Friday Night Photos #101

I actually have kind of a lot of photos this week, so I'll get right to it...

I'll start with this picture of Jerry, because he is SO EXCITED about this. As you may know, he's ridiculously into Ghostbusters. And a couple of years ago, he ordered this proton pack from a crowdfunding thing. I've heard about it at least once a day for the last two years. It finally arrived, and he is beyond thrilled.

This is what it looks like up close... (he sent me this photo today and told me I could use it on my blog if I want. Hahaha! It was cute that he was so excited):

I've been doing a ton of work on the "cat wall" over the past couple of weeks to finally finish up our bedroom. I'd put the shelves up (the holes are there for the cats to climb through up to the top--then they can enter the hexagon, which leads to the top of the closet in our bathroom) but I didn't like how plain the wall looked. With a black wall and black shelves, it just looked very bare.

So, I had the idea to add some cat silhouettes on the wall. I was thinking I wanted it to look like our shower curtain (which I'll post a picture of also) only it would be white silhouettes on black instead of the black on white.

Here is the shower curtain. Can you spot which cat is a little different than the others? ;) 

I looked for some stencils on Amazon, but they were all very small. So, I printed out some silhouettes that I found from a google search and then I used an X-Acto knife to cut them out.

 I had hoped to use the paper as a stencil, but it was just too thin and I didn't want to spray adhesive all over the wall. Instead, I resorted to the painstaking process of tracing the silhouette with pencil, then using a tiny little paint brush to trace that with primer, then fill in the middle with a slightly larger brush. When the primer dried, I had to do it all again with a coat of paint.

I really like how it turned out, though!

It looks less boring. I think I already posted a photo of that contraption on the top left, but I'd taken one of the cat beds and mounted it to a board (sideways, so that the opening was facing upward). Now the cats can climb into it from that top shelf. Chick can always be found sleeping there!

(It's so hard to spot the "kittens" when they are on the shelves because they blend in with the wall perfectly. If their eyes are closed, I can easily miss them!

I was so happy when I saw that even Phoebe wanted in on the action:

She likes to climb up through the hexagon and sleep in a bed on top of the bathroom closet. I felt bad because she gets bullied by the kittens (not necessarily "bullied", but they think it's fun to try to play with her and she definitely does NOT want them near her). I felt like she needed another exit, so I made a few more shelves for the other side of the wall, hahaha.

So now, there is a path over the bathroom door, leading to shelves that are like steps for them to get down.

I know this whole thing probably seems ridiculous to non-cat people, but we are a bit obsessed with our cats if you can't tell. They are spoiled, for sure. But it's so fun to watch them play and enjoy it! I have more ideas to add to it over time.

Speaking of painting, I had some store credit at Lowe's and when I saw this, I picked up a couple of them. I always wrap my brushes in plastic wrap, hoping to be able to use them the next day (or, if I'm really lucky, two days later). I hate cleaning brushes when I know I'm going to be using them again soon! Well, I wish I'd known about this thing five years ago when I was painting like crazy. It works SO WELL. I actually kept my brushes in there for over 10 days and they were still wet. One was oil-based and one was water-based and they both worked just fine. I think they were only about $5, and totally worth it.

As I've mentioned way too many times over the past couple of weeks, I'm pretty upset about our insurance. Jerry and I made a big mistake in the fall when we changed our plan. We didn't understand it very well and we thought we were making a good decision... and it definitely wasn't. My psychiatrist visit? I've always paid a $25 co-pay. Well, this month my visit was $260! My bipolar medication? It would be about $400 a month, and after some coupons/discounts, $320--so I ended up switching meds to get one that is $30 a month. So far, I really miss my previous medication. I hope this one will work better after I give it some more time. 

We definitely learned a big lesson about health insurance (the hard way), and now we can at least teach our kids what NOT to do, haha. Anyway, I had a really bad day and it started at 6:30 in the morning when I did the Wordle. Seriously?! My first guess was pretty promising to at least get it in three tries. By the fifth guess, I thought I may not get it at all.

And then I looked up some memes to send Shawn, because he's going through a problem with his insurance right now, too. Memes always make me feel better! Shawn sends me a lot of them, too.

I was excited to get a phone call from Nathan (my younger brother) asking if I might want to run a 10K race with him. Even though I'm not really interested in racing anymore, I was happy that he asked me and I said yes. So, we registered for the Rad Rabbit 10K! (Here is the post I wrote about it)

I started 10K training right away. During my run last night, I was trying to get home before dark. About a mile in, the lake was so still and it blended in with the sky--it was really cool looking. About 10 minutes after I got home, we had the loudest thunder I'd ever heard--literally. It cracked about five times and I thought our house was going to fall into pieces. Oddly, it barely rained!

I swear it was nearly dark when I took this picture, but my phone makes it look like I was totally lying!

And lastly, I decided to start my February craft project a little early. I'd finished my cross stitch cat, and I just wasn't that into knitting my hat yet, so I decided to work on latch hook. (I swear, I can NEVER remember if it's "latch hook" or "hook latch". I have to google it every time.) I looked through a ton of different patterns and I wasn't thrilled about any of them (there were a few cool ones, but they were like $70 and enormous)--I ended up settling on this cow. I've only done a couple of rows and it's not as much fun as I remember from when I was a kid, hahaha. But I'm going to finish it!

Well, I'm going to go put on my pajamas, make some dinner, then probably work on my latch hook while watching... a show. I'm not sure what to watch! I binged Monk embarrassingly fast, and now I need something new to watch while I keep my hands busy at night.

Have a great weekend! xo

Continue Reading...

Three Things Thursday: Board Games

I had some ideas for Three Things Thursday today, but each time I started to write, I could only come up with two for each category. So I'll have to think about those some more!

Jerry and I played a board game this afternoon while dinner was cooking, so I thought I'd list my three favorite board games (and why they are favorites). In no particular order:

1) Wits & Wagers - This was an impulse buy a few years ago after Christmas and I'm SO glad that I happened upon it! It's such a fun and unique game. (And totally underrated, because I've never heard of anyone else talk of it before.) I even played it with friends via Zoom during lockdown.

It's kind of like Trivial Pursuit meets The Price Is Right. Each person gets a dry erase board and their own "Meeples" (little wooden people). A card is drawn with a question on it, and the answer to the questions are ALWAYS a number. And it's very unlikely that anyone playing will know the actual number. If they do, good for them! Here are some sample questions:

For this example, we'll use the question: "In feet, how long is the square mat that gymnasts use for the floor exercises?"

So, everybody writes down their best guess on their white board. It's worth noting that The Price Is Right rule applies in this game: you want to guess as close as possible *without going over*.

Here is where it gets fun. Once everyone has their guesses written down, the boards are placed in order from lowest to highest. (There is a card that has a "1" on it that is always placed as the lowest--it's like bidding $1 on The Price Is Right when you think that the other answers are all too high.)

Then everyone places their bets with their Meeples. Each person has a large Meeple (worth 2 points) and a small Meeple (worth 1 point). You don't have to bet on your own number; you can look at all of the guesses and place your Meeples wherever you'd like. You want to pick the number that you think is closest to the actual answer without going over.

You can split your Meeples up, too--if you're pretty confident with your own number, you might place both of your Meeples on it, or even just your large one. But if you think you may have guessed too high, then you can also place your small Meeple on a lower number. Basically, you divide up your Meeples wherever you'd like, regardless of what your guess was.

To score, the answer is read out loud. (In this case, the answer was 39.37 feet.) If you wrote the closest number--without going over the actual answer--then you get one point. If your large Meeple is on that answer, you get two points. If your small Meeple is on that answer, you get one point. So there is a potential to get four points on each question.

Wits & Wagers is a great game to play when you don't want to have to concentrate too hard and you want to have conversations with people while playing a game. There is enough logical thinking involved so that the outcome isn't totally random (I don't like games that are 100% left to chance), but not so much that you have to stay completely focused. It's completely family-friendly, too.

Here is the exact one that I have (Amazon affiliate link--it just means that if you were to buy it via my link, I may get a small commission).

2) Guesstures - This is SUCH a fun game to play with a large group (probably 8-10 people is perfect) and you will have some serious belly laughs. I've been playing this game since I was a kid; I love it so much that I actually have THREE of them because I'm worried that when one stops working, I won't be able to get it again. So whenever I've seen it at a garage sale, I've bought it.

This game is like charades, but a million times more nerve-racking. Here is the gist:

You divide up the group into two equal teams. The team that goes first chooses someone to be the first "actor" (or whatever you want to call the person who acts out the words). That person draws four blue cards (blue cards are easier than red cards, so the first round is done with blue; the second round is done with red). Each card has two words on it with a number (the number is the amount of points the word is worth). The actor then chooses which of the two words on each card they would like to perform (which one they think they can get their team to guess).

Then, they put those four cards in order from easiest to hardest (by their choice). The one on the far left will give them less time to act out than the one on the far right, which is why you want them in order from easiest to hardest.

You put the cards in the timer box like above, and when ready, start the timer. The actor performs the first word (the one on the far left) and can only use gestures--no noises or words or anything like that. Once their team guesses it, the actor grabs the card quickly and pulls it out of the timer then sets/throws it on the table--if they are too late, the card falls down into the timer box and they don't get the points.

If the team is taking too long to guess, the card will fall down and the actor just has to move on to the next card. And so on, for the third and fourth cards. If all goes well, they will have pulled all four cards out of the timer box before they dropped down inside. If their team fails to guess the answer or if the actor isn't fast enough to grab the card, they lose those points.

Each round, another person takes a turn being the actor until everybody on the team has acted. Then it switches to the red cards and you go through each person again. Points are tallied up and the winner is obviously the team with the most points. It's worth pointing out that I am a very shy person by nature, but even I love playing this game!

You can find the current version on Amazon here (affiliate link). The versions I have are old school--not available anywhere that I know of. I'm sure the new version is the same, just probably with updated cards.

This picture is from 2007--YIKES. Hahaha.

3) Euchre - Euchre is technically a card game and not a board game, but I can't NOT include it on a list of my favorite games! Knowing how to play Euchre is pretty much a requirement to live in Michigan. If you're over 25, in Michigan, and don't know how to play Euchre, locals pretty much assume that you're from out of state. Euchre is a passion around here. (Euchre is a game that must be played with four people--teams of two, and you sit across from your partner.)

Whenever we get together with Dave and Renee, we always play Euchre! On this particular night, the power went out... so we used a flashlight that's as bright as the sun in order to still play (along with a candle on the table).

Euchre is also a very frustrating game to try to teach people. You want everyone to know how to play--and play well, because you don't want to disappoint your partner--but teaching it is like trying to teach teenagers how to properly fold clothes. Worse, even. There are so many weird rules that have the student asking "Why though?"

It's like explaining things to a toddler who wants to know WHY for everything: Why is a Jack worth more than an Ace during this hand, but worth pretty much nil on another? Why do you only play with 9s, 10s, Jacks, Queens, Kings, and Aces? How do I know if I should "pick it up"? Why do you have to deal in a pattern of 3-2-3-2-2-3-2-3? Why are both Jacks of the same color considered the same suit? Why is a hand with four of a kind a crappy deal? What does it mean to trump my partner? And why the hell are you yelling at me for doing it?! OH NO, I have to renege that last card because I forgot the Jack of Diamonds was *technically* a Jack of Hearts--please don't throw me to the wolves!

AND FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, GIVE ME A SECOND TO THINK ABOUT WHAT CARD TO PLAY! And, always, from seasoned players who like to chat while we play: "What's trump again?" Hahaha.

Sorry--these are all references that only people who know the game will understand. Now, I imagine it's much easier to learn how to play these days because you can play online. When I learned, I just had to learn from other people. And I still get nervous I'm going to make a rookie mistake, like trump my partner ;)

For this game, all you need is a Euchre deck! (It's just an ordinary deck of cards with the jokers, 2s, 3s, 4s, 5s, 6s, 7s, and 8s removed. The 5s are set aside to keep score and the other cards make up the deck. See? Simple! Hahaha)

This was an actual hand I was dealt a few years ago. Looks awesome at first, but a gamble to assume my parter has an Ace. I think we re-dealt that because nobody wanted to "pick it up". 

I thought this meme was awesome in 2020:

---

Since some of you may be wondering the answers to the Wits & Wagers questions I shared, here they are! Don't worry, I wouldn't leave you googling for an hour! 

Continue Reading...

Wednesday Weigh-In: Week 86

I started my 10K training plan last night, so I took this picture before getting on the treadmill.

I almost wasn't even going to do a Wednesday Weigh-In today because I just feel like it's been pointless lately. It hasn't been helping me to stay accountable (by that, I basically mean that ideally, I'd stay "on track" with my eating habits because I know that I'm going to be writing about it).

I haven't had a good week, and I don't just mean my eating habits. Mentally, I feel depressed--and today has been the worst of it so far. Logically, I know that it's likely the medication change and I need to give it more time; it's just hard to think positively when I feel like this. One of my biggest flaws is that I catastrophize everything. I've talked about it in therapy many times, and it's such a hard thing to change.

As far as my weight goes, I surprisingly didn't have a big change on the scale:

I was at 144.2 today, which is up from 144.0 last week. At this point, I'm just happy it wasn't more. But I feel like I just got lucky, because my eating habits were all over the place this week. Not at all as planned.

I was pretty busy working on random projects (the weather has been unseasonably warm, so I've been working on things in the garage) and unintentionally skipped breakfast and lunch most days. Then, by the time I came inside, I was starving and felt like I could eat everything in sight.

I've been staying up way too late at night, too, and I end up snacking--sometimes at 11:00 PM! There is no reason for me to be eating that late.

So, I know the things that I need to be doing: eat regularly (breakfast, lunch, dinner), go to bed at a decent time, drink a lot of water, go back to eating a higher-fiber diet, and stop the snacking. So easy to write--but so difficult to put into action for some reason.

I really didn't want to run yesterday and I figured I could just start the plan next week, but I talked myself into it and I'm really glad I did. I felt much better after running--so much so that I was kind of disappointed today was a rest day. I'm actually looking forward to tomorrow's run--if it's still nice outside, I'll probably run outside. I think starting this running plan will be helpful for my current mental health!

Okay, I hope this post wasn't too much of a downer. I've eaten according to plan so far today and now I'm going to make a (healthy) dinner, then knit for a little while before bed. If I must snack, I have a ton of oranges that are going to go bad if I don't eat them soon! ;)

Continue Reading...

Jerry Loses His Dad Bod: Week 1

If you missed my post last week, "The One Where Jerry Loses His Dad Bod", I explained that Jerry is going to start doing weigh-ins on Tuesdays (similar to my Wednesday Weigh-Ins) because he's ready to lose the weight he's put on over the last few years. He isn't happy with the tire around his middle (that came with middle age and probably too much beer and pretzels).

To lose the weight, he decided to keep things simple at first and not make too many changes at once. He is intermittently fasting (with an eating window of eight hours) and drinking 64 ounces of water a day. No exercise yet, and he already eats a plant-based diet (although his diet definitely could be better!).

Last week, his starting stats were:

Weight: 193.6 pounds
Body Fat Percentage: 24.4%
Waist Measurement: 37 inches

And for fun, these were his "before" photos, haha:

I was kind of nervous for him today! I hoped he'd have good results for his first week. Intermittent fasting has worked well for him before; usually, though, he loses inches/fat before the scale shows a big loss.

Thankfully, when he got on the scale when he woke up today, it showed that what he's been doing has been working:

He was down 1.2 pounds on the scale, but I wanted to see his body fat and waist measurement the most!

His body fat went from 24.4% to 23.6%...

And I was really shocked about his waist--it went from 37 inches to 34.5 inches! I'm meticulous about how I take body measurements; when I worked at Curves, I had to take body measurements of each woman every month; and I used to work at Leggs Hanes Bali Playtex (a bra store) where I had to do measurements as well. So, I know that I didn't screw up the actual measurement!

Week 1 Stats:

Weight: 192.4 pounds (down 1.2 pounds)
Body Fat Percentage: 23.6% (down 0.8%)
Waist Measurement: 34.5 inches (down 2.5 inches)

And even though it's only been a week, I figured I'd do a side-by-side of a couple of his photos:

I have to say, I am super impressed with his progress! He said he stuck within his eight-hour eating window all week and he drank 64 ounces of water every day. He admits he needs to eat healthier food, though--he doesn't eat many fruits or vegetables.

I'm excited that he's off to such an auspicious start! (Yes, that is my vocabulary word for the week, haha--you may see it a couple more times.)

Continue Reading...

The Rad Rabbit Run

We're only two weeks into the new year, and already I'm struggling with all the goals I set out to do. After having such a tough time in 2022, I was excited for 2023 to be a new beginning. Well, as it turns out, not a single thing changes between 11:59:59 PM on December 31 and 12:00:00 AM on January 1.

I knew this, of course. It's like my birthday; when I turned 40, I hadn't suddenly aged enormously between January 24 and January 25 last year. But I have always loved new beginnings--and new years are my favorite!

This year didn't start out so well. The biggest factor has been the change in my insurance (which Jerry and I discovered why all the changes--we'd switched plans, thinking that we were doing the right thing, but it turned out to be very, very wrong). Jerry filled out some paperwork to hopefully allow us to switch back to our previous insurance plan, but there are no promises, and we won't find out for 5-6 weeks.

My medication change has been a bit trying, for lack of a better word. The side effects have been noticeable: I'm more tired, I feel sad/depressed, very irritable, lack motivation, and want to eat pretty much everything. If it continues for a another week or so, I'll talk to my doctor about either changing the dose or switching meds again. I'm so bummed that I've had to deal with this when my previous medication was working so well.

I didn't have abnormally huge goals for the new year: 1) Get my weight back down to maintenance range and stay there; 2) Run 500 miles total for the year; 3) Completely one project per month; and 4) Expand my vocabulary. Because I used the S.M.A.R.T. method to plan my goals, I felt like I had a solid plan for success.

It's not too late--I know that--but I just feel like getting off to such a slow start is disheartening. My weight isn't going down and I'm worried I'm just going to keep gaining. I've only run six miles so far this year--I have reasons, but I know that they are only excuses. I did complete a project this month (my cross stitch, among a couple of other things). And I did select a vocabulary word to learn, but I was supposed to have done one per week--so I'm behind a week.

I realize that these aren't that big of a deal and that I can get back on track quickly, before it gets too out of hand. The hardest one is my weight! Especially if this medication has something to do with it.

To get away from the Debbie Downer stuff, I got a phone call from my younger brother, Nathan, yesterday. He asked me, "Hey, are you still running?" I laughed and told him yes--every morning, in my head, I am ready to head out for a run. Then I just don't. He said he's been trying to get back into it too, but he's only doing a couple of miles every other day.

Leap Year 4-Miler, 2016 (How lucky I was I to get number 44 for this race?!)

He was wondering if I'd be interested in doing a race with him in the near future. Normally, I would have said no immediately. But Nathan never asks me to do anything! I wish I had a better relationship with him (it's not that we aren't on good terms--we just don't have much in common and we never really talk). The only thing we've ever really had in common was running.

The Santa Hustle at Cedar Point in 2014

I thought just because we do a race together doesn't mean I have to run it fast or try for a PR or anything. I can just run it like I would any other easy run; it would just be something to do with my brother. He said he'd like to do a 10K, so it would give him something to work toward (we could both run a 5K right now if we wanted--certainly not FAST, but we could finish it). A 10K requires some training to build up endurance.

So, I said sure--I'd do a 10K race with him. I looked some up and we decided to do one called the Rad Rabbit Run and it's in one of the Metroparks in Michigan. It's up north of Detroit--about an hour and 15 minutes away--but it looks like a nice course and neither of us has done it before.

This is perfect timing for me to work on the mileage I need in order to hit my goal of 500 miles this year. Knowing that I'll be running this race with Nathan (and that I won't want to let him down), I'll be forced to train for it.

Cheering on Nathan at his first marathon in Detroit in 2014

To train, I decided to use my own 10K Plan for Beginners. It has four runs per week: one day being speed work (relatively simple stuff, alternating between sprints and tempo runs each week); two days of short, easy runs; and one day is a long run (which starts at just 2.5 miles and gets progressively longer each week). I'm not going to be focused on heart rate or speed. I'm just going to run my easy runs so that they feel easy and I'll push myself during my speed work. I want to keep it as simple as possible!

There are just under 12 weeks until the race and the training plan is only 8 weeks long, so I'm going to add some extra weeks in there to build a better base. I haven't been running consistently for a while! I'm sure I'll use the treadmill as well as running outside--just whatever I feel like doing that day.

Maybe the running will help me to want to eat better and I'll be able to be more focused on that goal as well. Working on a project each month is easy, and the vocabulary word each week should be easy if I would just remember to do it!

Actually, I'll pick a vocabulary word right now: AUSPICIOUS. According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary: Auspicious- showing or suggesting that future success is likely.

So, while the beginning of 2023 hasn't exactly been auspicious, maybe training for this race will help turn things around ;)

If anyone is interested in signing up for this race (I’d love to meet you!) if you use this link I might get a partial refund or something: https://runsignup.com/Race/MI/Utica/BadRabbit5k10kFamilyMile?raceRefCode=MoubJkhK

Well, here goes nothing…!

The Glass City Relay in Toledo in 2014

Continue Reading...

(Almost) Wordless

I wish I could come up with something--anything--to write today, but my mood is all over the place. I don't know if it's this new medication or if I'm just having a bad week. I'm feeling sad for no reason at all, having more anxiety than normal, and I just don't have motivation to do anything! I wrote out a to-do list and I am hoping to tackle it one thing at a time. So, I'm going to skip writing a post today and leave you with a couple of photos instead. And hopefully I'll be feeling better tomorrow!

For those of you that do the Wordle every day... this is how my day started. Sigh. So promising.

This was my mood by the time I got to the fourth or fifth guess...

Anyway, here are a couple of funnies to enjoy. Hopefully, I'll feel like writing tomorrow!

Continue Reading...

Another Piece for the Cat Wall

I'm going to keep this brief because I've been working on this all day and I'm wiped!

Remember back in August when I saw those cool cat beds at TJ Maxx? No? Well, Jerry ended up going back and buying two of them. One was this black one:

 When working on the "cat wall"--basically, I'm slowly but surely adding to a section of our bedroom that will be like a jungle gym/hang out for the cats--I had the idea to hang the bed on the wall somehow. I thought about it and stared at it over and over, but never really came up with a plan. Until recently.

I took a scrap piece of plywood and routed the edges, then painted the whole thing white. It was the perfect size to attach the chair. The problem was going to be how to attach the legs of the chair to the wood. I had to get very creative, and I think I may write a tutorial post about it (because I took pictures along the way); eventually, though, I figured out a good solution and now it's super sturdy.

I hung it with a French cleat to the wall right next to the top cat shelf in the corner. (Basically, the hole in the wall on top of my bathroom closet attaches to a hexagon shaped wooden box that the cats can go inside and from there, they can jump down to some shelves to get down to the floor. Or they can turn right and go up a level, almost to the ceiling.)

Anyway, once I had the cat bed attached to the board, I hung it next to the shelf (as closely as I could, so the cats wouldn't be afraid to use it). Immediately, the kittens were intrigued, of course. Then I let Estelle have a turn. (Phoebe wasn't interested, per usual.)

The closet door is only primed, not painted--that's why it looks kind of orange!

I love how it turned out! I'm not sure what I'll add next--probably a couple of small shelves leading down from the bed so there are two entrances/exits. To say the cats are spoiled is an understatement--you should see the bruises and cuts I got today while working on this thing! Hahaha. Not to mention all of the f-bombs Jerry had to listen to ;)

Continue Reading...