The week before Thanksgiving I had this adorable little Pilgrim.

The night before Thanksgiving, I got a precocious Smurf.

And this is also why The Diva will never get her paints again. HEH. Thanks Crayola paints. I appreciate it.

For more Wordless Wednesdays/Wordful Wednesdays, please visit 5 Minutes For Mom, and WordlessWednesday.com {HQ}

Just Another Wordless Wednesday… is a post from: Last Shreds Of Sanity | Blog Designer | California Mom Blog

1. Katie Talks About...

2. You're next!

I am the crazy Cat Lady. We own one indoor cat who is beautiful, but demon possessed. And I feed the strays. It started out last fall with 4 almost adult cats. Then a couple of more got wind that I fed cats every night, so then there were six. Then a couple of months ago, one of them, Mama T, had kittens. Only we didn’t know she was their mama until I found them nursing under a chair on my patio.

I was also trying out my new Photoshop actions and maybe played a little too much with them.

For more Wordless Wednesdays/Wordful Wednesdays, please visit 5 Minutes For Mom, and WordlessWednesday.com {HQ}

Just Another Wordless Wednesday…{Mommy’s Love} is a post from: Last Shreds Of Sanity | Blog Designer | California Mom Blog

1. PippaD 2. Not So Average Mama

3. Southern Bella's Ways To Save 4. You're next!

Oh that Diva of mine….she has her own style to be sure. She loves to dress up in pretty things.

Then go climb a tree or make mud pies.

She is a girly Tom-Boy.

Just like her Mama. Only I was always shoeless. Climbing trees, playing in the dirt…beating up the boys who annoyed me.

Ahhh, to be five again.

We got her a basket for the decidedly boyish bike that Grandma and Grandpa got her for Christmas…before she was two years old! She was pretending to be the paper delivery girl.

Then she was a vampire.

Then she was the Vampire Girl Newspaper Delivery person.

See what I mean?

For more Wordless Wednesdays/Wordful Wednesdays, please visit 5 Minutes For Mom, and WordlessWednesday.com {HQ}

Just Another Wordless Wednesday….{The Many Styles Of The Diva} is a post from: Last Shreds Of Sanity | Blog Designer | California Mom Blog

1. Beth @ Musing Mainiac 2. Katie Talks About...

3. Henrietta @ A Hen's Nest 4. Faythe @GMT w/linky

5. You're next!

Whatever will it be? Will it bloom? Will it only be pretty leaves then whither and die in the blazing Summer sun?

For more Wordless Wednesdays/Wordful Wednesdays, please visit MomDot.com , 5 Minutes For Mom, and WordlessWednesday.com {HQ}

Just Another Wordless Wednesday… is a post from: Last Shreds Of Sanity | Blog Designer | California Mom Blog

1. Jodi 2. Cindi @ Moomette's Magnificents 3. Windy Wednesday Find

4. Harriet-LINKY 5. The Mom Buzz - Little Model 6. Brandy @ Happily Blended (with linky)

7. Elizabeth @ Suzy Q Homemaker 8. Frosted Fingers 9. You're next!

Sunday, on our way to the Wal-Mart SuperCenter to buy groceries, the trunk of our car broke. Yes, that’s right, it broke. I went over a dip in the road, the trunk popped open, I pulled over and My Husband got out to close it. We had really thought that The Diva had pulled the release lever and that was why it had come open.

Nope.

It was broken.

On our way to Wal-Mart to spend a nice sized gift certificate on food for the week.

Oh the irony!

Hubby tried to tie it down with some rope he found in the trunk so that our happy asses could be on our way, but it didn’t exactly work in a way that would make the trunk seem completely closed. It was bouncing up and down on the freeway.

The part of the latch that is bolted to the frame of the car broke off because the metal that it was attached to disintegrated. The car is old. But I never thought this would happen. The latch itself is intact, but the frame needs to have a new piece of metal welded to it so that the bottom part of the latch can be reattached to the car.

Then on Monday after dropping Hubby off at work and The Diva at school, the rope that was used to secure the trunk lid down, broke, as I was coming into our driveway. I could not actually drive the car anywhere with it flopping and bouncing all over the place like that, so I found a wire hanger and tried to use that to secure it down. It was not good. I do not possess the strength to pull a thick wire like that taught through relatively small openings.

Luckily our neighbor came to the rescue by using some thinner wire and completely securing the trunk down. You cannot tell there is any problem with it.

You also cannot open it.

For more Wordless Wednesdays/Wordful Wednesdays, please visit MomDot.com , 5 Minutes For Mom, and WordlessWednesday.com {HQ}

Just Another Wordless Wednesday….Ghetto Fab-U-Lous Trunk is a post from: Last Shreds Of Sanity | Blog Designer | California Mom Blog

1. Secret Mom Thoughts 2. DogsMom:Good Help 3. Caiafa Craziness 4. Katie Talks About...

5. I Like It Frantic 6. CalgaryDaddy.com 7. ZOMBIE BUNNY 8. A Hen's Nest

9. Healthy Moms 10. You're next!

This is what happens when the real estate industry gets greedy and buyers get stupid. But why does it always end up across the street from your house?

An agent brought a a perspective buyer to see this poor house over the week~end. She was too afraid to go in and we watched her stand in the front yard looking freaked out. It was kind of funny.

Just Another Wordless Wednesday…. is a post from: Last Shreds Of Sanity | Blog Designer | California Mom Blog

1. AutismLearningFelt 2. Harriet 3. All Things Mamma 4. Annie @ Mama Dweeb

5. What Happened To My House 6. Jacqueline @Blessings Abound Mommy 7. Katie Talks About... 8. ArtSnark

9. Faythe@GMT 10. You're next!

Yeah, I got nothing interesting today, so I am posting a video Trisha showed us. Because I think it’s funny. But if you don’t blog or do any kind of social media, you may not get it.

Viva le Dorks!!

THE NEW DORK – Entrepreneur State of Mind (Jay-Z ft Alicia Keys Spoof)

Just Another Wordless Wednesday… is a post from: Last Shreds Of Sanity | Blog Designer | California Mom Blog

1. Susan@What Happened To My House 2. Upstatemomof3

3. suadi qaiz 4. hani altanbour

5. You're next!

I thought this picture looked like an angel flying. It was taken after a rain storm we had a couple of weeks ago. And I have a thing for clouds. I have no idea why. I just love them.

Except when they’re brown.

Just Another Wordless Wednesday… is a post from: Last Shreds Of Sanity | Blog Designer | California Mom Blog

1. AutismLearningFelt- Snowplowed In 2. Run DMT 3. Flat Stanley

4. Jacqueline @Blessings Abound Mommy 5. Southern Bella's Ways To Save 6. Upstatemomof3

7. abby @ both sides now 8. You're next!

Well I didn’t actually get any footage of yesterday’s tornadoes. They didn’t come right up to my house, but we did get some serious rain, thunder, lightening and wind. And more of the same is expected today and Thursday. With more tornadoes and water spouts a serious possibility. Tornadoes did hit my favorite beach {Seal Beach}, my friend’s house in Irvine, Huntington Harbor, Costa Mesa, my FIL’s neighborhood and Corona.Thank you El Nino! I know we need the rain, but damn, tornadoes?? WTF??

As I have stated many times before, Mother Nature has PMS.

Just Another Wordless Wednesday…Tornadoes In Southern California is a post from: Last Shreds Of Sanity | Blog Designer | California Mom Blog

1. The Mom Buzz - Disney Princesses 2. Katie @ thinkPINK 3. Secret Mom Thoughts 4. Words From A Busy SAHM

5. Susan@What Happened To My House 6. Brandy@Creatively Yours 7. Debra @ A Frugal FRiend 8. Not So Average Mama

9. Healthy Moms 10. Skin MD Natural Valentine's Day Giveaway Ends 2/7/2010 11. You're next!

Yesterday morning, after getting my Husband to his carpool for work, giving The Diva her breakfast and sitting down to see how much larger my email box had grown since I last checked it the night before, I checked in at MomDot and found a post about the beautiful Karissa. I knew without clicking on the thread, that it likely wasn’t going to be good news, but I never expected what was written there.

Karissa had taken her life over the week~end.

I gasped. I screamed out “Noooo!” and then I began to weep. I have been crying ever since. I have been weeping and screaming “Karissa, why did you do this? WHY? Why didn’t you say something, reach out? We would have been there for you! What was so terrible about your life that at 31 years old you felt the only way to relieve your pain was to end your life? WHY DID YOU DO THIS?”

I will never know the answer to those questions. I can only pray that she is in the arms of angels now and at peace.

You see, Karissa was more than just a review blogger or a green blogger, she was a friend — to many, not just me. She was always willing to help another, give words of encouragement and had the most wicked sense of humor. And she was beautiful…inside and out. Just ask anybody who knew her.

Imagine the shock, disbelief and pain we all felt upon hearing that she had committed suicide. Not “our” Karissa. No. Couldn’t be.

But it was.

Didn’t we just do this? Didn’t we just mourn the loss of someone in the blog community? So much tragedy…so much heartache….so many vultures looking to get their 15 minutes on the backs of others’ grief….I don’t think I can go through this again…I don’t have enough tears….

The world just became a little darker without her brilliant light. No one knew the depths of her pain…she hid it from everyone. Even those closest to her. Now we are all left wondering if we missed a sign, if we had just paid more attention, if we had not been so wrapped up in our own lives….maybe we could have talked to her. Maybe we could have helped prevent this tragedy…

Sadly, we will never know. That is the insidiousness of this disease of the mind that takes a human being to a deep dark place they feel they cannot climb out of…her pain has finally ended…ours has just begun.

As a tribute to Karissa, our beautiful friend, we decided to dedicate our Wordless Wednesday posts to her as a memorial to all the lives she touched.

This is for you, sweet, sweet Karissa. We love you and miss you. Our hearts will forever ache for you.

A few of us decided to do a picture wearing a mud mask on our faces. You may find this strange, but it is right up Karissa’s alley. She was a beauty and pampering maven. She loved anything that was green, organic and made you look pretty. So here you go Miss Prissy Green, me in an organic mud mask on the Internet. I would only do this for you, my friend. And you’ll be happy to know that my skin is as soft as a baby’s butt now.

Just Another Wordless Wednesday…In Memoriam of Karissa is a post from: Last Shreds Of Sanity | Blog Designer | California Mom Blog