Oh man… I messed up my posting streak. That’s okay… I’ll try to fit them all into this post. *grins*
For Free-For-All Friday: First, I re-found a really great message board: http://forums.online-sweepstakes.com/. They were very helpful with my Wordless Wednesday Game. With their advice, this Wednesday’s game will run for a full week.
Malwarebytes is my favorite spy-ware scanner and it is found here: http://www.malwarebytes.org/.
Did you know that Wal-mart gives away freebies? http://instoresnow.walmart.com/In-Stores-Now-free-samples.aspx.
For So Many Goals Saturday: My goals are simply to get the house ready for the holiday. Christmas Eve we are going to start a few traditions just for us. Don’t ask, because Brendan and I have no clue yet. Then we are having an open house for family and friends Christmas Day and then again on Saturday. The kids are home from school for Winter break, so I will be taking my fair share of generic Ativan and doing the 30/30 thing until then. Maybe cut back on sleeping. Yeah… that might work.
For Spiritual Sunday: We can touch on the “Reason For the Season”. As non-Christians, Jesus is not the reason for us. I think it has been pretty well proven that, assuming he existed, he was born in June. Christianity was trying to convert the Pagans so they created as many holidays near the old holidays as possible. Winter Solstice became Christmas. But, I don’t have a problem celebrating his birthday at anytime actually. Just as I appreciate being able to honor Martin Luther King and wish we did the same for Einstein’s birthday along with Gandhi’s day. When we have been so blessed to have such amazing people who have touched the world in a positive manner, they should be celebrated. What about Mother Teresa and Darwin? Their contributions to the world should also have a place among all of commercialization.
I might wish someone a Merry Christmas if I know they are Christian. I might say Happy Yule if I know that they are Pagan. Usually I will stick with Happy Holidays. Though I do like October Wife’s Happy Retail Commercialization Day as it is the most honest these days.
Well, it is finally cool down here… 58*F. So, I’m going to enjoy having my windows open and taking care of things around here.
Chaos
Hi everyone!
A huge thank you to those that played my first week. I hope you enjoyed it. I’m looking forward to next week.
Ready to see the original photo?
The winner is WaltzingDog!!! Congrats! Don’t get spending your big prize all at once, you hear? *grinning* Thank you very much for participating. I will get your gc out to you tonight.
Chaos
Hi! I’ll be posting the winner to the “Wordless Wednesday Game” at 5pm EST today. You have until then to make a guess. A winner will be chosen from any correct answers. I thought I would get Tutorial Thursday going though in case someone needed a last minute Christmas idea. They were big hits the year I made them. I hope you enjoy it!
No-Sew Fleece Blanket Tutorial ©2009 Melissa Olivero
*Please note that while this tutorial was written wholly by me, I am not the originator of this idea. These are the steps I used to create the item.
ITEMS NEEDED:
DIRECTIONS:
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Put your two pieces of fabric together with the good sides facing outwards. Double check that they were cut at the same length & width and correct if needed. Some people may prefer to pin them together at this point. Lay out on your large cutting mat.
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At each corner, cut out a 6″ square. Lay that fabric aside. Hopefully you’ll find a use for these squares in a future project.
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On each of the four sides, make a 6″ length cut at every 1″ to create a fringe.
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Once all sides are completed, you’ll need to double knot it all the way around. When I was first taught to make these, I was told that a single knot would be sufficient. I had a 3 year old at the time though, had given the blankets to other children and learned that you need to double knot. You’ll want to do a combination of an underhand knot and then an overhand knot. The end result should have one fringe strip laying on the opposite side fabric. As in the photo shown above, the white strip is tied to show on the print side while the print fringe shows against the white side.
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You are done.
Please do not worry if your strips aren’t the same length or aren’t a perfectly 1″ width apart. You cannot tell and something handmade like this isn’t supposed to be so exact and perfect. Once you have cut one or two, you’ll find yourself not even needing to measure cutting the fringe — only your squares.
The hardest part of this project is finding the “right” fleece fabric for the “right” person.
As always, have fun and enjoy the making of it!
Nope, not so wordless, but close. This is how this will work. Every Wednesday, I’m going to post a photo of a random object (this first one should be easy). Post your answer in the comment section… one answer per person please. You have a little over 24 hours to make your guess. I will assign a number to all the correct answers in the order that they were received and then use http://www.random.org/ to choose a number. This week, to start the game off right… there will actually be a small prize — a $5.00 USD Amazon Gift Certificate. I know it isn’t much, but it just a little something to make it fun. I don’t know if there will be a prize every week. I may tweak the rules as we go along… right now: guess only once and be able to receive the gift certificate in US dollars in the amount of $5.00. You have from now until 5:00 pm EST Thursday December 17, 2009 to make your guess. If you have any questions, post them.
Ready? On your mark…
Get set…
GO!
P.S. As the weeks go on, the pictures will become more difficult. I didn’t have a lot of time to think of what to do since this was a spur of the moment thing. The picture was taken with a digital camera and other than being cropped, it was not manipulated in any way.
Dear Diary,
I think I am doing really well with this new posting schedule. I’ve been blogging consistently since last Thursday and that is probably a record for me. Tantrum Tuesday is supposed to be my day to *be real*, vent, bitch, complain, whatever you want to call it. But…. to be outright negative is so not me. I’m very passive aggressive. I am better keeping at keeping it all bottled up or making veiled snarky comments or just call my Mom and/or Christine and tell them everything. I’m VERY comfortable handling negativity that way. It is way easier that I tell them every mean thing that people have said or that I’ve seen them do. This way it is released from me and I avoid being confrontational. That’s probably the way it will stay too.
The timer is beeping at me so my “break time” is over and I have to get back to doing chores. I’ll finish this later.
Okay, back again. The twins room is much better now. Everything is out from under their beds, tv stand and bookcase and put to rights again. Remember, you can do anything for 30 minutes. Yep… that’s what I’m doing today — thirty minutes cleaning and then thirty minutes computer time. Some days that works and some days it doesn’t. Today is a good day. Maybe that’s because I forgot to take my med two days in a row and I’m mildly manic? I always appreciate it when I am like this… so functional — I barely recognize myself. LOL
I’m resorting to random vents as my emotions are still too jumbled to be truly honest about the way I feel about anyone or anything at the moment.
- I wish I could feel like I feel today — every day, but add in being able to go shopping without freaking out (like this morning) and being able to socialize again.
- I think croc shoes are ugly and wish people would stop wearing them. I actually saw an idiot wearing them as he drove a motorcycle the other day.
- I wish I was better at disciplining my children.
- I AM SO DONE BEING JUDGED BY OTHERS. If you don’t have anything nice to say about me, the way I parent, the way I keep house… then leave me the hell alone.
- I wish I could find the perfect organizational system that would be intuitive and inspiring.
- I think that 2010 will be the year I finish writing a book and get an agent. My worst flaw is procrastination. I hate that aspect of myself more than anything else. If I can get myself to follow through on just one major project, maybe my life would change for the better.
- Most of the things I dislike the most have to do with myself, so I’ll end this here.
My time is almost up again. Next on the list is my oldest son’s room. I feel too good today to really complain about anything, so I’ll see you tomorrow for the Wordless Wednesday photo. What in the world am I going to find to post? You know, there used to be a site that posted a picture a day or a week and you had to guess what it was. You didn’t get to win anything other than the satisfaction of being right. Maybe I’ll do something like that… that will be fun.
Chaos
I like lists and I only have random thoughts today, so this is what happens when you combine the two:
- I have no religion and my belief system has no formal name.
- You know how when your back is turned and you can feel when someone enters the room even if you don’t hear them? There is that change in energy that alerts you that you aren’t alone, right? Well, I believe that we all give off that energy: humans, animals, plants — everything — and that collective energy is a huge part of what we perceive to be GOD.
- The above is also why I believe that prayer, spell-work, focused positive thoughts do work so well for certain people and even more-so for groups. When you have the ability and/or sensitivity to tap into those ropes of energy, you have an impact on them. Just as the person walking into the room has an impact and changes the room’s chemistry so much you can feel it.
- Depending upon the day, I can refer to myself as Universal Unitarian, Pagan, Spiritual Agnostic, New Ager, Witch. Those are on the days that I think I need to put a label on it. In reality, I truly do NOT fit into any of these “non-traditional boxes” either.
- I belong to a great Atheist Moms group where I lurk and I adore the women who talk there. But because I do believe that there is an entity that is larger than what we are, I guess that puts me out of that title too.
- I see dead people. Well, not all the time and there usually isn’t a lot of communication going on. The first time it happened was when a friend’s grandmother passed away when I was 16 or 17. I just knew that she had moved on even though she hadn’t been ill. We can expand on this on a different Sunday though.
- I love reading Tarot for people and when I was doing it regularly, I got rather good at it. Right now, my cards are put away until I am in a better frame of mind.
- I am not psychic in any way, shape or form. I wish I was… it would come in handy.
- I do not believe in the existence of hell or the devil. As far as an afterlife, I will also save that topic for a future post.
- I do believe that there are different planes of reality.
- I believe in reincarnation.
- I also believe that most of the above will eventually be able to be explained by science when we get there.
Well, that about covers it for today. Enjoy your day!
Chaos (Melissa)
Currently on my Goal List:
- To be as honest as she is with my children: Being Your Mom With Depression
- I want to look into this site: Experience Project. It looks cool.
- To create an anonymous blog like October Wife.
- To make lunch for the kids soon… still all soft foods.
- Do some laundry and straighten the house.
Some of these goals are for today and some are not. I’ll let you figure that out. LOL
Hi…
First, some free knowledge: Kids can get “Hand Foot Mouth Disease” more than once. Also, when all three kids have it, odds are that Mom will get it too. Yes, adults can get this and no I don’t want to talk about it (for obvious reason and because talking is a little painful). Here is some info from Web MD. Our pediatrician recommended combining 1 teaspoon of Maalox and 1 teaspoon of Children’s Benadryl to swish and gargle with (this is obviously for mouth blisters). Sounds weird, but we have only done it twice and saw immediate improvement. Life is always an adventure here. My oldest has it the worst. They should be better within 5 days and perhaps even back at school as soon as Monday, but we will see.
My new favorite free online toy is Pando. You can download it free here: http://www.pando.com/. You can use it to share large files, like sending large photo batches to family. There are also a few really great groups on Yahoo that you can check out here: http://groups.yahoo.com/search?query=pando. Have fun! It is quite addictive. We missed the new Christmas special Prep & Landing, but a new friend was able to help out.
I found a good freebie offer. I just ordered my sample of Dove Intense Damage Therapy HERE.
I also recently got a free year’s subscription to one of my favorite magazines that went digital. You can sign up HERE. They have Popular Science, Reader’s Digest and a lot more to choose from.
Lots of great free reads at http://dailylit.com/.
If you are into graphic or website design, then Smashing Magazine is the site that should be number one on your daily list.
Okay, I need to head for bed. I hope you found something useful in this post.
Chaos
Hi! Thanks for coming by.
My husband is doing much better. When they did the post-op appointment and re-bandaged his leg, it helped tremendously. It must have been too tight. I’m still not able to go out and socialize yet. I’m sad because I really wanted to go to the Grape Merchant for wine night. They were doing Champagnes… my fav — not to mention I miss being around people. Today, both boys came home with what looks like strep throat, so it looks like a doc appointment will be part of the day tomorrow. This weekend, we are finally going to get a tree and decorate the house. The kids are tired of seeing all of the Autumn stuff still up.
I thought I would try something new here… a posting schedule of sorts. Let’s see…
- Music Monday
- Tantrum Tuesday
- Wordless Wednesday
- Tutorial Thursday
- Free For All Friday
- So Many Goals Saturday
- Spiritual Sunday
Remember who is typing here… this doesn’t mean I’m going to be posting every day of the week. It just means that if I am posting on that day, it will help me to have a topic to focus on. I’m hoping that this will encourage me to write more often. I like the idea of Wordless Wednesdays as that is just posting a photo. I think next Thursday, I will post my tutorial on making the fringe fleece blanket.
I know. I know. You can barely sustain your excitement. Calm down and check back in tomorrow evening. We will see what kind of start I have.
Melissa (aka Chaos aka Dreamer)
P.S. Saw my wonderful shrink on Wednesday and we switched my med to Lexapro with encouragement to use my Ativan. Yep… GASP… I’m talking about personal stuff on my blog. While I don’t want to be considered disrespectful, RUDE and/or the cause of all the ill in the world… it took me too many years and hard work to learn NOT to be ashamed of certain aspects of myself. If I had MS or Cancer, it would be different and I could talk about my health issues anywhere, right? WRONG. That’s just another form of bigotry. Normally, it is only just a part of me… it is only when I am at the bottom of the big black hole that it becomes such a big focus. When you are drowning, all you are going to think about is just how you are going to get to breathe again. Soooooo, if you don’t get that, that’s your problem. Have a nice day.
