Happy News

I'm engaged!

Engaged!

ME!

WOOOOO!

I had the most perfect weekend with the most perfect guy ever.

Serious.

We went to a work party (his) at the Mondrian...this place is a hotel with restaurants and clubs...very ritzy and very surreal. The party started in the white room and literally everything was white. There was an open bar where I enjoyed a couple Tom Collins which after sipping several other people's drinks I found that the Tom Collins was the way to go.

I was quite the social butterfly, talking to many of Evan's co-workers, joking with them, and whatnot. It was nuts, I'm never this talkative.

So after a few hours and me camping out for appetizers coming through the door we were moved to the Red room and true to it's name it was all red. The thumping techno music was the perfect background to the random girl painting in the room and then the dancer who pranced on a glowing table and was doing handstands and backbends and dancing on the ceiling.

Craziness.

We spent the night on the tab of the company (thanks!) and we woke up, ate some delicious breakfast and went to out next destination which was secret.

It turned out to be the Hyatt in Scottsdale. It was GORGEOUS. Sprawling lush grass, full grown palms, acres of pools and spas, and extravagant rooms.

We pranced around the Hyatt for awhile. Literally, they had an ipod tour that we listened and followed. We found a pond, and then the massive amounts of koi, we took a dip in the hot tub under cascading aqueducts, and went to see the new disney film The Princess and the Frog. A good film, but not the best in Disney history.

Then we came back and got dressed for dinner and went to this SWB, South West Bistro where we sat in front of a fire and enjoyed chicken and asparagus. After the Bistro I was led to something very cool that we saw on the tour...a gondola ride!

Real gondolas from Venice with Gondoliers that were hired for their wonderful voices and not for their driving gondola skills. They were trained on the job. So, it was dark and the lake was uber quiet and so peaceful. We hopped in a gondola that was covered in tea lights and given a blanket to cuddle under. So we were paddled to the middle of this lake and our gondolier started to sing an italian love song about this guy who loved his girls beautiful lips and just wanted to kiss them all the time. So in the middle of the song Evan gets up and gets on one knee and he proposes! Very short, very sweet, "Sara, will you marry me?" and I'm freaking out saying "Of course!"

It was very romantic.

We got back into the dock and we went inside and sat down got a drink and listened to some romantic flamenco and Spanish guitar and we retired back to the room and we relaxed.

Then we came home today.

I'm in ecstasy with the happiness factor right now.

and we are in the process of buying a house too.

Hello Future, here I come!

Part I-A Post of Love (a warning!)

The other day Evan said something that made me bug him for a bit before he would let me know. He said that there were tons of tiny reasons why he loves me and why I am perfect for him. He didn't want to tell me any because he didn't want me to feel weird or change anything, but I promised I wouldn't so he told me one. How I say "Aloha" every once in awhile when I answer the phone or when he comes home. It kind of made go, awww.

So it got me thinking...what do I love about Evan? Many things...tiny things that he doesn't notice he does, but that I do.

So...I thought a list would do. Plus, the dear boy says he never reads this thing so I thought it would be good to get my thoughts out. So part one of a long extensive list.

1. Evan tries to load the dishwasher. He can't. At all. He is horrible at it, but the fact that he does and then runs it though...it is heartwarming.

2. Evan is always on the quest for knowledge...in EVERYTHING. I love how he throws himself into research. It just takes over his whole mind.

3. The big laugh he lets out every time we watch an episode of BullShit and Penn says "FUCK!?!!" during his narrative.

4. The way he curls up on the computer chair while he programs. It's cute and almost catlike.

5. Evan hates the lights in the apartment, they're too bright for his eyes and he does everything with the lights off. Showering...shaving...computering...all of it. Is cute.

So here are the first five. There will be more of this eventually!

I can't ride my bike with no handle bars, no handle bars, no handle bars

I really can't.

I have the balance of a...something that has no balance. Really.

I have been struggling finding something to do that is active and fun in the evenings that 1) Does not tear the shit out of my knees like running and 2) does not want to literally kill me like rollerblading. I took a NASTY spill (3 times!) the last time I went rollerblading and I was pretty much done. I now have a nice gross patch of skin on my arm that may never be the same. It's all healed up but still, I would rather not. I also had the biggest bruise on my bum ever and it took two months to go away. I felt dead sexy with those two things, let me assure you.

So, after months of pining for a bike. Make that years (I haven't had a bike since I was 10, my mom didn't want me to ride on our dirt road where I lived in MI and riding back and forth on our driveway had little appeal), I was finally able to get one. A REALLY NICE one.

Thanks to my folks. Oh goodness, thank you to my folks. They came to visit (the leave on Monday, much sadness) and they really outdid themselves with the gift giving. I won't go over exactly what they gave but it did help out immensely and then my om took Evan and I shopping for some more things. Evan got clothes that he DESPERATELY needed. Seriously, the man hasn't gone shopping for at least two years. We got some major good deals at Macy's too. We went yesterday and avoided the Black Friday crowd. According to receipt Evan got 500 bucks of clothing for only $200. These were some nice things too, Calvin Klein and whatnot. One shirt was $55 and it rang up for $8.99 and then my mom had a coupon too! I need clothes but I am working on my body so I opted for asking my mom and dad for a bike.

We had looked online and found a really nice and cheap Schwinn cruiser at Sports Authority so we popped over and they don't carry Schwinns in the store, online special only. Screw them. So there was an actual bike store in the next mall strip so we popped over there and I saw it. This beautiful streamlined, pink and grey, complete with matching basket in the front cruiser. I was in love at first sight. My mom said okay and she bought it for me. I could have cried. So we loaded into Evan's car and drove back to my brother's to drop off my mom so my dad could take her. I made Evan get my bike out so my dad could really see it (so he knew exactly what he bought me). I rode around the block before we put it back in.

Apparently while I was riding with my goofy-ass grin of sheer delight my dad said to Evan that he doesn't know why he buys anyone any gift if they don't love it as much as I love that bike.

So we bid goodbye and many thank you's to my parents and came home. Where Evan strapped on his roller blades, I got my bike, we grabbed the dog and we went to the dog park. It was awesome fantastic fun and I would like to ride my bike everywhere now.

Thanks Mom and Dad.

I aen't ded

I'm not I swear.

My job has had MASSIVE amounts of drama. I for one do not like the drama and like to keep drama away from my life, so it is upsetting to me that my life at my job has become somewhat drama-filled.

So anyhoo lots of other things have been going on as well. Evan got rid of our beloved fish tank (after several years of fish, he was just sick of taking care of them) We sold half the fish to this one crazy couple and then this sweet guy came and bought our tank and the rest of our fish, including my beloved Krab. This guy was so sweet about everything and he even gave us his number and if we are ever in his neighborhood we can come and see the fishies. So, that is cool.

So after getting rid of the tank we redid the layout of the living room it is sooo much more spacious and relaxing to be in. There is even a spot for Gala's stuff without it seeming crowded. I really like it in here now. Evan and I didn't realize how squished in it was. The only thing we are missing are side tables for the couch and my parents are bringing us two that they refurbished (they painted them red!) which will soo go with the living room. So exciting stuff. Since the living room is so nice and sparse though it has started a getting rd of stuff movement in me. We've been letting stuff pile up for awhile so we took a bunch of stuff to goodwill and I have some things leftover from the Bookman's run that need to go to the library. I also have this giant book shelf thing in the office that has just become a depositary for everything so I am packing some stuff away, binning other things, and pitching the rest. Then off to Craigslist the shelf goes. Parts of the apartment just have gotten too cluttery.

Other news is that we are looking for a house, we actually looked at several in Tempe and they were all holes. Expensive holes. So, we opted to look in Mesa and dear god....I am in love with about a billion of these houses. Evan and I went through the same list on different computers and then we put our lists into a program that sorted everything and we got rid of anything that did not repeat. So I had selected about 50 houses and Evan had selected about 40 and we ended up with 27 houses that we agreed to look at. Some of those will probably be out of the market and we'll be left with even less. It will be interesting.

I am growing up in so many ways and I think I may actually may be getting happy. Once the drama is done and the paperwork is faxed in.

Parental Issues

The one big thing about moving across the country that really really sucks is being this far from my parents. I am 3,000 miles away from them and probably will stay at least that for the rest of my life.

So when my parents are having health issues it kills me that I can't instantaneously teleport there and take care of them.

A few weeks ago my dad had to go to the doctor because he just couldn't walk, he was hobbling like an old man and had to hold on to things just to get around. Well, he had gout and plantar facitis so he had to start taking even more meds (he has had a kidney transplant years ago and eats a million pills a day it seems) and get this boot thing to wear to bed to keep his foot stationary.

My mom has had knee problems for forever now it seems. A while back she ended up tripping on a curb and into a store door (not as comical as one would think) and then she had tore a few things in one knee from that. Now her other knee was hurting so bad that she was just about in tears on a daily basis, so they finally did a stupid MRI and they found that my mom has no cushioning left in her knee. None. It is just bone on bone. She also has a heel spur and plantar facitis in her other leg because she has been walking weird since her knee hurts. She has another doctors appointment soon to discuss her "options" for her knee.

I have no idea what they will option her to do but I have come to this conclusion for my parents...

THEY ARE FALLING APART AT THE SEAMS.

My mom keeps lamenting about not enjoying her retirement now and keeps telling me that I better take care of myself. Which I am now. I could see myself going down that path and I am definitely not going to now.

I feel really bad for my parents. They also had to cancel their trip down here during my fall break. Not that my mom could have walked up the stairs to my apartment. There is no way.

So it will probably be December before they meet Evan and for that I am really sad. Who knows, they might not meet my "boyfriend" they could eventually meet my "fiance" I have no idea, but December is a really long ways away.

Le sigh.

T-Shirt Altering

Over the summer I found a book that was all about altering t-shirts into even cooler shirts or other misc. things. Well, the book was kind of pricey so I didn't buy it at the time. A few weeks later I kept thinking about this book so I said screw it, and went to go buy it at Barnes and Noble, well they ended up having two different ones and I bought both of them. I have been having major fun since then. I've made a bag, a wrap shirt, a halter top, a tunic, a sweater, a vest, a toddler dress, a mohawk hat, a rag doll, changed two shirts around, and a still-in progress scarf. I've also taught a friend how to make the bag I made and I went and helped a freshman team of volley ball players mess with their team shirts. I have also been asked to do some classes with teachers after school and to have a t-shirt party at my apartment. Student Council at one of my schools asked if I could teach them to mess with their shirts and the librarian gave me two shirts of hers to change around. One I finished, and I am still working on the other.

These books have pretty much changed a lot in my life and is forcing me a bit to become more social which is a good thing. Many of the friends I made last year are no longer around and I miss hanging out with people. So these books are providing me with the opportunity.

I really am trying. So we'll see.

On other news, did everyone know about the American Kamen Rider that is apparently on Saturday mornings? It's called Kamen Rider Dragon Rider and I just saw a commercial for it. It's totally like Power Rangers but it seems more for the tween crowd. It's all serious and dark.

Also I am hungry. I need breakfast!

A Day in the Life

Why is chartreuse not red?

It's a blasted pukey green color and yet the word is so pretty it needs to be red.

Any ways, I've been doing a lot of reading and exercising lately. I've got a few books going on the should help with the teaching woes (woes of which there are many, but I do not feel like bitching about, this blog is not about bitching) and a few about weight loss and dieting.

This weight loss and dieting thing is really interesting to me. I bought one book on raising a child to not have self-image woes. (Not preggers, no worries) but I wanted to see what they said, what I could learn from it, and how to avoid perhaps doing to my future child or children what was done to me. I feel as if I have a better grasp on that. I also bought a book about a diet blogger, Dietgirl, she is a sassy Australian lass who was at one point 350 lbs. The whittled herself down to 175 by the end of the book. The whole thing was all the ups and downs (literally) she had in her battle of the bulge and she won. It took her six years but she really did it.

This speaks to me because I am on that path as well. I was never so big or even classified as obese, but I had been in the overweight category for a bit and was right sick of it. So with Evan supporting me I have kicked a lot of flabbiness to the curb. By no means am I done, but I have tried on all of my clothes again and had to put a bunch of clothes into the too big pile. t was quite ridiculous. I few more pants got freed from the bin (my stash of smaller clothes from yesteryear that I was too ashamed to throw out) and I actually went to Goodwill today and bought a couple pairs of shorts and a new pair of khakis. The khakis I had made me look huge because they were all baggy. From this shopping trip I believe I'm officially down a size, but women's sizes are all messed up and I tried on 5 different things all in the same size and a few were baggy, some were too tight, and others just right. But technically, I'm down two sizes. I never bought anything of the highest size (never wanted to admit it) but I was definitely two sizes bigger.

As happy as I am that I am getting healthy and looking, quite frankly, fantabulous, I have these spurts of awkwardness. I don't know how to look in a lot of these clothes. I feel somewhat uncomfortable in my new skin because I am not used to being healthy and fit. Evan's sister apparently called me tiny over the phone the other day. TINY. Folks, I would have never ever used this word to describe myself. EVER. If I am "tiny" now just think in the next ten more pounds I want to lose, and then the last ten after that? I might be invisible!

Also, never ever get sized at Victoria's Secret. That blood store had me wearing the wrong undergarments for the past few years. I highly suggest Soma as they have the comfiest stuff in the universe.

Evan and I went on a lovely hike on Saturday at the Tonto National Forest and I will hopefully put up just a few of my favorite pictures from that hike. One of them being the one that is currently my new desktop backround on my computer. Yes, I am a nerd. I don't care.

Toodles for now, anyone who is reading!

Curriculum Night

I have two curriculum nights this week. One at each of the schools I teach at. So I get to hang out untl about 7 pm both nights at school. Wonderful fun.

I also stupidly scheduled my first observation with Tara for TOMORROW. I kind of know what I am doing but still am unsure. I kind of switched things around...but I think I will still do the notes for optical illusions and try and color theory/ optical illusion mini group quiz. Ill review with them how to do it today after the notes. Then If there is time after that quiz thing, I'll demo how to do the optical illusion project then let them start. I think this will work!

I took another step toward adulthood this past Saturday. Evan and I opened a joint checking account. Now we are in a committed relationship! We had been talking about how to split the bills and groceries and it just hasn't seemed like it had been working well so we came to the conclusion of doing this. We are in this for the long haul and it just seemed like a logical progression anyways. He is switching all of his bank stuff to mine. I am happy about that because if I had to switch it would be a major pain. All he has to do is go tell someone at work. I would have to drive to the district office, wait for the right person to come out and see me, fill out the paperwork, have the paperwork approved, and then I would be okay.

Ya, I don't really think so.

So, Evan and I also made ice cream yesterday..and by ice cream I mean a milkless and soyless cream-like dessert. We bought an Ice cream maker and substituted a lot of ingredients. It made a ton so it will last us awhile. It's not half bad but it is sooo not ice cream.

Well, busy days ahead. I hope this week goes uber fast. I have next Monday off...yay veterans!

Google Reader

Rss Feeds and Google Reader are the greatest inventions ever.
I check a lot of online stuff and everyday I was going to each site (sometimes more than once!) to check to see if it updated.

No more!

I subscribed to what I could and now I have a nice little Google Reader Gadget on my Igoogle account and it pops up little links whenever something is updated. It is FANTASTIC.

I am saving so much time by doing this. I need to figure out a few more things with it, but it's awesome and I highly suggest it!

Rollerblading

So I started learning how to rollerblade lately. Evan had been wanting to go and awhile back I was at this used clothing store and I found a pink and black pair of really nice rollerblades in size 8's that came with wrist pads.

It was fate really.

So we practiced around the apartment a few times..the apartment is scary all the sidewalks are short and hilly. Not exactly the best for a noob.

So finlly I went and bought some knee and elbow pads because just the wrist pads were not going to cut it. Just practicing with only the wrist guards was like courting knee death.

So it is finally cooling down in this desert and we went to this long sidewalk area right by the expressway. It was perfect and I FINALLY started to get the hang of it.

We went again tonight but it was way more difficult because Evan made me skate all the way to the long sidewalk which included me crossing a street and several business driveways. The sidewalks in this state has these bumpy things where it meets the road so I basically had this obstacle course to go through to even get to my blessed skate area.

I made it there in one piece. Thank goodness.

Evan had me practice some more moves and I ended up crashing down. Thank goodness for those pads! I would have been torn to pieces.

Had to go back through the obstacle course again to even get back home and this was made more difficult because I kept getting toe cramps and had to sit and take my boot off for a bit. Evan ended up pushing me down the sidewalk for a bit so we could actually get home.

Then we capped the evening by playing some wii Resort Sports.

Good times.

Diet and Weight Loss

In my last blog, I wrote a lot about diet and exercise regimen...which I won't all the time with this one but I do feel the need to talk about since it is such an important part of my life right now.
When I moved across the the country I gained weight...now I had already been gaining weight but moving and the stress of being a first year teacher became a catalyst for some major gaining. I was FIFTY pounds over weight.

Fifty.

ugh.

My parents brought me a Wii Fit for Christmas which I did after they left pretty religiously and I dropped 10 pounds. But due to a housing situation which I like to block from my memory completely I had to stop.

Moving eventually, I actually dropped another 5 lbs because I was hauling things every day for a couple weeks up 3 flights of stairs over and over. It jumped started my weight loss program again. I was excited to lose another 5 lbs...I thought I had gained everything back but I hadn't.

Then I met Evan, who has CHANGED my life forever. He has been such a positive influence on my life, I don't even know how it happened and it all happened soooo quickly. But I have never been happier.

Evan is a very conscientious eater, he has to be. He has a lot of allergies to food that cause him discomfort. So I started making meals that the both of us could eat. Which, he is pretty much allergic to unhealthy things that this made me eat a lot better. We went on a trip to celebrate our one month anniversary and I ended up gaining a bunch of weight during that ridiculously fun weekend. But it also woke me up. I couldn't keep doing this to my body. I was dating a very attractive, skinny, active, healthy eating boyfriend. I didn't want to be this round ball standing next to him.

So I became active with him. I do love being active on my own and I had been hiking and running and whatnot off and on. But I started going to the gym with him, we went on walks, did yoga, the wii fit more, my apartment gym, swimming, volleyball, badminton, etc. Just doing SOMETHING.

I also started paying attention to my diet. After a few issues I found out that I am lactose intolerant. Most of the dairy things that I like are bad for me anyway so I don't eat them anymore. I know I could if I got lactaid or something, but I just avoid it. Soy is another problem. It affects my moods, scarily so. I think actually it helped put me into a more severe depression back when I was in college. So I avoid foods with any soy in them now as well.

Evan and I moved in together too, at my apartments. We push each other now when we feel lazy. With school starting I've been doing my exercise in the morning, but a few times I've done some in the evening with him as well. We are really watching what we eat too and how much. We were both chowing down on things just because they were healthy and we were eating too much.

So with all of this in mind I now only have a mere 20 lbs left. I am halfway to my goal. Every day I weigh myself on my Wii Fit and everyday it's been going down ever so slightly. Sometimes it's up but then it goes back down. And I know I am doing things right.

I have this bin of clothing that I've kept over the past few years. Pants, shorts, t-shirts, and some bathing suits that I couldn't fit in because I had gained weight and I swore to myself that some day I would get back into them so I kept them in this small bin in the back of my closet. I had freed just a few things from the bin and I tried on the rest of my clothes and got rid of things that were too big and binned anything else that was too small.

Last night I decided to try things on from the bin, because it's been over a month since I tried things on. I freed up a bunch of stuff last night!

Two pairs of dress pants
Two pairs of shorts
Three t-shirts

I still have a bunch of stuff left, but some of the stuff I only need to lose 5 more pounds to fit into. Some things I was actually able to pry up my legs and buckle (even thought I looked stuffed into them like a sausage) but the fact remains, I used to not even be able to get them up my thighs. I now can pull them up and buckle them.

Next month I am going to try on the contents of my closet again...there should be a few things that I shouldn't even bother wearing anymore because they'll be way too big. There are also a few things that I love and would be willing to get tailored to let me keep wearing them.

I have about a month and a half before my parents come to visit me. They haven't seen me in person since March and that was before I met Evan. I want to be 10-12 lbs less by the time they get here. I want them to see how healthy and active I've become and I want them to be proud of me.

Because I am proud of me.

Ah, blogging...

So after giving up hope for a while on creating my own website and blog I have broken down and decided to get a blogger account so I can at least post my thoughts and art and what not. This blog is personal and business all in one. I think of my life as one whole piece so this blog will be too.