dream big

click here to download this wall paper

Okay so the April wall paper I made doesn't even have "April" anywhere on it.  Whatever. Enjoy.

I turn 37 tomorrow. I don't like the number 37. Not one bit.  I don't mind getting older, it's just that 37 is such an ugly number.  Not that I feel that strongly about numbers, but thrity-seven? Blah.

But I'm declaring April the month of April, as in me.  I'm gunna lose a few pounds, I just know it.  My head if filled to the brim with creative ideas.  April is the month to execute them.  I'm going to try to tell my children yes more often.  I'm going to stay on top of the laundry.  

I'm dreamin' big girls.

Maybe you are too?

scary

I have come to believe that I am a fearful person.  Not a worrier per say. Fearful.

I have a lot of special types of fears in my life. Take for example my constant fear of being hit in the face.  This is a fear founded in real life experience.  My babies regularly whack me in the face with toys and books. And on more than one occasion they have bucked and the special hard spot on the back of their cranium has smashed my perpendicular plate of the ethmoid bone (looked that one up, a girl likes to know what exactly has been crushed in her face).

The pain of having a hard little head crash into your nose is acute.  It brings tears to your eyes and swears to your lips.

So I live my life with something akin to post traumatic disorder. Constantly flinching when I catch a swift movement in my peripheral vision.

And there's the goo factor.  I live in constant fear of what goo I might encounter.  Coming across a wet patch of carpet makes me shudder. There's no telling what it might be.  If I'm lucky it's just a pool of spit. That's if I'm lucky.

I also have the special fear called nudophobia.  Fear of being nude in public.  Most phobias are unfounded, but mine is not.  My children consider my clothing to be scaffolding.  My neckline is the go-to grip used to hoist themselves up.  If I wear a skirt, they think I have a brought along an extra blanket for them to pull over their heads.  I am forever checking to make sure my boobs aren't exposed and my butt is covered.

So when I say I'm a fearful person, you can see, I'm not just blowin' smoke. 

I got issues people.

I'm planning on a lot of therapy later in life.

P.S. It's been really warm and the caged animals have been let out.

spark 2011

Okay folks.

Big announcement.

If you have followed me longer than a year you know that I have taught at Spark for the past couple years.  This year I am going to be a creative partner with Margie Romney-Aslett, Christy Thomlinson and Alisa Holland. 

We have started planning this year's event and let me just say, it's going to be amazing.  I am so excited about the look and feel we have created.  The teachers are going to be unique and fun.  There will be many different types of classes going on. We are trying to broaden our scope regarding creativity. Amy Dalley will be making sure the food is fab.  The decor will be, as in year's past, magical.

I will probably be mentioning Spark quite a bit here on my little piece of cyber space.  It's going to consume a fair amount of my life.  I feel honored to be working with the creative woman partnering in Spark.  They are all amazing, bright, kind people.

I feel lucky to be a part of Spark.  

I want to personally invite you to come along with me.

Registration opens April 1st.

frankie's high seas birthday

Henry's first birthday was a handmade affair.  We kept the guest list small so we could make each person feel welcomed and special.  The invitations were created using Paper Source products and hand carved stamps. I used twine from The Twinery on the invites and the favor bags.  The ship on the cake was made of paper mache wood and fabric. I got inspiration from the whimsical ships of Ann Wood.  You can view full sized photos of the party on my Flickr.

cheerio!

1. 'i am most happy'..., 2. pip, 3. Stitched lemon cards, 4. Pancake Day

Well it's back to our regularly scheduled program.  The grumps are gone. I'm my snarky old self again.

I'm working on the big birthday party today.  I will have pics to share on Monday.

Here are some fun things for you to think about this weekend.

A neat decorating idea.

A gorgeous iPhone case.

The cute couple at Vintage Restoration paint old furniture and make it great again.

When I move my studio the new floor will look just like this.

Have I ever told you how much I love the accordion and how the girls in this video are too cool for school?

My kitchen needs this.

My body needs to fit into this.

Really want to find time to make this.

And two babies in a bucket make me happy.

Okay my darlings, that's all for today. So much to do. Party planning is fun fun fun.

Have a fab weekend.

Cheerio!

where the sun don't shine

It's cold and wet again. And I'm in a surly mood.

Eduardo Recife

I'm in the kind of mood when you just say "eff it" and eat a bunch of chocolate and junk.

Then you feel even worse.

Nothing serious. Just the grumps.  It'll pass.

In the meantime, here's a playlist for your listening pleasure.  Music mavens that make me feel better when I get a bad case of the pissies.  

a dog with a stick

I'm going to admit something here that a few of you might find shameful.  

Whenever a news report comes on about the devastation in Japan I turn it off. I turn away.  

I don't let myself think about the people who are suffering. It's a totally selfish thing on my part and I know it.  It's just that there has been a fair amount of sadness happening to people close to me.  Sometimes I feel like I can only allow so much sadness in.  There's a tipping point when I become overwhelmed.  

Right now I feel that my efforts are best spent helping those standing before me.  So I change the channel.

But yesterday I listened. Just for a while.  I heard the story of Taylor Anderson, an American girl, who was only 24. Taylor taught elementary school in Ishinomaki.  When the earthquake hit, she made sure all the children where picked up safely by their parents before she left.  She was last seen riding her bike down the road, away from the school.  Her body was found some days later.

Taylor Anderson

So as I was driving and listening it all came home to roost.  The loss. The devastation.  The despair.  Taylor's mother.

I choked up. Couldn't breath.

At this moment, when I was beginning to think that the world was all a big piece of crap, with terrible happenings to everyone, all the time, I happened to glance over and see a woman walking her dog.

He was a big fat black labrador retriever.  And he had a huge stick in his mouth.  The stick was probably three times as long as his body and had lots of branches jetting out all over it.  He could barely weld such an unruly prize, but the pure joy written across his face was plain as day.  The curve at the corners of his lips and the twinkle in his eye were so completely infectious that I loss my train of thought and began to smile.

His tail was wagging a million miles a minute, causing his entire back end sway,  which made it even harder for him to lug the stick. But oh he was a happy dog. A dog with a stick.

And in that moment I was reminded of a life truth.  We must live in the moment. We must enjoy today.

Crap happens everyday.  Small inconveniences. Tragic occurrences.   No one is immune.

But we have a choice.  If we are given something unruly to bear we can lay down and whine or we can smile and wag our tail and lug that damn trial around until it is taken away.

Sometimes I hate my dog Finn.  But I think I will keep him around because dogs have a way to teaching you stuff.

Like how to be happy.

the art of living with caged animals

It's been raining.  Which is really good for the plants, but not so good for me.

The rain makes me feel like a complete blob of laziness.  I want to crawl back into bed with an old black and white movie and Milkduds.  And please don't bother me you needy children.

The rain also turns my kids into little crazed varmints.  Which in turn makes me want to flee the house.

It's an ugly business.  Rainy days.

Yesterday, the babies decided if they weren't allowed to go out, they would make as much noise as humanly possible.

They banged silverware on the tile. They screamed bloody murder at nap time. Birdie gave us a nice, albeit, very loud rendition of "Oh No".  A little known classic.

At three-thirty I realized I was pacing. Frantic, really to get out.  But there was nowhere dry to go. So I unloaded the dishwasher and changed wet diapers and sat slumped on the couch trying to tune out all the noise.

It turns out there is no art to living with caged animals.

Like I said, it's an ugly business.

bionic blather

The problem is that really great clothes just don't look the same when you have a muffin top.  This is what motivates me. Fashion. Shallow? I don't really care.

I have been a very good girl. I haven't missed a workout.  I did have some sweets yesterday but they were of the most delectable type that are worth every calorie.  Besides, this is a lifestyle change for me, not a diet. And my lifestyle will always include delectables.

When the Boy was two I ran a marathon.  Here's the problem with running marathons (other than blood in your pee and your toenails falling off): After the marathon you are used to eating what ever you like.  So you eat all this stuff but you aren't training any more so you don't burn off the calories.  It really sucks.

Thus the muffin top.

But I do have good news. I have had two, count them, two days where I felt like my old self again.  My energy was back and I felt really good.  It's not a lot, but it gives me hope that the good doctor might be worth his weight in beans.

So I'm starting to feel good and bionic and all.  But I am in desperate need of some good tuneage.  This is where you come in.

What songs do you have on your workout playlist?  Don't be shy. I'm am an admitted music snob, except for workout music.  Bring on the 80's hairbands, show tunes, teeny bopper jive, rap, whatever.  Really.  

happy birthday frankie valentine

You know the opening part of the movie Superman when the special space pod with baby Superman inside comes crashing down to Earth and scares the hell out of his adoptive parents?

That's how Henry arrived in our lives.  Not in a space pod, per say. But he did come crashing into our family like a bullet.

One year ago, I went to bed on March 18th the mother of two children and woke up on March 19th as the mother of three.  I had learned of Henry's birth at around one in the morning.  To say I was scared is a huge understatement.  Amelie was only ten months old.  I was beside myself.

And the Sugar Daddy was in Taipei.  

Holy smokes.  When I think back to that time all the emotion comes back to me. Even now, as I write, I feel the tightening in my chest.

I wish I had known what I know now.  I wish I could have foreseen the enormous joy that a four pound baby boy was capable of bringing into my life.

If Birdie is the cayenne pepper in our family, Frankie is the vanilla sugar.  He is the sweetest child I have ever met.  That sounds a little dramatic, but its completely true.  He was born with the kind of personality that makes you happy to just be around him.  I think he got the charisma that I always wanted to have myself.

God has never let us have any say in when our children joined our family. He likes to surprise us. Big  time.  We thought our third child would be coming from China. 

I never would have been able to imagine that a super baby would come barreling into our life from out of nowhere and inject our family with sweetness. 

Today, Henry turned one. We had a mini birthday with cupcakes. The big birthday party is planned for next Saturday when the Sugar Daddy is back in town.  When I put Henry in his crib to go to bed tonight he smiled at me and kicked his feet.  I stroked his hair and cried.

How did I get so lucky?