Saturday, July 31, 2010

To continue...

Here is the list I started yesterday. (To recap, I started making a list of all the things I would like to do, maybe not so much with the expectation that I achieve all ofthem, but who knows, right?)

1. learn how to twirl a baton
2. go a national park
3. make beef bourguignon
4. knit a sweater
5. publish something
6. go to Italy with my husband
7. successfully train a dog to come when called
8. espalier a fruit tree or two
9. connect and use a rain barrel
10. re upholster some sort of furniture
11. go to Scotland with my mother in law
12. grow potatoes
13. See Led Zeppelin should they ever reunite
14. get a pair of custom made shoes
15. go to Montreal
16. learn how to make chocolate
17. build our own house
18. learn how to make ricotta cheese
19. Learn how to make a hard cheese
20. make all Christmas presents one year
21. slow dance with my husband and not try to lead
22. go to Africa
23. sail
24. do the splits
25. take a spur of the moment plane trip to wherever is cheapest one weekend
26. learn how to make soap
27. watch an Alfred Hitchcock film
28. go to Napa Valley
29. go to Paris again...with my husband, without 40 high school kids
30. live in Italy with my husband for at least 6 months

On my walk this morning, I thought of a couple more:

31. go to an opera
32. make a souffle
33. go dogsledding
34. climb Mt. Kilimanjaro
35. learn how to tie five useful knots
36. learn how to belly dance
37. go to New England

I'll keep adding as I think of them---what are the first five things, in no particular order, that you would put on a similar list??

Friday, July 30, 2010

Life List?

I was surfing the interwebs today and came across this post.

I like the idea. Those of you that know me, KNOW that I have lots of ideas, schemes, visions of grandeur. I have a lot of things in my noggin that don't always spill out my mouth---things that I will do or accomplish "someday".

I like the idea of writing them down---why....what a fabulous idea. I love lists. I love organization and perhaps it will help me focus on the stuff that I really want to do and not worry about the stuff that I think I want to do because I think other people will think it is cool that I did it. That is a pretty lame reason for doing something, but I think many people can get sucked into it. I recently had a convo with a good friend about living a more authentic life, being a more authentic me. Christ, it shouldn't be that hard, right?

I haven't shared yet, but so far I have lost 32 pounds. That's pretty awesome. Since April. Again, pretty awesome. I have struggled with this issue my whole life and there is a blog post somewhere in my head forming about it, but that is for a later day. Suffice it to say, I am re-organizing myself in more ways than one.

I am only going to work on this list for 5 minutes......I am curious to see what I come up with.

1. learn how to twirl a baton
2. go a national park
3. make beef bourguignon
4. knit a sweater
5. publish something
6. go to Italy with my husband
7. successfully train a dog to come when called
8. espalier a fruit tree or two
9. connect and use a rain barrel
10. re upholster some sort of furniture
11. go to Scotland with my mother in law
12. grow potatoes

Hmmm....that was harder than I thought! I had lots of things pop into my head that should just go on a regular to do list like "paint the living room". I also had things that popped up that I felt weren't specific enough or quantifiable like "get better at ______". You can always get better at most things, yeah? When do you cross it off your list then?

Five more minutes?

13. See Led Zeppelin should they ever reunite
14. get a pair of custom made shoes
15. go to Montreal
16. learn how to make chocolate
17. build our own house
18. learn how to make ricotta cheese
19. Learn how to make a hard cheese
20. make all Christmas presents one year
21. slow dance with my husband and not try to lead
22. go to Africa
23. sail
24. do the splits
25. take a spur of the moment plane trip to wherever is cheapest one weekend

That one took more than 5 minutes, but I wanted to round off at 25. I am going to keep adding to this. I like it. I like it a lot.

26. learn how to make soap
27. watch an Alfred Hitchcock film
28. go to Napa Valley
29. go to Paris again...with my husband, without 40 high school kids
30. live in Italy with my husband for at least 6 months

I guess I had a few more in there rattlin' 'round.

Saturday, July 24, 2010

I Need to Evacuate the Randomness from my Brain.

Here is one way to do so: make a list. I think I have blogged about my undying love for lists. This is not one of those lists. I do love lists where I can cross stuff off. Sometimes it is just a one liner cross off. Sometimes, it is an all out black out so that you can't even read what was just completed. I really haven't ever used check-offs. Nor have I used squiggley wavy lines through an item. I must admit to having used color coding for items yet to do and items completed.

In some areas of my world, I am uber organized. Others.....not so much. Spice cabinet? Organized and labeled.
My office desk at school for the first six months after moving to a new office? Still in boxes. Meh.

1. I love when Lionel snores and dream barks. (Folks, this is a King size bed.)

2. I have lost 32.5 pounds since April as of last Monday.

3. I just got rid of one bag of clothes that were ratty and two bags to sell at the secondhand store. That was so much fun....new wardrobe to fit the new body.

4. I bought a Meyer Lemon Tree and the first lemon is forming with five more blossoms on the way.















5. It has been way easier to lose weight this time around. Like freak-me-out-easier.

6. We have an intricate system of moving colder air around our house. Window unit plus the "Hawaiian Breeze" fan on the first level. The Breeze may be Hawaiian in nature, but the sound is akin to a jet engine at take off. That sucker is loud.

7. I rarely have reaction to mosquito bites. Which is good in Minnesota.

8. I haven't done anything to prepare for school starting like I thought I would (And that is on my summer to do list....) other than put the school calendar dates into my planner. Oh, I also went to school and GOT the planner. See? I am accomplishing things....

9. I am completely fine with the level of accomplishments in number 8. I am enjoying my summer and nap schedule.

10. Sometimes, I don't recognize myself in the mirror---my face looks thinner. I do a little inner I-am-proud-of-myself-dance when that happens.

11. I am learning how to knit this summer. I feel like I am 72. But I really like it. I am making my second hat right now. We will not be discussing the first hat----felting incident gone wrong. So very wrong.

12. Benchwarmers was a stupid movie, but I cannot control myself at the part where the guy who hates the sun has to go outside to get the girl scout cookies....I am laughing out loud by myself right now. With the Samurai sword and the screaming and the sticking the hand out to test the sun. Who is that guy again? The butterfly guy from Chuck and Larry??

13. Still laughing.

14. I took a mozzarella cheese making class Wednesday. I thought it would be starting from "scratch" and milk. Nope. I feel a little cheated as it was started from mozzarella curds. Essentially, the instructor heated up the curds to melt them together to form a fresh mozzarella ball. I think it should be classified as less "making" and more "reconstituting". Truth in advertising, my friends, truth in advertising.

15. What was the point of calling cards in a social sense? "Hey, I was here."? It seems weird.

16. In the battle of Me v. Spiders? I am losing. I thought I got all the cobwebs last week....month? Turns out not so much. I tell myself: "The house is 115 years old, spiders are going to live in your house with you." (The truth is, I don't necessarily fear spiders....I just have Spider Karma Issues. Like if I kill one, all the Spider Buddies will gang up and come and crawl all over me while I slumber. Someone else in my house doesn't help matters by talking about laying spider eggs in/on me while I sleep....)

17. I made a Plum Crisp last night. It was pretty good...the plums were ripe.

Ah....more space has been freed in my head. And now, off to walk the beast before it gets Africa Hot and Carribean Humid.

Saturday, July 10, 2010

Uhmmm....hi. Hi.


We got Lionel a year ago last Monday. I think he weighed 20 lbs? We are estimating he weighs 160-165 right now. I bet his head alone weighs 30 lbs. The dog is big. As I type, he is laying on the dining room floor meticulously unraveling and obliterating a rope pull toy.


You have to feel bad for the kid, he destroys almost any toy in five minutes. Stuffed animals with squeakers? Gone--3 minutes. I got him a stuffed alligator toy with 16 squeakers, half were non-functioning before we were out of the Petco parking lot. He loves--LOVES---tennis balls, but now they are too small for his maw. I am afraid he will choke. Kong Brand does make a bunch of bigger toys that are covered in the tennis ball fuzz. He loves to delicately peel back the fuzz with his front teeth. AND they have squeakers. He still has to be watched with those; he goes for the squeakers first, gets those out, then goes about chewing off chunks of the rubber. We thought he was just Cookie Monstering it (chewing and the pieces fall out the side of his mouth) but today I caught him chewing a sizable piece of the tennis ball like it was chewing gum.


The only, ONLY, toy that is has not been able to destroy is the black rubber Kong. The red one? Shredded.