Hello Hello Hello!

I'm very happy right now because I'm done with school for the semester annnnd because I'm listening to Christmas music. Seriously, things couldn't be better. I love December. And I love being out of school.

Speaking of December, I'm working on my December Daily album. This is my first year making one and its been a lot of fun so far. It seems like EVERYONE is doing it, so I gave in. Plus, I figured this December has the potential of being very exciting since the boy gets home in less than 15 days! :)
Thats right...he will probably get here really really late December 17...meaning I probably won't see him until Friday the 18th. So soon!
Anyway, if you haven't heard about the December Daily album, check here to find out what its all about!
Pretty much you put together an album BEFORE December starts and then every single day leading up to Christmas you document what you did. Now I'm not completely finished with the construction of my album but I'm working on it! And I've been successful in documenting each day so far. I know, I know...its only December 3rd but that still counts for something right?
Here's a couple pictures of the album:




It is composed of scraps. But I kinda like it that way. Nice and cheap. And very..uh..scrappy.
I'll try to share some of the pages as I finish them each day. Just for fun.

Well I have a list of things that I want to do before school starts again in January.
One of the things on that list is to learn how to knit.
I sat down with my mom Sunday night and she taught me how to knit. I'm still struggling with casting on (simple, I know...). I think perhaps its because I'm being taught how to do it right handed...and I am sooo not right handed. It just feels funny. And backwards. She tried to teach me how to crochet right handed a long time ago and it never worked. I finally learned how to do it my way.
Anyway I have a couple of Christmas gifts planned that involve knitting so it would be kinda nice if I could get it figured out here pretty soon :)
In fact, I better go practice right now. Pictures later maybe? Wish me luck.

autumn is love.

These past few days have been intense.
And the intensity is going to keep going until next Friday.
On Tuesday I did homework for a grand total of 11 hours, stopping only for dinner. Yesterday wasn't much better.
And I still have a lot to work on.
But I wanted to quickly share something that is making me smile.
It's an early christmas present from my mom.
And I think it was heaven sent.



I've been looking for an old trunk for FOREVER! And I haven't been able to find one that isn't too damaged. This one has a little water damage on the bottom...but the inside is in perfect condition! It is perfect for me to put my quilts in! Ah, yes, I still get very very happy everytime I see it.

Another thing that is making me smile is autumn. I felt it in the air last week and it is making me so incredibly happy. This is, by far, my most favorite time of year.
Speaking of autumn, I signed up for Kara's "fall in love" online class. So cute! I haven't really had much time to put into it yet, but its going to be great! With all this schoolwork my brain is officially fried and I have zero creativity. Maybe next weekend...

Tonight I'm going to kick my feet up, dip apple slices in caramel, watch the office and the season premiere of grey's (thank goodness for dvr!) and not think about homework.

this calls for cake and ice cream, right?!

So yesterday was my blog's first birthday! I just realized that. Its been a pretty lame year, huh? I mean, what, like 50-some-odd posts over the course of one year? Most people have that many in like a few months!
ANYWAY, here is little update of the past month (in no particular order)....

I received news of Andy's release date. DECEMBER 17TH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! YAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I ran my second race ever (...my first one being my marathon) and got second place out of the girls. Anyway, I received a nice little gift certificate to Striders. And trust me, it is going to come in handy. I'm wayyy overdue for some new running shoes. Like so overdue its bad, real bad. Like probably a good 1,000 miles overdue. No joke.


I went on a picnic up in the Uintahs.
I went to a movie with my longtime childhood friend who I hadn't really seen since she got married! We saw My Sisters Keeper. And I think I was either teared up or crying during the entire movie.

I got some nice vintage items at some estate sales. Like a really cute wicker picnic basket complete with plates, cups and utensils.
I watched fireworks on the fourth of July by myself.

I bought a serger so I could make more aprons.

I bought more fabric to make more quilts.

I registered for school and forked out around $700 just for books and modules (Ah, I still want to cry when I think about it...the money AND starting school).

I took an online class from Miss Kara. She's awesome and inspiring. And she's only 17. It was a music art journaling class and it rocked. It made me happy. I'm still working on it (more photos on flickr).


I went to Public Enemies with Jacki. Mmmm...Johnny Depp is uh...awesome. :]

I've been keeping an eye on the demolition of my high school. Its kind of sad when you think about it. :[ KelliPirelli has a nice little post about it here.


And I've been trying to catch up on the Harry Potter movies. I tried watching the first one when it came out a few years ago and I hated it so I just never watched any of them. I am still not a huge fan of the first movie...but each movie seems to get better. I just finished the fourth one this afternoon. I almost cried when Edward...er..I mean Cedric died (umm...does anyone else think that Rob looks better as Cedric than he does as Edward...?) That was very sad. I'm a huge fan of Ron. He is my favorite by far.
Well thats about it. Maybe my next year on blogger will be filled with more posts. and maybe my summer will get more exciting. but probably not.

journaling rocks!

I love journaling. I have quite a number of journals stored up from when I was little. Sometime last year I was cleaning out my room when I found a few of my old journals. I started going back through them. I was amazed and intrigued by some of the things I had written down! Things that I'd forgotten about, things that made me laugh, things that made me cry, things that made me happy.
Thats when I decided that one of my resolutions this year was that I would start keeping a journal again. And I'm proud to say that I've kept that resolution.

I've been following this blog for awhile now and at the beginning of the year she started a project called 52Q. She puts up a journaling prompt every week. Every week I've been writing them down but I've never taken the time to do anything else. Well that changed last week. Now that I'm 6 months behind, I decided to start. So I did...and here are my first few.

week one




week two



week three



Really, you should do it. Its fun...its a stress-reliever...and its a way to keep track of your life RIGHT NOW. Take it and interpret it however you want. If you need inspiration, check out the flickr group. But do this project. Seriously.

spring break

Spring break is always a wonderful time of year. But this one didn't start out so good. 15 inches of new snow. Serious. But its finishing up rather nicely. Its pretty warm today. My brother and I went and played tennis and it felt so good to soak up some of that warm happiness. And good news: This week is supposed to bring us some more.
Now for even more good news: I'm finished with my clinical hours. And the very first thing I did was paint my fingernails bright red! We can have our fingernails painted while at the hospital but the polish can't be chipped. So of course I don't even attempt. My fingernail polish chips within the first two minutes of painting them. Anyway, now that my clinicals are done I have an extra twenty four hours a week. That is a whole day! I've been using my time wisely by placing at least two hours aside each day for some studying and flash-card-making time. I'll take my boards either the last week in April or first part of May so I've got to get cracking down on that studying. I don't want to deal with the procrastination or last-minute-cramming.
Besides studying, I've done some deep cleaning in my room. Some spring cleaning. And boy, have I gotten a lot cleaned out, a lot thrown away. I'm almost embarassed to say this but I still had my chemistry and physics workbooks from high school! What I was saving them for, I'll never know.
I've also been using my extra time to work on my art journal, my family history project and other random crafts. Here are a couple pages I did yesterday:

And this is a piece I made that was inspired by the wonderful film The Wizard of Oz. The colors are showing up a little yucky but I promise you there is a green, blue and purple stripe, even though it looks like blue, blue and blue.And this is what I'm going to work on this afternoon:

It is going to be my first attempt at a quilt. I'm so excited! My mom gave me this kit for Christmas and I am so in love with the fabric.

I really don't have much to say...

but I'm bored and I want to talk. So here I am.
This weekend was filled with lots of yummy things. Quiznos, running, shopping, pearls, paper organizing, disney princess pencils, sequins, electric-colored embroidery floss, diet coke, popcorn, new shoes, homemade chicken noodle soup, curly fries and the grammys.
I worked a little on my art journal today. Here are a couple of pages I whipped out. Pretty simple. This one is about our first ever family picture. The actual family picture is hiding beneath the other picture.

And that picture just screams fat, cholesterol, and calories. When I first started dating Andy I noticed that he would always put fries on his cheeseburger. And now he's got me doing the same thing.

everyday should be like this...

This was a very much needed day off. And it felt sooooo good. I slept in until about 9:30 and then went to the gym for a little jog. Came home, got ready, ate Quiznos with my mom, and then spent the rest of the afternoon in my craft room. :] To put it simply, it was a fabulous day.

I thought I'd share a few pages from my art journal that I finished up today.

Well, I think I'm going to make some ringtones for my phone (I've had it for about a month and still don't have any ringtones!), embroider and watch Jay Leno to finish off this wonderful day.

I want to create. I want to capture my life. I want to tell my story.But I have a problem. Nothing I do turns out how I want it to. And then I just get frustrated and throw it all away. Or sometimes I will sit for hours trying to come up with some idea...and nothing will come. And then I get mad at myself for just sitting there and wasting all that precious time. {I am very obsessed with time. And very selfish...too selfish...with my time.}Starting today I'm going to embrace imperfection.I'm just going to create. And not think about it.
And love whatever comes out of it. Love whatever I create.I'm going to start today. And everyday.