Welcome

Welcome to my VERY random blog. The Home page will show you all of the posts in my blog. If you would like to find just the posts related to our move to and life in Hawaii, click on "The Journey"

Wednesday, December 5, 2012

Never a Rest Before Christmas!

Things always get crazy for me right before Christmas.  It's become more and more so in recent years, and I completely do it to myself.  Every year, I learn how to make new things and thus I have more things to make for people as gifts.  I try not to repeat things from year to year, though a couple relatives got their second round of scarves last year.  This year my sister had a baby, so that's one more to make things for, though, itty bitty adorable things I love making.  On top of that, I had a couple orders in my shop!  One was straight forward because it was premade, the other included 2 sets of cat toys which I pretty much always make once they are ordered.  So instead of making my cute little itty bitty baby mittens for my niece, I had something more urgent to do first!  I worked on them all weekend and got the order shipped out today so now it is back to Christmas making!  I think I will be making things, either knitting or crocheting, every day until Christmas gets here.

One other thing that had me busy over the weekend and at the beginning of the week was getting ready for a big end of the month.  I have been selected to be Featured Zibbeter at the end of the month into the beginning of the year (that week) which I haven't told many people yet so, unless you read this, you probably wouldn't know until it is up on Zibbet and in their newsletter!  But I had to get a photo for them and fill out an interview which wasn't very long but some parts required some thinking on my part.

So a very busy month for me!  I'm happy, but also know I will be THRILLED once the new year is here and it's time to... sit... and do nothing for a bit LOL

~Katy

Monday, November 26, 2012

I Fricken Love Swagbucks

It's true.  I love Swagbucks.  Just ask my husband... I've actually loved Swagbucks longer than I have loved him HA!  But yes, I do love me my Swagbucks.

If you haven't heard of Swagbucks, it's a search and win website.  Ya know, use their site to search, win points, trade the points in for stuff.  I was skeptical, but now years later I'm in love.  This has been a slow year for me, I'm  working on one or more Amazon.com gift cards which would probably work me up to a whopping $25 of free stuff, but this year I have been slacking.  Last year it was $55.  The year before was around $150.

So, if I'm not getting as much free stuff this year as in the past, you may be asking why I still love them so much, why now?  Well I admit, I used to get a lot of swagbucks from game tournaments.  Not sure if they ever said why they haven't come back, they said they were going to take them down temporarily but never went back up.  There's still games, but winning 2 SBs at a time versus like 25 makes a big difference.  In any case, now they have shop and earn... and it is STEALTH.  How stealth?  Let me share.

I was looking for the best xbox 360 deal this past weekend after my brother in law posted that he had a bundle he was looking to sell, so of course, I was price comparing.  I found the bundle they had at Best Buy and I was looking at a whole bunch of other stores to compare and at one point I clicked on the Best Buy link through shop and earn.  They make it easy- if you enter in a store they have for shop and earn in their search bar it takes you to shop and earn results.  So I clicked through that way, but later closed the tab, and afterwards went back by going straight to bestbuy.com... and eventually did order the xbox bundle.  This was Saturday.

Partway through the day yesterday I get my email confirming my order from bestbuy.com... then on my way to bed LATE last night I get an email from Swagbucks, something about shop and earn.  I was SO confused.  I didn't buy anything through shop and earn.  This email contains no info.  So I checked my Swagbucks account, and guess what...

 STEALTH.

Even though I closed the tab, and then went back to Best Buy NOT through Swagbucks later, seems that didn't matter.  I'm getting 399 Swagbucks for buying my xbox online.  HELLS YEAH.  For the record, that's 51 swagbucks short of a$5 amazon.com gift card.

I almost couldn't sleep I was so excited.  Am I crazy?  Well, of course I am.  But that's why you love me.  And, if you decide to want to try Swagbucks too, use my referral link... then I get more Swagbucks LOL... http://www.swagbucks.com/refer/Chickcasa

And no, I'm not getting anything from Swagbucks for writing how much I love them.  Though, it seems they DO have a program for bloggers to earn Swagbucks for just that.

~Katy

Saturday, November 24, 2012

Look What I Made!

Now, I make things often, as you may know, but I never cease to be proud what I figure out how to make something new.  This is particularly true when it comes to knitting, as I am admittedly far more skilled at crochet.  Well, last weekend I got hit with this urge to knit some mittens.  Not sure why, I don't typically wear mittens.  But I found myself a pattern, grabbed some of the yarn I have laying around (and boy do I have some yarn laying around) and got to knitting!

And here they are!I finished them last night.


Not sure why the picture turned itself around but they still look rather mitteny!  I'm pretty proud of them :)

In other news I have realized I have put up coupon codes for my Zibbet shop a few places now but have so far neglected you all!  So here is your very own coupon code good through November 30th.  So, if you see anything you want at my shop here: http://www.zibbet.com/kakers use coupon code "BLOG10" and get 10% off your order (before shipping.)  If you happen to have a coupon code from elsewhere, they should be stackable.

Here's a preview of something I am working on today to add to the shop shortly:

I just have to make its match and finish them off.  And of course photograph them, so even if I finish today it's unlikely they'll be listed before tomorrow.  But I'm pretty excited about these fingerless gloves!  I love the colors:)

Now off I go to knit some baby mitts for my niece!  Woo!

~Katy

Tuesday, November 20, 2012

Getting the Most Out of Your Bubble Bath

Yeah that's right.  Bubble baths!  Who doesn't love them? Even my husband does (he is awesome like that.) And of course so do I.  I got 2 bottles of bubble bath for Christmas last year, funny story actually.  My husband and sister both got me the SAME kind.  At first I was thinking of exchanging one for a different scent, but decided I liked the one they got enough that I'd keep both bottles.  It shimmers.  It makes the bath water shimmer.  It's good stuff.

The kind they both got me is one of the Philosophy ones...

It is SUPER thick. I always felt like when I squirted it in, it just broke up and flowed to the other side of the tub, and the bubbles were good but I wanted MORE bubbles.  When I made it to the bottom of the first bottle, I had to figure out of course a way to use up that last bit that wasn't going to come out on it's own. And that is how I came up with the idea!

It seems, that THINNER bubble bath makes for a better bubble foam.  Since the bubble bath is made to dissolve in water, it can easily be diluted and still work.  In fact, it works better.

So the first thing you need is an empty bottle.  I happen to have the empty bottle that matches my current bottle, but any bottle would do.

Squirt 1 long squirt or 2 squirts of your bubble bath into the bottle...





Then you add some water to the bottle...


And swirl it/gently invert it or shake it VERY gently.  You want to dissolve the bubble bath, but NOT make it bubble (much) in the bottle.



If you mix it a day or more beforehand you can actually skip the mixing step, it will most likely dissolve into the water pretty well on its own.  Next time you go to take a bubble bath, squirt the watered down version into the running water and watch the bubbles come!  You get the same bubbles, if not more, with one squirt watered down as I used to get with like 5 squirts full strength.



~Katy

Wednesday, November 14, 2012

So Begins the Holiday Chaos! (And General Catching Up)

Well, we are now just over a week away from Thanksgiving. Are you ready for it?  It has really snuck up on me!  As you may be able to tell from my lack of posts, I have been QUITE busy.  I added a few hours with kids at work.  I went to my sisters (10 hours away!) for her Halloween party and then rushed to beat a hurricane home the next day.  That was fun.  Since then my weekends have been busy.  My gymnastics coach had a birthday party at the gym a couple Saturdays ago which was GREAT, and this past weekend I decided at the very last minute to go to a dance competition.

I am SO GLAD I decided to go!  I found out someone I knew back in high school (and haven't seen since) has taken up West Coast Swing.  He used to to Lindy Hop in high school, which is another form of swing that west coast evolved from.  So, knowing he would be there and it wasn't too far away (3.5 hours!) I just HAD to go.  Not only is he a fantastic dancer, but we also drew each other in the jack and jill competition we were in (where you get paired with random people) and had one of my best dances all weekend.  At one part, I think my heart stopped.  Seriously.  It was awesome.

And now here we are a week away from Thanksgiving!  We are going to my in-laws and it would seem that... so are my parents!  I can't wait.  I have a nice, happy, drama-free family.  Well, ok, no family is completely drama free, but we're as close as it's gets.  I like to think of it as my own personal family utopia.  Thanksgiving with my parents and in-laws, Christmas with my parents, my sister and her in-laws.  Sounds great right?  Well... it does to me anyways!  LOL

Other than being excited for Thanksgiving, though, I am completely unprepared for the holidays.  We don't know what we are getting anyone (except my brother in law!) and haven't figured out our travel plans.  So anyone else out there unprepared for the holidays?  Or are you all set and just waiting for go time?

~Katy

Saturday, October 20, 2012

Productivity Feels Good

I'm slowly but surely making more cool weather things to add to my shop.  The past few days I have been working on some fingerless gloves!  One pair that I made last weekend I am not yet sure if I want to keep them as my own or list them, and then I finished another pair today that I will be listing.  These are the ones I am definitely listing...


I think they turned out pretty good  Hopefully tomorrow I will get them listed in my shop.

I've been miserable with headaches most of the weekend.  None today, but a sore throat.  Stupid allergies!  Here's to hoping tomorrow is better.  I've also been LAZY as far as working out the last couple days which isn't good.  Tomorrow I HAVE to do an ab workout and play some Just Dance 4!  That will help!

~Katy

Friday, October 19, 2012

Abs Workout - First Try

Ok I promised to share my workouts for my abs as I work them out so here is the first one!  I'll try and get decent pictures for each exercise but I make no promises since I'll have to use the timer feature on my camera.  These are mostly from the Quick Fix workouts I was talking about in my previous entry, but with other ones in there, too.  Each one should take 10-15 minutes to do MAX.  I suppose after I do it all the way through I will share how long they took me!  I'm actually writing this out to plan out which exercises I am going to try first, and then adding in the pictures and descriptions. (edit, I am posting this without pictures, for the time being, but will add them later in the weekend!)

Ok so here is #1- if you can think of a good name for it, let me know!  For each exercise do 16 (some is each side, some total, I'll specify).  Why 16?  Because then you can do this to music more easily, most music is in 8 counts and 8 seemed too few, so 16 it is.  Not everyone notices if they are with the music, but being a swing dancer, it would throw me off!

1- Rolling Back Crunch
Sitting with your knees bent and feet on the floor, sit with your back straight up with elbows bent and hands by your sides.  Round your back lowering it halfway to the ground and sweep around straight out to your side and then in front.  Arms should reach straight in front of you as your back is at its most rounded.  Straighten your back while sitting up and take arms straight back to being bent by your sides.  This is one rep.  Continue in a fluid motion.

2- 4 Beat Reverse Crunch
Lie on your back with your knees up and feet on the floor.  Keeping your knees at a 90 degree angle raise feet until hips are also at a 90 degree angle.  Pause, this is the first beat.  Roll hips in towards abdomen, raising butt off the floor and keeping knees at a 90 degree angle.  This is the second beat.  Reverse this, again in 2 beats, until feet are just off the floor.  This is one rep.

3- Straight Leg/Wide Leg Crunch
Laying flat on your back with your legs straight out or in a V, hold your arms straight just over your hips.  Raise shoulders off the group while reaching your fingers towards your knees.  Lower back down. This is one rep.

4- Side Hip Raises - 16 each side
Lay on your side propping yourself upon your forearm with your hips on the floor and knees bent (alternately, keep your legs straight for a more difficult move) Lift your hips up in the air so your torso and thighs make a straight line, then lower back down.

5- Around the World Crunch - 8 clockwise, 8 counter clockwise
On Quick Fix they joke that this is like an "Groove Ab Funk" LOL.  Lay on your back with knees bent and feet on the floor.  With your hands behind your head lift your shoulders off the ground by moving your chest in a circle, lowering your shoulders back down at the end of the circle.  You can alternate clockwise and counter clockwise or do all 8 one direction before switching.  One circle is one rep.

6- Clocks - 8 to each side (alternating sides, 16 total)
For some reason this move reminds me of the hands on a clock.  Lay on your back with your feet up and knees bent and your arms straight out to your sides.  Roll your hips to one side then extend legs out to the side until they are straight while reaching towards your toes with the opposite arm.  Lower arms and bend legs, then twist legs back to the center.  This is one rep, alternate sides with each rep.

7- Clam Shell Crunch
Start laying on the ground with your foot on the floor and knees up.  Simultaneously lift your shoulders off the ground crunching your shoulders towards your legs while rolling your knees towards your abdomen.  Return to starting position.  This is one set.

8- In and Outs
Lay on your back propped up on your elbows with your legs extended.  Lift heels off of the floor then bend legs in towards abdomen.  Extend legs back straight without heels touching the floor.  This is one rep.

9- Bicycles  16 total, alternating sides (or challenge yourself and do 24 or 32!)
Your typical bicycle ab exercise, and one of my favorites!  Lay on your back with your feet off the floor and your hips and knees at 90 degree angles.  With your hands behind you ears or neck left your shoulders off the ground.  Extend one leg and twist that shoulder to the opposite sides bent knee.  This is one rep, alternate sides switching which leg is extended for each rep.

10- Hollow Rocks
Lay on your back stretched out with your arms by your side.  Hollow out your body (lift feet and shoulders off the ground slightly keeping your core TIGHT) and lift arms off the floor.  Use your abs to rock while maintaining this position.  Rock forward and back.  This counts as one rep.  Alternately, you can hold your arms straight up over your head off the floor while rocking.

Finish off with a good stretch!  Always end with a good ab stretch.

When I tried this workout it took under 10 minutes (about 8), and I was feeling every exercise before the 16 were done.  As I am editing and saving a day after initially writing, I can say that my abs were a little sore but not uncomfortably so.  I also have to admit to backing down to 8 reps for a couple of the later moves, but next time I hope to do all 16!  So while in the end it took me about 8 minutes, it of course will take a minute or two longer with all the reps.

Let me know if you try this how it goes for you, or if you have any questions about the moves!  Also if anyone is interested in logging it on fitocracy I can let you know how I logged it, it was worth 200 points with the 8 reps of a couple of them so it's worth over 200 when done all the way.

~Katy

Wednesday, October 17, 2012

I Can Walk Again!

So, on Friday night I did this abs workout, it was the one here which I hear is based on the p90x ab ripper workout.  Looking at an overview of the ab ripper workout, it looks like this one leaves out one exercise.  So, I did this workout, slowly.  I did one move for as many reps as it said... then sat on the ground watching TV and figuring out the next move, then did the next, etc.  So it took me a while.  I managed to finish it, though towards the end I was wearing low.

The problem I found with this workout is there is just too much focus on exercises where your legs are lifted.   This has the effect of working out your hip flexors as much as if not more than your abs.  Which led to my barely being able to walk or hold my balance for DAYS.  Seriously.  Yesterday morning it was still just barely noticeable.  Thankfully it was better today in time for gymnastics but YIPES!  I hear people get great results from it, but for me, I just don't think it is well balanced enough.  I do, however, need to get my hip flexors stronger as well so I think I will continue to incorporate some of the moves into my ab rotation.

Which leads me to- I have decided I am going to make my OWN ab rotation.  I'm going to pick out my favorite ab exercises and do different ones each time I work out my abs.  And, lucky for all of you, I intend to share those here in this blog.  I hope some of you will try some of my ab workouts and give me some good feedback :)  As I go I will probably narrow them down to a few set routines.  In the past I have used the Quick Fix ab workouts that are on their Total Mix CD.  You can bet there will be some exercises from there!  But I also have a binder full of workouts torn out from magazines (A BINDER FULL!  Though, mine is an actual binder.  With actual magazine workouts stuffing it.  There are pictures of women in it.  LOL.)

So I'll be going through ALL of that to find my favorites before I share them with you.  Maybe I will manage to make a routine rotation that is nice and well rounded!  I must warn you though, abs are my BIGGEST strength.  I love working my abs, I have natural endurance in them.  So, 100 crunches for me is only tough when I am REALLY out of shape.  This could be part of why the ab workout I tried on friday hurt my hip flexors so much more, maybe my abs (which were sore, but not a ton) are just up to the challenge and my hip flexors are weak.

So who will be trying my abs rotation when I put it up?  Anyone?

~Katy

Saturday, October 13, 2012

And Now, Back To Our Regularly Scheduled Programming

Ok, I know most of you don't come here to read about politics, and may just be tired of politics and election talk in general at this point.  So this is me, promising you that I am NOT going to turn this blog into a political one for the remainder of the election season.  I MAY write again about it, but I promise it won't take over my whole blog :)

Yesterday was I LOVE YARN DAY!  I have to be honest though, I wasn't much feeling in the yarnie mood.    Today, though, is a different story!  Not long ago I came across some washcloths I had made ages ago but never listed, and I was looking through yarn earlier in the week and came across a cotton yarn I wanted to work with.  So I made TWO more washcloths today, one in an ombre blue yarn and one white with that same blue yarn just on the outside edge.


So those I will have to actually photograph and list soon!  I love ripple washcloths, can you tell?

BUT!  It is winter, and my washcloths section of my shop is full (See?) compared to my selection of cold weather gear.  So my next task today?  Fingerless gloves!  I only have one pair in my shop, and I think people are antsy to see some more so I'm going to use some alpaca blend yarn and make some SUPER comfy fingerless gloves!

~Katy

Friday, October 12, 2012

First Time For Everything!

So, many of you may know me, but not necessarily well.  Because of that, it's likely that you don't realize how non-political I tend to be.  I tend not to vote, actually I have only voted once, and have always just let everyone else deal with political issues.  As you probably noticed from my last entry, this election season is different.  I am just over the main candidates.  And, thanks to isidewith.com, I found a candidate I DO like.  Which leads us to a first for me,

I never before have attended any sort of political event.  Starting to follow Gary Johnson, though, I have thought "it would be really cool to meet him, and to hear him talk in person!" And had that thought when an event was created for him appearing in New Mexico earlier in the week.  Then, up pops an event with him in DC.  That's close!  I was trying to figure out how to rearrange my work schedule so I could go, and up pops another event in Richmond.  The DC event was a "meet and greet" somewhere with drinks (THAT would have been nice) and in Richmond there was a "rally" at VCU.  Drinks is more my style, but my schedule could only be rearranged to get to Richmond so that is where I went!

Gary is just the same in person as in the videos I have seen of him online.  He is consistent with his message, and what really stood out to me was the question portion.  He answered every question, and they were not pre-screened.  He didn't go on tangents and avoid ANY topic.  He may have started in a direction that seemed to not address the question, but it always, always tied back in.  Basically, it would go like this "What do you think about X?"  and he would reply "Z blah blah Y blah blah, and that's why for X...." it's nice listening to a politician that is up front.

Here are some pictures from the event!  I even got to shake his hand and get a picture, I was thrilled!











~Katy

Wednesday, October 10, 2012

Who Is This Gary Johnson, And Why Should We Care?

If you happen to have me on Facebook or Twitter or Google Plus, you may have noticed since the first presidential debate I have started to get vocal about my choice of candidate for President.  You may also have noticed that my choice is NOT either Obama or Romney, in fact I feel quite strongly that neither of them is the right man for the job.  I am rooting for someone who arguably at this point in time may have little to no chance of winning, but he should.  And this is why.

Gary Johnson is up-front.  Sometimes a little in-your-face about what he believes, but this is a good thing.  He knows what he believes, he knows what he wants to do as President and he isn't going to sugar coat things.

Gary Johnson has a great track record as 2 term governor of New Mexico.  When he left office, he left the state with a $1 billion budget SURPLUS.   And he has a proposed budget for the country for 2013 on paper.  A BALANCED budget!  Yes, it has some major changes (cuts) to make that happen.  But that is necessary.

Gary Johnson is willing to do what is necessary.

Gary Johnson wants to abolish the IRS and replace income tax with a "Fair Tax"... a consumption tax.  That sounds a lot more fair to me (I suppose that is why it gets the name"fair tax.")

Gary Johnson opposes the Patriot Act.

Gary Johnson wants to end the war on drugs (it is a waste of money.)  and wants to end our involvement in foreign wars we really have nothing to do with in the first place.

Gary Johnson is a candidate for president and is a GOOD option.  He doesn't have the financial backing of the democratic and republican parties, true.  But do we want our candidates to be decided on who has more MONEY behind them?

We should care about Gary Johnson and his candidacy because he offers a refreshing, different alternative in an election where the major candidates do not have enough to offer most of us.

Does any of this sound like something you agree with?  What candidate do you side with?  Check out www.isidewith.com and let me know what you find out!  Be informed.

Oh, and Gary Johnson is bad-ass.  He climbed Mount Everest.  With a broken leg.  So kudos to him for that!

~Katy

Tuesday, October 9, 2012

Rain, Rain GO AWAY!

Fall is here!  It arrived over the weekend with a tap-tap-tap on the windows.   Oh, and a nice big ol' drop in the temperature.  20 degrees down!  Yipes!  Guess mother nature didn't want to do the gradual thing this year.

Personally, my body was created for the summer.  This kind of gloomy weather hits, and i need to do something about it.  I slept away half the weekend and have been SUPER low on energy.  Yesterday it was pouring down.  Today my clients cancelled and I couldn't drag myself out of bed before 1.  In the afternoon! On a workday!  WHAT??!!

So that decided it, it's officially time to start my tanning season.  Some people find it funny, I go all pale in the summer, but in the fall and winter you should see how tan I get.  Today was a horrible day until I went tanning, the effect of my energy level has already been nice and I only went for a few minutes.  I'm all about moderation and tanning safely!  I know, many people don't think there is a "tanning safely," but I have looked at the studies (the studies, not the propaganda style articles of doom.) Honestly I haven't yet seen one that looks at tanning in moderation.  Most lump in people who go tanning a handful of times a month, or even once in their life, with people who tan multiple times per day!  What??  For one thing, hello common sense, when the beds are regulated as having a maximum exposure time that means PER DAY!  I would even argue that it's a good general rule for that to be the maximum exposure per two days.  In any case, people who clearly tan excessively are OF COURSE going to have harmful effects.

Even water can kill you if you get too much of it.

~Katy

Saturday, October 6, 2012

So Tired!

I had a fun night last night, but am sure paying for it today.  I wasn't up too late, but then I ended up not getting out of bed until nearly 3:30 in the afternoon!  It's crazy.  All we did was go have dinner and drinks and watched a movie with some friends, and we were in bed before 1!  Oh well, I guess.

I also ended up feeling the urge to make another cowl.  It's just one color and only has one ruffle to it, but it's nice and fluffy and warm, made with alpaca!  I started it yesterday and finished it just now.



I'd say it turned out really good!  Will have to list it tomorrow.  Still need to sew in the ends on the two scarves LOL... But now I want to make more!  More more!  This is good for my shop.

So now I am just relaxing while my husband is out playing poker.  We couldn't think of anything to go out and do together, and he was going stir crazy and I didn't care to change out of my PJs and go anywhere.  So here I am just relaxing, crocheting, watching TV and movies, about to take a bath.  Maybe a bubble bath tonight!  

~Katy

Wednesday, October 3, 2012

One down, two to go!

Just a quickie to update that the cowl is now listed in my shop, here: http://www.zibbet.com/kakers/artwork?artworkId=989596 

Still have to tie in the ends of the scarves and take pictures of them, and plan to take better pictures of the cowl soon.  But for now, gymnastics time!!

~Katy

Tuesday, October 2, 2012

Two Debuts!

I know, I have been quiet the past few days.  Things are pretty great!  AND!  I have a couple things to show you and both are in the same pictures.  I started making a new item for my shop (and no, I still haven't sewn in the ends of the two scarves so I can list them, I need to do that this week, like really.) I got inspired by the scarves I was making and decided to make a cowl!  I don't normally like cowls, but I felt like the ruffles would work well with it.  I made it in pink and purple, pink in the center with purple ruffles on each side.

The other thing being- I got my hair done on Saturday!  I got it cut and I got it dyed!  It's a very pretty red now, at the suggestion of my husband.  So here is the cowl, on me,so you can see both!  I even made silly faces for you.




~Katy

Friday, September 28, 2012

What Next??

Well, it has been such an interesting day!  It started off a quite good day, our staff meeting was brief and brought with it good news. Our clients will no longer have a dollar cap on treatment for the year, so we no longer have to limit sessions!  Pretty awesome, considering they were only getting 4 hours per week of therapy when recommended is 20+.  It's called "intensive" for a reason!  Anyways, then I made a YUMMY brunch quesadilla with eggs and cheese and harm on corn tortillas.  Turns out, corn tortillas have fewer calories than flour ones, so despite the fact that flour ones really are much more tasty, I now have enough corn tortillas to last me half a lifetime.  I can only stomach them cooked, so they're a no-go for fajitas (tried it, ick, never again!) but for quesadillas as long as I salt them it turns out OK.   So I had a nice filling brunch that didn't pack a ton of calories and didn't come out of a bunch of little packages.

Left for my client in a great mood, enjoying the weather with my sunroof open, driving along.  On course to get there on time, but nooooo... disabled vehicle a couple miles before the exit.  NOT happy about that but pushed on through, only backed me up like 5 minutes.  Till I hit the entrance to their neighborhood.  It's a gated community, and I guess noon is THE time for people to arrive and have to check in at the gate.  So I got to sit there in line, and ended up 15 minutes late.  Not so much a big deal, but I have things to do today and that's 15 minutes everything had to get shifted back.  *sigh*  Oh well.

So, on my way home, and despite a little traffic a couple times that really pissed me off (I did NOT have time to hit traffic again!  Too much to do!!) I managed to actually make good time and got myself to the pet store to get food for the dragons.  Stocked up pretty good, too.  Got to the register... crap.  I didn't have my wallet on me.  Turns out when I was paying bills after the staff meeting I left it on the couch.  Seriously?  So it took me 30 minutes to get home and back with my wallet.  30 more minutes I didn't need to lose.

Ugh I am so frustrated!  I know, nothing horrible, but I have a report I am trying to finish and ...

(then I got distracted, cause I have ADD... LOL... and I went and wrote that report!)

~Katy

Wednesday, September 26, 2012

Small Project Update

One curly scarf is done (except for sewing in the ends) and the other is getting close to being there!  Here is where they are at now:




The one that isn't yet done is SO soft and just enough fuzzy with a little bit of shimmer in the yarn.  It's going to be one of those that I am tempted to keep for myself!

~Katy

WOO! Check Out What I Did!

Ok so I am proud.  I have been working on a flyspring for months, mostly on the tumbl trak which is a long trampoline, really.  Today I started doing them on the rod floor, which is a carpeted tumble strip with a bit more spring than the spring floor that the floor exercise is done on.  At first, I was doing them onto stacked mats at the end of the rod floor in the foam pit.  Then I moved one of the mats onto the rod floor and check this out!!


Now, if I take the mat away... which shouldn't make it harder, since the extra height of the may adds to how hard it is, especially with the softness taking away some of the push off the hands... I fall.  Yeah, not sure why.  Must be a mental thing.  I DID land it once perfect and once a little low but without falling.  My coach says it's a problem with piking my body after I punch (jump off 2 feet) which just means I have to really GO FOR IT and REACH so I jump straight into a handstand.

Anyways I am so excited!  I am so close to having it :)  WOOO!!

~Katy

Tuesday, September 25, 2012

He Lives!

So, I have for quite a long time wanted a massive fish tank.  Or a few.  A couple years ago I had a spare ten gallon and our office manager wanted a fish tank on her desk, so I brought it in.  I had the whole set up and it was just sitting under my table, so why not?  So for a while our office at work had a fish tank.  The kids loved it.  Eventually, though, the company grew and we just no longer had room for the fish tank.  So despite hearing for ages from Eric that, no, we were not getting a fish tank, I suddenly had a fish tank.  Fish and all!  But fish I didn't like.

One day I was at the pet store and found a great deal on a used 55 gallon tank with stand.  It took a while, but we transferred the fish into the big tank.  Still mostly fish I didn't like,except the Khuli loach.  Man do I love Khuli loaches.

Here is the wonderful fish tank, not long after it was set up last winter...

We've had all sorts of issues with it with green water (ugh) so even though I had all these plans for it with tons of tetras (yes, bunches of tiny fish for the big tank!  Schools of 'em!)  But I think what I will have to do is replace the light, because if I leave the tank light off the green goes away, but if I leave it on even a full day the water starts getting green again.  I need to look into what kind of light is IN there (the fixture came used with the bulbs in it) and what I can switch to.  But due to all these issues, I had gone for quite a while without the light on and as a result, lost a number of the fish.  All of the bloodfin tetras, at least.

I wasn't sure about my Khuli loach.  For those of you who don't know, they are the kind of fish that hide, and will typically come out when it is dark.  I hadn't seen it at all since the extended blackout, and just figured at this point it must have not made it.  Then today I go to turn on some lights in that room, and there he is!!!


Pardon the dirtiness, the whole tank needs to be cleaned.  But YAY!  The loach lives!  He is one of the fish that we had in the tank when it was at work, and thus he is called "Worm" because that's what the office manager thought he looked like.  

Hope to see you again soon,Worm!

~Katy

Monday, September 24, 2012

Little Projects

I can't work on the big project all the time, right?  That is part of why it is taking so long!  Anyways, I do have my shop to fill and with fall now here, it is time to add some new warm weather gear.

I decided (with some help from some of my favorite fellow Zibbet shop owners) to make some curly scarves and some neck warmers both.  I couldn't decide, they said do both, so I am!  But I am starting with the curly scarves first, at least a couple.  They just feel more "fall" to me.

Here is a sneak preview... I've just started work on one, and will be doing the next one in two colors :)




Yeah I know, not very much to show so far, but hey it's something!  The only thing about the curly scarves is that while they start up really quick, each row has twice as many stitches and thus takes twice as long!  Anyways enough time off from crocheting, back to it I go!

~Katy

Sunday, September 23, 2012

Big Project!!

So some of you may know that I love to crochet.  I love to crochet so much that I started making more than I could use or give away and I opened an online shop, first on Etsy, and now on Zibbet (because Etsy is horrible, people.) which if you want you can check out here... http://www.zibbet.com/kakers

Anyways I don't just make things for the shop.  I make things for ME and for my family as well.  Last year at Christmas Eric and I picked out yarn so I could make us a blanket and well, it's been somewhat slow going but I've been working on it more lately and it's getting pretty close to done!  It needs to be wide and long enough to cover us both at the same time.  I'm actually starting to think there's a chance I may not need the last skein of each color that I have in order to finish it!  But we will see.

This was while I was working on it last weekend...

And I went ahead and took a few more pictures to share with you :)


(Splenda wanted in on the action)

(So did Honey.  Yes, these are different cats.)


As you can see it has a little length to go but it's looking good so far!  I'm going to be so proud once it is done, I've never finished a full sized afghan before!

~Katy

Saturday, September 22, 2012

Make Your Own Pizza Night

Last night we had our friends Brandon and Aimee over with Brondon's son.  It was an awesomely good time, even though not everything went as I had planned.  We planned this idea like a week ago, and I had intended to make the dough last weekend to give it some time to proof and get a better flavor and all that, but once we figured out we couldn't do it until Friday I figured that would be too long for it to sit, and during the week I just didn't have energy or time.

So I ended up making the dough right about when they said they were heading over.  I scoured the internet for a recipe, again, I'd used 2 different ones so far.  I ended up finding one that looked good and used bread flour and some whole wheat flour, since Eric had mentioned that maybe we should throw the wheat flour away since we had other flour and I had refused.  Different flours serve different purposes!  Anyways I made the dough using the recipe I found using instant yeast, it seemed slightly dry to me but I went with it.  Unfortunately, the dough didn't feel like rising.  Sigh.  But I rolled some out and tried making a pizza with it, and it actually turned out super good!  Our pizzas all looked amazing and tasted as amazing as they looked :)


~Katy


Thursday, September 20, 2012

Good Job, VDOT

Unless you are a local you likely have not heard about the cluster f.... that was last weekends traffic in Hampton Roads.  Short version, the Virginia Department of Transportation decided to close a tunnel and a bridge, both going the same direction, at the same time.  This may not seem like the worst thing, until you realize there is only ONE other roadway going the same direction.  People were stuck in traffic for hours.  It was horrible.

Here's an article about it... http://www.wavy.com/dpp/news/local_news/newport_news/bridge-closures-cause-major-delays

Anyways, now they have cancelled their plans to close the tunnel again the next two weekends cause they realized it was a really freaking bad idea... not only that but they are publishing apologies left and right.  There's ads on the radio saying basically "we're so sorry."   You can hear it here... http://hampton.wtkr.com/news/news/62733-what-do-you-think-about-vdots-radio-announcement

Good job, VDOT, screwing up so bad and trying to apologize.  Don't you have people whose job it is to determine how much of an impact that roadwork will have on traffic?  Also, new flash, since apparently no one who makes these decisions for VDOT drives, it is NEVER a good idea to do major road work on multiple roads going the same way at the same time EVER, closures or not.  Just don't do it!  It WILL cause problems, and it's unnecessary.

~Katy

Tuesday, September 18, 2012

My quesadilla

Yum!


So Much Yummy!

We got a quesadilla maker for our wedding.  It is AMAZING.  It was one of the first things that was sent to us off our registry and let me tell you, it has been well used.  This week when I went shopping I guess I was craving eggs and bacon, because I got plenty of both (and cheese!) and not have a plethora of breakfast options.  Today, it is a bacon egg and cheese quesadilla!  It's still too hot to eat yet, but I am really looking forward to it.

I made 2 scrambled eggs (scrambled with milk and salt, of course) and used those plus some crumbled bacon and 1/4 cup of cheddar jack cheese, all of 9" tortillas.  I need to get smaller tortillas next time, I think our quesadilla maker was made for 8" ones but oh well!  These worked OK for now.

The only problem will all of this goodness is that it is 734 calories!  Yipes!  So I think I may eat half and then leave the rest for left-overs another day.  We'll see how hungry I am though, it's a late day for me so this is brunch really, so eating half of my calories for the day could just make sense.

Last night I made fajitas.  We tried the Taco Bell brand fajita seasoning and we both really liked it.  So that we will definitely be getting again, unless there is a less expensive brand that we also like.  My poor husband is still adjusting to my mindset of "if it tastes OK, we're getting the non-brand-name kind to save some money."  It just makes sense!

Ok maybe my quesadilla is now cool enough to eat... let's see...

~Katy

Sunday, September 16, 2012

This weight has GOT to GO

Ok, I know to most people I am not anything close to overweight.  But I have gotten to my heaviest point ever and it gets OLD not being able to fit into half of my clothing anymore.  This has GOT to stop.  Last year I lost 10 pounds between early September and New Years day.  I actually woke up on January 1 just under 140.  Now I'm weighing in around 156.  Ouch.  Here is where I am at now...

I gotta admit it's really not so bad from the front.  It's from the side... yipes.  My stomach is bigger than my boobs. That is just NOT OK.  That gut has GOT to go.

So here is my problem, I really am not a big fan of dieting or watching what I eat.  I'm not very good at it.  So my plan is to count my calories -which honestly the last time I did it confirmed I really don't eat THAT much.  Once I get a handle of how much I want to be eating I'll probably stop.  Last year I managed to lose it without cutting out my fast food and soda and all the crap I eat.  So hopefully I don't have to this time either.  I've already switched to mostly diet soda.

What I need to really concentrate on is EXERCISE.  I swear I WILL change my body significantly by becoming more active with only minor tweaks to my diet.  Just you watch!  It will happen!  Slowly, yes, but it will happen.  The slow creep stops NOW.

~Katy

Saturday, September 15, 2012

What to wear...

My biggest dilemma this weekend... I am going to a birthday party for a former client of mine that is turning 5!  What does one WEAR to a 5 yr olds birthday party?  I do not have children (clearly, from my previous post LOL) and have not been to a 5 yr olds birthday party since I was, well, 5.

No time to think about it though, the party is in 20 minutes and I have to dress NOW so I can go get a gift and get to the party!  This should be interesting.

~Katy

Wednesday, September 12, 2012

Life Changer?

Well, maybe life changing is a bit dramatic.  Or maybe not!  I think it all depends on how you look at it.  What am I talking about?  Going to the park.  Seems simple enough- and it is!

See, I work doing in-home therapy.  My schedule involves a decent amount of extra time between appointments so I can get between even if I hit a little traffic, and I had found over the summer that the time between 2 of my clients tended to be way too much.  I would bring my lunch to eat in-between, but have nowhere to go to eat it so I'd end up going and getting fast food and sitting down to eat it.

Not sure what took me so long to think of it, but this week I decided I would find a park somewhere between my two clients where I could go to eat during the nice days.  And oh did I find a park!  And it is glorious.

These were my companions during my short lunch break today...


I got so distracted by the turtles, they were just so relaxing to watch, that I never got to reading my book I had brought.  Monday I sat by the water on a little dock and read a book while I ate, then read my book on a swing when I was done eating.  Yes, I love swings.  I'm a full grown adult, I will never stop!  It's such a pretty and peaceful place.  I predict that going to the park during my breaks, getting fresh air, going for walks or swinging on the swings instead of sitting on my butt the whole time will make a pretty good difference in my life.  Cause it's the little things, really, right?

~Katy

Tuesday, September 11, 2012

Well Played, Burger King.

Some of you may know, some of you may not, how much I eat really crappy food.  I eat a LOT of fast food.  My husband and I own a deep fryer and I use it to make myself my favorite meal often (chicken and fries!) Well, I have been less than thrilled with Burger King.  What were they thinking getting rid of chicken fries?  Those were crazy addictive.  But they dropped them! WTF!

Since they got rid of chicken fries I've not eaten there more than once or twice.  Their nuggets they introduced when they dropped the chicken fries are just... yuck.  Their old ones weren't so good, the nuggets they insisted on calling tenders.  The new ones even worse.  Another, what were they thinking?  I haven't even bothered trying their new chicken strips.

But they got my attention with the popcorn chicken, I have to admit.  So after a couple years of refusing to eat at Burger King (unless someone else was paying, I'm not about to say no to free food LOL) I went tonight to give their new chicken a try.  I was pleasantly surprised!  I ordered, and they let me know it would be a few minutes because they cook the popcorn chicken to order.  That was a good sign.  Once they were done, and I had let them cool off a bit, I have to admit to being happy with the choice.  Actual breaded chunks of chicken- not ground chicken.   Chunks of chicken.  Yay!  It was nice and juicy and tasted pretty good.

So, well played Burger King.  I now will eat your food again.

~Katy

Sunday, August 26, 2012

It Does Not Rain Here!

So, Eric had gone to mow the lawn the other day before we went out to get some shopping done.  He cut up his hand at work, and managed to tear it back open mowing so I told him to only finish the front and I'd get the backyard over the weekend. Wellll.... Friday "doesn't count" as the weekend, and yesterday I was just lazy and today I realize crap, I need to mow the lawn!  It's almost 5 and it's looking dark... oh hey thats a lot of clouds!

So this of course is when I decide to mow the lawn.

Note, we are in that spot with no rain.  This is NOT an uncommon radar this summer.  And that big blob of red will never get here!  Today it is moving north.  But even when it is moving east, it ends up having what my father has dubbed "The Kate Effect" and breaks down to nothing before reaching me.  Frequently, we don't end up even seeing rain.

I.  Love.  Storms.  So I find it rather offensive that mother nature has somehow created this bubble over my neighborhood that seems to make it impervious to storms.

~Katy
PS- that lack of rain over the swamp is another typical pattern!  Guess the swamp is wet enough.

Friday, August 24, 2012

Happy Friday!

Well it is FRIDAY!  For most people it's the end of the work week. For me it's the start of the weekend!  Well, kinda.  I typically don't have clients on Fridays so all the work I do, I do from home.  In my PJs typically.  Sometimes I hole up in my office, where my cats aren't allowed, and sometimes I bring the work computer downstairs and cuddle while I work.  More often I just do nothing after the clinical meeting (which is online or on the phone!)
Which means that nothing exciting has happened today.  Except the rotten tomatoes.
See, I was sitting on the couch doing nothing important when I heard a sound.  I assumed it was a cat was coming into the room, but looked and saw 3 of them sitting next to me or at my feet (yep,my cats love me.) then they all started to look at where the sound came from, got up and started staring and sniffing.  I was thinking, oh hey!  I love having cats, they notice and creepy crawlies so I have warning and can find them.  I look at where they are looking expecting a bug.  Instead I hear a drip.  My husbands coworker had given him some fresh tomatoes from her garden, and they had ended up on the table. (Note, our kitchen table is currently in our living room.  Yeah.  We're strange.)  Anyways they were double bagged in Walmart bags and had gone rotten and started, as vegetables to when they rot, to get a bit soggy.  The water was dripping out of the bag onto the floor and into a pair of my shoes.
That settled my need to replace those shoes!  Later I went and spent entirely too much money on shoes, and now all is well.  The tomato water didn't get all over the table (thank goodness!) and not much had dropped before I caught it and tossed the bag.

~Katy

Thursday, August 23, 2012

Kids... Or a lack thereof.

So now that I am married and my sister has had her first child, I feel as though the topic of kids comes up more often.  Have you ever noticed that once you are married everyone just assumes you're going to pop out a kid or a few?  Like your marriage isn't complete without one.  You should hear the comments if your answer to "so when are you having one?" is "never." Even when you include a whole list of well thought out reasons why kids aren't for you, there's always a reply along the lines of "ohhh that may change."
I once even had a conversation with a woman explaining how I didn't want kids whose reply was basically that I would probably change my mind like her sister who never wanted kids but changed her mind... and  went on to add that now that she thinks of it her sister is just not a good mother.  Um, yes, thanks for proving my point!
I will be perfectly honest, I'm not completely sure why people want kids in the first place.  Childbirth and pregnancy are uncomfortable and painful.  Kids are a lot of hard work that you can't take a break from.  Most people don't even have time for their kids really, and pay to make them someone else's responsibility at least a part of the time.
My own personal reasons for not wanting kids are numerous, and one of them is that I love my job, I intend to continue doing it for quite some time, and would not like the idea of sending my kids to daycare.  I don't live close to my family, so I do not have the option to have family watch them like my sister does living close to both our parents and her inlaws.  I just personally don't feel child care is the best place to have a child for such a length of time almost every day.  In addition to being expensive, I would just not feel good about myself if I had kids in daycare.  Since I have already put a lot of time and heart into my profession, and those in my position are desperately needed, it makes sense to me to focus on that.
Also, I am in need of a lot of down time.  I like getting home from work and sitting on my ass.  My husband likes getting home from work and sitting on his ass.  That would not happen with kids.  I like to pursue interests outside of work, I swing dance and go to gymnastics classes and those are things I may not have the time to do with kids.  Some people see this as selfish, I know, not wanting kids because they would get in the way of me doing what I want.  But it's entirely the opposite.  I would be selfish if I decided to have kids and still did everything I wanted anyways despite it interfering with quality time with my kids.  I know lots of people like spending their time with kids (particularly their own) and are perfectly happy devoting all their free time to them.  I am not that person.  I worked hard to be a financially stable adult with the freedom to do whatever I want (within budget) whenever I want (work schedule permitting.)
And about that financial stability thing... KIDS ARE EXPENSIVE!!  We don't need that.  So much added stress.  No thanks!
I continue to go back in forth in my head on whether or not I'd even be a good mother.  On the one hand, I have a lot of experience and training and know my kids would be well behaves- IF I ever got up off my lazy butt to deal with them appropriately.  I'm just not sure if I'd be that mom who sat there and yelled "stop that!" from the other room without ever actually DOING something.  And I can't stand moms like that.  So I certainly don't want to become one.  And if I were to become one, my kids would be those annoying bratty kids that made me realize maybe I don't like kids all that much in general.
And of course, my husband also doesn't want kids.  He just doesn't like them, is what he says.
So, why do people want kids?  This is an answer I don't have many answers to.
To take care of them when they are older?
To have someone to love?
To have something to take care of?
To live vicariously through them?
Because god said they should?
Because society/family/etc said they should?
To see what the combination of genes with their chosen person looks like?
A crazy experiment?
Biological, evolutionary instincts?

If you have kids, why did you choose to have them?  If you have not, why not?  Would love to hear other peoples thoughts!

~Katy

Wednesday, August 22, 2012

I'm Back!

Hello there!  I am back and so much has happened since I last wrote!  I am married now, I think is the biggest change.  Another big change is I left the company I had been with since October, 2008.  I began a new job the last day of April and I love it!  I am still doing the same thing I was, but with a new company, and while the old company had a center where I did therapy, the one I work for now does in-home therapy and as of now doesn't have an office so I spend a lot more time at home and with the exception of clients and their families during sessions, I spend a lot less time with people.

Which is part of what sparked me to start up with my blog again.  Until this week, I was still going and overseeing a social skills group for  the old company, so I still saw my old coworkers once a week.  Now I no longer am doing that, and I miss my friends!  I worry about what will happen if I don't start to become more active about maintaining a social life outside of work- particularly now that I no longer have a social life at work.

Another thing that has changed even more recently is that my sister had a baby!  She was born a week ago and my husband, Eric, and I were able to go over the weekend to visit and meet our niece, Eliana.  She is so adorable!  Now, I tend to think newborn babies just look funny, or even downright ugly.  But not Eliana!  She wasn't born looking like a newborn.  She looks so much like my sister and I when we were born!  Except her hair is straight and ours was curly.  Gosh I love that little thing so much.  It is one of the few things that makes me wish I lived closer to my family.

Anyways I hope to keep this blog a little more active but I make no promises!  I hope you keep reading :)

~Katy