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Friday, December 9, 2011

Good to know

A friend told me today that they saw something sparkley and it made them think of me.

Life Mission: Complete.

BAM!

♥ Em

Thursday, December 8, 2011

Merry McChristmas to you!

Last night, D left to go bowling and the house was normal.
He came home to a Christmas Wonderland! I think there's still more to do, though, so he will probably be surprised when he gets back tonight as well.
Sneaky Snake, I am!

Some pictures for you---

Our Tree! I'll put another picture when I wrap the other presents :)

This is beside the tree - against the wall you walk in and see. I wrapped the lamps with tinsel to make them Christmas-y! So fun! Who needs fancy crap, I use $1 tinsel and bobby pins!
Also, Note the Green and Yellow/Gold Balls. 12-0

 My boyfriend Santa greets you at the door. Be careful- he's watching even if he does appear to be winking! And he might be staring at your butt a little, too. Who knows.  We've had to get creative with him because he's old and fragile and Carmen's whip of a tail will kill him with one good lick if we're not careful!


The Children's Stockings. Tini on L, Carmen on R with Brown Dog on it

Even our DVDs are in the spirit!
 Yes, Santa dancing singing bear-Elvis and Large Elvis ornament that sings and dances and lights up. Love it!

Baby Christmas Tree on the table
More pictures are to come, I'm sure... but there's a little hint of how crazy our house looks right now.

Enjoy!
♥ EM


***UPDATE***
There is now a second Tree. It's 4 feet tall and in the window on the opposite side of the room :)  That's what happens when D goes to Franklin 2 nights in a row.  We'll see how he takes it...

Baby Tree with niece presents under it

Monday, December 5, 2011

Crazy about Pallets!

(This post was from 11/15, but for some reason just posted today and I don't know how to change the date.. so just imagine that I posted it then!)


 I went to town on some pallets this weekend...

Wanna seeee?
Headboard for our KING SIZE BED we're getting for Christmas. This is a QUEEN in front of it. Do not think I'm measurement-stupid and over-did it. I did that on purpose :) ALSO bed will be on a platform eventually, so the plywood won't be showing!

Shelf for my cookbooks. I sliced a pallet in half (my craftsmanship is remarkable with a sawzall. Look at those straight lines...) One day I might fix that.

Inspiration: http://www.theroosterandthehen.com/how-to-make-a-pallet-headboard/ 

But, this is what I did instead...
 I bought a boatload of pallets (literally, you could load them into a boat) and white washed most of them. I had some Kilz Ceiling paint leftover, so I mixed 1 part paint to 3 parts water and whisked it to a milk-like texture and just overinduldged all my pallets with said waterpaint. It gave them a weathered- almost mold covered- look and I LOVE it. Obviously, you can see the ones that hadn't gotten it yet, but this was step 4. (1- purchase pallets fpr $1 each from sketchy individual named Stooooneyyyy 2- paint 3-rip them to pieces)

We'll start with 4. Lining them up how I want them on the headboard. I kind of wanted to stagger them like bricks, but due to how anal I am (the ends wouldn't have matched up because they would have been fresh-cut wood edges against the weathered looking sides and I would have had to repaint every SINGLE piece to make it work), and how lazy I am (see previous parenthesis comment about the amt of work it would have taken), I thought this was better! It also was more sanity-saving than staggering would have been. Oh MY, someone would have gotten hurt!

Step 6. Complete.
Step 5. Then I made sure all were painted and lined up. Again. And took 4 of the insidey pieces from the pallets (they're like 2x4s but I don't know the measurements other than it's not 2 OR 4...) to give it an outside even edge on each side...
Step 6. Have children sit in front of it and look freakin ADORABLE.


  

Step 7. Nail to perfectly-measured plywood.  This SHOULD HAVE been the easiest part, as I sawed most of the nails off and just had to pop out 3 per board to nail in the original holes and leave the rest of the original nails, but my foresight when ripping the pallets apart was not the greatest and half of them had the center nail still in them... but beaten down into submission. That had to be removed from half of them--- which took us well past dark and into 50 degree weather. I was soon told to come inside and stop playing out in the dark & cold.

Step 8. Completely unnecessary. Come inside and not freeze to death.
I brought this inside, too, just so it didn't get eaten or infested with bugs on the ground... or bird-pooed on over night. At this time, we realized why other people just NAIL the BOARDS into the WALL instead of putting it on Plywood. It weighed about 200 pounds at this point. (Or maybe 70, but 200 sounds more realistic. I don't know)

After step number 7 was completed the next morning, we had to hang this. At this point- with all the planks on it- the board now weighed about 500 pounds (again, probably more like 100, but really... 500!).
Step #9. Find Studs, make fancy-pants stud-marker-things out of thumb tacks, yarn, and heavy objects. 
That's right, Fancy. Pants. We had to know where the studs where the whole time D was screwing this bad boy into the wall, but couldn't really think of another way besides my extra special way.  
Step 10. Find 10 friends to hold this 1000 lb beast to the wall while someone who knows how to use a screwgun thing screwguns it to the studs. 

Don't have 10 friends, you say?  I guess I could just hold it while D screws it into the wall.

I could just hold it while I remove my arms from their sockets. Yeah. Heavy. Hard to hold. 2 people.

But I wanted it hung that day, so I had to hold it all by myself. I may have gotten splinters in my chest and face at this point, because I was just using my whole body to push it against the wall. I'm thrifty like that.

(Speaking of splinters... you would not believe how many baby splinters I had in my arms, legs, and butt from sitting on and moving this stuff around. Next time, don't wear leggings/tights. Wear real pants. Good to know. Note taken.)


FINISHED PRODUCT 
So beautiful. Now we need to redecorate the bedroom...




This will look so good when we get our new King Size BED!
I am excited!

♥ EM

Way Past-Due Stuff-making updates

This post was from 12/4 but just posted this morning when I realized it never made it... oopsie

So, I know all my updates have been about making stuff- stuff I've made- stuff I'm going to make...
Suck it up, because more is COMING!
This is my first ever experience playing with canvases and putting them where people can see them. Yes. That's right, it's like I'm an artist - except not a really good one! 

This has been completed since October--- well, kinda completed. I'm still not 100% sure that i'm finished. I need to cut the edges off and wrap them, but I kind of think I need another bird.
What do you think?


So, yeah the Edges need cleaned up. Here's the pretty much finished product.


And if you would like to take a tour of my brain... here's the step by step! But be careful, you may get lost in there... 

#0. My inspirational stuff that I looked at and morphed into my own thing: 
   (Both pictures taken from Pinterest) 





#1. I taped (yes, classily taped) the canvases to the wall like I thought I would like. Don't underestimate me, now... this was tape job number 387290 and picture number 30. And calling D freaking out about "ARE YOU SURE THIS IS OK" time number 6.  It's a tough job he has, but someone has to embrace my crazy

#2. I then- Everrrr sooooo carrrrrefullllly ripped pages out of my Alice in Wonderland book and started modge-podge-glue-paper machet-ing them all over the canvases for texture...


#2.5/3ish.  I also cheated and knew where i wanted the branches to be, so I strategically covered the branches in the parts of the book I wanted to be visible. It looks like an accident, but it was 100% plotted out step by step.

And yes, in some of these there is wax paper on the table I'm using. That's because I'm 4 years old and I can't paint or glue anything without getting ie EVERYWHERE. We're talking in hair, on clothes, on the dang dog, and oopsie on the carpet. Maybe my creative artristry is better reserved for the garage...

or maybe I'm just making the place festive with my whoopsie marks?  It might be on purpose. You don't know!

 #3.5/4ish. Painted all non-branchy parts with pretty sky colored paint. Thanks, Martha. You are the stuff. Martha Stewart Craft Paint---- WORD

Just a little bit of some of the words and pictures under the paint show, so it's PERFECT!!!  

#5. We'll go with 5 because I have lost "ish" count.  I took water colors and colored all the branch parts with those. I tried brown- but that was disgusting, so the color I went with in the end was like a mustart and yellow and brown and something else mixed together.  It worked... 





 A Close-up for you...
#6? Is that where we are?  All the texture pages on, paint dried, and branches painted... I picked where I wanted the birdies to go and couldn't decide what I wanted to do with them. I was torn between painting the craft paint around and making them with black watercolor or making them black craft paint... I think I am glad I chose the craft paint- Much easier and prettier. I like the boldness better than if I had made them water-colory and muted.
Closer-up of the birdies:

I'll eventually slice off the edges of the paper that doesn't want to stick to the sides (no matter how much glue I use) and take ribbon and wrap around for smoothness like I did the other 2...  But for now, I'm ok with it.

What have you made recently? Please share!
(please oh please share my 2 blogger friends who sometimes read my blog!)

Don't you worry- there will be more.
I have done a lot since I last wrote...
Enjoy!
♥ EM

Saturday, October 15, 2011

More stuff I made...

I made some more stuff today...
Totes stole idea from Pinterest.  New favorite website on which to waste my days!

I made hanging Ball Jar lanterns to hang on the fence.
Plan- To put citronella votives inside them and light them on evenings we want to play out in the yard. Much cuter than our Tiki Torches that used to be screwed into the fence!

This is the beginning... Quart-sized Ball jars, steel wire, wire clippers and some pliers. Once I got the hang of it, I was pretty quick at making them!




That is our back-door neighbors' massive house. Yeah- house is the little triangle in the front... then they built a million-square-foot recording studio with rooms above it on to the back of their house.
Look silly? Yes.
Make the house hard to sell in the future? Obviously, yes... as it has been listed on Zillow for 3 years.
Awesome.

Oh and there's Teenie Weenie licking her shoulder bc that shirt tastes deeelish!









Here's the final product!
I had a brain fart and couldn't think of HOW to get little dots on the inside of the jars, so I thought- OOH! Swirleys like an iced coffee!!!

I then figured out that you PUT the DOTS on the OUTSIDE.
Viola!  I may not be the brightest, but now all the little jar babies in the yard will look like they're full of lightening bugs when they're glowing.
YAY!

I am excited.

Maybe one day I'll post pictures of the canvasses, fabric squares, and other things I've made recently...

One day!

(PS 2 blogs, 1 week. This might be a record)

Thursday, October 13, 2011

I made some stuff.

I made some stuff and I wanted to share.
I'm only going to share a couple things, though, as some of the others aren't perfect yet... be looking for more updates, because I've been pumping stuff out like there's no tomorrow!!

Tuesday night, Carmen got sick in her bed... this lead to throwing away everything that was in it- mostly her pillows that she slept on. Martini is a jerk and she has eaten the stuffing out of all the pillows I've bought for her. Carmen's pillows were ones I had made and somehow Tini hadn't eaten through them yet, so we thought it might make sense for me to just make them both new ones. This is the result:

Isn't she so cute hanging out on her new bed? I think she liked it, especially since she went and laid down on it the second I tossed it into the floor! :) 


Martini (the snot), even loved hers! I put it in the floor and asked her to try it out, she then refused to get up. 

That's all I got for this morning, but I thought I would try to update and toss out my precious pictures :) 

More witty banter later, for now I must prepare for worK! 
EM

Tuesday, August 23, 2011

Overdue update

Am I the only one in the contest to see who can go the longest without updating?? Because that would mean I'm WINNING!
 June 14th was my last update... oopsie.

Since then, the babies have graduated from their Doggie Class:
  


I'm a little too tired to really do a huge one, so I'll just update on my 101 in 1001... it seems like that's all this blog is for right now!

Click HERE for the rest of my 101 in 1001

Complete:
#9. Go on a surprise super romatical date with my hubby -
      Our 3rd anniversary was in June- D surprised me (blindfold and all) and took me to the Melting Pot. 2 items marked off the list at once? Total WIN

#18. Figure out what I want to do when I grow up (or at least the next couple of years)
      I think I've figured it out. I guess we'll see...

#19. Get a tune-up for my car
      I don't think I need to describe this one. I got a tune up. Only 25,000 miles too late

#55. Dye my hair almost completely blonde
    ALMOST there! 

  
#69. Eat at the Melting Pot (again)
      See #9. :)

#79. Do all my Zumba DVDs
      Yeah, by far- the ones withOUT Beto in them are better. He just looks stupid and makes me mad when he's on the DVDs. I even got D to do the Abs one with me!

In progress:
#66. Read 12 books- I should probably keep a list, since I don't really remember everything I read... but I have read 1-2 more since last update. I have finished My Horizontal Life by Chelsea Handler, What the Dog Saw by Malcolm Gladwell, and The Help by Katherine Stockett.
Just a little gush- The Help was by far one of the best books I have ever read. I couldn't put it down and am torn as to whether or not I want to see the movie, as I am afraid it could never live up to the book.  I cannot say enough about how much I love love love this book. So much that I'm even going to BUY it! I know, crazy!

And that's all I have for now. I'm going to go try to update all my links and strikethroughs :)

And then to BED! So that I can be less grouchy at work tomorrow. I know what you're thinking-
 "You, Grouchy?! NO!"   Sadly, Yes. Yes, it is possible. 

Tuesday, June 14, 2011

Missed a whole month!

So, I missed an entire month! I am so sorry to the 2 people who read this blog.
I'm sure your life has been empty and boring while awaiting my next words.
Well I would just like to say...
   You're welcome.

I'm feeling pretty crappy tonight (allergies), but I thought I would update a little bit again.
As far as my 101 in 1001, I think that I have only completed 3 more things...
Here we go!

#33- Keep fresh flowers in the house for 2 months straight- Thanks to my husband (and my nagging, of course), this was completed May 26th. However, it is still going on. I have 2 still-live flowers currently in the house. We'll see how long they last- or if they get replaced.


Currently, these are hanging out around the house...



#42- Wear a scarf as an accessory (not just to keep warm)-
While in Denver for work, I pulled this look off.


Impressed? You should be! Also in the picture, you can see the progress I'm making toward blonde(r). I will get there, slowly but surely!

#95- Stay up all night with my husband (for no good reason)
- This was also thanks to our friends Kris, Jeannie, and Danny- we went out a couple of weeks ago, and didn't get home til almost 4... then were playing darts until almost 5 and someone noticed that the sun was coming up, so we went out on the front porch and watched the sun come up, then went to bed for the next 5 hours.  It was a super fun night, and I wish all weekend nights could be that awesome! However, I am sure our neighbors are glad that doesn't happen often, as several most likely heard us talking loudly while waiting on the sun. I'm just glad none of them woke up and came outside!!

OK that's all I have for now; I'm going to bed with a bottle of nyquil!
-EM

Thursday, May 5, 2011

Cinco de Mayo!!

Good morning! Happy Cinco de Mayo!!
Guess who had guacamole for breakfast today? 


That's right, me!

More updates later- for now, I have to hop in the shower so I can get to work almost on time!

Sunday, April 24, 2011

Completed-12, 14, 45, 56, 68; 4, 30, 33, 55, 66, 73 in progress... TAKE THAT

Since we have been internet free, several things on my 101 in 1001 have occurred. I will try to update briefly!

The following have been completed:

12- Decide what to do with the extra shower in our bathroom. THAT SUCKER WILL BE A CLOSET. Of course, I haven't had this DONE yet... but I KNOW what I want to do with it! YAHOOO! :) I can't wait! I just need a plummer to move the pipes, put a shower in our tub, replace our tub, then tile in the walls of the bath tub... and we're IN BUSINESS.
Yeah- see why it hasn't been done yet?

14- Decorate our naked wall in our living room.
Check!  You can sort of see it behind Ms. SanDiego's fat head in the picture.

45- Take an entire week off of work STRAIGHT.
I did it and it was AMAZING. I did nothing. I went nowhere. However, during this week was when #71 also was completed. D & I went for pedis Mon March 28.

56- Go to a Preds game IN Preds gear.
I do not have a single close up picture of this, but I swear it happened!!

68- Get a new surround sound system.
Thanks to my parents, this was completed free of charge to me! haha Happy Birthday to me, new blue ray surround sound thing!

71- See #45 description


The following are in progress:
4- Pay off the truck.
Slowly slowly slowly but surely!

30- Figure out if Carmen IS deaf and HOW bad it is!
 We went to the Dr last week. There's nothing obscuring her ears, so it may be inflamed inner tubes. She's currently on drugs to see if that's it.
Cross your fingers!

33- Keep fresh flowers in the house for 2 months straight
Hopefully this will be easy. For my Bday I got some gorgeous flowers from D. Some are still alive miraculously! I have flowers outside that are now blooming, so hopefully this will be easy- as I really just have to go CUT something once a week to have it work!  Those are my ghetto irises. They're too heavy to stick up on their own, so yeah. I tied those bad boys up to the front porch!

55- Dye my hair almost completely blonde.
I don't know if that's going to happen. I'm starting to think blonde isn't my color! haha We're doing this in phases.

66- Read 12 books
I'm about 1/3 of the way there? I read Strengths Finder 2.0... and some other ones that I don't remember right now


73- I have Spring, Summer, and Fall!!! Just need winter and I'm DONE!

OK after that, I need a nap.

Here's a quick picture of my precious Tini since we have a fathead picture in here as well :)

Tuesday, April 19, 2011

INTERNETZ!!

We HAS internets!!!
I am so excited... if anyone has noticed, I have been Blog-MIA for quite some time due to our neighbors recently placing passwords on their internet. I don't consider it "stealing" so much as "using my resources"

We are now paying for Clearwire, and if anyone wants internet and doesn't have it- I will give you my info to refer you to them because they have been amazing so far! I called the guy at 2:20, he set the appt for 3, got here at 2:59 (Yes, I KNOW!) and was gone by 3:20.

All set up, good to go, router attached to my blue ray player so we can download movies and watch them there, or through our Wii...

I. Am. Amazed.
lol

If you're bored, watch this video-
I hope to one day be as awesome as this girl that is rapping... 1:00 mark is the magic.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=khCokQt--l4

Thursday, February 24, 2011

That's All.

So, Can I just tell you how much I love my husband?
Not only does he NOT push me out of bed when I tough-talk him in my sleep, but he also does such a fantastic job of being patient and understanding when I'm being irrational/overly-emotional, he sings stupid songs to me (& makes them up as he goes), and he does some other pretty ridiculous things in order to surprise me or make me smile.


With the help of one of my friends, I recently had an epiphany! She and I were talking about random crap and something came up about stupid little arguments that we get in as couples. She then looked at me and said something like, "Yeah you argue about the direction the towels should be rolled, and he leaves his underwear in the floor, but really you should consider yourself lucky to have someone you love that you can share your life with."

That hit me pretty hard. I don't know why, but I have assumed that people would rather hear the negative than the positive. I suppose it could be that I remember when I was last single... I was incredibly bitter for a lot of that time. I would see happy couples and say, "awww so sweeeeet..." then in my head call them phony or stupid or whatever other horrible thing I could think of. I was only happy when I saw other people miserable, because that's where I was. I wanted friends there with me! I wanted to hear about the stupid crap that makes people mad at each other and all the negatives of relationships, because I wanted to convince myself that they're all like that. That it wasn't just me who was unhappy in a past relationship, or it wasn't just me who had been struggling for the past couple of years just to put on a happy face while in public with my boyfriend.
Why do we do that?  Of course now, I think that was so stupid and immature and petty and horrifically hateful of me.

So, yeah. We do nit pick at one another. He may leave clothes in the floor or look at the same dirty dishes for days on end like they're going to clean themselves. (And it would have to be him because I never do that... right?) We may get irritated with each other over something stupid and one of us (also, of course, not me...) may sit and pout for a couple hours on a Saturday morning.  He rolls over and snores/breathes in my face; I have been known to roll over and accidentally throw an elbow to his cheek/nose... But all of that stuff, that crap that really doesn't matter in the long run? That's all the absolute minority of interactions between the two of us.
Really, I feel incredibly blessed to have found the one person with whom I wish to spend the next 1039389021 days and months and years.  I feel so very lucky to be "SO YOUNG" and already wake up beside the person I'll be waking up beside when I'm old, wrinkly, and listening to our grandkids run around.  The honest truth is, I long for weekends not ONLY because I'm not working during that time, but because that is additional time  that I get to spend with him.  Whether we're doing anything or not, I'm perfectly content just sitting together. We have an amount of fun together that should be considered illegal. In fact, some times it may be... I'm kidding... sort of.


   What I guess I'm trying to say is, marriage is pretty awesome.  You should try it!
I love my husband more that I ever knew it was possible to love another person... ever. It's actually a pretty incredible feeling.

Yes, today's pictures are from us @Halloween... we were a S'more. 
Gag, ick, so cheesy, I know.  Sounds like somebody's just jealous. 

Monday, February 7, 2011

WORLD CHAMPIONS

There was this one football game last night...  Only a few people watched it, though, so I don't think everybody knows what happened yet!
Apparently there were these two teams playing for this bowl? :) It must be pretty awesome because people keep saying it's super. 

Yes, this was the scene during the game. He sits right in front of the TV so that they can hear him better. If you didn't know, we are Packers fans. The Pack beat out the Steelers last night to win the Super Bowl and become the world champs! It was pretty exciting! I don't remember much about the game, since the party was at our house and I was running back and forth the entire time, but what I saw of it was GREAT! 
Once the Packers stopped the Steelers' drive in the very end of the 4th Quarter, this is what we saw:
That's right, everyone giving him High Fives because--- I don't know if I've told you before or not, but--- D not only coaches the team, he's also the Offensive and Defensive Coordinator, QB Coach, Lineman coach, and best friend of every member of the team.  Yes, that's everyone giving him high fives for him winning the game! haha 


I love my husband. He's perfect in every way! 


Wednesday, February 2, 2011

So TIREd!

So, do you ever have one of those days where you just want to whine and complain about EVERYTHING?!
How about one of those... weeks?
I feel like I complain to everybody that I talk to.
AAaaaannnd I'm sorry, friends!

The truth is, it's much easier to complain and then continue complaining and talking about people/things than it is to shut up, deal with it, and do something about it.  Or even to just accept the things that we have no control over and focus on the things over which we have influence.
Why is this? Why is it that we are so hard-focused on talking about the negative instead of focusing on the positive?
I don't like it. And I'm tired of hearing/saying, "I'm normally a pretty optimistic person, but..."  I hope to start catching myself before I get 6 feet into the hole of talking about how much stuff sucks. I'm pretty much tired of finding myself 30 minutes into a contest to see whose story makes them seem like more of a martyr. SO, as of right now, I'm going to try to start remembering to monitor myself.
If you're my friend and you read this (both of you), I hope that you will help keep me accountable!
I have a bunch of cool things to write about, but right now this is the only thing I could tick tick out.
Happy February!

In Honor of Green Bay's winning the NFC CHampionship and heading to the Superbowl, here's a picture of me sick and kind of asleep during one of the games this season. It's rough, but Martini looks cute. This is tradition. We have to wear our outfits! Sick or not!

Monday, January 24, 2011

22. Update resume- Complete! Working on 12, 17, 55..

SO, I am currently updating my resume(Number 22). Mark that off the list!

I think I have decided on what to do with the shower (#17)

I have made 1-2 meals in the Crock Pot- so I'm almost half way to that goal! (#12)

ANNNND I'm one step into my blonde mission(#55). Got highlights a couple weeks ago, YIPEE!!!!!

To see the rest of my 101 in 1001, click HERE.

Here's some pictures for you of the children! We're just now finishing up Christmas with different parts of the fam... here's Carmen eating her big bone/treat thing from Christmas;

 ANnnNNnnnnnD the Weenie killing her hedgehog we got her. Such a jerk.



Monday, January 10, 2011

26. Get current on Criminal Minds Season 5- and SNOW DAY!



Last night it snowed 4-5 inches, which means SNOOOOOW DAY!
Snow day means watch DVDs of stuff all day! Which means we finished Season 5 of Criminal Minds.  Now I can check #26 off... YESSSS! :-)
(If you would like to see the rest of my 101 in 1001, click here)

AND we made a snow man & snow cream! Today has been super fantastical!


 The girls also enjoyed themselves... See? If they aren't the most precious things ever, I just don't know what could be!