How do you read your daily blogs?

I don’t know about other bloggers, but let me tell you, I read a lot of blogs, and I love it! Reading blogs of all shapes and sizes was actually the primary reason I started this blog – I realized ‘Hey, I have a voice and creative ideas, too! Let’s do this!’

I used to be able to manage my list of daily reads pretty well, but I’m now at the point where all the space on my bookmarks toolbars in Mozilla, Internet Explorer, AND Chrome, are completely maxed out!  I never cared or understood how to use Google Reader, and I didn’t think to research other reader alternatives, I was pretty satisfied with my morning routine clicking straight to the blogs I wanted to read in the same order, every single day. Talk about a creature of habit!

 I don’t even know how I stumbled on it, it must have been a re-marketing campaign while perusing the internet, but I landed myself on NetVibes reading about their awarded personalized dashboard and thought ‘what the heck, let’s give this whole reader thing a try’.  About two weeks ago I signed up for a free account I can’t tell you how much my life has changed.  Having a real time feed of all the blogs I read in a day makes me feel like I have the entire internet all in one place. It’s more than amazing!

NetVibes has been around for a while, but it’s completely brand new to me.  I’m still learning how to use it, but so far I’ve used 3 different views to read my daily blogs – the classic widget view (below), which is laid out in a tile board similar to Pinterest, and each tile lists the most recent 7 or so posts from each site.

 I also like the current activity view, you can see all the posts that were published today

My new favorite view is the image tile view for all posts most currently published.  I’m totally into this visual method of reading a feed!

 OK, OK, so I’m fully aware that utilizing a reader is a no-brainer for most of you folks, which makes me wonder, how does everyone else read their favorite blogs? What readers do you use? Or do you prefer to click directly to sites? Do you keep a list of your favorite blogs? I’m so interested!

PS: if you’re curious about what blogs I read on a daily basis, I created this page dedicated to them for easy access.  You can find the link to this page is on my right sidebar.

Finding the perfect gold spray paint

If only you knew the real life of an accountant.  Being a blogger/accountant is so hard sometimes, it’s like mixing oil and water.  Seriously, all normality is lost during month-close, but I’m slowly climbing out of it and have found a spare minute to share with you the journey I took in finding the perfect gold spray paint

I don’t know about you, but I haven’t had very much luck picking out the perfect gold spray paint straight off the shelf.  The paint can caps are deceivingly shiny and beautiful, the majority of the paint cans claim to be metallic but aren’t, and I usually don’t have enough patience to test out a bunch of random gold spray paints.

Today is the day we’re going to test out some options, because I believe with all my heart there is a perfect gold spray paint out there for everyone.  I chose 5 readily available gold spray paint cans from 3 shops – Michael’s, Home Depot, and Blick Art Materials.

In all my gold experiences, I’ve come to the conclusion that the color spectrum of gold falls into a quadrant of 4 distinct shades: brassy gold, yellow gold, green gold, and a warm honey gold. Each shade holds a purpose, and it’s up to you as the designer to determine which shade jives best with your look.

Usually if I decide to ‘go gold’ on a project, I look past using gold spray paint and go straight to gold leaf.  We all know how much patience goes into playing with gold leaf!  I wanted to find a paint that would compare to gold leaf, to save myself a headache and my carpet from a bazillion flakes of foil.

let’s find the best can of gold spray paint!

Montana Gold Acrylic spray paint is a professional spray paint that artists typically use for creative tag art.  Unlike some other professional artist spray paints, Montana Gold has characteristics in its formula that parallel home improvement spray paints, in that it can adhere to almost any surface.  The paint is flexible and has decent coverage, and it sounds silly but I really like the spray cap – It’s super comfortable! I was surprised that this paint turned out to be one of my favorites, because when the paint first comes out of the can, even after shaking vigorously, the paint was clear and appeared watery.  It was as if the paint turned to gold once it hit the air.

What I love most about this paint is that it dries with a super shiny with an almost lacquer-like finish.  The only qualm I have is that the paint is a bit runny, so you definitely need primer first, then you have to spray 2 light coats in order to get full coverage.  This paint falls into the honey golden shade I mentioned earlier, it’s so beautiful and complex, and mimics gold leaf in a way I wouldn’t have expected from a spray paint.

Design Master paints are readily available at Michael’s.  I’ve never actually tried this brand until now, and I can’t believe I held out for so long.  Both Design Master paints below are high quality, and are shockingly metallic in person.  The Gold Medal paint can is probably the most beautiful of the yellow-gold variety.  Both cans of paint are so buttery smooth and rich it was difficult picking out which I liked better.  Although, if I was forced to choose I’d have to say my favorite between the two is the Brilliant Gold.

You can see what I mean about the shades of gold, right? Gold Metal above is a yellow gold, whereas the Brilliant Gold below is a warm honey gold.

The next two cans of paint are perhaps the most common brands amongst crafters and DIY enthusiasts.  I’ve used these cans in previous projects, but I can’t say I was ever ecstatic with the results. Rustoleum’s Metallic Gold spray paint is more photogenic than it appears in person.  In person the paint is a greenish gold – not my fave.  Although, I am a big fan of Rustoleum’s paint formula – it’s adhesion qualities are en point, I’ll probably skip on their metallic cans and stick with their colored paints.

Michael’s also sells Krylon brand spray paints, such as this 18K Gold paint can.  The paint is great, I really don’t have any negative things to say about it, it just doesn’t live up to the other 4 paints here.  I do think it’s a little overpriced for being a smaller can, but that’s just me being a cheap-o.  Since this paint is in the yellow category of gold, I would suggest only using this paint for small projects.  Anything larger than a picture frame will look more yellow than gold.  I also wish Krylon would change the cap – the cap looks like a beautiful metallic rose gold, when the paint is more like the color of the clock on the label.

Well there you have it! I hope this post is somewhat helpful for the next time you decide to go gold.

booked!

This is an exciting day! I rarely post about my wedding plans on this site, mainly because I want to keep the more personal items separate from the blog items. Although, I have been compelled to share the important moments, like the proposal or wedding DIY projects like the initial charm necklaces.  And today I feel compelled to share with you – we’ve booked our honeymoon!

Art Print via Keri Bevan

We’re going to London!

In reality, we’re going all over Europe – London, Paris, Italy, Spain.  The plan is to catch a ride on a Mediterranean cruise (that’s the next step in “plan honeymoon”).  I’ve always had that strong itch to travel, but my man, he’s cool hanging out at home and spending the money on a new TV.  I’m just SO EXCITED we’re going to Europe together.  There will be plenty of tropical family vacations in our future, but Europe is something special, and I know the trip will be absolutely unforgettable.

blog goals 2013, & how did I do last year?

Hello! Happy New Year everyone! I can’t believe it’s a new year already (actually, 4 days into the new year, but who’s really counting?)

You guys know me – my home projects move rather slowly around my house since I work so much, but that hasn’t stopped me from drafting a to-do list for 2013! I realize now my 2012 list of 3 items was mighty ambitious, the only thing I accomplished was moving out! Ouch! Well, in my defense the other 2 items were huge projects, reupholstering a sofa? Building a headboard? Both items are being carried over to 2013, don’t judge!

Let’s talk about New Year’s blog goals today.  I have 3 biggies for the new year:

a little holiday home tour

This has been a mighty special year for me and my man.  At the beginning of the year, we were living like bachelors and saving money along the way.  After many conversations (and situations where we felt we just needed more space), we decided to take the plunge, spend a little more money each month, and move out! We moved to a beautiful loft, significantly closer to work, cutting our commuting time down from almost 2 hours each day to about ten minutes.  This was probably the best decision we ever made! Anyway, we pretty much started from scratch.  We needed furniture, kitchen supplies, storage solutions, a dining table, chairs, desks, etc etc.  To top it off, we also got engaged! Needless to say, we’re running a tight spending ship, and our budget for Christmas decorations was pretty much whatever we had on hand.

I wanted to join in on the fun today and share with you a quick tour of our holiday home.  I hope you’ll indulge with me

a black friday upgrade

My fiancee was the first person to introduce me to Black Friday.  I guess my parents never had the desire to take me and my 6 other siblings to Best Buy at 4 am to wait in line for hours to score any door busters.  We were a handful, I don’t blame them, but I seriously can’t believe that I was 24 when I experienced my first Black Friday.

I’ve been yearning and pining to upgrade my camera for, what feels like, forever, but just didn’t feel comfortable paying full price.  Well, duh, black friday was just around the corner, so I begged my fiancee to let me buy it (thanks babe!) as long as I had a plan to recoup the costs (and not eat away at our wedding fund!).

my very own desk

Hello! Before I dive right in, I just want to say thank you all for taking the time to comment on my crazy posts!  It really makes me feel connected with you, like we’re having a conversation together, versus feeling like I’m the only one talking.  I love hearing what you have to say!

I’m really excited to share this post with you today.  It marks a moment in my life where I truly feel like a grown-up.   I finally have my very own “home office”!  It’s my desk, it’s my work space, It’s where I throw my blankets and trinkets and pens and scissors and mail and chalk all throughout the day.  My desk isn’t very sophisticated, or refined, or polished, but it’s definitely me.

meet trixie…

Meet Trixie, our 4 1/2 year old English bulldog.  My frequent readers may already know this, but we actually have two dogs: Rocco, our French bulldog, and Trix, our English.  I decided today I wanted to devote this post entirely to Trix.

If our pups were our kids, as we often treat them to be, Trix would be our diva teenage daughter.  If you’re a pet owner, you know full well every pet has it’s own personality, and Trix is no exception.

flash back! top 5 by brittanyMakes

A few weeks ago I officially pried myself {and my blog} out of Typepad’s death grip, then dove head first into the heavenly world of WordPress. If anyone has worked with Typepad before, they should know this event is worth celebrating!  Sadly, I was only able to celebrate for a few minutes or so, until I realized I had made the move one step too soon.  The short story is, all my image links broke during the move to WordPress (which you may have noticed when visiting some old posts).  The long, and nontechnical story is, Typepad hates it when bloggers leave so they make it impossible to regain control over your own content.  There are special steps Typepad bloggers need to take prior to the move in order to keep all image links intact, and being a novice at this web design thing, I didn’t realize these special steps existed.  So, if you’re a Typepad blogger and are thinking of making the move to WordPress (which I FULLY recommend!), make sure to do extra research regarding transferring images before you flip the switch.

Now for the fun part! I’m {slowly but surely} going back and re-uploading the images to my old blog posts.  It’s a tremendous feat, but I’m determined to get it done.  I thought it would be fun to reinstate my top posts first, so we can revisit them and see how far this blog has come!

Let’s count down the top 5 posts! { click on the image to be re-directed to the post }

the bakery is open!

We celebrated the grand opening of Emi’s Biscotteria this last weekend! It was a major success.  Italian cookie lovers from all over town came to celebrate Emi’s big day.  Emi offered free samples, coffee, and stories of how her cookie journey began.  The wonderful ladies in Emi’s family (my soon to be in-laws!) have baked these very same cookies from recipes they carried over from Italy.  Italian women keep these recipes under lock and key, and only trusted daughters are handed these recipes as generations pass.  Emi wed her entrepreneurial spirit with her love of baking and this amazing biscotteria was born!