New Brand Launch

 Hello my dearest Dreamers!

I hope this post, and this Saturday, finds you well.

Can you believe that we're already into another month, the last month of 2016? Where the heck has the time gone? It seems like just yesterday I was working on my December Daily for 2015 after coming home from Germany, and yet here we are.... about to start 2017!

That is just crazy to me!

You know what else is crazy? I've moved this here blog to a new website! I have a new home and a new look! You can also find my blog by clicking the image below!

Please tell me what you think of it? This lovely site design was created by the wonderful and supremely talented Brittney, and if you're looking for a re-branding (or even an initial branding for your blog or biz), I highly recommend that you check her out!

Brittney is super sweet and easy to work with. She made this whole process seem really painless, she was very clear in her directions and requests, and it was all very simple (for me anyways, I dunno if it was so simple for her!) 

Either way. Welcome to my new home on the internet! I hope you like what you see here.

Later this week I will talk about my plans for this blog in the upcoming year and what I hope to see happen. Until then, have a look around and let me know what you think! 

P.S. if you find the wrong links or something that doesn't make sense, please send me an email and let me know so that I can fix it ASAP! AND any mistakes found in this website are my fault and OF NO FAULT of the wonderful Ms. Brittney!

So please go follow me at my new blog home to see the newest posts and hear about the new direction that I will be taking with my blog starting this month!

Getting Caught Up: December Daily 2015

Happy Thursday Dearest Dreamers!

I hope this finds you well!

Now that October is finished and I have finished filming my October Daily flip though videos, it's time to move onto my next project. It was definitely an experience working on my October Daily, a good experience though. I think that it helped that Lee was so interested in what I was doing. Either way, working on this project definitely helped renew my love of pocket scrapbooking.

This is the cover of my 2015 album.
I chose a standard TN and covered it with scrapbook paper and wash tape.

For a long time ever since the end of 2014, I have been more focused on memory keeping in travelers notebooks because they offer more space for journaling then pocket scrapbooking does. I've always been more of a writer then anything else, which I think is why I struggled so much with pocket scrapbooking in the beginning. But we'll get to how I'm overcoming that one in a minute.

This happens to be my favorite page, and probably something that I will repeat this year if possible!

Last year I decided to attempt December Daily in a travelers notebook, like I did with my October Daily two months before. Since I was leaving Germany right before December started, I made sure to pack up stuff that I would need in my suitcase before I left because my boxes weren't coming until January. There was a nice lady from the December Daily group on Facebook who sent me some stuff from last year's December Daily kit. I was incredibly motivated to start the project, but didn't really have a lot of room to work on it. There was a lot of traveling from North Carolina to Florida and Georgia during the month of December which also didn't help all that much towards working on my album. I got all the way to the 14th of December before I fell off the DD wagon. I have my pictures all printed and my list of activities written in my planner, but nothing is happening in my album.

I decided to take Ali's Storytelling With December Daily class again this year and it really got me thinking. It really makes me want to go back and work on my album from last year, in hopes that I can get it done before February of next year. I'm not quite sure why I just stopped working on my album, other then I guess life just got in the way and then we moved into the house we live in currently. It's not like I don't have anything to work with, I printed the pictures and wrote all the notes in my planner, it's just sitting down to actually work on it. I actually started working on it Friday night while Lee was practicing on his drums because I had lost interest in the internet.

Pro's of a TN: 

* Not nearly as big so it's easier to carry, which then limits your supplies

* it limits you on how bulky you make your embellishments, 

* focus on journaling, 

* you can use any size picture you want because you aren't worrying about the size of your pockets as long as it fits in your TN (and you can use vertical 4X6's, which is harder to do in a 6X8 mini album)

Con's: 

* You're limited on your embellishments in some ways, 

* It limits the products that you use in some ways

* Potential bleed through of your pens or ink

* You have to worry about writing on the backs of your pages

* If you fall behind it takes forever to get caught up

* You have to work on your pages in order, you can't skip days and go back to them. 

Something that I learned from her class this year is the beauty of mixing long and short stories in my album (which I already knew), but being able to print my stories on my pictures and print them from home. Also being able to use the digital stamps as well as trying new things with my Silhouette cutting machine. It will be easier to add things into my album that make it bulky because I don't have to worry about writing on the back of the page for my stories like I did in my TN (a big issue of mine, especially when the album gets bigger and bigger).

Like I said, I am hoping to work and and maybe even finish this album soon. It's already time to start prepping my 2016 album, which I will be doing in a pocket style like Ali and so many others do. I will record a final flip through video of last years for those of you that are interested.

Here's to hoping that I can finish two albums before February of next year!

December Daily Introduction

Hello Dreamers!

I hope this post finds you well!

So now that it is about halfway through the month, it is alright for me to start talking about and working through my December Daily album for this year! For those of you that don't know what December Daily is, here is how it is described by it's creator, Ali Edwards:

"December Daily® is a December mini-album project that documents the 25 days leading up Christmas. The simple goal is to capture the spirit of December via one story per day.

Over the last eight years this project has become one of the highlights of my year and a beautiful community of memory keepers has come together to share their December stories with one another. It is an awesome way to document and celebrate the season." -Ali Edwards

Some people do December Daily for the 25 days leading up to Christmas and some people draw it out until New Years. Some people don't focus on days, they focus on telling only the holiday stories. It is all up to the person completing that project.

For me, I'm going to complete the entire month, simply because we're traveling between our two families towards the end of the month. I want to document our first Christmas together and the fun times we have. 

Later on this week I will share a list of stories that I want to tell throughout my album, mostly because I want to have them written down somewhere and figure that maybe someone else here might be looking for stories to tell. It's always a little harder when you don't have kids, but I'll definitely make it work!

Until next time!

"I Love" Sunday's v. 83

Hello Dreamers!

Happy Sunday! I hope this post finds you well.

** Lee got super lucky on Monday and other then showing his face at first formation, he didn't have to be at work. His NCO gave him the day off since he had been screwed over in the weeks prior to that with the field and with EFMB. He and I got to spend most of the day together outside of when I was in class. Perks of working from home for myself. :) I did all my work from my laptop from the comfort of my own room (my roommate was super sick with strep and something else and was sleeping in the living room downstairs).

The added bonus to Monday was we went and ate dinner with our friends from a local bar. We call them the bar family, two of them are bartenders at this bar, another one is the DJ on the weekends, and the rest of us just like to hang out together. We met Jess and Dani because they came to a few of our shows and then Jess convinced her boss to let the boys play a show at the bar, and we've been great friends ever since. Even our bassist Josh is part of the bar family, he's probably the reason that we even started hanging out in the first place. Haha.

this is Dani and I from the last week!

** Lee and I went out to eat at Olive Garden for my birthday this past Wednesday since he wasn't here last week. I've always been very skeptical of our Olive Garden because when I first got to Bragg back in 2011, they had a case or two of Hep B and I didn't want to go anywhere near that! I finally decided that since it was years later without incident, I could give this one a shot. Olive Garden has always been one of my favorite places to eat at, so it's been killing me slowly that I haven't eaten there since I've been home.

To make it all better, Lee came home with some gorgeous flowers for me for my birthday! It was a total surprise but I love it so much! Aren't they pretty?

** Thursday was nice because we went out to dinner with some of Lee's new friends from EFMB before heading out to the bar to see our friends. We hardly drank anything, but it was nice to hang out with our friends. Lee has a 4 day weekend this weekend which started on Thursday, so we decided to go hang out with our friends.

I've made really good friends with the bartenders Jess and Drea, but I've become especially close to one of the other girls named Dani! She is kind of like my new best friend and I adore her to death! I need more friends where Lee and I live and I feel like this is a good start!

** Yesterday was band practice at Roger and Cheyanne's house before we drove back into town to see our friends at Bridge to Breakdown play at another local bar that we've played at before. I've mentioned these guys before because they're our friends and we try to see them anytime they're in town (they live about 2.5 hours away from us). Their drummer, Taylor, was super awesome because he gave Lee some travel bags for his drum kit and in exchange Lee let Taylor play on his kit for their show last night.

** I gave in and decided to order Ali's main kit from last year's December Daily and it arrived yesterday while we were at band practice. I can't wait to start playing with it! You'll see more of my posts about December Daily starting this week! 

.: Little Loves :.

|| Flowers | scrapbooking | moving forward | stars | crafting | Dr. Pepper | new friends ||

What's New?

Hello Dreamers!

Happy Tuesday! I hope you're all having a good start to November.

There were just a couple things that I wanted to touch base with you all on today. Well, for anyone that might be interested anyways.

1. Today just happens to be my 25th birthday. While I don't care much for my birthday (especially because the person I want to spend it with is stuck in the field until the 10th), it is kind of weird to think that I am 25 years old now. Where did the time go? I remember being a teenager and feeling like I would never be an adult. Now here we are.... 25.... what the heck? Haha. 

I'm halfway through my 20's! The good news is that things are finally starting to fall into place, even if it is a bit slowly. But I guess it's better late then never, right?

So, since Lee isn't around until the 10th, I'm going to veg in my room watching movies, and being lame. I think my roommate and her son might make a special dinner and a cake to celebrate with our friend Sarah and her family..... I am not entirely sure.

2. The other big news that I have is something that I have been wanting for quite a while..... a rebranding of The Diary of A Dreamer.

A rebranding means that I'll have a new web design, new color scheme, and even a new domain! That's right! I've bought a new domain for the blog because I want to really focus on my blog and make it more then just a hobby. 

While this will still be the lifestyle blog that you're familiar with, I want to focus a little more on scrapbooking and memory keeping, life after the Army while still being connected to it, and life of a college age spoonie!

Be on the look out for the upcoming changes, it shouldn't take more then a month to get it all situated!

Thanks for stopping by and checking out my blog!

Mickey's Not So Scary Halloween Party

Hello Dreamers! 

Happy Monday! also, HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!!!!

Is there ever such thing as a Happy Monday? Sounds kind of like an oxymoron to me.... but that may just be me.

If you follow me on Facebook then you will have already seen all of these photos, but for those of you that don't.... here ya go! Last Tuesday I went to Mickey's Not So Scary Halloween Party with my friend Ashes back home at Walt Disney World. We've been going to Disney on and off since I was in middle school, but for some reason this was the first year that I attended the Halloween Party!

We got to the park around 4PM because even though the event doesn't officially start until 7PM they still let guests enter around 4 so that they can ride some rides if they are only there for the party. It was the perfect time to get some photos of all the decorations and what not. The first thing Ashes and I did was to go look for some pins at the stores. We knew they would have special pins just for the party and we both wanted some.

Since my birthday is actually tomorrow, and one of the reasons that we decided to go was to celebrate my birthday, I got this nifty button that I got to wear. All the cast members that saw it wished me a happy birthday and I even got a brownie with dinner in celebration.

Ashes and I wanted to get on the Pirates of the Carribbean ride since it is one of our favorites, but unfortunately it was closed down for maintenance. We did manage to stumble upon this awesome treasure hunt though that we never knew existed! We completed 3 out of the 5 maps before it was time for dinner and we got side tracked. Next time I will finish the last two so I get all the maps AND the treasures! For those of us that are into scrapbooking and memory keeping, these maps and treasure cards are perfect memorabilia for our albums. I am working on my album this week, there will be pictures and a walk through video once I am done with it for those that are interested!

Excuse our derpy faces here! We decided to give vlogging a try and this is when I took a photo instead of a video. haha. We are both still pretty new at it and I will have the video up on my YouTube channel sometime this week. 

So I won't lie to you, this was our number one priority of the party, haha. We both love Nightmare Before Christmas (I'll include the video that I got of meeting them in my vlog) and it was definitely worth the wait. We ended up having this really nice family behind us and we sang with their daughters for the duration of the wait and had fun talking with the parents.

This was my birthday hug from Sally.

For those of you that aren't going to watch my vlog: If you are going to the party and you want to meet Jack and Sally, here is a tip for you. Get there at 4PM and immediately get in line (they are at the gazebo over near the Christmas shop) that way you don't have to wait long. They get there around 5 and the cast members close the line around 930-945. The earlier you get in line, the less time that you have to wait to meet the characters.

After this we went and rode the Haunted Mansion ride and did some trick or treating while waiting for the other main events to start. We decided to go to the later times for the events so we could enjoy the park and not feel rushed.

The Hallo-wishes event was fantastic, if not blinding. I love the colors that they had on the castle and how it was more villain themed to fit the occasion!

For a photographer I took some terrible shots! Haha. I decided against bringing my big camera because I didn't want to take the chance of damaging it, so I did most of the photography and videos on my cell phone. For the most part it has a decent camera, but the lighting for parts of the Hocus Pocus Villian Spectacular was terrible! 

The show was phenomenal and thanks to being handicapped, we actually got to see the show up close and personal. Which is really nice when you're short like Ashes and I are. Haha. It's definitely a must-see in my opinion if you go to the show.

We only saw part of the Boo-To-You parade, because we wanted to beat the traffic out for our 1 hour and 45 min long drive back to my parents house, but what we did see what phenomenal as well. I love seeing everything decked out in Halloween. Whoever thought to combine Halloween and Disney is an absolute genius in my opinion!

Thank you so much for stopping by and checking out my blog post! Make sure to keep an eye on my YouTube channel for the vlog as well as the scrapbook mini album that I am working on to document the trip!

Hope you all have a fantastic Halloween!

There's No Address In The Stars

"I stumbled across your old picture today

I could barely breathe

The moment stopped me cold

Grabbed me like a thief"

You would have been 25 years old today, just a few days older then me. I found this in my photos today and it both made me want to smile and cry at the same time. This one is old, circa 2007.

Looking back now, we would have never imagined that life would turn out this way. I wanted to go see you Wednesday, but other plans got in the way. I'll see you on my Christmas trip. I know you're watching over us all, and your family is always in my thoughts.

I miss you so much brother. It never gets easier. 

For all my fellow dreamers out there: hug your family extra tight today, give them extra love and enjoy the little things. You never know when they won't be there tomorrow. This is one amazing soul that was gone much too soon, but he died doing what he loved most, flying in a helicopter and fighting for his beloved country.

Song: "Address In The Stars" Caitlin and Will

Working The Haunted House

Hello Dreamers

Happy Saturday! I hope this post finds you well!

So yesterday was a super busy day for Lee and I, which only sucked because we're exhausted after this week. It's been busy and chaotic and he's been working 15 hour days. I really don't miss that part of the military life, I really don't.

Last night was the Haunted House for Lee's work, and while I was originally just there to help set up, I ended up becoming part of the cast for the event. Since it's a haunted house created by medics, of course there were lots of blood and body parts.

I wish I had gotten some more pictures of the event, but since I was in it, I forgot to ask someone to take a picture of where I was at. I showed up in all black and I let Lee cover my arms in blood. I was laying on an Army stretcher (does anyone else know how uncomfortable those things are?) covered with a bloody sheet. People thought I was a mannequin and once they got close enough to me (if they saw me at all) I reached out and groaned, moaned, or yelled while grabbing their ankle or grabbing at them. Needless to say, I scared the hell out of quite a few people, which made me laugh. Please excuse my terrible hair..... I don't know what was going on with it. 

 

We were set up in their locker room area, which helped lead people throughout the whole thing. We had to wait for it to get all dark because not all of the lights would turn off for some reason. I think they were on a time delay because eventually (about 30 minutes into the event) all of the overhead lights turned off and it made it incredibly spooky. 

 

Lee was being chased around by Josh (our bassist who was some creepy butcher looking dude) and he would scream for help and what not. Unfortunately I didn't get to see him because I was more towards the beginning then he was so he was on a different set of lockers. I was paired with one of the daughters of his boss (who was incredibly creepy) so her and I had a lot of fun. I almost got kicked in the head at one point because I scared one girl so bad, another girl yelled at me for about 5 minutes (which just made me laugh harder), and it was just ridiculous. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Overall the night went really well and apparently we were the scariest of all three houses at the event. We literally set everything up and finalized the plan for everything yesterday afternoon before everyone went home to get ready. For being slightly improvised, it went really well! I was pretty glad that they wanted me to help out because I rather enjoyed it. 

 

I know that it's hard to see, but Lee is standing right over my shoulder.

The little girl in white and the clown freaked everyone out. The little girl was screaming bloody murder (which helped with the house) but good lord she was creepy.

After that it was time for the Halloween party back home, which didn't last long. There was only one person that showed up for me and that's just because she was at the haunted house with us. Lee and I didn't stay downstairs long for it, he wanted to go play his new Battlefield game (he got it the night before the rest of the pre-order's did for some reason, so he's been playing it whenever he can).

Everyone that dressed up at the Halloween party including all the children. Lee didn't dress up because he was exhausted, but I put on my Gender-bent Jack suit for a little while, including the wig that my best friend sent me via priority mail just for this event. I didn't have makeup on because I had just taken a shower, that is reserved for Halloween night itself.

Thanks for stopping by!
Gotta go get ready for a show tonight. This is a new venue for us, so this should be fun.

"I Love" Sunday's v.82

Happy Sunday Ghouls!

Hope this Sunday finds you well!

** All schools, including my college were cancelled for this week, and Lee was home Monday due to the storm this past Saturday. He was upstairs playing video games when I came in to tell him that I gained another client and (although he doesn't look like it) he was super happy for me. I pestered him for a little while (he'd been playing video games all day) and snapped this photo.

** Tuesday saw me working on my October Daily album. I filmed a video that is posted on my YouTube channel of the latest walkthrough of my album. I think it's through day 10 as of right now (which means it's time to film another video.

** On Thursday, our friends Sarah and her family came over for dinner and just to hang out. Men's friend A was over as well, which always proves to be interesting. A is one of the best behaved and most polite teenage boys I have ever met! That evening Amy decided she finally wanted to have a fire in the backyard, which was fun!

** Friday was an incredibly busy day for us. Lee had a family organization day with his unit, which was full of games and fun and food, and obviously families were invited. Lee asked me to accompany him, and it was a nice day overall. I spent a lot of the time talking with his NCO (she used to be a flight medic with the 82nd) so we had some stuff to bond over. Haha. I really like her and I seemed to be the only significant other who talked to her without an issue (like other people seem intimidated or scared or something)

That night we had to drive 3 hours to a show, which went relatively well. The drive was long (and the drive home was kind of miserable. If my best friend from back home hadn't called me just to talk for 2.5 hours, I probably would've had to pull over and sleep on the side of the road). Haha.

The last good news of Friday? Lee's new kit came in before we left for the show, so we got to take it with us for him to play. It's a gorgeous ebony stain, with a much larger bass drum then he usually uses, so it's sound is ridiculous! I mean that in a good way! In some lights it looks dark purple!

** Yesterday was a kind of busy but still relaxed day. The whole reason that we drove home from the show instead of just staying the night like everyone else was because he had to work Saturday night and we needed to get some stuff before he had to go to work (like his dress shoes and a belt). So we spent the morning running errands before he had to be at work at 1 PM. We've been together almost a year now, which makes us both happy.

** Today was a good day! This morning we went to the NC State Fair (Brandon left his wallet in my bag on Friday night and I needed to get my camera back from them as well) so we met there. While we waited for them to get there we walked around the entire fair and just enjoyed the gorgeous weather.

We saw this MASSIVE pumpkin on display, it won first place. It weighed 1,090.5 lbs.... that is ridiculous to me!!!! Does anyone else think that it looks like two pumpkins that grew together into a single pumpkin?

.: Little Loves :.

|| Time off | cuddles | silly moments | being proud of the amazing drummer that Lee is | Feeling proud of the amazing soldier and medic that Lee is | Gatorade Arctic Blitz | movies at night ||

What are you loving from this past week?

"I Love" Sunday's v.81

Hello Dreamers! 

I hope this Sunday finds you very well.

** October Daily has definitely started! For which I am super stoked. I've shared some pictures on my IG account and I shared a video yesterday on my YouTube channel of my first week's flip through. I got a completely new album, which is discussed in the video, and I love it SO MUCH MORE!

** My mini pocket letter from Eny came in and I ABSOLUTELY LOVE IT! She is super sweet and I love everything that she sent me!

** Wednesday I shared with you all a look at my first ever flip book inspired by Sam of Halloween Happy.

** My kit came in from Serena Bee and I am super stoked! I bought her stamp set from last year because I just couldn't resist. The first thing that I did? Use the stamps in my planner. I'll share a picture of this on my IG tomorrow!

** This week is the last week of my Introduction to Human Services class (it was only an 8 week class). For this I am thankful because while I like the subject matter, the teacher left something to be desired and everything was crammed into a short period of time. Tuesday was my last day in class, which is where we presented our power points about our service learning projects and Thursday was the actual last day, where we just stayed home and took our last test. I think I would have liked the class more if we had more time and a different teacher.

** Lee had 24 hour duty Wednesday but has been off since Thursday at 0900.... and doesn't go back to work until Tuesday morning. That's a lot of time off. Haha. We went out and he bought a new video game that he has been obsessed with and played non-stop.

** Since I didn't have class Thursday (just tests), Lee and I decided to go to Red Lobster because his mother sent us a $25 gift card for no reason. It was very sweet of her and the food was amazing! It was nice to have a mini date night together!

** Hurricane Matthew hit North Carolina early yesterday morning and it has been one hell of an adventure. Our city wasn't quite prepared for the flooding that would happen, but that is mostly just because of the flooding from last week's storm. There were a LOT of rescues that day (around 700) and FEMA from NYPD and FDNY, NJ, OH, and Charlotte, NC came to help out, which makes my heart happy. I don't know if there were many (or any) casualties here in Fayetteville, but it is going to take us a while to recover. There are still a lot of areas that are flooded, schools are still shut down, and now we're having water problems. Fayetteville, being the military town that it is, will persevere.

The photo on the left is the two houses across the street as it started flooding. By the time it was all said and done the flooding had reached our driveway, but we got lucky that we didn't have any damage. The house on the right of that picture had sand bags in front of their garage door and the water over ran the sand bags. They didn't appear to have much damage (we went around the neighborhood today to see the damage and there wasn't much to people's homes).

The picture on the right was where the road was washed away right down the road from me. My nephew took that photo right after it happened because they heard it fall apart. It's a main road in our neighborhood so it's going to be interesting to see how this affects us in the long run. The guard rail and part of the road is now gone. The picture below is what it looked like from a better angle.

** We had my classmate Jakki and her husband over for dinner last night because they had no water and no power. We had a blast because we decided to crack open my new Cards Against Humanity box that I just bought from Target. It was hysterical and I can't wait to do it again. It was kind of hard to get all of us in the picture... that's part of Lee's face at the bottom. It's a weird photo, but I definitely kind of like it. My friend's husband always makes funny faces in pictures as you can see below.

.: Little Loves :.

|| All the Halloween movies that we've been watching | Extra time with Lee | October Daily videos on YouTube | Gatorade | No school | Dr. Pepper ||

What are you loving from this past week?