a little free time

Now that the faire is over I have all the time in the world. Well, I do but I'm not using it wisely.

Instead of cleaning my house and stocking my Etsy shop with items that are piling up in boxes in the baby's room, I've been lounging around on the sofa, cruising Pinterest and playing Sims 3 for hours every day. It feels soooooo good to do nothing.

Oh, and I started on my first novel in about eight years. It's under the temporary title of Coffee & Bacon and I have no idea what it's about just yet. That's how I write. I just start writing and see where it goes.

That's pretty much how I live my life really.

 

I'll be "faire free" until the middle of next year so I've decided that I need to use this free time to work on my family's Halloween costumes, write a bit, start belly dancing again, work on my Etsy shop and continue to unpack from our move two effin' months ago.

Speaking of belly dancing... lemme tell you a funny little story:

A few years ago I worked at a bank and the topic of belly dancing came up between me and a customer. 

The conversation went like this:

-------------------------------------------------------------------------

ME: I'm trying to grow my hair out so I'll look more authentic as a belly dancer. Many belly dancers have very long hair and I wanna look like that.
LADY: Oh, you're a belly dancer?
ME: Yeah.
LADY:  (leans in close and whispers) So do you go the the men's houses or do you meet them at a hotel?
ME: (long awkward pause) Um, I'm not that kind of dancer...

Dress: www.10dollarmall.com

Jacket: found

Socks: Just A Dollar

Suede Granny Shoes: Good Samaritan Charity Shop

Bonus:

The original photo is me trying to get the camera away from my husband.

A little bit of cropping goes a long way.

the great crossover

Yes. I finally did it. I cross dressed. It's something I've always wanted to do and boy am I glad I did it because I found out that I make a rather handsome man. 

 I think if I ever were to rob a bank, this would totally be my disguise. What bank teller wouldn't want to hand over a wad of cash to this dashing young chap??

 I wanted to do a full outfit, but my husbands pants are waaaaaay to small for me.

 Sorry about my weird holey ears. My gauged earrings kind of took away from my masculine look so I took them out. This will probably be the last time you ever see my ears without something in them... I think my lobes look like little anuses with out earrings.

Well now that I've got all the gender bending out of my system, I can't see myself making it a regular thing. Even though the urge to dress as a man was terribly strong, it just didn't feel natural to sport a stache and bow tie. I was especially a little weirded out seeing my dad's face staring back at my in the mirror when I finished my makeup.

That's my mom and dad in the 70s. I'm a good mixture of the two but today, I'm aaall daddy.

Here are some photos of very lovely ladies crossing over:

Julie Andrews in Victor Victoria. Never seen it? Well what are you waiting for?!?!

Scarlett Johansson

A young Frida Kahlo

That's Michelle Pfieffer. Hello! Very deliciously Clark Gable!

Josephine Baker, keeping it funny and feminine.

Sigourney Weaver!

***********

Are you inspired to cross now? I dare you to give it a shot. I'm waiting... :hint, hint: I'm challenging you all to dress like men and blog about it.

Check out more feminine crossies on my Pinterest board "The Crossover"

1,001 beards

I now have 1,001 followers on Pinterest. What does this mean? Nothing. It's not something I can put on my resume and it's wasn't a goal I was trying to reach- so nothing. It's just something neato that I noticed today. So in celebration of my new useless discovery, I shall share with you an outfit with some of my favorite pins in between.

As I mentioned in my post yesterday I'm planning my town's first beard and mustache competition. I contacted the owner of a local bar here and he's all for it! Now I'm studying the rules and different categories for facial hair judging. What have I gotten myself into? 

Did you know that in the World Beard and Mustache Championship there are over 20 categories to compete in? Including the Amish Beard, Fu Manchu and the Dali Mustache.

I'm going to just do five categories: natural full beard, groomed full beard, mustache, partial and freestyle artistic... and maybe a sixth for women's faux beards as I've seen done before.

Head scarf: sash from a hand-me-down dress

Tank and Cardigan: Walmart

Skirt: bottom of an old dress

Clutch: Ebay

Shoes: Local beauty supply store.

Moving on with this pin here: I will say with much confidence that if I was around in Tom Wait's youth, me and him would have been an item. We would have gotten married and lived in a castle made of  unicorn hair and dreams. I am very sure of this.

But God had a different plan for me and I'm ok with that. Sorry Tom. Maybe in another lifetime.
River will be 11 weeks tomorrow! Great discovery: I found out today that his favorite song for me to sing to him is "Wonder Boy" by Tenacious D. That's my boy! Not so great discovery: He pooped five times today. Holy smokes.

This pin is a bunch of bull. Well it's a pretty photograph of a dandelion on fire no doubt, but the pin's description says "Dandelion on fire. Bucket list for this summer... light a dandelion on fire". Mmm.... you know what happens when you set a dandelion on fire? It catches on fire... that's it. Not pretty pink and purple and yellow fire... just plain jane fire. Nothing more. Don't be fooled folks. You wanna good trip? Drop acid and go swimming.

Fun fact about me: I can't stand Tome Cruise. He makes me wanna puke... but I LOVE him in Interview. I have such a weakness for villains!

The end.

(And what a magically delicious end it is!)

what kind of bees make milk? BOOBEES!

What's going on party people? I hope everyone is fantastic. I sure am. Always!

I'm in the middle of planning our town's very first beard and mustache competition. It'll be a fundraiser for my faire of course and I'm pretty stoked about it. I'm studying how to judge and all the rules and technical stuff.  I'm wondering into a whole new realm of event planning and I can't wait to get it started!

Speaking of faire, I've been getting some pretty fantastic entertainment lined up for the 2013 faire. I've got my blacksmith and poetic pirates again, my wondering gypsies on horseback and an awesome fire-spinning group from Memphis, TN called Radiant Spirals. YAY!!

I also started a new blog called "Events In Texarkana" which is a MUCH needed site for what's happening in  town and the surrounding areas. It's catching on slowly- I mean, it's only been a few days since I started it but I'm more than sure it'll be a success.

So here's what else I've been up to lately:

I've been on a serious Pinterest recipe kick lately.

Here's some er, what is this? Oh yeah, cilantro lime rice with chicken and avocado sauce, I paired with edemame and toasted flour tortillas.

Salmon sweet potato burgers. I topped this with an avocado sauce and sauteed baby bella mushrooms. I deep fried the patties instead of baking them like the instructions say to do so they came out crispy on the outside and mushy on the inside... so the burgers fell apart and needed to be eaten with a fork and lots of napkins. 

My new favorite drink! I've only seen it in Mexican grocery stores but I recently found it at the Dollar Tree. It tastes like thickened lemon-lime Koolaid with bits of tasty stuff in it. Mmm... that's honeslty the best I can do it describe it.

Now that my office/craft room/baby room is clean and set up, I've been making a lot of steampunk jewelry and accessories and revamping my Etsy store. I also opened a Storenvy shop to try to get rid of some books and other little stuff I don't want anymore.

So today me and the husband are off to do our taxes so that we can (hopefully) get our tax return in time to pay for our trip to New York for my sister-in-law's wedding in June. Great, now I have to comb my hair and look presentable. I've really been digging the dreadlocks I've been developing since Easter.

Have a superdeeduper day my lovelies!

************

Bonus River Shots: 10 weeks old already!

"Whatchu lookin' at?"

Oh, Pinterest

Why am I thankful for Pinterest? Well, why shouldn't I be?

65 boards, 5,262 pins and 181 followers. I love Pinterest and here are 8 reasons why.

1. Recipes - there have been times when I was at a complete loss for what to cook for dinner. Never fear. Pinterest to the rescue. No more flipping through cook books, no more index cards and paper towel book marks. Now I can just browse through my board of recipes I've saved. It's like having your own customized cookbook online.

2. Saving Computer Space -  I used to save and hoard images onto my computer's hard drive: pics of cute outfits and pretty dresses, funny photos and art work. Cleaning out my files was always a very tough task. If I saved something on my computer, that means I REALLY wanted it. Now I can satisfy my compulsion to store images by pinning them on Pinterest.

3. Finding good blogs and other websites - Whenever I come across an image on Pinterest that really strikes my fancy, I often follow the link so see where it came from and to see if that site holds more goodies for me. I have found many wonderful online shops, blogs and websites this way.

4. "Slap-your-forehead-say-duh" tips and projects - I've come across some serious money saving tips and projects on Pinterest. My favorite so far has been putting a bread bag closure tab under your flip flops to secure the strap if it breaks through the sole. I buy cheap flip flops because I mostly just wear them around the house. I'm so happy I found this- plus many other "well why didn't I think of that" tips that will seriously help you in a semi-emergency.

5. DIY projects -  I love making stuff. Mostly because I'm a little on the cheap side. I can't stand spending money on something I know I can make for half the cost. Pinterest is full of super unique and often simple DIY projects that can make you feel like a frugal crafting genius.

6. Wedding blogging made easier - I have a budget wedding blog. I'm on hiatus right now from it so I can focus more on this blog. The DIY and budget wedding projects on Pinterest are so incredibly helpful and inspiring. Blogging became so much easier after I discovered Pinterest. Now that I'm hiatus from the blog, I pin inspiring wedding images and projects for my readers to view while I'm away.

7. Mock baby registry - I am super picky about my baby items. I don't like sports themed stuff for a boy and cutesy pink ruffly stuff for a girl. It's all so silly to me. People can go really overboard when they buy baby gifts. They buy what THEY think is cute, not what they think YOU'LL think is cute. I often find myself really disliking other people's baby taste so I started a board to show my specific baby style taste. I hope people pay attention.

8. Planning my Renaissance Faire - I started a separate Pinterest account for my Renaissance Faire. I found so many wonderful ideas for costuming, decorating and money saving DIY projects that helped me this year and will for sure help me in the future. I think I'm the only Renaissance Faire int he world that uses Pinterest for Faire planning... and with 41 boards, 2,564 pins and 289 followers, I think I might be one of the most popular Renaissance Faire accounts on Pinterest!

French Bread Pizza

Sooooo... this is what I made for dinner Saturday night. French bread pizza. I found the idea to do this on Pinterest and I was like, "Duh." So cheap, so quick and so easy to make... aaaaand muy tasty. 

So, alls ya need is a loaf of French bread, your choice of pizza sauce, shredded cheese and toppings. You'll find that you probably need more cheese than you think - like one bag per half loaf. 

So anyways, cut your loaf in half long ways, top that sucker any way you like then bake it. I baked mine on 350 for about fifteen minutes - any longer and the bottom of the bread would have been waaay too hard and crunchy for my taste.

And the last step: you eat it and enjoy it.

Yeah, I know the foil looks pretty redneck, but we still haven't unpacked a lot of our baking ware from when we moved in our new home about five months ago. Lazy.

must have!

I stumbled across this on Pinterest today. I am so in love with this onesie from www.locallygrownclothing.com. Other states available!

super colorful baby stuff

I love colorful things, but I like for my colors to be toned down a bit. But for some reason I keep finding myself drooling over these rainbowlicious and super bright baby items. All of these items should be connected to a link of some sort for um- you know... purchasing info....