Yay for 2012!

I can't believe it is already a New Year.  I feel as though the last one has just flown by, but I suppose that it will only get worse from here on out.  I am so excited to start this New Year off right.  I made a TON of personal goals.  It's probably a little too lofty even for me, but I just wanted to write them down here for my own future-self's amusement, if nothing else.  Hopefully it will at least make me feel a little responsible to accomplish them too.  I suppose only time will tell...  Here goes:

1. Complete a sprint triathlon, 10K, and half-marathon.  (My amazing new hubby gave me a bike for Christmas so I at least have to do the sprint triathlon if nothing else!!)
2. Find a good structural engineering job OR work on an ARL for teaching.  (I'm still unemployed and it is driving me bonkers.)
3. Get back into playing piano by practicing drills daily and mastering 5 new pieces.
4. Sew a new garment weekly or bi-weekly.  (I guess I will have to look at the next few months to see which-if either-is possible.)
5. Improve my cooking skills by cooking 3 new recipes for dinner and 1 dessert from scratch every week. 
6. Work on my Japanese by reading 3 books (one being the BOM) and watching at least 12 movies in Japanese.
7. Finish at least 15 books this year (not including the Japanese books).
8. Have FHE every week, go to the temple once a month, and pray every morning with my hubby. 

... And now I am done.  As you can tell, I am looking forward to an eventful and amazing new year.  Hopefully I won't be slacking.  So good luck with your resolutions too and let's ganbaru together!

What a slacker!

So I haven't been posting a lot lately.  Why?  Because I just got married, and then I went to Playa del Carmen (near Cancun) for a week-long honeymoon.  I am just getting settled in St. George and Christmas is around the corner!!  So many things to be working on and planning.  I am still unemployed, but hopefully that will be changing in the near future.  At least I got me an amazing sugar daddy until then!  :)  I truly do love my hubby!!  Here are some pictures from our wedding ceremony:

More pics to come later!!

Some new projects

I've been sewing quite a bit lately.  Here are two projects that I have completed within the past week!  Both did not come out the way that I would have liked them to, but I think I learned a lot from them.  And I don't think that they are completely wasted.  I will probably wear them at least once or twice.  And then I will rip them up and try again.  haha.  Oh the griefs of sewing.  I haven't gotten it right in a while.

This jacket is a different cut from regular jackets so it has a weird fit to it.  Instead of one seam around the armholes and a seam down the middle, it has a long seam from the shoulder to the cuff and a couple of seams down the middle.  But it is slowly growing on me.  I might even be able to bring myself to keep it for the future.  

I was going to try to wear this jacket for Halloween with the blouse that I posted about before.  But did I actually even dress up for Halloween?  No, I did not.  Kinda sad.  I was too busy to buy/make the accessories for this costume and I just gave up.  Maybe next year I will have time to do something much more substantial...

I was hoping that I could MAYBE use this dress for my after-wedding dinner or after-reception dress, but I think it looks too ugly for it.  I don't know when I am going to use it, if ever.  Church?  I still think the cut of the pattern is cute, but maybe I made it a size too large?  Either way, I think this kind of fabric is the wrong choice for this dress.  The sleeves are fugly and it is not flattering on my shape at all!  

Sigh... Oh well.  Maybe next time.  For now, I am just going to buy my other dresses for the wedding.  And as for sewing projects, I will just work on mending my current clothes until after the wedding when I can dig my nails into a more substantial project.  

Only a month left until the wedding!  And so many things to do!  Ahhh!!  It's exciting though.  I am moving on to greener (and warmer) pastures.  

Halloween Costume Pt. 1

I'm making my own Halloween costume this year.  (Or at least, I am going to try to!!  Time is a-ticking, I know...)  Here's a sneak peek at the first part of it: the blouse.  I just finished it last night around midnight.  Can you guess what I am going to be??

Free time, oh free time...

So it turns out that just when my life has gotten the craziest--trying to work 40 hours a week while planning a wedding AND working out AND doing other hobbies that I love--I get the news that I might have to start looking for a job too... OH the irony...  Good news is that I will have lots more time on my hands now.  And I have a little bit of money saved up so I can still continue with wedding plans and everything more or less as usual (at least for a little while...)  but oh boy!  My worry-wart side is definitely coming out!!  AUGH!!!!!!  breathe... inhale...exhale...sigh...

No, but really it will work!!  I AM DETERMINED!  There are a lot of silver linings to this cloud and I know that this is just the beginning of what will be a fortuitous occurrence.  First of all, I will have more time to plan my wedding, which was what I was stressing out about in the first place...  Second of all, I will have the opportunity to look for new employment (something I have been wanting to do for a while)...  Third of all, I will be able to move to actually live with my future husband!!  I just really hope that this unemployment doesn't last for too long...  So anyways, keep me in your prayers!  Or, if you don't believe in prayers, think good thoughts for me please!  :) 

A nice little touch...

I haven't been able to blog for quite a while.  So much to do in wedding planning, who would have ever thought?  Blogging is just one of my last priorities right now since I am still trying to have a normal sane life outside of planning for a wedding.  But I just thought I would write about this project that I finished a couple of weeks ago.

This project was super simple.  I bought this plain navy blue shirt-dress on sale at Wet Seal for about $10.

I really liked the fabric and cut but it was just a little too short... You can't really tell it's length from the picture, but the cinched waistline falls above my actual waistline and the hem of the skirt falls on my mid-thigh.

All I did was measure the hem line and cut a strip of cream fabric.  I sewed a couple of strips of lace in layers to the cream fabric strip and then attached the strip to the end and--voila!

I also used the remaining strip of lace for a little sash, but this is totally removable.  I am not sure if I really like it even...

Part of the reason being I feel like a little girl with it.  

But anyways, that's about it!  I thought I might use this for my engagement pictures, but I decided against it, thankfully.  I will most likely wear this, but I think I look a little pregnant in it.

Anyways, I am trying to get more sewing done so hopefully I will have more stuff to blog about.  I am currently working on a Halloween costume!  :)

The Girl Who Rocked the Bestsellers List

 Finished The Girl Who... series!!  If you like crime, I recommend it!  Slightly graphic, but if you are okay with skimming over stuff, it should not be a problem. 

The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest by Stieg Larsson

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


I finished the series!

This one took me a little longer for a number of reasons: 1) I felt like I needed a break from the serious contemporary/crime stuff, 2) the beginning was a little slow and difficult to get into, 3) life happened.  That being said, I finished the last 200+ pages in a couple of days and it was still really entertaining and it felt good to finish.  The second and third book to this series are more related to each other (since it is all about the Zalachenko affair) than to the first (the first book was about the Wennerstrom affair, an entirely different crime, and really only served as an introduction to Salander, who is The Girl...). 

That being said, I feel like this third book was a little different from the other two: first because it WAS a little more difficult to get into and second because it was all legal stuff--Larsson even had to insert a secondary storyline/mystery with Erika Berger in order to keep it rolling.  It kind of felt like the second season of Prison Break to me.  Lots of new characters appeared to further the already complicated story line and it was a little difficult to keep track of it all.  In addition, rather than actually just solving the mystery to the story it thoroughly analyzes the whole legal process that Salander is wrapped up in and continues to highlight Salander's life a little even after the it seems the main storyline and Salander's legal problems have finally concluded.  So the last 20+ pages were just anticlimatic loose ends with very little surprise or tension. 

Overall, I did enjoy this series quite a bit.  I think the series is rightfully famous, although I think it is a little overrated by how long it has been on bestseller's lists.  I would conclude that the fame of the series can be, in large part, contributed to the untimely death of its author, but I nevertheless think that it was cleverly thought out and written. 



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