THE QUEEN OF QUIRK

sooooo close

I mean, I can almost taste it.

Songbird Avenue is getting a HUGE face lift and I am so freakin' excited to unveil it.

The end is in sight! :)

earth's edge

No, I haven't fallen off of it. Close, though. :)

Hopefully, on Thursday, my life will slow down considerably. I'm eyeballs-deep in the site revamp over at Songbird Ave. It's coming along nicely, but now it's down to the nitty gritty...with the details and the fine-tuning. Thank goodness I have Lauren on this job. She has been an invaluable person throughout this project. And I simply ADORE Majestic. Makes it easy for a non-html savvy person such as myself to get around a site and manage it with ease. LOVE THAT. Like I really have time to learn another thing, right? ;)

And I promise as soon as I am done with this stuff, I have a gazillion photos I have to show you! I have some more garden photos and we've been to Bekonscot, St. Albans, Burghley House, and Gibraltar Point. MUCHOS FOTOS.

K, so back to work....just wanted to check in ad say howdy. Hope your Tuesday is awesome!

taken at Gibraltar Point

zero time

I wish I had time to update with all the photos from the weekend, but considering I am just now getting a chance to even come on the blog and tell you I have zero time to do that...I don't think it's going to happen anytime soon. I've got a gazillion things on my plate, so I'll just leave you with a rare family portrait. This is from St. Albans which turned out to be a total bust. :) We tried, but it just wasn't a very good day trip. eh. You win some, you lose some.

I hope everyone is having a great Tuesday. It's back to work for me! :) Ciao!

whirlwind weekend

Went on a day trip yesterday. Going on one today, too. Yesterday we saw the Bekonscot Model Village. It was built in the 30 and it is simply amazing. And in amazing condition, too. Here's one photo...I'll have more this evening.

Today we are heading to St. Albans to see military re-enactments complete with Roman Legionnaires at the Verulamium Museum.  We are also going to take in the Sopwell Nunnery, Roman Town and the Clock Tower.
Should be quite a packed day. Normally I'm not one for military re-enactments, but the Roman wore skirts to show off their legs. Should be a nice day. :)

lunch picks

MANY emails and comments about the lunch picks have come in. So, I thought I would share where you can get them. The site, however, requires that you "prove" that you are eighteen by giving an electronic signature. We all know what that means. ;) Sorry. But sometimes you have to wade thru the muck to find the good stuff. C'est la vie, eh? Just copy the "link" below and remove the spaces when you put it into your address bar.  I don't want to link directly to it. I only purchased 2 items from this site. The rest you can find easily on ebay. :)

http :// www . jlist . com / PRODUCT / ASA188

DISCLAIMER: I cannot be responsible for any shady, offensive, or upsetting content you see at the site I am recommending. Please be advised that I do not advocate or promote this site in any way. This is just the place I purchased this product from and I cannot be held responsible. Happy shopping. :)

hello, friday

I simply have two many plates spinning at once.

• my new site to finish, have built


• songbird avenue 1 year anniversary


• songbird site revamp


• may songbird kit


• 1 collab kit


• comb my hair

And most of this has to be done yesterday. Ugh. Still, I'm trying to keep my head on straight and tackle one thing at a time. That's all we can do right?

Remember yesterday how I said that my kids enjoy their lunches? They do. But, unfortunately, yesterday Lara was teased to the point of tears because of her Caprese salad. I have no idea what is so disgusting to her schoolmates about cheese, tomatoes and basil...but apparently the others were calling her "gross", "nasty" and "weird".

:(

So, Lara and I had a big, long talk about what she wants and how she thinks she should handle the situation. I managed to have a bit of progress. At first the conversation sounded like this:

"Can you just make me Caprese salad when I don't sit next to ______ and ______ in the lunchroom? Because they tease me and it hurts me."

Then by the end of the evening it was:

"If they say it's gross, I'll tell them to be quiet because they have never tasted it and I think it's delicious. And then I will eat it all up."

This was QUITE a leap. :) Because when I picked her up yesterday afternoon, she hadn't eaten 2/3 of her lunch because of the situation and she was ravenous when we got home. So, this morning, I asked her what she wanted for lunch and I made it all to order.

1 Caprese salad, comin' right up!

She had so much more confidence this morning and I am really hoping her lunch hour went well. It's so hard to convey to these kids a sense of independence and originality. Kids can be so cruel sometimes and it seems that these days it's easier to conform than to stand out. I just talked to her about doing what she wants to do and trying to talk to her about how real friends treat each other. I know these kiddos are only 6, but I really think they should start recognizing how people treat them and how they should treat others and that if someone says they are your "friend" then they should make you feel good, not bad.

UGH. I know I sound like such a softy right now, but this is just one of those things that gets me right here. I cannot stand it when children are bullied. And I don't want my kidlets to suffer because of anyone else's unhappiness.

So, BOO! on bullies! :)

And besides....my kiddos have grape trees for lunch. So, there. :P

:) Happy Friday, everyone!

amalgamation

Lots of goodies today! First up, my collaboration kit with my awesome friend, Liz, of Paislee Press! This collab has been talked about for YEARS, and I am so happy that it's actually here! We make a pretty darn good team!

And for a limited time, you can grab 2 fabulous quick pages for absolutely free! Click HERE to purchase ZIPPY HIPPY. :) Here's a bit of a better peek at the papers:

They are seriously yummy! I am so in love with the colors!

I'm getting back into the groove around here. Even when I leave for just a couple of days, it takes me a bit to get back into the swing of things. I wish I could hit the ground running, but apparently I need more time to decompress than most. :) Here are some photos from my adventures of being a supermom wannabe.

Almost every day for lunch, the kidlets and I consume rice and kimchi. It's a habit. So, I smell like hot, pickled cabbage and so do the wee ones. We can't help ourselves. Even the Noodle partakes of the goodness. She calls kimchi, "chim chim" and it the cutest thing ever. And since we've discovered furikake, the kids would eat this stuff for every meal if we let them. Furikake is a topping you sprinkle on your rice and they should change the name to "CONDIMENT HEAVEN". As if I really needed to be more enamored of Japanese food!

Yesterday, I prepared the kidlets their bento lunch, but it wasn't really photo worthy. Today's was rather purdy, though, so I snapped a quick pic of it.

Of course, I have to make 3 on Thursdays. Noodle goes to school all day, so I packed her a diminutive version. We'll call it "Le Petit Bento" since I'm still rather fresh off the plane from France. All I need is a beret and a jumpsuit and I can pretend I work on the assembly line at the Ford factory in France. Do they even have a Ford factory in France? Oui? Non? Hmmmm?

In about an hour, my kiddos will be chowing down on yogurt with fresh strawberries, blueberries and Cheerios, a mini Caprese salad with fresh basil, little garlic bread pretzel things, and apple butter on whole wheat PLUS bread. The PLUS is important, as you know. PLUS is very good for you. I tried to give them more food, but they literally can't eat it all. This may be a way for me to buy much cuter, much smaller bento boxes. (Of course, this conflicts with my self-induced budget...sigh..) And the girls have told me that their lunches are a great intrigue in the lunchroom. Everyone wants to know what they've brought every day. Pretty cool huh? Being different is apparently...cool. And I have to give mad props to my daughters for not only taking furikake to school, but reveling in their lunch glory like madwomen as well.

So, after I dropped them all off at school, I had a lovely, leisurely walk back home all by my lonesome. The garbage men had just emptied my trash can, so I grabbed that and headed to my backyard to deposit it. On the way there, though, was evidence of what I believe to be our first domestic homicide.

Oh the poor poor birdy. I hope against hope that this bird is OK somewhere. I am a wuss. Then I realied that the garden was lookin' pretty cheerful, so I ran inside to grab my camera. I took a photo of the crime scene. (A silent moment for the bird, please.)

Thank you. :)

Let's take a stroll through my backyard shall we?

Ah, that's nice. Such a beautiful day. Hardly a cloud in the sky. I hope everyone is having a wonderful day! Thursdays are my days off, so I'm outta here. Lots of fun, non-puter stuff I want to do. Ciao, all!

whew!

Next time, seriously, I am taking the train. It would cost just as much, but the trek wouldn't be nearly as long! I had an awesome time, just being in the moment and enjoying the company of new and old friends. I took not one photo. Not a one. Not til about an hour before I left. :)

My Kimmy. In her class, gearing up for a fabulous scrap lesson. I miss her so much already! I had so much fun pal-ing around with these guys, though!

On Friday, I arrived late into town and the girlies were all in the city eating dinner, so I went around the corner from our hotel to grab a bite to eat and wait for them. The waiter was bringing me complimentary drinks which I will gladly blame for the moment when I burst out of the restaurant and into the street upon seeing my peeps walk by the window! I exploded through the door and yelled something to the effect of "HEY YOU HOT AMERICAN CHICKS!!" They all then turned around and then Kim came barreling at me at breakneck pace and then I got to hug on Cori and I also got to meet Tena Sprenger and Laurie Stamas. The other gals were pooped, so Kim came back with me into the 'straunt while I paid my bill and gathered my slushy self. We got back into the hotel and in our search for Cori, I got to meet Amy Hanna and Pam Garrison. My jaw literally dropped when I realized I was meeting Pam. :) I am a total nerd and we all know how giddily and overwhelmingly impressed I get when meeting celebs. I'm a class act, alright. The gals had to get up at dawn to be at the convention center, so we all headed to bed. It took me forever to fall asleep. By this time it was 12:30 am and my blood was thick with adrenaline.

Saturday morning, Laurie, Amy, Cori and I met in the breakfast room and noshed and chatted before we headed out to the flea markets. We took the metro to the outskirts of town and settled in for a packed morning of treasure-seeking. I kinda wasn't feeling it, though. The things we found were beautiful and adorable and downright amazing, but the prices were just too rich for my blood. I was really hoping to come home with a painting, but the still life I found (which was gorgeous with its cool blues and blood red fruit) was 800 euros. There was no way I could justify getting it. I did pick up a necklace from a lady who had a bunch of vintage jewelry displayed. The one I got isn't old, but I really like it.

We saw amazing garden ornaments, huge onion dome bird cages, atrociously priced paintings and every kind of knick knack and collectible you could imagine. But seriously, the prices are just whackadoo right now. I did, however, pick up some letterpress stamps.

While Cori and Amy ventured off to another market, Laurie and I headed inside to a pizzeria for warmth and liquid sustenance. We had some seriously yummy pizza and quattro formaggi. Laurie and I hit it off amazingly and I am so glad I got to meet her. Talk about an amazing group of women! After a couple of hours, Cori and Amy moseyed on back to us and we all shared a bottle of vino before heading back to the metro. Not before we stopped and perused a handbag shop, though. Priorities, right? :)

We finally got back to our hotel and Laurie and I headed to the market to grab some snackies (i.e. 5 bottles of vin, baguettes, soft cheeses, salami, grissini and water) because it had been unanimously decided that we would dine-in tonight. Amy wasn't feeling well, so she went to her room and literally crashed. Laurie went to freshen up and I changed and then headed to Cori's room. I'm sure Cori just wanted to take a nap, but I, being the oblivious hanger-on that I am, parked my tush on her bed and chatted to no end. We had fun chatting about Franch stuff and we cracked open the wine and grissini. Laurie was taking entirely too long (what were you doing, Laurie!!?!?!) so Cori texted her and then she came down with Tena. The big girls showed up around then from their long day of teaching and Cori and I greeted Kimmy with a picnic spread out on her lovey blankie on the bed. She was happy about the wine...prolly not so happy about the crumbs. ;) After everyone got settled in, we ate and chatted until late at night. Much laughter was heard, stories shared, advice given. It was heavenly. Laurie has a stack of quotes, though, that would make yer mama slap ya! Apparently we are quite a naughty bunch of girls! If those quotes pop up somewhere, I'll be sure to share them. Kim also played around with her Flip and there are some seriously good laughs on that thing. And all I can say is..."no comment." ;) After the people in the next room pounded on the wall, we tried to keep it down, but it just wasn't going to happen. So, we whispered and giggled and said our goodnights and headed off to bed.

Sunday morning, I woke up bright and early to head over to Parc Floral with Kim, Tena and Pam to help hang out and spend some time with them. All three of them loaded me down with goodies and I am sooo grateful. I have so much yummy stuff to play with! Kim played around with my camera and tried to get some decent headshots of me, but I am seriously the most obnoxious person to take pictures of. Just ask Kim. I end up doing things like this:

Kim actually had to revert to her time-tested kid mode in order to get me to cooperate. This consisted of talking about poop and farts. Seriously, I'm taht bad. i have no idea what to do on the other side of the lens. I just freeze and then I start to make faces. I am 3.

So after some coffee and chatting, I had to head out in order to catch my flight. I had to leave early, because there was a marathon going on at the time and I had no idea how I was going to cross it. So, I hugged on Tena and Pam and told them how happy I was to met them and then I gave Kim one last hug and had to skedaddle before the tears really started to fall. I missed Cori, Amy, and Laurie by about an hour, but Pam let me text them to say goodbye. I hope they had a lovely day. :) I headed over to the marathon I had to cross and waited almost 10 minutes before a sufficient lull came along for me to cross through. I don't run. I sorta prance and hop. So, I underestimated the time it would take me to cross the street and almost got run over by some very determined joggers. The police, however, were laughing at me. :)

So, I got to the hotel, threw all my crap in my bag and high-tailed it outta there. The trek home was awful and really really long. My flight was delayed 2 hours and then when we finally got to Heathrow, we sat on the runway for almost an hour before they finally let us get into the terminal. And apparently I was lucky just to get a British Airways flight yesterday. Colin said that over 140 flights were canceled yesterday. Whew!

Just getting out of Heathrow is a huge mess. I swear I walked a mile from the gate to the baggage claim area. And when I got there, the floor was literally covered with baggage. As far as the eye could see, there were suitcases all around. I'm sooo glad my bag was still on the belt and I found it pretty quickly. So, from Heathrow, i have to take a 45 minute train into King's Cross and from there I have to take an hour train to gt home. I arrived right on time and Colin and the girls wee there to pick me up. They were all soooo sweet and happy and the girls couldn't stop kissing and hugging me. Noodle literally had her lips pressed to mine and would not back off. :)

When we got home, I gave them their gifts from Kim and they squealed and went nuts over their new outfits. Noodle insisted that I tie her ribbon on her head and she went to sleep with it on. I took it off of her when she fell asleep, so this morning, she had it in her hands and was asking me to tie it back on for her. And then we had breakfast.

So that's about it. We have to leave in an hour for a playdate and then I've got some unpacking and laundry to do. I cam home to a spotless house which was such a treat! Colin really spoils me. :) I've gotta dash! Ciao, all!

au revoir!

The countdown has officially started.

I'm meeting up with some fabulous women tonight in Paris. You can read about their antics so far here. I've got some last-minute packing to do, but I wanted to show you this little sneak peek of what's to come.

My brain feels like it's all over the place right now! So many things going on in my head, that it's difficult to know that I will not be able to take care of things for a few days. Yikes! On the other hand, I am so totally looking forward to hanging out in Paris. Good wine, fabulous friends, new acquaintances, croissants. Should be heavenly. :)

Au revoir, mes amis!

On y va!

mystery solved...sorta

Remember Cleopatra's mummy that I posted about? Well, apparently it's not the real, famous Cleopatra. This young, rich girl, 17, was buried 150 years after her celebrity namesake. The British Museum doesn't make that very clear, though. As far as the original Cleopatra is concerned, her mummy has not been found. Case solved. Sorta. Still have no idea why her head is so large. But apparently she was swaddled so tightly that it dislocated her hip. That would probably all get straightened out in the afterlife. Or it would have if her tomb had not been pillaged and ransacked for the sake of "discovery". Now the gods will never find her. Poor Cleo.