Bell Peppers

I used to love bell peppers. I would get them on my sub, chop them up in a salad, dip them in ranch. However, I have never been able to wrap my head around the idea of "stuffed peppers." Something about that concept just doesn't sit well with me. My stomach is literally lurching just thinking about it. Eww.

My love for peppers ended circa Spring Break 2009. We decided to go to the beach as a whole entire family and spend the whole entire week in one house as a whole entire family. I'm sure you're starting to realize that probably wasn't the best idea. I should pause to let it sink in that whole entire family includes the following: me, Hank, sister 1, sister 2, brother-in-law 1, brother-in-law 2, mom, dad, brother-in-law 2's mom, nephew, niece 1, niece 2, step-niece 1, and step-niece 2. Oh, and the nephew/niece pair? They brought friends. Yeah, let that settle for a moment.

Anyway, this blog is about bell pepper, not about my inability to spend an entire week with my whole entire family + 2. We went to eat at Ultimate California Pizza, which of course made my sweet husband, the pizza lover, extremely happy. We got our usual, a pizza (light on the sauce on my side) with pepperoni, mushrooms, and bell pepper. It was divine. Really, it was.

We left the restaurant to head to play laser tag (something my husband swears he will never participate in again as long as he lives). En route to laser tag, he sneezed a ginormous sneeze. Then he immediately began screaming and took both hands off the steering wheel. Yep, he was driving.

I grabbed the wheel and tried to talk him through the pain while keeping my eyes on the road. His hands were on the side of his face and he was screaming in pain, and, I kid you not, an entire bell pepper strip (think Subway), was coming out of his nose. Once he got it out, his eyes watered for probably 30 minutes or more, and then he was fine.

The moral of the story: bell peppers don't come in my house. They remind me of snot and boogers and all things nostril.

Anniversary Brick

I'm sure there are some people in our great society who would read the title of this blog post and infer something very different altogether. The truth is that my husband and I recently celebrated our anniversary. FOUR glorious years, people! We go to our local library a lot, and every time we go, we always point out the bricks placed there in memory of people we know. I guess it's pretty obvious where this is going. For our anniversary, he had a break installed at the library for me. This is it:

Not sure why it's sideways. Perhaps it's taking a hint from my sideways day.


My New Year's goals have been going pretty well this week. I've read two books, eaten well, haven't spent way too much money, and managed to walk every day. Next week will be when the real challenge begins because I start back at my second job and begin my last Master's class (Thank you, Jesus). I just have to make time to eat right and get my exercise on. I need to shed at least 60 pounds so eventually Hank and I will be ready for a baby.

Apparently, my walking is helping me sleep better at night. In fact, it might be making me sleep too well. I am supposed to wake up at 5:45 in the morning to get myself up, showered, dressed, fed, and ready for school. Setting the alarm for 5:45 gives me approximately ten minutes to hit the snooze button (two times on my clock), and leaves me about five minutes to spare in case my getting ready hits a snafu. This morning? This morning I woke up at 6:51. I'm supposed to be at school at 7:45 and have a 20 minute commute. Getting ready was a challenge, but I did shower. There was, however, no time for food. This likely led to the faulty food choice at lunch. I've just budgeted my points to make up for it. McDonald's Southern Style Chicken Sandwich, you were 11 points of chickeny goodness.

I'm hoping to sleep well tonight, but not sleep over in the morning. Pray for that, too, will you?

A Sassy Yellow Pillow

It's currently 1:19 in the morning, and yet, I'm still awake. I'm not even really sure why I happen to be awake; I'm usually the type of person who's done with living around 10 p.m. I need eight hours of sleep a night to be considered fully functioning. No, we don't have kids, and as mentioned in the previous post, my sweet Tallulah would sleep all day if we didn't force her to get out of bed and walk around the house.

I had been so discouraged with the whole sewing thing that I decided to sit down tonight and make something I knew would be successful...a new pillow cover for one of our pillows. We needed some new spunky pillows for our lavender room, and I am smitten with this fabric that I picked up from Joann's. I'm hoping it will make its appearance in my first ever attempt at a quilt.

So here you have it...a sassy yellow pillow.

Not too shabby for 1 in the morning...oh, and that cute little chair? My husband refinished it for me and upholstered it with leather for our "leather" anniversary last year. :) He's a keeper.

So this is Christmas...?

While there are many reasons I love being a teacher and being married to someone who works in the school system and "gets" my frustrations, some of my very favorite teaching moments are the built-in breaks we get. It's even more fun that Hank and I get to spend them together. Of course, there are times when we have to find something else to do because our nerves are shot from too much "together-time," but for the most part, having a very similar schedule has been good for us.

With that being said, we're obviously on two weeks of glorious Christmas break. No work, no papers to grade, no necessary early mornings. All of that is enough to bring out a chorus of rejoicing!

Today, we ventured to the country to meet up with our friend, Fennel, who works in law enforcement for us to shoot our gun. This is something my sweet husband is very into. We quickly discovered it's not really my thing. Other than shooting a BB gun with my daddy when I was little girl, I had never actually shot a gun before today. It jumps and smokes and all that jazz that just isn't for me. Hank had a blast though, hitting cans and targets and generally making a whole lot of noise.

I think we're probably still on the search for a "couple hobby" because this one most certainly wasn't it.