Life Changes, Challenges, RAKS, & Haircuts

I know it has been awhile, I have been busy not being busy! lol One thing I am doing, is trying to figure out how I am going to take better care of myself. Being that I have diabetes, high-blood pressure, gout, and many other afflictions, I really need to start eating better. My main problem right now is living with my parents. Dad is very picky and will only eat about 10 meals-he is very stuck in his ways, lol! I can't use garlic, rice, fish, or anything slightly different. I love to cook, but I am so frustrated with hamburger patties, meatloaf, chili dogs, hamburger helper and tuna casserole, with the occasional bland soup or fried chicken thrown in. Of course, eating better takes money, and that we are lacking! You know it is a sad day when you can buy 8 Little Debbie Snack Cakes for the same price of 1 apple, soda is cheaper than juice, and you can buy 3 meals of red meat and hot dogs for the price of 1 chicken meal. I don't know if this will happen or not, but I am still working out the kinks!

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Good news is we sold that Modis, so we have rent for a couple months, now we can pay bills. Cliff has a job interview this week, for a union position, and would make as much money per hour as the 2 of us combined did at my dad's shop! Keep your fingers crossed!

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Ok, rant over....On to the challenges I have worked on in the last few days.

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This one is for Method Playground. The challenge was to play in or reverse stamp with acrylic paint. I tried the reverse stamping, but my stamps just don't look right, so I used some mesh netting, painted over it, then tried daubing a different color over it, but lost the mess look. I took some more paint (red), covered my brayer, rolled over the mesh again, but this time used the mesh as a stamp. I think it turned out ok. I used Bazzill cs, BG scraps, MM paint (lagoon, cornflower, cranberry), "Best Friends" wooden title painted with Chocolate MM Paint, Bazzill and Kaiser Craft Flowers, button, 1/2 a felt flower from the Dollar Tree, and Scrappy Cat stamps. There is no journaling, but I think the page speaks for itself.

This one is for One Little Word. It did not turn out like I imagined, as a matter of fact, I think it sucks. I will embrace imperfection and submit is anyway. The word this time is LOVE, what else should I use but my husband and I. I used Bazzill cs, American Crafts pp, KI Memories pp, and Hambly Overlay, the leaves are cut from AC pp also (not what I imagined), title is made up of flourish rubons, ribbon is Christmas ribbon from Mikes, ribbon tag is MM, flowers are Kaiser Crafts, then misc buttons.
This one is for Use Your Stash, use chipboard. I tried to use enough chipboard, but without making it look cluttered. I used a mixture of ready-to-go chipboard, and some that I covered or decorated. Letters are Target Dollar Spot (as is), arrow is Bazzill (covered with pp), tag, butterfly and paisley are Maya Road (covered in pp or Stickles), Stars are all Scrapworks (as is), flower is made up of 3 stacked Scrapworks flowers and Stickled, and the owl is glitz (as is). Other supplies are Bazzill cs and October Afternoon pp.
Now for the RAKs...
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This is the RAK I got from the acrylic mini album I did for the August AMR crop, I got it yesterday. Scrappin{jewlz} sent me this arrow acrylic album from Clear Scraps! I am excited about this!

This RAK was in the same package from scrappin{jewlz} and was from another challenge on AMR.
This was from the Ongoing RAK thread on AMR, from Jessica. I didn't have this color and jumped on this bottle of alcohol ink as soon as I saw it!
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Haircuts!

Tigardlilly and I went to get our haircuts last week. We were referred to her by Kelliannie at AMR, they are best friends! Erica did a wonderful job! I was worried the bottom of mine was too square, but everyone here thought it was awesome, so I will have to trust them! I am sharing some photos, but I will warn you, the salon is dark, and the windows were in full sun, so the photos are not very good, the lighting is terrible.
Before...

During...
After...
Mirror image...
Here is tigardlilly, Before...
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Checking out the do...
After...
We will be going back to this gal! If you live in the Beaverton area, you can find Erica here. She is offering 40% off all services this month!
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Well, I think I covered everything for now. I will be back tomorrow with this weeks DT sketch and layout.
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