I love my dog! He is amazing! Oh my gosh. :-)

As you all know, one of the things on my 30 before 30 list is to learn how to properly use my DSLR camera. I am fortunate enough to have a Nikon D5000, and I absolutely adore it. Problem is, I don’t use it often. But lucky me, Ashley Sisk has these awesome scavenger hunts every week, and this is my first week partaking in them.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This week’s list consisted of:

1. Windows/Doors
2. Eyelashes
3. Paint
4. Leaf Veins
5. Faceless Portrait

And here’s what I found:

This picture is actually me standing in my backyard taking a picture of my reflection on our big bay window. It’s neat because it’s my reflection, plus a glimpse of the backyard, plus the center bright area is actually the other window that is straight ahead from the bay window. It’s like I am at 3 places at once.

2.) Eyelashes

Well, I am probably stretching this one a bit, but when I think of eyelashes, I often think of how my dog doesn’t really have any. But his eyes are still deep and so lustrous. And hey, his whiskers are sorta like eyelashes.

3.) Paint

 

This is the center of my patio table- the paint is peeling off, as you can tell. Reminds me that I should really paint it soon!

4.) Leaf Veins

 

It was so windy last night, but I am so happy I snagged this shot. The bokeh is perfect, and with a bit of sharpening, I made those leaf veins really pop. I adore this photo.

5.) Faceless Portrait

 

This photo is actually quite old, but I remembered this photo because today the little boy in that picture turns 12. This picture was taken at my little brother’s kindergarten graduation. About a month ago we attended his middle school graduation, and I am glad my husband took this photo many years ago. It’s like a small token to remember the small child we all once were.

Hope you enjoyed my photos/edits!

I am going to do a half-marathon.
Me.

Yes, me.

I don’t really think that is all that crazy, but you’d be surprised at the looks I get when I tell people I am training to walk/jog a half-marathon.

Maybe I shouldn’t tell them such things as I am eating a breakfast taco in front of them?

I suppose not.

But, no really, I am going to do the Rock ‘N Roll San Antonio Half-Marathon in November of THIS year. And I am truly excited and I am truly terrified. Mostly I am terrified I’ll be too slow and have to get escorted off the course and won’t get my medal.

And I would be livid if I went through all this training and then didn’t get my medal because I did NOT FINISH.

Oh my lord. Seriously. Thoughts like that cruise through my mind at least 10 times a day. Also cruising through my mind 100’s of times a day is the joy I think I’ll feel when I cross that finish line and get my medal.

A bit obsessed with the medal, eh? I am. Definitely.

I am following this half-marathon training plan meant for walkers, in addition to still attending 1-hour Zumba classes 2-3 times a week and strength training.

It is a lot of exercise, and yet I am still bulbous. For as much as I have exercised this year, I feel like my body doesn’t show it. What it does eloquently show is my love of breakfast tacos. And margaritas. And Whataburger.

While I fully feel I will eventually get better and hopefully achieve a 14-15 minute mile in time for the race, I still haven’t conquered the food demons. In late April, I had gotten down to about 26 pounds loss. Today I weighed in, and I am 21 or so lost. I am so pissed with myself because in 2 months I’ve essentially made NO progress. The year is almost half over, and I am not halfway to goal weight. I didn’t hit the 50 pounds mark by BlogHer like I wanted to. I just completely and utterly gave up and lost focus with food journaling from about late April til about a week ago. That is so much time wasted, and it almost makes me sick to my stomach to think about it. I could have made so much more progress if I hadn’t thrown in the towel.

Looking back, I don’t know why I got off track. I mean, I went to a conference, but that week I inadvertently lost 2 pounds because of food poisoning. I think I just wanted to eat all the foods I had forbade myself since January 1st. I went nuts—like food was going to all of a sudden disappear and I’d be left to starve. My other reasoning behind my diet hiatus is that I let work overwhelm me. Extremely. Then I used food to cope with it knowing food does nothing to help cure problems.

Food demons, I tell ya.

I am back on track as much as I can be, again. This time around I am not going to be super militant about it. I have increased my calories and just plan on not eating that many of my exercise calories earned. If I slip up, I am going to track it and make better choices the next time. I think it’s about time I find a balance so that this will be a lifestyle rather than a 12-month diet.

Yup.

I do have a few questions for you lovely readers, especially those of you who walk/run/exercise outdoors.

1.) I need headphones. The cheapo $3 pair I got from Wal-Mart slip out of my ears because I am sweating buckets when I do my outdoor walks. And I wear glasses. So with those 2 things in mind, what do you recommend?

2.) I need new tunes. What songs pump you up when you’re running/walking? My fave song lately is The Edge of Glory by Lady Gaga followed by Selfish by Britney Spears.

3.) Any tips to get through this half-marathon training? Any tips to get me to my goal weight without anymore unplanned hiatuses?

I’m on the edge of glory. I just know it.

Sorry things have been a little quiet on the blog front. Between work, Etsy, and training for my first half-marathon (WTF was I thinking?), I’ve been left with little spare time. But luckily, random.org is my trusty, fair method of picking out winners, and the winner of the CRI-Kits grand prize is the lovely Laurel! Congrats dear. Laurel loves to craft, and she loves cupcakes, so I know this prize pack will surely come in handy for such a creative friend- congrats!

If you want to see what I made, click on over to the original giveaway post.

Thanks again to CRI-Kits for hosting such a great grand prize and for making such awesome products. I’ll be back on Friday with news on my half-marathon training, a weight loss update, and maybe a new low calorie recipe.

I am going to BlogHer in August. Me. The girl who loses e-mail subscribers quicker than a woman losing her dieting willpower on a Saturday night. I am that talented y’all. Now I like to say I don’t care I only have 237 blog followers and 30 (as of today, we’ll see tomorrow) e-mail subscribers. Plus 2300 Twitter followers *fist pump*…BUT I do care just a little. I started this blog to quit harassing a friend (a friend at that time…my how things change) about the things I wanted. I’d e-mail her things like, “Hey isn’t this lamp DIVINE?” and “Hey, look at this damask item. Isn’t SO me?” and I remember being ecstatic when I hit like 10 followers. It was insane. I said something along the lines of “SHUT THE FRONT DOOR! I HAVE TEN FOLLOWERS!”

One of which was my husband who I forced to subscribe. Smooches honey.

And about 2 years later, I hoped to be fabulous and have thousands of followers on my blog. And I have roughly 250. But, regardless, I am going to BlogHer.

Which makes me wonder, why am I going? And then I remember that these people I connect with online are, ya know, real people. I was fortunate enough to meet some of my tweeps back in April when I was in Austin for a conference. My persona online is pretty true to who I am. I am sensitive, cry during weight loss shows, overanalyze everything and really random. And I like bows and sparkly things as Kit would know.

I was a little nervous when meeting these lovely Austinites for dinner back in April. Would I be shy? Awkward? Talk too much? And I just tried to tell myself to be me and be social.

That’s what I did. And we had a fabulous time.

Me, @gettinfitbritt, @melissalicia512 , @JHooker517 and @BeingKatieB.

Brittany: I LOVE this girl. She is one of my dearest friends. I can tell her anything. ANYTHING.

Katie: Super sweetheart. She is SO nice and sweet.

Jeanette: Hilarious. She is seriously funny. And lovely to be around.

Melissa: Witty and she runs. Like really runs. Marathons and stuff. So jealous- she is fit and cute!

Twipals (twitter + pals= twipals)

Obligatory lets-fit-as-many-as-we-can-in-one-shot-photo.

And somehow, thinking back to the fun I had on that Tuesday has made me a little less intimidated about BlogHer. I had a great time with these girls. It almost felt like we took our Twitter banter/chatter and just kept going at the dinner table. Like we’d been friends for a long time. So, that’s what I am hoping BlogHer is like. I have 3 amazing roommates: @temysmom, @Savingmoneyll, and @suzrocks. I feel like I am going to have some awesome roomies/women by my side to make BlogHer less intimidating and more fun. (Just FYI roomies, if you all try to ditch me, I will harass you on Twitter…kidding. Sorta.) But honestly, just e-mailing with them back and forth today about some BlogHer details has me psyched to meet people and take silly photos.

^Silly photo.

But yet, I am still nervous. So this post is for me to make it known to the world that I’d love to meet you if you’re going to BlogHer. I don’t care about your stats, I don’t care about your Google page rank and I don’t care if you have 3 Twitter followers or 30,000. I’d love to meet you. If you want to meet me too, please feel free to DM me on Twitter, e-mail me at monicawantsit@gmail.com or leave me a comment on this blog post. People keep telling me to get cell phone numbers and make a list of people I want to meet, so this is my way of getting started. Gosh, I hope someone wants to meet me.

BlogHer is about making connections, and overall being a better blogger. I guess this means I should continue to post on a semi-regular schedule. Hey, I’ve done well lately with about 3 posts per week.

Maybe one day I’ll crack 300 followers?

A girl can dream. And boy do I dream big.

Remember in my last dining room blog post I asked for opinions on what to do with this wall?

Well, I then started looking at sample paint colors on Sherwin Williams’ website, and they have this neat feature where you can upload one of your photos, and “paint” the wall a color so you can get an idea of what it would look like in YOUR space. So I uploaded the above picture and I must have tried 20+ colors in shades of blue, gray, beige, taupe and nothing was really wowing me. That is until Black Fox. Here’s what it looked like when I put Black Fox on the wall:

Lush. Crisp. Dark. And no I am not talking about the werewolf from Twilight…

Though I guess lush, crisp and dark works for him, too.

Yeah, definitely.

But anyway. Back to the paint. Black Fox looked good (hypothetically) to me. It made my cabinets pop. Really pop. Which I like. Plus it adds a sense of balance to a otherwise very white/beige room. I googled the paint color, and I found this gorgeous dining room painted entirely in Black Fox.

Credit: Bovagoods

And I was even MORE convinced that it was the perfect shade of dark gray/brown for the room. So, DH and I went to Sherwin Williams on Sunday and picked up a gallon of urbane bronze paint.

I know. What happened to Black Fox? Well, DH liked urbane bronze better and since they were so close to being the same color, I went with it.

I cut in the walls and borders of the cabinets, and I kind of liked the color. Then I did one coat, and it was streaky. Then I did another until finally I had a solid urbane bronze colored wall:

I still hadn’t done the 2nd coat yet, so ignore the streaks at the top.

How the room looks at night.

I like it. I think. I knew with the Rustoleum cabinet kit that I hated the paint and stopped. With this wall, I kept going because I am thinking it’ll look good once I finish the whole room. I think.

Maybe?

It’s dark. Really dark. I’d describe it as chocolate brown mixed with dark grey. I don’t think I had good light when I took those photos, so I’m sure you’re looking at my pics saying, “That is BLACK.” I promise it’s not.

How do you know when/if you love a paint color? Is it instant or do you live with it for awhile and decide? It’s growing on me day-by-day, but I’ll make the final determination when the whole room is put together, hopefully by the end of summer.

But, I still need your help because I am indecisive. Should I leave the wall as is (urbane bronze colored) OR leave it as is and add a lovely damask pattern (in metallic) over it for a nice, chic wallpaper look?

Credit: Royal Design Stencils

Credit: Cutting Edge Stencils

Also, now that I have a dark wall, what color curtains should I get for the opposing wall:

I was thinking these very affordable, very luxe white grommet curtains from Curtainworks (I’d get them in the 95-inch length):

I love these from Ballard Designs, but at $180 a panel (yes, really)…um, no.

There is, however, a sorta similar cheap knockoff at Wal-Mart that I’d like in the vanilla color (sadly, they only come in 84-inch length):

Well, what do you think? Which curtains should I get? Are there any other you’ve seen that would be affordable and great for my space? Does the length matter?

The winner of the Cushion Source pillows is at the end of this post…but wait…

I think McDonald’s pancakes have crack in them. Why? Well, because I can eat them any day of the week. Like seriously, if McDonald’s served those babies all day long, I’d be there all 3 meals ordering the hot cakes and sausage.

With a diet coke.

Oh please, you know you would too. Wanna meet me?

Nom.

Then I was also on Pinterest last week (which is crack for the uber inspired…me…again) and I saw someone pinned a recipe for mancakes.

Pancake + bacon + maple syrup= mancake

And it also equals a bajillion calories.

But, I knew there was a way to reduce both the calories of the dish and my trips to McDonald’s for breakfast. Here are my low-calorieish mancakes.

The ingredients:

-Pancake batter (I used one of the 50-cent pouches from Wal-Mart because it’s just DH and I. One bag made 4 big pancakes)

- Bacon (NOT the pre-cooked kind!) I used 5 slices in our 4 pancakes.

- Light/low calorie maple syrup

- Water

Easy peasy.

I put my bacon on a cookie sheet and plopped them in the oven at 425 for 15 minutes:

Once they’re cooked and crispy, lay them on a paper towel to blot off excess grease/oil:

While they’re in the napkin, use your super upper body strength to crush the bacon and then dump the pieces into your already mixed pancake batter:

Whisk together:

Apply to a griddle if you have one. I set mine to 375:

Wait til the edges brown & bubble, then use a spatula to flip over:

Mmmm, bacon. Once cooked, serve on a pretty plate and top with maple syrup. I used about 1/4 cup for a serving of 2 pancakes.

Dig in and enjoy!

McDonald’s hot cakes and sausage is $2.99 per platter plus about 650+ calories. Yeah.

My version omits the sausage, but adds bacon. The cost is about $1.50 per person (if you have NONE of the ingredients on hand) and about 475-500 calories. Not a super, duper low calorie breakfast, but better than McDonalds. Perfect for a Sunday breakfast. My husband and I enjoyed a banana on the side and drank some juice. It was perfection!

Hope you enjoyed that quick, easy recipe! Now let’s draw the winner for the Cushion Source pillows <drum roll>:

Congratulations Ro! I’ll be contacting you with details on how to claim your prize.

I still have one giveaway open til tomorrow for some lovely CRI-Kits pens for your diecut machine- closes tomorrow, so enter today!

This giveaway is now closed.

Remember a few months ago when I wrote about these fabulously gorgeous pillows from Cushion Source?

Well, I am back here again to offer a set of FREE THROW PILLOWS (yes, that warrants all capital letters) to the lucky winner of this giveaway. So, it could be you! Yes, you sitting there reading this blog post. I was fortunate enough to receive another set of pillows (the ones above are in our bedroom and they have just been so easy to take care of and they’re fluffy as ever), and they are sitting pretty on the sectional in my living room.
  
Like the other pillows I received in January, these pillows are way sturdier, fluffier and of higher quality than the usual ones I buy from Marshalls, Ross and JCPenney. The fabric is more luxe, the construction is better, and the filling always holds up to a household of 2 people plus a dog who thinks the world is his pillow. They don’t ever flatten out over time like other throw pillows I have. Trust me, I have a ton. I have a thing for pillows and lamps.
The brown pillow and gold pillow are both from Cushion Source. You can see how plush/thick they are against the blue throw pillow I bought on clearance elsewhere.



Gorgeous fabric with intricate patterns that are matched up to perfection to make a beautiful pattern on both sides. Attention to detail is something that is obviously important to Cushion Source.
 
Shimmering, chenille-like fabric.

Overall, a lovely set of pillows to complement my decor year round. I plan to have their pillows in every room of my house. 2 down, 3 to go! So, how can you get your hands on  your very own set of these uber fabulous pillows? You know want a pair- they are shipped securely, made well and they have something for everyone’s decor/taste preferences. You simply must enter. Here’s how:
1. Visit www.cushionsource.com and tell me your favorite fabric/style.
2. Follow Cushion Source on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/cushionsource and tweet this: “@monicabenavidez is giving away a set of @cushionsource pillows on her blog. Enter here: http://bit.ly/8MbyUP”
3. Follow them on Facebook http://www.facebook.com/cushionsource and leave a comment letting them know Monica sent ya.
4. Visit their blog at http://www.experienceoutdoorliving.com and leave a comment on one of their posts and/or follow their blog.
But, remember to leave a comment on this post for each entry, so you can enter up to 4 times.
Contest is open NOW through June 15th at 8 pm CST. Good luck!

A few months ago…ok, more like 6 months ago I found a wrought iron chandelier for $15 at a local furniture store that was closing its doors. I thought it’d be perfect for our outdoor covered patio, but it just hung there for the past 6 months until I got around to do something with it.

And lucky for me, Krylon Crafts sent me 6 of their amazing products to use for my projects here around the house. Today’s post will feature one of those products, and I am thrilled with the results. As you all know, I love Krylon spray paint! I used it for my ribbon holder back in 2009 and for my DIY family artwork last year as well as various other projects here and there.

Their products are easy to use, affordable and require no special skills. My cup of tea.

Here’s the chandelier I made over into something chic, girly and very Monica.

Love the fleur de lis details.

Where there are round platforms there is potential for candles. That is my motto.

Here’s a pic of the product I used that was provided by Krylon. I chose it for 2 reasons- one being that it was made for outdoors. I live in South Texas where it is HOT. I wanted to make sure the spray paint would hold up well to being outdoors 24/7 in sweltering heat. The other reason is that it has a textured finished which would give my chandelier the rustic vibe I was going for, while still allowing me to have a metallic like finish/color.

I attached this little adapter thingy which makes spray painting oh-so-easy. It was about $2 at Sherwin Williams and it fits onto most spray paint cans.

I sprayed about 2 coats on the chandelier making sure to rotate it so I got all the sides. It’s shaped like a hexagon, so I flipped it 2 times and also sprayed the chain. I then hung it back up and let it dry overnight.

In the morning, I got up and I grabbed the 4 glass candle holders I bought from Wal-Mart. They were 88-cents each.

This glue will glue ANYTHING together. Seriously- ANYTHING.

I spread a ton of glue on the bottom of the candle holders and put them on their pedestal one-by-one.

And then most people would have been done and called it a day, but I decided the chandelier needed some more pizazz. And I knew exactly where to add some:

I went inside and grabbed my purple box of acrylic jewels/beads plus some floral wire and floral shears.

Cut 24 pieces of 6-inch section of floral wire and threaded them with acrylic jewels. I think I bought these for my wedding in 2009 and never used them. Glad I kept them!

Then I went back outside and wrapped the ends of the floral wire onto the chandelier. That easy- just wrap and then pinch the wire in place to make sure it’s on there. I did it this way so as not to be permanent if I ever change my mind about the jewels. It would be as easy as unwrapping the floral wire- lovely.

And of course, I then used the E-6000 glue to adorn all the fleur de lis parts with round flat backed jewels:

I love it! Such an easy project thanks to Krylon Crafts. What do you think? I think I need to get my hands on more of the spray paint I used because I’d love to spray paint our outdoor patio set to match the chandelier. It’s beautiful matte, silver, textured finish that would be lovely on furniture and other outdoor accessories. I have no doubts that the finish will hold up over time. Now I need to get the rest of my patio fixed up so I can light up those citronella votives and enjoy my gorgeous chandelier.

Stay tuned for more tutorials using products from Krylon Crafts. Also, make sure to follow them on Twitter. Unlike some companies, they do reply promptly to tweets, which I love and appreciate. <3

Cost:

Chandelier- $16 w/tax

Spray paint- sponsored by Krylon Crafts

Misc supplies (jewels, floral wire, glue)- had on hand

Candle holders- $4

Candles- $5 for 25 citronella tealights at World Market

Total cost= $25ish for a year-round outdoor chandelier