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Tuesday, July 24, 2012

I need to write more!

I really do need to write more, maybe one day someone will actually read this blog and there will be nothing to read, and that will be very sad. I don't know how likely that is to happen, but either way I really should be writing more.  So, what have I been doing? I have been dieting, reading the 50 shades trilogy, getting over the depression that follows the 50 shades trilogy, sniffing scentsy, spending time with friends from out of town, randomly going cross eyed, finding out I need "all the time" glasses as opposed to the "reading " glasses of yore so apparently i'm getting old yay, snapping pictures at absolutely every turn, STILL adjusting to life in the commune (my in law's home), watching the view, eating pepper jelly, spending way too much time on Pinterest, moving furniture, reading apartment therapy.com, and quite possibly getting my urge to bake back. Today I'm making square corn dogs in my pampered chef brownie pan.  I'm hoping to bring in some extra writing help and spruce up this blog a little.

Monday, May 21, 2012

the business of pictures n stuff

To get back to where I was very recently, I officially accomplished a few tasks today. I enrolled back into a photography certification course (because while I know the basics, and a lot of the advanced, the certificate means a lot to me... and learning more than what I already know is a sure plus!). Super importantly I applied for my Tax ID and Occupational Licensing, purchased my domain, and worked out some hosting issues. So www.6seventeenportraits.com is officially a website, it is still pretty empty... I'm working on that.  I'm also working on free portrait sessions to friends and family to build up some fresh pictures for the website. I really hope to get support from my friends and family for my business venture. This has been my dream for a long time, and I'm determined to make it work. The name, of course, is the same inspiration as this blog. This blog has been big inspiration for me too. Thanks for being there blog, and readers (eh, reader? you there?).

Tuesday, May 8, 2012

I miss you Carrie Bradshaw!

     Sometimes I enjoy a lazy day.  Sometimes it is brought on by a bout of mild depression. That's when I enjoy a lazy week and a half. This time it is probably because I finished my class and have had nothing pressing to do for a little while. I have also made the decision to change the school that I'm attending. I don't really want to get into the details here about the reasons because I'm not an expert on the school itself, but there were some tuition and legal issues with the school itself that I'd rather not get myself into a bad situation with.

      All of that aside I am still planning to pursue my photography professionally and continue to attend classes. I am working on a new website portfolio for my work and obtaining a business license. I have also scheduled 4 portrait sessions this morning to brush up my portfolio and have some fresh work for the site. I know that it seems as if everyone who buys a camera or can use photo shop is a photographer these days... and sometimes it can be a bit discouraging. There is beautiful work out there. I also know it is very hard to break into a field already bombarded with amazing professionals and semi-professionals and really bad non-pros trying to come across as professionals.  This is a lot of the reason I have never really charged much for my pictures. I enjoy doing it and at this point have done countless family portraits, senior pictures, and kids photos. I have done 4 weddings.  I've been doing this for over 10 years now, I'm waiting for the time that I can get rid of the fear of looking like one of these really bad non-pros. I also hate over processed, over photo shopped photography. I assume that the only things that will help me is to do great work, and to have confidence in my work. So I'm growing up and building a website to showcase the work that I think I should be proud of.  Getting a few photo jobs out of it would be great, at least getting my family and friends to get me to do their portraits would be great (they don't, I don't even think most of them know I take pictures, or they just absolutely hate my work because they are always hiring out. This makes me feel super special and is a whole other story for a never time however.)

     So on these lazy days, like today, when I'm on the couch researching website building and setting up photo appointments, sometimes something as great as 2 hours of Sex and the City on E! and nap time align, and all is wonderful with the universe. While watching Carrie Bradshaw write her article on men, being single, and the pursuit of happiness, I realized how inspiring the show is. I think if Carrie had in fact given up on writing her column and moved to Paris for good she would have at least taken up blogging.  Between the cancellation of this show and Friends, NYC based (even if just in theory) shows are really few and far between. I miss them all.
 
      So that's what I've been up to, what about you?



(pic from http://eastcoastchic.com/carrie-bradshaw-adventurous-and-unforgettable )

Monday, April 16, 2012

Mondays are for...

Mondays are for organic toaster pastries, grits, coffee... blog updating... A new week of lecture reading, assignments, and text book chapters... Washing laundry from the weekend... Coffee with my sister... and later today Monday will be for rain.

To my shock, my first class is actually teaching me something. This is a strategies class for learning, doing college online, reading ability, time management, and basically how to work with your abilities and limits and use them to your advantage. One of the assignments last week was to make a calendar for everyday during the week to map out time for everything in your life. Of course including enough time for reading, studying, and doing assignments. I love my calendar. It has made me realize how much time everyday we actually spend doing very random meaningless things. Now I'm not one for enjoying having every minute planned out, but just allowing specific time frames for things has made it possible for me to accomplish an entire weekend in one day. Sunday my family woke up, showered and dressed, had coffee on the patio, played in the backyard, cooked on the grill, had a picnic, went to a birthday party, visited friends, made it home in time for baby bed time and mad men. It was very fulfilling to have such a full day to spend with my family. So if you can't tell, school is on week 3, and going very well so far.

One of the side effects of being so busy and not yet having cable in our part of the house is that I have been watching very little to no television lately. Mad Men on Sunday nights I watch when it airs, sometimes on Wednesdays I watch TV with the husband if I'm done with everything I have to do that day... and other than that i may watch one show online when i have the time. That's approximately 4 hours of television a week. Now lately my sweet pea has been in front of Sesame Street anytime she is home, luckily I've found her playing with her toys more even if the TV is on, but I hope to get her to do more without the TV soon.

That's pretty much what's going on in my head today. Now it's about time to get to work. I hope if anyone is reading this you have a great week!

Friday, April 6, 2012

Road trip, INSTAGRAM style.

Life at full speed

So this week I started school, part time, so far it's going well. I was able to complete all my assignments and reading for the week so that we could take a mini family vacation 3 hours north to visit family for Easter. We drove early this morning, eating at all our favorite road places on the way. Made it in time to still enjoy an afternoon at the zoo. This is my sweet pea's third zoo. I have been to more zoos in a shorter amount of time since having a kid than ever before in my life. Zoo's are fun.

Being the smart mommy that I am, I enabled tethering on my iPhone before we left town, so that on the ride and at my husband's aunt's house, in which we are staying, we could share the Internet connection. I luckily have the ability to access the Internet from my computer, and the iPad, and more importantly the iPod and Sweet Pea on the iPad... she may be a little spoiled? eh, who knows? We require a lot of technology to travel these days. I normally would have brought the iPad without the computer, but have I mentioned how much I love this thing lately? I LOVE this computer. I have had it since January, and I do believe I love it more and more the longer I have it. It is absolutely the best computer I have ever owned / used.  So many people told me it would be the best investment I could make in a computer, and that is so true.


Since we are road tripping it this weekend, I decided to bring out the big camera and snap some shots along the road and at the zoo. I'll follow up with an instagram pic post also. Tomorrow we shall search for more adventures.

Tuesday, March 27, 2012

blog about blogs and blogging...aka Bob LobLaw's Law Blog

I'm sorry, that joke never gets old... I miss Arrested Development. I think I have explained the reason I started this blog... if not i'm not going to do it now. I read blogs, I actually really enjoy the ones I read, here on the right of the screen. I've added some friends and family to the blog list also. Several of them I've been reading for a long long time. If you are reading this blog (who is reading this blog?) then I suggest reading these blogs.

Monday, March 26, 2012

one month, (two month, three month, four...)



It's been officially one month since the big move, and I think the depression has lifted.  It has either lifted or there has been so much going on that I haven't had time to be depressed. The husband and I were having a conversation in the car yesterday, during sonic's happy hour and nap time in the car, about how much happier we actually are now that things have settled. Routines have changed, Coffee is made every morning when I get up (of course on the rare occasion I get up first, in which I make coffee and the house people are appreciative.), my sweet pea loves to greet her morning with a cup of milk on the couch with her iPad, next to her grandpa if she is up early enough before he leaves for work. I have been getting laundry done and put away, keeping this house clean (probably cleaner) than my old house, and really trying to help out as much as possible. I think the depression was mostly not having our routine, I have become one of those people who are unhappy without a routine... what a scary thought. However, I am glad, exuberant, super excited that my family is happy here.



The husband found a job, with security, insurance, and lower pay, but not so lower that there will never be an end to this tunnel. The best part is that he seems to even like it. I don't want to speak too soon, but he said this himself.

While trying to prepare our house to be rented out, we discovered a few problems with a roof leak. The insurance company came out and I'm praying we will be able to repair it with the help of the insurance, but we have a plan if the insurance doesn't come through. I'm just hoping to be able to have our renters in soon and get this situation settled, because it's been a big cause of unhappiness and stress. I do love my old house though.



This past weekend was a huge party we threw for my In Laws with lots of family from out of town. They were both surprised and extremely happy and everyone had a great time. We have been invited to spend Easter weekend with the family 3 hours north where my husband spent all of his Easters as a kid. Next weekend is the Walk for Autism which is 2 hours away and we went to last year, and had a lot of fun with members of my family. The problem here is that these are two weekends in a row and we can't really afford to spend both of them out of town. I'm trying to figure out a way to work with this, but it's looking like I may have to give up my plans to spend time with his family. I'm okay with that because it's not something we've ever gotten to do and I think it means a lot to him.



Even with so much going on, I'm feeling springtime in the air. This makes me excited about the summer and summer activities. I'm hoping to do more library club, picnics in the park, and days spent outside like last summer. Last summer was a blast, I can't wait.

Friday, March 2, 2012

Yellow

It's been a while since I've been back here to write to absolutely no one. Mostly because we have moved, an I've been trying to piece what feels like my whole life back together. I don't do well with life events that make everything feel like I'm watching a bad movie. I'm expecting to wake up any minute now. Would I ever imagined that the economy would cause my family to pack up and move in with my husband's aging parents in an attempt to help us both? No, probably not. I just keep thinking of all the fun "back during the recession" stories I'll have to tell my grandchildren. The positives are that my new living room is bigger than my old one and I have lots of new decorative ideas, bigger kitchen (not that it matters, some people lose their sex drive when they go through a bout of depression, I lose the urge to bake.), and a nicer bath tub. The negatives are all the things I can't type about without crying like a baby. My husband has agreed to not complain when I decide to fill the emotional holes with decorative throw pillows. It's still early, I just keep thinking "it won't be forever" and hopefully the depression will go away eventually. Thanks, it actually helps coming here to talk, even though no one reads this. :)

Tuesday, February 7, 2012

Why do I still own things from when I was 14?

Why why why? I read that one of the traditions of the Chinese new year is cleaning, cleaning away last year's bad luck and making room for this year's good luck. It's an idea most people should take. Going through storage bins is making me realize that the ownership of stuff is a strange idea. I'm by no means on the verge of hoarding, but to still have two boxes of things from when I was a kid only reminds me that I was sort of a strange kid. I'm allowing myself one fairly small box of treasures to hold on to. It includes some old pictures, my late grandpa's handkerchiefs, and something silly from a childhood friend. I can't rationalize keeping anything bigger. In the back of my mind that box was there all these years, waiting to be sorted through, but it's important to remember that items aren't memories. All of this is an enormous task to take on by myself, with My Sweet Pea being a maniac, while the husband is working... I can't wait until its done!

Monday, February 6, 2012

Ack!!!

     We have lived in our current house for almost 4 years. It is an old house, built in 1947. Three nice sized bedrooms that range from large to office sized, and one tiny bathroom. This living room is considerably smaller than the one I had in our previous apartment. The kitchen is old, but functional... in reality, who couldn't use more counter and storage space? If you've never had to seriously ponder the amount of stuff one family collects in the time span of four years, you are pretty lucky.
     My husband wants to take a new career path, a completely different, starting with no experience, much lower paying career change. Okay so, he's wanted to do it for a long time but is now sort of being thrown into it considering that his current place of employment is closing. Sucky economy. However, looking at it from a positive point of view, he will probably be extremely happy finding something much less stressful.
   Both of these ideas come together in the fact that less money = less money to pay things, like mortgages, rising electricity bills, paper towels, and all those things we enjoy having around here.  We should look at this situation as being extremely lucky people. When we were first married, we turned a large enclosure added on to his parents house into a studio apartment of sorts. It worked out pretty well for us then.  Now considering going back there with 5 years of possessions and an 18 month old seems completely insane right?  It is, it really is. His parents are sweet people who are looking forward to having their granddaughter around. I keep telling myself that it's temporary, and it won't be absolutely terrible. We will have the "studio" area for a living/dining area, and a bedroom. The worst part will be getting rid of 85% of everything we own. Mostly because I'm not even sure what to do with any of it. I'm thinking about donating it to our Relay for Life Rummage sale at the end of February. I should turn my misfortune into something that could really help others shouldn't I? I have great friends who I am hoping to have renting my house for at least the next year, unless we decide instead to sell.  After reading articles and blogs online it really isn't an uncommon subject in this day and age. The economy really has been that bad. There are a lot of people way more worse off than us. We should consider ourselves lucky lucky lucky to have this opportunity to regroup and save and start again in the future. So after allowing myself one whole day to cry and be totally silly about the whole thing, I'm only going to look at this as us being completely lucky from now on. My Sweet Pea will have a fenced in backyard to play in and a roof over her head with several people who love her. I would give anything to live with my grandma that's for sure. Sometimes when it seems like life is being crappy, it really is showing you that life is good, just in a different way than you thought.
    Now to decorate and design my "pied-à-terre" if you will. I need some serious space saving design ideas.

Wednesday, January 25, 2012

It's Here!

I've done one of those things that a lot of people do every year, and fail miserably at.  I've promised things. I've promised to seriously write this blog, (okay that's different from writing it seriously, because I know this is not a serious blog, but it is something I've been inspired to do).  I've started many projects that are going to take up a significant amount of my time this year.  Well I'm here to tell you folks (who are you folks? seriously, no one reads this, does this make me crazy?) that it's January 25th and I'm sticking to my plan.  In order to create a business plan for a bakery/deli, start working on my photography (or graphic design) degree, be a more organized mother, and write this blog about all of it, I required a computer.

Come with me, I'll tell you a story completely irrelevant to anything you are interested in...

Last July, when my 2 year old Dell laptop said it's last goodbye, I remembered making a promise to myself that I would not purchase another computer unless it was a Mac. (I actually said this before I bought the Dell, but you know what they say about people and their promises.) So I purchased an iPad 2. I really wanted an iPad, they are very useful, and it has turned out to be a very good investment. (Especially for the toddler, kids as young as 1 LOVE the iPad and everyone thinks my daughter is a genius because she can work any iDevice with a basic knowledge of what to do.) So from there to here it's been all iPad for me, but of course more of this serious type adult work I've been trying to accomplish would be better done on an actual computer.  So I cried for 3 days, researched PC prices at all the discount outlets, and then sucked it up and ordered my Macbook Pro.  Writing this may be the 3rd thing I have done since turning it on.  Having been a PC user my entire Computer aged life (in my generation is like 12 or 13), using this is like being in a beautiful foreign land. Everything is so interesting and nice to look at but you have no idea what to do with any of it. I'm sure I'll learn and my amazement over not having a "backspace" key will subside and it will soon be as if the world was meant to work hitting the "return" key.

Tuesday, January 24, 2012

I'm really starting to consider getting one of this coffee pots with a programmable option. Waking up to a waiting pot of coffee would be great motivation to actually leave my bed in the morning. I have been coming up with ideas of things to blog about, but writing them on my phone is a bit of a pain. Luckily, after going 8 months without an actual working computer, I've purchased a MacBook. I just really couldn't see spending more money on another computer I didn't care for that wouldn't even last a year. I love my iPhone, and my iPad, so I really don't think this love will be any different. There are so many exciting things happening and I can't wait to do them and write about them here. Computer gets here tomorrow so hopefully I'll be back shortly.

Friday, January 6, 2012

Chicken noodle soup and building blocks

After making another successful pot of chicken noodle soup (from scratch), Sweet Pea and I decided to build castles out of blocks. (then went to bed only to stay up and watch 2 more movies, Gnomeo and Juliet and A Walk on the Moon) … Both better than the super cheesy movies of late (err earlier today anyway sorority wars) … I don’t know what’s with spending time on cheesy movies, but I think I’ll start heading in a better direction. Any Netflix movie suggestions sans cheese?

Tuesday, January 3, 2012

2012

I always feel like I watch far too much television, so we’ve changed our cable to the bare minimum and cancelled the DVR and TiVo services. (TiVo, I do miss you so.) However sometimes when feeling under the weather (or afraid of the weather,) I like to mindlessly get involved in one movie after another. Some of them aren’t good movies, none are really awful, but while they aren’t my favorite Netflix always provides the opportunity to watch movies I otherwise would have never paid to see, some I’ve just never seen, and some great classics.

So far this year I’ve watched these 8 movies, (it’s only the 5th day of the year.)

You Again (cute, good cast, one timer)

No strings attached (good cast if you are into Ashton Kutcher, I don’t have a specific Kutcher opinion as of late, he was good in this one. I always like Natalie Portman.)

Return to Me (starts a little cheesy, and I’m usually not a huge fan of Minnie Driver, but this is actually a good movie. It’s predictable but appealing to the nearest bored man. My sister’s boyfriend who happened to be here while I was watching got interested and watched with me.)

Little Black Book (ah Brittany Murphy, I really liked her in movies. Every time I see her I think about when she was in the area filming the movie skeleton key and was

too Hollywood

to stay at the Holiday Inn… But I digress, I always think about that poor girl when I see her in movies, it really is a shame she’s gone so young.)

Revenge of the Bridesmaids (I like Raven, watch if you are bored, beware of horribly executed Louisiana accents)

Father of the Bride (like you haven’t seen it. Recently my sisters and I had a day on my couch with ice cream and watched part II, so I’d been meaning to refresh part I in my mind.)

History of the World part I (Mel Brooks, Madeline Kahn, Bea Arthur… What more do you really want? One of my all time faves.)

9 to 5 (I love Dolly in everything, I love this movie, call me a sucker but I loved it when I saw it on Broadway.)

I wish I could this involved in books right now, too bad having a toddler and unimaginable loads of laundry don’t really make book reading as easy as watching movies.