that thing I do

Hello, you wild beasts.

Behold, a little weekend recap:

Here are some clothes and jewelry and my face and stuff.

 I'm wearing a recently thrifted dress over a skirt because the dress is oddly very short in the back. I never have that problem. My dresses are always too short in the front.... you know... the boobs and the fact that I have no rear. No butt at all - well, at least for a black woman. 

 

So check out these huge Afghani glass bead beauties I scored on Etsy. Two for $10! Not bad, eh???
They were marked down because they're a little damaged but nothing that can't be fixed.

After last year's jewelry mishap at the faire, I swore off dancing in metal jewelry.

In case you don't remember, I danced for two days in the sweltering Southern heat and my sweat and cheap jewlery did not get along very well. 

I had a rash on my left boob that got so bad, it split open. I had terrible rashes on my upper chest and behind my ears and down the sides of my neck from my earrings.

These necklaces are so fabulous, I can't see myself only wearing them for the faire. Look at these! I wanna sleep in them! 

Sunday afternoon, I joined some friends in the park for some drumming and music like we used to do  way back many years ago. Eh, hardly anyone showed up so it turned out to be more of just a hang out session instead of a jam out session. Oh, well. The weather was nice.

And here's me with a tambourine on my head showing off... my balls.

The aslatua is a percussion shaker instrument from Ghana. It's two little gourds filled with seeds or pebbles, tied to a string. I got these weeks ago and I love them. They're a serious challenge. You hold one ball in your hand with the string between your fingers. Then swing the other ball around your hand, over your thumb to make it hit the other ball in your hand. Swing it back around to catch it in your hand. 

Ok, I'm no good at explaining stuff.

I'll post a little demo video at the bottom.

Where does the sound come from?

Oh, and I finally got a pink ukulele! I had not idea how cheap these were! Er, well for a beginner one to just fiddle around with, anyway. Wanna come over and rock out with me, Emmy?

Jonquil Festival

Saturday me and family went to the Jonquil Festival in at the Historic Washington State Park in Washington, AR. Washington State Park is a little village town thingy that has been preserved and kind of frozen in time -  the 1800s.  I was under the impression the festival would be more like my renaissance faire but in the 1800s. Nah. Just a festival - corndogs and blow up toys kind of stuff. The festival was still pretty nice though - lots to do and see. There were a few ladies in hoop skirts and shawls giving tours of the historic buildings on site, but that required a $5 pass. I figured that money would be better spent on... you know... food.

I like food.

The collage of above has pics of merch from my favorite sellers. I totally bought a tie-dye onesie for Cedar from the groovy dude in the upper right corner.

This Native dude was luring people into his booth like the pied piper with his flute.

The scenery was very lovely with the blossoms and trees and super green grass from last week's excessive rain fall that caused flooding in much of the area.

Above I'm in the backyard of one the Purdom House.

Below we're romping in the yard of a restaurant that's been there since - you guess it - the 1800s. 

A cute little parade passed by as we were playing.

WHAT WE BOUGHT:

Caleb had a genuine leather work belt custom sized for him on site.

I got 2 jars of homemade jelly: plum and peach jalapeno

A mini handmade pecan pie (the official pie of Texas) for the kids. We don't do sweets much so the kids have never had pie before. 

Handmade Indian sandalwood soap samples

Tie-dyed onesie for Cedar

A handmade gourd birdhouse thing. It's big and weird! I love it!

Stringed brass bells made by my friends who had a booth at the festival. I already have two strands for home decor but I want another strand for my gypsy queen costume.

WHAT I WORE:

DIY kaftan turned jacket thingy. I cut the kaftan open last week and forgot to finish it off so as the husband was loading the car I used a few tiny dabs of hot glue to temporarily finish off the seams.

I did the hair wrap the night before myself. The dangly bits in the middle are from a broken bracelet and the cowry shell doodad is from my collection of costume making stuff. I have tons more!

Sunglasses - Romancing the Stone clearance

Necklaces - cheap eBay finds

Dress - handmedown

A better view

So how was your weekend?

What'd you do?

no cookies, no grains, no job, no nudity

Hey everybody! You know what time it is? It's HOLLIE TIME!!

Yo. How's it going. You doing good? All cool? Cool.

It's Sunday, it's noon and I'm fat, I'm hungry and I'm ready to party...

and by party I mean browse Pinterest and eat brownies for the rest of the day. 

Yesterday we took a little trip to see the husband's parents in Nacogdoches, TX.

It's boring two hour drive.

When we arrived we were supposed to check out the town's annual Blueberry Festival but when we pulled up it started raining cats and dogs and elephants too. Everyone in the festival was scrambling to get out of there. It didn't look like the rain would be stopping any time soon so we just continued to the inlaw's house.

▲▲This is the face of a man who has been robbed of a golden opportunity to get pie.▲▲

The rain hadn't reached the inlaw's house when we got there (and they weren't even there yet), so we seized the opportunity to take some photos.  

Just thinkin' about what's inside that trashcan out there. Lovely.

  And then the rain came. It was pretty awesome. Just my type of storm - no thunder or lightning. Just heavy rain, a little wind and cool temperatures. Ahhhhhh yesss...

  And River FINALLY got to play in rain for the first time evar!

So the inlaws came home. the rain stopped. Both kid's got a costume change. We ate some pretty effin' awesome ravioli and shrimp stuff. We hung out outside - which was gross and sticky thanks to the sun coming out after the rain.

Granny tried to help Cedar get over her phobia of grass.

And here's my first "wildlife photo". Look at these savage beasts! I can't believe I got so close to such wild and dangerous animals! I could have lost and eye or a limb or worse... A NOSE!

 Soooo, That's it. Oh wait!

In my last post I was whining about super pic-heavy posts and mentioned bloggers need to put photos in a collage to put an end to BRSMFIS (blog-reader-scrolling-mouse-finger-injuries)  right?

Well, many of you said you don't know how to put photos in collages.

That's a dang shame.

Let me help you... because, you know, the world revolves around me AND my opinion about you and your blog and how you do things is very important.

MUHAHAHAHAHAAAAAA!!!

Seriously, though. PicMonkey is the way to go if you would like to collage your photos. It's crazy stupid easy to use and making collages is a breeze. For realz.

Save a finger.

Collage your pics.

adventures in laa laa land

Me and the husband's fifth wedding anniversary was on the 8th and Mother's  Day is today so we celebrated it all as one lump holiday this weekend. I think I shall name this multi-purpose holiday

"We Got Married and Weren't Trying to Get Pregnant But it Happened Twice Day"

Ah, c'mon, I'm just kidding.

Anywho we went to Sci-Port Discovery Center in Shreveport, LA (about 75 miles away) and then on to the Louisiana Boardwalk for some food and to find my mom a Mother' Day Gift. Sooooo.... here are some pics from our special holiday... what did I name it? Something like "I Can't Take Birth Control Because it Makes My Boobs Bigger Day"? Something like that.

Joking, folks. Not about the birth control thing though... that's no joking matter.

Don't you dare laugh.

  

And then at the Boardwalk.

I finally had my first Bloody Mary!!

Shameless bathroom selfie.

Happy Mother's Day to all you moms, mom's-to-be, fur-moms, dad-moms, etc...