My Chemical Romance

So I've always loved music. I'm not too picky. I think there is at least one song of each genre that I like. Some genres I of course like better, but I have never really been one to focus on one type let along a single band that I liked enough to actually consider myself a fan of. And I mean a fan like, gets to know the members of the band, their story, and actually build an emotional attachment with that artist and their music. There have been very few that for me have stood out enough for me to put forth that effort. About seven years ago I heard a song that caught my attention called "I'm Not OK" by My Chemical Romance. Rarely has a single song caught my attention enough for me to be pulled into the world of the artist, but this song did it. It was the anthem of my high school years, though it was late, I had fallen in love with it. Enough that I began my emotional love affair with the band. The more research I did into the group the more of a connection I felt to them. They are generally my age, and their life stories are all relatable. As well as their music has a dramatic flair that I just adore with a twisted sense of humor that captures my heart.

They just released their fourth CD in November and if you want my opinion, you would be doing yourself a favor to pick it up. In celebration of this brand new album, that we've waited four years for, my friend Alyson and I went to see them in concert. I was lucky enough to see them three and a half years ago on their Black Parade tour, but I was so ready for some new live MCR. And they so did not disappoint. They played at a Christmas Concert series, so they were the second headliners on the night and by far the show the crowd most enjoyed. It was just so awesome and we had excellent seats, Alyson and I just screamed like tweens seeing Justine Beiber.

Here are some pics, they were with my phone, so sorry for the poor quality

Our close proximity to the stage

They look so tiny!

So hot!

The bright orange head you see in the top center is Gerard Way, standing next to his wife, then Mikey's wife, and the tall skinny blondish guy is Mikey Way. They were standing right below us watching the Smashing Pumpkins. Sqeeee!

Alyson and I all excited. :)

The other bands that played were Switchfoot, Jimmy Eat World, Bad Religion and Smashing Pumpkins. All of who were really awesome. I was however disappointed in the Pumpkins. Especially with them being one of the bigger bands of my adolescent years, their show was really blah and they only played their newer music. But the rest of the show was totally awesome. I already have my tickets to see MCR in May for their actual Danger Days Tour. Yay!!!

Updates

So it seems I owe a few updates. I never talked about the results of my little makeovers, life on Celexa and I never posted pics or a recap from our vacation, which was a lot of fun by the way. So that's my goal for this week to post some updates, then I won't feel as guilty about posting some new stuff. So stay tuned, if there is anyone out there still reading.

First Year

So yesterday was the one year anniversary of us getting the keys the keys to our first house. It has certainly been a year of ups and downs. Broken pipes, broken appliances, painting and the fun of trying to figure out where to find money to fix something else that just went wrong. It certainly hasn't been all roses.

But at the same time, we're still reveling in the idea that this is our house. I love that this is our house. I love this house. There is a lot I still want to do, a lot we've done and I'm sure unexpected problems will arise over the years, and I'm sure I will always have a room I want to paint, or one more piece of furniture that will finish off a room. But through it all I am so proud and happy with our home.
So here are some before and after pics of how the house has changed in a year. Please pardon the mess.

Living room

Bedroom#3

Bedoom #2

Dinning Room

 Kitchen

 Bedroom #1

A lot I still want to do. I think the kitchen is my next project, though it'll be a big one, so I'm saving up the energy. Hopefully a year from now I'll have some pics of the progress we make in the next year.



Moving On

At least preparing to. Two years I was moved into a nice middle level position with the Federal Government. A good stable and flexible job with good benefits and promotion and movement opportunities up the wazoo. Sure it's nowhere near what I'm in any way passionate about. On a daily basis I feel the life being sucked out of my soul and I see those that have been here for 20+ years as either walking corpses or someone who has set up their own mini empire, convinced this base cannot function without them, even though in reality they do nothing and they will more than likely die at their desk because it's all they have left in life. But it pays the bills, helped pay for our house, and pays nicely enough that combined with Chris's job we're comfortable.

And I guess that's the key word. Comfortable. I can easily find myself comfortable here. This job can quickly become a career before I even knew what was happening. I'm paying into a retirement that one day could be my soul source of income. I know my job. I'm familiar with the environment here. I grew up on an Air Force base, so really, it's an essential part of who I am. A huge piece of my life. To find a job somewhere else would mean I'd be leaving that piece behind. Which is really scary.

I had never intended to spend my life here. When I started in a temporary part time job seven years ago, I had no idea I would find myself here. In fact of all the temporary students around from those days, I think I'm the only one still here. Which I consider extremely lucky. I've been right where I needed to be for as long as I've been here. And as the last two years have passed I've become quite comfortable. Since graduating in 2009 it's become increasingly tempting to build a career here. Not the career I've always wanted for myself. But one that's good enough.

But, in contrast, over the last few months there have been small indications that this is not the place for me to set down roots. Nothing specifically big, just little things. It has become increasingly clear to me that I need to get out. I need to move on.

So I'm getting ready too. I applied to grad school and this week was officially accepted. I figure even though it won't be easy and I'm not exactly looking forward to going back to school. I at least owe it to myself to try. To take three years and work towards the career I know I really want.

I'm both excited and terrified. I hope I can do this. Just one year out of school and I'm afraid I've lost my momentum. That I won't be able to keep up anymore. But at the same time I'm really excited to be doing this for myself. To be learning more about what I'm passionate about. And that I'm taking steps that will hopefully open new doors for me.

We are going to continue TTC. I don't want to stop. I feel school is the place I need to be at right now, so I just need to trust that if I got KU it will work out somehow. I may need to take a break it I do. I really hope we don't have to wait another 3 years before we can have a baby. But I also can't keep putting this off just because I *might* get pregnant someday. And that's a BIG might at this point. So we'll just jump of that bridge when we come to it.

But overall, I'm really excited. I'm looking forward to this and the changes it means for Chris's and my future. So back to school I go!

Guess What

 

That's a BFN Pregnancy test there. In case you've never seen one. I have . A lot. So many in fact that I've developed a theory. My theory is that positive pregnancy tests don't actually exist. They don't. They're not real. They're just all a part of the fairly tail lie told when you are a impressionable little girl looking to a life with prince charming and 2-3 little charmings with starry eyes.

25 months. I've peed on a lot of sticks (or dipped the cheapy internet sticks into my pee, always fun) like this in the last 25 months. A LOT. Every single one with the same result. What did Einstein say? The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over again and expecting a different result. Hmmm……

Long Time, No See

So it's been a while again. And you know, I don't feel guilty at all. I've come to the conclusion that I don't really like posting stuff just for the sake of posting something. And well let's be honest, I'm not that interesting. Just look at the name of the blog. It'll tell you. Plus, I've been enjoying my summer, not being on the computer. Except at work. Where I have no choice but to be chained to the damn thing. I'm really kinda over it. But here are some random things just to let you know I'm still alive and just doing my thang. (That's right, I pulled out a "thang". What'cha gonna do about it? That's what I thought)

~ So pictures. Yeah, I still have them. Ready to be added to the posts that are sitting in my draft folder. You'll get them eventually. I promise. They've been delayed for a few reasons. One being that I'm really pretty unhappy with the quality. All of our cameras really just suck. I really want a new higher quality camera, but I just can't justify spending the cash just to take pics of the latest room I painted. The second is I keep changing little stuff here and there and then the pics I took last week are now obsolete, and I'm pretty sure everyone really wants to see the latest and the greatest. I imagine angry mobs at my door because the pics I posted are a week old and lacking the art I just hung up.  And three of course is the typical laziness.

~There are some big changes in store for the 2011 season of faire. I'm pretty excited, though there are a good amount of people who are not so excited and there are waves of drama flowing through the ranks. This is to be expected, so I just ignore what I can and laugh at the rest and move on with my life. I'll post more about things after some things are a little more solid.

~Chris and I have officially become pet parents. Our precious little cats have us wrapped around their psycho little paws, and the claws and in. They have chicken (canned kitty chicken) given to them twice a day with all their daily natural remedies to help keep they sensitive little tummy's happy. They get a half hour of play time in the evenings. And we spent a boatload of money getting stuff that promises to break your cat from peeing around the house. Which actually seems to be pretty worth it. Lady Jane has managed to not pee in the house in almost a month which is pretty much a miracle of biblical proportions.

~Chris and I are actually going on vacation. With a hotel room booked and paid for and everything. I'm not allowed to say when we are going because Chris is sure someone will somehow know where we live, beat up our housesitter, bust through the security doors and magically figure out the house alarm code and rob us. So, I'll have to save the when for after we get back. But anyway, I am super excited and so ready for the break! SO hopefully I'll have a recap and crappy pics to post soon.

~I've been an exercise fiend lately. I've been desperately trying to get my body to look anything but scary in a swimsuit for vacation. My diet is still wishy washy, but I think the exercise is starting to pay off. I haven't really lost any weight, which is annoying as heck, but things are starting to firm up, which is what is more important to me anyway. I stopped using Spark People all together for now. I got tired of it, but I do still keep mental track of my calories.

~This week Chris and I had our third wedding anniversary. I can't believe how quickly these three years has gone by. And though we've definitely had our moments overall it has been wonderful and I can't imagine another person I'd rather spend my life with. Plus he's super cute. ;)

~We're coming up on the big two year mark for our TTC fail. I'm not at all looking forward to this anniversary. I really never thought it would take this long. We've all but given up for now. I haven't charted in months and thanks to PCOS I really have no idea if I'm even ovulating. This is actually good because it's given me a much needed emotional break this summer. Infertility is just so full of negative crap. Anger, jealousy, sadness, disappointment, depression, emptiness, inadequacy and the list goes on and on. And after a while it gets really hard to separate that from everything else. So, the break has been good. This doesn't mean at all that it's not constantly on my brain, in my thoughts and that the tears don't come. I truly can't imagine ever totally letting go of this. I'm thinking though that this fall we'll get a little more aggressive about things. I do not want to wait another year. But at the same time, I really don't know if emotionally I can handle any more of this. If something like an IUI doesn't work, I'm afraid the despair is just going to be too much to bear. At least right now I don't have much to get my hopes up about.

~Work has been insane busy this summer. We had a huge inspection on base, and everyone has been freaking out. Thankfully after today it's over. I'll be so grateful to have things slow back down around here again.

That's all I can really think about for now. I'll really try to post more when I think about it, if I have something to post. I should have a vacation recap up soon. J

Oh Hai

Oh hello there long lost blog readers! Maybe it was me that was lost. Who knows. Anyway. Sorry I've been lacking in the posting department. A mix of being sick and lazy, plus no decent laptop for two weeks and no internet for a couple of days. But all is mostly back to normal now and I have a few posts in the works and they should be up soon. And more on the back burner of my mind. Lots of pics and lots of changes. So stay tuned.

Random Crap

I actually wrote most of this post over a week ago and forgot to post it. Than a lot of what I talked about here changed. So here is the update to the post you never read. Yay!

 

OK, this will be much more condensed this time. I promise.

- I've become mildly obsessed with HGTV. A TV channel I barely knew existed 3 months ago is now my default channel. I love watched the redecoration shows and the home buying shows. My favorite is now House Hunters International. Which I just found out last night that the show is actually staged. To say I'm disappointed would be an understatement.

- I had every intension last week of completely forgetting my age and going to the midnight premier of Eclipse. Unfortunately real life and reality of home ownership reared its head when Chris called as I reached the theater with the news that our sewer was backing up into the house. Thankfully it wasn't too bad and wit was easily fixed the next day, but still, not being able to use your toilet for a night is kinda rough.

- Chris got his deep cleaning last Wednesday. He was stressing out about this almost as if the dentist had said he was pulling out each tooth and replacing it barbed wire without any pain meds. The whole thing actually went completely without incident. The dentist completed the whole thing in one sitting and he didn't even need any Novocain. However, it may be a few weeks for his emotions to recover.

- We finally got rid of one of our old couches. The other is in our office where it works actually pretty well, but is supposed to go to Chris's sister whenever she can find a way to get it to Arizona. The house is starting to feel more and more ours. Right now I mostly want to get rid of the ugly valences that she had up. They're so ugly and even worse, they're from the previous owners. I just want them gone. But new valences are like $15 each and I need at least 10 for the living and dining rooms (big window) and another 6 for the bedroom. That's way too much money. S they stay. Sadly.

- Bart has become beyond obsessed with getting outside and will stand at the door and just cry pathetically. I've noticed lately that he's picking up some real bad habits to get what he wants. Some training may be in order.

- I've had little to no desire to do any work lately. It's not that I don't have plenty to do. I just have no desire or motivation to do any of it. I'm so tired at work, and typically spend the day wishing I was home, where I can accomplish the things I'd really would rather be accomplishing and counting the hours until my next day off.

- I'm going kinda crazy waiting for MCR to finally announce the release of their new CD.

- At this point Chris and I doing any sort of vacation this summer is looking more and more like it's just not happening. I am pretty disappointed/upset about this. At this point I don't think we'll ever be able to have an actual vacation.

- We've been discussing getting me a new car. I'm torn because I have a little over a year and my car will be paid off. I do like my car, my first brand new car and it's been a great car. But it's coming up to a mileage where taking care of it is going to start getting expensive. I have equity into the car so we're pretty sure I can get a better car for similar payments a month. A new car would be nice. But I'm not sure I'd want to leave a new car at the vanpool meeting spot at the Wal-Mart parking lot or take a new car out to the faire site and leave it in the dirt parking lot. If I knew we would have a baby then I would probably take the plunge for a more family friendly car, but I'm not sure I want to if that never happens. If it's just gonna be the two of us might as well go for the smaller 2-door. Anyway, we started looking last week and I like some of the options. And we'll probably so some more looking this weekend. A lot will depend on if Chris's sister wants to buy my car or not.

Random: Workout

Random: Exercise

OK, so I actually have a few things I'd like to post. Most of which involve pictures. But since the idea of getting out my laptop, plugging my phone and or camera into said laptop and going through all the drama of letting the pictures automatically load to my hard drive seems amazingly difficult. You just get a rambling post from me today instead. How exciting for you. Try to refrain from bursting with excitement. However I will give you a moment to happy dance.

 OK, let's see what can I bore you with? Um…

OH! Workout schedule!! Remember at the beginning of the month when I was super optimistic about working out and I was all set to kick my own ass down a few sizes? Well, yeah. I posted a great weekly schedule that was supposed to keep me accountable. Which BTW, none of the 3 of you that read this blog did. I'd fire you, but then I wouldn't have any readers. So I'll just wag my finger angrily at the computer screen for a moment…. OK, done. I hope you feel ashamed. But not so much that you stop reading. Please. I love you. Don't leave me.

Anyway, yeah, so on the first I was super excited and went straight home and worked out on my Wii. Then my crappy left ankle monster said to me "screw you woman! I can no longer perform in this manner!!" So I realized then that I would have to rethink my workout routine. By pretty much not doing it anymore. In my defense however in the 6 months since I last was weighed by the Wii, I somehow seemed to neither lose nor gain a single ounce. Really? How is that possible? But I did get connected back with Spark People and started tracking my calories and exercises again. The following week was my week off and according to the ever knowledgeable internet you burn like 180 calories an hour painting (have I mentioned this before? I can't remember. But I think it's worth mentioning again, because it's pretty awesome), and since I painted for like 3 days solid, plus heavy cleaning and walking. I kicked some ass in exercising that week. But somehow, managed not to lose or gain a single ounce. WTF? I think my Wii Fit is broken. Or enjoys slowly driving me insane. Probably the latter. I suspect that thing is going to try taking over my home one day. Unite with other Wii Fits and take over the human race as we are forever forced to step in rythym to our Mii characters and twirl non existant hoola hoops for the rest of our lives. This is why I threaten my Fit with a baseball bat every now and then. Keep it in line, thus delaying the eventual hostile take over. Your welcome.

I can't remember at all how I spent the third week of June in my little goal of fitness. I think I tried working out on the Wii a bit seeing what I could do without angering the ankle monster. And I tracked my calories like a good girl. Mostly because damn it, I wand those freakin Spark points!!! I have no idea why they are so important to me. But they are. I could probably look back to that week and see in more detail what I did that week, but let's face it, if I don't care enough to do so, than why in the world would you care enough to read about it. So I'll just save us all.

So that leads us into last week. Which happened to be my birthday week. Which I will really recap once I'm not so daunted by picture uploads, so let's stick to the whole exercise/healthy eating stuff. Well as far as the healthy eating goes? You can forget that. Between Thai lunch with the girls on my Bday, birthday dinner at Cheesecake Factory with Chris (where I actually ate so much food I was sick the next morning, yeah, that's embarrassing), second birthday lunch with my dad at Sizzler the day after, and second birthday sushi dinner with my family the day after that, I decided I had no business even trying to calculate those calories. Which I'm sure would have made me lose Spark points (which I don't think they even do, but they probably would have made an exception for my bloated ass), and we can't have that. Or even take that chance. This is real important to me. Clearly.

But!! There is some redemption!!! My birthday was Tuesday. On Sunday Chris and I had our obligatory weekly trip to Target to pay our mandatory $100 on stuff we really need!!!! Really!!! And while meandering through the video game section for my husband to drool over things I don't care about in anyway, I saw that Sports Active had a new update to their Wii workout thing (like how technical I get there?). I was interested, because I liked the Sports Active when I tried it for that one month last summer. Chris asked if I wanted that for my Birthday. And where I really hadn't given much thought to my birthday present, I decided I didn't because well, why have him buy me something that I can probably talk him into whether it's my birthday or not?  I'm sneaky that way.

Well turns out he's sneaky too. Because he saw something that when I noticed it my brain immediately put up blockers and refused to process. Jenny McCarthy's Wii Workout. Yes, that's what Chris got me. Now, you have to understand. I wasn't really upset about this or bothered by the gift at all. I didn't take it as him meaning I needed to workout or anything, because I know that he wouldn't do that. He values his balls me too much.  And I didn't even mind that he had gotten me the workout thing after I didn't want to waste a perfectly good present on something I could get anytime, because really, I had no idea what I did want and had given him no clues and to be honest, I am so freakin spoiled anyway, he could have given me nothing but himself in a ribbon and I wouldn't have complained a bit.

But, what I did hesitate on what JENNY FREAKIN MCCARTHY. Me, working out to Jenny freakin McCarthy. The girl that I just remember as a C lister farting on MTV. And enforcing the false belief that vaccinations causes Autism. Really? What in the heck could Ms. Usually annoys the crap out of me have to possibly offer me in a workout? Now granted she looks great and I appreciate that she's no longer farting her way across my TV, but still, really? I may be a bit of a snob sometimes. Chris had seen that this particular workout came with a camera, to scan my moves and judge my workout from that. He remembered (isn't that cute!) that my biggest complaints about the Active and Fit were that the equipment (the hand controllers and Fit) tend to get in the way. And where the Fit definitely has its advantages, holding onto controllers and exercise equipment at the same time can get annoying really fast and that was definitely the Active's biggest weak point IMO.

So he got this workout with the hope that the camera would make it easier to workout. And you know what? I actually really like it. A lot. I've worked out on it a few times; the workout has several different workout options so you don't get bored. It's fast pace, without being killer. You can choose the level of intensity you want for the day. You can choose the length of workout that you want. It builds in warm up, workout, cool down and breaks and it flows really nicely. The moves are easy enough to follow along to. Jenny isn't nearly as annoying as I had feared.  The music isn't NEARLY as annoying as other workouts both on Wii and regular videos. It sets up a regimen, but it's not so strict that you feel yelled at if you don't stick to it. I'm really liking it. Plus monster ankle doesn't seem as annoyed by these workouts.  So far I haven't lost anything I actually gained a pound, but I haven't been all that consistent and don't forget the million calorie week last week, so the fact that I didn't gain 15 lbs I think is a miracle.

OK, that ended up being way longer than I had anticipated, so I'll release you from my blog with just that for now. I'll throw more random stuff at you later. I have a feeling this week will be kind of low key in the workout/health arena. I need to start tracking again, but I'm ashamed to return to the Spark page. I will definitely be doing the Jenny McCarthy workout though.

Disclaimer: I pretty much wrote this post exactly how my brain thought it out. So here's a peek inside my brain. Thriling, wasn't it.

Back to Work

My week off was wonderful. My co-worker dubbed it the Nestcation because I was spending it getting my house settled. And I am so glad I decided to take a week off just to devote to my house. I was able to get so much done. So a brief recap:

Saturday was supposed to be my first day of vacation, but since work offered some overtime, I couldn't pass up the opportunity to get some extra cash, so I worked in the morning. It was work, nothing much more to say. Then I came home and got ready. My BFF turned 30 the week before and since February I had been planning to surprise her and take her to go see The Lion King, which she has been dying to go see for years, but never made it. So we drove down to the OC and had an awesome Sushi dinner, her first and she loved it, then I gave her the card with her ticket. Her face was priceless. The play was absolutely beautiful. Very well done. I think it has become one of my favorites. We had such a fun night together. She lived about an hour away and we both work full time so we don't get to see each other as much as we'd like to, so it was really nice visiting and catching up.

Sunday, Vanessa spent the night because we got back too late for her to drive back. Chris and I watched some TV while she slept in and I made everyone a yummy breakfast. Than Chris and I started on the house. We replaced the blinds in our middle bedroom because they broke. It sucked because they were really nice blinds and we just put up the cheap venetian blinds. I'm not in love, but they get the job done until I decide what I want to put up. I can't remember what else we did that day. I think just some house cleaning.

Monday I got started with the clean up. I got up had some breakfast and got to work. I made sure to stay away from the TV and computer. They can be great but also some major time suckers and I really wanted to make some progress this week. I threw away a ton of crap. I didn't even bother with a "yard sale" pile. I just wanted stuff gone. I was happy to fill up the recycle bin before the truck came so I could put more stuff in it. Since I wanted to switch the rooms, I put a lot of stuff in the garage to be brought back in when the furniture and painting were finished. I also finished painting in the middle bedroom. It was PINK!!!! when we bought the house. Bottles of Pepto Bismo look better than this room did. So it was the first to be painted when we moved in, but moving day came faster than finishing the paint job and it's had a pink corner for the last six months. So I made the PINK!!!! disappear. That night Chris and I moved the twin bed from the back room to the middle room.

Tuesday was a day I scheduled a break. My brother had given me a Spa Finder gift card years ago, but I was too lazy to find a place that took it. Finally I decided I needed a facial after faire to clean out all the dirt. So I found out that International Skin and Body Care accepted the gift card. I had never been, but I had heard good things. So I made an appointment for a facial and tub soak. And oh my, was it heavenly. The whole experience was wonderful. Everyone was so nice. I will definitely be going back. After that incredible morning, it was back to work. I went to Home Depot and got the paint I wanted to paint the back room. I then finished organized stuff in the garage, emptying out the back room and throwing stuff away. That night Chris and I taped off the back room.

Side note: If you decide to go and move dusty boxes and get all sweaty and gross immediately after a facial that opens up all your pores. Expect a few zits to show up. I think I was rather lucky, but I did have one pretty nasty one show up by the end of the week. Could have been much worse.

Wednesday I started painting. Nothing to interesting about that. Except my brother showed up to help and we were able to get all the walls done. Did you know you burn close to 200 calories and hour while painting? According to Spark People you do, so I didn't mind when A few days I went over my calorie limit a bit, I figured my body needed it.

Thursday was another break day. My mom made reservations for us to go and have tea and The Huntington. Chris took the day off of work so I left him home to tape up for painting the trim and gave him a few other projects and my mom and I went off to The Huntington. I just love that place. I had only been there once before, but couldn't stay long because it started pouring. Made it rather difficult to look at all the gardens. My mom and I only looked through about half of them, there are just so many. Tea was so much fun and so good. They had a little buffet of finger sandwiches and fruit. I was so full by the time we were done. Then of course we hit the gift shop up and spent way too much money. It was a lot of fun. Great birthday present from my mom. I came home to see the back room had all been taped off for me and Chris had done his tasks. I painted just a bit of trim to feel like I had accomplished something that day and called it a day.

Friday, Chris and I finished the back room. Painting the trim and doing the touchups. Then moved stuff back into the rooms in an organized fashion. Well as much as possible.

Saturday morning we brought the desk and hope chest that I had left at my parents house since I moved out over to our house finally. My mom was very thankful for this. And that was pretty much all we did on the house for the week. Chris Spent the rest of the day trimming the trees and bushes that were starting to get a little over grown with his new electric hand saw while I went to a birthday party. Then we went to dinner and had Sushi again. Sunday was half lazy and then we went to visit Chris's grandparents.

So that's pretty much it. There is still a lot to be done. Some of the stuff in the garage still needs to be moved back into the house. I didn't get a chance to clean out the closets to either room, so those need to be cleaned, organized and switched. We bought book shelves yesterday so I could put away a lot of stuff that was hanging in boxes. I feel so much better having those boxes gone. I didn't get as much as I wanted done, but I feel like it was still a successful week. Both rooms are so much more functional and look so much better. I'm no longer embarrassed to show them to people. I'll have pictures in the next post. I promise!

I also called Ashley Furniture yesterday to get an ETA on our couches. Right now they're saying June 25^th is the soonest. Which puts them at almost 4 weeks since we bought them. Sigh. I hope we still like them when they get here. They might be out of style by then!

The Great Cleaning

So a few weeks ago I realized I needed to take some time off or I'd lose it, so I decided to spend one week dedicated to finishing the projects that were started when we moved it and were going to get to "in a little bit" We've now lived here for seven months and nothing has been done. My goal this week is to correct that. The list? Is pretty long and a little overwhelming. But I think I shopuld be able to at least make some significant progress.

I'm really looking forward to cleaning out and throwing stuff away and getting some order to our house.

Looking Productive

So, I’m supposed to be pricing office supplies right now. Which I’m not doing obviously. I hate pricing office supplies. It’s a part of my job that followed me from my old position because there is no one else to do it. Overall I don’t mind being the ordering person. But price checking is by far the worst part. So, in an attempt to still look productive at my desk and not be doing something on the internet that’s traceable I’m writing some blog posts that I’ve been meaning to write down. So I’m still being productive, just not in a way that my boss might particularly agree with.

OK, so I promise that this will not turn into simply a weekend recap blog, but it was an extra long weekend, and a lot happened so I’m going to share anyway. I had scheduled to take off Friday before the holiday months ago and I sooooo needed the extra long weekend. By the time I hit Thursday, it was all I could think about. I wanted to spend some time in my own home and get started on some projects there that I’ve put off since January.

Friday I planned to get my pile of faire crap in some kind of order. This is kinda big for me. It’s not unusual for me to come home closing weekend, throw all the crap into a corner and leave it there for 8 months until I need to get it out and in a panic somehow get it all cleaned and organized before Saturday approvals. So Friday morning I had a slightly lazy morning until I went in and tackled the crap pile. The Wii is in the back room and in an effort to use it again for the first time in months I popped in the Netflix streaming CD and watched some Eddie Izzard on the Instant Queue. I just love him so much. How in the world is a man that wears makeup better than be just so damn sexy. Incidentally, if you haven’t ever seen one of Eddie Izzard’s shows, holy crap what are you waiting for, go to Netflix NOW and get yourself one or all of his shows. I recommend starting with Dressed to Kill. Freakin Brilliant.

Anyway, dear Eddie made the whole thing go much smoother. I sorted and organized and washed, underthings and dishes. I tossed my dress into the backseat of my car to drop off at the cleaners. I was so proud of myself. There was only so much I could do because there is a lot of sewing crap that will have to be better organized when my sewing corner is set up.

I made myself an appointment to get my hair done, like I talked about a little in my last post. It came out great. I love it. I have no idea why I look so pissed in these pictures though. Possible because I was concentrating on clicking the button. That was pretty difficult. At the end of the appointment I immediately made myself another one in 10 weeks. I figure I can save up or if it looks like money is tight I can cancel, but this keeps me from getting lost in time, being too embarrassed to call and all that jazz. The appointment is made, and it’s all upkeep from here. :)

Before

After

That afternoon I found myself with very little to do for the first time in months. I ran by Home Depot and picked up some sample paint that I’d like to paint the office/sewing room. Other than that I pretty much just wasted an afternoon on the couch. It was so nice. :)

Saturday, was back up to faire site one last time to help with tear down. Not much to say here except it was HOT and I got to use power tools. I worked hard enough to get some blisters and cuts and feel like I did my part. Its hard work, but really I love it. I feel like I accomplish something when I can get down and dirty with a power tool. That’s not a euphemism, get your mind out of the gutter.

Anyway, Saturday Chris was down at his grandparent’s house finishing up painting their house, and that ended up taking the rest of the day, so I got another lazy day on the couch alone. It was nice, but I was missing my husband by then.

Sunday, we were both actually home. I made breakfast, we had a nice slow and lazy morning. We went down to Chris’s grandparent’s house in the afternoon for his grandma’s 88th birthday. And we stayed there pretty late.

Monday was another nice and lazy morning. We were invited to about 4 different Memorial Day things, but since we had hardly spent much time with each other since faire started, we wanted to spend the day together. I also wanted to get something else accomplished so I dragged Chris out to go look at couches. 2 stores and several hours later e finally found our couches. We both really like them and that’s probably the first time we could say that about any set. They’re comfortable, the right size for our living room and we both liked the color. We got the couch, loveseat, oversized chair and ottoman all at 20% off. Which is great because after you add in the tax, delivery and protection plan, they were quite pricey. Enough that it looks like we will have to pass on the cruise this year. But the Couches are worth the sacrifice. We’ll hopefully enjoy them for much longer.

Here are some pics. Sorry for the poor cell phone quality. They are actually much darker than they look in the pics. We have to wait a while for them to be delivered because they didn’t have any in stock, which kinda sucks, but at least gives us time to get rid of the old stuff.

Couch and Love Seat

Chair, Ottoman and some sexy guy hanging out

We spent the late afternoon BBQing steaks, drinking and crying over the huge amount of money we just spent.

All in all it was a great weekend. One I very much needed. It was great to have so much down time and be able to catch my breath. Something I felt like I didn’t get a chance to do all May.

I’ll post some plans for the week off soon.

Seriously, Where Did May Go?

Holy crap May went by fast!! I swear that was one whirlwind of a month. Work was insanely busy and with my weekends so packed, there was very little time to relax. Because of that I have been looking forward to June like a five year old waiting for Christmas. I specifically planned June to be a month with built in relaxation to make up for May.

It's also the month that I start all my changes. I started back on Spark People yesterday with tracking my food. I bought a TON of fresh fruits and veggies at Sprouts and their yummy organic chicken and beef. And have been focusing on drinking more water.

I also plan to start working out again. I wanted to start yesterday, but we had friends over for dinner and that took pretty much the whole night. But, I am going to post my weekly workout plan here and at the end of the week what I actually did. Sort of a way to keep myself accountable. I'm starting off with small chunks. So:

Wednesday June 2^nd: Wii workout for 25 min
Thursday June 3^rd: 20 min jog with Wii
Friday June 4^th: Wii workout for 25 min
Saturday: Wii yoga workout (going to try, Saturday is going to be busy)

So I made that up just now, but it looks good. So we'll see how it goes. The Wii Workout is a mix of cardio, strength and yoga. I'm sure there will also be some bedroom cardio in addition, but I may or may not include that in the weekly workout wrap-up. ;) 

Anyway in addition to my ultra long weekend off last weekend, I only have to work four days before I'm off again. The week will be mixed with house stuff and relaxing. I have a facial scheduled for next Tuesday and my mom and I are going to The Huntington for Tea on Thursday. Both I'm really excited for. This Saturday I'm taking my friend to go see The Lion King in Orange County and introduce her to Sushi for her birthday. :)

Later in the month we have a friend's baby's first birthday, at least one trip to Disneyland and I'm having a little after faire get together with some of my faire family. Our first party at our house since New Years and our first in the backyard. Hopefully it isn't too hot.

So I think June will go by pretty quickly too. But I think it'll be a lot of fun. As I said, I've really been looking forward to this month the last few weeks. I especially love summer and I can't wait to get this one started. Not so much looking forward to the triple digit heat, but I'll manage. I definitely like the heat better than the cold.

Red Shoes

Last week I talked about making some of the changes that I’d like to make this summer. Starting with my house, and making it more into a home. Something that I am so excited about. I had originally planned to take next week off, but an opportunity for some overtime at work came up, and I had to take it, so I moved my week off to the following week, which will probably work out better since I’ll have the whole week instead of Monday being a holiday and busy with all the holiday stuff.


But I’m getting way off topic here. So anyway, other changes that I’d like to make this summer are more along the lines of a personal makeover. Because well, I’m a hot mess.

First my hair. I don’t really take good care of it. I last had it trimmed almost a year ago, and I think the last time it was done before that was about another 9-12 months prior. Needless to say, I’ve never been a salon gal that goes in every 6-8 weeks to get my hair done. I dye my own hair, and I have been doing so for about 12 years or so. Always red. I love my read hair, and though I do get itches for something different occasionally, I just love my red hair too much. I have had it done professionally twice, both about a year apart and by two different stylists because my soul dies at the thought of dropping $60+ every 6-8 weeks to have done something I can do in my bathroom for $10. I even consider the $10 a splurge because I can do it cheaper by buying the stuff separately from Sally’s Beauty Supply.

But, I’m not a mid-20’s starving college student with a part time job anymore. Somewhere along the line I moved into a professional job with a professional title and my own office and everything. And just because it most certainly isn’t the job I want to retire from and is miles from where I want to be in life, I still need to start acting the part. So, goal #1: Get my hair done and keep it up. I’m going to get my hair trimmed/cut (depending on how damaged the ends are), dyed professionally and get the blond chunky highlights that I got once before and loved but was too cheap to keep done again. Now, I can’t guarantee I’ll be sitting in a salon every 6-8 weeks, but I’ll certainly aim for 12 weeks and under depending on budget constraints. I do want to grow my hair out for now, so I’m not anticipating any major cuts right now. We’ll see if and when that changes.

Next, clothes. And good lord are my clothes bad. Truly. They may not have ALWAYS been bad, and individual pieces may not be too bad, but overall, my wardrobe is sadly lacking in decent modern style. I typically wear the same 5 or so outfits a week (and by outfits, I mean tops). Many of which have holes in them. I have about 2 pairs of pants I trade off wearing and I wear my one decent pair of jeans on Friday. Most of my tops are now stretched and faded so they are far from flattering. I look through my closet and realize that most of the clothes I have, just really don’t suit me anymore. When I was 24 and going to the club after class until 2AM they were cute. Now, they just look sad. Not to mention that the last time I had a closet full of cute, in style outfits was when I worked at Mervyn’s and I got fired from there in 2003, and never really bothered to update my wardrobe since. Yes, I’ve bought a piece here and there and I do admit that I do have a few really cute things, but the overall of my closet is just sad.

Now the wardrobe fix is trickier than the hair fix, because quite honestly, I am so overwhelmed by clothing and style, it’s not even funny. Part of the problem is I’m cheap. Incredibly cheap when it comes to clothes. I’m shocked and incredibly annoyed at the thought of paying more than $15-$20 for a piece of clothing or shoes. And I feel that once I’ve spent that $20, I need to stop because I’m spending too much money. Let me make it clear at this point that in no way does Chris contribute to this thought process. He thinks I’m crazy for turning down a cute top that’s $25 because “that price it outrageous!!!” And he actively tells me that it’s ok for me to buy some new clothes when I point out a new hole in a shirt. But this doesn’t seem to end the enormous guilt I have for buying new pieces of clothing.

What to know the funny part, this cheap side of me seems to only apply to certain areas. I seem to have no problem dropping $30 on a pedi that’s going to last only 6 weeks or so, or spending close to $100 for a goblet that I’m only going to use a max total of 14 days a year. But a new top for $25 that I can wear once a week for a good year or so? That’s crossing a line apparently. Yeah, my brain is totally logical.

The other side to this is I’m a pretty casual person. Though I adore a complicated outfit perfectly pulled together, I am generally too lazy to go through all that work. Hence why I end up wearing pretty much the same things every day. Hand in hand with this is also just the “simple” lack in confidence that I could even pull off anything trendy, cute and pulled together. Going back to the days of childhood, when I was relentlessly teased for my clothing choices, so now I tend to stick with the basics and avoid anything that might seem too bold for the sake of reliving those tortuous elementary school years. :/ And there is the fact that accessories scare me. I have no idea how to use them. And I’m pretty convinced that they may look adorable on others, but will look like crap on me of which everyone in my office will laugh at me like I was 7 years old again.

I may have a few issues I’m dealing with.

However, for the same reason as above. I’m an actual adult with a professional job and I really do need to start looking the part. I don’t plan to go on a thousand dollar spree or anything (though, if anyone wants to nominate me for What Not To Wear, I would love you forever. I'll be happy to provide pics if necessary.). But I do plan to slowly buy some more quality staple pieces at what I know will be more expensive. :/ But that I can augment with some cheaper trendier pieces. I will toss/donate the clothes in my closet I don’t wear anymore or don’t fit in anymore. And I will try not to hang on to pieces of clothing until their ripping at the seams because I know I can wear it one more time!!!

But if anyone wants to volunteer to be a shopping guide with me, I could really use the help, because as I said, I am completely overwhelmed and honestly have no idea what looks good on me outside of the same things I always buy. I tend not to veer too far off the path of what I know and am pretty scared of changing for fear of getting laughed at. Yes I’m almost 31 years old and still afraid of being teased. But in an attempt to break out of my rut a little I did make a bold move last week. I bought shoes. Red shoes. This is huge for me. Mostly because Every. Single. Pair. Of shoes I have are black. All of them. So I took a bold step and bough these really cute red shoes that I fell in love with. Time will tell if I actually wear them. I’m a little scared. Ok, a lot scared. :/

They are a lot more red than the pic shows. Apparently Target has some kind of block on their pics so I'll just link to them instead.

I’ll clearly never be a fashionista and I don’t want to be. I like being low maintenance in my style. Plus my work place is pretty casual, so its not like I need to dress for Wall Street, but I do think some improvements need to be made.

Lastly, My body: I really need to start working out again. Since I stopped taking the hormones I dropped about 6-7 lbs in a month and it was great and I stopped there. I would love to lose about another 5lbs, But more than that I’d really just like to tone up. Plus I know I’ll feel better about myself and overall if I’m exercising. I’m going to get back on Spark People and set small weekly goals for myself to get myself going. I’m going to start using my Wii Fit again and possibly the 30 Day Shred. But I’ll probably wait for that until later in the summer. Chris and I are going to start going on evening walks together. I'm going to start tracking what I eat again and start cutting back on the fast food. Some nights I'm just too lazy to cook so we run to grab fast food. I really need to work more at not doing that by doing more meal planning. I've started buying food at Sprouts which has organic meats, fruits and veggies at a ridiculously good price. And I want to start going back to the Farmer's Market now that faire is done.

Ok, I think that’s about it. Sorry this is so long. I have a lot of personal making over to do. :) At least I didn’t even get to the personality/inner self makeover stuff! Maybe later.

Changes

As Ren Faire is heading to its end for another year, I find that I can finally once again look past it and think about life outside of Faire. And as sorry as I am that Faire is ending, I am really looking forward to getting back to the rest of my life and attending to the things that have been neglected the last three months or so. To that end, I have made some plans that I'm pretty excited about.

First and foremost, my house. When Chris and I moved into the house in November we worked hard to make the house as functional as possible and ready to have people over for the holidays. However to do that we stuffed our closets and garage and an extra bedroom with boxes and crap that have pretty much just been sitting there ever since. I don't mind too terribly that it has been that way, but I do think it's time for that to change and to make our third bedroom and closets much more useful.

I've worked really hard over the last few years to save up as much vacation time as possible. In my job I often come across individuals who experience an emergency and have to take a significant amount of time off, but they do not have the leave time to cover it. So I learned to make sure I have a buffer. But I am only allowed to carry so many hours into the next year, any excess is lost, so I need to use my excess time this year. So I decided to take a week off in June to simply just focus on getting some order to my home.

Here is the plan for the week:
- Clear out the boxes and crap from the spare room
- Throw away, donate or sell unnecessary items, find proper places for the rest
- Finish painting the spare room
- Switch the two extra rooms, the smaller will become the spare bedroom, the larger will be the office/sewing room
- Get new couches (We're hoping to get a good deal Memorial Day weekend)
- Bring the desk and hope chest still at my mom's house over to our house
- And overall make both spaces much more functional and useful

I would like to do more, but I think this list is a tall order in itself right now and I think it's a good start. I am super excited about all this. I have been itchin to get back to fixing up my home for a while now and I'm so glad that I can spend the time to do so. Plus, I could REALLY use the time off of work

There are some other changes I'll be making after faire is over, but I'll save that for another post. J

Sixth Weekend

Holy crap Batman!! I cannot believe that faire has been going for six weeks and that this weekend will be the end. It has gone by so incredibly fast. On one hand I am so ready to have my life back, to spend my weekends with my husband, to sleep in, to get things on my to do list done. But on the other hand I'm sad. I'm going to miss faire when its gone. I'm going to miss the escape and the fun.

Unfortunately there was a significant amount of rumors and drama this season,  and it look like there will be some changes for next season, though I'm not really sure what they are since I've heard more stories than in a book of Aesop Fables. In any case, I know I'll be back for more next year.

I'm bummed that Chris won't be able to come and visit me this season. He had been planning to come out this weekend, but his uncle recruited him to paint his grandparents house, so he won't be able to make it out. We're both disappointed, but family comes first. I'm really not looking forward to the amount of crap that I have to bring home this weekend. The many trips to the car are not going to be fun.

My ankle did MUCH better this weekend, which is awesome. I am REALLY hoping to actually do a dance or two this weekend.

So Highlights of last weekend:

~ Saturday morning's Pony Ride
~ The amazing support of friends
~ Having the ball that is Master Jarvis thrown back into my court. I'm so gonna break Mistress Verno
   this weekend.
~ Dinner with the gang, including making Brendan wince at some very bad images I made him think
   about and almost making Alicia choke on her tacos.
~ Lady Shrewsbury getting the bagpipes to play at lunch for Lord Mountjoy
~ Finally catching a Commedia show
~ Spending Sunday morning with Lily and playing Eye Spy
~ Spending Progress with Fiona and playing Spelling Bee and playing with talking flowers
~ Getting to say a line for Queen Show
~ Officially receiving the title OMH (Old Married Hag) and now being called that by all the Maids. I'm
   having a handkerchief made with the initials OMH.
~ Catching a Boggards show.

I always feel like I'm forgetting so much. There is just so much that happens in two days, it's hard to remember it all.

I'll have some pics up later in the week and I'll actually have one or two non-faire related posts, if you can believe it.

Why?

So, I wanted to talk a little about why I do faire to begin with. Why I get up ridiculously early in the morning on a Saturday AND Sunday, to drive an hour, park my poor car in a dirt and rock parking lot, lug a bunch of crap I'll need for the day the quarter mile or so until I get to backstage where I can cover my body with 35lbs of velvet and silk. I cinch about 4 inches or so off my waist with a corset that sexily pushes a mass belly blob down, making me look like I have an 85 year old man beer belly. I hike up the girls, coat them in several layers of sun screen, layer on makeup, braid my hair and put in million hair pins all to make it look like I'm beautiful with no effort, though I have to reapply makeup throughout the day as it sweats off and cover my hair with a hat. I can only eat a little food because my stomach can't expand. I down water like it's going out of style as my dress turns into my own personal sauna. Using the giant port-a-potty to pee is an adventure of unspeakable proportions. After which the dress just does not sit right for the rest of the day.

I'll swing my hoops a bit to catch a breeze whenever I can. Attempt not to trip or fall on any of the unbelievably uneven ground or trip on my own skirts, or someone else's skirts or even a man's sword. I'm on my feet about 75% of the day. I can't raise my arms higher than my boobs, I can't bend over to pick something up, I can't get up from sitting without help. At the end of the day, after 10 hours in full dress, I can release my ribs from their confinement and take deep breaths again. My body is covered with dust and sweat. I feel icky all over as I lay in a puddle for a few moments trying to remember how to be human, before I hang every up, put everything away, lug the dirty laundry and everything else back out to the car, find some protein for dinner that my body is screaming for and go for another hour drive home before I can take a shower and collapse in bed. Then I get up the next day and to it over again.

No this isn't an exaggeration. This is pretty much exactly what faire is like. This is every Saturday and Sunday for 7 weeks. All this in addition to the 6-8 rehearsals we have throughout the year, 4 weeks of workshops and building, which is both Saturday and Sunday, and teardown the weekend after faire. In addition to the countless hours sewing, the million pricks of the finger, the dozens of trips to downtown LA for new fabric, the tears of frustration, spending more nights with my sewing machine than my husband. Alyson brought up a very good point a couple of weeks ago. That we spend our entire year planning, preparing and working towards what amounts to be two weeks of our year in the end. That's a lot of freakin work.

So why the hell am I doing it? Because I Love it. I freakin LOVE every bit of it. All of this is 150% worth it. And I really can't imagine not doing any of this. Yes, I know I may be clinically insane.

In 1989 The Renaissance Pleasure Faire moved from Augora, CA to Devor, which was about 10 minutes from where we lived. I was 10 years old and my mom thought it would be fun to take us to the faire. She even made me a cute little pink princess dress and my brother a cape and hat. I just remember loving every second of that day. It was so magical. I was in awe of the Queen and her Court (ironically many of whom I know very well now). I told my mom that day that I wanted to be in that court.  I remember one of the ladies giving me a little cheap ring, and I LOVED that ring. It slipped off my finger as we were leaving the faire and I was heartbroken.  We visited the faire a few times more over the years, and I always loved it.

In high school, I was always slightly awkward. Not quite a total reject, but certainly not cool. So of course I hung out with those like me, typically the drama gang. Some of who actually worked at the faire. In 1997, I was a junior, and my teacher was Chuck Obversby. Who just so happened to be a key player in the Guild of St George and had already recruited several students to join the guild. I BEGGED my parents to let me just do one year. I would be in household, and the guild would provide the costume, so we wouldn't have to put out too much money. My teacher would be there, and several other responsible adults. With great reluctance they agreed and I started faire.

First of course there were the rehearsals and then workshops. By the time faire was set to open, I had the most amazing feeling about faire. I was home. I felt so welcome. Everyone there was like me. This place was just as magical for them as it was for me. I was shocked to learn that people did this for years, some for decades. The people were amazing. I really can't describe it any other way, except that I just knew I belonged there.

I spent most of that first season in shock and confusion over many of the double entendres, mostly of sexual nature and about 90% of which went right over my head. I was from a Christian, conservative home and was pretty well protected from such things until then. I met and got to know gay people for the first time. I came into contact with such a wide range of people from different backgrounds, beliefs, religions. A whole new world was opened for me. I remember laughing. Laughing all the time. There was always something happening that caused me to smile and laugh out loud. I started acting and interacting with the customers. Trying to make their day as magical as mine was. I gained an amazing sense of confidence. These people had accepted me just as I was and really cared about me, took an interest in me. They didn't talk to me like I was a silly teenager. They listened to what I had to say and took me seriously. I would end the day/weekend more energized then when I started.

Now I'm 30. I'm about to complete my 14^th season. A lot has changed since that first season. A lot of friends have moved on or been sadly lost. I get a lot more of the jokes now, and I'm not quite as wide eyed innocent as I was then. And even some of the shine from the magic is gone. But the laughter still remains. I can always count of someone bringing not just a smile to my face, but laughter. Every day I know I will laugh and laugh hard. I know I have great friends who care about me. I know that there is always someone who is willing to listen to me, support me or just simply tell me when enough is enough. Faire is more than just a hobby for me. It cracked open my world. Exposed me to so much. It has had a HUGE impact on who I have become. It is a large part of who I am today. I can't even imagine who I would be without these people and this place. Every day I learn something new about myself and I continue to grow because of it.

Yeah, sometimes it sucks. It's not easy and not always fun. It's hard work. Some of the hardest work I've ever done. But when it is all said and done. It is totally worth it. So I'll get up and do all over again.

*Updated* Fifth Weekend

*Ok, sorry, pics must not have worked trying again.

I'm not going to really do a recap this weekend. they're kind of boring to write, and I'm even way more boring to read. So instead, some highlights:

~Belly dancing at St. Ives with my sister Saturday afternoon
~Watching Kat Ashley (Annie) break Yeoman Hammer
~Breaking Jimmy and Laura by describing what it’s like to live with my husband
~Christening my new goblet with a Pony Ride
~The invention of a Penny Ride
~Actually walking Progress both days and walking around the faire, visiting with patrons
~Starting Sunday with a nice quiet walk with Mary (Alyson)
~Being introduced to the meat locker at the Whore House
~QOTW "Jimmy, did you just teabag Jose's hat?"

And now some pictures:

Self Portrait

A good shot of my dress, even though I’m
making the dorkiest face ever.

And yes, I made that whole dress myself.
I have the blisters to prove it.

My pimp cane. Thankfully I haven’t had to use it in a couple of weekends. It’s still pretty bad ass.

This is my old (left) and new goblet. Both made by Girl Glass. To give you an idea on the size, my old goblet holds 16oz, I think the new one holds about 12-13 oz.

Taken in better light so you can see all the pretty colors. This was made to match my gown. I absolutely LOVE how this came out. Worth every penny. Yes those are flecks of gold throughout the glass. (sorry for the crappy cell phone pic)

A pic of the inside of the goblet. I can’t imagine the amount of talent it takes to make art like this, but I am in awe.