Question of the century

OK. To all the girls out there, I want to hear from you. When I was doing that tagged thing I made a comment about not having a brand of jeans that I like. PLEASE tell me if you have found some jeans that you like. I used to be in love with Gap jeans but now I can't find any that I like. They discontinued the ones that I loved. Go figure. They discontinued my favorite bra too. The last one I had was cut off of me in my car accident in 2001. It was beyond repair. I saved it for weeks trying to fix it and I just couldn't because of how they cut it.

So, back to jeans:

Do you have any tips for jeans shopping?
What brands do you like?
What brands do you hate?

You are required to leave a comment :-)

Tagged

So I used to hate being tagged to do things but I don't know what has happened but I don't mind anymore. So, below is in response to being tagged by Marcie.

I am: cold
I think: about fitness a lot. To bad thinking about it just doesn't take care of it :-)
I know: everything will work out ok
I want: to learn how to use my new camera
I have: big dreams
I dislike: having to check the pockets of cargo pants that have 50,000 pockets before doing laundry….did I mention Dusty has a lot of cargo pants? Dang Nature Boy! ha ha
I miss: being around family and ALL my nieces and nephews
I fear: I will fall short of reaching some of my goals
I feel: like I am moving onwards and upwards
I hear: the crunching of ice. I HATE hearing that all day……
I smell: some yummy black raspberry vanilla oil spray
I crave: some white bean pasta soup and cornbread!
I cry: when I actually let myself feel my emotions
I usually: use humor to lighten things up
I search: ponder and pray
I wonder: what my life and family will be like.
I regret: not going after what I really want a little sooner
I love: fall weather
I care: about creating healthy habits
I always: have a to-do list. Seriously. Everyday. Ask Anyone.
I worry: all the time……
I am not: a quitter
I remember: having a WONDERFUL childhood full of family and laughs and smiles
I believe: that all things will work for our good
I dance: all of the time
I sing: to my husband
I dream: BIG
I argue: only if I feel REALLY strongly about something
I write: to understand what I really feel
I win: when I play Dusty in Uno and checkers! HA HA HA
I lose: at the stupid shocker game
I wish: I knew how many kids I will have and where we will end up living and and and and and ……..
I listen: to my instincts (and the Spirit)
I don't understand: why I can’t find a brand of jeans that I am in love with or even remotely like
I can usually be found: with a to-do list in my hand!!
I am scared: going hiking with Dusty and finding cougars or rattlesnakes or anacondas or whatever and he goes to play with it. (just kidding, but I am scared of hiking sometimes)
I need: to date my husband a lot!
I forget: things that happened like yesterday but I have great long term memory. So if you need to ask me something that happened yesterday, just ask me in a month or so
I am happy: because I know I am a Child of God

I tag: Melissa, Chauntel, Charla

BTW....

All of those lame little posts that I did were just to earn extra points for a blog giveaway that I didn't win!!!!!!! Thanks for getting my hopes up, Angela. Just kidding. Thanks for lookin out fo a sista!

We all need help every now and then

I have noticed that some of you are in need of help in this arena and I want to give you a resource that is sure to give some tips and advice on how to control your young! lol Positive discipline for children is so important and we all need a little help every now and then. It's OK. Click on it.

Does this sound familiar?

"What do you want to do?"

"I don't know. What do you want to do?"

Take more initiative and planning with your time together and check out some original date ideas to put some spark back into your weekends!

Skincare

I know a few of you that read this blog are avid proactive users. I have always wanted to try it but haven't. Have any of you ever heard of obaji products?

Can't think of what to do?

I have discovered a great site full of family fun activities. Take some time to browse around and find something that you and your family will love!

Get out your water colors!

Dusty and I tried our hand at painting each other's faces completely for our date a few weeks ago. Many of you reading thought it was a great idea. We don't have children yet so we tried things that were a little more difficult and just plain random.

Here are some great tips for childrens face painting for those of you that have kids and would like some help on how to get started.

Vanilla Joy's Giveaway

OK. I know you have all heard me talk about how much I love the MiniBox from The Original Scrap Box but you are going to have to hear it again!! Vanilla Joy has the most amazing blog giveaway ever and is giving one away for a blog giveaway!

Being a home organizational consultant I understand the value of the MiniBox. Not only is a beautiful piece of furniture and the ultimate space saver, it is the most versatile and functional item you can own in your home. I love it so much I want 2 of them!!

I had the opportunity to be in a focus group, as you know, where the creators of the MiniBox came and showed us how it works. It was definitely love at first sight! They brought in a vanilla bead board model and that was the one I wanted. I knew I had to have it.

The MiniBox is for my Cricut and scrapbooking --and all things craft--supplies and the Work Box is for my home office. There are a million different uses for these! Scrapbooking is just the beginning!! Wish me luck :-) and head over to Vanilla Joy to enter for your chance to win!

Dirt Cake

Here was my first stab at a dirt cake. I must say it went quick and it was gone within minutes. I went and bought a ceramic pot on clearance and lined it with foil inside. I also bought a spade and served it with that it turned out great. It was fun and easy to make and it was the talk of the party. ha ha

How cute is he?

This is Dusty's little nephew Zac. What a cutie!

Zum Zum Zumba!

So Dusty and I are taking a night work out class together. We went for the first time last Thursday and thought it was going to be a Turbo Kick class. It was the same instructor but they have changed the format this semester and on Thursdays they are going to do zumba. Zumba is a like a 60 min salsa / Cuban workout. I was bummed at first because I thought Dusty wouldn't want to do it. Lo and behold if he didn't shake what his mamma gave him and had fun!! I love my husband!! He did SO GOOD! He and another guy took the back corner but he could have been front and center as much as he was shakin it and workin up a sweat. It was AWESOME! So, Tuesday nights will be Turbo Kick and Thursdays will be zumba and Saturdays I will probably go to by myself cause it's 1/2 Turbo and 1/2 step and I don't even like step that much and the teacher is just OK and her step routines are next to impossible to catch on to.

Anyway, props to Dusty for doing so good at the zumba!

Blog Week Giveaway ending soon!!

Don't forget to go over to the Pikes Pickles for the Blog Week Giveaways! Drawings are tomorrow :-) http://pikespickles.blogspot.com/

Good luck!

Pikes Pickles Blog Week Giveaway

I love the blogging community where you find people you instantly click with through your likes and interests. This is one of those blogs over at http://pikespickles.blogspot.com/. Just found her blog today through a giveaway and she is just great.

Blog giveaways are so awesome. The prizes are always awesome and people are so generous with their time and what they give. I want to do one soon....I just need to figure out what to give away.... Maybe one of Dusty's snakes....

Check it out for your chance to win. Although I really want to win, I will wish you luck too! ;)

New Additions to our Home

We have been slowly actually decorating our house. We only have really been concentrating on the living room, next is the kitchen etc. etc. We are really happy with what we have done. (more pics soon) Here are a few pictures of our tv armoire and new quilt. We are doing a rustic country theme in our home. It's amazing the feeling that you get even when you make just a few changes. It's fun actually creating a home with a homey feeling :-)

Hot Momma Comin Through!

I LOVE Melissa's new hair cut. She is sssssssssoooooooooooo hot. She looks like it is perfect for her. She was so ready for a change and she couldn't have picked a cuter style. Thanks Chauntel for inspiring us all to chop our hair off; even though you are growing yours out already..... I love my short hair but there is some moments where I miss it being a little longer.

Anyway. Here are a few before and after pictures. Everybody tell Melissa how cute she is :-)

Ohhhhh. It Ain't My Fault.

First off that title is in reference to a rap song. There are many of those throughout this blog so, just read it and move on knowing that you are not as ghetto as me :-) You can take a girl from the south but you can't take the south out of the girl!

Anyway. I realized than on my last trip home that my picky eating habits is NOT my fault. I grew up thinking that my parents ate a variety of different vegetables, fruits and adventurous foods. Um, what crack was I smokin? I tried to go home and fix meals for them and help out and I had a hard time figuring out what to make because they are PICKY!! Way picky. So I am relinquishing my guilt and resigning to my victimhood that my parents did this to me and it's not my fault. I think out of all of us Melissa is the one who will eat the most variety of fruits and veggies.

I will admit that I have been trying harder to expand my food vocabulary and I do eat peaches and black beans now. My parents have never even had black beans! Dusty has played a big part in helping me try new foods. Oh yeah and the other day I had fried pickles and delicious spinach salad. The pickles were just OK. Ranch overs anything up :-)

What is your most adventurous food you have eaten? What do you suggest I try next? (and you can forget about cherry tomatoes. Marcie could tell you I almost threw up in her kitchen....)

My first post here guys...

Since Amy and I recently rechristened her old blog as our new blog, it's now the Amy and Dusty Show, so I need to get postin' on here! ...Or go postal...or whatever...one of the two. :-)

Recently, Amy and I have been making an effort to take one of our Sunday School Teacher's advice to heart, and so we've started trying to date on weekends, where each weekend we take turns picking what we want to do. The rule is that at least one of us (the person whose turn it is to pick) has to really like what they're doing, and so neither of us have told each other what we're going to do until right when the time arrives...because we don't want the other person to dread the rest of the week. :-)

We paper-rock-scissored for the first go-round, and I won, and so naturally, I picked something with animals. We headed for the Tracy Aviary in Salt Lake, but on our way there we heard on the radio that it was "Ice Day" at the Hogle Zoo, so we went there instead. They brought out blocks of ice -- some filled with fruit -- for the animals to play with, lick, suck on, etc.

Here's an orangutan doing just that.

And here's my shout out to the Logsdon boys...a monkey giving his buddy a (for lack of a better term) proctology exam. Thought Jason, Jeremy, and Michael (and Nathan) could appreciate that. :-)

I've always enjoyed bird shows. When my family and I went to Sea World growing up, the bird show they had there was my favorite part of the entire day. While the rest of my family went to watch a ski show with stunt people from Baywatch, I went and watched the bird show again. They've trained these birds to do all sorts of tricks and fly over your head, inches away from touching you -- huge birds too, like Greater Horned Owls (think Harry Potter) and a variety of eagles and condors.

They had this going on at the Hogle Zoo. We got a kick out of it. Amy freaked out when a flock of white doves flew over her head (even after the showman told everyone to be still).

This hilarious Cockatoo was taking wildlife conservation donations after the show and dropping them in the slot.














Overall, it was a good visit, and Amy even bought herself some zoo paraphernalia before we left.

And so next week it was Amy's turn to pick our date. Nothing could have helped me guess her idea -- face painting. I have to admit it was kinda fun. She picked an idea for my face out of a book that she checked out from the library...

her book...

and the end result.

Then I went to work on Amy...I used my own imagination and decided to make a checkerboard out of Amy's face...it was cool. As I went through the photos, I just busted out laughing because you can see all the sides that Amy has to her personality. So, here we go...

First, the serious Amy.

The cute Amy.

The sad Amy.


The scary Amy.


The poser Amy.


The crazy, psychotic Amy.


The sleepy, tired Amy.


And finally...

The joker Amy.

Ya know, it's funny...Amy wasn't consciously trying to make all of those random faces...her "little person" just kind of came out in the photos. It was a lot of fun...she didn't even know what I was painting on her face until I showed her at the end. Same with me. I told her that her face was paybacks for kicking my trash at a game I taught her how to play (i.e. checkers).

More soon!

Happy Birthday to Me!

Well I had a great birthday today hanging out with the family here in Kentucky. I went to lunch with Mike, Charla and the CRAZY and FUN boys Blake and Eli and then mom and Melissa and I went out and then Nathan and Evan joined up with us for dinner.

I can't believe I am 27. It's kind of freakin me out that I am so close to 30, but deep down I am OK with it. It's just nuts to me.

Thanks for all of the birthday wishes!

A little OCD I guess

I can probably think of 20 things that I do the same way every single time. I just noticed this little trait of mine. Not really though. I have noticed it before but I realized how much like DAD I am.

For instance my dad will fold his trash at like a fast food restaurant. At Subway he will fold his sandwich paper and straw wrapper (very precisely) and place it into his empty chip bag and then fold that chip bag with the papers in it and place it neatly into his drink cup and throw it away. It drives him nuts when we don't and sometimes he even folds mine ours too!

I have another friend whom I think can relate. Her name starts with an "A" and ends with "ngela". HA HA HA

OK Here is a brief list of my OCD behaviors and I want to know a few of your because I KNOW you have some.

• Always put in and take out my right contact in first
  
• Brush my teeth in little circles starting on the right upper / outter side and work my way across then come back on the left side doing the same, then the surface teeth, then the back.
• Always use warm water when I brush my teeth
• Right shoe goes on first
  
• Right earing goes in first...

*As a side note, even if I have the left shoe, earing or contact handy, I ALWAYS do the right first. Have NO idea why.

• BUT, I shave my left leg first!
• Like mom, I tend to favor even numbers. My mom goes to the point where it drives her NUTS if the volume on the TV is on an odd number--or anything with an odd number for that matter
• I pretty much HAVE to have socks on when I sleep or am just around the house

I can think of lots more and I am sure my husband and my family can give you 10 times as much. As I think on all my quirkiness I am reminded that it's just the way I am and I am happy to be me. This poem says it best.

Me I Am !

I am the only Me I Am
Who qualifies as me,
no Me I AM has been before,
and none will ever be
No other Me I Am can feel
the feelings I' ve within,
no other Me I Am can fit
precisely in my skin
There is no other Me I Am
who thinks the thoughts I do,
the world contains one Me I Am
this earth shall ever see,
that Me I Am I always am
is no one else but Me!

by Jack Prelutsky