Fresh

After 8 years with a red living room, we've gone gray - Timber Wolf to be exact. I've always loved the red because it felt like us. It was warm and fun and really fit our aesthetic at the time. But, it was time for a change.

We painted our office a (different shade of) gray back in the fall, and had fallen in love with how bright and clean it felt.

It makes me sad to look back and see how few pictures of the red we have. In fact, the only pictures I could find were from when we first painted it.

From Housework

From Housework

Our AWESOME canvas of a photo taken at Eastern State Penitentiary by the lovely Hillarie Jason. This snapshot does not do it justice. On the left wall, not well seen in this picture are some botanical shots of mine.

From Housework

The print on the left we purchased at an art & wine festival we happened upon in Carefree, AZ on our first trip together in 2002. We had not framed it until now because we never had the right place for it. On the right wall is the amazing quilt my mother made for us. She is so talented!

January Craft Project

So, I squeaked by with my January craft project by the skin of my teeth. I did it on the second to last possible day - but that doesn't matter because I did it.

Like many people out there, I am spending more time these days on Pinterest than I am on Facebook. But what good are all these ideas, recipies and inspiration pieces if I don't do anything with them.

So, this month's project is an abbreviated version of the Paper Heart Wreath from The Hybrid Chick Click the link to get her wonderful instructions.

From She's Crafty

I wanted to do this only using things I already had in the house. I had glue, I had ribbon and boy, do I have paper. Now, Hybrid Chick's version uses double-sided strips that are 2" x 11". I had no double-sided paper. And some of the paper that I wanted to use was from a square paper pack that was 8" x 8".

To make my strips double-sided I cut from my paper pack strips of 2" x 8" and cut other 2" x 8" strips from my 2010 and 2011
Paper Source Wall Art Calendars*

I then glued my strips together so that each strip would have two sides before shaping the hearts and glueing them together. I have to say I'm pretty pleased with the results.

My version is definitely smaller than the original inspiration, but it looks just perfect on our front door. I really want to make sure that I set attainable goals for myself and if that means scaling back certain projects to make my goals fit into my life that is fine by me.

From She's Crafty

From She's Crafty

I already have planned my February craft and hope it goes just as well.

*I love the idea of the Paper Source Wall Art Calendars. Each month's calendar has patterns on the back so that you can cut up the calendar after it's original use to make pillow boxes, square boxes, note cards, etc. My problem is I've been stockpiling the calendar pages and not using them (until now!!!).

2 0 1 2 Goals and Aspirations

I'd like to not call them resolutions, because I throw resolutions away so quickly. But that doesn't mean I don't have things I want to strive for this year. And unlike last year, I need to be a lot less ambitious and give myself more credit for the things I do accomplish. A big one of those is updating my blog on a more regular basis, which should be accomplished if I can hit some of the other goals I've outlined below.

1. One craft related project a month (documented here on this blog).
2. One 30 day photo challenge this year (documented here on this blog). Project 52 will happen one of these years, but I'm not ready to fail at it again this year.
3. Read 25 books this year (documented via Goodreads)
4. Live a more active and healthy lifestyle. Don't just talk about it, read books about it, or half-ass it - this means to really change myself and my relationship with food.
5. Quit identifying who I am by my job. The highs and the lows bring me way too high up and drag me way too far down. I need to loosen what ties me to my job identity.
6. Write something start to finish. Anything.
7. Open up myself to failure. Stop seeing failure in everything I do; instead take more risks and realize life isn't as difficult as I've chosen to think it is. Enjoy the risks and forget the failure.