what's in my bag?

the other day at work, I had a balsamic vinegar spill in my bag :/

interestingly, this is not the first one.

this forced me to take all the contents out of my bag and I thought "hmm maybe I'll blog about this."

so here it is, what' I'm carrying around...

1. a gym card. even though I do like working on my fitness, that's not even my card...

2. burt's bees chapstick. there is no other chapstick that I use. all chapsticks are inferior to burt's bees.

3. a black ipod classic on loan from mon pere.

4. a spoon and a fork. I don't normally carry utensils, however I needed them to eat my lunch that day.

5. my wayfarer's. can't live in arizona without sunglasses.

6. my moleskine planner. that thing is definitely with me, at all times. sadly you can see the balsalmic stains on the pages :/

7. french grammar notecards. I like to get my study on :)

8. a pen, so that I can mark my super important things in my super important planner.

9. earrings that I was wearing, but got sick of wearing, so I put them in my bag.

10. bobby pins because, who likes wearing their hair down? not me.

11. 2 pennies...as you can see, I'm loaded.

what do you make sure you are always carrying?

enjoi

how to climb a tree, by little e

after seeing kung fu panda 2 with my niece, I was hoping to take a good picture of us by the poster.

not a chance. when you are working with a very inexperienced photographer and a child who just wants to climb a tree, you just have to go and do what she wants.

step one [I like the exertion you can see on her face]

step two

step three

that was about as high as she could go since I'm not that tall, but it's still a lot high than she could have gone on her own.

enjoi!

summer flicks...

since it is miserably hot in arizona in the summer, a popular activity is going to the movies.

and I'll tell you, I've been to lots of movies lately.

my thoughts on the many movies I've seen lately...

fast five-the first movie I saw in theaters since being home. I went with my family as the rock [oops, I mean dwayne johnson] and vin diesel are my dad's favorite actors. it was cool to see brazil, but it wasn't too different than the other ones. it was rather odd, on the drive home it felt as though we were driving ridiculously slow.

kung fu panda 2- I felt it was a good sequel. I got a little sad, but at the end they throw you a surprise to make you happy again! I especially loved seeing the baozi :)

x-men ___-I put the blank because I don't know which number it was in the x-men movie phenomenon. I thought it was cool to kinda see what made certain things happen; for example, why dr.x was in a wheelchair. I don't think I'd see it again, but I'm glad I saw it once.

rio-I honestly thought that I would have seen this movie sooner than I did, as my brother served his mission in rio de janerio. eitherway, I did see it and I loved it! the music was very good and I now have the travel bug to go to brazil.

midnight in paris-this movie was so dang good, and not just because it was made in the best city in the world. I enjoyed the storyline and the moral of it, something that I have been working on myself. ofcourse it was great to see my city, but what was cool to me was that it would show a random street corner or metro stop that would just make me smile.

so there we have it folks, the movies of the summer. I'm sure there will be more coming, so stay tuned!

enjoi! [and go see some movies]

branching out...

a bit ago I enjoyed a visit from various members of my family, including my little niece. 

when I visited her in boston, I asked what I should learn to make out of paper.

she replied, a kitty.

the internet is a fascinating thing.

one google search led me right to the video that taught me how to make her wish come true:)

origami kitty

the only way to get her to stand still for the picture was to let her do this pose.

I love it.

enjoi!

in my france, there'd be peanut butter

I think my favorite candy of all-time is reese's, which made living in france kinda sad.

apparently france doesn't believe in peanut butter. 

however, when life hands you lemons, make lemonade.

alors, when you live in france, find african peanut butter and make some reese's peanut butter cups.

aww...how cute.

recently I have been introduced to dark chocolate reese's peanut butter cups, and they pretty much rocked my world.

oh france, if only you knew what you were missing.

enjoi!

stow-a-way

once upon a time, I went to a high school baseball game...and I got bored.

ok, so that's not a "once upon a time" occurrence, more like an all the time occurrence, so I usually bring a book and a fountain drink and work on my tan. right after I learned how to make cranes I was at a game and asked my mom's friend if she had a piece of paper I could use. she had a small piece of lined paper and I made a small crane. probably the second crane I ever made...and I thought I lost it. then I went to work and I found the crane.

there he was, hiding in life of pi, just waiting to be found :)

still reading life of pi...review to come.

enjoi!
p.s. this means I'm 1/40th of the way to 1,000...

what's that little bird?

on sunday, two little cranes told me something great...

this weekend is stake conference, a special meeting for church, and we are having a special guest by the name of elder d. todd christofferson.

can I just say that I'm super excited?

I'm very excited :)

enjoi! 

a bit neglectful....

I have been neglectful of my blog...

is neglectful even a word?

eitherway, I have not been giving proper attention to this blog.

why?

1. I have been SUPER busy...work, family, the likes. 

2. I can't find the charger for my camera battery...alors, no new photos...and who wants to just read a blog. I sure don't. 

so while I search for my camera battery, I'll show you some crane things I've seen lately, that I love.

this is like the best necklace I've ever seen in my life...I will be the owner of it, someday:)

I do not know this couple, but I think they're pretty rad. my friend gabi showed me this and I thought, wow, this is like the coolest ever. if you'd like to see more this is the link.

so just be patient. I'll find the charger soon and load you up with all the wonderful things that have been my life :)

enjoi!

it's ok, you can just take the cookies

today I went to work like I do everyday. one of my co-workers started talking about paradise bakery and how much she loves their salads...so I start thinking about paradise. pretty much the only thing I think of when I think of paradise is their cookies and naturally I start thinking about how I want to eat their cookies...and I think about this for the next four hours that I'm at work. you better believe when I finished the first place I went was paradise.

I walked in while chatting on my phone and ordered 2 coconut chocolate chip cookies. the girl bagged up my cookies and I reached in my sac and pulled out a handful of change; last I checked it was still a form of currency. I started to separate out the quarters when the girl said "it's ok, you can just take the cookies."

I was a bit confused at first for a couple reasons; one, I was talking on the phone and in a conversation, two, I was counting out money and trying to figure out how much the tax would be since it wasn't already figured into the price, and three because my blood sugar was pretty low and I get spacey when I haven't eaten in a while. I finally came around and thanked her, thinking "oh man, this is so great!"

I love when people are just randomly nice and do nice things!

I would have photographed the cranes with the cookies, but you better believe I scarfed those things the second I got in my car. they were delicious.

enjoi!

oh yeah, I live in america.

on my way home from the gym, I checked the mail.

every once in a while, there's a little somethin' somethin' for your's truly.

today was one of those days :)

I looked down at the envelope and thought, "wow, something is weird about that stamp. why would they use an international stamp on me?"

then it hit me folks. I don't live in france anymore. I'm very much aware of that...it's just sometimes the little things get me.

enjoi!

afternoons...

people always ask...

are you a morning or night person?

no one ever asks...

are you an afternoon person?

I feel that I am not an afternoon person. I don't know if anyone really is, otherwise I think people would ask that more. since getting back from boston, I have fallen into a sort of pattern. I wake up in the morning and I go to the gym and work on my fitness. in the evenings, I go to work. usually my afternoons are full of...well just whatever. usually it was cleaning my room. however, today with my room being clean that left me with sometime. I saw this do-it-yourself project at honestly...wtf and decided that I would do it today.

not bad for a little afternoon project?

stay tuned...I'm feelin' crafty and I've got more cranes up my sleeve!

enjoi!

nostalgia...what a way to hold up saturday cleaning

so I am many things and one of them is a pack-rat. I seriously hold on to like everything. however, I am also a pretty organized person, so I try to keep all of my things in a very organized manner. I think I pretty much have every letter, card, or note I have been given since the age of 13. I would just throw them into the bottom drawer of my jewelry box. one day I came across this and knew something needed to be done. I didn't want to throw away these messages of encouragement, but I couldn't just have them taking over valuable jewelry box space. I found a scrapbook that just had blank pages on it without page covers, so I bought it and started pasting in the cards and envelopes to hold my letters. today while cleaning my room, I kept finding random notes or cards from either before my mission or after, so I thought it was time to update the book...which lead to my reading the book. probably the greatest note I found was one I had written to myself, probably in young women's around the age of 13. it reads:
dear me,
hey self. yeah, right. just do better with school. and boys. goodness they're hard to figure out.  remember when everything was so clear? screw it all just READ YOUR SCRIPTURES!!!
<3 me
gotta love how really...nothing has changed :)

ofcourse I had to make a little crane for this photo shoot. he's made out of an envelope from a letter I recently received. I realize there are lots of habits I have that some might think I got from my mission, but I had them long before. one being a love of writing letters. so, you want to write me letters, I guarantee you something cool in return.

enjoi!

recent fails

I used to read  fail blog from time to time because let's face it, some of those fails are pretty funny. however, this last week I did quite a bit of failing myself...

exhibit a.

one might say that taking a picture of yourself at the end of the day is a failure in itself, but that my friends is not the fail. the fail comes in the form of the harry potter glasses that I so eagerly awaited. voila. they finally arrived and I tried them on to discover they were poorly made and are a bit lopsided...it is rather unfortunate. I'll probably keep them anyway.

exhibit b.

the only crane I made while in boston...and basically the only picture I took in boston. as I was packing my sister mentioned this fail and how I could have found cool maps of the places I'd been in boston and made cranes out of them. what can I say, my vacationing skills are not what they used to be.

exhibit c.

every sunday i sit down and make goals for my week. [just so everyone is aware, I did that before my mission. thanks] neanmoins, this week for some reason I decided to make the goal of no sugar. why I was possessed to make that goal the week after easter is beyond me...especially with reese's bunnies and coconut hershey kisses! I didn't even know they made coconut hershey kisses, or that I was such a fan of coconut.

so there we have it folks, my weekly acts that can be called "fails."

enjoi! [and don't mimic this behavior.]

my cranes like to fly!

this week I went on a trip to boston.

on the way there I mainly read harry potter and the sorcerer's stone.

but I did manage to make a crane!

and I learned that napkins are not the best material for cranes...

on the way back I saw a pamphlet for a southwest credit card and decided to make cranes with it.

after all, this trip was made possible by southwest rapid reward points :)

so I made the cranes and was taking their picture when a lady across the aisle leaned over and said "excuse me, did you just make those?"

I replied yes, because I had.

then she said "well those are really beautiful."

how lovely :)

enjoi!

sunday will come

in the spirit of easter,

I have decided to post this message.

it is by far, one of my favorite talks of all time.
on my mission, I learned a lot about the resurrection
and just how grateful I am for it.

you can read the whole message here

happy easter!

enjoi!

sabbath cranes

I don't know if this is just me...but sometimes I feel my mind going in so many directions at once that I need to do something to focus it...and that happens most at church. I know, that is like the worst place, but sometimes it happens and I just need to do a little origami to focus my mind on something and I can listen :)

these are the two from last week.  how precious!

this little guy is not because my mind was going all over, but because I was taking notes on a post-it and I kept messing up so I started a new one and made a crane out of the old one. he's posing with my new scripture case, an old clinique free gift give away. I saw a sister in the mtc doing that and thought she was quite clever, so I used it yesterday and so many people asked about it.

enjoi!

ma chère macclaine

I've already given this girlie, macclaine a shout out before, but I'm going to give her another one.

check us out in the tuileries gardens! anyway, my birthday is in january and for my last birthday I had a joint p-day celebration complete with hot chocolate and cakes at angelina's! soeur macclaine surprised me with a present, origami paper! I was so excited!!!!! when I first learned how to make the cranes, I decided to make a crane out of each of the colors of the colorful pack! et voila!

how precious?! all just chillin' in the cup! the blue crane was my VERY first crane EVER! so I don't know why I didn't start with this post...oh well, it's all good! 

enjoi!

my love of moleskine

I don't know if there is a brand that I love more than moleskine. they are just so classy and quality. while I was living in france I went through a moleskine journal [a red one] and had to get a new one [peanuts limited edition :)] and obviously had to buy the paris travel journal...and when I saw that the 2011 planners were half-off right before coming home, that was a necessity...and the beautiful moleskine cahiers for my studies...very much needed :) the point of all of this, is that I love moleskines. inside each moleskine is a little pamphlet that tells you of the history of the company. I found an extra one I had and decided to use it to make a mamma crane and a baby crane. how cute!

enjoi!

umm, yes please!

yesterday I had the wonderful opportunity to hang out with one of my oldest friends [& first follower of this blog I might add] and catch up on some movies that I missed. ofcourse the first one that we watched was harry potter and the deathly hollows [part one] which made me realize how much I had forgotten about the magical wizarding world. so, along with making 1,000 paper cranes, I will also be re-reading the harry potter books :) I don't think it will take me that long...maybe 7 weeks? pas mal...neanmoins, this morning I was thinking about how I can't find my harry potter glasses anywhere and hopped on the ever trusty amazon.com and looked for new glasses and sure enough, there were many...and the easter bunny told me I could order them, so later this week I will receive my harry potter glasses that I will sport to the midnight showing of the final harry potter movie [I don't know what they are calling it...]

enjoi!

galler chocolate

one day on my mission, I was with my very good friend sister macclaine. she asked me if I had ever tried galler chocolate, and I responded that I had not. her eyes got big and she told me that I had to try it, that it was the greatest chocolate in the world. she offered me a bar, I don't know which flavor, but that is not important. what is important, is that she was right. it is the best chocolate in the world.

that's 59 bars of galler chocolate goodness that I bought on an exchange in brussels right before I came home. my favorite is noix de coco [coconut]. I was telling my sister how I didn't know how I could go on with life knowing that this chocolate was only sold in belgium and I didn't live in belgium when she informed me that nowadays you can find just about anything on amazon.com. I decided this morning to check it out, and sure enough galler chocolate is most certainly on amazon.com. 

enjoi! [and order some galler]

my favorite dinner :)

my mother makes the greatest stuffed shells on the planet. the thoughts of eating these often occupied my dreams while I was away and I'm so grateful that she made them for me tonight :)

aren't they beautiful!? don't you wish you had a wonderful mother that would make them for you?! I decided to take the label off of one of the spaghetti sauce bottles and use it to make a crane!

labels from bottles or cans are easy to use UNLESS they have a sticky back. this label did, so I stuck it to a piece of paper and cut the edges. very simple :)

[notice how the plates are different colors...they are so good that I had to go back for seconds!]

enjoi!

don't throw it out-fold it up!

another book...I know. I recently got back from serving an 18 month mission for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Paris, France [don't worry if you forget...Im sure I'll mention it every now and then ;)] anyway, at the end of my mission, a lot of people asked me what my plans were for my life after the mission and I always responded origami. upon returning home, I was in borders with my brothers and sister-in-law and I was determined to find an origami book that was cheap. my sister-in-law found me this book, trash origami. it shows you how to take items that you are going to throw away and turn them into origami projects! how nifty! so, as you will and probably have noticed, a lot of my cranes are made from materials already used. I feel that makes it so that each of my 1,000 cranes has more of a story than just something I made this summer because I wanted a fun hobby.

enjoi!

it all started with a book...

as a child, I liked to read. I would read anything and everything. randomly I will have memories of stories I read, but unable to name the book. I think I was in 4th grade and I read this book about a little girl who became ill from the effects of the nuclear bomb dropped in japan during world war ii. there is a japanese legend saying that if you make one thousand paper cranes, that you will be granted the wish of your heart. I have always wanted to get into origami since my 5th grade japanese day, so this summer I will be making one thousand paper cranes. not because I am ill from radiation, but because I want to, so I will take you through that process with this here blog.

enjoi!