Welcome to Pepsi and Happy Hunger Games!

I'm a bad little blogger! No posts in three days :( so here's what's been going on:

Sunday:

Mike put up my shelf with the new brackets that we got from Home Depot, and also with my hanging IKEA containers that I bought a couple weeks ago. I do have to say that I think it looks pretty fabulous! So thanks Mike! <3

Here's my handyman putting up the "good" brackets, and he didn't even need to patch up the old holes because the new ones just covered them up lol.

Uh oh...it looks like quality control is sleeping on the job!

He's double checking measurements here..or maybe that's what he wants me to think....hmm.

Mike was putting up the bar that my containers were being hung off of, an Chester was being super attentive as usual :)

Chester: "Are you sure that's level?"

Mike: "Yes, Chester, I checked it three times!"

Chester: "It doesn't look level!"

 "I'm helping! I promise!"

Voila! My finished craft area! I love it :)

So this makes a perfect segue into Monday:

This is what happens when we leave Chester and Bella alone all day for the first time in almost three months.

I bet they told each other: "Mom's leaving us to go to work?? We'll show her!"

Luckily nothing was broken, and now we know we need to secure the shelf to the brackets.










 So Monday was first day at Pepsi and it was interesting, but in a good way.  I was pretty excited to find out that my training class of 15 were narrowed down from a pool of 400 that had applied, so that made me feel pretty good.  I'll be in training for three months, its pretty intense but everything we're learning is pretty cool stuff and it's just making me super excited to get out there on my own. I also get to ride to and from work and have lunch with Mike, so that's fun too :)  After work, we went to see The Hunger Games since we didn't get a chance to go over the weekend. It was pretty good, although I was pretty disappointed as to how much they left out of the book. I guess they really couldn't put every little detail in though, especially since the movie was already almost 2 1/2 hours long, but overall I enjoyed it and surprisingly enough, Mike did too.  Now the wait begins for the sequel, Catching Fire, as of right now it's slated to come out November 2013. I can't wait, its only about 600 or something days, right? :(

 After we got home from the movie I was cleaning up the kitchen a bit and I got annoyed at how impractical my fridge was set up. So I moved stuff around, and look at how much more room I have! Random..I know, hehe.







That's the update for now, I have some studying to do since I have my first of five certification tests for Pepsi in the morning. Wish me luck!


<3  J

This weekend..so far..

And so my last weekend as a happy little housewife is halfway over.  I'm actually really excited to start work on Monday, I'm sure I won't be able to fall asleep on Sunday night. On to the weekend so far..

Friday is normally Mike's work from home day but since this was a release weekend he found that it was easier to go into the office for a little bit, and he came home around 3:00. I was elbows deep in clean laundry that was just waiting to be folded, and before I knew it, it was dinner time.  Amanda had texted me a little earlier saying that she and Kevin were thinking of coming by this weekend because they wanted to hit up IKEA for a couple things. As Mike and I sat down for dinner, Amanda texted me and said that she was leaving work and her and Kevin would be on their way! Yay!! I can't get enough of them, even if they were just staying until Saturday afternoon.

Mike had to go into the office for a couple hours today and last night Amanda, Kevin and I all said that since IKEA opened at 10:00 we would leave here at 9:00 to make it there right after opening and try to avoid the weekend crazies.Well..I barely remember Mike saying goodbye in the morning, and when I finally woke up it was 9:30! I ran to wake Amanda up, and we didn't end up getting on the road until about 11:00 lol!  We had to stop for some Dunkin' Donuts, and I'm so glad we did, because I haven't had any since we moved down here.  We made it to IKEA without getting lost time time, and well, I guess I'll let the pictures do the rest of the talking!

 IKEA!! I think I like this one better than the one in New Jersey, but like Mike said, getting to the one in Jersey is a hassle since you usually get stuck in crazy traffic on Rt.17 and by the time you get to the store you're already all frazzled, and then after you're done shopping, you get stuck in more traffic on your way home! This IKEA is just about an hour away, its all highway and its right off the exit! The ride went kind of fast today since we were just talking the whole time.

When we got there, surprisingly enough it wasn't too busy! We were even able to sign up for our IKEA Family memberships, last time the lines at the Kiosks were crazy long. I should have taken more pics, but I didn't know if they would yell at me or not, but I did get these few pics:

This desk, I saw it last time and I fell in love with it for a craft desk, its so roomy and clean looking and the accessories just make it look so much better.

I told them to "act natural" and this is the pic I got, I don't think they heard me but I think it came out pretty good, even though there's a random lady in the back! Amanda says, "What is this stranger doing in my kitchen?!"

LOL..

While Kevin was exploring, Amanda and I sat at the table and were enjoying being surrounded by all the fine housewares. 

You know..no one ever tells you when you're a kid that one day furniture will be more fun than toys.

"Why yes, Kevin, we will have some more tea.."



Yup, we were having way to much fun, lol!



















After walking around for a few hours, we finally went to the warehouse to pick up our stuff and checked out. I ended up getting a shelf for my craft area, a grill pan, and some jars to hold my craft odds and ends.  On the way home we had a late lunch and about 20 minutes or so after we got in, Mike came home.  We all just hung out for a little bit and played with the kitties before Amanda and Kevin got going.  We had a tornado warning issued for our area, and the skies were looking pretty scary.  Needless to say, Kevin was going to be the one driving back home since it had started to downpour as they left.  The rain didn't last long for us though, about 15 minutes after they left it had already stopped, and luckily, no tornados.

I was so excited to get my shelf up and set up my stuff, but apparently this was more complicated than I thought it would be.  So while I waited for Mike to get off a conference call, I Mod Podged a container for our various living room remotes.

Now they have a home, and hopefully we won't lost them in the couch or where ever else they like to disappear to.

 Now here's Mike, carefully measuring, making sure everything lines up with his pencil marks.  If it was me, I would just make sure the shelf was level, and try to screw in the brackets to the wall.  Apparently I needed to make sure that these were installed on a stud. Yup, I'll leave this one to Mike..

Making his "pilot holes" - again, I would just just screwed it in and hoped for the best lol.

When I showed Mike the bracket, he says to me: "How am I supposed to drill this into the wall?? Who makes a bracket like this?" He thought about it for a bit, and I could tell that he knew it wasn't going to work, but when we get into these situations, we think: WWSD? Yes, What Would Sal Do?

Mike didn't answer my question, and we just tried our best to screw it into the wall at an angle..yup, it didn't work so well, the brackets were all wobbly :(













We ran to Home Depot and to my surprise, they had a better selection of shelves than IKEA! I got a nice big "I told you so" from "Mr. I'm Always Right" and the project was put on hold until tomorrow morning.

So it was a pretty eventful day, it definitely wasn't a normal Saturday but it was nice, because it changed it up a bit.  I'll leave you tonight with a couple of random pics:

I got finally got sick of digging for stuff in the pantry and it getting all messed up so I made a makeshift "drawer" for the stuff in here.

So now if we need to get something from the back, we just pull out the box instead of trying to dig it out.

Everything also has it place here too, all meds are in the front in little sectioned off boxes, teas are behind them and breakfast stuff is on the back right side.

Friday night, I made pork chops with broccoli and mashed potatoes for dinner. It was deelish!

Here's my nifty new grill pan from IKEA, which I'm pretty excited about so now we can kinda grill steaks and salmon and chicken...yum, I'm getting hungry just thinking about it!

And finally, we had made a trip to Best Buy, and then Barnes and Noble.  I saw this book and I had to pick it up! If I wasn't a cat lady before, I think this seals the deal lol.











Good night!

<3  J

The closet and dinner..

First things first, Happy Birthday to the best mother in law ever!! Mike, the grandkitties and I miss you!!  <3

I finally got to the coat closet in the dining room and it wasn't as bad as I thought it was going to be. as always, I forget to take before pics, so the "before" is actually going to be more of a "work in progress" pic.

Again, my quality control department paid me a visit, this time Bella got in on the fun (before pic) and Chester inspected my work after it was all clean, from the top of the shelf there.









                         Before                                                                                                After

So a lot of the stuff in the closet was just thrown in there and it just needed to be organized  and straightened out a bit.  I used one of the ideas I had seen on Pinterest for my wrapping paper and my umbrellas, and it worked out really well because I had been hoarding boxes for a couple weeks now.

 


 On the left, is the box I used to make the  wrapping paper holder, and it was such a pain to wrap.  I should have wrapped the box, then cut it into the three sections.

On the right is the almost finished product! The only thing that I don't like about them is that I didn't cut them perfectly even, but I'll live with it.

After I hung them up, I thought they just looked too plain, so I added some labels with embellishments :)

That was today's big craft project.  I feel like things are kinda slowing down since I start work on Monday, or maybe I'm slipping back into my old lazy ways...oh nooo!

Mike was going to work from home today, but he ended up going into work around lunch time, so the whole morning I thought it was Friday since he works from home every Friday.  So by the time I finished the closet it was almost 4:00 so I had to get a move on with dinner.  Today we were having chicken with sausage, peppers and onions and rice. Mike doesn't usually get home until about 5:30 so I had plenty of time to get everything done which was good, because I'm usually scrambling like a mad woman and making a mess because I start cooking at 4:50 lol.

I get all my ingredients out, just to find out that my green peppers went bad :( I felt like Gordon Ramsey as I was digging in my veggie drawer only to pull out a rotten pepper. So once again, I ran to Food Lion and picked up some green peppers and while I was there I picked up some fresh parsley since the recipe called for it (I usually just use the dried parsley from my spice rack).  The recipe also called for pickled cherry peppers but I couldn't find those at Food Lion, and I didn't use them the last time I made this dish and it still came out pretty yummy.

Here it is cooking and making the house smell amazing!











 And here is the finished product! It looked more appealing in person, and it's missing the red peppers :( but it was still really good!








I think its bed time, I have been going to bed way too late and I am exhausted tonight! Good night!

<3  J

Food shopping budget fun!

Today is Wednesday so that means its food shopping day! That's one of the biggest adjustments, believe it or not, that I've had to make upon moving to NC.  Back in New York, Sunday was our shopping day since that's when the sale started, but down here its Wednesday..not quite sure why but if anyone knows, please fill me in!  So I like to set a $60 budget for my weekly shopping and I've gotten really good at coming within a few bucks of it unless we're having company then I might go over a little bit, or, if it's like last week. 

Last Monday I had gone to visit Amanda and usually when I'm there I hit up BJ's since she has a membership.  So I ended up spending $70 on stuff I needed, clearly $70 over my weekly shopping budget since I didn't really buy any food for the week.  Luckily, my fridge and pantry were still pretty well stocked that I decided to not go on my normal weekly food shopping run. The problem was that I was still $10 over my budget for the week. Usually when this happens, I'm like "Ehh, it's only $10" but $10 this week, $10 next week and so on adds up.

I decided to cut my budget this week to $50, still do able even though my stock was a bit low.  To make things even more interesting, I decided to bake cookies on Monday night and guess what? Half way through I realized I didn't have chocolate chips! So I ran to Food Lion and exactly $10 and 15 minutes later I left with two packs of strawberries, bananas and chocolate chips. Okay, so now my budget is down to $40..how will I ever pull this off? Long story short, I spent $19 at Walmart on groceries, and $24 at Food Lion, $3 over? I think that's pretty damn good!

On to the pics!

Here's a blurry pic of my wonderful fruit display! I think a pineapple just makes everything look a lot nicer, don't you agree?

And my pantry, which is a work in progress, but it's getting there...one shelf at a time!

I worked on the first shelf today, I hit up Dollar Tree and bought these food containers even though I have more than enough Rubbermaid to last me forever.  When the dollar store ones get destroyed though, I won't feel too bad because they aren't part of my set and they were only $1!

The peanuts on the top shelf are in the dollar store container, and behind them is a larger container with pretzels and fruit snacks. Even though I could have left all the stuff that's on the first shelf in their original packaging, I feel like it looks more organized this way..and Mike was impressed by it!













My freezer got a little bit of an organized make over too, the bins on the bottom shelf are veggies on the left and seafood on the right. Now I just need to label them!

And the random piece of decor that I put up today was this cute printable I found online, I slapped it in a dollar store frame and BAM! Cheap, and cute, just the way I like my decor!

 Alright, that's it for tonight, I hope I'm as motivated tomorrow as I was today! Good night!

<3  J

Jess? Organized?

I have never and I mean never been an organized person, my room when I lived at home was always a disaster, I just could never get it clean. So when we moved down to North Carolina, Mike and I agreed that I would have to make an effort to change and keep our apartment clean. I kept saying that I would change but I don't think Mike or anyone would believe it until they saw it.

Not having a job when we first moved down here freaked me out at first.  I was worried about money mostly, and also I knew that I couldn't just loaf around all day long while Mike was at work. I mean, the guest room was still full of boxes that needed to be sorted and unpacked, and as much as I wanted to do nothing for the first time ever, it just didn't feel right. 

Right around the beginning of Fall (I think) I had stumbled upon this little website called Pinterest, it was an instant obsession, but that's another story for another day! I mention Pinterest because now that I had all this free time, all this extra living and storage space I knew I was able to do some of the projects I had seen online. It took a few weeks to get fully unpacked to the point where I could actually begin organizing and I really had no idea where I would begin.  I scoured Pinterest for organizing ideas and maybe it's just me because I was never into organizing, but it seems like being super super organized is the thing right now. 

My first organizing project was the linen "closet" it really just needed some straightening out and I'll post pics later on but once I saw how nice all my towels and bed sheets looked I was hooked. I was on a mission to organize everything!  I have to say that my favorite organizing site is iheartorganizing.blogspot.com, I am so motivated after seeing some of the projects on there and seeing how organized her house is, well it's just amazing!  So now that you have some background, when I post pics of stuff I've organized you'll understand why it's such a big deal for me (I'll have to find an old pic of my room just to show you the craziness).

Well, this has turned into another novel of a post! I have some pics to share so keep an eye on my next post for those.

<3  J

Tick tock!

There are so many good things going on this week! The Hunger Games comes out on Friday, Mad Men season 5 starts back up on Monday along with me starting at Pepsi! I feel like my time is just ticking away, and while it's been fun staying home hanging out with the kitties and being a happy little housewife, unfortunately it doesn't pay the bills. I'm excited to go back to work though, especially since Mike and I will be working in the same building :) it's just perfect!

While I want to savor my last week off and enjoy it, I also want it to be Friday because I am so pumped for The Hunger Games! This is the first book that I've read that's been made into a movie, so I'm really anxious to see how they portray it on screen, it looks awesome from the trailers and snippets I've seen online.  Let's hope I can get tickets!

On a random side note (because I'm hungry), if you haven't tried Taco Bell's Doritos Loco Taco Supreme, you are missing out!  Mike tried it last week at work and since Frito Lay is one of PepsiCo's brands, he got a coupon for a free taco.  I was skeptical to try it but it was free so why the hell not, I like Doritos and I love tacos, let me tell you the combination was amazing!! I want to get one today for lunch, but I've been eating pretty badly lately so I think I'll hold off til this weekend.

Alright, well I'm off to tackle the dining room coat closet, hopefully I'll finish it tonight so I can post some pictures.


<3  J

St. Patty's Day Weekend

So this weekend I totally forgot it was St. Patty's Day, and I didn't think that it was a big "shopping" holiday, and maybe its not, but the two stores I hit up this weekend were crazy busy!

I had some stuff to return to Michaels and to Kohls but I never leave there empty handed so my first stop was Kohls.  Mike came with me and he had a gift card from Christmas to use so as usual he caught some pretty awesome deals there. I on the other hand, returned three shirts, and walked out with a fabulous pair of Rock & Republic blue suede pumps and a cute sun dress for one of the weddings that I'm going to this summer.

Since my new job at Pepsi is a desk job, I think I'll be able to rock these no problem!

I didn't get any pics of the sun dress because I feel like those kind of pics just never come out right.  I'm sure I'll have pics up after the wedding in May.




After Kohls, I just had to "quickly" run in and return one thing at Michaels but like I said, I never leave there empty handed and so I was inspired by Amanda's living room wall decor once again and I picked up some small 6x8 canvases. I was going to attempt a "paint chip" project I had seen on Pinterest, but instead of paint chips I used my cardstock.  I decided to punch hearts out of blue and purple paper for what I've heard called an hombre look, basically its a color gradient and mine went from dark to light to dark again.

I worked on it for most of the day on Saturday until my eyes started going a little crazy and I got three and a half of the small canvases done.  It doesn't seem like a lot but it took forever to punch all the hearts, and stick them to the canvas, and make sure they were all even. Maybe I'll make it a goal to finish this before Monday because I know that if I don't, I probably won't finish it and I've been on a roll with projects lately.
Check out one of the purple boards that I finished.












Oh, and I can't forget about my quality control department! This is Chester's spot when I'm sitting at my craft desk. Isn't he a cutie :)  This was on Sunday, the after him and Bella got a bath, so he was all nice and clean smelling.







Once this project is all done, I'm thinking of putting them in our bedroom over our bed next to our framed wedding pic and if it doesn't look good there, then maybe they'll go in the guest room once it's all set up.

I think that's it for tonight, I'm super beat and I found out the hard way this weekend that I can't handle staying up past 2am anymore.  I felt like I had a hangover on Sunday and I didn't even drink! So I better get to bed!  Good night!

<3  J

Closet - Complete!

What a busy couple days! I'll have to break out the past couple days into a few posts so lets start with my closet project.

So two Fridays ago I decided to re-organize my closet because that Saturday Amanda and I were going to hit up IKEA and I figured it would be a good chance to get some stuff to help with the organization. After spending a good two hours there and of course spending more than we should have, the only thing I got for the closet were a couple of the "Skubb" shoe organizers. I thought that I would get the closet done that weekend, but that just wasn't happening especially since I decided to take every bit of clothing that Mike and I own and re-fold/re-hang them.  It actually worked out really well and we ended up giving away a huge box of clothes so that's always good.  Finally, this past Saturday I finished the closet and I have to say that once again I have impressed myself and it looks a lot better than I thought it would. So here are the before and after pics:

It hurts my eyes! It was so cluttered, stuff was just thrown on the shelves and for some of the stuff we didn't even get to take out of boxes as you can see (or maybe not see). Aside from it being an eyesore, it was just a waste of a big, beautiful closet!















Oh, and just so you have an idea of what I was working with, because there was more than just the clothes that were hung up. Here's a pic of what the bed looked like...with only my clothes!





Yup, I guess that's why it took me just about a week to sort it all out. Any who, check out the after pics:

     
Isn't it beautiful! I put jeans, sweatshirts and sweaters on top of where our clothes are hung.  On the back wall, I have my handbags on the left and some of Mike's shorts.  Our hope chest is in the middle where it just looks so much better compared to being off to the side and that's filled with beach towels and linens.  All of Mike's shoes fit on the IKEA organizer and mine, well of course they didn't fit so I have most of my pumps in the organizer, overflow on the floor and then there is a box of shoes that I don't wear too often that you can kind of see to the left of the chest.  Oh and we finally hung up our mirror!

Just so you can see it side by side again and because I'm just in awe of my newly cleaned and organized closet here you go:

                                    Before                                                                           After



I have six days left before I start work, I'm going to try and tackle one more organizing project before then, lets see if I can do it!

<3  J