Good Morning!

So it's Wednesday morning and my first day of class was yesterday! I know what you're thinking, "But Carm, I thought you said the first day of school was on Monday?" Well it was supposed to be. I woke up Monday morning and I was so excited for school to start! I had my outfit all picked out and I was ready to go. I checked my e-mail like I do every morning and low-and-behold my teacher e-mailed saying the first day of class was canceled! Super bummer! So I did absolutely nothing on Monday, which I guess was alright since I was feeling a little under the weather. So yesterday was my first day of on-ground class. It was web design II. WDII actually isn't required for my Graphic Design Certificate, but I enjoyed WD I so much that I really wanted to take the second one and learn more coding, CSS, and Dreamweaver. Enough about school....

I started reading the book The Secret again. You know, it's that book about the law of attraction. I don't really believe it to the extend that the book explains it that every single thing in our life was brought in by our thoughts. Like this cold I got. I don't believe that I was "thinking sick thoughts" and that's why I got sick. No, I believe I got sick because Phil is in that Martial Arts class right now, he was wrestling around with a sick dude, got Phil sick, and vowa-la, I'm sick! Anyways, even though I don't believe it 100%, I do believe it to some degree so I'm giving it a try. Plus, thinking positive thoughts never hurt anyone. My positive affirmations right now are:  "I will have a successful career in Graphic Design" and "I will be a skinny, sexy, hot bitch!" haha. Ask and you shall succeed, right?

He Would Get Me Sick....

I couldn't sleep at all last night and I wake up this morning with a sore throat, a stuffy nose, and a weak body in general. Yesterday Phil was sick. Today I'm sick. See a correlation? Lame.

Yesterday was fun. I had the day off and we went to explore a little bit of La Jolla. First we took a drive up to Mt. Solidad- a veteran's memorial. It's on top of a huge hill and as you drove up the hill the homes seemed to increase in size, value, beauty, and the ability to make me completely jealous. They sure make my two bedroom apartment in Vista look like a shack.

The memorial was beautiful. It over-looks all of San Diego and it's gorgeous. There's hundreds  of  plaques dedicated to the brave men in women to served in the U.S military. This one man fought in WWII, Korea, and Vietnam and was a P.O.W (prisoner of war for all you civilians out there) for 7 years in Vietnam! That's crazy! And he earned almost every medal you can think of: purple heart, bronze star with a "v", silver star with a "v", medal of honor... more.

After the memorial we head down to the La Jolla Coves. The water is gorgeous there! It's a beautiful shade of blue (still cold though). We went to this area that had a bunch of seals all over the water. There was actually protesting going on because people were swimming at this small beach that the seals like to sun bathe in. The protesters don't think people should be allowed to swim there. That the area should be reserved for our wildlife. I totally and completely agree. There are so many other beaches in San Diego County and we've already taken over so much of the wildlifes' habitat. The least we can do is let them have the one area that they still try and use. 

A seal and a human.

The beautiful place I get to call home.

After the coves we went to the Museum of Contemporary Art. There were some amazing photography of China there that I absolutely adored, but there was also that really random, weird stuff that I don't really get. I don't really understand how someone can literally throw some paint on a canvas and call it great art. Maybe I don't have that artist eye or something, but Phil and I couldn't help but laugh at a few pieces because we just didn't get it. It didn't "speak to us" you could say. haha. 

Overall, it was a great day off! Now, it's back to work! and school starts tomorrow!

Life is Wayy Good

Seriously, I love my life. I'm so lucky to have my friends and family so close. It was so hard living in North  Carolina without them and I am so grateful that we were able to PCS back home to the west coast. I went to La Mirada yesterday for a short visit. I met up with Amanda for sushi at the center and then we went to see Bridesmaids at the dollar theater. It was HILARIOUS! Omg, great movie! Then Amanda and I picked up a table and chair set for my mom and dropped it off at her apartment. Later that night I stopped by Grant's, hung out with Michelle and Alicia at Michelle's casa and then Alicia spent the night. It was great just spending time with Alicia last night. We were talking about how much the Parkwood Crew has through together and how no matter what we've all been through in life (and we've all been through a lot) we stayed close. I know that they'll always and forever be in my life.

This morning/afternoon after spending an hour figuring out where we were going to go we went to Red Robin to eat. It was so much fun. God, we just always get each other laughing so much it hurts. It was a great time but unfortunately I had to work tonight so I couldn't stay too late.

I saw Phil for about ten minutes before I had to go to work. It's a shame right now, between my work and his MAI course we really aren't able to see much of each other. I'm looking forward to my day off on Saturday to spend some quality time with my #1.

Stress is an Ugly Thing

Eeeekkk! I don't know why I let the smallest mis-hap stress me out so much. It's pretty ridic. Today I got called into work, which is no biggie, because hey, everyone could use an extra buck or two. It was a closing shift and as I was in the middle of putting all of our closing numbers into the shop system program it froze up on me. I restarted it. Still frozen. I can feel the stress coming.. I call my manager, she tells me to fax in the paperwork. I do so. I get out 15 minutes late but that's life. It really wasn't that big of a deal right? See's still got their info, fax machines are great, so why I am I still stressed an hour after I'm home relaxing? I really need to work on my stress management. The smallest, dumbest things stress me out and I can physically feel the stress in my back, my neck, my head... Usually when I come home with stress I'll put on a good show and drink down a brew, but there's no good shows on tonight and beer isn't too flattering on my belly so I settled for a warm shower and a Zanex. Just waiting for it to kick in is all...

On a brighter note, I finished making the rest of my building blocks today!! And I made my first meal out of them! Spanish Rice with Shrimp. It actually was thebomb.com. I'm impressed. I hope the rest of the meals are as good.

I'm head up to LM tomorrow for just a short 24 hours but I'll get to see my mom and Angela, Shannon, Alicia, and Amanda. That's pretty exciting..

Carmelina isn't Rachel Ray....

Wowww!! I'm soo pooped!! Buying Rachel Ray's magazine was a hugeee mistake.

I really enjoy cooking dinner for me and Phil (and I guess for my little sister who has been posted up all summer at our apartment), but I never have enough recipes. It's like I make 5 dishes really well, but really? those same 5 meals every week? That's not going to cut it. So when I saw the "Twenty Dinners, One Day" article in Everyday with Rachel Ray I thought it was the answer to all my prayers! The article makes it seem so easy! Basically on day one you cook a few different "building blocks" to use in 20 different recipes throughout the month.  You store the building blocks in zip-lock bags, freeze them, and then take out what you need for each meal. Sounds simple, right? It's not....

So after spending $300 at Albertson's (I should note though that my price before savings was $360. I must have been feeling like a Super Wife because I woke up early and clipped coupons) I headed to the kitchen to get started on the building blocks (BB)... sooo I totally didn't realize that it would take me 5 hours to cook all the stupid building blocks!!! 10 pounds of pork, 13 grilled veggies, and 110 oz of tomato sauce (and a couple glasses of wine) later. I'm exhausted, out of ziplock bags and never cooked the dinner for the night. To make matters worse I still have to cook 8 pounds of chicken and 4 cups of rice to have all my stupid BB. Rachel your a total BITCH and you totally just put this article in your magazine so the average mom/wife can try it and fail miserably and be reminded that they'll never be you!!!

WOW! I'm glad that's off my chest!

Update on the Day Prior

It's 8 a.m. on a Saturday. Why the heck am I up?! I have no children, no work until 1, and no good reason to be up this early! But since I am I mine as well update the world wide web on my yesterday.

I'm pretty excited to report that I made it to the gym yesterday! It took me a little while to get there, but eventually I made it. I really should work on time management, especially once school starts, which is in nine days!

I have a few mix feelings about school starting. On one hand, I'm so excited to learn more about graphic design and learn Adobe Dreamweaver and Flash  and even more of Photoshop. These Adobe programs are so powerful and I really love having the knowledge to use them. On the other hand, I'm taking 15 units again which was pretty stressful last semester, but on top of that I have the Christmas season to look forward to this semester which means more hours and less time for homework and husband. (I should also note that more hours also means more cash-money-money.)

I'm trying to make the most of these short 9 days I have left of freedom. I work today but tomorrow I have off and Phil and I are going to watch a movie and take a nice, long, romantic trip to the grocery store. Oh the joys of adulthood....

Let's Do The Damm Thing

I've always heard journaling is good for the soul, but it's 2011 and my hand usually cramps up from writing too much so blogging is going to have to work. 

Today wasn't too eventful. I woke up, ate some breakfast, went to school to get my parking pass, got my T on, and then I was supposed to head home and hit the gym, but I as I was leaving the Hollywood Tan I was suddenly overwhelmed by the aroma of grilled onions. Five minutes later I found myself in the drive-through of In-n-Out, not at the gym. Ya, that whole remind yourself that "no food tastes as good as skinny feels" really doesn't work with me. I really am thankful to have the metabolism that I do and that a few greasy cheeseburgers don't really effect me, but I really wish I had more motivation when it comes to being healthy.  One day....

In other news, life's pretty good. I am so lucky to have such a great husband and my friends and family soo close to his duty station. I'm so lucky to have my childhood bff, Jessica, so close to me. If it weren't for her I wouldn't go on nearly as many adventures. 

Blah, enough for now.