Tina Butter

I'm Dumb

2012-02-08T19:42:00.000-08:00

I've always known I'm dumb...I say stupid things and no one ever teached me how to spoke...or how to think a thought in my head before opening my mouth. I've never been able to remember something past the point of rehearsing in my head the phrase "i won't forget that...how could i forget it...i'm thinking about it right now!"

I really never thought I could go downhill from where I was, but then I got knocked up. I have a serious case of the pregnancy brains.

Zero in: I've joined a yoga class with my other pregnant friend. Feeling inadequate and fat compared to the rest group, I'm a tad nervous...but doing pretty good to keep the awkward fidgets and sweats under wraps. I pretend like I've done this before. I set my mat up, sit on it cross legged in my stretchy pants and meditate. The yoga instructor comes up to me, notebook in hand, and calmly asks if she can get my information. I'm excited to tell her all about anything she asks, cause I of course love to talk about myself and my pregnancy is at the top of my list for things I like to share every detail about to anyone who will listen...
"what's your name?"
"Tina Wilde"
"how do u spell that?"
"T-I-N-Y and then wild with an E"
"And how pregnant are you?"
"11 wee...." glancing down at her paper, I see the word "tiny" written in place of my name.
idiot. i regret to inform all of you that this did not just happen once.

I take you to another pivotal moment. I'm at a birthday party for a girl in my ward. We've just sung happy birthday and we're eating cake. We get talking about babies and when it is a good time to have babies so they can have good birthdays. We each tell our stories about how our birthdays have significantly affected our lives (white people problems) and I interrupt the birthday girl who is in the middle of telling us about her own story..."when's your birthday?"
"February 7th..."
everyone gives me 'the look'...you know the one, the one you give people when you pity them and their obvious struggles in life being that dumb. This carries on for longer than it should while I smile my cute, innocent smile and think quietly to myself about how nice it would be to have a birthday in February.
"....today, Tina....her birthday is today."

Don't worry, I completely understand why I don't make friends well.

And today, I was chatting with my coworkers about the weather. We like to do that since we have nothing in common because they could all easily pass as my grandmother. At one point in the conversation, wanting to contribute, I decide to spit out "ya, tomorrow morning it was really cold out". I once again didn't even realize anything and kept waiting for the conversation to carry on. I once again got 'the look'.

I hate that look. I got it enough before and now I'm averaging a steady 2-3 times a day. Even if I didn't have pregnancy brain and could count to 100 without screwing up, I couldn't count how many times Al has said "you're kidding me right?? We JUST talked about that"...cue 'the look'.

Baby in my belly, you are completely worth it. I love you and your little fart kicks all day long. :)

pop POP

2012-01-16T19:58:00.000-08:00

Well the last few weeks of our little pregnancy lala life has been really quite exciting. My ittty bitty baby started showing itself in the form of my chubby belly, and I don't think anything has ever made me more pleased. So I thought I'd post an extra large picture of myself on my blog because I'm very proud of my big bellaaay. This is actually me TODAY.....almost like an action shot. That should make up for the last few months of my hideous blogging history, riiiiight?

So I am 17 weeks tomorrow and another fantastic thing that happened was getting over the whole "I'm constantly nauseous and miserable" ordeal. It's gone and I think it's staying away for goodsies. It has been a few weeks without and I feel like catwoman or spiderman or something... pretty sure I can conquer the world. Also, I think even I would make a better catwoman than Anne Hathaway. WTH?

Anne Hathaway as cat woman: bad news. Life outside closing my eyes and whimpering in my recliner: good news.

Aaaand although the pregnancy emotions are here to stay, they were pretty much here the whole time so Al should be used to them by now. I just try to avoid conversations with other couples about how often their wife's cry...cause he really doesn't need to hear that sort of thing.

And one more special surprise for you today....we have a new camera so you don't have to see just iPhone pics anymore! Hooray! For Christmas, we bought a digital SLR...Canon T2i????...if you really want to know ask Al because I was on the couch whimpering. I posted some of the new pics on Facebook and got 0 response from them, so you're only getting a few cause my feelings are hurt...and I'm a pregnant emotional wreck that doesn't handle rejection well.

So I welcome you to the new camera....for a new and improved BLOG....maybe....well, same blog, you'll just be able to see the zits on my face better now.

Christmas Day, Al put a shirt on a blown up cardboard cutout of Benson and scared the heebidy jeebidties out of his mom.

Me in the greatest outfit I've ever received on Christmas morning opening my new Wok. It is wrapped in a towel. And this picture gets put on here mainly because I'd like you to check out the the residue on my leg. Toothpaste from the day before's shower. Yes, I brush my teeth in the shower. It also made me barf a few times in the shower. But that's not barf, it's toothpaste.

I think this picture looks like it should be in a magazine. Probably The Ensign. Bishop Wilde and his first and second favorite grandbaby, Levi. We got to meet Levi over the holidays and I must say I just loved that little fella. What a chubby darling little thing...I LOVE BABIES.

Probably the best part of my Christmas holidays. This girl is hilarious. And this picture of her in her princess dress covered in jewelery is just so typical Chlobutt. Her lips aren't getting any smaller, if you didn't notice. And she thought it was really cute to touch my belly to poke "her baby cousin" so that was just kind of adorable.

No, I never shower and my hair is always in a really ugly bun. Over the holidays, Al didn't shower much either. Luckily we have a camera that can capture it all in it's beauty.

I did shower for Al's birthday. And made him a cake. It is the first cake I've made him...yup, just stick with me and maybe four years later I'll do something nice for you.

Effortless artistry (by me).

Well, FOR CUTE! so handsome he is!

Secrets

2012-01-02T10:00:00.000-08:00

While we were home at my mom's house for Christmas, my uncle and his wife who I only see about twice a year came to visit. It was Christmas Eve so everyone was over at the house including all five babies. My uncle sat next to me on the couch and starting asking me about what we were up to...and I asked him what was new with his family cause I'm super polite like that. He told me his daughter in law was pregnant and then immediately after said "whoops, I don't think I'm supposed to tell anyone that..." Luckily, five babies make quite a bit of noise so I was the only one who heard it....and I promised him I wouldn't say anything and would act like nothing eeeever even happened (clearly enjoying my uncle bonding time). Well about 2.5 minutes later, my aunt starting chatting me up and about 10 seconds into that conversation I asked her (proclaiming to absolutely everyone in the room)..."so is (insert cousin's name here) going to find out what she's having??!?!"

Oops.

It was sufficiently awkward.

Moral of the story...I am awful at keeping secrets.

Another moral of the story...I've been keeping a pretty LARGE secret for the past three months and it's been....well it's been interesting. I just try not to speak unless spoken to and that's seemed to work...kind of. Good thing the people I did accidentally tell are excellent at keeping secrets!

Yup, we're having a baby!! We were so excited to find out that we didn't even put the cap back on the pee stick. Just waved that pee around for all to see...like the proud parents we are.

Our baby is due sometime around June 27. The dates are a little wonky but it's sometime around then. We had an ultrasound really early and the tech told me I was nine weeks but whoever transcribed the ultrasound report typed 8 weeks...gotta hate those transcriptionists.

Here's a pic of when we very first found out. And when I was still exercising and feeling like a functioning human being. That was a nice feeling...if I remember correctly..

Just a few weeks later. Before my boobs were the size of watermelons.

And this was at like 10 weeks or something...I'm now about 15 and look much chubbier than this. And seriously, my boobs are giant.

Being pregnant is really quite hilarious. I had no clue pregos felt this sick...and bawling your eyes out at the Kindergarten Christmas Concert is normal...right?

We're just so very happy about our lives right now. I just keep thinking about all the love we have in our lives and feeling so blessed to have it. And so incredibly blessed to be able to share that love with our little nugget.

I couldn't ask for a better baby daddy. I have one more day before he goes back to school...so I'm going to go enjoy it. I'm even offered to go play basketball with him...yes, that's how in love I am!

Virtual Tour

2011-10-27T11:14:00.000-07:00

As previously promised to a total of 2 people (of whose opinions I obviously hold of upmost prestige), I took some pictures of my house and am posting them. I even got out the old point and shoot, even though I am 100% positive Al's 4G takes 100% better pictures. I think my point and shoot started giving me attitude when I had it set up on three books on the back of the couch doing a balancing act while me and my roomates made a dancing movie. Needless to say, it dropped and broke for a few days. It did come back to life, but has SUCKED ever since.

Enjoy your grainy pictures. Any complaints, send some money for me to afford a new cam.

Our kitchen is my favorite. I thought that I would hate how closed off it is, but I ended up obsessed with it. It's like my own little space and I love the cupboards and counter top. The floor is disgusting and I can't believe I missed that cup on our portable dishwasher. I tried so hard to move all the messes BEHIND me so they weren't in the shoot, but you can't win em all can ya? Sometimes, that cup wins.

The living/dining room. I really have nothing to say except that in front of the map is where our other couch is going to go and taking a picture of a chandelier is hard work and I made that deer head out of foam board. It is seriously so ugly but it took so much freaking bloody time that I decided to hang it up. That little wood table in front of the couch serves a lot more purpose than our dining room table...which is still our favorite J, don't worry.

I like the arches in our house....including the front entrance. The shoe organization going on here is an extremely rare occurence. Savor it.

This is the duvet cover I made the other day! I found this fabric at thrift village (I sound so cool) and was like "I'm going to make a duvet cover out of this, and a dress, and a little girls matching dress, and put some of it into the quilt I'm making!" turns out I didn't even have enough for the duvet cover, but I made it work. I LOOVE IT.

Try to ignore that laundry hamper. That thing is a DUMP. I've had it since I was like 14 and obsessed with black and my mom let me paint my room black and dresser black and dye my hair black...and get a black laundry hamper. why mom? why? look at that, i just officially got too lazy for proper punctuation...oh my gosh i'm going to fall aslsldfkseeeeep.

This is the dresser I painted. You can't really see the color that great in this shot, but it's maroon and I LOVE IT too. I love everything about our room except the laundry hamper. Oh look, I'm capitalizing again. Special.

And here is where Al is ALWAYS. He is supposed to build shelves in here to put his disgusting amount of text books on instead of in boxes and all over the floor like they are but he is studying all the time so when is he going to build shelves?

I am way too tired for this post but I wanted to show Sam my cute door knobs....I think you can see them in the hallway picture. The picture I tried taking of the door knob itself was actually seriously gross. It was like a mess of light and grain and someone give me some money for a camera pleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeease.

Alright then, I think I'l take a nap on my desk. Yes, my desk. Yes, I am at work.

Al-Poo

2011-10-12T11:46:00.000-07:00

The other day I had youtubed the song Someone Like You by Adele and was listening to it. Al discovered a while ago that he likes her songs so has listened to a few...and after we listened and watched the video he was like "see...(clearly he'd been thinking about this for a few minutes)...she has a cool voice and everything...but you can sing better than her." Now, my dear sweet little readers, I can't sing. I DO sing all the freaking time and pretend that I can and make Alan listen to the entire song every time I want to pretend I'm a fame-bot...but I'm rotten at it. And he was completely and utterly serious about his epiphany.

I call them love goggles. Or wait, maybe I call them marriage goggles. Crap I can't remember now but it's one of those two and you get the point. Marriage/love...same thing....well for us anyways...and I hope for you too. Really, I hope that! Marriage goggles are worn to trick you into thinking your wife is glorious beyond all compare when she really is a frumpy, dumpy mess who has developed dementia at the ripe age of 22.

They are the best. They trick him into thinking I am the freaking-sweets. Alan thinks I'm skinnny...no he really thinks that you guys. He says I look like a super model. FUNNY RIGHT? And he thinks I'm funny. It usually takes me about 10 to 15 minutes to think of a witty retort or quote from 30 rock (those usually come faster), but even after I leave the room and come back to say my hilarious comment from the conversation half an hour ago, he always has a good, real laugh. None of this courtesy crap (I don't believe in courtesy laughs BTW, so neither does he). He loves my hair. He thinks it's the nicest hair anyone's ever had! (or something like that). My hair is the worst. If Mango Tango is reading this, she can back me up on this, and she's a hairdresser, you know. I take horrible care of my already thin stringy hair so it's even more thin and stringy and also I'm a tard and don't know how to style it without looking like a wet rat.

I love Alan and his marriage goggles. I love that he wears them and that he glued them to his forehead for eternity.

It's not our anniversary or anything, I just wanted to say that I love Al. He wears a stethescope to school. And spending every spare second with him is just a delectable and darn good-looking treat.

I wrote this like a week ago and forgot that I had...but now that I'm posting it I'm realizing this could be a thanksgiving post! I am THANKFUL for ALAN!

CH-CHANGE

2011-09-14T17:20:00.000-07:00

Change is good. Change is so good, in fact, that I am going to put it as the title of my blog post and pretend to blog about it but probably go off ranting about some stupid angry tangent. But for now, let us discuss all things "change".

I started my new job today! I have been at orientation for two days (woof) and today started work (woof). Yes, we all know I despise a good job but, nevertheless, I'm excited about this new one of mine. I'm working at the university hospital right next to my big boy Al-Bear...could that be any more picture perfect and adorable? We get to drive together every morning and walk two glorious hours together from the parking lot to the hospital...I'm sure it will be truly magical every morning when it's 40 below and my eyes and nose are frozen shut and my legs feel like 300 lbs of rock solid ice. Can't wait. So yes, my new job is in the Pathology Department and it's just very new and different and the people I work with are in the same generation as me and I'm very excited despite the fact that I can't sit on my couch and watch Say Yes to the Dress all day anymore. Cause that was kind of freaking awesome.

More things concerning change: this new city. Saskatoon is singing to me. It's singing me songs like "I'm so pretty and look at my river and all the paths to run and walk on and look how nice everyone is and how all the people in the church here are so tight....like for reeeaaallsss...la la la". I think Saskatoon just made that one up on the spot but it was pretty good...I mean for improv and everything. I am just really enjoying our new life out here. I read a quote on Pinterest (get ready for a tangent on that) that said something liiiike..."home is where you are". Or something super gay. But gay stuff almost always makes me cry...including that inappropriate image I have of Jim Carrey in that one gay movie he made...but I just decided I need to stop being homesick and realize that I AM home cause my Al-Bum is here. And he's a tarty fart sweetie pie with a great ~~ass~~ butt.

And then there is Pinterest. I have so much to say to you Pinterest but all I can say is beware if you are a stay at home mom or if you have a job because you will have to quit that job due to excessive scrolling and pinning and clicking and reading and planning and dreaming...OH PINTEREST WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN ALL MY LIFE?

Ok ok ok. I'll refrain. Another change (can you believe I'm still on topic...holy crap). We have been eating healthier in our house. I promised I wouldn't blog about this until I lost 10 lbs...but every time I almost make it there I go to Dairy Queen so whatever....screw it (I am obviously the BEST at dieting). I started WeightWatchers a while ago. I did it good for like 3 weeks and ever since just kind of don't do it. But I do eat waaaaay healthier. And I feel golden. Like I'm made of gold. And I poop at least twice a day. And if you know me, you know that poop is pretty much gold to me. Did I just hear you judging me?

Eating healthier makes you feel better. End of story. I still eat crap, but just not constantly. Did I just hear you being proud of me?

I hung this picture up in my house. I got it off a little thing I liked to call Pinterest and just printed it right off our totally rad and free printer. I was impressed with that little gaffer! It's just a nice picture that makes me think of me and Al and this little journey we are currently embarking on....a journey I like to call LIFE...(I figured I might as well take that lame little comment and run with it).

Up up and away!

Well I know I promised ONE of you that I would blog my house but I haven't cleaned it ~~ever~~ yet so just keep waiting and your patience will pay off in the end....I'm sure. I also am missing a couch but we can work around that I think. Can't we? Come on, we can do it!!! Ok umm happy birthday to Chloe this weekend and Chloe if you're listening I love you and tell your mom you want to come to my house far away and visit me.

hello my name is unemployed

2011-08-29T16:43:00.000-07:00

Ok hi fine I'll post a dumb blog. I now officially reside in Saskatoon. My life is so strange right now...strangely glorious. I am unemployed...coming up on a month now...and I am obsessed with being unemployed. That's all you really need to know. I don't want a job. But still I seek employment at every clinic and hospital in the city...what is my freaking problem? I actually already have a job but just haven't started yet. And am open to someone paying me more. So ya...that's where I am right now. Uuuuuuh Sasktoon is pretty. It really is...I'm not just blowing smoke out my behind. It's gorgeous here. And people are very friendly and we're making friends and yada yada yada it's great. But I'm still 7 hours away from my sister...so I'm not going to say I love Saskatoon quite yet...don't get your hopes up high in the sky fly high bird sky. ... .....?

Al has started med school. His class consists of about 80 students and he is the only married one and the only one who doesn't look like they're 12 too. Anyways he comes home from school the other day...and I was jabbering about something unimportant and stupid that somebody unimportant and possibly stupid did to me and he responds by saying "ass wipe." I about crapped myself (I have never heard Al swear before) and realized that my husband is a changed man. He swore three more times that day.

I must tell you, I have a swearing obsession. Minus the big F bomb, I like to swear. I think it's funny and I have been known to have a problem. Since being married to and just generally being around my in-laws, I have learned to not do it very much ever...but I still secretly have a dirty mouth. Just don't tell my mother in law. Actually, you can, I'm sure she can sense what I'm going to say when I stop myself in the middle of my story after.. saying "what a b....". Uuuuh.

So anyways, short story long, I feel like our lives are going to be very different around here. And that makes me happy because it's a good change. Not just the swearing thing, but just US in general. But Al is already too busy for me to handle and me too not busy but I can handle it. So if anyone in Sasktoon is out there and ALSO bored, I AM HERE and I AM YOUR BEST FRIEND.

Here are some pictures for you and yours. Out of order, just like you like them.

This is me in a giant hand coming out of the ground.

This is a photo I Instagram'd of me and Smashy. Oh how I miss that baby. Don't make me cry stop talking about it!

This is my favorite person in the world who I also miss even though he's only about 15 feet away. In his new office studying. Good thing the Bach Pad comes on in 25 minutes! WHAAAAAAAAAT best show ever.

Saskatoon is pretty. Remember how I told you that already?

Saskatoon also has a few beaches. Ya, beaches. And me and Al spent lots of time on them before he started school cause we both had no job and no friends.

We like to ride our bikes even though I sit crooked on mine so my crotch gets really sore on the left side after about 30 minutes. Totally worth it cause the paths here are pretty. But I already told you that.

See! Big sexy beach!

Another thing we did before school started was go couch shopping. We couch shopped so much that I actually yelled at Alan to just PICK ONE because I was SICK of looking at them! And then the next day we took this one home and I'm sitting in it and it's so comfy and you are jealous of my new couch!

Oh and I just noticed myself in the mirror behind snapping the photo! Always a good thing to find! ha ha awesome!

Freaking Alan took me to the fair. I freaking love him and also I love things that little kids love...and I love them as much as little kids do and I act exactly like a little kid at them.

BYE BYE NOW. I typed this post in 10 minutes. Love you. I especially love you for not finding me and killing me after having put you through this torture! HA better luck next time...as in next time my post will be better k I promise.

how to make your husband do stuff for you

2011-07-11T19:38:00.000-07:00

I've never believed in reverse psychology. But a few weeks ago I gave Al a big fat dose of it, and it got me pretty far. So now I guess I have no choice but to believe in it. Clap your hands above your head and sing with me now, I BELIIIEEEEVE! You just have to be reeally sneaky when you are dishing it out. And it has to be used on a man. A man that is determined to succeed and please your every need. Ya, I have one of those living in my house...aint no thaaang (I am feeling very 'Queen Latifah' today...I recommend the 30 Rock episodes featuring her).

It all started when Pam posted yet another cruel Urban Outfitters link. I harmlessly scrolled down, and the next second I was jumping up and down on my bed, my computer flailing this way and that, pointing and gasping to Alan that I NEEDED what was on the screen. I wish I was exaggerating this story...but I swear to you that I am not. Here is what I saw. Sorry I don't know how to get the picture off of there and don't feel like trying.

So I kept this charade up for a few minutes to show Al how much I wanted and would spend 400 bucks on it. I don't know why I liked it so much since I usually could care less to spend money on anything other than clothes or food, but it just like hit me right in the deepest place of my heart that I needed this headboard. Plus we really like to watch movies in bed while we eat supper in bed, so a couch back for a headboard? Yes please and thank you very much.

I posted it on FB and 20 seconds later, the very dependable FB'er Jennie Holt sent me a link on how to make your own upholstered headboard. Man, I am linking up all kinds of things in this post. It's a new record! Of course I couldn't do it on my own, so that's where the reverse psychology came into play.

Here's how I made it happen and how you can make it happen by following these three simple steps:

1. Complain and wine exceedingly about how important this is to you and how you'll be forever in his debt if he can just do this one simple thing. Remember "it's all you ask of him" (make sure you sing this even more beautifully than Raoul on Phantom)

2. List all the projects your man hasn't done for you. Be sure to never mention anything that he has done. Be very negative about things you have asked him to build and that he hasn't.

3. Challenge his masculine power and abilities to complete the task.

Hopefully your results are as good as mine.

So here's how he started. Al is really amusing to watch do stuff. He mapped this baby out for a good two hours before starting. Now let's step back and picture me doing this project on my own.....I'd get a piece of plywood...draw a shape that looked similar to the shape in the picture and maybe the size of the bed judging on my very expert memory on how big our bed is and how far I can reach across it with my arms...and go to town. Well, Al had all the measurements perfect and everything set up perfect and we all mocked him the entire time, but I guess that's why I suck at everything and he is good at everything and I love him for it.

Van is a good helper. He's also hilarious, so that helped lighten the mood of me making Al work on this all July 1 :) (cute grin that makes you not hate me).

So we put some foam and fluffy quilt stuff on top of the plywood....

And then we started to upholster it which took for EVER. We had to put a needle through 2" of foam and fluffy stuff into a hole the size of......well, a needle. It was almost impossible to find that ________ hole. Man I wanted to swear but I'm really working on discarding of my swearing problem. Anyways, it was also really hot and I was sweating which, as you may have noticed, I do a lot lately. Mmmmmm yumm-ay.

And here's our headboard. Cute eh? I did want to do it pukey yellow or poopy green but couldn't find the fabric and hate ordering stuff online so it's grey and I'm looking for a duvet cover to match as the one we currently have is the exact same color as this headboard.

Oh man I can't even get a breath in edgewise in this post....(HUGE EXHALE)

I really need a pillow update. All in good time, my dear, all in good time.

So there ya go, my husband is awesome and good at everything he does! And I love my new headboard and no I won't make you one!

what has everyone been up to, what's the hot gossip, tell me everything.

2011-07-10T22:00:00.000-07:00

Here are some pictures. Let me see if I can share their story while my already fat fingers swell up and my brow drips perspiration in my 33 degree house. The heat is inescapable and NO I am not complaining. I love it. But this computer is radiating too much heat. I'll hurry. Shut up Tina.

Alan thinks it's amusing that I call all baby ducks duckies with no intention of talking like a 5 year old or a gay man. I just think that's what they should be called cause they are so ducking cute (quack quack (as in a duck laughing)). I followed these little gaffers around for about an hour at Henderson and if the freaking mom wouldn't have been such a control freak I would have swept one out from under her. Also, that is me acting like one! Just a lot bigger and a lot less cute. .

This pic is from over three years ago, when me and Al began our love affair. I can't really believe how this all turned out...I was just being nice to a guy in a neck brace and look where it got me...

And here he is this year...doing the same hike....but slower this time as the woman in the situation has let herself go a little. Nonetheless, I am so happy Al got out of that disaster safe and sound. I worry about his back every single day but we hiked a mountain this week...so I'd say he's doing pretty good. What a good boy! arf arf!

So ya, we took a little trip to Waterton this last week. I took three days off work after the July 1 weekend (which was fun too but I have no pictures of). We camped in our cute, not so little 6 man tent. I love Waterton and am going to miss being so close to it. This pic is both of us at Wall Lake.

We biked up to Prince of Whales and just sat up there for a while. I had to tuck my shirt into my bra straps cause the wind kept trying to take a peak at my lady friends.

Also while in Waterton, I discovered that Al looks hilarious when he fills his mouth up with air.

This is the mountain we hiked. Mt. Galwey. It was beautiful...I love being on top of a mountain...no matter how much heat stroke I get on the way up.

This is what we were climbing up. And a shot of my butt cause I know how my readers love those.

The nice folk that let us tag along. Lauren, her beau, Poop, and Ames.

A cliff. Pooped my pants a little.

We hired someone to hike up the mountain with us and pose us for this picture. Totally worth it, right?

While I'm talking about Waterton, in April when the place was still bombarded by snow, we went snow shoeing. There was lots of snow. I was going to post these pictures but then didn't so here we are. These pics actually make me miss bundling up. It's the only good thing about winter. You can hide so much under there!

Pregnant with gloves and hats.

Walked right up to the roof.

K bye love you.

buy, sell, buy, sell, funny money boom bang!

2011-06-26T19:05:00.000-07:00

The title of this is just a quote that's stuck in my head because we have been posting on Kijiji all day. If anyone can name what it's from, satisfaction is your reward.

Just so you guys know, that goal I made a while ago to be optimistic and happy is going quite splendid, I'd say. Aside from those three days in a row last week full of insane hormone swings and raging screaming fits at my sweet husband that I have since begged forgiveness for, things have been great. I don't even have to do my hair anymore or put make up on because I just really don't care. I guess this could be classfied as letting myself go........buuuuut.....ya I don't know what to say. It's freedom in my eyes, ok!

Anyways, I don't have much exciting aka pictures to post so to thrill up this post I am going to separate it into a happy/sad post regarding these last few months and the next few months.

WHAT I AM HAPPY ABOUT:
I'm happy that I have a husband that makes it so I literally have to search and scramble for stuff to blow up at him about. When I just HAVE to scream (which I do about once a month) it ends up being about a towel being not placed 'just so' on the rack...or him having a cold for too long or putting out his back. I really don't deserve my life.

We found a place to live in Saskatoon. We went there last week and it was a blast. I already feel like it's 30% home. So that means it will become home to me faster than I thought. The house we found is perfect. I love it. I need to paint it though so I am not charging for color suggestions.

I got a feather in my hair. This also is part of the sad list but I am happy that I got one cause I wanted one. More to come. I know, the suspense is killing you. No scrolling forward!

We had a yard sale this week and it went swimmingly. Me and Jen both had a bum load of stuff to get rid of and only had to take like 3 boxes for donation in the end. My house is a pretty prime location for reeling in H core garage saler's. Plus I got a sunburn so that's great. I am going to be a wrinkly melanomic mess one day, I know, but hopefully by then I won't care...or the world will end.

I'm still happy I married Al. No I'm not surprised about it but I am surprised how much more I love him all the time and how I can't not tell you this right now even though it's a big wad of cheese.

I'm happy about the cute TV stand Pam found for me in the dumpster by my house. It is white but really needs a paint job and, once again, free color suggestions today. YOU are WELCOME.

I'm happy that Al finally bought himself a guitar. And that he let me talk him into just spending the money to buy a nice one. It is pretty D sweet. You guys should let your husbands buy a guitar cause even if they can't play it, it's a pretty big turn on (just deal with the TMI, come on you can handle it). Especially if it looks like Al's. I should have taken a picture..sure it is sitting right beside me right now and my camera is pretty much touching my love handle...but it's Sunday and I'm not supposed to exert.

I'm happy that we went to see Bridemaids this weekend and that Jen came cause she is the best to go to movies with. She laughs louder than I do at funny movies...and you all know how much I love comedies...and some of you know how loud I laugh at them (inquire from my neighbors if curious). Just go to the movie...it was not a ra-tard like The Hangover (yes I just quoted and bashed the same movie in one sentence)...but Bridesmaids is actually richly hilarious.

I am just happy in general.

WHAT I AM SAD ABOUT.
Leaving. Leaving the fam. If I say any more I might bawl like a baby cow. I think what they do is considered bawling...

Leaving my babies behind. I actually have already had crying fits about this because I am obsessed ok? I'm sure if the ladies at work here me talk about something Chloe did one more time they'll cut my head off. "She's not even your kid!! SHUT UP!" And I guess you can't steal pics from FB anymore? So so much for that. So I just linked the words "my babies" with the two blogs...look at how cute...how can I LEEAVE?!

And in regards to the feather, it was cool when they put it in but now I don't know what to do because it just sticks out the side of my head and I look like yankie doodle who is clearly a lunatic.. To top it off, it is grey and looks quite a bit like a seagull feather. Classy.

I'm not sad about anything else. Except for the big desk sitting in the middle of my living room and Alan hurting his back this week. These two things are related cause this thing is heavy. It is really nice and sturdy if you want to buy it! Same with a whole butt load of vases and a futon that hopefully you haven't read about before in this blog. If you haven't, it is liiiike REEAAALLLY comfy.

opinions

2011-06-07T19:14:00.000-07:00

I am forced to blog again because Al is watching some dumb sporting event on TV. What happened to wanting to hang out with me more than wanting to watch abnormal-looking lanky men run around a court that is the size of their left hand??? Oh well, that's my opinion on THAT and here's my opinion on some not random and totally related topics:

Saw three kids on a leash the other day with only one mom holding on to all of them. How HANDY did that look?? Pretty handy, and I'm fine with it. Nobody is getting hurt, everyone is winning. Win here...win there. The kids all get to walk around and play and laugh, and the mom doesn't have to set up one of those horrid contraptions they call strollers. I promise I'm going to love my kids like crazy-go-nuts and also put them on a leash.

I just don't get why everyone thinks this is so terribly cruel. Want to know what's cruel? Babies in trash cans. Kids with FAS. Beating kids with baseball bats. Hiding children in basements their whole lives. Home schooling. Just to name a few.

Season 5 is on my computer and I pee every time I think about it. If BASSABALL wasn't on right now......I'd be done watching every single episode and my neighbors would be yelling at me through the wall to stop laughing like a loud butthead.

My blow dryer is officially out of business..cause going to work and church and Walmart with your hair wet is the best.

One thing is for sure, Constantine is hot. Every time the camera skims by his face/sexy bod real quick I get little sexy butterflies in my stomach and swoooon!

Ok I'm sorry you have had to endure my super awesome posts lately but the computer is dead and I'm done trying to ignore the game going on on the TV. I can't handle the sound of it anymore! haha you wish I was your wife don't you.

my week in pictures

2011-06-06T19:26:00.000-07:00

It's your lucky day! I confiscated the pictures that the marathon people sent me instead of buying them for 50 bucks each. They were trying to rob me! I actually felt guilty so only stole one and here it is.... along with some other pictures from the last little while. I'm a picture poster now...what of it?

This pic was really the only decent one. The other ones I almost posted to be funny but couldn't quite cut it. Yes, they were worse than that one I posted of me sleeping on the beach. I looked like I was going to DIE. Anyways, this one is ok...doesn't quite show my pain but shows how disgusting my lips were. And somehow, I lost the two bottom pins of my number. I guess I was running pretty fast.

Here we are on the train ride there. Al got up with us at 4 and came and waited for a solid 7 hours. He's nice.

Buddies!

After the race. My thought process went a little something like...."somebody kill me"

My mom can and WILL beat you in a race.

Everyone in the fam jam ran somethin. Me and D ran halfer; D, L, and P ran a 10'er; and J and Shell ran the 5'er. Cause we are pretty much the shaaaaz.

I love my patient waiter gator.

Pretty much the best part of my day! You are supposed to ignore Jen in this picture or else I'm not allowed to post it.

This is me and Dix runnin the Coulee Cactus Crawl a week later. We're kinda matchy! Except she's prettier.

Our relay team. This race was SO hot and my legs are currently still debilitated so I looked like....well you can just imagine what I looked like running the thing.

We had a little bit of a late Easter at the Heggie house. Doesn't matter though, both bunnies still got devoured within 10 hours by just one of us...I shall not reveal which one.

Alan likes when we take pictures together and be's real cute about it.

That's it, boring post. Jen is making me pasta...THANKS JEN.

PS if you don't like these GIANT pictures, let me know and I will change them cause I aim to please.

making goals like a grown up

2011-06-01T18:58:00.000-07:00

So I finished my second half marathon..or halfer as I like to call it...last weekend. My time was slower than my time last year which is pretty gay but I'm just glad I didn't die. At about km 15, I was thinking to myself...."who the H put me up to this AGAIN"? But somehow, someway, my legs managed until the end.

So I tried to go for a run today because, of course, I am signed up for two races these next two Saturdays (my running group is insane) and GEEZ....my legs wouldn't hardly move! I felt like such an idiot limping like the one guy in our run club with two broken knees...down the road. Oh well, the sun was out and that never happens so it was pretty much awesome.

I, of course, don't have a picture of the race because I miraculously remembered to pack the camera but evidently forgot to charge the battery. So I had Al at the finish line with my mom's camera and he, despite the 14 times I told him to, did not get a picture of me running. It's all I wanted in the world! I promised myself I'd never run another half marathon and that I'd need a picture of me actually running the flippin thing but Al just isn't very good at listening to instructions. I forgave him after I had some food. And there ARE some pictures of us posing with our medals looking real sick, I'll post them when they are in my possession.

So, Al getting into med school is SUCH a big deal for us. It shaves a whole year off of his schooling and makes it so we can move on with life, and we're so relieved. But the other day I was talking to my mother-in-law and she said something to me like..."don't you just wake up with a smile on your face??!?!" in reference to Al geting in to school. I gave her this weird blank stare and then went something like this....(Liz Lemon style).."haaaa HAHA ha ha...ha....ha..." And then it was really akward and I had to try and dig out of the hole and explained that I really was excited about it all.

I've been thinking....why did I laugh like that? Why did I think it was so hilarious that I would wake up with a smile on my face? Well, I do NOT wake up with a smile on my face. It goes more like this...
hear my alarm
immediate hunger pains
barf at the thought of having to get in the shower and put clothes on
barf again at the thought of going to work
squeeze my butt and realize that it's all still there and didn't disappear over night
roll over and look in the mirror on our headboard and cry a little at what I see
try and wake Alan up at some point in there
finally get out of bed at the thought of the chocolate milk I get with my breakfast

There you have it, I am a pessimist. I have come to realize this lately, and it makes me sad. I want to be happier. So I am on the verge of trying. I'm trying to just be happy with what I've got. I have a normal face and my mom's eyes, so I try to focus on that. My hair is growing out and even though it looks like the bird crap on my car right now, it's long and that's fun. My unibrow is plucked for the time being. My legs still kind of work. My boobs aren't shaped like bananas...and so on and so forth.

Optimistic, eh??? But seriously, I have so much wonderful in my life. Alan is the most amazing person on the planet, I have the gospel in my life, my parents didn't disown me at a young age, my best friend is an angel sent from above, my hubs is gonna be a doctor someday, I have a good job, my family is fun and close, one of my nieces/nephews likes me.....haha oh crap I got sarcastic again...well actually not really...but I think the other ones are warming up to me.

Ok I love my life and I just need to remember that nothing sucks in it. I am making a real ACTUAL goal (something I usually try to avoid for fear of disappointment - pessimist). Look on the bright side. See the cup half full. Stop calling yourself fat. Stop blogging about the fact that you're fat.

I might still blog about that but I'm sure you guys are ok with it because everyone likes to hear that they are skinnier than someone...but here we go...baby keep smilin!! Next time you see me in real life, if that ever actually happens, drop kick me to the ground if I'm not laughing and smiling and singing Lou Bega!

Here is a pic of me and my buddy at the race expo..

an excruciatingly long post about our trip

2011-05-23T14:56:00.000-07:00

Ok so I was going to just save everyone the time and energy of loading up my blog page to see the pictures of our trip and was going to just post them on FB, but I looked and it's been almost a few years since I posted pictures on there and I probably lost my privileges or something. Plus, FB friends are so judgemental. I know my blog friends won't judge me for showing pics of my marriage weight...you guys still love me right?

So here you are, a whole bunch of pretty horrible pictures from our pretty awesome cruise in the Caribbean!

Really excited to get going to Miami. This pic was taken after forcing Al to get up 3 hours early so we could make it to Calgary with enough time to run to American Apparel to pick up something...just real quick...only took me like an hour and a half. Haha, sucks to be a husband sometimes.

Here's us on the plane. I don't remember hating flying so much...I get more pathetic every day. Or maybe I hated it because we didn't eat anything the entire day because everything in the airport is triple the price of normal life and I am super defiant so refused to buy anything so I just drank Coke the whole day because that is the only free thing they give you. So I was sick both times we flew....but the view from Dallas to Miami was seriously amazing. We flew over the gulf of Mexico!

First day on the boat. Gettin ready to go try out the pool. We pretty much only swam in that thing once cause it was significantly disgusting...about the size of a queen sized bed with about 40 sunscreened-lathered, sweaty bodies in it. And salt water. So we had to eat ice cream all day to cool us off. It was rough.

The boat leaving Miami. Not to mention, a DANCE PARTY down on the main deck. partyin, partyin, YA!

The first day on the ship was mother's day and also our one year anniversary (NBD). These were my mother's day gifts. Little did they know...I'm not a mom.....oooh ya, I scammed that brownie good!

We would have went down the waterslide more, but every time we climbed the stairs, the black rubber burned the bottoms of our feet, and it really hurt. So instead of wearing shoes up to the top, we just allowed ourselves about one slide a day...and it was the BEST.

Us on the boat again...most of our pictures looked like this.

Alan is a handsome devil and the sunsets on the ocean were so pretty.

Plus size models can be sexy too, right! Don't you watch America's Next Top Model? This is my new fav swimsuit that would look better on someone else but that I still bought and wore the whole trip cause I felt like it. I just noticed this picture is really dark...oh well!

Here's a pic of my big bum in my swim suit. I thought this picture was cool. And since you guys aren't judging me for any of these pictures, I figured I'd post it.

These pics are us in Grand Cayman. Al was pretty excited about the second picture.

He was excited about this picture too. As hideous as it is, I still like it because it reminds me of that time I napped on the beach in Cayman like four times in the span of a couple hours.

My favorite picture of the trip. Dinner was so delicious every night. And so were the appetizers and dessert...every night (you should really go on a cruise).

Us sucking our chins in. That picture of Al is funny and the one of me I think Al covered the flash or something. Still working on that photography business.

These pictures are from Belize. We went cave tubing in the jungle and it was really freaking sweet. Those pictures are on a disposable under water camera. I don't even know how to get them developed but if I ever do and ever figure out how to scan them, then I might share them!

Alan sucking his chin in again at the theatre...waiting for the show to start.

I had my first legitimate crush while being married on the ship. I was (slash am) in love with the star singer of all the shows. He was so super gay, but I couldn't help it...you should have seen his butt in all those costumes...daaayammm.

Best part of the trip for REAL was scuba diving. Like put a 50 lb tank on my back and take me to the bottom of the ocean for an hour scuba diving. It was like Finding Nemo down there, incredible. More pictures of that hopefully on another disposable camera. And also, I know how cute I look in that picture. My hair does really well in salt water. I might as well have grown up in California.

So scuba'ing was in Izla Roatan, Honduras. It was HOT there and in this picture I originally had shorts on but they got all wet and it looked like I peed them so I took them off and wrapped a towel around me. Then I got a rash from walking around with sweaty sticky fat salt-covered thighs.

A better picture of the scuba trip.

I was so happy after I saw that I had captured these two doing this. I wish I had the ability to make friends so I had their email so I could send it to them. I wasn't trying to be creepy, I was just trying to get a picture of the island and I was in the back of a boat strapped to a 50 lb oxygen tank.

At the comedy club.

The comedy club had cool carpet that I ripped out and brought home with me to put in our house.

We love acting like dogs.....like no we actually do.

Elephanto.

Cutest serving of beans ever.

Another dinner. I wish we got pictures of us all dressed up (no not this night) but we were just so tired and full...

Al was sick most of the time. I took this picture to prove that point. He was finished eating and there was still bacon on his plate. :( it was really quite sad.

And here are some cute pics of Al and some ugly pics of me in Cozumel. This stop was fun too cause we found a nice fresh water pool and a beach right beside eachother to spend all day in. Oh and a blow up park out in the ocean that was free!! (no it wasn't)

Ok here's us in Miami....last day of the trip. I LOVED MIAMI ALMOST MORE THAN EVERYWHERE WE WENT.

A pretty tree. We found an outdoor mall and there were so many lesbians and good-looking people swarming around, I'd never seen anything quite like it.

Al at south beach. On our pamphlet that they gave us about Miami it said if we went to south beach we could see celebrities such as Gloria Estefan, Shaquille O'Neil, Ricky Martin, and Sylvester Stalone. They sold us. We hopped on the first bus there.

And there's our trip! If you actually read this whole post, first of all, I am amazed you made it and second of all, we have an announcement that is happy for the people who live in Lethbridge but sad for people living in and around Saskatoon.

AL GOT INTO MED SCHOOL!!!! We are moving to Saskatoon in a few months. I'm sure I'll have some great stories to tell...and can't wait. We are bloody excited.

our house in the middle of a....drug bust!

2011-04-28T07:09:00.000-07:00

At first thought of moving into our townhouse, I can't say I was terribly pleased. I'd only seen the place once, and it ended up being a drive by. Al's sister lived here for a while but when we came to see them, they weren't home. My houses growing up were always in new developments with brand new houses with potted flowers and window shutters and trampolines and connecting back yards that all the mormon kids ran around together in. So, needless to say, this place looked like a hole. But then once we got inside and came here a couple times, I decided it was going to be great. It's got a lot of room and is clean and nice and we're really quite comfortable here! I love our home.

I knew right off the get go that our neighbors were treats. Special treats. Every day when I would come home, the two neighbors on our right side were sitting right outside their door (since that is the only place to sit that is on your own property) basking in the sun...and they had been there the entire day. Dale had his shirt off and was the color of a walnut and the texture of an elephant and Susan had her orange spandex dress on with her hair slicked back. This was the same. Every. single. day. They are both on AISH and pleasant as plums and love to say hi but nothing else every time I walk in my house and also love asking for favors.

Susan is my favorite. We can smell anything and everything she does in our stairwell (and the rest of the house) but really good in the stairwell. She likes to smoke and also likes to burn her stinky food that she makes for her and her dogs. One day we heard smoke alarms going off and went to shut them off thinking they were ours. Turns out they were coming from the stairwell. So we waited like 10-15 minutes, and I figured I should send Al over there since I started smelling a nice disgusting smokey smell wafting in. So Al knocks on her door, and here comes Susan....one smoke detector under her right arm and one in her left....still beeping.
"just wanted to make sure everything was ok over here..."
"oh ya, just burnt some food"
"......."
(gesturing to the smoke detectors) "these should go off in a while."

She's the best. Another incident:
Knock on the door.
Alan opens the door..."oh, hey Susan!"
"could you shovel my walk for me in the morning?"
"..sure!"
"I can't get out of my house."
Susan climbs through the snow back home.

We also, right off the get go, noticed that our other neighbors a few doors away had LOTS of friends. New, different friends every day. Most of them 20-something grease monkeys just getting off work from their blue collar jobs. Everyone has a key. And if you don't, all you need is the mail box to get your friendship fix. But mostly, walk up to the house, go in, stay for two minutes, get your friendship, and go home....happy as ever!

As you can imagine, they are all quite friendly. And we really do love it here.

But a few nights ago, the top story in the Herald was a shooting.....involving a cocaine bust. We see the picture in the paper and, wouldn't ya know it, that's right by our house. Like, our house was almost in the picture. A legit, straight-up shooting right across the street from us. Our neighbors, upon questioning, referred to our neighborhood as "the projects" and "livin in the slums"

I feel pretty legit now (and BA enough to use the word 'legit').....like I've seen everything. "oh yaaa, this one time...pretty much right outside my front window...I saw a man shoot a guy....right in the face! I saw the whole thing!"

I guess it's a good thing we have to move soon. For now, I'll just keep my pepper spray on me at all times...like I was already doing anyways due to extreme paranoia.

PS the guy that got shot is ok. No need for panic. But he really DID get shot....and we really did sleep through the whole thing.

Whatevs, You Guys

2011-04-22T18:23:00.000-07:00

Hey there.

I am just soaking up the sun and the Easter holiday today. Or whatever it is. I think Monday is supposed to be the Easter holiday. Well I guess Good Friday and Easter Monday are holidays so we should get them both off, but ya can't have your cake and eat it too...oooor CAN YOU?

We got up and ran 11.5 miles for marathon club this morning. And 11.5 rounds up to 13, so I just basically ran a half marathon. WHAT UP. Running is kind of a good time. I think the only reason I enjoy it is because I'm in a club and I never got to be in one growing up cause I was such a queer so now I am making up for that and being really cool in a club with a bunch of old guys with broken hips that can run faster than me. Anyways, here are some tips for running from one of the best shufflers out there (that's a better description of what I do, don't think I can really call myself a runner):

buy lots of over priced and color-of-the-season running clothes so that the only excuse you have to wear them is to go running and so you have to go
don't expect to ever buy boots cause you officially have huge, muscly, manly calves
make sure you are super interested and intrigued by nothing at all, i.e. cracks in the side walks, garbage stuck to the fence, what people are doing in the privacy of their own homes in front of the window, the shape of the girls (or guys?) butt running in front of you, etc etc etc.
have your husband have chocolate milk, a smoothie, bagels, chocolate, pasta, peanut butter sandwiches, Nutella toast, and really any other carb in the house laid out on the counter for when you get home...and make sure you eat all of it so that you never lose any weight from your run.
don't ever stretch.
don't make goals for yourself. Just randomly start to run, run somewhere, and run back home. Don't look at the clock or try and beat someone in the club, just run. It will keep you nice and motivated.
And listen to this song the entire time your entire run...

In other news, I decided to make use of my sewing machine and ended up making a decently hideous skirt. See below.

Best worn with your ugliest, oldest shirt.

It's got pockets and everything. I might wear it sometime when nobody is looking. Or maybe to the wedding we go to tonight just to prove a point and say to everyone "I can wear whatever I WANT!"

We were priviledged last weekend to attend the great and magnificent Riverdance. Ok seriously you guys, it was so fricken sweet. I could have sat there for three days straight watching them dance and sing and fiddle and play the bagpipes. Never seen anything like it in my life. And I'd like to say that I've never seen a goofier picture of Dixie in my life either, but she does that in all her pictures. We tried to get her to stop...so now everytime we get the camera out she acts normal until the LAST second and then pulls the big eyes out. Nobody really knows why.

Me and J enjoying the festivities! I love my mother and my sister almost as much as I love Al, but sorry guys, not quite. But still, a LOT!

Wad Of Pics

2011-04-04T17:13:00.000-07:00

I've got some pretty good news for everyone today.....drum roll please. This blog is getting even better than it already was. WAM! Impossible, You say? Well aren't you naive. I know that the pictures I post on here are already exquisite and beautiful beyond all compare, but believe it or not, it's about to get better. Al recently (weellll actually like kind of a while ago by now) purchased an iPhone 4GS....complete with like more pixels or something than my phone and a flash and a little button that makes it so you can flip the camera and see yourself when you are taking a picture. Ya, none of this crap 3GS thing I've had going on. Things are getting pretty serious around here. Now the only thing left to do is get working on my tinawildephotography.com webside. It's gonna be HUGE.

So without further ado, all the pictures we have taken in, like, the last 4 months:

This one time I bought this really super long T-shirt from Superstore as a nightee and then went swimming at the Ramada. Next thing you know, I look like a Psych Ward admittee.

Then this other time I left Al home to fend for himself one night, and I receive message on the phone encompassing this picture. I threw up a little...or maybe a lot..in my mouth. He swears he loved it. Those are not hot dogs, they are breakfast sausages, for the record.

You know when you can see the mountains really good, so you try and take a picture with you in it and turns out you can't even see them at all in the picture? And also, you know when you take a picture with your left hand, unaware of what your right hand was doing at the moment? Yaaaaa....I don't know.

Al just YESTERDAY explained his smile to me. I can't count the number of times I've mocked him and other times screamed at him to "stop making that fake smile". He apparently cut his lip doing something in high school....ummm crap don't tell him but I don't remember what he said he was doing when he cut it......maybe I actually have heard this story before yesterday. Anyways, he cut his lip and now his initial smile turns crooked. So he tries to pull the left side of his lip down, making it look incredibly forced. So, whenever you see this smile, he really is genuinely happy, I swear.

A terrifying knee face. Artist: yours truly.

Takin a lover's walk across Whoop Up. We love you Lethbridge, but please let us not be living in you in a few months!

We took a little trip to Sir Scratchewan a couple weekends ago. It is sad when you consider being in Saskatoon for 4 hours and then Edmonton for like 5 a relaxing holiday, but I guess that's what us full-time employees gotta live with (I was clearly not made for working). Everyone kept telling us how excruciating the drive to Sask was going to be, but somebody's crazy cause that drive was gorg+beaut+fant. All shortened words for AWESOME. This blue bridge was my favorite part. We were in a hurry so we couldn't stop to take a picture, but being the photographer I am, the pics turned out great. I think the rock chip in the window adds all kinds of character.

I'm still mad at myself for not turning on Long Gone Sasatchewan by Corb while we were driving, but it was a little high stress on the way there. I had to help Al practice interview questions AND stay awake at the same time so we didn't die the whole drive. Be impressed, cause I did it.

The thing I enjoyed most about the drive was probably the 50 of the raunchiest, most run down gas station bathrooms I have ever laid eyes on and also peed in. Seriously, oh my gosh. Holy crap. I have never experienced such filth. I still didn't line the toilet seat with toilet paper or squat though. I guess that means I belong in Saskatchewan.

But also, the town of Alsask was pretty good. No, that doesn't say Alaska. It says AL-SASK. Took us about 13 minutes to figure that one out. So as we were pulling out of another putrid gas station, I decided to google map where we were. You guessed it, we were smack dab on the Alberta/Saskatchewan border. Really creative, finder of Alsask, real creative.

After being treated like Kings and Queens by Branny Pants in Edmonton, we drove home. And it was my birthday so we got to stop at Olive Garden. I also bought myself this new outfit. It was my birthday, shout hooray!

Why is this the first time I've seen one of these? Doesn't take a genious to know that I need at least 5 packets of ketchup every time I have fries. Five packets combined into one? Yes please!
And we all know I'm ALL FOR being sexist, but shouldn't this be upsetting more people?

Yes, we take all sorts of fun and interesting pictures around here. We are just snappin em left and right. That is quite literally all I've got in my photo library. I DO own a nice little Canon digital thing, but it either ends up in one of the random baskets of the house, the junk drawer, the utensil drawer, or the dish rag drawer, and every last one of those locations hides things very well....so good thing Al's iPhone is so rad.

Pervs

2011-03-27T20:08:00.001-07:00

A handful you may know that when I laugh and think it's funny, it tends to be excessively and unnecessarily loud. And it's usually involving something inappropriate. And now, I present to you....what got the best reaction out of me today.

PS I think my blog has developed a fatally chronic disease. And you know what happens with those. But we'll see if I can pick up my game. It's kind of sad when you get too lazy to sit on a computer, but it's happened. All I ever feel like doing on here is posting SNL clips anyways...and me and Jen and Derick seem to be the only people left in the world who still watches that. What the HECK YOU GUYS.

Ok more later....maybe...?

Little Girls, Little Girls

2011-03-14T20:04:00.000-07:00

I was having a little bit of a day today. Daylight savings is actually seriously gay and so is working early shift the day after dalight savings. If you don't count the time change, I was up at 3:45 this morning. So I was in a mood all morning. Alan was scared. I didn't get much done at work and a certain someone was being a tad bit too loud and giving me a headache. On top of these things that aren't really even bad but just seemed kind of bad...ok..., I had to get needles in my gums and pay a grand to sit in a dentist chair and get my face drilled off. POO BAGS.

But then guess who I saw?

I am in love with this little girl. Whenever I'm on my way to Jen's, I go at least 20 over the speed limit cause I am just way too excited to see her. She hugs me and cuddles with me and picks me first to take her to poo on the potty....which is obviously deemed a significantly high honor. Today she sang me a tune while I played the piano. Man alive, that kid!

So me and Dix took her to the merc today to pick up some chocolate. We said hi to gramps and were walkin around when I saw my mom-in-law! So I went to talk to her and Chloe was just suckin away on a sucker being adorable when I heard Dix yelling at me that she was choking. She was red in the face and her eyes were tearing up and she seriously was NOT breathing. I lost my mind. I do pretty well in high-stress situations. I did about five 360's and held my hands on my cheeks with my eyes and mouth as wide as possible (Home Alone) while I'm pretty sure Dix did the same thing. As I ended one of my turns, I see my mom-in-law doing the Heimlich on her. Oh darn, should have thought of that. So she started sputtering and coughing and eventually said Tina a few times. She then proceeded to throw up for about 20 minutes in the middle of the isle while we caught it with napkins and also while I gagged my brains out. Anyways, she was fine. And DJ saved her life while I spun in circles.

It scared the heebiejeebies out of me and I was glad all Jen had to see of it was Chloe saying "I bawfed mom...I sick mom...." when we got home. The poor chum!

I just love that little girl like a whole freaking lot. She is the number one reason I have a hard time with the thought of moving away when Al gets into school. Sure, there are plenty of other reasons, but she takes the cake. You certainly know I absolutely adore and crave Ash and my boys, but Chloe just absolutely made my crap-fest day wonderful today.

LOVE YOU CHLOE BUTT FACE!!!! (Jen can you tell her I said so? Thanks)

Hi. Remember Me?

2011-03-07T16:28:00.000-08:00

Yes it has been a month. But in my defense, February is a preeetty short month. If you round it down, it only counts for like two weeks. So you have to forgive me because it has been a slight bit of a busy two weeks. I finally decided today..."you know what, I am going straight home after work (oops already didn't do that) and am sitting on my fat lazy butt all night until I fall asleep at 8:30 trying to help Al study". So I thought of the things I could do while sitting. I came up with blogging, painting my toenails, ordering myself a birthday present online, staring off into space thinking about nothing, putting music on my iPod, picking at my hair, picking at my eyelashes (these are my favorite habits ever), and waiting for Grey's to come on. I can pretty much guarantee you that I finish this post and fall asleep until Al shows up to wake me up wherein I get him to throw in a frozen pizza and stay awake just long enough to eat and then fall asleep again. Best day ever.

Anyhoo, I guess I'll just give ya a little go round of what we've been doin.

Backing up about a month or so, I had the best day of MY LIFE. I get really hyped up about idiotic holidays like St. Patty's Day or Easter or Valentine's Day. I think it all stems back to the time when I lived with my mom and she always bought me presents on these days like it was Christmas or my birthday or something. Yaaa, no big deal but you wish you were me right now. Or I guess you wish you were me a couple years ago. So naturally, I was in a good mood on the 14th. Me and Al told eachother we loved eachother like 45 times via texting and we had all sorts of chocolate and cake and chocolate cake at work. And I freaking WON the raffle prize basket. Once again, you shuld have seen the look on my face. I absolutely lost it when they brought it to my desk. I felt like I was on some sort of talk show getting randomly selected for a trip to the Bahamas or a car or something. I was in hysterics (the good kind). After about 10 minutes of being a complete and utter spaz about it, everyone went back to work and I felt like a pretty good idiot, but in the end, it was still a hella sweet basket.

Look at those goods! I even got to keep the basket!

Then Al shows up with PURDY'S chocolates and a stuffed Pepe Le Pew who says all sorts of ridiculous things like "oh my golden girl, you are my corned beef to me, muah muah muah, I am the cabbage to you MUAH MUAH MUAH" and "it is love, love, love at first sight! No? Is it not? No? Yes?" It's funny, I swear. And I slept with Pepe for a week or so just cuddling him in between me and Al. I have no idea why, I just felt like it OK!

Then I think we went out for dinner or something. I really can't remember...it was like two weeks ago.

I think this was on V-Day too. A love bird that actually liked us and didn't chomp at our fingers. It was presh. Ok, he kind of chomped, but it was the kind of chomp that really meant something, ya know? I know what you're thinking...."Tina, just get a freaking pet already and stop bothering the poor little animals at the pet store every 10 minutes!". Relaaaaax, you guys.

I bought a shirt the other day that changes color in the sun. It's really neat. I picked it up in the store and tried it on and it was that nice poopy brown/beigy color that I love. I was pretty excited cause it hung out far enough that I actually forgot about my gut every once in a while. So I threw the little number on this morning. At work today we had a fire down the hall from us and so had to be rushed outiside (you shoulda seen the look of terror on my face) and it was a miracle cause the sun was out. So I am just talkin with my peeps or whatever and I look down at my shirt and would you look at that? It has turned itself a hideous shade of shiny lilacy purple. So don't go to Gap and buy this shirt. Unless you like the color purple, which I guess is cool too...?

So I still hate working, if you wanted to know. I don't want to directly say I hate my job, because I don't THINK I do. But it's hard to tell with all the negativity I feel to being employed interrupting my thoughts every time I try to decifer how I feel about my actual job. It's an ok job. Just, sometimes I get a headache. And sometimes I want to go do something else rather than work. And sometimes I don't want to start working on the weekends. MAN. I've said it before and I'll say it again, who invented women having independence? I want to be treated like the useless house wife that I am, please!

Another thing that happened was Al got some interviews to some med schools! Biggest turn on EVER. Of course, they are in the same weekend and of course they are both like 6-8 hours away from us in opposite directions. So, I'm thinkin we have ourselves a little road trip on our hands. I've been trying to help Al practice for these interviews, but I just get so tired, ya know? Pretty much every night it has been us sitting in bed with me holding the timer in my hands while Al puts every effort in his bones into answering the question. And then you look over, and there's little old me hunched over snoring while the timer slowly escapes my grasp and slips out of my hands. Heaven knows why he picked ME to marry.

But when I pop one out real soon here, it's going to look like this. So that's pretty much the best news I've ever heard.

I can't get enough of this picture. Al's g-ma Beaz gave it to us in our Christmas card and I turn to it oft for a quick shot of happiness. Ok and I'm not pregnant just planning on having 35 babies cause babies are awesome. You'd want 35 too if you played with Ashley for a minute and a half and also if your husband looked like that when he was little.

Remember that one time I made new years resolutions? Well, you'll be impressed to hear, I'm sure, that I'm following through. I have been runnin my chunky legs off for months, and they seem to remain chunky. Puh. What gives? Oh, maybe it's that 50 pounds of chocolate I put away in a week. Wooo-hooops. I am signed up for the Calgary half and am not looking forward to it at all but AM looking forward to Olive Garden after.

And as for my first real calling....oh, my dear sweet little Sunbeams. I was a tad bit anxious going into this thing as I get quite upset and angry with children very easily (I yell at Chloe more than J does) but guess what? My Sunbeams don't make noise. I sometimes wonder if they breath. I have five to die for little 3 year olds in my class and they sit there and listen about 78% better than I do. I am convinced they also know more of the answers to the questions than I do too. Yup. I sit there during sharing time and avoid the teachers eye contact hoping she won't ask me anything. There's me, just hanging out in junior primary not knowing any answers. Al says it's time for us to get one of those picture scripture books so I can learn all the stories. He doesn't understand that I'll just forget them in a week and be back to drawing blanks. When I got the calling I told the prez that "this is perfect! I was just hoping for kids that weren't smarter than me!". Well, that didn't turn out real great, did it? JK, I'm mostly joking, Sunbeams is perfect for me. I mean I do know who Jesus is and what my dad's name is, so I think I'm keeping up to the kids pretty ok.

And my last and most exciting update by far: me and Al are going on a TRIP. A cruise to be exact. We start in Miami and go to four different islands and eat whatever we want whenever we want and act like fools if we feel like it for 7 days! It is our postponed-by-one-year honeymoon! We leave on our anniversary and don't ever come back cause I'm moving to Florida.

TO FINISH, I will leave you with my recent doppleganger discoveries:

Ok maybe the anteater one is a little harsh but I couldn't help myself cause it's on my mind everytime I watch her talk! Sorry Britta!

Spaz Attack

2011-02-07T16:59:00.000-08:00

Another awesome, thought-proving post by KGibb ladies and gentleman! Holla! Read it cause it's awesome! I clicked on her new post this morning while I was sitting at my desk thinking "wow, I'm here again. I spend like 90% of my time at this bloody freaking desk. Why can't I be home in bed watching Mean Girls while I drift in and out of sleep in an attempt to wake up? I just want to climb up onto my chair and then on top of the side of the cubicle and land on my computer and smash it to pieces along with my desk and then file for WCB and then stay home everyday and watch Mean Girls in bed and get paid". So then I read her post and thought for the entire rest of the day "Tina, you are such a drama queen. Your poor, poor...........poor husband".

So that lovely post was about what pushes you over the edge or your "tipping point". What brings you to the point where you can't hack it anymore and you dive into bed smushing your head into your pillow and scream and cry as loud as you can until you've lost your voice and your head is pounding and you're thinking "I should stop, this is killing my head". I've obviously done this before. I'm hoping someone else has or, man, do I feel like an idiot (as you think to yourself..."rightfully so, you are an idiot!")

All day long today I was thinking of things that make me crack. (probably not always as severe as the one up here ^). As I came to realize today, I have far too many of them. No particular order here.

1. Getting rescheduled. I plan. I'm not sure why, since I'm not really an organized person, but I wake up and while I'm in the shower, I draw little ticks on my imaginary board in my head and place things in the exact order they will happen that day. Heaven for-freaking-bid they don't all go according to plan. HEAVEN FOR-FREAKING-BID!

2. Making rice krispy squares. Ok, lets just take a huge bowl of a billion of the lightest fluff puffs in the world and poor a hot sticky pot of melting marmallows into it and now lets just mix it, and remember, lets not spill any...oh do it quick cause you only have like 10 seconds to do this cause the sticky stuff is gonna get hard real soon. Like, where is my mom to make these for me? And why must they be so ridiculously delicious and cheap?

3. Being up past 10. I'm like a little newborn baby. Feed me, sleep me, and if you're lucky, you'll get a smile. But keep me up past my bedtime, and you might as well just lock me in a room and leave cause I promise you you'll hate everything else.

3. Socks. Now, I don't wear socks. The feeling of my toes not being able to wiggle freely drives me absolutely mad. But also, and something I've obviously never had to deal with until now, Alan leaves his socks in lots of fun and interesting places. Whenever he is done wearing them, he plants his feet shoulder-width apart and then slowly drags his feet across the floor, alternating left and right, until his socks have slid off. Then they stay there until I bend all the way over the ground, sacrificing my frail little back, and pick them up. Poor little drama queen me.

4. Sports on TV. You women that can sit there and watch a full football or basketball or hockey game with your beau and pretend to like it are saints. Absolute freaking saints.

5. Getting ready for church. When I see my next-door neighbors at church, I always avoid eye contact and anything that would lead to conversation.....cause there is absolutely no way they didn't hear me going "graaawrrrreeeerrrr" in my deepest manliest meanest maddest growl this morning, no way.

6. Charlie horses while I'm cleaning. I have two instances where I swear: when I'm making pervy jokes and when I get a charlie horse while I'm cleaning.

7. Talking in church. You know, I've learned a whole lot of really truly wonderful things to live by being a member of the Church, but one principal I've learned to live by and one I'm trying to teach Al is don't answer your phone if you don't recognize the number.

We have to talk in church on Sunday, and I've been having a big hairy spaz about it ever since Al picked up the phone call that I told him not to. I'm really bad at getting up in front of people and I'm even worse at expressing my feelings about personal things (hence, my entire blog...HAHA). But after reading that post this morning, I thought to myself "stop being such a freaking baby and get up there and preach!!" Then I decided to maybe not preach but to at least mumble some nonsense that I tried to be smart and write down and then smile real cute and sit down while Al makes up for the horrible job I just did.

And I should probably stop blogging and write a talk. Siiiiiiiigh. So, that is what I aspire to do. Little baby steps for this drama queen, but steps nonetheless. Please, I beg of you, wish me luck.

PS to cheer you up from what I kind of feel was a bummer of a post, here are two pictures that have the relation of true, genuine happiness. How could these not make your day?

Direct quote from this moment: "I am so happy right now".

I Got The Fever

2011-01-31T18:57:00.000-08:00

You know that moment when you see something you like, something you absolutely know you must have....and you don't know what to do so you just stare it right in the face..and then the next thing you know they are staring you right in the face..and you don't know what to do and you freak out a little inside but you just can't seem to stop looking..and then they have to be the one to drop their gaze cause they feel so incredibly akward...and you know that but you keep looking...and as they walk past you you try so hard not to but you can't help it and you turn your head to follow them until your neck is straining so bad you think you might pinch a nerve...and you feel all hope is lost and you're going to lose them forever and suddenly you feel your feet turning you in a 180 and you watch them walk away until they are a small spec in your vision...and out of your life forever?

Ya, you big creeps, you've all done it. You can be a big liar and say you havent, but you have. And I know I have. Many a time.

It all began with the boys with spiked hair and frosted tips and the seashell necklace. They looked so much older and more mature than I did, but I could still tell they were my age. And I couldn't look away. Then it turned into any older guy in general, didn't matter really what he looked like, but he was taller than me, and that was enough to have me goggling at him down the hallway no matter who was watching me. Next, it was the punk rockers with the band t-shirts and the "too cool for school" baditude. Following this, it was literally any guy with hair past his shoulders (preferrably dreads) with glazed over eyes and a half smile on his face as he nodded softly to his reggae blasting through his giant headphones. Eventually, I moved onto finer things and I stared after the boys with the big beautiful eyes and long eye lashes that my children would one day inherit. The boys who dressed nice but not gay and who had big manly hands devoid of any big gold bands on their left hand.

So now that I've put a ring on my best stare-down ever, I'm left with, what...you ask??

Pups.

Pups, pups, and more pups. It happened today. I saw them from a distance on my walk to my car. The owner was an older man, probably in his 60's, and he had two of them. Two stunningly beautiful, well groomed, full-grown Alaskan Malamutes. I tried to look away, but try my best, my eyes forbade me not. And as they neared, I thought of getting up the courage to ask for a little petting time, please sir just one pat on the head!! But then the man gave me a look that read "geez lady, what the freak?" and he crossed the street. But I did my little turn and watched longingly as they departed from my presence.

I JUST REALLY WANT ONE, OKAY???

An Alaskan Malamute is among the top of my choices. It's in battle for the top with those cutie-pie Bernese Mountain Dogs (the one in the first picture). Big, fluffy dogs just melt my little heart. Or my big heart? I dunno, I guess whatever you think on that one.

But ya can't go wrong with one of these sexy dogs either. Gorgeous I tell ya, just gorgeous!

I've always thought dalmations were hella sweet, and I still do, but I hear they are mean. And I can't have my guy never givin' me big slobbery kisses and nipping at my feet.

Rotweillers, I guess they can be pretty mean too. But I could probably handle the deep growling and gnashing of teeth and killing of my neighbors, cause LOOK AT THAT FACE!!!

When it all comes down to it, black labs have been there for me through thick and thin, and I've never stopped loving this breed. And I think if we got one anytime soon, we'd get one of these bad boys.

But that aint going to happen. Sorry to get your hopes up. But I don't want to coop my sweet little guy (I clearly already have one in my imagination) up in our teensy tiny house all day while me and Al go off on our day-to-day business. But to state the obvious, I have some major dog fever. And it's so much hotter than baby fever under all that fur!

It's Hump Day

2011-01-19T20:17:00.001-08:00

Well, apparently no one shares my Carey Mulligan passion. Oh well, more for me!

OKAY, I had yet another person ask me if I was pregnant today. Well, no I'm not. But thanks for asking. NOT! I swear I'm not fat enough for this question. I also can not think of a worse thing to get asked...especially when they ask it when I've squeezed into my jeans for the special occasion of leaving the house and am sitting there unable to breath and dreaming of my stretchy's back at home. So just to inform everyone, I am not "eating for two" as my FB status has previously stated. Just don't leave your FB on when you go to Jen's house...she won't go easy on you! When I'm pregnant, my blog fans will be the first to know. I bet you sure feel important now! You're welcome. :)

I know I blog about my pants being tight a lot...my deepest apologies...but it's just kind of hard to get it off your mind when you are so incredibly uncomfortable all day long. Can anyone else relate to this? Or should I just go try and find some new pants? But who really has the money for that sort of thing? I guess it's time to turn to Walmart brand mom jeans.

Did anyone watch the SNL Women Special on a few months ago? It was a hoot and a holler!

Oh, and while I'm talking about Tina Fey kind of sort of a little bit, anyone watch the Golden Globes? I was totally expecting everyone to have sacrificed their entire Sunday night like I did and be raving about them the next day, but I was alone everywhere I went. They must not have been informed of all the Christian Bale footage. Even underneath all those scrags, he still looks dreamy. Aaaaah....

Anyways, back to T. Fey, what's the issue with Glee beating out 30 Rock AND Modern Family. Who is judging these freaking things, anyways? Whoever was in charge of that award must have never watched Glee or else they would have seen Mathew Morrison (Mr. Shue...don't worry I had to look this up) and turned it off. I hate that guy! I pretty much feel the same way about the whole show. It's just really let me down. I gave it my all though. I watched it every week hoping that it would get better and they'd keep me interested, but they failed. They've lost a good soldier. Or is the word "fan"? I'm sure those words work as synonyms.

As you have already discovered, I don't have much going on to blog about. Me and Al have both been sick this week. Now, I think I've mentioned before how good I am at sleeping. I take pride in this. However, last night I found myself laying there with my mouth wide open in an attempt to breath and the area behind my eyeballs and all the way to the top of my head and down to my neck just aaabosolutely pounding. I spent the whole time trying to get my nose to stop running by turning over and letting it drain to the other nostril...but before I had the time to fall asleep...I'd need to turn over again. Being sick is THE BEST. So at about 2:00 AM (lets keep in mind I had to get up at 4:30) I was getting really sick of the whole thing and woke Al up in a frustrated huff.

He asked what would help me stop playing reruns of The Bachelor in my head over and over and over (we watched it right before bed last night) so that I could fall asleep...and I asked for a story. He proceeded to tell me the life-changing story of Lululemon Girl and her travels to Lululopolis. That girl sure came across a lot of things on her way to the big city, but somewhere between a talking pack of bunnies that needed her help and her "walking and walking and walking and walking and walking....and walking..." I started snoring.

Does anyone else love my husband as much as I do?? Probably not. Well, except his grandma. But I'm sure I could even take her out in a loving Al competition. He's just such the best.

So then after work today, I turned Arrested Development on and after half an episode, fell asleep. And then I kept sleeping for three stupendous hours. It was a glorious time and I wish a three hour nap upon everyone everyday.

And would you look at that, I just made a fairly decent-sized post out of absolutely nothing. Good for you Tina, good for you.

I already posted this on FB, but it's just making me smile. I love me some Xav!

Until next time...

I (emoticon heart) C. Mull

2011-01-08T19:09:00.000-08:00

Does anyone else want to marry this girl?

Cause I do.

We watched Never Let Go and The Education within the last few weeks and I just, ya know, love her. Go watch em (minus the parts involving Kera Knightly...barf)...and enjoy! I know I sure did.

Exhibition

2011-01-05T20:04:00.000-08:00

I have been associating the feelings I get when the thought of my blog comes into my brain with feelings of overwhelment (probably not a word) and anxiety as I try to unscramble the 500 events that have happened since the last time I blogged. Ergo, I have been putting it off. And I was going to try my best to avoid a huge Christmas post but the ONLY thing I took pictures of was our little 5 AM Christmas at our house...and I need something to help me along. Me rambling usually just turns into a whole bunch of mumble jumble nonsense. Who am I kidding, that's exactly what this will turn into. Anyways, I am currently blaming Alan for my lack of picture taking as every time I go to capture something chuckle-worthy, he withdraws worried that it will end up on here (this might have something to do with the butt-grabbing pictures of us in front of our tree). Well, heeellloooo? What else am I supposed to blog about??

Ok, exhibit A: Holly Jolly Christmas.

I have to be honest here. I ended up at the pharmacy on Chistmas eve buying the only over-the-counter anti-anxiety meds I could find. I did not sleep for the entire week leading up to this day. My stomach was in constant butterflies and it was giving me the runs. I couldn't concentrate on ANYTHING. I really am ashamed of what I just told you, but I told you nonetheless. Umm, you're welcome..? Ok and look how excited Al was, right? Rich.
I got a lot of nice things from the hub, but this made me swoon. Note to reader: do not buy a cheap 10 dollar ironing board at Jysk. It will make you the ultimate pissy grouchy wife every Sunday morning, faithfully.

I did not disappoint in present giving. That right there is a Cadillac of a drill set. It's got...like....all sorts of features...that...are.....like...good for drilling....and stuff... Ok fine, Steve picked them out.

Ok so special moments were had by all Christmas day. My favorite part was probably watching Chloe open her plethera of Belle toys (she's even more enthusiastic than Al). And I also recieved a sewing machine from the Mother. Watch out Jennie's Blog, my sewing projects are gonna slam yours to the ground.

So, first comes Christmas, then comes Whitefish. My camera remained in my suitcase to miss the event of my butt growing three sizes, but it happened. Good thing I had some nice comfy new jammies that allowed plenty of stretch room. So to say the least, we ate a lot...and hot tubbed a lot...and slept a lot...and shopped a bit but didn't buy anything. Oh and went snowboarding of course. Also, I didn't work ALL WEEK. Hells ya!!

Then came new years. And who really cares what we did. But I guess I should make some new years resolutions quick so I can put them on here eh? Ok here goes:
1. This is actually a real one. It's the only resolution that was thought out before new years came. Run another half marathon.
2. Be a good Sunbeams teacher. Yup, my first calling ever. :D :D I'm gonna dominate it...eat it for breakfast!!!!...which is how you're supposed to treat church callings...right?? I'm new at this.
3. Get Al into med school or get pregnant so I can quit my job.

Ok, that last one isn't real but it would be nice to get him in early. And would be nice to do that other thing on there too.....cough cough...Ok ok ok lamest resolutions ever. It's a step up from every other year though...since I've never made any before! What can I say...I'm a real go-getter.

If you haven't already noticed, Al grew out his beard for like 2 months. It was sexy right up until the end when it wasn't sexy and so I made him shave it. I actually miss it a lot. It was almost ready to braid.

He did the whole "stages and pictures" thing while he took it off but I refuse to post them because they make me cringe (moustaches...ew).

Exhibit L (I think thats what letter we're at now), Alan's birthday. I really hate that it's so close to Christmas. I'm debating changing it to like September. We need more to celebrate in that month, no? So, I'll let ya know how that one goes. Like most times, I had planned on capturing the events of the day with the ol' camera, but like most times, it didn't happen. I made him bacon for breakfast and took him out for all you can eat ribs for dinner. And got him a drill set for Christmas. It had to count because we're broke as a joke....from those drills....not a joke. Ok, so it was a pretty good day. I kept forgetting it was his birthday but everytime I remembered I made it count! (it was my first day back at work, cut me some slack). Then....as we are nuzzling into bed and about to fall asleep, I realize I FORGOT to bake him a CAKE. Just forgot. Just didn't even cross my mind. I'm a dirty dirty woman....and I need to be punished. I probably should have repeated that line to him to make up for the cake incident, but I just promised to make him a cake a different day and went to sleep. Hahaha, holy cow....I'm a dumpy wife!

Weeeeeelllllllllllllll, my eyes are now half closed. I'm gonna go see what's on TV. Oh and then I'm going to realize that the only thing that's on is hockey and Family Guy (is it just me or has that show really gone down the drain?) and I'll proceed to turn the TV off and roll over and fall asleep on the futon which is actually kind of like laying on a piece of wood.

Peace out home boy.

It's the Hap Happiest

2010-12-11T08:28:00.000-08:00

MERRY CHRISTMAS ONE AND ALL.

Pictured above: a Christmas tree molded out of a really nasty square given to me at work.

Now, like most people with a heart, I love Christmas. It is absolutely the best time of the year. But this year is delightfully special since it is my very first Christmas with my wonderful husband! Last weekend, Al finally let us go get a tree. I wanted one I think it was about November 1, but Al said the tree would have no needles by the time Christmas came, and we couldn't have that! No sir!

So we headed on over to Canadian Tire where they were asking for our souls in exchange for a tree. Sobeys, however, was cheap cheap cheap! After getting covered head to toe in mud from trying to pick up every tree and examine it, we found the best one this world has ever seen. Some guy wearing a fleece pullover, no gloves, and a hair net insisted on carrying it to the car for us...and I went inside to pay while Al strapped her onto the Corolla.

By the time I got to the car, woudn't ya know it, my door was strapped shut. I climbed through the window with ease, Al not so much, and I kept thinking "man, this is going to be a cold ride home with all the windows open". Turns out, you can still close the windows when there is only a tiny rope blocking the way. Who knew.

Here's me with our thrift store wreath (good find right?) while waiting for Al to bring Mr. Tree in.
We were veeerrry excited!

And here is the mess it made. I think I swept the floor more that day than I have my whole married life (stop judging).

Doin a happy dance since the tree looked AWESOME.

I never really got the opportunity to decorate the tree growing up. It was always Jen's duty since she's a bit of a perfectionist and got all the family talent in the form of "doing things well". I was always told I could "help" but once I figured out that every ornament I put on just got moved anyways, I ended up just observing and DJ'ing the Mary Kate and Ashley Cool Yule tunes. So this year it was my first time, give me a break.

Alan, going to school? I guess?

Attempts at a family Christmas photo:

We got a little red tinge goin on here.

Ooooh, and a white one now! (we switched up the book stack)

I was trying to get a kissy picture....

He just couldn't hold himself back!

There were about 37 more unfortunate-looking ones until this one happened. But don't worry, our smiles were still real cause we are VERY happy to be spending Christmas together.

So this was, like I said, last weekend we did that. I haven't been able to blog cause Al has been taking my computer to school every day and never coming home cause he loves studying so much. That same weekend, me, J, and Dix headed up to Calgary for some serious shopping. Now when I say serious, I mean serious. We left at 6 AM like we usually do and were pretty much waiting at the door when the mall opened. We figured we'd cover the mall by the morning/mid-afternoon, have a little lunch, maybe hit up Ikea or another mall..ya know...whatevs. But no sir, that is not exactly what happened. We went at it as hard core as shopping goes, and were in that mall for 12 hours. From 9 in the morning to 9 in the PM. I don't even remember having lunch or stopping for a pee break. It was all such a blur.

It was a really wonderful day though, and I bought like two people's Christmas presents. And maybe a few things for me....pretty successful!

There was no more room for a baby in that stroller. This was after we'd already made a couple trips to the car to unload packages. You'd think I had money to spend or something....abuuuuh...

Ash is the best person to shop with ever! And she's pretty freaking cute too!

I should probably go take pictures of the rest of our Christmas decorations and post them, but I'm so warm and cozy in bed and actually I think I'll just go back to sleep. A very merry Christmas to you, and you and you.

Mooooo-sik

2010-11-30T19:21:00.000-08:00

In recent events, Al's PC broke down. Yup yup yup I know what you are all thinking and my family has been saying it ever since me and Al started our courtship...."you should have bought a Mac!!!" It's almost kind of become a catch phrase with us by now. Anyways, that's beside the point. Point is - we lost most of our info off of that dumb computer. Having the most fantastic computer-savvy bro-in-law, we might be able to save some pretty important stuff, but me thinks the music is probably a goner.

So I'm thinking I'd like to keep track of a few our "our songs". We had a playlist of them on Al's computer and here I go attempting to remember them....

1. The Luckiest - Ben Folds. This one is a given. I think it is on everyone's romantic list. But the history goes as follows: it was one of those typical nights with me dropping Al off in the Ranger with him in his neck brace. The song came on from one of my mix tapes (slash CD's) and I sang the whole thing to Alan in a real romantic/kind of sarcastic way. He totally bought it. And he officially loved me...at that moment....right there. Just kidding, he loved me the first time he laid eyes on me.

2. Goodnight Starlight - The Julianna Theory. This song doesn't really have a reason other than it steals all the romance in your heart with it's first line "close your eyes, you're beautiful when you're sleeping". After that, you're hooked. And the rest of the song is bliss to your ears.

3. The Way I Am - Ingrid Michaelson. It was on our wedding slide show and it always made me cry when Al was away at BYU cause it reminds me of him and how he loves me even though I'm, like, the worst.

4. Just To See You Smile - Tim Mcgraw. Oh Timmy, you swoon all us lovebirds! Alan LOVES to see me smile, just ask him. His is pretty nice too. Especially with that beard he has been sportin as of late!

I'm sorry. I have to go off track for a second here. To get visual for ya here, I am blogging at the table and Handsome is on the other end doing physics questions which look absolutely ridiculous if you wanted to know. His stuff has been on my computer since his broke down, and I want to cry looking at those equations. Aaaaaanyways (man I am really drifting away here) it is a pretty quiet setting..we're both pretty focused. Al just shot up his head with a big fat grin on his face and exclaimed "THIS IS FUN!". He's not joking. He went on to explain something about batteries and forces and equations that didnt' make sense to me, and then told me that it was fun again. Yes, I said he is doing physics. What a guy....what a guy....

5. Loved You Before - Jason Deere. The week before our wedding, I had the week-before-the-wedding nervous breakdown. Not really about the Alan part, mostly about the wedding part. I was crying. Al started singing this song to me and danced me until I was semi-calm. Yup, he is a hopeless romantic. But not really hopeless, cause I LOVE IT.

6. Steppin Thru - Swollen Members. SWOOOLLEEEEN!! We like to dance to this one. And Al knows most of the lyrics. And Swollen is the bizzzomb.

And then there is the obvious song he made up for me and sang to bongo drums at our wedding that NO ONE video's. I plan on being bitter about that forever. (The tune is Steal My Kisses - Ben Harper).

I met you working at Raymond Pro Hardware

The girl behind the desk, you looked so fair.

I had to make a plan so you'd be mine.

I broke my neck, how could you decline?

(chorus)

I always have to steal my kisses from you.

Always have to steal my kisses from you.

ditto.

Now everything I saw, yeah, I was liking.

You swam, you ran, snowboard, and went hiking.

As time went by, together, we had fun.

I am so glad that you became the one.

chorus

I can't believe that to me you said "yes".

I'm so in love with you, I must confess.

Today is the first day of our whole lives.

With me as your husband, you as my wife.

chorus

He totally surprised me with that, I thought he was going to sing She's Everything - Brad Paisley. Which is kind of another one of our songs I guess since it makes me cry and Al probably sang it to me, har har. And yes, I cry a lot. Get over it!

And thus commences a part of the list that I'm sure will continue to grow with even more special moments!! Awwwwww! Oh, and Al has since claimed that "this is not fun anymore" (pertaining to the physics spiel).

One more thing: I have started to listen to the rusty old iPod at work lately. I put one ear bud in one ear and listen to the dictation in the other ear. It's a task that usually brings on a headache, but it drowns out some of the sounds I don't want to hear (coworkers). Whaaat? Did I just say that? Anyways, here are a few songs I've been relishing in.

The Greatest - Cat Power

Each Coming Night- Iron and Wine

Last Kiss - Taylor Swift

Scarlet Begonias - Sublime

Midnight Sun - The Sounds

Home - Xavier Rudd

Dearest - Buddy Holly

Land Locked Blues - Bright Eyes

Listen up, you'll be relaxed and happy, promise.

Grade X

2010-11-29T20:52:00.000-08:00

Aaaaaah, look at this gem of a photo. Grade 10. What a year.

To state it as clearly as can possibly be put, I was a freak. I died my hair jet black at the beginning of the year and always had it, for the most part, completely covering my left eye. I was completely obsessed with being some type of "punk rocker". I wore the color black, only. I would only listen to what no one else did, and outside my little group of friends, everyone was a "poser" (what a ridiculous word). The most frequent "compliment" I got was that I looked like the grudge.

Ever since reading my dear friend (pictured above) KGibb4's blog this morning, I have been thinking about high school. Lots of people, like she says, dwell on the past and can't get out of high school. I'm kind of happy to say, I don't think I have that problem. While I miss having all my friends around me all the time and having the metabolism the size of Hong Kong, I do not, I repeat I do not miss high school.

High school is hard on you. It's where you are trying to learn to be who you are but while you are at it you're getting all kinds of crap chucked at your face. Fear of not standing out, self-esteem issues, dumb boys that think with the brain that isn't in their skull, favoritism, issues at home.....bla bla bla the list goes on and on.

It might be kind of sad to admit, but it's the truth when I say that everything I am trying to be in life and every goal I work towards is the opposite of who I was in grade 10.

First off, I want to be nice. I want to tuck my hair behind my ears and let everyone see my kind of big ears and big forehead and chubby cheeks. I want to listen to T-Swift and J-Biebs all day long and tell everyone that they are my "favorite band". I want to wear pink if I feel like it and ruffles and earings and necklaces all the way down to my toes if I feel so inclined. I want to tuck my Lulu pants into my Uggs and go up to the store. I want to look at people and genuinely smile at them and mean it from the bottom of my heart that I hope they "have a good day". I want to be loved by my hubs as much as humanly possible and listen to him ramble on about how pretty I am as long as he wants without stopping him. I want to love him back just as much....even if he does occasionally listen to Nickelback.

Yes sir, I once lived in a fear of conformity. I am happy to announce that I have decided to conform (really hope I'm using this word right) to whatever I darn well feel like whenever I darn well feel like it. My newest goal in life is to do whatever my heart desires even if it is what every other 21-year-old girl is doing. Being different is cool...if you're actually different.

Just beeeee yourself!

You Are Freaking Out, Man

2010-11-25T18:37:00.000-08:00

I don't make dinner on Thursdays, deal with it.

So today when Handsome got home, we both alternated saying "I don't care" for about 45 minutes on the topic of what we wanted for supper....when it all came down to "let's go get burgers". So I put some stretchy pants on and shoved them in my boots, and we were off to Costco! (there is seriously a T in this word, after all this time)

CURVE BALL!

That's right, the legend of the biggest juiciest most fufilling burger is dead. Here is my shoulder, cry on it.

You know on Arrested Development when they did those few episodes in a row where everyone had their own little misfortune, and they all hung their heads after and slumped their shoulders and drug their feet while a little depressing tune played in the background?? Well, I'm pretty sure I heard them play that same tune over the intercoms today as Big Al slugged out of there.

It broke my heart to see him like that.

So in attempt to cheer the old chum, I exclaimed "well!! At least we still have Tony Ro......." And I had to stop myself because The Roma Burger is off our list as they jipped us out of like 40 bucks last time we were there. We've been back two whole times (time is very valuable when you do university like Al) and they still haven't fixed it. Queer bags!!

We ended up at Mcdeeee's and I'm still hungry from that skinny little patty. WHAT ARE WE GONNA DO!!!

I'm freaking out, man.

A Time To Want

2010-11-22T20:20:00.000-08:00

Attn: all giveaway'ers.

This holiday season, it's nice to see all these giveaways happening via blogs and such. It warms my heart to think that people are reaching out to others who (for the most part) wouldn't usually be able to afford these things or think about taking the time to do them. I really enjoy following them!

So I would like to share a new giveaway for all of you who are looking for ways to reach out to others less fortunate than you.

It's called....Tina's Terrific Giveaway. I named it myself.

The rules? I win.

The prizes:

Great, thaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaanks.

Plentiful

2010-11-17T15:53:00.000-08:00

What we been up to, ya ask?

PLENTY!

Just to keep the general theme of the blog going, we have officially finished watching all four seasons of 30 Rock. It took us a while since we had to reweatch over half of them (I fall asleep real lickedy split once I sit down). I am a woman obsessed. I'll relax eventually, I swear.

So a few weekends ago (been a while since I blogged) we got the lovely priviledge of sitting this little guy:

He's pretty handsome, aint he? Right up there with Al! See how he's sittin on that couch like he owns it? Yaa that is pretty much how the weekend went.

He was obsessed with cuddling with us and licking our faces and trampling us with love. He also insisted on sleeping in our bed right smack dab in the middle curled up into the biggest heaviest ball he could possibly muster. I pretty much slept through it, but it sure kept Al up. Poor guy.

So I made him some bruschetta to lift his sleepless spirits. I'm such a little fancy chef.

NEXT! We had a STAT holiday for Remembrance Day. Man, I love free holidays. The day all started out with me having a mental breakdown (refer to the end of this blog). So I was reeeeheeeally wanting to get out of the house. Thought about heading to Waterton but it was kind of windy and I was feeling super sponataneous, so we headed a different direction and ended up in the lovely land of Taber. I knew two things about that place: corn. And a pool. So we opted for the pool. It was actually freaking fantastic. That slide is JUST how I remember it. We just went up and down and up and down and up and down, we couldn't get enough!! The only time we had for breaks was when the big mushroom turned on and was gushing with water for us to frolic in! That's how I remember it anyways. I don't have any recollection of spending like two hours in the steam room. (unrelated: so excited for that steam room in our doctor mansion)

Turns out Taber has live FIVE restaurants too. Outstanding! So we hit up BP's and ate dinner while our skin burned from that freaking salt water pool, what is THAT about?

Another thing I've been up to is growing out of my jeans. Seriously....depressing. What is it about being married that makes me so fat? I ate like a cow before! I have been lazy my whole life! I would say I'm even less lazy now, which is pretty much ridiculous. So now I'm officially on my eat a little less chocolate and run if I ever feel like it exercise and diet plan. I'm pretty convinced big things are in store for me, big things.

Gotta dream big, right?

Oh, and my polka-dot shirt finally came in the mail which made me happy for, liike, an entire week!

Aaaaaactually, I am still pretty stinking happy about it. Al ordered it for me. I just love that man.

Wachu Wanna Orda Fo Lunch To-Day

2010-11-12T17:08:00.001-08:00

What's this? Talking about 30 Rock on my blog again? Whaaaaaaat!!?!

But this has been making me laugh for days. Probably won't make sense if you haven't seen the episode....soooo DUH go watch it!

It's in season 4, called Anna Howard Shaw Day. HEE-LAAA-RIII-OOOOUS.

Pro Schmos

2010-11-07T08:11:00.000-08:00

Ok so I kind of lost my mind last Friday. I apologize about being a grade A psycho, but it is definately harder than I thought to hear nasty things about someone who is truly wonderful and 100% undeserving of crap talk. And someone I love very much. I know such chatter is inevitable, but I hate it.

Anyhow, you know those adorable cooking blogs, Bakerella type ones? Where all the girls get together and make cake pops or cookies and they are the most adorable perfected things and you think "how easy! I could totz do this!" Well I've done it myself now. Me and Dix and J got together with all the kids before Halloween and decided to make a cute little treat and deliver them to some much deserving people. I figured I'd take some pictures and put them on my blog, just like all the pro's do! I figured my iPhone would do just as good a job as their thousand dollar cameras. Boy, was I not wrong.........:S oooor maybe I was.

So the idea we had was to make our favorite thing ever, caramel apples! But mini ones! So J found the idea on one of the many blogs she reads. We were to use a melon baller to make little apple balls. This worked out quite nicely actually....better than I thought it would. Then we stuck little sucker sticks in them and dipped away. We made caramel and chocolate and butterscotch dips and put sprinkles on them.

The results were beautiful. As you can see here!

Just like the professionals do, I'm sure!

Look at those beaut's eh??

Here's a close up of the best one. JUST RIDICULOUS!!

Oh well, at least the kids liked them.

In the end we eventually just cut up the apples and dipped them right in the caramel and put them right in our mouths. Yum. Successful enough for me!

Hope everyone had a good Halloween. We didn't even dress up cause we're super duper lame but we did stay home and watch Addams Family with popcorn and the halloween candy that we didn't end up handing out.

Rant

2010-11-05T14:43:00.001-07:00

Today, I am going to use my blog to yell at a few people that deserve it. I apologize if I scare the children.....

I just wanted to let let some people know that....guess what, you DON'T know what's going on in other people's live and your input DOESN'T matter and more likely than not, it has NOTHING to do with you.

Enough with the criticism and the snide remarks like you know what everyone is going through cause you have "been through it". Sure, maybe sometimes people can relate to other people's problems, but everyone is different and you can't open your big fat mouth until you've walked a day in another person's shoes, which I'll have you know is impossible.

I'm not perfect, I judge people and I think things of others that I probably shouldn't. But lets opt for some courtesy every once in a while how about?

And lets keep those loud mouths shut if you "heard this from this person who knows this person who heard if from this person". Really? Ever played the game 'telephone'? I think we learned when we were 5 how that one works.

I'm just so tired of watching people I love go through hard times and then having it made worse by people who think they are the fricken SHIZ. You aren't. Grow up. Spread some love, not hate!

IMA PUNCH YOU OUT!

Humorlicous, hah hah

2010-10-27T19:58:00.000-07:00

I tend to find everything funny....even when, and sometimes especially when, it's not supposed to be. I don't mind having the sense of humor I have; in fact, it makes everyday life pretty spectacular, but it also gets a tad bit frustrating. I just want to share the laughter with everyone! But how do I explain to someone that I think the way their right eyebrow is moving is making the giggles inside me (yup, I'm a giggler) start to rise higher and higher til I think I might absolutely lose it. You're right, I can't. And like I said, it's a little frustrating.

Like when I started my job at the hosp (shortened word forms are probably funny). I found all the new people I met amusing. I know, I'm horrible. They're wonderful people, they really are....but I just tend to get a kick out of seriously everything. The way people move their mouths, the force and speed at which they choose to type, the way they order medicine for their cats, the way they say "bu-bye" at the end of every phone call the exact same way....every single time.

Point of my stupid story? Humor. It's what I thrive on. It's the most wonderful part of my life, and the most horrible. Sometimes, I feel like I AM Liz Lemon. No friends cause all I do is mock people. I'd like to say "today is the day I change for good. Today, I start a new leaf and become a better form of myself and stop laughing inside my head all the ding dang day long", but sorry, not gonna do it. But I do promise to only laugh at nice things, like flowers. And rainbows. I promise I'll find a way to make them funny.

Thinking about this makes me feel lucky. I feel like I scored in finding someone that "gets" me. The other day, I did something spectacular. Now, this happens a lot so I don't remember the specifics but after I had done this so-called thing, I raised my fists high and shouted "STEVE HOLT!" And my sweet baby cakes, the skip in my step, the apple of my eye, burst out laughing. And my heart welled up so big in my chest I thought it might burst (kind of like the Grinch, you know the one?) Just like it does every day, when he gets my jokes and we're both doubled over in tears watching 30 Rock (I like that show, ok? like, seriously).

You know the good ol' classic relationship conversation of "when did you first know you loved me....(hands under chin).....(googly eyes)......(siiigh)....". Well, ok, we have had it. And you want to know about it, I'm guessing...since you're still reading...

Me and Al had known eachother for a mere few months. He still had his neck brace on. I told him all the time that he looked like a little innocent puppy dog (minus the neck brace) cause he had big puppy dog eyes and a beard and, you know, he just looks like one! I was driving him home in the Ranger like I always did since he couldn't drive since he was in a neck brace. We were talking in the car, it was probably 3 in the morning...I probably had to be at work at 6....(ah, to be young and in love). Anyways, he started acting the part that I always told him he was and started barking. And barking, and barking, and barking. And licking my face. (not in a creepy way, like a DOG). He went on like that for a looooong time. I tried to have conversations with him and he would only bark short answers like "YES" (imagine that as a bark). I laughed and laughed and laughed and cried a little. The next day I told the story at the dinner table and was in hysterics, tearing up, and spitting and sputtering between bits of broken up words trying to tell it. It was just really funny, I promise.

Yup, I knew he was the one.

And he still is.

And I can't wait for him to get home so we can watch more you-know-what. (I'm afraid if I make another reference to the show I might end up in jail for copyright...or something..)

Funny:

Oh and PS, BTW, really hoping someone gets my Steve Holt reference here or this post is for the birds.

The Fountain of Loooooove

2010-10-25T19:15:00.000-07:00

Since becoming a poor "student" and paying for tuition and rent and food and my own clothes and everything, I've developed into quite the day dreamer. Me and Al very frequently discuss what we will put in our big ol' doctor mansion when he finally finishes school and we have all the money our hearts could ever desire.

His top requests are reasonable:

a) A double headed steam shower in a steam room that also contains a jacuzzi.

b) A grandfather clock (not part of the steam room).

Mine are reasonable too, shut up!

a) A pool with a swinging ball just like at Nicholas Sheron and a hot tub and a sauna.

b) Some sort of contraption that allows my pots and pans to hang from the roof above my island.

c) A maid.

d) A closet that spins just like Hannah Montanas.

e) A horse pen and another maid to pick up their tards.

f) A masseuse.

And above all of the good and wonderful things this world has to offer, one of THEEEESE.

A posifruitly ginungous chocolate fountain and another maid who is constantly filling up trays of pineapple and strawberries and cream puffs for me and my guests to dip in the chocolate waterfall! (mine will just be a straight waterfall like Willy Wonka's, none of this mumbo jumbo nonsense ^)

Alan thinks it will get "gross" and is "unsanitary". What is he, a DOCTOR?

I'M GETTING ONE!

And you guys are all invited.

Another Completely Random Post

2010-10-13T17:51:00.000-07:00

I'm sorry ok? I can't concentrate on one thing for long enough to make an adequate post about it.

I was on my way to bed the other night, doing my usual ritual of not brushing my teeth and not washing my face when the other usual ritual happened where I find melted chocolate somewhere on me. Now before you get ahead of yourself here, I'll just show you the picture so your mind doesn't wander too far.

This picture looks pretty minimal actually, the chocolate spot looks smaller than it was in real life. But I mean, come on, HOW DID IT GET THERE?

So this last Saturday me and Al decided to put the books down (ok that was just him I guess) and go on our little weekly date. We had Costco burgers (go have one if you haven't) and then were going to hit up the early show when I decided we should spice things up and wait for the LATE one. What can I say? Sometimes I get a little crazy.

Turns out, everything closes at 5 on Saturdays when you live in the big city. It's a rough life. So after hanging out in Costco for a pretty long and decently entertaining while and getting kicked out at 7, we were pretty much SOL.

Good thing we discovered that Petland didn't close til 7:30. Yes! We had 15 minutes to play with the really weird looking animals that we eventually fell in love with and almost left with.

Rodents seriously love Al.... Melts. My. Heart.

Actually, I don't know if this was a rodent? More of a bearded bunny with weird eyes. Suuuper cute though (sort of not kidding).

Oh look, a picture that has nothing to do with Costco or chocolate or rabbits. Well, you can understand why I had to put this on here. I was having a hard time not sharing. I honestly have the cutest nieces/nephews known to mankind. To top it off, all Ash does is giggle and coo at me. How could I not absolutely adore her? Exactly, I couldn't. And I do!

So ya, my impending boredome as afore-mentioned in another post has hit. Al is once again a busy man and I'm a not-very-good-at-keeping-myself-occupied woman. I have been fixing up some curtains for the last few days though, and I must say, I've done it again! Impressed myself, that is. Jen, the mastermind sewer, has nothing on me! I mean, I only ripped, like, three holes in them!!

Sorry about Mr. Fuzz in the form of pictures, my iPhone is afraid of the dark. The curtains look cuter in real life.

VOW: I solemnly vow to only blog about one single thing the next time I blog. Tina OUT!

Shpanks

2010-10-10T09:42:00.001-07:00

I'm thankful for chocolate.

I'm thankful for my sexy husband.

I'm thankful for Jesus.

I'm thankful that I don't live in a basement suite.

I'm thankful for the two turkey dinners that we're having today.

I'm thankful for friends that still sometimes talk to me even though I do a pretty poor job of keeping in touch.

I'm thankful for good movies and good actors.

I'm thankful for funny sit-coms.

I'm thankful for Bernese mountain dogs and black labs.

I'm thankful for Sublime and for Superstore for playing them yesterday while we were wandering around waiting for our movie to start.

I'm thankful for SoAB and Raymond and that I got to grow up here and still get to live here and got to marry someone from here.

I'm thankful for my two families. This should be closer to the top, but this list isn't in order.

I'm thankful for my nieces and nephews when they're not screaming and whining at the top of their lungs. Just kidding, I'm thankful for them all the time!

I'm thankful for my motherly instincts and my baby fever and thankful that Al isn't giving into it just yet.

I'm thankful for the colors grey, peach, and mint green.

I'm thankful for clip on earings.

I'm thankful for garage sales.

I'm thankful for good health.

I'm thankful for wonderful people.

I'm thankful for a patient husband who forgives me immediately after a tantrum, which are not far and few between.

I'm thankful for how easy it is to make cookies.

I'm thankful for a dishwasher.

I'm thankful for birds, especially that blue one at the pet store last night. I am not thankful that she costs 500 bucks.

I'm thankful for the Rocky Mountains.

Really, I'm just greatful that this could happen to me.

I have such a wonderful husband and such a wonderful life, really I really really really do, really.

Quack quack, happy Thanksgiving!!

We're Tina and Tina, Aaaaaah.

2010-10-06T16:42:00.000-07:00

I used to be quite the little quoter back in the day. I was really into watching movies over and over and over again, but only the reallygood ones. I guess I'm losing my touch though, cause I'm just not so quick on the money anymore. It seems I used to have a comeback to anything in the form of a movie quote....once again...only the good ones. When I worked at the good ol' hardware store with Pierson, he would take his pointer finger and hold it up to his imaginary foggy window and go "eeeeeeee" every time I snuck a Mean Girls quote into a convo. If the window hadn't been imaginary, well I'd imagine there would have been a fair few streaks on there!

Mean Girls has always been top of my list for movies. Seriously, like, THE top. I almost don't like to share this bit of information about myself with people because of the reaction I get. It's never what I'm looking for. In most cases it's "man....I guess it's been a while since I've seen that" or "I've never seen that". Fags! Get a grip on yourself! (hopefully you're not out there reading this). The reaction should be more like: "............." cause they got too excited and the uproar of laughter was brought on so hard once they remembered the movie that they passed out.

It's just so clever. So witty! So...so....FUNNY!

I always knew the reason behind it all. I always knew who brought me this wonderful gift and let me enjoy it hundreds (literally) of times.

But I never really understood how much I would love this woman until I realized she'd brought me this, this most precious valuable gem...a new reason to wake up every morning....a reason to live a better life...a reason to do everything faster and more efficient to give me more spare time at the end of the day for it's viewing pleasure...

Nothing has ever been funnier.

I can literally sit at work and giggle at my desk all day long thinking of the episodes I watched the night before.

Thank you Tina,

Thank you for bringing this into the world. And thank you for having the best sense of humor in all the land. I. Love. You.

Love,

Tina.

(Honorable mention goes to Tracy Morgan)

Angry Bird: It's All About Tactic.

2010-09-29T14:27:00.000-07:00

Boy oh boy, do I ever suck at keeping this blog up to date. Yup, sure do. My deepest apologies to all the people out there that have been anxiously typing in my URL minute after minute and hour after hour and day after day. I hope you haven't given up on me. Or I at least hope you got a blog reader. I hear they are all the rage. I started pretending to start my own little BR up a while ago but then thought of how I don't even know my husband's phone number off the top of my head. You're thinking "what the shaaz does that have to do with a blog reader?". Well, since I have all the numbers in my cellular tellular, I don't have to memorize the numbers anymore. Therefore, I would forget everyone's URL's. And what if my blog reader broke one day, huh? Then what? Then I would be sitting at work and in bed late at night with nothing to do and no one to stalk.

Please excuse that weird tangent. It was unintended!

I am now about to blog about something that happened today. I guess it is probably high on the charts of the funniest of the day, but I didn't have much excitement today so that's why it makes the cut. And also, because it is close to my heart....cough cough.

A year or so ago, I adopted a little Kitty. In all essence of the saying, he was a little walking ball of fluff. Goodness gracious great balls of fire he was cute. I fell right easily into love with him. I rushed home at the end of the day to cuddle him, slept with him on my pillow curled into my hair every night, and let him watch me and Al make out pretty much every day (it was honestly his favorite passtime, and I'm not kidding). So anyways, he grew up and got weird like most cats do but I still loved him for all it was worth and gave him a good scratch on the back whenever I visited my old non-married house where my mom and dad live.

As I'm sure you can tell from the form of tense being used, "it" happened. I got a text from Dix today saying...and I quote "I just found Finn dead on the lawn." I gasped real big and told my mom I was absolutely devastated. Her words...."Me too. He was a good fluff."

My family isn't really pet clingy. I think I got the most of it. And I already am basically over these happenings that I just shared. What can I say, I'm a horrible person.

I really want a puppy. Alan won't let me get one. I'm devastated. Everday it's the same old..."Al, we should get a puppy!!!!". ...."naaah." ...."but I really want one." (super whiney)......"maybe someday when the kids are old".

I honestly have no idea where I'm going with this. I am truly sorry about this post. Let's get down to bussiness here. Here are some randoms from the iPhone.

I realized the other day that the last, like, five statuses on Facebook of mine were about the weather. Am I really this queer? That I can't find anything to rant about except the weather?Just such an old hag. Whatever though, I guess something about the weather effects me in some way or the other so here is a picture of Fall and the thousands of crusty leaves coming at me at 100 miles per hour on my walk the other day. It would have been scary if it wasn't so lovely.

Oh and lookie here! A brand new baby boy nephew. Isn't he the darndest sweetest thing in the whole entire world? If you answerred yes, then you're absolutely right because he is just an absolute peach. And he goes by the name of Baker!

Which brings me to my next picture from my iPhone, me being a baker. Tinabakeface. Yes, that is me and look what I made.

HOMEMADE FREAKING BREAD.

And the mess was something special.

An apron can only protect so much of my clothes I guess. Making bread is not easy or fun. The recipe said "knead like crazy" and you can bet your bottom dollar that I did!

I really should stop bragging about myself though because it seems that ever since I gloated my wife skills, things have been really going downhill. I have made two whole attempts at making brownies, and both of them tasted like sheer barf. The house is a mess all the time, my lasagna was a soup fest yesterday, and I can barely stand to put jeans on. I guess I'm just becoming a true house wife...?

If you turn it sideways, a message will appear. And it's for Alan...and maybe you depending on who you are.

Ok fine, it's for EVERYONE!! YAAAAY!!!!

And here is me with a heart shaped waffle. I suppose I'm good at expressing myself through food. I think we all already knew that.

I hope you watched conference this weekend and I hope you had a good day and I hope you danced like me and Poop and Mango danced this weekend when we finally got together after so much not getting together. Poop, come back to Canada. It needs you.

Al named this post for me, if you're wondering.

Disneyland, Please

2010-09-16T17:29:00.000-07:00

I just want to go to Disneyland where everything is joyous and grand 24/7 and nobody every stops smiling ear to ear and you do whatever the H you want and you can get whatever you want when you want it, cause you're in Disneyland. I want to be there where there are no jobs, no stomach aches, no headaches, no bad weather (okay there might be bad weather, but who cares? I'm in Disneyland!) There's no transcription in Disneyland cause no one needs anything transcribed because nothing in Disneyland is important enough to transcribe because it's just a big care-free fest of pure joy. When I'm in Disneyland, I don't have to type and I can dance around and jump and sing and ride and eat and not go to work and wear sweats all day if I want, cause I'm in Disneyland.

Point of the matter is, this has been a horrific week. If these friggin clouds don't depart from my presence soon, I am going to drown in a sea of gloom. Ya, check THAT sentence out! You know once ya start writing poetry, something is wrong.

I have been doing the late shift this week. That combined with the fact that I have been sick but not ballsy enough to call in sick combined with the clouds that never let the sun shine through has been throwing me into my extreme alter-ego, which you would not like if you saw, I can assure you.

I came home the other day and to prove to Alan just how extremely terrible I felt, I slumped my shoulders as low as I could and stuck my bottom lip out at least 3 inches and hung my head as low as I could just barely high enough so I could look at him out of the corner of my eye as I drug my feet walking through the kitchen. He got the point...and took me to the pet store and to get some orange chocolate (I'm 5).

It worked though, I love him.

But then I started getting pretty sick that night, and it un-worked.

Anyways, enough about the weather and the week from the utter pits of despair, how about everything else eh!? Let's see, what have me and my champion of a husband been up to...there's so much to shuffle through here....my goodness...what to tell...what to tell!

We've watched three seasons of Big Bang Theory, a season of Modern Family, and are half way through 30 Rock. We lay in bed a lot for lack of any comfortable furniture in the house. Ergo, we sleep a lot. Or at least, I do. I have never been so well rested in all my years! It's faaaaantastic. On Fridays, we go out to a movie. We saw Dinner for Schmucks last week. Don't see it. Seriously, don't. We weighed ourselves the other day and both were up about 10 lbs, so that's nice. On an unrelated topic, we love to cook enough food for at least 9 people and eat all of it in one sitting. I also love to bake and that only brings positive results, of course.

So ya, we're an exciting couple to say the least. And that's quite the way I prefer it.

We went out to dinner with Al's family the other day, courtesy of grandma Beazer (awesome). I had the pleasure of sitting next to grandma and so was chatting her up about what movies they'd been watching lately when I overhead talk of stroganoff on the other end of the table. I listenned in a bit and heard Al going on kind of like this..."Ooooooh, Tina makes the BEST stroganoff!!!" I just cocked my head a bit and gave him the utmost outrageous look but he didn't back down. So I looked at Bonnie and said, quite firmly, "I have never made stroganoff." Al was right baffled. He just gave me this confusing look "yaaa....(hand gesture)...like, out of that box?".

That's right, Hamburger Helper. I get praise at the dinner table (with the in-laws no less) for being able to make Hamburger Helper. Don't even try and tell me your husband is better than mine.

So yes, things are all well and dandy. I was planning on using this little space of time to nap, but I blogged instead....while multitasking and making my infamous stroganoff dish. Off I go to stuff my face!

Nooohooooo

2010-09-08T19:58:00.000-07:00

I was happily going about my daily after-work activities today just jaunting up the stairs.... when I turned the corner..and that is when I saw it. A big fat pile of books and binders and stacks of papers. The nausea hit me like a sledge hammer to the face. We are officially back in school mode.

BAAAAAAAARF FEST.

Yup, Al is back at the grind stone, or however that saying goes. Here goes all the endless hours of us doing virtually nothing together and loving every freaking blinking second of it.

If anyone feels so inclined to help release me from my impending boredom, I am feeling quite open to new ideas.

Chocolat

2010-08-30T18:38:00.000-07:00

I walked in from work today and thought to myself "I should blog today". So naturally, I pondered on what the topic should be. As I considered the possibilities, I glanced down and realized I'd eaten two entire rows out of the double chocolate coconut brownies I made yesterday.

Chocolate.

Would I be going too far to say that it defines me? Psh, no way man! It does. I am a firm believer that chocolate heals all wounds. Every time I have a stomach ache or (please no) cramps or I feel sad or worn out, I go get me some chocolate. It's the perfect way to celebrate...the perfect way to make a good mood even better....the perfect thing to top off ever meal. If you can't tell, I go through a lot of it in the day.

I remember last Easter we got a candy bag full of chocolate on our desks courtesy of The Social Club. How special, right? I was on early shift so I was there at 6. I was so darn excited by this little surprise (best day of work ever)...what else was there to do but dive right in! That bag of goodies was gone by 6:05. The (very skinny, I might mention) girl I was on shift with was disgusted with me. So, that among other things gave me a rep. And now whenever there is chocolate in the hizzy, I am the first one to know....and the first one to eat it!

I just turned to Al and told him I had "writer's block" and asked him what he thought when I said "chocolate". His reply? "My competition for your time".

I'm also known as a biiiiit of a messy eater. Just a bit. I spill a little...sometimes. Also, I really like white shirts. About 80% of the time (this is true honesty at it's finest), there is a chocolate stain somewhere on that shirt. And most of the time, it is smeared on my butt from spilling chocolate crumbs and sitting on them (in the car and at work would be the prime places for these little incidents).

I know what you're thinking, I'm gross. I am, I know. I often wonder what my neighbors think of me. Running to my car every morning with a handful of Reese Pieces or a Fudeo shoved in my mouth....but I'm sure they can just see the glowing smile hiding behind the chocolate dripping down my face.

Soo, my real hearthrob, you ask?

I have so much stinking saliva in my mouth right now, it is ridiculous.

I LOVE ORANGE CHOCOLATE.

Alan and I have discovered a new, delicious, and what I consider a healthy treat. Presenting: our chocolate of the week!

They're good. Seriously. Don't let the "dark chocolate" part fool you, your mind will be blown!

So anyways, it may add a few more cottage cheese's on my thighs and size up the tire around my tummy, but I mean it when I say: chocolate, you are completely worth it.

Date Night

2010-08-28T09:11:00.001-07:00

Friday night is date night. So, pretty exciting stuff.

We went to the movies.

Just one quick little thing to say about this movie...

WTF?

Mr. Pitt

2010-08-26T18:40:00.000-07:00

I used to carpool with this chickadoodle from work. Nicest lady you'll ever meet, bar none. I honestly sometimes would find myself wishing that everyone I worked with was her. Just 8 other her's sitting around me, typing their little hearts out....while I nod off to sleep or check my blog (gasp! don't tell!).

One fine morning, we were driving in her little Saturn when the topic of acting came up. The next thing I knew (it all happened so fast), she was just absolutely going on a rampage about Brad Pitt. She just went off telling me how she hated that "just because he was good looking, didn't mean he could act" and that how he "was such a terrible actor" and she "hated all his movies" (I have to put this in quotes so you for sure know these are not my thoughts).

I almost choked on my own vomit. I didn't though, I just swallowed it and tried to act like nothing was wrong. If it would have been anyone else, ANYONE.....I would have let them see the smoke coming out my ears and the vein popping out of my forehead as I yelled at them in fury telling them that they needed to be institutionalized......the next thing they'd know, I'd have curled up into a ball and slid out the door and all they would see is just a tiny me in their rearview mirror, rolling in the ditch.

But this lady is just too much of a sweet cake...so I didn't say anything. Just waited until she had stopped being outrageous and kindly changed the subject.

It nearly killed me.

How could such an absurd thought even begin to bubble in one's brain, I wonder? Brad Pitt is a downright stinkin genious! That's why everyone loves him. His looks (yum yummers) are just the cherry on top of the deeeelicious pie.

Here's him in the movie I think he looks his very best. Legends of the Fall.

Anyways, so I was just thinking about that today and then got thinking about how much I would rather look like Kate Winslet than me and how I love all her movies, so I thought I'd share a few of my favorite actors/actresses with y'all. Here they are in their (in my opinion) their shinest moments.

Kate Winslet - Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. I mean, name another someone you know that can pull off blue hair. Come on, do it.

Oh, Christian Bale. You were my first love, you had me star struck, but I wasn't 13...I was 20. (This is from a very nice scene in Equilibrium)

Maggie! Don't feel like trying to spell that darn'd last name of yours. Here you are in Crazy Heart! Good job on that nomination!

Mark Wahlberg in I Heart Huckabees.

Natalie Portman, Garden State. I just remembered that this is pretty much my favorite movie of all time, and I'm going to go watch it.

You'll notice that all of these people are gorgeous. Well, I'll have you know and am not ashamed to say that if I'm going to spend 2 hours of my life looking at you, you better look nice. That's right, I don't want to see that mess inside your mouth that you call teeth, MILEY.

Hair Voltaire, I Personally Would Rather Learn About Voltaire

2010-08-17T18:02:00.000-07:00

Sooo, I'm awesome.

Not to toot my own horn or anything. Actually, yes, to toot my own horn. Consider this as me, being a brag-whore.

I cut Alan's hair the other day. My first time ever as hairdresser! Unless you are counting Barbies which you're not because what kind of grown up woman even remembers playing with Barbies?!? Not me, I assure you. Psh...nooohot me.....

Ok...so the big reveal here.

DUN DUN DUN

It's half decent eh? I mean, it's no Angela Bridge hair cut, but what is? I was so nervous when I just started randomly snipping away not having a freaking clue where to start or where to finish or how to not cut my fingers every five seconds. I kind of figured it out though and seriously, I impressed myself...if you haven't already figured that one out.

You're probably thinking I am a huge knob job for bragging about something that, like I said, looks only half decent, but the thing is...I always screw things up. That's my nature. Screw up 10 times, then it will possibly maybe turn out good. I never plan things, never ever. I just GO. And it always makes a huge mess that I end up having to turn around and do all over again. For example, when I sew. I just slap a few pieces of material together and put my foot on that peddle and push as hard as I can cause I have to get this done!

In the long run, I always discover that planning would have been better. But I never learn from my mistakes...cause that would be too easy.

Anyways, sucess at it's finest for this young chap (me).

I always worked a full 8 hours today, went for a run, cleaned the house, baked cookies, made supper, AND I'm blogging. And yesterday, I worked, cleaned the car (seriously, worse than laundry), went running in the 30+ degree weather, paid some bills, cleaned the house (this apparently has to be done every day), and made Al's favorite dinner.

Is anyone else impressed with this new house wife? Caaaause ya should be!

Cuppy Cake Gum Drop

2010-08-12T17:49:00.000-07:00

So, this is a bit of a continuation from my last post about the peanut butter heaven that we whipped up the other day. Jen sent me the pictures we took, and I couldn't be selfish and not share them. Here they are in all their glory. I bet you are wishing this wasn't just a picture.

If I could virtually send them to you, I would....and once the smarty pants of the world invent a way to do that, I will send cupcakes to all my blog fans!

Here's me and Sam and Ash who was clearly wishing she was allowed off of her breast milk diet that day. Did I ever mention how much I love my new sister-in-law? Honestly, I'm not just saying this because Sam asked me for an "ode to Sam" post, I really mean it. She is so so much fun and always come and plays with the fam....absolutely the easiest person to get along with. She fits right in! We love her to bits and pieces.

And gueeess who passed school and is home for the month of August??? BRANNY PANTIES!!!!!!!

This here picture contains the genuinely nicest most loving girls in girl history....minus me. Really, minus me...I'm not trying to include myself in this....at all.

I'm just at work right now on my break actually. I figured I'd continue to hide out in the basement instead of going out on my attempt-t0-get-some-sun walk because the sun is most definately not shining. I am really and truly racking my brain right now trying to find something to blab about but all I can think of is "I want to go home". Being at work really bums me out.

Well, my 15 minutes of freedom are over.

I hope everyone is having a hippity hoppity jolly Friday! I promise I am despite my prior whining. I love Friday's. :)

How Much Happiness

2010-08-11T20:56:00.000-07:00

How about instead of before we take that big tasty bite of food and ask the dooming question of "how many calories are in this?", we instead ask ourselves "how much happiness is in this?" Cause that's what I do, and I'm really happy.

Me and Al down'd two jumbo bags of extra buttered popcorn at the Movie Mill tonight. Sure, we both feel like hurling, but we are oh so happy.

And yesterday me, Bran, Jen, and Samiclablami made peanut butter cupcakes with peanut butter icing and chocolate ganache on top. Tell em ladies, tell em how happy we were!

So drop your flash diets and eat, it's what god intended.

I loooove me some food.

Bamff

2010-08-07T08:57:00.000-07:00

I spell Banff like I do up there ^ because that is exactly what everyone says it like, so why in heaven's name is it spelt with an "n"?

I do not lie when I say this bothered me our whole trip there. Every time we said Banff...or rather BaMff, I would take extra precaution and try and pronounce the "n". Hard.

And dumb.

Anyways, this brings me to the beginning of a wonderful story in which me and my handsome prince took a weekend trip to Banff (I'll keep spelling it like this to avoid grammatical errors, cause you know how I hate those). We made the mistake of choosing a long weekend to go, but....like we had any other choice. Lets just say I was one among many, many Asians.

It was our little celebratory Alan-has-a-week-off-of-studying trip! I'd never been to Banff before, and we were already in Calgary, so voila! We paid next near a billion dollars to get in and another few million for a camp site that was right by the road with deee-sgusting bathrroms, and we had ourselves a grand old time! Really, we did!!!

Our only source of income right now would be yours truly, so we tried to avoid spending any more money than we already had to just go GO INTO THE CITY. I don't know why this bothered me so much, but it did. Anyways...we just kind of walked around looking at the places we'd never seen. We did splurge and went to the hot springs and ate out once...at Tony Roma's. Laugh it up!

We toured the big castle thinger-madoo there, whatever it may be called. The Prince of Whales of Banff, if you will. (I compared Banff with Waterton the entire time I was there, sue me).

I really really really liked walking around this hotel. I don't know why. We just kept acting like the snooty rich folk we truly are at heart and pretended like we were riding the elevator to get to our suite on the top floor.

We fooled no one.

Here is us at Lake Louise. That lake's color melts my heart, it really does. We happened upon a nice German friend on the trail and she took some pictures for us. I don't know what's going on over there in Germany, but she took some reeeeally crooked pictures. I loved her anyway. Up to heaven I go!

A dead stuffed wolf and I. This was at an information centre or something. They also had in their possession and on display a stuffed goat and a stuffed BABY GOAT. Yes, a teeny tiny baby goat. Sick, sick people.

Lake Minnewanka or something of the sort. The best thing about this lake was that it was filled with Powerade!

LIES! The best part was this little guy.

He was a begger and a half.

Another lie would NOT be that we spent over two hours playing with and feeding him. So in other words, we suuuure did!

Alan...caught in the act.

Alan makin us a fire. It actually rained a lot so we only had a fire once, but boy did I make s'mores! I actually like to call them "shmores" with a taaad bit of a German accent. It's more authentic since shmores orriginated from Germany.

(quite possibly another lie).

We found this lake on a map, got everything ready for a picnic, drove all the way up here, walked around for a good 10 minutes trying to find a place to spread out our blanket, found a place, spread out our blanket, got out our books and our lunch, and then it rained. Thank heavens we found time to squeeze a picture in there before it was too late!

Two pictures!

I was truly shocked by the mass of people and stores in this little city in the mountains. It was fun to go shopping downtown though. Alan got new sunglasses and was overly excited. He hasn't had new sunglasses since...ever. This is in no way a lie.

All in all, great relaxing fun trip. It was great to escape all of the madness....which includes my dumb job and the dumb laundry.

I HATE LAUNDRY.

But I love Bamff. No worries though, I still love Waterton much more.

MCAT Day

2010-07-30T07:43:00.000-07:00

Hello fellow bored's. Thank heavens for blogging to keep us occupied and our spirits high as we read about what everyone else has been ambitious enough to do, eh?

Today is weird. I am sitting in a hotel waiting for my darling cutest while he takes a test for five hours. Yup, MCAT day is finally here. I wasn't really expecting ME to be the one with the butterflies and the sweaty hands, but here I am....freaking out. It's been a while since I've had to deal with the pressures of testing. What am I saying...I don't have to deal with them now! But Alan does, and we are just so intuned that I feel it for him...(cute).

Yeeeee, hope he survives!

So anyway...I've been thinking about my blog. I actually think about my blog a lot so technically it should be a whole lot better than it is but nothing in my brain really ever gets put into action, so I'm not surprised. You shouldn't be either. I was reading a newborn blogger's blog and she was explaining the reason for her title. Then I remembered the first time Al looked at my blog and the expression on his face when he said "why Tina Butter?". So, I'm assuming everyone thinks this is just a stupid name I made up in a failed attempt to be clever.

Nope. I don't even make attempts, sorry.

The history is lame, but as per the afore-mentioned, I'm bored. And I'm too chicken to brave the city roads by myself and take me to a mall. I have this inkling I will get lost. It's actually less of an inkling and more of an...I know I will.

When I was in high school and Jen lived at home, we were bossom buddies. We were a tad bit out of control. What I mostly remember is singing into our thumb microphones and running along the tops of the couches and jumping all over the cuddle sacks singing as loud as humanly possible to the Wicked and Enchanted soundtracks....and Hillary Duff and Mary Kate and Ashley....only the good stuff. I miss those days.

When Jen met and married Reg, he used to say that when she was grumpy he would need to bring her to me for a "dose of Tina" and then it would be aaaall better. He called us Tina, Tina Butter....and JENNIE - like the commercial...peanut, peanut butter...and JELLY! You know the one?

And then Tanner and Regan forever called me Tina Butter. That is honestly and truly the only thing I've ever had that is close to being designated as a nick name. And the only people that ever called me that were Regan and Tanner. It made me feel super rad, since my lack of a nickname all throughout my life gave me a complex. Miss T never even gave me a nickname, and trust me, that is pathetic. Denise did used to call me "Teener" but I have always opted to not count that....for reasons your gag reflex is explaining to you right now.

I've been feeling guilty and thinking I need to change it to something like...Tina Butter and ALAN or Da Wiiiiildz....but really....despite the fact that the entire blog is about Al, it's still my blog. I'm actually 65% sure that he doesn't even read it on a regular basis, so until he can shape up, it's mine baby, aaaaalll miiiine!!

Just don't go thinking that I don't love him or my new last name and that's why I haven't changed it, cause I doooo (and that phrase should be said like Nacho Libre please).

Nap time? Ok.

Love ya J, I've been reminiscing prior to this blog post, and it's been pleasant.

Al Capone

2010-07-28T21:01:00.000-07:00

Al is just so cute.

I can't seem to stop taking pictures of him.

I just wuuuuv my hubbie bubbie!

Ra-haain

2010-07-21T08:27:00.000-07:00

Boy, we've sure had a lot of rain this summer.

We really soaked it up the other day....pun intended! Haaardy har.

We had planned a cute little couples run after work but by the time we got home the sun was nowhere in site and it was raining. Well......we went ANWAY. I know, the spontaneity is ridiculous. It turned out to be quite a jolly good time. I am just so happy to be able to spend so much quality time with my hubby bubby this summer. I am really hoping September never shows up.

And running in the rain is always fun. I really do love the rain. Especially that so-fresh-and-so-clean smell.

I didn't appreciate it this weekend when it soaked me to the core whilst doing my bridals though. I have the worst luck with weather for photoshoots. I'm starting to think that god doesn't want to put anyone through the pain of having to look at pictures of me.

I'm only joking. Look how beautiful I look when I'm sopping wet!

Haha, I was a mess....but I really do love the pictures despite the rain. This picture was near the end when my hair was sticking to my face, my dress was sticking to my legs, and my mascara was beginning to run. Yum.

Hot Hot Heat

2010-07-13T15:23:00.000-07:00

Now, I'm not saying that I don't love the heat. Cause believe me, I laaaaarve the heat. I love the sweltering hot sun in my face and the feeling of sweat dripping in between your cleavage while you sit on the beach eating and reading all day. I honestly can't get enough of tanning beds. And my heart sinks when they click off (I would go more if they were a little more in my price range). I always ALWAYS wrap up in my blankets at night and when I'm on the couch no matter how hot I am....and our room gets pretty up there in regards to the temperature. So hot.

However, the heat lately has been driving me mad. I don't even care if it is 30 above and gorgeous out....my day consists of sitting in the basement all day and then going home to the overheated house to clean it and cook in it while the sun shines in my face from the windows and I am covered in sweat with ALWAYS too many clothes on. If I have to blow dry my hair with swollen sticky hands against my swollen sticky face one more time, I might scream.

So, today with the hurling cold winds, I smile.

I smile and smile.

And then I walk to the back of my house and look out the window and frown.

The sun would never do this to our tree.

I'll never be thankful for the wind again.

I'm going to miss our cute little tree. :(

Second Non-Annual Anniversary

2010-07-08T16:10:00.001-07:00

Congratulations to us. We still are happily married after two whole months. Happily being a tad bit of an understatement.

Al wanted to do something suuuper special for our 2 month'er, so he did this.

It's not scary....it's cute, right??

Haha. He just took a liiiitle trip to the eye doctor today. He scared the crap out of me when he came home, and I was even expecting it already!

Happy anniversary toots. Love your stinkin freaking guts. You are cute when you sleep.

But you got some tough competition.

Housey

2010-07-05T15:29:00.001-07:00

I did a little decorating today and couldn't decide how I felt about it. So I took a picture and thought I would ask my blog fans for an opinion.

So Jen, what do you think? And while I'm at it, thanks for being my biggest and best and only blog fan ever.

So here is a picture of my little project. I just hung these frames today. I am going to change the pictures in them one day I'm sure....but we all know that it probably won't happen.

Isn't our coffee table cute? We got it for a whoppin $4 at Salvation Army and spray painted it white. Alan gets yelled at when there is anything on it because it is just too darn cute to be used.

And there's our bird cage and plates in there.

I was taking these pictures and thought, what the heck, I'll give a grand tour!

This is just by the front door.

And over here we have my beloved china cabinet. Yaaaaaaaay.

Kitchen. Thank you for giving me an excuse to clean it. (I don't know who I'm thanking with this, but nevertheless).

You even get to see our bedrom. Bow chicka bow wow.

And here is a picture of the best thing in the entire house. The AC.

Spooooooooooooooon collleeeeeeectioooon!!!

And this, my friends, as I'm sure you've already guessed, is where I get ready.

I'll clean it later, I swear.

It had been a while since I'd done an out-streched arm picture of myself, so I took the plunge...and did it.

Side note: Alan just walked in wearing a black shirt with navy blue shorts and a black hat. I was on early shift this morning and wasn't here to supervise.

Garsh, I love him.

Worst Blog Post Ever

2010-06-21T15:23:00.000-07:00

So here are some random pictures from San Diego that I never posted. My computer refuses to not be gay, so this is all I could come up with. The order is ridiculous because....well because I am too lazy to fix it.

Consider me a terrible blogger. I don't even care!

I loved San Diego :).....but it was a little too cold. And no, I'm not kidding. I was shivering almost the whole trip. Maybe it's just cause I didn't have my sweet hubby to warm me up. Or maybe it was that darn cold breeze comin off the ocean. I don't know.

In little Mexico land. We had "real" Mexican food. It tasted pretty much like every other time I've had Mexican food...those two times.

Just frolicking around California! Trying to forget how much I missed my man.

Famous marathon runners. Holla.

Ok, I think these two pictures are funny. It's called up at 3 AM and about to run 13 miles. SMILE BIG.

Oh and here is a picture of me at Disneyland, haha. We did ride It's A Small World, and I did get a headache. It made me unusually cheerful though, I'm not gonna lie.

Ok, I was SO excited to see Sully. We followed him for like 10 minutes until he finally stopped and then stood in line. He didn't talk to us though. None of the characters do. Does anyone else think this is creepy?

So I pretty much was hobbling around the entire day because of my stupid foot. At like 4 in the afternoon we finally asked about renting a wheelchair and it was like 10 bucks! And we got to cut to the front of every line! Scaaam aaartists!

A for Alan. I was going to explain myself and say that the reason I only have one shoe on is because my bummed foot was so sore...but then I looked closure at the picture and my LEFT shoe is off. Uuuuh, heat stroke?

I can't really blame heat stroke though when I said it was cold the whole time though can I? Gee, this is beginning to be a lengthy explanation for something you probably didn't even notice.

It was hot on the day we went to Disneyland! I swear!!

This was my mom's attempt to take a picture of both of us on a ride. Yes, both of us. And no, the ride hadn't started. I'm a pretty decent actress.

MICKEY MOUSE!! DONALD DUCK!

I would just like to say that my internet started working half way through this post, so it really wasn't that bad afterall. I don't think....

I'm in a weird mood. Alan has his volume turned on LOUD and is playing a game on his computer where penguins shoot out of a canon and they say "YIPEE" every five seconds. Five seconds is way too much of a long shot. It is about every half a second.

Bye.

TINA WILDE

Run Fat Girl Run

2010-06-11T13:55:00.000-07:00

Weeeeeeeeeell! I did it! 13.1 miiiiilez.

It was fun, and I loved it, and I would do it again in a heart beat...if I could run. But I can't, cause I bummed out my foot. So now all I do is limp and complain. So, you'd be best to avoid me for the next few weeks until it gets all better.

The runnin crew. We've had a lot of fun training together. I just wish I had as much energy as these 50-year-old (no, not you mom) ladies. They are out of control.

I love my mom! Still can't quite keep up to her though.

Marathon highlights:

The asian drum line that was goin at 'er as I ran past.
The moment the thought finally occured to me to just take my shirt off all together.
When that lady on the side of the road sprayed me with her garden hose.
The sweat dripping down my face into my eyes (I'm not being sarcastic, I don't get to experience that very often).
Actually spotting my mom in the 30,000 people crowd at about mile 10.
When Vengaboys came on my iPod.
That darn finish line.

I Learned Today That Hollywood is in California

2010-06-03T19:32:00.001-07:00

Has anyone ever seen this movie??

For some odd reason, it seems like me and my sib's are the only ones that ever watched this. And if I remember correctly, we watched it quite a few times. I had a spaz attack about it one time and asked everyone everywhere I was for about a month if they'd ever seen it. I never found a soul.

The spaz attack all started when I made a decently funny joke in reference to this movie, and no one got it. Is there anything worse? I finally find an ounce of wit in me, and no one knows that the H I'm talking about. Result: spazzy Tina.

The reason I'm talking about this movie you might wonder?? My favorite part to mock in the movie is when the little boy and his family are driving through California and he is in the back seat of the car rocking back and forth going "caal...i...fooooor...nia......CAL...I...FOOOR...NIA!". It's not meant to be funny but is (you know, one of those).

Well, my whole life I've dreamt of going to California so I could do the exact same thing in the backseat of the car and have everyone who is with me laugh and laugh and laugh at my funny witty joke.

I'm going to San Diego tomorrow!

So it's really too bad no one has seen this movie. Maybe on the plane when we start flying over California I will do the impersonation really loud and see if anyone laughs. If they don't, I'll just keep acting like I'm mental and everyone will look at me and my mom with pitty. Maybe I'll even get free stuff.

Turns out, that's only part of the reason I'm going to SD, CA. I'm going to participate in a half marathon. Yes, me. No, I'm not just going to watch. I'm going to run it. Or at least make an attempt. I'm also going to go to Disney Land. And to the beach.

I am T-rexcited. I have to leave Al behind (since we planned this trip long before we were engaged) which makes me sad all day. I better go spend some time with him before I leave him on a jet plane.

Good luck to me!!

Bad Blake

2010-05-29T19:27:00.000-07:00

This is the best movie I've seen in a long time.

I even stayed up until ONE THIRTY Friday night watching it. Maybe that doesn't impress any of you, but it sure impressed me. I don't remember the last time I did anything past 10:00 without falling asleep. I try to tell myself that it is a blessing that I can sleep so well at night and take nice long naps, but truthfully, it is a curse. This is one of the first movies I've watched with Al where I actually stayed awake the whole time. He was quite happy with me....well, at least, I'm assuming he was.

Anways, great movie. If I had the time, I'd watch it every day.

Honeymoons and Will Forte

2010-05-27T13:43:00.000-07:00

I loved our honeymoon.

It was in my favorite place with my favorite boy.

Wish we were still there.

I also love Will Forte.

We have watched this about 20 times today.

The Sunday following our wedding, me and Al both pathetically admitted that we were a little sad we

missed SNL the night before. But vowed (we were on a roll that weekend) to watch it the next Saturday

together in our own house.....so the next Saturday rolled around and YES, we had 90 channels of cable

set up with Shaw! But no TV. F'in S. After quickly stealing Alan's parent's just in time for last Saturday, it

was a bloody rerun! Good thing there is only two more sleeps 'til THIS Saturday.

Great. :)

So I Fell in Love, and Then I Got Married

2010-05-17T18:19:00.000-07:00

1 Week Anniversary

2010-05-15T23:01:00.001-07:00

I wished Al a happy one week anniversary today and his reply was. "That makes no sense. Anni comes from the word 'annual' which means 'year'". He is suuper sentimental.

Oh ya, BTW...we got married last week.

The best day of my life.

And this has been the best week of my life.

I'm going to post some more pictures later, but for now...I shall retire to bed with my husband. Goodnight.

Four Days To Go

2010-05-04T19:42:00.000-07:00

Only four days until I become a Mrs.

Holy granola.

Nuts, eh? I'm going to be all grown up and on my way to success with a wonderful husband at my side! I have to say, I can't quite wrap my head around this. I just can't seem to grasp the idea that this Saturday is the most important day of my life. I'm never very good at wrapping my head around things though. For example, Jennie being pregnant. I don't think I ever really believed it until I was holding that sweet little baby girl in my arms (who is the cutest thing alive and named Ashley Beth). Jennie never really grasped it either though, so I don't feel too terrible about myself. This one day when we were shopping in Calgary, it was funny... me and Jen and my mom were walking around Baby Gap lookin at baby clothes. One of the workers came up to Jen and her biiiig belly and was like "doin' a little preshoppin' eh?". Jen was like.....(weird look)..."preshopping for what?". This "not grasping" downfall runs in the family.

AAAAAAnyways, I'm just soakin up the home cooked meals and the promiscuous single life this week . I am sure going to miss Dix's food. I am not going to miss saying goodbye to Al at the end of the night though, that's for shizzle....my nizzle.

I don't think I have ever felt so many emotions at one time. It's bizarre....and exhilirating (two very strong emotions...see?).

1. Excited. OBVY, this trumps the list. I'm excited to spend the rest of my life with the man of my dreams. I'm excited to wake up in the morning to his smile. I'm excited to wear my mom's wedding dress and to get dolled up and called pretty all day (hopefully). I'm excited to never be alone again. And to be frank, I'm excited for sex.

2. Happy. Apart from the other emotions that I'm feeling from the usual stress that comes with weddings, I'm on cloud 9. Al is my dream boat.

3. Nervous. I am freaking out that everything isn't going to get done on time and that nothing is going to work out despite all my hard work. I'm nervous it's going to blow 100 km winds and snow and rain like it did today. I'm nervous Alan will realize I'm insane and hop on a Fed Ex truck and ride away.

4. Sad. I'm sad to leave my mom. I oh so love my mom.

5. Frustrated. WITH MAKING CRAFTS FOR THE GOSH DERN WEDDING. Flower after flower after flower I have folded and dyed and cut and glued. I've made a slide show. I've scrapbooked an entire guest book (with zilch scrapbooking skills). I've made 600 little party favors. I've made every possible thing I could out of doilies.

6. Tired. Too tired actually to list all the other emotions.

I toss and turn at night with anticipation. I repeat for the hundredth time on my blog that I am the happiest and the luckiest girl.

Life is a peach.

And my house is jam packed with peach decor. Hope you come enjoy the fesitivites this weekend :).

As Of Late

2010-04-05T19:19:00.001-07:00

Oh hi everyone.

I feel like I should just sit here and type for a while since I haven't been typing for doctors in what seems like forever. I went home sick on Thursday with a grumbly rumbly stomach and it has stretched on until today, making me call in sick 'the deuce'. I just have one thing to say about this:

Today, I love Greg Smith.

I should be up and running by tomorrow!

On the topic of wedding, things are going swimmingly. The invitations are done (five nine twenty thousand years later). Alan built me some peach backdrops. I finished scrapbooking the guest book today (two six eight hundred years later). And now I am just working on the slideshow, which is really fun. Breanne told me what song she is singing to us at our wedding and I am so excited about it I could die. She is the best MOH anyone has ever had. And looking at old pictures makes me realize how lucky I am to have such a wonderful friend. I love her.

Sorry to be all mushy gushy, but being engaged will do that to you.

Me and Al went and checked out our soon to be new digs on the weekend and it is perfect. Nothing could have worked out more perfectly. It is so spacious and has a dishwasher (yabadabadoo!). We even have our own fenced in backyard with a lawn. I don't even remember what it's like to have one of those!

Also, look what I got.

My grandma Heggie wanted to just get rid of it because it was in the way. Best unexpected surprise gift ever.

In terms of my marathon club, I have been a big poop ball. I missed the last big run from being sick and haven't been able to run since. I really hope I'm better by this weekend so I can catch up. But I made it on the wall of fame at Runner's Soul, so what else really matters? Right?

I really love my life and it is just fantastic to be in love with someone so ridiculously wonderful as Alan. I am surely getting the better end of the deal on this one.

Oh, and conference was great, even though I had to rewatch it today because the Gravol I took on Sunday knocked me out all day. S'all the same, right!?

So there's the update. I know how ridiculous exciting it was for everyone to read. I bet you'll read it ten more times just to try and relive the moment.

Blackjack Birthday

2010-03-28T15:40:00.000-07:00

I turned 21 on the 21st this year. It was my GOLDEN day. I have always been a big fan of my birthday and always take advantage of the saying "because it's my birthday!" I use this saying in different ways throughout the week of my birthday using it alternatively like "because it is my birthday tomorrow!" or "because it was my birthday two days ago!"

Might as well, right?

So, I had a really nice birthday this year. It was on Sunday so I just went to church with Al and then hung out with him at my house all day. Jen and Chlo came over for dinner and we had cheesecake (:D). And my mom and Jen got me this bad A antique vanity. It is so fetch. I can hardly wait to put it in our little town house!

But my favorite, of course, was the surprise part (I really like surprises).

I got home from a bunch of wedding errand shopping on the 20th (the day before my birthday), and there was a trail of cute little purple flowers in white vases with arrows on them leading me to this -

Alan had filled my room with balloons and put the reasons "why he loves Tina" all over my wall on sticky notes. It was about the most adorable thing.

Aaaaand I love him back. So much, in fact, that I think I'll marry him.

How Does it Feel to Have an Artist as a Daughter?

2010-03-17T14:38:00.000-07:00

Is what I said to my mom as I presented her her birthday gift today.

Wrapping paper is expensive.

Butcher paper from my dad's store, however, is not.

Lucky Dixie.

Sooooooo

2010-03-11T16:30:00.000-08:00

Sick of typing.

Won-da-ful!

2010-03-06T09:35:00.000-08:00

Today is the best. In honor of the good day I'm having I would like to share this little clip from Forgetting Sarah Marshall. Cracks me right up.

So this morning for Marathon Club I ran 8 miles. Yes, 8 miles. Maybe that doesn't sound like a lot to some, but I am pretty stinking impressed with myself. I have really been enjoying training for a half. But I'm kind of a wussy, so it hasn't been much of a breeze. I think my shoes are a good indication of this.

They even have a hole in them! Talk about hard core.

And as of today, me and Al have a place to live when we get married. His sister and brother-in-law are going to rent us their town house for a few years until Al gets into med school. It is cheap, on the south side, and it's a whole house to ourselves. I could cry of happiness. Well, actually, I am. :)

And the sun is finally shining.

Where My Fiance At?

2010-03-03T17:02:00.000-08:00

It seems like ever since I got engaged, I've spent significantly less time with Alan.

That's not right, is it now?

We are sooo busy. Alan with his 4.0 GPA and me with my obsessive everything-has-to-be-perfect-for-the-wedding attitude. I'm excited for when we are married and just sittin on the couch bored.

Mmmmm, love him.

#1 Wifey

2010-02-15T09:06:00.000-08:00

I am going to be such a good wife.

Alan had a hard week last week with mid-terms and everything. He was at the school every night until about 9 or 10 PM, which really isn't that unusual for him but it is still exhausting. So most nights he will head over here just to say hi at the end of the night, and while I'm waiting I usually either fix him up some of Dixie's delicous extravagant meals or prepare a little something myself. Since Dix and Steve are cruising it up, it was all up to me to please my fiance last week.

Every time I cook something it seems to go the same way. I mess up like 5 times, get frustrated, slam stuff around, make a huge mess, and waste a lot of ingredients. But the thing is, it always turns out okay! And by the time Alan shows up, I've cleaned everything up, and all he sees is the finished product. He thinks I'm fantastic.

This was my attempt at a milk shake the other night. I tried to use our "Magic Bullet". Harder than it looks that thing. Luckily, after a few attempts and milk and ice cream everywhere, I found one of these.

Genious!

And Alan loved it.

And here's a little special treat for everyone. We've been going through old pictures for our slide show. Ya, we're really on the ball.

Eye candy.

Tina Wilde, What?

2010-02-08T18:23:00.001-08:00

Yes, I am engaged.

I am going to be Mrs. Alan Wilde.

Soak it all up.

No one should be allowed to be this happy. This picture is us just newly an hour engaged calling everyone we love love love to tell them that I got a big rock on my hand as a symbol of Alan's undying love for me. That's right, it is undying. So I pretty much already feel busy with wedding preparations, and I have been engaged for a whole two days. I shall keep my three faithful blog readers up to date on everything. And here is my sparkly beautiful ring that I have to wake up every hour of the night to turn the lamp on to look at it.

I know what you're thinking, but it's not scratched already, it's just got a little fuzz on it. At first, I was going to take a new one and then a little part of me really got a kick out of the fact that there was a little fuzz on there.

If you click on the picture, you'll be able to see it. I wish I could have captured the sparkle. It's so pretty .

I am the luckiest girl alive.

Passionate Albertan

2010-02-01T19:15:00.000-08:00

I know that I already blogged today, but these things make me cry. Tears of joy, of course.

I looooooooove Alberta.

This.

And this.