Creepy Pumpkins and Crawlies

Today another Dr. Who Tardis design for a phone (in this case, an HTC model) is off to a customer in Florida and another creepy pumpkin is finished. A restaurant in Wickenburg said they'd like to have a few on hand and they think they will sell. Since a lot of tourists come through the town, I want to have three for the restaurant by September and go from there hopefully replenishing their inventory. 

Well, it's August 28th and I have two finished. I don't think I'll have three by September 1st. However, the third one will be in progress. I do have a big custom artwork in progress for a dear return customer, and between that and life's distractions, it's been a real challenge. 

Thank goodness for exercise and the gym. That's all I have to say.  Frustrated? Exercise. Run. Weights. Stressed? Exercise. Run. Weights. Sad? Emotional? Worrying about life? Want to get lost in music? Throw the ear buds on, turn up the music and Exercise. Run. Weights. Plus, I don't care that the gym has music playing. If I don't have my iPod, the work-out is a huge struggle. Especially when I was forced to listen to what the gym was playing. I'm sorry, but Justin Beiber's Baby Baby is going to accomplish the exact opposite of what I need at the gym!

As for life itself, I'm still missing Queen Creek, and sometimes it backs up on me. I want to work on some artwork that accomplishes something in the realm of moving on, creating new memories, despite how hard the "moving on" is. However, with Halloween season upon us, I doubt I'll be able to fit that in with all the Pumpkin fun.

Okay, there is that too.

One thing that does help with this transition is how much it cools down at night. This morning I almost felt a nip in the air. Sure, it's been an unusually cool August ("cool" being 90s and 100s...), but there is a difference here as opposed to the valley with all the concrete and asphalt holding the heat in.

I was putting off sharing this because of time and it wasn't fitting into the context of the posts i was working on. And well...distraction.

Back on the 11th, we were doing our usual evening weekday routines (so who knows what was going on), and then we hear Christian go, "What....is....THAT?!" And there by the dishwasher was this cute little baby snakie. At first glance, he looked almost like a worm, but then he had this tiny little tongue coming in and out and his little snakie wiggle. 

Chris and I assessed it and it was a good snakie. Not bad snakie. I know many people believe all snakies are bad snakies. But no. We let him go outside to hopefully find his Mommy Snakie, and he can grow up and eat the bad snakies. Bad snakies being rattlesnakes. It's a good idea in this ecosystem to encourage snakes like this one (we think it was a baby kingsnake) around your habitat to exclude the potentially harmful snakes, such as the rattlers. 

Cute little snakie. See the baby tongue?

The kids were freaking out while Chris and I are just standing there looking at it and trying to make sure he was a good snakie. Silly kids. Sure, snakes and scorpions and other critters were possible and I know they were in our Queen Creek neighborhood (a neighbor was even stung by a scorpion), but we were pretty much lucky to not run into anything like that at our house. We had a mouse problem about five years back but it was taken care of.  There would be black widows in the garage from time to time,  and lizards were in a house sometimes.  I'd try to rescue them (the lizards, not the black widows) before they fell victim to Simon (RIP Simon...) who was good at catching things. But that was pretty much it. Therefore, coming from their fluffy almost critter-free suburban lifestyle to our current residence continues to be an adjustment for the kids.

 Until next time...