Blue!

Well, as you can see, I went all blue on my blog.  I know the pink was very pretty and uplifting, but blue is my favorite color.  We'll see how I like it.

I've been MIA for a bit because my laptop died.  I'm still trying to fix it, but until then, I've had to confiscate borrow our son's laptop indefinitely temporarily.

I've been overly busy and overly exhausted as well, so that doesn't help the issue.  I have come to the realitization that I was spending waaaaaay too much time on the computer and that my whole life was wrapped up in that thing.  There are so many documents saved on that hard drive that I was devastated to the point of tears.  I'm still not happy, but I'm trying to spend less time on the computer and a little more time with family.  (Although Castleville on Facebook has gotten a bit of a grip on me.)

Anyway, this was just a little note to keep up with my blog and my viewers.  Thank you for your patience. 

My current projects are:
Make a drop spindle (to be able to spin the plarn better)
To crochet a scarf (currently looking through my tons of yarn for colors)
Planning a Gatehouse Scrapbook

Stay tuned....



Gnomeo & Juliet is a constant in our house and I just love the color Blue!



10 things I love about motherhood

Blog prompt from Mama Kat

4.) Many of us like to poke fun at some of the things that drive us crazy as parents…let’s flip the script, what are 10 things you love about motherhood?

1. Fishy kisses from my Buggaboo.  He loves to give kisses and uses any excuse, such as “I’m sorry”  “Hi”  “Bye bye”  or he’ll just climb up into my lap and give me three or four kisses and then get back down.  And when I’m upset/crying, he comes right to me and gives me fishy kisses until I start laughing.  It’s hard not to, because it’s so cute!
2. How my little man is turning into such a Mommy’s helper… or at least, he’s trying to.  He’s only 16 months old right now, but he’s already trying to “help” out now and then.
3. My hubby’s saying:  “If Momma’s not happy, no one’s happy!”  LOL  He and our oldest (who’s 17 going on 35) like to joke about that.
4. Having people understand why I’m so tired all the time.  All I say is that I have a teenager and a 16 month old and everyone gives me the sympathetic looks and sounds.
5. The power of “Because I said so!”
6. The ego boost that kids give you when they think you know everything.  (this is usually right before I have to burst that bubble, but for a brief moment, the exhilaration is intoxicating.)
7. The “Baby on Board” sign in the back window of the van.  Call me crazy, but I’ve always wanted one of those!
8. Rekindling imagination and the Legendary Characters of Santa, The Tooth Fairy, The Easter Bunny, etc. 
9. Bringing out the Inner-Child again.  I’m a little embarrassed to admit it, but It’s so fun to play with all the cool toys that are out there now, that they didn’t make when I was little.
10. Authority of Motherhood to clean anybody's face with spit.

2012

40 Bags in 40 Days Challenge

Just in time for the new year, I came across a new challenge (yet another one!) that I desparately need. 
40 Bags in 40 Days
The idea is to get rid of 40 bags of stuff from your house (and my whole family are packrats) in 40 days in any way... out to the garbage, donate, yard sale, etc. and by the end of it, have a cleaner, less cluttered home. 

So, starting January 1st, 2012 I'm dedicating myself to getting a bag together each day.  The size of the bag doesn't matter.  If you need a big garbage bag, use it, if you only need/gather a small shopping bag's worth, then do that, but what matters is that you do "A Bag A Day" for 40 days. 

Apparently, it came from the idea of the 40 days of Lent.  I think this is a wonderful challenge and have been in the cleaning mood lately, so hopefully this should work out.  Having just cleaned up the living room and kitchen for Christmas, I've had a jumpstart, so I'm excited about it.  I also plan to blog about my progress as well.  Please post comments about your progress as well if you plan to join me and post a link to your site if you're going to show your successes as well.  I'd love to see your pregression through the challenge.

Mermaid On Crutches?

Well, I came across one of the most ridiculous outfits that I’ve ever seen:

While quite beautiful, it seems to be very obnoxiously inconvenient and problematic.  I mean, seriously, how do you get a mermaid to “walk” with crutches (when obviously the poor model can’t even move her skimpy chicken legs?!)?

But then, while trying to find the actual fashion show that show cased this particular dress, I came across the following video:

I’ve never liked Haute Couture or any of the weird styles that some of the more popular designers put out… until now.

Jean Paul Gaultier is wonderful.  Somewhere into the video I actually found myself enjoying the fun that is JPG.  I still don’t quite believe it, but I did and now I do.  There were even a couple outfits that I actually liked.  The gold stockings on the one model were, in fact, my favorite thing for the whole show, but there were a few outfits that looked quite lovely as well. 

I enjoyed the music and the quirkiness that JPG apparently is known for and it is a pleasant and enjoyable attribute for a designer.  I wonder what else I’ve been missing with other designers as well as with this one?

(Just great… yet another object of distraction!)

But, then again, watching the models has given me new motivation to lose weight in the upcoming new year.  Will I lose enough to look like them?  Of course not, nor would I want to.  They are way too skinny, in my opinion.  But I would like to be my old self again, and lose quite a bit.  It’s always nice to have motivation.  The movie Dirty Dancing did it for me years ago and that motivation worked.  So, if it takes a Jean Paul Gaultier model to do it for me this time, then so be it.  Maybe I’ll actually keep this New Year’s Resolution and lose some poundage. 

Not that I want to wear anything that I saw in the video (I certainly couldn’t afford it!) but I would like the option and those things don’t come in my size.  What size am I, you ask?  Well, I’m not that brave as to post it on here, but if you’ve seen any of my pictures, you know I’m roughly the size of a small house.  Well, maybe not that big, but I feel like it.  And I am quite large.  So, my goal for this year is to lose 115 pounds in a year.  That’s only 2.2 pounds a week, so it’s actually quite doable… in theory. 

To change the subject yet again, I apologize for not getting any crafts out here… but the new year is just around the corner and once the holidays are over with, I’ll be able to concentrate on more than cleaning, cooking and decorating!

You know you're a mother when...

1.      You use your spit to clean off someone’s face… and it’s not necessarily your child! (It might even be an adult!)

2.      Your purse spills over and out comes nothing but baby wipes, cheerios, toys from numerous kids meals and a miscellaneous sock that would only fit the foot of a toddler… wallet?  What wallet?  Ahh, crap!

3.      You dig deeper into your purse to find the above lost wallet only to find… eeewwww, gross!  Where are those wipes?!?!

4.      You realize that you have no idea how you survived before you had wipes.

5.      You follow the disastrous trail of toys and clothes in order to find a child.

6.      The kids are constantly losing the tv remotes and you dig into the couch to find them and… eeeeewwwwww, Honey, bring me a wipe!

7.      You realize your mother’s curse worked!  Thanks a lot, Mom!  :-P

8.      You automatically move everything away from the edges of tables, counters, etc., even when in the homes of people who don’t have kids.

9.      You see everything as a hazard… this’ll poke an eye out, that’s slippery and someone will fall, this can get knocked off, that’s too dangerous over there…. OMG my house is a death trap!!  How on earth has anyone survived this far?!?!

10.  You realize you can’t even pee in peace, so you find your iPod, lock yourself in the bathroom and pray that the house doesn’t catch fire and no one bleeds to death for the five minutes you desire of “Me time” only to take the headphones off out of guilt.

11.  You realize that you’re totally exhausted, it’s only 5 o’clock, you haven’t even started dinner and you haven’t accomplished anything other than running after a munchkin, cleaning up after a munchkin, and keeping said little mess-maker from killing himself by diving off of furniture!

12.  You realize it’s ONLY 5 o’clock and you’re ready for bed, even if the kids aren’t!

13.  Your little one comes up to you and gives you a huge hug and the cutest little fishy kiss and the whole day melts away with his giggle.

Inspired by Mama Kat

Merry Ho Ho & Happy Humbug!

I love Christmas, I really do.  But every year I say I’m going to do better next year, get the house decorated earlier (or in some cases, get it decorated at all,) get cards mailed out earlier, clean up the house better, bake a lot, buy gifts throughout the year, so I’m not rushed, etc. etc. etc.  And every year, it seems I get later and later and less and less and…….  *sigh*

And this year, on top of all that, I seem to be feeling a bit strange.  I'm starting to see that Christmas really is too commercialized.  What happened to the true “Spirit of Christmas”??  Don’t get me wrong, I love Santa (I'm looking forward to having my little boy sit on Santa's lap again this year) and giving and receiving gifts, and who doesn't enjoy a Peanut's Christmas or Lampoon's Christmas Vacation?!

But why do I need to have this particular day to ask for something I want and why do I need this particular day to give someone, whom I care about, a gift?  Why can’t we just give gifts throughout the year… when we see that "special thing” that just cries out someone’s name and we think of that person, why then, can’t we just buy it and give it to them right then and there?  Why can’t we show them that we really care and think about them all the time and not just once a year?  And therefore, in that sense, if we’ve been showing that sentiment all year, why can’t we then spend the Christmas season focusing on the one who gave us the holiday in the first place?  Jesus Christ.  You can’t have CHRISTmas without CHRIST.  At Christmas, we could then just have everyone get together for dinners and focus on what the season truly means to us.

I suppose that would put Santa and a whole lot of elves out of work at that point, and then having all those little people out of work would flood the job market, making it even harder for anyone to get a job, but that’s already impossible at this point in our economy anyway so…..  Couldn’t we have a “Santamas” in July or maybe some other month that doesn’t have a major holiday in it?  A different time of year for Santa to do his thing so everyone who’s stuck on using the “Naughty vs. Nice list to keep kids in line” trick to still have. 

I’m totally torn on the subject, though.  I love decorating (in a very tacky way, I must admit) for Christmas and I’ve been quite enjoying all the Christmas movies on tv and the songs on the radio.  But I’ve really been seeing how we’re losing the meaning of this time of year.  I know, I know, there are other holidays around this time as well and I haven’t mentioned them… well, I really don’t know much about them, I’m sorry to say.  But with all the commercialism, they seem to be getting lost in the hustle and bustle as well.  When was the last time you saw a Kwanza sale or a Hanukkah sale?  But then again, there are the atheists who would miss out on all the hullabaloo if Christmas was moved.  And of course, there's the day after Thanksgiving.  We wouldn’t want to take the tradition of Black Friday away from anyone and what would the purpose of Black Friday be without Christmas?! 

Another thing that disturbs me is the fact that so many are taking away "Merry Christmas" and replacing it with "Happy Holidays."  But then again, that's the Christian in me coming out and probably should be in a totally different post. 

So, where does that leave me and my blog post?  Well, I still say Christmas is way too commercialized and we all need to step back and take a moment, perhaps at Christmas dinner or wherever you feel comfortable in doing so, and reflect on the origin of the season.  There is really way more to this holiday season than most people realize.  Go ahead, look it up.  I’ll wait….

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christmas

http://www.history.com/topics/christmas

http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/03724b.htm

http://www.santas.net/aroundtheworld.htm

http://mormon.org/jesus-christ/?gclid=CKGk66LjkK0CFUOQ7QodI2TFoA

http://mormon.org/searchResults?theme=blue&query=christmas  (Scroll down to where it says "The Christmas Spirit - Video - 3:57")  I think this last link, the video, says everything that I’ve been trying to get across.  We should focus on the “Spirit of Christ” rather than just “Christmas”

So, in the Spirit of both, God Bless and Merry Christmas!

 As an aside:

American Psychological Association (APA):

hullabaloo. (n.d.). Dictionary.com Unabridged. Retrieved December 20, 2011, from Dictionary.com website: http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/hullabaloo

      Origin:
1750–60;  apparently variant of haloobaloo,  rhyming compound based on Scots baloo  lullaby

Picture of the day...

Reaching for Mommy

Five Things...

Yep, it's that time again.  Time for me to do another long awaited Writing Prompt from Mama Kat.

Five Things. List 5 things we don't know about you, 5 things you're knowledgeable about, 5 things you know nothing about, and 5 things you believe.

5 things you don't know about me:
1. My favorite color is blue, but I just love the color combo of green and purple.
2. My first job was working in a lab in a hospital and I learned how to draw blood... and I enjoyed it!  (even though I pass out if I see a needle in my own arm)
3. The true meaning of my tattoo... and, no, I'm not going to reveal it here either, but it's nothing you could ever guess.  And that's not a challenge, just a statement.  It's the one thing that I have that is truly private and all my own... and it's going to stay that way.
4. I totally dispise dusting and do it as rarely as possible.
5. My favorite smells are fresh cut grass and freshly bleached clothes

5 things I'm knowledgeable about:
1. Computers (my ex was good for something... he taught me a lot about computers and then I taught myself from there.)
2. Photography (well, I know some)
3. Real Estate Title Insurance (only because I worked in the business for 5.5 years)
4. How to build a really nice snowman.  Great knowledge for this time of the year, but useless for living in Florida, which is where I am.
5. Adobe PhotoShop

5 things I know nothing about:
1. Being a Mother... I'm just totally wingin' it day by day!  I really have no idea what I'm doing, but don't tell the kids!  LOL
2. Twitter... I have a Twitter account, but I haven't a clue about all the symbols like the # and the @ and all that.  I set my account up to "Tweet" my posts and send them to my Facebook, but other than that, I'm clueless.
3. Printers/copiers... as much as I know about computers, I know that little about peripherals.  I even had to look up how to spell the word "peripheral"  DOH!
4. Flying a plane, but I always wanted to learn.
5. Music.  I'm musically illiterate.  I love music, but couldn't tell you the name of a song nor who sings it.  (Thank goodness for YouTube!)

5 things I believe:
1. I believe in God (and Jesus Christ and the Holy Ghost)
2. Santa Claus... a total contradiction of #1, I know, but I believe in the "spirit" of Christmas and I think that Santa's Nauty/Nice list is a good embodiment of that idea for the kids.
3. Imagination is greater than knowlege.  (quote by Mark Twain)
4. Everything happens for a reason. 
5. I believe that the Book of Mormon is another testament of Jesus Christ that goes along with the Bible and I have a strong testamony in support of it and of Jesus Christ.  (Yes, Mormons are Christians.)

NaNoWriMo

The Plarn Project Continues... finally

Ok, here they are... pics of the start of my plarn project.  With NaNoWriMo done, I can finally get back to some other projects.

This was just a sample to see how it would be to actually crochet with it.  I started without having the plarn "spun" and it was a bit difficult.  Once I had it "spun" it was a bit easier to see what I was doing.  I'm going to actually try to make a larger piece.  I'd like to make a tote bag out of it, which will probably take a while.  But I will take more pics as I go along.  I'm wondering if using the brown bags would look better... maybe more like raffita?  I need to cut up more brown bags and spin them into tighter spun plarn and try a sample with the brown.  I have more white bags, though, so I started with them.

Stay tuned...

Simply Said...

 I hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving holiday with family and friends like I did. 

Now for my favorite holiday...

"The Day After Thanksgiving!" 

Gotta love those leftovers!

Inspiration knows no time

I have bouts of inspiration, energy and motivation at the most inopportune times.  I always get these bouts when I'm on the way out the door for whatever appointment I have, or in the middle of the night such as this particular episode...

It is now 3:07am and I've just been spinning plarn on a make-shift spindle (note to self, take pics for posting) because I was trying out the new plarn, but it's a bit hard to tell where you're at when it's doubled over.  I then had the idea of spinning it kind of like you spin yarn on a spindle.  But how to do that?  Well, I decided to look up plarn again and see if anyone had any ideas on that.  Yes, they did!  (gee, what a surprise... not!  I swear, you can find anything on the internet these days.  I remember when you actually had to go to the library to look up stuff, but I digress...)

So, I found a few people who had the same idea of spinning plarn and one used a Navajo Spindle.  Well, she said it costs about $25 bucks, but it looks like a dow stick with a round doohickey on it to hold the ball of plarn... quite simple, really.  So, to save a few pennies (the wallet's tight these days) I'm going to see about making one.  I already have a dow stick around here somewhere... then I'll just have to figure out what to use for the doohickey (yes, I'm sure that's the technical term for it :-P)

In the meantime, I'm using a pen with a clip on it to help hold the plarn.  It's working out quite well, actually. 

I've also come across a different way of making the plarn, which might even be a bit easier, so I'll try that as well and let you all know how each one turns out.

Stay tuned....

Slowly but surely...

Creativity Blooms and Flourishes!

Wow, what a day!  My Muse has returned in full force and she is nothing less than Brilliant!

As I said in a previous post, I'm working on a very cute little craft that also goes along with gardening... I've now begun the first stages (last minute epiphany as I was working on a different project) so that really is coming as I had said.

In the meantime, I've also begun a project for a Gatefold Scrapbook.  The first little section turned out decent, so I'll take some pics as I create the second one.

I've also begun to make "plarn" or plastic yarn.  We've got waaaayyy too many plastice bags and although we use some for garbage and whatnot, we've got an overabundance.  I try to remember to take the cloth bags to the grocery stores, but I usually remember them when I've already made it all the way to the front doors of the store.  :-P  Now, if we have a few extra bucks (which is rare these days) I'll buy one or two of the cloth ones, but the rest of the groceries go in the plastic bags.  Ugh!  I've just become so self conscious about all that land fill stuff and the eco-nuts are starting to really brainwash... er... get their message through to me, so I've decided that I want to do something more than my family and I are already doing.  I can't wait to crochet a tote bag using the plarn!  (pics and links to come.)

Hence, "plarn" has been discovered... well, I think it's been around for a bit, but I just recently discovered it during one of my many many many distracted internet surfing sessions.  So, I've got a small ball of plarn going and will be taking pics and sharing that project as it goes along too.

I also did a smidge of writing (which I need to get back to after this post) and during that, I was inspired to do some sketching for the book, which turned out kind of cool... at least in my mind's eye from the book's perspective.  Of course, not reading the book or knowing what it's about, it looks like a bunch of chicken scratches, I'm sure.

So, I've been a busy bee today.  I'm going to post a sketch here, but the pics will have to wait.  Be sure to check back for them.

Word Count

Picture of the day...

I've hit 15,000 words!!!

Yayy, Me!

Plodding Along...

Slowly but surely, I'm getting there... but I'm falling farther and farther behind.  I've had a couple of depressing days and it's just been too hard to concentrate on anything during my grieving period. 

So, anyway, I thought I'd at least post my new word count total. 

The road to NaNo is paved with good intentions...

Well, I have to resign myself to only doing one challenge at a time.  NaBloPoMo is a big ol' bust... NaNoWriMo, however, is coming along better than last year.  I'm about 3 days behind, though... due to a few really busy days and one really depressing and upsetting day (yesterday) but so far, I'm proud of my word count as of today...

And, also,
Happy 11/11/11