Easter 2016 Recap

I have always wanted to be that mom that decorates the house up for every holiday, etc etc. I fall short most days. I’m not sure there is time for that when you’re in grad school! I was lucky to remember that it was Easter weekend. Friday I studied for round 2 of comps and by the end of the day I was totally fried. I face planted on a bench and laid in the sun doing absolutely nothing. Oh wait… that was on Saturday, see I couldn’t even keep my days straight. I swear, Grad school is fun. Someone told me that if you’re working on your PhD and you’re married, you’ll probably be divorced before you graduate. Sadly I think I could see that although I’m not anywhere near being divorced right now. But if a PhD program is worse than a masters (which it has to be) then wow!

Okay I’m done rambling. Easter I took a bit of a break. I got up Sunday morning and we went to Church. It was Easter. It was the day before Comps. It all sounded good!

When we left church, it was time to go to my parents house. Abug had fallen asleep on our way there so I got her in the house and laid down on the couch with her and took a short snooze until I passed her off to hubby. It’s fun to have baby snuggles/snoozes.

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Tuesday Brain Splat

My brain is all over the place. One such place… relief. At least last night’s comps is over and it’ll be a week before I hear results on either set, so that means a week of freedom, right? Please tell me I’m right. The stress the last few weeks kind of got to me. Ugh! I was talking to one of the professors last Thursday and said that grad school is more stressful than any job I’ve had and I’ve had some stressful jobs. She laughed and said, yeah, in grad school, you have a deadline and have to work on something until it is finished, where as long as your job is one of those you can walk away from at the end of the day, you’re done until the next work day.

I think grad school is taking a toll on me… I look old. That’s my opinion, but whatever…. Oh and gray hairs… they’re multiplying, I swear. Seriously? I’m only 32 (I think…. don’t ask me my age, ask me my birthday, I’m better at that number). And a tan, I’d like a tan… although I don’t want wrinkly skin, I have enough of that… so there is that…. anyway like I said, my brain is all over the place right now.

Today I feel like it is Thursday (don’t ask why, I don’t know) and yesterday I swore it was Tuesday (that’s because I sat at the school all day on a Monday which isn’t typical). So let’s see if I can impart some wisdom on you today… Here we go… if you have something that is bolded, italicized, or underlined and it is followed by punctuation, that punctuation carries the same bold, italics or underline. Although underlining words is a thing of the typewriter age when people couldn’t bold or italicize words for whatever the word is I’m looking for…. um…. emphasis I guess might be it.

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Today

I woke up this morning tired, stiff, and dreading the morning. Why? Maybe because it is Monday, or maybe because I’m just not a morning person, or maybe, just maybe it was because I have to take my second set of Comps tonight. This is Set 2 attempt 1. And then D) it could be all of the above.

This is the specialty set. It focuses on Professional and Technical Writing, which is actually what I’m getting my degree in. I’ve been studying all weekend. I’m not sure who’s brilliant idea it was to put this test right around Easter. Okay okay, so truth of the matter is that’s just how it fell. Fall, it is the last Thursday/Monday of October and Spring it is the Thursday/Monday after Spring Break. It just so happened Easter was early this year and it fell the week after spring break. I’m still going with that wasn’t brilliant planning.

Is it odd to admit that I’m not nearly as stressed about this set of comps as I am/was about the other set? When it comes down to English, my weakness is literature. It always has been and I’m not sure why. I like to read, although some of those authors are dark… I’m talking DARK! I’m not really crazy about that I guess. Life is too depressing, give me something upbeat. ha!

When I got home Thursday night after taking the other set, I was a mess. I’m not sure how it went as they said it’d be about a week for results, but I was a mess. I’m still not sure I passed because I didn’t completely get finished. I left the graders a note that I wasn’t finished and wanted to address this this and this…. we’ll see what happens I guess….

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Take Two

Holy Cow! I just walked in from outside and it’s freezing cold out there. Okay maybe that’s a bit of an exaggeration because I just looked at weather.com and it said that it is 40, but that doesn’t factor in that wind and that’s what is excessively cold this morning. Okay, so it’s 40˚ this morning, yet yesterday it was 70˚. Yes we had the wind but the weather was gorgeous. I was walking around in a t-shirt and comfortable. Today I have on a long sleeved t-shirt and my jacket and I’m still frickin cold! brrrr! I guess only in MO can (or maybe I should say the midwest?) you go from 70˚ one day to a freeze warning and a high of 50˚ the next and 60˚ or so the following. Yes Mother nature we get it, you’re still in control!

Speaking of yesterday, by last night I was spent. Today marks my second attempt at Comps (plus I have to take a different set on Monday night…. ugh!) I’ve been studying hard, maybe not hard enough, we’ll see, but I have been studying hard and last night I was just spent. I wanted to do something… anything. I didn’t know what though. We finally went and wandered around Target because I just needed to walk I guess. We wound up down the hair coloring aisle and I decided to dye my hair pink, what do you think?

Oh wait, that’s right… I only threatened… I didn’t do it :). haha… sike! or not but whatever, it’s my blog post today :). I also seriously debated dying my hair bright blonde. I have no idea why and I didn’t do it, but I did threaten.

I drove the truck today. Why you might ask? Well… because I feel like a badass driving a truck. Seriously. I’ve always been a truck girl. In fact, my first vehicle was a truck.

It was a little truck but it was a truck no less. Boy the day we saw this at the dealership we were in my dad’s 1998 F150 that I kept trying to talk him in to letting me have but he wouldn’t budge. That was back when with the extended cab you had the jump door. And it just had the 1, not both so to get to the drivers side back seat you had to go through the passenger side jump door. Anyway we were driving through the Ford dealership in Springfield the day after my birthday and we saw this little gem. I about jumped over the top of my mom and her seat trying to get out of dad’s truck to get out and see this truck. Then, I really thought we were going to lose out on buying it over $50. My mom could see me squirming in my seat and she knew I was ready to volunteer to pay the $50. Finally the dealership agreed with my dad and bam, the truck was mine. I’ve never kept such a poker face in all my life. So stressful as a 16 year old.

No, I don’t drive a truck right now, unless I’m driving someone else’s truck. I have my car. I like my car but it isn’t a truck. Oh the pretty purr of a diesel engine or the nice hum of flowmaster’s. Pure pleasure :). haha. Although have you heard the new diesel’s now? They are almost as quiet as a gas engine and unless you’re paying attention you might miss them. Sad but true statement.

Earlier this week I was joking with hubby that since I had to take comps tonight, can I drive his truck for inspiration. He said, “OK.” I laughed and told him I was joking because I was… mostly. Then I guess when I got in the shower last night, he moved vehicles around and when I went to leave this morning he left me with the truck.

I got a sweet text from my dad too. Everyone believes in me, I just hope I don’t let them down. That’s my worst fear! Letting people down. Adds a little stress. But I got in the truck this morning and started driving down the road. I don’t know, I think Joe Diffy was on to something when he said, “There’s something women like about a pickup man.” Although, I’m not a man… so maybe that doesn’t totally count in this instance, but it’s close enough!

Okay so speaking of the truck. Oh I shouldn’t tell this on myself but I can’t help it… It is too funny. Yesterday we were driving it and a bird flew past us. Neither of us saw the bird go anywhere else so hubby wondered if it got stuck in the grill. Hey weirder things have happened. So when we stopped, I got out and went up to the front to look. No bird and there was no grill guard. I about freaked out wondering where and when we dropped the grill guard and how did we not know that. Then I had a moment of clarity and realized that oh… it isn’t our truck that has the grill guard, it’s my dad’s truck. Duh duh duh.

Comps has me where I’m just frazzled. I’m ready for some mental clarity! The night before we had been working on Jared and Karen’s camper. When we were done I went to my parents and picked up the bug and then went home. At home I hopped in the shower. We have a speaker in our shower that hooks up to your phone via bluetooth. Hubby had his phone hooked up with a song for me to hear. So when I got out of the shower I went to turn the speaker off and instead hit the call button. Well that either answers a call if the phone is ringing while you’re in a shower or calls the last person you talked to. The last person hubby called was Jared so I tried to call Jared from the shower. I about died laughing.

That is how life has been for me lately… and this weekend is Easter, but I won’t get to enjoy that much because I’ll be studying for my next round of comps on Monday night. Who decided Easter weekend would be a good weekend to put comps after. Geez…. anyway wish me luck please! And if all else fails, know that I feel like a badass driving a pick-up truck!

Over and out!

Finally, the story

Let’s see if I can diplomatically tell this post, finally about a month later.

As most of you know, we’re a family of 4. Back in 2011 though, we were just a family of 3. In January of 2011 we traded my Mustang off for a 2011 Hyundai Elantra and Hubby’s 3/4 Ford for a 2011 Hyundai Tucson. That was done within one week of each other and the truck was traded off just days before the 18 inches of snow that snowed us into our house.

That summer we discussed how practical the Tucson was because even though it got great gas mileage, we needed a truck more than we realized. Every time we needed a truck, we had to borrow my dad’s which put him out of a truck. It was annoying for everyone involved.

So later that summer we went on a hunt for a truck again. It came down to the question do we need 4×4 or 4 doors more because for the price and what we could afford, both wasn’t quite an option for us.

We decided since we were a family of 3, we’d go the 2 door but 4×4 route and wound up with a 2011 Chevy 1500 (half ton). It was a great truck and did most everything we wanted, except haul a horse trailer. But when we had to steal dad’s truck to haul a trailer, at least he wasn’t out a truck so it worked.

Well in 2014 our little bundle of joy came along making us a family of 4. May of 2015 my dad wound up buying a half ton 4×4, 4 door truck that we wound. This last winter wasn’t bad and neither was the winter of 2013, but still, with 4 people and a 4×4 truck that seats 3, it just doesn’t add up. In bad weather my car doesn’t do well and his truck wouldn’t haul all 4 of us. This last winter we started borrowing dad’s half ton and leaving him ours so he had 2 different 4×4’s to drive as an option.

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Happy First Day of Spring

… yesterday!!…

So what did you do on your first day of spring?

This is what I woke up to…. Well technically it was a text telling us baby on the ground so hubby and I started annoying my dad for pictures 🙂

We weren’t able to go over right away. There are two weekends a year hubby has to work, and this was one of them. We decided to go to church (8:15-9:15) and then he was scheduled to work at 10.

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Waterfront Grill – Jenks OK

This weekend we took a group trip to Jenks, OK, outside of Tulsa to go to the Oklahoma Aquarium. We left right after church, so by the time we got to Tulsa it was noon and we were a hungry bunch. Our vehicle was the lead vehicle so they left it up to us to find the restaurant. Kimmy got on her cell phone and started researching restaurants in the area and that’s when we came upon Waterfront Grill.

I’m oh so glad she found this restaurant too, as was everyone else. Totall awesome!

When we got there and told them it was 8 plus a high chair, they said it would be about a 30-45 minute wait. Then not even 5 minutes later they asked if we had a problem sitting outside. We told them no because the weather was great plus they had their heaters running. So we were seated within 5 minutes. And this was our view for the meal.

Hubby, Rachele, and Doug decided they were going to order sushi. We got one and they got the other. I say we, I asked them to save me a piece of each because even though I’m not crazy about it, I’m willing to try. You never know, someday I may just like sushi/fish….

They got the Bonzai Roll. Spicy tuna, avocado, cucumber, & jalapeño topped with fresh eel and eel sauce. Served on a skillet that is on fire. (side note, wow I didn’t know I was eating eel…. yikes!)

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Oklahoma Aquarium

Over the weekend we took a day trip to Tulsa. After church a bunch of us loaded up and headed to Tulsa, the rest of our group was already down there. Our destination was the Oklahoma Aquarium. At dive club we’d been talking about taking a trip somewhere and finally we decided on the Oklahoma Aquarium. I guess technically we were in Jenks.

Our group that loaded up didn’t get breakfast so while we were supposed to meet the group already down there at noon, we stopped for a quick bite to eat at the Waterfront Grill and then headed to the aquarium, which put us there around 1ish. Sorry! Anyway the aquarium was a lot of fun.

Sadly because of our jump forward in time and going to church, Abug was up earlier than normal (equivalent to 5am for her). We then couldn’t get her to nap on the ride down so she was a bit sleepy going through the aquarium (as were the rest of us) but she handled it great!

Our trip down was fairly uneventful but we actually saw that precip that falls out of the sky. It was a crazy! I had to document it. (We’ve been on burn bans for the last 2 months)

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