Comments (19)

By kilax, January 16, 2018 8:33 am

William’s first birthday party was on Sunday at Christina and Will’s house in Kansas!

Will, William, and Christina

I loved the party theme – “Time Flies”! There were lots of plane details in the decorations, and in the food.

Each airplane closepin held up one of his one month photos! Recognize that blanket in the photos?

Somehow, PB&Js taste even better when cut in plane and cloud shapes! (There was a meat option, too)

The plane toys were a huge hit with the children (ha, and adult) guests!

We ate,

William ate his cupcake (they did a smash cake the day before his birthday the previous weekend),

and opened gifts!

We got him this roller coaster he had on his wishlist, because, duh. It’s for ages 2-5, so he uses it with an adult for now. It’s also fun for adults – you know we tried it!!!

It was great to visit with everyone at the party! Some of my family was there (my parents, and my older brother and his family),

and my in-laws came, too!

And of course, Christina and Will’s friends and some of Will’s family was there!

I was glad we had decent travel weather (for January) to go to Kansas City for the party. It was frigid and windy each day we traveled, but we didn’t have any issues with snow until we were two hours outside of Chicago on our way home yesterday. I would have been bummed to miss the party if the weather got in our way!

And back to the “Time Flies” theme – HOW is this little guy already ONE?! Craziness.

My snister and I are really close, and chat every day, and know everything that’s going on in each other’s lives. So I always know how William is doing and what he’s up to! But I wish we could all see each other more often. I miss them all!

Comments (17)

By kilax, January 15, 2018 9:22 pm

GUYS!

It happened! I completed my SMART goal for 2018 and ate one vegan donut!

I was an overachiever and drove much farther than from my house to Milwaukee to get one… I drove from my house all the way to Mud Pie, in Overland Park, Kansas. That’s 575 miles. One way. FOR ONE VEGAN DONUT.

SUCCESS ACHIEVED.

Okay, in truth, I was in Overland Park for a late holiday celebration, and my nephew’s first birthday party. My snister, Christina, mentioned that Mud Pie Vegan Bakery recently opened near her home. We were going to fit in going there if we had time during our packed visit together!

Also in truth, I didn’t recall that they had donuts. Christina has been sending me drool-worthy photos of everything she gets, but I could only recall a scone and a bar.

So we get there, and I see they have donuts, and I tell my mom and snis, “Oh! I can complete my one goal for 2018 today!” and they are like “huh?” Ha.

So to be 100% HONEST and TRANSPARENT and REAL… it felt half-assed. Like I didn’t put the work in. I let my snister do it (she even had a Groupon!). And then it just happened that they had vegan donuts. It wasn’t even planned.

And I got a scone and a bar, too. And a chai! The donut wasn’t even the focus of the trip!

I had built this goal up to mean SO much in my head, but now that it’s over, and that it happened so randomly, I feel a little sad about it. Sad about how it all went down. Sad that it was the only thing I was going to accomplish this year, and it’s already over.

Ugh. What to do. Eat more donuts? Focus on something else?!

Comments (2)

By kilax, January 13, 2018 8:35 pm

… can’t wait for William’s party tomorrow!

Comments (18)

By kilax, January 11, 2018 6:51 am

• EXCITING NEWS! After all my whining (mostly on here), I found out at the end of the day yesterday that my detail is being extended by thirty days! Yay! That gives me enough time to finish some of the projects I started with my team. And my bosses said they will discuss it again at the end of those thirty days. Thanks for reading/listening, and your input and support! I apologize for being mopey AF, but I did NOT know what was going on with it, and I was starting to feel frantic.
• Besides the Chewie and the porgs poster, Andrew also got me this framed comic from Poorly Drawn Lines I had asked for. Gah, it makes me laugh every time I look at it!

• I hung said Chewie and the porgs poster up! I wonder how long until Steven asks me to take it down. Ha!

• We still have all our holiday cards up in the kitchen. I think I’ll take them down when we start getting Valentine’s Day cards…

• And speaking of Valentine’s Day! I found my favorite candy in the grocery store (it’s kind of hard to find). Yay! I bought six bags, and the cashier says to me “where’s all this going?” I rubbed my belly and said “right here.” Muah ha ha ha.

Link to Random Thoughts Thursday 162

Comments (20)

By kilax, January 10, 2018 6:23 am

That saying – fake it till you make it – needs some caveats:

• Stop faking it if it eats away at your soul!
• Stop faking it if it makes you FAKE/disingenuous!
• Don’t confuse building your character by faking it with building tolerance toward something you hate

Yeah.

There’s a reason I asked Santa for the “Live What You Love” mantraband!

I’m a broken record, but to reiterate, I am not looking forward to going back to my old work position, because I don’t care for the work anymore (it’s changed a lot since I started), and for other reasons. I greatly enjoyed the work in my detail position. And it’s not because it’s new and different. It’s because it suits me.

I didn’t have to fake it at work while I was in the detail.

Ahh, and it was so refreshing.

The dread of going back to my old position is seeping in now, and really getting me down. And I hate that I am letting that happen! But I hate to think I have to go back to faking it, every day at work, trying to like something that doesn’t suit me. Being nice to people who are arseholes to me. Always being friendly, even though I’m fed up. It’s draiiiiiiiiiiiiining.

So, I am saying no to “faking it.”

I’m just not quite sure what that means yet…

Comments (26)

By kilax, January 9, 2018 6:17 am

I have an update on my ONE SMART goal for 2018 and it’s not a good one. Eek!

In my mind, driving to Madison on Sunday was an opportunity to maybe go the “long” way and stop in Milwaukee for a vegan donut, when Holey Moley opens at 6:30 am.

Alas, I did not want to wake up even earlier and do the longer trip. I failed before I even tried. Sigh.

I especially failed, because I made a special stop at Hurts Donuts in Madison to get donuts for Steven!

Ugh. If only they had vegan donuts! If only I wasn’t so lazy! If only I had researched other places in Madison that might have vegan donuts. Achieving this goal is harder than I thought it would be!!!

Luckily, I have a month to complete it!!! And I can keep trying, all year, if I don’t achieve it in January!

I am surprised I haven’t mentioned Hurts Donuts on here before. We went there in May when we were in Dallas, and Steven thought their glazed donut was the best he’s ever had (they also do tons of crazy cool specialty donuts, which isn’t his thing). When we got back home from that trip he looked up other Hurts Donuts locations and was excited to see they have this one in Wisconsin, and some in Iowa. So I had to stop and get him some since the race I did was only a few miles away.

And don’t worry, I did get a vegan brownie at Monty’s Blue Plate Diner. And it was delicious.

Comments (20)

By kilax, January 6, 2018 4:34 pm

Can I get a “Duh, Kim”?!

I’m super grumpy when I don’t run. And I prefer to run outside, but it’s been cold* and windy here, and bad conditions for certain workouts (speed, hills, long). So… I’ve been running inside, since last Sunday.

I thought that would combat the grumpy. At least I am still running, right?

No. By the end of the week, I could feel the grumpiness seeping in.

AHHH!!!! I just need to run outside!

And I finally did today. And feel so much better.

I’m sure the Vitamin D helped too

I’ve been doing other workouts as well – cycling, swimming, lifting, teaching classes… but nothing makes me feel as good as running outside does. Hopefully there is more of that next week!!!

*When the temp is single digits or negative, and the “feels like” is -10°F or lower, I just can’t do those “focused” or long workouts outside. Those nasty temps are for “junk” miles!

Tomorrow is this guy’s FIRST birthday, can you believe it?!

Photo from when I saw him in August! I haven’t seen him since September!!!! AHHHH!!!!

We’ll see William soon for a late Christmas celebration and for his first birthday party. I am so excited to see him and my family!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Comments (12)

By kilax, January 4, 2018 6:17 am

• We recycled our Christmas tree at the local forest preserve Monday, and now our living space feels so empty! But also, feels so nice and clean (minus those few stray needles, of course). Ahh.

• Snow left Tuesday am. He was inside a long time – from 2:00 pm Sunday until 4:00 am Tuesday! The first night he slept under the bed, but the second night, he discovered the joy (really, warmth) of sleeping on top of a human. I didn’t sleep well that night.
• Just as my detail at work is about to end, one of my teammates has come back from maternity leave! I really enjoyed working with her before she went on leave and am glad we get to work together a bit more.
• Data and Khali both ended up liking the cat house Santa brought for them, which made me happy. And I love how they both look sinister in the photos below. Ha!

• Steven set up an old monitor of his at my desk. Yay, I can be more efficient with three screens (it’s often I have to reference three+ applications at the same time for my work)!

Link to Random Thoughts Thursday 161

Comments (16)

By kilax, January 2, 2018 4:33 am

I got to do something yesterday I have been looking forward to since August – use my new “The Little World of Liz Climo” page-a-day calendar!

Who knew the first cartoon would tie in so well with my one goal for 2018? (Sadly, Holey Moley was closed yesterday – we thought about going!)

This will be the third year in a row that I’ve texted the calendar each day to Steven and Mom. I enjoy this ritual!

The last two year’s calendars were all quotes, and we would sometimes have discussions about the meaning of them. I’m curious what kind of discussions we will have about these cartoons. Hopefully something… I will miss our chats if we don’t!

I’ve saved my favorite quotes from the 2017 calendar throughout the year, and non-surprisingly, they fit in to two categories: work ethic and attitude.

Work Ethic:

I love “Dream a little and work a lot.” It’s a good reminder that getting what you want often requires HARD work – not just daydreaming about it! You can see that’s the theme in these five quotes – work for what you want, and don’t stop working. <— not saying I am an example of that, but that I aspire to be that way!

Attitude:

I don’t know about you, but I can always be reminded to be more positive and patient, and try to find the wonder (the little joys) in life!

Comments (21)

By kilax, January 1, 2018 9:17 am

Steven and I had a productive New Year’s Eve planned out – exercise, house projects, put away Christmas decorations, and work. Then we were going to treat ourselves out to dinner!

But our dinner plans went awry! We had a visitor over mid afternoon and THEY NEVER LEFT. And they didn’t want to go out to dinner with us, sigh. So we stayed in.

Ha ha ha. That guest was Snow.

I brought Snow in around 2:00 pm so Steven could work on insulating the sliding glass door around Snow’s house. Snow was doing okay, sitting with me and being petted, but then he started to get antsy about going back outside. But Steven had to close the door to Snow’s house to work on it, and we didn’t want Snow out there, unable to go inside his house, so we kept him in.

Snow, Khali, and Data watching Steven work

Snow waited by the door to go out (rather patiently, actually), but eventually tired of that and went upstairs to hide under our bed.

When Snow’s house was ready for him to go back outside, we called for Snow and he didn’t come. So we shook the dry food container, and Data and Khali came running downstairs immediately. Snow slowly came out of the bedroom, came downstairs, and walked right by where Steven was holding the door open for him to go outside… then turned around and ran back up the stairs. He’s usually super eager to go back outside!

I think Snow may be done with winter! And done with his surprise visitors outside.

Photo from Christmas Eve. We were all watching a movie inside when Andrew saw this coyote running around in our yard! I took this photo of him right by the patio that Snow’s house is on.

Snow then camped out under the bed, FOR THE REST OF THE NIGHT! At first I thought he was scared, but then I realized he’d let me pet him and get all purry, he’d eat food, and he played with a mouse I put under there for him.

Yeah, totally done with winter.

He picked a good time to spend the night – it’s -8°F outside as I write this (the first floor of his house is 40°F, second floor is 75°F).

We don’t mind if he’s inside, but we would like to be inside when he is (to monitor what he’s up to), since he’s not fixed, doesn’t have shots, and has all his claws (we’d never remove them – just mentioning that because he could hurt Data or Khali during play, accidentally). So… we may be home for a while. But again, it is -8°F out!

In other news, I stayed up until midnight! Woo hoo! We watched a movie until 9:30, then Steven worked, and I did some computer stuff, then tidied up and cleaned to stay up. Ha!

And one last cute cat pic from the day: