Christmas Eve Blizzard 2009

I wish I had clever titles.

We spent last weekend in Tulsa attending the Christmas Train and hanging out at the in-laws.Rashad, Crysta, Ashley, John, Megan & Stephen

Phyillis, John, Janet, Scott


This event is put on by Tulsa's Church On The Move. They have taken a old west town themed camp area in Dry Gulch USA and made it into a really festive holiday attraction. There are cute shops to look at, a few places to eat, go-karts, bumper cars, and of course the Christmas Train. It's a short 5 minute ride that takes you along a journey of Jesus' life through large painting and real life scenes from his life like the Nativity Scene, Crucifixion , and Resurrection. There was live sheep and everything! It was actually all pretty neat. Dominic would have absolutely LOVED the train...that's why I took a video.

I also sorta got my first unofficial Christmas gift. Janet gave me her old sewing machine! Her mother gave her hers so you could say she had a spare one that she was happy to pass on to me. Now I can do all my sewing at my own house. Only bad part is I can't go crying to my mom when something breaks or doesn't work right, now that I won't be using hers very often.

One more thing....I started work with a Temp. assignment this week. It's with Midland Mortgage which is part of Midfirst Bank. I file. Literally. All day long. I file hundreds of mortgagey papers into their files. At least I am busy and I am getting more money, but I'm on my feet all day. The first day I wore heels because I knew I had to dress nice and I didn't know what I was going to be doing. Bad idea. My legs hurt so bad the whole day and night.

I also had an interview with a temp-to-hire position at Chesapeake Energy today. It went really well and it would be FANTASTIC if I got the job. Say a prayer!!!!

Merry Christmas!

All tied with a bow.

I have one more gift to wrap. Then it's off to the post office and waiting until Christmas morning.

Thanksgiving

I know the video is small but the audio wouldn't load with YouTube because of copyright issues. So anyway....here's the movie on my blog!!!

Last Batch

I just pulled these peppers off the plant last week, and pulled 4 more yesterday. I can't believe it's almost Thanksgiving and I'm still getting fresh green peppers. I think it was the last batch though. I have plenty buds still, but it's too cold now. Growing these was so much fun, and I can't wait until next year to do it again!

Do you see what I see?

Do you see that? Look, right above this post title. Yes, in little letters. It is almost 6 months until we leave for South Africa. Nothing is planned. But at least we will get there and have a place to stay...for the second half of our trip. crap. I have a lot to do.


I wouldn't mind seeing an elephant..but I hope this doesn't happen.

promises promises

I will go run tomorrow. I will. No matter what....I will go run tomorrow.

Lemons

I made this Lemon Caper Chicken last night for dinner. Next time it will be better. It looks quite delicious and gourmet...but had way too much Lemon flavor. We ate it very fast with sour looks on our face. It was really easy to make, so next time I can use my own discretion as to how much lemon it actually needs.

Trash day was today and so yesterday afternoon I finishing digging away this random dirt mound in our front yard to put in the trash bin along with some branches from a bush. Well apparently I filled the bin too much and it was too heavy. I came home this afternoon to see the bin all bent out of shape and fallen over in the street with everything still in it. crap.

My mom was nice enough to let me come long an a mani/pedi outing and I am so thankful I have nice painted nails now.

That is all.

I told you I had the crafting bug....

I made this little tote bag yesterday. I just got super inspired from seeing this. It was not as easy as she makes it sound since it literally took me from 10:00 a.m to 4:30 p.m. Luckily my mom talked me out of doing the piping...and hey, the lining fabric made a nice border anyway.

I also made this today. Sitting at that chair is way more comfortable when you have some support. Take an old throw pillow, recover it, and walah!!!

Frustrating....

Today was an all around really frustrating day. However, in the end my project is finished and I'm having tea...so things are good right now.

First off...I could not fall asleep last night for the life of me.

Here's why:

Problem #1: I was thinking about 15 different things while trying to fall asleep and I just kept repeating themselves in my mind, I guess because I didn't want to forget about them in the morning.

Solution #1: Got up and wrote them all down to try and clear my mind. It worked for a few minutes.

Problem #2: After being so cold in bed while my husband was gone, I remembered that he is furnace, so I was really hot. We had the fan on, which helped, but I also didn't like feeling the breeze on my face.

Solution #2: Put some shorts on, and tried to cover my face with the blanket, but not my nose because that makes me feel clastrophobic.

Problem #3: The neighbors across the street have really bright outdoor lighting on their garage which was making me room brighter than I'd like it at night.

Solution #3: See if turning the blinds up instead of down would help....not really.

Problem #4: I simply just could not get comfortable, nor were my eyelids staying closed. I was also getting hungry by now since it had been 2 hours since I had gotten in to bed.

Solution #4: Get up and go do something and try to get more tired.

Finally...at 3a.m. I came to bed. By 3:15 I was finally asleep.

I didn't wake up until 11:30.. a bit over 8 hours, but my morning was also all gone. Which was not the plan for the day. In the afternoon was I able to go to the fabric store and by some fabric for the 3 crafts I plan on making soon. They didn't really have a good selection of what I was looking for, but I made do and got it all on sale which is a plus.

I came home, half the laundry wasn't folded yet, dishes were still out, and I still haven't swept my floor in like a week. All of that just kind of irked me. First project was to recover my office chair. Easy right?! Take it apart, staple on new fabric, put back together. Right.....

Staple Guns do not work on really tough plastic. I got emotional over this. My easy project suddenly just got really annoying. I cried.

Stephen wants to solve my problem, so we go to Hobby Lobby and buy hot glue sticks because that will surely work. We are super hungry so we had dinner at Chick-Fil-A and it was really good, but we also talked about my job search and that made me emotional, and I cried.

We came home, I hot glued the chair, Stephen put it together, and now everything is fine.

This could be multiple posts, but I'll just do one.

I've been obsessed with redoing our garden area. First I raked and pulled out all the weeds and grasses that were growing wild in there. Then I tilled all the dirt and debated whether to plant my tulip bulbs and put mulch down and just be done with it until spring, or just tear it all out, get the shape how I want it and then plant my bulbs and start over in the spring. I think it's obvious by the pictures which one I chose. Now I just need some serious help making my vision come to life considering i know nothing about plants.

























We are still working on getting the middle bush out. Its root system is horrendous!! The crepe mrytle on the right is staying however.

Stephen and my Dad loaded a bunch of free firewood to our house last weekend. There is more than this now...but I think we are stocked for the next three years.

























So I finally discovered Dr. Mario on the Wii after probably 15 years of not being able to play it on the old Nintendo. I'm addicted, my mother-in-law is addicted and my parents are really addicted. We have been known to have many "quick challenges" in one night. And the best part about this is that we can play eachother online!!!

The finished Bathroom!!!!!

The beautiful after!!!

Saturday

So some awesome things happened today and one scary thing happened.

We decided in the morning that we would head over to my parents house and watch the OSU football game since we don't get espn on our antenna tv. I tried calling my Dad to let him know but could not get a hold of him. Despite this, we headed over there anyway. I tried calling him again and still couldn't get a hold of it. Hmmm...interesting. I wonder where he could be. Not that he doesn't have a life or anything. This is not the scary thing that happened today. I called my Mom, who is in Georgia visiting her sister and she told me he was at a wedding. Okay...cool.

So OSU won our game...it was a bit sloppy but we won. I saw Stewey on tv and rewound it to show my Dad and then texted Stewey to let her know. She is a true Cowboy fan going to the game and all. I have to admit, knowing my husband who really likes to watch College football, hence then knowing that we'd be watching A LOT of football today, scrapbooked during most of it. But I am proud to say that I have finally finished my Honeymoon scrapbook. It's fairly amateur but I really like it.

We then went to church on Saturday evening. I haven't done that in FOREVER. It was a small crowd compared to our normal time of 11:30. Yeah..I still like sleeping in on my weekends and that time seems to work for us. Since Brian was coming home and since I had just shown my Dad the Dr. Mario game on his wii, we headed back for more football, some "quick challenge" games during halftimes, and me catching up on Project Runway.

After all this, a full day of being away from home, which was pretty fun and relaxing because i didn't have to look at or deal with the pile of dirty dishes and clothes at my house, we came home to realize that our garage door had been open the ENTIRE day. That's a little scary.

More Weddings....

These are pictures of people I know who have gotten married since I have. Enjoy the awesomeness.Me and Ashley at her wedding. She was my maid of honor.

My cousin Lindsay and her husband Steven saying their vows.

I had to add this picture of Lindsay because I think it is gorgeous.

Weddings!!!

Well man..I said that September was going to be wedding month and here it is almost October and I haven't posted a darn thing about weddings. Well, better late than never.This is my favorite picture of me and the girls

I also really like this picture of Stephen. He's probably thinking, oh no...what have I gotten myself into...or that he loves me.

I loved all the flowers I chose for my wedding and the colors were amazing for the fall!
Here's a crazy picture to remind you of all the fun you had!!!!

Observations of being at home: Television

Since I've been unemployed I spend a lot of time at home. Sometimes I like to take a break from job searching and everything to watch a little telly. Mind you, we don't have cable so there is almost never anything good on. Here are my observations:

1) The View, with it's constant chatter is really annoying. And why is Kate Gosselin a guest host?

2) Dr. Oz is stupid. I watched one show, okay one segment of one show, to see what the hype was about and it was just lame. It's like they threw together a bunch of random topics at the last minute and then made people feel awkward while talking about them for 2 minutes.

3) Drew Carey's new hair-do is really gross. He also doesn't fit the role of being the host of Price is Right very well. It's like bbq sauce and carrots...they don't go.

4) Soap Operas are silly.

5) I have sometimes caught myself literally spending 10 minutes watching completely pointless infomercials. Abcircle Pro, some awesome Weed Eater, Hip Hop Abs, A thing that works the muscles in your neck, Magic Bullet, Lifestyle Lift, Swivel Sweeper, etc.

5) The Today show is kind of fun, but checking the weather every 8 minutes gets really old. I feel sorry for the weathermen in your local area that have to stand by and do that for 2 hours.

6) Ellen is the best thing to happen to morning television. And so is Tivo so I can watch it whenever I want.

7) Family Fued is pretty awesome and a great way to wind down at the end of the day. You can even kinda play along. I don't know the host's name but he's perfect for the job.

8) This anchor on Fox25 needs a new haircut.








9) This guy is my favorite news guy.










He literally tells the news just like it is and that is refreshing, unlike Kevin Ogle who is just down right obnoxious.

10) I have to go to my parents house to watch Project Runway. Love that show!!!

11) Network television is still a saving grace at primetime though. Here is what I have planned to record for this fall season.
- Biggest Loser
- The Office
- Community
- Mercy (I'll give it a shot)
- House
- Ellen
- Flashforward (we are intrigued to see what people saw in their future)

No Title

For dinner, I just made this really awesome chicken soup with wild rice and it was amazing! And we have leftovers which makes it doubly amazing. It is a Rachel Ray recipe that I got from this blog. Speaking of Rachel Ray...have you noticed that every.single.one. of her recipes calls for that apparently oh.so.vital. EVOO (extra virgin olive oil for you non rachel ray peeps) ?! Sheesh...it's like the food can't cook without it. All I'm saying is that 95% of the time you probably don't need it.

A while back I remember my running group discussing trying out a new route for our runs, but we didn't know how far they would take us. Someone suggested they would try and find something online that would map their run. Well go figure...today I finally googled "map my run". Low and behold, the site is pretty cool. I suggest all you people who walk or run or even bike to check it out!!!!

This past weekend, my family did some serious football tailgating. And by that I mean, eat ribs, drink beer, and play ladder ball.
And finally the moment we have all been waiting for...............................the final placement of tile!!!!!! With only this much thin set remaining.....

Happenings as of late.

My green pepper plants are making me so proud. I have about 23+ growing right now. Last week we were able to harvest two of them and eat them that night all grilled up. They were so delicous!!!!
Stephen and I ran in our first 10k at Lake Hefner on the 12th. Stephen ran a 56:36 and I ran a 1:07:57. Pretty darn good for 6.2 miles in humidity I'd say. That's the farthest I had ever ran, and I'm so thankful the course was flat. There wasn't as many people attending as I thought there would be, so I'm grateful that I was still able to pace with people that go my speed. What's my speed you ask...about a 9-10 minute mile.
My next race is going to be the Juke Joint Jog in Stillwater on Oct. 24. It's only a 5k but I'm going to shoot to come in under 30 minutes. I've got to shave 2 minutes off my previous 5k time!! I'm hoping all this training for a 10k is going to pay off!

To celebrate our 2 year wedding anniversary we went to The Melting Pot. I had never eaten there before and it was awesome. Probably really overpriced, but heck..for a special occasion I didn't really care. I love the dress I was wearing too. And you better believe that I bought it, wore it and returned it the next day. I'm so bad.
And I know you've been oh so curious about our bathroom project. We're almost done!!! I know I keep saying that, but really we are. We're going to have all the tile finished and grouted by Sunday afternoon. We installed the vanity and the granite guy has come by and measured for our countertop. So seriously...we just might have a usable bathroom in two weeks!!!!!

Slacker

I've been slacking on my post this past week and half. I'm sorry. I will post some tomorrow.

Bye.

Food Friday

Comfort Food. Totally awesome.

For as long as I can remember, I have loved grilled cheese sandwiches. The trick to making them awesome is by using Monterey Jack cheese. When I was little, I just called it "white cheese". Grilled cheese sandwiches are perfect for a quick meal any day of the week. If I'm ever having a bad day, a grilled cheese sandwich always makes it better.

Back in high school and college my comfort food was chicken nuggets. I made sure to always have a bag on hand. Instead of ketchup, I use honey. I'm not sure why, I just do. These little delicacies were always the perfect pick me up.
On a more grand scale, hashbrown casserole is utterly amazing! The more cheese the better I say. Granted this dish is made mainly for special occasions I still consider it a comfort food because it just makes you all warm and fuzzy inside.
Stephen says that is favorite food is "Bratwurst...they make me feel good and I can eat them over and over again."What's your favorite comfort food?