Comfort Food for Thought

Afternoon kiddos… I just wanted to take a minute to ground myself and share a moment of clarity I had earlier today.  As, you know things are getting better for us (will be getting better for us), but because my job actually costs a lot of money in gas up front and I won’t be reimbursed until my first pay period which I still haven’t experienced yet – things are still REALLY tight.  So tight we ended up down to our final dollar once again.

After catching up on a ton of bills with Jay’s last check, we ended up with less than we needed wanted, and had to cancel a few fun meetings we had scheduled for the day in Boulder to save enough gas to get us through Friday of this week.

It was pretty disappointing at first.  The kind of disappointment where your tummy just feels like losing its cookies and you’re heart beats slower while your eyes well up just enough to prove how strong you are not to actually cry.

Okay, that might come off a bit dramatic…but in the past year we’ve given up so much to just to survive and we’ve made a large effort to enjoy life in the process.

Without giving away too many secret details, today was supposed to be about US and planning our future together.  -Well the start to that process anyway.

We could have let our empty bank account defeat us, but I noticed today that we have far too much experience in this matter to lose a fight that easily.

If today was supposed to be all about US, then money certainly can’t change that! Plans and meetings can be rescheduled and there’s plenty of time with which to do so…

• It doesn’t cost me a cent to spend quality time with the man I love right from the comforts of home.
• I’m not charged by the kiss, hug, or cuddle.
• No over draft fees on taking my dog for a walk, or cooking dinner with my soon to be husband.
• It doesn’t take a monetary value to prove to me that I’m the richest girl alive simply by loving another person unconditionally and who loves me in return.

I’m really proud of how far we’ve come in terms of our attitudes, perseverance, and positivity.  It’s not an easy task to hold on to that towel when it seems so easy to just throw it right in!

There are a lot of things I wish I could change and I’m haunted by many of them.  But, what gets me through no matter what the circumstance is trying to focus on what I can control and having faith in myself that I’ll find the means to rectify the rest if I never stop trying.

Oh, and obviously french bread pizza doesn’t hurt! Gotta love meals you can tweak into being healthy a dollar or so at a time!

This has been another after school special brought to you by our sponsors: The Recession! 😉

Dog Parks are for Lovers!

Good morning! Hope you all slept as well as I did last night! I can’t even explain to you the wonder and simplicity of my happiness in this very moment…even before we moved to Texas bed-less we had terrible broken down overstock.com experiment that simply never did it for me.

There’s just something to be said about sleeping a few more inches above the floor.  I’ve decided to spend my entire morning in this bed and have already brewed my one-cup caramel latte tasting coffee and decided to spend this comfy time updating you on my new favorite after dinner activity! 🙂

I know I’ve said it before, but I really have fallen in love with the location of my little apartment.  We went into the deal as a last ditch effort to get out of our horribly expensive horribly disgusting temporary apartment in Boulder.  The apartment was 1/3 the price, really cute and clean, and the landlord was really understanding of our situation – 3 components which made this apartment amazing all on its own.  However, since we’ve settled in a bit to the area I’ve noticed so many additional bonuses to its local!

So far, we’ve discovered the pool water park (0.3 miles from home), St. Vrain Greenway which has a trail route which leads right into the Farmer’s Market and many other places (0.2 miles from home), downtown main street with coffee shops, restaurants with patios, book stores, antique stores (2 miles from home), an adorable little tap bar that some friends introduced us to (less than 2 miles from home), a bowling alley (2.2 miles from home) and now our dog park (1.5 miles from home).

In the past few years, I’ve concluded that I would be happiest living in a walk-able community and I think I’ve finally found a way I can do that and still save money.  This is the cheapest apartment either of us have ever had, but it has everything I could ever want!  I just love having the option to walk wherever I want to go! Props to Longmont, CO city planners!

Ah, back to the topic at hand!  Linus’s new hangout.  The dog park, another local gem.  This park is HUGE and is a part of several other parks including a baseball field, tennis courts, a soccer field, and a hockey rink!  There are other public parks in our town that I’ve seen which include skate parks too! Gosh, I love my little Colorado city-suburb.  Jay told me recently that he read somewhere Longmont was voted one of America’s top 50 cities to live!

Linus is a silly guy and he’s working on getting over his fear of big dogs, but this little gal gave him a good workout….or I should say Linus gave HER the run around!  My dog is fast.  I mean REALLY fast.  No other dog can keep up with him and he loves it.  It’s hilarious to watch him taunt them with his speed.

Jay and I usually bring our softball and gloves and play catch while the dogs frolic, but before the days of dog parks Linus used to play monkey in the middle with us and run supah fast back and forth as we threw the ball around.

Side note: the people that go to dog parks are so friendly and talkative.  Clearly they also love there dogs almost as much as I do.  They love learning all about your dog’s little life story and their mannerisms, likes, and dislikes.  In a word….adorable.

So, if you have a pup and you’d like to give him or her some exercise and just get out of the house – I highly recommend taking advantage of what your city has to offer and go play at the dog park!

Have a great day everyone! I’m about to finish up that home-made caramel latte, hop in the shower, and spend the day in Boulder working and helping out at the store!

❤

Home Improvement <3

So I woke up this morning and felt like nesting.  Can’t really describe it, but it’s been a while since we’ve done anything to get settled into our new apartment.  I think we’ve been putting certain projects off assuming that they would cost too much money, but what I realized was that if we do them in pieces it will help us feel more at home an the expense would be minimal.

We still have SEVERAL things to do in our little apartment, but today we tacked our DIY entertainment center (including our wall mount, and shelf for the speakers and Jay’s computer).  We also put together our “open-box-clearance” Ikea platform bed.

We have had the wall mount for the tv for a very long time dating back to the days of Circuit City.  It was such a great purchase back when we had Jay’s discount and has saved us a ton on entertainment center furniture.  It’s easy to move, and easy to mount, and it doesn’t take up ANY space (which is helpful in a 500 square ft apartment)!  I’ve always thought having a TV above a fire place would create the coziest environment for a living room.  I’m really excited for the fall + winter where I can curl up with a movie and a little fire going.

In terms of the bed situation… We never had one in Texas but when we sold all of our “free” furniture pre-move to Colorado, we decided to shop Ikea for a futon that was on sale so we’d have something to crash on once we arrived.  We ended up finding a great platform bed on supah clearance in the open box section.  We haven’t put it together in the three months we’ve been here because we needed “slat’s which we assumed would be pricey.  You know what they say about assuming….. lol

Home Depot has clearance wood…. yes.

We had them slice up a few planks for us for a great price and we were on our way toward a great nights sleep!  I’ve been sleeping on the floor for the better part of a year and I think I finally snapped and I’m glad! We have a Bob-0-Pedic so there’s no need for a box spring…..aka we were literally inches away from the floor every night.

I am SO looking forward to cuddling up in my new bed tonight and I’m sure my Jason is going to pass out the second his head hits the pillow after all his hard work today!

We still have a few adjustments to make on both projects both including paint.  We are going to paint the shelf under the tv to match the couch and eventually the coffee table which also needs to be painted and we are planning on sanding and painting the bed to match my white vanity.  This may have been another deterrent to these projects, but like I said there’s nothing wrong with doing part of project NOW if it means you can enjoy it NOW.  We’ll make everything match eventually, but at least it gives me more space in the living room and a bed to sleep it at night!

Even though we still have a long way to go, it feels good to be at home little by little nesting my way into a Colorado life.

As far as the rest of day off #1 goes, we’re going to finish up some cleaning post-project messes, make some din, and bring our pup to the doggy park down the street.

Until next time my loves, try to appreciate the little things today.

Ps. my two projects today have created quite the dilemma.  Do I a.) Cuddle up in the living room and enjoy the new local of the TV or b.) utilize the new comfy bed and tackle a few more chapters of Breaking Dawn which has become increasingly more interesting since this morning.  What are your thoughts? 🙂

Exploring the home-front & love for the book exchange!

Evening my loves! The weather certainly kept us on our toes today!  We had planned to spend the day at the pool water park, but weather.com told us otherwise.  There was a chance of rain off and on throughout the day, and the temperature wasn’t ideal for spending the day in the water.

Not to worry, I just pulled from the reserves of my fun day plans and remembered that I had a bunch of coupons for local shops in our downtown area.  We decided on a 20% off ticket for a bulk food store and picked up some natural treats and bones for the pup and cookies for US 🙂

It was gorgeous outside while we were out so we decided to walk both sides of main street and check out some of the shops which included tons of second-hand vintage and thrift stores, book stores, art galleries, and a little paint your own pottery studio that does “date night” on Saturdays!

Other than sorting through the little treasures at the thrift stores, my favorite part of the day were the used book stores! We spent a good amount of time in one and will be participating in their book exchange in the future!  Their used prices were phenomenal and the conditions of the books were equally as impressive.  Jay has been working on the Harry Potter series as his Junk Food Reading while things are slow at the store.  He recently finished the first one in record timing so he picked up book two and novel written by one of his favorites 🙂

I was lucky enough to snag a used copy of Eat.Pray.Love so close to the movie release! I can’t wait to finish up the Twilight series (my junk food read) so I can move on to my other summer novel plans.

If I learned anything from having to leave all my precious books behind in New Hampshire when we left for Texas, it’s the art of sharing or exchanging books rather than making a forever purchase.

Local book-exchanges at used book stores are the perfect way to do just that!

You don’t have to worry about late fees from libraries (yes I’m a repeat offender) so you can keep them as long as you want and then exchange them for your next page turner at your convenience!  So excited to make make this a regular lunch date activity.

Okay, well I have a ton of baking, cooking, and salad prep to do for the upcoming week (today is our second day off) so I’ll leave you to it!  Check out my summer reading list page and help me add to my selections.  I’m going for a positive attitude theme  with my theory of read about it – be about it in mind.

What’s your favorite thing to do in your home-front? 🙂

Bowl-0-rama ;-)

Morning folks! Last night was a long-awaited bowling adventure for my Jason.  We haven’t been since his birthday back in March! Simply unacceptable seeing as it’s his favorite hobby of all time!

I know what you’re thinking: Bowling can be expensive and this is blog is typically about saving money. BUT! Believe it or not there IS  a way to enjoy this all American pass-time for less!

All you have to do is a little research!  Either google to your hearts content or visit the actual bowling alley in person and pick up their “specials” flyer.  Bowling alleys definitely make their money by charging by the hour or game, but if you take advantage of the specials which are usually “all you can bowl” you’ll definitely get your money worth!  Especially, if you intend on going with a champion bowler who would as he says, “…bowl until my arm falls off…”

As you can imagine five dollars a game would certainly add up under those circumstances!  But if you pay $10 and play five games together…..well that sounds a lot better to me!

Okay, on a personal note – I’m really picking up on this little sport! As much as I love the pink shoes and ball Jay got for me last year, I always felt a little silly having my own equipment with zero skill to go along with it.

However, last night I finally broke the 100 mark! THREE TIMES!

We played five games and here are my stats 😉

• Game #1: 94
• Game#2: 102
• Game #3: 99
• Game #4 108
• Game #5 103

We had a great time and we’re looking into joining a league for the fall season.  I’m really happy that we can share this together.  It used to be so difficult living so separate from each other with completely different interests but we’ve since realized that the best way to spend time together is to try new things and share old favorites.

Have you tried a new hobby with your lovey? Or, even better…have you tried something completely new together and it brought you closer together? 🙂

EggMcMuffins, Dogs, and Beer

Yay for getting up early on your day off and getting everything accomplished prior to 10am leaving the rest of the day open for relaxing and F.U.N.

This morning with my fab caramel coffee at my side I did three loads of laundry, cleaned the kitchen, we swept and mopped the floors, AND I made breakfast.

So, to get back to those healthy living questions – What I normally try to do is re-create the things that we already love in a healthier way rather than to give things up or deprive myself.

Insert: The Egg Mc.Muffin

• Two fried eggs (cage free) …hopefully local 🙂
• A dash of pepper or seasoning
• A little bit of mozzarella cheese
• Toasted whole grain english muffins
• Spinach
• Ketchup

It was a great little breakfast to jumpstart the day!  We had plans today to participate in a local Humane Society fundraiser where all proceeds went directly to the shelter!  We registered little ole’ Linus for a bathy and nail clipping and with that they gave us little freebies, and two beer comps EACH!

Good times were had by all and we made some new friends from my work who live in our town.  They also have their own little terrier so we’re all hoping Linus and Miss Maggie will become best of friends 🙂

I can’t think of a better way to enjoy our day off … hope you all had a fabulous weekend!

What’s the coolest fundraiser you ever attended?

Introducing! An even cheaper option than The Discount Theater! ;-)

Wow, I certainly fell off the blogging train there for a few days… sorry about that! Things got very busy so I thought I’d just catch you up to speed now that the dust has temporarily settled.

Errands can be boring, so I won’t bore you with the details, however we are now both able to communicate with the rest of the world via cell phones, wash our clothes (full disclosure here people…it’s not easy being poor!), and worry a little less about getting gas in the car.  It’s been difficult with my job requiring so much driving because I won’t get paid until August 1st and even then it will only cover the first two weeks.  I get reimbursed for gas as well (more than I probably use), but as of right now it’s almost as if I still don’t have a job AND we’re spending MORE!

Not an easy task as we were struggling before I started working, but obviously come August 1st we’ll be able to play a game of catch up!

Last night we were in dire need of a break and decided to make the most of a night IN.  Call me a home-body, but I LOVE spending the night at home curled up on the couch, “whatevaa I do what I want!” -that little gem was for pretty much every college friend that I have… 😉

We already had grocery shopping and laundry planned for the night so we decided to pick up some popcorn and ice cream while we were out and kick started the Netflix Watch Instantly section when we got home.

We watched some silly 80’s comedy and I fell asleep on Jay’s lap post ice cream cone and popcorn inhalation. It was a great time.

This morning, I’m going to continue the laundry process (as I probably will every morning until our outrageous amount of laundry is complete), sip on my incredible coffee, and make breakfast.  I’m thinking about surprising my sleeping beauty with some eggMCmuffins…..I’m making them myself, but for some reason still feel the need to add the “MC” to the title!

Today will be a double-post day for sure, because we have some pretty exciting day off events going on including a humane society fundraiser, and perhaps our mini waterpark!

Hope you all enjoy your Sunday Funday as much as I intend to 🙂

Cafe Mocha, Mom-inlaw, and Twilight to the rescue!

Hey guys! Hope your day has gone well …but in case it was sub par for any reason my next coffee recipe is sure to give you a fresh start tomorrow!  I came up with it in TX when I was school-sick for my cafe mochas, coffee shops, and friends.

I didn’t have a dime to my name during my Texas experience and actually, I still won’t until I get my min.wage pay check at the 1st of the month!  I’m not complaining though because A. I know I’ll be able to start catching up on bills very soon even with my tiny paychecks (money is better than no money) B. In the meantime, I can always passively look for a higher paying job, and C. If there’s a way to experience something that appears to be out of my reach…..I can usually find a way to recreate it for less.

The example here being “The Home-made Cafe Mocha!” It actually has potential to NOT go straight to your hips believe it not lol

My Cafe Mocha usually includes:

• French Vanilla coffee grounds
• Local honey
• Chocolate (non-dairy in my case) milk in place of a creamer
• And possibly the most important ingredient being Cocoa Powder! I usually do about 1/2 – 1 T depending on the size of the cup.

It’s so simple and inexpensive I really don’t know where my favorite coffee shops across the US get off charging $4+ dollars for it!  Since I’ve made my coffee experiments and discoveries, I guess you can I’m down to just being friend-sick.

In other news:  I feel the need to re-cap yesterday’s events post-Keurig Love Affair.  Let’s see….first there was work drama (yes, on my day off) …it was legit drama and a pretty unsafe situation so I won’t go into details here, but I was really lucky for having experience in this type of situation from previous jobs.  I handled it like a champ, it’s over, and I’m alive.  Moving on…

Next, we went to our previous cell phone provider to discuss why our cell phones had been disconnected two weeks after Jay paid our bill.  Well, needless to say no one knew anything in the store, no one knew anything on the out-of-state customer service line, and now we are in the process of pulling our bank records to prove that they in fact received our payment (but neglected to put it toward our bill thus shutting the phones off, and disconnecting our lines).  Fabulous.

Sometimes, it’s good to just know when to get out.  Which is exactly what we chose to do.  We’re going to take care of our end and see what happens, but honestly we live penny to penny as it is just for the basics of what we need so the fact that this major corporation has taken this money without services provided really upsets me, but there’s no need to dwell.  I’m just trying to focus on what I can control which is finding another provider and the proof that we were wronged.

Thankfully, we didn’t give in to how upset we were and we headed straight to another provider that would cost significantly less per month and they set us up no problem!  It was SUCH a relief because having a phone is very important to my current job and VERY important when trying to look for any other job.

I’m convinced that our day began to turn around the moment we decided to not give in to that initial negativity and decided to make a change rather than make a scene lol

After that, the rest of our busy errands went smoothly and things are really starting to come together.  The remainder of the month is still going to be penny-penny but that’s nothing new and I’m not afraid!

We decided we should really do something fun with our day off together after such a busy day and Jay suggested we use my Mum-in-law’s gift that she sent to me last week.  She’s so cute and supportive.  She sent me this card with a little note that told me to go see, “Eclipse,” and some mula.

So, that’s exactly what we did! It was so much fun- we had the theater to ourselves- and Jay really liked it Or, maybe he just really likes me…. either way!

Well, I’m off to fill my belly with some creamy pasta…it’s been a LONG couple of days.  Thanks for reading today’s massive post, I hope you have a fabulous night!

How do you cope in a high stress situation?  Do you feel like negative/positive energy has any effect on the outcome?  Positivity and redirection are my weapons of choice (even for myself).

A huge thank you to my Coffee Fairy!

I've got the golden ticket! 😉

The author of Lemons for Fools and my high school friend heard about my lack of coffee pot + lack of funds to replace said coffee pot and out of the absolute GREATness of her heart has sent me an extra from her home.  But, not just any extra – a Keurig!  I feel so fancy!

We have most of the country between us so I wasn’t sure how long it would take to reach me here in Colorado.  I’ll admit I’ve childishly checked my mailbox every day for a note from the post office.  My body mind and spirit have been craving a cup of coffee in the mornings for months and thankfully my own personal coffee fairy has come to the rescue!  Last night, when we got home from our longest day of the week, I found the “sorry we missed you” note in my mailbox!

Instant energy and excitement.  The note said I could pick up tomorrow any time after 8am, so obviously I was there waiting at 7:45 to claim my grown-up prize!  😉

Last week we picked up a little bit of yummy coffee in preparation.  I’m trying “caramel” flavored grounds!  I stood in line at the PO for quite some time mingling with all of the cute elderly early birds.  This adorable package was so much fun to accept and carry out proudly.

I fastened my new bestie in the passenger side – look how huge it is – and headed home to get started on my new Keurig love-affair.

I quickly cleared some counter space kicking the mini-food processor and toaster to the curb cabinet space.

I don’t know how this is possible, but I had never heard of Keurig products until my coffee fairy told me that she was sending me one!  IT…..IS…..AMAZING!

They brew one-cup-at-a-time which is incredibly perfect for me because I’m the only one in my house-hold who drinks it.  No more left over burnt coffee and messy clean ups!

This morning’s coffee included:

• Caramel flavored coffee grounds
• 1 1/2 T Vanilla Almond Milk
• Texas Honey (haven’t finished up my local honey from Austin yet, I can’t wait to pick up some Local CO honey though for new state allergy purposes!)

It was incredible!  Ever since I fell in love with the infamous “caramel latte” I’ve wanted to find a way to recreate it at home for a matter of pennies rather than the RIDICULOUS $4+ dollars most coffee shops charge.  I’ve since mastered the “cafe mocha” -will reveal in future posts- and today I have to say I came pretty darn close to caramel coffee heaven.

I don’t think I can thank you enough coffee fairy.  This truly makes me so happy….I’m not even sure that I can fully describe how this has already improved my life in being able to start my days with something that I love.

Sometimes -most of the time- it’s the little things in life that make all the difference.  And for me this “little” thing is huge.  But even more important than having my own coffee in the mornings, knowing that there are people out there willing to help someone else so directly makes me feel empowered.  I’ve been through a lot in the past year and this act of kindness means the world to me.

I can’t wait to find a way to pay this forward and to personally thank my friend and coffee fairy 😉

Has anyone ever done something so special for you that it just made you heart melt?

How did you find a way to pay it forward and thank them?

Representing the Longhorns + Long-A$$ Mondays

Morning everyone!

Charlie thought it would be a good idea to wake me up around 3:30 this morning and confuse the heck out of me…..usually he’s like clockwork and cries at the door when he knows we’ll be waking up to feed + love him.  But, today he was a little impatient and his early morning wake-up call resulted in over-tired-me sleeping through the alarm.

No real harm done, I woke up with plenty of time to get myself ready and decided on a yummy smoothie for the guy and myself.  This one isn’t my typical green smoothie, but it’s super delicious!

An Orange Dreamsicle Contains:

• 5 ice cubes
• 1 C vanilla yogurt
• 1/2 C orange juice (today I used orange-pineapple)

So simple, yet so fantastic!  It’s definitely Jay’s favorite.  Fun fact regarding this “Go Longhorns” cup: Jay and I have been collecting pint glasses from the various places we’ve visited over the past couple of years and we made sure to grab this little fella before we left Austin.  UT is my best friend Traceface’s school and their Longhorn football team fan base is so comparable to Sox fans.  People go CRAZY over this college team including decking out their children in Longhorn gear and training them to perform various Longhorn gestures.  So cute…

Today is going to be a SUPER long day so I’m preparing with lots of mini-meals!  I have packed home-made whole grain berry muffins, a pumpkin flax bar, 1/2 veggie sub, and left over whole grain ziti with tomato sauce to get me through from 8am – a possible 11ish pm.

As atrocious as Mondays may be, it’s comforting to know that we both have Tuesdays off.  🙂

How do you prepare for the day?

Check out this pathetically sad pup as his rents leave for the day! He can totally tell early on in the morning that we’re going to be leaving and he tries SO hard to guilt us into staying.  It’s very hard to leave that face behind, but you should see how crazy he gets when we return to him – dogs increase happiness – it’s a fact!