chimesblog

Today is my first day at ISU. Which means no more commute and oddly enough that I have to get up EARLIER than before to get to work. I was leaving Ames to get to Drake at 8:15ish but I have to be at work by 8 today. Let’s see how I do. Also, I’m biking. This should be interesting.

Oddly enough this post is going to be mostly about my last day at Drake.

Here is my super-empty cube. Bye bye cube!

And Shelly is really sad to see me go. Mostly because this is my list of jobs. I got everything done that I could on all of my jobs, except a lot of them were stuck in limbo (ie. proofing internally or with the client). It’s color coded so she knows where everything is.

Okay, so she might be a little sad that I’m leaving because I won’t be there anymore.

Also, I will miss the “Can’t Touch This Award” — the weekly award given to somebody who kicked ass the previous week. I got it before I left and I passed it on one last time.

Also … I ran out of stuff to do by 10 AM. So I may have played an hour of N64.

After work we met at Star Bar for drinks. I had a Dirty Blue martini (um stuffed blue cheese olives anybody?).

I’m excited to start a new chapter in my life at ISU: Hopefully getting my grad degree (paid for), getting to spend more time with Mark and my Ames friends (LUNCH anybody?), biking or bussing to work and best of all 2 more hours added to my day every day! I will miss most everybody at Drake and I will most definitely miss having design as my major responsibility. But, I need to hone some of my other skills in addition to design if I want to be a well-rounded teacher some day.

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Last month was crazy. Here is a sneak peek at things that happened before I get to blogging about them …

… Mark’s brother Nick’s birthday in Stillwater …

… Mark’s 25th birthday in Chicago …

… awesome new fabric …

… moving …

… a really awesome project for Drake …

... and LOTS and lots of food.

(asian lettuce wraps)

(chicken strips with honey mustard and sweet corn)

(kung pao chicken)

(stovetop creamy mac and cheese made with REAL cheese)

(chicken, broccoli and mushroom alfredo with pappardelle’s tomato cracked pepper pasta)

(tomato, basil and chevré pizza)

so hopefully I will have some time to share these experiences with you!  And of course all the recipes.  I will also try to start sharing points plus numbers with you at the suggestion of Kelly.

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Tuesday was my boss’s last day at Drake. *insert super sad face here*

She’s also pregnant — WITH TWINS! So we had a combination going-away-baby-shower party for her. I made chocolate covered strawberries. YUM.

One thing I learned from this round of chocolate covered strawberries (I’ve had less pretty ones created from previous batches):

BE CAREFUL WITH CHOCOLATE.  As in don’t overheat it.  Do 30 seconds at a time in the microwave in a glass bowl.  And when it looks like it needs about 30 more seconds, instead, stir it for 30-60 seconds to melt the remainder. BINGO. Perfect chocolate.  I also used a spatula to drizzle white chocolate over the top. White chocolate is even more picky, so be careful or it will get lumpy and clumpy.

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Last week I wasn’t feeling very well, and especially not on Wednesday, so I called in sick.  I didn’t realize that it was the same day that Twilight came out (barf), and my one coworker said “We all know why Calee’s not here today — she was up late at the midnight showing of Twilight.”

They all know how I feel about Twilight and, well, my coworkers thought it would be funny to photobomb my cube.

Here are photos from their debacle.

Ha. Ha. HA. Yeah … I enjoyed it. Made my day better. It was fun taking them all down.

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I just got done moving apartments, but I forgot to mention that I moved cubes at work.  We recently staffed up, so we did some shifting. Here’s my new (and maybe temporary — we should be moving buildings this summer!) digs:

And don’t forget the rabbit … this was a thrift store find from my co-worker. It uses a beer bottle tab as a hanging unit. For real.

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well, technically maybe 11 hours of actual painting.

I’m moving this week and I started off by painting and cleaning my new place. I agreed to rent this place on one condition: I had to be able to paint. Previous owners had painted the kitchen two shades of BRIGHT ORANGE. Not sure how they were able to cook while being simultaneously blinded, but to each their own.

So, I gained access to my new place yesterday and picked out some paint.

I had asked a bunch of people if they had some paint they’d be willing to give me, but decided to see how much paint actually cost since I was only painting one room and possibly a wall upstairs. Not bad. And Martha Stewart just released a line of paint with Home Depot. I figured if anybody could fix the orange mess, it would be her. So, I bought some of her paint along with a large bucket of greyish paint from the “oops” section for $5.

Anywho, I forgot that in order to paint, you have to tape everything off. This part is kind of a pain in the but. I enjoy painting, in fact, time flies when I’m painting, but taping stuff off? annoying.

After a couple hours and a roll of masking tape (which, by the way, do you guys have a preference on tape for painting? I got regular masking tape and the boy said I should have gotten the blue stuff. I hate the blue stuff! I’ve had issues with it. sorry. tangent) … I finally got around to painting.

It took two coats to cover the orange.  Not bad. I figured it would have taken three. Overall — Martha Stewart’s paint covers really well. The grey paint I bought was the kind that has primer in it already and MS’s paint covered just as well.

I finished painting the kitchen and the boy offered to help paint the blue wall upstairs. Apparently I should have hired him for the kitchen because he taped it off fast and like a pro. Not to mention, he’s a whiz with a roller.  We started and finished upstairs in 1.5 hours. Rock. On.

Anyway, I shall now  regale you with photographs of the experience.

This is the kitchen before I started painting.

The kitchen after adding 2 coats of the grey paint

The kitchen — finished, aside from touchups to the molding and to cover some of the orange peeking out of the edge.

Upstairs — before. I was intrigued by the paint job on the outlet.

Mark volunteered to help. I tasked myself with the hard job of photographer.

As you can see, it’s a really tough job.

Matching paint stains! Besties.

Mark was proud of a job well done. Don’t worry guys — I did buy him ice cream afterwards. Even though it was after midnight (guys, he’s not a gremlin, so I can feed him after midnight. it’s cool).

The upstairs — finished! I have a bit of touchup, but far less than I do in the kitchen. I love how the green and the wood color mix.

Also, for your enjoyment. Me after a long day of painting.

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I so don’t have time to blog about this in its entirety, but for now — I’ve got to post pix at least!  SOOOOO cool.  I’ll share more about what this is about later, but I swapped crafts with my way cool crafty co-worker (who loves metal/punk/cool stuff) and here’s my bounty! I’ll separate it out later, but here’s a gallery in the interest of the short amount of time I have on my lunch.

I’m missing TWO things which I need to photog and post yet.. I will explain all of this later!

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Sometimes it’s good, sometimes it’s bad, but when it rains, it pours.

I’ve been kind of complaining about money lately (really, who isn’t?). I’d taken out some extra flex dollars this year to pay for physical therapy, so my paychecks are $100 less each month. I also bought a car, which means I’ve got a $200 bill each month after insurance. So anyway, things are a bit tighter than I anticipated. I hadn’t banked on the $100 less on my paycheck. I realize that I’ve also been really dependent upon freelance and crafting for some extra income.

Anyway, somebody upstairs (or downstairs, or somebodies, or somebody who doesn’t exist at all — depending on your religious beliefs) was paying attention because fortune has smiled down upon me.

Not everything will pan out right away, but once things do, I will be sitting pretty, or more comfortably at least.

First, a local law firm asked me to redesign their logo, letterhead, business cards and other business materials. Possibly a website.  They are a serious client (yay!) and are willing to compensate me for my work.  This is exciting as many people don’t value design enough to seek out a talented professional and pay them what they’re worth.  Anyway, I sent them an estimate and contract and I’m just waiting to hear back to start. Should be an interesting endeavor!  Something different from most law firms, so it’s very exciting for me to be able to help them out and brand them.

Also, I’ve been working on a website for my friend Kim’s friend, Lisa.  I’ve put the bare bones together and I just have to work through all the technical stuff (you know, the hard part!) … and then we’ll be off and running. She has really amazing work, so I’m glad to be able to help her on this project.  She’s my first official BIG paying freelance job, so I was very thankful for that.  Most freelance stuff I’ve done has been pretty small, so I was excited for this opportunity. Plus, I love helping out the artist community.

AND I found a few other art/craft shows to participate in the next few months.

First — Relish the Hellish. This is going to be way cool. I’ll be able to sell some of my rock/punk/dark stuff here (I don’t usually at Market Day).  It’s basically an art/music event held at a local tattoo shop.  There’s going to be a lot of local vendors there, and I’m especially excited because Sew Zinski is going to be there (I blogged about her awesome work a while back) so I’ll finally get to meet her in person. We’ve been tweeting back and forth and I hear things about her (and vice versa) from my co-worker.  She seems like a cool cat.

Anywho — Relish the Hellish is the SAME DAY as Market Day!! Eep. Oh well. I’ve got it under control!

The other craft show is actually in my neighborhood — I’ll have more details later — but it’s the same day as Market Day in September! This one’s even crazier because there’s only an hour between events… I might need some help for this one!

ALSO, I won two blog giveaways today!! Wow.

Crazy.

I will blog more about the giveaways, Relish the Hellish and the other craft show! Right now, I’ve got to get headed to bed.

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I’m so excited about this!

My co-worker, Tory, asked me late this afternoon if I could possibly help her with her sister’s wedding shower invitations. She’d ordered 30 invitations from some bogus company (who shall remain nameless — honestly b/c I don’t remember the name!) and they never sent her a proof… let alone sent the ACTUAL invites. But they did remember to charge her card!

Anyway, she really needs to send these invites out on Friday.  Can I help?

Sure!

Normally I’d hesitate, but Tory knew exactly what she wanted and was able to provide me with copy within 5 minutes… so I was off and running.  She showed me the original cards she ordered, just for reference.

She said she really liked the modern look and how the border was brown — her sister’s bridesmaid dresses are brown.

She also said they’re doing a sunflower prairie theme.

So I took the sunflower prairie idea… the modern motifs…and a bit of my own style and whipped her up something in about an hour tonight.

Here’s what I came up with. I’m changing the font to the light version — my hard drive crashed last week and I lost all my fonts, but I can change it tomorrow at work quick over lunch or something.  I also fixed the sunflower in the upper right corner (part of the petal is missing).

I gave her 3 versions.  They went with the first version. The brown one was my fav, but I would have had to clean up the flowers a little bit.

THANKS to BittBox for the free sunflower vectors. I owe that blog my life, I swear.  Textures and vectors galore!

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I haven’t updated much lately because I’ve got way too much going on!

Quick updates:

1. The other designer I work with is leaving next Thursday, so we’ll be down yet another person at work. I pride myself in saying that we hardly ever HAVE to stay late and when I do it’s of my own volition to save myself or somebody else a headache and it’s not very often; however, that may change. Hopefully not, but it may.  Either way, I’m trying to take vacation tomorrow through next Tuesday, so I have been sticking around later this week to prepare for that
2. I have a LOT of projects I have to finish TOMORROW before leaving town. I’ve got a few things I have to finish for the Chicago trip … not to mention PACKING for the trip, some onsies that have been ordered after a few of my tweeps saw my blog post about them, a t-shirt recon for my co-worker who’s leaving next week, a teacup for a custom order on Etsy and 2 more things for my metal swap.  Hrmmm.. how much stuff can get done in ONE DAY???  EEEP!
3. Also, I have a half-day photoshoot today, but for me, it’s an all-day event. I’m directing the shoot and we’re doing 12ish still-life things, so I have to spend most of the day setting up so hopefully when our photographer gets there he can move from place to place, set up lighting, and go.  One good thing — no people in the shoot, which makes life SO much easier.
4. I’m doing a 50% off deal on Mary Kay right now, so I have to place my order for that today or tomorrow to get my discount. It expires on the 30th and I’m going to be out of town… So add THAT to the list.
5. there’s gotta be something else. I know there’s something else. Oh well.

As you can see, I’m super busy!!  Soo I probably am not going to update again until next week or even the week after that. I’m going out of town for 4th of July and may not bring my computer again.

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