So …

I’m supposed to have a craft project for my 12-12-12 project ready to post for today.

Let’s just say that isn’t going to happen. Not when my house like a hot mess anyway.

It’s cool I have a million and one ideas and I still love the project I’m just buried under the stress of buying a fixer upper, moving, work (construction in the summer h-e-l-l-o busy), and wedding planning. I will do 12 projects this year, they just might not show up in twelve separate months. What can you do? This is life, it throws you loops, and you take them like a champ and figure out a different plan.

Take this whole house buying thing; as much as I told everyone I knew it was going to be work and everything was going to change I still had on these awesome rose colored glasses. Yeah…well those glasses got crushed somewhere on the interstate after a toppling box-pot hole incident. What I’m seeing now man, it just isn’t pretty.

I had plans for this house and they were good, but now that we are actually living in this thing, I’m not so sure.

The first thing I want to tell you was that re-doing all 1100 square feet of wood floors in our house ourselves was a mistake. I don’t suggest it to anyone, it’s just too much for a couple of novices with full time jobs and a wild dog. That’s all I will say about it.

Now the real question is do I really want a grey bedroom? I’ve been dreaming of a grey bedroom for years, now that I can have it I’m freaking out that will feel all wrong, and you know paint is permanent. At least that’s the way my brain keeps processing it. I don’t have any idea why.

All this cupboard space in the kitchen is so nice, I have so many plans for it, except they are already full, because I am a hoarder and have 5 sets of china. Why do I have 5 full sets of china? Because I’m a food blogger and I need them for interesting pictures. Oh so you use them all the time right? Oh god no that would involve pulling them all out and cleaning them all, because clearly I can’t just bring out a couple to use in photos. Besides I use the same set of plates in all my pictures duh.

Aaannnnd now I am talking typing to myself in the third person. Moving on….

Can someone please explain to me why there are so many options for the shade of light blue? I can’t decide?! They all look exactly the same to me, yet for some reason I’m terrified to choose the wrong one, like I said before paint is totally permanent and everything.

Why are there so many damn bugs in this house? Moths in the bathroom, spiders everywhere and mosquitoes galore. There are side effects to living in the country people, I know, but how are they getting in???

So I think this is a good place to end this post. You get the idea of how ridiculous and frazzled my mind has been, besides I can’t even listen (read?) to myself complain any more. Maybe next week I will get my act together and have a real post, with pictures from a real camera, not just my phone. Also fingers crossed that there is time to cook for real.

 

A review of new years goals at the half year mark and a few new ones for summer.

Yesterday marked the first day of summer. The changing of the seasons always feels like a good time to reflect, and I have been doing a lot of that lately (See here, here and here). If you are interested in my thoughts from the beginning of spring you can read them here.

I had a few simple goals this year and at the halfway point I’m feeling pretty good about achieving most of them.

One of my main goals was to stay in touch with my many far flung friends, and while I have done better with some, others have fallen to the wayside, and sometimes that just how it ends up being, it’s ok, if time and life push us together once more I will happily accept them back into my life, if not that’s ok too. I have made a number of new friends that I am excited to get to know further. We are building a little community here in our town and it’s a wonderful feeling.

Saving money was very much on my mind in the beginning of the year and despite spending a pretty penny on our house, and this wedding we are still doing ok with that. Our spending habits have improved, along with our eating habits (I think that may be related). I know that during the work/moving phase of this year that will go backward a bit, but once we are settled I am hoping to keep those good habits up.

Fitness was another major goal category for me this year, and I have to say I could be doing so much better in this category. I have spurts of good habits before the stress of life pulls me back into laziness. I am drinking more water, eating breakfast every day, and my overall diet is much better than it was in January, but I have not been successful at morning yoga or keeping up with regular workouts. I hope that I can make this a priority again soon; there are less than 4 months until the wedding so I am running out of time!

Something that was not on my goals list, but I want to mention, is the blossoming of my artistic side (too cheesy? I’m not sure).  In the last six or more months I have really developed a need to be creative daily, something that I had hoped after NaNoWriMo to really develop. The 12-12-12 project has driven me some but the daily practice of being creative has really made me feel more alive than I have in a long time. It might even be to blame for why I can’t seem to get myself to work out regularly, I’d rather be doing something creative with that time. I’m looking forward to sharing a number of really awesome projects with you in the coming months, and I hope that you guy’s are too.

This summer is going to be busy, there is no doubting that and on the other side of it there will be a long awaited wedding, the first full week of vacation in almost 3 years and the first holidays both in our home and as a married couple. Even though I know that I already have a lot to look forward to there are a few little goals that I want to jot down here to remind me to enjoy the little things and stay on track.

1. Get the new yard under control
2. Do yoga often
3. Get married, without loosing my mind
4. Host a dinner party
5. Keep “Stuff” from entering the new house
6. Drink red wine by the fire in the back yard
7. Encourage Chuck and guests to play music more
8. Settle into the new house
9. Paint some rooms
10. Hike more
11. Fish often

I am so pleased with how the first half of this year has turned out and I cannot wait to see what summer and the rest of 2015 has in store for me.

How is your year coming along? Have you accomplished or worked toward any of your goals??

I love these kinds of posts, so let’s just get right to it.

1. I’m on my right now to an epic motorcycle and camping weekend in New Hampshire and I’m stoked for it.
2. I used to airbrush cars and motorcycles as a teenager. I should have never stopped.
3. I really don’t like my name. I never thought it was fitting, and growing up there was always another Jessica in my class. If I could I’d change my name to my middle name.
4. I’m good with blood and ghastly injuries, but I hide and make Chuck take care of it when the dog throws up. I can’t explain the rationale. There is none.
5. I hate driving. I mean I have no issues with it, I can do it in the city and on the highway, heck that’s my daily commute, but I always try to talk someone else into driving when I can.
6. I can’t cook plain white rice. I either forget to set a timer, or leave it on too high a heat. I know it’s ridiculous.
7. I love a good wheat beer, especially with some good German food.
8. I cry at every wedding I attend as well as every other time I read the news in the am. I’m pathetic, it’s cool.
9. I’m currently addicted to Cookie Jam on my new phone.
10. I also have a problem with Doritos. When they are at hand I have no self control.

There now you know a few more things about me. If your dying for more info like I know you are, check out my list of 32 things that make me happy, how I spend my me time, learn about my quirks, or find out what kinda girl I am.

Also head over to Helene’s page to find out more stuff you don’t know about your favorite bloggers.

 

So this Capsule Wardrobe thing has been around for a while and a lot of people are participating in it which has gotten me to think about it (obviously right?). Well I never thought I could a capsule wardrobe because I like to wear a wide variety of things, but after seeing Chrystina’s post on a Reverse Capsule wardrobe, my mind started to change. A reverse Capsule I can totally put together! I actually had a lot of fun going through everything I wore in spring. It also helped me toss a few things that I don’t really need and actually think about the things that are in my closet.

The impending move (remember we are looking for houses) has made me really think about all of the stuff we have and what we want to bring to our future home. There are a lot of things in my closet that needed to be let go before the move and the capsule wardrobe idea really got me to address that.

So there you have it the basics of what I wear most. You can probably tell that I have a pretty standard outfit of plain tank tops or t-shirts. My office is pretty cold so I have a few standard sweaters listed here despite it being pretty warm out, and that’s something that probably won’t change throughout summer. I am lucky in that I can wear jeans to work, but there are a few nicer tops that I wouldn’t wear if it weren’t for working in an office, those are the 4 tops pointed out in the second to last row, because let’s be honest I’m not really wearing more than one of those t-shirts on the top part of the chart on any given weekend day.

What is a little deceiving about this photo is the number of actual tank tops that I own. I wear so many tank tops and year round, because I like layers. If we are being honest here (and we are) I thought I should include a picture of the actual tank top collection. Please ignore the lack of handles on the drawers, it’s a work in progress.

For bottoms I pretty much just wear jeans and maxi skirts. I have a number of maxi skirts but these were my favorite for the winter and spring. For shoes it’s been all about the boots and flats. I’m excited to start adding my sandals back into the mix.

I tried on a lot of clothes during this process as an attempt to get rid of some stuff and I learned a few things. First off I have to admit something I’m a “skinny bitch” for the most part, and have always fit into clothes from the juniors section. The women’s section never fit me quiet right, and was more expensive so I was happy to shop in juniors. That is until recently. It appears that at 27 years old I am finally a woman (HA!), because the junior’s clothes look silly on me and pinch in all the wrong places, while women’s clothes actually fit and feel good. The last few months I have tried to rebuild my wardrobe with clothes that actually fit me, but many of my favorite junior’s pieces were still hanging around. This exercise really pushed me to ditch a lot of those clothes.

Other things of note: I own a number of heals that look like they’ve never been worn.  It’s just sad thinking of all that wasted money. Purses are in a similar situation, I use the same 2 all the time, one is leather and has lasted for a long time, so I think it’s time to invest in a brown version to replace the knock off one that has seen better days. I have a massive sentimental t-shirt collection, you know t-shirts form high school and college events? Yeah those need to go, I need to admit to myself that I’m never going to make that t-shirt quilt, and even if I do what would I actually do with it?

One of the major realizations that I had during this process is that the number of clothes that I actually wear was a lot smaller than I had previously thought. It really made me see just how many items I had that I did not need to hold on to. Getting rid of things feels so freeing. Everything once again fit’s in their drawers or allotted spaces. Pretty much everything was able to be donated, and only a few things needed to be thrown away. While I realize that I could make some money from some of the clothes, it’s just not worth it to me. I buy things cheap, and wear them out fast, that’s if they aren’t hand me downs already. It’s faster and easier to donate, and hopefully it helps someone else out.

I’ve already got my summer capsule in my head, and I’m excited to see if it actually holds up to my expectations, if so I might just do the real capsule wardrobe project for fall this year.