Attack of the Boy
Several nights ago, Daniel and I were sitting in the living room of his mom’s house talking to her about the recent internet catastrophe (somehow her secure network had transformed itself in to an unsecured network named ‘THE RCMP ARE CORRUPT’…we blame the neighbours). Anyways, the boy got distracted (as he tends to do) and grabbed a fuzzy brown blanket from the nearby armchair.
“Look! Mom bought a new blanket. It’s so soft. You must feeeeeeel it.”
So I did. I’ll admit, it was damn fuzzy.
“Ooh that’s a nice blanket. Where did you get it from?”
I never heard her reply. I was suddenly covered in fuzzy brown blanket. I threw it off myself to find him grinning crazily at me.
“Don’t. You are making my hair static-y. I hate static-y hair!”
It was no use. The blanket came at me again. I had no other choice but to attack.
We wrestled for some time before he covered me in the blanket, scooped me up and went running down to his room screeching something about hostages or sacrifices or caves…or something. You never know with him.
Once we arrived safely (surprisingly) in his room he calmed down. We watched two Star Trek movies before he felt the need to attack me again.
I was minding my own business when the blanket came out to play. He squealed with glee, attempting to smother me with the fuzzies. This time, I brought out the secret weapon. Biting.
Daniel has absolutely no problem with biting…unless I hiss and make a scary face and chase him around the room trying to catch his flesh with my fangs. He gets rather panicky. I do not blame him, but he was really asking for it.
We continued like this for some time until I got him on the bed. He was lying on his back covered in the blanket, squealing at the top of his lungs. I was leaning over him attempting to bite one of his flailing appendages when disaster struck.
As I went in for the kill his ‘panic’ took over. With a frenzied push, I went flying off of him…right in to his dresser.
There was a loud ‘crash’ as my elbow smacked the corner of it. He froze, staring at me in horror.
I got up and examined the large gash on my elbow. Not very long but surprisingly deep (That’s what she said!).
As I turned to him, hoping for some sympathy, I got this reaction…
“Laina! Be careful!”
Oh, boy. Whatever would I do without you?
A picture of us from a few years ago. He's lurking in the background, waiting to attack.
Ant War
After a lengthy absence I have decided I should probably write a blog post and let you all know what I’ve been up to which is extremely difficult because Half-Blood Prince is playing on tv.
My lucky friend went on a week-long trip to Mexico and I got to house sit (and watch her adorable dog, Maya).
I had a great time…she has a giant bathtub with jets. Candles, bath soak, ants…it was great. Wait, what? Ants? Damn.
"Hi! I'm here to ruin everything!"
Her basement suite has an ant problem. Not giant ants, luckily, but itty bitty ones. At first I didn’t see them. Then, there was a small line of them scurrying along the space between the heated bathroom tiles. The next day they had made their way in to the bedroom and were gathering underneath a plastic shopping bag. I decided that enough was enough…time to get rid of those damn ants.
I got out the vacuum cleaner and tried to suck them up, but they burrowed in to the carpet. Nice. To the internet! The internet always has great solutions that don’t involve chemicals or things that aren’t in the house.
It informed me that they don’t like the taste of lavender. Strange…the whole reason the ants were in the bathroom was because lavender body butter cream had been left on the floor in a wicker basket. Next!
‘Ants hate the smell of vinegar’. I got out a bowl of nice warm water, mixed in some vinegar and scrubbed the floor with it. I went off to make dinner satisfied that the ants would stay away. Guess what? Those ants looooove the smell of vinegar. *sigh Fine, ants, fine. You can HAVE the bathroom. I don’t have enough energy to keep squishing you. Daniel had other plans.
Whenever he had a chance he took a match and lit them on fire. As he gleefully informed me, “You don’t even have to touch them with it! As soon as they get close enough to the flame they die!” Hooray. Now I have a boy crawling around on the floor lighting things on fire. This can only end well. I apologize for not taking pictures of this event but Maya and I were too worried to leave him alone with the ants.
Maya looking worried
Halloween Pumpkins at last!
Well, it is finally time to showcase the pumpkins. Working somewhere that needs your camera almost daily does not allow much time for random photoshoots. I may have to start showcasing some awesome old photos of mine 
Anyways, time for the pumpkins! The first one is mine and the next two were carved free-hand by Daniel. I am jealous of his artistic talent. You will be too once you see them. Leave me a comment and let me know which one you like best! Enjoy!
Pumpkin Hunting!
Well I hope you all had a wonderful Halloween.
For quite a while now, Halloween has been my favourite holiday. I don’t really know why. I love the atmosphere, the decorations, the crisp air, the costumes, the firecrackers, the magic. I am always so sad to see it go.
I will be uploading some pics of our beautiful pumpkins tomorrow. Until then, I have one picture to keep you all amused.
The robot ‘Btzzo’ that Daniel designed came with me when I went to pick out a pumpkin. I went with Elaine, her boyfriend and his kid, Josh, whom you may remember from the haunted house building episode. Josh loved Btzzo and carried him around for as long as we would allow. I got a few pictures of Btzzo sitting on a pumpkin but my favorite was the one I got of him nestled in with the gourds 
On a side note, this is a YouTube video made by one of our customers who was very happy with his robot creation. If you are curious about 3D printing or My Robot Nation, take a look! It’s pretty cool.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=esq3Y9VnVhI
That's a funny looking squash...
Photo Challenge Fail
Sadly, my photo challenge kind of died. I shall continue to post photos, just don’t expect them to be in any sort of grand order.
As of late I have had many things happening. One of the most exciting things is my new job. Remember the photos I was taking for Offload Studios/My Robot Nation? Weeeell…yeah.
Offload Studios are the business partners and 3D printers for Kodama Studios’ “My Robot Nation”. Last week I asked the creative director at Offload if he had any work for me (as things were getting busy with the launch of My Robot Nation looming ever closer) and he hired me on as executive assistant. Pretty snazzy, huh? I am also the photographer for My Robot Nation 
If you haven’t already, you really need to go check out the robots and find out what all the buzz is about…maybe even create one of your very own!
My Robot Nation went live on Tuesday. It was featured in the Google Chrome store and CNET wrote an article about it. It is FREAKING AWESOME!
Below are some of my favorite photos I’ve taken of the robots. If you happen to make a super cool robot of your own, send me a picture of your ‘bot on an adventure.
Outlaw Bots
Family of Robots
They're coming!
My favourite robot(created by Daniel)
So cute!
Day 17: Your shoes
In case you didn’t read the title, these are my shoes. They are awesome. Be awed by their awesomeness!
My awesome denim shoes
Like this:
Day 16- Eyes
I really wanted to get a picture of my mom’s horse’s eye but that will have to wait for a different day when I can get down there before dark. For now, it is the boy’s eye. I had to interrupt him at work so he looks a little sleepy (He’s on a computer all day at his work).
Day 15: Long Exposure
Took these in high school for our ‘night photography’ assignment. I know I’m cheating but whatever. I’ll take new ones when I have the chance (These were also taken with my old DSLR).
He was NOT going 30 km/h. Shame.
Go truckies, go!
Like this:
Day 14- Silhouette
This day was actually supposed to be ‘Eyes’ but I switched it around cause I’ve been super busy these past few days and don’t even have time to do this challenge any more lol. I will get eye photos eventually.
This is from the Abbotsford International Airshow in August. Absolutely love planes. Here is my awesome silhouette photo… the F-86 Sabre, CF-18 and a Snowbird. <3 (This was taken with my old DSLR)
Day 13: Yourself With Thirteen Things
There is something satisfying about writing the word ‘thirteen’ as opposed to just writing ’13′. Don’t ask me why. I have no idea. Im sure someone else out there feels the same. Anyways, on to my ‘post of the day’. Oops.
I got the idea for my Thirteen Things from Espressivo. (On a side note, I’m super excited that I figured out how to link things properly. It was driving me nuts.)
So, here are my thirteen creative outlets. I found more hiding about my room after I took the photo but I refused to do a retake. They were upset but I told them they’d just have to wait until next time.
Taking this photo was extremely difficult. First of all, the angle I had to hold the camera at was ridiculous. There was no way I was going to get my tripod to do that one. My apologies for the very slightly blurriness at the bottom.
Second, my dog. She likes to be right in the middle of everything. In her mind, if anyone is on the floor for any reason they must be attacked (at this moment she is lying on top of my laptop bag at my feet. Beside the bag is just too far away I guess). She was pretty good for the first photo…nosed the journals about for a moment but then walked away. I lined up the next shot hoping I’d be safe to no avail. Just as I pressed the shutter down a fuzzy nose bunted my arm followed by a fuzzy body climbing in to my lap emitting strange ‘roo roo roo’ noises. Picture successfully ruined! It took a few more attempts before she just stood and observed. You can see her white paws in the corner of the photo.
Now it is time to introduce my journals! …I forgot my diary. Damn. (From left to right)
Black w/red stripe down the middle- I love this one. Definitely in my top 3. It was the first journal I used for writing in my Gr12 Writing class. It takes me a really long time to pick out a journal that I like. They have to be the perfect look&feel.
Dark brown- This one is amazing(also in my top 3). My sister bought it for me for Christmas last year. It’s made out of buffalo hide…omg a soft journal that smells of leather!!! *happy dance* I’m afraid to write in this one, though. I don’t want to ruin it with random rants.
Coil bound w/black trim- You can’t see it but it looks like a postcard on the front. There are old ships and stamps. Tis cool.
Painting of a tree- Went to see a Georgia O’Keeffe exhibit with my photography class in high school and had to pick up this journal. It has beautiful lettering on the inside cover and I love the painting on the front.
Black notebook that says ‘Notes’- This is the 3rd notebook in my top 3. It says ‘Notes’ (which I love), feels cool and has a little elastic strappy thing to keep it closed. It started off being a regular notebook for my university classes but turned in to so much more than that…stories, poems, quotes
Blue butterfly one- This was one of the first journals I had. It was given to me as a gift but I was too young at the time to actually write much in it. I think I have 2 pages filled haha.
Black one by my leg- This one was purchased for a school project that never happened. It would make a cool spy notebook…it has little pockets and things to store evidence in. Dun dun dun
Brown folder that blends in to the carpet- This one is full of stories and poems from school that weren’t written in a journal. Quite a large collection,
Eiffel Tower- I like this one because it reminds me of my friend Selina and it’s SQUISHY. OMG. I have never found a squishy journal before. I do not like how it is pink. But I will live.
Ugly yellow one- This one is where I started my novel. I started it years ago for a Gr12 project but didn’t continue it after handing it in. Story of my life…heh. It saddens me but I don’t know where to continue with it.
Black&red sketchbook- Has a few drawings and quotes. I’m not a big artist but I can draw if I really must.
Grey recycle book- It is recycled! Yay. Newest notebook.
Green book- This is my awesome list of quotes book but I left it on my desk for too long and the sun bleached it 
That’s what I get for not having blinds.
Aaaaand we are done! If you read that whole thing about my journals I’m super impressed. You should leave me a comment about it and I will give you 1,ooo points and a gold star.
