Favorite Things Friday.

(Not our countertop.)

*Reese's candy
I am so indebted to this candy right now! Reese's Pieces helped us potty train our daughter several years ago, and now (after a spectacular false start with Pez candy) mini Reese's peanut butter cups are helping us potty train our son! He's doing an amazing job!

*Hardwood floors
See above.

*Smoothies
In between grocery shopping trips, I ran out of our kids' usual baby carrots and sugar snap peas and was at a loss for a veggie. Luckily for me, it was hot out and we had plenty of spinach and frozen fruit! Zaza was a little turned off by the light green color from the spinach, but she quickly changed her mind when I had her taste it. The peaches, pineapple, bananas, and mango disguised any spinach taste, and they loved it! I'm already stocked up on more spinach and frozen fruit for the next hot spell.

*My guitar
15-ish years ago my dad bought a Yamaha acoustic guitar, and eventually bequeathed it to me because I was teaching myself to play. He lowered the bridge and filed down the frets to make it play easier, and I've had it ever since. It's had some bumps and chips, and I've had to glue both the nut and the strap button back on (at different times) but he's still going strong! Yes, my guitar is a he, and yes, he has a name. His case is even adorned with a "Hello, my name is" sticker.

*A 4-level house
If I start in the basement and go up to Zaza's room, I climb 3 flights of stairs. I may not be happy at the time (especially if I have to sprint because someone's screaming bloody murder, which almost always turns out to be a false alarm) but I'm grateful for the free exercise!

Favorite Things Friday

Now that I have a full-time job, I keep forgetting about my poor little blog. But I had off today so here's a new 5 Favorite Things Friday!

Pre-heated cream. I have no idea how I drank coffee for 17 (ish) years without doing this, it's fantastic! Before, I never drank my coffee fast enough while it was still hot, and my window of opportunity was made even shorter by the fact that the refrigerated Half & Half cooled it way down.

The side-part. I do not like to wear my hair down, mostly because I hate when it gets in my face. I don't like it in my face, on my neck, it just bothers me. BUT I also didn't like how it looked, very plain and kinda frumpy. Enter NCIS. One day it just hit me that Ziva's hair looked so nice down because it wasn't parted straight down the middle. Lightbulb! I'm still not wearing it down a lot, but I'm wearing it down a lot more often now that I give it a side-part. I love it!

Domino's Gluten Free Pizza. Thanks to our diet, I've been gluten free during the week by default, but when it came to cheat day I was still eating the regular food. I finally got tired of feeling gross, and have gone totally gluten free. I knew Domino's did GF pizza, but thanks to a really bad experience a few months ago we have never tried to order from them again. Well, we tried again tonight and thanks to the Pizza Tracker I know what the status is and the delivery person should be here soon. BUT, did you also know that you can pick any one of their pizzas and make it a gluten free crust?? The only other pizza place we knew that did GF pizza you could only choose cheese or pepperoni. I'm pretty excited about this meal, not going to lie (Buffalo Chicken Pizza, woohoo!).

Organizing. With the whole bug treatment thing, all of our stuff has been packed up for a couple weeks. Now that I can unpack it, I'm totally using the opportunity to revamp some of my storage spots. So far I've gotten some bins for the wall for mail/bills/keys, and I'm rearranging the shelf unit in the closet. I'd like to get another shelf unit for the other closet to hold extra food since we don't have a pantry.

Pinterest. I know, I know. But I'm a visual person and it's literally like a feast for my eyes. I have tried a handful of the things I have pinned, and plan on trying much more, but I have a few boards that are solely for looking pretty. And they make me happy.

Five Things I love Friday

1. Job Interviews. I don't currently have any (frowny face) and they're actually not my favorite thing, but when you don't have a job and need one, they're a bright ray of sunshine in an otherwise gloomy unemployment storm.

2.  Axe "Dark Temptation" body spray. I got this for Carl for Christmas last year, it was a gift set in a shrink wrapped box so I actually didn't even know what it smelled like. Holy smokes, it's my favorite. This stuff smells like freshly showered man & dark chocolate. It's amazing. I actually loved it so much that I got some for myself!

3. Sunshine. It gets light at 5:30am now (go on, ask me how I know that) and it's getting dark at 5:30pm. When the sun shines during the day I want to curl up in it like a kitty and take a little nap (which I have done before, just not lately).

4. Toys. If items for our children to play with did not exist, I would be in a looney bin right now. Be it intricate little mazes to pop a ball through or a simple cardboard box, I am so grateful that my kids have toys to keep them occupied! Although usually the household items are the ones holding their attention, hence the reason why Bogie and I have hardly ever purchased toys for our kids. Nothing beats an empty cardboard box and a set of measuring cups! (I'm not joking. get a couple extra sets at the dollar store and see how long they play with them. lots longer than that $20 noisemaker your son got for his birthday!)

 5. Brooke Courtney Photography. Brooke and her husband T.J. are awesome people and they did a wonderful job at our recent family photoshoot (despite the fact that our children were racing around like fiends most of the time and it was wicked cold and windy to boot). If you need a photographer, check them out!

Five Things I love Friday

I am going to ignore the depressed voice that says "life sucks" and attempt to count my blessings in the form of a Five Things I love Friday post despite the fact that I don't want to. So here goes:

This is the guitar I have! pic's not Duncan though.

1. my guitar. Ever since the one Sunday a few months ago when my FIL led worship and asked me to play guitar on the worship team, I've been a fairly regular member on the stage. I've been on the past several Sundays straight, it's been great being part of a worship team again and remembering all the little quirks that go with the territory. I've loved getting to know Duncan again (yes, I named my guitar. His full name is Duncan McTavish, if you care to know. I got him in high school, what do you expect?) and I have a new set of strings in my purse just waiting to be put on, and am on the search for some more picks (fun, brightly colored ones because let's face it, they're tiny and easy to lose, especially in a black guitar case). It's an emotional creative outlet that I never should have stopped utilizing and I'm glad I have started again. As are my kids because I let them strum the strings while I play and we've even looked up the chords to "Hokey Pokey" and "Five Little Monkeys".

2. Psych. New season started yesterday after a super-long hiatus (what was that all about??), we DVRd it because of the NLCS game and it's sitting there in that little black box calling to me. I even told Bogie how good I had been because I had resisted watching it all day long! What a good girl am I. Now, does anyone know where I can watch last season's episodes and get all caught up before we start the new season? I'll use my birthday candle wish on you!

3. Candles. We're sliding in the Autumn season now, it's colder and windier with fairly frequent rain. The leaves are changing colors and it looks like (probably because of all the rain we had...anyone?) the colors will be spectacular this year. My reigning favorites for fall are Pumpkin Spice and Cranberry Chutney, although I'm currently burning the rest of a Warm Apple Pie so that I can light up the new Pumpkin Spice.

4. Birthdays. Bogie's is the 20th. Mine's the 25th. We usually do a joint birthday celebration, which I love. We're currently planning a shindig or two and I can't wait! I've lost track of how old we are, but I'm pretty sure we're going to be 29. And no, that will not be my age for the next 10 years because I think that's a stupid habit. or tradition. or whatever you want to call it. Your age does not define you, just because the number goes up doesn't mean you're suddenly old or unwanted or useless. Own your age! Be proud of it! You've worked hard and overcome a lot to reach the age that you are and it's nothing to be ashamed of. Yes, there are people that are younger than you and there always will be, just like there will always be people older than you (probably. unless you're the new Methuselah, in which case I recommend investing in some vintage baseball cards and comic books). I know quite a few people that pretend (even though everyone knows they're lying) that they're much younger than they are and I think it's ridiculous. Stop worrying about your age and start worrying about your health, if you look great and take care of yourself nobody will care how old you are!

These two have been amazing to us these past few months.

5. Family. We are not in a particularly good place right now, financially, emotionally, etc. I'm still on unemployment (laid off 9 days after I came back from maternity leave) and if it weren't for the generosity of our family, we'd be in a very bad way. No job, no home, no car (yeah, it died. no COD yet) but we're healthy (well, mostly. D-man's got a stuffy nose and we're currently on day 2 of no dairy to try to figure out why he poops 50 times a day and the smell could gag a rhinoceros). We have food to eat, warm beds to sleep in, and we're all alive and well. and I'm not going to say "it could be worse" because the last time I said that our car died like an hour later.






Hey, I did it! It's been a rough week, and I'm kind of in "I have to laugh or else I'll cry" stage. I mean, it can only get better, right? There can only be so many bad things that happen in a row before I start writing it all down to turn it into a dark comedy screenplay. If I were Harold Crick, I would most definitely be in a tragedy right now. But notice I said "right now"! I am not in a Shakespeare play, I can change the genre AND the acts. and I will, I just need a nap or two, maybe a little red wine and chocolate.

Five Things I love Friday

1. Coffee. Bogie and I did a juice fast this week and I've been without caffeine for 6 days (but who's counting?). I can't wait until tomorrow when I'm done exclusively juicing and can have some coffee! I'll go easy with some decaf because I have no desire to be jittery, but oh that taste! I miss it.

2. Cheesy sci-fi B movies. They crack me up, no lie. A guilty pleasure perhaps, but I can't help it. "Megashark vs. Giant Octopus" was hilarious. The acting was so heinous I was actually wincing during one conversation between 2 leads. Bad acting, cheesy effects, plot holes galore...it all adds up to some great entertainment. Prehistoric shark and octopus, both so huge that the shark can swallow submarines whole and the octopus can snap off an offshore oil rig like a doll's head. Oh, and the shark can leap out of the ocean so high that it can take out a plane flying high above the ocean. Come on, that's good stuff!

3. Books. While some are a chore to read through (coughcoughjamesjoycecoughcough) I adore books. I love the way they look, the smell, the feel of the pages in my hands. A good book sucks me in and makes me a part of its world, and I love that escape. I've always been a fast reader, and when I'm in the zone I can rip through a good book in a matter of hours and totally don't hear people when they're speaking to me. It's awesome.





4. HelloGiggles website. The brainchild of Zooey Deschanel, Sophia Rossi, and  Molly Mcaleer, this website is full of intelligent, funny, and amusing tidbits. Articles, videos, artwork, links, rants, raves...and all in good, clean fun! Go there!






5.  Magazines. I only subscribe to two, Real Simple and Martha Stewart Living (MSL was a promotional thingy, I got a year free for signing up for something...maybe it was a survey, I don't remember. Point being the magazine was free!) Real Simple just rocks my socks off, I love the organizing and cleaning tips they give. MSL is a little over-the-top, every time I see the cover I think "overachiever" but it was free and has just as many good organizing and cleaning tips, plus lots of decorating and food insights. Each day one of them comes in the mail is like a tiny Christmas morning at the mailbox!

Five Things I love Friday

1. Mommy's Day Off. I am currently sitting in a Panera Bread with music jamming in my headphones (current song: Mumford & Sons "after the storm"), uploading photos, journaling, tweeting, emailing, and people watching. And before I was here I was book browsing at Barnes & Noble, and before THAT I was at my lovely cousin Jen's house to drop off an air mattress, and she served me yummy coffee and homemade peach muffins!

2. People Watching. So far today I have observed:
3 people try to push open the wrong side of the door, and almost do a faceplant in the process
1 (what I'm fairly certain was a) blind date
1 woman walk facefirst into the glass wall next to the door (yes, I had a very hard time not laughing. I couldn't hear her over my music but I'm pretty sure she was swearing as she held her forehead)
2 dresses and 3 shirts that were absolutely adorable and I'd love to have
1 very pregnant lady
6 different men hold the door for whomever was in front of/behind them

3. Bagels. I didn't get one today, but I'm seriously contemplating getting some for breakfast tomorrow because Panera bagels are amazing! They're the only plain bagels I can eat without putting something on it, they're that good! They also have this cinnamon crunch bagel that's ummmmmm (that's a yummy noise with closed lips so you don't drool on yourself)

4. Journals. I will confess, I have a problem. I like journals. In fact, I'm pretty sure I'm addicted to them. I know for a fact I have at least 1 completely blank one at home, and 3 others that are partially started, and I just bought another one today. Now in my defense, the ones back home are the cheaper kind with an elastic strap that goes around it, or even just a cute spiral bound notebook that's small enough to fit in your purse. Today's purchase was a legit journal, real leather with hand-tooled flowers and leaves on the cover. It smells amazing and I'm actually going to journal in this one (as in personal thoughts and dreams and not just sermon notes and funny quotes). My first action was to write my name in the front, and then the following quote:

"...though my soul may set in darkness, it will rise in perfect light; 
I have loved the stars too fondly to be fearful of the night."

Sarah Williams, The Old Astronomer to His Pupil

5. Bathrooms. For the very simple reason that I have to use one right now. I mean, think about it. How awesome is indoor plumbing and a private Loo? No squatting in the woods with a (hopefully non-poisonous) leaf to wipe with. And on that note, I'm going to go pee before I head back home to my husband and babies.

Five Things I love Friday

I know it's saturday morning, but I started this last night so it counts!

1. Sisters. I love my own more than anything, but I also have some very dear women in my family (who are all somebody's sister), and I love them too! (excuse the quality, it's a cell phone photo.)

My sister was in town for a few days, so we had girls' night out with all the aunties and girl cousins who live in this area. Girl talk was had, photos were taken, homemade mini-pizzas were consumed, and then a walk downtown for one of my favorite desserts, which brings me to number 2!

2. Ice cream. especially the homemade kind. or handmade, whichever you call it. Made right there on location from yummy fresh ingredients! I had Heathbar Crunch in a waffle cone. droooooooooooool.


3. the aforementioned Girl Talk. I love that close girl friends can launch into intimate conversations at the drop of a (cute little) shoe. Food, hair, relationships, shoes, decorating schemes, hobbies, jobs...we covered all these topics and more and I love it.

4. Adventuring. My sister and I visited several different places while she was here, little out of the way local shops that she discovered on her iphone. I've done more touristy stuff in the last 2 days than I have since I moved here after graduating college! A cheese farm, a pottery store, a flea market, 10,000 Villages (if you've never been to one, find it and go!!)

5. Coffee. The nectar of sleep-deprived mothers everywhere. I was given a bag by my aunt, so I have coffee again! Nobody else in this house drinks it, so I've been trying to make do with cappuccino mixes and teas, but it's not the same. Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm caffeine.

5 Favorite Things Friday, Christmas version

making and decorating cookies!

 the christmas tree, with all of its decorations!

 Christmas specials! We watched the Grinch for the first time (me for the first time this season, her for the first time ever! I had to get up from the beanbag where we were snuggling so that I could take a picture.)

 snuggly winter PJs and santa hats to play with (and the cutest little boy in the world!)

 okay, this one's not particularly Christmassy, but I love her. her and her gorgeously ginormous blue eyes.

5 Things I love Friday

1. Amazon's Universal Wishlist
COOLEST. THING. EVER. you know how when you have to supply a Christmas list to your family around the end of November, and you think "I had so many good ideas a couple weeks ago but now I forget" and then you end up asking for giftcards and kneesocks? Well, no more! (unless you wanted kneesocks, that is). Amazon itself is fantastic, but they have a button you can add to your favorites that will (once you create a wishlist on Amazon) let you add items to that list from ANY WEBSITE. Found a sweet pair of shoes? select the color and size and add it to your wishlist. Found a movie on eBay you really want? add it to your wishlist. You can go onto Amazon and search for any public wishlist by the person's name, and when you see an item you'd like to buy, just click on the item name! if it's from another website, it'll take you straight there and presto! It's that little moment of "oh, I could really use one of those" and now you can track those moments all in one place! I should be getting paid to plug this, because I'm doing a pretty darn good job. But it is just that nifty. Besides various random things (like a pink nalgene bottle) I have things on my list that I haven't been able to find anywhere, so I'm letting Amazon track it for me, like curtains for Dominic's nursery and my discontinued dishware pattern. I check it every couple days to see if the curtains and dishes have become available!

2. Supercook.com
I totally came up with this fabulous idea for a website, googled it to make sure no one else had it, and found that someone else had already thought of it. This website lets you plug in the ingredients you have in your kitchen and pantry and will spit back recipes that you can make with what you already have! It splits them into categories (entrees, deserts), and lists what ingredients you need if you happen to be missing any. You can even sign up for a username and password (which I didn't do yet) but I'm sure that lets you keep a virtual pantry that you can keep updated, and you can even save favorite recipes! How cool is that?

3. Friends
we suddenly (after a several month dry spell) have a ton of plans with lots of friends and family in the next few weeks! barbecues, baby showers, dinners, birthdays, I love it! and of course this is the month where all the towns have their street fairs, ours starts next week. I really hope they have a Merry-Go-Round, I want to take ZaZa on it!

4. Our Rec Center
A friend of ours who works there asked me to be her partner for this challenge that the Rec was doing, so for the next 6 weeks not only do I get to do fun challenges (some physical, some around the community) but I also have access to the amazing gym facilities for only $20! (the cost of the Dynamic Duo challenge). and the winners get to split a cash prize! I haven't yet decided what I'll do with it if we win, but I'm thinking either Bogie's birthday present or a trip to see one of my girlies. It's nice to be able to get out of the house for something other than church or grocery shopping, and I fully plan on taking advantage of the gym if I can.

5. Coffee
I just discovered this coffeehouse right down the street, it's super cute and the coffee was amazing! I bought half a pound of their House blend, now I just need to get some creamer and I'm all set for a couple weeks of caffeine. hallelujah. I really want to go there for lunch some time, the owner (a cutie-pie of a girl who couldn't have been much older than me) gave me a take-out menu with my coffee and the food looks really good. There was also a certain item for sale on their shelves that (if it comes in a certain color, which she is looking into for me) would make a great Christmas present for my mother-in-law! But don't tell her, shhhhhhhhhhhhh.
Who wants to go to Lunch with me??? http://www.newhollandcoffee.com/

Favorite Things Friday

1. ringtones. when either my momma, my sister, or my sister-in-law calls me, my phone starts cheerfully blasting Cyndi Lauper's "Girls just wanna have fun". I mean, not only does the music make me smile anyway, but just knowing that it's one of my 3 favorite ladies calling makes it that much better!

2. Teaching ZaZa new words. she likes to hear new words all the time and try them out, she has to know what things are called. sometimes I give her super long words (onomatopoeia and rhinoceros come to mind) for fun, but she's amazingly good at pronouncing them.

3. baking soda. this stuff is amazing. it takes the stink out of my diaper pail (I have one of those "in the fridge" boxes with the cloth sides sitting at the bottom), the man funk out of gym clothes, and I've been told you can use it to clean hair, although I'm waiting until I run out of my regular shampoo before I try it.

4. Bogie. I like to redecorate and rearrange furniture, and he's quite patient with me when I start moving stuff, even if it's to a spot that he suggested that particular item should go in the first place and I vehemently insisted I didn't want there. until now.

5. my new camera. I got a new camera, this thing's a beast (3 lenses, filters, all kinds of buttons and knobs) I barely know how to use it yet but I'm so excited to learn! anyone willing to give hands-on tutorials, speak up!

Favorite Things Friday

1. Birthdays. today is my mother-in-law's, and I love her. we had a cookout at their house to celebrate, it was great hanging out with family.

2. TCM (Turner Classic Movies). they do a "Summer under the Stars" month where all of August is a specific actor per day. Bogie and I have picked out one film per day that we'd like to watch for each actor, I'm excited for the month of August! We made a list and everything, of each day, which actor it is, and which movie we're going to watch. We get to start with Basil Rathbone and end with Clint Eastwood. I love old movies.

3. Sweatpants. I found a pair of capri sweatpants on clearance, and when I got them home and put them on they were SO comfortable that the next opportunity I got I went back and got 3 more pairs of them (in different colors, of course). If I'm going to be puked on all day, I jolly well deserve to be comfortable!

4. Checklists. There is nothing more satisfying than having a list of items to accomplish, and crossing them all off! Sometimes I even write down something I've already done that wasn't on the list just so that I can cross more things off. Or I think of quick things that I can accomplish and write them down so that I know my list will be at least half finished by the end of the day.

5. Organizing. I love being able to get organized, and finding things that will help me do that (like little plastic bins to hold odds & ends, and cupboards in which to put them!). I wanted to get organized before D was born (THAT didn't happen) so I'm slowly but surely getting there now and it makes me happy.

I forgot...

...about 5 things Friday. So I'm doing 5 Favorite Things Friday on a Sunday. It's like Christmas in July. except not.

1. Books. the smell. the feel. the type. the way a well-written story sucks you in and makes you so much a part of its world that you can't hear your husband asking you a question. and the way you don't even realize you're crying at the sad part until you hear yourself sniffling. Books rock.

2. my camera. I looooove taking pictures. and telling stories with pictures. I will post pictures on here as soon as I figure out how to do it. mmmmm, photography.

3. watching ZaZa make D laugh. He thinks she's the funniest Being alive, and she cracks up at him because he's giggling. it's too cute.

4. Tylenol. infant formula for teething babies, extra strength formula for headaches. the two may be related.

5. Bogie. his hugs. his kisses. the fact that he and I made two super cute kids. the fact that he's really good at math and can help me because I am most definitely not. I heart him.