Day 356

Today at lunch, I ventured out to my favorite bead shop to get some texturing plates. While I was there, I discovered that they now carry brass sheet. But even better is that they have it in 26 gauge, which is starting to become one of my preferred gauges - especially when shaping and not just pounding. It's much easier to cut than 24 gauge. I'll probably get some brass in 24 gauge as well, but for now, the 26 gauge is going to suit my purposes perfectly.

Day 354

I had some Christmas shopping to do downtown, and decided that a visit to some of antique stores was long overdue. I had so much fun looking through the treasures. I came across a collection of furniture, and wish I had a home for this piece.

Day 331

There was a deal at Costco that I wanted to take advantage of, so we decided to run by and risk the crowds. We were pretty surprised to see that it didn't seem to be any more crowded than any other weekend. The lines were actually very short. It might have been our strategic plan to go right at lunch, or maybe everyone was at the mall. Either way, we weren't complaining.

Day 313

My mom originally told me about these trellises with the vines climbing all around the structure. The changing colors are great.

There is beauty everywhere - even in the back of Target.

Day 309

The boys and I spent the morning running some errands and the last stop before heading home for lunch was at the craft store for mom's beading project. It was supposed to be a pretty quick trip since craft stores and little boys don't get along.

When we got back to the car after a successful stop, I realized I was missing something really important.

Two things were going on when I'd parked the car. One was that I was talking on the phone. The other was that it was pouring down rain, and I didn't want to try to wrestle two little boys and car seats and talking on the phone all at the same time. The new stereo we bought a couple of weeks ago has integrated Bluetooth, so I waited with the accessories for the car on (keeping the Bluetooth connection) until the conversation was over.

The problem is that when I got out of the car (preoccupied with the rain), I forgot to turn off the accessories and put my keys in my purse. I let little Matt lock the doors like he asks to and was promptly locked out.

Of course, it was easily resolved with a 90-minute sidetrack waiting for grandma, driving up to dad's work and coming back with the second set of keys. The boys were troopers because they didn't have lunch until after we were back in our own car. Paul said he was starving, and Matt piped up with "hungry".

Day 296

My mom called me last night to tell me that she found some mugs from our dishes on clearance for more than 50% off. I was so excited because these craftsman mugs are ones we've wanted to get more of for years. Even though it gives us an odd amount, I asked her to pick up all five of the ones they had on clearance.

Yay!

Day 261

I have been doing this blog for 260 days, and I'm pretty sure that today was the first day that I actually forgot to take a picture for the blog. (What's that about 21 days to make a habit??) Fortunately for me, I didn't forget to take any pictures at all. But my choices for today are pretty slim. Too bad I can't put it up for a vote.

I have the toddler moment where I might not be able to visit our local library again, and the technology win at the grocery store. Since I might be able to use the first one on our main blog, I'm going with the win.

We were making tacos for dinner tonight when my husband realized we were out of crunchy taco shells. I volunteered to run to the store. While I was there I heard over the intercom that they were having a special on meatloaf. Seeing an opportunity to take advantage of an inexpensive meal for tomorrow, I decided to pick up one from the refrigerated section.

Unfortunately, unlike the meatloaves sitting under the heating lamp, the ones in the refrigerated section did not have re-heating instructions. Go figure. But fear not, I had my trusty iPhone with the fancy macro lens.

As I was taking a picture of the directions, one of the super helpful (I actually kind of mean that) employees snuck up on me and asked if I needed help. I explained what I was doing, and she commented that she'd never seen anyone use their phone like that.

Now I live a bit in the country, but I assure you I haven't invented that particular maneuver. I just smiled and went to make my purchases.

And, that, is officially the longest post on the most unintentional daily picture ever!

Day 244

I've had these beads for two years now. I bought them at the Puget Sound Bead Festival in 2007. I bought the ceramic beads and then went home and picked out the Swarovski crystals in Jonquil from Artbeads. When I received the crystals, I put it together like I had envisioned.

And it was too long.

I put it away for a long time and recently re-discovered it. Tonight, I played around a bit with crystal sizes and found a smaller clasp. I'm pleased with the results, and happy to have one more project completed.

Day 226

We hadn't been to Costco for a while and since our list was nice and long, we decided to go tonight. One of the places my husband likes to look is at the books and see what's interesting. I'd been debating over getting the Twilight series for probably five or six months. They had it back in stock again, so I finally decided to make the purchase. I'm hoping to get to read the first two again before the newest movie is out in November.

Day 221

Back-to-school is just around the corner, so my oldest and I went school supply shopping this morning. What an interesting adventure!

I misunderstood the ad at the store I thought we'd buy his supplies, so Target got most of our business. Then after several stores and a check on the website, I discovered that Crayola does not make 10-count washable markers. They make 10-count regular markers, and 8-count washable ones. We went with the 8-count because I figured I wanted washable over pen count.

None of the package sizes were quite right. They wanted 24 pencils, but they came in packages of 10. I could get 24, but those were $2.50 while the packages of 10 were .10ea. I figure the 6 extra pencils might make up for the missing pens.

It took a couple of hours, but Paul was really quite good the whole time. I think he liked having that one-on-one time, and he's pretty excited about starting school.

Oh, and I almost forgot my kudos for Target. I had to buy 6 packages of markers, and the sign said $1.50ea. They rang up at $2ea, so I figured I must have read the sign wrong. I decided to go back to check on it, and sure enough, the sign said $1.50 but it expired yesterday. I took it to the gal to show her I wasn't crazy and she actually credited me back the difference. I was pleasantly surprised!

Day 191

Today I did something I've never done before. I bought a pattern and yarn for a sweater, and it's not even for me!

My mom has been doing so much for us the last couple of weeks from lending us her washer, to running us to the airport at all hours of the night, to sitting at my house for hours on end waiting for repair people who never show up. I wanted to find a way to thank her, and I was a little bit stumped as to how to do it.

The boys and I went to a small town this morning and did some shopping. One of our stops was a yarn and embroidery shop. I was a little bit nervous about taking the boys in because a lot of yarn shops around here are quite cranky about kids, but this gal was super nice and helpful.

I was browsing around and not really sure what I was looking for when I happened upon this pattern book of fair isle sweaters. The cool thing was they had a yarn that's dyed to give the effect of a fair isle sweater without the ten different colors. I worked really hard trying to figure out how much yarn to get, but eventually settled on an amount that looked like it should work for at least three or four different patterns.

Now I hope my mom likes it.

Day 134

Some days you get hit with certain things all at one time. Today was one of those days.

Matt has been needing some new shoes for a bit. I am super particular about the shoes I want my boys to wear on their growing feet - especially for Matt since his feet are growing and developing so quickly.

One of my local children's stores was having a sale of buy one, get one 50% off. My ideal would have been to find a pair of regular shoes and a pair of sandals for Matt, but unfortunately, they did not have any sandals in his size. I still ended up coming home with two pairs of shoes for Matt.

When I got home there were two more pairs of shoes for Paul that came in the mail. One of the bargain sites I browse was offering deeply discounted shoes that I like for Paul. It ended up that the two pairs of shoes I got for Paul were less than one pair for Matt.

Some days you win (get a really fantastic deal), some days you lose (pay full price/don't find the exact right thing), and others are a pretty awesome mix in the middle (today).

Day 90

While Paul was at preschool this afternoon, I was running some errands. I needed to find a new backpack for my husband's trip in a few days, so I stopped by the Eddie Bauer Outlet to see what they had. Since I was there, I decided to try on a few things because I hadn't been to the store in probably better than a year.

I picked up my standard choices of deeply discounted sweaters and cute spring tops. When I went to go try them on there was one lonely dress sitting on the rejected rack in front of the changing rooms. It was cute and a quick glance revealed that it just might be my size. On a whim I tried it on and shockingly enough, I have an adorable new Easter dress for a screaming deal.

There just might be a full picture of the gal behind the lens in the dress on Easter.