I want to get a tattoo on my wrists. I won’t reveal what I’m getting, but just imagine it’s a phrase that goes along both wrists. Such as:

(to be or)    (not to be)

The first part on the left wrist, the second part on the right.

Now, should the tattoo be facing me? Or facing the other way? Like upside down so *I* can’t read it, or should *I* be able to read it?

Victoria Beckham’s tattoo is done so the world can read it, but if she held it up to herself it would be upside down.

Whereas this random tattoo I found on Google is done so the person with the tattoo can read it, but the world can’t. I’m leaning more towards this way, but I’ve seen tattoos done where it’s a phrase and it’s done the opposite way (the Beckham way, shall we say?).

What do you think?

1. The Beckham Way? (Upside down)

2. The Love Way? (Right side up)

How do you think it should be done?

xoxo

Fab Brunette

I used to love love love lists. Like a lot. I would put lists everywhere: in my planner, in my phones, on my computer, in notebooks – everywhere and anywhere. There were duplicate lists all the time of things to do. Things to pack. Things to buy. Eventually I think I got overwhelmed by all these ‘deadlines’ and just gave up on it all. Ha! Just like that. Cold turkey. And I really don’t miss it too much.

Now I simply have ‘mental’ to-do notes. If it’s uber important it will go in my Blackberry, but otherwise it gets lost in my head. Seriously. I’m rather forgetful in my old age (26. Bleh.) and now I need to write certain things down or I will lose focus of it. There have been a few things I’ve wanted to do recently that I keep delaying or… forgetting about!

1. Get a tattoo. This has been on my list of things to do all year long! I’ve finally figured out exactly what I want (I think!), but now it’s just a matter of going to get it done….

2. Cook a steak. To perfection. Medium-rare. At home. Something I think is impossible to do. But I will try it, hopefully next week!

3. Drink more green tea. Something I used to do quite regularly has somehow fallen out of my daily routine. But how to remind myself? Reminder on my phone? Perhaps… it’s as if the kettle sitting atop the stove top doesn’t remind me enough. Wait – I’ll make a cup right now!

4. Get published. I know, I know, this is more of a long-term goal. But I love writing, I do. I’m currently working on a novel, but I’d also love to be doing freelance work, or even have a regular column – offline or online.

5. Be productive. I know what I’m talking about here. I am the Queen of Procrastination. As well as the Mayor of Distractionville. Today, for instance, I have sent out random emails to magazines and editors in hopes of job openings, baked up cookies AND brownies from scratch, cleaned my whole kitchen, and written blog posts. Be MORE PRODUCTIVE. Focus on work. That’s my mantra.

xoxo

Fab Brunette

ps. What’s on  your list of things to do? Do you keep lists or do you leave it to chance like me?

A few weeks ago I purchased a new fitness DVD, Gaiam’s 5 Day Fit Weightloss Yoga, and yesterday I finally put it in my dvd player and did it! I honestly forgot I purchased it! I love everything Gaiam, my yoga mat is a pretty purple with a lotus flower design from the same company. My water bottle is from Gaiam. I’m a sucker for anything Gaiam just like I am for anything Starbucks!

After doing Jillian Micheals’ Yoga Meltdown (which I actually really enjoy!) I really didn’t expect the new dvd to be challenging – famous last words.

The Gaiam dvd actually has 5 workouts on it, one for each day, which is why I bought it – I get super super bored of workouts, unfortunately, so this actually works perfectly for people who likely have ADD like myself. Regardless, I couldn’t finish the first workout. Serious. It’s just standard yoga, but it’s a lot of paying attention to the moves and really pushing yourself. I think I did 10 minutes.

Honest. And those ten minutes? They made me sore. I am totally feeling the pain today, especially in my legs where I’m not very flexible and probably stretched my muscles out too far and now they are achy!

My favourite part about working out is the ache.

I’m not kidding about that either. If I’m working out, I want to feel that something is happening, I like the feeling of a new muscle in my thigh that I didn’t even know existed. Not pain though, please remember if you’re feeling pain, that’s not right. But a satisfying ache? Perfect.

Do I sound sick? Maybe a little.

xoxo

Fab Brunette

ps.  What’s your favourite workout to do? Yoga, running, zumba?

pps. Do you like dvds at home, fitness classes, or gym workouts best?

I don’t know about you but when I have such a fabulous weekend and no pictures exist from it – I almost want to go back in time to relive the moment and take some photos of it! It’s almost like “did it really happen if there’s no photographic evidence”? But then you realise it really doesn’t truly matter if there are pictures or not, because you will always have those memories close to your heart…

Saturday started quietly, as most Saturdays do in our house. Princess plays on the Wii for a while, we eat, we listen to music and then we go out for lunch. We went to Rogue again, which is quickly becoming a neighborhood fave for J & I. I didn’t eat too much because I was saving my appetite for something even better – the Carribean Days Festival! Hello! Jamaican Beef Patties. Mmmmm! I love beef patties. My fave way to eat them? Slit open the top, stuff with some lettuce & mayo and it is like heaven in a patty.  Afterwards we took the seabus home and spent the night watching movies and munching on pizza!

Sunday was another lazy day in my apartment. We ventured out for brunch at Twisted Fork where I had an amazing fruit salad and freshly baked scones, Princess had a lovely banana-stuffed brioche french toast (that may or may not have ended up in my tummy as well), and J had a delicious Eggs Benny with some of the best ham I’ve had in a while. After stuffing ourselves we took a long walk down to the sea wall. Princess played in the water park while J & I sipped on some wine, and then we kicked around a soccer ball with her for a while. The sun was shining and we had a blast.

After Princess’ team won for the 15th time (I was on her team too, we were playing against J!) we decided to go get a barbeque. Random, right? We’ve been lusting over the Element Grill for a few months now and today was the day we finally got it! As soon as we brought it home, J cracked open a couple of beers and I put the thing together. Oh yeah, I’m the “man” when it comes to installing printers, putting together Ikea furniture and now evidently barbeques.

I then whipped up a delicious meal of homemade burgers, cheese sausages, macaroni salad, potato salad AND caesar salad! So much salad and none of it was really healthy! It was so good and afterwards we watched Cop Out, a funny movie with Bruce Willis & Tracey Morgan.

And although I didn’t get to take pictures of this awesome weekend, we had a great time and maybe that was enough!

xoxo

Fab Brunette

ps. How was your weekend?

We recently put up a hammock on our little balcony. It’s not a lie-down one, rather the kind of hammock meant for one person (and a second very small person), and the hammock can then be stretched across so you can lounge in comfort. It’s not very often I get to sit in it, and today is definitely not one of those moments of relaxation – the clouds are dark, the wind is strong and brings about a chill that I feel in my bones and I feel like having a cup of soup and getting under the covers. But the real reason that I don’t lounge in it as often as I should, is that when I’m in it, I feel a little guilty. Like there’s a million other things I should be doing rather than just taking in the view of the mountains and the water and taking a moment to myself.

Every Time I use the words should or guilt then I know I’m in trouble. Should is a word I am constantly trying to tear out of my vocabulary, and it has worked many a time.

The shoulds that have plagued me before:

 - I should be married.
 - I should be working.
 - I shouldbe excercising.

And the shouldn’ts:

 - I shouldn’t eat this extra slice of cake.
 - I shouldn’t be blogging right now.
 - I shouldn’t be thinking about vacations at a time like this.

I have slowly worked many shoulds out of my system. After the realisation that shoulds are merely ideas that have become traditional-ised into every one’s minds but aren’t necessarily applicable to all, well that kind of says it right there. They are ideas and not facts, and if it’s not something that is meant to be helpful, than what is it there for?

I should get a real breast exam one day. I should get my skin tested for cancer.

Those types of thoughts are real, serious, ones that are helpful. But who decided that I should or should not have more kids? Isn’t that a personal choice? Where I work, play, eat or go in my life – that’s all up to me.

While growing up and going through the stages of your life (committed relationships/marriages/children/careers/school) there will be people all around you giving you unsolicited advice, telling you what you should and should not do. How you should raise your child, what you should eat to lose those last 10 pounds, that you shoulddiscover your love languages in order for your marriage to work.

These are all personal choices that we give away freely when we agree with the shoulds.

The second you tell yourself, ‘I should raise my child according to this type of parenting style’ you are setting yourself up for failure. This is twice as hard when what worked with the first child doesn’t have a hope of working with the second – I see this again and again: ‘She should be crawling at this age, her older sister was…’  I see this all the time, and all it leads to is failure, according to you. Had there been no should then you would just realise that each person is different and works according their own schedule.

To quote Samantha Jones & Carrie Bradshaw:

As we drive along this road called life, occasionally a gal will find herself a little lost. And when that happens, I guess she has to let go of the coulda, shoulda, woulda, buckle up and just keep going.

So where does this leave me?

In a hammock on a cold day. Hot tea and a good book and a blanket.

Because it’s seriously chilly out today.

xoxo

Fab Brunette

What are the ‘shoulds’ that keep you from living  your life at its’ fullest?

1. I was born in Austria.

2. I don’t read newspapers or watch the news on tv. Unless it’s some kind of catastrophic event that needs to be watched.

3. I asked J to “go steady” to a Robbie Rivera song.

4. I was part of the Comm-Tech Crew in high school.

5. I have never read any Harry Potter books.

6. Previous jobs held include: working in a tanning salon, clothing stores, bath shop, hair stylist & colourist, wedding & events planner, cupcake baker & decorator, bartender, real estate consultant, and call centre receptionist.

7. I immensely dislike mussels and oysters.

8. My nationality is Polish and I’ve never been to Poland.

9.  I love anything to do with King Henry VIII, Shakespeare and anything else from that era in time.

10. There are 2 tattoos on my body and I’m desperately wanting a third.

11. My favourite ice cream is Ben & Jerry’s Half Baked.

12. There are Moleskine notebooks scattered all over the house ready for me whenever inspiration strikes.

13. I have two cell phones: an iPhone and a Blackberry.

14. I own one pair of flat shoes and one pair of runners. The rest are heels.

15. I check dlisted.com & gofugyourself.com more than twice daily.

16. I drink white wine, European or local beer, and lime margaritas, on the rocks.

17. I adore Jessica Simpson. Adore. To the point where I’m sure we’d be best friends IRL.

18. Other celeb loves? Victoria Beckham, Amy Winehouse & Jennifer Anniston.

19. I eat waaay too much pizza.

20. My favourite films include: Breakfast at Tiffany’s, The Nightmare Before Christmas, Amelie, and Old School.

21. I have lived in 7 different places in the past 7 years.

22. I never ate olives before I met J and now I love them on everything.

23. I have been officially dating J since October 7th, 2003. We met a month prior to that.

24. Favourite musical bands? The Killers, Amy Winehouse & Scooter.

25. I will never ever pass up a cookie. Cookies are my kryptonite.

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What are 5 things I don’t know about you?

I just came back from the gym, and although I wouldn’t say it was my greatest workout ever, the fact that I even went up to the gym has to count for something, right? I’ve realised that the less I think about something while I do it, the more motivated I am to finish. In work, life, workouts(!) as soon as I start thinking about what I’m doing, if I’m doing it right, these thoughts start slowing me down and I either give up or just don’t finish what I started.

I suppose these thoughts are ‘negative’ thoughts, although they are not negative in nature, the outcome becomes the opposite of what I’m hoping for. It will go like this:

I’ll start my workout, hop on my cardio machine of choice, and I start feeling good….

But then:

Oh I hate this song (flips thru ipod slowing pace down a bit) okay, good song. Okay, doing good. But I had that cookie today. So what’s the point of even working out. It was a good cookie, but still, I just want another cookie. NO NO Focus!! Focus on working out. What time is it? Another shit song. OMG so thirsty, okay, would it matter if I cut my time down by 5 minutes, I mean, it’s not going to make a difference anyway?

As you can imagine, I don’t come out of these types of workouts satisfied.

Today was a bit different. I worked out for 30 minutes, didn’t play with my ipod, watched some tv while I did it and 30 minutes flew by. I even wanted to go some more but I knew I had tons of other stuff to do that day. Again, not overly satisfied but you know what I did?

I just threw all my negative thoughts out of my head, showered and went on with my day.

xoxo

Fab Brunette

ps. Do you have negative thoughts? We all do – what do yours stop you from doing?