It took a month longer than I anticipated but I finally finished up my redesign for iCupcake. For the past few months I've been a little more obsessed with baking & cupcakes than I usually am. So much so that majority of the blogs I had been reading were baking/cupcake centralized, which of course would lead to bakery websites and cupcakery. It only seemed fitting to bring that atmosphere to my blog--to make it not only something that fits the domain name but also what I enjoy.
Since this is my first post for the New Year, I decided that maybe I would make some goals for myself versus worrying about New Year's Resolutions. I've never really made resolutions in the past and I surely never stuck with any. Goals seem more realistic and achievable so figured I'd stick with that.
- Increase my Xbox gamerscore. I'm sitting at 8405 right now and want to hit 10,000 before February starts. I frequently stick to specific games solely for multiplayer so this will be a nice challenge for me. I've got a few games to play right now that I took from Steve's which include Battlefield: Bad Company, Operation Flashpoint: Dragon Rising and a few other games that I just need to get 100% completion for achievements (Modern Warfare 2, COD4, COD:WaW to name a few.) Once I hit 10,000 then I'll just keep increasing. I've got awhile before I can catch up to Steve and his massive 104,000+ gamerscore.
- Bake more & photograph it. I've been stockpiling up numerous recipes for different sweets and treats but have yet to really go through any of them yet. A few weeks ago I purchased a good amount of material for making some cakepops as well as cupcake bites. I have only gotten around to making the cupcake bites so far. So I don't gain weight or make my little sister fall into a food coma, I also bought supplies to package these up. I plan on letting my mom bring some to work to offer up and hopefully, strike up some business through this. It's something new and enjoying, so I'm taking advantage of it.
- Taking longer breaks from the computer & gaming to catch up on all of the books sitting on my shelf. I have about 10+ Dean Koontz books that have not yet been read along with a few other authors. I just haven't been reading much at all the last year and really do miss laying around with a good book. So I want to read on book a week. This is a very feasible goal because I'm a fast reader. I read through the last Harry Potter book in ~6 hours so books that are 1/3 the size should be no problem.
- Relaunch an old project of mine so I can add extra monthly income. I started it back in 2007 and made a good amount of money for the three months I had been active with it. Since then I just let it die off. In the year and a half since then, I have definitely lost out on a lot of potential clients and money by abandoning it. Hopefully by mid-February I can have it relaunched to start selling on it again.
So rather then set goals for the entire year I figured I would just do something that would be completed within the next couple of months. Once those goals are done I can either mark them off as "finished" or "upgrade" them to make them more challenging for myself. Nothing is better then earning money, playing videogames and enjoying yourself rather than stressing out.
On a last note, if you spot any 404s, spelling mistakes, or other coding issues definitely let me know. I've been staring at this for quite some time so I may have overlooked something very minute. :) Also for those of you using >IE7, I haven't yet made it "backwards-compatible," so while it will work fine for you.. I haven't gotten around to adjusting the rgba to rgb so that it will render the colors for you. I'll get to it soon.
It's been awhile since I made myself my own little Christmas wishlist but there are a few items I have been lusting over for quite some time. This isn't my actual Christmas wishlist to anyone but myself. I try to refrain from asking for big ticket items from my parents as I feel that I should pay for them versus making them buy it for me. I think my last big gift from them was back in 2004 when I was surprised with my own desktop versus having to share the family computer.
Drobo S by Data Robotics - $899
I have had my eye on the Drobo S for quite some time now. I regularly backup to an external Seagate backup drive but it's down to 50GB now, so I've started to backup to a Western Digital 500GB SATA drive that I've got in one of my bay drives in my desktop. While this is feasible, I prefer to backup to an external device that I can easily upgrade to without having to spend more money. Granted, this is an $800 backup solution but given how invaluable the data is that I'm storing it's not a concern for me.
The biggest advantage is being able to toss in any SATA drive into the 5-bay network storage. This version also includes eSATA for connectivity so I wouldn't need to rely on crappy USB 2.0 speeds or fireware (although it still is an option.) No installation required! All I have to do is pop in a drive and I'm done. I don't need to setup any kind of RAID config, format, screws or anything. The Drobo will do it all for me. My other favorite features are the glowing status lights which when more space is available more blue lights are available, the less space there is the less blue lights you'll see and when near full they'll be red. But the best feature is that it is self-healing. If it sees that there is a disk failing, it will automatically start pushing the data to the other remaining disks so you don't lose that data on a disk crash. Perfect redundancy ftw!
X-Files: The Complete Collectors Edition - $175.99
I have been an X-Files fan since the show first aired back in 1993. I remember being so excited for Friday nights to eat Chinese food and watch the X-Files and be completely creeped out by some of the episodes. Heck, some of them are still pretty creepy when I watch them over 10 years later. I used to own seasons 1-4 to grow my collection of them but unfortunately an old roommate of mine had stolen them. I lucked out with these because I bought them for $75 for all four seasons from a discount I had when working at Best Buy. Since then I've yet to replace them or buy physical copies. I have watched them online on streaming websites but it's not the same. This is probably the only physical form of entertainment that I want to own. I need to have this on display AND so I can watch it at anytime without lag or loss of quality. I love me some Duchovney!
Tilt-Head Stand Mixer - Kitchenaid - $399
Here's the domestic in me coming out! The stand mixer I used that belonged to my mom bit the dust a few years ago when the neck snapped so if I use it, I have to stand there and hold it. So I usually resort to getting a large tupperware bowl out along with a handheld mixer and use that when I have recipes that require intense mixing. It's annoying since I have to turn the bowl, hold the mixer and also use a spatula to feed it towards the mixer when it gets spun to the outside of the bowl. I have been dying for a stand mixer for awhile and red happens to be my favorite color. I'm not partial to any stand but this one I loved because you can use attachments with it for putting out pasta, and who knows what other apparatus' to do whatever you need. Now I don't need to hold off on a recipe because I don't have the right tools.
The world's cutest pug
Anyone that knows me knows I have two obsessions: Pugs and Cupcakes. The biggest being with pugs. When I was in the hospital a lot of my little get well items were pug related like "Pugs and Kisses, Get Well!", my life-like 2 foot Pug that sits in my room, a Pug statue, a Pug beanie and more. I've also got pug thank-you cards I found on Etsy, pug stationary, and pug address labels. I've also get a few Pug calendars that I've saved so I can frame them into a little wall display for shiggles. A pug is the one thing I have wanted for years now and will always want a pug until I have one. I love the fawn breeds and would prefer a male puggy versus female.
I've been partially joking and teasing when I ask Steve to get me a pug for Christmas but in reality I know that's not going to happen. I drop my parents hints every chance I get; When I see a grocery list laying around I'll add in "Pug and pug toys" in either of their handwriting to make it look more realistic ;). When I was in the hospital my mom was seemingly serious about getting me a pug around the time I started walking but I've yet to even really see any sort of notion that this would happen so I guess this is one present where I'll have to just settle for trinkets and other oddities in lieu of an actual pug. *sniff*
What's on your Christmas list?
I haven't even had this design up for two months and I've hated it the day I ended up launching it. Tired of the colors, the huge size of it and the fact that it still isn't making me want to blog more often. So I'm considering working on a new design for it but yet again I'm not even sure that I want to keep it on icupcake.org. I like the domain but I was contemplating moving everything over to jordanriane.com (or even trying to get ahold of riane.com but not sure if that will happen.) Who knows what will happen because I've got a million ideas for some other projects I'm working on so I'll end up pushing it back.
In other news, in four more days I'll have been walking for a month. I started off using a walker for a couple weeks and eventually moved to just using a single crutch on my right side. Now I can pretty much walk without it although I did have an issue sprout up on Thanksgiving. My tendons are moving over the knee whenever it bends thus causing it to pop. There isn't any pain involved but it's very awkward walking. I'll find out Thursday at my orthopedic appointment on what I can do to help it.
I also graduated to being able to walk up and down stairs although I've yet to accomplish this feat at my house (excluding the patio stairs which are only 5 steps total.) My house stairs are both wooden so it's a little more difficult to use without the fear of slipping. Otherwise I've got not problems at Steve's house or the movie theaters (which we've gone to twice for New Moon & The Blind Side.) Now it's just a matter of getting more therapy (done by myself) to be able to squat without needing any kind of support and gaining mobility with my hip and knee.
So today is my boyfriend Steve's 25th Birthday and of course any opportunity to use a picture of a birthday pug is fine by me. ;)
Happy Birthday to the person that stuck with me through the worst time of my life.
Hello Cupcake!
I have strong love for pugs, cupcakes, & my boyfriend. I hail from the southside of Chicago where I am a frontend webdeveloper & a small business owner. Learn more about me.
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- I just started playing Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2. http://raptr.com/Cupcakes #
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