The one where Pheobe gets sick of talking about what to do next and talks about PBS instead.*

Your comments on the last post about staying or going were very helpful, so thanks! The numero uno reason that I would like to move to Typepad is to reply to comments directly to the commenter. Since someone said that wordpress offers the same feature for free I may look into that. I just got this here blog-thing where I like it, so I am hesitant to move. Funny how I am putting waaay more thought into this move than I do our brick and mortar moves. What I have to weigh is whether or not, at the end of the day I am going to want to move to Typepad anyway. Because if that is going to happen anyhow, then I migt as well move now, right?

Geez. Have we had enough of the stay/go discusson? Me too. Lets move on.

Aaron and I have been watching the new PBS mini-series, Simon Schama's Power of Art. Three words: Ah. May. Zing. I am so disapointed to find that we caught it on the tail end of the series and that next week's look into Rothko is the last one. We saw David and Turner and both were extremely fascinating. It is as much about the art as about how Schama presents it, which is brilliant. Actually it is probably more about Schama and his presentation because I am looking forward to the Rothko episode as much as I was the Turner though I am not as much interested in Rothko's work. I am, however, eagerly waiting to hear what Schama's commentary on the work is.

And now I leave you with my Club Little House submission. I had planned on doing a 4th of July picnic/fireworks show. Well that evolved into a Day at the County Fair. There is a fair poster, blue ribbon (you can decide what you won it for), a blanket to watch the fireworks show on and a firework. The firework has a long end to attach to the back of a dollhouse, so it really looks like a fireworks show.

*Not a real Friends title, but it sounds like it could be, dosen't it? Of all the Friends, I think Phoebe would be the one to watch PBS.

Should I Stay or Should I Go?*

VS.



I am a perpetual cheapskate, but I think I might have to be done with blogger. I want to be able to reply to the comments I recieve from all you cool people and get comments from those who email me to tell me they can't leave a comment because blogger has some sort of grudge against them. Was that a run on sentence? I feel like it was...but I digress. I am looking into typepad because, well, everyone has typepad, so it must be just peachy, right? The only thing that bums me out about typepad is that it costs moola and I am cheap.

Why pay for a service when you can get perfectly mediocre service for free, right? Hmm. Maybe I should rethink that one. Anyway, you typepad fans out there, sell it to me. Should I stay or should I go?

*Is it weird that song lyrics amd movie lines fit so well in my daily life? Probably, but it is fun. I am so lucky to have a husband who always knows what I am talking about when I insert a movie line into our conversation and can do it even more flawlessly than I.

6 years...

:: four apartments :: one house :: three cars :: millions of smiles :: a few tears :: bunches of good jokes (and only a few bad ones) :: two babies :: one fish :: dozens of movies :: oodles of evenings talking :: several seasons of geeky si-fi tv :: loads of patience (on his part)

:: 2,190 days loving each other ::

6::21::01

We tried...

really
really
hard.
Turns out popsicles keep tears away and kids from running off.

Wish we had thought of it about 45 minutes earlier...

It's Party Time!*

Sweet Table Settings: Check

Pretty Birthday Girl: Check

Uncle Aaron on Trampoline: Check

Party Crown: Check

Uncle Rhys enjoying tea with the kiddies: Check

*Said in the same manner MC Hammer says "It's Hammer Time!"

Shop, Stop And Stroll

My creation
Originally uploaded by littlelovelies.

Not only was this a completely cool name for a show, it was a completely cool night! Of the few shows I have done so far, this one was the best and by far the most fun. I'm sure it had a lot to do with the fab gals I was with!

What is even more exciting is that now Handmade Parade has a home! The owner of Coffee Garden in Scramento wants to do Handmade Parade with us in October and even said we could have a bigger crowd this time around! So now, we are in the process of getting together our amazing talent for the show, so if you are interested please e-mail me at handmade_parade@yahoo.com for all the info!!

Milestone

Milestone
Originally uploaded by astragalus.

We passed an important milestone last night. The "kid with a gaping hole in his head and needs to get stiches" milestone. As the kids were getting ready for bed Monkey was sitting on the arm of the couch and slid off right into the handle of the DVD cabinent. No roughhouseing, no running, falling, jumping. He just slid right into the cabinent as he was trying to help and turn off the dvd player.

That's whatcha get for helping, kid.

I took one look at it and realized stiches were needed and scooped up him and peanut and we were on our way. 5 hours later and one traumatizing sewing experience later we were home.

The ER nurse was particularly bothered by sewing our monkey up because he had one at home same age, same name (who looked remarkably like our monkey, too), so he was really brokenhearted at having to participate in our boy's pain. We all shed a few tears together.

Our monkey was a serious trooper, though. Once it was over they gave him toys and stickers. He even shook the nurses hand and the docs hand and gave them stickers to prove he harbored no ill will towards them.

When all is said and done he'll have a kick'n pirate scar over his eye to show everyone.

When Nothing Else Fits...

When Nothing Else Fits
Originally uploaded by littlelovelies.

My shoes always will! Thank goodness for that!

Tomorrow my neice and nephews are coming over to play and make homemade corndogs (maybe this is why only my shoes fit...). I don't know who is more excited about this me or the kids. Probably me. They are too busy being tired and grumpy at the moment. I accidentally squashed Peanuts foot with my chair and I refused to let Monkey have Corn Pops for dinner. two nights in a row. I am SO mean.

Lookie what my friends are up to!

Flickr Friends
Originally uploaded by littlelovelies.

I have some pretty fab flickr friends, no? Look at all this fabulousness!

I am hopefully going to have this uploading deal figured out soon because I have soooo many things to show. I made the dollhouse fireworks the other day, and man did they turn out CUTE! The quilts are only slightly less cute because I can't figure out the whole binding thing. Someday. But all in all the sets are super super cuta and I can't wait to see who gets them in Club Little House.

I have also been a decopauging fool the last few days and have an impressive pile to show for it. It makes me pretty happy I must say. There is a Sac Craft Mafia event (Stop Shop and Stroll) on Saturday night so I'll be selling the stack of goodies there.

But for now I am getting great inspiration off of flickr!

Vintage Photo

Vintage Photo
Originally uploaded by littlelovelies.

I wonder if we all had cool cameras like these if we wouldn't stll be using film...It's wierd, but I miss my film camera. I miss the click of the shutter. I miss wondering if the picture turned out (but I don't miss the frustration of getting a picture back that I had hoped would turn out well, but had actually turned out garbage).

I know there are fancy pants cameras that simulate all the fun of film without the frustration of not getting the shot you want, but I can't afford even the cheap versions of those cameras right now. Besides I have two killer film cameras that belonged to my father wasting away in the closet.

My Dad was a hobby photog. His subjects? Moi and my siblings, beaches and flowers in Hawaii, classic cars... About a year before he died he gave me his old Pentax camera and extra lenses. One Christmas he sat down and showed me how to use it and all the effects that it could create.

I hardly listened to a word.

Not because I am an ungrateful brat (at least not at that moment) but because I was paying more attention to how excited he got explaining something he loved to me. He would get all giddy and happy that we were interested in something he loved (his other love was math, and I am sorry, but we did NOT share that one) and try and teach us years of skills in a half an hour.

Now my Dad ws one of those guys who could actually learn years of skills in half an hour. It really must have chapped his hide that none of us kids were like that. Actually I take that back, my Marine brother is like that, but his interests didn't include photography as much as trying to figure out how to tap a keg when the liquor store forgot to give him one. A good skill to have, yes, but not really one my dad could relate to so much.

And so my Dad was left to teach me everything he knew about photography and telescopes (another love we shared). Today I am the proud owner of dad's cameras and telescope and sitting here wishing I had paid more attention to what he was saying when he explained these things and less attention to how much fun he was having explaining it.

Actually, I don't. It really was more fun watching him enjoy the moment. Besides, I can download the manuals of the internet, right?

My creation

My creation
Originally uploaded by littlelovelies.

Till i win the war between my camera and the computer I'll be creating mosaics. Lots and lots of mosaics...

bugs and glitches and such

So I am using a different computer for my blogging and whatnot and have just discovered two very disturbing facts. #1 - this computer eats my itunes. I just bought 3 albums on itunes, got my recipt and poof! they are gone never to be recovered. I want to call Apple and cry about it but I am about 90% certain they won't give a rip. And disturbing fact #2 - this computer won't let me upload photos. This is so sad because my pink birthday party was last night and I have some fabulous pictures. Cute pink decorations and grown men hula hooping. I know you are really sad to be missing out for the time being. IT (aka Aaron) is working on it. We better figger it out soon cuz we can't afford to go buying a new computer!!

Happy 4th!!

Thanks so much for the sweet birthday wishes. We had a pretty laid back day since the real birthday party will be on Saturday.

Hope you all have a great 4th! Please think of/pray for my Marine brother who is currently in Iraq for his third tour. He has been there a week today, and will be there for 8 months. Here he is with his wife Ashley last July.

Happy To Me!

On my sister's second birthday we took her to one of those make your own bear places and she went around the store saying "Happy to me! Happy to me!" As a result we named her teddy bear Toomee and frequently will say "Happy to me!" Instead of Happy Birthday to each other.

Today is my birthday, so "Happy to me!" We aren't doing much today since I will be having a big party on Saturday (yes, I still give myself birthday parties). I did take the kids to have cupcakes for breakfast and to the zoo in celebration. I forgot the camera, which is a huge shame becuase the bakery I took them to was adorable. These are the cupcakes I made for Monkey's birthday, I haven't made anything special for myself today.

I am celebrating the rest of the day by cleaning house and watching the history channel. The Presidents is on and I am a sucker for American history. This week has been chock-full of entertainment for me. It just now occured to me that its probably because of the 4th. Duh.

So. Back to our trip. On Tuesday we went to Disneyland, which was actually fun despite the fact that it was the middle of June. We didn't have to wait in line longer than 30 minutes, though my Monkey just couldn't understand why he had to wait in line at all. It is suprisingly difficult to convince a 3 1/2 year old that he does, in fact, have to wait in line like everyone else. The last straw came after a particularly long wait for a ride that ended up breaking down just before it was our turn. We gave him the choice of seeing Mickey or waiting for the ride to work again and he chose to leave the line and see Mickey.

I won't go into detail about what transpired during that wait. I'll just leave you with this picture and the knowledge that we packed it up and called it a day right after this.

My family assured me that Monkey was very well behaved for a 3 year old in a theme park for 8 hours, but I still have my doubts.

There's No Place Like Home

I am soooo glad to home! We had a great trip, which was only a teeny bit exhausting with 5 little ones and two unruly dogs. The chaos was like nothing I have ever experienced. These 5 munchkins woke up and hit the ground running each and every day. They didn't stop until they passed out each night. They were all pretty much a blur for the entire week.

We took them to dinner at the marina in Oceanside, looked at the boats, and made complete messes of ourselves with ice cream. When we got home we tried to get them all settled down for bed, but that was a complete failure. At one point my monkey was so tired and wanted to go to sleep soooo badly, but his cousin was playing cars on the race track that was on monkey's sleeping bag-while monkey was in it. Poor monkey couldn't cope and wanted to call it a trip then and there, but I managed to calm him down and get him to sleep in the dining room in his little beach tent.

In the morning all was forgotten, probably just as much because we were going to Disneyland as because he got a decent nights sleep (sort of). Tomorrow I will tell you all about Disneyland and why you shouldn't take tired children to theme parks. Oh wait, you all are smart enough to know that already...