Things I'm Obsessed with Right Now

Things I'm obsessed with right now.....

Coffee.
I've been a fiend for years. It is the second thing I do in the morning-make my coffee. (Nature calls first, in case you weren't wondering.)  I love the smell of the grounds (part of my routine is a big good morning sniff of the package) and I anxiously wait for it to brew. Which isn't nearly fast enough... I should clean my maker, but I swear, it takes a really long time for the coffee to get that full coffee flavor after scrub-a-dub-dubbing it. I really should get a Keurig so I can brew a cup while waiting for the whole pot to brew.... That wouldn't be obsessive, would it? A Pre-coffee maker to have while waiting for the full coffee pot to brew? My favorite brand of grounds is Dunkin' Dounuts brand, btw. And I use cream. Well, Coffeemate. I've been on a long and wide search for Fat Free Original Coffemate, but it seems not to be a popular "flavor" in my neck of the woods. Grocery stores must have an unspoken full fat creamer or real cream only rule in the land of dairy.
Special K Pastry Crips.
These buggers are yummy. Wait, scratch the fact I said yummy. I hate that word. (Based on how many pictures of other people's food I've been subjected to on Facebook with the caption of "yummy", the word now evokes nausea.) Crap, off subject there. Anyway, Pastry  Crisps are delish for these reasons One- It's 100 calories a pack. Two- they taste like the corners of pop tarts(which is my favorite part of pop tarts) with just enough filling to give these things flavor without being too sickly sweet as I find Pop Tarts to get. Three- In case you need further recommendation, I like the chocolate ones best, then the cinnamon, then the strawberry. They come in other flavors, too. I tried the Berry Streusel today. Not a fan.
Shannon Stacey.
I am so glad the powers of Amazon recommendations led me to this author! The first book I read of hers,  "Exclusively Yours" had me laughing my butt off. I'm so in love with the characters, the setting, the whole shebang. It pains me to admit this, but I'm a sucker for contemporary romances. That include naughty parts. This one is like none other I've read. The characters have sharp mouths and aren't afraid to give one another shit when shit is due. (As the semi-certified "Swears like a Sailor at Port" individual that I am, I embrace the character's language.) In the book, there is a big family with a hoard of comical kids and there's camping and swimming and four wheeling and annual volleyball games of Doom!  (Most of the family's activities and competitions have the appendage of 'of  Doom!') It's just all so completely endearing and relatable with the family dynamics, personal struggles that come with living life and maintaining lasting relationships and just being able to laugh about where life sticks you sometimes. Read this book!
Click here for information on getting your own copy.
I've also become a fan of this author's blog. She's my new literary hero :)
Copious amounts of ranch dressing on pizza-
I am not a fan of pizza. Don't scoff, I'd just rather have something, almost anything else over pizza. Until one night last week when I played the lazy card and made frozen Tombstones in the pizza maker and my little mini-me sang the praises of ranch dressing on pizza. So why not?  I tried it. And now I want to have frozen pizza with gobs of ranch all the time. And Reese's Peanut Butter Eggs. Nothing rounds out a good meal of fat on fat like Reese's Peanut Butter Eggs.

Scarves-
My neck feels naked without the warmth of a decorative scarf. I really hate the fact that the world will soon thaw and I'll have to accessorize with *ack* necklaces once more.... Until then, I embrace my colorful bands of fabric that I love so much.

I hope this has been informative, slightly entertaining or just a nice way to waste some time for y'all. 'Til tomorrow!

Appearances

Okay, I'm not really writing about other people's appearance. I'm going to talk about my own. That's alright, right? I guess what choice do you have other than read about it or not.
Today I decided to go all out and do the whole song and dance. This includes washing and conditioning with drug store shampoo and conditioner. I know, my hairdresser friends, buildup.... Then I moused, texture sprayed and blow dried with a round brush. The round brush is about the fanciest thing in my hair styling regimen. I don't own a curling iron. I have a flat iron, but I am disaster on wheels with that thing. I ditched the curling iron years ago. If I'm disaster on wheels with the flat iron, I'm disaster with a side of atomic bomb with a curling iron. Somehow, I end up with it backwards... Or upside down... I'm not sure what I do wrong, but I end up with crimps instead of curls... My second styling tool is my beloved backcombing brush. If I were writing this post twenty years ago, I'd be calling it a ratting brush. Some days I give my hair a little bump behind my side part and other days I go full on-just-short-of-helmet hair. Lots of volume, lots of aerosol hairspray (aerosol is key to big hair.)
Today I went with a little bump because my outfit wasn't all that fancy. When my best laid efforts were finished, my expression was one of consternation. Not from the finished shape and style, but because the color. I hate my hair color. I hate the phrase dirty blonde, but I must face it. After not seeing a stylist since the end of last April, that's what color my hair is... Yuck. I just have a hard time paying the money and blocking out two hours of my time to achieve the glorious shiny blonde I lean towards when I do get my hair done. Basically, I'm cheap and lazy when it comes to my hair.
So, with the hair done, it's contact time and makeup. I am often too lazy to put my contacts in everyday. Although I prefer my look sans glasses, contacts can be an ordeal all in itself when you don't use them everyday. I figured if I did full-on hair, may as well go for broke and pop the peepers onto my eyeballs. I only had to take the right one out once today to spray some extra debris off to give me a comfortable fit.
On to makeup. I'm pretty much a minimalist when it comes to makeup. When I look closely in the mirror at my thirty-two year old face, I could probably do well with some pore reducers, creams and foundation or powder. But I'm terrible at blending, choosing color and quite frankly, all that makes my face feel funny. If I were famous or my blog had a huge following, I bet I could say how much I love Bare Minerals and magically, I would have boxes and boxes of the product at my doorstep simply by mentioning it :) Since this hasn't or won't happen, I forgo the foundation. I don't do lipstick either. That makes my lips feel funnier than any kind of powder/cream/ liquid on my skin. Plus, I'd never remember to reapply, so the point would be moot by the time my lips saw natural daylight. So, by "putting of my makeup" I basically mean a good amount of eyeliner, eyeshadow (two shades most of the time, three if I'm feeling fancy) and many swipes of mascara.
Any skills I've mastered by applying these three products and really any hair coiffuring skills, I've learned from my younger sister, Melissa, during our yearly vacations to our Grandparent's house in Arkansas. And since we haven't been there in 4 years, that is the last time I've updated any kind of technique concerning hair or makeup. Sad? Maybe. I don't think I'm too far out of any kind of style, though. Blah hair color and neutral tone makeup is pretty, well, neutral.
Overall the finished, full effort still looks pretty darn okay and really after the 15 minutes it takes me to do all of this that it just took me 45 minutes to describe, my day goes on and I really never give my appearance another thought.
Now that I'm feeling completely vain and bored with my own topic, I'll bid you adieu.

My Love/Hate Relationship with Jeans

Jeans. We all own them, wear them, dig through our dressers for the ones we actually like...
And how is this? How can we own an average of seven pairs (Surely my research cannot be accurate.. Only seven pairs per American on average? My family must own enough jeans to account for all of Pleasant Grove's population.)  Thinking of all these jeans,  how many pairs do you own that you love?
 Me? None. I only love my trailer park pants. Definition- What my husband so lovingly calls my vast collection of yoga pants. I have a few pairs of jeans I kinda love. My Long and Lean style Gap jeans are nice. They're well constructed, they taper nicely so my longer than average legs look even longer and well, leaner. Best of all, according to the wonderful people at Gap, I wear a size 6! I will happily play into that delusion when I put on my favorite jeans. These are the pair I dig through my drawers to find, kindly pushing aside the one with "issues."
Let's talk about jeans with "issues." I can't account for all issues because different body types have different denim needs. These are my three big hangups-
Length- As I mentioned, my legs are longer than average though I'm only 5'6" Average or regular length make me feel like an awkward big bird figure whose pants just never quite rest on that sweet spot on my shoes rather just suspend in midair waiting to drape on something.
Rise- There is so much wrong with super low rise jeans. So much. Even if one is beautifully toned and tanned through the midsection (which I am not), the presence of crack is inevitable. If I can't bend, squat or sit down in a chair without the light of day bestowing upon my bum, I'm not wearing them. Okay... Maybe on laundry day when trailer park pants are not an option and I'm feeling a bit confident and I'm not planning any fast moves or strenuous activity, I'll wear the crack jeans. Then I wonder all that day why I still own them because I hate them. Then they get washed, folded and put back in my dresser. And the vicious cycle starts again. Maybe I keep them to feel as if I'm doing my part in keeping the national average afloat....Not really, I'm just lazy.
Color/Rinse-I prefer dark jeans. I just do. While all my darker blue jeans have options of distressing and rinse, my children's donotsomuch.... Kids jeans have nice options. It's so stinkin' cute when there is a teeny tiny pair that look like they've been worn in all the right places, but I won't pay forty bucks for teeny tiny pants. I just won't. So pretty much my kids look like they wear the same jeans over and over because in keeping with the cheapness that is me, the jeans I buy them come in light and dark. No fancy distressing and whisping. They're okay with that. Color is a whole other thing. Being a child from the eighties, I just can't bring myself to warp back to colored jeans. Also, I'm not that trendy. And again, I'm cheap. If I can't wear those jeans three years from now, I'm not buying them. Not to mention..my husband would make fun of me, so much fun of me, if I wore purple jeans.
Well, I have decided I've grown bored with this subject and truthfully, Sarah Jr (aka Ella) is having quite the little (HUGE) meltdown in the living room right now in which my role as "Mother," I must go investigate......*sigh*