as of right now...

Right now: Pre-Thanksgiving edition

laughing at this recipe a friend linked to on Facebook.  The comments are awesome.

enjoying all the Peppermint Hot Chocolates I can fit in this holiday season:)

anticipating the end of my (short) work day today. Then I don't have to come back until Monday;)

thankful, beyond words, for my wonderful family. Life would not be as amazing as it is without them

excited to really start planning the mom-daughter trip with Alex. The trip we planned had to be postponed but we've rescheduled for March!

looking forward to all the delicious food we're making tomorrow:) This and this and this.  Plus mashed potatoes (my favorite!) and a few others:)

hoping to catch up some on my Project Life over the next 4 days. I stopped about mid-October which is when I stopped last year. Must be something about this time of year...

bummed that I didn't do ANYTHING on my fall list. Even after making a list.  I just can't seem to find any extra time during the Holiday season for extra activities. Work, Alex & Nate, cooking and gym is about all I have time for.

not loving the Daylight Savings time change. I have so much trouble adjusting to this change in light and I get so depressed and unproductive when it's dark at 5:30. My energy has felt sapped for weeks now:(

drinking one of these tonight. Or when I get home;)

preparing for the Black Friday shopping-fest. We go every year even though we don't really need anything. It's just fun to be out in the craziness. no...really. This year we're hoping to score a TV for Alex.

freaking out that my daughter is going to be 18 in less than a month.

 

I'll end the post on that note...haha. Wishing you all have a wonderful Thanksgiving!

jen

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

realization

It suddenly struck me, while looking through some friend's blogs, that I haven't posted anything about my daughter in over 2 years. This post was the last time. She's changed so much since then. Grown so much. She'll be 18 this year and I'm tearing up just thinking about that. That I have an almost 18 year old.

She's been a dream child on so many levels. Only made a few errors in judgement. Had a  rough time in school but that seems to be even-ing out now. She is kind and thoughtful. Hardly ever talks back to me. Hasn't fallen into many of the bad behaviors that teens so often do. She really is a beautiful young girl. I love that she has her life planned out for the next few years (even though some of the dreams are costly and I'm hoping she realizes that the mom ATM dries up after she's out of high school). Or dries up considerably. I wanted to get a quick snapshot of her at 17 written down though...for my own memories:)

Alex at 17:

-likes anything feather related. Earrings, pictures, t-shirts with images of feathers.

-is into everything Native American Indian themed. Clothes, jewelry, purses, shoes. These were her BIG birthday gift from Nate and myself. Along with a few other gifts.

-is listening to old school music. Led Zepplin, Rolling Stones, Nirvana, Soundgarden, Metallica. I keep reminding her this is MY music era but she still keeps listening to it;)

-is obsessed with that Vampire Diaries show

- is a Tumblr fanatic. We... Santa I mean, got her a Kindle Fire for Xmas and she is always trolling tumblr. This is while she texts, and is on Facebook and usually while she is in front of the television.

-still says I am her favorite person to hang out with even though my hang out sessions with her are very far and between. I can't compete with friends and boys like I used to...

-hasn't had a serious boyfriend yet but just recently was nursing a broken heart. She loves a certain boy but doesn't feel ready for a serious boyfriend at her age and so he moved on to another girl. There is nothing like a sobbing broken hearted daughter to make your own heart break.

-needs a job! She has no concept of how much real life is going to cost. Despite my many warnings.

-is growing up WAY too fast.

(Caitlyn- her cousin, Alex)

Love this girl so much.

jen

 

Merry Christmas!

we celebrated our Christmas a little oddly this year and we opened presents at midnight. Alex had to be at her dad's early and so to alleviate the stress of a rushed morning we opened then last night. This photo is the aftermath...all the paper, trash and opened gifts. Nate snacking on fortune cookie and surveying the damage.

I hope everyone's Christmas was amazing and full of fun-filled memories!

love,
jen

giving thanks

today consisted of :
 lots of cooking
 dinner with Nate's family

Bones DVD
really tasty beer
talking until 10:00pm with Dixie and Greg and Meg
perusing the "black Friday" ads

talking about all the things that we want but don't need
sleeping in
mashed potatoes
my new cooking buddy (see pic),
a really yummy veggie loaf

sparkling apple cider
wedding talk (Nate's sister got engaged two weeks ago)
video game playing
hot chocolates
freshly made bread

going to bed early for a very early wake up

being thankful for food on our table and jobs to pay for the roof over our heads and our health.

I hope everyone's Thanksgiving was just as lovely as ours.

best thanksgiving ever!

I say this as I am a mere 5 hours away from leaving town for the mountain house. We did Thanksgiving 2 weeks ago, so for the next 4 days Nate and I are gone. Alex is with her dad until Monday...we don't have to cook any holiday dishes...we are off for a few days for time just with each other.

Wine tasting, hiking, visiting friends...it will be a much needed break given the rough patch we've recently been going through.

I hope all of you have a Happy Thanksgiving and enjoy your days off (if you get days off)
jen

happy 4th!!

It's been a while...we've either been working or out of town so it's been SO nice today to just hang out at the house today. I read a whole book before Nate got up this morning, we worked on the yard, cleaned our bedroom...and now we are cooking dinner together. Artichokes (I wish this picture really captured the humongous size of these artichokes!), tri-tip sandwiches with homemade red onion jam (made by Nathan), veggie burger for him...and homemade cherry ice cream (made by both of us)...just waiting for the fireworks to begin( we luckily get to just watch from our living room!). Love that the 4th this year was in the middle of the week...it's a nice little break:) I have so many entries I have wanted to write about but just haven't had time. I actually scrapbooked and have like 8 layouts to post, we went out of town two weekends in a row and Alex was gone to Arizona for 9 days (that was so rough) it's been a very busy summer suprisingly. I thought just Alex was going to be busy but Nate and I keep having things pop up:) I'm really gonna try to do better this month though;)

hope everyone is having (or had) a really awesome 4th of July:)

love long weekends

especially when I get to spend time with my family during it:) And it's rare when we get the amount of time we did this weekend:)

Had to stop by the beach whan we saw all of these awesome kites flying in the air. I guess the kite festival was on Saturday in Marina which is too bad because I miss it every year...so it was nice to catch these flying yesterday:) I love to watch kites. Flying them...not so much. I leave that to Nate or Alex:)

It's unfortunate that this wonderful weekend had to end and real life starts again...I always wish for one more day:)

jen

time well spent

today was a good day...a really good day...a day spent just hanging around town with my family. We all slept in for some MUCH needed sleep.Then we headed to downtown Monterey for the annual Greek Festival near the wharf. And it was the perfect day for it...sunny but not too hot and only slightly windy. We had decided we were going to walk down because its not that far and parking would be impossible to find anyway. Much to my delight, we actually convinced Nathan to go with us (he hates big crowds) by enticing him with all the really awesome Greek food we were going to be able to find down there:) Plus we told him he could just eat and then leave to get his hair cut. It was a typical festival...music, booths selling things, etc. not really anything outstanding per say except for the food. LOVE it. Everything...except maybe dolmas...not really into those. But the hummus, feta, olives, spanakopita, tiropita all rocked!! I seriously could live on greek food:) Anyway...it was nice to be out in the sun, eating good food, seeing friends I hadn't seen in a while, spending time with my family and friends:) It was also so cool to see Nate and Alex interacting today. Nate working so many hours really takes a toll on their relationship the most. He and I work hard to find time for each other but Alex, she's at her dad's half of the time and so their chances to see each other and connect are sooo limited. He gave her a piggyback ride part of the way up the hill back to our house (which is pretty hard given her height and weight now...definitely not as easy as a few years ago.) and they walked ahead of us for some much needed bonding time. It was very cool:)

We ran into our friend Michelle while we were there and she instantly wanted to know if I had seen this movie (which of course I had) and we started going on and on about it so this made Nate REALLY want to see it...becasue of how much I loved this movie. So after Alex went over to her friend's house I took my husband to the theater to see it . It was just as amazing the second time as the first. The only difference being that the first time you see it you watch with such excited giddy anticipation of what this family will have to face next. Seeing it a second time just makes you excited and giddy for what you know is next:) So if you haven't seen this movie RUN OUT RIGHT NOW and see it. It truly is the best movie I have seen this year. The only advice I give is that you have to watch it with an open mind. The language is a little bad in places, the open dyfunction of this family may be questionable for some but if you have an open mind and just watch the amazing acting by everyone in this film I promise you will not walk away disappointed in this film:)

Hope everyone is having an AWESOME three day weekend!

jen