Parking tickets bring out the best in people...

So you know those crazy people who think it is completely appropriate to yell at employees of some workplace about something that's totally not the employee's fault? Yeah... Mix parking tickets into the mix and it can get a little ugly sometimes.

The person who works next to me handles the parking tickets for the huge parking lot that surrounds our workplace. The other day, I was zoning out until I heard, "I GET A PARKING TICKET EVERY TIME I COME HERE!!" Of course the tone of voice caught my attention. I held my amusement down to (I hope) a small smirk. His rant continued, and ended with a really rather entertaining remark that went something like this. "IF I'M HERE MORE THAN HALF AN HOUR AND GET A METER TICKET....I'LL....BLOW MY TOP!!!!!!!"


Hehehe. Just a little amusement for your day. :)

50 things that make me happy

So I saw this as an idea for a scrapbook layout and thought it would be a fun blog instead. So, here goes.

1. My husband!!!!
2. Listening to rain
3. Cuddling
4. Our kitty
5. When my little nephew says something full of a-t-t-i-t-u-d-e. (Sorry Stacey..but you have to admit it's a littttle funny)
6. My nieces and nephews
7. Having sisters, finally :)
8. Reading a book so good that I can't put it down
9. My fluffy pig slippers
10. Making someone else happy
11. Laughing
12. Surprising Doug with something
13. Sales
14. Decorations
15. Cooking
16. Baking
17. Eating my creations
18. Watching movies
19. Sleeping in together
20. Hearing "I love you"
21. Wearing PJs
22. Giving compliments
23. Getting compliments
24. Drinking hot chocolate
25. Laying down after a long day
26. Paychecks being bigger than expected
27. Buying presents
28. Stargazer lilies
29. Friends
30. Getting free movie tickets
31. Singing
32. Dancing
33. Otter Pops
34. Hangin' out with my cousins (and their awesome kids!)
35. Date night
36. Hoodies
37. Beaches
38. The sound of the ocean
39. Traveling
40. Having my parents visit
41. My favorite Mexican restaurant
42. Pictures
43. Pictures of Christ with children (especially David Bowman's! Google his art. Now! Right now!!!)
44. 3 Doors Down, Linkin Park, Hinder, Saving Abel, and Nickelback music. Plus lots more.
45. The Twilight Series (so sue me. haha)
46. Sunsets
47. Organizing (it's a new one!)
48. Shopping
49. Holidays
50. Did I mention my husband? ♥


P.S. If you were naughty and didn't google David Bowman's art, NOW IS YOUR CHANCE! Haha.

P.P.S. You should do this too. I officially "tag" all of you who read this. :)

Food storage...Help!

I know I should have been being better all along, but lately I've been thinking about food storage a lot and wanting to get our's going better. I had been making it a goal in my head to get going on our 3 month supply. A few days later, I was looking through some papers and found a packet about food storage. I knew this could not be a coincidence. The packet listed the -Safely Gathered In- blog so I checked it out. It is an AWESOME food storage blog, I highly recommend checking it out.
So here's where I need help. I made my 3 month plan and started working on it, thinking it would be no real problem. It got hard because I was trying to think of meals that didn't involve eggs, cheese, or other dairy like sour cream since they can't be stored. I cook tons of different things, but a lot of them involve those dairy products that can't be stored. Does anyone know of something for eggs or sour cream? Like powdered milk is for milk?
Or am I just taking this too far? Something I looked at said if you followed their plan you wouldn't have to go to the grocery store a single time for 3 months. But we REALLY like eggs and cheese and dairy products..! I guess in a natural disaster or something it would be super hard to go to the store and they would probably be out of everything.. but still, that's not the only situation we plan for, right? How do you guys do it?
Next off, do any of you have any good recipes for food storage? Some of our normal meals work easily to store, but not a lot of them.

So pretty much I would love ANY advice, ideas, or help you can give me! I really want to get this going but I really need some help!

IKEA

Ikea. Where to start? I had heard of Ikea before. People say great things about it. I have spent hours drooling over their website. My visiting teacher (aka my personal angel!) even got me a couple things from there to go into my huge basket of bridal shower gifts from her. I love the sauce tool she got me. It REALLY does keep sauces/gravies from clumping!

Anyways... We went down to Provo a couple weeks ago with Doug's family to see his aunt and uncle's new house, and to see all their kids who are in town from all over the country. The house was FABULOUS!! It was cool meeting his cousins too, since I hadn't met most of them from that family before. We had a great time. When we were leaving town, Doug's mom asked if we wanted to stop at Ikea since me and Stacey (my sister in law) had never been there before. We happily agreed and I was SO excited!

The first thing we saw when we walked in the doors was side tables for $12. WHAT?! Who sells side tables for that cheap?!?!?! The family split up and set up a meeting time and place to leave. Doug and I took the escalator upstairs to the "Showroom". It was amazing! The store is so huge that they have to post signs up so you don't get lost. They even have posted shortcuts in case you want to skip some stuff to go on to other things. THEY HAD COMPLETE HOUSES IN THE SHOWROOM! They showed how you can utilize space and fit a whole house into like 500 or less square feet. You just can't understand the monstrosity of this store unless you have been in one.

We were walking along in the kitchen tools area and I saw a big basket of woks. I have been DYING to get a wok. In the store where we live, they are like $39.99 and up. I walked over to the basket and was admiring them and asked Doug how much they were cuz there wasn't price tags on them. He replied, "7.99". I squeaked out in excitement and asked if he had seen the right price for these. He assured me that was indeed the price of the woks. I excitedly asked him if I could get one and he said yes. There had been a lady near us who must have heard the whole conversation.. As we were walking away, Doug said, "As long as you cook stuff in it." The lady started giggling and as she walked by me she whispered, "Or smack him with it!" I couldn't believe it! It was so funny, but...I would never do that with someone I didn't know! Haha!

We picked up some wooden cooking utensils for... 59 cents (for a set of 3).

I saw a pot hanger. My parents have been looking for one since they moved into their new house. They had one in their old rental and my mom hated it at first and then fell completely in love with it. They looked around where we live for one and came back empty handed. They were not willing to pay $250-$300 for one. This pot hanger in Ikea was $15. I called my dad and he told me to get it. I grabbed fifteen hooks...$12. Are you saying WOW yet?!

We continued on. I saw pretty vases that at home would cost like $8-$12....for $2.49. Can you say HAPPY MARCIE?! I of course grabbed one. We finished looking around upstairs and went downstairs, where all the loose stuff is and the rooms aren't set up. I wanted EVERYTHING. I think my heart rate doubled in the kitchen tools area, because I wanted one of everything. My brother in law somewhere around this point asked me what I want for Christmas and I said, "This whole store!" He laughed. We continued and passed into the decorations area. We were unfortunately out of time, so we could only briefly look. It's probably a great thing, cuz I would have spent more money. :) We got a lucky twisting bamboo and a gorgeous little vase to put it in. I bet you can't guess how much the vase cost! 79 CENTS!!! And it's not plastic!!!

Somewhere in the middle, I looked at Doug and concluded, "We've died in a car crash, haven't we? We are in heaven." That is my summary of IKEA.

The joke of the vet clinic

Warning: if you have one, put your drink down. If you end up thinking this story is as funny as I do, your monitor will not appreciate a shower.

Flashback to years and years ago (probably close to 15 years ago):
My family sold an old vehicle to a Mexican family. They were soo thrilled that they handmade and painted a leather case that fit around a bottle of tequila and gave them to us as a gift. My parents kept it because the case was neat and it was hand painted.

About two weeks before present time:
My parents came to visit us for several days so they brought their 2 cats so no one had to come take care of them while my parents were gone. I miss the kitties so I was glad to see them. However, one of the little stinkers got hungry and tore holes in MY cat's bag of cat food. After my parents left, when my cat would get hungry, she would try and tear the holes even more.

Present time:
I moved the bottle of tequila and noticed the case had writing painted on it too, which I had never noticed. I hadn't looked at it closely since we had received it, probably. So I tipped the bottle over to try and read since I have taken far too many Spanish classes. Well, apparently the seal of the bottle broke, and tequila spilled out all over my hand and of course, the cat food bag just HAD to be right under the accident scene. Tequila got on the outside but there were holes all over it.
My cat was acting starved so after washing my hands and stowing the tequila away in a plastic bag, I felt her food and after deeming it dry, I gave her some. I regretted it as I became worried tequila had indeed gotten into the food and would poison her. I took the food away from her and called my mom for advice. She thought the alcohol would have evaporated but I was still worried. I said, "I can't just call the vet office and ask if tequila on my cat food is going to kill her!" My mom finally convinced me to call the office and not try and explain that I don't drink, but just ask if it would hurt my cat. So I did it. I really called the vet to ask if tequila would poison my cat.

Me: "Hi, are any of the vets available? I have a question."
Receptionist: "They are all with clients right now, but if you tell me your question I can ask them when they are done and have them call you back."
CRAP CRAP CRAP!!!!
Me: "Okay.. Well, my cat food bag has a bunch of holes in it and some tequila spilled out and I'm worried it got into her food. Is it going to hurt her?"
Receptionist: "A vet just came out. Let me go ask."
Receptionist: "The alcohol evaporates very quickly so your cat should be fine."

Really?! Who else in the world but me falls upon the misfortune of having to call the vet to ask if tequila will poison their cat?!?!?! I don't know how the receptionist managed to stay calm on the phone, but I am sure I was the laughing stock of that clinic once she hung up.

Recipe Blog!!!!

I finally got my recipe blog up and running with a couple recipes to start it off with! Go check it out! There will be lots and lots more to come. :D

littleladychef.blogspot.com

Also be sure to check out the post below, it's new. Funny I should get my recipe blog going after the post about how my kitchen is doomed....

Our kitchen is doomed.

Really. It's true. With the messes and accidents that happen in our kitchen, you would think we had 4 year old quadruplet boys.

The curse started (oddly enough) after we had been cleaning out the huge cupboard the serves as a pantry. My parents didn't move hardly any of the food out of it when they moved. So one night, Doug and I spent a couple hours taking everything out that we wouldn't use and hauled boxes and boxes of their food downstairs. We completely cleaned the inside of this huge cupboard and put all of our stuff back in.
Near the end, I got a can of Dr. Pepper out of the fridge, opened it, and had drank a little out of it. We thought we were done but spotted a jar of spaghetti sauce on the counter that we had forgotten to put away. Doug grabbed it and walked over to put it away. I had my Dr. Pepper in my hand, and as he reached to put the sauce away, he hit my hand (or the can) with the bottle, and my can of Dr. Pepper fell to the floor. Only, instead of just spilling, something horrible happened. It hit the ground and fell on its side, and suddenly started spinning so fast that it just looked like a purpleish red circle. And while it was spinning, it was OF COURSE spraying our entire kitchen, wall to wall, with Dr. Pepper.
I was soaked past my knees, Doug was soaked too, the wall closest to the scene was dripping from about 3 or 4 feet high down. The cupboard we had just spent 2 hours cleaning was dripping Dr. Pepper. Mind you, this cupboard is about 3 feet deep and a couple feet from the ground, and the back wall of it was dripping too. The food we had put inside now had brown polka dots. The nearest counter had gotten it to and my stovetop was even covered. Our other cupboards were dripping. Don't forget the floor had a puddle near the can, and sprays across the room....and we hadn't bought a mop yet AND it was around 11 at night. This Dr. Pepper not only had an incredible range, but it also got clear high up on things.
Now, I wish I had a picture of the carnage to show you. But at the time, I was so mad that it wasn't funny. I stood in the same spot, my legs dripping, speechless, just staring for I don't even know how long. Doug at one point said, "It's funny." and I snapped back, "No it's not!" I finally moved and we started to clean up. I was trying not to cry and I asked him to feed the animals while I cleaned. He walked away and I started to cry. Now it's HILARIOUS, but trust me, it wasn't then!

And that's how the curse started.

Next, (only a week or so later) I was reaching into the fridge for something, and knocked out a can of leftover pineapple. I yelled in frustration and stomped back to the bedroom to tell Doug, "Come look what I just did." He said, "Did you spill something?" And I said, "Just come look." He came out and we both had some good laughs about it. This time, I took a picture.

And last, (at least to this point), I was cooking dinner and got thirsty. I got out a can of my newfound friend Antioxidant Cherry 7-Up. I was browning hamburger to make Tory's tater tot casserole. I usually get low enough fat content hamburger that I don't have to drain it, but for some reason, it was fatty enough this time that I had to drain it. I tried draining into a little can and was struggling, so I decided to just tilt the pan and spoon it out. I had the pan tilted so the fat was near one edge and I didn't want to set it flat again while I grabbed a spoon.
I looked around for something I could set the pan handle on to keep it tilted enough. Viola! I saw my can of 7-Up on the counter right next to the stove and it was the perfect height. Now I'm sure you can guess what happened next, and sadly enough I knew it was a bad idea but I still did it. So I set the handle on the can. Surprisingly enough it didn't knock it over immediatley, but while I was spooning grease out something happened and the can tipped over. It was just far enough from the edge of the counter that when it tipped, the pop ran down the cupboards before hitting the ground. Yuk.

Let me repeat, our kitchen is doomed. I'm sure there will be more funny stories to come, stay tuned!