Pogey

Well, I have (somewhat reluctantly) returned from the land of the Irish. (No, not Ireland...just the Great American Irish Festival!) It was a wonderful 3 days...we ended up with great weather even though the forecast called for rain the entire weekend. My only complaint? It's not long enough! I could spend a week there dancing to my favorite bands, watching rugby, Gaelic football and Irish dancing, checking out the vendors, and eating lots of fatty, salty, unhealthy (and therefore totally delicious!) festival food!

One of my favorite bands that I saw this weekend is Pogey, a group of 5 young lads from Nova Scotia. It was their first appearance at GAIF and they were very well received...hopefully they'll be back again for GAIF 2010. As soon as they finished their first set I snagged one of their CDs (sadly their fiddler, Colin, just recently joined the group and isn't on either of their CDs but they are working on a new one which is tenatively scheduled for a spring release) and was first in line to get it autographed...and they remembered me after that one meeting! Unlike a lot of artists that spend the majority of the festival in the VIP tent, their tour bus, or a hotel room, these guys wandered around the fairgrounds and every time one of them saw me (it's not a very big fairgrounds so you're bound to run into people more than once!) they'd smile and wave. My WONDERFUL friend Cindy volunteered at the festival and snuck me behind the barricade to get a pic with the guys after their last set on Sunday morning...they were all too happy to comply.

Now, I may be biased, but in addition to being very talented musicians, and the nicest bunch of guys you could ever hope to meet, I think they're pretty darn cute too! Don't you agree? (Seriously. Don't you just want to take them home with you? ♥ )

Etsy's goin' green...

Clearly I'm psyched about the Great American Irish Festival coming up this weekend (even if it is supposed to rain the entire time) and so in honor of GAIF, I'm having a sale! I'm knocking $5 off the price of everything green between now and the end of the month! New items to be added soon!

Win It Wednesday - July 22

OK, as I promised, we are indeed having a Win-It Wednesday this week! (Don't know what time it is where you are, but it's 1:41 AM here in NY, making it officially Wednesday, albeit rather early Wednesday! What can I say...I'm too excited about this giveaway to sleep!) And in honor of the Great American Irish Festival coming up this weekend (pretty much the highlight of the year for me!!! Don't expect any posts from me from Friday afternoon through Sunday night, as I'll be at GAIF all 3 days!) the winner will receive this one-of-a-kind bracelet (and something else that I'm not telling you about right now because it might tip you off on the following questions.)

Questions? Yep, questions. You didn't think you were gonna get a prize for nothing, did you? ;) Oh no. I'm sending you on a scavenger hunt to find the answers to the following questions. (*hint* If you have not been reading my blog since the beginning, you *might* need to go back in the archives to find the answers to questions 1 and 2. For question 3, you'll *probably* have to go to my Etsy store and the website of the band from question 1.)

1. What is the name of my favorite band?

2. What year did I first see that band?

3. List 3 bracelets from The Laughing Girl on Etsy that are named after songs by that band. (There are 6...if you name more than 3 bonus points will be awarded and will be used in the event of a tie!) (*IF* there are 2 bracelets that go by the same name (example - Pink Lemonade I and Pink Lemonade II) they DO NOT count as 2 different song names.)

Since some of you don't have blogs I will not be using Mr. Linky for this contest this time. To avoid any cheating that might go on if you posted the answers in the comments section (not that I think any of you would cheat!), e-mail me your answers at Laughing_Girl_1278@yahoo.com. You have until next Wednesday evening (I don't know what time...whenever I get home from walking the dog after work so probably sometime after 9 PM) to submit your answers. I do ask that if you are participating in this contest, try to get the word out about it. Blog about it. Tweet about it. Post it on your Facebook or MySpace. Whatever. Let's see if we can't get more people over here to join in on the fun!

Teaser Tuesday

New Items in Etsy Store!

As you may have noticed in the mini-Etsy in my sidebar, new items have been added to my Etsy store! 4 new bracelets are up and I will be adding a few more bracelets as well as several pairs of earrings later this evening when I get home from work.

Raging Sea

Racing the Tide

Ghost of Ontario

Ghost of Ontario II

The names might be a little weird...but they *might* have something to do with the Win-It Wednesday fun I promised for this week! Ooo! Got your attention now, right? ;)

I Heart Faces week 28

Week 28 Photo Challenge: “Feet Week”

For the first time ever here at we are going to have a week that doesn't focus on Faces. We know, we know...it's hard to take in, but we are all grown-ups and we think we will all be able to handle it. :)
You see, we love feet too! Maybe not as much as faces, but they are pretty darn cute in photos. So, for this week only...the focus of your photo needs to be on the FEET...not the face.
How much fun will this be?!

Fun? Oh, hell YEAH it was fun!!! I had a blast capturing dozens of photos like this one, which, after much deliberating, I have chosen as my entry for this week's challenge.

I've been snapping feet pics for months now, ever since I saw that "feet" would be the theme of an upcoming challenge, but this one, which features Lil' J and The B Man once again, along with B's cousin The J Man, was taken not even a week ago as the kiddos flung themselves down a flimsy sheet of wet plastic and blasted each other with water rockets. I had a collection of about 5 pics from which I was certain my entry would be chosen...then I saw this one. As soon as I uploaded it to my computer, I knew it was it. I love it. I love the bright colors, I love the lighting, I love how they're all wearing crazy, obnoxiously bright colored Crocs. I love the water spraying up from the slip n' slide. It makes me smile every time I look at it.

This was a tough week for me. Really tough. I had a ton of great pics (IMO, anyways!) and it was hard to pick just one. If you'd like to see the ones I didn't pick, check out this post. And to feast on more than a few fun, fancy and fabulous feet from a flock of fantastic fotographers, flitter on over to the I ♥ Faces blog!

feet

OK, today's the big day...the "feet" challenge begins at I ♥ Faces. If you've been following my blog and/or following me on Facebook, you know that I've been a little obsessed with this challenge. Why? I don't know. But I've come up with many, many pics that I just love and it's soooo hard to pick just one. Unfortunately I have to. I have. I picked one...but I want to share the others that didn't quite make the cut.

Got a favorite photo? Think I should have entered one of these instead of the chosen one? Let me know what you're thinking!!!

what a Croc

Anyone else hear the news that the Crocs company is going bankrupt? This saddens me...while Crocs are the ugliest footwear known to man (though Uggs are a close second, IMO) they are so super comfortable and my feet have felt so much better since I started wearing them to work. I just got a new pair of lime green ones (after bidding adieu to the decrepit light blue ones, may they RIP) and am thinking I should stockpile a few more pairs just in case.

(and no, I'm not so obsessed with Crocs that I go around randomly photographing them...just still on the hunt for the perfect "feet" picture for an upcoming I ♥ Faces challenge.)