My totally fabulous and awesome manicure is no more ;( It began to chip away after two weeks but that is a brand new record for me! And with all of the job interviews I had recently I had to go for a more toned down look anyway. Isn't it silly that ten differently painted nails are somehow inappropriate? They're just nails! I chose the brightest red I own then had a little fun with it because solid color doesn't cut it for me anymore.
I also have to talk about these fun rings I won in Gazel of Bonjour Gazel's giveaway! I keep saying "I never win things!" but it's become a lie since I've won two giveaways now plus all of the awesome Scotch freebies last month.
Though I really like the 4 finger ring, it didn't fit me quite right. My poor little pinky looked ridiculous so I decided to use my soldering iron and pull that sucker apart. Thirty seconds later and I've got a whole other ring to add to the lot.
Thanks Gazel :)
My next post is gonna be a doozy! I've just finished putting together a nail polish rack and I'm super excited to share it with you, I just need finish up the tutorial.
I've been really bad at following through on my blog lately but thanks for sticking around. Things have been unusually eventful for me recently and I've been hesitant to talk about it out of fear that I would jinx it. A few weeks ago I came into contact with a creative placement agency and we were so in tune with one another that they lined up a lot of freelance work for me. This was absolutely wonderful because I had literally exhausted all of my funds and savings. Being a creative right now is really difficult! I freelanced at a HUGE company and picked up some off-site work with a client in Brooklyn. Things were totally looking up and then an actual salaried position became available at a magazine where a friend of mine works! I just about died. Interviewing for a job-job is so different than for contract work. I was a huge ball of nerves and anxiety but I did manage to get a call back. My second interview was last Monday and I was a wreck because it was super short (fifteen minutes!).
This morning I got ~the call~ and was offered the position. It's such a surreal thing to finally be employed after so long. I graduated in 2008 and worked with numerous companies but never as an actual employee. Tangent: Over. I start next week and I am SO thrilled!
You have to actually do stuff in order to blog about it...
Andrew and I decided we're going to stick it out and renew our lease. We've still got a year left on it, and as embarrassed as I am to admit it, we've been here for a year with a whole mess of unpacked boxes.
We lack closet space so a lot of things are just stacked and well, not organized at all. I decided to tackle my studio the weekend of the fourth figuring I would work on my Lisette Portfolio Top in my newly cleaned room. This is what it looked like at the height of the chaos (I blame the warm weather and BBQs):
I know
I studied visual communications so I needed a lot of tools. A lot of materials. A lot of a lot. At any given notice I had to have the right adhesives for 10 different stocks of paper which I had in 10 different colors in 10 different sizes. I bought two wide format printers during those four years. I bound books that I printed at home and cut to precision by hand! I loved it, but it was expensive and time consuming. So I have all this stuff, and I've carried it with me from apartment to apartment for years.
At what point should I let stuff go? I've left some boxes untouched for the better part of a year because I just knew that all of my fill in the blank were packed away inside. I can't justify getting rid of all these usable materials, and on top of all that, I have mountains of schoolwork. Andrew says "It's art, keep it!" but for how long? Have any of you gone to art school? How long did you hold on to your projects? I made a 60-page pop up book my last semester, I can't just throw that out! I feel like a hoarder, but somehow this is different? In my head it is... For some perspective, these are all our newly emptied boxes:
I know
So, being completely overwhelmed by the chaotic mess and my inability to let things go, I decided to just stop and paint my nails. The best decision I made all month:
I think the eye is my favorite. Maybe the cheeseburger?
Naturally my next step was to continue avoiding cleaning and illustrate the designs:
Don't lose faith in me, friends (I've lost another follower, 2 in 1 year!!), I will always return. No matter how long it takes! Plus, I am determined to finish organizing this weekend which means that top will get sewn. OR ELSE!
See what I did there?? I admittedly got a little distracted during the final stretch. I won't bother breaking each day down like my previous posts because I only worked on one thing after Plaid Day. And that was Lisette's Portfolio Top, which I plan to finish this weekend. Unfortunately I ran into a giant obstacle, like, uh, not paying attention and cutting the wrong size! Of course I didn't realize until I was almost done, too. So instead let's have a thumbnail party.
There was an absolutely ridiculous flash hail storm Thursday night. It was a gorgeous day for Andrew's track racing but after a single race the sky went pink, then purple, and then lightning set in. It was both amazing and terrifying all at once— the lighting was so wild! I even recorded a hilarious video of me laughing hysterically while Andrew's car gets beaten to a pulp by hail.
Just look at the size of that hail!!
Chicago has got some serious identity issues when it comes to its weather. The next morning was like nothing had ever happened, well, not quite:
The last random bits of bits to share are... (also known as my life in screenshots):
I know
I know
GO VOTE!