pixiegenné

my nephew is a superhero

i want to give a little shout-out to my nephew, graham, who turns 5 today. graham was born with a grim birth defect called a congenital diaphragmatic hernia (cdh). cdh is more common than spina bifida or cystic fibrosis but gets less press because it is so often fatal at birth. graham, however, is very much alive, and today, graham's birthday, marks the first cdh awareness day. pretty cool, dude.

and i have to share some pictures of a really cool book a friend gave me today. i almost peed my pants when i saw it, because a)the illustrations are amazing and b)my mom had this piano book when i was little. i've had "john jacob jingleheimer schmidt" in my head all day because of it...

more pics on flickr. happy monday!

jane needs her own craftblog

i don't know if this is another project from this book or not, but jane decided all by herself to make this wallet for charlie's birthday, which is next tuesday. she made it from an old comic book and tape. i want to have it bronzed or something i love it so much.

they go through phases of wanting to kill each other and getting along swimmingly. right now they are getting along swimmingly. as i type this, they are taking turns standing on each other's bellies and making gagging noises. isn't that cute? i'll take it.

we've got chinese food with friends tonight and a kegger tomorrow night. sounds like a righteous weekend to me. hope you've got some fun stuff planned, too.
xoxo

feeling sunny

it's finally feeling like spring. there's still dirty piles of snow everywhere, but i heard birds singing yesterday and that made me pretty happy. the forsythia haven't bloomed yet, but i'm seeing lots of yellow in blogland and flickrland lately (i'm too lazy to link, but i'm sure you've seen it too). this yellow trunk case is yet another way-late swap i'm finally tackling. i'm hoping to make some stuff for my etsy shop in the near future, too.

thank you for all the advice on orthodontia. i'd always heard how expensive that kind of stuff was but *wow*. i wasted some serious time the other night google-imaging attractive adults with underbites. which led me to pat benatar. which led me to yet another flashback video.

pat benatar was the shiznit.

drive-by thrifting

i had a couple extra minutes between getting stood up for an appointment and picking up the kids yesterday, so i hit a thrift store real quick. i grabbed a few cute books and a mug. the mug's got a little chip so i think it's headed to my office to keep my pens tidy.

(see my flickr for info on the books)

and i have an embarrassing announcement to make: if you are the erin from canada that won a group of books i was giving away, i have been meaning to e-mail you but lost your e-mail so i'm hoping you might be reading this...i was unable to send your package because it cost $35 to ship that pile of books to canada and i'm too cheap. i'm sorry! and i'm sorry i lost your e-mail! (and i'm sorry i'm too cheap).

ok, then. happy tuesday!

bleh

still getting over the flu which raged through our house last week. we're still coughing and sneezing and i'm still throwing back the nyquil each night but the kids went to school today and i will be back at work tomorrow. so that's progress.

jane got a hold of the spring mini boden catalog and got all wanty. i'm hoping throwing some appliques on last years' t-shirts will keep her placated. so far so good.

speaking of jane, we had our first consultation at the orthodontist today to discuss her underbite. that was fairly overwhelming and a little scary. if anyone out there has any experience with underbites and headgear and the like, i'd love to hear from you.

first day of spring my ass

it's gloomy inside and out and we are all home sick. again. but we're cozy with lots of quilts and pillows and spongebob videos and ben & jerry's and my laptop and scrabble friends.

it would be mr. roger's 80th birthday today (thanks for the link, liz).
and these have to be the fugliest shoes ever.
that's all i got. if you're sick too, i hope you're better soon. if you're not sick, start chugging your vitamins. it's headed your way.
xoxo

stroke my enormous ego*

working away at some long overdue swaps this week (the glue is still a little wet on this one).

i realized recently that i've probably sold about 100 suitcases. i wonder sometimes where they are, how they are used or displayed, if they ever think of me....

and i was thinking it would be cool to have some pictures of my work out in the world. if any of you have a suitcase of mine and feel like snapping a picture of it in action (on display in your home, with your kids, on a baggage carousel at the airport), send it my way. i'd be psyched. maybe if enough people join in, i'll start a flickr group.

*totally sounds dirty and reminds me of this song. i'm embarrassed to say my teenage self thought billy squier was pretty hot, though i now realize he wasn't dancing as much as he was probably writhing in social disease. is that an armadillo in his pants? holy crap!

happy joyfulness

jane asked me to bid on these little kidrobot guys at the school auction on saturday (a boxed set of 25 were donated). so i won them (and by "won", i mean payed lots of money for). but my kids were sooooo psyched. it was like christmas morning here on sunday. for me, too, because the auction is over! and it was really successful! and i can now move on to other things in my life!

the decorations for the auction came out great. i took lots of pictures but then saw that jen had taken better ones, so you can check them out here if you like.

now i'm off to clean, launder, and organize my life. happy monday!

more flowers

more flowers. these will be hanging from the ceiling at our school auction this saturday (much like blair's).

nothing but flowers here.
let's see what more interesting people are up to...

• just in case you haven't seen it yet, my friend emily was on martha stewart this week! she did a great job and looked adorable. made me a teensy jealous that she got to meet martha. (but mostly happy for her. like 98% happy and 2% jealous).
• "h is for home" just opened up shop. their vintage finds are way cool. i'm a new fan of vintage hornsea. made me wanty.
• heidi posted this video of ellen degeneres yesterday. made me really sad.
• marielle posted this fun video today. made me smile.
• i made a mosaic of some springy flickr favorites (see photo credits here). made me hopeful (even though snow is in the forecast).

paper flower factory

i'm working on lots and lots of paper flower bouquets for the kids' school auction this weekend. my dining room is covered in flowers.

it might be a little quiet here this week. i'll be back on track next week, hopefully tackling some long-overdue swap projects (you know who you are...i haven't forgotten).

i finally watched darjeeling limited this weekend. it's put this song in my head. plus i'm reading suite francaise, so i've got paris on the brain. i bet paris isn't covered in dirty snow this time of year. just a hunch.

happy monday!