Ramblings

It's been a while since I've blogged. As you can tell I started to update my blog. I thought that it would be a nice change for a clean and simple template. I haven't had the time to adjust the banner yet, but I think I will. I'm debating about changing the title of it too, but I'm not positive. I can't wait to make this feel all "at home" again. :) Sorry I've been slow about it!

I'm in the mood to ramble today, so I apologize in advance if this is a rambly post. I'm sitting at my desk at work. I love being by the windows. They are just gorgeous. Today we have some crows that keep flying by the window. The sun isn't out in full force, it was flurrying this morning. But the sun is trying to peek out. I can't tell you how much of a difference being by the windows makes. I can tell that the days are getting longer again. It's not completely dark yet when I leave work at 5 p.m.

One thing has changed since I've last posted. I turned 28 on January 24. I can't believe that I'm almost 30. It's crazy. Where has time gone?!?! My birthday was good. Jason and I spent it hanging out at the house together, we watched a couple of movies too. Jason took me out to Outback for dinner. Steak and Shrimp, YUM! And I just love their salad. It's the best with Blue Cheese dressing. So yummy. I enjoyed the last of my meal at lunch yesterday. I love having leftovers.

This month I have been reading books like mad for some reason. I have my list over at Listology, which I need to add to again. I've finished 2 more books since I last updated it. If I forgot to add the link, let me know. I'm typing this in Word right now, and I have a feeling I will forget the link. Books are like a comfort for me. I love having them around me. They are like friends to me. An escape from reality as well. I can so easily just get lost in a book. I love the escape it provides me. Though sometimes when I finish a good book, I feel like I have lost a friend and I'm a bit sad. Though I know I can always go back and re-read the book. Some authors I wish they would make a series out of books. I just get so involved in their lives.

Guess what else I did last Saturday? I went cropping for the first time in MONTHS! I had a blast! I am still working on my Cathy Zielske class Me: The Abridged Version. I got the base down for 32 8.5x11 pages. Now all I have to do is finish up all my journaling, and add embellishments and pictures. I loved the format of the pages. Clean and simple. Though I will be adding some embellishments. I also LOVED the line of paper I used. It's from "Crate Paper" and is called "Restoration." It is so ME. I bought way more than I need for my book, so I can't wait to scrap something else with it! It felt really good to get out and scrapbook with Mama Jenny and Mary. It was much needed. I still need to finish organizing my room.

I have a couple more updates, but I think I'm going to do them as separate entries. Do you have any topics that you would like me to blog about? If so, just let me know!

2011

Welcome 2011!

The beginning of a new year brings lots of hope and promise for me. I always like the start of a new year. There is just something about it that makes it feel like a fresh start. You can leave everything behind and learn from the last year.

Each year I usually choose a word or phase, a la Ali Edwards, "One Word." This year I didn't pour over her old blog entries about it. I didn't read through lists and lists of words. In fact I haven't read her blog in a while now, so I don't even know if she is doing it this year. The last couple of years I have chose a word and then didn't really focus on it. I might do that this year as well, who knows what the year will hold. But one word has been nagging at me. "Embrace." I realize that sounds like an odd word for anyone to choose. But I want to Embrace life. Embrace experiences. Embrace everything that happens. Embrace the every day things.

Aside from that I don't think I'm going to make any resolutions per say. I want to work on crossing somethings off of my Bucket List. You can find my Bucket List on Listology. The highlighted items are the ones that I have accomplished. Though I"m wondering if I should change them to a strike through. I will have to check that out. :)

Menu Plan, Money, and Ramblings!

Thankfully my migraine from Thursday and Friday is gone. I think I figured out the trigger for that one. Stress, plus I ate bananas. I must remember to not buy bananas.

This afternoon (after my nap, oh how I love my naps!) I made a menu plan. I decided to not make it by the day, but just make sure I have enough food for a few meals with leftovers. Here is what I'm going to make this week and possibly next.

Roast Chicken Legs and Dill Romanoff Potatoes and Squash

Broiled Tilapia

Cilantro Lime Shrimp with Cilantro Lime Rice

Rice and Beans

I have various frozen veggies in the freezer, and some lettuce salad as well. Believe it or not I had most of this on hand. I did pick up some chicken legs for $1.49 for I think 3 pounds. I didn't think that was a bad price.

What killed my grocery budget was that I had to put shampoo, conditioner, and mousse. With my curly hair, I hate using the el cheapo products. They just make my hair a tangled mess. I ended up spending a little over $10 on hair products. Ugh. I hate that, but it's necessary now that I'm working full time and have to look professional. I wish I had the money for the Aveda products, but I just don't. So instead I settle for less ones.

You know I started talking about a budget and did not explain anything. I'm started to re-read my Dave Ramsey book and found a show on CNBC called "Til Debt Do Us Part." Between Dave and Gail Vaz-Oxlade on "Til Debt Do Us Part." I've been really inspired to get my money situation in order. I've made a couple of budgets and started doing the money envelope system. I think I have to make some adjustments, but I know I'm on the right track. :) I'd love to hear your favorite financial blogs/websites. Or if you post about financial stuff! I'm looking forward to being on track, though I still think that Money Sucks, lol. :)

Ramblings

Tonight I feel like writing, but I'm not sure about what. I've toyed with a few ideas from my list, but none of them speak to me today. So I'll do a rambling list of thoughts.

• Today I gave a presentation on Outlook Calendar Best Practices to my work group. I HATE speaking in front of people, but I did it anyway. I think it went really well and afterwards people kept coming up to me and thanking me for giving it. I think everyone learned a lot. One person even told me that she is going to call me "Awesome Amber" from now on, lol.
• I am seriously behind on reading and commenting on blogs. I'm debating about moving my old Google reader account to a new one and weaning down on the blogs I follow.
• Speaking of following blogs, I'm so sad to see some of my favorites seem to be turning commercialized now. It seems like they are constantly giving sponsor items away and that most posts are about the products. That makes me very sad as I miss the real posts from them. :(
• I'm not ready for winter. I wish it could be 50-60 degrees and sunny all year around. Getting down to the 30's/40's at night. That would be ideal for me.
• I've been falling behind on cleaning and putting things away in the apartment. I've been feeling so exhausted lately. Not a good thing.
• I'm planning to go to bed early tonight and hopefully that will help.
• I've been listening to Christmas music already.
• I really need to create a new playlist. I've started it, but haven't finished.
• Speaking of music, I should share some of my favorite songs lately. Anyone interested in that?
• Books make me happy.
• I have a think for stationary and office supplies. Odd.
• I've been meaning to go to the Salvation Army and look for a couple of things for my desk at work. I have a vision in my head and need to find a couple things.
• I haven't been spending a ton of time online lately. That makes me happy.
• I've been devouring books like crazy.
• One can never have too many books.
• I want a good program to track/organize my books. Anyone have any ideas?
• I really want a bookplate/library checkout system for my books. Like this from uncommon goods. :D
• It sounds like there is a heard of elephants running around upstairs. I think my things are going to start falling off my walls.
• I have a vision for my living room and kitchen. I just need to get ambition to do it.

365 Days of Pictures

Random picture from my 2008 self-portrait a day challenge that I did. Man, I miss the green grass!

Andrew asked me something in a comment here on one of my blog posts and I thought it would make a good entry. :) Here is what he asked.

"I was thinking of the 365 photo project myself this year, but instead will do a weekly project me thinks. Would like your views on doing a 365 project if possible. Intense at times for instance?"

My first thought is, "Go for it! What do you have to lose?" I mean if you don't finish it, at least you will have taken more pictures and documented a few things right?

Now I would love to tell you all that the first time I started a taking a picture a day for 365 days that I finished it the first time I started. Nope, I didn't. I did my first complete 365 days (actually it was 366) in 2008. I started it the year before and got maybe a weeks worth of pictures done, that's it. I also tried to do a picture of anything a day in 2009. I didn't get very far into that one either.

For 2008 I think that it actually helped that I had a focus. Self-portraits. At least part of me had to be in the picture and I had to take the picture. I hated being in front of the camera and wanted to have more pictures of me. I also went into this with the thought that I wanted this to be real life. That I didn't want to sugar coat anything and that I wanted the pictures to capture moods, things going on in life, essentially to be a nice capture of what the year held.

I think I'm starting to ramble here, and I'm sure that's not what Andrew had in mind. Let's try to get back to his question.

I don't think that it was intense. I wasn't all about capturing the perfect shot, I just wanted to make sure that I had at least one photo for each day. I carried my camera with me everywhere, just so I wouldn't miss an opportunity. I would highly recommend that.

I will admit that for me, the 365 days of pictures was time consuming, but not everyone is like me. What took me the longest was choosing the picture (very rarely did I take 1 picture to choose from, I took a few, but again, that's just me) and of course the editing of the picture. I played around with my pictures a bit in Photoshop Elements, and then I resized them, and put my name on them before uploading them to flickr. Then after uploading them to flickr, I blogged them all. The editing and that process is what took me the longest. Now you don't have to do all of that, but I did. In fact, I also decided to scrapbook those pictures and I'm still working on that book. I really should finish that....maybe that's what I will bring with me on the next retreat. But that's a whole different subject. :)

The 365 days of pictures was a great experience for me. I learned so much about my camera, editing, everything! I loved it! I also met some fabulous people while doing this and I was so inspired by other peoples pictures. I think that my photography skills improved, at least I hope they did. I also accomplished the goal of being in more pictures. I'm now more apt to be in them as well, I guess you could say that it got me over not wanting to have my picture taken. I also succeeded in documenting life every single day for a year. I would have loved to be able to look back and see a year in the life of my parents, or any of my relatives. What a great history.

A tip I have if you are interested in doing a 365 project, is to keep up with it. I mean obviously you will snap the pictures everyday, but if you want to share them somewhere, then do your best not to get behind. I remember being overwhelmed by not keeping up with that and being overwhelmed by it. I know and understand life gets busy, but if you are feeling overwhelmed by it, then it's not fun anymore. Sharing it right away also makes it much easier to share the story behind the picture, if there is one. There were some days when I went to share the pictures, I couldn't remember why I took that particular shot. What was going on that day, etc. But once again, that was just my preference, I like knowing the story behind the picture.

Honestly, I would encourage everyone to do a 365 project. I found it very rewarding as I described above. I caught many moments (even pictures I didn't share on my Flickr/blog) that I normally wouldn't of, simply because I had my camera at hand. To this day I still carry my point and shoot camera with me wherever I go.

As you can tell from my previous blog posts, I'm attempting a 365 again this year. I'm not doing self-portraits every day, but various things. I want to focus on the here and now. The story behind the photos. How life is now. Record my random thoughts and memories. Likes/dislikes. I'm also using this as an opportunity to learn how to use my new camera. Looking back on 2009 I realized I didn't take as many pictures as I would have liked, and I hope that this gets me back into it. I missed so many moments and memories. Everyday life moments.

I also found a really cool site through Twitter (I can't remember who initially linked me), if you are wondering what in the world you are going to do with 365 photos at the end of the year, it's a possible solution for you. It's called Shutter Cal. At the end of each month, you can order a box of prints from them with the date and a description printed on back. Now I haven't ordered these yet, but I'm planning on it, and I love how they look in the photos! I look forward to seeing for myself. :)

If anyone has any questions about my thoughts on doing a Project 365, leave me a comment and I will answer it! I love comments. :)

Welcome to 2010

Wow, I can't believe it's already January 5 today. Where has time gone? I have to say that I truly enjoyed my Christmas break. I loved having the time off from my main job and only worked a few hours at my other job. I spent lots of time with Jason and Cullen. I only wish that I were still on vacation and home where it is nice and toasty warm.

Before going on vacation I decided that I was going to get so much done around the house. Do you think that actually happened though? Nope, it sure didn't. But it was a vacation so I should have relaxed and enjoyed my time off right? I hope so, since that's what I did. Everything is still there and will be there when I get to it.

As some of you know from my previous blog post I've done the "One Word" before. My previous words were Cultivate and Homemade Simple. Since December I've toyed with it off and on, and I decided that once again I'm going to do it. This year it's different though. I didn't wade through word lists, or spend too much time thinking about my word. I just felt a nudge that my word should be growth. I'm going with that nudge and that's my word of the year.

As always with a New Year comes with resolutions or goals. I've been debating about posting them here, and I figure why not. It's my blog, right? :) Without any further ado here are some goals/resolutions/things I want to accomplish this year.

• Get back to eating healthy and lose weight. (Again.) I realize that this is a typical resolution, but I recently started scrapbooking my 2006 pictures of our trip to South Dakota. I can't get over how much better I look there. I actually look fairly healthy even! I was still overweight, but so much healthier. I went back and read some of the journaling that I did in our travel book and I cried as I copied it into my scrapbook. I was making good choices then. I need to get back to that again. I need to do it for me. Thus it's one of my goals.
• Keep a list of all the books I read in 2010.
• Keep a list of all the scrapbook layouts I do in 2010. (I'm debating if I should also include the ones that I do for the scrapbook store, as they aren't for me. Hmmm...decisions, decisions.)
• Read at least 1 book off of the banned books list.
• Work on my Listology Bucket List. Cross off at least 1 item. (Hopefully more!)
• Get back on track financially. We slipped off the road so to speak, but I'm sure that we will get back on track. I'm re-reading Total Money Makeover by Dave Ramsey again. I'm already inspired. :)
• Learn how to use my new camera. I think I will need one on one instruction for this!

This year I also decided to try to do a photo a day again. I found a really cool site called ShutterCal and I've been uploading my pictures there as well as Flickr. I don't think I will scrapbook these, well maybe some of my favorites, but nothing like my self-portrait 365 that I still haven't finished! Instead I'm going to order the prints from ShutterCal and keep them in that nifty, sweet box! Isn't that neat? I love how they look! Plus I can then use my new camera more. :)

I don't think I blogged about my new camera. But I got a Canon Rebel XS from Amazon! I got it for a steal of a deal and absolutely LOVE IT! I can't believe the quality of pictures it takes and how fast the shutter speed is! It's amazing!!! I really haven't taken it off of Auto much yet, but I can't wait to learn how to use it! I am loving it!! Oh and I so want some of the fun lens filters too! :D

Oh and don't worry, I will share my daily photos here on my blog. Or if I'm behind, you can view them on the shutter cal link above, or on my Flickr account.

Speaking of pictures, I should go back and upload the ones I have taken so far and post them here! :)

Random!

I know that I do a lot of posts called random or something to that effect, but oh well. :P

A while back someone asked me for feedback on the homemade laundry soap I made. I think that was way back in January 2009, and I don't think I ever did. Anyway, the first soap recipe I tried, was a liquid soap and I didn't like it. To me it seemed like it didn't whiten my clothes. After that I tried another soap recipe that Ma gave it. We made that up a while back and really liked it. I just made up a second batch tonight. Here's the recipe if you are interested.

Ma's Laundry Soap Recipe

1 box Borax

1 box Washing Soda (I can only find the Arm & Hammer brand around here)

1 bar grated soap (I use Ivory)

Mix it all together, and ensure that it gets mixed up well. When I mix it up, I tend to layer it and then mix it up. I use anywhere between 1/8 cup and 1/4 cup per load of laundry. Depends on how large the load is and how dirty the clothes are.

I finished wrapping the Christmas presents that are in the house tonight! Reindeer names have been chosen, and now I just need to ribbonize the gifts and tag then with reindeer names. :) We are celebrating Christmas up north next weekend and I gotta be ready. :)

Our Christmas tree looks so lonely in the corner with no decorations or lights on. Tomorrow I hope we can get the tree decorated. With me being sick this week, it just didn't happen. Thankfully Cullen has been leaving the Christmas tree alone, expect he likes to drink out of the tree stand water. Silly cat.

I need to give a big THANK YOU to Heather from Cool Zebras. She brought over a HUGE bag full of clothes and another smaller (but still large) bag of clothes over for Kent and Doreen!!!! THANK YOU so much! I am so touched that you did this.

I also got my pay it forward gift from Heather, but that deserves a post of it's own.

I had good intentions of continuing to blog a few times a week, but I haven't been. I need to get back to it, since I realize how much I miss it.

Speaking of missing things, I also noticed that I haven't been taking pictures. I feel like I am missing memories when I don't take pictures. I need to get back to that too. My blog posts look so lame without pictures. Sorry everyone!

Laundry just stopped, so I best go and switch that around. :)

Progress

I've been at RSC all day and I'm finally making progress on my South Dakota trip pictures!!! Jason and I only took the trip in 2006 and I'm finally working on the scrapbooking pages. I've only done a few pages, but it feels great to make progress on it! I should be taking pictures of my layouts and sharing them, but I am too lazy and I'm using Jessi's laptop so I'm not going to yet.

The best part is that I decided that I'm not scrapbooking all of the pictures that I printed, so I bought some of the photo album pages so I can incorportate all of the pictures into the scrapbook. That is if I can fit them all into one scrapbook. I'm thinking it will end up being two scrapbooks.

I'm sure this blog entry made so sense to anyone since I'm carrying on conversations at RSC while I'm supposed to be scrapbooking and that I'm super tired and have an awful headache. But oh well.

Balance

Balance. Our sanity depends on it. Some people thrive on being busy all the time, I'm not one of them. Lately I have been struggling with balancing everything; it's such a huge internal struggle for me. I need to find a way to find a balance with all that I want to do and what needs to be done. Yesterday I needed a day at home. Thankfully I got it. I stayed home all day and never once left the house. I can't remember the last time I did that. I'm afraid that I may have made some people upset by my day home, but I truly needed it. It gave me time to reflect and to get a few things done around the house that I have been putting off.

Before when I was working full time I felt like everything was balanced very carefully. I worked every day and then Friday's were my evening alone and Jason and I managed to get everything done that we wanted. It was a perfect balance.

This last fall I started going scrapbooking just about every Friday and that felt like a good balance too. I got my socializing in, plus got some scrapbooking done.

Lately though I feel that I need to make some changes. Need to find a better balance. I feel that I'm all over the place. I miss being at home. I used to be such a homebody and I haven't been lately. I need that back in my life.

I thought about this a lot yesterday, in fact I had this blog entry written in my head yesterday. (But would you think I remembered any of it today. Nope, of course not.) I'm going to try to make a few changes and see how I feel then. Simple changes such as running errands one day a week and not multiple, clean the house on my days off. Not go scrapbooking every Friday. Go for about 2 a month. I need some changes and I'm going to see how these make me feel. I hope to find that happy balance again instead of being pulled in a zillion different directions.

Quotes from Retreat

A while back we had a work retreat where we had to draw a picture of a pig and depending on certain aspects of the pig that you drew, there were different perceptions/thoughts that are supposed to identify with you.  I have my very badly drawn pig and I was going to put it up on here to share, but of course I haven't taken a picture of it yet.  

Anyway, the reason why I wanted to blog about it this is that during the presentation there were some awesome quotes that were shared and that I wanted to share here on my blog.  I foound them inspiring!

"A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity; an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty."  ~Sir Winston Churchill

"Outside my window, a new day I see

Only I can determine what kind of day it will be.

 It can be busy and sunny, laughing and gay

Or boring and cold, unhappy and grey.

 My own state of mind is the determining key

For I am only the person I let myself be.

 I can be thoughtful and do all I can to help

Or be selfish and think just of myself.

 I can enjoy what I do and make it seem fun

Or gripe and complain and make it hard on someone.

 I can be patient with those who don’t understand

or belittle and hurt them as much as I can.

 But, I have faith in myself and I believe when I say,

I personally intend to make the best of each day."

~Author Unknown

Random Thoughts

First, I have to start out with a picture of Cullen. Maybe if I post pictures of him I will get more readers and comments since he is so handsome. ;)



The other day at lunch I actually wrote down some of my random thoughts in between eating and reading my book. Yup, I'm such a multi-tasker there. For your reading pleasure here they are.

• There's just something about sitting down with music cranked loud that just makes my day.
• I never realized how much fun the word Cullen is to write. Certain words make me happy.
• My Ipod cracked me up. It went from "Laughed Until We Cried" by Jason Aldean to "Crazy Bitch" by Buckcherry. My taste in music is eclectic. I like it that way. Never know what's going to come on next.
• It annoys me that some songs are the perfect volume and other sounds go from really loud to really quiet. Grrrr.
• Writing on a pad of paper is really soothing and relaxing to me. Coloring in coloring books with a new set of crayons is also soothing and relaxing to me.
• Loving the Twilight Score that I downloaded. Wonderful music. You should really check it out.
• I'm almost part-time again. YAY!
• It's funny how my writing changes. It goes from almost perfect to really messy. I don't mean to do it either.
• I really want to go and see Jason Aldean in concert again. Heck, I'd love to go to a concert again, it's been way too long.
• "No Shoes, No Shirt, No Problems" by Kenny Chesney really puts me in an awesome summer good. The song just says beach and summer all over it. Love it.
• One of the things I miss most while working full-time is being able to nap with Jason.
• So happy that I ordered my laptop! One more thing to check off my lists.
• It's beautiful outside today. Wishing I were there instead of here at work.
• I have some really redneck songs on my ipod, but I love them. A couple of them are "Thank God I'm a Country Boy" by John Denver and "Redneck Girl" by the Bellamy Brothers.
• I have a couple Guitar Hero songs that just make me want to play the game. "Talk Dirty to Me" by Poison, "Slowride" by Foghat and "Hit me with your best shot" by Pat Benetar.
• I like my tall kinda skinny writing best. I have to make an effort to write like that.
• Are you able to speak in lyrics?
• Love me some Taylor Swift songs...."White Horses" and "Love Song" are two of my current favs.
• The song "Chicken Fried" by the Zac Brown Band is so country, but I love it. One of my current favs.
• Music sounds the best LOUD.
• Music fuels my cleaning.

Cullen's Antics

Since I know that you all are waiting with bated breath to hear all about Cullen some more, I thought I would share some!

He seems to be adjusting well. He is eating and drinking and using his litter box. Today he FINALLY ate a treat and wanted more. Before the treats would have to sit out for a long time and he would just lick it, leave it, then come back and lick it again. This morning he ate one out of my hand and wanted another one. I wonder how long it will be before he knows the sound of the treat jar.

Cullen and Jason get along great! They play and really seem to enjoy each other. Since Jason works overnights, Cullen gets some playtime in then. It will be interesting to see what Cullen does during the day when I am back to part time.

I have a little nest on the couch. I always sit on the same end, and have my laptop there to use. Cullen has decided that he doesn't like the laptop on my lap. He belongs there instead. He also doesn't like it when I type, even one handed when he is on my lap. Both hands belong on him and petting him. I am so owned by the kitteh. :) Speaking of being on my lap, before he would jump up there and stay there for about 2-3 minutes before hopping off. Last night he was on there for a good half hour to 45 minutes before jumping down. It was so relaxing to have him there.

Jason discovered that Cullen can open the bathroom door! The door doesn't close all the way when I have clothes hanging there drying. Cullen can just stick his paw under the door and pull the door open.

I swear he has a fascination with the bathroom. At first he didn't like the sound of water at all. Now he doesn't seem to mind it too much. Yesterday morning after my shower, he was in the bathroom meowing and I thought it was because the shower curtain was closed (it usually is) and he didn't like that. I opened it part way and he jumped right into the bathtub. Whenever we are in the bathroom or if the bathroom door is open, Cullen is in the bathtub exploring in there. Unless a drop of water lands on him, then he goes tearing out of the bathroom. I don't know why he likes that so much.

Last night I took a bubble bath and Cullen hung out in the bathroom most of the time and almost seemed like he wanted to jump right in! He kept getting up on his hind legs and peeking into the tub. He kept almost touching the bubbles and water, but never did.

Cullen is a hoot when you play with him. He jumps all over the place and loves his toys. Specifically anything with catnip in them! (Of course, he is a cat after all). He is starting to play with his toys on his own as well. He loves to tear around from one end of the house to another. You can tell when he does that since the rugs are all askew. He definitely has some personality. Love that about him.

I do have some more pictures on my camera that I need to get uploaded and share. Don't fret, you will see more of him!!

Hi!

Did you know that one little "Hi" and a smile can change your day? It did mine.

Today was just one of those days where I wanted to stay in bed and shut the world out. But I couldn't, I had to get up and go to work. I was hoping to stop for a Starbucks Coffee before work, but was too slow moving I didn't have time. Since my desk was slow, I decided to use my morning break to head on over and pick one up.

I walked outside, enjoying the cool, brisk wind, and simply being outside. When I head to Starbucks, I always cut through the Gonda building. On my way to Starbucks, I was doing just that and a little boy about 4-5 was walking about 10-15 feet in front of his mom. He had a nasal cannula on, for oxygen, but looked like the happiest boy in the world. He looked up at me, smiled really wide and said, "Hi!". I smiled back and said "Hi!" too.

That one little smile and "HI!" made my day.

Things that make me happy

It's been a while since I've done a list and I thought I would do one about things that make me happy. I woke up really happy and optimistic today and thought it would be a perfect day to do that.

• Pandora--I can listen to music at work all day and it's Free!!!! Great discovery. (Yes, I know I'm late in discovering that.)
• Jason--Best husband ever.
• Retreat this weekend--I have been looking forward to this for what feels like forever and I can't believe it's almost here. Looking forward to a fun-filled weekend!
• The Bellywings--I don't know what I would do without my girls!! Even though at the retreat will be our 6 month anniversary, it feels as if I have known them forever. I don't know what I did before them. They are the best.
• Books--I couldn't live without my books. I've been immersed "Escape" by Carolyn Jessop right now and I can't believe how the FLDS works and how horrid the women are treated. After this book I need to read a fluff book.
• Finding out that a book was released and I didn't know about it! Best part was, Jason knew it was in a series I read and picked it up for me.
• Caribou's Iced White Chocolate Mocha. Heaven on earth. Perfect. Will be getting that again! Best part was I had a coupon, and when I bought that, I got another coupon. Woot!
• Twitter--So much fun. I've "met" some great people on there and love conversing with them. Though the 140 letter limit is hard sometimes! I like to be wordy. It's the Nelson side of me. ;)
• Pictures of my sisters. I've been stalking my sisters on Facebook/MySpace and love some of the self-portraits that they take on there. So much fun! I really should steal some and print them to scrapbook.
• Getting a notification for a PaperBackSwap that I never thought I would get on there!
• I'm such a geek that I love mail. I love getting the mail and always hope for some fun mail.
• Sunny days. It feels like spring is just around the corner. I love spring. Not the muddy/icky part of it, but when everything starts to turn green and bloom. Nothing like that at all.
• Coming home to dishes done. Such a wonderful feeling.
• Fresh sheets on the bed.
• Pictures and memories. Going through pictures of my childhood brings back so many memories. I can't wait to go through all of Ma's pictures and get them all organized for her. Plus I can scan some in for me to scrapbook. It's so much fun. I <3>
• Cheese Burger Birds---You know the ones that sounds like they say Cheese Burger when they are tweeting? They are really chickadees, but in my world they will always be Cheese Burger Birds.
• Ma--She is always there when I have questions. She is an amazing woman and just awesome.
• Lists--<3>
• Scrapbooking--Such a creative release for me. I love the process. I don't always love my pages when I'm done with them, but I enjoy the process.

I suppose I should end this before you get bored reading this. Tell me what makes you happy. Either leave me a comment here or a link to your blog if you do this. :)

Have a happy day!!

Professional Photographer Magazines

I've been working my way through magazines today. I have a subscription to two different photography magazines and after working my way through them, I realized that most of the images featured in there bothered me. Mainly the people ones. They looked too overdone. The models looked like they were photoshopped to have porcelain skin. They don't even look real anymore. Now I know that I Photoshop some images too much to some peoples standards, but I don't make them look perfect. There is still some character in there that I leave. I know for sure that I will not be renewing one of the two magazines. I can't believe it took me that long to realize what bothered me.

Grocery Costs

The past few months I have been keeping track of where we spend our money. Basically I created a an Excel checkbook type register but added categories so at the end of the month I can go through and see how much and where we spent things. The last couple of months we have been between $150-$165 on groceries. This is MUCH less than I thought we would spend. It also includes a few various type things that we picked up from Target that I didn't break out, like birthday gifts and Christmas presents. But I can also tell that we haven't been spending much, because we are getting low, or running out of a few things. We are going to stock the pantry up hopefully before the snow flies.

We have also really cut down on eating out. Last month we only spent $65, compared to around $130 the month before. My goal is to only eat out once per pay period unless we go up north, since we usually treat ourselves on the way home on Sunday. I've found that I haven't been enjoying restaurants as much lately. The food hasn't been that good or the service hasn't either. The one exception is John Hardy's BBQ, a local restaurant.

Another good thing is that as of yesterday gas was down to $2.99 a gallon!!! I am thrilled that it is finally below $3 a gallon! I'm hoping it continues to go down, though I'm not thinking that it will. But one can hope, right?

Working on me.

Work is offering a program called "LiveWell", and if you take the Health Risk Assessment, you receive 500 points, which entitles you to $10 off each months premiums of health insurance through June 2009. If both you and your spouse work here and do this, you get $20 off per month. Since I'm counting my pennies, we are both doing this! (At least, I think I can convince Jason to!) Then if you continue to use the program and earn 1,000 points by the end of June 2009, you can continue to get the amount off through December 2009.

This is a great incentive to work on me. I want to work on myself. To get myself in a better place. I know I have a long way to go on weight loss and exercise. I was down to 208 last year, and let's just say I'm way over that now. I want to get down under 200. I would LOVE that.

I'm ready to embark on this journey. Before I was using http://www.sparkpeople.com/ to track my food and such, but you know what, I just find that site so busy these days with all the ads and everything. It kind of stresses me out to go there. I'm just not fond of it anymore. Work is offering a similar site through LiveWell. I will use that to track my food (based off of their menus) and exercise.

Because I want to lose weight, I joined their "Healthy Weight Program" and with a little more looking around, I also joined their "My Stress Solution" program. The Healthy Weight program is a 12 week program, though you can use the tools much longer than that. The My Stress Solution program is only a 4 week program.

I'm looking forward to going through these, and working on me.

I found a great quote today that fits.

Be selfish. No matter how busy you are, set aside at least a few minutes for yourself every day. {Found on LiveWell site}

Works for me Wednesday {Daily Tasks}

This is my first time participating in Works for me Wednesday. It is hosted by Shannon at http://rocksinmydryer.typepad.com/.

This Sunday I started something on a whim and I'm finding it is working fabulously!! I decided to start a Daily Tasks list in a weekly format. Yes, that does sound confusing, doesn't it? Well here is a screen shot of what my Daily Tasks document looks like. I actually fit 2 of these on 1 page printed out.



Note: Click on the image to make it larger to see what I have on my list!

Yes, I had to use different fonts to make it a bit pretty. I thought about doing color, but decided against it since that would use up my color ink faster.

In the past I have tried to do a formal schedule and it never worked for me. With being part time now and varied hours and schedules, I can't have a formal schedule. I decided to create a simple one of things to get done everyday. Since my husband and I don't have kids yet, it may seem to simple, but it works for us.

Once I complete each task for the days I simply place an X there. There is something about doing that, that makes me feel like I accomplished something good. When I work 10-12 hour days, obviously I don't get everything done on my list, but so far it is working awesome for me!! I am just loving this.

Google Chrome

I am back at work for the first time in about a week and can I say how much I dislike IE7 now? I am seriously tempted to download and use Google Chrome here at work now. I know it's not considered the "Standard" but it is seriously hard for me to not be using it! Everything seems to take so much longer!

.Creating.

I was scrapbooking tonight at home, and realized how much I enjoy creating.  I'm wondering if it's feasible to scrapbook or do something creative for at least 1 hour a day.  Granted when I'm working 10 hour shifts, it won't happen.  But what if I go for something like 3-5 days of the week.   Something to think about.   I really feel like I'm in a groove creating and need to do it more.  My room is all organized and keeps inviting me to play.   Speaking of which I haven't shared anything scrappy have I?  Maybe soon I will.