Makeover!
llofte.com has been transformed from a simple blog, to a full blown website! Woohoo! It took me about 2 hours of fighting with FTP uploads and wrong directories, but I did it! For awhile there I was nervous that I permanently broke llofte.com. But my genius-ness pulled through… 
I am using Rapidweaver to publish the site (thanks Seth!). If you have a Mac and looking for something more than iWeb to make a website, I highly recommend this program. They have a lot of nice built in themes, but I’m using a purchased theme called Float by Elixir. Do you like it? I’m also using a plugin for my photography page to show off my photos in style 
It’s called Collage 2 by YourHead. One of the greatest parts of Rapidweaver for me is that I still have this blog powered by WordPress yet it matches the rest of the site. I need WP-blog to do it, but it works great, don’t you think? My pregnancy journal is another blog, but I’m not using WordPress to publish it. Rapidweaver has it’s own built in blogging, so I’m going to use that for the pregnancy journal and see how it works out.
Well, I hope you like the new look! I’m pretty happy with it. Well, my welcome page is pretty lame… hopefully I’ll come up with something better sometime this week.
Enjoy!
Change
Well, it has once again been months since my last blog post. However, I’m hoping my lack of activity will change. Yeah yeah, I say that every time.
I’m warning you now, this post will be hella long. But I blog for my enjoyment so I don’t care if you don’t wanna read it 
(more…)
A Bad Week
Disclaimer: This is a bit of a rant and not very interesting… continue reading at your own risk.
I generally have a happy, good life. But these past few days have been torture for me . I have had some good times too, but over all… bad. I’m sad and bored as I type this.
I procrastinated all last week and had a lot of work to do on Monday for an assignment that was due. I woke up at 8a and spent 8 hours working on that assignment to turn it in by 4p. Turns out he gave us an extra day anyway. But I didn’t eat at all during those 8 hours and barely squeezed in a shower. I had class from 4p-8p and felt like I was about to die by the time I got home. I was so tired and hungry and in a horrible mood.
Tuesdays I have to be at school at 8a to teach a business calculus lab. I was tired and passion-ridden as a result of the previous day. I always feel bad when I don’t give my all to my students. At least most of them finished early. After this, I had to start studying for my exam in Automata for Wednesday, then head off to our Mathletes basketball game at 7p. The game was actually fun. I was extra aggressive because of my mood, but I also missed like 80 shots. So that was a bummer. After the game, the team always goes out for drinks and food. We chose a bar that was doing trivia and we won a pitcher of beer! I drank a little too much that night.
I woke up on Wednesday with a headache and began more last minute studying for my test. When test time came, I spent 45 minutes getting nowhere on one of the 4 questions. So I was feeling pretty low when I turned it in. But then I went to where all my friends were… wait… what’s that?… there was a BACK SIDE to this exam?! WTF? But there was like 6 inches of space at the bottom of the page… WHY DIDN’T HE FILL UP THE FIRST PAGE BEFORE USING THE BACK PAGE?! So there was actually 7 questions to the exam… I answered 3. I was able to hold in the tears until I got home. It turns out that at least 2 other people didn’t see the back page either. That makes 3 out of 8 students… hopefully he realizes it’s not entirely our fault?…
Now it’s Thursday. Another day I have to be at school at 8a. But on Thursdays I don’t go home til 6p. Long day for me. Teaching lab went ok,; so that’s good. It’s just so nice outside that I want to be out there! I’m in my office hours right now. I normally grade labs during this time, but I forgot the answer key. So that’s a bummer. Now I’ll have to grade over the weekend. Not fun.
I haven’t had a chance to work-out this week either… so I feel fat.
Goals for 2009
Yes, we’re already 6 days into the new year and I’m barely blogging about my goals for the year. But hey, I’ve been busy driving halfway across the country and starting school
First I wanna look back at 2008… great year! I went to the Joint Mathematics Meetings in San Diego. I graduated with distinction from Sonoma State University with a BA in math. I turned 23. I was a groomswoman. I moved to Denver (to a bigger, nicer place). I started grad school. I have an office at school. I got a MacBook. I made new friends. I started working out. — Great year indeed!
Now it’s time for another great year. Here are my goals:
- Read my Bible more – I feel so guilty about never reading my Bible. I remember when I used to read it every day! So my goal for 2009 is to reach that point where I’m reading every day again… even if it’s for only 5 minutes! I don’t read because I don’t want to, but because I forget.
- Get in AWESOME shape by June - I’m not just talking about reaching my ideal weight… I can do that in under 2 months. I’m talking about being beautifully toned with a perfect tummy and adorable butt. We’re going to Costa Rica in June and I want to look stunning in a bikini! I haven’t felt awesome in one since I was 20, and I’m ready to get there again! I may sound vain, but whatever, every girl wants to look drop dead gorgeous half naked (and naked) whether they want to admit it or not.
- Keep a budget - I know, I’m a mathematician, this should be easy! And it is, I just get lazy. I have created a nicely complicated spreadsheet with Numbers on my Mac and have done great these first 6 days. I want to continue with this and not give up. Between my spreadsheet and Spend app for my iPhone, this should be a simple goal to keep.
- Save money - This goes with keeping a budget. I want to save a decent amount of money in prep for buying a house one day and hopefully buying a Mini Cooper in two years. I would also love to be able to buy a Nikon D90 sometime this year as well. I also have about $1500 of credit card bills. I’ve been very good about paying them off and believe I can have those taken care of soon. The other reason I need to save brings me to my next goal…
- Get pregnant - That’s right! I’m ready for the next huge stage of my life. But this goal is tricky because I have a very small window. Since I am in grad school and plan on staying in grad school while starting my family, I would prefer not to deliver a child during the school year. This means I need to get pregnant sometime during September-November in order to deliver during the summer of 2010. This would be perfect because I will be getting my masters degree that June and beginning the part of grad school that requires less time in the classroom and more time on research. And if it turns out that I can’t handle raising children and doing school at the same time, I will have already received my masters degree which is something I will be very proud of achieving.
- Visit Kansas City and Chicago - Now that I live in Denver, it’s only about an 8 hour drive to each of these locations for me. I would LOVE to visit them as there is sooo much of this country I haven’t seen. I have a friend who I play video games with who lives in KC that I would love to meet (yes, I know I’m a geek) and I have always wanted to eat lots of great food in Chicago Dave and I are discussing visiting KC this march during spring break and we’re going to shoot for Chicago in the summer.
- Blog at least 3 times a week – I’m a horrible blogger and I want to get better. I don’t care if I don’t have a following or anything, I just want to blog for my own personal enjoyment. I used to write in my journal everyday and I would like blogging to replace that. I think it’s cool when I see that I actually had some views to my blog and an occasional comment, but it’s not my purpose for blogging. I just like having my own little corner of the internet that I can’t to use as I please.
So these are my biggest goals for 2009. I believe they are all reasonable and accomplishable. Well, I guess getting pregnant isn’t entirely up to me. It’s not like I’ll have let myself down if I don’t get pregnant. If I don’t, it’ll just mean that it’s not the right time yet and I’ll be able to accept that.
I’m having a hard time deciding how to conclude this post, so I’m just gonna stop…
What are some of your goals for 2009?
Yay for Christmas
It’s Christmas Eve!
My husband and I started our Christmas shopping on Monday and finished on Tuesday. This was actually early for us. We have “traditionally” done all our shopping on Christmas Eve, but because of transportation issues, we did our shopping on Monday and Tuesday.
Today was an interesting day: I woke up a little after 11a feeling the beginnings of a cold. I farted around for a bit while my dad did some cleaning and my husband played chess on the computer. When my mom got home from work, all four of us when to the grocery store…. total madness! My husband needed the ingredients for wassle, I needed the ingredients for gingerbread cookies, and my parents needed various items for Christmas dinner. I don’t think I ever want to go to Nob Hill on Christmas Eve again. There’s just way too many people. Everyone was nice, however, just too many people for my comfort.
When we got home 4 hours later (with a $10 little Christmas tree), we began our Christmas prep. Hubby started making wassle while my mom started the sauce for lasagna. I dragged the tree over to the corner and threw the handful of wrapped gifts under it. Once hubby was out of the kitchen, I started the gingerbread cookies. My dad was awesome and followed me around cleaning for me as I went. Even though it made the kitchen very crowded (mom, dad and I), I was extremely grateful for his help. Everything went a lot smoother and quicker.
Once everyone was out of the kitchen, we started “decorating” the tree. It’s the cheesiest decorating job we’ve ever done, but it surprisingly doesn’t look that bad. I’m feeling a lot worse now and my nose/sinuses are killing me. I kinda have a bit of a “bah humbug” attitude right now because I’m sick. I just hope and pray I feel better in the morning.
Here’s a cute picture for you though!
left to right: Ruckus, Epsilon, Beast
It's Been Awhile
Well, I haven’t written a blog post in quite some time. I keep telling myself I’m gonna get back into it, but get distracted by other things. But today is the launch of WordPress 2.7, so I must make a post! My initial reactions to 2.7 are quite positive. The look is nice and everything just seems better organized. I’m just hoping that now that they (WordPress) has completed 2.7, they will focus their time and energy in upgrading the iPhone app. Now if the new update for iPhone is as good as I’m expecting, then I’m sure I’ll be addicted to blogging all over again!
Well, since the last time I’ve posted quite a few things have happened. One of the greatest being that I got a new laptop! And not just any new laptop… a new MacBook! Oh, this machine is beautiful and I LOVE it! It took a lot to convince my hubby to let me spend the money. I am SO glad that he did! I have been so good and haven’t really spent any money since getting it. I am also going to spend lots on him for Christmas so that he can build the gaming PC he wants to build. I’m pretty sure he’ll have all the pieces he needs under the tree on Christmas morning. I’m so excited!
Also, my husband and I have completed our fist quarter of grad school! Yay! I got a B in Functional Analysis and an A in Set Theory. Hubby got an A- in Functional Analysis as well as an A in Set Theory. Normally, I’d probably be a little bummed about a B, but this class kicked my ass. I technically should have taken about 3 other courses before taking Functional Analysis, but had no choice. I had already taken the other classes that were being offered and I had to have at least 2 courses in order to fulfill my requirements as a GTA and to qualify for health insurance. I’m just glad this quarter is over, and that I passed! Next quarter should be a lot more fun since I’ll feel adequately prepared for BOTH my classes. I will be taking Automata 1 and Rings and Modules. I know my husband is very excited about Rings and Modules because he loves algebra.
Since the break between fall and winter quarters is so long, my husband and I made the drive back to California for the holidays. It was an absolutely horrible drive, but that’s ok. It’s good to be home. It took us about 11 hours to get to Vegas, then another 9 hours to get to Salinas. Our poor dogs were soooo bored. But now they’re happy because I hardly leave the house now, so I’m home with them all day
Anyway, it’s getting late so I’m gonna head to bed. Watch out WordPress… llofte will be posting more! Hopefully future posts will have a bit more of a purpose than this one. Maybe I should create a separate diary-like blog… Hmm, I dunno, probably not.
The Puppies of the Family
Here’s a little video of all the puppies in my family. Ally and Epsilon are my two babies and Ruckus and Beast are my parents’ doggies. Enjoy!
- Beast – 2 years – Yorkshire Terrier
- Ally – 2 years – Miniature Schnauzer
- Ruckus – 1 year – Yorkshire Terrier
- Epsilon – 1 year – Yorkshire Terrier
I'm Not Good at This
So, I have been pretty horrible at this whole blogging thing. I get so busy with school and life, that I just don’t have time to blog. Usually I have an idea of what I wanna write about, but I know it’s just going to take too long. I need to figure out a way to manage my time better. I really like blogging, I do. I have the WordPress app on my iPhone, and I think I need to start using it more to work on drafts.
I have many iPhone app reviews that need to be updated, and many new ones I need to write. I have noticed that many of my hits come from people looking for reviews on iPhone apps, and I feel bad because my reviews are old since the apps have since then been updated. I think once I finish my homework today, I’m going to update my reveiws that need to updated. That’s my first project. Then maybe I’ll get around to writing a new post.
I’m currently saving money for a new macbook (I think I should have it in about 2 months) and I’m sure my blogging will greatly increase once I have it =D I won’t wanna put my macbook down and will just type away!