Would you take makeup advice from...

a guy wearing blue and pink eyeshadow who had hair poufier than you did in the 80's???

On Friday I ran into Sephora because I was running way too low on my beloved Bare Escentuals makeup. (If you don't wear mineral makeup or haven't heard of it...get out from under that rock!! The stuff is aweseom!!) There are 2 guys working on this particular day. Now I know there are plenty of male make-up artists out in the world and that is totally cool with me. But most of the ones I've seen don't actually wear makeup themselves and even if they do it is usually tasteful. These two men...not so much. The one guy at least stuck to a basic black eyeliner and his hair while over gelled and styled wasn't the worst I've ever seen. But the other one had like this big bouffant going and could have passed for a circus clown with the blue and pink eyeshadow. It was quite distrubing, I can't even describe it well enough, you really had to see it in person to appreciate it. I'm seriously not being judgemental here...the one guy really looked THAT bad, and the other was right up there in the freaky factor.

Now had I come into that store needing help from someone who worked there...well there's just no way I could seriously take any makeup/skin/hair tips or advice from people looking like THAT. Women, well most women, simply do NOT wear their makeup like that, and that hair hasn't been in style since the 50's. Maybe as a gay man you can pull it off...or THINK you can pull it off (trust me, you can't!)...but a woman looking like that would be a laughing stock. How could I trust anything they had to say, or even look at them with a straight face for that matter?

I had my children with me, my boys are 6 & 7 years old...I'm sure you can only imagine the thoughts running through their heads. But thankfully they kept them from running out of their mouths until we were out of the store. And THEN they fell into fits of laughter for the next 5 minutes.

So awhile ago I taught myself how to knit...

The only problem was I couldn't figure out how to read a pattern to save my life, so I never really did anything with my meager knitting knowledge. Not long ago I decided to pick it up again and see if I could do any better the second time around. This time I did a google search for easy knitting patterns, hoping there had to be someone out there like me who needed to have it explained to me like I was 2 years old. And so I made my first completed knitting project...a dishrag. Which will probably become unraveled should I ever use it because I was too lazy to weave in the ends of the yarn and just cut them off. But here it is...



Fresh off my knitting victory I joined a "Knit-Along" with a few other moms from the Granola Chicks board. We are all knitting the same thing and posting our progress. I finally got mine underway. We are making a neck warmer, kinda like a scarf, but small to fit just around your neck.

Ok, if you can't picture it, here it is...



And here is mine so far, I think its about 4" long so far and its supposed to be 16" when finished.

Parents all over the country are rejoicing today!

And I am one of them. Yes some lucky parents with early school start times have already experienced this joyful day...but for the rest of us, it has finally arrived, the FIRST DAY OF SCHOOL!!!!

I am especially happy this year because FINALLY both my boys are in the same school for exactly the same time!! The past 3 years the drop off and pick up schedule has been all over the place and gets very exhausting...but now I only have to go to the school twice a day, and maybe only once if C takes them to school.

So after a fairly calm morning of getting up way earlier than they were used to and getting ready right away...we were actually done early!! That's like, never happened before, LOL. So, knowing how awful the parking situation is we decided to walk to school.

R went to his line with no problems of course, went to his class and sat down easy peasy. E had a much easier transition than in the past. We couldn't find his class when they were lined up for the morning assembly. I didn't know for sure what his teacher looked like, so we stood off to the side. He was all concerned he wasn't going to know where to go, so I think he was flustered and a bit nervous. Once he got in he seemed a little anxious when he was unpacking his school supplies. But, there were no tears and not even one "I don't want to go!!" like every past year, so he's making progress!!

Here there are before we headed off to school!

E's first day of second grade...


R's first day of first grade...

R.I.P. Speedo Man

Before we came to Southern California we lived in Grand Junction, CO. There lived a man who the whole town knew as "Speedo Man", he is truly a town legend. We moved away from G.J. 8 years ago, but I've still thought of Speedo Man from time to time, he really is unforgettable.

I'll save you the story of how we found this out...but last night we discovered that Speedo Man has died (not recently, but a little while back). Apparently first he moved to Oregon, and then he died. It makes me kind of sad. A Grand Junction with no Speedo Man is hard to imagine.

Why did they call him "Speedo Man" you ask? This guy would walk and bike around town wearning nothing but a Speedo in the warm months, and a Speedo over top of some other clothing (at best) or with some spandex or one of those half shirt things in the cold months. When you first come to town and you learn of Speedo Man you're like WTH??? After awhile you come to just accept him as part of life. I don't know if anyone will ever know why he started it, but he kept it up because it got him so much attention. I only lived in G.J. a few short years, but I had the pleasure of several Speedo Man sightings. I worked in a daycare that had a playground in the front of it. This playground was where my class of 3 year olds played. Speedo Man would walk past there on occasion, and I'd hold my breath hoping that none of them would ask me why a guy was walking around naked. Although I bet even a few of them already knew Speedo Man's legend. A couple times I got to witness him bending over and pulling weeds from the sidewalk...in nothing but his Speedo. That was...really an image that I'll never be able to erase from my mind.

So long Speedo Man...

Changing things up

I thought it needed a bit of color around here...if you even noticed. The green is nice, but it needed a bit of a pick me up, a little splash of something. We definitely need to keep things fresh once in a while.

Lots of change is/may be happening actually, and not just in my blog color selection!

The boys start school on Tuesday. New teachers, a new year...change.

There's a very good chance we will be moving back to San Diego in the next month or two...change in house, job, schools, scenery.

Too much to do to get ready to pack for me to sit around on my butt on the computer all day long...change. Uh, is that good or bad change?? I guess I'll have to let you know.

Mmmmm....banana bread!

I made this today. It smells REALLY good, and it looks even better. So good I had to take a picture and show *someone*, LOL! (Ignore the messy stove in the background!) Too bad C isn't here, I made it for him, so I feel bad about eating it before he gets any, plus I'm going to have to fight E off from it. *sigh*

I do have self-control, I do, I do, I do have self-control...



UPDATE: Sadly, while it looked glorious and smelled wonderful...it didn't turn out so good. Our oven is a piece of crap, and that's putting it nicely. Things always end up burnt on the outside and not fully baked on the inside. Such was the fate of the poor banana bread, a big part right in the middle was total dough still, ugh. Let's take a moment of silence for the banana bread........

I forgot to do my pushups yesterday...

Well "forgot" is maybe a little inaccurate. I did think about doing them a couple times but decided to "do it later". And well, later turned into not at all.

So shuffling days a bit this week, doing them today and then on Saturday instead of Friday.

Today was a killer, btw. Monday was a breeze compared to this. Who made up this training??? Its so not fair to give you a tease day and then BAM, turn your arm/chest/back muscles into blobs of quiverring goo halfway through the next.

And to think, I'm willingly doing this to myself. *shakes head*

66 pushups, done. O. M. G.