A Mantle and Two Walls

Today I went to Hobby Lobby.  I love that store.  My bank account, however, does not.  Today though, I was happy AND my bank account was happy!  How you ask.  80% off sale.  Oh yeah!  The Valentine's Day stuff was practically being given away so I got stuff to make a mantle.  Isn't it cute!

 Okay, now close ups:

 I love this little guy.  I've decided that I have a thing for owls.  Remember my my Halloween mantle.  It had an owl too.  I even picked out a precious poster with lots of owls.  Anyway, this owl, at 80% off was $1.40!  I mean, look at him, he needed to come with me.  He also begged for a name, so I am calling him Charles-Winston.  He looks like a Charles-Winston, don't you think?

I saw this print (and the other cake pop one) at HL months ago and thought they were so cute, but I had no idea what I would do with them.  Nothing in my house is pink and it is really girly, VDay can be girly though.  Plus, sale!  You gotta have it then!

On another decorating note, I am angry at two walls.  That's normal right, to be angry at large stationary objects?  I have one wall in my kitchen and the other side of the same wall that is in the living room.  They desperately need "something", but I am having a hard time finding what that "thing" is.  I have these posters (below) on the wall now and they looked great against the old red walls, but they just blend right into the paint.  I have several old school movie posters that I could hang. I already have two framed, but I don't know, I cant decide if they will look right.  I think I would get different frames and paint them that shade of blue green that I love so much.  The other wall is sooooo long.  It just stretches all the way down the hallway and there is nothing there.  I want something with color because our house is very neutral, but I want something with personality.  That is the perfect wall for a landscape, but it just seems very generic.  I want something a little more personal, something that reflects my style more.  Thoughts?  Offer to come and just make it more decorated?  Anyone, anyone, no?  Sad.

I feel like I should talk about other pieces of my house and show random pictures ala:  couch, tv stand, spinny chair, but the post is long so I'll spare you!

Already a Fun Weekend

It has already been a good weekend and it isn't even over!  I have to show you guys the neat stuff I got this weekend.

First off, I found a Bed Bath and Beyond gift card at the bottom of my junk drawer.  Super exciting, but yet another reason I hate having a junk drawer-things get lost.  I went to BB&B after my RE appointment on Friday and got this pretty deviled egg plate and tea infuser for a grand, out of pocket, total of $0.16.  Yeah, totally worth it.  I am wanting to host Passover this year and I am going to use that egg plate as a Seder plate.  As Tim Gunn says, "Make it work".

Then I made German Red Cabbage.  It was Delicious!  I used this recipe which was oh so simple.  I love when food is pretty and you have to admit that this is going to look gorgeous on a plate.  Also, did you know the German word for cabbage is kohl?  So is Kohl's the store named after cabbage?  Maybe it's a person's last name, but really Cabbage as a last name is not a great one.  Beats Zit, the last name of someone my friend was telling me about.  These are things my mind dwells on.

Today I went to Knoxville to hang out with my wonderful friend, Bev.  We had more pretty food.  Don't you love sushi?  I do.  This was particularly pretty sushi.  Those smelt eggs on top just make it.  The whole time I was eating though I was mentally singing "the smelt and the sprat, they know where it's at..." from the song Under the Sea from Little Mermaid.  Again, these are the things going on in my mind.  Also had edamame which I think I could eat once a day, every day for the rest of my life.

Then we shopped til we nearly dropped.  I found this cute dress at JCPenney's for $10!  I love a sale!  I was wanting to wear it for Easter, but Josh says it is too revealing?  Please weigh because I didn't think so, but now I'm unsure.  I certainly don't want to look trashy.  I mean there is zero cleavage and it comes almost to my knees.  I don't know.  Thoughts?  

Then Bev and I went to Hobby Lobby which is pretty much our favorite store.  We both got stuff to make spring wreaths.  I can't wait to start on mine!  My door is wreathless and it looks so forlorn and bedraggled   Okay, maybe I'm anthromorphizing, but if that door had emotions, that's what it would be feeling!

I also had Starbucks so I am BUZZING.  Off to work on my wreath, and clean my whole house, and read, and watch tv, and ....

Have a marvelous Sunday.

The Reason for the Season

 You know how at Christmas everyone wears buttons to remind you to remember the true reason for Christmas?  This is just a little perspective on the holiday.

This could be seen as just to the bad side of irreverent  but I prefer to think of it as more cynical and sarcastic.

Let us remember the true reason for the day:  the death of a priest.  The following are depictions of Valentine's death.  Feel free to use these anti-Valentine's Day cards :)

P.S.  See here for my rant on Valentine's Day last year.

An Update on Something You May Know Nothing About

Some people know what's been going on and others don't, so for those people it isn't so much an update as a date, without wine or soft lighting.  I don't have high expectations for a second date.  No, I suppose it's really more of a news flash for them.

Josh and I have been trying to get pregnant for 17 months.  Yeah, 17...it's been a long time.  Granted, I know it has not been Nearly as long as other people have tried, but I'm pretty tired of it. After 13 months we finally went to the doctor and were officially diagnosed as the big I word (infertile).  Gosh I hate the sound of it.  It sounds better than barren though.  Barren just makes me think of Sarai in the desert.

My ob/gyn found a cyst and referred us to a specialist.  The specialist did more blood tests (seriously, at this point a stranger on the street could walk up and ask for blood and I'd just give him a vein no questions asked) and did yet another ultrasound, this one with many interns present.  I now have no dignity or modesty left.  All that found out that I have endometriosis.  It's not advanced as best the specialist can tell, but that does appear to be the sole reason we aren't getting pregnant.  We are still waiting for some more blood results, but those are expected to be negative.  The doctor is suggesting surgery, which I will do as soon as possible.

This sounds bad, but it's actually super good news!  I've been excited all afternoon since I talked to him.  After getting the endometriosis taken care of 70-80% of women get pregnant within the next six months!  That is amazing.  I was doing my best to hold on to hope, but after that many months of being disappointed, it was pretty hard.  Now I feel like I at least have a decent chance again.

I have hated struggling and failing to get pregnant each month.  It seems like every single woman around me has had a kid since we've been trying.  BUT, there have been good things that came out of this.  If we had gotten pregnant right off, Josh would have had a hard time leaving a stable job to go back to school.  I've learned a lot about myself and how I deal with issues (not always great, just ask Josh).  And I feel like I finally came to a point where I was going to be okay with not having kids biologically as long as I felt like that was God's plan.  I think sometime I will blog about the top five things I learned, but Josh needs the computer back to do homework.  So that's where we stand, surgery soon-ish, hopefully a pregnancy by the end of the year (squeal!).  I'll let you know when they go to cut me open, not really it's laparoscopic, so you can be praying please.  If I ever get pregnant there will be lots of cyber jumping up and down, get your knees and back ready for that cause it's gonna happen!

First Chiropractor Visit

Today I went to the chiropractor for the first time.  Oh my goodness.  It was glorious.  First the doctor felt my neck and was amazed at all the tension and general badness there.  That doesn't seem like a good thing, but I felt like my pain and discomfort was vindicated by him repeatedly saying "Oh wow, that's really bad."  Then he hooked me up to one of the electroshock thingies like my old physical therapist had.  One of those patches got exactly on a nerve though and it made my shoulder have these repetitive and painful shrugs.  It's a little funny to watch.  Sorry about the triple chins.

Finally, we were just chatting and he was rotating my neck and all of a sudden he broke it off!  Okay, not literally, but it popped about seven times and I thought he broke it off.  Then after the wave of nausea passed I had no headache.  Alleluia, Alleluia, A-ley-luia!  I had had that headache all week and CRACK-gone.  Basically I now have very deep and special feelings for this man because I am terribly fond of anyone who helps me!  Maybe Monday he will break me some more and keep the headaches at bay!