crazy for candles

Tags

candle, fresh cotton, hobbies, homemade candles, naidra, naidra walls, sandalwood

I can never just have a hobby. Usually, once it piques my interest, I grab it and I can’t let go.  Recently, I’ve been into candles. I bought this Sweet Basil and Herb candle by Tusca Mia from Walmart a few months ago and fell in love with it.  The bad thing about candles, is that once you burn them, they melt away. You have to buy new ones to keep the scent around. That can be problematic.  Plus, I couldn’t find this particular scent online anywhere! Whoever sells these things to Walmart is most likely a genius.

Nevertheless, because I’m pretty impatient, frugal, and somewhat crafty, I set out on the mission to make my own candles! The idea was that I could create my own sweet basil candle.  Well, I can try.  I actually ordered the wrong scent, so I have this woodsy-earthy basil and herb candle.  It doesn’t smell bad, but it takes some getting used to.  That’s fine though. The herbs cover the smell of my puppy (even though he’s been recently groomed, so he smells pretty fresh without the candles) and the smell reminds me that I just did something cool.  I also ordered some Sandalwood and Fresh Cotton scents. They smell good from the bottle – which is a good indicator of how the candles will smell.

    

I think I’m on to something.  Even though a million can (or do) make their own candles, who really wants to? I save a ton of money, and I can create my own scents. My apartment will smell pretty good too.

Basil and Herb Candles

This web hosting thing…I don’t get it.

Tags

bravenet, ecommerce, ecommerce for wordpress, get invictus, greek, invictus, invictus custom woodwork, naidra, naidra walls, paddles, web hosting, wood art, woodwork, wordpress

So, I’m trying to create an online store for my company, Invictus Custom Woodwork, using WordPress. I know that there’s a way to do it because Google told me so. Unfortunately, Google can’t input all of the information into my brain like they can in the Matrix, so I need some background information on how to host my WordPress site on a different server, then install the plug-ins, while still maintaining the ability to manage the site from the regular WordPress interface.

It’s confusing and frustrating. So far, I’ve downloaded the WordPress 3.0 from wordpress.org, and I’ve read the instructions on how to install it. Unfortunately, I’m stuck at whatever MySQL means, and I’m utterly frustrated.

This kind of reminds me of this online HTML class that I took last December through WebTechUniversity. It was a good course, but I was utterly confused at the beginning.  What is web hosting? Am I hosting a site through Bravenet? I think I am but all that’s up there is WebTech homework. How much space does Bravenet give me? Can I host a WordPress site from there for free? I’m all about free stuff these days.

After some checking, I learned that yes, Bravenet does offer the mySQL whatevers that WordPress requires to host your own ecommerce site, for the low, low price of $99/year. Which isn’t bad I guess…but you still have to buy the ecommerce plugin (if you want a sweet one) which could cost $30 – $40. All in all, the price tag could be $140 just to put the site up.  This isn’t considering the price that it would be to have someone manage the site as well.  Thinking practically, that could be a task for a smart intern though.  I’m sure  that there are a few people out there who would be willing to run the site for some great experience, and a resume-builder.  What do you think?

This is just the beginning of my journey to own and manage a functional site. I guess I’d better jump on the iTunes University bandwagon and start learning how to do web hosting and extensive WordPress management.  I’m sure the brains at Harvard or Yale would be willing to share that info. Heck, maybe they’ll even buy a few paddles from me. Get Invictus right?

2010 in review

The stats helper monkeys at WordPress.com mulled over how this blog did in 2010, and here’s a high level summary of its overall blog health:

The Blog-Health-o-Meter™ reads This blog is on fire!.

Crunchy numbers

A Boeing 747-400 passenger jet can hold 416 passengers. This blog was viewed about 2,400 times in 2010. That’s about 6 full 747s.

 

In 2010, there were 34 new posts, growing the total archive of this blog to 41 posts. There were 65 pictures uploaded, taking up a total of 44mb. That’s about a picture per week.

The busiest day of the year was March 4th with 29 views. The most popular post that day was love where you live?.

Where did they come from?

The top referring sites in 2010 were naidra.com, facebook.com, mycrazyreader.info, en.wordpress.com, and statistics.bestproceed.com.

Some visitors came searching, mostly for expedit desk, ikea expedit desk, insanity workout calendar, benno tv stand, and expedit.

Attractions in 2010

These are the posts and pages that got the most views in 2010.

1

love where you live? October 2009
5 comments

2

Worst-Paying College Degrees May 2010
4 comments

3

Sigma Lambda Beta Fraternity crest November 2009
3 comments

4

An interest in everything. November 2010

5

About… October 2009

Boost for my blog

Tags

11, blog, blogging, eleven, links, naidra, naidra walls, progress

It’s really hard to get a successful blogging gig, especially if you have relatively low readership.  So, I’ve made a point to do two things with my blog:
1) increase my subscribers, and 2) find more paid blogging jobs.

This is going to take some work.  I read another blog that gave some great suggestions, and my good friend Shawntai gave me some great tips.  These are the ones that I can do now:

* Link my blog back to other blogs.
* Tell my visitors about my latest fad or obsession.
* Go to more interesting places so that I have more to write about.
* Encourage sharing of opinions.
* Congratulate the top commentators occasionally.
* Share your hopes and aspirations about your blog.
* Join Yahoo! Answers and put a link on your website to your answers.
* Keep a track of websites that pick up your articles or press releases. Offer them exclusive news or content.
* Publicize your blog to your friends and relatives and let them do some work for you.
* Be active in Social Bookmarking websites.
* Share Link Love and you will get it back.

These are the top 11 so far. I’ll keep you posted on my progress.  In the meantime, what do you think?

Wii for mii?

Tags

exercise, insanity, mario kart, nintendo, wii, wii fit

So, for Christmas, my parents forgo-ed my plea to get in shape through the Insanity Workout, and bought me a Wii Fit (which I’m insanely grateful for), but at a way higher price.  The Insanity workout is a 10-disc set of DVDs that take you though intense excerises using your own body weight.  It has participants do sit-ups, push-ups, jumping jacks, and all kinds of other things without using outside weights that run the risk of tearing joint muscles and ligaments.  I was so excited at the idea that I might get this excellent workout, and at the idea that I could have a 6-pack in 2 months!  But, the folks thought differently.

Insanity Workout

A new Wii on Amazon.com costs about $200, and the Wii Fit Plus is another $90.  That’s about $170 more than the Insanity Workout — which is cool, except for the fact that the Wii doesn’t come with everything you need to be successful in getting fit!  If you want your system to stay in tip-top shape, you have to buy controller protectors, an extra controller (if you don’t want to play alone), AND a balance board protector.  Not counting all of the accessories you’ll need to play other games.  I was so hurt to learn that Mario Kart for the Wii, with the steering wheel accessory is $70 and I’d still have to buy the second controller…another $40 at least.  They’re around $50 if you want a black one.

So the question becomes: is the Wii for me?  I can’t afford the extra $200 to $250 to buy the ONE game and Wii accessories that I need to make my gaming experience worth the price of the system itself.  With bills, rent, and other expenses, all on a salary barely over minimum wage, how can I afford all of the extra crap?

On the bright side, the Wii Fit Plus has a personal trainer feature, and 15 more games than the normal Wii Fit.  It doesn’t make you beat every level to access more games either.  I haven’t explored all of it’s options and features yet, but my brother has been successful in beating me in every game that we’ve tried.  So, I have a lot of practice to do, and a lot of shape to get into.  Once I master the games on the Wii Fit Plus, I might move to that Wii Active game — if I have the money.  The idea of having real-looking people work with me to lose a couple of pounds and tone up seems exciting, or at least it’ll give me more motivation.  Maybe I’ll improve my center of balance and decrease my Wii fitness age from 80 to 30, or heck, 23!

I guess we’ll see how my workouts go.   I plan to start my exercise regimen when I go home on Tuesday or Wednesday, so I’ll be writing to track my progress.

Sigma Lambda Beta Fraternity crest

Tags

crest, Projects, shield, sigma, Sigma Lambda Beta, woodwork

I love projects: woodwork, crochet things, photography, and of course, writing things.  So, as a normal craft-head, I decided to take on the project of making a shield for my cuZZo, Armando.

Here’s what I started out with:

First, I started out with an image that I found online.  Then, I bought a poster board, and sketched the outline of the shield for a stencil.

Blown up for the stencil

I cut the wood next.  That might not have been the smartest 2nd step, but I had to take advantage of the weather.  Here’s how it turned out:

This is the first cut of the shield, the base.

The pieces inside of the shield — the book, lamps, scale, and keys — were so hard to find!  I really got to know my computer by looking for them (and I learned that Google isn’t as useful as it’s cracked up to be sometimes).

Next step: Cut the pieces out with a jigsaw.

SLB pieces and jigsaw

FINALLY! This is where I messed up.  I sanded the pieces down, making sure that there weren’t a lot of bad spots from where the plywood chipped during the cut process.  I was supposed to glue the pieces down before I started painting but…

Halfway painted then...oops!

So, yeah — I got a little excited, but I figured out how to fix it, and kept pressing along.  After a bunch of time, painting, and nit-picking, here’s what came out (almost completely complete):

Nearly complete shield

So what’s left?  The letters, date, a nice coat of glaze, and those nit-pickey details, of course. That’ll be done this week (fingers crossed).

Leave comments! I’m thinking of making this a business so I need thoughts on prices, clients, etc.

Edit: November 17th, 2009

This is what the finished (the real finished) product looks like:

Finished Sigma Lambda Beta Shield

What do you think?