Scrapbooking

I haven't been doing a ton of scrapbooking lately, but I have gotten a few pages put together. Mostly, I wanted my mom to know that I am doing my best to make good use of the awesome supplies she bought for me the last time I went to visit her. :) I've still got a ton to work with, and plenty of stories to tell. The problem is just finding extra hours in the day to put them together. I haven't made any pages about being pregnant yet, but I have a few ideas that could be fun. For now, this is what I've got. The middle one is kind of interesting because I used a divided page protector with 6 slots for 4x6 photos for something different. I like the idea of using one of these opposite a regular page in a scrapbook it to include more photos of an event without crowding the design.











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8 weeks

I really started to feel sick this week. Still nothing bad enough to actually make me throw up, but bad enough to make me skip walking the dogs two mornings in a row (curled up in bed, psyching myself up to go in to work). The rapidly dropping temperatures are not helping things (or making me more eager to get out early to walk the dogs). Also, work has been fairly crazy as we ramp up to the holidays. On Tuesday, we were understaffed, we were supposed to changeover the front of the store, and we got a really big shipment that needed to be checked in. I was really overwhelmed and not feeling good that day. :( At least by the end of the week I seemed to be feeling better.

We're up to a raspberry according to TheBump.com. Adam keeps wanting to nibble at my belly because raspberries are so delicious. I'm excited that my mom has found a place and set a date for a baby shower. May is definitely a LONG way out, though. Not much else to report this early on, so I'll just post a weekly picture. I'm wearing the same shirt as the my first (week 4) picture, so it's pretty clear that nothing on the outside is changing yet.





No change in my disheveled hair, but at least I look a little happier about it this week. :)

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7 weeks

Yes, I know it's been more than 7 weeks since I last posted here. :)

So then what does 7 weeks mean? Well, I'm 7 weeks pregnant! Crazy, right? And since my dad has been alternately bugging me about posting to my blog and about sending him "before" pictures of me, so I decided to kill two birds with one stone: a pregnancy update (with pictures!) on my blog.

For the first couple weeks I felt totally fine. If I hadn't taken that test, I definitely would not have guessed I was pregnant. The next week, my appetite felt kind of off. I'd be uninterested in food one minute and then starving the next. This week, it's been more of that and also a fair amount of just being nauseous. Today is actually one of my worst days so far. I started writing this blog post because my tummy was in no mood for breakfast when I got back home from walking the puggles. Still, it really hasn't been terrible. I've never felt so nauseous that I thought I would actually throw up, it comes and goes fairly quickly, and it's worst in the mornings so my afternoons/evenings are not so bad.

TheBump.com is kind of a cool pregnancy website. It has a baby size tracker that compares your growing baby to a fruit or vegetable each week. We started as a poppyseed at week 4 and now we've graduated all the way up to blueberry. Adam is super pumped for next week when we upgrade to raspberry - his favorite fruit. Thankfully, the full-term watermelon still seems very far away. :)

Mostly life feels very much the same right now. I don't feel physically different or limited at all yet, and since I don't smoke or drink or even drink coffee/soda that much anyway, I haven't felt like I've had to make any drastic lifestyle changes. Also, Adam and I are trying to keep a broad view on things and not get bogged down in details that don't need our attention just yet. Figuring out a schedule of visits, deployments, showers and eye surgery for Adam has been most important. The curtains for the nursery can wait. Right now, my attention is mostly on budgeting our way through the holidays. A certain puggle's emergency lump removal was a pretty hefty unexpected cost last month.

Now, I know that all my dad is interested in are pictures of me and my tummy. I've taken a picture every Sunday since we first got the positive test, but at this point, I could probably shuffle them all around and no one could guess which week is which. Yes, I'm a little round, but don't get too excited. I was a little round to start off with. I like to run, but like to eat even more. :)



Week 4


Week 5



Week 6



Week 7

Hmmm...clearly I need to work on having less disheveled hair and less fake smiles.

Until next week...

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My throat is on fire

I was really planning a nice post tonight. It's been a fun and busy past few days with work, football, keeping in touch with adam, running, hanging out with friends and miraculously winning my fantasy matchup.

Unfortunately, tonight my throat is on fire. My sinuses are a little congested, but everything else mostly feels fine. I feel sick, and more than anything, I just want to avoid getting any sicker. I mean, what would the puggles do if mommy got too sick to take them on walks? So tonight I am focusing on relaxing, with a little vitamin C on the side. And I think a little frozen yogurt might go a long way to soothe my scratchy throat. :)

I feel like I haven't posted scrapbook pages in awhile, so I might as well drop these in here to make this post seem more substantial.







Frank Gore already worked one miracle for me this week, do you think he can help me wake up feeling all better tomorrow?

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Bingo babe

I am not nearly hardcore enough for bingo. Me and a few of the CSO ladies went to Mary Esther bingo last night, and we came out sadly empty-handed. Our lungs, however, were filled with a great deal of second hand smoke. :) We had fun being completely clueless and giggly. I'm hoping to get som pictures from Crystal later because I didn't bring my camera.

The action at bingo was pretty intense, so I was hoping for an easy day at work today. Apparently, everyone else in Okaloosa county had the opposite idea, because the store was really busy from like 11:30 on. Jenn and I were the only ones there until 4 and neither of us were even able to take a full lunch break. Generally, though, I'll take a busy day at work over a slow one any time.

After work, I stopped at Target for dog food (my poor puggles would have had no dinner), and then spent the rest of the evening on the phone. I had really psyched myself up for a run before dinner (I had to convince myself after the busy work day that running was a better idea than sitting on the couch), but while I was changing I got a phone call from Adam. I hadn't heard from him since Wednesday. Obviously, we had a lot to talk about and it had gotten completely dark by he time we hung up. Now I'll have to wake up early tomorrow in order to walk the dogs and squeeze in a run before football starts. Definitely worth it, though. Having Adam away gives me more time to fit in my hobbies like blogging and running and gives me more latitude to try stuff in the kitchen, but there is no question that I am a happier Mary when Adam is here.

On a somewhat unrelated note: I think butternut squash is my new favorite food. I'd never had it before tonight and now I'm hooked. It's definitely going
on the shopping list again.

On another unrelated note: This picture of me and Willow is amazing. :)







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Location:Ortega St,Gulf Breeze-Harold,United States

Photo dump

Well, today was pretty boring.

Today was: walking the dogs, going to work, working out, making pizza for dinner and now cooling off my burned tongue with watermelon for dessert

Since I don't have anything interesting to say about today, I figured I'd head back into the vault and post some pictures from the last few weeks while I was absent from blogging.

I took sadly few (read: almost zero) pictures at the doggie birthday party, and none were very awesome. I guess I was just too busy having a great time. To prove that it did happen, here are the best pictures I could come up with. (I know the last one with Lauren is pretty awful, but at least you can see the delicious spread of snacks I put out.)













I took lots more pictures the next weekend (Labor Day weekend) when Adam's mom, Ron, Ambre and her boys Jagger and Max came to stay. These are a few of my favorites.


























Finally, here's some pictures of my "new" stove that we've had for more than a month now. :) Pretty snazzy looking, huh?







So what do you think? It was totally worth the wait, right?

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Quiet time

There are so few quiet, lonely nights in my life. I feel like I've been waiting and waiting for one in order to update my blog, and it just keeps eluding me. Now tonight, I'm finally alone and quiet...and blogging is not the first thing I want to do. :) Still, I'm here, and this is what I have to say.

The past few weeks have been pretty awesome.

Doggie birthday party: awesome
Visit from Mom, Ron and his family: awesome
NFL kickoff (and the quadruple team win): awesome
Putting off a real blog post to cuddle up with clean, soft puggles and watch a movie tonight: awesome
This photo: awesome




Good night.

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Checking in

I blame The Hunger Games.

I know I kind of fell off the face of the earth last week. I got my copy of the final book in the series and I was dead to the rest of the world until I finished it. After that, it was easy to continue to forget about blogging. Anyway, right now I've got a house full of company and no time for a full update, but I did want to get the ball rolling with a quick post here. Hopefully, there will be pictures of a fun weekend to follow.


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Oil change fail

Adam and I stayed in yesterday with the idea that we would go out to run our errands today. (I am off and he was scheduled to fly at night.) I had my doubts about getting Adam up and out of the house relatively early on a Monday morning, but we actually had the car loaded up with Goodwill donations and were on the road just after 10. About a mile away from home, though, we heard this really weird announcement on the radio. The local car dealership group (where we happened to be heading for an oil change in my car), was closed for the day in honor of their founder's death in 1983. It was totally bizarre and completely screwed up our plans. Even covering all the bases of our other errands and grabbing some lunch at Panera, we were home by 12:30. But now I have to go to the dealership after work tomorrow for the oil change, and also find time to vote in the Florida primary. Looks like I'd better tuck in the puggles and get ready for bed pretty soon. I don't really do well with less than 8 full hours of sleep. Adam prefers 10, but he's also extremely lazy. :) Of course, I can't sign off without posting some new pages.





I got these pictures of Adam's mom and Aunt Nancy while they were visiting this past April. I decided to use a ready-made sticker for the title, so it came together nice and easy. :)




This is a repost to see if Blogger is still messing up this picture from a previous post.

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Life is good today

I was feeling kind of crappy most of this past week. Not like totally crappy, but definitely a little. Adam was gone Monday throughout Friday. I got some disappointing news on Thursday. The weather was oppressively humid and it rained at least a little bit every day. I had headaches and sneezes and I generally felt on the verge of being sick.

I cant really put my finger on why, but today is better. The weather is still pretty gloomy, and my headache is still pretty much here. Yeah, Adam is here and that's nice, but he's currently ignoring me to get his schoolwork done and posted before dinner.

I think its mostly attitude. Today, I'm looking around at my life, and I just can't complain. There is a lot to be said for time spent watching your little dog play with a tennis ball. Or for comforting your big one when thunderclaps turn him into a shaking mess. In moments like this, it's so clear that life is really good.








You'd think that between this blog and all these scrapbook pages I wouldn't have to keep reminding myself. :)

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iPad pictures

I think I'm ready for an early bedtime. I don't really know why, today wasn't really that long or tiring. I was off from work again, so I did some more cleaning up the house and picked up Adam from the airport at about 4. I LOVE how much nicer the house looks when it's clean and picked up. We'll just see if I can keep it this way while Adam is here. He has an uncanny knack for finding clear spaces and making piles of crap on them. :)

Anyway, I hadn't posted yesterday, so I thought I needed to pop in with a quick update. Here are some pictures from last week when I first got my iPad.








And a picture of Willow, just because I think she's cuter than me. :)



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Location:High School Blvd,Gulf Breeze-Harold,United States

I want to remember

I read an article in Newsweek today about the decline in blogging and other user-generated content (like wikipedia) on the web. It suggested that while contributing to the "greater good" of free online content was fun for awhile, now it just seems like work. It concluded that there needs to be some kind of compensation (special perks and access, if not cold hard cash) to keep the up the rate of publishing we're used to.

It got me started thinking about my own - too often neglected - blog. It doesn't necessarily fit into the context of the Newsweek article because it would be quite a stretch to claim any sort of regular "readership" on this blog. But the concept of compensation does apply. I blog because I am compensated. The problem is that the "compensation" is just for me, and it's delayed. What do get in exchange for the time I spend blogging? I get the opportunity to reflect and remember what my life was like and what was on my mind weeks, months, even a year ago. Since the payoff is some date in the future, I sometimes forget how valuable it is. This blog is a lot different from my scrapbooks, even if they serve a similar purpose sometimes.

The article said that between 75-90% of blogs are abandoned after a year. Basically, it renewed my resolve not to be one of those blogs. I want to remember today. I want to remember waking up early. I want to remember how much I like walking the dogs on trash day because I always have somewhere to dump their poop bags. I want to remember marking down candy 40% off at work. I want to remember using hand sanitizer like crazy and popping vitamin C because I'm starting to feel a little sick. I want to remember mowing the lawn even though I didn't really want to. I want to remember how awesome it is to be covered in puggles (or CIP as we call it in this overly-acronymed household) right now.

Oh yeah, and I want to remember these scrapbook pages. :)






I cut out some interior shots of Adam's new car from the brochure he got to make this page. I tried to keep it pretty plain to look manly.







This page was fun to make. I used a bunch of the newest stuff I had (it's hard to tell from the picture, but the background is a subtle, shiny gold), and the picture is a funny outtake in the bright sun this past Easter.

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Location:Ortega St,Gulf Breeze-Harold,United States

Remember when I used to post scrapbook pages?

First of all, I just want to say thank you to the first genius who put together a warm brownie and cold vanilla ice cream. My mouth is very happy because of you tonight. :)

My computer is currently downloading a gigantic software update for my iPad, which means I can't just sit around and play with my new toy like I have for the past week. Instead, I popped in a video (The Italian Job) and am enjoying the aforementioned dessert. I did set up my computer to automatically sync my scrapbook pages with my iPad earlier, so I have a few to share. I know that blog posts are way more fun with pictures.




These pictures of Skelly and Willow were taken in the first few weeks after we adopted her. They were already doing well getting adjusted to each other. We still say that Willow's favorite toy is Skeletor.





I love this picture that my Dad took at Animal Kingdom, but there wasn't really much of a story behind it. (Ooh, look, pretty tiger!) I decided to just keep it simple so the focus was on the photo.

Now, I'd better get back to the movie or it'll get too late to finish it. Over and out.

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The iPad - Week One

So, in case it wasn't clear from my previous two posts: I got a new iPad! I realize now that in my frustration in not being able to post (or at least to type anything into the actual body of the blog post),I forgot to mention directly what brought me back to blogging. Of course, my Dad's gentle hints about whether or not I had abandoned the blog made their impression, too.

It's really amazing how having the iPad for only a week has changed my computing habits. Because I use it for most of my day-to-day computer stuff (checking email, reading blogs, etc.), I go to my laptop so much less frequently. Actually, I forget about some things I would normally do when I'm on my computer (like upload or edit pictures). Mostly, though, it's been really cool, and generally I think it's a good thing to use my laptop less. That was one of the main ideas: to help my laptop last longer by using it less. I'm still figuring out all of the ins and outs, and it's a fun process. Today, for example, my iPad case finally arrived. With that and our wireless keyboard attached, it's a lot easier to type things like a blog post this long. Overall, I think it was a great purchase. :)

Believe it or not, I have been doing more than just bonding with my new iPad. In fact, today I was a whirlwind of cleaning and organizing. I washed the dogs, cleaned up my bathroom, did dishes, laundry and got waist deep in putting away scrapbook layouts before I hit a wall about an hour ago. At least I have the whole day off of work, so I should have plenty of time to get a second wind and clean up the piles on my floor before bedtime. I also had good intentions of getting on the old laptop to print some pictures tonight, but I may give myself permission to put that off until tomorrow. It all depends on how involved I get in playing iPad games tonight. :)


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New app!

Hooray! It looks like I found my solution for posting from my iPad. I'm a little bit bummed that it took $2.99 just because my blog is hosted by Blogger (there was a free app for WordPress), but I'll take what I can get.

It's not super easy to type long involved posts on the iPad keyboard. It's not too bad, but I feel like i have to "hunt and peck" more to make sure i'm hitting the right keys. Tomorrow I'll connect the Bluetooth keyboard we got and give that a try.

It's kind of early, but it's just about time to hit the sack. We have to leave the house before 6 tomorrow to get Adam to the airport. I can't say that I'm super excited about 5 lonely days coming up. I don't know what I would do without my puggles to keep me company. Thank goodness they are both such good snugglers.

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Ugh! I finally signed in to update my blog and i can't type in the main text area! I'll be back tomorrow to troubleshoot.

Scrapbook pages

Yay! Blogger is working again. I tried to start this post earlier today, but I kept getting an error message from Blogger. As if it's not hard enough to remind myself to update the blog, I had to deal with technical issues. And I've definitely had plenty of technical difficulties to deal with lately. My printer is still broken and my camera battery situation is officially out of control. I fear that both may need replacing soon. :(

Until then, I've been doing the best with what I've got. I signed up for a Shutterfly account and ordered some prints to be shipped to the house so I can jump on the scrapbooking bandwagon again. I find it really difficult to juggle all of my interests at the same time, but I'm beginning to get comfortable enough in my running routine and the responsibilities of being a single puppy parent to find more time to play with paper. In fact, I even photographed some yesterday!


My dad took this picture when he was visiting in November. My newest Slice card had the perfect little "beach" word to cut out for the title, and that's about all it took to put this together.


I rescued this picture from a frame that I didn't want anymore and was donating to Goodwill. Whenever I'm kind of stuck with what to do for a page, I start cutting little squares and making a grid. It's just what works for me. I cut the "love" part of the title with another Slice card. :)

There's not much else going on to report. I'm working on finishing a few more loads of laundry before I take my bike for a ride along the beach this evening. I made sure that Adam showed me how to load up my bike in the car before he left, so I want to make sure that I make use of that skill. :) Then, I'm going to come home and make chicken parm and breaded zucchini sticks for dinner. Yum! Right now, my puggles look like they need a little attention. I think a short play session is in order.

Reboot

I intended to write more on that last post, I really did. Somehow, it got published right after I wrote the title, and I didn't really have the interest in going back and editing it. Oops.

I was really frustrated that day because I wanted to play with scrapbooking stuff and I couldn't print any new pictures. I just couldn't get interested in other stuff around the house (especially not the mopping I really need to do), and I felt weird most of the day. I did have a great conversation with my friend Brianna from high school. (Hi, Brianna! Now I know that you are reading my super-nerdy blog.)

Yesterday was a good day to kind of "reboot" things. I worked most of the day, then came home for a run before dinner. I had some really bad stomach cramps about halfway through. I had to walk it out for 7-ish minutes, but I was able to finish pretty strong. :) Then, I made a nice dinner (pizza and roasted tomatoes) and watched tennis/basketball with my puggles. Tennis is definitely their favorite sport; tennis balls are their favorite balls. :)

Today is another day off, and I'm finally getting around to mopping that floor. With a few breaks for tennis and blogging, of course. Adam will be very pleased to learn that Safina lost in her first round match yesterday; she looked straight AWFUL. It's all payback for the smug attitude she had last year when she was #1 over Serena. She's just a whiny little Russian who chokes when it really matters. On the flip side, I totally have a little tennis crush on Jo-Wilfried Tsonga this year. A.) He's French B.) He's cuddly-looking C.) Instead of signing his name on the TV camera after his win in the 2nd round, he wrote "Love you, Mom!" How adorable is that?

Finally, I bought a card reader for my camera! Yay! This post is not lame! Here are some pictures of my flowers/garden that I took a couple weeks ago. Now, I guess I should go take some new ones to see how everything has grown.

Wandering Jew hanging basket

My raised bed vegetable garden

Close-up on the bell pepper plants in the corner

My printer is broken

Mom's Video

I want to keep this quick, so I'll post it rundown style:

• I'm off today, hooray! I got in a (relatively) quick run this morning, and now I'm getting ready to pack a lunch and take the puggles to the dog beach in Pensacola. It's been a long time since Skeletor last went and Willow has never been. It should be interesting trying to wrangle them and all of our stuff by myself.
  
• It is HOT in Florida.
  
• Still no card reader, therefore no pictures, but I did make this short little video for my Mom. That's totally not lame. :)
  

Hooray for the weekend!

p.s. Dad, your video is one second longer than Mom's. I believe that is a statistically insignificant amount of variation, so scientifically, they are the same. :)