I've ignored it like poor Harry Potter in the closet under the stairs! I've ignored it like those crumbs you see going in the space between the cabinet and the stove but shrug and go on! I've ignored it like the pages and pages of Terms and Conditions you are supposed to read but you just click "I agree" without even thinking about it!
Unfortunately, when I work several days in a row poor Tom becomes my caregiver, and I become a zombie that would eat cereal, canned beans, and leftover broccoli for all my meals if I didn't have him to provide meals for me. Now, I do usually have a hand in preparing a plan of meals/shopping for ingredients with him before my zombie state comes on, but I don't know what I would do without him! So that is my excuse for blog negligence. I am hoping I will get better at living with sleep deprivation, but I'm not there yet, folks. I'm thinking about my poor future children, and it's not looking good for the little chaps. I hope they like cereal, canned beans, and leftover broccoli.
We have had some great fun between work schedule madness. Tom started his new, greatly anticipated hobby: beer making. Although he had been researching and wanting to take it on for a while, he finally got knee deep when he attended a beer making class where he got a basic kit for a good price due to an online deal with our friend Jason. He came back foaming at the mouth ready to brew on his own. This kid almost convulses when a book is put near him, yet I have seen him book worming away at his 300+ page "How to Brew" book. A couple weeks later, Jason and Tom (with Caitlin and I going along to make fun of (I MEAN support) them, went to a local homebrew supply store to get ingredients for their first beer making adventure that took place at our apartment. Now, I am excited that Tom is taking on something he is so interested in. I just like to mock him a little bit because he is so into it and geeks out on a regular basis about it. I'm not complaining about the home brews that will be available. BUT what was the best part of experiencing this adventure for me? VISITING THE GEYSER WATER STATION DOWN THE ROAD!!
This side story starts with the real estate agent who showed us our apartment in July. As a selling point, she pointed out the station down the road where cars were lined up waiting at this spout for what she called GEYSER WATER! I was entranced by this for some reason and made a big deal about it kind of kidding, kind of not. GEYSER WATER right down the road! For a while when I didn't know if I would have a job pictured myself selling my services as a geyser-water-in-a-big-bucket-on-my-head-carrier to the other residents in my apartment building. Kind of like this:
The beer brewing day, the boys had decided that the well water would be perfect for their concoction, so we made our first visit to the water well shack. We got two big buckets of it and it tasted fabulous! We had some left over in a bucket afterward, so Tom and I pretty much had a water hole (a set up including the water in a bucket and a ladle) that we dipped out of until it was done. The water was THAT good. Let's not talk about how one time I found a sliver of onion skin in it (putting it near-ish to the trash can was not our smartest move). I think I made a little "someone poisoned the waterhole" joke, put a towel over our water hole to block unwanted floating friends, and tried not to think about it.
We have yet to get to try the fruit of their labor, but it has been bottled and the yeast is munching on some sugar creating carbonation at this moment.
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| The brewer at work |
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| The beer fermenting |
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| "Geyser water" watering hole |
In preparation for Christmas, I decided that Tom and I needed a cool Christmas card. Yet, with horrible wounds still left from trying to be crafty/a perfectionist with the wedding, I was afraid of what type of animal I would become with this little project. I found a fun Christmas prop photobooth inspiration, made some santa and reindeer props from poster board on a day off, and had us do an fun makeshift photobooth photoshoot at our apartment. Should I have just sent the photo into walgreens and get them printed into cards really easy-peezy like? Yes. But it just didn't happen, and so I printed out the photo and pasted it on a blank card, then I had printer problems, so I decided to make a limited amount of them for family only so my total time spent on this could be like 8 hours instead of 20.
SORRY if you were not one of the few who received one this year, but I just couldn't do a ton of them! I will go more low key next year so I can bump up the volume :) Here is a screen shot of what it turned out to be, so please take this as your Christmas card and don't be offended, okay? I am more mentally healthy because of your sacrifice.
I see from checking the weather in the midwest that we are about 15 degrees warmer! It's also been the driest December on record this year! Maybe that is a little indicator that you need to make a trip ;) We could take a voyage to get geyser water and enjoy Tom's homebrew. As long as you don't come on my stretch of work days we could even have something besides cereal, canned beans, and leftover broccoli! So, go west young people (and young people at heart)!
Just surviving, water gathering, and brewing washINgton!
Love the card!
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