Apple Juice

In the eyes of Neil, my 3 year old, every drinkable liquid is apple juice, or, as he says "apbull jews"

This AM I was doing a few chores around the house and I have the ultimate lazy method of filling the dogs dish. It's directly behind the sink on the kitchen island, so, I can spin the faucet around, put it on a slow stream and it fills the bowl up. It's a bonus because usually Fiona, our dog, loves to drink the stream of water so she usually comes and drinks as it's filling.

Being the ultimate multi-tasker, I was also swiffering the other end of the kitchen where Fiona had made a mess (gotta love little dogs). So I finish up, get her some dog food and I called her "Fionnnnaaaaa" and Neil, who is always only 2 steps behind me yells "Nona.... apbull jews!". He was calling her to come get her apple juice haha.

I thought it was too funny that he thinks that not only is whatever I'm drinking "apple juice" but - apparently the dog drinks it as well. Just a little glimpse of perspective that reminds me how little he really is, and how adorable that is!


P.S. I finally cut his hair yesterday! He can see again! See the Before & After shot of the little guy!

Memories of My Life

My friend Kecia, from Lemoncholy's Studio here in NJ made me an amazing bracelet. I had helped her w/ some techie stuff, getting her website setup, etc and she had said she would make me a piece of jewelry for my help, which, of course was not necessary but, saying no to a beautiful piece of her work is nearly impossible! So, a few months went by and she asked for pics, etc, and I felt badly about asking for something, so I hemmed and hawed over pics to use, couldn't find the right one, one that was "perfect" haha.

So, in July @ an art show, Om Baby - Kecia stopped by to say hello and she had this awesome bracelet on, I fell in love! So, she created one special for me. It's called "Souvenirs de ma Vie" (Memories of my life). She asked me for a few words that I wanted on the bracelet, I chose Neil, Sean, Peace, Pray, Create (I think I chose Create? I can't remember hah!) And I gave her a few little things I'd had laying around in the jewelry box - broken pieces of jewelry, little doo-dads, etc that she encorporated into it. She created an amazing bracelet from these items. I had a sneak preview of it about a week before it was finished, and was in love as it was but she took it 10,000x better than I could have imagined!

I can't wait to wear it! If you are interested, she does these bracelets as a custom order as well! You can pick a few words, Send a few things you would want included and let her at it! The way to get the best work out of Kecia is to let her run wild with it rather than asking for specifics - so that is my suggestion - I have been a happy customer that way before!

You can contact Kecia @ keeshagirl@aol.com - or - here's her blog!
or check out her blog post here for more info about ordering! These bracelets take 3-5 weeks so order early for Christmas. Wouldn't this be a fab idea for a mom/grandmom? You could have the kid's names on the charms! Or, a bracelet for your wife - use your wedding date or the date you met, the city you honeymooned/married in, a nickname - you could really score brownie points with something like that!

Paper Source

My little sister, Neil & I decided to take a little trip into Princeton today. We stopped by Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory and said hi to Sean, he was working today and we got the "10cent tour" then we headed over to downtown Princeton for some shopping.

I was dying to check out the new Paper Source store, I always drool over their website/catalog, so their store was like the holy grail! I bought some goodies, would have bought more if it wasn't raining so hard - I was worried about the paper getting ruined on the way home.

One of my favorite things I got was these stickers called INANIMATE they're all eye balls and mouths - and you put them on inanimate objects to bring them to life hehehe. I have them on my cell phone, my sketch pad, my car stereo..... and probably more as I find more hehehe. I love them!

I am dying to go back. This time, I will check the weather so I don't have a 5 block walk in torrential downpour/flash flood to the car, and, I will bring lots of quarters to feed the meter!

Neil's Favorite Babies

Anyone who has seen Neil recently, knows that he's always got his three little comrades with him - Chaucer, Elephant, and little old Ming Ming. Sometimes he's got a little blanket with him too... they've all become quite a part of him! One night he brought me the camera, he loves getting his pictures taken..... and he showed me all his babies for photo's. These will go in the scrapbook for sure!

Chaucer is Neil's absolute favorite. So much so - that we actually bought a "backup" that we now have named "Bizarro Chaucer". We were in Borders w/ Neil, waiting in a long Christmas line and Neil saw Bizarro Chaucer and said "MINE! Dauder (how he says chaucer)" so, Sean and I decided to buy a "just incase" because at that point, without Chaucer there would be no sleep, there would be no peace.... it would be a bad thing! We've used him only once, and that was for a Teddy Bear Picnic that Neil had in school. I didn't want anything to happen to Chaucer in school, so we sent the stand-in Bizarro Chaucer. Ahh the things you worry about when you're a parent! But - yes, Chaucer is his most favorite, most loved teddy ever. He carries him with him nearly everywhere. He's well loved, fur isn't quite as fluffy and the stuffing isn't where it used to be.... you can tell he carries this bear in somewhat of a head lock, as the stuffing from the neck is totally gone! Once school starts, I can do some "surgery" on him and restuff him... but I think that would be too much for Neil to handle now!

The other two babies are Elephant, a little beanie baby sized elephant that plays "twinkle twinkle little star" when you push his belly. My cousin, Neil's Godmother - Bridget, gave it to me @ my baby shower. About a year ago Neil rediscovered it with some other baby items I was putting away, and hasn't let it go since.
Last, but not least, is Ming Ming, a chickadee. Now this one tickles me, because he's the teeniest little thing, about the size of Neil's hand - like a real chick! SO easy to loose. I can't tell you how often we are looking for this little guy. The Easter Bunny put him in Neil's basket. Neil named him "Ming Ming" all on his own, as this is the name of the duck in Wonder Pets, one of Neil's fav shows... I guess he thinks it's the same thing! I do think it's hysterical to hear him look for Ming Ming though, he goes around the house and says "Ming Ming....wear ahhh youuuu??" so cute.

The Blanket is a little more interchangeable. We have tons of those little flannel receiving blankets from when Neil was an infant. He has about 10 that he rotates through as his fav's to sleep and snuggle with.

Ahh, a boy and his teddy! You can click the pics for bigger versions!

Getting Stuck in the Woods

Sean & I frequently went out exploring in the pines when we were dating. And, since we've been together for nearly 10 years (10 years on October 11!) we've seen a lot of the ruins and roads of the pines. It's one of our favorite things to do. We did take a hiatus when Neil was born, partly because of his fragile infant state, and the chaos of his club foot, etc - and - partly because we were driving a minivan and a camry, not exactly off road vehicles. We had to sell our old 87' Bronco, which was loyal car and got us through many tough roads of the pines. The backseat didn't exactly connect to the car properly.... only half way.... so, without sufficient weight (like an adult) it would sort of bounce up and down. Not sufficient for a car seat.... not even close.

Well we have a good off roading car now, since last summer when we got Sean's Trailblazer. So, we've gotten back to our old selves and we go out exploring pretty often. Sean knows the roads back there very well. Even I'm somewhat familiar with the roads - which says a lot, considering I am extremely geographically challenged.
East Stokes Road - a road we have been on hundreds of times.... always good for some mud puddles, nothing awful though. We head out last weekend into the woods and E. Stokes is particularly muddy. No big deal. Well, about 95% of the way we hit a particularly long puddle, and since there is a "go around" already cut through the woods we take it..... BAD idea. The trailblazer quickly gets sucked into "bog mire" which, is pretty much a quicksand of the pines. Have you ever walked barefoot in deep mud or a muddy lake? You know how when you pull your foot up, there is a bit of suction almost like the mud is sucking you back? Imagine that - just on the entire car. Yeah... it was great fun.

Sean managed to get a cell signal, so we called our friend Cramer who had access to a jeep. He made it out to us and we began the recovery efforts. We had tow straps, chains, shovel, rope, come-a-long - you name it. It just wasn't cutting it. We tried from the front, tried from the back - nothing. I put out a facebook SOS through my phone (in the 2 min I actually found a signal) and our friends Jim & Angela were headed our way too. What a wonderful world facebook has created! We were literally digging the mud out from under the car, trying to give us some leverage.

After 3 hours, on our last ditch effort, we had decided we would try once more and then wait for the others that were coming. We thought the TB was too heavy for the jeep to pull, esp with the mud sucking it back. So we said - one more time - and miraculously, it worked! The TB came out of the mud with a pop (think uncorking a wine bottle). Ahh joy! I was beginning to panic a bit, but trying to stay calm!

<-- I call this pic "False Advertising"

We were able to drive home, the car unharmed (but very, very dirty). We went to the firehouse to hose the car off before the car wash.... you know your car got muddy when simply hosing it off isn't sufficient. The guys had to bring out the power washer to get it cleaned.... and even then... saying it was clean was a stretch!

Well, I think for 10 years of 4 wheeling, getting stuck once isn't a bad track record!

New Creations

In spite of the chaos of the Handmade Faire, I'm happy to say that I've been able to break away time for some new creations. Over the past spring I created some new wall art that I'm calling "Art Blocks Originals". Now, the originals will go for around $250 a pop, but of course in this economy, people aren't really spending on Art at that price.

I spoke w/ Julie, the owner of Creative Genius Art Gallery, an awesome contemporary art gallery where I have some of my art. She suggested creating the Art Block Originals in a way that I could sell them in a $20 range, and said that was a comfortable price that people will be ok with spending. I have to agree, my tee's are $20 and I do well selling them at art shows and online. It was a little difficult for me to "simplify" things to the extent that would put it in the $20 for my art, but I have done it!


Along with helpful idea's from Julie and my friend Holly I've created Art Blocks! They're little aprox 5x5 painted wooden blocks with prints of my originals mounted onto them. I am extremely happy with the way they came out, I even sold a bunch at the last two shows I did! I have to go get some more wood this week so I can create more to bring to Julie in the Gallery. Here's a pic of what I've been up to lately, along with a close up of one of my fav's. I think they look great alone, or grouped up in a big geometric style. Not all of them are of birds, but, yeah - most of them are. I was on a bird kick, what can I say! I have a few idea's for a new character beside the bird to introduce, but I'm still debating. If you have any idea's,let me know! Always looking for inspiration!

Tonight we're going to Atlantic City with some friends to see Harry Potter on IMAX. I do occassionally completely geek out and love Harry Potter... I'm still debating wearing my "Tonks" hat :) I got it last Halloween off Etsy.... wore it for the Halloween Party @ Crissy's (btw, sorry for posting this pic Sean, but you really shouldn't let me take pics when you've got beer in you!) haven't worn it since.... tempting, but, probably won't.

Art Shows

I am way overdue on updates, and I apologize! It is mainly thanks to the chaos of organizing the Handmade Faire: Summer of Love Edition which was more time consuming than the previous shows. The show ended up going fantastic, we had aprox 8000 shoppers come through over the day - we had 100 goodie bags to give away to the first 100 shoppers, and I was a stickler about not giving them out before 10:00 - even though people were arriving by 9! At 10:00, we began giving out the goodie bags and they were gone in about 20 minutes. We gave one per "group" so if a family of 4 came, they got one - seemed fair. So, the community support was fantastic. Now if only I could get the township's support! Check out more pics from the Handmade Faire here! (Click on the mosaic for a bigger image too1)


I also participated in another show this summer, EtsyNJ @ Om Baby in Point Pleasant,NJ. Had a fun time at that show too - it was all EtsyNJ gals, which generally is a really friendly, happy, supportive group! Kim from beachchikdesigns organizes this show, she does a great job. Her friend, Christine from Sweet Life Photography was there to take some awesome pics. The one to the left is one of my fav's that Christine took. It's actually sent me on a whole "I hate my photo's" spree because looking at this pic, and then looking at the pics I take, well, the colors are just so much truer in this photo than in mine. It's not that I don't like my actual photography, I just don't like what the camera is giving me. So, first after this picture, then after spending a day with my friend Heather from Heather James Photography who suggested the Canon Rebel for me, I am officially lusting after a new camera. So. IDK. Hubby and I do have our anniversary coming up in October, the 11th is 10 years of being together! That seems like such a long time! Maybe that will be my anniversary present :) If I can wait that long! I am not very patient when it comes to things like this haha.
Well, I am still in the middle of reorganizing the house and moving things around a bit, (read: the house is a disaster area right now) so, I better get back to that!