MERRY CHRISTMAS...and all that Jazz

MERRY CHRISTMAS week!


We've now reached the middle holiday, Christmas.  Such a controversial holiday.  To say 'Happy Holidays' or 'Merry Christmas,' that is the question.  Personally, I'm perfectly fine with Merry Christmas (as evidenced by above exclamation).  It's fun, though!  Usually.  This year I feel like it snuck up on me something serious.  I feel wholly unprepared.  The list of presents I have for people is short compared to what I need to have. Wednesday and Thursday shopping for me.  I hope there's something left to get! 


Today I went to Amazon.com and downloaded a bunch of free Christmas mp3s!  Steal!  That might become a habit.  I did it last year, too.  There's some decent stuff on there for free. 


Also, at work I was in charge of putting the Christmas Eve show together.  I am very proud of how it came out. :)  We had other staff members tell their favorite/most impactful Christmas memories and I put them all together and added music.  I hope people like it.  It's very different from what I do for day to day shows. There are some beautiful/funny/heart touching stories, too. It's worth the listen.


Another thing:  I finished my scarf! Gosh. Took long enough.  It's a little shorter than I'd like, but the black yarn ran out before the gray! What the...?  They were the same brand, same size and everything. I feel jipped. 


As far as wedding planning goes, we had a pivitol moment last week.  We realized while we browsed church websites over lunch that we don't have the time to hunt down a venue on our own.  We decided to ask our mothers to see if they could help us out.  Our budget is little, and all the venues we've looked at eat a good chunk out of it.  We found a church that will do it for $300 and then a little more for a reception or something similar, but it's a Baptist church and doesn't allow dancing.  I really want dancing.  That's one of the few things I've always imagined at my wedding.


On another note, hopefully soon I'll have another post.  Something a little more interesting than an update on my life. :) 

Games my family has me addicted to...

There are a billion apps on iTunes for your iPhones and iTouches. (iThis, iThat, etc.)  A lot of them are below average, not worth the time or money to download them.  There are others, however, that are good quality and well, addictive.  Most of the ones to which I'm addicted my family got first and then showed me.  I immediately had to download it and play it on my own iPhone.  Here are three that I would say are worth the time to download for free or for $0.99 to waste hours on:

-Fruit Ninja- $0.99

 This wonderful little game is the definition of addictive.  You use your finger to slice the fruit and hopefully not to slice the bombs.  It has 3 modes: Classic, Zen, and Arcade.  Classic starts off slowly and gets progressively harder.  Hitting a bomb in this mode kills you dead and you have to start over.  Dropping a fruit in this level goes by the baseball rules: three strikes and you're out.  Zen is one of my favorites. No bombs. No lives. Just cut as many fruits as you can! Arcade is fun as well. I minute to get as many points as possible. Hitting bombs in Arcade mode subtracts 10 points. 

There are many different achievements you can get, even the 'underachiever award' which is scoring under 20 points in Arcade mode after the bonuses. This is actually a LOT harder than you'd expect because Fruit Ninja has this funny quirk of giving odd awards.  For example, if in Arcade mode you hit a good number of bombs, one of the bonuses you can get is the Bomb Lover award, 50 points! My sisters and I have tried to come up with ways to make it more interesting yet, like playing it upside down. It kind of hurts your head.

-Pocket Frogs- FREE

 

I LOVE this game.  I have no idea why.  My little sisters got me hooked on it. All but one of my siblings has it on their iDevice.  Basically, you breed and/or race frogs. Earn coins from selling or racing the frogs and buy more frogs, habitats, accessories.  We don't ever buy that stuff though because when you take your frog to the pond to tame it, you find presents containing that stuff!  As you level up (by breeding and selling your frogs), you get rarer frogs and more habitats for your frogs (only 8 frogs a habitat).  There's also a Froggydex that keeps track of all the different kinds of frogs you've had.  Mine is still at 1%. My sisters are at 4 or 5%.  Those are some of the elements that make it addicting. To level up, you need to breed and sell more frogs. Since your habitats only keep 8, you need to keep rotating them to have enough room.

One of the things I love about this game is that you DO NOT have to log in ever day for the frogs to live or whatever.  Those types of games are obnoxious.  I just think the frogs are so cute and you get cooler and cooler looking frogs as you level up! It's so addicting! 

-Cut The Rope- $0.99 (Lite = FREE)

This is my most recent addiction from my family.  This little alien Om Nom eats candy and you have to feed it to him.  It's a puzzle and skill game.  You use your finger to cut the rope and get the candy to the little dude and get each star along the way.  Each level gets progressively harder.  There are several different level sets, one which they just added.  You start in the Cardboard Box.  I'm now in the next set, the Fabric Box and I'm stuck.  It really teases your brain though!  As you level up, there are bubbles, spikes, spiders, etc.  It gets pretty complicated!  It's really a cool game, though.  Keeps you there trying to get all 3 stars!

Matrimonious Decisions Pt. 2 - The Venue Hunt

There are SO many places to have a get together. Hotels, ranches, churches, breweries, etc.

Unfortunately, most of them cost an arm, leg, and your firstborn. When we first started looking for venues for the wedding, I felt very fortunate that neither his nor my church had a building. That meant I could choose anything I wanted. I could choose something beautiful. Something I really liked. Then we started looking. I saw many places that looks beautiful, the kind of place I would love to have as a back-drop...and then I looked at the price.

*choke* *spasm* *twitch*

I in NO way make enough money to justify putting down a down payment to reserve a place that is as much as my largest student loan. Our budget is mainly this: as cheap as possible. Though these places were gorgeous, I can't even consider them. It's ok. I'm not bitter.

My mother also filled my inbox with options, though we didn't really look at the price there either. It just disappoints me.

Fortunately, my man is a member of an E. Free church and there are a few well connected ones in town. Hopefully, because he's a member we can not spend what equals 2.5 months of my pay. And hopefully, at least one of them has a beautiful sanctuary.

Now to make the phone calls...

Uhm, November? Where'd you go?

So, it isn't yet officially the end of November, but it might as well be.  This week is full of December.  I feel like this month FLEW by.  Wasn't it just yesterday that I threw out those gross, leaking, moldy pumpkins from October?  Goodness gracious!

The last month of the year 2010 is upon us.  So crazy.  I rented a house, graduated college, got a job, and got a fiance all in the same year!  Aside from recalling all the achievements this year brought for me, the month of December is always full of its own adventures.  Namely:

TREE HUNTING!!!!

The Christmas season is officially upon us.  The 'fresh, farm cut' Christmas tree stands have popped up on corners all over the city, and we've already seen people trucking them home on the roof of their cars.  Do those kinds of trees really last to Christmas?  

Also out are all the fake...(what? oh!)...Pardon me, I mean 'faux' Christmas tree displays at all of the stores.  Walking through Sam's Club the other day, we even saw a predecorated faux Christmas tree.  Can we say, lazy?

No, neither of those will do.  I guess you could day my family is puritan when it comes to our Christmas tree.  We go out and chop one down.  We used to go to a Christmas tree farm for as long as I could remember, but last year we went up into the forest where the Park people have opened it up for thinning out.  

Christmas tree hunting has always been full of adventures (whether it was the actual act, or the 'personality' of the tree upon returning home).  I remember more than once our tree falling over in the middle of the night.  That's when we started tying it to the wall with baling wire which we now do every year.  Picking the tree is always an adventure on it's own.  More than once, one of us children was in tears or close to it because the whole family didn't want to pick the tree we wanted.  Ah, the holidays. 

Last year when we went tree hunting up in the forest, we spent hours trying to decide on a tree.  We drove around from place to place, wandering around in the knee-high snow.  It was exciting, except that we were freezing and tired.  We eventually decided on a tree...15 ft tall.  Our ceiling in the living room is only 11 feet tall at the peak.  That was a whole new adventure.  We cut the top of the tree and tied it on lower to make it fit.  That's right. We had a jury-rigged Christmas tree, complete with a separate watering pop can for the cut off top.  

In a few weeks, my family will go out and get another Christmas tree.  I can't wait to see what this year's tree-hunting adventures have in store. :)

Here and there...and everywhere

Happy Turkey Day Eve!

It's a wonderful day on the face of the planet. It's the day before we stuff ourselves and the day before the day before we go broke.  Anyone else trying to save room up for dinner tomorrow?

Ok, so true to my previous habits, it's been since last week that I posted anything. I'm afraid I don't have anything particularly poignant to post, just an update/journal.  Mainly, just to get into the habit of writing:

Saturday, my fiance and I took my youngest brother up to the Lego Store to turn in his wishlist (with a chance of winning something off of it!).  It was a wonderfully fun day.  It's nice to get to treat someone like that.  I bought him the Lego men that he built (3 for $10), but only gave him one. The rest I'll save for his birthday.  We had lunch in the food court (I got my brother to eat Popeyes chicken! Yay for breaking through picky-eaters!), and stopped last in the Toys R Us express store where I bought my fiance part of HIS Christmas present. I love geeks.  The whole day, it was surreal to walk around with my future hubby and a child.  It was kind of fun! :)  I know it won't feel the same when it's our own kids, but I hope it feels just as fun.

Also over the weekend, my brand-spanking-new niece went into the ER. Turns out she has meningitis. They started administering antibiotics and she is doing infinitely better.  They think she may have had it right away, but it only now got bad.  I pray there's no long-term damage, and that my sister and her husband avoid contracting it.

Then yesterday, my fiance had a really, REALLY rough day.  Nothing seemed to be going right for him.  He was very frustrated and it just kept building. I felt quite helpless. I couldn't seem to make it better.  We went out for lunch and before we got up to go in the restaurant, he vented a little. I still felt helpless, but apparently it made him feel better.  We had a long talk over lunch about the best thing I can do for him on days like that.  It was a good, informative, and it gives me hope for working problems out when we're married. 

The afternoon didn't turn out much better for him though.  We were both hoping he could take a 'mental health' afternoon from work, but it wasn't to be.  I was starting to worry because our wonderful coworkers had planned to have an engagement party for us and I didn't want him to go into it feeling so lousy.  We get off of work at 5 and the party was at 6.  I stayed at work and he went home and came back to work to get me at 6, and he was a little better.  In we went.

Both of us find it weird and slightly uncomfortable to be the center of attention, but it went well.  Pizza, Apples-to-Apples, and lots of questions we don't necessarily have the answers to just yet.  At the end of the night, we were both in a good mood and I was very, very thankful for that. 

I am also thankful for a few days off of work! I'm hoping my mom will let me cook a ham for Thanksgiving dinner, so I can feel like I've contributed and can cook. Tadaa!  Have a WONDERFUL Thanksgiving and weekend!

YOU ate all the candy?

My little brother's pumpkin got sick and puked all over the floor. And that black stuff in his noggin?  Mold. Ew.

Matrimonious Decisions Pt. 1

This woulda helped. (borrowed from www.ecw-weddings.co.uk)

"So, honey, which ones?"

I stared at my list ... well, listlessly.  I didn't want to decide.  

Decisions have never been easy for me. Even the unimportant, stupid ones.  I kept staring. I had to answer my fiance eventually. 


A few weeks ago we started our wedding planning process. If you have any inclination as to what goes into wedding planning, you'll know that it involves COUNTLESS decisions on the part of the bride:

Venue. Budget. Reception. Flowers. Dresses. Tuxes. Decor. Vows. Ceremony. Wedding party. Guests. Food. *

(*Not necessarily in that order)

That Sunday afternoon, we decided to tackle the guest list.  I figured once we had that, we could have a better idea of what venues to look at which would help us guesstimate a budget.  We were kind of hoping to see roughly 200, if that.  My love opened a spreadsheet and made 3 columns:  Invite, Announcement, and Maybe.  I told him to start with his list.  He almost effortlessly stuck names in slots under the columns he desired.  Bam, bam, bam. They were all there.  Then it was my turn.

"Where should we start?"

Of course, my family went under "Invite" but they weren't the hard part (though knowing which of them will come is kind of a gamble).  Everyone else was.  Do I really need all of these people?  Old friends. College friends. Neighbors.

To give you a little insight into how I processed this, I will tell you I'm the kind of person who is a people-pleaser.  I don't like confrontation.  I have a hard time saying no to people.  Put simply, I'm a wuss.  There, I said it.  Now that you know that, to say trying to decide where to categorize my guests was frustrating would be accurate.  I didn't want to decide, but I knew I had to.

Eventually, we found a place for everyone (I'd be willing to say more than 3/4ths of my guests ended up in the "Invite" column still).  My fiance totaled it all up.

*Drumroll*

Tadaa! More than 400 people total in the columns! OMG. Really. So much for me being decisive. "Just throw them all in the 'Invite' column. We'll be fine."

This wedding planning is going to be ... an experience.

Only a million more rows to go!

Last New Years, my aunt taught all of my sisters and me how to knit.  We were all trying to make scarves (what's easier than rectangles?).  I was hopeless at first.  I kept adding stitches, and dropping them and, whoo, it was a mess. Thankfully, my aunt decided to simplify the pattern to just straight knitting. Knit, knit, knit. By Spring Break, I had a scarf...sort of.  It was WAY wide and just short.  That was my first adventure in knitting.  

After I graduated in May, I had plans to be creative and productive and all those good things.  Yeah. It's now November and I've finally started to make good on some of those plans.  I went to a craft store in October and picked up two skeins of yarn, knitting needles and a pattern book.  I decided I would knit...a scarf!  Yay! More rectangles. 

The very first project in the pattern book is a ribbed scarf.  It involves not only knitting, but also purling.  No big deal.  I skimmed over the instructions to refresh my memory.  I actually started this scarf in October.  I started it several times in October. 

The problem this time around making a scarf wasn't adding stitches or dropping them. It was working the pattern. I had about a foot before I set it down for a few days and came back to it, only to find after a few rows I had somehow reversed the pattern!  It went in when it should have gone out and out when it should have gone in. Over and over, I tried to correct my reversal without taking out all of my progress, but it was useless.  


Ultimately, a little more studying of my pattern book helped me to get the stitches straight. (Oh, so when you purl you...Oooooh, I see now.)  I re-restarted on Monday of this week. I now have about 2 feet and my current concern is running out of yarn.  


Reminder to self:  READ THE INSTRUCTIONS. They just might help.
 

Fresh and New

Welcome!  

*cricket*  *cricket*

Uhm...well yes, it has been a while since I surfaced in the blog-osphere.  Yet, I have returned with a new motivation to write just as inconsistently as I ever did.  (Hey, I'm trying to be realistic here.)  

Hopefully this blog will do a few things for both anyone who happens to read it and myself:

1. For the reader- provide a chuckle or two and some amusement.

2. For the reader- keep you current on my life if you're so inclined.

3. For the reader and me- provide an avenue for me to share things I find fun, helpful, or useful.

4. For me- help me decompress and think things through in writing. 

5. For me- help me exercise my brain and creativity. 

Those are the five I can think of off of the top of my head.  I do so hope this will be beneficial to both parties, even if I am one of 10 billion blogs on the internet filled with inane ramblings of both the famous personalities and the average internet user.  Well, here's adding my two cents in with the rest. 

Good surfing to ya!