My Bucket List

So I read a (heartbreaking) story about a baby born with SMA named Avery. At birth her parents were told she had 18 months to live tops. So they made her a bucket list. It included things like 'draw on the walls', 'have a tea party', and 'celebrate my half birthday'. She died at the end of April, just after her half birthday. But it got me thinking: why do we wait until we have an obvious expiration date to decide what we really want to do? We need to start sooner, people! We gotta start while we're young enough and healthy enough to do this stuff. 

So here's what I have so far on my bucket list.

Skydive (tandem jump) May 31, 2014! 
Go to the movies alone (it's a confidence thing)
Get highlights in my hair 7/11/2013 I got copperish-red lowlights  & 5/22/14 highlights!
Go on a hot-air balloon ride (maybe wearing Depends)
Take my son to the beach (June 29, 2012)
Go canoeing or kayaking (as a rower, I was in a canoe as a little girl but don't remember it)
Go to Hawaii or somewhere tropical (with a pound of bug repellent) for vacation
Go to the National Archives (9/28/2012)
Go to the National Cathedral
Go to the Jefferson, Washington, and Lincoln monuments(9/28/2012)
Go to the Holocaust museum (9/27/1012)
Tour the White House (10/2/2012)
Go to Italy (scheduled for March, 2015!!)
Go to Germany and see Schloss Neuschwannstein (that's the castle on which they based Sleeping Beauty's castle)
Shoot a handgun at a shooting range (August 15, 2013)
Learn how to climb a tree (this is influenced by the Hunger Games books)
Do archery again (
Make my own clotted cream (because homemade whipped cream is NOT the same thing)
Paint a room (May 28, 2012)
Jog a mile
Get a facial (9/7/2012)
Plant a tree
Have a garden that doesn't consist of weeds (I planted Sweet William and a begonia just the other day! They aren't dead yet!)
Take dance lessons (like ballroom)
Do a backbend and/or the splits (I have this thing about being somewhat in shape)
Buy a lottery ticket (won $5 today on my annual birthday lottery ticket!--May 28, 2012) (Won $25 on my 32nd birthday ticket 5/28/2013)
Learn about spiders and snakes (because knowledge is power and they both scare the dickens outta me)
Polar Bear Plunge! January 4, 2014, the ocean was 40 degrees!

I know I will continue to add to this list (because as of today, I'm only 31) as I cross things off and think of new stuff and my tastes change. The list consists of things that are huge deal things and more mundane stuff, obviously, because marking little things off the list helps me feel I'm accomplishing things. Whenever I make a to-do list I like to include ridiculously easy things or even something I've already done, just for the satisfaction of crossing that item off the list. It's like building up momentum.

So here I go.

Good Idea, Bad Idea

These are some tips I've picked up, some I learned the hard way:

Good Idea: Using Icy Hot after a strenuous workout session.
Bad Idea: Mixing up the tube of Icy Hot with a tube of anything else.


Good Idea: Plucking stray eyebrows.
Bad Idea: Over-plucking eyebrows. They are very sensitive and if they feel you don't want them there, they will never come back. EVER.


Good Idea: Buying products suited to your hair type/skin type.
Bad Idea: Forgetting where you put them.


Good Idea: Cleaning with bleach and/or vinegar to get a deep clean.
Bad Idea: Doing your cleaning while wearing clothes you want to wear in public ever again and without rubber gloves.


Good Idea: Relaxing while reading a good book.
Bad Idea: Reading right before bed when you just can't put the book down. You'll finish in record time but lose sleep and dream about the book (anyone else having Hunger Games dreams? No? Just me, then?)


Good Idea: Going outside and lounging to enjoy the gorgeous weather while wearing SPF 30+.
Bad Idea: Falling asleep and getting a really, really uneven tan.


Good Idea: Playing Wii Fit.
Bad Idea: Playing Wii Fit when your pets are being needy and you have little kids running around. You don't get extra points for trying to concentrate amid the chaos; the trainer will think you have the balance of someone with a stomach virus and an inner-ear infection and you will have a very low score.


Good Idea: Sleeping on your back so you don't add wrinkles to your face by smashing your face into your pillow.
Bad Idea: Sleeping on your back while a pet sleeps on your face.


Good Idea: Vacuuming.
Bad Idea: Vacuuming when you're missing an earring or assembling a puzzle with a LOT of pieces.


Good Idea: Painting your nails red to add a pop of color and some spice to your look.
Bad Idea: Failing to fix mistakes. People will think you were just in a horrible fight.


Good Idea: Exfoliating in the shower with a mixture of cornmeal and honey, then soaping up and rinsing as usual.
Bad Idea: Doing the above when you have an ant problem.

More Kitchen Adventures

I'm not your usual cook. I make Hollandaise sauce in the blender, cookies out of cake mix, fudge in the microwave, etc.

 I prefer to bake. I have very little experience cooking meat, so Thanksgiving is scary for me because I'm suddenly in charge of a huge bird as the focal point. I can make meatloaf and Shepherd's Pie and cook eggs seven ways but something about cuts of meat is strange to me. I think I'm overly anxious about it not being done in the middle. I mean, let's face it, even with something as easy as Hot Pockets you usually end up with filling that's either half-frozen or lava. I've mastered Hot Pockets (thanks to college) but meat still confuses me. I don't own a grill either, but I should cook inside before I go outside and get attacked by  mosquitoes while I agonize over steaks on the grill.

I don't even like to defrost meat. People have their hang-ups and chores they don't like. One of mine is defrosting meat. I would rather take meat out of the freezer two days in advance then have a defrost-a-thon with the microwave. I've also begun to notice when something has been frozen. I don't just mean if something has freezerburn, I mean if pasta or whatever was frozen and then thawed and cooked or reheated.

My favorite cookbook is tried-and-true recipes from people I know. However, I did have an incident with French onion soup. I'm not a big fan of it anyway. But I tried making some, slaved over it for about 3 hours and then didn't like it so I had a pb&j for dinner. I was so disappointed! So I've learned not to mess around with a complicated recipe for a food I don't really care for (i.e. no asparagus or salmon in my kitchen). Sure, if I ran into Bobby Flay or Cat Cora in Kitchen Stadium and they wanted to make salmon for me, I'd taste it. Let's face it, if something tastes really good, it was probably a slight pain in the butt to make.

Now, I haven't quite figured out the spice thing either. I know if the dish is Italian-ish then you can add basil and oregano and garlic and diced tomatoes. Of course I usually add whatever a recipe calls for, outside of hot peppers (I have acid reflux and an onion allergy).

I have on occasion craved foods I don't even like. This wasn't just a pregnancy thing. But it's not weird stuff, it's just foods I normally wouldn't eat, like supreme pizza. I'm working on broadening my food horizons so that I can at least tolerate, if not enjoy, new foods. I've learned to like black olives. I'm still working on green. I like Kalamata olives too (they come on my favorite pizza actually) but I can't just sit and eat them.

I have a small addiction to Nutella. I don't eat it instead of peanut butter on a sandwich. I spread it on shortbread cookies and eat it for dessert :-D Then the next day I go to the gym.