So I KNOW that ya'll think I am dead....

But I am not. Really. I am just keeping up with a household that includes two very hairy and stinky dogs and one very very fast crawling- TEN month old (almost!) And she is REALLY working hard on pulling up to stand, she does it frequently now and it won't be long until I think she'll be taking steps!

AND I have been a sewing maniac. Maniac I tell you. I reorganized the entire sewing room. I went on a trip to get a bit of fabric and some elastic that I needed to finish the tank top and came back with this:So I got the tank top finished. It's stinkin cute. Then I cut out a tank top in the fireworks fabric to make for the 4th. We have been invited to four cookouts in three days, and will attend at least 2-3 of them, so I can't wait for her to wear it... but first I have to get sewing.

I wanted to cross the back of the tank top because it would look SO cute, but I didn't want to go to the trouble of how in the world I would get it over her head without adding elastic to the straps, which I didn't want. So it has straight straps in the back.

I am waiting on some Organic Sherpa Fleece that I had to order online (a trip to four different fabric stores resulted in many perplexed looks and one woman telling me there is no such thing) and then I will cut all of the flannel I got and some of the stretchy cotton knits into squares, back them with the sherpa fleece, and serge to create more wipes. I have been using baby washclothes and they worked excellent up until now. Of course they still work but I have to use more than I would like to because as a child's diet increases and expands into new tastes, her diapers expand and increase also... So a little textures Sherpa goes a long way on the ol bottom. I can't wait to get sewing those new wipes. I have ONE sherpa wipe backed with a cotton knit and I love it. I got a cotton knit fabric on clearance for $2.00 a yard, and the fleece prints were on sale too. LOVE it.

I have also been madly sewing fleece diaper soakers, with are super wonderful and I adore them. I will add some pics here of the ones I have sewn this past week. Actually I sewed all five of them in one day. Hee hee.

My favorite is the one with the skull tie-dye- I love the skull on the butt. And I do like the one that I got crazy and did some appliqué on.

I wrote a blog post in the middle of last week but never got to finish it, so I never posted it, but I will do that now.

I am getting ready to start making the cupcake invitations for Ardyn's First birthday party. That should be fun. I can't believe she will be a year old in two months. Doesn't seem possible of course!

I have a sink full of dishes to do. But I am ignoring them. Really ignoring them. I made organic spaghetti for Ardyn yesterday, except I used Couscous because I have such a hard time finding the spaghettio noodles... they are only at one store in our area, and it's an hour away so that just doesn't always happen. I need to freeze those tonight into portions.

For some reason I have been having this constant chest pain all evening. Hope my arteries aren't clogged and that it goes away SOON. It is bugging me and making me feel all icky and panicky. No one wants to have chest pain. So I looked on WebMD and I am sufficiently convinced that's it's just some phantom pain or perhaps muscle pain... and I am not having a heart attack... So on with my blogging.

Ardyn and I went outside and I pushed her in the swing, boy does she love that Step2 Toddler swing. The first time I push her she always gets this look of panic on her face and it stays for a few swings and then is replaced by peals of giggling laughter. Then she grabs onto the ropes and kicks and kicks her legs and feet and squeals with delight. I love seeing her so thrilled!

We entered the Goodmama photo contest on Saturday, and I was hoping that yesterday she would announce the winner, but it's Monday evening and I am still waiting on pins and needles to see if we had a chance at winning. Here is the photo that we entered (you have to be a flickr friend to view it because she is in a diaper and I am protecting her from the pervs on the internet) We also made copies of it for family as her 10 month photo. I took the picture, and it was my only real photo shoot attempt since the teacup pictures, so I was pretty pleased with the results. My new camera is too awesome for words!

Ardyn's newest accomplishments in the past few days include a few new words. Pretzel (Insane I know, I know- but she was repeating me, it was plain as day, and Evan heard her too.) and Roxy (my parent's dog) and she now barks like a dog and pants like a dog.... whenever she hears a dog, sees a dog, or sees a dog on TV, or in a picture. It is especially evident when she reads books. Today she saw a cow in a book and she said "Arf arf" and then DOG and Evan said "No thats a cow" and Ardyn looked at him and shook her head no and said "Arf Arf!" Hee hee.

Today I ordered myself a tie-dyed Bravado Nursing bra. It's the first expensive nursing bra I have bought and I have been nursing for 10 months now. I feel like I need and deserve a comfy cotton one for summer. And it's pretty and makes me think of how happy tie dye makes me. So I can't wait for it to get here. I hope it fits well and is a favorite. Everyone raves about them. I had two that I bought on ebay when I was pregnant but my milk came in and my ribcage expanded too with pregnancy, so it was WAY too small. I traded them to a mamma on diaperswappers for custom dyed and knit wool shorties for Ardyn. It was an awesome trade!

Well, I am outta stuff to talk about for now. Have a great night!

Dishes Suck

If I ever get divorced, it will be because I can't deal with the fact that Evan always puts dirty dishes in the sink. I spent over an hour yesterday, hand washing dishes and cleaning everything out of the sink. Then putting them all away. It sucked. Our dishwasher is on the fritz and I have a "fund" that I have started for a new one. Saving Saving Saving. Evan is one of those people who believe that dirty dishes should be filled with water and put in the sink. I am one of those people who believes in "rinse"and then stack neatly alongside the sink until it's time to wash. I hate dishes in the sink. I hate dishes in the sink filled with water. I hate dishes in the sink with that old disgusting water that has food floating in it. I hate having to sort through and separate spoons and forks out of bowls soaking in old icky water. But Evan believes that dirty dishes belong in the sink. So last night after his late night stir-fry episode, the sink was full of dirty pans and the vegetable steamer, and the other side had all of the things that I hadn't gotten to yesterday (all Ardyn's dishes from the day. My fault that I didn't get them done before bed) and so before I can wash Ardyn's tray and her dishes, and get us both breakfast, I have to go in and clean out the sink AGAIN and do dishes AGAIN and sort through all the gross dishes and cold water and food bits. Ick. Please dishwasher. Come quickly.

I have started a massive redirect of things. I tried the yard sale thing. Now my garage is full of unsold things. I have this desperately underlying feeling that we have outgrown this house and that no matter how hard I try, I will not be able to get around that fact. I had to bring home all of my stuff from my office at work, and unfortunately I have NOWHERE to put them. Three boxes of stuff with no home. The scrapbook room and office are repeatedly disasters because I can't fit everything anymore. It's time to purge and reorganize.

It's easy for someone who is not crafty to look at my house and say "you have too much crap." Of course I have too much crap. I know that. It's not like I am blind. But the point is that when you do crafts, and you sew, and you scrapbook, the more things you have, the more successful you are at your crafts. And as a crafty person, almost anything can be turned into something fabulous. A messy house is the price I pay for being creative and artistic. And life without creative and artistic would be HORRIBLE. I can't even imagine.

Last night I started reorganizing the toys, the office, the sewing room. Not a complete reorganization, but a better situation of where things "belong." I had a cabinet in the scrapbook room that was full of toys, mostly older kids toys like play-doh, water balloons, sidewalk chalk, etc. I moved that into drawers in the sewing room along with the little tykes desk that I got or $10 last week. (Couldn't help it) That made some more room in the office/scrapbook room to put away some of the stuff that I brought home from work. Ugh. Then I moved the board and card games into the office, onto two shelves that I cleaned off on Sunday. Then I put all of Ardyn's little people in the big basket in the living room. Whew.

THEN I went into the sewing room and cleaned off my sewing table (yeah. It was a mess of projects and upcoming projects.) I moved all the wrapping paper and gift bags onto the one table that is designated for gift wrapping. I put a tablecloth on the sewing table, and organized my folded fabric into a three drawer unit. Then I created a drawer just for WIP (Work in Progress) and separated projects into labeled ziplocs and put them into that drawer. Then it was 1am and Evan came down to see what in the world I was still doing down there, so I went to bed. Today I plan on cleaning up the gift wrapping table, organizing it, and putting the toys in the drawers under that table for storage. I have always had an area down in my sewing room with a wooden kids table, and crayons, markers, paints, and coloring books. I have expanded that and added the little tykes desk and all the play-doh. Hopefully that will be a nice place to play... when Ardyn gets bigger.

In the meantime, I am starting a new adventure this week. I will have a 7-year old girl coming twice a week, while her mom is at work. She is the little sister of a friend, and I am excited to have her come over. If it works out well, we will continue having her twice a week for the rest of the summer. I think that Ardyn will really enjoy playing with her, and watching a big girl. I am hoping that when Ardyn naps, I can do a few crafty projects with the big girl.

So rearranging that really needed to be done anyway, will be even nicer when everything is in a logical place and we can all hang out in the sewing room and play too.

Shhhh She is asleep!

Today, the motto is RELAX. And by relax, of course I mean do laundry, prep fruit, feed the baby, and wash and lanolize 15 wool diaper covers. Then attend a breastfeeding mother's meeting.

Ah. Relaxation. I am SO GLAD that weekend is over. It was. Pure hell. I mean, there were good parts. But it was way way way too much going on. I have gotten most of the pictures up from Ardyn's first ride on a carousel, and her first taste of Strawberry Daiquiri Shaved Ice. I also uploaded the reunion pictures. Yesterday was "cleaning people Monday" so that meant that on top of everything else to get done for the silly crazy weekend.... I also had to have everything picked up.

Saturday night after the deadly lack of sleep/yard sale/family reunion combo, I was very very very not feeling well. Stomach. Ick. Tired. Ick. all of us weren't feeling well, and we all agree that it was something we ate at the reunion. I went to bed at 8:30 with Ardyn and finally started feeling better at 10:30, when I got up, made a peanut butter and jelly sandwich for supper, and watched my evening addiction of Nick and Nite (George Lopez, Fresh Prince of Bel Air, and Home Improvement.) I slept for a very long time that night and felt more like myself on Sunday. We were all pretty run down, as Evan had a band gig that night and didn't get home till late. We just stayed around home, laid low, picked things up.

Yesterday I evacuated with Ardyn for the afternoon while the house was made spic and span and sweet smelling. We went to my mom's and then we all went to get groceries. On the way there we decided to stop at the cleaners to pick up my winter peacoat and then at the resale shop next door I got lots of 18 months size jeans for this fall/winter (Childrens Place, Old Navy, Gap, and Gymboree) and got a fisher price vacuum cleaner for just under $2 (to the attic with you! until she can clean the house!) and my mom got some good toys too, including a Fisher Price "Store" that looks like a kitchen-set type thing, with shelves for food, a scale for produce, and a cash register.... all for $4. Yeah. Good deals. She also got a potty chair/step stool and a push behind toy and some interlocking blocks with a matching lidded tote. It was a good trip. As we crammed all these good finds into the van, I discovered a nearly FLAT tire, and we drove to the dealership in the town with 30 minutes until they closed and discovered that when I went to the bank drive-up that day to deposit yard sale money (my bank is getting a new roof) I picked up a nice shiny nail in my tire. So. We waited to get that fixed. Then on to Aldi's and Wal-Mart to get groceries.

Monday night I stayed out at moms later than I should, came home at 10:45, ready to crash, only to discover that the SHEETS were still in the washing machine and the mattress pad needed to be washed along with the blanket for our bed. Did I forget to mention Ardyn gulping down her morning helping of boob-juice, settling in for a nice nap right along side of me, and then 4 minutes later puking up all the milk she just drank with the most startled look on her face, soaking both of us, and the entire bed, AND then smiling and laughing as the two of us had to step into the shower to hose down? Good fun. So Evan found me at 3am, asleep on top of an unmade bed, in my underwear, wrapped in our comforter, with the light on. Yeah. I tried to stay awake, I really did. But I just couldn't do it anymore. I even ate an ice cream bar for good measure. AND did a foot fixer. AND ate a bowl of honey nut cheerios. Nothing. Still fell asleep.

So it is BEAUTIFUL today. And I am staying away from it. We went outside for a little bit. And then we retreated in. For lunch. And I let Ardyn feed herself with the spoon. It was very successful. She fed herself her entire bowl of Butternut Squash. I would load up her spoon, she would grab it from my hand, suck it clean, and hand it back. And repeat. She was thrilled.

We have considered going outside to lay out on the blanket. Might just still do that. And read. because this day is all about lazy and recuperating. Because the weekend. Really sucked.

Blogging at my Yard Sale

Well, today I am monitoring my yard sale. There is no other reason that I would be awake and dressed by 8am with nothing better to do than blog. :) Ardyn is in the house with her dad for a while, and will come outside with me a little later. The crazy thing about it all is that this weekend is probably THE most busy weekend we have had in a long long time. Friday I had the yard sale for part of the day, and went to a few sales myself. Friday night we took Ardyn to Sheffield Homecoming to ride the carousel, and she tasted a strawberry daiquiri shaved ice, and some breading from a corn dog. This morning we begin the garage sale again, and at noon we have Evan's family reunion at the park here in town, and tonight Evan's band has a gig. Tomorrow is Father's Day. AND Friday was Kyle's 30th Birthday. Whew. If I was working my head would have exploded already. But despite all of the activities, I managed to wash diapers and hang them on the line, and make Ardyn a smocked sundress for the reunion today (although I am very disappointed that I ran out of time to make her the matching hat I planned for.) I am thinking about not putting her in the dress until I have the hat made, so she may be wearing it for another occasion. I actually did all the smocking myself, which was AWESOME. It took some time, so I am not sure how often I will be doing that, but it IS Stinking cute!

So I guess let's start by mentioning what has been going on lately around here. Not much! LOL. Well I mean really life as usual. I have gotten myself back into sewing, and made time for it. I grabbed a second excersaucer at the garage sales earlier this week, and have been putting it in the sewing room along with her mat of toys that is usually down there. I Have made her three new hats (all pictures here) and have lots of projects on the table, including some cute babydoll tank tops and a few dresses. I also made her a pair of recycled pants, out of some old lingerie of mine. They are SO cute and don't even require a pattern!

Uncle Kyle has a huge garden this year that I can't WAIT to see the results from, I am really getting excited about canning this year. I want to make my own spaghetti sauce in addition to the usual stewed tomatoes that I can. Besides that I usually freeze most of my things... and that will be great for future meals for Ardyn.

Speaking of which, the baby food making has really ramped up a bit. Last week I made 16 more meals for her, including Cheesy Chicken and Broccoli, Chicken Mornay with Vegetables (leeks, carrots, parsnips, broccoli, and chicken in a homemade cheese sauce), and homemade Spaghettios with organic Tomato paste and home canned tomatoes. She is a great eater. She loves whole wheat bagels, cheerios, goldfish crackers, juice, biter biscuits, baby mum-mums, Gerber's star Poofs and pinwheels, and lots of other things like fresh nectarines, bananas, and strawberries. She is to the point of wanting to eat everything that I have. It is good because it makes me much more conscious of what I eat. For breakfast we often sit down together and split some fresh fruit, and I will have cereal and she might have yogurt, and we will split a mini wheat bagel. Sometimes I put a little fruit yogurt on her bagel. She likes the fact that she is eating some of the same things as I am and she eats much more and much easier that way. She went through a phase of trying to resist vegetables to get more fruit, and Evan would try feeding her and she would turn away and he would just look at me and say "She doesn't want it" and I would be like- Bullshit, she's gonna eat it. Eventually she got out of that phase.

This past week we went to the Pediatrician for her 9 month visit. She is 18 pounds 4 ounces, just under the 50%. What kills me is that we often see people who say "How Old is she?" and when I respond 9 months, they say "Oh My God she is HUGE" and then things like "I thought she was two!" and I just look at them like they are Martians. If you don't know what size a baby is/should be, then keep your mouth shut. Otherwise you just look like an idiot.

She is now saying a few words, her top word is "dog" and other than that she can say daddy and now "girl" and we have also heard things like "uh-oh" and apparently everyone but me has heard her say "mommy" or "mom mom mom" - apparently she only says it when I am not around and she wants me. I long for the day when I hear her say it, but usually I think she is a little confused because she often calls me "daddy" or "dada" and I think that she thinks that Dada means both of us. Who knows. She has done a few signs, but mostly she just knows what they mean and doesn't sign them herself. She has signed both "milk" and "more." She loves to clap, especially if you start to sing pattycake. Last night she was clapping along when the band at homecoming started getting the crowd to clap. She saw them and just joined right in. She also does "So Big" and gives you "one" with her one finger to your one finger. She is HUGE about pointing right now. She points at everything. This is a good thing because then we can tell her the names of things and point to them, and name things that she points to.

Her favorite things are dogs by far, and animals that resemble giant dogs, like horses, cows, and zebras. She loves to watch Zaboomafoo on Sprout, which is a zoo type show that gets up close with lots of animals. She loved the cows at Grandpa Daves. She can also make a clopping sound like a horse, and I am trying to get her to associate it with the horse, but so far she hasn't really made the connection. She giggles extensively when you bark like a dog, especially if you toss your head back and howl.

We still haven't made it to daycare to visit yet. Last week I was all ready to take her, she was dressed, I was dressed, we were packed up and planning to visit and go get groceries. She went down for a 1pm nap, and although it USUALLY lasts about 45 minutes, she slept for almost 3 hours, which is unusual, and then didn't get up till half of the daycare crowd and at least one of her teachers would have been gone for the day. It made me sad. But we did get groceries!

I visited a health food store in LaSalle that was nice. I liked the fact that they carried lots of the products that I order online, for the same prices that I paid online. They had Nordic Naturals Fish Oil Supplements, Ecover cleaning and laundry products, Tazo cold teas, Burts Bees, Dr. Bronners, Jason products, and lots of food products also. It was a nice store and I got some Jason Natural Bug spray, and some Ecover Bac-out for the diapers, and some mixed brown rice. Really everything was very reasonably priced. I also discovered a new addiction. Tazo Peach Green Tea. I have some Ginger Peach Green Tea from the Republic of Tea that I really love, and had considered making it cold too, but hadn't tried it yet. Now that I have discovered this bottled Tazo Peach Green Tea, I am thinking I need to buy it in bulk. Ha.

The garage sales are REALLY slow. I have been open an hour and a half and have probably had 5 people, and have sold TWO things. For a total of $1.50. Yeah. I hope I am not stuck with all this stuff. I think it is mainly because instead of doing the usual townwide they have started participating in the "more on 34" yard sales that stretch for miles. And that means that FOUR local towns have townwide sales today. And that seriously takes away your crowd. People really seem to just be hitting the main drag and avoiding all the other side roads, which is sad because there is lots of good stuff in town. Yesterday I got a Fisher Price Little People Noah's Ardk playset for $2, and two wilton cake pans for $1 each (Mickey and Pooh) and a Fisher price Baby Gymnastics Bounce and Spin Zebra ($44 retail) for $10. AND A playskool ride and walk behind car for $5. Good Stuff! Oh and an excersaucer that folds flat for $25.

I was hoping to make enough money at the sale to put towards a new dishwasher, but seeing as how it's totally DEAD I am not convinced that that is even possible. Damn economy. Ha.

I'm even seling a digital camera, a diaper genie II, A brand new sealed box of Huggies, an air purifier, an answering machine, two wine bottle racks, shoes new in the box with tags, a graco vibrating bassinet, TONS of clothes that are all on hangers, about 25 pair of jeans (most of which are like brand new), new in the box Avon jewelry, two boxes of books, playstation games, Xbox games, computer games, and a basket of Victoria's Secret pajamas, a basket of just tank tops for 50 cents each, and a whole tub of sports bras and swimsuits. Seriously people. This is good shit. And. Nothing. No people!

I am really happy that the weather is nice today, but because there is such a small crowd, it makes me think that I would be better off fishing or reading a book in a hammock. I guess I could go get a book to read for the rest of the morning. I recently read Water for Elephants for my may book club, and am going to read Julie and Julia for June, and we are SUPPOSED to read Love in the Time of Cholera for July, but I started and was NOT enjoying it at all. It is so verbose and it just bored me to pieces. My life is too short to force myself to read something that I am not interested in. There are too many books out there to read something that isn't my cup of tea. Especially considering my reading time is limited.

Well, since people continue to drive by and gawk at me, I feel like I need to find a book to read, so everyone have a great weekend and a Happy Father's Day. More later I hope!

So much to do!

Well, this afternoon Ardyn officially pulled up to standing. Several times. We were excited. We almost missed it entirely, as we were putting lightbulbs in lights. She was right there in the room playing, and we looked over, and she was standing! Go beebs go! She had been up on her knees, and ALMOST got completely standing in her crib Friday (her legs weren't entirely straight.)

Yee! Looks like she might just go ahead and skip crawling after all! I have pictures but not very many because the camera wasn't in reach and she was only up for a little while before she saw that we were looking at her and sat back down. She's also a drool monster today, so I am wondering if we have top teeth coming in soon? Shes also working her gums pretty good.

I bought a new card reader at Target on the way home from Chicago a couple of weeks ago, but it worked for 8 days and then quit, Since the SDHC Card takes a special reader, I have a bunch of pictures on the card that I can't get off yet. Evan is exchanging the card reader today for another one.

Our cleaning people come tomorrow, and our house is a WRECK. We had band practice here Friday night, and all afternoon Saturday. Then Saturday night they played in Princeton and my sister and I went to watch. Today we slept off the late night (even a sober night can be exhausting when you don't get home till 2:30am) and then I went to my moms for a bit, and then home to do laundry, feed Ardyn and I lunch, and eventually take a nap with Ardyn. So I am pretty well behind here at home. Oh well. Most horizontal surfaces are covered with projects of some sort. I am cleaning my scrapbook room and organizing stuff to start a scrapbook for Ardyn (ugh) and I am also trying to get through stacks of magazines that I haven't had time to read, and get things ready for a yard sale in two weeks, which includes cleaning out closets. Ack. I wanted to put my garage sale stuff in the garage on a table as I get ready, but with the band practicing in there all this week too, that just isn't going to happen. So I decided to take it to the basement, and I know that's gonna be icky when it's time to take it all out to the garage, but that's about all I can do with it all for right now. This week I intend to fully focus on tackling some projects at home, and hopefully we at least get to visit Ardyn's daycare class this week, as planned. I have a computer user group presentation to give in two days and I haven't written the presentation or practiced, or researched, or tested the proxima with my laptop. Eeeew. Tomorrow. Or tuesday. he.

So that's all that's going around here. Busy as usual, and enjoying every spare minute I can with the baby. Who isn't much of a baby anymore!

eBay Drama

Ahhh. Sunday again.

This past week I logged onto ebay and found that a seller I had left neutral feedback for was contacting me to complain.

I purchased the little tykes tunnel and paid immediately. I paid $25 for shipping. A week after I paid, the item hadn't shipped yet. When I contacted the seller, she didn't respond. I contacted her twice via myeBay, and once via email. I was just getting online to get her phone number when I saw that she had finally responded. She told me that she was having problems "finding a way to ship the item because of it's bulk." Unfortunately, she was selling MANY other bulky little tyke type items, and was shipping them, and had been for what looked like years. She also had two other negative or neutral feedbacks from other members who had the same problem with her. She had either backed out of the transaction stating that she couldn't ship (after she said that she could in the listing) or she had held their items and not shipped in a timely manner.

So she told me that she would be shipping on a particular day, and that she would provide me with tracking information. I waited. That day came and went. No tracking information. This was when I was still working, and I was very concerned that this big item, which was nearly $100 after shipping, would be left outside of my house and would either be rained on or stolen before I could get home. I was worried that she wouldn't ship or that she was taking my money. I asked for tracking information from her again, and never heard back. When the item did arrive, the actual shipping only cost her $21 and the time it took to get from her to me was just 4 days... but it had taken two weeks to receive after I paid.

I was frustrated by her lack of communication, by her promising shipment by a certain date and then not shipping on time, and by her overcharging me on shipping. I wouldn't have minded a few extra dollars on shipping had she gotten it to me on time, but it's even more frustrating to pay that much and then not receive it for two weeks. If you are going to repeatedly sell large items and advertise that you will ship them, I would expect that you would have checked shipping costs and venues before you list the item and make that promise. And if you feel that the item needs to be disassembled (mine was not) then you should probably be sure you can disassemble it without damaging it BEFORE you tell the buyer that you will ship, tell them how much it will cost to ship, AND take their payment.

Instead of immediately leaving feedback, I decided to mull it over. In the end I decided to leave her neutral (not negative) feedback, about a month after the transaction. Immediately she thought that NOW it was okay to contact me in a timely manner and ask why I left her neutral feedback and why I didn't contact her to let her know I was unhappy.

Hello, just a note to ask you why you did not contact me to let me know you were dissatisfied with the transaction, I try to respond to all emails in a timely matter and before this neutral feedback I had a perfect 100%, I would have refunded or partially refunded your shipping charges, are you sure your remembering the right transaction as its been quite a while, please email me back and let me know how I can make this right. Thanks

This also frustrated me because it seemed like once her reputation was on the line, suddenly she was all about customer service. I explained to her why I was unhappy and that I felt it was my duty to leave this feedback so that other buyers knew what to expect from her. Since she primarily sells large items, and has, at least three times, refused to ship or complained that she couldn't ship the item, then I can see a pattern here.

So I let her know exactly why I was upset about the transaction:

I am sorry but I thought that you understood when the transaction took place that the shipping took too long. I remember it distinctly because I not only emailed you but sent you two myEbay messages also. I didn't hear from you for almost a week after paying. I was ready to look up your telephone number- but then you emailed and told me that you were having problems finding a way to ship the item because of it's bulk and that it would ship a particular day, and it shipped almost 4 days later. It was extremely frustrating to buy such an expensive item and be worried that it wasn't going to get here at all. I didn't receive it for two weeks after I paid but the actual shipping only took 4 days. You promised a tracking number and never send it. I had seen your previous two customers who were dissatisfied when you held an item and when you refused to ship another item that was listed as shippable, and I assumed that this was an ongoing issue for you as a seller. I felt others should know.

So below is the email that I got back from her, after telling her why I was upset. I have to admit that it really made me chuckle. Every time someone on ebay screws you over, it inevitably comes out that someone was sick, had surgery, or something. I understand that life happens, but if true customer service and satisfaction is your goal, and you make a mistake or have extenuating circumstances, then you should take care of those right away and make sure the customer is happy and taken care of. And if you've been selling on ebay for two years, and you haven't figured that out yet, then yes, you probably need some neutral feedback here and there.

I am a mom selling kids toys on ebay, my own and those that I find at resale shops, garage sales, etc., I do this as a supplement to our income as I have a daughter with special needs that requires me to stay home and thats not to try to get the sympathy vote. I am not an expert shipper yet, I do my best, sometimes I sell an item that proves a problem such as disassembleing that item might have caused damage to the toy which I do believe I emailed you about, I do my best to ship it as timely as possible, if something proves a problem I usually email and offer a full refund or shipping fee , a discount, I have never left anyone bad feedback, I would try to speak of my dissatisfaction first to that seller. I am so glad you are here protecting fellow ebayers from such unscrupulous sellers as myself. I will try to rectify my ongoing issue ( more than 2 yrs ago, and at the start of my selling.) and hopefully be the perfect ebayer you seem to be. Good day.

So I responded

Don't waste your time yelling at me. I don't really want to hear about it. I am a WAHM too. Sorry to hear of your difficulties and I wish you luck in the future.

I hope she figures this out. LOL. And just for the record, she didn't try to "make it right" and refund a shipping fee, or give me a discount, as she mentioned that she wanted to do in her very first email. Empty promises. LOL. And I was also pretty frustrated that she said those feedbacks were "over two years ago" because last time I checked, August of 2007 isn't even one full year ago. She must have her time mixed up. He.