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Sweet Feet Shuffle

In Which I Explain My Departure from OBG

Yes, after months of contemplation, I have decided to abandon One Blonde Girl. I no longer have the drive nor the passion to continue this blog. The imagined pressure of having to maintain a certain (negative) attitude on this blog has gotten to me. I no longer feel that I am in the same place as I was when I started this blog, and therefore I can no longer continue. I went back and forth on my decision to bail on OBG, and occasionally I still have discouraged, down-in-the-dumps, bitter moments when I think, "this would make a great post!", but those moments have become few and far between. My life has changed, and so my blogging needs have changed.

I'm not exiting the blogging world for good, but I'm certainly (drastically) changing directions. As I mentioned a few days ago, I've started a new blog, Sweet Feet Shuffle, that I feel is a better reflection of my newly discovered self. I certainly don't expect everyone to join me in my new home, but I hope that a few of you may be interested and will follow me. While in the shortly lived prime of OBG, I really enjoyed writing here and the feedback I received from you all. I will miss being here, but I think my new home will be a better, more positive, place for me to be.

An excerpt from Sweet Feet Shuffle:

About Me
Hi. My name is April, and I'm a 30-something year old blogger. I'm a soon-to-be first time mom, an elementary art teacher, and an all around good person (in my opinion). I am often crafty and artsy. My favorite, most rewarding thing to do is to work with my hands, whether it be baking, working with clay or assembling IKEA furniture (I'm a pro!). I also have a short attention span and numerous, fleeting interests, which has me bouncing back and forth between projects and activities.

While I would never consider myself to be spiritual (and certainly not religious), I strongly believe that optimism and positive thinking have a significant influence on my life. I try to avoid negativity and "bad vibes" in order to be as happy in my life as I can. I believe in Karma, or at least a version of it, and I have recently come to terms with the fact that I am relatively superstitious.

I've been involved in the blogging world for a few years now, and due to some drastic changes in my life over the past year, I decided to recreate, so-to-speak, my blogging identity to better suit my current outlook on life. I started blogging as a means to "find" myself and discover what it was I wanted from life. My blogs were a place for me to reflect and collect. While I was still "lost" in life, I found my blogs had ventured into very bitter, negative and resentful places, often masked with an attempt at humor. It'd been very hard for me to continue with those blogs because I no longer felt like I was in that place, but I felt that I had to continue maintaining that image for my readers. I was no longer being true to myself and went on hiatus in order to re-evaluate my reason for blogging. Enter Sweet Feet Shuffle, a blog that I hope will be a more realistic representation of my life, as it is now. A life that has become very positive, happy and satisfying.

Why "Sweet Feet Shuffle"?
While in grad school I was working on a journaling art piece that had me documenting my experiences with insomnia. During this process I kept notes on the phrases and images I could recall from the fleeting moments of sleep I managed to get. "Sweet feet shuffle" happened to be one of those phrases, and it seemed so poetic and appropriate that I knew I needed to somehow incorporate it into my life. When I decided to create a new blog for my new life, I immediately knew what I would call it.

I don't expect to be a daily blogger, and I plan on focusing more on content and quality rather than quantity. As my interests change frequently, my content most likely will to. I anticipate that this blog will become a reflection of who I am, an account of the more enjoyable aspects of my life, and a place to collect all the things I love. I intend on writing about being a new mom, including my adventures in cloth diapering and breast feeding. I may include aspects of my teaching life, although I do maintain a separate blog for that. I'll include stories about my family, about general things in life and probably even some DIY projects and tried-and-loved recipes. I might include some fashion posts, some design posts and maybe even some posts about my own art work. Most of all, I intend for this blog to be a positive place for me and my readers.

Of course, I'm not all sunshine and rainbows. I do have a penchant for the darker side of life. I'm an avid Stephen King reader, a horror movie lover, and my musical tastes tend more towards punk/post-punk/alternative rock/indie rock, so you can expect aspects of that side of me to trickle through onto this blog as well.

Thank you for stopping by, and I hope you are able to find something enjoyable or informative here, and if not, that's okay too!

I've Moved!

Well, not me personally, but I'm in the process of moving and combining my multiple blogs to make life easier for me. You may find that I have transferred some content from this blog over to my new location, but you might not. Most likely you were unaware that I have been juggling 5 blogs up until today (although some have become quite neglected), and so I decided to realign my blogging life to meet my new and improved lifestyle (compared to when most of my blogs were started). So... here's where you can find me now....

Art Teachers Hate Glitter- A blog about the realities of the day in the life of an art teacher. I very rarely post lesson plans or project ideas and instead I mostly write about the real-life struggles of being an elementary art teacher. With humor. Most of the time.

Sweet Feet Shuffle- My newest, consolidated blog (making One Blonde Girl and The Bittersweet Blonde obsolete). Things you'll find here will include DIY projects, links to cool and pretty things I like, posts about being a new mom, posts about things I may be doing in my everyday life, artsy posts, and whatever my new found happy-go-lucky self decides to write about. What you will not find here is the bitterness and down-on-life sh*t I was prone to writing about at my now defunct blogs. This blog is significantly less anonymous than my others.

The other two blogs that I'll be maintaining will remain out of the public realm. One is for my family and close friends, and the other is private, just for me and my daughter-to-be.

I hope that you can all find something you like with my content and can join me in my new home!

Remember When We Used to Get Drunk Together?

   
Yeah, me neither. But damn! Those hangovers were a bitch, weren't they?

On my way home from work today I was thinking hard about potential blog posts. Usually driving is a great time for me to brainstorm, but lately? Not so much. I've got nothing. Nothing at all. In fact, It's time to take an official hiatus.

So... I'm officially taking a break. I realize I've been on a break for awhile now, but at least by making it "official" I'll no longer feel guilty about not posting. I'm too distracted by all the great things happening in my life right now to give this blog proper attention.

(Yes, this is my actual baby-to-be. Yes, baby-to-be is a girl.)

Do I intend on returning? Who knows? I've got some events and get togethers and time off coming up in the near future, so... maybe. In the meantime, you can still find me writing about the "joys" of teaching art to snot-nosed brats at Art Teachers Hate Glitter, or you can find me and all my new found gushy soft spots for pretty girly things at The Bittersweet Blonde (If you're the kind of person who's interested in baby updates and style and design, this is the place for you). 

'Till next time! Or not.

Wordless Wednesday

     

DISCLAIMER: Please don't think this is true and get on my case. I'm not a smoker.

RST: Alfalfa, Oatmeal, Food Poisoning, New Job, and Things I Miss

            

        

It's Tuesday, which means, time again for another Random Shit Tuesday! 

My randomness...

I hate giving this man anymore attention than he deserves, however maybe it's just me, but doesn't it look like Charlie has the same barber as Alfalfa? I can't help but think that every time I see him in a pic with this unfortunate center part (that and, "Man, what a dork."). 

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I have yet to master the perfect bowl of oatmeal. It's either too dry and ends up like paste, or it's too watery. One of these days, though. One of these days. I'm determined.

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Every time I'm cooking or cleaning in the kitchen, I pretend that I'm in a Goofy How To short circa the 1940s, and I imagine what the narrator would be saying about me. In my case it would be called How To Catch Salmonella in Your Kitchen. The narrator would say shit like, "Notice how OBG  dries her mixing bowl with the same towel she just used to wipe up that spilled egg. Ah yes, her chances of food poisoning are great now."

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The G-Man starts a new job in about a week and a half. I know what you're thinking, "Wait, didn't he just get a new job?" Yeah, he did, but that was, like, six months ago, so, you know, it's about time to move on. Actually, as it turns out, there were some sketchy things going on at that new job that the G-Man had been misled/lied to about when he was hired, and it was decided that it would be in his (our) best interest to move on. Don't worry though, it only took him about a month and a half to secure a new job this time, and he only turned done a few outrageously shocking job offers. The G-Man's luck blows my mind. If you can call it luck. I mean, who becomes a Senior Systems Engineer with only a Bachelor's degree in psychology (from a state school, no less!)? The G-Man, that's who. Really though, this new job is a good thing, no matter how much of a hard time I give him about it.

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I miss raw sushi and regular cups of coffee and whiskey and wearing my favorite clothes and not gagging on red meat and sleeping on my stomach and eating popcorn for dinner and having an itch-free belly and...

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And that's all she wrote, folks.

Previously on OBG... Season 2 Premiere

                       
Although inspired in part by a true incident, 
the following story is fictional 
and does not depict any actual person or event...
except that it does.

Last Season on OBG...

 

...  New glasses were purchased, Snood was played, there was a hiatus for God only knows what reason (read: probably a hangover), 4th of July was a wreck, bar brawls almost broke out, a bunch of people in a bar talked about their kids, meaningless shit was discussed, hippies were puking in porta-potties, and people were stupid. What does this season have in store for us? Let's find out.

Scene Begins.

 

We're in the kitchen of OBG's townhouse, around 5:00 pm, on a Saturday night. OBG and the G-Man are on their way to a surprise 40th birthday party. OBG has just finished whipping up some appetizers, has removed the Brie en Croute from the oven, and is about to put the hot plate of golden cheese stuffed bread onto the serving platter when she notices something unusual. The G-Man is poking holes in the aluminum foil covering the mushroom turnovers. The act of hole poking isn't so unusual as it is beneficial for allowing the release of built up steam, thus preventing the turnovers from becoming soggy, but what is so unusual is that the G-Man has taken it upon himself to poke the holes without being asked to (OBG was about to do it after she dealt with the Brie en Croute). Thoroughly impressed, slightly taken aback and a tad bit distracted, OBG proceeds to move the plate of Brie to the serving platter.

"MOTHER FUCKER!"

 

With a sudden clatter, the plate of Brie finds it's way back to the stove top as OBG, with tears streaming down her face, proceeds to nurse the burned fingers on her right hand. But not before putting the pot holder she was holding in her left hand down on the counter.

End Scene.

This Season on OBG...
... What will this season bring for OBG? Will a new home, a new town, and the presence of new people bring exciting and interesting experiences for OBG (Ed's Note: Probably not.)? Will "pregnancy brain" and the impending birth of a baby have any impact on OBG's everyday life (Ed's Note: Probably)? Did OBG really leave her house and attend a surprise birthday party in her bedroom slippers (Ed's Note: Yes she did.)? And with alcohol off the table, will OBG's weekends be exciting at all? Will the audience even care? Is this the season OBG jumps the shark (Ed's Note: Apparently the introduction of new characters has that effect)? With all these Editor's Notes, do we even need to tune in for the next episode (Ed's Note: ...)?

Stay tuned to find out the answers to at least one of these questions and to the questions you never even knew you had.