One of my odd talents

I know I've blogged before about my love of antiques and that there are particular ones that spike my interest more than others. Andrew's mom and sister seem amazed sometimes that I've managed to memorize what the different types of glassware look like and that I can guesstimate their value as well. I get a rush from finding these treasures and paying low prices for them and I guess its better than most addictions like drinking or doing drugs.....but I digress. This is my strange talent and collection....my love of glass.

This stuff for example is Duncan-Miller and the pattern is called Cantebury - its my moms favorite. She started collecting this because her mom and her grandma both worked in this factory in Pennsylvania. Since my mom's mother died when she was 4, she doesn't have many memories of her so collecting this glass is sort of my moms way of connecting with her past. I only had one piece until about 3 months ago when I was at an auction that just so happened to have lots of Duncan-Miller pieces! I saw that vase and I just had to have it, I paid about $7 and I've never seen one like it!

Most of what you see here is Anchor Hocking made 30 mins away from where I live in Lancaster, OH. The top and middle shelf is called Bubble, its a clear glass with a slight blue tint. The two plates on the bottom are Early American Presscut and the glasses and pitcher are unknown....the glasses were Andrew's parents and the pitcher I got at a garage sale because it was so cute!

I know most people my age could care less about this stuff, but its something that's important to me. I think once a week now I'm going to blog about my new glassware treasures. I'm going to an auction tomorrow with Andrew's mom and sister so I'm sure I'll find some treasures there!

So what sort of things do you collect? Is there a particular item you have in that collection that you hold close to your heart?

Is it luck or something else?

I've always been a believer that everything happens for a reason, so I'd say I'm more of the divine intervention type....but part of me believes in luck too. I mean really, I don't think that God totally plans for people to win the lottery because sometimes it happens to large groups of people (like the Mega Millions) and I don't think we are all predestined to win contests and things of that nature. Some people are just lucky.

Take for example my brother, one Christmas he won $47 on scratch of tickets and I won $1. He also wins on bottle tops for pop and the non-scratch off tickets too, nothing more than $50 but still, its pure luck! Sure I've won a few things in my life, but nothing like Adam has over the years.

But there are times when I know for sure that God has intervened and luck no longer comes into play. Here are just a few things I can think of that have happened in my life.

• I remember when I was about 10 or 11 we were leaving church and running late getting out. My parents sing with a group at our church and everyone likes to sit around and talk after mass and for some reason things went long that day. We finally headed out and got up to the freeway overpass that we go under on the way home and noticed a horrible accident. A truck had come over the bridge and fallen onto the road below not even 15 minutes before we got to the intersection. Had we left church on time we could have been under that bridge and been smashed by that truck. For some reason that story has stuck with me for many years.
• I cooked lasagna for my high school boyfriend for valentines day one year. I planned this nice dinner with him and my parents even said they would leave so we could be alone! I was so nervous about it that I didn't cook the meat before I added it to the mix, but thankfully I didn't set the oven timer and the lasagna cooked a little longer making the meat cook as well and no one got sick. I would have been mortified at the time if I would have cooked something that made my boyfriend puke.
  
• I was supposed to be a personal assistant for a Realtor a few years back and after spending two months training for the job, he decided he could no longer afford an assistant. I had already quit my other job at the office to do this and I was angry. When his assistant came back from maternity leave he canned her too and he got in trouble for wrongful termination and moved to another brokerage....needless to say it was a good thing I didn't keep that job because I would have been wound up in his problems. Besides that I got a better job where I was able to put to use what I had done in school!

I had a hard time writing this post because it was hard for me to think of other reasons that I don't always believe in luck. I think there is a certain element that free will plays in all of our lives, but at the same time God has some kind of plan for all of us. Sure, we may not always think that what happens is fair, but its just the way things were destined to be.

So which do you believe in, luck or divine intervention?

I'm participating in Mama Kat's writers workshop today, so get on over there and do the same!

Weekend Recap

I look forward to weekends now probably more than I ever have in my whole life. Right now its just about the only time I get to spend with Andrew that lasts for more than 3 hours. He goes to bed at 7pm now and I'm not home from work till 4:30 most days.

Friday: I talked Andrew into taking me out to eat at Roosters, our favorite wing joint! The food was good but our waitress was lame. We headed home and by 9pm we were in bed. Both of us were so exhausted from the week!

Saturday: Andrew and my brother headed an hour north to a junkyard on the hunt for a 350 for my brothers '66 Chevy Truck (Rusty, as we call him). I stayed home and cleaned up the house and did about 5 loads of laundry (ick) and waited till my bestie Laura got off work so we could hang out. We went thrifting which was a total blast and got lots of stuff and grabbed some food on the way home (I decided on Chipotle....it was AMAZING). We had some sparkling wine and watched TV and carried on till 11pm, which anymore is super late for me!

Sunday: I made my typical big weekend breakfast of eggs, bacon and fried potatoes with cheese (yeah its not healthy but its so good on a weekend morning) and hung out with Andrew till we headed to the Scott Antique Market at the fairgrounds. There was so much stuff there that it was overwhelming and there was no way you could really see everything. Jewelery, furniture, decorations, glassware, toys and memorabilia - pretty much everything you could ever want! I got yet another vintage coat, knee length black wool for $12 and a case for my vintage jewelery too!

Goals for the week: Try cooking a new dish; workout in the morning at least twice; clean the bathroom; organize stuff for the summer garage sale.

Coming up next weekend: Auction on Saturday at the Fairfield Co. Fairgrounds with Andrew's mom and sister!

Home Sweet Home

I've been fortunate in my life to have not moved around too much once I started grade school. I was born in Dearborn, Michigan on a Thursday at 3:11am. My mom and dad at the time were living in a trailer as they were young and didn't have much money. When I turned two we moved to an apartment in Ypsilanti, MI and not too long after that my mom found out she was pregnant with my brother. We soon moved to a house in Livonia in a quaint neighborhood of what you could call Huber Homes not too far from one of the Ford Plants. The house was nice and the first place I really remember living. It had a fenced yard, a finished basement with a playroom for me (well I guess Adam too) and a pool table. My preschool was in our neighborhood and my mom would walk me to school. We lived there till I was four when my dad was given the opportunity to start a new job in Ohio.

My brother was only 6 months old when my parents decided to move back to my dad's home state. I'm sure it was not easy for my mom trying to move with two young kids. My dad went first and tried to find us a house but it wasn't as easy as he thought and we ended up living with my grandparents for a while. Soon my dad found a house for us, a nice fixer-upper ranch in New England Acres.

It was an adorable house too, a big yard and a garage, I even got a room with pink carpet and wild 70's wallpaper! There were lots of kids in the neighborhood and that is where I met my best friends Jessica and Melissa. My mom and dad spent a good part of the first year there fixing the house, tearing up carpet and putting down new floors, stripping 10 layers of wallpaper in one room, painting the outside and having the basement waterproofed. As Adam and I got older, my parents decided that we needed a bigger house with more room for teenagers and more than one bathroom. I was in 6th grade when they put our house up for sale and my parents knew they wanted to stay in the same general area so we wouldn't have to change schools. Prior to this, my 5th grade teacher had retired and was in the process of moving away and told me that my parents should buy her house. I laughed it off, but a few months later my mom and I drove past where they lived and noticed a For Sale by Owner sign in the yard. My mom walked in the door a few weeks later and instantly fell in love with the house.

We bought my former 5th grade teachers house and in the summer of 1997 we moved to Chevington Woods! It was there that I met two of my other best life long friends, Laura and Alex.

I lived here till I went off to college in 2003 and lived in the next 3 places on campus at Otterbein College.

In 2007 I moved back home and went to school part time. I couldn't afford to be on my own at the time since I only had a part time job. In 2008 I met Andrew and we started looking for a house not too long after in the area where he was living. He got a job on the total other side of town and we had to start looking in other areas, which worked out because it was the same side of Columbus where I grew up!

Then in the winter of 2009 Andrew bought a house and asked me to move in with him!!! On March 28th it will be one year since he close on the house. This is the listing photo, but trust me it looks much better now!

I really hope that we don't have to move again for at least 5 years!

Today I'm participating in Mama Kat's Writers Workshop and I chose prompt number 4 about how many homes you've had, but I kinda changed it up a little talking about all of the places I've lived! Get on over there and choose a prompt!

I've hit a wall

I've been trying since the fall to loose this 20lbs that I've managed to gain since Andrew and I got back together and I just can't seem to feel better about it. I have done nothing extreme to try to loose weight (I've done the Hydroxycut and the Green Tea pills before) and I've tried to workout a considerable amount during the week.

I buy healthy snacks.
I don't drink pop anymore.
I drink lots of water during the day and at home.
I don't eat fast food but maybe once a month.
I bring food from home and I avoid the vending machine.
I don't drink beer anymore (although I'm sure wine isn't much healthier)

Winter is killing me though....if I could just get outside to do things!! I love walking the dog but I have to take her to the field next to the house which is a total mud-hole right now (the pavement is too hard on her poor foot that was broken when she was a puppy). I can't afford to join a gym right now and I've got my Carmen Electra and 30 Day Shred DVD's in constant rotation, but I feel like its not enough.

My new plan is to work out in the morning before work (now that I go in around 7:30). If I get to bed by 10pm at the latest I can get up around 5:15ish and workout for 30 mins, shower and get ready for work. I also am going to try to eat breakfast as much as possible. I got some oatmeal at the store last week and yogurt so one of those would be fine as well - maybe even an egg and some cheese on an english muffin too!

I just don't know what else I can do to try and make myself healthier. I did decide though to be more vegetarian after we eat up some more of the beef we purchased in the fall. I'm looking for some suggestions here!!! Things I can do at home and eating habits that I can establish to make this weight come off before summer, and thanks in advance to anyone that wishes to comment!