Category Archives: Goals

Die Hard

Posted on February 21, 2012 | Leave a comment

I bet you thought I forgot about my one and only new year’s resolution to make two non-custom banners per month for my etsy shop. NOT SO.

Originally I was going to make something St Patrick’s Day-ish for February, but then I decided that’s a bunk holiday for drunken bros so instead I did something else. My two banners for February turned out to both be semi-musically inspired, so I’ve included the pertinent youtubes.

For this banner I used the same two-tone ombre technique I used for last month’s “True Love” banner, but instead of using two shades of the same colour I used two completely different colours. I really like the way it turned out. I haven’t made a listing yet but custom two-tone ombre banners are available for $2.75 per letter, with a minimum order of $13.75 for five of fewer letters.

I didn’t do anything super special for this fancy banner. I’ve only made a few of these- okay, I made a TON that said “Merry Christmas,” but they were all the same and making the same thing over and over is kind of a snooze. This is actually the first fancy letter banner I’ve made this isn’t silver or red, so it was a nice, albeit small, change.

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Posted in Arts & Crafts, Goals

Busy Bee

Posted on January 23, 2012 | 2 Comments

Sooooooo I’ve been busy recently with all kindsa stuff, here’s a small update on a few things.

Crafts
One of the custom banners I sold during my CAT AID sale was this delightful gem.

Last week the woman who bought it posted it on tumblr and it got almsot 2,000 notes. The picture was reblogged by STFU Conservatives and people FREAKED OUT over it. My etsy was blowin’ up, by which I mean I sold two and lots of people added my shop to their favourites. I even got a hater on tumblr saying my work was overpriced and juvenile and everyone should just make it themselves, it’s so easy! lol, whateverrrrrrrrrr fool.

I’m also still working on my resolution to make non-custom banners and over the weekend I finished this one.

C.R.E.A.M. (Cats Rule Everything Around Me) in gold with the same printed cat paper on the back as I used on the Forever Alone banner everyone loves so much. And speaking of cats…

Claire
Last week I took Claire into the vet for a fructosamine test and guess what… she’s great! Her blood sugar levels are good, her diabetes is in control, and her insulin dose (which is HALF what it was before she went into the hospital) is keeping her that way. So like, TAKE THAT, random internet creep who thought I should just let her die/put her down. WHO’S DIGNIFIED NOW???

Life
Life is just happening all the time! Sym is awesome, the dogs are just so doggish all the time (so is Claire, actually), and Taylor is as handsome and amazing as ever. Even when I’m down they all make me feel so much better. I could say more about how much I love my little family but I would probably go on forever and I have to get back to work soon. But first, some fine pet pictures from my phone.

Enjoy the rest of your Monday!

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Posted in Arts & Crafts, Darling Child, Goals, Happiness, Life Etc, Pets and Husbands

For-Stinkin’-Ever

Posted on January 12, 2012 | 5 Comments

Soooo you know how I made pretty romantic Valentine’s Day banners as part of my goal? They’re great and all, but what about the people who frickin’ hate Valentine’s Day? What about the people who thinks is cheesy commercialized crap, or maybe aren’t in a relationship, or think mushy couples are disgusting and want to shout it from the rooftops? Well DON’T WORRY, because I got you covered.

Forever Alone
I knew I wanted to make this banner, but I didn’t know how to make it special. Ombré wasn’t right, some fancy new typeface wasn’t right… but what was??? Last night I was just about to assemble it all plain with black paper on the back when a bolt of inspiration struck me: CATS. I know, it’s amazing.

Love Stinks
This was another experiment that turned out AMAZING. Originally I was just going to do the regular secondary-colour-on-the-bottom ombré, but something about the phrase “love stinks” paired with the acid-y green colour made me think drips.

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Posted in Arts & Crafts, Goals, Valentine's Day

Two of Twenty-Four, Plus One

Posted on January 9, 2012 | 4 Comments

Hey internet, long time no blog. A WHOLE WEEK I KNOW I’M THE WORST. I hope you all were able to get along without me.

Anyway the reason I didn’t post last week is because not to be over dramatic but every day felt like 100 years in hell and the absolute worst day of my life.

It was my first week back at work after my sweet, sweet Christmas vacation, I had my lady time, I was sick and my dog went insane and peed on the hallway carpet 350,000,000 times.

WHY YOU GOTTA PLAY ME LIKE THAT, DOG??? Anyway I’m all resigned to my fate as a working stiff, recovered from my ailments and yesterday I rented a carpet steamer and cleaned the hallway carpet like, SIX TIMES so it should all be okay now.

One thing I DID do while I wasn’t blogging was work on my new year’s resolutions, of which I only made one, and which I made a very concrete, attainable goal instead of something nebulous and easy to fail at. I said I wanted to make at least two non-custom banners for my etsy shop, every month, so I would have things for sale other than just my custom stuff (I think it looks better to have actual, real items for sale somehow). Anyway last week (while finishing up the last of my custom orders, so if you are waiting on one that hasn’t shipped yet it’ll go out today) I made not two but THREE all-new banners!

Since Valentine’s Day is coming up (part of the reason for my goal was I didn’t want to be blind-sided by holidays like I was by Christmas) I decided to make some cheesy yet lovely and romantical banners. Doing non-custom work also gives me the opportunity to try out new ideas, and for each of these I did something I hadn’t before.

True Love
For this banner I used a double-ombré technique. For my other ombré banners I’ve used a single colour/blend of colours, but for this one I did two separate colours. Starting with a white (diamond) glitter base, I did a pale pink (kunzite) glitter to about halfway up each letter, and then I added a deeper pink (tourmaline) to the bottom ¾” to give it more dimension.

Be Mine
This was the third banner I made and the idea for it just popped into my head. I wasn’t sure how (or if) it would turn out but it looks basically how I pictured it. I used ruby (red) glitter for the letters, and added metallic red confetti hearts to the bottom 1½-2″ of each. I tried to make them look like they’d been scattered randomly, but I actually glued each one in place individually, which did not take ten thousand hours at all.

Always
This is my Harry Potter-inspired banner; I’ve made a couple of custom ones before (Mischief Managed and Expecto Patronum) but this one was all my idea. It’s from The Prince’s Tale chapter of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows; if you’ve read it you’ll understand the significance, and if you haven’t well then what is wrong with you? I used this weird, pale gold glitter (which I am now out of) and although I’d originally planned on adding a white/silver ombre to it, in the end I decided to leave it simple. What makes this banner different from others I’ve made is the back; instead of using plain paper I used cream paper printed with the text from relevant passages of the book (I scanned it and printed it out; no books were harmed in the making of this banner!).

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Posted in Arts & Crafts, Goals, Pets and Husbands, This Blog

My New Year’s Eve in Photo Booth

Posted on January 1, 2012 | 2 Comments

We didn’t do anything. I mean, we did stuff but we didn’t go out to a club or a party or have people over or anything. Last year Sym was home but this year she was at her dad’s so it was just me, Taylor and the pets. I was actually in a really bad mood, I’m in kind of a bad place, physically pain-wise right now and I was not in the mood to have fun.

So grumpy! I wasn’t going to “get ready” or anything but I figured it might pull me out of my New Year’s funk. I curled my hair and put on makeup and BOOM, mood improved.

The only problem was I used this Moroccan Oil Luminous Hairspray when I was a curling my hair and although it worked well as hairspray, it smelled EXACTLY like a Diaper Genie (if you have Diaper Genie experience then you’ll know why this was an unacceptable situation).

Taylor made us a feast of frozen hors d’oeuvres and I made sparkly pipe cleaner crowns for us to wear, as well as one for the pets. I knew none of them would keep it on so I figured they could share.

Normally Taylor and I watch Anchorman on NYE, but we started our evening so early (I had my first glass of wine at about 5) that we decided to watch both parts of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows first. Apparently I felt like spending my evening bawling my eyes out! We finished those at around 11:50 and took the dogs out for a walk, so we were in the park at midnight. People were screaming and setting off fireworks and we kissed on the street corner, it was nice. When we got home we put in Anchorman but both fell asleep on the couch (although I stayed up long enough to guzzle a couple of bottles of water to counteract the couple bottles of wine I polished off) until 2am, when I managed to get us both to bed.

Happy New Year! I hope you all had as wonderful an evening as us!

I’m not really one for New Year’s resolutions- I think last year I came up with an idea to do mini-resolutions every month that lasted two months before I got bored. This year I have one resolution: to make at least two non-custom banners for my etsy shop each month, so I don’t get caught unprepared for every holiday. I was going to say I should make one a week, so four a month, but that seemed a bit ambitious. Babysteps, right?

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Posted in Goals, Hair Dos & Don'ts, Holidays, Pets and Husbands

Colour Challenge

Posted on July 6, 2011 | 1 Comment

I think I’m getting the hang of this wearing colours thing!

June 30th, 2011: brown plaid western shirt, vintage & Taylor’s.

July 1st, 2011: red plaid western shirt, Diesel, also Taylor’s; teal bag, Kinies.

July 2nd, 2011: chevron striped dress, Forever 21. I got tons of compliments on this dress. Okay, two. I got two compliments.

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Posted in Goals, My Unique Style

Colour Challenge

Posted on June 29, 2011 | Leave a comment

I told you you’d be seeing this pic again!

Tuesday, June 21st, 2011
colourful clothing item: floral blouse, Zara

Sunday, June 26th, 2011
colourful clothing item: wavy stripe bikini, Victoria’s secret

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Posted in Goals, My Unique Style

Colour Challenge

Posted on June 15, 2011 | 1 Comment

Clearly, I’ve been really sucking at making these posts. I swear I HAVE been wearing colourful clothes, I just haven’t been taking pictures. But now that I’ve taken the time to make a sweet header for these posts OBVIOUSLY that is going to change.

Sunday, June 12, 2011
colourful clothing item: orange maxi skirt, Zara

Another thing I need to do is take outfit pictures with my REAL camera, and also possibly during the day when there is light. Now that Taylor has organized all his camera equipment in such a way that I can get at his tripod without knocked a ton of stuff down on my head that should be doable. Realistically I should just be able to ask him to take pictures for me using all his fancy camera equipment but for some reason I always look like a C.H.U.D. when he photographs me. I BLAME HIM.

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Posted in Goals, My Unique Style, Purchases

Colour Challenge

Posted on May 14, 2011 | Leave a comment

I know it seems like I haven’t been keeping up with this whole wear-one-coloured-clothing-item-a-week thing, but I swear I totally am. I just haven’t been taking pictures because it’s like HERE’S ME IN SWEATPANTS AND A PURPLE TANK TOP! and that’s not exciting. I still don’t have many coloured clothes and I had to spend a big portion of my shopping budget on new jeans (and as we all know, denim is a neutral). HOWEVER. I went shopping with my friend Carleigh today and got two new shirts, both button downs, both INSANE, like clothes a crazy person would wear.

This one is from Zara and it’s enormous and it has pockets, like pockets nt he sides for you to put your hands in. It’s super light and summer-y and I can’t wait until it’s summery out enough to wear it with some ratty old cutoffs like it’s meant to be (note to self: acquire ratty old cutoffs).

Mt other shirt is even crazier but I’m not going to show it until I actually wear. It’s also worth noting that the whole time we were shopping, everything I tried on was brightly coloured, except a grey tank top with a kind of Southwestern-looking geometric pattern in rainbow colours and a black coat, which I only tried on because the only other colour it came in was yellow, which I think looked weird with my blonde hair. Anyway I didn’t buy either of them.

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Posted in Goals, My Unique Style

Colour Challenge

Posted on April 28, 2011 | 2 Comments

Since there aren’t any pictures of my outfit from Jaime’s wedding, here’s a video! Sym would only dance with me if I held her hands the whole time- at the end I let go and she just stands there, and I’m like “WHAT??!!”