lots of mail

Friday: was cold again, my countdown to Valentine's Day bag:

I'm loving how she decorated the treat bags. Not so excited about the trim. Got a ride to work because it was cold again.
Had a happy mail tag in the mail:

It was a good one. I decided I'd keep doing the happy mail tag, it's hit or miss on what I receive, but I like trying to keep my envelope flat and sometimes I get some really nice gems.
Work was ok, until about the last half hour. We had this guy who didn't want to pay attention to directions and shoved two discs at the same time into the media box, weirdly enough, they got stuck and it wouldn't work. He wouldn't believe me that there was nothing I could do until I took out the discs and then wouldn't wait for it to reset and tried to get more out, after I told him we had to reset the machine. He didn't get the other discs and we had to reboot the whole machine because he couldn't wait a few minutes. Our desk phone kept dying (it needs a new battery, we're working on it), and someone turned in a phone 5 minutes before closing. It was a typical Friday night, in that we had  a bunch of people come in close to closing, because they never realize that we close at 6 instead of 9, or that's what they say, some are regulars, so I know it's not true.
I picked up some ice cream on my way home:

Sadly, the toffee one wasn't that great. I feel the need to buy some Heath bars and throw them in. The mint one isn't as minty as I want it to be (they never seem to be).
Saturday: My countdown to Valentine's Day envelope:

LOVE these. I love handmade embellishments. I might use these as ideas and try to make some of my own.
We had a double header of basketball. The men's game was a ton of people who didn't know the bag policy. I'm very tired of that. Walked home, it was a nice walk, I was sweating when I got home. I barely warmed up and had to go back for the women's game. It was ok, pretty quiet, and then we had this patron with her messenger style size bag who got really upset because she didn't want to walk back to her car and she just had supper with so and so and they were going to sit with them. Doesn't matter, she still had to take her bag back, I didn't see her come back in. There's always one person that thinks they are above the rules. Walked home after that game, too. Not as nice a walk, but the wind died down between when I left for the game and when I went home. Found some mail when I got home.
Heart tags:

Love how she used die cuts, also hers are way more creative than mine.
Favorite color, green, tag:

Interesting selection, but I probably won't use much of it. I liked the last favorite color tag of one thing that was more geared to my interests.
I got 13,000 steps on Saturday.
Sunday: laundry day. My countdown to Valentine's Day swap:

 Some nice appliques.
Other than laundry I did put together a favorites tag:

 She liked stickers and owls.
Made some Vintage Valentine ATCs

 And was lazy. I did watch a few movies.
Monday: My countdown to Valentine's swap:

 I'm not going to use the sequins, but I like the pink and clear gems.
Work was busy for a Monday, we're supposed to get a bunch of snow (3-5 inches) and some freezing rain tonight, so people I guess are freaking out and need a bunch of books/movies to keep them occupied. I don't know about you, but I have things at home to keep me occupied, I don't have to go to the library to get things. Came home and did my taxes. I was planning to do them on Sunday, but didn't get to them, then thought I'd do them on the 14th, because I'd be bummed anyway, but figured, it was a good a time as any. I'm getting a bit more than last year because of something I chose to change, so that helps. Got 6 items in the mail.
Grant a wish, stuffed animal:

 I was supposed to have this item on the 7th, the person sending to me posted on the 6th that she mailed it out. It's cute, but smells of cigarette smoke.
Favorite animal, lion, tag:

 It's cute, it's supposed to be a patch (my guess iron-on), I'm not sure what I'll do with it. I wish it was more of a sticker.
Private swap:

 I had a die that someone gave me in a swap and I don't have a die cutting machine, so I asked if anyone wanted to swap with me. We agreed on a regular letter size/weight envelope swap. This is much more than that. I'm not complaining, but I'm not sending more.

Toss Away tag:

 We were supposed to send 5 items we'd normally throw away. I admit, I just wanted to see what it was, will probably not do this tag again.
Favorites swap:

 This was something my partner forgot to include in the other package. These are neat.
Frozen in Time:

we were supposed to print 3 pages of digital ephemera, love these.
It turned out to be a good ending to the day.

Lots of Reese's

Monday: We were back to colder, I got my somewhat heavy coat out. I stopped by the grocery store on the way home to raid their Reece's stash, because one of my swap partners liked Reese's chocolate

I wish they had just a bag of Reese's chocolate, wouldn't that be fun? Kinda like a grab bag of M&M's, you'd never know what kind you would get. Anywho, chose a few for my partner and kept some for me.

Put together a personal swap:

 This person liked sloths, Gorjuss girls and unicorns.
Received my 8 Day Valentine treat bag swap.

 This was a fun swap, I don't want to wait until Thursday to start opening. I hate being the bigger person and not complaining about things that happened while waiting for this swap to be delivered.
I also received a destash tag in the mail:

 It was ok, a lot of stickers.
Finished my swap that I had to pick up the Reese's for.

 Put together a favorite color of purple tag:

 Tuesday: I received mine Winter in Blue and White ATCs back:

I'm in this group that basically gets rid of things you don't want. I remember a few years ago when I was in this group, people who want the things you're getting rid of seem to make it so much harder. I feel you want the stuff, you should be jumping over backwards to get it.
Two people annoyed the crap out of me on Monday, so I decided when I got home from work I was done with the world. Posted a few things on Facebook and then turned off technology for the rest of the day and read a book. The world was still annoying me on Tuesday, so I mostly tried to finish the same book, and I succeeded, it was called Loot by Sharon Waxman, it was about all the ancient relics in museums and how they don't belong to them and should be returned to the places they were taken from. Like, pieces of the Parthenon that were removed by an English guy and are now in the British Museum. It was a very interesting book.
I hate that I have a hard time getting to bed at a reasonable time on Tuesdays. I close at the library, so I get home anywhere between 9:15 and 9:30, sometimes later depending on things. I have to open at the library on Wednesdays, meaning I have to be there by 8:15. I can't get home and go right to bed.
Wednesday: work as usual. I spent over $40 on postage, mostly because I stupidly didn't put a swap in a Priority flat rate envelope, that would have cost $7 something, I spent $10 something on it. And then I get home and start posting proof of postage on my facebook groups, but found out one person was no longer in a group. And of course that package was the heaviest other than the big swap I sent out. I'm very annoyed with the world lately. I just want to sit at home, and eat and ignore the world. Why can't people just be considerate of others?
I had a wish of tea waiting for me when I got home, and I slacked off the rest of the day. I took a shower about 8pm and when I came back to get on my computer, it wouldn't turn on. Ok, that's a lie, it turned on for a second and then shut off. I tried the power button and it wouldn't do anything, so I took it apart, looked at connections, everything looked fine and got really upset. At one point, I took out the battery, looked at it and put it back. Honestly, had no idea what I was doing, but there was nothing else to do. I put it back together and it worked for about 5 minutes. So, I took out the battery again, put it back and it worked for a lot longer, figured it had to be a battery issue, thinking maybe a connection thing, because then it died again. And I went to bed
Thursday: Got up hoping the computer fixed itself overnight, it didn't. I had emailed my tech person at work asking her input on it. Called her after the library opened, of course she can't see it over the phone, but after describing things to her, she agreed it was a battery connection issue, said there were communities online that mentioned putting a piece of cardboard between case and battery, that helped. I had taken the case apart again and it seemed to work fine after touching the battery connection. And seems to have been working fine all day. I have noticed the fan doesn't seem to be running, so that's probably an issue in itself. Using it tonight, I have noticed the battery is not getting warm (which it usually does, now that I know where it lives), but the place where the power plug goes in is, kinda. Anywho.
Had lunch with my parents, they gave me money for stuff and I realized I had more money in one of my accounts than I realized, that's always a nice feeling. I made another savings account and have been putting my earnings from Hilton in there. My friend suggested it as a house fund, today my parents suggested putting away money towards a phone, now I'm thinking it should be a new computer fund. Don't know.
Received some happy mail today.
SMS unique:

 It's a scalp massager with a unicorn pen in the case with it. While I agree it's unique, I'm never gonna use it.
Favorites swap:

 And everything out of the bag:

 Interesting collection. I like that she made stuff for me.
Valentine's Day happy mail:

 I'm loving the socks and the towel, I don't know what I'll do with the rest. I wish I had someone to make up a Valentine's day gift for, I'm getting a lot of valentine's stuff I'm not gonna use.
Vintage Valentine's ATCs

While these are cute, they reek of cigarette smoke. I never know how to get that smell out of things. I have them sitting next to an air freshener right now.
And I got to open Day one of my count down to Valentine's Day swap:

I'm excited for chocolate.

It's February

So, it's February. I had planned to go shopping on the first because the high was going to be 20ish. Except when I got up it was 1, with a windchill of -12. Finished up a few things to take to the post office. I've been having a fun time using some old book pages to cover up things on envelopes, here's one:

Heart tag:

I got the doilies in a Valentine's day swap, but knew I wouldn't use them, so packaged them up with some foam hearts and some stickers.
Valentine's Day Happy mail:

Got the card in a swap as well as the stickers at the top and the bottom. The dog stickers are actually flocked and the other piece is a Valentine postcard.
So, I went to the post office and the grocery store and then went home. And got more things ready to mail.
Ephemera:

And here are the envelopes:

Again with using the vintage book pages to cover the envelopes. I really enjoy collaging stuff, I think it's when I have the most fun. I might have to get some more packing tape if I continue doing this.

Unicorn:

 The white one is a massager, the pink one was from a surprise ball I picked up after Christmas.
Saturday, I was excited to head over to Hobby Lobby and see what all they marked down for their big clearance event. Sadly, they didn't have a lot marked down yet.

 envelope seals (50 cents each), tags ($2), succulent (60 cents), washi ($1.25), Valentine's stickers ($1.20), planner charms ($1), buttons (75 cents), tags (75 cents). Spent a little over $9. They didn't have stickers or charms or tape marked down. I don't ever need anything at Hobby Lobby, but I was so excited to go and was hoping to get a big stash of stuff. I was so annoyed I consoled myself with bread:

 donuts ($3), multi colored bagels ($3), pretzel buns ($5), Twizzlers bites ($4), Oreo bar ($2), Dove peanut butter heart (25 cents). Sadly, the donuts didn't live up to my expectations either, so I guess I'm back to not buying donuts. Also, back to not buying the filled bites, they're a bit expensive and they didn't taste very good this time around. Spent about $16. Funny story: the Dove peanut butter heart was 25 cents at Hyvee here, at Target they are a buck each.
Found this cute heart attached to me when I got home:

 Had to work that afternoon and we finally got back to busy weekends. I should not have time to get random things done on the weekend. Plus, time goes so much faster when it's busy. Went by way of the grocery store on the way home because I needed milk and cereal. I wore my light winter coat to Hobby Lobby in the morning and had my spring coat on when I went to work.
Today: I went shopping. The high was supposed to be in the 50's. When I left it was about 9:30, in the mid 40's and wicked foggy. It was about 50 when I got home, still wicked foggy and I had my coat open because I was sweating. Looks like we're still in a dense fog advisory until midnight, we were in one when I left that was set to expire at noon, but when I was heading home about noon it was still pretty foggy, visibility was about 2 blocks.
First up was Target:

 socks (75 cents each), Num Noms blind packs ($3), another blind bag ($3), Ghiradelli Creme Brulee ($4), stickers ($1.50 each), My Little Pony blind bags (2 each), more socks ($4), stickers ($1).
I was on the lookout for leggings, but couldn't find cheap ones at Target, the cheapest ones were $8, I do try to get stuff I need at Target, but they're usually more expensive than Walmart, so I don't. I found these great socks while looking for the leggings. The top ones have a stack of books and they say My Weekend is booked. Totally couldn't pass them up for 75 cents each. I bought a pair for me and a pair for a swap, but might keep them for me. The pack of short Star Wars socks has like 8 pairs (maybe not that many, but a bunch), and I couldn't pass them up. I won't use them, but I'm hoping I can pass them on to someone who will in the future. I'm trying not to do that as much, but when the deals are that good, how do you pass them up? I've never seen creme brulee Ghiradelli, so I had to get them. Also, I ran out of blind bags, I have a tendency to open one up when I have a bad day, it totally helps. The felt stickers had sloths and hedgehogs, sadly there's only 15 pieces for a buck. I've been on the lookout for the snail mail stickers. I had a left over gift card from Christmas, so I ended up only paying  about $3, though the total was $26.
Next up was Walmart

 leggings (2 black for $6 and a pair of pink for $4), Mr. Pibb ($2), chipboard stickers ($3), cupcake pics ($1), smooshy blind bags ($1 each), Besties blind bag (75 cents), tape ($6), stuffed monster ($5). Total $38. Totally found my leggings, I had two pairs die on me and since I know we're not done with winter I knew I needed some more. Picked up the chipboard stickers because someone had sent me some awhile ago in a swap. Of course, tape. I couldn't pass up this monster, he was only $5, and the perfect color. I'd been doing ok since I picked up the robot and the platypus shortly after Christmas, but I've had 5 days of no mail, I needed something. I only picked up the Pibb, cause it looked good.
Last stop was Dollar Tree, my intention was to have a $20 budget, but then I saw the stickers and decided I didn't care, and then the total was barely over $20, so I paid in cash,

 stickers. They had some cool multipacks, the ones on the top left and right edges had three sticker sheets, a layered sheet, a words sheet and an alphabet sheet. The books of stickers had 4 sheets of stickers: puffy, glittery, metallicy and glossy. The sweet treats and monsters were in the Valentine's aisle. The cupcakes are dimensional, and those elephants, so cute! They're silver with colored ears. And of course some labels.

 The whale is for a friend, I couldn't pass up the socks, my Dollar Tree never has cute socks for women. Picked up the sequins for a swap, couldn't pass up the sequin heart. Needed the tape and the smelly thing.
Got home and threw my laundry in the washer. Put together a SMS magnetic:

 And a favorites pocket letter:

I had favorite book: Radium Girls, favorite candy: chocolate, favorite food: donuts, favorite place: Hawaii, favorite animal: lion, favorite hobby: reading, favorite color: seafoam, favorite meal: lunch, and favorite flower: pansy.
Heart tags:

We're supposed to go back to normal winter temps this week

It's cold

Sunday: Had to work gymnastics, and those people are really rude with their bags. Someone told me gymnastics is always like that. It wasn't too cold, probably because I was moving around so much to talk to people about bags. It felt like every single person had a bag, it wasn't everyone, but it felt like it. And most people were just rude about it. There was a lot of "I didn't know that" "It should say that somewhere" "It's so cold, I'm not going out to my car". We started enforcing this policy in November, there is no excuse to not know about it. We're like the last of the big schools to adopt it, and apparently basically any athletic event you go to has a policy similar to this. My mom gave me a ride home, though I think I would have been ok. I ride the bus which is usually a 5 minute wait depending on when I go to the bus stop. Went home and did laundry.

Monday: opened at the library. Went to lunch with an old friend. It was one of those lunches where your jaw hurts from smiling and laughing the whole time.

I really wanted to go to Hobby Lobby on the way home because it's their big clearance event time, but the windchill was wicked. It was worse going home then coming in, because it was in my face on the way home.

Found a bunch of mail when I got home.

Penguin and polar bear ATCs:

 Pink pocket letter:

 My Favorites pocket letter:

 Basically we took 9 favorite things from a list and created a pocket letter.
Secret sister swap, the priority mail envelope was packed:

 And all the goodies:

I'm loving the paper and the notebooks and the minion stickers and the purple owl magnet
 And more goodies:

 I'm loving the butterfly stickers and the tiny sign, and the hot air balloon notepad, and the tiny pens.
After getting home and getting all the mail, I decided to do a little crafting and made some heart tags:

 Put together a destash tag:

 Made a green card:

 Put together a happy mail tag:

 And then it was supper time. So, it's gonna be wicked cold for the next few days:

We were in a wind chill advisory from Monday 6PM until Tuesday 6AM and have now moved into a wind chill warning, which is from now until noon on Thursday. They're predicting wind chills of -55 degrees, can get frost bite after 5 minutes of exposure and they high on wednesday was -12, but I see on that picture above it's -8. The university is closed until Thursday, which never happens. Schools are closed and some businesses. But not the library, I know we never close (we've closed 4 times since I started 9 years ago {fleas, norovirus, sewer backup, and once for weather, because of a lot of snow}), but I kinda hoped after hearing all the other places closing that we would close. The director sent an email saying we're considered a warming center for the county, so better be there. And if you can't get there, it's on you, you'll be taking a vacation day or a day without pay.
Tuesday: There was a lot of book reading. I got all bundled up to go to work. My mother would not let me walk to work in the weather. I found some mail on my way into the library.
Tea:

 Favorite color tag:

 LOVE THESE.
cards:

 Loving these, too. Not sure I'll be able to use them.
We were so dead at the library, Tuesdays are usually pretty slow, but with the weather, I wasn't surprised that no one wanted to go out. I decided to take a vacation day for Wednesday, I was going to come in just to do interlibrary loan things, but found out that the volunteers weren't coming in (I didn't blame them), so decided not to come in, either. As we were leaving, most everyone went out early to turn their cars on. My glasses fogged over due to me wearing a scarf over my nose and then frosted over. I didn't think the temperature was too bad, it was just when the wind catches you. But, I also have a great coat. It's made by Land's End, and they know how to make coats for cold weather, they're a bit more expensive, but totally worth it. I was a little disappointed that my apartment wasn't as warm overnight as it was during the day.
Wednesday: I slacked off all day. Read a couple books: Not Buying it by Judith Levine, she chose to not buy anything that wasn't essential for a year. She slipped up a couple times, but it was fun to read. I think it would have been more fun if it was written by someone who indulged more to begin with. She didn't drink expensive coffee or go shopping a lot, so it would have been fun to read about someone else's experience, too. And, The Public Library by Robert Dawson, it was a photo essay of public libraries around the country with some printed essays as well. Pretty cool, but wish it was thicker.
Here's a screen shot of the weather when I got up:

 And the feels like temp:

It was so nice and warm inside the whole day (maybe even a little too warm, i'm in a tiny basement apartment, so when the heat is on constantly it doesn't have anywhere to go). I watched a movie: Down a dark hall and created a pocket letter. I was thinking as I was creating how much fun it would have been to have this day a few years ago when we were in the old house and craft with my mother.