Saturday, October 27, 2007

Rick rack makes me smile (15 Oct 2007)

I love small details and embellishments on my clothes. I have a great appreciation for clothes with carefully placed embroidery, appliqués, and buttons. I saw this skirt up at Sundance on Saturday the 13th while up was up there for a recruiting event. It was on mega clearance, the last one available. I can’t imagine why it was still there but I snapped it up.

On Monday morning I woke up late and contemplated skipping class for a nice morning of the gym and a homemade lunch. But once I remembered the lovely skirt I had purchased over the weekend I was eager to get up and go to school. Maybe that’s ridiculous or superficial, but I’d rather look at it as an adequate choice of a coping method.

All day as I looked down at my rick rack skirt I smiled.

Tuesday, October 23, 2007

I've been tagged!

I've been tagged by my sister Annee. Since I don’t post very often, these may be longer than most people’s answers…


The rules:

A. Each player lists 6 facts/habits about themselves.

B. At the end of the post, the player then tags 6 people and posts their names, then goes to their blogs and leaves them a comment, letting them know that they have been tagged and asking them to read your blog, for these rules.


1. I am a planner. And I live by my agenda book. For the last three years I’ve used the basic DayMinder BYU version which I loved. But this year I decided to branch out. I found a planner at Paper Source while in Boston that has almost an identical layout to the planner I used to use. And it’s much prettier. I seriously don’t go anywhere without my planner. At the end of everyday I write down everything I did so it doubles as a journal. This probably comes from my dad who has years of planners bundled somewhere in his office. Along with planning, I’m a big fan of post-it notes. I especially love the longer ones with lines – these are perfect for making my lists. My planner and my post-its are never far from me.


2. I’m a huge Dr. Laura fan. I listen to every hour. I signed up a few years ago for the podcast so I’m able to download each show. I’ve always loved talk radio and could listen to Dr. Laura in particular for hours. It’s my favorite way to drive anywhere, do the dishes, clean the house, fold laundry and fall asleep. It’s probably the best $5 I spend each month!


Every now and then I run into someone who really dislikes her but usually this hatred is unfounded and out of date. Most often I have people tell me they hate her because when they were little their mom listened to her show in the car all the time and they got sick of it. What’s more frustrating is when people dislike her because they think she’s a crazy, man-hatter. Nothing could be further from the truth! To summarize Dr. Laura’s main points: people must take responsibility for their actions and accept the consequences of those actions as the results of their own choices. In my opinion she gives great advice and her moral consistency is commendable. Here are just a couple quotes:


“That something is difficult should never be an excuse not to do it.”

“What you feel only matters to you. It’s what you do to the people you love that counts.”

“Choose wisely, treat kindly.”

“Eat less, move more.”

“The people and the circumstances don’t make me who I am, they reveal who I am.”

“The fears will never go away, but they will subside as you impress yourself with your courage to do what needs to be done to achieve your dreams.”


I am very grateful for my iHome thing my mom gave me for Christmas last year. I use it everyday and it has earned a permanent spot on my desk.



3. I have a weird issue with buying gas. Meaning, I do it as infrequently as possible. You’d be surprised how long you can drive around in my car with the gas light on. I think I’ve gone 6 full days before. Granted, it usually ends with me out of gas in some parking lot far from home. It all comes down to me being an accountant. I have a monthly budget in which I allow for one tank of gas per month. This clearly is not enough but I try every month to make it work. Ken gets frustrated with this since I am the one making my own budget and I could just increase the gas allotment without much effort. Furthermore he says I’ll be using the same money today or next month, the only difference is the date that will show up on my Quicken transaction list. All good points. Nonetheless, I’m usually very out of gas.


4. I love throwing pottery on the wheel. I learned in high school ceramics and I was never REALLY good but it’s something I really enjoy. I don’t have much time or access to a wheel these days. But I always picture pottery as that thing I’ll pick up again when I have a mid-life crisis, or when all my kids are in school or out of the house and I’m feeling lost and in need of a hobby. My projects from high school are scattered around my sisters’ houses which is kinda fun to see.


5. I have something against tap water. I know, I know, it’s irrational. Some studies have even proved that tap water is cleaner than bottled water. And I live in Utah which has better water than Los Angeles. I don’t care. I drink bottled Arrowhead water only. That’s all we drank growing up (with some brief periods of Sparklets) and I’ve continued it since I’ve been at school. I buy flats of them from Costco, four at a time. I watch the prices of water bottles like a hawk and stock up when it hits the spot I like.


Once they were having a crazy sale at Smith’s on Arrowhead bottles. They were all out of flats on the shelf so I asked them to look in the back. The silly high school kid came back and said he didn’t see any. I didn’t believe he really looked so I made Ken go into the back room to check for himself. He confirmed there were no flats back there. I got a raincheck coupon good for the whole month. Yes, I was that crazy lady who asked for a raincheck on an item at the grocery store.

It’s not rational but those who love me allow me this oddity. We all have our things right?


6. I love Paris. Especially in the fall. I miss it terribly right now. It’s been almost two years since I visited. The fall I spent in Paris for my study abroad is one of the tenderest memories I have. It still makes me sick to my stomach that I lost basically all of my photos. I plan to visit again soon, either at Christmas when I go out to see my parents or next summer. Of course it’ll never be the same as living there again, but who knows, maybe I’ll have the chance to do that again someday. I feel like I could do it much better the second time around.


So there you go! I'm glad I finally got that done, I've been working on it for a few days. I have more ideas for posts, I've been taking pictures everyday. So there will be more to come soon. <3>

Monday, October 22, 2007

Help! My kictchen is overflowing!

I have a couple posts I've been preparing but I could not wait another minute to ask this question. I just took an inventory of my kitchen because it's been looking so full recently. I now realize my kitchen situation is OUT OF CONTROL! The following is a list of what is currently in my fridge, freezer and cupboard...

Sweet potatoes
Cauliflower
Lettuce
Tomato (fresh and canned diced)
Onions
Green peppers
Garlic
Potatoes
Carrots
Celery
Spinach
Broccoli
Peas
Corn
Canned pumpkin

Turkey
Ham
Chicken breasts
Ground Pork
Ground Beef

Chicken broth (about 12 cans!)
Brown rice
Couscous
Pasta & Egg noodles
Split peas
Oats
Cornmeal
Breadcrumbs
Cornstarch
Croutons

Cheese
Eggs
Buttermilk
Milk
Butter

Can you see how out of control this is?? Please give me dinner ideas!! Side note -- I'll be going out of town this weekend and again next weekend so maybe I should be looking for things I can make and freeze. I love soup, maybe that's what I should do. You can freeze soup right?

Sunday, October 21, 2007

Marathon 2007 = Complete!

Hooray! My third marathon is done. It was a good experience overall. I didn’t train as much as I should have (will I ever feel satisfied with my level of training??) but the race went fine nonetheless. I didn’t beat my last marathon time but running for time hasn’t been a big part of my running personality. I was pleased with how much of the race I ran instead of walking – which is a measure I use more than time to check success.


So now, which race is next? I haven’t decided yet because the memory of the last race training is still too fresh. The training for these marathons is pretty exhausting and mentally draining since there’s so much recalculating going on everyday. For example, should I run today or not? How far should I run today? Is it ok to skip my long run this weekend and push it to next weekend? If I get out there and it’s a bad run, how far will I force myself to go before calling it quits? What route should I choose for my next long run? What’s the weather supposed to be like for the next several weekends? If I miss a Saturday run, should I do it Sunday and go to late church or skip class to do it Monday? All these decisions are hard for me… and all the guilt that follows the choice is even more difficult to bear.


This is why I love half marathons so much. The training isn’t as intense and mentally draining. The race is long enough to feel accomplished but short enough to run without too much effort (that’s not the right word) or strain. So we’ll see where I go from here. For now, I’ll wait to see which race Annee decides to do next and I’ll probably join in. I wish I could find a good running group to train with.


On Sunday after the race I was quite sore and stiff. When I drove back to Provo from St. George I went straight to my sister’s house because I remembered the elevator at my apartment complex was broken when I left on Friday. I was worried that I would not physically be able to walk up 5 flights of stairs to my apartment so I thought I’d wait it out at Sarah’s! On Monday when I woke up I felt much better but I was still pretty sore.


I was late leaving for school on Monday but was pretty proud that I was going to my 8am class at all! If I don’t leave by 7:40am I know I will not be able to get a parking spot in what I call “the business corner” (which is really a Y-lot positioned closest to the Tanner Building in which I have all my classes). Nonetheless at 8:20 when I got to the lot I decided to drive through it just in case. Imagined how happy I was when the #1 spot in the lot was empty!! You can’t get any closer than that spot! So lucky!!



I doubt walking the extra 100 yards from a different spot would have killed me but it was a nice little blessing for my sore legs and ankles.