Borders: for people without real jobs

I went to Borders to hang out and draw the other day because when I'm at my apartment all day long I just want to fall asleep or write blogs. There were a few other freelancers there and I realized that it is a great place to work. And some random old guy came in and just sat in a chair for awhile too. I don't think he was a freelancer, but I don't think he has a real job either. So anyone out there without a real job, you should really join in.

Turnip Day

Tonight we're eating a tax deduction. I bought a turnip because I need to paint The Giant Turnip. It's great how you can buy anything and paint a picture of it so it's a tax right off. I should paint my dinner everyday.
I used to love eating turnip in Canada. I read on a random site though, that what people eat in Canada and call turnip we call rutabaga in the states. And the turnip I ate in Canada wasn't purple like that stuff I just bought at the store. So maybe I don't actually like turnip... I'm a little nervous. And I don't think Brandon is very excited about it because when I told him we were eating a tax deduction for dinner and he figured out it was turnip and not steak he said, "ew, gross."

My husband, the artist

Who knew that Brandon could paint? Last night I pulled out an old sketch from "The Monkey Story" that was printed on watercolor paper, gave him a couple of pointers, then let him go for it. Look at the natural talent. He's better at watercolors than I was when I first got into them as a 3rd year art student. Although, I did have to help him out when he wanted to give the kid red hair and used all red paint. I had to inform him that red hair is actually orange. So he fixed it up and it looks great.

Question:

I think one of the funniest questions I have ever been asked was when this self publisher asked if I knew anyone with a private jet going to China that could bring her books back for her so she doesn't have to wait on the slow normal shipping. And she was serious. I had to tell her no, no I don't know anyone with a private jet. sorry. Maybe I should have told her that sometimes my friends buy airplane tickets to fly places, sometimes even to China. I don't know if that makes a difference, but it's the closest thing I could think of to owning a private jet.

sports apologies

I think I apologize too much when I play sports. I make a lot of mistakes. I'm not too bad at defense and being aggressive in general, but I have no aim for shooting in basketball or passing or kicking goals in soccer. So then I have to apologize to my team for missing. Even when I do things right, like setting a good screen in basketball, I feel bad when the opponent runs into me. Or when they set a screen on me and I run into them, I apologize again. It's just an instant reaction I have for colliding with people. Do I sound pathetic?

congratulations to me

Today I have made some big accomplishments. First of all, this is my 101st blog. Congratulations to me, thank you. And.... I did my taxes! What a relief. I love BYU's free help. Thank you to Nate for being my free accountant. We do have to pay a little, but I'm just relieved because I knew it had the potential to be a lot worse. And I have to congratulate myself for being incredibly honest by claiming a lot of freelance money that no one even knows about.

Funny funny childhood

I think everyone has funny memories from when they were kids and they thought their family was normal until they got older and looked back. (my sister recently wrote a blog about our funny rules of remind me of all this) So to anyone who reads my blogs, let's hear a few of your own:

rules: TV dollars, we had only so many TV dollars per week and we had to pay a dollar for every show we watched.
I think my bed time was 7:30 until I was 10.
We had to stay in our church clothes all day on Sunday to try and keep us from being rowdy.
We had to check out exactly 10 books at the library so we would know if we were missing one when we returned them. (I still use this technique)

family foods: we ate (and still eat) delicious open face sandwiches that are made of a layer of ham, then slices bananas, and cheese, then cooked in the oven. REALLY good. But not normal according to everyone I have ever lived with since I moved away from home.
Also: I thought waffles and pancakes were a dinner food until I was in high school or something because we always had those for dinner, never for breakfast- that would have been weird.

fhe: there apparently was a shopping cart problem in our area, the carts were all over the city, so we spent a monday evening loading shopping carts into our suburban and returning them to the correct stores.

things I wore: Punky Brewster bold red, green and blue tennis shoes, maroon corduroys, and a pink blouse with frills all up and down the front and on the sleeves. And what Brandon refers to as our matching "valentine" outfits that we always wore, as seen in a picture of me on Santa's lap in that outfit.

favorite activities: sitting in buckets full of water in the summertime. making mazes out of moving boxes. Throwing Heather in the shower with her clothes on. Running around our kitchen in Spokane that had 2 doorways, one person would start at each door and we ran in circles until one person caught the other. Dressing up our little brothers like girls. Pico-Fumi.

What a blessing: the hair straightener

Wow. Scary, I know. frizzy, wavy, huge. This was the best of the non-straightened hair pictures. Brandon said I looked like I was on drugs or something. I responded, good thing for hair straighteners or you wouldn't have married me. He assured me that he still would have married me but he would have wondered how I got a job at the MTC.

And so, I just want to say how thankful I am that we have straighteners, because 99% of the time I am really glad that I don't look like I am on drugs.

Tip of the day: Don't rub sandpaper on your face

Sometimes boys don't shave and then their faces get scruffy. When I try to get Brandon to shave I tell him, in the nicest way I can, that his face feels like sandpaper. I tried to demonstrate how rough it is yesterday by pulling out some sandpaper and rubbing it on both of our faces and told him the sandpaper was even softer than his scruff. But a few minutes later we realized it really wasn't that soft and we both had sandpaper burns on our faces.

When does water expire?

Sometimes I have water bottles that sit out overnight and sometimes I wonder if it's still okay to drink. It's just water, right? Can it ever go bad? What if I put it back in the fridge, then is it okay to drink? What about a water bottle that sits out for a month, or a year? Is it okay? What about water in a glass? A few hours? A few days? At some point there is at least some dust collecting going on, if not more. What are your water drinking strategies? Do you have a reason behind them, or just habits?

I'll know I'm successful when...

There are a few things, besides money and power, that I look forward to as ways that will signal to me that I have become a super successful illustrator:

A. Bethanne will call and ask me if I will take an intern.
B. I get paid to travel to cool places just to write my name for people.
C. I have to get mad at people because they are copying my style.
D. I learn about copy rights and actually care a lot about it because people keep stealing my images. Maybe I even hire a lawyer, or just talk to Aaron a lot. (I don't know if Ronnie still exists, otherwise I might have mentioned him in there also)
E. My work environment has significantly upgraded to include my own computer, an art desk not in the living room, paints that cost more than $40 and maybe even a couple of ipods.
F. I no longer frame my artwork in frames from the dollar store or Michael's clearance rack. (I probably shouldn't do that anyways, maybe that's partly why I'm not super successful yet.)

I don't believe in ironing

It just seems so unnecessary. It takes an extreme case for me to think ironing is required. My mom told me she didn't realize how strongly I believed in not ironing until I transported my wedding dress in the car from Provo to Seattle and still didn't see much of a need to iron. I think clean clothes are important though, to an extent. Sometimes clothes with artistic stains are just inevitable and that doesn't usually stop me from wearing favorite articles of clothing. Clean smelling, that is what really matters. (Unless you are going to an athletic activity in which case it's okay to put on clothes that smell from the last athletic activity because there are just going to smell again anyways. And then you shower right afterwards.... right afterwards.) Let's hear it for wrinkled clothes everyone! Maybe if we get rid of our ironing board we will have room in the closet for our Christmas tree.

Special Skills

As many of my friends and family know I have a love of soap carving. I don't do it all the time, but I still really enjoy it. When I was in NY and saw people all over the streets by the Met selling art stuff I thought it would be fun to set up a little table and try to sell soap carvings. I only had time to go for an hour or so and no one bought any. However, I did have a lot of people admiring my carvings and people seemed really excited about it, especially the family from France who asked to take a picture with me. I have never lost hope that someday, somehow, this could be more than a hobby.
Well, every now and then I search the internet for people looking for illustrators. In the process I found someone starting a gallery in Salt Lake that is planning on exhibiting a variety of mediums from local artists. I emailed her about my soap carvings and she said she is interested in seeing my portfolio! I don't actually have my soap carving portfolio put together yet, but I guess I better get to work on it. I've heard they have professional soap carvers in Asia. I think it's time America branches out the art industry to include this great professional as well.

CM Party

Last night Brandon and I went to his Construction Management opening social. It was great, lots of good food, fun people to hang out with, even one of my illustration friends was there, a chicken wing eating contest, and the best of all: dance dance revolution. I have only played a small number of times in my life but I think it is incredibly fun. Even though I am not any good at it, no one else there was either. So I came away with 2nd place and a blockbuster gift certificate! oh yeah.

Partially eaten plastic spoon

We have a rice cooker and it comes with this nice flat spoon. It's wide and white and plastic and it works really well for browning meat on the stove because it's not wood and it doesn't scrape up the pan. Recently I realized though, that the spoon is getting smaller and is deformed around the edge. I guess when we scrape at a hot pan it melts and it leaves a little bit of spoon on the pan, which gets mixed in with the food, and then we eat it: the food, with a little flavoring of white spoon.

How to feel old when you're young

Recently I found out about my stake aerobics and yoga classes in the mornings, they are really fun and a great workout. Each day is a different teacher and I've experienced different areas of soreness on my body. After the workout yesterday I am having a hard time getting around, I have to move slowly and sit down careful, hold onto a chair when I pick things up off the floor, and my whole body aches. It's kind of ironic because these are the things that I hear you do when you get old. One of the reasons for exercising is that you are in better health so that you don't feel as miserable when you get old. But why wait for all those things when you can experience them now?

And that's how to feel old when you're young.

My basketball prime

I am pretty sure my basketball prime was when I was in 6th grade. I was really good in 6th grade and I think I've just gotten worse since then. Sad, I know. The other day I played some one on one with Brandon and I actually won! We played until 10, my shots counted as 5 points each, his counted for half a point, so I won 10 to 3 and a half. But let's be honest, he wasn't really trying. I'm planning on going to our Stake open gym night to play some more basketball, maybe what I learned in 6th grade will start to come back to me.

O Christmas Tree

Even though it is after New Years I think our little 4 foot tree still has pretty good odds of being up for awhile. Two main reasons:

1. we don't have many decorations in our living room and
2. we only have two places to store things, our coat closet (full) and under our bed (also full)

Santa Discovery

My friend Charlotte just wrote a really funny blog about how her little brother's comments about Santa and asked how other people discovered that Santa isn't real. I don't remember exactly how old I was, but I was already suspecting my parents from things like Santa's handwriting being exactly like my mom's.
Then one day shortly after Christmas I was over at my friend Karen's house wearing the sweatshirt Santa had given me with big Teddy Bear painted on it. Karen's mom said to me, "oh cute, I remember your mom making that sweatshirt!" My face kind of fell and I mumbled, "Santa gave it to me." Then I knew.

30 minutes please

I try to run everyday and sometimes it amazes me how it can take over 2 hours of my day to run 30 min.
First I decide it's a good time to go run and then I sit there and think about it for half an hour and try to get myself motivated enough to change clothes. I think about how far I will go and typically decide I will just go on a short run to make it more likely that I will even make it out of the house.
Then I change into running gear, that can take a good 5 minutes, then I stretch for awhile to prevent shin splints, further contemplate how this is really a good idea even though I'm not excited about it, and enjoy the warmth of my apartment a moment longer. (10 minutes)
Then there is the actual running part. Typically 30 minutes more or less.
Then I come back and stretch even more, again, preventing shin splints and just cooling down. (20 minutes) After that I usually think about doing some sit-ups and push-ups while laying on the floor for at least 20 minutes, typically longer though. Then I actually do the sit-ups and push-ups which takes another couple of minutes.
Then I have to shower and get ready for the day again because I smell from running of course and that puts me at well over 2 hours.
It seems a little ridiculous, I know, but what part am I suppose to cut out? The shower? The actual running time? Because I've already tried cutting out all the sitting around thinking and not accomplishing anything part and that just doesn't work.