With the Christmas holiday over, life is starting to go back to normal.

My fist order of business is to get all the necessary items to apply for post-graduate studies as well as getting all of last years files in order and filed away.

Although there isn't much on my agenda this week, I'm beginning to fill them up again along with some journalling in my Original A5 Filofax. 

I'm not quite used to the big clunky thing, but I love the room. In 2013, I've downgraded my Filofax from a Personal Finsbury to a Compact Personal Saffiano. I don't know if my switch to an A5 would be called upgrading, but nonetheless, I need to get used to a large organiser since this year would be a busy year. If all goes well and I'm accepted into post-graduate school, I know my agenda would be filled with assignments along with every day life.

The dough turned out rather dense and doughy, but the fillings which were red pepper herb ricotta cheese and pork and beef were good. This coming weekend, I will try to practice making the dough again with the same fillings.

In June, I've published a novel on Amazon Kindle Direct Publishing. I don't want to go on a sad note, but the novel only generated three sales party because I'm new to the publishing world and I wasn't sure how to market the book.

October brought in some much needed pick me up. I've gone on a holiday to the East Coast and visited around twelve or so different states. It was an amazing trip and I've expanded my photo library because of it.

In November, I've also learned that Advantage Rental Car isn't a good company to hire car when you're on holiday. In Washington DC, we've hired a car to get us up to Maine and back down to Boston. The first economy class car they've given us, the interior was dirty. The upholstery had Cheetos residue on them. They gave us another car, but this time, the car was wrecked. There was no other vehicle to choose from and they said to go ahead and take it, but make sure we've documented the damage. Thankfully, after an article I've read on USA Today, I made sure I took photographs of the damage on my phone (since it gives a time stamp and gps) and I've also videoed the damage.

A month after our holiday and the return of the car, Advantage was suing us for wrecking their vehicle. We informed the adjuster of the noted damage prior to rental and she said she'd contact Advantage for said paperwork. Advantage did not contact her back. I kept everything including the photos and videos. I e-mailed it to her and within a week, the claim was closed and we were not liable. So, note. Do not rent from Advantage!

December, life had gotten a lot busier with Michael's Union christmas party where I was hired to be the photographer. We've also catered a holiday luncheon for CSLB, then off to San Francisco for the Moose Feed. 

All in all, it was a good year.

Whenever I visit the Japanese grocery store, Oto's Supermarket, I'm always passing by their Daiso isle in hopes to find something cute. There were several times I've struck out, but yesterday's visit proved to be successful.

They had these sticky notes/memos and they are $1.50 each. They also had a cute notepad, but I decided against getting it. I wanted a cute notepad that I can holepunch to fit in my personal size Filofaxes and in my A5. The notepad was too small, so I just opted out for these.

Aren't they cute?

I've also been collecting paint cards from Home Depot after finding a project on Pinterest where the crafter punch those cards with a heart punch and glued them onto a piece of cardboard foam. I've done the same and adding wedding anniversary date to it in calligraphy.

I thought I would have used up all the cards, but no. I still have a big stack, so I decided to punch butterflies and glue them onto a board in a shape of a heart. I took a pice of pink ribbon and glued it to the back of the cardboard foam to act as a hanger.

Even with this project, I've still got a lot of paint cards left and I needed another idea. Thanks to Florence (@livelifeandcreate) on Instagram, I've found another purpose for them.

On Monday, I bought a couple of things at Michael's, one of them was the Martha Stewart Balloon paper puncher. I originally thought that the ballon was big enough that I can actually make some kind of wall art like I had with the previous two, but after punching one paint card, I found that it's big enough to use in my scrapbooking and card making projects. So I got out one of my old sketching books to do start the project. This is what came out of it.