Free Music!

Amazon.com is sharing the Christmas spirit by putting out a promotional code for three FREE mp3 downloads! 

And it's not just on Christmas music! 

Technically it is $3 of free music, so if one or more of your three songs is $1.29, you will pay the extra, but still!

Here's the code:

GET3MP3S

So here's how it works, for those of you who who have never purchased music from Amazon. 

This was my first experience with it...

You don't put a bunch into your cart and then purchase them all at the end. You purchase them all one at a time. When you click "buy MP3" by the song, you are directed to a page where you select which credit card you would like to use. Select one, and be sure to enter in the promo code underneath. Then you select to purchase your first song, and it will take you to a "Congrats, you just bought a song!" page, but not to your receipt. If you want to see the receipt there is a link from that congrats page, and then you can see how you paid $0.00 for it! :) 

I may or may not have viewed my receipt for each song I got...

You do have to download their MP3 download program. The cool thing, though, is that the program sends the MP3s straight into iTunes when your downloads are complete!  

SO COOL.

I have two Amazon accounts (one from before I was married, and one current one), and Kirby has an account as well, so I was able to use the code three times!

Enjoy!

Vancouver

Kirby has a 6 hour interview today with a company in Vancouver, WA. 

Technically Portland, but the offices are in Vancouver (just over the Oregon/Washington border)? Don't worry. I don't really get it, either. 

 

A cold front has hit the area hard--our flight was delayed a couple hours last night because the pilots of our plane got caught in a storm in Denver on one of their earlier flights, which made them late late late. 

I just got a severe weather warning text. Apparently Utah is going to be hit hard later today with extreme cold, snow, and wind. I wonder if it's the same storm that passed through here? It's funny to me how scared people are of snow here. It snowed last night, and one of the head guys at the company here in Vancouver called Kirby to let him know that there was a possibility that they would be closed if the weather continued to be "this bad." :) To be fair, the roads were CRAZY slick last night, but I still giggle inside.

 

We didn't get to our hotel until about 2:30am, after which Kirby ran (well, drove, technically--the company rented a brand new Corolla for us. Pretty awesome.) to the nearest 24 hour grocery store to get some baby oatmeal (the one thing we forgot to pack.) 

 

What? Our child needs to EAT!?

Meanwhile, I was with Emily in our hotel room trying to soothe her and keep her from waking up the entire lodge while setting up a pack 'n' play with one hand. 

All things considered, Emily did GREAT. She loved ripping up the in-flight magazine, and was surprisingly pleasant three hours past her bedtime. Thank heavens for goldfish. She actually slept through most of the second leg (we had a stop in Vegas... BOOOO...), which allowed Kirby and I to sleep for most of that flight, too!

Now I'm just chilling in our cozy lodge hotel room, taking a break from straightening my hair. Emily is sleeping right next to me. I've got some sweet tunes playing.

Life is good.

Our main purpose in the Great Northwest is to celebrate Thanksgiving with Kirby's family. All of Kirby's siblings will be there, so we are really excited. 

There is about a 60% chance we'll be moving out of Utah in January. Kirby is in final round interviews with some companies, and waiting on offers from a couple others. Looks like our options will be:

 

(Drumroll please...)

Portland, OR

If all goes well today, of course...

Madison, WI

Have official offer...

Salt Lake City, UT

They've told us they want him. Should have official offer in about a week.

Orem, UT

Kirby needs to send in a sample of his technical writing before the interviewing process is considered complete.

Dallas, TX

Kirby's wanted. Offer is in the works.

I'm pretty sure I did a fabulicious jig when we got the official offer from the company in Wisconsin. 

I mean, it's an OFFICIAL OFFER.

With details and salary and health benefits and everything. 

I don't feel grown up enough for this! 

But I am crazy excited.

We should have offers/rejections (let's me optimistic, though, shall we???) by the end of the month, and we've told the company in Wisconsin that we'd let them know by December 6th, so our decision will have to be made by then!

It seriously blows my mind every time I think about it.

Aaaand, that's all I have to say right now.

I need to finish my hair...

Gut Buster

I came across this tonight as I was editing. 

Pretty sure I laughed out loud for about five minutes. 

For reals.

Out loud. 

Five Minutes.

Check Out My Moves!

**Update: Come see new and updated photos of this project HERE! :)

Does anyone else feel like their spice cupboard and/or baking cupboard is full to the max? Or overflowing, even? I used to dream of a spice rack that would allow me to have all my spices organized and at my fingertips. 

And then I got one. And it collects SO. MUCH. DUST.

SO.

I have been saving and washing Emily's baby food jars ever since we got back from Florida in order to do this:

(see that dusty spice rack????)

In order to eliminate all of these from my spice cupboard:

I still have some spices left in my cupboard, but I ran out of magnets, so I was only able to make 10 jars.

These took a bit of time, but very little skill. 

Obviously.  

I just collected baby food jars, rinsed them out, and pulled off as much of the label that I could. Then I popped them in the dishwasher (the lids, too). I didn't worry about the sticky spot left over since it would be covered by the paper/cardstock I wrapped around the jar.

I had some nice powerful magnets. I got mine from some store on ebay. 

To eliminate any need to coordinate colors on my part, I used the DCWV Latte Mat Stack, with its coordinating solid mat stack to decorate the jars. I had bought them a long time ago when I was on my paper kick. It was fun to be able to use them for something besides eye candy!

I Mod Podged 1" strips of paper around the jar. The Mat Stacks I had were 8x8, and I found that a 1"x 8" strip is the perfect size to wrap around standard baby food jars. I Mod Podged them to the jars, and then covered the strip in Mod Podge, too, to give it a nice finished sheen and to make sure the end of the strip wouldn't ever start peeling up. 

I made the labels out of two circular pieces of paper. I used a half dollar for my big circles, and a quarter for the cream colored circles. Hi-tech, I know. I wrote the names of the spices on the cream circles and let them dry for a bit, just to ensure they wouldn't bleed at all when I put Mod Podge over the top. I the glued the big circle to the bottom and let it dry a bit. Then I covered it in Mod Podge and put the cream circle on it, let it dry, and then covered the whole thing in Mod Podge again. 

Now for the magnets. The ones I had were smaller, so I used two on each jar. Kirby is a genius and pointed out that if I just hot glued the magnets straight to the lid, they might not end up being level, which would make the magnetic bond with the fridge weaker, and could even cause the magnets to pull free from the lid. So we got out an old card table and I stuck the magnets to it, put hot glue blobs on those, and actually set the lid (with the jar attached) on top of the magnets. That way, when the glue hardened, the magnets would be perfectly even. Worked like a charm. That wouldn't be an issue if you had magnets with a nice big radius, though. I reinforced the magnet by putting a ring of hot glue around the edge of the magnet. 

Whew! That's quite an explanation for a project that requires little skill!

So far I am loving it. It's SO easy to find the spices I need. No more rummaging around like a mad woman. Plus--my fridge is right next to our stove, so it is the most convenient spot to keep them!

I LOVE being able to see the colors and textures of the different spices through the glass. 

Yes. I am a texture junkie.

This is the less-than-creative way I'll have to keep them most of the time, or the cupboard can't open all the way.

It feels so great to finally have finished a project that's been on my to-do list for a while now.

Okay, so I'm wanting to make more so I guess I'm not technically FINISHED, but you get the idea...

Today.

I'm sitting here waiting for my unexpected load of laundry to be done. Emily decided to overturn an entire bowl of oatmeal in her lap this morning. Hardly any got on the tray of her high chair. Her pajamas were thoroughly gloopy. The pajamas would have to wait, though--we were running late for her 1 year checkup.

Did I mention my daughter is a YEAR OLD!?

While at the doctor's office, she slipped and bumped her face while cruising along. I snuggled with her until she stopped crying. When she pulled her face away, there was blood smeared all across her face. I felt so bad that she was bleeding. 

Poor Emily.

Then the doctor pointed out that there was a decent amount of blood on the shoulder of my sweater.

Poor Me.

And thus the spontaneous load of laundry came to be.

In other less melancholy news, here are Emily's one year stats:

Weight :: 25th Percentile

Height :: 50th Percentile

Head Circumference :: Between 25th and 50th percentile. 

Cuteness :: Unmeasurable. Off the charts. 

The doctor said so.