Nothing Like Trucker Talk In The Morning

Lil' Spitfire got these really cool walkie talkies for his 3rd birthday. They're called Kid Tough by Fisher-Price. They are indeed tough and still work even after having both antennas bent into 90° angles . They are simple to use, no complicated bells and whistles. After my yelling "hold to talk, let go to listen!" across the house for an afternoon they've got them down pat. They're absolutely perfect for young children except for one major flaw, they pic up trucker CB banter as though those truckers are sitting right there in your lap. And, call me crazy but trucker talk just isn't something I'm keen on having my 3 and 5 year old listening to. I thought this might be a fluke but nope. You can read similar reviews here.

We picked up this talk once before but this morning Lil' Spitfire comes in while I'm still asleep, "Mamma, listen to this!" handing me a walkie talkie.

"You remember that woman so-and-so?"
"Yea, the one with the dark hair?"
"Yep, that's the one, remember what Bob used to call her?"
"Heh heh, yea..."

And click it off as fast as possible so my little boy doesn't have to learn what Bob the trucker used to call dark haired so-and-so. I don't need to be doing anymore of that kind of education. Just last night I had to explain to my Jr. High Girls Bible study group the definition of orgy because it was in the scripture we were reading, yea, the Bible is pretty hardcore! Anywho, that's about all my feeble heart can take for awhile so I think I'll have to confiscate them. Personally I think it's big fun and plan on listening in on those truckers from time to time.

Smiling All Over

While blog surfing the other day I saw someone had been tagged to post a certain number image from a certain number folder on their computer. Just out of curiosity I wanted to see what picture that would be for me and this is it. It was too perfect to keep to myself and in the spirit of impending spring I thought I'd share. I love this picture, those beautiful curls, the gorgeous smile and the perfect spring flowers. That's my Mr. Golden Curls nearly two years ago!

Vicious Cycles Of The Housekeeping Variety

1. Turn around one day and realize the house looks like a nasty tornado from White Trash Trailer Park USA swept through it, that you can't take a step without being stopped by a pile, and that every surface of the house is covered in stuff.
2. Spend the week obsessively cleaning it because it's been so long you feel like it needs every nook and cranny scrubbed right now!
3. Get so exhausted by the end of the week because all you've done is clean clean clean to the complete neglect of anything creative so you take a day off.
4. Do a pretty good job the next week maintaining the clean and therefore add back all the other responsibilities in life all at once, with a sprinkling of brand new things you've been wanting to add to your life, because you now feel you've got life handled. Feel pretty good for a week or two and swear to never go back.
   
5. Get increasingly frustrated as time goes on because you worked so hard to reach perfect house status but that takes too much work to do daily and you realize logically it's an unreasonable expectation to place on yourself anyway.
6. Enter the next week with hands thrown up in exasperated surrender unable to believe that no one else in your household holds the same unreasonably high standards.
7. Stop keeping house altogether, it's not worth it if it can't be done to perfection.
8. Rinse and repeat.

I'm currently I'm at step 1 and am trying very hard to break the cycle since it tends to appear in other areas of my life and I'm tired. Just clean like a normal person is the mantra running through my head, pace yourself, slow and steady wins the race... So far so good!

Identity Crisis

That was then...

...this is now.

Every once in awhile I go through this little artistic identity crisis. I look at myself and think that I must have split personalities, I wonder where the old me is lurking, I long for it, then I wonder if I even care to resurrect it. Around Christmas time this was all drudged back up when the boys got a ton of art supplies. One thing they got was a giant art tackle box and it reminded me of my supply box in college, only cheerier, and without all the stickered sarcasm.



Then I dug out some jars for the boys to use while painting and as I sat there watching Lil' Spitfire clean his brush in one of the jars I realized just how long that jar had been with me. Since before my beautiful children and my incredible husband. Well, before we were married anyway, not much has been around since before him! It still had my paint sludge in the bottom. It was one of the silly jars I used while making my giant, brooding, moody paintings and my other random mixed media work. Including the thing I did with a bloody abandoned baby discarded in a trashcan lit from the inside with a strobe light. Needless to say having a flashback that included that image and then looking up to see my own baby's tiny hand in the same jar was a little bizarre. Probably not as bizarre as making a bloody baby though, just guessing.


That was then...

...this is now.


Now here I am, a wife, a mamma, a scrapbooker? Seriously, scrapbooking?! But I used to laugh at those people with their silly coordinating sticker obsessions and enough ribbon to hang several convicts! I also swore I'd never be a graphic designer so how's that for never say never? Speaking of graphic design here was another funny past life vs. new life occurrence, Lil' Spitfire got a Fisher-Price digital art studio with a pen tablet for his birthday! Man I fought the Wacom back in the day, I used it like I was holding it with my toes for about a week. Then mmmm, pen tablet love!



I'll have to show off some more of my past life art sometime soon. Hopefully I can dig up some clearer pictures than the first one in this post!

Couch Potato Extraordinaire

That Mr. Cash sure does know how to lounge!

And just a friendly public service reminder:

Weekend Visitors

Three kids and each one is looking in a different direction!

This weekend our very good friends came and spent the weekend with us. We haven't seen them since we moved 6 months ago and I didn't realize just how much I had been missing them until they were here. They have a daughter the same age as Mr. Golden Curls. Actually we were good friends and pregnant with our firsts at the same time, they're only 3 weeks apart! All that to say, we're pretty tight and I was so glad they got to visit. And now it's back to life as usual.

My Pugfilled Valentine's Date

This afternoon I took Mr. Cash Pugface on a Pug date for Valentine's Day. Petco was having Valentine's pics so I wanted to take him for the nerdy pet lovin' fun. Petco's pics really are better than this but my scanner didn't do a great job. And my husband so rightly pointed out that he needs a black harness for times when he's dressed up! Of course his eyes also rolled when I said we could get one in about 5 min! When we arrived at the store we were immediately greeted inside by a female black pug, too cute! Doesn't he look so dapper? He's trendy too, going green in his all upcycled outfit!

This morning I decided he needed some Valentine's attire so I whipped up this doggie collar with tie! I made it by cutting the collar off an old shirt of mine, leaving the top snap so I didn't even have to rig another way to put it on Mr. Cash. The tie is made from an old belt of mine cut in 3 pieces, two for the parts that hang down, one for the knot. I sloppily stitched the three pieces together and safety pinned it to the collar. Since the tie is removable I plan on making ties for other occasions that I can attach to the same collar. It was such a breeze to make I'll have to whip one up a make a photo tutorial for it!

Look at what else this shirt and belt have made, saving the planet is so much fun!