Here Comes the Cupcake?

I've been asked to make the cake/cupcakes for a wedding. After some thought, some prayer and a panic attack (in that order), I said yes. Surprisingly, I'm not so panicked about it anymore; in fact, I'm rather peaceful about my decision. I'm excited to be given the opportunity to 1) provide a service for someone and 2) branch out and try new things! Not to mention the fact that I love weddings and all things wedding planning related. So, I have my newest obsession. Wedding cupcake designs. Yay!

This little baker wore orange tights today. Short of feeling a little like an Oompa Loompa, I was fairly happy with what I was wearing.

You can't tell, but my eyeshadow stayed on all day! It's the little things in life that make me happy.

Anyway, if that dress looks a bit familiar, it's because I happen to have it in teal & green. Scroll down, I wore it Tuesday.

This has been the week of colorful tights...Tuesday was green, yesterday was pink, today orange. Monday was kickboxing day so I wore leggings under my skirt instead of tights. What color should I wear tomorrow? Purple? Yellow? Blue? Stay tuned!

Is There a Shoe ER?

I fell down the stairs at Job #2 today. Somehow I managed to do it upright for the most part. It's a really narrow, steep staircase and if I had gone head first I would've snapped my neck. I thought I broke my left middle finger nail since it bent so far back it was bleeding, but there's only the tiniest of cracks in one side. My nails are ridiculously strong. It isn't right. Anyway, the worst of it was suffered by my shoe, which will need a TLC...Tender Loving Cobbler.

I saw the psychiatrist today. He passed with flying colors. He asked about my life and listened when I answered. It was refreshing. I got the lab tests ordered, a refill on my lithium and something for my anxiety.

Today's tights were pink. The camera is in my room across the house and once I head in that direction I'm not coming back, so you will just have to believe me.

Headed that way now. It's not even 8:30 and I feel like it's midnight.

Bedtime.

Hooray for Drugs!

Not that kind, silly.

I have a psychiatrist appointment tomorrow. The first one to take place outside an inpatient hospital setting in over a year, how's that for exciting and terrifying all at the same time?

I'm hoping the doctor is alright. I once had a psychiatrist that I adored. He was helpful, kind, willing to listen, didn't prescribe things that made me sick, and if they did he changed them immediately. One day I was given the devastating news that he would be leaving the practice...and not just down the road, either. He was going far, far away. I have no idea where he is now, but if I did, I would pay anything and travel anywhere to see him again. He was that good.

I don't know anything about the guy I'm seeing tomorrow. I'm a little anxious about it. Go figure. I'm hoping that this time tomorrow I have a prescription to help me with my incessant anxiety. I also need lab work ordered to check the level of lithium in my blood. Lithium is a tricky drug, you have to have just the right amount in you for it to work; it's called the therapeutic level. Too much lithium and you can become "toxic," and guess what, that can kill you. Guess when my last lithium level check was? Oh, last June, in the hospital where it was prescribed to me. Guess how often one is supposed to be checked? Every few weeks. Oops. I haven't died yet, so I'm guessing I'm ok.

Would you believe I found a use for olive green tights?

Don't I look just thrilled about that?

Why is everything I write a question?

I wore this dress (which is black, teal and green) in January with black tights and a teal jacket. Today I wore it with a black cardigan, the aforementioned olive green tights and black shoes. And yes, that is a matching blingy ring. I bought it a couple of hours ago. I saw it a couple months ago during all the Christmas sales, but I couldn't justify buying it, even at the sale price. Tonight, I saw it and it was on clearance. I took that as a sign. It's mine now. My precious.

Just kidding, that's creepy.

Great, now I can't get the image of Gollum out of my head.

I should see a doctor.

I get a lot of headaches. All kinds. Migraines, tension headaches, combinations of the two. Last night I experienced something I'm not sure I would wish on my worst enemy. Sometimes I wish I had the capacity to wish such harm against certain people, but I don't. It felt like my left eye was on fire and boring into my skull. The pain radiated through my scalp and part of my face, but never reached my right eye. I was getting ready for bed when it happened. One minute I was doing something on my phone and the next, I was suddenly in pain. I grabbed my eye mask, shut off the lights and immediately laid down, but soon after I was in even more pain. To top it off, I was having a hard time breathing. At the time I couldn't figure out why I couldn't breathe, but my dad pointed out that I was probably in a panic from the intense pain.

It hurt so badly that I cried. You should know that I have a very high tolerance for pain. The last time I cried because something hurt was in 2009 when I had paronychia in my right middle finger. The doctor had to stab my swollen, pus filled finger multiple times to drain it. The receptionist was kind enough to hold my other hand while it was being done, and I was in so much pain that I almost broke it. My grandmother said that when she had it, it was worse than childbirth. Go ahead, google it. If you know what's good for you, you'll stop biting your nails.

Today I read up on headaches on mayoclinic.com. Last night's headache fit the description of a cluster headache almost perfectly. It even said that people describe the pain as a burning sensation. What scared me is that the reason they're called cluster headaches is because they are recurring headaches, potentially 3 or 4 in one day, every day for some period of time. They also happen around the same time every day. After reading that I panicked about having another one between 9:30 and 10. Thankfully, I didn't. So I don't know why I had a cluster-type headache without the cluster. I do know that I don't want it to happen again.

I braved the yellow tights today...and got a compliment! I went suit shopping with my dad tonight and while I was waiting for him to come out of the fitting room, a girl who there waiting for her friend said that she liked my tights and that she thought they complemented my skin tone quite nicely. Who knew?

A Confession.

Like many, many other women, I have the usual laundry list of addictions: shoes, purses, coats, makeup and more shoes. Nothing shocking about that.

But there is another.

I have a thing for notebooks. Notebooks, journals, sketchpads...if it's bound, blank paper, I love it. I buy them, and then never end up writing in them. The ones I do write in, I never get rid of. I know it sounds super strange, but keep in mind, I never said I was normal.

I like what a blank page can represent. A fresh start, a clean slate, starting over, something with no mistakes on it. The possibilities for what you can put on the page are endless. I could write about anything! Where will it take me, what will I do next? The suspense of what could go on the page kind of keeps me from putting anything on it sometimes. It turns into a nice mixture of love and fear. I'm reminded of cement as I say this. My love/fear of blank paper is like cement. Sludgy, sticky and leaves me stuck.

I once read that when you have nothing to say is the time you have the most to say. I've found that to be true on more than one occasion. I've often had lots of emotions and thoughts racing through my head and been completely unable to make enough sense of it to write it down. It's different when I'm in front of a computer though. When I type, I can keep up with my thoughts. I think quickly, and I type very quickly. I don't write by hand all that quickly. When I try, my handwriting turns into another language (bekahnese) and very few people can read it. Not that many people read my handwritten journal entries.

For the time being, this blog is somewhat of a journal, I guess. But I should really try to put pen to paper one of these days. Moving on.

Today I wore the Olive Oyl t-shirt I bought yesterday, denim skirt, brown tights and brown leather scrunchy boots with gold bangles, a leather cuff bracelet and a beaded necklace. You can't really see the necklace in the picture.

I didn't have a sweater or anything that matched so I had to go without a warmer layer. Most things I own are black or grey, not brown and blue. I should remedy that.

Good, Bad, Ugly, Adorable.

The Good:

1. I bought a navy blue/white patterned skirt that will match my new blue shoes.
2. I got the niece a stuffed Hello Kitty holding a cupcake.
3. I had Panera Bread for dinner. It was delicious.

The Bad:

1. I forgot to take a picture of what I was wearing today. It involved flowery sweater tights. Besides that, you didn't miss much.
2. The carpool fell through tonight, so I didn't make it to kickboxing. I would have driven myself, but I don't see well in the rain. I'm serious. It's not a lame excuse, I swear. I was all dressed and ready to go, waiting in the appointed meeting spot, which is 15 minutes from my house and at least another 45 minutes to the gym, when it all fell through.

The Ugly:

1. My wedding song came on my Pandora station while at Job #2. It is a song I really liked by a band I really liked LONG before what's-his-face was ever in the picture. Unwilling to let him take it away from me, I sat through it. A few tense minutes later it was over, and lucky me, I was having the physical symptoms of a panic attack without access to meds to make it go away. I managed to breathe through most of the chest pain, not hyperventilate and get through it. Blah.

The Adorable:

This is Harold. Harold the Hedgehog. He is perched atop my monitor. I saw him at a bookstore over the weekend and had to bring him home.

As my niece would say, byebye seeya!

Aunt Bekah

My niece is cuter than your niece. You're going to have to take my word for it. No offense, but this is the internet and there's a chance I don't know you, so I'm not posting pictures. And if you do know me, then you probably already know what she looks like. So there.

Anyway, the kid's a riot. She's not even two and communicating in near complete sentences. She has made "please" and "thank you" an art form. When she wants you to sit next to her, it's in your best interest to sit there. And I think it's time to finish potty training, because she referred to herself as "gross" today. Gross or not, she's awesome. I spent most of the day with her and didn't rip my hair out. Aunt Bekah is learning a great deal of patience. Actually, that's not true. I learned patience when I was homeless and in an abusive marriage. Good things do come to those who wait, because now I can exercise that patience with my adorable niece.

This is all coming from someone who never really liked kids. They say parenthood changes a person, well I can tell you that so does aunt-hood. I like being an aunt. I can't wait to take her shopping and to get her hair done and give her advice on impractical shoes and brands of mascara.

Speaking of shoes and mascara, I struck out on both counts today. I wore flats because they were comfortable and I didn't put mascara on because I forgot. Ugh. I've been such a slacker lately. My moods and anxiety have been all over the place and I've been having a hard time getting out of bed in the morning. By the time I do, I have no time to get ready, I can't decide what to wear, I panic and stress out even more, pick something stupid and end up late for work anyway. I think I only wore powder once this week, and that was today. The rest of the week it's been smudgy eyeliner, visible blemishes and chapstick. My great grandmother is shaking her finger at me again.

My outfit today was *hangs head* a repeat. I <3 Diet Coke shirt, pencil skirt & cardigan. I switched up the tights though:

They're fun. (yes, I put heels on to take the picture because the flats looked ridiculous) You know, I should've made this year about tights. I could easily find 365 different pairs. Not that this project was ever about wearing 365 different skirt outfits. It's really more about approaching life differently, trying new things and sticking to my guns.

I'd go to bed, but...

1) I never did tell you what I wore today.
2) I have to research the best places to find men's suits. More on that in a moment.

I began this morning disheveled and grumpy because I accidentally slept in (after having been up past 2am making cupcakes). Job #1 said to go ahead, get ready, I'd feel better. It made sense, so I followed the counsel of my wise employer/father. An hour and a half later I arrive at work, coiffed and ready to go, only to find that my dad had just left and I had nothing to do. So I went downstairs to assess the damage on the cupcakes and do some dishes. I don't think I get paid to wash dishes.

Anyway, I ended up wearing a ruffled button down shirt (black with a tiny purple/red/mauve flower print) belted over a black pencil skirt with purple tights and black sling backs. Ta da!

I look a tad disproportionate, but it may be just how I'm standing. It's hard coming up with poses I look decent in. It's hard taking pictures of myself, period.

Speaking of pictures, the double fudge cupcakes came out great. The addition of ganache on top probably makes them triple fudge, but I'm trying not to think about it.

My dad said they may be the best chocolate cupcakes he's had in his entire life. Right. But that brings me to the second reason why I'm not in bed: suit research.

My dad needs suits. It's been determined that he is between sizes at the moment, which is a little unfortunate, because he has no plans to go up to the next size or go down to the smaller size. So now my job is to find stores that carry this odd number. A suit expedition for my dad is like me shopping for hosiery. It takes forever. He's weird sizes, I'm picky about my color, believe me, the two aren't so different.

And so I bid thee good night. I'm off to learn about men's pants and where I can get them in odd sizes.

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I think he should hire a tailor.