Donna Downey and the Heimlich Manuever

What does Donna Downey and the heimlich manuever have in common? I got to experince both within 24 hours.

Now don't worry, I wasn't the receiver of the heimlich, I was the giver. And let me just say this. I don't know how to do the heimlich. But somehow when you are in the midst of it, I guess instinct taks over.

It was a very, very eventful weekend. One of my besties, Laurel, had a rather major birthday last week, so this weekend was set aside to party hardy. We met up at a local bead store, Beadiful, on Friday night for some instruction and jewelry making. I have to give a major shout-out to the owner of the store, May. She was unbelievably patient with 8 very conflicted, undecided and occaisionally loud students. Then we headed to our local mexican watering hole.

Saturday was full of scrapbooking with the girls. And at the last minute, Laurel and I were able to get into a class with Donna Downey. We've been wanting to take a class with her for forever. And she was teaching for one day only, less than a mile from the house. Unbelievable! So, we packed up our stuff and went. The class was awesome. And I'll share more on that later.

Sunday was a very needed day of rest. Except my attempt at rest was thwarted by water sloshing around in our kitchen and squishing from the carpet. The old pipes in our apartment building decided they had had enough of the cold weather and went kaput. Once the panic of rising water and attempts to keep the doggy out of the water subsided, our house got back down to its usual noise level.

And then I heard the dog barking. And barking. And walked out to discover dear Jan was choking on her dinner. And I mean really choking. And then commenced the heimlich manuever. Only I don't know how to do the heimlich manuever. I've seen it performed on tv. Does that count? Apparently we did something right, because the offending bite came up. And all was well.

Whew. Perhaps I should move the "learn cpr" towards the top of the to-do list.