Where did that come from?

I always thought I was useless in emergency situations. I've already told my little brother that he is in charge of any medical decisions that might have to be made for our parents (in the very, very far away future) because I was pretty sure I'd be the blithering mess in the corner.

Well I found out (the hard way) that I might not be quite as useless as I thought. Crap. I mean, yay(?)!

Not to get all cryptic or anything I just had to share that when I was on the front line of a pretty intense situation recently, not only did I keep my head but with the help of God ('cause it sure as heck wasn't me) I was able to help and am continuing to help the situation.

Not much more to add, just a little peek into my growth and all that self-actualization kind of thing.

My life in photos - at least the last few days.

I've been introduced to the world of Zentangles. It's the perfect form of fine art for a non-draw-er like me. Just fitting patterns into fun and sometimes intricate designs.

Washi Tape makes everything more fun! And I never said I was actually GOOD at it.

My swimming pool and backyard have become the new (hopefully temporary) home of a couple feathered friends. I call them Mr. & Mrs. Mallard. They might even be the same pair that visited me last year, but since I'm no ornithologist I'll just say they are. They woke me up Sunday with all their splashing around. It was pretty cute.

I went to my first Author Signing Event on Saturday. It was in San Francsico. It was pouring. We rode the Cable Cars anyway. I got soaked but I also go to meet the lovely Kahea of Girl Hearts Books. So you, know I pretty much had a wonderful time! Unfortunately I hadn't read most of the authors at the event but I'm glad I went.

Did I mention it was raining? Lovely.

Lastly, though no photographic evidence, oh wait screen shots will do (I love technology!) I've started getting up in the pre-dawn hours to work out. My workout partner and I had to make the switch as we were blowing off too many evening workouts in favor of Happy Hour... You don't know of any Happy Hours at 5 am do you? Only kidding, kind of. As of this morning I think I may be on the precipice of actually enjoying the exercise. Who am I?

The Deep Dark

Hi.

I know, yet another apology for not being a good blogger. Can I even really call myself a blogger? Once upon a time maybe, but not now.

I've been down in the dumps. Feeling very much like a zombie. I've been on the verge of tears for about a month now but nothing comes out. Granted, it's not a constant state of depression, I can actually laugh and have a good time (especially when my niece and nephew are around) but it only seems to make the Deep Dark even more oppressing once the fun times are over.

I worry that this one will never go away. I've been sleeping a lot. My house is a mess, I'm starting to realize just how quickly out of hand things can get and why/how people become hoarders. I keep making these grand plans that "This weekend will be the one!" where I roll up my sleeves and get everything spotless. Then I wake up, look at the cat hair floating in every corner, the dishes piled stinky in the sink and just don't know where to start so I give up after 15 minutes and "take a break" in the form of a two hour nap.

Well that's me in a mini update.

Thanks for stopping by.

Just hanging on!

Holy. Crazy. Pantsville.

Hi.

Yes, I'm still alive. TONS of stuff has been going on. Almost all great stuff. One thing in particular I CAN NOT WAIT to tell you all about.

First things first: I can now be called a winning grant writer! That's right my partner and I were informed last week that two of the grants we'd applied for had been awarded to our client! Squeeeee!!!!!!!

Second: I've been so busy trying to keep up with the all the demands of my second (non-paying as of yet) job that I've had no time to do pretty much anything. You should see my house. I mean, I'm never going to be able to let anyone in, they would probably turn me in for being a hoarder. OK, not really, but it's pretty bad. I've been making cleaning a priority this week and only have the floors and Mt. Laundry left to tackle.

Third: I totally used Facebook to flirt with a guy from High School. I ran into him at the annual town festival and my cousin who was visiting at the time told me I should have been bold. Well let me have a keyboard, monitor and miles of internet between me and someone and I'll be as bold as all get-out. Haven't gotten a response...

But let's not dwell. Let's rejoice that even though its hotter than blazes around here I have a lovely pool to jump into whenever I want. That's good enough for me for now.

Cheerio old chums! I'll be back soon(ish) with some pretty exciting news!

Bad, bad blogger.

Would you believe me if I told you that I have about a dozen unfinished drafts of blogs that I never finished or posted? Yeeeeeah.

Not quite sure what the problem is. Yes, I started a business without quitting my full-time job so that severely limits my free time. It doesn't help that my biz partner lives 90 minutes away so a couple Saturdays a month I schlep half-way to her so we can camp out at Starbucks for hours and get lots of work done.

My house is a pig sty. Not even kidding, I'm a messy girl but when my fantasies start revolving around getting everything put away so I can mop the floor, you know its out of control. I did manage to conquer Mt. Laundry* a couple weeks back so that felt pretty good.

Things are looking up though. We recently sent out an invoice and were able to note that we had completed 67% of the project. That felt great! It will feel even better when I can deposit 67% of our fee into the bank.

Don't get me wrong, the biz is doing awesome, we started almost 8 months ago with nothing but a couple of laptops and some moxie so I'd say we're doing great.

In other news, I signed up for Brandgasm 101! I am CRAZY excited to learn more about design and copy-writing. I know just enough about both to be dangerous so this seemed like the perfect opportunity to get myself back into the swing of things. It didn't hurt that I talked my partner into letting the business pay for it since I could use my newly acquired skills for our own truly terrible website. So terrible in fact that I won't even link to it here.

Stay tuned for further updates!

Sometimes I forget...

How hard it was to let my Echo go. Especially when I'm cruising the pets section of Craiglist to ooh and ahh over the pictures of adorable kittens. Luckily, I don't forget about the littlerbox or cat hair covering every item of clothing I own so it keeps me from actually getting another cat.

That I've started a business with a friend and have actually gotten paid by clients. What?! Was it a dream? Oh wait, it wasn't. Remembering comes in handy when I find myself wondering what I'm doing with my life and bemoaning the fact that I'm about to turn 35 and have no husband or kids like the majority of my peers.

That I have a weak stomach and things like spit-up and poop gross me out. Remembering this helps with the last one. Makes me glad that I'm the only mess-maker in my house, and I'm REALLY good at making messes. I imagine the city would intervene if a kid's mess were added to my own.

That I have this blog. Oops. I'm working on getting back into the swing of things. 

Just how awesome I am. I mean it. I have amazing friends, a HUGE loving family and a God that loves me in spite of myself. I'm pretty freaking blessed.

Remember me?

I used to update this blog every now and then. Turns out, starting a business, taking on a giant new project at work and oh, yeah the 40 hours a week I do the work I get paid for, leaves me with little time or energy for my poor wittle blog.

Things are going crazy-good in the new business area. God keeps plopping people in our path that just seem to be exactly who we need at the time. My partner and I have been getting along really well and as long as we keep plugging away I don't see us folding up shop any time soon.

Personally, I tried hiring a housekeeper. I should have know when she offered to come for as little as $15 a week that she wasn't going to be the best cleaner in the world, but I was busy and desperate. I had to let her go after only a couple visits. I haven't had the nerve to try and find another.

I'll try to be better about posting. To any one out there still visiting my little corner, thanks!

What happens when I stop trying to save myself.

I mentioned last week that I'm back in the market for a roommate. So far all the responses I've gotten have been from older men. I'm not cool with that. I've had a couple of male roommates in the past but there was always another female in the house as well. So yeah... lot's of men looking for places to live. Just my luck.

I've recently been putting my writing skills* to good use. I wrote a script that was professionally produced and I've been writing grants as well as content for an online course being put together by a non-profit. Of course I've been doing all of the above for free in exchange for the resume boost. I'm not making any extra cash.

Yesterday I got the "brilliant" idea to see what other ways I can write for money. I've been heard a lot about the 50 Shades of Grey book. I even tried to read the first chapter on Amazon. I'm a bandwagon jumper-on-er, sue me. I wasn't impressed. But I thought, hey, I could do that. I ended up spending the rest of the afternoon writing my first erotic story. It took me quite a while to even get to the beginning of the "good" stuff. Then I had to abandon the new enterprise to go to bible study. I know, I know, what kind of hypocrite does that make me?

It turns out, God was not going to let me take myself there. I was sitting in the church last night feeling quite icky for what I'd been doing, rationalizing my booty off. "I'll only write about married couples!" or "Just because I write it it's the reader's responsibility to police themselves" and thoughts like that.

In the end, I came to the realization that I can do better.  I don't need to pollute my thoughts or enable others to do the same.

STOP THE PRESSES!

I just got an email from someone who needs a place to live for the summer. Looks what happens when you let God solve your problems instead of blindly grasping for any rope that appears.

Wow. Just wow. I'm not saying anything is going to happen with this chick, but it's a start!

*Don't judge my skills by what you see here, this is my happy place and I can post bad writing if I want to.

Roommate Wanted

I've come to the conclusion that it is time to get another roommate. The last one moved out over six months ago in a storm of drama and controversy. I'm not even kidding. I felt like I was living in a reality show. Miscarriages, creepy new boyfriends, cheating, job loss, the list was seemingly endless.

The worst part? We got on so well! Right until the creepy boyfriend practically moved in. I'm not good at conflict. I will do anything to avoid confrontation, it's something I need to "work" on. He had been spending every weekend usually Thursday-Monday in my house. He creeped me out. He was too nice. I know call the police someone is too nice! Trust me it was icky. It didn't help matters that my actual roommate was always trying to pay for things (vet bills, expensive beauty creams, groceries, health club memberships). Again you're probably thinking, free stuff = woohoo! It just didn't sit well with me. I like friendships to be equal. I also don't like feeling like I'm being bribed.

Towards the end of our time together her behavior just got more and more bizarre. To the point I was actually afraid that upon coming home I would find all my stuff gone or worse.

But it is time to try again. My bank account really needs the help. Wish me luck!

Big, BIG weekend plans.

Or not.

I mean, my weekend just happens to be jam-packed, but none of the plans I've made will require me to actually leave the house.

You see, I am  a messy person. I've never been concerned with things like dust bunnies under the bed of dishes piled up in the sink. It goes WAY back. Friends would come over for sleepovers and we'd end up cleaning my room.

I was pretty good for the two years I shared a dorm room but all bets were off after that. Even now, I have three whole bedrooms to stash my stuff but things get piled all over the place until I feel like I'm on the verge of being featured on Hoarders.

So yes, this weekend will be "The Weekend of Cleaning!"

I vow to wash every dirty dish, fold or hang up every article of clean laundry that is currently residing in a pile on the guestroom bed. Not even the garage will be safe from the swirling tornado of cleaning that will be me!

Somewhere amidst all that cleaning I also have to find the time to write a grant proposal (my first client, yay!) and come up with a lesson plan and example for a company I am doing work for. Both are due Monday.

Who needs sleep?

Happy Good Friday everyone! Take a moment to thank God for sending his son to be crucified for our sins.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=syExGszydHc&feature=related

All shook up. But in a good way.

Changes are afoot! As you can probably tell by the new blog URL and title. I feel like a whole new person lately.

The meds must have finally kicked in. Ba-dum-dum! Don't forget to tip the bartender.

But seriously, stay tuned for more developments as they.

Another one down.

So I'm a little late with my end of the year summary. Are you really surprised? I haven't exactly been devoted to this poor little blog. But on to the summation!

The big four biggest things that stand out from last year:

1. Hello Addie! My adorable niece arrived in late October and it was love at first sight. I absolutely love being an Auntie to her and her big brother Kevin. 

2. Goodby Echo. Without a doubt this was the worst day of the last year. I hope to never have to make a decision like that again.

3. So long Ecclesia. After almost two and a half years our church-plant threw in the towel. My friend Tony writes of it far more eloquently than I can.

4. Rekindling of a lost friendship. Thanks to a good friend's wedding in November I was thrown together with an old friend I'd lost contact with. It has been quite fun to get to know each other as we are now. I'm so lucky to have her back in my life!

NaNoWriMo - Hopeful

I signed up.

I have only done it once before, a long, long time ago. Probably when it was still a toddler. I didn't win then, and to be honest, my work ethic these days leaves me doubting I'll win this year.

Whatever.  I'm going to give it a go. Maybe it's just what I need to get myself writing again? I'd meant to spend last week outlining and getting ready to dive in today, but, uh, haha... Didn't happen. What did happen was I spent a crazy weekend hanging out with some truly fun people. Also my niece was born!

Addison Ann, 7lbs 4 oz., 19 1/2" long. We've all been forbidden to share pictures until my brother and his wife have so I'll pop one in soon.

Want to hear a funny story?

I have an old WIP that was my original Master's Thesis novel and the main character was named Addison. This was about seven or eight years ago, before Grey's Anatomy and LONG before the newest addition to our family. In fact, I think my sister-in-law was still in high school then. Weird, but totally awesome!

OK wish me luck on the NaNo!

Day 7 - 9lbs down!

Yes you read that right. I've lost 9 pounds since I started my juice fast last Saturday. I probably could have lost even more if not for a few hiccups along the way.

I didn't get to my current weight by eating healthy so it should come as no surprise that I leaned off the wagon a couple of times this first week. I'd like to think that even though I was eating food instead of drinking the juice, I made OK choices. Wednesday night I broke down and had Chipotle but stayed away from the carbs, and last night I had In-N-Out, again staying away from the carbs. I'm not proud of my choices this week. I kind of got into the mindset that I could ease up the restrictions a little until Saturday (tomorrow) since I would be going all juice then.

I have to remind myself over and over that I am the boss. Not my cravings, not the commercials telling me to order a pizza, not my friends who are all going out to eat, ME. I'm kind of a crappy boss.

Whatever.

I've got to not beat myself up, savor the tiny triumphs and just keep moving forward. Let me tell you it was hard this morning. I got yelled at by my Dad/Boss at work and it was all I could do to keep from pulling into the McDonalds drive-thru for some greasy self-medication. I was able to resist, thank you Jesus!

As a reminder my Tiny Triumphs of the Week:

• -9lbs
• No sugar or gluten for 7 days
• Was able to resist temptation even under stress

Day 4 - Stumbling but recoverable.

Yesterday ended on a "meh" note.

I stopped at Costco after work to load up on some more fruits and veggies and I was starving! I had to walk through the bakery department to get to the produce and thank you God they didn't have any chocolate cake on display or I might have gone home with one.

Instead I picked up a flat of beefsteak tomatoes, a package on mini European cucumbers, 5 lbs of strawberries, 2 personal sized watermelon and a bag of clementines. I also bought a rotisserie chicken, roasted turkey lunch meat and a big bag of raw almonds (more on that later).

It was a fierce battle in my head as I walked to the front of the warehouse. The devil on my shoulder telling me to go ahead and have a giant slice of pizza. The angel reasoning that I was almost at the end of day 3 and hadn't had any caffeine, sugar, flour or fat. I'd also made the mistake of slurping down my 64 ounces of juice before 1 pm and by 4 pm I was STARVING.

But I did it! I was able to resist the dastardly allure of melty-cheesy-goodness poison. I may have ripped open that package of turkey and wolfed down a slice before I made it out of the parking lot...

OK back to the part where I bought the meat and almonds. No, it is not on my "plan" but I also didn't properly for this endeavor and went from eating everything in sight, including blue-cheese fries the night before I began, to a raw, protein-free diet in a matter of about 10 hours.

I'm giving myself this week to juice all my meals, but supplement with pure protein in the form of chicken, turkey and almonds for the really tough moments. My goal will be to be all-juice by next week.

Now onto today. I feel great. I had a 6 am Bible study meeting so I had to get up at 4:45am in order to get in my usual getting ready routine as well as juice. I didn't even hit snooze. I was up and showering with in a minute of my alarm going off. I've had a bit of a mid-morning lull where my head feels a bit foggy but it probably means I just need to have some more juice. I'm really trying to parse it out to last me all day. And in between 16oz cups of juice I'm drinking the same cups full of water, at least one if not two. I'm spending a lot of time in the bathroom, but its all good because it means I'm getting cleaned out. Right?

P.S. See the link to my new Tumblr account on the right to get my juice recipes.

P.P.S I slipped and had the last remaining Eggo waffle last night. I should have thrown them out before this all began. But I beat myself up enough about it last night. Today is a new day and I'm going to move on.

Busy doing other things

I adore my homemade planner. I made it out of a plan black notebook, inserted/okie-rigged tabs to reflect what was important to me and viola! Thanks to my mom having a super cool Cricut machine I was even able to decorate with an adorable owl.

Moving on. Why am I bringing this all up? The time change has really gotten me screwed up this time around. Not only can't I fall asleep at night, but waking up what feels like and hour earlier than I am used too has made me kind of a walking zombie this week. As I will show you in the next few pictures you will see why that is a bad thing.

This is what my January looked like. If I still carried last year's notebook I would show you my December and the myriad of colors and appointments would astound you. January turned into a pretty light month.

 Then there was February. Holy crap, when did I have time to breathe? Did I mention that my calendar is purely extracurricular? On top of the 40-ish hours I spend at work every week I did all of the things you see below. This is what I show my dad (also my landlord) when he comes by the house and notices that the grass in the back hasn't been cut in about 6 (maybe more) months.

 I have high hopes for March. The latter half anyway. After going-going-going like a crazy person and getting a new (and absolutely wonderful) roommate I had decided to take the month off from almost everything. But slowly things crept back on the schedule. How could I say no to the casserole swap last week? Or playing XBox Kinect with Dina and her 5-year-old tonight? So what if the sun is currently shining and the weather is foretasted to rain the next nine days. The grass has gone this long with out mowing. It can go another week or 4. Right?

 April is pretty open... for now.

Maybe then I'll have time to clean out my overflowing bedroom closet, plant my seedlings or get the junk out of my office so I can actually use it?

Wow I kinda suck.

So much for getting back into blogging. It went almost as well as my attempt at vegetarianism. Yes, that is McMuffin you smell on my breath. Why do you ask?

Lucky for me blogs are free.

Here I go again, again. Join me will you?

Veggies on my doorstep!

Yesterday I rushed home from work excited to see if the veggie delivery service I signed up for last week had made the appointed delivery. And guess what? They had!

You'll have to excuse the rather uninspiring look of the package because what was inside totally makes up for it!



Just look at all those colors! My delivery consisted of: baby bok choy, arugula, assorted chard, radishes, heirloom tomatoes, cilantro, pears, plums and broccoli rabe. I'm a little concerned with the amount of greens as I've never really cooked with them before. Some friends have already offered some suggestions on how best to prepare the chard and Cook's Illustrated has some seemingly easy ideas for the rest.

You're probably wondering what I made for dinner last night with such an abundance of yum just waiting to be chopped up and put in my belly... Well, to make room for it all in the crisper drawers of my refrigerator I had to use up some of the older stuff already in there.

I had a ton of leeks starting to go limp so I chopped those babies up and made a super simple potato leek soup.

Potato Leek Soup Recipe (adapted from Cook's Illustrated)

5 leeks chopped into 1/2" rings - use all of the white part and a few inches of the green.
5 large red potatoes
5 1/2 cups veggie stock (you can use chicken).
2 bay leaves
1 tablespoon of flour
6 tablespoons of butter
1 splash of olive oil - to help keep the butter from burning
2 cloves of garlic minced

Instructions:
1. Begin by melting the butter & olive oil in a dutch oven or large pot.
2. Add the chopped leeks. Cook covered until soft about 10 - 15 mins.
3.Throw in flour and stir to dissolve.
4.Add stock and bring to a boil.
5. Add bay leaves and chopped potatoes.
6. Cook until the potatoes are to your desired tenderness.
7. Enjoy!

Of course I was too hungry and my kitchen too messy to take pictures, but it was yum and only took about 30 minutes (minus chopping time) to cook.