Don't Follow the Rabbit Trails

A phrase I love: There, but for the grace of God, go I. What an awesome, humbling statement to remember when looking on those who are lost, struggling, or less fortunate.

I saw an older mother/daughter couple in a clothing store the other day debating which top looked better. The green one or the tunic? And it made me hope that someday I'll have a daughter who loves shopping as much as me. We can furrow our brows in the fitting room together trying to decide which top has the better cuteness/value ratio...

I don't care what anybody says about technology making us less social. I am a MUCH more social person since I joined facebook six years ago. All those little status updates are an outlet for my wonderful one-liners (at least I think they're wonderful), and I get the luxury of writing a first draft, editing, and rewriting every comment before it is "out there"--a gift not given in verbal communication. On facebook I can be brave when otherwise I would be silent. Bryan said that channel 40/29 did a special on how technology harms relationships, and by their standards I have "a problem." Well... 40/29 anchors can't read a teleprompter (have you ever watched the morning news???) so I'm not going to let them judge my technology involvement. Facebook made me a better person.

So who's going to see The Social Network now that it won the Golden Globe for best picture? Put me on that list. Maybe. It's so hard to set aside time to watch movies. But hey, look at that, American Idol is on tonight. Maybe I'll tune in to see their strategy for jumping off the borderline of cancellation.

And who knew the Syfy channel could provide an evening of guilty entertainment? Oh, it must be SO HARD living as a vampire/werewolf/ghost in this modern society! I feel your pain and it makes me giggle...

There. Now I've said too much.

Lovely Distraction

With less than a month until our big move to the Midwest, I was spending several hours a day job hunting. I scoured every online job board in the morning, and again in the evening. Google search became my intimate friend. I found perfect jobs for everyone I knew, except myself. I was consumed and verging on despair when I finally accepted the hard truth: I need a hobby!! Something to distract me from my job-hunting obsession!

Cue the craft blogs. Yes, all of them. I visited one of my favorites for inspiration on a new project for me. Soon I clicked on one link, that led me to another, and after a messy maze of hyperlinks which I could never recreate, I finally found it. It was beautiful. They called it a buttercup bag, but I called it a savior. I knew instantly its destiny was to save me from my depressive compulsory job hunt. 24 hours and some leftover fabric later, I'd made my first purse. Another 24 hours and a fabric store after that, I'd made my second purse.


I'm extremely proud. I cannot stitch a straight line, the buttonhole is crooked, the magnetic snaps don't align, and my attempt to tackle piping is quite flawed, but I'm SO happy with the results! Considering I've never followed a pattern nor sewed anything more complicated than curtains, these purses were super easy to make. And best of all… I have three job interviews this week!

Sara K, the CRUSHER!!!

Ok, crushes are for more than just teenage girls, orange soda, and pro wrestling, right? I crush on people and things all the time! So here I have compiled a short list of what I've been crushing on lately. They include, but are not limited to, the following:

• Bite-sized Heath bars. Bryan picked out a big bag of these to sneak into the movie theater last week (I picked out strawberry Twizzlers) and I was shocked at how truly satisfying chocolate-covered toffee really is. Who knew?
• My new Facebook profile pic. I spent about thirty minutes doing some fine Photoshop work on an average picture of me to make it outstanding. I love the final result. Totally crushing on it.
• My husband. Nature is cruel at this time of the month.
• A hand-made heart pendant I recently bought from Etsy.com. I've been on the lookout for the perfect red heart necklace for a long time now—not too junior high, not too formal, not too red, not too expensive—and I'm so happy that I finally found the perfect pendant! Love it!• Kris Allen. SOOO proud of my Arkansas boy on American Idol!! I don't think he'll win, but I love that he's representing our publicity-challenged state so well!
• Yard sales. (I think I pretty much covered this one in my last post!)
• My grandmother's antique wedding ring. I've been in love with this little piece of jewelry all my life, and even wanted to use it for my own wedding ring. That didn't work out though, and for a long time it stayed tucked away in a safe place because I thought it would be tacky to wear a wedding set on each hand—but this week I changed my mind! Now it's out of hiding, on my right hand, and not tacky at all!
• Seagulls. I guess I've just been spending a lot more time outside and noticing them lately. They're such fun birds! I love how they always sound like they're laughing; it never ceases to make me smile!
• Pandora radio online. How does anybody ever get work done without Pandora?? Their steady stream of songs that are just to my liking helped me get through two weeks (and counting) of tracing photos in Illustrator. Couldn't have done it without ya, Pandora!
• My sister's new blog! It's all about how cute my little niece and nephew are, and Stefanie has an entertaining style of documenting their cuteness! There's a link to it on right of this page called "Borkerts the Sister".

Politics Make Me Uncomfortable

Ow. My foot is asleep and my shins are imprinted with red creases to match the form of my desk's edge. This is what happens when I try to do my American duty and research the presidential candidates of 2008. I've never been able to sit normally at a desk, so my twisted legs and squashed feet are not too happy with my decision to ignore their protests and remained glued to my computer screen.

I consider myself to be an open-minded conservative, so I went to the websites of both Obama and McCain. I discovered that both stand for things I agree with, and both stand for things that scare me. However, there is a bigger issue to consider that is not represented on either of their listed stances: web presence. Between the two there is one clear winner of my vote for the better website. I think that McCain's campaign has underestimated the importance of their web presence in this race. A quick YouTube search found 193,000 results for "Obama" and only 65,000 results for "McCain". Statistics show that people who are using the internet as the main source for their election news feel like they understand what is going on and that they have a say in how it turns out—in short, they sound like the type of people who actually get out and vote on election day. So if a candidate's website is unattractive and his web presence weak, how much of an effect will that have on his poll numbers?