Deep Thoughts With Jerry #2

I opened a blank blog post screen to start writing at 5:20 PM. It's now 5:49 PM and until I started this paragraph, I hadn't written a single word. I cannot, for the life of me, think of ANYTHING to write about. And my bad mood continues--I just need a win. I need for something to go right!

In the meantime, though, Jerry is here to the rescue for me. He's going to write today's post by answering some more icebreaker questions. So here is Jerry...

---

Q. What is your spirit animal? (The animal who is most similar to your personality.)

Jerry: I am a penguin. This description describes me perfectly...

"Penguins often dance for joy at the sight of someone they love. They sing their love for each other. Penguins are certainly not shy about expressing their love. Like humans in successful relationships, they find that hanging out with their partner is the greatest joy of life."

Katie: That was Jerry's answer--I didn't write it, I swear! 

Q. What is the funniest thing one of your pets has done?

Jerry: We went out as a family to run some errands and when we returned the entire house smelled like pancakes when we opened the door. It was quickly discovered that our dog had gone into the pantry, pulled out the maple syrup, and chewed the bottle open on the living room carpet. We scrubbed for a long time but we could never really get the smell out. The house smelled like syrup for months when we vacuumed. 

Q. What is something you can’t cook?

Jerry: Ha! I try to follow Katie’s recipes but I always end up fucking it up while adding my own ‘flair’ to it. Also... pasta. I always cook it for too long.

Q. What is your idea of fun?

Jerry: Relaxing at home. No plans. Nowhere to be. Just sitting and watching a show uninterrupted. I know it sounds simple, but those days are few and far between with my work schedule.

Q. If money and time were no object, what would you be doing right now?

Jerry: I would be trekking the continental United States to visit every MLB ballpark and collecting a 59/50 team cap from every city. Baseball is my favorite sport so to see every park would be on my bucket list.

Q. Where would you time-travel, if it were possible?

Jerry: I would love to visit central Europe. Visit the sites and museums surrounding the events of World War 2. I’m somewhat of history fan and would love to visit historical monuments. 

Q. How would you change your life today if the average life expectancy was 400 years?

Jerry: I would like to think I would slow down and enjoy everything, have bigger and better plans for the future and plan accordingly. It always seems like we are living on borrowed time and whenever plans are set there is always this feeling of ‘Well, we are only going to do this once.’ 

Q. What is the most challenging job you can think of?

Jerry: Currently, a police officer. In this political and social climate enforcing the law when everyone is watching over your shoulder seems like it would be extremely stressful. I love to to think that I would be one of those cool officers you see playing with the neighborhood kids and developing a relationship with the people I’m sworn to protect.

---

And there you have it. Some deep thoughts with Jerry ;)  If you have questions for him, feel free to ask! I like when he takes over my blog when I'm at a loss of what to write.

Continue Reading...

Wednesday Weigh-In: Week 62

I got this shirt at the thrift store the last time I went because I thought it was too perfect for me. If you can't read it, it says:

"If you fall, I'll be there" - The Floor
"If you fall, I'll drop you and probably hit you on the way down" - The Beam

I am notorious for injuring myself while working on projects (or even day-to-day tasks): bruises, cuts, scrapes, gashes, burns, you name it. But Jerry and I are convinced I'm going to die tragically in a woodworking/home repair incident. I wear personal protective equipment, but I'm just too clumsy and uncoordinated to work without getting injured.

The shirt reminds me of when I was working at my brother Nathan's house--I was scraping off his popcorn ceiling and at one point, I was standing on a ladder while bracing myself against his fireplace mantel. When I leaned my weight on it, the mantel flipped up in the air and I fell off the ladder in what felt like slow motion. Not only was the mantel flying at me, I was falling against the bricks of the fireplace. I even broke a big chunk out of a brick with my elbow!

Anyway, those kinds of things happen to me all the time, and I thought this shirt was quite appropriate for me ;)

Wow, it feels like I just did my Wednesday Weigh-In yesterday. I still feel like I'm in a mixed state of bipolar (in bipolar, a mixed state means having episodes of depression and hypomania/mania at the same time--you might have a ton of energy, for example, but mentally feel sad and unmotivated). So, I might wake up and have a great morning and then in the afternoon, feel depressed and crying over something totally irrelevant. I haven't had an episode like this in a very long time. Hopefully it'll be over soon.

It doesn't help that I have this issue going on with my bedroom and bathroom right now. Brian called me today and told me a couple of things I can do for it in the meantime before he can help me early next week. I just really want it to be done! It's super overwhelming and stressful to even think about. (You can see that I took my usual mirror selfie in my bedroom instead of my bathroom--that's because I have things crammed in the bathroom until after I get my bedroom put back together.)

Anyway, depending on when you ask, I had either a great week or a bad week when it comes to my diet, haha. I still haven't had much of an appetite, and I was sure that the scale would be down a few pounds this week because I haven't eaten as much as I'm used to. But it was actually up a touch:

Last week, I was at 142.0, so I'm only up 0.4 pounds today. However, I'm happy with 142.4! I can't believe how well I've been doing maintaining/losing weight this year. I don't know if becoming vegan has something to do with it or not, but I just hope I can keep it up.

This week, I am probably going to eat my weight in peaches. I picked up my Georgia peaches from The Peach Truck yesterday! Last time, I had to let them sit and ripen for a few days before eating them, but I ate one this morning and it was perfect. I've already had three today and I'm sure I'll have a couple more before bed. They're just so good; they're so juicy that the juice drips down my chin.

If you like peaches, I highly recommend checking to see if the truck is doing a tour near you. I've always really liked peaches, but once I tried these Georgia peaches last year, I realized what I'd been missing out on my whole life! I can't buy grocery store peaches anymore.

Well, I'm going to cut this off here because we're about to get a big storm and I LOVE storms. Jerry and I may go sit in the garage to watch :)

Continue Reading...

Transformation Tuesday #81

Happy Transformation Tuesday! It's late as I sit down to write this, so I may not get it done in time. I was working on my own transformation for the last few hours--Eli's bedroom. I didn't do anything big; I just couldn't stand to look at how messy it was and how it smelled like dog (Joey spends his time in there). There was dog hair everywhere and I don't know how he could stand to live like that!

So, while he went to the county fair with his girlfriend, I cleaned it the best I could without going through his personal stuff. It looks a million times better. (I won't post pictures because Eli hasn't even seen it yet and I don't know if he would want me to share pics.)

Anyway, here are a few readers' transformations today. There are a couple that I'm saving for next week, so if you sent me one and it's not here, then check next week.  Enjoy!

---

We built a lake house in Maine about 20 years ago when my kids were little. This spring and summer we decided it was time for a new dock. Twenty years ago we built a PT dock. We’d had enough of putting in and taking out the very heavy sections, so we invested in an aluminum dock with wheeled sections.

So easy to put in, and I love the chairs, table and bench we bought for it.  We also put a laminate countertop in when we built it, and although there was nothing wrong with it, the laminate looks cheap and cheesy. (No one is there if we aren’t, we don’t rent it out.) Love the new granite tops.  Also bought a new stainless steel stove; the existing stove came out of our last house when we replaced it with a commercial stove. It’s a great place to go in the summer and winter.

-Christine

Christine, what an adorable dock! It looks like the perfect place to sit and chat. And it's funny that the bird was posing in the "after" picture ;)  As far as the kitchen, wow--it looks so much brighter! I happen to like laminate countertops, so I don't think it looked bad at all, but your granite ones look so nice--and they definitely brighten up the room. I bet you're loving it!  -Katie

---

I come up with the ideas and my husband goes for it. This is a small transformation but even small ones make a difference and take time to do.  The first picture is the before picture -after killing the weeds and removing them. The second picture wood chips were added, the wood replaced on the bench and stepping stones added. Next, we may do the right side of the path.

-Kim

Christine, I love that dynamic--you come up with ideas and your husband does them. Sounds like a great idea to me! ;)  I cannot get over what a huge difference something as simple as mulch can make. And the new stone pathway and bench look great. I wouldn't call this a small transformation--it looks like a different space!  -Katie

---

This is sort of a reverse transformation. I moved out of my apartment at the end of my lease and into a new apartment my boyfriend. We kept most of his furniture and let go of most of mine. It was a lot of work (we moved everything ourselves), but you can see here we did it. Plus, I actually managed to sell everything in this room we were getting rid of!

(I was proud of how much money I made back by taking the time to sell things):

Bought the couch used for $350, sold for $300

Bought the coffee table used for $110, sold for $80

Bought the chair in the back right used for $75, sold for $20

Bought the TV stand new for $300, sold for $200

Bought the rug new for $150, sold for $50

Kept everything else

So made back $650/$985 (about 2/3) of the money I spent furnishing the place

-Emily

Emily, you know I'm a sucker for numbers and for thrifting, and I LOVE that you were able to sell everything! I absolutely would have bought a couple of things in the room--it looked great. Thanks for including the numbers--it's so interesting to me. I hope that you enjoy your new place with your boyfriend :)  -Katie

---

Thank you so much for sending in the transformations! It was fun to see four totally different transformation photos. If anyone has a transformation to share, no matter how insignificant you may think it is, please send it to me so I can post it on a future Transformation Tuesday! Just send a before photo and an after photo to me at: katie (at) runsforcookies (dot) com. Please include your name and a description of your transformation. Looking forward to seeing what you've got! :)

Continue Reading...

Bullets

Right now, I feel like everything is so chaotic that I can't even think straight. So, I figured writing some bullets would be the easiest way to write today. 

* Joey came home last night! If you missed it, my sister kept Joey for a while (maybe six weeks?) for a dog "vacation" with her basset hound. He had a BLAST, and I'll write a post about his adventures once I get some more details from Jeanie. Yesterday, Jerry drove home from Wisconsin after visiting a friend and he stopped at Jeanie's house to pick up Joey on his way home.

* Joey got used to going for two-mile walks at 4:00 in the morning, so I took him for a walk first thing this morning (it was definitely not at 4:00 AM, but still...). After that, he was still so drained from his vacation that he slept all day long.

* No news on my bedroom/bathroom issue yet. Brian isn't going to be able to help me until early next week, so I'm going to have to live with it like it is now. If there is one thing I cannot stand, it's having clutter all over the house. My house is never completely clutter-free, but when I have no furniture in my bedroom, the stuff has to go somewhere. So the house just looks way too full of stuff everywhere.

* Jerry decided to eat vegan for a month! I didn't suggest it or bring it up at all, and I've never pushed him to go vegan. He asked to watch the Dominion documentary with me (which is the one that made me go vegan) because he wanted to know why it had such a huge impact on me. We only made it a quarter of the way through when he was just too stunned and horrified to keep watching. After that, he started choosing vegan options more and more, and he even ordered a vegan burger in Milwaukee! He wants to try it--full vegan--for all of August. I'm excited :)

* I still haven't had much of an appetite, which is weird for me. But I've been feeling depressed lately and I think that has something to do with not having an appetite. Now that Jerry wants to eat vegan for a month, I'm going to try to make new recipes frequently so that he can see that vegan food tastes good!

* I haven't been reading any books lately and I really want to get into a series. I liked the Delirium trilogy (the third book wasn't as good, though, and it took me a while to get through it). So, I'm in the mood for another young adult dystopian series; unfortunately, I feel like I've read all the well-known ones. I really should start reading some of the books on my Kindle that I've not read yet. I get a free one from Amazon every month, but I rarely read them.

* Tomorrow is the day that I'm supposed to pick up my peaches from The Peach Truck! I can't believe it's been a year already since the last batch. This time, I only ordered one box (25 pounds) because I don't plan to make jam or salsa or anything. Noah and I will attempt to eat 25 pounds of peaches before they go bad, hahaha. (Jerry and Eli don't like them, but Noah and I LOVE them.) Brian has a freeze dryer, so if there are any left, I'll just freeze dry them for "astronaut peaches" ;)

* I've gotten really far behind on email (again) so I apologize if you're waiting for a response. Like I said, things are chaotic here. Also, this depressed mood I've been in has me in a funk.

*Well, I've got a date with my super comfy sleeping bag and a Lifetime movie (not sure which one, but I haven't watched on in such a long time. I used to love Lifetime movies! When Lifetime used to show a new movie every Monday night, I would watch it in the bedroom while Jerry watched Monday Night Raw wrestling in the living room. It was just a thing we did on Mondays, and even though we were in separate rooms watching separate shows, it was something we both remember with good feelings.

* Don't forget that tomorrow is Transformation Tuesday! So please send me a before picture and an after picture of a transformation--no matter how small or uninteresting you think it is--along with your name and a description of your transformation to: katie (at) runsforcookies (dot) com. Thanks!

Continue Reading...

August Goals

Today wasn't quite as busy as yesterday because I didn't have much that could be done with my bedroom. Brian (my older brother) is busy working on his own project--building a shed--so he can't help me until he's done with that. He gave me explicit instructions not to get overzealous and start tearing stuff apart.

You have no idea how hard that is for me. Especially as someone with bipolar disorder who is going through a hypomanic phase!

This morning, I cried for a little bit. It's kind of sad lying on my mattress which is on the subfloor of my bedroom, which has a huge hole in the wall and floor just waiting for critters to come in and give me rabies while I'm sleeping. (I blocked it off as best as I could for the cats, but if something wanted to get in here, it's definitely possible.

Anyway, with tomorrow being a new month (and the last full month of summer) I thought I'd list a few goals to work on. Not a "challenge", necessarily, but something to keep my focused during a time where it's very hard to focus (hypomania).

So, here goes:

1) This is no surprise, but I NEED to drink more water. I'm tired of waking up with a mouth so dry I can barely talk. Several years ago, I would drink a whole liter of water before I even got out of bed. I kept it on my bedside table and gulped it down. Then I'd drink three more liters throughout the day. And I always felt great! So I'm going to aim to do that again--starting with drinking a liter as soon as I wake up.

2) Start running again. This is getting really ridiculous--I haven't been running in months! The break only started because of my knee injury, but that hasn't been giving me any problems anymore. In fact, since becoming vegan, my body actually feels pretty damn good.

3) Spend more time outside. Every year, I tell myself that I'm going to take full advantage of summer by sitting outside on the deck. Jerry and I used to do that all the time. We'd each have a glass of wine or a beer in the evenings and enjoy the warm weather. Even though I don't drink anymore, I can still have my Heineken 0.0 or just some tea or something. The whole point is to spend time outside.

4) Work on keeping up the landscaping. We haven't planted anything yet and we aren't going to until next year (I want to keep the whole bed of mulch weed-free and prepped for planting). Every time I walk by, if I see a weed starting to grow, I pull it out. I'm starting to see more and more of them, so I want to make it a point at least every few days to pull out all the weeds I can see.

5) I'm just going to end with this one because this goal going to take up 99% of my time--finish this mess of my bedroom! I have to tear everything out of the master bathroom--including cutting up the shower to get it out (it's one piece and too big to remove)--and remove the flooring. Once everything is removed, I have to cut out the water damaged pieces of subfloor and replace it. Once all that is done, I have to level the floors with a liquid leveler. Then put plywood on top of that. Then install the luxury vinyl planking.

That's just the beginning! That's just getting it back to "livable". Other than all of that, we have to install a new shower (this time in the opposite corner). I'll have to install all new drywall (kill me now--I hate drywalling!!), sand the heck out of it, then prime and paint. I haven't decided on a color scheme, but since we have to remodel all this stuff, we might as well change things up a little. So that part will be fun!

Anyway, nothing super new for August goals, but hopefully writing them down will actually help me do them. Other than fixing the bedroom, I really want to focus on getting back to running. I think I'm going to go back to the good old 3-3-3 plan (run three miles, three days a week, for three months)--without focusing on anything other than those three numbers. No worry of pace, heart rate, etc. I'll probably do a lot of the runs on the treadmill, and that's fine with me. It's been in the 90s here lately and that is just too hot to run outside (for me anyway)!

Well, Jerry just got back with Joey after Joey's very long vacation. So I'm going to go spend some time with them :)

Continue Reading...

Opening a Can of Worms

Normally, I try to post a review of a new-to-me vegan recipe on Saturdays, but it's just not going to happen this weekend. The problem in my bedroom turned into a huge issue and now I am at the point where I'm just totally overwhelmed.

Thankfully, my older brother, Brian, was able to come over today and talk me through what was wrong, what my options are for fixing it, and basically just what I was looking at. Then he made me promise over and over that I wouldn't start anything new without asking him first, haha.

Basically, here's the problem:

The shower in the master bathroom is right between these doors (the left door goes to the closet, right door to the bathroom).

So when you walk in the bathroom, there is a stand-up shower on the left. I'd been planning to surprise Jerry by taking out the carpet in our bedroom and installing the luxury vinyl planking that we have in the rest of the house (I still had enough boxes for almost the whole bedroom; I only had to order a few extra). 

That should have been a fairly simple one-day project. Once I started taking the carpet out, however, the problems started arising. First, the floor had some high and low spots that I'm sure weren't there before. The floor was kind of "wavy" because of it. This could be a minor problem by using a leveling product that you pour in the low spots and it hardens quickly to make the floor level.

Considering this is a manufactured home, the flooring is MDF and not plywood. Not a huge problem unless something like this happens down the road. Brian said another option would be to remove all of the flooring and replace with plywood; he said he really doesn't think that's necessary, though.

He also mentioned that the MDF may be glued and stapled instead of screwed or nailed. Let me tell you, I swear this house was built with glue and staples, which are IMPOSSIBLE to get out cleanly. And it takes forever and causes carpal tunnel syndrome and makes your hands so numb you can't even do anything with them. He said if this is the case, he highly recommends *not* removing the MDF and just using the leveling stuff instead.

Okay, sounds good, right? A cheap and simple solution.

Then I got to the last part of where I was taking the carpet out, which was the floor between the two doors. When I got in the middle of them, I saw that there was clearly water damage behind the shower.

Since it went right to the wall, it was a safe assumption that the water was under the wall and into the bathroom (under the shower) as well. Brian said that part of the floor and the bottom of the wall for sure need to be replaced. Awesome--a day project just turned into a weekend project.

But wait! There's more.

To get to the floor under the shower, I have to move the shower. We've needed a new one for a long time, so we figured now is the time to get one. (I say "we" because I had to tell Jerry what was going on, so it's no longer a surprise.) The shower is one piece and won't fit through the door, so we have to cut it into pieces to remove it.

Side note: We used to have a garden tub in the back right corner of the bathroom. We never used it (it had jacuzzi jets and that grossed me out for some reason) so we ended up getting rid of it when we remodeled the bathroom. This is the only picture I could dig up at the moment; it's in the middle of the remodel. You can see the corner tub, though. (There were mirrors where the wallpaper is.) And we most definitely got rid of the carpet! Why they put carpet in the bathroom, I have no idea.

Since the water lines and drain are still there under the floor, I asked Brian about putting a bathtub/shower combo in that back right corner instead of replacing where it is now. And he said that's no big deal at all. So... that's what we're going to do. And thankfully, Brian is going to come over and "help" do the work (basically, I watch and learn). 

The best part is that we're going to turn the space from the current shower into a linen closet. Our bathroom is big with a lot of wasted space since we got rid of the garden tub, so I love the idea of having a closet. (Without a basement, attic, or any other storage space--other than the garage--the closet will be fantastic!)

Still, this is a HUGE project. Today, Brian told me I could cut the drywall out of that wall and cut out a section of the floor (where the water damage is). Being me, and definitely hypomanic (I think I'm in a rapid-cycling state of bipolar right now--super hypomanic and then depressed, very quickly.) I wanted to immediately tear out the shower, the bathroom floor, get a new shower, etc. But I promised I'd wait for his approval ;)

I finished cutting the drywall and I found the damage under the shower. It's bad! My tools could go right through the floor. So, it's not something we can put off; we need to move on this soon.

The hardest part now is keeping the cats out of there! I can't risk them going down under the house (right now it's a big hole). I grabbed some pieces of scrap from the garage and did what I could.

It's been a super long day and I'm exhausted. And it's not even close to done! I'm so glad that I have a brother who knows all about this stuff (he's been building for as long as I can remember). Patience is not my virtue, that's for sure, so it's good to have someone keep me in check!

Continue Reading...

Friday Night Photos

The punches just keep coming at me. I really hope that after this bout of things just not going according to plan, I can take it easy for a while without extra stress.

Today's problem was entirely my fault for starting a project this big. For the record, though, I thought it would be a finish-in-a-day thing. I didn't think it was going to turn into the mess it did, but now I have a HUGE problem on my hands.

Jerry is visiting a friend in Wisconsin for the weekend, so I had plans of redecorating the bedroom while he is gone, including installing luxury vinyl planking (we had almost enough left over from the rest of the house to do my bedroom, so I ordered a couple of boxes of the same planking and now we can do the bedroom). That was the plan, anyway.

I noticed that our floor had started creaking a bit and that I felt some high/low spots in the floor. I really hoped there was nothing wrong with the floor under the carpet. If all was good, then the installation of the floor should've been really easy.

Well, since nothing goes as planned, this was far from easy. And right now, my bedroom looks like this:

First of all, I was right about the floor being kind of wavy. That concerned me and I knew I'd have to fix it, but it wasn't until I got to the far side of the room that I completely panicked. The shower is just on the other side of the wall. When I pulled up the carpet there, I found this lovely scene:

Clearly, there is water damage from the shower. We've needed a new shower for a while, but as far as I knew, there weren't any leaks or anything. However, there is a soft spot on the floor in front of the shower, so I know that we need to fix the damage there, too. 

I'm just ready to tear my hair out. The kittens, though, LOVED this whole process.

Needless to say, I won't be surprising Jerry with an awesome bedroom makeover. I'll be lucky if we have any flooring at all.

This next photo is even grosser than the water damage. I had some holes in my walls that I had to patch up with some drywall compound (just from hanging things there). I went in the garage to get the compound, which I'd just used last fall. When I opened it, I couldn't believe what I saw:

I guess I didn't close it tight enough--it was all mold! So that was awesome.

On a more positive note, Noah's birthday party went off very well! I didn't stay for his actual party (which was in the garage), because the kids are 18 years old and what 18 year old wants their mom at their birthday party?

But I did spend a lot of time cleaning the garage and decorating. I love how it turned out!

The green screen in the corner was for them to use to take fun pictures or videos. We set up two Christmas trees (a little one and a larger one). For each of the kids young adults coming, I set up a stocking in front of the "fire place"--inside, I included a few silly toys, some goofy Christmas glasses and headbands to wear. (Now I wish I'd at least have gotten a picture of them with their stuff on.)

Here is a pic of the skeletons and me wearing some:

I bought all of these Christmas mugs at the thrift store--I thought it would be fun to serve drinks in those! I also made Christmas cookies for them to decorate and came up with a couple of things for them to do.

Noah and his friends had fun, and while he has no idea the time or effort I put into it, I'm glad that it went well.

Jerry and I went to Lowe's for a couple of things and we were looking at tool chests. I opened the drawer to this one and saw balloons spelling BYE. Haha! Just thought it was funny. Clearly we weren't meant to get a tool chest ;) 

At the thrift store, I saw this jacket and noticed the price was crazy high for a thrift item--$29. I googled it because I thought maybe it would be worth buying and reselling if it was a good brand. It looked brand new, too. I looked it up and they retail for about $150, so $30 was definitely a bargain. Too bad I'm not a cyclist.

I saw these shoes at the thrift store and just HAD to buy them for Riley! Are they so adorable?!

As I was flipping through jeans, I came across this pair that I thought was funny--the previous owner had written "skinny" twice across the back. I have no idea what that was about!

This was another impulse buy yesterday when Jerry and I were out doing some errands. It's a cactus scratching pad. It looks different than other scratching posts I've bought, so I thought it would be fun to give it a try.

Chick totally went to town on it right away. He was a blur of fur attacking that thing.

Duck was a little more chill. And Chick was watching him like, "C'mon, you're supposed to attack it!" Phoebe and Estelle showed a little interest at first, but then went back to being their old lady selves.

When we were looking at cat toys, I saw this one and nearly had a heart attack. It's literally a ball of yarn for cats! If you haven't read about what happened to Duck after swallowing some yarn, definitely read that before giving your cat yarn to play with. There are a million more toys to give them; I'd skip the yarn or string. It's just not worth the risk! (Or the $3,000 vet bill.)

And finally, we got around to power washing the deck. I still have some screws to replace (and even a few boards to replace) but it'll be ready for stain or paint very soon. We planned on stain, but now we're leaning toward paint. It doesn't make any difference to me, but Jerry seems to want to paint it. Still, though, look how satisfying it looks with the power washer!

Okay, I'm going to try to figure out a solution to this whole mess with my floor. It's sounding like I'm going to have to replace the shower (which we needed to do anyway), replace some of the underlayment/subfloor, and then finally install the planking. This was supposed to be a weekend project! My brother may be able to come over tomorrow to help me. If not, I'm going to have to hire someone because I don't want to cause even more problems.

And I'm out. Have a great weekend! xo

Continue Reading...

Mental Health Day

Getting the garage ready for Noah's Christmas-in-July birthday party (the skeletons wanted to take part, too)

If you read yesterday's post, then you know I'm just not feeling so great mentally. Jerry is off work today before going to visit a friend for the weekend, so I'm going to spend the day with him. I always feel less anxious when I hang out with him.

So, I'm declaring today a mental health day for myself and I'll be back to regular blogging tomorrow. Right now, Jerry and I are going to attempt cross stitch of all things! Hahahaha. It was an impulse buy, but we thought it would be fun to work on.

Have a great night :)

Continue Reading...

Wednesday Weigh-In: Week 61

I know I used this picture a couple of days ago, but I really do love that outfit and I figured there was no point in taking another picture today.

Another Wednesday, another weigh-in. It feels so redundant! Still, I have such a hard time letting go of streaks--and this one has been well over a year. Also, my daily posting has been going since January 1, 2020.

I have to admit that I really don't want to write today. Or at all lately. I've been feeling depressed and I just keep hoping it'll go away. I feel like I'm invisible in my own house sometimes and lately it's really been getting to me. I am sure that most moms go through a period of feeling invisible--where you give advice to your kids, they don't listen to it, then someone else gives the same advice and they're thrilled because their friend TikTok was so smart(!) to think of that.

Eli is a good example: Eli was going to the gym every single day for at least nine months to lift weights; he LOVED it. I took a personal training certification class (a very long time ago, but I remember everything very well!) and took several college classes that gave me all sorts of information about the human body and physiology. I told Eli all about how he needs rest days and how he needs to switch muscle groups so he allows each muscle group to rest. I said that if he goes every single day he'll burn out and not want to go anymore. (And don't even get me started on the nutrition part of strength training!)

Anyway, you can guess what happened... he got injured from working out without rest days and then he got burnt out from working out every single day. So he stopped going. But does he admit that mom was right? Of course not--I'm 40 years old, so what do I know about life and learning from the mistakes I made?

The example with Eli was just a small part of it; I feel like this a lot lately. I don't even know why I bother giving advice, because unless it comes from TikTok, it's wrong. *eye roll*

Okay, well, I didn't mean to get into that. I hate complaining about feeling sad or depressed when I know that I have a great life, family, kids, the whole works. Feeling unappreciated for everything that I do is just getting to me, and I'm probably writing this at a bad time today. (I spent SO MUCH TIME and effort working on things for Noah's birthday party today and he didn't thank me or even seem to notice. So I'm feeling very unappreciated right now!)

Alright, let's set all that negativity aside and get on with my Wednesday Weigh-In...

I was at 142.0 today, which is down a little from last week's 143.2. I don't really think the weight loss this week is from anything I did; I just didn't have much of an appetite because of the way I've been feeling. So, I'm happy with the loss, but I'm pretty sure it's not permanent. Hopefully I'll feel better this week and then I'll be back to eating like usual.

Lately, I've been spending as much time as possible cleaning and organizing things. I don't like the cleaning part, but I love organizing! I returned most of the plastic containers I'd bought at Hobby Lobby because the quality was terrible. I wish we had a Container Store around here! I went to one in New York once and it was one of the coolest stores I've ever been in. (Spoken as a total organizational nerd.) Also, I would probably need $20,000 worth of containers to organize my house and garage, hahaha. So, I've just been trying to get creative with what I already have.

Anyway, as far as my "diet" goals this week, I just want to get back to my usual eating routine. I feel a lot better when I eat regularly (and I'm sure my mood is better, too!)

Continue Reading...

Transformation Tuesday #80: An Update on Gilda

Happy Transformation Tuesday! Like I did a few weeks ago, I posted a single transformation of a cat adoption that didn't seem like it would work out, but it had a very happy ending. You can find that story here.

Today is going to be a similar post--more like a guest post than a typical Transformation Tuesday. This transformation is pretty long and I like to keep editing to a minimum when I can, so I chose to do this in a post by itself.

This is another heartwarming cat-adoption story, and it's actually a continuation from a previous Transformation Tuesday. So it's more of an update from the post on June 8, 2021. You can find that story here. This is about Gilda, the cat who was bounced from shelter to shelter and very clearly needed a permanent home. Runs for Cookies' reader Michelle adopted Gilda and worked hard with her to help her be a happy and healthy cat. This is the update on Gilda and how she's been doing in her new home. You can find more pictures there, too.

I'm going to turn it over to Michelle, who will continue Gilda's story...

---

A quick recap: The short summary is that it was difficult to find a cat to adopt during the pandemic, but after several months I found one that according to the shelter needed a bit of "work," which was kind of short-hand for a cat that had been sad, scared, angry, not good with change and needed some special attention. She was a bit over a year old when I adopted her, an owner-surrender with an unfortunate name she didn't respond to at all, so I named her Gilda.

Gilda and I spent lots of time getting to know each other, going at her pace. I can't believe it's been 14 months since I first got her, and my life is so much better with her in it.

Things about Gilda: She likes food--okay, LOVES food--especially kibble, but also a prescription wet food that can best be described as sticky-brown-smelly-sludgy-wallpaper-paste. (It's so gross but she loves it and it's a prescription she needs). Gilda gained nearly three pounds (almost 40% of her original body weight!) in the first six months I had her, before I got a handle on her ideal weight and how much I should be feeding her. She's back down to a healthy weight but would definitely be a very large (unhealthy) cat if I gave her unlimited access to food.

Gilda likes to sit near me, most often touching me, but she is not and may never be a lap cat. She loves to give me head-butts, and rub her cheeks on my glasses and my nose. When she's begging for dinner, she'll sit silently beside me with a thousand-yard stare, and then put one paw on my shoulder, very gently--it's so sweet. If I don't react to that, she bops my nose with her paw (yes I am a sucker.)

Gilda is *still* terrified of towels, but I've made progress with her fear of paper bags (I thought all cats loved paper bags!). I set up a giant paper bag meant for lawn waste in my living room, and cut a door/window in the end and she likes that well enough.

She ADORES something called Da Bird (which I highly recommend)-- basically a wand toy with feathers on the end that kind of "fly" when you use it-- it's pretty realistic. When she "catches" the bird in her mouth, she prances around proudly, dragging the wand behind her. (Katie here: I have to agree--my cats LOVE that toy! You can find it on Amazon here (affiliate link)). 

Gilda has a *wide* ranging vocabulary from little beeps to sweet soft squeaks when she's trying to butter me up so she can have more food. She makes a crazy yodeling noise when running around at night (or, um, during the day) and can project extremely loud obnoxious meows when I'm not getting her dinner ready fast enough.

Other things that have happened over the past year: Gilda and I navigated getting her to take anti-anxiety medicine so that I could put her in her carrier and take her to the vet for a checkup. The staff there *adored* her--she was well behaved (and acted kinda drunk)--and she was pronounced pretty healthy. She was also VERY happy to come back home with me. 

It was good that we had a successful first vet visit because we've had to return a few times--poor Gilda has some skin issues that were alarming. She'd scratch herself absolutely raw and cause large open wounds. I've learned that skin issues can be tricky to treat, but after about five months of a special diet/allergy challenge, we found out she's allergic to dairy and fish.

I learned that dairy and fish is in just about *everything* for pets, even things not fish-flavored and even some 100% freeze dried chicken, if it's been prepared on the same machinery as fish)...sigh. the good news is that I've found a mixture of prescription food plus one other chicken/turkey only brand that she LOVES and help about 80%. Of course, she also has some seasonal allergies that cause her to itch, so I have to keep a close eye on her, but I think we're at a place that we can both live with.

As for socialization, Gilda has come to really like my (elderly) mom and dad, who occasionally take care of her if I need to be out of town--I'm lucky they live close by. Gilda has also met my sister and niece and done well, and really adores another good friend of mine who we see regularly--but she still growls when she hears one of my neighbors opening their back door (I live in a small condo complex), etc.

Lastly, she's mastered "high five" when she wants a treat (the treat is just a piece of kibble, but she likes it as much as a treat), as well as "sit" and "up" which is when she gets on her hind legs.

I've been very inspired by a YouTube channel called Billi Speaks. During the early days of the pandemic, a veterinarian in Florida decided to teach her 12-year old cat to "speak" by using buttons--and BOY does Billi speak--her first word was MAD and if you're a pet person and watch it, you'll be impressed (and will laugh lots).

This kind of training has been done with dogs, and I'm a bit obsessed with the idea of it, but the buttons are a bit expensive--as is her prescription food--I think she eats better than I do! So I don't see myself tackling this project any time soon.

Please enjoy the before and after photos-- and I appreciate you hearing more than you probably want about Gilda.

Have I mentioned I adore her?? ;)

P.S. Thanks to Katie (and Duck), I make 100% sure that any string/yarn I have is well-secured in a closet Gilda can't get into, and if I need to do a project--such as repairing a sweater, etc.--I'm very very mindful of everything!

---

Katie here... I am SO SO happy to hear that Gilda is thriving! She seems like she's come such a long way since last year. I was thrilled that you chose to adopt her and that now she has a forever home with someone who adores her :)  I am absolutely sure that Gilda is grateful for your patience and she'll reward you with lots of love. Please give her a high-five from me! Thank you so much for sharing the update <3

Continue Reading...