I Am Resolved

I know tomorrow is New Year's Eve and I should wait til then to post this, but...I'm forgetful.  I can't help it.  I'm making my New Year's Resolutions.  I was going to the traditional "I'm going to lose fifty hundred pounds" but I know myself well enough to know that is not happening, so why set yourself up for failure?  Embrace the butter!  (After the butter, you will be more softy and embraceable).  Here are mine:

1.  Have/Find some sort of Bible Study for Josh and me.  We go to church and we each have a devotional but that isn't really study, ya know?  We need more.  Something more in depth.

2.  Be more confident.  I find myself saying "if I were really brave I'd...dye my hair, wear red lipstick, tell him what I think, etc."  I'm not talking about doing major things like jumping out/off of tall things or anything crazy, but you only live once so why not wear red lipstick?  Can I get an amen?

3.  Prepare for the week better over the weekend.  I'd like to have my menu written out.  I did that really well when I first got married, but over the summer it got tossed aside.  I think it will make the week smoother and more organized.  Who doesn't love organization?

So what are you resolutions?  Anything really good that I should steal incorporate into my list?

Happy New Year my lovely readers!

Toilet Friends

I had my wisdom teeth out on Monday.  Oh heavens.  It has been Rough with a capital R.  I have zero recollection of be druggy.  The only thing I remember is talking to the surgeon and then waking up in bed.  I'm hoping the surgeon had no part in me being in bed ;)  I did not realize the human body could swell as much as my cheeks swelled.  Seriously, my lips were almost entirely lost in the massiveness of my jowls.  Josh looked at me and said "Oh look!  This is what you'd look like if you were fat!"  He did Not win brownie points for that!  In payment he got a 24 hour virus.  We laid in the bathroom floor and were both pretty sure we were going to die.  It was unpleasant.  My cheeks are still big.  I'm still recovering.  Oh well.

So what I really wanted to talk about today was not my teeth cause that is about all I've talked about this week, let's talk about friends.  I have a very dear friend who offered to make us soup and come help and to clean my toilets.  Isn't that really the mark of a true friend?  Think through your list of Facebook friends.  Who are you toilet friends?  Those friends who you know so well that you will get all up in their business and it doesn't bother you or them at all.  You have friends you make casseroles for or pick up dry cleaning for and then you have friends that taste things after you said "eww...taste this, does this taste funny?"  Two totally different tiers of friends, not that you don't love the first, but you don't share those intimate details of your life with just anyone.

This is totally my friend and I.  We all have them.  Go write to your friend and tell them how blessed you are to have them in your life!

Hmm, somehow this post isn't the direction I had planned.  Sad face.  Let's blame it on me being sick.

P.S.  I wrote a blog post a couple days ago and it was a poem Dad wrote for Josh.  For some reason it wouldn't link but you Need to go read it, too too funny!

A Poem for Josh...

So my Dad and my aunt started giving each other gag gifts a few years ago.  Over the years they have exchanged pig ears, deer dung, light up bras, and an electric nose picker.  This year, because he is still "new" to the family, Josh was the recipient of the gag gift.  My Dad has many talents and even writing is among them.  Here is the poem he wrote to Josh.

Here's a little diddy bout Josh and Sierra
Cruising about in hurricane weather.

Travel and romance on the high seas
Tell me now children what did you see?

How blue's the water out on the deep?
Where did you walk, how did you sleep?

Tell me abou the moonlight, the sunsets,
the seas, the islands, the romance, did
you smell the salty breeze?
How crystal is the water, how shining
is the sand?  Did you swim in new
oceans, did you walk upon new land?


Regale me son, whatever did you see?


What's that...a terry cloth menagerie?
A tsunami of towel origami
A hog, then a dog, then a fabric folded frog


What, wait...is this unfolding in the sand?
Shush keep you eye on the folding man.
Will it have wings to fly?
Cottonelle featers and terry cloth eyes.


Sie, hold the romance, save up the smooch
Is that a monkey or a pooch?
Hold on babe save the pucker
I'm thinking that's a yellow billed sapsucker.


A fowl or a fish, a flower or a dish
see the bend and the twists
take notes, now wath this
the to's and the fros...and elephant who knows


Have trunk will travel,
as the towel turns
busy us a book
so the folding we can learn.


Well now my son you've gained your wish,
Read this book quick and fold me a fish.

And then Josh got a towel origami book.

Seriously though, my Dad wrote this in AN HOUR!  Props to him! 

If you missed it in an earlier post about my honeymoon or you didn't seen the facebook album, Josh and I Loved the towel folding stuff.  Josh was too manly and cool to do the demonstration in the ship lobby but he was all about folding the animal when we got back to the room.

Josh said it was the nicest poem any man had ever written him lol!

I hope you had a Merry Christmas!

Look At the Fruits of My Labor

Well, nothing about this really counts as fruit.  There is literally half a tub of butter in all this.  My arteries starting waving a white flag at like 3:00.  It all tastes pretty good, some of it doesn't look so hot, but that is small potatoes compared to taste.  There is party mix, chocolate fudge, chocolate dipped pretzels, Oreo balls, a cheese plate, and cranberry and white chocolate cookies.  I also made crab dip but I took it down to Mom's house.  I am cooked out!  The really funny thing is that this is only Part of the stuff that I am serving on Sunday to my in-laws.  That in and of itself isn't that funny, but what makes it chuckle worthy is how little the six total people that are coming eat.  Yeah, it got a little out of hand.  I am also having chips and dip, pizza rolls, meatballs, and chocolate chip cookies that I haven't fixed yet.  And punch.  And Tums.  Lots of Tums.

That's what I did this afternoon!  How was your day?

It's Beginning to Look A Lot Like..Spring?

We're Soapboxin' today!  You ready? 

I went to Food City yesterday and I was looking for chocolate oranges (no luck, where do you get them?).  There I was wondering the aisles when what should assail my eyes?  Valentine's Day Debbie Cakes.  VALENTINE'S DAY.  Pause while I check the calendar...yep, sure enough, it is still Decemeber.  Something like six weeks between now and the dreaded V-Day (my hatred of Valentine's is another whole post, it's a fun one).  It isn't Christmas yet!  I mean come on!  Could they not have left the Christmas Debbie Cakes for a few more days, til, you know, the holiday was Over!!?!  Now don't get me wrong I love me some heart shaped cakes, they taste better, but I think that is a mental thing.  Still!  Craziness all around.

And it was all around.  This afternoon I went to Hobby Lobby and what did I see?  SPRING decorations.  When I went to Hobby Lobby before there were aisles and aisles of Christmas decorations.  It was a Christmasaplooza in there.  Tinsels were coming out of body cavities that tinsel should never come out of...and don't even talk about those pointy little ornaments.  Today, everything was 50% off (which I loved, I plan to go back and rack up) but they were setting out tulip decorations and things that said SPRING in large pastel colors.  Today is the winter solstice.  It isn't spring.  In any definition it is not spring.  I know they want to get a jump on things, but geez louise they have a little time!

Blatant and excessive consumerism is already overrunning the holiday but now it is even restocking shelves with fresh junk seasonal decorations before the season has even passed.  Siiiigh.  I was appalled and had to share.  Now I have.  I know your day is better for it :)

Much Moreness

Do you remember this family?  This whole season is supposed to be about celebrating Jesus's birthday and yet He seems very absent from the celebration.  I've mentioned this to a couple of people.  Some say that it is because it is the first time I am doing my own thing for Christmas and so buying presents and planning a menu and decorating and trying to catch up work have obscured the reason for the season.  I'm sure that's partly true, but does it seem to be even More this year?  More non-stop music about what Santa should bring them, More hectic and spastic people at the grocery stores, More presents, just More.  Honestly, I don't feel like I've really stopped and celebrated The Birth yet.  Yeah, I've been to church every Sunday this month, but I'm used to have a more pervasive sense of wonder at the virgin birth and more focus on why it is I have a four day weekend...I mean why we set out cookies...I mean, do you see the Moreness I refer to?

Let's take a moment.  Mute the tv.  Turn down the radio.  Just sit and think about why we have Christmas.  Think about the peace that the angels spoke of and the glory.  Just rest in the beauty of the season and forget that you need to thaw the ham on Thursday and that you need a gift for Aunt Suzie and all that.

Ah.  Feel better?  I kind of do.  I hope you enjoy this season.  Don't let it get too hectic.  Remember, not even the shepherds brought a covered dish, and they knelt at the feet of God.

Filth All Around

I cannot get in a cooking/cleaning routine.  I hear what you are saying “geez Sierra, you’ve been married nearly a year how are you possibly not in a routine by now, you lazy slug?”.  I’m just not, here is why:

Feb.-still all googly eyed over being married and trying to remember where I live since I lived in three places in three consecutive months

Mar. & Apr.-Josh was working weird schedules.  Sometimes he would be home at 5ish, sometimes not til 10ish, sometimes at 3ish.

May & Jun.- Josh started working 12 hour swing shifts (fun times).  That was nearly impossible to schedule dinner around.

Jul & Aug-I took a class and wasn’t getting home til almost 10 some nights but I’d be home at 3 other days.  And we got a relator and started looking at houses in earnest.

Aug. & Sept.-Josh moved to a regular schedule but we looked at houses almost every evening and I had physical therapy three times a week.

Oct.-We moved, got settled in, went on a honeymoon.

So now here we are and I still don't have a routine.  Here's the thing with cooking.  Josh wants to eat pretty much as soon as we walk in the door.  I have Maybe 45 minutes to get supper on or he's going to have soup.  That includes prep time, so 45 mins total.  I come home at lunch sometimes and get stuff ready but a lot times that is just dog gone hard!  I know he's hungry, but I don't want him to subsist on soup.  I do use the crockpot and that most definitely helps but I can pretty much only do it with a liquid (ie, soup) because without a lot of liquid the crockpot and I disagree on what is "done" versus what is "burnt to a charred crisp".  Maybe cooking ahead would be the thing to do?  Does anyone do that?  Like make up all the meals we want to have for the week on Saturday and then just slide them in the oven?

Then there is the cleaning.  Saturday is the cleaning day, but I just don't feel like it is quite enough.  Basically I feel like we are wallowing in the filth of our day to day lives the rest of the week, though I hope it isn't quite that bad.  Last night I dropped my sock down the vent and when I went to retrieve it, I noticed how gross and fuzzy/linty everything felt.  Then I had a coronary because I touched a dead squirrel.  Except it wasn't a squirrel, it was my sock; that's when I remembered why I was in the duct work up to my shoulder blades.  Saturday cleaning is great for the weekly stuff, but I need time to wash the walls, and vacuum the vents, and organize the pantry, and, and, and.  You see what I'm saying?

I don't really know what the answer is.  When I come home I am so tired.  By the time I get supper on and the mess put away, I just want to sit down and rest.  And it isn't that Josh doesn't help, he does the dishes and takes out the trash.  I have found out that if I leave on my shoes then I am more motivated to continue cleaning.  So this whole post had a point (are you surprised?).  What are your cleaning strategies?  Especially you women (or men) who work.  What motivates you to keep trucking after hours at the office?  Honestly, right now I am considering a chore chart because apparently I am five years old old.  I think maybe the visual aspect of having what needs to be done right on the wall or fridge would be helpful.  If you are a lurker, this is the time to jump right into discussion.  I need to hear options and personal stories so I kind find something that will work.  Please and thank you for the help!