New Shoes

 Getting new shoes is a big deal for me because I will go years wearing the same shoes until I completely wear them out and I am forced to buy a new pair.  I think it has been over 4 or 5 years since I last bought a pair of nice shoes for work and every day use.  The summer time here is just so hot, it is important to have nice sandals to survive the heat and keep your feet happy.

  The first pair is a Jambu touring shoe.  It has a 2.5 inch heel and is very comfortable.  They are also very stylish, so I am going to use these for work shoes for my office. 

The second pair I ended up getting after I tried on a pair of Burkenstock Papillo shoes.  They have soft foot beds and I just loved the "peacock" designs on them.  My feet loved these shoes so much I wore them out of the store and didn't want to take them off when I got home.  I am so happy I won't have to wear $3 flip flops anymore. 

It's been a long time since my last post.

I am sorry to anyone who reads my blog, that I have not posted in so long.  My Facebook kind of took over my blogging efforts.  Also, I have pretty much lost focus on what my blog is supposed to be about.  I was kind of using for a diary, and a place to actually write something.  I am not sure I have anything interesting to post on my blog that I haven't already posted on my Facebook.  I have thought about making some posts on apps I like for my iPod that might be useful to read. 

Jelly Bean Foam House

We had quite a day today.  I got to see my baby stand up today, with help from his Papa.  He is such a champ.  I will try to get a picture of him standing up soon and post it up.  His older brother and I had a fun time making a Jelly Bean Foam House.  It is a foam structure which includes a little tree house, two bunnies, baby chicks and a lady bug.  You can decorate the house with flowers, grass and jelly beans and then play with it after building it.  It's such a cute arts and crafts project (which was actually left over from Easter). 

.      

I hope to do one of these foam projects for Halloween this year.  Last year we created a haunted house made out of a paper bag, we colored and cut windows and doors out, and made it look like a haunted house and then decorated it all with spooky stickers.  It had a haunted gnarled tree, a grave yard with grave stones and a secret passage



LUDO's Space Dracula Basketball Expo 2011.

LUDO's Space Dracula Basketball Expo 2011.

Tucson drew the luck of getting to dress up with the Dracula theme.  Here we were, we must be crazy, in our 30's dressing up like Dracula?  I'd do it for LUDO!  We did our best to mix the Dracula theme with rock concert look. These pictures span getting ready in our Dracula outfits before the concert to the concert venue and afterwards.

This is me me getting ready for the concert.  We tried to put on fake fangs but they didn't work out.  It was endlessly hilarious trying to wear them because when you tried to talk with them, "ewe thouded a bit ike isth."  That would make us laugh even more.  It's a miracle we got dressed in time to go.  

  Next we had to eat a good meal before the concert, so what do vampires chow on, well hamburgers of coarse.  I just had to sink my fangs into one.  Check out my bite marks on my neck.  "Ouch," they look like they hurt. 

 You would think getting my skull tennis shoes on would have been easy, but it was not.  I swear it took me 10 minutes to get those those bright yellow laces done up correctly. We were a bit late to the concert because of this.  Sorry everyone. 

LUDO performs at the Tucson's historic Rialto Theater July 28th, 2011.

  The Rialto Theater has a beautiful stage set up with a proper back stage area for the bands.  The stage is pretty small though, and it was very hot, but we packed in for a full house to sing out little hearts out.  Everyone there loved LUDO as much as I do, so it was a blast. 

Andrew Volpe tuning his guitar before the show started.  The crowd was going wild screaming, I have no idea how he heard anything with all that noise.

Matt Palermo warming up. 

Andrew Volpe of LUDO dressed as Dracula, starts the show off.   

LUDO did perform an acoustic version of "LOVE ME DEAD" after having us all sit on the floor and sing along.  

Tim Convy and Tim Ferrel

 Tim Convy making a face.

  We caught Tim Convy in the hallway afterward and he said, "Wow, great job you guys," in reference to our outfits.  I was a bit star stuck and only managed a "Thanks!" in response.  I wish I would have said, "Great job, loved the show, thanks so much! Tucson loves LUDO!" Or any number of things like this.   As well, you often don't ever get to say anything to your favorite band at all, so I'll just count myself lucky to get out a small word.  We didn't get to chat much with the members of LUDO like we had when they played the Rock, because it was just too crowded, but it was still a fun time. 

 Andrew Volpe was cool enough to let us take a picture with him after the concert.

 

I really love this flier for the "Space Dracula Basketball Expo" from the Roxy in LA.  It makes me laugh, the look on Dracula's face is priceless.  I love that he is wearing a LUDO tank top and has a space bubble on his head.  How is he going to bite anyone with that bubble on anyway? 

Classic Coney Island Hot Dog Recipe

My husband's family has been trying to duplicate these Dirty John's hot dogs for as long as I have known them. They were pretty close on their recipe, but Rachel Ray has shared the original Dirty John's Hot Dog Sause for us all. Finally I can try this famous recipe for myself. The natives call them Coney Islands, or from New Way Lunch they called them Dirty John's Dirt Dogs. If you mixed my Mother-in-law's and father-in-law's recipes you would almost have the perfect Dirty John's hot dog. I used to think of them as chilli dogs without the beans.

Ingredients:
8 hot dog buns
1 pound ground beef
2 onions, finely chopped
2 cloves garlic, finely chopped
2 tablespoons chili powder (Sometimes I use only 1 1/2 tbs)
1 tablespoon ground cumin
1 6-ounce can tomato paste
1 tablespoon yellow mustard, plus more for topping
1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
2 teaspoons brown sugar8 beef hot dogs in natural casings

Directions:1.Preheat the oven to 300°. Wrap the hot dog rolls in foil. In a large skillet, cook the beef, half of the onions and the garlic over medium-high heat, breaking up the meat, until the onions are softened and the meat is cooked though, about 5 minutes. Stir in the chili powder and cumin and cook, stirring occasionally, for 3 minutes. Stir in 1 cup water, the tomato paste, mustard, Worcestershire sauce and brown sugar. Bring to a boil, then cover, reduce the heat to medium and cook until thickened, about 20 minutes.

2.Meanwhile, in a large saucepan, cover the hot dogs with water and bring to a boil. Cook until heated through, about 8 minutes. Place the rolls in the oven and heat through. Place the hot dogs in the rolls and top with the chili, the remaining onions and extra mustard.

Note: Sometimes I just steam the buns on a rack over the hot dogs, but my husband likes the buns toasted, like on a grill. He tells me that is how New Way Lunch serves them.


Classic Coney Island Hot Dogs Recipe - Every Day with Rachael Ray

Chihuahua takes care of baby bunnies.

This story just warms my heart. This little guy was at a shelter and adopted these little baby bunnies who were rescued. What a good papa. His favorite thing to do is "clean" the little ones. You know, a chihuahua's favorite activity is licking.

Funny Cake!

I find this cake mix up quite funny. I usually get a laugh out of the cakes where the baker takes a cake order, but mis-understands the customer's request and is too literal about it. This cake is a good example. Obviously the cake text was only supposed to say, "Best of luck in Windy City" but the directions from the customer also got included. May I also just say, the person who decorated this cake has some really nice writing text skills. I find that when I try to write text on a cake, it looks like some 4 year old tried to do it.

This cake is from CakeWrecks: Post...Blowing In The Wind.

Snow, I can't believe it.

It snowed! It hardly ever snows here. What fun. This is a picture of my back yard. We went out a played in the snow all morning. We didn't have gloves though, so our hands got very cold.

Crazy Bike

I snapped a pitcure of this home made, instseresting, crazy looking bike parked outside today. I love seeing things that are unusual and hand crafted like this. It had tapestry fabric in two different patterns on the seat. There was another metal seat attached in the front, so it was a two seater. The handel bars were every wide apart and high, like a motor cycle.

The year in review: 2010

1. Imagine yourself five years from now. What advice would you give your current self for the year ahead? (Author: Jenny Blake) I think it would be a good idea to invest most of my time in learning everything I can about raising a hearing and visually impaired child. Next, to invest time in creating similar parenting styles with my husband. Focus on the people in my life who care about us the most, who want the best for our family, who help me become a better person then I am now. Forget about the rest. I should take some time to relax and read a book now and then and let my creative side out sometimes.

2. How did you travel in 2010? How and/or where would you like to travel next year? (Author: Tara Hunt) I didn’t travel many places this year and mostly stayed home due to strict financial reasons. It’s such a contrast to 2009, since I went to Disneyland and also to Carlsbad, CA., to the beach and Sea World all on summer break. In 2011 I would like to travel to St. Lewis, MO and see LUDO perform in their home town and visit some friends that live there. I have been there before and looked at the all the tourist stuff, but I think the city is very interesting and would enjoy visiting all the arts they have.


3. Let’s meet again, for the first time. If you could introduce yourself to strangers by another name for just one day, what would it be and why? (Author: Becca Wilcott) Kat would be my choice of another name. Kat is short, keeps the first three letters of my name intact, is cute and much less complex then Kathleen I suppose.

4. What was the best moment that could serve as proof that everything is going to be alright? And how will you incorporate that discovery into the year ahead? (Author: Kate Inglis) The moment I got to take my new baby home from the hospital after he was born. Even though we have many struggles to go through with him, it feels like it is going to be alright when I hold him. I will live my life and try to enjoy every moment I have with him because it is a gift.

5. Sift through all the photos of you from the past year. Choose one that best captures you; either who you are, or who you strive to be. Find the shot of you that is worth a thousand words. Share the image, who shot it, where, and what it best reveals about you. (Author: Tracey Clark)




At this moment it would have to be this shot of myself. I took it with my cell phone to try to capture the new color of my hair, but this auburn/gold/red color is proving more difficult to capture on film then I thought. It is an amazing shade in person, but in photos the lighting can change the way it looks dramatically. It best reveals that I am in a new place in my life. My eyes are open now and I will not and can not go back and my red hair reflects this aspect of my life. I think I look a bit spunky in this shot.

Reindeer Doodle

I created this little reindeer Christmas doodle to help me wish everyone a very Merry Christmas!

So far this year I have managed to get a few Christmas cards sent out. I still have a few packages to send off, so I hope those will make it to their destinations on time. This year it is not our focus to give many gifts, but to remember family and friends and the reason for the Christmas season, the birth of Jesus.

I have really enjoyed seeing all the Christmas trees decorated in so many unique and beautiful styles this year. I enjoy seeing all the Christmas lights at night. The neighbors on our street have really done a great job putting out their decorations and lighting up the evenings. Best wishes to all!

LUDO Doodles

I created these little drawings and doodles of the band LUDO last night. I had a fun time making them with a digital doodle program called Bamboo Doodlescape. I find it usually frustraiting to try to draw with a mouse, but for doodles it worked out ok. I would much rather use a pencil when I draw. I think I could actually use some more doodles or drawings in my blog more often. It might be fun to express ideas through drawing rather then words. Best of all I feel good that I actually did something creative today.

The History of My Little Blog.

We are all a bit mad here....

I feel that some readers of this blog may be wondering how I came up with my theme and why I often refer to "Alice in Wonderland", "Through the Looking Glass" or about the mysterious characters of Luna or Raven Spinner . I wrote a nice introduction when I trasferred my old blog into this site in June of 2009, just as we were shutting down our madteapartyafternoon.com web site. If you would like to read about this event, here is a link to my earlier blog about it:

Clink here to follow my link.

My blog has morphed into this creative outlet for me now. I find that most times I discuss books, movies, and music on my facebook, but my blog is more about creative projects I am working on or events I have been to or seen lately.

Botanical Gardens and Butterfly Exibit.

We spent a lovely afternoon at the Tucson Botanical Gardens last week. The best part of the gardens is by far the exotic butterfly exhibit. Walking into a heated tropical room full of amazing butterflies is like walking into another world. They have entry rooms and exit rooms to make sure the butterflies do not land on you and then escape the exhibit into the environment. It can be kind of amusing to have these voulteers who cary around dusters and fluff you down every now and then. I have never been "dusted" before. I wonder if this is how furniture feels?

The butterfly room kind of reminds me of a large fancy green house. There are many exotic plants and pools of fish and lush vegetation all around. The butterflies are just everywhere and sometimes they do land on you. Our baby loved seeing the butterflies flying above him and feeling their wings brush his legs when they landed on him. Our oldest son could not stand still when the butterflies tried to land on him. It was quite humorous to watch him jump to the side and laugh in delight. He also liked watching the fish. The room is quite warm and they do let you leave to cool off and then come back in later. The butterflies are from all over the world and are quite large and rare. Outside the exhibit you can see where they cultivate the cocoons and caterpillars before they transform into butterflies. The exibit is very educational and I was happy to share it with my family.

A gift of beautiful flowers.

I couldn't help but post a picture of these flowers. My husband was awarded these after a recital in which he performed on October 10th, 2010. They smell devine and are very pretty. I wish that they could talk. I'd imagine I would feel very much like Alice then....

LUDO concert September 28th

I absolutely love the band LUDO from their masterful lyrics to their sweeping melodies, catchy tunes, dramatic flair and humorous stories. I mean, what band do you know of that sings about, self loathing pirates, winking cyclopes, robots and cyborgs, parading skelletons, dreams of manta rays, true love, banking robbing with the girl you love, and all that topped with whipped cream? Who wouldn't love that? I feel extreemly lucky that D.L. White introduced me to them about a year ago. Her blog Storm In A Tea Cup often features LUDO as her muscial interlude. She also sent me a copy of each of their albums about a month before the concert. What a wonderful surprise that was. I have been listening to all four albums over and over ever since.

The self titled LUDO(2003), Broken Bride (their rock opera from 2005), Your Awful I Love You (2008) and the brand new Prepair the Preparations(2010).

I was very excited to discover that LUDO would be in my hometown as part of their tour in September 2010. We had to attend, even though I have not been to a concert since the Police in 2008. D.L. White was able to travel and attend the concert with us. What an amazing night ensued. Here are some pictures to document this fantastic concert during the "Prepare The Preparations" tour.

They opened the concert with the main theme from "Never Ending Story" (which I had not heard since I was a kid and LUDO admittedly say they are all big fans of 80's music, so this was quite fitting) and traveled right into "Go-Getter Greg" about a guy who is a bit obsessive over a girl who has moved into his apartment complex. Greg is a bit of a stalker, but it's a humorous song with funny lyrics and a very catchy chorus. Watching Andrew Volpe's facial expressions when he sings makes the song even that much more humorous.

Next it was on to one of my all time favorite LUDO songs, Hum-Along which tells the story of unrequited love which includes an imagined journey which spans being kidnapped by pirates, and singing to jaguars in twelve bars. My favorite line in that song: "And between the jungle and the stars, you sing nonsense songs in 12 bars to me / And in my sleep I hum along / You'll never hear this song / You'll never see the movie in my head."

Drunken Lament a song about drinking away the pain of a break up, and I just adored "Too Tired To Wink", which has lyrics that are impressively complicated, and reminds me of something from the mind of Lewis Carrol. For example, check out this line: "I stored a cyclops for a week with hard-tack in the clink / If ever he would bat a lid I thought it was a wink / But the world is flush with monocular mush and dingbats to despise / You find they're not thinking, just narrowly blinking, / But never quite cleaning their eyes."




Later on they performed "Lake Pontchartrain" which is a fantastic LUDO song, telling a story about a guy and his two friends who discover what is really at the bottom of the lake during a dark and stormy night. Tim Convey, the keyboard player made sure to get the audience all riled up to sing toghether: "Come down to Lake Pontchartrain / Rest your soul and feed your brain /That's where you will get to see everything the water can be" and watching Andrew's facial expressions was hilarious during the "scary" parts of the story.



Tim Convy also took charge of the whipped cream spraying during their "Whipped Cream" song as we all did the funny "Whipped Cream" dance from their video.

"Anything For You", was a great change of pace and Andrew and Tim Ferrell shared the mic.



At some point there was a break in the music that I am a bit confused about. I still didn't understand all that "MIKEY!!!" stuff between Andrew and another guy from a different band named Mikey. You just had to be there for that one I guess and then they all got into a dog pile during a long guitar solo of Tim Ferrell's. It was a bunch of boys and guitars all over the place, but they were able to untangle themselves to finish with "Love Me Dead" much to the delight of the entire audience.



I have never seen an audience who could sing their hearts out to almost every word of every song. You could feel how much everyone loved LUDO. We cheered and cheered. When the house lights came back up everyone gave up cheering eventually and we figured that was the end of the concert, but LUDO returned to shock us with "Girls On Trampolines" which they swore they were NOT going to sing. Haha, jokes on us! Thanks for the unexpected oncore!


The actual set list:

Go-Getter Greg
Hum Along
Drunken Lament
Too Tired to Wink
Topeka
Lake Pontchartrain
Rotten Town
Part I: Broken Bride
Whipped Cream
Horror of Our Love
Anything for You
Save Our City
Good Will Hunting By Myself
Love Me Dead

Encore:
Girls on Trampolines

After the concert, and much to our delight and surprise the band members signed autographs, took picture with fans and talk to everyone. It was amazing to get to meet these tallented guys and we couldn't help snapping some photos of them. I got my CD signed by each member.

Andrew Volpe (Lead Singer) and us. We were total nerds talking to him, but he was cool anyway. I am sure they are used to fans being silly and forgetting what they really want to say. I've never met anyone famous before, so I was pretty star struck and I couldn't think of anything intellengent except, "Your show was fantastic!" I can think of about a thousand things I would like to say now, but at the time I was just giddy from the concert experience. Maybe next time I'll keep my head together better.

Matt Polermo (Percussionist) and my husband. They had a nice conversation.


Tim Convy (Keyboardist) He called me a "sweetie."

Tim Ferrell (Lead Guitar)

My Pets Are My Pals.

I found my little dogs all sleeping on my couch today. I decided to break out the camera and snap some pictures of my old pals. Ivory is 12, Ebony is 11 and Rascal is 9 years old. Having older dogs is a challenge because they are kind of grouchy at times. They don't adjust fast to new situations, but their personalities are pretty sweet and have been since they were puppies.



Ebony loves to sleep in my bed, although I don't let him do that except at nap time occasionally, he will snuggle as close to me as he can, right next to my back. One morning it was so cold outside he ran in, jumped up on the bed and literally dove under the covers. He was hiding. He didn't move a muscle in case I decided to put him into his little doggie bed instead of let him stay under the warm covers with me. It made me laugh so hard I let him stay under the covers of course.




Last week Rascal was barking and barking at me and I had just let her out to go potty. I kept telling her to "hush" but she just wouldn't be quiet. Finally, after a time I realized the water dish was empty and she was telling me she was thirsty. I filled up the dish and she was happy. She is a demanding little thing and cute as a button. UPDATE: As of July 2010 Rascal has been adopted by my mother in law. I am so glad Rascal has a new home that doesn't include a 4 year old to stress her out and she is getting super spoiled. I think she will fit really well there.



In this picture Ivory looks like she has one ear, but really she was just annoyed to get her picture taken. None of my Chihuahuas like to get their pictures taken, except Ebony sometimes. I often find it hard to get a picture where Ebony isn't in it. What a ham.