What He Said

This picture pretty much sums up our summer. I was telling a friend recently, that if one more perfectly nice, well meaning person asks me how my summer is going I was going to lose it.

Among the people we know, we have had divorces, job loses, health issues, moves and deaths of relatives. Honestly the bad luck that has fallen on my family and the people we know and love has gotten a little much. I don't want to answer the phone, or the door, or open the mail for fear of what news it will bring.

On the other hand it makes me want to play the lottery since I MUST have used up all my bad luck by now, right?

Boxes, We Meet Again

I have been packing for about an hour and a half and this is what I have accomplished. I remember when my entire life would be contained in this number of boxes. Now? Not so much.

The good news is we found a house. It is in a part of town that we like. It is close to the school and close to good friends. It is one story and has a beautiful pool and an even more beautiful view. The people we are renting from our military. They are being stationed abroad for 2 years. So I am almost entirely confident that we will actually have the house for 2 years. But, I have said that before.

The floor plan is not ideal, but it is a beautiful home and with a little finagling fits our needs. And as painful as moving is, we are looking forward to the new home.

A Glimpse Into The Future

Charlie got a hold of AJ's glasses and tried them on. Is it bad that I now want him to need glasses because he looks so darn cute? He looks like he is channeling that kid from Jerry McGuire.

My Life In A Picture

I packed my first box. And I made sangria. (You will notice that the sangria is in a super-cool beverage dispenser. My friend Brittney gave it to me for my b-day. It is made from recycled glass. )

I am not sure what the upside down baby means. But I am sure it's significant.

The Birth of a Rendering

I was hired to do a rendering (That is design-speak for drawing and coloring.) the plans for the proposed community garden in our town. I was a bit nervous about taking the job since I am an Interior Designer, not a Landscape Designer. Luckily I didn't actually have to design anything- just draw it and make it look pretty. That I can do.

I thought it would be fun to post the process of how a drawing comes to be.

The is the penciled drawing that I did to scale. All the components that will be rendered will be in the drawing. This drawing took about 5 hours to do.

Now the fun part starts. I begin the coloring by using base colors and then work my way up to darker ones. It is a subtle way to add depth.

You can see in the raised garden beds I am using a total of 3 colors to give the illusion that the beds are three dimensional. The grass wouldn't get lighter in real life, but by making the darkest grass towards the gazebo, and the lightest grass towards the viewer, it a) draws the eye in and b) gives the illusion of a light source.

In the bottom right quadrant I have added the ground cover around the flower beds. It represents mulch. Also, you can see that the roof of the gazebo has been shaded and details added.

Shadows have been added to help with the 3-d illusion. And I have added some plant life to the garden beds.

Here is the final.

There is a giant chess board in the upper right hand corner, playground equipment, grills and picnic tables, pergolas (bottom corners), and a water feature below the gazebo.

And for the record, this was only slightly less painful then the births of my other children.

Nap Time

Nothing like a morning swim to get toddlers to fall asleep in random places and positions.

Twins!

This is how observant I am. I bought both boys the same suit, (at different times) from the same store months ago. I never realized they were the same suit until this morning.