New Look!

Since it's almost Valentine's Day, I figured I would change up my blog to fit the holiday. Hope you like it! Happy Valentine's Day! (Should be putting up another actual post soon so keep an eye out for it!)

Draig Battlehorn

I spent almost the entire day yesterday working on this drawing, and I think it turned out pretty well! It was done in charcoal (which is SO fun to use, btw!), and it was done for a Design A Dragon contest. I had to draw or describe a dragon I designed, and give him a personality (with favorite food, sleeping place, and an intense fear). Hopefully I will win, because I get a sweet dragon prize pack if I do, and you all know how much I love dragons...lol Anyway, this was my entry! :)

Hello apprentices! My name is Christina Strang, dragon expert, and this (*indicates photo*) is Draig Battlehorn, the most irritable and arrogant dragon in all the land. He is often seen circling the mouth of the fiery volcano he lives in, lounging on nearby rocks as his slaves shine his scales, or napping on the very highest point of his volcanic home. His eyes glow the color of molten lava, and his flaming red scales are so smooth and shiny, it appears as if he doesn't have any scales at all. The only way to distinguish one scale from another is if you are in very close quarters, and if you are that close to this angry dragon, you are probably not going to live to tell the tale. When Draig leaves his lair, a path of destruction and death is left in his wake. There is a rumor going around that the only way to escape this evil dragon is to claim that you see a scale that has lost its shine. He will be so distracted trying to find the dull scale, you will have a chance to escape. You see, an old witch looked into the future and told him that she saw he would die if any of his scales ever became dull, so he is deathly afraid of the vision coming true. If one should ever need to seek his aid, heaven forbid, bringing him his favorite treat (salamanders burnt to a crisp) might buy you some time to pose your question. I hope you never cross paths with this vile creature, but at least now you know how best to attempt to escape with your life if you ever do run into him.

$500 Shopping Spree = AWESOME :D

My husband and I got a phone call the other day, from which we learned that we were the winners of this drawing that we had entered in forever ago. We won a $500 gift certificate to a pawn shop! Unfortunately, we had to travel to Roy, Utah to get to the nearest of that particular store, but it worked out great! I had imagined the store to be a little bigger and have more things in it, but it was actually pretty small and didn't have exactly what I thought it would have. However, it was still a pretty nice store, and they did have a lot of awesome stuff in there for pretty reasonable prices. This is what we ended up getting:

An X-Box 360 Elite (with a second controller that they gave us for free)
A Nintendo Wii (with two controllers plus a nunchuk too)
A Nook
All Six Episodes of Star Wars (and for only 15 bucks too!)
Transformers 1 & 2 (also for only 15 bucks!)
And A Whole Bunch Of Games
               -Bully Scholarship Edition (Wii)
               -Borderlands (PS3)
               -UFC Undisputed 2010 (PS3)
               -The Elder Scrolls: Oblivion (X-Box 360)
               -Call of Duty 3 (X-Box 360)
               -Two Worlds (X-Box 360)
               -NHL 2K6 (X-Box 360)
               -Fable II (X-Box 360)

We ended up getting a lot of stuff, and we didn't even have to pay for it! On top of all that, we also found a disc still in the X-Box 360's tray (NCAA Footbal 12, which is like a $60 game!), and ANOTHER disc in the Wii (Madden NFL 10)! Getting that certificate was like Christmas all over again, only we didn't end up broke afterwards! All-in-all, a pretty awesome day, I would say! Amid all this chaos and stress that is our life, we were blessed with this amazing gift, and I'm so thankful for it! You never know when something like this will happen to you. ;)

Weekly Goals #11: The Goals

Hello, Readers! *waves*
Okay, so last time's goals were kind of a flop, and this week is Christmas so it's gonna be a little crazy, so I'm going to set some easier goals and try to get them done if I have the time.
1. Get Christmas shopping done! I haven't even really started on it yet! We are kind of waiting for a check to come so we can go do it. So, if the check does come, then we can get it all done, but if not, we can at least buy some little cheap things until it does come if we need to. Either way, we need to get it done!
2. Get things ready for Christmas! We need to figure out what we are doing and get all of the stuff we need ready to go! We only have one week left! :)
3. Send those two missionary letters! I really REALLY need to send them! So, I'll write them today, and get them sent out tomorrow so they might have a chance of making it to them before Christmas. If not, at least it will be soon after.
And that's all I'm gonna do this week! I would like to get some writing done as well, but I'm not going to set that as a goal, since I'm not sure how much time I will really have this week, and I kind of want to relax and enjoy the holiday. Well, hope everyone has a very Merry Christmas and gets everything they want! I'll probably post a Christmas post on Christmas Eve or on Christmas Day. Somewhere around there. Have a great week! :)

Weekly Goals #10: Wrap-up

Yes, I know, this is a week delayed! I got so busy with other things I just didn't even have the time to post last week, so I decided to just wait another week and take a week off of the goals. Well, I pretty much took both weeks off actually...I kinda failed at the goal thing this week lol Pretty much the only goal I did was the Christmas Cookies when my friend came down to visit. I didn't even look for my piano books or write the missionary letters. *guilty* I did write a little on my story, but I've been in kind of a lazy funk lately and haven't really wanted to do much on it. I did, however, make my mom's Christmas present. I'll post pics after I get some taken, it's so cute! I also have been reading my book this week, and I got a new game so I've been playing that. How could I resist a How to Train Your Dragon game? It was supposed to be for Christmas, but I couldn't wait so I got it early lol I bought Matt an Orson Scott Card book that he hadn't read yet, and let him have it early too since I got one early. He loves it. haha Anyway, back to business. So I didn't do so well on the goals this week, and this next week's Christmas, so I might not get much done then either, but I'll set a couple of easier goals and try to find time for them.

Weekly Goals #10: The Goals

Woot! Into double digits! The big 1-0! I'm getting a late start on this week, so I made some goals that I could accomplish in the time that I have. :)

1. Write 4,000 words. Pretty simple. I need to keep myself writing, and hopefully will do more than that, but since I only have part of the week left, and I'm having a friend come for a couple of days this week, I will probably be a little distracted. So I'll set my goal there and see how it plays out.
2. We finally tore everything out of the closet last week and reorganized it all, and I didn't see my piano books anywhere back there! :( So, this week, I need to search the rest of the apartment and try to find my books. I'll make it my second goal this week to at least search for my books, and hopefully I will find them! I really need/miss them!
3. Write/Send off two missionary letters to my friends Elder Scott Crowther and Sister Shantel Tavoian. I need to get myself to keep up on writing them, because I know how much letters mean to them, especially when they don't receive many others!
4. I'll also add one more goal this week because it should be happening while my friend is here anyway: Bake/Decorate Christmas Cookies! It was always tradition in our house to make and decorate cookies every year during the Christmas season, and I want to keep it up! So, while my friend is here, we are going to do it together, since Matt is a bum and doesn't want to help me :P lol. I'll post pics with the wrap-up.
Also, Sunday is my birthday! We probably won't have much money to even do anything for it or even really get me anything else, but I already got a bunch of books and I don't mind just spending it at home relaxing with my husband. Not sure if I want to invite a few of our friends over to watch a movie or something that night or not, but maybe I'll post an extra post Sunday with how it goes. Alright, those are the goals! Wish me luck! And make sure you are starting/keeping up on your own goals! They are so important! ;)

Weekly Goals #9: Wrap-up

Week 9's results!
 1. The first goal was to write 8,000 words, but I didn't quite hit that I don't think. I can't remember the exact number of words that I had before I started writing this week...Should probably keep better track of that...Oh well lol I think I wrote around 5 or 6 thousand this week though, so not bad all in all. It seems like it's moving so much slower lately! I write on it like all day and I end up getting like two pages done instead of the 10 I was getting before. I think it's because it's taking more research time and careful calculations now. It's turning into an awesome story! :)
2. My second goal was to write in my journal every night! And I actually did all but like two nights! I need to really force myself to sit down and do it because I want my kids to be able to have my journal to read in the future once I've passed.
3. The last goal was to get some reading done in preparation for all the books coming to me in the mail. I finished the book I was reading, Brandon Mull's Beyonders (which was really good btw!), and started on Tiger's Voyage by Colleen Houck (loving it so far!). I received all but one of my books that I ordered, so I've been just swimming in awesome books! :)
Well, all in all, a pretty successful week, I'd say! I know I'm really late posting these this week, so I'll quickly get up next week's goals and get going on them ASAP!