Settling In

I feel like I have been moving for weeks... but finally things are coming together at my new apartment. My furniture (after the delivery truck ran out of gas and was delayed) was finally delivered last night around 10 pm. Unfortunately two pieces were damaged and so now I have to wait on another truck to replace them, but for now at least I have what is beginning to feel like a home. Here is a sneak peak...

An original artwork in the kitchen...finally a place to hang it!

The eggies also keep watch over the kitchen!Moxie tested the new couch to make sure it was comfy. I think it passed - she is sleeping there now!

The bedroom: I lost storage by moving to a smaller apartment, so the bedroom is pretty packed. I may move the crate eventually, but I haven't decided exactly where it will go. *Ignore the unmade bed and the missing comforter, Moxie isn't allowed to sleep on the good stuff!The entertainment center: Again a little cluttered for my taste, but without storage options I am just trying to find a place to put things for now. *Also note the expensive dog bed that Moxie is not sleeping in right now!

This is the painting for above the couch - it should arrive this week. The reviews on the trueness of the color were good, so cross my fingers it will lighten up the living room with the dark couches.Dining Room: Finally there is room for visitors to eat here now! So anyone who wants to come to dinner night once a month to try out random recipes... *And the new couch is a sofa sleeper, so even though I only have a one bedroom apartment, guests are welcome!
I have always wanted a hallway with random frames of family, but there isn't much of a hallway here for a huge gallery, but I made it work. **Note the empty frame, and the fact that some need to be updated. Hint for anyone who wants to email a recent picture of nephews you would like to see here...And of course, it wouldn't be home if Moxie didn't destroy the blinds in the first week!

Catch up

Ok so I skipped some days, but I was trying to condense 13 days into 30 minutes… it’s the best I could do for my 5th blog of the year…….


December 1 – One Word. Encapsulate the year 2010 in one word. Explain why you’re choosing that word. Now, imagine it’s one year from today, what would you like the word to be that captures 2011 for you? (Author: Gwen Bell)

2010: Uprooting
2011: Reformation

December 3 – Moment. Pick one moment during which you felt most alive this year. Describe it in vivid detail (texture, smells, voices, noises, colors). (Author: Ali Edwards)

How can you not feel alive after witnessing something so amazing as the birth of this little (or not so little) precious baby boy…

December 5 – Let Go. What (or whom) did you let go of this year? Why? (Author: Alice Bradley)

I let go of a lot this year… a longtime work environment, my house, a lot of stuff in the house after a garage sale, donations, and the free storage in my old bedroom, a whole city, my friends, my home… sometimes I think I let go of a little too much...

December 6 – Make. What was the last thing you made? What materials did you use? Is there something you want to make, but you need to clear some time for it? (Author: Gretchen Rubin)

Santa brought a fancy new toy, so I made Double Chocolate Peanut Butter Drop and Butterscotch cookies yesterday. Even though the butterscotch batch happened by chance, they both were well liked at work today.

December 11 – 11 Things What are 11 things your life doesn’t need in 2011? How will you go about eliminating them? How will getting rid of these 11 things change your life? (Author: Sam Davidson)

1. Monotony
2. 25 pounds (or 30 before I am 30)
3. Excuses
4. Crutches (the emotional kind)
5. Three closets full of clothes in sizes 2-6
6. Anger
7. Regret
8. Fear
9. Futility
10. Debt
11. Repetition
(And Jenn, to help you out, I will take those 299 books…)

December 13 – Action When it comes to aspirations, it’s not about ideas. It’s about making ideas happen. What’s your next step? (Author: Scott Belsky)

One action at a time… today, finally emptied the last two boxes of books, then alphabetized… still not sure if I should have separated fiction from non-fiction, but then I started thinking about real literature vs contemporary fiction, memoirs vs true stories, textbooks vs anthologies etc. So basic alphabetizing was my solution. This by the way is the excitement that is my life :)

The action...

In progress

I hope to have the house on the market by the end of the month, so I have been working hard...

The study is done...

Working on the drywall in the utility closet...

I came home from work one day to find this... so I turned it into this... The guest bedroom is done too (well except for thosee clothes I need to iron)And super grandma morphed into super mom and came over to caulk my bathrooms...

More to come after this weekend. Hopefully it will be done!

Peek inside

For a quick update on the usual – this is my fridge… guess what I’ll be eating this week! The sale at the grocery store was $1.99. So I stocked up. Plus another $5.00 off when you bought ten, plus a coupon for $1.50. So the math says – less than $1.00 a meal! But the fridge is pretty empty and I feel like cooking something good. Anyone have some easy and healthy recipes? Taking ideas! Now I am off to a Twilight release party. I hope I can fake it enough that the guests don’t kick me out for being an imposter. I never read the book or saw the movie – and not really interested. Hopefully the food will be good!

On the Couch

So I am sick again! I started feeling a little under the weather yesterday, and a girl in the office had bronchitis, so I was a little concerned. I went to bed at 8:30 last night (a record for me I think!), but still didn’t feel better this morning. I even had a fever! So I went to work for a few hours but couldn’t stay longer. Than I drove to three minute clinics before I could be seen (and it was longer than a minute!). The prognosis was the flu. So no medicine to help, but mom made some home made chicken noodle soup and acai tea for me. Now I am in the best spot to be sick – the comfy couch with more soup and the moxie dog. So I figured blogging would be a good idea. I found a dog walker for moxie – she is coming over tomorrow to meet us. I hope we pass the test. She would come over twice during the week to take Mox for a 30 minute walk. I am sure Moxie would be a lot happier to get out every now and then. My treadmill has been getting a little use, but not as much as I would like. I did get Moxie to run for a few minutes though! I also went to the store to buy healthier food, but eating out is still so easy. So slow going on the lifestyle changes – hopefully being sick won’t keep me down too long!

Whirlwind

How to tell that you are eating a healthy breakfast... ... and yes that does say Grease Only! I guess that's how you make good southern biscuits.

So I am falling behind in my posts, but hopefully I still have some fans. A lot has happened in the past couple of weeks, and sometimes I feel like I am barely keeping my head up. Right before my car accident, my friend needed an emergency place to stay, so I helped her move all of her things into my house. She settled in and Moxie loved having the extra attention. She decided, however, that she wanted to have her own place, so two weeks later I helped her pack everything back up and move into her apartment. I am happy that she is figuring things out on her own, but I was actually excited to have the company so she will be missed. I did get to have a fun break in the midst of all that moving. “The triplets” went to the Beach for a long weekend and enjoyed some perfect weather. I got to work on my tan and relax.

Of course when I got back, my desk was piled with work and things were pretty hectic. I have been trying to exercise more on top of learning to adjust to the dog, working, traveling, cleaning, commuting, etc. Some weeks are better than others. This week Moxie and I managed to take four 1.5-2 miles walk/runs, so this week was a little better. We also went to the lake Friday night, and she had fun meeting new people and being the center of attention. Besides walking, I have to get back to the gym. I am tentatively scheduled for a sprint triathlon in May, so if anyone has any training tips that would be great! Today I spent the entire day cleaning the house top to bottom and it looks great – I only wish it could stay that way. Having a dog and trying to sell my house at the same time is a lot of work, but I guess that’s what I signed up for when I brought Moxie home. And tomorrow it’s back to work!

Indecision

e·quiv·o·cal - /ɪˈkwɪv ə kəl/ - adjective
-of uncertain significance; not determined

That about sums up my thought process right now. So the big decision is this: to moxie or not to moxie. Seems the hyperactive little fur-person somehow broke her tie-out, jumped out of a 6-foot privacy fence and then into another 6-foot fence to visit the neighbor’s dog (who by the way was recovering from surgery and not looking for a play partner). So I now face a decision I was putting off as long as possible.

For the past year and a half, little moxie has been staying in “foster care” with an extremely generous friend while I finished school. Unfortunately, that time has come to an end due her latest escapade and the caregiver’s increasingly dwindling time. I have at most three options in my mind:

1. Finding a home for her myself. This means screening applicants and maybe giving her to someone who would love her as much as I do. However, this also means she may go to someone who cannot handle her unbridled energy and she could end up in the dreaded shelter. This idea also includes a lot of effort and internet searching to find the perfect family. But on the upside, she may find the perfect home and I could hopefully get updates and pictures from time to time.

2. Adoption society for boxers. With this option there is no doubt that she ends up in a home with a family that understands the needs of such a high energy breed, BUT (and this is a big but) I sign away all rights and never know where she is or how she is doing in her new home.

3. Bringing her home! Right now seems like horrible timing because I want to do all these new things and try to find my place after graduation. Plus my house is on the market, which is a very slow and competitive market. I have put my best friend (who happens to be my real estate agent) on a fact finding expedition. She is going to talk to a seasoned real estate veteran to find out what my options are with a dog in the house with people looking and visiting my property. So that is in the works. Then there is the task of finding ways to help train Moxie and to expel her excess energy when I get home from work. Plus the many questions that surround the balance of my life outside my home and spending more time here in the middle of nowhere. I do not have friends that live in this direction and I am an hour from work, so having a dog here means less time with others and less time at the gym that I just joined – BUT I did it before and things weren’t all bad. Plus I keep thinking: who gives up on their children? Why can’t I sacrifice some of the things I want to do in order to keep my baby? I know she isn’t a person, but she is my fur-person and that means just as much. The other part to this is that I can try. Then if after a month or two, I realize that adoption is the better choice, I can still do that. And then I don’t ever have to look back and think, why did I not even try?! The other way around (chosing adoption right away), I never have a second chance.

So these are the options and I am running out of time to decide, but I don’t want to give up on such a loving animal. She is MY Moxie after all. But maybe what is best for her isn’t being with me either. HELP – I need some weigh-ins on this one. I know that ultimately it is my life and my decision, but any advice or thoughts on the matter may help swing the pendulum in one direction or the other.