Sunday, July 31, 2011


Lazy Sunday.  I guess shark week is uninteresting to her.  I'm about ready to cut somebody if I don't get some Dr. Pepper in my veins so I may walk over to the corner store and grab one.  That requires me to actually get off the couch though.  Decisions Decisions.

Thursday, July 28, 2011

Last night during our catch up session of watching Mad Men, I decided to jump in the shower before it got to late.  (Blasphemy, I know).  When I came out of the shower, Matt was sitting on the couch with a few tears in his eyes.  Apparently the episode hit him hard.  It had to do with Don and Betty sitting down with their kids and telling them about their impending divorce.


As we were going to bed he started talking about A and how he wished he could spend more time with him which then led to a discussion about wanting to make the time we have with him extra special.  I agreed with him to a point, but coming from a divorced family, I know what it's like when one parent tries to "out do" the other parent.

I try to make A's time with us special, just as I would any other child.  But I don't want those special times to be every single day he's with us because the novelty is going to wear off and I will be broke.  We take him to the movies, bowling, the beach, out to dinner, the library, museums, and then some weekends we have days where we stay at home and play with toys or hang around the house.

Matt thinks A is sad when he comes to our house and he thinks it's his fault.  For instance, last weekend on our quest to get an air conditioner, we stopped at Best Buy.  They had these remote controlled helicopters that A thought were the coolest things ever. We did not end up buying him one and as soon as we got back to the car he was mopey.  He told us that "every day is a bad day."  I took this as him being upset about not getting a toy but I guess Matt took it more to heart.  He feels guilty only getting to spend a limited amount of time with him when he wants to spend more and that guilt translates into wanting to do all these extravagant things for him.

I think this is a subject that a lot of parents who share custody of children can relate to, and maybe even ones who don't.  I, personally, think we just need to keep doing what were doing.  I don't want A to think that every weekend is going to be some sort of spectacle and have that be the only reason he wants to come see us.  It's a fine line.

Tuesday, July 26, 2011

You know that point in a relationship when you first start seeing someone or are newly dating.  You anxiously await every text message or phone call, so much so that you sometimes stare at your phone all day long. I had butterflies everytime his name would pop up.  We would send each other good morning and good night texts every single day.

And then we moved in together and that all went down the tube.

Now our texts consists of, "how much did the dog poop today?", "what's for dinner?", "huh?", "what are you working this week?".  It's all very romantic. I figured this would happen, the honeymoon stage is over and now we are just going through the daily grind. 

Sometimes he surprises me though and I wake up to this:

"I know you're sleeping but I just wanted to say I love you.  When you get up, listen to I Don't Mind by Defeater.  It reminds me of how I feel about you <3".

And then I remind myself that it's all worth it. Even the texts about dog poop.

Monday, July 25, 2011

This is Emma and her new friend, Blue, whom we met at our little doggie park yesterday.  I usually take her there more than a few times during the week to let her run and sniff and do dog things.


Blue was there yesterday and they chased each other around, her being a wee bit faster than his rolly-polly self.

I was watching a show called Pit Boss over the weekend and I learned that had we been living in Denver, both Emma and Blue would not be allowed to live there.  I've traveled pretty extensively throughout the United States, hitting up about 40 of them.  I have yet to make it to Colorado yet but the visions I have at that place tend to lean towards crunchy, granola, outdoorsy types.  The scenery is similar to Montana, where I was born and raised, and is breathtaking. 

Denver has banned pitbulls in the city.  If they know that you own one, they will come into your house, take your dog and kill it.  Pit Boss showed very graphic images of dozens of pitbulls, dead, piled on top of each other.  Typing that out makes me sick to my stomach. The thought of that happening to my precious Emma is horrifying.  They would probably have to take me first before I would let them get my dog.

This breed has gotten such a horrible reputation throughout the media.  Some of the tragic stories are indeed true, but some of them are not.  News stations have put out stories about pitbulls attacking people, when in fact, it wasn't a pitbull but they knew attaching the pitubll name to the dog would attract more viewers.  I know not to trust everything that the media puts out there but some people don't.  Some people eat up every word and start hating on an animal that they may know nothing about. 

I, admittedly, hadn't spent that much time with a pitbull until I owned one.  I believe that most dog behavior stems from how they are raised.  That's not to say that I am naive enough to think that Emma would never hurt anyone.  I don't think she would do it intentionally but I am still very aware of her and her surroundings.  I would never in my wildest dreams leave her alone with a baby, just like I wouldn't leave a chihuahua alone with a baby.  People need to have common sense about raising dogs and any dog has the potential to hurt someone.

Anyways, I wish more people could realize what a delightful breed pitbulls can be.  Emma is extremely loving, snuggly and so incredibly cute.  She would lick someone to death before hurting them.  I signed the Animal Bill of Rights and sent it to my legislation.  I'm not normally one to do that but I felt that I had to do something. The stories of families being affected throughout Denver have been on my mind and that's the least I could do.

Saturday, July 23, 2011


Two posts in one day, this is what happens when I don't go to work.





We were going a little stir crazy in the house so we walked down to a little beach close-by.  I think the river is actually the Mystic River but I have yet to see the movie that corresponds to that title so I have no idea what it means

Disgusting, sweaty bangs.  Matt called this my "new myspace pic".  I think he's right!


It's still too hot to move so we've been lounging around the apartment trying to stay cool.  We went on a mission yesterday to try and find an a/c but they were sold out, unless we wanted to spend $500 on one.  No thanks!  We bought a fan and that's cooled things down to a comfortable 85 degrees. 

These pics are from our beach adventure last weekend.  A is boogie boarding with his sled.  We keep it classy in this family. 



Emma is such a water dog, it's a little weird.  Most pitbulls don't like the water but anytime she sees water, she practically belly jumps into it.  We are lucky that there are good beaches within a 10 minute drive.



Back to watching the Harry Potter marathon.  I still haven't seen the new one and am not very happy about it!

Thursday, July 21, 2011

It is 91 degrees inside my apartment.  Let me repeat that.  91 DEGREES. 

We do have an a/c in the bedroom so we can sleep comfortably but most of the action in the house is not in the bedroom so hanging out in there is a tad boring. In turn, I'm sweating my balls off in the kitchen and living room.


The heat also turns me into a slug.  I can barely move, the dog can barely move, A can barely move.  Chores will just have to wait until mother nature decides to stop being pissed off.

Wednesday, July 20, 2011

My eyes are glazing over at work.  I needed to talk about something other than deeds and condominiums before I fall asleep, so I'll talk about my switch to being vegan.  I don't think I've ever talked about it here, or much in real life for that matter.

The thought of eating animals for my own satisfaction just started to bug me.  I watched documentaries and read books and the more I researched, the more disgusted I became.  Some scenes during these documentaries were too much for me to handle and what I read made me sick.  I would never push my beliefs on someone but I do encourage people to research for themselves and make their own decisions.  I'm of the belief that if people were able to see into the slaughterhouses and factory farms, a lot more of us would not be eating animals.

I went vegan about a year and a half ago and was vegetarian before that.  I love animals, which was one of my main points in becoming vegan.  I usually like animals better than people.  I cry when sad commercials come on tv about animal shelters.  I had a complete breakdown one day driving on Storrow and realizing that baby ducks were being hit and killed by cars. 

At this point in time I also started dating Matt, who was vegan.  Becoming vegan by myself would have been a chore because I don't like cooking but Matt came to my rescue and loves cooking.   Even if I wasn't vegan, I would be eating vegan because that's what he cooks. 

An upside of being vegan is that I'm now at my lowest weight that I can ever remember being.  I didn't need to lose weight per se, but it certainly makes me happier.  I'm about 23 pounds lighter than when I first started dating Matt. Before dating him I was stuck at a certain number on the scale and no matter what I did, the scale didn't budge (going to McDonalds probably didn't help). 

Enough about that, onto the food.  When you tell people you are vegan they (a) look at you like you have 5 heads and (b) assume you eat only lettuce.  To help ease the fears of many and make them realize that you can eat normal food, you just use different ingredients, I've compiled a list of my must have's: 
(Being near a Whole Foods is a lifesaver by the way)

Almond milk is a great alternative to Soy milk.  I try to limit my soy due to the estrogen levels and Almond milk tastes much better to me.  I go through a half gallon of the chocolate milk like it's going out of style.  It's that good. We use the original for cooking and the vanilla in cereal and iced coffee. I used to be a huge milk drinker but I don't really miss it that much, along with a lot of things.



Vegan options have come a long way in just a few short years.  Since becoming vegan, Daiya has introduced it's diary free cheese.  I don't know what we would do without this cheese.  We use it on everything.  From wraps, burgers, lasagna, pizza, mac n' cheese, eggplant parm, tacos, you name it.


They introduced a new flavor, Pepperjack, but it tasted like dirt.  It might have just been a bad batch but I'm going to wait a bit longer to try it again.

My old roommate use to eat this next product on bread. By itself.  It would always make me wonder about her but after I tried it, I knew why.  It's delicious!  It's an egg-free "mayonnaise" called Vegenaise.  Dare I say it might be better than the real thing and great for people who are skeeved out by mayonnaise.


For butter we use the Earth Balance brand.  You can normally find this in conventional grocery stores as well and tastes very similar, if not better, than butter.


I'm not a hater of the fake meat products, though I know some vegans are.  Some people wonder why you would want to eat fake meat if you don't eat real meat.  Simple.  Fake meat doesn't kill animals.  We eat a good amount of chicken patties in wraps and on buns.  My favorite brand are Boca.  (Some of their products contain egg whites so we do have to check, but mostly we find ones that are vegan)






 We also do pulled "pork" sandwhiches from time to time:


And these vegan black pepper "steaks" are probably one of my most favorite meals.  I annoy Matt with how much I want to eat them with some rice and asparagus.  Drool. 



We eat a lot of Chipotle burrito's too.

 As far as desserts go, the possibilities are endless. Ice cream, carrot cake, whoopie pies, lemon bars, cookies, and of course, oreos. 



I think that might be my longest post ever and now I'm hungry. 

Monday, July 18, 2011

What a nice weekend.  Lot's of time spent at the ocean, playing with the pup and letting A "boogie board", going to see dinosaur bones, catching up on Mad Men and Breaking Bad, and not doing homework (heh).


 Friday we went to the science museum since it was free.  It's astronomical in price otherwise and being that A is only 5, he hasn't really grasped most of the information yet.  We did buy tickets to see Waking the Dinosaur in 3-D which we all enjoyed.  We looked around and A geeked out over how BIG the dinosaurs were. He was scared of this moose,
and he also learned how much blood was contained in his body.

On Saturday A, Emma and I hit the beach with friends which I do have pictures of but my work computer is not recognizing my thumb drive, so those will have to come later. We didn't have a boogie board for A to use so we improvised and used his sled. He had fun and both him and the dog were worn out. My friend took him for a bit after the beach and he stayed and played the Wii with her husband and became a Jedi Master. It was nice for me to get a break and clean, do laundry, homework, nap and watch some tv.






It was such a nice weekend, the weather was gorgeous and reminds me why I love summer and can't stand the thought that winter will be here all too soon. (shudder).

Friday, July 15, 2011

Time for the breakfast of champions.  I eat this way to much during the week.  Sigh.



I thought my bosses were going to be in court this morning but I was wrong, seeing as how I walked into a blast of a/c.  Why do people insist on cranking the air when it's beautiful outside?  I work on one of the nicest streets in the city.  I just want to open the windows and hear the birds chirping and people walking, along with the honks and sirens thrown in. They are leaving for court around 11 so maybe I'll blast the windows open then and take off my winter parka.

In other news, I also got mistaken for a teacher today. Are teachers allowed to have sleeves these days?  I think the kid who thought I was "Ms. Eliot" wanted to crawl in a hole though after I politely told him, I am in fact, not Ms. Eliot. I would be a cool teacher though.

Tonight, we are planning on taking the boy to go see dinosaur bones as he puts it. Tomorrow I might take him to the beach to "rip some waves".  This kid, the phrases he uses sometimes kill me.

Wednesday, July 13, 2011

Some things I'm enjoying as of late:

-When I go to take Emma out in morning and she's still a little sleepy.  She trudges down the stairs and then streeeetttcchhhhessss as we go on our walk.  It's pretty adorable, I love sleepy puppies.

- Date nights.  Matt and I are trying to do a date night at least once a week.  Last night we took Emma to the park and cozied up in the air conditioned bedroom to start Breaking Bad. I'm already impressed and I've watched one episode.

-Going to meet Matt's new nephew on Monday!  He was born premature and is such a little peanut.  Can't wait to hold him <3

- Catching up with friends. Everyone is so busy these days it's nice to chat for awhile.

-Matt finding this website with offers for free stuff to do around Boston for kids on Fridays.  I think we may head to the Science museum this week.

-Finding old pictures that are just waiting to be scrapbooked.  I'm itching for them to come in the mail

and just because:

Monday, July 11, 2011

I love real blogs.  Ones that show the not so glamorous side of kids, relationships, work, life, whatever.

I like reading fluff blogs too, but seeing that other people struggle with issues makes me feel normal and not so out of touch.  All & Sundry posted about how her and her husband mishandled some parenting moments. It just made me appreciate her blog even more, nevermind the fact that I have so been there.

This weekend didn't have all pretty moments.  It was hot, I was irritated and I snapped more than I should have. 

I felt trapped.  Matt works every. single. weekend. and after awhile it gets extremely old.  He takes Fridays off to be with A, and then I have him on Saturday.  Sometimes I resent it and then I feel horribly guilty for thinking that way. It puts pressure on our relationship and then we snap at each other.

We've talked about going to couple's counseling and I just feel so defeated but I know I shouldn't.  Our relationship isn't normal. We were thrust into being a family.  There was no chance to just be us and unless you've been there, it's hard to understand. 

Matt and I want to be together, get married, have our own children and we need a solid base for that.  It would be easier to just give up and move on with my life .  I remember during our brief split that someone said I don't deserve to have to live like this, I deserve to travel and be in a relationship without the burden of someone else's child.  That statement really stuck with me.  Am I really settling in my life to be with Matt?  I don't believe so. 

We just have to work twice as hard at our relationship but I think it's worth it.  I know Matt does too and that's all that matters.

Saturday, July 09, 2011


A became a big brother on Thursday to a little boy.  Matt and I are both a little worried that his behavior may take a nose dive but we have expected a little bit of that.  He's been an only child for 5 years and now he's going to have to share his mom, something I'm sure a lot of kids have issues with. 

I hate the term "broken home" and we are trying to instill in A that he has two families that both love him very much.  We have had our issues dealing with his mom but the past few months have actually been sort of pleasant.  We really just want what's best for A and I'm wondering if that's finally starting to be realized.

Coincidentally I just turned on the tv and a documentary type program about the smoking baby is on.  I guess we are doing okay after all, no smoking babies for us.

Friday, July 08, 2011

At work, I torture myself by looking at condo's I want to buy.  A girl can dream, right?  I'm putting my dreams into action though and I'm going to start saving so that hopefully in 1-2 years we can put down a down-payment.

Housing prices are extremely low right now and I don't want to miss this opportunity. Some talking head said prices could be low for the next 4-6 years but I don't think I want to wait that long. We want to buy something in the city but need to be within walking distance to the train and close to the highway for easier pick-ups and drop-offs with A. South Boston would be perfect.

With people paying $60,000 just for a parking space in Boston, we know we need to save our pennies.  Our rent is over $1100 so ideally we would like to purchase something that would keep our mortgage in that range.  Ideally in a few years we will also be making more money so it could go up some. We don't want to stretch ourselves too thing though and have no money for incidentals or anything fun.

It's been fun looking though and drooling.  I love the old charm that a lot of these condo's have.  They were built in the 1900's so the moldings, built-ins are all stuff I squeel over. Going to set-up my "buy a condo" fund now.

Thursday, July 07, 2011

Sometimes I feel so extremely inadequate after reading other people's blogs.

That probably makes me really lame.  I don't think anybody even reads this thing, let alone follows it.  I liked it that way because I wanted to maintain some sense or privacy but after reading all of these fun,  young blogs, I kind of want that too. 

They all have cute babies.  Cute husbands.  Perfect clothes.  Cute apartments. 

I have zero of that.  I have a cute kid who's not mine, a cute boyfriend, clothes and an apartment but don't have the access to a money train to get either of them cute.  I do have a cute dog though so points scored there!


I wonder how it's done.

I think the first thing I would need to do is quit my job.  Most of the awesome blogs I read appear to be stay-at-home mom's and while that rocks for them, is not feasible for me.  Unless we don't want to eat or have a car or an apartment.

Maybe I need to get myself a button and link to other blogs.  I also need to become more of a commenter.  I'm notorious for reading and running. 

Or I just need a more interesting life. 

Although I don't have a cute baby, or husband, or the perfect clothes, my life is pretty sweet.  I'm working hard for what I want and I will eventually have all of those things.  By then, people may not read blogs anymore but that's okay.

Wednesday, July 06, 2011

Back to work after my very nice, relaxing, long weekend.

Friday, my bosses let us go early so I jumped on the train and met my boys at the theater to see Cars 2.  $38 later we were sitting in the seats with our 3-D glasses on.  $38!  I love going to the movies so so much but cripes, I don't know if we can afford to go as often as we like. The movie was good, a little darker than the first but Adrian seemed to like it. 

Saturday we attended Matt's Grandmothers 80th birthday party!  She's quite the hoot and her house is near the ocean on the south shore.  His family was there (minus our new nephew, squee).  They had a kiddie pool out, bubbles, chalk, water balloons, and everybody seemed to have a good time.  I got some insanely cute pictures of the kids but in the interest of not wanting to put their faces on the internet, I won't.

Sunday, Matt worked and I puttered around the house.

Monday we both had the day off and took full advantage.  We took Emma to a local park/lake thing and walked the trails.  She saw the lake and started running full force and belly flopped in the water.  It was pretty adorable.  She swam more than I've seen her swim before, I think her confidence level is building.  I also think it was easier to swim there than at the ocean.  As we walked around the lake, anytime she saw a good chance to swim, she did. We came home and cleaned and then headed over to our friend's condo across the waterfront from downtown Boston and watched the fireworks on the roof deck.

Yesterday I did more puttering and napping.  It was hard for me to get up this morning and go back to work.  Short week though, and dinner and drinks tomorrow with some old co-workers, which should be fun.  Can't wait to hear the latest horror stories from my previous place of employment.

Tuesday, July 05, 2011

Three years ago I heard of the Casey Anthony case.  A beautiful little girl, Caylee, was found dead and her mother was the one accused.

I've been watching the trial for the past 40-some-odd days, even through the jury selection process.  I'm work in law and I find the court and legal system very fascinating.  I wanted to hear the evidence for myself.  I streamed the trial in the background while I was at work and watched when I had more down time.  I shed some tears, the testimony, pictures, it was all so real and raw.  The crime is unthinkable.

The jury started deliberations yesterday and it was just announced that a verdict had been reached. A wave of adrenaline rushed through me as I'm sitting on my couch.  I have no ties to this case but after following it closely for so long, I feel for her family. I want justice to be done for that beautiful little girl and as much as I didn't want to believe it, I believe Casey was her killer.

In about a half an hour we will know her fate.

ETA:  I'm shocked.  She was found not guilty on all three counts relating to the death of Caylee.  I really can't believe it.