Merry Christmas!

Posted by jupe

It’s been a very Christmasy past two days.  We went to my cousin’s house for Christmas Eve and had an epic snowball fight in her basement with these soft handmade snowballs brought by Les’ friend. We were all laughing hysterically and nobody was safe. It was awesome.

The kids got to open their gifts and Nick and Rusty were given some pretty neat gifts. We got home late, as always, but it was a great day.

Today was another Christmasy day. My kids got up at 9 and we all came downstairs and opened some gifts. I got a new desk, a new light table for tracing, and a small package of goodies from my mom, including PJs, a gorgeous sheep sweater, and some bits and pieces.  Alex enjoyed the West Germany stein I got him and I think he’s looking forward to the Tesla test drive I arranged for him.

Anyway, it’s been a long day. We ate dinner at Stewart and Joanne’s place and all of us are STUFFED. It was delicious.

Tonight is more unwinding and then bed. I hope the kids let me sleep. Alex is off till Monday and we’ll have a quiet holiday at home.

Well, at least Monday is over.

Posted by jupe

It was a hell of a day.  The kids were really good for the morning, which was luckily enough to finish my daily drawing, but I sat alone with my thoughts and soon was completely miserable, by my own doing. All the reasons why are in that post I made, yesterday.  Anyway, when the kids were done resting, the sick was replaced with evil and they were back to normal, picking on each other till one of them screamed.  Because it took so long for them to get back to health, I hadn’t done my errands. Who wants to drag two kids around who are throwing up and pissing out their butts? Not me.

Anyway, I made dinner and called Alex, who picked up gifts for Beaver Scouts last night and he met me, albeit late, after a nasty exchange on the phone on the way.

Nick was really into the visit from Santa and Rusty hid behind me from Santa, but when Santa gave him a gift, Rusty said “Thank you”, which is a huge step, as he’s never said it before.

Alex joined us when the kids were eating snacks and he and I were civil again, thankfully. He wanted to go back to work but was really kind to let me drive out to see my friends at knit night. By the time I got there, they were waiting for the bill, but nobody had left yet and I was able to give them all a print for Christmas and stay and chat awhile.

I then drove home and told Alex he could head back to work but he decided not to. I could’ve stayed longer.

Ah well.

This morning was awful for getting up. Neither Alex nor I wanted to get up and we barely got Nick out the door. I was left to take care of the garbage by myself, so I did.

Today’s daily drawing is a gift for my son’s principal who likes both dinosaurs and Dr Who. I hope he enjoys it.

Have a great Tuesday!

It’s Con Day

Posted by jupe

I’m just about to get started on packing up all my crap for the one day convention. I have to sell six prints to break even. Wish me luck.

Yesterday was simply shopping hell. Bad traffic, long lines, and frustration. I got a couple things done but ultimately, not enough. At least I got my prints.

I have to leave soon, so I’ll keep this short. I might post later with a report. I’ll definitely post later with a daily drawing from the con.

 

It just HAD to snow…

Posted by jupe

It feels like every time we get really bad weather, I have to go to class. Of all days, it’s always when I am going to downtown Toronto in the middle of rush hour.  As I mentioned yesterday, we got some snow. By some snow, I mean 15cm of snow. For my American readers, that’s about six or seven inches.  Add, on top of that, the wind blowing it around.

It made for some really treacherous driving, as the roads were slippery and the plows can’t be everywhere at once.  I left home at 3:30, got Nick from school, and got to my husband’s workplace at 4:15. After that, it was actually surprisingly smooth sailing.  I was really pessimistic at first, but I suppose that more people than not decided that they’d stay at home and NOT drive.  All the better for me. Greg and I got to the Korean restaurant at 5:15 and waited an hour for the others to show up. Then, it was a matter of SHOVELING our food into our pieholes and arriving at class just when it was supposed to begin. At least we made it.

I got some really good feedback on my story and have some significant changes to make. I’ll sit down with Alex this week and make those changes. Also on the list, lots of stuff. Here’s a checklist, mostly for my own reference.

 

  • Work on Red Surge inks
  • Work on pages for Condo story
  • Get prints made for the table at comic con this Sunday
  • assemble craft for Nick’s teacher
  • draw picture for Nick’s principal
  • knit cowl for Nick’s librarian
  • knit for my mother
  • knit for my cousin’s son
  • knit for my niece
  • laundry — dear god, the laundry
  • dining room table
  • drive out to a secret location to pick up a secret gift for Alex
  • go giftmas shopping for the kids and get gifts for Alex from the kids
  • bake cookies with Nick

So much to do with such little time. So much to do that I don’t wanna do it… but it has to get done.

Off I go to knit.

Still Ploughing on!

Posted by jupe

Well, I’ve finished some art today. Page 1 of The Red Surge is finished, all inks and lettering complete. I need to do some of page 2 today, and I need to do some knitting in the worst way.  I also need to draw a picture for Nick’s principal sooner than later and finish his teacher’s Christmas craft.

Oy, vey. Have I taken on too much?

It snowed last night; how rude. About a foot of snow on the ground and probably an extra hour to and from my class as a result of it. I’ll be leaving home right after Nick gets out of school and braving the terrible drivers. Snow, I can deal with. People? Not so much.

So, yesterday a few things happened.

I spent the day drawing and inking, as I usually do, and Rusty didn’t nap. We went to get Nick, then went to CostCo because Nick had no more snack foods for his school lunches. Once that was taken care of, we went home, only to find that the gifts that my mother had sent us were left on our doorstep by UPS without a signature or confirmation. Just left out there for anyone to take, should they desire. What a piss off.  I brought them inside, then I dropped off the groceries, and then we went back to school, the three of us, because Nick had his Christmas concert.  Alex was stuck in traffic because people are morons but made it JUST in time for Nick’s performance.  I didn’t properly videotape it with the phone because I was distracted, but we amusingly discovered that he’s the kid who yells the lyrics of the sounds, rather than singing them. It was adorable.  He was also very into the choreography and whole ordeal. Such a good kiddo.

During the show, Rusty decided that he was gonna be a terror, more than usual.  He got out of his seat, pushed past the people in the aisle, and made his way right up to the stage where the kids were doing their show.  One of the teachers grabbed him and brought him back to me, then the lovely librarian took him to the kindergarten room so we could actually watch the show.  Later during the performances, she had brought him back to the gym where the Principal was keeping an eye on him.  Unfortunately for him, he took his eyes off of Russell for ten seconds, during which time Russell made another dash for the stage, and was once again apprehended.

I was just glad it wasn’t my fault that time, and thankful that the little bugger didn’t make it ON the stage, as he knows exactly how to get up there.

We had Harveys for dinner afterward because I had a coupon and Nick took FOREVER to eat his burger. I’m talking, 40 minutes to eat a kid sized burger. Bloody hell, kid, seriously? We spent way too long there cos all Nick did was fuck around.

The last stop was the dollar store for some candy canes for our trees and for gifts.

When we got home, Alex rushed in and I took care of getting the kids inside. One of our letters in the mailbox was from the dentist’s office and they had misspelled our last name, meaning I couldn’t mail in the claim. That, coupled with the kids being wild animals, I was happy to get Rusty and Nick ready for bed. After the kids were in bed, Alex and I worked on my homework and I think we have a nicely solid story in mapped format.  We’ll see what kind of subplot Ty will throw in there for us. Tonight, if class isn’t cancelled, Ty will also be teaching us how to write a roast, which will also be awesome. I can’t wait 😀

The last thing I did before bed was work more on The Red Surge. Sometime while drawing, the layers got merged down. I didn’t notice until I was out of Undos. OMG, I was PISSED. I put the work down for awhile and played PVZ until bedtime. This morning, I rectified the mistake and finished the work.

All good, all good.

Oh, I also stepped on what used to be a banana, all mushy and cold and slimy, on a chair which I was resting my foot on. A gift from Rusty.

How thoughtful.

It’s GO GO GO Time!

Posted by jupe

After waiting quite some time, I’ve been assigned a story for Toronto Comix.  This happens the same day that penciled pages started coming in for The Red Surge. It looks like I have a LOT of work ahead of me, coupled with Christmas and family stuff.

I’m going to put commissions on hold, I think, until this is all done, with time only to draw Nick’s principal’s gift and work on his teachers’ gifts.

Otherwise, anyone who asks me what’s up will most likely get the response, “JUPE DRAW. JUPE JUST DRAW. DRAW, JUPE, DRAW.”

Monday was exhausting. Tuesday is another day of doing stuff.

Posted by jupe

Yesterday was a busy as hell day.  Between daily drawings and planning crap and getting dental stuff sorted, I was ready to nap before I got Nick from school — but I didn’t. I got him from school first.

So, Nick got home, watched tv, and I passed out for about 45 restful minutes with only a couple interruptions from my spastic three year old.  The kitchen was still a mess and I was lazy, so I just made the kids Kraft Dinner, which went over really well, and by 6:55 I had Nick off to Beavers.  Then, it was up to me and Rusty to get some shopping done for holiday fun.

We piled into the car and drove over to the Oakville Michael’s where I picked up a bunch of kids craft items, plus the elements to make a lovely wreath for the front door. Almost everything I bought was half price so I ended up getting a lot of handy stuff for the kids to play and create.

Alex helped me get the garbage out after he got home from Fred’s. Fred is off to South America and none of us know when or if he’ll be back. He’ll be missed. Alex brought home some new mugs and bakeware and spices and such, which Fred had to get rid of. Thank you, Fred. 🙂 Bon Voyage.

After he got home, he basically dumped the cats litter box on me, when it’s well overdue to be his turn to clean it out, so in exchange, I made him finish cleaning the kitchen — which he overdid, and I am not complaining about. I can actually breathe in there.  At this point in time, it’s about 12:20am, and the litter box is now empty. I went back upstairs with it to fill it, only to discover that we were out of litter. So, I got dressed, drove to Metro, and bought some, all whilst grumbling. The self checkout there is SO cumbersome. DO YOU WANT THIS? DO YOU WANT THAT? DO YOU WANT THE OTHER THING? CAN I INTEREST YOU IN? LET ME HOLD YOU UP SOME MORE. For fuck’s sake, just let me pay for my cat litter and fucking go.

When everything was done, it was 1am and I was ready to pass out… and boy, did I.  Alex was even kind enough to let me sleep in until he had to leave with Nick. Bonus.

I want to start baking some gingerbread soon, so I need to make some templates for a gingerbread house to bring to next week scouts party. Icing is easy and candy is cheap when you get it at either the dollar store or the bulk barn. It should be a pretty fun house to smash.

Any additional gingerbread I have will be made into cookies and iced accordingly. I’m also considering shortbreads because it’s been a couple years since I last made them. Perhaps, perhaps.

I have a lot of knitting to get done. I should stop procrastinating and get it started today; I have two dolls done and two to go, plus three gifts for people at Nick’s school.

Hm. perhaps another cup of tea to get things going. Genmaicha was my daily tea and it was pretty nice. A lovely earthy, roasted flavour. It was offputting at first, but after the second sip, I decided I liked it.

Let’s see what I have to show in tomorrow’s post.

It’s beginning to look like Giftmas in my house.

Posted by jupe

We put up the tree last night. The kids had an awesome time and Alex and I enjoyed watching them.  We went to Home Depot to pick up a tree and found a beauty without any tags. All the other trees in the same section as that tree had pink tags, so we grabbed a pink tag from the ground and paid a sweet $20 for it.  As the tree relaxed at home, it became quite apparent that we got a tree worth much more than $20 because it is absolutely beautiful and full. It’s nearly as wide as it is tall.  I really do need to make a new tree topper, though. Almost all our ornaments are handmade ornaments and it would make sense if the topper was also a handmade ornament. I think I might just do that and we can make it a family treasure to pass down through the family.

That was the basic theme of yesterday. Here are some pictures! Some of them are a little blurry, but that’s because my kids, like most kids, don’t stay still for very long.  Looks like Alex caught me in some of them, and I caught him, too. We’re even.

It’s Tree Day

Posted by jupe

Today is Christmas tree day!

And as for yesterday, I don’t really want to talk much about it, other than we got the boys’ bunk beds put up. Nick was thrilled to be able to help out and was even happier to be on the top bunk.  Russell wasn’t happy to be on the bottom and disallowed access to the top, but hey. That’s kids, right?

I’ll post pics tomorrow of the tree and of the kids putting up decorations. It’s one of the best days of the year 🙂

I finished that daily drawing, finally. It’s all coloured and inked so tomorrow we’ll have something completely new. Not sure what it’ll be yet, but I’ll figure something out. Don’t I always?