A Tale of Two Tattoos

I have wanted a tattoo for YEARS. Well, two. No, three. Um, four, but that's pushing it. I've always, always wanted the Rolling Stones Tongue tattooed on my arse. Never was a huge fan of the Rolling Stones, but when I was in High School I had a patch of that sewn to the butt of a pair of my jeans, which drew more than a few suggestions. I don't think that one will ever happen, but it's funny.

I also want a band like my son-in-law Tony's, which has very medieval-looking tendrils and a sun in the center. But his has a broken rock in the center of the sun, & I want a smiley face with round purple glasses like I wear. That's another maybe.

Wanted Richard's name in fancy tiny script like Emma got on her arse in The Importance of Being Ernest, only on my upper thigh near the pantie line, but I don't think I'm going to do that anytime soon.

A few years ago my dh suggested I should have an ice cream cone just above my breast, for reasons all his own. But then he said, it doesn't matter, because he doesn't want me to have a tattoo at all. Ever.

Then on Valentine's day he changed his mind. Might have had a little to do with the fact that a while back I told him that when he dies, I'm gonna step over his corpse, go get a tattoo, and *then* call 911. So on Monday the 15th I went, took my art to the tattoo parlor, & on Tuesday the 16th I got inked.

The place I went is Alter Ego Tattoos in Knoxville, on Kingston Pike. Cleanest place I have EVER seen! Jon is the owner there, and has done tattoos for my daughter Des & her dh Tony. They said my artist would be Boyd. Here is my outline...

And hereon the left Boyd is, mopping up some extra ink. He has very WARM hands, by the way! Don't look at my face, didn't get a chance to put any makeup on! Arrggh!


Over there on the right, Brand new!


and here on the left, two days old. Healing nicely. Never did even get pink around the edges.

Alright, on to the next one! My ds#2 Artemas recently turned 18. When he was about 10 years old, he said, "Mom, you know that lizard like on the Sobe bottle? When I'm old enough, I'm gonna have a tattoo of that!"

I was like, "Sure you will." Everybody knows that between 10 years old and majority, little boys change their minds a bazillion times.

But he never did, and after I got my tattoo, he was like, when can I get one? He earned money this past year on Etsy, so I told him to get a pic he liked, we'd draw something up, & he could get it done.

So we took his drawing, along with my interpretation of it and a few notations, on over to Alter Ego and would you know, Boyd had an opening on Monday Feb. 22!

Artemas just about worked himself up into a state over whether it was going to hurt or not, so that by the time Boyd got started, he was beside himself. About 5 minutes in, he got to feeling light-headed. Didn't help that he only had a Mtn. Dew that morning.
Boyd gave him a glass of water & some skittles, took a short breather & got started again. Artemas handled it fine after that.


Here (above, right) he is getting the work done. There's also a video on Youtube called The Awesomest Lizard Tattoo, in which I am talking in the background. Maybe I was kidding, heh heh.

Here it is in the first hour, covered (& bleeding a little).


And here it is about an hour old, washed & dressed with chapstick. Great job! I love it, and Artemas does too!

Ponderings on Normalcy, Whatever That Is

Tonight in the shower I was pondering some things, and thought I would share with the great big family called the Internet.

I am a woman. For a woman, it is "normal" to have periods every month. Unless you are pregnant, which I have been 11 times. Out of those 11 times, I have birthed 7 live children, and had 5 go on before me, before birth (one set of twins), spending 63 months (5 1/4 YEARS) of my life, pregnant. From what I read, this is not "normal."

Most of my children have weighed between 7 & 8 pounds... this is "normal," until you consider that the ones that weighed that were anywhere from 3 to 5 weeks early. Then that's not "normal." The ones that went to term were 9.5# and 10#. Since I was NOT gestationally diabetic, again, this is not "normal."

I have spent 17 years breastfeeding 7 babies, which in my lifetime has relieved me of over 12 years of periods, and has spared my breasts 150 cycles of hormonal changes. Again, this is nowhere near "normal."

I have a period every month, like clockwork. I do NOT have PMS or PMDD or any other dang mood disorder over this fact. Apparently this is not "normal," (though my husband and kids are thankful).

Having a cycle every month is "normal," except for the fact that I am 48 years old. No symptoms of menopause. No hot flashes. No night sweats. No "Falling Hand Syndrome." You've heard it... Doc...

My hair is falling out

My head aches all the time

My eyes aren't what they used to be

My teeth hurt

My shoulders stoop

My breasts are sagging

My back aches

I can't hold my stomach in

and on down the body, a whole litany of complaints.

I don't have any of those (well except for those red +1 readers). So apparently I am not "normal."

Sometimes I long for the normal. I'd like to be like the other women, who know for sure when they're done forming a family. Who know that they'll never have to buy tampons again. Who can have sex whenever they want.

But then, doesn't menopause bring its own ailments? Bones that are more brittle, skin not as elastic, dryness in unmentionable areas, etc?

Perhaps, for now, I'll stick with NOT "normal." After all, it's what I'm used to.

Girls' Night In and Blue Pancakes

There is an old lady living next door. She has a granddaughter, about the same age as my 3rd daughter Veronica. During the week, the granddaughter lives with her mom. On the weekends, her dad has custody of her. He works nights, and even though he has a live-in girlfriend who would be at the house at night with his daughter, he brings her to the grandmother's house to stay.

Only he's gotten in the habit of just dropping her at my house instead, on Friday evening, and picking her up here on Sunday evening... thereby not spending ONE single minute with his kid. And also giving me an extra kid and mouth to feed for the weekend. I must have not read the custody agreement properly.

Anyway at least my girls have someone to play with. Amy hangs out with them and wears their clothes and goes to church with us, where she helps out in a toddler class along with my own girls. She leaves odd bits of laundry, which I find while folding clothes after I've washed it for her, because I don't have enough people in my house to do laundry for.

Here are some pics of the three of them having a lot of fun, one rainy Friday night. Don't ask what's happening here, I don't know.


On Saturday morning, I got up before everyone and went out for my walk. When I got home, I found mysterious things cooking. Someone (no names here, mind you) is OBSESSED with putting food coloring in any food they make, including pancakes.

Sometimes my life is so weird.

Wordless Wednesday - Not Fiber-Obsessed? Me?

Not that I'm fiber-obsessed or anything. Noooo. But I thought I'd share some of my Etsy favorites at the moment.

Hinky The Heartless Monkey Does the AMTC Convention, part 1

Guest post by my 14yod, Diantha!

Recently I went to a modeling convention held by AMTC, at the Gaylord Palms Resort & Convention Center in Orlando, FL.

We have this Huge stuffed gorilla named Red Floyd at home, and after we got to the hotel we would be staying at for the Convention we saw that they had a jungle setting, and decided he would be perfect for the plan we cooked up, which was to put Floyd in situations all over the place to make it look like he was having fun!

But there was a problem. We didn't bring him. So we just had to go to the local Big-Box store and get Hinky the Heartless Monkey. (He had a red heart, but we cut it off to give to Betsy.) Here's a pic of Hinky in a huge Aloe plant!! I love Aloe plants!!

Hinky went lots of places that week, and had a lot of Adventures.

First he wanted to have his picture taken by the waterfalls. In the atrium of the hotel, there is a big, false Spanish Conquistador castle, with ponds and waterfalls.

You can hear them from all over the hotel.


Next he wanted to walk down to Key West and get his picture taken. It's a REALLY long walk from Orlando, but we made it.

And then, he said he needed a break when we found a little moss covered table and chair set outside one of the restaurants. After a little set-a-spell, he said he felt much better.

We decided to go back to the room. Because Hinky is a curious and slightly naught monkey, he got left a little behind. We went back and found him using the (working!) antique phone in the hotel lobby. We still don't know who he called.

We duly scolded him and headed back to the room. We got out some snacks. When we turned around to check on Hinky, we found him eating very-bad-for-you food!


When we confronted him about his terrible choices, he pretended to be asleep.





On the way to one of the seminars, Hinky tried to hide from us again. But we found him, because we're so clever.

It wasn't all work and no play at the convention! In fact, one of Hinky's favorite places we visited was the arcade!

He got to ride in a yellow helicopter.


During one of the breaks at the convention, mom and I found a local shooting range and went shooting. Hinky didn't get to go, because he's still young and careless.

But in the arcade, he got to practice shooting an automatic weapon at bad guys.

And, he got to ride in a real-life pretend spaceship. I was a little jealous!

Because the hotel atrium is HUGE (4.5 acres), it took him a while to get around to exploring the end farthest from our room. That end was designed like the swamps of the Everglades. We found him hiding from us in the plants and mist.


And then we found him relaxing on the porch of a little fishing shack. The shack was interesting, as it had aquariums of little Everglades creatures, like snakes.

Hinky didn't seem to be afraid of them at all.

Upstairs in the convention center again, he climbed up on a decorative armoire to look in a pot. We had to get him down.

On Saturday night, there was a Christian Rock band that played. They were good, but the music was very loud. Hinky hid under a chair.


Then we found him being a VERY BAD LITTLE MONKEY! No, no, Hinky! That's not a potty! That's a donation pot for the rock group's mission trip!



After all the apologies, and the excitement died down, we went to the Haagen-Daz place in the lobby for ice cream before bed.

It seems that even bad little monkeys love ice cream!

Wordless Wednesday - Snow Beauty and A Little Beast