On day three of the vacation I’m currently on, I woke up to cloudy skies and rain.  I wasn’t concerned though; we’ve had our sun and the truth is sometimes I secretly enjoy a rainy day at the beach.

Because when it rains you do things you otherwise might not. You indulge in your lazy side; curling up on the couch with a blanket and a big bowl of popcorn to watch an old movie.  You challenge your family members in endless rounds of euchre, Yahtzee or Trivial Pursuit.  Or maybe you engage in a craft such as tie-dyeing shirts.  If you choose the latter, and you lack the craft gene like I do, please learn from my mistakes:

What Not to Do when You Tie-Dye Shirts.

1-Don’t read the directions after you have started the process.  My kit came with an instructional DVD.  Had I watched it beforehand, I’d have saved a bit of time and trouble.

2-Don’t assume working in the kitchen is a good idea.  I don’t know why I thought we wouldn’t get dye on our rental home’s White. Kitchen. Counters. Thank God for those bleach wipes.

3-Don’t say “Sure!” when your kid offers to help mix up the dye.  Red, yellow, and blue dye everywhere, one curse word, one kid running upstairs because she felt badly, and one mother who had to follow her up to apologize.  Ah, the irony of family fun….

4-Don’t assume you can skip wearing the gloves.  I currently have a semi-permanent rainbow across my hands, along with speckled legs and feet.  Yesterday, Abby fell on her skim board and I thought she had a huge bruise; turns out it was just green dye.

5-Don’t let my previous suggestions stop you.  Despite the mess, despite the teenagers making fun of me (their favorite pastime), despite the rainbow hands, we had fun.  And our shirts turned out pretty cool.  That’s what I love about tie-dye;  even those of us who can’t pull off a paint-by-number can come home with a pretty cool looking, one-of-a-kind work of art.

In later contemplation, I decided life is a lot like tie-dyeing, because: 

1-It’s messy.

2-It’s more complicated when you don’t follow  ‘instructions.’

3-Even when we’re trying our best, we fail, making curse words and apologies part of it. 

4-When you take short cuts, it shows.

5-Despite all of it, life is good, rich and with the right attitude, fun!

The Writer’s Progress:

One reason I started this blog was to keep myself accountable and thus I want to report my progress.  

1.  I’m on vacation so I’ve done next to nothing in the last 5 days.  I did however, arrange to arrange for an interview for when I get back.  This is progress! The week we get home I’ll collect my first story for a book on faith and miracles I’m working on.

2.  I have a friend working on getting me contact information for another person whose amazing story I heard through the grapevine (my husband, a valid source I’d say).  I’m so excited to interview this guy so am praying he’ll be up for it.

3.  Finished a freelance assignment I’d been working on.  Girl’s got to earn a little cash whilst she’s working on her dreams…