Old Artsy me

Me, Age 22 the "brooding Art student" lol

Artsy picture I took in my bug infested first apartment. I still love this pic

From 1999- 2003 I was an art student, free happy go lucky and talented (so I thought) with a secret ego the size of Texas. I enjoyed my college years, and it wasn't until recently, when I had to contact the school for some new recruits for a project, that I realized just how much i miss it, and the people who took care of me there. By day I would work at a coffee shop, running around high on caffeine (before my stomach decided to go by the way side and never allow me to drink coffee again without putting me in sheer acid reflux agony) by night i went to art school , happily soaking up art history 1-3 and figure drawing, I spent my weekends either camped out at the Art museum, studying or in my room sitting at my drawing table listening to Moby and Esthero working on my next great "masterpiece" I went to professional Graphic Designer events, and dreamed of the day that I would work for that awesome firm who would pay me lots of cash. or the fashion magazine who loved my work so much they would let me work from home. Music , coffee and Art were the three mainstays in my life, I could "fall" into working on a piece for hours,the "Art Coma" as I liked to call it, was my out for the trouble my heart was going through in those rough times.

After college and before i even graduated, I was pegged by ICI Paints (now Akzo Nobel) for my color aptitude, I was hired to work at their headquarters in a big building in downtown Cleveland as a Color Studio designer int thier Architectural unit, I was thrilled! And felt like such a "big girl" in my dress clothes, taking the train to work, and walking with the big suits each morning, I was sure I was going to get some where in that company. But after 3 years, reality set in and 9/11 had finally taken it's toll on ICI Paints, I got laid off...and that was the end of the honeymoon and the begging of a painful 4 year search for a job that i could stick with, I got laid off three more times, the economy sucked, and companies that i worked for could barley keep the lights on , let alone pay my salary. I was lost.

I finally found the job that I have now, wich isn't exactly in my field, directly, I work for PPG Automotive Refinish, and I work in the color library ,helping people with auto colors, I do still work with color at least and I am striving to move elsewhere with the same "I am going to make it in this company or die trying" work ethic, I had at ICI. Except now I am more realistic, I know the pitfalls, I know the possibility of losing my job in this economy, but I work with great people, and for the most part the job mildly satisfies me, but just recently as I talked to some of my old college mates and a few professors, I realized that I still have that drive in me, I still have the "artist" I don't draw really anymore like I used to. but I still come up with stuff in my head all the time and make a point to be creative, always try to work on something. And I still have the uncanny ability to walk through the Art museum with my hubby and give him a walking tour, telling him everything I know about the paintings, he loves to learn and I love the fact that I remembered enough to teach!

Still nothing can or ever will match those free wheeling, wild girl college days. Back when I swore I would be vegan, never marry a republican and never let a man hold me down.

.....my how things change! And yes....most for the better.......but still art and music are a huge part of me, and they always will be.

Puppy Post!

Since I will be out on tuesday, I wanted to post this Tune in Tuesday video now! Just a cute little ditty of my lovable mutt, Starsky :) Sorry for the sporatic jumpiness of the video, I am still working out the bugs lol.

Week 12- It's "poppin"

It really looks like I just ate 1 too many cheesecakes doesn't it?

Well here I am the last week of the horrid first trimester, and while I wasn't as sick as some people I have known, I sure as hell didn't feel like myself. But here I am, back from a crappy sabbatical, and hey, I even made it through the holidays (I am STILL not sure how that happened)

My nausea is gone pretty much completely, I still have some food aversions, but they come and go. And I got my sweet tooth back, which I was hoping wouldn't come back at all :( but what are ya gonna do right? I am also popping out just a teeny but.

Since I have been feeling better, i have been eating and cleaning, when I am not doing either of those, I am sleeping, and that is pretty much the gamut of my weekends, during the week insert 8 hours of work on top of that.

Everyone at work is so excited, they want to have baby naming contest which I think is cute, and they won't let me do anything physical, like lets say, kneeling for instance, I tired to tell them thanks for the concern but I am pregnant not handicapped LOL, if I want to sit on my knees so that I can file color standards then so be it. I also mentioned to someone I was cleaning the house the other day, and they told me I shouldn't be doing that, that I need to rest, well i DO rest, ALOT dammit if I don't move I going to weight like 860 pounds by the time this all over . I love to be active, and it's been so long since I actually FELT good, that now that I do I am playing catch up. I take the puppy for long walks after dinner in knee deep snow,because he has fun and it really helps my food sit better,I also do prenatal exercise videos each morning for 15 minutes. I started out at 154 pounds before I was pregnant, when I went to see the doctor at 8 weeks I was 163, I have an appointment on Tuesday and will be anxious to see how much more I went up, although i am not overly concerned with my weight while pregnant, I eat all the right foods, so anything that I put on will be healthy pretty much ( never mind the occasional root beer float or nachos binges)

And go figure this crap out.......the more pregnant I get, the more I WANT to breast feed......damn hormones..........

Today I spent the morning stripping the wall paper off of half of the nursery walls, and while it's no nightmare and seems to come off rather easily, it is a COMPLETE mess in there. But soon it will look super awesome, so I keep looking forward to the finished product.

ICK! I HATE Stripping wallpaper!

Well I'm off to nap......

Nursery Ideas

Alot of people have asked what I want to do with the babys room, and because I don't know the sex yet, that's a tough question to answer, but I have been looking through alot of catalogs today (nothing else to do, it's 10 degrees out and we are snowed in for the weekend ) and I found these pictures below, I LOVE this bedding! I think that it would look great with pale yellow and ice blue walls! and I LOVE LOVE this crib. But this is only one idea. I am sure more will follow.

Tommorrow, I plan on stripping the wallpaper backing off of the walls, here is to hoping for easy work!

New Tues Feature?

So I finally got around to figuring out the darn movie maker (i think) and here is what I came up with for today for my sweetie! Love you dear :)

I am going to try to do a different one either every tues, or every other tues.....we'll see

Positivity VS The World At Large

Picture by Shish Kebabness

After a lovely two weeks of holidays and being in a “Holiday Spirit Coma” I finally had to come back to reality yesterday and head back to work; and boy was that hard hit!
During the holidays you don’t really realize how generally positive and hopeful the world seems, until you all head back to work after that long vacation turn on the news when you get home or pick up the paper and BOOM “12 people killed in Gaza, 3 shootings on the east side of town, someone stole an old mans wheelchair and all of his money, A child suffocated while being restrained in a mental care facility……” Ect. Ect. (these we real news stories from yesterday) ….and there goes your cloud of positivity, just like that. Poof up in smoke….

I it’s a damn shame when the only good news on the evening news is ONE story about how two 7 years olds in Germany tried to catch a plane to Africa so that they could “elope” a heartwarming cute story yes, but at the same time, tremendously sparse compared to the stories we heard during Christmas…”Good Samaritan brings toys to family after they were robbed”…ect.

Maybe its just that we are in such a good mood (most of us) during the holidays that we do not HEAR the bad news, or maybe it is a media plot to get everyone jolly, then let them down a few weeks later with stories of crime and recession.

So starting today, I aim to be positive, to try to keep the sunny out look that I came close to losing last night. No CNN no MSNBC, BBC, NPR or any other news outlets for that matter, for at least a week, it’s all too depressing, I even set up a positive list on my iPod this morning of uplifting music, or music that doesn’t make me cry, No Three Doors Down, Sad Counting Crows, Staind or Linkin Park, who recently have gotten extremely depressive with “The Sun Will Set for You” don’t get me wrong I do like these bands, but the other day I found myself listening to a Stained song without realizing it right away, and I said out loud, “good god shut up already you whiney….”Expletive”

I don’t want to think about suicide, death, destruction and turmoil. Don’t get me wrong I am certainly one to blast Kittie or NIN at the top of my speakers on the way home from a bad day at work, but I don’t generally want to hear it on a cold ass cloudy day (which in Cleveland is the norm) when I am on my way to a job that I some times feels is going nowhere.

Phew!!
So in closing, here is what I propose to do to make life a bit more positive:

Quit being a news junkie
Compliment one person at least a day.
Say hello to someone in the hall at work that I have never said hi to before, or to someone who doesn’t seem too friendly.
Spend more time wrestling around with my loving puppy dog, or my husband for that matter WOOOO!!!
Try to find the good, even if it is miniscule in a crappy day.

And that’s all I have.

Well I am off to try to make this the most positive day that I can…..it will be a challenge!

DOUBT

Had a great afternoon with my mother and grandmother, WHO IS 88 TODAY I MIGHT ADD!!!!!! We all went to go see DOUBT, all I have to say is if you love drama, are a fallen catholic, staunch catholic, non catholic whatever, go see it!! I myself being the fallen on, my mom being raised strictly catholic ( and even joined the Notre Dame Convent of nuns at 13 years old!!!) and my grandmother the same, all LOVED it! Phillip Seymour Hoffman is terrific as the priest, I have always liked his acting since I saw him in Magnolia, hell I even liked him in The Big Lebowski. The movie may not be for everyone, but if you are of Catholic decent I think it makes it even deeper. here is a preview below in case you want to check it out.


we then had a nice dinner at Sugar creek for grandmas b-day and all split a piece of Snickers cheesecake which actually didn't taste that great to me in my currently non existent sweet tooth.

Well back to searching around online, I plan on organizing alot of stuff tomorrow and I am looking for different ideas to organize all my cosmetics.

Hope your year has went well so far!!