7 Quick Takes {16}

Linking up with Conversion Diary. 

1. I bought my first blogging ebook this week, How to Blog for Profit (Without selling your soul) by Ruth Soukup. (Ruth blogs over at Living Well Spending Less.) I've read a little over half of it and have highlighted a bunch of information I hope to go back and use on my blog sooner rather than later. Hopefully by next week I'll be making millions from this little blogging space. Kidding!

(Ruth, if you read this, know that I really am going to take some of your advice:)

2. Pretty sure I'm the only person who still hasn't downloaded the ios7 update. I've heard it's pretty nifty though so I should probably get on that asap. Any one want to share how they feel about it? Love it? Hate it?

3. The parentals house is getting super close to being finished! Thank goodness because I think they have both had enough of the whole building process. They finally got their cabinets in this week and now it's just the flooring, countertops and touch up painting type stuff. 

Hello house!

LOVE these bookcases that are built in to either side of the fireplace.

The kitchen is huge with tons of counter space.

This picture does zero justice to the fireplace. 

After watching them stress, Seth said we're never building a house because I'm too indecisive, and he's right, but I still really want to at some point. We'll see who wins that one. 

4. It's almost been a whole month that Seth and I have been living together and we don't hate each other. Yay, go us! I will say upgrading to a king size bed definitely wouldn't hurt the relationship though. Queen beds are kinda a joke. #iwantakingbed

5. I'm really in the mood to go Christmas shopping and get a few presents scratched off of my non-existent lists. I love love love shopping for other people but when I do it all in a one month time period it really kills the ole budget. Thinking I need to start my lists now so I can start shopping next month which is only a few days away. Do people do this? Does it help you stick to a budget or do you end up buying more because you shop now AND later? That's what I'm a little worried about. 

6. Day 5 of not drinking pop and I haven't died yet. I tried this a little while back and was doing okay until I went on vacation and fell off the wagon harder than an alcoholic at a beer convention. As of right now, so far so good. My goal is to drink only one a week and the rest of the time stick to water or tea (not sweet cause that's disgusting). If you want to encourage this good habit it will be greatly appreciated because sometimes I just want to throw a tantrum and have a Pepsi, ya know?! Plus I wouldn't mind dropping 10 15 pounds. Just saying.

7. Since it was Seth's birthday yesterday we had a little birthday dinner at home last night. Grilled BBQ chicken with over the top unhealthy twice baked poh-taw-tohs and fresh garden tow-mah-toes. Seth grilled the chicken while I sliced the toms and tried to kill us with fat in the potatoes. Maybe I should post the non-recipe here sometime....anybody feel like having a heart attack?

Act like you don't want to lick those potatoes right off your screen!

Gosh I just read this and it's a little d-d-dull. Do you wanna slap me for wasting your time? Maybe I'll ride a unicorn through a waterfall or something this weekend so I can bring you a little more excitement next week. 

Peace out girl scout. 

7 Quick Takes (2)

1. I'm loving my new phone! Not loving that my phone case from Amazon still hasn't been delivered. I mean, I placed the order Monday and it's Friday and still no delivery! Oh, and is there an app for patience?? Haha

2. I work for a printing company and they are very pet friendly. This is my newest co-worker, Bear. He helps me keep from stressing out some days. I would bring Gunnar but he would probably eat everything and ruin it for everyone so he gets to stay home.

3. My husband is on his way home to see me finally! Two weeks away is never fun but so glad that it should be ending in the next month or so. Then we finally get to take a vacay and spend the summer together doing fun stuff like going to Royals games. Love me some baseball!

4. I've been eating really healthy all week (minus my daily Pepsi's and occasional cookie) and the sales guys had to go and ruin it today by bringing us donuts for breakfast and pizza for lunch. No will power here...maybe I'm getting better though because I did only eat one slice of pizza and one donut. That's gotta count for something right?

From this...

...to this...

...to this. Oops.

5. I'm currently obsessed with the following songs: 

Boys Round Here - Blake Shelton

I know what you did in the dark (Light em up) - Fall Out Boy

Can't Hold Us - Macklemore ft Ryan Lewis.

All these songs make me want to jam out big time. 

6. It's May 3rd and it was snowing yesterday and acting like it wants to snow today. Come on KS, get it together! I need Summer NOW!!!

7. Earlier this week I bought a food dehydrator and last night I tested it out by drying strawberries, bananas, apples, pineapple, and blueberries. I tried a few of the fruits this morning and they are delish. I'm super pumped about trying some other stuff including jerky and then some herbs once it warms up enough for me to grow them in my garden. If you have any suggestions of good stuff to dehydrate, let me know. 

Happy Weekend!! You can follow mine on Instagram, here:)

More than a phone.

Well, I'm loving it, so far anyway. 

Even though I've only had my iPhone for less than 24 hours I've been hit with the realization that there are a heck of a lot of apps used to tell the world what you're doing. Facebook, twitter and instagram to name just a couple. I'm gonna have to be careful or I will end up spending more time telling the world what I'm doing than I will spend actually doing something in the world. Scary how easy it can be to get sucked in to social media. 

I've noticed recently that I have been using Facebook as a type of online journal if that makes sense. For example, I can go back and read about things that happened in college or the day to day stresses of planning our wedding. It's pretty neat that you can easily track all these little moments in life. I have always been somewhat of a historian in the way that I want to remember the past through words, stories and photos so this is really neat to me (thus this blog). Especially since I have always been jealous of those people that do journal religiously. My mom being one of them. It's amazing to go back through her journals and see all those little details that spark memories that would have otherwise been forgotten. 

As I install some of these new apps I'm hoping to be able to use this piece of technology to continue on the path of documenting life and memories. Time will tell if I'm able to easily live my life for me or for my technology. 

Oh, and click here for our Instagram debut:)

The Day I Ordered the iPhone:)

In an effort to start this week off right I did what anyone would do. I bought/ordered an iPhone! In a short 3-5 days I will have that lovely piece of technology in my hands and I can't wait! I have wanted a darn thing for as long as they have existed but my hubs and I are t-mobilers. Multiple times I have tried to talk Seth into switching carriers so I can get my darn phone but he was pretty insistent that was stay with T-Mobile because they have treated us alright and his family and my family all have T-Mobile. So I have been stuck, waiting for that wonderful day when T-Mobile would strike up a deal with Apple and I could get my phone. 

After visiting T-Mobile on Friday to discuss my plan options, I realized that Seth and I could both get new phones and still pay the same we already pay even after paying the $20 a month per phone. Once the phone is paid off we will pay less! So, duh. No reason not to change phones. I went home to tell the Seth the good news and make plans to order our phones the next day. Pretty sure I drove Seth bananas asking when we could go back to order the phones on Saturday and when we finally arrived, their computers were down:( So, we went back Sunday. Still down! Finally, yesterday I went and they were able to order. Hallelujah!

In order to keep the good karma flowing (and because I was hungry) I decided to text my sis-in-law to see if I could take her to dinner. After spending hours upon hours in her house and not being cleared to drive after her surgery she was more than willing to get out of the house. I took her to Panera since she had never been and who doesn't love a good bowl of soup? It was great to catch up with her and see how she's doing with all the craziness going on in her life right now. 

I decided to top the day off by picking up some candy for one of my cousins who is having a rough couple days. I dropped it off at school with an anonymous card to hopefully cheer her up. I think it's the little things that make people smile so hopefully it will make her day a little better. 

Going to lunch with one of my best friends, her mom and sis and my mom soon so this day is looking up as well. Minus the drizzly frozen rain junk that is happening outside right now.

Happy Tuesday folks!