Outer Space

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Real Life

Love and Retribution

He came to find me while I was sleeping.

The thought didn’t bother Nevaati. As a purely practical matter, it was good that he knew where she slept. And as an emotional matter, the idea of her yellow-haired friend

Somewhat more than friend, I think.

All right. Her somewhat-more-than-a-friend, then, coming to find her, maybe watching over her for a while, made her feel warm and comfortable an happy inside.

When I find him, I shall hug him and kiss him, because I can do that now. That makes me very happy too.

Of course, he did also play that prank with the feather and the shaving cream.

She’d awakened in an unholy mess of shaving cream and pine needles over her face, a feather on the ground nearby. Rakkan flatly refused to come near her til she’d washed.

Hug him and kiss him, she told herself again, and patted the box she’d been carrying around all afternoon. But then, he is going to WEAR this pie.

Nevaati

Rabbit Picture

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Uncategorized

Fishy, fishy, in the brook…

It’s a fish! Drawn on an art card, and colored with copic markers, mostly to start learning how to use these things. I’m fairly pleased with it, actually.  Please ignore the apparent lens flare over the tail, that actually *is* a lens flare – I took a picture of this thing with my phone rather than scanning it, because I am lazy.

artwork

Sketch in progress

Another in a long series of funky trees – this one appears to have taken root in a cloud.

artwork, Real Life

Adventures in Parenting: Cooking, whee!

The Boy is almost 12. Next month, in fact. It’s about this age that Mom started doing things with me like having me cook meals for the family. My meals tended to be pretty simple – macaroni and cheese, spaghetti, things like that. The point, when you’re 12, isn’t so much to become a gourmet cook as it is to discover that cooking isn’t that hard, that yes, son, you can cook, and that if by some chance a guy was home alone over dinner time, that guy probably wouldn’t go hungry. Because edible food? No big deal.

I feel lucky that Bond is growing up in a family of male cooks. Admittedly, none of the guys are OMG CHECK THIS MASTERPIECE OUT amazing cooks (except possibly my brother, who is good at everything, and I am not going to count him because somebody got all the cooking talent and it wasn’t me, and screw him anyway. xD) but all of them can produce good food that people are, at worst, willing to eat and at best actively look forward to. My father? Limited cooking repertoire, but he can do it, and has taught me a few tricks for such things as venison burger in the past.  Grandpa, during his life, was an army cook in WWII and had charge over important parts of such family meals as Thanksgiving and Christmas – the turkey every year was all Grandpa, and I aspire to be able to roast a bird like he did. Grandpa had a fudge recipe that my mother still drools over to this day. My aforementioned baby brother can take a pantry full of whatever-the-hell and produce the food of the gods. He really shines with wild game, though. Bond’s got lots of role models – and when I tell him he’s got great places to go for cooking advice, he inevitably says “Yeah, Grandma’s an awesome cook!”  But at least he wants to cook, he’s excited about it rather than scared of it, and I think it won’t be long before I’ll be having him cook a meal a week, just like I did.

Now to get him to clean his room and wash his own underwear.

Real Life

Dealing with it creatively.

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One of the things an asperger kid often does is chew on things.  Fingers, clothes, if (s)he has long hair, then the hair is open for chewing. Bond’s chew of choice is his writing utensils, or gum. This is a problem. For one thing, he can’t have gum all the time, it’s bad for his teeth and the time is soon coming when we’ll be dealing with braces. And for another, pencils and pens are horribly bad for the teeth and gums. There are chewy tubes and chewelry, made to stand up to heavy chewing by someone like Bond without breaking down quickly, but they are expensive and a kid on the verge of being a teen can feel a little out of place with some of them. (the clear pencil topper tubes aren’t too bad, but they’re nine or ten dollars a pop).  My kid-approved answer?  Drinking straws. Granted, they don’t last long, but they’re cheap.  And any kid might have a drinking straw. Bond doesn’t seem to mind them, anyway.  Above is the lastest acquisition:  Milkshake straws. I found these at Bed Bath and Beyond for around $2 for a bag of 50. Cut into thirds, that’s a lot of chew. Bond feels comfortable with them, I’m not sugaring him up with ridiculous amounts of gum, and everyone is happy.

Real Life

The finished product!!

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I gave up on her robes. Everybody gets to deal. xD

artwork, Ri'zani, SWTOR, Uncategorized

In progress

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artwork, Ri'zani, SWTOR

Choices

I have hit an interesting point in my life where washing the dishes and planning out good meals and being home when the guys come home sounds pretty good to me. My more feminist friends and acquaintances would be horrified. I like taking care of my boys.

Here’s the thing though. I also like the independence that having my own money gives me. I like the fact that Paul doesn’t have to worry about the power or the water. It’s not a huge worry to take from him, but it is a worry that’s not his anymore. And I like that if I want books or yarn or a video game I don’t have to ask him.

There are several ways I can take this. I can keep the situation as it is. It’s not a bad situation, my job is flexible and my boss is a decent guy (he should be, what with being my Dad and all!) it’s not what I want. But it’s a long way from being miserable. I could push Paul towards finding a better paying job so I can be home. And he’s not averse to that idea in fact. But that takes away the ‘my own money’ factor.

The more I think about it, the more I think I need to look into my own business in some way. I am intelligent, I am creative, I’m not so old, I should be able to do this, right? It’ll take a lot of work. But I think it’s time.

Real Life