Complicated Simplicity

>Lots of Sharpie<

Whew, I've had tons gong on lately. We have been super busy around here. And it doesn't let up! :-) I have a project to do for drawing class (eggs-due Monday) and need to set up my picture plane for design for Monday and I also have a math test on Monday. I'm finally settling into the flow of school again. Of course, my English class starts in a couple of weeks and that will throw it all off-AND I'm hoping Wal-Mart will call me for an interview sometime in the near future (keep praying for that one, if you would).

Anway, just wanted to pop in and share the Sharpie projects I've gotten back. My doodle and my contour drawings. I have come to love Sharpie as a medium and would use it constantly if I could. When I get my other projects back from those classes (I have done four more) I'll share those too. Here goes! Let me know what you think.

This is my contour drawing. We had to arrange five objects and draw the contours in Sharpie.

And my doodle. We had to fill and 18x24 paper with doodles-she wanted to see texture and various line widths. It turned out very cool and I think I'm going to frame it for our wall. I took some close up shots so taht you could see some of the detail-I poured myself out on this. Meaning, there are pieces of me in it all. Things I love, who I am, my dreams and wishes and deepest desires, a few of my favorite words, and my family, Paul and Wawa are all represented in it somewhere. Some of it you will easily see, other things you probably wouldn't be able to interpret unless you were inside my mind. :-) Feel free to ask about any of it! Enojy the search!

>Breathless<

Whew! Time has just flown by. Let's see...what happened since I was last on here.

• Paul finished up his internship at the church.
• We took a two week trip/vacation to Michigan. We spent a few days at my parent's and then went on for ten days on Beaver Island with Paul's family.
• We got back on a Saturday and Robbie and I headed back to my mom's that Wednesday. We went canoeing with Scott and Vange and it was quite the trip (I hope to tell you the funny and adventurous story, we'll see if I ever have time to do that!! :-).
• We got back late on Saturday night. That Monday was my first day of class.
• I found out I don't have to take English 1, so I'm enrolled in English 2 (which is both online and an 8 week class!!!).
• I found out I don't have to take Biology (which I wasn't enrolled in, but thought I'd have to take eventually).
• I found out that my math, unfortunately doesn't count since the math at KCC is 4 credits (and my pre-calc class was only 3), so I have to keep on with Intermediate Algebra (crazy, huh-since I took FST in HS and pre-calc at U of D, but whatevs) and take another math class next semster. Fun, fun!
• I realized that maybe I'm a litle crazy for taking three studio classes in one semester. Ha!
• I met with my advisor and created my academic plan, which I don't think I'm going to follow much now that I've had time to think about it.
• I missed my math class that day because my appointment took too long.
• It was the one day where she went over stuff that I am currently lost on (and the day they went through an entire section in one day). It's been six years y'all!!!!
• Robbie is loading up her stuff tomorrow and moving to Michigan on Saturday. :-(
• Unfortunately, I have a math test on Tuesday (and still don't understand section two, but Paul said he'll help me).
• And-I have two art projects due on Wednesday (a contour still life-will probably take me seven or more hours, seriously and a design project that I just have to add color to).
• Oh-and a photography project due on Thursday (have to shoot an entire roll of photos of things around the house). We're going to start developing then, and I'm a tad nervous about the process.

And that's it. Other randomness-I have two profs that want us to call them by their first name-and I just can't. Seriously, I call Paul's Mom, Paul's Mom. I can't call my profs Chelise and Jerry (oh yeah, and they're married. Yup, I have both of them-kind of weird).

I am okay with my math class so far. Some people hate Dr. Roy, but I think she's great (although we are only on chapter one).

My design class is okay, but it's not what I expected at all. I wish she would teach us more about the elements of design instead of just saying "do this" without much explanation. And, when she looked at our sketches, she didn't really explain well why certain ones were well-balanced and other weren't. I'm really intimidated by that class. Physical art is not necessarily my forte or what I want to do. It's okay and I know I'll do fine, I guess I'm just a tad underwhelmed with that class.

My drawing class is one of my favorites. The project I have to do this weekend may change my mind, but I don't think so. :-) I love the teacher, she doesn't care how "good" we are at drawing-as long as we're doing our best and practicing. She's really encouraging and helpful and good at explaining everything and the reason why we do something fully and completely. Our first project was to doodle. Seriously we had to doodle all over our paper (we work with 18x24 in that class-huge paper) in Sharpie. It was so much fun. I'll try to take a photo of mine to share when I get it back.

My photography class is alright. I'm not thrilled with it. I'm excited about challenging myself and seeing what I can do with film, but so far it's really boring. And I'm thinking it will pick up once we actually start shooting, but I don't know. We shall see.

As I said, I went to my English class once and then the school called and said my U of D class had transferred. Yay! So, I dropped English 1 and enrolled in English 2. Since it's an eight week class, I didn't miss any classes. I'm a bit nervous about taking my first online class AND having it be a super intense everything-in-half-the-time class. We shall see. :-)

And that's life. Paul is doing well with his classes so far. He seems to be enjoying them. And his work life seems to be stabilizing since McDonald's promised him 40 hours/week from now on!!! :-) He's trying to work out the other job with it and figuring out how the schedule will work out.

Anyway, that's what's been going on. I hope to update a bit more often-we shall see how that goes. :-) Have a good one.

>list. 7/5/2009<

 

What are your favorite summertime activities? XOXO ;-)

>Soles<

This post is inspired by Elise and Katie.

I'll try to take a photo of my shoes later today.

I am quite the minimalist when it comes to shoes. Seriously-I hate buying shoes. And if I can get a pair for super cheap (ie-$10-15) I'm happy. I am not a shoe person. I spend 99.99% of my time barefoot. I will purchase only what is needed and get those the cheapest I can at Target or WalMart and occasionally Payless. And I wear them until they fall apart and sometimes beyond. I am the same way with clothes. I'll get two or three new pairs of jeans every year to year and a half. I will get new shirts only if I see them on a big sale (like for $5-10) or when I need them. The only thing I spend $30 on are bras at Lane Bryant, and that's not by choice, but necessity. :-) Paul appreciates my low-maintenance way of life.

Anyway, back to the shoes. Here's the rundown:

1. Flip-flops. I currently have one pair that have chew marks from the dog. They are a thin pair that I gor for $1.50 or so from Rue 21 several years ago. I live in flip-flops most of the summer if I wear shoes.

2. River sandals. I have an off-brand from Payless. We paid more for these ($40) because I'd had some cheapy ones from Wal-Mart that gave me blisters all the time. These are starting to fall apart, so some new ones are in order. I wear these 75% orf the time-year round.

3. Tennis shoes. When my last pair fell apart, I got the exact same kind. I rarely wear these. Only when we go to the fitness center, mainly. Wal-Mart for $12 I think.

4. Salomon light hiking shoes. My brother got these for me for Christmas a couple of years ago. They're still in good condition. I wear them when hiking and they are amazing. I will never buy a cheap pair of hikers again because the comfort level and lack of blisters make it worth the extra money.

5. Teva leather boots. These were David's. They rubbed on his feet wrong, so he gave them to me (we have the same size feet-seriously). I love these. The way the look, the way they feel. Love them. If I'm not wearing sandals, I'm probably wearing these.

6. Black dress shoes. From the men's section because I have funny shaped feet. I only wear these with black pants to church, which is rare.
7. White flat sandalish dress shoes. I only wear these when I wear a skirt. They hurt my feet.

Seriously, that's all of my shoes. I take a bunch when I travel, because they all are for different things (hiking, water, lounging, church), but that's it.

I know, boring. But I thought it was an interesting thing to think about.

>Early Birthday Celebration<

Today we are doing my early birthday celebration. Paul has classes all day on Monday (my birthday), tomorrow is going to be crazy because it's Valentine's Day, and I'm always exhausted on Sundays. Therefore, today became the day. It's Paul's "mid-winter" break (which means he has no classes today).

The plan: We're heading to Red Robin for lunch/dinner-because I have a coupon for a free burger. Then we're going to Coldstone to get some ice cream-because I have a coupon for free ice cream. And then we're going to a movie-because I have a coupon for a free ticket. See the theme?

I'll be back with more updates later on this weekend.

Have a great weekend/Valentine's day/Friday the 13th!!!! XOXOXO

>Sicky<

A timeline.

• Sunday 8am-Woke up with a sore throat.
• Sunday 2pm-Nose started running.
• Sunday 6pm-Ears started hurting.
• Monday am-Woke up with sore throat and ears and a never-ending runny nose.
• Monday 6:30pm-Dropped Paul off at Pastor's house for Bible study and football.
• Monday 6:35pm-Arrived at church for womens study (which starts at 7pm)
• Monday 9:00pm-Arrived home and talked to Robbie.
• Monday 9:20pm-Got on bike to ride with talking to Robbie.
• Monday 9:25pm-Got off bike with head pounding insanely. Relaxed.
• Monday 10:00pm-Picked Paul up from Pastor's house.
• Monday 10:15pm-Feeling worse as far as congestion and headache.
• Monday 10:30pm-I *know* I have a fever. I can feel it in my body. I don't say it yet. Paul gives me a hug and asks, "Are you cold?" "Yes, why?" "You feel warm to me."
• Monday 10:45pm-Get into bed and take temp. Yup, a fever. Not high enough for meds. Paul keeps trying to give me meds. I keep telling him to let it get higher because it's my body trying to kill the germs. You don't take meds for fever until it hits 102 (it was nice growing up with a mom that was a nurse-you learn to let the little things go and when to worry or not)
• Monday 11:00pm-Unbearably cold. Paul gets me socks for my feet and a I grab another blanket.
• Monday 11:30pm-I start feeling warmer. Fever is breaking.
• Monday 11:45pm-Fever is gone, but my body is now achy. It's going to be a long night of uncomfortableness.
• Monday 2:00am-My headache gets worse and I cave to taking some Aleve for it.
• Monday 2:30am-Paul gets me some ice for my head.
• Monday 3:30am-Finally closing in on sleep.
• Tuesday 11:00am-Woke up feeling much better than last night. Still congested, but not achy like I was.

>2009 We Welcome You<

Happy New Year! Happy 2009! I am so excited for all it has to offer us this year. I don't know what it will bring, but I do know that it's going to be amazing. No matter what happens, it will be amazing. 2008 was quite a year-ups and downs and all the plateau inbetweens. And it was wonderful. Full of adventure and travel and love and heartache and hope and promise and laughter and tears and lessons learned. I can't wait to see what 2009 is going to be like. Will some of our dreams come true? Will we learn hard lessons? Will we grow by leaps and bounds? I hope so on all three counts. Welcome 2009, come what may, I totally embrace you.

>One Little Word 2009<

One Little Word is something that Ali Edwards has been doing for a few years now. She picks a focus word for the year. Her theme word, if you will. You can find out more about it here (2009) and here (past years).

My one little word for 2009 is organization. This year my focus is on organizing my life. There are several area that requre some organization.

Our house needs to be completely reorganized and deep cleaned and made to be more functional. I have a few ideas, and will be brainstorming more in the coming months. If you have any ideas, I will ask for them-things that can be done cheaply and reusing things that we have (boxes and such). We have a few problem areas, I'm sure you can relate. One such area is the garage. We had some mice invite themselves in for a feast on our birdseed a year ago, and we got rid of them but not the mess. Another area is the basement. We have boxes that were never unpacked and boxes of memento type things and all sorts of random stuff. Another area is the little bedroom downstairs. It is a scrapbook/library kind of space that is small and has the largest closet in the house. It it where stuff gets dumped-the things with no home and the things that we don't want to find a place for. A third area is the kitchen. We have limited cupboard space and games and music piled all around the piano. It collects the mail and other miscellaneous things. There are some other small areas that are cluttered. We have tons of books that I need to organize and somehow place in a nice manner.

Another area I need to organize is my health plan. I need to make exercizing plans and meal plans and figure out what I'm going to do and what my goals are.

I also need to organize our computer-delete old useless files, edit, upload and archive my photos, backup everything. All that kind of stuff.

There are so many more things to organize, but I'll post about those later. That's my word for the year. What's yours?

>Planning Ahead<

I know that it is still December. Early December at that, however I have caught myself thinking about the new year coming up. Of all of the things that I would like to do and see and learn during that year. I am a total dreamer-I think you know that about me by now. There will always be a wawillion things on my life/bucket/to-do list. I know this and I accept it. There are things I will never be able to do and places I will never go and things I will never see. Got that. However, there are those items on my list that I have complete control over at this point. And those are what I've been thinking about.

I've been thinking about a few different things I would like to learn next year. And thinking that maybe it would be fun to learn something new each month. Twelve new things in a year-how exciting! I haven't thought of all twelve things yet, I'm just thinking through a few.

I know that I want to learn to crochet and knit. My mom was constantly crocheting (okay, not really, but she did it a lot) when we were little. I think I'm going to get myself some crochet hooks and some yarn and see if she can't teach me how to do it. I would also like to learn how to knit. Mom didn't do this as much, although I think she did a little. She may be able to teach me, but I may have to consult a book or website for this one.

I would also like to learn to sew. Mom always made the cutest clothes for us when we were little (tank tops, shorts, swimsuits, dresses), and I would love to be able to sew blankets and curtains and all sorts of fun things. It's another thing she may be able to help teach me.

Another thing I would like to learn to do is quilt. Mom hates quilting, and I know it can be so very tedious (especially cutting those squares just so), but I absolutely *love* quilts. I mean *love* them. It is my dream to make one for each of my children and I'd love to make them for other family members as well. This one I'm probably going to have to get a book to learn as well.

As I am typing, I'm thinking of a few other things I'd like to learn. I'd like to learn some cake decorating. Nothing fancy, just some basics and I know mom can teach me that to. I don't know whether she'll be excited or not when I ask her to teach me so many things! :-) It will be fun though, if she will teach me.

One thing I'd love to learn to do, but am not sure where I could learn is to letterpress. Oh man.Elise has gotten me hooked on letterpress. I would love to create some awesome cards and calendars and other fun things. I just don't have any idea where I could even look for a place to do it.

Anyway, that's my list so far of things that I can actually learn and have a little control over. If you have any suggestions or ideas or your own list of things you'd love to learn please let me know.

I was inspired by a woman in my Stories in Hand class who said each of her three aunts taught her a different craft, and her mom did too (one taught her to knit, one to sew, etc). I thought about how cool a gift that is to pass on. And it really made me think about what I could pass on to my children and Karla's girls. What can I teach them? I'm still thinking, but wouldn't that be so cool? To give them some small skill that maybe they'd look back on one day with pride and joy in the memories?

Please give me your ideas of things I could learn to do or things you'd like to learn this upcoming year! :-)

>Etsy*love<

To the left (scroll down), you will see a link to my Etsy page. It lists my favorites and such. When you look through my favorites you will notice that I love letterpressed things. I love paper goods. I love baby things (I know it's weird since I have infertility problems, but I love looking through the awesome baby stuff on Etsy-it's helps to kee the hope alive and the cynicism away). I love patterns of cute kids clothes. I love trees. I love art. I love photography. I love Emily's camera straps. :-) I love calendars. I love bright colors. I love nature. I have a hard time deciding which I like more between colors or patterns of the same item (or kind of item). I love blankets and quilts. I love unique and tongue in cheek items-particularly for babies. I love a clean and grapic style. I also like modern, but also classic and vintage. I love orange. I love sheep. I love brown. I love non-electronic toys (hate electronic ones). I have in mind what I want vs. don't want when it comes to our babies/children (it's what happens when you have to wait 5+ years and counting-I'm quite opinionated). I love pirates. I love organic. I love handmade (obviously). I love birds. I love moose. I love toys that are animals that are unique (bats, porcupines, etc). I love Nightmare Before Christmas. I love fireflies and owls and dandelions. I love shilhouettes. I love bonnets. I love fabric lunch bags. I love Etsy.

***Note: I am constantly adding things to my favorites, so check back often for some cool things. Also, another good place to start your search is in my favorite sellers-so many cool stores out there. Buy handmade.****