wearing nail polish + lipstick again

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PROUD TO SAY that I started Weight Watcher's 3 weeks ago and I've lost 4.8 lbs.
I'm telling you, eating the right amount of food is one of THE coolest notions ever.
Alright, so only 15.2 more to go.

Also, we bought our tickets to Paris! ♥ I'm in complete disbelief, though.

This is a still from the movie The Red Balloon. Watching it is one of my earliest memories of attending French Immersion school. I went from 4 to 12 years old. A big reason going to France has been a lifelong dream of mine.

my nerdy valentine

heartless bastards

FINALLY seeing them tonight ♥

happy birthday, my sweet boy

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TODAY MY SON ARTHUR TURNS 14 YEARS OLD.

But he'll always be my baby boy to me.

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The following is a journal entry from sometime in 2005, when Art was just 7.

Friday night was the sock hop at Art's school. It was my first sock hop and the experience was surreal. Children everywhere, screaming, flailing, sweating, running through the darkness, bouncing off one another in quick bursts of disco light like a pin ball machine.

Leaving the school afterwards he told me his throat hurt. So we went to the grocery for ice cream and Tylenol. By 9:30 pm it was bedtime for the boy.

My sister came over for a Sex and the City marathon, one of my favorite guilty pleasures. Well, that and People magazine. Janna says I'm the only person she knows who can simultaneously appreciate AdBuster's and People magazine. Anyways, we finished around 1 am and I crawled into bed with a tiny inferno.

We slept closely. I listened to his sad sleepy moans, watched his chest rise and fall and felt his warm sick breath on my face.

By 2:30 am I got up to use the bathroom. Unable to distinguish between the flushing and his howling (a notable precursor to bedside vomiting), I returned to find the boy puking all over my pretty pink bedroom.

Did I mention he had ice cream before bed?

So, he curled up with a clean blanky and pillow in his usual post puke spot—on the fuzzy rug near the heat vent on the bathroom floor—until 6 am. Intermittently touching his neck, whispering I love you and kissing his forehead, I washed sheets, comforters, the bed skirt and pillow shams. Cleaned the floor and the dresser and disinfected the toilet over and over.

Somehow, in this rhythm, my mind rewound to another lifetime. I remembered wee morning breast feeding's slumped over in an oversized plum armchair. I remembered the humility of answering the door in a t-shirt soaked in two visible streams of breast milk. I remembered trying not to quote Sesame Street among my childless friends too often. And I remembered not quite recognizing myself in the mirror anymore.

I remembered it all. And it made my heart smile like it hadn't in a long, long time—stopping to be reminded of the overwhelming depth of love I have for my child. This boy who made me lucky enough to be his mama.

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resolutions and art

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THIS PAST MONTH has been good for me. Made a few New Year's resolutions...

• cook dinner every week
• prepare for my first time traveling to Europe (!)
• and lose 20 lbs (I can't believe I just said that one out loud)

Anyways, I like the path I'm on. I've never been really good at personal accountability so it feels good to be committed and focused.

The only negative is that I have a hard time getting it up to make art. I'm not beating myself up about it—I know it's always there, patiently waiting for me to come out and play—but it's just not happening for now.

So even though there's no new art of my own to post, I am excited to share two new pieces I've received from others!

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Meet "Claude de France," a Prickly Plaque made by mixed media, assemblage and collage artist Suzanna Scott. I fell in love with Suzanna's work IMMEDIATELY and knew I had to have this piece. You should check out the rest of Suzanna's shop on Etsy. Her stuff is unbelievably affordable, too!

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And the second piece of art we added to our collection is this amazing painting by Midwest artist Edward G. Kelley. It was a gift from my in-laws who bought Kelley's works at an auction not too long ago. Isn't she breathtaking? All those strokes of mint and mauve against the black. I love it more every time I sit and stare.

Nola wants you to know she loves it, too.

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