn't stop crying. I'd been wanting a puppy, and we decided that was what I needed to help me move on. I know some people don't agree with getting a new pet to help recover from the loss of an old pet, but we brought Sukoshi home on December 1, 2006, and she is exactly what I needed - an angel who has changed my life, led me to new friends, and will forever be my baby girl. After Sukoshi went into a deep depression after having a week long sleepover with Misty's (mistyinca's) Chloe while my husband and I cruised to Alaska for our 1-year wedding anniversary, our vet recommended we get her a playmate. So, we brought Tanuki home on January 12, 2008. They get along great for the most part, although Sukoshi gets tired of Tanuki always sitting on her and having no regard for Sukoshi's personal space . The girls have their own pink Hello Kitty bedroom, complete with a closet full of clothes! They are more spoiled than any human child could ever wish to be! I can only bring one baby to the meet-up though since I'm flying, so you'll get to meet my baby girl...Sukoshi!

Now...I still have a million things to do for the meet-up...so I'd better get to it...

See y'all soon!

[labrown]

Awesome info! AWESOME tank! I can't imagine trying to move that from house to house. We resigned our lease because we don't want to take down our meager 55 gallon display. It is a hard hobby, though. Lots of excitement and heartache.

I love the big smiles from you and your hubby. You both look like very happy people!

Ooh, I am SO excited! This is gonna be great!

[Sukoshi's Mom]

Originally Posted by labrown

Awesome info! AWESOME tank! I can't imagine trying to move that from house to house. We resigned our lease because we don't want to take down our meager 55 gallon display. It is a hard hobby, though. Lots of excitement and heartache.

I love the big smiles from you and your hubby. You both look like very happy people!

Ooh, I am SO excited! This is gonna be great!

Well...let me clarify that we didn't move it ourselves . The first time, we used our local fish guy to move it, and he sent only 2 non-muscular BOYS to get the job done (I don't know WHAT he was thinking ), so my hubby had to help (I was NOT happy that hubby was helping after the amount of money we'd paid for THEM to move it), and they still ended up having a very difficult time because it is so heavy...even when empty. It is a glass tank, so it's extraordinarily heavy...unlike the lighter weight acrylic. We estimate the glass alone weighs 300-400 pounds when empty, and the whole set-up weighs about 1 ton when filled with water . The wood cabinet isn't lightweight either, and we almost lost all the fish the first move because it took them so long to get it set-up at the new house (only 10 minutes away from the old house, so travel time was not the issue), and ALL the fish were laying on their side half-dead when we put them in the tank at the new house. I was crying because they'd "killed" all our fish, but AMAZINGLY they all bounced back except one sizeable green chromis. Then, for the 2nd move, we opted to hire a fish store that moves tanks more often, and they brought 3 MEN to move it, and my husband didn't have to lift a finger. They did end up killing our HUGE Vlamingi (they kept going on about how big and beautiful he'd been...gee...THANKS...we knew that already...why did you KILL HIM ), but they replaced him for us free of charge (which is virtually unheard of when moving fish...normally you accept that you could lose your population and the movers will not be held responsible), so I think he knows he did something to kill him...maybe stress him out too much while trying to net him, or maybe they dropped him on the ground , or who knows. Anyway, we were lucky they replaced him, but then the new one ended up dying when we had the outbreak of ich anyway. It's my husband's hobby really, but I do like to look at the tank. I used to get really attached to the fish (well...as attached as you can to the little swimmers), but then I learned to stop naming them because you never know when something will happen to kill them. My hubby has an R/O system and makes all his own salt water for the water changes. He's really good with it, but it's too much work for me !

[labrown]

Wow, that's some serious hard work. I love fish stores because they are almost always locally owned shops with passionate hobbyists at the helm. Sounds like you have a good one there! It is definitely my hobby, my BF won't take the time to do the research, and you can't do anything in this hobby without first knowing what you're up to!! We used to have a lot of bright little fish, but decided to switch to a mini predator tank recently. We have a dwarf lion that is the NEATEST fish to watch. He is pretty smart and SO beautiful when he fans out his fins. And we have a snowflake eel that is such a dunce! He is an escape artist too! Ugh, I could tell you stories! but feeding time is AWESOME because they only get fed every few days and they get to worked up about eating! With a tank that big, you basically have to have a water treatment system for water changes in your home! I can't imagine the time it takes him when he starts working on it! And I also can't imagine what kind of filtration system you have on that huge tank! TOO COOL!

[Sukoshi's Mom]

Originally Posted by labrown

Wow, that's some serious hard work. I love fish stores because they are almost always locally owned shops with passionate hobbyists at the helm. Sounds like you have a good one there! It is definitely my hobby, my BF won't take the time to do the research, and you can't do anything in this hobby without first knowing what you're up to!! We used to have a lot of bright little fish, but decided to switch to a mini predator tank recently. We have a dwarf lion that is the NEATEST fish to watch. He is pretty smart and SO beautiful when he fans out his fins. And we have a snowflake eel that is such a dunce! He is an escape artist too! Ugh, I could tell you stories! but feeding time is AWESOME because they only get fed every few days and they get to worked up about eating! With a tank that big, you basically have to have a water treatment system for water changes in your home! I can't imagine the time it takes him when he starts working on it! And I also can't imagine what kind of filtration system you have on that huge tank! TOO COOL!

LOL! We used to have a snowflake eel in our 135-gallon tank, but then he just disappeared one day . We were very confused because he was much too big to be completely eaten with no trace (we have a semi-aggressive tank) in the amount of time since we'd last seen him, but we figured that must've been what happened. Well, when we moved the 135-gallon tank out from the wall in preparation to upgrade to the 240-gallon, we found the eel...solid as a rock on the carpet behind the tank. Apparently he thought he could live OUTSIDE the water . He was wrong !!!

On that subject, our vlamingi (the huge one that died in the 2nd move) also tried to commit suicide one day. My hubby and I were watching a movie and heard this loud "thud". We turned to look at each other, but we didn't hear anything else, so we went on with the movie. Then a few seconds later, we started hearing all this flopping. By the time my hubby got to the vlamingi and got him back in the tank, he was bleeding from several spots on his body, and we thought he'd be dead by the next day. Amazingly, he went on to live for over a year after that before he died in this latest move. That's one reason I was so upset that of all the fish for them to kill, it had been HIM!

I do like lion fish (beautiful), but we've only ever had one small one (so he didn't eat everything in our tank), and he didn't last long. I tell you though...this hobby makes scuba diving and snorkeling much more interesting since you can actually identify all the fish you see. And I love going to the aquarium now. It means so much more when you know what you're looking at !

[RONLYNN]

Wow...the fish sound so interesting!!! I mean I've been to a few aquariums and owned a goldfish when I was little but that's about it on the fish front.

Well I have no idea what to share for the secret thing so I still have to think of that but here's about me.....I am single and live about 1/2 mile from the beach in CA (South bay). Love where I live. I have 2 dogs...Teddi my yorkie who will be 2 in Sept and Cassie my Standard Poodle who will be 14 in Sept. I have wanted a yorkie since I was little (I used to hope that when I opened a box for Christmas a little yorkie would pop out...but that never happened). I had been telling my sister in law that I really wanted a yorkie but that I couldn't afford it so she ended up getting my mom and sister together and they all chipped in so they could pay for half of my yorkie. She surprised me on Thanksgiving night by telling me she had a secret...and then told me she had collected half the money for my yorkie. It was really a ploy...she wanted me to go Christmas shopping with her at 4 in the morning so with that information how could I turn her down!! We ended up getting Teddi the next day!

I grew up here in So. California...went to college in Santa Barbara and have been working in the footwear industry for 10 years. I like traveling with my friends. In the last few years we have been to Australia, Tahiti, Moorea, England, Ireland and then little trips around the US. We just went for Memorial weekend to Charleston and Savannah. I love watching reality shows (specially Big Brother) and HGTV shows. I adore my neice and nephews (I have a niece and nephew - Payton and Killian (brother's kids) and 2 nephews Pressley and Nathaniel (sister's kids)). I have a great family and everyone lives within 45 minutes of me.

Here is my myspace if you want to see pictures of me and the dogs!!

MySpace.com - **Ronda** - 99 - Female - Manhattan Beach, California - www.myspace.com/rondasplace

Can't wait to meet everyone and see so many yorkies all together at the meetup!!!