Alarm-ing

Well first of all, good morning. And second of all, I wish I could say good night and crawl right back into bed. Today was one of those dreadful mornings where you curse your alarm for remembering to do its job. Why, oh why couldn't it just malfunction and let me sleep more? Why couldn't it magically add 2 more hours into the night? I found I have a tendency to rush through getting ready in the morning because once I'm totally ready to go, I'll hop back in bed for 20 more minutes and set my alarm for 5 minutes before I'm supposed to be out the door. That way I can get some extra ZZZs but I am ready to walk right out the door when my alarm goes off.

I tried once to make the whole alarm experience more pleasant by choosing a gentle, soothing ring tone for my alarm (I use my phone as my alarm). The tone I choose had a soft melody with water trickles and birds chirping in the background. Peaceful and calming. I was sure this would help me wake up and start my day in a positive way. It worked for about a day. Then even the water trickles and birds pissed me off. Funny how something so nice by itself, when put in the context of an alarm, can become grating.

I found some ways online to help people wake up feeling refreshed.

-Go to bed happy

-Splurge on a quality pillow

-Meditate or pray before bed, generally calm yourself down

-Don't eat right before bed

-Have a glass of water when you wake up

-Exercise in the morning

-Let natural light in

-Have something to look forward to when you wake up

These are just a few suggestions. You can find explanations for these at this website as well as this website. Or you can do your own Internet searches for ways to help you sleep better, wake up feeling refreshed, and generally be a morning person.

Best of luck.

Kate

Waking Up Content

This morning was one of those morning where you wake up and things just feel right. You want to sleep more, but the baby is crying, so you pull yourself out of bed. But once you're up you feel quite awake. You make breakfast for the baby, pick up the kitchen and the few toys and things you didn't put away before you went to bed, so now you have a clean house. You turn on some good music. You look out the window at the such-a-pale-blue-sky-it's-almost-white, and you have a rush of feelings that give you a sense of gratitude to just be looking out the window at the morning. I watch cars drive by. Some stop for coffee at the coffee shop below our apartment. An ungendered person runs by wearing hunter orange gloves and a big scarf tied around their face (how do they breathe while running with that thing on?) A sweet looking old man toddles towards his car after meeting someone for breakfast at the little family diner a few storefronts down. Life happens, but it feels good. You feel good. I feel good. Happy. Content. I'm waking up content.

Thanksgiving Results

Thanksgiving was an odd day this year. Being a new mom and newly engaged we decided to spend the holiday on our own as a family, just the three of us. This marked the first Thanksgiving that I was not with my parents and sisters. It also meant no football games or Thanksgiving Day Parade. It meant no obnoxious people or relatives. So, our day was quiet. We woke up and went for a run as a family in the ghost town of Ripon, Wisconsin. Then we got home and slowly worked on prepping our meal and began cooking our meal. In between cooking and listening to Christmas music (FINALLY!), Andy and I snuck in a game of Monopoly, which has always been one of my favorites. I got Andy hooked on it, too.


Overall, the food was delicious, and we ate well that night. The green beans were a little under-seasoned, but for a girl who isn't a green bean fan, I thought they were alright. Naturally, all that cooking means a lot of cleaning.

Our kitchen mid-day

But we kept up with it all and did multiple loads of dishes throughout the day. I'm a big believer in cleaning as you go (Andy seems to believe otherwise).


The cranberries were beyond tart! I knew that was the point, but I couldn't get past a few small bites. Andy, on the other hand, loved them. Alex, after making a few disgusted faces, enjoyed them, too. 

Cointreau Cranberry Relish

The stuffing was quite tasty but not how I expected it to taste. The Cooking Light recipe that we used had you make your own cornbread, but in an attempt to make things easier, we used a basic box mix. However, I think the box made more than what the recipe would have so the stuffing was heavy on the cornbread. Now extra cornbread is not exactly bad, but it overpowered the jalapeno and chorizo's spiciness just a little too much. I was hoping for a little bit more of a zip! So, my advice would be to stick with the recipe and nix the shortcut. I will say, Alex was a huge fan. He ate most of the leftovers, too.

My plate of deliciousness

            

The sweet potato gnocchi was great! Andy did a fantastic job with it. He put crushed red peppers on a plate and poured oil over it and let it soak for several hours so that the oil took on the taste of peppers. He sauteed the gnocchi in the hot pepper oil and then cooked them with pecans in maple syrup and bourbon. So we had two dishes that played with the balance between sweet and spicy. However, the gnocchi was the clear winner.    

Sweet Potato Gnocchi Pre-Baking

                                            

That day I also prepped homemade spiced cinnamon rolls for breakfast on Friday morning. The recipe came from Cooking Light. I have included the link here. They were pretty easy to make on a technicality scale, but they were a little involved. You have to let the dough rest several times. It actually worked well to make them on Thanksgiving because I could cook other dishes while waiting for the cinnamon roll dough to rise. Once I had them all rolled up, I parbaked the rolls and then kept them in the fridge until Friday morning. Then on Friday while I let them finish baking in the oven, I made the glaze to pour over them. Yum!

Par-Baked Spiced Cinnamon Rolls

All in all, a nice turn out of food and a sweet day spent with my family, and gave me the break I needed to remember why I am so lucky and to be truly thankful for all of my blessings.

Happy Holidays!

-Kate

Chew Toy

This post goes out to all those moms out there who are or have ever experienced a teething monster. A-hem.    Excuse, did I say monster? I meant baby. I am now experiencing the world of a teething six month old baby and in this world, he is the ruler. I am merely his servant who rocks and coos and cradles and nurses and soothes the tantrum-ing baby that has become my son.

I at a loss for what to do. I can't seem to make it better, and it leaves me feeling helpless. He cries like he's uncomfortable, and damn it! I would be too if I had little calcium spikes poking through my tender gums. But after trying various teething toy options, ibuprofen, Orajel, and lots of extra love and attention, it's still no go.

Believe me, I understand this is a necessary process and that it's one we just have to get through, but after a day filled with a screaming baby and stressed out fiancee, a girl needs to vent.

But here's to better days and toothy grins in our future!

-Kate

When I Grow Up...

I wanna be famous. I wanna be a star. I wanna be in movies. When I grow up I wanna see the world, drive nice cars. I wanna have groupies (boobies?). Okay so I'm not actually talking about the Pussycat Dolls song. This post will vibe with all those high school and college kids or recent graduates who are sick of being asked what they wanted to do when they grow up.

I know that nobody intends to piss you off when they ask that question but that's usually what happens. When you graduate high school people want to know where you're going to college, what you're studying and what you plan to do with that course of study. In college they still ask what you're studying and what you want to do with your degree. Then when you graduate everyone asks what you're doing with the expectancy that you have landed a great, high-paying job with benefits in the field of your major. Yeah right.

Even if we know where we want to go to college or what we want to study, the answer to the question, "What do you want to do when you grow up?" or "What do you want to do with your major?" Is still a highly frustrating one. Even more so is when people assume that you are going to do one specific thing with your major, as if teaching is the only thing I can do with an English major.

Editing and publishing was my answer to the dreaded question for a long time because it was a semi-obvious career for an English major that wasn't teaching. But as time wore on it just became an answer to a question. A way to deflect deeper questions and inquiries because if I gave them the truth to the question, "I have no f*&%$@g idea," those questions and inquiries would be sure to follow.

A lot of adults in the working world today are still under the delusion that kids with college degrees today will go into a field relative to what they majored in and will have the job for most of, if not all of, their career. That just isn't how it works today. We live in a world of betterment and progress and are constantly trying to improve our situations. People today get jobs and work their asses off to try and move upwards. It might be a different position, it might mean a whole other company or field. The working world is constantly in flux because of this betterment mentality. It isn't necessarily a bad thing but just because you've had the same job for 40 years with the same company in the same tiny office, don't expect us to want that. We'll feed you a bullshit answer if you want one: "I'm an English major, and I want to go into editing and publishing." But it's going to be just that, bullshit.

If you want the truth, ask what we're interested in. What are our passions? Did we like school and the subject we studied? Do we have any interest in graduate school? Those sorts of questions are apt to draw out more specific responses and are less likely to drive a student up a wall or into a corner where they feel bad telling you the truth that they don't know what they want to do when they grow up.

And let's be honest, did you always know what you wanted to do when you grow up? Did you do it? Are you in the same field you told everyone you'd be in? Are you working in the field of your major? Did you ever want to sneeze in someone's face when you were asked for the ten bazillionth time, "What do you want to do when you grow up?"

Well, did you?

Respectfully,

-Kate

Why Backwards?

The title of my blog, Going With It: The Backwards Life of a Twenty-Something, may seem a little odd. For one who does not know my story and I personally, it would indeed be confusing to use the word "backwards." I hope that by sharing a bit of my story that I might begin to shed a little light upon the thought process behind the title.

I am in my early twenties, still in college, and in a happy relationship with my boyfriend of 19 months. As you may know from mentions in my previous posts, I am also a mother to a 4 month old baby boy, Alex. Alex was far from being part of the plan. Thus I have accepted the fact that I am going to do my life backwards.

I had my kid first, am finishing college second, hoping to get married third, have some sort of a job or career fourth, and then perhaps have some more kids. It typically goes college, career, marriage, kids, and then more kids. My life is a mixed up version of that and due to this backwards order I have needed to develop a "go with it" philosophy.

Having Alex before completing college, getting married and all that other stuff threw me for a major loop as well as tossed in a whole heap of unexpected challenges. The best way that I have found to deal with them thus far is to just go with it. Resistance will get me nowhere and only create hassles. So there you have it--Going With It: The Backwards Life of a Twenty-Something.