Haha- another post about cleaning

So I've been unpacking and sorting our stuff everyday for the past year and a half- I finally feel like I'm making some progress- not that I haven't been but I've not seen a lot of evidence of it.

(side note- the pictures i'm using in here reflect more of my feeling towards the project in general- also how I felt this morning when first started on all of this)

SO my update on this ongoing saga of chores...

I can call the kids room officially done.  All of their toys have a place; the furniture is arranged in a very efficient and functional fashion- and most importantly the kids like they way the room looks and feels. :)

Our 'master' bedroom is officially done- David's office is integrated into the room in such a way that he has space and it feels office-ish- while the rest of the bedroom feels like a bedroom.  I feel like this is a HUGE accomplishment for that room since it's just a little over 100 square feet.  Also have the bed set up so I can put storage containers underneath it... although I'm going to need to do some repairs to the bed frame.  (more on that later)  And also found another storage spot behind the door- which allows the door to open comfortably while stacking a few plastic bins behind it.

Bathroom... I think it's done- I've thought this before- but I think the set up of shelves and mobile towel racks in a way that best utilizes the space without shrinking the room much smaller than it is.

The last two- the living room is pretty much done but needs to be better cleaned and the kitchen is in a similar fashion- though right now I need to integrate a dinning area into it.  (The kitchen serves as kitchen and laundry room- so what is one more function?)

That is the truth of most of the rooms actually- I try to make the little apartment sound bigger by giving each area (some as small as 20 square feet) big pompous sounding names.  It makes me happy :D

Then there is my office... Which is WAY better than it used to be... but still kind of a terrifying mess of boxes and... stuff...

I'm really hoping I can have all of this done by the end of February :)  I've been using every Tuesday as a big cleaning day- not really intentionally; but it has just worked out that Tuesday's are a really good day for deep cleaning.

Well that is it for today- I know not really an exciting post; but it's a little slice of my life- which is really what this blog is all about.

~Nikkie

Fav Song

One of the catch-up posts I did recently was about a favorite or important band.  I talked about the Moody Blues.  Since I've neglected today's post until just this very second I thought I'd share my absolute favorite Mood Blues song.  Enjoy :D

~Nikkie

Check in :)

I'm trying to get caught up- it is more difficult then I thought it would be since I've missed practically all of January.  I'm trying to get into a grove where I make time to post every day- it's just hard- as I discovered last year.
So for catching up I'm going through a generic blog challenge and answering several of the prompts on it.

I'm not asnwering all of the questions on it- just the ones that interest me.  At the end of this month I'll post a list with all of the questions I listed and corresponding blog posts- that way if there is something on the list that you particuarly care about reading you can without sifting through the entire blog.  This will save you time as I'm the worst at remembering to label my posts.

I'm only 11 days behind (as of this exact moment) So with consistent posting over the next few days I should be able to catch up no problem.

I still want to try the photography thing- but right after I made that declaration I really didn't take many pictures- outside of the ones of my daughter for a recent assignment. Go Figure.

I've been having the most difficult time managing my time this semester.  Because I'm both WAY busy and not busy- simultaneously.  I think more than anything I'm being thrown by how much of my time is mine right now.  I still spend 2 days a week on campus and I try to get homework done while I'm there- not that there isn't still plenty to do when I get home... But when I get home I'm in a weird sort of twilight universe- the last few semesters I've had a project due every 3-5 days it seemed (seriously that frequently) Sometimes I'd have 3 assignements due on the same day.  (last semester I literally did 42 different pieces of art)  I already know I'm going to have a grand total of 20 assignements for the semester; and the time requirements on most of them is a lot less then what I'm used to spending.  

Basically I have time to really work on my own projects (portfolio, websites, blogs, graphic novel... etc.) and can actually keep up with housework now (really I'm still playing catch up- not sure if I'm truely going to feel like I'm 'on top' of housework for at least another month or so).

So I'm kinda in lost puppy mode.  I need to schedule out my days better 'cause right now I'm wating a LOT of time.   And not even in a good way- like by playing a video game, reading or playing with my kids... I'm like sitting and stairing- confused as to what to do with myself; which is dumb- I have a LOT of things that I need to do...

So this is a new challenge.  

One of the things I'm doing to combat that is forcing myself to spend time cleaning my office.  SO it is a more functional room- I have it laid out a lot better now then I ever have before.  It's just a process of finding where everything goes.  Harder then it sounds. I have a rough idea of where everything goes; but there are a few odds and ends that I need to put away.  (I'm writing this on my ipad- and just now blogger has decided that it would be funny to pop the screen between the top of this entry and where I'm typing at every third letter.  I type fast- and am getting nausiated... switched from the actual Blogger to the Blogger app... stopped jumping now; but it has other annoyances. :P)

ANyway- what was Italking about? Oh yea- being lost and unproductive.

Not much more to say on it- but I need to be better about time management.  It is just a matter of *doing* something every day... The problem is my mornings- when I don't have somewhere to get to first thing I tend to be very lazy.  So I need to come up with SOMETHING to do first thing (not exercise; that can be second thing- for some reason the idea of popping out of bed and working out makes me want to snuggle in my blankets more.)  

I'm just thinking outloud right now.  This is definitly more of a journal entry today and less of a blog post.  It's cool when people are able to just write a rant that sounds more like an article- I feel like I need a lot of preparation to do that.  Of course they aren't writing every day (usually)

Well I'm off to do something else.

~Nikkie

Blurb about Photography... and my frustrations with my skillz.

After the past 3 days my dream house that I'm designing will now have a photo studio in it.  Like my office will have an area dedicated in it for setting up photo shoots.  It is just to frustrating to take good pictures in a home.  Controlling the lighting is awful.  I need to get to Lowes or Home Depot and get some lights... but in the mean time- I'm rigging up lamps and covering white surfaces with blankets (to minimize light bouncing back into the photo)

My daughter was the subject for the recent photo shoots; and she helped as much as any 2 year old girl can help.  

From the first shoot this: 

Was really the only good shot I got.  It's pretty and a nice portrait; not helpful though as my assignment is to do a full figure study.  

The thing I learned that night was that I really need to brush up on photography.  I've gotten lazy about practicing and learning and I've lost a LOT of knowledge that I used to have about taking pictures.  This actually channels the focus of my blog a little bit more- now I have a really good reason to take photos every day :D.

The photos from the first session were unusable- so we tried again.  With better results!! She was a lot more cooperative and I had brushed up on some camera terms so I was able to adjust lighting better.

I'm not posting any of that to this blog right now- once I'm finished with the drawing I'm going to write a long entry on my art blog talking about the process of going from thumbnail to finished drawing.  Or at least the process for this piece.

~Nikkie

Rocky Start

Honestly I'm little concerned about this 365 post thingy when I'm off to such a bad start.  Deep

Breath; ok- I'm going to make time for this!!
I love writing so I don't have an excuse in that way.
My biggest excuse is what I mentioned last time I wrote- I've been re-arranging furniture.  Things are settling in and starting to be more organized- so I won't have that time sink anymore.
Also I'm looking for blog challenges- if anyone knows of any (I think I've asked this before- for sure on facebook not sure if I have on the blog) let me know! I know of the A-Z challenge for April; and I know there are others- but I'm having a hard time really finding any.  Let me know in the comments if you know of any fun ones.

In the mean time- over the next few days I'm going to take more photos- I've been neglecting this because of organizing- and am going to do a 2 week 'get to know you' challenge.  Since even my family might not know everything about me.  Some of the questions I'm going to be going over I've answered last year- but I think I'm going to go ahead and answer them again- sometimes things change over time :D

~Nikkie

Re-arranging home again

First off- forgive the blurry pictures; my phone's camera has a damaged lens- and I haven't figured out how to fix it.  

So that dresser I was so proud of moving into my office- I moved it out; and up to my sisters bedroom.  Now I have a big hole where the dresser used to be and am puzzling as to how to organize my office from here.

That is really all I have to say about today.

peace

~Nikkie

Random Thoughts

I don't see how this post can be anything but random- I don't have anything really organized in my head right now.

So it's the first month of my 365 challenge and already I'm a week behind- so I'm posting today so I do not get more behind.  My goal for this weekend: not to get further behind and to catch up (I'll post date the entries- so it'll LOOK like I stayed caught up.  Bwa ha ha ha ha.... seriously I'm only doing it for my own organizational purposes.)

SO MUCH IS HAPPENING IN MY LIFE RIGHT NOW.
Honestly it's hard to keep up with everything so I got this:

Isn't it cute?

At the moment it is my life journal.  You can kinda read the flimsy tags sticking out of it (soon to be replaced with higher quality platic post its) But I track my schedule, assignments, sketchbook, my husbands schedule, my kids schedule, my blogs (that is a recent addition), etc.

All so I can stay on track with everything going on right now.

So this month I'm frantically trying to get 2 pieces together to enter the Society of Illustrators Student competition and the Spectrum Annual.  Honetly I'm not sure I have a prayer of getting in to either- also not sure if I'm going to get my pieces finished- but I'm trying!!! Next year I'm not going to be so last minute in my decision to apply... it is what it is I guess- at this point all I can really do is work for it.  

I'm also freaking out a little bit about my pending application to the BFA program at my school.  I don't know why I'm worrying about it- I'm not applying to get in this semester.  Well I'm applying to get in- but I won't be heart broken if I don't get in this semester.  The biggest reason I'm applying is so that I can apply in the fall (you can only apply in the fall if you've put in an application in the spring).  That will give me the summer to refine things.  It would be nice to get in on the first application- but I'm not holding my breath for it.  I've gotten a lot better over the last few years- but I'd hardly say I'm at the level I need to be in order to qualify for the BFA.  At least not in my paintings skills.  In my drawing skills I'm probably at the low end of what they are looking for.

SO I CAME UP WITH A BRILLIANT IDEA WHILE TYPING ALL OF THIS.  I take a lot of photos anyway- so I think I'm going to post a photo a day with a small blurb.  At the very least that is- that way I'll always have *something* I can post about- and post quickly about as well in most cases.  

So this year I'm looking for blog challenges- if you know of any please let me know in the comments.  I'm going to be participating for sure in the A-Z challenge.  It'll be art related; I'm not 100% sure what I'm going to be doing on this blog- but on my Art Blog I'm going to be creating an Alphabet Book and posting one page a day- at the end of April I'll be publishing it to amazon e-books if anyone wants to purchase it.  If I can make enough money that way I'll look into what it takes to publish it physically.  I'm still playing with ideas for a theme- but since my kids and I are fantasy nuts it'll probably be fairy-tale-ish.  We'll see.  That also is going to have a section in my notebook pretty soon.  

That concludes my random assortment of thoughts.  

~Nikkie