Subbing

Some of our friends recently moved out of the ward and when they did, the CTR 7 class lost their teachers. Our ward is currently waiting for all of the recent BYU grads to get down here to start working at USAA (last year about 6-8 families moved down for that reason and that is pretty normal here). We're also waiting for all of them so that they can immediately be called as primary teachers. For the time being, Chris and I are the subs for that class. When they called me yesterday and asked if we could teach for the next month or so I said sure, and then texted my friend who had been their teacher to get the scoop on the class. She told me how many kids there are (around 6) and warned me who the trouble maker is.

Fast forward to today.

We got to class and introduced ourselves and asked the kids what their names were. The trouble maker said "I'm not telling you my name, but I will tell you that I'm the one that causes the most problems." So I said, "Thanks (insert his name here)!" He looked at me kinda confused, I knew his name even though he wouldn't tell me. 

I love when the trouble maker tells you flat out that they are the trouble maker. If he's going to be super obnoxious at least he knows it and had the heart to tell me :)

All I can say is that I'm glad that the Primary President knows that we already have callings and they can't call us to be the actual teachers for this class... I think we have a long month ahead of us!

snacks

I'm in the market for some new snack ideas... 

Lately my favorites have been:

-hummus with either tortilla chips or vegetables

-taking a slice of tillamook cheddar cheese, breaking it into quarters, and putting those quarters on ritz crackers

-tortillas with peanut butter on them (and sometimes I'll add some chocolate chips or toffee bits or jelly)

What are your favorite snacks?

new hobby...

so today i found a new hobby. it's a bit of a joke of a hobby, but i get some satisfaction from it.

we are huge netflix fans, despite the issues that we have had we LOVE the service.

i was rating some movies and tv shows so that they would suggest media that would actually be appealing to us and i found myself reading some reviews for some shows to see what the shows really were all about. this is when i found my new hobby:

flagging the ratings that aren't actual ratings but are complaints as "inappropriate" since they aren't reviews/ratings but are complaints. for one show that i found about 50 people had posted reviews saying "you took season two off instant watch. you are stupid. put it back on." or stuff like that. those comments made it really difficult to find actual reviews of the show and i still don't know whether or not to watch them. so netflix, take better care of your site and maybe actually preview comments like you say you do. keep them useful.

note to self

now that the 10 day forecast includes temperatures such as 83, 85, 87, 90, and 95 you should probably start putting sunscreen on your face every day. that trip to the mailbox this afternoon made your face a little red. i'm just sayin-definitely remember it when you're going to six flags

day 30

Day 30 – A photograph of youself today + three good things that have happened in the past 30 days




I wish I had taken a picture of myself before I went to get a haircut this afternoon... because the lady who cut my hair didn't understand "I just want an inch trimmed off". I just keep telling myself that hair will grow back. Also, the next person who cuts my hair will speak english as their first language, not their second.  Also, don't mock my hair because I only could get half of it to act the way I wanted. Hope that doesn't happen every day until it grows out--it's too short to go up in a ponytail.

Three good things that have happened in the past 30 days:


1. I survived the Relief Society Activity from Hell. Okay, so it wasn't really THAT bad, but we did spend a solid 5 hours at the church the morning of decorating and setting up tables and chairs. We have a member of our committee who comes up with great ideas but once she has an idea there is no stopping her. It got really intense. Let's just say that we were all really happy to receive an email saying that the decorations for the next activity (which is this week) are going to be a picture of Christ on each table in a nice frame as well as a vase with flowers. Our set up should take about 35 minutes tops, depending on how many people show up. We'll literally just need to pull out tables, chairs, and tablecloths. No ladder will be required. Woohoo!


2. One day I completed three online assignments for my class that I'm working on as well as submitting an assignment to my professor to grade. This was the first time I'd had to submit an assignment to her and I was relieved to get it back with a 100% and notes that tell me that she was really happy with the writing samples I provided. I'm taking a cooking class and each lesson has me cook different recipes. After I cook them I have to write up what recipe I chose, why I chose it, who I served it to, if I would make it again, and what from the lesson I was able to apply to cooking that recipe. The assignment I submitted to her was a compilation of 6 of my writeups. I was very glad to know that I had been writing the amount she was expecting, not less. I'm excited to finish this now knowing that she's a fair grader! 


3. This one made me really happy. Each month Chris's team from work goes out to lunch where they celebrate the birthdays for that month and give some recognition and celebrate their successes by eating good food. Chris is in the group that picks different restaurants and the only criteria is that the restaurant must offer vegetarian dishes as there are several vegetarians in their team. The people who have birthdays that month have their meals paid for by the company, everyone else pays for their own food. For March the team went out to PF Changs. I've been wanting to go to PF Changs since New Years Day when we were really wanting some Chinese food, but we hadn't ever made it over to there. Chris ordered the meal that he knew I would want (Mongolian Beef with brown rice) and saved me a decent portion of each. He said he went for it because it was kind of expensive, but we both know he ordered it so that he could share with me when he got home! I was so excited that I got my Mongolian Beef and that we didn't have to pay for it! 


Also highlights:
USAAs recent hires (at least I think that was the group) were invited to attend an outdoor showing of Tangled last weekend. They provided pizza,drinks, popcorn, candy... we just had to bring a blanket to sit on or chairs. It was a blast, we loved the movie and the free food! i love free date nights!


we decided that next weekend we're going out to eat for our date night and Chris let me pick where (since he gets to pick where he wants to go out for lunch once a month for work). We're going to Rudy's to get us some good Texas BBQ. We already know exactly what we're getting: 3/4 lb Brisket, 1 whole sausage, and a pint of creamed corn. We're really really excited, it will be super tasty. Haven't had bbq since December when we went to the outlet malls and made our way up to The Salt Lick. 


I got to do proxy initiatories and sealings for the first time in the last 30 days. we go each month and do a session so i was excited when a friend asked if i wanted to go do initatories with her one day. then when chris and i went they told us the session was in spanish so we went and did sealings instead! 


oh and we bought hummus! we love hummus! it's one of our favorite snacks!

day 29 (only one more day!!!!)

Day 29 – Something you could never get tired of doing.


The first thing I thought of was going to this place:

And riding this ride:

SUPERMAN! The Superman Krypton Coaster. It is definitely one of my favoritest rides there! I could never get sick of going to Six Flags. Even when it is 95 degrees out, like it was when we went to Six Flags on Saturday. I love riding roller coasters. I couldn't find a picture of another ride I could never get tired of: The Scooby Doo Ghostblasters Ride! You hop in a little cart and have a gun that you shoot at little lit up targets and collect points. I love the Scooby Doo ride, and we often ride it when we need a little break from the heat. It's an intense competition!

day 28

Day 28 – Your favorite movie.


Oh man I have too many to pick just one favorite movie. Instead you get a list of my favorites.


Princess Bride.
27 Dresses.
Win a Date with Tad Hamilton.
Zoolander.
The Proposal (i was devastated when it got taken off netflix instant watch a few days ago).
Harry Potter 1-4, 6-7 (basically not 5).


Lately I've really been wanting to watch Johnny Lingo, don't know why but I have. Mahana you ugly!

day 27

Day 27 – A picture of you last year and how have you changed since then?

A year (and a week ago) I was in Salt Lake for General Conference with my boyfriend. 


A year ago today he became my fiancée (is that the right spelling?).


Now he's my husband! And we don't live close to Salt Lake so we watch General Conference on our couch. 


Now we spend our Saturdays not worrying about cleaning checks, homework and tests to study for. Instead we go to Six Flags just because we can. 


I got kind of excited when I realized that without changing the order this post is the one year anniversary of us getting engaged, that was an exciting night! We got free food up on campus because he was graduating. We went and saw Divine Comedy for the last time, and we laughed really really hard. We skipped (at least a little of the way) back to my apartment. We ate chips and salsa. And then he popped the question. Right there, in my living room! Both my roommates were home, but they didn't find out we were engaged for a while, one of them I think it took a whole day before she found out. We called my Jenny to tell her and she made lots of noise and was really excited! It was a way fun night. The next day I met Aubrey & Jessica who are (or were) in our ward here in San Antonio . Aubrey just moved into a house and Jessica just bought a house and will be moving soon. I can't believe it's been an entire year!


Also, this challenge is almost done and i'm so glad. A lot of the days turned out to be super lame. But hey, it got me blogging again!

day 26

Day 26 – A photo of somewhere you’ve been to


Here are a few of my favorite places that I've been:

This is a picture taken from a dock at the Kirkland Waterfront where Jenna, Megan and I used to go. This represents not just the waterfront, but the whole Redmond/Kirkland/Bellevue area

.

Mauna Loa! I love to go see the flowing lava!

One of my very favoritest places to be! Lavell Edwards Stadium! Love being there watching my Cougs play a little football!

day 25

Day 25 – What’s in your purse?

A Tide-to-Go pen
A coupon to JoAnns
Chapstick
A pen
keys
my wallet
a list of books I should read
my shopping list from JoAnns
the keycard to get into the gym at my complex


That's a really thrilling list. My phone would've been in the picture, but I used it to take the picture. Thrilling.

day 24

Day 24 – A photo of something that means a lot to you


I'm kind of in an interesting mood right now, one of my besterest friends from forever ago is getting ready to go on a mission and last night she went through the temple (assuming i interpreted a facebook comment correctly). Anywho, that comment that I read made me think about her a lot. Her and her sister. And that also made me think of our friend, Champion. So right now you get a few pictures that make me chuckle, smile, and almost cry all at once. I miss these girls like crazy, and Champion too!

 My Jenna and Megan!

day 23

Day 23 – 15 facts about you.


1. Monday is my most productive day of the week. I do 4 or 5 batches of laundry (depends on how many pairs of pants Chris wore in the last week... if he wore 5 pairs of jeans I have to do 5 batches because his jeans can make up a whole batch). I do all of the dishes from Sunday (I normally don't do them Sunday night, I don't know why....) While I wait for the first batch of laundry to come out of the dryer I really clean the kitchen-I'm talkin scrub the counters, stove, fridge, sweep&mop the floor, a good solid clean. While I fold the laundry I typically watch a movie or an episode of a show. It makes it just a little bit more fun. Yesterday i also went to the library. I always try to get the trash out Monday mornings before the guys come around to pick it up. Yesterday I was super successful even though the guys came almost 30 minutes early. Curse them.


2. I don't sleep very well if I get cold. Unfortunately that often means I don't sleep very well because Chris steals the covers. Really bad. No matter how hard I try to steal them back from him or force him to share it's almost impossible. He tucks them underneath himself and it's pretty much impossible to get them back. The other night I grabbed a blanket from under the bed and used it after he had stolen the covers and he tried to steal that blanket as well. I eventually got him to share the covers with me.


3. I really like doing yoga. I like to check the yoga dvds out at the library, but they don't have very many that are very good, and you can only check dvds out for a week. Instead I normally do the yoga from WiiFit, or from a movie from Netflix that is available on instant streaming. I try to do yoga 3 times a week but normally only get around to it 2 times a week. My Monday's just don't have a lot of wiggle room for yoga. 


4. When I turn my computer on and hop online I open up a lot of tabs all at once and read through them. They typically are: Facebook, the byu 100 hour board, my email, sarah's blog, my blog (i check my dashboard for updates from the blogs i follow), and usaa (i check my bank accounts/credit cards like 1,000,000 times a day). 


5. I have a list of 101 goals I want to accomplish in 1001 days. I'm currently 157 days into my list and I have 47 of my goals done! Also, I am incredibly close to a few others: on my goal to watch 26 movies i've never seen starting with each letter of the alphabet, i've watched 18 of them! I still have F,J,K,Q,W,X,Y and Z left. Seems like I've left a bunch of tricky movies. I've got an F,W and X planned thanks to Netflix instant watch but I'm struggling with Y.  I also have a goal to read 100 books. So far I've finished 17, but I'm working on two or three more right now. I decided during General Conference that I want to read a biography of each of the prophets. I hope that someone in my ward has a lot of biographies because I doubt I'll be able to find them from my local library.


6. I am kind of obsessed with The Biggest Loser. I like to turn an episode on while I clean/do my homework/cook dinner. I get really into it too. Since I started watching it (about a month ago, maybe more) I've watched one whole season, almost all of another season, and gotten caught up on the current season. I have favorites each time, and in one of the seasons I'm watching right now (season 9) i think my guess for who will win might be pretty accurate! I'm not sure yet about the current season, there are too many players with a lot of extra weight to be lost and it's trickier that way. I like when they show the food they are cooking out of The Biggest Loser Cookbook. They use Turkey Bacon a lot and instead of using ground beef they use ground turkey. They have a recipe for chili that has ground turkey in it and I really want to try it, it sounds super tasty. I placed a hold for that book at the library yesterday because I want to make that one specific recipe. I'm excited to see what else is Bob & Jillian approved. I tried Bob's Biggest Loser Yoga workout (I checked it out from the library) and it was incredibly intense, just like I suspected it would be. Bob is fantastic. If you don't know who Bob and Jillian are you are missing out. They are the trainers on BL and they are super crazy! I looooove them!


7. I don't like to shave my legs. But I do it anyway. 


8. The other day we were at the AT&T store upgrading my phone (Janyse if you're reading this I have FaceTime now) and President Obama was on the tv giving some address. I was really confused when I saw him. We've been watching 24 for a while now and I honestly forgot who the president was because there is a president on 24. Currently on 24 the president is a lady, President Taylor. Turns out she isn't the president in real life. Chris laughed at me when I said "oh yeah! Obama's president." so did the AT&T guy. 


9. We have towels that are green and towels that are called biscotti. We have sheets that are gold and sheets that are brown. I like to have the biscotti towels out when we have our gold sheets out. They match pretty well. 


10. While I love for my apartment to be clean, I don't always keep my bathroom clean. Since we only have one bathroom though, I do clean it when people are coming over. it's amazing what a quick spray of windex on the mirror and counter can do to make the bathroom look cleaner. When I really clean it I pull out my Foamy Q&A (a fantastic cleaner that I used as a custodian at BYU) and get the sink, tub, and toilet lookin pretty good!


11. When I was in Provo I bought a pair of skinny jeans because I needed jeans that could easily be tucked into my winter boots without adding a ton of bulk. I didn't ever wear them without my boots. Now I wear them all the time and they are my favorites. 


12. I like to try new recipes but a lot of the time I'm too scared. I love that I have a friend in the ward here who likes to try new recipes too. We get together and it makes it a lot more fun, especially when the recipes we try require a lot of "do this and let it sit for 10 minutes" or "do this and then let the dough rise for 45 minutes". We get to sit and talk and laugh and play with her adorable baby while we try new foods. 


13. A few weeks ago they finished building a new grocery store just down the street and closed the old nasty one that was basically across the street from it. I love going to the new one because they make freshly squeezed orange juice and fresh guacamole and always have samples of both of them. I'm really tempted to buy some of their fresh squeezed oj, it's oh so tasty. The boys that squeeze it and then hand out the samples make me laugh, they hit on every woman that comes up to them and say that they heard the juice is even sweeter because THEY squeezed it. Like that's going to convince me to buy it right then... psh, silly boys!


14. I'm kind of in love with kool-aid. Whenever I make manicotti I have to serve it with Ice Blue Raspberry Lemonade koolaid. Recently we discovered kiwi-watermelon. It's "invisible" so it has no color and it is oh so tasty! I love the smell of it. The only downside is that when I drink it I get a lot more sugar then when I drink straight up water. I have to stop myself from making it too often.


15. At the grocery store last week we bought a box of Honey Kix. I think they're absolutely tasty, and have just a little more flavor than regular Kix. I've eaten a bowl of it for breakfast almost every day since we bought them, minus Sunday when I made cinnamon rolls for us to eat before/as conference started. 

day 22

Day 22 was originally:  A letter to someone who has hurt you recently.


I didn't like that. If there was someone who has hurt me recently why on earth would I post a letter to them on my blog? I suppose i could write a letter of complaint to AT&T or Netflix, but that would just make me more upset than I need to be right now. Instead I'll just write a letter to someone I haven't seen in a while. Who knows, maybe what I post here will be part of a letter I actually send.


Dear Steph,


You've been gone for 18 months. Please come home now. And when you do, call me. My number is 2**-***-***0. Do it, call me, I dare you. This weekend as I watched General Conference it made me miss you even more. We used to watch conference together allll the time! I missed our traditional foods (m&ms, fruit leather, granola bars, pepperoni sticks, pizza between sessions on Sunday, you remember how it went). My new tradition is to make cinnamon rolls for breakfast one of the mornings. This time it was Sunday morning because Saturday morning was kinda rough here. Friday night Chris had to go back to work at 8:00 because it was project time. He didn't get home til 6:00 Saturday morning, so right before conference was kind of rushed. Since I wrote you a letter last week I don't have a lot to say, BUT we did get Marie to watch conference on Sunday! We invited her to our place to watch it but she had just had surgery to get fluid out of her knee and it messed up her knee cap and she's in a wheelchair and not supposed to move very much, so she didn't come. She did call us in the middle of the morning session to tell us that she was watching it. We were glad to hear that (as much as we didn't like that she was calling us during a talk, whoops!)


Anywho, love you girl! Finish up strong, but hurry home please! I have a lot of rollover minutes I want to use up with you! Are you getting your phone back or is dad keeping it? 


Love you,
Marce.


There you have it friends. A letter to someone who I haven't seen in a while.

day 21

Day 21 – A photo of something that makes you happy.

This image saved on my computer is called "kissing=happiness" so this makes me happy :)

Haha, I love that this blog challenge has turned into me posting engagement/wedding pics and a few days of just writing. That is fantastic :)

day 20

Day 20 – The meaning behind your blog name


When I've seen people do this blog chalenge some people use the name in the url of their blog (mine would then be krumpermonster) and other people use the words that they have in their headliner (mine would then be "life doesn't have to be perfect to be wonderful") I suppose I'll explain both.


First: Krumpermonster. With a last name of Krumperman growing up, the nickname krumpermonster was given to me by my 9th grade science teacher. She called nobody by their real name, she made nicknames up for everyone (except the kid who insisted on being called Thor). Mine was Krumpermonster. She was really good friends with the teacher I had for biology in 10th grade and chemistry in 11th grade, so that teacher also called me Krumpermonster. The name just kinda stuck so I used it when I made my blog. I liked it. I haven't changed it since we got married, mostly because I didn't want to take the time to make a new blog. I'm just lazy like that.


Second: Life doesn't have to be perfect to be wonderful. When Chris and I got engaged we were in the same ward at BYU. Our High Counselor and his wife came to our ward each week, and over the year I had gotten close to his wife. Her name was Gwen and she just reminded me a lot of my mom, and I just liked her a lot. Chris and I sat with them during Sunday School pretty much each week. When we were sending wedding announcements out we sent one to them. They wrote us a sweet card which included the advice that life doesn't have to be perfect to be wonderful. When she gave us the card she told us to not get discouraged when things weren't perfect, life could be great even if there were some things that weren't going the way we wanted. It was great advice that we really enjoyed and appreciated.


There you have it. Now you know.

day 19

Day 19 – Another picture of yourself.


I can't believe I've stuck with this blog challenge for a whole 19 days so far. That means I'm almost done! Here's a picture of me. 

P.S. tonight was a fun night. We went out to dinner with some friends to celebrate Chris' birthday, then went to Target to buy ice cream, and then went back to their place to watch a movie. Chris had to go to work halfway through the movie so I stayed and watched The Big Bang Theory with them for a little while. It was pretty much a hilarious night. Also, their son is adorable and makes me laugh each time I see him. He's only like 5 months old.