i think its officially here..

summer in arizona. and i dont think its going away this time. time to hide during the day and adjust the schedule so everything gets done at night. its 1:16 am right now. the kids and dogs are all sleeping and the only noise is the fan. which i love love love.makes me homesick and miss taking naps at my grandmas. theres not even the noise of police helicopters which is rare.
ive heard people say that they cant sleep without city noises and could never imagine that being true. i grew up with the sounds of crickets and huge skies full of tons of stars. you could go months without ever hearing the sounds of an ambulance or fire engine. its not going to be long and i will be hearing new noises.its been so long that paul and i have been apart its hard to believe its only a few short months away and i will be living in san diego. this is a very big year for us. first off my oldest is turning 21 my second oldest 18,my oldest daughter 16, and my youngest 13. all important milestones in a life.and all at once in one year. i couldnt have planned it any better. and we are also moving to california and starting a new life.. makes me think i should buy a lottery ticket. i look back at when i had my oldest and what i wanted for him and the dreams i had. all i ever really wanted for my kids was to be respectful to all living things and to be kind and i figured if they had that everything else would fall into place. keep in mind i was only 16 at the time i wasnt thinking about what colleges they would go to or jobs they would have. but you know, i DID raise very respectful kind kids just like the kid that i was set out to do.and im not sure what path their lives will take but iam sure of that and proud of them. when they were little and i would get mushy like this i would wake them up or try to just to kiss them and tell them i love them. now that they are teenagers do you think i could get away with that? lol maybe i will just go wake up the dogs....

lyrics from scene aesthetics bird and boat
im going to try to make something related to this for one of the special bdays

If you'll be my star, I'll be your sky
You can hide underneath me and come out at night
When I turn jet black and you show off your light

I live to let you shine
I live to let you shine

You can sky rocket away from me
And never come back if you find another galaxy
Far from here, with more room to fly
Just leave me your stardust to remember you by

If you'll be my boat, I'll be your sea
Depth of pure blue to provoke curiosity
Ebbing and flowing, and pushed by a breeze

I live to make you free
I live to make you free

And you can set sail to the west if you want to
Pass the horizon 'til I can't even see you
Far from here, where the beaches are wide
Just leave me your wake to remember you by

If you'll be my star, I'll be your sky
You can hide underneath me and come out at night
When I turn jet black and you show off your light

I live to let you shine
I live to let you shine

You can sky rocket away from me
And never come back if you find another galaxy
Far from here, with more room to fly
Just leave me your stardust to remember you by

Stardust to remember you by.

Sunday morning coming down..

This weekend has been eventfully uneventful. yesterday I picked up a piece of wood to paint on...with brushes.. which terrifies me. iI would much rather use qtips like I did for these (if someone can teach me how to turn a link into a word i wisll send you something) Im determined not to fall back into qtips.I prefer prismacolor pencils and know my way around them to the point I dont even look at the color I read the name of the color and know what to put it with. But you cannot use prismacolor on wood and canvas very well so Im limited.
My ac is broken and my mom said it is supposed to be 100 here this weekend so I covered all the windows and its quite cavelike.I love it.
Other than that nothing is going on really. We are going to my moms house and grilling today.It will be the last time we see her for about a month. She off on another adventure,greece,turkey and egypt this time.i cant wait to see her pictures.Im feeling a little anxious about her being gone that long and Im not sure why.Shes been all over the place.I think alot of it is that my health problems have brought us closer and this is the first time shes left since all of that has happened.
Tonight Im going to paint , listen to dreamy justin timberlake (shhhhh thats a secret) and get packages ready to go out tomarrow. If I make any headway on the painting I will show you tomarrow. happy sunday all. xo

ahhh....its friday....

Mondays used to be my favorite days because I would be so worn out from tattooing and running the shop over the weekend but now that Im not tattooing and it's just the kids and I I adore weekends. From the time my kids leave for school until about 11 I feel anxious that something happened to them on the way to school. I figure by 11 the school wouldve called if they didnt make it.I blame this anxiety on the school calling me and telling me my daughter wasnt there when she really was.My kids arent school skippers so if they arent there without my knowledge I know its something bad.The school let me go 2 hours in complete panic and terror until they realized they called the wrong parent. Its like a big sigh of relief when the last one comes home on friday and then I have a tendency to not answer my phone and try to keep them home all weekend. I love it. Being teenagers they probably dont,and dont get me wrong I do let them out but when I do i go thru the same panic as I do during the week and I have a tendency to call and check on them repeatedly. My oldest still in the house is going to be 18 in a few weeks so I work really hard not to hold him hostage but its an effort believe me. This weekend I plan to put the sewing machine away and work on drawing. Paul brought me an illustrator program last weekend and Im determined to learn how to use it. I spend alot of time looking at illustrators blogs in envy. Learning to tattoo the old school way,all of my art has a a thick black outline around it I keep telling everyone how I wish to do art with no outlines. or at least have it appear to have no outlines.....Ok I think Ive rambled on sufficently. The photo above is a birdbath pincushion Im working on. i made them so they can hold things too. My house is being overrun by chenille birds of all shapes and sizes that Im saving for future projects but I thought it would be fun to finish these up and put them in etsy. Anyway have a good weekend all!

housework

I was thinking tonight that housework with kids is like going to war. By no means am I comparing housework to what we are currently going thru now or any war in the past but more like the battles we had as children taking it very seriously but it didnt really have any signifigance to anyone in the world but us. I have literally spent half of my life as a single parent of 4 children and even though one has flown the coop there are still 3 in the wonderful stage that is teenagedom.(I have not seen such horror since the last one was in the throws of terrible twodom) As I was cleaning off counters and putting in the dishes in the sink I felt like possibly I won the war today. They were all fed,had clean pajamas for bed and clean clothes for tomarrow. We wouldnt be embarassed if someone came into our house today,lol.so then I had to think ahead towards tomarrow what they are going to eat,where they need to go,who needs to get up at what time and what do they like for breakfast and do I have it.One thing Ive learned recently is that if I dont have something for them or I dont get it done I shouldnt beat myself up for it so hard because I may have lost one battle I have not lost the war.Heres to us all wining are battle tomarrow. :)

softies,blog fright,and dumpster dived chairs...

I realized today that i have a bit of blog fright. I have a long list of blogs that I like to read often if not daily. (will add links soon) I find their lives ,colorful, and very interesting. My life... not so much and I always feel like I should have something meaningful to say or not ay anything at all. Soooo....here Iam with yet another lonely empty blog.
I will try harder.... promise.
So, this weekend Paul came to visit and it was a very nice uneventful visit except one thing.... and this is where I learned a lesson that I will pass onto you.Come here,closer....I dont really want anyone to hear...its kind of embarassing...
Im moving to San Diego this summer and to cut down on the cost of moving I plan on leaving alot of things behind. Mostly furniture. So when my last kitchen chair broke I didnt replace,I waited and when I found what seemed like a nice set of patio chairs by the dumpster I thanked the dumpster gods and brought them home. Well,do you wonder why someone would put nice patio chairs in the dumpster? I didnt.I should have. When the first 3 broke on my teeny daughter Mariah.I didnt think too much about it. All that happened was her bottom dropped a little and I would tease her that she was eating too many cookies. the last one looked fine....yup. To someone who needs glasses. So the other night I was sitting in the chair at the computer and was showing Paul some fantastic artist I found and the next thing I know Im looking straight up at
the ceiling and pauls taking pictures.(i do not yet have the courage to show these pictures lol)
I had pretty near brought everything on the table down on me.
yup.
im not a little girl either.
I have a stone floor.
I landed on my elbow.
uggh
I have spent the last couple days trying to decide if Iam being my typical drama queen self or if I should go to the dr.Im thinking it must be jammed like a finger as it hurts clear up to my shoulder. Given my health background I shouldnt be such a wuss and go but on the other hand considering my background in health...lol I figure I will give it a couple days and see.
But yeah..be careful with dumpster chairs.... :)
On a good note I can sew one armed.... updated the shop today and have more tomarrow. :)

my secret madness....

i realized today that i have a strange obsession with anthro flowers.

(maybe if we are quiet and dont move she will leave)

pay no attention to that poor little squirrel laying on his side over there. i had nothing to do with that i swear.
what are you looking at me like that for? i didnt do it. i didnt.

this is how i dream sometimes....

sigh....

after much hemming and hawing (did i spell that right?? and what exactly is hawing?) i have started an etsy and a new blog. i have alot more items to put on etsy but at least i got a start on it. im sure it will go faster when i have done it a few times.it doesnt help i have a mac now and i have no idea where the pictures go when i unload the camera. ooooo dell laptop how do i miss thee and love thee let me count the ways....