By Walking Away

Tag: Life

let’s try this again… shall we?

September 13, 2022 / / 0 Comments

Hi there!

First of all, my mom made it!

She came out of the hospital on March 1, 2022. It was a long road, but we made it and we thank God for her everyday. Her recovery has been a long one, but if there is one thing I know about her is that she is determined.

What did I learn? Don’t take those you love for granted. Every day is a gift from God and we should live our lives without regrets. Hug your loved ones. Don’t end a conversation with anger or frustration. Every time I am able to say, “Hey Siri… Call Mom” I thank God for being able to do so.

So, what’s new?

I’m currently sitting here waiting for jt to finish recording a video for one of his tutorials so that I can begin to edit. We started a website where we will host some of his classes and hopefully be able to at least pay for the new laptop we bought.

I also started an Etsy shop. Anvil and Pier – Handmade Goods. I currently have wreaths in there. Haven’t made one sale – but the Etsy shop is there. I’m trying to figure out if I want to keep going, maybe find a niche with the wreaths. But we’ll see. I don’t want to give up on it. I truly enjoy making wreaths and I would love to be able to make some extra income with it.

The main thing that we are working toward though… Buying our first short term rental. There. I said it. So now it has to come true, right?

Really though, we are truly passionate about this new journey. So we will begin to document that here. We are in the saving money phase. Not quite there yet to buy our first one, but it doesn’t stop us from dreaming. And with us documenting our journey, we will try to be as transparent as possible.

The facts:

  • We both work full time W-2 jobs
  • We are approximately 10k in credit card debt
  • We have a 20k car loan
  • If we were completely debt free, one of our incomes could be fully discretionary
  • We spend way too much money on food/groceries
  • We like Disney too much and find any and every excuse in the book to go to the parks
  • We just got a new puppy… lol

So there we have it. Our lives in a nutshell.

Ship it.

-Vanessa

Wedding Flowers… 12 Years Later

September 30, 2020 / / 0 Comments

We’ve been married for more than 12 years now… wow time flies!

We got married when we were very young and money was tight. This led to most of the wedding being DIY. I’ve always loved to figure out how to make things myself, so our DIY wedding was no big deal.

One of the things that I never did was look into how to store my gown or my flowers. Heck… the cake top ended up in the freezer like tradition calls for, and we totally messed that one up. It was disgusting.

While we were packing for our move back to NM, I inevitably came across my “stored” flowers. They were forgotten about in a shoe box. I seriously considered throwing them away. In these 12 years, we’ve moved a total of 13 times. These flowers have survived all of that! They deserved more than the trash can. So I decided that I was going to figure out what to do with them by the end of the year.

I came a across a photo on Pinterest of a jar with dried flowers in it. I thought that would be perfect for this. They can be displayed on a shelf without looking too wedding-y.

What I used:

  • Glass Jar – large enough to comfortably fit the flowers without breaking them
  • Scissors
  • Hairspray
  • Plastic Wrap
  • Dried roses/flowers of your choice

Let’s do this!

Here goes nothing! Said a little grateful prayer before cutting into my wedding roses just in case I was about to pulverize them.

I carefully cut the stems off and picked the roses that were still intact and set them apart. Once that was done, I lightly sprayed them with hairspray to help them stay intact.

Then I carefully placed each rose inside the jar, making sure I didn’t leave any obvious empty space between each rose.

Once I was done placing the roses inside the jar, I cut a piece of plastic wrap in the shape of the opening of the jar. This is to keep most of the dust off of the roses. I didn’t use a tight seal because I was afraid of what might happen if the flowers don’t have any air flow.

And there you go! Better than in a shoebox!

I placed the jar on my shelf in the living room, and I’m really happy they’re there.

-V

© 2024 By Walking Away

Theme by Anders Noren — Up ↑