Pink Be Gone

I had to put my painting on hold due to studies but now that it's reading week I'm attempting to get in some studies and paint. Life is hectic right now but the pink is slowly disappearing. Today I painted this closet, this is the before shot, tomorrow I hope to have another two closets and a hallway done, the doors might have to wait but wait they shall.

Vanity

So what does winter gear have to do with vanity? Lets start with the new jacket. It's a 3 in 1 jacket, the inside is down filled and it's a 3/4 length jacket, put that over top of an undershirt and a warm top such as a sweater or sweatshirt and what do you get? An instant 20 lbs., or so it seems. Then you add the scarf, gloves and I choose my mukluks, they're so warm. Inside of the mukluks are warm woolly socks so instantly even the feet get fat. Underneath the jeans goes a pair of thermal underwear on those super cold days and the already snug jeans instantly become lie-down-on-the-bed-do-up-jeans, well that's a bit of an exaggeration but never go to a smorg in your winter gear, something might give! Now put the jacket on over top of everything and when you're 5' 1 1/4" (not so tall), only the knees are visible. I'm at the age where I don't really care what I look like, the vanity is darn near out the window and when it's -40c I want to stay warm.... but I did get everything in black because it's supposed to slim you!

Thankfully there's no snow here as of yet but everything is good to go. I'm not going to freeze this winter... I hope!

Awesome Invitation

My family started a Christmas tradition a few years back, this will be the 4th year I do believe. We all come together and have a pot luck feast and a Chinese gift exchange. This year the event is going to be held at my oldest sisters place and she sure outdid herself with the invitations. I love how she included photos from this past two years Christmas functions and got each and everyone of us into the invitation. What an ingenious idea ~ Jewel you're brilliant!

Last year my oldest son hosted this event and his invitations were also extremely impressive. I wonder once my turn comes up again what I'm going to come up with for invites, if it's going to be half as good as this past two years I'd best get some ideas formulating now. :-)

Here I Go Again

I bought a new bench, one for when guests come in they can sit and take off or put their shoes or boots on or it can be used to pile coats on when the coat closet becomes to full plus it's extra storage.  I had to put this bench together myself. It was going pretty good, I was feeling confident that this was going to work....

I put the top on and only had the hinge left to do... 

So I put the hinge on and lo and behold my bench wouldn't close. They don't have markings where to put the hinge so I guessed and yup, I guessed wrong. 

This is as far as the seat would close. I fixed this, I took off the hinge and will wait until someone comes along and knows how to to put it on properly. Now I'm left wondering what ever happened to the good old days when you bought something and it came already assembled? You know.... back when wood was wood.

The bench is functionable as is, all is well in my world!

Little Girls and Ponies

How could I not pick this up for my granddaughter today as one of her Christmas gifts? Every little girl needs a pony!

Gettin' Ready

Well Halloween's now over, the Christmas sales are on, so why not get the decorations before the rush? It makes perfectly good sense to me. I have my indoor decorations but haven't really decorated outside for years, now that I have my own home this is changing. I've always loved Christmas lights and now I'll have my own!  This is so exciting for me... it doesn't take much to make me happy! :-)

This is only one of the reindeer which will decorate my front lawn but the decorations aren't going to get put up for about another month, if I can hold out that long. I'll post photos once the house is decorated and share my Christmas spirit with all of you, after all Christmas is to be shared. 

I'm wiped tonight, I was up until 4am last night working on a paper and back in class this morning,  so I'll play catch up tomorrow sometime when I'm rested and can really appreciate all of your posts. 'Nite, I hope you all have a fantastic weekend.

Life is Good

This morning I received some fantastic news, I've been selected to receive an award from Canada Post! This is quite the honor, 24 students from across Canada have been chosen to receive this award and I'm one of them. 

The award is an Aboriginal Educational Incentive Award which I applied for. I wrote the personal essay and submitted my transcripts as did every other student who chose to apply and lo and behold I've been accepted. This is surreal, but I have the letter right here. The letter states that "The selection panel was impressed by your submission and chose you from many applicants."  And here I wasn't even going to apply, I thought that I had such a slim chance of receiving this award, that self doubt almost stood in my way but I pushed it aside. It's amazing what we're all capable of in life, totally amazing! What I have to say about this, if you ever think you can't do something put aside your self imposed limitations and just go for it, what do you have to lose?

And I can't help but post this next photo, it's cute not to post! 

Abbie tonight at bath time,  she's such a good dog. I still can't believe that she sat in the tub while I snapped a few photos.  I thought for sure she'd jump out and make a run for it... and yes, she got a treat for being such a good girl!

Night Shots

In the old days a shot for me was about an ounce, today my shots are much more rewarding and I have fun with them... plus I remember in the morning what I did! :-)  

Tonight I found a new way to procrastinate homework, I went out and actually made an attempt to take a few night shots, two to be exact, and I'm posting them both. Any helpful hints on night shots would be greatly appreciated. And yes Joseph, I finally used my tripod!

 

"He stayed with [me]. [I] prayed a little bit. It was great comfort knowing [I was] not alone. He didn't talk much. He just listened."

 Mark Broussard

All In a Half Day

This morning I glanced outside around 8a.m. and it sort of surprised me to see the moon still out. I knew it was there this past while but I guess that I chose not to really look at it, if it's not there it can't exist, right? Wrong... here's a photo from shortly after 8 this morning. It's time for me to face it, the days are much shorter than they were a month ago... or yesterday for that matter now that I've acknowledged this. 

I left the house shortly after I shot this photo, it was time to get to my morning class which starts at 9. It must be an "up" day for me, I was looking up and noticed the sun beaming down, cascading golden rays upon the city and it looked so pretty, especially after all of the foggy days we had last week. 

Shortly after class began we got our mid terms handed back to us, it's a good thing I can write, (you'd never know from my blog because this is my fun space!), because I bombed on the multiple choice answers. The one good thing about being a strong writer is that I find if I can't dazzle them with brilliance, I sure can baffle them with bull!

Even with this mark my final grade on the mid term was a 78%, this shows me that it's time to buckle down on the studies and get this grade up. I wrote this mid term in my Research in Social Work class and yup, it's a research course all right, something which I have very little interest in but I'm going to have to find an interest and soon... it's only another month and a bit and we write the finals! 

Once class was finished I went in search of some curtains for my unpainted bedroom (I'll get to it all in good time). I had seen these drapes previously, they're the same ones I bought for my living room but in a different color. The sales lady told me that they never have sold these particular drapes in Ivory, and she was adamant about this. I say bull.... to that, I have a photo from two months ago and you bet I'm going to take it in and show it to her! Hopefully I'll find these drapes someplace, I love them!

I don't know, but I'd say this looks pretty Ivory to me! Oh well, going to this store wasn't a complete waste, I picked up one Christmas gift and saved 20% on it which is always a bonus.

So now my day is about half done, I've got my post in for the day and I can still hit the books for the better portion of what's left in my day... and yesterday I was wondering where this year has slipped away on me. 

Note to self: Keep looking up, when it's dark or gloomy looking down, up is the place to be!

Normal is Boring

Yup, my photo of the day about says it all. Not only is pretending to be normal exhausting, it's bloody boring... no more normalcy in my life.. I QUIT normal! Hmmm where's the quitting normal lineup?

Well people, we have 60 days left of this years Project 365, and I'm sitting here wondering where in the heck has this year slipped away on me? Right, I've been a student, graduated from the diploma level and started university. I worked a practicum for 2 months, most importantly I became a grandma for the first time.  I've worked here and there, visited the farm fairly often, did a whack of landscaping, baked, attempted to tend to the garden, I canned, cleaned, moved, painted, got a dog, went out and had a blast numerous times, got to take in a hockey game, went to the lake a few times, and I've taken hundreds of photos. I'm sure that I've missed a ton of stuff but now that I've listed a few things I've done in this past 10 months, it's amazing that it's not the year 2014 already! Thankfully it's still 2010...and just remember that if being normal is exhausting, just be who the good Lord intended for you to be.