Hi guys!

It's been awhile, I know.  I've been busy wrapping things up at work and contemplating my next professional move.  This is my last full week at work and potentially my last week, period.  If you ask me, they could have cut me on Monday but they're being nice enough to let me work one more week.  I suspect this is intentional and I am grateful to have a paycheck.

I've been researching becoming a Virtual Assistant (yes, it's a real thing).  Basically, people will (hopefully) hire me to do office work remotely.  I've also been dabbling with graphic design and having some fun with it.  See the graphic I made for my "brand".


I started designing my website too. Hoping to have it finished soon.  Email address is hollyhelpsu@gmail.com in case you want to email me for any reason.  Anyway, I'm excited and nervous to see what the future holds.  At any rate it won't be dull, I'm sure.  Wish me luck and I'll be sure to keep checking in with you all on the blog!

♥ Holly ♥ 

P.S. If you click on the ads I make money. *hint, hint* Go ahead, give em a click. Thanks! ♥

Good morning!

I feel so bad for my husband sometimes.  Our schedule is such that it's easier for us to get going in the morning; get the kids ready for school, coffee made, breakfast, dogs walked, etc. that I don't get "ready" until after Jack and Daniel have left.  They leave at 7:15am, while Dylan doesn't have to be to school till 7:30am, and it's right up the street.  I don't have to be to work till 8am and that's also a short drive.  So I drop Dylan off and come home to shower and do my hair, etc.  I don't often make time to do my makeup on a regular day, regardless of time.  I work in a very small office with about 2 people and I just don't care what they think. lol

The reason I feel bad for Daniel is because I didn't realize just how terrible I looked this morning till he was already gone. Dang it!

Here is the image of me I expect he left with:

I look like Beaker from The Muppets. (Mee, mee, mee!)

  I was so terrified by my own appearance that I took a little extra time to put on makeup after my hair was done.  I was so incredibly horrified, in fact, that I even shaved my legs. *GASP*

Not a total Betty, but a vast improvement.

I don't have a problem getting ready, per se... but I do have trouble making time to get ready.  I'd really rather sleep that extra 20-30 minutes, let's be honest.  I need to start waking up earlier and JUST DO IT.  (Sidebar: I'm getting my hair done in two weeks and going darker. It's just way too blonde now.)

I really blame my parents, come to think of it.  No offense, but my mom never really got dolled up a whole lot... she did childcare from our home so why would she?  (Not me!)  And we were always pretty lazy.  Some days we didn't even get out of our pajamas.  I come from a family of night owls so getting up early, something I now do every day, was never a necessity or priority.  When Daniel and I were first dating he'd call the house at noon and I'd still be in bed!  *Shudder*

So I think it's fair to say I'm much better than I used to be.  Now my internal alarm gets me up at 6am on the weekends!  So unfair.

Anyhoo, I just thought I'd share my real and give y'all a chuckle today.  I really am going to try harder to get up earlier and just get ready.  Maybe my trade-off can be laying down those few minutes before I have to get to work.  We'll see.

Yay, it's almost Friday! Have a great rest of your week and a wonderful weekend! 

♥ Holly ♥

Hi all!

So my wonderful mother in law made the cutest little curtain for my garden window in the kitchen.  She even climbed up onto the kitchen counter to help fluff!

She's the best ♥

The colors tie in perfectly and it covers up the gawd-awful top of the garden window.  It's double paned glass so moisture has gotten in between over the years.  Now you'd never know. 

Daniel's parents and my parents all came over yesterday for a (per Pat's request) steak lunch.  Which was expertly grilled by my hubby.

Look at those monsters!

In case you're curious, those are Rib-eye's from Costco, and that's garlic rubbed on the steaks with salt and coarse Kosher salt.

It's so much less stressful to have people over now that it's all finished.

However, the home-owner Gods have thrown us a little curve ball.  This morning we came down stairs to a leak somewhere in the wall by the window. *sigh*  So I'll be posting an update on that situation soon.  Thank God my husband is handy!

To be continued...
♥ Holly ♥

***UPDATE***

So my beautiful kitchen had to get ripped up a little to find the stupid wall leak.  *tear*  All this mess...


For THIS! Ugh, so annoying...


 A dang pinhole-sized leak. So lame.


Look at my handy-man.  Love that we save hundreds, if not thousands of dollars doing work ourselves.  But I know it's not for everyone.  My boss was just saying he knows better than doing the work himself after a few horrible attempts at DIY.

Daniel couldn't find the leak at first glance, until it sprayed him in the face. teehee  He had to turn off the water to the house, cut the pipe then slip a coupling on to cover the hole.  Then he soldered it into place.  We left everything open to dry out and I sprayed it with some white vinegar to prevent mold.  Tonight he's going to patch the drywall.  He used a razor blade to score the section of wall that bubbled up from the water and ripped it out.  Tonight he'll also re-texture everything so we can re-paint on Thursday.  Good times! Not.

Oh the joys of home ownership. Sigh 

♥ Holly ♥

OMG I can't believe I can finally say, after living in our home for almost 13 years, that our kitchen is done!  And we fixed it up by ourselves.  Of course, I say it's done but you know there's always going to be something.  We do have to re-do our floor tile someday but for now, we're happy enough to overlook it. LOL

Just to give you some perspective, here is what our kitchen looked like when we moved in back in 2005:

View from the dining area

OMG that light box was so ugly and that hanging lamp is a ceiling fan now. Wonder what my dad was talking about?? lol

And here is one more recent one just for reminder of the cabinets sake:

This was when we surprised the boys with an indoor tent camp out. :)

I took pictures of every room in the house when we moved in, but for some reason I guess I didn't feel the need to take a great picture of the kitchen. *sigh* Oh well, you get the gist.  It was all original stuff circa 1992.  Country blue carpet, white 12x12 floor tiles with country blue grout.  The kitchen and bathrooms all had linoleum that was rolling up at the edge.  Yuck.  

Here is what the kitchen looks like today:

Coffee/Tea Bar

I get a little choked up looking at it.

You guys, I can't even.  I am so totally in love with my "new" kitchen.  My hubby did all the tiling by himself.  They were 12x12 mosaic sheets.  He had to use a tile saw for a bunch of little cuts too.  So lucky we didn't end up in the ER. *phew!* ;)

We have been through so much with this kitchen, as you may be aware.  From painting the cabinets, adding hardware, trying out different countertops to finally tiling them... From painting the walls to finally installing our back splash.  What a looooong and arduous journey.  I am so relieved to be done.  Like I said, the floor tile can just wait a hot minute. haha

I also stumbled upon a great living room "before" shot so here is a before and after just because it makes me feel so good to see how far we've come!

Our first walk through as owners. ♥

I need to figure something else out for mantel decor... lol

I love what we ended up with in this room. It was our first major room makeover and we both love how it came out.  It's cozy and colorful at the same time. I apologize for not getting the wrinkles out of our worn couch. Hey, we live here people! ;)
 
That's all for now, folks!
♥ Holly ♥

Hi there!

So I recently got Amazon Prime and it includes a bunch of free Kindle books, which is super cool for a nerd like me who loves to read.  Yesterday I got a notification on my phone that The Princess Bride by William Goldman was available for free.  Fun!  I love the movie so I was excited to read the book, which I thought was originally by S. Morganstern (as it states in the movie).

Come to find out that it is all a lie. LOL  S. Morganstern is actually a pseudonym used by Goldman.  In his book he even goes so far as to claim that the estate of S. Morganstern is fighting him in his quest to pen the sequel, Buttercup's Baby.  Lies, lies, lies.  There is no estate because he does not in fact exist.  He details a trip with his grandson to the Morganstern Museum in Florin, none of which exist. And so on and so forth.

It's really quite brilliant, albeit a trifle disappointing, what he's achieved here.  I totally bought that Florin was a real city and that all the details from The Princess Bride were historical fact.  His "forwards" at the beginning of the book and its subsequent anniversary releases are all a part of the fantasy.

I never would have known any of this had I not begun to read the book and get engrossed in his tales.  It led me to research all of this and discover the truth.  Kind of fun in the end.  Anyway, I just wanted to share because it was so fascinating to me and I thought some of my friends would find it interesting as well.

The End.
♥ Holly ♥

Deep title, am I right?  ;)

Sitting here at the office, trying to focus but it's so hard anymore.  Business has been pretty tough at my job for the last year or so (I've been here for 11 years this October).  The boss just told us that the building is now in escrow.  We knew it had been up for sale for about a year so it wasn't a huge surprise.  And the way things have been going we, the tiny crew of 2 left in the office, have been thinking the owner should just call it quits.  After all, they are in their 70's and with no one to pass it on to, there doesn't seem to be much of a point anymore.  Especially if they're losing money.  So, he finally told us he's leaning that way if escrow closes in October.  Which means I'll probably be out of work by January. 

It's a little scary, I've been here since I was 23 years old and am now 34.  I've never had to really work to find a job either.  I knew someone with an "in" for my first two office jobs then after I got laid off from the second I walked in to my current workplace and just asked if they were hiring.  I was on the payroll 2 days later.  The timing was perfect.  And although I haven't been too shy about my dislike of this job, there are definite benefits which I'll be sad to let go of.  For instance the fact that I live less than 10 minutes from work and with it being family owned/operated I have a ton of flexibility schedule-wise.  If my kid gets sick I can leave at a moments notice, for example.  The thought of commuting is like a nightmare.

On the flip-side, I'm also excited at the prospect of change.  Eleven years is a long time to be doing the same thing day-in and day-out.  For me at least.  I liken my experience here to the movie, Groundhog Day.  Same routine, same arguments (OMG like a broken record!), same walls, same drama. LOL  I know that it's the same for most people but then I see those rare lucky SOBs people that actually love what they do and I'm like, "Why can't that be me?!"

Ideally I would love to go back to school and finish the cheesy romance novel I started 3 years ago.  Buuuut that won't pay the bills (yet).  It will be interesting to see what the future holds, that's for sure.  Does anyone have a crystal ball I can borrow?? 

In the meantime, have a great day y'all.

♥ Holly ♥

Hi everyone!

Sorry to say it's been 7 months since my last entry.  I've been so busy at the office and with house projects/yard work that I haven't had time to blog.  If we're friends on Facebook then you know how much yard work we've done recently.  After taking the grass out everywhere over a year ago, we finally have a small area of grass in the back yard that we sodded ourselves and we've gone water-wise in the front.  After years of taking an unreasonable stance against them, I've finally seen the light and have accepted roses into my garden-scape. For some reason I had the idea that they were too much work but they've actually been some of the most successful and low-maintenance plants I've had.  So I'm adding them in everywhere.  Also, our puppy digs these out the least because of the thorns.  Dumb dog.  She's ruined more plants, I tell you.  And dug holes! Ugh.  But she's getting better. Here's some pics:

Heaviest rolls of sod EVER

Digging trenches for sprinklers

After/Before (Not sure why I did it that way lol) Candy approves of the grass :)

Our new seating area out back LOVE

Front yard under construction.

Finished!

Close up near the porch

Front side yard

Toxic

Would you believe...?

Hi there.  Well, so much for my amazing 30 day challenge.  I fell off the wagon and into a bottle of wine.  LOL  It would appear that I can only last 2 weeks maximum on any "challenge" now.  I'm not happy about it, but on the good-job-Holly side of things I only had 1 piece of pizza this whole month! Which, if you know me, is quite an accomplishment. *pats self on back*

My Pacer app mocks me daily with helpful little comments like, "You haven't logged your weight in awhile" and "You really need to get your fat-ass to the gym".  Okay, so the second one isn't true, but it feels true...  Stupid app.

In an effort to collect swag from all the gyms in Southern California I signed up for yet another one last night.  Planet Fitness.  I get a t-shirt for signing up. Daniel wants to get back into shape so we're going to start going to the gym together.  If he's not into it, then I don't get into it.  It's hard to stay motivated alone.  #truth  It is for me anyway.

That's all I got for now.  We did install baseboards in our bedroom finally.  We haven't had baseboards since we put in the new flooring, 11 years ago...  And you wouldn't think they'd make a big difference but they do!  I love them and I wonder why we didn't do them years ago.  Better late than never, right?

Hope you all had a lovely Thanksgiving and have a great week!

♥ Holly ♥

***UPDATE*** (5 hours later)
I've been thinking about this post and realized that I took a very flippant attitude about giving up on my goals.  I don't like it.  I'm actually quite disappointed in myself.  I'm sitting here thinking about how terrible my skin is right now, how overweight I've allowed myself to become and it's got me down.  My only hope is that I can start again (going to the gym tonight will help) and give it another go.  Back on the aforementioned wagon! 

Howdy!

I have no idea why the cowboy theme, okay?  Why do I do anything? 

We had a very productive weekend.  I put the hubby to work, big time.  He painted our mantel, spray painted our back door which was gross, the list goes on.  All because we got a new TV.  Ours was 10 years old and the sound was finally starting to go out on us.  It was time.  Costco had a great one on sale and they also had this great TV stand on sale...  So of course we had to get both.  Which meant, taking the old TV off the wall and patching holes from the TV hanger thingy.  Then we starting moving art and discovering more holes to patch... 

So what started off as just replacing our TV turned into a whole thing.  Anyway, the living room needed it and it's done now (for now).  We can move on to the next thing which will be our bedroom.  We actually started on stuff in there too, come to think of it.  Got rid of our giant armoire, moved our hope chest which was at the foot of our bed, moved my dresser into the armoire's spot, etc, etc.  AND now that I'm thinking about it, we also moved 3 bookshelves into our office/kids playroom and created a little library.  Wow!  We did more than I originally remembered! And all between 2 soccer games and an end of season soccer party.

I've got bruises all over my legs from moving furniture and bumping into all sorts of junk that was displaced in all the hubub and my whole body aches from heavy lifting.  Good workout for sure.  Here are a few pictures.  Was too busy to take a bunch but I will tonight.

Patching holes in the drywall

Mantel, before.

 I don't think I've ever mentioned it before but Daniel and I did the stonework on the fireplace surround ourselves when we moved in.  This was before the days of those handy pre-fab stone tiles, etc.  We actually went to The Rockery and picked out each stone, cut them down, made a frame to hold them up, stacked and attached them.  It was a pain in the butt but now we feel that much more pride about it since we did it the old fashioned way. ;)   Anyway, here is after the paint job we did this weekend:


It's a really dark brown color.  It came out a little darker than I anticipated but we love it.  

Anyhoo, I hope y'all had a great weekend (back to cowboy speak for some reason) and have a wonderful week!

♥ Holly ♥

Hola my peeps!

Well, it's Day 11 and while I haven't been as strict this week as I'd hoped, I am still down in weight.  To date, since the 1st, I'm down 6 lbs.  I'd say that's progress!  I took some pics this morning and I don't know that I see a difference yet but at least I'm heading in the right direction.  Still haven't had a drop of alcohol. Yay!  So here's this morning's picture and the 1st picture I took below it:

139.4 lbs

146.8 lbs

I've been drinking a ton of water and have reached my goal of 10k steps or more 8 out of 10 days.  The last two days I've gone above and beyond with 15k and 16k steps each!  That's what happens when you have nothing to do at an hour and a half long soccer practice. 

I really want to add more exercise besides just walking but it's really hard to get motivated.  This weekend our goal is to DE-clutter the house and turn in our cans/bottles.  Should keep me moving at least.  Perhaps I can move our free weights to a new spot in the house.  That counts, right??  LOL

I hope you all have a wonderful weekend!  And THANK YOU to all our veterans!!! ♥

Love love love,
Holly 

Happy Monday!

Said no one, ever.  Haha jk jk.  I love the time change.  I had no trouble getting up early to work out a little this morning and go on a long walk with the dogs.

Before I get to my weekend art project I'll just tell you that I was good this weekend, diet-wise except for 2 meals.  We went out to Shogun for dinner Saturday night but I tried to order as healthy as possible.  I got the steamed white rice, had veggies, the clear onion soup and teriyaki steak.

Yesterday Daniel made his white/black bean chicken chili and I had a small bowl for dinner with a dollop of plain Greek yogurt in it.  Not terrible but definitely not Whole 30 compliant.  But you know I told you that I'm not going to be as strict this time around.  I think I'd go crazy and not be able to stick to this "challenge" at all.  The whole point is to break my bad habits after all and adopt healthier ones.  And I'm doing that.  Still not a drop of alcohol for the month too!  Woohoo! Also, I was 140.0 this morning so that alone is amazing for me.  I mean to end the weekend weighing less than I started it.

Anyway, now on to my art project.  We've had these large canvas' that we bought at a super fancy art sale... at Albertson's, soon after we moved into the house.

There are 2 huge insets above the stairs that need something to go in them.  And while there's nothing wrong with the 2 paintings, the house has evolved since buying them 10 years ago and I wanted something more modern.  I was inspired looking at DIY abstract art on Pinterest and while I am no artist, the tutorials I saw made it seem pretty simple.  Just slap some colors you like on a canvas.  How hard could it be?  

Really, not very!  I was pleasantly surprised.  I acquired some fabric from my work which is usually used for cross stitching but it totally worked as canvas in this case.  


I had Daniel help me pull it tight over the old artwork and used a staple gun to keep it in place.  Voila!  Instant canvas.  We had recently gotten a set of acrylic paints from Walmart for a school volcano project so we had it on hand.  I picked out the colors I liked and got to work slapping it on the canvas. 

I didn't end up using all the colors and went and grabbed some others along the way.  

I just dribbled the paint on and used a brush to sweep it across the fabric.  Then I kept layering on other colors with no specific idea of what I was trying to accomplish. LOL



I was not sure at this point.  It didn't look like the tutorials I'd seen and I wasn't in love with how it was coming out.  So I just kept adding paint until I basically ran out.  Ending up with this:


And you know what?  I love it!  I need to get more paint and then I can tackle the other one.  I hope it turns out half as good (beauty is in the eye of the beholder, remember) as this one.  If it doesn't, guess what?  There's plenty more fabric and paint where that came from so I can start over.


Not too shabby for basically free art, eh?  Someday when we repaint the inside of the house, we want to paint a darker color inside the boxes so then the art will really pop.

I hope you all had a wonderful weekend as well!  Happy arting! ;)

Peace!

♥ Holly ♥

Happy Friday!

I'm exhausted.  I need to get used to having a baby in the house again.  Not a human baby of course but our new 6 month old mutt of a rescue, Candy.  She's very hyper and like any baby, gets up several times a night.  Last night it was probably 3 times.  Once to go potty (she's pretty good about this which is nice) and 2 other times to give me a bath. LOL  I don't mind getting up but it's hard to get her to settle back down.  She'll get the gist.  Hopefully (insert bewildered looking emoticon here).  Here's a picture:



In other news, it is Friday so here is my challenge recap.  I started at 146.something at the beginning of this week and today I'm down to 142.2!  Woohoo!  Progress.  I'm basically sticking to the Whole 30 rules except I have put a splash of 1% milk in my one cup of coffee a day.  No added sugar though.   I'm also drinking 2 cups of green tea in the morning at work which isn't allowed on Whole 30 either.  But no breads, grains, or sugar.  And no alcohol!  It's undoubtedly difficult having 20lbs of candy in the house from Halloween but I have stayed strong. Yay me!  I've also reached 10k steps each day, so another goal reached (so far). 

If all continues as it should then I'll probably post a side by side pic next Friday.  Hopefully I'll be down another 5lbs or so. :)

Have a great weekend!

♥ Holly ♥

P.S. If you're interested to know, I've been eating an egg casserole thing in the mornings with turkey sausage, spinach, mushrooms, onions and a little bit of grated red potato.  It's delicious.  And am basically living off of rotisserie chicken and veggies for lunch and dinner with some fruit for snacks.  Tonight we're having Filet Mignon with asparagus for dinner.  Yum. ♥  I'm going to go shopping and get some shrimp and fish to mix things up too.

Hi there!

Halloween has come and gone and I only ate 2 Almond Joy's last night.  To tell you the truth, I've just about OD'd on candy and wine lately so I am really ready for this month.  I'm basically making this "challenge" up as I go but here are the main ideas: 

• No Alcohol

• Eat Clean (as much as possible but I'm not getting crazy here)

• Try for 10,000 steps a day

Easy, right?  Well I'm going to give it the old college try.  I really feel like just breaking my habits of gorging on pizza, various junk and getting my fill of wine will help immensely.  Like I said, it's a vicious cycle. 

I weighed in at 146.8lbs this morning.  Now for the moment you voyeurs  have all been waiting for, the "before" pictures.

I had to take them myself because Daniel left for work early and I'm pretty sure he's over my "challenges". LOL  I hope to prove him wrong and really make good progress this month and adopt healthy habits.  I have to try!

My plan is to check in on Friday's with pictures, weigh-ins and general thoughts.  Also, if you're on Snapchat I'll be posting some things on there as well.  Follow me at: athollywood24

Wish me luck!
♥ Holly ♥

Hi guys,
     I need to do something.  Let me just take you back to when I did my 90 day Visalus challenge:  In 3 months I lost about 11 lbs.  I started around 139lbs and got all the way down to 129lbs for a couple of days...  It's funny when you reach your goals or a goal how easy it is (at least it was for me) to just stop all the good things you were doing to get there and back slide, isn't it?  Well, let me tell you, I back-slid. Hard...

This morning I am weighing in at 145lbs.  145!!!  After our river trip last week I had gotten all the way up to 150lbs.  Gah!  Now, maybe that doesn't sound like a terrible number to some people but for 5 foot 4 inch me, it's, well it's the biggest I've ever been when not pregnant or having just had a baby.  According to the BMI scale (which I will say has some flaws) I'm borderline obese at this point.  When Daniel and I were dating (just after high school for me) I fluctuated around the mid to high 120's.  I wasn't working out, I wasn't eating healthy at the time but I wasn't drinking that much either.  That's just being young and not having had kids.  I get that.  I know my body won't ever be the same as that, life happens.  There are a lot of different factors.  Right now, I eat terribly and I'm not going to lie, I like to drink.  There, I said it.  #TRUTH  It's a vicious cycle.  Drink too much, then binge eat because my inhibitors are gone.

I don't like it. 

Don't get me wrong, I'm generally very happy.  I love my husband, my kids, my dogs, my house, etc.  I just need to start developing healthy habits to feel better about my body.  So I want to do another 30 day challenge for myself.  Like the Whole 30 but maybe not as strict.  It's pretty strict.  Part of my self-imposed challenge will be no drinking for the entire month of November (starting today with the not drinking though).  Thanksgiving shouldn't be a problem food-wise because it's going to be a very small group of us this year.  I'm toying with the idea of just getting a couple of rotisserie chickens and some veggies...  We'll see.

I was inspired by (besides feeling like crap) a blog I saw on Pinterest.  It's called 100 Healthy Days.  Her before/after picture spoke to me because I thought she looked about like what I look like now.  It helps when I see other people's realistic transformations.  My friend Britteny recently had a wonderful transformation as well which also really inspired me.  She lost a few sizes and became a personal trainer, so awesome! 

Anyway, this blog helped me when I did my other challenges to stay accountable so unfortunately for y'all that means I will be posting pictures of my fat-ass. LOL  Pictures to follow.  I hope you will all support me and send your positive vibes my way!

Love,
Holly

Howdy!

So back on the post titled 6 Months Later I posted "before" pictures of my bathroom if you wanna check them out again.  And here are some poorly lighted recent pictures!  These are after paint, baseboards, curtains and wall art.

Is that off-center rug driving you nuts too? LOL

 I got the pair of curtains at Fallas for like $5 and bonus they were long enough to cut off a bunch, hem and make a nifty valance for the window next to the shower.  I love it when a plan comes together!  Sewing cred to my awesome mother-in-law, she seriously rocks.  She does these little projects for me when she's watching the boys at our house.  How cool is that?!  And she makes them clean their rooms. LOL



Clearly, they're not light blocking curtains but I didn't need them to be.  They're merely decorative.
I LOVE the color I painted it too.  Very serene.  It's from Home Depot and it was an accent color I found on one of their idea cards in with the Behr paint selections.  I spray painted that palm tree wall sconce (above pic) from black to silver.  I think it goes much better with the other colors in here.


Baseboards, which Daniel surprised me with when I got back from one of my bachelorette parties last year. Score!  It was such a cheap and easy makeover, it's criminal how long it took to finish and post about.  

As is so often the case, I forgot to take "before" pictures of my dining room chairs but they were covered with the same fabric I used for the coffee table turned ottoman which has yet to be re-covered.  This ottoman pic gives you some idea of how nasty the fabric got.

YUCK.

 Once again, my MIL came through with some fabric that was donated to her to make dog beds (which she in turn donates to local shelters).  She thought this was too nice to use for that though so I scored again.


Much better and more practical if you ask me.  It's kind of shiny too so stuff rolls off of it easier than the cotton fabric I used before.  

Yet another free project.  Gotta love it. 

That's all for now, folks!
♥ Holly ♥

I've always heard from my friends that Fitbit's are addictive.  I did not believe that one little bit.

Recently, however, I downloaded a pedometer (step counter) app called Pacer.  It got 5 stars where the Fitbit app only got 3 1/2.  I have an iPhone 6 if you're wondering.  Anyway, I'm on day 3 of having this app and guess what...  I'M ADDICTED!!! Go figure.  Each day since downloading it I've reached or exceeded 10,000 steps per day and am on pace for that again today.  Now my phone is attached to me though which is the only drawback.  Having a nice little Fitbit on my wrist would be a little easier but oh well, this is FREE. And we all know I'm all about free. ;)  I'm going to attempt to make myself an armband to hold it in.  That would really help. 

Daniel is loving it because now he makes me go get things for him. "You need to get your steps in," he coaxes and damn it if it doesn't work! Hahaha

Sadly, this is about the extent of my excitement lately.  The boys have soccer practice or games ALL.THE.TIME. so I basically have no life.  Not that I had much of one before, ha!  I'm going to try to start blogging more because it's therapeutic for me and I keep getting notices of new views on my blog's Facebook page. I figure if people are checking it out while I'm not blogging (it's been 3 months) then just imagine if I did it steadily!

No new projects recently and haven't really finished any old ones either.  It's been a long, hot and therefore rough summer and I just can't find any motivation.  Hopefully once the weather cools down I'll get back on it.  Oh! I did recover my dining room chairs come to think of it.  I'll post pics later.  And someday pictures of my master bathroom makeover. Gah! I'm so bad.

Anyway, that's all for now.  In the meantime I found my doppelganger on a website for a local winery, see!  LOL Crazy.

Byeeeee!!! 
♥ Holly ♥