life

Currently…

| cheriarmour

I stole this from Rhapsody and Chaos, and I liked it so well that I am gonna use it!

Reading: Orange is the New Black.  I have been trying to get this book finished forever, but with wedding planning, it’s been challenging to find time.  But I’ve tried to  make some relax time, and made some time at the pool last week, and am making some time for the pool on Friday.

OITNB

Writing: This post – I’ve also played with the idea of writing a book on black women and working out, but that’s not even a thing until we get me married 🙂

Listening: To Dr. Phil.  Amber from Teen Mom is on there.

Watching: I guess Dr. Phil?

Thinking: About taking the day off on Friday so I can get some work done that I’m behind on at the house.

Smelling: The sunblock I use daily.  Sunblock has such a distinct smell.  It reminds me of summer.

Eating: I just finished a breakfast smoothie.  Berries, some Greek yogurt, and a little bit of orange juice.  Very yummy, but it’s very apparent I need a Vitamix.  I ate all the crunchy stuff in the beginning.

Wishing: My house was clean.  But I think the wish won’t work, I think I might actually have to clean it.

Hoping: That I get to straighten up the home tonight!

Wearing: A sports bra under a pretty work dress.  I couldn’t find a real bra this morning.  I really need to shop for a few real bras.

Craving: A cold glass of seltzer water.

Loving: Austin. My friends.  My pets.  Especially my Coco.  I talked to her this morning before work, and she just looked at me like “you’re really gonna leave me when we could be napping all day?”

Wanting: More hours in the day to run.  More hours in the day to clean.  And more hours in the day to craft.

Needing: All of the above.

Feeling: Happy.  Content.

Clicking: Myself on Women’s Running’s website.  You too can vote here!

What are you currently doing?

Tinder Dilemma

| cheriarmour

Hi!  I totally hope you guys are doing amazingly today – it’s Austin’s birthday today and between prepping to take him out for din and actually washing my birds nest of a mane, some things didn’t get scheduled, and you were out a post this morning.  For that I am sorry.  Only a little sorry though, cause I managed to squeeze a run in too this morning before it got up over 90 degrees, and that’s invaluable these days.

Now, moving right along folks, I want to present to you a little something that we in the biz (that’s what we call social work, the biz) call a dilemma.

So, have you guys heard of TInder? For those of you who are not privy to how us kids are getting’ down, a lot of our relationships are starting online.  And from that online dating thing, a few really interesting apps have developed, all for the purposes of providing millennials like me with an option to meet folks with the one thing we don’t leave home without – our phones.

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It’s cool, and it eliminates the awkward bar interactions that used to pre-date a relationship.

[As a side night, thank you lawdy that I had the good fortune to meet Austin during graduate school, cause God forbid I was out on the market now, I don’t think I could handle it.]

So here’s the dilemma, which a friend posted to Facebook a few days ago.

She’s on TInder. A “happily married” male friend of hers was on Tinder.  Does she say anything to the wife, who is also a friend of hers?  Does she stay out of it?  Maybe the couple is into that, right?

My understanding is is if you’re not looking for a relationship, you’re not on Tinder, or you’re not on of of these sites right?  But unless I’m really really close to one in the couple, I’m staying out of it…but is that the wrong thing to do?

Have any of you guys experienced a dilemma like this?  What do you think? 

Oh, and if you haven’t today, please vote for me to be on the cover of Women’s Running Mag!

Happy Father’s Day!

| cheriarmour

Today is Father’s Day, and I feel like such a turd because since we were all down for my brother’s graduation, none of us will be home for Father’s Day.  But in honor of the day, I will bring you an important story/memory I have of my dad.

DadThat’s my pops there in the middle.

So my dad is a really good person.  Like he always tries to do the right thing, and that has been very very deeply instilled in me, and is probably largely the reason I went into a helping field.

So years ago, like maybe 14 or 15 years ago, we were moving into a new house.

The movers were doing an awesome job, and stayed late into the night moving our furniture into our new house.  They were sweaty, and tired, and seemed to not know very much English, and their boss-man, a white guy, had left them to their own devices.

Debbie came to me and told me that she had witness one of the guys desperately drinking water straight from the faucet in my parent’s bathroom, and that when she entered, that he’d startled, and looked frightened, as if he was sure that he was going to be in trouble for drinking sink water from the faucet in a rich person’s home.

I told my dad what Debbie had seen, and he immediately drove to the nearest gas station, bought a ton of Gatorade, and asked the men to please have a seat and enjoy something to drink.

As a young teen, for whatever reason, this small act of kindness made a big impression on me.

I certainly never felt like we were any better than the men moving our furniture, and my dad confirmed it for me.  The guys were hot and thirsty and scared to communicate it to us, so he took the bull by the horns and made sure that they were taken care of, and then sat with them.  To me, it communicated a few things.

  • Be kind…
  • …’Cause everyone gets thirsty
  • You never know when you will be thirsty
  • And you’re not better than anyone else.

A simple lesson, but it has stayed with me forever.

Happy Father’s Day to all the dads out there!

The big announcement (that wasn’t).

| cheriarmour

So, this is kind of a weekend recap.  But remember a few days ago, when I told you I might have a big announcement?

Let’s talk about it.

So this weekend, we did our first big kind of marriage-type decision making thing together.

We started house-hunting a little while ago, and the thought of having a home with my husband-to-be made me giddy.

I wanted something older.  He wanted something newer.  We both kind of wanted something inside of the beltline due to the fact that we simply just love that area.  And a few weeks ago, Austin emailed me a home by KB that was to be built in the area that we were looking in.  It was in our price range, and there was an option for it to be the perfect color.

2380 Y_sch9

And did I mention it was in our price range?

So we started the process to buy the home, and on Friday after work, we headed down to the office to sign the contract on the home.

…and then we backed out.

It wasn’t right. The home was starting to climb up in price, and as we looked at each other about to sign the contract, it became more and more clear that we were not doing the right thing.

The poor woman helping us was really disappointed – as we walked out of the office I’m sure she could see her commission disappearing, but we did what was best for us at the time.

So the big announcement that was to be is not. We were disappointed that we didn’t walk away with a home for us, but we hope to come back to you with an announcement sometime soon 🙂 Happy house-hunting to us!

The definitive list of the 5 worst foods ever.

| cheriarmour

So, in addition to having a horribly irritable stomach, which I’ve shared with you time and again, some may say that I’m a picky eater.

I don’t consider myself a picky eater, especially since I eat a wide variety of weirdly healthy things, but since I was a kid, there are some foods I find absolutely reprehensible, and today, I share these foods with you.

800px-Broccoli_and_cross_section_edit

5.  Cauliflower.

Cauliflower
image via wikipedia.org

There is literally NOTHING that I find okay with cauliflower.  For one, it is a strange color, and for another thing, it looks exactly like the wart on the back of my hand after the dermatologist tried to burn it off.  Why would I want to eat that?  Fun fact:  the only thing fun about cauliflower is nothing.

4.   Broccoli.

800px-Broccoli_and_cross_section_edit
image via wikipedia.org

The green, less-disgusting (but still disgusting) cousin to cauliflower, I hate this more than you could ever know.  The absolute worst way that it’s cooked, is when you’re at a cafeteria-type place, and they cook it by simply boiling it until it’s so floppy that you can’y even get it to stand up straight on your fork.  ADDITIONALLY, when you eat it, it completely tears your stomach into 16 pieces. No thanks.  The only way broccoli is delicious?  No way.

3.  Mealy tomatoes.

800px-Bright_red_tomato_and_cross_section02
image via wikipedia.org

The only time I ever feel like no one cares about me is when I’m eating a salad, there’re tomatoes on it, and the tomatoes are mealy.  It sorta tastes like someone sat on the tomato and then left it out for a day or so before chopping it up and putting in on your salad.

2. The gourds.

image via wikipedia.org
image via wikipedia.org

Now I don’t mind any of the gourds in a bread.  And pumpkin, zucchini, or squash do just fine when you just throw them in a crockpot, and by the time all is said and done everything in there is the same texture.  But when the gourds are only slightly sauteed, and their mushy gushy seeds kind of just hang off of your fork?  Consider my entire meal ruined.

1. Mushrooms.

image via wikipedia.org
image via wikipedia.org

I cannot stress to you enough how badly my life is ruined once a mushroom is introduced into the mix of anything I’m eating.  You know what mushrooms taste like?  Exactly what they look like.  Which is a grey blob from deep in the pits of hell.  The worst part is, that since I’m a vegetarian, everyone assumes I must love mushrooms, and they punish me by offering me a giant mushroom on a hamburger bun. Literally that portabello mushroom sandwich you just offered me?  Just cost you our friendship.

**Honorable mention**

>>I wanna give a shoutout to yellow mustard and to effing pickles even when you didn’t want pickles or mustard on your sandwich for ruining every sandwich the two come in contact with.

>>Another extra special shoutout goes to fruit in my chococlate, without which none of this would have been possible.

>>And finally, I want to thank citrus flavored desserts for making dessert taste like the 409 that you’d use to clean your stove. Sick me out.

Come on, let’s hear ’em!  Comment with the list of foods you hate. 🙂 

Confessions

| cheriarmour

Can we just talk about the fact that Usher (one of my hall passes) wrote an entire album based on cheating on a significant other, and it was a smash?  And my parents let me buy/listen to the album on repeat in 2005, the year of my graduation?  Why was I allowed to listen to that?  But since you all are paying attention so nicely, here you go again.

usher-confessions-o

And if you think there’s no way he could have gotten better with age….

Screen Shot 2014-05-12 at 10.24.14 PMHe does the seemingly impossible.

Onto the good stuff.

I know a couple of bloggers do something called Confessions, where they confess to all the weird/funny/unknown stuff going on in their lives, so it’s my turn!  Thanks to all of you guys who inspired me to confess.

I confess…

//That I fell asleep fully clothed last night.  I was just laying down for a few minutes before I was going to at least shower and pack my lunch for today and catch up on blog stuff, and none of that stuff happened.

//I took a look at my bod today in the mirror, and I really liked what I saw.  I mean, usually I’m not like spitting at what I see, but I think this clean eating thing has done my body really well 🙂

//I typically eat really well, but I took on the challenge of eating really clean this week and prepping all my meals.  It’s made me more thoughtful about what I’m putting in my mouth.  My stomach, which I have all sorts of problems with, has been really calm this week, and my heartburn has calmed down.  I was only going for it for this week, but I’m going for it.  No sense going back to anything that comes in a package.

//I love my friends so much.  At any given time of day, I have like 2-3 group texts going on with folks I feel like are part of the inner circle.  I take my friendships really seriously.

//My house is a mess.  I fight a battle daily to keep in manageable, but I truly envy those folks who you walk in, and there are candles burning, the carpet is vacuumed, and it smells nice.  May I provide you with an example?

photo (30)

This is my workspace, which also doubles as a kitchen counter.  It’s a good workspace because I can stand up at it, but it’s not really be utilized to prep foods as it should be.

//I really insane opportunity has presented itself, and I’m really happy, but really overwhelmed, and I really can’t even tell anyone about it until next week.  EEP!

Your turn!  What are you confessions?

That time I sent my fiancé to Michael’s for something…

| cheriarmour

By now, you know that I’m marrying this guy…

photo

And he’s so amazing at so many things.  He’s an amazing caregiver, he’s smart, he’s sweet, he’s hysterical, and he’s two tons of fun to do stuff with  Some of the most things that we have done have involved us taking trips to Target to get stuff that we need.  It’s so awesome.  But alas, my honey-bear isn’t good at everything.  And disaster struck two nights ago.

Earlier this week, I went to Michael’s to pick up some things for my button/brooch bouquets.  This time, the experience was much better.  I’m honestly really curious to see who was the heinous woman that I dealt with in floral a few weeks ago cause she was mean and she sucked.

Moving right along.

So something that I needed for the bouquets was 50% off, and in the spirit of saving as much money as possible for the wedding, I sent Austin, with specific instructions for what I needed 5 fake blooms of certain flowers to provide the shape for my bouquets.  One of which was a peony bloom.

Evidently, Austin looked up something called a pilonie (I’m not kidding), and purchased this weird flower thing that I can’t find for the life of me now that I tried.  I literally gasped when I saw him, clutching these flowers in his hands, but the look on his face was so proud, so cute, and so accomplished, that I accepted the blooms with open arms.  (I later located the receipts and had to exchange them for the correct flower).

You ever sent your significant other out for something – with disastrous results?

 

Here’s What! What three things are you obsessed with?

| cheriarmour

I’m getting right into it, beautiful people!  (If you’re new here, I do this little feature every Friday, and it’s all the random crap that I’m completely obsessed with.)  Get into it!

1.  The big reveal!!!  Remember that I told you that I would show you what the save-the-dates looked like?  Well…I’m finally doing it cause if you haven’t checked your mail by now, it’s your own damned fault!

DSC_0497This is exactly what I had in my head when we started this – and the very very talented Evane Corder brought them to life for me.  I had them printed at a local boutique-style paper shop for super-affordable, and I addressed them myself with these metallic sharpies.  Very cool, and very involved process.

2.  Frank’s Red Hot Sauce.  “I put that shit on everything.”  I’m mostly a Tabasco type of lady, but Austin introduced me to Franks Red hot recently, and I literally just poured it all over my body this mac & cheese I made last night, and it really took me to the next level.  I’m not sure how I rank them, but Sriracha, Tasbasco, and Frank’s are like the 3 faves right now.

3.  Buttons + Etsy!  I made my first Etsy purchase earlier this week.  Wanna see?

DSC_0498The bag on the left is 5 pounds worth of white, clear, tan and beige buttons from a very sweet vendor on Etsy.  This weekend (and a little bit this evening), I will be working to create stems for my button/brooch bouquets, and I am SO thrilled to be able to share them with you when they’re done!  Eep!

Now honey-bears.  What three things are you obsessed with on this ridiculously warm Friday?

 

So this one time….

| cheriarmour

This is about to be a random smattering of all this crap I randomly remember and laugh at.  Enjoy!

This one time…

// I vomited in someone’s front lawn when I was running the Greensboro Marathon.  I couldn’t help it.  But I finished!

// When I was a kid, the priest came DOWN off the pulpit, took the stairs off of the alter, and walked many rows back to scream at some kids that were being bad and making lots of noise in Mass.  One of the scariest moments of my life, because I didn’t want him to come after me.

// My dog SHAT in my car because she was really really nervous.  This actually happened yesterday, and I had to add it in here.  But she was nervous, and all of a sudden I start smelling something.  And I look over, and it’s officially my worst nightmare, come to life.

// I sprained my ankle at a party when I fell off of a stage in a puddle of what I assume was beer.  Instead of getting some ice and going to bed, I continued dancing, and my ankle was the size of Jupiter when all was said and done.

// I worked as a cocktail server in a lounge downtown in grad school. Never ever ever ever again.  If I can help it.

// I worked in Whole Foods Bakery.  Since working at Whole Foods, I’ve totally switched around the way I eat.  I used to be super calorie-centered, and that meant I ate a lot of Lean Cuisine, and frozen or pre-packaged “diet” food.  Haven’t really done it since.  It’s awesome 🙂

// I peed in my car one time on accident.  I was stuck in a lot of traffic on my way into New York, and I really had to go.  The only thing I could do was pee in a Starbucks cup.  I did the best I could.  This memory was inspired by someone else sharing with me that they had done something similar.

// I was pretending to be blind (which is highly offensive, I realize, but I was just a kid), and ran straight and directly into a tree, where I completely busted my lip.

Tell me a totally random story!

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