My hunky chippy

His massive rugged hunky hands make these:



and it makes me dreamy
xoxoxoxo

Fiona the Fawn in the shop.

help me with the small sugar

man that went fast

Dear Finny. I had no idea back then that you would one day want to dress up as a transformer and make me go searching for the ALLSPARK all live long day and night.
At one time you were just thrilled with giant orange pumpkins.
Man that went fast.

i get up and nothing gets me down

I am feeling this woman. I found this
via another wonderful woman.

I love the thought of "RE-FRAMING BURN OUT INTO A BEAUTIFUL POSSIBILITY" on Danielle LaPorte's website.

Joe is at the workshop all day and night right now as we finish up a ton of wholesale orders and prep for the season of toys! I miss him. I am giving him a little present each night to show my gratitude, but I am searching for something for me. A slower pace? A space that is small and quiet. I am going at a pretty crazy speed and I have been for about 15 months.

Simple recharging and rest is a great gift I can give myself.
(I am aware- just not really practicing.)

What do you do to recharge?
I am working out most days and trying to eat well. (Have lost 5 lbs)
What else can I do? Essential oils?
I can't meditate. I have tried tons of times. Medicate I can do. Holla! xanax! I wish I had a little love affair with you right now. Meditate. Not so much.
Outsource cleaning the floors? (seriously. This gives me rage. The cleaning of the floors. Why can't they keep the food in their mouths?)
We are so lucky to have family coming in for the holidays this year and I just want to be able to DO what it is that I HAVE to do NOW and still be open and ready to receive the amazing time with the people I love.
I say yes to everything.
I open my mouth and say yes.
I love saying YES.
I love making out with my life.
But feeling toasty (as in burnt right out) ain't grand.
How do you say no?
Really.

just can't wait

My kids godmother (and my and my bff from 5th grade) is in labor right now.
She is about to have her second child.

We have known each other from unicorns and bubble letters
to late night whiskey rampages in college.

We are now in the mama stage of our friendship and it's kinda gorgeous.
I can't wait to hold that baby and tell him all the stories
about his lovely and wild mother.

Smooches beautiful Michelle!
We are thinking about you!

cribs and gives

It's like I so forgot how to get my kid out of a crib.
I couldn't get Finn into one and now I can't get Blaise out of one.
Any suggestions?

PLEASE CHECK OUT my ALESSI giveaway on my other blog CHEEKYMONKEY PLAY

photo via love generation
I WILL CHOOSE A WINNER TUESDAY at 3pm OHIO time! xo

do it like a bad habit for ten years

Last night I had the pleasure of attending and live blogging the inaugural TEDxColumbus event.(great job @ruthmilligan Curatorial Co-Chair)

It was awesome in a lot of ways.
One particularly awesome thing for me and my pal Angie was having dinner with John and Annie Glenn!

At the dinner/reception prior to the event we were hanging out and saw Mr. And Mrs. Glenn looking for a seat and we offered them space at our table.
We chatted away with them and had a lovely time!!!
We found out John Glenn has an iPhone and encouraged Annie to get one so that they could send each other love texts and silly videos. We talked about life and technology and TED.com.
We talked about space - because you would ask too!
You would be so predictable just like me if you sat next to an astronaut.

He said it was magic and he would go back in the morning if he could.
I felt for a moment like I was experiencing something so damn cool.

Like I understood why Aurora just went gaga over Jack Nicholson in "Terms of Endearment." -the man was IN SPACE!

This is like mind blowing and wicked cool.

He was so sparkly in the eyes and Annie was like a wee doll I wanted to cuddle.
Smart and cool and I am so fortunate to have met them.

I also crushed heavily on Matt Slaybaugh who opened the night with some poetry.
He said something that made me shiver and shake all over:

"Pick something that you love, and do it like a bad habit for ten years."

yes. yes. yes.

sorry to be so annoying...

I have such a big mouth.
You saw this on twitter or something perhaps- BUT. I am so happy.
It means a lot!

LOOK!

Etsy has featured us here!
(leave us a hello comment if you can!)

Thanks to Etsy and all of our awesome customers
and blogs and sites that have helped us start a whole new life as toy makers!
xo

all of the words burned like tiny phoenix feathers

My grandfather had a massive stroke and died at the foot of my grandmother 21 years ago today.
I was alerted and pulled from Mrs. Holloway's English classroom.
It was the first time I glanced a face that announced bad news without saying a word.
It was the first time my stomach hit pit sensation directly from the emotional heaviness in the air.

I was shuttled into my parents car and the drive towards my father's hometown was long and all I did was watch the guardrails roll by and listen to my parents emit low sounds of grief.
My fourteen year old self was unsure of the process of mourning if I recall.
I was so sad and unsure of what was happening and all I can remember really is the way the funeral home smelled - like the floral department of a grocery store- and the way my grandmother held her hands together.
She held her hands together so tightly, like the way her 90 year old hands now grip her cane.
She is a tough lady.

Today at the gym I was chatting to my friend Karen and she and I got to discussing love letters. The writing of love letters. She was telling me about her and her husband and how they wrote each other love letters years ago as they had a long distance relationship.
When she told me about it I could see this light pour out of her face and I bathed in it for a second while I peddled on the stationary bike.
Love letters are so powerful and at some point we just stop.
I told her to write her husband one today. I told her I would do the same.
We laughed big laughs that ended the conversation, but it got inside of me and I can't stop thinking about love letters.

When my grandmother got back to her house 21 years ago she took the bundled love letters from her dark brown amoire, they were tied up with string, she took them out and held them tightly in her hands.
She walked up the small hill by her house to the old barrel where she burned her paper trash.
She walked up to the rusty barrel and started a fire with the words of her lover.
She burned them all.
He was gone and the words only lived inside of her heart now.

All of the words burned like tiny phoenix feathers
and floated throughout the backyard of a woman so so sad in Southeastern Ohio

This is what happened 21 years ago today.

like a couple of years ago I said this would never happen

it is all about the tiny things that make you smile in cab rides home

I would expect nothing less than brill from her.
How awesome were her wedding favors?
The flipping Internet makes me want to get married all over again.
We are at ten years now.
Renewalhole?

like it always does

I would like to write a poem about how stunning
these red scattered leaves are on High Street
if I had the time
Because they are so red that they burn yr eyes for one split second when you look at them
the sidewalk looks bloody from far away they are so near perfect
like if you were to try so hard to describe red red leaves to a blind person
it would take so many hours and you would sweat when finished
and the stroller rolls right over them
and they don't make a noise
but you hear a low moan
announcing time has moved again
like it always does
that tricky bitch

outdoor play on smaller

I am over on Smaller today. (talking about Conkers)

milieu

The universe is made of stories, not atoms. -Muriel Rukeyser

I want to see you there!

Me and some Kirtsy gals- Love the way women work together!
I stole this photo from Laura Mayes- thanks baby!

Yo ladies please don't forget about this!
If yr a small business owner or have dreams to be one PLEASE come.
We will learn and play together.
We will laugh.
I promise.
There are 100 other cool nights out all over USA and Canda.
(Kirtsy and Microsoft Office Live ROCK)
Check it out!
Go.
You must.

If you live in Columbus or near enough to drive to these AMAZING FREE EVENTS
I will be giving cool things away.
We can sip coffee and wine and have a night just for us.
See you there!
RSVP pretty please xoxoxoxoxo

hold down the future

Finn's bottom two teeth are about to fall out and I swear to god it freaks me out.
It freaks me out that he is old enough to tongue his naked gums soon.
A hole where his teeth once erupted as I rocked him back and forth across many midnights.
Across the vast canyon of babyhood that only lasted for like ten seconds when I turn my head and think about it.
When I turn my head and strain my left eye.

trying to see the past
trying to hold down the future

I didn't even wear underwear to class today.

I went to a kickboxing class today and had to bail out after like 15 minutes.
I forgot to eat breakfast and I thought I was going to die or at the very least pass out and it would be so embarrassing for me to pass out in a group class.
The other sweaty small women would have to drag my large sweaty body to the center of the room and perform CPR and when they lifted my hand cut homage to Flashdance lijit t-shirt from my body they would recoil in disgust at the old tattered sports bra.
I didn't even wear underwear to class today.
I wore my tankini bottoms so that I could jump in the pool quickly after class.
These are the things I was thinking about while squatting.
These are the things that made me run from the sun filled room.

Well hot and heavy pumpkin pie

Love that up there, but I may just be a hippie inside. You know me and Joe bought some land in the country ten years ago. We will live there someday without shoes.
I found that video on this blog I now stalk.
xo Happy day.

Alabama, Arkansas,
I do love my ma and pa,
Not the way that I do love you.

Holy Moley, me oh my,
You're the apple of my eye,
Girl, I've never loved one like you.

Man oh man, you're my best friend,
I scream it to the nothingness,
There ain't nothing that I need.

Well, hot and heavy, pumpkin pie,
Chocolate candy, Jesus Christ,
Ain't nothing please me more than you.

Ahh ... home. Let me come home
Home is wherever I'm with you.

the glow of an autumn night

I love my husband.
We have wood on the brain- but he still finds time to take me out and thrill me.
He took me for a stroll up to the local pub Friday night for one drink and all of the sudden I had drank 5 pints and made several new life friends.

I also stood under the glow of an autumn night
and kissed him in the street
until all of the people stared
and wished for
one still second
that they were us

@thatpatti snapped this shot. love her.

And to live by the Girl Scout Law

I had to ask my friend Michelle the other day if it were true that we tried to break my leg back in Jr. High so we could ride in the car during the local parade in our town instead of marching in our girl scout uniforms. She confirmed this nugget of memory that popped into my head the other day. Yes. Anna and Michelle took turns jumping on my leg and trying to break it because we were older girl scouts and frankly, it was the kiss of death for us.
Luck struck and somehow we were able to get Anna's step dad to drive us in his Bronco and throw candy. We spent most of the ride ducking down to avoid eye contact with anyone on the street.

It makes me think of two things:

I am really mortified that I was so focused on what others thought.
That uniform was kinda cute when I jazzed it up and I liked old Betty, the troop leader a lot.
I learned shit there. I liked it inside the brown paneled church basement every Tuesday. I did.

I also think about Anna's step dad. He was a big part of my preteen and teen years. They lived on a camp as caretakers and it was amazing to go to Anna's house. I grew up in the woods but this was insane. Trails and tents and lodges and it was a wicked good backdrop for the teen years let me tell you.
But Anna's dad was just so good. He was a good and cool and funny man and he had two sons and they both died really young. One of them I loved in the way you love a boy when yr quite young and stupid. Like when you are so hot and cold and playing along with some game the older girls whisper about as they paint their faces in tiled beige school bathrooms.

I think about Anna's step dad and how I would still like to know him now. But I don't know him anymore. He is just sitting in the back of my brain in a room reserved for all of the other people that I just don't know anymore.
And I don't why.

I wish you were still here to drink pints with me

and talk about fantastic things
and laugh and laugh and laugh
I miss yr Anthony Hopkins voice so very much today.
Happy Birthday dad- we are all toasting you down here. xo






photo from 1999 tickhill, UK

it just makes everything sparkle

This is my partner in crime from 8-11:05. We walk the streets of our village together. We run errands. We play cars. My moods are wild and I am working on 702 things at once and trying to read Ayn Rand again and the holidays are here almost and there is wood to be worked and so much is NOW.
But, OMG! Look at what I see.
Look from my vantage point.
Here is what I see when I look down.
He is always by my side and he is always doing this.