Hoover Dog uses my living room curtains as a blanket.
I think it’s partly the blanket factor, but also the heat register.

I love him so much.

Blake couldn’t get to work today because he wasn’t shoveling this shit at 6am and despite the sun, we have snowsquall warnings all day.

Btw, does anyone need a stove? It’s almond, 3/4 burners work. Oven sucks.
Any takers? You can see it on the bottom right-hand corner there…

Snow.

I wore Blake’s shoes because I didn’t want to get mine snowy.
Nice track pants, I know. I’m on the rag, fuck off.

That “valley” there? Yeah, that’s the sidewalk.

Down the street.
This is what the kids had to walk through to get to school this morning.
I bet it was a snow day, but they like going on snow days.

Out the back door.
The dogs made their path to the back of the yard but you can’t
really see it because of the sun so I asked them to show you…

Lucky like to just sit there and cool his asshole in the snow.
I don’t know why.

Anyway, this has been my snow post for 2011.
Not as impressive as other years, but this is what I’ve got.

Oh man, the last 4 days have been absolute chaos and I am relishing the little bit of sanity I’ve gained from sleeping in my own bed and getting back to work this morning, back to my house and my routine. With my dogs. With my TV, with my movies, with my family, without lipstick, wearing sweats and a t-shirt and a ponytail. Without being “on”, y’know? Thanks god this whole Xmas deal only happens once a year…

Might as well start at the beginning.

Xmas Eve day I got up at 7am so I could work from 8am-4pm and that way we’d be able to leave early enough to get up North to my dad and Lisa’s for dinner with my Uncle Paul (Lisa’s brother) and his awesome girlfriend Sandi. Also invited was their friend Timber and his girlfriend Terri and of course my little sisters, Raili (pronounced “Riley”, it’s Finnish) and Rachael would be running around like crazy people.

Sandi made the most delicious lasagna I’ve ever had. It had MUSHROOMS in it! I love mushrooms! Lisa also made us a fantastic caesar salad with real bacon in it from the pigs they raised over the summer. Blake’s salsa was a huge hit, Lisa and Sandi devoured it. There was also shrimp on the table but shrimp is gross so I didn’t have any.

Pictures of Xmas Eve exist, most notably ones of me, Lisa and Sandi, and if I don’t look like shit in them, I’ll edit this post and post one [here].

This is what I wore Xmas Eve.
It’s a sheer black, meshy dress/tank top trimmed with dark blue, worn over jeans.
It’s not a very good picture of it, but I tried.

Paul and Sandi got me a fluffy housecoat and got Madison a jewelry box full of jewelry, which she’s obsessed with so way to go Paul & Sandi! I forget what they got Blake. I think they got Wes a remote control car. We got them each a pair of wool socks, which probably sounds lame, but they’re really outdoorsy people (all of my Muskoka family is) and wool socks are a coveted item. We also got them a bottle of Bailey’s.

Before dinner, Lisa gave each of us one present and she got me this really badass notebook/journal that was handmade in India. It’s leather with a design and a tiger’s eye on the front of it and then hand-pressed cotton paper on the inside (and LOTS of it) and then the whole thing closes up with a leather tie. I should take pictures of it, but I’m half writing this post and half working so I can’t. It’s really fucking cool though.

Phil (my father who’s just “Phil”, even my kids just call him “Phil”) got The Beverly Hillbillies on DVD so after the guests left and it was just us, we sat and watched that and then the kids sprinkled “reindeer food” outside on the snow and went to bed. Once that was accomplished, Blake, Lisa and I went to work filling the stockings and setting out Santa presents for my sisters and Wes who all still believe.

At about 2am, we all finally went to bed and the second Raili saw my eyes crack open Xmas morning, this is what I woke up to:

Lisa made some weird egg thing for breakfast that had broccoli in it so I didn’t have any. It’s not like I dislike broccoli or anything, I just don’t think it should be anywhere near eggs. And it should also always have cheese sauce on it. I mean really, all broccoli is to me, is a vehicle for cheese sauce. Having said that, I had toast instead.

After breakfast and me opening my stocking, which everyone else had already done while I was sleeping, it was time to open presents and really, there’s no details to be had there other than the fact that it was complete and total mayhem. And Wes screamed like a crazy person with every Zhu Zhu item he opened, which ended up being MANY MANY Zhu Zhus and accessories.

In the end, Wes scored 9 Zhu Zhus total and about 9 feet of Zhu Zhu playsets which are hamster tubes that all connect and that now my living room is overrun with. We also got Raili and Rachael pink and purple PRINCESS Zhu Zhus so there were 11 of the things going all over the place Xmas morning.

After the little kids went mental over presents, we just all kinda hung out while Phil & Lisa started making Xmas dinner. As I do every year, I went down to the basement and had a nap because I simply cannot function on only a few hours of sleep, especially when that sleep was full of nightmares. While I did that, Phil watched a bunch of videos on YouTube about the conspiracies surrounding 9/11 because he’s paranoid like that (we recommended he watch Zeitgeist, which he did later that evening but I don’t know what he thought of it).

So then it was just random socializing until Phil and Blake took the kids and the dogs outside to go toboganning with the new snow things the kids all got from Santa. I stayed inside, big surprise, but we could see them from the kitchen window and a good time was had by all, especially the dogs, until their snow things broke and everyone had to come in. They were outside for a good hour though and Phil would pull them back up the hill with the snowmobile. Shoulda taken pictures, didn’t. Oh well.

Xmas dinner was just Phil, Lisa, my sisters and us (which is a good thing) and it was a fantastic meal. Phil definitely knows how to prepare turkey and this year LISA made the stuffing at my request so there was no oysters or fucking PINE NUTS in it like there has been other years when Phil was responsible for it. To me stuffing is the best part of Xmas dinner and when Phil was doing it (and making it gross and inedible), it actually upset me that I couldn’t have any so this year I asked Lisa if she would make me just a box of Stovetop Stuffing or let ME make it and explained that Phil’s idea of stuffing was way too gross to all of us so she said she would but ended up making stuffing from scratch, in the bird, in the end, so I was very very happy about that. She also makes these killer whipped mashed potatoes that I love and there was broccoli WITH CHEESE SAUCE, so I was very happy with dinner indeed.

After dinner, Blake and Lisa cleaned up and once that was done, Phil, Blake, Madison and I pulled out my new, pink Bicycle playing cards and we had 2 games of Euchre. There was a bit of drama surrounding that because Madison’s emotions were running high and the fact that she’s still a beginner but Phil won both times, once with Madison as his partner and once with me as his partner. That means Blake lost two times. :oD

Then there was more Beverly Hillbillies and bed. But before I end Xmas Day, I have a sort of announcement to make that no one but me probably cares about.

You know my friend Jesse? I’ve written about him before and the last you probably heard of him was that he thought he was transgendered and into men. Well, he’s been seeing this girl, Patricia, for something like a little less than a year and on Xmas Day, he changed his relationship status from “in a relationship” to “engaged to Patricia [last name]“. I’m not *totally* sure if it’s legit or if they’re fucking with people, but if it is legit then all I have to say to them is “congrats!” and that I hope I’m invited to the wedding.

Jesse and Patricia

Truthfully, I haven’t spoken to Jesse in about a year. He won’t return my calls, won’t reply to e-mails or Facebook communications. He has sworn up and down to Raymond and Blake that he’s not mad at us and we haven’t done anything but still, I wonder constantly about the reason. Blake ran into him a few months ago with his mom and she told Blake that Jesse was in college (I forget what for) and Blake said Jesse, our fairy princess friend Jesse, had grown a manly beard and I got a little worried, but when Patricia posted the above picture on Facebook yesterday or the day before, I saw that Jesse was wearing eyeliner and felt immensely better because that means the Jesse I know is still in there and he already knows how much I miss him so all I can do is still be here when he comes around, whenever that may be. He’s obviously going through some major changes and maybe he felt he had to do that alone or maybe he was afraid of what we’d say or something. Who knows? And I know it’s not just us, he’s been ignoring Raymond too. But whatever, I’m happy if he’s happy and that’s all that matters.

Back to Xmas…

Boxing Day morning we woke up and Lisa made us eggs and sausage (I freaking love breakfast sausage but it’s SO bad for you I never have them, except times like that) and we just kinda hung out while Blake and I casually started rounding up all the kids’ stuff and got ready to start the leaving process. I went to the garage to give the dogs their Gravol so they wouldn’t puke in the car (Lucky puked on the way up, despite giving him the Gravol then too) and Blake took them outside for a final tromp around the snow and to pee.

During all this, Phil was getting ready to “go to work”, which in the end meant that he was going to the hunting camp with Paul and some buddies, I think. We packed up, said our goodbyes and off we headed to home.

Getting home was such a huge relief. I don’t hate going up North as much as I used to but being away from home for 2 days really really stresses me out. When we got home and settled, I did some internetting and watched the Leafs game while working on my “Snow Princess“.  Then Blake and I watched some Buffy and went to bed because we were absolutely exhausted from all these KIDS making us insane.

Yesterday was Xmas with my mom, her boyfriend John and his son Chris. This is what I wore (PS. I suck at taking mirror pics…):

The sweater is the $80 cotton sweater I was talking about months ago.
The gauzy thing is from Free People, which is my favourite.

We were actually going to John’s cottage to have Xmas with my mom and it’s right on the lake. John and Chris built a rink on the lake so there was skating to be had by my mom, John, Blake, Madison and Wes just slid around in his boots because his skates don’t fit anymore. I stood there and filmed them while freezing my fucking ass off. So video does exist of everyone skating but I haven’t uploaded it yet and truthfully, it’s not all that exciting so I’m probably just going to upload it to Facebook where I can tag everyone so their “people” can see it.

After skating, the kids played Wii with Chris and the “adults” (term used loosely) just sat around and shot the shit until dinner was ready. Dinner was pork tenderloin, which I don’t eat but everyone else liked it, carrots, broccoli (without cheese sauce), Stovetop Stuffinf (yay!) and roasted potatoes.  It was a fine meal and everyone enjoyed it, in fact I don’t even think there were any leftovers.

When dinner was finished, my mom asked the kids if they’d rather have dessert first and presents after or presents first and dessert after and they chose the latter, so presents it was. I got my mom peridot earrings to match the necklace I got her for Mother’s Day, I got John 2 boxes of Lady Fingers and Chris a black & silver Zhu Zhu pet because damnit, all the kids in my life were getting Zhu Zhus this year. I mean, he’s 15 (or 16?) and probably has no need of one, but he got one anyway.

I didn’t really see what the kids or Blake got, to be honest. I got a big bottle of REAL maple syrup, some weird rubber flower things you put on your wall, pajama pants, a Hello Kitty Beanie Baby, Skittles (w00t!) AND MOTHERFUCKING LEAFS TICKETS!

The tix are obviously for me AND Blake and it’s for the game on Saturday, January 22nd against Washington! So if things go as planned, it should actually be a WINNING game! (They lost the only time I saw them play.) This also means that I have to buy Blake a Leafs jersey for his birthday (the 11th) because I refuse to be seen with him if he’s wearing the knock off I got him from Wal*Mart (we got each other knock offs last year for Xmas, mine’s pink). But whatever, he’s Canadian now, sort of, so he needs his own Leafs jersey anyway.

So not only are we going to the game, but my mom & John have agreed to babysit so I’m thinking MAYBE, just MAYBE, we might get a hotel room in the city to do a bit of partying after the game. But we’ll see how things go. I am SO ABSOLUTELY FUCKING STOKED though. And I almost died of shock because my mother would never get us that in a hundred million years, so THANKS JOHN! :oD He is definitely a good influence on her…

After presents we shot the shit some more, then it was time to go home, we got home and pretty much just went to bed. And that was my Xmas.

How was yours?

Oh and since there’s not video of Madison, here’s a bonus one where she talks about peeing her pants on the way home from school. This was taken the week before Xmas, I think:

So it’s 3:15am and I woke up because this house is a million  friggin’ degrees. I turned the furnace down and now I’m in my office waiting for my room to cool down a bit before going back to bed. It doesn’t help that my husband is a walking, talking ball of fire. Sometimes he puts off so much heat that I’m afraid he’s going to spontaneously combust.

Friday was good. I woke up to a manageable amount of work e-mail and got the pile clear around noon (I start working at 10am), which gave me the opportunity to watch really bad movies (like, really bad – one was called Helen and the other one was She’s Out of His League or something – both horrible) and work on my last 2 paintings of 2010.

I won’t keep it a secret: one of the two is an alternate version of “Just Like Honey“. The original version, which lives in Winnipeg, had a black and yellow gold background (on white) and the girl had black hair with yellow gold and black stripes on her bodysuit (for lack of a better term for what she’s wearing) and brown eyes. The one I’m doing now, because I didn’t want it to be a duplicate, has more of an orangey gold, black & metallic “espresso” background, the girl has metallic “espresso” hair, an orangey gold & black bodysuit and a mix of the gold & espresso for her eyes. I wanted it to be more or less the same, but different enough that it wasn’t a duplicate.

Also, I think this one is probably going to be just for me. In fact I’ve been giving it a lot of thought and I think from now on, most of the paintings I do are going to be just for me. At least until I figure out how to make decent prints, which I’m in no rush to do. I think what I might do from now on is post paintings on my site and say like, “if you want this one, it’s $XXX.XX + shipping, so let me know and I’ll put it in my Etsy shop”. Because this is the thing: I’ve never really liked selling my originals but I have because until recently, painting and the pittance I make on Camwhores has been my only form of income. Now that I have a job and I’m making pretty decent money, I don’t have to sell my originals. I still want to have an art business, so I’m still going to make ACEOs and maybe I’ll put a few paintings up on Etsy, just not all of them.

I’ve also been thinking about my grant proposal and I’ve convinced myself that it’s pretty unlikely that I’ll actually get it and I’ll tell you why: I think my last 2 grant proposals were rejected because the first year, I only asked for $1500 because I didn’t read thoroughly and didn’t see that they didn’t award partial grants. The second year, last year, my proposal was less an arts grant proposal and more like a business proposal and the grants aren’t there to further your business. Or at least that’s the gist of what I was told by the program co-ordinator when we were e-mailing back & forth all summer about it. Nevertheless, I inadvertently made this year’s proposal a little businessy with talk about children’s boutiques at the end of my artist statement and I think that may turn off the jurors.

I wish I’d have come to the realization that I don’t have to sell paintings anymore, I just have to paint them and that I could either keep them or give them away to say, the children’s corners of libraries was one idea I had, y’know how most of them have a story time area? I think ideas like that would have made a better proposal but I just wasn’t in that headspace. My goal is/was to get my art seen my children and the only way I saw to do that was to attract a new audience by way of children’s boutiques but now that money’s not a motivator, I see that there are other ways. Thinking along these lines, can you guys think of any other places that are public where children gather? Places that might like a donation of art? Another thought I had was hospitals. Really, all I want is for my art to be seen, ideally by children with imaginations or who may need the escapism.

I also won’t been this a secret: there will be another version of “Just Like Honey” in 2011, but she’ll be a brown girl. I haven’t planned out every painting for 2011, but since “Just Like Honey” was inspired by The Secret Life of Bees, that seemed like a good place to start.

The other girl I’m working on as my last painting of 2010 has metallic white hair with metallic blue eyes and I love her so much I doubt she’ll be for sale either unless someone I like really really wants her. She was inspired by the girls in Mark Ryden’s recent Yak Show. She’s not meant to be an albino, just as I don’t think his girls are meant to be either, but I’m sure people will think she is one. The bodice of her dress is going to be the white sparkly paper I posted this evening, she’s going to have a white Swarovski crystal bindi (maybe, I might use them for “snow drops” instead) and the skirt of her dress is sparkly silvery white and will have white marabou trim. Her canvas is white crackle over light metallic blue, which I mixed myself, with metallic blue and metallic white splotches with the faintest bit of silver splattered across. I haven’t decided what colour of glitter to use. I have white glitter but that’ll be similar to the bodice of her dress so I probably won’t use it and I think silver is going to be too obvious/plain. I do have chunky silver glitter though, and that might look pretty cool. Anyway, I’m excited about her because she’s different from anything I’ve done so far and I think an almost albino looking girl is sort of apt for being my last painting of the year considering next year is going to be dedicated to quite the opposite. I didn’t plan it that way or anything but I did think tonight that maybe it was a subconscious thing.

Before I get any further into my own head, I do want to mention that my friend Robert wrote a book! I think he’s a fantastic writer and his book is about 3 teenagers who are in a mental institution and then there are 2 other stories in the book but I’m not sure what they’re about. I haven’t read it yet, it just became available tonight, but I think it’ll be good so I’m recommending it to you guys.

Anyway, by the end of next week these 2 paintings should be finished and the rest of the year, right up until January 15th, is going to be dedicated to my sketchbook for The Sketchbook Project since I have, oh, one page finished and it’s a crappy page. I haven’t even finished gluing all my pages together so there aren’t as many! I’m actually kinda scared that I won’t have time to do it the way I want to and that it’ll be a crappy effort, made worse by the fact that I paid for digitizing so the whole world is going to be able to see it. When I ordered the sketchbook and made myself part of the project, I didn’t know I was going to stumble into a full-time job. BUT if I can make every day like Friday and get these 2 paintings done as soon as possible, I should be able to make a decent go of it I think. Or I hope.

I think I might bring my drawing stuff up North with me over Xmas, which brings me to…Xmas.

Traditionally, this is about the time where I write my yearly post about how much I hate Xmas and how stressed out I am about it. But this year’s different: I’m actually looking forward to Xmas. CAN YOU BELIEVE IT? This year, since Xmas is on a weekend, I’m going to try & finish working around 4pm and we’ll head up North to my dad & Lisa’s like, the second I’m finished so we’ll be there in time for dinner where apparently my Aunt Sandi is making lasagna, Lisa’s making potato skins and a salad and I’m going to convince Blake to make salsa that they can all have as  an appetizer. Lisa’s going to make me a small Caesar salad because I don’t like “regular” salad (and truth be told, I think you should have Caesar salad with lasagna, although I couldn’t tell you why).

Then we’ll be there for Xmas Day, where I’ve asked Lisa if she’ll make me a box of Stovetop Stuffing because Phil’s oyster/pine nut stuffing concoction is way too gross for me to even fathom and I think stuffing’s the best part of Xmas to be perfectly honest. I’m going to be bringing my computer (naturally) and my monitor so I can take over their desk and be available to do my check-ins for work, which I told boss #2 I’d do. Then we’re going to stay over AGAIN so we’re there for part of Boxing Day and aren’t racing home in the dark or in a storm like we did last year.

I’ve already sent Phil a message on Facebook to please have the garage ready for the dogs, especially since they’re going to be there for 2 & a half days, so that stressor is out of the way. (Although he hasn’t replied…but that’s typical.)

THEN I figure the weekend AFTER Xmas, we’ll do Xmas with my mom at John’s cottage. Although I just realized that’s New Year’s Day so I’m going to have to talk to her about that…I have to work during the week and so does Blake, so I’m not sure how else we’ll be able to do it, unless maybe we do an early Xmas with my mom the week before while Blake’s off. Mother, if you’re reading this, e-mail me with your thoughts.

Our shopping is mostly done, or at least done enough that I’m not worried about it. I more or less know what else we need to get and Blake has the weekend before Xmas off, so he can do the rest of the shopping then. He’s also going to be a great help because the kids are home that week and the week after (I think) and I hate when they’re home now because while Madison’s old enough to look after Wes and I can close my office door, I end up policing them and getting pissed at them all day while I’m trying to work. I mean, my job’s not exactly a difficult one, but it does require concentration which is impossible when Madison’s driving Wes crazy.

I do have a tool to use against her if she does that though. For Xmas she’s getting a netbook which I can very well take away if she pisses me off and she won’t want that SOOOOOOOOOOOOO…

That said, I’m not worried about gifts this year because I started early and got people some pretty good stuff this year because we could afford to and we’re not going into (more) debt to do it.

Anyway, I think I’ve babbled enough for the middle of the night and it’s time to go back to bed. Also my legs are cold. So goodnight!

The veggie garden has been planted and soaked soaked soaked with water.
Since nothing’s really growing yet, I took pictures of the veggies’ headstones.

And Blake took a picture of me planting beans.

There are two rows of beans because they are “royal burgundy” beans, which are purple when raw but turn green when you cook them. They’re HYPERCOLOUR beans!

There’s a joke about Blake and a hoe here but I’m too tired to be that witty at the moment.

I may attempt homemade pesto…it’s just basil, pine nuts & garlic, right?

Two rows of leaf lettuce, the colour of which is one of my favourites. I’ll take pics when it starts growing.
(Obviously.)

Green onions for stir-fry. :o)

Oregano for spaghetti sauce.

Parsley to make me fart.

Lots & lots of sugar snap peas because Madison and I love them. We have to wait until next paycheque to buy some lattice for them to climb on. Theoretically the peas will be the first thing ready (in July).

Carrots were also planted but the picture of their headstone was blurry because I took it upside down as not to step on any of our rows.

Blake & I planted all the seeds while the kids played with toads and the dogs lounged under a tree. The last time all 4 (well, 6?) of us were in our backyard together was the summer before Wayne & Judy moved in. It felt GOOD being out there. In PEACE.

My arms are soooooo sore from mixing all that dirt yesterday and now I’m all sleepy from being out in the sun.
I need to find a non-greasy sunscreen for my face. Leah sent me one once that I really liked but it expired and I threw it out and now I forget what it was. :o/

When we came in, I had a shower so I’m all squeaky clean.

I just finished making a huuuuuge salad with romaine lettuce, Campari tomatoes, English cucumbers, sweet yellow, orange and red peppers, snow peas, baby carrots and little cubes of mozzarella cheese. I’m having shishkabobs as my main dinner and Blake & the kids are having BBQ’d chicken.

So we’re gonna eat until we feel like exploding, while watching the pre-LOST finale show, watch the finale and then get our sleepy asses into bed under nice clean sheets.

Today has been a good day.
:o)

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.

We’re supposed to get a crapload of snow in Sunnyland tonight and tomorrow, 10cm each day with whiteout conditions from snowsqualls. To those who don’t live near a giant lake in The Great White North, a snowsquall is kinda like a snowy thunderstorm, minus the thunder & lightning (most of the time…on the odd occasion we get both & it’s pretty cool, lightning in winter is green). Snowsqualls, apparently, are a result of the wind & snow crossing the lake and we’re close enough to Lake Huron (it’s only 10 mins from me) that we get these storms. Often during the winter, our road is closed because of them, although I doubt that’ll be the case tonight (and I also doubt we’re going to get as much snow as they’re saying.)

Anyway, this afternoon the snow looked really cool, it was coming down slowly and softly like a white curtain and I tried to take video of it but I think the framerate on my camera is messed up somehow because when I came back inside and looked the the video, the snow was falling much faster than it had been in person. Regardless, I uploaded it to YouTube anyway and if you care to see it, here it is…it’s only 40 seconds:

This morning I had to get up early to go to the lab and get a blood test done, which had be thrilled beyond belief because needles and veins and blood are just my favouritest things in the whole wide world! Almost as awesome as getting up early in the morning! They chastised me for taking my pills with about 6 mouthfuls of Coke Zero instead of water (some of the pills I take are capsules with powder in them and I find taking them with water really gross because the damn things dissolve REALLY fast and then the capsules feel like they’re stuck in my throat, for some reason this doesn’t happen if I take them with something carbonated) because they claimed it would affect my cholesterol reading. Truthfully, I’m not sure I believe them and they almost wouldn’t do the test but I told them it was my last day to do it, that it was Blake’s last day of vacation and that my doctor’s appointment was on Friday so if I didn’t get it done today I was screwed, so they said they’d do it but to make sure I told my doctor that the cholesterol results might be a little off because I was a VERY BAD GIRL. I’m not really worried about it though.

Remember last year when my GP freaked out about my cholesterol and put me on cholesterol meds? My shrink thought/thinks he was being a bit extreme because apparently my levels weren’t really anything to be worried about, especially since I wasn’t taking the medication that caused the spike anymore and while I’m still taking the cholesterol meds because I figure I might as well, I’m not worried about the 6 mouthfuls of Coke Zero I had this morning skewing my test results one way or the other. I am a little interested to see how my cholesterol looks since I began eating all these eggs though. Oh, did I mention I lost 2 & a half lbs last week? That’s almost 11 lbs total since I started eating eggs for breakfast 10 weeks ago. w00t!

After my blood test, Blake & I went to the post office where there were two packages to pick up. One was an Amazon box for the kids for Xmas from Blake’s mom & Charlie and one was a book called the Artist Trading Card Workshop by Bernie Berlin from Lia! THANK YOU LIA! I flipped through it when I got home, but then I got sidetracked and haven’t had a chance to pick it up again. It looks pretty wicked though, so many different kinds of cards! I plan on spending some time with the book later tonight. Again, thanks Lia, you’re awesome!

And of course, speaking of artist trading cards my first 8 are almost finished. They just need arms and a coat of varnish and then they’ll be done. And I guess when they’re “done” I have to figure out a way to put my name & stuff on the back…honestly, I’ll probably just write it. My printer is slowly but surely dying and there’s no way it would print labels nicely, even if I had any. I could also glue my business card to the backs of them, but I don’t really want 40 “internet people” having my home phone number. I’ll figure it out. Anyway, here’s a group shot I took of the 8 after I took the books off of them that were drying them flat:

Throughout the rest of this post, I’ll show you some of them close up. All images can be clicked to enlarge.

Doing the smaller girls has definitely been a lesson in trial & error. For the 8 that are almost finished, I screwed up just as many because like I said in a previous post, drawing them so small is actually kind of hard. I’m getting the hang of it though, and last night I started a sheet of 15 more, which I’ll work on while these ones’ arms and varnish are drying. Once the 15 I started yesterday are finished, I only have 1 more card with gold sparkles to do and then that stack is finished. The rest either have iridescent or silver sparkles.

While I’ve been doing these, because this is just how my mind works, I’ve been thinking about the ones that I’ll be selling and I’m not sure how I’m going to do that. I know that each card is going to be $30 + $2 shipping, but I don’t know if I’m going to sell them on my site or the site I linked a while back where all they sell is ATCs (or more properly ACEOs) in an Etsy-like setting. That site, from what I’ve been able to tell doesn’t take a cut, so I don’t have the issues with it that I have with Etsy and eBay, but I don’t know how popular it is or if the artists actually sell their cards. Another thing with that site is that you have to scan each individual card and list each one separately, which I guess makes sense, but that’s a lot of extra work and if I can avoid extra work and achieve the same result, I’m more inclined to do that. Selling on my site I have 2 options: scan, post and make a PayPal button for each one or DON’T scan them all, just show examples of each colour and then the card(s) the person gets would be left to my discretion. What do you guys think? I’m thinking that I’ll sell more if I scan each card and post them all with their own PayPal buttons, but I’m torn as to whether I should do that on my own site or on that ACEO site that just sells ACEOs. I suppose I could sell some on my site, like all on one page, and then on that page say that there’s more for sale on the ACEO site and give people the option to buy them there too, if the card they want happens to be there. I really really suck at the business of art, seriously.

Another thing I thought I could do, if I ever sell a freaking painting & actually have some money, is I could matte (mat?) and frame say, 3 cards and sell them as one piece. I have no idea how much framing costs though, so I don’t even know if that would be realistic or if I’d end up ripping myself off in the end because you can only price something like that so high.

Maybe it’s tacky that I think about selling things as I make them, but I’m a really utilitarian person and my grama, aka The Antichrist, is/was an artist’s worst enemy. I’m sure I’ve talked about this before, but when I was Wes’ age, I would make things and sell them in my grama’s furniture store and that taught me early that you only get to create things if you’re going to sell them. Even when I was an adult and we were living above her store and I started painting on canvas, I’d show her what I’d created and her response would always be, “Okay so you made it, now what are you going to do with it?” and when I’d tell her I was going to sell it, on the internet, because I knew that was the “right” answer, she’d say “Well who in the hell is going to buy that?” (This was back when I was going through my “fetal phase” and fuck you, grama, I sold every goddamn piece!)

While my mother definitely raised me (at least until I was 15), I spent just about every weekend of my life with my grama and the attitude that you can only create to sell is very deeply ingrained in me. The only thing I’ve painted for myself, in the 8 years I’ve been painting, is the covers of my sketchbooks and even those are extremely hard for me to do because as I’m doing them, I’m thinking that I could be spending that time and those supplies on something that’s going to potentially make money.

And back to the utilitarian thing for a second, I’m not a keeper on “nicknacks”. You will find very very few of these in my home and the ones I do have were given to me as gifts, I would never in a million years buy anything like that for myself because I think they’re a waste of money. They just sit there. Also the only pictures adorning my walls are my failed attempts that I don’t really know what to do with.

It would be lovely to say that I have this fabulous home and studio full of inspirational things, but I really just don’t. It’s the same thing with the way I dress, I mean people expect artists to be these crazy dressers with crazy hair & all that, but I’m pretty plain & boring. Today when I went to the lab, I wore grey trackpants, a brown t-shirt and a grey hoodie. Other times I just would have worn my pajamas because A) I live in sleepwear and B) I just don’t care. If I’m dressing up to go somewhere, whatever I’m wearing is usually pretty simple and usually pretty black. I suppose sometimes my hair, when I dye it crazy colours, is more conducive to the artist stereotype but it’s never really a conscious “oh I’m creative so I must look the part” thing, it’s just “hey I feel like having pink hair this month.”

I was actually reading about this very thing in the book Living the Creative Life a couple of months ago. Most of the artists who were interviewed for that book were like me when it came to dress and a lot of them said that they’d rather put their creative energy into the things they created than into looking the part of the “creative artist”. I couldn’t agree with that more, obviously, and it made me feel a lot better hearing it from other artists. I mean, why the hell wouldn’t I paint in my pajamas? I have nowhere to be, no one to impress and y’know what? I’m gonna get paint on them! And it won’t matter!

So there ya have it, my take on living the creative life.

Something else I’ve been doing this week is taking pictures and video for the background tutorial I keep being asked for. Today was the last step. I’m still not going to post it until after the new year because with Xmas & Buttercup & everything else I have to do these days, the tutorial is fairly low on my priority list. And actually, in writing this down, I’ve realized that I have one more picture to take for it and then all that’s left to do is edit everything together and make it into a post.

What I will tell you about it though, is that the background I made for the tutorial is the same as the black & gold ATCs on this page and the girl that’s going to be going on the painting is going to be a BEE GIRL wearing a tutu. I haven’t drawn her yet and I’m not sure if the tulle I have is tea-stainable, but she’s in my mind and I’m really excited about her. Again though, I’m not going to start working on her until after Xmas when things have died down a bit.

As per usual, all things Xmas have me stressed out beyond belief. I know I’ve explained this before, but every year for the past few years, we’ve gone up north to my dad & step-mom’s Xmas Eve, stay there Xmas Day, have Xmas dinner across the road at my uncle Paul’s house and then have to drive home Xmas night to do it all over again with my mother on Boxing Day. As I also explained in a previous post, last year my dad really disrespected my dogs by not cleaning out the garage and it upset me quite a bit. I didn’t sleep at ALL on Xmas Eve because I was worried about the dogs and felt sorry for them, only having the space of a blanket to lay down or move around on that wasn’t flooded or full of my dad’s van.

This year, to avoid all that, the original plan was to have my neighbours come and let the dogs in & out while we were away but as we get closer to actually having to do it I’m having a hard time dealing with it. Agoraphobia is the fear of the outside world, yes, but part of it, at least for me, is a fear of letting people into my inside world and the idea of people in my house while I’m gone really bothers me. I mean, I trust Wayne & Judy to look after the dogs, but I don’t know if I trust them not to take a tour of my house and inspect how clean my toilet is.

Last week I was really considering staying home with the dogs and not going to my dad’s at all because honestly, that sounds like the perfect Xmas to me – no Xmas at all – but even that stressed me out because like it or not, there are all of these societal pressures put on people during Xmas that you either have to adhere to or people will think you’re a shitty person. If I don’t go up north for Xmas, I’m a shitty daughter and a shitty mother (even though my kids couldn’t care less if I was there or not) and it’s going to look weird when they go over to Paul’s for Xmas dinner and I’m not there. People are going to expect Blake to explain and there really isn’t an explanation that would make anyone happy or us to seem less weird (when they already think of us as pretty fucking weird).

So after a lot of inner debate, the original plan stands, that the entire Crittenden family, those on 2 legs and 4 (well, minus Pixel who gets a nice vacation from all of us for Xmas), are going up north for Xmas and Blake’s going to call my dad personally and tell him (in nicer terms than I’m gonna put it here) that if that goddamn garage isn’t fit for MY dogs, we’re turning around and coming home. Blake also called the vet today to see if you can give dogs Gravol and yes, yes you can (1/4 of a children’s one, apparently), so this year we won’t be pulling over on some back road to clean up Lucky’s vomit with a box of Kleenex because that’s all that’s in the car.

To make matters worse, ALL of our Xmas shopping is being done on Thursday’s paycheque because we haven’t been able to afford it until now. And even then, and I’m sure Blake will love me for posting this publicly, we’re looking at deferring this month’s mortgage payment to even have Xmas this year because we simply don’t have the money to give the kids the kind of Xmas they’ve enjoyed previous years. Also, everyone who isn’t under the age of 12 this year is getting gift certificates because I just don’t know what the hell to buy anyone. When I’ve asked, I’ve been told gift certificates, so that’s what everyone’s getting. Our kids are getting clothes because they need them and we can’t afford to do “fun stuff” and clothes, so that’s just the way it’s going to have to be. My sister Raili  (aged 4) is getting Barbies and my sister Rachael (aged 10 months) is getting Little People because that’s what was asked for.

Also, I don’t even know for sure what the hell is going on with my mother this year and I’ve been too afraid to ask. The “tradition” has been that she comes here Boxing Day and we do presents and have dinner, but with her moving in with John, first of all, I don’t know if he and his son will be coming (which means extra gifts/extra food) and second of all, now that my mother has an actual HOME, she may want to start doing Boxing Day there like we’ve done for most of my life. The thing is though, with going up north and all the bullshit associated with it, we don’t want to have to do more traveling on Boxing Day and if she comes here, I hope she’s fine with pizza or Chinese food because I’m NOT leaving halfway through Xmas dinner at Paul’s house to make it back home in time for me to get enough sleep to cook Xmas dinner the next day for my mother.

Have I mentioned how much I fucking hate Xmas? Seriously, it kills me. I wish it was never invented. I wish I could sleep through the whole thing. I wish I could stay home, with my dogs, watching bad movies and pretending it wasn’t happening.

On a more positive note, did anyone see the Leafs game last night? Was that fucking beautiful or what? My throat is still sore from cringing/yelling at the TV.

And with that, I’m out and you’re probably thinking “thank god” because this post is 3,100 words long.

PS. My review of the new Sims expansion is up on Buttercup for those who were waiting for it.

PPS. I stand corrected about the snow. I just went outside and we got at least 15cm in the time it took me to write this post.