Weeks, months

The few weeks turned into a few more. I didn't forget, but I didn't want to rush either.

It's been a good few months.



I've been working hard and can see the hard work starting to pay off. That's always rewarding, but there's still plenty more to do.

I just feel it's time to start planning my return here. I won't get into the same pace of new posts, at least not yet, but I have missed writing.

Unplanned, but somehow appropriate, the day I felt ready to continue is September 1st.

Happy September! How have you been?

Have a break, have a ... Wait! What?

Hello, hello!

How are you doing?

I have to tell you guys something. To be honest, I am surprising myself, but I need to take a little break from the blog. I never really thought about doing that. In fact, I have a long list of topics to share with you guys. Yet, I just realized yesterday that taking a short break is the right thing to do.

Don't you just hate it when a blog you've been reading does that? Yeah, me too. But, sometimes this is absolutely necessary.

I am, finally, starting a new job tomorrow. I did mention it before, but it's now time. It's also prime wedding season, so I have a lot of custom work to finish. And, I also realize that even though I have a ton of ideas I want to share with you guys, I don't actually have the time to make (plan, photograph, edit and write) them. This is especially true for the DIY and recipe posts. 

So, all this is to say that I'm taking a short break from the blog. I'm thinking a few weeks to get my schedule back on track again. You can still find me over at various social media outlets:

Instragram @brinnertime 

Facebook

Twitter @brinnertime

And of course, don't forget to follow me on Bloglovin' and you'll know exactly when I'll be back again. Please feel free to contact me by e-mail (brinner.shop@hotmail.ca) if you have any questions or comments during my absence.

See you guys soon!

Sunday reads

Happy Sunday! Here's a few more links from last week, I wanted to share with you guys.

Best of Tina Fey GIFs - There ain't no party like a Liz Lemon party, 'cuz Liz Lemon party is MANDATORY.

Social Media genius at Oreo - This is how a great social media presence is created and maintained. Tips on what you can learn from them.

Stars and the actors who played them - Interesting comparisons between stats and the actors who played them on screen.

Stars and the actors who played them - Part 2

Outfits inspired by Disney characters - Several outfits comprised of regular clothes and accessories inspired by Disney. Some are more costume-y, but a lot could be worn on a regular day.

Please feel free to share any interesting links in the comments!

Link Love on Sunday

I actually quite liked last weeks Link Love for your Sunday post. Did you enjoy it?

Since then, I've found some other quite interesting things to share with you. Please enjoy a few more below:

Sometimes Sweet - I found this blog a little while ago and enjoy myself tremendously every time I drop by. Danielle posts often and has an interesting writing style, so I'm always entertained. Even though I don't have kids and very rarely read so-called "mommy blogs", since I rarely find myself relating to things they talk about (well, quite obviously),  I just love hers. And I do have a weakness to girls with tattoos!

How to make friends when you're old - Who couldn't use a few more friends? Interesting read.

Treasure hunting with Freckled Nest - As you know I love rummaging through thrift stores, so I was excited to come by this post by the Freckled Nest. I like hearing what are other people looking for.


Craft Fail - I promise this site will make you feel much better when your creations won't look as good as the ones you saw on Pinterest.

So, what do you guys think; do you like these link-sharing posts? Is there something you'd like to share? Please leave links you love in the comments!

Link Love for your Sunday

Needless to say, I spend a lot of time online. Besides my blog and my two online shops, I also read a ton of blogs, articles and tutorials. Somehow this week I've bumped into some really interesting things that I thought you guys might enjoy. I also saw some positivity inducing posts and videos that are added in the mix. Pick and choose the ones that you feel would hit home!

Gender and its Implications within Modern American Tattoo Culture - An excellent and informative paper about tattoos on women. I love tattoos and I love history and I love interesting research papers... So, I pretty much love everything about this. If the topic interests you, I urge you to read on. I might put in my two cents on the topic later.

Five Rules for life - A surefire dose of positivity your day. Just read a few posts and you start feeling the positive effects. "The premise is simple - people from all walks share what they believe are the most important rules to follow for a happy, successful, and fulfilling life."

Seeing Eye People - Another one from Improv Everywhere. If you're not familiar with the group, please take the time to go through some of their older events. You can't help but to smile!

Kicking people to the curb with Amy Poehler - She's awesome to begin with and this quote from her just adds to the general awesomeness.

If you've read or seen something you'd like to share, please leave a link in the comments!

Have a lovely Sunday!

One last letter

I completely forgot this tropical little guy from yesterday's mail post! I don't quite know how that happened, but I just noticed that there it was, at the very top of my 'May 2013' photo folder.

I've started organizing my photos in monthly folders. I have so many photos that I had to come up with a better way to organize. So far this monthly thing seems to be working. The only exception to this rule is if I'm traveling. Then I usually create another folder under the monthly one and label it with the name and time of the trip.

I realize I need to do a major overhaul with all the photo folders... I have a ton of photos and not all of them are needed. This might sound a bit odd, but keep in mind that I've ran the shop for over 3 years now... There's about a million and a half product photos, some of items I don't carry any longer. I think it's time to let some of those go.

How do you keep your photos organized? I would appreciate any tips!

M.I.A.

For the first time since I started posting the feature, I missed Friday inspiration two days ago. I sat down on the computer late on Thursday night and absolutely nothing came to me. It was like my head drew a complete blank. If I were to say that nothing inspired me at that moment, it would be true, but rather bleak. It's not like I was sitting here, miserable or sad. Quite the contrary. I was happy. Extremely tired, but happy.

I've been thinking about writing a post like this for a while, but couldn't really bring myself to do it. I don't go into my personal life much, nor do I talk much about other things than crafts, decorating, mail and occasionally my cats. When I started over a year and a half ago, I had no real idea what I would do with this blog. I didn't have huge plans, nor many expectations. I like writing and that's about all it took to get started.

Source: tumblr.com via lynn on Pinterest

Soon after I started my blog, I lost my job. It really, really sucked. I immediately started looking for new challenges. I worked on my business, my blog and on putting together a killer resume. It was all slow going, but eventually things started picking up. I got a pretty awesome freelance gig. It wasn't a steady 9-to-5 job, but fun when there were projects for me. I got more training to get better at this job. Which then lead to more projects. Last week, for example, was exhausting, but so much fun. And now I have a longer, full time contract waiting for me in a few weeks.

To add to this, I recently started doing wedding planning almost accidentally. I'm also designing custom invitations. And I am still working on my true passion, making new things out of old things.

Source: google.ca via Ann on Pinterest

All this is not said in order to make excuses. I'm trying to figure out my new 'every day'. I'm not quite sure how these pieces all fit together. All of these new things have required me to rearrange all the old things. I needed to stand up for myself. Not all of that was easy, but absolutely necessary. There's still work to be done, but things are starting to line up nicely.

So, I guess I'm saying that I'm working out a way to keep doing all the things that I love. I'm not quitting this blog, but it needs to be restructured. I want to write about more varied topics and still keep the things that brought you all here! I want to write as often and I did before, but still make sure I have time to do other things as well. I just need a new way of doing things. Which, come to think of it, is probably exactly what I need right now.

For right now, I'll leave you with this; Yay for Spring!! Stay tuned for regular snailmail post tomorrow!

May 1st!

Hauskaa Vappua!

May 1st is a pretty big celebration in Finland! It's considered the start of spring, although universally it tends to be really, really cold then. It has even known to snow on May 1st.

When I was a little kid, I remember waiting for May because I would get a balloon. That was a huge deal, since they weren't really a common party decoration like it seems to be now at least in North America. As I grew a little older, I started anticipating the fact that I could wear spring clothes. I realized I'd probably freeze, but still would be excited to getting rid of my winter gear. After graduating high school, you would wear your graduation cap, once a year, on May 1st.

I haven't celebrated in years, but I obviously reminisce a tad, not even sure why, since I was never a huge fan of vappu... I think it was the general festivity going and how everyone was in a good mood. Here's what I had to say about it last year.

We don't celebrate vappu here, yet the weather forecast makes me happy!

Does it feel like spring where you are?

Sunday scheduling

I'm planning for the new week. I know reading a post about how busy the blogger is gets really boring. I also know that there hasn't been anything really interesting in the blog recently. Don't get me wrong, I only write about things that interest me, but I have the opportunity to see what kind of topics you like to read about. I do check the traffic to my blog fairly often to see what are the more popular topics.

The good news is that there are more DIY projects coming, I know you like those! And I promise there will be some non-snailmail related ones coming soon. Don't worry though, there will also be plenty of snail mail. In fact, there's some new style of outgoing mail for the post tomorrow. I've also developed a new easy recipe to share with you.

The snow is melting. These photos were taken almost two weeks ago, it's even better now! Soon I can start sharing spring photos from Montreal.

I'm currently working on some very interesting projects. I actually get to plan my first wedding decor/concept! That's really exciting! I'm making custom invitations for two parties, the wedding I mentioned and another event, which is a combined birthday and baptism. It's so much fun to get to work on two such different events. I'll share some photos eventually if my customers will be ok with that. That'll have to be later though, since I'm sure they'll want their invitations out first.

I'm also still working on re-stocking my shop and trying out some new ideas for new products.

How does your upcoming week look like?

Boardgames

I have to make a confession. I don't like playing boardgames.

Weird, right?

I just can't really remember enjoying them much. There were a few I played with my sister when I was a kid that I think I liked, but as I got older I really didn't enjoy them.  The only exceptions I remember in the last decade that I had fun playing, or that at least seemed like fun, were Risk and, more recently, Scattergories. I'm much more of a puzzle kind of a gal, so that might be a reason why. Also, and here's another new piece of info about me, I am absolutely tone deaf*. So, this really limits my ability to play games like Cranium or anything that has a musical ("hum or whistle this song while your team tries to guess it") element to it.

The reason why I am telling you this is that, even though I don't like playing boardgames, I really love vintage boardgames... Makes no sense, right?

I am irresistibly dawn towards the boardgames at any thrift shop. The older the games, the better. I have an unexplained weakness to collecting colorful playing cards and cute game pieces.


Even though it's very hard for me to top the joy in finding the vintage treasures I've been searching for a long time, like the globe and the trunk, I did make a little squee of happiness when I recently found these two in the shop! how amazing are these cards? I simply adore them!





Anyone else out there who dares to confess not being a fan of boardgames?

*) and I don't mean this in "oh, I can't really sing very well" -kind of a way. Oh, no! I mean this in a "everyone who has ever heard me even hum along a song, has asked me to stop" -kind of a way.

Bursting at the seams

My head, that is. I'm having an overflowing kind of a day. The kind where there's a million things to do and I have a hard time prioritizing.

I've had this problem for as long as I remember. In my working life, however, I've spent years to learn how to deal with it and I've become fairly good at it. It's hard to use those same methods in my personal life, but I think it's just a question of getting used to it.

I have plenty of ideas for upcoming projects, I have a few custom orders to fill, I'm designing two different invitation suites and to top it all off, I am thinking about home decor. A lot. Oh! And I've been experimenting with some new recipes too.

Do you get these kind of days? How do you deal with it?

500 posts! How did that happen?

I just realized that I have 499 published posts in my blog. That makes this particular one number 500.

500!

That's pretty crazy. Gossamer agrees:

When I started this blog, I didn't really have that many plans for it. I originally wanted a place to talk more about my crafts. The idea was to show what happens behind the scenes when I make items for my shop. I also figured I'll just talk about things that interest me if I feel like it. Since then some topics have been left behind and others have taken on a life of their own.

I don't actually write posts much in advance. The exceptions are if I'm going out of town or sometimes I just can't help myself, I have so many things to write about that I simply can't pack them all in one post. Right now I don't have any previously written posts.  I did plan on doing that, you know, preparing well in advance, being all pro about it. But somehow it didn't work. At most I might write the post for tomorrow the night before. Usually not even that. The mail love posts are the only ones I prepare in advance, but even then just by taking photos before I go to mail things out.

I've started to make plans for the blog though. I do make a schedule with topics to write about. It's just because somehow I worry I'll run out of things to talk about, so every time I think of something I want to share with you guys, I'll write it down on the schedule. Usually I'll end up pushing them back because I have so many other things to write about... I still have a few topics to write about that I originally scheduled for January!

There are so many things in my head right now that I want to write about! I think I'll need to go put together my blog calender for April (Can you believe we're almost in April?) to clear out some space in my head. I do have a lot of ideas how to improve Brinnertime, so  looks like I'm not running out of things to write about anytime soon. I'm trying to start posting on a more regular schedule, about 4 times a week, but I've made that decision a few times already. Yet I still end up posting almost every day. I just can't help myself!

I have a hard time believing how many there are of you, my dear readers! Thank you all! I get so happy for every comment I get!

If you have any questions for me or suggestions on what you'd like to read, please let me know! I'd be more than happy to write about something that interests you, as long as it's something I know about (or can share publicly).

Ultimately I just wanted to share a few thoughts with you as I have now consistently written 500 posts and say thank you for reading! For ease of use, you can always follow me HERE or just use the Google Friend connect on the left.

Have a lovely Sunday!

P.S. I felt my blog has been lacking photos of the cats, so I figured I might as well share a few here... There's always cat photos over at Instagram (@brinnertime) if you want to see more!

Happy Monday!

Did you have a good weekend?

I wanted to drop by quickly to say hi and tell you that the usual Monday Mail post will come late this week. I have a busy day ahead of me and I won't have the time to properly prepare the post until much later. So, new snailmail will be up tomorrow.


Until then, you can check the old mail projects right here

And don't forget to follow me on instagram (@brinnertime) for sneak peeks of things I'm working on.

Time to catch up!

I'm fairly sure that time moves in clusters and not particularly evenly either. Sometimes I feel like there's nothing going on and all of a sudden things pile up like crazy. I had one of those weeks that started very slowly, but kept speeding up towards the end. Don't get me wrong though, I had an absolutely kickass week. It was like a big pile of awesomeness.

[Here's a look inside the Centre Bell to give you an idea. It seats over 20,000 people for a hockey game]

Chris and I had tickets to a Habs game (Habs = Montreal Canadiens (NHL hockey team)) and we had great tickets. Why was it so great? Free food! That's why. Well, the seats were good too, high enough to see properly, but not in the nosebleeds.

I got some really great stuff in the mail. Most awesomely a book from my sister. American Gods by Neil Gaiman. I've been wanting to read that for a long time. This also proves that you all should have a GoodReads account (also, add me as a friend) as apparently that's where she checked that I haven't read it yet.

[I don't know how many of you really care about hockey. If you do, you can probably find better sites for that than mine. For the rest of you, here's a Zamboni]

I was presented with some interesting challenges this week, at work and otherwise as well. I met some interesting people I hope to see more of and got excited about new opportunities.

Tonight we're having people over to watch UFC. Georges St-Pierre is fighting so we're all gathering to our place to watch the fight. (Did I ever mention I'm a fan of mixed martial arts? I'll happily discuss K1 vs. UFC if you're interested. I'm still partial to K1, but warming up to UFC)

To top this all off, tomorrow is St. Patrick's day. That's a pretty big deal here in Montreal. So, good times ahead too! Yay!

Do you have fun plans for the weekend?

Friday Inspiration - Have a good time

I'll just leave this here...



 Yay, Friday! Hope you have a great weekend!

Let's Partay!

Today is my birthday! I am now 33 years old. I could write this deep and thoughtful post about life and such, but instead I'm having coffee and chocolate for breakfast.

Source: parcelpost.wordpress.com via Cynthia on Pinterest

I will spend most of the day today crafting and whatnot. Doing all sorts of fun things. This includes putting together some very random snailmail-y things. So, here's my question:

Do you want mail from me?

If so, there's two things I'm asking you to do; 1) leave a comment to this post. Tell me how you celebrate your birthday, or what the weather is like, or what's your favourite chocolate. Anything really, I just want to hear from you! 2) Give me your postal address. Either leave it in the comment or send it to my e-mail brinner.shop [at] hotmail.ca Add a link to your blog too if you have one, I'm always looking for new things to read.

I'm not sure how many pieces of mail I'll send out. I'll just probably pick a few.

You have until the end of today (midnight EST), March 7th.

Back home from NYC!

As you might or might not have known, Chris and I were in New York City for the weekend. We only got home late last night. The trip was a whole lot of fun and I am now tired and sore from all the walking. I have a ton of photos and other New York-y things to share with you guys! (I took around 400 photos, so I'll need to go through, and edit, those)

Here's an unedited peek:

I will need today to regroup my thoughts. I have an event coming up at the McGill university next week, I need to prepare for that. I also have some new plans for the shop. And not to mention some more tutorials! I really got into those as the ideas just kept on coming!

Right now I need to get organized again, so I shall return soon with more coherent posts! In the mean time, how are you guys? Tell me what you've been up to recently!

Saturday morning

I feel like my head's been somewhere else all week. I have a lot to write about, but every time I start, I end up deleting what I wrote.

A large part of this week has been used up by thinking. I've been making plans for 2013 for my shops and working on some of the things I planned already. I've started designing my new business cards, I have updates planned for the blog as well, I am testing out new products and generally working on renewing practically everything.

I've known for a while that change is needed, but it's making the initial decisions that take up so long. I know that once I've figured the major changes out, the rest will fall into place.

Now, if only I could find the last pieces fitting into this puzzle...

Friday Inspiration - Openness

More often than not, this Friday Inspiration post is about design, repurposing or clever projects. However, there are other things that inspire me as well.

Source: 79ideas.org via Katri on Pinterest

I've recently talked about some new ideas I have for my blog and I guess because my mind is in a state ready for changes (not just for the blog) there's a few posts I've stumbled upon recently that hit home.

The first one is from Julie. She wrote her story as a small business owner. I enjoyed reading it and tremendously admired her openness.

Another thought provoking post, and one that I really read at an extremely appropriate time is "Adapt, Quit or Evolve" from A Beautiful Mess. It really sums up challenges I also am facing right now.

Source: 79ideas.org via Katri on Pinterest

Have you read anything recently that really resonated with you? Care to share?

Thoughts and decisions for 2013

Happy New Year Everyone!

I hope you celebrated with some bubbly!

My evening was lovely and I spent it with friends (and bubbly). You can't go wrong with that.

Last year I made some resolutions for the upcoming year. I didn't make any personal ones, but concentrated more on my business. I made five resolutions and I think it's time to take a look back and, perhaps, make some new ones too!

The first resolution was to revamp the blog. I did that and have been tweaking it a few times since then. I feel like it's reflecting the vision I have much more closely than before, but there are still things to be done. I absolutely did accomplish this, but I feel more needs to be done still. So, I think I need to make a resolution for 2013 to keep working on the look of the blog. I want to streamline the content too. I have some new ideas that I will slowly start introducing in the upcoming year, so stay tuned for that. I love blogging even more than I did this time last year, so I will keep at it. I might have to stop writing every day though as I have some more time consuming ideas, but I think it'll be worth it in the end. All this is to say that the resolution for 2013 is to:

1. Concentrate on all the aspects of the blog, the texts, the look, the photos and make sure they all show more personality.


The second resolution was to learn how to take better photos. Well, that I can confidently say I've gotten much, much better at. I've taken a few photos this year that even people who very rarely compliment anyone have told me they are good. More importantly, I am happy with those photos. I need to do a lot less editing than before and there are several photos where the only editing I did was cropping. However, there are many things to learn still. I want to get better! To continue from last year, my resolution for 2013 is to:

2. Learn to be more consistent when taking photos and keep continuously improving.

The third resolution was to think less and create more. That was a tough one. I have improved on this aspect a lot! I am proud to say that I tried many things that didn't work and I shrugged them off and went off to make something else. I tried to plan less, but the list-maker in me still takes hold sometimes. However, the improvement from last year is significant. There were things that worked out well without too much planning. All in all, I did get better, but there is much more to do. In the end, I can't change who I am, so the resolution for 2013 is to:

3. Create more.

The fourth resolution was to participate in more craft fairs. Which I did. Done and Done! I don't think I need to make this a resolution any longer, this is now an ongoing plan. Keep doing more fairs. Not a resolution, but a part of the business plan.

My fifth and final resolution was to stress less. Yeah... No easy feat that one. I do think I developed leaps and bounds on this one as well. I have been feeling much better in 2012 compared to 2011. However, I am nowhere near where I need to be. One major thing I did realize this year was the cause of most of my stress. So, the resolution for 2013 is to:

4. Concentrate more on me and worry less about others.

Looking at these resolutions makes me feel pretty good. I can compare these to the ones from last year and I can see how they are becoming more specific. Which really means that I am getting more specific on the things I need to work on. I like the trend, so I am super excited to see what they will be next year.

Like I mentioned before, I do have some cool plans for my blog for this year. I want to make sure that I feel inspired writing and that there is something interesting for all of you to read about.

I've realized that for those of you who know me personally, this blog makes a lot of sense. You know who I am and how everything I write about falls into place with my personality. However, I also realize that all of you who don't know me, and there's quite a few of you, this is a rather superficial peek into who I am. I always enjoy reading blogs where you get more of a feeling who the writer is, so I promise to exercise a little less censorship on my own writing.

Perhaps try to be less wordy...

Have you made any resolutions/decisions for 2013?