Our Christmassy-ness in Pictures

Here are the two ornaments Ben & I made at a glass blowing class we took for our anniversary. Aren't they cool!?
Even the weather is cooperating with our Christmassy theme!

The super cheap and simple wreath for our door. I think it cost a total of $4. But it actually looks really pretty, especially in the snow!
Our stockings hanging on our stairwell. And yes, those are candy cane reindeer I made at a relief society function. :)
Snowmen place mats I made for our table.


And a close up of the place mats.A little door wrapping on our downstairs bathroom door, to help us display our cards and Christmas photos!

Our tree! With a super easy no-sew tree skirt I made.

Close up of the tree skirt. Here is the tutorial I used to make the skirt.
And finally, another apron I made as a gift.

Christmassy Lists!

Here are a few Christmassy Lists for you!

Christmassy Crafts Completed:

I have officially finished all the Christmassy crafts I wanted to do this year! I'll post pictures!

• Christmas Card Door Display Ribbon
• Christmas Place Mats for the table
• Christmas Lights in our windows
• Christmas Front Door Wreath
• Christmas Tree Skirt
  

Christmas Baking/Cooking!

Now that I have finished all of my Christmas crafts, I will be moving on to Christmas baking and cooking! Here is what I will make:

• Cheese crackers
• Oreo Truffles
• Chocolate Peanut Butter Chip Cookies
• Sugar Cookies (I have new cookie cutters to try out!)
• Mexican Wedding Cakes
• Oatmeal Crispies
• Marla's Buns
• Cinnamon Rolls
• Loaves of Bread as neighbor gifts
• and duh, duh, duuuuuuhn! A TURKEY! (yup, I think that's what we're going to try to make for Christmas dinner this year. We'll see.)

Christmas Stuff We're Doing or Have Done:

• Watching the First Presidency Christmas devotional
  
• Stake Christmas Music Program
• Wildlights at the Columbus Zoo
  
• Two Sundays full of being in special musical numbers at church
• Ward Christmas Party (with a theme of "The Polar Express"--it was cute)
• A Girls Night White Elephant Gift exchange for Erin (in which I totally scored some Christmas kitchen towels and a mug with a Christmas tree on it that has lights that LIGHT UP when you put something hot in it!)
• A Christmas party at some friend's from church's house
• Caroling with the Activity day girls and the cub scouts
• I would like to go to the temple before Christmas, hopefully we can make that work in the next couple of weeks

And I think that's it!

We have a lot of Christmas going on in the Carper Household! I love Christmas, and I love celebrating the birth of the Savior! Don't we have such a reason to celebrate?! I love that people, even those who aren't particularly religious, tend to be a little kinder, or a little more compassionate during this season. I think the spirit of Christmas somehow touches the heart of everyone during this time of the year, and the rough edges on people tend to round out just a little bit for a few weeks.

Anyways, Happy Christmas to one and all!

Whew!

I'm finally done with my daily diabetes blogging!

That was crazy hard and ridiculous! But very rewarding! Thanks to any of you who read that blog!

So, what has been going on for the last few weeks? A lot!

• My diabetes blog was mentioned on the American Diabetes Association blog roll!
  
• Ben and I have been asked to sing in a double quartet for our stake Christmas music program. I've also been asked to play my flute in an ensemble for that same program. So, I've pulled out the ole' flute and have been practicing a bunch. And it feels pretty good. I have a love-hate relationship with music and musicians right now, but so far, I'm having fun playing again. We'll see what happens when I actually have to start rehearsing with people again.
• We went to North Carolina to visit Ben's family for Thanksgiving! It was super fun and super relaxing! We ate a LOT, played lots of games, raked leaves, and played with two nieces and a nephew!
  
• We've started decorating for Christmas! We bought a fake tree this year (mostly because it was only $20 which is cheaper than a real tree), and have put all the lights and ornaments on it, including the ornaments Ben and I made when we took a glass blowing class for our anniversary! I'll take pictures, don't worry. :)
• I'm getting geared up to start Christmas baking! Mmmm. I have a whole list of all the things I want to make this year, including some recipes I haven't tried before. If there are any favorite recipes YOU like to make, please share them with me! I'm always looking for more tasty things to bake!
  

And, that's about it. Hopefully I'll be updating more regularly now that I'm not writing the diabetes blog every day anymore!

Neglecting.

Since I'm blogging every day this month for diabetes awareness, I've seriously been neglecting this blog! Sorry, dear readers.

Let me say a few things, first off.

1) Last Sunday, Novemeber 7th, 2010 Ben and I were officially married for ONE WHOLE YEAR! That is like 2-3 celebrity marriages already! I think we're doing pretty well! In complete seriousness, though, it has been the best year of my life! He is the best man I have ever known, he is so kind, loving, and he puts up with all of my shenanigans (which are great in number, trust me). I would marry him over and over and over and over again.

2) Today was Veteran's day, and I want to publicly acknowledge all those who have served time in the military. My grandfather, uncles, and several friends of mine have all served in the military, and I know what a personal sacrifice it has been and can be for these men and women and their families. Thank you.

3) My sister-in-law & brother just had a baby! I have a new niece! She is adorable, and I can't wait to see her!

4) My brother is rad, and totally rocked his thesis defense. Congratulations, brother!

OK, that is all for now. Life is good, and I will try to keep you more posted on what is going on. But, in the meantime, you should read my other blog. :)

Halloweeining-Part II

As promised, here is a post about the rest of our Halloweening activities!


We had a ward trunk-or-treat party, and we dressed up as Tetris blocks! Ben was the brains & the engineering behind the design! He put those boxes together so expertly! It was very impressive! I was mostly in charge of painting and designing and making the game boy (which you can see behind us on the car).

Also, in appropriate Halloween fashion, we got a pumpkin from a pumpkin patch and tried to carve it. Unfortunately, we happened to buy a pumpkin with the THICKEST SKIN I have EVER seen on a gourd! We couldn't cut it with any knife, so we ended up having to use a hammer and nails to poke holes through it and then use them as guides for our knives! Sheesh!


But, after about two hours of blood, sweat, and tears, we managed to get a tiny little face out of our pumpkin.


In addition to a pumpkin, we also decorated the house with a door hanging, window decals, and graves! WE LOVE HALLOWEEN!!!!

Election Day Woes.

Well, now instead of having Big Government control my life, I get to let Big Business, Big Tobacco, Big Oil, Big Banking, and Big Pharma control my life.

Awesome.

At least I know I'll always have health care. :)


So, now what? Do the Dems get to get all crazy pants and start a Coffee Party?

Diabetes!!!!!!!!

For those of you who aren't aware yet, Novemeber is Diabetes Awareness Month, and I'm blogging here every day this month about diabetes to try to create more awareness!

So, go check it out, and please put a link on your blog, web-site, twitter feed, etc., so we can spread the news about diabetes!

Please check it out, add it to your RSS feed!

http://theinsulincrowd.blogspot.com/

Also, I'm drawing CARTOONS for the blog! Woot!

(And don't worry, Halloweening-Part II will be posted soon!)

Halloweening-Part I

The 2nd Annual Carper Family Pumpkin Show Trek!

For part of our Halloween festivities, we went to the Circleville Pumpkin Show! We went two years ago, when we were dating, but we missed it last year, because we were too busy getting married! But we went this year with some friends of ours!

Here are some highlights!

The Large Pumpkin Pie. (I think it looks gross)


The first place winner! 1, 622 lbs!


A gigantic tower of pumpkins! (Notice, the
one on the tippy top has a crown!)



And finally a pile of weird gourds, with the tall weird green ones
attempting to spell out "O-H-I-O."

Oh, the pumpkin show. It was very fun. Someone was crowned the Pumpkin Queen, there were parades, there were hog races, and there were lots of weird fundamentalist Christian organizations with booths full of children singing strange songs (one was even rapping!). There were Shriners, and Rotary Club members, and Senior Citizens groups, and the community band. And, of course there were lots of different pumpkin foods to eat! I had pumpkin chili and a pumpkin donut. Mmmmm. Donuts. . . .

Also, this year there was this weird back-alley part of the pumpkin show with a bunch of creepy carnies manning freak show booths, and exotic animal viewing tents. Spooky scary, indeed! We avoided that area.

Happy Halloween Week! Mwa ha ha ha!

Ahhhhhh!

Why is my life so stressful right now?!!! I don't even have a job!

Ridiculous!

I need to learn the art of saying "NO."

A few things:

Just a few quick things of late:

1) It's open enrollment season for health insurance! And I'm excited! Is that weird? Probably. But I USE my health insurance. EVERY DAY! So, you can imagine, that if the opportunity to get some better benefits arises, or maybe some different options, I am excited to find out what they might be! Also, we will definitely be increasing our coverage this year, because our insurance company totally lied to us last year (those evil and conspiring men!) and we got stuck in a super high deductible plan. So, I'm excited about having a much lower deductible this year. Also, that means I can GET AN INSULIN PUMP! Woot! I have been told that our open enrollment packet should be arriving in the mail some time this week. You better believe I've been anxiously waiting by the window to see when the mail man comes, EVERY DAY THIS WEEK! So far, nothin'.

2) Speaking of health insurance, a gigantic miracle happened. My health insurance authorized my request for a prescription of 8-10 blood glucose test strips a day, the first time I asked! Without fighting me about it! This is practically unheard of in the health insurance world. For some reason, insurance companies think you only need to test 6x a day (because, you know, they have extensive knowledge about what it takes to manage diabetes), and they almost always fight people when they ask them to pay for more strips. What does this mean for my life? Well, I don't have to ration my test strips, and can get better control because I can test more! No more will I have the following conversation with myself: "Hmmm, I feel like my blood sugar is high. . . is it high? I'm not sure. Maybe I should take insulin. What if I'm not high? Then I'll go low! But, I can't test, because I don't have enough strips, so I better just wait and do nothing until it is absolutely necessary to test." On rare occasions, the insurance gods show some compassion. Emphasis on RARE.

3) In non-diabetes related things, we have been Halloweening it up like crazy here in the Carper household. Halloween is my favorite secular holiday. I feel bad saying it is my favorite holiday, because I feel like that should be Christmas or Easter, but I just have this nagging, deep and abiding love for all things spooky scary, and, ok, it's my favorite! I admit it! It just is! I will devote an entire post to our Halloweening activities later, but just to give you a little teaser, I will tell you that we dressed up for our church trunk-or-treat party and we WON A PRIZE! Oh yeah!

Okay, friends. That's it! HAPPY HALLOWEEN WEEK! Mwa ha ha ha! I think I'm going to go watch Thriller now. And fantasize about health insurance options.

I need some ideas!

Help!

I'm going to start a blog all about diabetes for Diabetes Awareness month (November) and World Diabetes Day (Nov. 14th). I plan to write a different, small blog post every day that month, and then link it to my facebook page/status each day in that month.

So, my question is this: What's a good blog name/URL for this blog? I want it to be short enough that people remember it, but to also say what it's about. I'm a little limited, because I'm going to do it on blogger and some of the URLs are already taken, but that's OK.

So, here are my ideas thus far:

• ErinsDiabetesAwarenessBlog
• DiabetesAwarenessbyErin
• Diabetes101byErin
• Igotthesugar
• ErinsBetesBlog

You get the idea. Any suggestions?

Also, wear blue on Nov 14th. And send an e-mail to the White House at this link http://www.whitehouse.gov/contact and ask them to light up the White House blue for World Diabetes Day. That's what the WDD campaign does, they get famous buildings and monuments and stuff lit up blue. (They had the idea before Susan G. Komen, thank you!).

Thanks, kids!

I'm a game player.

Well, not really. But right now, I AM playing one game against Old Man Winter! I'm trying to see how long I can go without turning the heat on in our house.

So far, I'm winning. But, we have had a very hot summer, and a very warm and dry fall thus far, to give O.M. Winter some credit. We've had a couple of cold days in early October. Today it is pretty cold, but it's still 69 degrees in our house!

I've got on socks and a hoodie and am often bundled in a blanket on the couch! Booya! Take THAT Winter!

Latest A1C

So, it's not in the range that is my goal, but it's a number I can live with. I'm trying really hard not to attach a big fat "FAIL" emotion to this number and just look at it as information to help me change what I'm doing. It's not "bad" or "good", it's just information. Life is one big science experiement!

I'm sure my last crappy endocrinologist would say I was being "non-compliant". Yeah, right. I have been working SO HARD these past months! I am not a pancreas. I'm just trying hard to pretend to be one. :) Anyway, it is what it is, and while I'm not elated by this number, I refuse to let it get me down!

Take THAT diabetes!

(p.s. I still love that I can get my A1C done at home now! SO much cheaper, and so much less anxiety than going to the doctor!)

Diabetes Breakfast Success!

I've finally done it! After 17+ years of having diabetes, I've finally found a combination of things to eat for breakfast that doesn't spike my blood sugar in the mornings! (Stupid dawn phenomenon!)

If I eat one whole grain ( it must be whole grain or else there's not enough fiber to slow down the absorption of the carbs) english muffin, 1 apple, and 1/2 C of cottage cheese and then take 6 units of insulin, my blood sugar stays stable after breakfast! This is a pretty amazing thing for me.

The only downside is, I have now eaten pretty much this same thing for the last month or so for breakfast.

So, I guess now it's time to experiment with other breakfast foods, but I'm reluctant to do so, because this is working SO WELL right now! Also, the stuff I really want to eat for breakfast (pancakes, waffles, smoothies, cereal and milk, etc.) has WAY too many simple carbs for my insulin-resistant-in-the-morning self to handle. Sigh. My body can however handle these things perfectly fine after about 1:00pm, so needless to say, we have Brinner in our house a lot.

Oh well. This is the nature of the 'betes. Everyday is one big science experiment.

Here's to finding a new "go-to" breakfast soon! And until then, here's to LOVING the morning without a post-breakfast blood sugar spike!

GPS Fail!

What ho, friends! Ben and I took a small trip down to Chillicothe a few Saturdays ago to visit the Hopewell Culture National Historic Park. It was pretty sweet. And it was only an hour away, and it was FREE! This is just one of the many places in Ohio (and throughout much of the midwest we found out!) where there are a series of mounds built by Native Americans.

It was kind of an adventure getting down there. We trusted our GPS, and it totally led us astray, taking us past this creepy house.

To give the GPS credit, the site it took us to was technically part of the National Park, just part of it that was not excavated, and that did not have any official tour, was closed to the public, was located in a very creepy area and was only marked by a small plaque.

The part of the park with the nice visitor center that was open to the public is actually located in the middle of three, yes THREE, state and federal prisons. (And they send school groups to this park all the time! Maybe it's a "scared straight" thing?) So, I'm not sure which one I found creepier. But, the mounds were really cool, and you could walk right up to them, just not on them.

One more interesting fact about the mounds: During WWI there was a big military training camp, called Camp Sherman, that was built right over the mounds! They built army barracks right on the mounds! Just disregarding them all together! This seems so ridiculous to me, because it seems like it would be hard to build a building on top of a big lump of earth rather than on the nice flat part right next to it, but hey, what do I know. I'm just a civilian. :)

Any way, that was our trip! It was cool, I highly suggest it. But be careful, and don't get lost in Chillicothe, because you'll either end up in a creepy area or a prison parking lot.

Operation: Trying to make a house more of a home.

We finally got some curtains up in our kitchen! They ended up being red, when we really wanted blue, but now that the red is up there, we actually really like it. Yes, I realize they need to be ironed. Also, I'm trying to make some blackout lining for them because we lose SO much heat through these sliding kitchen doors! Hopefully that will help with our gas bills this winter!

So, this is my latest sewing adventure. Good thing it still only requires sewing in straight lines. Although the fabric is MUCH thicker than anything I've used before, so that's a new challenge. :) Wish me luck! Any advice will be greatly appreciated!

Blogging for sleep.

Blogging for sleep is my version of walking for the cure, or racing for the cure, or swimming for the cure, or whatever people do these days*. Except I'm blogging to try to help me fall asleep. It's a long shot, I know.

But, it's 3:50 am, and I'm in the throws of a fun night of insomnia, so this is what's happening. "They" always tell you that if you aren't asleep after twenty minutes that you should get out of bed and do something else until you get sleepy, so you don't associate your bed with NOT sleeping. Welp, that's all fine and good if you're the kind of person who can fall asleep within twenty minutes of laying your head on the pillow. I am not that person. I can't remember ever being that person. I'm not even that person when I'm doped up on Nyquil, or Benadryl, or melatonin, or a combination of the three.

I have toyed with the idea of trying Lunesta or Ambien, but something about the commercials with the radioactive butterfly tend to make me wary of that. Also, I have a friend who may or may not have had a bad Ambien experience in which she ended up in her sister and brother-in-law's bedroom, in nothing but her skivvies, in the middle of the night, hallucinating that her fingers were turning to liquid and falling off her hands. I'm just sayin'.

So instead, I'll blog. And I'll leave you with this gem. I smooshed my finger in the bathroom door the other day, and developed this awesome blood blister in literally 5 seconds. Cause that's how I roll.

*By the way, while I fully support the breast cancer awareness peeps, and think it's a very worthy cause, etc., those people have a serious monopoly on the fund raising events these days! Practically every other day there are loads of people wearing pink wigs and boas walking down the street! And, almost every product at my Kroger is now packaged in pink with proceeds donated to the Komen foundation! Even the NFL players are wearing pink now! Someone has a seriously brilliant marketing team, that's all I'm sayin'. JDRF, you totally missed the boat on this one.

Thievery!

We had a breach of security a few weeks ago. I forgot to post about this earlier, but I took pictures (for the non-existent police investigation) so I thought I'd share a few.

The break in happened in the middle of the night. Of course our car was the only one broken into in the whole lot! They broke our window, ripped out our stereo, and stole a bunch of (monetarily worthless) stuff in the middle console. LAME!

It happened on a Friday night/Saturday morning, which is lame, because most window replacement places are not open on Saturdays. This is our only vehicle, so we had to get it replaced ASAP, because we needed it for church on Sunday, work on Monday, etc. Luckily, after much calling around we found a place that could come out that day, and not charge us TOO much.

We still haven't gotten the dashboard repaired, but a friend of ours from church "knows a guy" who can get the parts for us, so he's going to help us out with that.

We were very annoyed by this whole experience. My car was broken into about a year ago, so this is the second time in a year we've been through this, so while we knew what to do about everything, it was still obnoxious. In Columbus, you just report the break-in on-line. On-line! Can you believe that?! They don't even come out to take a look at it or anything. Ridiculous! Plus, the stupid thieves ripped out our whole dash! Take the stereo, just leave the dash board intact, please?!

Also, I got a piece of glass stuck in my hand while trying to clean it up, and still have not gotten it out. The skin has now grown over it, and it is pretty much a permanent part of my being. So yeah, VERY annoying.

All in all, just a VERY LAME experience.

(I promise a more up-lifting post will be on its way!)

Confessions Part II

Some things that intimidate me:
1. Cooking large hunks of meat. For example, Thanksgiving turkey, Christmas ham, roast, etc.
2. Baking artisan breads, especially ones that require any sort of starter.
3. Sewing anything other than a straight line, or anything that could be messed up without exact measurements.
4. Standing up in front of people to do anything. (examples: directing music, giving a talk)
5. Making small talk with people I don't know (or with people I do know, for that matter).
6. Driving strange cars in strange places. Or just driving strange cars. Or just driving in strange places.
7. Women with skinny jeans, Ugg boots, over-sized purses and large sunglasses (and men with those things, for that matter.)


I started to make a list of things that do NOT intimidate me just now, but I could only think of 2 things, so I got discouraged and stopped. For the record those 2 things were:
1. Waiting until the last minute to write 10+ page papers. (EASY!)
2. Baking (with the exception of #2 above).

Operation: I Will Never be a Hoarder

Last week, Ben's brother, Phillip, introduced us to Hoarders, a show on A&E (first season available instantly on Netflix) all about, you guessed it, hoarders. You know, those people who keep absolutely everything, including trash, rotting pumpkins, really old food, and cats. Like, 40 cats. Plus some dogs. Plus a bunch of dead cat skeletons because they have so many cats and so much stuff, they can't keep track of them. Yeah, that kind of hoarding.

Needless to say, we were horrifyingly fascinated and watched three episodes in a row. And then I watched another two by myself. Thanks a lot, Phillip.

This week, operation eliminate-all-my-possible-hoarding-tendencies has commenced. So far, I have organized the pantry, and am finally organizing my sheet music binders. I anticipate that my next project will be our closet!

I will never be a hoarder, I will never be a hoarder, I will never be a hoarder!

These are my confessions . . . .

1. Okay, so obviously, the first confession has to be that I like Usher. Yeah and Burn are two of my guilty pleasures. What can I say? I'm hard like that.
2. Along those same lines, I saw Jay-Z and Eminem perform on Letterman a few weeks ago, and I LIKED IT!
3. I really only have enough will power and self control to work on one thing at a time. For example, if I'm trying really hard to control my blood sugars, my other goals of say, exercising more, or eating less junk usually go out the window. Seems counter-productive, right? Welcome to my world!
4. I'm fascinated by disaster movies. I could watch Twister and The Day After Tomorrow every day of the week. I even like the cheesy made-for-TV disaster movies.
5. I've probably eaten chocolate at least once a day for at least the past 8 years. There may have been an occasional day here and there where I was trying to give it up. But, I really don't think I've ever gone more than 24 hours. Yikes.

So, that's all I could think of right now.

You can certainly expect a Confessions Part II some time in the future.

" . . . . and I don't know what I'm gonna do wit out my Boo."

Busy Busy & New Mex.

We have had quite a busy month and a half! First, we had a friend of ours, who was feeling a bit under the weather, stay with us a couple of weeks. Her husband has been out of the country for school, and she was not feeling well, so we invited her to stay with us for a bit.

Then, we had an AWESOME, if too short, visit from C. Burns. You're jealous, I know. Sadly, she is now living closer to most of my readership than she is to me, so now I'm the jealous one! Bah!

Then, I had to abandon my dear, sweet husband while I visited my mim (that's Erin for mom)! It was great to see my mim, but ever so awful to be away from Ben! Yikes! Luckily, we had Skype, texting, e-mail, instant messaging, and cell phones to keep us connected. I love technology! But not as much as Ben you see! Still, I love technology, always and forever. La la.

Here are some pictures from the trip to New Mex. Farmington is very beautiful! It sits right in this valley of sorts with bluffs on the side, with a couple of rivers running through it.

My mom is a librarian, and is obviously crazy about reading! This is the front plate on her car. I wish I'd gotten a picture of the library, because it's all kinds of awesome.

My mom took me to some nearby Native American ruins in Aztec, at the Aztec Ruins National Monement. VERY cool, and fascinating for a wanna-be anthropologist! This place was a thriving, sort of center point for Ancestral Puebloans in the area from 1100-late 1200s! Can you believe that?! All this was thriving while the crusades were going on in Europe! Crazy!

This thing that my mom is sitting near is called a kiva. They think it was used for spiritual or religious ceremonies, since modern Puebloans still use them in that sense today. It's basically this round-ish room that sits half way underground. There were big ones and little ones all over the place at these ruins. The one my mom is sitting near was smaller.

This site also had a "great kiva" that was restored by one of the earlier excavators and his team. Here is a picture of the outside, and then of the inside, with me in it.

I took a ridiculous amount of pictures at this place, which made me feel like a big nerd, but that's OK. It was really neat to see. It made me annoyed that we didn't learn more about this in school growing up. Maybe if I'd lived in the southwest I would have?

Any way, it was a good trip, good to see my mom, but it was oh so nice to be home again.

I just have to brag a little bit about my trip home: My plane from Farmington to Denver was half an hour late getting in. This left me with, oh, about 3 minutes to deplane in Denver, catch a train to a different terminal and board my plane to Columbus. I missed my little husband so much, that I was not about to let a little thing like a late plane make me miss my connecting flight! So, I literally sprinted, the entire way, from one terminal to the next, only stopping while I was riding the train to the next terminal, and I MADE IT!

As I was entering the terminal that my plane to Columbus was at, I heard them make the last call for boarding over the loud speakers! I almost started to cry and give up, I was so out of breath! But, I put on my game face, and did some awesome weaving through the crowds of people (shout out to Ben for teaching me the art of weaving!), and made it on that plane! Barely!

I was the second to last person on the plane! As I was getting on the plane, totally panting and out of breath, the flight attendant looked at me and said "You must have been running!". I was so out of breath I couldn't even talk, so I had to reply "My plane . . . (pant, pant), was late . . . (pant, pant). I was SO sweaty from running, and I had to pee REALLY bad, because I didn't have time to go in the airport, but the plane was about to take off, so I just had to sit down in my seat, which incidentally was the middle seat. Ugh! I'm pretty sure I smelled bad, but the two people on either side of me never said anything about it. Also, because I'm ridiculous, I didn't get out of my seat the whole 2.5 hour flight, so by the time we landed, I almost peed my pants. But, I did get to watch a great Queen Latifah movie on the way home . . .

Any way, it was SO worth the sprinting, the sweating, the holding it, the suffering through Queen Latifah acting, and even the sore calve muscles the next day, to get home to see my husband! I missed Ben! I missed this face!

More fun with Vegetables!

We have peppers! And LOTS of them! We have had to get creative to try to use up all of these green peppers, but it's been fun!

Also, we have a cute bunny living near our garden, or at least hanging out in the massive weed bush next to our garden. The picture is a little blurry, but you can just barely see him hiding behind that chicken wire! Cute! And, he is not even eating anything in our garden!

An Open Letter to My Migraine

Dear Migraine,

Here are some things I dislike about you:
1. You are the 2nd worst migraine I've ever had.
2. You force me to eat lots of chocolate and drink lots of caffeine. But this time, the medicinal benefits of those substances don't seem to be working, so basically you are just adding to the circumference of my thighs.
3. You are too damn persistent!
4. You are a tease. When I think you're about to be over, you come back with a vengeance!
5. You have horrible timing. Because the "Aunt Irma" time of the month isn't bad enough, you've got to come around and make a bad situation even worse.

Here are some things I like about you:
1. You will eventually go away. I hope.

So, yeah, Migraine. While right now it seems like you will be here forever, I still have hope that with enough caffeine, enough pain killer to kill a small pachyderm, and a few hormonal changes, you will eventually take a hike. I CHOOSE HOPE!!!!

Sincerely,

Erin

Late-night Migraine Ramblings

Wowzas! It's been a busy couple of weeks! Holy Cow! When I'm more lucid, I'll write more about that.

It's about 2:45am right now, and I'm currently sitting on the couch, with a hot rice sock around my neck, trying to convince a migraine I've had off and on for three days to let me get some sleep.

It doesn't seem to be working.

And, you wouldn't believe how worthless TV is after Late Night with Jimmy Fallon. Worthless!

I'm currently watching Dr. Quinn Medicine Woman tell me that I should use a certain skin care product to reduce my fine lines and wrinkles. And that's the BEST thing on TV right now.

Oi!

Sewing!

I made this little gem recently. It was an adaptation of the last apron I made, which was entirely too long. So, this time around, I just cut off a bunch on the bottom, and it turned out well! I really think this fabric is super cool too, and wish I wasn't giving this apron away. But I am. :)

Maybe I'm on my way to being Martha Stewart after all.

I am obviously NOT Martha Stewart.

Not only do I NOT engage in insider trading, but I am also a hopeless home decorator. So, dear readership, I am turning to YOU to help me figure out what the "aitch" to do with my living room.

I will first tell you a few things we WANT to do with it, and then post some pictures showing you the space we have to work with.

1. We want a picture of Jesus Christ somewhere in the living room. (Oh, and does anyone know of any cool pictures of Christ that shy away from the Greg Olsen/Simon Dewey genre?)

2. We want a framed "The Family: A Proclamation to the World" somewhere. One idea I had, which I am SO willing to change, is to do a framed Family Proc. with different size pictures of our families all around it . . . any ideas on how that would look?

3. We want some curtains up. Our pervasive living room coloring is brown, dark brown, and more brown, soooo . . . maybe something with some kind of color?

4. We have a "Carper, est. 2009" tile hanging up & a drawing of the temple & our marriage certificate hanging up that we want to keep up, but are also willing to move them.

So, that being said, here are the pictures!
The back wall of our living room is a gigantic built-in book shelf. We have several empty shelves that we could potentially put frames on.

This is the "Carper, est. 2009" tile. It is currently hanging next to the front door.

The temple drawing & our marriage certificate. They are currently on this small wall right next to the stairs.

The big empty wall that we want to put SOMETHING on. It extends all along one side of our living room. We have nothing over the piano or on the wall in between the couch & the TV. Ugh. You can also see a corner of the front window that we want to put a curtain on (on the far right of the picture next to the TV). Maybe red? Floor length or window length? I have no idea!

The other half of the long wall with nothing on it! Bah. We are also open to moving our lamps around, FYI.

So there you are! Put on your decorating caps and help a hopelessly un-crafty sista' out! HELP HELP HELP!

** Also, those of you who use blogger, how the heck do you post pictures easily? Every time I want to insert a picture, it puts it at the top of my blog, instead of where my cursor is. So, I have to drag the picture all the way to where I want it. ANNOYING! Any tips?

Eat your Veggies!

We're growing tomatoes! Which is interesting, because neither Ben nor I really like tomatoes, so we will give a lot of them away. Maybe I will attempt to make fried green tomatoes, just for the heck of it. . .

And we actually managed to grow a few potatoes. Our potato plants were being eaten by bugs and looked awful, so we pulled them up the other day to throw them away. We were pleasantly surprised to find that we were growing some potatoes underneath them after all! We still pulled up the plants, because they were choking out other plants, but I think we will try again next year, only we will plant them in gigantic pots instead. The little red potatoes were too small to eat, so we left them outside on the back porch and they were GONE the next morning! Certainly the work of our very own backyard chipmunk that has been slinking around in our garden this summer.

Camping!

We went camping last Friday night at Tar Hallow State Park, about an hour south of us, out in the middle of no-where Ohio! Here are some pictures!

We never went camping as a family growing up, so the only camping I ever did in Ohio as a kid was diabetes camp and girls camp, most of which was done in cabins. I really caught the camping bug when I lived in Utah, and would occasionally go with my friends up one of the canyons near Provo. So, the majority of my tent-camping experiences have been in Utah. Ben does NOT like camping, but was so nice to go, just because I like it so much! Thanks Ben!

Fast forward to last weekend in Ohio, when we went camping with some friends of ours from our ward. We have our own tent, and lots of camping supplies, so we were all set in that sense. What I was not prepared for were the vast amount of flying insects that reside in Ohio! Oh my! The buzzing sound at night was horrifying (luckily I brought ear plugs), and the outhouse we used was covered in spiders and egg sacks and flies. Ew. Also, a member of our party got stung by a swarm of bees! Granted, he was trying to chop down the dead tree they happened to be living in with his axe so we could use it for firewood. And by a swarm, I mean there were about 6 chasing him, and he got stung 3 times. But his arm totally swelled up like a log.


Oh, how I missed the relative insect-free camping in Utah. There ARE bugs in Utah, but not like this. I'm positive it is because there is so much vegetation & water in Ohio. I'm grateful that it makes everything green and pretty, but it makes camping a lot more interesting.

But, despite all the insects, it really was lots of fun, and the park was beautiful! And, we had tasty tin foil dinners, s'mores & campfire eggs for breakfast! Mmmmmmm.

Next time, if there is a next time, I will come prepared with much more bug spray, and stick to using the bathroom in the woods and not in an outhouse where you are confined in a small space with all sorts of bugs to which you have to expose your bare bottom!

Eight Months & Vegetables!

Hurrah! We've been married 8 months! And it has been fantastic!

Also, those green beans are from OUR OWN GARDEN!

And, we harvested our first two carrots!

And we've got tomatoes growing!