Staying Home Sawyer

Real Life Living on a Real Life Budget

DIY, Holidays!

ShamROCKS!

DIY Gold Shamrock Rocks for St. Patrick's Day

Isn’t luck such a fun idea? To think that you could run into a little luck, and have everything in your life change in an instant, is such a thrilling thought. The fact that you could get lucky and win the lottery one day, meet your soulmate in an elevator, or get a free In N Out coupon in the mail is pretty exciting. Since I’ve already met my soulmate, and had plenty of In N Out coupons, I’m seriously waiting for the luck to run in my favor with the lottery. I mean, if some people can be lucky enough to hit two major jackpots in their lifetime, can I just hit one? Is that too much to ask? Just a little luck will do, thank you very much.

DIY Gold Shamrock Rocks for St. Patrick's Day

Regardless of if Luck does actually exist, I like to think it does. So I created my own little lucky rocks for St. Patrick’s day (again). I think last year’s rocks were cooler, but they took a lot more time. This year, I spray painted a bunch of rocks gold, then used Mod Podge to adhere little green shamrocks to them. I plan on leaving them all around our city again. When people find them, I hope they feel a little lucky. Maybe it will inspire them to play the lottery (they better share their winnings with this girl).

DIY Shamrock Gold Rocks for St. Patrick's Day

Lifestyle, Travel

Bucket List: Check!

Bucket List Check!

Guys! Guys! GUYS!!!!!!!!!!!!

I’m making that check. You know the one. The check! The check that you spend your whole life (thus far) thinking about. The check that you work towards every day. The reason you go to work every morning, the reason you skimp on eating out every night. The check that you feel is your check. You know the one.

I know you’re thinking about your check…but for one minute, let’s talk about mine. For as long as I can remember, I’ve been thinking about this check. I’ve been dreaming about this check. While other people were buying Coach purses or Louboutin heels, I’ve been buying Merona purses from Target and wearing my Chucks with pride. While other people have spent a few hundred dollars on a nice dinner out, we’ve been treating ourselves to In N Out. I know that sounds frugal, but it’s not. We definitely splurge for a double-double every once in a while.

To be completely honest, I’ve been a little frugal my whole life. Don’t go so far as to call me a cheapskate (which may be slightly accurate), but I’m definitely tight with my money. While it is definitely true that we travel quite often, we do so with complete frugality. Let me explain.

When we know that we have time off to vacation together, I spend hours online researching our trips. I scour the internet for weeks looking for the best deals, the best tips, and the best times to travel. Typically our trips are relatively inexpensive (read…better word than cheap). I pack our bags with everything we’ll need to avoid extra costs while traveling, and try to make the most of every trip. So far we’ve been able to see some of the coolest places on our lists. And saving our money for the trip.

I put in overtime on this trip already. While I typically spend a few weeks researching my trips, I’ve been pricing this trip out for over a year. I’ve put in hours looking for the best time to travel, the cheapest time for trips, and the ways to work around the expensive costs. While we definitely got a “good deal,” we are still spending more money than we’ve spent on any other vacation thus far.

French Polynesia

So there you have it. My whole life I’ve been waiting for this trip. I’ve always wanted to stay in an overwater bungalow in Bora Bora. While that was the dream, we are actually going to the beautiful island of Moorea (pictured). I didn’t know enough about the islands before my research, so I didn’t realize the islands are equally beautiful (but with Moorea being much less expensive). I could not be more excited for this once in a lifetime experience.

After our trip, I’ll hopefully be able to give you a list of all my tips on how to save some serious cash if this is your check too!

DIY, Holidays!

DIY Buckets of Gold for St. Patrick’s Day

Here's to finding all the gold

Most people expect to find a pot of gold at the end of their rainbows. Me? I just want to find an In N Out cheeseburger, with a side of fries and maybe even a Dr. Pepper. I mean, the fries are golden, so really it could work. I think this is something we should work on. Instead of celebrating St. Patrick’s Day with a little gold and rainbow project, maybe I should celebrate with French fries and cheeseburgers. It sounds like the best kind of holiday, doesn’t it?

DIY Gold Buckets for St. Paddy's Day with Free Printable

Sigh. But because the rest of you would probably just rather have chocolate, I’ll support you too. I’ll make you little buckets of gold, hide them in your office, and lead you to them with a rainbow or two. I mean, a double rainbow (or a Double-Double from In N Out) is the luckiest of the lucky. If I support you with two rainbows, it must be love. Please respond accordingly.

DIY Gold Buckets for St. Patrick's Day with Free Printable

I found these adorable little white buckets in the wedding section of The Dollar Tree. Yes, they have a wedding section. Don’t be surprised, they literally have everything. I mean, if you can buy a pregnancy test at DT, what can’t you buy? (PS: This is in no way an endorsement to buy a pregnancy test from the DT, unless you plan on appearing on an episode of “I Didn’t Know I was Pregnant.”)

St. Patrick's Day Buckets of Gold DIY with free printable

Fill your white buckets (three pack for $1) with little pieces of gold candy, print the tag, and gift away. If you’re like me, and want to make it fun, lead your recipient to their treats with a little rainbow. I mean, who doesn’t love a good treasure hunt? Besides, if they don’t work for their chocolate, is it even fun? A little effort can go a long way. And I’ll be over here waiting for my cheeseburger.

St. Patrick's Day Gold Buckets with Free Printable

Here’s a JPEG of the tag. Download and print to your size preference!

Travel

Mazatlan!

Mazatlan, Mexico - Rae of Sparkles.com

If you haven’t been to Mexico, you’re missing out. Unless of course you don’t like drinking fruity cocktails on a beach, in fabulous weather with spectacular views, while eating tacos and some amazing shrimp ceviche. And if you’re not the kind of person who likes that sort of thing, then you’re no friend of mine. That, and you should probably have yourself checked for possible insanity.

Mazatlan, Mexico - Rae of Sparkles

All kidding aside, Mexico is one of my favorite travel destinations. I know that a lot of people have qualms about visiting the country after they hear some of the media stories about it, but I choose to look at it in a different way. More crimes against Americans happen in America on a daily basis than crimes against tourists on Mexican vacations. So you have two choices. Sit at home on your couch, where the chances are better that nothing will ever happen to you, or travel the world and see what it has to offer you. Get out there. Take the plunge. Nothing will ever happen to you if you stay at home. And I mean that in more ways than one.

Mazatlan, Mexico Beach

My husband and I don’t always get to spend holidays together. With his job, he’s working them no matter what if they fall on certain days of the week. This presents us with a little bit of built-in appreciation for the holidays we do get to spend together. It’s much easier to take advantage of our time together, and to be that much more grateful for it when we can. This made our trip to Mazatlan a no-brainer for us. I had a three-day weekend (Thank You Presidents!), and Valentine’s Day happened to fall on his day off. We booked a quick trip to Mexico and off we went.

Mazatlan, Mexico Beaches

We landed in Mazatlan, grabbed a Pacifico at the airport, and jumped in a taxi. I couldn’t resist taking some photos during the ride to the hotel, which led to “the unfortunate incident” of the trip. We arrived at the hotel, I jumped out, grabbed my bag, and went to check-in. Leaving my cell phone in the taxi. While we held out hope that it would be returned, I wasn’t naive enough to forget that we were in a foreign country and the chances were slim. But I had two choices: Spend hours thinking about everything that was in my phone that was now, very lost. Or getting a margarita, heading to the beach, and letting bygones be bygones.

Mazatlan, Mexico Hotel

I made my choice. I wasn’t going to let this ruin my trip. I changed into my suit, grabbed a drink, and took my book (and husband) to the beach to relax. We still had each other, we were healthy, and we had a gorgeous day in Mazatlan to spend together. Things could be much worse.

Mazatlan, Mexico Love

Besides the incident, we had such a relaxing trip. We spent our daylight hours reading on the beach, drinking cocktails, and going for swims in the pool. We watched the sunsets from the beach bars, eating the best shrimp we’ve ever had (Mazatlan is known for their shrimp), drinking Pacifico’s (which happen to be bottled there). We spent time with each other, enjoying the company. We weren’t going to take any minute for granted.

Mazatlan, Mexico Pool

We definitely want to come back to Mazatlan when we have a little more time to spend. We didn’t get out as much as we would have liked, but did find a few amazing locales to spend a few bucks. I mean, with $1.50 Pacificos, you don’t need to spend much. That, and all the tequila shots my husband took. The second this guy lands his feet on Mexican soil, he turns from Brendan to “Javi.” He smokes cigars, takes down shots of tequila, and lives in his element. He would swim with the sharks if I’d let him. Which I won’t. Ever.

Mazatlan, Mexico Waves

Eventually the sun set on our last night, and we had to get ready to come back to the States. It was a short trip, but it was worth every penny. We had a great time, and while we had a minor setback, everything worked itself out in the long run. Here’s to our next trip to Mexico! ‘Til next time Mazatlan!

Mazatlan, Mexico Sunsets