A busy time-

Whoa, I can't believe the summer has ended. I mean, for me the summer is about the same as the rest of the year. However, since we had a fun vacation this year, summer was a little more varied than usual.

I'm playing catch up as usual, so I'll try not to make this epic-ly long. 

I did a lot of big projects this summer.

1) Planned and attended a family reunion for my mother's side of the family

2) Did a 100 day project

3) Made 162 art pieces for my brother's game Shadowlands. I posted them all on my 2nd instagram account compostofthehand

4) Published my book Awkward Procures Happiness on Amazon

5) Kept my babies alive

These are my kids in the tub and temporary ball pit. Since we live in Tucson, tiny cockroaches and sometimes big ones, come up from the drain, even though I plug it. So after we played in the balls for a while, mommy put them back in bags. Both my kids also had giant tantrums afterwards, since we stopped playing after a couple of jumps from the top of the tub. Hey kids, there aren't THAT many balls in the tub. Maybe another day we'll put them in a pack-n-play. Also, thanks America, for all the new fun toys and books. And clothes.

This is a giant tarantula I saw outside someone's door a couple nights ago. It was huge. I did not touch it, but the sister missionary next to me did. She coaxed it onto her hand and then placed it in the grass next to the sidewalk. Spooky.

We saw lots of family on our vacation. This is Uncle Dave. He's loads of fun. Bruce and Cordelia aren't quite doing sentences right now. However, Bruce did manage "No Dave cookie" after he'd taken a cookie from Dave and ate it.

 This is a Beast Mode card I painted for my brother Grant's game Shadowlands. I'd never played it before our Reunion this summer. Grant had sent everyone in the family the cards to print so we could play the game and give suggestions, but he didn't have any original art for it and hadn't pulled together the money to pay an artist. So after my 100 day project, I did 162 cards for his game. That was a fun project.

We actually surprised him with all the cards printed out at the reunion. My brother Christian actually superimposed my artwork onto his game cards and his wife Carly helped us by being sneaky. It was the BEST surprise ever. He was like WHAT?! So now I've played the game and am looking for more projects.

 These babies love Costco and samples. You can't beat stickers.

Another card for Gran'ts game. This is the Looter card.

 These books are just adding up. Someday we'll just have to get a house to fit all the books.

 This is a card back idea I had. It's a dragon I did which I'm not totally disgusted with.

 We're all set with clothes now, thanks everyone with all the hand me downs. Jess, America, Jenny, Sarah, Mom. Thanks for all the clothing!

 This is the horse master. It's probably one of my favorites. Actually, the more I did, the more impressed I was.

 This was free Chik-fil-A day. We also won a contest from the Ina at Thornydale and won some free food! Woot!

 Some trees for a background on the game.

 The sticky traps we set out for months. The only sign we had of catching a mouse, was a bunch of bloody mouse footprints along the top rim of our couch. Also, a dried puddle on the windowsill. We never found a mouse, but there's poison in the closet with the 5 traps in there. I'm hoping it somehow died and I'll never have to put these all out again.

 The moose, a mount card.

 This was mud day at the zoo. We participated and had loads of fun.

 An apron I decorated for an auction at a fundraiser.

After all that fun stuff, I'm looking towards Christmas and my projects for then. Also, perhaps a children's book.