Getting back to it.

Before we moved to DC I wanted to write a blog about the changes we were about to go through. I started, that was the easy part. But I was unable to motivate myself to continue writing after the first few posts. Im looking at my blog now, and in the last 4 months, I have written 10 posts. My goal was to do 2-3 a week, so I really should have more like 24-36 posts up by now.
It's a combination of things that has brought my writing to a screeching halt, and I am ok with haven taken the time to go through those things with out over analyzing them in order to be able to write about them. I'm still not sure I should, but Im going to start with the easier things.
Job hunting frustration. I enjoy working. (Correction!) I have enjoyed my last few jobs. Which makes it a lot easier to climb out of bed in the morning and go. I have been job hunting since we moved, and I had expected it to take a while for me to find a job that I would enjoy enough to motivate me most days; but not this long.
I havent found it.
Im still looking.
Its a frustrating situation.
I applied to a major retail store that I had worked for previously, because I was going crazy sitting at home trying to keep myself entertained. As I started working I put a lot of pressure on myself. In my mind I realized that this was only a part time, keep me busy while Mike is busy, don't really need it, kind of job; I wasn't treating it like that, with such easy expectation and flexibility. I became a working machine while at work, and picked up many more hours than I should have (thats a LOT of standing I was not used to). To the point that one day before work it all hit me, I didn't enjoy this job. At all.
I had put to much pressure on myself I was trying to make it something it was not. I was trying to make it more.
I was frustrated.
I had to have a talk with Mike, and then  a lot of thinking and re-arranging expectations. Since then I have limited the amount of hours I will work at once, and how many shifts.
Im looking at this job now as I should have the first few weeks.
I am much less frustrated.
I have lowered my expectation of this job, I doest not have the fulfillment level that my previous jobs had, and I'm  beginning to be ok with it.
I hadn't admitted it at first, but its a step back, a big step back in my "career".
I was trying to make it a step up from my previous jobs, and I think that is what was the most frustrating. Its not a step up, its definitely a step down.
But, I have found my motivator: to be able to quit this job, because I have a better job!
Thats what keeps me going, I cant wait to go in and quit this job.

Fantasy Football

This is the first ever time that I have participated in a Fantasy Football league. Don't judge, it had always seemed like a guy thing, and I didn't want to invade any bro-ness by asking to join. Also, Im Mexican, and it its not "futbol", didn't really seem that interesting. (unless you got to see it live)
My brother-in-law made this league for the family and a couple of close friends, so I have been very  carefully keeping track of what is going on Sunday and Monday's NFL football.

This week I had my first loss. It was tragic. I had been undefeated. Last week when I went up against my husband's team we were both undefeated, but only I came out victorious. But now that I have lost a game, I find myself re-thinking my whole strategy line up, (I really have no strategy). My WR, which ever they are, in my head I just call them my winged runners, don't ever seem to make the points they are supposed to.
Which brings me to the whole projected points thing. Its a mess, there really is no way to predict who will make points during a game, and so they change constantly.

 Beggining of the game. It was pretty even, I had a 1% advantage.

 A little further into the game, I had no player left, so my score was not going to go up. I was the underdog. I only got 81 points, I had been projected to get 114, you should know i was pretty stressed at this point.

 But here we are at the end. His remaining players didn't score the needed amounts, and I won!

In my game against my husband, which was week 4. I was projected to loose by about 15 points. I ended up winning by a margin on about 50.

This whole thing is quite entertaining, unpredictable, and fun.

Even after my loss last week, I am still in first place in the league because I have the most points, and no one is undefeated.

October

Today is the first of October, which means its been too long since Ive written a post.
Im gonna keep it short today, and just share with you my recipe for smoothies. Mike and I got a blender as a wedding gift, and I hadn't used it before these last couple of weeks. I don't know if it will crush ice, (growing up mom had a blender, and it was quite old, it couldn't handle crushing ice).
For my smoothies I don't use ice. So it doesn't really matter.
It a really easy recipe, and you can play around with it and add what ever you want to it.

Recipe:
1 cup of milk
1 cup of frozen strawberries.
1 teaspoon of sugar (or artificial sweetener)

We have also made some where we add a scoop of frozen sherbet. We have tried it with orange and raspberry. I like the raspberry better.

The Letter M

Mike and Megan

I like that both our names start with the same letter. It makes for inspiration for an easy little art project.
I found a Home Depot the other day, it was not far from the Target I go to. So I decided to stop in and look at their wood selections, because I had this project in mind. So I found this piece of wood, its was originally 4 feet long. So, I had the nice guy at the wood saw cut it into three pieces for me. He was so nice he didnt even charge me for the cuts. So now I have 3 pieces of wood for only 8 dollars. Score! (I got a soft pine, this allows me to hammer the nails in easy)

The rest of the material I already had on hand at home: hammer, nails (with heads) and some string.

I printed out a letter M on some paper, I just found one that had an outline I liked. You can probably free hand it if you are good at that. And I started putting in nails in the corners and important curves of the letter. 

Im not the straightest at hammering nails, but it doesnt matter. I just tried to make the heads all the same height.

I choose black string just to make it stand out. I started the outline of the M before I removed the paper, so that on the narrow parts I wouldn't get confused on what side the nail belonged to.

Once I had the out line done, I removed the paper. Then I when back over it, criss crossing the string. If you dont like it, its super easy to just un ravel it and try a diferent path. The hardest part is hiding the ends of the string. I left a long tail to allow me to do several knots and then cut it close so you cant see the tail.

I forgot to have my scissors on hand. So I used the hammer to keep the string in place while I went to look for some.

Here it is. A lovely M. I think Ill put it over our bed. 

I may un-do the string at some point later and stain and varnish the wood so it looks more finished. I just didn't feel like spending any more money at the time. I think it will look a lot more finished if I do that. 

Hope this inspires you to make one yourself. 

Here is a link to the original piece that inspired me. Nail feather

Groceries

Cost of living here in the DC area is a lot higher than in little Joplin MO. So one of the things we are going to try to do to stay with in budget is not eat out as much, which in turn makes grocery shopping much more important.
Having the right ingredients on hand, and getting them at the best price is the goal.
When we first got here we visited Whole Foods. Lovely shop. The problem is that its very expensive for very small portions. The few things we got where very yummy, but didn't last long at all. Needless to say we have not been back to do grocery shopping there.
The next place we tried out was Giant. Its nice and close so I can ride my bike there and pick up anything. But I did notice that food was still more expensive than I was used to paying. I got a rewards card, that enables you to get many in-store coupons, it automatically applies the coupon at the register. This is still my go to grocery store in case Im missing some ingredient or ran out of bread.
I finally gave in this week and made the drive to Walmart. Its a 30 minute drive from our house to the store. So I will not be making this trip often. But, I will be making it, probably once every other week. The reason is, that I can buy the bulk of our food, and not spend a small fortune.

50th Anniversary March on Washington

That's happening tomorrow folks. Mike has been able to get off class (the professors will provide a recording of the class for the students who choose to go to The March). So we will both venture to The Mall tomorrow morning to see President Obama, and I believe Clinton, and Carter as well.
Events like these are what make living in DC very interesting and exciting. It also brings important issues very close to home.
So, I look forward to posting tomorrow evening on how the event goes from my perspective.

Spoiler Alert!

I love reading, and with Mike doing a LOT of reading for school, I have also been reading a lot more. I started reading this book:

I enjoy reading about history, there is only one small problem. Spoilers! Since its history, people already know how its going to end. So I was reading along, and I decided to look up who had been presidents before Andrew Jackson. And that's when this happened: 

Thanks Wikipedia! Now I know that he does win the re-election!, and that he tosses out Calhoun and runs with Van Buren as vice-president!

I told Mike about my run in with this spoiler, and he told me it was my own fault. Which might be correct.