2nd half of January

Y'all.  I am worn out!  The thing is that I haven't really done anything to exciting.  This new work schedule is taking a little bit to get used to, but I am surprised that I have been able to get to work at 7 every day!  It isn't as bad as I thought.  I also changed my alarm tone on my phone to the song "Good Morning" from Mandisa.  That song is fun and always makes me want to dance.  :)

I did some major deep cleaning on my house a while back.  Like I'm pretty sure it hasn't been that clean since I moved in major cleaning.  I spent about 6 hours just in the kitchen and then also some time in other rooms.  I cleaned all the appliances, the floors, walls, blinds, counters, cabinets- anything you could possibly find in the kitchen- I cleaned it.  When I woke up the next day, my right shoulder was SO sore.  At first I thought I had something was seriously wrong with me until I remembered that I cleaned all day the day before. Ha!  I'm having a wedding shower at my house in a couple of weeks and so I wanted to get the deep cleaning out of the way and hopefully I wouldn't have to work as hard right before the shower.

I went to the dentist (no cavities!) and the doctor.  The doctor's appointment was ridiculous.  Well the appointment itself was fine but the wait before and after (I had to wait to check out and then they checked me out and didn't tell me) was incredibly frustrating. 

My Razorbacks have been doing amazing in basketball at home in Bud Walton Arena, and terrible on the road.  I'm a good fan and will watch every game that is on tv, even if it does mean staying up late to watch a disappointing loss.  I don't know if I will get to make it up to Fayetteville for a game this season or not, but I sure would like to!

I made a bunch of recipes that I found on Pinterest.  The first was the chicken enchilada crock pot soup.  It was great!  Here a (not very good) picture:

I made the Olive Garden knock-off dressing.  It was not exactly the same and had a whole bunch of ingredients.  It think for this one, I'd rather just go to Olive Garden. :)

I made some s'mores cookies.  They were pretty good too.

Then- the bad one.  I attempted to make a rocky road crock pot cake.  This is how it turned out:

It was still liquid WAY after it should have been done.  Let's just say it was a big waste of money, as not one single bite of it was eaten.

Now completely unrelated... I had a permit I was working on at the office, and the contact person was named PJ.  That got me thinking back to when I was a little kid and I had a PJ Sparkles doll.  And then I was asking around my office and not one single person knew what PJ Sparkles was??!?!?!

And funny story.  Ok maybe not so funny but anyway, this is my blog and I'm going to tell it.  This morning I had my hands full of my travel mug of coffee, a box for the recycling bin, and the invitations to the bridal showing I'm hosting in February.  Well, I was trying to be a good roommate since I am the first one to leave.  I tried to go to the garage without turning on any lights.  That was a good plan- until I walked right smack into the wall NEXT to the doorway.  Wall-1, Jessica-0.   Maybe I'll have better luck tomorrow- or use the light.

Weekend Progress

I finally finished that wreath that I wrote about in the last post.  I put the finishing touches on it Saturday night.  I wanted to watch the Arkansas vs. LSU basketball game, but for some weird reason it wasn't on tv, and they wouldn't let us watch it online because it was blacked out.  I watched Miss America instead, but I can honestly say I would rather have watched a basketball game!  And of course, I can't remember which girl was from which state, but that girl in the evening gown with the big bow on the shoulder is out of her ever loving mind.  She looked like a big Christmas present.  I mean, I like a bow as much as the next girl, but it shouldn't be bigger than your head!!

Anyway, back to the wreath.  This is a picture of one of the flowers I made.

This is the wreath before I figured out how to hang it.  Excuse the toes in the picture- ha!

My sister told me it would look better if I covered it completely with roses.  That would take forever!  I made all but 2 of these while I watched Miss America.  It doesn't take complete concentration but it is a kind of tedious task.

Here it is hanging on the door.  I couldn't exactly figure out which ribbon to use.   I had a couple of smaller ribbons that I bought for another reason also, but I liked this thick one the best.

And of course, giving credit where it is due, I completely stole this idea from my friend Myra over at Delight in your Life.  We live in different states, so I figured it would be ok.. :)  As a result of this project, I have a new found love of yarn covered wreaths. 

I also cleaned like a maniac this weekend.  I had today off work, and it sure is a good thing, because I could barely move my right arm when I woke up this morning!  I cleaned for about 6 hours just in the kitchen yesterday.  I mean- appliances inside and out, walls, floor, cabinets, blinds.... If it was in there, it got cleaned.  I actually ran out of a bunch of my cleaning supplies.   I also got rid of some marks on the front and garage doors and my car door (which really kind of ticked me off since it got on there when they did a recall repair on my Rogue- at least it came off easily with a Magic Eraser).  I also caught up on all the laundry, cleaned the living and dining rooms and the floor of the entryway and the floor/stairs of the laundry room.  When I woke up this morning, I was seriously concerned about the pain in my right arm/shoulder.  It took me about an hour to figure out that it was a result of my excessive cleaning and not something serious.  I've been kind of slow today...

I finally got a street sign on my street.  The old one had been missing for probably five or six months and they finally replaced it.  I am glad because I'm having a wedding shower in about a month for my bff and it is alot easier for people to find your street if there is a sign....  I bought some stuff for a (hopefully) really cute wedding shower gift for my friend.  I'm not sure if she will read this or not, so I won't say what it is but after the shower is over, I will show a picture.  Or if you know me in real life, I will tell you some other way. :)

I had today off work, and because of my new work schedule, I will also have every other Friday off.  So this week I only have to work Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday.  I am excited about having the Fridays off because I can do things when most other people are at work, so that there will be fewer people!  I made a GIGANTIC grocery list and I'm planning on making my first trip Friday morning and hopefully avoiding the crowd.  I have to get food for me, a friend who just recently had a baby, a Bible study meeting, and a super bowl party.  This is going to be an expensive trip.  However- I am trying 5 new recipes with the items I'm buying.  Hopefully all 5 will be a success:  Olive Garden Salad Dressing knock-off, smores cookies, chicken enchilada soup in the crockpot, rocky road crock pot cake, and chocolate chip cookie dough truffles!!

Christmas: Part 2 (and part of the new year)

Well- I intended to do this before the end of the year.  Obviously that didn't happen.

I went to Mississippi to visit my stepmom's family.  We had an awesome beach house.

I made a Christmas tree out of some of our empty cans.

I got tremendously sick.  It started the second day we got to the beach.  At first I thought I might be allergic to the beach.  :)  That was on Dec 21st, and I still have some remnants of whatever it was that I caught.  It seems like my whole office has it too, so we are probably just passing it back and forth.

There was a pretty sunset.

On Christmas eve, my sister was in a play at church at the 6:00 service.  Then, I played flute in the 11:00pm service.  I thought I might die due to my lungs being on fire from coughing.  But I didn't- which is good.  The music minister accidentally called me up too early in the service, so I ran up there with my flute and then had to sit in the choir loft with the choir.  That was really weird.  I don't like sitting up where everyone can see you.  It is hard to sit still! Then the acolyte forgot to get a candle for the end of the candlelight service, so the preacher had to take mine and give to the little girl. 

I loved this little countdown to Christmas.  My cousin was selling stuff as a school fundraiser, and this was in the catalog.

I was contemplating waiting to catch you up on everything else that has happened since Christmas, but that may or may not happen anytime soon, so I thought I should just do it now.

My friend Ashley had a few people over for New Year's Eve.  We played a bunch of movie related games that I really stink at, such as Scene It and Shout it Out.  I am terrible at remembering movie lines or movie titles or movie scenes.  So if you want to beat me at a game- that is what we should play.  I made some cookies that I was too embarrassed to take a picture of.  They were supposed to look like patchwork mittens.  Normally when I try to roll out dough, it always sticks to the counter or wherever I'm rolling it out.  So I think I went a little overboard this time.  It didn't stick to the counter, but then I couldn't get the different "patches" to stick together!  It was so much trouble, especially when I tried to get the stuff in the right shape and use the mitten shaped cookie cutter.  I ended up just smashing some of the patches together and calling them quilts!  haha.  In the cookbook that I used, the patches were nice pastel colors.  Well- mine ended up looking like playdough!  It was not my most appetizing cookie venture.  I thought they looked like a kindergarden art project, especially when I added the edible glitter on the top of them!  They tasted ok, but they didn't all get eaten.  I took the leftovers to work, and I think people there were a little hesitant to try them until I told them they weren't playdough!

My Razorbacks won against Kansas State in the Cotton Bowl!  I had some girls over to watch the game.  We were supposed to be having a meeting anyway to make cards for the card ministry, so I suggested that we meet at my house.  I was not going anywhere that did not have a tv! Luckily the Razorbacks pulled out a win.  I decorated my house for the party.

Woo pig sooie!  The basketball Hogs also won last night.  It was a good weekend for Hog fans.

I started making a valentine's day wreath.  Hopefully I will get it finished before long.  Here's a picture of what I have so far:

So far I'm doing pretty well on my New Years Intentions.  I've been to work on time more days than not, I exercised yesterday, and I made a new recipe yesterday.  Hopefully I'll be on time to work tomorrow since it's my first day of going in an hour early!  I'm sure going to try my best, but I think this new schedule is going to take a little while to get used to!

one more intention

I forgot the most important intention on my list in my last post:

I intend to be on time to work every single day!

Haha!  Actually I have a perfect record {so what if it's only one day} and I was woken up by my roommate coming home last night so I didn't get much sleep.  If I can get there on time today, I can get there on time everyday!

I'm hoping to start a new work schedule next week where I have to go to work an hour earlier than I have been, so that's the real reason for this intention!!  We'll see how my record is after next week!

In 2012, I intend....

Leslie had this great idea on her A Blonde Ambition blog.  She listed her New Year's Intentions.  I like that a whole lot better than resolutions.  So here are my 2012 intentions.

This year, I intend to exercise at least once every week, no matter how busy I am.  Lame- I know.  However, I always have the best intentions, and then something more fun always comes up.

This year, I intend to be the inviter, and not wait around to be the invitee.

This year, I intend to try at least one new recipe every week.

This year, I intend to blog at least once a week.

This year, I intend to tackle a lot of items on my 30 before 30 list.

This year, I intend to be more quick to forgive.

Also, this past week (as in years past) they were talking on K-love about picking one word to focus on for the year.  I was thinking that my word for the year would be joy.  So then last night I was reading Nicolae, the third book in the Left Behind series. {side note: Those books are kind of freaky.  I was talking to my co-worker and she brought up a good point.  She said she intends to be on the first train out of here.  I'm in full agreement there.}  Here is an excerpt from Nicolae that got me thinking:

"Joy, Buck thought.  What a concept in this place, at this time.  The name of the game now was survival.  Certainly joy took on a different meaning than ever before in Buck's life.  He used to equate joy with happiness.  Clearly Tsion Ben-Judah was not implying that he was happy.  He might never be happy again.  This joy was a deep abiding peace, an assurance that God was sovereign.  They didn't have to like what was happening.  They merely had to trust that God knew what he was doing."

That was sure good timing.  I picked that word not thinking of it in that sense at all.  But that seems like a good place to start the year- trusting that God knows what he's doing, with a deep abiding peace.