Well crap. lol

Hey all. Andrea here again...

Wow, I look different blonde, ne? (This is a pic from last year when I went blond for a short time.)






Well, today my brother John, his wife and baby John John came to visit. my nephew's 2nd birthday is coming up next week, so I spent the weeks before their visit searching for the right gift.

I like to buy unique gifts. Things I know no one else would think of buying. I bought both of my nephews a slide, I had their faces superimposed into DVDs of Dora the Explorer, Arthur the Aardvark and Barney where they appear in an entire episode... I did the same thing only with a book where their pictures are on every page, as the main character of the book.

Like I said, I like to get gifts I know no one else is going to buy.

I finally found some good gifts.

For John John's 2nd birthday I bought him Little Pim DVDs. Little Pim is a cartoon Panda who teaches toddlers and preschoolers different languages. I bought the Japanese volumes 1 and 2. Its never too early to teach a kid a second language. It's important as it helps with giving them an affinity for learning another language, which is beneficial for high school, college and being bilingual is great on job applications. And Japanese is just as important as any other language in my opinion, because lots of major American companies work closely with Japan.

My other sister-in-law is due to give birth to my first niece soon, so I special ordered her a Kimono styled onsee and matching kimono style newborn shoes.

I didn't want my other nephew Mikey to feel left out when his sister-to-be gets a gift, so I bought him a CD/Song book. It's Japanese toddler songs with English translations. The CD helps mom and dad learn the songs along with him. He has a real affinity for music. (if you sing a song to him once or twice, he can sing it back to you in perfect melody, in baby talk.)

he also loves music (obsessively) if you start playing a song, he'll make you play it over and over and will get mad when you turn the music off. He also has an affinity for languages (as he likes to make up his own language. For example: Music is Miika, Light is Unda, Grandma is Kangi, Money is Manga... He knows the real words, he just chooses to say his own. LOL and he's only 1.5 years old.)

So I figured I had really great unique gifts.

Well, my bro, sis-in-law and John John finally made it into town, and I was talking to my sis-in-law about my other nephew and his making up of words. I said he's going to have a real easy time learning another language.

That's when my sis-in-law said, "yeah, well, John John needs to learn English before he learns any other language. You remember when I did that book thing, were I asked for children's books instead of cards? Well, my cousin bought him the "green eggs and ham" book, only its all in Spanish."

(side note: my sis-in-law knows a little Spanish. not fluently, but enough to communicate)

"Well, that's just too hard translating it into English cause there are some parts I'm not sure of, so I just put it away. I don't even take it out... If he wants to learn another language when he's older, that's great. But I'm focusing on him learning English first."

As she's saying this, I'm thinking about the "Little Pim - Japanese" Toddler DVDs I have sitting in a gift bag. expensive DVDs too mind you.

Well crap.

So I'm going to give DVD 1 to my nephew Mikey, and the other DVD to his (soon to be born) sister. And tomorrow I'll have to run out and see if I can secretly buy John John a new birthday gift. Only problem is, the only real place I can go shopping around here is Walmart, which means, forget the unique gift idea.

I'm going to see if I can buy a baby guitar or a baby drum set. I know no one would buy him a baby drum set (for obvious reasons. lol) So fingers crossed that Walmart has one in the toy section. I mean, what are the chances really of her saying "If he wants to learn another language when he's older, that's great, but right now I want to focus on him learning English."? I mean, really?

*GAH*

Carefree day today

Hey all, Andrea here!

It was hot again today... I was going to go to the beach, but I had a small headache from the heat and I decided just to stay home and enjoy a quiet day relaxing.

I watched a little TV while playing a little Everquest II (for those who don't know, it is a mmorpg like world of warcraft.)

I play a half human, half demon/vampire character. Its a fun game.

This is my character, Andrieha

And this is my character Andrieha baring her fangs during a battle. (click the pic to see a larger version. Much cooler full size.)

lol

I ride in style on my enchanted tiger horse.  =^_^=

Playing video games is not all I did today. I also decided to shine up a few of my newest agates that I found when at the beach... like this one:

And I caught up on some reading.

I read my Black Butler Manga to the most current chapters

Black Butler is a pretty cool Manga.








I finished "Alice in the Country of Hearts". it was a pretty good manga... but I was shocked it was actually over. It was very confusing because the mangaka left so much unanswered an unexplained.

There was a message board dedicated to talking about Alice in the Country of Hearts, and a LOT of people seemed as confused as I did. If I were the mangaka, the last thing I would want to hear when a series is over, is that everyone was left confused, so that was a bit disappointing. The series had so much potential and had such an amazing start... it should have ran for a few more chapters to tie everything together neatly. However, it was still a good series. Confusing in the end, but good. I mean, you get the general idea of where the story was going... it just didn't get there as nicely as it could have had it ran longer. Still worth reading.

And I caught up on BLEACH. (The manga, not the cleaner)

*Spoiler alert* (since most of my friends read manga and watch anime. lol - us nerds stick together. hee hee)

I was pretty surprised Gin Ichimaru ended up not being a bad guy. Seriously, I thought the twist would be he would betray Aizen to rise to power himself, but instead it was all a ploy to kill Aizen and avenge what Aizen did to his true friend and the one person he truly cared about, Matsumoto Rangiku. (When they were children, he saved Rangiku from death at the hands of Aizen and his minions, and everything he did, his cold demeanor, his betrayal of the soul society, it was all to get close enough to Aizen to enact his revenge so Rangiku would hever have to cry again.)

So that was a pretty cool twist.



After reading the most recent chapters of BLEACH I decided to read a little of "Pride and Prejudice" (my third favorite book. Samurai Banners of Furin Kazan being first, and Pride and Prejudice and Zombies being 2nd. lol)

So all in all, it was a relaxing day. Nothing too exciting happened.

one funny thing though, I was reading the paper, and every day they have a police blotter. Basically, it tells you who got arrested, who got in a car accident, who filed a complaint against who, so on. (On the average basis, its usually deer hitting cars, DUIs, kids smoking pot, or people getting arrested for driving on a suspended license. Sometimes the occasional dog complaint... Nothing big really happens here.) Usually if something bigger than a kid knocking over a mailbox happens, its front page news. lol.

Today though, there was one cute animal complaint in the blotter.

"Mrs. ***** of *** street, called in a complaint against one Mr. Black Bear for trespassing on her property and disturbing a bird feeder. Mr. Bear, whose last known address was listed as The deep woods, had fled the scene prior to police arriving. Mrs. ***** was advised to remove the bird feeders for the time being and contact the police if Mr. Bear was caught trespassing again."

That gave me the giggles. Someone writing the police blotter that day was bored. hee hee

anyhoo... that's it for now. I have a lot to do tomorrow.  I have my brother, sis-in-law and nephew coming to visit Tuesday, and when they leave my other bro, sis-in-law and nephew (and dog) are coming to visit. Then I have an art show I'm entering, followed by a county fair I'm entering stuff in and I have to get that all prepared. I'm a bit late getting my butt moving for the art show next week. I don't want to be last minute for the county fair since I'm entering more stuff.

So lots of work tomorrow.

Beating the Heat

Its been horribly hot here. So I decided to go to the lake and beat the heat. It was sooooo nice at the lake. The water was warmer than it's ever been. Usually its like ice even on the hottest day, and is nearly impossible to swim in, but today it was so warm I didn't even have to get use to it gradually. I just plunked myself right in and started swimming. I couldn't believe how warm it was.

Even my dogs enjoyed swimming. Dojo doesn't like water much. (probably stemming from his dislike of baths) but once they were in the water, they didn't want to get out. Especially Yoshi. every time she neared the shoreline, she'd turn around and head back out.

It was the first time they actually went swimming of their own free will. (If they are really stinky in summer I sometimes would take them out to the lake and carry them in so I can shampoo them. lol) the water was calm and crystal clear, and they were enjoying chasing the schools of fish that were near the shore, so that helped them enjoy it.

They had a fun time just like me.

Although, I did get a smidge of sunburn over my sunburn. Lol. It was worth it though. I found 3 really nice agates and a few different coral fossils. I'll have to post pictures of those later when I've had time to shine them up.

the trip home was interesting too. I had twisted my ankle a bit so I had my mom drive home. I didn't feel like driving with a sore ankle. since I wasn't driving, I was texting my sister-in-law Jamie when my mom gasped and swerved a bit. I looked up and I saw something so large, I thought it was a deer trying to jump over my car.

I thought for sure we were going to get hit until whatever it was flew up and over the car. I turned around and saw it was a baby eagle. The wingspan was as big as my Rav4's windshield. Thankfully he didn't hit us, and continued to fly after whatever it was he was chasing. Momma eagle better keep a better eye on her baby. lol

Then we passed this older lady. From a distance it looked like she was petting her dog, when she stepped out in front of us with her hand out as if asking us to stop. As we got closer, my mom slowed down and we noticed the dog she was petting was actually a young fawn. Momma made it across the street, but the baby was too afraid to follow and kept following the lady around. Finally when we stopped she made the baby follow her across the street, then shooshed it off to it's momma where they both ran off. The lady thanked us as she ran back across to where her husband was waiting. It was the cutest thing. That little baby was a bit too trusting.

I guess animal mommas have their hands full with their babies this year. ha ha.

anyway. It was so nice today. A nice break from the heat. Although, the sun seems to have disappeared behind clouds. It's not suppose to rain, but it sure looks like there's a storm out there ready to brew. Anyway. I hope the rest of you stuck in the heat find an enjoyable way to beat the heat too.

Right now I'm catching up on some of my Japanese Manga in my air conditioned room. lol. Finally caught up on all the current chapters of BLEACH and am now working on Black Butler. =^_^=

So Kawaii!

Hey all, Andrea here! (I suppose it would be since this is my blog. lol)

I had to show you a pic of this adorable little guy I found when I was tanning on my deck today.

I'm not 100% sure what he is... but after some online research I THINK he's a Viceroy Butterfly Caterpillar. Whatever he is, he's so adorable. He had like this piggy nose, and if you turned him on his back and tickled his tummy he'd flip over. I wanted to keep him sooooooo bad... but he'd have a better chance of survival in his natural habitat with plenty of fresh air and plenty of natural food.

Somehow he found his way up onto my deck, so I brought him down and put him under the deck. It's safe because there is grass and fallen leaves under the deck, it's not in the direct heat of the sun, and birds don't tend to sneak under there. So fingers crossed he'll grow into a gorgeous butterfly.

But tell me this lil' guy isn't ADORABLE!!

Here he is just hanging around. (click on the picture to see a bigger version. He's just so cutsie wootsie)

This just cries "Rub my belly"! so kawaii!

Here he is crawling around.

Man I wanted to keep him so bad he was sooooo adorable!







Anyhoo. That's it for now. Back to getting a tan.

  <-- before I got sunburned. LOL Actually, this pic is just about 2 years old. taken before I moved from my old house. I lost that bikini in the move. Made me sad, it was my second favorite bathing suit next to this cute one-piece I have now.) ANYHOO. Neither here nor there. (I'm chatty tonight cause I've had a bit too much coffee.)

coffee, Coffee, COFFEE. HA

Speaking of sunburn...

If you read the blog about my vacation, you probably saw this one already. Believe it or not, it's been almost 2 weeks and I'm still sunburned, although its slowly turning to tan. I just wish I was wearing my bathing suit cause my tan lines are weird at the moment. hard to explain. I had the start of tan lines from being at the beach in my bathing suit, but then I got sunburned while wearing this dress, which gave me different tan lines over the tan lines I started. I'm tanning to fix it, but I worry about too much sun. I should just use fake bake tanning cream. but anyway. Again, I'm rambling.

(lack of sleep last night, hot, and too much caffeine.) ha