My new BFF Martha...

Yes, Martha & I, we're the new "it" couple! Actually i think Martha would hate me.... me & my potty talk, my lack of sheet folding skills, my ignorance in the kitchen... I am NOT Martha's kind of gal. I am quite sure if i was ever was on her show (it would have to be for a craft of some type) i would totally get snapped at by her for not having my supplies organized. I found this great Halloween Glitter craft on Martha's site & knew Darling Daughter & I were going to have to give it a go!!

I ran to Hobby Lobby & what do you know- Glitter was on sale 50% OFF!--MARTHA STEWART glitter!!!! I was so happy i cried... not really, but i cuddled the package on my lap the whole way home like a new baby, except if it really was a new baby i wouldn't have cuddled it on my lap, i would have strapped it in a car seat, but i digress...

18 bottles of pure glittery joy!

I had all the supplies for our Halloween Martha Project- oh was i happy! It's the small things in life for me, except for the Range Rover I'm dreaming of, but again... i digress!

So if you'd like to make your own glittery skulls here are my instructions & these are the good ones because i did it wrong the 1st time & made a huge glittery mess! Let's just say we all spent the weekend looking like #1 customers at the local strip club- all our little faces covered in glitter (along with the rugs, the chairs, the kitchen table, the counters, the cell phones... you get the picture!).

1. Gather your supplies:

glitter (IF you're not using the Martha glitter, shame on you! Grab Ultra Fine glitter!!)

SPRAY adhesive (I used Elmers & it was VERY easy to use & did a great job)

plastic skulls & bones (Jo Ann's had the best skull it was $9.99 & had 1/2 off, bag of bones, bag of mini skulls & cheap skulls at the $1 store- these are "ok" & for $1 were the best deal, smaller detailed skull $1.99 at Target)

chopsticks/skewers

egg crate/bucket of sand/block of Styrofoam

dremel or knife

newspaper

2. pick 3 colors for your color scheme. I went with greenish gold tones, another idea: black, purple & orange. 3. make sure the skulls/bones have a hole in them. IF not use your dremel & make a small hole in the bottom of each- big enough to put a chop stick or skewer in. If you don't have a dremel use a knife & do NOT stab yourself in the hand, unless you're looking for extra gore in your display... Seriously, be careful! Most of these already had a hole in them. i drilled a hole in the tiny skulls because i wanted 1 in the bottom & they had one in the top.

4. put each skull/bone on a chopstick or skewer

5. take them outside & heavily coat with SPRAY adhesive, not so it's dripping off the side, but made sure you have a nice thick even coat of glue.

You can see in this picture we started by painting the glue on with a foam brush.... trust me, stick them on a stick & SPRAY!

6. Hold the sticky skull over your newspaper & pour the glitter. If you don't have large bottles of glitter you may have to pour it back & fourth a few times.

7. After you get them glittered stick them in the egg crate to dry. You have to be a little careful & spread them out so you don't tip the egg crate over. You can also use a bucket with sand, or a block of Styrofoam to stick your skewers in.

This is the one from Joanne's it sat flat & was the 1st one i did by brushing on the glue... I wish i would have used the spray adhesive! You can brush the glue on but it takes SOOOO much longer! You have to wait for each section to dry & then it's harder to brush new glue up to meet the area that's already dry without knocking off some of the glitter, your fingers tend to "tear" the glittered glue areas too. This made a REAL mess!!

Here's our final result:

The one in front is the most expensive skull & i really think it turned out the best. I think the $1 skulls look constipated, but that's just me... (some of my skulls in this picturelook orange, but they are actually gold) The $5 had a lot more detail & the deep eye sockets... guess it just depends how much you want to spend & how realistic you want them to look. Have fun & get ready to get glittery!

If you make these, I'd love to see them!

email me your projects at:

chinamommy_04@yahoo.com

i vant to drink your blood....

It's almost that time again when i have to come up with a super cute Halloween outfit for my 1 & only... 1 & only DAUGHTER. Easy right? I mean surely she wants to be a Princess or a kitty cat.... maybe a cupcake, a fairy, or super girl? Nope, not this girl of mine, she wants to be a Vampire Bat... Really? Yes Mom, really! 1st she wanted to be a ghost... Now i know i've mentioned before how serious/non-glitzy she tends to be & boy oh boy, does this show up whenever we can do something way outside the box. Outside the box is NOT her favorite place to be. A ghost? A white sheet with some eyes cut out?! You know this almost broke my artistic heart, but it's HER Halloween & her choice on an outfit, so i say "that's fine". Immediately i start thinking of ways we can cute-ify a ghost... tulle, glitter.... hmmmm, maybe it won't be that bad. Then, just as i start moving on this idea she wants to be a Panda! Oh a Panda, now that i can do!!! I've got the outfit planned in my head immediately & then i sneeze & it's gone.... her desire to be a Panda that is.

Now she wants to be a Vampire Bat & she's firm on this one... Of course, that's fine by me. I don't want to crush any creative ideas my little accountant does have!

i have some cute ideas & now it's time for me to pretend i can sew & get busy! So if you've never seen a darling 6 year old Chinese girl Vampire Bat- stay tuned!

Mary Jane Vampire shoes by: emandsprout (on www.etsy.com)

silver vampire fangs from: charms4you

Blythe t-shirt by: ababietoy

smiley fangs by: silverfrog

My darling is home sick today, so i've got to run & bleach the whole house down!

WASH YOUR HANDS & don't touch your face! Also: don't flush with the lid up (don't even get me started.....), don't leave your toothbrush on the counter & use bleach/hot water when you wash your undies. Thank goodness i don't have that red thing on the end of a flashlight like they do on CSI! I'd have to live in a plastic bubble!

Winter, winter... how i hate you!

Stupid Michigan with it's cold weather! When my Mom was pregnant with me, they decided to move to Michigan... Here they were living in balmy tropical Indiana, i guess that wasn't cold enough! They thought "Hmmmm, where could we live where our beautiful new baby daughter could be cold 9 months out of the year? Hey, how about farther north where the sun don't shine & the snow does blow?" Seriously, how do some people have awesome parents who see the benefits of living in a warm & BEAUTIFUL climate year round? HAWAII people.... HAWAII!! Didn't Hawaii exist when my parents were kids? Didn't they dream of warm weather, sandy beaches & aqua water? No, apparently, they were too busy dreaming of snow forts & ragweed! So begins the start of my "I HATE Winter" rants...

Look at these goodies i found on etsy.... i HATE winter, i HATE cold, but i LOVE these!!!

Isn't this gorgeous? and the color of the water in HAWAII! This cowl neck warmer is by econica. Lots of gorgeous fashion in her shop- go check her out!! IF you are new to www.etsy.com go these & search by seller & then type in the sellers name that i'll give you for each of the following pieces. For the record any of the pieces I have listed would be a lovely Christmas gift for me, so feel free to buy & send my way...

Light pink scarfette by: AllInStitches

don't you love this??!! She has other colors & styles in her shop- check her out!!

light pink AND fluffy - cotton candy goodness!!

One of my FAVORITE colors & love that chunky stitch! This beauty is by: everything2for32 and see that? - the name of her store is also a good deal! 2 for $32!!!

& this one... hot pink & black!! and the flower!!! this is by:

brokenhalleljah

Now as cute as these are they are just teasing this northern girl! This darling designer is livin' it up in the SOUTH, so she can get away with these for a while.... Her shop is:

katinkapinka

I am IN LOVE! She has the most beautiful jewelry but her re-vamped vintage dresses... swoon!

They are a STEAL at UNDER $80!!

This light pink one had me at hello, but....the bust size laughed at me & threw me down off the porch!

oh those colors!!!... stunning!

gorgeous!!!

and this.... FEATHER??!!, PINK??!!! RHINESTONES?? Be still my heart.....

Well, hope you've buttoned down the hatches at your place! We have hand sanitizer at the door & anyone that enters MUST either use it or head to the sink & wash their hands! I'm also replacing everyones mouthwash with clorox! I'm not going down without a fight pig flu! I've been sick a week & am now going "over the edge" to try & stay well the rest of the winter!!

How Uncle Tweeter & an Easter egg tried to kill my family

Oh gals, i'm SICK, sicker than a dog.... or a hog! i went to the Dr. yesterday & got put in the "special" room. I was, of course, all excited that they got wind of me & realized i should be put in a "special" room until they had to burst my bubble & tell me it was for the flu & cold people, the nasty germ room.... i felt all like Rodney Dangerfield & his "i get no respect" shtick! Honestly though, i have the BEST Dr's ever, they are the nicest group of people i've ever met- the nurse practitioner i saw yesterday even hugged me as i left, now how is that for service?? i feel miserable today, my throat feels like i swallowed a package of those pink daisy razors. As i was laying (or is it lying) on the couch yesterday i was thinking about the time my brother, uncle tweeter, made my whole family sick with a pretty Easter egg... My parents had these friends that had 4 kids all with names that started with a K to go with their last name that also started with a K... anyway.... We loved these kids because they were older & got us wound up so tight when they came to visit it took my parents about 4 weeks to get us down of the ceiling! There was just 1 daughter in the bunch & she was such a glamour gal- oh MY, she was like the prototype for Barbie!!! The quintessential 70's teenage glamour girl, that's what she was i tell you! Long feathered hair, huge hoop earrings, crocheted sweater vests, tall boots with fur trim... We once wrote a letter to Ponch from that TV show CHIPS & covered it with lipstick kisses, yeah she was my glamour mentor! So anyway, back to that EGG & my near death experience!! They (the KK kids) colored Easter eggs for us one year & brought over Easter baskets. Well, Uncle Tweeter (my middle brother) was so in love with this egg they gave him he couldn't stand the thought of it being made into egg salad, so he HID it... hit it in his closet no less! A couple days go by & for some reason he fell out of love with the egg, or realized it really was of no value hidden in a closet or just wanted to try & kill his entire family- who knows!? Back to the fridge it goes where Chick (my mother) promptly makes egg salad with it. Now as i type this i can hear Chick saying "it was ham salad with egg, not egg salad" but hey lady, this is MY blog & i remember it as egg! So anyway, this tasty meal of egg salad is served up & who DOESN'T eat it? That's right, Uncle Tweeter!! My Dad eats 2 giants sandwiches & heads off to a school board meeting. As he sits there it seems the temperature in the room is rising & maybe the room is spinning...? He goes to the hall, cools down & heads back in where the same thing happens again. This goes on for several minutes until he admits defeat & heads to the car to drive home as fast as he possibly can. Let's just say.... he ALMOST made it, almost..... I remember my Dad moaning & groaning in his bed with the curtains drawn for what seemed like days. I guess i don't really remember how long this went on because i too was either in bed or in the bathroom with my head in the toilet. My brother was downstairs alone watching cartoons, eating the candy out of my Easter basket & scratching.... I'm sure he was scratching, isn't that what boys are always doing?

I'm headed to the couch.... & geesh when there's so much weird/sad/good stuff to talk about: David Letterman & his sluttin' around (Ewwwww!!!), art prize finalists, Roman Polanski, that poor Elizabeth Smart, Captain Sully returns to the sky, Michael Jackson's relative good health... and new art projects, and new blogs I've found!

I hope you have a great weekend, don't forget to WASH YOUR HANDS till they bleed- the key to good health!!

Has the whole world gone MAD???

If you live in Michigan, I'm sorry... hey, i live here & wonder why i do everyday except for the 6 sunny days we have a year! Hawaii- where were you when i was graduating from college & NOT thinking about my future happiness? I digress... I was starting to say: if you live in Michigan surely you're seen the following picture & blurb out of the Grand Rapids Press. For those of you lucky enough to live somewhere else: this woman, out of the kindness of her heart, was watching the neighbor kids before the bus came so their moms could get to work (yeah, some people still have jobs here in Michigan) on time in the morning & now they want to throw the poor woman in JAIL! Someone in my life (past life) owes me around $30,000, was court ordered to pay & hasn't paid one cent of it.... is he headed for jail?? HECK NO, they've got to make way for nice mommy's who help other mommy's!

Lisa Snyder, left, watches kids play at their bus stop, which is also her driveway, Friday, Sept. 25, 2009 with other neighborhood mothers Francie Brummel, back left, and Mindy Rose, back right, in Middleville, Mich. Snyder has been notified by State of Michigan that she is breaking the law because she watches her neighbors' children each morning before they get on the school bus. State Department of Human Services officials told her last week that she was operating an illegal day care.

(AP Photo/The Grand Rapids Press, Katy Batdorff)

Is that the DUMBEST thing you've seen in a long time, or what? Middleville, MI is this tiny little town south of Grand Rapids- the kind of town that stays out of the news for the most part. This story was on the TODAY show yesterday & today it's on the front page of YAHOO! Geesh i only dream on this kind of fame & attention! Personally, if it was me gettin' all this prime time, i would have been sure to put on my "1st Dibs on the Hottie" tube top & girl.... you KNOW i have one!!

I've been in my studio quite a bit this week even though i am fighting off the swine flu, no really... i'm sure i have it! I'm going to try & get some pictures of the goodies i've been working on. Have a GREAT day!

~m

PS: a special thanks to little miss crafty for showing me how to cut & paste on my mac!! Go check her out, she is one talented chickie!!

Art Prize- it was art-licious!

Oh my gosh is my computer connection S~L~O~W today.... since i started to download these pictures, i've done 2 loads of laundry, cleaned the kitchen, raised some chickens & taken the bar exam... geesh! Anyway this weekend was the start of ART PRIZE in Grand Rapids, MI. Google it for more info! We headed down there Sunday & WOW, was it a gorgeous day!! The weather was PERFECT... I guess that's why there were 9 bazillion people down there!

This is my view for a large portion of the day....

Here are darling & i standing by a giant wall of plastic garbage! See the legs in the top rt portion of the picture? yeah- there was a section where you could crawl up on this thing & right at that "step" was written in giant letters "DO NOT CLIMB ON ARTWORK"... see how well people listen?! All kinds of parents were helping their kids up there so they could have their picture taken... Does no one think rules apply to them anymore, seriously? The Mr. & I are "rules people" & that just drives us nuts. I think partly because we have people that are in our life (unfortunately) that do NOT follow rules & the rest of us pay for it... Ok, Sister Me is gonna get down off my soap box & quit my preachin' now!

Yeah, i had a jacket, you never know when you;re going to get cold in MI & that purse... or small piece of luggage i feel the need to lug everywhere! Bee sting? I've got an epi pen, dirty hands? i've got wipes, 4 sticks of lip gloss, pictures of my daughter as a baby, pens, camera, blackberry, a can opener, inflatable pillow, and the kitchen sink. If we suddenly became homeless darling daughter & i could live in it too!

there was a giant send off of thousands? hundreds? of paper airplanes in rainbow colors & darling was so excited to find one! We missed the actual take-off, but there were airplanes ALL over! Don't you love how her plane coordinates with her outfit?

A waterfall of melted glass- prettier in person! of course some boys were picking up pieces of it & poking each other with the shards 'cause 12 year old boys are smart like that!

Here are darling & i sitting on some crazy fabric mushroom thingy....

then we ate lunch with Stevie Wonder....

then back out for some more sculptures along the Grand River:

The Loc Ness monster:

a GIANT table & chairs made by the artist that founded "sticks" furniture. Do you know of sticks furniture? If not, google it, such cool art-furniture!!!

This stuff was HUGE, it was raised by a crane on top of a bridge downtown! As we were walking under it I heard some little girl saying "mommy if that falls it's gonna fall right on us"- oh NO, a child after my artsy-brother's heart! I have a brother that suffers from anxiety disorder & this girl was speaking his language!

Some funny faces on the side of a building:

There was a lot of art & it was FABULOUS to see how many people came downtown to support this incredible event, but the crowds made it hard to see everything, that & the fact i didn't grab a map or decide ahead of time what i'd like to see... planning isn't really my thing! :) If you're in the area- head down & check it out, if you're not: google it & see it online without the crowds! i would post more pictures, but i don't have another 9 hours to load 6 more pictures...

This Friday: the movie "Whip It", can't wait for that!! The mister & I watched: "Changeling" with Angelina Jolie & John Malkovich on DVD. I LOVED it, it's a true story & i almost always love those. It's a dark & sad story, but Angie (she told me i could call her that" did a great job as a mother!

Ok, It's now 12:20 & i have got stuff to do... Have a great day & i'll be back tomorrow with some bad egg salad...

Hey Lady where'd ya get that bird?

As i was sitting in my 16 year old Volvo the other day outside my daughters school, i began to wonder how long it would be before this car would embarrass her. I mean i love the beast, i think it's cool, it's vintage, it's the color of a tomato and has leather- what's NOT to love? Perhaps my parents thought the same of their hideous rides we were forced to be seen in as children. Now I'm not sure I have these in order, but let me give you the low down on some of the pieces of embarrassing crap we were forced to be seen in:

• Vega- the color of a school bus (literally the same orange/yellow!). Most vivid memory of this car- sitting in the hatchback with the neighbor girl while our moms picked blueberries. A stray dog came around the car & the neighbor girl pulled the hatchback down as my finger was on the little metal thingy that held the door up & split my finger! (just spend 15 min. on flickr trying to grab some pics, but still haven't figured out how to cut & paste a pic to my blog from the web on my mac... anyone? anyone?)
• Chevy Lemans- bright red, power seats & fins... I think it had fins, in my memory it does! My mom LOVED this car & was so proud that she paid CASH for it. It had white leather/pleather? seats that were power & was "quite a car in it's day" according to mom. My memory of it, i actually have 3. 1- being dropped off at school & all the kids making fun of it & how old it was, vintage was NOT cool back then! i remember just wanting to walk to school even during a downpour so i didn't have to withstand the humiliation. Memory 2- my mom's watch chain getting stuck in the horn & blowing that baby like a trumpet all the way home from downtown! Thankfully we didn't get behind a motorcycle gang! Memory 3- In it's later years that car started to chirp, chirp like a rooster not a parakeet! One day my mom was slowing down to take a corner & the car is screeching like we're choking an eagle & some guy yells "HEY LADY, WHERE'D YA GET YOUR BIRD?". At that moment i think my mom wanted to crawl in a hole, she lost all love for ol' red at that moment & soon it was sold for $300 i believe. My brothers could die now thinking of that "cool" car sold for a mere $300!
• Now i know i've mentioned our PIMP van before, but lets recap: Custom full sized Van (in the day before the now "glamorous" (cough, cough) "mini van".) White exterior with the words "BLUE JEANS" on the side!! Blue shag carpet, blue pleather seats with blue burlap fabric, blue dash, blue steering wheel, blue couch in the back.... yeah it was BLUE jeans all right & they didn't disappoint! My most vivid memory in this, thankfully is NOT eating a magic mushroom... We took this baby cross country to California (go back & look- i already posted this story) with 2 parents, 2 Grandparents, 3 kids & a plastic banjo! Yee-haw!
• Dad's blue truck. I always think of that line from the movies "Planes, trains, and automobiles" : "Do you feel this vehicle is safe for highway travel?" "yes, i do, yes, i do" This truck was beyond nasty! At one time in history it was blue (long before we were the lucky owners) but somehow was peeling in a way that left giant purple circles on it! Yep, paint that peeled in circles.... The sides of the truck bed were loose so my Dad just yanked 'em off & made it a flatbed. Now i'm sure you're picturing my dad at this point with a front tooth missing, a coon-skin cap, and bib overalls with one strap missing, but NO... he had a great job, a job that required a suit everyday! Don't ask me what his problem was... I had to ride with him in this piece of crap to school for early morning band practice (don't even get me started on BAND... marching band outfits are NOT made for 68 lb girls that aren't even close to being 5' tall! we'll discuss this later!). I would sit on the floor on the passenger side amongst the 15 basketballs. Yeah, he stored them on the floor because he was the girls BB coach. i was MORTIFIED! To those of you that had to park next to this piece of crap over at the Kalamazoo Country Club... I apologize for him!

Honestly, this is only the tip of the ice berg of mortifying things i had to experience as a child. My mom likes to call them "memories" and yes, yes they are!

Ok, let's end this with cuteness:

Darling Daughter & her baby: Teddy in a tu-tu

Tell me I'm not alone... did your parents drive a freak show? Go ahead, share, you're amongst friends!

*stuff*

i totally feel out of my blogging groove, it was there & then.... the computer took a crap & it was gone.... Hmmm, i feel like i need to hang out at Goodwill or downtown on skid row to get a good story, notice i did not say i should hang out at the MTV awards or something glamorous for a good story- i find celebrity's BORING! Ok, shut up, i do watch Entertainment Tonight, but i find a good bum more interesting than Brittany or Lindsay any day! Yesterday i went to lunch with friends, which was great! Summer was so weird, we were so busy doing nothing that we didn't have time for anything! Darling daughter just wanted to sleep in, hang out, play with the mother slut's kittens & jump on the trampoline. There was no schedule & i couldn't get anything done. I'm totally artsy fartsy & like to fly by the seat of my pants but i do need some type of schedule or i'm just a total slacker! Now that school is back in session i have put myself on a strict schedule:

• 7:00 am get up
• fix breakfast
• start yelling at darling daughter to EAT!
• get her clothes ready & check her back pack, tell her to hurry & finish EATING!
• yell at her that she just doesn't understand what hurry means
• make sure she is getting dressed, brushing hair & teeth, and going potty
• 7:58 yell for her & Teddy to get IN the car
• 8:00 back out of the garage like a bat outta hell & fly over to the bus stop
• she gets out into the swarm of mosquito's that are literally eating everyone they can because being 1st in line for the bus is a HUGE deal when you are 6 & in the 1st grade!
• i sit in the tank & wrestle the dog (dear Teddy, our Yorkie) off me
• 8:14 back at home, sit at computer & pretend this blog is a real job :)
• my goal is to be dressed & down in my studio by 10 am.... somedays are better than others & besides, i'm JUST getting back on my schedule, right?

Now, if you've been reading a while, you know of darling daughter, if not, here is a re-cap: i adopted her from China by CHOICE (childbirth freaks me out &, in my opinion, is NOT natural- although many like to point out giving birth is the MOST natural thing you can do.... ok, a person coming out of your JJ...? go right ahead!) anyway, she is very stoic, an old soul, serious, shy in public & LOVES to do math workbooks for fun- got the picture? She is the daughter of a full on right brained artsy type that does not mind being the center of attention "Hey y'all, have YOU SEEN ME YET?". Yesterday i made a stop at Target to grab a few things & saw this cute hat. I thought maybe she would want to work it into her Halloween costume since she wants to be "a ghost without a sheet on my face"... a ghost? REALLY?? Geesh, doesn't she realize that she has an artist at her disposal that can not only make a costume but can think up ALL kinds of cool stuff?! A ghost... I'm all about letting her be what she is comfortable in & making certain choices on her own, so i decide to go with it, but of course i'm going to have to go all Martha Steward - Betsy Johnson on that outfit! Visions of white tulle & glitter are running through my head. I see this scully hat with pink interior & long braids & think maybe, just maybe we can work with this. Well, when i get home & show her the hat i get a flashback to frosty the snowman "there must have been some magic in that old silk hat they found for when they put it on his head he began to dance around...". She wasn't dancing, but she transformed into a goof ball!!! Who loves her some Billy-Bob Teeth??? Yeah, she's purty....

i love it!!

Anyway, it's now 10 am & here i still am in my PJ's.... behind schedule already!

a post about nothing...

Now if that title doesn't draw 'em in, i don't know what will!

TWENTY years ago today, Baywatch debuted... and 15 years ago Friends debuted... Like my title says: a post about nothing. Seriously, i was going to post yesterday but i thought - what the heck do i have to say, i'm neck deep in laundry & who CARES... i've got nothin', i couldn't even make laundry funny & believe me doing laundry till 10:30 at night is NOT FUNNY! A giant squid found in the gulf of Mexico (yes, i did have to change the spelling of golf to gUlf) - 103 lbs and 19 ft long! Ok, i have the morning shows on, can you tell?! As darling daughter was getting ready for school that Snuggie commercial came on & let's just say "Put on your Snuggie" will NOT stop going through my head & yes, i did sing it till she was begging me to stop. Kanye has been offered 10 million by the WWE to wrestle "lightly"...

**~**You're welcome for your morning news update!**~~**

I got this new mac & honestly, i'm going to blame it for the lack of posts, that & the fact nothing exciting has been going on. The mac.... i'm still learning & i can't figure out how to cut & paste so i use my excuse of "i have no pictures to post" as my out. If anyone knows how to cut & paste pictures off the Internet so i can post them on here, please: LET ME KNOW!

I'm headed to lunch with a friend, i'll make sure to take my camera in case something exciting happens...

i've also been in the art room quite a bit with the girls back in school, so i'll have some goodies to show soon: new button rings, OOAK (one of a kind) painted clipboards, funky kawaii jewelry...

Have a great day and check out artprize in Grand Rapids, MI! I'll have more on that tomorrow! It's going to be something to see....

Whew... it's been Too long...

Well, so much has happened during that time that my computer took a big crap on us, i'm going to give you a quick re-cap & then we can move on... Look at me all "everyone hangs on every moment of my life like i'm Lindsay Lohan or Kanye West"

The Mister has been a gardening fool this summer! He's like a love child born of Martha Steward & June Cleaver! Growing, hoeing, and canning- that's what his summer has consisted of! Here's our little munchkin with a load of potatoes!

yeah, that's a glow stick in the freezer... don't you have one in yours?

Look at the mister all organized... did he grow up in Idaho? look how he loves those potatoes & groups them with their own kind! Don't you like how he draws a line with the gourds? and speaking of those gourds... he tried to feed us one! I kept saying "isn't that a gourd?" oh no, he was convinced it was some kind of squash... You don't even want to know how hard the skin on that baby was! YUCK! The bumpy texture is FAR from appetizing, that's for sure!

then of course was our "camping in a hotel" trip. While our poor friends sat around the lake-sized puddle in their campsite, we went to the hotel pool! And who loves them some 1980's style airbrushed dolphins? Why, i do, that's who!

Then it was time to get those girls off to school: 1st grade & a Jr. in HS!

and... if you're from the Grand Rapids, MI area you may have been lucky enough to see this roving piece of... ART?? It's often at Hobby Lobby where he's buying more supplies to pimp his ride! The day I saw it here, he was painting something about the New England Patriots on one side and the other side said "Bi-polar happens" & had a picture of Brittany Spears modge podged to the front fender. FYI: darling daughter was in the back seat snapping the pics for me since the owner was right there "working" on his car- don't you love how i have her going all "secret squirrel" for me? I saw the car again this past week & the New England Patriots had been painted over & MSU was having homage paid to them...

and since we now have a 16 year old, my VW bug changed hands & off we went to look for a "family car". We looked at a couple SUV's, but when i saw this big tomato red momma mobile, i knew she had to be mine! It's like driving a tank after zipping around in my bug for the past 6 years! It's a 1993 & runs like a top. It even has camel colored leather which has been something i put on my "must have" list. One night after we brought the ol gal home, the mister says "so how does it feel to get the vehicle you wanted?" The vehicle i WANTED?? I then had to remind him the vehicle i WANTED was the $83,000 white Range Rover that was still sitting on the lot teasing me with it's butter soft camel leather interior trimmed in black. Don't get me wrong, i love my volvo, but obviously the Mister was a bit confused... God love him though...

well, that's it for now! have a great day & i'm SOOO glad to be back... Ahhhh, i missed you!