Author: Jen Rios

#MyGirlL: The First Bark

We got Leia on April 28, 2020. Since that day, she is pretty much silent. Occasionally, when she’s sleeping, she will give off little baby sounds and twice when we were watching TV, she barked at the dog who was barking on TV. Other than that, for the past almost six months, she doesn’t bark. I don’t mind that at all!

Well, all of that changed today. My brother Dave stopped by on his lunch with some groceries for us and my Mom gave him some lunch to eat. We kept the front door open because we knew he was on his way. As soon as he got onto the porch, Leia started to bark! I was completely startled by the sounds that are coming out of her mouth! I backed up and started to record it.

She is not a big dog and her bark isn’t that big either but having never really heard it, it startled me and I laughed!

I cannot figure out how to put the video here on my blog so I will just post the video directly to Facebook and to Twitter. On the video, I missed out on her more powerful barks at the front door and once she was back in her bed, they started to lessen in intensity. My brother laughed and he told me that she was protecting us (my Mom and me).

I nce my brother left to go back to work, I looked at her and smiled, I thanked her for protecting us and my Mom rubbed her up and kissed her. I can’t reach her sitting in my chair. Once we shut the front door, she curled up and went to sleep. What a sweet girl?!!!





“Took My Breath Away”

So, I have been bummed out since learning Friday about my uncle Rey’s passing. My cousin, Reyna, called my Mom and we both spoke to her on speakerphone. Hearing her voice with her Texan accent reminded me of being young. I have SO many fond memories of being there and my Dad was happiest when he was in Texas! I told Reyna that I had been there maybe four or five times in my life and her family made a HUGE impression on me!

So, yesterday I was with my Mom when she ordered flowers for his funeral. Visitation was today. I was thinking about Reyna‘s Texas accent this morning and that picture I have of both my aunt Olga and uncle Rey. I scrolled through Facebook as I was trying to get my bearings about me and wake up when I saw this picture:

My Tïa Alma wrote this post and included this picture of my aunt Olga and uncle Rey. I gasped and seeing this picture took my breath away. I was either 6 or 7 when I was first introduced to my relatives in Texas. And Olga is my Dad’s aunt. She is my grandpa’s sister. Seeing this picture took my breath away because I am seeing their faces. The one I have that I snuck taking in church is of their backs but is uncle Ray’s arm around her and her leaning in shows so much they were in love. They are together now.

My Mom called the funeral home today to make sure the flowers were delivered and hearing the Texas accent again made me smile. The man who answered the phone told us they were delivered and later in the evening, both of my cousins (their daughters) thanked my Mom for the flowers, told her how beautiful day were, and texted her pictures:

The woman we spoke with on Saturday did a wonderful job arranging the flowers! Seeing the arrangement’s beauty and with my aunt and uncle’s picture in my mind, it still takes my breath away and I can’t seem to get this song out of my head:

The Perfect Picture

I have tens of thousands of pictures in my phone and I am still rockin’ an iPhone 7s! I recently upgraded my iCloud space so photos that were in my favorites, we directed to somewhere in my iCloud. I have been searching for a picture since Friday that I took it years ago. It was a perfect picture!

I took this pictures at my grandma‘s funeral. I know it was terrible to take a picture during mass but it was perfect! The picture was of my uncle Rey with his arm around my aunt Olga during the funeral mass.

I kept that picture in my favorites tab but when I upgraded my storage, it got lost. I am search my phone it’s Friday because that is when my Tía Alma let my Mom and I know that my Tïo Rey died. I searched in vain to find that picture for my cousins. My mom ordered flowers for the funeral because we will not be able to attend.

My mom ordered flowers my family for the funeral because we will not be able to attend. I am still going to look for that picture but I can’t stop crying…

For-Til B12

I think it was in the first few months of the, “Stay at home” orders when my hair started to grow out, that I realized that in the past couple years, my hair has really started to thin. My hair thinned out extremely when I was on my chosen shots. It was a side-effect from that shot. Once I stopped that shot, my hair started to grow back. I was very pleased about that!

But in the past few months, as my hair grow out, I noticed that it had begun to thin again. I’m not sure if you can notice it, but I do!:

But I just took a picture yesterday of my hair hand as it is longer, the waves have gone and it has gone back to my straight hair.

It just FEELS thicker! Which I Really like all a supplement that my chiropractor:/natropath told me about. I will like when I feel safe enough to go back there again! In the meantime, I will just order my supplements and I have them mailed to me. He recommended For-Til B12:

#blondetodarkhairchallenge

I have been seeing so many posts of this new challenge on Facebook, the #blondetodarkhaurchaalenge. Lots of my friends have posted pictures and even one of my brothers! I have never died my hair and I am a little bummed that I can’t participate. I came across some old pictures in my phone today and posted my own version of the challenge. To put this in context. I think I was about 32 or 33 years old so we’re talking five or six years ago. It made me laugh to post pictures and these are the ones I posted:

I think that I had to be above 32 because if Sean was a new older than 12, he would not have taken these pictures of me. I also was still working and still driving. I posted in the comments on Facebook that retrospectively, I wish I would have purchased the Medusa wig but, I had to be responsible and I had bills to pay so I couldn’t justify spending $24 I think on silly nonsense. I really DO wish I could’ve been irresponsible and just bought the wig. I STILL would be wearing it and laughing about it today! So, I really haven’t done this challenge because I’ve never dyed my hair but I wanted to post something!

So, this is my hair back then when I still had a manual chair and still worked:

So many things have changed since I took this picture so long ago, or had Sean take it. Or maybe it was my Mom?

To Me

I haven’t been out of my house since October 1 for my dental cleaning. It was overdue because I had to cancel my appointment early in this pandemic. Dental health is EXTREMELY important for me because I have MS. When I was out of my house, the leaves had not yet started changing. I started wearing a winter hat indoors a couple days ago because I feel so much colder since I can no longer control my internal temperature!

I love Fall the season and I love to watch the leaves change color. I don’t think that I will make it to cider mill this year to get cider and roasted, cinnamonsugared almonds and that kind of bums me out.

My Mom took Leia for a walk this morning and she brought Fall to me:

I smiled and I am so touched by her gesture! Just like in Sense and Sensibility, when Willabe brings the flowers to Marianne because she is injured, he tells her, “Since you cannot venture out to nature, nature must be brought to you!” That’s exactly what my Mom did for me!

Sean’s Hat

So, today was day six of watching Hocus Pocus and it is also day two of wearing a hat in my house! My Mom says that it is not really cold outside but I have a chill and I am cold! My internal temperature gauge has no rhyme or reason.

I started wearing my hat yesterday. By that I mean I wore the hat from the second I woke up until the second I laid down to sleep. Apparently, my hat cannot be found. It was misplaced so my Mom handed me one of Sean‘s hats.

It was a lined Piston’s hat and I put it on. He got this hat last year and has not worn it very much and I am grateful for that because it is NOT stretched out! That’s how it is with Sean’s hats because his head is bigger than mine! My brothers used to make fun of them when Sean was young but I would tell them that, “He has to have some place for all those brains to go! I’m very grateful for Sean’s hat today because it is very warm!

Random Tune #73 in my YouTube Feed

This is COMPLETELY out of water because I have a few songs posted on Facebook that I have not put on my blog but this one came this morning and brought with it TONS of memories! She opened for a Maroon 5 and introduce yourself as: “ Hi, I’m Sara and this is my band“ and she’s sat at her piano and started jamming! The person who I went to the cancer with, looked and me and we both said that she is really good! It was just before her first single came out but I remember hearing/seeing her play this song: