Staci\'s a quirky bird

Have you heard of GTD? It’s pretty awesome – it’s an easy way to plan out and catalog anything and everything so that you can actually get it done. And, you can get it out of your brain. Here’s how it works.

worry wart

One of the reasons that you worry (theoretically) about things that need to get done is because your brain is constantly trying to remember all of those things at once. So you just go around and around in your head about the things you need to do, which makes sparks shoot out of your ears as you freak out. The GTD process gets everything out of your head and into a manageable list that you can reference, so your brain can stop worrying about all those things you need to get done.

make a big fatty list.

So the first thing you do is write out a fat honking list of everything you need to do. It can be anything from vacuum to plan a baby shower to send out thank you notes. Just download everything out of your head and into a list.

organize it

Look over everything. Anything that’s takes more than one task becomes a project. For instance, plan a baby shower has many steps (make guest list, get addresses, source invitations, choose menu), but vacuum is only one. Now you should have a series of lists for each of your projects.

expand it

Now that you have your projects, expand each one to make sure you have all of the steps written down. For instance, I may have yard work as a project and one of those tasks is to weed whack. But I need a weed whacker, so I have steps associated with weed whack that include finding a weed whacker and buying it.

put it in order

Now, number all of the tasks/subprojects by what needs to happen first, if applicable. When you’re ready to work on that project, you just start at the top.

take it a step further, if you’re ready for that

Typically I don’t take it further than putting it in order, but you can! Give each task a note for where it needs to be done. For instance, confirming the guest list for the baby shower is something I need to do on the phone. Collecting the addresses is something I need to do in email, or computer (whatever label you want to give it). Buying a weed whacker is something I need to do as an errand. The idea is that you can sit down to email and take care of everything in your email label, or run all of your errands in that label at once.

what can make this easy for me?

Let’s be honest – if it’s not easy then we’re not going to do it. So how can you make it easy? Well, we use Things (mac only) – you can try it out for free and see if you like it. There’s an app for that too. If you have a PC, there are quite a few out there, just google GTD Software and try a few out. Most have a free trial.

I actually like writing things down on paper, so I made some printables that I’ll be offering for free here pretty soon! They turned out super cute, hopefully you’ll enjoy them as much as I have been.

David Allen wrote the book on it (literally!). Get it on Amazon here.

It’s something that I think about all of the time. Is creativity a finite resource? Sometimes I feel like it’s all gone. Sometimes I have so many ideas, I can’t keep them straight. So how do you stay inspired?

relax.

That’s I think one of the simultaneously difficult and easy things you can do. You’ve got to take time for yourself and unplug your brain. Go for a walk. Take a nap. Or a bubble bath. Watch the tube. Just unplug your noodle.

do something that inspires you.

Right now, I pinterest. I’ve been at it a week and I’m feeling like a brand new person. Inspiration is all over the place, and I can organize and save it for reference. Priceless. Or, walk around a craft store. Walk through the yarns and the fabrics. Look at some of the crafting books if you’re into that sort of thing. Inspiration, even if it’s not related to the medium that you want to work in, sparks something that gets you moving again.

See art.

Everywhere you look, everything you do, look for art. Yesterday I was washing my hands and admired my sink full of colorful coffee cups that were dirty. From the top, they looked so pretty, the colors all complimented each other so well with the combination of the circles…I should have taken a picture. See? See art.

bide your time.

If you’re feeling down about your creative juices, just wait – tomorrow you’ll probably feel a little better. And if you don’t, you could try something like I listed above and I bet you’ll be back in action in no time. Just know, creativity isn’t finite. You don’t just run out of it. It’s always there inside of you, you just have to pet it every once in a while when it’s sleepy to get it moving again.

Have you heard of Pinterest.com yet? You’re fixin’ to.

pinthe-what?

Pinterest is a fairly new network of pinboard or moodboards created by users. You connect your account to your facebook, and can follow anyone on pinterest and browse their boards. Not only can you browse their boards, but you can comment or like the individual images as well. Or, you can click through to where the image was captured from. All with the click of a button.

fyi – it’s amazing.

Nina Garcia is on Pinterest. You can search people, or you can search topics. Like DIY. Or Typography. Or, you can make your own boards, as many  as you want on as many topics as you want.

fyi x 2 – it’s easy

After you sign up and get approved, you’ll go through a series of steps – the last being to install the little plugin into your browser. Note: in firefox, you have to go to view > toolbars > bookmarks toolbar to drag the plug in into. When you’re on something you want to pin, click the pin it icon in your bookmarks toolbar and you’ll get a grid of all of the pinnable images on the page. Pick the one you want, tell it what board you want it to go to, and go. Doneso.

It’s so rad, I’m thinking about implementing it for our client moodboards instead of imgspark (which clients are constantly having trouble with) – it’s so flipping easy and pretty and accessible, I don’t see why not.

Add me when you join, my handle is imaquirkybird. Comment below if you want an invite!

you can’t make this sh!t up.

Chloe, age 7, writes a note to her mother while she’s on a work call asking for a Coke.

Soooo it’s 6pm and I totally flaked on day 1 of my attempt to blog daily. Ha.

turn that frown upside down

I hate Mondays. I really thought this one was going to be a good one, but I was wrong-0. If only my nook 2.0 had come in today! Sigh. Good news is that my art books shipped from Amazon today. Yipee! I’m looking forward to all of the goodies in that package, and sharing them with you readers out there. All 5 of you, love your hearts.

At least the day went nuclear AFTER I finished work for the day. And, there’s a cold beer plus a good book, a smiling baby and a hot dinner to make it all a little better.

Was your Monday better than mine? I sure hope so.

Sometimes we just have to face the facts.

So I’ve been trying to figure out HOW to make myself post more. I happen to be one of those people who, if something is part of my routine it gets done. If it’s not, it doesn’t. Simple as that. Problem is my routines are daily. I’m way too ADD to routine a week. So it occurred to me I should blog every (weekday) day. Which means…what? I mean I can’t blog once a MONTH, nevermind daily. Right? I guess we’ll see.

In my defense, I have been a little busy.

hello, denver.

We love it here. The scenery is amazing. The people are super friendly. There are a zillion things to do. The schools are amazing. Colorado had big shoes to fill coming from California, but I have to say it delivered, and then some. Let’s see how I handle the winter though, after having lived in a practically tropical latitude my entire life. Check out the view from one of the kid’s windows…

I love LA.

Went back to LA to stay with my bestie, Parrish. Had an amazing time with the girls for a pre-birthday eating/dancing/drinking/shopping marathon. It was excellent.

31 times the lady.

I turned 31 over the holiday weekend which we spent in Breckenridge. It was beautiful. I definitely missed our friends though, it was my first birthday without my people.

Candice chuborama

She’s getting so big! And cute. She’s starting to babble and grab things. Such a fun age – she’ll be four months old pretty soon. I can’t even believe that.

Ok, so enough about me. I have some blog posts in the works that aren’t about me (I know, shocking) and I’m going to try to get on here once a day during the week and post pictures if nothing else. Wish me luck with that hahahaha!

candice violet

2.12.11
5lb 12oz, 19.5 inches of cute.

it all started with a bad case of the flu

Chloe brought home the flu and was sick for a week with a super high fever. At the end of that week, none of the rest of us were sick…until BOOM. Claire and I both caught it. We had been mall walking for a few days trying to evict the baby, but Thursday the 10th we went into Labor and Delivery because my contractions were 2-3 minutes apart for 3 hours and bad enough that I was having to breathe through them. Yeah – they sent me home because I wasn’t progressed enough.

Friday the flu hit hard, we cut our mall walk short because I was feeling like roadkill. After a nap, I was laying in the living room and was feeling like I was going to pass out – my blood pressure was dropping intermittently. So they told us to come back to Labor and Delivery. They checked my amniotic fluid, which was super low, and voila…I was admitted and prepped for induction.

labor + the flu = THE SUCK.

Let me be the one to tell you that delivering a baby while fighting the flu is hellish. They induced me that Friday  night on the 11th at midnight: by 3am I was in bad shape. I was so sick, my head hurt SO bad that the bones in my face hurt. The nurse got me some advil, but by 4am I was still hurting. She suggested a narcotic, promising me it was just going to knock me out for 1-2 hours so I could get some sleep and get my epidural around 6am. Yeah, at noon I was still puking, totally hungover from the la la drugs. I never would have agreed to them if I hadn’t been so freaking sick, I just felt so awful I would have taken anything she had offered. Literally – anything.

fast and easy

I went into labor at midnight and Candice was born at 1:57 the next afternoon. My fastest labor yet! I pushed for about 8 minutes. The nursing staff and midwife were super cheerleaders. They put Candice right on me after she was born, that’s the first time out of three deliveries that I was able to experience it. It was amazing.

recovery? what’s that?

We left the next afternoon to come home. I was still battling the flu, but after a few days Claire and I were both feeling a lot better. By the next weekend though, both her and I were feeling worse. We thought our flu came back – that would have been easier than what actually happened. Claire, we discovered, had Pneumonia. I, we discovered, had an infected uterus. HTF does that happen?? Not sure, my guess is that my immune system was so busy taking care of the flu that the infection ran rampant all up in my womb. It was so bad that by the time I got in to see the doctor I could barely walk. When I got there, they were really concerned. They hooked me up to an IV chalk full of antibiotics and gave me a shot of penicillin in the butt. They sent me home with 875mg of amoxicillin to take twice a day. Holy horse pill, batman. But by that evening I felt so much better, finally able to walk comfortably for the first time in a week. It felt like my lady parts had been a punching bag for a prize fighter.

my baby is awesomeness.

This baby is a dream. She wakes up once in the middle of the night to eat (HOLLA for sleep). She rarely cries and is cute to boot. She’s mellow and makes noises like a baby dinosaur. We adore her. So much in fact, knowing it’s my last baby…I’m having a hard time watching her grow up! Every night I mourn that day lost. I’m getting over it though, she’s just graduated out of preemie clothes and into newborn size. 0-3 month are ridiculously big still. Candice was born two days before Valentines, which is appropriate since her nickname is Candi. Here are a few of our favorite pics.

It’s been a hairy couple of months.

Christmas madness

Christmas was nutso, we had my brother and his wife in town and my parents here often plus Jeff was working pretty much non-stop through the holiday. We survived though!

Claire got glasses

Claire, we discovered, is far sighted. Really far sighted. She got her first pair of glasses in the beginning of January – and surprisingly is adorable in them!! I was really concerned – I was the kid with glasses in school and it was…let’s just say it was less than awesome. They’re super cute though, and she’s rocking them out. The chances of her eyes correcting themselves is pretty high too, but with my raging hormones it was a lot to handle! It’s turning out to be way less of a deal than I thought it was going to be initially though.

baby shower goodness

Mid January we had my baby shower, thrown by a group of my best friends. It was super fun, and gorgeous to boot. Parrish headed up the operation, it was candy themed (YUM) – even more appropriate as we’ve chosen the baby’s name: Candice Violet. No, we won’t be calling her Candy as a general rule, but I think it’s a little cosmic that the shower theme coincided with her name.

chloe’s 7 and toothless

Chloe had her 7th birthday party the week after the baby shower at Chuck E Cheese. Don’t judge. It was easier than throwing a party anywhere else! And, the kids had a rager – success! Also, Chloe lost one of her top teeth and now has the cutest speech impediment that I’ve ever heard.

this baby wants out.

During the holidays, I was a lethargic mess. I couldn’t get enough sleep, my heart rate was doing whacked out things, and my body was in bad, bad shape. Went to the doc two days after Christmas and we discovered – I’m anemic. Like super hardcore don’t pass go – get some supplements now anemic. Started taking iron supplements and almost immediately felt a zillion times better all around.

The day Claire got her glasses, we were out all day (without enough water for me) and I was really upset about her having to get glasses. So upset that by the time we got home, made dinner and did homework, I was having contractions 1:30-1:45 apart. Scary contractions. Breathe through it contractions. So we packed up and went to the hospital for a magical shot of terbutaline to stop them.

Less than a week later, we thought I might be leaking amniotic fluid. Went to L&D and got a false positive on a litmus test – turns out NOT leaking fluid: just peeing on myself. That’s right, folks – I was leaking pee instead. Being pregnant is awesome. I’ll take peeing myself over leaking amniotic fluid at 35 weeks though any day. I couldn’t believe how happy I was TWICE to leave the hospital with no baby.

Self – imposed bedrest

My midwife and I had a good talk a week ago or so and she made me feel a lot better about becoming an invalid. If I get up from my desk and walk to the bathroom and back, I have contractions that hurt. Bad. So I’ve been laid up in bed working over the last week trying to keep this kid cooking for a few more weeks. I can’t express how much I appreciate that my midwife has had 5 kids – she definitely understood how much pain and frustration I’ve been dealing with and swore to me that I wasn’t going to have to deal with it that much longer. My worst nightmare is going 42 weeks in this state. Ok, that was melodramatic, but seriously – I’m going to be crying non-stop if I’m still pregnant in the middle of march.

eviction weekend

Next weekend I’ll be 37 weeks and we’re planning an all day mall-walk-a-thon to try to evict this kiddo. I had Claire at 37 weeks and my midwife assured me that we’ll all be good to go from that point, so the plan is to instigate. Wish us luck with that – I may have a nervous breakdown if it doesn’t work.

I’ll start by saying that, although I did lots of research before choosing the Nook, I haven’t used a Kindle. Here’s what I came up with in the way of features and which suited my needs the best.

general “why get an e-book reader” stuff

reading books is easier

Never lose your place again. Never get a hand cramp from holding your book open when it’s near the end. Turn pages with your thumb and a click without having to even move your hand. Download dozens of books so when you’re finished with the first book in the series, you can start book two without having to get up.

buy a new book without getting off your couch

With two kids, browsing the book store was a huge chore. With an e-book reader, download books fast and easy, 24 hours a day from anywhere you have wi-fi.

e-books are cheaper

I spent almost $30 on a hard copy of Mockingjay when it came out. It was on Nook for 8.99. Nuff said.

save your bookshelves

I was really getting sick of trying to find places for my books on my bookshelves – especially the ones that ended up sucking. Nook can hold up to 1500 books (more if you add a memory card). Try dusting that many books on your bookshelf. Or even a owning a bookshelf that would house that many books.

to 3g or not to 3g?

Unless you’re planning on browsing the internet on your device, you don’t need 3G. I personally wouldn’t ever use it for that, not only is it cumbersome to navigate, but I have an iphone that’s brilliant with my mobile internet needs so this was a non issue for me. Books download even on non-3G in about 30 seconds.

only with the nook

Barnes and Nobles is a real store (duh)

You can go into any Barnes and Nobel and read a book for an hour before you get shut down from that particular book. Also, you can go into B&N and play with a Nook before you buy it.

I’m an interface kind of gal

The kindle doesn’t have much in the way of interface for my tastes. The nook’s color lcd touch screen and interface helped tip the scales. I also like that I can browse books by cover using the flashy lcd screen in the store as well as in my library. You can also flip your pages by swiping the lcd screen, similar to the iphone. I read some feedback that the touch screen wasn’t fast enough – it’s definitely not as fast as an iphone but I don’t find it bothersome.

number of book titles available

Nook has double the amount of book titles available. A huge selling point, I did some research on specific titles that I wanted to read and found that Amazon didn’t have several on my to-read list that Barnes and Noble did. The count as of right now is 2 million Nook vs 750,000 Kindle (up from 1 mil. Nook and 500,000 Kindle 3 months ago).

not what it seems

sharing stuff

kindle – you can share books BUT only if all of the devices are using the same Amazon account to purchase books. You can’t share books otherwise at all.
nook – you can share books BUT only once. Seriously. Once ever.

both have

Share on multiple devices
Free sampling of books before you buy
Free books/publications to download (though Nook has more available titles)
True Ink – there’s not back lighting, the text looks like a real book

And with all of that, I chose a nook. I’m super happy with it, in fact I love it! I thought I would be sad to let go of real books, but it’s so much more convenient than reading paper books. Good luck choosing yours.

Uh, we’re moving again.

With the addition of our newest family member, we knew that we’d have to move our of our shoebox apartment and get a bigger place. But the question was, where? Living in southern California, as you could probably guess, is mondo expensive. So, we started looking around at other places to live. We couldn’t find anywhere that we thought we would enjoy as much as we enjoy living here, but the hunt was on.

just close your eyes and point to the map

Where could we live? Didn’t want to move to the East coast (weather, expense). Didn’t want to live in the midwest (weather, lack of…anything), or the southwest (desert – no thanks). Didn’t want to live in the south (heat and hurricanes? Been there, done that.), and didn’t want to live in the northwest (too freaking wet, I’d be depressed all year).  Which left pretty much nothing.

rocky mountains – DUH.

A friend of ours was joking about moving there and we started talking about it as a joke at first. Then we started really looking into it. First upside – cost of living is 58% less there. FIFTY EIGHT PERCENT. Secondly – there’s a huge art/music scene. Third – rocky mountains. DUH. How beautiful, and still has extreme sports for my adrenaline junkie husband. Also – I have a great friend that lives in Denver to not only give me the skinny on Denver, but to also allow me to crawl up her ass, as she will mine, as we’ve wanted to for years but were stopped by the miles between us. One of the biggest draws though is that my parents want to end up in the Denver area, and my Nana (who is still rocking and rolling – the woman is a machine that runs on sheer will and determination) would be willing to move there to. Oh and, the schools there are in the top 5% of to the country. Those things you don’t think about before you have kids.

but leave California?!

That’s the hard part. I won’t miss the insane cost of living, but I have a huge support system here. My best friend in the whole world is here. In fact, all of my friends are here, and I have some amazing ones. That’s really the only thing keeping me here though, and obviously we have to do what’s best for our family. The scary part – SNOW! I’ve only lived places that I can wear flip flops year round. So, this should be interesting. But I hear that the winters aren’t terrible, and that Denver gets as many sunny days per year as San Diego. Holla for that.

and it will all go down…

After the baby is born and our lease is up in early April, we’ll be starting our trek to the rockies. My parents and I will caravan, the kids can hang in the RV with them and watch tv while we drive. Jeff will take the uhaul and the dogs, and spring 2011 we’ll officially be Denverites. Who’s coming to snowboard next winter? Because it’s gonna be ON.