Sulk

Not going camping tomorrow.

Had no one to watch Roxanne.

Didn't want to take her with.

Getting a CAT scan instead.

Lung feeling the effects of being smashed by ATV.

Doodle when I sulk.

Depressed.

Friends City

Today I taped a roll of white banner paper onto the fence, gave the kids some paint and markers, and let them go to town... so they made a town. They named their city "Friends City". That's the cheesiest name I have ever heard of. The city is complete with a McDonalds, Starbucks, Burger King, King Soopers, a gym, Hot Topic, a skateboard park, a skateboard shop, a tattoo shop, a pool, a spa, two motels, muscle men, a drowning child, lifeguards, a rainbow, a beach, roof gardens, and more.

Note: This wasn't a "planned" craft day. It was just an improptu thing I did for my kids and then people just kept showing up... as they tend to do. It was a great activity, because I hardly had to do anything- infact I got a lot of work done on my own painting for... *gasp* my next art show!

Camping Concoctions

I sure do love making concoctions. One day I want to publish a cookbook called “The Creative Concoctions Cookbook” by Naomi the Concocter. My husband is very unsupportive of my pursuit of concoctions. Usually when I describe to him one of my newest concoction ideas, he says “you WOULD think of that”. What he doesn’t know is that I can see right through him, and while I am devouring my delicious concoction, he is secretly coveting it and thinking “oh boy, I wish I could ask for a bite.” Here is a list of some of my best concoctions:
· Beandip, guacamole and frito hotdog
· Maple rum milk for sipping
· Brownie batter and soft butter pudding
· Hershey syrup and rice crispy banana sandwich
Sometimes my concoctions don’t turn out so well (like the rice pudding and chicken casserole). But I always learn something, and I won’t put any recipes in my cookbook that I haven’t personally tested out.
One of the chapters in my cookbook will be called “Camping Concoctions”. This last weekend, I went camping with my in-laws, and I came up with two great concoctions for this chapter of my cookbook. I will share them with you now:

American Honey Campfire Banana
For this recipe I sliced a banana length wise and then cut some slits into the banana pulp (leaving it in its skin). Then I poured American Honey Liqueur into the banana and then closed it back up again and let it sit for a couple hours to marinate. Then, after the kids went to bed, I opened it back up and added a couple marshmallows to the liqueur-infused banana, then closed it back up and wrapped it up in foil. Then I sat it over the fire for about 10 minutes to bake. When it was good and hot, I opened it up and ate it out of the skin with a spoon. MMMmmmm… it was mushy and scrumptious! I also had another shot of American Honey on the side, which was perfect for my sore body that had earlier been thrown from an ATV and then steamrolled by it.

Ghost town cheese-it buttercup goodies
This recipe I invented after a bumpy ATV ride up an old trail to the top of a mountain where we discovered an old abandoned mining village made up of crumbling log cabins. We had packed a few snacks along with us, so we stopped in the ghost town to have a picnic. This recipe is pretty simple. Remove the top of a miniature peanut butter cup, and then sandwich the remainder of it between two cheese-it crackers. If I had any extra peanut butter on hand, I would have used to it paste the sandwich together and then display them creatively on a platter to serve. This was crunchy chocolaty peanut buttery goodness!

If you want a recipe for a great camping trip (this won’t be in the cookbook), one ingredient you don’t want to forget is Tim (my brother-in-law). Tim makes a camping trip great for a couple reasons. 1. He brings the ATVs. 2. He brings the liqueur (I wouldn’t have come up with my banana creation without him!) And 3. he is usually willing to try out my concoctions, something my husband isn’t willing to do, BUT, we sure do make one cute couple anyways, don’t we?!

This is a Crazy Song

Ok, I realize that this is the kind of thing that only a mom thinks is super cute... well, maybe a grandma too... and a few aunts (especially Aunt Carol), but I am posting another episode of "dancing with Rocket" (and this time he's wearing more than just underwear). After Aunt Becca emailed us a video clip of a breakdancing kid, Rocket discovered that Youtube is a goldmine of awesome dance moves. So he spent a good part of the day using this new found resource to research the subject of dancing, and this is what he has come up with. Maybe I am just a little biased, but I think this kid is a total stud and I give his dancing a 10 (and that's on a scale from 1 to 5).

A note about my art from Dr. Sketchy's

I have a habit of asking blunt questions that I really don't want to know the answer to. I did that recently when I asked someone why they didn't have a link to my blog on their page. Being the honest people they are, they gave me a blunt answer to the blunt question I asked that I really didn't want to know the answer to. And what it all boiled down to is that I needed to make some changes to the structure of my blog.

I really like nude people in art, and that's why I go to Dr. Sketchy's. I also like to share my artwork (as it plays out in my life) on my blog. But I understand that my nude drawings could pop up onto your computer screen when you click on my blog and be sortof like someone flashing you when you weren't expecting or wanting it. It can also be shocking or disturbing to people who aren't accustomed to nudity in art- especially for viewers from the religious circles I often mingle in.

On another nude note, I abosolutely hate pornography. I hate the arrogance and selfishness that is infused into the industry that creates it. I hate the crudeness of it. I especially hate the way it takes over lives and causes all sorts of emotional and spiritual problems. Although I'd like to think that MY art has nothing to do it, it is actually in pretty close proximity to it, simply because they are both on the internet, and, therefore, could be only a couple clicks away from each other. I really don't want my blog to be the catalyst that sparks the desire to click on the ugly alternative.

So as you will notice, I won't post any artwork that contains nudity (or partial nudity) on this page. Instead, I will provide a link that you can click on to view the art work. That way you won't see anything you don't want to see. I am posting just one picture I drew at Dr. Sketchy's last night of Big Mama Red (but I think it is appropriate enough).

If you want to see anymore pictures from last night's session, click here

Crazy Collages

It was another crazy craft day here at my house. There were seven kids this time. Days like this give me a sense of wonder for the women who deal with numbers like this on a daily basis- like teachers and insane mothers who end up with this many kids of their own. Today we decopauged magazine clippings onto canvases (the cheap kind that come in a pack of 3). Earlier this week I went through my stack of magazines that I had been hoarding for an unknown reason, and cut out objects that I thought would be of interest for collaging. Then I let the kids go through the images I cut out and piece them together in creative ways. It was fun for them because they didn't need the fine motors skills that is takes to cut around intricate pictures, but they could still use their imagination by choosing images they liked and creat their own scene out of them. Here are the eight (seven kids plus me) masterpeices we created:

By Lindsay (age 4)

By Rocket (age 6)

By Juliana (age 14)

By Roxanne (age 4)

By Jordan (age 7)

By Cullen (age 6)

By Chloe (Age 9)

By Naomi (age 26)

**Handy Dandy Crafting Tip From Naomi!!!**

My most hand dandy crafting supply is my polyurethane. I put it on almost anything to give it a shiny glass-like finish. I have found that even if kids do a bad job on their craft (as they usually will do), if you make it shiny with polyurethane at the end, they will be super proud of it!

Flower Fairy

Since our flowers have bloomed I often come outside to find a little girl prancing through the flowers, humming a song, plucking flowers for her hair or for smelling, and befriending rolly pollies and spiders. Then she pretends to fall into a deep sleep- but just before she doses off she whispers, "take me a picher, mommy". Our yard must be enchanted.

Fruition

Friday night was the opening of the Kustoms Klassics show, where my art peice, "500 years after the renessaince" was exhibited. There were some truly amazing peices at the show, and the party totally rocked. I hope that I don't appear arrogant about my art work by creating a montage of pictures of people looking at my painting. Honestly, I think it shows my inexperience that I am so enamored by the fact that anyone would even notice that the canvas is covering up the red paint on the wall behind it. For most artists, this is no big deal.

I was extremely honored that Jollene showed up to see the show. That was one of the best parts of the night. When she arrived and I saw how lovely she looked, I realized that I had forgotten to wear the special pair of earrings that I had bought especially for the night. I sulked about my naked ears for a while, but then she gave me a red jacket (which we exchange back and forth periodically because we have joint custody of it). In the pocket of the jacket was a pair of earrings that I had thought I had lost a long time ago. They were perfect!

Other than the presence of Jollene, and ofcourse, my ever supportive husband, the next best part of the night was that my painting SOLD! I never even imagined that it would sell at all, much less on the opening night of the show! I am hoping that I can look back on this day in years to come and call it "my first real art show" and not "my only real art show". Only time will tell!

Go Rockies!

After the museum, we made our way down to Coors field, where we met my dad, husband and son to watch a really great baseball game. Uncle Gary, being from Florida, was rooting for the wrong team.

Uncle Gary, Pops, and Rocket point towards the score board as they read Matt Hollidays stunning performance statistics. Notice that everyone except Uncle Gary is wearing their rally caps. Apparently, the caps did their job, and rallied the Rockies on to a victorious win after being down one point in overtime. The triumph was followed by an incredible fireworks show.

DAM!

This is me and my architect uncle, Uncle Gary. I took Uncle Gary to visit some of the best DAM architecture in Colorado. We started the weekend by visiting a really DAM good museum.

It was in a really DAM cool building. You can see the DAM building behind me at the top of this picture.

In this picture, prominent architect, Gary Hancock, points out a prominent feauture on the new DAM building. The old DAM building is shown protruding up from behind the building behind Gary.

Once inside the DAM museum, we were again very impressed with the DAM architecture. In the above picture, I look over one of the DAM balconies to experience the many angles and geometry that make the DAM building a peice of incredible artwork in itself.

We also saw some DAM paintings.

DAM is what the Denver Art Museum is referred to.

Best Weekend

I think I would venture to say that this has been the best weekend of my life. I feel a little bit presumptuous saying that, since the weekend is not over yet, and who knows what fatal event could occur tomorrow and ruin it all. But SO FAR, I think it has been the best weekend of my life, unless I am forgetting about some really good weekend from a long time ago. Since the weekend was so eventful, I believe I will have to break it up into four separate blogs- this being the first, and least eventful, of the four blogs. This was just the introduction. But, you probably read it as the conclusion since blogger posts written at the top of the page.

A lucky week for four in Breckenridge

About 6 months ago Matt entered a raffle at work to support some charity . He ended up winning a week's stay at a condo in Breckenridge for the summer time. This is typical of Matt. He has always been lucky. Sometimes his luckiness benefits me (as in this case). Contrarily, I have always been unlucky. Sometimes my unluckiness unbenefits him (as in two pregnancies). This blog will highlight some aspects of our vacation (excluding the bike ride, which I already blogged about). In this picture, Matt waits patiently for his food at a restaurant. I think he looks so cute, with his shirt matching the ketchup bottle and all. Maybe that's why the waitress kept touching him. I almost had to pull a "Faith Hill" on her. This too is typical of Matt. Waitresses always touch him. It probably has something to do with his luckiness.

In this picture, Roxanne waits patiently outside of a Breckenridge store while Grandma shops. Roxanne would often pick the flowers outside of stores and give them to me to put in my hair (even though we've told her not to). Ok... sometimes I get lucky... but not often.

The kids spent hundreds of hours in the pool. I couldn't be in the water that long, so one day, I painted this picture of Roxanne from the pool deck. She happens to be one of the best swimsuit (and hippo tube) models I have ever seen.
One day we went on a five mile hike (we were pushing our luck). Amazingly, the kids completed the hike with few emotional breakdowns- which means Matt and I were both lucky. I enjoyed the hike because it was like walking through a gigantic tree sculpture gallery. There were endless trees that had been uprooted leaving them in curiously disfigured positions that resembled artwork to me. The roots seemed to twist and convolute up into the sky, each one having individual undulating (one of my favorite words) nuances (another favorite). They seemed to have been stretched and twirled around a sculpting finger (possibly God's I suppose), kindof the same way Rocket holds gum between his front teeth and then stretches it out away from his face with one finger and then begins to wrap it around his finger again and again and again. Except this wood wasn't stretchy at all (and it didn't get smeared all over the van seats or stuck in anyones hair either)- it was as dry as bones. We collected our favorite knotty branches to use as hiking sticks. Then we brought them home, with enough extras for just about every kid in the neighborhood. Yesterday the gang came over and we sanded them and painted them so that next time we go hiking, we will hike in style.
This is a picture of the sticks that the kids painted yesterday. To the right is a picture of chloe in the process of painting her hiking stick.

Breckenride has left our family relaxed and bonded. I suppose we are all a little lucky because we have eachother and we all love eachother a lot. And I am lucky that I ended up with a guy with enough luck to rub off on the rest of us. Roxanne is lucky that she is cute, because otherwise we might disown her. Rocket is lucky that he has Roxanne for us to compare him to. And Matt is lucky that I agree to stay home with the both of them all day- which is exactly why I needed this vacation!