Wee Memories Challenge #53

I had intended to go to the gym this morning for spin class, but I realized that I didn't have any gym clothes left. Oops. Minor laundry crisis. Instead I made the best of my morning...I completed the following all before noon, suh-weet!

a. Did 2 loads of laundry.
b. Vacuumed 2 levels of the house.
c. Went grocery shopping. I saw my uncle and aunt there. I couldn't tell if my aunt was monitoring the items in my cart. I hadn't gotten very far in the store so she must have thought I don't eat very well. I think the only items in my cart were random things like chocolate chips and mayo. My uncle saw me in the dairy aisle, trying to decide what kind of spreadable butter I wanted. I bought a pint of the Ben and Jerry's Red Velvet Cake ice cream and was underwhelmed (say what?). I should have gotten Phish Food.
d. Went to the bank to get some docs ready for house hunting.

When I got home, I was diving into my roast beef sandwich. Ginger was being very needy behind me. She had the "I wanted to remind you that I'm a fan of roast beef too. Do you want to share? :D" Yeah, I caught the hint, thanks.

I made another batch of the chocolate chip sour cream muffins I made yesterday so that my cousin could bring some back to campus with him and then settled in for a very nice afternoon nap. Got woken up by said cousin, who was outside, ringing the doorbell and calling my cell. "Are you home?" Yeah ok ok. Dad was vacuuming downstairs so he didn't hear the doorbell either. I had to get up anyway, and much to my surprise, it was sunny outside! I thought it was going to be rainy. Huh.

Since some of my gym/running clothes had air dried from this morning, I went for a 4.85 mile run around the neighborhood this evening to make up for not going to the gym this morning. I saw a bunny and petted on of the neighborhood cats. :)

Currently reading: The Undomestic Goddess by Sophie Kinsella. I had read it before when it first came out, but found it for $1 at a recent used book sale.

Here's my take on Wee Memories Challenge #53:"Girls Just Wanna Have Fun- So for this week you will create projects with a girly theme i.e. dresses, purses, shoes, hairbows, girly colors, etc. Anything Girly!!" I decided to use this opportunity to use some Asian themed stamps that I bought on clearance recently. I used paper piecing as a way to add color to the girl since I don't have markers. As for accessories, I cut out a couple of fans from scraps of patterned paper. Finally, the sentiment. I should have done the sentiment first, but I instead adhered everything and then thought "Ok, what about a sentiment?" I didn't want to use embossing powder and risk getting the powder everywhere on the card and I didn't want to stamp a sentiment because what if I stamped it wrong? Fortunately, I had a pack of Thickers that I got at TJMaxx recently that I hadn't used yet. Ah, perfect. Ta da!
Card Specs:
Ink: Colorbox chalk ink in Blackbird. Tim Holtz Distress Ink in Tattered Rose
Stamps: Recollections- Kyoto (girl, fan).
Paper: American Crafts- Letterbox, Dear Lizzy
Die: Spellbinders Nestabilities Labels 4, Spellbinders Nestabilities Labels 8
Embossing Folder: Cuttlebug (Swiss Dots)
Stickers: American Crafts Glitter Puffy Thickers in Bumble
Foam adhesive: Thermoweb

Fall-To Layout #137

When looking for new recipes to try, I've been going to Tastespotting recently. For example, today. I wanted something sweet. I had my eye on a lemon poppy seed recipe, but because of the rainy weather, I didn't really feel like going outside to do some grocery shopping. Instead I went on Tastespotting, and when I was browsing, I saw a recipe for chocolate chip sour cream muffins. I never thought to put sour cream in muffins, but the reviews were positive and I actually had some leftover sour cream in the refridgerator that I didn't really know what to do with but also didn't want it to go to waste. This recipe was a great solution, and the muffins turned out great! I think it's the sour cream that made them so moist. Yum!

Have you seen the new Simon's Cat video? So cute and funny!

I went to my uncle's house for dinner tonight, and it was sad to not have Petty there :(

For Fall-To Layout #137, I knew exactly which embellishments I wanted to use. My sister had given me some cherry blossom stickers, and I wanted to use them for a card that I'm sending to my friend for her upcoming birthday. Purple is also her favorite color, which worked out fine because it jives with the pink blossoms. The purple patterned paper was added on at the last minute because I thought there was too much plain cardstock...the black, pale blue, and purple. I think it balances the visual interest.Card Specs:
Ink: Colorbox chalk ink in Blackbird, Rouge
Stamps: Fiskars- Birthday (sentiment), K&Company- AB Lotus Floral Stamps (flower)
Stickers: Jolee's Boutique- Together Blossoms
Paper: Die Cuts with a View
Buttons: Bucket White from Michaels. Favorite Findings in Pink.
White Gel Pen: Inkssentials

At the Office Goals, Part 2

Well, today didn't get off on the right foot (woke up late, left the house late, got to work late) but it got better as the day went on.

a. Got an Etsy sale this morning. #561. I'm creeping up to #600, yay!

b. Attended a really good presentation on public speaking at work. This was a very timely event because I talked to the Executive Director this past Monday about starting a speech club at the office. The idea would be to give staff an opportunity to practice their public speaking, while sharing what they've been working on either at the office or in their personal lives. The ED brought that up at the end of the presentation today and a part of me was like "Uhhh, that was MY idea." Then he asked the group "who thinks this is a good idea?" Of course, I raised my hand. "Of course you think it's a good idea, Tina. This was your idea in the first place." Oh, good. He remembered.

c. My other pet project at the office is starting to get some support too...the idea of having the junior staff getting together once a month to talk about stuff we're working on. The senior staff have a similar monthly meeting, but we need that type of venue to trickle down to my level. If I can get this group and the public speaking club running by the summer and have it catch on, I will be very happy.

d. Ended my work week with a 4.85 mile run around the neighborhood. I decided to give myself the day off of work...I need to recharge and make a conscious effect to step away from my work email. By the way, catcalling a runner while you're riding in a beatup minivan isn't really sexy, mkay? Dumb boys.

e. Painted my nails tonight. China Glaze: Little Drummer Boy, which is a dark dark blue.

At the Office Goals

Instead of working on a card tonight, I worked on outlining my accomplishments at work. With performance reviews coming up and budget cuts looming, I want to make sure that I can articulate what contributions I've made so far and what contributions I can make in the future. Whether or not I actually get a promotion isn't really up to me, but at least I can do my part and document what I've been up to and put that information forward.

::crossing fingers::

CPS #214

Ok, it's time to get serious. I officially signed up for the Capitol Hill Classic 10K tonight (race date: May 15). No more dragging my feet. No more "I'll register later." No more "Uhh, that scary scary hill at the end of the race." ithinkicanithinkicanithinkicanithinkican. On a related note, the HR director at work is a hardcore runner, and she's been encouraging me to do a running training program. Errr. Running with people? I dunno about that. What if I slow them down? I think she sensed my hesistation when I was talking to her in the hallway yesterday. She offered to put together a training program for the 8K I'm shooing for in the fall. With her and Meg (who texted me earlier today "Did you sign up for the 10K yet?"), I'm very lucky to have motivators.

Janice the Tuesday night spinning instructor was out today. The substitute was a lady who used to be a student and then she decided to take the instructor class. You go, girl! It was a good work out. I would totally take her class if she was subbing again.

I finally watched "The Hangover" last night. Yes, yes, I'm very behind. My former officemate let me borrow it and I felt bad that I hadn't returned it yet. It was funny, but I don't think I would shell out $10 to see it at the theater.

Here's my take on CPS #214. I was determined to use some chipboard elements so I dug out some cherries from American Crafts. I wasn't so precise with my stamping and accidentally got some on the pale green part and mis-stamped a pink flower. Solution: cover up the ink with the border strip and double stamp flowers so that they all look like the one that I goofed up on. Heh. Crisis averted.Card Specs:
Ink: Colorbox chalk ink in Blackbird, Rouge
Stamps: Hero Arts- Thinking of You Messages (sentiment), K&Company- AB Lotus Floral Stamps (flower)
Punch: Fiskars Scalloped Sentiment border punch, We R Memory Keepers Corner Chomper
Paper: American Crafts- Dear Lizzy (green), American Crafts Specialty Paper in Pearl (blue)
Chipboard: American Crafts- Fieldhouse- Glitter Blue Skies
White Gel Pen: Inkssentials
Foam adhesive: Thermoweb

Song of the day: "Shark In The Water"- V V Brown. Nancy the substitute spin instructor played this tonight.

Leadership Conference Follow-Up

I had a meeting with the Executive Director and the Chief Operating Officer this morning to debrief them on the leadership conference that I went to about a week ago. I told them about the new initiatives I had in mind, and they responded positively to them and gave me the green light to pitch the idea to the senior staff. At the end of the meeting, the ED said something to the effect of how I was quiet and won't really get in people's faces about getting things off the ground. I was laughing on the inside because of course he'd think I'm quiet. That's because a) he's the ED and b) we're not related. I'm glad that I had a meeting with the leadership this morning and I followed through with my plan. I'm not one to go straight to the top, but I guess in order to get stuff started, what better way to make yourself vulnerable and bring it up to the Big Boss? My next goal is to find some partners-in-crime.

Today's card is another one that started out with what I already had on my desk. The floral patterned paper was from the 1st try of this card, but I cut it too small. It was too big a piece to put in the recycle pile, so I decided to put it to good use. I wanted the flower to be the main focus of the card, so I decided to embellish it with some glitter glue and white faux stitching. I didn't want to cover patterned paper with glitter because a) it'd be overwhelming and b) the paper would probably start to warp. I don't use glitter a lot because I don't like risking it falling everywhere, but the glue helps set it.

Card Specs:
Ink: Colorbox chalk ink in Warm Green
Paper: American Crafts- A La Carte
Stamps: SEI- Winter Song (sentiment), Hero Arts- Cling Dots
Punch: Martha Stewart Doily Lace border punch
Glitter glue: Studio G
White Gel Pen: Inkssentials

Song of the day: "Heartbreak on Vinyl" - Blake Lewis. Heard it at spin class tonight.

Fall-To Layout #136

Here's my take on this week's Fall-To Layout (#136). I think that any cardmaker needs to have a few sets of go-to alphabet stamps. That way, you're not restricted to just sentiment stamps, you can make your own sentiments. Today, I wanted to use what was already laying around my work space. I started out with a card base that had a yellow piece of cardstock adhered on it. I masked off about 1/3 using a Post-It and stamped some berries on the remaining 2/3rds. I liked the tone-on-tone effect brought about by the Yellow Ochre ink. I added other elements from my scrap pile. I started out thinking that the sentiment would be "Celebrate" but then I realized that I wouldn't have enough space, so I did "Call Me? Miss You" instead. Even though the sketch has a button as an embellishment, I decided to use the tiny rhinestones for a little sparkle.
Card Specs:
Ink: Colorbox chalk ink in Prussian Blue, Yellow Ochre, Blackbird.
Stamps: K&Company- AB Lotus Floral Stamps (leaves), American Crafts- Rue (alphabet), Fiskars- Friendship Garden (flower)
Paper: American Crafts- Abode
Punch: We R Memory Keepers Corner Chomper, Martha Stewart Doily Lace border punch

Song of the day: "Some Kind of Wonderful" - Grand Funk Railroad. I went to Janice's 1-hour spin class this morning (I had to get my fix because she'll be on vacation for a little bit) and at the end of the class, when we had one song left, she called out my name, "Tina, Jessie J or old people music? Jessie J?" I shook my head no. I don't like that "Price Tag" song. I figured any old people music would have been preferable to the Price Tag song. This was the old people song she played. I think it'd be a good running song.

My spinning buddy had her baby at the gym today. "Can you say hi to Tina?" And my friend wiggled her baby's feet and the baby smiled. Awww, yay! The baby had cute rubber ducky pjs.

Link: Cute marriage proposal story.