Our Family

Us: Bill and I have been together since February 2009 and moved in together in July 2011 after we graduated from UCSD. He is attending Oregon State University in an Ecological and Biological Engineering PhD degree. I am assistant manager at a coffee shop in town. I want to go back to school in another year or so, and I figure that we'll have some pretty wonky schedules so I want to start getting in the right track with organization, cleaning, and money. And I'm going to share with you along the way!

The Fuzzies:
We adopted Meeko from the humane society soon after we moved to Oregon. She had just had some kittens and was looking for "a nice home to relax in." Ha! This girl is crazy- she's always chasing things and trying to get us to play fetch with her.

We adopted Percy from the same humane society a few months later. Her full name is Persephone and she is much more of a lazy cat. She likes to play sometimes, but would much rather hop on my lap and purr like a fiend and bite whatever book I'm reading. Or sit on the keyboard of my laptop.

The Scalies:

Bill got Speedy when he was young. She's probably about 20 now. For the longest time everyone thought she was a boy, until she came to live with us and I decided to figure out. After some googling turns out she's a girl!

Tonks was our first pet together. She is a Western Hognose and refuses to eat. She lost the tip of her tail this past halloween when Meeko got a little too interested in her. It was a rather traumatizing experience for all of us.

Blackberry Wine

Here in Oregon, blackberries grow like crazy. On the hill up to our house the roadside is covered in giant blackberry bushes. Each summer you can see tons of people walking along with pails and picking the most delicious berries with their kids or dogs or while they're on runs. Really, there are a bajillion and everyone loves them.

Well last winter Bill and I decided we would have a yearly tradition where we brew some sort of yummy drink. Last year we made some spiced hard cider which was amazing. This summer Bill thought it would be great to use some of these wonderful blackberries that are all around us. And tada! Blackberry wine!

Bill got pretty into picking berries. I was quite content to just wander around collecting berries, but Billy decided to go all out, decked in his battle gear- hiking socks, jeans, long sleeve shirts and gloves with a pitcher strapped to his belt. And this was August, so you can imagine how hot he was out there. He dove into those bushes and picked 80 pounds.

Look at those beautiful berries

So many berries! Our freezer was packed..and stained purple for weeks. I think Bill ended up collecting all of these between a couple weekends. 

We borrowed this press from the brew shop in town. Despite the horrible mess we made we still managed to fill a 5 gallon carboy.  After we pressed all the juice from the berries we decided to make a "second press" batch. scraped the pulp leftover in the press and added a bunch of water and sugar to it and juice concentrate.                         

Why are you taking a picture of something that's not me?

 Then we stuck it in the office for a couple months with some yeasty beasties.

Time to bottle! 

Theodore Geisel

I adore Dr. Seuss. I've been reading and listening to his stories since I can remember. I was right there with Sam, and Horton and the Onceler. These were the beautifully illustrated and tongue twisting fables that taught me so much more than the importance of hard work. Environmentalism, open mindedness, racism. These were real societal issues dressed up in little kid clothes.

I love it.

From Buzzfeed

At UCSD you pretty much have to love Seuss. Our real mascot is the Triton, but I think everyone identifies more with Seuss.

Here I am chillin' with my homies after graduation.

I'm really so obsessed I bought fabric and made myself a purse. It's pretty awesome. 

So thank you, Dr. Seuss. For everything. And explaining how to be a grown up.

Oops, I guess it's been a while since I posted. I've been promoted to assistant manager at work, and I'm really excited to implement some of the plans the manager and I have to make the store work more smoothly. I'm also excited for the raise and lots of hours :D.

One thing that is a bit of a bummer about it is that I will be closing 3 days a week, which puts a damper in dinner time planning with Bill. It does still leave 4 nights a week though, so it's not like we don't see each other, I guess it's just that we've got a pretty good routine going after 3 years.

I hope that having a really set schedule, and having enough hours that I don't need to pick up random shifts, will get me in a better schedule for housework and working out. The last couple weeks of not having to go to work until 2:30 have seen a lot of lounging around in my pjs killing time and making use of our new Roku and Hulu plus account. I also need to make school a priority even though I don't intend on applying for another year. I enjoy my job, and I'm really looking forward to making almost real money and tackling more things than just making food and drinks all day, but it's not my life-long career dream, so it is a little conflicting. No matter what the next year and a half will be a learning experiece and something to put on future applications.

Fabric Fun

 I've been hating the curtains that came with our apartment since the day we moved in. Ugly. Beige pleated canvas against a white wall *shudder*. Pinterest came to the rescue once I saw 365 Days to Simplicity no sew Roman shades. Hello beautiful. Of course our windows are juuuust wide enough that fabric won't quite stretch, so we put some ribbon on the edges with iron on adhesive. We followed the directions from the link using hot glue to attach the blinds on the the fabric.

In the last picture you can see the storage ottoman that we reupholstered the top of. The pleather had melted from Speedy's tank. We just took the top off by unscrewing the hinges and wrapped it like a present. Stapled with a staple gun and we have a whole new ottoman!

Thanks be to Goodwill

Goodwills in Oregon are amazing. Well at least the ones I've been to. We picked these babies up last weekend.

Fab mirror for $20

Lamp I am in love with - $6

It's a nice mirror, but it needed something more. Something....yellow.

Add in a cheap shelf from Home Depot painted a glossy gray

Meeko helped.

Put it all together and what have ya got?

I love it. I really just want to stare at it all day.

Back to the lamp. Billy found this link on making a lampshade out of paper. I had actually just been to JoAnns and bought a poster board, a metal 8" ring, and some some wire. Billy folded the poster, we hot glued the ring inside the top and wired around the ring to it would hang on the lamp.

It's perfect!

Resolutions

Resolution update!

1) I've been going to the gym 5 times a week and feel really good about it. I had a session with the personal trainer testing out my "fit score" (hmmmmm) and have another one next week where we can figure out a good work out system for me. Also I went to Zumba last night and LOVED it. So much fun. So yay working out!

2) Organizing-- well mostly we're been focusing on making the living room, but I hope to have get the office pretty before next weekend.

3) Crafty a go go! making the living room pretty is totally getting to my craft receptors!

4) Reading- I got bored with my book. Oops.

5) School- I've been researching some school and job options. I should be getting apps together this week!


So far so good. Here's to you, New Year.