Miss me?

Well, it's been a long two weeks since I posted last! In a way, I'm sorry, but on the other hand, I'm not. I've been so stinking busy, that adding my blog to the works probably would have sent me into a tizzy.
So, long story short, here's what we've been up to:

On Friday, October 27th, my boss asks to speak to me with the door shut...uh,oh! But, it was actually a good meeting. You see, our company rolled out a new project management software in January, and we've all been struggling to use it and make sense of it ever since. We all had formal training on it last December, but you know how it is, if you haven't ever seen something, and you're not using it every day, training is pretty well worthless. It's like teaching someone how to drive a car, when they've never seen a car, let alone know what a car is. Anyway, back to my point...the executives decided that they needed to have a full-time employee working on figuring out the software, finding the bugs and teaching people how to use it properly. Soooooo, my name was thrown into the hat, and they offered me the position on the 27th and needed an answer by the 30th! Fortunately, Jeremy came home from hunting a couple of days early, so we could at least discuss it together before I had to commit to a decision. This position is going to provide me a lot more flexibility and should rarely, if ever, require that I work more than 40 hours a week. What I do now is 50 hours a week minimum. So, revisit my previous post where I was freaking out trying to figure out how we were going to be able to have children and me still making money --- This just fell in my lap, and I am truly excited about it! It is going to be so very different than what I do now, but I really need a change of scenery. For now, the position is going to be full-time while I provide continuing education for the current employees, develop workflow processes, and develop updated training/reference manuals. I'll also be providing new-hire training on a regular basis over at least the next year as we hire new employees. After that, I may be able to add-on other training type responsibilities or maybe even HR type stuff like recruiting, career fairs, and interviews. Or, I may be able to phase myself out, or at least down to a part time position, or work from home (the software is web based and is available from any computer in the world as long as you have a username and password!). I could easily run a Help Desk from home with as little as a land line and a computer. Anywho, I've already executed my first training session last week for employees who hired on since January and didn't get the formal training last December. It was quite successful, and I'm surprised to say that I wasn't nearly as nervous or clueless as I anticipated! I am traveling back to Kansas City in December for more extensive training for myself so that I can continue being a few steps ahead of everyone using the software. Currently, I'm fulfilling both positions, but they are looking for someone to replace me on my project. I'm guessing that by January, no sooner, I'll be moving back to our Denver office and become full-time overhead! WooHoo!

DH and I just returned from A Weekend to Remember, a marriage conference sponsored by Family Life. My in-laws had given us a gift-certificate to attend for Christmas last year. We went once before when we were engaged as my in-laws felt it was an important part of our pre-marriage counseling. Honestly, I wasn't looking forward to it, thinking it would be a waste of time, because Jer and I really do have a pretty solid relationship, if you ask me. But I was truly amazed at the things we learned about each other, ourselves, and our relationship with God this weekend. Isn't it interesting that even though you are so close to someone and *think* you share everything with them, you find that there are things you've kept to yourself, whether or not you meant to? Take for example, something as simple as discussing how your day was! I've realized that even though funny, crazy, or important things happen to me throughout the day, I either forget to tell him, or consider them not important enough to tell him. So if he doesn't know all the things I experienced today, how can he truly relate to me and how I feel? Huge revelation! Trust me, we learned much more important things than that, but I know you understand how personal those things are, so I won't betray him by sharing them here. The biggest realization of all was how far we've allowed ourselves to stray from our relationship with God and try to control our own lives. And it's not that I didn't already know this, but I forget. I always need someone on the outside to constantly remind me that I'm not in control of this forsaken place and my life! My time here is limited, and my purpose is to live a life that portrays Godly characteristics so that others may find Him through me! And our purpose together is to live a Godly marriage so that our children come to know Him through us! It was a great weekend, just the two of us focusing on each other, without the daily pressures of life getting in the way (laundry, cooking, the dog, the phone, etc.). If nothing else, it reminded me how MUCH I truly, truly love Jer. I am so blessed and thankful that God chose him as my soulmate!

Don't Blame Me, Blame Julie

( ) Smoked a cigarette
(X) Drank so much you threw up
( ) Crashed a friend's car
( ) Stolen a car
(X) Been in love
(X) Been dumped
( ) Been laid off / fired
(X) Been in a fist fight
( ) Been shot at
(X) Been stabbed in the back- not literally
( ) Snuck out of your parent's house
(X) Had feelings for someone who didn't have them back
( ) Gone on a blind date
(X) Skipped school
( ) Seen someone die
(X) Been to Canada
(X) Been to Mexico
(X) Been on a plane
(X) Been lost
(X) Been on the opposite side of the country
(X) Swam in the ocean
(X) Felt like dying
(X) Cried yourself to sleep
( ) Played cops and robbers naked???
( ) Had sex on the beach…THE DRINK THAT IS…HAHAHA
( )Recently colored with crayons
(X) Sang karaoke
( ) Paid for a meal with only coins
(X) Done something you told yourself you wouldn't
( ) Made prank phone calls
(X) Laughed until some kind of beverage came out of your nose
(X) Laughed until you cried
(X) Caught a snowflake on your tongue
(X) Danced in the rain
( ) Danced under a Full Moon
(X) Written a letter to Santa Claus
( ) Been kissed under the mistletoe
(X) Watched the sun rise with someone you care about or love
(X) Blown bubbles
( ) Made a bonfire on the beach
( ) Crashed a party
(X) Gone roller-skating
(X) Ice-skating

1. Any nicknames? Jenny, Jenn, Jennabelle, Babe
2. What is your favorite drink? Dr. Pepper, Iced Tea, Beer, and Wine
3. Tattoos? Nope, too chicken
4. Any piercing? Both ears and my naval
5. How much do you love your job? Hopefully more and more from here on out
6. Favorite vacation spot? The beach, anywhere
7. Ever been to Africa? No, and honestly I have no desire to go
8. Ever steal any traffic signs? Um, yes, but can ya blame me for stealing Jennifer Dr.?
9. Ever been in a car accident? Of course
10. How many doors does your car have? 4
11. Salad dressing? King of all salad dressings, Ranch
12. Favorite number? 14
13. Favorite holiday? Christmas
14. Favorite food? Mexican
15. Favorite day of the week? Saturday
16. Favorite brand of body soap? Who uses bar soap anymore?
17. What happened to question 17?
18. Favorite toothpaste? one that cleans my teeth
19. Favorite smell? Fresh baked bread or cookies
20. What do you do to relax? SCRAPBOOK!
21. Message to friends/family reading this? Lots of love to you!
22. How do you see yourself in 10 years? In a great big house that I designed, cooking in my awesomely large kitchen for my kids and all their friends who only want to hang out at our house 'cause it's the most fun, and I'm the coolest mom in the world
23. What do you do when you are bored? SCRAPBOOK!
24. Furthest place you will send this message? Anyone creepy reading my blog?
25.Who will respond the fastest? No one, since I'm posting it
26. Least likely to respond? No one, since I'm posting it

Blushing!!!

Thanks girls! I had fun with it yesterday and I really do hope I keep it up. I've always wanted to keep a diary or journal, but was never motivated enough to do it. I had a diary in 1st grade for like three months then lost interest in it. But it sure is fun to read through it now and see who I had a crush on which day!

I hope this helps me with my journaling in my scrapbooks. Sometimes I have these amazing ideas and thoughts, but forget to write them down and then I'm stuck on journaling again. *Sigh*

I did 4.5 miles on the exercise bike last night so my butt is killing me today. Just when I think it feels better, I get up from my chair to go do something then plop back down on my chair and wince! I'm such a weenie!

So my creative streak continues! I finished my pumpkin carving invites last night (see the SJ gallery) AND I made two birthday cards! Wow! I'm in awe of myself. I've got plans to go to Scrap Mania at Archiver's on Friday night, so I'm crossing my fingers that I'll get some wedding LO's done. Oh, and Kris' CJ too that I'm in posession of. I'm still tempted to hang on to it and have Charlene send me her LO for it so that I can bring it IRL to Kris in December. We'll see.....

Yikes, I better get back to work before they fire me!

LET IT SNOW, Let It Snow, let it snow...

It's been snowing all day...our first real snow storm of the year. Didn't start sticking until about 3 hours ago though, so it won't take long to brush off the car, but I'm betting it will take a while for the car to warm up. What a day to forget a coat! Check out my snow pics on the SJ MB under the TX Gals thread.

Obviously, I've had a busy week. Nothing too exciting just busy, so sorry I've been absent! Last week I had several meetings and a couple days of training, so that left me no time to check in at work.

Reese's birthday was Friday, and she's all of 5 years old now! Hard to believe we've had her that long, but she's so integral to our lives. Can't imagine it without her either! It was relatively unexciting for her (and us!). We rented Fun with Dick and Jane and Wimbledon, then made dinner and watched the movies. WooHoo, we're so hip!

Saturday, spent most of the day cleaning the house for our pumpkin carving party. We did take a break and went to Supper Solutions to make our meals for October. Pumpkin carving was so much fun! Here's all four pumpkins together:

Here's my cute little pumpkin!

Sunday, I went to a luncheon for one of my scrappin' girlfriends. She's about to have her 3rd baby boy, and needed some girl time before he decided to show his face. If she doesn't have him by Friday, her doctor is inducing her, so she's looking forward to having a beer for Monday Night Football next week! LOL! She's so cute!

Hmmmm...so I have lots of friends who are preggo, or just had their babies. There's my girlfriend at work who's in her 4th month, then my scrappin' friend who'll have one by Friday, my sorority sister Gretchen just had her 2nd on Saturday, and a friend through my scrappin' friend just had her 1st nearly two weeks ago. Oh, not to mention Laurie and Crissy on the MB! Seems rather fishy to me, but nonetheless got me finally considering a little one. Anyway, DH and I had the finances talk last week, and I think it pretty much scared the **** out of him. He was the one who first admitted he was ready, mind you, then I finally got myself all talked into it and now he's not so sure! Funny thing is, we went to dinner with my in-laws last night and DH mentions that all our friends are starting to have kids, and in doing so, basically tells them we'll be having them sooner rather than later. Fabulous...now my MIL will be expecting them SOONER, not SOON, and definitely not LATER. Wasn't ready for that one! I'm finding myself swooning over baby clothes much more often, with a little butterfly in my stomach that didn't used to be there. My friend Jen, who was over to carve pumpkins on Saturday, always told me that one day you'll wake up and the switch will be on...but I never really believed her. I'm thinkin' maybe she was right! LOL!

So, the only other exciting (yeah right) thing that's happened in the past week was me slamming my own finger in my own car door last night as I was rushing into the gym. It's my right index finger too, so I'm shocked there's not more typos in this post. My typing ability is shot right now! Not to mention all the things you use that finger for and never realize it until it's incapacitated! Like washing my hair, buttoning my jeans, starting my car, using a pen...I felt like a four year old today. It's swollen to twice the size of my left index finger, and both knuckles are black and blue, with a little cut right where the door nearly cut my finger off. Okay, it's not that bad, 'cause I know it's not broken, but it sure hurts like a SOB!

Off to pile on some more clothes...my hands and feet are freezin'!

Baby, It's Cold Outside

The high is only like 41 degrees today! It was 82 on Saturday, 53 yesterday, and the rest of this week will be rubbing elbows with 39-40-41! Brrrr! It's been raining non-stop all day, and it's predicted that we'll have 4-8" of snow tonight in the metro. What happened to autumn? We went straight from summer to winter. And to think of it, there was no spring either. Straight from winter to summer. So strange for Colorado.

Well, I only got 4 pages done at Archiver's on Friday night. I get so caught up in chit-chatting, people-watching, and shopping, that I suck at getting pages done there! I did get to try out the Cropadile on the page kit they gave us, but I only used the hole punch part. What I do like about it is that you can set the guide so that no matter how many holes you punch, they're all in a straight line along your edge! Very snappy!

Saturday was an efficient day. We cleaned out the garage for the first time in FOOOOUUUURRRR long years. It so needed it and now I feel all fuzzy inside when I pull the car into the garage. Everything looks so nice and neat and organized. All the fertilizers are *finally* together. All the camping stuff is *finally* together. All the car wash stuff is *finally* together. It makes a world of difference. Okay, well it does to me!

Then DH took his buddy out to shop for hunting clothes since they leave in two weeks and DH's friend owns nothing. While they were gone I unpacked my bags from Archiver's and picked up the house a little bit.

Saturday night we had cooking club with our friends. I made a shrimp salad for appetizer, we had a pork sauerkraut dish with potato balls and an apple sauerkraut as sides, then had a walnut strudel, an apple cake, and my poppy seed cake for dessert. We don't usually have three desserts, but since the dessert gal was out of town, three of us found it necessary to pick up the slack. Everything was so wonderful, and I'm amazed at how far all five of us have come in the last three years. When we started, I was lucky I could make spaghetti and enchiladas from scratch. Now, here I am beating egg whites to fluff up my bundt cake!

Yesterday, we rolled out of bed and went shopping at our BRAND SPANKIN' NEW SuperTarget. It's funny how excited a person can be about a new store opening, and you should have seen how giddy I was! We've been suffering the last four years since we bought our house; the closest grocery store is 15-20 minutes away, and SuperWalMart is crawling with so many people that I swore I'd never set foot in there again because I was sure I end up literally killing someone. We've been driving out of our way, 25-30 minutes away just to be able to go to SuperTarget in Thornton. It was a blissful morning!

We drove up to Loveland and had lunch at PF Chang's with my in-laws for DFIL's birthday. I had the almond-cashew chicken and DH had Szechuan beef. After lunch we wandered around in Dick's Sporting Goods and I got a new pair of golf shoes that won't pinch my toes, and DH got a camouflage belt and a new Nalgene bottle.

Last, but not least, we got to go to the Av's game last night. It was awesome! I love hockey. The only irritating thing is that we had some "well to do" folks next to us and of course the women only wanted to gossip, not watch the game. That irks me...why on earth would you pay that kind of money for tickets, then sit there and drink wine out of tiny plastic cups and talk about the latest shocker at the country club. Hockey games are for girls like me who wear jeans, tennis shoes, a hockey sweater, have their hair pulled back in a pony tail, and is downing beer as fast as the guy can bring 'em. Whatever. At least the Av's won and we had a good time. We sneaked our peanuts, M&M's, and one Dr. Pepper in (Jeremy got busted with the 2nd Dr. Pepper and had to throw it out). It's hard to justify spending any money on consessions once you've paid for the tickets and parking.

Sorry, I keep rambling...but I have to share this with someone! Saturday night, I found out one of my two close friends from work is expecting! She and her DH are in our cooking club, and as we sat enjoying our appetizer, somehow the conversation got on the topic of having children and she said, "Well actually..." I am soooooo excited for her but have lots of other mixed emotions about it. On one hand, I'm relieved because people at work have been teasing us both about which one of us would be pregnant first, but I'm a couple of years older, so everyone assumed it would be me. Either way, it'll probably be an uphill battle since we're the two female project managers in the office, and no one has charted the course on having a baby and being a project manager. In the past, it's been the guy's wives or the gals in admin. that have had babies, so neither of us is sure what to expect or how to broach the subject. She hasn't told anyone at work and has sworn me to secrecy, so I can't talk to anyone at work about it. I've been bursting with the news, so thought I'd share with you guys.

On the other hand, I'm shocked that they were even trying! We have both always had the same response when asked if/when we're having kids. Big eyes, lots of excuses, and feeling for the door knob behind us to find the quickest escape. Obviously the older I'm getting, the thought is becoming less and less scary, but I've got two years on her. I'm guessing it's because her older sister just had a son last month, and it probably made her start thinking about it more seriously. It sounds like they've been talking about it for a while because they stopped preventing in Feb., started really trying in June, and found out in July! I can't believe she was able to not tell me about it this long!

On the third hand (don't you have three hands too?), I'm a little envious, because she is younger, and I guess I probably assumed that I'd be first too, especially since DH and I have started *seriously* talking about it in *literally* the last two weeks. It had me thinking the rest of the weekend about it. Every little detail has been racing through my mind, like we need to start sticking to a budget and putting all the extra aside, we need to get our house fixed up and get it on the market so we can build a bigger house, we both need to get serious about getting healthy so that we are healthy and weight-controlled before a pregnancy and are setting a good example for a child, we need to find me something that I can do from home because I'm positive I don't want to return to my job after having a child, I need to finish our wedding album so that I'm ready to start a baby album, and it goes on and on and on! I'm shocked that I was even able to fall asleep Saturday night because I has so many thoughts racing around in there!

*Sigh* Hard to concentrate on doing my job when all this stuff is floating around in my head. Thanks to all for listening!

Weeds out my ears

Well, yesterday was pretty uneventful, so I didn't want to bore you with the details.

Had to pull weeds last night when I got home from work because I shot myself in the foot. I sent our HOA a complaint about our next door neighbor because 1) he still hasn't finished his backyard landscaping (four years later) and 2) he lets all kinds of junk just sit around in his yard and it looks trashy. He's got an empty kiddie pool, a rolled up volleyball net, car parts, two sets of patio furniture that's trashed, a lawnmower, a grill, etc., etc., etc. None of it is organized so that it's neat and tidy along the side of the house, it's strewn all over the yard. It's bad enough that I keep the blinds shut on my kitchen window so that I don't have to look at it, but that kills me because it has the best view of the mountains. So I finally had it and submitted a formal complaint. Then the HOA goes and sends out a nasty note to the entire neighborhood (when it's only the two boneheads that live on either side of me) and contacted the City to start issuing notices of violation. So, I admit we have weeds in our yard, but they are so hard to stay on top of because neither one of our neighbors has finished their yards, so all their weeds blow into ours. We get bombarded!!! Anyway, I come home from work last Friday and we have a notice on the door that our weeds are out of control. Oh, I am so fuming right now! Why is it that the good are punished for the crimes of others??? They gave us a week to take action, and of course as busy as we are, we put it off until last night, because they're coming to inspect again today. I got five mosquito bites, which apparently I'm allergic to, because the three on my left arm have swollen up into a rather noticeable large lump! And I got one above my right eyebrow! Ugh! I swear if I get home today and find another notice from the City, my neighbor is going to wish he'd never bought his house! Mr. HOA and me are going to be best friends here in another month. Seriously! (to quote my most favorite Grey's Anatomy)

Anywhoooooo, I'm headed to Archiver's this afternoon for some good scrappin' therapy. I've got all my accumulated wedding papers and embellies with me so that I can start making a dent in my wedding album. Last night, I asked DH to guess what I was going to work on next as I was packing. Very facetiously said, "the wedding." And I said, "YES!!!" To which he replied, "isn't there another album you have to make for someone else?" Brat. So now, I'm more motivated than ever to work on it and get it done.

I'll probably be MIA all weekend (I try not to work on the computer over the weekends). Tomorrow we have cooking club with our buddies. That always makes for a fun evening. I'll try not to consume too much wine. The theme is German and I'm making German Apple Strudel. Sunday is DFIL's birthday, so we'll probably have lunch with him and DMIL after church. Then Jeremy and I have tickets to the Colorado Avalanche game Sunday night. Ahhhh, I am so glad it's hockey season again. I love it!

Ciao bellas!

Hello? Anybody out there?

So this is what's it's like to have a blog, huh? It feels a little strange, knowing that it's out here for pretty much the whole world to see. Not so sure I'm cool with that, but hey, it's the cool thing to do and I've been known to succumb to peer pressure in my past, so what can it hurt?

It was pretty fun getting it all set up and flipping through all the theme backgrounds looking for one that fit me. I like this one, but it would be really awesome if they had a JBJ one. I think my sister, Kris would like that, too!

So here I am on a Tuesday, sitting at work, wishing I were home creating something, anything...but alas, I must put in the hours to bring home the paycheck that feeds my creative hunger.

I've had a bit of a creative streak this week and finished two CJ's, wrapped up some ribbon for a couple of swaps, and actually started making invitations for a pumpkin carving party at our house. Funny thing is, I'm not really a card maker. I adore the ones I receive from my friends because not only are they adorable and clever, it means that they care enough about me to sit down and make a card for me! They cut up their cute and pretty patterned paper, use their gorgeous ribbon, and even put some of the more expensive embellies on them like metal ribbon slides! I am so selfish with my stash that I have a hard time parting with it, especially for a card that most people will just throw in the trash the instant they read it. But I really do adore the cards I get. I have a vision of displaying them on a clothes line with clothes pins someday in my new, perfect scrap room. For now, they stare back at me from the bulletin board while I sit and crop.

Anyway, back to my creative streak! I finally finished my sister's London album about a month ago but didn't get a chance to revel in it since we left for Alaska straight away. It turned out so fabulous, and I really hope she enjoys it! This means that, now, I can go back to working on my beloved wedding album that is so long overdue. And if you know me, you know that it's truly the only darn thing that my DH cares that I ever scrap. Sorry honey, I got sidetracked for another two years! Hmmm...I think that should probably be my next project to finish. Except that I really want to do my 6x6 JBJ album, and put the finishing touches on the tag swap pages in my JC '05 album. I'm starting to sound a little selfish, even to myself! I'd better put DH first right now.

So it's Tuesday, which means there's not a darn thing on TV to watch tonight. It's the one night a week that there's not a show on that I'm attached to, so I'd better get my butt to the gym tonight since it won't matter if I get home a little late. Thank goodness the work day is nearly over...it's almost too much to bear anymore. I used to be such a good little worker bee; organized and self-motivated. I actually used to care about what I did because I enjoyed it and I made a difference in people's lives by building them something that they needed. Yeah, I'm over that now. Whoever sold us the crap that promotions meant more money and happiness forgot to mention that along with the responsibility came a ridiculous amount of stress and oh, by the way, you can't have fun at work anymore. Ugh! On that note...