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I think I forgot to mention that I decorated a little bit. Mostly our room. Check it out!

The table in the corner used to be primary blue and red, from when Mark was little, and apparently was Mark’s mom’s furniture when she was younger too. I spray painted it an avocado color that we liked to go with the quilt and body pillow.

I spray painted all of these random frames one color and placed them around a mirror. This is really neat, but it’s kind of a pain in the butt at night because it’s right next to our bed and it’s easy to knock things off the wall …

And here is our geeky living room. It’s in progress. I want to add my Roseanne Afghan that I’ve been working on since 2007. Yes. Since 2007. It’s mostly done. I have to weave in ends on 120 granny squares to finish it. Which means 1200 ends to weave in. So I might be done by 2017.

But we’ve got a framed print of all the doctors from Dr. Who and of the main cast of Buffy (courtesy of my awesome friend Seth) and a framed x-stitch of a PBR label (courtesy of our awesome friend Katie).

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Last month was crazy. Here is a sneak peek at things that happened before I get to blogging about them …

… Mark’s brother Nick’s birthday in Stillwater …

… Mark’s 25th birthday in Chicago …

… awesome new fabric …

… moving …

… a really awesome project for Drake …

... and LOTS and lots of food.

(asian lettuce wraps)

(chicken strips with honey mustard and sweet corn)

(kung pao chicken)

(stovetop creamy mac and cheese made with REAL cheese)

(chicken, broccoli and mushroom alfredo with pappardelle’s tomato cracked pepper pasta)

(tomato, basil and chevré pizza)

so hopefully I will have some time to share these experiences with you!  And of course all the recipes.  I will also try to start sharing points plus numbers with you at the suggestion of Kelly.

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the week of sheer hell that i’ve lived through.

9:30 AM last wednesday I got a text from my sister asking me to call her ASAP. I thought my grandma had died. I was ready for that.

Not for this.

It was about our 20-year old cousin, who grew up and still lived across the street from my parents house where we grew up and who’s one of my sister’s best friends — Jackie.

Jackie shot herself.

Immediately I knew it was over for her. And was hoping for a quick and painless death or for some miracle of God to let her recover — FULLY.

But I knew what she wanted. If she didn’t want it, she wouldn’t have pulled the trigger.

Before you think I’m a complete asshole, let me say this: I’ve suffered from depression. It runs in our family. A lot of us have felt the black pit it creates.  I know what Jackie was feeling.  I’m guessing not to the extreme at which she’s felt it for the past several months.

So there I was last Wednesday. Wondering what will happen. Finding out on Facebook that Jackie is gone (before she officially was — for the record, thanks to the magic of small town rumors).

But somehow, I’m okay with it. Why? Because I don’t love my cousin? Because I’m 3 hours away from everything?

Yes on the latter.

I’m not insensitive. I absolutely didn’t want Jackie to die. But i just knew that whatever was building up inside her wouldn’t go away. Day in and day out. Misery. For no good reason other than the fact that …

DEPRESSION IS A DISEASE.

Yes. For those of you who think otherwise, fuck off. Right now. And don’t visit my blog again. Facebook friends? Hurry up and defriend me. I don’t like ignorant assholes.

Depression’s like cancer. It can be treated, but some people may never recover. And some people deal with it their whole lives — even if they take good care of themselves and everything is seemingly fine.

You know what makes depression a disease? The fact that people who suffer sometimes have no reason to feel the way they do.  And sometimes don’t even recognize that they are feeling bad.  Their world just starts collapsing left and right.

Which brings me back to Jackie. I can’t say for sure, but I feel like there was no reason for her to feel the way I’m guessing she did. And it probably spiraled so far out of control that she just wanted it all to stop.

I’ve been there. There comes a desperate moment where you want to claw your eyes out just to make the inner dialogue and hysterical thoughts stop. It stops briefly when you sleep, but it comes back tenfold when you wake up. Mornings are the worst.  I got help, and was able to recover for now. But I know it’s something I’m going to have to monitor closely for the rest of my life.

So, Jackie, I understand why you did what you did.

But that doesn’t mean that I don’t miss you. I wish depression hadn’t taken you, but it did.  I keep hoping that tomorrow I will wake up and none of this will have happened. But I know that isn’t the case.

I vow to not let depression take me away again. And I promise that I will fight hard to not let it take my life, or any of my friends or family’s life ever again.

In memory of Jackie, to remind myself that I’m loved and to be sure in those desperate moments — should they ever come again — that depression doesn’t take me, I got another tattoo today.

It’s simply the word “love” on my right wrist.  On my handwriting.  I use my right hand for everything.  I can’t pick up anything now without being reminded of Jackie, the love we all felt for her and the sadness we feel now, and the love people (including myself) have for me.

I am going to end this by saying this: fuck you depression.  I will not let you claim another person that I love.

PS I almost forgot.  Jackie was an organ donor. So now somebody has a new beautiful pair of blue eyes. And somebody else has a functioning liver.

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I just spent the best 7 dollars I’ve spent in a long time. I bought Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros album, Up from Below. Of course, I’ve been digging some of their songs on The Current for the last several months. But it was the song “Home” that did it for me.

Also, I’m not sure what the deal with this band is. I love this sound — but can’t decide if it’s a throwback or a parody of the 60s. And I’d like to point out that there’s entirely too many people for one stage.

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I’ve decided to steal a pun we came up with at work and use it on my blog. Wonder-Bred.  It makes sense.

Anyway, it’s another installment of Wonder-Bred Italian Boy ™ Cooks. Again — he came up with the idea and I executed.  It was my turn to cook since he made an awesome pizza a few days before and since he made an awesome brunch, which I will blog about tomorrow in my Sunday Brunch post.

I was making chicken fajitas and Mark came  up with the idea of adding a side of rice and “Mexi-fying” it.  I was pretty skeptical. I don’t like corn in things, but he was adamant about adding it.

So. I. Did.

It was awesome!

Without further ado, here’s the recipe.

Mark’s “Mexify-ed” Rice

1 15 oz can Rotel Tomatoes with chilies
1 15 oz can sweet corn
1 c brown rice
1/2 t cumin
1 t butter

In a medium-sized sauce pan, combine all the ingredients (do not drain tomatoes or corn). Stir, while bringing to a rolling boil over medium/high heat.  Reduce heat, cover and simmer for 45 minutes, or until rice has absorbed all of the liquid and is tender. Serve warm with cheese, salsa and sour cream, or as a side dish.

In case you’re curious, I may or may not have made dinner wearing my Ziggy Stardust t-shirt and my awesome custom-made Megadeth apron (the Dave Must-apron).

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It’s been a while since I made anything, so I decided to make a few things last night.

I haven’t had much of a chance to unpack since the move, and thus, not much of a chance to decorate. I bought some vintage (or at least used) frames from Salvation Army for 99 cents a while back and they’ve just been sitting around waiting for me to do something crafty with them.

So I did.

Nothing super exciting.

I rummaged through my fabric that I’ve been hoarding and found a really cute print from Echino that pretty much matches my bedroom decor perfectly. 10 minutes later, I had a cute framed print.

Easy.

All you need is a frame, a piece of fabric and some masking tape. Cut the fabric about a half inch bigger than the opening of the middle of the frame. Take masking tape and adhere the edges so the fabric is taut. Ta. Da.

As you can see by the back of my frame, I didn’t really measure anything. Seriously. It doesn’t get easier than this. Just make sure you’ve ironed your fabric.

Ta da! If you want to get super fancy and put a piece like this to use, you could use a more permanent adhesive (like hot or super glue) and hang earrings and use stick pins to hang necklaces.  But I like this, because I can easily change out the fabric and I can even use the piece of fabric for something else if I choose.

Here it is in my bedroom. Totally cute!

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It’s weird when all your belongings are moved out of a space that you used to call your own. It’s just … empty.  A shell.

I was sitting in my empty apartment waiting to get checked out when it hit me that I wasn’t in my home anymore. Then I got to thinking about all the stuff that happened in that apartment. First thing that came to mind was the time I got epically sick with the stomach flu and wound up lying on the bathroom floor all night. Then I remembered going through the breakup last fall and how I couldn’t stand coming home to that apartment because it didn’t feel like home to me. It was just the place I ended up when my last boyfriend didn’t want me around anymore.

But then I remembered that my first kiss with Mark was in this room.  The first time he came to Des Moines he spent time here.

That’s about it. Honestly, I’m not going to miss this place much. I’m going to miss the fact that I can’t go home and shower over lunch after a workout, craft over lunch, take a nap over lunch, or just chill out and watch crappy TV over my lunch.  Otherwise, I consider it just a place to store my stuff. Not really much of a home.

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Barney moved in with me (finally) on Saturday and he’s settled in pretty well …

… as you can see, he’s pretty tired from the move.

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Well, not really, but we did go to the townie bar.  Well, they’re all townie bars I guess.

I took Mark home last week to meet my family and my friends.  My family loved him (I mean, what’s not to love?) and my friends did as well. We went to the Eagles Club where my friend Lindsay bartends and did karaoke and danced the night away.  Here are some lovely photographs from the evening …

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Today was a very exciting day for a few reasons.

1) I finally got internet/cable. I’ll be damned if I can figure out how to hook up the cable with all my gadgets (Wii and DVD player).  I’m sure I could figure it out…except I’d have to be able to see what was going on behind the TV but I can’t move the entertainment center/TV (TV weighs about as much as I do).

2) I’m finishing my very first PAID freelance job. Working on the final touches right now and putting together an invoice. This is pretty exciting considering it might lead to more paid freelance work AND this client was pretty easy to work with.

3) My coworker bought us some gifts over lunch today…

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