A Vintage Christmas

I was in the Fullerton, California area this past weekend and I love the Oh, Hello Friend store, I just haven't been able to visit in a while. I was excited to find some vintage tags for gifts, and I also bought a vintage streamer that reads, "Merry Christmas" to hang in my window at home. I'll post a blog about vintage Christmas decorating later this week!

DIY: Painting a Mouse Pad (Part 2)

I took a small hiatus to have a vacation, go Christmas shopping and focus on my full-time job because December is the busiest time of the year for me. However, I was able to finish my mouse pad project! Click here for Part 1 and the link to the blog that inspired this design. Below you can see a close up of the design.

As you can see, I think it looks fantastic! I love i and I can't wait to find the right wireless mouse for this gorgeous DIY project. It look about 1 week, total. Each color took a day to paint and dry, and about two days to retouch and dry. I also added three Mod Podge coats once the paint finished drying.

DIY: Painting a Mouse Pad (Part 1)

I received some free mouse pads from work, but obviously the design wasn't the best.I decided to try to paint over them with a design that would match my office. First, place 3 layers of Mod Podge with a sponge. Let each layer dry before adding another.

 

 Then I used Blick Matte Silver metallic paint. Use a new sponge add as many layers as needed to cover the unwanted mouse pad image.

Then, I decided that I wanted to use the image of Mandi's from Vintage Revivals. You can click here for the DIY Retro Design. I'll post the final product soon!

Etsy Card Reader

I have some very exciting news! I received my Etsy card reader from Etsy.com. I had a square card reader for person-to-person sales at my first Pop-up last March. But now I don't have to worry about keeping my inventory correct. The card reader does it for me! I also loved the minimal packaging. And the free card/coaster and the sign holder is great too. I have been an Etsy customer since 2008 and a a seller since 2011, so I am very happy that I can sign up for more Pop-ups in various Southern California Flea Markets next year. Here's to a profitable 2015!

Try the World Box: England

This is my fourth Try The World subscription box. I thought I was going to get the Rome box this month, but England came! Which is great, because I was out of mustard and lemon curd. So far, I've tried the Carmel bar and the Colman's Mustard on my sandwiches. The box also came with Mint Sauce, Builder's tea, Shortbread cookies, Lemon Curd and the Carmel bar. I also love the new shipping box!! It's a smaller selection of items, but they're bigger! So real size items and not "travel" or "hotel" sizes.

A lazy person's guide to Halloween Decorating!

And by lazy, I mean a busy person's guide, because I am a very busy person. First, I got these Fall Paper Fan decorations from Target's Oh Joy Fall Collection. I love her blog and her products. I hung them at my front window.

Next, I bought some small pumpkins, because I was too lazy to carry heavy pumpkins into my apartment, design, carve and or paint them. So I got three small pumpkins and I had some gold paint. So I painted the stems. I saw on Pinterest and Instagram that people with free time have painted their stems and added glitter also. Who has the time? I wish I did.

 

Once completed, they looked like this:

 

I placed the the third pumpkin on a bowl and placed it on my dinning room table.

 

Lastly, I make Reese's Peanut Butter Cup stuffed in Chocolate Chip Cookies, in a muffin cup tin. But, unlike most years, I didn't have time to make it from scratch, like I did in this previous blog post.
Instead, I used these products, which saved me 2 hours!

I just use a piece of the Chocolate Chip dough, place on the bottom, add a peanut butter cup, then add more Cookie dough as needed. See each step here:

After about 15 minutes in an oven that is set at 350 degrees, they should be done and should look like this:

Once cooled, I removed each with a knife. They should come out easily (if you use PAM or a similar product) and then place them in individual paper cups. I don't heat them with the paper cup because, I hate eating a cupcake and some of it is still on the paper... what a waste!

The finished product! I cut a piece off to show you all what it looks like. I hope you'll enjoy making some for yourself for Halloween or Christmas, or any day really. I've also enjoyed this great song (click here, to listen on YouTube), so I had to share it before the month is out, I hope you all had a great October!

Challenges

I've decided to work on my finances and my digital bravery. First I joined Paige's No Shopping Challenge from Little Nostalgia. I just spend part of my savings on a fancy new road bike from Specialized. I have already seen results! I have been living paycheck to paycheck for the past few months, now I have only spent $200 of my last paycheck and my next pay day is in 10 days. Now I need to save all my cash to pay myself back.

I have also joined the Blog Society 30 Day Digital Bravery Challenge. I'm not exactly sure how this one will work, but I'm excited. I tend to be pretty personal and not "digitally brave". 

I also did a Forever 21 Challenge, which was horrible! I wanted a Beatles Mono Vinyl Set and took my best "Mod Photo". But Forever 21 never announced a winner, they just wanted entries for Instagram tags. I will not be participating in any Forever 21 Challenges ever again. I emailed them, commented on their blog, asked them on Instagram and they did not respond at all! At least I took a cute photo. #forever21istheworst

Smoothies

Over the summer I worked on some of my smoothie recipes. This Green Smoothie has two kiwis and and two bananas, coconut water and ice.

Sorry I took these  photos in my dark apartment. The Blueberry Smoothie recipe is two handfuls for blueberries, one banana, 1 cup or orange juice and ice.

Each smoothie is blended until smooth. The ice is there for a liquid consistency and to make the drink ice cold.

CURRENT AFFAIR: Pop Up Vintage Marketplace FALL 2014

As a vintage seller, I always wanted to go to the Current Affair pop-up show, but somehow I always missed it. Finally, I saw the email early on and bought my ticket for the Downtown LA market! I will say that although I sell vintage, I rarely wear vintage. I have one pair of vintage sandals and about 10 vintage leather belts. And this market is definitely all about clothes and fashion!!

I will say that while there were great choices and every booth designed their space beautifully. I did have a chance to wear my vintage German hunting pin at the event.

 

There wasn't a lot of room to walk around and the main issue for people was the lack or seating areas and the dressing rooms were in certain locations, so vintage sellers had to trust that people trying on clothes would come back. I didn't even have time to take photos because there would have been too many people in my shots. But here's the last one I took:

 I'm also not sure I'd go again. The prices were way too expensive for me! A $500 vintage dress and $200 used boots aren't my taste. But I'm sure that the vendors sold a lot of one of a kind items that look great on their customers! 

sound. at the Santa Monica Museum of Art: Mark Trayle

This may be the longest blog title I've ever used! Haha! Anyway, over the summer I went to
sound. at the Santa Monica Museum of Art with Mark Trayle. It's difficult to explain, but essentially made various sounds using some sort of audio contraption, unfortunately that is not my expertise. The Museum was in collaboration with the Society for the Activation of Social Space through Art and Sound’s (SASSAS) sound. According to the website, it featured "new multichannel pieces intended to conjure sonic illusions". The performance took place inside SMMoA’s exhibition, Robert Swain: The Form of Color. This exhibition was actually the reason I wanted to go to this performance. I enjoy the idea of two different art pieces being made into one experience.To hear what it kind of sounded like, click here. It was definitely an experience, I will say that I am happy that it was a free event, which allowed me to use my money to buy a CD of a previous Sound performance.

The Corpse Flower

One of the most exciting parts of my job is getting to visit my place of work during major events! This event was The Corpse Flower!

This was before it bloomed, but it grew to be taller than 5 feet!! I have never seen a flower like this before. You can read about it, here on my organization's website.

It bloomed over the weekend and there was a short line into the conservatory, but it was such a thrill to see, personally I thought that it just smelled like moldy flowers... others agreed that it did smell like a corpse. The flower is native to Sumatra, Indonesia. Below is a close up on the pollination process, which you can read about on the link I posted above.

Beach Waves Hair Tutorial

After I cut my hair, I wanted to try the wavy hair look. So I decided to loo online for tutorials and products. I tried the Not Your Mother's Beach Babe Texturizing Sea Salt Spray, but it wasn't right for my hair, neither were the YouTube tutorials that mentioned using hair straighteners to make your hair wavy. So here is my tip for those with fair wavy/curly hair that is hard to tame!

After a shower or wetting your hair divide into pieces and roll. Then pin onto your head, bobby-pins and hair clips are just fine. Allow some time for your hair to air dry. After 20 minutes to 40 minutes remove the pins and begin to blow dry (without unrolling your hair).

Once dried, it'll look like the photo below. Then unroll your hair and if your hair is like mine, it'll look like my hair in the photo above this post! No hair products are needed, but be sure to have some free time and patience.

Homemade Spam Sushi

 
I've been enjoying my subscription to the Try The World box! Here is my recipe for Spam Sushi: Teriyaki Spam, Avocado, Carrots, Rice, Seaweed and Soy Sauce.
It's quite simple, just heat some rice, cut a carrot, avocado and spam into small pieces as desired and roll.

Create and Thrive - Photo a Day Challange

I was a little uninspired in August in regards to my Instagram. Mostly I was just taking photos of food and my cat. I decided that after being inspired by the Modcloth' s Summer Challenge I wanted to  do another one, I did a quick search and found Jess' Create & Thrive's Photo Challenge! I liked the challenges and I had a lot of fun taking the photos. I may do another challenge later on, if I find one just as inspiring. Thanks for the fun photo challenge Jess!

 I was really excited when Jess from Create & Thrive chose my "Treasured" photo as one of her favorites. I decided to show my favorite vintage rings. My rings from left to right: 

From a Monterrey antique store this year, Found in a grocery store when I was a kid, Given to me from my Aunt, From a Pasadena antique store this year.

 

Improved About Page!

I've been working on a "better" blog throughout this Summer. Besides working on improving the text and images of my blog posts, I decided to focus on my About page next. Luckily enough, I saw the DIY Writing Workshop by Sarah Grear! I am so happy that I attended this workshop, I learned a lot about writing for a blog and met some great people and Etsy sellers there!

In addition to my new About page, I also added places to submit your email into my new mailing list. Check it out, here! I've also added an Instagram button on the right side of the blog. Shockingly, it's the app I use the most and I didn't have a link to it on this blog.

DIY: Spray Painted Basket Project

 

 I saw older baskets spray painted to be given a new look on Pinterest. So I thought I would give this a try in my bathroom makeover, which you can read about, here. First I placed blue tape along newspaper edges and then placed the tape (as straight as I could) along the basket. Then I spray painted the bottom of the basket, I let it dry for two days.

Afterwards, I carefully removed the tape and newspaper to reveal the two-toned basket. I'll be posting photos of my completed bathroom soon, I just have a few more projects to complete! hat do you think of my new and improved basket? I really like it!