This kid-on-the-toilet-drawing lady, that's who.
Ok, this illustration actually didn't make the cut, but you get the idea.
Thursday, March 31, 2016
My legacy is secure
Who's got two thumbs and a contract for a potty board book?
This kid-on-the-toilet-drawing lady, that's who.
This kid-on-the-toilet-drawing lady, that's who.
Monday, March 28, 2016
hulk makes naan
Oh thank the heavens it is almost time to go back to work. Holiday weekends are just long exercises in damage control. My young cousins put more effort into demonstrating how shitty they are at tasks in order to get out of them than the tasks themselves actually required. They're in it for the long game. Epically fuck up tying balloons now, save yourselves a lifetime of having to be nice to people on their birthdays later.
And I could go into a long and exasperated rant about all the ways the cousins tried to ruin the weekend for everyone and how they ate all the cookies before I could get back from putting the cookie rack in the sink and how they deliberately crushed every egg and popped every water balloon they held because for some reason that fell under "work", but I WILL NOT DO THAT.
So here are some other things that happened.
Our cat died, and it was awful. The man came back from the pet hospital bone-tired at 6am with our poor little kitty in a cardboard box. He put the box on the table and trudged sadly into the bathroom to wash up. I came out to see what was happening, and Zenny ran after me with her arms up, so I carried her on my hip and went to find some coffee. As we walked by the table, the kitten suddenly charged into the room, scrabbled up the table, savaged the side of the box, and then slithered into the flaps before I could grab him. I only had one arm because I was holding Zenny, and I didn't want to rip open a box with a dead cat in it in front of her, and I was too alarmed and sleep deprived to remember that I could put her down, so I did the logical thing: I freaked out and started yelling, "MIKE MIKE GET IN HERE HELP MIKE." Mike came skidding in just as I decided I was being a weenie and ripped open the box flaps while it pitched and rocked on the table. He stopped and clutched the sides of the doorframe, I reached inside, and when I hauled the frantic kitten out he calmly bent over and hyperventilated between his knees, because he thought the cat had resurrected and was clawing its way out of its coffin.
Sorry, Mike.
We weren't off to a great start, holiday-spirit-wise, and every time someone made an Easter resurrection joke I looked up and scalded them with my eyeballs. Not feeling up to cooking on egg-dying day, I bought a wheel of brie and the man volunteered to make bread. He likes baking. He's good at baking. He is not good at getting all the ingredients out and making sure there is enough to complete the recipe first, so he left a bubbling bowl of slime on the counter while he ran to the store for provisions. He came home with french bread to tide everyone over, and at about 9pm he finally hauled the last slab of naan out of the toaster oven. Or he tried to. The toaster oven had been sticking, and every few minutes a stream of PG13 cartoon swearing would come out of the kitchen while he jiggled and wrested the thing open. On the last batch, he grabbed the oven door, gave it a yank, and it exploded. A slow-motion shower of shards rained down on the kitchen floor, surrounding us in eight feet of broken glass. He carefully put down the handle of the door. "I fixed it," he said. I came over in hysterics and crumpled up laughing.
This week, I tell you.
And I could go into a long and exasperated rant about all the ways the cousins tried to ruin the weekend for everyone and how they ate all the cookies before I could get back from putting the cookie rack in the sink and how they deliberately crushed every egg and popped every water balloon they held because for some reason that fell under "work", but I WILL NOT DO THAT.
So here are some other things that happened.
Our cat died, and it was awful. The man came back from the pet hospital bone-tired at 6am with our poor little kitty in a cardboard box. He put the box on the table and trudged sadly into the bathroom to wash up. I came out to see what was happening, and Zenny ran after me with her arms up, so I carried her on my hip and went to find some coffee. As we walked by the table, the kitten suddenly charged into the room, scrabbled up the table, savaged the side of the box, and then slithered into the flaps before I could grab him. I only had one arm because I was holding Zenny, and I didn't want to rip open a box with a dead cat in it in front of her, and I was too alarmed and sleep deprived to remember that I could put her down, so I did the logical thing: I freaked out and started yelling, "MIKE MIKE GET IN HERE HELP MIKE." Mike came skidding in just as I decided I was being a weenie and ripped open the box flaps while it pitched and rocked on the table. He stopped and clutched the sides of the doorframe, I reached inside, and when I hauled the frantic kitten out he calmly bent over and hyperventilated between his knees, because he thought the cat had resurrected and was clawing its way out of its coffin.
Sorry, Mike.
We weren't off to a great start, holiday-spirit-wise, and every time someone made an Easter resurrection joke I looked up and scalded them with my eyeballs. Not feeling up to cooking on egg-dying day, I bought a wheel of brie and the man volunteered to make bread. He likes baking. He's good at baking. He is not good at getting all the ingredients out and making sure there is enough to complete the recipe first, so he left a bubbling bowl of slime on the counter while he ran to the store for provisions. He came home with french bread to tide everyone over, and at about 9pm he finally hauled the last slab of naan out of the toaster oven. Or he tried to. The toaster oven had been sticking, and every few minutes a stream of PG13 cartoon swearing would come out of the kitchen while he jiggled and wrested the thing open. On the last batch, he grabbed the oven door, gave it a yank, and it exploded. A slow-motion shower of shards rained down on the kitchen floor, surrounding us in eight feet of broken glass. He carefully put down the handle of the door. "I fixed it," he said. I came over in hysterics and crumpled up laughing.
Z dying all her eggs brown
Gavin planning rampage of water balloons to vanquish cousin
TONIGHT WE RIDE
the man with his new hair cut
typical
Easter morning
someone finally takes a picture of me, and I'm using my boobs as coasters
Stella, my mother's youngest cat
Kindle 101
Wednesday, March 23, 2016
Astrid
She wasn't dying, but then she did. She took a bad turn, we rushed her to the pet hospital, and we got the call at 5am to say goodbye.
Gavin is heartbroken. Leif is still sleeping and doesn't know. She was the funniest, cleverest, most beloved young cat. It was probably neurological and not trauma after all, but for all the thousand dollars it took to try to save her, they never figured out what was wrong.
Navigating this bad thing today.
Tuesday, March 22, 2016
Psychic magnetism can go DIAF
I was trying to convince a stiffly smiling girl in a ponytail to take a jar of cat poop from me. It had a little plastic spoon in it, like an ice cream sample. Yes, it's fresh. Yes, I was told to come here with the poop. Sure, go call and ask them. Oh good, I'm glad I pre-paid. I had an existential moment, standing there looking at the poop with the little pink spoon in it. What is happening? How did I arrive here?
I haven't had any bolts of precognitive woo in a while. Most of them, when they happened, were so long-term that they haven't even had time to elapse so I'll know if I'm full of shit or not. I had that one when I was 17, looking at the feet splayed beside me and realizing they were attached to my husband in the manner of someone realizing they will have to assemble a dresser with instructions in the wrong language, and that turned out to be a thing that happened. But it hasn't done me a damn bit of good in predicting any of the things that actually took a hammer to my peace of mind over the years, so I don't hold my imaginary psychic abilities in high regard. "Don't believe everything you think," I always yell at my kids and people on the Internet.
Then driving home yesterday, the thought suddenly arrived, in all-caps like the voice of Death in a Pratchett novel, I'LL HAVE TO CALL GAVIN HOME FROM HIS GRANDMA'S HOUSE BECAUSE SOMETHING HAS HAPPENED TO ASTRID. I clenched up with dread when we pulled into the driveway, but there was no dead cat run down in the road. Well, that's good, then. I got my shopping and trotted Zenny up to the front door and the cat came flopping out of the bushes with both her hind legs busted, like a really unhappy trout.
Three hours later, I was handing over my debit card and taking home my broken cat with $430 of diagnostic exams and no diagnosis. "She wasn't poisoned, she's not diseased, there is no infection, and X-rays are going to be another $300, so come back if she looks like she's going to die and we'll get those done. She probably got clipped by a car or kicked by a neighbor." GREAT. Whenever I feel pissy about the cost of medical care, I console myself by asking, "Would I want to bring the cat to Jiffy Lube and see if they can figure out how to spay her? Would that root canal look any better if it was my bank teller with the drill?" You pay for expertise and peace of mind. Even if they give you a plastic spoon and tell you to shovel up some poop in a jar as homework.
So the boy was called home from his grandmother's house because something happened to his cat. And the grandmother followed, because these are times in which you want your mom to come fix everything. The cat is doped up and convalescing, but she's not dying. Am side-eyeing my neighbors to see which one looks like a cat kicker.
Next time I get a bolt of intuition, I am going to shut everyone in the house and hide under blankets. Unless it's about the house going up in a blanket fire.
Then driving home yesterday, the thought suddenly arrived, in all-caps like the voice of Death in a Pratchett novel, I'LL HAVE TO CALL GAVIN HOME FROM HIS GRANDMA'S HOUSE BECAUSE SOMETHING HAS HAPPENED TO ASTRID. I clenched up with dread when we pulled into the driveway, but there was no dead cat run down in the road. Well, that's good, then. I got my shopping and trotted Zenny up to the front door and the cat came flopping out of the bushes with both her hind legs busted, like a really unhappy trout.
Three hours later, I was handing over my debit card and taking home my broken cat with $430 of diagnostic exams and no diagnosis. "She wasn't poisoned, she's not diseased, there is no infection, and X-rays are going to be another $300, so come back if she looks like she's going to die and we'll get those done. She probably got clipped by a car or kicked by a neighbor." GREAT. Whenever I feel pissy about the cost of medical care, I console myself by asking, "Would I want to bring the cat to Jiffy Lube and see if they can figure out how to spay her? Would that root canal look any better if it was my bank teller with the drill?" You pay for expertise and peace of mind. Even if they give you a plastic spoon and tell you to shovel up some poop in a jar as homework.
So the boy was called home from his grandmother's house because something happened to his cat. And the grandmother followed, because these are times in which you want your mom to come fix everything. The cat is doped up and convalescing, but she's not dying. Am side-eyeing my neighbors to see which one looks like a cat kicker.
Next time I get a bolt of intuition, I am going to shut everyone in the house and hide under blankets. Unless it's about the house going up in a blanket fire.
Edited to add: while I was driving home from the poop delivery, my phone buzzed with the first rejection for my book. HUZZAH.
Monday, March 21, 2016
People I'd Like to Kick in the Shin
Peter Jackson. PETER JACKSON. I am going to look up your middle name just so I can scream it at you in my mom voice.
It was a bit of a grim week. I saw a violent animal death on the road to work and cried enough to give myself sinus irritation for the next 3 days, went shopping through the desolate remains of week-before-Easter shelves while disproportionately irritable parents slapped and cussed at their children on all sides, and my mother took the boys for spring break so I feel like I've misplaced something very important.
Then we watched the last Hobbit movie. I don't need to leave a movie review for you here. You know. Around the world, hobbit lovers turned and fixed their searing gaze on Peter Jackson. And he combusted in the beam of that blazing wrath, probably, so we don't have to worry about seeing trailers for "Madeline: the Battle of the Bad Hat" or "Hatchet: Army of Mooses, part 1".
What we discovered after watching this thing is that there are very few Hobbit 3 gifs on the internet, because it is hard to make gifs after you've thrown your laptop out the window. So we made the most important one.
SCROLLING THROUGH FACEBOOK FEED DURING ELECTIONS
(Other options: "MONDAYS" and "opening the library two minutes late on a Saturday".)
Happy Monday!
Friday, March 18, 2016
Zenny's 3rd birthday
There was a party, and it was good, and I am so glad it is over.
I made deviled eggs with the whites dyed green - just the same as last year. "I don't eat green eggs," the cousins said, as if green eggs are actually a thing that people are faced with so often that they can develop aversions. I made pizza rolls. "I don't actually eat pizza very much," said the cousins. There was a fruit platter. "I only like bananas." And a strawberry ice cream cake. "I'd like it if it was just cake and no strawberries." And just like last year, they ate everything anyway, because these are kids who think that being picky eaters makes you interesting, and that not getting fat means not letting anyone see you eat the entire plate of appetizers. I let the older cousin palm pizza rolls and chew them silently with his back to me for an hour before reminding him that it's a party and he's allowed to eat the whole plate if he wants to. He then stood bent over the platter and stuffed his mouth with them until they were gone. I got myself a drink.
I made deviled eggs with the whites dyed green - just the same as last year. "I don't eat green eggs," the cousins said, as if green eggs are actually a thing that people are faced with so often that they can develop aversions. I made pizza rolls. "I don't actually eat pizza very much," said the cousins. There was a fruit platter. "I only like bananas." And a strawberry ice cream cake. "I'd like it if it was just cake and no strawberries." And just like last year, they ate everything anyway, because these are kids who think that being picky eaters makes you interesting, and that not getting fat means not letting anyone see you eat the entire plate of appetizers. I let the older cousin palm pizza rolls and chew them silently with his back to me for an hour before reminding him that it's a party and he's allowed to eat the whole plate if he wants to. He then stood bent over the platter and stuffed his mouth with them until they were gone. I got myself a drink.
Thursday, March 17, 2016
Saturday, March 12, 2016
Friday, March 11, 2016
Words!
I know I have been posting a lot of pictures and not a lot about other things, so here is the run-down.
I SUBMITTED THE THINGS. The manuscript and illustrations have been sent off to agents, and I am avoiding my phone because every time it buzzes - or does not buzz - I start fretting. Have been drawing girls with birds, instead. And now I can't find my phone, so I hope nobody needs me to do anything.
Meanwhile, the boy came in 2nd place for his robotics programming competition. In the country. Which is great, but it's just one place short of the world finals in Kentucky (wtf, Kentucky? When did you become the world destination for robotics? Update those "robot uprising and overthrow" point of origin maps, folks). But just to drag it out further, he's the understudy if the first place nerd can't make the flight. So now we have to find some 13 year old and push him/her down some stairs. WORK WORK WORK.
The small girl is potty trained. Mostly. Except if it's cold, and her footie pajamas zip from the ankle so she'd have to get naked to use the toilet, and I can't blame her for that one, so we are still in pull-ups at night. Well, she is. I'm ok.
On the needles: more socks. I know.
On the radio: after that last fit of shmoopiness, I have stopped listening to the radio. We are listening to the Amber Spyglass, by Phillip Pullman, instead.
On the netflix: An Honorable Woman. Which is a good show that is hard to watch while knitting, because they switch from English to Arabic frequently and sneak around doing silent things, so by the time I hear a gunshot and look up from my sock, my favorite character is dead.
Next: more girls with birds, and a St. Patrick's Day birthday party!
I SUBMITTED THE THINGS. The manuscript and illustrations have been sent off to agents, and I am avoiding my phone because every time it buzzes - or does not buzz - I start fretting. Have been drawing girls with birds, instead. And now I can't find my phone, so I hope nobody needs me to do anything.
Meanwhile, the boy came in 2nd place for his robotics programming competition. In the country. Which is great, but it's just one place short of the world finals in Kentucky (wtf, Kentucky? When did you become the world destination for robotics? Update those "robot uprising and overthrow" point of origin maps, folks). But just to drag it out further, he's the understudy if the first place nerd can't make the flight. So now we have to find some 13 year old and push him/her down some stairs. WORK WORK WORK.
The small girl is potty trained. Mostly. Except if it's cold, and her footie pajamas zip from the ankle so she'd have to get naked to use the toilet, and I can't blame her for that one, so we are still in pull-ups at night. Well, she is. I'm ok.
On the needles: more socks. I know.
On the radio: after that last fit of shmoopiness, I have stopped listening to the radio. We are listening to the Amber Spyglass, by Phillip Pullman, instead.
On the netflix: An Honorable Woman. Which is a good show that is hard to watch while knitting, because they switch from English to Arabic frequently and sneak around doing silent things, so by the time I hear a gunshot and look up from my sock, my favorite character is dead.
Next: more girls with birds, and a St. Patrick's Day birthday party!
Wednesday, March 09, 2016
Monday, March 07, 2016
Oranges!
Sketch for my book project. It has a lot of oranges in it. But not nice ones, mostly just round blobs. I ate this one. (The orange, I mean.)
This was my previous attempt:
So shiny. Eh.
Tonight I put down my night knitting and drew it. It was dark. Gavin was watching the new avengers movie next to me, and if you only listen to it, you can hear joss whedon burning his "just follow the formula, it's a franchise" producers with every one-liner.
Saturday, March 05, 2016
no socks for Bertie Wooster
I was going to do a sock-a-long on ravelry, wherein you follow a set of clues as they are revealed over a couple of weeks and knit up a mystery sock along with a group of other trusting sock enthusiasts.
But my yarn managed to be both too dark and too busy, so you couldn't even see all the little cables and zig-zags going down the leg of the sock. I ripped it out and cast on plain socks without a pattern. 3x1 ribbing, gusset heel, basic toe, DONE.
I decreased across the top for visual interest, but it's still just a sock. However, it is still cold in the mornings, so just a sock is what I need.
But I'm sad about missing out on the mystery knit-a-long, because the Bertie Wooster socks turned out to be pretty damn deco-tastic.
This industry of knitting and produce portraiture brought to you by my post-illustration-completion existential panic. Happens every time. I finish a book and then look up to discover that the sun is shining and plants are blooming and holy shit what am I doing with my life why have I not drawn portraits or painted a still life or developed a successful web comic or built a studio I am a failure and my life is slipping by with nothing to show for it and then I remember that I didn't do those things because I was busy illustrating a children's book. And that now I can start the next one, because I'm not good at comics or oil painting or quitting my job to lurk in the basement - I draw goblins eating oranges, and I'm happy while I'm doing it. And then I feel stupid and finish the socks I was knitting and think about the next book.
Coming next: the assembly of a pdf dummy book; the agony of waiting for feedback/rejection from prospective agents.
Not this guy
But my yarn managed to be both too dark and too busy, so you couldn't even see all the little cables and zig-zags going down the leg of the sock. I ripped it out and cast on plain socks without a pattern. 3x1 ribbing, gusset heel, basic toe, DONE.
Portrait shot
Arty shot
Action shot
Glamour shot
But I'm sad about missing out on the mystery knit-a-long, because the Bertie Wooster socks turned out to be pretty damn deco-tastic.
This industry of knitting and produce portraiture brought to you by my post-illustration-completion existential panic. Happens every time. I finish a book and then look up to discover that the sun is shining and plants are blooming and holy shit what am I doing with my life why have I not drawn portraits or painted a still life or developed a successful web comic or built a studio I am a failure and my life is slipping by with nothing to show for it and then I remember that I didn't do those things because I was busy illustrating a children's book. And that now I can start the next one, because I'm not good at comics or oil painting or quitting my job to lurk in the basement - I draw goblins eating oranges, and I'm happy while I'm doing it. And then I feel stupid and finish the socks I was knitting and think about the next book.
Coming next: the assembly of a pdf dummy book; the agony of waiting for feedback/rejection from prospective agents.
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