#57 – A New Look

I have been working on my new, more adult look for a long while now.  I am gearing up for a big weekend of trying on clothes and finally looking at what I have as a whole wardrobe.

For various reasons, yesterday did not start out with flying colors for me.  I ended up treating myself to a leisurely bath and shower at lunch (ain’t working from home just grand?) and dressed how I wished I felt in an effort to change my mood.

And you know what?  It helped.  I enjoyed putting on a colorful and flattering skirt with a cute top and necklace.  I enjoyed putting on more makeup than I normally do.  It made me feel a bit more like a capable person, even though I did not actually get much more accomplished at work that afternoon.

I am excited about some of the possibilities that I have in my closet, and I have decided that I am going to wear the clothes that I’ve been thinking about as “work clothes” for normal use.  Why not?  I can pair a cute sweater with jeans as well as dress pants, can’t I?

I’ll let you know how it goes.

#77 – Nonna’s

Last weekend, I took a couple of days off of work while the hubs was on fall break.

We got into the car about 9:00 Thursday morning and the hubs battled the rain all the way up to New York, where we visited his grandmother.  Luckily, we had a long book on CD to listen to in the car.  We got to Nonna’s in Queens around 4:00, and settled in.

Both of his siblings had visited her on their own several times, and this was the first time we were able to visit with her without the herd of family.  His Aunt Pam and Uncle James joined us for dinner that night, and the next morning we caught up on news and some reading.  After a nice lunch of fancy sandwiches, we headed into Manhattan to his Uncle Les and Aunt Nancy’s place.  We chatted with them for a bit and went out to dinner at a place close by.  Then, they continued on to a movie and we continued on to see Wicked.

The next morning, we slowly got up and headed out into the cool (but  — thankfully — mostly dry) weather for some sightseeing.  We walked through Central Park and down to the Met, where we saw the Oceanic Art and Arms and Armor exhibits.  Then we headed back across the park to the New York Historical Society, where we toured the exhibit on Lincoln and New York, which was enlightening.  We had a really good time looking through that and the fourth floor, where they have more of their collection on display than we’d ever seen out at once in a museum.  There weren’t explanations of it all — it was mostly unmarked shelves full of glassware, ceramics, silver sets, and furniture with a few descriptions sprinkled in.

Then we headed back to Nonna’s to have dinner with her and Les and Nancy.  After a quick breakfast in the morning, we packed up and turned towards home.  We got back in good time, arriving around 5:00.  And we still have a couple more discs of our book to listen to!

#10 – Complete

Last Friday, the hubs and I saw Wicked on Broadway.

I was very excited for this.  We had wonderful seats and really enjoyed the production.  Though we had listened to the soundtrack in order to become familiar with it (which was nice, since many of the lines were covered by the audience’s laughter) the end of the show was mostly dialogue, so there was still some things that we didn’t know.  It was a nice compromise between being able to follow the story more easily but still feeling that we were seeing it for the first time.

We had dinner with the hub’s aunt and uncle, and ended up walking around  Time Square for a good amount of time.  We did not get rained on, though the weather was threatening.

I think that we chose a great show to see.  The spectacle alone was worth it.  While I am sure that we would have enjoyed a touring production of it, I think that this had so much to offer — I’m glad we got to see it on Broadway, in a great theatre where we were a full head above the row in front of us, so no one obstructed our view.

#37 – Let’s Call this Complete

#37 on my list is to keep frustrating relationship details between me and the hubs.  Several people gave us this advice when we got married, and I really see the sense in it.  It is too easy to not talk about the good things and then your friends only hear about the bad frustrations.  This lopsided view into a relationship can give the wrong snapshot of the whole that the people in the relationship get to enjoy.

That being said, I had a hard time deciding when I had gotten into this habit enough to count this goal as complete.  There were times when I vented about something small that was bugging me at that moment, and many more times when I would match a frustration for a frustration in a conversation with one of my girlfriends.  One of the books that I read for completing #34 shed some light onto this.  Tannen pointed out that venting can be an indication of solidarity with the person you are talking, whereas meeting their frustration with a statement that you don’t have that problem can be really off-putting.  I decided not to worry about those things in terms of this goal.

For the other aspect of this, I consulted with the best friend and the lovely Katie W., as those are the girls that I would most likely vent to in any case.  They agreed that I was hitting a good balance between venting and keeping things between the two of us.  Most of the time, I can remember to wait a bit before I say anything to make sure that whatever I’m venting about is really a problem (not usually) or if I am overreacting to something that can be taken out of context.  If either of those are true, I try to keep my mouth shut.

I’ve decided that sometimes I will slip up. And that’s ok with me, because I am human.  This goal will be on-going, but I think that I’ve laid a good foundation.

Look What Is Growing Around Here!

Obviously these seeds haven’t known me very long.  I’ve got basil, parsley, rosemary and cilantro.  One of those hasn’t started to come up yet, but I don’t know which (I think that it is the rosemary that is missing.)  I’ve been turning the pot so that the fourth cup gets some sunlight as well.

The seeds and the nice planter were an anniversary gift from the hubs, but we didn’t plant them until just a bit ago.  I’m excited about them, even though it will be a long while before they will be large enough to pillage for some food.  Hopefully I’ll be able to keep these green and growing until they are big enough to actually eat.