Enough...

This is my first painting for illustrationfriday.com I am so excited I finished it! Hopefully you will be seeing many more Illustration Friday uploads from me!

Wouldn't life be simpler if it was just like Saturday Morning Cartoons...

Do you remember when you were little and you would get up in the morning and watch cartoons? You could always tell who the bad guys were by their curly mustache, dark black cape, and most importantly their evil laugh. MMMMUAHAHAHAHAHA!

Unfortunately in real life it can be hard to tell the Good Guys from the Villains. Wouldn't it be nice if they really did walk around in capes followed by the occasional flash of lightening. Instead they hide behind paper smiles and cranky additudes.

How do you know when someone is a villain in disguise or simply having a bad day? How do you know if someone is evil or you just quite simply don't get along. When do you offer grace and a second chance and when do you just learn to keep away?

Then there are the so called "Good Guys". Why is it that the people you put the most trust in always seem to hurt you the worst. Why is it that just when you decide that some one is good you discover that they have been out to get you the whole time. How can you trust someone when you know that they will ultimately let you down?

Now yes I know that we are all humans, filled with selfish desires and ambitions to be good. But being created in the image of God but being a fallen creature really adds up to one heck of a dichotomy. Wouldn't life be simpler if it was just like Saturday morning cartoons...

A Good but Odd Ood, Serving Food on the Moon!

Are you liking the new blog layout? I am LOVING it! My friend Fedora and I set up a swap for it. She got this adorable stuffed Ood (an Alien from the British Scifi show called "Doctor Who". We are both kind of obsessed with it!) and I got that beautiful banner! We both think we got the better end of the deal, so I guess it worked out well!
His name would be Frank, that is if Oods had names.
I would provide a link to the pattern but unfortunately the designer is currently being sued by BBC for copy right infringement. Oops...

Good Day...

I know, I have been a very cheeky monkey and have neglected this blog for sometime now. It's not that nothing eventful has happened, quite the opposite. There has been so much going on that I am not sure where to start. But I won't go into all that right now because our friends the Rosses (Or is it Rosss?) are on their way from Georgia and should be here very soon.

Today was a good day. We got up early and went to Target, Joann's where I bought the stuff for this afghan and then we went to the library (which is always fun!). I found some really cool new books explaining how to make dog sized furniture, a sofa out of card board and a really cute hat.

On the way home we stopped by my favorite restaurant Pei Wei, and ordered some of their crab won tons! YUM, I love those things! Then when we got home, I discovered I had some extra company in the form of a small tick that I have named Ted. He had been riding around on my upper thigh all day. So we made a small side trip to the emergency room, that got me out of work and gave me a chance to read my new books.

The Doctor (not THE Doctor, our Family Doctor) said everything was fine though and gave me some antibiotics just in case. But the best part is he says he also prescribes that drug for acne so maybe it will get rid of the BIG zit on my forehead!

When we got home from the Doctor's office, we did some cleaning before our company arrives and now I am sitting on the computer contentedly writing this post, listening to my new Doctor Who CD and eating a cookie.

Today was a good day but now it is time to get back to work. I will say more later...

Artistic...

Here are my two pieces for the 4-H this weekend. I have been working on them like crazy! The top one is my mixed media, I am not really happy with it. I think it is missing something. Although the girl turned out amazing. If you look it is actually the same image that is currently my profile picture. I printed that black and white image and then used acrylic paints to add color

The painting below is actually an illustration from a song by Superchick called "Alive". I have always wanted to illustrate a song and when I heard that line I knew I had found the perfect one. I L-O-V-E this painting!

This last piece of art was drawn for me last night at work by a beautiful little girl named Simone. She is three and her Mommy wasn't paying very good attention to her in the check out line. So I gave her a piece of recipt tape to doodle on and she drew me this beautiful flower. It made my night.

Open House...

My open house was perfect. I could go back and do it all over again I wouldn't change a thing. My sisters and brothers-in-law all came over and helped get things ready in the morning. My mom had been baking up a storm for the last few days and had made three cakes, 12 dozen bar cookies, 3 dozen cupcakes, and 6 dozen cookies. Several of our other friends also brought sweets and so let me just say there are a lot of leftovers (YUM!)

One of my sisters brought me a beautiful bouquet of flowers and some college start up money and the other gave me a wonderful SUITCASE! Now let me just explain that I have a slight obsession with luggage especially hard side luggage. I have been wanting my own suitcase for about 3 years but have not had the money to buy a nice one. So lets just say that I was thoroughly excited (i.e. jumping up and down screaming) when I saw it.

The rest of the day was just as good with my friends and family coming in and out bringing me cards full of well wishes and gifts. It was so nice to sit and talk. I felt so loved.

But graduating is bringing changes (although not as many as I had thought) such as marking the transition from Mr. and Mrs. to first names with many of my friends parents (WEIRD!) Now I am constantly like "Mr. Smi... I mean.... Jim..."

One of the coolest things about my open house though had to be the cake. Mom, Emily and I went to go order a sheet cake from Costco, but all the had was the exact same graduation cake that Stacy and every other graduate has had. A cake with a hat and some flowers. Well I am not like every other graduate. I wanted something different. So we started looking over the templates and I found the perfect one! A cake meant for a baby shower with a giant STORK on it! It was AMAZING. So we had the decorater's leave off the baby stuff, change the colors and put a graduation cap on it and this is what I ended up with...

Isn't it cool! Mom said that storks are usually only symbolic of one thing however and I said "Yes it represents my new birth as a College Student!" and Emily quickly added "Besides Mom, it's not a stork... Its a mutated Beaver!" LOL

So there it is... My fantastic day. Probably one of the best in my life. I couldn't ask for anything more...