Brain Power

There have been a few fun research-based quizzes floating around my Facebook feed the last week or so, and I was surprised by my results on some I've taken. Namely, a 30 second quiz to determine if you're more right-brained or left-brained.

Since I have a pretty creative nature, I thought I'd show right-brained hands down. But check out my results:

Did you take the quiz? What was your outcome?

I also enjoyed this quiz that determines what American accent you have. Get ready to sound like a crazy person saying words aloud over and over (please tell me that's not just me...). I ended up with Midland, but in the 93% range for The West. I'd say pretty accurate, being that I'm Washington born and bred.

I love these quick and interesting little quizzes. Hope you enjoy 'em too.

Pretty Thankful

Do you decorate for Thanksgiving? We're not hosting this year, but all the pretty things I've been seeing roll through my Pinterest feed lately have got me thinking I might pretty things up around here just to get in the spirit.

Here are a few of my recent faves, and links to the source and/or how-to below each image:

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Pretty painted pumpkins or gourds: Cut painters tape into geometric shapes, stick on, and spray paint! Short on time? Grab some ModPodge and wrapping paper or thin cotton fabric and glue, baby, glue.

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Hitting the grocery store for Turkey Day staples? Grab a few extra handfuls of green beans, asparagus or artichoke and decorate those pillar candles you have hanging around. A piece of double-sided tape might help the beans and asparagus stay upright until you can get the ribbon tied.

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A chain of thankfulness - Each link a scrap of paper with something you and your family are thankful for. Some pretty ribbon and a Command hook or two, and you've got meaningful decor.

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Break out that strand of white Christmas lights a few weeks early and use a little wire or thread to tie on some leaves - Grab 'em from the backyard or pick up a stem of good fakes and clip them apart.

I love, love, LOVE Christmas, but I'm one of those who really feels like Thanksgiving should have it's moment. Let's celebrate!

T1D Tuesday: A Day In The Life

For the month of November I'm putting my Monday 'Random Round Up' on hiatus, instead focusing on November being Diabetes Awareness Month. "T1D Tuesday" will hopefully shed a little light on Type 1 Diabetes. Learn, enjoy, and if you can, support JDRF (Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation).
Donate specifically to my cousin Ella's efforts at www2.jdrf.org, and search "Team Ella" in Minnesota.

 Sure, everyone has heard of diabetes. You may know that people who have it need shots of insulin, or even that the disease affects the pancreas. But do you really know what a diabetic deals with on a day to day basis?

Professional snowboarder Sean Busby does, and he's teamed up with the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation to give folks a little more insight. A play-by-play, day-in-the-life experience, right in the palm of your hand.
About one hour after you text T1D4ADAY to 63566, you'll start getting texts from Sean for 24 hours, letting you see firsthand how he tries to maintain a balanced life dealing with his Type 1 diabetes. You can even talk about your experience and see that of others who've accepted the challenge by using or searching #T14aDay on Twitter and other social media outlets.

I started this morning. Join me!


Extra Scoop:
Participation in T1D for a Day is free of charge. (You may receive up to 45 messages.)
Message and Data Rates May Apply.
Text Stop to 63566 to Unsubscribe.
Text Help to 63566 for Help.
Mobile Terms and Conditions at www.protexting.com/T1D4ADAY.html

HOWLoween TwentyThirteen

This should have gone up on the actual date of Halloween, but I think I was still laughing too hard from the photo shoot. Hope everyone had a wonderful, treat-filled holiday last week!

Create a picture collage

Two Minutes.

You have two minutes.

You do.

Now that you've read this, you have, let's say, a minute and 57 seconds left. Here's how you fill it:

And now that you've seen that (made by Ella's amazing mom, I might add), you'll be wanting to spend five minutes to donate to her cause. Click here to be taken right to the page to make your tax deductible donation for a cure.* On the anniversary day of her diagnosis, it's only right.

For Ella, for all.
And truly, thank you.


*Trouble with the link? Head to www2.jdrf.org and type Team Ella in the 'Team Name' box and choose Minnesota for the state. That will take you right to her link.

Random Round Up: Orange

Fall is all about embracing the orange:

Find-A-Puggle

Pumpkin doughnut taste testing (yeah, they're ALL pumpkin!)

Neon trees on our street.

The extent of my door-answering Halloween costume.

 And totally not falling into the orange category, but my former place of employment and much beloved Laura Bee Designs hosted it's eleven year(!!!) anniversary party this past weekend. I was lucky enough to get to come back and help out, and as always, SO. MUCH. FUN. Three cheers for getting some Christmas shopping done early too!

Have a happy week, everybody.

Two Cool Stools

The stars aligned, the angels sang, and light shone down from the heavens... Right onto HomeGoods.

Have you been in one? They're great, but pretty hit or miss. It's not like you're going to walk in and find a really specific thing you're looking for... Or are you...! We had a list of 5 places to go hunting for barstools to go with our new table, and this was the criteria:

Comfortable.

Not backless. 

Sturdy.

Stylistically compatible with the table.

We marched into our first stop - HomeGoods - got distracted by the pretty things browsed for a minute, and bam: Two perfect stools. They were like a tractor beam, I tell ya, and Nate and I gravitated right to 'em.

The only thing neither of us were crazy about was the cream pleather seats. But a quick flip-over in the store showed just 4 small screws holding the seat on, and I knew I could recover them pretty easily. Check it out:

This fabric is a little too classical for me, but I knew in small amounts it'd be just the thing.

Yellow for the kitchen, chestnut for the stools, black for the table.

I mentioned there were 4 small screws holding the seat in place... You'll just have to take my word for it since I failed to take photos (tricky to hold a stool, a screwdriver, and a camera... where is that third arm when you need it?!). But literally within 2 minutes, off came the seat and I had this:

Seat-free!

Centered, and traced with a few extra inches to wrap around.

Trusty staple gun - Staple, flip, done!

Tada!!

This is one stellar find and easy mini-makeover that equaled out to a pretty huge dining room upgrade. I'm in love.

One done...

...And two. Woohoo!