maybe

*

I guess I should have been a little more realistic in setting my goals and said straight out that weekends would not be included in "the next 26 days". Somehow, in my crazy head, I actually thought I might be able to include weekends. But, no. Too busy, too crazy, too kid-focussed. That's just where we are right now. The husband and I often reminisce on times where we'd eat when we're hungry (as opposed to, "Oh shoot! It's almost 8 o'clock and the kids haven't eaten - I guess they should have dinner... right?"), where we'd go where the wind takes us (not hindered by, "I have to go stinky poop RIGHT NOW!") and where weekends consisted of just sitting in the sun and slurping a mai tai. Sea World was a barrel of laughs yesterday, but, I think the husband and I would have had just as much fun with a pitcher of margaritas, chips + queso and a couple lounge chairs out in the backyard. Can't believe I sacrificed myself to prove to the kid that Shamu really and truly would splash everyone in the first few bleachers. That's just one demonstration of how much that little guy and I are way too much alike and often butting heads-

Him: "No, mommy, no one gets wet down there!"

Me: "Yes, sweetie, you'll get wet down there. Why don't we sit up there???"

Him: "I just want to SEEEEE if we get wet."

Me: "Ok, fine, we'll sit down there and we'll get soaked!"

Him: "Well, I just want to seeeeee if we get soaked."

Me: "Ok, you'll see..."

Instead of just giving in and saying, "Yeah, maybe you don't really get wet... how 'bout we sit up here so we can see if those guys down there get wet?" - I said, "Okay, I'll show you!" So the kid and I sit in row one, we get hit with the first wave, his little face turns to mine and it just about breaks my heart because I can see he's horrified. I swoop him up and start heading for the aisle when the second wave comes and hits me in the back. By the time we're in the safe zone, I'm drenched in killer-whale-salt-water. Nice. So maybe I'll stop being so stubborn. Maybe I'll let the kid have the last word. Maybe I'll stop feeling like I have to prove something to him. Maybe. You'd think I would have learned by now.

note to self

Woke up a little bit ago smelling popcorn and hearing what sounded like the puff-puff of a train. When I jumped up off the couch, I ran to the kitchen half-asleep exclaiming to the husband, "That sounded like a popcorn...I mean...It smelled like a choo choo...I mean...I thought that was a train!" He smiled and suggested that I go to bed. "Okay, I'll close up the house." Even though I practically tripped over the dog while rushing to the kitchen, the husband had to inform me that the dog was in and he'd lock up. "You'll probably have to wake up early anyway (the 1-year old)... why don't you just go to bed?" So, reluctantly (but not so much), because that popcorn smelled SO GOOD, I'm off to sleep. Note to self: get a big bucket of popcorn at Sea World tomorrow.

binding

My mom and dad gave me a paper cutter and binding tool for my birthday. I've always wanted to be able to make my own spiral-bound notebooks and journals. I put this one together tonight and added it to the Etsy shop. It's nice to find a home for some of the sketching I've been doing the past few days as part of my Mission:ABCs. Now that I've finished this notebook and gotten it loaded up on Etsy, though, I'm beat. It's a quarter to 11:00 and my eyelids feel like I've been forcing them open all night long. Time for me to join the husband on the couch and pretend to watch TV for 5 minutes before I crash. Night night.

dandy dandelions

Aloha
Friday!

C

*

What with my recent uncharacteristic fascination with Discovery Channel's Deadliest Catch you'd think I would have drawn up King or Ophelia Crab for "C". I don't know what it is about that show - I just can't stop watching it! It's so completely fascinating, even though it's pretty much the same thing morning, noon and night. Throw the pots in, let them soak, pull 'em up and sort the crab. Those waves! That ice! Salty fishermen with cigs hanging out of their mouths... I dig it. There's something about the thought of being on a boat in the middle of the Bering Sea that seems like possibly the most adventurous thing you could possibly do. My favorites are Sig and Edgar Hansen, most likely because they were on Martha. I liked the way they didn't tone down their salty tones simply because they were talking to the Queen of refinement - we are talking about a woman who pronounces 'herb' the same as the name 'Herb' afterall. When she asked what they liked to take on the boat for a long fishing trip I suspected she expected to hear things like 'photos of my family' or 'my fluffiest feather pillow' and not 'a case of cigs'.

bee

next 26 days

Something I've been wanting to do for a very, very long time now is to draw up some ABCs. I thought that if I drew up all the squares (one for each letter of the alphabet) in my sketchbook that I would eventually come up with all the sketches - but that brilliant idea struck almost a year ago and I still have empty squares. So now it's time to try something else. Let's see if I can get one letter of the alphabet done each day over the course of the next 26 days. (that's how many letters there are, right?)

homemade rings

The onion rings did not make it on the Fourth of July menu afterall - ran out of time. Since I had the buttermilk and vidalia onions, I made them last night instead - which was good because the friend who would appreciate homemade rings the most (Big Bry) didn't make it on the Fourth but was over for dinner last night. They were SO GOOD! This photo also gives me a chance to show off the bamboo plate I painted months ago. Looking at these rings makes me want them again, but the diet is SO back on today.

partial to felt

These are some booties I created for the Michael Miller Baby Bootie contest. I really liked incorporating this Michael Miller print fabric. These took quite a bit of time - definitely not something I would make to sell! (I don't think anyone would pay that kind of money for booties!) Taking the time to do an extra special pair was fun, though. It's important to do a few projects just-because. Check out the link to the contest. So many cute booties. The pair of goldfishy booties are my favorite. (I'm partial to felt + I love those fins)

well loved

It's been a tough week. I'm still having a hard time coming to terms with my cousin's passing. He was just too young. I was up until 3am last night putting together the slide show for his memorial this evening. That's hard - feel like I've been crying all night. Took me longer than it should have to get the music fade in and out just as I wanted for certain photos, so I must have watched it 50 times - every time getting all choked up. I'm sure this show is going to bring tears to everyone's eyes.

On a lighter note...

I have never had a Martha Stewart Living magazine that has been as well loved as this July issue. We're having a barbecue here tomorrow (like the rest of America) and I've chosen several recipes from this one magazine. Long gone are the days where I would methodically cut out Martha articles with an exacto blade and organize them in binders with plastic sleeves according to topics like "Good Things", "Kitchen", "Organizing" and "Holiday". With the Martha website, who needs to catalog this stuff anymore?

Had planned to bake these sandwich star cookies last night... they look so good! The dough is in the fridge, so they'll bake tonight. (check out that spilled God-knows-what... I used to take such good car of my Martha mags!)


I hope I have time to make these onion rings. Maybe it'll be another late night again tonight. We MUST have these onion rings with our juicy beef, turkey and veggie burgers. (I've always wanted to make veggie burgers and the recipe in the July mag. sounds good - although, I'm substituting Kasha for Quinoa. Why is it I've seen Quinoa on the shelf a hundred times before and now that I need it I can't find it anywhere???)

Have a wonderful Holiday Weekend!

Hug your loved ones a little tighter than normal
and
cherish each and every moment.

35

Never fails. I always get some of my first plumeria blooms by my birthday... today. Although, this year some of them started as early as last week. I finally transplanted the plumeria I've had in a ceramic pot for years into the ground - as well as quite a few my mom gave me that were in pots as well. I think they like it in the ground better. I guess after 4 years of living here I finally decided that this was where I wanted to start growing some roots. I'll celebrate today the way I often do, with a plumeria tucked behind my ear.

Today I turn 35.

Wow.

That's big.

I'm typing outside on my brand new ruby red laptop. (wonder if the husband had that planned - my birthstone is Ruby!) Oh the joy to not be tethered to the desktop any longer! I am going to take very good care of you, my little Ruby. No AutoCAD that makes your hard drive all wonkers. No massive photo storage - we have another big hard drive now for all that jazz. You will be my little pampered princess. You WILL NOT crash!

I think I've finally given up on New Year's Resolutions, but on this day, my birthday, I do still find myself making Birthday Resolutions. Silly things pop to mind, like, now that I am 35 I shall always have ruby red toes. And then other thoughts, like how much I love the lady at our Home Depot garden center and how she calls me "honey" or "sweetie" at least 10 times in the span of one check out. I've always wanted to be the one who calls everyone "honey". Shoot, now that I'm 35, I'm in a place where I can be saying, "honey." I want to spend more time in the garden, I want to spend more time at the beach. My hair color shall be "cinnamon stick", it's been good to me the past couple months, and I'll make more time for bubble baths. I think I'm getting more selfish with age. What am I saying? How is it possible to be selfish with a 1 and 4-year old? Just need to squeeze in more time for those girly things that make me happy. Say hello to the new, 35-year old me!

in memory

One of my first memories is the laughter that ensued when I asked my parents if you could marry your cousin. I guess it was pretty obvious how I felt about my hero, Johnny. It was probably about the time this photo was taken... we were both in my uncle's wedding. Weren't we precious?

I love you John.

i've seen london, i've seen france...

Check out this picture I snapped from the plane on the way back home...

I always love looking at the patterns that the landscapes make in farmlands. This grid seems too perfect. How did they do that? It's hard to imagine how they're able to create such rhythm down on the ground. Flying from the Midwest last Fall I was amazed by the circles. Click on the links for "grid" and "circles" - I'm so in love with Google Maps ! I often find myself wasting SO MUCH TIME exploring the world with it. In fact, it kind of makes the world seem small. (Or maybe I'm just getting bigger.) Why travel when you can just pop down in Athens or Africa or Machu Picchu while finishing your morning coffee? You'd need to be Matt Lauer to actually get that kind of distance. Maybe I'm just tired from all the aftermath of traveling right now. Maybe I'm just really super happy to home. The past couple mornings I've woken up feeling so happy to be home. Home sweet home. I've seen London, I've seen France, I've seen a fair number of this country's biggest and smallest towns. Maybe I'm done. Focus is on home for now. It's going to be a great Summer here at home!

back

Back from our trip. I love this bag I picked up from Apple Green in downtown Hood River:

Oregon

sure
is
pretty!

It took me some time to get over all the green - coming from Southern California where about this time of year everything is starting to dry out and all the hills are golden, the abundance of green was overwhelming. I thought I would photograph all shades of green and create a collage and quickly realized that Oregon is not shy about it's green. Even the greenest trees are covered with green moss...

Now that's just showing off!

This was my first time going up this time of year. I'd never seen new growth like this on the evergreens - such a pretty shade of green. I'm sure my awe is laughable to a lot - but this was all new to me! So beautiful!

As if the green weren't enough, we even had some fun in fresh snow atop Mount Hood. Snow was falling a mere 3 days before we were there. Snow in June! Me and my California ways - I didn't think it was even possible for snow to exist in June. Next to that there were days of bike riding, picnicking, hiking and playground scouting - much to the grown-ups' dismay, there were lots of playgrounds to be conquered by the short campers in our party. Long afternoons at playgrounds gave me a chance to pull out my cross-stitch again, though. Not a stitch had been made since our last trip in the Fall.

Camping was fun - exhausting, but fun. We were amazed by the long days - still twilight by 10 o'clock at night. That had it's effect on schedule and bed-time, as you can imagine. Our little guys were not ready to fall asleep when it was still light outside - so we had several very late nights. (which made the husband and I a wee bit grumpy the next day) The smartest decision we made was to hit the hotel in Portland for a couple nights after camping and before flying home. There is nothing like being in a clean hotel room after camping. After a long bubble bath I found myself walking around on the carpet barefoot and happily wiggling my toes - enjoying the absence of dust or dirt. We had fun knocking about Portland - but I loved coming back to our hotel room which had been cleaned and was crisp and cool from the air conditioner. Room service has never tasted better!

So maybe I'm not a true camper at heart. I love being outdoors - I appreciate the connection with a place you can get by sleeping with the elements. I'll always enjoy camping trips. But, I must admit, there is part of me that is very (I don't want to sound sexist here, but...) GIRLY. I love clean feet. I love crisp comforters. I love room service and I love hotel housecleaning. After spending a week on the tail of our little rascals, the ability to sit back in big comfy chairs drinking overly priced Jack and Cokes delivered to our room (in California you can ALWAYS find a liquor store that's open at 7pm - not in Oregon!) while the kids ran around and did as they pleased was pretty close to heaven. And now that we're home and I'm faced with unpacking and laundry, that hotel room is sounding pretty darn good.

mostly sunny

Where did May go?

I just don't know.

Cleaning, packing, preparing for a trip. Latest weather check for Hood River, Oregon...

A littler cooler than I'd like (I'm spoiled - 73 degrees is perfection for me) - but it sure beats days and days of rain, which is what the forecast was showing a week ago. The husband and I are prepared to encounter resistance, temper tantrums and quarrels. It's sufficient to say that we've stopped thinking of vacation as a time of relaxation. For now, vacation simply means a good time with all of us together - which is perfectly wonderful. But we do often long for those days where vacation meant bringing several good books (him) and a bag of yarn + knitting needles (me) and sitting on a beach somewhere for hours on end. So if this turns out to be a great trip, we'll be pleasantly surprised. If it turns out to be a camping trip gone crazy, we're prepared to deal with it and make the best of it. Hopefully, they'll be mostly sunny. In either case, we'll all be together - which is ultimately why we take such trips.

So, be thinking of us - huddled in our little tent (electric blankets, portable DVD players, bathroom + kitchen accommodations in my parents' trailer - yeah, that's about as "roughing it" as we get) - and hopefully the adventure will satisfy these little bugaboos for long after we get home so I can get some crafting and sewing done!

Please Note: The shop (OUToftheBOXcalifornia.com + OUToftheBOX.ETSY.com) will be closed until Monday, June 23rd. Any orders placed between now and then will be shipped on the 23rd!