Inside Kimmy's Mind

I’ve been having that itch to do something creative. Whether it be painting, photography, writing…just something.  And like I mentioned a bit in my Happy post, I am attempting some casual cosplay.

I’ve attempted cosplay before but I wasn’t very good at it.  My main problem is finishing the full outfit. I always start way too late and then never finish it. This time for Anime Matsuri, when Matt suggested we dress up, I immediately went to Rogue and Gambit. I thought, what could be easier? These outfits would be great to casual cosplay. And I managed to find pieces rather easily, they all fell into place, I ordered most of the items. Finding green pants was harder than I thought it would be though and I managed to find some at Macy’s, however I did not like how they looked. I decided to chance ordering some green jeggings on Amazon and they’re great! Comfy too! So I’m excited. I just now need to embellish the shirt, add the patches to the jacket, and remove the hood. I need to get a different belt and then still waiting on my gloves to come in. I hope they make it, these are important.  Now for Gambit, this has proved to be a bit difficult. The jacket….I haven’t been able to find an appropriate jacket anywhere. Matt is tall,  so I was hoping to find something in person so we could make sure it fits. He was hoping to get pleather too, but this jacket isn’t exactly in style. Plus, I was hoping to find something light weight so he wouldn’t be too hot. I know I’ll be hot walking around in this jacket and gloves, but I really just want cute pictures of us together. Won’t have anyway to take them, So I’ll have to do it myself. But oh, well. I wish my siblings were coming with us. I’m so glad Matt is having as much fun with this as I am. I just don’t want him to stress out about not finding the right stuff. I figured we could use these outfits again if we do another con or if we go somewhere for Halloween this year. I would love to use it them again! XD Continuing on, I’ve just been in the crafty mood, so I decided to paint…but what to paint? Rogue of course!!! So I drew from a reference photo and I’m actually surprised with out it came out, much better than I though it would. I’m not great at drawing, let alone drawing human characters but I’m pretty happy with it. I even painted it with watercolors!!! Again, pretty happy! The proportions are a bit odd  but still….happy! 🙂

I have a planner video coming up and a book haul video too, so if you’re interested in seeing those stay tuned! What do you do when you’re feeling motivated to create something? Do you have any artsy hobbies you haven’t had time for? I’d love to hear about it.

Thanks for reading!

 

Hello lovelies! I thought I’d share some things that have me smiling. I still have a collective book haul that I need to make, so look forward to that too.

• Breakfast: I love breakfast foods. However, I don’t usually eat breakfast in the mornings. I guess I’ve always tricked myself into believing that I wasn’t hungry. But Matt is very much a breakfast person not to mention a coffee person. We’ve been indulging a bit too much but I’ve really enjoyed it. But this past weekend he made me breakfast in bed…. I was still half asleep when he presented it to me, but it was one of the most romantic things I’ve ever seen. Scrambled eggs and toast with jam! Swoon! He’s so great!
• Final Fantasy Explorers: Matt and  I both just recently bought this game at Gamestop. I’m so glad we did, because it’s a lot of fun playing games together.
• Kanken Backpack: I bought this backpack a month ago for my weekend trip to Austin back in January. I now must have it in every color!!! Or at least in mint, yellow, and grey….for now. I have it in bright green! This backpack holds so much and just makes me so happy. It’s the perfect backpack. Seriously…perfect.
• Pokémon pin: Target Cartwheel is wonderful. I ended up getting a perk for a free, book, movie or toy..ect. I decided to buy this $16 pack of Pokemon cards just so I can get the extra MegaVenusaur enamel pin. And I got it FREE! Bulbasaur is my favorite pokemon so I needed this.

• Watercolor notebook: I’ll mention this more in a separate blog post. I’ve been wanting to get back into watercoloring. I was never really good at it, it was just something I enjoyed doing. I like having hobbies.
• Casual Cosplay: I’m really excited for this! Matt and I plan on going to Anime Matsuri this year and we’re going to dress up as Gambit and Rogue! These two are my favorite Marvel couple/X-Men. I’m not sure if I can pull off a really good Rogue, which is why I say casual. I’ve never really cosplayed before so I don’t want this to be something I stress over. The con is in April, so I want to get started on this ASAP. Casual, meaning we are just going to try to get key elements of the characters. For Gambit, I’m thinking Matt can get away with a trench coat, black pants, a purple button up, black gloves, and a deck of cards. Perhaps even his staff? For Rogue, I want to make sure to keep her signature yellow and green color scheme. Definitely want to find a brown jacket, yellow gloves, and her streak of white hair. I may even look for some green skinny jeans and some yellow chucks. I also want to get an X-Men belt buckle! I’m still figuring things out. If you have any tips on cosplaying, I’m all ears!
• Music: Elisa from MilkBox mentioned Passion Pit in one of her check in posts. I haven’t been able to get Where the Sky Hangs out of my head for weeks. Oh Wonder’s- Drive and Live Wire has also gotten themselves stuck. I definitely wouldn’t mind seeing them in concert. I love duos!

What are you loving at the moment? I’d love to hear about it. 🙂

Thanks for reading!

This may shock/bore you, if you are not interested in stationery, planners, or paper items in general. A new craft store opened up in Houston last summer. Needless to say, my sisters and I went a little crazy.

The planner craze is still going strong and  I’m obsessed. I love to see how it is constantly changing. I’m going to share the things I bought from that lovely shop and then I’d like to talk about some items I’d like to purchase this year to add to my planner/stationery obsession.

First up:

• Webster’s Pages Traveler’s Notebook and A5 Planner in Mint!

I love minty items. I can’t seem to get enough of them, I made the video above a while back but it still gives you an idea about how they look. There are pros and cons to everything but for the most part I love these items and will do an updated flipthrough soon so if you’re interested in seeing that, let me know.

Now on to the items I’d like to purchase

• Typecast Typewriter in Mint!

Michael’s has this typewriter by typecast and I’m sooooo tempted to buy one. I know, it might seem like a waste of money to you but to a stationery addict like me! I’d love owning one. I scrapbook as well as make cards and this would come in handy. My printer and I don’t always see eye to eye. It’s something I’m still considering so nothing has been decided yet. I’m still browsing the web and watching reviews on Youtube. It is 200 bucks, quite a bit to spend. Moving on…

• Portable Photo Printer

I’ve been wanting a small photo printer to print out my photos. I know, probably something else that could be considered a waste of money. But I’ve been wanting one. I keep looking at different brands, there’s the LG, HP, Polaroid, something Zip? So many different kinds and I can’t seem to pick one I want to save up for. I’ve been wanting to have hardcopies of photos and again, my printer doesn’t always work the way I want it to. I figured a portable printer might work out better. Any thoughts?

• New Digital Camera

This would be the most expensive. I don’t need it to be sooo fancy, since I’m still learning about photography, but I’d like to invest in a good camera and continue learning. Plus, I’d like to up my vlogging game with some new gear. This is also something I have no clue what kind I’d like. I’ve been researching but nothing concrete yet. If you have any tips or suggestions, I’m all ears. I don’t have a budget yet on the camera, I figured once I picked out the camera I wanted then I’d know what my aim is and then just start saving for it.

• New laptop

Like the camera, I would like to up my gear…including the laptop I would use to edit the video. I don’t need it to be topnotch, but I would like it to handle a bit of gaming and then my amateur editing skills. My current laptop is an HP and it can’t handle certain programs. I would love for it to be a mint color! I’ve always wanted a green or mint computer/laptop. That might be asking for too much, but it’s just something I’d like.

The smaller items I get fairly often but when it comes to the larger products, I tend to really put some thought into it before just going out and buying it. Do you usually weigh your options before buying a larger item, or do you just go for it? I’d love to hear your stories.

Thanks for stopping by and reading.

  

I love receiving/writing letters! As a child, I always wanted to have more people to send letters to.

The term pen pal was introduced to me in the 2nd grade, my class was practicing letter writing and we had been assigned a pen pal from a neighboring school. Sadly, I have no memories of my pen pal nor can I remember the gender or school my pen pal was/from. I can only recall the day my teacher told us that we would be paired up. I remember writing out my first letter to them, but again, no memory of what was actually said.

As I grew up, I still found joy in the idea of writing out a letter or sending a package to a friend. I exchanged letters with friends, whom I’d met at school from time to time but nothing that actually remained constant. It wasn’t until my first semesters at university did my best friend and I start exchanging a notebook where we would keep our letters in. She had moved to another state, me to another city and we wanted to keep in touch. Life got in the way but we kept it up for while and I was pretty proud of us. She and I still send each other mail from time to time and that always puts a smile on my face. And then this year for Christmas, the wonderful Whimsical Joy sent my sister and I a Christmas card with two crochet bookmarks. I just had to respond with my own handmade item so I wrote her a letter and made her a knitted mug cozy.

And when Matt and I first started to date, he went out of town several times during those beginning months and he would send me a post card from each place he visited. Such a thoughtful souvenir to receive from him. Also, a friend from college and I have agreed to write each other letters from time to time. He lives in Galveston, so we aren’t very far away from each other but he’s currently going to Med school and we’ve decided to stay in touch in anyway we can. Don’t know how he does it, but he’s always been a very positive guy and I’m glad to be reconnecting with him now.

I’m excited and hope to maintain a consistent back and forth of letter writing. It’s nice, getting a letter from a good friend. I plan on upping my card game. He’s in for a surprise.

That’s fall for now. Thanks for reading. ♥

 

The moments before I fall asleep I snuggle against your back, wrapping my arm around you and I can easily fall asleep with you beside me.

The moments before I’m fully awake, I can feel you kiss my cheek. I can feel you touch my hand.  My vision blurred, streaks of light peeking in through the blinds while purrs and high pitched meows beckon us to wake up.  I can feel myself wanting to say good morning yet I want to linger in your arms just a bit longer before I wake up. 

♥

 

It took me a while to finally finish editing this video but here it is! I sort of took a break from buying books during those months and wasn’t reading as much either. But hopefully, I’ll return to reading more books, I didn’t reach my goal of 50+ books in 2016 so now I’ll try again in 2017…haven’t gotten off to a great start but no sense in giving up. 😀

Here are the books I mentioned in the video:

• Bitter Sweet Love – Michael Faudet
• The Universe of Us – Lang Leav
• Fresh Romance
• Gabi,  a Girl in Pieces – Isabel Quintero
• Beauty and The Beast and Other Classic Fairy Tales
• Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats, Illustrated Edition – T. S. Eliot
• Crimson Bound – Rosamond Hodge
• The Sandman Collected Covers – Dave McKean
• Jane, the Fox and Me – Fanny Britt

Going to try to get back on a vlogging schedule and try to read more. I have a Book Outlet Haul coming up and I can’t wait! What books have you been reading lately?

Thanks for reading

While in school my concentration was in Creative Writing, and I struggled with characters, and creating different voices for each character. But I still enjoyed writing each of the different stories I came up with. Story Genius by Lisa Cron stuck out to me because of its catchy cover but also because of its subject matter. It never occurred to me to continue writing stories after college, I haven’t made any effort to write creatively but this book brought back a lot of those college semesters.

What I liked about the book was the voice of the narrator. Very funny and it was almost as if I was discussing literature with a peer. Another thing was the humor, especially when it brought up Fifty Shades of Grey. (If you like this series, take no offense, you are entitled to like any book you like. And hey, if this series made more people read, then right now!) It poked fun at it for sure and explained how ‘beautiful writing’ isn’t enough to get readers interested. It’s the story itself, how does it capture your audience? In the case of this, it had readers wanting more…

The next thing I liked about this book was its helpful prompts…or exercises. The ‘What to Do’ sections. I thought it was an interesting way to sprinkle those in every once in awhile and not beat with it over and over again.  If you are the type of writer that struggles with finishing or developing your story, I suggest giving this a try. If anything, it might just help you think out the parts of your story that you haven’t really put much thought into in the first place. It also made for an interesting read.

Happy reading!

*I received this book from Blogging for Books for this review.

I love affirmations and being positive is something I myself am working on and it’s a bit difficult sometimes. I try not to become a “negative evidence collector” but I find myself leaning more towards negativity rather than positive thinking.

Think Happy by Karen Salmansohn is the pep talk everyone and their pet cat needs. Now this book doesn’t just automatically change the way you view life. However, it helps you slowly want to change. But if you rather remain on the gloomy side, then this book won’t do much for you. I just want to express that.

The cute illustrations and happy go lucky attitude is just the bright light you may need to want to see that rainbow you seem to be ignoring. This book is small and the perfect addition to your coffee table. The cover alone brings a smile to your face and actually reading the different sections was eye opening for me. I found myself agreeing out loud.

My expectations when reading this book was that I figured it would be generic information that, if you’re not always a shiny, happy person, then it would just be annoying to read. I thought this would be the type of book that made me feel bad for not always feeling happy. After reading this little book, I felt myself feel motivated. Motivated to see myself in a more positive way. I expected the line, “If we all saw ourselves the way others see us, then we would all be happier.” But that’s not how this book was written. It was written in a way for you to feel inspired about being positive. And I’m glad the book wasn’t at all what I expected.

Learning how to be something is difficult, there are many tools available and having someone tell us what worked for them might not work for us. But this book isn’t exactly telling you how you can be happy. Only you are capable of finding happiness. I just feel as though this book motivated me, and I don’t want to be a pretzel!!!

*I received this book from Blogging for Books for this review.

Thanks for reading.

Here are the books I bought in the month of July, and I can tell you that I have made up for the lack of books in July jut in the first two weeks of August. But in July I just was taking it easy and trying to make time to read the books on my TBR.

• Maybe in another Life by Taylor Jenkins Reid
• Roses by Rose Mannering
• The Oxygen Thief by Anonymous
• Howl’s Moving Castle by Diana Wynne Jones

I have three videos in the making and I’m hoping to make some time to get them filmed and edited, but I also have a few workshop possibilities that I need to work on….aside from my full time job. It’s all about balance, and as long as the other things don’t disturb my day job, then I’m good. But here’s hoping this outside stuff works out. I hope you’re doing well, what are you reading or what have you recently purchased?

Thanks for reading

Now that I have a full time job, scheduling all the things I want to do has been tricky. I miss having more time during the week, however, now that I have to schedule things like work and my hobbies it’s making me a better planner and less lazy.

Before, I’d put things off and think, I’ll eventually get to it. But now, I’m trying to make sure I get to it sooner rather than later. There are a few excuses that I use when I can’t though. Filming requires good lighting, and I use the sun still, I don’t have lighting equipment. But that’s something I’m considering more and more lately.

Blogging however, does not require much. It just requires me to sit at my computer and type of entires that I’d like to discuss.  For this entry,  I’d like to discuss my now typical morning routine.

I filmed a little vlog for it too. I had fun filming it but I couldn’t film certain parts, like walking into work. I’m sure I could have but I’m not yet comfortable with filming in public quite yet. Plus, the job is still new so I should still be on egg shells. But next time,  I might do like a weekly-Life blog. Film a bit every day and then combine it into one video at the end of the week. We shall see. It’s just an idea, I just like working on new videos and improving on my editing.

 

 Other than that, work has been going well. I already have deadlines and projects to work on. I’m also working on  Mind-Speak projects as well.  It’s all about planning and making time for everything. Wish me luck. 🙂

How are you with planning out work and hobbies? Do you have any secrets?

Thanks for reading and watching