same password as before to protect the innocent.

you’re curious aren’t you?

it’s like one of those carnival sideshows only i’m not charging anything.

we’ve been seeing a lot of fe.d.e.x and up.s this week (unfortunately it’s all, errrr, dry goods).  this means we have wrapping to do!  seeing as my art is about found materials and red’s is about process we decided to recycle the pages of all our catalogs into decorative pretties.  it’s sooooo easy and i’d love for some of you to try it and report back!  the first site will teach you how to make bows.  now i’ve never been one for bows and instead go to the craft store and buy the fancy ribbons at 50% off but these are too cute.  ch-ch-check it out.

next, if you need to decorate your house and are sick of the wooden signs that say “north pole” and point anywhere but north, this is for you.  how cute would this look above that dining room table?  click here.

speaking of the dining room table, we made these with a friend last fall and never took them down.  i’ve also made countless for the hospital and they’re always a hit to brighten any room.  pom poms.

well that should help you recycle this week.  we’ve purchased one roll of wrapping paper for .99 and will be mixing it up with newspaper, our 6 art bins, and our handiwork from above.

next up?  we’ve already recorded one song and will be working on more this week.  i’ll try to share if i can figure out how to put it in a post.  though red really gets all the credit because her voice makes the song – i’m just trying to produce with whatever instrumentals i can find.

that email was like a hammer on my thumb as i’m sure it was for those of you using the same bank.  and you got to love how they talk about their shipping price going down when they’ve increased vials by almost $100.  all i can say is that i hope the sperm counts and motility are going up.

we have had the laziest week ever!  we used to go days without having a minute to sit on our couch.  now, i find myself fluffing the cushions regularly.  at least we’ve been jogging (albeit less than ten blocks).  our t’giving was peaceful.  we had our tofurkey, stuffing, corn bread, dumplings, green beans, sweet potatoes with marshmallow, and roasted veggies.  red rounded that out with her first pumpkin cheesecake complete with vanilla bean ice cream.  we sacrificed going up to CO in the hopes our kd would finally meet up with us.  apparently he’s flaky and while i don’t mind that (he’s got so many pros), we need to cross this bridge and put the anxiety behind us.  maybe we already have.

would you believe that we handcrafted each and every holiday card the night before t’giving?  i finally invested in the embossing stuff i’ve been eyeing all year.  red loves the process and it was a fun evening complete with amare.tto on the rocks.  i don’t think it’s a secret that we’re non-believers freethinkers but we do believe in the spirit of the season, esp winter solstice (my bday).  so we wanted our card to convey our most sincere secular greetings.  we chose the phrase “good tidings” after some thought.  red had only heard it in terms of church.  i disagreed.   after some research we went for it.  and for the image we poured over stamps at our local craft chain and went for what we like to think is the tree of life.

we also carefully budgeted the next three months (that’s how long we’ll last folks…this house better sell soon) and did most of our holiday shopping.  my parents have everything and they also have dec bdays.  i got my mom a great on-sale dig cam that she can keep in her coach bag for the hell of it.  my dad is too protective of his d.90 to share with her.  and their point-and-shoot is too bulky.  i’ve yet to secure re.d.s.o.x. tix for my dad but that’ll do for the man that needs nothing.  their bdays are another story.  i’d like to put in a shout-out for our favorite gift destination…C.B2.   we did the bulk of our shopping from there.

oh and while we have not gone mall-crazy for these shopping events (we’re online shoppers) we did pick up 6 poinsettias and a vintage sled yesterday.  i’ve always wanted one and i scored a gorgeous one for $19 at an antique shop!  we’re going to spray paint it red today.   pics to follow.

we’ve loved reading about everyone’s dinners and family time this week!

p.s. i made mexi.can hot choco.late today before we went to our “twi.nkle lig.ht parade” (worst parade in history but it was still a great date).  it sounds gross but trust us.  a can of evap milk and some half & half.  semi sweet or dark choc, chopped.  chili powder.  pumpkin pie spice.  vanilla.  all to taste.  whisk with an insane amount of vigor on your stovetop for at least 5 mins.  add fresh whipped cream (just heavy cream, a splash of vanilla, and some powdered sugar).  YUM.

email us for the secret code to the post about our nuptials.

metalstork @ gmail . com

PROS

we went for a jog today

tonight we purchased 2 bottles of wine, 1 bottle of champagne, and 1 bottle of sake (for a later date since we had plans out tonight – okay confession we polished the vouvray with dinner)

2 netflix came today – duma (we’ve really exhausted all the movies in the world and this looked cute) and frida (which, hello, what lesbian hasn’t seen a hundred times?)

luckylittle13 comes into town tomorrow with her belly full’o'twins

we went shopping today.  i got 2 dresses and red got a sweater and cords.  total for all 3 outfits? $41

we had a house showing this morning and 2 yesterday and as such the house is spotless

last night i made us a bath of milk and honey before watching fellini’s 8 1/2 and it was divine

CONS

the KD has canceled tonight for understandable reasons and so we’re going to try to meet up this weekend

red has just informed me we must go get vermouth because nothing we have sounds appealing

our haircut appts for today got postponed until next wednesday

hey everyone, red here. so it’s been an interesting couple of months since going jobless.  i certainly feel a *heaving* sigh of relief not to be under the thumb of mr. wacko starchitect and the toxic environment that was a part of my everyday. we have been unusually busy since then and the days are flying.  though generally at peace, i can’t help but long for a date – THE date – when we will be heading home for good.  trying to sell a house in this market and at this time of year is dismal and terrifying, to say the least, but we continue to be, even if naively, hopeful.  we are in some strange place right now, a transition bubble, where we are having a hard time connecting outside our walls knowing that at any moment (please, let it be this one?) we may pick up and leave, and yet are holding our breath for connection back east, as we may receive the blow that we won’t be able to be there just yet. i think today we’ll do a ritual: make a house of leaves and sticks, take it to the top of the mountain, and let it go.

on a lighter note, the bubble has been pretty beautiful from the inside.  gypsy and i can go to movies together at 3pm on a tuesday and plan and cook every meal together, and lay in each others’ arms in the a.m. every day (well, almost every day) if we want to . even if some days there is only change in the bank, i feel content and safe and more in love than ever.

we are planning to meet with a prospective KD this week. he is a beautiful long-ago friend of mine that is a brilliant artist who sometimes makes spaceships made of hair for the movies and was raised by two moms.  he and gypsy immediately fell in love on the first meeting.  i’ve thought of a million ways to pop the question and none of them seem just right or easy. any ideas??? we’ll keep you posted.

after shipping my m.acbo.ok to my brother in boston, i had hope that he could recover all the music i’ve produced this year, the photos, the videos i’ve shot of red, the loving sticky notes she’s left me, and of course my endless amounts of bookmarks.  no go.  he called yesterday and said they couldn’t save any of it.  i always say i’m not attached to anything but if the house was burning down and i could only grab one thing (assuming red was safe) it’d be the computer – we are designers, afterall.  then i think of that show cl.ea.n sw.ee.p and they say “the memories are in your heart.”   but still, the devastation lingers.  you see, after the new update, iphoto included a flic.kr upload button right within the program.  i’d always used a 3rd party app.   since march i’ve relied on the built-in uploader and had great success.  but then, being the minimalist that i am, i noticed that iphoto would save two folders with each upload group, one standard folder with the group, and one flic.kr folder.  i figured i could delete the flic.kr group since they were already on flic.kr.  delete delete delete delete.  it wasn’t until the computer crashed that i realized it pulled everything( since the march update) off the flickr site!  no more anniversary pictures, boston trips, balloon fiesta/colorado with my parents, the list goes on. so while i may have backed up sometime in the spring, the lesson is to back up way more often than that.

as my computer is currently on its way back to me, rebuilt with fancy new features/media courtesy of my brother, i’ve found some consolation.  red took me out to get the fancy new dro.id phone on its release day last friday.  of course this an affront to the ap.ple name with ver.izo.n’s aggressive adverts against i.p.hon.e.  my brother tested on and thought it too heavy.  i think it’s the first “toy” i’ve purchased in forever and with the amount of times red and i consider calling 411, we’re are going to get a lot of use out of this.  and from now on, i’m going to live more in the moment because photos/videos/songs are fleeting.

p.s. has anyone seen precious yet?  i’ve been eagerly awaiting this movie and even had my book, p.ush, signed by sapph.ire, back in ‘99 when she spoke at pr.att.  but guess what?  it’s not playing in this sleepy little city!  must move asap!

the hospital was fine yesterday.  i actually didn’t mind it much at all.  it was nice to see the nurses again and my photography is 24×36 up and down the peds icu hallway.  i played four rounds of candy land, 1/2 games of checkers, and a 1/2 game of trouble with a 17 year girl with down syndrome.  and i had to have many teaching moments with a mean 9 year old patient who felt better making fun of her.  but the good news is that i am done.  i don’t know why i didn’t let myself leave this job 13 months ago.  my entire demeanor changed on nights before i had to go in there.  sure there were many fun days but those off days when someone would die and i’d counsel the family and do handprints/footprints of the dead with them was too much (even if i felt strong at the time).

we saw whip it last night.  so much fun.  i wish my mother would see it. not that i’m a roller derby girl (yet) or anything.  she just reminds me of the mom in the film so much.  i wish it was doing better in the theaters!  there were 6 people in the theater (including us).    we both decided that this is a movie we will want our daughter to own in her teen years.

oh and we took the girls to whe.re the w.ild thin.gs are last week.  i’ve been meaning to write about this somewhere.  has anyone seen gummo?  for some reason i own the dvd.  i think i just had to own it so that i could go back to parts of it and really consider this place we call america.  anyway, where the wild things are is the “PG/abstract” version of gummo.  in fact i was attempting a visual diptych of the two when my macbo.ok crashed…hmm.  (genius bar useless, btw, it’s being shipped to my brother’s app.le store in boston).  both gummo and wtwta made this viewer uncomfortable.  the youngest niece wanted to leave.  i read a review in the times suggesting max needed a mental hospital and the monsters needed therapists.  the ira and judith banter was reminiscent of woody allen films (who i adore) but didn’t fit.  perhaps without dialogue (and solely a masterful score) it would be easier to watch.

even though we just flew back into town on sunday, i’m looking at vacations online.  red’s classes are pretty demanding and she’s fed up with tests every week and very little in-class discussion.  i think 3 days at a shore is in order.  it’s cheaper than ttc and i just can’t start again with all the uncertainties about the move – and, of course, our donor is sold out.  however, i’m confident that within a couple months we’ll be back on track.  (of course if the known donor works out and we’re doing ici, what the hell).

i had a dream that someone gave me to kill a mocki.ngbird.  i’ve never read it.  suffice to say that will change very soon.

we’re still around.

with red not being chained to her desk all day, well, we have been busy catching up. we’ve had two open houses that were not successful – as in, less than ten people. today we bit the bullet and paid the hefty fee to list our home on the mls. it’s still saving us a chunk of cash by not using a seller’s agent. we had lunch with the realtor we bought the house with and she came by and said everything looked perfect – and that houses don’t typically have much luck in november or december. fingers crossed the mls will bring more buyers and we’re happy to pay buyer’s agent fees.

we also just got back from almost a week in fort collins where we got to spoil our four nieces. wouldn’t you know it…they got 21 inches of snow and two snow days while their parents were away! never fear, red and i loaded the crew into the truck and drove through the blizzard to ta.rget where we killed some time before eating lunch out. they were great and a good reminder that we’ll only ever plan to have one child. so.much.conversation.constantly. having said that, i really loved the one on one time i got with each of them. but as a group we made and decorated cupcakes, pumpkin whoopie pies, spray painted snow with colored water, made a haunted basement for a h’ween party, saw the wild thing movie, and got a whole dry ice thing going on the steps for the trick or treaters. red and i enjoyed wine under the stars in the hot tub after i shoveled off the giant pile of snow and the kids were asleep. and i can’t forget: our brother-in-law makes the best martinis ever.

now that we’re back in the desert, i’m catching up on emails and voicemails and feel pretty disgusted with my boss. begin: vent. despite not being able to get consistent hours in months, she asked me to work t’giving and xmas. i’m the only employee who doesn’t have their immediate family in this city and it’s just pretty nervy to ask that of me. i told her i couldn’t commit because the house is for sale and we could very well be gone. but the whole reason i don’t have hours is because they are in a financial crisis and her response to my “no” was that they’d see if they could hire someone else. uh? so you can’t pay me the 20 hrs i was hired for but you can hire someone else? this boss has repeatedly called me her best friend and it’s true i consistently try to put distance between us because she is the most toxic person i’ve ever met. so this should be good right? i give my letter of resignation, again (she didn’t accept it 5 months ago) and dry my hands of the situation. wrong, she wants me to work wednesday…in h1n1 central. it’s asking me to stand on the front line before going home for good. and because red and i are opposed to the vaccinations (mostly because we live in a bubble and didn’t find it necessary) i have major anxiety about this. and i can’t say no because i feel like it’s the closure i need to get a good reference (never mind that i wrote two grants in this position and secured major major cash for a new maternal special care program and have been published in the newspaper for an event i organized at the hospital). end: vent

back to h’ween. red dressed up as an uncanny frida kahlo and i was amelia earhart. there was a little party for the kids and some wine & then martinis for the rest of us. see here:

also, before we left fort collins, i noticed my macbook had froze. looks like the hard drive completely crashed and i have genius bar appt tomorrow night to figure it out. my apple care doesn’t expire until dec so i’m grateful for that. of course, losing everything including all 300 photos i accidentally deleted off flickr recently is a bummer.

still, there is good news.  red has decided on med school.  we’ll be taking a trip abroad somewhere in the next year.  i’m looking forward to our cross-country drive to the northeast soon.  and we realized we know someone who we’d like to ask about being a known donor (this is a big maybe since we’re both hooked on our ccb donor but he’s currently sold out).

i’m all caught up on everyone’s posts and am so grateful to have this glimpse into everyone’s experiences.  ”congrats” and “better luck next time” to respective parties.

we finally got the call.  THE call.  since moving to the sw we’ve wanted to experience working on the sets of at least one of the many productions that shoot here.  i sent in headshots of red and i and lo!  i got a call on wed asking if i could do fri and mon.  red got called out of class on thursday asking her to come in that moment and also fri and mon.  we are shooting a gala scene for c.r.ash 2 which i’ve never seen an episode of.  e.ri.c rob.er.t.s is the star.  red told me on thursday he was a total diva and when they’d call for quiet before a scene he always barked and made trumpet noises.  i’m thinking tourettes.  anyway, he touched red’s arm on thursday and called her “doll” to which she smartly replied “oh i loved your work in the l word.”  that shut him right up.

it was fun to go together yesterday at 11 am but guess what?  we didn’t get home until 4 am!  we are very cranky girls today.  while we were both in different groups, i think we had good spots within them.  i know it’s good because we both had tape on the floor while the other background actors didn’t.  however, we’ll probably never watch the show and probably care the least about face time.  the other background actors behaved like they were on a bad reality show and we have some stories.  ooooh,  for example, red was in shooting a scene and i was in the holding area with a bunch of other people.  somehow it came up that i’m married to a woman and this other woman said “well i’m a jehovah’s witness so you know how i feel about that but we’re not supposed to judge”  and i said “listen, i’ve known i am gay since i was fourteen, i’ve heard it all.”  then this flake proceeded to say “why do some woman try to look like men? and why do most feminine women date butch women?  do you know you both don’t look gay?”  seriously?  and THEN!  she’s a flight attendant on a small mexico charter and she started saying “mexicans are the sweetest people.  do you know most of them don’t like ice?”  i kid you not.  “have you met my mexican wife?”

for the most part, it was a good experience.  we have to do it all over again on monday and i’m hoping it’s not another 17 hour day but i look it at it this way: one day of us both there is a vial!  now onto a possible open house this weekend.

p.s. i am getting O-L-D.  i volunteered for the GLBT film fest thurs while red was working on the set.  at the after party i had one drink that the volunteer coordinator handed me.  headache all day yesterday.  time to get pregnant already!

p.p.s.  remember that closet we started knocking out last fall?  here it is, in completion.  we installed the hardwoods, the crown molding, the shelves, the wire railing but by far, the demo was the scariest part.

we just got home from a movie at the glbt southwest film fest and while red is installing a cable wire railing, i’m helpfully sipping reisling and researching deer grass.  i was just reminiscing about a funny thing that happened when my parents were here.  we were at the gas station and red was cleaning the windshield while my dad was in the store.  my mom was in the front seat and i was in the back.  but first some background.

red is obsessive about shaving.  i mean who shaves her legs and armpits every day even through the winter??  of course, i’m not a fan of body hair but with her i wouldn’t mind if she turned into a werewolf.  lucky for me, despite my italian heritage, my hair grows in rather blonde and soft so it’s something i only pay attention to once a week if i’m not wearing a dress.  but i digress.  i implored red to let her armpits grow out a little (like a week…she’s way too picky to do much longer and also, i asked this of her once a few months ago and she begrudgingly obliged).

so there she is, cleaning the windshield in a tank, armpit right in front of my mother’s face.  oh man, i was cracking up before i knew how horrified she’d be so i threw her a bone when she returned to the car.  ”babe, is the rash getting any better under your arms?”  she happily played along while giving me dirty and blushed looks in the rearview.  i effin love this woman.

so we’re back after yet another respite – my parents called on thursday to say “surprise! we’re coming tomorrow.” (insert expletives and running around our construction zone with pledge and dish rag)  lucky for them, we are still housesitting (only we had yet to spend the night in the house the cats have covered with their fur).  we gave my parents our place in the evenings – which, if you knew my parents, this was a big deal as they are strictly 5 star hotel people.  i quickly threw together an itinerary to make sure everything i wanted to show them in the last 13 months would happen.  red and i worked at the balloon fiesta the morning of their arrival and the balloon we were chasing ended up having a hard landing in a spot next to the highway, inaccessible to cars.  what a mess.  really, it seems like so much work for so little fun.  so we barely made it to the airport in clean clothes.  the next morning we went back to the balloon fiesta, folks in the car, at 6 a.m for the mass ascension.  holy cow – what a sight.  my dad had his first breakfast burrito and my mom her first funnel cake (which is basically the fried dough on the east coast, yea?)

by 11 a.m. we were on the road to telluride, co (a measely 7 hour drive!) to see the foliage and spend the night at the lovely mountain lodge.  my mom was a little queasy at the mountain passes through silverton, etc. but all in all it was a really successful trip.  and i have to add that red insisted on driving the entire time.  while i have the better driving record, i do tend to have ny taxi driver qualities that aren’t suited for mountain roads without jersey barriers.

sunday we returned to abq at sunset to try to catch the tram but it was too crowded.  we called it a night and went to our cat house where we slept in our clothes as the cats wailed outside the door all night (we are never getting a cat).  by 7:30 a.m. we were back at our casa to pick my parents up for yet another road trip.  this time we drove south to socorro, the setting of red’s early childhood.  she was really worried my parents would freak out but of course they thought it quaint and fascinating.  my mom said it’s what she pictured old nm towns would look like.  red even let us visit her 91 yo grandfather in his cowboy hat and motorized wheelchair while her uncles roasted green chile in the front yard.  i’ll try and post pics of red and grandpa later.

we headed back to abq and hit up old town before dinner and a sunset tram ride.  yesterday morning we caught the zoo before i dropped red off at class and then my folks at the airport.

anyway, it’s only a matter of time.  the contractor is downstairs as i type and after he finishes, we’ll get our house on the market.  i’m scanning boston apartments/houses daily.  i’m sad about leaving my fertility doctor because they were really great but hey, i don’t even think we have health insurance today – red’s doing the cobra research.  our donor is running low on vials and that’s another concern.  we may order a couple to keep on hold because we’re both so hooked on him.  and i’m sure if we’ve secured the vials we’ll totally be impulsive and do an ici next cycle – pending insurance, of course.

red’s sister, the greatest sister ever, is flying us up to colorado in two weeks to babysit her four daughters and we’re stoked to hang with the coolest kids ever.