My Christmas Goodies

I have to be completely honest, it was really good to be Gloria this Christmas minus the crazy sickness and washer flooding. I guess you could say any bad things that happened were totally cancelled out by the good things, and by good, I mean TOTALLY FREAKING AWESOME.

I got the usual new clothes, shoes and accessories. My husband picked out this purse for me. I love it! Plus I can’t stop talking about how good it looks in my house. Especially in my bedroom because of a certain project I’ve started that have yet to share. I seriously get abnormally excited about things that “match” my house. Like when we got Elway, the chocolate lab, it looked like he was MEANT to live in our house. I think his fur is the exact same color as my kitchen walls. When we got Durant (moment of silence since we never found him…) was a a total surprise and I wasn’t a happy camper. I was a little mad and one of the first things I said to him was that he didn’t match the house. How superficial of me! I loved that little dog though once I got over how much he looked like a snake as a puppy with that short shiny hair and giraffe neck. Oh I miss him. Look how far I’ve digressed. I love the purse.

Now for the mother of all presents… My in-laws, YES I said IN-LAWS got me a new 15″ Macbook Pro. How lucky am I! I love my husband’s family! Well, they’re actually my family too and I love em!!!! I was SOOOO shocked. In my family we have a tendency to reuse boxes from other items to make wrapping easier. One year, my mom put a broken hammer in a old box for Five Fingers shoes for Caleb to unwrap, it was meant to be a gag gift, but the problem was that he REALLY wanted those shoes and got so excited at first only to be massively disappointed. He’s a little leery to open any presents at my parents now, with good reason.  So when I was opening my present and saw the Apple box, I kept asking, did you just use the box for wrapping??? But they didn’t! It was for real! I’ve already bought quite a few goodies for it to.

I had been saving up this past year to buy a macbook. All the money I’ve earned on the side was designated solely for me. I have a really hard time spending large amounts of money on things for me so I’ve been making invitations, selling furniture, paintings and random odd jobs to feel less guilty about it. Since I got what I had been saving up for, I now had money for all the other things I’ve been wanting but thought would be way far down the road. Sooooo, I went a little crazy on the shopping spree.

First up, I bought a Wacom Bamboo Create Pen Tablet. I haven’t had much of a chance to use it. I end up doodling for five minutes then get bored. I am a huge doodler though. As a graphic designer sometimes I get frustrated that I can’t illustrate the same as I can on pen and paper. This should help bridge the gap and I can’t wait to use it on a set of invitations in the future!

I also snatched up Abobe CS 5.5 Design Standard Programs. It includes Photoshop, Illustrator and InDesign. I could not live without all three of these. My lifeline.

I’m pretty excited about this one. It’s a Miter Saw that, ironically, I bought a couple days before the flooded washing machine and was going to finish up the trim in our house that never got finished. I won’t need it for that since it’s all getting replaced. I do have a bathroom that desperately needs it so I’ll keep you updated on that and hopefully I knock it out soon.

SKWEEEEEEEE!!!!! I’M STILL EXCITED ABOUT THIS ONE! I got a Canon EOS Rebel T2i. I opted for the body only. In high school I had a Canon Rebel K2, it’s  a film SLR and I had a 28-80mm lens so instead of adding a kit lens, I could just use the mediocre lens I already had and look at decking out the camera with goodies in the future.

I also opted for a Canon EF 50 mm Lens. I had read a quite a few reviews about it being a good lens to have in one’s arsenal and since I didn’t have enough money left  to spend $600 on  a lens I picked this one. When the package came I ripped into it, threw on the lens and… it wasn’t love at first. The love didn’t kick in for about a minute, but I do absolutely LOVE this now! I’ve been going a little/a lot cray cray with snapping pics of Elway. He’s been particularly hard to photograph because he is so dark and so twitchy until NOW!

It was really dark in my room when I took this last picture and Caleb was laying on the bed freaking out saying, “you don’t need a flash for that!!” NO! You don’t! Understand why I wanted this camera so bad? He totally gets it :) and I feel like SUCH a spoiled brat now, but I worked really hard for it. Oh and don’ t forget that my kitchen just flooded. So don’t be getting too jealous.

Beginning 2012

It’s almost the new year! Hooray! This whole month has completely flown by. Right before Christmas, I got some nasty stomach bug and took nearly a week to get back on solid foods. A week! Just when I’m starting to feel normal, my washing machine floods my kitchen. Since I have engineered hardwoods, they have to be replaced. I was kinda shocked. There is water all the way into the living room! Crazy! There were no pictures, just panic.

I’ve already bought a new washer and dryer set. In Oklahoma there is a rebate up to $680 for gas dryers, so I’m pretty much getting a free dryer. It was about time to upgrade since I’m not even sure how old the washer was. It came with the house and worked for us for two years, but we couldn’t expect that to last forever. Sigh. And boy did it go out with a bang.

So this is how I’m starting 2012! In complete chaos!

I’ve still got a ton of Christmas littering the house. While I’m semi putting that away when the brief minutes of motivation strikes, I’m mostly getting furniture out of the way and hopefully into a somewhat livable arrangement rather than haphazardly thrown into other rooms and the garage. The floors are getting pulled up on Tuesday and who knows when something else will go in. I haven’t even gone to see whats available. I’m pretty sure, I’ll go with the exact same color/width/finish because all of the bedrooms have this wood (which aren’t going bye bye) and I think it would look so  weird with a completely different wood on each other. Any thoughts, or advice is appreciated!

I hope everyone else has a blast ringing in the new year and that it gets off to a great start! Go TwentyTwelve!

30 Day Photography Challenge

Michelle over at Ten June  is hosting a 30 Day Photo Challenge and I decided to join in on the fun. I love her blog, subscribe immediately.

I didn’t really do every single day, but I did do a lot and decided to lump them all into one post. Most of them speak for themselves. I had so much fun working on this photo challenge, it was like being in art class again. And I LOVED art class. Here we go!!!!

What? No fruit? No problem.

I scratch off my nail polish way before it’s ready to go, in case you’re wondering what it is.

Animal cracker wars.

Sleeping Bear Dunes in Michigan, SO beautiful. Take me back!

Yeah, they aren’t real. So what? All in all I had a lot of fun doing this and playing with my camera. It makes me want to find more “challenges” and see what comes of it. Who knows, maybe I’ll make my own!

Happy Friday!

Halloween: A Brief Costume History

I went back and forth about a dozen times deciding if I would make a post of then and then ultimately decided that heck yes I would because the world NEEDS to see this.

This is last year’s costume. Not terribly exciting for me, we went as Deb and Dexter from, wait for it… Dexter.

There was another party the next night and I thought, Duh! I’ll be one of his “kills”. I wore a beige slip then wrapped myself in saran wrap until it was completely opaque and the right length and coverage! I bought three packages of saran and only used one! People were asking me how many it took.  $1.63, ya’ll.   I’m STILL annoyed I didn’t have someone take a picture for us so you can see what it all looked like.

I’m going to skip 2009, I was Kim K, with a black dress and pillow stuffed in some shorts underneath. Caleb was Edward from Twilight. Yes, he is a TOTAL Twi-hard. Not even kidding. I’m still bothered that we didn’t get to do a couples costume. I LIVE for couples costumes and I was too stubborn to be Bella ’cause how boring is that?!?

So this is 2008, our first Halloween as married people!!! What better way to celebrate than to dress in drag! Meet Dog the bounty hunter and his wife.
Gross. Seriously gross but so fun.

Ahhh yes, 2006. I have a thing for making my own costumes, always have one year I spray painted a clown wig so I could go as Richard Simmons. Here I am as a lollipop made out of styrofoam and our faces covered in eyeshadow to match. Not paint! Eyeshadow. Awesome.

Oh and my lovely husband, this is before we started dated. When this picture was taken, the though hadn’t even crossed our minds. We were just acquaintances.  Him, a former captain of the football team and her, the art nerd.

OOPS! That’s not a costume, just a typical outfit for me in highschool.

And lastly, we didn’t aren’t doing anything for Halloween this year. BUT we were flipping channels yesterday and Hocus Pocus was on. We were laughing at Bette Midler’s makeup and how freaky her lips are. Naturally, I ran to get my makeup and recreate it on us immediately. I mostly can’t believe Caleb consented! Then I tried to kiss him on the lips but couldn’t bring myself to do it I was laughing so hard.

Happy Halloween! Be safe!

Doggie Duvet

I am a mean, terrible, horrible person. That’s what Elway would say if you asked him about me. You see, I refuse to let him sleep in the bed. He is too BIG and DIRTY and just plain INTRUSIVE. Who wants that??? Well, Caleb for one, but not I. They both lost this battle. Being the only girl in the house, I get a little more veto power and I exercised my right. Elway still constantly gets up on the bed and it drives me INSANE. He literally jumps from the kitchen onto the bed which is crazy far away. Sometimes I want to strangle that dog.

He has grown out of the stupid chewing everything phase which demolished his previous dog bed. You know, it’s kinda hard to force a dog to sleep on the floor without giving them an acceptable alternative. I figured I could make him a bed because they cost way to much in the store, aren’t even big enough, and don’t match anything. The last point is VITAL.

Enter my old curtains. Perfect amount of fabric, doesn’t clash and don’t need ’em anymore for . SCORE.

I wanted this to be a BIG bed so I didn’t even cut it down. To start, I folded it over inside out and sewed along the edges.

Once the sides are all sewn up, I just turned it right side out and put in a giant pillow that I made from old stuffing and styrofoam  I had laying around the house. Seriously, it was an old cushion that was too big to fit in the closet so it was just standing against the wall in the living room.  Something HAD to be done.

Here it is all stuffed up. My own little, er GIANT, doggie duvet. This is the back side so you can see how it goes in.

This is the top side. I know it looks kinda lumpy, but c’mon, it’s for a DOG. He doesn’t care. He eats poop. And dried worms. He is SO not a diva. Durant on the other hand totally is. What is it about small dogs?

Elway loves it! And it’s a better size compared to his old one which was the extra large size but was NOT extra large because half of his body hung off it. He actually sleeps on it! But sometimes when I wake up in the middle of the night I find him sneaking onto the bed, then I do the figure S snap in the dark and he hops down feeling all defeated. I win.

Durant likes it too. He thinks its just his size. I think not.

Check out that booty! Showoff!

You know what was harder than making it was trying to get a decent picture of the dogs. It felt like The Ring or some horror movie, every time I took a picture then looked in the camera something terrible came up.

Oh no! Seven DAYS!

So that’s all. I’m off to get my THIRD cup of chai today.

I.

have.

a.

problem.

The Pillow Formerly Known as Tea Towel

It’s Tuesday, Tuesday, Tuesday!!! I don’t know why I’m so excited about that but, oh wait! I do know… It’s my anniversary! Been married for three years now. It has gone by so fast. Sometimes I still feel like we’re in highschool. When the heck did I grow up and become old enough to get married and how in the world has it been THREE years?!? I never in 4.2 BILLION years (because that’s how “old” the “earth” “is”, Guffaw!) would have thought that at age twenty-three that I would have been married for three years… to a captain of the football team. Me?!?!? The Art Nerd! I love you Caleb! Happy Anniversary to ME!!

Okay, so this tea towel. It’s such a lovely shade of turquoise and my mom picked up these two at an estate sale. They kinda sat in a bag for a while before I decided to put them to use. I’m on a kick of getting all of the tiny little projects done, and this is one of them. Oh it feels so good to clean out the clutter and MAKE STUFF. No more “someday” or “eventually” excuses.

My one condition is that I didn’t want to spend any money on it, for like the filling. I did what any sane person does and tore open some old pillows I didn’t use anymore but didn’t have the cahones to throw away. What if I NEED it someday! I think that’s a hoarders mentality.
Here is is all sewn up now. I made it the fastest way which doesn’t include a zipper or a way to get the stuffing out. It’s okay though because it’s going in one of those not used very much rooms.

It looks lumpy because I was just testing it out. Success, it works! I really love the  pillow with all of the colors with the newly painted side table.

Haha dog butt! He’s been working out and just wants to be applauded for his efforts. Silly Durant. Maybe I’ll submit this to pets on furniture.

Well, that’s one less bag of stuff to do laying around. What have you been working on?

Linked up:

Shorty Look Good, Time to Whistle At Her

What did I do this weekend? Plenty. My favorite though, was spending time with my mom, and sister knocking out some senior pics.

My sister, Marci, is normally a pretty low key kind of girl, but we got to dress her up for this occasion. I did her hair, makeup, and picked out her clothes. I don’t know what happened, it was like all of a sudden she just turned into an adult. She is no longer my baby sis, but a SENIOR, like in HIGH SCHOOL. Crazytown. There is maybe six years between us, but to me, the memory of her being a sweet quiet little girl is forever etched in my mind. It doesn’t matter that she is now taller that me and can drive on the highway, no she is just a little girl!

We ventured out to a few places around town. The coolest place was an old amusement park graveyard. It’s what is left of Bell’s for you natives. My mother did an awesome job as location scout, driver, sweat wiper offer, and drink purchaser.

Marci did an awesome job of modeling! Look at those blue eyes! She is so gorgeous!

I love the necklace she wore. We have a jewelry store that sells everything for $1, so this is three necklaces stacked together. Do the math, that’s a $3 necklace! I love stacking my necklaces because I’m too cheap to spend tons of money on jewelry, I lose it or it breaks. That’s my irresponsible history.

I took all of the pictures with my plain old point and shoot camera because that’s all I have. No fancy T3 yet. If it matters though, it’s hot pink. Then I did some photoshop editing. I’m not a professional photographer and don’t claim to be nor am I professional photo editor, but I did the best I could!

This fun photo shoot cost $4.26 for drinks and snacks. You can’t beat that!

Dear Baby

I’m the kind of person who feels emotions very deeply, but rarely shows them.  It almost always takes me a few days to “sort through” my emotions to figure out exactly what I’m feeling. This time, it was a little more complex.

At the end of July last year, Caleb and I found out we were pregnant then shortly later in August we miscarried. It was difficult then and less difficult now, but it doesn’t mean it’s easy. There were a lot of emotions involved and some that never really go away.  It’s a scar that fades, but still leaves a mark. Our pregnancy was a total surprise and I’m still not sure exactly how far along we were, likely 7 or 8 weeks… Enough for full on bloat and plenty of morning sickness.  We only knew for a couple of weeks, and I remember one day just not feeling pregnant anymore. I was totally worried about it, so I took a test, waited FOREVER for it to churn out the result, then stared at that digital pee stick as it yelled at me NOT PREGNANT. I was heartbroken. How could a pee stick be so cruel? I felt like it was mocking me. It might as well have been shouting at me with a megaphone directly in my ear, “YOU’RE NOT PREGNANT!” I guess there isn’t a gentle way to say that you’re not having a baby anymore. It stings. A lot.

It all happened so fast, but once that can gets opened, some things can’t be put back into place. It’s the love of a parent, when you know you are responsible for the life of another, there is an unconditional love placed in your heart. It’s an entirely new set of emotions, and you realize you didn’t think you could feel so deeply for someone. I’ve always heard parents say stuff like, “you really don’t know until you have your own kid” and it’s true. While I never got to experience the fullness of it, I got a taste of it. It’s like when I found the person I wanted to spend the rest of my life with and the first thought of losing him was so catastrophically devastating that I almost cried  right there on the spot, then I realized… I’ve never loved anyone so deeply, I didn’t KNOW I could love someone so deeply.

Sometimes I felt guilty for feeling so emotional knowing that it’s not that uncommon or plenty of other women have been through the same thing or we weren’t THAT far along or people have suffered a lot worse. It’s funny the role guilt plays and the mind games it put on us. It’s okay to cry and be sad.

Going through this, I knew this wasn’t something that God did. I don’t understand why so many people choose to blame Him for the bad things. He wasn’t “teaching me a lesson” and He didn’t “need another angel in heaven”. Bad things in life just happen. They do.  It’s through all of these bad things that we have to recognize that God is good and true and not out to get us. We have to CHOOSE Him.

I very much believe I have a baby in Heaven, and I can’t wait to meet my little baby. A lot of times all I can picture is my baby up in Heaven wondering if I even think about it, there’s that guilt again. I decided to write a letter to my unborn baby as a way to come to terms with it all.

…………………………………………………………………………………………………………

Dear Baby,

I miss you. A lot. There is no way around it, I miss you. Our time together was cut way too short. When you were with me, I was happy. So happy. Your daddy and I were so scared and excited but we vowed to be the best parents you could have ever asked for because you deserve it. We still try.

Even though its been a year, I think about you often. You would be six months old now.  We should be giggling together, strolling through the neighborhood together, crying together and getting up at all hours of the night together. Mostly, we should be together. I hope you know that’s what I wanted, to be with you. When you were gone, I wasn’t relieved, I was devastated. I was ready to conquer the world with you. I miss you.

I feel so guilty that I didn’t give you a name. I didn’t know if you were a boy or girl. I only knew you as my love. Maybe I should have started this out as “Dear Love”. That’s what you were to me, a love I had never felt before. And I don’t know what to do with it since you aren’t here.

Nothing could ever replace you. Even if we had five hundred kids, I could never forget you. There is a piece of my heart that is yours, it will always be yours and nothing tangible or audible can ever fill it. I will never hold your hand, I will never hear your laugh or cry, but I will always love you. Always.

Love,

Momma

…………………………………………………………………………………………………………

I realize I’m being a bit long winded, but its been a jumble of thoughts and emotions this the past year that I just needed to get out. I can’t pretend like it never happened, because it did. Nothing can change that and I’m sure there are plenty of other women out there who can’t “just forget it” either.

Please remember all of us mamas out there! Just because we don’t have a child in our arms, doesn’t mean we aren’t parents. I wish I could hug each and every person who has ever had to deal with this also. Life is not always fair, but it does keep going on. The days get lighter, and the sun gets brighter again.

Oh, in case you’re wondering, we aren’t actively trying for a baby, still just enjoying our time together. So no bump watch yet.

Ghost Dog

I swear I won’t turn this into a dog blog, but sometimes Durant does something so strange that I can’t stop laughing. Remember the cheeks?

I have the Ofelia blanket from Ikea, it’s exTREEEmely stretchy and Durant gets stuck in it for days. It’s awesome I don’t even need a kennel for him, I just throw him inside the blanket and he tries to get out! Don’t worry, it doesn’t hurt him, only his feelings because I laugh way too hard at him. Poor guy. He gets SO embarrassed.

What you can’t tell from these photos is how hard he fights to get out. It’s like he’s wrestling an alligator in there. Probably Lochness Monster. We watch a lot of Swamp People together and I like to think he has an overactive imagination.

Poor Durantula. But it really does help start my day off right.

Controlled Chaos

I can handle a mess. I don’t like it but I can handle it, and I can walk by it for days without putting any real effort to absolving it. You know, there pictures to hang and walls to paint. I can’t be bothered by something so mundane as dishes! This sink is actually tame compared to what it normally looks like…

But if THIS drawer is not properly organized, I will UN-cork!

It’s nice to know I have little spaces of this house that remain clean no matter what. Certain drawers MUST maintain order, my cleaning closet has to stay tidy. The truth is my house is rarely clean all at the same time and it can be so frustrating. The dogs bring in more dirt, hair and trash than I can keep up with.  I already need to sweep before I even finish sweeping. Such is life. Its better when I face it head on and be realistic with myself. My house is NOT perfect, probably never going to be.

It’s so easy to clean one specific space and take a pretty picture, but 80% of the time it doesn’t look ANYTHING like that picture. I’m being honest. It’s so hard to keep up being a working girl with three messy creatures in the house. I know I’m not the only one who struggles with keeping up with the house. It’s not that I don’t want to, it’s just another full time job on top of the one I already have. Rest assured that if you’re feeling like you’re fighting an uphill cleaning battle, you’re not alone.  Can you tell I had a breakdown about it recently? Cause I totally did. Well onward and upward!