Making Our Lists

I worked from home today to avoid Thanksgiving traffic.  Todd got to leave work around 2:30pm, when the CEO said they could leave.  We love special days like this when we can spend as much time together as possible.  (Ha ha, not like we don't spend enough time together already.)  We're weird that way.  We just don't get sick of each other like some couples are prone to do.  Even when we go on vacation for a week and are with each other 24 hours a day, we just enjoy it.  Yes, we're strange that way.

With some spare time before dinner, Todd and I utilized Google Wave and collaborated on a Christmas gift list for our family and friends.  It felt good to brainstorm and come up with ideas.  But also, we already have gifts for most of our family, thanks to some planning ahead.  Yaaaay!

We went to Rubios for dinner, where I chose the nacho grande with carne asada steak.  It wasn't until I came home that I found out it was 1400 calories.  I ate about 70% of it, so it was right under 1000 calories for me.  In total, I was only 30 calories over my allotted 1536 calories/day, due to sensible eating earlier in the day, and a workout that burned around 300 calories.  Sigh.  Better choices next time!

After dinner we stopped by Borders Books & Music.  Todd got a gingerbread decaf latte.  We really enjoy perusing magazines and books in the cafe at Borders.



I almost purchased two books that my blog friend Christi recommended to me on Goodreads, but even on sale they were pricier than Amazon, so I think I'll get them there instead.

Tomorrow we travel to my dad's house for Thanksgiving with him and Shelly.  I wish everyone a Happy Thanksgiving in advance!

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My Two Dollar Breakfast

Some mornings when I get to work, I stop by my work cafeteria to get some breakfast.  I usually get a little bit of scrambled eggs, and oh about... seven tater tots.  They weigh the stuff you get from the breakfast bar, and it's $5.76/lb.  Guess what my breakfast usually costs?

Two dollars. Exactly.

Now it's become a game between the cashier Stephanie and me. For my food to be $2.00 including tax, that means I have to get 0.32 lb of food. I try to do this every time. And most days, Stephanie will say, "Two dollars", and we both laugh. Then she hands me the receipt.

I know you'll want to join us at the Digi Dares this week and scrap a page.  Why?

Because, you get this gorgeous kit, Retro Revival, exclusive to the Digi Dares, made by Digi Dare designers, for free! It's our THREE year anniversary (Dare #156!) and we're giving you this kit if you do a layout for Dare #156 and link us up to your layout on the Digi Dares site before this Thursday night 11:59pm Eastern time. If you look closely, there's a template by me in there, along with some solid papers.

Here's my layout for the Dare.

Full credits at the Dare site. Check out the details and submit your page!

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Project 365 - October Template + Announcement

Here's the October freebie template for those doing Project 365, or for those who like to use it for any other types of layouts.



**Download link no longer available**

Here's a layout I did with it.  I used the "O" to make a layout about all the Ohio State football games we've been to the last few years.  I had been looking forward to "O"ctober just so I can make this and use it for this purpose, LOL.


Click here for full credits.

Now for the news!  I have decided to open up my own little blog store to sell some of my templates and digi-scrapping tools.  All the monthly templates from this year will remain freebies until at least the end of the year.  But I have so many other ideas for layout templates and other fun tools, and those will go into my store.  I'm busy working behind the scenes to create products and get the store ready to open. 

If you are interested in receiving store news (including the grand-opening), coupons, new product announcements, and freebies, please sign up for my newsletter HERE.  :)

Also, I would like to get your input into the first three products I'm putting into the store!  Some of you have written/commented that you would like certain other letters of the alphabets besides the ones for each month of the year.  Here is your chance to speak up!  Please leave a comment in this post about which letter you would like to see made into a template.  You can vote until October 23rd.  After that I will close the voting and total up the votes.  The top three vote-getter letters will be made into templates and go into my store for the grand-opening.  AND everyone who voted for the first-place letter will receive it for free!  So leave a comment with a letter of your choice!  And don't forget to sign up for the Listgirl Designs newsletter!

ETA: voting has now closed!

Okay, now I'll talk about my day.  Guess what happened to me today?  I had a root canal on my #10 tooth (one of the upper front ones).  I went to the dentist for my regular 6-month cleaning/checkup yesterday.  I told him that I had this little uncomfortable area above my lip and I thought it was related to a tooth.  It didn't hurt or anything like that, but it just felt abnormal and sensitive.  Well, they took an x-ray and found that the root was infected.  :(  No cavities, but an infected root.  So today I went back and got a root canal.  To be fair, my dentist is GREAT and I felt no pain except for the pinch of the initial novacaine shot.  And I got to watch a wolverine devour some other animal on "Planet Earth" while getting my root canal.  But still, an unplanned root canal is never fun.

But you know what IS fun?  The Silhouette SD digital cutter machine.  I got one off of eBay and started playing with it.  The machine will take what we design in Photoshop and cut the shapes out!  It also comes with 50 shapes, plus you can download any shape template at their online store for $1.99.  I made this card in 10 minutes today. 



It's nothing spectacular, but it's my first try at using the machine and it was totally fun watching it cut out the shapes. It will take some practice but I can't wait to use it to make holiday cards and stuffs!

That is all for today. Thanks so much for making it through this long post! Don't forget to sign up for the Listgirl Designs newsletter here!

PS - if you subscribed to the newsletter, please check your spam folder for the confirmation email containing the link to confirm your subscription. You aren't actually subscribed until you click on the email link to confirm. Thanks!

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The Elusive Five Minute Shower

Since late spring this year, San Diego has implemented mandatory water-use restrictions due to the unprecedented water-supply crisis.  Houses that end with odd numbers can water their yard on Sundays, Tuesdays, and Thursdays.  Houses that end with even numbers can water on Saturdays, Mondays, and Wednesdays.  There's other rules for apartments, condos, and businesses.  On those watering days, you can only water for 10 minutes, before 10:00am or after 6:00pm.  If you go over your allotted water-usage, then you pay a lot more for your water. And they set up hotlines so that you can report your neighbors. 

I've been seeing TV commercials about water conservation and showering for only five minutes.  So I've been giving it a try.  There's a clock radio on the counter right outside my shower, so I can use it to time myself.  So far I've been unsuccessful.  I've tried many times, but the closest I've been is an eight minute shower.  I can definitely do it if I don't wash my hair.  But when I wash my long hair with shampoo and conditioner, it's just impossible to rinse everything out and get my hair clean with a total shower time of under five minutes.  But I keep trying.  It's a game I like to play, to try to beat the time, while saving water.

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Rock On

Todd found a really great deal on Rock Band for the PS3, so we've finally joined in on the rockin' fun! Of course, he was already a rock star in my eyes. :p

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Sunset At The End of the Street

This was the sunset at the end of our street today, looking out west toward the Pacific Ocean. A closer look revealed a hot air balloon. Usually there's at least 5-6 hot air balloons... today I didn't see as many. Looking east and up the hill, from the same vantage point. After three weeks of higher than normal temperatures, we finally cooled down today to mid-70's, which is our norm. It felt so good and breezy! I'm excited to run tomorrow morning in this cooler weather... partly because I shared this delicious molten chocolate cake with Todd tonight at Chili's.

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Comic-Con

Today we went to Comic-Con with Peppermint & Tom. This was a very exciting day for Tom because he'd been wanting to go to Comic-Con for a long time. San Diego is famous for this annual convention, and about 150,000 people come for Comic-Con every year. We drove to Qualcomm Stadium and took the trolley to downtown again. Peppermint and Todd on the train. Once inside the convention center, we took the escalator up to register and get our badges. Tom and Todd were very excited and ready to get started. The exhibition floor was HUGE with very fancy displays. Todd with Bumble Bee from The Transformers. One of my favorite childhood cartoons in Taiwan (but it's Japanese): Mazinger Z! I was excited, because do you know who was sitting in the background in the photo, signing autographs? It's none other than Peter Mayhew, Chewbacca in the Star Wars movies! Todd caught a photo of someone in a Captain America costume. Me with the spies from Spy vs Spy (Mad magazine). Todd saw a woman in Wonder Woman costume. Todd with R2A6 from Star Wars: Phantom Menace. Todd found Waluigi from Super Mario Brothers. When we were leaving, Todd saw this guy from Rotten Tomatoes. Peppermint kept telling Todd to go take a bite out of the tomato, so he did! This photo makes me laugh really hard, LOL. After a good six hours at Comic-Con, we were tired, so we left and went to dinner at Nozomi's. We had sushi there and it was all delicious, except that both my sushi and Peppermint's sushi were very spicy. Hers even spicier than mine. Then we took them to Tea Station, where we introduced Tom to boba milk tea. He said he found it "interesting". We had a lot of fun today, but it was also very exhausting. I'm betting tomorrow's adventures will get a late start as we all get some beauty sleep tonight!

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Neighborhood Jam Band

I slept until 7:30am today, which made me a pretty happy girl. Since we had the day off work today, we drew all the shades before bed last night. I'm really sensitive to light, so it helps me sleep more. First thing in the morning, we dropped off Todd's car for an oil change. Unfortunately, they called later to say there's all kinds of things wrong with it and we'll probably have to do about $1,000 worth of work on it next week. We've had the car since Oct 2001 and it has over 120,000 miles on it, so we do expect to pay money to maintain it. I still hate it when it happens though. Right next to the mechanics was a McDonald's, so I got a holiday treat of a sausage egg McMuffin sandwich and McCafe caramel iced coffee for breakfast. I helped Todd make this Balsamic Carrot Salad, which we had for lunch with our leftover steaks from last night. Todd did a ton of housework today. He sanded the bottom of our front door down. It had gotten wet and warped, so the door would get stuck when you try to open or close it. It was annoying. He also drained out all the crusty yucky stuff in the bottom of our hot water heater. He drained the dirty water from our jacuzzi outside. We would fill the jacuzzi again, but San Diego is under a level 2 water restriction right now due to drought, so we would get penalized if we used too much water. I take that to mean that filling up a 500 gallon jacuzzi is not a good idea right now. Todd also put new mulch down in our front and back yard. We had bought six big bags of mulch from Home Depot, but Todd said he needs another eight bags to complete the mulching. The funnest part of the day was the late afternoon, when we went two doors down over to Mel & Margaret's house for the neighborhood jam band party! Fred next door invited us a few weeks ago. Then Margaret next door to Fred stopped Todd at the mailbox a few days ago and invited him again. As you know, Todd plays piano/keyboard. Fred plays guitar, and Mel plays drums. They invited some other neighbors/friends, and we got a jam band going! There was also singing involved. (Margaret, Mallory, and Maureen.) Margaret prepared lots of snacks, food, and drinks for everyone. Plus people brought stuff too. Remember my blog post two days ago, when I said I was swarmed by bees at Togo's parking lot? Both AJ and Lynnette made comments today about the Padres game last night, where the left outfield was swarmed by bees too! They had to stop the game for 52 minutes because of the bees! What the heck is going on with bees around here??? Now I'm scared to go to the Padres game this Sunday!

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Weird Puffy Bedhead

I got my first haircut in over six months today. The last time I got a haircut was before Christmas. Why so long? Because I hated my last haircut and I literally had no one to go to that I can trust with my hair. So I held out as long as I could. Until now. My hair was getting so long that it was taking forever to wash, condition, dry, and style. Also, all the layers grew out, so it was slightly shapeless. This hair dilemma started in September 2007, when my most favorite awesome hair guy, Jay, got accepted to grad school and quit cutting hair. Happy day for him, sad day for me. He was SO good with my hair. I would get a trim and you wouldn't be able to tell that it had happened, which is how I like it. After Jay, I went two or three times to this lady that Jay had recommended. Each time I was unhappy. She wasn't precise. Sometimes the cut would be uneven. She was sloppy and quick. So I just stopped getting haircuts. Last month Todd decided to try a new person at the salon where Jay used to work. Her name is Heather. She did a fairly good job with Todd's hair. So I finally bit the bullet and went today. She did a lot of layering on me. I told her to cut off one inch, and not to cut off any of my bangs, because I like them long. She cut off three inches, and cut at least an inch off my bangs. I thought I might cry. (I have cried after a haircut before.) After she dried my hair, she styled it and put in this magic volumnizing powder called Dust It at the roots. The stuff really was magic. Within seconds, my hair was practically standing straight up. I have weird puffy bedhead. This will take some getting used to. Oh, I almost forgot! I had to get a sandwich from Togo's for dinner tonight because Todd had a Toastmasters training meeting, and I had my haircut at 6:30pm. I got swarmed by bees in the middle of the parking lot! At first I thought they were just regular bugs. I was surrounded by hundreds of them. Then I heard the buzzing and looked closer and they were BEES! OMG I totally freaked and ran away. Miraculously, I didn't get stung. But I found something interesting at Togo's: the napkin! Love the graphics on it. I guess inspiration can come from anywhere, including a napkin, LOL.

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Label Love

I don't often post about things, because I try to make my memories about more important things in life, such as people and experiences. But one thing I do love is labels. Labels make me FEEL organized, even if in reality I'm really not that organized. It is the *possibility* of being organized that makes me excited about my labels. :) I received this Brother P-Touch PT-2430 PC today from Amazon. It connects to your computer via USB port, but there is no software involved. Well, unless you want to do more complicated things like print labels from an Excel spreadsheet. Then you have to install the software that comes with it. Within five minutes of opening the box, I printed the labels you see in the picture. It truly was plug-and-play! The biggest draw for me was that you can use any fonts installed on your PC, plus you can use your computer keyboard to type your labels instead of keying the words into the weird little typepad like other labelers. BTW, the fonts above are Kristen ITC and CK Marissa (the same font that I use to journal on my photos). I'm such a dork, I know, but I'm excited about my new labeler! On the remodeling front... today they stained the cabinets. Well, supposedly they did. The color doesn't seem quite the shade we picked, but they're not done yet, so I'll reserve judgment until tomorrow. It feels like a lot of "hurry up and wait" lately regarding the remodeling. It seems big things only happen every two weeks, then we just wait around. I went to the gym after work tonight. I've been going twice a week for about four weeks now, doing the weights. I am encouraged, because I've noticed lately that my upper arms jiggle less. Less arm jiggling is good. :p I keep forgetting to bring it up, but last week The Daily Digi featured The Digi Dares twice! I got to pick my favorite Dare layout I've made, and answered a couple of questions. You can read it here and here. I made a page this weekend that I'm really excited about. I've been into the artsy look lately and tried my hand at it using all Little Dreamer Designs stuff. Full credits and explanation of technique here.

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Feliz Cinco de Mayo

For the longest time, I thought Cinco de Mayo was Mexican independence day, until my friend Julio corrected me a few years ago. Turns out that the holiday celebrates the Mexican army's victory over the French forces in the Battle of Puebla on May 5, 1862. But now it's an excuse to eat Mexican food, and to drink Coronas, Dos X, and margaritas. Who am I to NOT celebrate Cinco de Mayo, since I live so close to Mexico? :p

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Hippy Hippy Shake

Photo today: Look at me! No makeup and au naturel! Tonight was my second hula dance lesson with Jennifer. Annie next door didn't go because she wasn't feeling well, so Margaret and I went. I think I'm getting it a little more this week. I was able to do the hand movements at the SAME time as my feet and my hips! It's so weird how our bodies aren't completely balanced. I can sway more with my right hip than my left. And when I run long distances, my left leg hurts more. We found a puddle of water on our kitchen floor tonight. Todd pulled out the dishwasher and found a leak underneath it. I think our kitchen KNOWS that remodeling starts in a couple of weeks, and it's shaking its fists at us! "You're trying to replace me... I'll show you!"

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Hula Girl Loves Nerd Boy

Tonight I went to my first hula dance lesson taught by Jennifer. I went with my next door neighbor Annie, her next door neighbor Margaret (on the other side), and Celeste across the street. Annie's husband Fred dropped us off down the street at Jennifer's house. It was so close we could have walked, LOL. My hips tried really hard, but they looked nothing like Jennifer's. We learned to lele and kaholo. I didn't do too badly for a first-timer I guess. Jennifer was a thorough and fun teacher and I had fun just hanging out with my neighbors. :) We took the day off work today so that we could go sign the contract with our remodeling contractor. After that we met with Jim the appliance guy and got quotes for kitchen appliances. Then we stopped by the plumbing store and Mark schooled us on shower heads, valves, toilets, and sinks. And we got tons of brochures to bring home. Then we met with Kim, the designer we're working with, and picked out the stone for our kitchen backsplash. It was so fun, but overwhelming and exhausting. We walked away with so much information and sometimes even more confused than before. The tentative start date of our remodeling is April 6th. Todd had an interesting night too. I'll let him talk about it in his own words. :p The San Diego Science Festival is going on right now. When I heard they were having a presentation by author Ben Nugent about his book American Nerd: the Story of My People (book review here), I had no choice but to attend. I felt like a bit of an automaton as I was drawn to the Pacific Beach library to see what I might find. The night went about as I expected. The author was nervous, unpolished, and not well-dressed. Nugent started by reading a few passages from the book and followed it with a much more fun Q&A. His most interesting concept was Dr. Frankenstein as the "proto-nerd." He was feared because of his mysterious technical skills. Similarly, we nerds/geeks of today wield a bit of "mystical" power. Those who don't have it become jealous and cast aspersions our way. And of course we don't help ourselves with our poor social skills. I think a lot of the audience wanted to believe the romantic-to-them notion that the nerds of adolescence will rule the world as adults a la Bill Gates (while the jocks have seen the best years of their lives already passed by.) At times it seemed that the bulk of the crowd wanted to hear that affirmation. That wasn't really Nugent's message but he ran with it a bit. It is true that there are more opportunities than ever for the technically sharp/socially inept. I enjoyed the sociological message and it was a fun and unusual evening. But after attending this event, I still am not sure if I am a nerd or not. However, my love of Battlestar Galactica is unquestioned. :p

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