Chickens With Their Heads Cut Off...

Graphic title. I know. I hope whatever mental image you just got was not too horrible. I have actually seen a chicken without a head though. My grandparents had chickens years back, and eventually the chickens became a meal. My cousins and I kinda helped prepare the chickens...

That is so not what this post is about though. Well not directly at least. I have felt like a chicken with its head cut off though. This last week has been absolutely crazy. Like ridiculously busy and stressful. 

Brett and I finally finished school for the semester. Brett loaded like 18 some odd credits for his criminology major this semester. Finishing with the ugliest finals I have ever heard of. I think he said he had a research paper due in every single one of his classes. Like giant research papers, ones that I would never even attempt to complete. The kinda that I cry in front of the computer over. 

I took some photography and photo editing classes this semester. I took classes that I knew I would enjoy, because when you are pregnant and in school, you don't want to be in school. I figured that if the classes were happy classes I might not hate life so much. The hardest thing I had to do was find time for homework. At least finals weren't too bad. I had a big shooting final that was nearly impossible to find a suitable subject to photograph. However, neither of us failed any classes, two thumbs up.

Then, there has been all this baby preparing going on around here. Like baby gear and stuff. However, I don't think anyone is ever truly ready for a baby. While Krista was here in April she helped Brett and I finish up some baby shopping, but there was still the nursery to put together. I recently finished the armoire for baby's room, attached bedding, washed some baby outfits, packed diaper and hospital bags. It's all so exciting.

Finally, the straw on the camels back. Work. Brett has been working a lot, like he always is. This is my last week of work before I go out on maternity leave. The last six weeks of work have been so busy. I have been trying to get all my clients in so that as few people as possible have to come in while I am out. I have squeezed clients into my books where I didn't even think they could fit. My last day of work is supposed to be the 21st if May, but at the beginning of the month I decided that I was done with it all. Done with being pregnant and done with working while pregnant, and on the 14th I clock out of work for at least six weeks. Maybe longer. 

So now we are on the countdown. Waiting to meet our baby and crazy thing is life is about to even more busy than it is now.

April 22nd, 2010: Work

I quit PostedProperties.com and am now a full time stylist at Ulta!

The end.

Announcements, Stories, and Shreds of Unimportant Information

Apparently it's been awhile since I sat down to type a blog. Ironic as it may be, I have hours of free time in front of a computer; I choose to watch The Biggest Loser and The Office. Because of my lack of blogging, I will soon be flooding my computer screen with meaningless words in an effort to document the first quarter of 2010.

Get ready for our announcements, stories, and shreds of unimportant information. I promise that it will be mostly boring, but you will find at least one sentence that will bring a bit of excitement/happiness to your heart.

Announcement.

When Brett and I purchased our Costco Membership for the first time, we took a step towards growing up. Costco is kinda a big thing. It was a little scary having to be responsible for the $100 minimum purchases we would be making for the rest of our lives, but we have acclimated to shopping in a giant warehouse. But, at the end of April, we really have to start calling ourselves adults. Real grownups. Homeowners.

And I'm excited.

We are in the process of purchasing our first home and are set to be in it by mid April. As for the location, I choose not to disclose any more of my not so personal life on the internet than necessary. You know how to reach me if you really want to know. For now, I'll just say for most people, it's far.

We decided to build our home, which is a process that takes forever. Lucky for you, I'll be posting boring pictures of my framed house, followed by carpet-less floors, and finally some finished walls.

If you are wondering why you didn't hear about this news sooner, Brett and I had a mess of paperwork to sort through and didn't want to announce anything until we were 100% positive we really wanted to do some growing up. If you heard from someone other than us, I am sorry I didn't get to tell you the exciting news and we can talk later. If you are just as excited as I am, then come over and help me paint, lay tile, and landscape a backyard.

And if you ever meet President Obama, tell him things for the eight grand for me.

Story.

Like most people, we spend the majority of our money on food. So we decided to really focus on making a dinner menu and try our best to stick to it. Brett has been the most wonderful husband and cooks dinner as much as I do, if not more. However, as much as I would love to continue to praise him in all his awesomeness, I can't help but drench this blog entry with the worst dinner he has ever made.

The recipe is called Hunter's Style Chicken. It's something that my mom got from an aunt of mine, and it came along into our little family of two. It ends up being this sort of tomato "slop" on top of rice. This recipe is as follows:

Cooked rice

2 large chicken breasts cooked and cut into bite size pieces

1/2 pound of bacon 

1 large onion 

28 oz  diced canned tomatoes

1 bottle Heinz 57 steak sauce

1/4 cup sugar

Cook bacon, drain and set aside. Using 1 tablespoon of bacon grease, cook onions until tender. Add chicken, cooked bacon, tomatoes, 57 sauce, and sugar. Stir and let simmer on low until warm. Serve over cooked rice.

One evening brett gets home from work. The kitchen is a complete mess and dinner isn't made (I was probably being lazy that day). So, I offer Brett the privilege of dishes or dinner. He chooses to cook dinner since the dishes are bad, really bad. He pulls out the recipe card and starts to make dinner as I clean the kitchen. Brett gets out a cutting board and a knife, and in his best Julia Child voice gives instructions on how to properly cut an onion. I laugh.

Twenty minutes or so go by, the dish washer is running and I'm drying and putting away the remaining dishes. Pans go under the cookie making canisters, cookie sheets go under the spice jars. Brett is almost done with the "slop" part of the meal and is about to move on to cooking the rice. I bend down to put a pan away and as I come back up I notice that he left the lid to one of the canisters open (he always does that). Right and I am silently complaining in my head, I realize that the canister he left open was the once that holds the salt. I close my eyes and say to him, "You didn't just put salt in the dinner, did you?" Brett says with confused confidence, "No... oh crap!" Instead of following the directions for 1/4 cup of sugar, he added 1/4 cup of salt. I don't think we even go through that much salt in a year!

Brett leaves the kitchen crushed with hunger and falls to the ground. He just ruined dinner. My Julia Child husband ruined dinner. I get the guts to taste it, thinking it wasn't too bad. Nope, it was bad. Brett was on the ground still talking about how much that meal just cost and we aren't eating any of it.

So I did some thinking.

I poured our dinner into a colander and rinsed it off in the sink. One by one, I taste each remaining ingredient. Chicken, still good. Bacon salty but acceptable. Tomatoes, not bad. Onions horrible. So I needed to replace the onion, not a problem.

But I just dumped $3.50 of steak sauce and tomato juice down the drain. I go to the panty, tomato soup should replace the juice just fine, but dinner should have been done already and I hate going to the grocery store and I don't even have time to go to the grocery store.

Well, little does half the world know, but the internet has everything on it including a recipe for Heinz 57 steak sauce. Brett found a recipe and we were one step close to eating dinner. A little bit of ranch, chili powder, apple juice, ketchup, pepper, and Italian seasoning makes Heinz 57 Sauce. 

Dinner was served and tasted just fine.

Bon Appetite.

Unimportant Information.

I'm currently an Ulta Stylist.

I recently got a position as a stylist at an East Valley Ulta. I spent $17,000 on a cosmetology education and was doing nothing with it.

The salon is great, the girls are great,  the clientele is great. The tips are wonderful. My discount is awesome. It's close to my new home. But... I still have my full-time job with Posted Properties and am still enrolled in school full-time. I work weekends, and I occasionally clean the bathroom.

So, come see me and get your hair done!

PostedProperties.com

I figured that since I finally know all my responsibilities at my new job, that I'd quickly blog about it. A few weeks ago I had posted that I had just gotten offered the job. At that time I was a bit confused as to who I was working for. I thought it was RedBrick Reality, it's not.

I work for a company called PostedProperties.com. They are a bidding service for clients who want to purchase foreclosed homes at auction. We do the majority of the research for our clients. Then, they offer a bid for a property and we take it down to the trustee sales and place their bids. There is a lot more that goes on than just that, but I gave you the condensed version.

Now about this job.

I had my first day of work the week of Christmas. It turns out that December is the slowest time of year for foreclosures.  As a result, my first two weeks of work were extremely boring. But let's not move too fast. 

Week one at work was extremely confusing. Everything they showed me to do on the computer was easy. Research sales dates and times, and check for IRS liens. But it's never easy trying to catch up on the lingo your job uses. Your coworkers get so used to using acronyms, nicknames, industry specific terms, and inside jokes that you are always fives steps behind. But the work it self was simple. I was pretty bored after about three hours of work though.

Week two was completely different. See I have like three bosses. Well maybe four or five, I'm not sure. There is Doug who owns RedBrick Reality and PostedProperties.com, then there is "Laser" who does all the operations and office stuff, Damon who deals with the clients and makes everyone laugh. Steve, he is a bit intimidating, he is the bidding manager and is usually out of the office when I am in, but he's cool too. Everyone I work with is cool. There are few other employees but they aren't current to this story right now. So for the duration of week one Laser wasn't there. He was away for the holidays and he know what my job is. So when he decided to finally show back up to work I wasn't so bored anymore. He made my job a little more clear and gave me more things to do. So I guess if anyone is my manager, Laser is. 

And now weeks three is over and I think we are back to being fully functional. Apparently January is the busiest month, or so I hear. So you bet that when Monday came, I actually had to work. As a matter of fact I put in over 40 hours of work this week. It's been a long time since that has happened. 

I like my job, a lot actually. I saw an old friend this weekend and we talked about my new job. She called me a nerd and said I would be one to like a desk job with lots of computer time. It's true. I really am a nerd. I even enjoy my video games and wear glasses, sometimes.

The end.

RedBrick Realty

I am happy to report that I found a job and I start Monday.

Yay! I will have a regular schedule, with regular hours, and I won't have to be sitting at home anymore. I'll be working as an administrative assistant for RedBrick Realty and hopefully I'll be super busy. Let's face it I love being busy.

As for hair, well I need to figure that out. As soon as I get settled into this new job I'll get around to making that work.  I am thinking about working Saturdays and maybe one night, somewhere. Like I said, I need to figure it out at some point.

Anyways, I am super excited.

Unexpected Situations, New Obsessions, and Good Deals

I guess I am a liar. I promised a post weeks ago. Better late then never. Ooops.

Yesterday, when I was thinking about the promise I made to post, I realized that I'm bad at posting because life right now is just kinda slow. I don't have a ton to report on. I have three minor categories of life to expound on. That's pretty much all you are going to get.

Unexpected situations. This category is pretty much an all encompassing title for the events in my life.

No one expects to get sick: unless you are sharing a lollipop with a sick person. Brett and I got sick. Not due to a lollipop. Brett decided to go help out in 5th grade where his sister teaches. Apparently all but nine of the kids were out at once due to illness. Brett has his own personal version of the swine flu, again, which included massive headaches, a vicious cough, a sniffly nose, and a few body aches. Several days later I got sick. Just a basic cold followed by five days of having no voice.

Meanwhile, I have been working at the salon. It's slow, I'm enjoying it though. After working in this particular salon/studio for about three weeks, the lady I rented from called and asked if I wanted to take over her lease. Now, I knew that she eventually wanted someone to take it over, but I was thinking at least six months from now. Unexpected. Anyways, Brett and I are looking into taking her up on her offer. I'll keep you updated on that. Next.

This category is probably my favorite. New Obsessions.

About three years ago my supervisor from Best Buy tried to get me onto the whole TV shows bandwagon. I had already committed my Monday TV time to How I Met Your Mother and Heroes and he wanted me to try getting into The Office. So I tried. I started with season one, watched two episodes, and had about had it with the rudeness of Michael Scott, I handed seasons one and two back to him and said yeah right. Well these days I still find time where I am bored out of my mind, so I put my Netflix account to good use. I had a The Office marathon. I started with season one at 1AM Sunday morning and got caught up with about five episodes of season six Wednesday afternoon. I didn't get much done around the house for a few days. Needless to say Brett is also hooked on the shows, but is taking his time getting through the five seasons we have missed. We often find ourselves talking about Jim and Pam and sometimes find instances to quote Michael with a "that's what she said" joke.

Obsession number two is all mine. I love decorating my apartment and can't wait to have a home to decorate. So as part of decorating my home I love fixing furniture, art, and making pillows for my home. My mom had acquired a bench that had a broken leg, everything else was in good shape, but the color didn't go with what I had going on. So my mom and I reupholstered it. It came out so good! So if anyone had furniture you are thinking about getting rid of, don't.

And finally good deals. These always make me smile.

My aunt had called one Friday morning, waking me up to a Nyquil hangover and no voice, to tell about some great furniture that was at the Mesa Auction. I drug my butt out of bed and my mom and I met her down at the auction house to see what they had. So much freakin cute furniture. So we planned out what furniture we wanted to try to get and how much we were willing to pay. Seriously, I feel like I stole the furniture, I got such a good deal.

I picked up some nice filing cabinets that go for $100 a piece at Ikea. I got three for $25 each. I also fell in love with a funky lamp for $35. So here is how the story goes. I had to work the night of the auction. I had sent my mom and my deal expert aunt to go get these filling cabinets and lamp for me. After I had finished doing hair for the night, Brett and I hurried our butts down to the auction to pick up our filling cabinets and to check out the rest of the auction. Brett was shocked at how nice some of the furniture was and how cheap it was going for. My mom was eyeing this curio cabinet/china hutch. She had decided though that she wasn't going to bid on it. After this beautiful cabinet has sold for $265 the auctioneer had said that there were two more available new in box to anyone else who wanted them. My aunt and I were very bad influences and panicked my mom with the amazing deal and she bought it. We later found out that this curio cabinet sold for $2200 at retail. We saw a Pioneer Elite TV go for $900. The bidding started at $500 and no one was taking it. I wanted to bid on it so bad. These deals we just so crazy.

I also got a peak at my Christmas present. Well, it wasn't a peak. I had also been eyeing this pub table. So freakin' cute. But, I didn't want to spend any more money and decided that if it went over $150 I wasn't going to bid on it. It started too high for me. So there goes my aunt bidding on it. It was sad. Then she won the bid. Being the brat that I am, I pretty much asked for her to leave it to me in her will. My mom then looks at my aunt and says, "Should I tell her?" which totally made me curious. My aunt was upset and stuck her tongue out at me. And then my mom tells me that she just bought my Christmas present. I was so excited! I apologized to my aunt, she really wanted to table too. Unfortunately, Christmas is still weeks away, so my table isn't in my home right now. It was fun though. A bit of an adrenaline rush.

That is all I have to report. We have family in town for Thanksgiving, so maybe I'll post some pictures of my niece and nephews.

Growing Up

I'm not sure exactly how I feel about this. Well, growing up in general I'm totally against. But the growing up I'm talking about involves a big girl job.

Translation. I'm working in a salon now. Official stylist status.

It's called Bourgeois Salon, www.bourgeoishair.com, and it's this studio salon. It's super cute. So tell all your friends that are looking for a stylist to come and see me.

Welcome to the real world.

I'm Licensed

I passed my theory exam. I passed my practical. That means I am officially a cosmetologist.

Dear Friends and Family

So, it has come to my attention that blogging left my vocabulary sometime around September and has not returned until... now. Actually, mid-December I redid the background thinking that the white simple look would inspire me to write more, but that did no good whatsoever. So, as I delay my bedtime, I'll attempt to recall the last few months of 2008.

I do have a very good excuse for not being a committed blogger, and I am sure that Carly will forgive me for not giving her updates to read up on. 

Hair school has been kicking my butt since August 4th people! Don’t think for one second that hair school is supposed to be easy. I spent my first three months in a classroom that is 92% girl, and for anyone that knows me well enough I don’t do well with girls. I suppose I am in the wrong industry, I mean, I can handle being friends with a few of them, but level with me: girls are a handful. My first three months of school were solely dedicated to learning the basics. Then sometime in November, I can’t remember when, I tested out of basic. I totally don’t mean to brag, but between my written and practical grades, I averaged a 98%. So I was proud of all my hard work. Since then I have been taking clients and have been doing their hair. Anything from going back blonde, to old lady rollers, to the terrifying mens cuts. It’s been stressful though. Unfortunately, the school I go to has some very rude teachers, so plenty of words have been exchanged. I do have a couple of great teachers though. I am enjoying it though and am doing something I like. I will be done in July and just want to get there.

Back in July Brett tested for the Mesa Police Department and passed all his exams very well. However, for some reason the economy is down, I don’t know! I guess that equals no money for hiring officers. Pretty much all Arizona cities are on a hiring freeze for officers. And so school continues.

Christmas came and went. I spent the holiday with mostly Brett’s family. Krista, Andy, and their two kids Carly and Parker were here from DC. The kids were a blast to have. We all spent plenty of time playing on the Wii. Casey came down from Provo as well. Brett got an acoustic guitar for Christmas and I got Mario Kart and Rockband 2. 


Now, we are just here. Brett is getting ready to start up with school again and I trudge on with six months to go. And that is all I intended to write, a brief update.

July Update

July went by so fast. Brett and I have been doing pretty good. He's still working for the mailing company and waiting to hear back from the Mesa Police Department. He's been through so many different tests to try and get into the academy. His most recent interviews were background checks. We was asked a bunch of questions about things he has or hasn't done. Some were weird others weren't. The officer that interviewed him teased him on his almost perfect background. The only dent he has is getting suspended from school for water balloons at a sports assembly, some people got wet.

I’m currently employed at Best Buy, still. However, I’m enjoying not having to work there. Sounds strange right? Well basically I work a four hour shift once every other week, sometimes longer. The best part is that my discount still works. After my mom decided to break her foot, I tagged along with her on the pool route to make sure she didn’t break anything else. That lead to me being a pool cleaner too. So now I spend a few hours each morning cleaning pools on my own route. I now quote with my mother that “I drop acid everyday” she is such a good example. Starting August fourth, I’ll be back in school again. But this time I get to do exactly what I want to do. I’ll be at Empire Beauty School. I call it hair school, much easier to get out than cosmetology school. School came with a nice price though, seventeen grand. Thank you Uncle Sam for fronting the money. Anyways, I am excited.

Our APX Lives

 That is Alvin my piñata. As you have read in previous blogs, out little family has a wonderful birthday tradition. So for my birthday we got a very tough piñata and let him drive home. I'll leave some pictures so you can check out the fun we had. Bryan was the entertainment.

Selling alarms sucks. It is hard work. You go around and just bug people all day long. Our days start at noon with an awesome meeting usually ran by our fearless leader Lance. Then by about 1:30 PM we are out bugging people. When it starts to get dark, around nine, we head home and finish out night partying. Partying translates into feeding the unmarried kids and talking about the crazy people we knock into. That is what we have been doing this summer. Six days a week. Oh yeah, on Saturdays it is even better. We start our meeting at nine and come home around ten. I our office did well that week, we get to all go out to eat on APX.

Chicago, IL

There really isn’t an easy way to talk about Chicago in a blog. I mean what ever I type is just simple words that are boring on their own. You’re going to have to look at the pictures. We had so much fun. The city is so cool. Everything is different. I surely haven’t seen anything like it in Arizona. We just played in the city. There is so much to see. 

We spent an afternoon at Wrigley Field watching the Diamondbacks lose to the Cubs. Baseball life in Chicago is amazing. You are either a Cubs fan you a Sox fan. So being from Arizona, we were easily spotted. Lots of people made fun of us but we sympathetic, and told us to enjoy the Wrigley Field experience. The fans there are fun. They sing songs when the game is over, they put flags up counting their wins and losses. Everyone wears something to show team spirit. And the food, best food we had in Chicago. Their hot dogs were so good.

The Sky Deck/ Sears Tower. That was cool, but expensive for an elevator ride. You can see the entire city of Chicago from just one building. They make it all cool and fancy though. They make you watch a video and strategically place gift shops at doors. You can see all the places you’ve been and even more places that you’d want to go. Did you know the building was explained to an architect with a pack of cigarettes?

Then there is Millennium Park and Navy Pier. Whoever though of THE BEAN was awkwardly creative. That shape is fun. It made for some cool pictures. There is also the face water fountain. I’m not sure what its official name is but we liked it. We tried to make a replica shot from the movie “Bruce Almighty” when he walks on water. Navy Pier was the perfect location for my first Ferris Wheel ride.

There was so much to do in Chicago. 


We made it one day the Ukrainian Village. 


Chicago was just a ton of fun.