Browsing the archives for the Nerdy category.

Tweaking…

Nerdy

So instead of posting this afternoon, I decided to make a few changes to the site ‘first’ and got caught up, as usual.

There is still a little more to do, mostly cleaning up colour issues (like the unsightly light pink on hot pink mess over there <----) and a few broken images in the sidebar all of which will be fixed tomorrow, but overall I'm a little in love with it. Thoughts on the font? Adoring love for my social media coffee cup icons? They're amazing, right? I'm so modest sometimes I don't know how you stand it! Ha! Anyhoo, as my Dad has always said ‘Nothing comes as early as the dawn’, and unfortch, tomorrow is an early morning for us.

So much is in store for the site this year!!

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Resolutions?! Ok, Here We Go…

Crafty, Domestic, Healthy, Kids, Marriage, Naughty, Nerdy, Pretty

Just a few days ago, I proclaimed to one of my best friends that I will not be making resolutions this year. Actually, it went more like this.

May: Did you see my new boots on Facebook?
Talea: I did, way to upload pics right away.
May: I know, right?! That’s my only resolution.
Talea: That’s it?! That’s your only resolution?! I’m sitting here racking my brain for more things to list!
May: I’m going to keep up my healthier eating, I’m going to work hard on my blog, but uploading pics quickly is my only actual reaolution.
Talea: Pfft.

Pfft indeed, Talea. Pfft indeed. So after thinking about it a little, I realize it is pretty lame of me to not make resolutions. Not because the idea of not making resolutions in itself is lame, but I always make resolutions and most of the time I do ok. One or two fail before spring – always. A couple more make it to summer/fall, and there are usually at least 1 or 2 that make it all the way into the following year and become a regular part of life.

Last year I didn’t make any public resolutions but privately I resolved to save as much money as humanly possible and be well on the road to buying a house in 2011. We ended up saving more than I ever thought could be humanly possible and we bought our first house on August 2, 2011!! Mission accomplished!

I’m feeling really ambitious about 2012, because so many exciting things about my husband’s job and his goals are really coming together and as much as I would looooove to go on and on about them here, it’s not really my place to talk about it all. I will say however, that I am incredibly proud of him and it makes me want to work so much harder on my own goals – especially goals I have come close to touching in the past but for whatever reason allowed myself to back away from. Some of my resolutions are to keep up past resolutions I’ve succeeded at, because if they fall off the list, I may stop being mindful of them! So first, things that need changing, followed by changes to keep up.

1. Maintain a vegetarian diet and take steps toward cutting out as much dairy as possible. I have said so many times that I could never be a vegetarian because I love certain foods too much to give them up or because there are some foods that are so ingrained in my life and our family’s traditions that I just can’t imagine what those traditions would look like without those foods. However, I have also said so many times that it’s just not possible to un-know stuff, you know? I’m not at all out to turn anyone else into a vegetarian – at all. My husband and kids eat meat and I will still prepare meals with meat for them and I will still blog about those meals, so while I am going veg, this blog/website is not.

2. Get down to my goal weight. Sadly this is one of those goals I’ve come close to hitting! I lost 50lbs last year and fell off the wagon when my Granny passed away. Once my emotions leveled out, I never got back into positive eating habits. I’ve been limping along again for the past two months and have lost some of that weight again. It looks like there is a very exciting move happening for our family in the nearish future that will keep me on track. More about that as details unfold here.

3. Blog, blog, blog!. There are hundreds of photos waiting to be posted about – really hundreds! Decadent desserts, healthy mains, super fun crafty projects, heaps of makeup photos and random tutorials. Partly it’s about finding the time to post about it all, but I have no doubt that I have that time, I just need to take it from somewhere less productive! I also have a pretty intimidating/impressive idea list of things that will end up being blogged about too. Even though this is technically #5 on my list, it’s defo one of the most important resolutions this year.

4. Keep up positive parenting. By this I mean keeping the kid’s feelings and hopes in mind when making decisions as well as the obvious not screaming and yelling and generally lashing out at them when they are, let’s say, difficult. I think it’s fair to say I have been developing this skill for the last 11 years but of course I can always get better. I’ve been being really mindful since I read How To Talk So Kids Will Listen & Listen So Kids Will Talk and even more so since I went to the workshop. Yes, I dig parenting classes. Anyhoo, treating our kids with respect is an ongoing resolution.

5. Keep up the domestic goddess habits. This is a goal I achieved a couple of years ago, where I have manged to keep cleaning and kitchen routines going – regardless of vacations and babies and visitors and moving and head colds and all the things that I used to allow to derail me. It’s an ongoing process though because messes happen every day and meals need to be prepared everyday. So I’m keeping it on the list!

6. Keep up the hair and makeup everyday. I know people think it’s funny (or maybe a little crazy) that I wear some pretty alarming makeup, including gorgeous lashes, out in the woods in my town of 300 people (maaaaaybe, probably less). On an average day, I see one other mom and two other dads at the school bus stop. I see my next door neighbor when he waits for his kids to get off the other school bus and 3 other people who walk their dogs past my kitchen window. That’s it. But they are not why I take the time to get snazzy everyday, I do it for my husband and kids. They claim I look adorable even without doing my hair and makeup and that’s incredibly sweet of them to say, but we all know how much more adorable I look with effort.

7. Help my husband with his goals. This goes without saying really, and my husband has said this shouldn’t be a resolution because I’m always supportive of his goals BUT, just like with the kids and the house, there is always room for improvement and I think it should always be on the list. He’s also way more supportive of my hilariously big dreams than pretty much any other husband I’ve ever met, so I think that calls for above and beyond, right? Right. <3 I feel like I should have 3 more for a rounded out list of 10, but 7 is where I'm at this year. I honestly wish everyone success in 2012 so that when we all sit down to write out our 2013 lists we are full of optimism and have a nice list of completed goals under our belts! Onward!!

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A Typical Day….because you asked.

Crafty, Domestic, Healthy, Kids, Marriage, Naughty, Nerdy, Small Town

For what it’s worth (and because I’ve been asked), this is my basic schedule since we moved about 6 weeks ago. I’ve included the other stuff too, just to give you an idea of how I work around everything else.

Our mornings are prepped the night before, (because as I’m sure you know, chopping celery and washing lettuce goes a lot faster at 9pm than it does at 7am). So clothes are already picked out and school bags are already packed and ready on each kid’s hook by the front door. I know my neurosis is showing again, but this takes maybe 20 minutes after the kids are in bed to accomplish and I save myself all kinds of headaches in the morning – and frees up that time to get other things out of the way.

I brush my hair and throw some makeup on while I’m still in my PJs right after I’ve brushed my teeth – otherwise it just might not happen! Then I just grab whatever I put out for myself the night before and wake the kids – then they separate into their bathrooms for teeth brushing and face washing (that sentence made me sound a lot snobbier than I really am, we just happen to have two bathrooms very close together). I’ve changed the baby and brushed her teeth at this point and she’s likely on my hip in the kitchen making oatmeal with me while the other two get dressed in whatever was pulled for them the night before.

While they’re eating breakfast, I take their (mostly made) lunches from the fridge, add whatever is left to add and put them in their bags. Now, I have time to make the beds, pick up laundry, give each bathroom a tidy and wash the breakfast dishes before we even have to go outside for the school bus.

Once the older two are on the bus (to keep time in perspective, I usually get up around 6:30ish and the school bus rolls up around 8:30), wee one #3 and I go back inside and do a quick tidy of the home office so it’s ready for my husband when he gets up. Then, for no more than an hour, I set to work on all the chores for whatever room is assigned to that day:

Mondays – office & kitchen
Tuesdays – living room & dining room
Wednesdays – bathrooms & hall
Thursdays – kids’ rooms
Fridays – our room, laundry room & entrance
Saturdays – outside & garage

Each room gets a total once over every week, so it’s always super clean. Aside from the occasional ‘how did that end up on the ceiling fan’ chocolate milk mishaps, nothing too damaging happens over the course of a week. It’s when we leave things for months on end and then notice how gross it is, but by then everything has been left that long and it’s all gross!

So after giving the area(s) of the day an hour of cleaning time, it’s about 9:30. 9:30 and the house is clean (I don’t do laundry in the day because we’re on time of use meters in Ontario for our hydro consumption, so I save my family a lot of money by only doing laundry (and cooking) at off peak times).

This frees up the next hour to working out. I know. Roll your eyes at me harder, why don’t you? 😛 I’ll type out my workout routines for another post – some days it’s stability ball exercises, some days it’s resistance bands and there are usually free weights in there too. And cardio. As a rule is goes like this; Mon, Wed & Fri are abs & arms days with PSX cardio. Tues, Thu & Sat are butt & legs days with strippersize (ooh la la) and on Sundays I try to do ‘fat burning yoga’. My friend Gill is the fitness queen, and I try to make her proud, this schedule may seem crazy and you may assume I am super fit, but really this routine is nothing compared to hers and I am just borderline healthy, not yet fit. Ask me where the toddler is. You know you’re thinking it. She’s right beside me trying to work out – it’s hilarious! Of course. Then, once you add in changing in and out of my workout gear, drinking about a liter or more of water and having a very fast (and very hilarious) shower after, where I very carefully avoid getting my face and hair wet – and try to keep wee one #3 from stepping in with me, it’s about 11am.

That’s typically when I sit at my computer and check out my favorite forums and read some of my favorite blogs (while sucking on a protein shake, no less). I check in with my girlfriends via email around this time and then as I’m making lunch I generally call my Dad. I’ll be 30 next week and I still feel the need to check in with him, and let’s be honest – I totally call him Daddy. Ahem. I’m a grown up, shut up. 😛

I feed the littlest one and then cart her off to her room for a nap between 12:30 and 1pm. This is where parenting controversy comes in. When I put her down with her water and her blanket, I sit in the room with her (on wee one #2’s bed) and I knit until she sleeps. Will she always need me there? Am I warping her for life? I don’t know, but I did this with the other two and all is well, so I’m not messing with a good thing. Sometimes, she’s out cold within 15 minutes and on those days I’ll sit there and knit for another 15 or so. Other days it might take half and hour or even 45 minutes. I just keep knitting, happily while she lays there watching me till she drifts off. I’m out of there by 2 for sure, usually a lot earlier.

Wee one #2 is in SK, and in this district that means she’s in school 3 days a week. So if she’s home, we’ll get crafty together for an hour and a half at this time. Usually painting or coloring or something involving pipe cleaners or glue and googily eyes. If she’s at school, I’ll use this time to work on the blog or call a long distance friend or reply to pen pals. Yes, pen pals. <3 The magic ‘nap must end time’ at this house on a week day is 3:20, because we have to be at the end of the driveway for the school bus drop off just before 4.

Once they’re off the bus, they run around and play in the front yard, if no one has homework we take the 5 minute walk to the lake and maybe collect rocks, or just throw them in the water.

Once we’re inside (always by 5) it’s that whirlwind of supper prep and homework. I am a homework helping kind of mom. I never do it FOR him, but I always check answers and insist sloppy homework is redone. If supper is ready before homework is done, we take a break and it’s finished up while I do dishes and clean the kitchen after supper. Now it’s about 6 or 6:30ish. All homework is finished up or kept at if there is lots and school bags are prepped for the next day. All papers signed, all books put away, and they’re hung on the kids hook by the door.

Wee one #1 will either read or practice his guitar or maybe watch a movie with Dad or wee one #2. Bath time for the younger two is at 7, I wash them and then read to them till 7:30, then it’s teeth brushing and PJ time for them. They’re both in bed having their last story read by 8. I sit there again and knit till #3 is sleeping, which usually happens around 8:30. Then I remind wee one #1 that it’s time for a shower, he gathers up his school stuff if he hasn’t already, puts it on his hook and is in the shower by 8:45.

While he showers, I prep lunches for the next day, take another look at the calendar to see if there’s anything important going on and once the oldest comes back to the kitchen to get a glass of water and say goodnight, I’m off to the laundry room to pop in the only load of dirty clothes (sheets and towels are done on Saturdays). Then I’m in the office with my husband to update the family photo site with the day’s photos and then I close my laptop, watch old movies with the husband and knit my face off till around midnight. Then I have a shower, get primed for the next day and go to bed, usually somewhere around 1am – unless my husband comes with me and then who knows how late I’m up? 😉 I pop the wet clothes in the dryer before I got to bed because we have this indoor dryer vent thing to help heat the house at night. Anything that saves on hydro make us happy around here. 😉 Saturday and Sunday are typically the days I do the most baking, though I can be found in the kitchen instead of knitting doing supper for the next day if I’m excited enough about it. Food nerd alert!

Nothing fantastically glamorous, but I love it. Things we used to do weekly (like date nights, Saturday night parties and Sunday suppers at my aunt’s house) are now monthly things because we moved to the woods, but the trade off has been amazing! My girlfriends will come up in two separate groups about once a month, and we’ve already had a handful of random visitors make the drive, and a few on their way!

What I like most about this schedule is that if we make last minute plans or someone wants to come for the weekend on little notice, it’s not a big deal to skip a day because it’s always done!

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Window Shopping Wednesday, Part 6

Nerdy, Small Town, Window Shopping

Living out in the middle of nowhere has made me more grateful for my friends than ever before. Some of them I’d see literally every weekend, some even more often than that (hi Gill!) and some friends about once a month. Now that I’ve moved a couple of hours away and some of those friends have moved even further (hi Talea, hi Brigitte!), we are all about texting and emailing and talking on the phone – and letters!! That’s right, good old fashioned letter writing! Talea mailed one a few days ago and texted me that I’d be getting it ‘when the pony express made it’s way through town’. So, naturally, I’m now on the hunt for stationary and fun letter writing gear!

I found this neat organizer that looks perfect for stamps, a pen, post cards and an address book or note book. I have found that while a letter writing box or area at home is great, you really need all your gear on you and quickly accessible when you want to send post cards on road trips.

My husband is always off to the next town after we pick up post cards, so if I want the post mark to match the town on the card, I have to get that sucker in a mailbox and fast!! This little number just jumped to the top of my wish list!

This sweet Etsy shop is probably for scrapbooking, but I can only see the endless possibilities for other paper crafts! Cards and stationary galore! Super cute papers!

I am also in love with the clip art.

Now that I have a bean field out my back window, this clip art is so fitting it hurts!

These wee notebooks are too cute to not post, though I’m not totally sure what I’d put in them. Maybe a nice, long, catch-up style letter? Or maybe they could be shared, long distance journals (!), now there’s something I haven’t done since junior high!

 

it occurs to me that I have no actually posted any stationary! Maybe next week I’ll have some to post. For now, I’m loving these finds and maybe I’ll spend part of this week making some stationary for my friends!! I will keep you posted!

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The Carputer

Nerdy

When I refer to myself as nerdy, I’m not sure I can possibly convey to you just what kind of nerdy I qualify as, and exactly how nerdy I am capable of being. Everything I know about computers I learned from my husband, actually I knew how to use the PINE email program at the university, but that was it when we met. Our childhood experiences with technology were not at all similar, by the time I met him he was building his own computers and restoring discarded laptops, and maybe borrowing some internet from neighbours and writing irc bots all night. I? Was not. So over the years all I’ve ever known is the nerdiest of nerdy – I know my husband feels responsible for creating a monster, I’ve been so hilariously sheltered from how normal people use their computers. I only discovered a few years ago that people actually just plug their computer directly into the internet! What?! No firewall? No router? Nothing? Or that there are people without an email address.

After going from knowing nothing about technology to referring to my BlackBerry as a appendage, when my husband announced he was installing a computer in the car I was not only not at all surprised, I was so very excited! Immediately, I started calling it The Carputer. Because right?! He was very lucky in that he came across one of those treasures of Craigslist, a man who didn’t know the worth of what he had. We had to drive out to Ajax to get it, (of course it was Ajax, the TO burb I make fun of the most), it turns out the guy we bought it from was using it with a DVD player and thought it was clunky. O. M. G. We got the monitor, skinny keyboard, power supply and actual computer (all Xenarc) for $500. That’s probably about 1/3 of what it’s worth. Hooray for others not doing their homework.

The monitor is a touch screen, it also has a remote with it to move the cursor, but the touch screen works so well I’ve never used the remote. The monitor needs to be mounted, so to check it out before we installed it, we set it up on my tripod.

Carputer Monitor

The next few steps are a little sketchy to me. I know he needed to add this port, and I know there was a lot of soldering going on in the garage. That night, he and Andrew installed the actual button on the dash to turn on the system in the trunk.

  
  

One they had that working, they just had to make it neater and hide all the cords under the carpet and door trims. Success! The first is the trunk view of the system, behind the backseat. It pops down into the car for easy access!

  

Then came the really fun part. No, we didn’t make out in the garage – well, maybe a little. The really fun part was mounting the monitor to the dash! We had spent over a week trying to figure out how to mount this sucker so the passenger could easily use it, but not take up any leg space. In the end he picked up a metal rod and a pivoting tripod head, and a few u-rings and bolts and he just bolted it to the side of the dash.

  

He had to drill both into the side of the dash and into the front (behind the stereo) so he could get his hand through to hold the u-ring in place to secure it.

  
  

 

So, halfway to Sudbury the following weekend, we tried it out for the first time on the road. I hit Twitter and chatted with Kit through Parry Sound and was impressed at the speed! The keyboard is really, really slim and tucks just between the passenger seat and the center console. Under the top of the mat by my feet is a USB hub and plugged into the cigarette lighter is the husband’s iPhone – we used internet tethering from it! We have a rocket stick now though, so next time we’ll be using that which will be much faster, though even the tethering worked fine!

It’s such a silly indulgence because really, I could have my netbook on my lap in the car, with either internet tethering off the iPhone or with the rocket stick, but the mounted monitor is a dream and the keyboard is so much lighter than the netbook. From start to finish this took about two weeks to pull together, and a lot of that was time spent on other projects. I think this qualifies as uber-nerdy.

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50 Things!

Crafty, Domestic, Healthy, Naughty, Nerdy, Pretty, Toronto

In the spirit of new blog friends, and good friends starting new blogs, I’m posting a rando ’50 Things’ list of stuff about me that isn’t too obvious. Consider it the intro I never wrote. I’d love to read your 50 things!

1. I got married when I was 19 and my husband was 21, and we just celebrated 10 years of marriage!

2. Our first child took us by surprise, it took four years of trying to have our second, and we patiently waited for our third (who arrived 3 years later).

3. I am a very good long distance friend. So many dear friends have left our amazing city for adventures in other countries and then settled there. I’ve also made some wonderful friends online over the years that are scattered all over the place.

4. My husband is a hard core computer geek and he works from home 100% of the time. I shudder to admit how many computers we have in the house – all actually doing something I swear.

5. I go to a big Sunday dinner at my 87 year old Grandmother’s house every Sunday where I get to see my parents, my sister, my aunt and my uncle.

6. Every weekend I host a knitting/board game night with my girlfriends and my sister, there are 5 ‘regulars’ and another 10 or so that are in and out from one week to the next.

7. I was born on University Avenue and am an unapologetic Toronto snob.

8. I am still very close with the two first friends I ever made in kindergarten.

9. I am firmly planted in 1996. Soundgarden is still my favourite band, Party of Five never gets old and I still say ‘duh’ and ‘rad’ like they never went out. However, I do not wear plaid flannel shirts or babydoll dresses with no stockings and mary janes like I did in 1996 – there are limits.

10. When I was 24, I was freaked out about turning 30. Now, I’m 29 and totally fine with it.

11. I am way more religious than I ever let on. Partly because it’s really none of your business and partly because I can’t help but feel people will look at me differently, even though I’m still just me.

12. I am still totally head over heels for my husband, and we are so into each other life is still spicy! Yes really.

13. I got hooked on fitness and nutrition after my third wee one was born. I work out 6 days a week and allow myself one cheater meal a week (but not on my off day lol).

14. I am the opposite of a helicopter parent. I really think it’s important for kids to do kid things like playing in the dirt and sneezing on each other and making messes and splashing in the tub (with the curtain or shower doors closed!)

15. I have 9 tattoos (both shoulders, back of my neck, side of my neck, right breast (scandal), right leg, left big toe and both wrists). Somehow, I don’t look like a biker. 😉

16. I am a 50s housewife to the bone. I own a closet full of cute dresses and only 2 pairs of pants. I cook almost all meals from scratch, handle the kids on my own, keep the house impossibly tidy and fetch my husband coffee. Sometimes with pearls on!

17. Ever since I got pregnant with my first wee one, I’ve been reading books on parenting and I have learned so much. I also read heaps of classic fiction and my friend Romi has got me into new fiction – which I also love.

18. I learned to knit 6 years ago and I loooove it. I feel like I hardly knit anymore, but I still do. My preferred thing to knit is socks and small creatures. I taught a bunch of my girlfriends how to knit a few years ago and now one of them knits way more than I do.

19. I’ve been off and on with blogging a lot, but lately I’m so in love with it I can’t picture stepping away again. I think I just needed to find my groove.

20. I got hit with awful postpartum anxiety and it lasted a year. I am terrified of it happening again, so no more wee ones. Otherwise? I’d have two (hundred) more. I recently feel like I’m coming to be ok with this and really, if I had a fourth would I have a fifth? Where is the line? I live in a major city!

21. I call my Dad at least once a day, sometimes more. He gives good advice, has great recipe ideas and is really good at listening. I refuse to believe that one day he wont be there, I’ll cross that bridge when I get to it.

22. I am more addicted to my BlackBerry than I care to admit. But it tends to keep me off my actual computer during the day.

23. I aspire to be an amazing gardener, but I’m not very good and mostly just resent my flower beds for allowing weeds to sprout. I’ve also been known to say ‘I wish my lawn was emo so it would cut itself’ (yes, I stole that from a tshirt).

24. I won a beauty pageant when I was 8. My mother was terrified of pageant moms and didn’t encourage me to go to to the next level – which I am so thankful for!

25. I quit smoking over 2 years ago!

26. I have dyed my hair every colour possible in the last 14 years. Currently, it is black with blonde chunks. Yes, I am ‘that’ girl. I even sometimes rock the guido poof!

27. When people say ‘and Becky was all like, OMG, I know!’, they’re talking about me.

28. I have broken my right ankle 5 times, all my fingers and toes at least once, and my left arm once.

29. I took pre-law in university and honestly thought I’d be able to put my kids in child care and go off to law school and be a lawyer. Maybe when they’re all grown.

30. I’ve given birth three times. First and third were natural, second time I had an epi and later wished I hadn’t.

31. My husband and I have a monthly date night, even though we hang out every night.

32. My three favourite magazines are Martha Stewart Living, Cosmo and Today’s Parent. Which is actually a pretty good layout of my life. 😉

33. I caught chicken pox from my sister when I was 14. It sucked.

34. I love really, really bad television. Like Bromance and Paris Hilton’s new BFF. I know it’s awful but I can’t help it.

35. I could play Mario Kart everyday and I played an 8 hour game of Mario Party last year.

36. My husband and I are huge on movies and watch at least a few every week.

37. I have a serious crush on Anderson Cooper.

38. I once dropped a butcher knife in the top of my right foot and I had to *pull it out*. Yuck.

39. I used to hate cars and never wanted to learn to drive or buy one. Then my husband got his license and a car last year and now we go on road trips all the time and I loooove having a car.

40. It is eerie how quickly and easily I adapt to new situations and circumstances.

41. Our favourite date night activity is going to the drive in <3 42. I wear makeup every day, even if I stay home all day. 43. I used to drink 3 + cans of pop a day. This year, I quit! 44. I have alarmingly ugly 70s tile in my kitchen and I embrace it. My dear friend Brigitte made me an apron from matching fabric. Bless! 45. I keep a 'quote book' file on my BlackBerry to record all the hilarity that goes on with my girlfriends, my husband and our kids. The funniest quote is too graphic to even put here! 46. My bestie, aka my girl soul mate, aka Talea moved 5 hours away almost 5 months ago and we both feel like we lost a limb. We text and Facebook message each other like we’re 17.

47. I really love red wine. I didn’t at all until a few years ago when the above-mentioned Talea got me hooked. Now, it’s all I drink, aside from theme drinks for parties, of course. Thanks for turning me into a wino!

48. I’m awesome at Monopoly and suck serious ass at charades.

49. I have drank my coffee black since I was 14.

50. Technically, I was a teen mom. My oldest was 3 months old when I turned 20.

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