reminiscing

It has been awhile since summer has parted and autumn has made it's debut, but no matter how long it's been I'm still having troubles saying goodbye. This summer was filled with long, care-free days of wearing no makeup, staying up well past midnight, and sleeping in far past noon, and although I honestly love every little thing autumn has to offer, I'm stuck reminiscing over some of this summers greatest memories.

There are plenty of wonderful memories that won't be forgotten, and although I'm sad that summer has ended, I know that summer 2012 will be here before I know it, and it will be a fabulous summer that will include many more long, care-free days of wearing no makeup, staying up well past midnight, sleeping in far past noon, and even a trip to New York City to celebrate my Sweet Sixteen! Oh yes, summer 2012 will surely do me good.

Until then I'll just enjoy these fabulous, crisp, fall days.

What about you? What are you looking forward to?

how time flies!

 I took a trip through memory lane last Friday night by going back to my first post, and reading all the way up until my last post. Having all of these memories safely tucked away in one place is truly incredible, and I can only imagine the happiness I'll feel while reading them when I'm 34 and have been blogging for 20 years.





After about an hour of reading I came across this post and almost instantly had tears welling up in my eyes. Wasn't it just a couple of days ago that I was counting down the days to summer vacation? 65, 64, 63, 62, 61... I remember mentally crossing each day off of the calendar and getting so excited when there was only one month left.

And now it's November 4th. We've been back in school for nearly two months, and I'm almost positive that Christmas, New Years, Spring Break, and Summer 2012 will all be over before we know it, and that saddens me.

I want time to slow down, and I want each and every day to mean something. So please, let's stop the clock and relax. I'm in no rush!

fall in photos

More to come. 

Happy Sunday to You, You, and You! 

the weekend

After 5 very long days of rising before the sun, dragging my stuff from class to class, pushing my way through the crowded hallways, coming home to do nothing but homework, then going to bed and repeating it all over again, the weekend has finally come. I'm fairly certain that it couldn't be any more welcome than it already is!

Weekends are for babysitting, spending endless hours on the computer, hanging out with friends, sleeping, drinking hot chocolate, snuggling in a warm bed with a good book, and most importantly, catching up and winding down.

This is what my weekend consists of, but what about yours? 

click it up a notch picture share | october

Slight change of titles this month, but still the same thing as always! It's (already) that time of month again over at Click It Up a Notch! My favourite this month:

-Hope

life can suck

I'm not the kind of person to complain about meaningless things such as fights with friends or a bad grade on a test because I know those things will blow over and I know that everything will be better soon. However, my grandma had a stroke yesterday and I guess you could say that I'm upset. 

First off, she's fine. She's at home safe and sound with my favourite auntie who will no doubt take very, very good care of her, but I'm still left shocked and saddened. Wasn't it just over a year ago when she was in the hospital for a quintuple bi-pass open heart surgery? 

The thing that hurts me most is that she does not deserve this whatsoever! She eats properly, exercises regularly and is the healthiest woman I know, so why do things like this keep happening to her? Between losing her husband to cancer, having a quintuple pi-pass open heart surgery, and a stroke, hasn't she had enough!? And even worse is that she'll beat herself up over it because she feels like she hasn't done enough to keep healthy and stay fit. 

I just hope that these kind of things would stop happening to our family, because honestly, it's really starting to stress not only me, but everyone else out, and it can suck, but such is life and we'll move on.

-Hope

subway art tutorial

I posted a picture of a personalized present I made a friend for his birthday on my flickr, and a couple of people asked for a tutorial, so here it is!

What You'll Need:

- A Blank Canvas (I think mine was 18" x 24", but you can use whatever size you would like)

- White Spray Paint

- Black Spray Paint

- Letter Stickers (I actually used a Cricut Personal Electronic Cutting Machine with vinyl paper, but stickers would probably work just as well- as long as it's adhesive)

Instructions:

1. Take your canvas and spray paint it white. I know the canvas is already white, but over time it will start to fade and turn yellow, so I spray painted it just in case!

2. Plan what kind of theme you would like to make- mine was Taylor Swift song titles, but you could do anything that interests you or the person you're making this for. 

3. Take your stickers and arrange them on the canvas however you would like. It looks a lot cooler if you use different fonts and sizes, but like I said, it's all up to you!

4. Once you have all of your letters laid out, take the canvas outside and paint with a thin layer of black spray paint. Paint it with thin layers over and over again until it's completely black. It's important that you do many thin layers instead of one thick one because you don't want to create bubbles and make it messy looking.

5. Read the label on your spray paint and wait the suggested time until the paint dries.

6. After it has dried, carefully peel off the stickers.

7. If a bit of spray paint has sneaked underneath the stickers you can just take some white acrylic paint and a paintbrush and carefully fix the little mistakes.

8. You're done! The finished product should look a little something like this:

If any of you decide to try this out I would love to see your results, so make sure to leave a link in a comment so I can check it out! :) 

-Hope

chloe & annika

I had a sleepover last night with my two favourite twins, and this morning, before I left, I so kindly asked kinda forced them into having a quick little photo-shoot with me, and I'm so glad I did because I really really love how well some of these pictures turned out! :)

Annika:

Chloe:

Any favourites? :)

-Hope