Nothing encourages creativity...

Like the chance to fall flat on one's face. -James D. Finley

 I've discovered what my problem is.


I do a project, and it turns out AWESOME... And then I get ambitious, and I do things that are too hard without any transition, and then I want to shoot my life in its face.


Being snowed in leaves lots of time for crafting. And we've had plenty of it, thanks to about 6 inches of snow and a layer of ice underneath of it- also, us not possessing a shovel. (We should work on that before the next storm, eh?)


This weekend, I was on a bit of a recycled kick, so I made a wallet out of an old milk carton. Which was actually super awesome. I attached a bit of ribbon and felt very clever and creative.

The lid twists off in order to open it.

Then Monday was sewing day, part one at the House O' Bricks. I finished my t-shirt quilt (there will be no pictures of this, since it's kind of the ugliest thing ever.... But awesome anyway.). Then, Monday night, I burned a notebook that had some stuff I have been dealing with in it, and it needed to go away.


Tuesday morning, I woke up and thought "I have a brilliant idea." I went down to the fire and pulled the spiral from the notebook out of the ashes, then twisted it into my new purity ring- which is pretty bangin', if you ask me.


This is where my head started to get big. And so I thought, ohhh, I'm going to make this super awesome flower thing out of newspaper. (Thanks, Kans, for showing me the recycled origami book. I might blame this one on you in the future.) It was a pain in my butt, and I got super annoyed, but I made it the whole way through... And then the darn thing didn't even look like a flower, it just looked like a pinwheel.


I was pissed. Also, Kans' project wasn't working correctly, so she was annoyed too... I decided to quit crafting for the day and just laugh at Kans.


Eventually, Sarah started altering some of her dresses, which meant that I got to help pin them. No big deal.


Until hannaHRose wanted a dress altered, too.


See, hannaHRose is super stressed about being poked with pins. So every time my hand got near her, she would say "Don't poke me." I heard it like, 6 times. It was obnoxious, even though I understand the concern.


I ended up poking myself like, 13987 times in order to make sure hannaHRose didn't get poked. And then her dress required re-pinning and adjusting and was just a general obnoxious pain.


I woke up this morning cranky. I don't know if it was left overs from last night, or being stuck in for 3 days, or what the issue was, but I snapped at Sarah basically the instant she came downstairs. And then I realized I was being super lame.


hannaHRose managed to get her tank out, and when we got home, I started a new project- a crochet pig. It's actually kind of cute.


We moved all the cars today, and hopefully I'll be able to get to work tomorrow... But I was thinking about it, and when I get stuck somewhere, or things aren't going exactly the right way, I seem to revert to "Life sucks."


And really, that's not it. I think sometimes we have good days and we have bad days, but when my outlook on life is "Life sucks", then I'm never going to have a good day.




Pretty good for a brain full of snot.

So that's where peanut butter comes from.

Sometimes, I think I would be fine if there were no cops...

But then I realize, I drive completely different when there's a cop behind me than when there isn't.- Donald Miller, Blue Like Jazz

After being snowed in the house for two days and going through a gamut of emotions- thrilled to have a day off work and to see the beauty of the mountains covered in snow, to being bored out of my skull, to being downright cranky- I decided I need to have an outlet. Facebook can only do so much. I feel like all 500 of my friends are reading every word I put on there, even if it's only "up" for two seconds. I can't handle the pressure. Here, I don't really know if you're reading or not- and I'm going to go ahead and assume that no one will read the writings of a disquited young adult trying to find a way to make it on her own in this big world.

See, here's the thing- my life isn't going exactly the way I planned. Yeah, it's God, and yeah, it's amazing and I'm ecstatic to be along for the ride... But honestly, I planned on sitting in a college classroom with my parents paying for my education right now, not worrying about if I'm going to get to work tomorrow so that I can pay my bills at the end of this month.

But... Life has become something that's not about me. Somehow, I've come to realize there's something bigger, something that makes more sense and yet makes no sense at all, and I've just got to deal with it- hang on and know that it's going to come out better.

So for now, I'm going to go to bed and pray that the roads are clear so that I can work tomorrow. I'm going to pick out a White Elephant gift to take to my Christmas party tomorrow night. I might read a little Donald Miller. I'll wake up in the morning and feed the cat, empty his litter box, put clothes in the washer, and make my bed, because no one else is going to do it for me.

Oh- and, I'll relish every second.