Fresh. Well... Fresh-ish.

Sometimes I get home late from doing something fun with my friends in Astoria and sit down at my blog to, ya know, just quickly check and see how popular I am and... get really, really, REALLY distracted. Tonight was one of those nights.

I was all, "wow, that mermaid on the header only looks 'meh' so maybe I should just change it real quick" and then I realized that there were new layouts that I wanted to play with and then I realized that they looked nice for the first 5 minutes but I hated them and thennnnn... I had to back and try and fix it, which was impossible since I just screw around changing and moving stuff until I like it/get bored, so I made a new layout. Which led to how my blog looks now.

Which is like this:

I figured that I'd put a nice little picture in there, since I am 98% sure that I'll be changing it in the morning. We'll see if I forget to or not.

Also it is technically the 4th of July now, so HAPPY AMERICA DAY! Let's all eat some hotdogs, drink a beer, watch 'Independence Day' and look at some fireworks.

Like these. 

I straight up took that picture from here because it's pretty, so thanks Kelly Davenport (whoever you may be) for that picture of fireworks over Louisville. Nice.

TA~DA. 

I am so overtired you guys, and I keep getting surprised by the sound of assorted fireworks/crackers/snappers/poppers/whatnot outside in my neighborhood which I can still hear over the sound of my AC even though it is LOUUUUUD. 

I don't know why I'm still doing this right now. 

SO I WILL STOP.

Happy Birthday to Me.

Hello ladies. 

It was my birthday this weekend and it was SUPER DUPER FUN. We went out and did some exciting karaoke and stuff, and I thought that I would commemorate it on my blog with ponies. They live on my bookshelf and are amazing. Basically anything on my bookshelf should be considered amazing. 

Please note that, as I mentioned before, I love these and that I GOT THE BLUE ONE. YEAH! Aww yeah. 

Happy New Year!

Here is a collage forest.

Mixed Media Collage, 13"x 13"

HAVE A HAPPY AND SAFE NEW YEAR EVERYBODY! Because if you don't I'll find you. 

Merry EPIC Christmas

I love Christmas.

I love the carol of the bells.

I love this.

Whellp, I made Christmas in my apartment last weekend. AND IT LOOKS AWESOME. I love the whole Christmas season with giving presents, the shitty music (AND ALSO CAROL OF THE BELLS), the lights outside, and the general feeling of goodwill towards men.

Also this tree. 

We, however, have a little baby fake tree with itty bitty ornaments and all kinds of random snowmen and Santa's and a menorah.  I. Am. Ready. Bring it on holidays. Now all I need is for it to 1) get below 48° for more than a day 2) snow 3) still be able to pay off all of my student loans after buying presents and having friend shenanigans. Because, for anyone who doesn't know me: I love giving presents. Love it. I, like Santa, make a list throughout the year - but unlike Santa, it's not of who's naughty or nice, but rather what I think good gifts for people would be. Some people are better gift getters than others...

... for example my sister.

She can be damn near impossible. She is a world-saver that Christine is (and therefore a lot of the time likes for gifts to be practical), so for part of her Christmas present I'm donating/trying to get people to donate to Oxfam of America! It's a charitable organization which means that you could even claim it on your taxes after helping others. WIN WIN!! SO HELP ME HELP HER HELP THE WORLD. Any amount helps those in need... and it'll only make Santa like you more.

Feel free to let me know if you do and I'll draw you something as thanks... maybe a tiger or a unicorn. Or a mermaid. But for now you can look at pictures of my apartment looking XMAS 
SWAAAAAAAAANKY. 

Happy National Cupcake Day!

Sooooo, this is an exciting time! Today is National Cupcake Day! 

This cute little blurb above from punchbowl is also exciting because its all teal... and a teal cupcake is 562% more awesome than a regular cupcake. Teal in general makes things 562% more awesome. 

In an coincidental turn of events, yesterday I bought myself a little Kidrobot blind-box from the tokidokoi UnicornO series while out Christmas shopping for others... and it was a cupcake one! HUZZAH! A few of my favorite things all mashed together: unicorns, tokidoki, cake, and awesomeness. 

So cute.                                          So fun. 

I want to god damn catch them all.

...because I really wanted the blue haired cow one... 

Fairy tales get weirder - The Little Mermaid

OH HAI BLOG. SORRY I LEFT YOU ALONE FOR SO LONG - I GOT A LITTLE DISTRACTED BY MY HOLIDAY FESTIVITIES. In my family, Thanksgiving is serious business and we go alllllllllll the way out. For like a full week. Even though it may seem weird to just about everyone, Thanksgiving is and always will be one of my faves, and it is super awesome. Here are pictures from part of it.

Pre-Thanksgiving pizza night. 

Cousin Walk - Thanksgiving 2011 (wearing mom's attractive sneakers)

So, yes, mermaids. I also love pegasus's and unicorns. Or pegasus/unicorns. And magic, and pretty flowers, deadly things that look cute, reading, teal, getting more than I payed for, grapefruit, birdcages, CAPSLOCK, movie trailers, buying people gifts, keys, Alphonse Mucha, tea, ninjas, and Thanksgiving. I AM VERY VARIED IN MY INTERESTS. But I just keep going back to mermaids... so here is a teal one based off of a book. Combo-interest attack!

We may as well get into the story that pretty much started it all. If you don't have the time or the energy to delve into reading that... I will break it down the story after the four scenes that I drew:

The Little Mermaid

                                                      Colored Pencil, 13"x 16"                             Colored Pencil, 16"x 13"

1. There was once a Little Mermaid who was the youngest and prettiest of all the mermaids. She had five sisters who were far less interesting (but I MADE them interesting looking. MADE THEM) than she was even though she was apparently 14 (which may be like 26 in people years) and had no idea what was going on in the real world let alone the ocean... but I digress. She wanted to go to the surface to look at things up there which she was allowed to do - once she turned 15.

2. She went up, fell in love with a prince, and decided that she would do just about anything to get him. Literally. More than any one person should have to do to be with someone. She saved his ass from a sinking ship and that just wasn't enough... so she just went right ahead and visited the sea witch to get a potion to turn her tail into legs. In order to get it she had to cut out her tongue as payment, and "drink the draught down. Then your tail will divide and shrink until it becomes what the people on earth call a pair of shapely legs. But it will hurt; it will feel as if a sharp sword slashed through you." BEAUTY IS SUCH A GOD DAMN PAIN. However, if she didn't get the Prince to marry her, she'd die and forever be in limbo because, apparently, mermaids don't have souls. Oh, and her feet would bleed as she walked. That too.

3. She went above and tried to charm the prince with her smokin' human bod but, although he liked doing things with her (such as climbing mountains and watching her dance her feet into a bloody mess), he thought of her as pretty much a little sister. Because she was 15. That didn't stop her from trying though... "She danced time and again, though every time she touched the floor she felt as if she were treading on sharp-edged steel. The Prince said he would keep her with him always, and that she was to have a velvet pillow to sleep on outside his door." Like a dog. Like a shapely little dog.

4. Sadly, the Prince decided to marry someone else (who wouldn't add him to any government watch lists and force him to stay 100ft from a playground) and set sail in a ship with his new bride and the Little Mermaid. She was obviously a bit distraught about this development, so on her last night she was up, staring at the Prince and his wife as they slept, and heard her sisters calling out to her from the water. The five of them had gone to the Sea Witch, cutting off all of their hair as payment, and gotten her a knife that would return her to being a mermaid if she stabbed the Prince with it and let his blood fall on to her feet - turning it back into a tail - and allowing her to live out the rest of her 300 mermaid years. She considered it...  but declined. Instead, she threw herself into the sea and turned to foam (as mermaids tend to do do when they die). And they lived happily ev- oh wait, no. Not even close.

At the end there there is also a bit about her floating into the air and talking with some spirits trapped in limbo for (again) 300 years, that tell her "unseen, we fly into the homes of men, where there are children, and for every day on which we find a good child who pleases his parents and deserves their love, God shortens our days of trial. The child does not know when we float through his room, but when we smile at him in approval one year is taken from our three hundred. But if we see a naughty, mischievous child we must shed tears of sorrow, and each tear adds a day to the time of our trial."


Good luck with that, Little Mermaid.

SO YOU HEAR ME KIDS? DON'T EVER CRY OR YOU'LL KILL A MERMAID.
Or something. 

HAPPY MOTHER LOVING THANKSGIVING.

THANKSGIVING IS MY FAVORITE.

Happy All Hallows Eve.

I can't help but want to share this picture of my cat doing the classic "RAWWWWR, I'ma get chuu!" Halloween pose. She was *very* little here, but let me tell you something - she is still a monster. Don't you forget it. Meow.  

I recently watched an old History Channel special on the history of Halloween and how it progressed through the ages. It went a little something like this: 

Serious business with the Pagans and Druid priests → serious business adapting the Pagan/Druid rituals for Christianity → less serious, more fun times and parties and beginnings of costumes → serious business making it seeming less 'witchy' with those costumes for the church; slightly less serious business for the rest of the people still celebrating it. This happens for a while in Europe, while the Puritans head over to North America and take the fun out of everything → later, the masses immigrating from Europe (see also: Ireland, land of awesome Druid lore) start bringing the life of the party back to October 31st in America → things are fun for a while, still a mostly adult holiday, but teens start taking it to the streets and putting the 'trick' into trick-or-treat. And by trick mean fire → in order to not have people killed, Halloween is put fourth as a holiday where kids are really excited and cute and parade around in bumblebee/Buzz Lightyear/princess/Elmo/ Frida Kahlo/witch costumes and beg for candy. Halloween is no longer life threatening (except for that whole razor blades in apples scare in the 70s... but that was found to be mostly untrue) → those kids who grew up in Halloween-fun-era dress up their kids and take them out... but also want to go out themselves and pretend to be something their not. Like a raccoon. And the cycle continues. 

Which brings us to this: 

Some of us may be more excited than others to be dressed up. But only some

of us are raccoons. Suffer with that one pissed-off-cat-man... and sorry I tried to bite you. 

Again. 

EDIT: I had forgotten how very different it is for trick-or-treaters in the city versus upstate. Personally, I had the classic 'you dress up and your parents take you from house to house' or if I was lucky, I had the 'you dress up and your parents stand in the road so you can go up to the house alone'. My sister and I would take pillowcases as bags and tromp around with friends and neighbors, working our way through the town for maximum candy ownage. Here in the city though, people seem to either trick-or-treat strictly within their buildings (weird) or at businesses in their neighborhood (weirder). I mean, I suppose it's not REALLY that weird, but it is weird to me. Either way, I'm sure they make bank on candy. There are way more places/people around here then in my hometown.

Have a super fun holiday everyone!!!