Wonderful Walk

I decided to switch things up excercise wise, and go for a walk today, instead of doing Walk Away the Pounds. It was a cool day, but the wind was so fierce, so it required extra layers. Which never FEELS great when you have to walk. Sure, it keeps the bite of the wind from freezing you, but once you start to sweat, it does NOT feel so great anymore. And that is what happened. If I was just strolling outside I would have just been in jeans and used one of my sweater jackets. But I was wearing my shirt, sweater jacket, heavier jacket and scarf, and while that took all of the sting out of the wind, once I started getting warm from excercising it made me sweat more. Yuck.

But it was such a beautiful fall day, I am so glad I went. I took my small Kodak with me. I would have preferred the Nikon, but I was excercising so I took the camera that fits in my jackets' pocket. You could just smell the scents of Fall starting. The trees in my neighborhood are just starting to change colors, there are plain pumpkins out on neighbor's stoops, it is just such a wonderful time of year. It was a day that made me re-appreciate living in New England. There is no place else to experience Fall. Apple Harvest Festival is going on. Katie picked up some Apple Fritters, and they are so delicious!! Sure, I didn't get them warm, which is when they are THE best, but they are still delectable!! I was licking the left over sugar off of my fingers. It IS a good thing I have decided, that the Apple Harvest only lasts 2 weekends, because if these fritters were around all the time, I would gain so much weight as I can't STOP myself from eating them!! I want Kate to pick up some more tommorrow, because once Friday arrives, the entire state shows up to get them, so you wait for hours and if they run out and you have waited 4 hours, you are out of luck!

Anyway, I am going to post the pictures I took on my walk around the neighborhood.

Ouchies and Pendants

Today was not very holiday here in the M household. We cleaned the basement, yahoo...yes it wasn't sincere. Nor was it any fun at all. We had saved up a LOT of stuff, thinking we might do a tag sale, but now we are just junking it and Good Will-ing it. There is like 100 or so VHS tapes, from all the movies I now own on DVD. Some are even in their shrink wrap still, so hopefully SOME people still use their VCR's and watch these GOOD movies. I paid like $20 a pop for these movies, and now I would have made, what, 50 cents at a tag sale? *big sigh* And so many bags of garbage to take out to the garage for a dump day. And then hauling all the Good Will stuff to the garage too, it was tiring.

Yesterdays' misadventure has come back to haunt me, or bite me, to be more accurate. I now feel All my bug bites. Bugs love me, Sandy said she read they are attracted more to some people depending on the sugars in you, and as I am a Diabetic, of course my sugars are higher than other peoples! They must have known I was a Diabetic years before I did, because they have always loved me. But in the last 5 years or so, bug bites on my legs and feet are a real problem. **You see, Diabetics have to be really careful with their legs and feet. When you have diabetes, proper foot care is very important. Not taking care of your feet with diabetes can lead to serious health problems, including possibly having to remove the foot or leg (amputation). We have reduced blood flow and nerves in our feet. You are actually supposed to check your feet every single day for cracks and scratches, etc because all can lead to infections or amputations. I don't, bad me. I also go barefoot always which is a no-no. There are special socks, etc., but I like the socks I wear, so until I need them, I will wear what I like. You aren't even supposed to cross your legs. If you have a callus or anything else, you are supposed to go to the doctor's...but supposedly he is supposed to check my feet each time I see him and he doesn't, so I don't either. Heck the man hasn't ordered an A1C test for me in like 2 years, I am the one who WANTS one!!**

Anyway, as I said bites and scratches have become a major problem for in the last 5 years. If I get a nick from shaving, I have a scar. If I scratch bug bites, which is a weakness of mine, I will of course scar now, but they usually get infected first, incredibly so. So having 2 bites on my right leg and 1 on each foot is a BAD thing. And they are SO itchy! And my Saving Grace is not working! It is called After-Bite, and will work on some bites, but if they are really bad or big, or in an awkward spot, not even it can help me. Right now I have an ice pack on the one on my left foot, because it is SO itchy and is on the hard part of your heel to the side. So I WANT the bump to raise so maybe After Bite will work, but nothing will make it rise! I was scratching it with a letter opener for crying out loud!!

Anyway, on to what caused my other pain. After I picked up that stuff to make some pendants with, I worked on all 4 until I was done and the pliers/cutters I used killed my hands. They were throbbing after. And then I noticed some bruising today in my palm, and as the past 2 days have gone by, I have this horrid pain in a finger on my right hand. It has a weird mark, like a blister but my Mom says its' not a blister, you feel nothing. Plus it is red and the pain goes down past the marking so she said I may have sprained it. Great. It is killing me tonight! And having to shower, the heat made it hurt and soap stung so bad! So I have decided, making jewelery will NOT be a new hobby. When Sandy heard, she was like Oh I have tiny ones for doing that. AFTER!! And she knew I had to make the links to hold the pendants, because after seeing my red pendant, she went out and bought the same one!! Copy-cat Sandy!! Yes you! Anyway, here are my necklaces:

The keys and locks were meant to be charms on bracelets but I wanted them as necklaces, so I bought some bigger link things (I know I speak in pro) and changed them into necklace charms. The 3 keys one is a fave, because I can wear them together, or for a cleaner look, pick one key and take the other off. This is the bane of my necklace making existence, linking things together like this:

It is so hard and I almost got my fingers multiple times so I am now afraid of pliers!! Linking links together sucks. Linking links to chains, sucks. I like the pendants, HATE the making!! BTW, the crown necklace says "A crown is merely a hat that lets the rain in". There were SO many cute pendants...but I will make Sam make them for me maybe, because I am in agony. So my hands hurt, I have itchiness all over my legs and feet...I am a wreck! LOL! And I think I am getting a migraine to top it ALL off. Anyone wanna trade bodies for a little while? Dontcha want to experience what a migraine FEELS like? Come on!!

**Knowledge Section - You can say I Learned something real at Wendy's Blog today!!

Glazes and Gifts

Okay so nothing exciting went on today. It was a tired day. I checked out this non-SLR one more time. The Nikon Coolpix P80 with 18X zoom and 10.1 megapixels. See I have a definite budget because this was supposed to have been a Christmas present, Yes I am serious. My Dad bought me another DVR but it didn't have a tuner so he was going to get me one with a tuner. And then months went by. I'd remind him, and he'd be oh RIGHT, okay this weekend I will look online...this happened for months. So finally 2 months ago he asked me if I still waned the DVR, because I could pick another electronic if I wanted. And told me the price range and I thought that maybe something else would be more fun. And though I have a nice compact Sony digital camera I can bring anywhere, the thought of an SLR so I could be creative appealed. Of course then I found out the prices. Whoa. So I found this refurbished Nikon and it says it is as good as a SLR but you don't have to purchase other lenses which sounds sweet! So my father is ordering it...okay supposedly....tommorrow. So I shall be waiting to learn how to use this:

It's still like a professional camera, because I can choose manual and change apertures, etc. So I am kind of excited to see what I can learn to do with this camera! It will be nice to get my Christmas present...just over 6 months late...yeah Dad joked that maybe I can't use it until NEXT Christmas...funny....yeah not so much. LOL!

I went and picked up the food from the Polish place. When I ordered on the phone she knew it was me again and this time I have no idea HOW. Because she goes, "you want 4 pierogie for Mom"?, which we usually do, so that is how I figured she knew who I was last time. This time SHE brought it up first and I was like "oh...no not this time" so I have no idea how she knew it was me!!? Freaky but neat, that they know us now. So we ate around the table for once, I know holy crap! But it was nice. Afterwards we watched NCIS's and I was kicking my own butt again doing the Walk and Kick, man I felt like it was the first time, I am in pain!!

Anyway, I have the photos of our fun at The Auracle painting pottery! I can't wait for Saturday, they are supposed to be ready for pick up!! The guy had a full kiln because of the holiday weekend being off, so we didn't have to wait a week! I am excited to see how they all turn out! Sandy pretty quickly picked the things she wanted to paint. An adorable penguin and one candle stick to hold a single flower, hey it was her birthday, she can be as odd as she wants! LOL! Katie saw the platter that she had liked a year ago, even though we were at a different store. She knew it was pricey but said she'd pay for it on her own. And she bought special glaze for it too! I was going back and forth over and over. All the things I really wanted to do were so expensive. I mean a big round plate should NOT cost $34!!

I know about pottery and clay. I have had classes, not just in high school, but I took a Pottery class with Sandy in college a few years ago. Clay is not very expensive. And people who are good at throwing pots and bowls, etc (it is the term, not actually throwing pottery at the floor people) can make some of this stuff in minutes! And even if it takes them longer, like to create Sandy's penguin, that is A MOLD! You can't have that many of the penguins and they look ALL the same and it not be a mold. So the prices are ridiculous. It's sad because I would so be there more often if the pieces weren't so bloodt costly. And you also have to pay the studio fee, which is for using their place and glazes and any help you get. Grrr. If you are going to shell out $34 to paint a big tukey platter they should include the glazes and such in that cost. It just makes me mad. If the piece was hand made, pain-staking effort put into it, and many hours just to create that one piece, I would get the price, but this is mass produced stuff. See this little lady, I forget what she is called, I looked it up and researched it and I created her. She can have anwhere from one child to dozens. This took me hours and hours of class time and then to get the glaze which we had to purchase to cover her ina way that made her look authentic, was so hard! Well, I think she is pretty cool anyway and very authentic looking! LOL!

Anyway, I ended up choosing the bowl Sandy liked. She said it could be good for popcorn and chips, etc. So we chose our glaze colors and the guy working brought them to us. He asked me, if I wanted to make it solid or if I wanted to use a sponge and give it a texture, he showed me an example and I fell in love with it, I so hope it turns out right! So I started sponging. If you click on the picture, you can see the texture, just for all of you who don't know glazes, they can look the total opposite of what they look like once they go through the kiln process. You can paint something this obnoxios brown-orange but once it goes through it's chemical process, it may be a deep magenta. And no, it is not a guessing game, which is why you are shown what the colors look like after they go through the kiln. So my speckled color is a depper blue or it better be!LOL! Sandy made wuick work of her "flower pot" but chose to work very carefully on the penguin, she already adored!

Katie first chose to paint the back of her platter a dark dark purple (yes it isn't dark yet I know). And one coat of the purple on the top in case her special glaze could be seen through in spots.

I knew I wanted to do a large fluer-de-lis in the center of my bowl, and four small ones around the thick lip of the bowl which I painted a solid color. My hands, used to be so steady, it came in real handy in my art classes. But being on all these meds and for so long, I shake a lot, so it was really frustrating and was not turning out perfect and I AM a perfectionist.

Sandy was meticulous with her dear penguin too.

Katie began slathering on her specialty glaze. Yes it looks really ugly right now. Gray with big pieces of grit. But it is suppsoed to melt into these gold designs, swirls and circles and such. I saw a picture of the glaze so I am really excited to see how this turns out.

This is Sandy's Penguin pre-kiln. It better make her happy when we pick it up! She loves him!

This is my bowl before we left. You can sort of see one of the little fluer's in the bottom of the picture. I am really hopeful that it turns out beautifully!!

And this grey monstrosity of Kat's is GOING to turn out beautiful, I just have a feeling. The plate is so cool and this glaze is special so I think Katie really will love it!

Happy VD, yes I Made this.,,

Yes it is officially that Hearts a Flutter Day known as Valentine's Day. The Day the Man invented to get you to shell out more money on cards and candy, just because he could. Do I like candy? Yes. Do I like the fuzzy pj pants my parents gave me that are white with hearts and rainbows on them? Why...yes. Still, as I have no real Valentine, unless you include Max, I CAN harp that the holiday is just silly. Even if it is a sweet holiday...in every way!LOL!

Anyway, I decided to share with you the VD card I designed for my Illustration class. Hand painted, even those tinyyyyyy letters. Please to "get my card" you HAVE to CLICK on the picture!! Please, do so now. I will wait.


You like? I like! Okay, just in case any of you are really having a ...bad night (see I was kind as it is Valentine's Day), this is what the "chinese" says if you look sideways. Die you freakin' jerk. Heehee! I love it! My sister Sam, when she was a senior in high school, asked if she could scan it and make copies for her friends, and she did! I thought that was awesome! LOL!

And I also decided, after I painted it, that the VD could also stand for Vinereal Disease. LOL! I mean it could work for either I think. I was inspired with the chinese saying part by searching for hours the web for an idea of what kind of card to do, so I can't take complete credit for that idea, but the rest, all mine. Including it being a VD card. I find it tasteful and honest. Refreshing if you will, LOL.

I was really proud of this, especially the shading on the inside (right hand half) of the card, that goes from completely black to completely red. I do love acrylics...too bad the brand I love is not so cheap. It is not BAD, I mean I have seen WAY worse...prices I mean. I like Liquitex (I think that's it) and Golden is not bad, but it starts to go up there in price. That is art classes though. My color class, where all we used were paints, brushes and paper supplies? Over $300 just for supplies, the class of course was way more. Maybe at that time it might have been 700 - 800 bucks, so a thousand at least for one class...but I LOVED it! I even took it again a few years later, luckily I had most of the supplies still, just needed more paints in certain colors. Sorry I may be rambling!!

Watched my Christmas copy of Prince Caspian (uh hello, Chronicles of Narnia) with the whole fam tonight, that never happens. And it just upset me again that Susan and Peter won't be in the next one, which they ARE making as we speak. If they made the last of the 7 books as the one after that, I would be happy. I know things now from a website that make me happier with how it all ends. And man, who knew people saw that much christianity in these books, I never thought of it until I saw it on wickipedia!!

My ABC soaps didn't tape today...*sniffle*....I can get GH online at ABC.com but not AMC or OLTL, and they looked SO good....it is cliffhanger FRIDAY!! *sobs* Okay I am trying to gain my composure back.

Ornaments and some Christmam-y-ness

Yes this is our tree this year. We went with blue tinsel this year. My Mom made the...thing that goes around the bottom!!LOL!

These are some of my FAVE Christmas ornaments! And ones I put up EVERY year! All pics are clickable.

This is the Koala Bear, celebrating our pride in being Australian. It must be from my Grandma, because I don't remember NOT putting this up, and she LOVED koala bears being FROM there.

My Mom made special ornaments a few years ago for her Gifts from the Heart. Knowing how I feel and felt about Grandpa, she made it with one of my fave pics of the 2 of us when I was younger. That big headed doll is Huggins, my Hugga-Bunch doll, I have her in my hope chest.

I just love this one BECAUSE. I love the glass bubble, it shows different colors in the light, and it makes me remember Grandpa's cherry cigar tobacco.

My Mom made these a different year for Gifts of the heart. We each got an ornament with a picture of us with Max, we adore him THAT much. Another year she got us return address labels with his pic on them! I LOVE mine...and have rarely used them, so precious!

Not the best pic, but it is Santa sleeping in an armchair, i just love this ornament. Last year his hook fell off but using scotch tape Sandy fixed him for me. :)

This is one of MANY of my Mom's hand-made decorations. The first few years after marrying Dad she made all sorts of different ones. She WAS a seamstress, so they are cute! She made mice and Frosty and Santa and Mrs. Claus,etc. Some look pretty bad now....4 kids! But they are treasured!!

This I think I made in Primary when I was 4. It is my thumbprint turned into a Santa face.Go Awwww, LOL.

I had talked about how 1 year I painted plaster statues for the fam and except for 1 statue, no I did not go look for them and take pics. I did take pics of some of the Christmas ones I have done. We used to have a craft store that carried these bigger ones every year, for reasonable prices too, and most light up too. But then they closed and for that one year I did special ones, I had to send away for them. Expensive AND they did not include paints. Luckily I have acrylics and bought some of the glaze stuff to set them ( I hope forever!!Eeeesh!). So here are some of my Christmas statues I have painted.

This one is againt the wall of the mantle, it has a light that makes it look like the room is lit up. The reindeer were so bloody hard, since I painted the SNOW first...aye the brown got everywhere....thank goodness for touch-ups!

This Santa light up too, though my Mom just like him sitting there now. This one is 3 dimensional, as are the rest, so it goes all the way around, it was fun to paint because there are a dog and a cat hiding behind the tree.

Ehh not the best photo. It has a warm light to make it look hot inside the gingerbread house but my Mom prefers it as a statue. My fave part is the faux hershey kisses on top.Mmmm.

This is Frosty, yes he CAN have a light, Mom likes him on the dining room table though.

This WAS a Gift from the Heart. The Snowman heating his rump...yes the candle is missing, must put one in the groove that is there. He was my G.O.T.Hear for my Mom that year. Underneath is the special message just for her.

This is a closeup of his rear so you can SEE I made his bum pinkish and toasty, LOL!


One year I handpainted these ornaments, but never made them into actual hanging ornaments, so Mom uses the ones I felt turned out nice, like Santa up there, and puts them in our curio cabinet.

What about your houses, what decorations or ornaments are your faves? We are VERY decked out. We have decorations from the :

VERY OLD (this was Pop's my Mom's Dad)

To the VERY dear (My Mom made this Advent calendar, and I don't remember ever having Christmas without it!)

To newer loved decorations we can grow attached to in the years to come! My Mom made the stocking, replacing the ones she made when we were all born. I have my older one hanging in my room, I am that attached. Of course the stockings can't go here this year. :( The new pellet stove sticking OUT of the fireplace makes it a hazzard. And there is poinsetts with evergreen garland lights up this year, otherwise, exactly the same!

* Please do not steal any of the home-made designs/ideas. I would hate to regret sharing them with you, especially my Mom's designs, only to have a cherished idea stolen without permission! Please.

NOOOO It is Back!

They ARE bringing it back. The Church Nativity Walk. Why is it called walk, when all you do is have People's Nativity's all over the gym on tables...I dunno...uh you walk over to them maybe...but it is SO boring and this has REPLACED our Ward Christmas party!! All you do is for the three nights it is open is you go and LOOK at Nativity's. No food, no fun anything. Just bring non-Mormon friends and LOOK. and then leave.

So I got roped in last year to do a Mural. I did NOT volunteer, I was emailed and ASKED...and did I say NO, like I wanted to? No. I made sketches up and let Beth pick the one she felt most went along with her ideas, as the Ward...uhhh....crap...Activity Director!! Knew I'd remember! So she picked the one and told me, it would be QUITE large, I'd get paint and it was on sheet rock that someone was building to be standing. And I told her my requirements, I wanted them on plastic, so I wouldn't ruin church property, and I wanted them at the church by THIS date so I had time to paint this HUGE thing. She assured me she had paint,etc.

So I get to the church with a couple of family members, and first, I find it on the stage, the carpeted stage. I said ON the gym floor, as it is wood and easier for me to work on. And was it ON plastic? Nope, had to do that ourselves. Was it free standing? Nope, they NEVER did that, it was all leaning against the walls. And my paint...was housepaint, which wouldn't have been so bad, if not for the fact that it was ancient paint, most were rusted closed, and couldn't be used, they would have HARMED me and any family member I had helping me on a particular day. So we had to go through 75 cans of paint to find out WHAT colors they were, and if we could USE them, and how much was in each bucket. Sam helped me with this it took hours. AND was it nice smooth flat sheet rock, as PROMISED? Of course NOT! Why be correct about even ONE thing. No I was very upset and dismayed to see it was particle board. VERY textured, so very hard to paint on, and get in ALL the grooves and crannies. And as I knew I was going to be using my hands for blending...was going to be very scary painting-wise. SO we left for the night.

I returned a few days later with Sam and Mom, and sketched it out onto the particle board with charcoal, I needed to know where the lines were. And that took forever, Boy was I really sorry I had gotten hoodwinked into this. I was ready to lose it. And so I got OCD, and knew I wanted it done ASAP. Mom and Sandy helped me one night, the basic layers and basic colors for the sand and rocks and trees. One day I went over and Katie showed up a few hours later and helped me do the buildings which was just in black except for the windopws but took hours and hours. Then I went over again, and my Dad was like don't, go another day, RELAX. But I was miserable!! I HATED this, I was SO unhappy, the painting, even the basic stuff was taking multiple coats because of all the nooks and crannies needing to be filled. And this was going to LOOK GOOD. I was not going to have people say Wendy did that at church and it look crappy, so every NOOK had to be FILLED!

So I went over by myself, time to work on the sky and make sure it all looked right. I had used my hand only a little for blending so far, so I had not really experienced how my hands would be treated. I started to mix the paints, I needed about 6 shades of blue from light blue to a very dark blue to achieve what my goal was. Over the city the lights of the sky would be a light blue, from all the city lights but as you went further out, into the dessert I wanted the sky to look normal, so DARK. So I was finishing up making all these colors/hues with this crappy house paints I had been given, when I hear a knock on the glass doors down the hallway. I left the stage and went out into the hall and saw....my Dad! Not an artistic bone in his body but he was there ready to be the next paint slave!! So I drew lines of where he should paint a blue and then when he was done I drew another line, and while he was on to the next shade of blue, I started using my hands to blend the colors so it would look like a gradual transition from light to dark.

OW!!! I was worried and I was right to worry, As I swirled and squished the paint, the particle board stabbed me over and over again. As I blended it BIT me. And I LOVE using my hands. My Dad could put up the initial paint, but I had all the buckets and pans available so I could get the paint to really blend. That means bare hands into buckets, coating them in paint so I could really work the colors in...and really working them in was ripping my hands! Owwww!! Even when it didn't puncture it still scratched and felt like little stabs.

So after that I had some touch ups and I was done...and happy...with IT, not the experience. Then we had to clean up, which took forever. My Dad went down the street and brought us back McD's. And we gathered all my supplies together and finally LEFT, DONE. I contacted Beth and reminded her, that as she had said this was to be used year AFTER year, she had to have it sprayed with a product to lock the paint in. And I told her to do it OUTSIDE as it is powerful stuff. She SAID she would have the missionairies do it...did she? EVER? No, so I have NO idea what shape my mural is in now. Which will be a shame (I am downplaying my anger) because everyone said they loved it, which made me feel nice. But here is one thing...if they asked me AGAIN? NEVER. NEVER EVER EVER again, will I make them a Christmas mural. That might make me a bad girl but I don't care! They LIED to me about everything. And this was SO stressful, even with the help of my family as paint slaves, they so did NOT enjoy putting the base colors on...especially when they dripped (old BAD paint people!) and they KNEW I would make them fix it. So here is my "labour of love"....never again.