life

Tidbits

/ body and soul, life, Uncategorized

Today was a beautiful day. The temp was in the 70s. I busted out my roller skates and although it took me a while to get my legs, I was able to feel pretty confident on them again.

I got the new aquarium… and I’m excited about that.

It will be Friday AND payday in about 22 minutes.

I’m going on a diet. A real one, starting April 12th. I tried to start one with mandywriter but it’s hard to stay accountable when she lives all the way in Washington while I am here in Ohio. Libby is going on this diet with me (even though Teresa thinks we’re “midgets”) because we both want to get in shape. I also want my pants to stop being tight. I had to be that girl at life group last night–you know, the one who unbuttons her pants after dinner (which happened to be three bowls of Caty’s DELICIOUS soup). This means that:

  • I’ll need to cut out grilled ham and cheese sammiches from the cafeteria at work, chocolate chip cookie dough, and generally any unhealthy snack I enjoy. 🙁
  • I’ll need to eat more fruits and veggies, and also eat less. I’ve been making a pig out of myself for about 7 weeks now and it’s time to call a halt.
  • I’ll need to start working out. Libby wants to work out with my twice a week downstairs in the workout room. For the record, I SUCK on equipment. Give me a good beat and I’ll dance my a$$ off, but using a treadmill? Stair climber? Argh. It’s just… awful. So we’ll see how that goes. Maybe if I take a book and my iPod, things will be different.
  • No more Kool-Aid, pop, or anything yummy. Only water or tea.

It is going to suck! But you know what, I need to get healthy again. I just feel bloated and icky and gross these days. And I’ll get used to it. Right? RIGHT? I mean, there are loads of sweets I can eat without stuffing in the sugar. Like sugar-free Jell-O. Or fruit. Yeah, fruit. I’ve been enjoying strawberries like whoa lately. I also think I need to go back to this meal plan:

  1. small breakfast (eg granola bar)
  2. big lunch
  3. small or no dinner
  4. tiny snack

I’ve really been out of control lately, and right before the summer? Unacceptable. Totally.

ANYWAY….

No writing today. I don’t think I even got anything planned. Oops. I did THINK of how to modify some scenes. I didn’t get a chance to write it down–so hopefully it will come back to me at a more convenient time.

HEY what do you know, I just remembered. Please excuse me …

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New Home!

/ life

Miranda, Freddie and Flossie have a new home. Today I bought a 29 gallon aquarium, new decorations, and a stand, and we moved them this evening. It took Miranda all of three minutes before she was up and about and exploring. Freddie and Flossie are a bit freaked out, understandably, but I think they’ll love their new non-leaking home. I’m very excited about the purchase, and look forward to spending evenings in the family room, writing and watching the fish tank. 🙂

Good night!

P.S. I have 52 emails that need my attention, and who knows when I will get a chance to deal with them? So, I’m not ignoring you if I have one from you–I just haven’t had time to handle it yet. :O

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Saturday (Pictures)

/ aidan, life, mommyhood, pictures, recap, weekend, writing

Did you know the first day of Spring is in just a few days? That’s insane! I’m so glad, though. I can’t wait ’til the weather finally breaks. Although, we’ve had quite the mild winter–no complaints there. I’m just ready to wear flip-flops and skirts and traveling and taking pictures. So ready!!

Work news:
During lunch one day, Shannon, Justin, and Patty had a “puppet show” of sorts with spoons. Hilarious. KA told me that I’m getting good at proofing the reprints. YAY because I enjoy doing it very much.

Amanda’s last day was yesterday. She was my cubemate and so awesome. I get my own cube, but I won’t get Amanda. I’ll miss her.


Amanda looks pretty.
I look like a dork. My hair is awful. 🙁

Aidan news:
He is climbing all over me and it’s driving me crazy. There are a million places to sit in the family room, and he insists on sitting ON MY BACK. It’s not comfortable at all. He’s trying to force me to eat a Pringle. A Sour Cream and Onion Pringle for breakfast. HONESTLY. Ew. He’s also learned how to ask for every single toy he sees. Oh my.

I got him REAL underwear in hopes that it will speed up the potty-training process. I figure, if he wets himself and feels it, he’ll be less inclined to do so in the future. I know this will mean lots more laundry over the next few days to several weeks, but hopefully it will mean the end of buying diapers and Pull-ups soon. He’s getting there, but he gets lazy sometimes. Way too much, actually. So yeah.

I feel like I’m constantly running the vaccuum because Aidan is forever spilling crumbs or something all over the floor. Our family room carpet is awful, and the shampooer is broken, so I just have to live with it. *sigh*

He pronounces “butt” so funny. I keep asking him to say “butt” or “nut” or “cut” because I love the way he says those words.

I feel like all I say is “NO!” He gets into so much stuff. All the time. He climbs like whoa, nothing is safe!! He’s so destructive if he’s not being watched or monitored every second. It’s exhausting!

Writing news:
In April, I ‘m going to Spring Fling Writer’s Conference. I’ll get to meet other writers there, authors, agents, and mandywriter!!! It’s gonna be fun! 😀

I haven’t done much with my WIP. I have ideas all the time, but once I start working, I seem to lose steam. Not sure what the deal is. Well, it’s hard to focus. I’m trying to write romantic scenes, and that’s hard to do when Aidan is asking for help with something every five minutes, or when Chris is slamming things all over the house. I think I have to get away to be able to write those scenes. Also, there is so much I have to do, write, revise, change, that I feel overwhelmed by the idea of it all. I simply need to FOCUS, get in my zone, and let go.

I heard from my agent. He’s had to expand the submissions list to include Christian publishers. I’m getting discouraged because my book is on that fence: too Christian for mainstream, not Christian enough for the Christian publishers. I don’t know if Only Yours will sell. All the more reason I’m glad I have a super agent–he’s working his butt off to sell my book because he sees merit and that’s incredible to me. I always let him know how much I appreciate him.

Pictures:
It’s been a while since I’ve posted loads of pictures. I know certain people have been requesting them (ahem davidd), so here we go:

Captured!

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Weekend End

/ geekalicious, life, shopping, weekend

Today I hooked my monitor and stuff up to my laptop. Then I realized that I needed a USB keyboard, so off to Best Buy we went. I was going to get a wireless keyboard and mouse ($49), but then I saw a nice $19 USB keyboard, wired, but good enough for what I wanted, so I got that. THEN I picked up a 160 gig external hard drive ($89). I’m backing up all my files now. YAY. This was important to me because I was feeling weird about having all my precious files on one place. Call me paranoid, but after losing two computers within two weeks of each other, I don’t want to take anymore chances.

I mean, I know it’s weird, but I missed writing at my desk. So until I get my desktop computer from Andy, I will probably keep my laptop hooked up here… well, at least until I need to be downstairs with my laptop, like tomorrow, for instance. I’d LOVE a docking station, but I am not sure if they make them for my particular computer. That way I can just plop it on the station and not have to worry about stopping things and unhooking them and stuff. But again, I’ll get my desktop sometime, so I probably won’t even need to do that. We’ll see. 🙂

Fifteen out of forty-nine folders have been copied, and it’s been going for about 90 minutes now. 😀 I have about 70 gigs of stuff to move over.

Chris is planning a vacation for us. Unfortunately, not Disneyworld. 🙁 However, it will be the southwest, so I’m okay with that. Vegas (a stripview room in Rio!!), Phoenix, Mexico. Good times. It will be my first time visiting outside of the U.S. I know, sad, isn’t it? I’ve never even been to Canada, not yet anyway. Anyway, can you say BELLAGIO BUFFET??? And fountains, and the malls and pretty stuff and photo ops… YES. Can’t wait. 😀

Yesterday, I spent the whole day indoors thanks to a poopy scratchy/sore throat. Chris took Aidan to the Air Force Museum, so I got some quality rest in. Then I watched Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. Robert Pattison is illegally handsome. 😀

Today, I found out that Katie reads my LJ, so hi Katie!! ♥ Same to all you “IRL” people who read my journal. Don’t be afraid, come on out and say hi! 😀

Right now, Aidan is watching Monsters, Inc which I bought today, along with The Parent Trap. I’m looking for Blast from the Past on DVD. I wonder if it’s out. It’s such a cute movie! Okay, I’m being summoned by my little guy. I’m also craving bacon like WHOA but I don’t have any in the house, and I doubt I could convince Chris to go out and get me some. 😡

Anyway, good night!!

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Chit Chat

/ life, recap, shopping, weekend

I had a busy, busy day yesterday. We left the house at about 8am and didn’t get back last night ’til nearly 11pm. We went and got Aidan, then stopped by Ty and Jolene’s place. They had never met Aidan, and we had never met little Ellie, and it turned out to be really great and way too short as usual. Ellie is the sweetest baby ever. She’s six months old and smiles, smiles, smiles. The only time she got upset was when she was hungry. She and Aidan took a real liking to each other. Ty and Jolene made us chili and they ate like 438957497 Zingers. I passed because I don’t like coconut–but Ty bought me cookie dough. 🙂

Jolene has this amazing camera: a Canon DSLR, and OMG. It’s sooooooo awesome. She let me take loads of pictures with it. Wow. *breathes* Of course, I took pictures with my camera as well.

After that, we headed back home. Chris drank two Red Bulls and two Starbucks Double Shots. We stopped at Best Buy where I used up the rest of my gift cards and my reward zone certificates and purchased a BOAT LOAD of DVDs:

The Wizard of Oz three-disc collector’s edition
A Different World season one (!!!)
Growing Pains season one
Clueless “whatever” edition
Titanic special collector’s edition (with 45 minutes of deleted scenes!!)
Hercules

I also got The Golden Girls season four for Chris, and he bought Aidan Danger Mouse seasons three and four. So yeah, if Chris doesn’t get a big enough bonus for us to go to Disneyworld this year, we have plenty of DVDs to keep us occupied, no? Cause he bought LOADS, I mean LOADS. It was insane, the amount of DVDs he got. Most of them I have no interest in watching.

After Best Buy, we stopped at McDonalds, then went to Chris’s mom’s house. Grandma Edna is all moved in, and she was smiling a lot. We put in the DVD of Grandpa Myron, and it was hard for me to watch. Chris’s mom started to cry. Aidan lightened the mood a LOT, though. Chris’s mom gave me a box of “75% less sugar” Trix. Walmart is the only place we can buy them around here and I refuse to go in that store.

I wish someone would release an entire DVD of Woody Woodpecker cartoons. I saw a couple of Classic Cartoon sets, and they each had ONE Woody Woodpecker episode on them. What’s up with that? I’ve been fiening for some Woody Woodpecker, but I’m not buying an entire set for ONE EPISODE that’s probably like seven minutes long. And why isn’t The Wonder Years on DVD yet???? I dunno about you, but DVD TV shows are the coolest thing EVER. Especially when the old shows are resurrected. I wish they’d put The All New Mickey Mouse Club on DVD. I’d buy them ALL in a HEARTBEAT.

Lady and the Tramp (along with loads of goodies) should be arriving for me any day now. Wheee! Chicken Little is also on my “to buy” list, because Aidan likes it a lot.

Chris and Aidan are at church now, so I’m taking the time to relax. Yesterday was long and tiring, although good. I can’t believe I managed to finish The DaVinci Code AND Elsewhere before I had to return them to the library. But good books have the ability to hold my attention, so it worked out well. But now, I have a copy of TTYL out, and I can’t find it. I’m going to renew it so I have more time to look for it. I didn’t enjoy that book, and I only read about five pages before I had to put it down. Maybe I’m getting old (NOOO) but an entire book written in IMs is a bit much.

Have I posted that before?

Anyway…

We hosted a Game Night at my house on Wednesday. Just the life group, nothing huge. We had pizza and played Apples to Apples and Scene It! Good times, good times. Chad and Ben got into yet another argument–Ben is Jewish (not sure if he is Messianic or not) and he wouldn’t eat the pizza because even though it was cheese, it was half cheese and half pepperoni. Chad was asking Ben why did he still keep kosher (especially since he’d eaten a Big Mac the other day), and round and round they went.

Ben: You give me the SAME SPIEL every time!
Chad: That’s because you ask the same six questions every time!

Good Lord.

The house is already crumbling. *sigh* Well, I had a clean house for quite a few days, so yeah.

I wasn’t planning on doing any writing yesterday. I did jot down a few ideas in my writing journal early this morning, but anything serious? I’d pretty much shelved the idea. But for some reason, I opened up Becoming Me and went to work on revising. I rewrote the ending, cut out entire chapters, and got rid of seventy-five pages of gobbledy-gook. Now it’s with my crit partner Mandy (mandywriter) and with Kelle Belle (itskels), my reader. In the meantime, I’m going to take a small break and then jump back into my WIP, all while jotting down ideas for future projects.

I love writing!

Why did it take me so long to discover the beauty of RSS Aggregators? I use Sharp Reader and I like it very much. I especially like getting all the news from the sites I visit in one spot, rather than going to loads of webpages. It’s great! 🙂

‘Til next time! 🙂

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