Americade 2006

(OK so this is a shot of Luke's old Sportster, clean and pretty just before we sold it, but all my Americade pictures are on my home computer so this one's going to have to do.)

I just found out today that we're going to be taking a trip to Lake George, NY next week for Americade 2006 and I'm so excited! First off, I haven't taken a vacation in a long, long time and I really need one, and secondly, Lake George is one of my favorite places to go, especially on a motorcycle and especially in June when the air is clear and the weather is warm. Two years ago we took this same trip and had the most amazing week we've had in a long time.

In 2004, I was new to riding, I was just gaining my confidence on Ol' Bessie (the '83 Nighthawk) and I was going back and forth in my head the week before we left - I'm going to ride my bike, no, I think I should be a passenger, no, I'm riding my own bike... Finally, the night before we left I decided that I'd be mad at myself if I didn't ride so we left the next morning on two bikes and it was one of the best decisions I ever made. I think taking that trip to Americade gave me the time in the seat and the confidence that short trips around home weren't giving me.

We took the longest possible route from Connecticut to New York and rode on some of the most amazing roads. Big hills and sweeping curves, lookouts and valley-views. We rode through farms and forests and tiny little towns. After a few hours, we were hot and tired, searching the middle of nowhere in the 90-degree June heat for a place to stop for lunch. All I wanted was a big glass of seltzer and Luke was ready for an icy cold beer when we came up on a place so perfect, I'm still doubting that it could have really existed. Not only did it have seltzer, it had Rolling Rock, air conditioning, and burritos! What more could we want? We recharged and cooled down and got back on our bikes, even happier after our perfect pit stop. In total, it took us six hours to get there and, except for the heat, I was in heaven. Bessie and I were getting to know each other better and my increased confidence on the bike allowed me to relax and enjoy the trip that much more.

We stayed with some friends who were nice enough to let us camp out on the floor of the cabin they rented in Lake George. We spent four days riding and shopping, eating and racing go-carts. We met some new friends and had such perfect weather. It still seems like a dream. Nothing went wrong (except for the little allergic reaction I had at dinner when we realized that the tonic in my beloved gin and tonic contains sulfa - which I'm allergic to - but that was over quickly and no harm was done). I was so proud of myself for being brave enough to ride and for keeping up with the pack and for trying and learning and having a great time, that I bought myself a little rally pin that says "Americade 2004". I wear it on my riding jacket to remind me of that fantastic week. It was a dream trip and I have been dying to go back. Now I will!

This time we're leaving at night because of our work schedules and we're going to take the highway up. I'll be on the Cyclone now that Luke's got his new Ulysses with the luggage bags and all (I'm very excited about that). I'm looking forward to riding the Buell on those great mountain roads around the lake, but the wind on the highway up there's going to be rough. Once we get up there it'll be fine. We're staying with the same friends again (hi Fran and Tracy!) and I'm keeping my fingers crossed for some more great weather. Stay tuned for more Americade stories in a couple of weeks and more pictures than I'm sure you care to see.

I Made It

I am now officially thrity years old. Thirty and a day, to be exact. Hello, my name is Lisa and I am thirty years old. See how I've already adjusted to it? I can just admit it to the world. Thirty I am, and quite happy, too.

Sunday, my mom and sister threw Luke and me a big b-day bash and all sorts of fantastic friends came out to celebrate. The weather was spectacular and I think everyone had a great time, epsecially Molly and Jimmy who seem to be the only ones who had their pictures taken that day. Here are a few non-pup pics that we managed to capture:




Molly got to meet Amanda's pup, Jimmy, who is cute as could be and went swimming for the very first time, once by accident, the rest of the times were on purpose. Here's his first doggie paddle lesson:
That's his dad, Greg, and no, he's not trying to hold him under, he's just helping him along.

So the party was great, and yesterday, on my real birtday, we had a nice low-key day. There was still a lot of post-party clean up and about 700 flies to kill, but after that we sat out in the yard, enjoying the beautiful day and Luke took me for Mexican food in the topless Jeep (must be careful with the word order there). It was a great way to end the week and celebrate turning thirty.

Thank you to everyone for making Luke and me feel special and loved and old and young and very lucky to have all of you as friends and family, all at the same time!

Entirely Unnecessary

Some guy on the road just called me "dickhead".

I can't recall ever being called dickhead before. I was so stunned, I wanted to follow him to his parking spot and confront him. "Did you just call me dickhead? Oh. OK. Just checking."

It's a beautiful day in Connecticut. The sun is finally shining, everything is green and blooming and it's so warm that I was driving with my windows down. How can anyone be crabby on a day like today? Especially outside of a Starbucks!

Because everything is in bloom, my allergies have kicked it into high gear and my head is killing. Even still, I'm in a good mood because it's so lovely outside. I thought that a nice iced coffee might help the headache, so I stopped and got one on the way back from lunch. I pulled out of the parking lot and approached a line of cars waiting at a red light. I was thinking about the new prescription sunglasses I'm waiting for and how they might help this headache, too, and apparently I wasn't using my psychic ability to sense that this large man in a large car with no visible turn signal was thinking of turning in front of me into the Starbucks lot. Shame on me. He turned in behind me. Poor thing had to wait an extra three seconds to get into the parking lot! As he went by, he leaned my way and yelled "dickhead!"

Seriously. Are you that impatient? That self-absorbed? Here's a little tip for all of you prone to road rage out there. Nobody's perfect, and every little thing that happens on the road and appears to be an inconvenience to you is not done to spite you. Believe it or not, I don't hate you. (Well I might now, you called me dickhead.) I don't even know you. Sometimes I just make mistakes.

Now take it back, you big jerk, you're killing my nice weather buzz!

Sketchy

I know, you've all been wondering, Lisa, what's it like to get an illustration job? Well, being the passive marketer I've been lately, I have to admit, I almost forgot. Thankfully, my favorite clients Ford Folios, called recently to ask me to work on a new project for a local fair catalog. I thought it might be fun to share the steps of a new job with you.

#1 Ideas and Rough Sketches

The wonderful folks at Ford Folios are brilliant and creative and usually have a good idea of what they'd like to see before they call me, so for me, that's very nice. Their specific ideas and my little touches make for a fun project. For this one, they wanted a picture of the kids' pedal tractor pull with kid on a pedal tractor pulling a wagon of candy or apples or something like that. The catalog is small, and there needs to be room for the title and some text here and there. I got to work on some very rough sketches and here's what I came up with.


#2 Fine-Tuning the Design

The FF folks thought that the girl looked more like she was in a parade than a tractor pull and neither of us was thrilled with the boy with the apples. We both liked the thrid boy with the puppy and the girls i nthe background, but they asked if I could also add a weight to the wagon. After redrawing it with the weight, I decded that the wagon looked a little crowded wit hthe puppy so lef thim out. I thought the wagon needed a little character, so I decided it should be made out of wood, and I thought that the background didn't look like a fairground, so I added some fair details. The FF folks liked the girls in the background because they thought it looked like that boy was trying to impress them. This is what the next sketch looked like.
The FF folks liked the weight, but missed the puppy (me too!) and they said they liked the simpler tree/bird background a opposed to the fair background. I had to redraw the wagon to make it a little bigger to accomodate the puppy, and move the girls back a bit so the puppy didn't cover them. Here's what I came up with.
It's up to the fair officials now to approve the sketch and then when I get the OK, I can put paint to paper. Now for step 3, waiting.

Twenty-frickin-Four

I don't watch a lot of TV. Sometimes I wish I did so I could share in the conversations about Survivor or Lost or House (which has awesome commercials that make me want to watch it) or whatever everyone else is talking about. I'm so out of it. I only have two shows that I watch every week: Gilmore Girls and 24. I've been watching GG for years, but I was only infected with the contagious 24 virus at the beginning of last season. Our neighbors talked about it all the time and were so hooked on it that we wanted to see what all the fuss was about.

Well. Let me tell you. All the fuss was about Mr. Jack "I can kill you with just about anything including my penetrating stare" Bauer. And the super-suspenseful structure that keeps 24 going (which, for anyone out there who might watch less TV than me, is that each season takes place over the course of only one day, each weekly episode is an hour in that day). We were hooked and watched every week until the end where Jack had to fake his death and disappear forever to avoid imprisonment by the Chinese government. Forever? Really? I had a feeling he'd have to come back for some reason and I wanted to see that, so we started to watch 24 this season. And he came back. Surprise, surprise.

Since this season began, I have been loyally watching every show even though I get so emotionally wrapped up in the show that I get physically uncomfortable and want to leap through the TV to slap that smug bastard President Logan and I shout things at the TV like, "slap him with your pistol!" or "kick him in the nuts!" (which I yelled last night). It's not healthy. I don't sleep well on Monday nights because I go directly from watching 24, holding my breath for an hour, to trying to sleep and instead, having fitful dreams of the CTU and things exploding and me running from bad guys.

So we had agreed that we wouldn't watch 24 next season. Luke doesn't like to have shows that we watch and he'd be happy to just get rid of the TV altogether and I thought I could do without the stress, so it was settled.

Until last night. Last night was the season finale. The last two hours. The wrap up in which Jack Bauer saves the day again and gets hit in the head with a wrench and shot at and kills many bad guys and then gets to go back to his girlfriend and actually have a happy moment. A moment where he might actually smile for the first time in the two years I've watched this show - but wait, before you go home with your girlfriend and live happily ever after Jack, there's a phone call for you, and even though we all have multiple cell phones and calling devices, we've forwarded this call to the phone inside this creepy dark warehouse. Go there, take the call in "private".

It's at this point that I said to Luke, "there's still the small matter of the Chinese government who are going to want to kill him now that they know he's alive." Well. Wouldn't you know, the Chinese government kidnaps Jack and beats the crap out of him. He tells them to kill him, they say that he's too valuable to kill. And the show ends with Jack's girlfriend noticing that he's missing and a view of a container ship sailing away, toward China I assume.

NOW I HAVE TO WATCH IT NEXT SEASON! Damn it! All I wanted was to see President Logan go down (check), I wanted the terrorists to be stopped (check) and I wanted to see the creeps who worked with Logan (like that weasely little jerk with the wireless headset and the irritating glasses) to get what was coming to them, too. Then I would have been happy. But noOOoooo. Instead, Jack Bauer has to be dragged off by the Chinese and now I have to wonder about him until next January when I'm sure I'll be too weak to resist the lure of the commercials and I'll be hooked again on another emotional season of twenty-frickin-four.

Thanks a lot FOX!

Not Interested

Every spring the turtles come up from the river to lay their eggs in the sandy ground around our house. Every year Molly tries to convince them to play with her.


Molly: (sniff, sniff) Hey! What's this?

Turtle: (from inside shell) Go away.

Molly: Hey, you're not a rock.

Turtle: Go away.

Molly: Let's play!

Turtle: I'm out of here...

Changes to Etsy

Things haven't been moving at my Etsy shop, but I'm just convinced that I can sell my jewelry there. It seems so easy and convenient and so many other people are doing it! One woman is even selling homemade cookies for $15 a batch! How does she do it?

In an effort to make my shop clean and easy to navigate, I've decided to create two separate shops - one for my jewelry and one for my art. You can now visit the new and improved Jewelry by Lisa Gaumond or the new (and currently empty) Lisa's Studio.

Jewelry by Lisa Gaumond now features new photos, new styles, and even a new "Amanda" bracelet! I still have the double bracelet to name, should I call that one the "Paula" or maybe the "Flannery"? I've been naming the jewelry after the person who inspired me to make it or who bought the most of that style, but I don't make many of the double bracelets so I don't know who to name it after...

Well, stay tuned, more lovely things will be added to Lisa's Studio very soon and new pieces will be added to Jewelry by Lisa Gaumond as often as I can make them.

Finished!

Here's the final product for the crayfish postcard. What do you think? If you're in the area in July, shoot me an email. It's a fun time. You don't have to ride a motorcycle to partake. All you have to do is like to eat.

I pinch.

Have you seen the recent commercial for the Honda Element? The one with the crab? If you haven't (and even if you have) you should treat yourself to this link: I Pinch. Luke and I are now bruised everywhere from sneaking up on eachother and saying like the crab "I peench!" or "maybe little peench?" or "why no peench?" Yes, we're cruel. And easily amused.

This little guy on the left won't pinch. He's a little sketchy sketch I did for a postcard announcing our third annual motorcycle campout and crawfish jambalaya extravaganza. We host a campout for my dad's motorcycle "gang" every July and the first year I wowed them all by catching crayfish in the river and making jambalaya out of them. Y-U-U-M-M-Y! So now it's tradition. Catching them is 90% of the fun. Peeling the little buggers sure isn't a party. You can see a slideshow of last year's festivities here, just click on the "DHMC Sweaty Boobs" (that's the old name for it, the summer version of the "Frosty Nutz" trip they take to Vermont in October - it will be renamed this year).

Oral History

I was so excited that my computer was finally hooked up again after being down for almost three weeks, so I could finally update my iPod. Along with all of the podcasts I was missing out on, I suddenly had the urge to buy music from my high school years. I don't know where the sudden taste for early 90s music came from but I went with it. Now strange floods of memories are hitting me whenever the songs play. Strange memories, weird points in my life, bad haircuts, awful outfit choices, they're all coming back to me and I just had the urge to share them with you.

18 and Life - Skid Row

It's 1990, my friend Jen and I spend every weekend at Golf Land, playing video games, eating at Subway, and irritating the patrons like no one but a 13-year old girl can. We're too cool for ourselves, even, and we're trying to look foxy in front of the (loser) guys who hang out there, too. (I say loser now, because looking back, they were a group of 18+ guys who hung out at Golf Land. Come on now! At least we were 13 and had to be dropped off by our parents. They had cars and could have gone somewhere else!) So I was wandering around the video game machines, I'm sure I smelled like Loves Baby Soft, when on the radio comes this guy singing this song - wait, is it a guy? That voice is pretty high. No, it must be a guy. "This song is AWESOME," I think to myself. I have to buy the tape! I go home and tune my radio to 107.3 WAAF and wait for them to play it again.

House of Pain - Faster Pussycat

The funniest thing about this memory is the thought, "I can't believe I did a project for English class on this song". They actually let me get away with that? I can't remember what the assignment was, but I loved this song so much that I remember illustrating a poster about the song with lyrics and blue flames. It rocked, I'm sure.

Ocean Size - Jane's Addiction

Probably sometime in 1991, I'm riding to school in my sister's 1981 silver Camero and this song is playing, not loudly enough for my taste, but it was a feat of patience on my sister's part that she actually let me play my tape in her car so I didn't complain. I think to myself, "god, I love Jane's Addiction. Who doesn't? I can't wait to have my OWN car with my OWN tape player so I can play Jane's Addiction all day every day as loud as it goes!"

This Love - Pantera

It's about 1993 and Luke convinces me to let him drive my car up to this spot above the highway in Willimantic where there's a lookout. It's over route 6 and I'm not sure exactly how we got there or if it was illegal, but we ended up way on top of the highway, looking down on all the cars. It was late at night and it felt like we were miles away from everything, we were so high up. We parked the car and cranked the stereo and this song came on, it was awesome. The sad part to this memory is that one of Luke's high school friends was in the car with us and a few weeks later he died in a drunk driving accident, so I can't hear this song without thinking of Dan. But it's still a great song that needs to be played loudly.

And one more memory, this one from elementary school and no, I didn't download the song from iTunes. But I'm thinking about it...

Elvira - The Oakridge Boys

When I turned eight, I had a birthday party at Skate Fantasy in Manchester (which is now, sadly, a Big Lots store). When you were the birthday girl at Skate Fantasy, you got to pick a song and have it played just for you. What song did I pick? That's right - Elvira. My heart was on fire, for Elvira. I think I was the only eight-year old who knew all of the words and I'm still amazed that they had it there to play, but play it they did and I skated and sang my little heart out. I also have a memory of sitting in the TV room at my parents' house and absolutely blasting this song on the record (yes, record) while I worked on a paint-by-numbers picture of a horse.

Well thanks for taking a walk down memory lane with me. Does this give you any insight on the strange person I've grown up to be? From the Oakridge Boys to Pantera to Jack Johnson. Interesting.

She's a Star!

Molly's profile finally showed up on Old Navy's mascot search page. Isn't she cute?

But look at her competition. These two perfect pups belong to my friend Amanda.

It's not too late for you to enter - the deadline is May 29 (which also happens to be my brithday in case you haven't bought me a present yet). To enter, visit the Old Navy website.

Visual Overload

PICTURES! Finally! And so as not to overwhelm your poor little eyeballs, I broke everything up into separate posts. I hope you like the pictures. I'm working on some great before and after shots of the house, too. Stay tuned for those.

The Office

No, not that Office, my office! Here are the shots of my beautiful new space.

This is the computer/beading area. Please take a moment to admire Luke's beautiful built-in desk. It's everything I hoped it would be!

Here is my painting/drawing space. Much time is spent here gazing out the window, daydreaming of new things to put on paper.

And here's another shot of the beautiful desk. See, I'm on Blogger! There's still a box of desk stuff that I haven't unpacked yet, so the surface will be much more cluttered with beautiful things and it will look much homier very soon. Even now, I just love it! I wake up in the morning and just look in here because it's so pretty and so much better than it was before!

The Mandi

Here we are, finally, the shots of my new necklace design, the Mandi, named after my cousin (who knows nothing about this) who was wearing the necklace at my mom's Lia Sophia jewelry party.
I figured that since Lia Sophia jewelry is "inspired" by designer jewelry, my necklace can be "inspired" too! The necklaces are 36-inches long and strung on colorful nylon cord (more colors coming soon). They can be worn as a single strand, or doubled up and worn as a two-strand look. Very pretty and very versitile and only $22. Soon to be listed on my Etsy shop.

Woof!

Here's miss sassy in her fancy new haircut. I cropped out the grass stain but you can still see her lovely new pink collar. (Blurry action shot due to her "sitting pretty" while I took the picture.)

Dilated

No, I'm not stoned, I had an eye exam this afternoon and was lucky enough to have my pupils dilated. This shot is three hours later and not as impressive as right after the exam when you couldn't even see what color my eyes were. Talk about uncomfortable! But I did score a new pair of prescription sunglasses, thank you Davis Vision. Everything is still kinda blurry and I'm typing in a dark room because light makes it feel like jagged spikes are being forced into the back of my eyes, but it's starting to go away. Just thought I'd share that with you as sort of a warning in case there are loads of spelling errors in these posts.

Pretty

It's very pretty. Too bad I don't have any pictures to show you. This weekend Luke and I busted our rumps to get the studio/office back together and organized. He built my dream desk and shelves in my closet, I cleaned and painted and cleaned and organized. I still have a little nesting and decorating to do, but it's just about finished. I love it. It's been so long since my studio was a place I wanted to be. When we moved into our house, my studio was in the nastiest room in the house with no carpet and bad lighting and none of my old office furniture fit well in there. I didn't feel at home in there and I ended up painting at the dining room table and making jewelry on the coffee table. Now I have a creative haven, complete with new floor, a built-in desk with room for my beads, and an organized place to stash all of my supplies. I'm in heaven. All thanks to my honey. (Here's a piece of advice for you single girls out there - marry a handy man. Seriously. I'd be living in a dirt floor shack without Luke. I don't know what I'd do without him in so many ways.)

So anyhow, yesterday we had the moms over to celebrate mothers day and I wasn't able to play in my studio because I was too busy fussing over the moms so I still haven't gotten any of the new pictures off my camera. Tomorrow - I promise. Your eyes will fall out of your head after all the fantastic things I have to show you. First there's my beautiful studio and the rest of the floors (which are DONE!!), then there's the new necklace design, and Molly has a new haircut.

Speaking of Molly, I just have to say that we've got one super-tough little pup. She may look small, but she can take a licking like you wouldn't believe. She jumped into Luke's truck once and slipped out, falling on her back on the concrete; she's attempted to leap up onto the deck without using the stairs and instead ended up wedging herself into the space on the back of the stair (in other words - through the step); she once had a tree stump fall on her when she was playing where she shouldn't have been in the river; and yesterday, she pole-vaulted herself into the ground using her little snout as a pole.

We were out in the yard and she was running around, herding imaginary sheep or whatever it is that causes her to run in giant circles at breakneck speeds with her body leaning in at a 30-degree angle, when something went terribly wrong. Maybe the rain got in her eyes, maybe the g-force knocked her out momentarily. Whatever it was, she took one fantastic header that actually left grass stain on her shoulder. She came around a bend and was about to slam headfirst into a tree stump. She managed to pull out of it, but then she tumbled and planted her little nose in the ground. He body was still going too fast to stop and she, as Luke described it, pole-vaulted herself over, slamming her body to the ground and making her skid to a stop in the grass. I missed the most dramatic portion of this show, thank goodness, and only showed up after she had popped back up wet and dirty, and was panting and shaking with excited energy, ready to keep running. I poked at her, I squeezed her muscles and moved her limbs and she seemed perfectly fine. I can't believe it. She's made of rubber, I swear. I hurt my back walking to my car - she body slams herself at 30MPH and she's ready to keep running. She's a tank.

So anyhow, tomorrow, my three faithful readers. I will have plenty to show you tomorrow!

Misery Loves Company

Looks like someone else is freaking out about an upcoming birthday. One of my regular blog reads, the very funny Ultratart. Hey, at least I'm younger than she is!

Sorry the blog's been photo-free lately. My home computer is still in three different rooms of my house, patiently awaiting its new desk which my wonderful hubby will build for me this week, so I have to bring my pictures to work to upload. This scheme was working fine until impending old age or the large amount of pain-killers I was on last week caused me to jam my CF card into the reader backwards and bend the pins. CRAP! Now I can't get it to work and I have buy a new one.

I promise I do have some new things to show you, like my newly redecorated, reorganized, refloored studio and the new necklace design I'm adding to the line. I like naming my jewelry after friends who inspired it (like the"Christy") so I think I'm going to call this one the "Mandi" after my cousin who was wearing a Lia Sophia necklace that inspired me to create my own. So just imagine how fabulous everything looks right now and I will post pictures for you very soon!

Rabbit, Rabbit, Rabbit

I'm not a superstitious person. I walk under ladders, I don't "knock on wood", I open umbrellas indoors, but there is one little thing that I must do on the first day of every month or else all hell breaks loose.

My third grade music teacer, Mrs. VanSickle (no I didn't make that up) cursed me by telling me and the other impressionable eight year-olds that on the first day of each month, the first thing you say in the morning right after you wake up should be "rabbit, rabbit, rabbit" and then you'll have good luck all month long. Now, Mrs. VanSickle also taught me how to play the recorder and sing silly songs, none of which I can remember twenty-two years later, but "rabbit, rabbit, rabbit" has stayed with me these many years. I've even brainwashed my husband into doing it. I usually wake up, roll over, look at him and say "rabbit, rabbit, rabbit". He says it back and then we bicker about who has to get up and go make coffee. This has become normal. I have succeeded in passing along the curse. Nearly every month for the past twenty-two years, I've said "rabbit, rabbit, rabbit" on the first of each month. Except for this month.

This month, on Monday May 1st, I woke up early and took Molly for a walk, making sure not to say anything. I figured that Luke generally plays along with the "rabbit, rabbit, rabbit" thing but at 5:45 in the morning, he might not be so accomodating so I was planning to hit him up with it when we got back from our walk. We ventured down to the river, Molly frolicked and swam and chased the birds, I whistled to signal that we were heading back (because whistling doesn't actually count as talking) and we went back to the house. When Molly ran straight to the door without me having to whistle again, like usual, I was so happy that I just said "GOOD GIRL!" ...and then a sharp intake of breath - oh crap - I didn't say "rabbit, rabbit, rabbit"!

Gloomily, I went in the house, knowing that I was now doomed for the rest of the month - my BIRTHDAY month - and I went to see if Luke was up and said the standard "rabbit, rabbit, rabbit" then told him what happened. He laughted, because he thinks I'm crazy already, and we went on with our days. I headed over to Max Downtown before work to fix their chalkboard again, then as I was walking back to my car, the curse of the rabbit hit me like a ton of bricks - I had a back spasm. Crap. I managed to cram myself into my car and tried to breathe through the spasm as I called work to say I was going home to lay on an ice pack. I drove home and hobbled inside, made an appointment with the chiropractor and cursed that Mrs. VanSickle. This is all her fault.

I've been out of work and away from the Internet for three days now. I came to work today, partially to do some work, but really to check my email and catch up on the blogs I haven't been reading. I was starting to feel twitchy. I can't go that long without going online! The real kicker is that we just put the new floor down in my office and had to move the computer out. If I was desperate enough, I could have put it back together and gone online from home except for the fact that the darn thing weighs a ton and right now, carrying my purse and a bottle of water at the same time is a little more than I can take. I've missed you internet. I'll file this under reason #679 that I should have bought a laptop.