ch-ch-changes

Sorry if I've been gone (and I have), but I have a good excuse! Several excuses, in fact.
But the main one is that my family has got a new dog! To catch people up to speed, our old, much beloved corgi died last year. But last week we got contacted by the Corgi Rescue Society, and now Spike is a member of our house!
He's adorable, and shy, and hasnt quite got the hang of the house yet. He also is taking some energy to acclimate to the new location. Hense my MIA status.
Its good to have a dog in the house again, and I'm seriously taken with Spike. He's an adorable little gent, with his expressive ears and his shy manners.
Easily enough to melt any girls heart.

Thrift.

So my current job is not a perminant position. This is fine, I woudldent want to work there forever anyway.
My current living situation makes it possible for me to save a lot of the money I earn, building up a nest egg for the next phase of my life.
Nest eggs are good, important things. However this means that I have to control my spending.
Its not like I'm a shopaholic, but I certainly do love shoping. Stuff and aquiring stuff is good fun for me.
With that in mind I have set myself a budget.
I have $20 of pleasure money a month, plus $10 for a reward. (I get this reward at the begining of the month if I've been working out routinely and have been watching my eating.)
I can spend it on anything I'd like, but I need to include things like sales tax and shipping in the reward money. It cant, for example, be a $20 something with $5 shipping, unless I cut into the reward money.
April is a little diffrent, because my mom gave me $20 for Easter money, so that goes into my fun money, but the same rules about shipping and tax apply.
This ban will not cross over into essentials, though those perchases will be thoroughly documented.
For example, if I need to buy chapstick, then I may buy chapstick. It will not come out of my fun money. Also gas doesnt count as fun money, even if I'm going somewhere fun.
This is gonna be tricky, but I intend to keep it up until the end of this job, so that the majority of my eggs go into my nest.
So I'll probably be documenting my fun things here, to keep me extra accountable.

Hidden

This has been a very bad week. My work has become very disorienting, and my office is understaffed because people seem to have caught the plauge.
However, it is Friday, and I will have a weekend full of nice things to remind me that my job is just a job, its not perminant, and that I shall overcome it. Its just my job, its not my life.
My life includes painting small canvases, reading good books, cooking tasty food, buying some small, pretty, things, sleeping in, and maybe, if I'm lucky, one day having a fort like the one above to stay hidden from the world in.

(picture via Gala Darling

Boing, boing.

Gettit? Spring? Boing? Oh nevermind.

This first weekend of spring has been very nice, full of the soft air and rich light that marks the rosiest of seasons.

All the trees have turned pink and purple and white, and its delightful.

We all fall down.

Whew, what a long week.
Mostly it was good, but I had a really lousy nights sleep last night, and it has made me irritable all day, in my snuffling fire-breating-dragon mode.

Oh well. I shall dedicate myself to thinking of some of my favorite things, and then I wont feel so bad.

Stating the Obvious.

So, if you couldent tell, my favorite color is yellow.

Tiger

Happy Lunar New year.
Its the year of the Tiger. I am a tiger, according to Chinese Zodiac.


Also happy Valentines day.

Mondays.

You know what are awesome? Books.
You know what else is awesome? Thrift stores.
You know what trumps awesome? An armload of wonderful books from a thrift store setting me back less then four dollars.


I love used books. New ones, with their crisp edges and sharp print and unbroken spines are all very good. They do hold stories, after all, the best of all things.

But nothing will replace the romance of a used book for me, the spine bent back to favorite scenes, mysterious notes in the margins, inscriptions on the front page, birthday gifts, tolkens of esteem long sense past.
Who owned this? What did they think of it? Will I like it too?
Even if the reader before me was unambitious, and like me left no notes, I know someone else has turned the pages, and that makes the story something that has been shared.

Somewhere Cheerful

Isnt this a pretty room? I should like to be there right now. It would cheer me up quite a lot.

(from Real Simple

Birthday

(errr.... where did this come from? Do you know? I'd like to credit the artist)

Its my birthday today! I ate pretty pasta, and a delicuous lemon square, watched a pretty movie, and got some pretty lovely things.

Its a good day.

So you had a bad day.

(Photo from Anthropologie)

My day was not fantastique today. Sometimes things just frustrate me up a wall, and then I can dig myself into a little pit of bitterness, and not even a visit from Eddie Izzard bearing chocolate can pull me out of it.
But I’d rather not get myself into that funk, even if my day has not been 100% wonderful. After all, a bad day is part circumstance and part mindset, so even if I cant fix the situation I can change how I will deal with it, and how I will conduct myself for the rest of the day.
These are the things I try when I know its going to be a nasty-no-good-very-tricky-frustrating-teeth-gnashing sort of day.

1. Dress Well- I find it difficult to be completely unhappy or out of sorts when I feel put together and generally cute. Wear a hat, put on extra blush, wear your favorite earrings, spray your favorite perfume on a ribbon to wear in your hair. Its hard to be sad or frustrated when you feel like a million bucks.

2. Accept help- This is hard for me to do sometimes, without it feeling like I’m copping out, or that I’m somehow unable to handle it. While its true that I can handle things on my own, asking for help, and then accepting it, is often very good for me.

3. Do something fun- Read a book you love, take a long hot shower, watch a Say Yes to the Dress marathon, cook up a delicious new desert. Watch funny movies (might I recommend some Eddie Izzard stand up?). Have some fun, and don’t let yourself brood on the frustrating things.

4. Move!- Exercise, jump up and down, dance to the funkiest music you know, do a yoga pose, kick a soccer ball, do anything to get your heart beating and the endorphins releasing. But make sure its something you actually like. I will happily play on the Wii if I’m sad or stressed, but if I run around a track I’ll just get into an even darker mood.

5. Create- Write a furious, long winded complaint in your journal. Read it over a month later and wonder what all the fuss was about. Pretend to be Jackson Pollock, and fling paint at a canvas. Get clay all over your hands as your throw a bowl, or play music with all your soul.

6. Let yourself be sad, or frustrated, or angry with your day. Accept it, and then, when you wake up, resolve to have a better day then you did before!


How do you handle a bad day?