reflection

i have a secret shame. well it is not really a shame i guess because i am owning up to it right now in a most public way.. i love to listen to country music. but i pretend i am too cool for it and i am not sure why. i don't think country music is necessarily nerdy but i think there is a stigma that goes along with it. anyhow, love it or hate it, i listen to it occasionally when i am alone in my car and by listen i mean full blast singing my heart out like i am the best singer anyone has ever met.(ps. i am.) well tonight i was driving a little way home and had my music blasting and i got to thinking because country music does that to me and i was thinking about my love life or lack thereof in the past
i was thinking about my first boyfriend and "missionary". man i loved him but was NOT the nicest of girlfriends. i was catty and bratty and caught up in myself he came home a wiser man and realized it and chose another girl over me. as far as i know they are doing great and are a great little family and i am so happy for them but at the time i thought i was going to die. i thought nothing could be worse. but country music go me through it. the dixie chicks in fact.oh man i needed them.
my next love was a friend i had had since sixth grade. i was sure we were meant to be together and he was the greatest thing. i thought we were perfect for each other and so did tons of other people.....except him. i was also immature and our communication was absent. it took a long time for me to get over him. YEARS!!!! but i did it and he is still one of my best friends in the whole wide world and i miss hanging out and talking and i miss his family. in my years of getting over said friend, country music came through for me. it was my shoulder to cry on when i was frustrated and sad and lonely.
my next love was another good friend and i was shy and reserved and insecure and things were not that open but oh we had some fun times and i still laugh aloud at the things we have done. he is great and i miss him and our escapades. ilove when we finally talk after months and it is as comfortable as always. man alive, but a broken heart.... guess who came through...country music.
tonight as i was driving, i was not frustrated or sad. i was happy and even a little sappy and i listened to some of the cheesiest lyrics around (come on admit it country fans) and i totally identified!!! i even got teary eyed as i thought of my little love waiting at home for me. he is perfect for me. and i sometimes feel a little lame that i am 30 and just barely married because in my culture that is a little strange but i am so glad i found him and he get me and loves me as i am with all my faults and foibles. and laughs at me when i am being hilarious even when no one else thinks i am. and reaches out to find me in the night and packs me a lunch and folds my underwear and millions of other unglamorous things. i love to come home to him. forever. and force him to listen to sappy country music with me once in a while. good old mark.

documentarians

ok people, here is a question i am posing for you. i am going to give you 2 choices. please pick one. would you rather watch a documentary about people at bus stops waiting for the bus with questions such as what do you do? where are you going? why do you ride the bus? why are you wearing that fuzzy blanket? where did you get that saber? just basically finding out their stories and see if they think you are crazy (or the documentary maker is crazy) or is they answer candidly and have honest heartfelt answers. or would you rather watch a documentary about all the people holding signs at freeway exits, under passes, stop signs etc. asking for help, anything helps signs and have a brief glimpse into their lives. maybe spotlight a few of them to find out their stories and what made them feel so desperate that they had to beg for money. also find out if any of them are scam artists. thanks for your help. here is the back story. mark is obsessed with people at the bus stops here. seriously. anytime we drive past a bus stop, he always points them out and now refers to them as the bus people. he talked about them so much that i told him he should make a documentary about them. then, i thought i sholud have a competing documentary so i came up with the one about the sign people. i think it is more compelling and has a more human touch. don't steal our ideas because they are AWESOME and copyrighted. thanks.

alive

i promise we are alive. things are quiet here but i thought i should put something on here so i was not staring at my blasted curlered hair every time i opened this thing. here are some highlights of the past little while.
1. we have friends! i never thought i would see the day but alas, we are popular again so never fear. i am going to do a new friends post soon so hold on to your hats.

2. with aforementioned friends, we took a trip to moses lake, washington this past weekend. i took 2 pictures and they are of us in the car so not so exciting. it was a fun relaxing weekend and was on the tail end of mark's spring break, so we had to party it up.

the whole time i was in moses lake when i was not partying, i was looking for my friend's uncle john. and the sad thing is that i have no idea what he looks like. i just know he lives there.

3. the temple gig is going well. we get up at freaking 4:30 am but other than that it is pretty nice. i am always tripped out for some reason when i see mark there doing some of his duties. fun times.

4. we bought a vintage fondue set off of ebay and i made some yummy cheese fondue for valentine's day and got myself some beautiful calla lilies.

5. there is still snow on the ground here.

6. i got a job. kind of. it is for the 2010 census bureau. it lasts 10-12 weeks. someone told me that hannibal from silence of the lambs killed a census worker so the job is now not appealing at all. that show freaked my freak for years and caused me to not sleep in my basement bedroom for weeks. sigh.

the sun will come out tomorrow

well friends on the quest for beauty i have had yet another hair brained idea. you see, my hair is the bane of my existence. it is a pain to flat iron and it is so blasted curly, i always look like an infant. what i wanted was those loose pretty curls that most girls seem to be able to do. so, i went and bought myself some rollers. the curling iron was working but i was afraid of all the damage being done and the time it took, so of course in my peas sized brain, rollers were the answer.
my friend had these rollers for her daughter and they produced really pretty curls in her hair so i thought i would give them a whirl so i went and bought some and lo and behold, wound them tightly

posed for a few picture so you could all be jealous of how cute i am with no makeup and rollers. all i can say is good thing mark married me because hello, not so cute. anyway, on with the rollers. want to see the results of this brilliant idea??!! behold
side view=hot

front view=hot

back view=hot

so the moral of this story is that i have brilliant ideas and everyone should rush out and go buy themselves some rollers. actually the moral is that i am once again and idiot. sigh.

fashion plate

homies. guess what. i got some sweet orthopedic shoes. i got them free from a lady who works with us at the temple. wanna see them so you can see how fashionable i look? okay here you go. feast your eyes on these beauties.
pretty sweet eh?

sorry about the cankles

and as an added bonus, they look great with jeans!!!!!

i mock, but seriously, they are so comfortable and wasn't that so nice of her to GIVE me these? they are not cheap shoes. so thanks friend.

actual conversation

mark: honey, maybe we should stop drinking caffeine so much since we are going to be working in the temple now.
me: you don't really drink caffeine.
mark: i meant you. and honey, maybe we should stop swearing or try to not swear so much.
me: you never swear.
mark: again, you.

so i think it is plain to see who is the saint in our coupledom. whatever. i bring a lot of joy and happiness to sailors and truckers in the soda business so i contribute too. take that mother theresa.

correction

remember a few posts back when i said mark and i were going to be working in the temple. i made a mistake. i meant don johnson. from the miami vice days. sorry.
common mistake

days of yore

remember when mark was amish and sported a lovely beard? well those days are over folks. he is smooth and his hair is cut (by yours truly who claimed to be a great hairstylist in order to get the privilege- hahahahaha)

so folks in honor of the new do and smooth face, we tried a few new hairstyles to make mark's appearance more shocking, stylish and awesome. ta da: the new looks. you can vote if you want

1. the bad boy

2. Middle part with curlicues

3. the rocker? or the widow's peak

4. fresh off the mission nerd with a part

5. mormon mom (my personal favorite)

let us know what you think. our primary kids just thought he looked weird. at least they are honest

lame post warning

remember when i said this blog should be called old news??? well i meant it. here is some, to catch you up. in december on the day before we were supposed to go home to utah, it began to snow. and snow and snow and snow. it was a marshmallow world and we were stuck inside. the roads did not get plowed and there were people walking if they had to go anywhere. luckily we were ok. mark's final was cancelled (after a scathing email telling the students to prepare for bad weather and give themselves plenty of time to drive to school) and so we were pretty much snowed in for 2 days and then in between storms, we made a quick break for it to make it to utah in time for the holidays. so here are some pictures of the snow because i have them, and this is old news and so therefore appropriate for the blog. for your viewing pleasure:

our shoveled walkway

our friend ian's car. he was staying with us because he was moving to chicago.

mark and ian were proud of this little driveway they built from our car to ian's so we could get out. we got out and then later that day, the plows finally came and covered all their hard work with snow so ian was stuck. luckily there was a neighborhood shovel brigade out and about.

more of the shoveled out "driveway"

cars slipping and sliding and mark sweeping

snow land

our car getting unsnowed

our steps. note. that handrail where the snow is piled up to is up to my waist!!

our car. wowzers. old news for sure but still.....

new job

mark and i got a new job. we will be working here for the next little while. mark will be the one in the white suit and i will be the pleasant lady in the white dress and orthopedic shoes. please stop by. we will be there the first 3 saturdays of the month from 6:30 am people!!!!! until 1:00. see you soon.

mystery solved

i figured out why no one wants to be our friend. this is our picture for the ward website and i bet when people are on there wondering, " hmm who should we befriend?" i bet they skip right over us. i mean seriously look at the dirty look mark is giving the camera. so mean. and also the fact that i have 9 chins. we will be alone together the rest of our lives. sigh.

home again

i am thinking of calling my blog, lamewad or old news. seriously that is all it is. I am alive and well and back in spokane so take away the well part because i am not so happy to be here. my new year's resolution is to have a suckier attitude about spokane than last year. so far so good. we were in utah for the last 24 days!!! can you believe it? It was a LONG vacation and was delightful. here are a few highlights.

• family
• friends (sorry if we missed you!)
• sleeping in
• mark with no school
• mark's birthday
• a rocking new years
• american idol
• family dinners
• game nights
• stomach bug
• cold
• loverly christmas

we had a great time and not you are caught up on our lives for a while. also did you hear about all the snow that we missed her ein spokane and all the flooding? we are so glad. we left in betweeen storms and saw enought to disgust us with no snow plows and such. it was pretty though and i was glad we didn't get too snowed in and could still leave for the holidays. well the snow is melting and there was some news of flooding but we live on a hill so i think we are alright. in other news i cut my own hair today. hahaha. i may have to post pictures. i am not very good.

go here

friends, isn't this so pretty. well my friend susan is selling these in her etsy shop. she and he husband made them!! so cute for a kid's room so go order some. she also has some other really cool prints so check them out. here is the link to her etsy shop

crapload

were you wondering how my day is going? oh thanks for asking. it sucks. here is why. i feel like crap and i have a nyquil hangover. also here is the best part. i was leaving for work this morning and i was carrying a pumpkin (already embarrassing). i was carrying the pumpkin to the garbage can and also my work bag. also i had on slippers. because they look like shoes and they make me feel cozy at work. (don't judge, they look like shoes!) so unbeknownst to me, jack freaking frost decided to come last night and make things all icy. well in his trickery, it just looked wet. so i went down the stairs paying no heed to their treacherousness. well of course i fell ALL the way down them and of course the pumpkin flew out of my hands and all the contents of my bag. and of course someone just happened to be walking by my house right then at 8 in the fricking morning and had a front row view. typical. i just sat on the bottom step in pain and embarrassment and then finally got up just as mark approached the scene of the accident. he laughed. he will regret that later. oh how my butt is so sore! so sore. there is going to be a huge bruise and you better believe i am going to blog the picture of it. i need sympathy people. then i got to work where i could really use on e of those inflatable donuts to sit on and realize that i have forgotten my phone and brought the wrong lunch. best. day. ever. good thing my laughy husband felt bad for me and remedied the forgotten things. what a guy, he would be almost perfect except for his penchant for laughing at me all the time. sigh. woe is me. woe is my bum.

a scroungy home is coming along

ok, i have done a few more projects around the house and so of course i need some opinions. please try not to be too harsh because most of them i like. here is our bed before. i liked this bed but the blues were really hard to find anything to match with so i changed them.......to this. what do you think? the whole time i was thinking of my friend darci who is not a fan of red and thinking she would hate this! but i like it and it made a lot more things possible.

there is a slight problem, the curtains look like bandannas (thank you matt) but i sort of accidentally miscalculated the amount of fabric i ordered. oops! so bandannas it is. sigh. oh well they still look better than boring windows. (sort of)

this little lovely is in a frame and a collage that for some reason i didn't get a picture of. oh well. these were my valentine cards last year and i loved them.

i was reading on a diy website to use ceiling rosettes as wall art. well i couldn't really find rosettes but i found ceiling tiles and they were 100% free!!! also they are big and make a blank wall not blank anymore. since we are poor, i have to make up my own wall hangings. frustrates me to no end since i lack the creativity gene.

this next homemade wall art is a collage of some of our many wedding cards. i thought it was a fun idea but maybe you might think it lame. not quite as cool as i had hoped but at least no more blank walls in the bedroom. i do not heart blank walls.
we got this huge vase for 2 dollars at a garage sale and it has been sitting empty for months so i bought some flowers and such at pier 1 and went to town. flower arranger i am not but oh well.
painted our star red. it was yellow before. also here is some of matt's photography from thailand.

and here is our pioneer quilt. just so you know how pioneer like i am. this is the ohio star pattern and my childhood neighborhood made it for us for our wedding. pretty. and so warm. so that is our new bedroom. now i will show you some "art " projects i made that are totally embarrassing and many of your pre-k children could have made them.

for the dining room. hahahahahahahahahahahahahaha

and for the living room (oh the shame). where did i get the idea i could decorate. (an emoticon who is giggling at herself while shrigging her shoulders and putting her hands up.)