My New Life as a Fashion Blog-tista

I am constantly getting asked Fashion advice, so I have had countless request to add a "Fashion" portion to this blog. Here I can give tips of fashion do and fashion do not. I know it will benefit you so sit back and enjoy this free fashion advice.

Okay, that was all a lie. Who would want to take fashion advice from me? You want to know what I'm wearing right now? I'll tell you. I am wearing a long sleeved red maternity shirt with hot oil stains on it, a jean maternity shirt that hasn't been washed in who-knows-how-many days (weeks), and a pair of lamb skin boots that go up to my knees. Now, the boots are most likely stylish, or at least they were a few years ago, but the scuffs on the toes and the sole coming off don't exactly make them this years fashion statement.

Let's face it: I'm am bad at dressing myself, but I am sure great at telling other people when they look bad. However, I do have a few tips up my sleeve of how I do my shopping. Thanks to Stacy and Clinton from TLC's What Not to Wear I don't waste money on the cheap stuff that I really don't love. And let's remember the influence that Stacy and Clinton have had on our lives.

How could you not love them?

This is my only tip. Quality! I never buy something just because it is on super sale anymore. A five pack of V-neck T's for example should never be high any adult female's shopping list. If I don't think I am going to wear it daily, I don't buy it. If I don't like the feel of the material or if it is really uncomfortable in the dressing room, then it will not be fun to wear all day.

However, I have found a new Maternity article of clothing that I would like to wear. Thanks to google images, this man has inspired me. If you locate this outfit at any store, please let me know. Preferable one that doesn't show so much cleavage though.

Please send me pictures of yourself in an outfit that you are on the edge about. I'll let you know what I think. Trust me, if you look nasty in it, I'll let you know.

Pleasently Plump or Positivly Paranoid?

Sorry for the lame alliteration. I thought of it this morning and when trying to think of something actually clever, this was the only thing that kept coming to mind.

All my life, I have always been the super skinny girl. Not a problem for me. I just can't eat that much. From the day I started school as a Kindergarten kid though high school, I pretty much only ate half of a peanut butter sandwich for lunch. I was very satisfied and almost even full some days when I stuffed the whole thing down instead of stopping when I was satisfied. If there was anything else in my lunch like fruit or, better yet, fruit snacks, I would usually have to skip out on my peanut butter sandwich just in case I was going to explode.

High school was nearly seven years ago and not much as changed since then. My husband and I both don't eat very much. We share a meal when we go out to dinner and still have leftovers. Every recipe that I find online or that a friend gives me, I half it. Even then, we still have enough for the next day and the day after that before we get sick of it and throw it away.

Life as a pregnant woman has opened my eyes to a whole new world: a world where I need a constant stream of food coming to my mouth. Here's the thing though. I think I eat the same amount that I did before, but I have to spread it out throughout the day. I can't sit down and eat a whole plate of food anymore. After 5 or 6 bites, I am stuffed full and have to wait 30 minutes and two bathroom trips before I can scarf anymore down.

Going back to my eyes opening... It didn't hit me that I was going to get big as a pregnant lady until I was about 5 months pregnant and I went into a bathroom stall. I did my normal walk into the stall thing, but then something happened. I couldn't close the door. What? Me? Too big to fit into a bathroom stall? It was true. That day, I gained a whole new respect for my dear overweight friends. Now I resort to only using the handicap stalls.

For those of you who are still skinny and have never had this problem, let me tell you, not being able to close a stall door is hard. There is a lot of maneuvering and crouching over the toilet in "pee position" just to get the door shut. Don't even dream about having clothing with ties in the back because those babies will just take a little unwanted dip in the toilet.

As my pregnancy days started to pass, I felt really FAT. I know that I'm not and I am still pretty petite for a pregnant lady, but boy, those hormones make me think otherwise. My wedding ring still fits. Occasionally it even feels loose. I still fit into all my shoes with no unattractive ankles pouring over the edges. My pregnancy weight is right on track. No evidence of any triple chins or thunder thighs. Just the same me with some handles on the side and a basketball under my shirt.

But it's days like these when my shirt feels a little tighter than usual that makes me paranoid that I am becoming the Goodyear blimp that really get to me. I have a Clinique face lotion that I use every morning (or afternoon) before I put on my makeup. I always use to use just one pump to cover my entire face. Today that one pump just didn't go very far. After covering my cheeks, I ran out! I had to use two pumps today! Great, now my face is getting fat.

The whole point of this is because I have a whole new realization of how those girls in high school and college felt. You know, those girls that just weren't perfect model types; the ones that use two pumps of lotion on their face instead of one. It always bugged me how those girls would complain about their fatness when they weren't fat at all! They each had perfect little bodies, but something in their mind made them think they were fat.

I guess this is my public apology to all those girls who would complain to me about how they thought they were fat. I am sorry for all the times I rolled my eyes at you or laughed in your face for thinking you were crazy. I feel the same way now too. I feel plump. But let's face it, we are crazy because we really aren't fat.

Maybe the Life Lesson We Need to Learn is on TV

I have learned some invaluable things on TV sitcoms growing up. For example, I never use to cry when I chopped up an onion, but then one day in my third trimester of pregnancy, that onion just made me tear up. You know what came to mind? Something that I learned from Veronica Mars, the teen detective with an amazingly interesting show. I remember she was chopping onions with her mother and had a spoon upside down in her mouth to prevent the misty eye. I haven't cried since.

Step by Step: who could forget that show? I remember once Al, the daughter was trying to be nice and fold the towels for her step mom, Suzanne Summers. Now Suz, being the perfectionist that she was, took over and showed her daughter a new was to fold towels so that none of the edges were showing. Since that moment, I have never gone back to my old sloppy ways of folding towels.

Now, let me be a little prideful here for a bit. I've always considered an expert on dating. Okay, well, maybe that is a slight exaggeration. Since returning home from serving a mission, I was older, I knew what I wanted, and I didn't take time to sift through the garbage before getting to the good stuff. Even with girls looking for men to date, I felt like I knew who people were personality wise and their intentions. I can't say much for the gentleman's side, but I have sure lived with a lot of different types of girls and have been neighbor to even more. Here's something that I did learn; some are annoying in front of a gentleman caller, but even more annoying to their girlfriends.

I try to give girl advice, when asked, to some of my single guy friends that I grew up with or knew before I was married. Let's face it, they all want the happy married life that I have. I do my best to criticize the girls that they are interested in and point their heads in the direction of the cute, emotionally stable girls. Then it just hit me today:

John and I don't watch TV. We don't get any channels, therefore, watching is a little difficult. We were in a hotel room visiting another state, when we decided to watch TV because we hadn't since we got married. You know what was on? The Bachelor. That was pretty much the best thing to watch out of their 7 channel selection. I always judged people who were on the Bachelor and even worse, who would want to watch something like that!? Okay, I'm hooked. Just watching it in that hotel room got me hooked. Now I watch it on Hulu and am a bit bummed that I have to watch it a day delayed.

My point is, I think I am out of a job. I no longer need to give out my dating tips to people. To all the single men out there looking for a wife: watch the Bachelor. Just on the show, there is every type of woman. Learn their personalities, then know what to avoid. There are so many girls that are into drama and are not looking for the "real love" thing, but see dating as a game. There are girls that YOU date that are like that. Study the women on The Bachelor and don't be fooled by the silly school girls out there. Then there are some really good ones that are sincere and don't annoy the heck out of me. I will no longer need to tell you how to figure it all out. Just watch the show. It is a great life lesson that can be learned.

One of the girls on The Bachelor was describing another woman on there. She said that she is perfect like a Barbie doll and everyone wants to hate her, but she had the heart of Mother Teresa and who can hate Mother Teresa?

Find one of them.

Movies? Ya'll Know Nothin' About Movies

Either I developed a really bad habit as a child, or everyone that I know just doesn't know what GOOD movies really are. Let me explain.

When I was growing up, I remember watching the same few movies over and over again. For example, the classic: The Sound of Music.


I could watch that movie 5 times through without even thinking that that type of behavior was unusual at all. It was well written, spectacular acting, and the filming seems pretty darn good. But let's face it, as a child, I didn't think of that criteria as important for a movie. This movies was just entertaining, realistic, and I was happy after I watched it.

I feel like I apply those three things, entertaining, realistic, and makes me happy to how I rate movies now. My husband's family loves movies. Most of the movies that they watch I actually like, but some I just cannot sit though. Now, here's the thing though is that it's not just my husband's family that loves these movies, it's a lot of people. I just don't understand why. I need some people to explain to me why I should sit through these movies and enjoy them. Here, let me give you a picture list for visualization.



I don't even know why anyone would like that movie. It puts me to sleep fast than Nyquil. I just don't like any movie with war-like fighting and especially fighting that takes place a super long time ago with a bunch of dirty men with fake accents. Just doesn't appeal to me.



This movie is rated R, but we did buy it edited for clean viewing. I never heard to this movie until we bought it, but my husband talked about it like it made billions in the movie theater. I felt like everyone heard about it but me. Here, let me assume that you never heard about it before, tell you a little about what it is about, then tell you why I don't like it. There's aliens in it and something about them doing something. I don't even know. The reason I don't like this movie: totally not realistic. If it can't happen in real life, I don't like it.



I have tried really really hard to like these movies. Okay, maybe the word "like" is going a little too far. I have tried really really hard to stay awake through these movies. I know that they are very well done because I like that portion of it. Did you know that extended versions are 4 hours long! And there are 3 movies! That's 12 hours total. Here's the thing that I don't get; people actually sit down and watch them in a marathon! A MARATHON! Now, when I was with the in-laws after Christmas, we watched all the movies over three days and I tried really hard to stay awake. I did. I think I stayed awake for at least an hour of the last one. How do I remember that? I cried like a baby in the very very end when everyone bows down to the hobbits and Sam, my favorite hobbit, got married. You want to know a secret though? I don't even know what they did or what even went on in the movie, but I still cried like a baby.

Okay, so now lets get into the real movies that are entertaining, realistic, and make me laugh.



I love almost anything Sandra Bullock and this movie is a love! It is so funny! Everyone laughed at this movie saying that it was the dumbest thing that Sandra could have done. One review online that I read even said, "The problems start in the script and are made worst by the delivery to produce a tremendously unfunny, clueless mess." How dare they! I'm sure this person was over thinking everything and only likes movies that spend billions of dollars on unrealistic phony computer graphics.



Not only is John Ritter, the most amazing actor that ever lived, in this movie, but it is realistic, but not a common thing that happens. If you haven't seen it, it's a great movie, but I can't really tell you that much about the plot. Billy Bob Thorton plays a mental guy who was in an institution for 25 years for killing his mother and her lover, but then let out. It is all about after his life there. It's very well done and realistic.



What an inspiration! I'm sure after watching this, every blonde was motivated to apply to Harvard!

There are some amazing movies out there that nobody can file under the "Bad Movie" category. There are always the classics like The Sound of Music, Little Mermaid, Pollyanna, Fiddler on the Roof, and A Goofy Movie. Then there are the inspirational movies where I feel personally offended when people say they didn't like the movie like The Shawshank Redemption, Cinderella Man, or Pursuit of Happyness. But I think the rest of the world can agree with me on those movies.

Just remember, next time you are rating a movie, don't think about if it is well-written, the acting, or how well done or how much effort and money they put into the movie. Are you just entertained after watching it? That should be the real scale for movie ratings!

And here is just a little extra for you to watch. Growing up, my sister always wanted to watch The Ten Commandments on Sundays. Great movie, but a little hard for me to sit through every Sunday. Classic though. Here is a little clip from youtube where the film is "recut" to be a high-school-drama-chick-flick-like movie. It's pretty funny. There are a lot of videos that are on youtube that are "recut" and pretty funny. I have to warn you at the end, stop it where the burning bush comes. I have never seen it there because my husband said that they say the "F word", so I always stop it right before then.

Enjoy: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u1kqqMXWEFs

What's Up in the News Lately

I'm addicted to the news. The first thing that I do when I start my computer is check the news to see if anything exciting or life changing has happened. I think part of me is also afraid that I am going to miss something really big that happens in the world like California falling into the ocean. We don't have TV, so we don't watch the news, and I don't like to watch the news anyway because that means 1/2 hour of watching stories that I might not even be interested in. I'm all about the internet.

There are still really big things that I remember learning from the news. It was tragic when I learned about the death of John Ritter. I remember where I was and the lighting in the room. Other news events I remember really well like when Elizabeth Smart was found, the 9-11 attacks, and when Princess Diana was killed. If I went to school and someone told me those stories, I wouldn't have believed them, but finding out myself through the news makes it more believable.

Nothing HUGE has happened in the news like the death of a president or a mass suicide (knock on wood). I guess that's a good thing though. But just today, there were a few stories that I thought were interesting:

Woman Unaware that She was Pregnant Delivers a Baby:
http://www.foxnews.com/health/2011/01/05/woman-unaware-pregnancy-delivers-pound-baby/?test=faces

The title pretty much sums up the story, but I put the article there just in case. Whenever I hear about women that give birth and didn't even know they were pregnant, I get really irritated. I don't know why this bugs me more than most things. Granted, most of the women that "didn't know they were pregnant" are usually extremely overweight and the added 25ish pounds of pregnancy seems really slight to them whereas for me that was 25% of my pre-pregnancy weight. I know that some women don't get super sick like I do during pregnancy, but come on, no period of 9 months? Hint hint? There are some birth controls that women take so that they only have their period every 3 months. Even then, 3 missed periods is a lot. Okay, then I understand the argument about not keeping track to dates because I never did. I just think that almost a year without getting out those tampons and pads is a little too big of a blessing without a baby attached to the end.

Polygamist Pummeled by Wives for Planning Fifth Marriage
http://www.aolnews.com/2011/01/05/polygamist-pummeled-by-first-and-second-wives-for-planning-fifth/?test=latestnews

Again, the title says it all. I just thought the story was kinda funny when I read the title. The article wasn't as exciting as I thought it was going to be, but that's just another little thing in the news I thought was interesting.

DNA Helps Calif. Cop Reopen 1968 'Jane Doe' Cold Case
http://www.aolnews.com/2011/01/04/dna-helps-california-cop-reopen-1968-jane-doe-cold-case/?test=latestnews

In a nutshell: 1968, lady murdered, her body was never identified, nor was the killer.
I've always loved reading about cold cases that seemed to be solved 30-some years later. I use to watch "Cold Case" on A&E channel back in the day. I always found it so interesting, but for some reason when I was reading this news article, I was a bit irritated that they would spend time opening up a case that is that old. First of all, if there were any witnesses it a crime that happened in 1968, they are either dead, too old to remember, or impossible to find. Then there is so much time and money put into investigating the crime, it seems like it could be put to better use. I usually don't have this opinion about cold cases because even I like to dabble in serial killers who have never been found or other unsolved mysteries. My mind was just in disagreement when I read this article.

Don't even get me started of Celebrity Gossip. Now that, I agree with some people that it is a waste of time to read about, but for some reason, I still click on articles about LiLo and her time at rehab. Maybe I should find a new hobby.