Thursday, December 28, 2017

Venting

Because it's my blog, and it feels like I can't complain anywhere else.
Yesterday, after visiting the post office, I went after Christmas shopping downtown, which was disappointing. One store either didn't have stuff marked down or didn't have signs about what their mark down was. This is a consignment store, so I get why some things weren't marked down yet. What I don't get was the table full of Christmas stuff that had a red line through the prices. There were no signs anywhere saying if items were marked down, or how much. I didn't feel like taking things downstairs to the desk to ask, especially since all I got was a 'Hello' when I entered the store, no 'Can I help you' or 'Are you looking for anything?' So, I didn't buy anything.
The next store, all their Christmas merchandise was marked down 50%, and while I get that you're an independent store and and need to have higher prices to survive, I didn't feel like paying even the half the price for the items I wanted.
I found this rather cute owl:
 He was probably 2 feet high or so, and he bobbled on his feet. Very cute, but full price was almost $40, and I didn't want to pay even $20 for half price. I certainly don't need another one, and as I'm sitting here, I'm not sure there's even room for him in my apartment. So, after careful consideration, I put the three items I had picked up, back and went along my way.
The last store, their stuff was 75% off, that's more my liking. These three ornaments were $5.98, $6.59 and $5.98 full price:
 I ended up paying less that $5 for them altogether. That's my price.
When I got home, I found a secret Santa gift from one of my Facebook groups in the mailbox.
Some shaped paper clips:
Which I don't remember asking for, but there it was on the post. I'm not sure why I asked for them, I have a ton of paper clips I don't use already.
I watched movies and YouTube for the rest of the night. I wasn't quite ready to go back to normal life yet, figured I'd do that today.
One of my swaps I got a few weeks ago was to send your partner $10 worth of new Christmas crafting stuff. Here's what my partner sent me:
 
And the front:
So, she sent me a used set of stamps. I contacted the admins of the group, and they said she said it was new, so now it's her word against mine. So, I asked, what about the fact that it's not Christmas? Apparently it's now between her and me, because she sent me something. Which I feel is bullshit. She didn't follow the rules of the swap, and sent me crap. I'm not going to speculate on her side, but I told the admins, I would finish my two swaps in the group, and then I would leave, because that's not fair.
I think she should at least send me something Christmasy, because that's what the swap called for, but I guess as long as you send something, it's OK.
This is the second time I'm leaving a group, because the admins took the other person's side. Another group I was in, I left because a known flaker joined the group. I told the admins she had flaked on me and was told they'd gotten this response from a few other people in the group, but they were going to give her another chance. Then she should still be sending out those swaps for people she owes them to. I'm not staying in a group where you have a person that flakes on people.
And it's sad, that the people who are following the rules are the ones that have to leave. I'm a member of quite a few groups, 4 or 5, on facebook, and I guess the world is just telling me to stay with the few I'm already in.
So, there was that today. And then my parents gave me some money to move into my savings account and we're sitting in the car talking about it, and they've already told me all this stuff, and I feel like they're treating me like I'm 5. Like I don't understand things.
I got home about 10:45, and I want to drink some alcohol that's in my fridge because I'm so annoyed at the world, but I can't because I work tonight.
I'm so annoyed at how people are, I just don't know how to get past it. Maybe reading a book about having more happiness in your life will help.
I've also noticed, it's taken me twice as long to write this because apparently when i'm pissed I screw up more when I type.

Tuesday, December 26, 2017

After Christmas shopping

I always try to go after Christmas shopping as soon after Christmas as possible. The forecast today was not inviting. It was 2 with a wind chill of -13, as I'm writing this at 3:54 pm it is now 5 with a windchill of -10. The whole week is forecast to be cold. My goals were to pick up some things for my Advent calendar next year, chocolate because I didn't get much this year and get stuff for people's Christmas presents next year.
My mom offered me a ride to Target, so I took her up on that. Most everything was 50% off, which is different for Target, usually the candy is 30% off and everything else was 50% off.
 a set of stars, ornaments, chocolate. The reindeer letter to Santa was for my brother.
The minion ball was not on sale, someone had put it in the wrong space, but it was only $3, so I bought it anyway, plus everything was free for me because I got Target gift cards for Christmas.
I also had a cartwheel savings on clearance clothing.
 Both of these shirts were marked at $2.40, I paid a total of $1.68 total for both of them.
Next up was Walmart:
 chocolate, gift tags, sticky notes. I can't help picking up sticky notes, plus my friend talked me into it. I passed on one of each of the chocolate in that mix and the Pocky to a friend for her birthday present.
Next, Dollar Tree:
 paper bags, stickers, gift bag, cactus ephemera, Mountain Dew, pretzels, necklaces. I picked up the paper bags for my Advent calendar, the gift bag for my friend's birthday. I had to get the necklaces for a swap I'm in.
After that a bit of a short walk to HyVee:
 These weren't really on sale, but they are higher priced chocolates, so I picked them up for $2 each.
My friend left me at this point, and I checked out JoAnns:
 These both rang up a regular price, the hedgehog $6.99 and the stickers $1.99. The lady ringing me out said the ornaments were on sale the other day, so she gave it to me for $2.99. I didn't actually see sale signs for the Christmas stuff, so I don't know if they were on sale, it would be stupid not to have it on sale.
Last stop was Hobby Lobby:
 rice krispie treats, stickers, tags, ornament, blind bag, and some birthday journaling cards.
All the Christmas stuff was 66% off, and still holding at that, that was a little disappointing. I limited myself to the rice krispie treats, the stickers, the tags and the gingerbread ornaments. I picked up the blind bag and the birthday journaling cards from the clearance section.
I put all the fun stuff: the ornaments from Target, the cactus ephemera, the blind bag and the ornaments from Hobby Lobby in the brown paper bags for my Advent calendar. I found everything to be really picked over this year. It seems that things are going on sale earlier and people are really taking advantage of it. There was a bunch of trees, boxed ornaments and gift wrapping supplies, but not a bunch of gifts and stocking stuffers. It was a little disappointing, though not that I need more stuff.
When I got home, I found my January 2018 calendar tag in the mailbox:
Tomorrow, I plan to go After Christmas shopping downtown, I have five stores I want to check out. I also have swaps I need to finish packing up to mail tomorrow, grocery shopping to do, a birthday present to deliver and a bus pass to pick up.

Monday, December 25, 2017

Merry Christmas!!!

My Advent calendar for the 24th:
 The sticky notes are from mine, the straws from the envelope countdown, and the arrows from the pocket letter.
I did laundry yesterday, two loads, so it took about all day. My parents and I went to my aunt's for Christmas eve. We used to go to my grandparents (on my dad's side) every Christmas Eve. Last year my aunt (on my dad's side) invited us to her house for Christmas Eve, and I hope it becomes a yearly tradition. I feel that we don't get together with my dad's side of the family much and it's fun. I may not like kids very much, but one of my cousin's kids has 3 kids and they are just entertaining.
I had to snap a picture of my aunt's pig serving dishes for my friend, she likes pigs.
 And here's Christmas. I didn't get a picture of my Advent calendar goodies: I didn't have anything for mine, I had a LUSH bath bomb from the envelope countdown and some snowman socks from the pocket letter.
I went over to my parents house about 8, we didn't open presents until probably 10. Here's what I got:
 the tube has pieces to make a giraffe, a snowman wall hanging, an ISU snowman, some Ghiradelli chocolate, a stuffed owl, the snowman from Rudolph the Red Nosed reindeer, and an Andes mint chocolate bar.
 Washi, a washi book, a cute iris folded card, and an owl keychain.
The washi was from my brother's girlfriend, I love that she got me something I'm into, I feel bad that I don't really know what she's into. My mom made the Iris fold card, there was a Target gift card inside it.
 two soft and warm hats, socks.
There was also a raincoat, but I'm not gonna use it, so my mom is keeping it, she said she'd give me something the equivalent of what she paid for it.
I also had a lamp re-wired, another Target gift card, and some cash.
My dad is cleaning out his DVD collection, because he doesn't watch them anymore, so I got some:
The Da Vinci Code, Seabiscuit, National Treasure, The Hunt for Red October, Night at the Museum, The Bucket List and A Few Good Men.
My brother made a roast for lunch with mashed potatoes and green beans.
I went home about 2:30. The older I get, the more unexciting Christmas gets. I realize this when I can sleep through the night before Christmas. My brother and his girlfriend went to her family's get together after lunch and I went home. I know part of the holidays is to spend time with family, but when I'm at my parents house, all we do is sit there and do nothing. I'm not gonna sit there and do nothing when I have stuff to do at home.
Tomorrow brings after-Christmas shopping. I bought a few of the presents I gave out this year at after Christmas shopping last year, so hopefully I'll have the same luck this time.

Saturday, December 23, 2017

Days 22 and 23

Life was pretty boring yesterday, and I thought about posting and then promptly forgot.
Here's my Advent calendar:
 The buttons are from mine, the chocolate from the envelope countdown and the ribbon from the pocket letter.
Here's a better look at the buttons:
I opened the journaling card set I bought on Thursday, and decided the 6x8 cards would make some nice journals. I bound them up with hand stitching, and was trying to figure out how to get the edges to line up once bound:
 Work was a normal Friday, I picked up some cereal and Mountain Dew on my way home.
Here's my Advent calendar for today:
 The ribbon and earrings are from mine, the buttons from the envelope countdown, the bling and ephemera from the pocket letter.
I worked on some swaps today, A year-round tag swap:
 and year-round paper clips:
Other than laundry, I'm not exactly sure what I'm doing tomorrow.

Thursday, December 21, 2017

Lunch with a friend

Today's Advent calendar:
The tree clothespin is from the pocket letter, the tree mix from the envelope countdown and the minion from mine. I really like that packet of wooden trees, it also has some plastic pieces that look like peppermints
Here's what was in the minion blind bag:
 Apparently it was a Halloween one.
I went to lunch and shopping with a friend today, and I spent way too much money. We had tacos for lunch.
First stop was Micheal's:
 mini notebooks ($1.99), pink 12x12 paper ($0.69), two big blue pom poms ($0.89 each), dinosaur sticker book ($1).
When I showed my explosion box to one of my co workers yesterday, she asked if I would sell her one for her niece, who likes pink. So, I had to get some pink 12x12 cardstock. I have maybe three sheets of 12x12 cardstock.
 two packages of mini matchboxes ($2 each), a set of vintage decorated clothespins ($2), flower washi ($1.99), thin pink washi ($1.99), a waffle squishie keychain ($1), vintage calendar ($0.80), wooden under the sea shapes ($0.29), a bunch of pastel trims ($2), and some sequin trim ($0.49). Mostly everything was on sale, the matchboxes, clothespins, paper, keychain and sticker book were regular price.
Across the street is a Tuesday Morning:
 I found this stack of 100 sheets of colored 12x12 cardstock for $7.99, there was a smaller pack (probably of better quality) for $9.99, this will work fine for my purposes. The small pack of 6x6 paper is called tealightful, it was $2.99, it has 36 papers with 24 designs. The misc me! journaling card kit was $5.99, it has 240 cards: 60 8x6, 60 4x6 and 120 3x4 cards. I love the designs.
 Robot stickers ($1.49), lace collage pack ($2.39), puffy pony stickers ($0.79), mini sticky notes ($.99), glue sticks ($0.99), gymnastics stickers ($0.29), jeweled flower stickers ($0.99), and acetate under the sea pieces ($0.29).
two packages mini croissants ($1.03 each), mini cookies ($2.39), European cookie collection ($2.39), raspberry marshmallow cookies ($2.39), and a chocolate cone ($0.71).
My friend suggested Pier 1 imports because they usually have some good stuff on clearance at this time of year. They already had Valentine's stuff out:
 I found this cute hedgehog.
 A cool hedgehog towel, I was tempted to buy it for $5.
 A cute mug, I love mugs, unfortunately, I only use one or two if I'm lazy and don't wish to wash the other one. I kinda wish I could have a shelf full of cups, maybe some day when I have my own place.
 Also, saw this cute card.
 I bought a spider necklace and some owls. The spider necklace was from Halloween and was 90% off. All their ornaments were 50% off, but these rang up less, I'm not complaining.
We still had a little time before I had to be back for work, so we went to Dollar Tree:
 bagel thins, candles, legal pads, toys, shipping labels. After buying all that food at Tuesday morning, I didn't want to buy too much more, but I was intrigued. I got the candles to put under a Christmas tree. The legal pads are for a future swap. I can't help tiny toys. I misplaced my shipping labels the other day, now that I bought more, I'll probably find them.
 stickers and washi. I found those new 'metal' stickers, I picked up the hearts, stars and royal looking ones. I wanted the ones with less color. I found these cool color your own stickers. I found the minion and Tsum Tsum washi, and some puffy princess stickers as well as these cool flower stickers.
 These were in the blind box above.
When I got to work today, I found a few gifts.
 A Supernatural Impala, sucker, keychain, chocolate and a Burt's Bees ornament. I may have already eaten the other food.
Here's her card:
 We're both dragon fans.
As I was taking pictures and sorting stuff out when I got home, I found this beautiful moth pin.
 The person that asked me to make the explosion card gave me this card:
 She told me it looked like a card I would like, she was right.
 One of my supervisors gave me Christmas potpourri.
I also found this pen and notebook set in my mailbox.
Work was a normal Thursday, slow.
I spent way too much money on myself. So much for not spending extra money, and I'm planning to go after Christmas shopping next week. But, considering there's not a ton that I wanted before Christmas that I didn't buy, maybe (hopefully) I'll just get some good deals on stuff for next year. I do, want to buy stuff for my Advent Calendar next year, nowish, because I knew what everything was in it this year, I hadn't really forgotten by the time I opened it.
I didn't get any mail Monday and Tuesday, Wednesday I got a pocket letter, today I got a bill. I'm hoping I can get something interesting tomorrow, but not holding my breath.

Wednesday:

I totally forgot to post yesterday. My advent calendar:
 The lip stuff on a keychain is mine, the cupcake pics are the envelope countdown, the 'smile' is from the pocket letter.
I totally bought the lip thing for the popsicle in a tutu, I didn't realize they were all lip products.
I got a snowman pocket letter in the mail:
And I created another explosion box:
This one's a mini, I started with a 6x6 piece of paper for a 2x2x2 box. These are kinda addicting, though the smaller size made it harder to figure out, but I also tried to do some measurements that were harder, geometry was never my thing.
When I got done and took my shower it was barely after 9pm, I didn't even eat supper, I was exhausted from being up late Sunday and Monday night. I didn't sleep that great, but it helped.

Tuesday, December 19, 2017

I made something cool today

My life was too boring to post yesterday. My advent calendar:
 The tags from the pocket letter, the stars from the envelope countdown, the flowers from mine.
See, even my Advent calendar goodies were unexciting. I can't even remember what I did yesterday, I believe I was reading something online. Work was pretty good, there was this patron on Thursday that got upset with us because we passed on an expensive item he left behind on to the police, he came in Monday night and apologized, which was greatly appreciated. And then I stayed up way too late again.
Today, I worked on an art project all day, and am so tickled with the results. My advent calendar goodies:
The hot cocoa from the envelope countdown, the washi from the pocket letter and the rice krispie treat and turtle massager from mine. 
Here's what I was working on today:
It's called an explosion box, it's a birthday gift for my friend. These are fun, I'm excited to make more.

We haven't gotten any mail for a few days, every time this happens I'm always paranoid that someone else has asked to stop our mail. I have something that should arrive tomorrow, plus there's a mailer we usually get every Tuesday or Wednesday.
Tomorrow I plan to take my box to work and show it to everyone.