what's new?

My phone finally died awhile back and I had to replace it. I got a second job so I now work 7 days a week, roughly 8 hours a day. I'm a zombie. I let myself have a tiny bit of a social life this week and took a day off and saw Kyary Pamyu Pamyu at the Showbox and hung out with my dad. I got my hair cut (24" off!) and colored it redd-er. And I've been working on this pair of fingerless mitts/wristwarmers and they're shaping up nicely.

tyrannosaurus style

wearing: thrifted dress, talonalia necklace, diy spike haircomb, red lippy, thrifted boots, & everyday glasses

I made this crazy cool haircomb ages ago after seeing the tutorial on the always amazing Honestly WTF. One of the spikes fell off before I ever had a chance to photograph it so it sat languishing in my jewelry box until I finally remembered to dig out my E6000 and glue it back on. I'm actually glad it sat around for ages because the shiny brass spikes tarnished a little and look SO MUCH COOLER. It's perfect with my Talonalia necklace both because of the tone and because the spikes remind me of dinosaurs (yes, I know tyrannosaurus rex is not one that has spikes, shut up, blog titles don't need to make sense) which are, you know, ancestors to birds. Yeah, I think about weird connections way more than I should!

my favorite cold remedy

. . . is a Hot Toddy. I'm sick right now and this is the only thing making life worth living at the moment. Sore throat, headache, sniffles . . . I've got it all. If you're feeling similarly under the weather, mix grated ginger, fresh lemon juice, honey, and whiskey with a generous splash of hot water. It's basically DIY cough syrup.

valentine's cards

This is a fun little Valentine's card I made for a swap with some lovely ladies at work. I stuck a heart shaped doily to the patterned paper and gave it a good spritz with spray adhesive. Peeled the doily of, doused the thing in gold glitter and stuck it on a kraft colored card base. Now I have to work on some ATCs for another swap!

Deck The Halls: Mistletoe Ornament

I think hanging up mistletoe is super cute. Excuses for more kisses are never a bad idea in my book! But why is it so hard to find fresh mistletoe? I tried to find some a couple years ago to bring to a Christmas party, and I went to a bunch of Christmas tree stands 'cause I figured they would have it and grocery stores with floral departments, but no one did. Finally, this year I got some at Molbaks, but I think you can probably find it at florist shops as well. Since finding it was so hard, I didn't want to be boring and just hang it right up with the tacky plastic ribbon it came with, so I came up with this: Terrarium Style Clear Glass Ornament with Mistletoe! It's a great project if you're throwing a holiday party this year. Just make sure to serve some spiked punch or eggnog, and things could get really wild.

Materials:

large clear glass ornament*

ribbon

fresh mistletoe

string

*Clear glass ornaments can be found at craft stores in a variety of sizes. You want the extra large size for this project, mine are about 4 or 5 inches. I don't recommend smaller because the opening will be too small to fit your mistletoe without ruining it.

Process:

Remove the metal cap and hook from your clear ornament. This should come out easily. Cut several pieces of mistletoe, of varying lengths but all shorter than your ornament. I like to do one that will almost touch the bottom and a bunch about half that length. It fills the ornament best that way. Tie pieces of string to each stem of mistletoe and carefully insert them one by one into the clear ball. Your mistletoe stems need to be pretty narrow, unfortunately, to get them through the opening without damage. Adjust the strings so it all hangs nicely and tie together as one bundle. Now, tie the strings as closely as possible to the metal cap and replace the cap (squeeze the wires together to get them inside the opening). Add a nice ribbon to hang it from and a pretty bow and you're done! Now find a high traffic place to hang it for maximum smooching opportunities. Pucker up!

crafternoon with rallison

After I posted my spring flower crown, my favorite co-worker Allison told me she wanted to make floral headband with me. And my response was, of course, "Yes, please!" So Thursday we met up at work before I had to start my shift, bought a pile of flowers and whipped ourselves up some headbands. Of course, after we were done we took a bunch of pictures.

floral headband - diy, tshirt - target, cardigan & skirt - uo, tights - hansel from basel, clogs - jeffrey campbell

I love the whimsy flowers in your hair adds to any outfit! This silk scarf style skirt (woah alliteration) and scallop tights fit right in with the whimsy thing, don't you think? And how freaking cute does Allison look? She posted more pictures of herself on her delightful blog, note to self. She is rocking that bug print shirt!

The headbands themselves were super easy to make! I put together a little photo tutorial for you. You need a headband, floral wire, wire cutters, and an assortment of fake flowers. Create a bundle of flowers and leaves and wire them together, leaving a long tail of wire. Use the tail to attach the bundle to your headband. Continue adding flowers until you cover the headband, leaving the last few inches of each end bare. You can go back and fill in blank spots, or anywhere you see the wire, by hot-gluing small flowers to cover gaps. Now go rock your flower headband!

Thanks to Allison for taking pictures of me and for a really fun day! Now I have a million craft projects I want to do, so next time you're home again, let's hang. Also, any other friends want to get together for a crafternoon?* Things are more fun to make with friends. 

Also, check out my fun ombré manicure! I basically followed the tutorial on Jezebel, except I didn't do a base color. I wanted a more subtle look, so I just used a single color+clear. I think it turned out super fun! I'm starting to get into doing my nails more. I've been super inspired by The Dainty Squid as well. Kaylah posts the best nail tutorials. I tried her triangle nail before but it got screwed up before I got a chance to take any pictures. 

*I'm pretty sure I stole the term "crafternoon" from White Lightning. 

crafty girl

I think I've mentioned before that sometimes I get to bring projects home from work. This is one of our new lines Christy Tomlinson's "She" by Pink Paislee. It's really fun and mixed media-y, I guess because she designed it as stuff she would actually use in her own work. I made this wood plaque, which I think I'll buy when we're done displaying it at the store, a bunch of cards, and a scrapbook page I don't show here because I haven't added the photo yet. I think the plaque would be really fun displayed in a craft room, hence the phrase (I love those wood letters, by the way!) "crafty girl."

p.s. One of the managers at work, Beth, just started a circle Smash. She got a Smash book (super cool mixed media journals) and is passing it around, letting different people do a page. She gave it to me to do the first page and I'm such a mix of nervous and excited! I also just took her art journaling class at the store, which was a blast.

totally tutu

We created what is probably the coolest retail display ever at work recently. For our tutu section, which before has had kid sized tutus on dolls or hanging from the ceiling, we made paperdolls of ourselves and dressed them in little mini tutus. All the girls in our department, plus our best dude, got to be photographed doing silly ballet poses and then we printed them, glued them to foamcore, cut them out, and created mini tutus for each of us. I'm up top, wearing the purple and teal tutu, and Allison is right next to me, wearing a pink tutu. This was so fun and reminded me that I basically have the best job ever.

foodie digressions

Oh my goodness, I had the most delicious dinner. I made a pot roast with delicious carmelized onions, baked potatoes, and brussel sprouts and now I'm waiting for some homemade butterscotch pudding to chill. I have been on such a huge cooking kick these days. I used to only cook more asian or other "ethnic" foods but I've been focusing a lot of traditional foods. Lots of meat and potatoes type meals. I've also been obsessed with spinach, brussel sprouts, broccoli, and parsnips. And soup, oh my gosh am I obsessed with soup. I bake a chicken about once a week and use the carcass to make stock. Split pea, lentil, butternut squash, potato leek, all sorts of things. These simple dishes are so satisfying, I'm surprised it's taken me this long to learn how to cook these things.


pants - target, shirt - pacsun

I'm on spring break right now and I stayed home today, so this is what I wore to clean, do laundry, and cook the tasty meal I was jizzing in my pants over up there. I started cleaning up the kitchen while I was cooking and went a little insane. I scrubbed down our disgusting stove hood (oh my god, the grease was so bad) and that took a few house. I smashed my thumb which hurts to type now, but it looks so much better. I have some more to do tomorrow, but it's looking good.

Yesterday I picked Justina up from work at two and we met Amanda in Seattle. She had to pick her dad and brother up from the airport at seven and didn't want to go home after school. I wore this sweet sweater vest J gave me a few years ago and my corduroys, and a jacket I bought in Australia. Unfortunately I didn't take any pictures. I even, unusually, wore my glasses and heels! Oh well. We got lunch and went shopping. I bought a really sweet silk tank top that has a really great shape and details at a vintage shop. I also stopped by the thrift store on my way home, and got an ugly suede skirt which will be turned into something AWESOME, just you wait and see.

projectssss

I have bunches of things on my mind that I want to make or do.

I want to knit a slouchy grey wool cable knit hat. Something sort of like this:

but I think I'll do different cables. I'm planning on just making up the pattern as I go. I've never knit a hat and I've never knit cables but it really dousn't seem like it'll be too hard.

I want to finish this painting:

You may recognize it from one of my pictures from photo 1, in which my friend was pretending to paint it. I started it ages ago but haven't gotten around to finishing it up.

I want to make some slouchy menswear style pants using this pattern:

I'm thinking of finding some giant men's pants at the thrift store, made of a nice fabric and big enough that I have plenty of room to work with and turning them into lovely pants like those. There were also some Anthropologie pants I loved a few years ago that were high waisted trousers with a big sash and bow and I wish I could find a picture of those.

I need to get my hair cut. I want it cut like Linda Ronstadt:

So so adorable. My mom promised she'd pay for me to get my hair cut for Christmas, but we haven't done that yet. She's going to make me an appointment at the salon my friend goes to (they use all organic products and are really cool) on Friday, so hopefully my hair will be gorgeous soon! I was considering dreading it, which I have always wanted to do and definitely will do some day, but I decided I want pretty hair right now. Locks don't really go with a lot of styles I'm interested in wearing and I don't feel like limiting myself right now.

By the way, I just added a list of blogs I read to the sidebar over there. --> There's a lot of really great blogs on the list and I think they're all amazing. I am inspired by such a huge range of styles and I think you can see that in the blogs I love. They're all so wonderful in their own special ways.