My Side Hustle

Meet my side gig: Silpada Designs.

If you know me, you know that I love fashion and accessories. Since we moved to a new city over a year ago, I wanted to do something that would help me meet new people. Enter Silpada.

A friend of mine back in South Carolina was a representative and had so much fun with it. I thought it would be a great creative outlet for me and an excellent way to meet new people.

I’ve been working my business since July 2014 and have had a lot of fun. Some months are better than others, but I’m looking forward to expanding my business and meeting new people in the future!

Stop by my website, take a look around and let me know if I can help you accessorize!

Website: mysilpada.com/kelly.apgar

Sharing the Love

It doesn’t take much to make someone smile. Or tell them that they’re appreciated.

I e-mailed a co-worker today to thank her for bearing with me and guiding me along on a project that I really don’t like working on. I’ve been sort of exasperated by the whole thing and may have been short with her.

These issues are my issues. Not hers, and I wanted her to know that I appreciate her patience and guidance.

My gratefulness may not come through in my day-to-day emails and I think it’s important to stop and recognize someone who is helping you with a simple “Thank You”. That may not seem like a lot, but it could make a huge difference in that persons day.

Mind you, I’m not always the “go out of my way to thank someone for doing their job” type of person. Sometimes I want to yell a big FUCK YOU….but you know, I try to call it as I see it. Reward patience and kindness. And try to keep it real. 🙂

Pinterest

I go through these phases with Pinterest. I make up all sorts of different storyboards and go to the trouble of actually pinning things that I like from actual websites (not repinning) and then? I promptly forget about all of it.

When we first moved to Florida, I knew we’d be buying a house within a year, so I started several different storyboards for how I wanted to change the decor and color scheme in our new home. How I wanted to dress up our outdoor living space. How I wanted to set up my new workspace. Etc Etc Etc.

Then, I forgot that I even did any of that. Curated these lovely boards full of inspiration.

Now that we’re under contract for a new home, people ask how we’re going to decorate. Are we going to paint? Buy new furniture? What colors? You know what I reply with? I reply with a big “I dunno.”

I dunno???

I spent so much time slapping together these perfect storyboards to respond with I dunno. I had these perfect ideas in my head and now that we actually have a blank canvas to work from, I’m stumped!

Well, not really stumped. I finally remembered how much time I put into researching color palettes we liked. Possible furniture ideas. New paint colors. Curtains.

And now Pinterest is my internet wormhole again.

Sigh. So long productivity!

 

 

We bought a house

Yup. The title says it all. We’re currently under contract to purchase our next house. Husband and I hooked up with a Realtor a few weeks ago to start the house search. We looked at about 12 homes in a weekend and I was really dismayed with the options. Not only were some of these homes in serious need of upgrading (popcorn ceilings anyone?), but I have to say, many people really do not keep a tidy house. Sorry, it’s true.

Tip: If you’re trying to sell your home, please do not leave a bucket of putrid looking mopping water in your laundry room. This will turn people off. Not to mention turn their stomachs. Get rid of that shit, yo!

After having an interesting weekend of looking, I was a bit dismayed, but excited about the prospects of homes coming in the market. It’s Spring! People are listing homes left and right! We’ll find something!

Then that something came on the market in the middle of the week. Our Realtor sent us an MLS listing for a newly listed home. Husband and I went through the listing, analyzed the pictures and were chomping at the bit to get in to see it. Our Realtor made an appointment for one day out. I said no. We need to see this house NOW. Not tomorrow, but NOW.

On paper, the house looked perfect. Had everything we wanted. Excellent location. Needed some minor upgrading, but nothing we couldn’t handle down the road.

So, our Realtor was kind enough to oblige and get us in ASAP.

I was giddy with excitement on our drive over. We couldn’t wait to see it.

ANNNNND we walked in and it felt like home. You know that feeling. Total peace and warmth.

It was perfect. The floor plan made sense. It had the extra space we wanted. Cozy rooms. A work nook. A cabana bath. A pool. A three car garage for the husband.

We immediately put in an offer only to find out we were one of three offers and we had to bring our best to the table.

We offered what we felt was fair, with a few contingencies.

They asked for highest and best offer. We stuck to our guns.

We lost the bidding war.

But it was OK!! What we offered was fair. It was what we were comfortable with. We weren’t interested in raising our bid out of our comfort zone just to win. It just wasn’t meant to be. That was all. Back to the drawing board. Surely there was another home out there for us.

Then it happened. The following day we received a call from our Realtor explaining that the accepted offer fell through and would we still be interested in submitting our offer again.

YES! YES WE WOULD!!

We made a few tweaks to our offer. They countered. We countered back. And lo and behold they accepted! And we had a fully executed offer! HOLY SHIT WE WON!

That was about a week ago. We’re currently buried under mortgage, inspection, insurance and utility paperwork.  And we couldn’t be happier about it. Really. We’re on cloud nine.

I can’t wait to share pictures of our new home with you. But, because I’m a bit superstitious, I won’t share them now. Once we close and I have the keys in my hand and we can call it ours, pictures will be plastered all up in here!

I’m excited to share our new home journey with everyone. From new paint, to updated counter tops, to the new sealed floor my husband wants to put down in the garage (sigh!).

Stick around!

Name change

Yes, once again….I’m back. I can’t promise for how long, but here I am. Complete with new blog name.

Anyone else struggle with blogging? What do you get out of blogging? Is blogging out of style these days? Are all the cool kids on Tumblr now? What is Tumblr?

So many questions!! 

I feel like I sort of lose interest in blogging after a while. I’m struggling with trying to figure out an identity for my blog that I can maintain for the long haul.

My husband and I had an interesting conversation about blogging a few months ago. He used to blog for a start-up sports site that his friend started. That website has now become an extremely popular network of sports bloggers. He didn’t keep up with it because he didn’t have the time, but during that conversation a few months ago, he mentioned that we should have some sort of shared blog. 

We discussed what “our” identity would be. What would our schtick be? What would make our blog different from others? We struggled with the answer to that. But, after thinking about it for a while, I came to the conclusion that it’s your voice that makes or breaks a blog. Are you interesting? Are you captivating? Are you a good writer?

Now, I don’t know if this blog with be a shared “voice” blog with my husband. But, I do think that it will focus on us and our family and maybe, just maybe….I can get him to contribute once in a while. 

Simple & Fresh Pasta Pesto Salad

I hate lunch. I hate thinking about what to eat and I hate making it.

Lunch is stupid. The End.

Lately, I’ve gotten back into the wormhole of Pinterest for some inspiration in the kitchen. I should also mention that I hate making dinner too. I like dinner, but I hate prepping and then cooking it.

So, back to Pinterest. Since it’s summer, I created a board specifically for light & fresh summer foods:

Have I tried any of these recipes yet? Nope. That is, until today.

This is the recipe that inspired me:

I say inspired because I went a different route and made it quick and easy for myself based on what I had in my fridge and pantry. That’s the beauty of this recipe, you can go crazy with it by adding extras* (suggestions below) or keep it simple like I did.

What you’ll need (this couldn’t be easier or simpler):

• Your favorite boxed pasta. I chose ridged elbows. The ridges really help retain the pesto, so be sure to purchase a pasta with ridges.
• Pesto. Now, you could make your own, or you could buy a really great quality fresh pouch like I did. Ain’t nobody got time to food process!
• Grape or cherry tomatoes.
• Salt/Pepper to taste.
• Parmesan cheese.

So, super simple! All ingredients cost about $8.00.

• Bring pasta water to a boil and dump in desired amount of pasta for your meal. (I used half a box which will provide me with three meals.)
• Cut tomatoes in half. Place them in the bottom of the bowl.
• Drain pasta and rinse with cold water. Add to bowl with tomatoes.
• Add in desired amount of pesto.
• Toss everything together and give it a taste.
• Add salt/pepper if the mood strikes you.
• Top with Parmesan cheese. Fresh is preferable, but canned will do.

Tada!

If you like your pasta salad cold, prepare earlier and refrigerate for awhile. Since this doesn’t have mayo in it, it’s great for camping, picnics or BBQ’s.

*On to the extras I mentioned above. If I was making this for dinner or to bring to a friends house, I’d add a few other items to it to make it a bit heartier.

• Mozzarella pearls (Ciliegine)
• Red onion
• Small handful of spinach
• Sliced olives
• Chopped red bell pepper
• Drizzle of olive oil
• Lemon juice for flavor pop

The ideas are endless! And if you want to make it creamy, by all means add some mayo. To keep it light, I omit the mayo.

Enjoy!

Random Photo

Meet Pepper. This picture is the perfect reflection of his personality. Totally cool and relaxed. Although his little head on that big body is a strange juxtaposition, but I keep telling him his head will grow.

Disney Princess Marathon Weekend – An Exercise in Insanity

I belong to a wonderful community of women right here on the Internets.They’re kind, supportive and are AWESOME at helping each other reach goals.

Back story:

About a year and a half ago I was left without a gym to attend because of a fire. I decided at that point to take up running until the gym was back to normal. At least I was doing something, right? I was super hesitant to take up running because…well…I hate it. I really don’t like it. Didn’t want to do it, didn’t want to deal with shin splints or wonky feeling legs. Didn’t want to struggle with a water bottle and where to put my iPhone.

But you know what? And this even surprised me….after awhile, I found myself actually craving a run. If I couldn’t go on one for a few days, I missed it! I needed that extra release that a run would give me.

So, I kept going even though I added some different things (boot camp) into my fitness routine.  I even signed up for a few races! And I’ll tell you, there’s nothing like crossing that finish line and making your goal. Absolutely nothing.

Back to now:

Oh yeah, my awesome internet friends! We’ve all decided to sign up for the Disney Princess Marathon Weekend in February of 2014. One or two are just doing the 10k, which is very wise. A handful of us are doing the Glass Slipper Challenge which consists of a 10k one day, then the following day will be the Half Marathon.

Say what?

Yeah, you read that right. Back to back races. At Disney. With Internet friends. Crazy, right?

Crazy like a fox, I tell ya!

However, I’m absolutely looking forward to this and am happy to have this goal on my calendar. I’ll do my best to get sufficient training in. If I walk some of it, so be it! I’ll get to admire the lovely Disney property along the way.

Beer me strength? Or just beer me at the end of the marathon. I’ll need it.