DIY Trophies

Every summer my office hosts a picnic.  The employees get a free meal and we plan some sort of event that is intended to raise money for charity.  Two years ago we threw one pie at a supervisor or doctor for every $25 we raised and donated the money to Susan G. Komen.  Last year we had a dunk tank and sold throws for $1 each or $5 to push the dunk button and donated the money to the local free clinic.  This year we got a little more ambitious. 

This year, in the spirit of the Olympics, we decided to host our very own office Olympics.  Teams of 5 paid a $25 fee to compete for the charity of their choice.  Their $25 fee went straight to their charity and the winners earned additional money for their charity.  The events were modeled after a combination of field day and my days on academic teams in high school and college.  The five events that made up our Olympics were egg-in-a-spoon carry, water balloon toss, office trivia, general trivia, and a giant team relay which included a three-legged race, dizzy bat, person scavenger hunt, and an accessory dress up which required participants to find a scarf, a bracelet and a hat, put them on, and then run to the finish. 

While the winning teams would have additional money going to their charity of choice, my fellow Olympics planner and I felt like we needed trophies and medals.  We could have gone to a party supply store and given out generic plastic trophies to the winners, but that's just too easy and I'm too crafty for that.  So I boldly declared that I would make trophies. I went online to fin tutorials but found nothing close to what I wanted to create. 
I developed my own plan and I set out on my journey planning to build my trophies out of plastic cones, wiffle balls, and action figures.  I was going to paint them gold and bubble paint Olympic rings on them. Things didn't go exactly as planned, as cones are more expensive than I'd have liked and my bubble painting skills are lacking, but I was so happy with my final, revised result.  I think they would be perfect for an Olympics party or any competition where awards are needed and cutesiness is appropriate.

DIY Trophy

What You'll Need

1 Solo cup

1 Wiffle ball

1 action figure*

hot glue gun and glue sticks

gold spray paint

mardi gras beads (optional)

What You'll Do

1.  Place your solo cup upside down on a flat surface and, using the hot glue, attach the wiffle ball to the top. 

2.  Apply hot glue generously to the feet of your action figure and attach to the top of the wiffle ball.

3.  Once the hot glue is dry (it shouldn't take long), take your trophy to an open area to spray paint.  I tend to do this on an old table outside.  I think I put on 2-3 coats, just to make sure all the crevices were covered.  Let dry and bring inside.

4.  If you're really obsessive, turn the trophy on its side and spray the inside as well.  Obviously, I was obsessive enough to do this.  

5.  At this point, if you'd like, you can be done. But I just felt like something was missing.  Enter my partner in crafting, Mandy, and just the right amount of extra mardi gras beads.  Wrap the beads around the bottom of the trophie to measure how long the strand needs to be and then cut. 

6.  Put a line of hot glue around the bottom of the trophie, just above the lip of what used to be a cup, and then attach the beads to the hot glue.

7.  Again, you could be done here, but like me, you'll probably have left over beads which can easily be fashioned into a pretty fabulous boa.  Put a dab of hot glue on the back of your victor's neck and attack the beads so they cascade over the shoulders.

At our Olympics the trophies were displayed on a table that included Olympics-colored bunting, which I was also pretty fond of.

I got a lot more positive comments about my little beauties than I was expecting and was sad to have to give them away.  But since they went to people in my office, at least I can visit them occasionally. And I alreay told my husband that when we have kids we'll have at least one Olympics themed birthday party so I can make these again.

*I wanted a figurine that could raise it's arms (in victory, of course), so I was excited when I found little parachut men.  Any action figure with swivel arms would work.

Blessed

Today I have a lot to be thankful for.  Last night a pretty huge storm blew through the area.  There were wind gusts up to 80 mph and trees are down all over the place.  There are power outages from at least Wytheville to Richmond.  But not at Casa de Yopp!  All day long I've been getting more and more reminders of how blessed I am and how thankful I am for my world and my life. 

Friends
Last night I was sitting in Cookout, eating a burger and drinking a milkshake after having just seen "Magic Mike" with two of my best friends.  I'm thankful that I have wonderful friends who I can meet for movie and an unhealthy dinner on a Friday night.  I'm thankful that I had one of those friends in the car with me while I battled the elements and made my way from Lynchburg back to Roanoke.  Beth kept an eye on the radar map while I introduced her to the wonderful world of One Direction.

This morning Paul's best friend called to tell us that their power is out.  There are electric poles and trees down around his neighborhood and there's no estimate of when it's coming back, so their giving away everything in their freezer.  He invited us to come by and stock up on whatever we want.  They're giving everything away so it doesn't go bad, and it does my heart good to know that.

Electricity
Somehow we still have electricity.  It feels like business as usual around here.  I'm doing laundry and putting up blinds in the air conditioning, and it's hard to be annoyed by these chores when some people are sitting in sweltering heat.

Traffic Lights
A few minutes ago I drove to Paul's work to take him a cold jug of tea.  On the way there I noticed half the businesses I passed were out of power and the others were swarmed with people.  In general, the drive was pretty normal.  But when I left I realized I couldn't turn left where I needed to  because the traffic lights were out.  I ended up driving a pretty random route home because, getting around without traffic lights?  It's not easy.  It's actually pretty difficult.  So I took all right turns until I got to the interstate and could make my way home.

The Kindness of Strangers
When I was walking back to my car after taking Paul his tea, there was a woman walking across the parking lot holding a plate.  She asking me if I was going to Home Depot and I said no, that I was just visiting my husband.  She then gestured with her plate and told me that Home Depot was giving away pizza.  Home Depot was lucky enough to still have power and was giving pizza away to all the people who couldn't make their own lunch. I'm sure they'll make up for that cost with all the generators and chain saws that will be rolling out the doors this weekend.

Strong Trees
While a lot of people are spending their day cutting up fallen trees and dealing with insurance companies, we just have a some large twigs scattered around the yard and driveway.  About 4 houses a way a tree split down the middle.  I passed a house for sale that now has a tree laying on the roof.  There's also a huge tree by the library that fell on the power line and is being kept off Williamson Road by nothing but that power line. And all I have is a few twigs that I need to pick up. 

Summer Reading

I recently discovered the magic of reading at the gym.  A couple months ago I downloaded Chasing Mona Lisa by Tricia Goyer and Mike Yorkey to the Kindle app on my phone.  I've had the app since I got my phone over a year ago, but I'd only used it one time, to read a short story that was only released a an  ebook.  But when a facebook friend posted that Chasing Mona Lisa was free that day, I figured I'd give it a shot.  That day at the gym I pulled the book up on my phone and realized that I could increase the font so that I could read it without squinting.  After I finished that book I downloaded Sprig of Thyme by Jenna Dawlish (again, for free) and I finished it in just a week's worth of gym trips.  

I grew tired of the free options on Amazon and decided to check out my library's ebooks and now I'm obsessed. One day, through blogs and the library, I truly found magic.  

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It's safe to say that The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern is now one of my favorite books.  I truly felt like I was being transported to another world while I was reading.  I would love to give a synopsis of the book, but I don't think I could do it justice.  I will say that it's about a very special circus (obviously) and a competition.  And it has a wonderful cast of characters that I fell in love with.  I didn't  want the book to end and delayed finishing the book because I didn't didn't want to say goodbye to the characters.  I would recommend this books to anyone, especially anyone who has read and enjoyed Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children by Ransom Riggs. Like Riggs' novel, The Night Circus is full of magical realism and it's easy to transition from one novel to the other since reality has already been somewhat suspended.  

The Night Circus is available in hardback, audiobook, and ebook form,  and will be released in paperback in July.  Do yourself a favor and pick it up.  

Having A Bad Day?

Don't worry about it.  Just watch this.

You're welcome.

I'm sorry Harvard baseball team, fun., and President Obama, but this is the best cover of "Call Me Maybe" in the whole wide world.

Safety First

You may or may not remember that Paul got me a shiny new bicycle for Christmas.  It' a cruiser bike and looks something like this, well, actually, it looks exactly like this.

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He picked this one because it's the same color as my stand mixer.  He correctly, figured that would be important to me.

Unfortunately, my pretty bicycle sat in the dining room until this past weekend.  I new Paul didn't think I liked it so I decided that it was time to get out an ride it.  About a block away from the house I remembered why it was that I hadn't ridden my bike yet.  I don't have a helmet.  I was feeling a little wobbly, since I hadn't ridden a bike since I was about 12, and decided that rather than wiping out and having a car come along and squish my head like a grape (my biggest, most irrational fear...we'll talk later), I'd head home. 

I began my search for a helmet thinking that it wouldn't be hard to find something both fun and functional, but I was wrong.  Everything I found looked very aerodynamic and like it belonged on Lance Armstrong, not on a girl out for a casual pedal around the neighborhood.  But then I found Yakkay.  The company is based in England and make helmets and helmet covers that are SO. SUPER. CUTE!!  they don't look like helmets.  They look like hats with chin straps.  Here are a couple of my favorites:

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Those would be excellent for a casual pedal around the block, AMIRIGHT?!  Unfortunately, they come at quite a price.  I found a company in Chicago that sells them stateside, but they're $124.  And as cute as they are, I just can't justify spending that much on something I'm only going to use every now and then.  And I can only imagine the look on Paul's face if I were to tell him that I have to spend $125 for something that I could pick up, albeit in a much less cute form, at Target. 

Do you know where I can get a cute bicycle helmet without breaking the bank?  How confident are you in my ability to figure out a way to make my own super-cute helmet cover? 

My Newest Obsession

I'm pretty sure I've already titled a post "My Newest Obsession," but I'm pretty okay with that. 

My newest obsession is with kitchen canisters.  My current canisters are terrible.  One of the lids is cracked and all of them have small mouths so I have to spoon or pour the contents out.  I don't like that.  I got them for $15 and only got them so Paul wouldn't have to feel like he was living in a dollhouse with the pink canisters my mom gave me after college graduation.  They're ugly and I hate them and I've been using them nearly three years.  It's time for a change. 

Lucky for me, Martha Stewart has come to the rescue. These beautie are from her line at Macy's and I'm enamored. I've actually wanted something like this for a long time but I figured I'd have to DIY if I wanted them to happen.  I spent the better part of the past weekend obsessing over these canisters until I finely bit the bullet and placed my order. 

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They're tin adn look like 1960 and I can't wait for them to arrive on my stoop.  I ordered Flour, Sugar, and Cookies and I can't wait to not have to fight with bags of flour and sugar whenever I need them.  These are going to make my freakishly bright kitchen even more delightful than it already is and I'm pumped. 

Why I'm Not Team Peeta

Let me just get one thing straight:  Peeta Mellark and Katniss Everdeen are perhaps my favorite literary characters of all time.  Not as a couple and not as a team, but as individuals.

My love for Katniss is obvious.  She's a survivor.  She's a badass.  She is woman, hear her roar!  But what makes her truly brilliant is that she is devoid of an emotional connection to nearly everyone and everything around her.  She's so in her head all the time that she hardly ever has time to be in her feelings.  I, on the other hand, am constantly in my feelings.  Reading about Katniss is refreshing in a weird way because she's so different from every other female protagonist out there and so very different from me. 

And then there's Peeta.  He is unapologetic about being just who he is all the time.  He cries on the trip to the train station because he needs to cry because he's about to go into the em-effin Hunger Games.  He likes decorating cakes.  He loves Katniss with his entire being and he's not afraid to say it to her or all of Panem.  He likes to bake and paint pictures and doesn't feel emasculated by Katniss's superior hunting skills and he loves the color of orange at sunset.  And perhaps most endearing, he helps Katniss stay alive (without actively keeping her alive) when everyone else was thinking only of themselves.  Even when he's been hijacked by the Capitol, somewhere deep inside he knows who he is enough to know he loves Katniss.

Gale is an okay character, but I don't like who he becomes in Mockingjay and I was never that excited by him in the other books, either.  As a character he didn't really intrigue me or keep me on my toes. 
Yes, I like Peeta more than I like Gale. But that doesn't make me a t-shirt-wearing, poster-board-waving member of Team Peeta.  Because I also like Peeta more than Haymitch and Finnick and Effie...and Jay Gatsby and Harry Potter and Atticus Finch, for that matter. 

The reason I'm not Team Peeta is that these books are about so much more than a girl picking out a boyfriend. They're about survival, growth, and  being true to who you are.  I'm not Team Peeta and I'm not Team Gale because I'm Team Katniss.  I root for her because if there's anyone who deserves to survive, it's her.  It's the girl who has done nothing but take care of others all her life.  And ultimately, Gale is right, she ends up with the guy who she can't live without.  She doesn't need someone with whom she can be angry at the world.  She needs hope.  She needs the first dandelion of spring.  She needs a loaf of bread when her family is slowly starving to death. She needs Peeta.  She never truly had a choice because, in my humble opinion, she always knew she needed Peeta. She doesn't need him to physically survive because we all know she's got that covered, but she needs him to make life worth living.

Perhaps I'm most angry about this whole Team Peeta vs. Team Gale nonsense because Team Boy vs. Team Other Boy was born with Twilight, a book about how important it is to have a boyfriend.  There was no Team Harry vs. Team Ron because the Harry Potter books were about a lot more than that, as are the Hunger Games books.  So let's just quit it, please?  Pretty please?  For the sake of the integrity of the books, cut it the eff out.