Really? Are you quite done yet?

I don't even know where to start.

I guess I could go on some overdone rant about how Im a bad, bad blogger who hasn't posted anything new in like a month. But you all probably know how that goes "Im busy" "I didn't know what to talk about" "I didn't have anything to share" "life got in the way" etc... Yeah all those things. So, Im sorry about my absence.

Im sure we all feel like our life can be difficult sometimes. I have a big sadness in my heart for some of the things that are happening in my life. And aint it true; when it rains, it pours. Literally, I think people have gone into institutions for less that the hand that I have been delt right now. Okay, maybe thats a little dramatic.

Im trying to stay positive and use these experiences as stepping stones towards a new future. Im trying to find happiness and peace in my heart. Its hard. I want to blame and point fingers. I want to pretend like nothing is wrong. Im tired of facing the music. And while it might be hard to understand whats going on here in my crazy lady land (I haven't really shared a lot of things publicly), I do want people to know that both Gavin and I are heathly and safe.

I will let everyone know that my sweet, little Ditto dog had to make a trip to the ER vet this evening. He got bit by another dog and has some pretty serious head wounds. I think he will be okay, I don't know. He has some serious swelling around his head area and Im hoping that everything will work out. Please keep him in your thoughts, and pray if thats your thing. Any dog mommy/daddy will know how heavy my heart feels tonight. Seriously, why?



I will say I feel like I have had my fill of hardship. Im ready to move forward. What ever I did to piss off God or karma or whom/what ever, Im sorry. Please stop. I get it.

I know my woes are light and I am certainly a lucky and blessed person when I look at my life as whole. Im grateful for the wonderful people and experiences that help me grow. I try hard. Im just feeling like I have some hardcore bad juju right now. I just want to better tomorrow than I am today, and that is apparently way harder than I thought that it was going to be.

Think of my Ditto. Keep him safe in your thoughts. My problems are small comparativly to so many things. I guess life is all about perspective. . .

All Better

Well, I fixed it (I hope)! I had to change stuff around on over HALF of my photo posts. I forgot to post Sept 20th. That messed up a lot of stuff. I was really, really hoping that every photo could have its own separate post, but I can't figure out how have a new/old post, so day 42 and day 43 are sharing a post. I feel better about it now. Thats the kinda stuff that drives me crazy until its fixed, or I just give up. Didn't wanna just give up on this project, I have way too much invested in it already! Plus I enjoy it A LOT!

And because posts aren't all that fun if they don't have a photo to go with it, and Chester provides hours and hours of entertainment everyday:



I hope thats comfy dog. And where exactly are your front legs?

Harumph

Well poop. My 365 blog is all sorts of jacked up. Im missing my photo from Sept 20th (I think, or there about). I have a photo for that day it just didn't get posted. Which means my numbering is off. Or something like that. I can't believe it. Im so pissed I can hardly stand it.

Plus awhile back I kinda got freaked out about some of my stuff on Flickr so I changed a whole bunch of the permissions on photos of Little G. I didn't really think it through because now you can't see those photos on my photo blog. I changed the permissions back to "public" but it didn't really fix that problem. I think I have to re put in the HTML. Blah. This is total messing with my artistic harmony.

Heres a photo just because. Ahh the dogs life . . . Im sure Chester isn't freaking out about any of his stuff.

Fairmount

Hopefully you all know me well enough to know Im a little weird. Hopefully you will take that knowledge into account while reading this post.

I did a lot of great things these past few days. My favorite thing that I did was spend time at Fairmount Cemetery. I took a million, billion photos. I was helping my Mom by taking some photos for a paper she is writing. It was the best day. Being at the cemetery gave me a lot to think about. There was so much to know and see and learn from. Some of it was sad. Some of it was funny. It was a beautiful, peaceful day. I want to go back. I literally took hundreds of photos so I will only share a handful with you.

It was interesting to learn at little bit of history about this place. Farimount has been serving the Denver communities since 1890! Thats incredible! Im sure someone out there now thinks Im a total whack-a-do, but I really did enjoy this day. I left feeling like I had a whole different perspective on life. It can be very short, or very long. You get to choose the legacy you leave behind. People you don't even know will be touched by your life. You matter, no matter how long you spend on this earth. It was a good day :)

On a side note, I might not have chosen the most appropriate footwear for this adventure:

Live and learn. At least I looked good (you know for the zero other people that were wandering around the cemetery that day). Any woman will tell you, heels and grass don't mix.

One is the loneliest number...

Something else that makes me happy today is the fact that it is 11/1/11. I like that. Its special. It won't happen again for a long time and Im glad I got to be part of it this time around! Yeah, ONE day!!

What Happened to Fall?

Umm didn't Fall just get here? I swear it just got here.

While running some errands this morning I decided to stop by Bath and Body Works to grab my all time favorite candle, Leaves. Its the best candle ever and they have it in store for maybe 2 nano seconds every year. I get to the store and notice the big sign out front that says "All Fall items are 50% off." Well great, 50% off fits into my budget! Maybe instead of getting a little candle, I can now spend the same amount I was planning on spending and get a bigger candle. I was trying to be optimistic. I knew that because that sign was out, that there would be very little Fall items left, and the would definitely be NO Leaves items left. I go in the store anyway.

Um yeah. Christmas. Everywhere. They weren't messing around. Im talking balls to the wall Christmas.

Sigh. Fall, you are a sneaky little mistress. This year you came late. You danced your little dance and left a trail of swirling leaves in your wake. Im sorry that Christmas has stolen your spotlight. Im sure Thanksgiving feels your pain. You should start a support group together. Ill come to the meetings.

I managed to find a pumpkin candle and a marshmallows candle that I liked. They should get me through these next few weeks.

But in the spirit of embracing the present, I treated myself to some Christmas/Winter novelties, A peppermint shake from Chick-fil-a, and some peppermint bark form Williams Sonoma.

Just these few little extras have made the day good. The peppermint tastes cold and crisp and wintery. Im not ready quite yet to embrace winter/Christmas with open arms but I loved this little taste test into the future!

Happy and Halloween

We have had some happy around here lately. We spent some time at the cabin. By "some time" I mean less than 24 hours there and back but it was still fun. And in case you were wondering, Yes, you can fit 5 dogs, 3 adults, 1 toddler, all the gear and a smattering of plumbing supplies into an Escalade. There was only a little bit of snow, but a lot of cold.

We also enjoyed the festivities of Halloween. We went to trunk or treat, we carved pumpkins, handed out candy at the house, and Little G and I even made it to a few neighbors houses. I can not tell you how happy Little G makes me. 

I love Halloween. It was fun this year.

Lots of photos, not a lot of words lately. Life is good when you have the cutest monkey on the block.

Baby Steps

So from the beginning of this blog I have always wanted this to be a safe place for me to go. I said I wanted an honest blog. I feel the things that I have written are real and honest, but might not have painted a complete picture of my life. Things are never what they seem on the surface.

I have a lot of things happening in my life right now. The majority of which I don't feel like sharing with the world. That's honest, right? So while this blog might not have every single facet of my life splayed out in full view, I still want this to be a place where I can share the things that make me happy.

Things in my life are different and confusing right now. I don't really want to talk about it. I am growing and changing. I will be a better and stronger person tomorrow because of the things I do today. I will try to move forward even if I'm not sure which way forward is.

I am healthy. I am safe. I am loved. My son is the light of my life. He is handsome and smart and funny. He fills my heart with love and hope and happiness.

One day at a time. One day at a time. Or as my good friend Bob would say, "Baby Steps". You may also sing a rousing verse of "your death therapy cured me, you genius", if you like. All kidding aside, I want to share things here, maybe not all things, but some things. Good things that make my heart happy.

What to do, what to do?

Well my blog people, what should we talk about today? I don't know, but I felt like I should blog before the Cards game started instead of trying to write and watch baseball at the same time.

I have been quilting away like a crazy lady downstairs. I think at the beginning of the week I had 20 or so finished quilts waiting to be picked up! They are slowly being picked up by their owners. 4 made it out of the studio today only to immediately be replaced with 4 new quilts awaiting quilting. I have even more scheduled quilt drop offs tomorrow! Its busy and I like it like that. However, Ditto is feeling left out. He is not supposed to come into my studio, so he hangs out on the top of the stairs, looking at me longingly. Sorry dude, no dogs allowed!

So I was a little jealous of all the cool kids that went to Sewing Summit this past weekend. I wanted to go but there was NO WAY it would have fit into my schedule. Plus my "negative self" kept telling me that I wasn't good enough or bloggy enough or quilty enough to go. Why is it that I self doubt myself so much? I'm an AWESOME quilter (if I do say so myself!), my blog is new and still growing but I'm proud of it. I'm good enough, I'm smart enough, and doggone it, People like me. (Thanks Al Franken, I am good enough!) Still, there's always a shadow of doubt in the back of my mind. I'm sure that's normal. Like the first day of school, wondering if anyone will play with you at recess. I guess it never goes away no matter how old you are. And because everyone was out playing, all the blogs that I love were very quiet. Not all of them, but a lot of them. But everyone seems to be back and now I can rest assured that my quilt blogs will be inspirational and motivational again! Thank you to all my blog homies that I stalk, I need you more that you know!

I feel like I should give you an ongoing quilt project update, but those are funner if I have pictures to go with my ramblings. Ill work on that.

Why is it so hard to pick out a Halloween costume for yourself? I have lots of ideas for Little G and will cherish these next few years where I might get some say in what he wears, but for the life of me I cant figure out what I should wear. We are going to friends sons birthday/ Halloween get together and they have asked everyone to come in costume. At one point in my life I might have been able to pull off the sexy nurse, sexy kitty, sexy librarian, etc . . . but definitely not now. Plus I think showing up to a 5 year olds birthday party dressed as a sexy bumble bee just might be a tad inappropriate. Last year the family went with a group costume and it was super cute! We were Popeye, Olive Oyl, and Sweet Pea! But Matt doesn't want to do a theme this year so I'm stuck trying to find something for just me and Little G. Lets just say, its been tough so far. Any family appropriate ideas out there? Help a mommy out!

You got a little stain on your . . .

Deck.

So I normally try and only blog about the stuff that I do and not all the stuff that everyone else is doing. But, The Hubby has been extra busy this weekend. He really wanted me to take a before and after pic of his handyman work so here you go:

BEFORE

 AFTER

Its not perfect (his admission) but it is a million times better. There is still a little bit of work yet to do, but it will certainly take us through the rest of the fall without a yucky looking deck. We will see what it looks like in the Spring and just might breakdown and do a massive sanding and re-staining party then. And the best part of all of this is... I did nothing. Well that's not completely true. I answered some questions and helped for a minute or two when asked, but 99.5% was done without me. Heaven, I'm in Heaven. Thank you Hubby.

Because it was a painty kinda weekend I picked up all the paint for my next two painting projects. More details later :)

We had a great weekend (besides a Cards loss yesterday)! It was full of everything and nothing all at once. I felt like we got a whole bunch done but also felt like we hung out together a lot. While we were picking up some painting/staining stuff at local giant hardware store the Firetruck and Ambulance were in the parking lot and they were giving tours to all the kids. Little G was tired and kinda grumpy so I only took a few photos.

The Hubby also made dinner one night. Clam Chowder and French Bread. I helped a lot with the french bread but only because I sent him to run some errands. It was yummy!

I don't know what he is doing, but he was been majorly helpful lately. I'm not complaining or anything, just wondering what hes trying to butter me up for ;)

I think we have an official first word from Little G! "UH-OH!" Well, its the only thing he will repeat back to you after you say it, and he says it on his own, but I don't think he knows what it means. I don't know if that counts or not. Its so funny. Who woulda thought you could have a whole conversation using "uh-oh"!

Finished Walking in Circles before Lying Down, Merrill Markoe. Liked it a lot, but I like dogs and dysfunctional people.  Currently reading Salem's Lot - Stephen King

Well I am going to go back to giving my Cardinals full attention - we are winning right now 6-2! - well make that 7-2 yay Pujols! Gotta go!

Adventures of Photographing a One Year Old and GO CARDINALS!

First of all, photography is a recently new hobby of mine. I'm learning all the time. Its been fun for me most of the time. Its been frustrating at other times. But its taking me out of my comfort zone. I try to think a little bit before I just start shooting. I'm I good at it? I don't know. I feel like Ive taken some pretty good shots and for each one of those shots I taken a million bad ones. I don't have photoshop (its not for lack of want believe me), so all of the photos that you see here and at my photo blog are straight out of my camera with the only editing being a possible crop. I kinda like it that way for now. Would some of my photos be better with a little editing, yes they would. But I think if I knew I could just fix all my photos after I take them I would become lazy with shooting them in the first place. I don't know, like I said, I'm still new at this.

So Ill walk you through my thought process on this mornings adventures.

I don't know about you but I am soooo excited about game 5 for the Cardinals tonight! So excited I threw on my sparkly Cards tshirt, dirty white STL hat, and red and white polka dot socks. Because I'm the mom of a little tike, I get to dress my kid in whatever tickles my fancy. So on went the Cards onesies and matching shorts. I even grabbed his hat in hopes that he would keep it on for more than 30 seconds. I wanted to write a blog post today about how excited I am for the game tonight so I needed some cute photos to go with it. So out to the front yard we went dressed in our Cardinals garb. I don't know what I thought was going to happen but I slung my camera over my shoulder ready to capture whatever went down. I was hoping for at least one shot of Little G all cardinaled up and lookin cute, cutie pie face, standing still. Now here's what I got.

Hmmm, I think Ill hide behind this hat, but I wont wear it.

I throw the hat. Please note the smirk on his face. Brat.

I'M YELLING! Nice face dude. I laughed out loud when I saw this.

I'm running. I'm also not looking at where I'm going. Take an action shot mom. Are you watching?

Whats this shadow thing? I don't know, but Ill chase it while I bear crawl on the driveway.

No, I will not look at you if you put my hat on backwards.

I'm a skilled bubble blower.

Hmmmm. These rocks are so interesting. What should I do with them?

Ill put them in my mouth. Oh crap, you are watching me. What? I'm not supposed to do that?

Okay then Ill just lick them.

And because I love you, a peek behind the camera.

So there you go. Little G's and my photo contribution to the Cardinals nation. 

So whats next on the list for my "Go Cards" post? Well here's a little song for you. 

"Go Go Go Go Go Go Go Go Cardinals - It's your birthday - Were gonna party like it your birthday..." 

You must sing it to the tune of 50 Cent In the club. Not familiar? Here is a dorky youtube vid to get ya going Go Shorty I'm a family lady so its a video of a lizard dancing to the mostly edited language version.

Cant do the lizard dance? How about some sweet "churn the butter" moves. Its my preferred dance. While wasting time on youtube finding you the most informative "churn the butter" step by step dance guide, I found this gem. Now normally I wouldn't have posted this video but mama rapper seems to be sporting a pretty awesome hat, so here ya go. You gotta wait like a minute before yall see what I'm talkin about. lean wit it, rock wit it, hold on, stop, do the Butta Churn While I could pick apart this video all day (did ya notice the white ankle socks with the black flip flops? Straight up gangsta if you ask me!) I am going to choose to not hate on what are apparently my STL homies.

Anyways throw it all together and what do you got? My perfect Go Cards song and dance.

PS
GO CARDINALS!!!!!!!!!!!