Staci\'s a quirky bird

So, Parrish and I have started a new side project, a Marvelous Mustache Merchandise site called Mustache Attack! We’re having way too much fun with it, even developing our own products, like this:

We’re also doing coupon giveaways if you send us a picture of you Mustache Attacking someone! Here’s how:

We’ve been waiting for years to open this store, and we’ve finally done it! Word. Go find yourself something awesome!

Poop. Bloody poop. I wish it were the funny British cursing poop, but no. Real bloody poop. From my dog. In my kitchen.

That started by day yesterday. I rushed our 9 year old lab to the vet to find out she has an bacterial infection in her intestines and…wait for it…….Hepatitis. I’ve got to get her to stop sharing needles with the junkie dogs in our neighborhood.

It’s totally treatable. That’s the good news. And, we got a wellness plan which saved us a good 500$ yesterday. Also good news. That didn’t really stop my afternoon from being a complete wreck though. Walk through it with me for old time’s sake.

3:15 – vet calls with the news, lets me know I can come get her.

3:16 – Candice starts screaming. She’s tired! But the bus lets off at 3:45 and I don’t want to wake her up, so up she stays. She is visibly unhappy about this.

3:45 – Claire comes home off the bus. “Where’s Chloe,” I say? “Uhhh, I don’t know,” says Claire. Oh yeah – it’s Wednesday which means Chloe has nature club until 4:30.

3:46 – Candice starts screaming in earnest. I pack everyone in and drive to the school hoping (wistfully) that she’ll fall asleep in the car.

3:47 – Cue torrential downpour

4:30 – Nature club is released, but it’s raining. There’s a bush in the way and I can’t see Chloe, she can’t see me, so the teacher won’t let her go. I have no idea where she is, so I have to get out in the pouring rain leaving screaming baby in the car with 5 year old.

4:32 – Soaking wet, deep breath, drive to pet store

5:00 – pick up Lula, need to get her some different food and treats to hide her giant horse pills in. Chloe pushes cart with baby in it, I wrestle 88lb dog and try to read dog food labels

5:01 – Lula bloody poops a gallon on floor of Petsmart. I sheepishly apologize to a teenage girl that walks by who points me disgustedly to a pet mess station. Um, did you not see the GIGANTIC mess? And you want me to use single server paper towels and a poop bag? Classic. Claire happens to be standing in the center of said poop mess in rain boots and a rainjacket, looking around with saucer eyes like she’s in a mine field.

5:05 – After 10 trips to the poop station for supplies, a manager finally comes over with a ream of paper towels and a petsmart bag. He saw me and came to help – the little snatch that left me there with my three kids, a gallon of bloody poop, and a freaked out 88lb dog that my 7 year old was trying to keep in check, was no help whatsoever.

5:08 – Attempt 2 at reading dog food labels

5:09 – More poop. Ensue song and dance deux.

5:12 – Decide to get the $(*% out of Petsmart. I have to get the treats though or she won’t eat them. I’m sweating buckets that this point from stress.

5:20 – Kids, dog, meds and self are in car headed home.

5:45 – 7:15 – screaming baby

6:30 – 7:00 – fit throwing DivaClaire, sent to room, locks me out. Result: Claire no longer is allowed a doorknob.

8:00 – kids in bed, beer in hand, nerves somewhere on Mars.

Let’s hope today is better because more days like that and I may end up in a mental institution.

If you’re on Pinterest, you’ll get it for sure.

busy beavers

So I’m busy. Like, really busy. And so is Jeff. We realized about 6 months ago that we were wasting mad cash because we weren’t planning our meals. But we didn’t have time to plan meals either.

I saw through following the owner of Project Life’s facebook that she used e-mealz, which is a meal planning website.

E-mealz -Here’s how it works

Subscription is 5$ a month which gets you access to their weekly meals. You can choose from various lists (safeway, walmart, vegetarian, meals for 2) and every week you get a menu with instructions and a grocery list. EASY!

the only problem

The meals were totally hit or miss.

Sometimes the meals were great. Sometimes the recipes were jacked up and I ruined dinner. Most of the time, the meals didn’t coincide to use the same ingredients. Sometimes there was way too much food. Sometimes there wasn’t enough. They say on their site that groceries for your weekly recipes should be 85/week. We were spending about 120. And, there were only about 5 real dinners per week, plus a lunch and a breakfast. I don’t really ever want to cook lunch, or one of their breakfasts. Also, I couldn’t choose what I wanted, or recall any other recipes.

relish relish.

Then, Jasmere ran a deal on a meal planning site called Relish. I so  jumped ship because we were so sick of the meals with e-mealz. Here’s the rundown:

Subscription is 7/mo
You get 15 recipes to choose from to add to your weekly list (as many as you want)
There are also 15 freezer recipes to choose from (set it all up, stick it in the freezer, cook when you want)
Once you move the recipes into your list, you can print up a grocery list and your recipes
You can set how many servings you want (2-8) so the recipe is automatically adjusted to your family size
Each recipe gives you a rundown of calories, protein, sugar, etc as well as WW points
You can save your favorite recipes and add them back into your list whenever you want
The recipes are DELICIOUS
They have real instructions (e-mealz is one short paragraph, typically as long as your ingredient list)
Groceries for a 6 dinner week was 94$ last week
The ingredients coincide through the recipes
They have other lists you can access at any point (like kid friendly, vegetarian, various holidays, etc), as well as all of their past recipes
The meals generally take 30 minutes or less to make
All of the recipes I’ve had so far are pretty low carb (e-mealz: just about every meal had pasta, rice, or garlic bread in it)

Can I tell you that I LOVE THIS WEBSITE. Love. It not only makes my life easier, but it’s saving me money and getting me excited about cooking again. I used E-Mealz for about 6 months, we’ve been on relish for a few weeks now. There’s really no comparison. Relish is amazing and full of really delicious recipes. Every week they have a theme too, like last week was pineapple. They had me making pineapple mango salsa, grilling amazing marinated pork chops with grilled pineapple, etc. This week it’s jamaican, several of the recipes have chimichurri or jerk flavors. The other night, we had lasagna spinach roll ups with a salad with homemade buttermilk cucumber ranch dressing. DROOL.

Go give it a shot, you’re not going to be sorry. Click here to go to Relish and get your grub on.

get dressed, lazy.

Working from home it’s easy to get into a rut that involves sleeping until you want to and working in your pj’s or yoga pants all day. FYI – wearing yoga pants is not equivalent to getting dressed! At least, I tell myself that or else I’d wear them every.single.day. All day.

so what did I do about it?

My biggest issue is how to get  motivated to get dressed and put a spot of makeup on so I don’t feel like a slag come 5pm. So I decided to take a picture of myself every day at 9:45 am. Either I was going to look cute, or I was going to look a wreck. I opted for cute. And, for accountability sake, I’m posting them here. Talk about motivated!! I’ve gotten dressed every day. In real clothes. Complete with a little lip gloss.

how to make it realistic

I’ve been taking a shower at night and blowdrying my hair before bed so I don’t have to do it in the morning. If I have to shower in the morning, it’s going to take me 45 minutes to get dressed and get on with the day. Yesterday, it took me 12 minutes to throw on clothes, foundation, blush, mascara, and a little lip gloss. And brush my teeth. Don’t forget that.

did it work?

You bet. It’s made a huge difference in my attitude, my productivity, but best of all, my self esteem. I didn’t realize how crappy I felt at the end of the day when I was in the same thing I went to bed in the night before. I was amazed at how quickly I got dressed and put a smidge of makeup on. Do you have 12 minutes every day to get presentable? I found the time and am so much happier for it. So is my husband

Sometimes you have to crack some skulls when you run your own business. And that’s ok. It’s hard as a woman to be tough sometimes, but boy is it rewarding when you can. Gain face. Bust balls. It’s ok.

Drew this this morning, pretty productive for a Saturday at 8am I’d say. What can I say, I was inspired. If you need some inspiration, watch the video to the right – or go listen to some Sleigh Bells (the band, not the Christmas song) and put your asskicking boots on. Take over the world, one set of nads at a time.

The first few months here haven’t been so bad. I’ve been skyping, texting, calling friends from back home and it hasn’t really felt like I’ve been gone. Until recently.

get out of my butt

That’s what Parrish said (with her mind) last week after I was constantly hounding her about…well…everything. Like I needed to call her every time anything happened, or I saw something that made me think of her, or wanted to talk to ask her how to do something (like paint furniture, or really anything – she’s like a hipster martha stewart). And then I realized – I need some friends here.

meeting moms

This has to be one of the hardest things to do without joining a mom’s group. So I joined a mom’s group. I actually thought I gt rejected because it took a few days to get approved. sad face. Was super stoked today to get APPROVED (say it like the Target lady!) – am going to the first event next week. happy face! I’m way too excited about it – which tells me again that I really, really needs me some friends!

To all of you out there (hi mom! Actually, I don’t even think my mom reads my blog haha), I hope you have a happy holiday weekend full of sparklies and yums and good times.

I feel sucky today – so it’s just going to be some video love for you

A couple of things to note:

1) These guys are the absolute kings of catchy songs.

2) It took me a full minute of watching to realize that the video is being played backwards.

3) This means they were dancing backwards. This not only made me supremely happy, but relieved that they aren’t just a bunch of spazzes.

So, for your listening and viewing pleasure, here’s Peter, Bjorn and John’s Second Chance

So I finally got my Amazon books and holy cow – I’m totally inspired again.

I cracked these bad boys open and started sketching immediately. Already I’ve learned so much about proportion and how to draw the body from them. I can’t believe I haven’t done this sooner. No, I’m way too headstrong (aka Boneheaded) for that – I’ve got the the “screw-the-manual” attitude that tends to make things way harder for me than they have to be.

As I was sketching, my sketches were all distorted because I was laying the book down flat on the table to draw. So I decided – I needed a drafting table. And then I made it so.

Have I SERIOUSLY never thought to get one of these before? REALLY?! Game changer. Drawing is not only much easier, but more comfortable. I can set my books up (my favorite of the new set is the one here – I highly recommend it for anyone wanting to learn to draw the female form) and sketch next to them. It’s got a ruler. And trays for my goodies. And it was only 60 bucks with my 40% off coupon at Hobby Lobby. WINNING. duh.