Tuesday, December 29, 2015

12 Days of Chirstmas Swap Reveal

As most of you all know, I participated in CG Swaps 12 Days of Christmas Swap:
Chaotic Goddess Swaps' 12 Days of Christmas Swap Show-Off
And today, is the swap reveal day.

My partner was Jacquie of My Confessions, and this is what I received from her: Some soothing lavender beads/lotion, body scrub, and a couple pine scented candles,
 a couple boxes of tea, and a package of pumpkin spice pretzels
 Pumpkin spice and gingerbread cookie mix
 snowmen decorations
 more snowmen: a baking cup set, hand wash, and mug, as well as an owl mug
 a milk chocolate orange, a Brad Paisley Christmas CD and some vintage buttons.
Once again, another great 12 Days of Christmas swap, click on the button above to see what others received this year.

Friday, December 25, 2015

Update in pictures

It looks like I haven't checked in since December 6th. Basically, I've been working and getting ready for Christmas. I was done until I remembered I had forgotten to get my brother's girlfriend a gift, and at some point I just decided I was done.
I don't have an Instagram account, but here's some pictures that would appear if I did:
Presents to my friends, with some creative wrapping.
 I signed up to be/have a festive friend at work, here's some things my friend got me>
 My aunt sent me cookies, I thought this one was the cutest:
 And another gift from my festive friend, the cup says The Nice list is overrated.
 My supper on the 22nd:
 Caramel rolls on the 23rd:
 The 5 inches of snow that was not predicted for us:

I was really excited when our forecast was for the lower 40's and no snow for Christmas, on the 23rd it rained all day and turned to great, big, beautiful flakes that evening. It dropped off and then on the 24th about mid-morning it started snowing again, and by that night we had a total of 5 inches. People forgot to drive and there was a multiple car pile-up north of town.
Today, I got up and went to my parents for Christmas. It was nice. I hope everyone had a grand Christmas.

Sunday, December 06, 2015

weekly update

So, since Wednesday, I haven't really done much, just reading and work.
Thursday, my muse finally showed up (not early enough to make anything for anyone this holiday season, but at least she's back), and I spent the afternoon piecing together a few pieces. For some reason, I decided to get out my fabric scraps and piece together a quilt like thing on a couple stocking backgrounds. One of them is mostly green pieces, the other I started with sheer pieces, but decided the stocking was too big of a canvas, so I moved to a smaller mitten. I love how they both turned out, but now I have to sew them all down. I haven't really done any sewing, not since I did my fabric book a few years ago. I do hand sewing, so I'm not entirely sure how I'm going to sew down the sheer pieces so it looks good. Anyways, I got so caught up in that, that I didn't eat lunch, and barely got to eat supper and have things ready to go before I had to leave for work. Thursday night was work.
Friday, I had the day off because I was working Saturday. I did go in to talk about decorating the library for the winter holidays, we basically spent most of our time putting together a tree and trying to make it stand up in a stand that was not made for it. I mailed my package for the 12 Days of Christmas swap, and got lost in my art project again. Friday night, I went on a home tour. My mother signed up to do a holiday home tour this weekend, so this was the tour for the people on the tour. It was really fun, but the thing I don't really like about this tour (me and mom usually go on it as one of our holiday traditions), is that everyone's house is so big, and I feel so very poor touring their houses. I mean, it's always fun to snoop in other people's houses, but these are never small houses. Of course, they probably aren't really rich, but I always feel the gap in what I make over what they (probably) make. Because I got lost in my art project (and forgot to turn the ringer back on, on my phone), I didn't eat dinner, so by the time we were done with the tours, about 9pm, I was hungry. We were right across the street from a Dairy Queen, so I asked my mom if we could pick up some food. But, for some fun reason, she decided it was faster for me to go home and warm something up than to get fast food. It wasn't, and part of the reason I wanted DQ is because there's nothing fun to eat in my house. I was just thinking that I would love someone to give me a $100 shopping spree at HyVee, then I could get some fun frozen dinners. I feel none of the food at Fareway is really exciting. I just keep thinking about Jim Gaffigan's gag about Mexian food "Look, it's all the same shit, just say a Spanish word and I'll bring you something." Sadly, I feel that way about life lately. I try to make it interesting, but nothing's really getting me in a better mood.
Saturday, I had to open at the library. This is maybe my second time opening on a Saturday, but it was crazy. We had a holiday book sale going on in the auditorium, when I went to turn on our public access computers, they weren't connecting to our private internet, and our displace monitors wouldn't connect either. Weirdly, all the computers we left on overnight didn't have any problems, so the ones in youth and upstairs were fine. And then, later in the morning our automated check-in system went down and we couldn't figure out what was wrong with it, my boss had to come in and call the company. They had it back up before I left, but there was still a lot to run through it. Also, our three tech people were away and couldn't really help with stuff. Saturday afternoon, I went to help with the home tour. I really felt like I didn't need to be there, I'm not really good at volunteering information. I can answer questions fine, but I don't give information so easily. After standing pretty much all day, I was ready to go home and sit when it was done. My mother said I should stay for a holiday party their neighbors were doing, she said she'd leave to run me home if I wanted to. So, later when I asked her to do that, she kinda ignored me. I was to a point where I was just going to go get my stuff and then leave before she said she'd take me home. Lately, I feel she thinks her time is more important than my time, and she's been pissing me off.
Today, I was supposed to help with the tour again, but my mother annoyed me so much yesterday, plus they had plenty of people to help, that I just decided not to. My plan was to work on my art project, but I basically just slacked off online and watched movies. Oh well, it was a nice relaxing day for me, and I needed that.

Wednesday, December 02, 2015

updates

So, it's been about a week or so since I checked in last. What have I been up to? Shopping and holidays mostly.
I saw this cute ornament a few weeks ago when I was shopping. I didn't buy it, but I think it'd be cool to make one like it. I could've bought some round ornaments and added lace to them, they'd probably be about like this one.
 For all my button lovers, I saw this somewhere, I think it'd be cool to have a button bouquet.
 Thanksgiving turned out OK. I basically made everything. My mom decided we needed to start everything wickedly early, except the meat, so then we were waiting on the meat to finish and didn't sit down until about 2pm. It was good and filling, not too much this year, but I wanted to eat earlier. I liked the potatoes, they seemed a little bland, but it's probably because I always load a lot on top of my potatoes.
 Saturday, my mother and I shopped downtown for Small Business Saturday. I probably shouldn't have gone shopping the weekend before. I was hoping we could go shopping late morning, have lunch, and then visit a local Tree festival. My mom thought it was better to do shopping early in the morning, do lunch and then rest for a little while then go back and enjoy the trees. Oh, well it worked out fine.
I found this cute ornament at one store. Hope has been my word since my ex and I broke up in 2012.
 A few highlights from the tree festival, this is a bad picture, it's a star wars tree, it was decorated like Darth Vader and lots of Star Wars ornaments on it.
 I find these weird, but people really like to have them.
 This one was decorated by a local coffee house, I thought it was cute.
 This was a super hero tree, it had a lot of super hero ornaments on it, and comic strips instead of ribbon.
 Today, I may have splurged a bit much. I was looking for hot chocolate and chai mixes. My local grocery store had some great ones, last year. This year when I go to stock up, they didn't have them, figures. So, I went to HyVee to see what they had and made a few stops on the way there.
I'm also finishing my shopping. A mug, cute house ornament and a couple star picks.
 Found the hot chocolate, some donut puffs, and some chocolate.
 Found the chai, too, and a cute little snowman ornament.
 Also, went a little nuts at the Asian food store. A few breads, fruit chips, strawberry puffs, haw candy, and a milk drink.
I think I've decided I'm done Christmas shopping. I'm tired of it, and I don't need to spend more money on people. I don't need to spend more on myself either. I need to start saving the extra money I'm making before I have to move next year.