Susie’s Thoughts

Melissa at Such Simple Pleasures had an idea for a new meme for Saturday. The idea with the meme is to re-post an old post from the archives, and since I’m still busy spoiling my grandson, I’m happy to jump right in.

The post I’m re-posting is from January 2005, when I tried a lot of dating sites on the Internet. The post is called What does it mean to be kind or intelligent? Should I keep a list? Or not!

When someone asks me what kind of man I want I have big trouble answering. Of course, I could make a list of traits and go with that, but what does those traits really mean? What does it mean to be kind? Taking out the garbage? Fixing my car? My kids take out the garbage and I don’t have a car for the moment… I want a man in my life, not a janitor. Does kind mean that he won’t hit or verbally abuse me? I assume that the norm is we don’t hit others, so I don’t consider people who doesn’t hit or say mean things to others as exceptionally kind, they are just normal.

Intelligent? I guess that is something I could put on my list; I want the guy to understand what I’m talking about… but, on the other hand… I don’t want a guy who is so intelligent that I don’t know what HE is talking about. I have never been able to be that cute little girl gazing at a man with big, soulful eyes, admiring every word he says. Even though I’m quite short I have had some trouble being a cute, little girl in the presence of a man. It’s easier for me to be either a bad girl or one of the guys, than a girly and cute girl.

Powerful? Rich? I do believe that both too much power and too much money corrupts. I want the guy to be able to pay for the food he eats and buy the stuff he thinks he need, but too much is always too much. Even if I haven’t had much money, I have been able to take care of my family for many years and expect to be able to do that in the future too.

A list is good to put up when we need to make up our minds on something. If there were a man in my life that I liked, but some of the things in him made me crazy, then I would put up a list to decide whether to continue seeing that man or not. I’m just fishing around now and a list would just make it more difficult for me to examine the catch. I expect men to see me as the unique woman I am and to respect me for that, it’s only fair that I give guys the same chance. Unfortunately it seems they are more into the list thing than I am and some of them have quite long lists too, but that’s another story…

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I love colors and what is better than a website where you can mix and create color palettes that suites your taste or web site. The ColourLovers site is a good tool for anyone who is about to redesign there website or create a new blog template.

I’m enjoying my time in Florida and I just love spending time with little Baby Booker. He’s a really calm baby, he sleeps most of the time, so catching him when he’s awake is a task. This is a fresh photo from today and the baby is one week old here.

This was harder than I thought… giving birth to children is a lot easier when you are the one doing it… waiting is hard, I understand the fathers a lot better now. My grandson is now born and I’m a grandmother, I’m the one allowed to spoil him.

I’m going to leave for Florida on Tuesday and I have a lot to do before that. I wish you all really Happy Holidays, a Merry Christmas, Happy Hannukh and in Swedish, God Jul, in Finnish, Hyvää Joulua!

Sorrow and her children has made some beautiful gifts they are giving away for free to anyone who pays the thought forward and does some good where they are. This is what Christmas is all about. Christmas is not tinsel and glitter and buying more than you can afford, it is about making someone happy by doing something good.

In many places in the world it isn’t politically correct to spend a traditional Christmas anymore. We are not supposed to say Merry Christmas. What we forget is that many of the Christmas traditions we have aren’t really Christian. Some of them are pagan, especially the ones we have here in Scandinavia, and others come from a later age and has nothing to do with religion at all. The Vikings used to celebrate the midwinter and the Swedish and Finnish word for Christmas has nothing with Christ in it, in fact the word we use for Christmas comes from the old Norse word for the midwinter feast. In many other pagan religions the winter solstice was celebrated in some way, and I think the reason the celebration of Christmas has become such a big deal is because we need to celebrate the return of the sun in some way.

Why can’t we just forget politics and join with each other in joy to celebrate the returning light, whether the returning light is the birth of a child or something else doesn’t really matter! Let’s follow Sorrow’s example and do something good for someone else, let’s do it in the spirit of the returning light!

It is funny how when you take a step in a different direction, you suddenly notice how many roads there are to choose from. When you live your life the same way, day after day, you tend to think you have no choices, you tend to only see what has to be done next. Life becomes a routine, one day looks a lot like the other day. At some point you start to think… this is it… this is how it’s supposed to be… not happy, but not sad either.

All it takes is a step in a different direction, one small step… and suddenly you notice all those roads you didn’t see before. Surprised you wonder if they have been there all the time. Have you passed them by, blindfolded, never really noticing them… or did they just appear?

I stumbled upon a blog that isn’t updated anymore, but well worth reading. The blog is called 1000 LIFE LESSONS or HOW TO STAY ALIVE FOREVER. I have started reading the lessons from the last to the first, since that’s the way a blog is built. So far I’ve come to life lesson #998. The lesson says:

If your heart says change, then change.

It won’t be easy.

A lot of truth in a couple of words.

I used to own a web shop. I started my business 7 years ago when Internet business was something new in Finland. I sold computer games and multimedia products online, and even though the product in itself was suitable for an online business, I couldn’t compete with the bigger businesses selling the same products. My web shop was a second income and I was able to keep it up for a couple of years, even though I never really made a profit out of it.

I decided today to start a new web shop together with my daughters. Both of my daughters are studying business administration at the same school I both work and study at, in fact my daughters are my students too, and since we all will have a business degree we decided to start a business together. I know how to build and run a web shop, I’m able to photograph our products and I’ve got a brother-in-law who is willing to invest some money in our business. The only thing missing is the product to sell.

My daughters are young and into both fashion and make up, and they really love mineral makeups. The problem is that you can’t buy them in Finland. You can buy some brands of mineral makeup in Great Britain, but those brands are pretty expensive. I guess our business idea at the moment is to start importing and selling mineral makeup online.

What do you think? Do you have any experience in selling online and what do you think of our choice of product?

While working on my Wordpress template I’ve used some resources I discovered when I started my design blog many years ago. I thought I’d plug the tutorials for those of you who are planning on updating your template.

Color scheming and page layout

Other ways to create color schemes for your template

CSS and XHTML tutorials, Blogger Tags

Wordpress tags

Example of the color palettes from the Color Blender page I used for this template:

I didn’t use every color, but I selected the value I needed from the palette. The original red, green, black and light yellow are from the header image.

I’ve always been proud of my independence. It’s always been important for me to be able to provide for myself. When I need to make a decision, I want the time and freedom to make up my own mind. If I need to ask for other people’s opinions, I almost always check the facts or ask for more than one opinion. This is not because I don’t trust people, but because I want to examine important problems from more than one aspect before I make up my mind. I just can’t believe that there is only one solution to any given problem, I believe that there are many, and my task is to choose the one that is best for me.

If needed, I fight for my independence… I know how it feels to not have freedom. This doesn’t mean I fight every time I feel my freedom is threatened, I pick my fights and sometimes it’s better to negotiate instead of fighting. I do think I have a good head on my shoulders, but I’m not always right. I have made my fair share of mistakes and I have admitted to them. I see my mistakes as a way of learning for the future. I’m trying to build a good life for me and that isn’t always easy.

Recently I’ve learned that you are stronger in a group, I do need other people, and I’m trying my best to work well in a team. It isn’t always easy, with all out different cultures and languages, but I’m hanging in there. There are days when I don’t feel I have much to give… there are other days when I know I’ve got a lot to give, but yet I have trouble getting my voice heard. And then there are those rare days when I have a lot to say and I know people listen… These are the days I value the most.

I know I’m just a little country in a big world, but today is my 90th year of independence and when I look back at those years I have to say WOW… I was one of the poorest in the world, I had nothing when I started and look what have become of me… I can provide for my children, my sick and my old… it was hard work, and even though I’m not amongst the richest countries in the world, I’m not that far behind.