Tuesday, September 18, 2012

That Time I Went Grocery Shopping For the First Time After Getting Married

When Eric and I were eating dinner last night, we were talking about how often we ate out when we first got married and how strange it was for me to spend money on going out to eat because my family rarely ate out growing up. Then he brought up the first time I went grocery shopping for the first time after we got married. It gave both of us a good laugh and I thought, heck- why not put it on the blog so that when we get older we can remember/share with our children funny experiences we had in the early years of our marriage. So without further ado, my grocery shopping story:

We had gotten home from our honeymoon and were settling into real life in our adorable little townhouse in Scottsdale as a newly married couple when we realized our cupboards were bare. Eric asked if I could go grocery shopping after work on Monday, and like a good little wifey, I happily obliged. I asked him if there was anything specific he would like me to get, and he said to just get whatever I wanted. Perhaps he meant, or what he should have said, is to get what I thought we needed for meals for the week.

Now, in order to fully appreciate my story, I must provide a little back story. Although I had moved out of my parents house after high school, and had lived on my own (well mostly on my own) I still had never gone "big grocery shopping," as we called it growing up, by myself. I usually would only pick up a few items at a time that I needed. Basically, "big grocery shopping" meant mom was going to wal-mart an hour away (oh the joy of small towns) to buy tons of groceries to last the next few weeks and we'd end up spending like 3 hours in wal-mart, during most of which we tried to convince her of things we should get. Things that we really, realllllly wanted. Most of those items included completely unhealthy, sugar infused, extremely delicious snacks. She, of course, always said no and would occasionally let us get one, less than $1, candy or candy bar at the check out stand. My sisters and I tired to get smart and one of us would distract my mom, while the other would place a yummy, non-mom-approved, snack into the cart and hope she would not notice. We actually got away with it a few times, but mostly, she found our hidden treasures when she started stacking all of the items on the sliding grocery belt. Okay, now fast forward back to Monday after work.

With no list in hand, I made my way into the grocery store after work and grabbed a cart, wondering what I should get. (You know what's coming, don't you?) I racked my brain, trying to remember the meals I knew how to make and trying to recall what the ingredients were. Just like I remembered my mom doing, I started at one end of the store down one isle and then weaved up and down the isles until I ended up on the opposite side of the store. After a couple of hours of pining over what to get, I realized I had successfully filled up my cart and proceeded to check out, with a big smile on my face.  I remember thinking, "Gosh, grocery shopping is so expensive!" It was so fun to be able to grocery shop for my own household, our little family of two. I loaded my brown plastic bags into the trunk of my car and headed home. I called Eric to let him know I was on my way, and to be ready to help me carry the groceries in. He asked how much I spent and I told him the amount... which was like $200 or something, and he asked if I got a lot of food for that amount (you see, he had never really "big grocery shopped" either, although I'm not sure how it was done in his household) and I told him I got tons! He could tell I was very excited and he met me outside when I pulled up to help me carry in my large load.

After all the bags were brought in, I started unloading the goods. And I do mean goods! As Eric helped me put the groceries away, he kept looking through the bags as if he was looking for something. When I asked him what was wrong, he said, "Where's all of the food?" As I looked around at what I had purchased, I had realized my little kid self inside me took over as a grocery shopped! I had come home with $200 worth of delicious snacks, and no actual food to eat! I guess I got overly excited about being able to get what I wanted, that I forgot that I would actually need to have meals to eat. The only thing I could think to say was, "You said to get whatever I wanted." My poor husband! He couldn't help but laugh because of how excited I was when he talked to me on the phone and then how sad my face looked when I realized I had ultimately failed at my first grocery shopping trip.

We ended up going back to the store the next day, together, (okay, it's obvious I needed some supervision!) and bought another $100 or so worth of groceries to make actual meals.
Oh common, who needs breakfast, lunch, and dinner anyway? :)

By the way- I realized I liked grocery shopping with Eric rather than alone so I came up with "the grocery game" to convince him to come with me. If you have a husband that doesn't particularly like going grocery shopping with you, perhaps my game will work for you! Let me know if you want the rules to the game!* ;)

Want another laugh? The next time I went grocery shopping, I ended up getting a few packages of paper plates and plastic cups because both Eric and I hated doing dishes. I may as well have taken up stock because that lasted a good 6 months! The only time we busted out my adorable dish set that my mother-in-law got us, was when someone else came over to eat. I can admit when I'm lazy, and that was such a lazy thing to do, but hey, it made us happy and made for a clean kitchen!

For those who may be concerned for my husband's well-being, I assure you that I am a very competent, list-making, occasional-coupon-using grocery shopper now, I do know how to cook a meal or two, and both Eric and I know how to and do actually clean the dishes. ;)

*Update:
The Grocery Game:

Rule 1: You both have to be present to win.
Rule 2: No adding along the way with a calculator, only secretly in your head.
Rule 3: You must make your guess prior to the first item being scanned. (On your way to the check-out stand works great.)

Objective: Be the one to estimate the closest cost of the grocery bill.

Prize: The one who gets closest to the actual bill (can be over or under), gets one SEXUAL favor of their choice (translate that however you wish;) ), redeemable within 24 hours. :)

Wednesday, September 12, 2012

Strength?



This quote describes how I feel today, and everyday for that matter, in regards to infertility. When people say to me "I don't know how you do it" or ask "how do you stay so strong?" Well, this is my answer. I don't have a choice. I don't choose this. I can't just flip the light switch to off and say, "Okay, I'm done now! This infertility thing was so fun while it lasted but I'll just go ahead and take that newborn girl, actually make that two, next Tuesday around 2:30pm. I'll take them with a side of curly hair, one with blue eyes, one with green, extra chub on the side, light on the crying, hold any health issues. Please and thank you!"
 People that don't struggle with infertility don't know just how lucky they are. Sometimes people close say completely the wrong thing to me or around me... I just smile and don't clue them into the hurt, and occasional anger, going on inside me in reaction to what they said. Today I feel pissed at the world but seeing this picture posted on good ol' Facebook helped me realize that I am strong, though not fully by choice. Tomorrow will be a better day and I will feel not so moody and pissed off:)

I have decided soon I will write a "what not to say to people struggling with infertility post" to hopefully help people be somewhat more understanding and to also keep things from being said that can set off a hormonal infertile at any given moment. :) 


For now, that is all.


Friday, September 7, 2012

A Random Post About Feelings, a Confession, Venting, a Wedding, Choreography, and the New House

For the past few weeks, I have kept trying to start a new post and each time, I realize I'm just not sure what I'm wanting to blog about, so this is just going to be a post of random ramblings.

I have loved the support Eric and I have gotten from friends, family, and strangers with our infertility journey. It has been nice to be open and talk about it with people instead of just keeping my thoughts and feelings to myself. I also have loved that there have been some people who have come to me with their story and thanked me for sharing mine because they can relate. I really wanted to be able to help someone in a similar situation and have been touched by those I've been able to relate to.

So I'm going to confess an awful addiction I have that I, for some reason, torture myself with. I absolutely love watching A Baby Story, Make Room for Multiples, and even more awful, an occasional Teen Mom and shows about teenage pregnancy. Why do I do this to myself, you ask? I have yet to find the answer myself. In fact, I'm watching A Baby Story as I type this- awful, right? Watching A Baby Story and Make Room for Multiples isn't that bad. I love watching the whole experience and seeing those babies fresh from heaven just warms my heart and with the multiples show, many of the couples struggled with infertility and had to have a treatment in order to get the babies here... so I allow myself a 1 minute pity party that I don't have a baby, and then move on. The Teen Mom and other shows about teenage pregnancy, that's where more of the angry feelings come out. Now, don't get me wrong, I don't think that teens are incapable of being good parents, but it's just super frustrating that so many teenagers, making not so good choices, get to be blessed with the gift of creating life, while married couples, with the love and means to take care of a child, are left with vacant wooms. (Ha get it? room/womb.) I try not to judge, because I know that children are placed where and with whom they are meant to be, but I can't help but be a little jealous and hurt when they say things like, "I wish I would have waited to have sex" and "I wish I didn't have this baby so I could do teenager thing." It's just a slap in the face, ya know? Okay, I'm done venting about that for now.

Being so busy with infertility treatments from October to June, it kind of felt like infertility was our whole life. Everything revolved around weekly, and sometimes daily, doctors appointments and our emotions were all over the place. We wanted to be hopeful, but realistic, then we'd get excited and be so scared, and after every failed treatment we were really sad and then tried to be faithful and patient and hopeful for the next month. Basically infertility took over everything. These past 3 months have been a nice chance to breath and to kind of reconnect with each other. I have had to remind myself that infertility does not define us and that we have so many things to be grateful for, namely each other. Even though going months without any treatments sometimes feels like we're wasting time, we have had other things to focus on. I am so happy I've been able to lose 25 scratch that, 24 pounds (I gained 2lbs last week with going to San Diego and everything, which I'm okay with because I was so sure I gained at least 5, and I've lost 1 of those this week so far) so that has been awesome. I hope to lose about 20 more, but realistically I think 15lb would be good. Maybe when I get brave, I'll post pictures of my before and after.

Well little Chelsea Bea is married off now- She's Chelsea Hansen! So exciting! We love Justin, aka Biebs, and him and Chelsea are so perfect for each other. They got sealed in the San Diego Temple, which was absolutely gorgeous! Her dress was so perfect and everyone loved it! The pictures outside were... well you know how family pictures at weddings go if you've ever experienced it, ha. Our family is a little loud, obnoxious, loving, and so much fun, and the Hansen's, well lets just say our families fit well together! I can't wait to see the pictures, I'm sure they'll turn out great! After the pictures outside the temple, I went with the photographer and Chelsea and Justin to La Jolla beach for pictures. I basically helped fluff her dress and held their shoes and anything else they/the photographer needed. Oh.my.goodness it was gorgeous, and I seriously cannot wait to see how those pictures turned out!
We had an awesome long weekend filled with tons of family, food, swimming, and great times. One of the boys' favorite eats of the weekend was Slaters 50/50. It was so delicious and has been featured a few times on the Food Network. If you haven't hear of it, you should look it up.

I have also been busy with choreographing for my mom's show choir, which I've been doing for like a million years... okay like 8 or 9 years, but still, that's a lot. The show we have been working on as of late is a Tribute to Michael Jackson show, and let me tell you- it's pretty Bad A, if I do say so myself! If you happen to wanna come watch the concert, dinner included, it's on Monday (the 10th) and I can get you the rest of the details if you wanna come. :)

The new house is coming along, for those of you that are interested, and hopefully we'll be able to get to move in pretty soon. We're all ready to get out of this house and have more space, although not necessarily excited to actually pack and move. Another reason is the backyard here. Holy yuck! Last month we realized we have a tick infestation when we found ticks on our dogs, those poor things. They had tons of ticks on them and we ended up taking them to the animal hospital for medications and luckily the property management company paid for it to get sprayed. I'm happy to report that our pups are now tick free thanks to their way too expensive monthly medication, but I know one spray is not gonna keep those suckers (literally) away, so I'm definitely ready to get out.

Welp, that is all I feel like rambling about for now! I'll post some pictures of Chelsea's wedding weekend a little later. Until next post.. :)