Beat down the walls, begin, believe, behold, begat- be a better drummer, be an up and comer, Can you picture that?

Fact- I am crazy.

Fact- Anyone who has known me for the better part of a week knows its the good kind of crazy.

Fact- Even the people who love me best sometimes wonder if the above fact is true.

Fact- It is true.

Cam and I were walking in Pike Market in Seattle, looking at all the awesome home grown crafts and goods and produce and fresh fish, when I stopped to have a look at a very beautiful dressing gown. After taking a gander at the outrageous price tag, I tilted my head to the side in consideration, took a picture on my camera, and walked away.

Cam: You're going to make that aren't you.

Me: Well I'm not paying $120 bucks for it when I could make it myself in under 40.

Cam: That's what I love about you Leigh. If you like it but don't want to pay for it, you always find a way to make it yourself.

Which had bearing on a conversation a few months later.  I had just picked up an old fashioned wooden window, from which the glass panes had been removed, and it was in pretty rough shape- it desperately needs sanding and re-painting and maybe some carpenters glue for good measure.

Cam: What the hell is this piece of crap?

Me: Well, its going to be a picture frame.

Cam: That's going to take a lot of work.

Me: Yep, and then it will be awesome.

Cam: How many projects do you have going at any one time?

Me: Depends. Do you mean ongoing, complete-able, or conceptual?

Cam: Um...complete-able?

Me: Probably about 15.

Cam: I know that you will eventually make something neat out of that piece of crap, but until such time, you will have to endure my cynical skepticism and mockery. Which will be replaced with genuine praise when you complete your turning-this-junk-into-stuff.

Me: Acceptable.

Why am I telling you all of this?

Because many of those projects are complete, and now I'm going to show them off.

Project 1- Bedroom with canopy

Materials-
Paint, $50
gorgeous fabric that I found on sale, $20
Two pieces of wood- free
Staples- $1
Paint- leftover from painting the room, so technically free.
Time- In total, probably 2 hours.

Before

Project 2- Office

Paint- $20

Time- One afternoon.  And it'll probably take me an hour or so to clean it up again. 

Before

After

Project 4- Sewing Desk

Materials- Desk $10 (also, an antique belonging to a feminist newspaper columnist living on the island in the 1960's.)

Leftover paint

Shellac $8

Time- two days

Sadly, no before picture, just afters. Its not actually this yellow- that's because of the lighting. Its a night light butter colour. 

Project 5- Workbench

cost- $25 at a garage sale

time- an hour with my dad. =)

I was convinced when I bought this that it would fit in the sewing room all in one piece. Michael and Cam loudly assured me it would not. ....they were right. So Dad and I cut it down to size!

Project 5- Sewing Room

Materials- 

Paint and supplies, $50

Desk- $10

Lamps, electrical, rugs- Birthday gift from my parents and sister

Furniture- Birthday gift from Sarah and Michael

Time- a few weeks, in total probably about 4 days worth of work if you did it in one stretch. 

Welcome to my Zen Den. Combination sewing, crafting, guest, and soon Wii playing room. That weird thing at the bottom of the second picture is my arm and a coffee mug, not included.

Sarah and Michael surprised me with the wonderful recliners and hide-a-bed, with which the former owners included sheets, blanket, quilt, and feather pillow.

While Sarah and I are sitting on the comfy chairs and comfy couch, enjoying the newly completed Hobbit Hole, Cam opens the downstairs door and hollers down to me. 

" I apologize for my former skepticism, and the moral of the story is you should always get free furniture when you can."

....?

Turns out that when Michael and Sarah went to pick up the furniture, the people who used to own it asked them who they were and what they wanted the furniture for. When Michael told them about us and Noisy Mime, they lit up and said "We were just talking about you!" Why? Because one of them is the VP of Island Musical Theatre ( I think that's the name, I wasn't there so I will correct it if I'm wrong) and own and operate a music studio/school in Mill Bay. They have offered us rehearsal space, access to their wardrobe, have contacted their students on behalf of our upcoming auditions, and can accredit me as a voice teacher. Ah, universal synergy. God does not play with dice. 

"Whew!" You must think. All that and work and turning 26? Yes. I am busy. 

We had a lovely BBQ for my birthday, with new friends from the Dice Bag and Starbucks. Cam got me the latest book in the Dark Tower series, which means I need to hurry up and finish reading said series so I can read the book he got me, so excited!! I kept telling myself that I needed to take pictures of the bbq, and then of course promptly forgot, but it was a birthday party like any other. 

What else is new? 

This. 

How do we deal with this level of cute?

Its hard. 

Emma has discovered that while the dog is mostly an irritant, it can be lots of fun to antagonize it by walking right past it, enticing it to chase her, and then smacking it in the face from the safety of a windowsill. Our attempts to deter this behavior on both sides has failed substantively, and our days are a whirlwind of trying to wear out the pup and appease the cat, and keep them from constant sibling antagonism. Puppy is up at all hours of the day and night because she is either going full speed ahead, or sleeping soundly on top of an air vent where she can get the most benefit of the air conditioning through her thick coat. She is adorable, she is trouble, she is frustrating, she is entirely affectionate, and she has a very large problem with biting at the moment that we are working on training out of her. Its not her fault really- teething in human babies can be awful, teething in a puppy must be equally painful, and they can't have baby aspirin. Still, it is exhausting. 

Did I say I wanted kids? We'll see. 

Much else new? No. We've set up auditions for the theatre company for Sept 1, 2, and 7, and are getting more and more e-mails every day. We've also set up something called Chip-In, which is basically the Canadian version of Kickstarter to get our first show up and running. I've included the widget on the blog and the link is here;

http://noisymimetheatre.chipin.com/p/

Video of Loki soon. =)

Fact is there's nothin' out there you can't do- even Santa Clause believes in you!

In the car, on the way to Bright Angel Park.

S: "I've got it! I know what we can name the kids."

M: "Oh yes?"

S: "Spawn, Spawnlet, and Spawnling."

L: "What happens if we have four?"

M: "We name the fourth one 'Here Cam, this one's yours!'"

Like any general of the Imperial Star Fleet, I have extremely good and valid reasons for why things are not getting done in a timely manner. Like blog posts, or finding the rebel base, or finishing the second Death Star.

But here I am, writing up a new one, and I will try my best to fill you in on the past three weeks.

Firstly, Michael and Sarah found a brilliant new place to go while I was stuck at work with a 30 hour week (that sounds like complaining- its not, I'm just only part time so it was kinda crazy for me). It's called Bright Angel Park, and it is a big park encompassing a solid length of a beautiful fresh water river perfect for swimming and general laying about.

A real life suspension bridge!!! I know, right!?

Most of the two weeks proceeding friday the 13th were spent in preparation for my family visiting. They arrived the night of Friday the 13th, and man did we ever have a fantastic time! At least once a day we visited some kind of waterside, be it

Transfer beach or Bright Angel or Cherry Point or Cowichan Lake. The pictures below are not any of mine- my genius photographer sister Danielle took them. And I think some of them Mom took on Dani's camera, I'm not sure. Regardless, I'm just going to let everyone marvel in the absolute gorgeousity (I'm making that a word right now) of Dani's photos.













ARRIVAL

It was storming on the island as the ferry came in, but not on the water,
resulting in some beautiful double rainbow action. 

He's not actually that muscular, he's jut full of hot air. ;)

"Next time on Tales of the Ferry- when windbreakers attack!"

You make think that its Ireland, but its not.

A very beautiful view of the crossing

Impressive. We drove through what felt like a freak lightning/thunderstorm to pick up Mom Dad and Dani, and witnessed some really awe inspiring rainbows. It was a 15 hour travel day for the Fryling Clan, so it was straight home to a curried turkey soup dinner and then bed.

BRIGHT ANGEL

The next day the weather was kind to us, so we took everyone on a picnic to Bright Angel, where Dani took these wonderful shots while my father and I made fools of ourselves swimming in the river and poking at an ancient crawdad.

 


Dani said that it looked like some setting for one of the Dungeons and Dragons type games I play. I think she's right. There be elves here.

NANAIMO

We arrived in Nanaimo just in time for the Nanaimo BBQ Festival and Silly Boat Regatta! I can't begin to tell you how much fun the Silly Boat Regatta was. As I understand it, it is a charity event where teams are given three hours to build a boat from pre-approved materials and then race them in Nanaimo bay. Here are some pictures of our favorite teams.

So THAT'S how they got out of Alcatraz.

Just sit right back and you'll hear a tale, unless we start to tip...
Actually, these guys took the race, they were FAST.

See? Look at em go!

Much of the magic of the day came from the fact that people neither sank nor drowned. They should have, but they didn't. 

You can just see our favorites in the lower left corner- that
giraffe boat was not only awesomely ridiculous, but it FLEW.

Oh the vikings! Points for style, but that boat sat lower and lower
and lower in the water as the race went on. Dad and I
didn't think they'd make it to shore. 

There's a better picture of the giraffe!

 

You can see me doing this next year, can't you?
We also enjoyed the bookstore, some very fine bbq, gift shops, and sunshine. Afterwards, we went to Transfer beach, where Dad and Dani hopped in the ocean for a dip and mom and I sunbathed and read books. Then we went for a fruit serving.

A fruit serving? Funny family story. Toward the end of her life, my Great Grandma B was diabetic, and was only allowed so much sugar as was in a serving of fruit. To circumvent this limitation of her sweet tooth, any and all adventures in ice cream were referred to as 'fruit servings', and we call them that to this day. As my dad pointed out- "We're on vacation. Of course we're going to have ice cream every day."
And we did.

BEACON HILL PARK

 
  The best was driving down to Victoria for the day, to a place called Beacon Hill Park, where we stumbled across and absolute gem of a cove called Horseshoe Cove. We were getting quite hungry, and lucky for us there was a Thrifty Foods just down the road, so we stocked up on meat and cheese and bread and spread ourselves out a picnic blanket on the cliffs overlooking the ocean. From where we were sitting, we could see the mountains of Washington State (at least, we were pretty sure it was Washington, that's what the GPS said).

Harley the Heron, who followed us.

 

 

 This was of course after we drove around Victoria for about an hour trying to find somewhere to have lunch. We really lucked out. Dad and Dani picked up some driftwood to take home as a souvenir, mom tried out her photographer skills, and I sat and enjoyed some time with my family. Maybe I'm just very blessed, but truly hanging out with my dad, sister and mom is some of the best time I've spent in my life.

Some enterprising soul made a driftfish!

 

Ahh, paradise. 

We then hit the city of Victoria itself, with its wonderful architecture and street vendors and general city-ness. Unfortunately, I only have four pictures of this jaunt, I'm expecting to get more from the family when they've uploaded them. You hear that Frylings? Send me pictures!

Mom and Dad. I mean, um...

 
 

And then we ate more ice cream. 

COWICHAN BAY, THE END OF THE VISIT

On our last day together, we went out for dinner to a place called the Rock Cod Cafe in Cowichan Bay, on the advice of a local friend. We walked and enjoyed the free maritime museum, and Dani took these beautiful pictures of the town in the early evening. 

The requisite "Everyone make a face like a doofus" photo

Michael's fantastic Fruits de Mer Curry, 

My favorite photo. Open it in a new window to see it in its true glory.

As with all good things, my week with the family did eventually end. We made it to the ferry just in the nick of time to get them on it and back to the world of Michigan. There was barely time for a hug goodbye, and then I was back in the car driving up the island. 

My father texted me from the ferry, to tell me he loved me and to apologize that there wasn't enough time. "Sometimes," he said "there is never enough time"

"It occurs to me," I texted back "That that is what heaven is. The place where there is always enough time."

Or, y'know, this place.

After the family went home, things got crazy again. due to vacations and some hospitalizations, I ended up pull a 60 hour week this week, and I am wiped out. But, on the bright side of things, only one more week until puppy comes home to live with us. Would you like to meet Loki?

More next week!