Make Someone Smile Today

The thing about people is, they can never all agree on something. But most of the time, that's okay. Being an individual comes with a unique thought process, and the thing I enjoy about social media is being able to see lot's of different thought processes on any given subject. Sometimes it can open my mind to a new way of thinking, or sometimes it can just make me giggle, like the conversation below. 

 And since we're giggling: 

After trying to convince me I needed to buy a particular sweater (IN AUGUST!) because it was "really cute", "all the girls are buying it for back to school", and "it would lay over my boobs good", the same girl in this boutique that wouldn't stop talking to me asked how old I was. "What?!? You don't look a day older than 21.....Well, just between you and me, today you are 21."

Girl, you're a little craycray.....but okay.....sure. 

It reminded me of an incident a few weeks ago, when I tried to buy spray paint and got carded. Getting carded for alcohol is one thing, but spray paint brings it to a whole new level of flattering! And all cases like that need to be documented, for I know one day, the chances of it happening will be ancient history. 

Although I really am okay with my developing age spots and the fact that I only have 14 more months of being in my 20's, I can't deny that I love people lying to me about looking younger. Cheers, to those who make it a point to say something to someone just to get them smiling. 

MAKE SOMEONE SMILE TODAY. 

I've Never Felt More White (Project Pretty Week: Who Knows)

(Project pretty is a personal commitment to share my weekly journey of keeping my non-New-Year's-Resolution: staying fit to improve quality of life while inspiring others to do the same. Let's all jump on the endorphin wagon!)

When I decided to try Zumba for the very first time, I totally wasn't expecting to pass out, which is what almost happened. To be honest, I've always been a little skeptical about how good of a workout Zumba could actually be, but since I love to dance and was looking for something fun to kick start my re-introduction to the gym after recovering from all my stupid injuries and medication induced ickiness, I was willing to give it a shot. 

source

I loved the music. Grooving to new school and old school Hip Hop, Pop, and Latino music was right up my ally. In-between the disguised squats and lunges, it felt a lot like being at the club, but with water instead of alcohol, minus the constant obstacle of shooing away strange men trying to grind on me, and without the fear of having a hangover the next day. Of course, a normal person would be dancing in synchrony with their instructor (their very talented African American instructor who knows how to shake her ass like she's on a Ludacris music video and move her feet to the Moroccan beat like Saleena), but I was doing good to shake my hips and try to look like I was following the moves all while not tripping over my two left feet or spraining a knee. I seriously have never felt more "white" in my entire life. 

source

"Don't over think it," she said, "Let your body move naturally to the beat."

This IS how my body wants to move to the beat, I thought to myself, awkwardly and a tinsy bit off rhythm......like Mary Kathrine Gallagher. Geez, Napoleon Dynamite could probably show me up!

Towards the end of class I started to feel really sleepy. Things only went downhill from there. Small black and brown spots began vandalizing my vision, growing bigger and bigger. I kept trying to blink them away, but around the time I could no longer see a single thing, I became distracted by the fact that my hearing was disappearing. Voices were still vaguely audible, but oddly distant, traveling to me in slow motion through some sort of metal tunnel. My brain felt so full. I stayed strong up until this point, careful not to make a scene or worry anyone, but my body couldn't stand upright a single second longer, so I plopped myself onto the floor and pretended to stretch.

source

After recovering my senses, I walked to the car and took two bites out of a snack bar I found in the console, only to realize it expired 14 months ago, (Ew! Note to self: clean out pantry), then headed home for a real meal. And to think, I was worried I wouldn't get a legit workout! In all reality, this was my first real workout since being on Metformin and I'm almost positive I was experiencing a blood sugar issue, but Zumba really was a fun way to burn some fat. I'll definitely be returning, but with substantially more to eat next time. 

Have you ever fainted?

ME? Tongue Tied???

When I discovered Blue October was having a mini concert at Barnes & Nobles to promote their new album "Sway", I HAD to go, so I headed to Dallas after work to buy a CD, reserving the lucky 57th seat out of only 60 available.

With still a few hours before the concert started, I attempted to take nap, but my excitement paired with the beautiful sunshine blaring through the car windows proved counteractive, so I killed time by browsing North Park Mall, eating cheap Tom Thumb sushi, reading as much of Into the Wild as I could without paying for it, and trading tattoo stories and favorite concert experiences with surrounding music enthusiasts.

Abandoning my bed with less than minimal sleep in a 48 hour period due to my unconventional work schedule was worth every minute of sacrificed sleep, which I proved by being the only person with a seat who actually stood for the 6 song set (show some enthusiasm, people).

Justin Furstenfeld (a southern Texas native, who resides and recently married in one of my favorite parts of Hill Country) sang his ass off, hiding behind nothing but a smile. "It feels good to have something happy to write about. You can't smile when you're singing about turmoil," he exclaimed after the opening song. I've always admired his brutal honesty and uncensored lyrics, feeling connected to them in some way. Dark or light, I enjoy listening to the unapologetic style no mater what kind of mood I'm in. 

I found myself fighting back tears when he sang Fear, his newest self proclaimed favorite, with such sincerity and truth that it really touched my heart relating to my struggles from this past year.

He goes on to explain how he put his wife through hell and back in the beginning of their relationship and Bleed Out, is that story told through her eyes. (My ol' trusty camera pulled through for me once again.)

 You probably have a preverbial filing cabinet  of cleverly loaded compliments you plan to unload on the plate of any given one of our idols, happen you ever get the chance to meet them. So did I. Did. 

But as Justin was autographing my CD, all I blurted out was, "My husband wanted me to tell you 'Hi.'" I felt like I needed to fulfil Patrick's wish since he was missing out on all the fun.

"Hi, Husband," he replied, smiling again.

Feeling like I needed to describe my fanship a little better I continued. "He's been listening to y'all ever since you used to play at Treff's in Waco." What? I have a blog pretty much about me, I talk about me a lot, I think about me all the time, yet when I'm present with the opputunity to meet one of my favorite bands all I can do is talk about my husband? Have I been BRAINWASHED.....HYPNOTIZED?

"Wow; that's awesome."

I finally managed to gather my thoughts enough to tell the rest of the band how oustanding their performance was, receiving grateful feedback and seemingly surpised reactions. 

And now Patrick already likes for me to retell him the story of how I told Justin he said "Hi". 

Who is your favorite band of all time?

Lampshade Mobile Tutorial

I love a whimsical mobile, and making them from scratch not only allows space for customization based on room themes and colors, but also can be very cost effective!

A while back, I made a butterfly mobile in purple's and grey's using the skeleton of a lamp shade. And recently, I've been at it again, making my friend Ale the closest thing she can get to having a "chandelier" in her little boy's room. Without any further adieu, here's how it's done:

Supplies:

Old lamp shade (You can find them really cheap at garage sales, thrift shops, and antique malls. I've never paid more than $1-3 for any of mine. Just make sure there is an actual metal frame to work with. Sometimes you'll find the material is actually holding the bars together, and that's okay because we're going to wrap the metal in this tutorial.)

Hot glue gun

Sissors

1/2-1 yard of material to your liking
Scrapbook paper
Glue stick
Fishing line

Beads (optional)

Decoration for outside of frame (optional)

It's demolition time. Destroy the shade material however you please; strip it down to the metal. 

This particular frame had solid connections, but the shade I used to do the little boy mobile I featured didn't. In that case, I  secured the frame back together with masking tape. 

Rip or cut your material into 1 inch wide strips (if the strips are too wide, it will be more difficult to smoothly wrap the material around the metal frame). 

Wrap and hot glue, wrap and hot glue. Keep it tight. 

Keep going until the entire lamp shade frame is covered to your liking. 

Next, pick out your favorite scrap book paper (Hobby Lobby sales the books of it for 50% off every other week).

Decide what shape you'd like hanging from your mobile (in this case, a butterfly), find a silhouette picture of it on the internet, print it off, cut it out, and use it as your template for tracing. (If you're one of those fancy people, you can just use your  Cricut to complete this tedious part.)

Trace as many butterflies as your little heart desires (actually, however many you'd like hanging from the mobile x2) on the backside of the scrap book paper.

Cut them all out. (I used 2 different sizes, and a few different colors.)

Cut several pieces of fishing line, varying in lengths.

Coat the back side of two butterflies with your glue stick (I like the purple colored kind because it's pretty and so I can tell I did a good job.).

Put a dot of hot glue in the center of one butterfly

Position the fishing line down the center of one glue covered butterfly, then cover with the other prepared butterfly. Now you have a double sided pretty butterfly on a string! Repeat this step all the way down the fishing line, spacing the butterflies out in various places.

For the beaded fishing lines, I used the tiny jewelry making crimping beads and a pair of needle nose pliers to hold the decorative beads in place. 

Tie the decorated fishing line onto the material covered lamp shade in various places around the top.  

And for those of you that like clutter as much as I do, you can add a little extra cuteness by gluing/sewing/tying on some cloth flowers or in the boy version's case, some manly metal accents. 

Suspend this beauty from the ceiling or put it on any kind of lamp base (with the light bulb to be safe), and it's ready to entertain some wondering baby eyes!! 

A Series of Unfortunate Events: Told

Given my hiatus from the blogging world and the state of my recovering body (AKA bumps, scabs, burns, and bruises), you'd think either my husband started beating me or maybe I was in a really bad accident. As it turns out, I'm just a complete klutz who can barely walk across a parking lot without falling flat on my face and skidding across the pavement as if someone pushed me while I was in a dead sprint, or (a more a likely scenario given my luck) slipped a decomposing banana peel under my unsuspecting feet.

source

What is it about time that makes it slow down in moments we want it to the least or speed into a blur whenever we'd like it to stretch on forever?
It's a funny thing, what happens to your mind when your body is acutely aware of it's impending doom. Everything becomes so clear; the world pauses. Time skips a beat. I had an hour to comprehend exactly how bad landing on heated asphalt was going to hurt, but less than half a second to plan how to approach meeting the ground in a graceful manner. Due to the adrenaline of my automatic flight or fight response (which apparently was definitely not "flight" since I lost the battle with the pavement), I was completely oblivious to my ruined pair of dress paints and all four acutely injured extremities, due to the utter embarrassment of getting a pity response from a bystander who tried to make witnessing my cartoon inspired moment less awkward by telling me she was clumsy too.

source

It's amazing how much I never knew I use my left elbow until I continuously inflicted torture on myself post injury by pressing it against the driver's side car door to push it open or leaning it against the wall to balance myself while bending over to grab something. I was accidentally marking my territory with blood stains on everything in my path (because getting a bandaid to stay on longer than 2 minutes in 110 degree heat is a joke).
Becoming the stinky girl in town was easy, since I refused to take more showers than absolutely necessary. Standing under running water is quite painful when you're missing your half of your knee, and I'm sure all my neighbors could hear me screaming when the soap hit the raw flesh where all my epidermis layers once subsided.
Not even a week later, our less-than-a-year-old microwave died. Did you know the more you use your oven the more your risk for oven burns increases? If that statistic didn't exist before, I just proved it should. And to think, my hot glue gun burn had finally healed.......
Yup, I'm pretty much a hot mess right now, but the good news is it's not due to an abusive husband. If anything, I'm the "mean" one. Every time I get hurt he's appropriately sympathetic, and takes such tender care of me. And each time he stumps his toe, hits his head on something, or flips over the handle bars of his mountain bike going 40 mph down a hiking trail, I laugh so hysterically it should be a crime.  It's hilarious. I can't help it. And every time, he looks up at me as if I'm a stranger and says, "What's wrong with you? Why are you so mean? Don't you love me?"
I do. I love him. I just have some crossed wires.

source

I also love to show off what a good cook he's becoming! A couple of weekends ago, he won a friendly brisket cook-off competition at the White House (where Carrie got bit on the lip by a pip-squeak dog, causing me to laugh so hard I couldn't talk for a solid 5 minutes), and just last week we went over Tim and Lara's house to eat some of Patrick's amazing homemade pizza. I even made some fresh bruschetta using veggies from my garden! Never-mind the dessert pizza turned out tasting like burnt cocoa puffs......it's all about trial and error. Besides, if it weren't for burnt pizza, I may never have fell in love with Maple Pie.
I throw the word "love" around a lot. But I love as much as I laugh.

Do you have a problem with laughing at real life slap stick situations or inappropriate times? Did you know Dave writes about all things in life that are worth writing about?

Pennant Banner Tutorial

Hosting a shower can get expensive, so for decor on a budget I stepped out of my comfort zone to use the sewing machine to make my friend something to pizzazz up her party that could be also used in her baby's nursery afterwards. At first I thought I needed to take my machine to an expert to be tweaked before starting a project such as this, but after a quick consultation discovered it was just user error and my old trusty Riccar 3500 was in mint condition. They just don't make new machines to last this long anymore........

There reason I chose to actually the banners, is so the edges would be sharp and never ravel, they are now machine washable (the last thing anyone needs in their house is something else laying around collecting dust and too delicate to wash), and having the weight of the extra fabric just helps the whole banner itself hang more naturally and not be so flimsy.......oh yes, and it looks so much more official and expensive than just cut out out triangles glued to a string.

The following list will make two 3 yard long Pennant Banners. 

Supplies:

3 yards of fabric (I used 6 colors, 0.5 yards of each) 

2 packages of 3 yard long 7/8" wide double folded quilt binding bias tape

Matching thread

Sewing machine

Fabric pins

Measuring tape or ruler

Scissors

Something to use a template to cut fabric (I used a recycled magazine cover)

Start by measuring out 10 inches by 10 inches on whatever medium you chose to be your template (in my case a magazine cover), and cut it out. Then use your template to cut  24 squares of fabric (each one 10X10", duh). The magazine cover works great because it's easy to just pin it onto the fabric, cut around it, then remove the pins and move on. 

Fold each square in half, corner to corner, to make a triangle.

Pin closed only one edge of each triangle. 

Sew each pinned edge closed, from tip to top. 

Turn the triangle inside out (a pencil works fabulous for getting the tip all the way out), position the seem in the center of the triangle, fold down the left-over material at the top, turn over. Now you have a pennant. 

Iron every single pennant to get sharp edges and keep the top flap from interfering with the next step. 

Starting a few inches from the end of the bias tape, pin the pennants in the fold of the bias tape, positioning them where each top corner of every pennant touches it's neighboring pennant.  

12 pennants should fit on a 3 yard strip of bias tape, leaving a few inches free on each end to use later for hanging the banner.

Sew along the edge of the bias tap, securing the pennants in place.

When all that is complete, you can cut off the little flap left over on the back.....or you could just leave it there.

Done, done, and done! These banners are ready for some action!

......Maybe one day, when Ale finally uploads her pictures from the shower, I can finally show exactly what kind of action I'm talking about!! 

**Edited to add more banner's I've made for shower's**

A Pleasant Surprise

Everything just fell into place, really. I was suppose to work all weekend, so Patrick went to Waco without me for a family gathering. But then a friend asked for a switch, and although only having off one night nestled smack in the middle of 3 is a big stinker, I was happy to make the trade when a friend of a friend offered me 2 free concert tickets to the Gexa Pavillion. 

Gavin Degraw got the night started with some positive energy. He dedicated his performance to the late and great Kidd Kraddick after saying a few nice words, then ran through the crowd to spread the love.  

"Are you having fun dancing alone in the middle of thousands of people?" my brother asks me as he's doing his best impression of a petrified bump on a log. 

"Heck ya. I'm fired up! I could care less about what other people are thinking or doing and you shouldn't either." My kid brother is could probably embarrass himself just by picking his nose in front of the mirror; I hope he grows out of it someday. 

The Script is from Ireland, so between almost every song they made sure to let us know how they were melting like snowmen in hell. "At least we're useful and melt into whiskey," they'd add. The lead singer showed off his major chops by singing "The Man Who Can't Be Moved" a capella, then to perk things up again, asked someone in the audience to call an ex-boyfriend and give him the phone. He verified someone was on the other end of the call, had the audience say hello, and then sang "Nothing" to Carson, the ex on the phone, pausing every now and then to make sure he was still on the other end of the call and holding the phone screen up to the cameras so we could see. "Did you hear that, asshole?" he asked Carson when the song was over, having the audience close the call with, "Goodbye, asshole!" Oh those Irish boys........

I wanted to send the hubby a picture to rub it in that he was missing out on a good show.....obviously Dusty is a terrible photographer because he made me look totally off my rocker. A pro would have found a way to make that pose look sexy. 

Patrick, the lead singer for Train showed a little extra love to the crowd by grabbing people's phones and taking selfies with them, and then walked through the pit after asking the crowd to marry him and sang "Marry Me". When he came back on stage he proceeded to explain how when we walked through the crowd, a very tall man patted him on the head like a dog, "Thank you for that."

In light of the tour being called Mermaids of Alcatraz, several girls and one guy dressed up in their best mermaid costumes for the opportunity to stand on stage and sing with the band.

Who knew Patrick played the saxophone??? Not me!!

Even more unexpected than the sax ,and a very fun part of the night, was when everyone cleared the stage except the drummer, who did a very cool solo to some crazy dubstep music. And later, we'd be surprised once again by a cover to Macklemore's "Can't Hold Us". 

After inviting the country singer Ashley Monroe on stage to sing her part of their new radio song "Bruises", she stuck around to sing a love song of her very own, "Weed Instead of Roses". Have you head it? It's pretty catchy.....almost as catchy has my Hunny's new song.

To close it out, the encore "Drops of Jupiter" was dedicated to Kidd, and I left pleasantly satisfied with by a super fun concert that I never would have bought tickets to on my own, but am so glad I went.