Life

Well, for awhile there, we thought spring was coming any moment. Then we woke up to a bit of snow on the ground yesterday. Sad face. I was soooo ready for spring and the sunshine and flowers! But of course, Idaho has to ruin my hopes and dreams. The snow then melted away until about 5 PM, when it started to hail, sleet and snow a bit more again. It's mostly all gone today, but it's cold and overcast. :(

For those of you who don't know, I was let go from Macy's a few weeks ago. Basically, there was some miscommunication between me and my manager regarding sick days, leaving work early due to sickness, etc. I had a meeting with my manager & the store manager a few months ago that was basically a 'shape up or ship out' kind of meeting, at which point, I told them it wouldn't be a problem, etc. A few weeks later, Zak and I were both sick. But I went to work, talked to my manager about what would happen if I were to go home (since I was throwing up and it was a blizzard outside), since I didn't want to get in trouble, etc., etc. He said everything would be fine. So I went on my sick little way and lo and behold, a week later I was called in to talk to the regional HR gal. Who promptly told me I was being let go, despite me telling her how my manager had ok'd me to go home and all of that. Oh, and my manager just 'happened' to be out of town that week anyways.

So now I am collecting unemployment and taking some time for myself, which I haven't had in awhile. I've been applying for jobs every week, and even had an interview the other week (it didn't work out, oh well). But now I spend my days reading, playing video games or watching t.v., and trying not to cook or eat everything in the house. I'm looking forward to when it warms up, so I can go on walks. I'll be receiving unemployment for up to four months, so I have some time to find a job I'll like.

With that in mind, I had some kind of 24 hour flu or something on Friday. Zak had a little bug and has been fairly congested all week. Whatever he had must've transferred to me and kind of destroyed me by Friday afternoon. I ended up sleeping for 2 and a half hours until Zak got back from work. I was freezing cold and had a temperature of 101! I don't remember the last time I had such a high fever. I normally run a little lower than average as it is. My entire body ached and hurt to be touched, I had a nasty sore throat, coughs and sniffles and was so tired. After a few hours of slumping on the couch, expressionless and lifeless, Zak convinced me to take a shower while he went to get me some medicine. He got me some aspirin and theraflu, and a few more hours later, I wasn't freezing and my temperature had gone done a degree or two. He sent me off to bed and I woke up feeling a fair amount better the next day.

Now I just have a nasty cough and congestion headaches. Hooray.

Our St. Patrick's Day was nice. Zak had to close, so we got up and had breakfast. I made my family's buttermilk pancake recipe (yum) and turned them green because: 1. it's fun, 2. it's tradition in my family, and 3. it's FUN. So we had green pancakes, bacon and green-tinted limeade for breakfast. Then Zak went off to work and I got dinner started. I just cut up some scrubbed red potatoes and dumped them and some baby carrots into the crock pot. I added the corn beef with its spice packet, added in some water and let it cook on high until Zak got home. Easiest meal of all-time. Zak invited our friends Mat & Erika over after I got it started, so I fretted that there wouldn't be enough food, but there was. And everything was just delicious. They were so impressed, they asked me how I made it all so tasty. I just credited our lovely crockpot, hehe.

That is about all I can think of that has been going on in our lives for us. We have started to think about our summer plans. It basically starts next month, when my sister is coming to visit us. Then Zak's mom will be staying with us for a few days before his cousin's wedding in May. He also has another cousin getting married this summer, but I can't remember the date at the moment. We are planning on spending about a week in CA with my family when Kenny gets back from Sweden in July (!). There is also our anniversary in August, followed by Mat & Erika's wedding the next day in Seattle. Looks like we'll be spending our anniversary in Seattle, but that's just fine because neither of us have been there yet. We're hoping to be able to see Zak's sister Delaney when she comes out to Rexburg for school in later August/early September in order to help get her set up, etc. And even now as I'm writing this, my head is spinning with all of these plans! I need to pace myself. It looks like we are going to have a fun summer. But first we have to get to spring!

The hamsters are doing well. We are planning on getting some new fish soon. Zak isn't entirely convinced that he shouldn't get me a companion kitty ;) (We'd really love one, but we're not supposed to have one....but I think I qualify as someone who needs a companion kitty, right?). That's all for now, folks!

Good News

In reference to the previous post (click for it),

Zak got the position!!

The C.E.O. called him today and told him the good news! More updates will follow as we get them. Congrats Zak! :)

Zak: The Business Man

Zak wrote this post on Facebook, and I thought I'd just cut & paste it here for everyone who hasn't read it yet. Although I was sad to be apart from him, I'm glad he had this opportunity to go. I'm really confident he'll get this promotion, it's pretty much a perfect fit for him. I'm so proud of him! :) Here's his trip, in his own words.

I left Tuesday evening out of our little regional airport. I felt like a pretty cool businessman until I saw the horde of Beta Theta Whatevers getting on the plane for their spring break trip. I flew on a Bombardier Q400, which is a turboprop plane. Pretty cool. I had a brief layover in Seattle. The airport there is very cool, very interesting architecture. I had a brief jump from there to Portland, where I sat next to a man who'd had so much to drink, it was coming through his skin. My favorite! Fortunately, he was passed out for all but 3 minutes of the flight. I got into Portland around 10pm, where I was directed to get on the wrong shuttle and got sent to the wrong hotel. I eventually sorted it out and got to my room at approximately 11pm. I startled my roommate pretty badly, haha.

Wednesday was my first real day of training. We talked about colored stones, tweezers, and the minutiae of diamonds. We also spent time learning how to estimate diamond prices based on their attributes, an important skill for the custom design work.

Thursday was the first day we actually got to play around with the CounterSketch program. It lets you customize and tweak lots of aspects of a library of 3000+ ring designs. I picked it up pretty quickly, because it is a pretty straightforward program. Today was also the first day we worked with the CEO of the company, Sean Ritchie. He is the third generation of the family to run the company. He is a very nice, laid back guy. I tried to make a good impression, but you never know...

Friday was for me, the hardest part: the sales presentation. I would write more details, but it was pretty straightforward. We also worked on some of the more advanced aspects of the program. Or at least I did. Friday was also everyone's last day, so everyone went home. Except me. I got to stay in the hotel alone with only a warm pizza for companionship. It wasn't that bad. I flew home Saturday morning, and got home around 11am. It was very nice to be home.

The training was also kind of a selection process. They brought in 8 guys for the training, but they only have 3 computers. So I tried my best to apply my wealth of diamond and gem trivia, and my considerable aptitude for moving scroll bars and sliders on computers to the task. My boss, Mat, said he heard from both his boss and some of the people in the corporate office that I really impressed everyone there. So I am hoping that translates to me being selected. Cross your fingers for me, I will hear on either Tuesday or Wednesday.

TL;DR: I went to Portland on a business trip to get trained on using a custom jewelry design program.

Oh, and here is a ring I designed.

Zak's New Threads

So for the period between Black Friday and Christmas, Zak's work, Harry Ritchie's had this competition/contest, called 'Cranberries to Chirstmas", going amongst all the stores. Each store had a goal, and if they made 100% of their goal, everyone would get a nice scarf. If the store got to 105% of goal, they got sweatshirts. At 110%, and for the final gift, jackets were the reward. Out of the 3o or so stores in the company, only a handful of the stores reached at least 110% of the store goal. The Moscow store was one of them! (Kind of a rare occasion, since their store goals are always so high and/or the corporate office isn't too fond of the Moscow branch; there have been lots of drama within the last few years.)

After the contest ended, Zak and his co-workers filled out size and color orders and a few weeks ago, the merchandise arrived. And everything is surprisingly really nice and comfortable. Here are some pictures of Zak modeling his new gear:

what a snazzy hoodie (the logo is small and on the left (of Zak))
what a nice (cashmere, even!) scarf and jacket (notice how the logo isn't that obvious, so that's nice)

My grandparents got Zak a gift card to use at Amazon for Christmas. He didn't really know what he wanted to use it for; there weren't any games or movies he just had to have. So he let it sit for awhile (something I'm bad at doing, I always seem to spend my gift cards like, the next. day.) until he came across some watches he liked. Mind you, he got a nice watch for our anniversary, but it's more of an every-day, casual watch (and we'll disregard the fact that I pointed this out before we got the watch; I asked him if he might want a nicer watch, what with his fancy job of selling jewelry, etc., but no, he assured me he wanted that one), and not a dressier watch. So he debated between a few types, but settled on a nice one from Stuhrling that he ordered last week. He was pretty excited about it. So excited, in fact, that he opted for the express shipping (yes, I rolled my eyes at that, but I let it go, he was too cute about it).

He loves this watch. The face is bigger than his other one, but it still looks very nice on his wrist. I'm just happy he is in love with it. I guess I'm the next one due for a fancy watch, but I'm in no hurry. Here's a rough picture of the watch:

Date Night!

We have just had the crummiest week, weather-wise. Snow and snow and snow and ice and freezing cold and snow. Oh, and snow is in the forecast for the next week or two. Apparently, the end of February is typically like this: stupid and deceiving. Here we were, getting excited for spring, what with the weather being sunny, clear and in the 50s almost every day. But no.

So yesterday we decided to have a Date Night, since we rarely do that, especially with our crazy schedules. We needed a break from being inside and ventured out into the cold Idaho weather. We are definitely thankful to not be walking around in such awful cold, like the 'good old days' in Rexburg.

We picked the place we went to for our anniversary/Valentine's Day dinner a few weeks back: Sangria Grille. This time we didn't have to worry about being back for work, so we were able to enjoy ourselves. And, randomly, we were seated at the table we had previously dined at. Next time, I guess we have to demand 'our' table. I noticed there were sweet corn tamale cakes on the menu for an appetizer, and asked Zak if it'd be alright to get them. I have something of an obsession with the Cheesecake Factory's sweet corn tamale cakes. All other appetizers fail in comparison, in my opinion. So we got them and boy, were they a good choice. The cakes were a little bigger and denser than I expected, but every bit delicious. [Side note: I found a recipe for them that I guess is a copy-cat version of the C.F.'s dish, and I am excited to try it. Will write a review with the recipe when I try it.]

Last time we ate there, Zak got this amazing skirt steak with fried bananas, that was just incredible. I could not resist and opted to get it this time. It did not disappoint. I normally don't order steak, I think the last time I got it at a restaurant was over a year ago, but I made the right decision this time. I couldn't eat it all (darn!), so I plan on having it for leftovers later today. Zak debated between a few options and finally chose to order the half-rack of ribs. He hasn't really had experience with such an order, so I walked him through it. My brother Kenny is like a ribs
connoisseur, so I have plenty of knowledge about them. The ribs were very tender and had just the right amount of sauce. We were both too full to try for dessert, but that was just fine with us.

We quickly grabbed some groceries (and candy) from Winco and headed to the movie theater. There weren't a lot of options to choose from, but The King's Speech with Colin Firth, Geoffrey Rush was playing, and I persuaded Zak to go see that with me. I had heard rave reviews about it, and I love Colin Firth (duh), so I knew it'd be good. I thoroughly enjoyed it, and thought it was just beautiful to watch. It was a bit too slow for Zak's taste, but he appreciated it as a good film and that I liked it. I was just happy that he came with me and had a good time being with me.

We came home and quickly ran inside to escape the clear, cold -9 degree air and snuggled up in blankets and turned on the t.v. It was so nice to go out and do something other than be at work or getting groceries! Of course, no pictures because I ran out of the house without the camera! Oh well, maybe next time!

Belated Valentine's Day Post

I know this is a week late, but I still wanted to write it.

Our Valentine's Day

I woke up early last Monday and starting work on breakfast. Since Zak didn't have to go in until 1, I thought we could have a nice, leisurely breakfast together. I started frying up bacon (splurge, yes), and cutting up strawberries (splurge number two, couldn't say no) and then got to the crepes. As I was about to get Zak up and start making them, I decided that I should make them pink. My family has a history of adding food dye to many holiday meals. Well, initially it started out as you know, green milk for St. Patrick's Day or pastel colored something for Easter. But then it got weirder and weirder and there have been reports of purple tuna sandwiches my father has made for Jenna. So I am just used to that and thought it would be fun. It was fun and breakfast was delicious. Especially considering the fact that strawberries, bananas and nutella make the ultimate crepe. Perfect.

Zak went into work at 1, at which point, I cleaned up a bit. For his gift, I got him some neat posters that I thought he'd like. And I had the cute idea of putting them up along the kitchen/dining room wall while he was at work, and taking down the previous pictures I had put up when we moved in. After that, I lazed around for a bit, got all pretty, and then started in on dinner. We decided on salmon, and the package for it had a recipe for honey-mustard sauce that I thought would be good. Except that the salmon was supposed to be broiled and the skin was still on half of it, so needless to say, I was a bit freaked out that it wouldn't work out right. The potatoes and broccoli were fine, but I was most worried about the fish, because I've only cooked fish like, one way before: on top of the stove, not in it.

Well, once Zak came home, we had a lovely candlelight dinner, on our traditional heart plates I've had for a few years. The fish was great, as was everything else. For dessert I tried a recipe that was like simplified bananas foster. It was essentially bananas caramelized in butter and brown sugar, drizzled with caramel sauce and topped with coconut flavored whipped cream. It was delicious but so, so rich. It was like, a once a year kind of dessert.

Zak got me a cute plush talking doll from Hallmark (Yoyo, of Hoops & Yoyo farme. They are brilliant). And this awesome print from the comic I love. It's called Extra Ordinary Comics, and it's just the cutest comic ever. I really love it. So I was thrilled, and put the print over the hamster cage so I can admire it all the day long. So we had a great Valentine's Day together, despite it being awful and snowy outside and Zak having to work. :)

all three posters

the print Zak got me, 'SPACE SHARK'

this is Yoyo :)

Four Years

Yesterday Zak and I celebrated being a couple for 4 years. It's strange to think how quickly the time has gone, we certainly don't feel four years older or different. But so much has changed and happened in those years. To celebrate, we both worked the closing shifts at work, hooray! But on our lunch break, we went to the restaurant that's in the mall parking lot, called Sangria. It was a cute little place with really neat wood and leaf decor. It was basically how I'd decorate my porch, with vines and lights. Anyways, it was nice. And affordable, and surprisingly very good. There was lots to choose from, and I thought I read that the cuisine was like Peruvian fusion? Well, Zak had a delicious steak with some fabulous sauce and...plantains? It was amazing. I had a breaded chicken cutlet over spinach basil pasta. I had my leftovers for dinner tonight. So that as a nice way to celebrate, and it kind of counts for Valentine's Day, since Zak has to work.

Last year for our anniversary, we went to that wonderful concert on campus with a genius pianist playing one of my favorite pieces by Rachmaninov. Then we had dinner in Idaho Falls. While it was a nice night, even though I forgot our leftovers, I have to say I really enjoyed this year's celebration. The weather was better and we didn't have to drive half an hour to get to dinner! But last year we had the top tier of our wedding cake, which was nice. It was nice to celebrate a little, even though our new anniversary is in August.

Two years ago, we got engaged. It was a Thursday, because I had to go to my stupid art seminar, and I dragged Zak along with me. Beforehand, I surprised him with his mom's recipe of chicken pot pie, his favorite. After we ditched out of the seminar early, he surprised me by proposing in "our" building on campus, by the famous poster of the elephant periodic table. That was a wonderful night, and even though I suspected the proposal, it still caught me by surprise. I think we hardly slept that night.

Three years ago, Zak was working in Connecticut and I was at school. It was a crappy winter and although I had great roommates, being all by myself for our first anniversary and Valentine's was hard. But Zak found a way to make it better. I remember coming home from a particularly grueling drawing class, feeling hopelessly depressed and frustrated at my lack of artistic talent. It was freezing and there was just so much snow and I was tired and hungry...but I remember coming home and my roommates were all excited and giggling as I saw the beautiful bouquet of red roses Zak had ordered online for me. I pretty much lost it and we spent the evening on the phone. I had sent him a box with homemade candies and chocolates and all kinds of cute things, and he sent me a cute little box as well. So that made our separation less difficult.

Four years ago we became a couple. I had to ask him, since he wasn't sure that I liked him in that way. Well, he was wrong. And yeah, two days later it was Valentine's, but it really wasn't that awkward. I do remember my roommates being mad at me for getting a boyfriend right before Valentine's, and they wouldn't let me come to some Singles Only party or whatever, but I didn't care. Zak wrote me a sweet song and played it on his guitar, in the freezing cold. It was a great night.

I'm so glad to have such a fun, smart, wonderful guy in my life who plays with me and pampers me with pretty things. He is a great husband and friend and I am happy to be his other half. :)