Shop With Me!

I thought doing a typical WYBDW would be a bit repetitive. Let me give you a rundown. I've been painting this week.  Sick of hearing that yet? :) I had a couple of helpers (Thank goodness!!) Monday & Tuesday and we knocked out my Dad's dining room. It's so amazing what a little paint (or a lot, apparently that room is so huge!) will do!

Anyways. Lyndsi & I took a little trip to Rochester (haha...I laugh because trips to Rochester never seem to be little. What I mean is, time just gets sucked up and you can so easily spend the day there before you realize what happened!) We had some clothes to donate after our sale & thought it'd be fun to hit up one of our favorite Salvation Armys on a Wednesday, which for those of you that don't frequent them like I do are their "everything is half off except one tag color" days. Clearly it's preeeetttty awesome. We also made a couple other stops, and I thought Hey! I should let you guys "shop with me" today, as in show you my purchases! I would apologize for the picture quality but yeaaa, you know about that by now. :) Also, excuse any furry body parts that snuck into my pictures...it was easier to let it happen than avoid it.

Salvation Army 

 Jean vest. Of course the week after I make my own, I find a pretty awesome one at Salvo. I decided to still take it home, because the jacket-turned-vest one is a little big, I need to try to take that in. Sooo...I'm accidentally starting a jean vest collection I guess?

Yes. I'm a varsity lacrosse player. any other questions?

THIS FLANNEL SHIRT. I'm so excited about it. I maay have one very similar BUT it's pretty short on me. Here's a secret tip, fellow long-waisted girls. CHECK THE MEN'S SECTION & get a small. Game changer.  Longer sides, longer sleeves. Unlike the XXL or whatever you'd have to get in Hollister or Abercrombie (sad little side story, I had to ask Brad how to spell that word) to tryyyy to get the same fit. Anyways.  Expect to see it on a Patty near you. :) 

Ok. We don't even need to to get into my baby-shoe problem. The only excuse I have is, they were each less than $.50. 

Another great thing which I love. Lyndsi found this + offered it to me...cute little silhouettes in a gold frame...what more can you ask for? I see it in a future nursery!

Haha...I'm such an awesome photographer. I got a valance, 2 square-ish curtains & 2 long curtains. They are the RE target brand, and as neutral as the off-white is, I figured I'll use them for sure! I'm suuuuch a bad curtain shopper. I think I've done it only once. I just feel like they are so expensive, and I never really know what I want. So I end up just "making do", so most of my windows look a little cray. 

Playto's Closet

This is a shirt for Brad. He thinks I buy him clothes sometimes because otherwise I'd feel bad that I bought some for myself. There may be a tiny bit of truth to that, but mostly if I see some that I like and think looks nice, plus if it's for a steal, why wouldn't I get it for him?

THIS. Look how excited my toes are. and Tard's toes. Welcome winter coat 2014 to the family, closet. Again, I have trouble with girl coats sometimes being too short, so for the last few years my go-to winter coat has been a black one I got from Salvo...in the men's department. Are you catching on to my secret? :) I doubt I'll completely retire that one, but it's definitely seen better days. I wasn't totally sure how I felt about these long trech-type coats, but I realized it would fix my "too short" problem. Plus it's in army green, and has fun pockets. Also plus the sleeves were long enough! I actually had been looking at coats similar to this last winter at Forever21, but just couldn't make up my mind. I ended up with a couple jackets from there that I love (thanks to my boo) when Christmas rolled around. I thought this one was from there, but it's from H&M aka the store that we don't have anywhere near us. :/ So for now, she hangs in the closet waiting for her time to shine as the leaves change and our breath gets frosty! Sorry lovely coat, I hope those days are still a long way off!

Target

These are something new I thought I'd try. I have never done anything with fabric softener (which always smells so good!) but I have been using hand-made laundry detergent and it doesn't have much scent. I thought it'd be nice to give my nose something pleasant to sniff while I'm folding laundry.

Lip gloss...a little pigmented, I'm still not totally sure I like it. I put some on in the car after I got out there (try and tell me you don't do that...I won't believe you) but I had lipstick on already so it was hard to tell. I'm just not sure I'm a gloss person, it may be a little sticky for me. But I thought it'd be nice to have some subtle color. We'll see. Now on the right...Matte polish top coat! I had seen people use this here and there and have had it in my head on my wish list for quite a long time! There was a few different brands there, and (of course) I went with the cheapest, under $2 I think. I used it tonight (also of course) while working on this post...and it is pretty mega awesome!! If you aren't familiar with it, you use it over any color polish you have as the top coat, and it just cuts all the shine and gives it a different look. 

I haven't bought much eye shadow in the last 3 years or so because I got this mega huge pallet for Christmas (thanks again boo!) that I will probably never run out of. BUT its not very travel friendly. I have some weddings coming up where I am doing hair+makeup, plus with my own traveling, I thought this size would be nice. It also seems to have some really fun colors, kinda sultry shimmer. It'll be fun to play around with.

TJ MAXX

I'm sure I've mentioned before the plan of re-doing our bedroom. Actually, I think I'd call it "doing" our bedroom. Since it's never really been done. Anyways...an upgrade to our laundry basket would be necessary either way, since ours is ugly and pretty broken. I bought this one thinking I'll keep the receipt and not use it until I'm sure there isn't something better out there, but it's growing on me pretty quickly. 

Cosmo Prof

Texture powder. I've heard/seen a bit about this lately. It's not something I have experience with, but I think it's been around awhile. You would tap it on your roots for some volume, and I saw here what it can do to a braid so I thought it'd be worth trying out! I wasn't sure about how well the white powder would blend in with my dark hair, but it was true...I just "tapped" it in, and it disappeared! I'm eager to keep trying it and see what all it will do for me!

There were a few other items that I picked up and carried around for awhile...am I the only one that does that? Of course that happens at Salvo, cause you have to pile things in your cart and then go try them on. Buut at Target or places like that...it seems like I have a thing where I can't really decide if I want/need to get something, I think about it while I'm at the shelf looking for a long time, then if I do decide to grab it...it ain't over until it's purchased. Because quite often when it's time for checkout...I may shed myself of an item or two. It's weird, because it's not like I didn't think long and hard about them when I first grabbed them. So let's just say, everything that makes it home should feel grateful. :)

And that's the end! I did get some hair color & a surprise something that aren't pictured. And for those of you that are like "haha...I know that girl ain't go all the way there and didn't eat or drink"...I'm sorry, the Starbucks & Five Guys burger didn't get photographed. :) 

Happy Wednesday!

Ps. 1 more post to go until 50...are we excited??

A Couple Things

Hey readers heeeey!

Let's start off with a funny story.  Noone objects to those right? *scans the room for a raised hand..* Ok good.

Yesterday morning I had a little down time and I thought it'd be a good chance to blog. I opened my laptop aaaaand. the interenet wasn't connected.  It generally works really well, but when it doesn't I'm up the creek without a paddle unless Brad is home, cause he always fixes it. So I texted him and then painted my nails while waiting for a response. He gave me a couple options to try, so I tried those but still no luck. I texted him again, and finished my nails while waiting.

*SIDE RANT* Do you know what I do not love?? bad/yucky/crappy/faulty top coat. It's such a waste of time!! I took the time to paint my nails without smudging...who knows how long THAT takes, and when I go to put the top coat on it doesn't glide on smooth, instead I have to keep re-dipping to have enough which makes it weird, aaand it started to smear around my black, which i KNOW should have been dry enough! Urgh. Needless to say THAT polish is getting thrown away, and sooner than later I'll get a top coat worth my time! I know some people skip base/top coat (I skip base fairly regularly, buuut I think one thing that helps is for your color not to stain your nails, fyi...) but the top coat really does just kinda seal the deal and make them look shiney, IF it's doing its job.

Anyways. I obviously needed to get that off my chest. :)

So I was trying all of what he said, and he was trying to fix it remotely (he can forreal do that sometimes!) and my Dad came in from mowing the lawn and was like "I'm in big trouble!" I asked him what was wrong, and he said "I mowed over that cable outside and sliced part of it!" oopsie. No wonder I wasn't getting a signal, that was our internet cable. :) We have learned that Dad is a very ambitious mow-er, We have an in-ground dog fence that is just laid back in the pine trees that boarder two sides of our property, and he + his mower found that one day too, Brad was like "wow he really gets in there!" All is forgiven, but it's something I chuckle about. Nothing is safe in the great out doors when Carl is on his machine..dun dun dduuuuunnnn!

The last couple weeks have passed with me spending a lot of time with a paint brush in my hand, not that I mind that terribly, it's just time consuming.  Sorry I haven't posted 2-3 outfit posts a week like normal (laugh with me, ha ha ...) but when I'm painting I basically wear the same clothes. Every day. Don't judge, I hate it. BUT I get paint everywhere (hair included) on myself. I told someone my Indian name would be she-who-gets-paint-everywhere, shewho for short.

I really don't mind painting (except ceilings, I strong dislike ceilings) once I have everything that I need out and ready. I don't love wiping everything down, or having to paint around things. Basically I'm maybe a high maintence painter.  My dad's kitchen was my first project.

It's a pretty small kitchen, I'm standing in the doorway, there is the sink and cupboards to my left, and the wall on the right just so didn't make it in the picture. SO, I was painting around all those appliances. That's probably why I painted myself so much, I had no room to breath!

I snuck in a little painting at home - I bought a couple dressers on craig's list for our bedroom that I'm re-doing. (that will probably have it's own post) I also had been meaning to go to the Sherwin Williams store to get a swatch to have Ben Moore match (that store is much closer for me) and so I swung in there when I was in Geneva last week. Weirdly, the guy said that they didn't have the color I was after, but they could match it. I'm pretty confused by that because the girl I asked had given me the color and company. ANYWAYS, my timing was pretty good accidentally because this weekend Friday-Monday, SW is having a 40% off sale! I hear their paint is pretty top of the line, so I decided to just let them match my color and buy it from there. I was second-guessing my square footage calculations, so I was a little confused how much paint I would need. He told me a trick, you can buy gallons of un-tinted paint (like plain white) when they are having the sale, and either return them if you don't end up needing them, or bring them back in and have them tinted for free! SO I got 2 gallons tinted in my future bedroom color, and one gallon un-tinted. I doubt I'll just return it, but if I don't need it for the bedroom, I could have it tinted for another project. When he told me that, I said "Ok I'll have 27 gallons please" lol. It seriously was a good sale, I think they were about $23 a gallon or so?

So basically I can't wait to start painting my bedroom, I even have a helper lined up because I helped her paint her fence one day :).

But first....I have to do my dad's dining room next. Today Brad & I will go over there to take EVERYTHING OUT because I was not having a kitchen repeat, and I'll probably wipe down the walls. One thing I am not looking forward to, is that his dining room ceiling has trim all over it, that creates squares. Kinda like how you can see in the kitchen picture, but more. urgh.

Ok, enough about painting for now.

Last night Lyndsi + I put on our third ever Clothing Exchange. The concept is that we alert a bunch of girls that we are planning one, they got through their closets, and give us the clothes/shoes/purses/accessories they are willing to part with (not junky stuff, more stuff that you never wear, but hate to just donate, but feel better about knowing your friends might take it and wear it :]) a couple days before the actual event. Then Lyndsi and I sort it by type and size (like tanks, short sleeves, sweaters, dresses, jeans, etc) and make it easier to hunt through. Theeeen, the ladies come the evening of the event, bring a yummy snack, and get ready to re-vamp their closet, for freeee! I have a few pictures, mostly from the last time we did this. Secretly it looked a little more fancy that time anyways. ;)

We make little dressing rooms, and try to have as many mirrors down there as possible so people can check themselves out. :) Usually people are bustling around at the beginning and on the hunt, but towards the end people are chillin, talking, and just browsing a little more. Lets just be honest, when there are this many clothes laying around, whether you thiiink you are done, it's hard not to just keep skimming. This time when things had died down we decided to kinda do "show and tell" , and have people show what they picked. I thought that was pretty fun, because some things screamed that person's name, and other things were a little more branching out, but you feel more free to do that when there isn't a price tag! Lyndsi and I agreed that this girl's finds were SO her. & definitely said "Classy Chic", which she totally is. :) I also make it my mission to force things on people that I think would look awesome. Some people believe me, some people don't. You all can thank me later. ;) 

And now you are caught up! I'm looking forward to this evening, there is a Campfire #3 planned. These always including volleyball + ultimate frisbee, some yummy food, and good fellowship. Sign me up! (ooops, speaking of that, I better go RSVP!)

Oh, I almost forgot to mention something else! This is post #47 for me, & I had decided a while back that I was going to do a little give away on post #50. So it is approaching rapidly (or less rapidly, if I continue at the rate I've been going!) , stay tuned for that! :)

WYBDW

Welcome to another episode of What You Been Doin Wednesday! Not that you should be surprised, since I do this every week right? Riiiiiight. :)

WHAT HAVE YOU BEEN DOING?
Let's see...A good bit of this and that. June was a busy busy month, and I know I've touched on a few activities. The most recent, and one of the most exciting was my best friend getting hitched this weekend! It was an outdoor event on the loveliest of days! It was probably the prettiest decor/location that I've ever seen, and the whole day was just so fun and stress-free to be a part of. Last night was also my 2nd softball game of the year...I had missed a couple so it felt good to be "back at 2nd base". :) Also, Brad's whole family came over for dinner after the game (something that I'm ashamed doesn't happen more than it does, but it's rather hard aligning all those schedules!) and it was delicious treats + time together. One of the brothers is heading out this weekend for the mission field for 2 whole years! I admire his heart for service there, but boy oh boy will he be missed here!

WHATS ON THE AGENDA?
I'm planning to begin painting at my Dad's house. He's been asking me to do this for a few weeks, and I finally have some time. I'll be happy to get it over with, because that will mean freedom to start some more painting projects here! :)

WHAT ARE YOU LOOKING FORWARD TO?
July 4th! There is some out of town family that will be here, and there will be a cook-out & hang-out & all that fun stuff. :) Who doesn't love that? Thursday evening there will even be a concert on the lawn (err...in the barn?) at my in-laws from this family group. Definitely looking forward to that!

WHAT ARE YOU ENJOYING?
This weather. Seriously, sometimes I forget how much I love the summer. Actually...maybe I knew how much. But I'm just soaking up these hot days. Days like today (upper 80s) I'm not outside as much, but I still love knowing it's so hot and beautiful outside. :)

WHAT ARE YOU APPRECIATING?
My dad & his lawn mowing skills. :) He really stays on top of keeping the yard up, and I need to make sure to let him know I appreciate it. This week it got a little longer than usual because he left his mower at his house, and so yesterday I braved our old unusual mower (the brake doesn't work, and the hydro-something is weird, so basically you have to keep your hand on the throttle at all times or else you might randomly go speeding into the side of the building while trying to turn. NBD) and mowed about half, then handed it over to Dad and weed-eated (most of) the ditch. I now have 6 blisters to prove how often I (don't) do that. #humblesigh

WHAT CAN YOU LEAVE US WITH?
"Small things become great when done with LOVE."  So true. If we focus on who we are loving through our every day tasks, and be purposeful about that, it will probably make the load seem lighter anyways, and less like a boring chore.

I could get into what I'm disliking etc, but who wants to dwell on that stuff? Not me! I have walls to wash and trim to paint! Happy 4th! :)