ROAD TRIP!

So I had to go to LA for a meeting for a bunch of murals Im gonna be doing, so we decided to make a trip out of it! Don't get too excited or anything, but here are a bunch of pics we took and what they are of....hold on to your hats!


So this first image is of the murals this company's California guy has done for them. He's not around anymore, and these businesses are to be in AZ, so I was asked to do several murals with a "hispanic flair". When asked to do murals of this style, I wasn't sure if the guy wanted me to do something "Diego Rivera" or more like what's on the side of a boxcar...thankfully he was more into Diego. I'm gonna LOVE doing these murals, and there are a LOT of them! Yay!




These next two fellas are my schweet thangs, Ken, and Weird Mexican Elvis, both at Olivera Street in LA.





One of my fave parts of our adventure was going to San Clemente to see Katie and her new digs. Rats...couldn't find my camera in the pile of junk in our car when we were there, but she has an awesome house right on the beach! I'm super jealous, but pretty happy she has a nice comfy couch for her mama to crash on! She just moved into it with 2 friends this last weekend. We had some fabulous pizza and a great visit. I think I took a couple of pics and sent them off to facebook, but my phone was the only camera I had at the time, so no images here...sigh.

These next 2 images are Ken and Me hiking to Sullivan's Curve, and a cool train pic at the curve. Sullivans' is a VERY steep grade and curve at some cool rock formations up in the San Bernadino Mountains. We had to go over a RR bridge to get to it because the creeks were raging from the recent rains, so we couldn't drive to it in our little car.



Well, we had a pretty fun trip. We REALLY needed that! Here is one last image of Ken. On our way home, we took the long way and went through Kingman AZ. Kingman is the final resting place of the Steam Locomotive that Ken's dad took on it's last run, way back in the mid '50's, over the previously mentioned Sullivan's Curve. It was getting dark, so this flash image is a little fuzzy, but you can still see what it is. And that was the end of our trip! Lots of good times!

So for those who knew me from the wayback, you know I was 6' tall at 115# until I had my second child. Well that was then and this is now:


yeah, I likes my butter slathered popcorn, candy and internet...not a good combo. Lately though, I don't feel good. My clothes are shrinking or something. My feet hurt and Im tired all the time. Oh that and folks keep asking me when my baby is due! (thanks for thinking Im young enough to actually get PG!). So yesterday I went with my bro Bill and my mom to a hypnotist where Bill is quitting smoking and I'm loosing weight, and mom's gonna chill and be pain free, and we will both be happy to do it according to these CD's we got.
I don't know how the others are doing, but Im really gonna give this a chance. Sugar and salt will have a weird taste, I will drink a ton of water all day, I'll be exercising more, I'll eat stuff that grows in the ground, on plants and trees, plus fish and chicken if I like. And whole grain bread, but not much. No more cokes, or at least very little...water will be the thing that refreshes me.

We'll see how this goes.

Hay, I think my blogspot is in russian or something...what the heck? I'll fix it. Laurie's was too, I thought it was just her!

So what I'm gonna do here, along with an occasional pic of my big fat bingo arms and my looks like 6 months PG belly shrinking, will be to post some extreemly yemmy recipes I've discovered. I assure you they will be simple, so try them!

!st recipe:
I cut a large zucchini squash in 3 LONG slices, sprayed it with butter flavored cooking spray on both sides, then sprinkled parmesan cheese (the good stuff you get in the cheese section) on it. Then placed it in a 400 degree oven for 30 minutes. IT WAS AWESOME!!!
Albertsons has zooks on sale for el cheapo this week. They also have these little frozen single serving size salmon and other fish for a buck each. I scooped up lots! Oh and the cheese too. It's normally about $5-$6 for a container. I got it for $3. Such a deal!
Oh and pat me on the back. I WALKED to the store.

The Anti-blank walls of Primary

Well, they are not totally blank...there's a couple of little bug kites hung in the corners. I was just asked to be the nursery coordinator in church.
My plan is to make this a happy place for the kids to come. A place to learn and feel loved. My first priority is not only for the kids, but an aid to me. To learn their names. This week I will take photos of the children and the nursery workers. Im going to make an apple tree wall hanging to be hung by the door. It will have leaves with our names on them. There will be a holder which will contain apples made of felt, with pictures of each of us. When we come to nursery, the first thing will be to go to the holder and put our "apple" next to our name. This will be a good first thing for each child to do, plus help us adults, including new people (like me!) and subs learn each childs' name. A very important thing.

The next priority will be singing. I need to make singing visual aids. I will write about this later as I make these things. First I need to take inventory of what is already there, which I will do tomorrow.

And to lively up the room and get rid of those giant white walls pictured above, I will paint a mural on canvas to be hung on rods above the toy boxes. I have a PERFECT reference pic for that and Im pretty excited about it. That will be done this week, and will also be posted....STAY TUNED! I've just begun!!!!!!!!

Such a fun n busy weekend! First to Elaine's in Cottonwood to give her all those gazillion leaves I raked from my yard for her garden (sorry LeAnn, I was going to see her anyway and gave her the leaves...I still love you tho!). We were hoisting and raking leaves all over so when done went for a dip in the hot tub....mmmmmm. I forgot my camera, so this is taken with my handy dandy waterproof cellphone. a little fuzzy but that's cool.


Then the next morning off to Bills (aka Will) to move him back to Prescott! This is a pic of us after loading our 2 trucks up with junque and about to head down the road. He's staying with us so his dog can acclimate to our house where she will stay when Bill is on the road in his new job. Also, we really like having him here!

I got the blaaaaaass

I've been pouting because I did not get what should have been the coolest mural I've done (maybe except the Grand Canyon mural). I'd spent the last 2 weeks going over in my mind how I would do this mural...lots of ideas! I guess this is what actors who go to auditions feel like. The people at ERAU didn't have a prob with my art though, but with the price. I really couldn't lower it though. It was a fair price considering my expenses and time.

Ken was an absolute sweetheart. I was really upset yesterday when I found out, and he just hugged me. We went out for a drive just to "get away". He didn't try to happy crap me into feeling better which I absolutely hate, but was just nice and mellow, letting me vent. Anyway, I told Ken im giving myself till 11am today to get over it. It was 1pm and I was still in a funk so decided I needed to get out and get some hard physical exercise and work out my frustrations. It worked. Im over it.

Gotta start working up some stuff for the next big project on the horizon. That one I will likely get, and it will be several businesses, spaced about 3 weeks apart. Physically I will be able to handle that much better anyway. The ERAU mural would have absolutely exhausted me.

I'll likely also do a couple of small private murals between now and the time I start the biggie in late feb.

So here's a pic of me where I am smilin'. Kinda green or something, but the teeth are showing so I guess that's good.

Ken told me his mom believed that whatever you were doing on New Year's Eve/ New Years Day would reflect how the new year would go. I kind of poo-pooed it at first, but then got to thinking of past New Years...maybe she had something there?

Our New Years was going to be uneventful, even kinda yucky. I was going to stay home alone while Ken was going to drive to Phoenix, sleep in the cold in his truck at the train depot to get his 0600 train in the morning. He didn't think it would be safe to drive at 2 or 3 am on New Years' cause of all the drunks which I agreed. Sooooo, rather than subject him to that, and beings it was New Years, we decided to go together, go out to a nice dinner, get a motel and make a night of it! MUCH BETTER!

As we were driving to Phoenix, the moon started to rise...not just any moon, but the Blue Moon, and it was HUGE! We watched it rise and get smaller and brighter...very pretty. The next morning we got up early to get Ken off on his train, and on my drive back to Prescott, I saw that gorgeous, large full moon again, but this time it was sinking into the horizon. Hmmmmm, now what could that possibly mean according to Ken's mom?