thanks!

Tuesday marked 3 years of being married to my wonderful husband.  ...and his family.  I LOVE the Steichens.  They are the family who are all so smart, well-rounded, and talented.  Seriously - this is the type of family that spontaneously gathers around the piano and sings (yet are still somehow all very normal people) at the holidays....or really anytime 3 or more of them are gathered.  I'm pretty sure I'm the black-sheep of the family in that arena.

My mother-in-law is fabulous.  In fact, her nickname is FMIL - which pre-wedding stood for "Future Mother In Law," and 3 years later we both still use it on cards, etc. and say the F stands for Fabulous.  She once told me that if she was ever getting on my nerves the F could stand for something completely different.  Ha!

Anyway, my FMIL completely read my mind this week, and got me some beeyootimous new placemats.  Um...I mean "us."  She got US some new placemats.  

I was feeling a bit artsy fartsy, so I went ahead and made a homemade thank-you card.  Forgot to take a pic of the inside.  Whoops.

....Yep, another door in the background.

finally.

Finally is not the name of the painting so much as me saying, "Look, I finally painted after a year of stalling."

Also, open doors behind people feature in several of my paintings and drawings.  Wonder what this means deep in my subconscious?

This painting has no name right now except for "Audra's," because I started it for her more than a year ago.  Aud - you may officially title this piece.  Might I suggest - "My painter is a big fat procrastinator?"

Jenny - you're up next.

lines.

I like lines.  Not standing in them...drawing them.  I like sortof - but not quite - parallel, repeated lines used to create shadow.  I like drawing people.  Kindof serious people drawn in a slightly weird-looking or naive way.  I like a little bizarreness.  Can you tell?

And I think these 2 people might be part of the reason why:  Edward Gorey, illustrator/writer.  Mateusz Skutnik, of Pastel Games.  Their artwork makes me happy when I look at it.  Very very happy.

spectacle

So, Mark and I definitely have a routine in the morning.  It begins with both of us lying there pretending to be sleeping while we are really just waiting for the other to get up and go hit snooze on Mona.  Mona's our dog...the newest member of the Steichen clan that wakes up whining (and/or barking) at 7am on the dot every day.  I know, I know..7am is sleeping in for some of you folks.  Well I think you are deprived.

Anyway, this morning, I was the one who caved first, but by this point the noise had escalated quite a bit, so I was in a hurry to get to the dog to quiet her down.  In the darkness, I didn't notice that I was completely blind without my contacts in, so I didn't even think about grabbing my glasses.

Instead, I stumbled across the hall to practice the "quiet" command with Mona-the-destroyer-of-sleep, and immediately felt bad for cursing her under my breath.  It looked as if she had gotten sick in the bottom of her crate.  Poor thing!  Must have been that Mento I let her eat the night before.  No wonder she wanted out so badly.  I loudly called out to still-pretending-to-sleep-Mark that our little pup was sick, and stumbled back across the hall to grab my glasses so that I could survey the damage to the crate and the dog.  Only, with my eyes on, the puddle of sick I had seen only seconds before had been replaced with Mona's rope-bone.  She hadn't gotten sick after all.  She was just being a brat, and I am very blind.