Shared: A New Way to Walk (Walk, Walk)

Now that my knee is (mostly) feeling better, I'm working on increasing my activity.  I was told to go slow and work up.  Because I lead a very sedentary life, I figured the best and easiest ways for me to just walk around more at work.

So I got a pedometer!

This one is amazing because you can out it anywhere on your body and it accurately counts your steps.  Since I don't have pockets and am too "curvy" to comfortably wear one clipped to my waist band, I actually just stick this in my bra. :)

I originally got the clippy strap to keep it from falling out but that has ended up not being an issue at all.

The clip was actually really annoying so now I just put the pedometer down the front of my bra. :)

I tracked how many steps I took on an average day for a week.  Then I figured out the average per day and strive to take a minimum of 200 steps a day more than the average.  No, it's not a lot but I really feel it in my knees when I take more than that right now.  I have a goal of 5,000 total additional steps above my base point and then I'm going to get myself a treat.  I just haven't decided for sure what that's going to be yet.  I'm really eyeing these leggings, though.

I have discovered that if I dance a lot, it can increase my steps so I have to be careful of that.  Yeah, the movement is good overall but the point is to increase the endurance of my knees. :)

I've thought about joining the gym here at work (just $6 per paycheck!) but being sweaty in front of other people is absolutely mortifying to me.  And I sweat easily.  I don't glisten like some women, either.  Nope.  I turn bright red and wet. :P  And when I get hot, I get super nauseous.

So walking is the first step.  Walk, walk!

Random necklace pic:

Pendant: Fire Mountain Gems

Bought: Secret Agent Sarrah

Well, after years of hoodies and sweaters, I finally bought a real life coat for the cooler Autumn and Winter months ahead.  :)

Winter coat: Torrid

This picture does not do it any sort of justice, though.  It's more of a dark charcoal and has a nice texture to it.

I like that it is warm without being TOO warm since winters in Atlanta, GA are fairly mild (compared to northern MN where I grew up).  It also has nice deeeeep pockets.  So far, I've gotten to wear it once this season.  :P

It also finally gave me a place to wear some of the pins I've gotten recently.

Lapel pins: Creepy Company

I've had these for a while but just couldn't figure out a good way to style them with the way I normally dress.  I even tried some of Mutant Stomp Friends awesome suggestions but I don't dress the same way. :)  I'm a lot less creative with my fashion sense. LOL

The hearse has a hidden details that makes me giggle, though.

What creative things do you do with pins/buttons/badges?  I need ideas! :)

Shared: Wedding - Comic Book Table Runners

44 days to the wedding!  I can't believe it is almost here.  Fortunately, now that I have the table runners done, there's not too much left to do before hand except put together the loot bags (in lieu of favors) and get Andy's suit fitted when it comes in.  He got a custom made suit in dark charcoal grey.  It's really nice!

There's a ton to do for the wedding weekend with our families but that's mostly food related and can't be done until right before we check into the rental house.

I am really happy with the way our runners turned out!  Because our apartment is tiny and we don't have a lot of floor or table space, I came into work last Saturday and used one of the conference rooms to make these.

First, I cut some cheap contact paper to size.  The design was not important because this is going to be on the back so I just got the cheapest I could find on Amazon.  The paper is 18" wide so I cut in half then cut it into 35" lengths.  I need each runner to be a bit over 36" to allow for overlap on the tables.  (Some of the tables are 6' long but 3' runners are easier to manage!)

Once those were cut, I removed the backing from each strip, laid it sticky side up, then arranged the comic book pages in a planned-random pattern.  I wanted it to look random but I also needed them to be within the right width and I kept on eye on color placement, which way the text was pointing, and splitting up like characters.  I know those are details that only I would notice but since I would notice it, I wanted to prevent it. :)

After the contact paper was covered, I used double-sided tape to add a few pages to the top as well as stick down any loose corners.

Once I had one done to my liking, I used it as a sort of template to keep the dimensions close on the rest of them that I made.  For the comic book pages, I used The Flash and Flashpoint (his favorites) plus Invader Zim and I Hate Fairyland (my favorites).  It was really sad cutting apart those books!

Because I had already cut up the books during a previous weekend, it took me less than 4 hours to make all 13 runners.  I still need to figure out how to safely transport these from the apartment to the rental house to the wedding venue without folding them.  Right now, they are stacked on top of one another and draped over the backs of a couple chairs that are also holding other wedding items.

I have a few ideas but would love suggestions! :)