Janae Says...

After four or five nights of experimenting, I think I have formulated a pretty decent (and mostly clean) hot chocolate recipe. When I want a clean version of something, I usually head straight to The Gracious Pantry . She is amazing and has easy recipes. So I found a couple of recipes on her site. This is the one I have primarily leaned on in the last few days. I have heated the milk and cocoa powder and added the sweetener after. I have heated all of it at the same time. I've put too much sweetener. I've heated it up with Peppermint Mocha creamer . I've tried lots of things, guys. So I usually buy almond coconut milk from Blue Diamond . It lasts quite a while. I use it in place of cow's milk, for the most part. Anyway, I ran out of milk the other night and ran to Wal-Mart last night. This was a mistake because I always buy my almond milk at Smith's. Wal-Mart was all out. So I had to resort to getting the more expensive, double-calorie Silk coconut milk ....

Oh hey, guys! I'm back. And this blog post is going to rock your world. That's right. This one has been rolling around in my brain for a while. We'll see how it all works out. See, I have this problem. I can't seem to find a chap stick that I like. Once I do, I can't find it anywhere anymore. After going through so many of these, I have managed to concoct a list of characteristics that I need to have a successful relationship with my chap stick. First, let me explain what has been wrong with each of these. Ah, Burt's Bees. HONEY lip balm, no less. Everyone swears by this stuff. I thought for certain it had to be good. I haven't tried this in a very long time. I gave up on it after a few applications of it. From what I can recall, I don't like the way it goes on--kind of rough at first. And after using it, my lips felt dry. It created a need for more chap stick. That is not what I want. I don't want a product that makes me need it! ...

So I have this love in my life. It's called " So You Think You Can Dance ." It's on Fox. It is my favorite. Seriously. I don't watch a lot of TV shows. I don't like feeling obligated to finish things. Because then I have to. And I don't like when enjoyable things turn into things I have to do. Which is what happens with TV shows for me. Anyway, I had my cool friends Kristen and Julie record my show on their DVR this past season. I seriously feel like I cannot live without it. I look forward to it every year, and when it's on I look forward to it every week! Kristen decided to text-message the surprise to me yesterday morning: she would be taking me to see the LIVE SHOW. Fortunately, I had no other obligations for Friday night. She already bought the tickets. And she said, "Happy early birthday!" Three months too early, but for real? No complaints when it comes to this. My mom and grandma wondered what my #sytycd business was all about o...

I have one of those chicken or the egg questions for you. Did I stop blogging because I thought no one read my blog? Or does no one read my blog because I never write on it? Really, I think about blogging all the time. I even have a notepad on my phone full of blog topics and ideas. I just never sit down and actually do it. So you can only imagine my surprise when the awesome Danakin Skywalker nominated me for the Sunshine Award today. I read her blogs regularly, and was just going through her post this morning, and saw a link to my blog  on her blog post . What the? I was so surprised and had to reread to figure out why I was being mentioned. So this was a day maker, ego boost, whatever you want to call it. Thanks, Danica! This award is "to notice and encourage positivity and sunshine on the Internet." I never have considered myself to be an especially sunny person. Especially when one of my first thoughts on the road this morning was, "Wow. The only thing worse th...

I went to the Big Ass Show on Saturday with a couple of awesome friends ( Eileen and Whitney ). We saw - Dear Hunter - Family of the Year - Pepper - Capital Cities - Blue October - The Airborne Toxic Event - Panic! at the Disco It was loads of fun. Pepper and Family of the Year were good to dance to. The Panic singer was both funny and horribly cocky and un-funny at the same time. And while this day was great, this is all beside the point. Why? Because I was wearing this: I figured we would be outside, in 90 plus degree weather. It's a concert. Why wouldn't I wear a tank and shorts? I normally try to strike a balance. For example, if I'm wearing pants, I am OK wearing a tank. If I'm wearing shorts, I try to have short sleeves at the very least. But today I made an exception. After Whitney left, Eileen and her friend went to the meet and greet for Panic! While I sat and waited for them, a former student came walking up to me. Student: Hello. Me: W...

Narci-cystic So last August, I had these pretty intense pains. They felt like gas pains. But it lasted for a long time, and it hurt to move my legs and to walk. It wasn’t enough for me to feel like I needed to do anything about it. The same thing happened in October, much worse than in August. I was in the middle of a workout, doing sit-ups, actually, when I started hurting. It was bad, but I was determined to finish my workout. Then suddenly, the pain came in sharp spurts. It was excruciating. I cried mixed with quiet screams—the inhaling, confused, panicked kind. I didn’t know what was happening. I folded up into fetal position on my living room floor, unable to move because any small movement sent pains shooting through me. A less extreme version happened in December. Then it happened a few weeks later in January. In the shower, I was extremely light headed and felt those familiar gas pains. I knew something was wrong since I felt like I was going to pass out. I con...

On July 31…  -P picked me up at the Baltimore airport, and we went straight to breakfast. -P had heard about this restaurant on Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives that he wanted to try. -So we went to Blue Moon Café. It was amazing. -I had the country scramble (biscuit topped with eggs, bacon, cheese, and sausage gravy) with hash browns. P had the Captain Crunch French toast. I had a few bites. It was basically like eating dessert for breakfast. He said it was “too much of a good thing" and got tired of it. -We were able to check into the Best Western early and leave our stuff. -We headed to Fort McHenry where we spent several hours walking through the museum, around the perimeter of the building, into the little underground areas, and through the barracks and other rooms. It was really interesting to learn about the huge flag (30’ x 42’) sewn by Mary Pickersgill. -We drove to look around at some restaurants in an area. There was a little pub and also a Ji...

Things that make me say the F word... Utah drivers... Extreme weather... And seeing this in my bathroom at 2:30 in the morning... Things that make me want a husband...  Hanging up light fixtures Hanging up mirrors (perfectly level on BOTH of these jobs, by the way) And... Killing spiders at 2:30 AM.

DC, Philly, NYC, and Olive Juice Well we all know that I function by lists, and this is the best way I could recount everything. So I went to Maryland to visit an amazing guy who shall henceforward be known as He, Him, His, or whatever other male pronouns or terms of affection seem fitting. (*Editor's note: I had to remove all pictures of him as well. Sorry to disappoint.) This list will give a brief overview of (almost) everything we did together because let's be honest, you probably don't want to know everything .  Thursday 6/13 ·           I got picked up at Philadelphia airport with an awkward side hug ·          Drove home arm in arm ·          Stopped at TGI Friday’s where I had chicken fingers and he had chicken and shrimp with Jack Daniel’s sauce ·          Took a nap ·        ...