Dinner Party Planning

Ugh, this week has been terrible. I have been so unmotivated. I don’t want to teach. And I definitely don’t want to go to class anymore. I am fed up with this semester. I really liked Thanksgiving break. Why can’t I go back to break? I keep repeating to myself: Only a week and a half left…

The one bright spot that I am looking forward to is the dinner party that I am hosting on Friday. I decided a few weeks ago that I was going to bite the bullet and have people over. This seems simple enough, but it actually takes a lot of motivation. I have to clean the apartment and plan the food, the theme, the activities. It can be quite an ordeal. But it has been a very long time since I’ve had people over, so I thought it would be a fun change of pace.

For some reason, I felt absurdly nervous about whether people would come. When everyone said that they would come, I became nervous about whether it would be fun. I suppose you can say that I am not a natural entertainer. I would much rather be the guest and not deal with the pressure of hosting. But then I tell myself that I invited  my friends over, for God’s sake. It’s not like I’m bringing horrible people into my home. Or weird strangers. There is no reason for it to be awkward or disastrous. So we’ll see how it goes. Maybe I’m just out of practice and this will encourage me to have people over on a more regular basis and then I won’t ever have to deal with nerves.

On the bright side, my dinner party is already bringing amusement to the world. Today, I stopped by Target to pick up decorations and supplies for the party. Instead of Christmas in July, my theme is The 4th of July near Christmas. It will be very patriotic with loads of red, white, and blue. When I was checking out at Target, the cashier jokingly said, “Are you having a 4th of July party?”  I laughed and said, “Actually, I am!” She was very amused when I explained the whole situation. After long lines of people buying Christmas themed items, she couldn’t believe that anyone would do such a thing! She loved it, and I love it!

Amusing strangers is one of my favorite things. It always brightens my day when something I am wearing or something I say makes someone I meet out there in the public happy. I remember last spring, I was wearing this fun retro dress and I stopped by the post office. A little old lady was just tickled by my appearance and couldn’t get over my dress. That makes me happy and it makes putting the effort into outfits worth it.

Hopefully, the dinner party will be fun and allow everyone to let off some steam as the semester winds down. I know that I certainly need it!

There Goes the Neighborhood

I have lived at the same apartment since I moved to Bloomington in August 2006. People have come and gone in that time, but I barely notice. I’m not too friendly with my neighbors, mainly because I know their cars better than their faces. I literally never see these people who live around me. But I hate when that purple car takes my spot..GRR.

Anyway, the one thing that  has been a friendly constant is the married couple who live on the other side of my building and decorate their porch for every season and holiday.

But now, I have reason to suspect that the insanely festive couple has moved out!!! Their apartment is dark and their porch is desolate. On the one hand, I am relieved that I will no longer feel inadequate due to their excessive display of festivity and their romantic grilling and general public displays of grown up-ness. Even though I told everyone that I felt bad for them and that they really needed a house with all of those decorations, I kind of miss them already. They were the old guard, the stable presence. Where did they go? Did they finally get a house? A divorce? Who will move in next? Oh, this is crazy.

Not as crazy as when they put out a fully decorated live Christmas tree on the porch. Or when they had a life size hanging scarecrow off the railing. Or this past year when they and the other three apartments hung orange Halloween lights in front of all of their apartments and then stopped mid-railing where my area of the porch started, so that my apartment was the only undecorated, unspirited section. Yeah, they were intense and we definitely had a history of awkwardness, but the idea that they are moving out and moving on just stings because I’m still freaking here, year after year and will be here for the next few years, too.

There goes the neighborhood….and I’m still here.

Surprised Kitty

I’m having a hard time getting back into the swing of things after Thanksgiving break. I just want this semester to be over!

But here is one thing that is making me smile today:

Christmas Shopping: Done

As you can tell by my last post, my gift-giving ability was not in top shape on Black Friday. Fortunately for me – and really lucky for the fam! – I found inspiration in the Cyber Monday Deals on Amazon.

I opted to buy board games for most of the 13 members of my shopping list. I like themes. I think that by narrowing it down to a specific category rather than being overwhelmed by every possible thing that I could get people, I was able to really focus on what people would like within that genre. So the games took care of the kids and then for the adult women, I am making a goody basket around the theme of cookies. I got a 3 tier cooling rack for $10, cookie scoops for free, and a special baking sheet for $12, then I am going to buy a package of cookie mix and throw it all together. I figure that it would be the best bang for my 25 buck(s). And for the men, I bought sporty outdoor stuff. They’re not too picky, so I’m not either. It is definitely a relief to have it all done. Now, I just have to wait for them to arrive and buy some wrapping paper at Target.

While I was doing my browsing, I came across a few great gifts that would be perfect for someone…just not anyone on my particular list.

Here are a couple of my favorites:

I know that there are many fans of The Office and I count myself among them. I think that this would be a hilarious and fun gift for a fan. Unfortunately, none of my family members even watch the show, and I guess this isn’t the kind of thing that I would buy for myself. But if I find out that someone I know gets it for Christmas, I will be over to play it with them in a hot second.

I also found this really neat (and I suppose nerdy) item while searching for kids’ toys. It’s called Moon in my Room, and you hang it on the wall of the child’s bedroom and it will go through all of the moon’s phases.

 

There is also Rainbow in my Room which is probably what I would have chosen as a child.

Something that I did end up buying that is so very, very cool is something called IlluStory. My 5 year old cousin loves books and drawing, like most kids do, so this is a really great gift someone like her. The way it works is the child will write a story and illustrate it, then they send it to the company who will then produce a hard cover book of the story. There is even an About the Author page where you can put the child’s picture. I would have loved something like that when I was her age. Actually, I think it would be pretty fun nowadays, too!

 

I am also in love with all of the Alex Toys. I can’t wait to have my own kids and buy them all of those adorable toys!

 

Switching gears from happy children’s stuff to the most disturbing item I found:  Terrorist Target Practice.  I would NOT recommend buying these for anyone. Yikes.

 

They come in a 25 pack, and I guess look like that.

 

On that darker note, I will end this post. I am just so happy and relieved to have my Christmas shopping done. And it wasn’t so bad after all. Yay! I am back to being the benevolent, selfless giver that I know that I am!!

 

 

 

Greediest Person Ever

Wow. I really want to buy a lot of stuff for Christmas.

The problem is that all of those things I want to buy are for ME, ME, ME!!!

All of this Black Friday hoopla got me thinking about what gifts I shall bestow upon my family. I started searching around online to brainstorm some ideas and comparison shop. But in the end, all of the special deals and markdowns really just appealed to me.

A GPS for my car? Oh, yes, please Santa. A new DVD player? You don’t have to check that list twice. A microwave? Well, mine has been sparking and whistling lately, so now that you mention it. My favorite clothing websites offering 50% off deals?  Boy, I can never have enough sweater dresses! And it goes on and on…

Look, I know that the holidays are about giving. And that it feels great to give the perfect gift to a loved one. And I have so much already that I really don’t need those things.

But maybe, just maybe, if my family made it a little easier to buy for them, my own wish list wouldn’t grow as vast as my frustration with Christmas shopping.

 

Trusting Instincts

This is going to be (necessarily) vague, so I will make it short.

I have never been entirely convinced that I should live by intuition and instinct because it seems so random to make life decisions based on a feeling. I would like to think that my sense of what is right for me is accurate, but I never know for sure if it is a meaningful signal or a capricious whim. Too many times, I try to resist what I feel, and analyze things to fit into a narrative of rational justification. In the end, though, I usually do what  feels right, regardless of what I think about it. When I am in the uncomfortable situation of my logic telling me to do something, and my gut feeling tells me not to do it, I try to do the logical thing first. I try to think myself into feeling what I have deemed to be the right thing. And then I feel conflicted and unhappy because my heart just isn’t in it.

Now I recognize a lesson that I’ve had to be reminded of every once and awhile:  it is much better, perhaps the only way to live, to stay true to the signals and feelings because those are just as authentic and important as all of the “shoulds” that we think we need to live up to.

And when I am able to stop living limply and find a moment when the feelings and the mind align, it’s clear that there is no other way. There may be no rhyme or reason why it is “this” instead of “that” but ultimately, you have to do what makes you happy.

 

How Tall Will Your Children Be?

You all know about my obsession with tall, tall, super tall men, so I was fascinated to see how tall my kids would be if I do get to reproduce with a guy who is very tall.

I’m 5′4. If my baby-daddy is 6′6, our male child, let’s call him Fletcher*, would be 6 feet 1.5 inches. Our daughter, let’s call her Remy*, would be 5 feet 8.5 inches.  If this turns out to be true, I guess my  family will look down on me, and I’ll have to sit in the front in all of our family portraits.

If you are curious to see how tall your babies will be, you can go to the Height Calculator.

 

 

*I have decided that my Top 2 baby names are Remy and Fletcher. So people I actually know who read my blog, I call dibs! Not that anyone else probably likes those names; they’re kinda unconventional (but not too weird!).

 

Why Oprah Matters

Oprah with the Oprah hair that I will always remember her by….

 

As I am sure you are aware, Oprah announced on Friday that she will be quitting her talk show in September 2011.

Of course, I am devastated. Absolutely devastated.

Trust me, I know that Oprah is over the top sometimes, and some of what she presents is problematic at best, exploitative at worst, but still, she’s Oprah. In true Oprah-esque language, she has “touched my life” and challenged me to “live my best life” and helped me learn from “the stories of others,” and by God, I even had an “aha moment” or two over the years.

I was born in 1984. Oprah’s show debuted in 1986. For nearly all of my life, then, she has been in the background of my life at 4pm. Daytime television has historically been aimed at women, especially stay at home moms. This means that daytime TV is also very present in the lives of the children of those stay at home moms, grandmas, and babysitters. I recently wrote about the end of Guiding Light and how sad it made me because I associated it with my Nan. I also have an enormous sentimental attachment to Family Feud in the Ray Combs era (his suicide was another pivotal moment in my TV-Real Life emotional connections). But Oprah leaving the airwaves – well,  now, that’s just personal.

In the late ’90s when Oprah decided to use her show to uplift people rather than be part of the trashy Jerry Springer and Jenny Jones murder milieu, I became a follower. The bus dropped me off at my house around 3:55, and I made the mature decision to watch Oprah while eating my Hamburger Helper instead of The Brady Bunch and The Flintstones as I had in my elementary school days.

At first, I rolled my eyes and got really annoyed when a show was devoted to her theme “Live Your Best Life,” but slowly, it grew on me. I started buying the spiritual and self-help books that she recommended and I kept a gratitude journal. As I was forging through my angsty mid-adolescent years, it was so encouraging to have someone in my life who cared about self-reflection and questioning who you are in order to find your purpose. The real women in my life were too stressed to mentor me in that way, and I’m not sure that it ever occurred to them. So Oprah became my guru and guide as I developed my identity and put my life plans into action. Without my family, I traveled around the world and moved to New York City and decided to get a PhD. In one of the last conversations that I had with my Nan before she died, she told me that she was so impressed and proud that I had the courage to do all of the things that I have done. She envied my independence and confidence because for her at my age, it had been a challenge to drive to a nearby town by herself after my grandfather died at a young age. I never saw myself limited by where I came from, and I think that a lot of that came from developing myself through Oprah’s personal story and her show.

I still watch her show now and then. As I’m older, I find myself being a little more skeptical about some of the things she does, but when I was younger and so hungry for guidance and a sense of self, she was a wonderful resource. Oprah is renowned for her cultural and market influence, but I think that she is also a sign of this era of self- help and personal testimonies and a search for meaning in an increasingly technological and shrunken world. I think that she provided comfort and inspiration to many women who wanted something deeper and who, like me, needed a mentor to talk about the things that we didn’t yet have the language of self growth and personal meaning nailed down. When she leaves, there will be a void in the sense that the cohesive source of all that will be gone. In her absence, her minions, the Dr. Ozes and Dr. Phils and Rachel Rays will carry on the legacy -  fragmented and cheaper versions of Mama O.

 

 

 

Pug Wedding

Surprisingly, I was not the little girl who spent copious amounts of time fantasizing about my wedding, and I grew up to be pretty ambivalent about marriage in general.

BUT if I ever do happen to have a wedding sometime in the future……………

THIS. MUST. HAPPEN.

 

 

Source:  http://www.jaggerphotographyblog.com/

 

 

Cute