All the little things

What the Fed Ex man brought today...

Oh yes. I am a happy girl.

Past our prime.

So, we went to see Cursive last night. Whole lot of emo kids there. The show was in a fairly small bar, and we were about 2 feet away from the stage, I was pretty much standing up against a P.A. speaker. And while we were standing there before the first band started, observing the fact that not many of the kids around us even had "over 21" wristbands on, Kory asked me: "so, at what age does this become depressing?" And I answered "well, at least we still look 18." I would bet money we were the only married couple there. I would bet even more money that we were the only ones checking our cell phones constantly because we didn't want to miss a call from my parents, home with Celia.

It's been a long time since I've seen a band right up in front like that, an even longer time since I've seen one that close who really rocks out like Cursive does. Totally amazing show.

But today, I'm hurtin' a little bit. Sore from standing in one spot from 7-11:30. Still regaining my hearing. Last night after the show, I posed the "when does this become depressing?" question to my best friend (who saw Curive the night before in Chicago) and he replied "oh, it's been depressing for a few years now."

But we go. We keep on going, can't imagine not going. Because it is not about being part of a social scene, hanging out at shows with our friends, all the other reasons people go when they're 17, 18, 19. It's about the music. Loving the music. Knowing that's something we'll never outgrow. Music was a part of what brought us together, and it's the grown-up topic we can always find to talk about when we are need of discussion that does not revolve around the Backyardigans. It's the common ground we share with each other and with our closest friends. It's the metaphor we all use to talk about how we feel when the words become too difficult. And the day we were too old to care about any of that would be the day we didn't know ourselves or each other anymore.

But still, maybe there's a time to start hanging a little more in the back of the crowd. Ask me after the next G.A. show I go to.

The coolest freakin' thing...

I can't believe I got a CK cover. Seeing it in person is *so* cool.

And, CK is having a really fun contest. All 25 HOFers made Thanksgiving place cards, and you can enter to win a blank set. I don't know if details are up on the website yet, but you can read about it in the Nov issue, which is apparently on stands now :) :) :)

Drum roll....

Since Mat has the cd cover art up on his MySpace page now, and since all the files are finished and off to our lovely FTP server and the disc is going in to be mastered and then manufactured on Monday, I am finally going to share all the actual album art :) Pretend it's all cropped in a little closer, this is all with extra space for bleed lines and whatnot.

So first of all, the cover:

The inside of the booklet:

The back of the booklet:

The tray card back and sides (that ugly white rectangle is for the bar code):

And finally, the thing I think is the coolest thing, the actual disc:

So, what do you think? Don't you want to buy a cd that looks that cool? Eeeek, I'm so excited to see them in a few weeks!!

This & That...

I really don't have time to blog right now. So what am I doing? That's right. I'm blogging.

Thanks for the concern over my little stove incident. Yes, we're all fine. The kitchen is fine. I caught it before anything was damaged, thank goodness. I owe it to a spider. I got up to scoop a spider up and throw him outside. If I would have just squished him, I would not have been going to my back door next to the stove, and I might have burned my house down. I'd like to say there's some kind of spider-saving lesson here, but really the lesson is just pay attention to which burner you turn on.

Celia had her first "big-kid" gymnastics class friday. My MIL owns a gym, so we've been doing parent/tot as long as she could walk. But even though she's a bit young, we decided that she's ready for big-kid, no-parent classes. She did amazingly well. She is normally so shy, but she really comes out of her shell in gymnastics. She totally stayed with the class, did everything she was supposed to do, didn't cry when she saw us watching, had a huge smile on her face.

And then, we got out to the van after class. Where she promptly became hysterical, and screamed at Kory: "You're supposed to run with me! Not just watch!"

Sigh. She's learned the fine art of holding it together in public.

And in other news, my friend Mat has his music myspace page up, so you can finally go hear some of the songs from the cd. Check it out! My 2 favorites of the songs he has up are Father's Eyes and I Could Try. Last I saw, he didn't actually have any of my album art up yet, other than the lovely couch pic. But the cd will be out very soon! E-mail me or check his site if you want to know how to get your hands on one very soon.

That's all for now!

A public service announcement...

When you are boiling water on the stove to make your child a nice bowl of oatmeal, double check to make sure you have turned on the correct burner. Especially when there's a metal burner cover and a pot holder sitting on top of the other burner that you *might* accidentally turn on.

Nothing gets the blood pumping like a little kitchen fire, let me tell ya.

Martha Stewart, I am not.

I love....

Scrapologie kit debut day.

This month's kit is fantastic. Can't stop playing with it:

And then, the fabulous Jason Gaylor designed a set of brushes exclusively for Scrapologie to go with the Sept kit. So cool! Love his stuff.

I'm off for a busy weekend...my best friend is in town, C's party is Sunday...so I might not see you til Monday. With party pics, of course. Happy weekend, everyone!

Something new, just for fun...

I've been wanting to do this for a long time, start some kind of album or series of LOs or whatever that's all about song lyrics I love. No other journaling, just lyrics that are meaningful to me. So tonight I decided to jump in and play and do it all digi. I really really like digi for scrapping myself. Because maybe I'll get an actual album and get around to printing them at some point, but that isn't the point. They're just for me, for fun, and if they just live on my computer for a while, I'm okay with that. Most of my "me" LOs have been digi.

So anyway. I am starting this little project with no goal in mind other than to do a quick fun digi LO when I think of a song lyric I'd like to scrap. So there.

Here are the first two. Everything is from designer digitals, except the brushes on the first one are Jason Gaylor.

These took me maybe 15-20 minutes a piece, involved no mess, and were fun. No paper was harmed in the making of these purely frivolous LOs. Whee. Good stuff.

She blew out the candle herself.

In other news, I made the incredibly difficult decision today to step down from 2 of my DTs, Arctic Frog and Imagination Project. I've been feeling guilty for a while for being spread too thin and not really feeling like I've been the ideal DT member lately, and with the SS gig, I just knew I couldn't do it all and still be what those teams deserve me to be. But just so no one speculates that there was any other reason for me leaving, I want everyone to know that I never had a single complaint about *either* of these companies. They are both absolutely amazing, Alannah, Ginger, and Barb are all warm, funny, down to earth women who I adore, and I am so thankful for the time I spent working with them. If you ever have the opportunity to work with either of these companies, jump at the chance! You won't regret it.

She is three.

Only birthday picture I've managed so far. Lousy on-camera flash, happy girl.

She's at the store with daddy getting cake mix.

Her favorite gifts? An easel, more paints, a huge pack of paintbrushes in all different shapes and sizes. Love how into art she is lately.

Three. It sure does fly.