Happy Halloween Freebie!

Happy Halloween everyone! In the spirit of this lovely holiday, I would like to share with you a delightful calendar for the month of November :) I'll be posting more calendars and other printable goodies soon and in the future, so keep checking back! Click the image below to download :)

Monday Mania!

Happy Monday, y'all! I don't know about you guys, but I've got quite a week ahead of me. It's going to be wild.

My best friend Rebecca visited this weekend! She lives in Tampa so I don't get to see her very often, but I really really really love her and it was seriously so awesome to see her.

Most of the reason this week is going to be busy is because of music. We just got our first ICCA song, "Settle Down," so I feel like a lot of this week will be spent working on that. I really love the arrangement. I printed out my music and listened to the MIDI a few times this morning and I think it's going to be awesome. I'm so glad we've got our ICCA music just about ready! I think it's going to make the process of preparation so much easier.

The rough draft of the Lois Lane arrangement is due on Friday. This means it has to be basically done - we have a rough draft due date simply so that we can all go through it and decide to tweak it here and there. I'm not so much worried about the deadline; I'm worried about having the inspiration and motivation to keep working! Lately I've been feeling a little "blah" when it comes to a cappella, and I just feel like I need something to spark the fire and I'll be okay. I finally got my new portable MIDI controllers (little mini keyboards so that I can arrange more easily in the library) working, so I definitely think that'll help the inspiration!

This song, "Reconcile" by ARORA, is also really sparking my creativity and passion again, as well. I think I'll be just fine.

This week I scored a great deal on this Daytimer Flavia planner. I've been wanting one of these ring-bound, leatherish, nice organizers for a while, so I'm really excited about it! I definitely love my planners, and I've been obsessing over it all weekend. All. Weekend. I'm insane.

I decided to make the cover page really sassy. Despite the "foul" language (which doesn't really offend me in anyway - I'm a badass bitch and you can't fuck with me) I think it's some pretty great inspiration. Also, it's the perfect size to let me slip my Moleskine planner inside so I can carry TWO PLANNERS IN ONE!

It's a planner inside a planner. I'm crazy. But I love it.

I'm using this organizer for a variety of random things. At the moment, I'm testing out some Daytimer Day-On-Two-Pages inserts for things like tasks/timing my tasks throughout the day, and also tracking my Weight Watchers points! As you all know, I love doodling in my planner, and I found myself often with a million different to-do lists in a million different places for any given day, so I figured trying a daily layout couldn't hurt. I just got a pack of the generic Daytimer, $6, three-months-of-daily inserts to try it out. No huge commitment yet, but I gotta say - I like it so far!

I took a ton of pictures of my mice this morning when I gave them a giant rice pop treat to share between the four of them, so I wanted to post some pictures. I also took video of them (which is adorable) because they are mice and never stop moving (as you can see from all of these lovely, high-quality, BLURRY PICTURES), but editing the video is turning out to be more annoying than planned and I just don't feel like dealing with it this morning, so I will be posting that video on another day! Until then, enjoy the following adorable pictures.

I gave my mice this really nice wooden tunnel house type thing when I moved them into the spare cage. Within a day they had chewed up half of it. I'm glad they enjoy chewing on it! Lawd knows mice need all the chews they can get. I guess I need to get them a plastic igloo soon.

This week I don't really have much school work to work on, but I have a lot of other things to do! I have to finish Lois Lane with my arranging partners, pay bills, work on some school stuff, learn a ton of new music for So Noted, and just generally attempt to stay sane. I'm back to work after about a week and a half off on Thursday, and I'm working during our Halloween event! I get to hand out candy to kids who are for some reason trick-or-treating at the mall. I think it'll be a fun day. And on Sunday, I get to work on my own for the first time! I am both extremely excited and terrified. But it'll be fine.

Thursday is Halloween and since I work that night and it's a Thursday, not much is happening, but on Friday, Ryan and his roommates are hosting a Halloween party! This year, I'm telling people that my costume is a secret agent. In reality, though, my costume is an excuse to wear my badass combat boots, utility belt, and new really attractive bustier (what?! I'm 20 and I've never had anything close to a "provocative" costume before... LET ME DO ME ALRIIIIIGHT?!). It works. I think I'm going to bake a ton of stuff for the party or something.

And of course, there's my planner! It already looks pretty full for the week. Life is hard.

Have a great week y'all!

Friday Five!

Happy Friday, y'all! It's a beautiful one here in Orlando - though a busy one! I got my first direct-deposit paycheck from the new job today and WOW I forgot how great it felt to get a paycheck! Especially since I've been working on setting up an effective budgeting system for myself all week... I'm just feeling great.

We'll get right to it! I have homework, my best friend Rebecca visiting, more homework, more homework, rehearsals, arranging, auditions, and a Halloween party to do this weekend (mostly today...) so this is gonna be quick. But don't worry - it's always good.

1. I recently started using a dual-monitor setup at my desk since I had a small television that was going unused in the apartment. I love it. This week, I decided to use a 2" binder as a laptop riser on my desk, and an old bluetooth iPad keyboard, and now I have the perfect workspace! I love it so much. The keyboard isn't very good, but it works, and it sure does look nice!

2. I switched the mouse friends into my spare cage this week! Their other one was just getting too smelly too fast, and I think this one has more space in general, so I decided to try it out. So far, it's not very smelly! But of course they're still throwing bedding everywhere, which makes it look really attractive. If anything, they are absolutely LOVING exploring this new space and climbing all over the place!

3. I recently started listening to an a cappella group's new album, Bioluminescence. It's perfect. I have nothing to say about it other than it's perfect and you should listen to it immediately. The a cappella group is called ARORA - formerly known as Sonos (yep, they were on the Sing-Off!). Above is one of the songs off of the album.

4. These past couple of days have been beautiful, weather-wise. It's finally getting cold! I know it won't last, but I'm enjoying it while it's here.

5. Last, but not least, my planner! It's been a week. I feel like I haven't gotten anything done even though I know I have. I also started experimenting with different doodles and borders and it's been really fun!

I saw this quote on the back of someone's car earlier this week and really loved it.

Anddddd that's it! Have a wonderful weekend, everyone!

Monday Mania!

This morning on my way to the library I saw Knightro on a scooter. I really like college.

Happy Monday, y'all :) I'm currently at the library planning for the week, working on music, and studying for some exams I have coming up. It's a busy week! But first, I wanna talk about my awesome weekend.

On Saturday, I attended a day of workshops, master classes, and performances presented by The Vocal Company called A Cappella Ed. As all a cappella events do, this event kicked ass. I attended workshops about recording, visual performance, and listening to music; So Noted had the honor of working on two of our songs with the Vocal Percussionist of Jaded and The Executive Board, Rachel Chalhoub.

Rachel Chalhoub (Sara Bareilles look-alike and new girl crush) and myself after our master class!

The master class was really awesome. Since Rachel is a vocal percussionist, she had a lot of stylistic advice for our music and she helped us bring out more expression in our two songs - simply by being more percussive. Master classes are always opportunities that you don't want to miss in collegiate a cappella. Not only do they bring in different opinions, but they can bring in advanced advice that they can back up with professional experience. We had a lot of fun and learned a lot from Rachel!

And then we wanted to sing ET for her, but we didn't have a vocal percussionist present at that moment for it. Amelia, our music director, asked Rachel if she'd like to try it. I handed her my music, and next thing you know...

A Cappella Ed inspired me a lot. There are so many aspects of a cappella groups that you don't think about until an event such as this, and I know that my group is now overflowing with ideas and excitement about a cappella. It was definitely a kind of renewal that we needed.

So Noted is starting to work on the above song, "I Can't Make You Love Me" by Bonnie Raitt (I posted the Bon Iver version because I just discovered it and I love it) mashed up with "Stay" by Rihanna. I'm really looking forward to working on it! The arrangement is really cool and it's going to be fun to perform. Other than that, So Noted is just trucking along with perfecting our music and preparing for SoJam and ICCA. Our ICCA arrangements are certainly coming along; I've been working on Lois Lane a lot and I think it's going to be pretty much finished within the week.

Did you know that UCF beat Louisville this weekend? And now we're in the BCS Top 25? I mean, you could say we're pretty excited around here. I know I am!

This is a cute little sloth.

This week is just going to be full of school school school music music music. I have a statistics exam on Wednesday, four sociology of deviance assignments due Sunday, and lots of music work wherever it'll fit this week. One good thing about this week is that I'm finally getting groceries! I've been a little lazy/broke lately and have basically only eaten granola bars and mall food for the past few weeks. My body is not happy with this abuse, and today I finally have a shopping list and coupons ready to get some real food in my apartment. It's gonna be awesome.

My planner for the week! It looks really boring right now. Oh well. My planner is getting pretty popular on the Planner Addicts Facebook page - it makes me feel special. They asked me to post a video tour of it! If I do, I'll post it here too. Because I know my two followers really wanna know. ;)

Anyway, I've gotta get to work! I will leave you with a wonderful two-person a cappella cover of "I Choose You" by Sara Bareilles.

Have an awesome week!

Friday Five

Hey y'all! I'm having an incredibly distracted morning. I've actually been at the library since 7:30am and I feel like I've gotten very little done. Pretty inconvenient. I'd be in the middle of one thing and then find myself getting distracted into doing a million other things. So naturally, I pulled out my box of Washi tape and put a task list in my planner, listed in the order in which they need to be completed. I go girl. I've spent the majority of the morning planning this post... which is strange, because usually I just pick my 5 subjects and any little points I might want to make (usually a very small list in my very small notebook), but today I got really detailed and now I'm working off of a detailed, color-coded outline of the pictures, videos, and subjects to be discussed in this post. So I'll just go ahead and apologize in advance: this post is probably going to be pretty long.

1. I feel like today's a great day for music, so I've dedicated #1 of the Friday Five to just that.

This is a video of a baby rocking out while watching Queen's Live At Wembley video. Watch it.

"Tom Sawyer" by Rush

I heard this in the car this morning and had a great time rocking out. Enjoy.

"Like to Love You" by Bean

I discovered this adorable song by Bean and fell in love pretty quickly.

I was finally able to get together with my little arranging group to start working on our arrangement of "Lois Lane" for our competition in January. The arrangement is coming along really well! I was even able to incorporate three measures of Queen's "Bohemian Rhapsody" into the Alto 1 line (something I am embarrassingly proud of). I'm really excited for it!

2. This week, I sold my iPad on eBay! I'm mildly excited. I'm strangely attached to my iPad, but since I bought my new computer last month, I haven't even touched it! I had it listed for a week, but did not get any bids until the last half hour. And that last half hour helped me sell my iPad for like $50 more than what I was going to get for it. I think I made some decent money off of it. I am going to miss it, though! I'm thinking maybe one day in a few years I'll get an iPad Mini or something, but for now, all is well. Especially since I am making money off of it. Because I am a little bit broke.

3. Speaking of broke, I think my life is in financial ruins.

Okay, that might be a little dramatic. But I really need to figure out a way to organize my finances... this whole growing up thing is taking its toll on me! I've been trying to figure out a way to organize/plan my money and spending, but I just can't figure something out that works for me. The problem is that I really can't get along with the idea of a budget. Budgets just seem so rigid - which may work for, say, a family with consistent schedules and incomes - and I need to figure something out that is as flexible as my life would require it to be. I can't ever see myself sticking to the idea of "okay, I'll spend this much on groceries, this much on fun stuff, this much on pets, and THAT'S IT." I'd rather just come up with an effective strategy for paying bills, paying debts, spending money, and saving money. I know that it'd be easiest if I could just prioritize my spending - that is: Rent/Utilities/Bills - Computer Payment - Food/Personal Care - Pets - and then have whatever's left over be for anything I choose. The problem is that bills are due on different days and paychecks come in on different days and me and my pets need things at variable times so it's difficult to plan.

Adulthood sucks. Don't do it.

4. I have recently become obsessed with Filofax. Filofax has a huge collection of beautiful personal organizers/planners, and if I had tons of money (which I don't - see above :)), I'd have bought like six hundred by now. I just love how pretty they are, they're ring-bound so I can customize the planner to be anything I want it to be, they're durable, etc. I think it'd be awesome to have one. Maybe one day.

Filofax Original

Filofax Malden

5. Here's my planner for the week! I didn't do much. I've been at the library every day doing a ton of homework and arranging, and I without notice decided to move into Ryan's house for the last three days just because my apartment is messy, I'm out of groceries, and I'm bored. College is cool sometimes.

And that's it! I'm singing on the Free Speech Lawn with So Noted in about half an hour, tonight we have rehearsal and we'll be attending the Gemini Blvd. and the Crescendudes (two other a cappella groups at UCF!) concert as well. Tomorrow morning is AcaEd, which is a day of a cappella workshops and master classes! Unfortunately I'll only be able to be there until 11am, as I work that afternoon until 9:30pm, but it should still be enjoyable.

Have a good weekend!

Monday Mania!

Happy Monday! I had such a busy weekend that I didn't even think about the upcoming week. Which is really against my norm.

But, hey - I worked 21 hours this weekend. At a job that I actually enjoy. So that rules.

I got a key to the mall Friday. I also got to walk around the mall passing out memos to every single store. There are a lot of stores. It was wild.

Yesterday, the power went out at the mall. It was both hilarious and miserable. Everyone was being really rude about it to guest services (as if we can magically fix whatever is causing the power to go out???? we are guest service representatives, NOT electricians) but we handled it like pros and it was a great customer service learning experience. Once the power was back on, the phone was ringing off the hook so I answered call after call after call after call. It was quite a day.

As for this week - I just know that today I'm getting lunch with my best friend while she's in town and I'm probably going to the library soon to do some homework! But that's it. Nothing interesting.

That's how my planner's looking! I literally have no idea what's going on. I guess I should get around to figuring that out. Hehehehehehe.

There's a mouse on a scooter to start your week off. Have a great day!

Coupon Binder For One!

I'm about to look like a huge nerd. I am going to try really hard not to care.

I kept telling myself I didn't need one. But the pile kept growing and the search for what I needed got longer and longer every time I went to the grocery store.

It soon became apparent that I needed a coupon binder.

My binder! And my overflowing desk trash can, because I am a college student and sometimes if the trash doesn't smell, it doesn't get taken out. In my defense the only thing in that trash can is paper anyway... hehe

This binder has become a life (and money) saver for me over the past few months and I'm going to give you a general overview of how mine works!

Supplies needed for a kick-ass coupon binder:

• Large, durable binder (mine is a 1.5" Target knockoff of the Avery Durable binders, but I know that I need a 2" or bigger very soon)
• Pencil pouch
• Sheet protectors
• Binder Pockets
• Dividers
• Trading card pages
• A lot of time on your hands
• The desire to not spend a ton of money on things you buy often

I got tired of cutting out every single coupon that I printed out in addition to coupons in ads/other places so I started numbering them and hole-punching them to be cut out and used as needed!

Let's start with the life cycle of a coupon in my possession:

1. I receive the coupon (Sunday newspaper, printing it out, stealing from my boyfriend's copy of the Spanish Saturday paper that he for some reason receives)
2. The coupon goes in the "inbox" file holder that I have hanging above my desk (I am a 30-year-old business man crossed with a 30-year-old professional homemaker stuck in a 20-year-old psychology major's body)
3. I work up the motivation to take it out of the inbox file.
4. The coupon is entered into my spreadsheet (more on that in another post... I'm still trying to get that damn spreadsheet up to date!) and either clipped or hole-punched (if it's hole-punched, it gets a page number).
5. If the coupon is clipped, I fold it up and stick it into the right section in my binder. If it's punched and numbered, I'll stick it in the front of my binder, in the right place for its page number.
6. I work up the energy to look through weekly ads and decide which coupons and sales correspond with items I need or will need in the very near future.
7. The coupon is taken out of its home in my binder and moved to its correct section in my small 4"x6" expanding file, along with a shopping list, which is thrown into my purse.
8. I begrudgingly hand over the coupon to the cashier and save a lot of money on things.

When you first open my binder, this is what you'll see. In the pockets on the left are usually just a couple of coupons/ads that need to be sorted. These are usually "special" or different from the others in a way... for some reason I felt the need to keep these separate, so, that's what's happening.

On the right is a pencil pouch, with scissors, a highlighter, and a pen. I usually only use the things in here when I'm planning for a shopping trip or stealing coupons at Ryan's house. I hope I never have to use these things to clip a coupon in the middle of a store. I'd sooner leave my cart, go out to my car, clip the coupon, and go back in.

Behind the pencil pouch is a clear binder pocket which is pretty much only used for coupons that have already been cut out and need to be put in their section. Usually these are coupons that I took out with me and didn't get a chance to put back in the binder yet.

Behind the clear pouch starts my coupon pages! I used to clip every single coupon that ever came my way, but this week when I started working on my spreadsheet, I decided I'd only clip the printed coupons as I needed them. What I do now is number the pages, enter them into my spreadsheet (including the page number), and just hole-punch them so they can be inserted directly into the binder.

After the coupon pages is a screen protector holding some inserts from the Sunday paper. I just write the date on the front cover of the inserts and put them in here. Once I put the coupons in each insert into the spreadsheet, I will clip out the coupons that I KNOW will be useful, and put the rest of the insert into a screen protector and leave it there.

My categorized sections begin after the newspaper inserts! Each section starts with a divider - it turns out I need bigger dividers. But that hasn't really bothered me, and I've pretty much memorized the layout of my binder, so it works for me.

The dividers are labeled to correspond with their respective categories. Innovative, right?

To make myself feel better about the fact that I have a coupon binder, I made a "cover" page for each section. They are pretty and I love them.

The reason I started this blog is because I was interested in things like keeping an organized home and saving money on groceries and other necessities by using coupons, but I didn't need those things for an entire family - just me - and it's impossible to find resources on the internet for things like this for a person like me. So, that's where my categories come in. A lot of coupon binder tutorials you'll find online include super-specific sections that are helpful for families with young children and varying needs, but I'm a single college student and honestly, I only really need one "cleaning" section rather than "bathroom cleaning," "kitchen cleaning," "cleaning for the neighbors," "cleaning at my son's elementary school," etc.

However, I took cues from all of those super specific posts and came up with these less-specific categories that have worked well for me:

• Food
• Pretty self-explanatory; since I tend to only eat the same specific foods for the most part, I try to only print/clip/save coupons for food and drinks that I know I'd actually ever buy. I also save coupons for things that I might buy if I can get a great deal on - usually treats, like cookies or candy. I am trying to get healthy, but I also do really love Oreos. And I thoroughly believe in the treat yoself philosophy. This category also holds my prized printable "$9 off a handle of Jägermeister" coupon. It expires a few months before 21, but, ya know. I have older friends. I'm sure they'd appreciate it. (And I mean it's kind of a life goal of mine to have a Jäger bomb with my father)
• Health & Beauty
• This is generally where products that you'd find in my medicine cabinet or under my bathroom sink go, and probably the category where coupons have saved me the most money as well! Shampoo, conditioner, face wash, body wash, deodorant, razors, etc.
• Medical
• This one's really simple. Medicine, vitamins, first aid. That's it. This section is generally pretty small, but also very helpful.
• Cleaning
• There is where you will find all things cleaning! I've saved a lot of money in this part, too, because there's ALWAYS a sale and there are ALWAYS coupons. If it has to do with cleaning, it's here. Exception: Paper towels. Those go in the next section.
• Home
• Household goods! Things like lightbulbs (one of my most cherished couponing moments is when I got enough CFL lightbulbs to change out all the lightbulbs in my bedroom, my dining room, and my living room [and still have two packs to spare] for $5), paper towels, toilet paper, batteries, Zip-Loc bags, air freshener, laundry detergent, etc. It's all in here. I find that I use this section a lot less than I'd like to, but when I do, it's soooooo worth it.
• Office
• Thanks to my addiction to planners and office supplies, this section is really great. Unfortunately, however, office supplies are expensive and so this is one of my smallest sections. But around back-to-school time, I was able to get $2 off a pack of my favorite pens (which are generally like $6 for a pack of three, which is heartbreakingly expensive) a few times, so anytime I see a coupon for office supplies I put it here. Pens, paper, notebooks, binders, printer ink, etc. will be found in this section.
• Pets
• I created this section hoping that there would be more pet coupons out there, but there really aren't. Luckily, caring for four mice and two rats is not very expensive, and I have come across coupons here and there. Currently I just have a coupon for bedding and a coupon for food in there.
• Miscellaneous
• If it didn't fit elsewhere, it goes here. This section is usually very small, because my categories pretty much cover everything I need. This is where I put coupons like "15% off your entire purchase" from stores like Kohl's, Joann's, Michael's, etc. The only exception is if they expire soon after I get them or they're from a restaurant - I usually just pin those to my cork board or keep them in my wallet so that I don't forget them if I happen to need one.

Within each category, you'll find sheets of trading card pages. I just fold up the coupons so that I can see the savings and the product and slip them in. I like that I can just glance at the page and locate a coupon, and that each trading card page can contain up to 18 coupons.

Behind all of my categories is where I keep printouts of the digital coupons I have. Publix does a program where you select coupons online and then enter your phone number at checkout to apply them - I use these printouts to see which coupons I've added to my digital coupon bank. Sometimes I circle ones that I know I'll use on an upcoming trip, so that I remember not to use a printed coupon for it, as these are manufacturer's coupons.

Finally, in the back pocket of my binder, there is a little envelope that says "Ryan" on it. One of the main points in my intro to coupons was "don't be greedy," and I don't know if I can say that enough! If I come across a coupon for something Ryan uses, I'll stick it in this envelope. I give him the collection every once in a while with a quick run-down of what's in it. I have no clue if he actually uses them, but what am I gonna do with $2 off men's deodorant anyway? If I come across coupons that other friends might find useful, I'll just give them the coupons. Sometimes my roommate finds coupons on the fridge for things she can use for her pup, and I know those come in handy!

ANDDDDDDDD THAT'S IT for my coupon binder. I genuinely love this thing. It has helped me so much, and I hope that sharing it helps others, too!

Linked up @ A Bowl Full of Lemons!

Friday Five!

Good morning lovelies! I'm exhausted. It seems that this week has just FLOWN by. I'm scheduled to work a total of 21 hours over the next three days (starting today) and it feels like there actually hasn't been four days between my last day of work and today.

My favorite motivational tea cup.

1. I spent the entire week stressing out about finishing all of my homework before the weekend, including 16 hours at the library over two days, only to get to my statistics lab yesterday and find out that I'm a chapter ahead of the class and to log onto my statistics homework website and find that HE EXTENDED THE DUE DATES FOR EVERYTHING BY LIKE A WEEK. I mean, I don't mind being ahead, but this man is constantly changing due dates, and situations like this happen every other week. It's a little annoying. Maybe the week would've felt a little less obnoxious if I knew he was going to change the due dates beforehand.

2. Lorde is a singer/songwriter from New Zealand. All summer, I was jamming to her first single, Royals, and the EP she had released it on. Well, this week, I made the genius decision to buy her new album (released on September 27). I'm obsessed. One thing I really love about it is that, in her songs, she so perfectly captures the essence of youth and growing up. Even though she's only sixteen (born in November of 1996 - she's younger than my little brother! ...which creeps me out a little but I love it), the music on this album is so relatable to anyone who's "growing up." The song above, "Ribs," has the following ever-relatable lyrics: this dream isn't feeling sweet / we're reeling through the midnight streets / and I've never felt more alone / it feels so scary getting old. Like I said, she's only sixteen - so I'm really looking out with what she comes out with over the next few years.

Van's Whole Foods Waffles

3. Every day on my to-do list this week has been "groceries." I have yet to make it to the grocery store. A couple of weeks ago I bought a couple of boxes of these whole foods toaster waffles on a BOGO deal and that's pretty much all I've eaten this week. Someone take me to Publix! Please.

4. So Noted Things: We started working on "I Choose You" this week, and it's proven to be more difficult than we originally thought! The song itself (and the arrangement) has a ton of syncopated/otherwise weird rhythms, but we're getting it, and it's sounding good. I'm really excited to hear it come together! Also, I started working on a rough arrangement of "Lois Lane" for our ICCA set. I didn't want to get too into it since I'm working with two other lovely ladies on it, but I think it's going to be fun!

Here's a picture of one of my rats being a cute creep this morning.

5. And last, but not least, a picture of my planner below. It was somehow a busy, stressful week, and therefore, there is a lot of doodling.

That's it for this week! Coupon binder post will be coming up this Sunday. Get excited!

Have an awesome weekend!