To...VACATION!

So, today is bittersweet.. I have to leave my husband :( but Im going to Cancun...soooo I cant be that sad. lol Sorry Daniel! Haha. Just kidding. It just hasnt hit me yet. I finished writing all my daily letters for him that Im going to place all over the house, that way he wont forget about me while Im gone. :) Ughh..Its only 4 days! Come on.. I can do it. Haha.

Anyways, today is going pretty slow and Im ready to go home and spend time with Dan before I leave. My mom is coming over at 8 and we are driving to Elizabeths to sleep/watch tv until we have to be at the airport at like 3 am. Oh what fun. I hope I get at least a little sleep so Im not so tired the first day but Im a trooper and Im pretty good at running on adrenaline.. it worked in Vegas!! Ill make it... :)

I feel like I need a break, lately Ive been really stressed out..I kinda think its PMS though.. ya know?! I noticed on Sunday that there was water on the floor in our kitchen, and it was kinda smelling like vinegar..it was weird. Actually it started to drive me CRAZY and I think it was Monday I decided to wash the rugs thinking they got wet and now they are smelling. Somehow it was logical. After I washed them...which was a huge task. -- They are from IKEA so you are not supposed to wash them but I did anyway thinking its worth a try!? They fell apart in the washer, on the floor, outside, in the dryer lol. They actually did the best in the dryer because it took all the fuzzies off of them. Dan flipped when he saw our backyard because it was covered in red fur from the rugs lol. He was like sneaking up to the backdoor because it was kind of dark out and I was like what? what?? what?? I obviously knew about the rug and told Dan about it earlier but since hes not the best listener he didnt hear me. I was freaking out that there was a person in our yard or something but noo...it was the rug all over the place lol. He thought an animal or something came into our patio and did that. lol Wow.

So anyways... After I get those all cleaned up, the kitchen smells good again.. the next day I started to notice a little water...I just thought I spilt it and cleaned it up..Yeeeah, things dont usually click with me very quickly. So yesterday I get home from work and two rugs are soaking wet, and the third is getting there.. WTF! I call Winfield and the guy mentions something about the freezer to Dan so hes moving stuff around. The maintenance guy finally comes around 7 or 8 and tells us thats the problem. Apparently I was blocking the vent in my freezer (no one has ever informed me of this!) and it was freezing the back of the freezer and melting, rolling behind the cabinets, and onto the floor. Oh how nice. BTW Im so happy we do not have own a house lol Ive gotten our $527 worth of rent this much on maintenance alone. (Remember the fridge light incident ? lol - and our internet is not working so theyve been out to our house about 4 times in 2 weeks.) The maintenance guy is over at our house right now thawing out the back of the freezer to speed up this process so that we dont have to wait for it to unthaw over the next few days. What FUN! :)

Back to being stressed, as all of this was going on last night I was sooo hot because I was cooking in the oven (our grill is broke) and our a.c. was just not cooling off the house fast enough. I was stepping in this stinky water as Im trying to cook. I was trying to move fast so I broke a nail, bruised my hand and almost cut my finger. I was about in tears.. Im so happy to have a vacation now. I want to get away from normal life for a few days... Not Dan but thats the sacrafice I have to make unfortunately.

To end on a good note, Im excited for vacation tonight/tomorrow to start and spend some quality time with my family. My love for Dan will grow even stronger the time we are spending apart and I know when I come back we will have a great reunion. :) lol It will all be worth it. AND he will have a happier wife! Life is good.

To.. work days :P

This morning was ridiculously fast, this afternoon is dragging. I found out that 3 of my reps are no longer with my territory so that lightened my load A LOT. They were the busiest out of all of my reps so it looks like Im going to have to watch more tv. I know poor me. I have to admit its not as great as it sounds. I would rather do actual work then trying to pass time all the time but whatever. Ill take it.

This past weekend was so nice. Last Friday Dan and I got a pizza from Amano's - Chicago style deep dish sausage pizza. It was HUGE! I weighed it as soon as we brought it home. It weighed 6.5 pounds!!! Can you believe that? Its crazy. We each ate 2 slices and thought we were gonna die. Last time we got this pizza we only ate one each and it was just the right amount. I decided to give my mom the rest and I saved one slice for me and one for Dan to eat a day or two later. I knew we couldnt eat that much pizza. While we were eating pizza, drinking a beer, and catching up on tv shows, the freakin tornado siren went off. We threw everything in the bathroom, including the pizza, dogs, and beer, and hung out there for like 20 minutes. What a great surprise! haha. Not! Even though the a.c. was on, it was still super hot all crammed into a tiny bathroom. After that passed, which luckily it was very quickly, we watched tv and hung out the rest of the night on the couch.

On Saturday morning my mom woke me up at 6 and we drove to Elizabeths house in Bloomington. We took a long walk with the dogs and by 9 am it was super hot. Im glad we went early while it was cool(er). After the walk we ran in TJ Maxx and then went out to lunch at this really good chinese place. It was a good day. Dan and I just hung out at home the rest of the night. On Sunday we went to church and then my parents came over. We got Buffalo Wild Wings for Fathers Day lunch. It was good! We got like over 40 wings and all 4 of us ate them all, plus salad to go with it. After my parents left we went to Dans mom's house for dessert and wine. It was a nice time. His grandparents came over and so it was good to see them. I love them! They are the sweetest people, and they actually like me, which is more than I can say about my grandmas! Haha. Juuuust kidding. They love me..

Im so happy I got some quality time with Dan this past weekend, hes been so good to me and Im sooooo happy. Hes a really great husband and so supportive. Im glad we have trust and our marriage is strong so that I can go on vacation this weekend! My mom told me last Saturday that we were going to Cancun this FRIDAY! Its crazy but in an awesome way!! Im so excited. Im not thrilled about leaving Dan but it will be okay. I decided to do something for him while I was gone so today I wrote him a letter for every day Im gone. Im going to hide them all over the house so that everyday when I can talk to him (just for a minute - its $.99 a minute to talk!) I will tell him where the next one is. Im going to miss him a lot but absence makes the heart grow fonder so Im not worried. I have a 3 days weekend next week so I will have plenty of make up time with Daniel. :)

Only 3 hours left of work, I just gotta find three 1 hour shows and Im set! Hmm... :) Hopefully tonight we can go to the new frozen yogurt place on campus, that sounds soo good right now! I love ice cream on hot days, they go so perfectly together!

To..vintage!

My mom has kept some boots since the late 70's - early 80's that she used to wear, she brought them out last month and gave them to my sister. We visited Elizabeth in Bloomington this weekend so I stole the boots from her haha. For some reason she cared a lot that I took them even though she hasnt wore them yet! Apparently she forgot about them, whatever, not my fault..Ill wear them! haha. Heres some pics of them, they are really cute and comfortable!

To...holy humidity!

Wow, is it hot here...I LOVE IT!!! Im probably the only person in C-U enjoying the humidity but I dont care. I have waited all winter for this kind of weather. It finally feels like summer. My work turns the a.c. on pretty much as soon as May comes around, Ive had the windows open today to warm me up..haha. I went home on lunch to lay out and it sucked because the sun would hide behind clouds every 2 minutes, now its been staying sunny for the past 2 hours. Arg. I want to refresh my tan, ya digg?

Its really slow at work today so Ive been watching a new show on ABC called Here Come the Newlyweds.. its a reality show and passes the time so whatev. Ive also been searching for a place to go on a mini vacation with my parents and sister. Turns out we are going next weekend!! WTF lol That is sooooon. Pretty exciting though.

Besides that, Im really excited for the next 3 weeks. Well this weekend starts in an hour and a half. Next weekend Ill be on the beach. Following that weekend will be 4th of July, which I just found out I get paid to be off on the 3rd. So stoked! My day just got better. Peace out.

To...married moments..

Sorry Dan..Im about to put you on blast haha.. but you deserve it!! lol jk..

So this morning, I actually woke up early for once and felt great! I had plenty of things to do in the morning without feeling rushed or anything. I cleaned our bedroom and took a shower and whatever.. Dan kissed me after I got out of the shower.. then he went downstairs and came up again and kissed me again to say goodbye (this is crucial to the story lol). It was a nice morning UNTIL...

I have about 10 minutes before I have to leave so I opened the fridge to grab my lunch and the light was off.. I pull out the mac and cheese me and Dan made last night and it had dew/moisture on the lid. So yeah I freaked out.. a stupid broken refrigerator. I felt everything else and it was cold so I figured it had just broke. I call Winfield and told them my fridge might be broke and I get the answering service..they tell me they will call me at 8am. Well I gotta get to work so I start moving everything outta the way to prepare for a new fridge to be brought in the kitchen. I take all the pictures and magnets off.. I take the bread box off of the fridge. I move all the furniture in the back to clear room since thats how they had to bring it in last time it broke. I got bags ready to put everything in it so that maintenance can transfer all of our food easily.
I am trying to call Dan the whole time but he wouldnt talk everytime I answered, which made me more mad. lol. Finally he texted, whats up? I told him our fridge broke and I called Winfield. Hes like no it didnt break, the lights out. I was like the food is warm! (I lied a little lol) Hes like Erica, when I opened the refrigerator this morning, I heard the light bulb pop and it went out.

Yeah.. so apparently when Dan came up right before he left and he kissed me, he could have told me about the light.. buuuut he didnt. Whats up MEN? lol Seriously! After all that, It was like 2 minutes till 8 am and I have to be at work at 8. Normally I wouldnt care because I can use my lunch time to fill in for the minutes I missed but I had a dentist appointment today during my lunch so that wouldnt work. After lots of texting and bitching on my part, he apologized which made me feel better. But seriously, all of that could have been avoided if he told me right when it happened. You would think after 9 years of being with him he would know me by now lol and know that I would react that way if the light was out. Wow. what a morning.

I called Winfield a few hours ago because no one ever called me and they are like yeah.. maintenance went to your house and it was a broken light bulb, your refrigerator is working fine. HAHA! Whoops.

So that was a fun morning. lol Im pretty much okay as soon as Dan apologizes so for me it didnt take long to snap back into a good mood. I was just frustrated because it seems like the only time we fight it comes down to lack of communication... and this situation was no different. Maybe I should have asked him if anythings going on before he left.. but how would I know? I dunno, Im just trying to figure out the way men think and work and its not workin too well. Guys are simple creatures but I still havent figured out WHY they do some of the crazy stuff they do lol. Im so glad Im a woman! :)

To.. weekends

This weekend really flew by! Dan and I made herb risotto and hung out on Friday night and dropped off the dogs at his moms house. We woke up at 6 am on Saturday to get going on our road trip to Schaumburg. We left around 6:30 and got to Schaumburg around 9:30. I was pretty impressed because for a while we were going around 40 mph because the rain was so heavy and the traffic was kind of busy. We got lucky that the traffic wasnt so bad, Amber gave us a good route to take that had the least amount of traffic and tolls! Im going to keep it for the next time we go to IKEA there. Normally we just go to Bolingbrook so it probably wont be for a while. Dan and I shopped for hours and then had lunch. I dropped him off at the hotel to take a nap and I ventured out on my own. I went to Kohls and bought my dad some Adidas Slides for Fathers Day. After that I tried to find a store that I had went to with Buffy a few months ago called Filenes Basement.. its like TJMaxx but with higher end brands. I couldnt find it anywhere! The stupid GPS made me do like 3 U-turns in like a block radius.. clearly couldnt finding it either. After like an hour, I went to IKEA which was ridiculously packed. I told my mom I would buy her a lamp and 2 lamp shades so I found an employee and somehow found an open checkout lane and was out of there in 15 minutes. I think thats a record!

Dan and I took a taxi to the wedding at the Schaumburg Golf Course, a mile from our hotel. It was really pretty outside where Amber got married. She looked beautiful when she came out and it was a very cute wedding. Im so happy for her. I cant believe shes married!!! :) I met her husband at the reception, very nice guy and you can tell he has a lot of love for her. I had a few martinis and Dan was drinking some gin and tonics so we were feeling pretty good..haha. Once we started dancing we really didnt stop. Dans a dancing machine I swear..lol. It was a lot of fun and there was soo much food! Omgosh I couldnt believe how much food there was. If my camara was working I would have taken a picture of every course haha. There were passed appetizers as well as some set out for you to help yourself. I think there were 5 or 6 different things. Then there was the soup course, followed by the salad course.. then dinner which was filet minon and chicken. After dinner we were served ice cream. Like 30 minutes later, cake was available. Then around 9:30 they had chocolate fondue with anything and everything to dip in it. I couldnt believe how much food there was. I basically ate a little bit of everything and was stuffed. All in all I would say it was a successful wedding and reception.

To change the subject.. my parents have been wanting to take another vacation with my sister at the beginning of July. I, of course, wasnt allowed to go unless I paid for me and Dan. My sister however, got it for free. Last year my sister took a friend and my parents paid for her to go with them and the friend paid their way. I said something about my mom paying for me and she was like 'no, Elizabeth only gets it for free because shes not married'. How does this make sense? It doesnt. She should reward me cuz I am married...haha JK!
Anyways I finally figured out that this didnt make sense and decided to confront her last week. Im like just because Im married doesnt mean you dont have to pay for me... You can pay for me and then I can pay for Dan to go. Basically I told her thats whats going to happen and she agreed lol. So I talked with Dan and hes not really wanting to go anywhere again but he said I could go. He cant miss a day of school either and we would be going Thursday - Sunday. So now Im deciding on whether or not its okay to go on a vacation without my husband. Im so attached to him and I dont want it to reflect badly on our marriage. However, Im going with my sister and my parents..not exactly a crazy vacation with your girlfriends or something. I see this as an opportunity to spend time with my sister which whom I rarely get to spend time with. Any married women, wish to comment?! I would love suggestions. Its really hard to turn down a quick vacation all expenses PAID to the caribbean with my family. I just wish Dan could go!!

To.. counting down the minutes!

I am sooo excited for the weekend to start! Especially since this week has been dragging by sooo sooo slowly. Since I have this obsession with food I will start off sharing something really cool that happened this week. Risotto is pretty much my favorite food..ever. I like it any way...Well without mushrooms (probably the only food I can not eat if I tried!)...

When we were in Vegas I had three different types of risotto... haha, yes I am obsessed! One of the best ones was at a restaraunt called Aureole at our hotel, Mandalay Bay. It was an herb risotto and probably one of the best things I had ever eaten. Dan and I couldnt get enough! Last week I decided on a whim that I would email them since it really doesnt hurt to ask so I emailed the hotel asking for what was in the herb risotto. They replied back that they would forward it to the restaraunt and Aureole would get back to me sometime later that week. I totally forgot about it actually and on Tuesday I got an email from the restaraunt with the entire recipe!! I couldnt believe it. How freakin awesome. So tonight Dan and I are going to make that with seared scallops.. I can not wait.

Right now I have overcome my laziness and have only ate out twice since Memorial Day weekend. Ive cooked for every single meal... Im so proud of myself. :) One of the times doesnt count because Dan took advantage of me when I was in a weak state (drunk) and I requested that he take me to Steak and Shake at 2 am and he was all over that! I regretted it the next day because I was on a streak! Arg lol. Yesterday was the first official day I had eaten out and me and Melissa downed a whole medium pizza at Jupiters. Im so happy I waited..that pizza was good! lol

______________________________

I gotta share something creepy that happened to me.. Okay its maybe not really that creepy but for some reason this guy at my workplace totally makes me feel uncomfortable. I think that you have to listen to your gut instincts when it comes to stuff like that so I really do think Im totally spot on with this guy.

Ive been working in this building for over a year and a half and my company just rents a room out of a realtor's office building. There are builders and other people who work out of this office but Im the only employee in my office. This guy (I dont even know his name, but of course he knows mine) bugs the crap out of me every week. lol I dont mean to be mean but I would think that Ive sent enough signals to tell him to leave me alone. This is probably the first time IN MY LIFE that Ive stood up for myself and didnt laugh some weird guy off like I usually do. Thats probably why I dont feel bad actually. So yes, its a good thing for me, think what you want.

Everyday when I would pull up to work, he would come outside to get in his work truck.. I started waiting in my car until he got in his so I wouldnt have to talk to him, or I would run to my door if I didnt see him. I shouldnt have to feel this way, should I? Sometimes I think its all in my head but if someone makes you feel uncomfortable you have the right to avoid them.. I think. One time he gave me a cupcake.. isnt that weird? I dont even know him lol. Apparently he has a fiance, one of the other guys told me that.. if Dan was giving cupcakes to girls at work, I would be pissed. Thats like something your bf would do or whatever.. I dunno. Hes does many other things but whatever, Im over it. I just wish he would leave me alone. Theres like 10 or 15 that work in my building and they all talk to me or whatever, none of them are creeps! Only that guy.. I call my stalker haha.

Okay so yesterday he walks in my office and hes like "Hey Erica do you need furniture?" Me: "Nope." Hes like "Oh you dont?" Im like " Nope, I got a small house and its full." See how direct Im being? Im so proud of myself lol. He goes on telling me that his friend is having a huge sale with awesome stuff and that its this Saturday. He draws me a map of where its at, gives me directions.. Then 30 minutes goes by and he comes back with a map that he had printed out from google maps.. wtf?!?! lol He starts telling me about a table he got there that is soo awesome or whatever, trying to convince me how amazing this sale is.. um yeah I dont care. I threw the directions away. But then Im like well maybe I should give the directions to Buffy, my mother in law, since she always loves a good sale. I started emailing her and then Im like, what if this is his house and theres no sale? Like would someone actually do that?! I cancelled the email because I thought she would think I was crazy if I was like 'theres an awesome sale on saturday, and give her all the details and stuff and then be like, theres a 1% chance theres no sale and its this creepy guys' house from my work. LOL . Can you imagine? OK OK.. I know Im just paranoid but please buddy, leave me alone! lol

So if anyone really does want to go to this HUGE AWESOME sale, its off of Staley Road in Champaign in that really nice neighborhood. If it really does exist, it will be pretty cool I would think.

Tomorrow me and Dan are going to Ambers wedding in Chicago....and Im very excited to spend some alone time with Dan. I think we will be avoiding IKEA even though that’s my favorite store ever! We don’t have extra spending money so that’s probably the best idea. We will see how that goes haha. Im sure we will eat a nice lunch once we get there and get in the hot tub or something..take a nap and then get ready for the wedding at 5pm. I cant wait to see Amber, shes going to look so beautiful and I cant wait to meet her new husband! Ive never met him before so Im looking forward to that. I feel so blessed to share her wedding day with her.




Psalm 91

To.. rainy days

This day is going by really slow. I have absolutely nothing to do!! No work at all. Boo.

Im so happy that I got to meet Melissa during lunch today, that definitely made my day better. :) I hadnt seen her in a month or two so it was good to reconnect. Journey is about to leave for vacation for a month and I tried to get her to come today but she couldnt make it. Ill miss her while shes gone.

Man I swear the world revolves around babies and pregnancy.. lol Not thats its a bad thing but if you want to wait a while before starting a family, it really seems impossible. Like everyday, my mind changes about when I want to start trying... I think it pretty much revolves around what I hear or see online or from my friends.. it could make a woman go crazy! lol I think its hard enough turning 25 and not having kids yet. I understand 25 is NOT OLD.. but ya know when its happening to you, I dunno it just makes you realize that wow.. Ive lived for 25 years.. I have been out of high school for 7 years.. WTF! That doesnt even seem possible.. haha. Yeah.. Im crazy. Not to mention I know a lot of people with two kids.. people that are younger than me. That makes me feel like 'wow what am i doing?' lol

But to be completely honest, I just loooove being with Dan so much so that I really dont want anything to come between us. I know a baby will not be a hinder to our relationship, well it can be if you let it I guess, but it will make a stronger and closer together. Its just the part where I cant just be with him or whatever, I gotta always worry about another human being 24/7. Not so easy, lol. I always want to come first to Dan and he will always come first to me, no matter what (Ive learned something!:). I appreciate all the knowledge Ive learned to get to this point in my life. I feel ready to have kids in one way but obviously really not ready in another way..because you are never really ready for a baby.. how can you be?!!

If I could be a nanny to two children (7 and 3) when I was in 7th grade for like a year or two (only on weekends and summer since i was in school), then obviously now that Ive grown and learned SOOO much more than from where I was, I will be perfectly fine. I still find it completely crazy that I was a nanny to two children when I was like still a child myself, like 12 lol. I was awesome. haha.

I talked to my mom for an hour today and hung out with Melissa and have been sitting in my office for like 5 hours thinking about crap and this is what I came up with lol I dont care if Im crazy.. actually I might just be a typical woman. Ill go with that. :)

To.. hump day!

Whoo hoo..FINALLY WEDNESDAY! This week has been seriously dragging.

The rest of the week should be great from now on.. small group tonight, ice cream tomorrow night then Friday night with Dan!
Dan and I have started a little thing on Thursday night where we walk the dogs to DQ or Marble Slab (maybe even A&W for root beer floats!) and split some ice cream. This way we can eat ice cream every week and it wont be THAT bad for us since we are splitting it and walking to get there. lol Brillant idea! haha. Also spend time together.. :)

Last night was nice.. after dinner me and Dan went to the park to play frisbee with the dogs. Well only Suki.. Leia is lazy when it comes to playing lol..
Another dog came into the park and Leia growled and snapped at him then walked away. Luckily he was a nice dog and just looked at her like she was crazy and didnt do anything.. phew! I really need Ceaser Milan to come over and train my dogs!! Leia is so terrible when she first greets a dog. However once she gets over that, shes completely fine. Its so dumb. Im just afraid that one dog will have the same personality as her and they will fight and Leia will get injured. I have been thinking a lot about how Im going to change and teach Leia to act right... And this is what Im going to do -- Im going to use Suki as bait lol. If I have Suki put her face in Leias and correct Leia everytime she growls or snaps then one of these days she will just get used to it and get tired of it. I hope!

This is kinda the same approach I need to use when it comes to Suki's bad behavior. Suki is a golden retriever so shes very easily to train.. she loooooves to please and really will do anything to make us happy. However.. she does have one big problem, otherwise she would be perfect... (lol riiight). When someone comes in the door, she wants to be ON them.. she wants to lick them, tackle them, touch them.. whatever. Shes crazy! Seriously, nothing you can do to tell her to stop, she cant hear you cuz shes so freakin excited. So.. Dans mom suggested that she would come over and just come in and out for like an hour or whatever until Suki wasnt interested anymore. She thinks that once we do it enough it wont be anything special and she will be over it. So I thought that was really good advice. I really need to do it because Ive gotten to that point where it really drives me crazy. And the thing that sucks about it is really the first 10 minutes. After she goes all crazy on you, shes fine. lol

I hope that kids are easier to train than dogs! haha JUST KIDDING! :)

To.. reality check

I have had a rough day to say the least. I did some stuff and said some stuff Im not proud of last night and today Im definitely feeling the consequences of my actions. I dont try to pretend Im perfect and I know Im WAY off from that.. This blog is just an outlet to express how Im feeling and continue on my journey with God and the people I love. I know Im a very broken person with a lot of garbage. For me, God is a way for me to have hope. Without Him, there is just an evil world with a bunch of evil 'things' trying to get you. It really does seem like its you against the world. I mean you cant take anyone with you when you die..you are alone. (in that sense) . Ive always felt a sense of peace and comfort knowing there is a higher power and praying and growing as an individual.

Before I was a Christian, I was a child.. so its hard for me to know anything else. I was 14 or 15 when I was baptized and thats when I felt like my life changed for the better. My outlook on life was different from that point on. I was no longer afraid to die.. when I had a problem I could talk to God and it was released.. the worry was gone... I always had someone with me, I was not 'alone' anymore. So really this is all Ive ever known and all I do know. I dont know facts.. I cant quote every bible verse in the bible.. so yeah dont get in an argument with me about this.. I can only speak about whats on my heart and my experiences and if thats not enough for you then Im sorry.

Anyways, Im ready for Ambers wedding this weekend in Schaumburg. She is getting married at the golf course and having the reception inside. Im soooo excited. I bought a dress for it a couple months ago that I havent worn yet. Its a little short, so now Im debating on whether or not I should wear it. Hmm. The best way for me to shop is to look at Elizabeth's pics on facebook. I swear she never wears an outfit twice so all I have to do is find a dress I like and then tell her to bring it to me lol Awesome way to shop! haha

Off to browse facebook... :)

To.. stress

Most days I am fine with stress.. I pray, take a nap, have a glass of wine, or just talk to someone about my problems (usually my husband).. and then Im fine. Today I have anxiety like crazy and I am finding it hard to have faith and to trust God to take care of everything.

Obviously I have been struggling with money for a couple months now and its gotten to the point where its a little overwhelming. Ive never struggled with finances so I think thats why I find myself stressed out so much and having such a hard time dealing with it. It sucks that Ive taken things for granted for sooo long. Dan and I used to do whatever we wanted, buy whatever we wanted, ate whatever we wanted.. life was good. lol Seriously its like a reality check or something.. and it sucks! I guess Im a spoiled brat reacting this way but Im just tired of it. I understand that the bad times make you a stronger person and maybe this is a way for me to appreciate things in life. Right now Im at a point where I dont see the end of the tunnel but Im hoping that it will be clear as day soon. Dans in school for about a month longer.. I just have to make it until then. AND I will.

I feel fortunate to have a great place to live, a supportive loving husband, a strong relationship with God, and a great family and friends. Those things are priceless and invaluable to me and I know that I shouldnt take those for granted and I do not. I have always wanted to live a simple life. I never thought I was materialistic and now I realize that Im more than I thought. I hope from this experience that I grow as an individual and gain a lot from it. I want to continue to value experiences and people more than a fancy house, car, or lots of money. Im working on it, but its coming along. I want to raise children who find worth in experiences not how much stuff they have. I understand now that I have to live that way in order for me to teach my children how to live. If I think back to times when I was a child, it wasnt how many toys I had or the clothes I wore, it was the experiences I shared with my family and friends. :)

"Trust in the Lord with all your heart,

And lean not on your own understanding;

In all your ways acknowledge Him,

And He shall direct your paths" (Proverbs 3:5,6)

To.. staying calm.

This week has been messed up for me.. I wish it wasnt so crazy. Really, on the outside everythings okay but inside, its turmoil. Somehow I managed to get like 4 people mad at me this week and I work alone.. what the eff.. .UGH! Im usually really good at avoiding drama. I stay clear of it whereever I go but for some reason this week its been impossible to do my job when other people are hazards in the way. Whatever.. Im over it. Two people told me I need to get thick skin and quit being so sensitive..whatever, go screw yourself lol. Juuuust kidding! :) I am really trying not to be mean but it really bothers me when people think Im intentionally doing something I am not. If I were doing it then I would be totally fine with it but its when you arent doing something and you get yelled at for doing it. I know that probably sounds confusing.. whatever.. Im over it! DONE!

I am looking forward to the weekend beginning. Today is a gorgeous day outside! Dan and I are having a couple people over for a cookout, should be perfect weather for that. I hope our grill works! It was acting weird the other day.. it wouldnt get warm. That worries me.. hmm. Ill be doing some praying before dinner tonight, haha.
Tomorrow Dan is playing at Farmers market and we have the gallery tomorrow night. Pretty relaxed weekend. Next weekend is Ambers Wedding in Schaumburg!!%$%^^ Im so excited.. I really cant wait.

I feel so blessed to live where all my family and friends are but today Ive made a conscious decision (along with my husband) that we are going to move when he is done with school. Soooo in about 5 years. lol I really want to live on the west coast and Dan just wants to move. I used to be so held down by my family, specifically my mom, but I dont think I can live like that anymore. I need to do what I want and why should I live somewhere where Im not happy?! We want to buy a house in about 5 years and thinking about it I really couldnt figure out where we wanted to raise our family.... St. Joseph, Savoy, Mahomet, Champaign? None of those ideas sounded good to me.. mostly because if we did live outside of Champaign we would have to drive.. in the winter. Not my thing. I dont like Champaign schools and Savoy is a great town but the school thats being built there is considered Champaign. I really dont want to compromise. Im not a country girl.. or a city girl.. I just like warm weather and scenary! I really want to live in Arizona.. somewhere around there. I need to do a lot more research and actually go there to know where to live lol but I was thinking a place where you get all the seasons. I think its Flagstaff, my friend said that when she lived there and it snowed, you could walk outside in a tshirt... how freakin perfect is that?!?!?! :)

To.. getting over it!

I took medicine today to get over this sickness before tonight and I feel worse than I did before I took it! WITH one exception my throat doesnt hurt anymore. I feel drowsy, groggy, my stomach hurts, and my head feels so heavy. Blah. I dont know whether or not to keep going with the medicine or stop taking it so I can go to church tonight. Hmm.

Sometimes when you dont want to do something, there are many obstacles that can easily get in your way. Mostly because you dont want to move them out of your way. Thats how I feel right now. Im going through healing journey at church.. and boy its a journey. It takes you on a path that is very difficult to face and hard to overcome... I will overcome it but it wont be easy or painless. In order to get past something, to really get past something, you have to get through the hurt that was the root. Its not going to be easy and its not going to feel good but once you get past it you will be much better! Fortunately I dont have to do it alone, I have God right there next to me.

Ive wrote this paragraph like 3 times, not knowing what to say. I feel stuck. Its hard to know what to write and how much to write when I dont even know what I feel. I just got back from a vacation and already feel like I need another one. I long for alone time with my husband.. maybe Im just spoiled since I spent 11 days with him but uugh. I miss him so much. I feel obligated to do things I dont want to do and I cant seem to get out of them. I confess stuff to people and then they turn it against me.. How could they do that? I know they dont mean to and I need to learn to stand up for myself but ugh. ugh. Im one of those people that when you ask me to do something that I dont want to do, Ill say no.. then if you ask me again, Ill say yes. Im so afraid of coming off as a bitch that I end up doing things I dont enjoy or want to do because of it. I get mad at myself, and feel guilty for blaming them when its my fault!

Guilt. Thats my biggest struggle. I feel guilty if I eat too much, drink too much, dont exercise enough, call my grandma enough, please my mom enough, clean the house enough, if I miss church, if I dont pray enough, read the bible enough, if Im not being the ultimate housewife, hang out with friends often, if I dont work enough, if I spend too much. When Im with friends I feel guilty for not being with my husband, however when I dont spend enough time with my friends I feel like Im losing touch. This is something Im working getting over because I know its impossible to be perfect and please everyone and spend enough time with every person you love. I dont like the guilt. I used to think it was normal actually until I went to HJ and now I realize that Im not supposed to feel this way.

Romans 8:1 "So now there is no condemnation for those who belong to Christ Jesus."

Right now God is working on me to get to the bottom and root of my guilt... which goes back to my childhood. Its not easy doing this but how fun is it to feel guilty for everything I do?

I liked this ..

" "to get somethign you never had, you have to do something you never did"

When God takes something from your grasp, hes not punishing you,

but merely opening your hands to receive something better.

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Concentrate on this sentence...

"The will of God will never take you where the grace of God will not protect you" "

To.. summer weather

What a beautiful day today! I love it. Unfortunately Im sick and stuck inside at work but on my lunch break I got to sit outside and enjoy it for a minute.

Ive been getting discouraged lately about bills and money since we only have one income right now in our household. Ive been working really hard to try and get expenses lowered. Today some issues finally got resolved. I got our cell phone bill lowered by $15 and our cable/internet billed lowered by $76! That makes me feel so much better. Its supposed to cool down by the end of the week so if we can avoid turning on the ac that will save money too. Our house stays pretty cool downstairs, its upstairs when we are sleeping that is the problem. Maybe we can just turn it on at night... Fortunately we have low income housing (in a way) so our AC is not that expensive, our bill is normally $30 a month so when we turn it on, it only increases by about $30 or $40 more.

Im so happy that my boss gave me and Daniel health insurance starting in May. That has really helped! I have to pay for $60 or $120 (not sure yet) a month but we were paying $400 something for my health and Dans health and dental insurance. Daniel has been taking care of his teeth a lot better (as in flossing daily now lol), its awesome because we dont have to have dental insurance for him anymore. So I was able to cancel that...thats saving another $50/month. Im on a roll today. We paid our care credit off last month, the final $200. We opened that card for Dans wisdom teeth and we were able to pay it off in 9 months. I had faith that God would provide and bless us financially and he is definitely doing so. We have saved well over $400 since last month. Praise God. :)

Our weekend was pretty crazy, thats probably why Im sick now. I really havent slept since Vegas, its terrible. On Thursday night I went out with Journey, her rapper bf (always makes me laugh lol :) and Scott. It was pretty mellow. We played pool and darts at Guidos and then walked to Soma for a minute. Journey and her bf went home and me and Scott went to the new bar that opened up where Barfly was. It was okay, they make their own beer (not yet but they will) and I dont really like beer. I did drink one that was an apricot flavor, it was okay. On Friday night we went to Dans old job's party - Ragle's 30th anniversary at the iHotel. It was pretty amazing. They had a food buffet set up with apps, really good ones! Open bar and a band for dancing. I couldnt get Daniel off the dance floor. Im so happy I have a husband who likes to have a good time! :) We probably danced for a couple hours. We went to Tora's house after that.. me and Dan just hung out with them while they all did shots of this crazy scorpion tequila stuff and we drank water lol.. then we went home around 1 or 2am.

I knew I was getting sick when I didnt wake up on Saturday morning for church. I slept in until almost 11. Thats really unlike me. Usually on the weekend I cant sleep in if I try! Its impossible. I felt pretty bad that day, Dan and I laid outside and read my book. On Saturday night all the girls met at Michelles house for a get together. It was fun, pizza, ice cream, movie and girl talk. When I woke up on Sunday, I felt terrible. I went to St. Joe to pick up Leia, my mom watched her since I had plans all weekend, and we layed out for a while. I kept getting progressively worse. She made me breakfast, then lunch lol then I went home and fell asleep for hours. Dan made me dinner - ramen with hard boiled eggs and we made homemade potato chips with our mandoline. It was a nice night. The MTV movie awards were on and there was no point to watch them unless you are obsessed with Twilight lol. Im debating on whether or not I want to see that movie or not.. Im not a fan of vampires and feel weird about them so I dunno. Apparently the books are amazing and so is the movie.. hmm maybe.