According to Jolene

Pinterest Interests

2012-02-21T18:26:00.001-07:00

Here’s a few of my Pinterest Interests for this week!

Source: michiganbulb.com via Jolene on Pinterest

Source: polyvore.com via Jolene on Pinterest

Source: ibreatheimhungry.com via Jolene on Pinterest

Source: Uploaded by user via Jolene on Pinterest

Source: cmt.com via Jolene on Pinterest

Jolene

I love comments and followers! It lets me know who’s reading so I can make sure to visit you in return! Feel free to add me on Facebook and Twitter as well, as soon as I have more followers to interact with on them I plan to make more and better use of them both.

What I’m Wearing

2012-02-20T21:33:00.001-07:00

What I’m Wearing for today(ok, yes, I know it’s not my usual What I’m Wearing day, but hubby’s days off were switched this week) is one featuring a contest win! I entered a contest that Moe over at My Favorite Things was running in December, and I was one of the winners! Can’t even tell you how much that made my day when I found out I won! The prize was something from Shop Translated, which if you haven’t checked out yet for plus size clothing you must!

I had to send them my top 3 picks, and even though their selection isn’t huge it was still hard to choose 3 things because what they do have is great. Sadly a few things that I really wanted to choose weren’t available in my size, but I did manage to come up with not only 3 choices, but I went with things that are different than what I would normally wear. I figured what a perfect opportunity to go a little outside my comfort zone, and I’m glad I did!

This is the one of my 3 picks that they sent me:

I received the dress about 3 weeks ago, but as you can see it’s not exactly made for Winter, and even though we’ve had a mild one compared to what we’re used to, it is still very much Winter here as the snow last night reminded us. I knew I couldn’t wait until summer to wear it though, looking at it hanging there for 3 weeks was hard enough! I knew I had to find a way to “Winterize” it so I could wear it. Most of my wardrobe is black though, and I still can’t decide which side of the “black and brown together” side I’m on(seriously, half say you can wear them together, half say you can’t…which is it? LOL….how do you all feel about that?).

I managed to find enough brown things in my closet and make what I think turned out to be a pretty good Winter outfit out of this beautiful Summer dress! One mistake I made though, I forgot to put some tights on underneath it and my legs absolutely froze under the very light skirt part….it will be great come Summer though, in the mean time tights are a must.

A dress that would have been outside the box for me is now something that the more I look at, the more I love! The style of dress is totally me, but the pattern is not something I would have walked up to a rack and picked out. I need to try something new more often.

Dress: Shop Translated, win, but retails for $74US(2012)

Cardigan: Reitmans, $15ish(2010)

Belt: Forever 21+, $8(2011)

Boots: Payless, gift from inlaws(2007??)

Necklace & Earrings: Avon, gift from my Mom(2010)

So what do you all think? Did I do as well as I think I did “Winterizing” this gorgeous Summer dress?

Jolene

Friend Makin Monday

2012-02-20T02:25:00.001-07:00

If you’ve taken part in FMM then you know the rules. If you’re new, please take a moment to answer this week’s questions on your own blog then add your link in the comments section at: www.alltheweigh.com so we can all see your FMM questions and answers. Please invite your blog readers to add their links too so everyone has to opportunity to be seen. The idea is to connect with other awesome bloggers so take a moment to post your own FMM post and comment on a couple of other posts. Now it’s time for this week’s topic!

FMM: Travel

Where did your most recent trip take you? Last road trip was last September to the southern corner of my province. Last trip actually away from here was 2004/2005 when we went from here to Mexico, then Phoenix, then Texas…..they were moves but our last holiday before that was 7 years before, so they were kind of like move/trip rolled into one I guess lol.
Is there a place that you’d like to visit that you haven’t yet? If so, where? Oh gosh, so many! I would love to just travel all around Canada and the US. There’s places overseas I would like to visit(Scotland and Ireland, yes please!), but even if money weren’t an issue I’m a little scared to fly like that.
Do you travel lightly, or do you cram as much into your luggage as possible? Well, I pack for 4 so not lightly, but at the same time I try not to take more than is needed.
Do your eating and exercise habits change when you travel? If so, how? There has been a couple of times in the past that we’ve gone away and I’ve been on some sort of eating plan and it definitely never sticks while we are away. Restaurants up here especially just don’t cater to a lot of different eating lifestyles.
Tell us about a place you’ve been that you’d like to go back to. Mazatlan, I absolutely adore that place and have been 4 times. With the instability in Mexico, combined with lack of money I’m sure it will be a very long time before I go there again. And my inlaws have been trying to sell their home there, which means no more free accommodation for us. And Phoenix, and Dallas-Fort Worth…..LOVE both those places too and miss them so much!
Do you prefer to travel at a certain time of year? Not really, if driving of course winter is bad.
If you had to choose, would you go to the beach or the mountains? I love the beauty and peacefulness of the mountains, but I LOVE the beach so it would be my pick!
Have you ever needed a passport to travel? We got one for our second trip to Mexico 14 years ago, we were flying and were told if flying you were better off with one. Haven’t had one since though, which is why now we can’t even drive into the US unless we buy them(for the whole family that’s a LOT of money!)…..grrrr, so stupid that we need one just to drive across the border now!
Do you collect anything in your travels? No, just pictures and memories. When I was a teenager I used to collect shotglasses wherever we went, still have them.
Where do you plan to go next? We are going on another road trip here in our Province again in July and another in September…just a few nights each time….hotel rooms are expensive here!

Now it’s your turn! Don’t forget to go to All the Weigh to share a link in the comments! Happy Monday friends!

Jolene

Bacon Cheeseburger Salad

2012-02-19T20:44:00.001-07:00

Good thing it’s recipe day, because do I have a simple yet yummy one to share!

A hamburger is my absolute favorite food, I could eat a hamburger every day and not get sick of it. I’m not eating bread though, ok, once every week or two hubby and I are going out for a Five Guys burger and eating the bun, but it’s like the only carb we eat the whole day and the only time we are eating out. This definitely helps keep the constant burger cravings at bay. No, I’m not one of those overweight people who would go and eat multiple burgers and fries a day, never have been. If we go out for a burger I will only eat one other small meal that day, and depending on the burger I can’t even always eat the whole thing in one sitting. I don’t know how people can eat that much, I might be overweight, but it usually doesn’t take much to fill me up.

Anyway, I love burgers so much that even that yummy Five Guys burger every couple of weeks doesn’t completely keep the burger cravings away. I found a recipe though that does and I can have as often as I want!! While searching for low carb recipes(I’m addicted to recipes, I search for them almost daily!) last week I came across one on www.food.com called Low Carb "I'm Dying For A Burger" Salad. Basically you throw all the toppings you like on your burgers into a salad and voila, there’s your “burger” without the bun. So, does it taste like a burger? You bet it does!! I made it tonight for dinner and it was absolutely fantastic! I’ve eaten a burger before and just discarded the bun, but somehow with all the ingredients mixed together like this it tastes more like a burger than doing it the patty and toppings way.

You can make this any way you want, just do it how you like your burgers. You don’t have to be doing Low Carb to enjoy this, it’s just plain yummy! Makes for a great lunch too, I sent hubby to work with some. I’m not going to include amounts for the ingredients because it’s one of those recipes that you just throw in however much you want of everything. This is how I made mine:

Bacon Cheeseburger Salad

(inspired by Low Carb "I'm Dying For A Burger" Salad by Not-2-Sweet)

Ground Beef

Onions, chopped

Garlic, minced

Liquid Smoke

Bacon, cooked crisp and broken into pieces

Lettuce(I use Romaine, it’s better for you than Iceberg and has more flavor)

Tomatoes, chopped

Onions, sliced thin

Pickles, sliced

Cheese, shredded(I used marble)

Mayo

Mustard

Ketchup

Heavy Cream

Brown ground beef with diced onions and garlic, add in some liquid smoke.

Toss together bacon, lettuce, tomatoes, onion slices, pickles and cheese.

Mix together mayo, mustard and ketchup. Add enough cream to thin it out a bit so it’s more like a pourable dressing.

Toss meat, salad mix and dressing mixture together. Warm in the microwave for about 30 seconds to wilt the lettuce a bit.

Enjoy!!

Jolene

What I’m Wearing

2012-02-16T01:43:00.001-07:00

It’s Wednesday! Hubby’s off! He’s taking me out for lunch! Yayy! Oh, and he got his T4 last night so I did his taxes early this morning before going to bed and money is on it’s way to help pay down the credit card! Yayy!

Here is What I’m Wearing today! Decided to wear something I rarely wear, had this top for a long time and this is only the second time I’ve worn it….still can’t decide if I really like it or not LOL, it’s like a faux wrap style, it’s a little loose in the bust area so I don’t like the shape it gives so much….makes me look a little saggy LOL. The skirt I wear a bit in summer, but not a lot because it likes to scoot up and I always have to pull it down…gets a little annoying.

Skirt: Reitmans, $10ish(2007)

Top: Addition-Elle, $10ish(2008)

Boots: Sears, $40(2011)

Tights: Forever 21+, $6(2011)

Bracelet: Dollarama, $1.25(2011)

Necklace & Earrings: Avon, don’t recall price

Jolene

(meant to post this before going out but forgot to hit publish….oops )

Valentine’s Day

2012-02-14T19:26:00.001-07:00

I don’t add Facebook statuses much these days, but I added one today on my personal account for Valentine’s Day. I think it about sums up what I think of Valentine’s Day:

“I have the best Valentine because he knows I don't want overpriced flowers that will die in 2 days or overpriced chocolate that I won't eat, he knows I don't want money wasted on a day that is made for retailers to make more money. He tells me he loves me no matter what day it is, he takes me out for lunch or dinner when he knows I need a break, he brings me home my favorite coffee because he knows it makes me happy, he strokes my head every night because he knows I have troubles sleeping and it helps relax me, he's there for me when I have nobody else and need a shoulder for anything. He does things because he loves me no matter what day it is, not because someone labeled a day and said he should. Those are the things that make a good Valentine, and mine is the best.”

Happy Valentine’s Day

Jolene

Pinterest Interests

2012-02-13T22:11:00.001-07:00

I haven’t spent quite as much time on Pinterest the past week, until early Monday morning while I was waiting for hubby to get home from work and went a little crazy on it. It’s the perfect time killer when you’re too tired to do anything else.

Here’s my Pinterest Interests for this week:

Source: stainedglassandmore.com via Jolene on Pinterest

Source: polyvore.com via Jolene on Pinterest

Source: electriqueboutique.com via Jolene on Pinterest

Source: eatingwell.com via Jolene on Pinterest

Source: Uploaded by user via Jolene on Pinterest

Source: cutoutandkeep.net via Jolene on Pinterest

Jolene

Follow my blog with Bloglovin

Stuffed Peppers

2012-02-12T20:30:00.001-07:00

Ok, I know I said I would be posting in a couple of days about some changes hubby and I are making to our diet…that was more than a couple of days ago. I’ve had a busy week, a lot of it dealing with finances….the cost of everything is going WAY up while the paychecks go up a little once a year if you’re lucky. I freaked when opening the utility bills this week, we used less electricity over the previous month yet the bill is $50 higher just for the electricity part alone….everything else went up too when our consumption changed very little. Basically my utilities are at least $150 more than the previous month, plus groceries just seem to keep going up and up every month. I tried to find a way to spend less than $600 a month on groceries, but unless all we eat is Kraft Dinner there’s just no way, groceries just cost too much here, I spend less than most families for a family of 4. So, as always, money is stressing me out man! I need to find the time to focus on how to earn some money while still being here for my family, problem is being here for my family doesn’t give me a lot of time to think about how I’m going to earn money or have the time to do it.

Anyway, because of focusing on finances this week I didn’t really pay much attention to my blog at all. I will still be posting more about our change in diet and why, for now the short version is that we have cut out all carbs….no sugar, no bread, no flour period. So I have also been working on getting set up with different recipes and meal plans than I am used to, which is surprisingly more time consuming than it sounds(especially when you have to play referee in the middle of it lol).

Yesterday I made Stuffed Peppers for dinner, I’ve been meaning to make them for a long time but never got around to it. It was a perfect meal though for our new(again…yes, will get to explaining that soon) low carb lifestyle. I knew it would be as simple as omitting the rice that is usually in a stuffed pepper, but as I was looking around for a recipe I couldn’t find one I totally liked. All the recipes I found were either missing something or had too much of something, or I just didn’t like the recipe overall. So, since I have been wanting to do more of making my own recipes from scratch instead of using existing recipes as a base, I made my own recipe and it turned out better than I had even hoped! I mean, these were seriously delicious!!!

I made mine with green peppers only because I found bags of green peppers on sale for pretty cheap($2.68 for 4 peppers, if you told me years ago I would be paying that one day and calling it “cheap” I wouldn’t have believed you!), my original plan was to use a mix of all colors, but they were quite a bit more expensive. For me I think I would have preferred a yellow or orange pepper, but I also am picky on how I like green peppers, they have to be diced and cooked soft and mixed in. But you can use whatever peppers you want, I would even do it with large jalapenos if I got a deal on some. Oh, and my 11 year old who hates peppers LOVED these, inhaled 1 before I even sat down, downed another seconds later and was begging for more, he was begging me for mine!

This is how I made it and there were plenty for 5 people and one left over, adjust for how many people and whether or not you’re eating something else with them, hubby and I had only these(he had 3, I had 2), the kids and my bro in-law had 2 each and potatoes with theirs.

Stuffed Peppers

6 Peppers, any color

1 lb Ground Beef

1 lb Ground Pork Sausage

1 Onion, diced

3 cloves garlic, minced

1 can diced tomatoes, or equivalent of fresh diced

1 tsp Cumin

1 tsp Oregano

1 tsp Chili Powder

Salt

Pepper

Shredded Cheese

Brown ground beef and pork sausage, dump meat into a strainer straddled over a bowl and let fat drain out. Saute onion, add garlic when onion is almost done and saute for a few minutes, stirring continuous so you don’t burn the garlic(if you don’t cook a lot you may not know that garlic burns very fast, I always add it in as late as possible, burnt garlic is very bitter and will ruin the taste of the dish). Add meat back into pan along with tomatoes and spices. Mix together well and cook on Med-Low while you prepare the peppers, stirring every few minutes.

Wash your peppers and slice them all in half, carefully clean out all the pepper guts and stem, try not to let the pepper half lose too much of it’s structure. Boil the pepper halves in a pot of water for 3 to 5 minutes depending how crunchy you prefer your peppers(I did about 4 minutes and it was perfect for the guys, I would have liked them a little softer).

Cover baking sheets with foil and lay pepper halves out. Fill peppers with meat mixture and top with as much shredded cheese as you would like(I used marble). Bake at 350* for 30 minutes.

Enjoy!

Please leave a comment, and you can add me to Twitter and/or Facebook too(links on the upper right column). I love connecting with people!

Jolene

Pinterest Interests

2012-02-07T01:25:00.001-07:00

Here’s my top Pinterest Interests for this week!

Source: victoriassecret.com via Jolene on Pinterest

Source: sewmamasew.com via Jolene on Pinterest

Source: pinterest.com via Jolene on Pinterest

Source: theangelswearfins.blogspot.com via Jolene on Pinterest

Source: nuttykitchen.com via Jolene on Pinterest

Source: ifunny.mobi via Jolene on Pinterest

Jolene

Wonky Posts In Reader

2012-02-07T00:58:00.001-07:00

Hey all, I just found out that some of my posts show up kind of wonky in Google Reader when they have a lot of pictures. I’m not sure if that is the case for all feed readers or not. I should have checked sooner because I know some posts I get from others in my Reader are wonky too. I do my posts in Windows Live Writer, not sure if that has anything to do with it or not(curious if others just do theirs on the blog websites or use something else). So if this happens to you just click on the post to read it in my blog instead .

Jolene

Friend Makin Monday

2012-02-06T19:48:00.001-07:00

I missed posting a recipe yesterday on Recipe Day, but for a good reason. Hubby and I are making some changes to how we eat. We watched a documentary on Friday that confirmed some already existing beliefs we had on diet. It was sort of our wake up call because we can also say we knew from experience in the past it to be true. Anyway, I’m crazy busy now finding new recipes, re-planning how I do our menu and shopping and everything. When I get into something, I get into it big and become a little obsessed with it! LOL! Anyone who follows me on Pinterest will notice a certain trend to most of my Pins for the past couple of days. I’m working on a post explaining what we’re doing a bit as well as a little bit of “weight” history. I didn’t want to miss Friend Makin Monday though, so taking a break from working on my other post to participate in this weeks FMM. Hopefully I’ll get the other post done in the next couple of days

If you’ve taken part in FMM then you know the rules. If you’re new, please take a moment to answer this week’s question on your own blog then add your link in the comments section here at: www.alltheweigh.com so we can all see your FMM questions and answers. Please invite your blog readers to add their links here too so everyone has to opportunity to be seen. The idea is to connect with other awesome bloggers so take a moment to post your own FMM post and comment on a couple of other posts. Now it’s time for this week’s topic!

FMM: Habits

Are you proactive, or do you procrastinate? It depends, and I’m not even sure I can say depends on what. I do definitely procrastinate a lot more than I should, but then again so does everybody. I don’t know a single person who doesn’t, even people who say they don’t procrastinate DO!
Do you eat breakfast everyday? No, but then again our entire day and mealtimes are all jumble up because of hubby working night shift. Basically we eat when we’re hungry, not at specific times, and I just simply plan meals, I don’t plan based on this breakfast, this is supper. Hubby is up around 2 or 3pm, we first eat around 3 or 4 and it’s more often than not a “supper” type meal. And often we’ll be eating eggs before we go to bed, like last night/this morning hubby got home at 5:30am and we had scrambled eggs before going to bed.
How much time do you spend watching TV on an average day? Hard one to answer. Hubby turns the TV on the second he is downstairs, I don’t always fully watch what he has on though, sometimes I do. Once he leaves for work some nights I’ll have something playing all night, other nights I don’t watch a single thing. I really love watching shows, but other than nights hubby is off and I sit and watch with him all night, there’s really no rhyme or reason to my TV watching.
Do you talk on the phone, or do you prefer e-mail and/or text messages? I hate, hate, hate, hate talking on the phone. I mean I can’t say enough how much I hate talking on the phone. I don’t particularly know why, I can only guess it’s from the years of working retail and not knowing if you had a friendly or horrible customer on the end, or it could be from a short stint I did working for the local phone company on the phones and ended up quitting that job in tears because I hated it so much…I couldn’t blame the people on the other end for getting pissed off with me calling because I do too, but at the same time it was my job. I also have a hard time talking on the phone because I just don’t hear very well, it is really uncomfortable saying “pardon me” constantly so instead sometimes I end up just not knowing what the person said. Anyone who knows me knows I don’t phone unless I have to and that if they want to talk they are better off coming to see me, emailing me or messaging me on Facebook(not so much that one anymore, kind of Facebooked out). I’m not big on texting either, but I would do it over a phone call.
Do you exercise in the morning, afternoon or evening? hehe, exercise, yeah right! Yeah, I admit, it’s been a while. But when I do did it was usually at night while hubby was at work and the kids were in bed. Years ago I used to do any exercise in the morning.
Do you take time for yourself regularly? If so, how do you spend that time? My time for myself is just ~~working~~ playing at the computer or watching TV while hubby is at work and the kids are in bed.
How often do you make your bed? These days never. I got out of the habit because hubby would be getting home from work and going to bed just as I was waking up in the morning and by the time he woke up I was too busy with other things downstairs to bother going up to make it(and of course he didn’t LOL). Now I keep his night schedule but just never got back into the habit of making it, he also still usually wakes up a couple of hours after me and I rarely go back up to the bedroom until bedtime.
Do you plan meals? If so, how far in advance? Yes, I plan a week ahead but allow flexibility in case something comes up and that meal just doesn’t work for whatever reason.
Do you wake up at the same time everyday? Usually within a 2 hour period…depends what time I got to bed and how many hours I spent not sleeping through the night.
How often do you brush your teeth? Twice a day.

Now it’s your turn to answer this week’s questions! Don’t forget to go to www.alltheweigh.com to add your link and read Kenlie’s answers. Happy Monday friends!

Jolene

Copy-Cat Friday

2012-02-03T19:33:00.001-07:00

Well, according to my blog schedule that I made today is Copy-Cat Friday. Even though I have been wanting to do posts like this for a while, this is my first one. And, well, it’s proving to be harder than I thought! I want to copy outfits in a way that I would wear them, but that also includes a price that I would pay. With so few plus size clothing sites out there who cater to my kind of budget it’s near impossible. So I’m going to have to be a bit more flexible than I originally planned. I will include the styles that I would wear, but pricewise some things may be much more than I would actually be able to pay(ok, I admit it, it’s a combination of can’t afford and the fact that I’m a cheapskate…you learn to be when you’ve been through what I have). Knowing that some sites run some pretty good sales every now and then is what saves people like me with little to spend on clothing. So if I include an item from City Chic that may currently be $60, I know that they have 50% off sales which will make the price a little better. And while for some things that is still more than I ~~can~~ will pay, I also know that some items do eventually go even lower than that after they have been around for a while, though selection in sizes may be limited the lower the price goes.

Another stumbling block I ran into was that I wanted to use Polyvore to put together the outfits. I’ve already run into sites that Polyvore just won’t work with though. So I guess I won’t be using it right now, I don’t want to limit what sites I use to put outfits together. Fortunately my graphics program works just as well!

Now, let’s get down to the fun and the copying!

I found this outfit on Pinterest, looks like it was originally put together on Polyvore, by who I have no idea though as it doesn’t link back to it. I also have no idea where the pieces in this outfit came from. I know I love it though! I love leopard, red and flats….my kind of outfit!

Here is how I would put this outfit together based on what is currently available and making it as affordable as possible:

The shoes. Yes, I know the shoes are a cheetah print and not leopard, and while the two are very similar they are not the same. I put this shoe with the outfit because this is exactly the style of shoe and around the price I would buy…and really I think you could get away with wearing this print anyway even though the purse and earrings are leopard. I’m on my second pair of leopard flats. First I got from Walmart, second from F21, both I paid under $20 for. So while I couldn’t find exactly the shoe I was looking for to add to this outfit right now, I know they’re out there and for the price I would pay. F21 usually has them and had a pair when I started putting this together, but now it’s not up anymore so must be sold out at least in Canada.

Here’s what I added to the outfit:

Whiskered Flare Leg Jeans from Forever 21+ $21.80 CDN

Longline V-Neck Cami from Forever 21+ $6.80 CDN

Amber Shrug from Sealed With A Kiss $39 USD(more than I would actually pay, but best value I could find at the moment)

Red Infinity Scarf from Target $14.99 USD…they don’t ship to Canada and we don’t have them until next year. Something comparable could easily be found here, just nothing online I could find right now. Or have someone in the US send you one.

Bueno Rouched Leopard Handbag with Croc Trim – Camel from Target $29.99 USD….best I could find online, because it’s Target same as with scarf.

Gold Leaf And Leopard Feather Dangle Earrings from Torrid $12.50 USD…a little more than I generally spend on earrings…but they’re awesome!

Beaded Fashion Bracelet from Miz Outlet $1.49 USD

Mossimo Supply Co. Odell Ballet Flats – Cheetah from Target $12.99 USD

Wow, it took me WAYYYY longer than I anticipated searching out and putting everything together. Hopefully the next one will be faster and easier now that I have sites more organized and know how I’m doing it!

Jolene

I Would If I Could

2012-02-02T22:08:00.001-07:00

It’s time for I Would If I Could. My chance to show the gorgeous things I would buy if I had the money for them. A chance for you to see what things are out there right now that I’m lusting over!

I’ve spent all day trying to figure out how to cut what we spend in a month only to come up with unless we don’t eat out even once(and our eating out is not much, so even that wouldn’t cut a lot) there is nowhere else to cut . *sigh*, how depressing huh? We need my hubby’s income but to live in a city that’s not so crazy expensive to live lol.

So while I sit and pout over finances I thought a break to torture myself over things I want but can’t have would be a good idea and lift my spirits. Ok, yes, that was total and complete sarcasm! But I’m trying to stick to my blog schedule I set as best as I can, and I really did need a break from all the number crunching(my eyes are going buuuugggy!!).

So here’s what I would love to add to my closet if my husbands income was twice as much as it is, LOL:

I loved most of the stuff at Forever 21 when I first found out last year that they carried plus sizes. I got a few things that I really liked from them, then all of a sudden not only did they seriously slow down in how many things they were listing, but I didn’t like the styles that they were listing. Now as Spring is getting closer they seem to be getting nicer things again!

I love this Lace Flutter Dress from Forever 21+. It’s $27.80, which is definitely less expensive than a dresses from a lot of places. With my current need to tighten the spending it’s not something I can buy right now though. It is just soooo pretty! Not surprising that on the Canadian website they are down to only 1X now though, and it hasn’t been up very long. Wish they would get more of the really nice stuff so it didn’t sell out so fast.

V-Day is near! We don’t celebrate it, I’ve told hubby if he wastes money on overpriced flowers or chocolates just because some made up day to make money says he should, I’ll be pissed! But, since the whole married people don’t have much sex thing is a HUGE load of BS, I wouldn’t be at all upset if something like this was laying on the bed for me, and hubby wouldn’t be at all upset if I came into the bedroom wearing it! Black With Red Trim Micro Chemise from Torrid on sale for $24.99

I don’t own anything from SWAK yet, just haven’t found anything in my size I could afford when I’ve looked. Found things that I could afford but they didn’t have my size, and I’ve found lots I love on there, just couldn’t afford at the time. This Classic V-Neck Dress In Grey is such a nice simple style that could be dressed up or down. Grey isn’t usually a favorite color of mine, but it looks gorgeous on the model, could only hope it would look just as nice on my pale skin. It’s on for $29.99 now, they appear to have a full selection of sizes in it too.

I don’t have a ton of purses like some of the fashionistas out there, which is why I don’t include my handbag in my OOTD posts, my purse doesn’t always match the best. Once again, because of money LOL, geez, isn’t that always the case? I saw one similar to this on sale on Ricki’s website recently but it’s gone now, boo! It’s the first time I’ve seen one on sale, I like most of their purses. I like this one too though. It’s their Large Croco Tote in deep violet for $39.50. Ricki’s is a Canadian store and I don’t believe ships to the US. But for you Canadian ladies and anyone visiting Canada, they carry up to a size 18 in their stores, and they carry Tall sizes in pants!! Both very hard things to find, especially in non-specialty clothing store! Some of their pants come in 3 or 4 lengths, from a 30 to a 36 length. This is a huge deal for those of us with long legs, you can’t alter a regular length to make them longer and finding anything over 31 or 32 inches you almost always have to go to specialty shops. I only wish they carried men’s clothing too, I’m having an impossible time finding 36 length for my son.

Well, there’s my I Would If I Could items for this week, must force myself back to menu planning, shopping lists and number crunching….sounds like fun hey?

What’s catching your eye out there these days? Are you having to watch every penny right now too? I know I for one cannot wait until tax time and we get some money back so things can get a little bit back to normal! I’m always pretty careful about what we spend, but this time of year tends to be the tightest for making ends meet.

Jolene

What I’m Wearing

2012-02-02T01:05:00.001-07:00

(yes, I know it’s technically Thursday morning and I missed Wednesday, but it’s still part of my Wednesday lol)

What I’m wearing….or, wore. I wore this last week. Haven’t felt great this week between migraines and stomach issues, so I haven’t been out this week.

Mixing patterns I’ve noticed is something becoming popular lately. Normally it’s not my thing, I’m pretty picky about patterns in the first place. But I did it, I’m not sure if it really works or not though. The only reason I actually mixed patterns was because I needed a scarf to cover my neck and I have a pretty limited selection of scarves, this one was the closest match to what I was wearing. I’ve had pretty bad skin since about my late 20’s and lately it’s been horrible. It was made worse by something I was taking for energy that I didn’t know can flare things up in people with bad skin. Now I’m having a heck of a time clearing it all up. I’ve started using a different foundation that covers much better than what I was using before, but some areas it just doesn’t cover enough. My solution has been scarves! Hopefully my skin clears up soon or I’m going to have to buy a better selection of scarves lol.

What do you think of the mixing of the print on the scarf and the leopard top?

Do you have problem areas you use tricks to cover up? Whether it be skin issues like I have or certain parts of your body you try to cover your extra “curves” more than others. What kind of tricks do you use to cover up your issues?

Jeans: Forever 21+, $15(2011)

Leopard Top w/belt: 121Avenue, $11(2011)

Jacket: City Chic, $26(2011)

Boots: Payless, $40(2011, leftover style from 2010)

Scarf: hand-me-down from a friend

Earrings: Avon, gift from my Mom

Jolene

Pinterest Interests

2012-01-31T16:12:00.001-07:00

There is just so much that is wonderful about Pinterest! I’ve noticed there’s even a lot of guys starting to use it! I know my husband often looks at it with me and loves the cool things we find on it. I just can’t say enough about how much I love that site.

Here are some random pins from my Pinterest boards, I have all kinds of boards and pins. Hey, I’m a gal with a wide variety of interests, a site that caters to all of them is pretty cool in my books!

Source: polyvoreimg.com via Jolene on Pinterest

Source: wanelo.com via Jolene on Pinterest

Source: Uploaded by user via Jolene on Pinterest

Source: une-deuxsenses.blogspot.com via Jolene on Pinterest

Source: flickr.com via Jolene on Pinterest

Source: keepbusy.net via Jolene on Pinterest

Jolene

A Little Bit of Rambling

2012-01-31T01:42:00.001-07:00

I know I just posted my Friend Makin Monday post(after missing most of the past weeks posts..shhh, we won’t talk about that), but I’m feeling the need to ramble at the moment .

Like I said in my earlier post, I have had a migraine for the past 2 days. It has finally eased up and is now just a tired dull ache across my forehead, hurts but tolerable. I’ve always been one to get a lot of headaches, but I started getting migraines probably about a year or two ago and they seem to get worse. I live in a place with lots of major weather changes, it can go from –20 Celsius one day to +10 the next. We can also get some days with really strong winds. My migraines definitely seem to coincide with the weather for the most part, and that is common around here for people with migraines. I’m not one to go on prescription drugs(I can count on one hand how many times I’ve been to the Dr even in the past 10 years), but I’ve just learned that taking painkillers for headaches and migraines can actually cause more headaches. Since the painkillers rarely do much of anything anyway I think this is enough to make me skip the painkillers for my headaches at least, my bad back needs painkillers when it flares up, but at least they actually usually help when it comes to that. So now I’m going to have to search and see if there’s anything else I can do to prevent or at least alleviate the pain of migraines.

Do you get migraines? If so how do you deal with them once you have them or try to prevent them from coming in the first place? Dark and quiet help me a bit, but with kids who are at home all the time I don’t get much of a chance for dark and quiet until they’re in bed. I tried some Tiger Balm on my forehead because I have heard that it helps, I’m not quite sure if it helped much or not, if it did help I really do not want to know the pain without using it, the pain with it was bad enough. Unfortunately I have bad and sensitive skin and I don’t think it did my skin any favors.

I have so much I want to do lately, the number of things swirling around in my head is surely not helping my headaches. I do this to myself all the time. I think too much. Problem is when I start thinking too much nothing gets done because I get so overwhelmed with my thoughts that it exhausts me and then I’m too tired to do anything. I need to pick just a few key things and focus on them I think and allow the other things to move to the side for now. It’s hard for me to do, but I think if I want to keep my sanity and get anything done, I must. So I think I have narrowed it down to a few things.

De-cluttering! I know it’s only the end of January, and where I live Yard Sale weather doesn’t hit until June(May if we’re lucky, but that’s rarely the case). We just have too much stuff though and I need to get rid of some of it. So I need to focus on some deep cleaning of the house and organizing all the crap we don’t need so that come June we’re ready for a yard sale. Some extra money is definitely needed too and that will help, hubby’s first couple of weeks of holiday are in July so if we could get enough money to pay for a couple nights of hotel it would be a huge help for us.

Sewing! I have been wanting to get into sewing more for the longest time and I think now it’s time to do it. I have several things that just need altering, but I also have several things that I want to make for myself and see if I am good enough at sewing to make some of my clothes instead of buying….of course this will also be dependent on finding a place to get fabric that is affordable…that’s actually the hard part! I want to start with simple things like skirts and dresses for myself to see if I might be able to eventually move on to things like PJ’s, pants, shirts and shorts for my guys. It’s impossible to find pants long enough for my oldest(poor kid has ONE pair of pants that are long enough, nobody carries a 36” length without charging a fortune for them), so it sure would be nice if I could make him pants since he has many years of growing ahead of him still….it’s either I learn how to make them, he lives in shorts, or one of us gets an extra job just to pay for pants for the boy!

Blogging! I want to be a better blogger on here, but that is not the only blogging I want to focus on. I mentioned last summer about our trip to see Ghost Towns in our Province. We went out twice, once in July and once in September, and had so much fun. I absolutely love old and abandoned things, it’s hard to explain this love, but I seriously LOVE even just looking at pictures of old and abandoned things. We took a ton of pictures and hubby and I have talked since then about blogging about these places and our road trips and posting pictures. We have only made the 2 trips so far, but plan on making many more. We can’t afford a trip away for vacation(as much there is a beach somewhere calling my name!), so instead we are going on road trips in our own “backyard”. Hubby and I have been trying to figure out a name for this blog and I think we finally have one we agree on, so I want to focus on starting this blog and sharing pictures and stuff on the places we have already visited as well as get us planning our next trip.

Ok, ramble over, felt good to ramble a bit, I love rambling . I’m kinda shy in person(especially until I get to know someone), so it’s nice to let this part of me out somewhere lol.

….oh, and one more thing….I’m going to be a Great Aunt anytime now, if not already. All I know is that my nephew got a girl pregnant and she was induced today(yesterday). Don’t know much else because nobody tells me much in my family lol, I’m just expected to know what’s going on and get funny looks and comments like “oh, you don’t know?” when I don’t. Most of what I know is from reading status updates from family on Facebook, this is how I get my info on what’s going on with family since nobody talks to me, cool huh? Not that I’ll see my Great Niece/Nephew anytime soon, they live in Arizona and as much as I LOVE the place I have no money and no passport to go there anytime in the near future. hmmm, wonder if my husband could get a transfer there?? I lived there for a whole 2 months before, would love to live there in better circumstances/conditions than I did the last time.

Jolene

Friend Makin’ Monday

2012-01-30T22:37:00.001-07:00

It’s Friend Makin Monday time again! A little late in the day I know, but I’ve had a migraine for the past 2 days and am just starting to feel I can function again.

FMM: Makeup Favorites

Do you wear makeup everyday? I definitely wear make-up every day if I’m leaving the house. If I don’t go anywhere I still usually wear it, but if I’m not feeling well or my skin has been especially bad I will skip it some days. Wearing make-up makes me feel good about myself, so I don’t skip it too often because I notice a difference in my mood when I do.
Does your routine change if you’re going out with friends/on a date/to a party? If so, how? Not a lot. If I wear make-up at home I wear only a little, but if I’m going out I tend to do it the same regardless of where I’m going or what I’m doing.
Are you loyal to one brand, or do you use different brands for different things? Not at all. It’s mostly about price for me.
Do you wear primer/concealer? If so, what’s your favorite kind? I sometimes use concealer, but the current foundation I use I find I don’t need it as much.
What’s your favorite brand of foundation? I just switched to Revlon after using Cover Girl for years.
Do you use blush and/or bronzer? If so, what’s your favorite kind? Yes and yes. No favorites, I’ve used many different kinds. It just depends on what is available that I like and at the right price when I need it.
Do you wear eye shadow/eye liner? If so, what’s your favorite kind? Yes, both. I like Avon eyeliner but am trying to check out other brands now. Once again, pretty much dependent on price for me.
What’s your favorite kind of mascara? This is one that I do have a favorite in. I’ve been using Maybelline Great Lash Mascara for years. Not that I wouldn’t be willing to use others, it’s just a good price for a good mascara.
Lipstick? Lip gloss? Both? Favorite? Both but I prefer lipstick. Lipstick doesn’t last long on me, but lip gloss is usually worn off in half an hour so it’s pointless to wear.
Do you wear nail polish regularly? If so, share a few of your favorite brands/colors. I do! My nails do not hold polish well though, I have tried everything it seems and nothing seems to help make my polish last even 24 hours before it is peeling bad. I mostly wear China Glaze now, love their colors and they are cheaper than Opi and Essie…though I do want to try some of both of those brands too. I don’t really have a favorite color, I have a variety of colors and wear them all…my son actually often picks out my color for me LOL.
How do you remove your makeup at the end of the day? Walmart brand facial cleansing wipes are what I’m using right now. When not those usually just soap and water.
Do you feel prettier when you’re wearing makeup? YES! YES! YES! Sooooo much prettier! Make-up does huge things for my self confidence.
Do you have any beauty tips that you could pass along? None that I can think of right now.

Now it’s your turn to answer the questions!

Jolene

I Would If I Could…

2012-01-26T21:46:00.002-07:00

I have not bought a single piece of clothing or accessories of any kind this month and probably won’t next month either. So looking at any clothing websites(and even blogs and Pinterest) right now is a little bit of torture for me. It’s torture at the best of times because I simply cannot afford a lot of the stuff.
I saw a website referred to as extremely affordable for those on a budget. I went and checked it out and the cheapest dress was about $50, cheapest top was about $40. Those are not affordable to me, those are more than the maximum I can afford for clothes lol. We’re not poor(ok, maybe to some people, but really we’re not, trust me, I’ve been poor!), but unless I’m only buying a couple of articles of clothing for the year there’s no way I could pay that. The things I’m posting that “I Would If I Could” are certainly not going to be things that are priced at what I would actually pay if I were currently allowing myself to buy clothes, some of them might be, but overall they are things I love and would be buying if I had more money to allow me to buy.

I am loving this Galaxy Tunic from City Chic and have been for a while. I desperately need stuff to wear with my leggings and this is definitely my style. I had it in my basket and almost bought it during the last big City Chic sale, but even on sale for half off it’s regular price of $78, it is still more than I can justify paying for it. I will keep watching though in hopes it goes down enough that I can afford it at some point.

This Burlesque Lace Dress from Sexy Plus Clothing is one I know I’ll never own. The price of $189 guarantees that! But regardless, I looove this dress! I love lace period, but the colored lining on this one I think just gives it the WOW factor. Definitely stunning!

I love dresses. I love leopard print. I love Pin-up Girls. I LOVE this dress! This Leopard Print Heidi Dress from Pinup Girl Clothing is just about the most perfect dress ever in my eyes. At $88 US it’s not likely to join my wardrobe, but I’ll admire it’s beauty all the same!

While I’m still finding stuff that I love enough to taunt me, I have to say I’m a little disappointed in the choices right now for just regular every day wear. Maybe it’s because it’s in between seasons, or maybe I’ve got myself so much into “can’t buy” mode that I’m not digging stuff right now because I know I can’t buy it.
Jolene

Posting Schedule

2012-01-24T21:22:00.001-07:00

I’ve decided to set up a posting schedule to follow and help keep myself more organized with blogging! This isn’t to say I will be able to post every single day every week, but it should help me post more than I have been.

Sundays will be Recipe Sunday. I guess that’s pretty self explanatory!

Mondays will be Friend Makin Monday. I’ve participated in a couple of these now from All the Weigh, and I’m going to try to participate most weeks. I enjoy doing them and going around and reading other’s answers.

Tuesdays will be Pinterest Interests. I love Pinterest and spend way more time than I should be on it, it’s something enjoyable I can do when I get my headaches and can’t do much else. I see others sharing some of their favorite pins on their blogs and thought I would do the same!

Wednesdays will be What I’m Wearing Wednesday. These are my OOTD(outfit of the day) posts. Since I don’t go out a ton I can’t do daily OOTD posts like some do, but I figured if I set aside a specific day then I should be able to post at least one outfit a week that I am wearing when I do go out.

Thursdays will be I Would If I Could day. I think I’ve only done one of these posts and have been meaning to do more. I’ll post what items are taunting me around the web that I would buy if I could. Hopefully it won’t be too torturous for me LOL.

Fridays will be Copy-Cat Friday. I will take outfits I have seen posted elsewhere, whether it be on other blogs or Pinterest or wherever, and I will try to recreate it based on items that I find affordable and available in Plus Sizes. I will try to make picks that are available to Canada, but our options are so limited up here that I won’t be able to for all….for us the other option is to order and have it shipped to someone we know where it is available and have them send it to us. Sometimes instead of recreating it with things to buy online I might try to recreate outfits with my own wardrobe and maybe end up with different outfits than I would normally think of with what I have.

Saturdays won’t be anything specific, if I blog at all it will just be whatever…a recipe or outfit if I have extras to post, or maybe just a bunch of rambling .

Jolene

Friend Makin Monday

2012-01-23T02:06:00.001-07:00

Hey all! Been quieter than I would like to be. I like to blog when I won’t be distracted, problem is that the only time I won’t be distracted is also when I’m too tired to focus on anything. I think I’ll put myself on a blogging schedule one of these days and maybe that will make it easier. Maybe if I have one day of the week for an outfit post, one day for a recipe, plus I have other types of posts I’ve been wanting to start. Hopefully if I can organize that it will be easier to blog with distractions and exhaustion .

For now I’m going to participate in Friend Makin Monday again! If you would like to participate head on over to All The Weigh and join in!

FMM: Short Answers(yeah, I’ll try, short answers are difficult for me)

Mac or PC? PC
Do you paint your own nails? Yes, but it gets annoying because nail polish will not stick to my nails no matter what I do. So if I want nice polish I have to paint them every day, and even then I’m lucky if the polish makes it through the day.
Beach or mountains? The mountains are gorgeous and I do enjoy it when we go(lucky they’re just a short drive from here), but I reallllllly love the beach. I rarely get to see the beach(been a number of years ). I love that the beach can pretty much be enjoyed year round….I hate snow so the mountains while always beautiful are just not enjoyable to me when there’s snow…unless I’m only looking at them.
What’s the title of the book you’re currently reading? I’ve been having problems getting back into reading lately, so nothing at all.
Do you dance? No, wish I could though.
CNN or Fox News? Don’t get either.
Do you ride a bicycle? Not in about 25 years, we’ve been thinking about getting bikes though.
Do you get a yearly flu shot? Hell NO!
Best movie you’ve seen in 2012? Haven’t watched any new movies, re-watched Easy A though, very funny movie!
Do you prefer to workout at home or at the gym? If I did get my butt in gear to work out I would rather work out at home with gym equipment. Though we had a fitness center in an apartment building we lived in once and we were usually the only ones there, that was ideal for me!
Last airport you were in? holy crap, umm??? Would be Calgary International, how many years ago though I can’t even guess!
Married or single? Married 14 1/2 years
iPhone or Android? Android
Do you prefer to be in pictures or taking pictures? Neither, trying to get better at both though.
Favorite brand of sneakers? I hate sneakers with a passion, I have a pair but have no clue as to brand, had them for at least a dozen years.
Do you like snow? No! Sure it’s pretty to look at, that’s about it.
Do you have/want to have kids? Have 2, not having anymore! Too old and too tired to start again LOL.
Summer or Winter? Summer, though prefer true Fall weather over all other.
Do you know how to swim? Yes, but haven’t truly “swam” in years.
Do you prefer to shop in store or online? Prefer online, but some things are easier in store.

Jolene

Recipe Time: Confetti Squares

2012-01-17T22:22:00.001-07:00

I’m having a frustrating night with my teenager tonight, my throat is sore from yelling now. grrr, can’t wait until this teenage attitude thing is over! Cooking is my preferred way of going into my own little world and relieving stress, but since the offending boy is currently scrubbing down my kitchen from top to bottom, blogging a recipe will have to do! I think it’s time for another recipe anyway!

Something simple and chocolaty sounds good right about now! I made these squares at Christmas time and they were probably the next best dessert of the ones I made, after the Carrot Cake. I’ve made these before using butterscotch chips as well, they are absolutely delicious either way!

Confetti Squares

1/2 cup Margarine

1 cup Smooth Peanut Butter

2 cups Chocolate Chips(I use Milk Chocolate)

1 to 1 1/2 cups White Mini Marshmallows

Melt margarine in a saucepan. Add peanut butter, melt. Add chocolate chips and stir until melted, blended and creamy. Remove from heat and allow to cool enough so the marshmallows won’t melt. Mix in marshmallows then pour into a greased 9x13 pan. Refrigerate until set and enjoy!

See? Easy peasy!

Jolene

What I’m Wearing, Birthday and COLD!

2012-01-16T21:02:00.001-07:00

I think I finally managed to make it through one of my kids birthdays without having to go off for a secret cry. My oldest turned 14 on Saturday. I have been an emotional bawling baby for the past 14 years lol. It took a lot to make me cry before pregnancy messed with my hormones. I still can’t believe how fast time has gone. He’s old enough to get his learners license now, he’s old enough to get a job now. Both will be coming up in the near future! Honestly, that scares the hell out of me!

We’ve pretty much cut out eating out for this month and probably next, but since it was his birthday Friday was an exception. We always go out to eat on birthdays, or at least the most convenient day closest to the birthday. We have my brother in law over on Saturday nights, so we went out for dinner Friday. Fortunately he wanted to eat at Montana’s(think they’re only in Canada) and I had a coupon. We all thoroughly enjoyed one of our favorite burgers, which are so big that I can usually only manage 1/4 of after eating the fries…which means leftovers for later . I mean, huge burger loaded with jalapenos, bacon, cajun onion straws and some sort of super yummy BBQ sauce…..seriously yummy! And since it’s so big we get 2 meals out of it, ok, hubby and I do because we can’t eat the whole thing….the growing boys, that’s a different story, not sure where the skinny buggers put it all!

I was glad we got to go out and I got to dress up, because I won’t be again until probably this Friday. They warned us and they were right. The cold they forecast is here, and it’s absolutely bitter out there! Friday was decent, cold but not really for this time of year and considering what it is out there now. So I took advantage of it and wore a dress. This is a different dress than I wore for Christmas, but I wore it with the same belt and jacket. I’ve had this dress for a long time but hardly wore it because it was just missing something. I know this is pathetic, but until earlier this year I didn’t have a belt and I knew that’s what this dress needed. Now with not only a belt, but a jacket to add to it as well I LOVE the dress! It is such a nice fit, it’s faux wrap and has always fit decent when I lost a little weight and like now at my high weight. Now that I have a way to wear it nice I’m sure I’ll be getting a lot more wear out of it! I do prefer the pattern of the dress I wore at Christmas, but I’m glad I can get more wear out of this one now too. I know it would look better with my heeled boots, but we were doing some shopping as well and some of the parking lots are a little icy so for safety and practicality I had to do the flat boots.

Dress: Zellers, $15ish (2007ish?)

Blazer: City Chic, $26 (2011)

Belt: City Chic, $12 (2011)

Boots: Sears, $40 (2011)

Necklace: Addition-Elle, $10 (2011)

Earrings: Avon, gift from my Mom

Now, this cold weather I mentioned? Well, take a look at this, and it started on Saturday night…..

If you’re not familiar with Wind Chill, basically –40 Wind Chill means that’s what it actually feels like out there even though the thermometer reads –28. The forecast temperatures are not including Wind Chill, so it will actually feel colder than what it says. These temperatures are in Celsius of course, but –40 in Celsius is actually also –40 in Fahrenheit, this is the point the two intersect. I’m grateful that I don’t have to bundle up to walk the kids to school or go to work or anything, because I’m hoping to not have to go outside at all until Friday, at least it will be a little warmer by then….provided the forecast doesn’t change.

Jolene

What I’m Wearing

2012-01-12T19:56:00.001-07:00

Looks like we’re going to get hit with a true blast of winter! We had some true winter weather early on, then for the past couple of months it has been very warm for this time of year. This week that started to change, and the forecast for next week is pretty much the usual for this time of year….cold and snowy…yuck!

I’m curious to know what others do as far as caring about “fashion” when the extreme cold temperatures hit? I mean I get that a lot of people don’t live where it gets quite as cold as it does here. Our forecast high for Monday and Tuesday is –21 Celsius(that’s about –6 Fahrenheit for my US readers), yes, that’s the HIGH. And that’s normal for us for Winter, it gets colder than that, and once you add in windchill it will definitely end up feeling much colder than that. Normally by now we’ve had many days of those kind of temperatures, but since Halloween we’ve probably only had a few days that cold this year.

While I take care in how I look no matter what when I leave the house, I have to say that when it gets this cold I definitely don’t go into as much detail. I need to wear footwear that won’t have me falling on my ass and won’t freeze my toes. I need to wear something that is going to be warm enough outside, but then not too hot and uncomfortable for when inside. I don’t always wear much in the way of jewelry when it’s that cold because the jewelry gets cold and then freezes you when it touches your skin.

Hubby and I went out just briefly yesterday and while it wasn’t those kind of temperatures cold, it was cold. I didn’t want to dress up too much because we were just going to Walmart and nowhere else, then coming home to watch TV. So I wanted to look decent for leaving the house(I don’t care if it’s only Walmart, I won’t leave the house looking like a slob no matter where I’m going), but I also wanted to wear something comfy so I didn’t have to change again as soon as I got home. Of course what is more comfortable than leggings? Nothing! But I’ve only recently gone from being one who thought “I can’t wear leggings, I’m plus size” to realizing that big girls can wear leggings too, and if they are worn right they look great!

I don’t have many tops though that are “tunic” like to wear with my leggings, for me this is the right way for wearing leggings with my curves. I can’t afford to buy more clothes right now, so tunics will have to wait a little while. The solution I came up with was to wear my husbands shirt! I felt totally comfortable, I didn’t feel too self conscious in the leggings thanks to a longer shirt, and layering it over a long sleeved top worked perfect for the cold day. And….my husband LOVED the look LOL. While I was looking in the mirror trying to figure out if it worked or not, he spoke up loudly that it looked great! Now, I think men do have this thing though where they like seeing women in their clothes, not women in men’s clothes in general, but THEIR woman in THEIR clothes. No, the same loving of it wouldn’t go over if I wore his jeans or something lol, it’s not an open to any of their clothes sort of thing.

So I want to know what you think of this look. Wearing hubby’s shirt with leggings….YAY or NAY?? And how cold is really cold where you live? Do those temperatures I mentioned scare you, or sound like your Winter too?

Leggings: City Chic, $6(2011)

Top(black one): Warehouse One, $8ish(2011)

Top(white one): Hubby’s Closet, Walmart, $8(2008)

Belt: Forever 21+, $10(2011)

Boots: Sears, $40(2011)

Necklace: Forever 21, $7(2011)

Earrings: Avon, gift from my Mom

Jolene

Friend Makin’ Monday

2012-01-09T22:15:00.001-07:00

I’ve been reading the blog All The Weigh for several months now. She always does Friend Makin’ Mondays, I thought it was time I participated in one! I know it’s a little late, but it’s still Monday here lol

If you would like to jump in and participate at the tail end of this weeks too just go to Kenlie’s Friend Makin' Monday post for this week.

FMM: Getting To Know You

1) What is one of your favorite ways to spend a Saturday? Hanging out at home with family playing games and/or watching movies.

2) List your top three favorite TV shows. Tough to narrow down, I watch a lot of shows! A few of my faves are Castle, Fringe and Eureka

3) Would you rather be in pictures or take them? Neither lol, but I’m trying to get better about being in pictures, obviously this blog is helping that.

4) Why do you blog? I like to ramble LOL!

5) Share five websites that you visit regularly…

Twitter, Pinterest, Swagbucks, Food.com, Facebook

6) If you could have lunch with one person from your Twitter list who would it be? hmm, that’s a hard one, I have 2 Twitter accounts, but I’m going to pick someone from the one not associated with this blog…..Callie from Scrappin With Life. Though there are lots from both accounts that I think would make great lunch company!

7) List a few of your favorite snacks. anything with dip, I don’t have it much because most dips are so fattening, but I loooove dip with chips, crackers or veggies

8 ) Do you have a pet? If so, what kind? Nope….allergies, can’t afford one, not allowed pets in our home, can’t stand the smell or the hair…etc etc will probably mean it will be a long time until we do, if ever.

9) Which three material possessions would you struggle to live without? laptop, nice clothes, make-up

10) What’s your favorite drink? pretty much all I ever drink is coffee or diet Pepsi

11) Do you enjoy cooking? Yes! Love it most of the time, every once in a while I have no desire to cook, but overall I love cooking and feeding people.

12) Do you have children? Yes, 2 boys….11 1/2 year old and oldest will be 14 on Saturday

13) What are your favorite hobbies? well, I used to cross stitch and would like to again. Been trying to get into genealogy, it can get a little overwhelming though. I guess cooking and baking are a hobby for me.

14) Would you consider yourself to be shy or outgoing? I’m pretty shy and always have been, better at faking it than I used to be but wish I wasn’t so shy at all.

15) If you could change one thing about yourself, what would you change? Only little things, I wouldn’t change myself overall. I wish I was a little less shy, I don’t want to be skinny but I would like to be a *little* bit thinner(just slightly smaller belly, hips and thighs). The biggest thing I would change is my skin, I have horrible skin and I hate it.

16) Who is your favorite actor/actress? not sure that I really have a favorite.

17) What’s the coolest thing you’ve done this week? Well, the week just started and I haven’t really done anything so far lol.

18) Do you live near your family or far from them? Near all my immediate family except 2 half brothers, far from Aunts and Uncles and Grandparents.

19) List three of your talents. I’m a good cook and baker….that’s about as good as it gets lol.

20) What is your greatest attribute? my boobs lmao! Ok, for real probably my great common sense? I don’t know lol.

Jolene

Goals for 2012

2012-01-09T04:43:00.001-07:00

I am so late getting to this. My year has gotten off to a very slow start. I’ve just felt off since New Year’s Eve and can’t shake the incredibly lethargic feeling I’ve had. Could just be the wonderful world of pms, it does this to me some months where I feel like complete crap for up to a few weeks before anything hits, it sucks(thankfully I’m not really the bitchy pms type LOL). Hopefully it will be over soon because I have things I want to do! I have 3 or 4 blog posts I’ve been slowly adding to for the past week but can’t seem to keep focused long enough to get any one of them done lol. I’m determined to post this one tonight(hey, might be morning for most, but it’s night for me lol), I started it 4 or 5 days ago and keep changing it.

I don’t set New Year’s resolutions, but this year I decided I wanted to set some goals for the year. These are things that I would like to strive to do this year, but if I don’t I won’t be crushed or feel like a failure or anything like that, which I think setting and failing at resolutions tends to do.

My goals for 2012:

Do more/better housekeeping…tired of these piggy boys interfering with my love of CLEAN! lol
Cook more/Eat out Less…already cook a lot, but need to spend less, so cooking even more is the best solution.
Lose 20 pounds…I like how I look for the most part, but my clothes are a little snug right now, easier to lose a few lbs than spend money on more clothes. I think 20 is a good number, clothes fit better but curves stay.
Plan a business…said for years I wanted to start something, time to focus and work on a plan. We need the extra money but hubby doesn’t want me to go out and work and I don’t think I could anyway, boys are getting older so time for me to figure out what I want to do for the years to come as my boys get older.
“Try” to eat more veggies…I LOVE several kinds veggies but I’ve had stomach problems for 20 years and the good for you foods are the ones that cause me the most pain. Going to have to focus on eating the few I can handle.
Cross Stitch…I used to love to cross stitch but haven’t touched it in a couple of years, haven’t finished a project in so long I don’t remember. I want to try to start and actually finish a project this year.
Sew….find a place with affordable fabric and teach myself how to sew some things.

I had some other ideas, but I think that’s enough to work on for now! I thought of stuff like trying to stop being so emotional, then I realized that really would be stupid, not only because it’s something that’s hard to control, hormones seem to determine that, but also because that would be trying to change what is me. If anything my goal should be to stop trying so hard to hide how emotional I am, stop trying to be ashamed of or embarrassed by it! It’s part of who I am and I don’t want to make any goals to change who I am, I’ve worked too hard over the past year to finally start loving who I am.

Have you set goals or resolutions for this year? Have you broken any resolutions yet if you did set them? I mean, we are already over a week into the year lol.

Hope everyone is having a great 2012 so far, make it special! No, not because some kooks think the world is going to end lol, make it special just because!

Jolene

Happy New Year!

2011-12-30T13:09:00.002-07:00

I can’t believe tomorrow is the last day of 2011! Am I the only one who gets emotional at New Year’s? I always get teary.

Do you follow any sort of “good luck” thing on New Year’s? I started doing the cabbage and black eyed peas thing a couple of years ago. I had never heard of any sort of thing about eating certain things on New Year’s for luck in the year until my friend from Texas told me about cabbage and black eyed peas. So I decided what could it hurt right? For the past 3 years I have made cabbage(fried, mmm) and a black eyed pea dip every New Year’s. And since while we have a long way to go, the past few years have been the best years we’ve ever had financially(no, we don’t have money, but bills are paid and food is on the table with a little extra to actually buy other things once in a while…more than can be said for the rest of all the years we’ve been together). So while I’m not an uber superstitious person or anything like that, I’m willing to keep up this simple tradition.

I’m not a big pea/bean person but to eat the black eyed peas I found a recipe for a dip, I LOVE dips and this one is very tasty and very spicy! I make it up on New Year’s Eve and have it both New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day….it makes a LOT, so unless you have lots of help eating it you will be eating for a few days, so you might want to cut the recipe in half.

I can’t remember where I saw the original recipe, but I had to make changes to it because some of the ingredients we don’t have here in Canada. I believe the original recipe had a can of Rotel instead of the diced tomatoes/chilies separate. Oh how I miss Rotel, sadly I’ve only seen it once in Calgary and that was in a little Mexican store that is no longer there, and it was pretty expensive(I remember with coupons in Texas I used to get it for soooo cheap). So if you’re in the US you can just use Rotel….and maybe send me a few or 12 cans .

Good Luck Black Eyed Pea Dip

2 (15 ounce) cans black-eyed peas, rinsed and drained
1 (4 ounce) can jalapenos
1 onion , diced
1/2 cup sour cream
1 (15 ounce) can diced tomatoes
1 (4 ounce) can chilies
1 cup shredded cheddar cheese(I usually use marble)

Mash the Black Eyed Peas with a fork, leave some of them whole. Add remaining ingredients and mix. Spread into a baking dish and bake for 30 minutes at 300 degrees.

Eat with tortilla chips, crackers, and/or veggies.

Wishing you and yours a very Happy New Year!!

Jolene

A Homemade Christmas!

2011-12-26T14:49:00.001-07:00

Well, it’s over for another year . I’m so sad how fast Christmas comes and goes again. My body is probably ok with it though, I’ve had so much on the go the past couple of weeks(and that is so not the usual for me, I gave up the crazy busy life years ago now), I guess it has all caught up with me. Even after almost 7 hours sleep(a lot for me!) I’m absolutely exhausted today and my back right from head to tailbone is in so much pain I likely won’t leave my heating pad all day.

I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas! Hubby and I didn’t get each other anything, we just bought for the kids. We’ll see if we can afford to take advantage of after Christmas sales and get each other something.

I’ve already been sharing some of the recipes that I made and used for gifts this Christmas(I have plenty more!), well now it’s time to share the non-food stuff!

I only have one little niece, I have 2 older nieces who are grown and married now, but they are the kids of my brother who lives in Arizona so I’ve only ever actually seen them a handful of times. My only sister has the only girl that I get to actually see as she’s growing up. So needless to say not having a girl of my own I have this extreme urge to spoil her! This year I did well not to struggle with the ease of going overboard and instead made her something that I think will look absolutely adorable on her.

This was the first thing I ever sewed(besides just mending) other than an apron I made my youngest several years ago, but I had my mother in laws help with that one. This one I did on my own just from looking around the internet at some tutorials on making similar dresses. I’m so thrilled with how it turned out, it will have to be worn more like a tunic though because it’s not quite long enough for her(I just used pre-cut pieces of fabric from Walmart).

The dress/tunic for my 4 year old niece:

Next is a toolbelt I made for my 2 year old nephew. It’s my sister’s boy and he’s the last “baby” in the family since we are all done having kids. I made this out of a placemat and got him a set of Home Depot play tools to go with it, definitely happy with how it turned out too!

The toolbelt:

And the last thing we made 2 of(hubby helped and actually did almost all of this one for me ). These were Magnetic boards for my nephews, 10 and 6.

The magnetic board:

There you have it, my partially homemade Christmas! I gave each of them a non-homemade gift as well to go with it and tins of homemade fudge and cookies.

Even though I started planning these gifts early this year I want to plan even earlier for next year. I just don’t know what my family is planning on for gift giving. They tried to change it on me this year and I am still quite pissed off about it, I have no interest in changing how we give gifts. We buy for only the kids and my parents and I like it that way. So now I’m afraid if I start too early they will pull the same thing and try to change it again after I’ve already done most of my Christmas shopping.

Have you done some homemade Christmas gifts this year or in years past?

Jolene

Are You Excited?

2011-12-22T17:54:00.002-07:00

Can you believe it’s almost Christmas!?! I say this every year, but it’s so true, where has the time gone? Crazy how fast a year goes by!

I finished my Christmas shopping a few weeks ago with the exception of stocking stuffers. Yesterday hubby and I went out to get some groceries and the stocking stuffers and ended up picking up one more gift for our youngest. Now we need to get one more for our oldest to keep it even. We spent like 3 or 4 hours searching for something for him and ended up with nothing! I can’t believe how hard boys are to buy for once they hit a certain age. I can think of all sorts of things for a 14 year old girl, but for a 14 year old boy the options seem so limited. I’ve searched for ideas online and all suggestions are electronics(what he doesn’t already have we have already bought for him), books(already bought), sports stuff(not overly into sports) or gift cards/cash(for my own kid I really don’t want to resort to that for Christmas). I thought about something to do with cooking because he likes to cook, but there’s really not much to choose from for him that I don’t already have in my kitchen for him to use and the couple of things that I could think of I couldn’t find anywhere.

Shopping for him in about 3 years will be easier because he will be getting old enough that we can start helping him make sure he starts building up the things he will need when he moves out on his own(don’t even want to think of that yet!). I need to figure something out by tomorrow and I still have no clue what to get him. So, if you have any ideas for a 14 year old boy that are not what I already mentioned above please tell me! I need to spend around $25 to keep it even. It’s looking like it might end up having to be more books or a board game or something(which they have TONS of board games too).

What do you have planned for your Christmas menu? We are going to do Christmas dinner on Christmas Eve this year. My brother in law always comes over on Saturday nights for dinner, so we figured we would do Christmas Dinner then so we can have it with him. He’ll be having Christmas with his ex and his 5 kids on Christmas Day(who we’re not allowed to see…his ex is one of the most psycho people I’ve ever met). My inlaws won’t be here for Christmas(they’re trying to sell their house in Mexico), so at least this way we get to celebrate it with someone from his family.

My Christmas meal plan is:

Turkey of course! I can’t do Christmas without Turkey. I’ve been using Uncle Bill's Method for Cooking Turkey for a few years now and it results in an absolutely perfect moist turkey every time without fail! I highly recommend it!

Mashed Potatoes of course! Another thing that I can’t do a Christmas meal without! I don’t follow a recipe but I whip my potatoes with a hand mixer and add butter, milk, cream cheese, salt, pepper, onion powder and parsley flakes……absolutely delicious potatoes I tell ya!

Gravy, I don’t normally do gravy for potatoes, except when I make a full turkey meal. I make Kittencals Easy No Fail Make Anytime Turkey Gravy, heavy on the pepper and it’s a quick and easy absolutely fantastic gravy!

Stuffing. I don’t stuff the turkey, but I do make stuffing on the side. I haven’t found or come up with a stuffing recipe that I absolutely love yet. My Mom makes a really good stuffing so I should really get her recipe one of these days. I did make this Crock Pot Stuffing recipe for Thanksgiving and it was really good, even my husband who doesn’t like stuffing enjoyed it. I skipped the apple and celery in the recipe and used French bread, this time I’m going to use Sourdough bread.

Corn. Simple, hubby doesn’t eat much veggies so I have to put out what he will eat.

Broccoli Salad. My sister usually makes a Broccoli Salad when we have family meals, and I LOVE it! I’ve never made one myself but I couldn’t get enough of it last weekend during our Christmas dinner and I need more! There are so many recipes for Broccoli Salad, all just very slightly different. I’ll probably use parts from several recipes.

Watergate Salad. I first made this about 5 or 6 years ago. My youngest was born on St. Patrick’s Day and I made everything green for his Birthday. He fell in love with it and since we don’t do parties for him anymore I make it for occasions like Christmas and Thanksgiving. It’s more like a dessert but is considered a salad. It’s awesome, just awesome! I think most recipes for this are pretty much the same, I use the Kraft recipe, Watergate Salad. I skip the nuts and double the recipe.

Buns, homemade dinner buns. The recipe I use for so many types of buns is Bread Maker Hamburger Buns. It’s a great base recipe that you can use for dinner rolls, hamburger buns, hot dog buns, I even use it to make cheese buns and cinnamon rolls.

Carrot Cake. For dessert I’ll be making the Carrot Cake recipe that I posted the other day. It’s so good we just have to have it again!

I might make another salad or veggie dish of some sort, sort of craving Brussel Sprouts lately, might have to satisfy that craving. I like to make a lot because we then get so many yummy leftovers for the next couple of days and I don’t have to cook .

How’s your Christmas planning coming? Done shopping, or going to be out there Saturday finishing up? What’s your Christmas meal like? For us a Christmas meal is about the same as Thanksgiving and Easter….and every once in a while I’ll make it just because it’s such a big delicious meal.

Jolene

What I’m Wearing

2011-12-22T02:10:00.002-07:00

I’ve always had a thing for the look of shawls, I don’t know why but I love them! I’ve never owned one though, until now! And this one is even better than a regular shawl, it’s a “cardishawl” and it is so incredibly comfortable! It made this whole outfit perfect for a day of shopping and running errands. I felt great, felt like I looked good(which is always a bonus! LOL), and loved how comfortable the whole outfit was. I know I should add some more color to my wardrobe, I wear an awful lot of black, but I love it and think I usually manage to wear it well, or at least fooling myself enough into thinking sticking with black is a good thing for me lol.

Shawl: Addition-Elle, $15ish(2011)

Top: Reitmans, $10ish(2010)

Jeans: Forever 21+, $15(2011)

Belt: City Chic, $12(2011)

Boots: Sears, $40(2011)

Necklace: Addition-Elle, $10(2011)

Earrings: Avon, gift from my Mom

Am I alone in my love for black and shawls?

Jolene

MUST Try Carrot Cake

2011-12-19T16:38:00.002-07:00

Think you don’t like Carrot Cake? Think again!

My husband hates Carrot Cake so I haven’t had it in years. I decided I wanted to make some as part of my desserts for my family Christmas on the weekend. As I was making it on Friday I asked hubby why exactly he doesn’t like Carrot Cake. The reason I asked is because there are many things that he doesn’t like, but a lot of those things he doesn’t like because either his Mom made them or bought them often when he was a kid. So his answer for why he doesn’t like Carrot Cake? His Mom used to buy it when he was a kid. I said then he hasn’t had GOOD Carrot Cake, he’s had store-bought overly sweetened and dry Carrot Cake.

As with most things he said if I make it he will try it. Yes, my hubby absolutely loves my cooking and baking and there’s more than a few things that he wouldn’t touch before that he will now, as long as I make it LOL. So I found a great recipe for Carrot Cake, made my own little tweaks to it as usual. As soon as I had it iced I took a bite and I think I swooned just a bit at the awesomeness. I took him a bite, gave it to him and told him I had 3 extra pieces that wouldn’t fit in the container I was putting it in. After his bite his response was, “I’ll have them!”. He had another piece at dinner Saturday night, then another 2 pieces late Saturday night/Sunday morning before we went to bed. Then another 2 pieces last night. There’s no more Carrot Cake. We’re all very sad. We want more, the kids want more.

Not only did he “hate” Carrot Cake, but he hates Pineapples and this cake has crushed pineapples in it. Sometimes all it takes to make someone love something they thought they hated is to make it right! LOL! You just can’t compare store-bought to homemade. Yeah, store-bought is good if you’re in a pinch, but this cake didn’t take much more time than it would have to bundle up, warm up the car, drive to the store, pick out a cake, stand in line to pay for the cake, get back to the car, drive back home……all for something that might make do, but will not be absolutely fantastic like homemade!

I think I will be finding myself in the kitchen making Carrot Cake again for our Christmas Dinner that I’m going to do Saturday. If you need a fantastic dessert recipe for Christmas dinner and want something different than traditional Pumpkin recipes or Cheesecakes, this is the one!! It is so incredibly moist and not overly sweet. I reduced the sugar from the original recipe and used Applesauce instead of Oil, so it’s better for you too .

Carrot Cake

Inspired by Carrot Cake by Lennie

2 cups All Purpose Flour

2 teaspoons Baking Soda

1 teaspoon Baking Powder

1 teaspoon Salt

2 teaspoons Ground Cinnamon

1 cup Brown Sugar

1 cup Apple Sauce

3 eggs

1 teaspoon Vanilla Extract

2 cups Shredded Carrots

1 8oz Can Crushed Pineapple, drained

Frosting

1 8oz Package Cream Cheese, softened

¼ cup Butter, softened

1 to 1 ½ cups Icing Sugar

1 teaspoon Vanilla Extract

Sift together and mix flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt and cinnamon. Make a well in the center and add sugar, apple sauce, eggs and vanilla extract. Mix with a wooden spoon until smooth. Stir in carrots and pineapple. Pour into a well greased 9x13 pan. Bake for about 45 minutes at 350 F.

For frosting cream together cream cheese, butter and vanilla extract, Sift and add icing sugar and beat until smooth and creamy. Frost cake.

Jolene

What I’m Wearing

2011-12-18T20:29:00.002-07:00

I absolutely love what I wore to my family Christmas yesterday! I’ve had this dress for a while, it was supposed to be a goal dress when I lost a bit of weight last year. Strange thing is that I actually gained back the weight that I had lost, but it fits me anyway. Not sure how that makes sense, but I’m glad it fits because I love the way it looked!

I wish we lived somewhere that I could dress like this more often. It was a gorgeous day yesterday so I was able to wear something nice. Unfortunately during Winter here I usually have to wear something warm because it’s freezing and shoes that have grip so I don’t fall on my ass on the ice and snow(which anything with a heel obviously does not!). It’s so hard to dress nice in that kind of weather and here we get many months of it. But occasionally we get what are called Chinooks and the weather can change dramatically for a day or two. Yesterday was one of those days.

Please excuse the mess on the floor, that is “snow” from my husband’s Christmas Village that blows onto the floor every time someone walks by LOL.

Dress: Walmart, $14(2010)

Blazer: City Chic, $26(2011)

Belt: City Chic, $12(2011)

Boots: Payless, $40(2011, leftover style from 2010)

Necklace: Addition-Elle, $10(2011)

Jolene

Pumpkin Loaf

2011-12-18T00:51:00.002-07:00

Today we celebrated Christmas with my side of the family. To say I’m exhausted would be an understatement. I spent all week doing cooking and baking for my Mom and Dad’s Christmas gift as well as tins of cookies and fudge to go with my niece and nephews gifts, plus I did dessert for our Christmas. I’m not one to do things small when it comes to cooking or baking. In fact when I make a Christmas meal just for the 4 of us I make more than what there was today for 17 people. I like variety for everyone and I like to have lots of leftovers(with boys in the house they don’t last long!). I baked 6 different things for dessert alone. So my busy week has sort of caught up with me, add to that one of my headaches which hit tonight, probably related to weather change and being in a house full of people didn’t help.

I have so much to share, recipes, outfits, and pics of the gifts I made for my niece and nephews. This week should be calmer so hopefully I will get to lots of posting! For now here is a recipe for Pumpkin Loaf. I made one for my Mom and Dad and one for us. I’ve been using this recipe for a couple of years now and it is absolutely delicious! I like it even better than Banana Bread! Most recipes I change a bit from the original I find, this one I didn’t change, it’s fantastic as is.

Pumpkin Spice Bread by jmelyn

2 cups Canned Pumpkin

3 cups Sugar

1 cup Water

1 cup Vegetable Oil(I use Canola, much better for you)

4 Eggs

3 1/3 cup All Purpose Flour

2 teaspoons Baking Soda

2 teaspoons Cinnamon

1 teaspoon Salt

1 teaspoon Baking Powder

1/2 teaspoon Nutmeg

3/4 teaspoon Ground Cloves

Heat oven to 350.

In a large mixing bowl, combine pumpkin, sugar, water, vegetable oil and eggs. Beat until well mixed.

Measure the flour, baking soda, cinnamon, salt, baking powder, nutmeg and cloves into a separate bowl and stir until combined.

Slowly add the dry ingredients to the pumpkin mixture, beating until smooth.

Grease two 9 x 5 inch loaf pans and dust with flour. Evenly divide the batter between the two pans. Bake for 60-70 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in center comes out clean. Cool for 10-15 minutes, then remove from pans by inverting onto a rack and tapping the bottoms. Slice and serve plain, buttered, or with cream cheese.

Jolene

A Tale of Two Lasagnas

2011-12-13T02:56:00.002-07:00

I really should be sleeping but I’m feeling guilty over lack of posts and I have so many recipes to share that I thought I would squeeze in a post before I nap for a bit. I still have some laundry to put away, cookies to put in the freezer after they’re done cooling and raisin bread to bake after they rise. Hubby isn’t off work for another 3 hours though so I think I’ll give my tired body a nap before I finish up for the night.

As I said in my last post, I’m making food for my Mom and Dad for Christmas. Since I have stuff to make for that, cookies for tins for my niece and nephews, and dessert for my family Christmas on Saturday, I’ve divided up everything I have to make throughout the week so I make 2 or 3 things each day. Yesterday I made Lasagnas for my Mom and Dad. If they taste even half as good as they smell they are going to be amazing!

My Mom is a diabetic, my Dad doesn’t eat any meat except poultry, neither of them eat spicy foods, my Dad won’t go anywhere near anything with garlic in it. All that makes most of the dishes I usually make for us no good for my Mom and Dad since we eat a lot of beef and pork, and we also love foods with a kick. So I made them a Chicken Lasagna and an Eggplant Lasagna. Both which I think they will love, especially the Chicken Lasagna, it was serious torture making that and not eating any! I didn’t actually bake them, but I put them together in little aluminum pans to freeze them, they are a perfect size so each pan is enough for one meal if they add some salad or something to go with it.

My pictures are even worse than usual because I forgot to take pics yesterday before I froze the lasagnas, so had to pull them out today frozen to get pics. I really need to get better at this picture taking stuff. I can take pics just fine of scenery, but food pics I’m no good at. Because they aren’t baked, they’re just put together to be frozen and baked later, they don’t look as good as they would look baked.

Chicken Lasagna

Inspired by White Cheese Chicken Lasagna by HDMac

½ cup Butter

1 Onion , chopped

½ cup All-Purpose Flour

1 teaspoon Salt

2 cups Chicken Broth

1 ½ cups Milk

4 cups Shredded Mozzarella Cheese , divided

1 cup Grated Parmesan Cheese , divided

1 teaspoon Dried Basil

1 teaspoon Dried Oregano

½ teaspoon Ground Black Pepper

9 Lasagna Noodles (I used about 12 for 3 small aluminum pans)

2 cups Cottage Cheese(or Ricotta)

2 cups Cubed Cooked Chicken Meat

2 (10 ounce) packages Frozen Chopped Spinach , thawed and drained

2 cups Mushrooms, sliced and cooked until water is released

1 tablespoon Chopped Fresh Parsley

¼ cup Grated Parmesan Cheese , for topping

Melt the butter in a large sauce pan over medium heat, and saute the onion until tender. Stir in the flour and salt, and simmer until bubbly. Mix in the broth and milk, and boil, stirring constantly, for 1 minute. Stir in 1/2 of the mozzarella cheese and 1/2 the Parmesan cheese. Season with the basil, oregano, and ground black pepper. Remove from heat and set aside.

Preheat oven to 350F/175C.

Bring a large pot of lightly salted water to a boil. Add lasagna noodles. Cook for 8 to 10 minutes, until al dente, and drain.

Spread 1/3 of the sauce mixture in the bottom of a 9x13 inch baking dish. Cover with 1/3 of the noodles, cottage cheese, and chicken. Layer with 1/3 of the noodles, 1/3 of the sauce mixture, spinach, mushrooms and the remaining mozzarella cheese and Parmesan cheese. Top with remaining noodles and sauce mixture, and sprinkle with parsley and Parmesan cheese.

Bake 35 to 40 minutes.

Eggplant Lasagna

Inspired by I Lost My Noodles! Low Carb/South Beach Eggplant Lasagna by PattiCakeB

2 large Eggplants, peeled, sliced lengthwise into ¼ inch like “noodles”

Cooking Spray

Salt and Pepper

Meat Sauce

1 ½ lbs Ground Chicken

2 tbsp Olive Oil

2 Onions, chopped

1 16oz package Sliced Mushrooms

2 tablespoons Italian Seasoning

Salt and Pepper

1 10oz Package Frozen Chopped Spinach

1 28oz can Tomato Sauce

1 15oz can Diced Tomatoes(or 3 chopped Roma tomatoes)

Cheese Mixture

2 cups Cottage Cheese(or Ricotta)

2 Eggs

3 Green Onions, chopped

3 cups Shredded Mozzarella

½ cup Parmesan

Preheat oven to 425 degrees. Spray cookie sheet, arrange eggplant slices and season with salt and pepper. Cook eggplant slices 5 minutes on each side.

Lower oven temp to 375.

Brown meat and onion in olive oil for 5 minutes. Add mushrooms, and cook 5 minutes. Add spinach, tomatoes and spices and simmer for 5-10 minutes.

Blend ricotta, egg and onion together in separate bowl.

Spread 1/3 of meat sauce in bottom of 9” x 13” glass pan. Layer ½ eggplant slices, ½ ricotta, 1/3 mozzarella and parmesan.

Repeat.

Add last layer of sauce, then mozzarella and parmesan on top. Cover with foil and bake at 375 degrees for 1 hour. Remove foil and bake or broil another 5-10 minutes until cheese is browned.

So that was part 1 of my parents gift, enough for 6 meals for the two of them.

Jolene

A Lame Post

2011-12-07T21:39:00.001-07:00

Ever feel guilty about a purchase as soon as you’ve done it? I did that yesterday . I already have some stuff on the way from City Chic from their big Black Friday sale and then yesterday I just couldn’t help myself and ordered some stuff from Addition-Elle and Pennington’s. I got a great deal on everything, it was all 50% off the sale price and then I also had a coupon code they sent me for 30% of my total order…..I don’t think I have EVER got such a good deal from them! It’s a bad time to be spending the money though. I’m trying so hard to track our spending and find a way to pay down the credit card, it got built up a few years ago when hubby was out of work(was the only way to pay for groceries unfortunately, wasn’t frivolous spending) and even though he was only out of work for about 6 months living off just one income it has been impossible to get it paid down. And of course being Christmas there’s so much extra being spent anyway, and being winter bills are so much higher.

I’m not usually a big shopper, but reading all these blogs and seeing everyone’s great outfits has made me a little jealous and desperate for nice clothes and wanting to feel good. I’ve bought more clothes for myself in the past year than I probably have in the past 15 years combined LOL. No, that’s not saying I’ve spent THAT much on clothes this year, that’s saying I spent next to nothing on myself for the past 15 years! LOL. I have to put myself on a spending ban now, only essential items. I’m usually so good….not called a cheapskate for nothing lol. But I seem to have got the spending bug this year! Time to squash it. If I could get these boys of mine to behave a little better and be more responsible so I could focus on trying to do some work from home for extra money things would be a little different. Trying to focus on anything with these 2 seems impossible still though lol.

I’m feeling a little bad that it has been a week since I posted. Lots of posting ideas swirling around, but it seems the only time I have time to sit and put those ideas down are when I’m struck with one of my headaches. And well, once the headaches hit there’s no way putting thoughts together is going to work out all that well LOL.

I have just a week and a half until my family is getting together for our Christmas so I’ve been busy finishing the homemade gifts for my nephews and niece. Now I’m planning out my cooking and baking for next week and having problems focusing. I need it planned out so Friday I can do the grocery shopping for everything I need. I’m doing dessert for our Christmas(and I can’t possibly do only one thing, can I?), plus I’m adding tins of baked goodies to my nephews and nieces gifts.

I also have to do my Mom and Dad’s gift. It’s always hard to figure out what to get them. They don’t need “stuff”, they have no room for “stuff” and I don’t want to contribute to an already big problem at their place. I’m tired of doing gift cards, it’s a great back-up, but I really didn’t want to have to resort to that. So instead this year they are getting baking and cooking from me! I’m going to make and freeze some meals for them, plus some baked stuff that can be frozen and give them some of my Apple Butter I canned a couple of months ago.

So if I don’t get to blogging much for the next couple of weeks it’s probably because I’m baking up a storm!

Jolene

Perfect Doesn’t Exist

2011-11-30T00:35:00.002-07:00

I saw this posted on Thick Threads Facebook Page today and it is something everyone needs to see. We all know that photos are airbrushed to death these days. Photos that young kids see as they grow up and believe is how people really look, how they should look. Photos that even us grownups see and while we know different we can’t help but think “I wish I could look like that”, knowing full well that most of what we’re looking at is not what these people really look like.

Most of the time these pictures are of celebrities, people we never actually see up close to know exactly how they look. We see them in pictures and we see them on camera where there may not be airbrushing, but where numerous make-up tricks are used to make them appear “perfect”. We don’t see them face to face to see the lines, wrinkles, pimples, cellulite etc., so our minds trick us into thinking that this is really how they look. Then what happens? We look at ourselves in the mirror and start picking out all the little flaws we see.

Go check out this website, click on the “toggle” button to see the before and after for each row. Look closely at each little change on each picture. It’s shocking. Even though we know they do it, to see each and every little detail they change is a real eye opener.

Jolene

What I’m Wearing

2011-11-29T03:51:00.002-07:00

Holy smokes! Where has the time gone? I can’t believe we’re at the end of November already! I managed to pretty much finish my Christmas shopping this weekend, I only had a couple of things for my kids left to buy and sales were great this weekend and made it easy to accomplish. I just have to get stocking stuffers and finish making a couple of homemade gifts. Hubby and I decided we’re not going to buy each other anything before Christmas, we’ll try to come up with something to buy together after Christmas instead. We’ll just get each other something small so we each have a gift to open on Christmas morning. Definitely happy to be done shopping early again, I’ve managed to be pretty much done by the beginning of December the past few years and I love it! It makes Christmas so much less stressful and more enjoyable….and with the family issues that are pissing me off anything less stressful is a good thing!

We had another windy day Friday when we went out shopping, so I had to do a ponytail again. Little did I know that the windy days we had last week would be nothing compared to what was to come Sunday! Crazy I tell ya! The whole house was shaking, and not just a little! All of downtown was shut down because windows were being blown out of highrises, not only was it too dangerous for anyone to be down there with the threat of getting hit by something, but the roads were so filled with debris that some of them weren’t reopened until Monday afternoon. There were trees down all over the city, HUGE trees! Shingles blown off and even some homes had part of their roof blown off. South of the city it was even worse a lot of major damage to homes and businesses and then on top of that some pretty bad fires started threatening homes. It was just an absolutely crazy day here in Southern Alberta!

Here is my wind and shopping ready outfit from Friday, hair secured up, no skirt to worry about blowing up and comfy flats for lots of walking.

Jeans: Penningtons, $50(2011)

Top & Belt: Dealzone, $10(2011)

Cardigan: Penningtons, $30(2011)

Shoes: Forever 21, $18ish?(2011)

Cuff: Forever 21, $5ish(2011)

Necklace and Earrings: Avon, gift from my Mom

Jolene

What I’m Wearing

2011-11-24T14:37:00.002-07:00

First off I would like to wish my American friends a Happy Thanksgiving! I hope you’re enjoying the day with loved ones and eating lots of yummy food!

I managed to get a pic of what I wore yesterday. I apologize for the bad backdrop, I’m not brave enough to pose for pics outside(plus it’s a little cold to pose without a jacket now) and my house is a disaster right now. Why is my house a disaster? Well, on top of the usual slobbishness of my 2 boys, I asked slob1 to bring up all the Christmas decorations and stack them nicely together somewhere so we can start putting them up. Slob 1’s translation of this was to bring up all the Christmas decorations and spread them all over the entire main floor and start yanking stuff out of the boxes, so my house now has boxes, rubbermaids, garland, lights etc etc spread all over the place. Needless to say a good place to take a picture does not currently exist in my house.

I actually wore my hair in a ponytail yesterday! I don’t wear my hair up often, especially not in ponytails. I just don’t think I look good with a ponytail(my super fine hair makes a pretty pathetic ponytail LOL). The winds were insane yesterday though, not quite as bad as the town about an hour from us that had the roof ripped off the High School from the wind, crazy huh? But they were bad enough. So instead of my hair whipping around in the wind and getting all knotted up I decided to put it up. Thank goodness my headache wasn’t as bad as I usually get when we get a Chinook and these kinds of winds and I was able to get out of the house for a few hours and go for lunch with hubby. As you can tell from my last post, I NEEDED it! It wasn’t a cure-all, but it helped give me a bit of a mental break from stuff.

I went without tights because I thought it was warmer feeling out than it was and I didn’t want to overheat. Turns out I should have because I froze my legs every time we walked from the car to store and back to car again. I loved what I was wearing except that the skirt kept creeping up while I walked, I’m not big on skirts any shorter than what this was so it was quite annoying LOL. I usually like to wear this top with my black jeans, but I just felt like wearing a skirt yesterday.

Top: Addition-Elle, $15ish(2010)

Skirt: hand-me-down from years ago

Boots: Payless, $40(2011, leftover style from 2010)

Necklace: Forever 21, $6.80(2011)

Earrings: Avon, gift from my Mom

Jolene

Ten on Tuesday

2011-11-15T16:09:00.001-07:00

I have lots of recipes I can post, I think I have one or two outfits I can post, I have lots of other posts I’ve been wanting to do. But this week I’m just blah and can’t focus on posting anything good. The weather is really changing and my body is feeling it bad right now. It has been really windy off and on and I get headaches whenever it gets windy. We got some snow yesterday too. Just the whole weather change in general is hitting me hard right now. My head hurts, my body just aches everywhere and my head is so fuzzy…I hate that fuzzy feeling, especially when it lasts for days. I’ve been like this for about a week now and I’m so ready for it to end! My list of things to do is growing and I’m making no progress on any of it. I’m hoping since the winter weather is likely here to stay that I will get used to it soon and get back into the great groove I had started lately. I’m upping my vitamins and going to pick up another supplement I’ve heard good things about…..hopefully those will help too.

I came across one of those question thingies and thought this is at least something I should be able to do without too much thought…..so here is my “Ten on Tuesday”

Ten on Tuesday at Roots and Rings

1. What are your pantry staples?
Flour, Sugar, Oats, Honey, Peanut Butter, baking supplies(the usual baking soda, baking powder etc.), Tomato Paste, Diced Tomatoes, Tomato Sauce, Tea

2. What are your refrigerator staples?
Milk, yogurt(homemade),eggs, marble cheese, margarine, ketchup, mustard, hot sauce, ranch dressing, Miracle Whip, cream(for coffee), pickles, Parmesan

3. You already look like Heidi Klum (or your favorite supermodel). Now, what are the top three non-physical things you would change about yourself?
My nervousness, my constant worrying, my shyness

4. What’s holding you back from your dream job? (If you already have your dream job, how did you get there?)
Other than being a Mom I never really had a dream job, as I said in a previous post I always thought I would be a model but never went further with that….too old and fat to do that now LOL! But I am a stay at home Mom like I wanted to be, I imagined having more as one though and not struggling financially(ok, we’re not exactly struggling anymore, to some it is, but compared to what we’ve been through I can’t call this struggling). My kids are getting older and I know I have to think about what I’m going to do as they start building their own lives, ideally I would love to start my own business but what kind I don’t know yet, I know I really don’t want to go back to working for someone else. My husband and I have this dream of owning a very large chunk of land and having a Paintball field, Paintball arena, Laser tag…..all sorts of fun stuff like that on it and then maybe a small diner or cafe and live on the land as well….yeah, big dreams for people with no money LOL…..that’s the thing about dreams, you can make them as big as you want .

5. You have $500 to spend but it has to be on one item only. Go.
There are so many things that $500 could buy that we need, this is a hard one. It would probably be a piece of furniture. Either a real bed for hubby and I….in the 16 or so years we’ve lived together we’ve only had a real bed(frame, headboard etc) for maybe a quarter of those years at the most, last time was about 7 or 8 years ago. OR a new Dining set…..hubby is building me a table(very slowwwwly lol) and I need chairs too, so $500 could buy me some nice chairs. OR a China Cabinet….I’ve never had one and I have stuff I’ve accumulated from my Grandma’s that I can’t put out anywhere, and I just got another box full of stuff from my Grandma’s house that my Mom and Dad brought from a trip out there…..I would love to be able to put everything out on display instead of having it packed away.

6. What is something that you are embarrassed to admit you buy on a regular basis?
hmm, been racking my brain on this one and I can’t come up with a single answer! Yeah, every once in a while we buy chips or junk of some sort out of weakness, but we definitely don’t buy anything like that on a regular basis…..and not exactly something I think we should be embarrassed to buy…maybe if we were buying it a lot, but we certainly don’t. So I would have to say nothing.

7. What’s in/on your bed every night?
Two pillows, fitted sheet, hubby’s down comforter for him and my soft blanket for me, my heating pad….and at night nobody since we don’t sleep at night lol….but during “our night” which is morning for everyone else….hubby and I

8. What is a non-necessity item that, no matter how expensive it gets or how tight your budget if, you will always find room for it?
Make-up! I can’t live without my make-up, I’ll use the cheap stuff if I have to(and I usually do anyway). As for food it would have to be eating out once in a while. I love to cook but often when we eat out it’s just as much for sanity as it is for the food. Hubby will take me out sometimes because I’m home alone with the kids so much, I had no problems handling it when they were little, but at this age omg, I need a couple hours every once in a while.

9. What is the weirdest sandwich you’ve ever made?
Margarine and Pickle! It’s good! Kids were hungry and I had no meat or peanut butter or anything so I told them to use pickles…..they named it the “Freak Sandwich” and ever since we have it every once in a while even if we do have meat because it’s just simple and pretty darn good. My youngest tricked my oldest into adding Jam to the Sandwich once, saying he tried it and it was really good, which he had not hehe.

10. Would you rather: Be banned from Pinterest forever, but gain a million captive Twitter followers; or, never get on Facebook again but gain five thousand blog readers?
How about neither? LOL. If I had to pick I guess I would say the latter. I’ve been on Facebook for so long now that I’m actually growing a little bored and tired of it lately and I don’t care as much about Twitter. I love Pinterest and I would love more blog readers….so definitely the latter.

Jolene

Potato Soup

2011-11-09T01:37:00.002-07:00

I grew up with my Dad often making Potato Soup and it was one of my favorite meals. I never thought I could have a Potato Soup as good as that. I tried for years to make it and get mine to taste exactly how my Dad’s did. While I don’t think I ever got it tasting exactly like my Dad’s did, I got mine tasting pretty darn good.

I wasn’t looking for a new Potato Soup recipe, but I love looking at recipes online to get ideas, every once in a while I find one that looks good enough to try almost exactly as it’s written. I came across this recipe for Potato Soup that is apparently a copycat recipe for the Potato Soup served at Panera. I’ve heard of Panera before, but we don’t have them up here, so I have no clue what their soup is like. This recipe looked so good though that I had to try it….as for whether or not it tastes like the soup from Panera I have no idea!

I like to make soup in the Winter for my husband to take to work for his supper. He works in a cold warehouse all night, so I like to send him with something that will warm him up. Last Winter I decided to give this soup recipe a try. It was so fricken good that it is now a regular on my soup list for his work suppers. I mean, amazing good! It tastes like a creamy loaded baked potato, and who doesn’t love loaded baked potatoes!?! I sure do!

I went a little crazy with the chicken stock when I made it last week(yes, because I don’t measure LOL), so the soup in the picture is not as thick as I usually prefer it, the taste was not affected though, it was still just as good. I always make a double recipe so I have enough for at least 3 or 4 nights of hubby’s supper and a little extra so I get some too .

Cream Cheese Potato Soup

Inspired by Panera's Cream Cheese Potato Soup by Shawn H

4 cups Chicken, Turkey or Veggie Broth*

4 cups peeled and cubed Potatoes

1/4 cup minced Onion

1/2 tsp Salt

1/4 tsp Pepper

1/4 tsp Ground Red Pepper

1 pkg(8oz) Cream Cheese

Saute onions in large pot in a little bit of oil. Add broth, potatoes, salt and peppers. Boil on medium until potatoes are cooked. Mash potatoes, but not all of them, keep it a little chunky(unless you really don’t like chunky, then by all means, mash it all up!). Mashing some of the potatoes will release the starch and thicken the soup.

Remove some of the soup into a blender, add the cream cheese and blend well. Pour back into the pot and simmer until it has reached the thickness you like and the cream cheese is nicely melted and blended in with the rest of the soup.

Dish out and top each bowl with some shredded cheese, crumbled bacon and green onion.

*I’ve made it with all 3 and they are all good.

Jolene

Planning for Adulthood and Quesadillas

2011-11-07T22:00:00.002-07:00

(Scroll to the end of the post for a recipe for Quesadillas if you don’t want to read my other ramblings )

My almost 14 year old has taken an interest in cooking over the past several years. He has been able to do some simple things like making soup from a can, making Kraft Dinner and making frozen stuff you stick into the oven for several years. He started doing stuff that requires a little bit of actual “cooking” like making eggs a few years ago. He hasn’t really gone beyond that though. Yeah he helps me in the kitchen sometimes, but breakfast stuff like eggs or waffles(no, not frozen lol) is probably the only cooked from scratch meals he’s done on his own.

We’re trying to get him to think a little more about what he wants to do, he’s at that age where it’s time to sort out the ideas of what he wants to be that have been lingering through childhood and think about which ones he’s serious about. We don’t expect him to make a definite decision at this age of course, but getting an idea and setting some goals to work towards is something we want him to work on as he gets closer to High School. It’s something I don’t really remember my parents doing, I know my Mom wanted me to go towards Hair Dressing and I started taking it at the beginning of High School because my friends were, but quickly realized it really wasn’t for me. I didn’t have any other ideas to fall back on.

As a child I had done dancing, singing, a little bit of acting classes and modeling. I think in my earlier years I always thought I would be a model, but moving to a different city ended what I had began when I was little and when I tried to re-enter the world of modeling as a young teenager I was stopped short by knee problems preventing me from doing the "walk”. I guess I figured I couldn’t do modeling because of that, and as far as I remember that was the reason I didn’t go back. My knee problems weren’t fixed until I was in my late teens(if you can call it fixed lol) and by then I was busy being a teen and really didn’t even know how to get back into it or if I should. Now as I look back and know more about the world of modeling I’m sort of glad in some ways I didn’t continue, I’ve seen some horrible things about that lifestyle and I probably wouldn’t have lasted long in that life….and considering my body completely changed as soon as I got pregnant the first time even if I had gone into the life it would have been over after that LOL.

With no other plans for my future to fall back on and part of a family that couldn’t afford to put one of us through a post-secondary education, never mind all of us, I finished High School without a plan for my future. I knew I wanted to get married and have kids, that was it. So what did I do? Yes, I got married and had kids, but I worked nothing more than retail and customer service type jobs. All of which were low pay. The best job I ever had was managing a baby store, I loved my job….only job I ever had that I loved. Problem was I worked my ass off running a store for a boss who took advantage of me and made it extremely difficult for me to do my job, plus lied to me constantly about a variety of things….all for $9 an hour.

I want more than that for my kids, but unless we were to win the lottery we could never afford to pay for a post-secondary education for our boys. Grandma has offered to pay for Culinary school for my oldest, so if he’s serious about his interest in cooking it is something that he will have a chance to get the proper training in. So in the meantime while I’m far from a professional cook I’ll do what I can to teach him what I can in the kitchen.

To give me a break from worrying about dinner one night a week and to get some practice making a variety of things I have decided that Sunday nights will be his night to make dinner. He gets to pick the dish he is going to make, as long as he lets me know by Thursdays when I make up my shopping list and gets my approval as far as ingredients go(groceries are expensive here, some things we just can’t afford so my meals are always planned around foods we can afford of course). Oh, and it has to be something he has to actually cook, not just something to throw into the oven.

He has made dinner the past 2 Sundays so far. The first Sunday he made Bolognese, this past Sunday he made Quesadillas. I usually go the lazy way and instead of typing out how I make something I look for a recipe that’s close to how I make it and print it off and just change the parts that I do differently. I couldn’t find a single recipe even close to how I make my Quesadillas though. The recipe is incredibly simple, but for someone who doesn’t follow exact amounts of much of anything when cooking it’s hard to write out a recipe! LOL! So these are totally just estimates for amounts, it’s what my son followed and it tasted the way they do when I make them, so I guess they must be close enough LOL!

So I apologize for my very amateurish recipe writing, but trust me, the resulting product is VERY good!

Chicken Quesadillas

4 Large Flour Tortillas

2 cups Tomatoes, diced

3 to 4 Chicken Breasts

2 Tbsp Taco Seasoning

Water

2 cups Shredded Cheese

Sour Cream

Dice Chicken Breast, cook in pan over Medium heat until browned and no longer pink in the middle. Add enough water to just cover bottom of the pan, then add taco seasoning. Keep cooking over low-medium heat until water is evaporated and chicken is seasoned evenly to your taste.

Lay out tortilla and top one half with chicken, tomatoes then shredded cheese. Fold other half of tortilla over the half with the toppings and press together. Heat a tbsp or two of olive oil in frying pan on medium. Gently place Quesadilla into pan and heat until browned and slightly crunchy, gently flip the Quesadilla over and do the same on the other side. Remove from pan, cut in half. Repeat the process with the remaining tortillas. Serve with sour cream.

Jolene

What I’m Wearing and 20 Years!!

2011-11-03T22:03:00.002-06:00

20 years ago today my husband and I started dating! I was 16, he was 17. We have been through so much in 20 years. Not a lot of people can say they’ve been with the same person for 20 years, even less can say they have been through the things we have and still be together. But here we are!

This is us back in 1992 heading to Alex’s High School Graduation, we had been dating about 7 or 8 months at that point. He was 18 here and I was just about to turn 17. Yes, he had a mullet LOL, it was 1992, everyone was blind and thought they looked good back then, most of the guys had at least some resemblance of one LOL.

Life isn’t always perfect, life is hard. We’ve had a lot of hard times, or one continuous hard time, depends how you look at it lol. I hear people complain when their perfect life has one little hiccup, I laugh and think if they only knew what a truly stressful and hard life really is. We do, it could have been worse and I’m grateful it wasn’t. I don’t credit anyone else for it not being worse, we worked too hard ourselves to improve our lives to give anyone else credit for what we did. We did have a bit of help in a couple of ways from our parents, and we’re grateful for that as it was the only kind of help we got. We were lucky enough to always be healthy, I’m grateful we never had to endure that part of a hard life(and hope we never will). Even those closest to us(ok, don’t think I really have anyone that “close”) don’t know the extent of it, they think they do, but they don’t. We never blamed anyone else for our hard times, while there wasn’t a whole lot we could have done to prevent them(6 layoffs in 12 years, how could it be anything but just bad luck?) I still don’t blame anyone(ok, there may be a few specific employers who’s bad business management cause the layoffs that I would love to give a nice swift kick in the ass). But we made it through. Life still isn’t easy, but compared to the past it’s like a bed of roses!

I wish we had more at this point in our lives, but we have what we need and that’s all that matters. We haven’t owned our own home in years and since unless you want to live in a small box you can forget about getting anything decent under about $350,000(even most apartments are over $200,000), owning a home here is probably never going to happen. But we rent a house I love in a community I love, and fortunately we don’t have to see our landlords very often(I believe landlords come from another planet, they all surely must because they are all the same lol).

I wish my kids were more responsible, better behaved and took more interest in doing what they should instead of just what they want. But they are kids, one a teenager. They behave just like you expect kids their age to behave. They are the most polite kids to other people, they only have bad behavior toward Mom and Dad. I expect a lot, but only because I know they’re capable. They still want to be with us all the time, my 11 year old calls and complains we’re gone too long if we’ve gone out for more than an hour, he misses us already. His favorite place to be is still cuddling with us on the couch. I wish they could be more mature in a lot of ways, but they aren’t trying to grow up too fast in most ways and I’m ok with that(I just won’t let them know, shhhh).

Life isn’t perfect, but life is good. It’s hard to live off a single income, it’s not a large single income, but it’s the highest one we’ve ever had. I know people who live off twice as much and can’t make ends meet, but when you’ve lived off far less your entire life you just know how to make a dollar go farther and know what is important and what isn’t. We don’t HAVE to live off a single income, but life was actually harder when we had 2 incomes. Our 2 incomes at that time combined were far less than the single one coming in now. I’m where I’m meant to be, home to take care of my family. Not out of laziness, but because while we’re not religious people, we have very strong family values, I guess we’re a little old fashioned in some ways.

I’m hopeful that the hard days are behind us. Life will always throw difficult things into the mix, but the constant daily struggle we had for years has finally left us to enjoy life. My husband has a great job, maybe even a chance for a great new position in the New Year, we’ll see, but even if he doesn’t get that, the job is still great, and the company he works for is great. I’m finally a lot less depressed than I was for so many years, I like me and I don’t think I’ve ever truly felt that way before. The kids still have a lot of raising and growing up left to do, but with one already in his teens and the other not too far away we are finally able to focus on not just being parents, but being a couple too. I’m looking forward to the next 20 years and beyond and I honestly believe we have our best years ahead of us!

And here we are today! We took this picture just before heading out to eat today . The skinny bodies turned to fat, his mullet replaced by no hair(not because he’s balding LOL, he has such a thick head of hair It’s disgusting, he just likes the clean feeling of a shaved head and I think it suits him), a few gray hairs….ok actually a lot, but all on his head! Not a word of a lie I haven’t had a single gray yet(and not because of coloring LOL, I have plenty of dark roots between coloring)! And a few wrinkles here and there LOL.

We don’t usually go out on a day that hubby works, but he didn’t have to go in until later tonight so he and I went out for nice lunch/dinner together….we went for Vietnamese, our favorite! So that means I actually got to get dressed up nice to leave the house!

Jeans: Forever 21+, $15(2011)

Cardigan: Addition-Elle, $10ish(2009)

Layered top: 121Avenue(eBay store), $11(2011)

Lace trimmed tank: Warehouse One, $10 (2011)

Boots: Payless Shoes, $40 (2011)

Cuff(you can see it better in pic above with hubby): F21, $5(2011)

Necklace(see better in above pic): Warehouse One, $10ish (2011)

Earrings(sorry, can’t really see them ): Avon, don’t recall price (2009)

A kiss to hubby hehe!

Jolene

Chili

2011-11-03T20:15:00.002-06:00

It’s that time of year for foods that warm up your insides! We are expecting our first bit of snow sometime between tonight and tomorrow morning. Sounds like not a lot, but any snow is too much! Yeah, not a fan of Winter, can you tell? I like the “cool” but hate the cold. I like looking at beautiful pictures with snow. I love looking just West of us and seeing the beautiful Rocky Mountains with their snowcaps, it’s a stunning site and I’m lucky to live close enough to see it whenever I want. I hate actually being in the snow though, I hate the slippery roads and sidewalks, I hate the deep snow you have to walk through to get anywhere and then the messy slush you have to deal with when it starts to melt. I hate having to bundle up before you can leave the house.

I love Winter cooking though! Soups and stews, using the oven and not worrying about making the house too hot, instead welcoming the added heat….well, ok sometimes, I get hot even in Winter lol.

Last weekend I made Chili for the first time since Spring. I don’t make Chili in the Summer. Even though I make it in my Slow Cooker so it wouldn’t heat up the house anyway, Chili is just too much of a warming food for warm days. Perfect though for the days that are now upon us! The high tomorrow is –8 C….our first day of the season below zero…boooo!

My family isn’t a fan of beans, so if you like beans feel free to add them, but we don’t. We like our Chili nice and thick and meaty. I usually make it with Ground Beef, but I have made it with Ground Pork before too because when I had a Costco card the pork was usually cheaper. There is very little difference in taste, I have replaces Ground Beef with Pork in many recipes and if anything I almost think the pork absorbs the flavors of everything in the dish better. Of course you could also use Ground Chicken or Turkey….both are insanely expensive where I live(so is the beef for that matter LOL!), so I have never used either of them. If you can afford them of course you will end up with a leaner Chili.

A note on the tomato items I put in as well. These are the items I buy to put in if I’m out of canned tomato products and buying some specifically for Chili, but if I’m just cooking from what I have on hand I have used many different combinations of tomato sauce, diced tomatoes and stewed tomatoes. The only one I remain consistent with is the tomato paste. I put the same total amount of tomato items in though, it doesn’t seem to affect the Chili by changing the combination of products.

Chili

(makes a big Slow Cooker full, for my family of 4 with 2 boys who are HUGE eaters we get 2 meals plus enough for lunch for one or two of us out of this recipe)

1 giant bulk pack lean ground beef

2 large onions

4 cloves garlic

2x 398ml cans of tomato sauce

2x 156ml cans of tomato paste

796ml can of whole tomatoes

398ml can of diced tomatoes

2 1/2 tsp cumin

2 1/2 tsp paprika

1 1/2 to 2 tbsp Chili Powder

2 1/2 tsp Oregano

1 1/2 tsp salt

1 1/2 tsp pepper

3 tsp Worcestershire sauce

Saute meat, onions and garlic. Add to slow cooker when done.

Add all remaining ingredients, give it a good stir, cook on low for 8 hours. If you don’t have a Slow Cooker you can cook on the stove simmering for about 2 hours.

Jolene

Happy Halloween!

2011-10-31T22:26:00.001-06:00

I hope everyone had a fun and safe Halloween!

Now with this Halloween over we are down to one more Halloween to trick or treat. Next year will be the last one for our youngest. We believe that Trick or Treating is for kids and not teenagers, so after 13 there’s no more Trick or Treating. My oldest is 13 so this was his first Halloween not Trick or Treating, he just wore a mask and walked along with us to take my youngest. My youngest is 11, so one more now and he’s done.

My husband LOVES Halloween, for me I like taking the kids out, so next year will be sad for me being the last!

We were out for about an hour and a half tonight and my boy got 2 bags FULL of candy….which of course he will share with his big brother(and Mommy hehe). It was a little cold and windy, so we were more than ready to come home and warm up by the time his bags were full.

Here’s my Zombie(he had to play the part of pictures! LOL)….didn’t my husband do a great job of the make-up? Almost every house complimented him on his make-up!

Jolene

“Only Fat People”?, No! “Everybody is Beautiful”!

2011-10-31T14:36:00.001-06:00

I’m bad with Twitter. I have 2 accounts and I’ve never been good with tweeting much on either, I like to read everyone else’s tweets but rarely send out my own. I think part of it is I have a really hard time saying things in so few words, if you haven’t noticed I tend to be a bit of a rambler. In person I’m shy and quiet usually until I get to know someone, even online in direct conversations I struggle to find words, but when it comes to typing out my thoughts I can go on and on. I type fast too(thank you to typing class in High School, I did retain something I learned in HS at least LOL), so often I feel my fingers fly across the keys faster than I even realize what or how much I’ve typed. So Twitter and Facebook restrictions on how many characters you can type are very hard for me.

I was on one of my Twitter accounts yesterday following the Nascar race because it wasn’t on a channel I get. I glanced over at the trending topics and felt sick and disturbed to see what one of them was. “Only Fat People” was one of the top trending topics on Twitter. I wanted to click and see what people were saying to make it trend, but I was scared to. I’ve been a little depressed and frustrated lately and I was scared that what I saw might not help my current emotional state.

After it staring me in the face for a while I decided to click on it and see. I am a very nervous person and I have to say I was incredibly nervous clicking on it, worrying I was about to make what was already not a great day worse.

As I scanned over the first 100 or so tweets I took a big sigh of relief and felt pride that while there are some absolutely disgusting people out there(likely the ones who started the trend), there are still people who refuse to accept that kind of behavior. Of the 100 or so tweets that I read(what was the most recent 100 at that time), only ONE was negative toward “fat” people! The rest were people absolutely disgusted that such a thing would be trending. There were people of every walk of life, every age, both sexes, every ethnicity, every SIZE….just everyone….tweeting how disgusting it was.

I felt so much relief to see that while this trend likely started because of some incredibly disturbed people, it became such a big trending topic because of those who were speaking up of how wrong it was. And before long a new topic was trending, it quickly became more of a trend than “Only Fat People”, before long “Only Fat People” was no longer even showing in the top trending. Instead “Everybody is Beautiful” had begun to shine and taken it’s place….and what a beautiful sight it was!

Everybody is beautiful! And if you don’t feel beautiful, then do something to make yourself feel it, everyone is beautiful and everyone can feel beautiful if you will just allow yourself to feel it, and everyone deserves to have that feeling. Once you’ve felt it and feel how wonderful it is to feel that way, you will strive to make yourself feel that way as much as you can. Beauty isn’t limited to those who are thin, those who are young, those who have money….beauty is in us all, if you haven’t found that feeling for yourself you owe it to yourself to do so. We all have our days where we feel blah and ugly, but once you let yourself feel beautiful those ugly days become few and far between and become so much easier to overcome because you know that’s not how you should be feeling and that’s not how you want to feel.

Have you let yourself feel beautiful today?

Jolene

French Loaf Pizza, Pizza Sauce and mmm, Bacon

2011-10-28T14:34:00.002-06:00

I’m trying really hard to use up stuff I have in my freezer so have been using that to get back into menu planning. I’ve found sometimes in the past when I planned out my menu in advance I actually ended up spending more in groceries than when I didn’t, weird I know because it should be the other way around(and no, eating out wasn’t where it made the difference, we rarely eat out more than once a week unless I’m not feeling well and need hubby to pick stuff up…which is usually that crappy TOM LOL). My freezers have been so crammed full of stuff that I really need to empty them out a bit, I had one hell of a time trying to fit my turkey stock from my Thanksgiving turkey in there.

I bought a couple of French Loaves a few weeks ago because they were on sale for 89 cents, I figured we would easily use them because I make garlic bread a lot, but we just haven’t had a meal that goes with garlic bread since I bought them and 2 loaves take up quite a bit of space in the freezer. So, how can you make a French Loaf the main part of a meal instead of just the bread on the side? Use it as a pizza crust!

First start off with your Pizza Sauce, yes you can buy it and I sometimes do(if I buy it I buy a Garlic and Basil sauce, the plain ones are blah). But why buy it when you can make it even better and it takes very little time and tastes so much better! Even making a single recipe I didn’t even use half the sauce, so there’s plenty to refrigerate or freeze until next time.

Onions, Italian Season and Oregano…the smell of it cooking is amazing, my kids were asking me why I was trying to torture them.

Who needs store bought Pizza Sauce when in a short time you can have this!

Pizza Sauce

recipe adapted from Kittencal’s Pizza Sauce on Food.com

3 tbsp Oil*

1 Medium Onion, finely chopped

1 tbsp Minced Garlic (or 1tsp Garlic Powder)

4 tsp Italian Seasoning

4 tsp Oregano

1 6oz can Tomato Paste

1 28oz can Tomato Sauce

1tsp Salt

1 tsp Pepper

1-2 tsp Sugar**

Saute the onion, Italian Seasoning and Oregano in the oil until onion is translucent. Add garlic and saute for another minute. Mix in tomato paste, tomato sauce, salt, and pepper. Simmer on low for 45 minutes to an hour. Add sugar at the end if you would like.

*I just used some bacon fat because I had it and I’m running low on oil, but use Canola or Olive or whatever you have.

**I actually forgot to put any sugar in and didn’t notice.

I’m a horribly photographer, but doesn’t that look delish?

French Loaf Pizza

1 French Loaf

Pizza Sauce

Shredded Cheese*

Onion, sliced thin

Meat of your choice**

Preheat oven to 400 F. Cut French Loaf in half and then each half horizontally in half so you have 4 quadrants of loaf, place on baking sheets. Smooth pizza sauce on each piece, I put it on a little heavy because it is a thick loaf and will soak in a bit. Add a little bit of cheese, I find putting a bit of cheese on the bottom and then a bit more on the top helps to “sandwich” the toppings and help them stay put better. Add onion slices, and meats of your choice….load it up as much or as little as you want. Top with more cheese….a generous amount . Once you have it loaded up as you like put in the oven for 10 to 12 minutes, until cheese is melted and bread has crisped up a bit. Let cool a few minutes then slice each quadrant into 3. Enjoy!

Ingredients are vague because like all pizza you can really just add whatever you want….this is how I made it this time, but how I make it in the future will depend on whatever I happen to have on hand.

*I use Marble Cheese for almost everything, it’s our favorite, but use whatever cheese you like.

**I used ground pork sausage and bacon, it’s what I had in the freezer.

mmmm, Bacon!

Hate cooking bacon? Hate that greasy splattered mess all over your kitchen and that nice top that is ruined from playing catch with grease splatters? Have no fear! There is a solution!

I’m not a big fan of regular bacon, I do enjoy it on stuff but if I’m having bacon and eggs or a BLT or something I prefer the taste of Turkey Bacon, regular is just too greasy tasting for me. I do like regular bacon on some things though, and my guys love it. I got away with not having to cook it for a very long time, but hubby is on a bacon kick lately, so I’ve been doing a lot of cooking bacon.

I cook turkey bacon in the microwave, it is quick and easy and always comes out the perfect crispiness without making any mess. I’ve tried the microwave for regular bacon, it sucks! A frying pan for regular bacon leaves the stove, the counters, the cupboards, the floor and me covered in grease. For a while I started using my big pot to cook bacon and it was MUCH better, because of the high sides it drastically reduced how much splattered out. Biggest problem was that I could only do 4 pieces of bacon at a time that way, and with 3 males in the house, 2 of them growing boys with huge appetites, I need to a cook the whole package of bacon and it just took too long.

There has got to be a better way of cooking lots of bacon at once with little mess I thought, surely it can be baked? Bakin’ bacon…yep, you betcha! You can do the whole package at one time, clean up is easy, and it really doesn’t take that long. Here is how to do an entire package of bacon at one time:

First cover 2 baking sheets with foil(make sure you use baking sheets that fit side by side in your oven). Lay bacon out on the foil in a single layer. It’s better if it’s a little more spaced out than I have it here, but this package had more slices than they usually do so really filled up the trays even more than usual.

Place sheets of bacon in a 400 F oven for about 15 to 25 minutes, depending on how crispy you like it. And then you will have this:

mmm, yummy crispy bacon! We like it super crispy, can you tell? I take the bacon off the trays and put it on some paper towel to help soak up the extra grease. I pour the bacon grease from the trays into a bowl to use in other cooking…..I don’t normally use anything that fatty as an oil in my cooking(I’m a Canola Oil or Olive Oil girl!), but some things taste great with the extra flavor the bacon fat adds. Certainly not something I would use for cooking on a regular basis though.

Let me know if you use any of the recipes or tips that I post! I would love to hear opinions and comments on them!

Jolene

What I’m Wearing

2011-10-27T01:41:00.001-06:00

I’ve been so horrible with OOTD posts. As a stay at home, homeschooling Mom that doesn’t drive you can imagine I don’t get out much. My husband works 10 hour nights so gets 3 days a week off, those are my chances to leave the house. Once Winter weather hits we may not leave the house all 3 of those days, it depends on the weather. But the rest of the year, you know the 5 or 6 months of the year it doesn’t snow, we try to go out at least for a bit each of his days off.

Another wrench in my OOTD posts is actually remembering to get hubby to take pictures! We usually run out the door as soon as we’re all ready and by the time we get home I’m exhausted and so not feeling working it for the camera LOL. I have to do a better job of getting him to snap some quick pictures before we head out because I’ve worn some outfits lately that I absolutely love! I’m still really picky about what I wear, I’m not too daring, but from reading so many great blogs with great OOTD’s I’m getting better at taking what I see that I like and applying it to my outfits in my own way. To some my outfits may be simple and boring, but for me it’s what I feel comfortable and sexy in.

I really don’t like the way any of the 3 pictures hubby took of this outfit turned out, I felt that this looked so much better that how I see it looking in the pictures and I felt great in it. I picked the best of the 3 pictures, hopefully it doesn’t look as bad to other eyes as it does to mine LOL. I’ve only worn this top with skinny jeans before but decided to give it a try with a skirt and I liked it, but think I do like it better with my skinny jeans.

Please excuse the mess in the picture! My ~~oldest child~~ husband has been decorating for his favorite holiday, and he’s a very messy decorator LOL.

Top: 121Avenue(eBay store), $12(2011)

Skirt: Addition-Elle, $15ish?(2010)

Belt: Penningtons (reversible, leopard on other side), $20(2011)

Boots: Sears, $40(2011)

I went simple with accessories, I wasn’t really feeling like the weight of jewelry(doesn’t anyone else find that some days? You just don’t feel like wearing the jewelry?). I’m wearing a silver heart locket with my boys pictures(Christmas gift) and some leopard teardrop earrings from F21.

Here’s a close up of the boots, I ordered them and was going to return them because I thought I hated them, tried them on again a few hours later and started feeling them and now I love them! I so badly needed flat boots(as I said before, heels and me don’t do well). I can’t wear them over skinny jeans though because they’re just a regular width calf and unless they stretch some(not leather, so not likely to stretch much) I just don’t think it’s going to happen. But for $40 I’m not complaining! They are very comfortable and I have another pair on backorder that are more of a pant style boot that I’m hoping will be wide enough in the calf to work with my skinny jeans!

Jolene

Showing Some Love

2011-10-26T21:30:00.002-06:00

I have a couple of bloggers that I need to throw out a huge thank you to!
The wonderful and beautiful Yolanda, Queen Diva herself featured me on her blog today! I was her Diva Spotlight for this week and I couldn’t be more honored! Hers was one of the first Plus Sized Fashion blogs I came across when I realized there was such a thing, and it was the beginning of my learning to accept my body as it is. Thank you Yolanda for allowing me to be a Diva on your blog, and thank you for your wonderful blog that helps women who aren’t at a point of acceptance begin the journey and see that it is possible, and for those who already have there could never be enough support out there and you are part of that. I considered giving up on my blog because I’ve struggled to get readers, a shout out from Yolanda asking where I had gone made me feel all warm inside that while I thought nobody was noticing my blog or even that I was reading and commenting on theirs, someone was! Thank you Yolanda!
Another fabulous blogger I want to thank is gorgeous Gabriella from Principessa Gabriella. I won a giveaway on her blog for some scrapbooking software. I’m not really into scrapbooking anymore, but wanted to support Gabriella and figured if I won it would be a great tool to make calendars, and I’m really into making homemade gifts and things right now and I think I could make great use of it for many other things than specifically making a scrapbook. While I’m thrilled with my win, even more than that what I want to thank Gabriella for is for her support on my blog! Not only is she only one of a couple of people that have made any comments on any of my posts, she has done so many times in my blogs short life! Thank you so much Gabriella, you have no idea how happy it makes me when someone comments! She comments, she follows me on Twitter, she follows me on Facebook and she Follows me with Google…..how can anyone ask for more?!? I hope that one day I will have many who will enjoy what I have to say enough to follow me and comment like Gabriella does, but she will always be my first . Thank you so much for your support Gabriella! And if you don’t already read her blog you must go check out her outfit posts, I absolutely love her style and her hair, oh my, the hair! As someone who has jet straight insanely fine hair, I am soooo jealous of her hair! It is absolutely gorgeous! Go see!
Thank you ladies for being so fabulous, for being so supportive of my little blog, and for just being you!
Jolene

RIP Dan Wheldon and Hold Close Those You Love

2011-10-16T20:16:00.001-06:00

I have yet to talk about my love for racing on here. To some it may seem odd this obsession I have with watching things go fast because I don’t drive myself, I’ve never driven a vehicle farther than from one end of a street to another when I was 16 and while nothing bad happened I just felt that driving wasn’t for me…20 years later I still feel that way and have no desire to drive, in fact as I got older it turned more and more into a fear I guess, one that I’m ok with not overcoming. I also have an extreme hatred for people who drive poorly and don’t obey the speed limit. But I love, love, love watching the sport of racing. My favorite is Nascar, though I could(and do) watch anything race and love it.

I don’t catch very many Indy car races(I don’t follow it as closely as I do Nascar) but I knew there should be one on today and I was pretty sure it was the last race of the season. Just as I was going to turn the TV on to see if it was on a channel I get I looked at my Twitter to see a tweet from Samantha Busch(Nascar driver Kyle Busch’s wife) that there had been a big wreck at the Indy race. I found the channel the race was on and learned that there had indeed been a very big wreck, 15 cars involved on only the 12th lap of the race. One of the drivers involved was Dan Wheldon, a very popular driver, 2 time winner of the Indy 500…including this years win, and winner of the Indy Championship in 2005.

Wheldon was immediately airlifted to hospital. For the next 2 hours there were lots of interviews with other drivers as the race was red flagged, there was word on everyone involved in the wreck….except Wheldon. After some time the drivers were all summoned to a meeting….I’m sure I was only one of many who felt sick waiting, knowing that no word and a meeting being called likely meant bad news and they wanted to break the news to the drivers before announcing it to the public. After the meeting finally let out it was hard to read the faces on most of the drivers, except Tony Kanaan who was apparently one of the drivers closest to Wheldon. He understandably was having difficulty holding back his emotions and watching him made us pretty sure the news was bad, very bad.

Sadly, the announcement everyone had been hoping and praying wouldn’t come did. The Indy racing family, and more importantly the Wheldon family had lost one of their own. At 33 years old Dan Wheldon race car driver and more importantly husband and father of 2 little boys was gone. The drivers and Indy officials decided that they would not finish the race and would instead do 5 laps in honor of Dan Wheldon. With Wheldon’s crew lined up alongside the track, Wheldon’s car number 77 the only number lit up atop the scoring board, and the rest of the Indy racing family and extended family lined up on pit road, the cars that were still remaining took 5 incredibly emotional laps around the track.

I think I find myself so incredibly emotional over the death of Dan Wheldon not only because of my love and respect for the sport and those involved in it, but because he was so young and left behind a young family. He was only a few years younger than I am and he had a wife and two very young sons. My heart aches and is absolutely breaking for his wife and boys, the youngest being only a matter of months old.

There are still 2 other drivers in hospital because of the wreck, both are awake and alert and are being kept overnight, but it sounds like they will both be ok. My thoughts are with them for a quick recovery, and with the entire racing world for the strength to get through this tragedy.

Dario Franchitti would have been crowned the Championship winner today, and while he is still the winner there was no celebration. It should be a great celebration for Franchitti, but how do you celebrate when something so horrible happened? Franchitti’s win was confirmed because of the accident, his only competition for the win, Will Power, was involved in the accident.

Treasure each and every day with those you love because as much as we don’t like to think about it, you never know when tragedy can strike. I know I gave my husband an extra tight hug before he left for work tonight and I’ll be giving my kids and extra tight hug when I send them off to bed for the night….and be grateful for my life and hope I’m lucky enough to never have to go through losing a loved one at a young age.

RIP DanWheldon, you will be missed.

Jolene

I’m Doing It, and My Giants!

2011-10-12T19:10:00.001-06:00

I was up sewing until 5am! It’s not unusual for me to be up until that late, hubby usually gets off work around that time, but usually I’m just sitting on the couch with my laptop and watching TV when I wait for him. This time the night just flew by because I was sewing the whole time!
First I just did a bunch of practice stuff, then after the kids went to bed I started making the dress for my niece. I got all of it done except I want to do a couple more rows of shirring but ran out of elastic thread, and I need to do the straps still. I’m so proud of myself because I look at what I’ve made and I can’t believe I made it!! I mean I seriously look at it and think “Wow, I did that???”. It is soooooo cute! It’s going to be hard waiting until Christmas. I hope it fits her, she’s such a tiny thing and I can’t go by normal size for her age.
Ok, so if I really get into this sewing thing I need to learn to make pants….really long pants! I decided out of curiosity to weigh and measure my boys this weekend. It has been a long time since we’ve done that. They’ve always been big for their ages, they were born above average and both were always above 90th percentile for both weight and height for their age….often over the 100th. My youngest at least does the usual slow growth then having big growth spurts…my oldest not so much. That boy has never had a slow growth period since he was born, it has always been just constant, but not a slow consistent.
At 11 years old my youngest is 5’2” and this boy who actually stalled out at 80ish pounds for the longest time is now weighing in at 103 lbs! He weighs almost what I weighed even in High School LOL! Now, my oldest, this one is the one who is really a giant! He is 13, will be 14 in January and is 5’10” and weighs 145lbs!! I tell you, it is the weirdest feeling when your child starts towering over you(and I’m not even short)….and now he is only a couple of inches away from being as tall as hubby….but he still has LOTS of years left to grow!
Do you have any idea how hard it is to find pants for a teenage boy who has a 32 inch waist but doesn’t quite have the umm, “junk” to fill in certain parts of men's pants. And then the longest length any regular store carries is 34”….of which I bought him several pairs of when Walmart had jeans on for $8 and now those 34” length jeans are too short! So, if 34” is too short at 5’10” what the heck am I supposed to do when he reaches 6’3”, which he likely will easily before he’s done growing? Oh, and on top of that, he’s already wearing a size 13 men's shoe! Hubby wears a size 13 and often it can be hard to actually get something because most stores if they order a 13 at all only order one in each style of shoe…..but at least hubby is done growing and won’t get any bigger. What are the chances that at 13 my sons feet will actually stop growing at a size 13? I’ve never seen a men's shoe larger than that. How do I get him any bigger?
We make financial sacrifices so I can stay at home with the boys and raise them, I shop clearance racks for clothes because we can’t afford even Walmart’s regular price LOL, I’m going to have to get a full time job just to pay for this child's clothing because I’m going to have to buy from expensive specialty shops! I laugh over their size because I just can’t believe how big they are, but omg, it’s actually so scary at the same time! We told him he better learn to tolerate the cold better because he’s going to have to wear shorts all winter LOL! Let’s just hope since he has had such consistent growth his whole life that he slows down now at the age when other boys are having some of their biggest growth(hey, nothing wrong with being a little backwards LOL)…..is that too much to hope for?
Jolene

Wish Me Luck!

2011-10-12T03:22:00.001-06:00

Just a quick hey there! Thanksgiving was great! Even with a crappy cold and little sleep because of said cold, I cooked everything I planned on for Thanksgiving and had it all ready on time! I have to admit I always make a good turkey, but I think this one was my best yet! It was absolutely amazing! Everyone enjoyed the whole dinner, at least they said it was great, hope they weren’t lying! hehe!

So now that I have the kids school sorted out and Thanksgiving is over I have moved on to a new wave of projects! I have decided to make most of my Christmas gifts this year! Not all of them, but I plan to give each person one homemade item and one bought item. I have already bought about half of the bought items and planned out most of the homemade items. Tonight I started actually making the first one! I’m making my niece a sundress!

I’ve had a sewing machine for quite a few years, but mostly have just used it for mending stuff(done a lot of turning pants to shorts because of blown out knees…no surprise with boys!). I’ve only ever actually made one thing with it, I made an apron for my youngest about 7 years ago. It turned out really well but for some reason I’ve always been scared to attempt anything more. Well, I’ve decided to be fearless of it no more! If all goes well with the Christmas stuff(not all will be sewn, but probably half the stuff) then I think I will tackle making something for myself, maybe a skirt or a dress as I’ve seen some pretty simple looking tutorials for both!Could be my way around the halt I’ve had to put on buying new clothes until we can pay down the old CC a bit.

So wish me luck with the sewing! I hope it works out because I get all depressed when I try something and it doesn’t! The cold yucky weather is already giving us a sneak peak off and on, that alone is enough to start depression, I don’t need any extra help LOL!

Jolene

Happy Thanksgiving!

2011-10-06T23:58:00.001-06:00

Yes, I know most of you are thinking huh? It’s not Thanksgiving yet. Well, it is in Canada! Actually it’s technically on Monday, we celebrate Thanksgiving in October in Canada. I am doing Thanksgiving Dinner on Saturday night though. We have my brother in law over every Saturday for dinner and Saturday also happens to be my father in laws birthday, so I thought Saturday would be the perfect time for our Thanksgiving Dinner!

Working on my shopping list tonight so tomorrow hubby can take me out to get everything and I can come home and start prepping and cooking for Saturday! All I need is to wake up feeling great, hubby managed to catch a bit of a cold from work and kindly passed it on to the boys and I. We rarely get sick, each of us has now had 2 colds in the past 2 years including this one. It was my mistake, we don’t get sick much because we take Vitamin C and D(trust me, it works, used to get colds a lot before we started taking them regularly), and if we feel something coming on we double up on it and nothing comes of it. We got a little lazy though and didn’t take our vitamins all summer and instead of starting them up again before cold weather hit we started as the cold weather hit and the bugs started going around. Fortunately we got on them right away and these colds aren’t too bad, this is only my second day feeling blah and I’m already starting to feel better.

Anyway, back to Thanksgiving! Other than the date Thanksgiving is pretty much the same up here as it is in the US. Of course there’s little differences even in different parts of the US where certain dishes are traditional but aren’t in others. My Thanksgiving menu is pretty much the same as my Christmas menu, I change up the side dishes sometimes though.

My menu for this weekend is(everything is homemade…no boxes or packaged anything….homemade is so much better and I like knowing what we’re putting into our bodies for the most part):

Turkey

Gravy

Mashed Potatoes

Stuffing

Broccoli Casserole

Watergate Salad(my youngest HAS to have this every year, and shhh, I quite like it myself!)

Corn Fritters(possibly, only if I have time)

Corn

Dinner Rolls

and for dessert my husband has requested Chocolate Éclair Dessert, I’ll probably make some sort of little cake or something too for my Father in Law if I have time. I’m using a different recipe this time for the stuffing and rolls, and I’ve never made the broccoli casserole or corn fritters recipe before….usually I like to make things at least once for just us before I make it when others are over, so I hope they turn out good since I’m not doing that this time! I just felt like changing things up a bit and trying different recipes than my usual….hope it doesn’t backfire on me! LOL

Do you celebrate Thanksgiving? I know some people don’t bother with it. My side of the family doesn’t do it every year(and since I haven’t heard from anyone I’m guessing not this year), my family is fairly big though so it can be hard to find days when nobody works and can get together. But I do Thanksgiving with my own family every year, I love cooking for everyone and sitting around the table enjoying good food with the ones I love!

If I remember I might take some pictures of everything, but knowing me I’ll forget! Once I start cooking I get into my own little zone I guess you could say and I’m off in my own little world. It is very relaxing for me….that is until my feet, legs and back start hurting from standing on the hard tiled floor for hours!

Happy Thanksgiving to my fellow Canucks!

Jolene

Penningtons Review

2011-10-04T18:32:00.001-06:00

I recently got the chance to take a visit to Penningtons and do a review of their store. I believe some people were chosen to do these reviews because they are bloggers, I assume that because when I went in and told them why I was there they wanted to know all about my blogging LOL. Obviously since my blog is still at a trying to get readers point that’s now how I was chosen. I actually was chosen through Divine.ca where I have been entering contests for a few years(no wins yet from them though LOL) and a little while back I got an invite to join their “Review Squad”. Up until now the only invitations I got for reviews was for diapers and well, we’re sort of long past that stage LOL, so I didn’t bother applying for those reviews. I was so excited when I got an invite to apply to do a review for Penningtons as it is a store I shop at already. I was even more excited when I got an email that I was one of the ones chosen to do the review! So even though I am doing the review separate from my blog where I just send it into them I thought I would put my review up on here as well.

I think I have already mentioned Penningtons once or twice on here, and most probably know who and what they are. But for those who don’t, they are a Canadian Plus Sized clothing store(who DO ship to the US!). My Mom has been shopping at Pennington’s for years so I was familiar with the store even before I became a curvy woman to shop there myself. The selection of the store has changed a lot in those years, they did have more of an “older woman” feel to it back then, it now has a great variety for women of all ages.

I've now been a shopper myself at Penningtons for several years but have never visited this particular location I was asked to review since it's farther from where I live than others. I learned that this one is the largest in the province and was very impressed with the size. As is usual for Penningtons I was greeted with a friendly "hello" and informed of the current promotion as soon as I walked in. The ladies took care of me to get me my gift card once I showed them my email as part of the review program and then left me to browse. Once they saw me with a few items in my arms they offered to start a change room for me. Once in the room I was given the help I needed for additional sizes and styles to try. As I find is usually the case at Penningtons the ladies were very chatty and friendly when I paid for my items....this is something I have always loved about this store and I'm glad to see it's the same even at different locations.

I have been thrilled with the fit of Penningtons clothing. I have always had problems with finding pants that don't gape at the back and problems finding pants long enough for my long legs(I’m not super tall, just have long legs). I had no problems with either! I found a great pair of jeans that don't gape at all at the back, it seems the designers for Penningtons have fixed what is a common issue for curvy women. These jeans don’t gape AT ALL, I’ve never found a pair of pants like these and I LOVE them! I also didn't have to worry about a regular length pant being too short, I don’t believe they carry a “tall” length but the regular length was just long enough!

My one problem with them is that I do find Penningtons quite expensive and normally I only shop the clearance racks for that reason. I did treat myself this time to buying new in season styles which I honestly have never done before, but thanks the graciousness of Penningtons to offer me a $50 gift card for my review and the fact they had a "buy 2 get one free" sale on I chose to spend a little extra above the card and get some non-clearance items this time. I love each item I got but as a single income family to allow me to be home to homeschool my kids our budget just doesn't have room for Penningtons regular prices. I would love if they could offer a bit more of a selection that would include different price points since I know a lot of other women who are in the same boat as I am and are looking for great but affordable clothes.

These are the 3 items I got:

3/4 Sleeve Pointed Long Cardigan with Ruching

Reversible Animal Print to Black Belt

Regular Slightly Curvy Bootcut 5 Pocket "No Gap" Jeans

I love all 3 items, the only complaint I have of any of them is that if I wear the belt with anything but pants with belt loops there’s nothing to hold the “flappy” end of the belt. I wore it today over the cardigan and the end of the belt flapping about was a bit annoying. An extra moveable loop like you have on a watch band would be nice…..guess I’ll have to figure out my own solution to that because I LOVE the belt, I’m having a bit of a leopard obsession lately!

Jolene

Full Body Project

2011-10-03T22:08:00.001-06:00

There is something that everyone must do, and now! Go to Life & Style of Jessica Kane's Facebook Page right now and be part of the Full Body Project. I mean it….go NOW!

What is the Full Body Project? It’s all about loving yourself for who you are and just being positive in general. All you have to do is go to Life & Style of Jessica Kane's Facebook Page, when you get there upload a FULL BODY picture to her wall….yes, it MUST be full body! Show all your beautiful curves! After you do that click on the "Join and Win” tab and enter your information….and that’s it! You are a part of the Fully Body Project!

Why do I think you should enter? First and foremost to show the world that you are beautiful and proud of it! There’s also a few other perks in some prizes, some great gift cards are up for grabs for those who enter.

While I enter a lot of contests and love to win(and have been on a dry spell lately), my reason for entering the Full Body Project was not the prizes. I entered because I wanted to be a part of the Project itself, I wanted to be up there with all those other gorgeous women who have said to hell with what society says we *should* look like, we are beautiful just as we are and it’s time the world sees our beauty and self confidence!

So I’m not even going to ask who is going to join me, because I expect each and every person who reads this to get on over there and be a part of it too! Now go show off those beautiful curves of yours!

Jolene

Bourbon Chicken

2011-10-03T02:08:00.001-06:00

I should be heading off to bed! I’ve been moving in so many directions lately and not sleeping much and I think it’s catching up with me. But I was tending to my Facebook Page(pleaaaaaaase like me on there! I need likes! ) and I started to feel guilty for not posting again. I decided I needed to come do that before I go to bed! So here is just a quick post with a recipe, I really do enjoy feeding people so want to include some of that on this blog(too bad I couldn’t actually feed you through my blog!). I’ve spent the past couple of weeks doing some canning as I said before….in the past 2 weeks or so I have made and canned Plum Jam, Orange Jam, Apple Butter, Apple Jam, Apple Jelly and Apple Pie Filling(can you guess I got a good deal on Apples? LOL). There is more I want to make and can too, I’m really enjoying doing it, but had to give myself a bit of a break because my feet are still swollen and back is hurting like hell still from so much standing in the kitchen.

This is sort of a cheat post because I’m just going to copy and paste from a recipe blog I started and sort of abandoned…..but it doesn’t change how yummy the recipe is! LOL! Please let me know if you try any recipes I post and what you think of them! They are not all my recipes, some are from other sources, most are recipes I have changed to make my own…..I rarely follow someone else’s recipe exactly, I love recipes but usually use them as a starting point or inspiration and then change it to make it my own. Hope you enjoy!

Ok, so this doesn't have any Bourbon in it, but it has sort of a Bourbon or Asian type chicken flavor. I found this recipe on www.recipezaar.com then made my own changes, although I don't think I changed much on this one from the original posted one as it was excellent to begin with.

This is probably my husbands favorite meal that I make.

4 Boneless Skinless Chicken Breasts

2 Clove Garlic

1/2 tsp Ginger

1 1/4 tsp Crushed Red Pepper Flakes

1/2 cup Juice*

2/3 cup Brown Sugar

4 tbsp Ketchup

1 tbsp Cider Vinegar**

1 cup Water

2/3 cup Soy Sauce***

corn starch

1. Heat about 2 tbsp of Olive Oil in a large pot. Cut chicken breast into bite sized pieces and cook in pot until nicely browned and cooked through. Remove chicken from the pot and set aside.

2. Mix all remaining ingredients together and heat over medium heat until well mixed, add about a tbsp of cornstarch to help the sauce to start thickening a bit..

3. Add chicken back in and bring to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer for about 20 minutes. Add more corn starch if needed for a nice sauce.

4. Serve over rice or pasta. I usually serve it over Linguine then top with Sesame Seeds and Green Onion if I have it. And while very time consuming, I have made homemade pasta to serve it over before and it’s amazing!! If you have the time and the equipment to do so give it a try!

*(I have tried this with Apple Juice, Orange Juice, Lemonade and even Apple Sauce...so use what you have, all tasted great, I think the Lemonade tasted best but there was a very subtle difference between all of them)

**(the recipe called for Cider Vinegar which I used to use, but when I ran out I couldn't find it anywhere so have been using Apple Cider Vinegar since and it works fine, I'll be honest I don't know the difference between these vinegars LOL)

***(I've made it both with regular Soy Sauce and with Low Sodium Soy Sauce, it actually tastes different both ways, better with Low Sodium)

Jolene

Ready for Fall!

2011-09-26T01:43:00.001-06:00

I don’t know about anyone else, but I am so ready for Fall weather! The past few days were around 30 Celsius here, which to some may not be that hot, but for me it is HOT…..and for here it’s pretty hot! I don’t sweat, instead my body overheats and I get heat exhaustion or heat stroke….so yeah, the whole not having to worry about smelling or soaking through clothes is great, but not really worth it because of what even a little bit of heat does to me. We spent some time outside on Saturday at Heritage Park(local historical village) and the only reason I lasted a couple of hours was because I actually wore a hat(which I don’t do often), I carried around a frozen water bottle and hubby was spraying me with water the entire time. Normally outdoors I can’t handle much over 20 degrees if I’m going to be in any sun. So, yeah, I’m ready for some cooler weather! Sadly once the cooler weather comes for us it doesn’t last long and Winter weather hits ….I wish we could have Fall-like weather all Winter. I LOVE 15 to 20 degrees, any hotter and it’s uncomfortable for me, any colder and it just sucks because that means that awful white stuff!
What is your favorite season? Do you get “true” seasons where you live? We can get anywhere from in the –30’s to the +30’s in Celsius here. Usually we get lots of 30 degree days in summer and a few pushing the high 30’s, this year we didn’t get our 30 degree days until September though but never went above it. The rest of the summer was nice I thought, lots of nice warm days without being too hot and enough cooler and rainy days that while it got very dry here it didn’t get dry enough for us to have a fire ban in the city(south of us did though)….we usually end up with a fire ban for at least a short time during the summer. Winters can be very brutal here, last year was not only an extremely cold Winter, but sooooo much snow too! I sure hope we get a milder one this year. We’re only a few weeks from when we saw our first hint of snow last year, fortunately it didn’t stick around, but it can…..sucks knowing how close it is to that time.
Another great part of Fall is the clothing of course! I love jeans and boots! I actually have some great jeans for this year too, I’ve never had jeans that I truly love at this size(still hanging onto some smaller sized ones I love should I ever get back to that size)…..but this year I have 3 pairs! I don’t even remember the last time I actually owned more than 3 pairs of jeans at one time, so to have 3 that I love is a big deal for me! And I found a great pair of new boots for a great price. I just need to find some flat boots now though. I have a black pair and a brown pair of boots, but both have heels, and as I’ve said before I don’t do heels a lot and don’t get how so many women can wear heels all the time. We’re real homebodies, but when I do go out we usually walk a lot wherever we’re going and I need a nice pair of boots with little or no heel for those times when we’re walking around for hours because I know I can’t do it with the boots I have. I wore my new boots out last week when we had a cooler day(before those hot days hit) and my feet were killing me.
Do you have any favorite pieces for Fall that you can’t wait to wear?
Jolene

I’ll Be Back Soon!

2011-09-20T19:30:00.001-06:00

I promise! I will be blogging more regularly soon! Our holiday was fantastic! Hubby is back to work and I have been researching Homeschool Curriculum until my brain has turned to mush! As soon as I get the kids school year sorted out I will be making becoming a more regular blogger a priority!

Guess what else I have been doing? Canning! And OMG, I make some kick ass Jam! Just saying….LOL! I think I’ve found a new love, who would have thought Canning would be so fun….now if I could only find cases of fruits and veggies for a good price so I could do more canning….oh right, nevermind, I live in Calgary where everything costs a fortune! LOL!

Here’s a picture to enjoy of one of my favorite spots we stopped at during our road trip. It was our first stop and I fell in love with it! I haven’t been camping in probably about 18 years and I think next year we are going to try and go camping at the campsite right next to these Falls…..I could imagine sitting near these Falls for hours just enjoying the peace and the beauty.

Jolene

Plus Size Shopping in Canada

2011-09-04T02:40:00.001-06:00

Getting to this post much later than I had planned on! Does someone have a few hours they can give me for my day? LOL! There’s just not enough is there?

Here in Canada shopping for clothes for us Curvy girls is HARD! There is just simply not enough stores offering plus sizes, and then on top of that the even bigger challenge is finding clothing that is affordable. There are a lot of us up here that are nice and curvy and we need clothes right? Yep, we sure do! So why is it so hard to find those clothes? I really wish I had the answer to that, but sadly I don’t. What I can do is share with everyone where I am buying my clothes and hope I can help others find more options for themselves.

First some advice for shopping online since that is what most of us have to resort to. Sizing is hard when it comes to clothing of any size, I do recall back in my skinny days that sizing was all over the place even for small sizes. There is no exception to this with Plus Sized clothing. I wear a 16, but occasionally I need a 14 or even an 18 in some styles/brands. In some stores a 16 translates to an X or 1X, in other stores it translates to a 2X. So I have definitely learned that taking measurements and keeping them handy when shopping online is very important until you get to know a store and what size fits you in their version of sizing. Length can also be a difficult thing when shopping online. I’m not overly tall(was 5’8” but have shrunk already to 5’7” *sniff*), but I have and have always had very long legs…my legs are as long as my husbands and he’s 6’. If you have shorter legs length isn’t as much of a concern because you can always shorten the pants, but if you’re tall or have long legs you want to make sure to pay attention to pant length before ordering. I know I can’t order anything shorter than 32” in length, fortunately I find this is actually becoming more of a standard length these days, it used to be 30” and I could never find anything longer(and I won’t even get started on “tall” sizes which are even harder to find than plus sizes). So definitely know your measurements, returning purchases from online are usually at your expense for shipping, which means if you send it back you will get your money back for the item, but then you end up paying for shipping to end up with nothing….just NOT worth it, so be sure of what you’re buying before you hit that button to confirm your purchase. I like to test a new store first by only ordering one item so I can check fit, I can deal with one item that I might have to make alterations so it fits, but I certainly don’t want to end up with several things ordered to find out that’s not my size at that particular store.

Since this could end up being a very long blog post I will limit it to where I have recently been doing my shopping for clothes. I have a long list of stores that I would like to try and stores I have bought from before but not recently or regularly, but I will save those for another day. For today these are places that I am buying from and plan to continue to buy from.

Walmart: Ok, this one is obvious I know. I don’t buy much from Walmart, but every once in a while I find something. Their selection for Plus Sizes is BAD as in quantity, I’m not sure if this is the case in the US, but in Walmarts here in Canada it is. They have a very small Plus section that sadly in my opinion has only got smaller in recent years. At least in this small section they do seem to have an ok variety of styles for different ages, which I also think is important for stores to carry. I’m 36, I like to look good but what I think looks good and is appropriate for me now is not the same as what I would wear 10 years ago, my mom is also Plus Sized and in her 60’s so she is obviously not going to wear the same styles that I do. In their small selection Walmart at least seems to cover stuff appropriate for all ages. Fit is a problem for Walmart though, they are guilty of what so many are, they simply increase the amount of fabric with sizes but do not take into account other things that change with size. I think I have only ever once been able to buy a pair of pants there because their pants will fit perfect throughout but then have a HUGE gap at the back of the waist….obviously impossible to wear pants that fit like that. Tops aren’t too bad though for some of them if it has straps they’re too long and the tops often gape under the arm. But I have been able to find some pretty decent tops there in the past. My best buy at Walmart has actually been shrugs, I’ve even been able to fit into their regular sizes in shrugs(which is a plus because they’re cheaper than the plus ones). Shrugs are so expensive for so little fabric in some places, I’ve found Walmart’s much more reasonable.

Forever 21+: As far as I know the only place you can get F21+ clothing in store in Canada is in Toronto. I know for sure you can’t in Calgary . It wasn’t that long ago that I even found out F21 carried plus sizes, they are new up here and the only other time I saw their stores was when we lived in Texas and there were no plus sizes in the store I was in there either. So for most of us up here the only option for F21+ is online. I did a review on them here and I do still check their website almost every day to see what they have added. I don’t like most of the stuff they have added the past few months though so I haven’t ordered anything for a while. I really liked stuff they were adding for a while but their stuff lately just isn’t my style….a lot of t-shirts and I’m so not a t-shirt person. I’ll probably place another order after we get back from our holiday though because I am still so in love with my skinny jeans I got from there and want to get them in black if they have them, I just hope they add some more stuff I like so I can spend the $60 to get free shipping……fortunately there’s always shoes and jewelry . I love their shipping(it’s fast!) and haven’t had to return anything but I’ve been told by the people in the stores that I can return items to the stores for credit that can be used online….with the order comes a piece of paper that says otherwise but I have asked twice in the store and they assured me I can return there if I need to.

1-Plus: This site is a combination of Addition-Elle, Penningtons and MXM Boutique. Addition-Elle and Penningtons are two separate stores, MXM is a line that is carried I believe only in Addition-Elle(I could be wrong on that one, it might be in Penningtons too…I can’t remember). But they are all owned by the same parent company and you can order online from all 3 on the same order. I seem to have a love/hate relationship with these stores. I love their clothes, love their customer service in the stores usually(usually the associates are very friendly and chatty which I love), their locations for me are great(I have 3 of each of the stores within about a 20 minute drive from me), and I love that you can order online from all 3 on one checkout. I hate their prices though…I have noticed their prices seem to just keep creeping higher and higher to the point that even a simple sale doesn’t bring the prices down to what I’m willing to pay, I have to wait until they have stuff on clearance and then a sale like another percentage off of that price before the prices become ok. I can’t justify paying $30 to $60 for a top, I mean if I pay $30 or $40 even for a dress it better be a pretty amazing dress, there’s no way I’m going to pay that for a top, especially if that top is not much more than a tube top….so little fabric yet such a high price, I can’t and I won’t pay it. I really love their stores though, they are definitely the best option up here for a store to walk into and shop, selection is usually really good…..a good variety of tops and pants, and an ok selection of dresses and skirts(sometimes I’m a little disappointed in the selection of regular everyday dresses)….they also carry PJ’s(I love their spaghetti strap nighties and own a few which I wear almost every night), panties and bras(haven’t tried their bras as they’re too expensive for me but I’ve heard they’re good). I have only ordered once from their website and my biggest complaint with that was that one item I ordered that said in stock got canceled. Apparently this is what is done if they don’t actually have the item even though the website and checkout says they do, problem is they don’t let you know that the item is out of stock or even offer you a chance to choose another item….they send you an email that makes it look as though they are canceling the item for you because you requested it be canceled. When I emailed them because of that it took much too long for them to get back to me with an explanation, there is no reason for it to take more than 24 to 48 hours for a company to get back to a customer….it took them a week to reply to me….I’m a real stickler for customer service and to me that’s not good customer service…..in this day and age all stores should offer very good and quick customer service via email, I know I’m far from alone in being someone who does almost everything via email. So my experience ordering online was definitely not as good as my experiences in store and I think they should improve on some things to make their online customer service better. Overall if price is not an issue for you these stores are definitely the BEST option for most of Canada, if price is an issue for you as it is me then you really need to watch for the good sales….sign up for their emails and join their Facebook page is a great way to do that. They also ship to the US for anyone down there interested!

Sexy Plus Clothing: I have to include this website on this list even though it’s not a place that I will buy from much….at least not as long as I have kids to feed and clothe still. I have only ordered one thing from this store and even on sale it was expensive for me, the prices are really high(crazy high for my budget on most of them), but it was so cute and hubby loved it so I caved……unfortunately there’s one part of the top that just doesn’t fit me right and I haven’t worn it yet….I really must get that taken care of so I can wear it since it’s a Fall top and soon the weather will be right for wearing it. BUT, the reason I must include this site is 1. because her stuff is GORGEOUS and 2. the owner is so absolutely wonderful! I don’t know her so this isn’t just a plug for someone I know, but I starting following this store on Facebook as soon as I found it and the owner interacts with customers on her site and you can just tell she is a sweet and wonderful person and cares about her customers…..and she even included a really nice pair of earrings in with my order as a thank you for ordering which I though was absolutely the sweetest thing ever that you will never get from a big chain store. She does have an actual store, but unfortunately it’s in Toronto, the rest of us can only order off her website, which saddens me because from feedback I see on her Facebook page it sounds like a trip to her store is a fabulous, fun and sexy time! If you’re tight for money like I am this store will not be for you, but if money is not an issue and you like good quality, fun and sexy clothes then you MUST check out her store either online or in person if you can.

eBay: Ok, on eBay it is two stores specifically….121Avenue and DealZone. Both of these stores carry the same items so I believe they are connected(and I’m pretty sure my orders from both did come from the same place). They are a US based eBay store but they also offer free shipping to Canada(I think some shoes and jewelry you pay shipping but clothes are free). I have ordered about a dozen items from these stores in the past few months. They carry from Small up to 3Xand even the occasional 4X. Their stuff is cheap and cute! Some of the stuff is definitely a little thin(which for me is a good thing because I’m always overheating and need light stuff especially in summer LOL). They are not going to be amazing quality for most of the stuff but are a great option for those on a budget, though a couple of the tops that I got definitely were of a surprising quality and I was really shocked and impressed. I have not seen a single piece of clothing listed for more than $20, including the dresses! I’ve only had a real problem with one item so far, sadly it’s my favorite! The first time I wore one of the dresses half the stitching came out in the top part(it was a strapless) and after taking it to an alterations place yesterday I found out it is something that is very difficult to fix and it will be very hard for me to find someone to fix it…..I’ve sent an email to the eBay store and am hoping even though I’m past the return date(which is only 7 days and you pay shipping….I didn’t even wear it until after I had it 7 days) that they will do something for me because of how much I’ve ordered in such a short time…..so we will see how that goes, hopefully well LOL. All items except 1 were exactly as I was expecting…..there was one dress that was WAYYYY shorter than what it appeared in the picture, in the picture the dress went down to the mannequins knees, on me it barely covers my ass LOL, so I have to wear it as a top and it works just fine.

City Chic: This site I have noticed is very popular among the Plus Sized blogging community, I will be completely honest(as is how I am with everything ) to say that this store has huge potential to be one of the best, but both from my own experience and from things I read on their Facebook page from other customers they have some work to do(I’ve seen complaints about service, pricing and quality apparently not beeing as good as it once was). I had an issue with them when I first ordered from them in that I could not get a reply from emails to their customer service and then posted on their Facebook page to only be ignored at first there as seemed to be the same for anyone posting a complaint…..they were on their page often posting things but were not acknowledging anyone posting with problems(while they would comment to people asking questions that were not complaints). After a second post in which I said I would not shop there again and would share my bad experience with others I finally got noticed and someone got in touch with me. Apparently not being able to get through to customer service is not usually a problem for the US site(this is according to the service rep I was corresponding with) but it has been for the International site…..so she couldn’t even offer me a reason as to why nobody got my 2 emails I had sent. I did get apologies from customer service and they even gave me a credit to try ordering from them again. I did order a second time and the item came quickly, other than an issue with fit on the top part of the gorgeous dress I ordered I was very happy….I love low cut stuff(ok, my husband loves it when I wear low cut stuff LOL), but this dress just would not stay put….I wore it yesterday for the first time(it’s a Maxi with a heavy lining, which I don’t get….I don’t want a heavy lining on a summer dress) and I spent the entire day covering my boobs back up LOL. I think the problem is a design flaw in the dress, the bottom is lined and I think the weight of the bottom because of the lining(it is pretty heavy) is pulling down on the top part of the dress thus showing off my boobs to the world….at least I was wearing a pretty bra! LOL! So all I can say is that I hope my little service issue was a one time thing because I was pleased with my order. Now, when it comes to prices at City Chic things are a bit crazy! Their regular prices are high but they seem to almost always be having a sale of some kind. Problem is the prices are just all over the place from one week to the next at times. For example a dress that is regularly $80 in a period of a few months I have seen be full price, half price, I’m pretty sure I’ve seen it at 30% off and 40% off, and even for $20……confusing part is that with clothing you usually see an item at full price when it’s new and then the price gradually goes down….not the case here though, I’ve seen it go down and back up and down and back up again. Maybe I just haven’t paid enough attention yet to know how and when they run their sales, but it just seems odd and something I’ve never seen before with clothing. I will continue to check this store though(I believe they have actual stores in the US) as I like their styles for the most part and maybe I can get a good deal on some things I like. Shipping is usually free but I was on there one time when all of a sudden it was only free over a certain dollar amount, every other time it was free no matter how much you spent….so not sure what is up with that.

I have more to share but it’s getting late and I need to get used to an earlier bedtime(not my usual 4 to 6 am going to bed) because hubby is on holidays and we’re going on a road trip next week…woohoo! So at least here’s a start for anyone interested and I will talk more soon on shopping for Plus Sized clothing in Canada!

I hope everyone is having a wonderful and safe long weekend….I know it’s a long weekend both here in Canada and in the US this weekend…….stay sexy, love your curves and I’ll hopefully be back to regular blogging soon!

Jolene

I So Suck

2011-08-21T19:37:00.001-06:00

Yeah, I totally do suck! How do I manage to let 2 months go by without posting? Amazing how easily those days just tick away, it really doesn’t seem like it’s been that long. I don’t think people who don’t blog really realize how much work blogging really is. When I had my first blog I literally would spend all day doing stuff for my blog and things related to blogging….like being a Mom it was a full time job that didn’t really pay LOL. I made a little bit of money doing website reviews and such…but no more in a year that what most people make working a few days at a full time job. I don’t have that kind of time to put into blogging right now, though I certainly didn’t mean to have such a long hiatus already. I would like to be a regular blogger, though not an obsessed one as I used to be….for now anyway LOL.

I haven’t been MIA for no reason at all, life can just be so darn busy LOL. I was planning for a road trip when I last blogged and now I’m getting ready to plan another one that we’re going on in a couple of weeks. I’ve also got the Contest bug back again, I used to enter a lot and while I didn’t win anything huge(yet!) I did win some things so thought I would try to get back into it and see what else I can win….maybe finally win something big . And I have my Facebook game that I love(Treasure Madness) which I don’t play to the extent I used to but I try to keep up with because I gave it up once and when I started it again it took me months to catch up again….so I try to keep that up….crazy I know, it’s just a game LOL, but hey, it’s my “fun” thing! On top of all that I’m a Mom of course which always takes up time, yeah my kids are a little older and fairly independent….but it still takes a lot of time to yell and nag y’know! LOL!

Now in addition to planning our road trip I need to plan our school year. The kids were going to be going into online school this year instead of me homeschooling them, but after some major problems with our school board we have switched boards and the new board doesn’t offer online. This other board is supposed to be a really good one though, and a change was definitely needed after the way the other board was treating us. So bad that I had to tell them to stop contacting us unless they offer us a full apology and I informed them I was filing a complaint with my MLA and with the Minister of Education…..I haven’t decided yet if I will file those complaints or not. I want to because I don’t want any more families to be treated as we were(we’re not the first they’ve done stuff like this to), but at the same time dealing with them for the past year or so has been so emotionally draining for me I don’t know if I can handle dragging it out(I don’t handle stress well at all). So because of all that I need to plan their curriculum which I wasn’t planning on being the case this year. My youngest is still easy because he’s going into grade 6, Elementary grades are super easy to plan. My oldest is Grade 8 though and way more complicated because of a serious lack of curriculum choice I have found for Jr High grades for Homeschooling. And since we’re going to be with a new board I sort of want to wait until we meet our new facilitator sometime in September likely, to see what they would suggest. So I need stuff to get them started for the year until I meet with him/her and can plan for the rest of the year.

Ok, well that was a long boring post after 2 months away LOL! I promise the next one will be better! Next post should either be an outfit or a post about where I’ve been doing my shopping lately…..depends what I feel like doing at the time LOL!

I would like to offer a special THANK YOU to Yoli from Diva Deep in Thought! I have to admit I was also feeling a bit bummed because I was having a hard time getting readers and I’m not sure why….I never had that hard of a time before getting readers and even though I was reading, following and commenting on other people’s blogs it wasn’t doing anything to get some of my favorite bloggers to read to come and read mine too. So I guess that might have made it a little easier to let the days tick by without blogging because I was so bummed about that. I just found out that Yoli asked where I went on her blog….I’m not sure if she has been reading mine but at least she paid attention to me commenting on hers(hers is one of my favorites! I just got good vibes from the first time I read her blog, I like kind and genuine people and that’s the vibe I get from her). Even though it was a while ago she asked about me it was just a few days ago I found out, and that made me feel so good and gave me the push to make an effort to try blogging again! So, thank you Yoli!

Jolene

Biscuits and Gravy

2011-06-23T18:20:00.001-06:00

I said I would include recipes once in a while on here too since cooking and baking is something I’ve been known to do well . Since my blog is almost a month old I think it’s time for a recipe!

Tonight I made Biscuits and Gravy for dinner, which for us is more like breakfast so the type of meal was fitting. Hubby works nights so we go to bed usually between 4 and 6 am and wake up usually anytime between 10 and 2. Our first meal is usually Dinner though even though it’s really “morning” for us, but since there’s only a few hours from the time we get up until hubby is off to work again I make Dinner so we have a good full meal together and he goes to work with a full stomach. Every once in a while we do breakfast for dinner though. Our days and nights are mixed up so why not our meals too? LOL

We have been eating better than this lately, better as in healthier, but this week I’ve been trying to use up some things and I had a package of sausage in the freezer that needed used….so Biscuits and Gravy it was!

We lived in the South in Texas for about a year and a half several years ago now, but I actually never tried Biscuits and Gravy until I decided to make them myself a few years ago. I honestly didn’t think I would like them, but I do! Hubby and the kids LOVE them! I used Italian Sausage this time only because it was the sausage I had and me personally I don’t care for Italian Sausage, usually I use just a regular pork sausage and it tastes much better that way.

Biscuits and Gravy

1/2 to 1lb Ground Sausage

1/4 cup Butter or Margarine

1/3 cup Flour

3 1/2 cups Milk

Salt and Pepper

Biscuits

Scrambled Eggs

Brown sausage in frying pan then remove and set aside. Melt butter or margarine in the pan, add flour and blend well. Cook butter/flour paste for a couple of minutes. Slowly start adding the milk and mixing well as you go, a whisk works best for this to make sure there’s no lumps. Add salt and pepper to your taste, I personally go easy with salt but load it with pepper because we like pepper. Continue stirring/whisking for about 10 minutes, as it starts to thicken add the browned sausage back in and mix well.

Cut biscuits in half and lay open on the plate, top with some scrambled eggs then top with the sausage gravy. You don’t have to add the scrambled eggs but it really does taste good with them added to it and makes it much more filling. It is very filling!

You can use storebought biscuits or make your own, they are VERY easy to make…..here’s the ones I always make:

Buttermilk Biscuits

2 cups Flour

1/4 tsp Baking Soda

1 tbsp Baking Powder

1 tsp Salt

6 tbsp Cold Butter(unsalted) or Margarine

3/4 cup Buttermilk(if you don’t have Buttermilk just add about a tbsp of vinegar to a measuring cup and then fill with regular milk to 3/4cup mark, stir and let sit for a couple of minutes…I never have Buttermilk and always use this method for anything that requires it)

Put flour, baking soda, baking powder and salt into food processor(I have a Ninja blender/processor since I last made these and used it last night and it worked just as well as a regular food processor). Add COLD(yes, this is important) butter/margarine, make sure they are in small chunks and not just one big chunk. Pulse a few times just until you have a course texture. Add Buttermilk and mix it just until it’s combined, make sure you do NOT overmix or you will have very dry brittle biscuits. Dump your dough out onto a floured surface and flatten out gently with your hands until about 1/2” thick….don’t use a rolling pin because the dough needs to handled gently. Cut out biscuit sized pieces, I just use a cup that has the right sized mouth as my “cutter”. Place on a baking sheet, I recommend using parchment paper so they don’t stick. Bake at 450 degrees for 10 minutes.

There you go, not just one recipe, but I gave you 2! LOL! If you happen to try it yourself please let me know and tell me what you think of it .

Jolene

What I’m Wearing

2011-06-22T04:01:00.002-06:00

geez where does the day go? I’ve been meaning to blog all day but instead got busy with all sorts of things then sat here all night reading blogs instead of posting. Reading them is so much easier sometimes LOL.
Happy Summer! Woohoo! And we actually had Summer weather for the first day of Summer! Imagine that! It was a gorgeous day and I only just finally closed the window I’m sitting next to and it’s 3:30am. Of course by the end of the week we’re back to cool and rainy . At least we got the yard done finally, and managed to get eaten alive by mosquitoes in the process.
I wore this outfit on Saturday. It was a very cool and rainy day. We went to the opening of a new park not far from us, a very very cool park that I know we will visit often. All the opening stuff was inside but we wandered around outside too so we could check it all out. We got pelted with rain, and I mean pelted not because it was raining all that hard, but because the wind was insane and causing the rain to pelt us. Fortunately I had hubby take a picture before we left the house so you don’t have to endure looking at wind blown hair LOL…..although we had a reporter from a local University paper take our picture for an article he interviewed us for…outside in the insane wind, I’m sure that’s a picture I’m not going to be thrilled to see how it turned out! LOL!
So, on to the outfit, I totally love skinny jeans now, I only have this one pair but can’t get over how I love them! Pre-kids I lived in skinny jeans! Yeah, I went to High School in the days of “bangers” and “preps” and such LOL….good thing I already shared my age because if that’s not aging myself I don’t know what is, haha! I was a “banger” I guess(wow, totally weird saying that, it’s been so many years!) and well, we wore the super skin tight jeans. Back then it wasn’t a problem, I was so skinny I wore one of the smaller sizes off the rack LOL. The guys used to call them painted on jeans because they were so tight. After having kids and ending up with this very generous curvy figure I never imagined I would ever wear a jean like that again, if I did it would only be because of trying to fit into jeans 2 sizes too small LOL! I was skeptical that skinny jeans would ever be for plus sized women when I first saw them getting popular, but I was wrong! Not only are they for us too, but I think they look better than I ever imagined they could on our curves! I’m so in love with them now and on Saturday wearing this outfit I felt amazing! I have learned to love my curves, but still nothing beats wearing something that makes you feel “skinny” and this outfit made me feel that way!

Shoes: Zellers, $15???(2006)(love this wedge height and wish I could find more shoes like this…glad they’re still in good shape…sorry they’re dirty LOL)
Skinny Jeans: Forever 21+, $14(2011)
Tube top: Addition-Elle, $10??(2010)
Shrug: Walmart, $12(2011)
Earrings: Forever 21, in store, big honking multiple layers of hoops LOL, $5(2011)
Bracelets: Forever 21, in store, simple silver bracelets, $5ish(2011)
Glasses….if you are interested LOL, are from Clearly Contacts. I said I would do a post about them, I still will do one just about them one day. Not because anyone is paying me to, but because I think they are that awesome! I own 5 pairs of glasses, 4 of those came from this place and I LOVE them all and you wouldn’t believe what I paid for them if I told you, their prices are that amazing(and they do some awesome giveaways too, which I’ve been lucky enough to take advantage of). These ones in the picture are my newest pair, I wear them and a red pair the most because I think they look the best on me. I haven’t been brave enough to attempt contacts, so for me my glasses are totally an accessory. They have a US website too, Coastal Contacts, I can’t speak for them since I buy from the Canadian one….but the Canadian one not only has incredible prices, but incredible service too! I can’t say enough good things about them.
Jolene

What I’m Wearing

2011-06-20T18:24:00.001-06:00

Well, I have definitely not been good about blogging or reading blogs the past couple of weeks, but since most of the bloggers I read were in NY anyway I don’t think there’s been a lot of new reading for me. So tonight I’m reading and writing! And I can’t wait to read about Plus Size Fashion Week in New York and see all the pictures!

I have a few outfits to post this week from the weekend, so this is the first of 3 that I have for now, will post the others over the next day or two . Now, one question I have is, is it only me that has a bitch of a time with the linings on short skirts? As you can see in the pic, it’s showing and this always happens to me with these skirts.

Skirt: Ricki's, bought in store, $11.25(2011)

Top: Reitmans, bought in store, $9??(2010)

Belt: City Chic, online but no more, $12(2011)

Shoes: Walmart, in store, $15(2011)

We’re not really good at taking close-up pics for my accessories, but I’m wearing a bracelet which I got from an American Indian woman selling at a rest stop in Arizona several years ago, the earrings are from Sexy Plus Clothing as a gift, and the necklace and a small bracelet I’m wearing with my watch are part of a pearl set that I got for $8 at Walmart.

Well, now I’m off to do some reading!

Jolene

It’s My Birthday

2011-06-15T17:11:00.001-06:00

Yeah, it’s my birthday, woohoo! I’m 29 years old today! Yeah, sure I am! What? You don’t believe me? Ok, so I wouldn’t believe me either LOL. But that’s what my husband is telling everyone, that I’m 29 LOL! Ok, so I’m really 36 today, but that’s ok, doesn’t bother me how close to 40 I’m getting….OMG, wait? Only 4 years until 40!?! No fricken way!?! Well, I’m lucky enough to take after my Mom and look younger than my age. I was about 30 before I finally stopped getting the “how can you have kids, you’re not old enough to have kids”, even in my late 20’s I would get the occasional “ you’re still in High School right” hahaha! But here I am, 36 and not a single grey hair on my head, and I only just started getting the little wrinkles around the eyes that everyone else I know my age has had for years……and I am proof that stress does NOT cause these things too! I dare you to find a person who gets stressed out more than I do LOL, seriously I am always stressed out, everything stresses me out, so much so that I cannot believe I don’t have an ulcer or something, it’s seriously that bad. So if I’m still without a strand of grey, stress obviously is not the cause of greys LOL…..I can still say I do not have to color my hair to cover grays, I color my hair because I want to!

Anyway, been a bad blogger this past week, but the 2 people who have viewed my blog since I last came on 3 or 4 days ago I’m sure didn’t even notice. Yeah, feeling pity for myself because I’m having such a hard time getting readers…..hey, it’s my bday, let me have my pity party for this day LOL

So we’ve been busy which is why I haven’t been blogging! Total school issues and now trying to decide on a new school to register the kids Homeschool through. And we have been building a table! I really need a new dining table but can’t afford one so we’re building one with the crazy amount of wood we have in our backyard. It’s going to take a while though because we can only work on it when hubby is off work and when it’s not raining, and lately the days when it’s not raining are few…wish we had a garage to work in! But once it’s done I just have to save up for new chairs and I’m going to have an awesome new dining set made with love by our own hands, and it will be big enough so when we have people over we’re not cramped around the table and pulling out TV trays. It also weights like a ton though, which is good because it is going to be so solid and last forever, but bad because it’s fricken heavy to move!! Can’t wait though, my lovely $200 Walmart table and chairs have been great for the past 6 years and are still in great shape, but it’s time for me to have a real nice dining set for the first time ever! The Walmart stuff can get stored away until the time the boys are heading off on their own and need something.

Another thing I’ve been working on is searching out Ghost Towns in the province of Alberta. We’re going to go check some out in one part of the province next month when hubby has a week off, then in another part in September when he has 2 weeks off. We can’t afford a nice tropical holiday like we would like and after several years of no holidays away at all we are trying to at least go somewhere nearby to get away for a couple of days. I think checking out some of the history of our Province is a great way to spend that time, and education for both us and the kids. So I’ve spent the past few days sorting through websites about Ghost Towns figuring out where they are and what is left. I’m so excited now to check out some of these places and can’t wait until our first little trip in a few weeks. We can only afford a couple of nights in a hotel so won’t be away too long, but hopefully we can see a lot in a couple of days and then relax at home and around the city for the rest of his week off.

I haven’t had any outfits to post because when I have dressed up decent it was just to go out quick and then I had to change when we got home into clothes for working outside. Maybe I’ll have something this weekend since it’s supposed to be too rainy to get any work done anyway, so maybe I can get dressed up and stay dressed up for more than just an hour or two.

Anyway, there’s my little update for all the people, I mean for myself who is the only one reading haha!

Oh, and reading everyone tweets about Full Figure Fashion Week in New York, hope everyone is having a great time!

Jolene

What I’m Wearing

2011-06-09T00:26:00.001-06:00

Hubby was off today and we were out and about all day after little sleep last night. I’m totally and completely exhausted and forgot to have hubby take a pic until just now so excuse the exhausted and drained part of my look LOL. First time I wore this dress this year, but it’s not new, only thing new is the cardigan.

Dress: Army & Navy, in store, $15(2009)

Cardigan: Joe Clothing(Real Canadian Superstore), in store, $12?(2011)

Shoes: Walmart, in store, $15(2010)

Necklace: old

Earrings: sorry, too tired to get close-up pics of them, they are from Forever 21 but we made adjustments to them(loved them but they had 2 parts too them and were too long so we took out a part)….will include in a future outfit and get pics.

And I said I would get pics of my nails, I kept them pretty simple and of course did them last night before deciding what I was going to wear today so they don’t match my outfit LOL. Need to figure out how to take close-up pics because I can’t seem to get decent ones to show the nails better.

Polish: China Glaze Midnight Mission

Stamp: Konad white with m8 plate.

I ordered new glass from Clearly Contacts, they are supposed to come tomorrow so if they do and if I like them I’m going to do a post about glasses and my most favorite place to get them from! So cross your fingers they look good on me!

And thank you to the few people started to slowly trickle through my blog and my first Google follower! I know my blog is still new but I’ve been pretty bummed that I’m having a hard time getting readers. I’ve started following a lot of people on Google, Twitter and even Facebook and I have been commenting on blogs but can’t seem to do the “hey, I’m over here” wave to stand out LOL. The last time I had a blog I didn’t have this much of a hard time getting readers, though I did use Entrecard at that time to find blogs and get readers, it doesn’t really seem to fit with the type of blog I’m doing now though so I guess I will just have to be patient and keep going and hope the readers will come .

Jolene

Getting Nail’d

2011-06-07T23:13:00.001-06:00

haha, you thought I meant sex didn’t you? Ok, maybe not….maybe that’s just me who would think that LOL. Yes, I’m a dork thank you, my husband has rubbed off on me over the years…blame him!

I have weird nails, like really weird. I can grow them long but they curl badly most of the time, or if they actually do manage to grow long without curling they peel….which is my issue right now, the curling has been better but I just had to cut them all short because they were peeling so bad they were ripping . I love my nails long, and would love to get fake nails again except for 2 reasons I won’t; first reason is cost, second reason is fear of infection. We lived in DFW, Texas for a while and when we lived there there were numerous news stories of women getting infections in nail salons, some women even died from the infections. So, that has left me scared of those places now. Now I just do what I can to keep my own nails looking decent….I’m not a pro at it, but do the best I can and save a ton of money.

I recently learned of a nail polish brand called China Glaze and fell in love with it! They have awesome colors available and while I love OPI polishes as well, China Glaze are about $3 less per bottle. I’ve only found one chain of stores so far here that carries China Glaze though (so if anyone else knows of any Canadian stores that carry it as well I would love to know who, even if it’s online! Chatters is the only one I know of). I’ve started collecting different colors though and love love love their vibrant colors! I’m even wearing blue nail polish which I’ve never been a fan of before because the colors are so awesome! Might even do green, I hate green but I’ve seen a few pics of some great greens on their Facebook page.

Right after learning about China Glaze I also learned about Konad nail stamps! They are so neat!! Fortunately there is a mall just outside of the city that sells them and I was able to pick some up. This was definitely a splurge for me, I spent a little over $50 on a set of plates and everything I needed to get started….considering that’s the cost of a single manicure in some places and I will get many out of that I don’t feel too awful spending that much.

These are pics of my first attempt with them(I’ve used them several times since but keep forgetting to take pics before it starts chipping), I apologize the pictures aren’t great….I don’t know how to take close-ups without them being blurry….maybe my camera won’t LOL:

The base color on these is just an Avon polish, Strawberry, but like a braindead twit I can’t for the life of me remember or figure out which polish I stamped my fingernails with….the toenails were just stamped with the Konad white that came with the kit.

Aren’t they cool!?! The full nail ones are a little hard to get on because they’re not quite wide enough for the thumb especially, so it’s hard to get coverage there and have it look nice. But overall I love Konad! They are opening up next month in a mall closer to me, so I’m sure in addition to collecting polish I will be collecting the Konad plates too!

I’m doing my nails right now and if I remember I’ll take a pic when I’m done and post it later.

Jolene

Heeeels! And Shoes in General

2011-06-06T15:58:00.001-06:00

I love reading everyone’s blogs and seeing the different outfits they put together. A common thing I’m seeing in a lot of outfits that you won’t see often in mine is high heels, and often not even a little bit high…really high heels! I love an amazing shoe as much as the next girl, I don’t own as many as most but that’s a combination of cost and can’t bloody well find what I ‘m looking for. The part that I don’t get is how do y’all stand wearing all these heels all the time? Am I the only fool that can’t wear these gorgeous heels?

Maybe my feet are damaged from years of working standing on my feet for hours on end, maybe it’s my bad knee(no, not from weight, problem since childhood), maybe it’s my bad back(also, no, not from weight, problem since childhood), maybe I lack balance or something? I don’t know, all I know is if I wear heels I sure better not be walking much farther than from a building to the car and back again or my feet will cramp up and I won’t be walking anywhere.

Does everyone just not walk as much as I do?? If I’m leaving the house unless it’s just going for dinner and back we’re going to be doing a lot of walking somewhere before we make it back home. Is this not what everyone else does and that’s how they can wear these heels all the time? Or am I just that much of a wimp that I’m the only one who can’t do it?

I’m definitely not a skinny high stiletto kind of girl, but I sure wish I could wear heels a little more often, it’s just so far from practical for me that I can’t justify spending the money and then when I do try to wear them I feel so silly, clumsy and even “elephantish” in them LOL. Maybe it’s a thing going back from my school days when I was the tall girl(no, not so much anymore, already started shrinking :*(, wahhh!) and I felt so awkward and uncomfortable being taller than everyone else.

Now, my biggest shoe complaint is that it is so hard to find nice, cute flat or flatter shoes! Does anyone else have this problem? I mean I so cannot spend $100 0n a pair of shoes, ok, not even $50. Most of my shoes end up from Walmart because even Payless has a crap selection for shoes I like and when I do find something I like they are not really all that cheap(yes, in the US they are cheap, but here in Canada they charge us almost double what the US price is….can we say gouging??). At least at Walmart I can get some cute flats once in a while for around $15, but even that can be hard to find because they put out shoes that could be cute but then put an ugly print on them and then put the cute prints or plain colors on the shoes that aren’t as cute or comfortable. Or I find a shoe I love but the heel is either too skinny or too high .

I’m a girl, I want shoes! Am I the only one that has such a hard time with finding shoes?? Oh, and don’t even get me started on boots and the fact that my black boots are falling apart everywhere and I can’t find anything decent to replace them with for under $100 which I simply cannot afford until my hooligans are off and supporting themselves……

Jolene

What I’m Wearing

2011-06-06T04:50:00.001-06:00

I’ve decided I don’t like the title “OOTD”, I don’t know why, I just don’t so I’m not going to use it anymore LOL.

Just a simple and comfortable outfit I like to wear often, these are my absolute favorite Capris, most comfortable ones I’ve ever had and I definitely wear them a lot! And as for the top, I’m really not a big fan of blue on me and I wanted the black and white version of this top but they didn’t have any in my size, after trying on the blue I ended up surprised and actually liking it! So it’s one of the very few blue things in my closet….besides jeans of course!

Top: Penningtons, in store, $15ish??, no longer available(2011)

Tank: Warehouse One, in store, 2/$20(2011)

Capris: Addition-Elle, in store, $30??(2010, think these might be them)

Shoes: Walmart, in store, $15(2010, they have them this year again)

Necklace: Forever 21 Socialite Trim Necklace, $6.80(2011)

Bracelets: Forever 21 Brocade Etched Bangles, $6.80(2011)

Earrings: just an old pair of cheap hoops from Walmart

Jolene

I Would If I Could….

2011-06-05T20:42:00.001-06:00

Ok, I need a catchy name for my “I want to buy if I could” posts, I’ve seen some nice catchy titles on some blogs but don’t want to steal anyone else’s….so until I can come up with my own I’ll use “I would if I could”, simply because for most of it I can’t! And maybe I’ll just like that title and stick with it LOL. So, these are what I would buy if I could!

For today I’m just going to post some stuff from Forever 21+ since it’s where I have made most of my clothing purchases from lately, and I have been very pleased with both my purchases and my experiences ordering from their website….add to that for the most part their prices are reasonable for my cheapskate ways and more likely than some sites that I might actually buy some of these things.

The first item is a bathing suit! While I see some people posting on Facebook about the extreme heat they’re suffering from, some of us have had a very cool and wet spring….but still glad it’s not snow and glad summer days are ahead(just hope it’s not too hot, heat + me= baaaad)! I really do need a new bathing suit but swim so rarely that I can’t quite justify a new one right now, but this one considering the prices of bathing suits these days is not too terribly priced and I think it’s lovely and I would be happy to show off my curves in it!

Tribal Tankini $41.80

The next thing is this adorable strapless top, I LOVE this top and if it goes on sale I’m definitely buying it(ok, IF I can afford an order at that time). I am not much for wearing green, but there is just something about this top that I love, green and all! I would wear it with either my skinny jeans or black capris.

Shimmering Strapless Top $29.80

Another top, I think this one is so pretty, it is on sale and if I could afford enough to spend the $60 to get free shipping I would definitely be including this one in the lot!

Sheer Caftan Top on sale for $16.99

And one more for now, this is such a pretty dress! I don’t know when I would wear it since I don’t go out too often where I would dress this nice, since the kids are old enough to leave at home alone for a bit it might be nice to have to wear if hubby and I go out for dinner.

Crochet & Pleats Dress $33.80

So, would you buy any of these if you could? What would you wear them with or to? Do you have any favorite picks from the current styles at Forever 21+?

Jolene

Goody Spin Pins

2011-06-03T21:54:00.001-06:00

I know I said yesterday I was going to blog about things I want, but first I want to quickly post about a fantastic hair accessory! Nope, this is not any sort of a paid blog post, I went and bought this on my own….I’m cheapskate and never buy hair accessories anywhere but the dollar store, but I read reviews online of these and they sounded to be worth the extra money.

I try to mostly wear my hair down in Winter, but in the Summer I have to have it up. I don’t handle heat well at all and my hair on my neck makes me overheat. I usually end up putting it up in a bun because I just don’t think a plain ponytail suits me, so I either clip it all up or put it in a bun. Problem with a bun is the bobby pins poking into your skull which can sometimes cause a headache, but when it’s really hot and I want my hair up nicely a bun is the best way to do my hair.

Last week I saw an article on Yahoo and it showed the Goody Bun Spiral. I went searching for reviews and information on it only to find the reviews not so great, for some people it worked fantastic, but for others it didn’t work at all, but by searching for that I found out about the Goody Spin Pins….and those had some pretty fantastic reviews! So I decided to give them a try.

I picked them up at Walmart, they were $6.95 and come in a package of 2, you can get them I believe in 2 colors, brown and blonde. And let me say, I love them!!! I was able to put my hair up in a bun and have it feel nice and secure without feeling anything stabbing into my skull. They held nicely all day for me. I have very fine hair so have a hard time getting hair accessories or really anything to work in my hair because I just don’t have any thickness to hold anything, but the Spin Pins were super easy to put in and stayed. I’m sooo happy to have found these and know I’ll be using them a lot this summer if we ever get out of this rainy weather .

I’ve read reviews from people with thick hair that said they worked great too, so looks like a great new hair accessory for anyone with long hair! Yippee!

This is the Bun Spiral, if it was a bit cheaper I would consider trying it, but due to the reviews I’ll stick with the Spin Pins:

These are the Spin Pins:

Jolene

So Much Stress, Seriously?

2011-06-03T01:39:00.001-06:00

ugh, my mind will not cooperate for a decent post even though I’ve desperately wanted to post for the past couple of days. Yeah, nobody’s reading anyway LOL.

Just the story of my life, one thing after another, this week our Homeschool Board decided to throw some BS at me at the end of the school year, second year in a row! And having just finally breathed a sigh of relief from some stress our horrible bank put us through(ATB Financial in Alberta, yeah, they are the worst bank! Closing our account after almost 20 years it’s so bad)…well, lets just say to follow it up so soon with more stress for someone who doesn’t handle stress well, I had a couple of very rough days of migraines, nausea and crying. It’s not dealt with yet, trying to get it dealt with but so far without cooperation from anyone at the school….but I’m feeling better anyway after sending a nice long email to the Vice Principal.

So anywho….I am dying to do a “things I want” post, hopefully I can get to that in the next couple of days…depends what the weekend holds for us I guess and just how busy it decides to be . Either way I should have something up by Sunday night at the latest and I can’t wait to share what I would be ordering if I was lucky enough to have some money burning a hole in my pocket! LOL. Just can’t figure out how torturous it will be on myself LOL!

Jolene

OOTD

2011-05-30T20:55:00.001-06:00

I don’t dress up to go out every day, I don’t work outside the home and I don’t drive so on days that hubby works I’m usually home all day. So, that leaves about 3 days a week that I actually get dressed to go out. I will take advantage of posting OOTD’s when I can .
So here is my OOTD today, and yes, hubby was playing the part of the “model photographer” and being a big goofball as usual!

Shoes: Walmart, in store, $15(2011)
Skirt: Ricki’s, in store, $7.50, clearance(2011)
Top: Reitmans, in store, $9, clearance(2010)
Belt: Forever 21+(sold out), $10.80(2011)
Necklace: Forever 21+, Helen Multi-Chain Necklace , $9.80(2011)
Necklace: smaller necklace is just a heart locket that says “Mom”, Christmas gift from hubby and the kids.
Earrings: these were a gift from the lovely sweet owner of Sexy Plus Clothing, she included them in an order I placed for a top(2011)
Bracelet: had this for about 14 years, bought from a lovely Native woman selling her stuff at a rest stop in Arizona, love buying stuff this way but can’t afford to travel
Ring: Forever 21+, bought in store(can’t find it on their website), approx $5(2011)

Jolene

My First OOTD

2011-05-29T01:09:00.001-06:00

When I blogged before it was nothing about clothes but since that’s something I’m really into right now I’m going to try and force myself to get into pictures and do some of these OOTD postings that everyone is doing!

Yesterday after I got my Forever 21 order I got hubby to take some pics because I quite liked what I was wearing! So I guess that would make a good starting place! Excuse the goofy faces, hubby was trying trying to play the part of a model photographer and was making me laugh!

Boots: Payless Shoes(2007??) Xmas gift from inlaws
Pants: Forever 21+ Fab Skinny Jeans (Regular) in Indigo $14.20
Tank: Warehouse One, in store, 2/$20
Shrug: Walmart, in store, $12
Jacket: Forever 21+ Destroyed Denim Jacket $29.80
Bracelet: Forever 21+ Textured Cuff Bracelet $5.80
Necklace: Warehouse One, in store, under $10
Earrings: can’t see them because of my hair LOL, but they’re Avon, couple of years old

I’m going to include prices when I can anytime I do an OOTD. I’m a cheapskate, so I’m told LOL. The almost $30 for that jean jacket is a LOT for me and I only paid it because hubby convinced me to and made fun of me when I said it was too expensive LOL. My limits for clothes for me are usually not to pay over $25-$30 for a dress, $20 for a top, $20-$25 for pants, $20 for a skirt, $10 for a piece of jewelry(unless of course it’s a “special” piece not for every day wear), $20 for shoes and $40 for boots. And even those prices are pushing it for me, I strive to look for under $15 a piece for any shoes/clothing I buy.

Jolene