Be Careful What You Wish For... It Just Might Land In Your Lap!

Panic! Excitement! Terror! Joy!

Today has been absolutely INSANE!!! I got a call from the local author that I am working with that Nimbus Publishing in Nova Scotia answered his query letter. Not only are they willing to review the manuscript that my sister and I helped him polish, but they will look at my artwork as well!! I made sure that he put this line in his query letter:

“I am working with a published illustrator here in Monition who has been able to offer me some advice. She has advised me that most publishers prefer to assign their own illustrators to projects, but has agreed to prepare some drawings for this story as samples for her own portfolio. If you wish to see the full manuscript, with or without some sample illustrations, please contact me at your convenience.”

They answered that this was indeed correct, but that they were interested in seeing what said illustrator had done with the characters. So tonight, Paul came by to show me the final printout of the manuscript and approve/ offer feedback on the main pencil sketch as well as the two character sketches. By Monday, all three will be final illustrations.

On top of that, I got a phone call from a client that is going to require totally reworking a layout that sat on their desks for a few days while they were busy with something else, but now they need the new proofs (with WAY too much information crammed into a page to look nice) redone for Monday!!

I know that it is better to be busy than bored... but this is a bit too crazy.

I can’t believe that they will look at both his story and my pictures!!!!! EEEEEEEeeeeeeeeeeeee!

Full Circle Joys...

I’d meant to write something entirely different tonight as my post, but I am sitting here with a huge lump in my throat and tears of joy just stinging my eyes a bit. After Internet hassles for much of the Province this afternoon and being completely off-line, I snuck down to check my messages. There was an invitation to take part in School District 2’s Storyfest 2007 as an illustrator!!

Last May, Erin’s school called me the night before and asked if I would be a parent chaperone because the guidance counselor had to go to an emergency meeting and they knew my schedule could be flexible. I wrote a long entry in my journal about how I was dreading it... sitting through presentations by people who had actually made their dreams of writing and illustrating come true! I was already feeling like I was at a crossroads and not sure if I’d made the best choices by putting so much energy into something that could be so easily stolen.

I went and followed the kids and sketched and ultimately met Nanny Kay. Within 2 weeks, I was doing pencil sketches for the book and the summer’s adventure of illustrating her 2nd book became a reality.

Tonight, the invitation sits in my e-mail program and all I can do is smile. What a difference a year can make! I guess it really never is too late to chase a dream and bring it to life!!

Of Timelines, Tonsils and Triumphs...

It’s a bitterly cold Friday with another night of -30° C with the wind chill. I’m pretty sure that’s close to zero °F. It’s been another hectic week with little time to blog and I somehow feel more out of touch with myself for not having anchored my thoughts in entries.

Erin had to do a timeline project of her life thus far for French class. It was amazing how many things she found as highlights in her vast almost 12 years of life... from first steps and words to finding out this week that she won the Legion’s Remembrance Day essay contest for School District 2 again this year.

One of the primary sources for Erin’s timeline project was digging through some of my journals to double-check dates and facts. One of the reasons that I love to keep a journal is because my thoughts and experiences are anchored to those pages in time and far less subjective that memories. It was quite amazing to look back at the wide variety of freelance things that I did before cross stitch really took off and how I am moving back to many of them once again a dozen years later. Maybe there is something to the 12 year cycle of the Chinese Zodiac!

I’ve really enjoyed speaking at the schools this month about being an illustrator. My last scheduled appearance is this Monday at Havelock Elementary about 20 minutes from Moncton. My only worry is that I seem to be coming down with another throat or sinus infection because I’ve been losing my voice all afternoon. I’m actually wondering if maybe the last sinus infection that Bethany and I had over the Christmas holidays didn’t quite clear up with the antibiotic... because we’ve both been sniffling again for about a week and then yesterday I started to feel awful again. At least one of the best things about working from home is that I can put on my big fuzzy sweater, sit a box of kleenex beside the computer with a mug of something hot and just honk or hack my way through the day. It also guarantees that no one else will want to touch the germy keyboard of my Mac!!

Erin’s Guide Camp this weekend was canceled because of the cold and the fact that one of her leaders has an elderly mother who is in the hospital, so she’ll have time to finish off her other project. Her week ended on a very high note today as a letter arrived in the mail from the Provincial headquarters for the Legion congratulating her on winning the essay contest for the entire province of New Brunswick again this year. The local branch forwarded the winning essays on to Fredericton and now her essay will now go on to the National level! The cheque that came with the certificate and letter is safely deposited in her savings account towards University and she is hoping again that this time her essay will win for the entire country. Ah, the confidence of youth... or maybe she inherited the ability to dream big!?!

I think an early night and a bit of dreaming is just what this dragon needs!

How Can It Be FRIDAY?

This past week just feels like a total blur. How can it possibly be Friday? My grandmother did warn me that as I got older, time would move faster... but this week has just raced by at Warp 9!

Monday, I spent at a local Elementary school with the Writers/Artists in the schools program, getting paid to talk to lots of classes about what it was like to be an artist as your job. It was great fun, although I did sit down on the floor with most of the groups since the little kids were getting stiff necks looking WAY up at me! They all squealed like crazy when they saw the little dragon holding the heart that I put up on Cafe Press (the coloured pencil version) in my portfolio. Cuteness has universal appeal!!!

Tuesday, the whole province was under a Wind Chill Warning. The kids have actually had to be inside at school for all of this week and most of last week, so temperatures are starting to fray a bit. Attendance was off a bit in the two Weight Watchers meetings that I lead, and it was a very cold walk home, but I was well bundled!

Wednesday was completely taken up with finishing off an assignment for Dairy Farmers of Canada that took up most of the weekend. We are trying to get a Parent Piece ready for distribution, but I found it very challenging to squeeze 5 pages of a Word document into 2 sides of an 8.5 x 11” piece of paper!!

Wednesday night, Bethany had Brownies and Erin was in the School District Spelling Bee as one of the top two from her school. She made it halfway through the evening, but then wasn’t sure about the h in chronic. She was a bit teary about not going farther, but since she wants to audition for Canadian Idol in 4 years, I figure this was good practice in not always getting what you want on the first try. I was SO proud of her for just getting that far and trying her best!!

Yesterday was spent working with another local author who is trying to get a story published. Drawing a dinosaur is going to be right up my alley, but I’m still trying to encourage him to submit to a publisher in Halifax first, just to see what their response is. If I do a drawing or two to send along and they assign someone else, I still have new work for my portfolio.

By last night, both girls were cranky, teary and just feeling miserable for some reason. I decided to keep them both home with me today to see if I can get them back to normal. I don’t think it is a bug, I think that they are both just feeling out of sorts from the weather, the pace of life this time of year and in Erin’s case, the stress of dealing with 3 major projects in one month. She handed in the first this week, but the other two are due on the 21st. Next weekend, she is away at Winter Camp with her Guide troupe, so this is the last weekend to get them finished. She has finished writing her book report in French and is busy typing it in on the other computer as I write this. Bethany began an illustrated book project today as well, but has demanded to take a break “because her arms hurt” after printing sentences on 3 pages and doing one of the drawings.

Part of me is also feeling strange because for the first time in 4 or 5 years, I am not in Nashville right now setting up for the show this weekend. I made the decision months ago not to attend when I looked at what Nick’s schedule and mine were going to be like between Christmas and March Break... but it is still strange to know that the vast majority of my friends and colleagues are at the show and I am not. Not bad... just strange.

My meditation for today reminded me that each day is a new blank canvas... but this week has felt more like I am painting one long mural that just zipped past because I was on roller skates. My goodness! It really is Friday already!

Speaking of Cuteness...

Any artist will tell you how rare it is to have your hands to exactly what you want when you pick up that pencil or brush. So often, you keep working and reworking the initial sketch until you get it to something you can be happy with, even though it doesn’t live up to the vision which burst into your head.

This little dragon was an exception. I’d been thinking of the big eyes from Puss In Boots in the movie Shrek and some of the expressions on the animals in the manga Fruits Basket that the girls and I have fallen in love with in both Manga form and on DVD. Suddenly, this little dragon was staring back at me in blue pencil on my sketchbook page.

Inking him was easy, but deciding how to colour him wasn’t. I’ve only just installed my tiny Wacom tablet on the eMac (because it never really worked right on the older mac) and started to play around in Photoshop Elements and Painter. Compared to what I can do with real pencils, this feels like trying to draw with a cast on. I know that it will get easier and more instinctive, but when I see some of the digital art out there that the generations behind me are able to paint right into their computers... I feel a bit old and clunky.

I streamlined the inked dragon once I had scanned it into the computer and tidied it up as a vector drawing, colouring it with flat colour in Freehand. I liked the results, but part of me really wanted to do some shading... so then today, I got out my coloured pencils and played at the dining room table for while colouring the dragon in by hand. I then brought that back down to scan in so that I could add the text in Photoshop Elements.

CafePress recommends that you print your files out on the printer to check for crispness before sending them over. That created the only real dilemma of the day. The version that was coloured in by hand and then scanned in, just didn’t have the same punch as the Vector version. It looked much softer and I couldn’t get the black outlines to jump without making all of the other colours too dark or spending 3 hours that I didn’t really have playing with the magic wand tool to isolate all the black lines and darken them. Some Photoshop expert out there could probably teach me a way to overlay the line drawing as a transparent layer... but I didn’t know how to get around the softer look in this version.



In the end, I decided that the one with more punch would look better on the products, especially the ones being done onto clothing as transfers. This little dragon is now up on all kinds of products on my Trading Emporium (shameless plug) not just for Valentine’s Day, but to adopt and bring home as yours any time you feel like adding something cute and mythical to your surroundings.



In the meantime, the little coloured version will nestle into my portfolio and probably have a nap. I somehow don’t think that I’ve seen the last of this little dragon...

Cuteness And Getting Around A Subzero Photo Shoot...


In past years, when the temperature dipped this low and I had photos of models to shoot, it involved MANY layers of clothing, ice treads on my tripod and hoping that the shutter wouldn’t freeze on my poor camera.

Luckily, technology has improved and I have gotten smarter. I figured out how to do the photo shoot today with just the french door into the living room open to give me the sunlight I needed and the models set up on a chair right next to the door. It was still cold. I could see the waves of heat shimmering as the warm air of the house met the frigid air outside... but with a digital camera, I could tell right away if the shots were good. I think I like progress.

Digital cameras are also good for capturing cuteness. Smudgy was eating his veggies last night and we managed to get a good close-up of our fuzzy grey bundle. He’ll never be as much of a people person as Wuffles was, but at least he doesn’t bite the way Nipper and Jellybean did. They would latch onto you with their teeth and kind of dangle!

Today was also a great day for drawing. Every now and then my hands are able to just create something that I am proud of with very little changes. I’m working on a little cartoon dragon for some stuff on my CafePress site that I want to get up for February 1st, and it turned out SO CUTE! Both girls squealed in the supersonic range, so I think that it a good sign. Hopefully I can ink it tomorrow night and then get it into the computer on Wednesday.
This little dragon reminds me of a cross between Puss-In-Boots doing the big eyes in Shrek 2 and all the cuteness of Japanese Chibi Manga!

Acceptance and Blessing...

Don’t you just love it when something you read excites you, makes you think or totally challenges your intellect for the day? For two days in a row, I’ve had mental meat to chew on when I am stuck in bank lineups or waiting for something to download because of the words that I read first thing in the morning.

Yesterday’s passage was all about acceptance. That instead of being in denial or wishing things were different and getting caught in that stress and anxiety, we have to learn to accept the reality of the day before we can truly begin to change it. We have to accept what the scale is really telling us before we can commit to making it change for the better. We have to accept the demands of our job or the balance of our chequebooks or the state of a relationship before we can truly decide if something needs to change.

Reading this right after spending Monday surrounded by brown envelopes and receipts as I got the last of the information ready for a new person to do my corporate taxes was very humbling and liberating. I was able to look and see how much income from cross stitch had dropped with the loss of the chain store orders, how income from different sources was up or down and see where and what had paid off. When you are just tucking receipts into the proper files and waiting until a set time to look at all the information, it is easier not to see the big picture. Acceptance of a situation or problem is the first step towards changing it.

Today’s meditation is the one I am finding a bit harder to chew on. It talks about moving from acceptance of a situation to being able to bless it. I can think back on many moments or events in my life that I don’t really feel like blessing, but maybe in hindsight, since they helped to form who I am today, that makes sense... but I am still working on the blessing bit. I like a challenge.

I also was reminded today of why I love keeping a journal. Bethany wanted to know exactly when she broke her arm last January, so I pulled out the journal that I just finished filling to the brim on New Year’s Eve and looked up the entry where I’d written about that. I also stumbled across the very tearstained entry that I’d written exactly 365 days ago during a 2 am “pity party” of angst, self-doubt and sadness. The words and the blotches are there permanently anchored in time to those pages, but then I am also able to read how things changed... or see where I am a year later.

‘Here I am at 40, still too afraid to chase that dream of illustrating children’s books- still finding new ways of getting caught up in daily tasks like getting ready for Nashville, Austin and Toronto!’

At 41, I accomplished that dream and worked through the fear and self-doubt while working on the project. It never vanished... I just got stubborn and did it anyway.

‘My life feels as cluttered and as messy as my office. I just feel as if pieces of me are scattered everywhere and I can’t put them back together!’

My office floor has been clear for almost 2 weeks now and most of my desk. I have thrown out an incredible amount of “Stuff” in the past 3 weeks that really wasn’t necessary or essential to my existence. I am also learning to get things put back where they belong as soon as possible instead of just letting them pile up and spill over. I can still see my carpet... it is such a nice blue colour when it isn’t buried under piles of junk and paperwork or projects!

‘Like something precious that gets dropped and shatters- sometimes you just can’t put those pieces back together as if nothing happened. Sometimes you just have to leave them behind or melt them down and forge something new. Maybe I need to stop clinging to the shards of things that might have been... I just wish I knew how to scoop up all of these itty, bitty fragments and pour them into God’s hands without slicing my palms to shreds...’

I am learning that my life is not about a whole or pieces. It is about patterns. Like a kaleidoscope where the pieces keep shifting to make something beautiful and new each time change comes and the tube turns again. It is all about how the pattern changes into something new. We humans have an incredible capacity for change, redemption, courage and transformation. It’s just easy to forget that sometimes in the day to day chaos. One day at a time, one action, one page in a journal, one blog entry, one hug, one kind word, one dream, one moment of courage to take the next step in a journey. That’s how the adventure moves forward. Sometimes I can only truly appreciate that when I look back at where I have already traveled to see how far I have come.

Hoarding Gratitude...

Every now and then, there are books that reach out, grab you and speak to you deep in the core of your being. I am experiencing that on 2 levels right now...

The first is in watching Erin discover Susan Cooper’s The Dark Is Rising sequence that so enchanted me as a young girl and having the pleasure of rereading it myself. What fun to totally soak myself in wonderful fantasy about good vs. evil, dark vs. light and being heroic when times are tough. This kind of classic literature never goes out of style and is timeless enough that my own children can read it over 30 years after I did!

The second is exploring the many thoughts that I have while reading my Christmas present from my sister. Simple Abundance by Sarah Ban Breathnatch was first written over 10 years ago as a daily meditation/day book. It is perfect for women who feel overwhelmed, unsure of where to head next, in transition, in crisis or frustrated at the sense of chaos that our world sends our way with its “have it all, get it all, do it all, need it all” mentality. As the title suggests, the book helps the reader look at all they have, how to find serenity in having less and how to live more joyfully and gratefully than they were before. Since I read back over some of my posts from last year and noticed that when times were tough, I sometimes tended to get a bit whiny, I think this book may be perfect for me!

One of the tasks that I have enjoyed most from the book so far is the creation of a Gratitude Journal. Anyone who’s ever watched Oprah or listened to some popular motivational speakers will be familiar with the concept of ending each day counting the blessings that it had contained and writing down a set number of them into a journal... I certainly was. What I was not prepared for was the incredible difference it has made in my ability to fall asleep with gratitude instead of anxiety. I am thinking thankfully about what has gone right in the day that has just ended instead of making mental notes to myself about all the things that I need to accomplish the following day. Not that I am skipping around in a daze of non-productivity... in fact another book that my sister sent me is making a HUGE difference in that area as well, but that will be a whole other blog entry.

I am discovering the pleasure of hoarding gratitude. Just picture a dragon curled around a treasure of little glistening, translucent bubbles and sparkling crystals of wonderful memories or special events. Not gems or jewelry that might be stolen by some pesky knight, but precious wisps of things intangible...

I knew that I had a journal in my box of blanks that was perfect for this project because it was covered with little smiling hippos. I had given it to my grandmother about 14 years ago for Christmas and my Mom returned it to me a year or so ago when she found it while tidying out my grandfather’s house. I thought it was completely blank and so did my Mom who glanced through it quickly before sending it to me. Imagine my surprise, delight and slight twinge of sadness when I opened the first page to begin and found two brief entries from her written a few years before her death in October of 2000! Now I think of her each time I sit down at night to write my gratitude list before bed. Since she so often lived this type of simple abundant life and spoke kindly in almost every circumstance... it is wonderfully appropriate that she share those pages with me...

I am grateful for all the wonderful memories I have of her in my life!

Storm Day... Ski Day and My Baby Is Back!!

With most of the Maritimes under the worst storm system to hit our area in 2 years, the decision to cancel school today makes sense NOW, but at 6 am this morning when they had to make the call, there wasn’t a flake in sight! Once we heard the news, Nick and I went back to sleep after calling out to the girls that it was a snow day. They must have slept right through that announcement because I woke up around 8 am to hear them whispering in Erin’s room about being late for school and arguing over which one would try to wake parents that had obviously slept through their alarm! When they found out it was a snow day, the squeals of glee were almost ultrasonic.

We did race out to do a few errands before the storm hit, including a run to the blood lab for both Bethany and I. By the time we got home, the flakes were falling fast and furious, but the forecast still warned of a switch over to rain by mid-afternoon. We ate our lunch and then I went out for my first cross country ski run of the whole winter! It was exhilarating as well as exhausting in the wet sticky snow. I am sure that by morning I will hurt in places that I’d forgotten skiing used, but I got a solid 45 minutes of skiing in before it switched to rain. We shoveled the driveway as soon as I got home to make sure that it would be clear before things froze and switched back to snow by midnight tonight.

Later this afternoon, I was sitting at the dining room table and suddenly heard the sound of water dripping right outside the door to the deck. The soft wet snow had started to melt off the slope of the roof and blocked the rain gutters with slush and ice, so they were overflowing in the heavy rain. Being TOTALLY paranoid about water getting into the office via that stupid window under our deck, I threw on my rain gear, grabbed a metal soup ladle and raced outside to climb up on my laundry bench to empty the gutters! I am sure the neighbours are used to me being strange by now! When this freezes and turns to snow again it is going to be a skating rink out there! The plow has gone by once, but there are reports of sewer drains being blocked by ice and snow causing flooding around town. How I wish it had all stayed as snow like in the middle of our province! It is time to face the fact that Moncton’s climate is shifting to be more like Halifax as everything warms up on our poor planet.

The girls have been lost in one of the most intense Barbie games they have played all year and for once seem to be getting along well. There must be an “Idol” component to the game because there seems to be a lot of singing going on upstairs, including a few duets!

I have my computer back at last!! They were able to undo whatever Nick had done for just over $100.00 and install my new system 10.4.6 at the same time. I am still getting used to a few Tiger quirks, but it is just SO great to have my machine back. After the teasing he got about sending it to the shop in the first place, I think he’s just going to stay away from the machine for a long time. I did tell the girls that Mommy’s work computer is totally off limits to anyone but ME on the keyboard. There are 2 other Macs in the house for them to use, even if only one can connect to the Internet at a snail’s pace... Paws off Mom’s machine!

Creatively Murdering My Husband...

I’m going to have to be creative when I kill my husband. The ground is just too frozen to dig a grave anywhere. Given that the temperature has dipped to -36 degrees Celsius with the wind chill factor, I think I will just put him out on the back deck in his underpants, throw a bucket of water on him from Erin’s bedroom window and let Mother Nature take care of things for me...

He messed up my computer. While I was working at Weight Watchers last night, he just went down to my office to play a game and check one thing on the Internet... but somehow random clicked on things to get Internet Explorer out of the endless loop it goes into with System 10.3.9 and now it gives the “kernel panic” message that you NEVER EVER want to see on a Mac... it kind of an “I don’t think I’m a real computer anymore and I need to be reset completely!” kind of panic message. A few minutes on my machine, however unintentional the incident was, and I am back to having no machine to work on, work with or make work for me.

Luckily for him, he’s cute, he’s handy and it would take too long to break in a new one. But the urge was there last night amid the tears and the panic and the bashing of the head against the desk when my Recovery Tools couldn’t even find a hard drive to try and read...
I mean... after all the computer woes, terrors and hassles I’ve had since the middle of November, it’s actually amazing that I still have any of the following: fingernails, a waistline, hair on my head etc.

This morning, I was able to run another diagnostic program on the poor machine amid the random freezing and kernel panic messages which told me that the bit mapping was all messed up and the volume couldn’t be read in order to check files for damage... so off I went in the subzero weather to haul the eMac’s sorry self into the store. I brought warm coffee as bribes and they promised to have it ready by tonight or first thing tomorrow morning.

Well, something came up. I just called to check and they told me that they haven’t even looked at it yet, so I am blogging out my frustrations and indulging in a brief fantasy or two about wreaking havoc and harm upon my poor spouse.

At least all of my information got backed up on Friday when I thought I was going to install the new system 10.4.6... so I won’t loose more than a few files from the weekend and first of the week if they have to wipe everything.

If the machine ends up being beyond repair for whatever reason, I will just have to buy a new computer and not do the show in Columbus this summer in person. Having a working computer as a Graphic Artist has to be the priority... but you can bet that either way, the machine I do my work on is now going to be off limits to ANYONE but me!!!

Of Storms, Struggles and Clipping Hamster Toenails...

One week after the last storm day, the snow is falling fast and furious outside the window of my office. All of our family activities and one meeting I was supposed to attend tonight were canceled because of the storm that started around supper time and should last until tomorrow morning. We decided to get into our jammies early and play a game as a family since all of a sudden we had no where we had to be... but the other three people in the house are doing their storm dances in the hopes that school will be canceled tomorrow morning! I may actually be the only one going out of the house to work!

Tuesday is the day that I lead 2 Weight Watcher meetings, so in the morning, I will see how bad the storm was and determine if the morning session needs to be canceled. Since I can walk up there, I only cancel things if the roads are dangerous... so we shall see. I am sure that by the supper time meeting, everything will be plowed out.

I am waiting patiently for Apple Canada to send me a new install disk after the one I purchased from the store on Friday turned out to be a dud. My eMac will play all kinds of DVDs and has had no problems with other install disks, but this one just spins in place for about 3 minutes trying to read and then the computer spits it out. Once I can update to System 10.4, then I can start working with jAlbum to get the illustration side of my website revamped. I have kept myself busy in the meantime with mundane stuff like tabulating receipts for the accountant who needs to do my corporate taxes and tidying my office. I can actually see carpet and desk surface for the first time in many months. Another huge garbage bag of paper and older leaflets that I’ve now destroyed went out the door for the trash man to collect in the morning. Ah the joys of de-cluttering!!

My sister and I had a great chat today. Its funny how the distance between us geographically has no effect on how close we feel emotionally... other than I don’t get hugs from her as often as I’d like. We’ve both fallen in love with people who took us to places away from where we grew up and neither of us would change that for the world. She is a wonderful sounding board about stuff and a great friend as well as my sister. Today was just one of those days when I really appreciated having her in my life. Every time that Erin and Bethany get into a yelling match or go through a stage of being absolutely nasty to each other, I remind them that when they are older, that 4 years won’t be such a big deal and that they will be the only ones who can commiserate with each other about what a pain their Mother is!!!

This transitional time, early in the New Year, as I am still mapping out the next few months, setting goals, trying to get some new things started etc. is both exciting and frustrating. I meet on Thursday with another local author to see about helping him get a children’s book published. Unlike the last project, this author may choose to send things off to a publisher first, but I may still end up helping him publish it on his own if he can afford to invest in self-publishing. LIke many cross stitch designers who self-publish, you have to be able to look at what it will cost you to print the product and sell it yourself, even if the theory is that you keep more of the profits that way. You could also end up with lots of boxes of printed stuff that is paid for and isn’t selling! He’s still thinking about which route to go, but since the story involves a dinosaur, I am game to do some sketches.... dragons and dinos are not that far apart!!

It’s funny how we’ve been conditioned to want results or answers or solutions immediately. The storm tonight reminds me that we do not have control over everything in our lives. Spending 10 minutes trying to grip a tiny, wiggling ball of feisty fluff to clip Smudgy’s back toenails was also a good analogy for how difficult it can seem sometimes to get something accomplished. We had all 3 girls working to keep him calm. Bethany baited him with a large flake of American Special K cereal (MUCH better than the Canadian version!) while Erin held the squirming bundle in her hands and I reached out to try and immobilize a back paw to clip even a single toenail or two with the baby nail clippers. Smudgy doesn’t bite... but he does wiggle!! I think I managed to clip at least 4 nails... so that’s it for tonight.

If you’ve never watched the CAT HERDERS EDS Trilogy on YouTube... give yourself a laugh and go search for that title. It’s Monday... and you can never have too many laughs on a Monday!

Back To Health At Last... Computer And Dragon!

Well... Bethany and I are finally on the mend after spending the first week of 2007 with one of the most horrible sinus infections I’ve ever seen. We’d been fighting the same cold that put Erin on antibiotics before we went to Mom’s, but by New Year’s Day, I felt horrible. The sinus infection produced a horrible tickly cough that just left us both gasping and wheezing. We tried to tough it out so that we could get home to New Brunswick and our own medical system, but that just gave the infection more time to flourish. By the drive home, Nick made a stop at a Super Walmart to get me some cough syrup so that he didn’t have to smother me at night or leave me in a snow bank somewhere. As soon as we passed through Fredericton on the way home, I called our clinic and told them we would be back in the city by 2 pm, January 4th. Bethany and I got our appointments for 2:15! Of course the clinic was very backed up with other wheezers, hackers etc. so it was about 45 minutes before we found out we were both going on the same antibiotic as Erin had just finished... but yesterday was the first day I really began to feel human again instead of some tall Darth Vader sounding dragon!

I’d been looking forward to shooing them all out the door back to school and maybe crawling back into bed... but it turned out to be the first Snow Day of the school year because of the transition from snow to rain, so we ALL went back to bed and slept in.

So life is getting back to normal now and my computer is working and connected to the real world. The technician was VERY thorough and we now have wireless for Nick’s laptop as well...FREE because of the teacher’s laptop program!

I’m still going to crawl into bed early for one last night because after leading 2 Weight Watchers meetings today, the voice is a bit croaky again, but I wanted to share the photos that I took on the last snowy day when my eMac was off-line.



This is really what New Brunswick SHOULD look like this time of year. Right now, there is less than an inch of snow on the ground that a heavy rain and then freeze has turned to hard, crusty brown and white ooze.

Doesn’t this tree look like a strange hunched dragon shape emerging from the woods? Or do I just have too vivid an imagination??



May 2007 be a path of adventure and wonder for us to walk down...

A Master's Piece

It is the last night of the year and today has been a great day, despite the fact that I seem to have finally lost the battle to fight off Bethany and Erin’s cold. The minister at Lennoxville United church had the chance to go away and spend some time with his family and Mom offered to plan the service and put everything together, as long as she didn’t have to do the sermon (that always was Mom’s least favourite part about being a Minister)! As part of her Christmas present, I volunteered to do that part, as long as the local church had no objection to a lay person preaching.

As I sat down to write tonight’s blog entry, I realised that what I spoke about this morning already summed up all my hopes, dreams and outlook for the year ahead... and so I have posted it here for you to read.

If you would prefer not to read anything of a religious nature, please just skip over this entry and catch me in 2007, knowing that I wish you well.


A Master’s Piece by Jennifer Aikman-Smith

There’s something about a blanket of freshly fallen snow...the way it turns everything into puffy, marshmellow-like lumps...the way it brings out that inner child longing to race though the backyard and be the first one to make any tracks.
Yet all to soon, tires and boots turn roads and sidewalks, parking lots and store entrances into brown slushy swamps.

Today is New Year's Eve... the brink of a New Year with all its possibilities, all of its potential - a NEW BEGINNING of sorts.
Surely I'm not the only one who is hoping that 2007 will be different from the year 2006!

Have you been asked yet what your New Year?s Resolutions will be?
When you think about it... it?s no wonder that many people hate making them, because we seem DOOMED to FAIL from the very beginning. Just stand in line at the grocery store and REALLY look at some of the magazine titles!
"Lose Ten Pounds Before Swimsuit Season" one banner cries.... superimposed over a glossy photo of a double decker cheesecake drenched in hot fudge sauce and the headline "Quick and Easy Chocolate Desserts Your Whole Family Will Love!"

A New Year is like a new piece of paper, a new journal, a new sketchbook or a brand new set of coloured pencils.
None of the tips are worn down yet. There are no silly doodles or drawings with mistakes... no words we wish we'd never written or said. Why do MISTAKES, or the making of them, scare us so much?

When I was a student in Fine Arts at Mount Allison University, one of my printmaking professors was the engraver David Silverburg. His studio was filled with over a hundred sketchbooks from his travels to different countries and each book overflowed with the most amazing line drawings I had ever seen. He would capture people and places with just a few beautiful lines. There were no rough pencil marks beneath the ink drawings to guide him. He simply sketched in ink.
I was in Awe!

I tried to do the same, sketching in ink or felt pen so that my first marks were the ones that stayed.
You couldn't go back and erase anything...
you just had to work with it.
But all I could see were my MISTAKES.

You would think that in the 20 years that followed, I would have learned to live with the fact that even famous illustrators such as Norman Rockwell are seldom satisfied with what their own hands produce. This summer, I finally had the chance to illustrate a children's book for a Moncton author and that same fear of making mistakes haunted me for the 10 weeks that it took to create the 30 illustrations for the book.

Most of us tend to find fault even in those things that we do well.
We look for mistakes and point them out before others have a chance to.

My Mom has a board game where you share memories and stories from your past with those around the table playing the game with you. As each player reaches the end, they have to sit and listen to all of the other players say something nice about them. It is amazing how hard and embarrassing it is to sit there and listen to those words of praise... even for me- the ultimate extrovert!

Why do we find it so hard to accept compliments? Is it because we can only see the mistakes, or flaws,
when we look inside ourselves and think "If they really knew me... they wouldn't think I was so wonderful!"

Yes, here we are on the brink of a New Year... with all of its new beginnings and possibilities, but we can also feel as if we are bringing all of our baggage... our mistakes... our "slush" with us into those bright new Tomorrows.

Who we have been is a part of who we are. The things that have shaped each of our lives cannot just be dismissed...
but we can look at them in a different way.

As a cross stitch designer, working with threads instead of paint to create my images has taught me to think of my life as a tapestry. There are the bright golden and silver threads of special times and places or things that I have done well...
There is the incredible variety of colours from my everyday living and
actions that weave and blend to create row after row... and there are the darker threads which add richness and depth to the pattern.

It would not be as rich a design if any of these threads were missing!

I also remind myself, sometimes daily, that I cannot always see the whole pattern of my life's weaving yet... and that there is no thread that I work into my life that a Master Weaver cannot use to make the whole a thing of beauty.

The message is there if we can listen to it through the din of the world around us...
whispered in Psalms, shouted in the Miracle of the Resurrection.....
if only we can even begin to truly believe it.

We are NOT alone. We live in GOD's world.

There is no mistake, mark or blemish on our life's drawing that keeps it from being beautiful when we give it as a gift to our Creator... for when we feel like scrumpling up that picture and throwing it in the trash... it is God who, like a proud parent, smoothes out the wrinkles and puts it up on the fridge for all to see.

In Life, In Death, In Life Beyond Death... God Is With Us!
We Are NOT Alone!

We do not have to be a Masterpiece in the world's eyes....
for we are already a Master's piece.


Thanks Be To God!

When The Going Gets Tough... The Tough Visit Their Moms!

We arrived safely at my Mom’s yesterday afternoon and tonight is Christmas Dinner part 2, complete with gift exchange etc. My two girls are in the midst of Nanny spoilage, cuddles and hugs while Nick and I are rediscovering the joys of just being able to go off by ourselves for a walk, a chat or an errand! We walked for 45 minutes this morning even though it was INCREDIBLY cold and slippery.

Being up at my Mom’s is a wonderful blend of escapism and being a child again. I was starting to feel like one of those perpetually tired and grumpy adults that I remember observing covertly as a child and wondering why they never seemed to have any fun. Here I can rediscover the fun of hunting for the right puzzle piece, singing around the piano or curling up with a good book and not be worried about schedules, deadlines etc. It is better than sitting at home staring at my eMac and having a continual pity party.

Now it is time to recharge my batteries a tiny bit and look ahead to the New Year so that I can set some new goals, challenges etc. I love this time of year and the promise that it holds. Only when we dare to dream really big dreams and reach way beyond ourselves to we break out of our comfort zones. If I dream big and don’t quite make it, at least I got farther than I would have if I only dared to take baby steps.

What would one of your impossible, crazy dreams be??

Am I the Glitch?
Honestly… despite all the wonderful e-mails and warm fuzzy thoughts from everyone, I continue to slide from the ridiculous to the insane… Nick braved the insane Boxing Week Sale crowds to return the iPod transmitter to the store where he bought it and came home with a new one. We loaded up the van, got the hamster ready to be dropped off at the neighbours, hooked up the iPod and discovered that it had been wiped clean!

Yes, apparently while updating the iPod last night with the eMac, it decided that I didn’t have permission to have the music purchased from the iTunes store on a computer that now thinks it is a new machine (for iTunes, Quark, Photoshop etc.) because of the new logic board. Without an internet connection to authenticate said programs and purchases, it triggers all kinds of error messages. So Nick and the girls ran the hamster up to my friend’s house while I sat there are reloaded all 757 songs from my music library onto the iPod. Then we could set off at last.
Sigh!

The good news is that the motel tonight has free wireless internet and as I much a few baby goldfish crackers, I can blog about my continuing adventures. The new transmitter did work like a charm for the whole trip today. Yay!!!

Ok… this is getting just a wee bit ridiculous now! We had an absolutely wonderful Christmas as a family and are getting ready to head to see my Mom tomorrow, but this little technology glitch that seems to have moved into our house is taking things a bit too far.

Nick bought me an FM transmitter for the iPod since our other one got stolen out of the van last summer. This one is really cool and fits in the cup holder of the van, but when we tried to test it out on the way to Nick’s mother’s house last night, we discovered that there is some kind of short in the power cord or the base! It will only turn on for a few seconds and only stay on if I lean over and hold it in position. Somehow, I just don’t think that I can do that all the way to my Mom’s place! So we might stop in at the store where he got it on the way out of the city tomorrow if the Boxing Week sale shoppers aren’t too numerous. Because New Brunswick stores have to be closed today (unless you are a drugstore) the crazy sales are all tomorrow.

If yesterday was all about family, both near and far, today was all about just getting stuff sorted and put away, organized and chilling as a family. Everyone slept in for once and Bethany even tidied her desk to have room to put some new things away! That was a Christmas Miracle in itself. We had some friends over for godson/goddaughter gift exchange stuff and packed, but the rest of the day was just spent at a truly relaxed pace. The weather outside was pretty messy since the snow they called for actually came as snow, sleet and rain, so we were happy just to stay put. Friends of ours had to drive up North where they were calling for a snowstorm but they headed off anyway.

It still feels weird to be blogging on Nick’s laptop, but I am getting used to the feel of the keys. I hope everyone celebrating yesterday had a wonderful time. Now it is time to look forward to the closing of one year and the dawning of another. This is one of my favourite times of the year because I love setting goals and the new beginnings that such a milestone offers. What is on your goal list for the coming year?

This Is Just Crazy!!

If it weren’t sliding so far into the absurd, I would probably be curled up in a corner having a pity party somewhere!

I was SO ready to yell in joy to the whole world that there was indeed a Santa Claus!! I got a call late yesterday afternoon that the logic board had come in and that my computer was ready to come home! I took a whole plate of Christmas cookies over to the computer shop as a thank you and was absolutely giddy until I got home and plugged the eMac in. Everything turned on perfectly, but it was absolutely unable to connect to the Internet! I called Aliant (our internet provider) for help and they walked me though everything, but had no explanation for why it wasn’t working other than it could be a hardware issue! By this time of night it was too late to do anything else or take the machine back to the store, so I stomped up to bed.

This morning, I decided to see if the problem was with Safari or with all of the web browsers on the machine, so I snuck down to the office as soon as I woke up and turned on both machines. It was then that I discovered that I no longer had ANY internet connection on EITHER machine. No email, no FTP access, no web browsers of any type at ALL!!

Trying not to panic, I called the help line at Aliant and they tried to help me check the modem that they provided to us. It began to look as if the ADSL was not registering at all on the modem, no matter how many times we unplugged it, counted to 20 and plugged everything back in. So, the helpful person on the other end suggested that I try the power supply and phone line parts of the modem in another phone jack elsewhere in the house. As I was cutting the zip ties to release those cords from the bundle of wires at the back of my machine, I accidentally cut through the modem’s power cord!! This sent us out to find a replacement cord from one of the Aliant service centers around the city on one of the busiest shopping mornings of the entire year…

Since the computer store is right near Zellers, we went in to see just what was on sale for the special early bird event… and I thought I would faint! First, let me set the scene properly. Way back in late October, Bethany and I were checking the Littlest Pet Shop website and she discovered that there was a Chinchilla Littlest Pet that had the cutest face she’d ever seen. We’d never seen that one around here so we checked the Hasbro site and discovered that it was unavailable. The hunt began and I was finally able to find the Chinchilla and Ferret as a pair on ebay (listed as VERY RARE) and won the bid for roughly 2.5 times what these little plastic toys sell for in the store… but that was what Bethany had put on her list to Santa, so I felt it was worth the price for a little Santa Magic. After a communication snafu, the items finally arrived at my stepfather’s US mailbox late last week! My Mom mailed them off to me via Priority Courier and they arrived late Wednesday. I was smug that Santa’s reputation was saved for another year for my youngest who still believes with all her heart…

So here we are in Zellers in the toy department where a new shipment of Littlest Pet shop toys have been brought out just in time for last minute Christmas shopping and I find myself looking at over 20 of the little Chinchillas, all smiling at me with their $4.97 price tag. If I could have screamed I would have. Bethany immediately went into acquisition mode and begged for one in case Santa couldn’t find it for her! I was able to calm her down and reassure her that Santa would come through for her and that she needed to wait until Christmas morning to see for herself. AAAAAaaaaaargh!

We brought the new power cord home, hooked everything up and tested the modem out in a new phone jack. No solid ADSL light. Finally, after testing quite a few configurations and possibilities, the nice helper at Aliant decided that we needed to have a technician come to our house and check everything out… but the earliest day said techie can come is the day we leave to visit my Mom!

So, I couldn’t even set up the little surprise that I’d planned for stitchers to tide them over. A friend DID help me get a newsletter update up this afternoon with his FTP and my passwords, but now that I’ve checked the site, I see that two files are still missing… so maybe I can be a total pest and get those files up to him on a CD tomorrow afternoon between the morning and evening church services so that he could send them over.

I can still blog though Nick’s computer and I will be able to do the same from my Mother-in-law’s and my Mom’s, but I will be basically blind and deaf on the Internet until January 5th at the very earliest.

That’s just the way the cookies crumble. As I said at the beginning of this blog entry, it has become such an absurd adventure that I can only try to laugh or groan. At least I’ll be able to spend time with my family guilt-free because there isn’t anything I can do to fix this over the holidays!

Lights In The Darkness...

It is amazing how just when things seem darkest, there are lights to remind you that all is not lost. A little stuffed elephant arrived in my mailbox with twinkly stars on the fabric that lines its fuzzy ears (thanks a million Erin!), a stitcher called from Toronto to see if I wanted the phone numbers of the Mac shops there who might have parts kicking around, a friend called out of the blue to say that she’d been sending happy thoughts my way because I’d been on her mind, I got lots of sympathetic and understanding e-mails about the delay in getting the Morning and Evening Dragons on-line... and after I came home from running an enrichment afternoon at Nick’s school there was a message on my machine from the contact person at Apple Canada telling me that my logic board part shipped out today!!!

Of course, with the holidays this weekend, it might not get here quite as quickly or get repaired in time for Christmas Eve, but I think I have an alternate plan in the works so that I can still get a tiny gift ready for stitchers to enjoy from the newsletter thanks to a few helpful elves!!

Upstairs as I write this, 140 cookies are drying after being iced with all kinds of colours. As soon as the Royal Icing is hard enough to package, they will be assembled into baskets, boxes and mugs for teachers, bus drivers, neighbours etc. When the dragon can’t be on her computer... she bakes! Actually, I do it in batches every weekend in advent and feed the freezer then take everything out the night before to ice/decorate. The only bad thing about being stressed and having baking around is the incredible temptation to eat it all!!!

So.... tomorrow is the last day of school for the girls. I am having a craft session at our house Friday morning with my girls and 4 neighbours kids who have chosen not to go to school for the 2 1/2 hours that it is open on Friday morning. It should be a half day, but because of the bus schedule, our kids would arrive at school at 8:15 and leave again at 10:30... which seems really silly to me. We’ll just take in all the teacher presents tomorrow and get them out of the way so that we can relax a bit Friday until their teacher parents come to our house and the real unwinding begins!!

If nothing else, these past few weeks have taught me that you need to be persistent and firm when trying to get an answer to a problem, to laugh when you feel like crying, to remember that there are always lots of other people who would still trade places with you in a heartbeat, that there are still many wonderful moments of light and hope amid the chaos... and that the true magic of this season is that it can work miracles through people all around you!

Someone Wake Me Up From This!!!!!

I guess the best news is that Erin was not barfy because of the flu, but rather a reaction to the increased asthma medicine to get her under control while she has this bad cold. She went off to school today sounding a bit better, even though getting up out of bed produced the same dizzies and gagging... she was fine after breakfast.

The nightmare is really with my eMac and I am reaching the end of what little rope I have left. What happens when the going gets tough? The tough get twisted....

‘Twas the week before Christmas
And all through the house,
A dragon was moping
And clutching her mouse...

(To the Tune of “All I Want for Christmas Is My Two Front Teeth”)

All I want for Christmas is my eMac please... my eMac please... MY eMAC PLEASE!!!!

(To the Tune of “I’ll Be Home for Christmas”)

Please be FIXED by Christmas
Stitchers are counting on me!
They don’t want snow or mistletoe
Just dragons under their tree (or to stitch!)

After almost a month with a computer acting wonky and a week with NO graphics computer at all, I am getting just a little bit grumpy and panicky. I called the shop today and they told me that they still had no idea when that part would be shipping, so I spent almost 40 minutes on the phone with Apple Canada trying not to beg, plead, whine, cry, yell, use vulgar language or rant in order to get to the bottom of what is going on.

If the part is out there somewhere, find one and tell me WHEN I will have it. If there is a real problem getting said part and my 2 year old computer that is still under warranty (the store sold me THEIR extended warranty plan instead of the Apple one which I will never EVER do again!) then be honest with me and I will somehow find a way to buy a new one. I cannot survive without a Mac as a graphic designer and I have work to do for clients in the New Year as well as my own stuff.

I WANT MY MAC BACK!!!!!!!!! (dragon taking a deep breath so as not to melt the only working computer in her office into yet another heap of useless plastic)

I am REALLY sorry that everyone is having to wait for all the fun goodies stuck in the main computer. I should know in 48 hours whether that part can be found so until then I will just cross my fingers and toes.

At least I’m not looking at the flu sweeping through the house for Christmas!!!

Surviving...

Watching the final episode of Survivor and Reunion Show last night while batching up a Hoffman order, I was struck by several comments that players made about the primal nature of their experience. Becky, a lawyer, commented that when she’d first arrived on the island, she’d spent most of her time asking other players what time they thought it was. Her life was so defined by her watch and schedule that she had a hard time letting go of that structure. Ozzie pointed out what a primal experience just focussing on survival had been. He was right that only a few thousand years ago, even a few hundred years ago, most of us spent a good part of each day just trying to survive.

In our climate controlled, consumer driven North American society, as the mad rush of last shopping days until Christmas whirls around us, it is very hard to remember that there are corners of our planet and even our cities where the struggle to survive still rages on.

I read the girls one of our Christmas books before bed, about Laura and Mary Ingalls in the Little House on the Prairie. It was about the year that Santa couldn’t cross the rain swollen creek but Mr. Edwards still managed to deliver presents on Santa’s behalf. My kids were entranced by the story, but a little baffled at the joy Laura and Mary felt at receiving a tin cup, a stick of candy, a little baked cake and a shiny penny each. When I explained that people didn’t have as many things back then or as much money, Erin got very thoughtful but Bethany was still baffled at the lack of toys. It is amazing how much STUFF our children end up to play with that gets thrown in drawers or cupboards because they get BORED... I wonder if they ever realize how lucky they truly are to have that problem!

We got through the Christmas pageant, Erin’s solo in church, the two Christmas parties this weekend... all of which were joyful and wonderful and totally draining. I came home and just crashed for an hour’s nap after which I felt human again, but Nick and I are still feeling very drained. Everyone is just counting the days until the break...although I think much of my countdown still has to do with when I get my main computer back.

Would I ever be able to unplug completely? Like Ozzie, I think I carry a lot of skills that would certainly enable me to survive if thrown into a challenge like that (for real not for the cameras). I can cook well, swim well, sew, make things, invent stories, build good fires, weave, lash things together thanks to many summers of guide camp or fort building and I know quite a bit about First Aid. Would I choose to live like that instead of in comfort? I guess that depends on the day. While I can’t see anyone on this planet truly choosing cold and hardship over a comfy bed, regular meals, indoor plumbing and chocolate, there is that little voice inside most of us that longs for something simpler than the mad race to collect stuff, earn money, get to appointments, stay thin, be successful etc. These past few weeks with a wonky computer have taught me to go with the flow more instead of trying to control everything and plan it out. It has made me look more closely at the vulnerability of what I have chosen to do as a career and considering a back-up plan, especially as Bethany starts Grade 3 next year and has a longer school day.

This morning, things have been turned on their head yet again. Nick took the van in early to fix the damage from a little mishap in the parking lot of the video store two weeks ago and Bethany went up to the bus stop with a neighbour because Erin woke up and started being violently sick to her stomach. The flu / Norwalk virus has been going through schools in the area and has hit quite a few families that we know. I don’t know if this is what she has yet (because she’s been fighting more of a cold and cough) but it was instant quarantine to her room and LOTS of hand washing for me. I don’t handle barfies well and am very prone to rapid dehydration myself... so I am going to be VERY, VERY careful.

As I look about this week and think of all the ways in which I am NOT fighting for survival on a daily basis, I will remember to be thankful.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, MOM!!!