Sunday, February 27, 2011

Bodies Are Mysterious

Our bodies are special things.  Really.  Think about all of the things that your body can do.  Go ahead.








Are you thinking?








All done?  Good.

Now lets talk about something with our bodies.  Arm hair.  I know some people chose to shave their arms, but the majority of people walking this earth have hair on their arms and do nothing to maintain it.  I am of the opinion that this is because as we go about our lives, our arm hair takes care of itself.  I mean, really, somehow, without trimming, it it never gets that long.  If I went that long without trimming my head hair it would be CRAZY long.  I think that before individual hairs get too long, they fall out because we do things.  We wear them off.

And yet, sometimes, if I actually look at my arm hair, I find one or two that are freakishly long.  It's creepy.  Why do they do that?  Why is that the exception and not the norm?  Why don't they make arm hair trimmers?

It really is a mystery.

Thursday, February 24, 2011

Oh, Tender!

Since I am currently unemployed, Hod often asks me to drive him to school.  He says it's because he likes to spend time together.  I actually think it's just because having someone drop you off at your building is a lot easier than finding a parking spot and walking.  But whatever.

Apparently, dropping your spouse off for class is a very common occurrence.  Hod and I have a mostly unspoken rule:  All goodbyes must be accompanied with a kiss.  Don't worry, not something big and sloppy.  We keep it clean, and simple, and cute.  I'm sure most of you are thinking, "Yeah, Duh, Everyone does that."  It's true, they do!  And I get to see it.  No, I'm not some creeper who is sitting there watching everyone.  I just notice it as I drop Hod off.  There are always other cars, doing the same thing.  Yeah for love!

Sunday, February 20, 2011

A Time of Transition?

Greetings Bucketeers!

Life in the frigid North has been changing.  Well, it's maybe changing.  We're not sure what is going on for sure.  A week ago, I lost my job.  That story is not something I am wanting to share here.  During the next 4 days Hod had some intense opportunities come up.  He is being very seriously looked at for a new job.  We are really hoping it works out.  Although, if he gets this job, I won't be seeing him until April.  He'll still be sleeping here, but I will probably feel like I'm running an upscale bed and breakfast where they will customize meals to your liking, and they do your laundry.  With full time school and working all but full time that's just the way it will be.  But we feel really good about this opportunity, so we're planning on moving forward if it's offered.

Also, Hod has been applying for internships.  And not a one of them is in the state we currently reside.  He has interviewed for one.  He has applied for others.  He has another interview type of thing in March.  And we don't know if he'll get anything, or when he will start. Meanwhile, I'm applying for jobs.  It's not a fun thing to do, but it's a must.

So, to sum up, Paily: no job.  Hod: Has one job, is interviewing for another, and is also interviewing for paid internships that start sometime.  It is such a good thing I have a dependable hubby!  (And as an added bonus, he is super cute!)

We don't know what is going to happen, we don't know what Hod is going to be offered, nor do we know what we will accept.  But for now we're "loading up the car" so to speak.  That is from an analogy Hod's mom gave him about not being a parked car so the Lord can do what he wants with you.  Right now we figure we've put the car in neutral, and we're packing up the trunk so we can go anywhere.  So, right now it's all one giant MAYBE.

Friday, February 18, 2011

Can You Explain It?

There is one thing in life that has almost always been very important to me.  Once I was shown how it would change my life, I have always done what what I could to make this a priority.  It is life changing.

Of course, I am talking about decorative socks.

They are cute, they are all the same thickness so you don't have to mate them, and often so soft.

Yesterday I noticed something about them.  I must admit I feel betrayed.

Decorative socks are almost always tall enough that they shouldn't be worn with shorts or capris.  This I already knew.  However, I realized that when you wear pants, and then you wear shoes, suddenly no one can see the socks.  Why do you have socks that are so cute when no one can see them?  I mean, I guess you know that your feet are cute, but you can't share the goodness.

Why, decorative socks.  Why have you suddenly turned on me??

Thursday, February 17, 2011

I've Been Tagged!!

Good Morning Bucket ... Family!

Ok, you're not all family... unless you go to the we're all part of the human family thing.  I've been watching Extreme Makeover Home Edition while I've been looking for a job online.  (Did I mention that I lost my job?  More on that later.)

I have a friend who tagged me!  I don't believe I've ever been tagged before.  So, to honor this occasion, I'm actually going to make my list.  The assignment:  list 15 interesting facts about yourself.  We may think different things are interesting.  Hope I don't bore you.  And, seeing as almost all of my followers are family, you probably know most of the facts.  Oh, well.  Here we go!

1.  I met Hod because I dated his best friend for 7 months.  3 1/2 months after the ex and I broke up, Hod and I were engaged.  I know that sounds all sorts of scandalous, but it's not.  Really.  I didn't even consider looking at Hod that way till after the break up.  Hod just moves fast, and somehow he got me to move fast as well.  I always said that I wanted to date someone at least 6 months before I got engaged.... Yeah that didn't work out for me.  Eh, that's fine.  Hod is totally worth it.

2.  I secretly dream of being a super good chef.  I have no desire to work in a restaurant.  I just want to be the best chef on the block.  In my dreams, I'm all grown up and have kids, and my kids bring the neighborhood kids over, and they all want to eat my food, and it's so good that kids who never eat their vegetables will start, because my veggies are SO amazing!  And my pastries.  And my main dishes.  The problem is, currently I am usually too lazy to really cook.  This is mostly because Hod works nights and I don't see the point in cooking amazing things for myself.  And I don't really enjoy the dishes.  And we have a super small dishwasher, so we can't really put any big bowls in it.

3.  My brain has mad skills.  Wow, that sounds egotistical.  Let me explain.  Growing up, I was always taught that if something was in your head, and you didn't want it there that you could hum your favorite hymn (sing out with vigor and vim) or recite a scripture, and because your head can only think of one thing at a time the unwanted thing will be pushed out.  Yeah, not so much for me.  I can honestly think of 2 or 3 things at once.  This means to push out the unwanted stuff I have to be singing multiple songs at once, a scripture, and lines from that scene I took to competition in high school called "Men are Slime".  We didn't do well, but it was a super fun scene!

4.  As I'm sure you've noticed I like to go off on tangents.  Seriously, it can be hard to stay on one subject.  I don't know if that's because of my funky brain, or if I do actually have ADD like people have said I do, or if maybe my brain works faster than my mouth... or would that be my mouth works faster than my brain.... it's a rough life. ;)

5.  My family is super crazy.  Oh, as individuals we are super cool.  But as a whole, things are special.  Let me explain how this works.  All of my grandparents are gone, but when I talk about them, I have 5 grandmas and only 2 grandpas.  I have around 42 aunts and uncles.  I have over 400 first cousins.  3 of my siblings are old enough to be my parents.  I have 2 nieces and 1 nephew that are older than me.  This then flows down to my niece who very recently turned one.  And honestly, I wouldn't change a thing.

6.  My favorite numbers are 3, 7, and another 4 digit number.  I would share that here, but that would give you access to all of my bank accounts.  Seeing as this is a public forum that would not be a good thing to share.

7.  I am actually super happy to have my own little place to run.  Even though sometimes I put off folding laundry, I love having an apartment.  Hod and I have had fun arranging the furniture, and hanging pictures on the walls, and picking the color scheme for our kitchen.  It makes me happy.  This place is ours, and that is so fun!

8.  While in college I became somewhat addicted to Gilmore Girls.  Despite the fact that Hod really wants to live in a city, I want to live in a place like Stars Hollow, where everyone knows everyone, and they all have silly little quirks, and stupid holidays and lame reenactments.

9.  I would rather have just enough money to have some wants, and all of my needs, but I want to have to save up to go on a vacation.  I have no desire to live in a huge house, have a maid, and be rich.

10.  One of my favorite memories as a kid is when we would play "Annie-I-Over" for Family Home Evening. For those of you who don't know this game, it goes like this.  You separate into 2 teams, each of you on one side of the house.  (this works best with a one story home)  Team A throws a ball over the house, and Team B tries to catch it.  If they do, Team B runs around to Team A's side and tries to hit them with the ball, thus gaining more members on their team.  And that's about it.

11.  I am super klutzy.  To this day I wonder how I made it through 4 years of high school marching band with large drums strapped to my body, and without any death, broken bones, or broken instruments.  I always have bruises in random spots on my body.  Hod has commented before that sometimes my legs look like he beats me.  He doesn't.  I promise.  I just run into things on a regular basis.  I'm like a young teenage boy still trying to figure out his body so he runs into everything, only I'm 26 and I've had this body for probably 10 years.  (As in, my body stopped changing about 10 years ago.  I've had forms of this body for all 26 years, no brain transplants, promise.)

12.  I am addicted to books and movies.  And not just reading/watching them.  I want/need to own them.  This addiction is being helped while I am a poor newly-wed and I can't afford to feed it.  Lets just say, that out of the 95-is movies that Hod and I own I brought about 75 of them into the marriage.  I know many people own a lot more movies, but considering the lack of funds in my life since I was 18, that really isn't too bad.

13.  I think I'm funny.  Sometimes while I am doing hum-drum things like mopping my floor, I am telling jokes to myself in my head.  Then I laugh.  Then Hod looks at me and thinks I'm crazy cause I'm laughing while mopping the floor.  But if you knew the dialog going on in my head, you would be laughing too.

14.  I'm really bad at grammar, and yet when I see grammar mistakes it drives me crazy.  I really wish people knew the difference between "your" and "you're".  Or "to" and "too".  I would rather someone scratch their fingernails on a chalk board than have the wrong word on a billboard.  Cause the nail scratching will stop, but the billboard will be there forever!  Make it stop!

15.  I hate gum.  I think it's gross.  The texture is icky.  And when people chew it, they always think that their mouth is closed, but it almost NEVER is!  And then you can hear them chewing, and you can hear the slobber, and the squeaky-ness of the gum against their teeth.  I believe whoever invented gum should be put in prison.  Then they should be put in solitary, with speakers in the room.  But the only sound that comes out of the speakers should be the sound of millions of people chewing gum!  And they will sit there for years until they go completely mad, thus understanding the travesty they have put on the human race.

So, there you have it.  15 random things about me.  Yep, it became random instead of interesting.  Oh well.

Have a great day, yo's!

Tuesday, February 8, 2011

One of Life's Lessons

Yesterday, to celebrate Hod's birthday, I turned our apartment into a life-sized board game.

This morning I woke up to a regular apartment.  I'm not going to lie, I was a little bit disappointed.  After living in a board game, regular life seems to be lacking something.  Oh, well.

Saturday, February 5, 2011

Bittersweet

Sorry, friends, this is not going to be warm fuzzy.

This week two of my dear friends gave birth.  This week, I have also heard through the grapevine of two other friends who just found out they are pregnant.  I'll be honest, I feel like I only have five friends up here.  The other friend is like me: trying to get pregnant but failing.  She's been at this much longer than I have, and I can't claim to really understand her side.  But I do know mine.

I realize that I've only been married 5 months.  That means I really shouldn't be sad about things at all.  I mean, really, 5 months??  Not that long.  Yet, I can't stop myself from doing the math and realizing that I should be 20 weeks pregnant tomorrow.  But I'm not.  I had surgery instead.  And now, because of my surgery, my body is basically going through puberty again.  Really, I've been breaking out like I did when I was 11.  And I'm super CRAZY irregular.  How do you get pregnant when you don't know when anything is happening?  And this is the second month in a row that I've been 2 weeks late (Ok... only kind of late cause apparently I'm just irregular, but for my old self I'm late) and despite how many pregnancy tests I take I always fail.

Part of me knows that some people have it so much worse.  But I also haven't mentioned the other things that have been going on.  Those aren't my things to share, so I won't do that here.  Just suffice it to say these past 5 months have been the hardest in my life.  Not because of anyone's fault.  Just because of past things that are coming to surface that now we have to deal with together.

It's all out of my control.  I realize that.  Part of me knows that Heavenly Father has a plan for me.  The other part of me can't see it at all.  Hod and I will be ok.  But today, I'm just throwing myself a little pity party.  And wishing I could hold my baby.

PS  I took off comments for this one.  Thanks for the warm thoughts, but really, no one can say anything to take away the problem, so I thought I'd save you the trouble of feeling like you had to try.

Love you all!

Wednesday, February 2, 2011

Blogging For Books, Jumping on the Bandwagon

Hey there friends!

Laree recently posted a review on a book she received for free from the Blogging for Books Program.  Being a poor newlywed who LOVES new books, (Not just reading them, but owning them) I decided this was the perfect program for me.  So, without further adieu, here is my review.

Lady In Waiting
By Susan Meissner
Lady in Waiting - Susan Meissner

This book was exactly in my genre of "I LOVE YOU" books.  The story is about a woman named Jane who owns an antique shop.  One day, hidden in a shipment of other things she finds a ring inscribed with her name.
*Time Travel To The Past*  We then get to meet Lady Jane Grey.  Now, I don't know a lot about history, but she was a real ruler in England way back in the day.  We followed her life from the view of her seamstress, Lucy.  Learning how each of the Jane's progressed in their lives was quite the enjoyable experience.  Susan Meissner is very skilled in keeping the reader's attention.  Every time I would be completely entranced with Modern Jane's story, I would be dragged back in time to Historical Jane.  Then when I was just as interested in her story, BAM back to the future.

Really, read this book.  I loved learning about their lives.  The story was compelling, and beautiful.  As the events unfolded my emotions were surprisingly close.  This is the beauty of the book.

My one complaint, I felt that at the beginning of each time travel, Susan Meissner spent a lot of time describing the setting.  Almost a little too much description.  Luckily, after a few paragraphs the details would become less laborious to get through.  But, really, go get this book.  It was wonderful!


*Disclaimer* 
I received this book for free from WaterBrook Multnomah Publishing Group for this review

Tuesday, February 1, 2011

Yeah.... We Totally Love You!

So, funny story.

There is a couple at church that Hod and I quite like.  They are just super cute, and we've talked multiple times about getting together.  But we never have.  Sunday, Hod was talking to the MR about how "We should get together."  The MR agreed.  And I could just see it happening like it always does.  "Hey, lets get together, Yeah, let's..."  And then we never do it.  So, I poked my head in and said, "You should actually plan something".  And they did!  We had plans to get together and play games and get to know each other.

6:00 rolls around, I'm thinking about making caramel popcorn to take over, and I turn to Hod and ask, "Dear, can you remind me of their names?"  Now to this point, 98% of all conversations with this couple was Hod talking, and I was normally busy doing RS stuff.  I think I had been introduced to them once, and I liked them, but I'm bad with names.  Hod's response to my question was, "Uh... I'm not sure?"  WHAT??? REALLY???  You have GOT to be kidding me!  We are going over in one hour and we don't know their names?  My mind was racing... do you think they'd notice if we never called them by name?   We spent most of the next hour on our Ward's website, but not every couple had pictures, so we couldn't find it by that.  Hod started calling friends who may have known, I started calling friends (One who did know her name, but we were still lost on his) and FINALLY we found one person who had records so they knew.  And A LOT of people got a really good laugh.  It was such a random strange moment.  Really, imagine this.  You call a friend and the conversation goes like this, "Hey, so we're getting together with this couple tonight... and they looked like this at church, and they are really nice... do you know their names?"  So awkward!

The good news is, we went, we knew their names, I don't think I'll ever forget them, and we had a wonderful time.  I hope we can be friends.  And maybe someday, we will tell them our awkward story.