Baby Steps All Around

Here's a future project. Hopefully, by the end of the year, they might get altered, LOL.

Well, overall Thursday was a bit better than Wednesday for me. I still have this bug, and I'm very depleted and tired but I really believe the intermittent nausea, cramps, etcetera, is slowing up. Not getting them quite as often. I'm thinking a couple more days and I might be feeling better. I called my doctor's office yesterday to ask if anything like this was going around, and there is an intestinal virus/flu making the rounds. Sounds like this might be that. I'll just continue to take it easy since there is little else one can do for that.

Here and there, I've been fiddling with my Goth ATC's, and applying thin multiple coats of Diamond Glaze over my rub-ons is doing the trick. So is heating the rubon for a few seconds with a hair dryer before applying them. I've also been applying them to vellum and since that is less porous than paper, I believe that helps. So, I contnue to have fun with those.

I'd sent the swap hostess the photo of them when I emailed her to drop out. She wrote back asking me to stay in it if I could and she would give me more time, because she loves my ATC's and they are exactly what she was hoping to receive. So, I'm back in the swap, I think, if I continue to feel well enough to sit long enough to do some work. We will see.

One reason I like doing this kind of crafting is because I'm learning a lot by trying different things out on the ATC's. I have different inks and it helps to know which ones dry faster and more permanently, which ones stay wet longer and can be embossed, etc. etc. I used some copper Brilliance ink to edge some vellum, and it really dried well. OTOH, the Versafine I used to edge another ATC took forever to dry, but I'd really globbed it on there, too.

Seems like I get to experiment more than when I do greeting cards, and although it doesn't have to be that way, that's the way it usually turns out. Anyway, I can take baby steps toward learning more about techniques, as well as getting experience so maybe I'll remember how to do them the next time...

Open hearts

I made these artist trading cards for a swap in one of my Yahoo groups that I used to be active in back in 2006, and I recently began looking for swaps again. This time I'm determined to be more choosy, though. I'm hoping to stick to holiday-themes, because you know those little wire trees you can hang ornaments on? I have a couple that can be used year-round if I'm careful, and I just thought they would make cool displays for my ATC's. And if the cards were holiday-themed, instant ornaments.

Anyway, we will see how it goes. I'll be getting some pink cards, and some St. Patty's or Easter, as well as some Valentine atc's. It's an experiment and an excuse to do some atc's but not get obsessed with them again, frankly. I can always make my own on any I need more of...

I think today's sidebar quote, another one from Maya Angelou, is one of my all time favorites. And, that's what I've been attempting on this blog, particularly with my Dare-->Bare-->Care-->Share goal for 2008. It's unsettling for me to try to bare my thoughts, but it has its rewards.

I was so heartened to see all the comments and emails from yesterday's post. What diversity of opinion, and I respect you for them. I'm also blown away at how civil and supportive most of you are, even if we hold different beliefs. Thank you from my open heart, my friends, for respecting me, too.

Did I mention that I've tried 3 times now to get all my hair chopped off? It just never worked out, so today I cut it myself again, not as short as I wanted a stylist to cut it, but it will help until I finally hook up with an appointment that's halfway on time and I don't have to wait forever and a day.

I basically bent over, brushed all my hair to the top back of my skull, tied it with a scrunchie so that it would stay sticking up some, then stood up and wacked the ponytail off. I knew I would get a shaggy look, and it seems okay so far. I needed to get the weight of my hair off my hair. In other words, it was breaking and coming out a little too much for me. Thank God I'm on thyroid medication or I'd be bald by now, I do believe.

I have found myself not washing my hair more than once a week in order to not have to comb it out, and leaving it up and pulled back as much as possible. So, I was needing to wash my hair today and I just did not want to take another shower with hair loss.

I got my wish. After I cut it, I showered, and not one hair pulled out. So, the weight must have lessened.

Speaking of weight, I cannot believe that I've remained steady for over 3 months now. Probably wouldn't hurt to get back on the loss regimen. I'm more convinced than ever now that for me at least thyroid med helps against gaining weight, but you still have to try to lose it. Some are lucky as heck and their weight just melts. Unfortunately, I'm not one of them, LOL.

Will It Be This Week?

...that it snows here?

LOL, just kidding. I know it won't, and I really don't want it to, as people just go wacko whenever it snows. That's a photo of the eastern sky this morning, taken on my back porch. Tres cloudy. The sun is usually blinding me, but not today. Hovering around 40 degrees, and I'm feeling very lucky. My heart goes out to you all enduring the below freezing weather, ugh!

Ok, back to what my title meant..."Will It Be This Week?"
...that I do everything I've planned for it?

I highly doubt it. Seeing as I plan way more than I realistically can do, that is. So, another new, fresh week for me to screw up, LOL. Dangit, why do I do that to myself?

I was thinking about that this weekend. Little things that set our moods, expectations, ways we judge ourselves (fairly or not so much) when we're not even looking. And ways we react without even fully ingesting what we are reacting to.

Heavy stuff. But here's my case in point before your eyes glaze over in utter confusion, lol. When Hubs and I got married, he already owned a home. He'd bought it with his first wife and kept it in the divorce.

And, it did not have a dishwasher, which I noticed right off the bat because I'd never lived without one. Even when I was a baby, we had one that rolled out and hooked up to the kitchen sink. No way was I gonna start living with one now, right? It was 1987, after all.

The week before our wedding, he took me to Conn's, had me pick one out, and then bought it, remarking, "Here's your wedding present."

Well, I thought he was trying to be funny. That was a joke, right? Uh, no, it wasn't. I decided to not make any drama over it, but I remember being a little insulted and just wrote it off to eccentric behavior on his part.

Now, from my first visit to Hub's parents' house, I knew his mom did not have a built-in dishwasher. She had the kind we had when I was a freakin' baby, except that her machine was not as old as I was by a long shot. I refrained from asking any questions as I didn't want to appear rude.

All these years go by, and I'm still just writing it off to eccentric behavior being genetic, okay? Cuz to my mind, no one in their right mind lives without a nice dishwasher, a built-in dishwasher.

This weekend, Hubs and I are talking about our new dishwasher and how I forget it's new and more modern and improved than the one we had for 10 years prior (the one after my wedding present one, which stayed in the house when we sold it in 1998). How I just automatically treat it like the old one, even though the new one is lots more powerful, yadayada.

Well, I make a quip about it being my third wedding present, and that hurts Hubs' feelings. I'm like, confused and ask him to explain.

Turns out, he had bought that first dishwasher for me as a sincere gesture of bigheartedness, because he was raised to be dead-set against them as a general rule.

"After all," he said, "my mom had to wait 20 years to get one."

Well, that just floored me. Not only did Hubs genuinely believe he was giving me more than his dad had given his mom, and a heckuva lot sooner, but I'd never even realised it! And, he'd never even realised that being against having a dishwasher wasn't even a belief he really wanted to own at all.

I swear, if O. Henry'd been sittin' there, he'd have had a new story line. It's just funny, we really do learn something new every day. LOL

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Hey, I have another layout on Scrap the Girls. I say this because you can, too. It just has to be a girl layout. It can be your child, but it can also be you or your mom or sister or friend. They want their readers to send them layouts. It's more like a reader's gallery than submitting and competing and all that crap that I avoid. So, if you visit that blog and believe in spreading your scrap love around, send them a few of your fave layouts about girls. You need to read the post to see what file size and where to send them, so check it out!
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Doesn't that look delish? Don't worry - it was. Food by Hubs, presentation by me. Another funny story here: he told me we were having mahi mahi. Now, call it a sixth sense, but something told me to ask him how he was cooking it. He was going to blacken it. I don't care for his blackened foods, but I'd never told him that. Now I was going to have to fess up, which I did. He got a little ticked, but begrudgingly said, well, I'll fry it in batter then.

Later, I go to make my plate for dinner, and what do I find? Pan-fried blackened fish. {Sigh}. He's just lucky it was delish, that's all I'm sayin...
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Now, what about this dish? It's called Simple Chicken and Sausage Gumbo. You can get the recipe HERE. This is a fave dish at Hub's workplace, and their food rivals any fire house, okay? If you are in the mood for gumbo, this is it.
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Did you ever know a dog that watched football? Our Reggie does. Here he is, catching the games yesterday with Hubs. I don't think Reggie knows how to yell at the refs, but when Hubs does, Reg starts howling. So, maybe I'm wrong...
Anyway, we've been trying to pay a lot of attention to Reggie and he's been lapping it up. I might pay a hefty sum to know what he's thinking. If he's missing Sheila, or even wonders where the heck she is. I know I'll never know this, but still, intriguing questions.

I do notice that he spends a LOT more time in the doghouse now. Granted, it's winter and cold, and that's where the space heater is. I will be curious to see if he continues once the weather warms. We always wondered if Sheila kicked him out of there, since we'd often find him outside when he was supposed to be sleeping...
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The 2peas blogger challenge for today asks: "If you set a New Years Resolutions, how are you doing with it?"

Well, I did not make any per se, but my WordQuad (Dare-->Bare-->Share-->CARE) implies my resolutions, since I'm trying to do more of those 4 things. And so far, I have:
1)dared to go through my "nice" dressy clothes and part with some outfits that I frankly looked silly in but had to have because the model looked great in it. I bared and tried them on first and looked in the mirror, I suppose to hope in vain that I didn't look silly, LOL. Anyway, I shared by donating them to charity when they called for home pickups. Gonna try to do that every time they call, til I get rid of all the silly stuff, and because I care.
2)Yeah, not gonna go thru the words in each case...that one above was just to show the process...I sent my layouts to Scrap the Girls, cuz they asked for them.
3) I've been keeping in touch with my IRL girlfriends more, as well as our couple friends.

Each of these have been conscious efforts, where my first response was not to bother. So, it's a beginning.

How Aimeslee Gets Her Groove Back....

... or attempts to, anyway. With me, it's always done by thinking and sculpting ideas.

I thought a lot this weekend about things: life, the new year, attitude, commitment, tasks, goals, dreams. I'm not sure I reached any concrete conclusions, but I do think I have some good leads about the directions in which I want to travel this year. And as I go about writing them down for you, I'm frankly amazed, just a little.

I realized how out of the loop and clueless I was just days ago. It's as if I've been piddling along in my own little world. Well, heck, I have been doing exactly that. Things I knew in my head needed to be decided this time of year were just not showing up on my radar, and I think it was on purpose. I need to ease into this year for some reason. This must be where the "No deadlines" thing is coming from. Anyway, none of these things actually are required of me, but now's the time to set them up if they are going to be done at all.

First, I've decided that the entire month of January is my time to celebrate New Years. It's all too much for me to have in place by 1/1, especially since I'm such an unrepentant slowpoke. Longer if I need it, and I probably will.

Second, what's my Word? This is not as easy to decide as choosing focus last year. I know the convention is one word, one little word, in fact; but, the Rebel in me is yelling. For one thing, I'm not feeling any one particular word over another. I mean, I have a list of like, 6. But no luck narrowing down to one. For another thing, I'm a fan of alliterative language, and I've been very fixated on two phrases using 4 rhyming words. It sounds really cheesy too, but it's where I want to explore right now.

Dare to Bare... Share to Care....

Visions of Care Bears keep littering the view. Half of me is almost ready to just accept them and incorporate them into the view, along with the rainbows that also appear. Pesky little devils. Yup, cheesy alright. Very too much 80's, right? Don't mean to, but the subconscious must want it badly.

I've almost decided to go with this WordQuad and just be different. I'm calling it One Little WordQuad. My Rebel side loves it. (rebel = artist)

Okay, it's official: I just blogged it in a comment to Ali herself, so no turning back. (Not that anyone is going to notice it, that is, LOL).

I had so much more to mention, but I'm needed elsewhere right now. I'll close with the 2peas blogger challenge for Today:

Do you try to get current pictures of yourself by doing a self photo shoot or having someone take them of you? If you have recently taken some new photos share with us

I actually do both now. Started a few months ago and already have double the photos of myself. (This sounds voluminous, but it really speaks more to how few photos I made of myself prior to now.) I've played with making typical MySpace-type self-photos (failing miserably and looking totally dorky), as well as bugging more people to snap the shutter for me. Both have their drawbacks, but I'll continue this way indefinitely.

Here's a favorite one from the holidays, of me with my Missy:


Have a great Monday!