Loco-motivation

This is a freshly-sealed mounting block for the mask I'm making to send to NYC. I have all the pieces ready... I just need some motivation to put it all together and get it in the mail... *sigh*





The mask itself is out in the garage waiting for the final coat of paint to dry. It's going to be a dual-part mask, completely different from anything I've ever done, and I'm totally excited for it to be finished.

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In the rush to get going this morning, I didn't get a chance to weigh the kittens, but they're doing wonderfully.

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I have a raging headache from so much stress the last couple days. I'm going to go drink some water and wait for my lemon cake (for the school librarian <3) to come out of the oven. Then another cake will go in.


Oh! Speaking of water, anyone who knows me well knows I have a bit of an obsession with 24 oz tumblers. I don't want glass. If my kids knock it over, I don't want it broken. So I have some Tervis tumblers. They are genius. They hold 24 oz, but there are smaller sizes and coffee mugs and all sorts of stuff. They have travel lids. They are dishwasher safe and the microwave safeness is awesome! You put them in the microwave and the stuff inside gets nice and hot and the outside stays room temperature. They insulate so the stuff inside STAYS hot or cold. They don't sweat! They are way more efficient than those weird insulating glasses with the not-water (what IS that stuff, anyway?) in between the walls. They come with cute patches in between the walls. I have one with owls, one that says "mom", an Avalanche patch in one, and Husband always steals the one with the flag inside. They're 100% made in America! Tons of options for patches! You can get them at Tervis.com or at your local Bed, Bath and Beyond or whatever linen supply store. Get them! They're a little pricey, but totally worth it!

Here we are at 19 days old!

Twisted Metal- The Aftermath of a Train Wreck

It's not that I don't like being a mother, it's just that my kids spend an unbelievable amount of time trying to make me crazy. For instance, I don't understand the appeal of cat kibble to small children, but now that Older Daughter has learned that we Do Not Touch, it's time for Younger Daughter to be in it all the time. So I try to keep it picked up unless the cat is actually eating. But then I get busy doing something else (dishes, taking trash out, changing diapers, etc) and I forget and immediately I have to dig cat food out of baby's mouth and wash it off of her hands and sweep the floor.

If I sweep and mop the floor, someone will immediately spill their milk or water or drop sugar all over the floor. I can't win. Eventually, it all starts really getting to me and there are days, like today, that I'd like to pack my bags and leave all of this behind. I won't, but I'd like to.

This morning started with Son taking a shower and immediately putting on filthy clothes that he'd worn twice since last week without washing them. They were smeared with who knows what and when I told him to go change his clothes, I was met with half-assed refusal. So I yelled at him, swatted his butt, and then I followed him up to his room and watched while he changed all of his clothes. It would be one thing if this was the first time, but we've gone through this before. He wore the same outfit for a whole week once before I lost my temper and spent 20 minutes screaming at him that he needs to put on clean clothes every day. Why? Why is this even an issue?

While we're on the subject of Son getting on my nerves, I'd like to know why he will NOT stay out of things he's not supposed to be getting into. Why does he insist on destroying things for no reason? Why does he have to give me THAT look when he knows it makes me crazy? Why can't he just behave for once, if even just for a little while?


Younger Daughter didn't help matters this morning by screaming like she was being killed when I put her in her high chair to feed her breakfast. I gave up and put her down for an early nap.

Kittens? They're good. Not much to report. Closing in on half a pound each, still way behind where they should be, but they're healthy and energetic so I won't worry.


I've got my first Pay It Forward project for facebook completely put together. A little polishing and it will be finished and in the mail. I also have some wonderful ideas for other stuff I want to make, I just have to actually go DO it.

For now, I'm going to take Older Daughter up to my art desk and let her dig through stuff so she can decorate a little heart thing for her preschool class. I don't really want to do so, but it's due tomorrow and I need to get moving and stop stewing about everything that's annoying me today.

First a nap, zen we launch ze miss-siles!

No post yesterday as the whole day was a chaotic mess. Son couldn't get on the ball in the morning and it took constant prodding to get him to eat, shower, and brush his teeth. Youngest Daughter was screaming to be fed, kittens were screaming to be fed, Grandmother was busy taking medicine and putting on makeup and wasting time doing nothing. Oldest Daughter crapped in her pants and proceeded to take off her pants, leaving her mess all over the living room floor and smeared up and down her legs.

Emergency bath, load everyone in the car, almost missed the bus. Traffic to Denver was ridiculous, but that's 9 am rush hour for you. Dropped Grandma off at the Center for The Blind, Youngest Daughter is hungry but too tired to eat by the time we get home.

Weigh the kittens, both are down about a half an ounce. Covered in urine and feces. Feed them, wash them, now they're escaping the box when I'm not looking.

Youngest daughter gets up to eat, we drop cakes off at the school and come home and she goes right back down for another nap. Feed kittens again. Start some laundry, load the dishwasher, Husband calls at 2:00 when he's supposed to be almost home from Colorado Springs and says he's just now leaving. This upsets me, but it isn't his fault.

So now I have to get dinner started because Oldest Daughter is always hungry around 4:30 or 5:00, sooner if she's been at day care all day. A neighbor brought Son home from the bus stop because Youngest Daughter is still asleep. Dinner is started, ready to go in the oven right as Husband gets home with Oldest Daughter.

Give him directions. Do some laundry. Dinner in 30 mins. Kittens need to be fed. I have to go.

Book fair wasn't bad, waves of lots of people and then dead for a while. Rinse and repeat.

Neat fundraiser they're doing this year. Colored change buckets. Green, pink, purple, orange, blue. Drop in some change. Librarian will dye her hair the matching color after 3,001 books are sold. Money goes to Children's Hospital for new books. Scholastic will match each book we buy for the hospital with another book for the Homeless Coalition.

8:30. Time to go home. Free bag of clementines. Avalanche lose to the Wild. Guinness! Sleep.

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Now it's Wednesday. Oldest Daughter has spent most of the morning on the potty because I can't have another episode like yesterday, and she's ready to be potty trained anyway, even though she blatantly refuses to be at this point. She changes and wipes her dolls. Wants to wipe herself. Makes all her dollhouse dolls sit on the toilet. She's ready. I will get her potty trained.

Going to Denver this afternoon, like every Wednesday. Half to come up with a casserole idea or something since I'm not making a roast this week. I'd really like to take a nap, but instead it's more laundry, more dishes, more kittens.

Each life has meaning

Da Vinci passed this afternoon while I was meeting the bus. In 12 days, he'd only gained an ounce. He and Spirit will be buried in the flower garden this spring.

Waiting with baited breath

I'm making a special update for those of you following the kitten saga. I have a vet appointment this afternoon for Da Vinci. He's suddenly very lethargic and won't eat anything at all and he's lost lots of weight.

Lunar (Chinese) New Year

It's the Year of the Dragon, y'all. I'm a snap dragon, myself. Part of me has snapped and the rest of me is draggin'. Speaking of dragons, the Postal Service has new stamps out today. Oh, and another lovely price increase. But cool stamps.

Book Fair at Son's school starts today. I've working sales tomorrow afternoon until about 8:00 pm. I've also volunteered to bring in something for the cake walk, so I've got to make a decision on what to make and then make sure I have everything I need for it.

All of the kittens have their eyes open now. They're getting big too, and look like real cats and not just balls of mush and fur. Da Vinci is the only problem. I have to fight him to eat at every feeding. He's lost about a half an ounce in weight (which is a lot as a kitten) but he did finally eat really well this weekend.

Neighbor girl and her mom came by last night to see him. They want to take him to their house for the weekend. I explained that he has to be fed every three to four hours and they'll have to stimulate his butt so he can poop. Mom doesn't seem to thrilled about the idea now, but I think if the daughter wants to do it, they'll go for it.

I started a new book this weekend, since I finished The Mill River Recluse (the ending was wonderful!). I'm now reading The Magicians by Lev Grossman. Only about a chapter in so far, but it's starting out well.

I have all the supplies for the Mardi Gras mask. No I just have to get it put together and have a plaque made, and I can put it in the mail.

Not much else to talk about. We stayed at home the whole weekend with kids and kittens.

It's Friday and I'm in love!

Big weight gain for all the kittens over the last couple days. No one has their eyes open yet, but that doesn't stop them from exploring and climbing right up the front of us during feeding time.

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I made it to my art desk yesterday and actually made something! This is a Bic Round Stick pen, covered in a polymer clay cane I made. The cane has silver leaf in it. Doesn't look too fancy yet, but should look better after I get it sanded and polished.

Anyway, I made it because I was experimenting with canes for the Mardi Gras mask I'm making to send to NYC.

Wait. Have I even mentioned the mask? If not, the short story is that I've been asked to make one to be hung in a Cajun restaurant. Not gonna say which one for fear of jinxing myself (and no, I'm not really superstitious, but still) right now, but if all goes the way it should, I will definitely be back here telling all about it.

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The crazy wind the other night left a huge mess in its wake. I live in the suburbs, so half the people out here have trampolines (apparently, they never watch AFV). After the wind storm the other night, half the neighborhood trampolines are missing. The other half are twisted and completely mangled. A tree in the park was blow over from the roots. We tied out porch swing down so it would stop banging into the house like a battering ram.

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This afternoon I'll be going over to Son's school to help set up the Book Fair. I worked over there most every day it ran last year, and this year I decided not to. Partly because of two Daughters instead of one, partly because of kittens, and mostly just because I didn't feel up for it. I'm fairly certain that I'll be running the whole thing one of these years, so I'm fine with avoiding it now. I did, however, sign up to work a couple shifts on each night it runs late and I'm signed up to bring Yummies for the cake walk that happens those nights, so that's enough. Am I meeting the PTA Mom quota? I don't know and I don't care. I'm doing what I can without stretching myself past my boundaries.

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I started designing my Etsy banner last night, but when I uploaded it, it was all blurry. Of course, I got discouraged and gave up. Not a completely bad idea because I have a better idea of what I really want it to look like now, so I can redo it and get it figured out and not be left with the nagging feeling that I could do better.

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Now I'm off to find some lunch. Thanks for stopping by. Tell your friends. They certainly want to read about kitties and art and children too, you know ;)

The howling of the wind does a nice job drowning out the screams of my victims.

Why am I posting at 3:30 in the morning? Because the insane howling wind is keeping me awake.

I actually came to report that I *made it to my art desk* last night! I discovered that chopping up clay in a food processor is way more fun than it should be. I suck at making Starry Night canes. My leaf-shaped ceiling fan blades look much more awesome in green than in mud brown. I need to clean my desk and my shelves. Sometimes I enjoy the view of the mountains more than I enjoy drinking water, breathing, or having a heartbeat.

***

No one should be awake right now. And from what I can tell by a quick glance out the window, no one else is. That, or they're all lying in bed, willing themselves to sleep. I tried that for an hour or so and then gave up.

So now that I'm awake, I'm gonna rant about a couple things.

I'M SICK OF POLITICS!

Also, as human beings, it's in our nature to move and be active. We are animals. That said, when did we get so lazy and fat that Physical Education had to become a CLASS that's taught in school? Seriously, it's against our nature and the very way we're designed for us to be in the collective shape that we are.

Oh, and all you wonderful people who are taking initiative to get healthy, for whatever reason, kudos to you. Not the candy bar, those are TERRIBLE for you. But really, I commend you for taking charge of your life, and probably lengthening it in the process.

On the other hand, all you Stepford wives in the suburbs who wear yoga pants all the time and constantly talk about the four hours you spent at the gym and how many calories you ate and what a cow you are.... Shut up. To the woman who weighs 115 lbs and wants liposuction... You're an idiot. There's more to life than being rail thin and having your hair and nails perfect all the time. And those of you who put makeup on to pick up your kid at the bus stop when it's right behind your house and you don't even have to come outside... You're actually pretty goofy looking and the makeup isn't helping. Neither is the milk mustache. That actually just makes you look like your brain is short-circuiting.

Okay, actually the last paragraph was all directed at various mothers at Son's school,and while we're on it I've got more to say. Most of them also suck terribly at driving and obeying basic parking rules (like NOT parking directly behind someone's car when the only way they can get out is to back up). "Pull forward" means pull forward. "Do not leave car unattended" means do not get out and walk away. Pulling your kid out of class five minutes early so you can beat traffic out of the parking lot is ridiculous. There are 19,000 people in this whole town. A traffic jam is six cars at the light. Get over yourselves.

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Ghost kitty lost her cord yesterday and had her first bath last night. Like Specter, she's content to let the warm water run over her and she'll just go to sleep.

The kitties all got weighed yesterday, and while their weight hasn't doubled over the last week, they are all growing and gaining weight. They're all love to be cuddled and touched, so they should all grow up to be wonderful companion pets. Shadow still doesn't really want anything to do with them, but that also means she isn't being aggressive.

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I'm going back to bed now. Hopefully the wind will die down long enough for me to get some sleep.

Four.

Four years ago, the man who would become Husband asked me to be his girlfriend. He also hinted that I was not allowed to say no. Seven months later, we'd be married. Today, to mark this special occasion, I've gotten out my cake tools. Decorating cakes for more than ten years was quite enough for me, so I only do so for special reasons now. Even more special is the fact that Husband doesn't know I'm making the cake.

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I weighed myself today. I am down 5 1/2 lbs and can fit into smaller pants. Score one for me. Hasn't been hard and I haven't made huge changes to my diet. Just a lot more activity now, largely in part to my fitbit.

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Kittens are well and wonderful this morning. Not much to report today. No eyes are open yet, but their ears are slowly unfolding.

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Older Daughter is learning her colors. She can now correctly identify red, black, green, blue, yellow and pink. Purple and blue are a little bit lacking yet, and white is not registering at all.

I'm giving serious thought to changing Younger Daughter's name to Baby No Nap, because she never sleeps. Then she's miserable by 4:00 and I can't let her go to bed before we've even eaten dinner.

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Husband, who is crazy scared of needles, is donating blood for a blood drive at work today, after they got an email that pointedly said they needed A+ blood type donations. I'm so proud of him <3

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Anyone who knows me knows that I'm not a huge fan of cooking. I've been known to state that I am allergic to the stove. Husband did most of the cooking for the first couple years we were married. That said, I find a special satisfaction in cooking for my family and friends. They get good food made with lots of love, and that makes me very happy.

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I went out and bought a polymer clay book yesterday, because I'd borrowed it from the library and renewed it too many times. The inspiration and tutorials in it are wonderful, though, and I was struggling without it.

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That's all I've got for right now. Maybe something more exciting will happen with kittens today and I can come on here and brag about it.

"Taking food alone tends to make one hard and coarse. Those accustomed to it must lead a Spartan life if they are not to go downhill. Hermits have observed, if for only this reason, a frugal diet. For it is only in company that eating is done justice; food must be divided and distributed if it is to be well received. " -Walter Benjamin

Ze Kitties... Zay GROW!!!

Kittens are eating quite a lot now, compared to a few days ago. They're also spending quite a bit more time awake and moving around. Haven't weighed them yet today, but that also is a noticeable difference when it's feeding time.

Specter (the all-black male who will be going to my sister) seems to take great comfort in being in water. We bathe him in the sink and he goes right to sleep. Ghost is definitely the leader of the group, loud and pushy. She'd rather be cuddled and stroked than sleep. Da Vinci is my little sweetness, that's all there is to it. He loves to nuzzle my hand and sleep next to my leg while I feed the others.

Some neighbor kids came by just a bit ago to see them, as I've gotten word that they might be interested in taking Da Vinci home with them when he's old enough. I'd love to see all the cats be with people I know.





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On a separate note, I bought some logo design software today. If I plan to make anything of etsy, I'd better make some effort and take it seriously. Getting the mask done and sent to NY would probably work wonders for getting my name out there too... Yeah, I've got to get on that.

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That's all I've got for today. Time to finish making supper and take some medicine for this headache I'm developing.

*yawn*

New Year, New Adventures

As usual, it's been a long time since I posted.

If you've come from facebook, you all ready know the story of The Kittens. If not, a short summary; I was going to get a new kitten for husband anyway so that Shadow Cat could have a playmate during the day when kids are gone and I'm busy.

There weren't a lot of options and the people on craigslist were blowing me off. We were supposed to go look at a Maine Coon mix in Fort Collins, but the lady gave it to someone else before we could get there.

The next day, I happened to glance at craigslist again and there was a post saying a stray had delivered a litter and left them and the poster didn't know how to care for them. I went and picked them up, and it's now five days later.





There were three, then we got an email later that night saying they'd found a runt and he had been out in the snow all day. We went and picked him up only to discover that he was a whole ounce under weight (a lot when you're supposed to weigh 3.5 ounces) and he had a cleft palate. We named him Spirit, and cared for him the best we could. He died two days later, but he was warm and loved while he was here. We're going to bury him in the flower garden when it warms up outside.









The other three kittens are eating, sleeping and growing just like they should. We're keeping the only girl, and we've named her Ghost. My sister will be taking one of the boys, and his name is Specter. The last one, who we call Da Vinci, has two potential homes.



So that's where we are now. Not a lot of free time between The Kittens and Younger Daughter. Younger daughter is now 8.5 months old and is pulling herself up to stand. When not standing, she crawls all over the house and tries to eat every bad thing she shouldn't have.

I do have some inspiration and ideas, though! I just need some time.

When I'm not caring for kids and cats, Husband and I run all over town looking for Skylanders. Yes, those goofy toys that all the young kids obsess over. Today, a new batch was released and they're all ready gone. Husband stalks them on the internet though, so he went out and got a couple sets this morning.

We also got fitbits. What's a fitbit? It's a Super Pedometer. It counts steps, of course. But it also counts flights of stairs, how many calories you burn, distance, and at night you wear it in a strap on your wrist and it calculates how well you sleep and how often you wake up. It's an amazing little device. It also keeps all your information on your person fitbit profile and updates whenever you get within about 15 feet of the charging dock. It only has to be charged about once a week. It's very motivating, and I have quite a few of my facebook friends as friends on fitbit, so we try to outdo each other. We got them because I have a goal to lose 70 lbs by October, as that's when my youngest sister is getting married and I'm NOT going to be a fat bridesmaid.

I'm all ready down 5.5 lbs, so it seems to be working.

So that's where we are now. I'm doing Pay It Forward on facebook again, and have a couple other things I want to make, so hopefully I can make it to my art desk sometime soon.