The Honest Truth

I know this isn't something that blogger's usually post about, but this is my blog, and I'm going to post how I'm feeling. No matter what the outcome is. I've been battling depression for a while now. 

Actually since I was a child. My mom was never around, she worked three jobs, and I had to take care of my brother and sister. On top of that, she dated all the time. And I felt like she never actually cared about me because all she cared about was the man she was dating. I use to literally beat myself in the head with a bookshelf, of some type of heavy object and leave bruises on my face and body so that she would notice me.

Then it went away for a while. But came back after I got married and then 3 months later found out that my husband was cheating on me with a girl that I worked with everyday. I mentally broke down. I cried in the closet. I started smoking. I started feeling like my 8 month old daughter at the time was the only person in the world that I had. I didn’t even want her to be near him. But I sucked in my pride, forgave him for our family and just hid behind a lie ever since.

Then I tried to move on from that. I went up to where I grew up. Met someone, and only had more heartbreak. I’ve gone so far out of my way to try to make people feel like I care about them. I buy them things. I make them things. I cook them things. I drive over an hour out of my way just to surprise them with Sonic since they were craving that all weekend. And my living situation while I’ve been here hasn’t been good either. Cops have been called, arguments have been had. And I’ve left in the middle of the night to try and protect my daughter.

Sigh. I just…I just want people to realize that everything is not always okay. People see me and they automatically think that I’m happy all the time because I’m smiling. I’m a small, bubbly person who apparently always looks happy. But all of these demons just keep growing inside of me. Sometimes I feel like I don’t know what to do. But then I look at the little two year old who tries to get into my makeup, and jumps and dances on my bed. Then I realize, it doesn’t matter how depressed I am all the time, because that little girl needs her mom, and she’s worth everything in this world. I’d do anything for her, including smile. 

Hair-istory

After High School Graduation '09 --Natural hair highlights

I saw this post by Scribbles of Valerie and I was inspired to do my very own post of my hair history! And this is going to be adventurous for me, considering I change my hair all zee time. But I figured I'd give it a shot! And also try to spread it out a little bit. 

Three Months after Madalyn was born- October 2010

 After Madalyn was born, I cut my hair to a medium length and died it darker, just because it was Fall. I tend to do that…a lot. I have naturally dark eyebrows {darker than my natural hair color} so the dark hair colors often looks good on me.

Winter of 2011

 After Madalyn got a little bit bigger, I let my hair grow out. I found this was easier since she wasn't constantly pulling on it. I love my long locks. I just prefer long hair to short. And this was when I was sporting messing bangs. What can I say, Lea Michele's look from Glee got to me. It still looks cute!

Summer of 2012

First time I ombre'd my hair. I actually have a DIY post here. I did like it, but eventually I got a little tired of how it just went from brown to blonde and didn't have a lot of fade to it. So I dyed my hair to a red-ish color. 

Fall of 2012

Then after the red set it, I thought it would be a great idea to ombre it again. And after I did, I completely fell in love with it!!

Winter 2012

Then after the blonde tips started to dry my hair out really bad, I cut off the dead ends and stayed a short reddish color for a little bit before completely doing something new. One day I went to the hair salon and decided to get a lot of blonde highlights in my hair. 

Summer 2013

I have a lot of low lights and highlights and I'm a lot more "blonde" than I've ever been before. Plus my hair naturally lightens in the sun, so it just keeps getting lighter and lighter. I have got to say, I love being blondish, haha. 

How much has your hair changed in the past couple years?! I'm anxious to know! 

Baby Fever

Hi everyone. My name's Brittany, and I have Baby Fever.

You know that moment when you find yourself looking at your child and thinking, "When did you get so big?!" Every day I find myself doing that more and more. With my two year old turning three in the next 7 weeks and my party planning mind going crazy, I realized I miss her being a little itty bitty baby. So of course, what do I do? I start looking through old pictures, and videos, and I become baby crazy!

First of all, everyone should know {and judge} that I have a baby name list on my phone. Yes people. A whole note in my notepad dedicated to just baby names. Am I pregnant? No. Do I plan on getting pregnant soon? No. Am I just plain weird…well to that I say, uh, yes.

I mean, seriously, look a this video from Madalyn was a baby and tell me that she's not flippin' adorable! I mean, not to brag or anything but she has some pretty great genes. ;) 

Anything and everything that has to do with babies I…LOVE LOVE LOVE. I can't help it!! I adore them! The mommy in me just wants more! Have you ever had Baby Fever?!

Decor Inspiration: Madalyn's Room.

Since I'm moving pretty soon, my mind has been going c r a z y with decoration ideas! And of course, where is the first place I go? ETSY. One room I'm particularly excited to decorate is Madalyn's room. She hasn't had her own bedroom since we moved out of my apartment about a year ago. So I'm eager for her to have her own space again. (seriously, can not flippin' wait!)

So as I'm skimming Etsy, I favorite everything that I think would look amazing for the idea I have for her room.  And I, of course, have a Pinterest board dedicated to just her room. {i get a bit obsessive} So here are some images and links of some of the things that I've found!

SnowWhite Book Bunting by HomemadeHousewives 

Plush Deer by WonderForest

Wallpaper found on Houzz

Wallart by The Fox and The Teacup

Cute little DIY by Moryma.typepad.com

I'm definitely excited to see what else I can find, and even making my own little DIY deer for her room like the one pictured above. I'm thinking about using yellow patterned and light floral scrap paper or maybe even fabric to make it a bit more quality and also match her room. 

What do you guys think of the little inspiration board I started? Or do you know of any other good products out there that you think would be good for her room?! Let me know!! I'm open to anything. :D 

New Cards for sale on Etsy!

I'm so excited to introduce some of the new cards I've been working on!! They're now up for sale on my Etsy: DeraeArt. We've got some new (and funny) homemade greeting cards for multiple occasions. From pregnancy cards, I love you cards, and summer cards!! Here's a preview of some of them, go check the rest out!!

 Let me know what you think of them!! Or anything else that you'd like to see. And just to let you know, we have NEW PRODUCTS ON THE WAY! I can't wait to show some of them to you. :D

Recreation.

Aside from spending time with my family, the one thing I wanted to do while I was in Florida was recreate a photograph that I found at my Great-Grandmother's house. As I was looking through her photo albums, I found an old picture of the Disney entry gate. Like most tourists, the Walt Disney World Entry Gate is the first picture of the vacation. After I saw the vintage 60s-70s coloring of it, I knew I had to recreate it! I adored the way the color went with the style of the gate, and the clouds in the background. 

Luckily when I drove through the gate on my Vacation, the clouds were big and puffy (because a little Florida shower was on the way) and the gate was looking beautiful as usual. I'm so happy with the photograph I produced, and the way I colored it to kind of match the style of the photo she had. One major goal for me is to start printing out all my photos that I take and put them into picture books, or albums. I did this forever ago, and kind of lost track of it once just "putting photos on Facebook" became a huge thing. The last time I got pictures developed is when Madalyn turned one (She's almost three now). So yeah, I need to start doing that again. Hopefully one day soon I'll start on that project! Let's hope I remember! 

Florida Vacation: Day One

HELLO DOLLS!

I've been away on a holiday for the past week. I've been visiting my parents in the good ol' Sunshine State. FLORIDA. And boy, was it amazing. Ever since I've moved back up to Maryland, I've missed Florida so much. I miss the high speed limits, the non-crazy drivers, the atmosphere and most of all…the beach! As I uploaded all my photos from my week long trip, I've realized there was no way possible that I could fit all the pictures I wanted to share in one post. So for the next couple days I'm going to be sharing some experiences I've had when I was down there. (And there were a good many). One of which is when I (finally) ate at the British Pub I've been wanting to eat at for the past 6 years!

Anyway, here's an overview in pictures of the day I spent with Derek, Madalyn and my brother, Marty in Downtown Historic Saint Augustine. I love how old and unique everything is down there. And when I lived there, I didn't really appreciate it. But (as you can probably tell by the pictures), that changed a bit.

Fried Gator Tail…. Mmmmmmmm, yummy. ;)

Sunshine State

For the next week or so, I will be in Florida visiting my family. So my posts won't be so up to date, every day. But thus far! It's been amazing. I love spending time with my family that I haven't seen in a while, and plus my little sister turns 19 today. (She's not so little anymore, which just makes me feel old) 

To kick start vacation, my family and I went to the pool and just had a good old time. And afterwords we went to one of my favorite restaurants in Jax Beach called TacoLu. TacoLu is a sugar skull themed Mexican restaurant, and it's just simply amazing. The atmosphere is so relaxed and inviting. Plus the food is cheap and flipping amazing!! 

The decor in TacoLu definitely inspired me for some home decor ideas as well. I'm so excited to be spending the rest of my time here in Florida and sharing it with you guys. I will also be pigging out a lot so...expect to see more food. ;) 

Cupcakes and Mason Jars.

So as we were preparing for our fourth of July get together, I got a bit crafty. It's just in my blood, I can't help it! As Madalyn watched cartoons, Derek made sandwiches and homemade iced tea, I made the cupcakes and mason jars. The cupcakes were (of course) Red, White and Blue. Making multicolored cupcakes are really easy and simple to do. All you have to do is mix the batter as stated on the box, then separate it into separate bowls, add food coloring and then mix the colors when you put it in the cupcake tin. Granite it's extra work, but it makes for extra cute cupcakes!!

As those were baking, I started making a Mason Jar for all of my friends that were coming with us. It was Derek's idea to put their xbox gamer tag on their mason jars, and they loved it, haha. Here's all you have to do to make custom Mason Jars for any occasion. 

1. Get Mason Jars. I got mine from Michaels and Walmart. If you're buying a lot, I suggest going to Walmart. I got 12 jars for 8 bucks. At Michaels it's a dollar and some change for one, so you'll be saving money.

2. Buy Glass Paint. I got Martha Stewart paints. These were three dollars for one, so it was a bit pricey. But I wanted to make sure that they were washable and weren't going to peal off.

3. Start decorating! Derek wrote some of the names (except for mine…cause I'm greedy) and I decorated them. I like to do something different for each person, and be a bit creative. Luckily they loved them!

4. Bake them! If you don't want to bake them, it takes 21 days for them to air dry completely. So I suggest popping them in a completely cool oven, and then letting bake for 30 minutes in a 350 degree oven. Pull them out and let them cool before touching-- glass is hot my friends.

After they're baked and cool, you can dish wash them and everything! Happy crafting!