Songs of Love

FANTASTIC day/night people! First of all, like most couples, we didn't celebrate Valentines Day yesterday okay? It's sort of a silly holiday. I prefer showing how much I love my wife all year round. Second, today was one of the best days off. The weather was perfect (especially for February) We got to have a nice family walk at the park down the street, and Mia played on the swings for the first time. Boy, did she LOVE it. Later, Jill & I went out to dinner at this place called ZIN in Delafield. My boss gave us a gift card for this place last year because "it's strange and different just like us". While the comment was a bit weird, we defiantly appreciated the gift card. Especially since the place was a bit pricey for us. The food was absolutely awesome and if you've got some extra cash and like Italian food, I'd recommend checking the place out. We even enjoyed some ice cream afterwards over at Cold Stone. Haven't been there since we started dating back in 2004. All in all, a delightful and rare evening for my wonderful wife.

Woah, wait...what about Mia? Well thankfully my little brother and his wife baby sat Mia tonight. How awesome right? They had a great time watching her. We were slightly concerned since on the drive to their house, she was pretty cranky. STOKED that when we got back to their house after our little "date" she was happy and had a great time. Sadly on the drive back to New Berlin, she was cranky. Gave her a little snack to keep her happy or at least content.

Slowly making progress on this dog drawing. Taking....quite....a..longgg....time. Thankfully, no rush. We've got a round of visitors coming in this weekend. Hopefully the weather stays somewhat decent. Later kids.

Pints of Guinness Makes You Strong

" Pints of Guinness Makes You Strong" by Against Me! has been stuck in my head all day. Might be something to do with my attempt to keep positive. Or, that the dark stuff is fueling my late night drawing session before bed. Whatever the case my be, I finally kicked myself hard in the butt to start a complicated, yet neat dog portrait for a customer of KT. It's tricky because the picture is small, but I think I can make it work. That's the thing about being an artist-You never know how the end result will be when you start a project. All you can hope for is something to be content with.

Enjoyed another Wednesday off. Visited my Dad today with Mia. He always loves it when we come over. Mia was less interested in sitting around, and more intrigued by wandering around the house. After a delicious dinner and bath time, she passed out in Jill's arms as we watched Modern Family. It was so cute and it blew me away how big she's gotten. Reminded me of those tiresome nights of us taking turns trying to get her to sleep. Rocking and "shhhhing" her. Don't miss those nights at ALL. Other then that, nothing else exciting to talk about. Hoping to put in at the most 17-18 hours on this dog portrait. That is, if Mia allows it. Later peeps

Stove By a Whale

Holy Batman, it's February already! Lots & lots to do. First of all, a year ago I completed my 28 days of Art project and for the most part, was pretty happy with how everything turned out. Today, thankfully Jill & I were off and had a pretty great day. Put my vacation in for our Florida trip this morning. I'm pretty stoked about it. It's been almost 10 years since I've been to Florida (ironically, Jill was there too in the marching band in 2002) and this time, I'm not surrounded by large cartoon animals. Not that Disney World isn't a fun place to be, but I'm sure I'd enjoy it more when Mia gets older. No, this trip is all about visiting Jill's Grandpa in Sebastian. Yeah, I'm not too familiar where it is either, but from the map I recently looked it, it's on the Atlantic side of the state. Sadly, this is Mia's only great Grandfather. So I'm pretty happy she'll get to meet him. Hell, it's been almost 4 years since I've seen him, at our wedding. It's kinda weird that we're going down during Spring Break. Hopefully Mia's good on the airplane.

So earlier in the week, I was feeling pretty depressed. Work of course bringing me down. I don't know why. Makes it hard to even go in sometimes. "Why am I here? What difference do I make at this place? What would I rather be doing" Do people even get excited about work anymore? All that college preparation for the working world, and you don't get the "dream job"? Why? Will I ever get a better job, or am I doomed to be at this place for all eternity??! Sorta going on a rant here, but these are questions I've been asking myself lately. But as I read photographer and overall cool buddy of mine Andy Stenz's question of the week on his Facebook page, It made me feel slightly better. The question was "what makes you most happy?" And it couldn't be a person. So with that, I found three things that make me happy, and now, I'll add to it. Here's the list in no particular order :

My daughter's laughter/Smile

A Tall Guinness

Playing my drum set

Playing music live

The sound of a paint brush going across the canvas

"Biomusicology" by Ted Leo & The Pharmacists

Photographing on a sunny day (Hawaii, New York, Milwaukee..it doesn't matter!"

Wisconsin's Fall

Oahu, Hawaii

New drawing pencils

The feeling of completing an art project

Playing hockey outside (even though it's been quite a while)

Getting tattooed

I could go on & on. Making this list got me through the day and hopefully the rest of the week. Thinking of the positives help keep away the negative feelings. If you ever feel stressed or depressed, I suggest doing the same thing :) Later

Sing Out America

Hey dudes and dudettes. I've got a fun story to share from my day off yesterday. Didn't get to write about it last night since Mia decided she didn't want to sleep and would rather play last night. Crazy Kid. Anyways, so yesterday I was upstairs with Mia. We were playing with Remi. Like a normal day. She enjoys walking through our hallway and discovering him laying on our bed. I looked over to the corner of our room and saw my bass guitar. It's a black Ibanez. Nothing real special about it. I bought it when I was 17 years old. It was a time in my life, when I had played drums quite a bit and wanted to branch out and try a new instrument. I'm not that great, but I'm good enough to read tabs correctly and figure things out by ear at times. Anyway when I noticed it in the corner, I thought "hmmm I wonder what Mia would do if I played the bass with her...?"

So I pulled out the beat up bass and we had a total blast. I was strumming it, and she found it fascinating! She would hold the strings down and watch me strum with this major smile on her face. Like "Dad, how are you doing this??" It's been the highlight of my week. Today during her photo shoot at the studio playing with my Pearl Piccolo snare drum come second. I was showing her "Mia, hold the drum sticks and hit the snare like this" and quickly she'd figure it out. She seemed to enjoy throwing the sticks more though, but that's alright. She's got the music in her blood, her soul and her heart. Just like her Dad.

Tomorrow, maybe we'll play a little bongos. It's been a while. She's been enjoying walking and wobbling around the house more and more. Exploring the rooms and seeing what she can play with. Won't be long before she's doing it without holding on to my hands. Then I'll have to chase after her. Good grief. On my way to a work leadership thing today I put in Decibully's World Travels Fast record in the car. Almost forgot how perfect that album is. They were one of Milwaukee's finest bands live and on record and sadly, most of the people here probably aren't that familiar with their work. But then again, that may have been a good thing because they may not have gotten the same experience from their music that I did. Easily one of the most creative bands I've ever heard. Anyways, back to my bowl of grapes, then to the showers, then to sleep. Peace out kids.

Sauve Les Requins

Hey dudes. Tonight was a perfect night. No, really. It was. We love Wednesday evenings. During the day, I spent a little time with my Dad. Did a surprise visit with Mia. He really wanted a picture of himself with Mia in Tampa Bay Lightening Gear (the Bolts are his fav hockey team). Later at night, Jill and I had a nice dinner, bath time for Mia followed by a hilarious episode of Modern Family; one of our favourite sitcoms on TV. This is the life. Through my teenage years, I never imagined having a family like this. Hell, I never thought I'd ever find a person I'd get married to. It's an added bonus that we have this little peanut-kid that cracks us up every day. So when Jill & I have days together or just a few hours at night, we take advantage of it. Mia absolutely LOVES it when we're both home together. You can tell in her face. She crawls around super happy. She was tackling me Sunday evening when I worked the day shift. It must have made her day because she was super stoked. A happy Mia makes me a happy Dad.

So my last blog post, I said I'd come up with a list of goals for the year. I didn't make all of mine last year, so a few will make this year's list.

Get SERIOUS painting done for a possible art show.

Create and put together a new website for my artwork

Design a popular shirt for Threadless (hopefully)

Play music again

write some music? Maybe?

Do some creative photography

Design some new Thrill Factory logos. Most likely will be Incorporated in the new website.

Try to play some pond hockey before Spring.

Start a dog portrait for a customer

Not a lot of goals on this list, but some are pretty challenging. I will do my best to complete more this time around. My time is always limited to what I can do and when I can do it.

Call Me Home

First post of the new year. Lots going on folks. Lots of goals, perhaps a trip and a slew of weddings this year. Let the craziness begin. So New Years (like last year's) was quiet. Sorta. Drove down to Illinois listening to my new Florence & The Machine album (thanks to my awesome friend Micaela) I could barely contain the excitement to see Mia and Jill again that day. When I walked in the door, Mia was re-familiarizing herself with my face and mouth. It was pretty cute. That night he kept it chill. Her parents made a delicious crab legs dinner with veggie pizza and a tasty tart. Jill crashed early, her bro went to a part-ay (or a box social as some call it) and her parents headed off to sleep. Remi and I rang in the new year together. Aw. And there were big fireworks shooting off in Oswego. Lovely.

So the last few nights have been pretty rough here. The teething is getting the best of her, making nights very painful, especially for Jill. Thankfully tonight. it's quiet upstairs and they're both asleep. Jill needs like, 2 solid days of sleep. Too bad that's not possible eh? haha.

So after 6 or so painful years, I got a new ride and dumped my lousy Dodge Neon. Good riddance to a horrid car that caused me so many problems. It's got low low miles on it, but let's face it, the car sucked a ton, didn't cost a lot at the time and nickel and dimed me for the last time. Jill and I looked at crossovers for quite some time. Especially my dream vehicle; the Mazda CX-9. A sleek, quick 7-seater perfect for the familia. Sadly, they're expensive. Very expensive. The cheapest we saw, was like 20K. Ouch. So long story short, we went to Carmax and got a good deal on a car, yes a car. It wasn't in the cards to get a bigger vehicle no matter how much we wanted. We wanted to keep payments low, but wanted good MPG and low miles on the vehicle. So without further or do, I'm now owning a Toyota Corolla again. Dark midnight blue. YES, Jill and I both have Corolla's now. Silly, but that's okay, my bro and his wife have his and hers Civics :)

Both our vehicles should last us a long long time. Maybe our next car will be a crossover, who knows. I now feel a little safer in my ride, unlike my Neon that almost broke down a few weeks ago on the freeway. It wouldn't be a big deal if it was just me driving around in it, but I can't take risks with Mia. Next post, I'll give you a list of goals and things I'd like to accomplish this year. Hopefully.

100 Resolutions-a reflection of 2011

Last blog post for 2011. Tonight, I'm reflecting on this whirlwind of a year. 2011 was quite interesting. The word, Interesting doesn't really do the year justice. Amazing? Frustrating? enlightening? I could go all night. Here's a look back of the year.

In January, After an amazing show at Linneman's and a heated argument later in the week, Clean Hands went on indefinite hiatus. Our bassist Jason flipped and quit the group. Nick and I treated the stab wounds and put things on hold. With my daughter on the way we figured it was best not to try pick up another bassist and keep the ball rolling. It was a very frustrating time for myself because our group was doing quite well, released an EP in December and were starting to figure out our next move. Since then, Nick's kept busy playing keys in the folk/indie band Conrad Plymouth and they're releasing a full record.

At the end of March, my wife and I became parents and our little angle Mia was born. Parenthood has flipped our lives upside down and we devote 100 percent of our lives raising and loving her. Sappy I know, sorry. I'm missing them both right now since I've been by myself for the last four days. April, I got to see one of my favourite guitar players of all time, Ted Leo, perform PLUS meet him before hand. Hands down one of my favourite shows I've ever been to. My older bro, his wife and I watched him and Maritime guitarist Davey Von Bohlen perform in Madison. What a beautiful night to have a beer and watch a genius at work.

In the Summer, I got to visit Chicago's Shedd Aquarium twice with my wife's family. My first time there, it was a beautiful warm day in one of my favourite cities. I loved taking in all the wonderful animals and such. The 2nd time I'll never forget. My bro in law who interned there hooked my wife and I with tickets for a penguin encounter. Penguins are my favourite animals so it was a great and surreal experience for the both of us. Throughout the rest of the year, I've been figuring out the whole "Dad" thing. Mainly trying to keep her happy and alive. She's a wonderful girl, but face it, a baby is a lot of work and every day is a new adventure.

Favourite Albums of 2011 (In no particular order)

Maritime-Human Hearts

Amazing album from one of Milwaukee's finest groups. The songs and catchy and hooks are fantastic.

Decibully-Decibully

This final record from another Milwaukee group is bittersweet. The band has always been an inspiration for myself, art & music wise but these guys go out in style with this album. It's an art piece in it's own

Less Than Jake-Greetings From Less Than Jake EP

A delightful EP from Florida's greatest punk/ska band. Short but sweet. These guys still and always will have it folks.

Alkaline Trio-Damnesia

Despite this simply being a collection of past songs performed semi-acoustic, it's pretty rad none-the-less. The new songs are both great and fun. It's also nice hearing some of the classic stuff I grew up listening to.

Dan Andriano In The Emergency Room-Hurricane Season

Alkaline Trio bassist Danny performs some amazing songs here well worth listening to. He's always had a knack for writing some of the most heart-filled songs, but with Dan, I'd expect nothing less then fantastic.

Smoking Popes-This Is Only A Test

Not the best thing they've put out, but defiantly a great record. Josh Caterer and Co. decided to write a record from the point of view of a high school kid going through the ups and downs of being a teenager. Some stuff is 'eh' but there's a few rad songs here.

Favourite Songs of 2011

Maritime- Annihilation Eyes & It's Casual

Dan Andriano-It's Gonna Rain All Day

Florence & The Machine-Shake It Out

Smoking Popes-How Dangerous

Less Than Jake-Can't Yell Any Louder

Joy Formidable-A Heavy Abacus (hey, it's catchy)

Alkaline Trio-I Remember a Rooftop

So last year I typed out a list of goals to accomplish. It's a work in progress. I nailed a small amount of them, but keep getting projects that are stacking up. Hopefully by the end of 2012, I'll nail out some more goals. With that, I say thanks for keeping up with my adventures and highs and lows over the years. I've enjoyed using the blog as an outlet to reflect on the day and update anyone interested.

"I've got 100 resolutions, but I've got no solutions.
I've got one song I write 100 times.
And only a dozen or so rhymes." The Lawrence Arms