Oh for shame

BEFORE:

AFTER:

It is progress in the right direction. I am well aware that "Red" didn't like doubling as a laundry line.....for the past 2 weeks!! Oh for shame. The first step in the right direction is admitting my problem of using exercise equipment to moonlight as laundry lines. I'm a work in progress. Follow my momentum. Remove your laundry and dust your exercise contraptions this week. Now to actually get on the thing.

Waddle Warmer

Chloe knit up this cute cell phone holder which is awesome because although I'm not an avid user of the thing, when I do carry it I drop it, and it gets dinged and it isn't so svelte when that happens. The color isn't coming through. It is really a royal purple and I love it.I loved the color so much I decided to use some of the leftover yarn for the trim on this little waddle cover up. Remember that guy Richard Fish from the show Ally McBeal? He would be so mad, because well he loved to finger a waddle, but really who needs to see my cold wattle? Nobody that's who. The design is from Tangle. Wow is that a super inspiring site! The pattern can be found for free here.
Yes, I am modeling it in all my retouched neck glory. Because again, this is about the neck warmer, not my floppy neck ;) What am I staring off into the distance at? I don't know, I was hopped up on DayQuil.

Pinkalicious

S child just started taking ballet. Okay, she doesn't actually participate in the class yet. We sit by the door and she watches all the other 4 yr olds chasse, jete, tendu, frappe and curtsy in their teeny tiny leotards. For the record I had to consult the Googles for the proper spelling of all this French that the instructor rattles off. I feel very mature when I come home and try it out on the unsuspecting family. Its only week 2 of ballet and I'm hopeful she'll participate at some point in the next 6 weeks. She can then victoriously run crying back to me in all her spunktifulous glory. Don't try to Google that word, it's all mine baby. I'm cool with her taking time to feel comfortable joining in. I'm also very cool with how these little leg warmers turned out. Anyone, hearing Flashdance music? I was when I knit them up last week.

Pinkalicious

Pent up energy to ride=Bake & Cook like a fool

I'm catching on to this lately. I can't ride today, but apparently I sure can cook/bake. I'm starting to realize how my obsessive nature can take over in their various and often displaced ways. It's been raining the past 2 days and since I'm a pretty fair weather rider and never slapped those fenders on my bike here I am blogging about cooking up a storm. This morning I've baked 2 dozen muffins (a batch of banana and a batch of peanut butter) both with secret ingredients (cauliflower puree and carrot puree respectively). Then I thought of trying my hand at Cottage cheese pancakes so Satori helped me slap those together. However, the coffee and ride with drawls are kicking in so strongly that I'm now making pizza dough for tonight's dinner "Brazilian Style Pizza" and a Greek "black bean" Salad to have around for snacking. Oooh and I get to eat it after my ride tomorrow yipppeee! I am also getting some great ideas off of this site that a food thoughtful friend linked me to last year Culinary Competitor. The Brazilian Style Pizza is featured on their site. I still have chicken to grill up too. Egads I'm a mess, but we're not starvin' up in the woods hood. Off to cook off some more of this energy...oooh or maybe I should clean my bike :D

Stupid cardiovascular!?#@ outdoor blasphemy??*&!$#

Oh hello :)

I rode my bicycle outside today. I rode a whole whopper (said sarcastically) 27.88 miles and told my rider buddies' I *may* cut out early (because last year this route was easy peasy by summertime and today it felt like a century) and I  stuck my cycling cleat firmly in my mouth today.  Holy hellicious-ness this route was my favorite complete with all the climbing up front and then the fast flats with friends giggling and "racing". However, with good weather, fantastic company, glorious smells of the outdoors, and some sarcastic friends she (me) huffed and puffed her way off the BACk of the pack today (bows head for shame factor). How did my fun little 30 ish miler become such a hard ass task? 

I was both humbled and inspired today. It was a great place to be both mentally and physically for me. I need to work MUCH harder :/

The gym=no substitute for the road! I will still go to the gym; I will also take more advantage of the road! 

Now I follow fashion Yo.

2 blog posts in a day...i'm on a roll. 

Is this: 

Inspired by "Dumb Donald" or what?

He had stripes though. However, I love the pink tie in. It really connected my thoughts on the ridiculous matter. Cohesion of fashion. 

When a girl stops blogging

does it mean she has nothing to say? 

HELL NO! 

I just haven't had anything blog worthy. Nothing funny, nothing quirky, nothing serious. Everyone else around me knows I always have plenty to say ;). I've been in a funk. I don't feel motivated to do anything. It takes a lot of effort to haul my booty to the gym and I'm either ON or OFF.  The house is a mess. I want to paint, but I'm color paralyzed. I tried to garden yesterday and remembered how much blood, sweat and tears it takes to grow 5 peas, 1 green tomato, and some worm infested root vegetable. I'll still take the challenge on because it is an excuse to have dirt under my fingernails and play with worms.

I really have been blogging or more like blog-journaling in the most sterile and mind numbing way on my "other" blog.  Now if I could clean up my diet I may be living some as semblance of what is known as synergy. 

A girl can dream.

Martha Would be Proud: 2008

Our Gross Halloween Party meal was a total success. Mara and I managed to really creep out the kids, hubbies, and even ourselves with our efforts. Amazingly enough the kids tried almost all of the menu choices and even had seconds. I have some fun ideas already planned for next year. I have more fun with getting this meal together other than any other throughout the holidays. Although at the end of the meal Mara and I were already thinking how we could make Thanksgiving preparation more fun (for us all) so we threw around the idea of making everything miniature. I'm tired of the turkey year after year that hardly anyone enjoys in our own house. Here are the pictures because words do the meal no justice.

"Ogre toes" were buffalo wings and if I had more time I would have put out a sign for the blue cheese that said something like "Ogre toe jam" :) The "mashed boo tay toes" should have been piped nicely onto plates with some olive eyeballs, but things got a little hurried. In the picture above were our "creepy creature eyeballs" (deviled eggs) and next to that was a creative macaroni dish with "bugs, worms and snails" (hotdogs, olives, and mac and cheese).
Mummy toes were simply mini cocktail sausages rolled in crescent dough from the can.
Mara made this delicious soup/bread/cheese concoction for the "Jack-o-Lantern pot". It tasted like french onion soup. I'll have to get the recipe from her and have this for another time.


These "bat wings" were most probably the grossest item and surprisingly delicious (soy sauce, brown sugar and food coloring).

Jumble Jambles

I think Jumble Jambles means that I'm going to have a bit of what some may call a stream of consciousness. I have some verbal vomitus that needs a purge. Thank you ahead of time blog for listening.

Kombucha is dead and dumped due to furry growth. Sad news to me. However, there is hope. I found a scobi source and I'm going to try try again.

My running. After going to California and having my road trip extravaganza I was sure my "other goal" of running the Run Like Hell Half-Marathon would be nixed due to some very poor training. I however, am lately a girl of my word and after numerous attempts at trying to back out of the 1/2 and into the 10k I failed (at the back out). I ran the whole 1/2 marathon and more. I somehow managed to follow the 10kers through the finish line, but oopsie I had committed to running the half, so back out of the finish line I ran and back to the split. The girl at the split had inadvertently told me the WRONG WAY because the stupid number patches or whatever the hell they are called were so close in color (light orange 10k and one shade darker orange 1/2 marathoners) that I got to go through the finish line twice...um not so cool, but whatever. I'm not bitter I ran more that the 1/2 that day and 14+ miles are more than these little legs have trucked in a single shot evah! Okie dokie, done with the vent and on to the fun details.

I ran the first 6 miles with Saori my bff. She did so fantastic for not having trained at all. She was going great and at mile 5 she got reallllly quiet. I looked at her and thought she needed a talking to, so I joked with her a bit and tied to get her to laugh, but to no avail. She just shot me some really funny looks like: shuddupbitchi'mtryingtobreath...so I backed off, because I have totally been there and I was just proud of her for joining us this frigid morning. We're good and we joked about it later. I left her after the dirty looks and ran throught the finish line. Then back out of the finish line to the split I went :grumble grumble:. The next few miles went all up hill and it was nice. I don't mind running uphill, but by mile 9 I was starting to experience some knee pain which would stay with me for the next 5 miles and just get worse as I trotted back down hill for the last 4 miles. Ugh. I'll spare you all my complaints. It hurt, I didn't walk any of it and I made it back across the finish line to the cheers of my family and friends (Saori and her Mama) . The icing was that my oldest 2 kiddos ran through the finish line with me!! Fun stuff. I'm not a runner, but I did it and I need to thank Mara for holding me hostage to my commitment :) Thank you Mar!!
Heres my mug shot. It looks like my feet are barely leaving the pavement :P

Last news on the Jumble front...my bike is back on the road with me on it fo shizzle and I'm all decorated in soft merino wool :swoon:. My new affections lie in my comfort. Fo rizzle...out.