The House Across

Zach and I have another major remodel project underway, at the house across the street from us, forever forward referred to as "The House Across".

It's a team effort really. Zach definitely needs me to "loosen up" the trickier demo items...

The Romper

I feel like the universe really wants me in a romper. They're everywhere. I gotta say, though, I was worried that the idea of it would be so much better than the reality. I'm 39 years old, and I'm not sure they're 'age appropriate'. I decided to go way out of my comfort zone and get one from ASOS. Out of my comfort zone? Am I crazy?! This thing is the most comfortable thing I have placed on my body in a really long time. And, it's cute! I texted the photo below to my boss with the caption: "I HOPE YOU LIKE ROMPERS BECAUSE I WILL BE WEARING THIS UNTIL SEPTEMBER 30TH." 

I call it my 2017 Summer Romper

Versatile!

On a recent trip to my parents' place, there wasn't much to decide in the way of packing:

But that's not the point of my story. The point is that when you go to your parents and basically spend the entire day Saturday and Sunday drinking alcohol (mostly to forget your mom has cancer AGAIN but really just because that's what you do every Saturday and Sunday) and you have all those bathroom breaks --- a romper becomes a somewhat complicated apparatus. I got it down though. I left the straps tied and just shimmied my arms up and out of it to go pee 8.6 million times per day. 

It was at 4am, though, when Rowdy woke me up to be let out of the house that I sleepily untied my romper (YES I SLEEP IN IT TOO) and used the toilet. When I went to retie it, the strap in the back was WET. 

It FELL IN THE TOILET. Determined not to let the romper-toilet-strap incident get me down, I rinsed it, did my best to get the bar soap involved, tied it up and went back to sleep. 

Later that morning, I needed to use the toilet urgently, but my dad was in there (13 people, one bathroom) and so I was forced to use the outhouse, except for the fact that I hadn't yet gotten to  item number clean out the outhouse on my chores list. I opened the door, frantic, only to find 432 spider webs and the world's most giant spider covering the outhouse seat hole. I swiped it with some toilet paper but had no time to clean it properly and so I disrompered and did my thing, naked and standing up. 

Of course I hadn't shut the outhouse door, one because it was too spidery in there and two because I never shut a bathroom door. I looked up at some point to see both my sister Kasey and my Mom waving to me from the kitchen window.

Microblading

Did you/have you noticed in previous posts that I have absolutely no eyebrows of my own? It's OK -- I just draw them in with a pencil. 

But that's irritating and almost free, so why not spend $600 on a semi-permanent solution that will fade in about 2-3 years? 

I'm talking about microblading. It's like a tattoo, but less permanent. AND I LOVE IT. 

Don't ever let anybody tell you it doesn't hurt. Because it really hurts bad. And it takes two hours. Twice. So just prepare yourself for that fact and never mind anybody else's opinion on the subject. 

Also for about a week you're going to look like two chocolate-y brown caterpillars crawled on your face and died. But that fades and they look amazing again after you pick all the scabs off. 

You'll regret it for like 5 days.

But don't worry, you'll go back to lookin' like yourself again.

Cancer

Well, it's back again. The lung cancer, I mean. That lump in her leg turned out to be lung cancer as we know, but it never really went away and plus she had been having major pain in her chest so she went in for her three-month checkup and they took a scan. Lung cancer. In lots of spots. 

That's the bad news.

The good news is we have been hanging out a TON lately. I'm typing this up from my old loft bedroom in tiny Roosevelt MN with a vodka squirt in my hand. 

Living with Teenage Boys, Vol. 2

"Throw your dirty laundry down the stairs!" 

I forgot to say "...and make sure they land. down. the. stairs."

Zach-isms, Vol. 4

"I try to be easy on the eyes."

"I'm not laughing at you OR with you."

"I do toot kind of a lot, but what happened this time?"

"Old people have oatmeal every day."

"Whatddya mean 'have I pooped?' Do you think I'm new? I'm the king of bowel movements."

Sylvia

Kelly's Yorkie Sylvia is 832 years old. She has zero teeth and it's sort of my fault. You see, Sylvia's breath stunk so bad that I refused to hold her or pet her or babysit her and then finally Kelly took her to the vet and every single one of her teeth was rotted out of her head and so they pulled them. I'm not suggesting it was 100% my doing, but I definitely was a huge hag about it. Kelly was probably sick of hearing me crab.

Anyway, now Sylvia has a stuck out tongue all the time. There's no teeth to hold them in. 

She pees everywhere and she loves to ride in my pocket on a bike ride. 

Hal-isms, Vol. 68

"Well, it was a memorable time."

"I don't talk about mushy stuff it gets ya combobulated."

"Maybe we can find our real kids, Mom, and get rid of these sh**heads we got now."

"Rowdy you're the only kid we've had that can lay quietly while we watch a movie."

"Last night I said something to that damn sister of yours and now she's going to write it in her portfolio."

Living with Teenage Boys, Vol. 1

A surprise around every corner.

Who Wears the Pants?

This is embarrassing for me to admit, but I tried on Zach's pants and they fit me. In fact they were kind of tight:

Worse, he fits in mine too and they look better on him: 

Hal-isms, Vol. 67

"I don't know about gettin' drunk but I'm gettin' diarrhea"

"Well, you marry a gadabout you get a gadabout"

"I know what the community needs"

"This guy left me a gallon of coyote urine, and we were gonna split it..."

"What's so funny about that? He gets two quarts and I get two quarts?"

Prude to Be an American

I work out at a fancy schmancy Pilates Studio multiple times a week sometimes. I change in the bathroom from my work clothes into my expensive Lulu Lemon/Athleta outfits Target sale rack stained with bacon grease outfits.

I am also late every single time, so I'm always in a rush and running to the bathroom, changing while I pee (I have this down to a science. I can do my bra and top during the pee and also change my pants and socks). 

Anyway, I have in the past forgotten myself and started unbuttoning my top in the lockers area, which wouldn't normally be a problem except there are occasional men who work out there and also the front desk person is a man and although they aren't always in the lockers area, they could totally go there, because it's not a WOMEN'S ONLY kind of thing. 

The other day I came sailing out of the women's bathroom to find a tall skinny model of a woman (the only people who work out at my Pilates studio by the way) standing in the lockers area with her button-down shirt open and her bra totally visible for the world to see.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!! DID YOU FORGET YOURSELF AND START CHANGING OUT HERE INSTEAD OF IN THE BATHROOM??!?!

"No", she said in her perfect European accent. "This is just a shirt", she said, flapping her real shirt open and shut to reveal her bra, which I was accidentally staring at because she was calling it a 'shirt' but it was totally a bra.

"OH HAHAHA I JUST MEAN THAT, YOU KNOW, BECAUSE DUDES COULD COME BACK HERE, I'VE DONE THAT BEFORE AND I THOUGHT HAHAHA THAT YOU...ACCIDENTALLY...HAHAHA..."

"No," she said again in her perfect European accent. "I did it on purpose." and didn't shut her shirt.

The image I found when I google imaged "tall skinny model in locker room"

Golf!

In December during our trip to Hawaii, Zach and I came to the harsh realization that we are basically golfers. 

I mean, we golf. We just do.

In Kona, we definitely drove up to the Country Club on several different occasions to find we had just missed closing time, but then when we finally got in we couldn't go because he didn't have a collared shirt so then we bought one at the grocery store and then we definitely bought a couple of buckets of balls and hit them. I got to hit a lot of mine twice! Because they didn't go very far!,

On the way home we drove through Palm Springs where we just couldn't resist the urge to hit the links for an 18-hole Par 3 experience. We are just naturals let me tell you. The scores don't lie -- and mine was the highest and best score you've ever seen!

It makes sense really, because golfing combines everything we love: driving a golf cart and drinking beer. AT THE SAME TIME.

"Collared shirt". Fancy!!

Left-handedly using a right-handed putter.

Zach has it in his blood, I think. His uncle hikes around and hits a golf ball wherever he goes. I think he's going to walk across the US hitting a golf ball -- and has already gone the whole way around the Salton Sea.

Zach-isms, Vol. Fart

"I'm not farting ON you, I'm farting WITH you."

"I like to toot around you."

"It's like a weird bladder infection, but it's brought on by poop."

"You know how I always say I like my farts? I didn't like that one."

Hal-isms, Vol. 66

"Kady he fell off the stage. Do you know I've fallen off every log, hay bale, and tractor I've ever seen? And do I whine? Kady, have you ever heard me whine?"

"I've accepted my fate to be an example to all humans."

"Well why don't you go back to sleep? It's 9am...it appears you have a laid back lifestyle. Meanwhile your mom yelled at me for leaving the broom and dustpan out and the door open."

"Give me that one present. Don't blog this."

"If I didn't love ya I wouldn't give a damn."

The Half Moon Treatment

Zach and I just got back from Oahu. While there, we walked about a mile to get from our hotel to our favorite beach spot. The quickest way was to walk along the beach but at some points the water line was right up against a hotel and so part of the way we had to walk along a pretty narrow sidewalk (pictured here). 

We walked with tubes and so it was a little awkward to traverse, and in some places it jams up with people cuz a giant turtle appears in the water below - anyway it's mostly single file. One day I was ahead of Zach in the single file walking, and we are in love, so I lowered my pants enough to give him the half moon treatment. 

When I turned around to laugh about it with him, he wasn't there. He's so sweet he let a tiny little demure Japanese woman and her husband pass him.

2016 - The Year in Review

Remember 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, and 2014?

Somehow there IS NO "2015 - Year in Review" post. 2015 was a blur. I got botox for the first time, bought my house, renovated it, met a boyfriend, fell in love, GOT ENGAGED, and my mom got breast cancer and moved in with me for 6 months to get surgery then radiation and chemotherapy treatments...then Hanna moved in...like I said. Blur.

2016 was WEIRD. For one thing, I didn't leave the country. (For the first time since 1998). Do you count Montreal, Canada? I guess I did leave the country. It didn't feel like it counted because it was just for the day and I didn't get a stamp and I drove there by myself when I was visiting Zach in Vermont. 

Oh yeah, Zach. I forgot to die alone and instead I got married! 

Photo by nylonsaddle

During 2016, Zach and I went to 27 states together (and Puerto Rico).

I became a stepmom.


We joined a kickball team:

We weren't number 1.

My mom got lung cancer (again) and this time it had moved to her leg (surgery to remove) and her brain (radiation to zap). I was all ready for her and my dad and Rowdy to move in with me and Zach and the kids into this 900 square foot house, but as it turned out she was only in the city for a month. While they were here they celebrated their 50th Wedding Anniversary.

2016. 

A great year. 

A tough year. 

The last year of me NOT being 40. 

Hawaii

Hawaii

Zach-isms, Vol. 2

"You have a very large arm. That arm should win a competition for something."

"I really feel that I'm 100% mentally there I'm just not audibly there and I mean that in a really sincere way."

"You have like a bowling ball head."

"Don't you dare face that on postagram."

"Let's try to do something that'll make our farts come out."

The Worst Kind of Turd is an Honest One, Volume: Step Mom

One of the first bike rides we went on as a step-family happened to be a 68-mile round trip from our house to Wisconsin and back. Which of course took hours. And made for a nice opportunity for conversation. 

The 14-year-old and I were riding side-by-side at one point, and he said to me: "Out of all the girls in my life I've ever met you're the only one who doesn't complain about her weight."

<Insert AWWWWWWWWWWWW here>

My heart got so warm. My head got so big it almost exploded. Every feminist bone in my body shone brightly --- finally! Somebody noticed and appreciated my "realness". I thanked him for noticing and responded by saying that it's important to be healthy and riding bikes is one way that I try to stay healthy, and blah blah blah....but then my mind retraced his comment..."complain about her weight" 

I asked, "wait. are you saying that it's surprising because I'm also like the one girl in your life who's not skinny?"

"Well. Yah," he said, "you're actually kind of fat."

Gonna be a long ride.

Squinch

I normally go to my Pilates class after work but today I wasn’t able to --- and so I hit the noon class. I was ten minutes late, of course (as I am ten minutes late for literally everything else in my life). I ran into the class, jumped on my machine and tried not to interrupt much.

The first move is called Beach Ball Twist. This is where you are on your knees, straight back, and take the handle of the Fit Former in front of you with “I Dream of Genie” arms and you twist at the waist. From 10:00 to 2:00, back and forth. It works best if you squinch your butt cheeks as hard as you can. So they say. So I squinched. And squinched. And twisted and turned from 2:00 to 10:00 to 2:00 and back.

The next move is Shot Put. This is where you take the same handle in your right hand and make an “L” – or half a football goal post. Then you TWIST and squinch your butt some more and then give yourself a “High 5” in the mirror. As I returned back to the half football goal post “L”  I happened to look over my shoulder at the person behind me.

Male Co-Worker.