Photo Travel Blog: Dallas, Texas

The Sixth Floor Museum was the only museum I really had time for. Because of the crowd and the audio guide, it took about 3-4 hours. Also the museum store was full of great JFK books!

 

The John F. Kennedy Memorial was also a great spot, it is a meaningful tribute to JFK.

 

We also stopped by the Dallas Arboretum and Botanical Garden. They had a fun Pumpkin Fall Festival. There was plenty of Texas decor too!

On the last day we went to Reunion Tower to check out the Dallas landscape. It was really fun and the interactive screen was helpful and told us what each building was.

I'm Back!

I'm back from my vacation and I've re-opened my Etsy shop, Sea Sand Vintage for two weeks, before I go on another vacation later this month. But in my travels I did found one new vintage item that I've added as a new listings, you can check out this vintage antique lama bronze figurine here.

I'll also, I'll post my vacation photos from Texas, travel tips and YouTube videos soon. In the meantime, you can check out my Instagram here, and my YouTube channel, here.

No Shopping Challenge : How did I do?

As you may have read in a previous blog post here I was working on myself and some challenges that I was doing. Paige from Little Nostalgia posted her experience with the No shopping challenge. I will say that I did shop twice. I bought an outfit for a holiday work event and then another for a vacation in the snow and I live in Southern California, thus I own no sweaters. Because I went shopping, I decided to extend the challenge two extra days, so it ended on January 3rd instead.

I did pretty well, however I did do A LOT of online window shopping! I emailed myself links of things I'd like, I used Pinterest a lot too. So what have I purchased so far? A sweater on clearance at Target for $7.00 and the most amazing boots! As you can see below, they are adorable and match my purse quite well. I've been looking for black leather boots for work and I finally found some that weren't too expensive at Macy's. I was willing to spend between $80 - $100 on some if I really liked them, and boy was I surprised when he cashier told me they were half off!!! Seriously, I got some boots for $45.00 total. I feel pretty good about waiting until after Christmas to do some of my shopping. It all seemed to work out and I'm pretty thrilled about it.

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!

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.

Blog Content

I am currently working on better content for my blog. It's been a long time coming but I think I'll be making more time to write and post. Two of my inspirations lately have been Dana from The Wonder Forest and Gerry from The Bunnie Hole. I've been watching their videos on blog content and posting ideas. My brain is full of ideas, so I just need to post my new vintage listings on Etsy and write new blog postings.

Swap Shop December 2012 (Part 2)

Since I sent the Swap shop package a couple of weeks ago, I am going to assume that it's alright for me to post photos I took of my wrapping of vintage items for Vicki of of Vic and Lily Vintage.Although I won't be sharing what I sent her just yet, please enjoy the photos of my gift wrapping:

Swap Shop December 2012 (Part 1)

Long story short, kind of. Danni from Oh, Hello Friend announced that she was having another Swap Shop this December. I could not pass up this opportunity, especially since I'm such a fan of her shop/blog. We were paired by the aesthetic of our shops. I have luckily paired with Vicki of Vic & Lily Vintage, from Hong Kong. Please check out their blog, here.

This is just the first part of my blog posts of this swap, because I wanted to talk about different aspects of the swap separately. This post is just an introduction to the swap and photos of the lovely packaging that Vicki did! Happily I took some photos before I opened the parcel. The next blog post will be me modeling the lovely vintage clothes that I was given!

Moving...

I will be moving these next two weeks, which means that I won't have too much time to blog as much as I have been. But I will be adding to the "Inspirational" page on my blog. These posts will include videos that have inspired me and others as well. I will also have time to post some of the items that I will be buying or am very interested in buying for my new home, enjoy!


 

To Facebook or Not to Facebook?

 

(Nürnberg, Germany)

I am debating if I should also add a Facebook page for Sea Sand Vintage. I am leaning towards not doing so, only because I have this blog, which is a much more creative outlet for me. I feel like the posts I write here go a little unnoticed, however since I am the Facebook user  that I used to be, maybe a Facebook page would lack in "Likes" as well.

But let me go back and review my online outlets for Sea Sand Vintage:
The store is on Etsy.com, the updates are on Twitter (which is connected to Instagram) and this blog on Blogger to share my etsy store updates, and personal updates about my life.

I think that more than enough as I do have a full time job, currently looking to move and have a social life (including my hobby of selling online). So, I believe that for now, I am alright with these Social Media Outlets I am using, but if anyone thinks that Facebook would be useful please let me know.
 

#Marchphotoaday

I have been doing this Instagram Photo Project created by Fat Mum Slim. I thought that would continue to show my previous photo on my blog to try to catch up, and show my new followers my previous March photos.

My Model and Graphic Consultant

 My sister Danie is kind enough to act as my Etsy Model when I need to take photos of a person using or wearing a Vintage Item. Above and below are some photos I've taken of her, you can also read her style and fashion blog, Dustland Fashion.

New Blog Look

This is my new Blog Design 4.0.My previous designs have been based on Vintage items that I have had. My sister, Daniella of Dustland Fashion consulted with me regarding my next blog look. Mainly because I get bored of the same look all the time and I always try to improve my Shop's online presence. This 4.0 features my photos as Polaroids, since I currently have two Polaroid Cameras for sale at Sea Sand Vintage.
As you can see, I've changed the look a bit since last year.

1.0: Vintage Paper




2.0: Getty Villa (My Personal Favorite)

3.0: German Countryside

4.0 Vintage Polaroid

Part One was brainstorming what the new theme would be, my sister an avid camera collector suggested a Polaroid Theme with my Instagram photos. Part Two was going on to Picmonkey.com to edit the photos using their Polaroid Application, next was moving on to Pixelr.com to put them together to into one Banner Image. Short and sweet, but it took about 2 hours to complete this project.