Thankful Thursday

Especially the way everything's been going recently, I have to remember to be thankful.  I feel like I can barely get up, before I'm knocked down again.  But, there are so many good things in my life, that I have to be thankful.

*My family and friends.  I love them, and know that I can count on them for anything.
*My health.  I know that I'm definitely blessed with that.
*I have a roof over my head and food in my belly.  Even though it's not where I want to live, I'd rather live here than in my car!
*The ability to read- so many don't have that ability, and  reading is my escape!

Finally Friday!

It's been a rough week, I've worked every day, and if I can just get through tomorrow morning, I will actually have Sunday off!  Whoo!!  I am thrilled, even though I still have to work my other job on Sunday.  At least I'm not in retail!  I'm excited!  And then next week, I don't have nearly as many hours, so I can just relax and just deal with my other stuff that needs to get done!

I really need to get crocheting and crafting for the 2 craft fairs that I've signed up to participate in.  I just want them to go well, and just get stuff sold, and a following!  That's all I want, is that too much to ask??

At least everything is fixed now....

The entire matter has now been resolved.  Thank Heavens!  There was a massive mis-communication between myself and the president of Luke's school's PTO.  Thankfully, it's been resolved, and I'm all good now. 

Let me back up a bit.  I've been volunteered to be the head of the book fair, and was told to change the spring book fair.  I changed it, but not before someone else did, and no one caught it until recently. I spent over an hour on the phone with people today, just to get it all straightened up, even though it wasn't my fault.  At one point, I offered to step down.  That wasn't met really well, but at the same time, I viewed the whole thing as being micromanaged, and I am so not cool with that.  I'm an adult, and I can do things on my own.  However, you need to communicate with me, not just go behind my back. 

I've joined Pintrest.  It seems pretty interesting, and basically what I've been thinking about doing anyway- making a dream board.  What I want my house to look like, what I want the rooms to look like, where I want to visit, etc.  We shall see how it turns out.  :)

Cooking with Frugal Girl

Let's just be frank here, I love cooking.  In my dream world, I have a huge farmer's kitchen, with tons of cabinets and counter space, where I bake bread daily or every other day, and I create wonderful home cooked meals daily for my family.  In reality, my kitchen is....not quite that nice, although, I try and compensate for it, by having pantries in addition to my meager counter space.  And in terms of cooking, I do the best I can, I bake bread almost every few days, and have struggled with, and have mostly succeeded with cooking 6 days out of 7, and going out only 1 time a week.  I've told my husband that if I had a bigger/better kitchen I'd cook more!  And enjoy it!  :) 

I collect cookbooks, and am a semi professional cook (I get paid for it, but I don't do it daily).  So I can look at recipes, and kind of change things around so that the recipes are good for me and my family.  And I'm also on Weight Watchers, so that is another thing that I am constantly tweaking in recipes- the nutritional content.  And I enjoy doing that.  I enjoy making things healthier and better for us. 

I don't know that I'll ever post some of my recipes here, just because it seems almost pretentious, but I might.  If I'm feeling....well.... pretentious!  

Tired... so very very tired....

I was at work this morning, and I agreed to stay later, a little.  I didn't want to stay a whole long time, and I think I pissed off the guy I was supposed to be helping.  Oh well, tough crap, I was totally not even supposed to be there anyway, so screw it.  I've been there almost a year, so it's not like they're going to fire me after the Holidays.  Ya know?  All I know is if they ask me to stay tomorrow, it's not happening!!  Not. At. All. 

And part of it was that I had to take Luke to the doctor this afternoon.  We've pretty much decided that it's an allergy thing, so we need to start trying Zyrtec to see if that works.  If it doesn't, then we'll move onto something else.  But until then, we'll just go with OTC meds.  

But beyond that, I did get exercise in, I did 3 miles to Leslie Sansone.  Whom I hate more than life itself some days, but I plugged in my Brantley Gilbert and walked to him instead of her. 

Good Bye Comcast!!

I just placed an order for AT&T U-verse.  We are getting rid of Comcast- prices keep rising, and the service just keeps getting worse.  Our modem crapped out, so we got a 'new' one, and the same problems are still occurring.  And while I could give them another chance, I'm not going to, because we've been contemplating the switch for a while, and we're just tired of Comcast in general.  We are getting installed on Oct. 19th, which given how much they're advertising, they should have tons of openings!!  Oh well, there's an end in sight for Comcast. Which is totally the most important thing!

Central Indiana Pickers

Could totally be an A&E show!  I was talking to a friend this morning at work because I was telling him about my Goodwill adventure yesterday.  He has agreed to help teach me what to look for so that I can start picking too.  He's even going to take me to auctions to teach me what to do there.  I would love to get into storage locker auctions as well.  My brothers do that, and I think it would be awesome. 

So in my first foray into picking, I visited two Goodwill stores.  One, I bought a few books, one for myself, and the other two to read with the intention of reselling to Half Price Books or listing on Paperback Swap.  The other one I sort of lucked out, I found a pair of jeans for me to wear (that I thought would fit sometime this winter, and for $6.99 with tags, I really couldn't beat that), and several Aeropostale and Hollister shirts. So tomorrow, I need to take those to resell.

But, in terms of the pants, yeah, I looked at them, went, they look like they'll actually fit me.  And they did.  They're a bit tight, but nothing major, like I can totally wear them.  So there goes that plan of having them when I need them later.  Which kind of stinks, because I really do have enough jeans that fit, while they might be bigger than normal, and I wanted a pair of jeans that I could wear when those were just WAY TOO big.  So now do I return them, and then get something else?  Or just throw them in the pile of stuff to sell tomorrow?  Decisions, decisions....

We all want things....

But, that doesn't mean we're going to get what we want!  We are working on this with our oldest- he's decided that since he's ridden the bus both ways a few times, he deserves a moving train.  Um.... not so much.  :/  Like I told him- we all want things, but we don't always get what we want.  We get what we need.  And, he doesn't need another train.  He got 2 this weekend, and he didn't really do anything to deserve them.  I'm tired of bribing because he doesn't want to do something that he needs to do.  So I told him when we got off the bus, you got two this weekend, and you don't get any more  any time soon.  Sorry.  Too bad, so sad. 

I'm not sure how else we can break this habit of his.  We do give an allowance, and are trying to do the Dave Ramsey method of saving, spending and giving, but I don't know what else to do.  I never got an allowance when I was kid, so I'm totally in uncharted territory with this!

It's weird- I'm kind of 'off' today.  I don't know why, because everything is going awesome for me.  I had to work this morning, and I got off a bit early, so that was nice.  Now I'm home, preparing to drive north for another job, and seeing a friend for dinner tomorrow night. I am mailing in an application for a craft fair I want to do in November.

But I feel like I'm missing something?  I don't know- it's hard to describe.  All I know is that I feel slightly off, like I'm forgetting something, or missing something, or something.  Oh well.  Maybe it's just me being odd because I actually have 2 days off in a row.  :)  I mean, I went from 6 days this past week, to 4 days next week, and then back up to 6 the week after!  Truck is being odd, so that's why the random scheduling problems. 

I am super proud of myself though- we all know my struggles with weight, how I'm slowly taking it off, and everything, and we went out to dinner last night, and I actually got something healthy (fajitas) and brought some home with me!  Now it's my lunch for Monday or even dinner tomorrow night, depending on when I get home from up north.

I did it!!

I am thrilled to announce that I will be participating in the 2012 Mini marathon here in Indy.  I am nervous as hell, but I know I will be able to finish it.  My goal, literally, is just to not get picked up by the van, but that's fine.  2013 I can go for faster.  :) 

Behind the 8 ball

Or at least I feel like I am!  I feel like I'm being pulled in 3 different directions at once, and I don't know where to start!  I've been proactive already this morning- I got off work an hour early, so I came home and wrote  1 of my 4  messages, but still need to call people.  But as it's only 8:10am, it's a bit early to be contacting businesses! I am in charge of the book fair at the elementary school we attend, and I need to change the spring book fair.  I called the woman 4 days ago, and she still hasn't called me back.  So this time I'm just calling her cell, instead of her business line.

I couldn't do this yesterday

I know that everyone was posting about the 10th anniversary of the September 11th attacks yesterday, and I thought about it, but I KNEW in my heart, I couldn't do it.  I just couldn't.  You see, 10 years ago, I was living in Ohio, along with my then fiance, now husband.  My younger brother, who is just 18 months younger than me, had decided to move to NYC in August, 2001.  He and a friend had gone out to New York City, found an apartment in Jersey, had gotten some interviews set up, etc.  They came back home, and were waiting for the apartment to be ready.  It was supposed to be ready 9/1.  Then 9/5.  Then 9/10.  See where I'm going with this?  By the time they got to the 10th, the landlord had PROMISED, it's going to be move in ready and they felt comfortable starting to make interviews.  He had gotten an interview at a company that was involved with the stock market somehow.  It was set for 9am on Sept. 11, at the World Trade Center.  A few days before 9/10, the boys had called the landlord, is the apartment ready?  It wasn't, so all interviews were canceled.  Including the one at the WTC.  Obviously we all know what happened 9/11.  And the company that wanted to interview him ended up losing several employees, and they never hired/interviewed my brother after that. And 10 days later, my brother and his friend rented a u-haul and moved to NYC anyway.

I spent the day yesterday watching all the shows, remembering just being so grateful and relieved that nothing happened to my family, and that the fire inspector in Jersey hadn't gotten his poop in a group and signed off on the building.   My brother now proudly wears at tattoo on his arm, signifying that time, it's roman numerals IX- 9/11. 

I am so incredibly glad...

I only have boys!  I was at work this morning, stocking Halloween crap (yes, it's already out!) and I came across girls fishnets.  There is no costume in this world that is appropriate for a 6 year old that requires the use of fishnets.  I don't care!  Fishnet gloves are ok, because apparently, the 80's are coming back for costumes, and that's fine.  But, all the costumes that are coming out this year for little girls are hooker-y.  I can see adults, but not kids!

Which brings me back to Reason number 569 that I am so glad that God didn't 'bless' me with girls.  >:)  One of these days I will write a list! 

I am thrilled- I finally found a chip that I absolutely hate!  I love most chips/salsa, they are completely my downfall- so much so that I can't have them in the house at all.  So but anyway.... 

I went to Meijer this morning to pick up milk and sausage so I can make *Lucas breakfast burritos for next week, and saw that Meijer now has baked chips.  Thought, what the heck, I'll try them.  Yeah, never again.  They are NASTY!  They are supposed to be like the Baked Lays, but they aren't.  The Meijer brand is thicker, so it doesn't crunch as much, and you can actually see the salt glazed on them.  They also don't have a good taste to them-there's a chemical aftertaste to them almost.  The only good thing is they're slightly cheaper, but really, it's not that much of a difference, so in the future I'll just splurge when I want to blow points on chips.

And I was so excited to try them.  The Meijer brand is usually awesome- there are some things that  I won't buy name brand anymore- I have completely switched to Meijer.  So this was completely unexpected.  Maybe because it just came out, they haven't gotten all the kinks out yet?  I don't know- but Meijer, if you're reading this, please fix the baked chips!  They're gross as they are right now!! 

I hate when I cannot remember what I was going to blog about right when I go to sign in and start typing!  Argh!  Oh well, I'll blog about something else, and then when I do remember, I'll just do another blog post. :)

I've been losing weight, and recently, I've just decided that I want to run a marathon before I'm 40.  It's on my 40x40 list.  Well, by May 2011, I'm not going to be ready to run a full marathon, but I've decided that I am going to walk the Mini in Indianapolis.  My whole goal is just to not have the bus pick me up, so that's under 4 hours, walking 13.1 miles.  I've talked to people who've done it, and they say that it's not bad, but it's a mini marathon, so it's bad.  So I'm signing up here in a few weeks, and we'll start training.  I want to do it, to prove to myself I can.  And I will do it, I want to put that sticker on my truck. :)

These are a few of my favorite things....

Since I'm having a downer of a day, I've decided to overrule that part of my head, and think of things that make me happy!

*Watching the First 48.  Yes, it's a crime drama.  Love it!
*Ghost Hunters!  Again, love it!
*My son.  Love him with all my heart.
*My family- mom and dad and younger brothers.  Don't know what I'd do without them.
*Reading- which reminds me, I need to get myself to the library this evening to return some books!
*Live music- I saw Jason Aldean/Chris Young/Thompson Square last weekend, and just purchased tickets to Brantley Gilbert here in town. 

An attitude of grattitude

I've been thinking so much about that kind of attitude.  I try so hard to be grateful for everything I've been given, although I know sometimes I fall short. I have enough to eat, somewhere warm to sleep, a car to drive, a job to go to.  I also have enough money to pay my bills. I have my health, and a wonderful son.  All that is more than I can say for a lot of people. 

Sometimes, it's so hard to remember how blessed I am though- I want to go somewhere, and I don't have the money.  I want to do something, but I have to work.  I'm so grateful I'm not saying, I want to go somewhere but I can't, because of my health, or because I have no way to get there.   

One of my jobs, I work for a gambling establishment. Most of the women (and really, if you saw this place, you'd realize I wasn't exaggerating!) are fantastic.  They say please and thank you, and are grateful for what we do for them.  But, there are some that you can't please no matter what.  You do and do and do, and they still want more.  I wonder what's going on in their lives that they just expect everything to be handed to them.  Were they raised that way?  Is it because of something else?  I don't know, and it's rude to ask.  *shrugs*

I love live music

One of my new favorite musicians is Brantley Gilbert.  He wrote My Kinda Party that's sung by Jason Aldean, so you know what he sounds like.  He also has "Country Must Be Country Wide" out right now.  Well, he's coming to 8 Second Saloon in November!  Whoo!  Tickets go on sale on Tuesday at noon, so I'm totally buying tickets for a few of us.  I'm so excited.  I love his music. 

ETA: I purchased VIP standing room only tickets for the show this morning.  Granted, I totally think I was the first or second person to buy them!

Happy, yet Sad

But, really, just really happy.  :)  Let me explain.  I've been on Weight Watchers since Mid- February.  Since then, I've lost 33 lbs.  Whoo!!  But, I had these awesome shorts that I used to be able to wear, before I was pregnant, and early in my pregnancy.  I tried them on before the Jason Aldean show, and they FIT!  Whoo!!  So I wore them to the show.  And they're awesome- they fit perfectly, they're short, yet not too short, and they fit great around the waist- not too mom jeans-ish, yet not 'here's my thong'-ish. 

So I'm sad that I won't be able to wear them, after this year, but happy because I'll be able to get better shorts next year in a smaller size.  :)