Look what my calendar said for yesterday:

 

!!!!!!!!!!!! 

 In my little house, in my little town! I have been kicking tail to get the house clean, grout lines filled, windows sparkling. It's been exhausting!! Scheduling anything in the mountains in January is sketchy. But, never in my wildest dreams did I think we would be in the middle of a flood watch. Many of our neighboring county schools have been closed due to washed out roads and sandbags were set up outside stores. Our backyard creek has swelled into the landscaping and is so powerful with the 5 days of solid rain, that we can hear it roaring inside over the TV.        

When I got up yesterday, the lights began to flicker. Within minutes the power was struggling to stay on. 'Oh, please not today!' I was praying. But, an hour into the shoot, we lost it. Every single wonderful drop of pretty power had left us. We all 5 stood around my kitchen island, staring at each other in the dark. And then I was like, I'll take matters into my own hands...

 

 

I got on the horn. 'Look Duke Energy, sir, please, please, please, flip my switch! I need this desperately!'

No such luck. Instead, we got a recording telling us that they hoped to have the power back on in 2 1/2 hours.....

Unbeknownst to me, Robert had brought home an extra generator from his dads vacation home a month earlier. What ?!  Hallelujah!

After a few, we were back in business. 

I can't wait to share all the details with you. I think it comes out in May. I'm excited!

Oh, and the power is back on--just in time for yesterdays floods to turn into an official flashing across the TV winter snow storm today ... possibly 6" !!  really??

      

 

 I have had the pleasure of painting many murals over the last several decades. It's so refreshing to get to work on such large scale projects. But, it sure does take a toll on your body. I have never been more sore than when rolling home after 10 hours of painting above my head, on a ladder. Multiply that by a week and you have successfully accrued many hours on the heating pad and several visits to PT. That's why I am so impressed with people like the wall dogs who do this every day. They are passionate and devoted and entirely talented. Take a look at them creating a sign for the Etsy Holiday Shop.  

   

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 I could watch artists create all day. And their comment at the end of the video-- 'learn to respect the smallest of details' is such a true statement. It applies to all creative fields and really does set apart the good from the best. 

{video via etsy}

 

 

What a fun-filled, exhausting, warm wonderful weekend we had! Friday night was Mustang basketball night.

 

 

 Jack was right in the middle of our enthusiastic fans. Can't spot him?? Emma and Jack are the ones holding the 'D--Fence!' 

 

 

 Saturday morning we headed back to the high school to decorate for the semi-formal dance that would be that night. The theme was 'Ice, Ice, Baby' which was pretty ironic considering how crazy warm our weather was. Here are the girls testing the glowability of their blacklights.   

 

'How do my teeth look??' 

Of course we had to paint Maris a pair of shoes to match her cute dress. The fabric is sort of a gold metallic with dark silver jeweled shoulders.  

 

 

 The shoes were originally navy and I painted them nude mixed with a little touch of metallic gold. Then I painted the soles and the heels with a metallic silver. When that was dry, I glittered the heels. I finished by coating everything in a semi-gloss acrylic spray.

 

 

 

 

 Her sweet date brought her a bouquet of pink roses wrapped with a sheer metallic gold ribbon to match her dress.

 

 

 He was so cute when he presented it to her from behind his back.

 

 

Some of the girls got ready at our house and they all gathered here before going to dinner.

 

 

I love being around these kids!

 

 

After all of the 'old' kids left for dinner, our next party group showed up --  some of Jack's besties from the Class of 2017.

 

 

Sunday afternoon was spent sharing all of the stories of the night, and looking at everyones posted Facebook pictures of the pretty dresses and cute dates. They all had a blast and are already starting to talk about their excitement for Prom in just a few short months.

I hope your weekend was fun-filled!

 

 

 I wanted to create a fun Christmas gift for Maris who will be attending University of Kansas in the Fall. My fashionista loves shoes and you've seen me jazz up a pair for her before. I found this pin of a pair I loved and thought that she would, too. 

 

 via

I took lots of pics with my phone while I was painting them. But, because the kids go through the pictures on my phone all the time, I immediately emailed them to myself and then deleted them. I didn't want Maris to see them before Christmas. When collecting the images for this post, I can't find them anywhere!! I probably created a fake folder to hide them in and, of course, I hid them from myself as well. Why is my brain so dumb? So, I just have shots that I took after I gave them to her...      

 

 

KU's mascot is the Jayhawks. Because I wanted a perfect mirror image, I made a little template out of computer paper that I taped on to the toe of the shoe and flipped it over to use on the other shoe. I used a fine tip Sharpie to trace around my template. This gave me the exact size on both.   

 

 

The back's got the Collegiate KU and on the inside, I wrote 'Rock Chalk Jayhawk!'

 

 

I wanted just the jayhawk {not the whole shoe} to have a nice shine so when the paint was dry, I covered up the blue of the shoe with painters tape right up to the edge of the white outline and used several light coats of clear acrylic gloss spray.

 

 

She wore them this morning and here is Jack sporting his SMHS tie from yesterday's post!