Outta the Mouths of Babes: Mean Mom Edition

 

My dear darling five-year-old is mad at me at the moment, because I wouldn't let her rip out the page she drew on in my planner to give to her friend. So what does she do to let me know how mad she is?

Why, draw me a picture in which I have only one arm, of course!

Which reminded me that I have some Outta the Mouths of Babes to post...

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After a time-out-for-hitting-big-sister session:

ANNELIE [glaring hard at me with what she calls her Hot Laser Eyes]: I'm thinking very angry things at someone right now.

ME: Oh yeah? What kind of angry things?

ANNELIE: Really bad ones, like swear words. I'm thinking them at someone. [screws up face to glare even harder]

ME: Oh, wow, that does sound angry. What kind of words?

ANNELIE: I'm thinking words like stupid and sucker at someone.

ME: Ahhh, I see.

[sometimes is is SO hard trying to keep from laughing]

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GRACIE: Sometimes when you get really mad at us, I wish we could go live with Grandma.

ME: Sometimes when I get really mad at you, I wish you would go on a long vacation to Grandma's.

GRACIE [laughs hysterically]: That works.

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ANNELIE [pausing during playtime for a hug and a moment of sweetness]: I love you, Mommy.

ME: I love you, too.

ANNELIE: I love you even when you be mean.

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And I love her, even when she's giving me Hot Laser Eyes. Oh the joys of being a mom.

Happy Wednesday, folks!

xoxo,

Hearting Being Elmo

So, it might just be a weepy time o' the month for me, or something, but lately every happy thing I watch has me crying. Sometimes sobbing. It's a little silly. Especially when what I'm watching is a documentary on everyone's favorite furry and red, preschool-aged monster.

Being Elmo. Have you seen this documentary yet? SO GREAT.

I wasn't a particularly huge Elmo fan back in the day. Ernie and Bert have my heart ALL THE WAY. My kids were never Elmo fans, either. In fact, they never even liked Sesame Street, preferring a certain purple dinosaur to Jim Henson's amazing muppety monsters (Seriously, what is wrong with my kids? I just don't know)

But it doesn't matter if you love adorable furry puppets or not, this movie is such an awesome, inspiring story of someone with a creative dream making it happen ( I'm talking about the puppeteer, here, not the puppet - if you want an inspiring Elmo movie, try CinderElmo - with the help of his Fairy Godperson, his dreams come true, too).

That's pretty much all I have to say on the subject, other than if you haven't seen Being Elmo, you should.

How about you folks? Seen anything amazing lately?

xoxo,

Sleeping Beauty (or how I learned I am crueler than a wicked step-mother)

In the wee hours of the morning, I woke up, and there was Annelie beside me, pajama-free (her sleeping preference), curled up in a shivering ball.

MY POOR SHIVERING BABY! I thought, as I grabbed the big brown blanket at Annelie's feet, and cuddled it up to her chin.

There's something completely satisfying about pulling a blanket up to your sleeping kiddo's chin. It never fails to give me those Chicken Soup for the Soul warm fuzzies, being the adoring mom, adoring my sleeping baby... Especially as she had probably run to my room from the other side of our dark, dark house, because of a bad dream.

I'm pretty sure I was smiling as I fell back to sleep, having done my parental duty of keeping my child warm and safe.

When my alarm clock woke me up an hour later, Annelie woke up too, and let out a joyous gasp. "You gave me brown blanket! Thanks, Mom!"

Her voice was thick and sleepy, and she smiled huge and closed her eyes again, snuggling into the blanket.

"I woke up and you didn't have a blanket," I told her, patting her head. "You poor thing. You looked so cold!"

She opened her eyes and gave me a funny look. "Yeah. I was cold. But remember? When I came in because I had a bad dream, I asked if I could have a blanket, but you said no."

Yeah, you read that right.

She asked for a blanket, and I SAID NO.

"Are you sure about that? I don't even remember you coming in," I said, just to clarify, because seriously!

"Yes, I'm sure. You always talk to me when I come in," she said. "You said no, and told me to just go to sleep."

And that, folks, is how I learned that I talk in my sleep. And that my sleep-self is a terrible mother.

How about you? Learn anything startling about yourself lately?

Happy Tuesday!

xoxo,

"There's a storm blowin' up - a whopper, to speak in the vernacular of the peasantry."

On Tuesday, my hubs decided to work from a nearby coffee shop rather than drive the three hours into Dallas, where his office is. Other than the whole WOO! My hubs doesn't have to travel for work today! (his new job has him traveling 3-4 days week), this was a non-event.

And then I got a call from my Grandma, who asked how we all - particularly Will - were doing.

Well, it was a clear blue skies kinda day, and we were all feeling just fine. With the TV off and the Jack Peñate station on Pandora blasting from my speakers, I had no clue there were tornadoes tearing up Dallas.

This morning, however, when I overheard the tornado warnings stopping Annelie from enjoying her episode of Caillou, my heart froze. Ice slipped down my spine. According to the warning flashing across the screen, tornadoes were on their way to Dallas.

MY BELOVED HUBS IS NOW IN DALLAS!

I tried not to panic. I didn't want to upset Annelie, especially not after seeing all the photos of Tuesday's tornado damage spread across Facebook this morning, and knowing just how disastrous tornadoes are.

"I'll just give Daddy a call and see where he is," I said, sounding übercalm. Then I left a message on his machine to call us back IMMEDIATELY.

"This is the worst day ever," Annelie said, as morose as possible. She knew about Tuesday's tornadoes, and was no doubt imagining her dad's office getting sucked up and whirled around and spit back out in the land of Oz.

With more warnings interrupting our regular programming, the few-minute wait to hear from Will was excruciating. When the phone rang, and the caller ID told us it was him, I was so, so, so relieved.

"I don't hear warning sirens!" I exclaimed. "That's a good sign that things are okay where you are, I'd say!"

"Um.... what are you talking about?" Will said back. "The weather is perfect. All sun and blue skies."

*crickets chirping*

"But it's saying across the TV screen that there are tornado warnings in Dallas...." I said.

And then I looked at the TV again.

Here's a little something to note: we have DVR. And Caillou, while being a show in which tornado warnings blaring over the whiny, obnoxious main character's voice makes it BETTER, is one of Annelie's favorite shows... so I record it for her daily.

Yeahhhh.

I was watching a pre-recorded tornado warning. From Tuesday, actually.

*facepalm* 

Man, no one even needs to bother fooling me on April Fool's Day. I fool my self.

If you haven't seen the photos of Tuesday's tornadoes, this collection of photos is pretty chilling. I'm so glad the injury rate was so low (about 12 hurt) and the death rate, as far as I've read, is non-existent! Hope all my Dallas-living blog peeps are doing fine!

And now for a round of Random Quote Trivia - which character in the 1939 movie of The Wizard of Oz is responsible for my hilariously awesome blog post title?

(hint: it's Professor Marvel!) 

Have a great Thursday, folks!

xoxo,

Spring Bunny Digital Stamp Freebie

 

I've had digital stamps on the brain lately, so after whipping up this little spring bunny for Annelie to color in whilst watching Sponge Bob last week, I decided to turn it into a digital stamp for my bloggity blog. However, I wanted to make it downloadable via MediaFire, which I can't for the life of me figure out... and I failed.

So here it is. Not downloadable via MediaFire, but here for you just the same!

 

If you want it, just save it to your pictures. You can color by hand, or do what the awesome Alyssa did, and use Photoshop:

www.Alytopia.wordpress.com

LOVE!

And if you are of the pinning to Pinterest persuasion, or want to share it on your own blog, would you mind using the watermarked version only? It makes me SO SAD to see handmade pictures floating around the internet with no links or source, and I don't want my bunny to float linkless and sourceless, too.  

Looking for more cute freebies? LOOK NO FURTHER than my good pal April's blog, Apple Loves Orange - because she's made a ridiculously cute poster up for grabs. 

Here's a sample:

 

Click the pic to see the whole thing!

Hope you are all enjoying spring so far! It's been crazy busy round these here parts. I'm looking forward to a LOOOONG vacation... but I still have two months months of busy-ness first.

Happy Tuesday, folks!

xoxo,

Rediscovering My Roots and Rekindling the Fire (or a post in which I draw again, and get cheesy about it)

Holy interplanetary yardsticks, Batman, has it really been about a month since I blogged last?

Yep, it has.

But crazier, I have spent this last month DRAWING.

Okay, that shouldn't seem so crazy. After all, drawing is what I DO. Or at least, what I did.... and I came to the realization that the last time I picked up a colored pencil and sketched was NINE MONTHS ago. And before that, I went six months without drawing.

Let me just say, Marisa without a drawing pencil is a sad Marisa indeed. And I didn't even realize it. For a handful of years, my life was draw, erase, sell my art, draw, erase, sell my art. Since '10, however, my life has been strictly write, delete, rewrite, write, delete, rewrite, and so on - still creative, but a whole 'nother kind of creativity. And it has been solitary work, when before, I spent my days drawing at the kitchen table with my growing-up-way-too-soon kiddos.

The above samples are from the children's book project I was working on for a friend during Feb/March - a therapy book for preschoolers, as part of her dissertation. It was kind of immense. And exhausting. And the hand cramps, oh man.

But when I started drawing again, it just felt good for the soul, in a total Campbell's soup commercial kind of way.

My kids have been in heaven - drawing again has meant more time sharing table space with them kiddos -- who love tracing my pictures and coloring them in, and adding millions of details of their own.

(Annelie's picture)

And after seeing how excited the girls were with my sketches, I started digging though Ye Olde File Cabinet of Curiosities, where a stack of unfinished Elegant Snobbery sketches - a stack at least an inch thick - has been lurking since '07.

My good pal Alyssa has been pushing me to do digital stamps for ages now, and I've been smiling and nodding and completely ignoring her.

But I think it's time to start listening to the wise gal that she is, because I ADORE the idea of turning my old designs into digital stamps. And it just might prompt me to color a couple of them in, which I can pretty much guarantee I'll love doing, too.

And I know my kids'll love it - maybe even more than me.

How about you guys? Any old loves you've rekindled lately? Any loves that need rekindling?

Hope the last month has treated you kindly, folks! Happy Thursday!

xoxo,

Outta the Mouths of Babes: The Portrait Artist Edition

ANNELIE: I drew you a picture, Mom. It's you and Dad.

ME: I love it. Looks just like us.

ANNELIE [inspecting her picture]: Yeah, it DOES look just like you! I'm going to put it on the fridge to show Gracie when she gets home.

[sticks it on fridge, admires work]

Wow. I'm pretty sure Gracie won't even know I drew it.

[looks at me VERY seriously]

It's so good Gracie will think YOU drew it, Mom.

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Hee hee, my kiddo cracks me up whilst flattering the both of us, and I'm not going to say I don't love that ('Cuz I do)

Annelie is a pretty fantastic artist, if I do say so myself. I'm quite a fan of her emo graphic novel-style art.

I get hundreds of little emo-kid ink drawings a day.

Hundreds. Literally. This kiddo draws morning, noon, and night.

Move over, Edward Gorey - Annelie Hopkins is on her way!

xoxo,