Harajuku Mini for Target

Okay, so, last night I saw from some blog (think it was 80s purple) that Harajuku Mini was at Target opening this morning.  Until then I didn't even know anything about this.  So I immediately found out when the store opened and set my alarm clock for 7:30am.  On a Sunday.  Sleep day.  I got up and quietly got dressed so I didn't wake up hubby or baby and just rinsed with listerine and left.  I got there at 8am and they opened the door I was at last, of course.  So in my mind everyone was there for Harajuku and there would be nothing left by the time I got to the racks.  I might be the only one who actually cared about this collection in South City.  So here are a few things that I bought but there are way more things than they show on the Target website.  I bought a baby hat, shoes for Russell and the baby, cool plaid jacket to go with these pants, and I might get more stuff because there's some things that was on the website that I didn't see in the store.  Maybe they didn't have everything out yet because there were some blank spaces on the racks. 

Another Japanese Halloween

This year we decided to do another Anime Halloween.  Last year Russell and Sam dressed up as characters from Naruto.  This year it's Pokemon.   

We ordered Russell's Ash costume from ebay.  It was only around $25.  Not bad.  And after materials and my time it cost the same to make.  Russell and Sam were skeptical that I could make the Ash costume.  Whatev.

I made this pokeball bag and finished it today.  I started it a few days ago and was all proud and stuff but then I found out I made the ball upside down with the white on top.  It took me a day or two to get over how upset I was before I fixed it.  For the circle I just traced the bottom of Jade's exersaucer.  For the black circles I traced Beqi's bobbin container.

This is the Pikachu costume that took me 2.5 hours to make.  I made the first part Friday in two hours then it took me 30 minutes to embroider the face and add the tail.  I just totally pulled this one out of my ass because I had never made a baby one piece before and never made anything with a hood.   

I totally would have ordered this costume online for a reasonable price but I couldn't find any.  Originally I was going to be a (slutty) Pikachu and baby was going to be a Pokeball but I felt like Pikachu for the baby made more sense.  While we were at Boo at the Zoo we had the theme song for Pokemon playing on the iBaby.  Sam and I haven't made costumes yet for this year and we probably won't.  Ofcourse we could be Brock and Misty but I don't have red hair and it'll be too cold to wear shorts and a tank top. 

My Coupon Experience

So I started on the coupon bandwagon.  I have been doing it for about 3 weeks now.  It's super awesome and a great hobby to have.  Everything pictured below I got for either free or close to free.

These are JUST the toiletries.  And I have wayyyy more coupons that I haven't even redeemed yet.  Also there are 48 rolls of toilet paper that I didn't photograph.  I didn't get the toilet paper for free but it was only $0.16/roll.  I am used to paying around $0.70/roll.  Last Thursday I went to the grocery store and saved 50%.  I am definitely going shopping more often (nearly every day) but I am not spending anything except gas.  I don't even consider myself aggressive as far as the couponing goes.  This is super mild.  I don't go out and buy newspapers.  I print coupons at home and there is usually a limit of two coupons per computer.  Definitely not extreme.

Also, yesterday Sam and Russell bought me an Azalea bush for my Mother's Day present.  So sweet of them.  I used to have one in the back yard that my dog ripped out of the ground when we first got him.  Russell's so cute.

My Generic Spring Look

So this is pretty much what I choose to wear almost every day.

RayBan Aviators, loose fitting button down with the sleeves rolled up half way, leggings, and a high bun.

You can find me wearing this exact same outfit atleast once every week.  So far I have 3 shirts to choose from that are of similar style.  Two of them are from H&M and this one is from Macy's in the old lady section.  I got it for over 50% off.  The ones from H&M constantly need to be ironed but sometimes they're worn unironed.

I wish that I had bangs sometimes so my hair looks like the photo below.  I need a temporary bang.  A faux-bang.  A FANG!

These are ths new sandals that Sam bought me today.  Isn't he sweet?  It's my first pair of nice flip flops that aren't $1.50 shower shoes.  I'll have to get used to walking in them though.  They fell off a couple times on my way to the car.  I have really fat big toes that have extra meat facing inwards thanks to my dad and sad looking pinky toes thanks to my mom.  Russell ended up having crooked toes on both feet (that are really cute).  His kid will probably end up having 3 toes and their kid will probably end up having no toes.   

At the beginning of the month Russell lost his first tooth.  It had been loose for a long time and we were just going to let it come out on it's own (not with pliers or a slammed door like my mom did to me).  We were playing Wii Sports and Russell hit me in my hip and I pretended to be really hurt and crying so he bent down to give me a kiss on my hip.  He ended up kind of slamming his face into my hip (but not real hard) then noticed the taste of blood.  Then he noticed there was a missing tooth and we had to look for it in the carpet.  Russell was really distracted this whole time by the video game.  For his first tooth the toothfaerie (I spell fairie "faerie" because of Neopets.  That's how they spelled it on there and I liked it.) gave him $1.33.  Reasonable price for a tooth.  He shows everyone he meets his missing tooth.  His other bottom tooth is loose too.  It will be really cute if he has both missing.

Stop Moving Your Head!

I told Russell to look tough.  This is what he gave me.

Russell likes to wear his mohawk up when he goes to karate because he likes it when people say stuff like "Cool mohawk Russell!"  He also doesn't know the meaning of "Stop moving your head!"

I went to Value Village today because they were having 50% off all coats.  There was a certain coat that I wanted back in October that was one of those long belted buffers in ELECTRIC BLUE!  I really should have bought it back then.  So I wanted to see if it was still there.  Of course it wasn't.

BUT, there was a fooseball table for $13. 

So it came home with Russell and I.  He was super excited about it.  He really didn't want to go to the store in the first place but he thought it was awesome we now have a fooseball table.  It will eventually go in the basement.  Right now it's in the dining room until Russell has had a chance to show all of his friends and we're done challenging each other.  Russell moves my goalie when I'm not looking.

Rasterbator!

I found this idea from someone elses blog.  I think it was called Not Martha. 

Anyways, she did a picture like this of her and her husband.  I found the program (that you can download for free) called Rasterbator.  All you do is upload the picture you want and then you have options such as the dot size, color, landscape, how many sheets wide, etc.  I didn't really know what to put for dot size because it was in mm and I didn't have a ruler on hand.  So I just picked 15mm.  I originally did 5 pages wide landscape but the other pages were too much.  I suppose someone that is good at planning things out before they do them (not me) would have cropped the picture first.

So I cut out all of the sheets while watching Bethenny Getting Married on HULU. 

Then after a run to the store for tape (I totally had 3 rolls of tape that have completely disappeared.  I even looked on top of the refrigerator because Sam likes to put things there.) I came back to piece it together.  The piecing together job was not the best as you can see.  My mom would probably make it perfect but seriously, it's just regular printing paper, nothing serious, I might get bad reviews and throw it away (I mean recycle it).

I hung it up on one of our new plaster walls to the left of the window. 

I used some of that 3M tape that is supposed to not damage your walls (since I don't want to put nail holes in our new plaster walls).  I haven't had a good experience with the 3M tape so far but it's all I have.  I'm interested in that UGlu stuff that I saw a commercial about.

Miniature Float Parade

This girl I know had a great idea for a miniature float parade.  It started at one park on Morganford and ended at the Turkish Pavilion.  Here are some photos I took of the floats. 

This is the one Sam and Russell made.  It was carried on a Spider Man remote controlled car.

This is our first outing with Bones and his new "gentle lead."  It's a success.  You'll see him out more now.

Lately...

This is how Russell does homework. 

I made my first Lasgna using this recipe.  It's not too pretty but it sure tasted good. 

I was so excited to make it and so focused when I was at the grocery store that I forgot to buy anything else. 

Had to go back to the store two days later.  So it goes.

Today I made a couple door snakes using old fabric and grocery store bags. 

Last night we went to Olive Garden for dinner.  It was the first time since high school that I've eaten there. 

Sam said in a slightly louder than normal table voice that we only go to non-local restaurants every 3 years. 

Hah! 

 This is what I had and it was delicious.  No leftovers.

Way too cold to go outside

This is what we did to an area of our house to make it look more magical.

Sam said that when he was little he would stare at the lights and think of what Christmas presents he hoped to get.  Russell would rather play video games than use his imagination.

So it goes.

This is one of Russell's school pictures.  They had three poses. 

Makes it super hard to buy anything less than the whole package.  Thanks mom.

Russell loves to dress like this and does most of the time.  He likes to feel "fancy."

This is how our dog, Bones, cuddles.

So I wanted to do strawberries but I didn't have red so I just used pink.  It's still drying right now.

Going to craft fairs inspires me to stop being so lazy.  I heard someone at the Rock and Roll Craft Show that was scoffing at other people crafts saying, "I could do that.  I should be in this show."  But she didn't because she's lazy and jealous and has a bad attitude.  This is me not being that person.   

We've been super into Mario everything lately (Thanks Buns!).  Russell even has Mario Kart Bed sheets and a Mario/Luigi present that he doesn't know about that I purchased at the craft show.

Happy Thanksgiving

This is what Russell told his teacher he's thankful for.

Russell helped me put up the x-mas tree.  It's one of those vintage aluminum ones. 

We also have a color wheel for it. 

Sam made EVERYTHING for our Thanksgiving dinner.  He's awesome.

  Pac Man