{25} define me

i bought a dictionary for 25 cents at the thrift store earlier this week and i hope to get good use out of it! i began with this. i found words in the dictionary that defined me for each letter of my name. then i highlighted them and drew the letter around that word. again, i like things a little messy and not perfect, so it is free-handed and full of scribbles but i enjoy fast projects. there will be days again when i can devote hours to a creation but that day was not today! :)

{24} cereal box

i was totally inspired yesterday by this blog (http://rebecca-365daysoflove.blogspot.com/). she is also doing a 365-day project and i love (pardon the pun) that we are both doing words every single day. her creations are way more impressive than mine but she has inspired me to get more creative and work a little harder at what i'm doing. i'm definitely going to follow her progress!

so, i saw how in one of her posts she created these pop-outs from a cereal box so i dumped out my fibre one and ripped apart the box. then i just folded the box in on itself, grabbed my x-acto knife and started slicing. it went really fast (i'm less about perfection than getting the task done) but i do enjoy the result.

the question now is, do i keep these things? i mean, some of them are dispensable but would i keep something like this? i'm saying 'no' because what would i do with it? maybe if i knew someone named 'lauren' i would gift all this over to her but i think i'll just chuck 'em. :)

{23} lipstick on the mirror

first, i actually had to see if i owned any lipstick. i don't do lipstick. it just does not work for me. but i liked the idea of writing with it on the mirror in the bathroom. of course, then i remembered that i must have lipstick because how else did i do the post called "39 kisses"?

today was a weird day. it was a good day except for the fact that i totally wiped out on the ice on the sidewalk outside of my house. b-rutal. plus, there were three neighbors on the sidewalk at that time and they all saw me go down. i just laughed and said i was fine but as soon as i got inside and shut the door i went "owwwwwwww". my tailbone is totally bruised. in fact, it made me so upset that i went and bought candy to make myself feel better! no! what about the post yesterday about fitness and motivation? well, this was a test. and i failed. i guess that's why i will get up tomorrow and start all over again and remind myself how strong i am and that i do have willpower. i lost 75 pounds for sh*t's sake. i can do this!

back to the task at hand (i jazzed up the picture by upping the contrast by 300% in PS):

{22} fitness

i've got fitness on my mind. on the weekend, my friends erin, carrie and i decided that we would sign up for the manitoba marathon in june! yoiks! not the full marathon or anything crazy like that, but still, it's definitely a goal to work towards. i'm really excited about it. so, today i ran 1.7 miles in 30 minutes. not great but not horrible for just starting out. i figure we have 16 weeks to train so i will improve by then. i just want to have the endurance, you know? if i walk the entire thing, that's great, just as long as i can last through it all!

{21} paperclips

well, this didn't turn out exactly the way i had planned. it was originally supposed to be embroidery thread wrapped around the letters of my name but i couldn't figure out how to do that properly. so, that might have to be a project for another day (only 344 to go!).

i used 24 paperclips and bent them in various ways to make the letters of my name. they are held together with little strips of scotch tape! then i realized i didn't know how to display them because they were white (which i originally had thought would be totally advantageous). i tried hanging them in the window but after looking at the picture i realized you couldn't see them. i do want to do a camouflauge day but today was not supposed to be that day! so, i ripped off the artwork from my dining room wall, strung the letters from my empty frame and placed the frame back on the wall.

of course that totally prompted a re-organiztaion of my artwork so what was in the kitchen is now in the dining room and what was in the dining room is packed away and one of my pieces that was packed away is now in the kitchen. just keeping it real.

{20} credit card

yeah, maybe i shouldn't post a picture of my name on my credit card but i really don't see why not. that's because i had to cut it up as soon as the picture was taken. my credit card number was totally stolen! for reals. that's wild. so, i had a call from the credit card company and they said they saw some suspicious transactions trying to be processed so they cancelled my card (hence why i wasn't able to use it recently!) and called me to tell me about it. i'm just glad that they monitor my account and have now placed a warning flag on it. that's just totally wild. never had that happen to me before.

{19} nail polish

nearly three weeks in! i thought writing my name on my fingernails would be tougher than it actually was. but, it wasn't. first i gave myself a nice little manicure and got rid of those awful cuticles that winter tends to produce.

hey, did you know that an anagram of "lauren" is "unreal"? i can't believe i've lived 30 years without knowing that. i think that i need to start incorporating that a lot more in my life because it is totally awesome.

{18} george

consider this day to be one of the laziest creations. actually i consider anything that i create on the computer to be "lazy" just because i'd rather use my hands to be creative than use a mouse. plus, i'm totally not stoked about how this turned out. i actually doubt that i will ever like any of my computer creations, but some days i know i must use the computer instead.

anyway, here is my sweet pup george. he is just the best thing in my life. he makes me laugh and smile every day and just fills me with general happiness and glee. i love him so super much.

{17} books on a "shelf"

i'm sure i'll use books again at some point but i loved this idea. i at first tried to line up the books like this on  my actual book shelf but it proved to be much too much too small so i had to create a "shelf" on the floor. actually i had to do it twice. at first i got all the way up to "laure" and then i ran out of wall space for the "n" so i had to move everything to a new wall! and then george went up to the books to sniff them and i panicked that my precariously placed "a" and "r" books would topple over! fortunately, they stayed in place.

i know that some of these authors are going to roll in their graves (so to speak, because some of them are still alive) because i placed them next to books that they do not want to be associated with but...whatev. these are the books i have read and the ones displayed on my shelves.

they are: apollo 13, harry potter and the half blood prince, the bourne identity, shopaholic & baby, shopaholic & sister, the wizard of oz, sisterhood everlasting, seinlanguage, committed, mini-shopaholic (sense a theme?), wicked, confessions of an ugly stepsister, slammerkin, the girl and the dragon tatoo, eats shoots and leaves, persuasion, the night circus, bossypants, everyone worth knowing, to kill a mockingbird, irma voth, goin' deep, fever pitch and dispatches from the edge.

(i've decided to try to include a picture of myself as often as i can along with my name. either creating it or with the medium used.)

{16} sign language

this was actually one of my first ideas written down...to do my name in sign language. oh, please tell me that i got the letters correct and that they are facing the right way!

when i was a tween, my friend renae and i learned how to do the alphabet in sign language and i remember that we would sit next to each other in church and "talk" to each other throughout the whole service in sign language! of course, that brings me to my next memory when we got in SO MUCH TROUBLE because our moms could see us mis-behaving from across the church and my mom came all the way over to us and told us to "smarten up!". yup, definitely one of my most embarassing moments ever.

i'd love to be able to communicate in sign language so that i could work with deaf people, and especially deaf children. i'd love to be able to do that type of charitable work. if only there was a sign language class available to take here in steinbach. maybe some day there will be!

{15} snow

i have a sneaking suspicion that i will use snow as a medium again sometime but in a different way so i will leave this post's name just that vague.

the good news is that it has been so warm again lately that i've started running again! yeah! i started running in the fall of 2009 but after injuring myself quite badly in florida while on a run, i have found it hard to get back in the habit. i tried running a bit last summer but now that 75 pounds are off my frame, it's easier than it used to be. so, little by little, i'm building up my endurance. maybe by the time "real" spring comes, i'll be much better at it. i still have dreams of doing a marathon some day.

today's name comes courtesy of my back yard and a stick. woohoo. george and i were playing with his ball in the backyard and there wasn't a lot of snow that was still untouched but i found just this little nook of smooth snow. unfortunately the shadow from the fence is casting a strange glow...actually creating the letters and then hanging them from a tree branch or from the fence and taking a picture of my name in shadow is a fantastic idea. notebook!

curious george and the balloon

this is seriously the cutest thing ever. i had this small balloon and i put it over the register and because of the constant air movement, the balloon stayed afloat in the air. and then george wanted to play with the balloon. *gosh, he is the cutest.

{14} conversation hearts

happy valentine's day! i shall eat myself silly with candy today (well, after my freezing wears off from THREE fillings i had this morning...probably the result of indulging on candy last year on valentine's day). c'est la vie.

conversation hearts are my second favourite candy. my first favourite candy is banana marshmallows. they are my equivalent to drugs. or alcohol. i was addicted. i have not had one now since sometime in 2010 and my hips are probably thankful for that. i really have not had much candy but when i saw this bag of conversation hearts at the store, i couldn't resist. i just went and bought them. bad, lauren! bad! oh, well. i'll be better tomorrow.

oh, and let me please address the fact that some people think it's funny to say to me "happy national single awareness day". now, don't get me wrong, i love being single. i really do. i love the independence and lack of drama that comes along with not being attached to someone. so, because of this, i do not like if people think that i'm at home today moping and crying and overeating on chocolate (even though i am planning on overeating on conversation hearts). because i'm not. this is the life that was laid out for me and i'm okay with that. if you're in a relationship and you're happy, then good on you! really, i think that's admirable. but, people who are single can be equally as happy too.

oh, i should show the picture(s) now:

{13} blue bombers memorabilia

looking around the house for something nearby that would inspire a different medium, i gravitated towards some of my memorabilia. it started out easy enough...the rally towel, the lanyard, the pins and badges. but then it got tough because i have a lot of larger items like caps and helmets and books and posters but those were going to be too big. so, i had to get creative in my layout!

of course, curious george was ever present and he was upset that he was not allowed to steal away the "car dice" from the "R" and chew on them. so, he chose instead to lie down and furiously pout while i finished laying out the letters and taking a picture.

side note: *sigh. i accidentally typed the title as "{234}" and that made me wistful for the day when i can actually type that in!

{12} wordsearch

you know i have this list of 70 ideas i made myself, plus i have my book to spurn creativity and yet i sat for the longest time this morning frustrated because i couldn't come up with any ideas i was totally passionate about. so, i was quite relieved when i thought of the wordsearch idea and decided to go for it. i just made it using an online wordsearch creator. at first it didn't like that all the words were the same (ie. "lauren") so then i started calling each word something different (e.g. laurena, laurenb, laurenc) and then the creator liked that better.

{11} badges

a few days ago my mom uncovered this ice cream pail full with badges that my brother had collected in his childhood. there were so many awesome ones like from the Expo '86 in Montreal, Curling badges from the mid-60s that my dad earned, Smurf Ice Capades or some vintage Superman ones. they were so much fun to sort through and then my mom suggested that i use the badges for my medium today and i thought it was a great idea too. my mom has been super supportive with this project and is coming up with more and more ideas on a daily basis. between her and my "365 days of creativity" book, i feel pretty confident that i can complete this project.

george's involvement: i had finally laid out the "LAUR" and george heard a noise at the door and went racing THROUGH all the badges i had just finished laying out. they were a mess. i had to actually start from scratch again. then he just wanted to be fully involved again so i had to try to keep him distracted but still close to me that i could supervise him from messing anything up. :)

{10} shoes

i don't even have all my shoes at home! i have 4 or 5 pairs still at work and if i'd known i was going to do this project today, i would've brought them home. oh, well. i do love my flats. there are only two pairs of kitten heels and one pair of actual heels in this bunch and i never wear any of them. i'm short. why pretend i'm not short?

oh, and can i just say how thankful i am to have an even number of letters in my name to make it easier to spell it out in a 2x3 format? oh, the frustration i would have if my name had 5 or 7 letters. grrr. this makes life so much simpler. it's like my parents knew i would do this project one day so they were looking out for me.

ten days in! so far, so good!

{9} facebook

well, i wanted to create something on the computer today. so, tried. it did not look good. definitely not worthy of using for only day 9 of this project. maybe on day 217, i would go "yes. ugly, but it's something." but, i'm not willing to give in quite yet.

so, today's name comes from my facebook page. everyone else's facebook profiles seem to be updated to this new fandangled timeline view (or whatever it's called) but mine is still old school. fine by me. it takes forever to load those other views anyway. i still do love me some facebook. i log on at least once per day. ususally in the evening but i've been known to surf over my lunch break at home or even before work in the morning. i love staying connected with people that i may not get to see in person as often. it's such a wonderful tool and i love social networking.

vintage buttons

will my button collection make me a millionaire? not likely. but today i had an extraordinary haul of interesting buttons from the local mcc. i love the ones with the family crests on them. i just wish i had a way of discovering their significances. i guess i have some googling ahead in my future. but for now, i will share these few favourites.

i love buttons!

{8} sweetener

is it sweetner or sweetener? i mess that one up all the time. i like "en" in the middle of the word, so i shall run with that.

this is my life. i cannot have any sugar. really, i shouldn't have sweetener either but i could only take that for so long. from march 15, 2011 until november 27, 2011 i did not eat sugar in any form in any instance at any time. ever. never a single tiny little morsel of cheat. beyond that, i did not eat any form of yeast, dairy or gluten either. how did i manage that? now that i've introduced those foods slightly back in my diet, it's been nearly impossible to avoid them again. i'm trying, though. at least during those 8.5 months i lost the 75 pounds i needed to get off my frame and get out of the severe obese-obese-overweight range until i hit a normal weight a mere 6 days before my 30th birthday.

wow, overshare on the 365-project. anyway, here i am. sugar-free but still sweet.

{7} 39 kisses

gee, i sure hope no one was peering through the window as i made this one...it must've looked ridiculous. i kept on kissing the paper, reapplying lipstick and kissing it again. it's my homage to sephora (although i'm sure i'll have another homage to sephora again later on).  only 358 more to go.

pyrex love

yay! i got a beautiful extra large canary yellow pyrex bowl at the mcc today (plus, another jar of buttons). so, i was prompted to set up a photo shoot with my small pyrex collection. i'm working on building it up!!

{6} ode to tim hortons

i've been known to drink my fair share of tim hortons' coffee. i'm addicted. if i can't get one on the way to work, i text one of my co-workers to go get one for me on their way to work. i used to take my coffee with one milk and two sugar but since i've had my lifestyle change, i've been drinking it with three sweetener (it started off as one, but i've worked my way up to three!).

so, i took three old cups and cut out the letters of my name from the cups and then placed them in an honour-ring around my beloved large (formerly extra-large) coffee. yum.

ps. only after uploading my photo did i notice that i placed the letters to my name in a counter-clockwise fashion! why would i do that?! oh, well. mistakes make us human.

{5} hand-stitched

i started making a baby quilt way back in early 2002 when my sister-in-law was pregnant but, of course, i never finished it. so i grabbed that fabric, stretched a semi-solid piece of white fabric across my embroidery hoop (i have many!) and started stitching my name. it took a lot longer than i was prepared for and my stitches on the "L" started off quite small but then i saw that was going to be absurd, so i started to lengthen my stitches. i was quite happy when i finished it!

{4} hand shapes

slightly more complicated--and painful! my hands were forced into some uncomfortable shapes to make these letter shapes. the "n" was the toughest and i couldn't keep my hands still so that one came out a little blurry. then i compiled them together in photoshop and put them in black and white because the colouring varied in each picture so much. i did not have much patience to make sure the lighting was perfect.

{3} ransom letters

grabbed the nearest copy of "EW" magazine and quickly snipped out some letters. then they are stuck to some old kraft paper that i use as a table protector for when i'm painting.

Project: {365Names} -- Part Two

I'm super stoked about the project and to share my creations.
So, it is day two of creations. I won't say what I've done but I'm pretty darn pleased at its fun-ness quotient so far and the fact that neither project has taken more than 5 minutes to create. i trust that there will be projects that take much longer but for now I'm good.

Now, what is the purpose and goal of the project?
1. I want to stick with a project for more than a month or two. I want this to keep on going and not get frustrated if I miss a few days here and there. I'm trying to be focused on the end product which will be my name in 365 different forms.

2. I'm sort of hoping that once I've picked up some momentum (maybe after 1 or 2 months) that I'll make a link on my facebook so that people are aware of the project. Then I'm anticipating that people will send me there own pictures of my name that they've seen and I'll be able to include those as well! Wouldn't that be neat?

3. Expand my creativity beyond sorting buttons, pinning things on Pinterest and scrapbooking 5 times per year. I'm a creative person, and I want to have this small moment each day where I get to do a quick project that's based on a theme.

I don't know what tomorrow's creation will be, but I'm totally excited about it!

{2} milkbones

george was super curious wondering what i was doing dumping out his milkbone box onto the floor. i must admit that he did sneak several treats away and i kept on having to replace them to keep the letters in tact. eventually i had to tell him to 'wait' so i could snap a picture and then he had fun pushing the bones around again.

just happens that the long frame i have in my dining area has six rectangles which is perfect for displaying the letters of my name. i hope to use it several times over during the course of this project.

{1} stick people

super quick project. quickly drew up some stick people posing as the letters of my name. some of them had to have unhappy faces becaue those poses looked downright uncomfortable.

Project: {365Names}

Well, yesterday I saw this book about creating something every day for one year. Now, I've tried this idea plenty of times before--the photo-a-day, blog-a-day, drawing-a-day, journal-a-day--but nothing has ever stuck longer than 20 days. But, I became inspired. So, I've asked my good friend Cara to come along on this journey with me. Starting tomorrow, we will both be creating something every day. My chosen theme for the year (or until I run out of ideas, get frustrated, or just don't want to anymore) will be...my name.

I've always had an interesting relationship with my name. Though I was gifted the name "Lauren" at birth, by the age of 4 I declared I didn't like it and wanted to only be called "Laurie". And, so it was. That's how it was throughout my childhood, teenage years and work experiences. Then it changed.

In September 2005, I began college studying creative communications and I wanted my name to change. So, when in my very first advertising class, my professor asked if I wanted to be "Laurie" or "Lauren", I hesitated and then declared "Lauren". And, so it was. But, now I was left with all my family and friends who only knew me as "Laurie" to contend with. It was a difficult transition and I do not request that any of them call me "Lauren"...that's too strange. However, I introduce myself as "Lauren" and address myself as "Lauren".

It's a confusing relationship. If I'm talking with Erin or Korine, I know I'm "Laurie". But, if I'm talking with Karen or Brant, I know I'm "Lauren". Elijah and Emma call me "Auntie Laurie" and yet if I ask them my name they respond with "Lauren". Confused, yet?

Hence this project. Let it be known that I love the name Lauren. It's my name, and I think I'll keep it.