Okay, seriously: how cool is this?

I used to be so artsy fartsy DIY, then I got busy and lazy. Check this out: it takes DIY to a whole new (EASY) level! I think I may have to run over to Borders tomorrow to check out the book!

Magazine Beads

While I was visiting The Frist Center today I saw some jewelry in the gift shop that was made out of recycled magazines. I have seen these types of beads before, but today I realized that this would be the best way I could reuse the magazines I'm done with. So, with a little help from Google, I found tutorials here and here. They were linked from here and I may have just found another new favorite site.

I'll let you know how the beads go, let me know if you try out any of their other tutorials, the site looks amazing!

Golden Age of Couture

I went to the Frist Center for the Visual Arts today to redeem the Groupon that we purchased yesterday for a free membership. It was perfect timing because I was already planning to go today to see the Couture Exhibit that leaves on September 16. There were a few things I learned:

1) I should have been born rich, and in 1930 so I would have been the perfect age and class to wear all of those amazing clothes.

2) I want to pay more attention to vintage styles and hopefully score some dresses from the 40s and 50s.

3) I want to start making my own clothes again. I made the dress I wore in my High School graduation pictures...but that was the last thing I made, even though I received a sewing machine from my parents when I graduated from college.

Thought for the day

"What would life be if we had no courage to attempt anything?" - Vincent van Gogh

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Amanda Moon

Sunsets

We saw amazing sunsets the first day of our vacation and the last.

This picture was taken in my car, somewhere in Kentucky. Sorry about the bugs on the windshield.

I took this photo of the sun setting over Mary Lake on my phone. My dad got some pretty incredible pictures on his camera, I'll post one of them after I get them off of Chris's computer.

My Sven

Chris: "Would you like a massage?"

Me: "Yes, but I'd like Sven to do it."

Chris: "Who's Sven?"

Me: "The Swedish masseuse!"

Chris laughs and begins to massage my shoulders.

Lily: "I want to Sven too!"

Climbs into Chris's lap and helps massage.

Lily: "Mommy, are you stressed?"

Me: "Not anymore!

Lacking Contentment

I pride myself on being a bargain hunter extraordinaire. One of my best friends from high school once told a chaperon on a mall trip that if she couldn't find me the best place to look was near the clearance racks. It was, and still is, completely true.

But I'm struggling right now with trying to figure out where blatant consumerism for the sake of consumerism starts and good, honest bargain hunting ends. I went to The Gap last Sunday for a free pair of pants- an incredible deal because I LOVE Gap's pants and I truly don't know how I got chosen to receive such a valuable coupon. While I was there, I found out that my weight loss efforts have had huge effects, I've dropped 2 pants sizes even though my overall weight loss is only 20 lbs, and decided to go ahead and buy myself some jeans too, since they were on sale and another coupon I had essentially made them buy one get one free. Throw in a dress and another pair of clearance jeans and I walked out of there with a bag full of great clothes for just over $100. Not bad right?

Right. But did I need any of it? Probably not. My clothing collection already takes up nearly 2/3 of our walk in closet, my husband's stuff shoved to the side and underneath my ever expanding racks.

Then there are the sites like Groupon, Living Social and SavvyAvenue. I buy things from these sites that I wouldn't otherwise make room in my budget for because they are cheap. None of what I've bought is "bad" it's just that I know that these are items that I could live without. But because it's literally a click of the mouse, it's easier to buy than reason with myself.

I'm also a "member" of RueLaLa (if you're not and want to be, email me, I'll send you the invite.) They are essentially a clearing house for factory direct clearances. They carry everything from furniture to clothing to cookware. Last week they hosted KitchenAid and this week they have Analon. I've wanted new cookware for some time now, so I'm very tempted to shell out the $200 and get some of this high quality stuff and a deep discount.

The problem that I'm struggling with is that, yes, I wantnew cookware, and an argument could be made that I have a few pots and pans that need replacing. But the reality is, I have a full set of cookware that works just fine. It's not perfect, but it works.

Financially right now, we don't have a whole lot left over. But, we have a whole lot that most people don't- 2 iPhones, 3 computers (in a house with 2 adults and 2 toddlers) etc. etc. etc. We have more than we need, but because I am constantly seeing other things that I want, I feel like I'm depriving myself when I don't hit the "checkout" button on my online cart.

We are living nearly debt free right now- we have 1 car note (we paid off my car last week!) and our mortgage. Our monthly expenses are relatively high because of where were have chosen to live, but we handle them. We don't have much in savings, but we don't carry credit card debt. I see all of our friends going on vacations and buying (it seems) whatever they want whenever they want and I can't help but be jealous. Maybe they are drowning in mountains of credit card debt, I don't know, but sometimes I wish I could just have that carefree attitude when it comes to money. But I also know I want to be secure and responsible.

I'd love some suggestions for how you handle the balance between giving yourself what you want and being content with what you have. I've heard of people that have gone an entire year without buying anything new. Or only bought goods from local vendors at the source of production. I'm not ready to try for a year, but a month maybe? I don't know if I could do it. Tell me what you think.

*Photo from here

Book Review: Same Kind of Different As Me

5 Stars--Eye Opening

Same Kind of Different As Me: A Modern-Day Slave, an International Art Dealer, and the Unlikely Woman Who Bound Them Together

If your elementary school reading list was anything like mine, you may have read Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry. If you're from the north, that may have been your only exposure to life in the south after slavery. I knew all about sharecropping and how it was essentially a way to make slavery legal, what I didn't realize until I read Same Kind of Different As Me was that there are still sharecroppers alive. I thought it was one of those terrible things in our history that went on long before the World Wars and modern times. It's not.

Same Kind of Different As Me chronicles the stories of Denver Moore, a sharecropper-turned-homeless man and Ron Hall, an up and coming art dealer. It is told in alternating chapters from each man's own perspective, first recounting the life events that brought them to Texas at the same time, and their ultimate meeting and friendship.

Written directly to the reader, as if you are sitting down for coffee with Ron and Denver, the story is gripping and personal. You come to know them like friends, and it's just as hard to put the book down as it would be to walk out on someone while they are talking.

Fun at the Lake

We are in Minnesota this week with my whole fam-dam-ly staying in a huge cabin on Lake Mary. We are in a really remote area, and I love it.

Triathlon training is going well- Sunday I ran almost 8 miles, yesterday my aunt and uncle took me for a nice 11 mile bike ride and today my dad took me swimming. Dad had to me swimming because it's been so windy here I can't swim distance where we are at- he took me across the lake to where the water was a bit calmer. It was still really rough, I only swam for 20 minutes and it wore me out.

I'm sitting by the fire by myself right now, the first time I've really been alone for about 5 days. Grandma is reading the kids a bedtime story, and I need to go ahead sign off before Chris starts looking for his computer.

Too much?

I think it's possible I've hit the limit to the number of balls I can have in the air without completely loosing track of things. Here's what I have going on right now (in no particular order)

1. 2 1/2 year old, 1 year old


2. Husband


3. Creatively Fit Marathon: 26 paintings in 13 weeks


4. Training for second triathlon this summer- Cedars of Lebanon on August 28


5. Training for Women's Half Marathon on September 25


6. Etsy shop (sort of...haven't sold anything yet)


7. Finding Water: The Art of Perseverance Group


8. Full time job


9. Private Pilates Lessons


10. The Pilates Lifestyle Book


11. The Book of Ruth

I think I'm a little overwhelmed. Actually, based on my shopping habits lately, I know I am. When i get overwhelmed, I shop. A lot. When I was in the hospital with gall stones last year I bought $350 worth of stuff from Gap.com. Luckily, I was able to send it all back when the pain meds wore off. My big purchases lately have been gear for the tris, new clothes, and books. I currently have over $200 worth of stuff in my shopping carts at both Athleta.com and TeamEstrogen.com. I've also got $60 worth of stuff in my Amazon cart. Chris said it's fine, as long as I don't hit the "Complete Purchase" button on any of them.

"Honey, it's okay" he said, rather reassuringly. I knew what was coming. Encouragement that if it was stuff I really needed it was okay. I was wrong. "Cute stuff will be on sale again another day. You don't need to buy it now."

Such a wise, wise man.

Latest Paintings

Here are my latest Creatively Fit Marathon paintings. Mile 11 is tomorrow, I can't wait.

The next "marathon" starts on September 3, and I highly recommend it. Get all of the details here.

The whole point of the marathon is not to make amazing works of art (you paint over them every 3-4 days anyway) it's to get in touch with your right brain- to learn to be creative so that you can find creative ways to solve your everyday problems, to "create change" in your life. It's also an amazing form of meditation. I always thought making art was hard- this has been the most relaxing part of my summer.

My weird relationship with John Mayer

Actually, I don't have a relationship at all with John Mayer. I've met him once, seen him play several concerts, and am a fan of his music. But sometimes, like today, I have a crush on his voice. He really is a great songwriter. I do have a problem with some of his, um, personal choices, shall we say, but he really does make some good music. I'm just saying.

I have other voice crushes. My biggest one is on Edwin McCain. Love that man's voice. Wow. My other major voice crush I can't divuldge, because he's now one of my husband's friends. And that's a little weird, because long before I met my husband I had much more than a voice crush on this man. Ahh....to be fourteen again :)

Man on a Wire

Somehow, it seems I've never written about Katie. I'm not sure how that's possible, because I LOVE her blog. It's amazing.

Anyway, a while back she wrote about meeting The man on the wire- the man who walked on a tight rope between the World Trade Centers towers. Chris and I are watching the documentary now, it's pretty incredible and inspiring. Talk about going for your dreams!

Dear Blog World

Hi. I've missed you. Let's not let so much time go by next time.

Race Report

I finished in just over 2:15. My goal was to beat my 2008 time of 1:58 at the race in Atlanta, but pretty much nothing went like I wanted it to. The biggest problems were: I wasn't prepared for the heat (it was 90 when we started) and I did some bike maintenance on Saturday night and forgot to tighten one bolt. Not a huge deal, except that because that bolt wasn't tightened, I wasn't able to shift up, and lost a good 10 mph going down hills. It was pretty frustrating.

All said, though, it went well. My swim time was actually better than the last tri that I did, and this was the first time I've swum in a river (other than floating when canoeing). The current was so strong that race officials were coaching us before we got in the water as many of the front (faster) people were getting pushed off course. I did okay with that, except that I couldn't actually put my face in the water, the current was too strong for me to exhale against. So I kept my head up the whole time. I told Chris that swimming in his sister's above ground 12 foot pool was actually the best training that I did, because Lily was sitting on a floating chair while I was swimming in circles (I was so dizzy!) so I had to keep my head up to make sure she didn't fall in the water.

The bike didn't go well at all. The course was essentially 6 1/2 miles up hill, turn around, then go 6 1/2 miles downhill. My bike is not a race bike, so it's just slower than most of the other racers. I knew that going in, I knew I was going to get passed a lot. For the fun of it, I tried to count the number of people who passed me, but I got to 50 in under a minute, so I stopped counting. I ran out of water at mile 5 (didn't conserve very well, but it was HOT.) which was also about half

way up the biggest hill on the course. My head hurt and I was crabby, so I pretty much decided I was going to quit, but there were no support vehicles around, I didn't have my phone with, and I didn't want to sit on the side of the road waiting for anyone. At least if I was moving there was a breeze. Once I got to the top of the hill though I got to go down it and decided to keep going. That's when I realized I could no longer up shift, so I was stuck in gears 1-8. I should have gotten up to at least 30 mph on that hill, and I think I topped out at 18. At the turn around where there were support vehicles I decided I couldn't quit since, really, I could still ride, so I finished. My bike time was 1:04, only 1 minute longer than my time 2 years ago on a much harder course, but my training time had averaged almost twice as good as it did 2 years ago so that was really disappointing.

The run couldn't have been hillier. Literally. We ran up the hill, over a block and down it, over another block back up it, then down it to the finish. But, after the first mile it was shady. I was too hot and exhausted by then to run, so I just walked. There were lots of walkers, so I just made friends with people...talking makes the time go so much faster :) I ended up catching up with the woman who was in front of me in the swim, she had passed me really early on on the bike. She wanted to quit, so I talked her into walking with me for a little while. At that point we really were only a little over a block from the top of the last hill and the last mile was all downhill to the finish. I kind of underestimated how serious she was about quitting though, it look us almost 20 minutes to walk the last mile and I was actually feeling good enough to run in by then. But, I'm glad I stuck with her, she had done 6 triathlons 4 years ago or something but had to drop out of her last one and was so upset about quitting that she just quit training. At least this time she finished. And if was nice to have someone to pass the time with.

I'm signed up for the Cedars of Lebanon Triathlon on August 28. Hoping it's a little bit cooler, and blessed to have a race bike on loan from a friend, so I'm looking forward to a much better race.