Merry Merry

Merry Christmas to all...
And to all a continued respite from my posting.
'Tis the holidays and we have been having a jolly old time celebrating with family and friends. I have fun photos and things to share soon.
In the meantime enjoy this great little drawing Luke did about a week ago of the Nativity. Aw.
Hope you've all had a great Christmas week!

Christmas Card

Yes. This is me. I'm all about high class, you know. I'm all about designing our Christmas card and then not printing enough so I had to mail those to family and email a printable version to friends. Yes. That is what we call classy.
And now I've become a martyr to my own generosity (line?). How can I not share it with you? It's easy, occupies some time and exercises crafty brain muscles.
So if you're bored at work or have bored kids, print and cut out a last minute deco to remind you of what the season is really about.
Merry Merry!

Jingle Your Bells

Phenomenal Handclap Band "15 to 20" Official Video

The Phenomenal Handclap Band | MySpace Music Videos

Has a week gone by already? Man- I should be updating more often.
Forgive?
You will after watching this. Shake that booty of yours while up to elbows in wrapping paper and shiny bows. The video style is sweet- I love all the subtle filters. Enjoy!
(Plus, it helps the kids with their number sequencing.... ha!)

White Hot

Can I just vent a wee bit here....
I have wanted a boss white watch for over a year now and when they all started to crop up last spring there were some that were CLOSE to what I wanted, but enough of something wrong to turn me off: girly swirls, diamond bling in the face, pink accents, plastic, etc....
Well, count on Nixon to release what I want: the 42-20 in white.
It is perfection. It looks like a storm trooper that tells time and I really, really desire one.
Oh yeah, guess how much it is?
Two freaking thousand dollars.


Ugh.

Wrap Up of Lately

So... whew! I know I've been a little MIA from here...hopefully I can get back on top of it. I'll catch up in order of events...
The Girl Next Door show was a great success this year! I couldn't have been more pleased with the results. We had a great variety of vendors and an amazing crowd of friends, family and others to come check it all out. I know it's a busy time of year but we had so many people come by. Thanks to anyone reading this who could make it! You can read more about it on the official site here.
After the show I kind of checked out and slipped into the weekend doing things with our little family and friends, including the Santa Run (see below) on Saturday. Then Monday my parents stopped by on their way home from L.A. and ended up staying until this morning. It was a short stop but so fun to have them here- so I continued to put things off to play with them. We got some Christmas shopping done and while my Dad did some home improvements, my Mom and I made trees for her to take home. They are planning to return for Christmas so we are all excited to see them again. I can't wait!
Such a great time of year. I'm trying to cut back and not stress about a lot of little things. Let's see if I can do it with two weeks left to go. :) Hope you're Christmas season is fun so far. I've been so aware lately of the great family and friends that we have. We love you all so much!

Santa Run 2009

Last Saturday was the annual Las Vegas Santa Run and some friends and I decided to try it out this year. The registration fee includes a cheap Santa suit including pants, top, belt, hat and beard. To qualify for the attendance record (apparently many cities do this, trying to have the most attendees) you have to run wearing all five items. Now that's the Christmas spirit!
Naturally I was interested after hearing that.
Who wouldn't want to run around looking ridiculous in a Santa costume with nearly 9,000 other weirdos? Sign me up!
We were all laughing as we put our gear on... some pants and coats were huge, others were small...the beards shed and the belts fell apart...but it was awesome! So much fun. Look at all the people waiting to go...

Here we are in all our splendor before the start. I love these fun ladies...



After looking at this, I think I may actually be more attractive with a beard...

And off we go! Good times and giggles all along the way. Erica ollied over every speed bump, Jess listened to dirty rap and Catherine kept the speedy pace. (See? Check out those hot pants o' mine- nice!)

All the Santa's on our way back to the finish. Almost done!

My awesome photography as I turned around at the finish line, capturing half of the group.

This is DEFINITELY a new tradition we will do every year. We're already talking about wardrobe enhancements. I'm grateful for such silly friends and hope you're all having a fun Christmas season so far. Merry Merry!

Paper Wonderland

If you have some Sunday time on your hands (and possibly don't feel too motivated to put up all your holiday deco's), this was a great time filler I did with the kids two weeks ago. I'm surprised at how much we are enjoying them. They feel really festive and the kids like to discuss them while we eat. Or, rather, while they don't eat.
I kept it simple... we only folded the paper squares twice so I wouldn't have to hear moans about it being too thick to cut. Tie with string and tack to the ceiling. Easy, peasy- frosty, freezy!

Still Hungry?

Happy Holidays, Peeps!
The season is upon us. I hope you all had a great Thanksgiving. I decided to take a vacation myself and thoroughly enjoyed: eating lots of turkey/pie/donuts/oh my, hanging out with visiting family, mt. biking & putting up Christmas deco's with the kids that I didn't take one photo. Not one.
But I'm really not that heart broken about it because it was nice to not care. :)
Alas- it was short lived. I have projects to finish before GND on Thursday.

In the meantime.... I did swipe these clever images from some random site I can't remember and couldn't resist sharing. They are from a fancy fashion show/gallery thing and I loved how great the cake was. Yes- the cake! Do you have room after all that Turkey for some tasty Mies?? I thought so. Looks yummy, eh?

Holiday Girl Next Door show busy-ness

This is why posting has been so slow. Not that it's probably been that missed... :)
The Girl Next Door show is next week!

Been getting the new website up and features posted though they aren't all up yet.
Have a looksie if you're interested.
And if I don't post before Thanksgiving, enjoy you're Turkeys!!! (Family and Non)

Oh Yes I Did

-Small private theater (no line waiting! It's great to be a tag along)
-Tons of fans
-Sharing popcorn/licorice with good friends
- ... at midnight!
-Too old for that, but whatever
-Finally good music (St. Vincent/Bon Iver's is physically melting)
-Slightly better acting
-MUCH better eye candy (Edward should have at least waxed... and some weight training couldn't hurt. He could bench press some giant sycamore's)

This girl gives it two thumbs up! If you're not that into this stuff, that is okay. But if you're not that into it just to rebel against the hype, get over it already and have some fun. A great number #2 after an average #1. And boy oh boy- I need to get me a warm reservation boy for myself!!!!!! Hot Diggity Wolf!

Randomness

Posting will be thin around here for a couple of more weeks. The Girl Next Door holiday show is right around the corner (I'll post more info on that later) so I'm trying to get that organized. I'm also deep into embroidering some scrubs for Scott's staff. And may I just back up a bit? I came home from that Art Weekend with my head full of ideas but needed to figure out digitizing first ('designing' with thread so I could embroider his logo on these scrubs) and locked myself away for a couple of days determined to decipher Windows confusing ways.... so now my head really hurts. Thinking. Ow.
I also whipped right back around and headed to Utar for another short weekend trip. This time it was to join the Leavers for a girl trip as Jennifer invited us all to attend Time Out for Women. Scott's Mom, Mary Jane, and I carpooled to and from SLC together- a great treat for me. Our long visits were way overdue and never tiresome. As usual with these conferences, some things are oozing cheese, and others are amazing- it's the amazing that makes it worth it. I love inspiration and women who will share their stories of pain, change, courage and love. I love my church. I love the great family and friends around me who love me for what I am and that encourages me to be better. Thanks for the great weekend, girls!
What else have I been doing? Not much.... going on Elliets school field trip, mountain biking and doing art projects in between. Hope you're having a fun November!

Art Weekend

Over the past few weeks I have slowly achieved some small organizing feats within my house. It has been so long since I have gone through my kids rooms & playroom and it.was.time. One of the changes I made was I moved all the art/drawing supplies from the playroom into the kitchen area where we do homework. There were too many times we needed scissors, glue sticks or markers to keep running back and forth. Aside from convenience, a new perk is that my kids now draw pictures all the time. And I mean all the time. Also, new problem: I must find contained areas for display. Case in point, Luke has been using his door. This was too funny to not share. Do you like that hot pink school flyer he added?

Speaking of creativity, I had a sweet chance to escape to Salt Lake for the weekend and take some cool art classes. Scott willingly let me go and took care of everyone for the weekend. It was SO nice and fun and very informational. My main goal was to figure out how to do home screen printing (so I could decide whether or not to invest in the Yudu) and it was all worth it. Andy, our teacher, was extremely knowledgeable and thorough. The class was exactly what I needed. I'm so excited to try it out! I also took two additional classes- one on Scherenschnitte ('Sharon-shnita' so says my teach) which is paper cutting and it was fab... check out my teachers site here (I have some more examples of what this is in my art blog-amazing!) and another class on how to make complex patterns in Illustrator. Those were also each really great and fun. I came home with my own paper cutting and am playing with patterns already (note my chevron bird below). Tweet!
Aside from a good creative dipping, I also got to enjoy my family again and the beautiful season, even if it was only for a slice o' time. The weather was so temperate and the surroundings were very November. I stayed with Rich & Randi one night, we checked out Marty & Jess' new place a couple of times and I even got my hair cut. The trip was short but trés sweet. Thanks everyone for feeding me, putting me up and giving me rides.
Now I've got to get crackin' on some projects because GND is coming up!

Halloween Party

Here is a sneak peak of the Dark Circus Bash we had last Friday night. I think this was the first party in years where I didn't have a ton of last minute stuff to do (or care enough to do it) so the day was a good one as we got all ready. I made these spooky flag banners earlier in the month and my treat contribution was cotton candy. I will say, it was some freaky looking stuff because I could NOT make it look good. That takes some special talent to swirl the paper stick in the bin and come up with a beautiful swaff of orange cloud... mine were like wadded Trump comb-overs. Spooky! Scary! Weird! Jess made some delicious pumpkin muffins with tasty cream cheese frosting- I wish I'd taken pictures of them because they were really good. There were some great soups (new this year thanks to a friends idea), "interesting" and funny videos and fantastic company. Our party is only as successful as the attendees effort and what an effort everyone made. We are so grateful for such clever and fun friends! Thank you for your participation, excitement and attendance. It means a lot to us. Hope you all had a great Halloween!

PS-More pics on the party blog for those of you who want more

Halloween!

Hooray for Halloween! It is so fun. The costumes, the pumpkins (I just realized I didn't take any pics of the night we did that-probably because I was the gloop scooper), the music, the movies, the anticipation... the kids are really getting into it which makes holidays the best ever. We had a kids party planned that afternoon and I have to say, I was getting partied out. After that full week of parties (school and otherwise), I didn't have the motivation to do one more thing...like the cupcakes I was in charge of and didn't do. Luckily the friend I planned it with felt the same so we ended up doing a couple of chill games with the kids and just hung out. Then it was off with Jess to the grocery store to make chili and cornbread and get ready to trick-or-treat!
We could not have asked for a better, more temperate evening. It was a perfect 75 or so degrees out and calm. We set out around the neighborhood with Scotts parents and caught the Lords doing their rounds as well so all of us tromped around together. The kids looked so cute in all their costumes running through the orange lit sidewalks in the night... I loved it! Kids make this stuff better than anything else.
We got home, gorged on some candy, sent the kids to bed and the four of us stayed up to watch Mission Impossible 3 on TV. Nice. Hope you all had a great Halloween!
*Could my nephew Graham be any more cute!?!

The Last Week

The busy final week of October. Let's see if I can remember all the shizzle that went down...
I was responsible for a project for the twins Kindergarten class on Thursday and finally committed to making a hinged skeleton the kids could cut out and assemble. It turned out awesome!...for 2nd graders. It was more advanced than they could do (oops) but there were plenty of other activities so luckily my failure wasn't too obvious. I was in their class all morning helping out and it was fun to work with the kids, but man- I was wiped out at the end of that day. I don't know how their teacher does it! This year the school did not do the trunk or treat like last year and instead had a Halloween parade outside (not as cool but whatevs). As usual, the PE God Mr. Shenkberger was the master of fun and lead everyone in Monster Mash dances outside. Look at the dude- what kid wouldn't love that PE teacher? Then it was back inside and this time I went to Elliets class for her class party. I was in charge of cupcakes and have wanted to make those Martha monster cupcakes forever so I used this as a reason to finally do it. Scott helped me do these the night before... I didn't know he was so creative with marshmallows. The kids had a really fun last day of school (Friday off for Nevada Day) so it was a good set up for the weekend ahead.
Marty & Jess decided to come visit us last minute and we were so excited to have them come. They arrived late Thursday night and stayed through Monday. We hung out doing little preparations here and there for the party that night (more on that later) and Jess and I even got in a work out up at Red Rock. The weather warmed up beautifully in time for the weekend and was perfect for Trick or Treating (since I want to keep this post short I'll do those pics next). A good Thursday (and whew, it was done).
PS- If your kids are bored and/or want to give them a busy anatomy activity, email me and I'll send you the pdf for Mr. Bones here. :)

Neglected No More

Sorry the posting has been sparse. Been busy as all get out and having lots of fun on the side. Here is a very brief and probably boring update of some of the goings on:
Halloween is afoot! The kids have class parties on Thursday which I'm helping with, our Halloween party is on Friday - still have to finish costumes, make award ribbons and our video for that, a little party for the kids on Saturday and then Trick-or-Treating festivities that night. It's going to be a helluvaweek at sea, sir....
Finally finished my book and hosted book club, checked out our friends band down at House of Blues, joined some girlfriends on an impulsive attendance to Justin Timberlake (oh he's just as yummy in person, me thinks), caught the Leadville 100 screening (fascinating), and went to U2 last weekend. This I will expand on a little bit (see below).
Scott and I also got mountian bikes and have gone out half a dozon times in the past two weeks. It's been fun to go through the learning curve together. It's definitely different than road biking and a challenge- but I've been bored with my fitness lately and am enjoying the change. Even if it is kicking my rear (for reals, yo). I've decided it's like an abusive boyfriend: I'm bruised and I curse and yet... (cue romantic fan blowing on my bike) I fall in love deeper each time and can't stop myself...when can I go again?
Here's a snap of JT singing to me. "It feels like sumtin's heatin' up- Can I be wich yoo?" LAY-DEHZ

So here is my small sum up of U2. Scott got tix and I didn't know until a couple of week before. I wasn't really that stoked to go (he knew this already so don't feel bad) but hey, he wanted to go so "I will follow". I dig old U2 but haven't gotten much into newer U2, and these mega-thon concerts are kinda annoying. But I also know that of all mega-concerts, U2 does go all out on production and knew it wouldn't disappoint. And I was right! Here is what the stage set up looked like before the show. I swear half the time they performed I had so many engineering questions and design curiosities enter my head. I want someone to do a backstage/behind the scenes show on that. I bet it would be wickedawesome. That black half-cone shape thing above the stage was a TV screen compiled of hexagon panels that stretched down into a funnel during the show (the next pic).

The colors and design were so so so impressive. I loved watching what changed with each song. And they did sound great and put on a good show because, hey, that's what they do so it's expected. It was a perfect 70 degree calm night for an outdoor show. Thanks, Scotty-man for taking me on a fun date!

Grande Greed

I want all this dinnerware by Paola Navone.
I love the delicate beading on the edges of some of the pieces. It's actually not as expensive as I thought it would be, but that means nothing ... saying that is like isolating a pillowcase from the bed set you want... and I want the whole bed. You can understand, I'm sure. These are fab.

RICHSKEY

Happy Birthday to mine broder Richard-Ricarldo-Manto-Bahn.
Rich! You are like a fine wine- aged well, full of flavor and... smell good from a glass?
I LERV YOU ever so much. How could I survive without my mirror sibling? You are creative and fun and full of life. I'm proud of you and love you to bits. I hope you have a 'heppy' day.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO THE GROUND!