I was about to give up on this idea of blogging everyday and call it all rubbish until I read Cathy’s comment. It’s amazing how an audience of one can totally change your opinion of yourself. It’s still probably rubbish and you are just being kind, Cathy, but thank you!

Yesterday was an exercise in failure. Like many behind the scenes crafting days. Painting an organic object like a pumpkin is challenging. It’s totally doable but you can’t be a perfectionist about it.  The surface of the pumpkins is porous and has some moisture to it so the paint doesn’t want to adhere as easily as you would think. It does actually stick and it works but you have to be patient with it. The other hurdle is the bumpy surface of the pumpkin. First go around I used painters tape to create the top layer. That peeled the paint off and there was no way I could paint the other half without peeling even more off (because I never wait for paint to completely dry—who’s got time for that?!!)  so I gave up on that idea. Then I tried a piece of cardboard cut into a reverse circle to act as a shield when spraying. That sort of worked. But the surface is bumpy so a slight haze of paint snuck through the divots between the cardboard and the veins of the pumpkin. This is probably impossible to visualize. Just add it all up to why I am procrastinating on this craft.

Today I carve the painted pumpkins. I’m nervous I’m going to screw up my paint jobs. I probably am.

In other news we found a yellow pumpkin at Pavilions this weekend. I’ve never seen a yellow pumpkin before. They are called “Mellow Yellow.” You can google them. All sorts of places sell them. They were the coolest thing I’d seen since that year we found a bunch of green pumpkins. That post is gone now for some reason. Looks like anything older than 2004 is gone from this blog. Ugh. I am so over trying to fix it.

Speaking of fixing websites. I am almost done with brendaponnay.com. Well I’ve got the bones of it done. I’m not a web designer. I’m just mucking around with a WordPress template and I am forever frustrated because it works nothing like the layout programs I work with as a graphic designer. I’m currently stuck on trying to get my social media icons into my menu bar. Nothing is working. And I need to write an actual bio with a photo that someone can’t crop to make me look like I’m wearing nothing instead of a strapless sundress. Sigh. AND I need to link all my books to amazon. So much to do.

What else is new? I’m currently dropping my exercise ball. I was juggling that one in the air for so long and doing so well. Something always has to drop.  I used to take the dogs on epic long walks and get 20,000 steps in a day. Now I’m lucky if I get 2000. I quit the boxing program, though I do intend to start up again in November. I am feeling like a fat slob. AND it’s baking season. Not a good combo.

Okay! Off to go clean some pumpkins and then maybe illustrate a new banner and pay some bills. It’s the first of the month! Happy October!

I’m trying something new. I’m going to journal here (the pc version of course) and skip my usual morning journaling in my beloved moleskin. Poor moleskin. He’s going to miss me. Journaling on the computer is how I started blogging in the first place. I can type so much faster than I can write (which you will see might be a hinderance). Thank you 8th grade typing class with those heavy black metal typewriters that clacked so loudly. Anyway, in preparation of November write a Novel month (what’s it called? NOVOPOMO?) I thought I’d try to write daily here first. Disclaimer alert. I should never say my goals out loud because I invariably break them or resent them. But here I go!

The problem I have with writing a novel is that I don’t have really strong plot-writing skills. I can describe a character, a room, all sorts of things. I can even write dialogue, I think. I just have trouble coming up with a really good plot arc. That was my whole problem with the Secret Agent Josephine in Paris book and the reason I never wrote any more Secret Agent Josephine books (though I still want to get back to the Secret Agent Josephine At Home). I just couldn’t write a kids’ spy book and have it be something silly about chasing down the blueberry caper or solving another stolen art mysteries. Snore… Spies are about murder and duality and finding secrets with trickery and sex appeal. Not exactly children’s literature material.  I just couldn’t make Secret Agent Josephine a go-go-gadget character, even though she sorta was. So she sits in my head getting extremely bored.

ANYWAY! I swear, journaling with me (with the ease of typing) is just an endless stream of tangents. I thought I was going to start this post talking about Fall! Ha! Another tangent: A long time ago, I think during my messenger days of sending Bethany Actually a million texts all day long as a release vent for my failing marriage, I programmed my computer to type hahahahahahahahahhahahahahahhahahahahahahaha!!!!!!!! instead of the word “ha” as a shortcut because I was terribly offended by “lol” back in those days. I was such a snob. To this day (through three computers even,) every time I type anything with the letter “h” and “a”, it automatically fills up my screen with hahahahahahahahahhahahahahahhahahahahahahaha!!!!!!!! It’s terrible. hahahahahahahahahhahahahahahhahahahahahahaha!!!!!!!! it’s like a virus hahahahahahahahahhahahahahahhahahahahahahaha!!!!!!!! I can’t get it to stop. Try typing hahahahahahahahahhahahahahahhahahahahahahaha!!!!!!!! ppy Birthday or Hahahahahahahahahhahahahahahhahahahahahahaha!!!!!!!! lelujah or hahahahahahahahahhahahahahahhahahahahahahaha!!!!!!!! nd job. Just kidding. I never type hahahahahahahahahhahahahahahhahahahahahahaha!!!!!!!!nd job. And I don’t remember how to fix it. So I’m constantly backspacing over my hahahahahahahahahhahahahahahhahahahahahahaha!!!!!!!! to turn it back to ha-something

So Fall!! I was thinking about it just before I sat down to type because I stuck a spoonful of caramelized sweetened condensed milk in my coffee this morning and it was swirling around so majestically. Joon had a baking babysitting event this weekend (I’ll have to blog that later) and she taught herself how to make caramel by baking sweetened condensed milk in the oven. It takes about an hour but turns out amazing. So caramelly and gooey! We have a ton of it now so I thought it would be a good idea to stick a spoon of it in my coffee with a nod towards Starbucks and their endless parade of fall-themed drinks. Take that Starbucks. I’m probably going to gain about ten pounds right before we have to get holiday pictures taken. Groan.

But it also feels amazingly fall-ish because we actually hahahahahahahahahhahahahahahhahahahahahahaha!!!!!!!!ve a chill in the air in the morning. I LOVE a change in seasons. I felt the same way about summer. When you wake up in the morning and something seems different, it’s magical.  I cannot wait to wear sweaters and socks and slippers again. I have fuzzy UGG slippers and they are THE BEST.

The girls have been wearing heavy over-sized hoodies all through summer. Eighty degrees in the shade or not. They are nuts. They have heat rash to prove it. Hoodies have been a fashion statement this year and they wear them every single day like a uniform. The bigger the better. I think they each have about twenty hoodies apiece. I know this because they don’t hang them up or fold them and put away them in drawers or on shelves. They just leave them hanging around their room in various stages of inside-out-ness. Finally I got sick of the problem and designated two of Bug’s expedit baskets for hoodies instead of old toys that she hasn’t played with since she was six. It was a rite of passage. Out with the toys, in with the bins of hoodies. So now she stuffs them in her baskets and we are all happy.

You might be wondering how these teens could amass twenty or more hoodies each. Well, it’s something like this: every time we go to the store to buy them some necessary garment like a shirt or a much needed bra they end up picking out a hoodie instead. And then there’s me being the clueless parent that I am and I fail to remember that they already have several at home. It could also be that the teens are extremely persuasive. They are!!! They make it seem like the hoodie in question is some kind of collector’s item that their life depends upon. I’m just stupid. I fall for it every time. But no more I say. They have enough hoodies to dress two rugby teams and they would fit too!

I digress again. I’m hahahahahahahahahhahahahahahhahahahahahahaha!!!!!!!! ppy it’s fall and I cannot wait to carve up a dozen pumpkins for all my alphamom crafts. In fact that’s what is on my to do list today. What a silly job I have.