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Stupid Beading Tricks: Earrings for Coworkers and Election Day woes.

By on November 6, 2012 in I have family and friends, I have hobbies, I make jewelry

Happy Election Day! We voted a little after 7am and then got coffee and a donut at Dunkin’ Donuts to celebrate. There was no line and we received no stickers. I have never received a sticker for voting. Eh, no big. In other Election Day news, I am staying off of Facebook for a few days. When I made a plan this morning to post a picture of agreen “X” illuminated next to Roseanne Barr’s name just to piss off everyone there (“Hey, guys, I listened to ALL of you and voted for candidate that NONE of you trashed! Click “Like” plx!) I realized I needed a break.

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In the meantime, I’ve made a few earrings for my coworkers.

“CC Rider” — beads wrapped around a circle frame with a Swarovski dangle in the middle. My first foray into ombre.

“Life’s a Beach” – featuring shell drops by Lillypilly Designs.

“Griffith Lane” – I handmade the teardrop frames. I swear the middle bead on each earring are the same color. There’s an AB finish on one side.

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My NaNoWriMo Novel Permanently Shelved is trucking along. I’m still on track to finish on time and will break the 10,000 word mark today!

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Being cheap!

By on April 9, 2012 in I bake things, I have family and friends

Easter dinner was held at the lovely Kristen’s house* and it was magnificent. I was tasked with bringing dessert. I checked out Pinterest for inspiration and found these:

There's a mood-killer, hm?

Whoa. While completely in tune with the THEME of Easter, the tone of those cupcakes borders on the macabre. (I have no idea where these came from. The link on Pinterest was spammy)

Rather than recreate The Passion of the Pastries, I decided to make a carrot cake. I found a carrot cake recipe on Smitten Kitchen. I have NEVER gone wrong with Deb’s recipes.

It was around noon today that I realized I had no way of taking a layer cake anywhere. I don’t have a cake carrier. I wandered into CVS after church** and while I didn’t see any cake carriers, I saw that they were selling Easter baskets for $5.99 and basket wraps for $1.99. Score!

I filled the bottom of the basket with crumpled up aluminum foil and put a cake pan on top of it to build a raised base. I set the finished cake on a plate and put the plate on top of the pan. Wrapped the basket up and voilà!***

An Easter-y (and cheap!) way of taking a cake to dinner. And oh my gosh the cake was so good.

*and my brother John’s house too but he doesn’t have a blog or bylines anywhere.

**I went back to church today. It felt really good.

*** Not viola. Not walla. Not wallah.

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Puzzling behavior

By on January 4, 2012 in I have family and friends, I have hobbies, I love Disney

I grew up doing puzzles every summer. We’d keep a puzzle on the kitchen table and add to it as we passed back and forth. Then, my family being who we are, we’d keep a tally how many pieces each of us properly completed. And when the puzzle was finished, the winner would gloat. Then we’d go and get another puzzle.

Unfortunately, having a bento box sized apartment, we don’t have a lot of space for puzzles. But oh how I yearned to feel that familiar soft thuddy click of a puzzle piece sliding into place. So last weekend we bought a cheap card table and one folding chair at Target.

And a puzzle. Yes, shut up, a Disney puzzle. But what I really like about this one is that the characters are roughly placed in the geographic locations where their stories took place. So Mowgli is in India and Tiana’s in the US Southeast and the rest of the Princesses are taking part in #occupyEurope.

Naturally, the puzzle we chose is too darn long for the card table, so we’re doing it in halves. When we’re done we’re going to glue it together and forget about it in a closet put it on the wall somewhere.

And then we’ll go and get ANOTHER puzzle!

**
And hey, tomorrow around 9:15am EST, could you send me some positive “knock-em-dead, champ” vibes? Maybe hum the awesome beginning measures of “Welcome to the Jungle.” Dun-nuh-nuh-nuh! Dun-nuh-nuh-nuh! Dun-nuh-nuh-Dun-nuh-nuh-Duh-nuhnuhnuhnuhnuhnuhn. Thanks, all!

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Get thee behind me, rotten week!

By on June 26, 2011 in I have family and friends, I love the Internet, I work for a living

I’m so happy it’s Sunday because this past week was one of the worst ones I’ve had since 2006. Let’s have a crazy week in review…

1) Sunday: Father’s Day. Talk to Dad & learn that he’s having some nonbloggable (but not health) issues. Ugh.

2) Monday: Calm, which is good because I needed it for Tuesday…

3) Tuesday: More layoffs at the Courier-Post. We lost 13 that day including my manager, whose position was eliminated. This means more work for all of us. I don’t know how many times I can go through watching my friends and coworkers leave HR with teary eyes and an envelope.

Also, Tuesday was Mom’s first follow up post ankle break. She was told that the bones were healing wrong and she had to have surgery to pin it together. Plus, this resets her recuperation calendar. Grand!

4) Wednesday: Mom gets the call that her surgery will be Thursday. John* and Kristen take Mom to Jefferson in Philly for five hours of pre-admission testing.

Meanwhile, I get an email saying that I didn’t get a job I was hoping to get. I’ve been working that prospect for over 2 months. I made it through 2 interviews and didn’t get the job because I don’t know Drupal. Feh. I should really learn Drupal, I guess.

5) Thursday: Mom’s surgery. I take the day off. John and I leave her place at 5:15am and I don’t get home ’til after 8pm. Luckily, sugery goes very well and now the offending ankle is pinned and plated together. She’s back to “stay off your feet as much as you can for 2 weeks” meaning we’re all still going back and forth to make sure she’s fed and her dog is taken care of.

6) Friday: Back to work. The day is piles of crazy, because we’re all trying to adjust to being shorthanded again. It’s just a stinking sad day.

7) Saturday: WM (remember him? He’s awesome and wonderful because he’s been keeping my home fires burning and our dogs fed and happy while I’m running around like a nut. Everyone should have a WM.) and I go to the Celtic Fling at the PA Ren Faire site. We have a GREAT time until I’m felled by the Vile Goddess Menstrua. Now seriously…it’s been YEARS since I had cramps so bad that I’ve had to mention her. Plus I’m remotely trying to fix some advertising problems that I have no control over anymore.

Along the way, I gnawed off all of my fingernails, hemorrhaged cash, exceeded my text message allotment and was hit with a round of stress-induced rosacea.

But today’s a new week. Right now I’m off to Mom’s to take care of the lunch & dinner duties. Tomorrow I’ll go to work and try to juggle some more responsibilities.

*John’s week was worse than mine – he took last week off entirely to just chill at home. Worst. Vacation. Ever.

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