I've been spending a great deal of time working on making decisions for my SCA persona. I grew up within the SCA; my parents had joined when I was ten or so and were avidly involved (or at least my dad and uncles were) ever since. I didn't really enjoy much more than the clothing until I was old enough to duck out of babysitting before I was asked. I went to Great Western War this year, and despite being completely unprepared, Rosslyn and I put on a half hour show at the Open Arms Bardic Hall. I took a few classes over the weekend and in general enjoyed being there as a vacation. While there, I took two classes from True Thomas the Storyteller (look him up, hire him, he's sooooo worth the money), "Fyrecrawling101" and "Coaching". I had some embarrassing moments (forgetting the words to a song--remember how I said I was completely unprepared?), but by and large, I think I grew a bit. I got bolder...I even learned a story to tell instead of being a singi...
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I am shocked and amazed by the world around me. How much joy and how much pain surrounds me on a daily basis? At the same time that parts of my world fall apart, other parts step in, strong and valiant, and buoy me up and along to safety. I love my gospel. I love my religion. Most importantly, I love my God. He provided me a Saviour and my life, wonderful friends, tough-as-nails family, and a capacity for love and compassion I am still shocked to find within myself. The hardest thing for me to come to terms with is my utter powerlessness. Everything going on in my family is none of my business and not my place to butt in. Nothing I say will change anyone or fix the problem. I was sharply reminded of this the other day. I wasn't sure if I'd have the strength to deal with the problems that keep coming up, and then I received a phone call. My bishop had recommended me to be a Temple Ordinance Worker and I am now set apart to be so. As I had been considering requesting that mysel...
There's a lot of interesting articles floating around the internet lately having to do with minimizing your possessions and/or home, getting by with far less, how to shop for better deals and what one needs to truly be happy. Personally, I don't really shop much. Oh there's tons of things I wouldn't mind owning, but they are hardly "must-haves" and in the end, I'll likely never get them. At the moment, I'm working on purging myself of things I already own that I don't want or need. Besides, since I received my endowment in the temple, I've felt an increased need to get rid of material things that don't uplift me and focus on what's important. So I intend to sell most of my unwanted things in garage sales or on ebay. The "expensive" things are going out through ebay at a decent/extravagant discount, and the rest I'm just hoping for some pocket change and all that space in my room back. Here's my ebay page if anyone w...
It happens once in awhile. You go about your business and trials come your way. It is through those trials you are shown your true character and begin to learn who you truly are. I've finally settled things with the DMV, now I need to settle things with the CHP by the end of the month. I'm doing what I can to handle that end, but it won't be easy. I have learned that the county Superior Court is far more friendly, helpful, understanding, and ten times more efficient than the DMV. They even make jokes about how terrible the DMV is, comparing it unfavorably with their system (which they claim is bad enough, but I saw nothing bad about it: the line was short and even the security was anything but rude). Conversely, the CHP offices (not officers) are not very helpful, but in their defense, I seem to have come in the middle of a time crisis, with every phone going off at once. I think I'll just go through the court from now on. A family member and I had a long talk recen...
I decided to have some fun before giving a proper, more serious update. So here is my doll Briar giving a tour of my room! I'm talking in black and she's talking in purple. Hello. Can you sees me?! I's down here! This is the room! The Lady finally cleanded up in here, so I gets to show you round! Yes, those are warhammers by the bed. The Lady has strange collections. She has two real ones and one boff--boffer?--one. This is the only time we see them. Here is da other side of da room. Hello, can you see me? I'm on the candee bins! The Lady worked at a candy store and her coworkers gives them to her as presents when she quitted. Ok, over here we has the desk and then the computer thingy with the scanner and printer--oh this is funny! The Lady was livin' with her parents awhile back and needed someplace for the computer tower to sit when she came home from school, so her daddy went out and nailgunned a piece of wood to a crate--they didn't have any stools she co...
Time for an update! My posts seem to be much less frequent. I should attempt to remedy that. I have a lot on my mind lately. It seems almost all my trials and tribulations revolve around my car. Oh I have a parking ticket, oh they still won't send me my tags, oh I'm behind on my payments and they keep calling, oh I got pulled over, oh my car needs this, that and the other replaced, oh oh oh!! I'm tempted to sell it and have done and walk the 70 miles a day to work! Just ugh! I enjoy my car a great deal. I enjoy having the freedom to pick up and go relatively anywhere, anytime. I would like to take car of it and have it clean and well-maintained and insured and registered. But intentions aren't good enough to do all those things. They take time and money, and don't wait for payday. In fact, if one is without work for a time, they like to make things worse. But, if I lose my car in some fashion, I lose my job. I cannot afford to let that happen. Closer work would ...
Eek. Didn't post for a bit there. Whoops. I've been busy. In the last month, I've moved all the furniture in my room around and gone through a lot of things in the process (my ebay sell pile is much larger now), I've turned 25, and I've received my endowment . As that last is rather sacred, I'll let the link speak for me and suffice it to say my life is changed for the better and I've never felt so blessed. My new job is working out nicely, though some scheduling snafus on my part and my boss' part made life interesting for awhile. I turn into an instant weebly stress ball when I'm late, let me tell you! Unfortunately, working consistently puts me in the position of not caring about upkeep when I get home, so I have a messy room and bathroom. Oh well, a bit at a time and I'm done. My birthday fell on a Sunday and I had entirely too much fun. I went to Sacrament meeting and then I was taken to go see a live performance Pirates of Penzance at a...
Wow, what a party! I had a great time these past few hours. I went to work this morning, came back and was joined by a friend for sewing. She reminded me how to use the machine and I finished a dolly chemise for under my Khorae doll's Red Queen outfit for an Alice in Wonderland doll meet/party. With this new friend and a couple cheats I have in mind, I could finish this very soon. My hands also thank me for no longer needing to do the hand-sewing. Ugh. What a pain. Literally. After we worked on our various projects a bit, I did the dishes and cleaned up the kitchen and we ran to the store for our St. Patrick's Day party! Armed with a recipe and food coloring, I made an Irish dessert (applesauce cake with green glaze icing--it was amazing), and once the corned beef arrived, we made corned beef and cabbage (of course). I played with the recipe and everyone seemed to like it. We had fun dropping food coloring into our beverages (Martinelli's sparkling apple cider and IBC roo...
Time for an update! I had received my call from work as promised on Friday. They asked me if I could start on Monday and I said YES! I went up and spent Friday and Saturday with my family, having missed my sister's big 21st birthday, and will now be missing the b-day barbecue this coming Saturday. I got to spend some time with her and we spent a lot of time talking and colluding and helping each other with some issues we remembered growing up; just working things out between us and bonding. We went to get our hair cut on Saturday and I, who've not had bangs since high school, got my hair layered (it's so light now; I can turn my head freely!) and bangs cut. I feel the bangs are a bit too long though, so I'm going to have a friend trim them a bit soon. I started work on Monday and found the work relatively simple but very detail oriented and meticulous (things that I like to do), and heavily based on memorizing which of nearly 300 people go with which slot. I think I...
I finally have good news on the job front!! My new company reconciled things with the hotel enough to get me a part time position (as opposed to full time). This does mean I have to reapply as a formality, but I'll be called once the job is posted so I can immediately apply and get a schedule and things. I think I can still get benefits under part time (one of my interviewers mentioned this), so I'm hopeful and gonna go with it. I'm so happy to be almost working again!
I still haven't started my new job. I still have no idea when I will. I received a blessing assuring me that things will be alright, but the worries and concerns are still present. As much as all this time off has done well for me in some ways, it's not been so good in others. Being stir crazy is not fun. I'm working on a doll sized chaise lounge right now to help defeat the boredom, give me a creative outlet and also have somewhere for my Khorae doll to sit and store her things (it'll have a box under the seat). My dolls have both received new faceups and new clothes, so I figured I'd spam photos instead, so here's some pretties to look at. This is Khorae with her new faceup, a new outfit removed from an antique store doll that was edited and fitted to her, and then a hat that I made myself. The pic was taken by Rosslyn in an antique store against a plaster wall relief that we were both impressed by. However, the price tag was a bit much. And now here'...
I'm coming to the conclusion that I'm not very self-motivated. That worries me. I don't like to do anything alone and I usually need to be prodded to do anything that doesn't yield rewards right now, such as posting something online, when it'll be weeks before anyone says anything or wants to buy it (speaking about ebay). Receiving advice I cannot immediately act on: "oh you should call such and such group, they'll help" after hours. Thanks. By the time I can call, I forget. I've never been in shape. I've been in better shape, but I've never been thin, I've never been on a major sports team (by major I mean soccer, baseball, water polo, etc.), and I've never been in shape--ever. I do like to mountain bike and I do like to swim. I've worked out at a gym and I don't mind that either. But I don't like doing anything by myself! For one thing, with mountain biking and swimming in the ocean, there's a safety issue. And ...
Wow, the hits just keep on coming! I will roll with them, I swear! Last night I discovered I wouldn't be starting work for yet another week. At least. So, after an email asking for compensation or someone else to fill in on the training (my trainer has to work off-site), and then getting both options shot down this morning, I woke up a bit before seven am with diarrhea, which quickly evolved into going at both ends for the better part of the day. I had all of three crackers to eat until just now. It went around my friends' place a week ago, so I'm not surprised it happened and I guess it's just as well I didn't start work today, as I would've ended up sick by the side of the road before I'd gotten very far. So, lying around all day has further messed up my sleep schedule, but I feel better now. I am drinking some pedialyte stuff and nibbling crackers with my tension headache meds. My neck is all kinds of messed up now. Maybe I'll get real adventurous...
I haven't really had much to say lately. I've been treating these last two weeks between jobs as a vacation, getting my mind in order (and my house) so that I wouldn't be a wreck with this new job and I'd be ready to learn the new things. While I'd been hoping to just jump right in, perhaps it really was better for my mental health not to. The cramps came back again a few days ago, right on schedule, but they were much easier to weather. I only took one Vicodin and had a blessing from my guy friends, and I think it was mostly from sitting in a hard wood chair for game on the first day of having the painful things that really set me off. The next morning, nothing. Oh a little sore perhaps, but no cramps, no pain. One good night's sleep and poof. Gone. I'm beginning to think they are stress related. I mean, really. Day after Thanksgiving and Christmas Eve, both of which were days I was working/supposed to work? But the day before I'd been bouncing on clo...
Well, the last week has been amazing. I mean, I had it completely off! This coming week, too! It's giving me time to get over being sick and rest from in between my jobs. Mentally, it's been wonderful and will continue to be so. Monetarily? Not so much, but I think I can scrape by. I'm going to visit my aunt on Thursday (technically she's my greataunt, but meh) and she's going to help me and Rosslyn learn to sew on a machine for our dolls. She's crocheted gowns for her dolls, so she's totally willing to do this. Mwahahahahaha, I didn't even know she liked dolls that much until this past Christmas. So I start my new job officially on Monday. Whatever issue they had seems to have been worked out. Unfortunately, these days off have been getting my sleep schedule all kinds of messed up, so I'm gonna try and get to bed at a decent hour (midnight) and wake up before 11 the next day. I has goals, yes. It's been storming since midnight last night, th...
A sort of vague resolution while I'm still sick: People are often unreasonable and self-centered. Forgive them anyway. If you are kind, people may accuse you of ulterior motives. Be kind anyway. If you are honest, people may cheat you. Be honest anyway. The good you do today may be forgotten tomorrow. Do good anyway. Give the world the best you have and it may never be good enough. Do good anyway. For you see, in the end, it's between you and God. It was never between you and them anyway. -Mother Theresa
It's the time of year for making new goals and resolutions, but I've been laid up with a cold, so I'm holding off on doing the truly in depth goal making until I can think straight and have time to sit down and do it. However, one of my obvious goals--getting a new job--I've already accomplished!! I just got the call this morning and they want me to start next week! I've been really counting on this job, as it has a wage increase, hour increase, no customers and no money handling, and --and this is the good part--it has full benefits even if I'm part time. Despite my being sick, I'm trying hard not to dance around (mostly because I'd get dizzy and fall). So much for sleeping in; I'm wide awake now. I still need to quit my current job and I feel a bit bad giving him only one week notice and have to change next week's schedule around, but I need these benefits and I need them now. Hopefully they'll kick in before my cramps begin again, so I ...
Getting organized is time consuming, but I always seem to be very satisfied when I finish. My computer is currently getting wiped and reformatted, so I'm remaining on the borrowed laptop from Rosslyn for now, until my Zoro is ready (yes, I named my computer). It'll be like getting a whole new computer! Nothing beyond the OS already installed, so I get to finally put in my copy of CS2, and a couple of my games, but otherwise, brand spanking new! I'm excited! Rosslyn and I were on an absolute flurry of errand running today. We went to compare prices on Zoro first, got shelving units for our crafts and garage, bought cool calendars, then hit Fry's to take care of Zoro and get a few odds and ends there. We stopped for dinner and then went on a nice, gentle walk along the trails behind our development. Now I'm organizing my crafting supplies. They've been sitting in bags on the floor and it's starting to annoy me.