In response to Peter's concern...

Peter commented with immense concern over my bookcase organizing system, by color. You can read the comment on that post, which I think is two entries down. There he writes that organizing by color is "barbaric" and wonders how on earth I can find any books at all and ever.

Peter, calm yourself. Let me quiet your fears by explaining.

I am a Literature major, therefore I love books. I have purchased hundreds if not thousands of dollars worth of books in my lifetime. If I were to keep them all around, my whole apartment would be a library. So I only keep books around that I like, and since I've read them a couple times, I tend to know the colors of them, and usually search for them by color because who on earth has time to organize alphabetically?

For example, a sampling of my books, and, without looking, their colors:

• The Undomestic Goddess - Yellow
• Calico Palace - White
• Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix - Blue
• Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince - Green
• Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows - Orangish
  
• The Holy Temple - White
• The Five Love Languages - Purple
• Dictionary - one Red, one Blue
• Harry Potter books in French - Black
• The Secret Garden - Green

Is everyone feeling a little more peaceful about my decision? ;-)

Colorbatize Your Bookshelf

There is a whole flickr group dedicated to arranging bookshelves by color. I saw it done on some random indie-creative blog, and I thought it looked really cool. Better, at least, than the random mish-mosh of non-organization that I had going before. So I did it to ours:

Looks kind of cool...

Subversive Sewing

Steve bought me this book for my birthday called "Sewing Subversively." It is really cool, because it is mostly about a process called "Refashioning," meaning you make new things out of old things. Its perfect for me for two reasons:

1. We are on a budget
2. It means less difficult sewing

Basically the idea is to take something you already have (or something you buy secondhand) and make it into something you will wear. I have a lot of clothes with cute patterns or almost-perfect fits, and this has cool ideas about how to make them cute and fun to wear.

Yesterday I finally got up my courage to sew something real on the machine. I took a sweater that didn't fit quite perfectly, cut the sleeves off just so, and made it into a cute sweater vest. I know that sounds geeky, but I think it came out kind of cute. I figure I can wear it to work over a blouse. I'm also planning to cinch it in the back with a ribbon. I'll post pictures when it's finished.

The coolest thing about getting my sewing machine is that I just realized that I don't really dress the way I actually want to dress, but obviously we don't have the money for me to go out and redo my wardrobe. This gives me the chance to use what I have to make what I want.

C'est Amusant...

Two things:

1. I finished Harry Potter 7 last night. I am surprisingly sad that the series is over, but I did think the book was really well done. I feel like part of my childhood is over, though, or teenagehood, which is a weird feeling. I won't say any more than that because a lot of people are still reading it (and I LOVE seeing people all over carrying it around! I feel SUCH a sense of comradery... I want to ask people, "So, what page are you on?")

2. I found this during a short break at work, and it amused me:
How To Make Homer Simpson's Donut Trophy

Reading Harry Potter

Well I'm on page 565, so I guess I won't be writing until I've finished. :-)

DOORBUSTERS!

Steve and I were "DOORBUSTERS" this morning. Meaning we got up to go to the 8am-1pm sale at Penney's, because Steve needed a new suit, and Jenna's Steve had gotten a fantastic one from there. I was a little skeptical about Penneys, having had a less than fantastic experience with it as a child/young teen, but I was pleasantly surprised.

Steve of course, found a fantastic suit (which looks very nice on him). It is a tan wool/cashmere blend, retailed at over $400, he got it for $198 because of the sale. Sweet!

I got not one, but TWO dresses (both at 50% off--woo!), both of which I really like. Now I will only have trouble deciding which one to wear to Kevin & Rachel's wedding on Friday.

We also went to the fabric store, to stock up on stuff for my new (new-to-me) sewing machine. I bought thread it different colors (including hot pink and aqua!), a seam ripper, and a measuring tape.


I made this little guy (below) as a warm up. It's been a long time since I've used a machine, so he was fun. He appears to be a seal, though he was originally intended to be a porcupine. Obviously he had other plans. Even though he isn't the best looking thing, I love him, and I'm proud because he's the first thing I made myself on the machine. Steve named him Frederick.


This is my "sewing area" a.k.a. our kitchen table:



AND... to top off an already fantastic (I've used that word like 3 times, sorry) day, my copy of HARRY POTTER came in the mail today!


I am such a geek that I sat right down and immediately started reading it. Steve was very nice about it. Though as I sat down to post, he started in on it as well...


We might have to battle it out...

Monday

I went to the bookstore the other day and felt like a hungry person in a grocery store. I wanted to buy everything. I'm dying for something good to read. I finally had to force myself to leave because I knew I was going to buy something just for the sake of having a book, and it would have subsequently disappointed me for sure.

Graduation is coming this weekend. I'm excited to see my family, and Steve's family is pulling an all-nighter to drive down after his sister Jessie's graduation the day before. It will be so fun to see them. We get to see my family a lot but the Waltons live a lot further away.

I'm trying to get things in order. Like our whole life. Steve will be starting med school applications after finals, so I'm on the look out for anything that will help him get in. Tips, tricks, scholarship opportunities, everything. I think I'm beginning to understand what being a mom must be like. I'm learning to juggle things, but also to prioritize. I want to do anything I can to support Steve, because I'm so proud of him for working so hard and taking such big steps. He's so brave.

Buns (hehe)

Sooo... what's up with me? Well I recently joined a neat little website called goodreads.com (click there and you can add yourself as my friend and join me!) which is fantastic. You basically review books and see what your friends are reading & etc. Very neat, especially for a bibliophile like myself. Steve got on it too, but so far all he's done is rated all the books he was forced to read in high school as 1 star. He makes me giggle. I love that husband.

What else? I baked!!!! And I mean SUCCESSFULLY!!! Last time I tried to bake something, I messed up the breadmaker and it just baked a pile of ingredients without mixing them. AT ALL. Like so:

So I'm pretty proud that I found a recipe and actually baked these beautiful cinnamon rolls!

Check out the hi-tech cup-turned-rolling-pin I'm using!

Cut the long roll into mini-rolls using floss (you're supposed to!) and then placed them gently into their 8" pan.

Mmmm. Ready to bake. The brown sugar + butter on the bottom of the pan caramelizes deliciously.

They turned out! Steve has a very discriminating tongue, and he ate like three of them the second they came out of the oven, and then five more the next day. So all in all, I felt pretty successful.