A Break for Awhile

I know that I haven't been posting a lot lately, and no where near as much as when I first started Fondant is Gross.  Life has been kind of crazy for me and I haven't quite managed to find a balance yet.

I also need to have some time to re-think about what I write about and what I put on the internet in general.

Three weeks ago today, our rental house was broken into.  Many things were taken, but we were relatively lucky. No one was hurt, and Tesla is fine even though she was loose in the house when it happened.  We also have several family things going on and it's just time for something to give.  I am tired of feeling guilty for not updating this more, so, I am taking a break from blogging until I can get my head on straight.

I will still update my weight stats when I can and I hope to be back soon doing full posts.

Take care of yourselves and we'll talk soon.

Jenny

FF - Favorite Blogs I Follow

1. Hyperbole and a Half by Allie

I've been waiting to write this until she started blogging again, which she has recently, yay!!.   I believe I found her blog through the 2010 Bloggies and it was the most hilarious one that I found.  I spent an entire weekend reading through her archives because she was so funny.  Had I been drinking milk during any of them, it would have come out through my nose.  Even her most recent post is funny, even though she is talking about her struggle with depression.  Which is not funny, and I felt so bad for laughing at her post, but she is so funny and I love to read her blog!

2. Marriage Confessions by Katie and Chris

Watching their little family grow has been wonderful.  Katie shares their ups and downs in such a personable way, I look forward to each and every post.  Even the ones that talk about child rearing that are irrelevant to me right now.  She has so much love and happiness in her life and her kids are so adorable!  Gracie totally looks like her mama, smiley and pretty lady!

3. Living Like the Kings by Kat

There is no favoritism being showed here, Peanut is so freaking adorable, I can't wait to see what she'll do next!  I just want to pinch her cheeks and make gurgling baby noises at her!

4. The Ex-Pat Bride by Sarah

 

She doesn't post often, at least since I have started following her, but I love her blog.  We have, I think, a lot in common.  Sarah and Mr. Darcy just returned from their pre-wedding honeymoon, which they won!  I can't wait to hear how it went!  Oh, and she's moving to England.  ENGLAND. This chick is jealous.

5. Fat Cyclist by Elden

He inspires me to be a better person with every post and giveaway that he does to help raise money to fight cancer.  His first wife died from cancer several years ago and I am not sorry to admit, I cried like a baby when I read that.  He is a funny, poignant wonderful blogger.  And his guest bloggers are funny and tell great stories (that's right Paul, I'm looking at you).  And his wife The Hammer is pretty cool.  And the IT Guy, the twins and The Swimmer kick some butt too.  And he has a book coming out and you can pre-order it on PayPal.  Go read him.  Like, now.

What are your fav blogs to read?

Guest Post at The Ex-Pat Bride

Oops! I thought I had this set to automatically go up yesterday, but I was wrong!

Well, yesterday I was featured on The Ex-Pat Bride's site as a guest blogger, go check it out!

Today is the first time I will have done a guest post for another blogger!

Sarah at the Ex-Pat Bride is on her honeymoon, so I wrote about Adam's and my honeymoon at the Castle in the Country.

It's fixed!!

Last night I posted a plea for help with the header of Fondant is Gross.  And two people offered their assistance.

First, Niki posted on Facebook, that if I sent her the code and what I wanted she'd fix it for me. I wasn't sure if I wanted to just let someone else do it, because I was so freaking frustrated with it or continue the learning process so I could fix it later, if when I break it trying to do something else..  So, I slept on it.  I awoke with the desire to continue beating my head against the brick wall that is web design.  But I still want to thank Niki for the offer, so thanks Niki!!

Fortunately, I also woke up to an email that would assist me in my fight.  The email was from my friend Charlie (one of our groomsmen) who does some computer support things for a company in another state.  Our relationship is very weird.  I spend a lot of time telling him to shut up, because he deserves it.  I swear, we must be brother and sister in another life.  Many times when we lived in the same state and city and were hanging out, many household objects became weapons of destruction.  One time I ended up falling over the pile of logs next to the wood stove in an attempt to get to the slipper first.  Don't ask.

Another time poor Jeff, Adam's roommate at the time, was on the receiving end of the slipper attack in a rare moment of united weirdness. Long story.

Ah, memories! (Anyone singing CATS here will be shot. I hate that musical. Ugh.)

Aaaaaaaanywaaaaaaay!  Charlie lives with his wife, Rachael, too far away from us, but it is what it is.  Charlie kindly spent some time answering my questions and helping me wrangle and beat the CSS into submission this morning/afternoon.  After several hours of chit chat while CSS. HTML and Blogger put up a valiant fight, Charlie and I finally, finally beat them down.

I couldn't have done it without you, Charlie.  

I would spend a considerable amount of time talking Charlie up now, but since he already has a full-time job, I don't think he would want to be embarrassed on here, but if he tells me otherwise, then I will write more.  Basically, just having him point me at the appropriate W3 Schools CSS tutorials and telling me how to  fix my improper coding (when I tried to adapt the example code to what I needed, and broke the code) was a huge help.

Thanks again and give my love to Rachael!

P.S. Everyone please keep your fingers and toes and eyes and arms and anything else you can cross, crossed, I should hear on the job I interviewed for earlier this week very soon! 

Please, please, please help me!

I am in day four thousand of fighting with the template of my blog.  It is getting rather demoralizing.

I have managed to do a lot of things fairly easily, I picked a new template, went through several different colors til I decided on this one and then I had to go through matching the colors through out the blog because I didn't use any of the pre-chosen color swatch things they have. Because I'm stubborn like that.  Or stupid.  You pick.  I also had Adam take the picture for the header.  Well, several different pictures, poses, etc.  Then I edited my favorite until I got the perfect header!  Woo!

I also added the Facebook button that links to my new Fondant is Gross Facebook Page, the Twitter button to my own Twitter feed, a button for my RSS feed and one so you can email me.  I changed the fonts and sizes also.

One problem is that I can't get the picture, or my Blog Title and Description to do what I want.  I want the picture to be stretched out across the top so it is even with the tab menu and I want the title of the blog along the bottom, on the left.  Or at least the knowledge of how to align it vertically until I'm happy with it.

So, please, if you can help me with the HTML and CSS so I can get those things to work, I would really, really appreciate it.  I'll even give you a whole post worshipping your mad programming skillz, or let you plug your mad skillz yourself if you like. Or both.

This is the last thing that I want to do to it and I cannot get it to work!! ARGH!

 PLEASE HELP ME BEFORE I RIP ALL MY HAIR OUT!!!

Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes!

A lot is happening here at Fondant is Gross.  I wanted to personalize the layout more than just having the template Blogger gave me, so I am doing that.

Unfortunately, I am not very good with HTML or CSS yet. I know very, very little and I have a propensity to breaking things, which I think is what's up with my RSS button.

Adam is helping with what he can, but this isn't his specialty, although he has that experience.

So, I ask your superb patience whilst the changes happen here, and please let me know if I break anything!

Back from Vacaaaaaation!

Hellooooo!  I am back from 10 sandy and mostly sunny days at the beach from Hoeft State Park, the best State Park in Michigan.

My apologies to all who thought I may have disappeared for good this time, especially my new reader from Wide Lawns, Dawn.  (Hi Dawn!)  I didn't want to post that I was going on vacation as it didn't seem wise, but I have no qualms in telling you I have returned.  I would have posted that I was at least taking a hiatus from blogging, but the days leading up to our departure were rather hair-raising and didn't leave a whole lot of time for posting.

This vacation was particularly important to my family as we weren't sure that my mom would be with us for this one.  But we are very glad that she is and we can continue our family ritual of camping at Hoeft for 20 straight years, woo!

And a big kudos to a Mrs. Esther Gibbs who has been camping at Hoeft for 60 consecutive years.  They threw her a party :)

Alright, back to more regularly scheduled (and far more freckled) programming!

Why Structure is Important. Very Important. For Me.

For the last twenty years, I have been living my life on a semester based year.  That's a long time.

Now I that I have graduated, I no longer live my life based on semesters.  It's weird.  But I have been trying to get into a rhythm, a routine to keep me from wasting time while I look for a job.

I get up sometime between 8 and 9 am, if I sleep til 10, the rest of the day just disappears and I don't get anything done.  I eat breakfast and on Monday/Wednesday/Friday I wait an hour or so to digest and then I go to the gym to workout, shower, eat lunch and blog.  And after I eat lunch, I get really sleepy.  I have been trying to keep from succumbing every day, but today it's extra difficult.

Tuesdays and Thursdays are difficult, because yoga is at 7:30p.  I have no real structure on those days.
Those two days, and M/W/F afternoons are really where the time suck happens, because I don't have anything planned.  I try and keep busy with projects around the house. Like, making a new papasan chair cushion or a case for my kindle, unpacking things and getting ready for Courtney's Bridal Shower and Bachelorette Party.  But eventually, you just plain run out of stuff to do.

I need to find a job.  I am running out of things to do around here, and it's beginning to drive me mad.

I am trying to not get to the point of boredom, but I feel it's not far off.

Structure, for me is so important.  And if I had kids I would be able to have time to help them learn new things, and do all kinds of stuff, but that ship will not come into the harbor for several years.  With structure, deadlines and projects, I feel productive.  And it doesn't hurt to get paid for those things.

In the mean time I will spend my time working out, blogging, watching movies and reading lots of books!

And job hunting.

Important Announcement involving shoeperwoman.com

I read a blogger named Katri from The Cat With Glasses who follows a woman named Amber who styles herself the Shoeperwoman.  She has been actively blogging as Shoeperwoman for a little over two years and has had the domain since 2008.

Now Amber, has run into a problem with another woman named Laura who has knowingly registered Shoeperwoman with .co.uk and has now been trying essentially un-do all the work that Amber and her husband have been working for.  I really hope that this never happens to me, but I also don't anticipate this blog actually being more than an outlet for me.  You know never know, though, so please go give Shoeper Woman some love and read the full scope of the problem.

30 Days of Truth - Day 16: Someone or Something You Definitely Could Live Without

1. Drama (not the theatre kind but the kind theatre people create outside of a play)
2. Being sick (ugh, I am miserable!  I am working on a great fever, so exciting, right?)
3. People I love dying
4. People I love being idiots
5. People who are mean to me or people I love
6. People who use scapegoats instead of admitting they effed up, or don't know what the hell is going on.
7. Not getting cast in things - I like being cast, it's fun.
8. Bigotry
9. Sexism
10. Extremism
11. Violence of any kind (that's right, I'm talking to you a-hole upstairs)
12. Sarah Palin (why won't she go away?!)
13. Fox News "op-ed" people
14. Asinine behavior in politics - by anyone.
15. People who attack others for their beliefs, not cool.
16. People who choose ignorance over learning something and forming an opinion instead of believing what others tell them to.

Well, I that's all I can think of at the moment, I'm sure there are other things that irk me.  If I think of them, I will add them - just for you!

Thanks for sticking with me through this blogging blitz, I am only four days of truth away before I am caught up.  As for now, I am going to go to bed, I mean sleep, I'm already in bed.  Wish me luck in getting better!

30 Days of Truth - Day 12: Something You Never Get Compliments On

I don't know!  My shoe size?

That seems a weird thing to be complimented on. 

I also never get complimented on my blogging skillz.  But I don't really talk about it a lot either.

I'll edit this post if I can think of anything that I like about myself that I never get compliments on.

Short post.  Hmm....

PIE!

Just checking to make sure you were paying attention! :D

Aaaaaand: Make sure to go vote for The Williamston Theatre at the Pepsi Refresh Project!!