catching up and crafting.

Merry Christmas!!

I absolutely love the Christmas season. I don't mind extending it just a little before Thanksgiving. But I know some people are very opposed to that, and so do my Christmas lights. So, just before thanksgiving break, they were so eager, just popped up in the living room asking if they could stay!

They're still hanging out in the living room, but we did put up our little dorm tree! :)

I haven't blogged in a while but a lot has happened! One thing I've really enjoyed doing this semester is putting on a good movie, sitting in the living room and painting! So, in the past few months, these are the projects I've worked on while doing just that... :)

This painting is for my friend, a writer who is excellent with words! I read this quote while studying for Great Speeches, and thought she would like it: "Kenneth Burke considered clusters of words as dancers of attitudes~choreographed into the message"

This little piece was also inspired by a quote. :) Though it's super simple, it's one of my favorites! When I was a little girl, I absolutely loved Winnie the Pooh. That love was rekindled when I watched the movie that came out this summer, it was so similar to the original!

This piece was inpsired by my friend, Hannah. She's getting married next summer and I thought it was so cool that she chose yellow and grey for her wedding colors. I saw the pattern on Pinterest and did it with the people on bikes as her and her wonderful fiance, Jake.

:) #winning

This piece was for my friend Melissa, who is also getting married next summer to the man she has been dating for seven years! They are an incredible couple! They are also Arkansas fans so I made this little piece for their future home :)

I actually did this at the beginning of the year with black and white paint, I love the Mickey and Minnie leaning in to kiss.

I hope you enjoyed this post and I hope you're having a very Merry Christmas... it's the best time of the year, you know!

Five Friday Favorites

Happy Friday!!! There are a lot of things to celebrate today:

~the beginning of the weekend

~the last day of September

~my sweet friend, Bethany, gets married in 21 days

~Homecoming week at Ouachita begins in 3 days

~I have no class today :)

Because this Friday has so much to celebrate, I thought I would do so with Five Friday Favorites. I would love to share with you a few unique/fun/special things that brought a smile to my face this week.

1. Kiss with Confidence Peppermints!

I laughed when I saw this fun and creative treat. I love the vintage picture on the container and the idea. Lets be honest, who wouldn't like a sugar free mint with sweetness and mint flavor to enable them to "Kiss with Confidence??"

(I am now stuck with underlined font and I'm not ashamed to admit that I don't know how to turn it off. But I don't want to reload the pictures so I'm not starting over.)

2. Love, Peace, and EEE Tanks

I'm an EEE at Ouachita Baptist University and my pledge sister, Krystal is consistently designing and making awesome EEE tshirts. The latest craze is this tank top. It came in every color of the rainbow, sooo I broke down and got this one as well as a bright orange one that I'm wearing right now! They're suuuuper soft.

3. Seasonal Mini Journals

AH! The underlining turned off! Yes. :) Another thing to celebrate!

Are these journals not precious? I don't have my summer one in this picture because I use it so much, I keep it by my bed. The verses that I'm trying to memorize during the fall or the lyrics, quotes, or lessons that affect me the most during that season are recorded on each page of my autumn journal. Also, I think autumn is the only season that gets two names. Summer, winter, and spring got jipped.

4. My favorite C.S. quotes and coffee with hazelnut creamer.

Again, the mug is evidence that I'm an EEE. I think I actually got it before I even came to Ouachita.

I got the book for my 18th birthday from a wonderful friend back in Columbia, MO. It is a compilation of several of C.S. Lewis' best wrirtings and I absolutely love it. I feel like every time I open it, I'm challenged in a new way. And as for the coffee, who doesn't enjoy coffee with a good book in the morning? :) Especially in a Mickey Mouse mug.

5. My last favorite is.... this guy.

But really, this guy is definitely one of my favorites.

He's my swing dancing partner, my kanakuk krush, that beta boy, a funny ginger who plays video games, one of my best friends, and

I happen to be dating him. So, I may be a little bias but not really :) This week, he was fun and undertstanding in the midst of stress and I can't express how much I appreciate that.

(I'm not totally sure why the underlining is back but it's ok, we'll work with it.)

I hope you enjoyed today's Five Friday Favorites and that you can find five things that make you smile today :)

simple to special

All wonderful things about autumn...

~pumpkin spice lattes

~the brilliant colors

~soft and warm sweaters and cardigans

~the cool weather

~bright blue skies

~leaf piles

~scarves

~pumpkin and cinnamon in recipes

~boots

~fireplaces and bonfires

~it's cuddle weather

...Even school supplies. Stay with me, I really enjoy that aspect of fall. :)

Shopping for school supplies always seemed to take longer because hardly anything was perfect. I wanted colorful, personal supplies that made me smile when I pulled them out of my bag. I may not be as picky about pens and pencils anymore but when it comes to journals, planners, and binders- I love making them fun and personal. If you're at all like me, it can be hard to find the right thing so here's a craft idea to turn something simple unto something special.

What you'll need for this:

-solid or simple base

-paint brush

-paint

-sharpies (lovvve these)

I was searching through Barnes and Noble for the perfect planner, and the one I found was very organized and easy to use but had a pretty plain, light green cover.

Start by painting a solid space, a fairly different color then the base or cover. For this book, I painted a simple circle in the middle of the planner. One word I'm learning a lot about right now is freedom. ("You, my brothers and sisters, were called to be free. But do not use your freedom to indulge the flesh; rather, serve one another humbly in love" ~Gal. 5:13)

I used a white paint pen to write the word, but you could just use a small brush and paint if you're more comfortable with that.

Around and inside space you painted, you could do any design. Find one you love, use one you already know, or just pinterest it. :) This specific design is one that I personally like, and it's really easy to draw! Use a sharpie and sketch your design, creatively using the space!

I hope this is helpful in making some of your more simple possessions more personal and special to you- to the point where you smile when you use it. It's a little thing that can make your day a little better. :)

He danced with "Cinderella"

I'm watching Tangled.

Eating princess fruitsnacks (tastes like childhood).

I just got back from EEE tiger tunes.

I'm in a very Disney mood!

Girls, you know those days where you just want to put on

a pretty dress, sweet shoes, and work extra hard on your hair? I think the deep down root of that feeling is the desire to be a princess for the day. Don't you?

Or when you're a little girl and you put on your Easter dress or your ballerina outfit or even your dad's big shirt and twirl because you KNOW you are Belle in the enchanted ballroom?

Yesterday was my dad's birthday, the man who has always made me feel like his special princess. One day, when I was about four or five years old, I determined to do a beautiful ballerina dance with my dad. He had been working all day long from early in the morning and came home to have his daughter throw herself at him, begging him to dance with her. He was so kind, put on his Sunday clothes and waited for me. I pieced together what I thought was a beautiful outfit and dictated to him exactly how the dance should go. He spent time working with me on our dance, letting me fix his outfit, and then performing for my mom and brother. (I don't think Margie was around yet). I loved how he could so effortlessly pick me up and spin me around our living room. This is one of the sweetest memories I have with my incredible dad. He is so good to me, making time to take care of me and provide. Even if it's a silly dance with an insistent, perfectionist five year old. He's the most amazing man I know and I love him more then I can say.

~birthday menu~

Today's post is brought to you by my suite mate- Taylor and the creativity of her boyfriend, Ryan.

My wonderful suite mate, Taylor Stanford and I have been friends since the beginning of our freshman year at Ouachita, bonding over TWIRP week, intramural flag football ("Ching-a-Lacka Chicks" -clever? I thought so too.), and eventually pledging EEE together in the spring.

I remember meeting Taylor at OBU's new student retreat and she was so beautiful and dolled up with this thick Arkansas accent, I thought "She's one of those Southern Belles who I'll never really get to know probably." And she turned out to be one of my very best friends. This girl is an incredibly hard working Chemistry major with a beautiful voice, a sweet and selfless spirit, a heart for other people. She strives to be excellent in everything she does. And as you can see, she's just gorgeous. So yes, she's a Southern Belle, but an extremely bright, loving, Christ-like Southern Belle who happens to be very close to my heart.

That's my little back story for today's blog: a date/gift idea. Taylor is dating my friend, Ryan- a very involved, funny, creative guy here at Ouachita. Oh, and he was elected "Mr. Tiger" last year. Well, last week was Taylor's birthday and Ryan went the extra mile to be creative and make his gift unique and special.

Taylor came in the other morning with a confused expression and an envelope of Monopoly money with a note that said, "get excited!" Ryan wouldn't tell her what the money was for but wanted to see her later that night...

She came back into the room that night with a "Birthday Menu"...

Inside, Ryan had given her several options and categories with which to use her Monopoly money! He split it into a food, weekend get away, and active category! He did this for Labor Day weekend so they would actually have time to really do several of the options. He didn't skimp on the "money" or the generosity. He told her she could do as many of the options as she wanted. :) Good idea, right?

I hope this is helpful and fun! She was thrilled and I know they had an awesome time, especially with a progressive dinner in Little Rock!

That's all for today's post- again, this was brought to you by my suite mate, Taylor and the creativity of her boyfriend, Ryan. Have a good one!

Crafting with Audrey Hepburn

Last Wednesday was the first day of my junior year of college (which seems surreal). It was a rainy day and I only had one class, my first college art class. So when I got back to the room, I was in this fun, artsy, "i need to be crafty" mood. I made a fresh cup of coffee- with hazelnut creamer- of course, and put on the old black and white "Sabrina" with Audrey Hepburn. I grabbed my supplies and set to work on today's craft idea! I saw something similar to this on Pinterest, where someone took an old book/newspaper page and made a card out of it by adding a drawing little girl with a red umbrella over the old font.

For this project you'll need:

~a blank canvas

~an old book or newsprint

~mod podge

~brushes

~a little paint

~sharpies! (very useful friends.)

I personally used a book that I LOVE, "Hinds Feet on High Places". It's a book I've written in, underlined, drawn in, and accidently gotten wet at one point. Needless to say it was falling apart. So, I found some of my favorite pages and quotes and pulled them out of the binding. Some of the pages, I ripped into smaller pieces, making the focal point a quote I love or a certain sentence that stands out. Then I mod podged those pages onto the canvas until it was covered...

After the mod podge dried, I used a sharpie to draw a simple sketch young lady walking in the rain with an umbrella. I looked up a couple different ideas, pictures and sketches and combined a few of them to make the girl on the bottom left hand side of this canvas!

Then I grabbed some red, black, crimson, and white paint (my life as an EEE) and tried to lightly fill in the dress, boots, hair, and umbrella. I used a thicker sharpie to write the quote at the top-now I've learned that I'm really not good at spacing and symmetry when it comes to writing. But my friend, Skylar is! So from now on, I should get her help. :)

And here is the finished product! The verse is from Proverbs 31, about the characteristics of a precious and honorable woman who fears the Lord. Characteristics I need to be reminded of consistently! I hope this post is helpful! Enjoy crafting away- I would definitely recommend watching a good, classic movie while you craft and possible some coffee. :) Maybe next time, I'll watch Father of the Bride or While You Were Sleeping.

personal crafting

Another craft idea :)

Hobby Lobby. Maybe one of my new favorite stores and probably the place I am most tempted to spend money. The other day, my sister and I decided to redecorate part of her room. She saved her own money and bought a few classy but inexpensive suppli

es to make a better space to display special drawings and pictures she saved. When we walked into Hobby Lobby, several "wall letters" were on sale.

So, of course I ended up buying eight separate "E"s. Half of them were more extravagant but the other half were plain, flat "E"s that would be very easy to craft with- making a fun little gift for some of my pledge sisters.

They were originally gray so I painted them each a deep, rich red.

After the paint dries, I printed off several small pictures of some of my favorite memories in the past two years of being an E with my amazing pledge sisters.

I cut most of the pictures out but tore some of them for a rougher, different look. Then modge podge

the pictures on the "E"s. :)

I used glitter modge podge which was really fun it sometimes got in the way of the pictures. I like the way it looks but when I do this again, I think I'll use regular modge podge. Here's the finished product... :)

You could do this with any letter or experience, it's special and personal and really easy to do :)