Christmas Presents 2012

Our stocking gifts are actually bags. So I got nail polish (see next paragraph), an Aston Martin hot wheels car, a Million Dollar chocolate bar, popcorn, licorice, fruit snack, socks, head light, flashlight, a puzzle, toothbrush and paste, mouthwash, cool hair spin pins, nail clippers, and a bunch of candy.

Three nail polishes from the O.P.I. James Bond Collection. A gorgeous red ('Skyfall'), a royal blue ('Tomorrow Never Dies'), and awesome orange ('Die Another Day'). One of them was hiding in my plethora of candy so I didn't find it until Mom wondered why I was just favoring the two colors. lol. It was funny. I LOVE the 'Skyfall' color. It is even prettier in person.

I asked for solid long-sleeve shirts so I got several of those. I got two dresses. One summery lace dress and the other a sweater dress. (Those two dresses I think might be returned. They're short.)

Mom and Dad gave everyone a car emergency kit to put in their car. It's really cool. The bag has velcro on it so it sticks to the carpet in the trunk. It's genius I tell you. It comes with 79 different things. And the bag has a nifty pocket that comes out so I'm going to stick a blanket and some water bottles there. I'll probably use my brown fleece blanket for now because it's small and comes with a strap to keep it rolled up.

This year we drew names for our sibling gifts. Steven had me. He gave me not one tv series that I asked for but two! I got Numb3rs season 6 and Doctor Who season 6. It's awesome. DW is a used copy so the box is a little battered. But the disks look brand new. And when it's inside of it's outer case you can't tell at all that anything is wrong with it. I will be attempting to fix the case in the next few days. Maybe I can seal the cracks or something.

Grandparent's Hall (Mom's parents) give us money every year so with that money I'll be renewing my 'Friends Of Josh Groban' membership and buying 'All That Echoes'. I think with the left over money I'll buy some fabric.

I got myself a quilt book. Modern Minimal: 20 Bold and Graphic Quilts by Alissa Haight Carlton. I love this book. The quilts are so gorgeous. There are about half a dozen that I will make most definitely. I also got myself a Zig-Zag quilt pattern by Empty Bobbin Sewing Studios. I really like this quilt. It is so cute.

Brave

The other day Josh Groban released his first single off of the 'All That Echoes' CD. The song is called 'Brave' and it is a gorgeous song. I can't wait for the CD the come so I can hear it in surround sound. And then I want to hear it live! This song would (and will) sound so awesome live.

This afternoon I got an email from my friend, Angelique, and it had 'Brave' attached as an MP3 file. So I have basically been listening to the song on repeat for the last hour so far. lol. It is such a good song.

Listen to 'Brave' below and buy it on iTunes here.

Bigger In My Head

All day today I have been gathering ideas via Pinterest for my "Alice In Wonderland" themed wedding. lol. I'm not engaged. I don't even have a boyfriend right now. But, hey, a girl can dream. lol. I added a TON of pictures to my "Alice" board. It is making me excited to plan my wedding for real.

Source: disneyweddingsblog.com via Krysta on Pinterest

Today I also wrapped all but one of my Christmas gifts. It's nice to have them all done. Now I just need to figure out what I'm getting my brother and buy it. I have nine days to do it. No pressure. lol. I like the theme I have this year for my wrapping. I am using red paper, green striped twine, and silver stamped names. It's simple and makes me smile when I see them sitting under the tree.

Yes, I got myself a present.

For FHE this past week we decorated Graham cracker houses. I decided to make a TARDIS from 'Doctor Who'. I dyed some frosting blue and "painted" the sides of my house. I decorated it with York candy pieces. I think it's kind of funny that my blue turned out to be a Tiffany blue. lol. I would have made it darker but I only had a pastel-type blue. It's unique and I like it.

For the past few weeks I have wanted to put my DVD collection in boxes on my bookshelf. I have covered my books white and the DVD are distracting. lol. So I thought I could put them in a shoe box and cover it. DVD don't fit in shoe boxes. So I turned to Pinterest for some ideas. I found this idea where they made there own boxes. Heck, I can do that. So, with permission, I took some cardboard boxes home from the plethora at work. This next week I will cut into them and create the perfect sized boxes. I'll cover them with either white or black paper. I think I'll even label the boxes a bit so I know what DVDs are inside. The labels are mostly for my tv seasons (Doctor Who, NCIS, Numbers...) and the other misc movies can be in an unlabeled box. Maybe.

Oh my gosh!!! I haven't told you about the most awesome news I have heard in the past couple of months. Josh Groban announced his new CD!!!! Eep!!! It's called 'All That Echoes' and it will be released February 5, 2013. I love the album cover and I can not wait to see more photos from the photo-shoot  And to hear the album, of course.

Polish, James Polish

I love nail polish. I have a few brands that I know work and love every color they come out with. Last night I came across O.P.I. James Bond Collection. They created 12 polishes named for each movie for the 50th anniversary.

(click photo to view larger)

I love all the colors. I especially love that burgandy red named Skyfall. It's so pretty. I also really love the teal/grey sparkle color named On Her Majesty's Secret Service.  The gold sparkles is pretty. It's called Goldeneye. And the bright blue color named Tomorrow Never Dies is gorgeous.

Oh and the cool thing about that 13th color (which is a top coat) on the far right ... it has flecks of 18K gold in it! Real gold on your nails. That's crazy but awesome at the same time.

Black is the New Me

For Halloween I decided I wanted to dye my hair temporarily. It took three different times and three different hair dyes. The last one is a tad more permanent than I was initially going for but I really like so I don't mind. The color will come out by the beginning of December.

Brunette before ...

Black after ...

P.S. Yes, that is my natural eyebrow color. It works really well with black hair. lol.

Purple Words

Last week I decided to make my two pillow covers with that Ikea wordy fabric. I really do LOVE this fabric. It's so fun.

So I took these gold pillows that I bought a long time ago and took off their covers. And then after measuring and sewing some five-minute covers and put them on my white pillow forms.

Gold pillows before...

Wordy pillow after.

The word pillows are residing on my bed.

I also wanted an accent pillow for bed too. So using the extra purple fabric I had I covered a smaller pillow using this tutorial. I think it turned out adorable.

Now my bed is all pretty. And comfy. I winterized my bed last weekend too. Meaning I put my second comforter on the bed. During the winter I sleep with two comforters. :)

Halloween decor

I don't have much in the way of spooky decor.

I have my three witches I made a few years ago and a giant spider. This year I made a web for my spider to be on and hung him on my bedroom door.

I found the spider web idea via Pinterest. How About Orange has a great tutorial here.

Before ...

After.

Spidey does get kind of lost because he is black too. But he pops off the door because he is 3D and the web is flat against the door. Maybe I'll hang him lower on the door so he is on the very bottom of the web. Either way I think the web is a great addition to Spidey.

Purple and Gold

I have been thinking about my Esmeralda costume for Halloween. My version is a simplified version of her main outfit. The skirt will be purple. I bought the fabric a week or so ago. I just need to sew the skirt. I'll have a white blouse top, which I need to find. She needs her gold bangles and earrings. I got some the other week too. And I really like them. I think I want to find a thick bangle to like she has on her left wrist. The ones I got are the thin ones. I even have a gold anklet I can wear. In order to incorporate her teal corset in my version I was thinking of having her skirt wrap be teal. (It's the dark purple fabric in the above picture.) I also plan on having her pink headband. I need to find a pattern for that. Also I need to get the perfect pink fabric. I think it would be fun to dye my hair black or find a long black wig that I could wear. But if not then my normal brown hair will work fine. I also want to find a tambourine or even a goat stuffed animal.. I think that would be fun.

Shadow

Shadow

... Having fun randomly in the backyard.

What I Read

What I Read

... Battlefield Earth: The Saga of the Year 3000. I'm almost done with it.

This Happened Today

This Happened Today

... I worked from 10am to 6pm. Being the day before a football game I thought it would be more busy then it was.

Lunchtime

Lunchtime

... turned into snacktime at 3pm. Gotta love popcorn.

Where I Stood

Where I Stood

... in my messy room

Taking Photos

I have been wanting to get back to taking photos. But I seem to never have any inspiration. So when I stumbled across a website that gives simple prompt words for a photo a day challenge every month I got excited. Chantelle of Fat Mum Slim puts up a list for every month and people play along. I used to do a photo a day challenge and I had a lot of fun. So here I am carrying my camera around everywhere I go again. I decided that I'll put the photos here on my blog and link to them via Facebook/Twitter. I am going to jump right in and begin with the photos for the last week of September and then I'll be fully joining in for October and beyond. I like how simple the prompts are. Some of the photo-a-day challenges I have been a part of were somewhat specific. For example with the prompt "take a photo of the night sky" I felt like I had to take a night sky photo. There was not much creativity room. But FMS's prompts are more like "moon" or "night" which I could interpret as taking a day shot of the moon or the street life at night. I feel like I can be more creative with very simple prompts. Looking through October's lists I have some ideas for a few of the prompts. It's going to be fun.

Last Weekend

Saturday night was the Utah vs. BYU rivalry game. I worked all day from 10am until just before 9pm. The game started at 8pm. It was such a late game. Utes won in the end, 24-21. The game ended around midnight.

My cousin's mission homecoming talk was yesterday. It was really good. I also enjoyed the speaker after her. I thought their talks want very well together.

I fed Satine last week. She got two mice. It's odd because after she ate the first mouse it didn't look like she ate anything. But after the second mouse it looked like she ate. She had a tiny bulge in her stomach. lol. She hasn't moved much since I fed her. She's just hanging out on the heat. She should be moving around more in the next couple of days.

Vacation Debriefing

Well we really didn't have a good connection up at Flaming Gorge so I didn't watch the US Open. I did check the scores on Thursday and I found out that Roger Federer didn't make into the semifinals. He always loses when I want to watch but can't. It's not cool. lol. And because of rain in NYC the finals are delayed to Monday. Too bad I'll be working. Maybe it will be sort of a slow day and I can watch it. Ooh! We have ESPN at work. I can watch it on tv. lol.

Flaming Gorge was really fun. We toured part of the lake, went on hikes, played games, had campfires. Today we headed home but made a detour to Dinosaur National Monument. We haven't been there for ten or fifteen years. It was cool.

Family Week

My family and I are on our way to spend the week at Flaming Gorge. It'll be fun but I'm sad that I'll be missing the second (and always best) week of the US Open. Hopefully we have a good internet signal because if we do Dad said I could watch tennis. I'm mostly just worried about the weekend when the semifinals and finals are being played. I finished all but one book that I borrowed from Colton. Well, two books but Green Rider I'll borrow from the library because it's part of a trilogy and I have read them before. And I think there is another series I want to read first. The book I brought this week is a 1050-page science fiction novel. It'll be nice to get out of the "real world" books that I have been reading and read a really long and completely different book. The book is by L. Ron Hubbard and it is called Battlefield Earth: A Saga of the Year 3000. From the reviews in the book and the introduction that I read this morning apparently this book is Star Wars meets Indiana Jones or something like that. lol. I think it'll be interesting to read.

Room Cleaning

Several months ago I started putting together a 5000-piece Van Gogh "Starry, Starry Night" puzzle. I even created a giant puzzle board with that size puzzle in mind. (Although it will be nice for other, smaller, sizes as well.) And then it sat in my room for months. I have the stars put together and a bit of the streak in the sky, and the edges of course. It's a really great and hard puzzle.

I also have been practically hording my magazines thinking I'll do something with them. And I have looked at them but after that they just sit in a pile at the foot of my bed.

Those two things combined with my bed not ever being made caused me to declutter and clean my room this weekend. I am tired of things just being plopped down and laundry never being folded and then I can't walk around my bed because there is baskets and a puzzle in my way. When cleaning my room I made sure I had the three magazines that I will use (Success, Better Homes and Gardens, and Saveur) and then I recycled the rest of them. There were a lot. I don't know why I was keeping them for so long. I also put my puzzle away. But it took me like ten minutes to put it away because I didn't want to undo the work I'd already done. Therefore I had an idea to put the stars and stripes and moon into envelopes. Each element has it's own envelope and I labeled them so I'd sort of know what was what. I then put the edges on the bottom of the box and separated them from the rest of the puzzle by placing a paper over top of them. They took two layers to get in the box. Next in went the star-envelopes. And lastly, the bags of loose puzzle pieces that I had already sorted by color went into the box. To make sure I, or anyone else, didn't shake the box and made a sign and tied the box with yarn. It's awesome. lol. I did find one puzzle piece I missed on the floor so I put in a plastic bag and put it with the box. I couldn't put it in the box because it was already tied up. But I stapled the bag around the yarn. While all that was being done and I was straightening the rest of my room my comforter and sheets were being washed. I put a little bleach with my comforter to get it to be a crisp white. I had to dry it twice because it's so big. lol. My room looks so put together when my bed is made too.

I decided that I do really like the black and white contrast I have going on in my room. My bedding is white and my headboards are black iron-looking. My book shelves are black and my books on the shelves are covered in white. I have two black end tables in my room which I'm not sure what to do with yet. I like the color scheme so much that I decided to go with it and add my throw pillows back on to my bed with slip covers on them. I keep seeing quilts with a large word fabric and every time I see I love it. So I did some digging and found out that Ikea is the maker and beholder of the fabric. So I went on Saturday to Ikea and braved that maze of a store to the textile department to get my Britten Nummer fabric. I decided to get four yards because My original thought was to have that fabric be the back of a throw quilt. But I decided I could always go back for more later when I'm actually ready to make that quilt. Not all of my throw pillows are going to get a word slipcover. I want a pop of color so at least one will get a colored one. I haven't decided on what color to accent yet. It's either purple or green. I want to pull colors that match my painting above my bed. I think I'm leaning toward a nice rich green color because I like green a lot more. I haven't looked enough into the different colors from Kona to decide on a good color scheme for my quilt. One of those colors will be made into the slipcovers for that accent-accent pillow. lol. For right now I plan on getting a white sheet from the second-hand store and then (after washing it of course) creating a undercover-slipcover for all the pillows so those non-word pillows will still be white. I decided since my pillows are not white to begin with and the word fabric is a bit thin I would whiteify the pillows a bit before the words go on them by adding a white slipcover underneath the real covers. lol. It's maybe more work but I don't really mind. I think it'll make it look nice.

Weekend Activities

This past weekend our single's ward went on our super activity. On Friday we went up to Pineview Reservoir and hung out at the lake. There were five or six boats there, including our boat. They also had a water trampoline. It was a lot of fun. I was so sore that night. We had pizza and a movie at the church that night. The next day, on Saturday, we had breakfast at the church and then went up Provo Canyon on a hike to Stewart Falls. It was not a long, strenuous hike but since most of us were sore from the activities the previous day it was harder. The falls were very pretty. After the hike we went to Vivian Park and had lunch. And then, in two groups, we took tubes down the Provo River. That was fun. I don't think I've ever done that before. After tubing we had dinner and a devotional from the bishop at the park. I was very good about putting sunscreen on the whole weekend so I didn't get burned at all. Although I think my face did get a tiny bit of a sunburn because it itched on Saturday but it was fine Sunday.

On Saturday during the hike Colton and I talked about us. We concluded that our relationship wasn't really going past this point so we are no longer together. It's kind of sad because I think I'm more lamenting the fact that I'm single again then the relationship itself. Don't get me wrong. I like Colton. He is a great guy. I like hanging out with him and everything. But for whatever reason I was feeling no attachment to the relationship. I was neither for it nor against it. It just was. The first month was really fun and new but about the third was when I started to think this wasn't going to work out. Four months is along time though. And do hope that Colton and I can stay friends and still hang out.

After I read the Inheritance Cycle by Christopher Paolini and couldn't decide on what to read. So I borrowed a bunch of books from Colton. Most of them are short one or two day reads for me. I have already read two of the books I borrowed. Right now I am reading Ballet Shoes by Noel Streatfeild.I think I'll read the other three books in the Shoes series before I move onto another book.

Wedded Bliss

It's not my wedded bliss. I'm not engaged yet. lol. It's my trip to Colorado last week.

For the past week I and my brother, Eric, have been hanging out in Colorado. It was so nice and relaxing. We drove there in my car. We drove there on Wednesday. And I, primarily, went for my high school best friend's wedding which was Thursday afternoon/evening. Eric came to parkour and just hang out. I went with him to a few places. But mostly we just had a good time hanging with our host family and each other. I always have fun when Eric and I go on road trips together. (Which I think we have done a couple of times. Going to/from Utah and Colorado.)

Like I said this trip was for a wedding. I had tons of fun at the wedding on Thursday. It was up in Estes Park and it was gorgeous, if slightly warm, weather. Kristine and Tyler both looked awesome. They were emotional and it was perfect. They are SO cute together. After the ceremony there was a dinner and then dancing. They ceremony started at 4:30pm and I didn't leave until 11pm. I was having so much fun dancing and being with Kristine. We really need to stay in touch. lol.

While I was at the wedding Eric went to Boulder to hang out and parkour at a gym over there. It's also one reason why I stayed so late at the wedding. He had the car and didn't get back to Estes Park until we all were going home.

On Friday and Saturday Eric and I went and parkoured. Well, he did the parkouring. I filmed and took photos. It was insanely hot while we were in Colorado. I am pretty sure on Friday and Saturday when we were outside walking around it was over 100 degrees. Surprisingly, I didn't get sunburned at all. I got kind of irritated on Saturday probably because of the heat and I wasn't drinking enough.

We had late nights but since we didn't have any plans we were able to just sleep in the next day. I did bring two books because I knew I'd be finishing the first one while we were there. But I didn't read as much as I thought I would. I probably read less then ten chapters total. I had to have read at least five. Because I read the last three chapters of Eragon and then I read a couple in Eldest.

Eric and I brought a cooler for some water and snacks to have in the car. We ended up bringing it in the house during the night/morning because our frozen water was thawing out and then in turn the candy was getting soft. We brought a box of candy bars, a bag of trail mix, granola bars, and a bag of Skittles and Starbursts. With the Starbursts I got a lot of wrappers/links for my chain. It was awesome. And there are still more candies to eat.

Our host family was very nice and let us stay with them the whole week. We were planning on staying with five different families, one for each night, but due a tragic accident we ended staying with one family the whole time. Well, Sunday night we did stay with another family for the night.

(Tragic accident involves a canoe capsizing with three kids who weren't wearing their life-jackets. One teenage kid going missing while the other two were able to get back okay. People looked for him all that day and finally found him the next morning. He drowned. He was 17 and I knew him when we lived in Colorado.)

While we were there we got to see 'Brave' with some friends. That movie is so cute. I really liked it.

The High Park fire right near Fort Collins made some days smell smokey. I was having flashbacks to the Cerro Grande fire that I was a part of. Fires suck. And there are so many that are burning right now all over the west in the USA right now. It's not cool. We need rain. Everyone, pray for rain. I got some cool pictures of the smoke and sunsets though. lol.

Smoke and the Sunset

Other cool photos I took were on the way to Colorado.

Tennis Fabric

So here's my idea for the tennis fabric which will be the backing and side panels of my tennis court quilt. I think some of the rackets need to be rotated more and I'm not sure about some of the colors of the rackets. But this is the idea. And I want it to be some sort of repeated pattern on the fabric itself. I want the fabric to look like it's not repeating and more of an all-over pattern. I might have to play around with the placement before I actually have Spoonflower print the fabric.

Here is the idea with the rackets in black.

Here is more of what I want with the rackets in color.