Last Christmas I brought three different lip glosses from Sephora.  While I love lip gloss, that wasn’t technically my favorite thing.  I explained that my favorite thing was the little black and white Sephora bag.  Just seeing one of them makes me giddy because you just know whatever is in inside is magical.

This Christmas I brought three pairs of silver hoop earrings.  I love hoop earrings so very much.  And not the little ones that barley fit around your ear lobe, I’m taking the bigger JLo style hoops. I’d bet that I’ve worn hoops 95% of the time in the last five years.  I don’t know how my love affair with hoop earrings started but I know it’s true love and it runs very deep.  (The top picture is of JLo.  That’s me below.)  (You know, in case you got confused.)

Last year I went home with bubble bath, fancy dish soap and a romantic comedy.  This Christmas I went home with a huge thing of hot chocolate mix, a bag of Seattle Chocolates and some chocolate covered Oreos.  Most people didn’t bring food items, so it was kinda of off that I ended up taking home so much food.  (I’m not complaining!)  Other things people got were soap, lotion, pie filling, washcloth, socks, and even salad dressing!

I’ve been thinking about what I’s pick if asked what my favorite things are, sans $5-$8 price limit.  While I try to not be super materialistic I do own some things that I love so very much and feel they are worth every penny spent on them.  I don’t have a lot of disposable income to spend on myself so what I have I cherish.

We’re not at a party and I don’t intend on buying three of these things to share, but here are some of my favorite things and the reasons behind them.

While saying that “boots” are my favorite thing is a little too general I have a few pairs that I especially love.

Last winter The King was at the REI “basement” looking around.  (The “basement” is where you can go and buy returned items at a discounted price.  REI has a Lifetime Guarantee on everything they sell.  Because of this they get a lot of returns.  Your kid grows out of his shoes, take them back.  You bought your gear to climb Mt. Rainier but don’t plan on doing that again, take the stuff back!)  While checking out the shoe section he came across some brown Merrell Tetra boots in my size that were marked about 75% off their retail price.  Naturally he bought them for me.  They needed a new insole and after contacting Merrell directly they mailed me one.  At no cost!  This winter The King found another pair of the same boot (in black!), again in my size, again marked WAY below retail.  Being a super good husband, he bought me the black pair as well.  These boots are great because not only are they functional (totally waterproof and comfortable) but they look good with pants, skirts and dresses.  I love them so very, very much.

My other favorite boots are my pair of Aerosoles Gather Round boot in camel (faux) suede.  I bought these at the end of season years ago and at first I wasn’t sure they’d go with too many things.  But then I saw a picture of Heidi Klum in a maternity dress (I was pregnant with Rerun at the time) wearing a gray dress with camel boots.  I figured if Heidi Klum could do it, then so could I.  I’ve been rocking my camel boots with jeans, skirts and dresses ever since.

For this last Christmas’ party I waffled between taking hoop earrings or Burt’s Bees Lip Shimmer (in Watermelon!).  The hoop earrings won, but only by a hair.  I’ve lost count at how many tubes of this I’ve gone through.  I used to use my Border’s 40% off coupons to buy these.  I was super sad to see Border’s go out of business because now I’ll have to pay full price for my Burt’s Bee addiction.

I love saving money, bringing my lunch to work every day and pizza.  Put that together and you’ve got the Safeway Eating Right brand frozen pizzas. They cost $2 and are yummy, yummy, yummy.  I eat one for lunch 98% of the time.  I prefer the pepperoni or four cheese.

No matter how many times I’ve seen it before watching an episode of “Arrested Development” cracks me up.  The only bad thing about this show is I can never decide who I like more; George Michael, Michael or Gob.

Right before I got knocked up with Rerun my bestest friend May told me about her love of the Old Navy roll over knit skirts.  She told me she had one in every color and suggested I do the same.  I bought a black and gray one and they got me through my entire pregnancy.  I didn’t buy the maternity version because I knew I’d be able to wear the non-maternity ones when I was pregnant and then keep wearing them after I gave birth.  I’m still wearing them. They look just as good in the summer with flip-flops as they do in the winter with boots.  The King bought me a new brown one this Christmas to complete my set.  (But get this, I don’t have one single top to go with the brown skirt.  FOR REALS!)

The King and Babboo surprised me and bought me a Lulu Lemon hoodie (in black!) for Mothers Day a few years back.  This is a splurge that I would have never bought myself and yet I love it so much.  It’s so thick and soft and cozy and every time I put it on I think to myself “this is so worth $100!”  (There is a Lulu Lemon outlet on the way to Canada that we always stop at.  Their hoodies are much cheaper there and I was able to get a purple one last year.  The King has some too.)

I knew I didn’t want to take my Coach purse (bought at the outlet) on our trip to Europe this summer.  After much research I decided the Harriet bag from Timbuk2 (in black!) would be the perfect fit for my needs.  The straps are adjustable and it even has a hidden zipper at the bottom to expand it.  It’s so perfect in fact that I’m still using it while my pretty Coach bag sits alone in my closet.  (I noticed last night that some of the stitching on my Harriet bag is coming undone.  Timbuk2 has a lifetime guarantee and I hope they’ll be able to fix my bag.  I sent them a request and pictures this morning.  Cross your fingers.  I’d hate to have to stop using my Harriet!)

I know a lot of people found fancy new iPads and iPhones under their trees this Christmas, but not me.  I’m still rocking my iPod classic (in black!).  I bought it probably six years ago with a bonus from work.  So what if now it looks antiquated and nerdy, it’s full of my glorious music and I love it.  If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.

I was gifted a subscription to “Sunset” magazine by a close friend who is a big fan of the magazine.  It’s full of fancy recipes and local insights.  The King and I have been converted and not a week goes by that we don’t make a couple of “Sunset” meals for dinner.  (The King got a “Sunset” cookbook for Christmas.  LET THE COOKING BEGIN!)

I recently bought myself a Book or Mormon study guide to use alongside my daily scripture reading.  Using it has helped prompt me to new thoughts and revelations.  I started using it towards the end of reading the Book of Mormon.  I look forward to starting from the front once I’m done with this reading.

I teased The King about the Moleskin planner he used for years.  (NERD!)  That is until he bought me my own last year.  It didn’t take long for me to realize how awesome it was.  My MIL gave me a pen loop (in pink!) for Christmas which I promptly put on my planner.  It made this perfect planner even more perfect.

And last, but not least, Sally Hansen’s Super Shine Top Coat has been true and faithful to me since I started using it ten years ago.  It continues to make my nails look pretty.  While I love OPI for colors, I also use Sally Hansen’s for my top coat.

Would any of these things be on your list of favorite things?  I’d love to read posts from you guys about what your favorite things are.  I’m always looking for new things to love.

So tell me, what are some of your favorite things?

There it is, a face tattoo.

And I’m not talking about the small, yet somehow both pretty and tasteful face tattoos like Kat Von D has.

I’ve seen some very odd face tattoos lately.  When I see them it takes me aback and I find myself doing a double-take.  I quickly feel guilty for staring but then I remind myself that I’m not staring at some unfortunate person who was scarred by a fire.  This person wants to be started at.  I mean right, the main reason someone would get a tattoo on their face is so that people will stare at them?

I wonder if I’m just noticing face tattoo’s more or if it’s a new trend and there are actually more people willing to commit to something on their face FOREVER?  Hey, I’m all for trends.  I’m fine with tattoos.  It’s just the face tattoos that freak me out.

Maybe we have Ed Helms to thank?

But I doubt it.  The type of person who would get a face tattoo isn’t the type of person that, I would think, would be super into comedy.

(Maybe I’m wrong.)

When I see someone with a face tattoo my first thought (after reminding myself that it’s okay to stare) is of their mother.  Their sweet, sweet mother.

I picture a woman, maybe not that much older then myself, holding her precious baby in her arms and promising to always feed and clothe him.  I see her wrapping him in a soft blanket and rubbing his perfect baby face as he falls asleep.

Fast forward eighteen plus years.  The same mother is setting the table for Thanksgiving dinner.  She carefully lays out her wedding china while she waits for the turkey to be done.  She baked her son’s favorite banana cream pie and you can still smell it in the air.

It’s the next part of this little vision that makes me want to run up to the person sporting the face tattoo and yell, “what does your mother think about your tattoo?!”

I hope it’s a rhetorical question.

His poor mom didn’t ask for this.  When she was baking the crust for the banana cream pie she didn’t think that when her precious son finally walked in the door she’d be trading that banana cream pie for face tattoo.

Seriously.

Why would anyone tattoo their face?

How can they do that to their mom?

I honestly don’t worry about the person with the actual face tattoo.  I don’t spend time wondering what type of office allows it’s workers to have tattooed faces.  I don’t try to picture how that tattoo is going to look once the kid is about 50 and their face starts to wrinkle.  (Forget about what it’s going to look like in their eighties.)  I just think about their mom.

I don’t know what I’d do if Rerun or Babboo showed up with a tattooed face at some point.

They can be darn sure they wouldn’t be getting any more banana cream pies.  That’s for certain.

So tell me, are there a lot of face tattoos out there or is it just me?

(And what would you do if your kid came home with a tattoo on their face?!)

This cousin of my mom’s has some kids my age.  I always hung out with them at subsequent family reunions.  It was always in the back of my head that their dad had been to the top of Everest, but I never thought much about it.  Except for the fact that I knew he was missing a toe.  Gross.  I haven’t seen my mom’s cousin and his family in probably about fifteen years even though I actually live closer to them out here in Seattle then I did when I lived in Utah.

When The King starting training to climb Mt. Rainier this last year I remembered my mom’s cousin.  Since he’s from the Pacific Northwest I figured he had probably climbed Rainer too.  A quick google search found that he’s on the short list of those who have been to the top of Rainier the most; well over 100 times.  This google search led me to read more about Rainier.  I eventually had to stop reading about it when I started realizing how dangerous The King’s hike was going to be.

I was especially nervous about The King’s attempt at Rainier because I was hugely pregnant.  I had nightmares of going into labor while he was on Rainier and not being able to get a hold of him.  (I had more intense fears about his hike, but let’s not talk about them.)

Thankfully The King was successful and made it to the top of Rainier (and back down again).  It was a very spiritual experience for him and it was amazing to listen to him talk about it.  After a few weeks we stopped talking about it so much.  And then Rerun was born and that was pretty much the only topic of conversation for the next while.

During Rerun’s first few months I spent a couple hours every night feeding him in the dark.  I wanted to make a better use of this time so I got out my little book light and starting reading any book I could get my hands on.  I quickly finished all of the books I had around the house so I grabbed The King’s book off of his night stand:

“The Kid Who Climbed Everest” by none other then the ultimate outdoorsman Mr. Bear Grylls.

This is so not a typical book I’d read.  While I do admit to purchasing the book, it wasn’t because I had any interest in reading it myself.

The King was only about 30 pages into the book and wasn’t too thrilled about me bogarting it.  I surpassed his 30 pages the first night I started read the book….and then didn’t put it down for the next week.

Holy cow, the book was INTENSE.

I usually don’t like knowing how a story is going to end right from the start.  I was pretty confident that Bear wasn’t going to die on Everest.  And, thanks to the title of the book, I was pretty sure he was going to make it to the top.  And yet, I hung on every word of the book…not sure what was going to happen next.

I’ll be honest here.  I started this book not being the biggest Bear Grylls fan.  I was also quite bugged by the poor writing in the first chapters of the book.  This all changed.  Bear is a pretty cool guy.  He’s very spiritual and really just seems to be a good person.  And I think he got a ghost writer somewhere around the middle of the book, so the writing got better.

While reading about Bear’s attempt at climbing Mt. Everest at the age of 23 first hand I was amazed at how one goes about preparing, financing (it can cost upwards of $60,000!) and eventually climbing Everest.  This isn’t a 3 hour hike.  Or even a 3 day hike.  Because of the time needed to acclimate ones body to the high altitude, it usually takes quite a few months of living on the mountain before one makes the actual final climb to the summit.

You start at the Base Camp and then head up to the four other camps along the route to the top.  The climbers train by climbing back and forth between the camps multiple times over a few month period.  It’s boring and tedious work to get your body ready for the final 17 hour climb.  Plus, they are carrying heavy tanks of oxygen.

Like I usually do when reading a book that sparks my interest in a new topic, I promptly got on the internet and read every single thing I could find on Everest.

I found out all about the unsung heroes of Everest, the Sherpa’s**.  The Sherpa’s are the indigenous people of the region.  According to Wikipedia:

Sherpas are renowned in the international climbing and mountaineering community for their hardiness, expertise, and experience at high altitudes. It has been speculated that a portion of the Sherpas’ climbing ability is the result of a genetic adaptation to living in high altitudes. Some of these adaptations include unique hemoglobin-binding enzymes, doubled nitric oxide production, hearts that can utilize glucose, and lungs with an increased sensitivity to low oxygen.

And guess what else I found out?  That cousin of my mom’s whose missing toe freaked me out when I was a kid?*** Yeah, turns out he’s a pretty big deal in the mountaineering world.  And the story about him getting down from the top of Everest on the back of a yak?  True story. And not a funny one.  Not funny at all.  He was close to death and that yak was the only way he was going to get back to the bottom alive.

Climbing Everest is a huge deal.  People die doing this.  A lot of people die.  Well over 200 men, women and Sherpa’s have died in an attempt to climb Everest (or on their way back down).  And if you do make it to the top, you experience and see some pretty horrific things along the way.

Bear’s account really opened my eyes to what the human body is capable of.  And not only the body, but the mind too.  I’m convinced that a big part of surviving Everest is purely mental thing.  Sure you have to be in tip top physical shape, but you also have to be the type of person who can mentally conquer the challenged.  The thought of having to cross a crevasse sends chills down my spine. There is no way I’d be able to cross as many as they do to get to the top and then back down again.  That’s another thing that freaks me out, once you get to the top your journey is only half over.  You’ve still got to survive the trek back down.

I finished Bear’s book a month or so ago and since then I’ve watched a few documentaries on Everest and I have a few other Everest books on hold at the library.  I am thirsting for more knowledge.  I am so intrigued by what would make someone want to even attempt this as well as the logistics of the climb.

I know I’ll never get to the top of the world.  Not even close.  I have no desire to even attempt something like that.  And yet, I so want to do it.  But really, I don’t.  But still, it would be awesome.

For now I’ll just read more books and daydream about what it would be like at the top of Mt. Everest.

“I didn’t conquer Everest – Everest allowed me to crawl up one side and stay on the peak for a few minutes” –Bear Grylls

*Google told me what he was the first to do.  And honestly, I’m not sure how a person’s body can even do that.  Apparently only a small percentage of them can.

**Did I tell you that May, my best friend who deserted me and moved to Reno, got to drive the famous Apa Sherpa (Super Sherpa) around town earlier this year?  Apa Sherpa has the record for amount of times reaching the summit of Everest.  Guess how many times he’s been to the top?  Come on, guess.

TWENTY.

(One year he made it to the top two times!)

(TWO TIMES!)

***I never actually saw his foot and the spot of the missing toe.  It was just the idea of a missing toe that freaked me out.

Merry Christmas from my little family to yours.

The wife is very pretty (The King really thinks so).  She has great hair color and a really sassy cut.  She is always dressed very professionally and put together.  The King and I really like her style.  She’s got a very important job working for a very large firm and I hear she excels at her position there.  The King used to see her from time to time on the bus ride to work.  She would be eating her breakfast and reading her scriptures.  (I would be scared of getting punched if I read my scripture on the bus.)  Rumor has it that she doesn’t like movies or music.  She’s totally an “all business” type of person.  She’s got her head on straight and I like that.

The husband is a nice enough looking fellow.  He usually wears jeans and I’ve seen him in a baseball cap more then once. (He usually wears a nice suit to church.) He’s an actor and works sporadically.  He love all things associated with pop culture and is pretty hip to what’s going on.

While the husband and wife are both very nice people, they do not even sort of seem like they’d make a good couple.

I am not sure how they ended up together.

And yet, they seem very happy and very in love.

The King and I have talked about what an odd pairing they are amongst ourselves.  Yesterday another lady from church mentioned it to me in passing.  Phew – I wasn’t the only one thinking it.

Are most (happy) couples similar to each other?  Is the old adage “opposites attract” true?  I read once, in high school, that the majority of people end up married to a person of comparable attractiveness to themselves.  If both are similar in their attractiveness, does that mean they’re similar in every other way?

My younger brother and his wife are almost spitting images of each other inside and out.  (I’m not saying my SIL looks like a dude…I’m just saying her and my brother could be mistaken for brother and sister.)  My older brother and his boyfriend are pretty much identical on the outside and probably on the inside too.  My younger sister’s husband is almost two feet taller then she is.  He likes to cook and she likes to eat.

My parents are nothing alike.  I take that back; they both like to read.

I’m pretty sure they are all happy and in love.

So this got me to thinking.  I wonder if people look at The King and me and think we’re an odd couple?  He is such a hard worker and is dependable and reliable.  He’s handsome, smart, funny, self-less, and a snappy dresser.  He doesn’t like to read, and he enjoys watching “true crime” shows on TV.

Me?

Yeah, not so much.

Okay, so The King and I both dislike sports.  Whether playing or watching, we do not like sports.  That it. That’s our one thing we have in common.

It doesn’t really matter if people The King and I are an odd couple.  Heck, it doesn’t matter if we are.  But it has got me thinking about all the couples out there and how everyone has ended up with the person they’re in a relationship with.

So tell me, do you think you’re one half of an odd couple?