Uncle Mike is Home From Iraq

Well Van's Uncle came home from Iraq last Friday. He was the Commanding Officer of his unit (about 110 men) & truly a hero in our eyes! He deployed for Iraq a few weeks after Van was born.

This is Uncle Mike holding Van right before he left. It was so amazing watching them come home, marching almost in silence down the road from where they dropped off their weapons.




Coming home to their loved one's and Mike following them up from behind. They marched right up to the crowd and stood at attention until Mike dismissed them, and then I was in a sea of people searching for their men that just came home after seven months of fighting.




I felt the adrenaline rushing through my veins and the energy was so thick in the air you could almost see it. As I walked through the crowd looking for Mike, I had to snap some photos of these people reuniting with such energy and love. It was truly a release of emotions for everyone who was there, their is always a level of uncertainty that comes along with having someone you love



deployed. But once you see them again and give them that long awaited hug and kiss the emotions all come pouring out. I think a couple of these guys had not yet met their babies that had been born while they were gone!

















I have been procrastinating about writing this post because I was fearful I could not paint the picture that I saw the right way. But I went for it and here it is, certainly an experience I will never forget.
Thank you Uncle Mike for protecting our family & our country you are a hero to us all.

Stop, Drop & Drive to Vegas

We have had a crazy past few days! Yesterday Conner & I decided it would be best to leave our house and drive out to Vegas to meet Big Poppa (Conner's Dad). It was so surreal driving thru California and seeing all of the fires, I was like a little kid at Disney world for the first time. I realized on our way to Vegas the strength of Mother Natures Fury. She is not messing around! Growing up in Florida I saw several hurricanes but fire is really a different story. Water damage doesn't destroy your entire home the way that fire does. I prayed for rain on the way too, but there is none in sight. Our house is not in danger right now, but they have set back fires in Camp Pendelton to make sure they don't come near the neighborhoods or the huge power plant that we are so close to. The smoke however was unbearable yesterday at our house and the ash looks like snow. Everything has a layer of grey on it. We drove right thru the middle of the big fire in riverside/Fallbrook yesterday. The first picture is from our house, it was Monday when the smoke had just started to flow thru! These other pics are from the two fires we saw while driving to Vegas yesterday. On top of having to leave our house and pack only a few things that I would want to keep in case our house went down in flames, Van is sick. So he is stuffed up and it is really hard for him to eat because he cant breathe when he is drinking from a bottle or nursing!
Anyways we are safe, we did have to leave Zeek and Lola at the house and Auntie Maria is taking care of them. I am worried about them though and wish we did bring em to Vegas now.

The rice Canyon Fire is the one that is the closest to us, and here are the stats ans dome more images of that fire.
More later on this, pray for all of those who have lost their homes, and the animals that are suffering from the fires too.

Pray that I can win some money while we are in Vegas so we can have a little fun!!

Our house is where the black circle is on the map. Just so you can see that we are truly surrounded by fires and heavy smoke.



Acreage: 7,000 acres (3:39 p.m. 10/23)
Containment: 0 percent
Homes burned: 100 homes destroyed (10/22 at 3 p.m.) 1 structure damaged, possibly a trailer (10/22 1 p.m.) 500 to 1,000 homes in danger over next 24 hours

No. of evacuations:45,000

Seven Months

Mod Tot's

So Van's Mimi is in town and she has been a huge help to my new little side business!
We went shopping for fabrics and many other fun things and we have been sewing all week long, well she has been doing it... I have been doing a few too, but mainly art directing. That's what I do. I am going to be screen printing on them now that we have sewn several appliques on them too! I already have several orders i am so excited.
For all those asking about prices. They all vary and you can get one onesie with just screen printed letters or numbers/graphics for $15 - 20. The onesies with sewn and printed graphics are Around $25 each!

So it has been fun creating this new little line of clothes.

Van is already 7.5 months old, and I haven't gotten around to putting a picture up of him yet!
So here he is when we were at dinner the other night!



I found some great little eco friendly graphics to screen onto my baby clothes. I have been looking fort the right one's lately... I have an idea for one with a world screen printed on one with love your mom on it around the world! just an idea!

Okay so I have two ideas for the name of the company - mod tots, or butter beans! let me know what you like!!!

D

Baby Onesies

So I designed my first onesies, this is one of them. I told Van to look surprised... I think he takes direction pretty well. huh? Here is Van modeling my 123 king of the hill onesie!

I plan on hanging them all along the crib or outside on a clothes line and taking a photo of them once I am ready to do a photoshoot.

This was just for fun! I took the photo of this one after Van was wearing it, so it is a little wrinkled.

I will have several made in time for the beginning of Dec so I can sell them to people for gifts for the holidays! Let me know if you want one, the quantities will be limited, and each one is hand done. So they all look different. I am working on purchasing organic cotton onesies to design on with water and vegetable based inks so they will be 100% healthy for the little tots.

I wanted to list a couple of all natural companies/websites that I really like a lot, along with some books & Cd's I really want to get for Van.

Buying Guide: Rattle N Roll; Crib Rock Couture; Foco Loco; Small Roar; Duck Duck Goose Boutique; Thea Starr; Babesta; Mahar Dry Goods; Livie and Luca; Belle Gray; Saari Designs; Cool Baby Sheets

CDs and Books: Dan Zanes - "Family Dance"; Uncle Rock - "Plays Well With Others"; Justin Roberts - "Yellow Bus"; They Might Be Giants - "No!"; The Sippy Cups - "Kids Rock for Peas"; Audra Rox - "I Can Do It By Myself"; Holly George Warren - "Shake Rattle and Roll", "Honkey Tonk Heroes and Hillbilly Angels"

Hide Video

Organic Baby

From your baby's layette to his first rattle, taking out chemicals from the nursery doesn't mean taking out the style or softness. Watch the Video

Buying Guide: Kate Quinn Organics; The Baby Panda; Pur Bebe; Craftsbury Kids; Our Greenhouse; Patemm; Lala Natural; Fuzzibunz; Kissaluvs; Very Baby; Veda PURE; The Complete Organic Pregnancy; Bumpstyle Maternity

tata for now.

Where's the tiger & Lovin Lola

I thought these videos were fun, and a little look into what Van's days consist of.

These Hands

Moving Forward

I am working this week on a couple of projects, so my time is precious. I really feel stuck right now. I need to work so we can stay in California. But I want to stay at home with Van part time too. I am plotting and scheming about ways I can start my own business and work at home. I know I can do it. I just have too many ideas in this head of mine and want to design baby clothes, build websites, and create my own graphic design & freelance company.

Van is loving the dogs now he tries to call them with this little high pitch voice of his, and he likes to spit too when he sees them. I think he thinks that they like that but they tend to run away real fast when they see him coming these dayz. I captured some moments yesterday with them. Zeke was there too, but he wasn't in camera's range.