Nail polish and restless thoughts

Yesterday I watched the girlies while Adam and Britt did some Christmas shopping. I really wanted to paint the girls' nails with festive sparkles so I brought over all my goods. They are so eager for their nails to be dry that we have to get creative with ways to sit still. This time I had them watch a timer on my phone and told them when they heard the dog bark alarm at the end, it was time...time to start the countdown again. I thought we were in the clear but I didn't expect Brynn to dig into her laughing cow cheese immediately after we were finished so as she was sucking cheese off of her finger she also ate her nail polish. I guess only re-doing one nail on a 2 year old isn't so bad!

Lots of transition happening in our life and the lives around us. It's making me restless and reexamine every little thing about me. Silly things like...Do I give good Christmas gifts? Is my house organized? Do I live functionally or do I just pretend to?? Bigger things like... Am i keeping in touch with friends as best as i can? Is my character strong enough to set good, lasting examples for the little babes in my life?? So I tried to make a good Christmas gift list and then ignored the rest for now.

In the coming weeks, a lot of things will be decided for our little family. I am anxious but excited. And I love going to sleep at night knowing that there is already a plan, we just have to trust in it. Stay tuned!

Baking Day

I was lucky enough to get Thanksgiving week off of work, and so I knew that I wanted to spend one of my free days baking a pie. A Dutch apple pie, to be exact! We bought apples from the farmers market last week while waiting for our table at Snooze, and I was slowly getting all the supplies I needed to make this delicious treat.

My cousin Nasime got a last minute flight to come for Thanksgiving, so while my sister was picking her up from the airport, I thought I was being super prepared and packed all my pie goods to take to her house for our baking day. i stopped at King Soopers for Britt's supplies, got some coffee, and I was really feeling like a hybrid of Martha and Giada all rolled into one.

I passed a horse pasture and caught a glimpse of the back of a horse wearing a coat, but for some reason it looked like someone had dressed up a scary figure and placed it in the pasture to scare people. I had just read some thing on pinterest about how to scare the hotel maids by making figurines out of towels, so I automatically thought, oh thats not weird to have a scary figure in a pasture, but then realized that people generally don't try to scare you during Thanksgiving, and no...its not scary, its just a horse with a jacket on. Moving on.

Then, the second I pulled into her neighborhood, somehow my mind realized I had left the pie dough I had so carefully prepared last night at my house. Come ON! So I unloaded all my gunk and told myself I would be back in 10 minutes. That's a lie. I have to lie to myself sometimes.

I called my mom on the way and after hanging up with her, I was just driving right along when I realized I had missed my exit. What the heck!! I do not live in a big city by any means. Traffic was not an issue. I wasn't talking on the phone. I just missed it. Now, something I realized today was that if you miss the Mountain Vista exit, the next exit is in SEVEN MILES. In Wellington. That's practically WYOMING. So I turned on my iPod and settled in for the road trip. Once I turned around, I speedraced back to my exit, and as soon as I was on Mountain Vista, there it was....a TRAIN. A freaking train. I blew half a tank of gas to speed up to beat it, but those dang arms came down (much too soon, in my opinion...I could have beat that train fair and square) and stopped me. Now this was a quick train, thank the good Lord. Otherwise I would have had dragon fire coming out of my mouth.

Anyhow, I got the dough. I baked that dang pie. And we had a super time doing it. I will be using that pie pan again...and maybe some new decorative crust tools that my grandma gave me? Look out, Christmas!!

Beer at work and other important news

How to feel like you are drinking a delicious porter at work:

Get a cup of black coffee
Let it cool
Take a sip and hold it in your mouth for a second
(this part is crucial) Tell yourself, "This porter is kind of strong but soooo good!"
(bonus step) Hold your breath for as long as possible and you will feel like you have a (short) buzz

That is how you feel like you are drinking beer at work.  It's so easy!!!



In other news, I only washed my hair once this week, and I believe it was a successful venture as no one has asked me if I am homeless.  I already high-fived myself, practically every morning, so you can hang on to your high-five.  Who's cool!

Looking forward to a Saturday of sleeping in, a Sunday of cornhole at Pateros Creek, and then a holiday week where I hope to bake my very first Dutch Apple pie and learn to knit a cowl scarf.  If that doesn't sound cozy then I don't know what does!!

How do I post on this thing again??

I have neglected this little blog ... I wish I had all the creative motivation and all the time in the world, and I would spend my days sipping americanos in a dim room, listening to folky music and blogging about all of my incredible opinions and such.

Turns out, with all this election hoopla, I really have a tough time forming an opinion about hard core things...I hope thats okay.  Mike says that later in life when I become a Republican (jigga whaaaa?) that I will have some opinions like his...but I don't see that day ever coming =)  I guess I just don't like to debate things and I just like to let people think what they want to think, then let them change their mind if they want.  I'd rather spend my time cuddling all these new babies that have entered our world and watching football on Sundays and scouring Pinterest as if I'll actually ever do any of those incredibly crafty things.

This weekend, we celebrated a year of true wedded bliss.  Even though we got "public" married in April, we got "legally" married last year on 11/11/11 (who's cool!) right before we moved in together (and by moved in together I mean lived in a place together where there was space other than my bookshelf for Mike's clothes and other random necessities).  It was a super secret for a while, but now its kind of fun to say, we've been married a year!  He sent me some lovely roses at work (that will never get old) and then we went to Jay's on Saturday night for a feast of all feasts.  Mike really does know how to dine out and I sure do enjoy that about him.  Wine for each course.  Soups and salads.  Dessert.  Sub "this" for "that" cause "this" sounds better.  We originally had reservations for 7pm, but then it was snowy and he remembered that I have the bedtime of a geriatric so we moved it up to 6pm...and we were in bed watching Netflix by 8:30!  Now thats what I call an anniversary.

I love shopping for cards for him cause they all make me cry and
I have to hide my tears in the middle of the store.  Good times.

Now that I'm back to being bored at work, I think I'll have more time to collect my thoughts and blog more. Remember Ashley, remember why you started blogging in the first place...to REMEMBER!

Peace out.

Click

My days lately have been dominated by work.  Its not all bad, only because I know in a few short weeks, it will all be over...but I can I just share a pet peeve real quick before I go ignore my dirty dishes to lay in bed to catch up on all the new shows...

I have been training our election judges on how to use our electronic pollbook.  This involves a computer.  And even after lifetime judges challenge me on new information ("Well in 2008, ...), even after the guy eating popcorn snarfs his popcorn but is sure to leave a popcorn trail all throughout the building, even after the 60-something's shush each other...my main pet peeve will still be this:  When people don't know whether to click once, or to doubleclick on something.  Maybe I should just get over it and count myself lucky enough to be born into the generation that just gets it.  But COME ON.  If you hover and you see an arrow, click twice.  If you hover and see a hand, click once.  Its that simple.  Am I right??  These sweet volunteers are clicking their hearts out, getting lost, finding screens they should never even find, getting impatient, etc.  Meanwhile, I am thinking, thank you Jesus that my children will never not know how to operate a computer.

Night night!

Saters Strike Again

I love the babies that my sister and her husband make. We, like so many others, are so blessed to have sweet children keep appearing in our lives.

Britt was due on 9/22, but a few of us had a little inkling that the magic would happen on 9/20.  So when Britt called me on Wednesday night and said "Don't freak out.  But, I think you should spend the night tonight, just in case something happens in the middle of the night," I practically leapt home, threw my crap in a bag (then took a brief, weird nap...I am in a senior citizen phase) then Mike and I headed to Camp Sater for as long as necessary.

The days when Britt has babies are my absolute favorite.  With the other two baboons, my mom comes up from Denver, I take time off of work, then we shop and cook and clean and take care of the big sister(s). As soon as the baby arrives, we huddle around our phones and spread the good news. We get the big sister(s) ready for the first hospital visit and have such a fun time snuggling up the little baboon while Britt tells us her labor tales.

Now, I say this all like she has had 14 children. Let me be clear that this is only (only?!) her third, but these births have been such super family moments that they melt my heart into a puddle and make me feel so cozy.

Wednesday night came and went, so Thursday morning, I went with Britt to see her doctor, and he assured her that today was the day. She has a cool relationship with her doctor, being that they are colleagues, and modesty is not a condition that they are aware of. No messing around happening there!

We went about our day and tried to get as much done as possible. Target. Eye brows waxed. Lunch. Laundry. Bags packed. Beds made. Around 4, Britt's contractions were getting just intense enough that Adam needed to come home and I needed to get the girlies out of the house so they would stop watching her hunch over on her exercise ball and moan every 10 minutes.  (And I felt weird too...do I help?  Do I leave the room?  Am I helping?  What does that FEEL like???)  So, I decided to take the girls to the park while we waited for Adam to get home.  Addy chose her bike as her method of transportation to the park, while Brynn chose the "Pooh-Choo".  Let me be clear about the Pooh-choo.  This Winnie the Pooh train is not meant to go long distances.  It is meant to be driven in small circles on driveways and decks.  But, this was Brynn's choice...so about 10 feet from the house, she needed to be full-on pushed.  Does the Pooh-choo have good steering?  No.  So, I am crouched down, pushing her on the 'choo, using one hand to steer, the other to hold her on it...Man, the things we do for these sweet children.  Just as we approached the park, Addy announced, "I see a snake!!" As I tried to get investigate if the snake really existed, while trying to not actually see the snake if it did exist, while trying to not instill my fear of these nasty slithery creatures in the girls, thanks to the good Lord, Adam pulled up before the snake could be found. He threw us, and the damn Pooh-choo, in the truck and whisked us home.

Ten minutes later, Adam and Britt were off to the hospital, and Gigi and Mike were on their way to the house after work. We made big sister tutus and all squealed (was Mike in on the squealing?  Maybe I did enough squealing for the both of us) with delight when the text arrived at 9pm that Reese was here!

The Saters Strike Again!  We love you Reese Harlynn Sater!!!!!

Lesson learned from Starbucks

This morning, the kid in front of me at Starbucks was having an issue paying for his coffee. The barista explained to him what payments he could accept, and this made the kid fly off the handle, throwing the lid off of his coffee and storming off while saying, you can keep your f-ing coffee. It was so rude! After a second, the barista went outside to the kid and tried explaining to him again why he couldn't accept whatever it was he was trying to pay with. They walked back in together, with the kid apologizing and the barista saying, i just want to have an honest conversation with you. I don't want your money! I just want your respect.

Wow!

Isn't that what we all want? Just a little genuine conversation and some dang respect?

Perfect timing for me to witness this incident. Yesterday, after a coworker went over my head TWICE and overturned two decisions i had made, I finally had it and responded to her quite rudely. Tsk tsk.

Lesson learned. We are all going to find ourselves in situations where we don't like how we are being treated. But, instead of exploding (ex: Ashley), we can speak to the perp with respect and genuinely explain why we are frustrated (ex: barista).

Goal for today: preserve dignity by maintaining respect, no matter how irritated I become in the next 8 hours :)