06 August 2009 @ 10:34 am
Well, today is my 30th birthday. I can hardly believe it! I have been alive for 30 years, 3 decades, it really seems like a long time. I don't know why it bothers me so much, but it sure does! When I turned 25 and noticed wrinkles around my eyes....I sort of freaked out and I started making face cream (http://www.hip-threads.com/bodyherbals.asp). After that, I felt much better about my skin...this 30th birthday however....I ordered a bunch of stuff from arbonne in their line that reverses the aging process of the skin (supposedly). Maybe I am afraid of looking old? That could be part of it, who knew I was so vain? Certainly not me!
Maybe its because my body isn't as resilient as it used to be. I hurt my back a few years ago and continue to be plagued with pain now and then. (*though I have a grrreat physical therapist who saves me every-time I hurt)....then I hurt my leg pretty good when I started up running a few weeks ago. I went to my physical therapist and I have tendinitis! what? how did that happen. She says, you need to start stretching before you run, you need to make sure you stretch after, use ice or heat too. What? All of this just to run?! and it's only supposed to be down hill from here, right?
I think I worry about aging because I don't want to look old, but even more, I don't want to FEEL old. You are only as young as you feel. Or as Bob says on the biggest looser "you are only as young as your spine" and with all the back problems I have had...that rings true!
I am going to try to care for my body more in this decade...and I am going to get over this anxiety I have picked up over the last few years. i hate it!
Last night mu hubby and I reminisced about my last 10 years. We have known each other and been together since I was 21 years old. Its been my whole 20s pretty much that I have known him and loved him. We have enjoyed many vacations together across the country, we moved across the country together with no money and no jobs, we have been through a lot of ups and downs in our relationship. It has been wonderful. Marriage and moving to Colorado are my two favorite decisions in my 20s. I have a surprise birthday weekend coming up, I am looking forward to fun with friends and maybe family...with no anxiety and lots of good memories.
Current Mood: 
calm
08 December 2008 @ 08:55 pm
Here is the green accent color wall. I am really excited about the "accent color wall" !!! I have always liked the concept, but never had anywhere to put it!
Current Mood: 
blah
07 December 2008 @ 09:22 am
The last couple of weeks we have been back, hard at work in the basement! I really want to use the space for Christmas, and to have a tree this year!!!
So, somehow a bunch of pics I took up to the point of paint have gotten deleted :(
probably b/c I didnt delete them off the camera and Josh had to take it to work *(cause its his work camera) and there were pics on it, and he deleted them. :( shoot!
But here are a few pics of the paint!
The paint color is harvest wheat or something like that. It ended up looking just like the basement bedroom paint, even though they are two separate colors :( shoot! On the right, the white wall will be painted an evergreen green.
A plug for paint ~~~ We have painted this whole basement, ACE HARDWARE paint is way better than behr, home depot paint, and many others! It covers much better, we always have a lot leftover, and its not very expensive either. plug plug
Current Mood: 
busy
01 December 2008 @ 02:53 pm
Here are some Christmas gifts I can post on here. I am pretty sure the people they are for will not check out this blog :)
I made 2 reversible table runners. One side has Christmas holly with shiny gold thread appliqueing holly berries and leaves in the center of the runner. The opposite side has snowmen (my godmother collects non-christmasy snowmen or snowwomen for the wintertime).
I added beads to each end instead of tassels. The beads are attached on a button, and can come off the button to put the runner in the wash! I think they turned out pretty good!
Current Mood: busy
24 November 2008 @ 09:30 pm
Still pretty stressed around here. The worry of Josh's job loss still looms, and I am working lots of hours both at work and sewing to pad our savings account. I am also sewing some custom orders, and making Christmas gifts. I am really hopeful the gifts turn out as great as they are in my head :) I am really excited about them!! I love to make handmade gifts, I wish I didn't have so many other projects right now so I could enjoy them more. My Christmas wish is to have the basement usable in the next 2 weeks so that we can get a christmas tree, since we are not going home (and we have no room in our house currently). with lots of work, from josh, (as i work OT, sew, and make christmas gifts:) so we'll see if it happens or not...:) I am really hoping! (he never reads this)
Anyhow, I have had a small amount of time to do a few other things for my website.
They are available to buy, think GIFT ideas!
www.hip-threads.com
jenshipthreads.etsy.com
Above, Cotton pants with stretch, with vine & leaf appliques.
www.hip-threads.com
Above, Corduroy Lotus flower Applique skirt with ruffle along the bottom. more info at
www.hip-threads.com
Cardinal Wall hanging
More at jenshipthreads.etsy.com
Shea Butter Hand and Body Soap
Shea Butter Massage bar ~ jenshipthreads.etsy.com
Italian Kitchen Soap, natural antibacterial!
jenshipthreads.etys.com
Current Mood: 
tired
11 November 2008 @ 07:36 am
My "to do" list is a mile long...it never ends, and i am starting to get a little bit stressed. And by a little bit, I mean a lot!!! Josh might be loosing his job in the upcoming weeks and that has caused HUGE stress around here! There is so much going on, and not all great to post on the internet, but we had to hire a very expensive lawyer this week to help josh keep his job. If the lawyer works out, and he gets to keep his job, life will be ok...if he still looses the job, then we are out a LOT of money and are completely screwed! I am scaired! I was not sure about this lawyer thing at all, Josh really thinks its the best way to go, I am not so sure, but it's him who has to deal with what is going on for the rest of his life....and maybe this is the best route, I just dont know. So i am freaked out about the money, I am working lots of OT at my work b/c my boss is great & understands whats going on, and we are down 1 staff at another facility, so I am making up time for them. Josh is also working as much OT as he can get, 6 days per week, like I am, and we are just totally beat. Then we come home and I work on sewing orders, he his homework, or the house. It just never seems to end. Today I called into work, I have a pounding headache and feel ill. I need to take care of myself today. I need to get some things done so I can focus and be a happier person. The holidays are coming up, and usually I am really happy for them. Now i wonder if Josh will be out of work by Christmas, and what kind of holiday we are going to have. I hope not one where we are looking for jobs all the time and worrying about paying bills...cause, thats no fun! lol. We obviously can't go home this year, and will miss being with our families so much :(
I get sad when I think of not going home, missing my family, grandparents, Josh's family, and Steve. Josh really worries about Steve and his health. I love Colorado, but sure miss being near home when times are tough. And they are tough right now!
Current Mood: 
worried
02 November 2008 @ 07:57 am
I can't believe it's been 1 month since I have posted here!!! This month has been as busy as it gets! Josh's mom Peg came and stayed in the beginning of the month for a good long week, then we went on our anniversary trip!
It was great to have her here, I just wish the bedroom downstairs was not torn up so she had a more comfortable place to stay. The foundation people, of course, couldn't get the walls fixed in 3 weeks (like they promised they would!!! argh) so she slept in a room without 2 walls, and drywall laying everywhere and drywall dust too! Boy did I feel bad for her, but she said she didn't mind....so, I guess thats ok?!? We had a full week of activities planned, the Komen race for the Cure, hiking and going into the mountains, going to Coors, and Coyote Ugly. And of course lots more!
Here are Peg and I at the start of the Komen Race. The pink scarves were given to us from my work. I thought that was cool!
Here is the start of the race, you can see that people are walking in front of us for a loooonnnnngg way!!! The Komen race in Denver attracts over 70,000 people and is the largest walk in the nation. woo hoo!
Here you can see all the people walking on the entrance ramp to I-25. I love this part of the walk! It's so awesome to see all the people who are also walking.
Here is Peg under her Survivor Sign. 11-20 Years survival from Breast Cancer. YEA! How awesome is that. Seeing all the women there, and how everyone is touched by this disease makes me feel like my job is sooo important. Sometimes work is boring and long and I dont want to be there...but I know that i am making a difference each day. Cancer research is one of the most important parts of finding a cure, and collecting and analyzing the data is too. It's great to be a part of the cure for all of these women and their families. (Same for all the other cancer out there, not just breast :)
Here is the 3 Sisters Trail in Evergreen, CO at Sunset. We had a nice little hike through the woods, then climbed the rocks and had a beautiful view of the autumn colors and beautiful mountains and sunset!
More pics of the 3 sisters trail.
Apparently, I do not have that many pics of Peg's visit, or they never got downloaded into the correct spot? Peg, send me some of your pics! The Coors pics and some of the other cute ones, so I can post them!!!
Current Mood: tired
04 October 2008 @ 08:07 pm
29 September 2008 @ 09:35 am
Yesterday Heather and Josh had planned a surprise birthday party for me! Josh happened to slice his hand open on my actual birthday and we had to spend the evening in the urgent care center. (we have been in these a lot lately).
And no-one was really around on my birthday either! Mary had just given birth, Jess wasn't here yet, Josh had schoolwork and other house duties that needed to be done, and Megan had just moved to Ohio. So it was fun to have the whole group together. Most of them anyway.
Heather had orchestrated a roos to get me out of the house to help her study medical terminology at Barnes and Noble. We did this for not very long, and then Heather was like, why dont we just go to lunch and get a beer...which we did. Then Russell was there when we arrived and I was pretty surprised to see him...but I didnt know what was going on until Josh and Jess showed up with happy birthday balloons, Heather pulled out a cake, and Mary & Jeff with baby Elena walked in, then Laura and David came shortly after.
Mary got me the America's Test Kitchen Cookbook that I have been drooling over. I had borrowed hers a couple of weeks ago and Loved it! There are lots of pictures and helpful hints in it :) yay! thanks Mary!
It was a great surprise and makes me very thankful for the good friends I have!!
In other news, Josh is on day 4 of this nasty cold. He is sooo sick, sore throat, runny/congested nose, and of course a little grumpy. lol. He had to call into work today, he just felt so nasty, often I will look over at him sitting watching TV and he is just staring off into space. Poor guy. I hope I don't get it!!! I hate being sick, and Peg comes on Thursday and I don't want to be sick when she is here!
Olshan the Foundation fixing company was supposed to come today and start re-work again. They are taking the drain out THAT THEY JUST PUT IN LAST WEEKEND b/c it doesn't drain right, and they need to fix their braces on that side of the house. Then supposedly the recommendation was to excavate externally, seal the whole wall and put an external drain. To "do this right, finally". Apparently Josh says they have only been here 7 times. Not the original 30 times I had suggested. i think 7 seems WAY too low, i remember them here at least 2 times in the first year, I cant think of at least 7 times, and I am sure I am missing some. It has been over 3 years!!!! I just want this job done right!!!!!
And if we don't hear from them today, i am going to be sooo mad!
Current Mood: busy
27 September 2008 @ 09:59 am
This week has been a long, long week. Lately, it has seemed like nothing has been going right for Josh and I.
Right before my parents got here, our washing machine broke. And not only did it break, but it managed to spew motor oil all over our clothes. The seal on the drum broke, so the oil was leaking out the middle and onto everything. I managed to do 1 load extra before figuring this out. Then after 2 weeks Josh finally "fixed" it. Well, I told him it was not fixed, he didnt believe me and washed more clothes in it. More clothes are totally stained now with motor oil. We do not have 1 set of sheets for our bed that were saved. :( Since we just bought new sheets, we dont exactly have the money to go buy more, especially since after Josh spent money on parts for the machine and we had to buy a new washer anyway. gggrr! So we are sleeping on motor oil stained sheets, which really freaks me out actually. I wake up and see the stains and they are black and i think its a bug or something. It's really gross, but we dont have much of a choice right now.
We are also having major car issues, the lawnmower broke partially, just enough to make it fairly dangerous when you mow. Unfortunately, we have no money to fix these things since, we just paid tuition, our credit card for our basement is now due and we will have a chunk to pay off in October, I just had a bunch of DR bills for my staff infection (and i have insurance!!) it was pretty costly to get moderately sick, Christmas coming up and we probably cant afford tickets to go home, especially with the tix at 600$ each! Yikes! Lets see, and we need new truck tires for winter very badly, and our anniversary is coming up! I planned a trip for josh and I which will cost a bit, but I do think we need the time away. Badly! We need to get away from life for a few days :)
So money is tight for us...and like most Americans nowadays we dont have much extra. If something really bad happened, I dont know what we would do! I am thankful that we have what we do, and I am grateful josh can fix most things which helps us a lot. Being grateful makes me feel better after all that whining! Ah, but when It rains in life, it pours! And thats life, I have learned! So, it will eventually go away, and i hope it doesnt get any worse.
Secondly, Olshan, the company who is "fixing" our wall problem, has been here probably 3-4 times in the last 2 months. (I have lost count as to how many times they have been here since 2005 when we bought this place). Each time they come we think it's the last time, it never is. Maybe this time, probably lucky number 32 or something, will make it stick? Blah! So the last time they came, since we have had SO many problems, they decided to rip out OUR DRYWALL that we hung, mudded, sanded, texturized, primed, painted ourselves. Then they put up a plastic shield and re-did their drainage system. Then they are paying for a drywaller to come back and fix it. We water tested it, and water poured in through their wall brace they put on initially in 2005. ARGH! So we call, and the Denver manager doesn't call Josh back, we are so mad at this guy. Josh said to the receptionist I will give him until the end of the day or I am calling the regional manager. He did not call, so Josh called the regional manager. Who was really nice, got back to us ASAP, and now there are workers here today, epoxying again and I am so sick of that smell! it takes a long time for it to go away (like a month then we become used to it, other people can smell it though). They are also extending the wall shield to the ceiling (which they were supposed to do last time, they were also supposed to extend the drain last time and did not do that either, WTF?!). Today one of the managers is here supervising. But not the manager guy who we are pretty annoyed with. Furthermore, that manager DAVE, said he would come out to supervise the lasts 3 times they came to "fix" it, and he never did!!!! I dont like Dave, you should fire him Olshan, if you ever read my blog. lol
The rush here is that Josh's mom comes to visit this Thursday and it HAS to be drywalled by then! Stress! B/c there is a HUGE mess to clean up down there already, and after the drywallers even more. The drywall is scheduled for Wed, which gives me very little time to clean up. And josh is sick, came down with a sore throat and congestion yesterday, woke up today WAY worse and is dealing with all this foundation stuff today, poor guy. I have to deal with it on Monday, they come back then and test and check it. I hope Josh gets better soon and I hope even more that I dont get sick too! I cant deal with getting sick again, that staff infection was bad enough, isn't that enough for now~!
Oh, and work hasn't been a picnic either.
Whew, that was a lot of complaining! I hope I have gotten it out of my system, lol.
On the UP side ~~~~` I have been thinking and thinking about Christmas gifts that I have been wanting to make for family this year. I am trying to make all gifts like I did last year, it was a lot of fun to make things for my mom, she really liked them last year! that made me really happy.
And i have a really, really, really good idea now for this year!!! I am so excited!! But I Cant tell :) i know you all read this.
The idea actually came from a little bird, seriously!
Current Mood: 
stressed
22 September 2008 @ 01:39 pm
I had a few more photos of healing from the staff infection that I was going to post on here, but for some reason they got deleted off the camera.
The labs came back STAFF infection not MRSA. (staf? staff? ...spelling??).
Thank goodness! But the staff was pretty terrible no matter what it was! I had to stuff wound packing inside the hole in my leg for 3 weeks. I am finally done with that as of last Tuesday. Now I have a huge black healing scab. Its much better and I am grateful it didn't get worse than it did.
My work and coworkers were so nice about it all. My boss allowed me to work from home all week, due to how contagious it was and even if it wasn't contagious, there is no way I could have made it into the office with that leg wound. I had to clean it and pack it at least 1 time per day. It hurt terribly!
I felt very lucky that my job allowed me to work from home and that my coworkers could take on the inner office duties while I was out. It was a real relief to me to have that support. If i was at my old job, I would probably have had to take 1 week off of work, that would have sucked!
The people at the new job are very supportive.
So thats the update, Feeling much better, glad it's over, hope it doesnt happen again and that the staff will be the last illness i will have this fall. (I usually get sick when it gets cold out)
Current Mood: mellow
16 September 2008 @ 06:28 pm
I was so excited to have my family come to Colorado this year, and my whole family too! Dad, mom, and sister! They havent all come out together since our 2nd year here in Colorado. It was great to have them here!
Here are some photos of us hiking Mount Evans, 14,258 feet above sea level. It was 69 in Denver and 39 at the base of the mountain, and much colder at the top. It was one of the toughest hikes I have done, mostly due to the snow and very very cold wind, but we all forged onward and completed the 5 mile hike. ( It felt much more than 5 miles, and technically we came down a steeper and shorter incline, making the hike less than 5 miles. However, after many years of hiking and running and timing myself, I felt this hike was probably longer than measured)
Here we are at the start of the hike. It was pretty steep near the start and we were climbing and bouldering up some pretty steep & slippery areas. It was a little treacherous. 
(lt to rt) Jess, Laura and me. We are on the top of Mount Spalding (or what we thought was Mt. Spalding but maybe was another mountain) about 1/3 of the way into our hike. Behind us is Mount Evans where we are heading. 
We are standing on the ledge here, taking a break, calling mom so she was not worried, and eating some. We did not know we were standing this close to the cliff, dad took this pic from higher up on the mountain. The cliff went straight down to a huge dropoff. There were many places early on (and actually most of the hike really) that were very steep drops, sheer cliffs, and scary terrain. 
Wow, pretty beautiful right? Dad took this while standing right in the gully between the 2 mountains. Very cool!
The 5 of us on the top, with josh's great timer, camera skillz. Pretty beautiful! 
Here are josh and I on the top of the mountain. This is our 7th 14er!
I love the blue sky!!! Very tippy top of the mountain!
Marker on the top of the peak.
Deciding which route to take down. It was my suggestion that we just go down the fast, steep route. It was probably not the easiest route, and much farther than it looked too... We just went over the edge of this mountain here....whew!
HOW cutE!!! Sleepy, tired, exhausted dogs, but they got the humans down from the mountain alright, their job is done :)
YAY we are done!!!! wa hoo!!!
03 September 2008 @ 07:06 pm
Getting a bit better today, I feel better and the wound is not excrutiating...instead just really painful.
Thats better! Its more red from all the bandages being taped and untaped than from being infected. Its still oozing and the wound nurse showed Josh how to pack it. OUCH!!! I am not looking forward to that, i have to do that each day until its healed! They have to stick a cutip in there and clean it then put packing in....OUCH !!!! that is going to suck for josh tomorrow...
Current Mood: tired
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