My Sweet Ebony and Me :)

Just a quick pic of li'l Sweet Ebony and moi. You can read more news regarding the latest on exciting my stamping escapades on my art blog. I still need to post details on our totally awesome (and totally exhausting) trip to Disney Land California last week so stay tuned!

By the way, I have finally posted pics of Alora's crazy hair cut attempt from earlier this year. Haha! The memories! You can see the new pics and read the blog here.


Update December 30th 2008

I also have tons of pics from our trip to California Disney Land and Sea World which I still need to post. Also pics of our family's Christmas. We had a lot of fun and the children made off like several very fortunate bandits! So stay tuned. At the moment, I'm just putting up my feet for a bit before the new year hits. Doubtless it will be so busy starting next week that relaxation will not only be a thing of the past, but also a miracle if I can squeeze any of it in!

Have a fabulous New Years Eve for tomorrow!

Biggest Hugs!

Twilight the Movie – Midnight Madness Vs. Second Glance Irony

Jabba the Hut Hair



Here is my take on the movie including my movie experience. Sadly it was not what I had expected the second time viewing. At any rate, enjoy! :)


Midnight November 21st, 2008. Saying the theaters were crowded at this unearthly hour is a grizzly understatement. One would be better to think the world had hit Defcon 1.

Obsessed female fans (with tag along, morose boyfriends and a smattering of male Twilighters here and there) ranging from tween to grandmother, bedecked in “Team Edward” garb and “I Heart Jacob” tees, spilled into each theater by as early as 9:00pm. According to various reliable sources, some obsessed Twi-hards confessed being in line since 11:00 that morning.

Armed with a Fandangoed ticket for the 12:05 am showing (only due to the 12:01 being sold out in record time and my lack of quick-thinkingness) my Twilighter buddy and I bustled into the theater buzzing with riotous, giggly chatter at approximately 10:20 pm where we managed to salvage two unoccupied and unsaved seats side by side. That in itself was a Herculean feat. Next to us, a young woman was swapping seats with her obviously besotted husband (as he had not, as yet, read the book) to avoid the mad enormous stack of Jabba the Hat hair perched directly in front of her (please refer to pic).

The frenzied babble died momentarily as the lights dimmed before it hit deafening decibel levels at the showing of the first preview; a shrieking roar as a victimized deer raced across the screen, which escalated in pitch when “Twilight” faded on against the eerie green of Forks forest and Bella’s voice pervaded the blackness of the theater.

My paradigm was to view the movie with little to no expectations except with the intent to enjoy the flick. The two point something hours went quickly, fueled by the frequent, intermittent squeals and titters and endless giggles of Cullen crazed fanatics. The ambience was electric, hard to miss, hard not to enjoy, hard not to loathe, and loaned itself well to the excitement of the Meyer-slash-Hardwicke screen play. The forgivably unforgivable, ridiculous irony of Midnight Madness.

By the time Edward and Bella had become “an item”, the shrieks and sighs of the teen giggling gaggle had reached the point of (past) pestilential.

Still, much of the 2 hour screening held good value. It seemed greatly funny. Infact, practically every scene conjured hysterics from the adoring audience. The awkwardness between Charlie and Bella when he picked her up in her truck. The random scene with the semi carrying the big logs in the middle of the street in Forks. The scene in biology with a disgusted Edward. Bella’s hair blowing in the fan. The school excursion to the green house (not in the book). Billy Black staring Edward down as they passed eachother in their legendary vehicles. And so forth.

The movie remained on par with the book as far as scene adaptation. It wasn’t perfect. But a movie rarely ever is when based on a piece of literature. Admittedly, I had a couple of irks that nagged me.

One was Edward’s sexy Volvo. It was meant to look luxuriously sporty and scream HOTNESS.

But a hatch back?

*Raises eye brow*

Of course Rosalie wasn’t insanely beautiful. But that’s a fact that’s been ambushed all over the cyber world since pictures of Nikki hit the net. Nothing new.

Then there was the kissing scene in Bella’s bedroom. Since when did she wear underwear over sweats to bed? And when the heck did sexually clueless, unaggressive Bella know HOW to kiss so freaking well?

I shrugged it off.

But despite these setbacks, all in all, the movie was good for a small budget. The closing titles received thunderous applause and piercing two-fingered whistles from the frenzied fans and I left with a sense of overall satisfaction and a strong desire to see it atleast five more times that week. And though I met a throng of negative reviews on Facebook the following morning, they did not sway my tenure and the giddiness did not pass…

9:45 pm, December 10th just under 3 weeks later. Without the obsessed fans. Without the hype. Without the gushy crowds. It was simply my hubby and me in a quiet theater with no more than six people in the enormous room altogether.

Our intention was to enjoy Twilight. We had been waiting to view it together for weeks. He was excited. We’d read the books together and hubby loved them (even more than the Eragon series *cough*). With such a cozy atmosphere and zero madness of teen femme chatter, it was only too easy to see the movie for what it was; to be objective (the irony being opinions are all subjective). Of course I knew what to expect. And doubled with my husband’s next-to-flawless memory of the book, Twilight the movie, sunk.

Scene after scene conjured problem after problem.

A quick preface. To all my Twilight friends who’ve read the book and loved the movie, and STILL love the movie after each viewing, well done. You rock! I love you!! Don’t get me wrong; I – hubby and I – love the book! The movie, however, is left wanting…

To all those who saw the movie for the first time and didn’t like it, I can empathize. Finally.

To all those who hated the movie at first but found that it got better with each new viewing, wow, how do you do it?

To all those who saw the movie once, loved it, then saw it again and felt bored half way through the second viewing, let’s do lunch some time.

I have listed below a few of those scenes that I, in my opinion, felt to be problematic. There are probably tons more (or fewer, depending on your perspective) that are not mentioned. Of course, this in no way infers they are a universal given or a problem at all by another’s standard. These are factors that I personally didn’t like and in no way suggests that anyone else should feel the same way about it. Feel free to add or to comment on any of them. Furthermore, these problems are not intended to demote the book by any means. It is because of my individual love for the book that I have decidedly found “problems” with the following scenes in the movie.

True. It’s only a movie.

Which goes to show, once again, the book is always better.

By the way, you can go here to view all the differences between the book and the movie: http://twilightsaga.wikia.com/wiki/Twilight_book_to_movie_differences

*sucks in a big breath*

♦ Edward’s Volvo. What the. It’s meant to be sleek, sporty and the personification of sexiness in a machine. Edward is hot. His car is meant to reflect its driver and exude major HOTNESS.

A hatch back doesn’t cut it.

This sore lack of attention created a huge black smudge in my books.

Low budget or not. This one is unforgivable.

♦ Bella clutching, HUGGING a cactus. 0_0 Um. Lame. Did I say lame? I’ll say it again. LAME.

True that it's a minor detail, but it really bugged me. It was so appalling that at first I did not think the cactus scene was in the book. Upon retrospect, it IS.

But this did not improve the scene. Ok. So she misses Arizona. But I don’t understand how she, the Bella in the movie, doesn’t like to be coddled (see scene with Edward trying to put on her seat belt) yet here she is coddling a keepsake.

Inconsistent. And horrible. Take care of the small details and it will lead to big dividends.

♦ What’s with Charlie and Bella feeling awkward ALL the time? In the book, they were comfortable around eachother. The awkwardness didn’t last.

♦ Bella’s mind was strong and mentally, she knew where she stood. But it didn’t mean she felt secure as a person. She was clumsy and just like any teen, felt insecure about her looks and who she was as a person. In this particular sense, she fit into the “ordinary” teenage girl stereotype. Since when did she start giving girl power advice? (Eg. Bella’s conversation with Angela at the beach). Then when Bella pulled the “cool” greeting/hand sign thingy at the prom. What the -?? Since when was Bella “cool”?? Wrong. Wrong!

*Shaking head furiously*

♦ Bella’s prom dress. In the movie, she’d said it was something she’d “borrowed from Alice”. One look at that ugly thing, anyone would KNOW that Alice wouldn’t be caught dead (ha ha) with that relic (double ha) in her closet. And in the book, Alice had doctored Bella up AMAzingly. Bella had even worn amazing heels on one foot that Edward couldn’t stop looking at her legs. One pair of sneakers and old school 80’s tights instead? This was a disgusting adaptation of the real thing. Ugh. Ugh. Ugh.

I wanted to barf.

♦ Baseball uniforms and baseball caps.

I repeat. Baseball uniforms and baseball caps.

Holy crow. Can someone hand me some butter with all that corn??

Pull-lease.

♦ Bella never once said, “Holy crow”!

*fume*

♦ Bella is wearing underwear or panties in bedroom kissing scene. Of all the sexualized, Hollywood stunts. This had to be one of the sweetest, innocent scenes in the book and they went ahead and screwed it up with little panties and Bella KNOWING how to kiss!!!

NOOOOOOO!!!!

SOMEONE PASS ME A BUCKET.

♦ Is it just me or did it seem that Bella and Edward always seemed so tense around eachother? She seemed anxious and disturbed in his presence all the time. Dare I say annoyed? They’re supposed to be in love. She hardly EVER smiled at him. Infact, she looked more comfortable hanging around Jacob! For crying out loud… Lighten up Stewart. Read the book properly BEFORE the script.

♦ Edward’s skin didn’t merely “glitter”. He was “beautiful”. Breathtaking. I imagined a more powerful, prismatic, radiating effect. I know. Low budget. They could have spent more money here than on the cactus.

♦ Jasper. Dude. Lighten up. He was supposed to exude calming feelings. He certainly didn’t LOOK calm. But always tense. Anxious.

Why does everyone LOOK this way in the movie?

♦ Rosalie.

You know the rest.

♦ Edward mauling into Bella’s wrist to suck out the venom. No. No. No! Edward was always very careful of Bella. He never wanted to hurt her. Her well being was always his first priority. And he was always, always very gentle with Bella. It was one of his outstanding character traits when it came to her. And though he was afraid that he couldn’t stop in the book, as soon as he tasted the morphine and that her blood was clean, he released her. He found the power within him to do this. In the movie, it looked like he was losing control and wanted to tear her arm off. WRONG. Thanks for the insight Aubry. You are so right!

♦ The acting over all. For those actors who professed to have read the book, it looked like they hadn’t or that their hearts certainly weren’t into the story. The acting wasn’t much to rave about by any means.

♦ Special FX = Low budget. Or rather Low Budget = Low SFX.

Oh well. Here’s to hoping New Moon will be better (FINGERS CROSSED).

And please. Correct the Volvo. PLEASE.

And just to add a bit of balance, here are some of the things that I DID like about the movie.

♣ LOVED Alice. Spot on.

♣ Jessica was great. The semi-pretty I’m-so-everything snob. She pulled off her lines convincingly.

♣ Mike. Good choice.

♣ Charlie was a great choice, although I envisioned him slightly heavier set.

♣ Carlisle and Esme were great personifications of the characters in the book.

♣ When they first met in Biology was funny.

♣ Edward saving Bella from becoming a memorable dent in the side of that oncoming van was well done. Yes. I liked that part.

♣ Kitchen scene at the Cullens where they’re preparing an Italian meal for Bella. Very cute. I laughed here. Especially when they said, “Mmm. Smell that!” upon Bella’s entrance into the kitchen, despite the food they were making.

Feel free to add more.

Overall, the movie was enjoyable clearly on a superficial level, though for me, even that didn’t last long. Despite my hang-ups (and experiencing near boredom the second time around), I’ll most likely still buy the DVD when it hits the stores; I’m a sucker for collecting movies to go with its books.

I just read in an email sent to me via Summit Entertainment that Chris Weitz will be the new director for New Moon. Perhaps [hopefully] he’ll add a [much needed] fresh tangent to Catherine Hardwicke’s direction.

And of course I won’t be missing out on viewing New Moon, most likely as another Midnight Madness deal too.

LOL.

Pics!

Just popping in real quick to post a few fun pics that my wonderful sister, Galen (photographer extraordinaire!) took of yours truly last week.

Love always,

Holy Crow!!

An oldie of my "Edwardian" Clint and moi. *sigh* He's absurdly GORGEOUS!!



That said it all, "Holy Crow!!"

I just HAVE NOT been here for, good grief, how long?? TOO long!! I apologise. It's time to get back to my personal blogging!

A google-plex of happenings have been happening (haha) since I wrote last. Ironically enough, my last post, I believe, was about attending the midnight release of Breaking Dawn, the last book in the absurdly awesome series called, "Twilight".

If you haven't read it, you need to.

Need.

The irony lies in the fact that Twilight the movie will be released here, in the States, on November 21st 2008. And what will this faithful, die-hard fan be doing? Why, she will be leaving the kids in the care of dearest Daddy Clint, and attending the midnight release at exactly 12:05 am!!

*giddy, girly SCREEEEEEAAAMMMM!!!!*

Needless to say, she - being me - will not be viewing this cult film alone. I will be traversing with 2 other giddy Moms (Twilighters no less). I plan on wearing my black "Edward" tee with my latest super hot acquisition, a pair of yummy American Eagle jeans (size 2 - and am proud of every solid digit), black heels and red lippy.

Hot.

Hot!

I purchased the tickets a couple of nights ago on Fandango.

It is safely. Securely. Placed in the middle pocket of my red hand bag.

Can't wait!!

*Hyperventilates*

*Drops*

*Stops breathing*

*Is resuscitated by hubby...

*and is resuscitated again. haha!*

Oh-kay, now THAT was fun! Ha ha!

On Monday night this week, my Twilighter friend and next-door neighbour Heidi (who, you might recall, also went to the Breaking Dawn midnight release with me and will be attending the Twilight movie midnight release with me... she is a true kindred spirit) and I had some much needed, away-from-the-kids girly time.

Once again, our hubbies looked after the kids.

Yes. We are spoiled.

Ridiculously spoiled.

But she will be viewing the movie TWICE. At midnight and at 1pm the following day.

This must mean she's a bigger Twi-hard than I am...

Noooooooooo!!!!

Mehhrrrrrr.

I guess I'll just have to go with her again!!

We both got the newest Twilight movie soundtrack on CD (some of the music playing on my playlist is on the soundtrack, such as Flightless Bird. LOVE that song!). Borders Book Store was sold out. The supposed reliable source.

Peh.

So we called the bigger, better book store, "Barnes and Noble", which of course had the soundtrack in stock. We had them reserved, drove over and made the acquisition!

I also procured the lucsious Twilight Movie Companion, plus the latest glossy mag known as Vanity Fair. There is an amazing photo shoot of the Twilight movie cast in it.

I now deem myself: Ready. For. THE. Movie.

I still need to post lots of pics. Like the before and after shots of Alora's crazy hair cut. Wow. I'm glad that's over!

Hey! Here's another take on the crazy fervour our household has on midnight releases. My sweetest hubby, Clint, loves gaming. But not just gaming with any game. He's a World of Warcraft uber pro-fanatic.

He's a WOW "nerd".

I mean, he has two 70's and spends way too much time on that crazy game (so much so, he's been thrown the evil eye by his loving wife around dinner time more than once, yea, more than thrice, yea even umpteen countless times).

Do you have any idea how long it takes to create a level 70 character??

*feigns a horrified expression*

He's tried to get me hooked on it, but the poor man may as well be barking at a brick wall. I have a ton of better things to do (like I'm a MOM for crying out loud).

Like read Twilight and its sequels four times through.

Du-uh.

So WOW recently released their latest expansion where you can level your character up to level 80. Apparently, this is major "Uber Woah" material.

*rolls eyes*

But I really can't talk. I'm a crazed loon who's pro Team Edward.

(For all you non-Twilighters who have no idea what I'm yammering about, I apologise. Unless you read the books, you won't get it. :S)

*rolls eyes*

So at 11 pm, Wednesday November 12th, he drives out to the GameStop on Broadway and Old Spanish Trail (for you Tucson people who are familiar with the area) to get a good spot in line. Upon arrival, there were already two impossibly long lines, snaking from the front of the store all the way down to Pier One Imports.

As he related this story to me, I was flummoxed. I had no idea that WOW was that popular here in but one portion of Tucson suburbia!

Apparently some people don't have a life. Staying up past midnight to get a GAME.

0_0

Tsk. Tsk.

He was surrounded by three kinds of people: the nerds, the fat guys and the goths.

My strapping, handsome, tall fire fighter just didn't fit in! LOL

He said you could totally tell who the Hordes were verses the Alliance. Ha ha!

One of the die-hard WOW-ers happened to be a grandmother! She was getting the expanision for her and her 25 year old son who had to work. Apparently, she was standing next to Clint in line, and she was telling him about all these other places in WOW that she had gone in and raided, places he'd never even visited or heard of!

Laugh. Out. Loud.

My man is all guy. He rues shopping. Once he got the game, he paid for it and got out. He arrived home a little after 1 am. He had to get ready for work in 5 hours. So he installed the game.

And started playing!!

Ahahahahaaa!!!

He went to bed, happy and excited, at 5 am. Got up at 6 am and made it to work.

Holy crow.

I guess some people never grow up!!

Tee-hee!


With that said, it's time to read the Twilight saga for the fifth time...

Y'know. To preface the movie.

All four books.

Seriously.

I'm going to do it!

*Nods furiously*

*Spies hubby rolling his eyes*


Ooohhh!! WOW Alert!

Clint (AKA: CLINSTER or RALINDA. All cower and despair!!) just told me he got a text from one of his WOW buddies (Steve, AKA: GORTHANK) yesterday. First of all, he wanted me to state that he doesn't play WOW that much.

And he's not a WOW nerd. He's a WOW fan.

*rolls eyes*

Yes. That was me rolling my eyes.

Anyway, so the Great Gorthank texted Warrior Clinster (all cower and despair!!) yesterday. Apparently, a Human Paladin was the first to make it to level 80 yesterday on his server.

HOLY CROW!!

Like Mr-Has-No-Life-Paladin must have been playing 2 whole days straight to move up ten levels! Mr-Has-No-Life-Paladin must have had ZERO potty breaks but sat in an adult diaper for 48 hours!!

*Shudder*

Maybe it wasn't a "Mr". Maybe it was a "Ms".

*Shrugs and shudders*

And that. People. Is World of Warcraft news at its finest. My eyes about fell out of my head this morning when Warrior Clinster (all cower and despair!!) told me.

IT HAD BEEN TEXT-WORTHY!!

*rolls eyes*



I will write more again soon on the latest shernanigans of the Bell household.

...fingers crossed!

*wink*

Plus I have tons of highlights to share with relevance to Whiff of Joy Stamps, Sugar Nellie and other exciting stuff going on in my neck of the woods pertaining to the fantastic craze with regards to all things stamping and other areas of my art work!

*gasps for air*

Hugs always!

I'm Back!

Life has been a whirl wind. One giant dust devil. Very much like our breaking down vacume cleaner. It smells dusty and creates havoc in its wake. Instead of sucking up debris properly, it coughs it out.

Okay, not quite. But it makes for an interesting analogy, eh? :)

Soooo much to catch up on! My mind is spinning in an endless vortex! Sorry for being away so long. Gee'willickers, the Breaking Dawn Midnight Release was over aeons ago, and I've read the book TWICE already! And thoroughly LOVE it! The second read was with hubby. Oh, he is truly a covetous calibre of man!! :D Hehe!

The Breaking Dawn Midnight Release was tooooo much fun! We arrived at 10:30 pm. Borders Book Store was like Defcon 2 with screaming teens beserk over the prospect of finding out what would happen next between the famed and drop-dead-perfect Edward and ever popular Bella. Plus, teens teemed in costume. Werewovles. FANGED Vampires (tsk tsk). Old-school prom dressed queens. Every time a vampire passed my friend Heidi and me, we cringed. Stared. Then laughed. And quickly moved in the opposite direction.

Haha!

We met up with the rest of our group of crazed Twilighter Moms and survived the countdown to 12:01 am and toughed out the neverending countdown it seemed AFTER that to finally get our books.

Then we chuffed over, bleary eyed and fighting constant manic urges to fall asleep (afterall, we're not used to this, staying up past 1 am - speaking for myself anyway), to the VCA Hotel on Alvernon and Speedway.

Followed by an eventful stretch of hours of reading! We endeavored to uphold the one chapter reading rule, but after chapter 5, we all gave up and read at our own pace. There were about 10 of us gals altogether, and at one point, we all found ourselves squashed on the same double bed in one of the rooms. Poring thrilled and red eyed over every word over each of our books.

Some dropped into LaLa Land by 4 am and got a good, sane several hours of shut-eye. The rest of us trooped on with our reading. By the time we got home the following morning, we either crashed (lucky girls!) or fulfilled the busy Mommy agendas we had no choice but to sluggishly slave through.

As for me, Clint was home. Yup. I crashed! My day was done! Wot would I do without my hubby?

*sigh!* Thanks, babe!

I'm up for another round of all night reading. Who's with me??

AND! I've got my sister Cynthia hooked on the books! Mwahahahahahahaaa!!! LOL!!!!!!

We're going to Forks next year for a couple of days! Woo-hoo!! Can't wait!!

Okay, so I still have so much to do. Here's my list.

Experiment with my stamping inks and pens that I bought AGES ago!
Post the results.
Post the Before and After pics of Alora's hair cut.
Blog about it.
Tidy up my studio office.
Wash and fold the laundry. (Mundane. Neverending. Story.)
Paint a mural on Alora's door.
No wait...in our new house.

Whoops! Breaking news!

We're planning on selling our house. If all goes on schedule, it will be up on the market next month. So now we're looking for a new house. I'm ready for the change. But oh, the stress!

Meehhrrrrrr!

Sooo, paint a mural on Alora's door in our NEW house.
FIND a new house!
Save. Save. SAVE. For our trip to Oz.
MAKE our trip to Oz happen!

Make plans to go and do the popular Polar Express Christmas event around Christmas time with Heidi and their family.
Acquire new jammies and robes for this event.

Work on totally FUN Flag project with Aubry! (Can't wait Aubry!)

Get Aunt Sharon's (late) birthday gift to her as soon as it arrives.

On the business side:

Create (more) images for Whiff of Joy Stamps stamp company in Switzerland (these are already in the works - they're beautiful!!).
More images for Sugar Nellie stamp company in the UK.
Paint Melody's wall mural of faux stone.
Complete Laura's trade mark for her business.
Draw Aubry's pic of Collin.
Draw Aubry's pic of "Follow the Son" with all her boys.

Create a blog candy give away on my art website soon!
Send off special "Thank You's" to Marlene and Tiets. :)

Follow-up with families waiting to receive children's art lessons.

And I think that will keep me on my toes for a while.

By the way, Katharina of Whiff of Joy Stamps told me that someone had asked her if they could use one of the Angel images I created for Whiff of Joy as a tattoo!! LOL! How crazy cool is that??

And I was approached by a third stamping company to design for them! Wow, I was so flattered! Unfortunately I had to say no at this time, but perhaps in the future. It will be fun to see what happens next! :)

I've also been getting so many lovely emails from admirers of my Sugar Nellie Sweet Ebony images. I can't tell you how excited I am for the "Elisabeth Bell" range of images to be launched through Whiff of Joy Stamps! If you'd like to read more about the art business side of my life, please visit my blog on my art website.

It is late (11:33 pm), the kids are sleeping and I hear thunder overhead. Monsoons. I'd best get ready to hit the sack and get some more shut-eye.

Love to you all!!

*Ahem!* And now to Breaking Dawn...

The wait is almost over!!

*Decibal shattering EEEEEEEEeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!!!!!!!!!!!*

My sanity has held out this far! As I write, there are precisely 2 days, 9 hours, 15 minutes and 2 seconds remaining...no wait, make that 2 days, 9 hours, 14 minutes and 55 seconds...52!

Okay, okay. So my sanity is questionable.

I have read all 3 books in Stephenie Meyer's Twilight saga 4 times over (twice with my husband, bless his sweet, handsome heart, I love you Clint!) and hubby and I have read Meyer's "The Host" (which we absolutely loved!!) in the past month to fill in the ever decreasing gap between the official book release of Breaking Dawn and the current day!!

*gasp of breath!*

As it stands, BD will be released in exactly 2 days and Oh. My. Gosh. I cannot tell you how deliriously giddy and excited this makes me feel. As for hubby, he can't wait either!!

So, my good friend Kris Crandall, and my friend and nextdoor neighbour Heidi, who swore that she doesn't read but read all 3 books in a matter of 2 weeks(!), and a number of other deliriously giddy gals, and moi, are choofing over to Borders Bookstore at 11pm Friday eve (August 1st) to wait out the bewitching hour of midnight. At one minute past the bewitching hour, we will claim our already reserved titles of Breaking Dawn. We will then consider staying on to party with the rest of the Twilighters at the bookstore before heading over to a hotel that is reserved for our band of crazy, squealy group of Twilighter Moms to read Breaking Dawn - til the break of dawn! LOL!!

How does my sweet hubby and soul mate Clint fit in all of this? He has made the ultimate sacrifice by staying at home to watch the kidlets for me while I go and be a bit inane with my girly friends. And he actually took time off work both days to do this for me! And I didn't even have to twist his arm! He volunteered on his own!!

Now now, girls, he's all mine!! LOL!!!

I am one lucky gal for sure!!

One rule does stand however. As we are reading as a group of girly, giggly, silly Moms, once one person finishes a chapter, they must wait for the others to complete that chapter too before continuing. Can you imagine the dilemma a speed-reader would present in our situation? We just can't have someone bursting out in fits of laughter when they're 3 chapters ahead of everyone else!!

And you may ask, how much reading will one actually digest in a sitting of less than 11 hours in a room with a bunch of giggly girls poring over the words of the same book title?

Not much of course.

BUT! How fun will all this be, eh???? *hehehehehehehehe!!*

Okay, I'm already giddy and the day hasn't even arrived yet. LOL!!

So, to rectify this most horrifying conundrum of the aforementioned question proposed, I (for one) will return home, and re-read the entire contents of the novel with my hubby, thereby savouring all the delicious ingredients of the storyline bit by bit.

Savyy?

Hee-hee!! Too much fun!!

Ooohhhh!! I have more things to post, like Alora's "Before" and "After" shots of her hair and some fire pics from California!!

Back soon!!

"Joyous" News!

Just a quick note regarding my late business ventures over in Europe! Some of you (and many others) already know that I have been creating images for rubber stamps for the past several months with a stamping company in the UK called Sugar Nellie. I have recently signed a contract with a second stamping company called Whiff of Joy Stamps and they are already receiving enormous attention!

So now I am one of the very lucky illustrators to be on board with both Sugar Nellie and Whiff of Joy Stamps! I cannot tell you how exciting it is for me to be with both companies who are already reaching stardom!! My friend and work associate Katharina Frei of Whiff of Joy Stamps is literally "a JOY" to work with (hee-hee!), and we have tons of exciting ideas ahead of us regarding beautiful stamp images for you to play with and enjoy too! :D You'll have to stay tuned with the Whiff of Joy blog as well as the Whiff of Joy online store for more details!

Here is a sneaky peek of Willow carrying a lantern with a Christmas theme to be released through Whiff of Joy Stamps. Hope you all like her! :) Click on over to my art website blog to read all about how our "Willow" got her name! It's very, very cool!

*Big Big Hugs!!*

Lovely Brown Crackers!

Lately I'm finding that life likes to give things in small doses. Ofcourse only when It decides to. And never when we expect it.

Yesterday I was busily typing away in my office, content that my children were occupied by the yammerings of Goofy on tv while I worked on some emails. My darling son came up to me and handed me something small, brown and squishy. It looked an odd shade for the fistful of crackers he had been nibbling on. I caught a strange whiff. What was that bizarre smell?

I ran my eyes down his arm and stared at his grubby hands.

Grubby?

Uh-oh.

Traces of poop smeared up his arm and leaked out of his bulging diaper. Worst still, his binky held tell-tale traces of an experimental snack.

*Aauugghhh!!!*

MAY-DAY!!! I scooped him up in one quick stride and holding him as far away from me as I could manage, tanked to the bathroom, his legs dangling in mid air as he sucked nonchalantly away on his binky. I could just hear his little mind thinking that this was purely elementary behaviour in the Bell household! Frantic mother. Clueless child. Haha, if you can imagine it, we must have looked pretty funny!

I plunked him in the tub fully dressed and wrenched the hot and cold faucets around to their limits until water belched its way out at high velocity. As the water jetted into the tub and as Cougar endeavored to drown our bathroom by sticking his finger beneath the faucet and spraying the walls, myself included, I proceeded to peel off the poopy-ridden onesie that was now beginning to smell like my little brown and squishy "cracker".

*sigh* My little angel.

And that was definitely no cracker! LOL!!

Two days ago, I received the best phone call from my soul mate. He was being demo'd (demobilized) and he would be on his way home in the morning! As I type, he is only a few miles away from Phoenix. He and his crew have been driving all day today. I will see him in a couple more hours. I wasn't expecting him home until Sunday, so this is better than Christmas!

I'm soooooo happy he's finally coming home!!



Here is a pic of my beloved hubby playing Mr. Mom and being the biggest sweetheart cleaning our very messy livingroom on a laundry day. No wonder I can't live without him! Hee-hee!!

(OMGosh!! That room really is a mess!!! (See, Aubry? It DOES get messy around here, haha!) And when was the last time I straightened up the picture frames on the back wall? Umm........ LOL!!!)

There is saying from a prominent breakfast cereal company that says, "It's the [small and] simple things in life that are often the best".

And might I add, "And also the funniest!"

How true that is. :)

Life in Real Time

Alora now


Alora's final haircut


Alora's haircut from the back


During (first) haircut at Grandma Bell's


Alora's hideous haircut!!





Finally! Pics of Alora's Hair Before and After her crazy hair cut!! LOL. Geez, how I love my kids! :P



Clint has been gone for a little over one week already. He has also taken the camera with him which means I can't take pictures while he's away. Ironically, it's when he's away WITH the camera that all the crazy things begin happening around here!

Just when I thought I was taking things into my stride as a "single parent", life decides to spice things up just a notch to make my life a little more "interesting". Yesterday was a real blast. While changing Eden's diaper in the livingroom, Cougar had found his way into my studio office for the umpteenth time. Alora has been such the big helper these days, but to the point where she "over helps". Now that it's over, I can laugh about it. *Strained chuckle*

*Rolls eyes*

Cougar was helping himself to some of "Mummy's things" in my studio and Alora went charging to the rescue and hussled him out of the room. In the process, she shut the office door.

After changing Eden and sensing the would-be calamity to have died down, sighing with relief I went to enter my office. The door handle wouldn't budge. I was locked out of my office!

Not only that, my cell phone and the GOOD phone that works and my computer with some very important emails I was composing before Eden created her stinky were all in my office!

I was going to rip my hair out!!! Haha. Uugghhhhh....

*Inhale*

After briefly having a word with Alora (who very innocently said she didn't do it), I hurried to the bathroom to find a bobby-pin. I'd seen it done in movies and knew my husband could do it (but he wasn't here, dagnamit!), but I'D never done it!

Straightening out the bobby-pin, I pushed it through the tiny round opening in the middle of the door knob digging around hoping to spring a catch or SOMETHING. I had no idea what I was looking for. So I twisted and prodded to no avail. I had a wave of inspiration. "Google it!"

Thankfully we have 3 computers in our house, so I ran to my bedroom where my hubby's computer sat patiently waiting for me to pounce on it. I googled, "Unlocking a door". I pulled up some YouTube info, but they were really no help.

Great.

I did read somewhere that someone had used a coat hanger, so I grabbed an old wire hanger in our closet, straightened out the hook, and slid it between our 2 doors hoping to push the catch aside. Nope. So I proceeded to dig around in the door knob again. The fleeting thought of calling 911 did a merry jig across my mind.

Then suddenly, a distinct "click" and the door popped open! Relief!!

*Major Exhale!*

The coat hanger remains propped up in the corner of my office as a souvenir of yesterday's crazy antics.

Then Life decided to have another go at me today.

Just before 7am this morning I heard the soft footsteps of Alora approaching my bed. I was still curled up beside Eden (who was already awake busily downing a bottle of apple juice). I wear contact lenses, so without it I'm practically blind, so I didn't see Alora clearly when she came up beside me to say good morning.

"Mummy, guess what?" she suddenly gushed with a little too much enthusiasm for 7 am.

"What, honey?"

"I did something very, very good! I was helpful! Remember how you said yesterday that I was going to get my hair cut? Well, I helped you and I cut my hair!"

My eyes bugged wide open although that didn't help my vision too much. I whirled around to stare at her, squinting like an old woman. It was simply too early to NOT be completely taken off guard. My brain was spluttering like an old motorbike - a very annoyed one. Breathe, Lis, breathe, I told myself. You don't have all the facts. Maybe she's kidding.

"What?" I croaked still dazed from sleep. "You CUT your hair??"

"Yes."

"When did you cut your hair and where??"

"I cut my hair in the bathroom."

"This morning??" (Obviously I was still half asleep, ofcourse it was this morning).

She nodded.

"Which scissors did you use?"

"I used the ones in the kitchen". I cringed imagining the mess, hair scattered everywhere. And those blunt kitchen scissors...

I whipped my spectacles on and studied her head. Yup. She did.

And nope. She wasn't kidding.

I closed my eyes stifling a laugh and wanting to blow up at the same time. In less than 40 minutes, we were supposed to get in the car and drive her to school.

Oh. My. Gosh.

Heaven help me, I whimpered. And I thought I had reached my wits end yesterday.

Alora's face was still as beautiful and as angelic as ever. She is truly blessed with beauty and nothing she did could ever mess that up. Her hair on the otherhand.

The pictures above show the length of her hair. Those pics were taken several months ago, so her hair has grown about an inch since. She had chopped off her hair right up to the hairline above her brow so that little tufts of black spikes stood on end. It was the first thing you saw when you looked at her face. She said that her hair had gotten in the way when she ran around so that was her 7 year old remedy. LOL!

As for the rest of it, she had hacked the length of her hair to shoulder length. I suppose she was looking in the mirror when she did this as the length was approximately (emphasis added) even. The back of her hair remained in a jagged mess where she had ventured blindly with the (blunt) scissors, leaving a handful of long tresses as she missed. Imagine the popular 80's Rat's Tail gone wrong. Really wrong.

I WISH I had my camera!!

"Honey", (I practically whined) "Why didn't you wait until Daddy got back? I would have taken you to a professional to cut your hair. Sweetheart, I will tell you the truth, YOU still are beautiful but your hair is a mess!"

I wanted to hug her. I wanted to yell. I wanted to tell her the truth. I didn't want to hurt her feelings. I wanted to cry. I wanted Clint to be home! It was clearly WAY TOO EARLY for this to be happening!!

I was just trying to help", she said with a straight face. "I did clean up". I checked afterwards and true to her word, she had cleaned the chopped bits of hair off the floor and most of it lay in a big, lumpy mass in the trash. I sighed. I knew that I had to record this 7 year old milestone moment where Alora exercised her independence by cutting her own hair. In the morning. Before anyone else was awake.

Hilarious!!

I called the school and left a message that she wouldn't be making it this morning. Then I called Grandma at the Bell Patch and told her of the emergency, asking if she wouldn't mind watching the kids while I took Alora for a professional hair cut. Her hair was beyond any saving that I could possibly administer. Mom suggested the next best thing, she could cut her hair. Okay I said. Maybe I could get a bit of grocery shopping done while she was at it. She said that was fine. AND she would take a picture of Alora's hair too!

Thus my day is coming together. Finally.

Now to rescue a screaming 8 month old and a 2 year old that is bent on turning the fan on high and blowing us all away.

I love being a parent!! (*exclaimed with tongue in cheek*) xx

BLissful Parenting!

Alora, our beautiful Second Grader.


Our lovely, sweet and adorable Eden.


Our crazy sweet Cougar with a new hair cut and glasses!

For the sake of family all over the world (you all know who you are) I have made the active decision to update my blog ATLEAST once a week. I make no promises. You could get lucky and I could update it more often!

Once upon a time I was the avid journal writer. But now, such is historical antiquity. Children, family, being a full time Domestic Engineer and Professional Artist (haha, don't you love my lofty titles?) have overtaken everything else in my life. That and going insane on this small spot of the world. My beloved soul mate is off in northern California fighting fires for 2 whole, frustrating weeks which has left me to be in FULL charge of the household and everything within and about it. I'm not READY to be a single parent! I didn't sign up for this. Where is the off button? I want to jump off and run away to a remote island somewhere in some gorgeous villa and lock the door behind me...(here Clint would have me include the fact that he would be there with me too. Haha!) Only, I'd miss my kids too much. Then I'd have to come back to reality. What a jarring slap in the face that would be. AAuuugghghghghh!

So he's been gone 5 days already, but only 3 of those days count (travel time not included - darn it!!). 11 more days to go. Plus travel time. Why does counting backwards sound like it's less time and provide more sanity than counting forwards?

- AND we have only a few chapters left of "The Host" to read! As soon as we finished Stephenie Meyer's "Eclipse" we picked up reading her latest release, "The Host" together. He left just at the height of the story! Now I have to wait for him to get back before I can find out what happens to Melanie and Wanda!! Doh!!! And because I'm so steadfast and will wait for him AND to read the rest of the book together, I'll just suffer and vent all over my blog! :P

I miss my Clint.

Ok, vent is over. It's really not as bad as that. I'm glad I can be here for our kids. I wouldn't have it any other way. I was able to go to Target yesterday (flanked by a 2 year old and an 8 month old in her humungous car seat. Humungous for little me atleast) and do lots of fun shopping. Now could I have done that if Clint were with me? Are you kidding? I'd forever be hearing him sigh in every aisle, and be harrassed by his "Nooo, we don't need that" glares hurled in my direction every 2 minutes. Yes, I pick up something and look at it every 2 minutes.

No I don't. But he thinks I do. Haha!

So, the bliss of being able to shop (and shop I did) all by myself (minus the 2 kids who were actually quite well behaved under the circumstances - until we hit the juice aisle...) was refreshing. Nice to get out of the house. And to spend money! LOL! Oh dear, somewhere in northern California, Clint's ears are burning, and it's not because of the fires.

So back to the juice aisle that I'd mentioned in parenthesis. As soon as Cougar saw all the gleaming, colourful bottled juices, he belched out a Cougar-iffic high pitched squeal. That's when I realised his sippy cup was empty. So if you're a parent, you may be able to relate. I put down my cute red shoulder bag to prepare myself. That's when Eden joined in with her shrills. Oh dear. I was ready with a bottle of apple juice and popped that in her mouth. One down, one to go.

I scanned the ridiculous shelves responsible for our current mayhem hunting for some type of juice that didn't require a straw or wasn't packaged in some type of heavy cardboard that was parent proof in situations like this. I needed something easy to open and in a hurry. No straws. Not only would a straw produce a huge mess that I wasn't willing to deal with, I wasn't going to spend precious minutes trying to dump the juice into his sippy cup through the teeny straw opening. Of course, I could rip open the juice box. Of course! C'mon, this is me here. I don't think like that under pressure. My hubby could though, bless his heart. And he wasn't here with me!

Then I found it. Gatorade. I pounced on the orange bottles and wrenched off the plastic rings binding the pack together, twisted off the lid and hurriedly poured the contents into his sippy cup that I managed to open in under 3 seconds. A Lissy's World record. He popped the sippy cup right into his mouth, and ahhhh, the sound of silence. As much as can be afforded in the middle of the juice and cereal aisle in the middle of a Target store at any rate.

Then, as the kids were happy, I was able to throw down a yogurt covered granola bar. It was 9:30 am and this was breakfast. We hadn't had breakfast, so no wonder Cougar was a bit grizzly. So I grabbed more snacky items, fruit chews, and opened those boxes as well. Haha, how often have I done this before in times of desperation? *sigh* My poor brain.

I needed an outlet. We needed a new dvd player. It had finally broken down due to its exhausted use by my crazy 2 year old who likes to switch dvds every five minutes. First it didn't eject properly. Then it stopped playing altogether. We went to electronics.

My outlet? Spending money. One dvd player later, plus 2 dvds for Alora, a training potty for Cougar, a Fisher Price Ocean Wonders soother for Eden, and a bunch of food that I probably didn't need (word of the wise, NEVER shop hungry) we were on our way back to the car with a store assistant pushing an extra shopping cart behind me.

That's when I noticed Eden had done the biggest poop in her car seat. It had oozed over her onesie, crawled up her back and spilled out over her chunky little legs onto her seat. I rolled my eyes. That would have to wait until we got home.

Earlier that morning (unbelievably to me, this was only yesterday) we had driven Alora to school. It was her first day back from summer vacation. She is now an official second grader. Where does the time go?

As I approached the school, I could feel my stomach dropping, my face turning into a grimace, then puckering into a scowl. There were cars EVERYWHERE! Cars were parked haphazardly by the sides of the road, along the curb. Parents in a late frenzy to get their kids to school and on time. It was chaos. I hate the first day of school.

Then I realised that Alora had a new teacher and a new classroom. We didn't attend Meet the Teacher night so we had no clue who her teacher was, or where her classroom was located. Was I just going to drop her off at the school to fend for herself on her own so I could avoid the cataclysm of banked up parking and harried parents? This place was worst than Best Buy on Christmas Eve.

Of course not. I was going to brave the throng. The horde of crazed people. I would lug all 3 of my children out of the car and get my daughter to her classroom, even if I had to wrestle my 2 year old along the way and carry Eden in her stroller with my free arm and pummel everyone else in my way with my feet! I would be a dedicated, responsible parent who takes care of her daughter's scholastic needs. Help, I whispered to myself. I said a necessary prayer.

And I did it! WE did it. Alora was amazing. She helped out with Cougar on the way to the office and through to her new classroom. She held his hand and opened all the doors as we walked through the school. Cougar was helpful in the fact that he held Alora's hand and didn't try too hard to run away. She was my saving grace on the way to her room and I was able to push Eden along happily in her stroller. As for Eden, she just sat back and gazed at all the new surroundings. Oh, the joys of being a baby!

On the way back to the car, I managed to hail down the help of Natalie, one of the assistant teachers. She was so nice and helpful, to her credit I even remember her name! :) She pushed Eden in her stroller while I rounded Cougar up and kept him from running away. When we finally got to the car, I thanked both Natalie and heaven most emphatically. Incidentally, the parking lot was void of the monstrosity alive only minutes before. School is a crazy place. Thank goodness tomorrow is the SECOND day of school!!

All in all, Alora had a wonderful first day at school. I was able to get out of the house and find some enjoyment at Target. AND I managed it with my kids. Oh, and I managed to hook up the new dvd player ALL BY MYSELF. I don't care if it doesn't require an IQ to hook up a dvd player. I'm real proud of my accomplishment. You see, that's something else Clint would do for me. He practically does everything for me. I am very spoiled.

How I miss my man. (Can you tell? Maybe I should change the title of this post to "Ode To Clint" LOL!!) I really love that he treats me like his princess. I truly love my family, so much that my heart breaks over the amount of love I hold for them.

Clint and I get to text eachother every day. I'm grateful that his cell phone gets enough signal to do this. He and the rest of his crew are out in the wilderness living like mountain men. They're sleeping in tents, and have special places set up for them to wash and go bathroom. He hasn't shaven for days! He'll come home with a beard. Haha! Ugh. As long as he's safe and healthy, and comes home undamaged, that makes me happy. His phone is running very low on batteries, so we hope he'll find some place to recharge it.

I'm grateful that we've had some type of communication every day so far. We've already discussed all the things we'll do when he gets back. We're both planning on taking a late anniversary getaway for a couple of days. I wasn't able to earlier in the year as I was still heavily nursing Eden. Another plan of ours is that I complete weining Eden during the short time he's away. That won't be a problem as Eden is already preferring the bottle now more than me. It's a bitter sweet thing. Although I loved the act of nursing my babies, I am through with all the mastitis and nursing problems I encountered this third time round.

Geezz, I know, it's only 2 weeks. But I'll be honest. I miss the heck out of him. It will be good when Daddy returns. Then perhaps my sanity will return. Afterall, he is my sanity. And insanity. Haha!!

Girls Day Out!

(This is a rough sketch for ideas for Elisabeth Bell stamps through Sugar Nellie. You can see more sketches in the SASS gallery on my site.)

Today was just too much fun! For the longest time, this has been high on my list of things I NEED to do for me to just get out and have some fun girl time with another fun girl. And having had 2 babies 2 years in a row, both c-section births requiring extensive recovery time after each delivery, my priority for my mental health's sake (and my husband's) was to simply get out and have a bit of "me" time. Clint is always extremely supportive when it comes to me and my need to relax and enjoy life, so he watched all our sweet little kidlets for 6 hours while I hung out with my friend and cousin Aubry and let me tell you, I took full advantage of our "girl time" and we both had a total blast!! I think I can speak for Aubry too in saying this!! :)

So, can you imagine it, 2 Moms finally getting the chance to get away and to get out without kids (she has 4 boys under the age of 12!) and finally getting optimal psychological air. So what did we do? Well, naturally, we went SHOPPING!!!! Without kids and WITHOUT husbands!!! Mwah-hahahahahahahaha!! Oh, that can bring out the evil side in any woman!! Heehee!

First, I stopped by at Aubry's house to check out her GORGEOUS new home. And OMIGOODNESS!!! Let me just say that the tour took alot longer than we expected (we did alot of yakking and I did alot of gushing over all her spectacular rooms and furnishings, decorations etc. - I mean really, this gal knows how to decorate her home which exudes stunning antique appeal with a modern twist) that we didn't actually get out of the door to begin our "outing" until close to 2pm. Oh, I've got to admit all the gushy giddiness was really very refreshing for a girl like me who is prone to indulge in a sense of girly girly-ness every now and then! It was a full shot in the arm with "Just what the doctor ordered" inscribed on the Rx!

Haha!

>sigh<

So when we finally left her gorgeous home, we took a quick bite of a late lunch at Panda Express (Asian fast food) then hurried over to the next predetermined destination, a must-stop-by place: Cold Stone Creamery.

Okay, so we're in the ice cream store and looking over all their yummy and delicious treats, and I spy a sign on their wall advertising their newest line of treats: NRgize. I read it aloud, slowly annunciating each letter and syllable, rolling my tongue over the "Rr's" in a highly exaggerated manner for an Ozzie like me: "NERR-gii-zah". I screwed up my face and looked at Aubry, obviously completely flummoxed. I thought, "Interesting, but what in the heck is a name like that supposed to mean?" Aubry didn't even bat an eyebrow as she looked at me with a "What-do-you-mean" expression on her face, and read the sign herself, "Energize".

It only took a moment when we both bust up laughing! DOH!!!

I don't know how I had totally missed that. It was like my brain had stopped working for a moment and I seriously thought that I was looking at a sign that read NERR-gizah. And I really, really thought that that was the most stoopidest name to call a treat, by hey, it was pretty creative too. Hahaha!! Um, who's the "creative" one here?? *Rollz eyes* So now, every time we got to Cold Stone Creamery to order one of their "NRgize" shakes, we'll only be getting NERR-gizahs! Haha!! What a dope I am!!! Too, too funny.

Then we went over to Ross. We spent something like 2 hours in that store. Needless to say, this is just one of the best stores on earth, hands down. This as well as Aubry and I as a combination can only be good for Mr. and Mrs. Ross making lots of moolah off of us!!! Sooo, Aubry bought this awesome huge clock, stunning distressed antique looking clock, with lots of encouragment from me. :P She wasn't too sure about it at first, but made the decision to do so, since her hubby has been wanting a clock in the room it was intended for too. (And to make a happy ending for the clock and all parties involved, it really does look fabulous in the room!!!)

We just had too much fun shopping and being naughty spending all that money on frivolities. Yes, I admit it. We are very spoiled. Well, when we don't have screaming, irritable kids to worry about being bored out of their brains, and irritable hubbies bored out of their brains, what more is there to say but we make good use of our time and SHOP!! It was far too easy to do with this recipe. I know, who am I trying to convince? Hahaha!

No, I won't tell you how much I spent! (But if I'd bought a clock like Aubry's too, we would have been even!! LOL!!)

It was after 5pm when we finally got back to Aubry's home, checked out how the clock looked in her livingroom space (like I said, it looked FABulous!), and by the time I got home, it was heading towards 6:30pm.

And oh, it was a wonderful day!!!! And to make things even better, my lovely hubby was already preparing dinner for our family (left overs, and that works!) when I arrived home, so I didn't have to lift a finger! And then we watched a movie (Live Free or Die Hard which I actually liked), stopping half way through to put little Cougar to bed who was already beyond irritability.

It's so hard to watch a movie properly with our little Cougstar. He always likes to be the star of any (every) moment if you know what I mean.

As for the movie, it was probably a good thing he went to bed sooner than later. Not really a kid movie in my mind. Clint was okay with it (yeah, make him look like the bad guy), but next time, we should be more selective around the kids. Yeah, I should just put my foot down!

Sooo back to the day, thanks Aubry, we'll have to do it all again! We think our hubbie's won't let us shop again together, but to tell you the truth, Clint didn't even raise an eyebrow when he saw the bags I'd brought home (all part of Lis' relaxation and calming experience probably! - heehee!) Then again, I didn't tell him how much I spent. Then again, I did get him alot of dress pants and white shirts for church, including a couple of ties. Haha, leverage! No really, they were belated birthday presents (his birthday was yesterday).

Haha! I'm not kidding. Seriously. Although he wished I hadn't bought anything for him. Such the self-sacrificing hubby that he is.

Nope! I STILL won't tell you how much I spent!

Yaayyy! So I got my psychological air! Back to the drawing board tomorrow - literally! I need to finish up the final images for the next set of stamp designs for Sugar Nellie. And back to the battle field with my sweet and crazy little 'uns tomorrow, as my beloved is back to work. I guess good things come in servings. Thankfully, my family is the whole yummy cake so to speak, and I get to have a slice of all the wonderful experiences with them every day.

And I can't go without giving the rest of all my thanks to my beloved sweet Clint, who made this wonderful day of mine possible in the first place.

Ooohhh! It's so late! I just type and type and type...such the yammer-er. Kay, gotta go! Will write again soon.

Lis xx

My Happy Place!

Where is it? As I type away with little Eden on my knee, I smile. The answer is quite obvious: right here with my hubby and little ones. My home. My family. Too true, I'm a hopeless Romantic. Undeniably and irrevocably. Utterly and absolutely convicted.

I can feel the Twilight books creeping in to my writing style! Haha!

Eden is hitting some mile stones. She is rolling over on her own (has been doing this for some time) and is becoming quite mobile during tummy time. One moment she's on one square of a blanket. The next, she's rolled right over by the television. She can also hold her own bottle up all by herself. What a big girl she is! This month she'll be 7 months old. We have a sneaky suspicion that she might be teething too. Time is flying. Too fast it seems at times for me.

Cougar got a major hair cut last week. His first big hair cut. Clint (Daddy) pulled out the clippers and gave him a number 3 up the top, and number 2 all around. I can now see his entire face! He reminds me of a miniature Avatar. All he needs now is an arrow on his forehead! LOL! He looks so cute!!! And so GROWN UP!!! I'm still trying to get used to his new look and I actually miss his hair. The lengthy black curly tresses made him look like a little boy. Now he looks like a big boy. And he's turning 2 in just under 2 weeks. I feel like my little boy has left me! *WAHHHHHHH!!!! SOBB!!!* Such a drama-mama I am.

Yesterday, Clint and I dropped the kids off at Grandma and Grandpa's and we went on yet another date! We had lunch at Applebees by the Park Place Mall, then caught the 2:35pm showing of Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. We loved it!! Without giving anything away, the movie truly kept to the "Indiana Jones" style with all the far-out action (especially at the beginning of the movie), zany and far-fetched stunts and action sequences, crazy suspense and laugh-out-loud comedy. And perhaps the best part of all was this "episode" finally provided closure to the Indiana saga.

For those of us who've seen all 3 of the Jones' movies, there were lots of fun instances in this movie indigenous to the Indiana story line. Lots of fun to pick up on. All in all, the fourth and final of the saga provided great entertainment for all ages, especially for those of us who grew up with Speilberg's Indiana Jones; us old fogies would probably get more out of it than the younger generation. To illustrate, according to tabloids and statistics on Fandango, Kung Fu Panda rated highest on movie popularity and sales.

Which is but another movie hubby and I want to see too!

And finally, about 3 hours ago I looked at the calendar and in bold black letters in the box that read Sunday June 15th, the horrific reality bawked at me heralding the ghastly realisation of tomorrow: FATHERS DAY.

Did I have anything for Daddy? Nope. And after all that he'd done for me on my birthday as well as Mother's Day, I felt lower than than the lowest of the Low!

So I racked my brains (thank goodness I still have some) and haphazardly created a Sweetheart Award Certificate! Lame, I know. But I'll also bake choc chip cookies for him tomorrow too after we get home from church.

Alora created a big Father's Day card for Daddy using her markers and pencils and her amazing 7 year old drawings, mostly consisting of many miniature Spyros (the purple dragon from GameCube games). Alora's had a crazy fixation with Spyro for years. She also wrote that she wants to go swimming with Mari at Grandma's pool on Monday. Bless her little heart. She put the finished card on Clint's computer in our room. I just know that Daddy will love it!

In 4 days it will be Clint's birthday too, so we'll go out together then and get him a whopping good b'day prezzie. He wants a new dishwasher (our current one works insofar that it's a glorified dish rack) and since he does the dishes a lot, I think he deserves the extra help from an electric one.

Well, it's heading towards 8pm and the kids are all still awake. But not for long! MWAH-HAHAHAHAHAHA!!! As much as I love my little ones, I really do need that precious "Me" time!!

So finally, I get to go to my Happy Place! Clint's at work. :( Well, one of my Happy Places anyway...a good book and a warm cup of half hot chocolate and half Postum. And all the kids in bed. I don't care if they're still awake and raising the roof. Sounds awesome! Gotta go!

Love to you all!!!

*Big hugs n kisses!*

Lissy xx

BTW: The illustration is a Sneeky Peek of one of the pics that will be released in the next batch of stamps by Sugar Nellie. I'm very excited for it! Enjoy!

Summer Simplicity

Today was our family's Monday fun day! We went to Grandma and Grandpa's farm (the "Bell Patch") and went swimming in the pool to enjoy our lovely sunny days here in summery Arizona. Going to Grandma and Grandpa Bell's farm is always a treat! The farm is a literal child's playground heaven. There are trampolines, animals - including horses, mules, chickens, dogs, cats, turkies (new members!), goats, stretches of green pasture, a swimming pool, playground equipment, a vegetable garden with home grown produce, loving hearts and warm welcome arms, it's truly a magical place! Alora LOVES going to the farm, and if she had her way, we'd all move in with Grandma and Grandpa and stay with them forever!! That would be her ideal heaven.

We stopped by McDonalds on the way to pick up some burgers and fries to fill some little tummies for a late lunch, and ate by the pool. At 4:30pm, outside was warm and sunny. Perfect pool weather. Cougar and Alora had a thrilling time splashing and doggy paddling in the water (which happened to be a perfect temperature, not too cold, not too warm) with Daddy. Grandma and Aunt Mari (who Alora practically worships) joined us before long. They didn't have their swim suits on, so they jumped in the pool fully clothed! Too much fun!! Mari had broken her arm falling off a horse a few weeks ago and had it in a cast, which she ended up soaking "inadvertently" within minutes. Try as she did to keep it above water. Given that the cast will be removed on Wednesday, it will only smell for a few days! :)

After a couple hours of splashing and sunning, and briefly jumping on the trampoline to dry off, we then gathered over at Aunt Sharon's big, beautiful house and had dinner together. Baked potatoes and yummy fixings was on the menu. The sun was still up by the time we'd finished eating around 7pm. Long summer days are here.

After dinner, Grandma and Grandpa headed over back to their house to prepare putting up a special pen for the turkies by the pasture. No doubt getting ready for the all American Thanksgiving season. We were invited to stay on to watch Disney's "Pollyanna" with them, but had to take a raincheck to do some last minute shopping.

The sun was setting by the time we hit the road back home, not before stopping briefly over at cousin Brooke's house to tour their cozy abode. Then a quick stop off at Frys grocery store to pick up some bread, juice and other necessary food items, before hitting the freeway back to Vail.

By the time we rolled down our circular drive, the sun had set and the sky had darkened. Little eyes still sparkled from the delights of the day, though I could tell eye lids were beginning to droop and grow heavy.

Quick bubble baths were taken before cuddles, kisses and bed time.

Now, all three kidlets are sleeping, and hubby and I have some time to kick back and relax...I blog and check my emails and reply, he plays World of WarCraft to unwind. We'll probably catch a movie on Pay-Per-View later if there's anything good on.

...A nice change of pace to the mayhem of our household a couple of days ago. >sigh!< So grateful for the respite.

Still wanting to see Indiana Jones at the theater! Perhaps we can fit in a nice dinner and a movie date sometime this week. That would be nice.

And another lovely day with my beautiful family draws to a close. Got lots to do tomorrow, including lots of drawing! And I still need to do some colouring using my new inks and blender pen. Sooo excited!!

Still thinking of something fun to do on Father's Day for our special Daddy. Clint's birthday is also coming up, shortly followed by Cougar's 2nd birthday. Wow! Time flies!!!

We are so blessed. Life is good!

*Big hugs!*

Lis xx

Chaos = Kids = Love = Heaven

My house is a madhouse. We have our daily mayhems which brings us all together! It's filled with crazy kidlets. They drive their poor Mum crazy. In a good way! To be honest, I couldn't live without my kiddie-winx. Funnily enough, hubby falls into that category. Haha! Am I the only one in this world with "crazy" kids?

Thank you for that enormous round of chaos! Thank goodness the feelings are mutual! :)

We must all be blissfully happy! Haha!

So here are some pics of my crazy, adorable, beautiful, splendid, terrific, maddeningly loveable children. I love this pic of Eden and Alora.

*Warm fuzzy feelings*

Alora is the BEST big sister on earth! She's our big helper and she ADORES (capitals are not understated) her younger siblings. Today she said to me, "Oh, I'm so happy I have 2 babies!" And then Cougar stole the gamecube controller from her hands, and suddenly it's war!!

She also comes up with the funniest things to say. With her inquisitive mind, Alora has been asking "Why" to endless questions of late. But the other day, she had composed an answer of her own to a matter that must have been eluding her for some time. We had been talking about death due to some deaths recently having taken place in the family. The importance of being healthy and strong became even more essential to her. Then recently out of the blue, she said to me, "Mummy, I know why *Celeste's grandma died." I asked her why. She answered solemnly, "It's because she didn't take her vitamins!" Celeste's grandmother had died of other complications, which Alora had no idea about. As serious as it seemed at the time, especially to my 7 year old, I couldn't keep a straight face after she left the room. Bless her sweet and innocent 7 year old reasonings!

Going on 2 year old Cougar loves to create havoc (another understatement) with our DVD collection. (Can't you see the look of utter mischief wreaking utter pandamonium all over his sooo cute boyish face???) "His" box of Baby Einstein flicks are strewn all over the floor before the end of the day. Without fail. And each time I look at him as I stare at the mess, he grins and with his almost two year old chipper, he exclaims, innocently and wide eyed, "Heh-llooooo!!"

He also loves to run into my art studio office and steal important sketches, which drives me bananas to no end. He tries to be stealth, but my bionic hearing picks up on the rustlings of my all too familiar friends. Ofcourse. Nothing escapes Mum! He also tries to ambush my junk drawer next to my computer. It's located right next to me as I type. I have a couple of unused ink cartridges stashed away in there. He finds them and runs off, bouncing as he goes. It's a "Cougar" run/bounce/run type gait. Try to picture it.

Eden. What can I say? She is my little garden of joy. All I have to do is look at her and automatically I begin singing this wierd song designed only for her by a clucky, doting mother.

Haha! No, I won't write it.

Eden looks like she's trying to hide from her crazy, snap-happy Mum armed with the camera. Heehee!

Today she did two huge poops in her diaper. Gifts for Mummy. Daddy changes Cougar's stinkies. Mummy changes Eden's. Which is perfectly fine by me. Cougar does "big people" poops. Eeeyyooooooo!!!!! I'm sooo glad I'm not Daddy!...Until he goes to work for 24 hours. DOH!!

And Daddy. What can I say, he's my other kid. What is it about men that they always need attention? Gotta love 'em, eh? And yet, he's totally my best friend. Have I told you he worships the ground I walk on?

*Girly giggle!*

Here is a sweet pic of him playing one of Alora's gamecube games. >sigh!<

Me? I'm the super-dooper Domestic Engineer. What more can be said? Oh, I hear some loud dripping - of sarcasm! Lol!

Well, Cougar's done another disaster in his nappy. Time to call the rescue squad. Excuse me, "CLIII-IIINNTTT!!!"

Thanks for letting me share a bit of our chaotic and heavenly home with you!

(Omigoodness, he REALLY reeks!! Gotta go!!)

*Lots of Hugs!!*

Me xx

A Bit Giddy!

I just watched one of Katharina's amazing tutorials and passed out, picked myself up from the floor, uprighted my office chair - and passed out again. Okay, just kidding!! :) But I did learn SO much in the space of just under 9 minutes from her tutorial!! OMGosh!! I can't believe how talented this woman is!!

Okay, so remember when I went to Michaels the other day and bought the inks? I actually bought more than 3 items (it's nigh to impossible to leave Michaels with 3 items or less, LOL!) and among my acquisitions, I'd picked up a couple of pencil blenders in the form of "pen brushes". As far as blending pencils, I've always used a pencil blender in the past to blend the pigments (sounds reasonable to me), so when I bought the two said funky items, I was rather clueless as to how to use them and what the results might be like. It really should have been a no-brainer (no-duh!). Rather, how embrarrassment! Haha!

So might I just say that Katharina's fantastic scalloped mini-card tutorial shed much light on this matter, and now I am atleast fifty times more informed than I was - ten minutes ago! So now I can't wait to use these awesome 3 bucks a pop blender pen brushes on my Prismacolor escapades!

On that note, Katharina, thank you so very much! There is no doubt in my mind (and there never was) why you are on the Sugar Nellie DT!! Along with Marlene and Tiets (and the other artists and myself - heehee!), there is no reason why we won't conquer the stamping world in nothing short of a heart beat! LOL!!

Oh, I love blogging on my personal, non-business, blog. I feel free to be completely open, random and a bit inane! :) Though admittedly I am in danger of sounding a little "sloshed". I'm really quite lucid actually. I don't drink alcohol, and my fave beverages are hot chocolate, Pepsi decaf, OJ and yup, water!

So now I have Marlene's tutorial to follow too using my inks! And as I look at Marlene's distress inks tutorial, I see she's using the same blender brush pen thingamabobbie! Oh, hahaha! LOL, Lis! I think I'm drunk! (but seriously, I'm completely sober, I don't drink) Just a little giddy and BLIND!!

...It must be the music. I just LOVE listening to Michael Flatley's Lord of the Dance! I just want to jump up and dance with wreckless abandon and be completely, ridiculously giddy with my kids! I think it takes someone really secure (or mental) to say things like this, LOL!!!

Okay, off to do some more stuff involving drawing, less yammering.

Thanks for reading! Big hugs to you for that! And I hope you all don't think I'm too ditty, atleast not always anyway! :D

*Big big Hugs!!*

Elisabeth xx

I Went Shopping!!

Okay, so yesterday I went to Michaels as I'd planned, to spend a billion bucks (just kidding but wishful thinking!) on stamping stuff. I took my 7 year old with me, and let her have $5.00 to spend on anything in the exciting arts and crafts store. Ofcourse she was thrilled with the idea. My Alora is following in her Mummy's footsteps as she's already a truly amazing budding artist. So when her eyes fell upon all the offerings of Michaels, she pretty much went as crazy as her Mum!

I can't tell you how muddled I was when I was directed to the stamping aisle with all the stamping knick-knacks, scrapbooking material and inks. To say I was overwhelmed is an understatement! Thankfully I had a very helpful and friendly store assistant ("Maggie") to share some of her deep wisdom on stamping with me. She asked me what I intended to do with the materials and I told her I designed images for a stamping company in the UK. I'm not sure if she took me seriously at first, as she looked a little skeptical. LOL! But as she loves stamping and scrapbooking, she ended up getting excited and she gave me her email address so I could send her some info on Sugar Nellie and my Sweet Art Ebony stamp images. I told her I wanted to try my hand at colouring my images with inks (just like all you amazing stampers out there!) and that I was new to it and needed some help!

To cut a long story of uhmming and ahh-ing in the stamping aisle for almost one whole hour short (no wonder my husband loathes coming to Michaels with me), I finally decided on a few items. Almost an entire hour on just 3 things. LOL!!

As I've been wanting to try inking in my images, I had brought some suggestions for supplies that the amazingly talented Marlene had personally emailed to me (thanks Marlene!). I wanted to get some of the famous Distressed Inks that she as well as many other stampers use to create that bright, gorgeous watercolour effect on stamped images. But there weren't many in stock to choose from. So, rather disappointedly, I ended up buying some brushes and a pack of Inkabilities by Posh Impressions. I'm still clueless as to how they'll turn out, but I'm hoping it will do the trick to some degree. Since I won't be doing any "stamping" (as I already have the images, lucky me!), Maggie suggested I would get better use out of the pots of ink rather than a stamp pad. She's the expert so I went ahead with it.

Meanwhile, Alora, my 7 year old, was amusing herself in nearby craft aisles and finding the cutest stickers and rubber stamps etc. and loading our shopping cart waist high with her acquisitions. Haha! That's one way to keep yourself from boredom! Bless her patience! We ended up putting everything back though. Oh well.

So now I have some stamping materials (not the Distressed Inks yet, I still plan on getting them but may have to look online for more colour options), all I need to do is find the time to use them! LOL!!

On a completely different note, here is my schpeel on my fave author: I'm RIDICULOUSLY excited over Breaking Dawn coming out on August 2nd!! The first chapter of BD is already out in book stores in special editions of Eclipse. I know more than a dozen other people who LOVE this saga (my hubby included - we're reading the books together again for the second time - his second, my forth!) and we're all going to see the movie when it comes out December 12th!!! (EEEEEeeeeee!!!) I believe I'll take a trip to Borders bookstore and sit down in one of their cozy book nooks and curl up with a special edition of Eclipse to read the first chapter of BD. It won't be too difficult to wait just a couple of months for the rest of the book. Hey, I would have waited for almost a year for it in total. Others have been waiting longer. I pity them. I admire them. Stephenie Meyer is the most AMAZING author (well, she certainly has my vote and about a google-plex of others also) and I just went to her website and read up on the latest regarding Midnight Sun, Edwards perspective on Twilight (which is, conversely, Bella's perspective). Edward, ofcourse, is the dreamy and absurdly perfect speciman for a Vampire and any man (even my hubby loves him, LOL! so darn funny!!).

Okay, but the reality is (and let it be known), no matter how much I may "love" Edward, he doesn't come even a fraction close to my hubby who is entirely and maddeningly perfect for me, and it helps that he worships the ground I walk on. Heehee! (PHew! That should make him happy!! Haha!) And the fact that my Clint will sit down TWICE with me to read through all 3 books together just goes to show how perfect he really is!! How can a gal get so lucky??

Stephenie plans on writing Midnight Sun after Breaking Dawn has been released. AAAUUUGGGHHHH!!!! It's so thrilling, I CAN'T WAIT!!!!!

Breathe, Lis, breathe.

BTW, if you have no idea what I'm talking about, where on this beloved earth have you been?? Find out more here and go get Twilight and read for yourself. You'll be hooked, so look out!!

Love to you all! Will write again soon.

Lis xx