Sneak Peak

I forgot to post the "before" so, here ya go!

John Deere Office/Music Room:


Second Guestroom/Office.
I went with the blue.







I felt like the light green organic bedding blended into the walls too much, but didn't actually match. And the bright green didn't fit in with the other two bedrooms. This was a nice contrast, fit with the rest of the house, yet was different at the same time.

I bought pillows at Ross, and the bed frame which came with a mattress and box spring on Craisglist. We decided not to use the box spring (the frame doesn't need one) and stored it in the basement. I had everything else already.

Pillows: $15.98
Bed $50

Total: $65.98

Bad Blood

The lab results came back yesterday.

Jerad has mono.

Its a freaking good thing we never share drinks or utensils, or make out (ewe!) or I would probably get it too!!!

Oh Wait.

The first thing most people said when we shared the joyous news was "did he cheat on you???" Which makes me think maybe I am way to trusting. Or lazy. Either way, the answer is no, we are just whores about sharing drinks and utensils with other people. Plus we like to lick our friends faces.

Here are some fact about mononucleosis:

Mono is caused by the Epstein-Barr virus (EBV). It is most often seen in adolescents and young adults. Children can get the virus, but it often goes unnoticed because their symptoms are mild. Adults usually do not get mono, because they have immunity to the virus.
- Jerad and I are children at heart
- Also EBV, is a member of the herpesvirus family. Jerad has the herp.

Mono can be spread through contact with saliva, mucus from the nose and throat, and sometimes tears. Because the virus can be spread through kissing, it has earned the nickname the "kissing disease." If you have mono, you can avoid passing the virus to others by not kissing anyone and by not sharing things like glasses, eating utensils, or toothbrushes - I basically share saliva with everyone I know. Coworkers, friends, pets... sorry about that. Seriously, I hope I'm not infected cause I prolly started an epidemic.

As soon as you get over mono, your symptoms will go away for good, but you will always carry the virus that caused it. The virus may become active from time to time without causing any symptoms. When the virus is active, it can be spread to others.
- Freakin great.

The most common symptoms of mono are a high fever, a severe sore throat, swollen glands and tonsils, and weakness and fatigue. Symptoms usually start 4 to 6 weeks after you are exposed to the virus.
- Srsly, sounds like a party.

Avoid contact sports and heavy lifting. Your spleen may be enlarged, and impact or straining could cause it to burst.
- Eff.

The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly.

The Good

The present that Shannon sent me in the mail today. A reusable shopping bag (I love love love these!!!) Organic chocolate, and sunflower seeds. This present is 210% me. Thank you sooooo much!!!!!!

Homemade french bread:

Spring arriving! Our orchid tree is beginning to bloom:


And all the tulip bulbs I planted in the window box last year have come up:


The first blooms of springtime:

The Bad

This is what I came home to today:

This would be a $40 dog bed:

Dirt from the palm tree:

I guess the dogs are at the end of their non exercised rope since Jerad has been so sick. We've only been on two or three hikes in the last two weeks instead of the usual almost daily romps in Peachy Canyon.

The Ugly

Jerad got much sicker over the weekend.

Much sicker. This is how he spends his days. And nights since he can't sleep in bed laying down.


We went to the doctor on Sunday who diagnosed him with a Peritonsillar Abscess. It hasn't gotten better and he got to the point today where he could barely breathe. He had to leave work yesterday after only 4 hours, and call out today. I left after lunch and we went to a throat specialist who said nope, no peritonsillar whatever, its a bad case of tonsillitis and maybe mono. Schweet.

Then off to the lab for bloodwork.

Then the pharmacy where we decided to wait for his iodine drops prescription since it would only be 30 min. After 40 they told us, JUST KIDDING, they actually didn't have any. Fuckers.

An hour and a half later after conquering Hell-Mart I had his meds and tonight he is finally feeling some relief.



For dinner I made Jerad homemade 3 potato-basil soup then blended it so he could actually swallow it. It tasted delish, but the purple potato gave it a weird color when blended. More like split pea soup.

I made me this:

Caprese salad and homemade french bread. Mmmmmm.

Puss balls and penicillin

After I blogged about Jerad finally getting better last week, he promptly took a turn for the worse. His ear started hurting again, except instead of just one ear, it was both ears. Then his throat got so sore he couldn't swallow. He felt like his sinuses were draining down his throat.

I kept telling him, it has to be your sinuses. Rinse your sinuses. If its your ears, and throat and (eeeeew) draining, its your sinuses! So he rinsed and rinsed even though nothing came out.

Sunday I went with him to the doctor so I could make sure that he remembered to relay all of the facts, and for the love of god mention that he can't swallow pills and needed liquid medication. If he actually feels bad enough to go to the doctor, he will just sit there and not really tell them anything or ask any questions which isn't the most helpful.

First the Dr. looked in his sinuses and was very impressed again with how clean they were, then the ears and said there was no infections there, then the throat where the cancerous blob was forming. Holy eff. I got to see it and my goodness, no wonder he can't eat or breathe! Its called a Peritonsillar Abscess. Basically a huge puss ball abscess blocking his airway. Hope you weren't eating breakfast!

The Dr. told him that the treatment was going to be a ton of BIG penicillin pills a day for 16 days, and since I had made death threats, Jerad mentioned that trying to swallow pills made him gag and he pretty much couldn't do it.

So the Dr. walked out of the room and hollered to the nurse, "Good news, you do get to see his butt!"

So she returned with a big needle, asked him to drop his pants and said "remember, you wanted this, not me."

The shot wasn't painful and since he asked so nicely the doctor was able to figure out what the adult dose would be for liquid penicillin and liquid Tylenol w/ Codeine in case he needed it. The pharmacy techs were all confused making it also and it took forever. BUT, he can actually take it and should be getting better soon.

I'm glad they actually figured out what was wrong with him, and it wasn't that the ear infection spread to both ears. His Dr. said that we needed to be super careful these next couple of days because the throat cancer (as I like to call it) can all of a sudden grow really fast and block the airway completely requiring an emergency ER surgery. Nice.

I talked to him at lunch and couldn't recognize his voice, I thought it was an 80 year old jewish smoker calling to see how my day was going. My bad.

Narrowed down to three!

Good morning readers! AKA sukas!
Jk, I'm just enthralled with your patience. You'd think I'd have to post some naked pics of something to keep you coming back. Anywho, we left off here with me still trying to pick a bedding.

I didn't have too much time, so online shopping was out. Also no point going to San Luis. Paso was my only option. I went to Kohls, Ross, Walmart, and Target. I found two oh-so-soft pillows at Ross, and a Mattress pad and possible sheet set at Kohls. Everything else at Ross. I decided to just buy both sets I was thinking about, bring them home, look at them in the room, and return the one I didn't like.

Option #1: Organic Target Bedding. Linen Feel, soft muted colors.


Option #2: Target "bed in a bag." Has Cute bag and dust ruffle too. BRIGHT colors.


Its also Reversible:


Option #3. I had all of this stuff at home already (for a full size bed)


The clearance sheets I found aren't the perfect color, but they sure are soft:


Jerad and I completely disagreed on what choice we should make, what do you think? I'll post what we went with later. And if you've seen it, don't spoil it:)

It sucks for you that I'm so one track minded.

Remember last year when we were remodeling our house and I posted like 50 bajillion posts about curtains and tiles and "should I chose this or that?" and "ooh i picked out this today!"

Ha, totally sucks that we're doing another room huh?

Anyways I am soooo in love with Pottery Barn's Piper Organic Bedding:


Seriously, how happy is that? Way more than I want to spend, but for our room I'd love it! Gah, they don't make it anymore:( Too bad, way cute.

Oh my lunch break I went to Ross and Target and bought two other bed ensembles to choose between the one I had and the sheets I got yesterday. We will put the room all together, then make the bed and see what looks best then I will return the other two.

The walls are a bright buttery yellow now (I'll post before and after pics later), and the sheets I got were a blue paisley to match a white with blue and teal accent duvet cover I had. The only problem is the duvet is for a full size bed and the design is centered so I have to make sure it doesn't look funny. Today I also bought an organic muted green and brown comforter and sheet set with a flower design, and a bright and busy patterned green white and brown set that I almost bought for our room before I went with the black and white. Hopefully I love one of them!

Book clubs and box springs

Last night was my book club. I had sort of forgotten about it so I didn't feel fully prepared. I would have liked to have bookmarked things, highlighted, made notes, been my typical type A-OCD self. Oh well, at least I read the book!

Half the people forgot their books so it was just fine. There was about 16 of us and we read The Shack.

I had just finished reading it on my own time when they announced it was the next book club selection so I was really stoked to discuss it.

Plus we have wine, sparking cider, homemade cookies, and a lot of refreshments.

We ended up talking for over two hours and by the end I was anxious to get out and pick out new bedding for the bed Jerad was bringing home so I flew out at the end when they were announcing the next book. Now I can't remember what it was! Four Cups of Tea? Three Tee Times? Noooo friggen clue.

I miss working at Borders. I miss hearing the first word of a book title and knowing exactly what the book is, and where to find it. I have no idea what is on the best seller list anymore. I'm out of the loop. Then again, In this economy thank God I don't have a retail based job right? Yeash. I don't even buy books at Borders anymore, I try to support our little local book stores and libraries. Or if I'm feeling lazy/cheap I use Amazon.

Tell me what my next book club reading is so I don't have to look like an idiot. Tina, you watch Oprah, you must know?

Since we are strictly sticking to our Dave Ramsey budget system, I have to create our new guest room out of like $5 or something like that since I hadn't actually budgeted for it. Luckily I have a ton of gift cards (nah nah nanana take that budget!). So with my belly full of cookies and sparkling cider, and my mind mulling with stimulating conversation I headed over to Kohls after my book club to focus on bedding.

Do you ever watch the show Clean House? Well, a big part of my yard sale profits would come from bed sets. I have all colors and styles. However luckily instead of storing them across my living room floor they are folded nicely in a linen closet:) With all the bedding I have, of course none of it will fit a twin size bed.

Since Kohls clothes are always like 95% off, I thought shopping there was a good plan. Eff man, not only are they freaking expensive, they carry butt ugly bedding! Or at least they only had the fugly stuff in stock last night.

After an hour of digging I finally found a decent sheet set and a mattress pad on sale and after my gift card ended up spending about $3. The sheet set is actually soft and will match a full sized duvet cover that I already had. I'm not too stoked with the ensemble, but it will work temporarily.

The bad news is I hate the bed we got. Hate it.

It was just a cheap CHEAP plain black rot iron day bed that we got on Craigslist to hold us over until we saved up for a white trundle bed. Because we wanted to be financially responsible and not step outside of our budget or take any money out of savings. Ugh.

Its not that it isn't the bed that I wanted. Its that its allll wrong for the room/our house. People always come over and like our house and my decorating. Well, its because I work really hard at it and don't throw random crap into rooms. That's basically what we did this time. I wish we had gotten a simple white headboard like this or this instead:

there were a million for about $20.

BUT I couldn't find any cheap mattresses. Plus we would have needed a bed frame.

The bed we got was a frame, mattress, and box spring for $50. And it turned out to be from someone we knew so I was going to catch a deadly disease.

The bed we got will work in the meantime, and its not forever, but it makes me want to change the paint on the walls. Which makes Jerad twitch. We really should spray the frame another color. Even grey would help. It isn't helping that the room isn't put together yet, everything is thrown around and it is a small room. It was a good sized office, or nursery. Bedroom is a stretch. Once its organized that should help.

Maybe I'll hang some curtains in front of the bed to soften the black? I'm just going to think of this as a challenge. This is going to be my project tonight. No matter how long it takes.

Our guestroom theme is shabby chic.

Our new guestroom office theme is going to be shabby cheap.

Let your imaginations run away with that.

I'll post pictures and a break down of costs tonight or tomorrow.

All Better

Jerad is returning to the land of the living. In his words "today I came home to let the dogs out on my lunch and got mauled twice and for the first time in over a week it wasn't the end of the world."

So... whatever that means! But he is laughing and smiling and hugging and life is good. To celebrate we had a special dinner just for him (that he cooked) lean meatloaf stuffed with Gorgonzola, mashed potatoes with canola butter, garlic, and non fat milk, and lots of yellow squash.

Yummo.

Also he bought me a bed for the second guest room/office. Its not the trundle bed of my dreams but it is a cute substitute in the meantime!

Yes Please

Right Here.

Dinner

Last night I paired some of my Farmer's Market finds with some leftovers. We had last week's chicken enchiladas with beets, and a mixed green salad.

Salad with beet greens, red leaf lettuce, spinach, cilantro, yellow squash, feta cheese, olive oil and balsamic vinegar:



Beets and enchilada:
Beet recipe:

• 1-2 Tbs olive oil
• 1/2 organic white onion, chopped
• 5 cloves organic garlic, minced (you might want to adjust this down if you aren't garlic ppl)
  
• 4 tsp cumin seed (if you don't normally cook with cumin seed then substitute 1 tsp, or 1 tbs of the powder)
  
• 2 Tbs unbleached organic four
  
• 4 good sized beets, peeled and and shopped into one inch cubes
  
• 2 tomatoes - peeled, seeded and chopped (I used canned organic tomatoes because that was what I had)
  
• 1 1/2 cups water
• 1 teaspoon sea salt

1. Heat a saucepan over medium-high heat. Pour in oil and saute onion and garlic until translucent. Mix in cumin seed and saute an minute or two. Sprinkle in flour and saute 1 minute more.

2. Stir in beets, tomatoes, water, and salt. Reduce heat to low, cover pan with lid, and allow to simmer 30 to 45 minutes, until beets are tender. Yes, it really does take this long.


This is a good dish to serve over rice. Be prepared to have red hands.

As weird as it sounds, beets steamed with apples and cinnamon are also pretty delish over ice cream or sorbet. They have a very sweet flavor alot of people make beet cakes and jam.

I want I want I want

I forgot to mention my new precious.

While we were at Costco scoping out exciting things like towels and dog beds (which they apparently don't carry anymore), we came across this lovely:


Okay okay, picture it without all the kiddo bedding, and in our yellow office. Maybe covered in something like this:

Or something blue and whimsical? I'm getting tingly just thinking about it.

Jerad was ready to just buy the bed on the spot, but you know me, ever frugal I have to budget, and research, and craigslist, and wish upon a star first. Then I started cursing my KitchenAid because if I hadn't gotten it then, I could have had the freakin bed. Grrrr. I'll have to go home and console myself with some fresh brownies or something.

We are hoping (har har) to put a rush on turning the office into a 2nd guest room and complete it by this weekend since I'm having a sleep-over but... we all know how likely that is. Its okay, Tina likes to cuddle which leaves the guest room, air mattress, and couch open.

In the meantime I will be dreaming of sleigh and trundle beds.

Blueberries, Ear Infections, Bbq, Beets, Bigamy...

And that about sums up my weekend!

It has been brought to my attention that you are preschoolers with short attention spans and you need more pictures to keep you focused, I will try to oblige.

Thursday night while Jerad slept off his pain I was watching 30 Rock

And Hell's Kitchen (loooove Gordon Ramsay)

while texting Tina. On Hell's Kitchen they had to make breakfast and I was having the hugest craving for pancakes and almost got up and made pancakes at 10 at night. By almost, I mean that I went in the kitchen, got out all of the ingredients and a pan and had an internal struggle. I even pictured that little Weight Watchers fuzzy Orange monster guy!

Then I thought, um, I'm not on W.W. so who cares right? But, I decided to have a modicum of self control and chewed on the couch pillow instead.

Bright and early Friday morning I got up and made a little slice of heaven:

AKA three cakes of heaven:


Homemade blueberry pancakes, slrrrrrrrppp! That was me licking the screen. Dang I love breakfast. That's why I don't eat it. I wouldn't be able to stop:)

After getting progressively worse, going home sick on Thursday and calling out on Friday, meaning that he worked a total of 4 hours last week, Jerad went to the doctor. He has a triple threat ear infection (that wasn't the medical term). Anyways apparently its super rare for adults to get ear infections this bad unless they get reoccurring ones. Which he does not.

Because it was all the way in his inner ear, onion juice wouldn't help. His Dr. was very impressed with his clean sinuses, thanks Neti pot! Also, because it was so deep, it kills him to swallow and he lost 12 pounds last week since he couldn't eat anything. The doctor wrote him a prescription for vicodin since the pain was so bad it kept causing him to throw up. Well, Jerad can't swallow pills (wuss) so he has to grind them up and mix them with water then swallow them. This makes them waaaay more potent because they don't slowly dissolve.

If you take your pills this way, you should tell your doctor and make them write you a prescription for another form of medication. Since most doctors actually don't know very much about pharmaceuticals, I mean how can they med school and pharmacy school are the same length, they will usually just tell the patient to suck it up and learn to swallow the pill instead of calling the pharmacy or researching an alternative. By the time the Doctor was ready to write his prescription for an antibiotic and vicodin Jerad had been there for 2 and a half hours and just wanted to leave so he didn't want to ask for anything special and just high tailed it out of there.

He doesn't usually even take Tylenol, so the Vic. should have been super super potent. Ya, he crushed up 2 and they didn't even take the edge off. Poor baby.

The rest of Friday he spent dying on the couch until I drug him to SLO to try out Tina and Tom's wedding caterer. It is BBQ, so even though he hasn't been able to eat all week (he's lost 12 pounds), he "suffered through" and quite enjoyed himself.

On the way there we were talking about getting married and what we would register for. We seriously don't need ANYTHING since we have a fully decorated house, backyard full of furniture, camping stuff and multiple sets of dishes. I said that I would want a bunch of new kitchen towels and over sized coffee mugs because all of our nice kitchen towels have somehow turned into car rags or migrated off somewhere and the matching coffee mugs we have aren't the nice over sized roundy ones that fit so nice in your hands.

So, after we tasted the food at the caterer, which by the way we gave 5 stars! We headed over to Costco where Jerad bought me 10 brand new, adorable, over sized, kitchen towels! So, now as long as he gets me some cute mugs, we don't really ever need to get married! I mean, he already got me my KitchenAid so... that's why ppl get hitched right? The presents? Just kidding. It was funny though that we found those towels RIGHT after talking about it. He just felt bad because the boots that I I had been begging him to get me there for MONTHS were gone.

Saturday I made Sick Boy some more Stinging Nettle tea because "it doesn't taste right if he does it himself," and walked down to the park to farmer's market. I got all sorts of goodies!

Organic canned tomatoes, organic chili sauce, spinach, broccoli, carrots, beets w/ the greens, strawberries, red leaf lettuce, and a HUGE bunch of cilantro. For like $13. I am super excited about all the things I am going to make with this stuff this week, especially a new beet recipe!
Sunday I went on "cleaning binge '09." Every weekend is sort of a cleaning binge, but since Jerad had been so sick I sort of went all out, took everything off the counters and steam cleaned them, steamed couch and, washed all the bedding, floors, ALL the laundry, dusted... one of those days. I broke out a lot of my old CD's and had a trip down memory lane which was fun:




Once everything was spiffed up, it had started raining, so I let in the dogs who promptly started shedding and getting muddy footprints on the floor. Le sigh.

Did you see Big Love last night? OMG? What is UP with Nicki????

And seriously, Kathy, dead?


She annoys me, but Wanda is worse so I didn't want them to knock off Kathy!
Ahh bigamist's lives are so much more interesting than mine!

I also watched Celebrity Apprentice (hey, I was worn out from all that cleaning). I was annoyed, but at the same time so drawn in. That annoying red head poker bitch is going to keep me coming back for more! Plus Clint Black is on. Jerad needs to get better so I stop watching so much TV.

He did make it back to work today so that's a start!