Promises...promises.....

Before you read my post, you have to PROMISE not to steal my idea!  Okay?  I would seriously cry and be devastated.  Promise???? Good!  :D

I know that in my last post I promised to write more -but as you've hopefully realized, my schedule and I don't always see eye to eye.  It wins, mostly...I lose, mostly.  So when I told you about the challenge, I intended to be right back, but was stuck doing my schedule's bidding.  So enough of that -are you ready for my idea?

Remember last week when I posted about the Husband Challenge?  No -this is not a challenge to get a husband.  This is a challenge that helps you work on communication and loving language -allowing you to realize how wonderful your spouse is, even if it's difficult time in your lives.  Trust me -this was a God send!  We're both students, working 30+ hours a week, and the communication department was definitely losing out.  So my proposal is heart felt, honest, and serious!

I would like to start a blog that concentrates on healthy communication in relationships, problem solving, and story sharing.  It would be a lot like Two Of Us (which is a favorite website of mine), but using challenges to encourage us to keep working on our marriages, and stories from other women to help us, keep our heads up, and to make us laugh (and probably cry).

So you want to know how in the world you'll have time to do this (I'm asking myself this at this very moment, but I think I'm too excited to worry about that...)?  Easy -trade-offs!  Each woman has a period of time that she runs a challenge, or shares a story, or posts scenarios.  After that time, she passes it to the next woman, and so on and so forth.  It can be as involved or relaxed as you make it.

So -here's the shout out to all the good women out there.  Who's with me?  :D

E-mail me at br.priester@gmail.com!


Hope to hear from you soon!!!!

The Husband Challenge!

Photo by friend, JRD Photography!

Happy to September my wonderful bloggy friends!  :)  It is my belief that the BEST things happen in September...mainly my birthday.  This means presents.  Briana + presents = *squee!!*  (if you don't know me very well, I'm sure this seems very selfish.  If you do know me -then you know that I'm not kidding when I say that I LOVE presents.  No joke...).

So last time I posted (I won't even link to it...it was grumpy!), I griped about my lovely Mr.  He really is quite wonderful, but sometimes men are completely clueless.  Can I get an Amen?  Can I get a double Amen for their house cleaning cluelessness  {that sounds like: Amyamennnnn!  Just in case you were curious....}?  What I failed to tell you was that as he was unconsciously picking a fight with me, he was trying to relax from a stressful day, just like I was.  We all have those right?

Just today I was invited to do a brand new kind of challenge.  It's called the "30 Day Husband Encouragement Challenge".  When I first got the invite on fb, I had a little laugh to myself thinking, "I don't need a challenge to remind me of how wonderful Mr. is!"  But then I started reading.  And then I felt like a jerk.  And then I realized that this is EXACTLY what we need to help us make it through the Semester of Doom (we're both finishing up coursework and exams, and he's starting his dissertation!).  He's working as a bus driver, shuttle driver, and soccer referee, and I'm working as a care giver and soccer referee on top of both sets of our school work.  This doesn't leave very much time for us!

This life doesn't leave very much time for me to look for opportunities to tell him how much I appreciate him.  Now I have 30 days to do just that, and hopefully the rest of forever to learn to appreciate him as we grow together.

Who's with me?  I'll post more about the challenge tonight!

Keep on keepin' on!

Why cleaning the house makes me crazy.

Be prepared -you're probably going to laugh, and then feel sorry for me.  Let me just tell you that it's okay to laugh and not feel those things -he has it coming....

This was me three weeks ago (minus being amazingly
beautiful and being C Z-J...just sayin'
source

Three weeks ago....
Me:  (determined....)  You know what, babe-
Mr: No -what?
Me:  Even though school is starting, I'm really going to try really hard to keep our home a priority for me.
Mr:  What do you mean?
Me:  (enthusiastically)  You know -cleaning up, keeping things tidy, staying up to date on all the chores.
Mr: (nervously) Yeah?
Me:  (excitedly) Yeah!

Fast forward to tonight:
Allow me to set the mood.  He's freshly showered from a soccer game and eating dinner.  I'm sitting on the sofa trying to learn two more songs so that I can pass my guitar exam (we have to memorize almost 50 songs.  For someone who's strictly a music person -not words -this is the hardest thing I've ever done....).  He asks about an important meeting I've had, and then responds to my statements with his unrequested observations.  Sometimes this is helpful, however, I'm not asking for help -I'm studying.

Get the picture so far?  He's asking for it...right?

Me: gets up from sofa and stomps into kitchen and proceeds to bang dishes and slam drawers (not like -really slam, but make noise so that his Fox news -that he's leisurely watching -is drowned out by my poor complaining kitchen).

10 minutes and a clean kitchen later (yeah...I'm that fast....)...

Mr: Thanks for cleaning the kitchen, babe.
Me: *dirty look*
Mr: It looks really good....
Me: *dirtier look*  (you see, he didn't even get off the sofa....)
Me again: (very irritated) So -do you have free time tomorrow?
Mr: (wryly...) I suppose....
Me: Well -don't let me interrupt your schedule, but can you please go through your things and determine what is necessary to be save and what can be put away?  (because he's got massive stacks of stuff that is spread all over my house.  Books, magazines, not to mention two double basses that are currently living in MY living room.)
Mr: (exasperated and annoyed sound) Sure (now he sounds curt...like I care...)
Me: Great -because the hard wood floors are going in soon, and we need to move everything this weekend.
Mr: Fine.

Me now -except maybe a little more crazy looking....
source

Ok -so you would think that after all of the psychology and counseling courses I've taken that I would know how to get what I want, right?  How to word questions and phrase demands so that I end up with the desired result...?  Well -this is the same every bloody time I go to clean the house.  Maybe this is why I never do it, and then get upset because I have a filthy place to live.

This makes me want to laugh myself into hysterics.  Then cry.

This is why cleaning the house makes me crazy.  Feel free to laugh at your leisure.