The Daily Grind

Every morning, one of the first things I do is literally grind my coffee! It makes such an amazing cup of coffee, that it's totally worth the extra cost.

But even more than I love whole bean coffee, I love using my Chemex. (Even though, really, they go hand in hand.)








I got it for Christmas last year, and it's probably one of my favorite gifts ever. In case you're wondering, a Chemex is a manual coffee maker. Meaning, it takes a little more work than just using an electric one.

Being the lazy person that I am, I kind of figured that I would stop using it regularly once the novelty of it wore off, but I haven't! Our electric coffee maker would never get used if Dane didn't use it, and I would be fine with just getting rid of it.

Every morning I measure out and boil my water, measure out my beans and grind them, and stand there and make my coffee. Something about it must be cathartic to me, because it never gets old!




If you want to see an example of what using a Chemex is like, check out this brew guide by my friend Molly and her husband of Terminus Coffee Co.



A Chemex Brew Guide from Photography by David L Clark on Vimeo.


Hope you guys have a happy Monday!

My Lovely Mama

Today is my mama's birthday!

She's coming over with my sisters for lunch today, and I'm so excited to give her gift to her! She is one of those people who are so easy to buy for. She always puts everyone else's wants and needs before her own, so I love getting to give her something that I know she's been eyeing for a while.

I also like to go all out with my wrapping too!







Obviously my theme was paper doilies, and I may start putting them on everything now!

Happy birthday to my wonderful, beautiful mama, and happy Friday to all of you!

What's in a Name?

This post will be a little bit of a hint as to what I've been working on lately. But just a little!

I don't know if many of you remember the facebook poll I took, asking your thoughts about some new names. Well, I had narrowed it down, and things have been working out great.

Then I started laying out a new blog design, and now I don't love it.

I can't quite put my finger on it, but I know that I definitely need to go back to the drawing board. I'm a little bit stuck, because what I thought I wanted for my color scheme, isn't turning out like I wanted, but I feel like what I do want, won't work with my name. I am determined not to change it, but I hope I can decide on some color soon! But, I think this is a case of getting too focused on something, and I probably need to take a step back for a bit, and it will give me some better perspective (ha ha, see what I did there?).

The good news is, I have decided on a date for my big reveal!

As of right now, November 1st is the day I have set to show you all exactly what I've been working on. That might seem like a long time still, but for me, it feels just right. Long enough to do everything I need to (with room for issues like the one above) while short enough to be a little challenging and keep me moving forward with good progression.

I've discovered that things like this can take a lot of time!

On a completely unrelated note, check out this *crazy beetle!




I don't think I've ever seen one like this, and he was out on my front porch last night. He's totally creepy, but in an awesome way (but not like spiders, those things are NOT awesome), so I had to catch him. I will probably let him go soon, but I also kind of want to wait for him to kick the bucket and use him to start a bug collection!

Too much? Maybe. Either way, he's very cool.




*I looked him up, and I believe he's a California Prionus beetle

Late-Night Munchies

You know those fast food chains that are always targeting their late night hours toward stoners? Well, turns out that they also appeal to bored insomniacs!

So now that I've polished off some extremely terrible (but delicious) food, how about some eye candy?









Can you tell that I'm ready for fall??

Also, for any fellow insomniacs, did you know that Kathy Lee and Hoda come on crazy late at night?! I may never go to bed at a decent hour again ;)


Oh My-LANTA!

It has just been one of those days!

Well, at least part of the day anyway.

You know that major change to the blog I was talking about the other day? Well, things have been slowly trucking in the right direction, but I've hit a bit of a roadblock!

Now, I'm not spilling the beans just yet. There will be a big reveal (hopefully) in the near future! But, I've hit a wall, and in frustration I just have to vent to someone. With dear husband still at work, I figured a good option would be YOU, my dear readers :)

I'm not super great at techy, computer stuff, and I feel like it takes me forever to learn new programs and such. Unfortunately, this new venture I'm starting requires a lot more in depth knowledge of computers than I realized! Things had been going along pretty well, but today I've come to a halt.

Imagine having a question, about something fairly complicated, and trying to read an article full of technical terms and mumbo jumbo. Imagine trying to decipher all of these new terms and concepts out of this article, and then multiply that article by twenty! Yes, twenty. Meaning that I've read that many (at least!) and still haven't found an answer to my question. In fact, I think my question multiplied into several!

It's enough to make me literally want to scream bloody murder! And maybe pull my hair out too, for good measure.

The funny story is, in an attempt to take a breather and a step back, I thought I'd get out an old knitting project that I haven't worked on since I moved to Idaho. It's been sounding like a lot of fun lately, and with summer drawing nearer to a close, I always get in a cozy, curl-up-and-do-some-knitting, kind of mood.

Well, I got a couple rows in, and realized I had started out wrong, and therefore would have to take out and re-do said rows....

And that, my friends, is how I ended up here. When things get frustrating, I've found a great way to clear my head and calm my nerves is to write about them!

My day hasn't been all bad though. In fact, most of it was great! I woke up to rain and cloudy skies (yay fall-ish weather!) and made a delicious batch of banana bread. Nothing beats the smell of fresh baked, spiced goods, in my opinion. Then my bff came over for a coffee date and we spent all morning and afternoon hanging out. I'm thinking she should have stayed longer, and then I wouldn't have had the chance to spiral into a ball of stress! ;)

What do you know, though? I got to the end of this story, and I'm feeling loads better! The gung-ho side of me wants to jump right back into that stupid technical garbage, but the fact that I'm still referring to it as garbage makes me think it wouldn't be a great idea.

So here I'm off to find something else to settle these nerves with, like maybe a nap!

Happy Hump Day friends!

It's Been 26 Days......

....since the last time I posted anything to facebook!

I joined the challenge 99 Days of Freedom, which is basically just logging off of facebook for 99 days. Now, I will admit that I have logged on twice since then, once as a favor to a friend, and once to message someone for job info. I didn't check my notifications, or scroll through my feed, so I still feel like I'm holding up to the rules pretty well!

And technically, posting this to my blog's page is also cheating, but for me it was less about the posting, and more about what I was seeing on my newsfeed. Don't get me wrong though! Most of the stuff I saw from my friends was great. I didn't have a problem with "drama" or anything like that, but it was other things.

Before I saw this campaign, I was already feeling like I needed a break. I was way too addicted, and I could tell it was making me unhappy. The first thing I did every day was get online, and I was constantly on it throughout the day. The real clincher though, was all of the trending topics and news articles people shared. I have been avoiding watching the news and going to news sites for a long time now, so when this stuff started showing up more and more on facebook, it was really bringing me down.

I know the obvious thing would be just not to read the kind of stuff that bothers me, but unfortunately I don't seem to have that control. I would get sucked into these articles of politics and controversy, and things that I don't agree with, and I would just keep reading. One article would lead to another and then another, and I would end up mad or irritated or down, just because I couldn't resist. And it got to the point where facebook was just another media hub that I wanted to avoid.

But I have missed sharing things with people! That has been the thing I have wanted to do the most. So, this is how I'm going to continue to do that, without having to see all of the stuff I don't want to. Eventually I will start logging back on again to see what all of my friends and family are up to though, and hopefully I will have the self control not to let my facebook take over my life again!

Because I have to say, I feel like I am happier without it :)

In regards to social media as a whole though, I didn't give up on everything! I'm still on pinterest, and I have an instagram account as well! I couldn't just go cold turkey on it all at once now could I? ;)

Now, what have I just been dying to share lately? Well, just summer as usual!

I have been going to concerts and camping trips, and enjoying the sun and my family! Like I mentioned in my last post, things have changed a lot around these parts. We moved from Southern Oregon to the Boise area of Idaho last spring, which is where I grew up and most of my family lives. I've been having such a great time seeing my parents and sisters whenever I want, plus my best friend and her adorable little boy.

It's most likely just a temporary move, only for a few years, while my husband works over here, but I plan on making the most of it while we're here!

I also bought a small vintage camping trailer to renovate, and while I haven't gotten as far as I had hoped I would by this time, I'm still super excited about it. I want to try to post regular updates as I make some more progress on her, and I will be sure to share lots of pictures as she comes along! (Btw, she is named Gloria)

I'm also in the process of working on a major change to this little old blog of mine......

.....but I'm going to be keeping that secret for a little while longer still ;)

So stick around (and I'll try too as well), and I will be sharing more about that in the future!

Happy Hump Day everyone, and I'll see you next time!


 

Popular Posts

Like us on Facebook

Pinterest