A lovely 4th. Good food, good company (being Jake), beautiful weather, more hammock time spent unwinding my tired brain. We made homemade bread! My parents unexpectedly bought us a kitchenaid - the REALLY nice model with all-metal construction. Bread has become super easy and delicious. (Though, our OVEN is a bit of a problem. We've got a new one on order, because ours has a short.) I anticipate, what with the prices of things, that we'll be making a lot of fresh bread. $5 for a loaf of wonderbread? I think not. Devoured our farm share today, except for a few bags of greens that we chopped up and froze because they were getting wilty.

In celebration of the fourth, I was a capitalist, and GOT THROUGH THE QUEUE. No, seriously, I finished the EMG queue. Everything is up. That's all she wrote. (Except the silhouette stuff! Still ironing that out, folks!)

I totally prefer to put up little bits of things, not 60 some designs in two days. It's better - saleswise! - to put things up in groups of 5 or 10, and give an impression of freshness and activity. But I also detest making people wait around so long. Some of those pieces have been in the queue since APRIL. I'm sure the artists are just as happy that I'm done already, darn it.

The process IS a lot easier than it used to be. I think that if I can get submissions open a little more frequently (2 or 3x a year), that may make a good balance. Ideally, of course, I'd be able to get work up rather continuous-like, but I just haven't been able to make that happen.

Anyway, go check out the awesome new artwork I've got up: http://www.ellenmilliongraphics.com/fantasyart/

You will be delighted. There are some mind-boggling pieces up. 1391 of them, to be exact, from 188 artists.

*blinks*

Wow. That's a lot!

No wonder I'm tired...

Hope everyone is having a great time today. I certainly have!

I woke up this morning late, so I missed the parade that my celebrity family member was in >.< But thats okay it went well, hehehe and said person had fun. :) I'm sure I'll be seeing pics in the paper.

After that I went with my two brothers and me mummy to go watch the new Incredible Hulk movie. (I haven't seen any of the previous ones). It was pretty typical of the action film, it followed in plot sequence the same as any other generic action film so it was kinda meh, but it was fun at parts. What was really great though was we were the ONLY people in the theatre so my older brother and I had great fun getting into a popcorn toss and I tried my best to make farting noises every time the Hulk had a grimace on his face. 0:D heeheee heeee!!!

After that I went and looked at the little civic that my older brother is rebuilding that he just got running. Nice little car to drive (same year as your's, Rach) has a wider wheel base than my fokey and sits lower to the ground and takes turns quite nicely. Engine is smaller and has more get up and go too.

After that I helped Daddy put freon in my car, tighten up some loose parts having to do with the AC and watched him seal up some leaks I had going in my windshield. Then my daddy showed me this awesome little kinda sorta but not really mini bike and I got to go ride around on it! I rode around for an hour, it was so much fun! 2nd time I'd ever ridden a motorcycle. The first was an itty bitty mini bike. this one was like a full sized Harley but smaller. I asked Daddy if I was ready to get my own Harley yet and he said no, but when I do get one I have to ride it around in the country first because the city was too dangerous. And I have to get my license. >.< *Squee!*

So now I'm home. Its late. I'm thinking about drawing, or debating going to bed. Should prolly go to bed. :/

Happy 4th. :)

Saw this on cuteoverload.com and thought it was the sweetest, most loving thing ever. I had to hold back the tears. :)

I learned about this place last night and made my first micro-loan so a lady could buy a milk cow for her family!  :D  What an awesome thing to do for people.  :)

Goddess and a God are the biggest jokers :) Yesterday while performing a ritual I asked for a sign.... well....AHAHA... I got one... found it while cutting our old flower bushes that was growing towards the road.

Can it be more obvious one? LOL

I got the afternoon off of work and had another hammock accident. No jury in the world would grant me that it was an accident, however. Putting on a swimsuit and slathering on the sunscreen clearly indicates premeditation. Even if it was expired SPF FOUR and probably did nothing.

(I don't know how we even ended up owning SPF 4. Usually we get the waterproof kids sunscreen rated 50+ because Jake and I are both pale-skinned, pale-haired, pale-eyed people who burn and peel at so much as a glimpse of the sun.)

I did not stay out long, as evidenced by the fact that I am not a lobster, but it was sooooo nice and relaxing to just lie out in the warm and do nothing for a little while. I totally needed it.

To make up for that, I felt guilty after dinner and did work. I didn't feel I had the mental faculties for artist pay, but I did get 25 designs up. My fingers hurt from clicking all the damn checkboxes. I have about 40 more to get through, which feels like an end in sight.

Speaking of ends in sight? It's bedtime. *yawns*

I think I need some time off. My mind does not seem to want to work. I think I'll take a few days down time and do nothing. I get tired just thinking about the last month. I have ...

- cleaned up the artwork files for Mythic Oracle
- completed the border and back design for Mythic Oracle
- created the art files for the 45 cards
- updated two websites, which involved adding over fifty different products
- completed 9 artworks
- half completed a tenth very large one
- created over 60 pages for Dreams of Magick

... and all of that's been on top of doing the usual mom thing too.

Yes! I need a break.

Mista D's latest batch o' blades are fresh out of heat treat and I'm fixin' to start setting lines and polishing on them >.< Ooooooooooooooooooooooh I'm so excited! I'm working on two right now that have been around for a little bit to get them polished... one has a very interesting hamon showing up on it so far.. and the other, the more I polish and handle it the more I like it. After that I might get to polish up a coupla blades with a 'flame' pattern type hamon... and there are other many interesting hamon on some of the other blades too!


This is all probably greek to most of you... but thats okay :) Here you can see different types of hamon. enjoy. :)

Things are definately going well with Job#3. Put in my notice at Job#2 today, but told them they could keep me till mid august if they want but I gotta be gone before school starts. (no freakin way I could handle these three jobs and school all at once.. though I would try.... and kill myself doing so.. so I'll let job #2 go).


OH! and I have an amendment to my sandwich rules! I didn't write on there but its true I think plain old PB&J sandwiches are BORING! If a sandwich has peanut butter on it it must have honey and bananas!!! HOWEVER, my very special super dooper awesome cool friend made me this BADASS PB&J sandwich.. well.. not one.. but TWO Pb&J sandwiches with crunchy PB and Kiwi Spicy Pepper 'Somethingerother JELLY that was freakin MMM MMMMM nummeh nummeh!!!! They made them just for me to take to work with me cus my chicky chimichanga I was saving went bad..... <.< I'm so loved :D

I saved one for breakfast in the morning. :D

Nomnomnom.

Anyhoo... I've been plotting my Halloween costume since um... November 1st of last year (I've actually wanted to do this for a LONG time but just haven't been able too) and I don't think I will be able to do it this year. I have, for the longest time, wanted to dress up as Elvria (and not some chintzy cheap dress and wig) I wanted to MAKE the dress and style the wig myself so it would look good. Unfortunately time constraints and lack of working sewing machine plus other issues are going to make that near impossible. I also have wanted to dress up as the dark Lily from Legend. (you don't see the actual dress until the end of the clip... but.. I love that part. :D she gave into the side that had the chocolate) I talk about this because I had a dream last night that I got the dress for Lily made but instead of white diamonds or rhinestones for that sash she's wearing I found some dark smokey crystals instead. <.< I've already got a ton of the structure details worked out and everything for the gowns.

That costume won't be doable either. *sigh* Must think of something I can do. :/

I can haz red fruit tingles ... I is happy.

Hey moonvoice ...want one??

On another note ... when did my little boy suddenly become a man? Where did this 6ft tall blue-eyed young man suddenly spring from? When did the focus of our conversations suddenly turn to career path's, the pros and cons of doing a school-based traineeship, of going to university or college, and saving money for a first car and/or a new 'big' amplifier for his guitar so he can perform at highschool events?

I saw the changes. I knew they were coming.

But wow ... I'm suddenly hit by the realisation that I only have him for a few more years before he will fly away.

I am making spaghetti! It's different every time, I throw in whatever we have on hand. :) I can't wait to eat it, I am so hungry.
Tomorrow I am going camping with my mom and youngest brother for 4th of July weekend. I haven't been camping in ages, so I hope to have fun! Won't get much art done, heheh -- but perhaps I'll bring the camera along to take some forest pictures. That is, if my little brother doesn't hijack it.
Amazingly, we don't have a movie rented tonight. We've had one every single night this week.... makes me think we ought to sign up for Netflix. Araya has come up with a couple of new words out of the blue today. She picked up her old Easter basket and said "basket", and stuffed a koala stuffy into it. And, when we were watching Curious George she pointed at the screen and said, "George!!". Heheh. It's weird how they pick up words that haven't really been taught or even spoken very often. She must have been thinking about those for awhile.
I finally finished my website update, whew. At least so it is functional again -- I'll be struggling with OsCommerce for awhile yet, but that will all be on a test site for the time being.
It is time to eat spaghetti!

Hey does anyone know when this will be on again??

I followed April over to Wonderlands today. Here are my Ning Profiles.




PS I don't know what causes that scrollbar.

Thanks to rhiamon I learned about Wonderlands social network and decided to join today!  :)  It looks like it is more geared towards the entire fantasy genre instead of focusing on a sub-genre like fairies.  And this makes me very happy as while I enjoy fairies, I really do enjoy the more broad genre of fantasy more.   :)



I hope to see you there!  :)

Days never go quite as planned, do they?

Still, yesterday was a good one. With a few hiccups. I was working on the calendars in the morning - had a few roughed up layouts that I sort of liked and wasn't in hate with... and uploaded a preview via FTP to my site and went to get a glass of water.

Came back, and my computer had shut down. DOH! I had forgotten that the night before I was downloading big, big files and set my FTP program to shut down the computer when it finished file transfers. So, of course, when it finished up with that one little file, it shut down the computer - including all the open files in InDesign and Photoshop. DOH!!

I did get some designs up, but no product photos, and at about 5, I remembered that it's JULY already, and I have to pay artists. Those pesky artists.

I also had an accident involving our new hammock. (A co-worker of Jake's evicted their big free-standing hammock that they never use and he brought it home and set it up in front of the house.) I accidentally went outside when I let the dog out and accidentally sat down on it. It was fully in the sun, and my photon-starved skin said 'YES' and the next thing I know it's half an hour later and I'm stretched out on that thing petting Norway and soaking up rays.

Woops.

I also picked up our farm share. Not sure I mentioned that here! It has been SO SO worth it so far! We've gotten big totes full of greens - and I'm only getting a half-share. Delicious, yummy, tasty FRESH greens.

Work now. LAST DAY. (Maybe. Sort of.)

As if we artists and authors needed another networking opportunity*:   http://wonderlands.ning.com/profile/MaryLayton

* Yes, of course we do - we need all the exposure we can get! :P

There are no better artist than a Mother Nature.... this apple was laying just in between others when I noticed that funny pattern started to appear on it. I have no idea what caused it and may be there is very simple explanation to it, but I just thought I would share a magical creation of Nature with you...

WOW... Check out this Oiran doll... Isn't she amazing?

Check out the awesome new figurines Ash Evans has had delivered! Don't they look wonderful? I am totally getting them all! :D

Since I posted a reminder about the current auction in my update, I just thought I had best write a quick note to let you all know that 'Queen of Hearts' sold through the 'Buy it Now' option. I'm a little stunned, but also very delighted. Even better, I know that my little queen is off to a new home with a wonderful person I who will treasure her.