Most Impressive

I found this via Black Eiffel–a blog I found via A Cup of Jo. When I first watched this the only two words that came to mind were “brilliant” and “how”. Really though, HOW in the world would someone make a video as imaginative as this?? With lots of time. And sketching. That’s how. I’m hoping that someday I’ll be able to pull ideas like this out of my own head. Not necessarily videos, just whatever I need for whatever project I’m working on. I’ve been feeling lately like my own work isn’t all that fantastic but hopefully this too shall pass.

Spring Break

I’m on spring break and absolutely loving it!

Click for Artist.

No…I’m not going on a road trip.

No…I’m not traveling to a different country.

I’m at home.

I haven’t done anything.

I haven’t even really looked at blogs.

It’s been so nice.

Bethany’s here with me and she had her wisdom teeth pulled so I’ve been hanging out with her, watching movies, making an occasional smoothie and fetching an ice pack every now and then. It’s been good! And Drew’s supposed to get here tomorrow so that’s going to be super nice too!

So I would once again like to apologize for not posting, but honestly, I’m not really that sorry. The break has been really good and I haven’t really had anything to say lately. No cool finds. I don’t really want to blab about my uninteresting self so that’s been the reason for my silence. I would like to get some good, solid, regular readers so I can start posting my own stuff however that requires an ungodly amount of commenting and I don’t really want to take the time to do that right now.

For You: My Apologies.

I know it may seem as if I’m failing miserably at my list of goals considering the fact I haven’t been posting three times a week…however, I’m actually not doing so bad with completing them. Well, except for the blog goal. Here’s how my list looks now:

01 Write on here at least three times a week.

02 Practice the piano an hour a day 5 days a week.

03 Drink lots of water.
(I’m improving, yet haven’t reached this goal quite yet…hence the partial strike out).

04 Organize my blogroll (see right) and bookmarks into categories.
(All my bookmarks are organized. It’s beautiful.)

05 Pull together a good resume that I can send out to potential employers. Back it up on my external hard drive.

06 Make grocery bags out of some of my old t-shirts.
(Not completed, however scheduled for spring break next week, so it might as well be crossed off).

07 And of course, last but not least, write down my goals.

This is a new addition to my list of goals:
08 Stop using extra words I don’t need to. (I frequently add extra words that don’t matter, “just”, “awesomeness”, “amazingly”, “so”, “haha”, etc.) It’s becoming a pet peeve of mine.

And on top of these goals last week I’ve had a mountainous amount of homework that I wasn’t expecting. I’ve plowed through the first half and am working on getting through the rest, so I can’t promise many posts this week…but I’ll try my best. :-)

The weather's getting warmer. (Meaning all I want to do is be outside...camping, hiking, sleeping. Anything, really).

The Moon and Stars

Last night after work as I was walking back to my room and I looked up and noticed, for the first time in long while, the moon. It was the waxing crescent (ie cheshire cat) moon. It was right in front of me, just above the treeline, and was huge and slightly orange. It reminded me of living in our little earth home out in the country. My sister had this glow in the dark night sky book that had all the constellations printed on each page for every season. Every now and then during the summer we’d drag a couple lawn chairs and blankets out into the yard along with the book and just gaze at the stars. Very Apollo 13-esque, right? haha)

There was one winter where there was this big meteor shower on a school night. We begged our parents to let us stay up late to watch the falling stars. Not only did we get to stay up late, but we even got to sit out on our roof (huge deal…we weren’t allowed on the roof). Mom fixed us some hot chocolate and Dad brought out some blankets for us. That’s one of my most fond memories of that little house.

But I was thinking about it last night and I realized something, I haven’t really looked at the moon or the stars a lot lately. Partially that’s just because there are so many trees on campus. Partially because it’s cold, and partially because I just haven’t made the time.  I miss seeing the stars. I’m looking forward to when it gets warmer out. I’ll make it a point to go out and just look at the stars and the moon. Count that as added that to my list of goals.

The List

Something that I really enjoy doing is setting goals. Big goals, little goals, long-term goals, short-term goals…just goals in general. Unfortunately there are times where I don’t write these goals down and, if they aren’t of any consequence, will usually forget them. I would give you an example, buuut I’ve forgotten which goals I’ve forgotten.  ha. Go figure. The other goals I’ll usually conquer (or fail miserably, depending on which ones we’re talking about…but hey. At least I remembered them).

So here’s a new goal of mine: Write down goals. I know that might sound lame and kind of like a no-brainer but I think it would be good for me to keep a log of all my goals. That way if I’m ever having a day of self-doubt I can go back and look at things that I’ve accomplished. And also so I can actually remember them.

So without further ado, I’ll give you some of my goals for this semester:

01 Write on here at least three times a week.

02 Practice the piano an hour a day 5 days a week. (Thank you, Mom, for encouraging me to practice all those years. And thanks for putting up with my stubbornness. haha)

03 Drink lots of water. (8 eight oz cups) I’m not going to completely forbid myself from soda, but I’m definitely going to cut back.

04 Organize my blogroll (see right) and bookmarks into categories. Seriously…it’s getting ridiculous.

05 Pull together a good resume that I can send out to potential employers. Back it up on my external hard drive.

06 Make grocery bags out of some of my old t-shirts.

07 And of course, last but not least, write down my goals.

My mom gave me a moleskine notebook for Christmas that I’ve been saving for a legitimate use. I’m thinking I’ll use it for my goal-making and conquering. I’ll keep you posted on it’s progress every now and then.

Something that I found is that it's best to keep goals pretty basic.

Now That’s Classy

There are some things in life that I just find classy and elegant.

01 Girls with thick eyebrows. No, not caterpillars or unibrows. Just girls that have well-groomed, thick brows. It’s so lovely compared to the plucked away stringy antennas that some like to try and pull off. (It doesn’t work. Ever.) Oh…and girls with thick eyebrows and bangs? Extra classy.

02 Mary Poppins. If you ever need a definition of elegance just say Mary Poppins. I mean, c’mon…who has a carpet bag and umbrella like that? So classy…Plus, I’ve always loved how poised and proper she is, yet mischievous and fun all at the same time.

03 Composting. Last summer I had a compost pile at home and loved using it. I miss it dearly these days. I just love the idea of re-using everything, so taking left over food and weeds and whatnot and turning them into dirt to grow more food sounds absolutely amazing (and classy…) to me! PS – Check out this blog…this girl has reduced her trash output to zero. Impressive, right??

04 Collections of mismatched things. Some might call this hoarding. But that’s definitely NOT what I’m talking about. I’m talking about taking things that are similar, but different, and displaying them in beautiful ways. (Art from trash, perhaps?)

05 The last thing I shall mention is the nightstand. I’m not exactly sure what it is that is so stinkin classy and elegant about a nightstand…but they just are. I really miss mine. Well…technically I didn’t really have one at home either. I just put a lamp on my djembe and called it good. (I know…cardinal rule of drum-owning: Never place anything on a drum no matter what…I know. I fail at life.) But I’m really tempted to make one similar to this one that I found on design sponge. Instead of using obnoxious boxes though I’d use these old pepsi-cola crates that I’ve had my eye on for about a year now at Thackerland. I have plenty of books to use and could even find some more at Thackerland if I needed to. The only thing that’s keeping me from doing it is the fact that I’ll have to haul those books and crates around whenever I move out and the window ledge I’m using now is actually doing a fairly decent job of working as a night stand.

Just For Now

Sorry I didn’t post this yesterday like I said I would. I guess life just got in the way. It was kind of one of those days…One of those days that are perfect for Imogen Heap. She’s one of my all-time favorite artists. Not only is her voice gorgeous (not to mention incredibly classy in her own eclectic sort of way) but she’s so insanely talented that she can perform an entire song onstage by herself. And not just any song…but a song with all these different parts…and it sounds like there’s all these people on stage with her…but no. It’s just her. And it sounds fantastic!

I found this video a couple years ago and will watch it every now and then. I just like listening to her. Her voice is so soothing! If I could pick who I could sing like it’d definitely be her. But anyways, here’s the video–you should watch it. It’ll blow your mind…or at least it did mine.