Firsts on the First

In honor of it being the 1st, I thought I would share some firsts with you. My original paln was to dig out some old pictures and somehow make them digital. Yeah, that didn't happen...

My First Car

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1983 Toyota Corolla. Mine was cream. With brown interior. His name was Tommy.

My First Cassette Tape

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The Bangles "Everything" My parents gave me this for Christmas when I was in first grade. It had such kid friendly tracks as "In Your Room" and "Eternal Flame." I was given this with my first boom box. Before that I had a record player and hit vinyl that included Mickey Mouse.

My First Boyfriend
It was 7th Grade. His name was Dustin and we "went out" for 7 months. Which is like an eternity in middle school time.

My First Job

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I worked at a store in the mall that sold fancy clothes for little kids. Christening gowns, tuxedos, flower girl dresses etc.

First Concert

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New Kids on The Block. It was on Valentine's day. I think I was in 2nd or 3rd grade maybe. Jordan made my little kid heart swoon.

What are some of your firsts??

In the news...

I try to stay up on the news. I watch the local new in the morning as I am getting ready (mostly for the weather), and I try to catch up on the world news at night. But if I am being honest, politics bores me. I really hate it when people post political type statuses on Facebook, even if it is for the candidate I am voting for. (Really, it just causes drama, no reason to do that). Any who, most of my news and I get from the yahoo ticker or TMZ. Here are some highlights from the week.

Did you see this story:

Dentist pulls out all of her ex-boyfriend’s teeth after split

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Basically, this guy cheated on his girlfriend (his dentist), they broke up he went to her because he had some tooth pain and she freaking PULLED OUT ALL HIS TEETH! My favorite quote from the article: "I tried to be professional and detach myself from my emotions," Anna Mackowiak, 34, told the Austrian Times. "But when I saw him lying there I just thought, 'What a bastard' and decided to take all his teeth out."

Obviously, I don't condone pulling out your ex-boyfriend's teeth, but seriously WHY WOULD HE STILL GO TO HER? Isn't there like thousands of dentists in the world? And, I can't say that I haven't thought about causing harm to an ex-boyfriend after thinking the words "What a bastard."

This next story just makes me real mad...

Teen Mom' Amber Portwood Ordered to Pay Up After Mooching Off Poor People

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Amber is the crazy one from Teen Mom. She's the one that was put in jail for beating on her baby daddy and drug use. Any way, when she's not in jail, she has been living in subsidized housing for low income families. That makes sense since she is a single teen mom. EXCEPT she lied about her income on the housing application. Last year she made over $200,000. Way over. $280K! WHAT!!! I have a masters degree, my husband has a college degree and we don't even make half that. Are you kidding me MTV? 

And a video story that made me smile (I needed it after that crap above!)

You can read it here. So this is in China. That dog guards the bike while his owner runs errands around town. Then he rides on the back of the bicycle to the next errand. I freaking love it. My dumb dog barks if I try to leave him outside the library to check out new books. Boo for my dog.

He is cute though :)

Have you found any crazy news stories lately?

30 before 30

I turn 30 this year. In about 114 days in fact. (That means you have 113 shopping days until Christmas!) With just 3 1/2 months left in my 20's, I have decided to come up with copy cooler people than me and write out 30 things that I need to do before the big day. There are tons of these lists out there, but most were written a few years out from the big day. I have about 3 months, so I  am setting up two rules for my 30: Realistic in the time frame and the item must really only depend on me to make it happen. (For example "Go to Australia" is not realistic in the next 3 months so it doesn't go on my list.)

1. Vegas with my hubby!
2. Finish another 1/2 Marathon
3. Sew something that I am not embarrassed of
4. Reupholster something... (I guess I need something to recover!)
5. Create a gallery wall
6. Frame & display wedding pictures
7. Lose some weight. (I hesitate to put a number on this. I want to be healthy and feel better about myself, and it has to be a realistic number. I'm thinking 15-20 lbs??)
8. Go vegan for a week
9. Cook a new recipe once a week
10. Let people know about this little blog and get some followers
11. Continue blogging 4-7 posts a week
12. Clean out the spare room (formally wedding room, now disaster room)
13. Paint the hall and bedroom
14. Get a make-over and buy some of those products
15. Send Christmas cards
16. No fast food for a month (Does Subway count? What about Dutch Bros/Starbucks??I will have to decide...)
17. Take a necklace I inherited from my gramma in to have some links added
18. Do something from my pinterest boards
19. Get a massage
20. Do a version of Stephanie O'Dea's Daily 7
21. Meal plan for three weeks straight and follow the plan!
22. Go see a movie by myself
23. Have my eyes checked.
24. Get a new work ID (with my married name)
25. Take a cooking class
26. Send birthday cards in the mail, even to people I see regularly
27. Stay a week ahead at work
28. Floss
29. Put 10% in savings from each paycheck
30. Roast a whole chicken

Bathroom Desk: What I learned

As I said, the desk I found to give me some more storage/counter space in the master bath was in not so good shape. I don't have any "before" pictures, but know it was a used kids desk that had been marked down three times before it found its way into my home.

I took Little One (the desk) outside and put it down on a drop cloth. I wiped it down and used some goo-gone on the stickers/tape that was stuck to it. Then I went over the whole thing with sand paper and a couple of coats of marshmallow white paint later, I was (for the most part) pleased. I switched out the drawer pulls with some pewter colored pulls from Home Depot and brought it inside and set it up. I liked it, but something was missing. I looked through some inspiration and decided I needed some cute little birdies on the drawers. Since I am a no good draw-er, I did the next best thing and went to etsy for some vinyl decals. I found these from etsy seller Cherry Walls and purchased them in violet.

I added the lovelies (after the three week wait time for freshly painted surfaces) and I lurve the outcome. So cute! The Mister said he put Garbage Pail Kid stickers to his furniture when he was a kid. So it's the same. Here she is:

See how perfectly it fits in the space? And its just the right size for kitty box!

And the up close at the adorable little birds. See my little attempt at staging on the top?

Admittedly, I am a novice a furniture refurbishing so I learned a bunch of stuff from this first "big" project.

What I Learned

1. Small dings in the surface are magnified with paint. Next time, use wood putty to fill in those dings for a smoother finish.

2. Drawer pulls are kind of spendy. I happen to like the less expensive ones, and only spent $2 each, but there were some that were $6+ each. Yikes!
3. Vinyl decals are fun! There are so many on etsy that you can customize with colors/words. Plus, I just saw some at Target the other day that are fairly inexpensive. Putting a larger decal (a whole wall!) would be quite the undertaking, but could make a (removable) impact on a room.

4. The Mister does not share my vision when it comes to redoing furniture- yet. I think he will come around. Maybe.

Top 5 Friday

I've seen Top 5 Friday around the interwebs, so I guess I'll give it a shot :) Next week is the last week of summer break before I go back to work. Well, I guess this week is the last full week, since we have meetings on Monday and Tuesday, but there are still 5 open days after that (Weds-Sunday) + this weekend. So for my very first Top 5 Friday, I dust off my summer to do list and pick what I really NEED to get done.

Top 5 Things I Want to Accomplish This Week

1. Paint the hall- When the Mister and I got back from Kauai I decided I was sick of looking at the country stencils all over the house, and finally chose paint colors. I completed the living room in two days. The kitchen paint took longer... week and a half ish. (I took a lot of breaks.) I have a gallon of Manhattan Mist that has been sitting in the garage far about a month, so it's time to get-r-done.

2. Finish my new jewelry holder- I was inspired by this post on Better After. I have it started on the deck now. My first How To post perhaps?

3. Organize the Christmas Decorations- Yes, it is August. This may seem like a weird thing to have on my Top 5 now but let me explain. This summer we finally started to clear out our garage and after two large trips to the Goodwill drop off and filling our garbage can AND recycling bin to the brim we were tired. I told the Mister I wanted to go through and get rid of a bunch of the holiday stuff and to organize it. That was about a month ago. (During the same time that I bought the paint for the inside.) The Mister brings it up every few days. I'd like to get it done while he's at work one of these days.

4. Homemade Mac and cheese- When I mentioned I wanted to try to make this to the Mister, he said "I want shells." So I looked up some recipes, went to the grocery store, bought the needed things and now it's time to get on it.

5. Read The Help- Everyone and their mom is reading it right now. I hear about it everywhere. A woman in Costco actually told me it was the best book she ever read. I really don't read much during the school year, and I think this book deserves some attention.

Do you set any weekly goals?

What's this?

Welcome to my little blog!

The Mister and I are in the weird place that we are past newlyweds, but pre-kiddo. We've been married a little over a year now, and are watching the majority of our friends have babies or get pregnant around us. While I am so happy for all of them, we just aren't ready for kids yet. He admits to not wanting the responsibility and I admit to being selfish. I like to buy shoes and clothes and necklaces for me. Neither quality is very good for parenting.

So what's this blog about?

I read a lot of blogs. One blog post I read had a post on how to be a good blogger and one tip was to decicde a focus/feel for your blog. Hmm. Is this a cooking blog? Probably not. Travel blog? I would love that, but then there would only be like a post or two a year, along with a smattering of weekender posts. Home renovations/decorating? Martha I am not, but I am trying. Thanks to the blogs I do read. So the answer is... its all of the above, plus anything else I feel like writing. I guess this is a place for me to keep track of our successes and struggles with life in general.