Lydia's Journey BEYOND Hollywood

Well, Well, well, what did you do this weekend?  Me?  I got married.  Yup.

Okay....  2nd birthday was last night at Chuck E Cheese's.  That was a success.  Nic didn't run off screaming - but he wasn't dancing and laughing the whole night.  As long as we didn't have a huge meltdown, I consider the night a success! We are officially one week away from our lovely beach wedding.  Now I know why people elope!  Geez..party planning really ain't my thang! But in a week - it will be over and the honeymoon will begin!  Hopefully for the rest of our lives!  Actually, since finding a sitter for 2 toddlers still in diapers is damn near impossible - it looks like we will have to take the kiddos with us if we want any kind of real honeymoon.  So we are thinking of taking a road trip (I know - we're crazy) to maybe Memphis/Nashville/Pigeon Forge, TN - cuz we love country and have never been to music city!  So, wish us luck.  We will need it! School officially starts next Tuesday!!!!!!!!!!!! I think I'm mor...

Well well well... SOMEONE'S busy!  Geez...I have SO MUCH going on this month - it's crazy!  Not that that's an excuse for my break from blogging...  well, actually it is.  :) Let's see....  We are officially 30 days from our little beach wedding, 2 days away from my bachelorette party/girl's night, exactly 3 weeks away from Nicolas's 2nd birthday party, so my hands have been busy taking care of goody bags, invitations, wedding RSVPs and centerpieces!  Yikes! And on top of my busy personal life, I am now casting the feature film B.O.O.S.T.  So here I am hosting a fundraiser in Austin for this project, organizing the table read in Los Angeles, and auditioning actors already, way into pre-production.  Did I mention I was busy? Yet, here I am, updating my blog, instead of packing for our trip to Corpus this weekend, which we leave in just a few hours.  And that's because I JUST finished editing an audition tape for one of my clients.  Oh...

My first wave of excitement was when I became a professional actress. My move to Hollywood and the jobs I started to book filled me with such excitement that I couldn't contain myself.  (Thus this blog...)  It was a lifelong dream and I didn't know how to separate myself from my craft.  It was the scariest thing to decide to leave Hollywood and my career for who knows what.  I just knew it was time to make a change.  Nothing had ever filled me with that same excitement before and I was afraid I would never feel it again.  I was leaving behind everything I knew and felt was ME, to start a new life. I knew it was time to change when I stopped having fun, when that excitement started to fade.  I would book jobs and it didn't feel the same.  I wasn't sure if it was me burning out and just needed a break, or it was time to just walk away.  I felt like this for a few years before I decided to leave. I moved back to Texas, as most of you know by ...

Wow - I used to be SO good about updating my blog.  My apologies to my readers.  It just seems like ever since I had kids, I have no time for anything!  Lol Well, a small update:  I'm currently participating in The Austin Latino New Play Festival.  We are presenting staged readings of 3 new plays to an audience this weekend.  I haven't been on stage in 2 years!  Thankfully it's just a reading and I don't have to memorize my entire script!  It was 2 weeks of rehearsal.  That I can handle... I'm sending the kiddos off to school this fall.  Twice a week for a few hours each day, so that gives me time to get back to work.  I can't wait to dive back into casting!  I just read that the NBC show Revolution may start shooting out here in Austin.  I would LOVE to cast a TV show here in Austin!  It would be awesome to give all these wonderful actors opportunities! On the family side of things...  My baby girl, Ivy Rose ...

Well, this week, I've learned the importance of an hour. Sometimes all it takes is an hour of grocery shopping by myself to happily call it "me-time".  I can have a day or week, or shoot, even a month, when I am with my kids 24-7 and I need some kind of BREAK.  I think I need a night out with girlfriends or a 4 hour shopping spree, or even a manicure/pedicure - but really all I need is an hour to HEB and I start to actually miss those kids that crawl all over me and don't let me breathe, much less shower!  It's funny how that happens.  I'll bitch about how I need to get away, and when I do, I miss home.  Go figure. This week has been pretty busy on the "work" front.  I've been taping clients this week for their taped audition submissions and getting ready for the local screening of HOMEBOUND in El Campo this weekend, where it was shot.  I'll be part of the Q&A since I cast the film. Really excited to see the film on the big screen and...

I quietly smile to myself as I open the oven door and pull out my parmesan breaded chicken strips.  I feel so domesticated!  It wasn't that long ago that dinner for one consisted of something frozen from the grocery store, or something quickly picked up from a drive thru window.  I'm a long way from that life.  Nowadays I look forward to feeding my family.  I buy in portions of 4 (since Ivy is eating table food now), well, really portions of 3 since the babies share a portion.  And I'm now that girl who looks for recipes to try and cute new crafty projects for each holiday.  Seriously domesticated.  And I smile to myself because I'm now getting comfortable, dare I say happy,  with this life change.  I've always been happy about it, just in shock really.  I couldn't get over how drastically different my life now was and it scared the crap out of me.  I now had this family that depended on me.  I craved this when it was just...