Happy birthday Monika!

DIY: Fern watercolor

As you may remember from my post last week, Monika recently turned 30 (and boys can also be jerks). As part of sister Monika's present, I wanted to paint her a little outdoors that she could bring indoors. Cue the ferns!

Sister Monika turns 30!

Today marks Monika's 30th birthday. Monika is the middle sister and some of the stigma surrounding the middle child probably applies to Monika (I think she would agree, she wears her middle sister badge proudly).

Peanut & Purls: Bo Peep Scarf

I'm still trying to catch up on all the fancy projects that I knit (or might still be knitting, hey Christine!). This week I wanted to show you Monika's little Bo Peep scarf from Tiny Owl Knits.

Happy Birthday!

To this little lady. AKA, Monika. AKA, the middle sister. 

a snapshot from birthdays past

She's chilling in Tacoma with Mom. Lucky birthday girl. 

tiny winter scene

One of the gifts Monika gave us contained the supplies to create a mini winter scene. A couple tiny trees, several handmade mini packages (loaded with pennies for weight, of course!), crinkled paper for snow, and a little plastic deer. I put mine in one of my domed displays. Super sweet, right?

Sisterland!

Monika and Catherine in the Badlands circa 1993

Monika and I spent this last weekend making memories. Every time something unfortunate happened, Monika would say, "whatever, we're making memories!" It wasn't in a sweet way, it was sort of a shut up we're having fun kind of way. Our first set of memories were made when we decided we would walk 7 miles to the mall. Memories!

Here are some of my memories from this last weekend.
Scroll down to make my memories your memories!

Olive (or "Crispy" as Monika has started calling her) was a big part of this weekend.

These are Monika's leaf garlands. She made them with Christine.

There are so many damn leaves around her house. 

I'm jealous and it's definitely a part of a memory I made.

We made lots of memories at Disneyland.

Including this one that involved a Disneyland opossum.

The opossum kind of freaked us out. That picture isn't zoomed in. It was just hanging out next to the Nemo submarine ride. I guess if I were an opossum, I would live in Disneyland too. Do you ever think about how if you were a bird where you would live? I used to do this all the time. I would pick someplace cool like the White House, Buckingham Palace, or Woody Allen's penthouse balcony.

Thanks, sister, for all the memories!

fruit and veg, of the knitted variety

Every once in a while, Monika will knit us some amazing fruit and veggies. And surprise: they're actually cat toys! Just imagine several happy kitties bunny-kicking the heck out of what you see below.

a peach

and a turnip

I love the sweet rosy colors--they make me think of spring.

I would like to put in a request for a parsnip, two blood oranges, and a pomegranate. Stat!
You can check out more knitted fruit and veg on Monika's ravelry page.  

P.S. We're well aware that we've been doing some major slacking lately.

We'll try to do better...especially that Monika. Sheesh.

bee's knees

Um, I was going to write a post apologizing for not posting as frequently as I ought, and within this post I was going to level an accusation at Monika for also contributing to blog stagnation, but then she went and posted last night and my blame deflection tactic is all scrambled to hell. 


Oh well, how can I expect to sustain any degree of frustration when she wrote about a topic near and dear to my heart? Bee carcasses! I only wish I'd discovered this interest in bees pre-2004, say around the time those bees moved into the wall of our garage. There was a mountain...well, a hillock of bee bodies available for the collecting and only slightly covered in pesticide. All tumbling out from behind the drywall, mounding up behind the boxes of Christmas wrapping paper. Such a pity.


Also, how can I be mad at Monika who, like me, hesitates before picking up a public puppet? I just can't fault someone with that kind of instinct. Mom, on the other hand, dives right in.

Marine Puppet Theater at the Ty Warner Sea Center

I think they're acting out a scene from Mega Shark vs. Giant Octopus. Obviously, Monika is playing Debbie Gibson's part, and since there doesn't appear to be another lady in this film--why would there be?--that leaves Lorenzo Lamas to Mom. Sorry, Mom.

Santa Monica

Also known as: the place we saw Kevin Spacey! Yup, we did. Monika spotted him on the Santa Monica Pier. The sighting was confirmed by me, Mom, and Ben. That means it's legitimate. You have to admit, that's a decent way to cap a California trip. I believe this was also the night Ben showed Mom his latest music video, the one I kept humming the entire weekend, and the teaser video for the new Beastie Boys album + video. What?! Yeah. Let's talk about: Will Ferrell, John C. Reilly, Jack Black, Ted Danson, Jason Schwartzman, Rainn Wilson, Susan Sarandon, Stanley Tucci, Steve Buscemi, Elijah Wood, Seth Rogan, Danny McBride, Will Arnett, and Chloë Sevigny? And the Beasties. Future us's are complete idiots.  Fight For Your Right: Revisited. Watch it!

Santa Monica Pier

I think we're all on the same team here, and that's the "no pie, no sledgehammer" team. Have you watched the Beastie Boys video yet? I'm going to watch it again right now.

Rancho La Brea

Nestled within the city of Los Angeles is a pit of tar. Well, not tar really but asphalt. I know it seems backwards, but asphalt is actually the lowest grade of crude oil. Tar is produced when organic substances, like peat or coal are distilled. I won't spend forever going over the geology of the area, so if you're interested (and you should be), you can visit the Asphalt & Hancock Park FAQ page. All your tar/asphalt questions will be answered!

Page Museum La Brea Tar Pits

Most of what you see here is water from heavy rainstorms that moved
through LA the previous week. The water floats on the asphalt!

Do you see the ripples in the water?

Methane escaping! Or as Attenborough would say mee-thane.

Over 1 million bones have been recovered at La Brea, and the discoveries (as well as the entrapment of animals) continue to this day.

The species that wins the award for the most bones present at La Brea? The Dire Wolf.
With bones numbering in the several thousands.

This Dire Wolf mural reminded me of Gmork. The Page Museum is big on murals, which I like.

Murals, murals, murals!

And the bones, man! Look at the bones!

There's also a conservatory in the center of the museum. There are koi, turtles, and lots of little birds. I didn't take pictures of any of those things, however. I only took this picture looking out over the conservatory...it reminded me of Jurassic Park. Monika agrees.

Monika and I also saw a woman point to a stork skeleton and tell her pre-teen son, Look, honey! It's just like the one that brought you to me when you were a baby. Sounds like someone should prepare to be a father at fourteen. I could hang out at the tar pits all day and not just because I want to see a pigeon get stuck in the asphalt.

Mom seconds that.  

just beachy

Yesterday afternoon a couple of the neighbor girls climbed out on their roof to smoke cigarettes and wear slouchy hats and mess with their iPhones. I know this because as the word neighbor implies, they live right next door to me. Their roof is viewable through my picture window. Now in my estimation, the only reason for climbing onto the roof during daylight hours is so that people will see you sitting on the roof and think: Whoa. Those girls are edgy and cool, like an Urban Outfitters ad. Doesn't that sound about right? I mean, sitting on your roof at night needs no explanation, but at 5PM, it's kind of douchey move.


Enough codgering. Let's look at some beach pictures!

Santa Barbara

This little oyster was unusually chatty. Can you guess what it said?