Sunday, September 26, 2010

Saturday madness!

My weekend is still not over, but yesterday is still so unbelievably vivid so I wanted to blog about it before I start my Sunday.

Woke up super early to make it to the Manhattan Training Center at 7:00am for Summer Training.  Then around 9:15am headed to U haul to pick up my 10' Truck on 23rd and 11th avenue.  A friend and I jumped in the truck and he says, "This is my first time in a uhaul truck." I say, "me too! and my first time driving in the city!" We both crack up, but inside I was screaming madness! I drove north and crossed town to upper east side to meet my friend.  Loaded a bed and a sofa then drove cross town to my place on upper west side then dumped furniture in my room.  Dropped off friend back to MTC then I headed back to U haul.

I secretly was so damn proud of myself so I decided to not go home just yet and enjoy my Saturday.  I hit up Chelsea flea market and found many treasures!! Its really just an avenue long, but there was so much to take in, more so than at Honolulu Swap Meet! Lots of cool antiques and vintage jewelry.  My phone was dying so I wasn't able to snap pics to help me with my design ideas. I did also meet Celebrity Chef, Brett August (finalist on Food Network's NFNS) he had a booth set up and I bought his Carrot Bread and Zucchini bread.

Later, I meet up with a few friends and we get lunch at the Chelsea Market (different from the Chelsea FLEA market). We ate - Pollo Panini, Lobster Roll, Currpy won tons, Cookie n Cream milk shake. Yumm! Then we walk to another underground flea market on 25th between 5th and 6th avenue.  This flea market was unbelievable! So the parking structure closes on weekends and so it becomes a flea market with even more more more antique treasures to be found! I didn't get anything from here, but took in a lot of design ideas.

As soon as I got home I organized my room with my queen size bed and double seat sofa and tried putting my curtains up (big fail!).  Ate some zucchini bread and took a big long nap...and woke up and now it's Sunday morning :)

Scored these antique gold plated and ceramic earrings at Chelsea flea market for a buck!

Thursday, September 23, 2010

Day #5 - Vapur


So exhausted!  

Sorry, I'm so pooped so this is a real short, boring blog.

But check out what I found at MoMA (refer to Day #3 blog)
Vapur, The Anti Bottle

 

Wednesday, September 22, 2010

Day #4 - Yanni


Today started off pretty insane. To keep my cool I thought about maybe my lack of gratitude for all the little things.

We've been working elbow deep in a whole bunch of sketching and shading techniques.  It's been pretty tedious and intense. So to make it easier for us (if our lighting isn't cutting it) the school offers us designer boards that we can put on our desk that allows us to do our work at an angle. I opted not to use it. The theme of my life lately has been, "Frugal hand trumps Luxury hand".  In starting my business there will be sacrifices to make and I know for starters that a designer board definitely lands on the "luxury hand".  We are given so many tools for so many different things that I can't keep up with all of them.  I'm a simple girl. So my choice is to tough it out. If you can balance innovation, resourcefulness with passion then things work out better than "okay". Take Yanni for example. This man had a passion for beautiful music.  He grew up with just a piano and no music instructors.  He created his beautiful music with what he had in his head and invented a style of music all his own (literally - he has his own music writing style). 

So while doing my work I thought about all this and thought about everyone I look up to and the hardships they have endured.  I'm pretty lucky.  I should have more gratitude for every little thing.  But instead of Yanni my iPod played Yann Tiersen today :) Yann Tiersen is a combination of my two faves: Yanni and Paris! (And yes! I do admit to being a Yanni fan.  Proud fan since middle school, baby!!)

Tuesday, September 21, 2010

Day #3 - Drinking Water

I decided that since I'm getting a second chance at things then I might as well go all out and be an overachieving dork.  So I completed all my projects in class today.  The drive to excel and get everything done so that I don't have any work to do at home was the hope to get a run in at Central Park or a little bit of yoga.

So throughout the day there was a lot of talk going around about drinking water and the cost of water. We noticed that there are no drinking fountains on campus.  There are snack and drink vending machines, but no drinking fountain.  There is a refrigerator and a microwave, but no drinking fountain. I had to take a part my purse to find every nickel and dime I could get to pay for a bottle of water. I never realized that a bottle of water can actually be such a huge dilemma.  See, as a foot commuter, you take what you can carry - books, wallet, cell phones, iPod, gym clothes, umbrella, home lunch, a bottle of water, etc.  When you carry a bottle of water it's usually filled with water then at the end of the day you can fill it with water from a drinking fountain and have water on your commute to your next destination.  But if you have no access to drinking water then you are left with an empty bottle that takes up room and space in your bag and if you're thirsty you gotta pay another buck or two to get more water.

So I did no running or yoga tonight.  Instead, I decided to use my time off to go venture with a classmate to get last minute supplies for cheap!

Supply shopping went as follows:
*Cheap sheet protectors at Kmart
*Cheap tiny paint canisters at Bed Bath & Beyond
Then all i needed was a piece of glass, acrylic or mirror

So we decide to hit Jack's World because they have a 99 cent store as well.  So I got a picture frame with an acrylic plate for ninety-nine cents! We also scored Brita Pitchers for $9.99!!! vs $21 dollars everywhere else. 

So we're keeping a pitcher in the campus refrigerator.  Drinking water for all!! :)

$9.99 Brita Pitcher from Jack's World




 I realized I take many small things for granted.  Today and everyday, I give thanks to water


Side note: My blogs lately have no mention about the content of what's going on in my class because it's just a whole bunch of facet drawing and shading.  No one wants to read about that.  Then again no one really wants to read about my cheap finds.  But once class gets more interesting, I promise my blogs will too.  HAHA!

Monday, September 20, 2010

Day #2 - Facet Junctions

So technically, today was my first "real" day of class.  After a crazy, insane, mind blowing weekend; I woke up at the crack of dawn and got myself ready, prepped my lunch, and mentally prepped for my first day. 

There are a lot of things to get used to. Besides being in a new home, the next most obvious change would be my commute.  Going to temple, going to church, going to parties [just noticed I listed "partying" after "praising" - yessss, I know my priorities ;)], going to get groceries, going to school, all require a different set of trains, cabs, subways, walk to get there.  For instance - going to temple: Leave apt, walk to subway, take 1,2 or 3 to Times Square, transfer to S to Grand Central, catch the 9:48am Metro North to White Plains Station, then catch cab to temple. And, that's actually a not-so-bad trip.  Getting to the beach like Fire Island, however, is just a whole other "OMG" type of story.

In due time, all these changes (making my own lunch, being a loner at school) will eventually become part of my daily routine.  My Oh-my-gawd-I'm-changing-my-entire-life paranoia isn't as bad as I had imagined (so far).  Things get thrown at me left and right and I'm impressed at how I've been handling it.  Today in class while properly drafting diamonds the instructor asks us to, "draw in the facet junctions" - The wha?!? It threw me off for a few seconds before I made a mental note to look it up when I get home.

One thing I can easily get used to and will always look forward to is my sister texting me daily pics of Nohea's daily routine. 

She sleeps all day :)

Thursday, September 16, 2010

Day #1 - Bodily Fluids

Today felt like Christmas! Everything was perfect on Orientation day.  Entering campus felt like I was going in for a Spa Treatment.  I never imagined that a school could make you feel so pampered.  Its a small class of about 14 students and everyone came from countries across the globe: Taiwan, India, Bombay, Mexico, Panama, Canada, Japan, Philippines, even as far as New Jersey! [just kidding ;-)]

We had a campus tour, reviewed the syllabus for the term, then we opened our Christmas gifts of text books and cool goodies stored in our jewelry design tool box.  We even got a triangle ruler that you can only get from Austria!? Crazy, right? Then we watched a video on safety where "bodily fluids" was mentioned one too many times it started to make me feel uncomfortable to the point where I felt an urge to go make an appointment to see a gynecologist.

Today's experience solidified my decision in taking the step in changing my career.  Actually the moment I knew this school was a perfect fit for me was....(see image below). Last week, some friends and I went to Ikea to grab a few things since we all either moved into new rooms or moved in period.  We picked up this cool conventional white light desk lamp.  I thought, "I could use a cool 'Pixar-looking' lamp for my workstation in my room".  So in class today the instructor advised us to create our workstation at home and to get ourselves our own white light lamp as well over the weekend.  The work lamp on my workstation at school is exactly like the one I got at Ikea!  A light-bulb went off in my head (no pun intended). I am exactly where I am supposed to be!

"my at-home workstation"

FORSÃ… work lamp from Ikea

Sunday, September 5, 2010

Conversations

Fire Island, NY

What I've been living off of these past few weeks are the conversations with friends and loved one.

  • Great reads and why we couldn't put the book down
  • Why don't I have any blog posts for the year 2009?
  • Passion in creating ideas that we know will just work...gourmet cupcakes on wheels?
  • Why we should eat at "X" instead of "Z" and on a Tuesday instead of a Friday night
  • Why I've made it back here and when you'll be back there
  • Sharing similar fears, having the same gratitude, and totally embracing the present with hot coffee and great conversations...