So I kind of have an obsession of sorts.

And it’s nail polish.

I like to think I’m not annoyingly girly. Though more often than not, I get described as cute… but we’ll just ignore that.

I mean, I love an excuse to dress up. I like to look nice when I go out in public. Sometimes that even means going as far as putting on make-up, doing my hair, or wearing a dress. But I can be grungy too. I wear sweats at home, and often when I know I’m not leaving the house, I don’t even bother putting on real clothes. That’s right, after I shower, I just put a clean pair of pajamas back on.

But my one really girly trait is that I’ve always been a nail painter. Part of the reason why is that my nails are very thin and easily break or peel. So, the only chance of having even somewhat long nails is to paint them and repaint them when they first begin to chip. (My sister, on the other hand, got the good genes and has thick nails… to the point where she’ll leave her chipped nail polish on for weeks and still be fine. So mad.) Also, I just love the feel of nail polish on my nails. Plus, so pretty!

My family has often made fun of me for it. We go on vacation for even just a few days? I’m still not without my nail polish, nail files, cotton pads, and nail polish remover. And if possible, I’ve changed the color every day to match my outfit. I’m known to have more nail polish than is probably healthy, and yet I can’t stop myself from buying more.

Through years of experience, I’ve developed a pretty steady hand, even when painting with my non-dominant hand. So much so, that my sister usually tries to con me into painting hers. However, all that nail painting and I’ve really never dabbled in the nail art world. But thanks to the internet (more specifically pinterest.com and instagram) I’ve got endless design ideas and tutorials that I’m now dying to try. So I apologize in advance if this blog becomes more of a nail blog than anything else in the upcoming weeks. It’s just that… I’m a tad excited.

So there’s this thing called tagging going around.

This brings me back to my middle school days when myspace was cool and you did these kind of questionnaire things. Omg… I’m dating myself a lot there.

But why not give it a go, right? I obviously love to talk about myself for any given reason, and this could be fun.

So, Mackenzie tagged me via her ManicMation blog. The game seems simple enough. Answer her questions, tag my own followers, and ask them questions of my own.

Grocery shopping is always an adventure.

Friday is usually grocery shopping day in my world. It has its own set aside time because it’s something that must be carefully planned for since I don’t have a car. Which was fine when I first moved down to school. You see, my roommate actually liked me then and would allow me to tag along when she grocery shopped. We were even cool enough to share in buying things like milk and whatnot. But that was a long time ago and a completely different story.

For a while now, I’ve been on my own when it comes to transporting groceries back to the apartment. If I go home for the weekend, it’s great because I can either go grocery shopping while back home or I can usually talk my dad into stopping at the store down here to let me pick up a few things. However, most of the time I just have to walk a few blocks from the store to a bus stop and rely on public transportation to take me the rest of the way home. Nothing like riding a bus with groceries.

Most of the time, my boyfriend tags along with me. Which is lovely because I have some company and somebody to help me carry things. And as a result, he gets dinner made for him. Pretty sweet deal, if you ask me.

These conditions alone usually make grocery shopping enough of an adventure as it is… but this weekend, it was even more so. Why, you ask? Because there was a lesson involved! That’s right. I learned something.

Sometimes I like to be crafty.

Every once and a while, I get this bug to pull out my art supplies. It’s like an itch that doesn’t go away until I give in and scratch it. Maybe it’s my ties to my old high school days, when schooling wasn’t just about cramming information into my brain, but also about having some fun and being creative. Thinking back, art class holds a lot of my more fonder memories.

I blame my boyfriend for this most recent urge to do something that involved getting my hands dirty in the name of art. I helped him paper mache and paint a mask that he wore to PAX. Anybody looking for a quick, and odd, laugh, I share with you the video that inspired his costume: Cool Guy Has Chill Day.

Anyway, running my hands through the paper mache mix and picking the dried paste off my skin gave me that giddy feeling which only creating something can give you. Being a double science major, art gives me that creative release that I find myself randomly craving. Oh, the smell of paint can be so intoxicating. It speaks to a part of me that nothing else can touch. And that’s why I will dabble in art for the rest of my life. In fact, I’m looking forward to being a parent for many reasons, but a big one involves impromptu craft afternoons and making the biggest of artsy messes!

I’m in the middle of transitioning through roommates at the moment. My old roommate just moved out this weekend, and took with her a mountain of stress. With my new roommate not moving in until later this month, I’m left feeling a rush of relief and the urge to bring something new into the space. Coupled with the sudden need to dust off my paints, and an offhand comment made to Brandon that I was going to make him watercolor with me… the answer seemed simple: art needed to be made. That was all the reason I needed to spark an idea that ate away at me until I drew up plans. The question: How to cover my wall in art without painting directly on it or tacking a lot of things on it (since I’m living in a rented apartment that does not allow it).

Hello. My Name Is…

Seeing as I really have viewed this thing as just an online journal of sorts from when I first thought of creating it… I never really took the time to introduce myself.  But I guess, in the unlikely event that somebody actually wants to follow me, I should say something.

I mean, I realized I told you my age and a good chunk of my basic history in my first two posts–and such personal things like the fact that I have an active sex life–but I never even told you my name.

It’s Amanda, by the way. Amanda Lyn. And though I still shake my head at my mother for the most uncreative choice of giving my sister and I both her own middle name [Also, my sister’s name is Abby, so we share the same initials. That in itself has also been a struggle at the weirdest of times.] I do thank her for the fact that mine sounds cooler than my sister’s. Amanda Lyn? Sounds like mandolin. Look it up. That’s an honest-to-goodness instrument. Kind of classy, right?