Both Wes and Madison got their report cards today and both of them got almost straight A’s with a couple of B+’s thrown in. (Nothing lower than a B+. Wes got more A’s than Madison.)

This is typical for them, so I wasn’t really surprised, although I was glad to see that Madison’s finally starting to improve on doing homework. Every report card she’s had since grade 2 has always been good, but the teachers always say she needs to work on getting her homework done or handed in on time. This is the 2nd report card in a row where the teacher didn’t say that, so yay Madison!

Also enclosed with both of their report cards was a yellow letter that says:

Dear Parents/Guardians,

This is an invitation to attend the Principal’s Achievement Assembly. Your child is on the Principal’s Achievement list this term and will be receiving a certificate of achievement on March 26, 2010. To get on the list students must score a total of 24 or better on the Learning Skills portion of their Report Card. Due to a large number of students on the list (260) [note: out of about 800 kids] we are having two assemblies.

Gr. 1-3 at 9:00am
Gr. 4-8 at 9:45am

Parents/Guardians are invited to attend. I look forward to seeing you there.

Sincerely,
Principal

I realize that a lot of kids are getting this award, but it’s still cool that both of my kids are among them. In fact, it seems that every time there’s any kind of award at school, one or both of them gets one, so in case it isn’t clear, I’m totally proud of them for always doing their best. I think it’s great that the school has awards like these so kids continue to do their best and to maybe push the ones who aren’t to do better. (Or maybe these awards are totally heinous and only make the kids who don’t get them feel bad…that’s an idea to consider too, I suppose.)

Either way, they did awesome, because they are awesome.

Oh procrastination, definitely my best skill. Right now I’m supposed to be writing an article on what it was like being raised by a teen mom for Buttercup but instead I’m sitting here listening to music and contemplating a full day of Dragon Age Origins.

The last few days have been phenomenal for me. First, on Sunday my country won gold for hockey and the game was unbelievable, one of the greatest games I’ve ever seen in my entire life. I told Blake at the beginning of the Olympics that if Canada’s men took gold, he wouldn’t be able to stop me from ordering myself a Team Canada jersey, which I’ve always wanted. So, minutes after Sidney Crosby scored the final goal in overtime that gave Canada the win, I whipped out my credit card and ordered my Team Canada jersey. I wanted a medium, which is the same size as my Leafs jersey, but Blake wanted to be able to wear it too so I got a large.

Then on Monday, it was my birthday, which was pretty low-key. Blake got me Y the Last Man books 6, 7 and 8, so I spent the day reading those and eating half of a McCain’s chocolate cake. (I also did a show that afternoon, which is available in the archives, although it’s nothing spectacular.) My mom sent me a card in the mail with a $25 gift card to Michael’s (an art supply store) and on his way home, Blake asked me what I wanted for my birthday dinner, but I felt too sick to eat anything (I’m just getting over a stomach flu) so I told him I’d take a raincheque on that for another night. And that was pretty much my whole birthday.

But then YESTERDAY was like, an extension of my birthday where many good things happened. It started off not so good, as I was awoken by my dogs freaking out because someone was knocking at the door. I tried to ignore them but they kept freaking out so I got up and by the time I did, whoever was knocking was gone and there was a DHL post-it on the door saying that they’d try again tomorrow (today) to make their delivery. Since DHL is an international shipping company, I knew the package they were delivering was contraband from Cuba that our friend Drew had sent to us when he was on vacation there since he couldn’t send Cuban stuff to his home in MI. I signed the post-it saying that they could leave the package at the door and stuck it back on the door and put one of the large magnets we have on our door so it wouldn’t blow away.

After that, my neighbours called and asked me to come over, so I did and we sat & chatted for a couple of hours. They gave me a birthday card with a scratch off ticket inside for my birthday and that was cool. Then I came back home and made myself eggs and watched the movie Private Benjamin, which I’d never seen before and now that I’ve seen it, I cannot for the life of me figure out how or why Goldie Hawn won an OSCAR for that role because she was as Goldie as she’s ever been in any other movie I’ve ever seen her in. It must have been a slow year that year.

While I watched the movie, I renewed a couple of domains I own and registered a new one (my youngest sister’s name), and then I put in my order with Vesey’s for the seeds for the veggie garden we’re going to have this year. Our house came with a veggie garden already “built” in the backyard that’s about 14 feet by maybe 6 or 7 feet and bordered by railway ties. I ordered Royal Burgundy Beans, which are a bush bean that is purple, but when you cook them, they turn green and for that reason, they’re a big hit with the kids. I also ordered napoli carrots, thunder cucumbers, simpson elite leaf lettuce, parade green onions, super sugar snap peas, fat & sassy green peppers, purple star peppers (that are sweet peppers that are PURPLE and look lovely in salads), bobcat tomatoes and sugary cherry tomatoes. Truth be told, I’m not sure the garden’s big enough for all of that stuff, but I’ve never had a veggie garden before so I’m kind of going by trial & error. Mostly I’m worried about the cucumbers because I think vines need a lot of room to grow, but I figure if I plant them along the top of the garden they can drape over the 3 feet of lawn between the garden and the house and we just won’t mow there or we’ll move the vines when we mow and then put them back. And as I do every year, the whole gardening experience will be documented on my site.

After I ordered the veggie seeds, the movie was over and I took a nap which I was rudely awakened from by the dogs freaking out again because my kids were talking to other kids in our driveway.

When I finally got out of bed, after the kids had come inside, there was an Amazon package sitting on my desk that Madison told me had been sitting against the front door when they came home. So I opened it and inside was all kinds of birthday presents from a friend, including Dragon Age Origins which I’ve been wanting to play since it was released.

After I opened the Amazon package, I sent a thank you to the person who sent all of it and after it was sent and my browser came back to my inbox, there was an e-mail from Vancouver 2010 telling me that my Team Canada jersey had shipped and that it should be here in a few days. Score!

Shortly after that, Blake called me on his way home and I asked him if I could have my belated birthday dinner and he said yes, so I asked him to bring me home an assorted sub from Mr. Sub, because I had full intentions of installing Dragon Age as soon as I got off the phone with him and a sub is an easy meal to eat at the computer. See? Always thinkin’ ahead.

Well, I got distracted by Madison, who had sprained her toe and required drugs because she was in pain. Her toe looked horrific, it was so purple it was almost black, but she could move it, so at least it wasn’t broken. She said she sprained it when she fell at recess. Soooooo I drugged her and she went to bed.

Then Blake came home and I began installing Dragon Age, which I played for about 5 hours and then I went to bed.

Annnnnnnnnd now you’re up to date with the past couple of days of my life. :o)

Yesterday while I was in bed wanting to die due to this stomach flu/codeine withdrawal combo I’ve got going, Blake took the kids to my mom’s boyfriend’s cottage for a day of skating on the lake. John (my mom’s boyfriend) was nice enough to send them home with pictures and here they are. :o)

My mom drinkin’ & skatin’.

My mom & Madison.

My mom & Wes.

Chris (John’s son), Wes & my mom.

Blake, Wes & my mom.

Madison & Wes haz a bucket.

Madison & Wes

Chris & Wes

…………..

Blake, Chris, John, my mom, Wes & Madison

THE END.

Last night Judy watched the kids and we spent 2 grueling hours in a packed Wal*Mart doing the bulk of our Xmas shopping. This year I/we decided fuck it, if you’re a grown up who can buy your own crap, I’m not even gonna bother hazarding a guess as to what you DON’T already have, so (and hopefully none of them are reading this, but I guess it doesn’t matter much if they are) all grown ups in our lives are getting pictures of the kids and gift certificates. Blake got almost all of the gift certificates yesterday on his lunch and only has one more to get today and then we are DONE.

Today Madison and I are going to clean the bathroom, then tomorrow after work Blake is going to vacuum and then my house will be presentable enough for when my mom, her boyfriend John and his son Chris come over to have Xmas with us on Boxing Day. I didn’t get John or Chris anything for Xmas because my mom basically told me not to, which was a great relief because we’re in the poorhouse as it is and my poor Visa is dangerously close to its limit. We decided not to defer our mortgage payment this month, but instead do all of our Xmas shopping on Visa and pay it off when Blake gets his bonus in March. If anything comes up between now & then, like say the car blows up, then we can defer a mortgage payment if need be and have it taken care of.  Now that we’re done our Xmas shopping, the only “big ticket item” we have to worry about is getting all of the animals their shots in January and then getting their township tags.

After we got home from Wal*Mart, Blake made a great steak dinner that I couldn’t eat because right now I’m pretty fucking sick and the only thing keeping me sane is Advil Cold & Sinus. I thought it was just a cold when it hit me on Friday but I’ve had a fever off & on all weekend and yesterday, my whole body aches etc. so I’m putting it more in the flu category. I am SO SCARED to get any of these friggin’ kids sick (ours + Courtney) that I reek of hand sanitizer and there have been no bedtime hugs. I just do not want to deal with 3 sick kids during the 2 & a half week holiday break, especially not if I’m sick myself.  I feel really bad that I felt too bad to eat the dinner Blake made us last night. :o/

We (well he) ate while we watched the Leafs vs Sabres game I started recording while we were at Wal*Mart and when food was done, I got started on wrapping presents. We got Madison this cute makeup bag that’s turquoise patent leather and her first set of makeup. I went way way way overboard in hooking her up with a good variety of stuff (like 6 bottles of nail polish, 3 compacts of eyeshadow…) and I wrapped each thing individually and put it in the bag, with cotton balls on top, zipped it up, then put the bag in a box and then we wrapped the box up. Annoyingly, Blake left a bag on my chair this morning with my hoodie over it which contained makeup removing facewash and mascara that should have gone in the bag with everything else, but I thought all of the cosmetic type stuff was in the bag I was wrapping from…soooooo I wrapped up the mascara & taped it to the box and the facewash I’ll just put in her stocking or something.

And that’s all I got wrapped last night because rapping all of those teeny tiny things took me the entire hockey game and when it was done I was exhausted so I just went to bed. What kills me about wrapping presents is how bad I suck at it. I make all these cute little girls with cute little paper dresses and I’m a whiz with scissors etc. but when I wrap presents, it looks like it was done by Wes. In fact Wes probably does a better job than I do. That’s why every year I usually get Blake to do all the wrapping but this year there won’t be enough time for that so I have to pitch in. While we were at Wal*Mart I bought gift boxes so at least some stuff I won’t have to wrap.

The next thing on my blogging agenda is that my cat is fucking retarded. Every single year for Xmas I buy her a treat or a toy and every single year she wants no part of it. Last year it was a laser pointer, she wanted nothing to do with it. The year before that a mouse or something, I can’t remember but she didn’t want anything to do with it. The year before that I bought her like, 5 different kinds of cat treats but she wouldn’t eat any of them. She just likes her cat food and that’s it. A few weeks ago someone on Facebook linked a YouTube video of all these cats getting stoned on catnip in a garden and I thought HEY WE SHOULD TRY THAT because I’ve never seen a cat actually high on catnip before. So last night, I bought some and it came with a little heart-shaped toy to put the dry catnip in. So I filled it up and got the cat and got her to sniff it and…she wanted no part of it. The toy then split apart and I spilled dry catnip all over my office floor so I picked a bit up and got her to sniff it and no dice. I thought maybe, just maybe, after we went to sleep she’d start getting all stoned on the pile which I left on my office floor for her but when I woke up this morning, it was undisturbed. So I give up. The cat no longer gets anything for Xmas and I guess Alex’s cats have a new toy and a big bag of catnip. Someone remind me next year that my cat sucks and not to get her anything because I know I’ll forget (or maybe it’s denial).

Blake & I weren’t going to get each other anything for Xmas this year due to money, but when we were at Wal*Mart I picked myself up some makeup because I’m running low on the essentials and this was an excuse to replenish my stock. We also happened to be going down the aisle with all the sports stuff and Blake pointed out Leafs jerseys….that were PINK & WHITE. Obviously not regulation, being pink & white, but NHL sanctioned and so Blake got me one for Xmas and I got him a Leafs home jersey (not regulation either). One day I will have a regulation Leafs home jersey to go along with my Leafs 3rd jersey but since they’re over $100, we’ll make due with Wal*Mart jerseys for now.

The rest of the stuff we got was mostly odds & ends, like I was out of incense so I picked up a bunch of that and I wanted to get a plastic “boot mat” for under the dogs’ bowls because they make such a mess and there’s constantly dog food all over my kitchen. (Lucky eats laying down and if Hoover’s eating too, Lucky will pick up his bowl and eat in the living room.) I also wanted to get Madison some yarn because I know she’s getting crochet hooks for Xmas and books about how to crochet, so we picked up a bunch of that too. She also needed pajamas and bras so those went in the cart as well.

We didn’t really get anything for Wes at Wal*Mart because Blake had gotten him stuff at Toys ‘R’ Us yesterday afternoon (Lego, some plastic dragons, I forget what else), but we did pick him up Lego Batman for his DS and Blake had already gotten him a few pairs of pajamas and some clothes so he’s good.

We got my 4 year old sister Raili some Barbies and my 10 month old sister Rachael a set of Little People. We got Courtney next door a DS game of Deal or No Deal. What else? I don’t even remember and you probably don’t care anyway. Long story short, after Blake picks up a couple of things on his lunch today, we are done our Xmas shopping completely. I plan on spending all afternoon today and tomorrow wrapping things and getting the house clean and after that we should be good to go.

Blake called my dad on Sunday and asked him to clean up the garage for the dogs, which he said he’d do and that takes a lot off my mind. What do the dogs get for Xmas? Well my dad hunts and I’m not sure what he hunted for this year, but usually it’s deer and moose and occasionally bear but whatever he hunted for in the fall, he gets the butcher to save him some of the bigger bones for his dogs and mine to have at Xmas.

I also have children’s Gravol to give the dogs before we leave so they don’t puke in the car on the way up. (And yes we called the vet and yes you can give dogs half of a children’s Gravol if they’re the size of mine.)

So I guess that’s it, we’re on track for Xmas. I had more to say but I think I’ll just end things here and start wrapping presents.

I worry, a lot, about the fact that I no longer seem to see the world with the same magic glasses I’ve worn my whole entire life. Not too long ago, I could take day to day situations and make them spectacular, because to me they were spectacular, and share them with the world via this blog, but ever since my meds have become stable, that scenario has become a rarity. Or maybe it’s because I turned 30. It’s hard to say because the two events sort of happened around the same time.

But I miss it because it’s always been a part of me. I often sit outside, usually because I’ve taken up smoking again, but often just to sit outside in the sun because I don’t like my lightbox, and I think about how I see the world now versus how I used to see the world before. Now I see hard reality, I see what’s actually there, whereas before I saw the potential in everything, what could be there.

When we moved to this town I was ecstatic because it had so much potential. I loved that it only had 1700 people and that it had a downtown core reminiscent of another once small town outside of a big city called Unionville. (And yes, I know I’ve written about this before.) See, Unionville was this little village built around the same time as this one (mid-1800s, if not earlier) and as the city of Markham expanded, Unionville became this little boutique town full of art galleries, cafes and antique shops – or at least its downtown core did.

With Elmvale being so close to Barrie and Barrie being the ever-expanding metropolis it is, I envisioned a similar scenario here, especially after we’d already moved here and our neighbour on the right told us that they were going to be building a subdivision of 300 brand new, $250k+ houses right across the road from us. As Barrie expands and creates more jobs, more people are wanting to move to Elmvale and that’s the same thing that happened with Unionville.

But here we are 4 years later and now when I look at Elmvale’s downtown core, all I see is a dead village because that’s what’s there. No longer do I see the potential, I see the reality. As I’ve mentioned before, half the downtown shops are empty or uncared about, the restaurants leave something to be desired, we’re only a town of 1700 but we have 4 big name fast food chains and a Wal*Mart up the road…pretty much the only thing about this town reminiscent of Unionville is the organic food store which I’ve never been in and I constantly wonder how the guy stays in business. The dollar store here is abysmal with the lowest stock of any dollar store I’ve ever seen, we have one clothing store by a woman who makes all her own designs but they’re designs for heavier set 40+ year old women, not exactly high fashion and I too, wonder how this woman stays in business. We have one gift boutique-y type shop but I’ve never been inside and from what the kids tell me, it’s mostly stuff made in China. There’s an art studio downtown that, from looking in the windows, appears to be occupied by a potter but it’s never open and I don’t think it’s ever going to be open to the public. Another artist works out of that same studio, Blake actually found her on Etsy, but I can’t remember her name. She makes really expensive beaded broaches, or at least that’s what she had in her Etsy shop.

I guess the potential’s still there, it’s just not as easy for me to see it because I’m either medicated up to the tits (which I am) or I’m old and jaded (which I am).

Blake was interviewed on the phone this week for a new position within his company and from what I understand, they’re fine with remote work so he’d theoretically be making more money and would have a more secure job, but we’d still be stuck here. He’s applied for another job within the company which is basically the same scenario but more money than the first. He’ll find out Dec. 8th if he’s made the short list for that one.

So, it looks like we’ll be staying here for a while longer and I have to kiss my dream house with its studio and our dream town goodbye. Really, it’s bittersweet. The hassle of getting our house ready to sell and then selling within a timeline feasible for buying another house made me really nervous because I don’t know how to do that, so I’m glad we probably won’t have to do that now. I really hate my house, though. It’s small, dumpy and needs a whole hell of a lot of work that neither of us know how to do. All of our bedrooms are impossibly small, we only have one tiny bathroom, I have hardly any room for my art, even though I have a whole room to myself to do it in, because the furnace, elliptical and a futon are in here and this is where the grown ups hang out. I’m glad we won’t have to leave Wayne & Judy because I really do love them, but with the way things are going with them financially…I’m not sure we’re going to be neighbours for very long anyway.

But I’m trying so hard to access my power of seeing potential to see the positive in this. More money and the same commute means that we’ll have money to fix this house up. It means I can get my dad to build my built-in bookshelves in this room and get him to lay the new carpet and re-trim the whole room. It means I can paint my studio how I want to. It means we have time to go slow and do a project at a time so when it comes time to sell this place, everything’s ready. It means I won’t have to sod over my garden right away.

It means that I won’t have to find a new doctor after I’ve finally gotten this one to work with me as far as pain management. It means I won’t have to find a new dentist after getting this one to understand that I’m seriously terrified of dental work so he drugs me up a little extra so it won’t be so scary. It means that the pharmacy is still going to know who I am and will continue to spot me a weekend’s worth of drugs when I forget to call my shrink to renew my prescriptions. It means that the ladies at the blood clinic will continue to remember who I am, that I’m terrified of blood tests and they’ll continue using the needles they use on babies to take my blood. It means that if one of the kids is sick at school, Judy’s still just a phone call away at work and can come get them and bring them home.

It means that things will remain the same but with a few minor improvements and I guess I can’t really complain about that. I just really really really wanted to move. :o/ There’s nothing in this town for me, I’ll never drive here and will be forever dependent on Blake to get anywhere, and Cookstown had so much more to offer. But the thing is, and I told Blake this a long time ago, I’m only moving one more time. It’s either the house we’re going to be in for the rest of our lives or nothing. With Blake continuing to work in Barrie there’s no point in trying to upgrade to a nicer house in this town because it won’t be our forever home because his “forever job” will probably be in Scarborough after he moves up from either of the positions he’s applied for.

I guess I should be thankful that in this economy he has a job at all and maybe it sounds like I’m whining here, I’m just tired of feeling like we’re in limbo. I hate not having a plan. In the beginning, when we moved here, we had intentions of staying in this house for 5 years tops and this July, it’ll be 5 years. My feet are getting itchy and I’m way less in love with this town than I was in the beginning because it’s become quite apparent that it’ll never be what I envisioned it would become.

So I guess it’s time to try and put my magic glasses back on and seek out the magic that was once here. Easier said than done.

So Judy’s surprise party was a roaring success despite a few glitches.

As I mentioned, Judy has an infected tooth (more like an abscess) so she came home from work at around 10:30am and went to the doctor who prescribed her antibiotics because she couldn’t get in to see the dentist today. She was supposed to work until 3pm and then go to Wal*Mart shopping, where she’d meet Wayne and they’d do some more shopping until about 5/5:30pm.

So she was home all day and we couldn’t get started on decorating until 3:15pm when she left to go to Wal*Mart! But, that ended up being plenty of time to get everything done and by the time they got home from Wal*Mart, we had all the lights off and we did the “SUPRISE!” thing and she was definitely surprised.

This is the cake that Madison and Courtney (Judy’s 9 year old daughter) made for her this afternoon:

Ashley, Judy’s 23-ish year old daughter who’s currently pregnant with her first child and her baby daddy came up from Toronto too, then there were the three kids from up the street, Madison, Wes, me, Blake and of course Wayne & Judy, so it was a full house. Wayne had bought chicken wings to go with the lasagna Mikayla’s mom made and he also brought home this “3rd degree” hot sauce for them, which is like, industrial strength hot sauce that the deli at his work (he works at a grocery store) uses on their take-out wings.

I didn’t have any because I don’t like chicken wings or spicy stuff, but the stuff was so hot that Ashley couldn’t even finish three wings and Blake & Wayne were practically crying as they ate theirs, which was followed up by a great deal of beer.

Blake had mentioned earlier that he rarely walks away from a dare and somehow Ashley dared him to drink two shot glasses full of this hot sauce…which he did because he’s an idiot. Here’s the proof:

After the hot sauce was down the hatch, Blake pretty much downed an entire can of Coke Zero and about an hour later, he went outside and barfed three times between Judy’s house and ours…because he’s an idiot. After that he felt much better though and when we went back to Wayne & Judy’s, he consumed more wings with hot sauce. During that time, I actually came home and had a nap for about an hour & a half because I’m currently taking an assload of pain medication and it was making me sleepy.

Between Blake barfing and me having a nap, the cake was served:

After that, we just sat around and shot the shit and long story short, a good time was had by all, especially Judy who sampled some of my pain meds because of her tooth and washed them down with a hell of a lot of beer. And that was pretty much our day.

THE END.

Obsessed I tell ya!
This is what I spent my evening doing, while talking to Ronny & Alex.

Once these are dry I’ll mix glitter paint with glazing liquid and water and do a heavy coat of that on each card, then it’ll be time to start working on the girls which I have a feeling is going to take foreveeeeeeeer but I think it’ll be fun.

I won’t have time to work on the cards tomorrow as we’ll be busy setting everything up for Judy’s surprise party. In the morning, when Courtney (her 8 year old daughter) comes over because it’s a PA day and I look after her when there’s no school, Blake’s going to help her and Madison make Judy’s cake and then he’s going to start blowing up the balloons while Madison cuts metallic purple ribbons for each one. When the cake’s done we’re going to go over to Judy’s house to start decorating. Madison bought green and purple streamers (Judy’s favourite colours) and she already has two garbage bags full of blown up balloons, so those, along with the ones I bought, are going to be taped to the ceiling in the kitchen and living room so they look like helium balloons with their ribbons hanging down. We did this for Madison’s 4th birthday (except we filled the balloons with heart-shaped glitter and gave my cousin Haylie a pin ;o)). Madison’s also been busy all week making frog-themed decorations, which she’s going to tape up all over the living room.

As far as presents…I got Judy a box of hair dye and a pack of three lip balms and a birthday card that’s sort of cheesy but has a recipe on the inside which I think she’ll like because cooking and baking are her favourite things to do. Madison sewed her a stuffed frog. Courtney got her a plant and Alyssa, one of the kids down the street, got her two frog birthday cards to be from all the kids and she also got her a set of three ceramic frogs that are really cute. (Did I mention Judy collects frogs?)

I think I mentioned this already, but last Saturday Courtney’s best friend Mikayla (which I’m probably spelling wrong) and her mom took Madison to the dollar store in Barrie to buy the streamers and decorations for the cake, as well as the cake mix and icing. Then they went back to Mikayla’s house and they all made Judy a lasagna which is thawing in my fridge right now. Unfortunately Mikayla and her mom (whose name I believe is Sharon, I’ve only met her once and wasn’t introduced) can’t come to the party because the husband has the car that day and they’re homebound. I was going to talk to Blake about maybe calling and offering to come get them and drive them home afterward, but with everything going on and the fact that we need his help because he’s the only one tall enough to do the streamers and balloons, I’m not sure that’s going to be possible. It was really really nice of her to do all that though, making the lasagna and everything. I’ve tried calling her to thank her (and get directions for heating up the lasagna) but I keep getting their answering machine.

What sucks is that tonight at about 10:30 Judy called our house saying that she had a really bad tooth ache and she wanted the number for our dentist to see if she could have the tooth pulled tomorrow. That means that there’s a very good chance she’ll walk in as we’re getting the house ready, which I’m worried about. :o/ All of the kids have worked so hard on this party and they’re so excited that it’s a surprise and she has no idea that it would really suck if the surprise was ruined. There’s not much we can do about it though, so we’re just going to go ahead as planned.

But how much does that suck, having to get a tooth pulled on your birthday? And the worst part is that they don’t have dental insurance so they’re going to have to pay out of pocket when they’re already struggling financially. :o/ As Blake said though, at least we’re doing something positive that she can enjoy even though that aspect of her birthday is going to suck.(And hey, I have like, a metric fuck tonne of painkillers, so I can get her all high and she won’t even think about her tooth if need be.)

After we have the lasagna and do the cake and presents, we figure the kids are going to wander off to play and that’s when we’re going to bust out the cards to play Judy’s favourite game: euchre. I was talking to Wayne today and even though he has to work the next day, he says he’s up for staying up late to play with us (Judy has Saturday off so she can sleep in or have a nap).

All in all, I think it’s going to be a good day for her and godammit, she deserves it too. She sacrifices so much for her family and goes without constantly, which is why the kids all wanted to do this for her. On the weekends, when she’s off from work, she invites all the kids over and bakes with them or plays cards with them and like, her door is ever revolving with neighbourhood kids. I think it’s awesome that the kids planned this and were that thoughtful. In fact, they started planning this 3 weeks ago (it was Madison’s idea) and Blake & I only even heard about it last week!

Anyway, tomorrow’s going to be a busy but good day and I hope Judy’s surprised. It really sucks about her tooth though, I’m worried about that. :o/

Well, I should probably stop writing now and get some sleep because there’s a lot of work  to be done tomorrow so I better not sleep ’til noon. Goodnight internets, I love you. <3

I love Blake being on vacation this week. Honest to god my favourite thing in the whole world is sitting around talking to him about anything and everything and that’s what we’ve been doing this week, mostly. It’s a long story, but right now he’s in Madison’s room having a talk with her about her little boyfriend Ashton, who’s been beating up grade 3 & 4 kids, including girls (he’s in grade 6) and how that’s not cool and that Madison either has to influence him to stop doing this or she has to break up with him. DRAMA! I have no idea how the talk’s going, but they’ve been in there for over an hour so far.

Report cards came home today. Wes got straight A’s, Madison had A’s, B’s and a C in math and somehow both kids are getting awards from the principal next week at a ceremony we’re supposed to attend. In fact because 250 kids are getting these awards, there are TWO ceremonies and each of our kids is in a different one so we’re literally going to be at the school all day. It’s nice that they’re getting awards and we want to be there to support them, but that’s a lot of sitting around watching a lot of other kids get awards too. Urg.

Blake & I were busy today. First, I was supposed to get a blood test this morning but Blake forgot about it and didn’t wake me up so it didn’t happen and we’re going to have to do it Thursday morning instead. (The lab’s only open Tuesday & Thursday mornings.) Then I got up and Blake was gone and the fucker didn’t leave me a note so I didn’t know where he was until he tweeted a TwitPic of a cutting board and a rolling pin, which was a clue that he was at Wal*Mart.

When he got home, we had breakfast and I took my pills and after a bit of digestion it was time to go to Barrie for art supplies and other errands. Since Marylin was curious about what I got and some other folks might be too, here’s the list:

Curry’s
- Two cheapo angled brushes, one smaller than the other
- One script liner because mine’s starting to lose its shape
- Two Micron Pigma archival markers, size 02
- 9 x 12 block of watercolour paper
- These neat little pre-cut blank ATC cards that were only $1.25 (I got the acrylic linen canvas one)

Michael’s
- Glorious Gold metallic paint
- Emperor’s Gold metallic paint
- Champagne Gold metallic paint
- Festive Red metallic paint x 2
- Gold glitter paint x 2
- Silver glitter paint x 2
- Red glitter paint x 2
- Weathered Wood crackle medium, 8 oz
- Triple Thick Gloss Glaze varnish, 8 oz
- Interior Gloss varnish
- Interior Satin varnish
- A metric fuck tonne of scrapbook paper & cardstock
- Green balloons and purple ribbon for Judy’s surprise party
- An archival Martha Stewart fine point pen

Exciting, no? Yeah, not really. Mostly I was replacing boring stuff I’ve either run out of or I’m about to run out of. I was on a pretty tight budget so there wasn’t any wiggle room for fibres or embellishments or fun stuff like that. Just the basics.

Since Starbucks is in the same plaza as Michael’s, we went there were I got a chocolate coffee (I dunno what they call their crap, I’ve never actually been IN a Starbucks) and Blake got some sort of caramel coffee with whipped cream and crunchy caramel things on top. While we drank our Starbucks, we went to Jiffy Lube to get the oil changed in the car, something I’ve never experienced before and it was BORING AS SHIT and after that we had to stop off at Blake’s work so he could check on something that ended up not being there but will be there tomorrow so despite being on vacation, he’s probably going to have to go in tomorrow to do whatever it is he has to do.

Then tomorrow night Blake has to go to the hospital for a sleep study because he has sleep apnea and our doctor wanted to send him in for another sleep study before recommending/prescribing a CPAC (??) machine or a mouth appliance.

And now we’re home with nothing planned for this evening other than watching V and perhaps me playing with ATCs. I also heard a rumour that I might be getting a massage later. Hmmm.

Anyway, that was my busy day. I know, it was riveting. Aren’t you glad I write this shit down for you?

Today something clicked in my head and I made a realization that was so funny to me I can’t stop mentally laughing at it. And I totally can’t even share what it is because I don’t want to bring any more attention to it than I already have. Long story short: jealousy can be a VERY funny thing that makes people behave like complete idiots and all you can really do is laugh about it.

And that’s all I’m going to say about that.

This afternoon I watched the movie Sunshine Cleaning, which was alright…kinda “meh”, and worked on the painting that’s been causing me so much grief. I’ve decided that it doesn’t have to be absolutely perfect and that I should just get it done because it’s blocking me from doing anything else and I’d really like to do something else. I’m determined to have it finished by the end of the weekend come Hell or high water.

While I was waiting for paint to dry I tried having a nap but when I laid my head down, all of these thoughts came rushing to me and I was unable to fall asleep. I have drugs for when that happens, which I took, but when I laid down again it was the same scenario so I just gave up and now here I am. The stupid part is that I don’t even really remember what most of the thoughts were or I’d be writing about them now. They were mostly working the logistics of this painting out in my head and the thing I mentioned in my first paragraph which has me SO FUCKING AMUSED, but it was like every 10 seconds a new, interesting thought would pop into my head and I was just completely unable to fall asleep. So I gave up even though I slept for crap last night and I’m really dragging my feet today.

Annnnnnd hopefully I’ll be up late tonight playing the new Sims 3 expansion I mentioned yesterday even though Blake’s attempts at finding a copy on his lunch break proved to be less than fruitful. I guess this thing’s selling out like crazy, it’s even sold out on Amazon.ca. There are still 3 other stores to check though, so hopefully I’ll have a copy tonight. If I don’t, no big deal, I just wanted to get a jump start on it so I can do everything in the game before I have to review it for Buttercup. I’ve been getting my family ready for the expansion for the last 2 weeks so everything’s in place, now all I need is the damn game.

My mother e-mailed me today and unfortunately she no longer has her For Better or For Worse books, so I guess Madison won’t be getting those for Xmas this year. I’m sure I can find them in a used book store easily enough, but there are other things I’d rather spend money on for her for Xmas so they’ll have to wait for another year or maybe for her birthday. AND GROSS, THE CHILDREN JUST MADE HOT DOGS AND NOW ALL I CAN SMELL IS WIENERS. *shudder*

Speaking of my mother though, she’s going to be on TV tomorrow on a show called “Daytime – York Region” on Rogers TV @ 11am (with repeats at 3pm and 5pm, I believe). I don’t get the channel she’ll be on so I won’t be able to see it tomorrow but my mom thinks they show clips on their website so if that’s the case, I’ll link it when it’s up and we can all see it. :o) And since I haven’t pimped my mom in a while, here’s her site, which doesn’t get updated as often as her Facebook group. Keep an eye out for her boyfriend, John’s, wicked windchimes and antique teapot birdhouses. In the new year, pending I get a copy of The Visual Quickstart Guide for Dreamweaver CS3 for Xmas, I’m hoping to get her site in better order to reflect what she’s been doing lately and to add John’s work as well. We haven’t really talked a whole lot about it, but I’ve procured a copy of Dreamweaver for this specific reason and I know she wants some things changed around, so that’s my project for the new year.

Annnnnnnd speaking of websites…I have sort of a dilemma and I’d like it if people felt free to weigh in. Recently I registered the domain “SunnylandStudio.com” and I’m not quite sure what to do with it. Should I just make it point to my current site and let that be that or should I make a new site that’s JUST dedicated to my art? The reason I ask is because say I send out a media kit to a gallery I’d like to sell my work and they come to my site on a day where I’m at war with my mother-in-law…that could end up being a good thing or a bad thing, but if they went to a site that’s just my art, it takes the possibility of it being a bad thing out of the equation. (Although I’d link to my “personal site” on the art site.) My only real issue in doing this is that for years I maintained separate sites for art, camming and business (copywriting) before and it really fucking sucked, so I’m not really all that gung ho to jump back into that unless there’s definitely a benefit in doing so. I’m also afraid that if I separate the two things, personal and professional, that the art site won’t get as much traffic and my art won’t be seen by as many people as I get now. So I don’t know what to do.

All I know is that in the spring I’m thinking that one of my goals is going to be trying to get my work into a couple of the local galleries here to see what happens. I’ve been reluctant to go the gallery route all these years because the bastards take 50% and I can’t afford to sell my painting for half of what I currently charge and in my opinion, they’re not worth double what I charge right now. However, the Ontario Arts Council grant that I’m not applying for this year may be a possibility next year or the year after and they’d like you to have some gallery exposure. People this summer warned me of the pitfalls of selling myself short just to “get my name out there” but it’s seeming more and more like that’s just part of the game. With the economy the way it is, I haven’t been doing so well with selling online, which traditionally I’ve never had a problem with, so I think it’s time to pursue other avenues in order to move forward with what little “career” I have. When I was looking at Barrie galleries last year, I found two that I thought would likely display my work no problem so let’s hope that they’re still around. (In this economy, there’s a very good chance that they aren’t. :o/)

So these are the thoughts rattling around in my head today. Maybe now that they’re “on paper” and I’m sending them out into the universe I can finally have a nap.