Freak out day

and more ramblings from a strange woman.

So, this weekend I was in a lot of pain from my problem tooth. Yesterday, I made an appointment with my dentist for today, and in less than an hour it's coming out. That's good news, but I'm freaking out a tiny bit. I'm not scared, I did have this done back in August, it doesn't hurt, but I can hear it. That's why I'm freaking out, it's so close to my ear I can hear it, and it's not a nice sound. I looked at the x-ray, looks like it will be another easy pull, I went to the bank to make sure I had the money to cover it, if it's not. I'd have been fine either way, but I would have been under what I'd like to have in my account, if it turns out to be the higher number.
This morning, I decided it was time to get rid of my old microwave and set up my new one. Now, that it's not snowy out, I could put my old microwave on the curb, and people could see it, it was white. By, the time I got my new microwave set up, someone had already taken the old one. It wasn't a long amount of time, but I did extend it a little after shocking myself when I plugged it in. That was fun, not an experience I'd like again.

At least it's my day off, so I can recover from everything before I have to go back to work tomorrow.

Ramblings of a strange woman

Hello all,
What's been going on with me. Well, New Year's, it wasn't very exciting, I did make it past midnight, but mostly only because I had a Cherry Coke and was in the middle of a movie.
The library's been great, every time I'm working at one of my other two jobs, I find myself talking about it a lot. I really like working there, I plan to be there for a very long time.
Last week, I was at the book store for RUSH (when the college kids come back), that was a long week of standing for about 40 hours. I had already worked the 40 hours at the book store, when I went in to the library last Friday for a shift. I felt my weekend off was very well deserved.
This week we're back into very cold temperatures. Last week at the book store, it was below 10 degrees every morning when I went in to work. Today, the high was 14, they dropped that to 13 before I left work at noon. It was 2 when I left for work, and the wind chill was -11. I really do love Iowa, I just don't like all of it's seasons.
I signed up for a candy box swap, I had to decorate a candy box and fill it with goodies and mail it off to a partner. I finished decorating it Tuesday, and every time I look at it, I love it. I also joined a swap where we send something handmade with a heart on it to a partner. I decided to do some kind of sewing.

And then there's the moaning below:

I'm having a horrible day, week, month, whatever. I got a letter in the mail the other day saying my health insurance premium is going up to $200 a month. I can't afford that, I'm thinking about cancelling it. Someday, I'll have to have another one of my back molars pulled out, because I didn't brush my teeth in college, I'm thinking about having it done soon because I'm sick of picking food out of it. I keep spending money on stuff I don't need, I went grocery shopping today, and I didn't buy ice cream, but I sure didn't need the chocolate eclairs or the slice of lemon pie. I keep signing up for swaps to create stuff so I can make that connection that I keep reading about on other people's blogs. The meeting someone who becomes a great friend online, and sends you fun random presents. I have met a few people that I follow their blogs, but I've also met other people where I've sent them things, but feel it's a one sided relationship. Now, I know, I should be getting enough satisfaction in just making and/or sending people fun things, but sometimes I feel as if no one cares.
I work 19 hours at my job, which I LOVE, I just wish I could get more money. I know I could get more if I worked more, which I have the option to do, but after working 18 days straight between two jobs, sometimes I just want that day off to recover my sanity. When I'm not at work, it seems all I do is sit on the couch and watch movies. Maybe, that's part of the reason I sign up to do swaps, so I can motivate myself to do something else. I love the 3 jobs I work, I just wish I could make more money at them, and not have to get another job.
Sometimes, it feels like the only thing that makes me happy is to buy things, which in my current situation, doesn't really help anything. Listening to my music helps too, but sometimes not enough.

I think I'm just in a funk of being bored with cold weather and snow. I recently took down all my snowmen decorations. I was only going to take down some of them, but then realized I'd have to bring the boxes back out when I took down the rest. My decorations are so nice and colorful now. Most of them are garage sale finds, and I realized that when I go garage saleing this year, I need to be buying a few less things. This past year, I bought a lot of vintage linens/doilies/things, tea cups, saucers, heavy glass creamers and sugar bowls, sundae cups and wine glasses. I've decided to buy
more linens, I keep using them for my sewing and swaps,
more craft supplies, but only those I might actually use,
jewelry, I'm still on the look out for a cute tiny bracelet,
owls, I'm on an owl kick right now, I even have an owl corner in my apartment.

and of course I can't think of any others right now. I bought a Pyrex mixing bowl a couple years ago, and couldn't figure out the hype, and then this past December while we were cleaning out my grandma's apartment, I picked up 3 more Pyrex pieces, I'm still not sure why. Two of them are these small red rectangular containers, probably not more than 4 inches long, the other one is a casserole dish in this beautiful turquoise color with snowflakes on it. I really like that one, mostly because of the snowflakes, I'll probably actually use that one. I get that people like Pyrex, I just don't think I need to be collecting it.

All right, that's the end of my rambling, I hope you stuck around to read it.

Spending Money

So, my brother gave me a gift card for JCPenney for Christmas, last week I went online to spend some of it. I wanted to buy boots, but they didn't have what I wanted in my size, so I decided to look at their clearance clothing section. Here's what I got:

This is what I ordered, this cute little dress, 

And here's what I got: not such a cute little dress, totally not what I was expecting, I'm thinking about returning it. Anyone have any comments about how it looks? I think it looks kinda nice.

 Here's my second dress, unfortunately, I think it makes my hips look huge, so I might be taking that back.

This picture is kinda blurry, sorry. Anyways, I ordered both the shirt and the skirt. I like them both, plus they go great together.

 

I would love some feedback on how you all think they look on me, please.

After Christmas shopping

Decided to kill some time yesterday after work, so I took a detour to Hobby Lobby and an local flower store.

Found some great after Christmas deals.

The sparkly butterfly, elephant and blue poinsettia are from Hobby Lobby. The alien, gold ball, and snowman pick were from my flower store.

I also went to HyVee, but resisted the urge to buy Valentine's candy. I didn't buy any Valentine's stuff at Hobby Lobby either, but mostly because it wasn't on sale.

I'd love to find a great Valentine's swap to get into, I miss swaps.
I'm also missing garage sales. I stopped pretty early last year, I have no idea why. There's a few antique/consignment stores in my area, but they seem to have the same stuff all the time, so it just doesn't seem worth it.

HELP

Is anyone having problems uploading pictures from their computer? I click the picture icon, but it never loads the button to upload from my computer.

Any suggestions?

Swaps

I signed up for quite a few swaps this holiday season. One of them was an ornament swap where you send ornaments to a partner.

I sent this out awhile ago, so I know my partner's received it by now. She said she liked owls, and bright colors.

We were supposed to send these in order for our partner to receive them by December 7th or 10th, depending on whether you're reading the initial post or the email that was sent out with partner's information.
I hadn't received her package as of yesterday, so I emailed her this morning. She said she was waiting for my package to arrive to get my address. USPS says my package to her was delivered on December 1st, so I don't know what to think about that.

I also joined a swap back in November to make ATCs with flowers on them. The hostess lives in another country, so it took a while to get items to her, but they were due in the middle of November. I got an email the other day, saying they were on their way back.

I also joined a supply swap where we send each other a small Priority mail box full of Christmas-y supplies. That's supposed to be in my hands by Saturday.

The last 3 days I haven't gotten anything in the mail. I've worked 30 hours this week already and I'm ready for something good to come back to me.

The reason I love this season is that I get to give gifts to people, more so than the rest of the year. I love picking out things I think they'll like.

This past Sunday, we had my mother's side of the family Christmas. One of my cousin's kids seemed kinda bummed, so when we got home I put together a stocking for her, and since her brother is younger I didn't want to leave him out. I mailed them off today, they don't know about my blog, so I'm not spoiling any surprises. I just pulled things from around my house, the only thing I spent money on was shipping.

This first one is for her brother. I hope he'll like the stocking, it's not really boyish. I included a couple wind-up toys, some bug goo, and a bag of mint M&M's. I took the M&M's to the get together, and he really enjoyed them there.

 This next one was for her. The stocking is from my vintage stocking swap partner from last year. I included a butterfly clip, some lip gloss, a choker, a cute bird ornament, a snowflake ornament, journal,

 a couple more necklaces, some fingernail polish, some lotion, a pair of earrings, a "bobbing" chicken (he dances from side to side in the sun), and a cute sun catcher.

I think they're both fun stockings for kids.

Festival of Trees

A few weeks ago, I went to our local festival of trees. Here are some interesting ones.

 This one was a little weird, it was decorated by a local clothing store. They chose to attach the torso to the middle of the tree and then decorate the bottom of the tree.

 I love the silver and blue on this tree.

 Love the pink and green together on this tree.

 This one was decorated with corks. I've seen a few trees floating around the internet with this decorating pattern, I don't understand what's so cool about it.

 Loved the light green, blue and bright colors on this one. It was available for bid, but it went too high for me.

 Another one with blue and green.

 And another one, are we seeing a pattern here.

 This one my mom liked. We have an ISU tree that we decorate with red and gold ribbon/beads, and ISU ornaments. We top it with an ISU Santa hat, and put all mom's ISU Santa's underneath.

 There was also an art auction going on, they do one every year to raise money for the Octagon (an art studio). Here's what I put in the winning bid for:
This is a plastic chicken, it's probably a foot and a half long and a foot tall, it's feet are bent over so it stands on them. I just thought it was funky.

 This is a painting of poppies, I thought they were cute

 This last one I only bid on for the keychain. They're both pieces of leather with patterns stamped into them. I don't wear headbands, so I don't know what I'm going to do with it.

Still cleaning out

Last weekend, we had my mother's side of the family Christmas. We also took more things from my grandma's apartment. Here's what I found.

Some embroidered dish towels:

 They're so pretty, I don't want to use them.
An embroidered heart, October angel, the bug is a top from a candle holder, and a mouse ornament:

My grandma collected Avon bottles, the shoe and owl she had in her bathroom for as long as I can remember, I liked the frog, they are all now in my bathroom. The snowman is a candle holder.

 A Pyrex casserole dish, I love the blue color and snowflake pattern, an owl hand towel and an unopened peach gift set.

We didn't have enough room in the car to bring everything back, so the next box is coming later.

Christmas Decorations

This is a picture heavy post. I haven't been in the mood to dig out my holiday decorations yet, I keep seeing the Christmas lights and other people's decorations, but I couldn't get myself to do it. Yesterday, I decided it was time. Most of the reason I didn't want to get them out is that I have over 300 snowmen in my collection, and it's a lot to bring out. But, then I got smart, why not just get out my favorites? So, I did:

 This is a button tree I won last year at our Festival of trees, I got a few owl ornaments last year for Christmas, and it has become an owl tree. It actually never gets put away, I love looking at it all year round. I bought the blue and orange owl on the right top at a fundraiser this year, it's actually a coin purse. The owl at the top is actually a cell phone holder. My other new addition this year (as of yesterday), is the blue one on the right side, it actually says "Baby's first Christmas", but it was just too cute to pass up.

 I'm sorry this picture is blurry. If you can see, the tree is one of those porcelain ones with plastic colored lights, that you put a light bulb in. My grandparents had one of these when I was growing up, so when I saw one at a garage sale last year, I had to have it. I never plug it in because I think the bulb is too powerful for it. It's decorated in Merry Moos, they're from a swap I did last year, they measure 2" x 1". The white girl at the bottom is one of the ornaments I received last year in the button floozies swap.

 This is the top of my DVD case, you can still see the painted pumpkin I bought last month, it's so cute, I can't throw it away. There's also a hippo ornament in there that I bought yesterday, too cute.

 This is where my old TV sat, I have a hard time finding tall items to put in it for every season. You can see the tree stump birdhouse guy I bought this summer, I dressed him up with a top hat ornament I found at Walmart yesterday (can you see a little theme, I went Christmas shopping yesterday). I also love the hot air balloon ornament I got in the vintage stocking swap last year. The snowball I bought this year, I was trying not to buy more snowmen, but he's so cute, under his hat is a candle. The cup next to him I got in a trade at an antique store this month.

 This is the top of my DVD case. The little black tree I got a couple years ago at Borders. I love how my snowmen pop against it.

 This is on top of another of my DVD cabinets. The poinsettias are clips I got last year.

 These are on top of my radiator. The nesting dolls my parents gave me a few years. The bird is from my shopping trip yesterday.

 In this picture, is another of my trees, it's actually a part of a tree in our yard that we had to cut out, because it was dead. I stained it and have been using it as decoration for awhile now. Most of these snowmen are kinda heavy. I had to put them here to hold the sewn decorations onto the scarf on the book shelf. To see more of the sewn decorations, go here. There's also a seahorse keychain that I got when we went to Hawaii a few years ago. I love the "world's greatest crafter" ornament hanging next to the seahorse. My best friend from high school gave that to me.

 This is the top of another bookcase. My favorite snowmen here, are the "peppermint" candles. I also couldn't bear to put away the velvet painting in the background.

 This is further down on that bookcase. I love the stocking holders, even though I don't hang stockings on them.

 This is my radiator in the kitchen, my kitchen snowmen stay out all year long. I guess they're my favorite favorites. The one on the left is a singing one, it came with Hallmark cards one year. There's also a cute praying snowman, I got last year. I love the unhappy frog, he was a present from a former employer. There's a couple cookie jars there, I looked in one of them the other day and it had candy I totally forgot about. There's also one in the front that has a beanie on, I always thought of him as an "artist" snowman.

 These are on the top of my refrigerator. They're mostly ISU snowmen. Iowa State University is located here in Ames, IA. The university used to come out with a new snowman every year, and my parents would get them for me, unfortunately they stropped do that. These mostly stay out because it's so much work to get them in and out of their packaging.

 This is in my entryway. I sprinkled some of my smaller snowmen throughout my vehicles. I love sailboats, the one on the right is made out of foreign Coca Cola cans that I found in Washington, D.C. one year. There's also the USMC's 250th anniversary commemorative silver dollar, I'm very proud of that. On the left, you can see the glass bottle I altered.

 Here's the top of the cabinet, with more snowmen around my vehicles. The fighter jet on the right is also made of foreign Coca Cola cans, I found it in New Orleans. The Mustang, is my favorite version of that car.

 Here are the stockings I made this year, they started out for a swap, and then for some reason, I didn't want to use them, and my partner decided she wanted a more traditional stocking. To read more about them, go here.

 This is also in my entryway, on the other side of the above doorway. The letters spell out collector, with snowmen being the "O's". On the left side are a dress form ornament that I got in last year's button floozie swap, and a tag.

These are mostly this year's button floozie swap, the stocking is from last year. I'm still waiting on one more from this year.

news

Hello All,

How have you been?

Last week, we started moving the library, and we now have the whole collection at our temporary location. We had to be out of the old location by 11/29, so this is wonderful. It's been so much fun. Unfortunately, now that we have the whole collection moved, it's back to normal tasks, and I won't be using my muscles again.

Starting on Tuesday, I've had some kind of bug/cold. I was so tired while I was working on Tuesday. Yesterday, I called in sick after walking four blocks and feeling like I could pass out. Today, I still feel like crap, just not as much. Hopefully, I will be back to a condition where I can work on Sat when I'm scheduled next.

 

I'm still waiting on swaps that were due awhile ago, and I signed up for 3 more. I'm so excited, one is Little Pink Studio's Vintage Stocking Swap. We have to make/decorate a stocking for our partner and stuff if full of goodies for them. I participated in this one last year and had tons of fun with it. Another is a holiday goodies swap through one of my Yahoo! groups, we're filling the tiny Priority mail box with gently used supplies and sending it to a partner. I love these kind of swaps, it's always fun to get supplies. My last one is an Ornament swap, where we send each other ornaments, I participated in this one last year too. Unfortunately last year I forgot about it until my partner emailed me, not this year, I'm on top of it.

 

Hope you all are having a great day and....

HAPPY THANKSGIVING!!!!

New purchases

A couple weeks ago, I picked up these gorgeous roses at Walmart. I just had to throw them out this week. I forgot how nice it is to have live flowers in my home.

 Yesterday, I trekked downtown to check out what people were putting up for Christmas. One of my favorite spots is Anything But New, they're a small antique store. I took in some vintage Christmas ornaments I had and traded them for the elephant bank and the snowman cup you see below. Another stop was our local flower shop that always has such great items. I bought the owl pick for me and the needlefelted snowman for my mother.

 Last night was a fundraiser at one of the local stores. Twenty percent of the proceeds went to Project Smyles at the library, I spent way too much money. I picked up the reindeer for my brother, he collects them, and every year it's getting harder and harder to find good ones. The owls are for me.

 I couldn't pass up these cute paper pieced cards either.

Cerri at Little Pink Studio is having her Vintage Stocking Swap again this year. I'm a little divided on whether or not I want to join. I loved doing it last year, but right now it seems people are having a hard time getting things to me on time. I have a swap that's due in partners hands this Sat, I haven't received anything yet, I have one that was due in hostesses hands last Sat, haven't received that back, I have the one that was lost in the mail, and I'm still waiting on the 2nd box. I'm just getting sick of receiving nothing or junk in the mail lately.
I know I'm also stressed about the upcoming move at the library, I'm excited but also stressed. And of course it's getting into the holiday season, which even though I'm usually done with things early, I still stress.
Speaking of holidays, I'm done Christmas shopping for my brother and mother, and wrapped all their presents last night. After spending a lot for presents last night, I decided not to spend so much and stop at less presents.

odds and ends

So much has been happening since I last posted. Let's start with a picture:

I signed up for the Fall Favorites Swap on Nicole's blog, the above is what I sent my partner. There's a sparkly brown leaf, a teddy bear magnet, a wallhanging of pumpkings and acorns, a teddy bear wearing a pumpking shirt, glow in the dark skeleton socks, pumpkin spice Hershey's kisses, an owl on a jack-o-lantern figuring and a couple maple leaf pins. My favorites being changing leaves, Halloween costumes, pumpkins, owls (I know these are all year, but in decorating they come out more in fall), and pumpkin pie (also a Thanksgiving thing, but after Halloween, these Hershey's kisses aren't around anymore).
I mailed this out early October, her first package to me got lost in the mail and I'm still waiting on the second one.

The big thing I've been worrying about lately is the upcoming move at the library. We have our location pinned down, we'll be getting the whole collection in the space and most everything we feel we'll need. Our maintenance person already has people over there getting it ready for us to move in. We're working on getting all the stuff we don't need for two years moved out and into storage. We stopped taking requests on items to focus all our energies on the move. We will start moving on the 16th. Now that it's November, I realize how close it is. I'm trying not to think about it when I'm at home, because it seems we still have SOO much to do before then, but it's still kinda freaking me out.

I stopped going to garage sales, I haven't even looked at the ads since probably early October. I just don't feel like spending my money right now, and I have more than enough stuff in my apartment. I actuallly realized how little money I have in my bank account at the beginning of the month, so I really don't want to spend money. I will have to go to the grocery store soon for food.
I joined a Christmas ornament swap on the Button Floozies blog. I'm almost done with my ornaments, I love them. I will post them on my craft blog once I know my partners have received them. We were supposed to make 5, 4 to send out and one to keep, but I had enough material to make 6, so I have an extra I'm not sure what I'm going to do with.

Church sales

Well, I was right, it didn't live up to my expectations. Here's what I got between two church sales:

A cute teddy bear, a rose, a mug, a sugar bowl (?), some trim and a cute little cross stitch pillow for my mother. I also bought some dutch letter bars, some lemon bars and some other kind of bar that looked good.

My mother and I both decided that the bigger church sale didn't have near as many vendors as last year. I also decided that maybe it was more exciting last year because it was new and we'd never been there.

Snowmen

Remember how I said I wasn't going to garage sales anymore? My neighbors were having their annual one and I had to check it out, I'm glad I did. Here's what I found:

 very cute snowman candle (my favorite purchase), Santa (for my mother), snowman cup, and a cute glass bowl (also for my mother).

tiny light up glass Christmas tree, 101 Dalmatians DVD(I love this version and I don't have it on DVD), a very cute get well book.
I spent $8.00 there. Today, my mother and I are going to a craft/rummage sale at a church, we went last year and had such a fun time. I'm afraid that it won't live up to my expectations though. Stay tuned for pictures of what I buy there.