DIY Dinosaur Print Sweatshirt

Time: 2 hours total?
Listening to: Birdy
Drinking: Two buck chuck

I saw this shirt from Zara and was convinced that I could make one myself. My first step was procuring a cheap shirt from Old Navy. I then proceeded to wear that shirt once just in case if I ruined it with my fabric paint. After being satisfied in my wearing experience, I decided to get to it.

I first traced a dinosaur I found from a good ol' Google search. Then I cut it out in some foamy material that I found. I had some leftover fabric paint from this project so I decided to use that. It is a dark blue so I was so scared of messing up some place and then ruining my soon to be dino shirt. But, after a few sips of my wine and some encouraging words from my hubby...I painted and printed away.

It took a while as I tried really hard not to mess up. Also, I ended up having to use my paint brush quite a bit to do touch ups because I was a bit stingy with the paint on my stamp. I'm really pleased with how it turned out, though!

Just how pleased?

This pleased.

Enjoy! Let me know if you make any of your own dino shirts!

15 Things I’ve Learned from 6 Months of Biking

1. Yes, raising your seat up higher does make pedaling easier. Raising it so high that your feet just barely reach the pedals does not, actually, make you ride faster.
2. You must resist the urge to buckle your seat belt every time you get on your bike.
3. This one may surprise you...other bicyclists, walkers, and joggers can all hear you. For some reason, I constantly am surprised when someone actually says something to me while I'm biking.
4. There is really no need to panic over every yapping dog at your feet. This may or may not save you from a slow-motion falling incident three feet away from the dog's elderly owner. Not like this has happened to me before...
5. Riding without your prescriptive eye glasses on makes for a fun ride. Suddenly, everyone looks just like someone you know or someone famous!
6. Pretending to be the Wicked Witch of the West actually makes the ride go faster. As does practicing biking without hands. Just remember the advice from #3.
7. Quality rain gear makes all the difference. Shell out the extra bucks for the hurricane rain pants. It is totally worth not having a giant U-shape of wet on the inner part of your legs every time it rains. I swear I will never make fun of people who are obsessed with outdoor gear again...
8. Always remember that it is a game between every stop light. Pace yourself so that you never need to fully stop.
9. Give yourself an extra ten minutes on the wind-going-against-you-the-whole-way days. Your thighs will thank you.
10. Make sure to always look walkers and joggers in the eyes as you pass them so they know just how much faster you are than them.
11. Wearing a dress or skirt while biking is risky. If you take that risk, make sure to bike extra fast.
12. If there is a 40% chance of rain...it will rain on you. So just put on those unflattering, swishy rain pants.
13. You always tend to overdress for cold weather because you are sure that if you don't wear five layers, hypothermia will surely set in! Because of this, you usually are near death from heat exhaustion by the end of your ride. Therefore, armpit vents in winter jackets are truly amazing. Simply unzip and enjoy!
14. Just give up on wanting to look good when you arrive some place. No matter what, you'll either have helmet hair, red cheeks, or sweaty armpits.
15. Obey the traffic signals--they serve the perfect time to casually glance over at the drivers next to you. Suddenly, it becomes pretty clear to them just how tough you are to be biking in 20 degree temperatures when they have their heated seats on full blast. Go ahead and give 'em a small nod. Yeah...I am that tough.

2013 Reading Goal: The Patron Saint of Liars

As I mentioned in my 2013 goal, I’ll be reading mostly women lit that focuses on women authors or complicated, strong female characters this year.  First book: Madame Bovary. Second book: Hypocrite in a Pouffy White Dress. And here is the third.

Rating: 5 Stars! (and an exclamation point)

Photo from Goodreads

 I read an interesting article a while back in the New York Times about the loss of faith in fiction. As a religious person myself, I’ve been thinking a lot about the fiction I read and if there are any books that tackle the depths and complexities of the religion that I know. I think it is incredibly hard to portray religion with truth and not have it seem hokey or overly dramatic. One book that I immediately thought of was, The Patron Saint of Liars by Ann Patchett. And lucky for me, it was on my list to (re)read this year. I've read a bunch of different reviews on this book and it really surprised me how little religion was brought up. Even with such a great, seemingly contradictory title! 

This story begins with the beautiful Rose, who has grown up in the church and believes so strongly that she is entitled to a sign from God that she looks everywhere for it. She says, "I did not ask for more than my share, one sign. That which was by rights mine because I believed and was so ready to listen." In the very next paragraph she says, "Nun or Wife, my choices loomed above me like giant doors, and I waited, listening for God to give me the word." She believes that those are her two choices and that God will clearly tell her what she should do.

So when a romantic, handsome man comes to her and tells her beautiful things...she assumes that this is her sign. She marries him and she is happy at her wedding. She believes she is doing what God has called her to do and she is happy about it. After a couple years of marriage, she suddenly could no longer breath unless she was out alone on the road...free in her car. She realized that she had "said yes to Thomas Clinton and later thought that I had said yes to God and later still realized I had said yes only to Thomas Clinton." She was nineteen years old and "knew so little that I took [sexual desire] to be a sign from God." 

Rose finds out that she is pregnant and she panics. She doesn't want this life...boring, routine life because she thinks that God has some other sign for her. She runs away from her husband and her mother and flees to a home for unwed pregnant women. She lies to all of the nuns, telling them that she wasn't married and that the father had died. Rose feels like she can leave her husband without telling him that she is pregnant because she will have to suffer herself by giving up her mother. That is her idea of penance...since she will suffer, she feels like she doesn't have to be remorseful.

It was also intriguing to me how all of her images of God are tied up in the men that she knows. She is so incredibly close to her mom, but she is always looking for the men to show her God. First she thinks Thomas Clinton is her link to God. Then she admits that whenever she asked for forgiveness at church, she really just asked forgiveness from her priest, as she often viewed him as her father.  Later at the home for unwed pregnant women she describes the maintenance man, who happens to be named Son, that he "seemed to bear all of our pains." Her language implies that she thinks of him as some Christ figure.

Rose fully intends on giving up her baby. She never picked out a name for her, she never made baby clothes...she really just shut her mind off to the fact that she was pregnant. At one point, she has a kind of exhaustion induced meltdown. She goes out to this field in the cold and demands that God gives her another sign because she misread the last one. She yells, "Your will be done. Okay? Tell me what in the hell that's supposed to be." Rose is so eager to do what God wants her to do but she is so lost at what that might be. Suddenly in her state of delirium, Son comes to save her from the cold. Patton writes, "The figure that came toward me in the whiteness was huge, big enough to be the Son of Man. He who so loved man He sent His only Son."  And suddenly, she decides she is going to marry this Son. She thinks that God is once again telling her to marry a man that she doesn't love. So she does it. She marries him so she could keep the baby. 

So she stays on and runs the kitchen. Somebody mentioned to her that suddenly, she was treated like one of the sisters. Rose replies, "That's an awful thought." And I have to wonder why is that awful? Is it awful because she always believed that she either had to be married or be a nun...and if now she is like a nun...she made terrible mistakes twice in her life? 

The book is divided up into three different parts, the first is Rose's story. The second is Son's and the third is the daughter's story, Cecelia. As the book progresses, Rose drifts further and further away. You begin to see just how closed off and weighed down from all her lies she really is. Rose cooks, raises her daughter, and is married to Son.  She barely has time for Cecelia and is definitely not the mom that Cecelia craves. Rose was looking for her own mom for so long that she couldn't even think about being a mom herself. I better stop there before I give any of the ending away!

As you step away from Rose, Cecelia takes a more center stage. Growing up among a hotel full of unwed pregnant girls and nuns, she has a unique upbringing to say the least. But in many ways she is lucky. She is growing up with religion but she has people that can help her negotiate the complexities of God. When she is dealing with something, Sister Evangeline tells her directly that "This isn't any sign from God." She is surrounded by various people who can teach and help her along her path. She isn't isolated and alone in her religion, like Rose. Yes, Rose was very close to her mom, but never did she mention that they were close in a spiritual way. They talked about make-up, beauty, marriage, movies, etc. Maybe this is why Rose was always looking to the men in her life for that spiritual void.

The first time I read this book, I naturally assumed that the Patron Saint of Liars was Rose. Her very first sentence mentioned how she was going to be a liar for the rest of her life. The word liar or lie must have referred to her at least a dozen times in the book. She was constantly lying to herself and the people around her. But the second time through, I couldn't' help but think of her daughter as the Patron Saint of Liars. Cecelia is surrounded by girls who lie about their lives--their pasts especially. She grew up with her lying mother. Even her father (Son) lies to her about being her real father. Yet, there is a part of the book where a girl mentions that all of the girls want to be her because she is different than them...but doesn't judge them. They all look up to her in a way. She is one of them but isn't one of them. She is guided by the nuns to see and have the touch of holiness that the town has in its water. 

And I can't help but think that if Cecelia really is the patron saint, then maybe her mother, Rose, was really missing her sign from God all along.

My lessons from this book: Learn from those around you. Talk to others about religion and God. Even when you can't articulate what you feel...try! Be open, be vulnerable.

A Love Affair with Bookbinding

Time: 2 hours
Listening to: Teacher

I took my first class at The Craft Center on Thursday and had so much fun! In an art class that I took back in 2005, I was given the overwhelming introduction to bookbinding by having to make my own sketchbook. While it was lots and lots of work at the time, I actually really liked it. Yes, my fingers were very sore by the end of it, but I enjoyed the process.  Over the years, I kind of stepped away from making books and I have missed it! I've been wanting to  take a class at the Craft Center and thought this would be a good introduction to the center and also a good reintroduction to bookbinding.

Here are some of the books that I made during the class:

Simple book with a hidden knot inside

Inside hidden knot

I forget what this is called but it actually has two different "books" inside it!

Write one book---flip it over---and you have another one!

I also learned the running stitch!

2013 Reading Goal: Hypocrite in a Pouffy White Dress

As I mentioned in my 2013 goal, I’ll be reading mostly women lit that focuses on women authors or complicated, strong female characters this year.  First off I read Madame Bovary. The second one I knocked off the list was Hypocrite in a Pouffy White Dress.

Rating: 3 1/2 stars

Picture from Goodreads

I had a hard time getting into this book. Even after about 100 pages, I kept thinking...jeesh...300 more pages to go? Couldn't someone have edited this down some? But then things started to get interesting for me. While sometimes she'd be way over the top and I'd roll my eyes...other times she would hit upon  parts of her life that resonated with me. I loved the stories about how she wanted to be a feminist but she was still learning and struggling with what that all entails. She wrote about always believing that girls were just as good as boys...chanting on the play ground from a young age "Girls Smart, Boys Fart." She also "made a point of reading hundreds of biographies of famous women, then sprinkled my dinnertime conversation" about them. Then she would hit up her dad for money and not understand the ironies of that. She writes that her dad told her "I just think it's cute how you call me a patriarchal oppressor, then fifteen minutes later, you hit me up for money so you can go to the movies."

One of my favorite bits was about her first job as a coffee barista. Her boss was always giving the girls advice on how to get married. In one story she faced the idea of hairy legs..."I was chewing over the remark about 'hairy-legged women's libbers.' I'd always shaved my legs, and what did leg hair have to do with wanting equal treatment under the law, anyway?" I loved the moments in the book that were like that. Moments that really illustrate how a girl wanting to be a feminist suddenly is struck with the idea that she might be doing something wrong! Or just not understanding at all what something like a hairy leg might imply or symbolize. Gilman also tends to exaggerate and be over the top with things so some of the stories or moments of enlightenment are quite funny.

I also think that her struggle with becoming engaged and married were interesting. So many of the women lit that I've read in the past all have to do with women shedding the confines of marriage. Stories where the women can't breath or can't be herself because of the social constrictions on who a woman can be. While reading those stories as a young woman, I just assumed that I wouldn't ever get married. I've always been rather stubborn and not always the most "think of the other person before you" person so I figured I just would go solo through life. It seemed easier almost. But things turned out a bit different for me when my boyfriend at the time went away for a semester to another country and I was stuck behind...absolutely MISERABLE. I didn't want to live apart from this guy, this best friend of mine ever again. As I grew up, matured, and learned more about who I am...I realized that marriage did not have to be a box that I had to contort myself into. It could actually be more freeing. BUT it still was strange for me to suddenly be talking about weddings, dish sets, and linens. And Gilman does an excellent job on telling that side of things. She writes, "But as a feminist, nothing was as daunting to me as getting engaged. Because as soon as Bob slipped the ring onto my finger, it was as if we were instantly catapulted back into 1956. Virtually overnight, people stopped treating us like individuals and began relating to us instead as a traditional Bride and Groom--sex roles as shallow and reductive as the symbols on public restrooms."

She also tells the hilarious story about how much she resisted the white wedding dress...until everyone twisted her arm and guilted her into trying one on. So she goes into David's Bridal...puts one on and refuses to take it off because it makes her feel so good. She writes, "As I stood there, something else occurred to me: why did it take so long to have this experience? Every woman should have this experience--and not only if or when she gets married. Every woman should see herself looking uniquely breathtaking, in something tailored to celebrate her body, so that she is better able to appreciate her own beauty and better equipped to withstand the ideals of our narrow-waited, narrow-minded culture."

I gave the book a 3 1/2 overall...but I think I'd give it a 4 1/2 for the last 150 pages or so. I think she really hit her stride there---or maybe I was just able to connect more with it.

One last part I loved...she wrote about how she felt when her and her husband move to Switzerland. While I didn't move abroad...I did recently move 2000+ miles from my family and friends so I feel like its another country. She says..."Funny how glamorous stories about people going abroad always conveniently seemed to leave out this part--the unnerving schizophrenia of arrival--the panic you can feel in a strange city when you realize: whoa. This is it. You're not going home next week with a bagful of snow globes to hand out."


Lessons from this book: Embrace the contradictions! Don't be afraid to get everything right the first time. Be a life learner! (Insert other cheesy, motivating sayings!)

Self Portrait Sunday

Here are some of the self portraits that I've taken this week:

Simple Tank with Contrasting Ties

Time: A couple hours
Listening to: Grace and the Nocturnals (my current craft-to obsession)
Drinking: Twinings Chai Tea

My lovely sister gave me some perrty fabric for Christmas and I was itching to work with it. She also happened to send me a shirt idea like this one months and months and months ago...so I figured it was destined!

It is a little bigger than I like currently so I will have to do some tweaking. I do like how it looks on my dressform, though!

A close up of the side and sleeve

Birchbox Love!

I've been subscribing to Birchbox now for half a year or so and it is so much fun. You sign up to get a box full of fun beauty samples sent to you every month for $10. We cut back on our spending a lot since moving to Eugene...but I just can't give this up. To get an adorable package in the mail every month full of fun little samples inside...it is worth the $10 to me! You first fill out a questionnaire about your beauty habits, your hair type, your skin type, etc...and then you sit back and wait for your fun box to arrive!

I thought I'd share some of my favorite samples I've received...

Nuxe's Masque Creme Fraiche de Beaute----great mask for winter skin
Color Club Professional Nail Lacquer in Disco Nap----love this gold nail polish
Harvey Prince's Hello perfume----such a great smell! Light and fresh
Fresh Citron de Vigne eau de perfum----a bit musky at first then settles into a great, fresh smell
12 Benefits Instant Healthy Hair Treatment----great for before blow drying
Etoile New York (nail polish) in Navette----A great slightly sparkly nude shade
G-1 Hydrating Cream----leaves your skin feeling so good
Fibre Lashxtend Extreme Black Lengthening Mascara----Love this mascara! Plus a huge sample!
Model Co Ultra Lip Gloss in Showgirl Red----The name sounds intense but it actually isn't. Smells good!
the Balm Stainiac Beauty Queen----Gives a hint of color to lips and cheeks
Jouer Perfume Oil----A bit more flowery than I usually like but I love it!
Lulu's Hair Powder Lavender & Clary Sage----Works great for days I don't want to wash my hair!
the Balm Mary Lou Manizer Highlighter----A nice highlighter that also works good for eye shadow

Stumbled on Favorites

A few of the favorite things I've stumbled on recently.

Found this over here!

I love this five story tall rubber ducky!

I LOVE this playful art on crumbling buildings.

Beer barrel bed! How cool!

I want to try this recipe pronto.

Hellogiggles.com is so great.

This made me laugh...the skipper.

I just found out about this site and I am so excited to delve into it more. I think it will really help me with my 2013 goal!

Amazing lecture on the meaning of life..definitely made me cry.

19 Things to Stop Doing in Your 20s...good stuff!

My aunt told me about Irena Sendler...what an inspirational woman. Can't believe I've never heard of her before.

2013 Reading Challenge

Some of you may know that I am a sucker for reading. I almost always have a book in my hands, next to me, or on my mind. I'm focusing on women authors and/or strong, complex female characters this year.

Here is my not-set-in-stone list of books I want to read this year. 

1. Margaret Atwood--The Blind Assassin
2. Margaret Atwood--The Handmaid's Tale
3. Jane Austen--Mansfield Park
4. Jane Austen --Northanger Abbey
5. Lynda Barry--What it Is
6. Samantha Bee--I Know I Am, But What Are You?
7. Elizabeth Bowen--The Death of the Heart
8. Kate Braestrup--Beginner's Grace
9. Willa Cather--Death Comes for the Archbishop
10. Kate Chopin--The Awakening (reread)
11. Kathleen Davis--The Thin Place (reread)
12. Debra Dean--The Mirrored World
13. Simone de Beauvoir--The Second Sex
14. Emily Dickinson--The Collected Poems of Emily Dickinson
15. Annie Dillard--Pilgrim at Tinker Creek
16. Rachel Dratch--Girl Walks into a Bar
17. Louise Erdrich--Love Medicine
18. Helen Fielding--Bridget Jones' Diary
19. Fannie Flagg--Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop
20. Catherine Gildiner--Too Close to the Falls
21. Susan Jane Gilman--Hypocrite in a Pouffy White Dress
22. Mary Gordon--Spending
23. Frances Hodgson Burnett--The Secret Garden
24. Frances Hodgson Burnett--A Little Princess
25. River Jordan--Praying for Strangers
26. Barbara Kingsolver--The Bean Trees (reread)
27. Anne Lamott--Bird by Bird
28. Jhumpa Lahiri--The Namesake (reread)
29. John MacArthur--Twelve Extraordinary Women
30. Carson McCullers--The Heart is a Lonely Hunter (reread)
31. Margaret Mitchell--Gone with the Wind
32. Liz Murray--Breaking Night
33. Irene Nemirovsky--Suite Francaise
34. Kathleen Norris--The Cloister Walk
35. Flannery O'Connor--Mystery and Manners
36. Flannery O'Connor--Three (reread)
37. Ann Patchett--The Patron Saint of Liars (reread)
38. Ann Patchett--Truth & Beauty
39. Dorothy Parker--Complete Stories
40. Sylvia Plath--The Unabridged Journals of Sylvia Plath
41. Adrienne Rich--The Dream of a Common Language: Poems 1974-1977
42. Marilynn Robinson--Housekeeping (reread)
43. Marjane Satrapi--Persepolis
44. Amy Sedaris--I Like You: Hospitality Under the Influence
45. Lucy Shaw--Breath for the Bones
46. Alice Walker--The Color Purple
47. Sheila Weller--Girls Like Us: Carole King, Joni Mitchell, Carly Simon
48. Edith Wharton--The Age of Innocence
49. Mary Wollstonecraft-- A Vindication of the Rights of Woman
50. Virginia Woolf--A Room of One's Own
51. Virginia Woolf--Night and Day

Let me know if you have any suggestions of books I should definitely add to my list!

DIY Paint Chip Sample Wall Hanging

Time: A couple hours
Listening to: Grace Potter & The Nocturnals
Drinking: Coffee with creamer

I've had a stash of paint chip samples on my desk since August and finally decided it was time to do something with them. We have a lot of white space in our bedroom and I've been itching to add some color.

First, I cut apart all of the paint chips and arranged them to my liking. I'm a sucker for color gradation (like how I organize my books) so I decided to go that route. I then sewed them together and hung them up. I just used tape for now but if they keep falling down, I'll use some string to hang them up better.

Nice and easy!

Journal Prompt Jars

Time: A couple hours
Listening to: Doctor Who
Drinking: Country Peach Tea

One thing that I've realized from my 2012 challenge is that I don't write nearly as much as I'd like. I'm someone who needs to process things and often writing is the best way I can do that. Even though I know this...it is hard for me to sit down and just start writing. It takes a lot of energy so I often don't do it. One thing that I thought might help me begin writing more is my own journal prompt jar.

I first sat down and did a major brainstorm on memories and topics that I'd like to write about. Some are really simple and others are very broad. I took a lot of time in this part of the process because I figured the more thorough it is, the less often I'll have to refill my jar. Then I wrote my prompts out on cardstock and cut and folded. This I did with the help of Doctor Who (Season 3!). I then found an old cashew container that we were going to recycle and made it into my little journal prompt container.

Here's to writing more in 2013!

Self Portrait Sunday

Part of my journey for 2013 is to take self portraits to connect visually with what I'm learning. I read about someone who did a 365 day challenge and how she learned a lot about photography and herself. I'm not sure I'm really interested in doing a 365 day challenge but I will be showing you at least one each Sunday.

Here is my self portrait for today:

2013 Goal: Reading Madame Bovary

As I mentioned in my 2013 goal, I’ll be reading mostly women lit that focuses on women authors or complicated, strong female characters this year. The first one I picked up to read was Madame Bovary by Gustave Flaubert…and WOW…what a good one.

Rating: Five Stars

The book centers on the ambitious, romantic and ever dreaming Emma. She marries young when she thought she was in love. But when “the happiness that should have followed this love not having come, she must, she thought, have been mistaken. And Emma tried to find out what one meant exactly in life by the words felicity, passion, rapture, that had seemed to her so beautiful in books.”  

She wonders what her life would be like if chance had brought her another man to marry. She imagines how different and wonderful it would be from her current life. When she gets a taste of a rich and elegant ball, she falls in love with the romance of it all. She wants her husband, Charles, to inspire the passions inside her, and teach her the beautiful, extraordinary things in the world, but he is a commonplace man who talks of normal, everyday things. Charles is very happy with their married life and is blind to all of Emma’s unhappy qualms. She never tells Charles any of her hopes and dreams…but rather keeps it all inside her.

So Emma begins to look to other men to fill this void in her. She first has an emotional affair with a young Leon. Then when he removes himself, another man, Rodolphe, steps in whose ambition is to conquer Emma. When she accepts, they begin a long affair…one which she eventually decides she’ll leave Charles and run away with him. When he backs out of their plan she becomes despondent and ill.  Her husband Charles is so out of touch with Emma that he always thinks she has this nervous condition…when really her heart flutters at the passions that she feels. Eventually Emma recovers and a chance encounter brings her back in touch with Leon. From there, they begin a passionate affair which Leon pushes for. Emma consents and eventually becomes more and more like her previous lover, Rodolphe…the wooer, the romantic…while Leon struggles to keep up with her.

Emma eventually spirals out of control…leading to a tragic end. Her life becomes full of lies and deceit and eventually it catches up to her and those around her.

I’ve thought so much about this book since I finished it. I’ve kept wondering if Emma really would have been happier if she had married into a rich and luxurious lifestyle to a man who was romantic and inspiring...like she dreams of. Would she have still found the unhappiness that always seems to find her? Would she have become bored with him, too, like she did of all her lovers?  

Or rather is the problem that she was never truly free? Even when she fought for freedom from Charles, she still always turned to another man. Even when she gained legal freedom, she still turned to another man (sleazy, con artist) to guide her with her finances which she has no clue how to handle. It seems like there is no place in this society for a woman like Emma. She tried religion, but she was much too romantic and sexual to be a nun. She tried marriage yet that didn’t suit her either. She never looked inside to what she could contribute or what she could do to make her situation better…instead she wants happiness to find her. She wants the men in her life to bring her the romance and passion to her. If she was living in a society where a woman wasn’t assumed to either be a nun or married…would Emma have been freer to dream outside of love and romance? Would she have been able to dream bigger?  

Lesson #1 of 2013: When you feel lost or unhappy...don't blame the people around you. Get involved, change your habits, and look inside yourself to see what you have to contribute to the bigger world. 

Reinbeer: A leftover Christmas Post

So I have one project straggling from Christmas that I haven't yet posted....and here it is!

For my brother-in-law for Christmas, my husband picked out an assortment of beer for him. But we figured we couldn't just give him beer...so I made it into reinbeer! My friend Molly first gave me the idea and then I used this tutorial as a guide. I did it a bit differently but you get the drift.

Sorry for the terrible picture...

My 2013 Goal

Here is the plan:

• I'll be reading woman lit that focuses on women authors and complicated, strong female characters. I'll also be reading essays and other random applicable articles I stumble on. 
• I'll be journaling about my own journey looking at my past, present, and future.  
• I'll be working on self-portraits along the way--photography, drawing, and painting.

I'm not sure yet how/if this will be reflected on the blog but I'd love any book/essay suggestions if there is anything you think might be helpful for me on this journey.

Thanks for the support!

My Favorite Projects of 2012

I can't believe that my goal for 2012 is complete. It feels good to be done with it but I'm excited to stick with my new lifestyle habit of being creative! Here is my look back at my favorite projects of 2012.

Day 274

Day 273

Day 281 and numerous other days

Day 248

Day 29

Day 271

Day 2

Day 106

Day 354

Day ?

Day 287

Day 344 and Day 349 and Day 339

Day 351

Day 140 and later Day 163

Day 361

Day 307

Day 330

Day 335 and others

Reading List of 2012 and Women Lit

Day 341 and Day 278

Day 250

Wedding Kit and Hospital Kit

Wedding Invitation Design

Day 47 and Day ?