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Two.

Two years ago. 

Two crazy kids. 

Joined their two crazy families. 

And had one kick-ass wedding. 

<3

I love you, Hub. 

Not just for halloween anymore

Ok, seriously?! How cool is Disney Bound? Tons of Disney themed outfits that are a far cry from this:

(via http://www.disneystore.com)

No, no. We're not talking kiddie halloween costumes here. We're talking ensembles such as:

AWE. SOME. 

Just a thought

I miss writing. Like WRITING writing. With pens. My penmanship is like that of an 8 year old boy and I really think I could stand to work on it a bit more than I currently do. Damn keyboards. That's all.

By any other name

My pup, by any other name, would continue to smell like ass. Oh well.

Mila's Nicknames:

New addictions

Because I needed a new excuse to waste hours of my life on the internet, I joined Pinterest. Just this morning I came across a hilarious etsy shop: Spidercamp. I especially like their Weird Stickers collection.

That last one seems to be the theme of the past few days for me.

And if you're not reading The Bloggess, you're seriously missing out. Read this story right now, or else I won't be your friend anymore. 

Despite the title of my blog

We've been getting a little crazy in the health and fitness department of our home. The hub joined the gym a few months ago and we've been going several times a week to work out. He even started working out with a personal trainer and I've had the privilege of working out with them one or twice. In addition, we've been making weekly trips to whole foods and stocking up on protein shakes and powders from the local vitamin store. I've been trying to get over my aversion to eating green things and I like to think I'm working my way through the 12 steps of Carboholics Anonymous. I'm not sure what spurred this movement, but it was definitely much needed. I was proud of my frequent gym visits at the beginning of the year but they slowly tapered off when round 2 of the dreaded exam came back in the spring. After the exam was over in April, though, I had no excuse. I got back into the yoga groove and kicked up the intensity on my cardio. After reading several fitness blogs and subscribing to Jillian's podcast,  I also started weight training. It was daunting at first but really not too bad. It's definitely empowering and worth a shot if you feel your workout routine is in a rut. The best part is that it goes by pretty fast as opposed to the seemingly endless 30-45 minutes on a treadmill. If  all you have is 15 minutes, you can get a great full body workout. Current favorite fitness blogs are Fitsugar, Self, and Women's Health.

Yoga peeves

Teachers who look at the clock after every pose and then say, "OK, let's do....(pose name here) now. Please come into class with a plan for a cohesive practice session.

I love beards.

That is all.

Yoga peeves

Ladies and gents that wear shorts so tight I can see what they're thinking.

I think it's fair to say

...that I have a hard time committing to anything that's not related to my hub, family, job, dog or food. Hence, the 30 day photo project that quickly went down the tubes. Not to say I'm going to abandon it completely, but I won't be posting consecutive days. It's going to end up being way longer than 30 days, but oh well. I've had some very valid distractions though:

I mean, seriously, how can anyone tear themselves away from that?


Also, Maui in August! Stay tuned.

Something to think about

What if you woke up today with only the things you thanked God for yesterday?

I'm flying!

Sorry about the delay, it's just that I've been busy relishing in the fact that I am now a registered civil engineer in the state of California! I honestly thought the results could have gone either way and I was in shock when I opened the envelope from the Board and I read that first word in all caps: "CONGRATULATIONS!" I collapsed into a heap of elated tears.  I did it, peeps. And I am over the moon. What started out as one of those days ended in sweet, sweet victory accompanied by ice cream cake.  I need to thank the hub and our families for their support and encouragement as I missed many an outing over the past year, all in the name of my studies.  And guess what? It paid off, my friends. I'll get to enjoy this summer and hopefully make up for the fun I missed out on last summer.

To my hub

Happy birthday (yesterday)!

These two right here, they're my faves. <3

I SO agree

Yoga Peeves

• The lady doing yoga with her Bluetooth ear-piece in her ear (it matched her outfit, but I still won't give her a pass)
• The lady doing Warrior 2 while kicking into her back hip (don't be lazy!)
• Stepping in puddles that I hope were created by sweaty water bottles and not sweaty people from the class before yoga
• People stomping out in the middle of savasana

It's so shiny!

I done got me one of them new smarty phones, an HTC Inspire.

I chose not to go the iPhone route after becoming increasingly frustrated with iTunes and all the hardware updates which would periodically render my iPod useless.

Having been accustomed to the iPhone way of doing things, this phone has somewhat of a learning curve. After about a week I felt pretty confident about the in and outs of this HTC phone. From what I hear, the other HTCs are almost identical (Evo, Thunderbolt...). 

The 8 megapixel camera with flash is amazing. And the photo apps! Ohhh the plethora of photo apps is my never-ending playground. 

Another big plus is the ease with which I can transfer music to my phone. Once plugged into my computer, it functions like any other USB storage drive and all I have to do is drag and drop files into the "media" folder of my phone. Gone are the days of syncing my ipod to my iTunes and then making sure to never sync it with any other itunes on earth, lest I lose all the music that was there before. Gone are the days of the 348,901,927,439 MB updates to iTunes. 

This is what freedom tastes like. 

Yoga Peeves

During yoga, my brain is unable to slow down and concentrate solely on breathing and balance. Instead, my brain keeps buzzing in my skull and is entirely too aware of my surroundings. I usually end up making silly observations like:

• "Oh, that person came in late, I could never do that. How rude." or...
•  "Of all the spaces available in class today, I had to settle down next to The Flatulator." or...
• "Why is that guy wearing a visor in class?! Those things were cheesy even in the late 90's. Oh, and P.S. The lights are dim. And there are no windows in here. And it's night time." 

It's very un-yoga of me to think like this during class, but I can't seem to help my hyper-vigilance. Instead of beating myself up about it, I thought it might make for some fun quips on le blog so check back for some updated "Yoga Peeves."

Beautiful Nerdery

Nature by Numbers from Cristóbal Vila on Vimeo.

Feeling motivated

We finally got some sun this weekend and it brought me some motivation to catch up on things that I've been putting off (this blog included).  And behold...the new masthead. I think it was the sunny weather that made me not only go with a pink header, but rather, a PINK header. Which reminds me...

I've been watching this show religiously and I feel like such a dork when I do. I find myself sitting there with a ginormous goofy grin on my face while Blaine from the Warblers covers a Katy Perry song and then I inevitably start singing along and bopping my head along to the beat. Seriously, Katy, watch your back because Darren Chris can take you any day of the week. 

Yesterday I got around to hanging a couple of frames above our bed and 1 above the guest bed. I'd show you except for 1 minor detail....the frames remain art-less. I don't have photos or art for said frames right now but I figure that getting them up on the walls is half the battle. Or at least a third of it. It'll give me a little push to scour Etsy and other shops to find some lovely prints. 

In other domestic-ness...I recently took a stab at cooking chicken cacciatore from The Pioneer Woman. 

It was delicious. If it weren't for all the cleaning, laundry, and homeschooling of four children, I would TOTALLY trade places with P-Dub (That's Pioneer Woman for those not in the know).

Stuff the hub says: dos

Recents:

• "I really hope whatever I just put in my mouth was edible."
• "This is why I married you. Your knowledge of Muppets characters."
• "Dude, Sheboygan is fucked tomorrow."

I'm deciding to not give any context to these. They feel a little more absurd if I don't.

let me explain

I know, I know. Another long absence. There's just been so much to cover over the past several weeks that I don't know where to start. I went on a family vacation to the motherland, got a new phone, got props at work, spring has supposedly sprung (cue the new masthead) and the latest update is that a nasty virus is hosting itself in my chest and throat and has been ruining my life for the past several days. Now of you'll excuse me, I need to go pass out now since writing these few lines has zapped all of my energy. More to come in the near future. I promise.

Car sick

Honest to blog, I saw this bumper sticker today:

Almost puked right there in the car.

They're taking over

I don't know what the deal is, but lately it's been babies, babies everywhere around me. Three family members are currently pregnant and at least 3 friends are at the end of their pregnancies. Side note:

When did everyone decide that 'preggers,' and 'prego' are fun synonyms for 'pregnant?' I feel like 'preggers' is a kind of critter that you catch if you hike off the trail with your dog. "What's wrong with Sparky?" "Oh we had to take him to the vet because he caught some nasty preggers along the American River trails." And prego? Really? All I can think about there is pasta sauce, and meatballs, and parmesan cheese, and then I get hungry and am no longer interested in the story at hand. Now before this turns into a post about my sordid love affair with carbs, let's just call it what it is: pregnant. Thanks. The more you know.

Needless to say, I think I'm catching a bit of baby fever. They're everywhere! And so cute! They're so small & bald & chubby! No, not like George Costanza, babies have far less emotional baggage. And they're much cuter. Every now and then I turn to the hub and quietly say "I wanna baby." He smiles and nods and we proceed with our grocery shopping or whatever it is we're doing. Actually now that I think about it, my baby proclamations usually come out while we're at Target, passing through the baby clothes aisle. I'm easily influenced by leetle plaid shirts and tiny Easter dresses. But really, what female isn't?

In all reality, I know now's not the time. I'm rather enjoying the ridiculous amount of free time we have together. Sleeping in on the weekends and spur of the moment trips to San Francisco are delightful and I would definitely have a hard time trading them in right now. Not to mention that often alluded-to trip to Europe that we need to plan. (Perhaps 2012...?) I don't think we're done being a childless couple yet but the prospect of children feels far less scary than it once was. 

Inspiration delivered

Like I needed another distraction. I went and found Polyvore and I can't tear myself away. This site is place to create "vision boards" for fashion, interior design and art. You can shop and clip images of items that strike your fancy and then paste the clips into your "Night on the Town Outfit" set or your "Dreamy Bedroom Decor" set. I for one, found a new favorite color combination from this set:

modern bedroom idea board by the lowen on Polyvore.com

Tell me I'm not alone on this

I love it when straight edge people have foul mouths.

Makes me wanna give them a mutha****ing hug.

Photography: Uno

So to go along with the start of the new year, I thought I'd start some photography related posts. Since I'm basically a beginner, they might not all be totally groundbreaking but hey, I'm still learning.

Last spring I bought my first DSLR: the Canon T1i. I asked our wedding photographer (thanks Clark & Corona!) for "entry-level" recommendations, and being a Canon girl herself, she recommended the T1i and the XSi. I happened to pick the T1i mostly because of its HD video capability. It came with the standard 18-55 mm kit lens which is nothing to sneeze at but after playing with the camera for several weeks, I started looking for more of a portrait lens. After doing some research, I narrowed it down to 2 lenses: Canon's 50mm f1.8 and Canon's 50mm f1.4. Both give amazing depth of field but there's a major price difference between the 2. Since I'm such a newbie with not a ton of disposable income (I dropped a fair chunk of it on the camera, after all!) I opted for the less expensive f1.8. Both lenses are great for photos with a nice, fuzzy background and a beautifully focused subject.

And if a novice like me can take photos like these, you know this lens has to be good:

(These are all "SOOC," or straight-out-of-camera shots 

with no editing done in post, so they may not be perfect, but I love them anyway.)

oh no, not again

Friends, I'm in love.

With her:

She's being fostered locally and we're going to go meet her on Wednesday at our local shelter. Dear sweet Jesus, that face makes me melt.

For the dog lovers

Yes, I'm partial to Boston Terriers.


Stella's Shasta Adventure from Jesse Rosten on Vimeo.

Stuff the hub says

During conversations with the Hub, he'll sometimes emit the finest pieces of prose that ever graced the English language.  These are just a few good ones:

• "It was so super it was SUPERFLUOUS!"
• "They were engaged in a tepid affair."
• Me: "Your hands are so warm." (after he tenderly caressed my face) Him: "They haven't even been in my pants."
• "Dammit, I should have married a dumber woman."
• "I washed our bidet!"-This one requires some context...He called me at work one day and proudly exclaimed this little gem after he washed our DUVET.
• "It's almost the dog's birthday. Should we have a party at Round Table?"

Stay tuned for more Hub-isms in the near future.