Inspiring pictures, pickle jars, Pinterest, and bad dreams

I can't remember which wall paper site I found this lovely picture on, but I love it, and more to the point, when I saw it, it screamed Miyuki. Miyuki is the name of a character in a story I have been writing, working on, tinkering with, and and so on for the last several years. I haven't been able to finish it and maybe that's just me being overly critical, or maybe it is that I don't really know where I am going with it, or maybe it just isn't ready to be written just yet. Either way, when I get ready to hunker down and actually work on it again, this will be my desktop background to help keep me inspired.  I typically have something that reminds me or inspires me to keep going when I am working on a specific project. Plus this fulfills a need to go look up pretty pictures every so often. 

Pickle jars. My friend Chris always has pickles available at her house and I like them enough- or rather got hooked on them- that I started buying them in bulk as she does. So now I have pickle jars sitting around. I thought to make them flour and rice containers but that's just a pain in the ass mostly because my hand won't fit in the jar with my measuring cups. I thought, well, I will just pour the stuff out but knowing me, I would just make more of mess and end up wasting stuff. So, I have decided to keep a couple jars to use for craft projects and the rest are going to be recycled. This also cuts down on the amount of glass available for me to break. What can I say, I am clumsy.

Last night I decided I needed some Pinterest time. Only my laptop battery was running out and I was too lazy to get out of bed to fetch the power cord. I was also very tired. So this morning I picked up where I had left off. I have some craft projects I would like to do and am compiling a visual picture list for myself. At the moment most of them are sewing projects. All of the quilts in my house were made by my 3 of my Grandmothers and most of which were hand sewn. They are old and most are older than I am, having been used for at least 2 generations.  Since I treasure them and want to keep them as long as possible, I decided that I need to start quilting myself. This is to carry on the family tradition but also to fill a need to have gothic and witchy quilts fill my house.  Anyway, back to Pinterest, I spent an hour looking at DIY gothic crafts, clothing, some crochet, and coloring pages. I started to doze off, so I decided it was time to move on. 

I had a rather bad dream last night. I dreamt had my boobs removed and reconstructed to prevent cancer. Since my Great Aunt died from breast cancer it's a pretty vivid and valid fear I have. I decided a long time ago to disconnect from my boobs in the event that I turn up with breast cancer and need to have them removed. But the truly upsetting part of my dream was me looking at Grad schools. I went into talk to an adviser about possible schools. Well, I was told that I had to take 20 more credit hours and all at the 200 (sophomore) level to not only graduate with my BA, but also to have any hope of getting into grad school. Okay, this has to be because my history class, the last class I have before I graduate, it a 200 level class and there is a ton of work already. Secondly, I am not happy that I am already starting to have bad dreams and panic attacks within the dreams about Grad school.  I'm not sure what to make of it just yet. I am kind of afraid to think about it. 

Lastly, I am pushing my homework off until this evening. Amanda rented two movies that I need to see before 9 pm tonight. One is Victor Frankenstein with Daniel Radcliffe and the other is Krampus. And given that all I want to do is take a nap, I figure if I watch the movies, take a short nap, and wake up in time to cook dinner before Amanda gets home, I will be doing good. Then I can devote my evening to the bit of homework I'm allocating for myself.   

The Jerk, company, a belated birthday pic, some other stuff.

A belated pic from my birthday. Amanda's Mom was going to make this whole woodland themed cake and then she heard me say I wanted to do Mermaids. Of course, I didn't know what she was planning. So she combined the two. So there is a german chocolate cake under the colorful icing and Cathy made regular cupcakes for those who didn't want the cake. That all took place last month but I wanted to share a pic of the cake at least. 

Still don't know my grade in my Lit class. So in my opinion, the instructor is still a jerk. 

My break week was and is kind of shot. We have had company the whole time. I wish I could have had some time alone to do a few things but I have also had some fun with the Twins and with Amanda's friend from Boston. It was nice to finally meet the Boston friend since she and I are so much a like. 

We went out yesterday to show Boston friend around and you know after three weeks of being sick, trying to run around downtown on foot is kind of exhausting. Worse, I haven't gained any weight that I know of, but my legs were like, "nope, bitch, nope!" The muscles kind of burned. They felt like that when I went to the community building to exercise. I had the same thing happen today too, but I will get to today later. So I am annoyed. But on to yesterday's adventure downtown.

  

We went to the Looff Carousel in River Front Park in downtown Spokane. It's an antique and really fun. 

Amanda on her horse

Boston friend on hers

And me on a dragon bench. I opted for the bench because I didn't feel like climbing on a horse and I could put all our bags next to us. Also, that is not black lipstick, it's actually a really dark purpleish-plumb. Also, I really need to redye my hair. 

After the carousel we fed the trash goat statue. It has a vacuum in its mouth, you press a button, and hold your trash under it and it sucks it up. It's kind of fun.  

We had a decision to make after the goat. Do we try to talk through the park (it is a big park and normal people can do it), find a bridge to cross the river, and go to The Flour Mill where the chocolate Apothecary, Wonder of the World, and Wonder's Bead Shop, along with several other shops are? Or do we just cross the street and to go Boo Radley's and find food for lunch? I opted for lunch because I honestly didn't think I could make it across the park, shop, AND make it back to do some more shopping and then make back to the mall's parking garage. 

So it was off to Boo Radley's toy shop. It was a neat little store that we hadn't even been in. Lots of fun trendy things. Atticus was our next stop. Atticus is a tea/coffee cafe/ bookstore and drink wear sort of store. (Yes these two stores are themed after two character's in To Kill a Mockingbird)

Amanda stole Boston Friend's head band.

So that was yesterday and today I had to take Amanda into work. She forgot that she had to be there at 8 instead of 7. When I came home, I called my Dad work on my new laptop. I just had a question or two about some of the programs I didn't recognize. I took a short nap afterward and then got up to cook lunch. We had bacon grilled cheese sandwiches. Well we had them with Amanda when Boston friend and I went to have lunch with her. I also took a Blood Orange and some red skin dill potato salad. It was nice to sit on the terrace of Amanda's work, which is up on the 8th floor. It's not too hot of a day, however, it is brilliantly blindingly sunny. So in the short time that we were up and out there, my arm started to burn. I had to move after about ten minutes. Thankfully, I haven't broken out in hives. Time to get some sun screen. 

Later we are going to go pick Amanda up form work, go to dinner, and then take Boston friend to the airport. I suppose we will just come home and go to bed after that. But our stint of company isn't over. I have to drive down to Moscow, Idaho tomorrow to pick up one of the Twins. She has a date with a dude from another town over. She doesn't drive. But hey, her sister will come get her. 

Well, time for another nap. 

Unexpected sewing projects, changes, exercise, self care

The twins came up for a visit this weekend. I mostly kept to myself and did my own thing, including watching the Talking Kitty on Youtube for a little bit. (I learned the sad news that Gibson, the gray kitty of that web series passed away recently from bladder/kidney infection complications) Other than that and a nightmare that I haven't quite been able to shake  (someone truly awful keep following and touching me and no matter how much I screamed and pushed, no matter how angry I got, they kept following, touching, and hurting me even- needless to say I don't want anyone to touch me in the conscious world either right now), it has been a quiet and pleasant weekend. Tonight I am going to make a lemon garlic chicken with cream sauce over rice with some asparagus for dinner. Amanda and I are going to pick up the house a little and then just spend some time together. 

Still don't know what my final project or even what my final grade is my lit class. *sigh*

All that aside, we went to Joann's fabrics yesterday. The twins wanted colored pencils and I wanted to check to see if they had the fabric I had in mind for one of the potential cosplay ideas I'd had. They do but it will be expensive. So if I go with that character, I am going to have to budget and plan accordingly.  While I was looking around, not intending to buy any fabric, I found the one pictured above and knew it not only had to come home with me but that I had to make a skirt out of it. I just had to get the okay from Amanda because she had all the money this time around. She not only approved but she'd found some really soft, minky like material with a Princess Sofia print and wanted something made from it. I will be making her two pillow cases. I am hoping to get those projects cut and sewn this week and get a set of curtains made for the dining room cut, sewn, and stamped/painted as well.

Yesterday morning, needing some time to myself but not wanting to stay home, I went to the apartment complex's community building with Amanda and the twins. They went swimming and I went to the tiny gym. The treadmill feels different than any other I have been on, the sitting bicycle is nice for the most part. I like the weight machines too but even though I was careful to not over do it, I am still a bit sore today. I didn't get up and move a lot while I was sick so I am slow, but also I have this problem where my brain thinks I can just go and go and go, but my body says "Wait a minute, think again!" Ever since that disk herniated its like I have had this disconnect and sometimes it feels like this isn't my body. This is obviously something I am going to be speaking with a therapist about. Something I also plan to get set up and started this coming week. But yes, I did some exercising and found that I actually like doing it alone better than with anyone else. It's nice to just put on a set of head phones and listen to music, shutting everyone and everything else out for awhile. 

Exercise is part of my self care, the self care that in the past I haven't been so great at maintaining- as in self care in general. I'm going to be fixing that problem. There have been some things that I have put off doing because of this or that or I was waiting for Amanda or trying to work it around her. Fuck that shit. I'm going stop that. Along with  that, I have some other changes that I am going to be integrating. Amanda almost has the spare room/office/bowie room put together and that means my desk will be moved in shortly, possibly even today. One of those changes is that when I go into that room, I am officially at work or school. Not to be bothered. Further, Amanda and I have both decided that if we really are going to make careers out of writing, then we need to cut down on social time. With her at work full time and me doing school full time plud the IEPG stuff, we just can't afford to do as much socializing as we have done in the past. Further we don't owe anyone any explanations, if we say no, that means no and will remain no with none of this going behind one persons back to ask  or con the other. No, means no. Period. And if our friends have any respect for us what so ever, they will respect that. 

I talked to my Dad again this weekend. There is some good news in their part of the world. My Dad is taking over the house arrest install business for his friend. Said friend and his girlfriend are moving to the Virgin Islands to live and work. The guy will still own the business, of course, but my Dad is running it for him and if business improves then my parents will have a little more money than what Dad was making at Wal-Mart and if not, then they won't and Dad will look for other options. Personally, I think it is a good deal especially since Dad will get to drive the company truck and not put more wear and tear on his. And he can still be there for Grandma and Grandpa. Of course they are still in the vicinity of the Beast (a.k.a. my aunt) but that's not going to change until they move. 

Well in keeping with some self care, I am going to go take a short nap with Amanda. We have our lovely new sofa and we want to try sleeping on it.

Started Dominion, need to catch up on Defiance, and well blog

Last night I was feeling pretty weak and achy so I decided to play on the computer. We were watching a stupid movie on Syfy and there were ads for Dominion. Since I don't watch a lot of TV I probably wouldn't have cared too much about it, except that a friend had told me about the show last weekend. He said it was the spin off of the movie Legion. Given that I really liked Legion, I knew I wanted to at least give the TV series a shot.

So, we watched it and from the two episodes I've seen, I like it and want to see what they do with it. And because I was watching the Syfy channel, I

saw ads for Defiance. I didn't get to see all the episode from season one but they are on Netflix now. I'm planning to play catch up on this show today. It't another series I really liked. I figure I can get some crocheting done that way I haven't completely wasted time watching TV all day.

I would also like to get at least a couple of blogs written today. I didn't get very far yesterday. My one hour nap with Yoda ended up being two hours and then I started dinner. I should probably figure out what we are having for dinner tonight too... or maybe I will focus on lunch first since it's that time and worry about dinner later.