Save The Date!

I did manage to complete this project for my daughter! Yay!

Here are the three options I made for them. She and her fiance will take their favorite and mail out 300 of them to their closest friends and family.  :)

Chores

My doctor says I have to try to make my life less overwhelming. Part of that is making sure my kids do household chores to prevent my surroundings from feeling... chaotic? out of control? or yes, overwhelming.

Over the years we've had chore lists. For the most part they're effective. With child #2 leaving for college, my breakdowns, and life havoc, we haven't made a new one to account for our familial changes.

So.

I made chore lists. (Typo's everywhere. Please pardon those, as I honestly have a hard time finding right words and letters while I'm thinking. Even proof reading more than once, my brain says it's correct. My kids know what I mean, though, and I'm not wasting paper printing new ones.)

Wahoo.

These designs are somewhat creative and somewhat drearily-burn-your-eyes-out boring. I'm fairly certain my Typography teacher would roll her eyes at the gazillion different typefaces I used. There's no color. Because no color printer. blech. BUT, we have crayons and colored pencils and markers. The kids have each decorated their own chart, so they're much more fun in real life.

This one goes in a picture frame with dry-erase markers so it can be reused all year long. They can track the dates for each week, what their Sat job is, and what reward they're working for.

Some days I honestly cannot summon the energy to make the kids do their homework and chores. Therefore they each pick a reward, I buy it, and they know they can claim it at the end of the month. I need the rewards to be visible and believable so the kids aren't working for an empty promise.

I don't know if this will work. If not, I get some My Little Ponies, KreO Transformers, and a Barnes & Noble gift card at the end of January. I'm claiming them if the kids don't earn them. I think. Not sure, really, how we'll handle that. If they'll roll over to the next month, if I save them for Christmas or birthdays or something?

Not really sure how I'll handle missed days, either. If there's a mulligan, a pre-set of days they can miss, or something? Maybe I can hand out mulligans as a reward for extra awesome behavior? I have no idea.

This may or may not make sense if you look at it. On our calendar, sundays get marked with the A-F, and Saturdays get marked with the 1-6. That way everyone knows what they're expected to do during the week and what their Saturday job is. This is posted next to the calendar. And yes, mom and dad are on the rotations, too. We all live in the house, we all have to pull our weight. 

This page tells the kids exactly what is expected to consider their job done.  My 9 yr old suggested that Kitchen include wiping out the microwave. I am wondering if I should have added vacuuming off the couches to the vacuum chore. This is posted next to the graph that details who has what job on what week. That way no one can say they didn't know.

My son can read, so even he can't say we didn't tell him. And at the age of seven, yes, he CAN clean bathrooms. He may not do it perfectly, but he CAN do it. I refuse to have a child head off to college or live on their own and not know how to care for themselves, their home, or their bathroom. ICK.

And this. This one is for me. I am super forgetful, and I tend to avoid things that are good for my mental health and self-satisfaction. So here it is. Me talking to me. I have put a sketchbook by my computer, by my bed, in my backpack, and am planning on putting one at work. I need new ones, most of mine are full or almost full, but I am attempting to make that happen. The writing thing shouldn't be impossible either. I am addicted to my computer and sit here all the time. In fact, I hung my job chart right here on the wall next to me so I can see it and not forget.

Now that I think about it, I need to figure out a dinner schedule. Who makes snacks for after school when I'm at work, who makes dinner on what days, and what days I am expected to crock-pot.That feels extra complicated right now, so I probably won't do that yet. But we need it. Dinners are the hardest thing after cleaning house.

Logos!

So in between and after various camping trips this summer, I've made a couple of logo's.

I'll share, shall I?

For Jwelr's Cakes

for my cousin, MontE, because he capitalizes his E, and because he's Uncle Monkey :)

That monkey e there? Illustrated type. Finally, I can mark off that I've officially done it, now.

Playing with Fire

Today I looked at my manuscript, of which I have all of six chapters left to write to finish, and I couldn't make myself write. There are many other things playing through my mind right now. I want to figure out how to enjoy this upcoming Christmas season, I want to let go of things from childhood that haunt me every year come this time, I want to feel the magic. All kinds of things completely unrelated to a slave girl lost in space.

So, when I sat down at my computer today, I decided I wanted to play with fire. I pulled out my tablet, looked through the pictures my daughter has taken for yearbook, and sorted through some background patterns I downloaded from pareeerica and after a couple of hours messing with various brushes and tools in Photoshop, managed to create this.

Yeah, I won't be quitting my day job any time soon. I'm so out of practice, I don't even know what to say. But I had an itch, so I scratched it. (I'm not even sure why I'm sharing this picture... It's unfinished and un-something.)

Bacon and Jabba the Hutt

I leant my camera to a friend to take on a hiking trip. Due to some computer glitches, he left the pics on my camera so I could download them and then transfer them to him.

While looking through the 500+ photo's he took, I couldn't help the thoughts that were popping into my head. I begged and begged for permission to use his pics, and he went ahead and let me. (yay!)

Kid Tips

This is true because my daughter said so. And if she can put on her favorite dress, her matching sunglasses and find a way to be happy even when her sisters or her mom or her dad is grumpy, well, then anything is possible, right?

So doll yourself up, -- especially if you're having a bad day -- find a matching accessory that makes you just feel awesome, and face the world. You know, that project you've been avoiding, or people who make you crazy, or that overwhelming pile of laundry waiting to be folded and put away, and something fabulous will happen.

Happy Birthday!

If You're Happy And You Know It, Levitate!

There are inherently happy people placed here on this planet, and they seem to have a gravitational pull on those around them. When they are happy, instead of getting pulled down by the people around them, they have a lifting affect. So it doesn't seem to matter what part of the "ride" of life they're on, their car seems to glide a little smoother or lift off the rails so the bumps don't quite hit as hard. It's not that the bumps aren't there, they just seem to have an innate ability to adjust their attitude to continue to be able to float along and find the joy in the journey.

It has been said many times that life is a roller-coaster, with dips, turns, twists, and many ups and downs that leave your stomach heaving sometimes and other times fill you bursting with laughter. Whether life is a roller coaster, a merry-go-round, a Ferris Wheel, or a box of chocolates, in the end we get out of it what we put into it. And today I think my challenge is to decide to levitate. It's much more fun to pull people along upwards than to grouch, grumble, and groan about everything that is going wrong.

A Lack of Verbosity

The past few weeks have been quite busy, and now that the holiday is over and the family trip to Zion Nat'l Park is over and the Young Women camp is over I can rest. And so my brain turned off. Sometimes it's nice to just be. I'll admit my house may not be the cleanest right now, but my kids are hugged and fed and I am happy to just sit here and be their momma for now. Words will come later.

There was a forest fire a couple of mountains over, so our little valley was filled with smoke.

The fire within?

Some days I'm full of piss and vinegar, just raring to go and feeling like I can conquer the world. And other days... not so much. This week, being a birthday week, has been one of those ohmygoshIcan'tgoonanotherday kind of weeks. Today I MADE myself get up and mow the lawn because really, I don't live in a jungle. And as much as I want to be lazy, I'm sure the neighbors will eventually get fed up when the grass gets so tall my house is no longer visible. I thought I'd have enough energy to go back out and weed-whack or clear dead weeds after a short nap. My back muscles and body mutinied quite loudly when I attempted to get up off the couch.

But, I do have lots of other non-aerobic interests. I did go to school and learn a bunch of fun computer programs. So I decided to play around the rest of the day in Photoshop and my kids sat around and watched as I applied layer after layer and made the magic happen. I ran through some basic tutorials to re-familiarize myself with layer options and styles. The original in the tutorial looks much cooler than this one, and when I showed it to my mom, she thought I'd put dancing imps in the flames. Which makes me think that I probably should have; I can see them now that she pointed them out. I may work on that now that I can see it... anyway... While this is not at the professional level I'd like to be at, at least I remembered enough to get this far. Progress!

This is a Photoshop tutorial from PSD Tuts only instead of using pictures of actual fire, I played around with fire brushes.

A Confession

I have an admission of sorts; a guilty pleasure if you will. I love the smell of cigarette smoke. It envelops me in its warm spicy scent, holding just enough hint of sweetness that it makes my nerves tingle all the way to my toes like the gentleness of a first kiss. 

This may seem quite odd to those of you who know me. I have very strong adverse reactions to the smell of coffee (it makes me more nauseated than pregnancy does. And when I was pregnant even the smell of fake coffee made me want to curl in a ball and die.) Most assume that because of my religion or because of whatever other reasons they may assume about me that I would react similarly to cigarettes.

It's All About The Journey

This past Saturday, I had the opportunity to go rock climbing with two of my girls, several of their friends, and my nephew. The cliff face we chose to climb was in shadow from the sun after 4pm, and the hike up wasn't terrible. I wouldn't want to do the hike in sandals, like some of the moms did, but that part of the journey was relatively easy.

Life is kind of like that, isn't it? When we start off on our quests, the road is flat or has a gentle upward or downward slope. We don't hit the big bumps or obstacles until we've traveled for a bit. But it's usually the obstacles and the bumps that determine the course of our journey. There's never a straight line from point A to point B.

Believe

Some days I could talk forever. Some days I don't have anything to say. And while there are many many things going on in my household today, I don't have any ideas to string together today into a cohesive essay. So instead I played in Photoshop and InDesign.

I firmly believe that the ideas behind "The Secret" and "Ask And It Is Given" are true because I believe that God is serious when He says that through faith all things are possible. ALL things.

So even when we have bad days, down days, or bad things happen despite all that we have tried to do, giving up is not an option. If we have a dream, and we believe that dream can be realized, it will be. The "how" of things don't matter, what matters is that we believe it.

Magic Happens

Originally I had typed up an essay about fairies and fairy homes. I could resort to talking about how flowers are temporary summer homes for fairies, but the more I looked through the photos I have taken, the more I decided that what I really look for in nature is the opportunity for magic.

Notes From God

My friend and I were lamenting the joys of raising children, and I mentioned to her that I wished that all of our kids came with little notes from God. Most of their issues aren't as obvious until they hit teenager-hood, and by then it's too late to fix what you did wrong when they were babies. She laughed so hard, she said I should make it a graphic and pin it. So, while I had not been thinking at all about blogging today, I decided to share with the world. Just because I love you, Christine. This is for you.

Happy Mother's Day!

My Lizard Brain Is In Control!!

Go watch this video. I love this. He's speaking directly to me. I am too afraid to finish a piece, and therefore I'm in the run I'm in. Super good advice here.  Seth Godin's Quieting the Lizard Brain.

Happy Birthday

I made a card for my friend's birthday. We've sort of fallen out of touch over the years, but I love her dearly. I facebooked her this digi-card today. It's a picture of the tree in my back yard, which I'm convinced has a door to Fae in it.

And this one I made for the world:

Finishing the Quote series

Rob picked the quote and pic for me. The picture I found for Rob was... well, the best one I could find. I need to take more pictures. I'm not sure I consider any of this awesome design, but I have to admit that it felt refreshing to do it. I love to play with type. And if nothing else, it's experience working with kearning, leading, and matching various typefaces together. I do not like Verdana at all. So it's what I used for boring. It was a toss-up between Times New Roman and Verdana. I remember the people at school really really really considered Papyrus "Of the Devil" but it seemed so appropriate for age-old wisdom for Rob's quote. On another typeface note, I would have used "Fairies Wear Boots" for the "madness is genius" bit of the quote, but it really wasn't readable. /sadface.

Sir Wil

Here's Wil!