1 more day of September

and THIS is the weather I am dealing with?

I see that it's cooling down to the 80's, but I want fall weather dang it! I am reading all of your blogs and you all seem to have nice and cool weather (I am oozing with jealousy!) I can't believe this is the last day of September 2010! Where has the time gone? It seems that summer has really flown by!

My work situation is in a little transition. My office manager offered me a position that is more of a data entry/administrative assistant to the various project managers we have working here. It's a long back story that I won't get into, but the way things have been going around work and the way it was presented to me, I felt like they were pushing me out of my job for a less qualified individual that happens to be part of the bosses family. Then they were just going to move me where I wasn't happy. Needless to say, after my pow wow with the big boys, I was frustrated, stressed, and needed to get outta there. Thankfully my knight in shining gym shorts was home yesterday so instead of the gym, I went to vent to him and get advice. Long story short - he helped me see the positive in the offer and how this is actually a great thing. The position they want to move me into would allow me to take home a lot of stuff while I'm on maternity leave (and when I finally do tell them I'm not coming back lol). My other worry was stress since the project managers here are very stressful people to work for, and my hubbster calmed me down and told me not to let it stress me out, it's just a job. It's so true if you think about it. The last thing I need right now is stress, and there are WAY more important things (and people) in life, than work and I shouldn't let it get to me. Easier said than done, but it made sense to me and I'm pretty sure I'll be successful at keeping the stress to a minimum. Plus, I'm gonna get a new desk- A-YO! So excited about that!

So a lot of new changes, and all the details are still being ironed out, and things probably won't be set in stone for a week, maybe 2. I will keep you all updated :) I started thinking too, I only have 2.5 months until I leave work for maternity leave (and for good, ha!). Crazy how time is really sneaking up on me!

Sweet Tarts and Paula Dean

So today at work MAYJA' "Karli has hormonal blow out". So I have had a box of MOVIE THEATER SIZE sweet tarts on my desk for about 3 days. Whenever I get light headed or just want something tart (my FAVORITE flavor), I grab a handful. So today was a somewhat stressful day, so I reach for my box on my desk next to where I keep my picture of Nick and I and what do I feel? AIR!! The box is completely empty - some a hole cleaned me out! I was robbed! I had at least a quarter of a box left when I left yesterday afternoon. Someone had the balls (I knew it was a guy), to clean me out and then to leave the empty box on my desk-- and not mention a thing about it?!?! I was PISSED. Like where I wanted to cry, pissed. So I ask a guy I work with if he knows who took them and to my luck, he DID! Long story short, I marched straight to the guy and let him have it. It was a pretty quiet day at the office with the boss being gone, so the whole office tuned into my 3pm rant to the Sweet Tart thief. I threw every question at him: Who does he think he is going on MY desk and helping himself to MY sweet tarts?! How would he like it if I took shit off HIS desk and didn't tell him?! He played it off like it was a joke, but this raging hormonal sweet tart craving girl was NOT letting up. When I get really mad and into confrontation, I can feel myself getting red for steam. I also tend to wanna cry (when I'm REALLY mad). So after telling him how I felt, I took a walk outside and IM'd Nick about it. I had to practice those Lamaze breathing techniques to clear that friggin lump in my throat. No one wants Kermit the Frog answering their phones. I went to the gym, let out some steam and relived it to Nick, and now it is done - off my chest - tomorrow is another day - but men be warned - do NOT, I repeat, DO NOT touch anything especially food on a (pregnant) woman's desk.

Now, dinner, aka my happy place. I have dinner in the oven, but I have taken a little preview bite of what is to come and I can already recommend this recipe 110%. Enter Paula Dean. This little southern gem was calling my name, telling me to just cook one of her cheesy hot meals and fuh-get about the sweet tart thief.

Here is a recipe I'm sharing with ya'll (just cause it's a Paula Dean night, you get a 'ya'll'). Just FYI - on the sour cream and cream cheese, I used Fat Free :)


Mashed Baked

Ingredients
4 cups frozen hash browns
1 (7.6-ounce) package butter and herb mashed potato mix
1 stick butter, softened
4 ounces cream cheese, softened
1 cup shredded Monterey Jack cheese
1/2 cup sour cream
1/2 teaspoon garlic salt
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon pepper
2 cups boiling water
2 cups prepared French-fried onion rings
Directions
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

Bring a pot of water to the boil and add the hash browns. Cook for 5 minutes and drain. In a large bowl, mix together the cooked hash browns, mashed potato mix, butter, cream cheese, jack cheese, sour cream, garlic salt, salt and pepper. Stir in the boiling water. Place in a greased 2-quart casserole dish. Bake for 35 to 45 minutes. Sprinkle the onion rings over the casserole and bake for about 5 to 8 minutes longer until onions are golden brown.

What to do next?

Like I have said before: now that my 10K training is over, I think it's time I start focusing on getting ready for the summer. This means: watching my carb intake after work (4pm and until bedtime), lifting at least 3 sets of every exercise, and to give everything I have in a 30 minute cardio session (less walky walky, more sweaty sweaty). I still plan on incorporating XBIKE classes into my routine. That'll be Mondays. I have also decided to switch things up a bit and start dusting Jillian off the shelf, and do my shred DVD on Saturday mornings instead of going to the gym. Nick wants to go to the gym after he gets off work on Saturdays anyways, so I can get in my cardio and gym stuff then. I was looking at pics from my sparkpage (sparkpeople.com), and I was looking at my body when I was doing MAINLY 30 Day Shred. Please feel free to check it out. It definitly gave me a positive outcome. So here is my "It's time to SPRING yourself into your Summer body" plan (I am quite aware that I like to post my workout schedules a lot haha)

Sunday: Run/Rides with Nick (roughly 5 miles)
Monday: XBIKE
Tuesday: 30 minute run, upper body and abs
Wednesday: REST
Thursday: 30 minute run, lower body
Friday: REST
Saturday: Shred in the AM, 30 minute run, abs and back

Now I just gotta stick to it :) I have it written on my calendar at work (since that's where most people spend their life anyways), so I don't forget.

Speaking of work, my desk is coming along nicely.


I think the giraffe really adds that character :) It still looks kinda bland, but you should have seen it BEFORE I started. I added some color with my mousepad, and I got a pink desktop calendar.




I have this one picture at home that I think I'm gonna put above my desk that I was trying to sell, but I think it'd go nicely at work. Here is what I stare at at the moment:



I want to bring this bonzai looking picture, and as much as I'd like something else above my desk, I would prefer to spend money I could be spending at Forver 21, just for work decor :)I'm gonna bring it in tomorrow, and hopefully everything will be okay with it (I'll get the clearence today from my supervisor). I just want something else to stare at other than a eggshell wall with pin hole marks all over it. I'm pretty sure I'm gonna put mine and Nick's picture in a different frame for my desk too. I just don't like the cliche' cheesy "holding hands", "times together", phrases all over it. Do you lovely ladies that work at an office (or just want to give input), have any ideas on how to spruce up my desk?

Have a splendid Tuesday lovelies!

Can I get some love for yoga?

I am so stinking excited for what is about to occur at 7:30 tonight! YOGA!!! I took a yoga in junior college and it was da bomb! I also have numerous DVD's that I like to do to. Oh yoga makes everything better! I plan on doing a 2-3 mile run before, I dunno how much time I'll have.

Work is going really good, busy since people are trying to get their taxes done before the last day of the extension on the 15th. Welcome to America, the land of the procrastinators! Lol

Not dead!

Alas, I have no fallen off the face of this earth, but have been training my firm ass off! Whew, what a huge process this is. My office is really cool. There are 8 people inncluding me who work there, but this office could easily fit 8 more people. I have worked in all sorts of sizes when it comes to employee's, but I will say that I prefer smaller better. You get to know every single person. After the 1st day, I already knew everyone's names (snaps for Karli!). The office manager (my training guru) has off Thursday, Friday and Monday. When I heard about this and the fact I would be by myself after 2 days of training, my eyes almost instantly started welling up with tears. But never fret faithful readers, for I have the gift of grabbing the bull by the horns and hanging on :D. Today was actually not too bad, but I am not letting down my guard yet for tomorrow or Monday. Speaking of tomorrow, working gives you such an appreciation for the weeekends. I am so tired tonight (which is why I am keeping this short), and what I would give to just give to be able to sleep till 8 am tomorrow! Ahh, the good ol' unemployment days, ha ha. The sucky side of unemployment is no health insurance or money, so I'll take working thanks very much :)

So far I really like the people and my boss. He likes certain things done a certain way and I am going to try really hard not to mess up cause I don't like disappointing people. Its like Bestie since I was 4 years old told me, "Your new, its to be expected your going to have a few mistakes". SOOO true.

I know this blog is short and sweet, but I PROMISE to update more this weeekend. I am just so looking forward to getting in bed before 10, he he!!

XOXOXO

She works hard for the money...

Hello bloggies :) So tomorrow is the day! My 1st day at my last job *thinking really positive*!!! I am so excited! This will be the job that I will be in until N and I start a family and I then go into my new position of being a stay at home mommy and wife (REALLY looking forward to it!)

I have no clue as to what I am going to wear yet, but I promise to fill you in with the outfit as well as how the day went. My office manager said tomorrow is basically filling out a bunch of paper work and then start training on the phones and shadowing her on how she talks to customers and how to handle situations. EEK!! So excited!! Then after I sort of get the hang of the commute, I can start going to the gym in the AM :)

Speaking of the gym, I didn't go today like I wanted :( I had to talk to Dell's customer service and was on the phone for 1 hour and 46 minutes trying to track down our repaired lap top!! By that time I lost my motivation for working out and since it was a dark cold day, I decided to go home and enjoy the weather :)

Is anyone else enjoying the football season?! N and I have been all about it this season (mostly N since I have to admit, I've been slacking on watching..BAD Karli!)

Have a great Tuesday people! OOOOO and I almost forgot, The Biggest Loser starts tomorrow. PLEASE watch it! You WILL get inspired and its so touching to see these people go through the struggles that they do. It will motivate you to add that 1 extra lap around the block or get the grilled chicken salad instead of the fried.

bitter sweet

I have worked here for 2.5 years. By far the longest job I've ever been at. My NC bestie Christine put it best today when she said "it is sad. Its like the last chapter to a good book and no one likes it when a good book ends". Something like that, but pretty dang close. It is just so true. Today I was so bummed. More bummed than I thought I would be. I was crying over stupid things. I'm really going to miss Christine. My boss too, even though him and I have had some serious ups and downs, I know he cares about me and wants me to be happy in CA. I really am, I am so excited to move back its I just hate hate hate saying goodbye. Christine has been one of the bestest friends I could ever ask for. She's only been here since September, but she means the world to me and I want to thank her for making coming to work so much better.

Enough depressing stuff. I totally flaked on the gym this am. I don't know why I was so tired, but I was and there was no waking me up. I really wanted to go too. I want to go running, but don't want to have to go back and change then go to the gym. So I think I'm gonna do a workout DVD. Maybe the Shred. Then I'll go tomorrow(Saturday yay!!!) and run & do legs tomorrow. N and I have to go get oil changes tomorrow, but as for that we got nada planned. Any suggestions? I don't think there are any movies in the theater we really wanna watch. Hmm.....what are YOU doing tomorrow? I really really wanna lay out, but got no where to lay out lol

Have a great weekend lovelies!!

What the heck?!

Hello lovelies! I am sorry for the no post yesterday, but I had some stuff going on. So this morning(and when I say morning, I mean 12:30AM!!!!) I woke up and was ridiculously nausea's and my stomach hurt super duper bad. I had a bad case of salmonella in October 2008 and that is what the pain in my stomach felt like. If you've never had salmonella, imagine somebody literally twisting your lower guts and wringing it like a towel, hurting so bad, it causes you to sweat and no matter what position you set your self in, it doesn't stop. Happy thoughts, no? LOL, no that I've freaked you out and you will probably think twice about ordering the chicken cordon bleu, I'll get back to today. So I woke up and ran to the bathroom. I won't go into all the gory details, but I promise you, it wasn't pleasant. I almost passed out hugging the toilet, but I dragged myself back to bed and curled back up with Mr. N. I dunno about you, but I'm a baby when I don't feel good. I don't want N to literally sit at my bed side and tell me about rainbows and kittens, but I want to know he is right there if I need him. He always is, but this California Dreamin chick is what some like to call, "A Drama Queen". I have no problem admitting it either. I am dramatic and I'm sarcastic, and some even say I'm funny, but hey, that's the ABC's of me. So when I'm sick, it kicks into high gear and I whine and make a big stink about it. I skipped my 5:30 wake up call for pounding the pavement since I think my body was crying out for more sleep, and when the alarm went off at 6:30, I felt a-okay. A little uneasy in the nausea department, but no stomach issues. I shower, eat some cereal since I don't think my stomach could handle my usual egg whites on a bed of spinach, and then..dun dun DUUUUUN!! My stomach starts hurting again! I talk myself down and tell myself, "Your fine, its okay, just get dressed, grab your lunch and go to work". So I attempted to dress, got dizzy and a sudden case of the nausea/stomach pains sweep over and its back to the bathroom. I just decided to call it a day after that cause there is no way I'm running back and forth to the bathroom all day at work people. I refuse to do any of "that" stuff @ work unless it was an emergency, and it would be an all day emergency if I had gone in. Thankfully my boss didn't seem to peeved about it since he responded back to my "out sick" email with "K". His famous word, not.kidding.at.all!

This week has been funky. I had a bad case of the Mondays, I've been super tired all week which in turn my workouts suck and I don't push myself as hard cause I lag, then my eating its like "Umm, excuse missy, when did it become okay to sneak a piece of pizza right before dinner? Wasn't that you I saw eating 2 pieces at dinner AND you had dessert?" Hopefully it was all chalked up to this bug that has hit me, and I'll be up and running by tomorrow and the weekend. Ahhh, the weekend, how I love thee. Sleeping in with N, going for a run when I want to, not when it fits into the work schedule, le' sigh......:) Have a fabulous Thursday everyone!!

Refresh

So I've been looking at my work clothes lately and I think I need to refresh a bit. Like not buy a totally new wardrobe, but I can tell I've gotten comfortable wearing the same things that are too comfortable rather than keep a polished look. Especially since I've lost weight (and hopefully I'll keep losing), my paints get loose. Like these one black high-waisted sailor looking pants I Have are super cute, but waaaay to baggy now since I've lost weight. Since I mentioned it, I wanna give a shout out to sparkpeople. Not gonna tell you about it cause you have to go there yourself, but I will say that if you want to lose weight or just want to live healthier, go there immediately. My problem is, is that I will wear a certain pair of pants or shoes until they die, and before they completely die, they look unprofessional from all the wear and tear. So, I'm want to get a few things to revamp my style a bit for work. Get a couple new blouses and maybe a dress and/or carpi's for work. I got a couple new pairs of shoes cause I was wearing the same ol' shoes over and over and the seams were all coming undone and it was majorly embarrassing, but not anymore. Check out the new additions :)

Aren't they cute?! I had a pair of black pointy toe pumps that I'm starting to break in too, but have been too afraid cause I'm a baby about my feet hurting. Back onto clothes. I'm a Forever 21 whore! I admit it, I love the store. I'm 22 and until I can no longer fit (please God make it never!) in clothes at F21, I will shop there. GREAT prices and great clothes. I do want to get a couple tops there for work and such cause they have amazing deals and they are still age appropriate while still being "business casual". Any suggestions for on a budget, but still age appropriate/business casual wardrobe? Suggestions please :)

Not a fan of humidity

I hear people say how great humidity is for the skin and what not and how they love the humidity much more than dry heat. Not this West Coast girl. Nope, give me a dry blazzing hot day w/cool breezy nights any day. Its humid here in Raleigh and somebody definitely turned up the heat. Nice day just to sit out on the deck w/a cold margarita (on the rocks if you please). O and P.S. Even MORE humidity to come. Tomorrow's high is 90 flippin degrees w/showers. Fan- friggin -tastic! At least I have to go to work and I have stay in the A/C all day long :)