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Friday, April 11, 2008

Good times, good times. 
Don't know why I bother planning anything. Nothing ever turns out like you think. Yesterday was still awesome, but far more hectic than I had anticipated. Mostly my day was working from the computer while trying to juggle straightening the house before The Soph's tutor came (check), getting the kids to do their chores (check), getting files to the printer in time (check), getting that freelance project finished up before we leave today (not a check, but today, for SURE). Yesterday I needed files on my home computer and on my work laptop. Since my work laptop got stolen (and government jobs take FOREVER to replace things, like say, the TOOL you use EVERY DAY. Ahem. No, I am not complaining, it is totally reasonable to take 4 MONTHS to replace an object. Damn paperwork. Do you really wonder why we are still in that damn war? OIL? Hell no, we just can't get the paperwork through. I bet the order to pull out the troops was 2 years ago but the paper work is still stuck on some IT guys desk under his some stack of papers he has forgotten about because he is so busy calling all the goverment employees back every day to tell them what their forgotten password is. AGAIN. But I digress.) I am using an old one we had but one that has a cracked screen. When I am at work we get to hook up to a nice huge 20" screen, so it is no big deal. At home? Kinda a big deal. There is a huge black streak running across it. A bit hard to design on, but me? I'm a trooper. So I took it into my office and worked on both all day long. But I would look at one screen and type on another. Or use the mouse of one and think it was not working when nothing happened on the other screen. Yeah. I'm not the sharpest tack in the box, let's just say. (You do NOT want me to be the IT guy, the war would NEVER end.) So I drove myself slowly insane as the day wore on and when 5pm came, I was DONE. I have a printer coming by the house to drop off proofs for a magazine today and I am praying whole heartedly to the printing gods that everything looks good and it is set to get on press Tuesday. PLEASE Printing Gods, I sacrifice this cyan toner cartridge on your behalf.

Here is what my day pretty much looked like yesterday:





So yesterday had no time for pics. Best Boyfriend Ever surprised us and came home early to cut the lawn. YAY! It looks so nice and the cut grass smell put me in an extra happy mood for the rest of the day. I played with Sophie for a bit then ran Noah to Blockbuster to rent a game. Why? Because I am not a Soccer Mom, noooo, I am a Sucker Mom. I am too lenient. There I said it. I am Such. A. Push. Over. My son comes up to me and gives me a huge hug, tells me he loves me and give me that big goofy grin. And off we go to the store. So sad. I know. Don't bother telling me. I'm not winning any best parenting awards any time soon, I know.

Later that night with Noah happily playing something or other, me and the Soph trumped Best Boyfriend Ever to buy Enchanted on On Demand. We all cuddled up on the couch eating popcorn and, hello, BLISS! And oh my gosh!!! Seriously, I don't care if it is politically correct or not, and I am sure that there are women all over the world pissed off about this movie, but lordee it was ADORABLE. It was so cute and funny. For reals. Boyfriend must have rolled his eyes, oh, I don't know eleventy billion times, but me? I say, Mr. McDreamy, you can come save me any day! (Actually, there was a twist where she saves HIM at the end and that was cute.) But for the most part it is a feel good kid friendly movie that has a happily ever after ending and I love those. This world is way too mean and cynical for me and what the hell is so wrong with happily ever after anyway? I am a rose colored girl that adores the happy endings. So sue me. LOVED IT.

And boyfriend and I went to bed at abut 11pm and I let the kids stay up a bit late since this was the last night I would let them before school began again. This morning I woke up with a present from Sophie. An oragami flower taped to my door. Happy fairy tale endings to the night, happy mornings to wake up to... does it get any better?







Took the dogs out with my morning coffee and watched them run around like crazy, um, well, dogs. I swear I can hear them laughing in my head they are so happy when they get out there and get to play. I think they love the warm weather just as much as me. Do they make doggie flip flops? Hmmm....







So this morning I need to get a poster revision done and some car decals finished for a client to proof. Then I have to get this freelance web job done before we leave. Luckily I can do the laundry WHILE I do all this. Yay for working at home. I'll tale pictures from the trip. Promise! Cause I know y'all just live to see what I post next! Right? Um...right? Leave me and my delusions of grandeur alone. You still read this, right mom and dad? Mom? Dad? Sigh.... I do it for my fans in Turkey. They love me. Shut up. Yes they DO. heh.

Thursday, April 10, 2008

Working from home today and tomorrow 
Life is good. my babies are back home. I arranged with work to work from home today and tomorrow so I could be with them. Tomorrow we are going to spend the weekend with my parents and celebrate the end of spring break along with my dad's birthday. Yay! for celebrations! I try to find as many things to celebrate as possible. Every day preferably. Yesterday when I picked up the kids we went to Dairy Queen and celebrated seeing each other again after 10 days. With soft serve vanilla and sprinkles and oreo blizzards. Yum! Then we went to Borders and Sophie got a huge book about Egypt for only $9.99, on sale for $29.99!! It is filled with the most amazing pictures. She is totally into archaeology right now and that is all she wants to know about. (I figure anything I can do to veer her away from the ridiculous idea of being an artist for a living I am more than willing to do!! I jest, I kid... not really. Kidding! Sort of.) We were then on a mission for Noah to find the Calvin and Hobbs book I had found at another Borders last week that was only $5.99 but I could not get a hold of him to ask him if he had it already. We never did find it again, but he found a Garfield one he wanted. It was a bit pricey at $14.95, but listening to a too cool for school almost 12 boy that pretty much thinks everybody in the world is a dork, giggle out loud all night long while he read it and say, "Hey Mom, read THIS one!" made it totally worth it. I LOVE to hear that little boy turning too quickly into a teenager laugh. (If I thought any of his friends read this blog I would not have just written that, but I am pretty sure my audience is NOT 11 and 12 year old boys whose soul mission is to keep on top of exactly which Mario Kart game is coming out on which system and on which day.)

Anyway, I will take pictures later to celebrate today and post them cause today is AWESOME. Being at home with my kids and dogs. Best Boyfriend Ever bought a lawnmower last night to cut our jungle, er, LAWN and so tonite promises to be filled with the scent of fresh cut grass on a spring day warm enough for flip flops. FLIP FLOPS! There! As if there was not ENOUGH to celebrate today, now we have flip flop weather again! I know God loves me because he gave someone the idea for flip flops. What says Higher Power and unconditional love more than color coordinated footware for $5 and under?!?! Proof enough for me, I say.

Ok, off to work!

Tuesday, April 08, 2008

Coolness 
From the current issue of Doggie Aficianado's Spring 2008 issue...








Hoping to have a really fun announcement very soon about a project that has been in the works and in the final stages right now!

(cause ya know, I need more excitement than PARIS! Did I mention that I was going to PARIS? No? Well I am! THE Paris! the one in FRANCE!



um, maybe I am a wee excited...

It's official... 
Just finished buying our tickets to Berlin and Paris. CAN. NOT. WAIT. More tomorrow. In a few short months I will be kissing Best Boyfriend Ever on top of here:




Oh. Yeah.

Monday, April 07, 2008

Great weekend! 
I decided to paint all weekend. I have not painted in a while, and decided I wanted to paint doodles I was drawing during the week. Mostly during meetings or on the phone. All of my notebooks, planners, sketchbooks are covered in doodles. Of dogs, cats, penguins, an alligator here and there... Some are from scenes from children's books in progress in my head and make it onto paper, some are just scenes that pop into my head and must be put on paper or else they are all I think about all day long.

So here is what I painted this weekend. And like always, painting is what I love to do most in the world. It calms me. And my style is meticulous. These paintings are small, no taller than 4 inches on one side, but they take a lot of time. I use many, many coats to get them as opaque as I do. I hate to see a hint of white from the canvas. In a weird way, the saturation of color calms me. And the outlines? Making everything "just so" and finishing it up with nice tight edges? Better than any anti-anxiety medicine there could be out there! Truly, based on my style you would think I would be a neat freak. But just to take these pictures, I had to dust off the layer of dog hair on my dining room table unless I wanted to actually document my UN-neat-freakness...Which I don't. So here they are:





This one is for Best Boyfriend Ever, who worries about every possible way ANYTHING can go wrong. Which it never does. And I try to tell him what ever doom and gloom he thinks up will NEVER happen, but he still takes precautions. As a girl who leaps and looks after she realizes she has no parachute, we are a good team and even each other out. I have become a bit more of a planner and he has become a bit more of a risk-taker. But while I was painting and we were discussing an upcoming trip (that needs it's OWN entry, I am SO excited!!) he came up with some scenario about how the trip could be DOOMED and I told him his "What If Monster" needs to go take a nap because he is bugging the ever-loving crap out of me and he is NOT going to ruin my dream trip! So I painted him and boyfriend took him to work today to remind himself that the "What If Monster" is really very teeny tiny and he can stand up to him any time he wants!





This is just a lil' alligator that crept onto my sketchbbok page while I was in a meeting about, um, er, um, prolly something I should remember, but this little guy charmed me too much to pay attention...




This is a scene from a children's book I am working on. I have a "Be Brave" print that I have printed and sold well from another illustration of it. In the book Little Dog is off to face his fear and cross the water in search of his dream. Little Mouse is the encouraging friend that bids "Good luck and be brave!" I love how the paintings work together and think prints could be really cute.




My polar bear needed a friend. And this little penguin appeared along with the alligator during the same meeting.




I sketched this a while ago for a study for a prototype painting for another book concept. I ended up not using it, but I loved the angle so I keep sketching it from time to time and decided it needed to be painted. And I had painted so much blue this weekend, the little pup needed some hot pink!



I think I might put these up for sale on etsy, or make prints. Or both. We'll see. I would love for my little doodles to have homes that love them.

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