white picket fence

enough?

I have a big batch of journal pages I've done in the last few months. But I'm feeling ambivalent about posting them here, or anywhere. Is it weird to post personal artwork online for others to see? I confess I love the feedback more than anything, but I also feel like I'm giving back/contributing since I love to look at other people's work, too. 

I feel like I had fairly realistic expectations for what being a full-time mom would be like. I obviously didn't picture picnics in the park and cupcakes every day. I knew I'd be challenged by the Sisyphean task of warding off domestic entropy. I'm not sure I expected to feel so completely enveloped into my new role, though. I did really want to try to have a side business, or do freelance, or basically, just protect a small portion of my time for artistic pursuits. But I'm finding it's incredibly hard to find time to accomplish all those little tasks that add up when you feel like you should be "making something of yourself" or "staying true to your artistic self" blah blah blah. You know.

I guess the question I'm asking here is, do I need an Etsy shop? (something I've been stressing out about lately.) Do I need to make and maintain a portfolio site? Do I need to blog everyday? Or is it okay for me to just be a mom and spend a lot of time folding towels and also sometimes do nothing but watch marathons of Top Chef during naptimes?

And I know that no one can answer those questions but me.

I also know that I want to keep doing arty things, just for myself. I want to keep sending out funny little postcards. I want to help my friends and family with the little design projects they request. And I want to be the best mom I can be.

So. Maybe those are the answers I'm looking for. 

friday morning videos

When your child wakes up at an hour that can always be considered "too early" you have to learn a few coping mechanisms. For a while we had success with getting him to lay in our bed and play with pillows. He eats breakfast really slow so I'll cop to sometimes going back and laying down while he takes 20 minutes to finish his cheerios. And the 7 am episode of Curious George is a godsend, without it I doubt I'd ever dry my hair, read blogs, or eat my own breakfast. 

This morning felt like an extra lazy day so we settled into my bed with a laptop and youtube. You can see how we kind of followed a little internet trail of kid-friendly music videos. Happy Friday. 

 

A classic: Feist, 1234.

 

More Feist, I Feel it All. This one has fireworks! Yay. 

 

Feist singing 1234 on Sesame Street. This one is a classic in our house. 

 

OK Go (& the Muppets) singing the Muppet Show theme song. 

 

Muppets, Bohemian Rhapsody. David actually didn't like this one, I guess i can see why. 

 

Beaker the Muppet, Ode to Joy. 

And for good measure, this one, which we watch about a dozen times a day anyway. 

 

Thomas the Tank Engine Theme song.

all night flea market

(a.k.a one of my favorite nights of the year.)

I live near a fairgrounds that holds this all night (4 pm- 4am) flea market every year. I've been going for years now and it's one of those calendar landmarks I look forward to every August. I used to stay up late and go, since the deals get better as the night goes on, but I can't jive with that lifestyle anymore. I think this year was the earliest I've gone: 8:30, right after the kids' bedtime. Some day I hope to go at 3 am because I'm sure by then the sellers are practically paying you to cart their junk away. 

My favorite part of going is just the people watching. There was a hippie band playing obligatory but not entirely unlistenable covers of CSNY. Random leftover early 00s goth people. Old guys fully commited to the beard lifestyle. High school hipster kids. Suburban older middle aged women alone or in pairs. Also, and this bugs me EVERY year, families with little kids. Come on! Don't bring your kids to this kind of weirdo factory at 10 pm. About every third kid I saw was crying or having a meltdown. 

Here are some of my finds. I think I spent about $8 total. Sweet.

As I walked over I thought about what I was looking for. I specifically said to myself, I probably shouldn't buy any more vintage napkins. Then this happened. Oops. But totally cute. 

These 2 books are collage treasure troves. 

A few pillow cases, and a sheet in that same pink floral pattern. I'm planning on using the sheet for the back of Norah's quilt. You know, that one I may or may not ever make but have already bought most of the fabric for. 

The books and the quilt were from the same seller. There are certain booths that are like pots of gold at the end of the rainbow, and this was one of them. I try to find the sellers that basically look like they took the contents of their grandparents basement and spilled it out on a table. The lady that sold me these said, "Yeah, we were cleaning out our closets and thought we'd see if we could make a little cash." Anyone that is too precious with their merchandise? You just know they're going to rip you off. Dude. Like those bad amateur oil paintings you can find at any salvation army for like a quarter apiece? Some guy was trying to sell them for $20 or more. I saw a terrible clown painting tagged $30! I actually laughed out loud. 

Funny giant bead necklace and cute leather bracelet. The bracelet, while it technically fits, kind of cuts off wrist circulation. Sad face. I'll probably save it for Norah's dress up bin, but if you have a really tiny wrist and want to lay claim, let me know. It cost me one bone so I wouldn't even make you pay for it. 

I could have spent a ton of money. I debated on a few vintage floral tablecloths. There was one I probably should have gone back for, because it was in good condition and that's the kind of treasure I don't normally run across at regular thrift stores. But when it comes to old cheap stuff I get really miser-y. It was $15, and in secondhand money that's pretty steep for me. 

Oh friends! I wish you all could have been there with me. There really is so much good stuff that you would have loved. Great condition and pretty colored Pyrex, old puzzles and games, nice linens, interesting furniture pieces, truly adorable vintage girls dresses, lots of weird old books and photographs. Of course, it's all mixed in with cheap sunglasses and sports memorabilia and the truly deluded people still trying to sell beanie babies or smurfs figurines for a ton of money. But it's so fun. You should all come visit next year. I'm serious. 

a year ago in Iowa

The past few weeks all my Iowa friends have been killing me with their State Fair talk on facebook. I went last year for just a few hours, but it stands out as one of the highlights of my summer. I was in Iowa for my friend Mindy's baby shower and we drove to Des Moines to find a place to eat dinner. After a quick discussion it was pretty clear that, for us, fair food was a better option than any restaurant. 

It was fantastic. I love Iowa so much. To an extent, I've made my peace with the idea of living in Illinois for the majority of the rest of my life. . . but that doesn't mean it's ever going to take over the place in my heart that Iowa holds. 

The sky over the midway. 

My obligatory "food on a stick" purchase. This was tiramisu on a stick and it was actually kind of disappointing. Oh well. I also ate a corn dog and corn dogs never disappoint. 

And this is Mindy and I at her shower. Two pregnant ladies! I was about 2 months along with Norah at this time last year.

If you had a chance this year to see the butter cow or the giant bull, to eat cheese curds or fried butter on a stick (I heard it was the talk of the fair this year!), and to people-watch the fascinating Iowa crowds, consider yourself lucky. I wish I could have been there too. 

old friend / new friends

I've known my friend Kimberly for 6 or 7 years now. We've known each other through engagement, marriage, kids. But until this week, our friendship was only through email, facebook, blogs, twitter. That's why it was SO great to finally talk face to face on Tuesday. And even though we've known each other for so long, meeting in person makes it feel like I have a new friend. I wish you lived closer Kimberly! 

I wish my photos of the day were better. (I swear my poor old point and shoot is getting blurrier by the day.) Kimberly's are great, but she's a real photographer, so, of course. 

This one makes me smile so much. That's David's "cheese!" face. And Jasper was apparently done with picture taking. 

We had such a big day on Tuesday that the rest of the week has gotten away from me a bit. Up until now, I've taken my new at-home lifestyle pretty seriously and kept us busy with outings, projects, and keeping up with the house. Today I woke up feeling a little under the weather and now, well, the house has unravelled and a trip to the post office was the single high point of the day. But like some friends on twitter reminded me, a lazy day is sometimes necessary and productive. So we're owning it. It's naptime for the two little ones and I'm catching up on DVRed episodes of Anthony Bourdain's No Reservations. Aaah.

our first vlog

will you look at that! we made a vlog. it's always fun to see & hear people online so I thought I'd share a little bit of us with you. We ended up doing two, mostly because my personal attention span for watching videos online is about 40 seconds, and we ran into some troubles during the first one. 

 

Norah started out making cute noises and ended up making very upset noises, so we cut this one short. (I love that screen grab btw.)

 

Annnnd, this is the addendum video. 

I hope you enjoyed these. We had fun making them. And David had fun watching them about 50 times this afternoon. What is it about little kids and watching videos of themselves? 

saturday afternoon at goodwill, a re-creation

The lovely Erin of Swonderland has been doing an "out of the bin" series recently about her finds at the Goodwill outlet store. (PS. I checked and we do not have any in Illinois, bummer.) I was hoping for a good chance to participate, and I found one Saturday afternoon. David and I stopped into our regular Goodwill after grocery shopping; he had been so well-behaved I figured he'd be okay to sit in a shopping cart for another 20 minutes. 

Since we went in on a whim, I didn't bring my camera to take in-action photos of the finding. So I've decided to recreate it here. 

Wait, what, inanimate objects at the thrift store don't talk to you? Okay, guess I'm a weirdo. 

So that's how I ended up with 4 new coffee mugs. It was something on my mental list of things to search for, since I've been systematically breaking all my favorite mugs over the past few years. (Other things currently on the 'to thrift' list are curtains and wall decorations for Norah's room, plaid shirts for me, and more little plastic animals for David.)

And since David was being such a good boy, we spotted this Tonka garbage truck and added it to the cart too. Unfortunately, right after we bought it he discovered that it makes a loud noise. Like, a really loud noise. I'm guessing that was the reason it was at Goodwill in the first place. Oh well, the boy loves it so I guess we'll deal with it. 

Have you had any good secondhand adventures lately?

what i did then & what I do now

I had to drop something off at my old office today. Just driving there gave me a pit in my stomach. It's only been a week and a half since I left but it already feels like a separate lifetime. 

I never wrote much about my work online. It didn't seem necessary, for one. I don't know. It really didn't figure very largely into my overall view of what my life was like, you know? It just wasn't my passion. I did enjoy my old job, had fun with my coworkers, and at least 75% of the days I didn't dread going in (the intense, crazy busy weeks are a different story). And now that it's over, I might as well share a bit. 

I worked as a graphic designer at a direct selling (a.k.a. in-home party) company that sells kitchen products. The thing I loved most about my job was the crazy variety of things I worked on. Designing catalogs, from concepting, to layout, to art direction at photoshoots. I designed logos (my favorite!). I illustrated product lineart for packaging. I worked on everything from tiny recognition jewelry to giant 20 foot event signage. I have a soft spot in my graphic designer heart for the truly mundane: formatting text in business handbooks, layout out product Use and Cares. Newsletters, brochures, t-shirts, giant checks, recipe cards. . . man. I worked on a lot of projects. 

There was some wacky stuff too. Hand modelling for product photography (which I hated). I art directed a company-wide photoshoot with a bullhorn from a cherry picker. That was awesome. And once I had to dress up in a giant gold foam star costume for one of our yearly conferences. Evidence:

And it was all great, really, and I'm glad I did it. But mostly I'm glad it's over, too. 

Now I'm here, sitting at the dining room table typing this while both kids are napping. This morning I made breakfast and folded laundry and did dishes and played baseball. Read stories, made bottles, wiped up spills, picked up toys. This afternoon we're going to go downtown, get frozen yogurt, and meet Mike at the train station on his way home from work. And then I'll make dinner and play more baseball and give a bath and read more stories. And I am so, so happy to be doing it. 

july 2011 family photos

Last month we had our first official family photos taken since Norah was born. I did a little old-fashioned bartering with a former coworker of mine who started her own photography business: I designed her logo, she took our photos. Good trade. You can visit her website (and see my logo!) here: Appelman Images. 

Despite the fact that it was about 90 degrees at 9 am when we took these (you can tell which photos are from the end of the session because David's head starts to get really sweaty), they turned out great.

four books

I keep a lot of notebooks; it's something I've done since I was young. In high school I filled three ring notebooks with incredibly detailed descriptions of my days. In college I got a new planner every year and kept my whole life there: class assignments, club meetings, doodles, ideas. I've kept fashion scrapbooks, work notebooks, journals, sketchbooks. 

Now I compartmentalize things a bit. I have four books right now, all for different things. 

My art journal. A little 7x7" blank art book. The current one is almost full, only a few pages left to fill. It's so fat it doesn't really close. 

This is my happiness book, or "gratitude journal" or whatever you want to call it. It's from Chronicle books and was designed by Susie Ghahremani. I write in it at night sometimes, putting down all the nice things that happen, cute things David says. Sometimes I put big ideas or goals here too. That's my regular handwriting. It's awful, I can barely read it, but I can write FAST and get a lot of ideas down while they're in my head. 

My "mom" notebook, a cheap little book I picked up at Target. It's totally practical: grocery lists, library call numbers, to-do lists. When Norah was little I'd record her sleeping/eating schedules here. There are long lists of recipes to try. Total mom stuff. 

My sketchbook, a basic black unlined book from the local art store downtown. Mostly for doodles, sometimes for idea lists. This is the one I carry with me all the time so sometimes it's the place for phone numbers or reminders for myself. I've been drawing a lot of these little people again, filling up pages full. 

So. It's Monday and a new week. Last night I stayed up late to clean the whole house and undo the damage I did tearing the house apart looking for a tiny piece of art. It feels nice to wake up to a neat house. Last week I kind of took a little vacation from everything, but now I'm ready to jump in and get things in order and settle into a new routine. We've got a fridge full of food, meal plans, outings on the calendar every day, and a pretty good weather outlook for the week. I feel so thankful for what we have and happy to be in this new life.