Education Week - Day Four

Hm - I was all mentally set to go for my walk yesterday morning and then I realized that it was pouring rain. No walk. Now I could have been good and did the stairs a few times, but I did not. But I take the stairs all the time to my room on the 4th floor and totally at the opposite end of the hall from that staircase. I did make it to about 5000 steps yesterday so I'm good with that.

I've been able to avoid all the bad stuff although I was so hungry the night before when we sat down at the restaurant, that I did have some chips and guacamole in the Mexican restaurant. See what happens when you don't keep those hunger pangs at bay?

Anyway - something very interesting happened yesterday. I normally do not eat bread. I might get the occasional piece in but I can't even think of a particular instance when I've last eaten bread. I eat pasta with gluten so I don't think gluten is an issue for me. But yesterday at lunch, I decided to have the vegetarians wraps and instead of eating only the filling, I ate the tortilla as well. ONE tortilla was all I had. I was so bloated by mid-afternoon, I felt sick. Why was that? I'm not sure it was the tortilla - but I didn't really have anything else. Going to have to do an experiment on that one. It was NOT a good feeling.

At least, the rest of me is healthy. One of my colleagues had to fly home yesterday morning after she missed the day before while she hung out in her hotel room with what we think is the flu. She was not in good shape and it hit hard and it hit fast. One of the managers wasn't feeling well yesterday and hopefully, they did NOT pass anything along to us.

Today is the last day of education week. While I'm sad that it's coming to an end, it's time to get home. It's been an incredible learning and team building experience. The connections, the networking, the learning, my head is spinning.

What blows me away is how giving everyone is of what they do. They're willing to share and my head is exploding with ideas and things I want to do, things I HAVE to do and all kinds of other stuff.

What's interesting is that the more I learn, the more I realize what I don't know and as I always say - the day I stop learning is the day I'm out of here. Well, according to the list in my head - I'll be around for a long, long time!

Not sure if you saw the pictures of the geckos on Facebook and Instagram. It's a class - if you want to make one, get in touch with your Husqvarna or PFAFF dealer and have us book one for you! They are super fun to make and well - I think you're going to see a lot of geckos around. I didn't get mine finished before I came here. I'll show him to you when I get home. But the fabrics - well - there are some pretty spiffy geckos. Now I'm on the hunt for shiny, stretchy fabric. I'm sure I have some at home - I just need to put my hands on it.

The fun thing about what we're doing in our projects is that we work on all kinds of fabrics. Yesterday, we made a small scissor holder in the hoop and it was made with gorgeous cork. That Husqvarna Viking Designer EPIC had no issues to embroider through two layers of cork. And then go to vinyl and stretchy fabric? No problem.

We had a free evening last night. And a few of us wanted to hit a couple of shops. We went to Wal-Mart first so I could get my journals that I've been searching for. I made some journal covers in three different sizes. We can only get the large size journal in Canada so I was able to get some of the medium and the small journals to fit inside my journal covers. I was happy. Total spend $5.61 or something like that.

Then we popped off to Hobby Lobby. I didn't really want to go in - I didn't need anything, and I ALMOST bought some shiny stretchy fabric but I didn't. I found (and bought) two bicycle appliques which I thought was hilarious since we're here to learn how to make embroideries. NO worries - it's research. I bought a couple of other small things. Total spend was $15.40. I also bought a magazine the other day for $6.99. I don't think I'll be over my limit when I cross the border later today.

It's all about being realistic. As I walked through Hobby Lobby, I saw some very neat stuff, but nothing that I really, really want at this stage of my life. And besides, there's NO room in my teeny tiny suitcase that I've already paid as check-in luggage because of my snips and not wanting to have to potentially deal with that at the airport.

Off to dinner with the small group of ladies and one last pit stop at Target where someone wanted to get a specific T-shirt. I didn't even get out of the car. The discipline, but then I'm not really a shopper so that's not surprising.

I've been watching the weather. I see that we're back up to getting 10 cm of snow back home tomorrow. Oh yeah! And they're going to get a ton of rain here. I guess I'd prefer the rain over 10 cm of snow and cold, cold temps. But that's life.

I still have at least an hour to kill before my walk but I have a bit of computer work to do so I'd better get that done.

Have a super day!!!

Ciao!