A Little Whine With That Cheese

I don't even want to put my mouth on this topic we have waited so long for this moment. I guess with every rose there are a few thorns. Before I proceed, I want to say there are many more roses than thorns at the time.

Those who follow my blog know that Toby has been searching for the right tattoo shop to follow his dream of tattooing for quite a few years. Well, I believe he has finally hit the jackpot. I have postponed posting anything about his new shop because I wanted to wait and see how it was going to turn out for him.

So many times he has gone into a tattoo shop and it ended up being a dead end shop with dead end artists....which is very common in the tattoo world.

Although his career choice tends to rock my world, I have always stood behind him in his decisions. I trust him to follow his instincts and his heart AND I know he is very serious and professional about his tattooing and he conducts himself appropriately around half naked people....I hope anyway. :-)

That being said, there have been many times in our past 10 years that I have just wanted him to throw in the towel and go get a "real job". We have had many confrontations over this issue in the past about his tattooing. Being the structured, organized person that I am, it has never been easy for me to have my schedule constantly changed, or not having a set amount of money to work with each week for the budget and paying bills.

Over the years, I finally saw he was going to stay true to himself and that he wasn't budging. I figured if he had that much faith in something than so could I. Lastly, I would never want him to have hatred or resentment towards me if I had insisted that he keep a "real job" and forget his dream just for the sake of satisfying my ideals.

For the past month he been working in a very successful tattoo shop in Austin. I know a month doesn't sound like a long time but in the tattoo world a month tells a hole story about a shop.

When he first got the job at Atomic I told him if he didn't succeed there than he just needed to just pack it in and give up the tattoo dream....at least in Austin. Atomic is one of, if not the most, successful shop in Austin. They have not only one location, but four different locations in the Austin area. The shop is ran like a business and has a good reputation. It is also very professional and successful...which of course appeals to Toby and I both.

Everyone knows we are in an economic crunch right now. It is also the slow season for a tattoo shop right now. Without going into financial details I will tell you that neither of those two factors have seemed to affect Toby's income from that shop. He is finally making "real" money and doing what he loves....which is of course, the most important thing.

Now...that was the roses part, now here is the thorns part....

He has held onto his welding job to make sure that the tattoo job was going to pan out. Well, for whatever reason, even though he doesn't have to, he has held on to the welding job. Maybe, loyalty, security...I don't know.

That's why you haven't seen me posting any adventures on my blog lately....there hasn't been any adventures. No adventures can come to families that just see each other in passing.

Busy lives, busy people, lots of money.....but no time together. I miss our family adventures and hope that everything will soon get back to normal. I can only hope that the success bug hasn't bit Toby and he remembers he has a family at home waiting...waiting...waiting....