New J-O-B and a vacation!

Oh you know it might maybe have been three months since I have written anything. Well it’s pretty much been three months since I have done anything but work and sleep! Back in April I accepted a new position at a new hospital an hour away from where we live. This was the ideal position I have been waiting for! I get to work less days a week and still make the same amount of money! I now work two 12 hour shifts a week instead of four 8 hour shifts a week. The catch was I was taking a medication that was very expensive without insurance coverage. So for the past 3 months I have been working two full time, six days a week!! Needless to say this has been hard on my body, our family, and most important our relationship. I have now passed my 90 day probationary period and have insurance coverage! I am officially Per Diem/on call status at my original job and full time on my own at the new one. YAY!!

We kicked this off by a camping trip to eastern Washington. Now in the 12 years that Ron and I have known each other we have never been camping together. We spent 4 days and 3 nights at Potholes, WA, The Mardon Resort. Ron and his dad used to come camping and fishing here when Ron was just a little boy. It was really special to Ron that he was able to bring the kids back here and give them a piece of his childhood.

At The Mardon Resort they have a doc structure with many places to tie up your boat which makes many places to fish for fun little fish like, perch, crappie, and blue gill. The kids had a blast. They both caught their first ever fish alone without any help from the two of us. Many it was hot as heck over there though. The difference between western WA and eastern WA is that there aren’t any shade trees, Eastern, WA is almost like the desert during the summer. We spent a lot of time swimming in the lake to help cool off.

On our last full day there we rented a 14’ boat to take out further and explore the lake more. This was amazing to the kids! The three of them caught some big catfish and I caught nothing! The kids thought it was pretty funny I didn’t get anything. We first got on the water about 8 that morning and I had packed some sandwiches and chips for lunch so we ate on the water. We headed back in around noon because it was so dang hot! We hung around the swimming hole floating around and having fun till dinner. After dinner we went out on the boat again for sunset. Have I mentioned the sunset? It was beautiful every night we were there!

We had such a great time. It was nice to get away from home for a few days but we were so glad to be back in our own bed and our own shower.    

Home again, Home again.

Holy wow it feels like I haven’t written anything in so long! Really there just has not been time. It has been over three months! Let me tell you these three months have been a whirlwind. When I wrote last we had gotten back from visiting Ron in San Diego and having a blast.

In March I actually went back to San Diego by myself to drive home with Ron because his TDY was over. He was actually working when my plane landed so a good friend picked me up from the airport and dropped me off at the apartment. When I got there Ron had left me a note and instructions on what to make for dinner. He has purchased all of the ingredients ahead of time and had them waiting for me. Chicken and Rice one of the fave fives.

When dinner was done we packed it all to go and we went to one of the most beautiful places, The La Jolla cliffs, to watch the sunset. Something we had done before. I was nice to eat and watch the sun go down. We cleaned up and when we got up to fold the blanket Ron got down on one knee and purposed! I was so surprised and didn’t see it coming. It was the perfect evening, dinner, sunset, and a proposal!!!

The next day he had to go back to work for a half day to wrap up everything there and I got to stay home and relax. When he came back home we went to the store to get a few things for the ride home and then came home to get ready for dinner at The Melting Pot. Which Ron had made reservations for and had wine waiting on the table! My I was spoiled. Dinner was delectable and I couldn’t have asked for better.

Dinner at The Melting Pot wasn’t even the end of it though, Saturday night we went to dinner at a traditional Brazilian steak house, Rei De Gado. There was about 10 of us including Ron and I. The others were some of Ron’s co-workers. I have never been to anything like this and neither had Ron. If you have the opportunity to go to a traditional Brazilian steak house I highly recommend it. At Rei they offered 20 different cuts of prime meats for dinner service and I think we sampled all of them. They also offer a full salad bar of traditional Brazilian dishes as well as a full bar. I have never eaten so well in my life!! These were the best cuts of beef, chicken, lamb, and pork, so juicy and tender. I have never had better. The drinks were amazing as well as all of the salad bar items. We only made one trip to the salad bar as the meat service is non-stop and all you can eat. I’m telling you, unimaginably amazing.

We woke up super early Sunday morning to start our drive back to Washington. We had about ten hours ahead of us until we got to the resort, Gaia, Hotel, restaurant, and spa, that we were staying at that night. So we loaded the last few things into the truck and off we went, Bye San Diego.

The drive to Anderson California was pretty uneventful. We stopped a couple of times here and there for snacks and such. The last hour of the drive though one of the wheels on the truck started making a funny grinding noise. We left it for the night to check into our room and head to our massage appointments. After our couples massage we had dinner at the resort and the food was again amazing. I had apricot stuffed chicken with garlic mashed potatoes. We also had complementary cheesecake for desert. After dinner we didn’t waste any time going back to our room to the huge comfortable king sized bed.

In the morning we got up early and set out to find a repair place for the truck. It was Sunday so shops that are open are few and far between. We went to Walmart tire center and they told us that sears auto center would be open and luckily for us it was! Sears could fix the problem as soon as the part arrived from the store. It was about a three hour ordeal but we were back on the road as good as new. The rest of the drive was uneventful stops for gas and snacks. We made it home that evening around 10pm. The kids were very excited that dad was home to stay, and so was I.

Engagement night.

The most perfect ring

Reo Drinks!

Before Reo De Gado

On the drive home

Voodoo Doughnuts, of course we stopped.

San Diego vacation

I know I keep saying that I should be better about blogging but life just gets away from me way to easy. Especially when you’re the only parent to two little kiddos, man single parenting is hard! I’m going to be glad when Ron comes home in March. I might actually get to sleep for 8 hours, and the gym I can go to the gym and not have to worry about toting the rugrats along! I do love all of the time I get to spend with them though. I enjoy every bit of them. They are wonderful.

Ronnie is speaking so much more and he is so intelligent. Every day he surprises me with things he says. Miss Evee will be 7 in what seems like a matter of days. She as always is Ms. Mother Hen. He school is doing a spell-a-thon and she is collecting pledges, she has 25 words to spell. She is so much like me and doesn’t much care for spelling.

I’m going to sign both of them up for swimming lessons in about two weeks. They will start when Ron is home so he will get to participate in those. He is going to be so happy.

The three of us went down to San Diego January 11^th-21^st to visit him. It was really nice to get away from rainy Washington for a while. WE all had a blast. Ron was so happy to get to spend time with the kids. While down there we took the kids to Legoland for the second time, of course a great time was had by all of us. They had the sets from the Lego movie set up to walk through and all of the rides with the exception of one roller coaster were up and running.

A good friend of mine lives in San Diego as well so we got to spend a bunch of time with them too, we haven’t seen them in two years but picked up right where we left off. She was so amazing and offered to watch the kiddos for us so that Ron and I could go see one of our favorite country artists, Eric Church, perform. We had such a great time and the show was amazing!! But before the show our Seahawks played an amazing game to clench a spot in Superbowl 49!! For the second year in a row repete!! So of course we were already on a high from that. It really was an amazing concert and amazing game.

We were all really sad to leave Ron and the nice weather but we had to come back to real life. Oh what fun it’s been. Coming back to real life, luckily I scheduled it so that I had a day off at home before I had to go back to work to collect myself from my “vacation.” I will always schedule vacations with the extra day at the end it worked out perfect.     

Your way weight loss.

One of my very best friends, the type of friend you don’t have to talk to in years but pick up right where you left off, is a social media guru. I’m talking bogs, podcasts, designing apps, Twitter, Facebook, he is the go to man. I am so happy to share his newest venture with all of you! It’s a blog with weekly podcasts on weight loss your way.

Each week he features a new person and their own inspirational weight loss journey. I love, love, love, how he is highlighting that each persons’ journey is their own and what works for one person will not work the same way for another. I might also be partial to the first podcast because it features his mom, who I love dearly. She is the good in this world for sure. She has struggled with being over-weight for a long time and has lost a running total of 180lbs!!! Not to mention Brett has lost something like 165lbs himself!!

They are both so inspiring. You will always find a smile on either one of their faces. I am so glad that they both have made the decision to live a healthier life style. They are the type of people that the world needs more of.

I binged and listened to all three podcasts tonight while I was cooking dinner and getting ready for work. I loved all of their stories. I personally need to do better myself. I am capable of it. I just need to stop being lazy and do it!!  

I urge you all to listen to these podcasts, even if you don’t struggle with weight or weight loss. They are so inspirational. You can find them at Paleo Update or Your way weight loss.  Please listen, learn, comment, and if you have your own story fill out the information page and you might get the chance to share your story too. 

Direct Link to the podcast http://paleoupdate.com/episode-001-patti-fairall-getting-centered-to-lose-weight/

Jingle Ball Bash!

Last night we went to a concert thrown by a local radio station here Kiss 106.1 called Jingle Ball Bash. I originally bought tickets to see Fall Out Boy at this show and about a month out they ended up canceling and the venue changed. The only other person we were excited to see was Lindsey Stirling.

We saw her earlier this summer at the fair and the show was amazing so when she was coming back with Fall Out Boy of course we were going. Then FOB cancelled and they offered refunds but we decided that since we had already bought tickets we would still go and enjoy the night. I think we are all glad that we still went, it was fun. There were a lot of younger kids there with their parents, I felt a bit old.

Mary Lambert was there as well and she had a really great set and as a surprise guest Macklemore showed up and sang "One love" with her! It was pretty awesome that he came out probably just because Seattle is his home town. He also did a song with another band Fences.

Of course we had to take a bunch of selfies and there was also a photographer outside while we were waiting in line who took our picture and it ended up on the radio station's Facebook page, which is pretty awesome! Its a good picture of all of us. 

Kiss FM photographer's photo of us 

Sexy faces

They are crazy!

Pikes Place Market before the show

Crafty!

  

One of my Black Friday scores was a new Cricut Explore. I LOVE LOVE LOVE my Cricut expression and am so ready to see all of the awesome new things that you can do with this new all digital machine. The best part I think is that my sister is getting one for Christmas too. Its so fun to have someone to share all of my excitement with!

I actually scored this deal early Thursday morning while I was at work. It was live on walmart.com so we decided to just order it and pick it up in the store whenever it arrived to avoid the black Friday mess that is Walmart. The black Friday "bundle" included some extra goodies that made the deal that much sweeter. The machine its self retails for $299. It was on sale for $199, with a free Cricut tool kit $24.99 value, and a two month trial to the online library a $19.99 value. A total of $343.98 for $199!!! That is an amazing $145 savings!

Mine is set to arrive in store to pick up on the 3rd and my sisters is supposed to be ready for pick up on the 4th but fed ex says that it should be there today! I might be a bit jealous that she will get to play with hers first. But I'm also going to a concert tonight so its better that it comes on the 3rd.

We are excited to make our holiday gift tags with the new machines!

Thanksgiving 2014

Wow! It’s amazing how fast life just sails by, these past few months while Ron has been in San Diego especially. We are quickly approaching the start of our fifth month of single parenthood and some days it feels easy and some days I feel like I have been hit by a bus. We have good days and we have bad days but we are pushing through.

I’m always looking for new, cheap, and quick things to do with/for the kids to keep things exciting, browsing Pinterest the other night I found a recipe for pumpkin play-doh that needed only two ingredients, two cheap ingredients, so I swung by Winco and picked them up. Large cans of pumpkin puree and large cans of corn starch, I also dumped some cinnamon in for a little pumpkin pie smell. It took 1.5 cans of corn starch to one large can of pumpkin and however much cinnamon you’d like. All you do is mix the two together until they are play-doh consistency. Bam! Done, it was super easy and cost all of $3 to make. So I make 9 good size balls put them in ziplock bags and took them to Ronnie’s classroom the day before thanksgiving break as a little something fun for the kids to take home and have over the weekend. I would consider this one of the better days.

We went to my parent’s house for Thanksgiving this year and I was pretty much no help at all because I worked the night before but, I did cook the turkey! 20 delicious, juicy, pounds of bird! It was a good turkey if I do say so myself. It did help that it was free with my $150 grocery purchase earlier in the week. It was a good dinner and it was nice that my sister and brother-in-law were able to be there too.

Our tradition of looking at the black Friday ads after dinner was pretty uneventful this year. There just wasn’t anything that we really felt like we needed to head out to the store in the cold, wind, and rain for this year. In fact I was able to order the one thing that I wanted the night before while I was at work and I will be able to pick it up on Dec 2^nd. Bam! Done no long lines, no getting soaked, no dealing with grouchy grumpy people. Black Friday win for me.

After dinner we skated out super early to go home and go to bed. I was crazy exhausted and could hardly stay awake. I think we made it to 6pm before we went to bed and slept till the next morning. I consider it a good Thanksgiving! 

All the play-doh credit goes to Fun at home with the kids! Thank you so much for sharing your recipe.