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Archive for the ‘self’ Category

 

IF and when

27
Mar
2010

ellie n' meI’ve been participating in Illustration Friday over at the Calobee Doodles blog, and I’m enjoying it immensely. It’s keeps me motivated to doodle at least one thing every week. Follow me there if you’re into that sort of thing!

We’re spending the weekend at my folks, but before we left, we tried to get some photos of Elspeth and I. Looking at her baby album now, you’d think she was motherless. But it was the end of a long day for all of us, Elspeth was restless and cranky and wanted nothing to do with this particular photo shoot. So here I am with my daughter, in the one picture that worked from a whole series of blurry, poorly lit and pouty (Elspeth, not me) photos. Many thanks to Tim for putting up with us!

 
 

a fungus among us

23
Mar
2010

Last week was Mold Week here at Casa de Moore. Tim discovered a huge colony of the black stuff lurking in Ellie’s closet under her dresser, the product of a plumbing leak that initially seemed harmless enough, but turned out to be kind of a bitch. The leak itself was an easy, inexpensive fix, but the previously unseen damage added up.

Not wanting to take chances with our health, we immediately called in a cleaning specialist to help with the mold. His advice was to remove anything that could easily be removed, scrub the rest down with dish soap and water, and speed-dry it–so that’s exactly what we did this weekend! And by “we,” I mean Tim–my job was to wrangle the baby and worry about how much the repairs would cost (worrying is one of my many useless super powers). When Tim had to take up the linoleum in the downstairs bathroom due to moisture and black gunk underneath, it dawned on me that this “little project” was going to be a bigger pain than I’d thought.

I take the Total Denial approach to home repairs. If I ignore the problem long enough, maybe it will go away on its own. This works perfectly in theory–ignoring things I don’t want to think about is another one of my super powers–but not so well in practice. This is why Ellie’s closet is now missing its carpet, and the downstairs bathroom looks like… well, like hell. It’s missing the bottom part of its wall, a baseboard, a third of the ceiling and about half the linoleum. All because of a “harmless” little leak I hoped would fix itself. Hah-hah.

But in a fit of positivity, we decided to turn this into a good thing and make some necessary changes. Our condo was built in the 80′s, and boy, does it show (think rose pink bathroom fixtures and beige faux-tile vinyl) so replacing the bathroom floors is a worthwhile investment.  The flooring itself is free–my parents have a leftover piece from their first bathroom remodel that should fit our 5′x7′ room.  We’re also going to tear out the bathroom’s clunky, water-damaged vanity and replace it with a practical laundry sink. This will give us more room to put up shelves, so the half-bath will become a combination bathroom and walk-in storage closet. As much as I dread any kind of disruption in my home, I’m excited to have a functional storage area.

Consider these your “before” pictures. Hopefully I’ll soon have a much-improved bathroom to show you!

 
 

alice in wonder-zzzzzz

14
Mar
2010

peekaboo!We’ve been long overdue for a date night, so this weekend T and I left Danielle to fend off the vicious baby-beast for a few hours while we enjoyed an evening to ourselves. It started with dinner at one of the six billion steakhouses in the greater Bangor area, where the hostess, mistaking us for sports fans, seated us on wobbly bar stools inches from a giant flat-screen TV that was blaring something about football. How… romantic? I had an internal debate with myself–do I want to be one of “those” people and ask to move, or should I suck it up and deal with it?  I decided on the former, because as I told Tim, if I wanted to eat steak in a rickety chair next to a giant TV, I could do it at home–and for much less! But once we were settled in a booth, the crab-stuffed filet and the pomegranate margarita more than made up for it.

who, me?Dinner was followed by the late showing of Alice in Wonderland, during which I could barely keep my eyes open. I literally nodded off four times. It could have been the result of being up past my bedtime, but honestly, I don’t think so. The 3-D made me dizzy (odd, I don’t usually have that problem), the characters were flat, the pace was rushed and the story felt sloppy. Our movie choices recently have been hit or miss, leaning more toward the “miss” side of things. Oh well. If nothing else, it got us out of the house for a few hours!

In unrelated news, it’s been a while since I’ve posted gratuitous baby photos, so here you go. Insert lamentation about how fast she’s growing, how I wish she’d stay little for longer, how I can’t believe she’s almost 15 months old, yadda yadda yadda. I’m too entranced with her sweet face and those adorable pudgy cheeks to be coherent about it.

 
 

well, at least they’re not two-headed

8
Mar
2010

woodlandsI probably jinxed myself by writing my sick post so early in the season, but I spent the weekend sleeping and cuddling with my new friend, the toilet. The toilet isn’t all that cuddly, actually, but I didn’t have much choice in the matter. I think the bathtub is jealous of our new, special relationship, but I can’t say I’m all that thrilled about it. The toilet is kinda clingy and co-dependent, and I’ve seen far too much of him in the last two months.

And no, I’m not pregnant! I’m just unlucky enough to have the pleasure of two stomach viruses in two months. Yay, me. At least the toilet’s getting some action.

Before The Sick fell upon me yet again, I worked up this little woodlands doodle. I freely admit to tracing from a photograph the deer you see in the distance, because I got frustrated when my version looked like hunchback aliens with tentacles for legs. I was reminded why I don’t draw for real–like with pen and paper–because I suck at it! Yes, I’m an illustrator who’s totally dependent on Illustrator. There’s a reason I use the word “doodles” instead of “drawings” or “illustrations,” and Attack of the Killer Alien Deer from Outer Space is one of them. Frolic away, little woodsy creatures, knowing you’re safe from my poor non-existent hand-eye coordination!

 
 

i am unstoppable!

22
Feb
2010

Numbers poster in neutralLast weekend was a whirlwind of creative energy. So many ideas! So many new things I want to try! I’m blaming the strangely warm weather we’ve had this February. It’s pulled me out of my winter funk and straight into spring mania (I don’t have the heart to tell my muse it’s not really spring yet).

First things first–I got new glasses on Friday, and I am in love with them. They are purple and just geeky enough to be “me.” I tried to get a self-portrait but I am so out of practice I couldn’t do their awesomeness justice, so I’ll have to wait until Tim can help me. In the meantime, these are my new frames–I think “spiffy” is the appropriate word here.

Second, I’ve been doodling like mad since last Wednesday, and I’m ordering no less than 15 test prints from my printer this week (!!!)  That’s an insane amount of new work for me. I wrote about the new “numbers” colorways (above), and I took a few minutes to put up a new banner in the Calobee Doodles shop. There are several new prints and products coming soon, too! And I’ve been chipping away at custom orders amidst everything else, so all in all, I’m kind of floored by my own productivity. Where did this crazy-high-energy person come from? Can I keep her?

Finally, on Sunday we hung out with our long-lost friend Danielle and played lots of Wii. Tim picked up Super Mario Bros., which brought me back to my childhood–I spent many hours watching my brother play Super Nintendo, all the while yelling at him to go left, right, go back and get that coin, you missed a pipe, etc. I’m not only a backseat driver–I’m a backseat gamer. I can’t boss Tim around like I used to my bro, but it’s not for lack of trying.

All this fun and I didn’t even have to leave the house! Now, I must keep up with this productive streak and get back to work.