This past weekend FLEW right by so fast that I barely remember it, but thankfully there is this thing called Instagram. So, I’ve pulled all of my photos off of there from the past weekend, and threw them together for a quick Weekend Wrap-up before the week gets crazy. (3 Million things to do this week, and not nearly enough time.)

Friday night was spent getting organized so I could begin packing four our vacation. We leave in T-Minus 3 Days and the only things in our suitcases right now are our bathing suits and some alcohol sitting next to the suitcases. I guess that’s all we need though. :P On Saturday, we washed the cars/truck, and cleaned them out which is when I found a NYC parking ticket lodged between my windshield and the dash, from 10/10/10. (I bought my car in July 2011). Sunday morning, We stopped at Sheetz for some breakfast with my brother before heading off to Hershey Park.

Sunday was the last day for Hershey Park to be open for the summer season, and since we bought tickets to go way back in May, and this was the last day to use them, we had to go. They only opened at 10AM, and we got there right on the dot (no idea how we pulled that off) and we stayed until 3:30PM. We spent the day riding all of the roller coasters, including the insane SkyRush & Fahrenheit and we even hit up the zoo, which was included free with our tickets. Most of the animals were sleeping though, including Mr. Bear.

We also caught a Sea Lion show, which was awesome. Once we left Hershey Park, we went and picked up Travis’ truck which was getting detailed by a family friend. The paint job on the truck looks like glass now.

How was your weekend? Did it fly by for you too?

P.S. I’ll spill the Vacation deets on Friday!

Posted on May 26, 2013 - 14 comments
 Filed Under: Weekend Wrap-Up

I recently made a really simple & easy fall inspired wreath, but the pictures in the post really don’t do it justice. Basement apartment + no windows/no natural light + no flash = no good. I actually was going to just skip this post, but I figured I’d post it because it at least shows you guys how to do a triangle felt wreath, or what Travis likes to call, the “Dragon Wreath”. (He thinks it looks like a dragon.) All you need to make a triangle felt wreath is a bunch of felt sheets, hot glue, a wreath form & scissors.

Start cutting your felt into triangles. I usually cut two sheets at once and I also usually cut out one triangle and then use that one as a template to cut the rest, but sometimes I accidentally use my template, and have to cut another one. (I’ve looked around for felt cutting machines, so this step is faster, but I haven’t found anything that would work well without risking the machine breaking, so if you know of something that is not discontinued like the Sizzle, please let me know!)

Then you want to grab your wreath form and plug in that hot glue gun! (You’re going to use A LOT of hot glue for this project!) I always use the floral green wreaths, they seem to be the sturdiest.

Once you have a good amount of triangles cut out, put a line of hot glue around a section of the wreath, and then put your triangles on that hot glue like the picture below:

After you have done the above step, you want to add another line of hot glue, but put it ontop of the triangles you just glued down, and then fill in the gaps, like so:

Once you have filled in the gaps, you can start on your next row. I usually do a line about a half inch about the last one, but you can go closer if you’d like.

You then just keep repeating the three last steps, all the way around the wreath. Here is what a small section would look like:

And here the wreath is about half-way done. Just keep gluing and gluing, and try not to burn your fingers!

Once you are done gluing your triangles, it will look like this:

Meanwhile, what are Travis & Coco doing while I’m gluing & gluing? Playing with my orange ribbons of course…

I wanted to make this tutorial really simple & easy to understand, but I still wanted to use my wreath, so I grabbed a pre-made bow from Michael’s craft store, and stuck it on the wreath for some fall-ness.

& of course, while I’m taking pictures of my wreath, I look down and see this… “Are you done yet Mom? I’d like to go to bed.”

Now time to brainstorm Halloween wreaths, I’m thinking that I’m going to do an all black one from felt, but using circles, like I did with my Saint Patrick’s Day wreath. :)

Posted on May 26, 2013 - 41 comments
 Filed Under: Holidays, Projects

This is going to be ridiculously long, so if you don’t read it, I don’t blame you. This blog was meant to be about homes, diys, and little bits of my life, but sometimes it turns into something more. Sometimes I just need to vent a little bit, or talk about something serious going on in my life. This is one of those times, and if anything, this blog has helped me grow as a person. It has let me vent things, I’ve never really told anyone, and all of a sudden I’m telling a bunch of people that I’ve never met, but who are all so supportive and kind. ❤

I’ve been in a rutt lately with work and life in general. I know where I want to be, but I keep telling myself, I’ll get there, I just have to get thru today. But I don’t make any changes to my day to day, I just keep going with this image in my head of where I’ll be in five or ten years. And I also put things off, I’ll put it off until tomorrow, or next week, or next month. But yesterday something happened. Yesterday, I decided to look up my horoscope, which I do from time to time. (I’m a Pisces) I get daily emails of my horoscope that I read everyday, but I like reading the extended ones since they are usually dead on. Yesterday was one of those days where I decided to check up on what my extended one said.

It said, “Try to be more open to change in your life today. Because if you are, you could enjoy a wonderful last-minute adventure! If you get too stuck on following your schedule to the letter, you’ll miss out on some fun, spontaneous stuff. Good for you for wanting to cross things off of your list, but is there any harm in putting a few things off for the sake of a picnic, lunch with an unexpected visitor or an exciting business opportunity? Let yourself have a good time if you can — you deserve it!”

I read this right after making a long boring to-do list, of things to do when I got home from work. So I decided you know what, screw the list today, I’m going to go to the drug store, pick up some hair dye & grab a notebook while I’m at it since I’m out of notebooks at home and I really love writing things down. I then decided to be nosey and look at the horoscope for the next day (which would be today) and it had a section in it, that I want to forever live my life by:

I’m pretty sure I’m going to turn that quote into a print so I can hang it on my wall. It’s the first thing I wrote on the inside of my notebook cover too. I tend to forget about myself and focus on others most of the time, until someone or something comes along that forces me to look at myself. I’ll mention something about my health, and then I’ll never do anything about it until Travis demands that I go to a doctor, or I end up in the hospital over a “vodka attack” as Christine calls it, haha, and the emergency room doctor tells me that I should probably get something checked out as soon as I’m better. So then I do. This quote was one of those times. I need to make some changes in my life and in my lifestyle.

I’ve made a list of things I need to focus on everyday, and ways to just make life less stressful, because I stress about everything.

• Don’t sweat the small stuff
  Life is too short to stress about the small stuff. Brush it off, and get to living life. I sweat the small stuff 24/7 & I need to stop. So my wreath is not done, and there is a dirty dish in the sink and my pants need washed; life is flying by you, don’t worry about that small stuff. It will all get done eventually, and you won’t even remember that stuff a week from now. No need to worry when it’s not that big of a deal.
• Family & Friends are the most important thing in life
  Someone can be taken from your life in an instance, so cherish the time you spend with them and spend as much time as you can with your loved ones. Camping trips with my family are some of my best memories and moments in my life. Growing up with your cousins is one of the best gifts your parents, aunts & uncles can give you. Your cousins are your first best friends, don’t lose that as you get older, hang onto them & stick together.
• Surround yourself with beautiful things & people
  I cannot be in a bad mood when I’m surrounded by mason jars, flowers and amazing people. Someone once said, “Have nothing in your houses that you do not know to be useful, or believe to be beautiful” You want to surround yourself with positive & kind people, you don’t want negative and nasty people in your life, that just brings you down, the same goes for things in your home. You don’t want something in your home that just makes you sad.
• Be Kind
  There are definitely a bunch of people out there who are cruel, judgmental and just down right mean. It blows my mind when I come across websites like Get off my Internets, how can you sit there and bash someone that you don’t even know, and why would you waste minutes of your life doing so. When your time comes to leave this world, do you really want to look back at your life and remember being so negative, and sitting behind a computer screen and trying to bring someone down just because you don’t like something. No, you don’t so be kind to everyone. You know those days where you are having a horrible day, and one act of kindness from a random stranger turns everything around. Be that stranger.
• Don’t stress
  I stress so bad that my hair falls out, everyday. I stress about money, and time, and my future. I need to forget about everything and just live for today. We will get a house eventually and it will be amazing, but I need to stop stressing about the money for it day in, and day out. Money makes the world go round, but it doesn’t have to make yours go round. I could honestly live in a 16 foot camper, and be happy as can be. I need to remember that stress has a negative impact on the people around me and a negative impact on my health, so stop stressing.
• Be who you are
  I’ve encountered a lot of people in my life who lie constantly, as if they are ashamed of who they are. Never be ashamed at who you are. I know a lot of people who are afraid that if put something out there about themselves, that it will not be received well. The people who truly love and care about you are not going to care, their opinion of you will not change, so say what you want to say. Let it out. I put myself out there every time I do one of these posts and I’m always scared as hell, but I do it. And if someone decides they don’t like me after it, then I don’t need them in my life anyways. Don’t be afraid to be you.
• Do what you love
  This is one of the ones I struggle at. If I was a millionaire, I’d be blogging, flipping houses, and saving animals. I’d be living on a small farm, where I’d drink wine on the porch in the mornings as the sun came up. (Breakfast of champions) But I am not a millionaire and never will be. However, the only thing on that list I’m doing now is blogging, but I’m doing it in an environment that I hate. (at my job & in my apartment) There is no quick or easy solution to these issues, it will all take time, but I need to take steps every day to make things better for myself. Spruce up that resume, put a little extra into savings, crack a bottle open at 6AM ;) Kiddinggg, maybe. I could sign up for a charity run to benefit animals, donate more to the puppy mills foundation then I already do. The list goes on and on, but one step in any of these directions, is the right step.
• De-clutter your life
  One thing that stresses me out and weighs me down is clutter. It suffocates me, so I need to get rid of it. De-clutter things whenever you can, I’m going to try to do this quarterly. There is no reason to hoard all of this junk, that you’re probably never going to use anyways, so donate it, pitch it, recycle it. Just get it out of the stress-zone.
• Be happy. Love, smile & laugh.
  Right now, be happy. Life is way too short to be anything but happy. The best moments in life are filled with laughter and they say cancer can be cured with laughter, so be silly and crack jokes. Smile at a stranger. And tell the most important people in your life that you love them.
  
• Life is an adventure, make it fun
  Take a break from everything, and go on a road trip. Go somewhere you’ve never been. Make a memory, they last a lifetime. Just go out there and live.
• Get rest, don’t burn out
  Just make sure you take you a break when you need it, you don’t want to burn out, or get yourself sick from just going & going. The best Sunday mornings I have is when we just lay in bed with the kitty, and laugh, catch up on our dvr shows and just relax.
• Get organized
  Being organized makes life sooo much easier. No more wasting 15 minutes looking for something, when it’s exactly where it should be. I actually figured out one way to get organized last night, I wrote down each day of the week (Mon – Fri) and put what chores I’d do that day, like laundry, vacuuming, dusting.. etc. So, as long as I do 1 – 2 chores a night, they won’t get overwhelming. Don’t let housework run your life, make it simple and easy, instead of piling everything into one day.
• Be healthy, but indulge sometimes
  Being healthy lets you enjoy life more. More energy to do so many more things. I’ll never forget when Dance Dance Revolution came out for the Xbox. I use to play that game every day after school and I was in the best shape of my life. I was on top of the world. Being healthy though is probably the hardest thing to do in my household, because we buy a lot of quick & processed meals, because we are always in a rush. I think I’m going to try to plan my meals out, pick up the ingredients I need, and actually cook. (If you just fell over from shock, my apologies.) Just remember though, if you’re eating healthy, you don’t have to skip dessert every single time. Indulge sometimes. Ice cream date nights are the best.
• Have goals, both big & small
  I think you always need to have something to strive for, even though you want to live in the moment. You still should have BIG goals, and then have small goals that will help you reach that big goal. I’ve always had goals in life, and I’m not going to stop now. You don’t want to just spin in circles in life, you want to move forward. So write down your goals, both big & small, and achieve them.

My apologies if this all sounded like a tacky hallmark card, but I’m hoping that you all get some kind of inspiration from this post, because it definitely worked for me. Or maybe I should just stop blogging nonsense. :-X By the way, While browsing “don’t sweat the small stuff” images, I found an amazing print shop here.
Linked up.

Posted on May 26, 2013 - 21 comments
 Filed Under: Goals & Dreams, Inspiration, My Life