Being Adventurous!

Sunday morning, as soon as I rolled over and woke up, the first thing I said to D (who was still half asleep) was "Hey, let's go to the beach or something today." He was stunned ( If you know me, you know that I am far from spontaneous when it comes to life. My brain functions on a timeline/itinerary type interface. If something on my daily mental itinerary is altered or changed on short notice, I have to completely rewire and mentally re-plan my timeline for the day, subsequently leaving me stressed and annoyed at the person or thing that changed my plan... control issues much? ) and half way mumbled something.

Then, baby A wandered into our room and we asked her what she wanted to do. She of course said the zoo, but we went to Wild Adventures the day before so we decided not to repeat that again so soon.

Dustin had the great  idea of going on a hike at Stephen Foster Park (in Hamilton County, FL).

I am from the beautiful mountains of Western North Carolina so there were always hiking places and state parks close and available. Heck, you could walk around my back yard and neighborhood and it could probably count as hiking.

Down here in the flat lands of South Georgia, hiking is not really interesting ( not interesting if you had been spoiled by the Appalachian Mountains as your backyard growing up) or as big of a tourist draw as I was used to. So we had to drive a little over an hour to get to a state park with hiking and stuff. The drive wasn't bad, but we took our adventurous streak a step further and did it sans GPS. Dustin had a general knowledge of the roads and where it was so it turned out fine, only a couple of u-turns.


We got there around 11am after a quick hiking snack food stock up stop. With our hiking gear, backpacks and puppy dog in tow, we headed out on an 8 mile loop. (ha! with a toddler and a puppy..like we would get 8 miles)

Addy was such a trooper, she hiked all by herself and never asked to be carried, she only wiped out about a 10 or 12 times, and each time, she quickly responded with a laugh or an "I'm okay", even when she fell up hill into a tree. She loved seeing all the caterpillars and lizards and hearing the birds, she wasn't even scared of the snake we saw!


 We were finally getting into the thick of the flat woods when we realized we were in the thick of woods in the thick of tick season. We were having to pull ticks off every couple minutes and with a dog and small child we knew we needed to get out there soon, we took an exit path and ended up in the craft square.


Addy got to use a loom with some guidance (which she was absolutely fascinated by...I see a crafting buddy in my near future! )  and we watched a potter at work and some other crafters.

Addy said to each crafter: "that is so neat, how you do that?"  They were all so excited to have someone so interested in what they did and they explained things on her level and they were just amazing. She never meets a stranger!

 We rounded out our trip with ice cream, a trip to the gift shop and some time on the play ground.  And even Ace buddy (our 1 year old Chocolate lab) enjoyed the slides with Addy.



We ended up hiking about 3ish miles total, and my baby A hiked the first mile and half without being carried at all! (she was only carried for time's sake, we had a snail's pace)



According to D, I didn't even complain very  much and was very "go-with-the-flow" the whole day. And it actually felt pretty nice not to have every last detail planned.



Going on a quick hike in flat land on a weekend doesn't sound too adventurous. But I hate the woods, bugs, snakes, and spontaneous changes in the course of my day or plans so this was a big adventure for our little family. 

A Blue Streak

If I could, I would have rainbow streaked hair and more tattoos and piercings...but I have a job at a law firm and if you want a professional job (especially here in the deep south)  you usually need to be a little more conservative. I saw this pin (it links to a tumblr page, so the only instructions I have were in the description of the pin) that explained how to get temporary hair color streaks and I was more than excited. This could give me a little fun for the weekends, but rinse out for work.

The pin says to use oil pastels to color on the section of hair you want and hair spray it to hold.

Not Your Mother's 'She's A Tease' Hairspray and Cray-Pas Junior Artist Oil Pastels

So I did exactly that and it worked like a dream! I tried a few different colors and was pretty satisfied with all of them. The flash caught some of the shiny particles from pastels I guess but the color is more smooth and not grainy like that in real life.

Update: It washes out easily! I washed my hair the next morning and it came right out.

DIY Decoupage!

I love to use decoupage for pretty much anything and everything when it comes to crafting, but buying jar after jar of decoupage gets pricey when one jar is almost $8.

When I saw this DIY version on Pinterest, I knew I had to at least give it a chance for my wallet's sake.The pin links you to a super adorable blog who got the idea from a pin she saw that linked her back to this super awesome blog.

The instructions are simple and easy! Mix 1 part glue with 1 part water, shake until mixed. DONE.

This is an easy and cheap alternative to the store brand. (especially if you are a slight supply hoarder like me and stocked up big on random school supplies at this year's back to school sales!)  Lucky for me I also have lots of empty glass containers hoarded  laying around for anytime I might need them, much to the annoyance of D.

Speaking of dear old D....

I only have one further instruction: 

DO NOT LEAVE OUT WHERE YOUR HUBS MIGHT DRINK IT THINKING IT IS MILK!

I am counting my lucky stars that he asked me why I was painting on stuff with milk. This could have been an ugly, yet hilarious situation.

Happy Crafting !