BFF

FYI

Adobe Illustrator is my new best friend. I love it even more than I love Edward Cullen (hehe).

Currently reading Jane Eyre as my penance for liking the Twilight books a little too much.  

But unfortunately it is turning out to be equally addictive.  I need to forgo real books in exchange for audio and maybe I could get my bathrooms clean.

As for the progress on the fabric design...it is going so slowly it is making me crazy.  I sat for a few hours and cried in front of my  monitor yesterday.  Which in turn prompted an embarrassing plea for help.  Hmm, really wish I had installed Illustrator first thing instead of last thing.  I think it will be invaluable in getting my drawings into a workable digital format.

I'm thankful for progress however small it may be.  It's better than being stuck!

Earth Day celebration

We got to spend Saturday with this little angel.  She is an absolute doll.  Even if her smile is illusive to capture on ...oops I almost "said" film.  What do you say now anyway?  CF card!
Charlotte with her belly primed for another "zerbet" as I like to call it.   Bentley is on the attack.
Chickie just planted a flower.
Ellie befriends a caterpillar!  That's right you heard it here first.  The bug that even Chickie likes.  A friend to even the most squeamish of girls.
Need anyone wonder why his nickname is Stud Bud, Studders, Studder Budder, and my fav Budder Smooch. This look says it all!

Ain't life grand!!

ode to my right hand thumb

Roses are red

Violets are blue

Thumbs are the best 

and I miss you

Ok I can do better than that....

  

Doo doo doo doo, doo doo doo doo doo....

Understand the things I say, Don't turn away from me,

'Cause I've spent all my life with you, you wouldn't disagree.

I use you! You help me! You help me!

Pick up my son he is a heavy one! I need you.

I use you to type and to chop and move my mouse!

Does anyone care?

Unhappiness is life without your thumb,

and I don't have use of my thumb,

Cause it is fat,

You see I miss my thumb and I ice it when I can.

My right-thumb, My right-thumb

She's swollen, She's swollen, when I woke up this morn.

My right-thumb, My right-thumb,

She's tender, oh, so tender.  Does anyone care?

Doo doo doo doo doo doo doo doo

Two verses to a thumb is enough, right?

I had hoped to work in the fact the the right thumb is pivotal to using a curling iron and my hair looks really bad today...but oh, well, things to do!

the inspiration to this ode is found here

my act

I keep telling myself that I need to get my act together.  Over and over today this sentance floats through my mind.  Meaningless really.  Too exhausted to really care at this point.  But then I had the thought, "If it's all just an act...then why bother right."  I wonder why we say that.  

I've been working on things that I just can't accomplish fast enough.  You know that feeling.

Just look at this poor little bonzai tree.  I thought it was dead.  I tried to throw it away.  But it was wired down to it's cute little pot.  Then I discovered green inside the stems.  So now we will give it another try at life.  

Just keep truckin along. Right!

Mr. President

Today was all about Chris (at our house anyway). His dreams of becoming President have finally come true....  Elder's Quorum President that is.  Watch out.  Our Stake President told him a leader is a teacher. And Chris said, "Good, I'll have them all dancing in just a few weeks."  It was a bit of a shock.  I had to apologize for laughing a little too loudly when the call was first issued.   If this churchy lingo makes no sense to you...basically what it means is that now Chris has a huge responsibility at church.  And if you need help moving give him a call...  All of this he does free of charge and I'm excited for the spiritual growth this will bring to our family. 

And just think, last night he was dancing around at the Gold and Green Ball wearing a pink T-shirt under his suit coat.  Everyone was asking where it was today.  Very funny.  

And look. I took a picture with a blurry background! Yay!

In other good news, Chris found my wedding ring.  Before we left for the beach I had thought Bentley dropped it down the vent in my room.  

Chris is truly my hero today.

I'm obsessed

"Twilight": who are you? (now w/ pics) created with QuizFarm.com

You scored as Alice Cullen You're Alice. You're a vampire who can see into the future once a person has actually made a decision. You have no memories of you're human life or of the pain of being reborn. You constantly walk like you're dancing and are very supportive of Edward and Bella. Alice Cullen 100% Esme Cullen 88% Carlisle Cullen 75% Edward Cullen 63% James 50% Jasper Cullen 38% Charlie Swan 25% Emmett Cullen 25% Bella Swan 13% Rosalie Cullen 13%

what we did

besides swim in freezing cold water....
Chris played a lot of volleyball with the guys.  Did I mention that we went with Derek and his whole extended family. Parents, brothers, sister the whole deal.
Chickie became fast friends with Kaylee, Derek's niece.  We had a lot of fun taking them shopping and to the movies.  
Lindsay took some really cool family pictures of everyone, of course.  More to come on that hopefully soon. Lindsay took THE most awesome picture of Chris and I.  This isn't it...but she did take this one on my camera.  Fun huh!
I had to get some while wearing this white trench coat that I am still very excited about.Lindsay tried to teach me some things on my camera.  And I practiced mercilessly on my family.  Even breakfast wasn't off limits.  This picture of Chickie cracks me up.

Look at B holding that little fluffy dog. So cute. 

I think I may need to stick with the auto pilot for now.  But I'll definitely be practicing. 

But seriously, mostly what I did was read the Twilight series.  Heather, Beth, and Katie were right. Totally addictive. I'm glad I saved it for vacation. But I should get a book light next time.  I spent two nights laying right outside a bathroom door slightly cracked open for light. So I wouldn't wake anyone.  I read the last book the whole way home. Chris wins the prize for being the most supportive husband ever.  He drove the whole way home just so I could read and completely ignore him. When it got dark I used my cell phone for light.  He's my own personal Edward.  

I didn't think Bella was stupid.  Is that bad?  I could kind of relate.... maybe I won't say in which ways....

Daytona

We're back. Brr. It was cold.  and windy....but still how bad is your worst day at the beach?  Plus running on the beach...awesome!

check list

1. arsenal of sunscreen...check
   
2. plenty of reading materials....check
3. knock off designer sunglasses....check
4. on the go crafting materials....check
5. sustenance for further packing...check
   

Almost ready for the beach!  Yay!

ignoying

These pictures are from a couple of days ago.  I got out the camera when Bentley had a dino in one hand and was batting an ant with a flower in his other hand.  I started to snap away.  Both kids completely ignoring me.  Although I did manage to get one smile from Chickie.
I asked her if it was fun having me take pictures or if it was annoying.  She said, "It's Ignoying!"  So I have given the camera a little rest for a few days.  We've been getting ready to go to the beach next week! Yay! Hopefully, the camera won't be so ignoying after a few days rest.  I have been a little snap happy lately.

I'm so grateful for spring! and parks.

twins

There is nothing better than being twinners.

sunday evening

We really enjoyed conference, once again. It was a bit challenging getting the kids content enough for us to listen.  I was better prepared last time.  Note to self... do better in Oct.  I really needed to hear M. Russell Ballard's talk.  It was directed to young mothers. I think I wrote the whole thing down.  I have been stressed about my mothering abilities lately.  It is a hard job. Unrelenting. Thank goodness for dads right!


 I loved David A Bednar's talk on prayer.  He speaks in such a way that always helps me understand how to be a better person.  And I'm so excited for our new prophet, Thomas S. Monson.  It's a very cool time! Very exciting. It's nice to feel the nudge to do better. I felt overwhelmed at first (probably due to my own lack of preparation), but ultimately comforted.  Definitely loved.

Afterwards we went for a walk in the park. What a beautiful day.  This park is my favorite place in the world.  I am so grateful for all of the blessings I have especially these three.

I'm thankful for today!

Cookies, What a great way to start the day!  Why haven't I thought of this before? Well, it actually started with a spinning class.  And when I walked in (late) everyone cheered.  That was my first clue that this day was going to be awesome.  Really, everyone in that class likes to scream their way through the pain.  So any old excuse will do, even me.  Chris likes to make fun of them.  But he doesn't know what he's missing.

So back to the cookies, Mandee and I had to make something yummy in our newly finished aprons.  We used this pattern.  So cute and fun to make!

Plus it's reversible.

Aren't we cute?!

I love this picture!  So sweet.

Outside is always the most fun.  And today was such a gorgeous day.
Bentley went digging.
Chickie struck it rich and found gold.

Then after nap/work time...off to another friends house!  That's so unlike us! Two outings in one day.

Little Riley, so cute and about to turn four!

Time sure does fly.
Chickie found fossils.  Or apostles, she was a little confused as to which one it was.  But apparently it was an Apatosaurus.  And she was much too busy digging to give me much of a smile.

The best part about today is that Chris is coming home! Yay! Now I will be able to sleep again.  Good thing it's only been a few days.

coming clean and going without a pattern

Does anyone else have a major case for spring cleaning?  I have been organizing everything. Thank goodness.  Some closets were getting dangerous! But it's not only physically cleaning that I feel myself driven to do.  I feel the need to come clean about a few other things.  And since this is just ranting and revealing, I am going to post some pics of the presents I talked about here just for prettiness.  These projects are from this book.  It's nice having a pattern, knowing that you have the materials you need, the steps you need to take, and a pretty picture of what it will look like in the end.  But more on that later.

My last post was a little odd.  If I don't blog for a while I feel the need to prove that I have indeed been doing something. So I list it all.  

And the thought just occurred to me that maybe it's a bad idea to post pictures of other people's children without asking. I usually feel free to talk about anything I've done with Mandee because it's all her fault I'm blogging in the first place. And she has a blog of her own.  So beware friends, if you have a blog you are fair game! Hmmm, is there a blogging ettiquet class out there? If so I need to take it.

Well, at least some of this is about to stop anyway.  One little last post of "look, I promise I've been busy."  And then we can all go on under the assumption that if I'm not posting, it's not because I'm lazy but the exact opposite. 

I think I may be the only person who uses blogging as my own personal "do something" police.  I'm one of those people who really, really loved school. I loved having projects with rules, deadlines, and of course, the almighty grade. 

 I have had issues with being productive in the world ruled by myself.  Until now. Now I have all of you to report to.  I'll admit that it is a little confusing at times. Not really knowing who my audience is. It's mostly friends and family who really don't care about what I'm making.  But I secretly aspire to the likes of other craft blogs.  At the same time, I really like to talk about church and other personal things like ballroom dancing and random antics about my friends looking like cartoon characters.  These subjects may annoy serious artsy craftsy types. So I guess my best bet is just to let myself be my most important audience.  Isn't that always true?  Aren't we the ones who ultimately give ourselves our own grade.  And aren't we probably our own most critical judge?

And while I'm at it I want to come clean about something else that I have hinted about before.  I finally have a serious art goal again that I'm very excited about.  All year I have been working on designing my own fabric line!  It is so fun. I'm really enjoying it. I've been taking it relatively slow, working two hours 6 days a week.  But now I've got what I think are my final drawings and I'm working on color and fretting about doing repeats.  Today I talked to a real live human being from a company that I'm interested in working with.  I wanted to get a clearer idea of what point I need to get my work to in order to send it in for consideration.  That alone made me very exited. At this point I'm ready to work a little more and push just a teensy bit harder.  This means that I probably won't have a lot of evening time left for my little sewing projects for the next little bit. Hence, less reporting, but more working.  

This past week I have been making color wheels out the wa-zoo. If that's even a thing.  It made me feel like I was bettering my paint mixing skills, but at this point I'm really anxious just to dig in deeper regardless of my current skill set. I want to get Adobe Photoshop and a good textile book to go with it.  Neither of which come cheap.  And I'm anti-credit card debt, so I'm considering a yard sale. Last year we cleaned house! So to speak.  But we did have a much better location and all that stuff from our old dance studio.  In retrospect we probably sold things for too cheap.  I keep thinking, maybe I could sell hotdogs, and pincushions, and try to convince my whole neighborhood to do it, too.  But maybe that's a bit much.  I don't want to get distracted by things that seem like they are helping with my goal, but are in reality doing the opposite.  It is difficult not having "the rules" because there are none for this.  It's difficult not having anyone with experience to talk to.  It's a little scary not having a pattern, because when I don't have a pattern things turn out a little iffy.  See here and here.  But I guess when I think about it do things with out a pattern quite often.

But I cannot tell you how exciting it is to have drawings on my desk right now with post it's stuck to them.  I never take my artwork to this level of completion. I finish a painting and there are parts that didn't turn out so well. But my usual reaction would be, "Oh well, at least it's done!"  So it's very exciting to think I am going to work and work and work on these 15 or so drawings until they are perfect. And then after that I'm going to do them again in a few more colors!  In all honesty. I feel like myself again. I love having a big creative goal. I love being a mom and I don't want to ignore my kids. But I need this too. And luckily, there is time for both of these in my life. Just less down time is all.  But it's worth the sacrifice!

hmmm, all this talk about cleaning reminds me of this and this and this. Who was I kidding we all know I love to clean.  (I just happen to equally love making a mess!)  Right now I'm doing a little of both.  That's why unchartered territories are so exciting.  I'm thankful for not having directions, but having a definite path. I'm thankful that this weekend is going to rock, spiritually speaking!