engagement pictures

last week, bfff & i drove up to flattop (a common local mountain to hike) and met our friends judie & steve for our engagement photo session. steve had suggested flattop as a good background for our pics to get some scenic views of alaska. we brought our puppies up with us to attempt to get some shots with them...but they were a little too crazy to sit still. the weather was pretty ominous the whole week and was supposed to rain...but the clouds broke for a couple of hours, just when we needed them to. here's a small assortment of the amazing photos that steve took:

bfff & i walking...

hanging out on these random log benchs...

check out the snow on the mountains...in june

through the trees...

bfff making me laugh (as always)

my bling!

puppy training put to good use

look at those sweet faces!

our little family

an enormous thank you to steve and judie for the photo session! we had a wonderful time :)

weekend is here...almost

for a short week, this one sure was busy. i am SO thankful for the upcoming weekend, even though i'll be working my butt off. i managed to get a lot of things checked off the wedding list, including a big one: addressing & mailing the invitations! i have a few extras that i will take some pics of this weekend to show you all.

since bfff will be busy all weekend, i am going to (finally) use a spa gift card for a much needed massage, spend some quality time with the crazy pups, and make mass amounts of books for the upcoming art show. oh, and clean the house. and actually fold the laundry instead of just leaving a giant pile on the floor. which mia decided to use a little bed last night.

speaking of mia, in addition to coming out of her shell and being a rambunctious puppy that literally zooms around the house, she's also learning some new things from her brother vito. for example, vito has taught her that socks are FUN! grabbing socks from any pile of clean or dirty laundry, flinging them into the air, playing tug of war with them, or just keep away from me....all of it is tons of FUN. i used to see vito proudly trotting past the doorway with a sock in his mouth. but as of this morning, mia was the sock queen. four times past the door, different socks, and a puppy gallop! we're so glad she's finally settled into her home. even though 90% of our socks have holes now.

what are you all doing this weekend? what ever you do, ENJOY!

engagement dinner

we decided to celebrate our engagement by going to a fancy restaurant for dinner! the view was spectacular:

and it got better as the evening progressed:

i forgot to take a picture of our dinners (which was amazing!) but i did get dessert :)

us in between courses:

me, deer in headlights:

then me looking very Japanese (i should have shown the peace sign):

yay us!

the end :)

weekend

we took the crazy puppy out during the weekend for a walk (full sprint for him). here's a couple of pictures:

sprinting towards our knees

not tired at all

since spring is coming, everything is melting and turning into a sloppy mess. which means vito is wet, dirty, and stinky. quite the combination. so, we got ready to give him a bath:

note the tail is a blur of happy

the end.

puppy antics

our dear puppy vito stayed the night at our (& his) friends' house over the weekend. bfff & i were going to help out at a gun class early sunday morning and our options were to either take vito & have him be stuck in the car, then probably start eating the car....or leave his with his bestest friends. so we decided he would have more fun with his buddies.

he had a blast. and he was also exhausted. he slept hard when we picked him up and all the way through monday. and we started getting worried. "why is he SO tired? he should have bounced back a bit by now." he usually jumps up when he hears the cheerios box rattle. he normally looks out the window with a bit more excitement than this:


then, at about 5:30pm, bfff was petting him and vito started the sound. if you have a dog, you know what i'm talking about. the "i'm-about-to-throw-up" sound that usually happens at 3 in the morning and wakes you up from a dead sleep. fortunately, he made it to the linoleum. lo & behold...he had eaten a squeaker. we don't know when he ate it or where for that matter. at least he threw it up. and didn't choke.

5 minutes later, he was back to normal. he wanted to play, race around the house, bite bfff's ears, eat, and be his usual mischievous self. geez.

ski weekend

this past weekend, our friends rented a little cabin about an hour outside of our town. we met them out there for a little mini get-together and it was a blast!! bfff & i decided to attempt skijoring with the puppy, since all he ever wants to do is pull anyway. for those who aren't familiar with skijoring, i'll explain: vito has a harness that connects to us with a lead. we hook that into a harness we are wearing. and then he pulls us while we ski behind him. in order to get him used to the harness, we've been taking him sledding and having him pull up the sleds when we get to the bottom of the hill (partially training, partially because we are lazy).

our friends cross-country ski. bfff had never tried that type of skiing. and i hadn't done it in over 10 years. and quite frankly, i really didn't like it when i did ski 10 years ago. i learned how to cross-country ski in high school and HATED it. loved the people i skied with though, they were great. but the actual skiing part sucked. i wasn't good at it, the head coach of the team didn't give a rat's ass about you unless you were good, and the competition side of it wasn't fun at all. however, this weekend completely turned around my outlook - i had a blast! first, i actually remembered how to ski, which was a surprise. second, this was something we could do together as a family (me, bfff & vito) and with our friends. there wasn't the stress of racing and it was fun to see vito in his element. bfff picked it up SO quickly - he did so much better than me on my first couple of days on skis. he seriously impressed me. and was brave enough to have vito pull him around too.

i eventually had him pull me and that puppy hauls ass! he was SO receptive to my direction and if i fell, he'd stop and check on me. instead of dragging me through the snow on my face. so, overall, it was a pleasant experience.

poor pup is tuckered out. our friend got some video of us skiing a bit but i don't have a copy of it yet. so here's a pic of vito on our way back from our trip:

we usually can't even get him to sit down for more than 0.3 seconds when he's in the car.

we should have named him "destruct-o"

after last week's episode of vito dismembering our friend's baby/dog gate, i had the urge to try, try again. so i made my way to our local tar-jay (said with a french accent of course) and picked up a new baby gate. something without mesh. something made of plastic & smooth surfaces to avoid attempts at puppy climbing.

the new puppy obstacle

bfff arrives home after the first attempt - puppy had a couple of hours alone with a peanut butter filled kong, favorite bone, bed & water....and all is well. we decided to try this alone time again, upping the ante at close to 3 hours. all is well. the next day...bfff beats me home again. and all is....umm, well...see for yourself:


i know this might be difficult to make out (darn phone camera) but these are the blinds that dared to stand in the path of vito's rage (i.e. puppy energy). i should say, what's left of them, that is.

at least the gate stayed up.

birthday

i had a good birthday this year. it was at the tail end of a long weekend. i turned the big two - eight...i feel like i've officially entered my late twenties. so that means i should be older, wiser, & confident, right?

this year was extra special because it was the first time bfff & i were able to spend my birthday together in alaska. (there was one other time but we were in seattle.) every other year he's been out of town due to work. bfff set up this big dinner at one of my favorite restaurants and ordered the most delicious cake. here are some pics from the evening:

bfff actually did not hit my eyeball, but it was close. sweet hat, no?

opening presents (3 generations of my family!)

my super special awesome birthday cake, thanks to bfff

tadgear softshell - gift from bfff. i have been eyeing this coat for months.

after dinner & getting ready to go home

i laugh out loud every time i see this. it's titled "picture face". ask my mom :)

i had such a fun evening with some of my favorite people! too bad puppy couldn't be there. but then we'd never be able to eat there again.

i wonder what 28 has in store for me this year....

paper cutter suckiness

i received the stack paper cutter i ordered a while back (and wrote about it here) and was SO excited to get it open & in use. i imagined stacks of perfectly cut paper & book board just waiting to be made into books. i saw images of the blade cutting through 10 sheets of book board like butter. tons of ideas floated around in my head - new books i could make with trimmed, flat edges. and then reality kicked me.

first off, i thought the cutter would come assembled, due to the many reviews i read online. umm NOT! so we (meaning bfff) pieced it together fairly easily, following the rather minimal instruction sheet. then we had to square the measuring piece up to the blade (pain in the ass). so it was square & done & we left it alone for a couple days.

well i realized that some other adjustments needed to be made - measuring piece had to be moved so that it would cut 2" and not 2.5". then the cutting wasn't so good. in fact, it sucked. book board was a huge hassle. i couldn't get enough leverage to cut through the board. bfff adjusted the blade so it was more level. cutting still sucked. the board edges were mangled. the clamp had to be locked down so tight that it left ruts in whatever i was cutting. and even so, the stack still moved. a lot.

fed up with the number of adjustments & the fact that this machine wasn't performing up to my expectations, i called the company and laid it out for them. basically, the rep made it sound like operator error, that i needed to make more adjustments, and finally, he reluctantly gave me a return authorization number. i had ordered a refurbished cutter but they actually sent me a brand new one because they were out of the refurbished ones - not that it mattered. SO disappointing. and frustrating. and irritating because i now have to pay an asinine amount of money to ship this stupid piece of crap back to the company that they WILL NOT REIMBURSE ME FOR.

lesson learned: order from a trusted company, be wary of amazon reviews, and get free shipping.

outdoor fun!

since this past weekend was a long weekend for me - plus valentines & my birthday, bfff asked me "what do you want to do?" i dug deep into my childhood and a brilliant idea came to me - SLEDDING!! oh yea! we geared up, snowpants, gloves, hats, and all. bfff had gotten vito (the now 67 pound puppy) a harness and lead for skijoring (for those who don't know - apparently the dog pulls you while you cross country ski. which means i would probably run into trees or be dragged face first a lot.) we got the puppy all set up in his harness and after a while he stopped trying to bite it.

we headed out into the warm, sunny 30 degree weather...and made a quick stop at our local tar-jay. bought 2 saucer sleds and this:
yes it's a sled for pulling stuff. but it's also large enough to sit in and has this little rope on the front that gives the impression you can steer. which, i found out, you can't steer. at all.

we went to the park where we normally take vito. bfff instructed me to sit on my neon green saucer and hold on to vito's lead in the middle of the trail. i sat at the top of a hill with a gentle slope and vito took off FULL BLAST! we flew down the trail and it was SO freakin fun. all vito wants to do is pull so we figured - let's let him pull! must be the half husky in him.

we found a good sledding hill, that kids abandoned for the goliath hill on the other end of the park, and i got the first run. i hauled ass down the hill with snow spraying in my face while i screamed the whole 3 second ride. i had seriously forgotten how much fun sledding is! vito ran up and down the hill with us and pulled me on another trail (and almost into about 10 trees).

lesson learned: screw expensive winter activities like snowboarding & skiing! free sledding is the way to go!

oh, and get a padded sled. i think my backside is bruised.

surprise at work

i received a mystery phone call right after lunch today:
"hello?"
"is this stephanie?"
"yes."
"do you work for the *insert business name here*?
"umm who is this?"
the caller then immediately launched into an explanation for the phone call....he was a delivery guy. for this:



seriously?! flowers!! how awesome is that? i was completely surprised. bfff did good :)

etsy shop project

since it is now 2010, i thought it would be a good idea to start up my etsy shop. really get it started - not posting a few things here and there like in the past. i would really like to start generating some sales through etsy and broaden my customer base. i've been doing a lot of reading regarding how to set things up and information about photo taking, advertising, etc. and to start, i opened a new account with etsy - one completely separate from my personal (shopping) account. so now, people will be able to find my etsy shop by searching for TamaPress (under sellers)! since there is currently nothing up, i'll post the link to the shop later...

i'll post updates as things progress and links to products once things are set up. in addition, i'll also work on updating the Tama Press website with new photos.

thanks to bfff for planting the seed (eons ago) to have my etsy site under TamaPress. once again, his support has helped me take one more step towards making my artwork full time!

before & after - bedroom

i apologize for not getting the pics up over the weekend. the days just flew by! bfff is back *hooray!* and our puppy can't let him out of his sight. it's the cutest thing. it is SO good to have our little family back together. i was scrambling to get the room finished before bfff flew in - so things weren't quite as tidy as i had hoped & not all the pictures were hung. oh well.

i remembered to take the before pictures after some things were already moved around and i had taped the walls. oops. at least i remembered this time. the room is a long rectangle - big, but awkward. as you'll see, there are 2 closets, 2 doors & 1 window, making furniture placement rather difficult.

here's the before pics:

on the right wall you can see closet doors

taken from the closet doors in previous pic

and the after pics:

bfff has been wanting an office area for quite some time, so i made an attempt to set one up, along with all of his "me" wall stuff. the bed & office areas are currently separated by vito's gigantic kennel, but hopefully we won't need that soon & i'll be able to put a shelf there instead.

the white lights were inspired from a picture i saw on design sponge (here). they add a nice little soft glow & looked better than i hoped.

in addition to the paint, i got a chocolate duvet cover (matches the puppy), new aqua sheets, & a little pillow (that vito has already decided is his).

vito posing & smiling for me

bfff's reaction was classic! after we got home from the airport, i rushed upstairs to get vito, plugged in the icicle lights, and closed the doors. bfff eventually went into the bedroom and exclaimed "HOLY ****! this looks GREAT!" hahaha!! definitely the reaction i was going for. i got a little nervous the day he flew with thoughts of "what if he doesn't like it? i don't have time to paint over it!!" i'm so glad he likes it & has a space to work now.

my studio space & office (aka storage room for random stuff) is a mess right now and are next on my list to revamp!

clarification

so it was pointed out to me that my last entry didn't come off how i had hoped and that i sounded unhappy. well, i'm actually quite happy - for the past year, i've been extremely happy with bff! i've done more things and had more adventures this past year than i have in...well i don't know when.

to clarify one section: "and i know i can't always be happy, but i could be happier more often." in the past week, i've heard of three deaths. a daughter lost a mom, a mom lost a daughter, and an incredibly creative & sweet man passed away. so, i wrote that i know i can't always be happy, because things like this happen - people pass away before it's their time to go. and it's heartbreaking. knowing people i care about are hurting makes me hurt. so i am going to try to be happier more often, appreciate more little things, not let stress get to me, and even be thankful that i have this stress.

i hope that clarifies that last post. i did not get the "writing" gene (my brother did).

weekend

what a productive weekend! made lots of book covers, cut down a bunch of book board and put a good starting dent into my show inventory. a couple of pictures from my studio (of chaos):

my main work table

book cover scraps - i always want to keep these little triangles for some reason.

i'm planning to have around 260 books made for the november shows, in addition to some new note cards, boxes, and some prints. whew. so far i have 14 books completely done. haha i have a ways to go. but i also have 89 books in progress. maybe, just maybe, this year i won't be completely sleep deprived. riiiiiiiiiight.

my puppy kept me company while i worked and made sure to keep me on my toes. there was a lot of "drop it, Drop It, DROP IT!" and "hey come back here!" and "don't chew on that!" he eventually calmed down (for about 10 minutes). he always sleeps in these weird positions. if he's on his bed, his head is hanging off the edge. or lately he's been doing this:


o he also came with on a little field trip to pick up more dog food. he got to pick out a new toy:


he proceeded to rip off an arm & strew stuffing everywhere by the next day. one more toy added to the growing pile of toys that need surgery. at least he hasn't destroyed any of my work....yet.

bff & i went to see a performance of the lion king, which was AMAZING. i didn't think i would be impressed, but wow i was wrong. not one detail was left to chance. the performers were incredible. the costumes were so creative. just WOW. plus it was our third official date! :)

labor day weekend

i hope everyone had a great long weekend! i'm still getting caught up, as you can tell, since it's already wednesday and i haven't posted anything. bff & i helped out at a defensive pistol course all day saturday & sunday. it was a great class - everyone was tuned in, the weather was gorgeous, and it was a lot of fun! (doesn't hurt that i got to do some shooting too.) puppy met lots of people and was pretty good for the most part...except for the chewed seatbelt buckle. but it still works. we also had a chance to catch up with some friends sunday night. it seemed like its been forever since we've seen them!

monday was my day to get stuff done. did a bunch of laundry (although it is still waiting to be folded). finished some books for bella boutique and cut down a bunch of book board, paper, and ribbon for my next batch of books. also figured out my supply inventory. whew. bff came home from fishing and made the best spaghetti and meatballs EVER. and i made funfetti cake!

so i figured out what i would need to purchase and placed a couple of orders today with my suppliers. and i have to get on my soapbox for a couple of minutes: shipping costs up to alaska STINK! for goodness sake, we are NOT another country, we are part of the united states and should be included in the same shipping rates as everyone else in the contiguous 48 states! it's not the mail delivery people have that hard of a time delivering packages to us - its the same as everywhere else. and how about offering some other shipping options besides UPS? because they might as well ask for your first born child instead of the ridiculous shipping rates they require. *getting off soapbox now* does anyone else have this problem?

oh here are some pics of my favorite books i dropped off at bella (i seriously contemplated keeping them for myself):

this paper is PHENOMENAL in person. it is "Katazome-shi" or stencil dyed paper, printed based on traditional kimono printing techniques.

isn't this perfect for fall?

i hope the rest of the week flies by! i love short weeks :)

back from vacation

just got back from a whirlwind vacation to the east coast! what a great time! i met bff's family for the first time and they were amazing. everyone was so welcoming, straight forward, and full of life. normally i get pretty shy and quiet when it comes to crowds of people, but i was completely at ease.

the weather was phenomenal and the temperature hung around the 90's. i got a slight tan and managed to avoid getting sunburned. we hung around the pool about 98% of the time since it was so hot.

so every year around this time, a rib cook off takes place - and this is serious business. secret recipes and ingredients are guarded with fervor and cooking teams break out their creative side with props & t-shirts.


we didn't have a whole lot of time to prepare a theme and had an idea at the last possible second:


overall the trip was a complete success. things went better than i imagined - it was great to be accepted for who i am. i think the only drawback was that the trip was so short.

p.s. the puppy had fun at his best friends' house and got to play to his heart's content. i think he's bored being an only "child" now.