Second Bedroom Fix-ups

Remember how we want to make our condo a vacation rental? Well, we finally got around to making the second bedroom an actual bedroom. Before, it was a tiny room, filled with stuff that I didn't want to deal with. Conrad used it as his office and as his dumping place for all things surf. I used it as a crafting/storage facility. Ironically, it was the only room in the house where art was hung. This week we bought a trundle day bed, hung curtains, and figured out a wall system for two of our several surf boards. I also finally dealt with the mounds of junk that had been accumulating for the last year. Now, it's the only finished room in the house. It's a functional office, bedroom, surf dumping ground, craft room, and storage area. We're still ruminating (pondering, not chewing cud) about a new desk for Conrad so he'll have a spot for all his books, so you may or may not see an updated version of this post including that desk.

Here's the process we used to help us organize and plan for this room:
1. Clean everything off the floor that doesn't go there.
2. Organize items into piles (books that need to stay in the room, surf items, etc.)
3. Decide the most effective way to store or display the items that should stay in the room (a desk or shelf for the books, bungees and hooks for the surfboards, labeled boxes for smaller items)
4. Get those things. Don't forget to measure!
5.  Play with room layouts and enjoy your newly organized space!

The Picnic

Conrad wearing his newly screen-printed shirt!

How about that awkwardly placed wrinkle on my shirt?

Summer makes me:
Wear white pants
Eat lots of food at barbeques
Go nuts with love when Conrad plays with babies
Love the Carlsbad flower fields
Envy the stand-up paddlers

We had an awesome Memorial Day. We remembered the lost and the fighting. We ate with friends. We ran lots of errands. We checked some big items off of our second bedroom's renovation. We spent time together during the day. I walked with my friend. Conrad surfed. We got sun. We grilled burgers for dinner, just the two of us. I just love three-day weekends.

Creativity Kills, Part 2

On Saturday, the second day of the workshop, we did screen printing and silversmithing. I pressed an ampersand onto a t-shirt for Conrad, and I did seahorses on a shirt for myself. Then I forged a ring, guys. FORGED. I meant to give it to Conrad, but it's a little too big. Anyone want to buy a silver band with a brushed finish, size 10.5?

Today we're running tons of errands and fixing up our second bedroom so the apartment can sleep more people. Pictures to come!

Creativity Kills

Today was Part 1 of the Prospector Artisan Workshops. We worked on Pop Art panels and Letterpress. Maybe it's just me, but whenever I use my creative brain a lot (more than my logical brain, I mean), I get really exhausted. The last few days I've been painting and doing some creating, and I hit my wall way earlier than usual. I'm getting tired around 8:30, where I can normally stay up until 11:30. Here are some pictures of the things we worked on today!

These are some Pop Art examples that April showed us. I love how vintage they look!

These are the adorable little boxes we were given for lunch. Inside was an amazing baguette sandwich, pasta salad, and cookie.

This is one of my ink mixtures for the letterpress portion. It's a really pretty burnt orange. The ink was as viscous as pitch, so mixing it wasn't the easiest.

Ben showing us how to use the letterpress.

Some of the stencils for letterpress.

The red trike and the amber narwhal were some of the cards I made on the letterpress.

This is my in-progress Pop Art piece. Remember this post? Told you I'd do something cool! I can't wait to finish it and show the finished product.

On bravery

Amelia Earhart

This last week, we went to Conrad's cousin's house for dinner, and I fell in love with their two-year-old Gavin. He's all boy. He loves animals and trucks and bikes and pasta and legos. And I helped bathe him and then I got him all riled up right before bed. We were all kind of marveling at how much fun Tess and Gavin have together. 

His mom Jessica was telling me how he reacts when he gets hurt. She told me about the last time he got a shot. The nurse put the needle in his little arm, and he looked at it, and he looked up at his mom, and his lip quivered and he said in a slightly defeated tone, "I'm brave." He does the same thing when he falls off his bike or bonks his head. 

His parents have taught him to be brave when he's scared or hurt. This is a quality that many adults don't possess. Many people go their whole lives without travelling or trying something new or overcoming a fear. 

Some people are naturally braver than others, and some are taught to be brave, and some are simply not brave.  There are different types of bravery, too. You can be brave like a soldier. You can be brave like a cancer-survivor. You can be brave like a single mother. 

I'm brave when it comes to travelling. I'll go anywhere. Really. Also, in a massive crisis, I'm very brave. I could help people out of a car accident, or calmly drive someone to the hospital, but little everyday braveries are harder for me. 

For example, I'm not brave when it comes to vulnerability. I don't like to work out alone, so if no one can go with me, I just don't go. That's my loss, not anyone else's. 

I have an extreme lack of bravery when it comes to going in the ocean. I get so scared that being in the beautiful sea is more of a terror than an activity of enjoyment. 

But part of fear is anticipation of pain, either mental or physical. If people new exactly what they were getting themselves into, they would never do anything. I bet Gavin would never have agreed to get shots if he knew he would have to be brave. 

I started thinking about the things I want to be braver at. 

Be braver with the ocean. 

Be strong enough to work out on my own.

Kill more spiders instead of making Conrad do it.

Don't be insecure about my projects. 

House to Bookstore

When Conrad and I were on our honeymoon in Ojai, we stopped at this awesome, quaint little bookstore. Here's the thing: it used to be a house. It was the coolest thing I'd ever seen. The walls were FILLED with books. There were shelves everywhere. The bathroom had books on household cleaning and trivia books. The kitchen was filled with cookbooks and home decorating books. The library had encyclopedia sets and dictionaries galore. There were even books outside on - you guessed it - gardening and yard care. What an awesome presentation! This never really left my mind. If I ever open a thrift store, it will be formatted just like this, with appropriate room decorations, and clothes in the closets and couches by the fireplace with vintage nik-naks on the mantle. Dishes and vases will decorate the kitchen, along with hutches and china-cabinets.

Now... Does anyone know how to open a thrift store?

Sweet and Sour

There's always something sweet and sour about a bouquet of flowers. They're so pretty and they smell good, but they'll only last a few days before they wilt and turn brown. I got this bouquet at church on Sunday (just for being awesome, I guess?). I'm a sucker for tangerine roses. I don't like the way roses smell, but I think they look so pretty, and these orange ones go so well with the white hydrangeas!

Sweet: I can't stop eating Talenti Gelato. CAN NOT STOP. It is literally sweet.

Sour: So many calories. Even my daily hike can't support this habit. 

Sweet: Being out in the sun every day. I wear a sports bra or tank top on my hikes, so my shoulders are getting some good color.

Sour: A sports bra/racer-back tanline. And potential skin cancer.

Sweet: School's end is so close! July 21 is my official Commencement date!

Sour: What in the world will I do with myself when I'm not slaving over books? 

Sweet: Tracy Chapman. I keep humming her stuff, which transforms into me singing, which turns into full-body movements of pure soul. I've never felt whiter than when I say I have soul. 

Sour: Is Tracy Chapman a male or female? The name Tracy is kind of ambiguous. As is the voice. And the Whoopi-esque clothing which leaves people confused. 

Sweet: The coming Memorial Day weekend, which Conrad has off from work.

Sour: The fact that we'll be spending most of it doing chores, fixes, and side jobs. No relaxation for us!

P.S. Since we're going out of town for the summer, we're going to rent our condo for the week we're gone! I'll post pictures of the house if anyone's interested. If you or anyone you know would like to come to Carlsbad, San Diego during the third or fourth week in July, email me at tesiahwilk@yahoo.com. 

Easy Blogging 101

I'm a cheater. I'm a super cheater. I take a lot of shortcuts when it comes to blogging. I absolutely love blogging, but sometimes life happens and it gets tricky to juggle. Here are some ways I make blogging easier and increase my audience.

How do you think of blog posts even if you feel like you have nothing to write about? 
I keep a document called Blog Ideas where I write down all my... er... blog ideas. It's got all kinds of post ideas, from different recipes I've been thinking about trying, to party ideas, to household tips, to etiquette tips, and everything else from here to the moon. When I feel like I have nothing really current in my life to write about, I turn to the list and am not only inspired for a new blog post, but to create something! I get to try new recipes or projects. Any time I think of something I've been meaning to try, or an idea for the blog, I write it down there and save it.

What if you have lots of ideas all at once?
This is my favorite thing. It happens to me a lot. Sometimes I'll have a new recipe, a new outfit, a new project, a memory, and millions of other ideas all ready to blog at once. So I blog them all! To stay consistent with my posting (I try to post daily, and more lenient on the weekend), I schedule my posts in blogger. I'll write a separate post for each awesome idea, then schedule them for the day I want them to post. I can write several days' worth of blogs at once, and not have to worry about it for the rest of the week!

How to schedule your posts to go up automatically: 
When you're in your dashboard on Blogger and you're writing a post, in the right column is a list of tabs (Labels, Schedule, etc.). Choose "Schedule," then select "Set date and time" and "Done." On the calendar that pops up, choose the date and time that you want it to post, then click "Done." When you've finished writing your post, hit "Publish" like you normally do (sometimes it says "Schedule"), and it will post on its own!

Organizing your thoughts
I started scheduling my blog posts in my calendar, as well as on blogger. This way I can see what I have planned to post for the week, and I can schedule "event posts" in advance. For example, for Mother's Day, I scheduled a post devoted to Mom way ahead of time, because that post takes priority. I want to make sure that I blog about relevant things.

How do you get more viewers?
There are encyclopedic amounts of advice for this one, but I'll start with the really basic starting points.
1. Follow other blogs. And when people follow you, follow them back. It's nice to be followed, and you're not the only blogger. Pay it forward.
2. Use keywords and phrases in your posts. If you're posting a recipe or a how-to project, make sure you include words that people would search for. Simple things like "Stroganoff recipe" or "How to Remodel Wood Furniture" are great key phrases to include in your posts, and even better as titles. If people can easily find your stuff on the internet, you can bet more people will see it.
3. Link-ups. Post links to your blog posts all over the internet. Here is an awesome list of link "parties" where you can share your helpful posts as well as view others.
4. Make your posts interesting. A huge piece of this is including pictures in every post. A picture's worth a thousand words. Another huge piece of this is to be happy. If all you do is rant about how difficult and horrible your life is, you'll depress your readers and they won't come back. Be a source of light on this dark thing called the internet.
5. Make your posts unique to you. What do you have that other bloggers don't have? Showcase it. Make them come back for more. Maybe it's your awesome recipes, or your high-end photography, or your insatiable wit.
6. Hold giveaways and sponsor other blogs. In my own experience, this is the one that will really get you more readers. Get your blog out there by sponsoring other blogs. Readers from other blogs will see your button and hop on over. A successful way to make them stay (besides your insatiable wit) is to straight up bribe them. Promise them goodies if they follow you. Hold giveaways. In the future, I'll do a whole post about sponsoring, and a whole post about giveaways.

I love these kinds of questions. For any specific questions, email me at tesiahwilk@yahoo.com! Oh, did I mention that if you send me a question, I'll link to your blog in the post? Hello, free advertising!

Hats for winners!

Ok, remember this post? Where I promised that one winner would get one of the homemade knit hats? Well, Lissa was the winner, so here are her choices!
Top row: Maroon with pom-pom
2nd row: Blue without pom-pom
3rd row: Light brown with pom-pom
4th row: Blue with pom-pom

Just email me and tell me the one you want, Lissa!

Date night

This is the only picture I got of my outfit on date night. Blue pants, white shirt with zebras on it, black satin jacket. My regret isn't that I didn't get a better outfit picture, it's that I didn't get a picture of Conrad and me together. The lighting was really dark, so faces were really shadowy. Anywho, the night was full of conversation and thinking and imagining our future together. We imagined buying a house at the tip of the lagoon, with a dock so Conrad can paddle out to the ocean. We imagined Christmases with babies and friends and bigger houses with bigger kitchens and high ceilings for bigger Christmas trees. And garages for bigger cars. Geez! Are we consumers or what?

Paper love

I whipped this up while indulging in Netflix the other day. I love how I can find inspiration in household items. I think one of the most fascinating things is inspiration. It's different for everyone and it comes from anywhere. For me, paper is a huge inspiration. Words on paper is one of the most beautiful things. The rich smell of an old, yellowed book. The sound of a brown bag opening. The way paper bleaches or yellows if it's exposed to sunlight. How nothing adds character to a room like a stack or row of books. How books pair well with so many other things.

A book and a scarf.

A book and a swim suit.

A book and a cup of tea.

A book and a bath.

A book and a blanket.

A book and a fire.

A book and a chair on the porch.

A book and a road trip (if you're a passenger).

A book and a storm.

A book and a beach.

For more paper love, check out Handmade Library.