yeah, pretty much.

How's it going, world?

Okay, so I guess I failed at my Project 365 which sucks because I was seriously right at 200 photos/days in. I was doing so well. Things just go too chaotic - roller derby several nights a week, work overtaking me because of Scales, stress, money, bills, not to mention the time in the hospital because of a "severe bladder infection" and on and on and on...

Anyway, I'll try to update more often, just to see where this blog goes. More pictures, more posts about roller derby, life in general. I don't vent enough, and I've also stopped keeping a journal, which is very out of character for me. I opened it up the other day and I haven't written in my paper journal since May! And I used to write every, every other day or so. I have so many journals, in my night stand, under my bed, been keeping them for years. Tsk tsk on me. Letting life get the best of me. Or maybe I'm getting the best of life, and I don't have to write about it so much anymore.

Things are changing, some things good, some stressful, but nothing really bad. Just a lot. And honestly, I'm still learning how to be an adult sometimes, and still learning how to handle my anxiety and panic problems.

Wish me luck. That's all for now.

Behind.

Yes, I'm very behind. Life has been extremely busy lately. A lot of traveling, we shot a wedding last weekend, visiting with family, and lots of other stuff... derby practice, work, and trying to paint the backdrop for the photos we're taking at this weekend's Zombie Prom! I'm a little overwhelmed, to be honest. But I've been keeping track of my photos, what I'm missing, etc, and once I actually can sit down, transfer photos off the camera and do a crap-ton of editing, we'll be back up to date. I've made it entirely too far to give up now! :)

But I'm really tired... and it's catching up with me. Also, we've been so busy that we haven't had time to go grocery shopping and I'm slowly starving to death.

Weakness is leaving my body? I'm okay with it.

OK, so I'm behind. The last picture I posted was for April 1st (last Friday). I'm pretty sure I have a picture for everyday, but to be honest, Roller Derby has been taking up a good majority of my time.

Saturday, I got up early and me and Adrienne spent the day together, going to Greenville, having lunch at this awesome little Indian restaurant and shopping at various malls between Greenville and home. ;) Haha, it was an awesome day. We went to this rad little art festival, but alas, I had left my camera in the car! I was livid and depressed all at the same time. I need to import some photos.

Sunday Todd and I went to Tryon Palace (free on the first Sunday of the month) and took some fun photos. :) Had a lovely day with my hubby.

Monday... practice. Todd took photos. ;)

Tuesday... practice. Took some photos of Adrienne's bruised knee-caps.

Wednesday (today)... oh my god, I'm so tired. And I have a shitload of photos to catch up on tonight! No practice tonight, which sucks, but my body definitely needs a day to recover. I've just been going, going, going non-stop.. and the house is suffering, the laundry is suffering, and Todd is suffering because I haven't cooked a real dinner in... forever?

Also.. I'm still trying to think of my perfect derby name. Let's see. I'm short, but I'm fairly agile, although I haven't gotten my speed back up yet. But I'm not terribly slow. I love birds. I love the color blue. I'm an artist, painter, photographer.
My favorite name was The Mad Splatter (the Mad Hatter, duh. Splatter = painting and also splatter horror films), but it's taken.
You can check your ideas/suggestions here at the registry: http://www.twoevils.org/rollergirls/

K. Well. I'm pooped. Later.

84-88/365 - shoes, balls, books & cats, OH MY

OK, I know. This is getting ridiculous. Almost every night I sit down to post my photo and get distracted. And then I'm like, I'll just post it tomorrow. Then tomorrow comes and the same thing happens. Soo, here we are, almost a week behind! So, let's see...

March 25, 2011

Friday. Went shopping. Got these awesome shoes.

March 26, 2011

Saturday. Wore my new shoes out bowling with some friends. :) These weren't my new shoes, obviously. 

And here is a funny picture of me from later that night, playing DDR after a few beers:

March 27, 2011

Story: Sunday. I believe it was Friday evening that Todd noticed Jake kind of favoring one of his legs. He wasn't limping, he just seemed to be not walking normally. I checked him out, gave him my best "exam" and he didn't seem to be in any pain or discomfort, even when I was trying to make sure his legs weren't broken. 

We kept an eye on him over the weekend, and it wasn't until Sunday that I noticed he had almost a golf ball sized lump on I guess what you could call his "inner thigh". It was very tender to him when I touched him, and he didn't want me bothering it. Naturally, I freaked out and wanted to call the vet right then, but Todd suggested that we watch him Monday and if it didn't go down or get better, we would call the vet Tuesday morning. 

Monday before I left for work, Jake had to go to the bathroom so I let him outside to go potty. When he was done, he laid on the back porch lawn chair with Mazzy Moon, sleeping. Figuring they would sleep there all day like they have many times in the past, I left for work. This was around lunch time. When I got home at 6pm, he wasn't waiting for me in the driveway like he normally is. He wouldn't come when I called him. For hours, and hours, I called him. I walked up and down the street with a flashlight, stood in the backyard calling him, looked under the shed, he never came home. This is extremely out of character for him, because he sleeps inside almost every night. I feared the worst... that he had gone off into the woods to die.

Tuesday morning (today) I got up early to see if he had come home and call the vet, but still no sign of Jake. I geared up in heavy clothes and my boots and went exploring in the woods, calling him. No luck. I didn't have to be at work until 2:30, so I was going outside calling him every so often.

I went to let Ben out one last time before leaving for work, and had resigned myself that I'd just have to hope he was home when I got off work.... so I opened the door, hoping to see him standing there like I had been all morning - and wa-la! There he was, like nothing was wrong in the world!! He strolled on into the house like, "What up, mom? Why you been crying all day?"

My animal-whisperer future-vet tech friend Crystal, after hearing all his symptoms, suggested that it was probably a cyst. They could cause great pain and he probably just wanted to be alone, to lick it or help it burst, and then he'd come home good as new. She was absolutely right.

I noticed he wasn't limping or favoring his leg, and he hopped right up the steps with no trouble. I followed him in and gingerly checked out where his lump had been... to find a massive gaping hole. ---well, it looks massive to me. It's probably more about the size of a dime or a nickel. I'll post photos. It's kind of gross but.... goes with the story!

March 28, 2011

Monday. Today I finished reading "Eat, Pray, Love", which was the first selection in this pretty rad book club I'm in. Can't wait to meet, eat, discuss it, and pick a new book! I really, really liked this book. If you're avoiding this book because of the hype or the movie, please ignore it. 

March 29, 2011

Tuesday. Today. Jake came home. Yay! And what is there really to say about this photo except.... ew?
But it looks much better now. It's been flushed & irrigated and all cleaned up. Will continue to flush it twice a day with saline solution and keep him inside until he's all better.

ALSO. I think I will start doing what I used to do and separating these posts by days, even if I am behind, instead of lumping them all together in one post. That way they can be more "organized" by subject or what have you. That way people who are searching for book recommendations won't run across busted cysts/abscesses in cats.

Hahahahah.

i've strayed away from words for a reason.

I'm starting to seriously believe that there may be few things harder for a woman than to be emotionally ready to become pregnant and have a baby... but not being able to due to whatever financial or worldly reasons.

This photo blog has been one of the best things for me because I've learned to keep my mouth shut. I was an over sharer. Many of you remember. My blog used to get me in trouble a lot, because I was overly honest and didn't care who knew it. And more people than I realized read it. Because people were nosey, I guess. Or I'm just that interesting. Not sure which. Hmm... okay, I jest, but I've noticed via my stats and such that I don't have nearly as many visitors as I did when I just kept a blog about my life, instead of documenting things in images.

Images are more fun, sometimes even more personal, yet seem to get me into much less trouble.

The point is... the only thing on my mind lately? Baby.

baby. BABY. Baby. BaBy. Bay-bee. baby.

But, like so many other normal, hard-working people right now, we are at the whim of this terrible economy. We are mastering living paycheck to paycheck. We don't know what a "cushion" is. Our savings account fluctuates more than Oprah's weight.

There's a blog I follow, have been a follower for probably a couple years now, Girl's Gone Child. Not only is she an excellent writer, but she pretty much leads my dream life. Gets to stay home, blog, cook, raise her two beautiful kids and be fabulous in LA while her husband does... whatever it is he does. We're not clear on that, exactly. Or I'm not. And she just found out she's pregnant again.... with twins.

And all I can feel is jealousy. I kind of sort of most definitely have a dream of wanting to have twins. Call me crazy, I don't care. But I want twins - a boy and a girl, and that would be enough for me.

So, we've started up the photography business in January, and things definitely seem promising. Our goal was by the end of the year, to have enough clients and enough business/money coming in, that Todd could stay home and focus on the business full time, and I could just keep working. Because Todd works over an hour away and the gas money alone is breaking us. And we had said that at the end of the year, we would reevaluate our financial situation and see where we were... and then we could reconsider coming off birth control.

So right now, it's a waiting game.

Would it be in poor taste for our photography advertisements to read:

"PLEASE CHOOSE US FOR YOUR PHOTOGRAPHY BUSINESS BECAUSE WE REALLY WANT TO HAVE A BABY!"

Yeah... probably so.