DelightfullyMundane

Taking Back The Night

2011-10-30T19:20:00.001-04:00

Ahhhh, sleep - how I've missed it. I never thought I'd declare that 6 hours of sleep was a 'good night of sleep,' but this is parenthood. Last week, we were staring down 30 minutes of sleep at a time, so 6 hours now sounds downright luxurious.

And with the extra sleep we've been getting, we had time to embarrass our child with his first Halloween costume. For the record, I was against dressing him up this first year. But this costume was a gift we gave to someone else a few years ago & made it's way back to us ... soooo, why not?

Scrambled Eggs & Other Foods My Brain Has Turned To

2011-10-20T13:43:00.001-04:00

Three months of sleep deprivation
+
A whole new person to worry about every single minute of every single day
+
Fires at work that need to be put out and trying to do so from home
+
Stopping whatever I'm doing every few hours to pump or breastfeed
=
Scrambled eggs for brains

Luckily, as it turns out,we have the most perfect child there ever was. He's happy most of the time and when I wake him up in the morning, he stretches and gives me sleepy smiles that make getting up at 5am just a little easier. And to add a little hilarity to it all, he's sleeping in his car seat in order to keep a bout of acid reflux at bay.

For Halloween, he dressed up as The Cutest Polar Bear in the Whole World and we visited Dad at work for a Halloween parade.

This week, we're in the middle of a few practice days at daycare. Gabe spends a few hours at daycare while I run around town trying to get a few things done and trying to shake the feeling that I'm forgetting something or leaving him in the car.

The Fastest 2 Months Of My Life

2011-10-20T13:41:00.001-04:00

Suuuuure, I'll have time to blog during maternity leave. Why not? I'll be home all day - what else have I got to do? While I'm at it, I'll make dinner every night, reupholster our dining room chairs, keep the house spotless, work from home, & lose all that baby weight.

Then I blinked & 2 months had flashed by.

I'm not even sure what happens to my days. Part of the day must be spent in fatigue-induced stupor. When Gabe is awake, I try to focus on interacting with him. Then there's the feeding - that's basically a full time job. Diaper changes are just overtime. Add in a few hours for all the projects listed above that I thought I'd accomplish & I'm pretty sure it adds up to about 26 hours.

Oh, and then there's the picture taking. He's just too darn cute not to keep a camera nearby.

3 Weeks

2011-09-12T09:39:00.017-04:00

Happy 3 Week Birthday Gabe!

We've somehow managed to keep you alive for 3 weeks without doing anything that should scar you for life. However, there was the binky incident wherein your father thought it best to wing the binky at me from across the room and it bounced directly off the back of your head. You weren't a fan of that particular feeling, but I don't think you'll be able to use it as an excuse not to rock your SAT scores.

So here are some highlights from the last 3 weeks:

You've watched 41 episodes of Mad Men with me, mostly at 3am. Someday this will be comical - today, it's mommy's survival method for middle of the night nursing.
We've walked laps around the neighborhood. I can't say you get excited about these outings, but you tolerate them & they put you to sleep, so I'm good with that. You have a funny habit of resting your hands on the strap that goes over the car seat like it's the most boring roller coaster ride ever.
Everyone says you look like me. However, you have the body of a baby, the facial expressions of a little old man, and the acne of a teenager. We're considering renaming you Benjamin Button (Too many pop culture references? Don't worry - ask your Aunt Amanda)
Despite my continued love of everything sweet & carb-loaded, I'm only 15 lbs away from my pre-pregnancy weight. The significance is more economical than vain - I just don't want to have to buy a whole new wardrobe when I go back to work. If I could just slip right back into my pre-pregnancy work clothes, my wallet would be quite pleased. For now, we're both wearing our stretchy pants.
You eat every 2-3 hours, but for that matter, so do I, so I'm not sure that's something you'll ever outgrow.
We tend to get hungry at the same time, so I won't deny that I've dropped crumbs on you while you nursed. And there may have been a stray chocolate chip from a fiber bar that melted in the rolls on your neck. Don't worry - we bathed you.
You finally got to meet who we hope will be your future neighborhood buddy, Marius. Up until now, one of you was always nursing or cranky, so this is a rare moment of no meltdowns. He's three weeks older than you, hence the size difference. He'll probably always be taller than you, though. Just get used to that now.
We're pretty sure you kicked your own umbilical stump off since we found 'stumpy' on the couch and a blood stain on your heel. You've definitely managed to stretch out since your days as a breech fetus, but you still enjoy being scrunched up in a little ball, with your feet up by your belly button.
You already have the cutest smile ever, but the only thing that brings it on is your awesome man-farts and filling your diaper. Fart jokes will always be funny in this house, so we don't expect you to outgrow that, either.

If anything else memorable has happened, your father will have to tell you. I haven't gotten enough REM sleep in the last 3 weeks to process long-term memory at night, which is one of the many reasons I'm writing it down here. But since I'm taking pity on your father who has to go back to work much earlier than me, he's getting full nights of sleep and hopefully storing away some memories for you. So for officially the first time - go ask your father.

Menu of Options

2011-09-11T10:42:00.001-04:00

So it's a given that babies spend their days eating, sleeping, and pooping. And if we're going to get picky, there's some crying and cuddling mixed in, too. What authors of all those baby books don't write about is what mom ends up doing everyday.

It's amazing how fast a day can go by when it takes 45 minutes to nurse, burp, and diaper a baby, especially when they're going through a growth spurt and they need to eat every hour, from start to start. That leaves about 15 minutes between nursing sessions.

So what does a new mom do with those precious 15 minutes? My days have become a menu of options from which I can only choose about 2 or 3 items. My options everyday have come down to:
- Eat
- Take a nap
- Take a walk
- Take a shower
- Pump extra milk for bottle feedings
- Bathe Gabe
- Have visitors
- Squeeze in a little work (solely to log the time & end up with more time to spend with the munchkin later)
- Do some housework (I have yet to cook any meals, but I've managed to keep us in clean clothes & maintain a sanitary kitchen)
- Snuggle time with Gabe when he's not eating or crying
- Blogging since I don't anticipate remembering any of this within a few weeks/months/years.

Doing anything that doesn't directly relate to Gabe makes me feel like I'm neglecting him. Going through a day and not accomplishing something that doesn't directly relate to him makes me feel like I'm neglecting me. I'm working on that balance and putting my multi-tasking skills to good use (most of this post was thumb-typed while nursing). The hour or so after the morning nursing and pumping tend to look a lot like this:

In the meantime, what hasn't made it to the menu at all?

- Doing my hair or makeup
- Going anywhere
- Going to the bathroom whenever I want and for however long I want
- Talking about anything not related to Gabe
- Exercise of any kind other than walks (still too early due to the C-section)
- Doing anything with both hands
- Getting more than 3 hours of sleep at a time

The Best Laid Plans

2011-08-31T10:39:00.001-04:00

Baby Gabe made it into the world safe and sound at 11:16am, Tuesday, August 23rd. For anyone who's counting, that's two days before our nice, calm, relatively pain-free C-section was scheduled to take place.

What really ended up happening went something like this:
12:30am
Woke up feeling uncomfortable and quickly realized I was uncomfortable every 7 minutes for 60 seconds each time.

1:30am
Woke up Matt and gave him the news. The doctor on call sent us to the hospital. Regardless of the time & the obvious contractions, we had a calm ride in to the point where Matt ran the last red light just because he felt like he should (but only after sitting at it for 3 minutes and realizing no one was coming from the opposite directions)

2ish
Show up at the hospital & get hooked up to monitors to confirm I was, I fact, having contractions. Not being dilated, though, we were sent home to continue progressing. Looking back, we should have insisted on staying. Apparently, my high pain tolerance fooled the nurses into thinking that my pain was merely discomfort. As Matt describes it, my pain face is the same as my "that was an awful joke" face.

5:30am
Leave the hospital a little nervous that I'm still having contractions and assuming we would return later that day. In the meantime, we swung by my office to pick up what I would need to work from home and returned home.

7:30am
Ate some breakfast (the first I was able to eat or drink all morning). Sat down to keep a written log of contractions when I suddenly had the urge to visit the restroom and in the only good timing of the day, my water broke while in the restroom.

7:35am
Called the answering service to page my doctor and sat down to await his instructions and time contractions.

8:00am
Contractions are 4min apart. Paged doctor again.

8:01am
Told Matt we couldn't wait any longer. It was time to go. On the way to the hospital, the doctors office called and confirmed that it was a good move.

8:30ish
Times get a little fuzzy at this point, but we arrived at the hospital. Matt dropped me off at the door so he could park the car and I managed to make it up to labor & delivery on my own. There's something strange about slowly making my way through the hospital hallways and seeing everyone going on about their business, while in my head, I'm screaming, "I'M HAVING A BABY! GET OUT OF MY WAY! CAN'T YOU TELL, I'M HAVING HIM RIGHT NOW!"

Sometime after 8:30...
Matt & I found ourselves back in the same room at the hospital, hooked up to the same monitors as the night before. Only this time, since I came in "claiming" that my water broke, I had to undergo painful exams between contractions to prove I was in active labor. In these situations, the nurses treat you like a liar until proven otherwise since patients come in faking it in order to get that coveted C-section slot. Even my low fluid 'went along with my story,' but wasn't enough to prove it. About 2 hours and 6 centimeters dilated later, I was in extreme pain & mu OB showed up just in time to whisk me into the OR and shove a spinal into my back during contractions since there was no longer an 'in-between' time. Once I had the spinal, life was good and it was time to have a baby. He came out folded in half, just like we thought he would, healthy, and adorable.

So 10 hours of labor and a major surgery will evidently get you one of these:

Totally worth every minute.

Better than mirror photos

2011-08-14T08:12:00.000-04:00

Thanks to Brad & Darlene, Matt & I have photographic evidence of this pregnancy that didn't require me to take a picture of myself in the mirror at 7am before work. We put off the photo shoot long enough that I'm still tired and puffy as if it were first thing in the morning - and in our brilliance, we decided to launch a marathon grocery trip just before heading to their house for the photos. Regardless of my face, there are photos of the belly.

2 weeks... Or 38 weeks.. Or whatever, it's almost baby time

2011-08-10T15:19:00.001-04:00

Whether you've started counting forward or backward, it's almost time for this baby to make his appearance in the world. In true Mowry style, he's stubbornly insisting on arriving butt-first. However, that doesn't fly with me or the doctor, so C-section it is. If all goes according to plans, we should have a nice calm ride to the hospital at 5am, plenty of time for painkillers and a smooth delivery. If he really wants to show us who's boss, he'll decide to come early and we'll rush to the hospital for emergency surgery. I would like to choose door #1 please and thank you.

As for my part in preparations over the next 2 weeks, I'm done with heavy housework and decorating. While most expectant moms use this time to stock their freezers with casseroles, I'm stocking my Netflix Instant Queue with bad TV shows that have probably all been cancelled after the first season and stocking my closet with high waisted sweat pants. Suzie Homemaker I am not.

Matt, however, has been cooking up a storm. Seeing as how he liked to cook, he's a really good cook, & he'll have 4 weeks to prepare delicious meals for us after the baby arrives, who am I to step on his toes?

TIRED

2011-07-31T07:58:00.000-04:00

I really should come up with a better title for this post, because I have a feeling it will be a running theme in my life over the next few months (years?), but hey - I'm too tired.

Last night was my first real night of horrible pregnancy sleep. Now that we have a C-section scheduled for Aug 25th, I am, of course, terrified that I will go into labor early and my doctor won't be available. So I had an elaborate dream that 12 hours before the surgery, I started going into labor. And like any good dream where it would be vital to contact Matt, my cell phone malfunctioned and refused to let me alert him of the situation. I woke up before I got to find out how it ended, but once I was awake, I was AWAKE ... at 3am. I was achy all over and very thirsty thanks to our Greek dinner the night before and if I tossed & turned too much, I'd disturb Matt, whose alarm clock was set to go off at 5:45am. So it was off to the couch with me.

In good news, I won't have to spend my sleepy day slaving over the house. Ana & I will be launching a major shopping trip to buy all the fun baby items I didn't receive at any of my showers. My very generous family & friends got together yesterday for my last baby shower at a cute little tea house - hopefully, I'll be able to gather everyone else's photos soon.

34 weeks = reality

2011-07-17T11:20:00.001-04:00

Last Thursday, we hit 34 weeks of pregnancy & reality is setting in for both of us. I know people who had their babies at 27 weeks & took them home at what would have been their 34th/35th week. And I've seen those babies - they were real, live babies, so it freaks me out a little that I have one of those hanging out in my belly. It would explain why I can feel constant moving, squirming, kicking, & punching & why I can wake him up by drinking cold water or laying something cold on my belly. I just hope I'm not asking for serious payback by messing with him before he's even born.

I also succumbed to the pregnancy leg cramps this morning. And while I was clinging to the pillow, whispering, "Ow, ow, ow, ow, it hurts, it hurts, it hurts, hee hee, hoo, hoo" and Matt was valiantly rubbing the cramp out, I'm pretty sure he & I were thinking the same thing - "wow, if this is painful, labor is really going to suck." But that's what epidurals are for.

Truth in Advertising

2011-07-05T20:14:00.000-04:00

This is one of those times (as if they're rare) when the blog post truly goes along with the title of this blog. Life this weekend was truly delightfully mundane.

Matt & I joined up with some friends to watch Red, White, & Boom from a great location on Friday night. Saturday was all housework, all day. On Sunday, we drove up north to be with the Mowrys wherein there was a day of cornhole, remote control helicopters, good food, and more fireworks.

Dave provided the family with homemade cornhole games, which the Mowry clan immediately gave him crap about since the finish wasn't quite slick enough for the sliding required to appropriately aim the cornhole bag. Luckily, Dave had already looked up the American Cornhole Association's web site and was able to quote the rules to us, which we promptly ignored. All rules and regulations were subject to change, depending on where the shade fell.

We teamed up and I found myself standing next to Grandpa Mowry, who, as it turns out, is a ringer. The guy's been practicing his cornhole game at the retirement center for weeks and kicked some serious butt. However, we were an odd match as neither one of us could easily touch the ground to pick up the cornhole bags. With his bad knees & my giant belly, we made quite a pair.

When it got too hot outside, we went indoors to play with Dave's Father's Day gift, a remote control helicopter. As childish as it sounds, it's a ton of fun and good cause for a case of the giggles.

Monday found us back in the car, headed home to Columbus. Stacey, Andy, & Frank came over for dinner and lawn darts. You know, the family-friendly game of throwing sharp objects across the lawn. Luckily, no fetuses were harmed in the game playing.

So there you have it - Independence Day Weekend 2011 in a nutshell. Just as I said, quite delightfully mundane.

All Day Aerobics - Oh, and the Nursery is Painted

2011-07-02T09:25:00.000-04:00

Alternative titles - Thank Goodness for Family and The Generosity Keeps on Coming

Regardless of my inability to choose a title for this post, I am currently tired, sore, grateful for my family, and excited to have an almost-complete nursery. This past week, Matt & I took a few days off work to get some things done. My in-laws came down to help and we immediately went about splitting up the guys and girls. Karen & I spent a solid 12 hours cleaning, painting the ceiling, cleaning, painting the walls, cleaning, painting trim, cleaning, touching up, and cleaning. My part of this process included climbing up on a ladder, painting with my arm above my head, climbing down the ladder, squatting on the floor, then climbing back up the ladder. I had no idea so many muscles could hurt at once. But we successfully have paint on the wall.

The next day, my parents brought over the nursery furniture - a crib, changing table, & dresser that my cousin basically gave to me and it fits perfectly with very little room to spare.

All that's left to do is paint the doors in the nursery, the closet, and do some decorating. The current debate is whether we hand-paint a tree on the wall or purchase a giant applique. As usual, I'm pushing for the easy option, so we'll see how the next two months go.

Sick & Tired of Being Sick & Tired

2011-06-20T16:25:00.001-04:00

I'm generally a very healthy person and I rarely get sick, which makes it all the more special that I'm on my third cold during pregnancy. I'm pretty tough, though, and I'm OK foregoing some cold remedy drugs to save some of the baby's brain cells. What I'm struggling with is that I want nothing more than to spend the day on the couch, watching bad TV. If I take a day off of work, though, I'm giving up 1 of 3 things:

1. A vacation day I had set aside next week to set up the nursery with Matt.
2. A sick day that I would otherwise be using during maternity leave to recover & spend some quality time with the baby before I resume a normal work schedule & dump him off at the sitter's everyday for the rest of his childhood.
3. A personal day that, unused, would mean cash in my pocket next month.

I'm not a fan of any of those options at the moment. I guess I'll wait & see if my priorities shift when the alarm is going off at 5:30 tomorrow morning.

Week 29 & Oh, The Excitement

2011-06-11T08:59:00.000-04:00

Just 11 weeks to go and so far, this pregnancy has been quite uneventful, which I'm very thankful for. Except for a little morning sickness at the beginning, I'm finding it quite easy to even forget I'm pregnant at times - until I try to stand up from a deep couch or squeeze through small spaces, that is.

This week we attempted to get a fancy 4D ultrasound and instead, sounded off a few pregnancy alarms because their wasn't much amniotic fluid. A stress test was called for, which wasn't at all stressful. They hooked me up to a machine that amplified all the fun sounds going on inside. They wanted to track his heartbeat, but I had more fun tracking his kicks. When nothing abnormal came back, they sent me off to Riverside for a next-day appointment to get another ultrasound. Luckily, the little bugger is healthy as can be and there's enough fluid in there for him to do all kinds of acrobatics. So in the end, I got to check in on him a few extra times and he seems to be perfectly healthy - everybody wins!

We didn't get the best 4D image ever, but he's still the cutest baby in the world.

Generosity & Bargains

2011-06-06T23:08:00.001-04:00

Being pregnant is like joining some special club where people can't help themselves but to buy you gifts and give you their own possessions.

In addition to an early baby shower thrown by some of Matt's co-workers, we've also already been the recipients of
- An entire nursery set partially given to us by my cousin & partially purchased by my mom
- A glider purchased by Matt's parents
- More than enough stylish maternity clothes to last my entire pregnancy (although, I have to admit that it didn't stop me from buying some new things - it's an addiction!)
- Tons if hand-me-down baby clothes from a friend, with the promise of more to come

Between everyone's generosity and a little bargain shopping with Erica (who could walk by barely used baby outfits for $1.00? Apparently not me), we're on our way to filling an entire room with baby items before there's even a nursery.

I probably didn't need to fill the guest room with neatly stacked piles of baby clothes, organized by category and size, but it certainly was fun.

Alien Stage

2011-05-20T08:05:00.001-04:00

Week 26 and while I feel huge, photographic evidence suggests otherwise.

I've officially hit the stage where when the baby decides to pop in that kickboxing DVD, his efforts to pummel me from the inside are visible to the world, "Alien" style. Evidently, space is already getting tight in there. My new favorite hobby is to goad him into movement and just staring at my belly.

This morning is the official glucose test, which determines whether I have gestational diabetes. Fingers are crossed that everything is fine because frankly, I love ice cream.

I wasn't lying after all

2011-05-16T20:49:00.000-04:00

About 3 years ago, I thought it would be a brilliant idea to go back to school and get my MBA. I had made a career of learning on the job and had suddenly been promoted to a position where I could no longer absorb every possible piece of information from my direct supervisor like a sponge. I'm glad I did it, but boy, was it a challenge. Every weekend was 16+ hours of homework. Weeknights were either spent in class or preparing for the next class. I learned things I never even thought I needed to know or could ever figure out. Like the time I gave myself a crash course in Calculus because it was assumed we had all taken that class in high school. Me? They gave me the 'senior math review' taught by the football coach in high school because math just wasn't my strong point. Well, in grad school, they don't take any lame excuses, so I now own every Math for Dummies book ever written and this English major did a pretty decent job of keeping up.

All this to say that a few weeks ago, I attended my official graduation ceremony at Capital University. I actually finished classes back in August, but Capital only holds one graduation a year, so I got to wait about 9 months before walking. Good thing I can appreciate delayed gratification.

The family came down and we made a day of it. A shorter day than it should have been since I took it upon myself to lead the mass exodus of grad students out of the auditorium halfway through the program. Nothing drastic, mind you. After the 50 or so of us grad students crossed the stage, we were left to sit through about 600 undergrads and it would have taken hours. So in a very stealthy manner, we snuck out, 2 by 2 (see, I learned something in Sunday school) throughout the program until we were all free to celebrate.

The family celebrated at Schmidt's (where else?) and headed back to the house for cake and the never ending 'name-the-baby-game.' Oh, and grad school? Totally worth it. I highly recommend it and given the chance to go back in time and make that decision over again, I would totally do it, even though I'd rather tear my fingernails out one-by-one than have to do grad school again.

Product Option Overload

2011-04-30T14:00:00.001-04:00

One of the fun things about being pregnant is registering for presents. I get to shop & daydream about how we'll use all of these items without spending any of my own money. Our registry is about 90% complete - we're down to strollers and car seats.

The problem is, the options are endless. So I've called in reinforcements and who would be better to help me out than my best friend/mother of 4? She has become my expert on all things baby. So wish me luck. I'm going to try and pick out some very expensive products that I'll be relying on to keep my future offspring safe.

And in the meantime, until she gets here, I'll be sitting in my car eating fruit snacks. Seriously, never leave home without them.

How many crafts could a crafter craft if a crafter could craft faster?

2011-04-24T19:44:00.003-04:00

It's no secret that I love to learn new things and there's a part of me that's actually quite proud of that. However, there are only so many crafts a girl can decide to jump into before the entire house is overrun with random, half-done projects. When I was little, the lady across the street taught me how to knit, which led to many blankets and baby hats. This is a skill that comes in quite handy when it seems that pregnancy is an epidemic. Currently, though, there is a giant box of yarn-without-a-plan in the basement and a constant in-progress-project in the family room. Add to that the many supplies people have purchased for me over the years and the knitting habit has taken on a life of its own.

Last December, a friend of mine & I took a month of cake decorating classes. It was tons of fun and I'm glad I have a little skill now. My first real project was to make this year's Easter cake. Not too bad, if I do say so myself. Notice the timeframe of the class, though - since it took place in December, all of my Christmas gifts revolved around cake decorating. I'm thrilled to have the right tools, but now there is another space in our basement dedicated to a professional cake turntable, icing tips, bags, cutters, and anything else you could name.

And then just recently, Darlene & I decided to take a jewelry making class. Also tons of fun and I'm glad I can make a few simple pieces. Luckily, no major holidays followed and since she & I are both in the process of major life upheaval, we made a pact not to go overboard and buy a bunch of supplies. So for now, I have these handy earrings. Maybe someday in the future, jewelry making can have it's own corner in the basement and we'll be overrun with random beads that only small children and myself would be caught wearing in public.

Pretty fortunate, I am

2011-04-23T10:12:00.000-04:00

I won't call it luck, because it's not like I bumped into Matt one day, a ring happened to fall on my finger, and we found ourselves married. Like a job interview, there was plenty of time for us to decide if we could spend the rest of our lives together, put up with each other's flaws, and do so without killing each other. So far, we're both still alive, so the plan is working.

The extremely fortunate part is how motivated my husband is to keep improving this little house we've been calling home for the last five years. It started out with lawn maintenance - rearranging some flower beds, planting fruits and vegetables, and tearing down old plants we never wanted to see again. Then we moved our focus to the inside of the house. We've painted rooms, built an addition, renovated a bathroom, and now (right this very minute), he is downstairs with my father-in-law, building out an office in the basement. They're making me some brand new walls from scratch.

This is all in an attempt to create some room for the soon-to-come-baby and probably more so for all of the many things that come along with a baby. Neither one of us have any idea what we're doing when it comes to all of this home maintenance, but he is a master student when it comes to self-teaching (or does that make him a master teacher?) and he has become the handiest handy man a girl could ever have.

I blinked & there went another year

2011-04-20T18:02:00.001-04:00

Does that ever happen to you? You blink just a little too slowly & a whole year just disappears?

I guess that means it's time to make another attempt at resurrecting this blog. I just hope this attempt isn't as pathetic as the last few. But I have a good excuse & a few new resources. Now that I have apps on my iPhone & iPad, I have no good reason not post on the go - say, while waiting at a doctors office, which I may or may not have doing when I started this post.

So what did I miss while slow-motion-blinking?
1. I finally finished my MBA - woohoo! Oddly enough, I finished in August & will be attending my graduation ceremony May 7th. A little delayed gratification never hurt anyone, right?

2. We added a whole new room to our house. Better yet, it's a bathroom! Every house should have at least 1 bathroom for every adult who lives there.

3. We just finished renovating the original bathroom and it looks amazing. (guess where we spend most of our time...)

4. Sadly, we lost Charlotte, the best dog ever, to a rabbit-chasing-car-accident. She died in my lap on the way to the doggie ER and we have vowed to exact revenge on all bunnies who come near our yard this year.

5. In good news, we're expecting our first baby in August! More news (much more, I'm sure) to come on that front. In the meantime, here's the 20 week belly picture and my promise to myself that more pictures will be taken.

Some major milestones under my belt

2010-03-23T20:30:00.000-04:00

This week marks the end of my second-to-last semester as an MBA student. I couldn't be more excited to only be staring down one more semester of trying to balance work, school and life. I'm not quite sure what I'm going to do with myself when I'm not over-scheduled and constantly rushing home to jump on my computer and cram a bunch of homework into the end of my day, but I'm excited to find out.

This news only pales compared to the fact that I'm launching the biggest project I've ever worked on in my career. When I was hired on at the current job, priority number one was to rebrand and redesign the company and create a brand new web site from scratch. Ok, priority number one was really to find out what the heck the place was all about - and then tackle all of that other stuff. Six months later and I've launched everything internally and so far, the response has been really positive. We go live with the site and make the new branding official on Monday. I'm really excited to have a concrete example of what I do and to have something I worked so hard on to be received so well.

And all this really just to explain that it's 8:30 and all I want to do is go to bed. Maybe a good book under the covers will suffice. In fact, that sounds pretty darn good...

Breaking the seal

2010-03-08T22:06:00.000-05:00

Today was a gorgeous 55 degree day, so it was a perfect time to venture out on my first run of the season. I always over-think the first run. I know it's going to be hard, so I don't want to do it when I know I won't be able to follow up with possibly better runs. And I don't want the experience to be miserable and scare me away from officially launching running season, so basically, all the stars have be in alignment in order for me suck it up and do it.

But my Garmin tells me that at this time last year, I was hitting the pavement and when the sun came out today, I couldn't resist. The run itself turned out to be a pathetic 2.5 miles - I even had to walk for a few minutes in the middle. But I'm glad I did it. I broke the seal on the first run of the season and hopefully, I'll be seeing some mileage improvement soon.

The Snowstorm of 2010

2010-02-23T18:19:00.002-05:00

I have a feeling that when I look back at my years of late 20s and early 30s, I’m going to say to myself, “Wow, I was really obsessed with that dog.” Heck, people say that about me now. And she is quite an awesome dog. But as much as I love her, I love photography. So I feel the need to say that the reason I have just shy of 400 photos of her (yes, that’s over 100 photos a year) is that she is one of the few beings I can grab a camera and practice taking action shots, head shots, outdoor shots and indoor shots with no warning, no preparation, no explanation and no shyness on her part.

So all of that being said, the big snowstorm of 2010 will be documented by photos of Charlotte playing in the snow. The whole collection can be found here, but for your viewing pleasure (OK, for the fun of putting it together), I turned them into a little movie, complete with soundtrack. And if it's not totally obvious by the photo, Charlotte spent the whole time with her head in the snow, looking for lost tennis balls. True to her Lab heritage, she goes gaga over a tennis ball and we probably lost 5 of them that day in the snow piles.

[Side note: Because Flickr limits your movie length, the end is cut off. Oh well - you didn't miss out on much. More snow, more photos...]

A new day, a new strategy

2010-02-19T07:09:00.000-05:00

It’s been winter for what seems like forever (roughly 3 months), so it’s of course time to start planning the spring fitness strategy.

I’ve discovered that I’m really good at doing anything once. I ran 2 triathlons (1 & 2 - seriously, was that 5 years ago??), but it was just one summer of training. The next summer, I found myself planning a wedding and the thought of repeating such an intense training schedule was just too daunting.

I ran a half-marathon, but the next summer’s training brought on an aggravated injury, followed by a brand new injury, followed by a brand new job that took up all of my time and energy.

So the question becomes, do I need an insurmountable obstacle to overcome? Is it a requirement of my psyche to have some kind of seemingly impossible challenge to work toward? I enjoy challenges – I like setting goals and working toward them and, most of all, meeting them. What’s life without the next big challenge?

And I guess I don’t have an answer to that today. I’m tempted to plan out my training schedule and set a date for when I’ll be laying down 12 mile runs every weekend. But maybe I’ll play it by ear and see what happens. Not so much lowering my expectations, but more of focusing my energy elsewhere.

Valentine's Day From Scratch

2010-02-15T08:38:00.000-05:00

I’ve never wanted to buy into Valentine’s Day. Why do I need Hallmark to dictate when I appreciate my loved ones? But as we get older and busier and free time becomes a rare commodity, it is nice to have a reason to slow down, spend some quality time together and tell each other just how much they’re appreciated.

Matt had a last-minute brainstorm and decided that if he made an elaborate/cheesy homemade gift, I would be forced to display it in my office. It actually turned out to be pretty cool and I will display it proudly.

Gifts were followed by a Sunday brunch at the Dorrs, along with the Pecsenyes, Collette, and Frank. There was good food and board games, both staples at the Dorr household.

Later that evening, Matt made a delicious dinner of Salmon with Beurre Blanc, asparagus, steamed vegetables and Champagne. It was a great evening and reminded me why and just how much I love my husband. So thanks, Hallmark – we needed that.

Snow Day

2010-02-09T17:56:00.001-05:00

The snow is coming down and the roads are treacherous … I hear. I would know this first hand, except that I work for a place that reintroduced a phrase into my vocabulary that I hadn’t used since high school – the almighty Snow Day.

That’s right – when the roads are slippery, I’m not expected to risk life & limb to get to the office; I’m not even strongly encouraged to stay home, leaving me to feel guilty for not trying harder; No, I’m not allowed to come in on a snow day. How awesome is that?

I’ve managed to conquer homework, do some work from home, clean the house, work out, decorate Valentine’s Day cookies & play my piano (yes, I still do that on occasion).

It’s like a free day – like someone magically added 24 hours into my week and I can do whatever I want with it. I just hope I remember how excited I get on these days. I want to always appreciate that I have this privilege and that it is exactly that.

Maturity or Self Absorption? You Decide

2010-02-05T21:44:00.008-05:00

As I was looking back on some of my older posts, when life was completely different than it is now, I ran across this post that includes a photo of my shoes.

The post itself was more of a woe-as-me/funny story about wearing uncomfortable shoes. However, the thing that struck me was that all my shoes were black. At the time, I had the worst taste in clothes, combined with the fact that I just didn't care. I was more concerned with making sure I had the right triathlon gear than working wardrobe.

However, fast forward five years and I've become a shoe whore. Matt's my enabler, but shoe whore nonetheless. I'm now an owner of red shoes, grey shoes, green shoes, brown shoes and black shoes. I would say that my goal is to finish out the rainbow, but I really just don't see myself in purple, blue or orange.

(Note the gym shoes still visible in the background - some things just never change)

However, I have heels. Three inch heels to be exact and I have not fallen once (knock on wood). So I haven't figured out if this means that I've matured and paid fashion (& DSW) it's due or if I've just become self-absorbed enough to care about how I decorate my feet.

Or maybe they're just shoes.

Expanding My Horizons and My Waistline

2010-02-02T20:35:00.005-05:00

I was just catching up on Jon’s blog and had to laugh about his “Muffin Day at work” comment. I have never before worked at a place where they fed me so much!

Weekly Friday morning meetings are stocked with donuts and who can pass up a donut on a Friday morning? In most other meetings, we’re supplied with cookies or snacks and if the meeting happens to fall near a meal of some kind, we have catered food.

To top it off, the school has a Culinary Arts program, where they encourage sampling and eating at their restaurant once or twice a week. Before Thanksgiving, they hosted a huge Turkey feast with everything you could think of, homemade and laid out on a buffet. Today, in celebration of the upcoming SuperBowl, they created a theme nacho buffet with buffalo wings, poppers and stuffed mushrooms. How am I supposed to say no to this kind of stuff?

The event that tops all others, though, is a meeting I had where we were challenged to bring the best dessert. First off, there were 4 of us coming to this meeting, so we were already headed down a path of destruction by eating 4 desserts. Secondly, of a few of us got a little busy and forgot until the last minute. What did this mean? It meant that 2 of us banded together and bribed the Culinary Arts class to make us a GIANT pan of PeanutBuster Parfait (complete with Oreos, caramel, hot fudge, nuts & ice cream). Another co-worker drove through Wendy’s & picked up Frosty Shakes for everyone and the last co-worker (the only one to plan ahead) brought gourmet brownies that just happened to be the size of my hand.

Seriously, I understand that I’m totally spoiled with all of this. But if they keep spoiling me, I’m going to have to buy a new wardrobe.

Go ahead - tell a lie

2010-02-01T16:00:00.002-05:00

A few years ago, Gienna hosted a weekly writing competition. I believe the week I stopped participating was when the prompt was something like “tell a lie.” I was stumped. I had nothing. Well – today I have a great lie for you.

Since I’ve made my vow to reignite my blog (which, by the way, I have done before. Not proud – just sayin’), I mentioned to my Mom that obviously readership is nill and I’m OK with that. I feel like the mundane part of DelightfullyMundane is taking over and I was a little intimidated at keeping things interesting for the number of readers I used to have.

Ok, so that’s the lie, right there – I laid it out for you. I just spent a few hours browsing through 2005 and 2006 and I have to tell you, I really miss all the blogging friends I communicated with back then. I almost teared up at the encouragement they offered during my triathlons and the excitement when I announced my engagement.

So while I can’t really help that work and wedding planning and house-buying and grad school sort of took over and pushed my blogging to the side, I can say that I appreciate the friendships that I had during those first few years of blogging.

2009 Year in Review

2010-01-31T12:11:00.008-05:00

An entire year has gone by and I have managed to write zero blog posts. I’ve said good-bye to my blog numerous times, but I keep coming back to the need to see what’s happened over the last few years, see what obstacles we’ve overcome and remember how much fun we had doing it. I don’t usually make New Year’s resolutions and I’m about 31 days late in doing so, but I’m resolving here and now to continue this blog. As we get older and busier, my need to remember is only going to grow stronger and this blog has been a great way for me to look back and not rely on my selective and often spotty memory.

So here’s about as much as I can remember from 2009. It was rough & rocky. Much of it I couldn’t write about while it was taking place. Now that it’s over, I have the opportunity to reflect and reminisce.

January
The company I had worked for going on 5 years was starting to look a little rocky. I began a serious search to start looking elsewhere.

I started my Spring ’09 semester for my MBA, taking Economics and Organizational Behavior. Friendships I had made in the MBA really started to solidify, so while the classes weren’t much fun, the company was great.

Somewhere towards the beginning of the year, I signed up for Facebook. Once my mom was on there, I figured I had no choice but to give it a try. I'm a true addict, which is one of the many reasons this blog was so neglected.

February
Matt surprised me with an iPod Touch for Valentine’s Day. This began our obsession with the iPhone.

March
Drama at work really blew up when my boss was laid off. Things were looking pretty bleak.

April
Charlotte began some serious shedding that worried us, so we commenced hypochondriac mode and hounded our vet to run every test possible.

I began interviewing with an ad agency that looked pretty promising. Things were looking up.

May
The job took a turn for the worse – they beat me to it and decided to fold the Marketing Department. I was out of a job with them, but I had 24 hours to accept a job with the same pay and benefits with our parent company. It involved cold calling and sitting in a cubicle, so I spent the next 24 hours figuring how many ways there are to say “take your job and shove it,” but my frugal side won out. I needed a steady paycheck and they were offering me a job.

The ad agency brought me back for a few more interviews and really expressed some interest in having me on board. At least that made the current job situation bearable.

While all of this was going on, I started my Accounting semester for the MBA program. I was so lost the first night, I almost cried. But I managed to get through it and survived to move on to Finance.

Charlotte’s shedding was getting worse and to add to it, she was having accidents in the house everyday. We attributed the accidents to my wacky schedule, but we were still driving the Vet nuts, trying to get an answer.

June
I took the job at the parent company and tried really hard not to focus on how much I hated it.

The ad agency blew their HR budget on stealing a huge VP of Marketing from a large gaming company and asked if I could wait a few months. Luckily, I had scored an interview with a school as their Marketing/PR person. After the second interview, they called me before I even made it home to offer me the job.

Not only was it a better gig with an amazing boss. It was also a huge pay raise for me. Who thought that in the recession of 2009, I’d actually come out on top?

July
After using up all my vacation at the old job, I started the new one. Things couldn’t have turned out better. I love what I do and really look forward to going to work everyday.

As it turns out, the school has a relationship with the local zoo and we got to go visit.

August
The Finance class FINALLY ended. I think I’d rather have my fingernails torn out than take that class again.

I’d been working at the school over the Summer, so there were no kids or teachers. They all came back in August and added a whole new dimension to the job.

Our Vet found a rare case of hormone imbalance that could be the cause of her crazy shedding. We took her to MedVet and they fixed her right up with a dose of Melatonin. Crazy as it is, that fixed her accidents, too. Happiness has been restored to the household. Check out the Before & After photos:

Matt & I gave into our iPhone obsession & traded in the Touch for the iPhone. Now we can be found many nights, both in the living room, hunched over the phones. Yeah, I know - it's a problem.

September
My Mom & I took Charlotte to the annual Pooch Pond. Good times were had by all.

September is also the month of Oktoberfest, so there was a Polka-till-you-drop marathon.

October
One of our very close friends got married, which gave us an excuse to get together and party.

November
Matt splurged way too much on my birthday, with fancy dinners and amazing gifts.

December
My sister-in-law graduated from college, so we had a lot of reasons to celebrate this month. This was also the first time that I had ‘school vacation’ instead of ‘corporate vacation’, which means that I had plenty of time off over the holidays to enjoy family and friends.

So the year started out a little rough, but couldn’t have ended on a better note. I'm looking forward to a great 2010 when I'll graduate from my MBA, get a full year under my belt at the new job and find out what my next great challenge will be.

Happy Birthday Charlotte!

2009-01-13T06:02:00.000-05:00

Charlotte The Dog turns 2 years old today. Happy Birthday Charlotte!

Two years ago, she was born into the Morrow County Humane Society along with a few brothers & sisters who looked nothing like her. We're pretty sure her mom was that type of girl.

She's grown quite a bit in the last 2 years. She lost that puppy look and officially weighs 50 pounds.

She graduated Obedience Training and can

sit
stay (for 3+ minutes even if you leave the room)
come
heel
speak
shake (as in shake the bathwater off of yourself before I let you out of the bathroom)
down
paw
touch
ring a bell when she wants to go outside
'go lay down' (as in go lay down on your pillow until further notice)
high five
leave it
drop it
roll over
give kisses
and she knows her toys by name - she'll go fetch whatever specific toy you request (specific types of beer & snack foods are next on the list of items to teach her to fetch).

She experienced her first snowfall last Spring & swam for the first time last Summer.

She's run in a number of 5Ks with me and helped me train over the Summer for the Columbus Half Marathon.

She does not like hats

She likes to play with anything that squeaks (this includes live bunnies, but that's another story for another day) and when she has toys she really loves, she puts them in a pile & rolls on them like they're money.

She wakes us up when we sleep too late and lets us sleep when we tell her it's the weekend.

She loves a good sunbeam and is not a fan of the mailman, which works out great when she wants to tell him just how much she doesn't approve of his daily disturbance.

She definitely has attitude & isn't afraid to show it.

Happy 2 Years Charlotte.

Work/Vacation Balance

2008-12-30T21:47:00.003-05:00

Matt & I have yet to figure out how to vacation. Specifically, vacation from home. Who knew that this was a skill we're not naturally born with? When we're slacking off, we feel like we should be working. When we're working, all we want to do is slack off. When we travel for vacation, we slack off the whole time & just feel guilty for the first few days. That guilt tends to wane as the alcohol gets poured.

When we staycation, though, the guilt takes over and we feel compelled to complete home improvement projects. The upside is that we are here to balance each other out. If Matt were here home alone, he would hit the ground running every morning and never stop. He's proven this with the patio project from his summer vacation. If I were here by myself, absolutely nothing productive would get done. I might play the piano, take the dog for a walk and go to the gym, but that would be the extent of my excursion.

What ends up happening is that we try to get the work out of the way early and end up working so hard that we're took tired to enjoy the vacation part.

Vacation Day 1
Clean the house nonstop from top to bottom until 4pm. Nap for an hour. Make dinner. Clean now-dirty kitchen. Go to bed.

Vacation Day 2
Wake up with a cold. Eat Christmas cookies & watch Polar Express. Take the dog for an hour walk. Hit the stores looking for post Christmas sales on home decorating supplies. Bring supplies home, tired & despising the mall scene, but happy with our progress. Hang curtains & set up lamps - hate it all. Take it down and put in 'return' pile. Make dinner. Go to bed.

Vacation Day 3
Pay some bills. Send some emails. Spend 4 hours scrubbing & waterproof painting basement walls. Collapse in exhausted heap on couch at 2. Putter & some light cleaning until midnight.

Vacation Day 4
Clean up basement mess from day before. Clean basement & do some organizing. Feel much better about basement livability & usefulness. Return bad purchases from day before. Scratch our heads over home decorating dilemma. Go to gym (yay!). Play piano. Eat dinner. Watch too much TV. Blog.

So there's a lot of working and probably enough relaxing. We just haven't figured out how to do vacationy type stuff while we still have enough energy to do it. Our vacation is bipolar. We go from work to sit and stare at the wall and then back to work until we can't work anymore.

Withdrawl

2008-12-22T19:25:00.004-05:00

Is it a sign that I have a problem when I'm at the gym, surrounded by TVs and all sorts of interesting people watching and while I'm skiing to nowhere, all I can picture is my running route in my head and Charlotte's floppy ears bouncing around five steps in front of me?

I swear to you, every song reminds me of a certain street. Tegan & Sara's Time Running is the house where the other runner dude is always stretching and waves at us in the morning. The B-52's Funplex is the corner where Charlotte always expects her share of the water bottle. The White Stripe's Conquest is the stretch along the school playground. And The Arctic Monkeys Dancing Shoes is the street that lines the tennis courts - have you ever run with a lab past multiple tennis courts? The multitude of tennis balls is almost too much for her to handle.

And why is it that I don't remember the long stretch that never seems to end? Or that when my calves cramp up, they always do it right before we get to that school playground? Or that last half mile where I bargain with myself the whole way that I'll 'run to the next driveway' then 'to the next driveway' and so on.

Is this why women have more than one baby? You remember all the good things and forget that hard part? Regardless, I want the sun to come out for more than a few hours and warm up the air so my dog and I can go run in a big 4 mile circle - much better than skiing to nowhere, right?

Back from No Man's Land

2008-12-16T19:44:00.003-05:00

So have I mentioned before how hard this whole MBA thing is? I'm pretty sure I gave up my favorite hobbies, socializing for the most part, a little sleep and a lot of sanity to get through that last semester.

The semester ended about 2 weeks ago and I'm just now coming out of my post-semester fog wherein I'm a complete idiot, incapable of stringing together more than 3 words at a time or holding a thought in my brain for more than 30 seconds. The day after my last final, Matt found me standing in the middle of the grocery store, just staring off into space. I have no idea what I was thinking about.

I can't even make conversation. Someone asks me how I'm doing and in my head, I'm saying something like, "Things are great. We're getting ready for the holidays and getting our shopping done..." Somewhere between my brain scripting these words and transmitting them to my mouth, regression analysis, linear programming and the Utilitarian & Kantian theories strip my words of any meaning and by the time my elegant narrative of our holiday activities makes it to my mouth, it sounds something like, "Huh? What was that? Sorry, I zoned out."

In the meantime, while I wait for my brain to recover, I spent the weekend with someone who doesn't require elaborate conversation and is good for tons of crafting and Christmas fun - my niece!

We spent weekend decorating candles, writing people's names with beads and trimming the tree.

(hey, my sister-in-law's name is Ana L. - I have to take advantage of it)

1st 1/2 Marathon

2008-10-21T21:26:00.004-04:00

It was a success! I finished in ~~2:30~~ 2:03 (stupid mixing up of numbers) and I didn't walk, which was my only real goal besides just finishing.

The race started at 7:30am and it was freezing out. 38 degrees and dark - I was in shorts. 'Nough said.

It was an amazing experience to run for hours with 11,500 people and to see so many people standing outside in the cold cheering us on.

My parents, Matt & his sister met me at mile 9, at which point I felt really good.

By mile 11, though, I would have paid money to sit down for a minute. Despite the guy chatting on the phone next to me, though, I muscled through and made it to the finish.

Matt's cousin ran the full marathon and finished in 3:30, which qualified her for Boston - way to go Heidi! And of course we had to pose with our medals afterwards.

Everyone

2008-10-06T22:11:00.004-04:00

Someday, I'm going to invent an imaginary friend, name him Everyone, and make him happy. That way, I can claim that once in my life, I managed to please everyone.

Ever have one of those days?

That aside, the training for the Half is going well. A week and a half ago, I ran my last long run - 12 miles. Just one mile short of the half marathon. I feel ready. Except for this cold that I'm currently sporting, but I have time to kick that. My strategy for preparing for this race includes:

Positive thinking
A kicka$$ playlist
Short runs between now & the race (especially in this cooler weather so I can adjust to the temp)
Lots of water
Not much salt
Flat shoes

Most of this will become more important the week leading up to the race, but at this point, after about 6 months of training, that's what's going to get me to the finish line.

Falling with a Strategy

2008-09-20T12:30:00.002-04:00

I accomplished my 11 miles this morning - woo!

This time I stuck to my normal route around the neighborhood so I could take Charlotte with me. She made the first 5.5 miles and then I dropped her off at home to finish on my own. I even managed to do that without hardly slowing down. We blew through the front door, I unhooked the lease, made a beeline for the fridge to grab a fresh water bottle, went out the back door and finished the run.

I love running through our neighborhood. It seems to be a very fit and dog-friendly place. There are always other runners out, people walking their dogs and I hardly ever make it through a run without seeing the local cops either in cars or on bikes, so I feel very safe. The only downside is that the sidewalks are anything but smooth. You would thing we'd been hit by an earthquake that uprooted all the concrete, which then settled in random heaps. I pretty reliably fall once every Summer. Usually on days when I'm especially tired and not picking my feet up high enough - today was one of those days.

I'd been thinking about my annual fall, though and I felt prepared. Usually I fall very superman-like and my hands take the brunt of the fall. I'm left to run home with scraped up and stinging hands. I've been tempted to ask one of those nice local cops for a ride, but apparently I'm too stubborn.

So today, I was running along our nice bumpy sidewalks and my the toes of my right foot tripped on the pavement. And suddenly, my body went into autopilot and I didn't realize what I was doing until it was already done. In the half-second it took me to fall, I let go of the leash and with whatever leverage I still had on the toe of my shoe, I launched myself sideways into the grass and rolled to my side before I hit. I made a very nice landing in some soft grass and I have no blood to show for it. Not bad. I guess it always pays to have a strategy.

10 Miles - No Stopping, No Walking

2008-09-13T10:54:00.002-04:00

Alternate Title 1: My Husband is Awesome
Alternate Title 2: Thank Goodness for the White Stripes

I finally hit my 10 mile mark! Woo! And Matt made it very special for me. We went out to the local bike trail and he road his bike along beside me the whole time, cheering me on and giving me water.

But I hit a good stride early on and hardly ever wavered from that pace. I just went on auto pilot and tried not to feel anything.

Now, we're going for pancakes.

This is what school does to me

2008-09-06T17:32:00.002-04:00

So second semester of my MBA started up 2 weeks ago. This semester doesn't seem like it will kick my butt quite as much as last semester. Although, I'm pretty sure any time accounting is not involved, I'll be OK.

Not only are classes going well, so is my training for the half-marathon. I've been increasing my mileage every weekend with short runs during the week. Last Saturday I completed 9 miles and this weekend I had a 10 mile run scheduled that I really felt ready for. And of course the 10 mile run is so important because that's the real marker for being prepared for the half. They say if you can run 10 miles in training, your adrenaline will carry you through the last 3 in the race. This weekend was going to solidify my goal to run the half.

Why am I speaking in the past tense, you ask? Matt & I were both struck down with some horrible flu-like fever earlier this week and we've both been useless for days. Apparently we have the symptoms of both Mono and West Nile - horrible achiness, throbbing headaches and extreme fatigue. Never in my life have I had a stronger desire to know a drug dealer who could score me some serious pain killers.

For now I'll just settle with curling up on the couch with my blanket and enjoying a Top Gear marathon.

But cheating feels so good!

2008-08-21T18:45:00.003-04:00

I happened to be at the gym Wednesday night to take a spinning class from a good friend and I figured, hey - why not run a few miles on the treadmill? I got a few miles in before the spinning class and after the class, I put my thinking cap on one more time and said to myself, 'Self, if you log a few more miles on this here treadmill, you could sleep in tomorrow!'

So I jump back up on the treadmill and start chugging away. I started to feel like a superstar athlete and then I realized that there was no humidity, no wind, no rough road, no car smells, no dog pulling me in the direction of any random squirrel or rabbit (even upwards - she hasn't yet figured out that she can't fly). So running on a treadmill is totally cheating, but it felt SOOOOOO good to have nothing standing in my way or holding me back. I logged another 4.5 miles after that spinning class with 2 sprints in the middle. AWESOME!

My Reward

2008-08-18T19:13:00.003-04:00

So evidently my reward for dragging myself to the gym after work was a fire alarm that required everyone to leave the building -- while I was in the shower.

I'm not sure I've ever gotten dressed so fast in my life. The threat of possibly being dragged out of the locker room in just my towel probably got my heart beating faster than the workout did.

More goals! (and the semi-annual Charlotte movie)

2008-08-15T16:06:00.007-04:00

So I finally dragged myself from bed this morning to go running. The weather couldn't have been more perfect. There was a cool breeze, it wasn't muggy and the sun was shining just enough to light our way. The only bad news was that I screwed up the settings on my Garmin, so I had no idea how far I ran until I mapped it when I got back home. Remember that goal of 7 miles? We made it 6.75. SOOOOOO CLOSE!

Part of me is disappointed that I didn't make my goal. The other part of me is just thrilled that the run felt good and I think as long as I keep my breathing controlled, I'll do just fine with long distances.

And - I know you've all been just waiting for the latest addition to the Charlotte movies, so I won't hold you in suspense any longer. And since I know my parents are the only people on the planet who will be patient enough to sit through 4 minutes of my dog being a spaz to music, I've cut the movie down into three parts, each less than 90 seconds, and put them up on my Flickr account here, here and here. The full version is definitely better, but I'll admit to being the only person who cares enough to see the difference. Enjoy!!

Time

2008-08-14T07:58:00.008-04:00

Since I have a two week break from school, I took this opportunity to also take a one week break from work. I'm sure I made a list of things I wanted to do and that list is somewhere, but here are a few things I've accomplished:

Sleep in.
Ok, so the alarm still goes off at 5:45am because Matt still has to make it to work on time, but I've become a master ignorer of high volume public radio.
Go swimming.
Not only did I swim laps (which I might do again today), I also spent a fun-filled afternoon hanging out at the outdoor pool with my mom and niece. We floated around in the lazy river, took turns daring each other to go down slides and jump off diving boards and gabbed non-stop for about 7 hours.
Knit some things for myself.
I managed to make two sets of hats and scarfs to go with my both my winter coats and I started in on some baby hats for the many people I know who are expecting.

Ignore me in this photo. I look all tired and puffy from allergies, but the hat and scarf came out nicely.

I liked that fall yarn so much, I made a little baby-sized version:

Catch up on some house cleaning
Not necessarily what you would associate with a vacation, but it had to be done and this weekend is going to be jam packed, so it's now or, well - so far into the future that the family room will have it's own air quality alert.
Help Matt with some house projects
Also not on my wish list of things I would want to do on my time off, but it had to be done and I couldn't leave Matt to do it all on his own.

This is the site of our future patio. All the dirt that used to be here, had to be hauled into the backyard. You can't tell from the picture, but we dug down about 6-7 inches in that whole area. It wouldn't have been that bad of a job if our dirt wasn't rock-hard clay. It felt like we were digging through concrete and hauling boulders.

And now this giant pile of dirt is the future site of a new flower bed.

The only thing I haven't accomplished yet was to hit my goal of a 7 mile run. Every morning I've either been too sore from last weekend's hilly 5k & the hauling of dirt in the evenings or my head felt like it was going to explode from allergies. I still have a couple days left to try, but maybe this is a good week to take a break. When I'm busy with work and school, early morning runs are just about my only option for a good workout. Now that I have some extra time, I can swim or use the equipment at the gym and give my knees a little rest. Oh yes, I can justify anything.

Ignore Me - It's the Withdrawl Talking

2008-08-12T19:34:00.002-04:00

Today is a sad, sad day. Ice cream has been banned from my house and I didn't even get to say good-bye. I woke up this morning to find the last empty container perched at the top of the pile in the trash can, just staring up at me, having been snatched away in the middle of the night.

It's been said by some that I eat too much of this scrumptious sweet and my need for chocolate chunks and gooey goodness cannot be contained. But I say, if eating a half gallon of ice cream every week is wrong, I don't want to be right!

So I may just show up on your doorstep someday soon - you know who you are, fellow lovers of Rocky Road, Cookies and Cream, Peanut Butter Cup, Chunky Monkey, Chubby Hubby, and all things frozen and delicious.

In the meantime, I'll just be sitting here drinking my chocolate 1% milk and visualizing Death by Chocolate with chocolate fudge sauce - and a cherry on top.

Answer: 25 minutes

2008-08-11T08:10:00.004-04:00

Question: How fast did I run Saturday's 5k? Specifically 25:17. Third place in my age group and Charlotte won 'first dog'. Neither one of us got any kind of recognition, though. They didn't award first through third in each age group - just first, which was odd and a little disappointing. Charlotte did get cheered on at the end of the race as being the first dog to finish.

Regardless, this time is a personal best for me (high school cross country notwithstanding) and the hills on this course were murder. Two days later and I'm still so sore I can barely walk.

This race was especially fun because it was 'back home' for me, so an old high school friend ran it with me and my parents were there to cheer us on, and as always, Matt was there to document every moment.

The other unique part of this race was that it was held at a nature conservatory, so the scenery was amazing. We ran along the nature trail, in and out of the woods - much different than running in the middle of the road in downtown.

After muscling our way through those hills, we sprinted the end and then enjoyed a nice moment in the shade.

Overall, good race and I'm looking forward to doing it again next year.

To half or not to half

2008-07-29T18:17:00.003-04:00

OK, so here's the deal. I've been running and my runs feel pretty good. Actually, a friend from work just lent me her Garmin Forerunner, which reported to me that I ran 6 miles this morning. I can't tell you how proud that makes me - and slightly sore, too. Six miles is a long way from a half marathon - it's not even half of a half marathon.

But come October 19th, my presence will be requested at the Columbus Marathon to cheer on one of Matt's cousins. So if I have to be there anyway,shouldn't I just run it? I mean, it only makes sense. And you know I'm only going to be green with envy if I have to stand there and watch all these runners go by.

I'm at the point where training gets pretty brutal, though. I'm already getting up at 5:45am to hit the pavement and the longer the runs get, the earlier the alarm goes off so I can fit my run in before work.

So I guess I'm gonna go for it and just see how far I get. This is official public declaration that I'm going to attempt a half marathon. Even if I just do this half-marathon thing once, I'll at least have done it. I did a summer of triathlons and that was fun, but who knows if I'll ever have time for that kind of intense training again? So maybe I'll just hop from one kind of race to another and I'll always have the standard 5k in my back pocket to fall back on. God bless the 5k's. I swear that first 3 miles isn't any easier than the last 3, but the t-shirt is totally worth it.

How old are we?

2008-07-13T11:14:00.004-04:00

At the aforementioned party we attended Friday night, there was a very sweet couple whom we had never met that we sat across from at dinner. They just happened to be about 20 years old and looked really young to Matt & I.

Partway through appetizers, I commented that our waiter's hairstyle makes him look like a hobbit and Matt & I discussed how this is the new style and how it's "cool" and how the fact that we think what's "cool" right now deserves quotation marks to indicate how un-cool we believe it to be, makes us very old. Now this is where, in all seriousness, this young couple looks at us and says, "Oh, how old are you? 25?" Now, don't get me wrong - I love that they think we might look 25, but do they really think 25 is old?

I just shook my head slowly (partly because I was already halfway through the first Long Island) and said, "Oh, no. Try packing on a few more years." I remember when I thought 25 was old. I made those pacts with my friends that if we hit 26 and we're still single, we'd get married. I didn't realize until Friday night how close I came to seeing that pact come to fruition.

So now I'm curious how we look to a couple of 20 year olds. Do we look like that cool couple who has it all together and they'd like to be us in a few years? Do we look lame and make them not want to grow one day older?

So I had to dig through some photos to find what Matt & I looked like at 20. I believe in these photos we were closer to 22, but whatever - close enough.

Awwww, how young we look. I think I might see a little glimmer of innocence there where now we have cynicism and sarcasm. And, of course, we need some after-photos.

Irony at its best

2008-07-12T13:11:00.002-04:00

After a crazy work week that, in and of itself, would have driven me to drink, I also had a presentation for school, a group project for school and a mid-term on accounting to study for. I was so freaked out about this mid-term, I couldn't sleep the night before without dreaming of balance sheets and cash flows.

So by the time Friday rolled around, I was ready for the get-together we had planned with some friends. It took two (count not 1, but 2) Long Island Iced Teas, one very delicious Amaretto Sour, a platter full of fried foods, and most importantly, some quality time with old friends to make me forget about the evil world of Accounting. I had a great night, I felt better about myself just for being around these people and I slept like a baby - until the alarm went off - at 6am - to talk radio - the topic being Accounting Principles.

Seriously? Did I deserve that? I mean c'mon - not even a full 12 hours without having to think about accounting. So I woke up this morning immediately thinking about that mid-term and how I should have calculated my end balance differently and whether I worded the definition of the accrual concept correctly.

A little coffee and a little breakfast later and life was good again. At 9am, I had to call the vet for Charlotte since she's been paying a little too much attention to herself lately & we thought she might have some kind of bladder problem. The request from the vet was to collect urin sample. WHAT? I'm sorry - you want me to follow my dog around with a little puppy piss pot in the hopes that she might have to go and catch a few drops before she jumps away in fear and perhaps a little disgust that I'm invading her privacy while she's doin' her thing? Yes - yes, that's exactly what they wanted. In protest, Charlotte has chosen not to go in about 6 hours.

What a Saturday. I'm going to need a weekend to recover from my weekend.

Don't you wish you could be cool like us?

2008-07-06T08:10:00.001-04:00

Typical Saturday night - sit around on our computers, posting blogs and making movies.

Many years ago, Matt's Dad made a very nice gun cabinet. We've had it for quite a while and seeing as how we like liquor a little more than guns, we finally did a little rehab work. Check out the below movie for the grand unveiling. It's a slow build, but worth the wait and make sure to have your sound on.

Movie

P.S. That's right Mom - now we have room in the China Hutch for......wait for it.....china!!

Oh, to have a fence

2008-07-05T21:05:00.005-04:00

Typical Saturday morning - un-hogtie my dog from the backyard.

Apparently, she finds it hilariously funny, but I would love to have a fenced-in backyard someday. Summer isn't really all that bad, but fishing that rope out of a foot of snow at 6am - that, I could do without.

So Much to Do... yada yada yada

2008-07-01T21:39:00.011-04:00

Wow, so school is totally kicking my butt right now. The minute we entered the world of accounting and those pesky debits and credits (seriously? debits at the window and credits at the door?), I've been struggling to keep up.

Today, being a typical non-class day for me, consisted of one early morning run, a full day of work without taking time for lunch, staying at work until 7 to work on a school presentation, running home to do some necessary kitchen cleaning, then hitting the books again until 9:30.

And there's some strange man roaming around my house. I've heard him referred to as my husband before, but seeing as how I haven't really seen him or spoken to him much in the last few weeks due to my crazy schedule, I'm beginning to wonder...

I shouldn't exaggerate as I'm want to do sometimes, though. Life is not without it's fun. A few weeks ago, we threw Matt a rockin' 30th birthday party. There was much tandem bike riding, corn-hole playing and giving of liquor to Matt (he's very hard to shop for). And I got to hang out with my best friend - it's been waaaay too long.

Recently, we were rocked by some serious thunder storms, during which Charlotte & I stayed up all night making funny faces at each other.

And this past weekend, we (Matt, my Dad, myself and a couple of friends) went up to MidOhio to see the Vintage Grand Prix races. It was a great time with interesting cars and I even got to ride around the track not once, but TWICE in an MG Midget. How does it get much better than that? Oh yeah, the pouring rain turning the race course into an ice skating rink - that's how it gets better. Notice that race cars are NOT supposed to be turned sideways.

Ok, that's it for me. I'm going to go crawl back under my rock now.

The Early Bird Gets to Run in Reasonable Weather

2008-06-08T17:30:00.005-04:00

Today was the 3rd and final 5k that I signed up for this Summer. There may be more and there's still that remote possibility that I'll make it through a half marathon this Fall, but that's still up for debate.

This morning's run was downright painful. Charlotte & I have been running early in the morning lately since Summer has officially arrived, so neither one of us was ready for the heat. The temperature was in the high 80's and sunny by the time the race started. I probably should have known better than to let Charlotte run with me due to the extreme temperatures, but I figured it was just a 5k, I made sure she had plenty of water before, during and after the race and she's shed enough fur recently that she couldn't get too hot - 8 hours later and I'm not sure she's forgiven me yet.

She was all excited at the beginning and even tried to pass and go around people at every chance.

By the end, though, she was struggling. Does it look like we're standing still?

Once we slow-jogged our way through the finish (since she was the one wearing the fur coat, I totally let her choose the pace), she made a beeline for the closest concession table and dove underneath to hide in the comfort of the shade. For the next five minutes, you didn't exist unless you were holding an ice cube.

It didn't help that right before the race started, an impossibly adorable girl fell in love with Charlotte and wanted to express her joy by feeding my dog pieces of banana. It was so cute, I just couldn't stop her. That was, it was cute until Charlotte had to stop twice in the middle of the race to poop and I was left carrying the poop bag.

Needless to say, our time wasn't marvelous. Total stops for Charlotte were 4 - one pee, one water, & two poop. We had a good time, though and supported a good cause. Now I'm off to study for a mid-term exam. Weekends are all about ~~exercising~~ exhausting the mind and the body.

Running at a Feverish Pace

2008-05-25T10:12:00.002-04:00

Yesterday was the annual Pet Promise Rescue Run wherein hundreds of people who are crazy about their dogs gather in one place to run a 5k and raise money for the local shelters. It's my Mecca.

The weather was perfect and the course was decent. The only downside to this course it that you have to run it twice, so there's no fooling yourself into believing the finish line is right around the corner. The benefit, though, is when you know where the finish is, you know when to start sprinting.

Matt & I met some friends at the race, cruised the vendors for free stuff and picked our meet-up spot afterwards. The importance of the meet-up being that we were all headed back to our house afterwards for a post-race cookout.

This is the first race I've run with Charlotte, so I was extra excited about it. She did great and probably would have preferred that we run faster if her attempt to sprint the first mile was any indicator. But then she fell in beside me and we got our pace and made some tracks.

I love seeing everyone out running with their dogs, especially the people that run with multiple dogs at once.

This girl not only kicked ass yesterday, but also at last week's Race for the Cure. I don't understand how those small dogs can keep up.

And the reference to running at a feverish pace? Oh yes - that's because just hours after running, I found myself with a 99.5 degree fever and miserable. I knew I wasn't feeling well when I woke up that morning, but I was determined to run this race, so I fueled up on nasal spray and decongestants. Now I think I'm out of the running business s for a few days, at least until this sore throat, stuffy head & runny nose go away.

I Heart Boobies - Go Team!

2008-05-18T14:46:00.005-04:00

Yesterday was the annual 'Susan Komen Race for the Cure' 5k and this year (quite unfortunately), we had a friend to run for. In celebration of her, we formed our team and even made some awesome t-shirts.

Luckily, our friend felt well enough to run the race - rock on, Amee.

As far as we can tell, there were roughly 40,000 runners. It was really cool to be running with that many people. I'm glad Matt sprinted up 4 flights of stairs to get this photo.

Stacey and I made our goal of not walking through the entire race and (counting the slow start because of the giant mass of people), we ran it in about 29 minutes. Amidst our endorphin rush, we contemplated training for a half-marathon in October. It started to sound more plausible when Stacey and I agreed that it would have to be a walk//run - run for 5-7 minutes and walk for 30 seconds. We're thinking about it - we'll see how that goes.

The whole set of race photos are saved here and they were all taken by Matt. Thanks, Matt!!

I'll leave you with a few favorites:

Proof that there are things taller than Andy

When running a 5k, it's important to remember 3 things:

1) Always rock out

2) Remember to stretch in front of the paparazzi.
3) Wear the appropriate hair ribbons - very important

Next week - Pet Promise Rescue Run and Charlotte's racing debut. Woo!

Ohio Weather

2008-05-06T20:45:00.003-04:00

I can't even think of anything to say about this rainy weather. Here's hoping the weather man is more wrong than usual!

Run Away!

2008-05-01T19:40:00.006-04:00

I was just burning a workout CD for some friends and decided that in the spirit of running season, I would share my list of music that gets me up and moving these days:

Gnarls Barkley, Run (I'm a Natural Disaster) From The Odd Couple
Gnarls Barkley, Going On From The Odd Couple
Body Rockers, I Like The Way You Move From BBC TopGear Soundtrack
The Hives, Hate To Say I Told You So From BBC TopGear Soundtrack
The Killers, Somebody Told Me From BBC TopGear Soundtrack
Cream Vs. Hoxtons, Sunshine Of Your Love From (what else?) BBC TopGear Soundtrack
Wolfmother, Love Train (and Frankly anything else from Wolfmother) From Wolfmother
The Stone Roses Love Spreads From (ooh! guess!) BBC TopGear Soundtrack
Razorlight, Somewhere Else From (last one, I swear!) BBC TopGear Soundtrack
Teddybears, Punkrocker (Feat. Iggy Pop) From Soft Machine
Teddybears, Cobrastyle (Feat. Mad Cobra) From Soft Machine
Veruca Salt, Seether From American Thighs
Yeah Yeah Yeahs: Date With The Night, Man, Tick, Black Tongue, Pin, No No No All from Forever To Tell.

So Christy and Stacey - if you see anything on this list you don't like, speak now or...well, complain about it later, I guess. I'll be distributing CDs the next time I see you! And just for the record, I highly recommend the Yeah Yeah Yeahs for spinning and Cobrastyle for that end-of-run/workout sprint.

Framed

2008-04-30T17:27:00.002-04:00

After two years of living in our house, we finally decided it was time to start paying attention to our walls and how bare they are. After deciding we weren't all that excited about any of the art we could afford, we settled on just purchasing frames and filling them with our own stuff later.

Luckily, Matt is a genius with the camera (although he won't admit it) and has already started taking some gorgeous photos to fill our walls.

Equilibrium

2008-04-28T19:40:00.002-04:00

I've discovered that I've hit my body weight equilibrium. I'm not saying here that I think I have the perfect body or that there's nothing I'd want to change - what I'm saying is that I've accepted the fact that I can't change things.

Over the past 5-6 years my weight hasn't changed, give or take a couple of pounds. Over those year, I've trained for and run triathlons, I've spent months at a time being slothful and I've held a perfectly normal workout schedule for periods of time. What I've discovered is that my appetite fluctuates in direct proportion to my workouts. Big shocker, I know - but I guess I always assumed that to lose weight, you simply work out more. I'm at the point where if I increase my workout (while the workout itself is a healthy activity and I gain muscle and lower cholesterol and all that jazz), the end result as it pertains to weight is that I simply must eat more.

Case in point - I went out for a particularly good run Sunday morning, followed by strength-training and sit ups. I ate a healthy lunch and then went out with the hubby for an afternoon of shopping. Halfway through the afternoon, I found myself in World Market, ready to throw myself to the ground in tears, angrily calling Matt on his cell phone to find out exactly which large display he disappeared behind and being an overall crank because we couldn't make it out of the store fast enough to get me to Steak 'N Shake for a raspberry yogurt shake thingy.

So there you have it, my revelation for the day - that, and I should never be allowed out in public when I'm hungry.

Whose Mommy Are You?

2008-04-27T12:29:00.003-04:00

We spent the beautiful day we had yesterday celebrating a 6 year old's birthday. Happy Birthday Jessie!

We knew going to the party that we'd be the only people not sporting kids and we're cool with that. Depending on our mood and the kids present, we can either be found hiding out back with the 'adult cooler' or pitching in and helping the harried parents. Some days it's a mix of both, which becomes a little tricky if we've been hanging around the 'adult cooler' a little too long before jumping in to help with the organized activity - on the other hand, a few drinks go a long way when screaming, sugared-up kids are involved.

I had a very surreal moment while playing "Don't Break the Ice" - a small girl looked up at me and simply asked, 'Whose Mommy are you?'. I was totally caught off guard as it's never been assumed that I was anybody's Mommy and I definitely did not expect to be explaining my life choices to a six year old. Apparently not having a kid was completely acceptable to her and gave her the chance to adopt me as her temporary Mommy until her own returned from some errands. I can live with the Rent-a-Kid program for a few more years.

3 Races. 3 Weeks To Prepare.

2008-04-24T18:11:00.002-04:00

I have 3 races planned so far for this summer. First up is the Columbus Komen Race For the Cure. This race is HUGE. I don't think I've ever seen so many people in one place before I started attending these races.

Following close behind is the Pet Promise Rescue Run to raise money for the local animal shelter. Last year, Charlotte was too young to run with me, but this year, she'll be my running partner. If it's too hot, we'll just walk it. A couple of our good friends are going to walk this race, so we'll be in good company.

Lastly,the Jack Roth 5k Rock and Run. It's so close to home, it would be a waste not to run it. Besides, the last 2 years I ran it, I got a trophy or plaque, although one year I technically tied with Stacey and the other year, I'm pretty sure I was the only person in my age group.

Now, the big challenge is to get out and get some runs under my belt. Too bad the forecast is calling for rain for the next week. I think I'm just going to have to brave the rain and as long as it's not storming, run through the rain. Here goes nothin'!

Sex & The City ate my soul

2008-04-21T20:02:00.004-04:00

Wow - a whole month with no posts. Where have I been? Oh yeah, about a month ago, a friend of mine lent me her Sex & The City DVD collection in preparation for the movie that's coming out at the end of May. Apparently the only way to make it through 6 seasons of a weekly HBO television show in one month is to be completely anti-social and have the flu.

When I wasn't sick with the flu, I was out enjoying this gorgeous weather we're having and getting a jump start on our landscaping. I hope to have before and after pictures soon. We were lucky enough to have Matt's parents come down and stay with us for a weekend, which was just long enough for them to kick our butts into gear and get something planted. After 4 1/2 hours of work, my mother-in-law and I crashed. Hard work deserves a long nap.

I've also gotten myself and my dog out running before it gets too hot to take her with me. We're currently preparing for this year's Race for the Cure in honor of our good friend who was recently diagnosed with Breast Cancer.

And in other news, I have just 2 weeks to go before I start my 2 1/2 years of spending my evenings and weekends sitting in a classroom, staying up late writing papers and stressing over tests. I really want to be excited to start my MBA program, but at the moment, I'm more excited to start getting it over with.

Oh, and before I end this post, Charlotte sends this message to all those who claim there are too many pictures of her. That's right - you know who you are. ;)

Too old for this

2008-03-16T19:25:00.002-04:00

Last night we converged downtown with a bunch of friends and friends of friends to celebrate a birthday with drinks, pizza, bowling and karaoke. I managed to eat an entire half of a pizza and bowl a strike - just one, but it was a strike.

The whole night was loads of fun. The only drawback was saying goodbye to everyone at the end of the night. Oh yeah - and recovering the next day. How is it that at the age of 28 (I'm not ashamed!), I'm too old to party until 1:30 in the morning?

Because of a well-planned nap and much caffeine, I was able to stay awake for the whole party (a rare occurrence for me), but when I woke up this morning, I was hurting. It wasn't even the alcohol consumption - neither Matt or I drank very much. It was just the lack of sleep and perhaps lifting too many heavy bowling balls, but we've been pretty much down for the count all day.

We were saved from doing housework by a call for brunch from none other than the birthday couple themselves, so we dodged the cleaning bullet. Whew! By the time we got home, we had just enough energy to make it to the couch to nap until 5. I think the most productive thing I've done all day was take Charlotte for a walk.

So the lesson for the day is that it requires a whole weekend - Saturday to prepare and Sunday to recover - just to have a night out with friends. I'm a party animal. Whoo!

The Blizzard of '08

2008-03-08T14:10:00.004-05:00

That's the scary term they're using on the news to describe today's weather. As long as you don't have to go anywhere, it's really pretty and a lot of fun outside right now.

We commemorated today's snow with a Charlotte movie. Make sure your sound is on for some true Frank Zappa awesomeness.

Chaos In My Head

2008-03-07T19:30:00.003-05:00

I know it's an awful stereotype that I'm a girl and I'm not fond of math or science, but now that I'm back in school, I can't help but make a comparison between the way I comprehend math and the way I comprehend written English.

When I read, whether it's a novel or a technical document, I don't read individual words. I don't figure out what each sentence means and then string it together with the other sentences. I don't even really see words. The second I start reading, I see a movie in my head - in color with surround sound.

Now, when I read a math problem, even when they try to put it into a little word problem with a little story about a little man doing something that requires a little math, there is no movie. The only way I can describe the type of chaos that goes on inside my head is to picture a big white room and inside that big white room are a bunch of munchkins (not unlike oompa-loompas, but maybe not quite as creepy and without songs). When a math problem is presented and numbers and letters are thrown out, these munchkins begin running off, grabbing bigger-than-life numbers and symbols and signs from the memory room where everything I've learned is stored and they throw these numbers and symbols and signs up onto the big white wall inside the big white room like giant puzzle pieces. When one arrangement doesn't work, they scramble around to try a different arrangement. Certain munchkins must run off to exchange wrong numbers and symbols and signs for assumingly correct numbers and symbols and signs. Sometimes there is method to their madness and sometimes there is not. After a varying amount of attempts, they get it right, heave a collective sigh of relief and start all over with the next problem.

Can I tell you just how exhausting that whole process is? My brain is tired.

Praise Whore

2008-02-27T20:05:00.000-05:00

You know, if it weren't for that pesky mortgage and needing to eat and clothe myself, I would totally work for a big pat on the back and a 'Nice Job!' With exclamation points. And maybe even a smiley face - that's right, an emoticon, perhaps in a bigger font ... and bold.

It's funny how a congratulations on a job well done puts a completely different spin on your day.

Snow Smells Like Donuts & Olives Taste Like Cough Syrup

2008-02-26T17:30:00.004-05:00

So it's a given that I'm weird.

I have 2 differently colored eyes, as shown by the amazing photo Matt took of me. I've had a portion of my digestive system removed because apparently I got the wrong size (I hate it when that happens - the return policy sucks). I hiccup at least once a day - sometimes more, but at least once every day. Apparently fluid behind my eye can shift, causing me to see spots and little light shows for weeks at a time (that's a new one for those of you keeping score).

I have to sleep on the side of the bed farthest from the doorway just so I can have that extra milisecond of warning if someone were to enter (you know, like the boogeyman). I treat my dog like a kid-substitute. I'm a well-educated working woman, but my all-time favorite TV show is Planet's Funniest Pets & People - I could watch that all day long.

And my favorite - I'm convinced my life will fall apart and everything in the world will go as horribly, destructively wrong as it could possibly be horribly, destructively wrong if the towels in the bathroom are hanging tag-side out and the toilet paper roll is situated with the free square underneath. That's right - weird.

But sometimes, every great once in a while when I'm not paying attention and I let my weirdness take over, I can even surprise myself.

Today I was hungry - hungry and busy. Usually when this is taking place around lunch time, I have a handy healthy salad or cabbage-filled, ready-to-go meal I can run to the break room and grab to eat at my desk. Today, there was no such healthy meal awaiting me, but there was a Wendy's calling my name. The part that surprised me was how much convincing it took on my part that my arteries wouldn't immediately clog from taking a bite out of a tasty, cheesy hamburger. Needless to say, nothing of the sort happened, but I caught myself being a little surprised after lunch when the buttons of my pants didn't go popping off from the fat that was surely repopulating and creating their own ecosystem in my belly.

So yeah - weird.

Highlights

2008-02-25T19:15:00.004-05:00

I wrote an amazing prose about the great weekend we had and then for reasons I won't go into, the post came down and now I have to recreate that excitement I felt and try to rewrite what was originally here. It would have blown you away, I promise - but for now I'll just cut it down to highlights.

Friday
Darlene and I went out for a much needed girls night. We ditched the guys and met up for drinks, dinner and a movie we know we'd never drag our significant others to see. It was a great night and we vowed to do this more often.

Saturday
I woke up literally nose-to-nose with my favorite puppy. I have no idea how long she was standing there, but she was definitely ready for us to get out of bed.

Because the weather was so nice and because Matt was going out to breakfast with a friend, Charlotte and I made a quick trip to the dog park before her morning obedience class. I love seeing dogs play in the snow and they seemed to be enjoying it, too.

The afternoon consisted of attending a good friend's wedding.

They were quite laid back about everything and wore appropriate footwear for a long day. I don't know why we didn't think of that.

And because we hadn't seen Brad and Darlene for about 12 whole hours, we were quite happy to spend the afternoon with them.

Of course, Matt & Brad had to have the super-cool-camera-duel.

After the wedding, Matt and I used the remaining hours of sunlight to take a sunset stroll at the local metro park. There were some great opportunities for photo ops and Matt took advantage of them.

Charlotte used her super sniffer to help us find additional photo ops. Unfortunately, none existed underground.

Sunday
Matt cleaned the house. How does it get any better than that?

Crock pot Challenge: Week 3 Ginger Pork

2008-02-12T18:50:00.000-05:00

Just the aroma coming off this dish while it was cooking was mouth-watering. It's a little high in sugar because of the apples and plums, but good for you nonetheless.

Ingredients

1 2-lb boneless pork shoulder roast
3 Tb quick-cooking tapioca
2 medium cooking apples, peeled and cut into 1/2" thick slices
4 medium carrots, biased cut in 1/2" pieces
1 medium onion cut into 1" chunks
1 cup pitted dry plums, quartered
1 cup chicken broth
3/4 cup apple juice or cider
1 Tb lemon juice
1 tspn ground ginger
1/4 tspn ground cinnamon
1/4 tspn ground black pepper
1/8 tspn ground cloves
dash of salt
hot couscous or rice

Trim fat from meat. Cut into 1" cubes. Place meat in 3 1/2 - 4 quart slow cooker. Sprinkle with tapioca.

Add apples, carrots, onion, dried plums, broth, apple juice, lemon juice, ginger, cinnamon, pepper, cloves & salt. Stir.

Cook on low 7-8 hours or high for 3 1/2 - 4 hours.

Phenomenon

2008-02-11T20:52:00.001-05:00

The situation:
I made the bed with freshly laundered flannel sheets over top of one silk fitted sheet.

How Matt remembers it
While on the phone,he stripped the bed of the flannel sheets and rotated the mattress. At this point, I walked in the room with one silk fitted sheet in my hand that I had brought up all the way from the basement and announced I would bring the rest later. He put the silk fitted sheet on the mattress, made note that I never came back, put the still dirty flannel sheets in the laundry basket and stored it in the hall closet. I asked him where the flannel sheets were, he pointed out the hall closet and asked me when I was bringing up the rest of the silk sheets. I ignored the question and picked up the dirty flannel sheets for laundering. While getting ready for bed later that night, he was shocked to see that I had made the bed with the flannel sheets and better yet, had put them on top of the silk fitted sheet.

I, however, do not remember any of this.

How I remember it
While on the phone, he disappeared into the bedroom and apparently stripped the mattress of the flannel sheets and flipped the mattress. Some time later, I asked him where the dirty flannel sheets were, he pointed out the hall closet and I picked up the sheets for laundering. When the sheets were clean, I made the bed (obviously on top of the one silk fitted sheet) and thought nothing of it until we compared notes at the end of the day.

There was no bringing of sheets. There was no conversation about bringing more. That entire interaction does not exist in my brain anywhere.

Apparently we both lived two completely separate afternoons. So the question is, did I completely black out for 10-20 minutes and do things that make absolutely no sense, such as bring just one sheet up from the basement (where our clean sheets are stored) and proclaim I was going to do something I never ended up doing, or did Matt create some scenario and conversation in his head that never happened? One of us is losing our mind, or being abducted by aliens for an afternoon. We're both completely dumbfounded and each swear our version is what really happened.

Two Accomplishments

2008-02-08T17:49:00.001-05:00

Matt and I finally splurged for a new camera. He's always been an amazing photographer, but didn't have a camera that was fun enough to keep his interest and I just like to take pictures.

Unfortunately, it's cold and nasty and dark outside, so our photography opportunities are few. On the bright side, we have a cute dog that likes the attention.

I'm still getting used to all the settings and I have a feeling I'm going to be reading the whole manual, but on auto, I'm enjoying non-blurry action shots.

And just because I couldn't stop pointing and clicking, here are some more:

She's cute even when she looks like an idiot with her tongue sticking out.

Ringing her I want to go outside bell. Note the paint we've sacrificed on the door so she can notify us of her every need.

So sad. Apparently she doesn't have enough toys or doesn't get enough attention. Yep - that must be it.

Cranky dog - I think she wants me to put the camera down now...

Oh yeah - and my second accomplishment - I finished the blanket I was working on! It's huuuuuuuuge. I just hate it when blanket aren't quite big enough, so I sort of over did it.

All In Perspective

2008-02-02T17:53:00.000-05:00

I really wish I had a time machine. I'd like to claim this desire is based on some need to change America's history and improve the world. But really, I'd like to go back in time and slap myself. Right about the time I started college would be a good time to hold my own intervention for myself and I would say to myself, "Self, whatever you do, don't take college too seriously. Have fun. Enjoy learning new things. Make new friends. Just don't put too much emphasis on grades." Hmmm, too bad I never warned myself about that.

I'm currently taking a college class that I had as a freshman. I'm just working on improving my math skills before I start working on my MBA classes and for the life of me, I can't figure out why I hated college so much. I remember despising this class and getting horribly frustrated that I couldn't get it. Now, in my defense for this particular class (Stats), I had a TA who couldn't speak English very well and mixed up her 5's and 7's - that did cause problems. That doesn't account for every other class I took, though.

The good news out of this, though, is that while it's not easy squeezing school time into my already full life, going to class can sometimes be a nice break. I can show up and just take in new information and let someone spoon feed it to me. And after I've learned all this great new stuff, I'm not expected to perform miracles with it or create some great new project designed to wow and impress. All I have to do is get it. I can do that.

Solution

2008-01-30T22:01:00.000-05:00

I have come up with the solution to a couple of my previously whiny emails. This topic probably falls under the category of extremely mundane (although delightfully so), but I refuse to be a whiner without trying to do something about it.

Issues:
1) I'm having trouble balancing work and school and home when I'm busy Tues, Wed, & Thur nights.
2) It's too cold to go outside and do things with my dog like take long walks and go to the park on the weekend.

Solution:
In order to answer issue 1, I'm dropping the obedience class I take Charlotte to on Wednesday nights. She's already mastered the stuff we do there - we just kept it up for the practice and because it was already paid for.

In order to answer issue 2, I'm enrolling Charlotte in a Saturday morning off-lead control class. And this off-lead control class will prepare us for a future agility class. Woo!

Tired of Winter

2008-01-27T11:44:00.001-05:00

It seems like in the Summer there's an endless list of things to do - both that fall under the category of grueling yard work (which, honestly, I could do without) and that fall under the category of fun outdoor activities.

In the Winter, though, we begin to feel just how small our house is when the cold weather prevents us from wanting to step outside our front door. I'm torn because I want to get out and do something. I'd love to take a long walk with the dog or go to the dog park. I'd love to just hang out in my backyard. Heck, the cold is even preventing me from going shopping or going to the gym because those activities require going outside where it's cold and I despise feeling cold.

I'm sure I can convince myself to do something - I just have to go figure out what that something is.

Crock Pot Challenge: Week 2 Fennel and Pear Chicken

2008-01-26T10:45:00.000-05:00

Week 2 of The Crock Pot Challenge is underway. The first time I made this recipe, I followed the directions exactly and it got a little overdone. I've made my recommendations for changes in my recipe below and this time it came out wonderfully. And the best part (at least for me) is that I put it all together in about 15 minutes and then let the crock pot do the rest.

Fennel and Pear Chicken

Ingredients:

1 medium fennel bulb, trimmed and cut into 1/2 inch thick wedges
2 6-7oz jars (drained weight) sliced mushrooms, drained
1/2 cup coarsely chopped, snipped dried pears (dried apples make a good substitute here if dried pears are not readily available)
2 tablespoons quick cooking tapioca (this is just a thickener, so you could always substitute with flour & cornstarch)
2 1/2 lbs boneless chicken thighs
3/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon dried thyme, crushed
1/2 teaspoon cracked black pepper
2 cups pear nectar (or apple juice if using dried apples) NOTE: The original recipe calls for 1 cup, but I think it gets dried out and needs the extra cup of liquid.
Hot couscous or rice (optional - I like this dish on it's own)

Brown chicken in olive oil. Then, in a 3 1/2 - 4 quart slow cooker, combine sliced fennel, mushrooms and dried pears (or apples). Sprinkle with tapioca.

Add chicken thighs. Sprinkle with salt, thyme, and pepper. Pour pear nectar (or apple juice) over mixture.

Cover and cook on low heat 7-8 hours or high heat 3 1/2 - 4 hours. Cook long enough that pear nectar or apple juice caramelizes slightly, but not so long that the chicken dries out.

Serve over couscous or rice and garnish with fennel tops.

Day In Photos

2008-01-26T10:28:00.000-05:00

As promised, Dad's 60th birthday party was a blast. I love telling and hearing stories from when Mom and Dad were young and my brother and I were the same age my nieces and nephew are now. Every time we get together, at least one of us learns something new about the good old days. Usually it's my parents hearing about what kind of trouble we got into that we're just now confessing.

My nephew is turning into quite the cheese ball in front of the camera, so why not indulge his inner-cheesiness and my need to take photos?

He also borrowed the camera and took a few photos on his own. This photo-journalistic-style picture is my favorite. I think I might start using him as my stealth photographer since I can't seem to ever get photos where people aren't posing and smiling.

After the party, Matt and I went home to do some housework where I ran across this awesome green, pointy-top hat. I couldn't resist throwing it on Charlotte just for kicks. She was not amused and refused to show her face.

She finally relented to pose when I agreed to turn the flash off.

All Is Well - Once Again

2008-01-23T19:19:00.001-05:00

So whatever demon that temporarily possessed my normally well-behaved dog has been banished from our house and Matt & I were allowed a full night of blissful sleep last night. And for her good behavior, Charlotte was lavished with praise and soon thereafter swooped off to doggie daycare to ensure yet another good night of sleep.

In good news, today is my Dad's birthday. Happy Birthday Dad! We'll be celebrating tonight at my brother's house, which means the whole family is getting together and that's always a good time.

And at the moment, I've been treated with a day off. The trade off is that I have to stay in the house where the doors are open because we're having insulation blown into our attic. Did I mention that it's 6 degrees here today? Yay for blankets!

Sleepless Night

2008-01-22T16:48:00.000-05:00

10pm
Go to bed, looking forward to a good night of sleep before returning to work after a 3-day weekend.

11pm
Matt comes to bed. I wake up – roll over and go back to sleep.

1:30am
Charlotte paces around our bed and whines. Matt swears she was outside for 20 minutes before he came to bed. We both roll to the middle so she can’t lick us and we try to ignore her. She is not so easily swayed, so Matt gets up to find out what’s wrong. She has water and she doesn’t ring the I-want-to-go-outside-bell, so he puts her in her cage in the hope that we can now sleep in peace and he comes back to bed.

1:45am
Charlotte paces in her cage and whines. I can’t sleep through it, so I get up and let her out of her cage. She sits in front of me and paws the air like she’s trying to tell me something, but I don’t speak dog, so I let her outside. Ten minutes later, she comes in and accepts her fate back in the cage.

3:30am
More whining. I get up again as it hasn’t woken Matt up yet and I really want him to get some sleep in his post-flu recovery. I let Charlotte out of her cage and there’s more air-pawing. I still don’t understand. Evidently Matt has woken up and he offers the advice that I should let her outside the front door on her long leash so I can see what she’s doing as we’re now convinced she’s not sick or dying and is just bored or obsessed with something in the backyard.

I get the leash out and Charlotte thinks we’re going for an early morning walk. No luck, pooch. She runs out into the front yard and when I don’t follow, she looks back as if to say, What? You’re not coming? This is lame – I’m coming back in. She proceeds to mope back to the front door and sits her butt down facing away from me and if she had arms, they would be folded across her chest and if she had lips, they would be pouting.

She comes back in and settles on her pillow. Hoping the drama is over for the night, I leave here there and shut the bedroom door. Pacing around on her pillow would be quieter than pacing around in her cage and at this point, I’m just looking to mute the dog.

5:00am
We awake to the I-want-to-go-outside-bell that we’re now cursing ourselves for teaching her to ring. Matt is officially furious. I’m pretty sure he is graciously giving her one last chance to go outside via the front door where he can witness that she doesn’t have to pee and that she’s taking full advantage of our hypochondria-prone nature by convincing us that if we don’t come rushing to her side immediately, she’s going to die and it will be horrible and won’t we feel terrible for not rushing to her side when we find her dead in the morning from not going outside?

At this point, the only thing left to do is scare her into submission. Matt gives her a tongue-lashing that even makes me cower. I’m sure all she understands of his graphic but well-phrased threats is BLAH! BLAH BLAH BLAH BLAH!!!, but apparently screaming transcends all language barriers and we don’t hear a peep from her for the rest of the night and we relish in our hour of sleep.

Refreshed

2008-01-20T15:07:00.000-05:00

I've slept. I've made and eaten real food. I've accomplished some home improvement and massive housecleaning. I've spent time with my husband and I've been outside while the sun was still up. I'm feeling very refreshed.

Matt and I decided that to celebrate the end of such a draining week, we'd treat ourselves to pancakes for breakfast. We've been waiting for the right moment to experiment with Badder Blaster. This stuff is really cool and actually quite organic. It makes for some really fluffy, tasty pancakes. The best part is, now we can make shapes out of our pancakes. Oh, how we have missed out all these years eating round pancakes. A whole new world of writing our names and creating shapes out of our food has been opened up for us this morning. You're never too old to play with your food.

Charlotte also joined in with the relaxing and found herself a nice patch of sunshine to take her post-full-night-of-sleep nap this morning. Because, you know, that whole sleeping thing can really take it out of you sometimes.

Perfect Timing

2008-01-20T14:43:00.000-05:00

A friend of mine just started a Flickr group all about crock pot cooking. As it turns out, there's a ton of us full-time working women who don't have all the time in the world to whip up gourmet meals and are happy to turn to the crock pot. If you're interested, join the Flickr group here.

For the first week's challenge, I'm throwin' my favorite recipe out there. Ratatouille is quick and easy and requires very little mess. I also enjoy incorporating differently colored foods into my diet - just seeing all those colors and fresh foods perks me up a little. And for a meatless dish, this is very filling.

Per the challenge guidelines, here's the recipe:
Ratatouille
Ingredients -

3 cups eggplant (peeled if desired)
1 cup coarsely chopped yellow summer squash or zucchini
1 cup coarsely chopped tomato
1 8oz can no-salt-added tomato sauce
1/2 - 3/4 cup coarsely chopped sweet red pepper or green pepper
1/2 cup finely chopped onion
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon ground black pepper
2 cloves garlic, minced
2 tablespoons snipped fresh basil (or 2 teaspoons dry basil)
4 tablespoons Parmesan cheese

In a 3-4 quart cooker, combine eggplant, squash, chopped tomato, tomato sauce, sweet pepper, onion, salt, black pepper and garlic. (If using dry basil, add now)

Cook and cover on low-heat for 4 1/2 to 5 hours or on high for 2 to 2 1/2 hours. If no heat setting is available, cook for 4 1/2 to 5 hours.

Sprinkle with Parmesan cheese and serve with crusty bread or sourdough rolls.

And just to throw in my own addition, I like to add some red pepper flake at the same time as the rest of the seasonings just for some heat and extra flavor.

Enjoy!

Totally Brain Dead

2008-01-17T17:26:00.000-05:00

After those 14 hour work days and all the scrambling around I did, my brain has officially gone on strike. My brain refused to register the alarm going off this morning and has apparently decided that the best way to deal with the storm of crap over the last week is to completely block out the month of January and stand firmly on the idea that we're already into the month of February. I had an interesting morning of planning projects, thinking that today was February-something-or-other. I didn't really place a number to today's date in my mind - I was just floating around in February-land, temporarily losing touch with reality.

I'm getting ready for a nice, extended 3-day weekend during which time I'll hopefully be able to jump start my senses and return to normalcy.

Torn

2008-01-16T20:31:00.000-05:00

I am not cut out to work 14 hour days.

I am especially not cut out to work 14 hour days while I'm in school.

I'm also not cut out to work 14 hour days while I'm in school and while I have a sick husband at home who needs taken care of.

And I'm not cut out to work 14 hour days while I'm in school and while I have a sick husband at home who needs taken care of and while I have a hyper puppy who needs attention, walks and playtime.

So this was a busy week. Many hours were worked, classes were skipped, home was ignored and now I'm trying to figure out how to catch up.

What I really want to know, though, is how one comes down off of an incredibly long and stressful, edge-of-your-seat, sliding-under-the-deadline, executives-counting-on-you, adrenaline-pumping, kick-some-ass-around-the-office kind of day enough to show up at home all sunshine and cheer to take care of someone else and come down from all that during a 10 minute commute. How do you shrug that off in 10 minutes? I could take the long way home, but then that cuts even more into my take-care-of-house-and-husband time.

Tonight I took the selfish road and made a very therapeutic trip to the dog park with Charlotte. She needed the exercise and I desperately needed to be around someone who didn't need something from me or wasn't stressed or angry or sick. Sometimes I need to surround myself with people who are happy just for the sake of being happy.

Thus ends my freakout and rant. Tomorrow shall be a much better day.

Becoming a Whole Number

2008-01-13T12:22:00.000-05:00

Charlotte turns 1 whole year old today. Happy Birthday Charlotte!!!

We celebrated with a new squeaker toy, a new bone, a birthday cannoli and Animal Planet's Funniest Videos.

This year has gone by fast, but Charlotte has still managed to accomplish a lot in her 1 year:

She became house trained in 2 days and has even learned to ring a bell when she wants to go outside.

We found out the hard way that she's lactose intolerant despite her desperate love affair with cheese. And if she smells that you've recently eaten this forbidden treat, she will attempt to climb inside your mouth to find what was rightfully hers.

She has redecorated our family room on the premise that a window is for looking outside, not looking at blinds. Just to prove her decorating genius, she proceeded to chew the bottom few slats off our brand new blinds.

She has come to the conclusion that on the weekends, 7am is a perfectly acceptable hour to wake up and if we're still in bed, she better poke us repeatedly with a cold nose to make sure we're still alive. Whereas on weekdays, if our alarm fails to go off and we oversleep, she's courteous enough to leave us to our business of sleeping for as long as our hearts desire.

She has also come to the conclusion that since she enjoys some nice petting time, I must enjoy it equally as much. So on those weekday mornings when she didn't come wake us up and I go to visit her on her pillow in the family room, she will pet my head with her little paw and try to lick the sleep out of my eyes.

She has become my guardian while I workout in the basement, dutifully stationing herself in front of my stationary bike and staring at the basement stairs, ready to launch a verbal attack on any feet she may see venture down.

She learned that she can trick us into scratching her butt by placing her cute little head and fuzzy ears underneath our hands where it would be impossible not to give her a good scratch. And just when you start thinking that you're dog is oh,-so-cute with her velvety ears, she maneuvers herself around and you're scratching dog butt.

She has learned to read a calendar and knows that on Saturdays, we go to the dog park. Heaven forbid I take the time to drink some coffee or get dressed before we leave. And when we start driving down the park's driveway, she jumps up to stare out the window and I swear to you she's looking to see how many dogs are already there for her to play with.

She learned to swim at the dog park and even transferred this new skill to swimming some laps at the local pool.

She has made the all-important decision that Animal Planet is her favorite television station to watch. Besides dogs and wolves, she's really into learning about penguins.

She discovered snow for the first time and discovered that she loves snow and everything about snow and why can't we have snow all year 'round?

So happy first birthday, Charlotte! There's many more years of spoiling to come.

Divide and Conquer

2008-01-12T11:56:00.000-05:00

There's so much going on this weekend, Matt and I have decided to split up and individually represent The Mowrys. I'm off to my cousin's son's first birthday party. This one is very exciting because they just adopted him from Guatemala a few months ago, so this will be the first time I get to really see them as a fully functioning family since they brought him home.

Matt is headed out of town to celebrate a friend's 30th birthday with much booze and little sleep.

Can I just tell you how accurate our ambassador appointments have been assigned? Little kids and chaos are not really Matt's cup or tea, whereas I LOVE to see little ones running around and having a great time. Admittedly, I'm very happy to give them back to their parents at the end of the event, but I have fun nonetheless.

On the flip side, Matt really digs the bar scene and staying up late with a bunch of friends. Me? I enjoy it until about 10pm. I'm good at 9:59pm, then once the clock hits 10, I immediately crash. I become whiny and I don't like to be whiny, so I'm whiny that I'm whiny. I'm a real buzz kill sometimes. Now, if they wanted to come over at 7am and party, I'd be all over that. I'm just too much of a morning person to stay up late.

Let the countdown begin

2008-01-08T20:50:00.000-05:00

It didn't take me very long to completely forget that I had made a list of resolutions last January 1st. Luckily, I really did plan to do those things and stick to them.

1. Work less. I have worked less. I'm leaving on time and even a little early when I work through lunch sometimes. Turns out there's a whole world out there after working hours. Who knew?

2. Get back into tri-training - heh, not so much. I had to set this one aside to focus on all the others.

3. Blog more - so I come and go, but I'm here now!

4. Go back to school and get my Masters. Now this has been my big accomplishment for the last year. It's not as easy as signing up for a class and just strolling through the doors. I spent months just studying for the entrance exam. And when I say study, I mean buy all the 'Math for Dummies' books I could get my hands on and teach myself math skills I had never learned in school. I took practice test upon practice test and then took them again. I took a 4 hour exam with no calculators - just a little dry-erase pad and a marker. Luckily, all the hard work paid off and I was accepted. Yesterday was the very momentous first day of school - the countdown has officially begun to when I'll be done with school. And yes - that is how I'm looking at it.

5. Try my hand at this thing called cooking. Depending on your view of cooking, this may or may not count, but I have become the Queen of the Crockpot. I'm totally in love with the crockpot. Dump stuff in, turn it on, go to work and when you come home, voila! Dinner's ready! It's awesome. And the best part is the leftovers from each dinner will last me weeks of lunches. Leftovers rock. And there's that whole concept of being able to contribute to the marriage and providing dinners for my husband - that's nice, too. But really, leftovers rock.

6. Get a dog. You've already heard too much about my dog, but if you haven't seen too much, there are plenty of photos.

Energy needed - willing to trade for sloth

2008-01-08T08:22:00.000-05:00

For the most part, Matt & I balance each other out quite nicely. When I'm feeling unmotivated, he's Mr. Motivation. When he's feeling down, I'm usually happy enough to bring him out of it.

This weekend, though, we were hit with the standard post-holiday sniffles and neither one of us felt like we had an ounce of energy. There were plenty of things we needed to do, but neither one of us could kick the other one's butt off the couch because that would require some kind of physical movement.

And then it suddenly dawned on me - we are the adults. There's no Mom hovering over us telling us to make our bed or dust the furniture. If we decide not to do it, it's not going not going to get done. When did that happen?

So if neither Matt nor I are feeling any motivation to be productive, I figure that leaves the dog. And that probably explains why our major accomplishments on Sunday were taking two long walks in the unseasonably warm weather.

Indoor weekend

2008-01-06T11:27:00.001-05:00

It's cold and rainy and dreary and gross outside, so most of our weekend took place in the house, in our pajamas. Why not?

And what better day to make a giant pot of soup than on a cold and rainy day? Every 2-person household needs 12 quarts of vegetable soup, right? Well, it makes good leftovers and I'm all about leftovers.

Just to spread the pajamas fun, our friends came over for an extended Christmas celebration. Jessie was one of three recipients to receive all of my old Barbie toys. I always had elaborate dreams of passing these toys down to my kids, but at 28, I'm unwilling to keep these boxes and boxes of Barbie stuff in my basement any longer and these girls really enjoyed getting so many toys all at once. Everybody's happy.

And of course, there were some lovins for Charlotte. She just ate up the special attention - you know, because she's so neglected most of the time.

Too cold

2008-01-03T19:14:00.000-05:00

It was a little too cold to be outside, but Charlotte had some puppy energy to burn off and she promised to keep me entertained - as always, she came through.

New Year's Resolutions

2008-01-02T13:54:00.000-05:00

Matt & I managed to make one New Year's resolution this year - every year on New Year's Day, we would be as slothful as possible.

We started the new year out right by staying our pajamas all day, watching a CSI Miami marathon on TV and eating leftovers from the previous night's party. Thank goodness for my Grandmother's birthday that evening, otherwise we probably never would have changed into real clothes and seen the light of day.

Last year was the Ugly Betty marathon and two years in a row of true slothfulness makes an official tradition. Next year, we celebrate with the director's, uncut Lord of the Rings movies.

Rising from the dead?

2008-01-01T21:58:00.000-05:00

Ok, so maybe I can't accept that my blog is totally dead yet. Perhaps now that I've driven away all of my regular visitors with lack of updated posts, there will be less pressure to be witty, entertaining and grammatically correct.

I will warn any remaining visitors of a few things:
1) I have lost some of my meager HTML skills and don't currently have the patience to work on them.

2) This is no longer a fitness-heavy blog and may, at times, border on a pet-centered blog due to my unbelievably cute dog.

3) I will probably still come and go at random intervals, but hey - such is life.

I leave you with the reason I have to keep this post short. The puppy wants to play - how do you say 'no' to that face?

A picture's worth a thousand words

2007-12-18T21:56:00.000-05:00

So my blog has died a slow, slow death. My life is now documented by photos on my flickr account. Feel free to look around and catch up on our goings-on.

Quick update - we did get a puppy. Rescued from the pound, but born in the pound, so she came to us with no previous abandonment or abuse issues. She's the best dog ever and I mean that with all sincerity. She's even going to pass her Good Canine Citizens Test in February. That's right - my dog rocks. Check her out!

Too much cuteness

2007-03-13T19:33:00.000-04:00

This weekend didn't quite mark the end of a work week for me as much as it should have. I didn't step foot out of the office until 9pm Friday night and I worked intermittently all weekend. I did, however, get a round of applause for all my hard work on Monday morning. That was nice.

We did make time to puppy shop while the weather was nice. We almost went home with a puppy Rottweiler cleverly disguised as a German Shepherd mix. Thank goodness for retired veterinarian friends. On the way home, we stopped by the local pound to see what was there and while I want to be that person who saves a dog from the pound, I'm not sure I can be that person who ever goes back to the pound. The minute I walk in, I hear that voiceover from the Pedigree dog food commercial and start to get a little sniffly. I'm very proud of us, though, for making it through the whole day without caving and bringing home a dog just because it's cute. We are determined to be practical and smart in the face of wagging tails, big lovey eyes and wet noses.

And just because puppies aren't cute enough on their own, we got to visit some friends and their newborn baby girl and give away some of my hats that I'm so proud of. Both parents are doing well and are absolutely wonderful with their new little bundle of joy.

Keeping My Hands Busy

2007-03-08T21:16:00.000-05:00

I've been using the incredibly cold weather as an excuse to stay inside, clean my house, and knit up a storm. I finished a giant scarf (picture to come later) and immediately launched into baby hats. Not only do these little hats make great gifts for all the people I know who are about to have the first, second or third child, they're also a great project to experiment with since they're so small. I can crank one of these cuties out in an afternoon, so there's no great time commitment and no real loss if I screw something up and have to pull a bunch of rows out.

So if you're expecting a wee one, watch out. I've learned how to knit shapes - and not just shapes that actually look like something, but shapes I can give away. You will be dumped on with many tiny knitted items.

The Innocent Shall Remain Nameless

2007-02-27T19:49:00.000-05:00

I just have to admit that I'm very proud to live in the house where all the guys want to hang out. Does that sound weird? I absolutely love that some of our single guy friends consider our house a default location to chill on the weekends to play video games and board games while some of the married guys will mosey on over if they need a few quiet moments after helping a houseful of kids with their homework.

I've always found it easier to get along with guys than girls. With the exception of a few tomboys, the majority of my friends have always been male. Give me pizza, beer and video games and I'm content for the night. I am in no way comfortable in dress clothes, my hair just begs to be pulled back in a ponytail and there is no controlling my incredibly loud laugh in a high-class social scene. If there is no belching contest, I cannot wholly be myself.

In other news, my friends and I went to see the new James Bond movie Friday night. My dad always enjoyed Bond flicks, so I grew up on them and was always partial to Connery. Casino Royale is officially the best non-Connery James Bond movie I've seen. I may just have to show up on my parents' doorstep with popcorn and movie in hand.

And in final news, since my ability to cook is nil, and Matt is currently distracted helping one of the aforementioned guy friends move furniture (they're good for that, too) I'm currently sucking down raisins for dinner until my chef/mechanic/landscaper/repairman/IT support/all around wonderful husband returns to feed me.

So Many Toys, So Little Time

2007-02-21T21:18:00.000-05:00

Well, we did it. We finally did it. It only took a few days, but we managed to make the outstanding, physically engaging, active video game that is the Wii a lazy activity. I knew if anyone could do it, we could.

After a full day of work, we decided we were just too tired (ok, I decided I was too tired) to get up for my turn at bowling and discovered that at just the right angle, dangling your arm from the side of the couch with just enough room to swing, you can still bowl a pretty decent game without ever standing up. Admittedly, Matt started it when he golfed while sitting down last night. It's just too tempting.

Tomorrow - tomorrow we will box and play tennis is enjoy our physical activity with the Wii, but right now I'd just like to enjoy the bliss of sitting still for a few minutes.

On a side note, Matt was given a brand new iPod shuffle that he promptly passed on to me because he's just that kind of wonderful man. It's just too cute. I can't wait to take it running with me. Now when I trip on the sidewalk and fall flat on my face, I won't drop my iPod because I won't be carrying it - it clips directly to your clothes. I guess the goal now is to not land on it.

Wiiiiiiiiiiii!!!!!!

2007-02-19T21:09:00.001-05:00

Long weekends are amazing. Knowing you have that extra day just makes everything so much more relaxing. Matt and I have been hangin' with each other all weekend and we wouldn't have it any other way.

Quotes of the weekend
If cleaning is going to be fun, it needs a soundtrack.
Someday, you should use your creative powers for good and not evil.
I've been playing video games all night and I can't move my arms!

New obsession
The Nintendo Wii. I laughed after I heard that someone lost 20 lbs after playing this for 2 hours a day, but I gotta tell ya, after playing golf and tennis and after bowling and boxing, I'm exhausted. So far, my favorite is the boxing. I'm surprisingly quite good at it - apparently, I have some built up aggression and I enjoy pounding people's faces in.

We've made Miis (your own player that you can make to your likeness with very eery accurateness) for ourselves, my parents and some of our friends. I can't wait to get everyone I know over here to play.

Lesson of the day
If you're going to be swinging your arms around the room with extreme ferocity, do not leave a full mug of black coffee sitting next to your white couch. Thank goodness for Scotchguard.

Recycled Romance

2007-02-17T10:29:00.000-05:00

I have to say, one of the perks about Valentine's Day is being able to recycle the romance. A quickly thrown together Friday night dinner easily becomes dinner by candlelight with flowers and all the fixins.

All you have to do is not clean your dining room after the Valentine's Day celebration. Light a few candles, pour two glasses of wine and voila! Instant romance. We're thinking of not cleaning and dragging this out for a week.

Guest Post!

2007-02-16T21:08:00.000-05:00

Okay, the header's fixed for you Safari users (go you!) Here's something for you to play with while I'm curing Cancer.

Love and kisses,
Matt

A & M Forever

2007-02-15T21:28:00.000-05:00

So I haven't cured Cancer or ended the war, but I did finally design my own heading for this blog. I'm still restricted to working within the confines of blogger, but hey - I'm proud.

Ok - I lied. Not so proud after viewing the site in Safari. Check it out in Firefox if you have access while I fix the mess that is Safari.

Our first Valentine's Day was wonderfully romantic, but not in that mushy, Hallmark kind of way. After braving the treacherous roads to get home from work, I found this layout waiting for me.

There was a delicious steak dinner, a fabulously cheesy valentine, petit fours, and a bottle of champagne. Most importantly, a relaxing evening with my husband. There are just never enough of those.

The Things I Do For Love

2007-02-11T10:18:00.001-05:00

In preparation of Valentine's Day, I've been working on a batch of the only cookies I've found that you can successfully remove all the sugar from and still have a great tasting cookie with the same texture. That's right - I'm making sugarless sugar cookies. Mmmm, I can just taste the Splendarific irony.

For anyone who really gets into their sugar-free baking, here's a tip I learned. Splenda is considered a dry good. It won't cream with your butter and it really won't cream with the eggs. You'll still come out with good tasting cookies, but they'll either be too flaky from not creaming or they'll be a little rubbery and the end result will have some bubbles from over-beating. I'm still working on the best way to handle the sugarless baking.

My theory on cookie baking is that if you're going to make a mess of your kitchen, you might as well bake a tone of cookies to make it worth your while. So now I have about 75-100 heart-shaped cookies in my kitchen, including these itsy bitsy ones that are awesome because they're so small, you don't feel bad about eating more than one. It's like eating the crumbs - it doesn't count.

Now all I need is a sugar-free icing that doesn't taste like plastic pudding.