Casual week off

My Look

Andy and I have had this entire week off of work. I've been so lazy padding around the house in my slippers and not bothering to brush my hair until 2 in the afternoon.

We've done a lot of crosswords and watched a couple of movies. Yesterday I made peanut butter cookies and raspberry bars. It's been wonderful just chillin at home.

I've also had some time to browse a lot of my favorite online shops and have some great stuff to share with you in the coming week!

Have a lovely day and a very Happy New Years Eve!

It's play time!!

We got some fluffy powder dumped in our yard today so Andy and I took Ash out to play.

We threw the frisbee for her and she bounded through the snow like a little jack rabbit.



Coming back for more over and over again.





I couldn't help but purposely throw a low one so she'd have to tunnel through the snow with her nose to get it.



Because she'd come back all snowy faced and looking so adorable.



Henry didn't appreciate the snow. The poor guy was tip toe-ing around like a little baby and shaking off his wet paws after each step.



I gently tossed him in a snowbank.



The second he got his footing, he high tailed it out of there, stopping to give me a dirty look as he passed.

Best of G.K.

Best of 2009 just posted at Gabrielle Kai.

Hurry.

Click fast to see this lovely photography!

Sad Face and Music Monday

Boo hoo. Christmas is over, just like that. After all the anticipation and build up and it's gone for another year. But New Years is coming up and that's something fantastic to look forward to.

I hope you all had a wonderful holiday weekend. I got to spend Christmas Eve and Christmas day bouncing between my moms and Andy's parents house. Good times, great food, amazing family. I'm so blessed.

I had to work on Saturday and Sunday but that was okay. I had my Ipod to keep me company. On constant replay lately has been Lisa Mitchell and Bon Iver. I love!!!





I have to work tonight but then I have the rest of the week off!! Yippy! Plus, I'm getting kissed this New Years! Pretty sure it's gonna be a good week.

Until next week!

Well, it's time to give the dog a bath and get her smelling all sweet for her trip to Grandma and Grandpa's.

I probably won't write again until next week so I hope you all have a wonderful holiday season!

On finally enjoying Christmas

Andy and I finally got to enjoy the holidays this past week. Thursday found us at my grandmother's house eating a delicious cranberry, creamcheese, and jalepeno dip that my aunt brought and later passing presents and guessing Christmas song lyrics.

Saturday found me wrapping presents. Boy, was it nice to have a day off!




Henry helped.




Later on we went over to our friends, S & Di's place. The house was full of other couples AND their million children. I confess, up until this point in my life, little children haven't really been my cup of tea. However, I found myself lifting up a random child at the party and setting her on my lap. She quickly riggled down, but the strange feeling came over me that I wished that one of those rug rats was mine. Maybe I'm finally ready for that stage in my life. Who knows.

Andy brought these to the party:



Yum! Easy lemon cookies made with lemon cake mix. Email me if you want the recipe and I'd be glad to share.

He wore his Charlie Brown sweater. I love it!


Last night I worked and was dreading coming home. The past few weeks I've been coming home to remodel mess as Andy tries to finish our kitchen. I'd been doing my best to hide the fact that it had been making me very depressed and irritable, but I was wearing thin and I think Andy could tell.

I walked in the door last night to a wonderful surprise. Andy had spent the day cleaning the kitchen and living room. I could actually see the surface of the coffee table!! The kitchen was immaculate and my curtains from this post, where completely clean!

The cherry on the top of that night was seeing a plate of homemade cinnamon rolls, sent by Andy's mom, sitting on the countertop. What a nice treat!

PS- Here's a sneak peak of our new concrete countertops!!

Christmas Cartoons

One of my favorite things about Christmastime when I was growing up, was the Christmas cartoons. I was just reminiscing today about some of my favorites.

Want to reminisce with me?
















And my absolute, all time favorite Christmas Cartoon was The Nutcracker Fantasy. Thanks to Andy for helping me find it online. I loved, loved, loved this version of the Nutcracker.



That was so much fun!! I miss these cartoons! IMO, cartoons these days are just crap. Last year Andy got me a compilation of some of my favorite Christmas cartoons as a gift and I was so excited! I think it's time to get them out again.

The new stuff

My Look

Snow is so lovely right after it falls, but the second the world starts moving for the day, everything starts to turn gray and look a bit...

This is the Real World Baby!!

This aint no Wonderland, this is the real world, Baby! A look for sophisticated, hardworking women.

A little playful banter

So Andy and I are sitting in bed with our laptops winding down from the day and the following conversation ensues:

Him- I'm thirsty.

Me- Me too.

He gets up and leaves the room to get a glass of water and then comes back into the room offering me the cup.

Me- no thanks. I can't drink that.

Him- Why?

Me- Because you got it from the bathroom sink.

Him- What's wrong with the bathroom sink water?

Me- It gives me the hee-bee jeebies. I can't drink it. Sorry.

Him- blank stare

Me- It smells funny. It tastes funny. I can't drink it.

Him- It's the same water that comes out of our kitchen faucet.

Me- I know.

Him- He looks at me with amazement like 'well....?'

Me- The bathroom water is not the same. It's contaminated. I'm sure of it. I can't drink it.

Him- *playfuly* I'm gonna slap the crap out of you. You are so wierd.

Me- *grinning* I know.

Commence surfing on our laptops.

A little while later...

Him- Babe...I got you a drink.

Me- No you didn't.

Him- Yes I did. I got you a drink from the kitchen. Do you want some?

Me- You did not get me a drink from the kitchen. I listened to you and I heard you go into the bathroom and get the water from the bathroom.

Him- No, no. I swear I got this water from the kitchen. Just drink it.

Me- Nope. Gross. Thinking about drinking that water makes me gag.

Him- holding the water over my head. I'm seriously going to slap the crap out of you. If you don't drink some of this, I'm pouring it over your head.

Me- No! Under no circumstances can I drink that.

Him- So what did you do when the kitchen sink was out of commission for a month while I worked on the counter tops?

Me- I didn't drink water. (of course...duh!)

Him- You didn't drink water. Uh huh. You are so difficult.

Me- I know.

Commence laptop surfing.

A little while later....

he farts. and laughs.

Me- Ugh! What is with guys and farting ALL. THE. TIME?

Him- It's what we do. Hey, at least I aimed out the other side of the sheets so it would drift away from you.

Me- Gee thanks. I swear. I'm gonna slap the crap out of you.

Him- Too late.

Me- rolling my eyes and again trying not to look amused at his little joke.

But I couldn't help it and started laughing.

Then we turned out the lights and called it a night.

Ten minutes later I got out of bed, went upstairs and got myself a deliciously glass of cold water....

from the kitchen faucet.

On my mind

What's on my mind today? A little bit of this, a little bit of that...

- It never ceases to amaze me how many people actually believe that the whole world wants to hear their personal phone conversation and therefore, answer their phones in inappropriate areas and talk as loudly as possible. Inconsiderate people are a huge pet peeve of mine.

- My Grandma's christmas party is tonight and I'm supposed to bring a veggie tray. Yesterday I braved the crowds of people at the store and picked up everything I needed. As soon as I got home I realized I forgot the sour cream to mix with the veggie dip. Grrr. That always happens to me!

- As I sit here at work at 8am, I'm feeling quite grateful that the 12 hour overtime was called off last night at job #2 and I managed to get home by 2 am and get a little bit of sleep before having to be here this morning.

- Nothing could bring me down now after I've discovered that my job graciously gave me this Saturday off so Andy and I could attend a friend's party AND they graciously gave me Christmas day off. Well, I better not say 'nothing' and I better knock on wood real quick.

- Ash seems to be functioning quite fine with a gaping hole in her side. We still don't know exactly what happened but we're obediently feeding her the prescribed medication and doing what we can to nurse her back to health.

- FINALLY!! Our kitchen countertops are finished. Okay, not all the way finished. There's one tiny little section that still needs concrete but enough is finished to be a cause for celebration. Seriously folks, the kitchen remodel has me at the end of my rope so every little step towards victory makes me cry a few happy tears.

- 8 days until Christmas! Holy wow! Where did the time go? I keep making a mental tally of the gifts I got for Andy and feeling like it's not enough. He has a talent for gift giving. I've never been disappointed with what he's given me and have frequently been surprised at the things he's thought to give me. Me, on the other hand, I struggle with finding the perfect gift. So now I'm feeling a bit of anxiety regarding what I chose to get him and worrying that he'll think my gifts are lame.

- With all this overtime I've been working, I should have a decent paycheck coming up. Which means: pay off the little bit that remains on my last credit card (hallelujiah,) go to the dentist (no dental insurance or health insurance for that matter really bites,) go to the eye doctor (because I'm tired of alternating between my glasses and contacts just trying to make my contacts last a little longer,) and put the rest aside to be used when we go to Vegas this march!!! woo hoo!

So that pretty much sums up the corners of my mind today. What's on your mind?

thank you for the pretty

Sometimes I see images on other blogs and it just makes me cry with delight at how pretty they are. It lifts my spirits and warms my heart. I'm so touched that so many of you can find the beauty in your every day lives. It inspires me to no end.

Luphia LovesLuphia LovesThe Drifter and the GypsyUna Bella VitaTales of a Wondering StarGathering SpriggsDesire to InspireThe Unicorn DiariesDaydream LilyGabrielle Kai

Something that makes me happy

After talking with Andy the other night and getting an encouraging email from him yesterday afternoon, I'm feeling much better.

It's funny how the next day, looking back, things don't seem as bad as you made them out to be. This is just another reason why Andy is so right for me. He is so calm!! I'm not saying that if an emergency happened, I would lose all sense of myself and not be able to handle it. But I am saying that I tend to make a bigger deal out of the little things and I get myself all upset. Andy is such a good counter balance to me.

Anyway, I decided to cheer myself up even further. What better way to do that, than to organize!! Yes, people. Organizing cheers me up. You have no idea, how happy it makes me.

Anyway, I took to the pantry. (Which, btw, is just a bookshelf set up in the kitchen. It works for us, though.)




So I set to work color coding and alphabetizing the cans of soup.




Just kidding. I didn't color code or alphabetize. But I did set everything in order. And I felt quite satisfied with myself when it was finished.

I also had to share with you the curtains I made for the shelf system a couple months ago. I wanted something that wasn't going to look too makeshift and would fit in with the rest of the room. Also- it had to be green, of course.



Isn't that fabric so cute!



So what do you think? I still need to create some sort of ties, so we can tie it off if we want. But for now, it serves the purpose of hiding our food mess.



I feel bad though, because I wasn't smart enough to take them down before we started pouring concrete for our new counter tops. Now the bottoms of the curtains are splashed with little dots of concrete. Oops!

Anyone know if concrete will wash out? Oh well. I can always sew some more if I can't get them clean.

PS- Sorry for the crappy photos. I really need to take a photography class.


Photo spotted on Brown Button and was just what I needed to read today.

I'm crying 'UNCLE!!'

Alright, I usually try to see the positive in all things and stay upbeat no matter what goes down in my life. But this week has been the week from hell and although I've tried to keep it on a lighter note and just stay happy, I'm starting to crack.

When it rains, it pours? Well, this week has been a complete tsunami for me. I've been as strong as I can be, but I think I'm going to allow myself to just lose it and have a good cry.

I talked to my mom tonight and she says I need to stop being so hard on myself and stop working myself in to the ground. Easier said than done. But she's right. We're midway through December and I haven't done any enjoying of the Christmas season at all aside from hastily putting up the Christmas tree.

I'm totally sympathizing with Kim from PCL and her dog, Rocky, right about now, because I came home from work to find that my dog has a gaping wound in her side. This is just six months after the last gaping wound she had. Both of which, we have no idea where they came from.

The first time this happened, it resulted in three sets of stitches (all of which she managed to rip out,) twice a week vet visits for two months straight and two months of 'cone head', bandages and wound cleaning. Finally six months, several thousand tears and a couple thousand dollars later, she healed up.

Now, here we are again. And this is just the culmination of a weeks worth of crap like this happening to me.

I guess tomorrow will have to be reserved for damage control. It will involve a trip to the vet, reassessing my budget, and rethinking my job situation.

I don't know how much more of this I can take and I can usually handle a quite a bit.

all worked up

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It's the busy season at work. Mandatory overtime is required and last night we were asked to work 10 hours shifts. Sometimes they bump it up to 12 hours.

I'll be honest. It sucks.

So when I start feeling down about all the time I have to spend working on the weekends these days (especially now, during the holidays), I remind myself why I'm doing it and what it's all leading up to. And I also remind myself that I'm lucky to have a job right now.

Sure, I don't need this job to pay my bills. I could quit working on the weekends and still be able to survive financially. But... I would not be saving anything.

And Grad school, out of state, is not going to pay for itself. And that is an experience I want more than anything.

Even if I get scholarships or other funding, it's not just school that I'll be paying for. It's living expenses as well. And I would be extremely upset if I didn't save now and then ended up having to take lame online classes from home because I couldn't afford to move to the school of my choice.

So even though my weekends are typically spent working, I try to be home during the week by 5pm and have all my class work and other tasks done by that time as well. After 5 is spent enjoying time with my family.

Basically, it's a matter of figuring out how to juggle things right now so that in the future, I can have the career and schedule that I really want.

When you know what you want out of life it would be a shame to take the lazy way towards that goal and then feel regret for missing out on some really great experiences along the way.

Life is beautiful

Gratitude Journal

I have so much to be thankful for this holiday season. My heart is full and I couldn't be more pleased with the direction that my life is headed. I have so many great things to look forward to but I really believe that right now, I am right where I'm supposed to be and that is an amazing feeling.


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