I’m Moving

I don’t remember if I posted this here yet, but my family is leaving Tampa and headed west…to Yuma, Arizona. We couldn’t be happier. While we will be living right smack on the middle of the desert, this is the first time in almost 10 years that we will be within driving distance of family and we are soooo excited! So, what does this mean for my craft business?

In the long run, it doesn’t mean anything. Just that I may start to paint cacti instead of palm trees. But for short term, it means that I will have to close up shop for a bit while my stuff is packed up and in route and while I get settled. So….I have a few dates set. Since we haven’t even set up an official day to move yet, these dates could change so check by my Facebook page for updates as I may not get around to updating my blog.

Feb 1 is the last day to buy anything from me.

Jan 15th is the last day to order anything custom (sewn or painted items).

I am going to add an album to the Facebook page soon with all sorts of Valentine’s Day items, so check those out and order soon for that special someone.

Lean and Mean for 2013 (not a crafting post)

As my title said, I am blogging today about something other than crafting, so if you only stop by to read about crafting this post isn’t for you. But if you’d like to stick around, you may enjoy.

In the end of October I joined a weight loss challenge. In the beginning, I had no intention of really winning it or even losing a ton of weight. The main purpose of this challenge, called the Healthy Holiday Challenge, was to help keep you focused on weight management around the holidays. You hear a lot of people say, “Oh it’s the holidays, who cares. I will just get back on track after the first of the year.” This challenge was aimed to prevent that. Instead of shoving a plate of cookies down your pie hole you were forced to think about it and only take one cookie or no cookie at all. I really liked the sound of this. Each participant paid $10 and we sent our weights in each week. The person who lost the highest % of their initial weight (this way it was fair for people of all shapes and sizes) would win 75% of the pot and the second place winner would win the other 25%. So…back story time.

Growing up I was always athletic. I love sports! I loved running. At one point, I thought I would follow in my dad’s footsteps and run track or cross country in high school. Fast forward to 7th/8th grade, the boobs grew, like a lot. I don’t even remember it happening. One night flat, the next day I am wearing a B-Cup bra. Puberty blows. I was still doing sports and running in P.E. but was definitely slowing down. And that’s when I noticed the chubbiness coming on. I remember the photo. I am at the river with my grampa, I’m 13 in a super cute blue bikini, and my stomach roll hangs over the bottoms. That’s probably around the time I stopped weighing myself also. I was about 135lbs at 5 feet 1 inch. Now I know some of you are like, “Omg, that is not fat.” I know this. But it isn’t exactly skinny either, especially in middle school and being short. Nothing but frustration was ahead of me. Pants that fit me in the waist but were too long. Shirts that never fit me right. Screaming buttons. I spent a lot of time wearing t-shirts from the boys section and sweatshirts. I was about a size 13 in the juniors section.

Fast forward to high school. I’m still doing P.E., I am still athletic and love rollerblading and bike riding, but I am struggling to run a mile when I was forced to. I think I was running (walking at times) a mile in about 15 minutes. And besides P.E. I wasn’t doing any other sort of gym-like activity.  Then I got a boyfriend. You know boys change everything. Even though he wasn’t looking at me naked, there is that thought that he might someday and I better look my damned best. So in 11th grade I stopped eating. Okay, I ate. But not a lot. I ate a lot of salad, I skipped a lot of meals, and I only drank water. In 11th grade, I was 127lbs and wearing a size 7. Between then and say about 2003, I was averaging probably somewhere between 127 and 135. Which in hindsight is totally not horrible. But I wasn’t working out regularly and I wasn’t eating healthy. I was just eating.

Fast forward even further to 2006. My husband (remember that guy I started dating? Same guy) deployed for a year. I went home to California and got an awesome desk job. There it was. Sitting on my ass for 8 hours a day. And what did I do when work was slow? Snack. And when it was lunch time did I bring my lunch? Heck no. I went down the street to eat mexican food and Jack in the Box. And I was not working out. Sure I was still active, I never stopped that. My gf and I bought matching pink beach cruisers and used to ride them at the beach all the freaking time. But in between weekends, nothing but sitting at work and eating.

This is me November 2006 when my husband came home from R&R. Look at my arms and stomach in that shirt. That shirt is yelling at me to buy a bigger size.

Fast forward again to 2007. Hubster is home safe and it’s time to start a family. So I got pregnant. Couldn’t have been happier. I absolutely loved being pregnant. And it was time to be weighed bi-monthly and see how everything was going. I remember my first real appointment… I don’t remember how far along I was, but I was about 160lbs. I was not even worried about that. But my doctor and I figured that I was probably around 150lbs before I got pregnant. Remember, I’m 5feet tall!! That is not good. So, I’m prego, eating and eating more. I ate everything. I especially ate a lot of Taco Bell and pizza (must be why my daughter loves it so much now). I never gave the excuse that I was “eating for two”, I just ate because I was hungry. But again, I wasn’t doing any sort of exercise. I was walking sometimes but nothing consistent. So on the day I gave birth I topped out at 196lbs. I gained about 45-50lbs during my pregnancy. But I gave birth to this……

I made this beautiful creation! So who the hell cares about how much I weigh?

Well, I should have cared. I wasn’t healthy. My problem was, I didn’t know what to do. I had tried doing crunches on a daily basis but that never works. I would go on walks but I wasn’t going regularly. I swore that once my daughter was walking around I would probably drop weight because I was running after her. Not the case. So one day my neighbor friend invited me to a yoga class. I went, it was nice. Afterwards, she and a couple other friends were saying that we should all try the kickboxing class that was before the yoga class. Workout routine was born!! I was doing kickboxing twice a week and doing a legs, butts, and guts class one other day. Also, my husband and I started eating low carb. I had found my weight loss plan. The summer of 2009, I was wearing a size 6 pants. People didn’t even recognize me. But I was oblivious to the weight I had lost until I saw photos. I actually looked skinny. Well, a few months into the kickboxing class I went on vacation and wasn’t able to go to the class. I thought, I should try jogging. If I can do an hour of cardio in class, I could definitely jog. So I tried it and I could jog about 3/4 of a mile without stopping. So I did this a couple days a week. Then a few friends wanted to get into running so I started doing intervals with them. But when they weren’t running, I wasn’t running. And I was slacking on my low carb.

Fast forward a couple years to last year, 2012. I was still running but not as consistent as I should. If I didn’t feel like running, I didn’t do it. My husband had back surgery in January and wasn’t working out, so I just didn’t either. I just didn’t care. Probably not the best attitude to have. And all this time, I wasn’t weighing myself. I always said, “I don’t care about the number, I just want to be happy and healthy.” That is still true, sort of. I obviously wasn’t that happy. I wasn’t fitting into my clothes like I wanted to. Those size 6 pants didn’t fit anymore. I was back to wearing a size 10, 8 if I ran often. But in juniors (I’m almost 29 but I still want to be cute) I was wearing around a size 11 or 13. So figuring that I haven’t gotten any taller since 8th grade, I was probably sitting around 140lbs.

This is me this past summer. Not exactly healthy looking. So I set a silent goal for myself. I was going to be less than 140lbs. I didn’t care about how much less, I could be 139lbs because it was still under 140. Then this challenge came around. And you know what this did for me? It got my ass into gear!!!

Like I said in the beginning of this (long ass) blog, I didn’t do it for the money. I did it because I thought it would help get me into a good routine and maybe lose a couple l-b’s along the way. Well it did that and more!!!!!!!! Here comes the fun part.

At my first weigh-in, I was 137lbs. It was definitely a good week before that one because I was 139 the week prior. So we will just say I was 139lbs. The first week I lost 3lbs. I was running 3 days a week. I was seeing my name in lights (it was actually just a leaderboard) on our Facebook group page. Each week following, I lost 1lb or just maintained my previous weight. I changed my routine to running 5 days a week. And not just because I was losing weight, I wanted to run. One morning it was cold and I thought, “I will just walk today. I don’t feel like running.” I switched my playlist to my soundtracks and went out for a walk. I walked a half mile and started running. I couldn’t just walk. That shit was boring. I wasn’t getting sweaty. I didn’t feel like I was doing anything. I had turned into a runner.

Today, January 5, 2013, was our final weigh-in. 128lbs. Back in my size 6 skinny  jeans. Actually, I switched styles. I was wearing the Old Navy Diva skinny jeans but I didn’t like the way they made my legs look. I have lovely legs, no, freaking sexy legs. That is something that hasn’t changed. So I wanted to show that. So I switched to the Old Navy Rockstar skinny jeans. They are skin tight and I LOVE them. I wear tight shirts now. I don’t suck in all the time. I don’t pull my shirt away from my stomach every 5 seconds.

This is me today!! ^

 

^ This was me last week. That grey shirt is the same one I was wearing in the photo above from last summer by the waterfall. Looks a lot different doesn’t it?

Here’s an even better photo I took in the middle of writing this blog. It’s the same pirate shirt I had on in 2006. Look at the arms! The shirt isn’t yelling at me anymore.

This is what this whole blog is about. I lost just about 11lbs in 3 months and I did it by exercising and eating right. Nothing fancy. Now don’t get me wrong, when I wanted a cookie, I ate a freaking cookie. I drink beer. When my daughter asked if we could go eat at Taco Bell, we went. And I don’t just eat a taco. I eat a couple of those bad boys and a cheesy gordita crunch. I may cheat my diet, but I don’t cheat myself. That doesn’t work for me. But when I eat junk, I run harder the next day. When I started this, I was running about 2 miles 3 days a week. You know how many I run now? 4 miles. I run 4 flippin’ miles 5 days a week. Rain or shine, cold or hot, I’m out there running. And on top of everything else, I have a new goal. Besides maintaining (losing a couple more pounds would be fine but I’m really happy with where I’m now), I am registered to run a race in June. I will be running the World Famous Mud Run at Camp Pendleton in California with my dad June 9th. I am so crazy excited and anxious about this. Remember that girl I wanted to be back in the day? The girl that wanted to do track or cross country like her dad? Well, it took me about 20 years, but here I am. Let’s do this!!

Commissioned Christmas

If you have been keeping up with my previous blogs you know that I hand made every gift I gave this Christmas (with the exception of one but it was for a 2 year old and he just wouldn’t have appreciated a handmade gift). I also had the pleasure of making some money this holiday by making things for my customers to give for Christmas.

First, my best customer, Sarah (you’ve seen her name before) asked me to make her friend some ornaments. Her friend loves Twilight and True Blood, so I made these.

I wanted to make them as “store-bought” looking as possible, so I copied the images just like the titles. The True Blood one was pretty easy because it’s plain block lettering. I just added the dripping red for blood. Then I put the white satin ribbon inside to make the red really pop. For the Twilight one I didn’t want to just go in with the black paint in case I messed up, so I drew it with a marker first. This way I could wipe it off easily.

Then I went over it with the black paint and added the red ribbon.

For both of the ornaments, I used the paint specifically made for glass. The only step I didn’t do was bake it in the oven, but these aren’t going to get wet and once the paint sits long enough it becomes permanent anyway.  I heard from Sarah and she said her friend loved the ornaments and even posted photos to her Instagram. I guess when your art is Instagram’d you’ve really made it!! LOL!

My aunt later commissioned me to make some jewelry as stocking stuffers. She bought some of the jewelry I had listed on my craft page and then asked me to make a few other things. The first was a bracelet with the bent wire in the shape of the word “Lucky.”

On the back side of the bracelet where the clasp is there is a clover charm as embellishment. To match, a pair of earrings with green beads and clover charms.

Now, I am pretty good at crafting and I do a little of everything in the crafting world. But, I cannot do everything. So sometimes I have to ask my mom for help. In the case of my girlfriend, Theresa, I really wanted something crocheted. One day while I was browsing (you guessed it) Pinterest, I saw a scarf and it was made out of skull shaped pieces. Sort of like granny squares but skulls. I knew I needed one of these scarves so I told asked my mom to make me one. She made me a rainbow colored one. It’s AMAZING! Theresa loves skulls (and could be moving somewhere cold in the near future) so I knew she needed one. One of her favorite colors is blue, closer to turquoise, so I sent my order to my mom.

PERFECT!!! After Theresa opened her gift, she got really mad at me for being so thoughtful for my gift and not just buying her something at the store. She then spent a week trying to buy a gift “as good as” mine. I told her repeatedly that it was the thought that counts, but she wouldn’t have it. She ended up buying me two skull sweaters that are pretty much the cutest sweaters I own. I wish I could wear them everyday. She really did awesome!

 

Tomorrow (or possibly tonight), a post about a scrapbook-type memory book. Easy enough for anyone to make. You won’t want to miss it. Also, don’t forget that I have a small contest on my MUGSTACHE post.

Happy Friday!!

Mom and Dad’s Christmas

I can’t believe it, but I kept forgetting to take photos of my gifts. So I am going to show you a couple and then tell you about a couple.

First up…..

You know I am into Day of the Dead, and my parents are into the sun and moon symbol, so how cool is it to merge the two! This was hand drawn with colored pencils and framed. I think my dad may burn this into wood in the future also. That would look so incredibly awesome.

A gift I made just for my dad was a camera strap cover because he just got a new camera. Of course that is something I didn’t take a photo of. But…I do have a couple listed on my Facebook page if you want to see. I sell them for only $10. They just velcro around your existing strap so you can change them whenever you want.

I made my mom a few rings…I think I sent her a LOVE one and then one with my dad’s name, FRED. If you haven’t seen my other rings, check them out here. The big gift I made for my mom was another Pinterest find. I actually pinned it a while ago and made one for myself, but never shared it with you guys or my mom because I didn’t want her to make one for herself. So here goes…

This is the original pin if you’d like to see it. It’s a calendar but with a scrapbook twist. The main idea is that you have a box with 366 pieces of paper in it, each with a day of the year…no days of the week and no years. Each paper just says, Jan 1, Jan 2…Dec 31. Each day, you write the year and something that happened on that day. You do this every year and you can look back to see what you did each day. The day I saw it, I made myself one. I had some cute rectangles of scrapbook paper but not enough and when I want to do a project really bad, I sort of stop at nothing to do it and get it done. So for mine, I used some of the cool paper but for the rest of the days, I cut up old manilla folders in rectangle shapes. So mine doesn’t look quite as cute as my moms.

Here’s moms. I wrapped a shoebox in cute paper also.

On special days, my bday (pictured), family bdays, anniversaries, I put photos and special paper.

And here was day one. I had my mom open it to this day where I already got her started. If you can’t read it, it says “2012 I received this calendar as s gift from Chrissy.”

This was a super fun project. It was a little expensive (I don’t work so expensive for me may be different than what you expect) to make because those pre-cut, super cute scrapbook papers are a little pricey. About $8 per 100 sheets and I needed almost 400. But you figure, $30 for this and some elbow grease, or $12 for a calendar that you use for only one year and throw away. I choose this one, hands down.

The last project for my parents (and all the other grandparents and a few friends) was a hand print Christmas tree that my daughter painted. Again, don’t know why I didn’t have a photo of the finished project, but here is a work in progress one and you can get the jist of it. She did 6 green hand prints on a canvas to make the tree and then used other colors to make the decorations. Great gift because you can take it out every year to enjoy. And it’s fun for the kids to make and great to teach them that gifts don’t always have to be store-bought. It’s the thought that counts.

Mugstaches!!

I am finally sitting down and writing some blogs about the Christmas presents I made this year. I only bought one gift this year! The rest were totally handmade. I feel so awesome about that. I am going to write a couple different posts with different items, read ’em all or pick and choose, but I hope you like my art and maybe you can try some next year…or buy from me. That is always an option too. 🙂

First up, Mustache mugs.

This one is for my husbands bff, Aaron. This one was super special made because he is left handed so I had to make sure it was on the right side when he held the cup.

And then this one for my husband. (Yes, he is wearing a snuggie, or actually this one is called a Forever Lazy. It was a bday present from his bff ^)

These were super fun mugs to make. Here’s what I did:

If you’ve read my other blog post “Pin Pin Pinterest” you have seen that I experimented with drawing and painting on glass. The idea I saw on Pinterest for that stated that you could use Sharpee pens and cook the glassware in the oven and it would be permanent. Well…. this is what I learned from both projects. When you use a Sharpee on clear glassware, (I used wine glasses) it stays. I rubbed the heck out of the drawing and it wouldn’t come off. The only thing I noticed was that the yellow color burned off. No biggie. Since I had been successful with the glasses, I figured it would work just as well on the white mugs. After all, the original pin showed using white mugs and white plates. Perfect.

This is what happened. The black Sharpee did not stay. So, I simply repainted the mugs with my paint specifically designed for glass, cooked them in the oven, and voila. Perfect. (The photo above is another mug I made for my husband that I have to go back and paint.)

I made another mug for my father-in-law. I used Sharpee on this one but I used color Sharpees.

Maybe it’s just something with the black, not sure. But once I cooked this one, I also rubbed the heck out of it and everything stayed put except the black. So I went back in with black paint and did like I did with the ‘stache mugs. Does anyone know what the symbol on this mug stands for? Maybe a free pair of earrings for the first person who gets it right!! 🙂 Just comment and guess.

But of course, there is something else you can’t forget with these……..hand wash only. No dishwasher. Hubster didn’t know that and this happened……

At least I still have the outline. Maybe the Sharpee just needs to be cooked more than once. Ah well. Now I have something else to do.

Stay tuned for a few more posts about other gifts.
Happy New Year!!!