Finding Pants

Brenden just left to drive the missionaries to our church building for something. I didn't really catch what he was saying because I was in the shower getting ready to go shopping. As soon as Brenden gets back home we're heading out to the mall to go shopping. For clothing. For me.

I hate shopping for clothes for myself. Despise it. I hate clothing and fashion and malls and new Fall catalogues and the way brands market their clothing lines for winter. No one can possibly be that happy in that much snow. I don't care how cute that matching hat and scarf set is. That smile is FAKE!

Right, so anyway, shopping. I suspect a lot of women would be excited to have their husbands take them shopping. I don't actually know. I definitely appreciate Brenden for wanting to take me shopping. My goodness, he knows how unpleasant I am when looking for clothes. Why would he willingly put himself through that?

It's not that I hate all shopping. It's just that I don't want to buy myself another pair of pants when I already have eight pairs (is that a lot or too little?) Sure, they don't fit me as well as they should (too big or too small- I don't know why! They fit when I bought them.) And, yes, it's true I often complain when getting ready in the morning because of this fact. (It was actually because of this complaining that Brenden demanded that we go and buy me a new pair of jeans today.) But pants are expensive! Clothing is expensive! And I'm too short so all the pants in the store are too long for me. ALL OF THEM. And I hate having to get my pants hemmed because I don't sew which usually means that my pants will stay too long and I will wear them anyway and then they will get all torn up where my shoes step on them. And shirts? Shirts are just annoying. There are so many different designs! Button up, v-neck, crew neck, scoop neck, long sleeve, three-quarter sleeve, cap sleeve, tank top, regular t-shirt, sheer, silk, cotton. I generally stick to t-shirts because they're pretty simple and I would get them for free for going to special events. (Too bad I can't wear my old softball t-shirt to church!)

Like I said, I don't hate all shopping. I love shopping for kitchen gadgets. I like shopping for furniture. I like buying books and art supplies. And I enjoy shopping for others. I even enjoy shopping for clothing for others. I just can't stand having to pick out clothes for myself.

Can I show you something that would be embarrassing if I actually cared?
This is a picture of some of the items in my closet:

This is hardly the entire contents of my closet but I wanted to share these items because it gives you a little insight to my shopping habits. I hate shopping for myself so much that when I go shopping, if I find one thing I like or doesn't look too bad on me, I basically buy it in bulk so I won't have to go shopping again for a long time.

Here I have 7 of the same polos from American Eagle, 5 of the same long-sleeved t-shirts from PacSun, 4 of the same blouses from Macy's, 3 of the same (only 2 pictured) skirts from Macy's, also not pictured: 3 pairs of the same jeans, 2 pairs of the same corduroys, 2 pairs of the same flats, and 5 pairs of the same flip flops. There are a few things these items had in common when I was shopping: 1) They fit me. 2) They came in different colors. 3) They were on sale for super cheap. And those are my basic requirements for buying clothes in bulk.

(The rest of this post was added after my shopping trip with Brenden.)

Because Brenden and I had a Macy's gift card and very little time to shop, our shopping trip was limited to one department store. Generally, when I go shopping for myself, it is because I need a particular item of clothing. I went into Macy's looking for a pair of jeans that fit well and weren't at risk of having holes suddenly torn in embarrassing places (I have two pairs of blue jeans, one of which I've had since seventh grade. It was my best Gap buy ever; unfortunately, the pants are now very worn and thin and at risk of having holes suddenly torn in embarrassing places.) Very much to my relief, there were a ton of jeans ON SALE and I began grabbing pairs off the racks and shelves and handing them to Brenden. After I had about seven pairs to try on, I headed to the dreaded dressing room and began trying them on.

Here is one thing I hate about women's clothing: how much the sizes in different brands vary. I tried on a pair of pants that were size 5 and they were too small, then I tried on a 7 from the same brand and they were still too small. If I tried on a size 9 in this same brand, I would have to hem the pants at the knee, thereby ruining the boot cut, so they'd be short enough for me to wear. Needless to say, I gave up at the 7. But then I tried on a size 3 S (s for short) in another brand and they fit. And I didn't need to hem them. And I shook my fist at the size 7 on its hanger in my dressing room and said, "I liked you better! You were $10 cheaper but you failed me!" And I went to the counter, paid for the jeans, and left confused about what size I actually wear because, apparently, I'm anywhere between a 3 and a 9.

It doesn't matter too much, though, because I just bought a new pair of jeans which means I won't need to go jeans shopping for another ten years.

I want to build something!

I have been spending too much time on pinterest lately (again) which just further irritates this itch I have (that just won't go away) to create something big and awesome and marvelous. This itch hasn't gone away with craft projects or furniture painting projects. And it has become a little bit annoying. I lie awake at night thinking up projects I can do to fill my days, to beautify my home, to give to friends and family. And then I lie awake at night wishing Brenden and I owned a house with a garage with a workshop where I could build things.

Yes.

I want to build things. With nails and screws and hinges and knobs and pulls and wood and metal and all those other things I don't even know exist.

Ever since I was little, I have loved trips to Home Depot and Lowe's. I loved seeing the lumber, the hardware, and the power tools. I imagined the things I would create if I had unlimited resources and actual skills. At first, I wanted to build a dollhouse and then I wanted to build a playhouse for the backyard and then a treehouse like that one in Home Alone. And now I want to build a bed, an armoire, bookshelves, a real nightstand with drawers and everything! When I was younger, I would see my dad take sheets of plywood and two-by-fours (along with those metal things that held it all together- nails, screws, etc.) and create things in our garage- cool things like bunk beds and dining table chairs. I regret I hadn't spent more time watching and learning from him when I had the opportunity. I was too occupied with musical theater and dance and softball and school and friends to actually spend time watching my dad build stuff. And girls had no place around a circular saw anyway, right?

What was I thinking?

Maybe I thought the power tools were too loud. Maybe I was too scared I'd lose a finger or end up with a screw in my toe. Maybe I was JUST STUPID.

For Christmas this year sign me up for a circular saw, a sander, a nailer and stapler (don't worry, I already bought myself a drill), and a few gift cards to Lowe's so I can buy some materials. And if you're feeling particularly generous, a new house with a garage with space for a workshop.

It's alright, I know you're probably thinking it.

Yes, I'm crazy. Puh-leeze, I already knew this.

All Hallow's Eve

Did anyone else ever wonder why we never got Halloween as a day off from school? I think every year I was in elementary school as the holiday approached, I got excited about the prospect of no school. (I also thought I got the summer holidays off from church.) And then the week of Halloween, I'd look at the school lunch menu stuck on our fridge at home and realize that they were serving lunch AT SCHOOL on HALLOWEEN which could only mean one thing: we would have school on Halloween. Of course we had Halloween parties and we were even allowed to dress up sometimes but why didn't we have the day off? It's something I got used to by the time I was in middle school though I still can't believe that professor my freshman year at BYU who assigned us a paper due the DAY AFTER HALLOWEEN. I mean, seriously, what was he thinking? My roommate (who was in the same class) and I decided we would write our papers quickly so we could go out and celebrate but then Brenden invited us to do something and we abandoned our homework until later that night when we stayed up late typing our papers and kicking ourselves.

Our Halloween this year began on Friday when we went to our ward's Halloween party. Brenden and I were in charge of the bean bag toss game. There weren't a lot of games there so we usually had a little crowd around us which included its fair share of ducks, vampires, witches, and even a Storm Trooper with a lightsaber. Unfortunately, the party was outside and it was cold and drizzly. When it started pouring, our trunk-or-treat was quickly relocated to the pavilion where the children walked up and down the rows between the picnic benches. Some kids thought they were slick and kept coming back for more candy. I recognized them, called them out, and gave them candy anyway. They were cute and really good at the bean bag toss-- why shouldn't they get more candy?

I wore my go-to Halloween outfit for the event. I wore it last year and the year before that. But this year, I changed it up by adding a cheap (and by cheap I mean poorly made and relatively inexpensive) witch's hat. Brenden wore jeans and a Batman t-shirt and called it good. He didn't want me to include the picture with both of us in it. Probably because he wishes he looked this awesome.

Brenden insisted I put a broom in this picture.
Also, my hair is super long and I don't know what to do about it.
On Saturday, Brenden and I worked on a project that we've been putting off for awhile now. We haven't finished it yet which means we have an unfortunate looking piece of furniture sitting on top of a plastic sheet in our dining room. Hopefully it will be done (or at least out of the room) before we have dinner guests next Sunday. Also, the Georgia Bulldogs beat the Florida Gators on Saturday, 24-20. I mention this because it is significant. We didn't get to watch it but from my ESPN phone app, it looked like it was an exciting game.

On Sunday, Brenden and I finally carved our pumpkin. And even though this is our fourth Halloween together, we've never carved a pumpkin with each other before. We decided to make it something more complicated than we'd ever made during our separate pumpkin carving experiences. It took us awhile but we were proud of ourselves when we finally finished. It was pretty cool.

It's a Georgia Bulldog! Because we are suddenly very school-spirited!
Unfortunately our Bulldog didn't get to see much daylight before he became this:

Some stinky kids that we PROBABLY gave candy to destroyed him while we were eating dinner. We know it was during dinner because we set up our decorations outside before we sat down for dinner and then after dinner we went outside to light them up and our pumpkin was already in the street. I was so sad. At least we took some pictures of our guy during our short time together. Next year, we'll put our pumpkin in the window.
Here's what our place looked like before our pumpkin died:

Our landlord somewhat recently had the exterior of our place painted, including our front door. Unfortunately, the guys painting the door broke the door numbers when they removed them and have yet to replace them. Brenden and I are considering keeping up our door decorations a little longer just so friends can easily identify which place is ours. "Our address is _______. Our door has a scary face on it. No, really, it does." I think my favorite part about the eye placement on the door was that the little peep hole was right between the eyes which meant when I checked the door, it was like looking through the eyes of my monster!

Our rearrangement of decorations and our lit ghosts:

We also had a few decorations in our house that Brenden made almost ten years ago.

These guys sat on top of our fireplace mantle. Fancy.
I copied Brenden's costume design and wore a t-shirt and pants for my Halloween outfit. Unfortunately, in this picture you can't see the bright red pants I was wearing. Not exactly pink but close. Go go Power Rangers!

We didn't do much besides give out candy, eat candy, and catch up on The Walking Dead but it was a good Halloween. And tomorrow is All Saint's Day which means if I was still in elementary school at Galveston Catholic, I'd be dressing up as a Catholic Saint for a special Mass tomorrow. This year I'll just be out running errands while Brenden's at school. Boring.

Cardboard, Crafts, and Birds

After making Brenden's awesome nightstand, we had a few extra pieces of cardboard lying around the house. I was bored one evening and really wanted to make something. My desire to create most often leaves me stranded without an idea of what to create. This usually translates to me being fidgety for a bit, looking through my art and craft supplies cabinet (which is severely lacking, by the way), browsing online for any inspiration, and then getting stuck online reading home decorating blogs or stupid articles on CRACKED.com and/or Facebook stalking. However, this evening was different! A large piece of cardboard was calling me. I pulled out the only bottles of acrylic paint I currently owned, all in traditional baby pastel colors, from a project Brenden and I did a little over a month ago. I mixed some colors to make a nice creamy yellow and then started painting.

I had no idea what I was going to paint. I just knew I had a paintbrush in hand and brown cardboard on the table. I suppose I also knew I wanted a yellow cream background on whatever it was going to be. I'm not quite sure what happened but I got some water on my pseudo-canvas and quickly made a watery streak down the center of my piece of cardboard. Oops. I wasn't too perturbed, though, because I still didn't really know what it was I was trying to paint. Once the water dried, I painted a huge green stripe over the watery streak. I thought the green was gross and then painted a huge black stripe over the green. And suddenly, INSPIRATION!

I sketched out a giant bird shape and painted it white. I determined it look unfinished and boring so I looked around for more inspiration. I grabbed the newspaper I was using to prevent a mess from my painting and starting cutting it up. I glued pieces of the newspaper onto my bird shape, painted it white again, and then used a black paint pen to draw the bird's feathers. And there it was. Cute random bird project. Made with cardboard.

It doesn't have a permanent home yet, so it's just propped up against the wall next to Brenden's model cars in our computer room.

Sometimes I pretend the bird is sitting on a giant cable.
Other times I pretend it is just a really tiny bird.

Cardboard bird, model car, and Lord of the Rings Elven Helmet shadow.
Yes, that's right. We are awesome.
With my self-confidence renewed by my unlikely and easy success with the cardboard bird project, I sought a new challenge. For those craftily inclined, I'm sure this little rolled fabric flower would pose no threat. But for me, having never wielded a hot glue gun without supervision and having very limited knowledge about fabric in general, it was a little more difficult than I thought it would be. I thought by the end of it I would have a cute little flower not this thing:

My sad attempt at making a cute crafty flower.

This is what it was supposed to look like except with my blue polka dot fabric. If you want to try making this flower, THIS is the tutorial I used. I'm sure yours will turn out better than mine did.
I had no real purpose in making this flower except that I was bored while Brenden was out home teaching. (Apparently, my muse is boredom.) I had some fabric from a project Brenden and I were planning on doing about two years ago and put on hold until one of us learned how to sew and I was spending too much time online so after finding that flower tutorial I decided I would try it. I pulled out my brand new glue gun (what have I been doing all my life without a glue gun?) and got to work. My "flower" didn't even try to look like a flower. Brenden laughed at it when I showed it to him. Maybe I used the wrong fabric, I probably pulled the fabric too tight in its rolls, and sometimes I globbed too much glue onto the fabric-- it just didn't turn out right. Now I'm trying to think of what I can do with it. It's really small so I thought about attaching it to a hair pin but when I put the "flower" in my hair and looked in the mirror, it looked like I just had a ball of rolled up fabric stuck in my hair. That's really what it looks like (and is)-- a ball of rolled up fabric, perhaps neatly rolled up but rolled up nonetheless and looking nothing like a flower. Maybe I'll have better luck next time. With a completely different project.

And so this morning, I pulled out my sketchbook and charcoal pencils. I am a little more comfortable with these items than fabric and glue guns, even though I go through phases of drawing and not drawing. Right now it seems I'm on the end part of my not drawing phase. (As indicated by my desire to draw this morning.) Also, I was so annoyed with my failed flower, I needed to somehow redeem myself. It was such an easy flower project! How did it go wrong?!

I'm currently formulating an idea for a friend's birthday present and this drawing was a little preparation for that upcoming project.

Can you tell what kind of bird it is? The proportions are a little off. The head's a bit too big for the rest of the body and the body is a little too plump but not too bad for my first bird drawing, right?

In the process of drawing. My bird is missing an eye.

With some color! It's supposed to a Baltimore Oriole.

I love birds. The Biology 100 class I took at BYU was taught by an ornithology professor who was so enthusiastic about birds, you couldn't not love them after taking his class. I learned to recognize certain bird calls. I was able to identify birds by their size, feather colors and calls while I was hiking. I would often stop walking on my way to my classes to try to find the bird whose call I had just heard so loudly above me. Sometimes I wonder what it would be like to take flight and soar high above cities and forests, farmland and beaches. I loved watching barn swallows flit around the parking lot at my old apartment complex, their forked tail feathers behind them. And California quails with their loud "CHI-CA-GO" calls were fun to listen to. Oh, I love birds. What beautiful creatures.

This is about Hawaii except it isn't really about Hawaii.

This post is long overdue. It's been about a month now since I came back from Hawaii and I still haven't posted about it. I just haven't really known what to say about the trip. It was great. Tiring. Fun. Exhausting. Beautiful. Stressful. Relaxing. Hectic. Simple. Eye-opening. Momentous. See what I mean? How am I even going to explain any of that? Maybe I should just end this post now and hope those adjectives suffice.

No, no, no. This trip deserves more than eleven adjectives.

Last month, I met my mom and sister at Intercontinental Airport in Houston to accompany them to Honolulu (my Aunt Ernie also met up with us later in Honolulu.) Stef was going to start college at Brigham Young University- Hawaii in about a week. Most of Stefanie's friends had already started classes at their respective schools in Texas. She was the one to see all of them go while she waited patiently for September 7th when we were to leave for Hawaii. That day had come and her eyes were puffy from her own goodbyes. It was time to go.

Once we landed in Honolulu, we met up with one of my mom's good friends, Beth, at the car rental place near the airport. Though we were exhausted (I had left my house in Georgia around 3am and had been flying for ten hours), it was only about noon in Hawaii and we had the rest of the day ahead of us, packed with things to do. First item on the list was Stefanie's job orientation on campus in Laie, about an hour's drive from the airport which was perfect since the orientation started in, oh, about an hour. We sped off to Laie, ooh-ing and aah-ing at the lush, green mountains, amazed by the trees, the deep red dirt (that stains white shirts really well), and then the water. Oh that water. The water was so blue and it stretched out as far as we could see. We saw mountains juxtaposed with the beach and the many green trees and plants and I realized how Hawaii was the combination of all the places I'd lived except perfected-- Galveston's warm beaches, Utah's towering mountains, the abundant trees of both Seattle and Athens. Hawaii was a combination of all the things I loved. And then I kicked myself for deciding to go to BYU in Provo when I could've gone to BYU-Hawaii. Blah, blah, yeah, my life would be completely different right now if I'd gone there instead. But look!

I mean, seriously.
Hawaii's beautiful. There's no doubt. I could write several posts about the beauty of that place and I could write several posts about all the things we did there. But those aren't the things I wanted to focus on, which is a little funny, by the way, considering that in anticipation of this trip all I could think about was how beautiful Hawaii was and of all the fun things I was planning on doing there and just how excited I was to be there. It was Hawaii! People dream about going there. Ever since my last trip to Oahu, I certainly did. I was finally going back and it was going to be an awesome vacation.

My expectations were set much too high for the purpose of our trip. We were taking Stef to college. We weren't on a vacation. And during the time it took me to realize this, I was grumpy and selfish. It didn't help that I really wasn't getting enough sleep but even that isn't a good enough excuse for my initial attitude. Here's a shout out to my mom and Stef for tolerating me while I was being such a bum. Thanks guys!

When I stopped being a brat for the most part (hey, I was still sleep-deprived) and started looking beyond myself, I saw a few things I hadn't been paying attention to. Like the fact that my sister was in Hawaii to start FREAKING COLLEGE. Wasn't she just starting high school, like yesterday? I heard this stuff all the time growing up. Still do. "I can't believe how much you've grown!" "You were just a baby when I last saw you." "I remember when you were this high." And then the person holds her hand up to her knee or her waist to indicate just how small you were and then grabs your cheek between her fingers and makes such a weird face at you while calling you cute that you have to remind yourself to not run away because this is one of your mom's oldest friends and she's just trying to be nice. Don't pretend you don't know what I'm talking about.

Well, I was on the other side of that exchange this time, minus the cheek grabbing. Stefanie was starting college? When did she graduate high school? When did she go to high school? She finished middle school already? But I remember when she watched Gullah Gullah Island and Blue's Clues and Little Bear and she had that doll I gave her for a present, Lucy, I think she named her, and she had that Barbie workbook she never worked on even though I pretended to be her teacher. I remember picking her up out of her crib and racing outside one day because my dad burned potatoes on the stove and I thought the house was going to burn down. I remember when she said "lellow" instead of "yellow" and "hangabooger" instead of "hamburger." I remember her obsession with Pocahontas. I remember her being too small for her school jumpers and the cute bob haircut she had and the big bows she wore in her hair. I remember jumping on our bed and turning our desk lamp so the light could shine on our wall and pretending we were on TV. And then I also remember those times I ignored her. I remember when siblings do that thing that siblings sometimes do and I hurt her feelings. And we grew apart because I pushed her away. But she never let go. And I'm so glad she didn't. Because I remember those times when she was this little *gestures to knee* and I don't want that to be all that I remember.

So there we were, in Hawaii, at the nearest Walmart (about a 45 minute drive from campus) buying stuff for her dorm, picking out school supplies, grabbing snacks off the shelves. And I just thought, was it really four years ago when Stef and the rest of my family were doing the same thing for me? Stefanie was an adult now. No question about it. And she was starting college. I watched her for the week and a half I was there. I saw the initial excitement and then the trepidation as the date of my mom's and my departure grew nearer. You could see it in her face. She couldn't wait to get going but wasn't quite ready to leave. She was excited but she was also scared and understandably so. Moving across an ocean to live in a place she had never even seen before? That girl is crazy. Crazy awesome, that is. Crazy courageous. Crazy amazing. Or maybe just amazing, no crazy. Stefanie is amazing. Yes, that sounds right.

While the Hawaiian sunsets were painted with every beautiful color you could imagine and the weather was perfect and the fruit was ripe and sweet and delicious and the people were friendly, it was my sister who amazed me the most while I was in Hawaii. She made friends easily, her bubbly personality burst through her nervousness, she went to work at the Polynesian Cultural Center, she went to her classes. I watched her and thought about how much she'd grown in those years I was away at college. I walked her around the campus to all of her classrooms the day before school started (I guess I read maps better than she can) and thought about when we were little and I would hold her hand while waiting for our mom to pick us up after school. I didn't need to hold her hand anymore. That realization alone made my brain go haywire. And I wanted to take her back to Texas. I wanted her to go to school in Georgia where she could live with me and Brenden. And I suddenly really, really didn't want to let go. Stefanie is the baby of our family. She was the one we always protected. I saved her from the nonexistent potato house fire! But I guess babies grow up and they learn how to pronounce "yellow" and "hamburger" and they let their hair grow and they switch from jumpers to skirts and they drive cars and sometimes they move away and go to college so they can keep growing.

Hawaii is fertile ground for Stef. She is going to grow so much there. She has already grown so much there. I'm happy I got to help her get settled in. I'm happy I got to help her figure out her classes and schedule. I'm happy I got to be there for her first day of college. I'm happy I matured enough to realize what a remarkable little sister and amazing friend I have in her.

Hey Stef! Guess what! I think you're AWESOME!

A few pictures of us through the years:

Dancing (or something like it)

College visiting (I was really excited.)

Girls camping

Pink posing

And a few pictures of us from Hawaii:

Dole Plantation Visiting

Luau-ing

More dancing (or something like it)

Waikiki Beach-ing

Posing while other tourists were stopping and staring

Ladies of the Family-ing

And here's a list of a few of my favorite things about that trip (besides being with my mom and sister):

• Staying in Haleiwa on Hawaii's North Shore. The town itself reminded me a bit of the Philippines and that made me very happy.
• The Polynesian Cultural Center
• The Ala Moana Mall Food Court where 10 of the 16 restaurants served Asian or Hawaiian food: 4 Japanese, 2 Chinese, 1 Vietnamese, 1 Korean, 1 Hawaiian, and 1 Thai. Yes, I counted.
• Driving down the Likelike Highway
• Visiting Pearl Harbor
• Fruit stands. Farmer's markets. Fresh fruit every day all the time.
• Light rain every day and the accompanying rainbows
• Wearing my hair down and not feeling weird about having such long hair.
• The beach, duh.

(Some more of my Hawaii photos are in my Facebook album.)