A Great Big Sigh of Relief

For months things have been bad on our horizon.... Michael happens to be in a field that is a combination of the two worst things in the World right now... banking and realestate. Today, after months of literally being sick with worry... we got the news that Michael still has his job. We still have some big hurdles to get past... it's been a really tough year for the Carrillo's... but this was seriously sweet news. Albeit bittersweet...his boss, who had been with the company for 30+ years was let go today. There's a really bad feeling in your gut when you think that while we're breathing our sighs of happiness and relief... his boss and coworkers are cleaning out offices, and are dealing with the "what now?". It's such a crappy time.

Dylan and I made another birdhouse for our backyard.

And here's "Gigantor"! I traded Paul Loghridge some artwork for this badboy. I love him!!!

Check the hand letterin on the old volt meter. awesome.

We actually got news about Hubby's job scene today while we were at the Pumpkin patch. That would have been a real buzzkill had the news not been good...
Here are Bodie and Dylan at the petting zoo.



Jennifer Soto brought Shannon over to meet us at the patch. There's a lot of love between these two. Shannon always talks about marrying Dylan. She plans on dressing up as Belle on the big day.. and Dylan will be dressed as the Beast.

Here's Jennifer and Shannon amongst the pumpkins.

Dylan sits atop a really big pumpkin. Tomorrow we carve!!!!

And finally here's a picture of me and the pilfered frogs. There's a house down the street from us that went into foreclosure, and the people left in the middle of the night. I have a huge thing for frogs, and they left this little statue behind. I decided I would snag it up while neighbor Bonnie and I were on our nightly walk. But when I ran up to the porch to get it... the neighbors pulled up and shined their headlights right on us. Nice. So Bonnie and I pretended to be tying our shoes... instead of stealing frogs... at least until they went inside.

Alright, Michael and I are going to crack open a bottle of champagne... and celebrate the days good fortune.

Art & Crafts

My wonderful artist friend Brandon Steen will be having a solo show at MModern this November and asked if I'd like to throw down on a painting together. His show is called "Gunky Gave Me Cash" and is inspired by the man himself. Here's our collab on the Girl From North Country...
Here's Brandon's side of things...


and here's the final on our girl...

Thanks Brandon for letting me have fun with it. I'm so looking forward to finally meeting Brandon and his beautiful wife, Miss Jane. They live up in Canada, so for years we've talked via email and phone... but have never met in person.

Michael's parent's had the boys for a sleepover last night, so I worked on that painting and then did a few crafty things that I've been thinking about. First I Mod-podged this little painting Dylan did at preschool to a piece of wood. It'll be sweet to break this out and hang it on the door year after year.
Then I finished up this funkin. I silver-leafed it and painted flames. I have two more to do still... I wanted to make some things to decorate the inside of the house with every year. I have a ton of little crafty Christmas things... but with two boys now, I figure I need to beef up Halloween.

The Hap's

I'll start this post off with a cute little drawing that Dylan did. It's cool to see him starting to draw little characters and animals already. Note the belly button...
And here's a couple of shots from the Baby Tattooville visit to Jeff Soto's studio on Friday, October 3rd. It was really cool getting a chance to say hello to some of the artists that were there. I even got a chance to slurp down the first oyster I've ever had in my life... and I can now officially say I love them.


The next morning Mike and I road tripped up to Santa Clara California for the "Cosmic Art of Robots" show at Sonya Paz Gallery. Here's our Bodie Bear waving bye bye and seeing us off.
The boys stayed at the house with Nana & Pop's overnight while Hubby and I tripped.

The Gallery was a really cool space. The layout, the archetecture, and the vibe of the joint were all killer.
Michael flanked by Sonya's art and standing next to a Paul Loughridge bot.

Paul Loughridge's "Steampunk Steer".

As an added bonus for the night my bestest Gal Sloan had to make a trip up to Santa Cruz, so she ended up staying in the room right next to us at the Marriot and going to the show.

Here'a all of the artist's together: L to R Tracy Cox, Christine Benjamin, I'm the Brick House in the middle, Sonya Paz, and Paul Loughridge
On a sidenote... after seeing myself in these photos, I've since been walking my ass off (down 5 pounds!) and have chopped my hair into a cute little bob. I'm on a mission to get my Mojo back, dammit.

Here's Sloanie with Sonya's cute little dog Miss Sami. We laughed about this picture because Sami looks like she poses for pictures quite often.

I had such a great time at the show. Obviously I don't have the time to get out much right now, so it was such a joy to hobnob with the other artists. I totally had an amazing connection with Christine, she's someone I wish I could hang out with regularly. I had been a fan of Paul "Lockwasher" Loughridge for a little while thanks to Flickr, so it was really amazing to see his stuff in person. I had told him I would love to see what his workspace looks like, and he told us to cruise on by since he'd be on our way back home. Paul's a totally great dude, with a fantastic sense of humor. I would love to walk around inside his brain for a day to see what his thought process is like. His work is amazing.


And his workspace (the garage) is equally amazing. He has stuff everywhere. By the way, that small 8" x 8" space on the table there is actually where he works.


a shot of Paul and Michael in front of the nuts n' bolts display case.
Thank you Paul so much for the hospitality!

And on Wednesday, we took Dylly back to Disneyland. I'd never been there at Halloween time, so it was really magical to see all the decorations. They had this really amazing dia des los muertos display up near New Orlean's Square. Here's Michael and Dylan by the all dead band.

Free day of the dead face painting. Dylan opted for his arm.

I got a cute little skull on my face. I think next time we go we'll be taking Bodie with us. We hadn't taken him yet because he's really sound- sensitive and has that stranger anxiety thing going on... but I'm dying for him to experience this with us.

It's been a busy, busy time this past week. I did a little work for an iphone project, and then finished up another super cool project that I'm dying to show... but I can't yet.
I'm also working on a joint piece with Brandon Steen for his upcoming solo show at Mmodern so I'll post pics soon. Then it's on to painting for the Alcove "Wizard of Oz" show, and the "Pin it Up Babycakes" show at the Minna. Whew, there really aren't enough hours in the day right now.