That silly beagle did her trick (jumping over her old crate) and graduated! I'm so proud!
Tuesday, February 03, 2009
Weekend recap
So I'm not going to lie. I wasn't looking forward to last weekend. But it ended up being SO MUCH more fun and productive and relaxing than I thought it would be!
Friday we left work just a bit early and I thought I would use that time to wash one of the cars and take a nap before Chad got into town and we went for drinks. I took Milly out for a walk, and cleaned out the Corolla. I tossed Milly into the Corolla for the short ride up the street to the car wash place.... they told me it would only take 20 minutes so I thought... I'll just take Milly home and feed her and then head back and pick up the car. But when I got home with the dog, I realized that I had left my condo keys with the car wash guys and the Corolla. DOH! At that point, I knew the nap wasn't going to happen so I let myself into the garage with the opener remote and then took the Rav over for a car wash. Man, that really confused them. They were like "Wait, what car did you have? The corolla? But that isn't an SUV?" All the while I'm explaining that I have two cars, and would like them BOTH washed I'm trying to make Milly maintain her sitting, which is like trying to tame a wild hog, especially in a new place that sells all kinds of snack foods, with bags of peanuts at snout-level. Oy, the dog, she needs some major work in the obedience area. (as a random aside, our trainer told us that dogs learn contextually, so they learn to sit in place A and place B and once they've learned it in ALOT of places only THEN do they have it down. This makes sense because Milly is OK at Sit at home and at the trainer's place but sucks at it outside or anywhere else. So yeah, it needs to get warm outside so we can practice outside in lots of places!)
I got just a few minutes to close my eyes before needing to go pick up Mike at the train and letting Chad in. Then we all headed off to Durkin's for a lovely evening of $15 all-you-can-drink-and-eat beer and Domino's Pizza. The place is a little collegiate but holy crap what a deal. I think the only way we'll ever stop going there is if they stop offering that deal; I'm more fiscally responsible now than when I was 23! Usually we are definitely the oldest people there, but this time it didn't seem that way. Maybe the recession is forcing people to go to cheaper happy hours? Regardless it was super fun and I was home between 10:30-11 which was awesome. I would so rather not be out super late anymore, I am getting old!
Saturday I had to go to the grocery to get hoagie rolls and a few things I accidentally forgot for the meatballs. Once there I realized that Jewel was having a massive sale on meat. This made my day and I totally stocked up. At first I was going to pass it up but was like "No! Can't! Chicken only $1.50 a pound!" It was awesome. Plus it was the morning so Club Jewel was busy, but not as ridiculous as it normally is, especially on superbowl weekend.
I then spent the rest of the day making meatballs & queso and getting ready for the next day (we hosted a few people for a superbowl party). That night we hit up Fogo de Chao for dinner... YUM. I love that place. Meghan introduced me to this Green Goddess salad dressing that I would have never tried, ever, if she hadn't said how good it was. And I ate my weight in parmesan scraped straight from the inside of a massive wheel of parmegiano reggiano (sp?). I want my own wheel of parm. Would that be too much? I can see it now: Hey, wine and cheese party at my place, just knock off your own piece of parm! haha....
Sunday the guys played football out at Diversey fields and Meghan and I took Milly to watch. Milly was having a grand old time digging big holes in the snow (I can just hear the doggy thoughts "Every hole I dig has GRASS in the bottom! SWEET!") and watching the boys play. I just felt bad b.c I couldn't let her run free.... the field was only divided from Lakeshore Drive by one of those metal guardrails and not an actual fence. I couldn't be sure she wouldn't bolt for the highway, so had to keep her on the flexi-leash. Poor pup!
A little bit later, everyone came over to watch the SuperBowl at our place. We got a new keg in the kegerator and I had the meatballs and queso, and had also made peanut butter blossom cookies (my specialty). Writt and his girlfriend Kelly brought this AWESOME cheesy artichoke dip and this really good guacamole with tortilla chips. Carl and his girlfriend Emily brought tiny bite-size calzone-like meat pocket things that were great. Rogus and Lindsay brought some chips, french onion dip (I could eat that stuff until I am sick), tater tots and waffle fries. Amy brought this awesome garlic-y cilantro shrimp.... other people brought various chips, dips, and cookies. So basically we had a metric ton of junk food. It was soooo good and I think I grazed almost all night. The game was somewhat interesting, the commercials were good and it was a generally calm and fun party. It was fun to have everyone over and I enjoyed it!
So anyways, lots of stuff going on and that is our weekend. I have pictures of NONE of it because my point and shoot camera got broken on new year's eve.... so I finally caved and bought a new one last night. I can't stand not having any pictures of anything. And I'd like to start taking and posting more pictures on the blog. I don't know if I'll go back to project 365 (take and post a picture a day) or if I'll just try to post pics from 3-4 things a week. We shall see!
Friday we left work just a bit early and I thought I would use that time to wash one of the cars and take a nap before Chad got into town and we went for drinks. I took Milly out for a walk, and cleaned out the Corolla. I tossed Milly into the Corolla for the short ride up the street to the car wash place.... they told me it would only take 20 minutes so I thought... I'll just take Milly home and feed her and then head back and pick up the car. But when I got home with the dog, I realized that I had left my condo keys with the car wash guys and the Corolla. DOH! At that point, I knew the nap wasn't going to happen so I let myself into the garage with the opener remote and then took the Rav over for a car wash. Man, that really confused them. They were like "Wait, what car did you have? The corolla? But that isn't an SUV?" All the while I'm explaining that I have two cars, and would like them BOTH washed I'm trying to make Milly maintain her sitting, which is like trying to tame a wild hog, especially in a new place that sells all kinds of snack foods, with bags of peanuts at snout-level. Oy, the dog, she needs some major work in the obedience area. (as a random aside, our trainer told us that dogs learn contextually, so they learn to sit in place A and place B and once they've learned it in ALOT of places only THEN do they have it down. This makes sense because Milly is OK at Sit at home and at the trainer's place but sucks at it outside or anywhere else. So yeah, it needs to get warm outside so we can practice outside in lots of places!)
I got just a few minutes to close my eyes before needing to go pick up Mike at the train and letting Chad in. Then we all headed off to Durkin's for a lovely evening of $15 all-you-can-drink-and-eat beer and Domino's Pizza. The place is a little collegiate but holy crap what a deal. I think the only way we'll ever stop going there is if they stop offering that deal; I'm more fiscally responsible now than when I was 23! Usually we are definitely the oldest people there, but this time it didn't seem that way. Maybe the recession is forcing people to go to cheaper happy hours? Regardless it was super fun and I was home between 10:30-11 which was awesome. I would so rather not be out super late anymore, I am getting old!
Saturday I had to go to the grocery to get hoagie rolls and a few things I accidentally forgot for the meatballs. Once there I realized that Jewel was having a massive sale on meat. This made my day and I totally stocked up. At first I was going to pass it up but was like "No! Can't! Chicken only $1.50 a pound!" It was awesome. Plus it was the morning so Club Jewel was busy, but not as ridiculous as it normally is, especially on superbowl weekend.
I then spent the rest of the day making meatballs & queso and getting ready for the next day (we hosted a few people for a superbowl party). That night we hit up Fogo de Chao for dinner... YUM. I love that place. Meghan introduced me to this Green Goddess salad dressing that I would have never tried, ever, if she hadn't said how good it was. And I ate my weight in parmesan scraped straight from the inside of a massive wheel of parmegiano reggiano (sp?). I want my own wheel of parm. Would that be too much? I can see it now: Hey, wine and cheese party at my place, just knock off your own piece of parm! haha....
Sunday the guys played football out at Diversey fields and Meghan and I took Milly to watch. Milly was having a grand old time digging big holes in the snow (I can just hear the doggy thoughts "Every hole I dig has GRASS in the bottom! SWEET!") and watching the boys play. I just felt bad b.c I couldn't let her run free.... the field was only divided from Lakeshore Drive by one of those metal guardrails and not an actual fence. I couldn't be sure she wouldn't bolt for the highway, so had to keep her on the flexi-leash. Poor pup!
A little bit later, everyone came over to watch the SuperBowl at our place. We got a new keg in the kegerator and I had the meatballs and queso, and had also made peanut butter blossom cookies (my specialty). Writt and his girlfriend Kelly brought this AWESOME cheesy artichoke dip and this really good guacamole with tortilla chips. Carl and his girlfriend Emily brought tiny bite-size calzone-like meat pocket things that were great. Rogus and Lindsay brought some chips, french onion dip (I could eat that stuff until I am sick), tater tots and waffle fries. Amy brought this awesome garlic-y cilantro shrimp.... other people brought various chips, dips, and cookies. So basically we had a metric ton of junk food. It was soooo good and I think I grazed almost all night. The game was somewhat interesting, the commercials were good and it was a generally calm and fun party. It was fun to have everyone over and I enjoyed it!
So anyways, lots of stuff going on and that is our weekend. I have pictures of NONE of it because my point and shoot camera got broken on new year's eve.... so I finally caved and bought a new one last night. I can't stand not having any pictures of anything. And I'd like to start taking and posting more pictures on the blog. I don't know if I'll go back to project 365 (take and post a picture a day) or if I'll just try to post pics from 3-4 things a week. We shall see!
Wednesday, January 28, 2009
Resolutions!
Here is where I'm at so far...
- Journal: I have been writing in it, at least every other day
- Another photo class: This is a fall '09 resolution!
- No caffeine: Being good. Found three cherry diet cokes in the back of the hall closet (where we keep extra beverages) and let myself have one on Sunday (and THEN had five solid hours of productivity... ), so that was my once a month. Other than that, been completely off it! It was a little rough-going this morning when I was super tired and smelled someone else's French Vanilla Dunkin' Donuts though.
- Buy a paper shredder: I forgot both times I went to Target this month. doh!
- Website and cart for name frames: I figured out the cart stuff on paypal, and downloaded some templates for the actual website.
- Quit candy: Going strong
- Finish purple scarf: Finished knitting a whole skein of yarn! Just one more to go.
25 random things about me
I keep getting tagged in this "25 things about me" meme on Facebook, so I thought I would post it here instead of Facebook. Posting stuff like this on facebook bothers me for some reason.
- It's very rare that I get through a day without putting my hair into a ponytail at some point. I will take it down and put it up a million times throughout the day. Once a friend sat behind me in a college class and told me after class "I mean, no offense. Don't get me wrong, it's nice hair. But you play with it more than ANYONE I have EVER seen."
- I really really really want to go to BlogHer this year to meet a bunch of people whose blogs I read. But I will probably chicken out and not go. Because I don't actually know those people. And I feel kind of like a moron fangirl by going up to people whose blogs I read.
- I quit caffeine a couple months ago because of my acid reflux, and really miss a warm cup of joe and a diet coke every now and again.
- I love to read, and do so very fast.
- I flip the bird to Worm's Way everytime we drive past it on the way to and from Bloomington. I did a group project for them once and it was the most awful ridiculous thing I ever did in college and I got a bad grade (for me, a low B).
- I know an absurdly ridiculous amount of stuff about baby gear for someone who doesn't have a kid. It's all those blogs I read! At least it benefits my sister and friends sometimes.
- I remember almost anything for a very long time if I see it in writing. In college I took copious notes but almost never referenced them. I do the same thing at work now.
- I am really bad about calling people on the phone, unless it's for a specific reason (ie asking if someone is coming to event or making arrangements to meet up).
- I know the caloric content of almost anything.
- I have only had one traffic ticket my entire life: a moving violation for going the wrong way on a one-way street.
- When my husband first saw me, I was wearing a red coat. I save that coat for special occasions and now just wear it on fancy date nights.
- I thought my husband was a weirdo the first time I talked to him.
- My nose runs ALL the time, almost. Especially when I run. Then it runs alot.
- I worry about almost everything, and then try to plan obscenely far in advance to mitigate that worry.
- I have a deep, mad love for Pequod's pizza and chicken/tofu pad thai
- I am a pastor's kid.
- I obsess over losing things (I look in my seat when I leave places and check that I have my wallet over and over), although I hardly ever lose/misplace anything for any period of time
- I love hanging out with my family and look forward to any time I get with them.
- I never wanted to get married or have kids until I met Hubs. I just thought that would never happen for me.
- I bought a Wii fit and never did use it.
- I feel like the housework and to-do lists just never end and wonder how everyone keeps up with it all. There is always something I feel like I missed no matter how much I do.
- I have run two half marathons at the breakneck pace of 12 minute miles. Despite that, I am decidedly not a runner.
- I think alot about my grandmother who passed away this summer, and what she would think of certain things.
- I once had a bedroom that was cotton candy pink. Like, when I was 24 and lived with 3 friends from college. Pink is still my favorite color.
- I am a compulsive putter-awayer. I will put my cell phone in my purse without realizing it, even if I meant to leave it out to keep an eye on it.
Saturday, January 24, 2009
And then we almost got arrested...
Well, it's been a kind of crappy week in the Knowles household, and it started off on Monday night.
On the way home from puppy class, a light turned yellow and Mike started to throw on the brakes to stop, then realized that throwing on the brakes would slam Milly into the back of the seat (she was wet and dirty from prancing around in the snow, so we put her in the very back of the SUV). So he sped up to make the light. Only because he had slowed down before, the light was red when we went through it. Immediately, red and blue flashing lights lit up the night, and Mike sighed and said "Great. I don't have my ID on me either." I don't take my purse to puppy class, because I hate leaving it in the car (asking for a breakin!) and hate leaving it sitting out on the sidelines (I am just way too paranoid). So we had no ID on us at all. Then for some reason our insurance card was missing! So the police officer asked us to follow him to the station. AWESOME.
Once we got there, we were convinced our car would get towed and the officer already told us we would have to post bond. I didn't have my purse or phone and Mike has a new phone with almost no numbers in it, so I was convinced I was going to have to call my parents to get my brother's phone number to come bail us out (I have three numbers memorized: my dad's cell, my parent's home, and mike's cell). We didn't know how long we would be in the station so we took Milly in with us. And I think she saved us! The officer wrote us the two tickets he could have written out on the street and another notice that said basically we would have to pay $1K if Mike doesn't show up in court. Then they let us go home! We were there for less than a half hour which was awesome.
Obviously, we were really nice and polite and I'm sure they don't see that alot. The officer was laughing that night too, saying that some guy was getting arrested for threatening to blow up a bar after he got kicked out for being way too drunk. We saw the guy, too, and it looked like he had had better days.
So anyways, moral of the story: Dog gets us into trouble, Dog gets us out of trouble. The End
On the way home from puppy class, a light turned yellow and Mike started to throw on the brakes to stop, then realized that throwing on the brakes would slam Milly into the back of the seat (she was wet and dirty from prancing around in the snow, so we put her in the very back of the SUV). So he sped up to make the light. Only because he had slowed down before, the light was red when we went through it. Immediately, red and blue flashing lights lit up the night, and Mike sighed and said "Great. I don't have my ID on me either." I don't take my purse to puppy class, because I hate leaving it in the car (asking for a breakin!) and hate leaving it sitting out on the sidelines (I am just way too paranoid). So we had no ID on us at all. Then for some reason our insurance card was missing! So the police officer asked us to follow him to the station. AWESOME.
Once we got there, we were convinced our car would get towed and the officer already told us we would have to post bond. I didn't have my purse or phone and Mike has a new phone with almost no numbers in it, so I was convinced I was going to have to call my parents to get my brother's phone number to come bail us out (I have three numbers memorized: my dad's cell, my parent's home, and mike's cell). We didn't know how long we would be in the station so we took Milly in with us. And I think she saved us! The officer wrote us the two tickets he could have written out on the street and another notice that said basically we would have to pay $1K if Mike doesn't show up in court. Then they let us go home! We were there for less than a half hour which was awesome.
Obviously, we were really nice and polite and I'm sure they don't see that alot. The officer was laughing that night too, saying that some guy was getting arrested for threatening to blow up a bar after he got kicked out for being way too drunk. We saw the guy, too, and it looked like he had had better days.
So anyways, moral of the story: Dog gets us into trouble, Dog gets us out of trouble. The End
Monday, January 19, 2009
Thursday, January 15, 2009
Wednesday, January 14, 2009
Uh, anyone need an IT Auditor in Florida?
Yikes, dude! Yesterday the high was like 7 and Dog laid down in the alley and refused to walk. Mike said "She would have died there if I hadn't picked her up and carried her back to the condo!"
Friday, January 09, 2009
Yum
A good little recipe for acorn squash!
http://find.myrecipes.com/recipes/recipefinder.dyn?action=displayRecipe&recipe_id=226448&package_id=238154
http://find.myrecipes.com/recipes/recipefinder.dyn?action=displayRecipe&recipe_id=226448&package_id=238154
Wednesday, January 07, 2009
Hair pretties
Ahhh, my new pasttime, making little hair pretties for my niece and friends who have baby girls!
Statcounter troubles
So I logged onto StatCounter this morning to see my blog traffic and it said I had NO visitors since mid October... I was a bit confused, especially since at least Michelle commented on an entry or two and then realized I didn't insert the StatCounter code into my new design. Oops! I mean, it's not like I get a whole heck of a lot of traffic anyways, but it was weird to see NO visitors. At first, I was like "well, if no one is visiting, then I can start the Brutal Honesty portion of our show"... but then realized it had to be a mistake.
The mistake was mine, a technical miss on my part. At least I figured it out. Shows how often I log into StatCounter!
The mistake was mine, a technical miss on my part. At least I figured it out. Shows how often I log into StatCounter!
On a totally different subject, did anyone see this? I have been eagerly anticipating a Slingplayer client for my iPhone since I purchased it and am super freaking pumped. Hopefully it works well, and isn't super slow. Who knows, though? I guess the app would only be as good as your connection, so there would be limitations. But at least I could watch some shows on the iPhone through our Slingbox rather than buying anything I want to watch on itunes. That would save some bank. Each show is only 1.99 but that adds up.
Tuesday, January 06, 2009
More 2008 recap....
I am totally stealing this from Michelle... a summary of our 2008 travels.
January and February
Nowhere.... blessed nowhere
March
April went to Sydney, Australia for work
April
April went to London for work, and Mike tagged along
April went to visit Katie in Indy to help register for baby Gracie
May
To Evansille for April's sister Katie's graduation and baby shower
Logansport to visit Mike's family
June
Pokagan State Park in northern Indiana for Stratton Family Reunion
April's Evansville high school girlfriends all came to Chicago for big reunion!
Lake cottage with Underhills in Northern Indiana
July
Coldwater, Michigan for annual Duff lake weekend
Fort Wayne, Indiana for Grandmother's funeral
April visited Katie, Drew, and Gracie for a weekend
August
Wedding anniversary trip to Saugatuck, Michigan
Visit to Indy to see Katie, Drew, Gracie and observe Hot Box Pizza operations
Charleston to visit Dixon
September
Hilton Head for Peter and Kira's wedding
Merrillville for Justin and Kimmo's wedding
Evansville for April's high school reunion
April visited Dora at Cornell in Ithaca, NY
October
GACRT/Iowa game at IU (both Mike and April)
Homecoming at IU (only April)
November
Purdue for Old Oaken Bucket game
Evansville for Thanksgiving
December
April went to Vegas to run mini marathon
Mike went to Logansport to visit family
Then Indiana tour 2008 for Christmas: stops in Evansville, Indianapolis, Terre Haute, and Logansport
January and February
Nowhere.... blessed nowhere
March
April went to Sydney, Australia for work
April
April went to London for work, and Mike tagged along
April went to visit Katie in Indy to help register for baby Gracie
May
To Evansille for April's sister Katie's graduation and baby shower
Logansport to visit Mike's family
June
Pokagan State Park in northern Indiana for Stratton Family Reunion
April's Evansville high school girlfriends all came to Chicago for big reunion!
Lake cottage with Underhills in Northern Indiana
July
Coldwater, Michigan for annual Duff lake weekend
Fort Wayne, Indiana for Grandmother's funeral
April visited Katie, Drew, and Gracie for a weekend
August
Wedding anniversary trip to Saugatuck, Michigan
Visit to Indy to see Katie, Drew, Gracie and observe Hot Box Pizza operations
Charleston to visit Dixon
September
Hilton Head for Peter and Kira's wedding
Merrillville for Justin and Kimmo's wedding
Evansville for April's high school reunion
April visited Dora at Cornell in Ithaca, NY
October
GACRT/Iowa game at IU (both Mike and April)
Homecoming at IU (only April)
November
Purdue for Old Oaken Bucket game
Evansville for Thanksgiving
December
April went to Vegas to run mini marathon
Mike went to Logansport to visit family
Then Indiana tour 2008 for Christmas: stops in Evansville, Indianapolis, Terre Haute, and Logansport
Monday, January 05, 2009
One more thing
on the resolution list.
I'd like to finish that purple scarf I've been knitting for two years!
I'd like to finish that purple scarf I've been knitting for two years!
Resolutions
I have been kicking around resolutions today. I want them to be important yet measureable...
- My brother and his girlfriend got me this awesome journal, and I want to make sure I write in it each day. So that is the first resolution.
- I would like to take the Digital 2 class at Chicago Photography Center (I took Digital one last year). I see this happening in the fall or late summer for me.
- I want to keep up with my quitting caffeine and carbonation thing. I cheated a little over the holiday and my throat is paying for it. My one exception to this would be champagne, maybe once a month, and maybe one diet coke a month. But I am going to try and go without it totally.
- Buy a paper shredder. I keep putting it off because it's SO not a fun purchase... this should be an easy one to check off the list.
- Start the website and checkout abilities for the name frame business. I want to have this up and running by April.
- Quit candy with Michelle. I would also like to lose some lbs and fit into my clothes a little better, but doubt putting that on the resolutions listing would do anything but make me feel bad. If it's measurable (lose 10 lbs), I don't think it's a good fitness goal. And if it's a good fitness goal (be stronger, pants fit better) then it's not measurable. Candy is a big weakness of mine and one reason why my pants don't fit well, so I'll make that a resolution and hope that helps the weight-loss effort.
Seriously, Tazo?
Tazo Tea instructions:
- Bring some fresh, filtered water to a boil
- For hot tea, place one Tazo filterbag in your cup, mug, or gourd
- Pour 8 fl oz of water over the filterbag
- Steep for 3 minutes while contemplating your favorite eternal mysteries.
Who writes this stuff?
Sunday, January 04, 2009
Dog found her Howler
Dog found her Howler
Originally uploaded by agstratt
Friday, January 02, 2009
2009
This is the year that my husband and I both turn 30. How crazy is it that across the blogsophere I see people saying they can't believe they are 30, and only have one kid. They are onlly 30 and haven't done x.
Well, I am 30 and haven't done much of anything! surprising, I know!
I would like to count myself blessed though, because I love my life and those that are in it. I wonder what the future holds for us, and I think it'll be interesting.
Well, I am 30 and haven't done much of anything! surprising, I know!
I would like to count myself blessed though, because I love my life and those that are in it. I wonder what the future holds for us, and I think it'll be interesting.
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