I Don't Know

I don't know how I'm going to get through the next 5-6 months.  The plan is to stay home in an effort to save more money.  And to get some stuff from our registry for my birthday and Christmas.

The last few weeks have been a roller coaster of emotions.  One big source of emotion is something I can't talk about publicly.  The other one is my living situation.  I've reached a point of feeling beyond frustration.  Like I'm crawling out of my skin almost all the time.

I could have it way worse.  WAY worse.  And it's not that I'm not grateful.  Because I am.  But sometimes the frustration just overpowers everything and I forget that I'm grateful and that I really do have it pretty good.

The only thing that is going to get me through this, besides my wonderful fiance, is prayer.

6 miles

I ran 6 miles today for the second time.  I got up at 7:30 in an attempt to get started before the sun came out.  No such luck.  I made it through all 6, but it was tough.  The hill at the end kills me and I'm more trotting than running.  But, I still did it without walking.

And now, my legs are done.  Just done.

Post run meal:

Peanut butter and jelly on whole grain bread, banana, strawberries.  I think I'll tell Mat we need to hit up Starbucks when we're out and about in a little while.

Tonight is the Taylor Swift concert.  I bought these tickets last fall sometime for my sister's birthday which was in December, and now we're finally going.  This is an expensive birthday present, and I also promised her Vegas this year for her 21st.  Oy.

I need to pray more.  I'm sad and lost these days and I know prayer will help.  It's upsetting that when I'm the most in need of it, I somehow forget.  I suppose it's because I'm so caught up in my thoughts that that's all I can think about.  Mat has been wonderful through it, and has been reminding me to pray.

Another bad thing is when I fall asleep before I can get any real prayers in.  *sigh*

First Day of School

Tomorrow is the first day of school.

Last year on the night before the first day, I don't remember how I was feeling.  However, I think I was rather edgy and stressed and anxious.  First day in a new school, after all!

This year?  Eh, whatever.  :)  I'm pretty relaxed.  I'm more aware of what I'm doing simply because I haven't taught in a couple months and because the first day is different than other days, but I'm not on edge at all.

Once the year officially starts, I can think about how once I get through it, just this one year, I will be marrying the man of my dreams.

Oh yeah, and I'll nurture some young minds.  That's good too.  Hahaha.

The Dress!

I bought my wedding dress yesterday!  I absolutely love it, and now not only am I waiting 10 more months for our wedding, I have to wait until January or February for my dress to come in.  THEN, it has to be altered!  Ahhh I wish I could just wear it anytime.

Even though I've been dealing with a lot of emotional stress the past week, I know that our wedding day is going to be absolutely beautiful.  The location, the flowers, the centerpieces, everything is going to be amazing.  I wish time could just stand still on that day.  I get teary just thinking about it.  I love him so much.

Save the Date

I just clicked "Place Order" for our save the date postcards.  And for our thank you notes.  We had a coupon to save $20 on an order of $99 or more, so we went ahead and got both at once.  I'M SO EXCITED!!  The save the dates I finally decided on are super cute and playful.  Our invitation will be much more formal, but I like doing something more fun and cutesy for this.  That's kind of the whole deal with our wedding - it will be formal and traditional, church ceremony, somewhat fancy reception venue, but there will be touches of fun.  White daisies, different shoes and hair for the bridesmaids, stuff like that.

The front looks like this:

Right????

Ahhhh I LOVE this.  It helps me to feel better in the midst of all the crap that's on my mind.

Tomorrow is an early morning run.  Hopefully it's uneventful.

Running in the Sun after Work = Death

I originally was going to shift my runs from morning to afternoon once I went back to work.  That all sounds fine and good until you realize that, oh yeah, August and September and October and November and even December in Southern California do not have happy breezy afternoons.

They have death afternoons.  Blazing sun.  In your eyes.  Little/no breeze.

Not cool.  (Yes I realize the double meaning behind that little sentence there).

Don't forget that after you've been at work all day you're more tired.  Today and yesterday weren't even school days yet.  I don't even want to think about how much more tired I'll be once the kiddos arrive.  On Wednesday.

Solution: Run in the morning.  I've officially decided that I would rather make myself go to bed at a decent hour like I should be doing anyway and just running in the morning.  It's cool, quiet, and I'm more awake.  I found that running in the afternoon, besides it being hot, is not pleasant because I've eaten that day and it makes me feel sluggish.  It doesn't really make sense, I know, because I always wait a bit after I eat, but I just do better on an empty stomach or just a little orange juice for some natural sugar a few minutes before I go.

To keep it safe while running at 5 am: alter my routes so I'm in primarily residential areas.  I also just bought an awesome Spibelt off Amazon.  I learned about these from this blog and decided it was amazing and that since I'm coming into extra money this year from the school day being extended (hello extra 4 grand at least from last year) I could afford to spend 20 bucks.  And safety has no price tag, right?

I swear I'm almost done...
Yes, we're getting paid extra for the extra half hour being added to each day.  This is in addition to the extra we are already paid for meetings and other work outside the regular contracted school day as well as in addition to the $1000 bonus that we get in June for having attended extra meetings and done extra work.  Yes, we get double paid for that stuff.  It's awesome.  I see furniture and a fabulous honeymoon and a chunk of a house down payment in our future.

And Now it Looks Like I'm Changing My Mind Again

I had yet another not so pleasant conversation with my mom today.  She's not happy at the prospect of us living together with 9 month still to go until we get married.  Apparently my dad isn't happy about it either.  I never actually said we were going to move next month or anything, but I guess I can see why they'd think that.

Financially, we should wait until after Christmas.  We'll be able to save a lot more money toward our future house as well as get a lot of useful presents.  My birthday is in October which means even more useful presents.

And, my mom seems open to the idea of us moving in closer to February/March.  I don't want to let parents control me or tell me what to do, and I told her that, and in the end I won't.  However, at the end of the day I also don't want to cause an argument.  If I stay here for a few more months and I'm stressed because of it, ok then I'm stressed.  If I move out "too soon" and then cause my parents to be really upset and angry at me for a while, then I'm just trading one stress for another.  And the second option will cost me money.  Moving out is supposed to relieve stress.  If it will just end up creating a new one, and all for the sake of a few months, it's not worth the money.

In the end, I will be out soon - 6 months or less.  I don't want this to be misunderstood as letting my parents control me simply because they don't feel it's "proper" to live together before you're married.  Because I made it very clear to my mom that she cannot tell me what to do.  I think it's the first time I've been that adamant about something.  It's not letting them control me, it's avoiding unnecessary anger on both ends for something that isn't COMPLETELY necessary.  Yes, I'm going insane.  Yes, I need my own life.  But my mom actually is right in that I'm about to have it.

Plus it's more money saved.  And we really could get that TV and blu-ray player we want.

The school year is starting and time will fly by.  Before I know it Christmas will be here.

A few more months.  I'm calling it a few.  It sounds more bearable.

I'm Thinking I Might Move Out. Soon.

We always intended to stay living at home until we got married.  There were a few reasons for this.  One was that we could save a lot more money to buy a house later.  Another was that we're a bit old-fashioned about such matters.  So much so that while we aren't super innocent (come on, we're human), we are of the wait until marriage type.

However.  This summer has shown me that I can't continue to live at home.  There are a lot of factors.  I'll be 26 in two months.  I live with my parents.  Anyone can see that this is not a good combination.  I also have a 20 mile drive to work.  That's 40 miles a day.  That's bad for the gas tank and the car.  That's bad for the sanity and the patience, of which I already have very little.

My parents were gone for 3 weeks at the beginning of the summer.  To say that Mat wasn't going to come and stay with me the whole time would be stupid.  Really stupid.  Of course he stayed.  I would be the stupid one if I wasn't going to take advantage of such a thing.

You know what?  It was really, really good for us.  We felt it, and both his mom and sister commented on it.  I think them commenting on it made me realize it even more.  When I'm home with my parents I'm grouchy and irritable and I pretty much stick to my room.  You know what else?  Living in a bedroom the majority of the time makes one crazy.  Perhaps it's worse lately because it's summer and I haven't been working, but during the school year it's not much different in the afternoon/evening and on the weekends.

Mat and I go out every Saturday night simply to get away.  Even if we end up spending more money (a lot more money) moving out, we at least won't be spending the $100+ a month on going out.  And we'll be eating healthier.  Helloooooo wedding dress!!

And really, we're getting married in 10 months anyway.  By the time we actually get a place, get some furniture, move, get settled, etc, the wedding will be 8 months away.  In the end, are we really living together prematurely?  Probably not.  Are we going to still wait until marriage for that one thing, even if it's weird to be living together and not doing it?  Yes, because we're strongly committed to that decision.  Will we have less money saved?  Yes.  But will my sanity be saved?  GOD YES, in more ways that one.

I Don't Have to Be That Skinny. Right?

I've been having a lot of trouble lately with size and body image.  It's synonymous with the trouble I've been having with ballet.  I know that size is just a number.  I know that after starting the pill (just because my body doesn't like to have it like a regular person good lord it's annoying) I went from the skinny "filled-in" that I had become when I was about 23 to having a little bit of actual hips and bigger boobs.  I wasn't thrilled, but if I wanted my period to be regular and if I wanted to not put my body through hell going off of it and then back on it 6 months later, I would just deal with it.

I know that my body shape changed a bit with doing less ballet and doing more of other kinds of workouts.  I'm slowly, very slowly, learning to accept and embrace this change.

I thought that with the end of the school year I'd get a better handle on my eating because I would be less stressed.  And I did do that, in the sense that I didn't have a nervous anxious craving for chocolate every minute of the day.  But I still ate chocolate.  Plenty of it.  Thankfully this time it was because I simply wanted it.

I hate dressing room mirrors.  I enjoyed buying a new pair of jeans on Thursday night that I feel more comfortable in and I enjoyed buying new functional bras and a super cute new fun bra today.  But I hate dressing room mirrors.  Even in Victoria's Secret.  You'd think that Victoria's Secret would put nice mirrors in there so you don't feel even more depressed that you already did having looked at the pictures of models hanging all over the store.

Maybe all the food and healthy living blogs I've started reading will help.  They started to, and then I got distracted.

School is starting all too soon.  My wedding is still 320 days away.  We looked at furniture today.  I wish we could have bought it now.  I wish we could get our apartment now.

I'm frustrated.

On a more positive note, my future mother-in-law lent me these books a while ago and I'm reading them for the second time right now: Vision in White (The Bride Quartet, Book 1)Bed of Roses (The Bride Quartet, Book 2)Savor the Moment (The Bride Quartet, Book 3)Happy Ever After (Nora Roberts' Bride Quartet Series #4) by Nora Roberts

So Unfair

I was told that there is now a job opening at the school where I student taught, taught summer school, and long-term subbed.

If this had come up a couple of weeks ago, it would have been better.  We go back next week.

I'm especially PISSED because working there would mean an increase of 15k in salary.  That district pays really happy.

WHY??????????

Still Debating the Blog Changes

I have this lovely idea that I can transform my blog from what it is now to something more personal.  A title that has popped into my head lady is "From Dancer to Runner."  Part of me is proud of that, but then another part of me gets sad about it.  Thinking about ballet still makes me sad.  I last went to ballet on July 30th.  I was in San Diego for 5 days which obviously meant I wasn't going to go, and then with the hip flexor situation going to ballet would be a stupid idea. I think my hip is getting better, but I don't want to chance it.  Ballet really puts a strain on it.

But, I digress.

I'm obviously getting very into running.  And less into ballet.  But am I going from dancer to runner?  And if so, how much?

Add to all of this the frequent ups and downs with my self-esteem.  And a lot of that is pretty stupid.  I don't need to be a juniors size 0 because I'm no longer 13 years old, so why should the fact that those juniors size 0 jeans got tight in the last year bother me so much?  It's about time I filled out and look like a grown woman, right?

I need to learn to love my body.  Every day, not just some days.

Heck Yes 5 Miles!

Yes.  I ran 5 miles today.

I was nervous about it for a couple of reasons.  1) I've never done that before  2) My hip has been bothering me.  However, I ran the whole thing.  Halfway through my lower right calf (same leg as the hip) started seizing up and getting tight, but I kept going anyway.  I'm sort of bad like that - I'll push myself to the death and back.  It's really bad when I have a cold and will continue working out and living life like normal including going to work because goodness knows a substitute when not absolutely necessary will just screw up your class even more.

But yeah.  5 miles.  Followed by a nice breakfast of iced coffee with sugar free hazelnut and nonfat milk, bread and peanut butter, and a banana.  Mmmm.

I snagged a cookie after church, because I wanted to. :)

A couple slices each of ham and cheddar cheese this afternoon before running to Costco and partaking of the free samples, and a few strawberries and a bite of ice cream when I got home.

Sundays tend to be snacky, can you tell?

At Least this Time I was MIA for a Reason

Sort of.

I looked at when I last posted, and it was July 26th.  That's pretty pathetic.  However, in my defense, I was at my little sis Alex's wedding on Saturday the 30th and then was in San Diego for a conference Sunday the 31st until last night.  So there. :-P

The conference was actually pretty useful.  Those things are sometimes stupid and don't really give you much you can actually use.  Or they're really long and boring and held in windowless rooms that are way overly air conditioned and leave you cranky and with a massive headache.  This one was still long and sort of boring and was held in windowless rooms that were way overly air conditioned.  However, I finally GET how to use Cornell notes, writing, and reading skills in a math classroom.  I also feel more ok with the school year starting.  I'm not thrilled to be losing my lazy days of summer, but I'm more confident in what I'm going to do this year and how I'm going to do it.

Plus, once the school year starts I know it will go fast and the faster it goes the sooner I move out of my parents' house and closer to work and the sooner I get MARRIED!

Speaking of getting married, I was going to come up with table names this summer (we're naming the reception tables rather than using numbers) and I haven't done it.  Maybe I'll start that today.

I'm still debating the idea of hosting my blog somewhere else, giving it a new name, and giving it a new sort of "theme."  The jury's still out.