Make a Paper Chain/ Christopher the Christmas Tree

I don't know where to start this one so I'll play it safe:

Hello! How's it going? That's good. Me, I'm doing well. 

In October I took a couple days over to fly out (in a horrible sketchy plane) and be a bridesmaid in my best friend's wedding. I have four 'best friends' but this particular one has been around for many years, she and her twin sister have been my 'besties' since we were ten, and friends since we were seven. You can see a precious before and after type picture on my Instagram by clicking HERE.

Anyway, as wedding favours she had little baby pine trees and a very cute pinterest-y display. I snuck this picture while picking up empty pop cans and beer cups. Sober bridesmaiding at its best.

Now this may seem like a complete 180 degree topic change but I promise it's related: My favourite Christmas movie growing up was Christopher the Christmas tree. I know that it's not on many lists, but it just always got me. You can watch the whole thing on YouTube HERE. The premise is very ugly duckling-esque but without spoiling the ending... Christopher was a baby Christmas tree who was never taken into anyone a home to be their family tree because he was so small and "ugly". So I took my little baby pine tree and names it Christopher. He sat in a mug for three months until I finally made him a home.

You would be surprised how hard it was to find a basic clay pot that wasn't enormous or teeny. I found this guy and his base at Michaels for under $5 (with a coupon of course). 

Now I have a pretty realistic view when I have ideas of how things are gonna turn out. I picture something in my head and know it's going to be 30% not as nice. So when I decided I was going to turn this clay pot aka Christopher's future home into a kate spade esque room decor masterpiece, I knew there was going to be a learning curve of sorts. After like six coats of white paint, some gold I borrowed from my moms ancient paint stash and a monogram stencil curtesy of markandgraham.com and my Silhouette Cameo, I was done and you can see the result at the top of this post...

30% people. I know it's not perfect but for my first attempt of stencilling I'm pretty pleased. Not perfect, but hey, it's... authentic.

Now to complete the look I figured Christopher needed some decorating... And conveniently a WTJ page came to mind. To see how Christopher's lovely garland came to be you can check out my latest Wreck This Journal series video.

Not perfect, but cute tight? 

Thanks for reading (and watching)!

Adrianna.

Quote/ Unquote

I'm what you might call a quote-a-holic. Actually, you probably wouldn't because you're obviously way cooler than me and wouldn't use terms like that. But I really, really, REALLY love quotes. My obsession started back in elementary school when chain emails were a big thing. I actually have a few funny ones saved on my computer still, but the majority were cheesy poems that you had to forward to everyone you loved to remind them that you care. And when you were twelve in the early 2000's, it was very serious business. Anyway, I received one (and I honestly couldn't tell you who sent it to me) but instead of the usual cheesy poem it was a bunch of (equally cheesy) short sayings punctuated with emoticons illustrating each saying. And a monster was created.

I printed out the group of sayings on my dad's old black and white printer and pinned it on the little half cork board and half white board that I had in my room. And thus, my new quote obsession spawned my first quote board. These quotes also found their way into my msn messenger screen names more than once.

I had just finished a book report for school and part of the assignment was to include a quote from the book. In grade seven if was that annoying overachiever/ goody good/ teachers pet and of course just one quote wouldn't suffice. So there were three. 

And after getting my book report back, I cut up the part with the quotes and that went on the quote board as well.

Then, one of my first online loves was discovered: http://www.firehotquotes.com (It still exists!). I spent countless hours copying and pasting quotes from and into word documents. I then found quotes from digimon, and at the time I was hiding my obsession in order to appear 'cool' so I altered some of the quotes to be un-digified. 

The collection grew and grew and I began cutting and pasting all these quotes onto my little bulitin board. And then upgraded to a full size bulitin board. And another. And another.

Then I decided the quotes were too spaced out and older quotes were too separate from newer quotes and I wanted there to be more variety on each board as well as an optimal use of space. If you can't tell, I take the weirdest things very seriously. So, an entire summer was spent taking off all the quotes that had been held on with sticky tack, and reapplying them with glue and leaving as little space between them all as possible. I got really good at Tetris that year.

Now, I have nine quote boards. They have travelled with me from old house to new house, some to four different bedrooms and multiple room reorganizations. Each one has some kind of mini tribute to Canada as well as random things, pictures and of course... So many quotes. 

Of all the things I own and have made, my quote boards are the most special to me. It was something I came up with all on my own and they grew and evolved with me. Yes there are the cheesy quotes I found when I was twelve, and the digi-sensored ones as well as the later added actual digimon quotes. They are still incomplete and I have a drawer of 'to be pasted' quotes as well as a document of 'to be printed' ones. After ten years of an obsession I have over a thousand pages worth of quote related word documents and have depleted Canada's supply of sticky tack and glue sticks. 

There are very few things I treasure to the same standards as these boards and I'm only half joking when I tell my mom that they can't go into storage because they're going with me to every room I ever occupy, including my grave. They can be cremated with me, right? 

Adrianna.