Commitment

Inbox (1)

(Hooray, new email!)

Subject line: "what races are you doing?"

Uh oh. Busted. But in a good way! Knowing that someone read my New Year's Resolutions blog post (hi, L!) and specifically mentioned those running-related goals makes me even more committed to see them through. Would I sound wimpy if I told you that they make me nervous? I guess this is why "easy peasy" is not in the definition of "challenge."

After a week break from going to the gym, I was ready and eager to go to spin class tonight. I really welcomed the good workout. I was kinda surprised that there weren't more people there, given that many people probably had "work out more" on their New Year's Resolutions list.

I came up with this card when I was in spin class (I was paying attention to the workout, I promise). It's kinda like a word-find puzzle, except I already found the words for you. I wasn't sure about what I was going do do with the bottom half of the card when I was stamping the letters, but when I got a slight red smudge on it, I decided to cover it up with some red/white paper and tack on a black cardstock punched border. I think the card still turned out pretty. :)

Card Specs:
Ink: Colorbox chalk ink in Blackbird and Warm Red
Stamp: Inkadinkado (alphabet), Fiskars- Friendship Flowers (heart)
Punch: We R Memory Keepers Corner Chomper, Fiskars Apron Lace border punch
Paper: American Crafts- Metropolitan
Other: Black Sharpie Ultra Fine Point marker

My computer thinks it's still Christmas season. I've heard several of the Vince Guaraldi Christmas music from the Peanuts TV show. Oh well. It's soothing.

CPS #199

Well, folks. Today's the last day of winter break. Everything goes back to normal. The Christmas tree and decorations need to go back into their plastic containers. I must remember to wear business casual to work tomorrow, instead of the jeans and occasional hoodie I've been donning since December 20.

My sister is going back to school tomorrow and for her last meal at home she requested dumplings. So for about an hour this afternoon, my sister, my mom and I wrapped up dumplings for tonight's dinner. Can you tell which one I folded up? Mine's the one in the middle. Maybe my origami folding skills paid off?

Because I got some Michaels gift cards, I went there today to do some shopping. I was able to get a great deal on the pink Scotch Advanced Tape Glider (originally $39.99, but bought with 50% off coupon) and a bunch of sparkly brads to put in the center of my fabric flowers (all 50% off). As you can see in the picture below, I was very eager to use the brads. I hope the ATG gun is as awesome as everyone says it is. I went to A.C.Moore on the way home and bought some felt to put on the back of the flowers, pins to complete my fabric flower brooches (50% off), and some glue sticks for my new glue gun. My goal is to not make any more crafty purchases until February 2, one month from now. I have enough supplies to keep me pretty busy.

Below are some of the brooches that I finished making today. The flower center on the bottom right is one of the brads that I bought this afternoon. I used my Tim Holtz scissors to cut the prongs off. Those scissors have been such a great investment! All the other flower centers are buttons that I bought last Thursday. I pinned a red flower with a sparkly clear gem in the center to my black pea coat. So cute!
I tested out my new ATG gun with my card tonight. The assembly instructions were pretty easy to follow. I love how I don't have to worry about glue warping my paper and I don't have to wait for the glue to dry to continue with my project. I decided to tackle CPS #199. I used some paper that I purchased recently and a fabric flower that I made earlier today. I wanted to make a non-traditional colored valentine with no reds or pinks in the card (I'm considering the color of the fabric flower to be red-violet). Perhaps there's a non-girly girl out there that'd appreciate it.
Card Specs:
Ink: Colorbox chalk ink in Blackbird
Stamp: Studio G
Punch: We R Memory Keepers Corner Chomper, Fiskars Upper Crest border punch
Paper: American Crafts- Metropolitan and Letterbox
Other: Black Sharpie Ultra Fine Point marker
Brad: Recollections Gem Brads

New Year's Resolutions

Woot, happy new year! The family (+ Robyn) dinner last night was fantastic. We had a huge Chinese food dinner at a restaurant. My favorite dishes were the shrimp/crab ball and some tofu with this egg/crab/veggie sauce. I don't think the descriptions make the dishes sound that great, but I promise they were yummy. After dinner, we all went to my uncle's house and played cards and watched Over the Hedge until the ball dropped. The picture on the right is some of us (not everyone could fit in the frame) watching the ball drop in NYC.

Time for New Year's Resolutions. Let's revisit the ones that I posed last year and see how I did.

• Keep up with my blog and Etsy shop every day through promotion, posting, or listing. Check. This wasn't too hard. Even though keeping up with a handwritten journal was tough for me growing up, with the help of technology and my fast typing abilities, maintaining this blog wasn't a challenge at all. As for my Etsy shop, with the new shop tools, it's so much easier to manipulate shop settings and edit listings.
  
• Take a picture every day (Project 365). Err...this one didn't really go as planned. I thought I'd be able to take a non-card related picture every day, but my life's not that interesting. Maybe I need to make an effort to find the extraordinary in the ordinary.
  
• Maintain a healthy lifestyle (physically and emotionally) by continuing to attend spin class, not giving into my sweet tooth as much, and not taking b.s. from anyone. This one was also half and half. Spin class was a joy to go to this year, and I did somewhat pick running back up. However, I gave into my sweet tooth just as often.
  
• Partake in more random acts of kindness. I didn't really keep track of these. Is it still a random act of kindness if you already know the person? Are baking cookies and sending cards to people considered random acts of kindness?
  
• Learn a new craft. (Any suggestions? I'm leaning towards scrapbooking or crocheting.) I did pretty well with this. I learned more about scrapbooking through The Paperclipping Roundtable, but I only did one layout. And I didn't even get to share it because my camera ran out of battery power. I did try my hand at crocheting and sewing. I think I'll always be a paper crafter at heart, but I can't wait to explore making those fabric flowers further.
  
• Track my financial spending better by keeping receipts and entering data into MS Excel. I get an A+ with this one. I have a spreadsheet that has all my purchases itemized with different tabs on the bottom for each month of the year.
  
• Take a chill pill more often (a sister-submitted suggestion ::eye roll::). Hmmm. I dunno about this one. I'll let the people that know me better decide on this one. I probably freaked out as I normally do.

2011 Resolutions

• Repeats from last year: Keep up with my blog and Etsy shop every day through promotion, posting, or listing. Track my financial spending better by keeping receipts and entering data into MS Excel.
• Reach 625 Etsy sales by January 1, 2012. I'm currently at 485 sales.
  
• Complete a 8K in March 2011 without walking. I did this race in 2008, and my time was 54:22.
  
• Complete a 10K in April 2011 without walking. I also did this race in 2008, and my time was 75:55. It was a huge challenge for me because I hadn't trained very well for this race, and my knee was in a lot of pain during the last mile of the race. I want to do better this year.
  
• Continue to go to spin class, run more, and incorporate weigh lifting into workouts more often.
• Leave the nest. This is going to be tough as I have never lived by myself before. I guess it's time to grow up a little.
  
• Teach a class on origami. Hopefully this'll help me with my fear of public speaking.
  
• Increase my professional contributions at work and work towards a promotion.
  

I think that list will keep me busy in 2011. What do you think? Are there any goals that you have in 2011?

Here are 2 pictures that I want to share with you today. The first one is a squirrel that stopped by who had no tail! There wasn't even a stubby one! So weird. He seemed to be functioning find without it, but I dunno if he's able to climb across telephone wires and stuff like that. And then I also made a Valentine's Day card using the elephant origami model that I learned a few days ago.
Hope you all have a healthy and prosperous New Year! Let's do it.

Goodbye, 2010

I'm ending 2010 on a good note, and I hope that you all are too.

a. I spent most of the day making fabric flowers, paper crafting, and watching reruns of NCIS. Some of my favorite activities. I love how that black and white fabric has the illusion that it's made out of lace because of the pattern. I also tried making a pointed tip flower (vs. a rounded tip flower) and also a flower that has 6 petals instead of 5. I am becoming better friends with my new glue gun today.

b. I sold two cards from my Etsy shop today, after a 2 week drought. I was able to test out the scale that my sister gave me for Christmas. Yay, it DOES work!

c. We're having a family dinner tonight. Robyn, a friend from college, will be coming along too. I'm glad that the thought of spending NYE with my large family didn't scare her off.

d. I signed up for an 8K that's taking place in DC in March 2011. There's no turning back now! I'd better get my running in gear in the next few months!

Here's my card for today. I found a tutorial on how to make origami wreaths, and I happen to have some American Crafts scraps laying around so I decided to give this a try. I love this stamp because it covers, well, everything. I can't decide if this card is masculine or gender neutral. I suppose it could go either way. I'll have to find some Valentine's Day paper to make similar cards for Valentine's Day.
Card Specs:
Ink: Colorbox chalk ink in Charcoal
Stamp: Studio G
Punch: We R Memory Keepers Corner Chomper
Paper: American Crafts- Metropolitan
Ribbon: Spool O' Ribbon
White Gel Pen: Inkssentials

Lunch with Jessie

I was SO happy to be able to catch up with my friend from graduate school, Jessie, over lunch today. The last time I had seen her was over the summer, so we were able to update each other on travels, house hunting/buying, and other fun adventures since the last time we talked. Then I got to go home early because the Big Boss dismissed us at 1 PM. This allowed for a nice long nap when I got home.

I was working on my kanzashi flowers, but I did take a break to fold a new origami model (a lotus) using a YouTube tutorial. The guy speaks Portuguese, so I had no idea what he was saying. Fortunately, I could tell what he was doing just by watching his hands and occasional subtitle. Yeah, so the lotus has purple leaves. That's the scrap paper that I had on hand for practice.

Tonight, I went to A.C. Moore to get a glue gun with my 50% off coupon. I also ventured to the local fabric store to see if they had any cute fabric and yep, they did! On sale too! And the few buttons that I got were on sale too. Scoooore! My favorite flower is the blue one. Third time's the charm tonight. I finally figured out about how much to cut the petals once they are on the needle.

Movies at the Office, Day #3

Today's feature presentation at the office was Sling Blade. Like yesterday, I was in the middle of a conference call so I had to pass on the movie. I found it ironic that even though I was the one that organized the movie marathon this year, we didn't watch any of the movies that I brought in. But that's okay. As they are MY movies, I can watch them whenever I want. :)

I didn't find a new origami model to fold, but I did find a video tutorial on how to make fabric Kanzashi flowers by folding fabric and sewing the petals together. Fortunately, Mom had some leftover fall-y fabric, so I used it as a test until I can get to the fabric store and get fabric of my own. I have to get me a hot glue gun so that I can attach buttons and embellishments to the center of the flowers without worrying that they'd fall off. This regular glue is not going to work for fabric projects. I guess we all gotta start somewhere. On another note, I found it funny that the name of the person that made the video tutorial is Tina, too.

Here was this week's One-Layer Wednesday challenge (#34): Make a one-layer card using only one image stamp and no more than two ink colors. You may also use a sentiment stamp. Hmmm, this is kinda limiting, right? I guess that's why they call it a challenge. Duh. Here's what I came up with. I went with a mini card (2.5 inch square) because the regular A2 size was kinda big and intimidating to me for this challenge. Besides, I don't do mini cards very frequently so it was nice to step outside my comfort zone. I wanted to use my new Dear Lizzy stamps somehow, so I chose a bee and a sentiment stamp from a set that Meg gave me for my birthday last year.
Card Specs:
Ink: Colorbox chalk ink in Charcoal, Yellow Cadmium
Punch: We R Memory Keepers Corner Chomper
Stamp: American Crafts- Dear Lizzy- Warbler (bee), I can't find the brand of the stamps that the sentiment comes from.

Movies at the Office, Day #2

The feature presentation at the office today was the movie 21. I was in the middle of a conference call so I wasn't there when the movie started and by the time the call was finished, the movie was well underway. And since it's kinda tough to see a movie from the middle, I decided to go outside and get some lunch. I ended up getting a little more than lunch. In a good way of course.

I started out at Panera. The line was too long, so I left. I went to Potbelly. Same problem. Fine, I'll go do some shopping. I saw clearance signs everywhere. I started out with Ulta, where I found a clearance section of nail polish. I found two that I liked from China Glaze: a bright green and a very deep navy blue. Check out the regular price- $6.50 each! And then the sale price. Mwah ha ha ha. I love a good deal! Then I went to Borders. No no no. I wasn't looking for books! That'd make too much sense. I was looking for chocolate. I found some peppermint bark from Ghirardelli that was 50% off. Score. Yummm. As if I didn't have enough chocolate running through my bloodstream already. And then finally, I went back to Potbelly and got my roast beef sandwich. :D

I'm still on a find-new-origami-models-to-fold kick. I saw this video on how to fold an origami elephant last night. I practiced with some regular ol' copy paper earlier tonight and then when I found that it wasn't that difficult, I used some grey origami paper. Woot.