The Boy Loves His Processed Chicken.

Ah, my sweet boy Tully...


Holy cow, he needs a haircut!!

Tully is a super picky eater. But that is pretty much his only sticking point - he's a seriously easy kid otherwise.

Tully's picky-nutrition philosophy has food groups - they are as follows:

1. The Peanut Butter Toast Group
2. The Waffles/Pancakes/Cinnamon Rolls Group
3. The Only Fruit I'll Eat Are Oranges Group
4. The Ketchup is a Vegetable Group
5. The Lunch Treats Group (Gushers, Chips Ahoy, Rice Krispy Treats, Goldfish Crackers)
6. The Vanilla, Orange or Berry Yogurt Group
7. The Popcorn Group
8. The Pizza Rolls and Pizza Group
9. The Fast Food Hamburgers Group
10. The Kit Kat Bars and Bubble Gum are the only candy in the world group

The most important and oldest established Group is the Chicken Processed into Breaded Shapes Group:


Ever since he started solid food, he has loved chicken nuggets & chicken strips. The kid eats them daily...


Tully cooks them himself in the microwave, which I think makes frozen breaded chicken seriously nasty. But he loves it, and gobbles it up, and I'm okay with that.

Ceramics Joy

Here's the ceramics studio where I take my classes...


Ceramics are DIRTY. Sometimes I feel like I'm merely playing with mud... Making mud pies... which I kind of am.


I always leave the studio nasty & dirty... It kind of drives me nuts, but I'm getting over it.

Plan for tomorrow: working on my ceramic taxidermy dodo bird head. Wish me luck.

I really think this camera would make me endlessly happy.AND IT'S GREEN! AND GORGEOUS!!

It gets kickass ratings on Amazon, and it's $20 off right now! Maybe Santa will bring it if I'm good...

My camera cooperated at school. I forgot I had it in my pocket for part of the day, though... Here's my morning:


I ride a suck-ass school bus to campus. The University of New Mexico has NO CAMPUS PARKING so students have to park miles away and be shuttled in on nauseating buses. Not enjoyable.

It adds about an hour to my total daily commute. GROWL.

But the buses are cheery red-Lobo-colored!! HOWLLLL!


No, it doesn't help much. I still hate you, Mister Bus.

The campus is looking pretty right now - the best trees in all of Albuquerque are on the UNM campus. Fall is phenomenal!!


¿Dónde está el rastrillo?


What's this? It's the Art Building!


Well, it's the sign for the art building.

Here is the inside:


I seriously think I sunburned my eyeballs in my shop class today... I spent about an hour welding a steel box with an oxyacetylene torch - I was totally wearing welder's goggles, but I don't know - maybe they were old or something. Hopefully I won't go blind... Wouldn't that be fun?

NEW SWEATER ALERT!

Hey, Tallulah...


Do you like your new sweater?


YOU ARE A SHAKY LITTLE CHIHUAHUA and you need to stay warm and snuggly...


She is just my cute little cuppy-cake...

Motherf*cking Hugs.

I'm supermotherfucking tired, mentally & physically. Had a fight with Stone after school today that involved a lot of YELLING and STRESS but eventually I WON and we apologized to each other. Teenage boys are really never enjoyable; dare I say it, sometimes they just SUCK.

I actually took more pictures today, but my camera is downstairs and I'M TOO TIRED TO RETRIEVE IT and I'm just going to watch motherfucking South Park and going to bed.

This picture makes me happy:


They were actually hugging before I ran and got my camera... then Mouse reached out and the moment was over. Whatever. I take too many motherfucking pictures of my animals. And I need to stop swearing. It just relieves stress so nicely... Motherfucker.

Too Tired To Shop...

Photoshop, that is. I was attempting to photograph the lovely Tallulah - she's so hard to get a good shot of because usually her pictures are a black blur.

I took this picture tonight:


And she was posing so sweetly, I just needed to adjust the levels with PS and get rid of her 'green-eye'... NOT so easy!

Photoshop has a 'red-eye' fixer, but not a 'pet-eye' fixer that I know of... So she looks just awful:


BUT IT MAKES ME GIGGLE EVERY TIME I LOOK AT IT!! I gave her alien eyes. Oops.

This is what you get for trying to fuck around with Photoshop at 10 p.m. when you should be going to sleep because you have to wake up at 6 a.m. to get your kids ready for school.

But Tallulah is adorable even when she's not Photoshopped:


Why mess with perfection?

A Little Inspiration For My Art

What images are inspiring you right now?

Tivo is a dickhead.

But it is a such a conundrum, because I cannot live without it.



My ancient 5-year-old Tivo system had a fatal hard drive error - I didn't even know that Tivo had a 'green screen of doom' until it happened. My old box had been totally fine up until that point about a month ago.

I am in super conspiracy theory mode about it - since Tivo has total control over my box with its constant weekly updates, it would be so simple to send some kind of asshole virus my way... yeah, my box was super ghetto old and didn't support HD and it couldn't record more than one show at a time BUT IT WORKED, DAMMIT!

When I called Tivo to get it repaired, I was told it would be about $150 to fix... I could get a refurbished 80-hour for $79 with free shipping. So what was I to do?

They did try to talk me into the fancy-pants HD super-duper version for $300, and they'd give me $100 off since I was such a loyal customer!! I had to say NO three times before they gave up.

When the 'new' refurbished Tivo came in the mail, I plugged it in, all excited because I'd been missing my Tivo, and the 'new' one was tits-up greenscreen as soon as I plugged it in! Argh!

It took a week to get a new-new-refubished Tivo in the mail, and I'm happy to report that it's humming along nicely...

In other boring-as-shit news, I've been eating the hell out of oranges and they are SO damn good and knock-on-wood I haven't gotten any colds or flu even though I'm around shit-tons of sick-ass germy college students on a daily basis. I've also been force-feeding oranges and fresh-squeezed-by-me orange juice every day... I have no time for sickness!!

Love My Little Old Piggie

I love our guinea pig, Monica...


She's 5 1/2 years old, so she's hitting her 'golden years'...


One of the best pets I've ever owned, and TRUST ME, I've owned a few.


Such a wonderful, squeezy, fat ball o' fur.


Beware her fabulousness...

Inspired and Tired.

Taking so many studio classes requires an INSANE amount of hours of work outside of class. It's already kind of retarded because the classes are 2 hours and 45 minutes twice a week and I'm taking 4 of them. Well, shop class is only once a week, but I still have to head down to the studios on my 'days off' (if you can call them that - hello, housework!) and spend hours slaving over propane torches and potter's wheels.

Today was my 'half day,' but instead of heading home early, I went to graduate student presentations - partially because I am getting 5 points per presentation for my small metals class, and partially for OH MY GOD THEY WERE SO INTERESTING!

These were the initial presentations, where the new grad students meet their faculty advisory board and present what they plan on developing as their art for their master's degree... I made it to five presentations, and they were all amazing!

It was shocking how blunt the advisors where... you have to be made of steel and bulletproof to withstand the blows that come flying at you. It took everything in me not to come to the defense of some of these amazing artists - there were some serious zings flying!!

Off to bed early tonight... Exhausted & I still have a 6-hour-plus day at school tomorrow!

I'm A Girl Who Likes Bugs.

While perusing my photo albums for something interesting, these (low-quality) photos caught my eye...


If you squint, you'll see my little buddy. He came out of my raised flower beds whenever I watered all summer long. Praying mantis ROCK. They look like adorable tiny aliens.


AND they eat bad bugs. They are welcome to chill in my flowers any day!

I am also a huge caterpillar nerd - I found this fat amazing caterpillar AT THE MALL when I was shopping with Stone. He was hanging out on a outside wall, about to be eaten by a bird.

I shooed the bird away, and put the little wiggler in my McDonald's water cup, and brought him home. He/she proceeded to quickly make a little cocoon, so I didn't get any caterpillar photos...

A couple of months later, SURPRISE!


Huge crazy moth!


He had just hatched, and his wings were still drying out...


I'm a make-up wearin', love to shoppin', crazy-ass girly-girl, but I do loves me some bugs!!

No Pictures, Dammit.

There are very minimal pictures available for me to blog... Why, you ask? Well, Shane took the fabulous camera with him and he won't be back for another month... I have the suck camera that doesn't like to work quite often...

It's on my list of things that I desperately need, but that list gets neglected a lot.

So my husband gets to take fantastic pictures like this:


Oh, deer!

And this amazing shot, that looks like a screensaver/desktop background that would come with your computer:


At least someone gets to take some good shots...

Banana Puppy!

I thought I should lighten things up a bit after yesterday's depression...

I think Tallulah dressed up like a banana is entirely appropriate.










The costume looks pretty damn amazing even without the peel...


Though it does look a little teeny bit like a KKK hood when she wears it alone. Oops.

Seeing Ghosts...

So the English 220 class that I'm taking right now is a 'topics' class... the only topic that fit into my schedule was "Genocide and the Media." Sooooo I had to go with it...

I didn't realize how little I knew about what happened in places like Sierra Leone, Rwanda, and Darfur... I now know a lot more about these African countries than the average person.

It is depressing and uncomfortable and it makes my head hurt quite often... But I am so glad that I'm not ignorant about horrible shit that goes on in our world...


I now feel super-guilty that I own a diamond. I had wanted Shane to buy me one for so many years, but after reading books and article after article about Sierra Leone, My big sparkly diamond has lost a lot of its luster... I still love it, but it makes me a bit sad.

Watching documentaries about Rwanda right now is heartbreaking... The articles I have to research are dumbfounding. I just finished watching the movie "Sometimes in April", and tomorrow we watch "Hotel Rwanda" in class. If you have a moment, give these a viewing... but be warned, you'll do quite a bit of cathartic crying.

If you've ever wondered what a machete-attack survivor looks like...


I'm not gonna get all Sally Struthers on your ass, but 800,000 people were killed in 100 days in 1994 in Rwanda. MOSTLY WITH MACHETES. Yeah. Don't ever complain about your life ever again...

This picture haunts my dreams...


These boys are my sons' age. They are pleading with Zaire troops to let them follow their mothers into Zaire as they flee the murders in Rwanda. Their moms were allowed to cross the border, but the troops closed the border to these boys.

Sigh.

I gotta go hug my kids.

Oh Snap! It's November!

I'm in bed doing a last minute email check before shutting down for the night when I realized that it's November which means it's NaBloPoMo!! So here is a haphazardly thrown together first post...

The University of New Mexico is excellent thus far... It's just keeping me so very busy!

A lot of ceramics...


This is the beginning of what ended up being a 22" tall vase... More pictures later.

And below is my Small Metal Construction class triumph:


A fabulous metal pillbug/roly-poly/potato bug!!


My teacher absolutely loved it.


It had to be either steampunk or thumb armor... My pillbug is both :)


His eyes are endearing to me...

Excuses, Excuses, Part XXVIII

I uploaded these pictures on AUGUST 24TH. And there they sat for a month and a half... Good job being timely, Valency!!

The thing is, I'm never COMPLETELY inactive on the interwebs... it's been mostly Twitter and Facebook lately.

My hair is BROWN right now. I don't know how much longer it will last all one color, but its a nice change for now...

I will most likely be hitting up a random salon in Rio Rancho this week and get three or four inches lopped off... My ends are looking jacked. Super exciting stuff, eh?

A few last random pictures from Seattle this summer...


Yes, I am the nerd who made Shane line up with the ferry for the above picture...

Gotta love those ferries. We had to take one to Orcas Island for Shane's cousin's wedding...



And we went to Camano Island to hang out with Shane's family friends, where Shane took this picture:


Barring the goofy look on my face, I really like this picture! It looks like it should be an album cover or something.

That's Shane's dad... Here he is with Shane's sister:

Awwwwwwwwww!

Speaking of family, I was able to see my baby brother for a split second because he moved to MAUI the day after we got to Seattle!


He knows how to rock the goofy face better than anyone. That's my sister Kippy to my left, and all of our fabulous kidlets... My brother doesn't have kids yet... He's a chef, and he wrangled a fantastic job at The Plantation House in Maui. I'm saving my pennies to visit him! I love Maui!!

Tallulah got lots of love in Seattle, especially from my niece Vivian and my nephew Theo:


Theo is 8 years old and is in his second year in lessons from The Pacific Northwest Ballet... He had a decent little part in their Maurice Sendak production of The Nutcracker last year; he tried out again this year and he got TWO MAJOR PARTS!! (Clara's little brother Fritz in the first half, and Toy Theater in the second half, if you know Nutcracker...) He is such an unbelievably naturally talented dancer... and handsome as heck to boot! Le sigh.

And my Vivian is just edible...


I just pretend that she's my baby girl, too... My sister is awesome and she's willing to share ;)

Some of the Iraqi pilots that Shane flew with in Iraq came for some training in Albuquerque this summer... They cooked us a huge meal and kept chastizing me for not having enough babies for Shane... Big families are an honor over there.


The pilot above was funny as hell... he had been in prison for 14 years because he refused Saddam's orders to kill the Kurds... He was only freed after the Americans entered Iraq. Good things DID come out of it, people...

And Stone started high school! OMG!!


Here he is at the brand new Cleveland High School with two of his best friends... They're in the very first freshman class! We got to tour the school... It is gorgeous.

Below is the first picture he posed for. I told him to stop being inappropriate.


And my little peanut Tully is still going strong on his french horn... Advanced Band this year!


He bought this helmet at an Army/Navy surplus store in Seattle... It looks adorable on him, and is probably a good idea to wear when you have a brother like Stone...

I'm Here, I'm Alive, Don't Worry!!

Been running around like a chicken with my head cut off as usual... I cannot WAIT for the boys to start school again - I'll have 2 weekdays off from my school where I can be home alone and take care of business... I really prefer housework when NOBODY IS HOME... there is just something very zen about it.

I have about a babillion summer pictures to post... I'm such a slacker. There really is no excuse! Our annual trip to Seattle was a success, but it was MUCH TOO SHORT since Shane is finishing his Masters degree and couldn't miss more than 1 class...

One of our favorite adventures in Seattle was going to see Underground Seattle - I CANNOT believe we've never taken this tour before!! Well, Shane took it in grade school, but the kids educational version is not as great as what we experienced!

The tour guides were basically stand up comedians - this much be their day job! They were SO hilarious...

The only downside is that it is very difficult to take pictures because it is dark and gloomy and I have no skills with a camera on a good day, let alone with a bleachy-terrible flash...


The boys actually really enjoyed it, even if you can't tell by their expressions...


Stone got the Slash/undertaker-looking hat at Display & Costume Supply - it's a theater-grade hat, so it's pretty nice without completely breaking the bank. He is a unique child. Le sigh.


His hair is just out of control here... I've cut it a lot shorter since. It's just too 'pretty' for his adolescent face. Drives me nuts.


I listened and laughed a lot. Seriously, if you visit or live in Seattle, GO!! They even have a '21 & older Underworld Tour' at night - Shane & I are absolutely taking this tour next summer!!


So much rusty goodness...

THIS IS THE FACE OF A KILLER.

So I see Henry out the kitchen window, laying in some grass and intently gnawing on something... I asked Shane "What is Henry chewing on?" Shane said it was just a bone... I wasn't so sure...

And then I saw that Henry was EATING A MOUSE!

Evil hound of hell!!


Can you see the evil pouring out of him??


Shane went outside & took the mouse away from him, and went to BURY IT in our backyard. The backyard that our dogs hang out in AND DIG HOLES IN.

I had to almost yell at my husband to throw the hantavirus vermin into the garbage can PLEASE!


Henry obsessively stalks the mice that live under the deck... we've stopped feeding the birds ever since we discovered the mice, and I REALLY don't want to attract any snakes into our yard, so... sorry little mices!!

They don't call my dogs rat terriers for nothing!

The No. 1 Ladies' Television Show

I was thinking about taking Sunday off from blogging, but it is just TOO EASY for me to fall into a rut and stop altogether so here is another non-exciting post...

These came in the mail last week:


The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency books! I just got the first three... there are 10 altogether.


The first series just finished up on HBO... SO AMAZING!! They were produced by HBO (love HBO shows!) along with BBC (love BBC shows!!) so they had no choice but to be outstanding.


The shows are gorgeous to look at and the storylines are so entertaining.


I have to admit that now that I am reading the books, I read them with a Botswana accent like they use on the show... You never know when I'll get a movie role where I'll need to use a Botswana accent!

And they have the best, most artfully-made opening & ending credits...


The whole series was actually filmed in Botswana... it makes me want to visit there!


The hairdresser character cracks me up...


My favorite character on the show is a little boy named Wellington... I couldn't find any images of him on Google, dangit! Take my word for it, he is flipping adorable.

I was lucky enough yesterday to come across a sale on books 4-9 on HBO.com... I got them for $3.24 each!! They're all sold out now, though. I'll hold off on getting book 10 til I can find another amazing deal like that... It'll probably take me the whole summer to get through these, anyway!!

Chihuahua Overboard!!

I wanted to find some sort of infant-sized blow-up raft for Tallulah, but alas, with all of the safety regulations out there, I couldn't find one...

I did find a tiny blow-up infant pool at Walmart... It is a Fisher-Price pool and it was only $5... SWEET!

Here is Tallulah trying out the new 'boat':



I tried to find an image of the pool online... GIS didn't have it but look at this awesomeness:


My sisters and I have the house, complete with the beds that had a foam mattress and a mini-toilet. HOURS and HOURS of fun, I tell you! If we had the above pool for our house, it would have been unbearable.

I went to the Fisher-Price website to try and find a picture of it, but this was the closest I could find:


Nice rainbow! Mine is smaller, no rainbow, but I'm okay with that since this pool is $25 and mine was only $5 and it is to be used for a ridiculous reason.

While I was on the Fisher-Price website, I peepsed some of their 'modern' Little People sets and OH MY GOD HOW CAN I JUSTIFY THE PURCHASE OF THESE?? I need them NOW.


The above one is on sale for only 10 bucks!!
Are you kidding me?

"Grandma and Grandpa love to enjoy their favorite things—knitting and reading the paper!"
And they can only afford to check one piece of luggage when they come to visit you because it is so damn expensive! (They are only $6!)

This is the Fisher-Price version of The Mayflower:


Apparently, there was a plank on the Mayflower - you know, to make the bad crewmembers walk off it when they weren't behaving. Does anyone else see a problem with this??

The more traditional Thanksgiving scene:


Halloween with the CUTEST costumes:


A wedding scene! With the groom holding a giant diamond ring! To start your daughter's unreal expectations as early in life as possible!


I dig that they chose to include cat and dog figures instead of actual guests or a non-denominational priest. Most 3-yesr-olds would prefer a cat for a maid-of-honor anyway...

I may be able to justify the purchase of this little gem of a set:
Nerdy girl with glasses! And hiking gear! And a flask(?)! And a firepit! AND A MOTHERF*CKING HEDGEHOG!!

I definitely prefer the short, squatty figures to this:
They're doing some new, taller Little People which kind of defeats the purpose of calling them LITTLE People...

DON'T get me started on the Christmas sets...


The only Little People of Stone & Tully's childhood that I held onto was the Christmas sets...


I don't have these particular sets, though...


I have the original Nativity set, too... but they have EXPANDED GREATLY on the scene...


OH MAN! And the 3 Wise men now have their own tents!


And you can get stalls! For your animals! And a well! With water!


They've even pimped out The Little Drummer Boy!


This last set is the cherry on the sundae... I couldn't justify the purchase of it for myself but I STILL WANT IT so to calm myself I bought it for my sister Kippy a couple of years ago...


YES, yes, the Little People have Hanukkah, too! This set is no longer available on the Fisher-Price website, but it is available on Amazon.com...