Garden Progress

We've been making slow progress on our gardening efforts around here. First of all, it's a lot more work to dig a small plot of dirt than you'd think. Also, it takes a lot more dirt to fill a space than you'd think. Finally, whoever said that you can save money by growing your own fruits and veggies was on crack. This stuff is expensive! I can't tell you how many freaking bags of compost we've bought so far. I lost track.

But, things are starting to come together. Both of my varieties of tomatoes have sprouted in their little peat pellets. The back lawn is looking more green than brown, as is the front. And, we finally have some beds completed!

I think this one is my favorite right now. The house across the street from us is vacant (who wants to come be my neighbor???) and they had some workers in totally gutting it. They pulled out carpet, cabinets, appliances - everything - and replaced them. They also pulled out bushes and trees in both the front and back yards. They dug up the front lawn and laid fresh sod. They painted the house on the outside, and probably on the inside too. There was a dumpster in that driveway every day for almost two weeks!

Well, one day I was outside and I was watching them throw this cabinetry in the dumpster and was thinking what a shame it was. I mean, you can donate that stuff to the Habitat for Humanity ReStore, you know? Then I saw they were throwing away those scallopped brick garden edgers. A ton of them. As the workers threw them in the dumpster I felt myself being disgusted by the waste and even complained about it to my husband, who was telecommuting that day.

Well, after they took that load to, presumably, the dump, I noticed that they had started to add these retaining wall bricks to the pile of trash in the driveway. I was horrified - those things are not cheap! I know because I had originally wanted to make my raised beds with them but they were cost prohibitive at $2 each. Quickly my brain began to work and I bravely went and sent my husband over there to ask if we could have them since they were going to just throw them out. They said we could have them! We scored 26 of them for free. Kick butt!

I hand painted the sign on a scrap of wood I had in my craft room. I love how bright and happy it looks out there. There are two varieties of pumpkins planted in that bed. It's going to look so nice when the vines start to grow!

This is my vegetable bed. Since the retaining wall would have been so expensive to do in an area this big, we decided to go with two raised bed kits from Lowe's. My husband put them together after we cleared the gravel from the area. The ground inside got broken up a bit then mixed with compost and garden soil. This bed will hold onions, carrots, zucchini, and my tomatoes when they are big enough to be transplanted. It's right outside my craft room window so I can admire it and bang on the window to scare away birds if need be.

Here are all my herbs in pots along the edge of the patio. The ones I started from seed haven't sprouted yet. There are about six strawberries growing though!

Oh, what's the muddy mess in the background?

The thorn in my gardening side. Remember my potager? This was to be the first bed I completed, and the biggest containing lettuces and herbs. I read in my gardening book those sorts of things grow well in our soil so I decided to just dig up the ground and plant them directly in there. Well, my husband and I were taking turns digging when he got a little over zealous, went a little too deep, and hit a freaking sprinkler line!!!

We had to quickly shut off the water while we pondered what to do. Luckily, when the landscapers came out two days later they said it wasn't a big deal and repaired it. Of course, when we went to turn the water back on another hose started to leak! I know that hose was not leaking before we shut off the water because it was spraying in a huge arc across the grass. There's kind of no way to miss that, you know? So as of right now, we don't know how that one happened. It's just a small puncture but my husband thinks he can fix it.

At this rate that bed will NEVER be done. To think, we started it first!

Keepin' it Real

I've had a few people tell me in the past week that they admire how organized I am. That they wish their homes were as tidy as mine and they could post pictures online. I gotta tell you, I'm not giving you the whole story here.

I was working full time, as my husband currently is doing. Being pregnant made me so tired, that in the beginning, I would come home from work, take a two hour nap, get up, have some sort of fast food for dinner, watch a TV show or two on the DVR, and go back to bed. This was my entire existence. On the weekends, I was still so wiped that all I wanted to do was sit on my butt, or go shopping (aka do something fun). I didn't want to clean house, and neither did my husband.

Needless to say, it got pretty dang messy around here.

Now that I'm home (can you believe it's been a month already???) I have the time and the energy to actually straighten up around here, and even some left to pursue other interests! I'm under no illusions though - I know I'm very lucky to be able to stay home, and if I was still working, this place would still be a disaster. I usually post photos here AFTER a room has gotten a pretty good cleaning/organizing. I'm really trying hard to keep things tidy once I get them that way though, because I know that this period of time may be the last period for a LONG time that I'm able to keep it looking tidy, what with the wee punk, as Ms. Kwan put it, coming soon.

I pride myself on not being one of those bloggers who only paints a perfect and rosy picture of her life though, so in the interests of "keeping it real" around here, I present to you my secret shame - the closet:

This is my closet. This is the chore that I've been putting off and putting off and I can't quite seem to get to cleaning. This photo is blurry, due to the low light, but you can see that not only are there piles of crap (consisting of clothes, handbags, shoes, etc) on the floor, there's a good sized pile climbing pretty high on top of that bookshelf as well. See that paper bag in the foreground? That's full of sorority shirts that I need to find a way to get rid of. I haven't been in college in almost FIVE years!!!

I have the means for it to be organized. There's the shelf, plus the wooden shoe racks that you can't see, bins, very nice wooden hangers (including the clip type ones for pants and skirts) and labeled drawers. I just kinda open the door, sigh, grab what I need and then shut it again. I think to myself, "Maybe tomorrow."

Ugh. So there you go. It's not all sunshine and roses here at Casa de M. Just thought I'd share that tidbit.

I took another belly picture. I got lazy and just did it in my husband's bathroom. The light is better in there than in mine for some reason, even though we have the exact same fixture fitted with the exact same bulbs. Weird.

That's what 30 1/2 weeks looks like on me. No wonder I have stretch marks! I'm like a house! I went to the doctor and she said I'm measuring right on target, and anemia aside, all is well. I'm up 15 lbs total. The baby is moving like crazy, and has added the multiple bump to his repetoire (which previously only consisted of the quick bump, the hiccups, and the slow stretch. Last night, I swear, it looked like he was just rolling around in there trying to find a spot where he was comfortable. It was quite entertaining.

Guess where I went today?

Give you a hint:

We went to the Seattle Aquarium! It was pretty cool. I got a TON of really cool photos. I have to tell you, it's awesome to have a camera that you actually know how to use properly, even if it is a cheap little point and shoot. I saw so many people there with huge, fancy digital SLR's, trying to take pictures of things behind glass with a freaking FLASH and then complaining about the glare. Duh!

There were so many clownfish hiding in this anemone. They moved really fast though, so they were hard to photograph.

This was in a tunnel, up over my head. There was sunlight filtering down, and all thse long skinny little fish just swirling and swirling around above you. So freaky, yet cool at the same time.

The sea lions were just doing laps, around and around their tank. They'd roll over on their backs, never once breaking formation. Just swimming and rolling along.

This little guy had his tail hooked round that branch thing (so I'm not up on my terminology, I'm from the desert, cut me some slack!) and was just hanging out. Sea horses are so cute.

Okay, so we were looking at this one huge tank, and there was an enormous puffer fish in there. I'm talking like three feet long, and least! He was way, way in the back, but even though I wasn't using a flash, I think the little red "ready" light on my camera caught his attention, because he totally made a beeline for me and came right up to the glass.

He was apparently ready for his close up.

Pretty green anemone and some bright orange starfish.

We had dinner with my mother in law, her boss and her friend and this cute little restaurant on the beach, after which my posse (consisting of my husband and me and the critter in my belly) headed down to...

That's right! I got my milkshake, finally! Check out the prices:

My husband was grousing that they raised them, LOL! I'll take my $1.90 milkshake and be happy, thank you very much!

I saw this under the price sign, and felt it was very interesting:

Dick's hamburgers, the home of the $2.40 deluxe burger, has better benefits than the Hilton. The 401k is better, they offer childcare/tuition reimbursement, and the starting pay is $1.50 an hour higher than the hotel engineers make. They also get three weeks of vacation, whereas I had to be there a whole year before I even got one. Their milkshakes taste way better too.

I'm ready to start singing about how I'm free as a bird now!

99 bottles of beer on the wall...

Wait - no, that's not right! It should go:

99 days till the baby is born...

HEE HEE!!! The final countdown has begun! Well, the big one anyway. Can you believe I only have three months left here? It's gonna fly by.

It's a day of change here. The weather has changed (cooler and overcast and rainy - absolutely beautiful!), I'm entering the last part of my pregnancy (third trimester officially starts in a week, but whatever) and best of all...

I'm FREE.

That's right folks. I am unemployed, and as ugly as that word sounds, it's music to my ears. No more catty, bitchy, immature coworkers. No more managers who don't really manage anything treating me like crap because I just make coffee and copies. No more guests whining because I have to charge them for stuff. No more gossip, no more backstabbing, no more feeling like I just have to make it to the end of the day to survive. No more trying not to think about tomorrow.

Now, I get to LOOK FORWARD to tomorrow!

When my husband got home, we talked about what had happened, and together with everything else I've told him over the past few months, he agreed with me that for my sake and for the baby's sake, it was time to be done. I went to give notice, and she knew. She had the HR lady in her office already, waiting for me! I explained what my husband and I had decided, and she said okay, and since I'm leaving on vacation next week, my last day would be Friday, which is today. Then she's like, well, if you want it can be today. Yeah. Lets go ahead and do that.

So there you go. I kinda knew that would happen, but I'm totally okay with it. Instead of having to deal with people looking at me and a final day of judgement (they are SO not nice to people when they give notice around there), I'm home. I slept in until 9:30, I had some toast, I played with the dogs, all the shades are open so I can admire the lovely gray day, and I'm surrounded by things I love in my scraproom that got cleaned up just in time. Oh, and the baby is kicking.

Life is GOOD.

I figure, I'll take it easy, try to get that stress level back down (my heartrate is up, I can feel it pounding away in my chest!) and relax for the next few days. Then we go to Seattle, and I have fun, and when we get back, I get down to the business of getting this house in order and settling into a routine of sorts so that I'll be better prepared when Sawyer gets here.

I'm gonna be a housewife. HA! Loves it. :)

Final Warning

Some people think I'm really funny. I don't know why. I don't try to be. I'll tell you what I am though:

HONEST.
LOYAL.
SINCERE.

And I try to do things to the best of my abilities. I don't slack off. I know my strengths, and admit my weaknesses. I am proud of these things.

However, other people aren't necessarily like this. They can tell everyone on earth what their problem is except the person they actually have a problem with. They tell you that the only stupid question is the one that you don't ask, yet when you DO ask questions (and therefore open yourself up to vulnerability by admitting you don't fully understand, quelle horreur!) they accuse you of being argumentative or trying to undermine them.

No babe, I'm just asking a question. I like to be CLEAR on things.

If you've read here for any length of time, you would be able to understand when I say I haven't had the easiest of lives. Really, most people could say that, but I'm thinking I have some good evidence on my side though. Up until I was 20 or so, I was treated like crap, by my mom, by my family, by my first serious boyfriends. I finally got to the point where I said enough. I'm valuable, right? Why should someone get to be a total ass to me, and I have to sit there and take it? I told myself that I was the only person who was guaranteed to be with me until the day I died, and therefore, I needed to start looking out for my best interests. No more letting people be mean to me. No more taking crap from people. I said enough, and I tried not to look back.

My intolerance for people being asses to me gets me in trouble though. I really and truly don't get WHY it's okay for people to be rude to me but I can't be rude back. I got written up for it today at work, on FINAL notice no less (it's my first write up and you're supposed to have four warnings, but I only get one apparently). So, because I'm a bottom of the barrel peon clerical employee, a manager can be an ass to me but if I call them on it I get in trouble because they're managers and I'm just support staff. My boss even said, it's not fair but that's just how it is.

I call bullshit.

I don't take being disrespected lightly. I was treated like crap for the first 2/3 of my life and I'm so done with it. Today was a rough day. I've been home crying all afternoon, feeling like a total failure of a human being because the people at work are apparently talking about me behind my back. Never mind the last minute projects I threw together for them. Never mind the kick ass job I did on their marketing materials. Never mind the times I stayed late because someone "forgot" to ask me for something and it came up at the last minute. Never mind how I perform every task on my job checklist completely, thoroughly, and in a timely manner, never trying to pass it off onto other people.

What gets noticed is a question I happened to phrase in an unfortunate manner in an email when someone asked me to do something. I ASKED A SIMPLE QUESTION. If that person read it as me being a bitch to them, why not come to me, and discuss it with me? Isnt' that how grown ups are supposed to handle things? I could have told her I didn't mean it that way, and I was sorry, and we could have moved on. Right?

Nope. She forwarded it to HR, my boss, the general manager, and God knows who else, with a snarky "woe is me why is she being mean" comment attached. So I got written up for "lack of hospitality" because she's a manager and I'm a peon.

Oh, and I get told that it's not just that, it's because the general manager feels I argue with him. I barely talk to the man!!! Apparently, he told my boss I haven't been making coffee in the afternoons. Um, yes, I have. My boss says, well, he says you haven't. I'm like, I assure you, I have. She says, well, I'm not going to get into this argument with you. How do you come out ahead in that situation?

Also, there was an incident where a guest wanted me to print something off a USB drive. I was told by our previous IT person never to let anyone do that anymore, because I would get viruses all the time and it would take all day to clear them. Well, the GM caught me telling a guest this, and he asked me why, so I explained to him what the IT guy said. He said never mind that, we do whatever it takes to make the guest happy. I asked, even if it means that I'm down and can't do anything the rest of the day? He said yes.

I ASKED QUESTIONS FOR CLARIFICATION ON WHAT WAS A NEW TO ME POLICY.

Apparently, that's being argumentative in his eyes.

Then again, this man is the control freak who had our maintenance guy use a hacksaw to remove the height adjustment levers from the chairs around his conference table, because he didn't want them moved from his preselected heights. This way, they'll ALWAYS match. And I thought I had OCD!

So yeah, those three things, and I've got a final notice write up. I'm so pissed. My hours have also been cut back, because I was told that I'm obviously not happy in my position (I'm not) but they still needed someone there. That part is fine by me. I'd rather not be there AT ALL.

I feel like such a total failure at life sometimes.

I'm tired of people telling me how good I am, how smart, how creative, how organized, but then trampling me in the next breath. If I'm so wonderful, why does this crap keep happening to me? If I'd supposedly be good at anything, like my boss told me, why can't I seem to be successful at anything?

Of course, I find my mind drifting over to the baby. Isn't it my job as his parent to show him how to be successful at life? How the hell am I going to do that if I can't figure it out myself?

I want to get down on my hands and knees and beg my husband not to make me go back anymore, I don't want to go back to those people. I know that's a tad bit dramatic, but it's how I honestly, truly feel inside at this moment.

Paperclipping

Today, a guest came in to drop of some papers for a coworker. He asked me if I had a letter sized envelope in which he could place them. I apologized, told him no, and offered him a regular business envelope. He said no, he'd rather not fold them, so I offered him a paper clip. He says okay.

So I turn toward my desk drawer, open it, and extract a paper clip. As I turn toward him to hand him said paper clip, I see that he already has one, and is clipping the papers together. As he pulls his hand away, this is the sight that greets my eyes:

(yes, I stole the paper clip and replaced it with a normal one just so I could take photos of it!)

I don't shock easily. Even if I do get shocked by something, I rarely get stunned to the point of silence. I'll tell you though, this did it. There are some things that you simply do NOT expect to see at work, much less handed to you by a kindly old man! Was this guy really carrying THAT around with him, and handing it to a complete stranger? A female stranger no less?

I kinda gave him a blank stare, as he handed me the stack of papers. Now, he was facing me, so what I saw was the backside of the stack of paper. He tilted them forward, towards me, so that as I took them, I was able to see the front of the stack. This it what I saw:

Yeah. I'm a dork. Funny that it was a bone though, huh? I'm thinking, PHEW, self, you need to get your mind outta the gutter!!! But then, I wondered if it was just me, so I showed it to a few select coworkers (you know, the cool ones) and they thought the same thing that I did. It wasn't just me!

It was brought to my attention that I didn't have any very recent photos of myself (that weren't maternity/belly shots anyway), so as I was having a pretty decent hair day yesterday, I took a few by the kitchen window. I actually managed to get one that I liked too.

I could have used a little lip gloss, but eh. It was 7:15 in the morning! I need to clean off my hutch. I see a package of fondant and my vitamins on there, and that looks messy/cluttered. NEXT weekend, I swear!

Bored.

BORED. BOOOORRRRRRRREEEEDDDDDDD.

I hate my job. I really do. I'd love nothing better than to go back to being a housewife. I'd even do the laundry, I SWEAR. Just someone get me the hell out of here!!!

It seems like in the last four months all the fun people have either quit or been fired. Mostly quit though. Of course, the people who live to make others miserable are still here. Isn't that always the way? I'm tired of all the gossiping, all the passing the buck, all the taking advantage of others, all of the crap that happens day to day. I'm just over it.

I'm not challenged. A monkey could do my job. I'm just bored and over it. I only worked half a day yesterday and still got all my stuff done. It's easy peon work. They're like OH, you have time then and want to make me pick up the slack for others. Um, you compensate me for that and we can talk. You pay other people way more than me and they can't fulfill all their responsibilities and now it's MY problem? Don't talk to me about being a team player either, that's just management manipulative speak. I'm not stupid. That's not giving me more responsibility, that's having me clean up after lazy people.

I pray for something to happen so I don't have to be here anymore, but that's not likely. *sigh*. I took a photo of the shelf under my desk, as I find it amusing:


Since I don't eat very much at meals anymore (no room in there!!!) I end up getting hungry in between meals now. I was going to the gift shop every day, but as I work in a hotel, you can imagine how spendy that was getting. I've bought some crackers and stuff to keep under my desk for "emergencies". To tell you the truth, I don't get into it very often, but it's comforting to know that it's there, and that I have plenty of options between salty and sweet. I also end up feeding coworkers pretty often too. I like being prepared!

It's funny, when one of my coworkers found out I was expecting, she was like, you got a secret stash of food yet? I'm like, yeah, haha! Apparently this is common?

Frustrated.

I work in a clerical position. I make copies and fax stuff for guests, I run reports, do some filing, sort mail, order supplies... you get the idea. While the average clerical assistant in the US makes between $28,899 and $41,504, I make less than that. My job is not hard though, so while I wouldn't mind making more, I'm okay with that.

Here's the deal though... they know that I know Photoshop. My boss, who is in charge of marketing here, has been using this fact to her advantage. I've designed numerous items for a big corporate event we had here a few weeks ago (name tags, signage, posters, invitations, etc.), as well as marketing flyers. I do good work. I am versed in design basics. I know how to pick colors and fonts. I know the appropriate way to make my files the best for printing or to be web ready for emailing.

I'm not a professional, but I know more than anyone else here about these things.

Further adding to my frustration, in the past week I've also been told to "come up with" text/copy for these items on my own because I'm "good at that" and/or our marketing person is too busy. I've been told to work on ideas for these things at home too! I'm not a marketing person. I don't get paid to be a marketing person. I don't sell things and I don't know how to sell things, and I'm not PAID to sell things. I'm really frustrated here because I feel like my employer is taking advantage of me, and I know if I complain that I'll be told I'm lucky to even HAVE a job, as most other departments here have experienced lay offs or hour cutting.

Does that make it any more fair?

Here is my issue: While I like doing this work, and I feel it's good practice for me and a great way to establish a portfolio, I can't help but feel like my skills are being taken advantage of. I've done the research, and I know that to get a flyer made by a professional would cost, on average, about $120, and I'm being paid a teeny fraction of that for my time. Also, a professional designer would not be required to come up with the copy for these items, as it would be the client's responsibility to do so.

When people request a product from another, it is because it has worth. The reason they are coming to me for this work is because they want a product that is better than they are able to create using techniques that they are not able to do. I know that someone else could slap together flyers, the way it was done before I did them. All they have to do is choose a theme, add photos and text in Publisher, and then download and print. In just three easy steps they would have a flyer designed.

The problem is, the other folks here know next to nothing about how to design. Fonts, colors, image placement — it all matters more than someone who doesn't know anything about design would imagine. That's why my work looks so good, if I do say so myself!

If you aren’t trained in construction, would you try to build a house from the ground up? If you don’t have mechanical training, would you try to tear down and rebuild a carburetor? No matter what a person is selling, they didn’t just decide one day to start selling it and become an overnight expert. It took time and training to learn all of the details.

All I'm asking, is that as an artist, and a hard worker, give me my due.

Busy busy!

I feel like I need a nap.

Monday, I went to a crop. Although I thought it kind of strange to hold a crop on a Monday night, I figured, what the heck, right? Gotta get out of the house and meet new people! It was really small, and only three hours long. I stayed just for two though because I had to work the next day.

Considering the short amount of time I spent there, I got a lot done! I did three layouts. One I'm thinking I like just the way it is. The other two I think need a tiny bit more tweaking before I'll consider them done. For instance, one has this cool faux leather frame on it, but there's nothing inside. I need to think of what to put there, and then it will be done.

What I really planned on working on were the latest batch of ultrasound pictures, and of course, that was the one thing that I didnt' touch! Ah well, there's always this weekend, I suppose. The baby won't be here until October, so no rush, right?

Speaking of the baby... it's seems to be really hard to break the habit of calling it Bubba. My husband has taken to saying Bubba Sawyer, as a sort of compromise, but in my mind, the baby is still Bubba. Oops. My own stupid fault!

Yesterday I had this training all afternoon, and so I didn't get to leave work until six o'clock! Usually I leave at 4:30. We're not supposed to be getting any overtime either. I got up late this morning and didn't make it in until 8:30 though, so perhaps that half hour I was late will balange things out slightly. BLAH.

Tonight is cake class. I have to go home and make up a bunch of royal icing, when really, all I want to do is take a flipping NAP! I'm so tired, I just want to sleep. I'm already not sleeping well at night, and I know it's just going to get worse before it gets better.

In good news though, my appetite is coming back. I had been eating maybe 1/3 of what I could eat previously at one sitting, but in the last couple of days, I've really been able to pack it away. This is, admittedly, a bit scary, so I need to watch it. It is nice to be able to eat again!

Still waiting to feel the baby move... I'm sure it will be any day now, right?

Oh, and I still haven't heard from Mom of 3 yet about the RAK. I posted a comment on her blog but there's no email link. I didn't want that post to drop off the end and get lost. Please email me if you see this at sara.fehling@gmail.com

Forget Wire Hangers, no Walmart Babies!!!

So, I had my 16 week doctor appointment the day before yesterday. Everything is looking good, with the exception of a little blood in my urine, that the doctor seemed unconcerned about. Oh, and she said I wasn't drinking enough water. I was shocked to hear that, because, as anyone who knows me will tell you, I drink a LOT of water. I probably drink more than anyone I know. It's crazy how much I can go thorough in a day. But, you know, doctor's orders, so I'm trying to step it up a bit. I did over a gallon and a half yesterday, not counting a mini Powerade and a lemonade with lunch.

At the end of my appointment she was like, okay, I'll see you in four weeks! Then she says, well... I guess I could let you come in two weeks from now to let you do your ultrasound. It would be kinda mean to make you wait the full four weeks, wouldn't it? I just gave her a stupid grin, you know, cuz I'm verbally gifted like that. So, I get to see Bubba again on the fifteenth! That's only a week from today!

I'm crossing my fingers that Bubba cooperates and shows us the goods, because I am DYING to know what this baby is going to be. I want to go shopping! There are stupid hats to be bought, people. I have needs. My husband and I are both taking the entire day off from our respective jobs. The appointment is at 10 am, and by the time they see us and we're done there it will probably be close to noon, which means lunch and then hitting the mall. I'm so freaking excited I don't know how I'll sleep the night before. This is bigger than Christmas and Disneyland COMBINED.

Today, I had lunch with Devon. We hit the mall food court, and I got to enjoy not only her company, but her 3 1/2 month old son's as well. I'm telling you, I've seen pictures of the child, but they so don't do him justice. This is a really freaking cute kid! He just sat there, and grinned at us and babbled and drooled quietly the whole time. He was a good ad for a baby, haha! Definitely not a Walmart baby. (Bubba, take note!) It was a fun time, and I even ate some steamed veggies with my Sbarro pizza. Trying to be healthier, you know, for Bubba's sake and all.

At work, we're doing this huge sales blitz, and I've gotten to play graphic designer for the past week or so. My husband says this could potentially be the start of a freelance portfolio, since it is technically a corporate event, which means I'm doing graphic design work in a professional capacity. It's all a beach theme, so I used lots of surf boards and palm trees in my signs and the invitations. I'll tell you what, working on Photoshop all day sure makes the time pass a lot faster than my normal administrative tasks, that's for certain!

This weekend involves plans for sleeping and eating. Life is Good. :)