wip 11.3.12

friday:
nick had the day off because we were supposed to travel to indy for him to participate in the mini marathon.

the best start to a day off... scrambled diner! nick got the reuben skillet. i had the cincinatti omlette. both were delicious.

then we split up and he ran a few errands and i ran a few errands.
we met at home and headed out for a movie. saw pitch perfect. we weren't expecting much. it was sooo funny. will definitely own that one! 

and i'm kinda excited for the hobbit. wasn't a big fan of lord of the rings, but the hobbit has me intrigued. maybe it's their obsession with food. i'm all about multiple meals! :)

ran a bunch more errands after the movie and after picking ben up from school.

i know i shouldn't have been surprised... but really. christmas stuff already?! i can't handle it!

someone hit the jack pot at old navy. 

a super healthy dinner on the go. we were not expecting to be out so late. oh well...
ben is loving his new dice he got out of the machine at old navy!

pardon his hat head. 

once ben was asleep nick and i started american horror story. we missed the first season. thought we would watch a few episodes of this season and give it at try. five minutes in, we stopped it and bought the season on amazon so we could start from the beginning. so good!

saturday:

i think our pumpkins are kaput. 

entertaining a three year old while shopping for home improvement items....

checking it out with daddy.

ben spied the hot dogs. 

errands done.
home and jousting. i think we might need to purchase more pool noodles. these have definitely been worth the money!

someone found the old batteries. totally takes after his momma since he lined em up like that!

work book time!

grilled cheese dinner. grilled cheeses might be one of my favorite food groups. so easy and so many options! 

ended up having an impromptu movie night. had family stop by to drop off some of ben's baby things they had borrowed. ended up talking about snow white and the huntsman, so we watched it! better than i thought it would be. still not a fan of kristen stewart. charlize theron is amazing.

sunday:
tracing time.

 

what? you mean the markers aren't blocks? 

had a lazy day.
nick worked on a home improvement project.
ben hijacked an old pot and a lid. or shield as he called it.

found nick's old phone and new phone in a funny location....

then it was soup making time!

apparently, beads, noodles, a screw driver, a cell phone or three, necklaces, balls, and his army men weren't enough. he thought he should add a little benjamin!

ten on tuesday 11.27.12

- sorry for no post yesterday. i blame this awful head cold. tried to climb and bed and go to sleep after putting ben down, but got sucked into food network on demand.... so i guess i could have been up scheduling blog posts for the week.

- i tunes match is my new favorite. nick made an oopsie when he ordered my new iphone. accidentally, got the smallest size. found match and it's the best. kinda makes me happy for his mistake. so cool to have all songs available at any given time. loving it at work to listen to some good tunes while charting in front of our new computers.

- how do people think that 'wrighting' is a word. ugh. makes my skin crawl.

- ben and nick were playing a video game this weekend and we hear, 'what the hell.' come out of his little mouth. i cannot stop laughing. inappropriate, i know. nick talks to him. explains those are not nice words. we don't use those words. ben says, 'but the guy killed me.' sigh. finish our conversation. nick unpauses the game and immediately ben says, 'what the hell.' so we pause again. have another talk. and this time, i think it worked. haven't heard it since. thank goodness!

- when we watch football ben always asks who the teams are. nick was telling him that one team was called the baltimore ravens. ben replies, 'oh yeah, the ravens.' a few minutes later he asks daddy if the raisins are the good guys or the bad guys. so cute!

- my husband is amazing. just saying, i'm a lucky girl.

- tree is up. was hoping everything would be done over the weekend. see first bullet. stupid cold! {i didn't leave the house friday, saturday, or sunday.} ben is so cute with it. the ornaments, the lights. all of it. makes decorating worth it. ;) but i'm still taking it down asap!

- went to throw dinner in the crock pot today and couldn't tell if the pork smelled or if it was just me.. stupid cold... asked nick and he confirmed that i wasn't crazy. i hate it when you buy something and it is bad before the expiration. such a waste of money.

- my hands are not ready for this cold weather. let the cracking commence.

- work funny: had a patient who needed a referral to a dr. chang. {his first name consists of initials only} our receptionist turned to ask if she needed an order to give the patient the number to pf changs. um, nope. but are you hungry? :)

grateful

happy thanksgiving.

i did compile a list of things that i'm thankful for through out the month. i think i'll post that on the 30th though. i mean it is called 30 days of thankful, so i haven't finished the month's list just yet.

ahh, that's better.

our pots and pans storage drives me bonkers. i almost don't want to cook because i have to go into the abyss that is our cabinets.

have pinned a few ideas here and there. showed nick one and he liked it! i think it helped that it wasn't too much work for him. =)

decided on a whim to tackle the project one weekend. headed to lowe's and bought two separate products. we weren't sure what would fit or work, so we can home with two thinking we could always return one.

good thing we got two. we used them both!

i originally thought the project would be super quick. i mean, it's just taking out pots and pans from one area, installing the racks, then putting the pans back... right?

nope. our kitchen was a mess for like 6 hours. i guess if we're gonna do it, we should do it right! so we reorganized all of our storage. well, nick did.

here are the befores. they are awful. i cringe just looking at them.

next to the stove. our juicer, a crock pot, a popcorn popper, cast iron skillets, random baking pans.

the island. {sorry it's blurry!} looking at it from the sink side: choppers, pans, blender, food processor. random lids, mixer.

and looking from the other side: crock pot, pans, lids. 

the during. shit everywhere!

the handy man hard at work.

ben nabbed a lid and said it was his shield. 

 and the afters.
ahhh. so much better.
the island looking from the sink. one side is pans and lids. the other is blender, dutch oven, and pots.

and pulled out.

and next to the sink.
not the prettiest. but hella improvement.

makes me so happy!
it's the little things. thanks babe for spending so much time on it! xo.

ten on tuesday 11.20.12

- jury duty just got serious. not sure i can share specifics on here. but pfwhoa. more details when i can share.

- when i asked ben what he had for lunch one day last week, after listing off his main course he said, 'green bean like balls.' apparently, i don't feed him enough peas!

- cannot believe it is thanksgiving week. so does not feel like it. i'm not ready for christmas!

- played frisbee golf for the first time this weekend. who knew it was possible to be so sore from throwing a damn frisbee for 18 holes!

- song pop makes me want to shazam every song on my phone. or wish i had my old car where the radio told me what every song was!

- ben thinks bob the builder built our house. i don't have the heart to tell him otherwise.

- people were strange today. felt like a full moon or something.

- think nick might get up early for black friday. his psp took a bath in milk this morning, don't ask. went to trade stuff in and buy a new one and they told him he should wait til friday... let's see if he'll actually get up that early! i think my black friday days are way over!

- didn't realize how far behind i had gotten on weekend posts! must try to get back on track.

- think i'm getting sick in time for the holiday weekend. sucks. hoping to go to bed super early tonight and try to keep it at bay. i hate being sick. hoping beaner doesn't catch it either.

Committophobia

So Shannon and I were driving in the car a while back talking about whether she was going to join a running program or not.  I know it would be good for her physically because, aside from her crazy work, she does absolutely nothing that could be construed as exercise.  Ok, so she does walk up and down the stairs, but that's about it.  So I was trying to talk her into it and she wasn't really having it.  She was also kind of upset with me and I was able to get out of her that she was mad that I hadn't asked her to play volleyball with me.  In the summer I play about twice a week and the rest of the year I play once a week.  I'm not sure why I would have to ask her because she used to go and the invitation is always open for her.  Then as we we continued talking it came out that she doesn't go because she hates having something she "has to do".  (Admittedly I was confused at this point in the conversation because she had just got done telling me she was sad that I don't ever invite her to play and now it comes out that she doesn't play for other reasons, but that is really beside the point) Then it hit me; Shannon is a committophobe.  (That is called a portmanteau by the way.)

I started thinking about it and it makes sense.  She hates making lengthy commitments.  She hated being in volleyball leagues and was always trying to find a way out of playing.  She won't do a poker league.  We did a summer bowling league once but there was no way she would commit to a winter league.  They're like 30 weeks long or something! And now she won't commit to a running program, although admittedly she has ankle issues which could be problematic for her.  And her condition also includes committing to events/gatherings/dinners/etc. on weekends.  If she says she'll be somewhere, she'll be there.  But if she has one thing to do on a weekend, then the weekend is totally booked.  We could be trying to plan something for a Friday, Saturday, or Sunday, and she'll say, "We can't this weekend because we're already doing something Friday, and we can't the following week because we have something Sunday.  Then the following week is national zebra week so we can't do anything that week either." (Ok that last part isn't true.  There isn't a national zebra week.) It makes me crazy.

I honestly have no idea how I was able to get her to marry me.  I can barely get her to consent to watching a movie with me.  I guess that says a lot about my charming ways and dashing looks (the wedding part, not the movie part).  But I guess we all have our little quirks and it's up to our friends, family, and significant others to just put up with it.  My friend, Jason, and I were able to talk her into a fantasy football league so maybe she's making baby steps in the right direction.  Time will tell.

halloween pinterest project 2012 - tutu skirt.

wanted to make my costume a bit more girly.

decided to make my own tutu. have seen and heard of people making one for their little ones, figured it shouldn't be too difficult to alter it to a grown up size.

googled how to make a tutu and it seemed do-able.  thought i would give it a go.

stephanie let me borrow her tutu after boo at the zoo. totally helpful for determining length and the waist band. and if i failed, i had a back up!

got my materials and i'm ready to go. i bought elastic for the waistband and 10 yards of tulle. 5 shiny and 5 plain.

here we go!

i cut the tulle where the lady had folded it. then cut my strips. i forget the exact measurements. and someone stole my camera during the process. ahem, benjamin. see...

okay back to the tutu. cutting the strips was a pain in the ass. easy. but very time consuming. gave me a ton of respect for those project runway designers. ;)

once the strips were done it was easy-peasy. just looped them onto the elastic band.

i put the plain black on first. then i went back and added the sparkle. i gave up and didn't put as many strips on as i probably should have. oh well, i'll go back and finish that up. but i procrastinated and wanted to be done!

ended up wearing stephanie's tutu to work despite all of my hard work. the other one was just too puffy to wear when taking care of patients.  not to mention that it left a glitter trail!

took it to work to show my coworkers that i really did make it and ended up letting one of them borrow it for the day.

i think it went perfectly with candace's home made teenage mutant ninja turtle costume, don't you? well, she wished it was blue since that was the color of her shorts underneath... told me i should have made her one!

halloween 2012 - super hero edition.

have to post this before thanksgiving!!

the fun coworkers.
love that we still dress up. i even had a patient tell me they were sad that they didn't come in on halloween.

 it's always a mad dash after work to get everything ready. wanted to make a crock pot meal, went with something new. wasn't very good. ended up having frozen pizzas! oh well! i blame nick. he chose that one!

ben couldn't wait to get outside. 

he didn't really want to go trick or treating. he wanted to stay with grandma and hand out candy.

we convinced him! and then mr. independent wanted to go by himself. 

i think he got a bit flustered when the other group of trick or treaters joined him at this house. we asked him if he said thank you, he said no, turned around and walked back up the driveway. the lady was like batman do you want more candy? and he said, 'no i forgot to say thank you.' and walked away. 

love that my dad kept the super hero theme going. i had no clue he owned a superman shirt! 

total blur. wanted to hurry up and get home.

pardon my crazy sweat pants. it was chilly!

ready to go by himself again. i think the giant stairs made him nervous at a few houses. he did turn around at one house after proclaiming 'their ding bell is too high momma.'

stopping to feed the monsters. 

i think my dad needed a cape. =)

batman and robin.

showing grandma his loot. 

enjoying some candy. 

love that face.
ignore the crazy rotten pumpkin in the background. silly warm weather. but i guess it made them a bit creepier for the holiday. 

it's getting colder. we needed hats and gloves and blankets. 

asking to play with daddy. 

and one last try at trick or treating.

my super heroes.

ben and his pumpkin.

had some visitors that came in to warm up for a bit. enjoyed some umizoomi with ben.

 love that winnie's panda hat was on backwards. she's awesome. 

our halloween tradition. the nightmare before christmas. ben was mesmerized.

my favorite picture from the evening. thank you instagram for making a not so great picture better!