Clothes and Couches.

Clothes

Our care group is having a little BBQ this Saturday and since it’s supposed to be 84 degrees, I’m planning to wear my new dress:

I LOVE this dress. It’s so comfy, casual and for some reason, I’m smitten with the orange/tan color combo.

As for the trendy vs. timeless pants, longevity and comfort are the winners this time.

The skinny jeans fit me well… standing up.

But they’re a little iffy for bending over or sitting down, meaning I’d always have to wear a belt. And since I don’t like being limited like that…

Dress pants it is.

The dress pants are the Aubrey cut from Gap (a quick Google search shows that they’re either only available at Gap outlet or have been renamed). They’re the perfect size in both the waist and hips (hard to find!), perfect length to wear with either heels or flats, and they’re machine washable. Best part, I got them for 50% off. I feel like $30 for nice dress pants is a very reasonable price.

After much contemplating, I mailed my “marathon shirt” back yesterday. I did exchange it for a large and while it fit better, it was still really long and a little tighter than I would prefer:

One of my friends is an amazing seamstress (I was going to write “sewer”, but somehow that didn’t seem right…) and I was thinking about asking her to shorten the shirt 2-3 inches. But the more I thought about it, it’s just not the right shirt. So back it went, much to our wallet’s delight.

Speaking of our wallet, I have not bought and am no longer planning to buy a Garmin just yet. A new pair of running shoes had to come first (somehow, they seemed more essential) and our Alaska trip has pretty much eliminated any wiggle room beyond that in our budget. But it’s a small price to pay for the trip of a lifetime.

So what am I planning to wear for the marathon? Well, after way too much thought and deliberation, I’ve (almost) decided to go with this short-sleeve shirt if it’s a warm day:

 Malibu Half 2010

Or this shirt if it’s chilly:

On the bottom, I’ll wear my pink running skirt over my 2XU compression tights. The other bottom option I’ve been thinking about is my running skirt over my Aspaeris compression shorts (just in case compression tights would be too warm) but then I’d want to wear compression socks and not only would that be more $$ to spend, I’m not sure it would be any cooler than the tights in the first place. I’ll probably change my mind 10 more times before the race and end up bringing along 5 different options anyway. Le sigh. #firstworldproblems

Travis laughs whenever I bring up the majorly important and hard decision of what I’m going to wear during the marathon. “When I ran my marathon {Twin Cities 2006},” he said, “the night before the race, I realized that I didn’t have a drifit shirt. My roommate said he had one I could borrow, and that’s what I wore.”

Boys.

Couches

We are LOVING our new couches that we got from our friends who just sold their house to travel around the country:

You almost can’t even see Charlie on the loveseat… but she’s there. All. the. time. Luckily, besides a minor mishap (looking at you Katy) in the first 36 hours, the couches have remained intact. But the dogs still lick them every chance they get. ?!?!?

I broke into my own house.

It’s a Friday. Things were pretty slow at work (when are they not?) so I headed home at 4. I was anticipating a delicious nap in air-conditioning while the dogs were roaming outside so they wouldn’t wake me up. I was feeling pretty good about my mad traffic navigation skills, too, as I was able to avoid practically all of the jams I saw on my way home (side roads are where it’s at).

I went through my usual routine of parking my car in the driveway, opening the garage door with the remote, and grabbing all of my crap to carry in. But when I reached the door to the laundry room, the knob didn’t turn. Thinking it was just stuck, I jiggled it a few more times. Nope, it was locked. That had happened to me one other time. Since it’s the kind of doorknob that you turn the notch to lock (see pic), sometimes the notch gets turned just a little bit every time you use it until bam, the door is locked.

No problem, I thought. I’ll just go through the front door. Well, unfortunately the recent re-addition of our screened door put the kaibosh on that. It was locked as well. No key for that door.

Hmmm…

While the dogs were whining and pawing at the door to get out, I called Travis and told him the predicament. He suggested I take the pins out of the hinges of the door.

Good idea!

I was able to get the pins out fairly easily but then the dilemma was, how do you pull a door off that is still locked? Those skills were beyond me. So I got out the cordless drill and removed my side of the doorknob. When I couldn’t figure out how to get the door unlocked even then, I remembered my friend Carrie’s story about a friend’s little boy locking himself and his playmates into her daughter’s room. Apparently, he only knew how to lock it but not unlock, so she also resorted to removing the doorknob. I remembered her saying that didn’t work, but I couldn’t remember what actually did work. (Maybe she coached them through how to unlock? Do you think that would work with my dogs?)

While I was standing there jiggling the knob, I could feel the cool breeze blowing from the laundry room into the hot, sticky garage. Taunting me.

Finally I gave up on that door. It was of no use. Maybe there’s a window open!

Indeed there was. And luckily, it was my bathroom window, which had yet to be replaced with the new kind with screens designed to only come out from inside. Instead, the screens were homemade (we think) and held in place by some plastic clips that you turn to remove (see pic).

Between a nail and a putty knife, I was able to turn the plastic clips enough to push the screen out and into the bathtub.

Then I got out the ladder. Carefully straddling it over one of our beautiful shrubs, I climbed up.

Now, as you can see, our windows are pretty high up and fairly small. Good thing I don’t weigh 200 lbs or I would’ve been cooking in the hot sun until Travis got home from happy hour.

So the question was, Should I go in head first or feet first?

I decided feet first would be the safest route so I lifted my left leg into the window and straddled the sill. I stared down at the hard, porcelain bathtub. Whatever you do, don’t get hurt.

I kicked off my flipflop so I could better grip the side ledge of the bathtub. Now, how to get my right leg inside too? I pushed aside the shower curtain and leaned down onto the toilet tank. Holding on to the window frame, I was able to wrestle my right leg in too.

Whew! I’m inside.

Time for a nap.

Sunshine and spring.

I love spring. Especially spring in Denver, where you don’t have to deal with mud and puddles as the snow is melting. (Although you do have to deal with wind, which is just as annoying.)

The view out the office window

I can’t help but be in a good mood when I wake up, go into the office with my cup of coffee, and see the shadows of the evergreen boughs dancing on the west wall in the early morning sunlight. That is a delightful sight.

I just love sunshine and light. When Travis and I watch TV at night, he always wants all of the lights off, with just the TV illuminating the room. I prefer to have all of the lights on. Light makes me feel cozy; darkness makes me lonely and cold.

Though I love our cute little house, I wish our office had a bigger, south-facing window. Right now, it has one small one that faces east. The sun only shines into the room until about 9:45 at this time of year. I absolutely love the office that the character Erica (Diane Keaton) has in Something’s Gotta Give:

Look at those windows! And the flowers on her desk. And the hydrangeas out the window with a view of the beach. Sigh. It would be so wonderful to work in that office everyday.

If I do end up making a career out of being a writer, I am going to move our office into our guest bedroom, which has two windows, one east-facing and one south-facing. It is sunny in there almost all day long. It’s a wonderful room. The only problem right now is that the windows are very old and leak cold air into the room, so it’s always freezing in there. But Travis is planning on replacing those this spring or summer… so maybe around that time?

On a happier note, the tulips I planted last fall are coming up!

I planted white, yellow and red tulips. Can't wait until they bloom!

So about that…

I’ve been struggling lately.

I didn’t get in the Word once while in Columbus (at a Christian conference no less!) I got in the Word Wednesday and today but out of sheer willpower. 

I encounter the cards with my memory verses on them every time I open my Bible. There they are, tucked neatly between the pages of Romans. I feel a twinge of guilt as I stuff them back between the pages at the end of my quiet time. I’m still writing verses on cards every Sunday. I’m just not memorizing them.  

Every time I go to the bathroom (excuse me if it’s TMI), I am reminded (and grossed out) about how dirty my bathroom floor is. Once I notice that, I start glancing around at the other surfaces and notice that indeed, they are all just filthy.

In this year’s election, I voted for Obama. But I am just now familiarizing myself with the changes he’s made and policies he’s created…oh and giant bags of money he’s handed out. And I majored in journalism. Yeah, I know, I would suck at being a journalist. Politics to me is like sports–I find it just interesting enough to care but not interesting enough to consistently pay attention.

[Side note: I am sooo glad that I am not the President right now--or really anyone that needs to make decisions about our nation's future. When I read about the financial situation of the global economy, I want to crawl into bed and pretend that the problem will just disappear on its own. I bet you're glad I'm not the President too.]

My vacation to Mexico is a week from this Sunday and I haven’t felt more bloated and flabby than I do right now in a long while. Eating chinese for dinner tonight didn’t help. I honestly tried Intuitive Eating from when I wrote my last post about this until yesterday…when I broke down and logged my calories on Livestrong. “Just until after Mexico…” I tell myself. Uh huh, right, just keep telling yourself that.

I volunteered to translate articles from English to Spanish with Gospel Translations and while I’ve had the article sitting in my inbox since February 16th, I just started working on it Wednesday night…And I only translated 3 paragraphs.

Well, this blog post wasn’t meant to turn into a Woe Is Me lament. I’m just being honest–this is where I am right now. I am a messy, ambitious but lazy, paradoxical, confusing sort of person.

Some people have willpower of steel. They have to force themselves to take it easy (and even then, they don’t really take it easy). 

Some people are always laidback and chillaxing. They have to force themselves to do at least one productive thing during the day so they can say it wasn’t a total waste.

I am a pendulum that swings back and forth between the two. Sometimes it takes me a month to swing from maniacal to couch potato. Sometimes it only takes a day. You could say I’m slightly bipolar. Or you could say that I’m just your average woman. Both would be accurate.

Pathetic little cold.

I think I’m getting sick. On Tuesday night, I started to get a sore throat. Yesterday my nose started to stuff up just slightly. Today was pretty much par until tonight when I got a headache and feel exhausted. I’m thinking that maybe aerobics tomorrow morning is out of the question (Fridays are tough so I have to be on top of my game to survive!)

I told my women’s group tonight that I’ve been asking God to either make me better or make me sick enough that I can justify staying home from work. Then I could watch House all day long.

Glorious.

But then I realize I would only enjoy it for about 2 hours before wishing I was just better already. I am too active a person to lay on the couch all day long. Even back in July when we were just moving into our house and I went to the ER from work because I was having trouble breathing and my chest had stabbing pains (turned out I suffer from acid reflux!), I still helped paint the walls and trim and move our stuff the next day (never mind the fact that I couldn’t sleep at night because it hurt to lay down and I couldn’t bend over because it caused stabbing pains.) I’m tough.

But when it comes to work, let’s just be honest. Everyone needs a good sick day now and again. I mean, no one wishes for any serious illness of course. But a wimpy, day-long cold every now and then? Bring it on.

Then there’s the kind of cold I have–enough to wear me out but not enough to knock me out. In short, just annoying. Boo.

Ok, well I’m going to go to bed now in case I do feel well enough to go to aerobics. And if I don’t, I really hope I don’t feel well enough to go to work either. Hey, it’s Friday. Can’t I dream a little?

An anomalous day

Today is strange. I don’t have anything that I have to do…and yet, I feel like I shouldn’t just spend my time lying on the couch watching TV. It’s a weird feeling really. This doesn’t usually happen to me… usually I have lots of stuff to do or I don’t want to do anything but lie on the couch and watch TV.

So far, since coming home from church, I have cleaned out the coffeemaker with vinegar (something that was LONG overdue!), watched our wedding video (for old time’s sake), painted the wooden box I’m going to hang in the bathroom when Trav gets home, and folded the laundry. I have a canvas that I want to paint our wedding vows on but I feel like I should have a stencil instead of just doing it free hand. I could work on my memoir but I just really don’t feel like it. I think I will read…and possibly take a nap

Meanwhile, here are the pictures of our wonderful new patio furniture–that we have yet to use since it’s cold here already! We also have an orange umbrella that goes with it but we haven’t taken that out of the box yet…

We chose the lowest maintenance furniture we could find.

But the chairs are actually really comfy!

The chairs rock--literally

The lone tree in our backyard is finally turning yellow!

That’s it for now. I’m off to read The Gospel and Personal Evangelism by Mark Dever.

Funk Free

The funk I was in a couple weeks ago is gone!!

I have been going to aerobics classes at our neighborhood Rec Center. The 2 classes that I’ve gone to so far have both been some version of step aerobics. The first one was 5:30-6:30 in the morning. It’s hard to get up for a class that early but I did–once. It was a good class–it was mostly 30 and 40-year-olds. I was by far the youngest one there. It was a little challenging (mostly to figure out what the instructor was doing!) and the ab workout was killer.

The other class I went to was from 5:30-6:25 PM and it was a younger crowd. There were probably 3-4 other women my age, others in their 30s and 40s, and 1-2 looked like they were even older than that. The instructor wasn’t a skinny minnie–she had a little extra weight on her. But man, did she have endurance. It was an entire hour of high-intensity aerobics. I kept up for the first 30 minutes but after that, I was seriously contemplating just getting up and leaving. But it was a good workout and I know that it will get easier the more I do it.

So I’m interested to see what the class is like tomorrow…hard or moderate? I’m sure it won’t be easy but I hope that I can at least keep up with these old folks! These aerobics classes are kind of like hiking–I think that I’m in pretty good shape until I go hiking or to one of these classes. Then I’m like “Man! I really need to work out more!”

On a completely different note, Travis and I went out to eat tonight and then to the Avs preseason game against the Chicago Blackhawks. I’m pretty sure the Avs lost (we left early). And now, I’m going to go watch Season 2 Disc 1 of House!!! We got through one whole season!! (But sad day, I missed the new House episode this past Tuesday. I’m hoping that NBC still posts past episodes on their website so that I can catch up before the next one).

Update 10.4.08: I went to the Cardio Kickbox class this morning and it was SO fun! It was challenging but I kept up with most of it (there was one point where I was so out of breath that I had to stop moving but other than that, I kept up). We got out the clappers and pounded them with jabs, hooks, uppercuts, and kicks. I had never done that before and it was really fun! I will definitely go back.

I rule.

All of my recent posts have been self-loathing and bemoaning my laziness. But this one will champion my productivity and ambition! A good change of pace if you ask me…

What did I do today exactly? you may be asking. Well, let me tell you.

1. Read my Bible and Day 31 of The Purpose-Driven Life

2. Went to church

3. Went to Walmart and bought toiletries, a plant, a pot, and some soil

4. Went back to church for a children’s ministry meeting

5. Potted new plant and repotted old plant

6. Emailed 3 of my old friends to see what they’re up to

7. Went shopping for hiking pants and scored a $9 North Face t-shirt as well as awesome-fitting ski pants AND hiking pants (I have such a hard time finding pants that fit, that whenever I do find pants that fit, I pretty much buy them regardless of cost. The hiking pants are The North Face and were $50. The ski pants are Columbia and were $65 on sale. Was it my shopping day or what? See pics of my finds below).

8. Called 3 girls from care group to catch up

9. Made 3 cards–a baby shower one, a sympathy one, and a so-sad-you’re-leaving one

10. Went to Home Depot to buy Travis a part he needed for his DIY plumbing job (more about that below)

11. Did laundry

12. Cooked dinner and did the dishes

13. Researched identity theft and submitting a fraud report to the Social Security office (one John Glenn has his name under my SSN! He hasn’t yet spent the millions of dollars I don’t have but I don’t want some guy’s name under my SSN!!)

14. And now I’m blogging!!

It has been a very productive day, I must say. And I love this feeling!! I don’t think I’m quite out of my funk (especially the eating junk food and exercising part) but at least I wasn’t a bum today!

So here are the pics of my way-awesome purchases today:

My sweet-o snow pants and new t-shirt

My ski pants from the front

Close-up of my $9 t-shirt score--LOVE IT!

My hiking pants from the front

From the back

My butt--to show how good they fit!

They're amazing!!

Travis was very productive today too, except he has only been working on one stinkin’ project since we got home from that church meeting–installing a pressure-reducing valve on our main water line. The water pressure in our house is something like 130 psi–twice what it’s supposed to be!! So in consideration of our pipes and water fixtures, we’re putting a valve on the water line to reduce the pressure. He’s also putting a water shut-off valve in our coat closet so that we don’t have to go all the way into the crawl space to shut the water off in an emergency. Travis had some defeats at first with the soldering but he’s gotten a long way–as I type, the water is shut off so that he can connect the PRV with the main water line. My fingers are crossed for him!

Our coat closet currently

Travis is down there in the crawl space!

In a funk

For the past couple of weeks, I’ve been in a funk. I just feel icky–not like I’m getting sick but I am just exhausted and lethargic a lot. When we first moved into our house, I feel like I didn’t take any rest–I was just go, go, go because there were so many things I wanted/had to do. But now, man, I get home, lie down on the couch, and I’m out.

Like Sunday, after church we helped some friends move some paving stones to their house. When we got home, I ate some cheesy bread and then proceeded to take a 2-hour nap. It was one of those naps when you wake up from time to time, half of your brain telling you to get off the couch and do something productive, while the other half of your brain is dead to the world. The feeling of your body being one with the couch, like you couldn’t even move off the couch if you wanted to. That’s how the nap felt. Then, when you do get up an absurd number of hours later, you feel groggy and lazy for the rest of the day.

Today, I left work a little early because I’ve been working some overtime out of necessity (things are C-R-A-Z-Y at work right now) and trying to make it up, since I don’t get paid for it (oh, the luxuries of working for a non-profit). I came home and read the new Newsweek for about half an hour, at which point I started to nod off. I had been planning on reading a little and then going on a run before Travis got home. But obviously, my love for naps defeated my current apathy of running. I slept for a good hour and a half. While I absolutely love the feeling of a nap, I hate the ensuing feeling of being a bum and having nothing productive to show for a good chunk of my day.

That is one of many reasons why I feel like I’ve been in a funk. I know that I’m not getting enough sleep at night. I should really be in bed by 8:30, falling asleep at 9:00, so that I can wake up at 5:30 with a good 8.5 hours of sleep (the amount I really need). But I find myself getting in bed around 10:00, 10:30. Way too late!

Another reason is that I’ve been watching House like it’s my job. It was the season premiere tonight. I thought it would be on at 6:00 here because it was 8/7c. But I guess not…because it came on at 7:00 here too. Travis made a good point about 7:00 being prime time. We also have Season 1 Disc 3 right now…only 13 more to go until we’re all caught up!

Yet another reason is that I haven’t wanted to run lately. It has felt like pulling teeth. I feel like I should still want to run, like not running would be wrong. But I don’t entertain the thought of running in the morning at all and I have a hard time motivating myself to run after work. I have found, though, that the prospect of going to the gym and doing the elliptical or aerobics classes is appealing. So I am going to join the Wheat Ridge Rec Center. It’s cheaper than the Y and a decent gym. The Y is nicer but it is $24 more a month. Bush League!

So needless to say, my exercise schedule hasn’t been followed to a tee. I have been doing Pilates/Yoga about 3 times a week so I’m not a complete bum, but the cardio has definitely been lacking. After such long, stressful days at work, I’d rather curl up with a bowl of ice cream and watch some TV, rather than go pound the pavement–which is, needless to say, what I have been doing.

Which leads to yet another reason why I’m in a funk–my eating habits since we’ve moved to our new house have been horrible. I was doing really well for a while but I tend to get pretty lax when I feel good–it’s counter-intuitive I know but somehow when I feel good because I’ve been exercising and eating right, I then feel like I can eat 4 slices of pizza and a bowl of chocolate chip cookie dough and skip that day (or 3) of running and not gain weight–like I’m immune to the calories now or something. But the worst part about is that once I start eating poorly, it’s so hard to get back to eating right–so as you can guess, I haven’t. I haven’t gained much weight (maybe 1 or 2 pounds but I prefer to think that the scale is just wrong every morning for weeks in a row), which is a good thing. I just feel like a fat blob.

And the hardest part about it is that I know what makes me feel that way–eating ice cream everyday on top of little candy bars at work and light frapps from Starbucks. I have tried numerous times over the past several months to stop eating so many sweets. Most of the time, I don’t even make it a day before caving.

This is what I wrote about me and sweets a few months ago:

“There’s only so long that you can sit in front of chocolate, hearing it call your name and resist. Willpower has a time limit. I’m a ticking timebomb in front of sweets. As soon as the timer gets to zero (willpower), I explode and devour everything in sight.”

But tonight at the gym, I decided that I’m sick of feeling gross and flubbery. I am going to cut out sweets–except for Sundays. (I may be ambitious but I am still realistic!) No chocolate (ouch), no candy (oooo), no ice cream (uuuuhhhh). It’s gonna hurt but it will be worth it!!

So here’s to no sweets. I did it for Lent; I can do it again. And I am going to do this until at least Sept 30th–21 days from now because that is how long experts say it takes to form a habit. Hopefully I can kick my chocolate-tootsie roll-ice cream-gooey goodness addiction for at least that long. Wish me luck!

I love House

No, I’m not trying to impersonate Steve Carrell in Anchorman–I’m talking about the show House. It is by far my favorite TV show of all time, hands down. I don’t know why I like it so much but I do. I just love it–the intrigue, the wit, the mystery, the bluntness.

And just my luck, I discovered the other day while updating our Netflix queue that we can get all 4 seasons of House on DVD. I am beyond excited. But only 4 episodes come on each disc so each season is 4 whole discs. We only get one DVD at a time and watch about one DVD per week on average–so that is 16 weeks of House. Travis thinks that I’m going to get sick of it, but we’re 2 DVDs in and I can’t wait to get the next.

Season 5 starts this coming Tuesday at 6 PM Mountain Time and I am SO there…because at our house, we finally get a few good channels with the bunny ears! Like FOX, abc, and NBC. Woohoo!! As much as I am anti-TV (I think that it makes you waste a lot of time), this is one show that I can justify watching. House, here I come. 

Tuesdays are my new favorite days.