Dishes...UGH

Does anyone else look at a dishwasher full of clean dishes waiting to be put away and a sink full of dirty ones waiting to be washed and think, "UGH. There goes my night." Then, of course, you do them and it takes, oh, seven minutes? Yeah. I totally do this.

Erin's New Clothes

I have a few talents. Dressing myself is not one of them. However, I have many friends who have many talents and some of those talents include dressing me. After months of saying I was going to go shopping and years of complaining about my holey and stained clothes, I did it. I enlisted Camie, bought her over with lunch and bracelets, and "let" her dress me. It took nearly five hours and a lot of money, but it definitely was a good start. Let's call it Shopping 101. And yes, those are salmon pants at the bottom of the stack of pants; why do you ask?





What's in the syllabus for Shopping 102? Learning how to put it all together. I look at these lovely clothes and don't know how to put wear them. While shopping, Camie would bring me piece after piece and she'd have to tell me what to put on with what. So I need to go through these, put them together as outfits, and then take pictures and hang those pictures inside my closet door. You think I'm kidding. I'm so not.

Shopping 201: A few more pants. Some spring/summer shirts. Non-clog and non-flip-flop shoes. I'm not sure I'm ready for the graduate-level course Shopping 601: Accessorize Me! (Yes, it does require an exclamation point.)

P.S. And because I'm positive I'm not sending the right vibe about this: YES I am excited. YES I am thrilled to finally spend this money Chuck and I saved for this very purpose. YES I love the new clothes. YES I know how lucky I am to have my own small, What-Not-To-Wear-experience with Camie. YES I don't deserve it as I still am not at that goal weight. NO I do not care.

Things Rhett Says

We're having pancakes with blueberry sauce for breakfast, a meal usually reserved for dinner...
Rhett: I call this Brinner!

In a whisper voice...
Rhett: I love you way more than I love Kitty, but don't tell Kitty that because she'll get upset.

After a particularly hard morning with Ollie...
Rhett: Mom, I bet you can't wait for Ollie to go to college.

After learning we're having homemade [lean turkey] burgers and [oven baked] fries for dinner...
Rhett: It's a junk food dinner! It's a junk food dinner!

Rhett puts Ollie in a half-nelson. Ollie bites Rhett. Rhett gets mad.
Rhett: I wish Ollie was a teenager so he would go out.
Me: Where would he go?
Rhett: To get a job.

After I put Rhett's dinner dishes away (instead of him doing it himself)...
Rhett: When you're nice, you're the nicest mom in the world.

While playing with our $4.25-newly-thrifted tool kit set...
Rhett: This is like our own little Home Depot!

After getting into a sun-warmed car...
Rhett: I'm almost cooked back here!

On Second Thought...

Thanks for the input, but maybe I'll try one more time for Lasik. In my 21 years of wearing glasses, I still cannot find any I really like on my face. Plus, I miss wearing sunglasses. (blah blah prescription sunglasses blah blah)

Glasses Poll

I heard about this company that does frames and lenses for only $95 so I thought I had to try. Since I think I'm going to be in glasses for the rest of my life, I should at least get some fun ones, right? They let you try on five pairs at a time, so here's my first batch. What do you think--any keepers? I can't really see how they look on since once I take off my regular glasses I can't see anything. (And yes, I know this isn't my finest photo shoot ever. In fact, maybe it's the worst. But I don't care. I'm puttin' it all out there!)

Glasses #1:


Glasses #2:


Glasses #3:


Glasses #4:


Glasses #5:

2013 Resolutions

Before I left for Oklahoma, Chuck and I discussed our 2013 Resolutions (2013 as in the year, not the count). Here goes.

What kind of American would I be if I didn't set some sort of fitness goals...
1. Earn points in all six championship series races that I run. It means I have to finish in 10th (or better) place in my age group. I ran my first earlier this month and squeaked in at 10th place. Phew. Only five more.
2. Add easy strength workouts to my life. These are things that I see floating around on Pinterest, and are of the sort I can do in my basement while watching TV.
3. Hike monthly with the family. It's important for me to get the boys outside, enjoying nature the way I did. Yes, these will be easy hikes, but that's not the point now, is it?

For the kids...
1. Start an allowance with Rhett. Teach him about savings and spending. Let him use the cool wallet from Auntie Em!
2. Do more Ollie-appropriate activities with Ollie. Too often he gets the shaft because Rhett things are more fun. But he needs it.
3. Re-institute "One-on-One" days with the boys. We did this Saturday and I took Rhett to the Building Museum and Chuck took Ollie to a special baby day at the library. Both boys need the attention.

For Chuck...
1. Learn more about our retirement. What do we already have in place? What do we need? Should we make adjustments?
2. Plan for and begin buying food storage. I delude myself into thinking we already have this, when in reality, what we have is a basement pantry. It's no 90 days. But we want 90 days.
3. Practice obedience more. Be better at couples scripture study, prayer, and fasting. Baby steps, people, baby steps.

For me...
1. Use the dang serger! I started a class on it through Craftsy and am hopeful that I will get over my fear of that machine.

Random Thoughts (part 2)

While dowries aren't that common anymore, at least in America, I was thinking of an updated, modern type dowry. You know, as in, what gifts or money did I bring to the marriage. Clearly there was money (ahem, some of Chuck's loans that "we" paid off), but I'm not interested in that type. Rather, I am just thinking about the things that I introduced Chuck to that he might not have seen had he not married me. For example, Daria. This cartoon is about a too-smart, socially-awkward teenager and her popular sister. Let's just say I could relate; man, was I popular [sarcastic font]. Anyway, this show is awesome and Chuck and I love it. I loved it before, but now he loves it too. So yes, I think of it as my dowry to him.

This was my one-thousandth pin (thanks, Eileen, for bringing number 1,000 to my attention). I love Pinterest. Who is having the next baby girl?

Speaking of Eileen, she and her friend Kara started a blog a couple of months ago and on Wednesday they did a special post on me. Man, I sure can talk a lot about myself.  Feeling a little self-conscious right about now.

Locals, have any of you seen the uncooked tortillas? My sister and I bought some at Walmart this summer in Utah, but seeing as I never drive to Germantown, I'm looking for them locally...without success. If you've seen them, let me know.

I am 35, but don't feel like it. I'm not talking physically, but mentally. I mean, when I look at people who are just out of college, I think, "Yeah, they're my age." And when I see people on TV who have houses, spouses, kids, I NEVER think, "Yeah, they're my age." Here I am at 25 (maybe nearly 26?). I know it's a bad picture but it was taken with film. Color film, but film nonetheless. Maybe I am old. But at least I still look this good.

Random Thoughts (part 1)

Because I still can't get my brain to create full-length posts, my aforementioned topics will be turned into mini-posts today and Friday.

As previously mentioned, Chuck and I have the opportunity to go on lots of dates in the next couple of months. Here are two ideas for dates I'd love to go on, but won't. First, I would love to go shopping for Airstream trailers. Not because we want one, or could we even afford one. But I think they would be so much fun to walk in and through. Second (don't judge me), I want to rent a hotel by the hour. Hear me out. Who wants to watch TV from their bed while eating jalapeno chips (and not care about the crumbs)? I do! Who wants to take a shower and leave towels on the floor for someone else to clean up? I do! Because this is a PG-rated blog, I won't mentioned the other, but...I do!

I told Chuck that one of my resolutions this year is to take off the peel of the clementines into one piece. He said, "Now that's a worthwhile goal." I responded, "AT LEAST I HAVE GOALS." I think I won that one.

If you got our Christmas card this year and you read this blog, I apologize. For 2013's card, I aim to include things you didn't see on the blog. However, since most share-worthy things get posted here, the card might include things like, "We made all the lights on the way home from church once!" Don't get too excited.

I am constantly amazed at how people lived without the internet. Granted, I was one of them until college, but still. I mean, how did people find out how many meatballs came in one particular box? Or how did people know the current weather? (These are real searches recently made by moi.)

Why No Post this Morning

I am just so excited to be home and to be returning to my regular life (no holidays, no work trips, just plain ol' weeks) that I haven't put a lot of time into the blog. Obviously. That doesn't mean I haven't been thinking about it. Rather, I have about a half dozen ideas that are running around in my head, but I just haven't made time to write them. As proof, here are the topics:

Recent projects

Discussion on modern "dowries"

Why I don't travel well for work

Things Rhett says

A treatise on being 35

New Year's Resolutions

It's Still Friday--I'm Not Too Late!

I'm still adjusting to life back home (because, you know, I was gone soooo long). Meanwhile, you can help me decide what to do with two new fabrics I got thanks to a Christmas gift certificate.

This is a laminated cotton. I love it. It was a total splurge, so whatever I make of it must be totally worth it. No bibs.


And this just struck me. I love the colors.

Oklahoma Report

I've been in Oklahoma for a day and a half and man, what do people do here? It's really flat and all of the flora are dead and it's just weird. So far, not a fan. But I'm not here for fun; I'm here for work, right? Right.

So what do I do on work trips, besides work? The first day I always find a grocery store or convenience store. I hate the idea of eating out for three meals a day for three to four days. I'm too cheap and too worried about gaining weight. (Totally lame on both accounts, right? Right.) I just can't do it. Plus, I'm not great at eating at sit-down-with-a-menu restaurants alone. And I'm even not greater at going out with colleagues. This trip is no different. The first night here I walked around Bricktown and found a Circle K to stock up on apples (fruit), granola bars (grains?), and jerky (protein). If I had a fridge in the hotel I would have picked up some string cheese (dairy). I don't eat vegetables at home, so why do it here? Kidding (kind of).

My second night I went to a movie. I ate at the same taco place and it was good and cheap = perfect for me.

Pretty exciting, yeah? I bet you wish you were here!

Of course this was the plan. The surprise was that I woke up Tuesday morning at 4:30 a.m. totally sick. Only got out of bed once to present at my conference and then returned immediately to bed. Sigh. I hate being sick.

Yogurt Eating Tutorial

How yogurt should be eaten:


How yogurt should not be eaten:

A Mishmash of Updates

New Years: We had a really great New Year's Eve. We invited some families over and did some kid-friendly activities. We played, ate good food, destroyed two Chuck-made pinatas, ate too much candy (not at all my intention--my apologies to our guests), took fun pictures at our photo booth, made way too much noise, and rang in the new year precisely at midnight...Greenwich Mean Time (7:00 p.m. EST). It was a success!

Redskins: I feel like among all my friends, probably none of them knows of the big football game happening on Sunday. I, of course, married a D.C. sports junkie, so I am fully aware. But needless to say, I will be a football widow this Sunday from 4:30 until 8ish. Anyone want to invite us over? We'll bring food.

Resolutions: Some goals that we've tossed around are working on our food storage, understanding our retirement accounts and wills, teaching Rhett about money, and doing more Ollie-appropriate things with little Ollie. I am taking a class so that I can learn how to use my year-old serger. Chuck is taking a guitar class to practice his erin-seducing skills. What are you working on this year?

Dates: Because of our babysitting co-op group, me tutoring a YW in exchange for babysitting, and us hiring another YW to help her raise money for camp in exchange for babysitting, Chuck and I have a lot of upcoming date nights. So dang happy about this one. So dang clueless how we'll spend the dates.

Me: I am going to Oklahoma City next week for work. If I didn't (1) feel guilty for leaving my family and (2) have a strong distaste for all things Oklahoma, I might be excited.

Rhett: Seems more like a five-year old every day. He just seems like such a different boy from who he was this past summer. He's bigger (as evidenced by his very short pants), but also more mature (if a five-year-old can ever be called mature). Crazy to think that he'll be in kindergarten in eight months.

Ollie: The only thing to say about little Ollie is that he goes to nursery in one month. One month people. Only four more Sundays of hanging out in the foyer because he's just too darn disruptive. This might be the highlight of the entire year.

New Years = New Calendars

I love calendars. I love crossing off individual days, flipping the pages for new months, and especially getting new planners for the new year. Last year I found erin condren, and because she's an erin without any capitals, I loved her immediately. And then because she wants to sell me a calendar with my name on it, I keep loving her. So I loved my 2012 calendar enough to splurge and get another for 2013.


Equally exciting is this calendar we found for our wall. I love it. I love that it doesn't hide our switches like last year's. I love that it's got these fun drawings of cities (only four of which I've been to).


The back page of the calendar was this page. Look at these cute thumbnails of each month! Don't you just love them? Of course I want to turn them into something crafty, but what? Ideas please!