The cleaners

I have a dilemma and I'd like some advice.  I got a dress to wear for a wedding, but it is dry clean only.  I haven't ever taken anything to the dry cleaners, so I was really nervous to take it in.  I had been talking for a while before taking it in about how I was nervous that they were going to ruin my dress.

Well, we took it in because I had worn it previously and I was going to take it home to Iowa to wear when we went to Circa 21 (which was VERY fun by the way!).  We went to pick it up the day before we left for Iowa, and there were some dark markings all over the dress that looked kind of like grease or something.  I complained about it and was told that it was probably from the cleaning solution and that they would run it again to see if they could get it out.  However, that meant that I didn't get to wear the dress in Iowa since it wouldn't be done in time.  I was bummed, but hopeful that they would be able to get the dirtiness out.

We got a call that the dress was done and that a manager had personally looked it over and it looked good, so now that we are back in CO we went in to pick up the dress.

There are still spots on it.  How in the world did the manager not see them?!

So now we have to wait until Friday until another manager is going to be in so that we can talk with them.  What I want to know is what kind of liability they have to replacing my dress.  I still have the receipt from purchasing it and the original tag.  We didn't have to sign any papers when we brought the dress in to the cleaners agreeing to anything.  The manager originally told us she would reimburse us for the cost to clean the dress and give us store credit, but if she says that again I don't know what to do.  I don't want store credit because I obviously will not be going back to this same store.  I also won't be wearing the dress again if they can't get the stain out...

Thoughts?  Anyone with prior experience in this area?  I hate when my first experience with the cleaners confirms my fear!

Holiday break

Friday was my last day at TJ before holiday break.  I promptly got sick around 10am Saturday morning.  How rude.  I was scheduled to work Sat night but I called out, then today I stayed home from church and tried to go to work this afternoon but left after about 2.5 hours.  So how is my "break" going so far?  Just dandy.  Haha.

I still can't believe that I get to go "home" on Saturday.  That's this week!  I am extremely pumped.  Some friends of our's are leaving the same morning and relatively close to when we are, so we are going to carpool and then hang out and drink coffee while we wait for our flights.  I'm very excited about that too.

Jake is eating peppermint ice cream right now.  He tried to convince me that it's awful, but I know better.  I don't think we have purchased it since I found out about my milk allergy, and I felt like I had to grieve another food all over again.  Oh my gosh that stuff is SO good.

Tomorrow is sleeping in, eating some yummy breakfast food, and attempting to work 3-11:30pm.  But Tuesday, oh Tuesday.... NOTHING!  I love breaks.

You know you work at a sporting goods store when...

Happy Turkey day.  I just told my parents this story, and I told Jake last night, so it's not exactly new to those that read this blog... but oh well.

I worked at Dick's last night until o'butt30 in the morning.  More specifically, 2:30am.  I'm a bit tired now, but we had to get the store ready for black Friday.

Anyway, part of getting ready for black Friday includes lots of balloons.  Tying balloons to fixtures inevitably leads to balloons that get loose and fly up into the rafters.  You know you work at a sporting goods store when your manager gets a BB gun out to shoot down the runaway balloons.  Scared the crap out of me the first time he shot at one because he didn't announce over the radio that he was going to be shooting in the store.  Oh well.

I work from 4:30am-5pm on Friday.  That's going to be fun.  The girl who took my place as lead when I left got promoted to another store as a sales manager, so this week they are relying upon me a lot more.  That basically means that I am working full-time at Dick's.  It is kind of nice to have another job where I can fill in the days when we don't have school though (since I am hourly at school I don't get paid on days we have off).  As much as it sucks to be consistently working around 50 hours a week, I'm very thankful that I have these job opportunities.

So many things for which to be thankful!

Communication skills

I do an after school program (CP) a couple of days of week in which I transport one of the girls from school to the program and work with her for a couple of hours.  The student's mom is very unreliable and I never really know whether I am going to CP until it is late.  Most of the time the not knowing has to do with the girl's mom, but many other times there is simply a poor lack of communication between the office staff at CP and the clinicians.  Drives me nuts.  Here is today's example.

The schedule for the week was sent out on Sunday evening (nice and late, eh?), and it said that I was not working on either Tues or Thurs this week (Thurs since it was Thanksgiving and obviously Tues because the student was going to be out).  I got a text message from one of the directors on Monday saying that he had me off the schedule because he thought the school was closed on Tuesday and the student would therefore not be there.  However, he found out we had school and asked if I could work on Tuesday.  I was not happy about it since we have a ton to do, but said that I could.

Today I sent him a text confirming that the girl was at school (she wasn't yesterday) and checking to make sure that he wanted me to come.  He replied with a "yeah buddy!" so I was planning to go.  During our last period of the day, I had a meeting with a student I work with, her mom, and other people.  I looked down at my watch at one point and realized that I was supposed to leave for CP 8 minutes prior, so I freaked out and excused myself from the meeting.

I went downstairs to find that my student was already gone from the classroom with the other student who goes to CP, so I ran outside to go get her.  As soon as I got to the car, I found out that my student was not going to CP.

You've got to be kidding me.  My ride that was supposed to transport all of us to CP (Jake would pick me up from there) was no longer my ride.  I don't have a car to drive myself home.  No text message or anything saying that I wasn't going to work today.  Luckily I was able to hitch a ride from someone so I could get home, but seriously.

Terrible communication.  TERRIBLE communication.  Glad I'm not stranded right now.

Cooking help for dairy allergies

Over the last couple of years, I have known that I have an allergy to milk and peanuts.  It has been interesting to observe others as they try to prepare dishes that don't involve these ingredients.  Peanuts are obviously a pretty easy thing to steer clear from (don't put peanuts in a dish and don't eat anything with peanut butter).  Milk, on the other hand, is apparently a little more tricky.  I'm not upset nor do I hold any ill will toward those who struggle to know what foods include milk; it is just simply interesting to observe.  There have been times when I have told people that I am allergic to milk, but then they will ask me if it is ok for me to have cheese or sour cream.  It's odd to me but it does take a bit to get used to ingredients that are usually used but no longer can.  I have compiled a list of things that should not be included in food that I consume if I want to have a happier stomach and nose.

Dairy ingredients
Cow's milk
Cheese
Sour cream
Butter
Ice cream
Milk chocolate (including syrup and hot chocolate mixes)
Yogurt
Ranch dressing (and any other creamy dressing)
Creamer
Whipped cream
Cream cheese
Cream of anything soup
Anything with the word "cream" in it
Anything in the dairy aisle :)

There are many foods that typically include these ingredients, and they are not usually noticed by someone not used to dairy-free cooking.

Foods typically including dairy:
Cornbread/rolls/biscuits
Pancakes
Waffles
Most cookies and cakes
Mashed potatoes
Green bean casserole (and many other casseroles)
Pumpkin pie
Pasta with cream sauce (or gravy with cream sauce)
Vegetables with butter

Suggestions for cooking for someone with a dairy allergy
1. Cocoa.  Using cocoa usually is a good substitute for chocolate, so looking for dessert recipes that use cocoa instead is a good bet.
2. Non-dairy margarine.  I generally have a tub of milk-free margarin on hand because I love it and tastes just like the real thing to me.  I will use it in any recipe that calls for margarine.
3. Non-dairy sour cream.  This stuff is pretty expensive but I use it when I am making something that absolutely calls for it- such as my cauliflower mashed potatoes.
4. Chicken broth. I make many soups, pasta sauces, and other casseroles with a chicken broth base instead of creamed soups.
5. Goat's milk cheese, such as feta.  I don't tend to like these kinds of cheeses, but they are out there in case someone wants to make a greek salad or something.
6. Brownies!  I feel as though brownies are about the safest baked dessert.  I don't think I've seen a brownie recipe with milk in it... including those already made at the store.
7. Put the cheese on the side- or on part of the meal.  A lot of times recipes simply call for cheese on top.  In that case, you can have cheese on most of the dish and just leave it off a portion of the dish.

All in all, there are many things that I can still eat as I have learned how to make substitutions.  There are a lot of meals we simply have stopped making, but we are still able to get a pretty good variety in our food.

So... thoughts?  Anything you were surprised about or hadn't thought of already?  Or is none of this surprising to those of you who read my blog?

Running update

Mmmk, Pam suggested that I blog about running.  Well, she suggested many things, but running is the easiest one to blog about and I feel like I should go to sleep really soon, so running it is.

I'm kind of lazy.  I'm thinking about doing another half in April, and one in May, but those are sooo long away.  It's difficult to figure out what I should be doing in the meantime.  My typical training pre-race includes about 10 weeks of training, but obviously April is further than 10 weeks away.  I ran 5 miles on Saturday at just under a 9 min/mile pace which I was happy about though.

I also was planning to run this afternoon.  In fact, I still have my running clothes on since I never went.  I was literally walking out the door when Jake got home... but then it was way more fun to hang out with my husband than it was to go running.  I left my running clothes on thinking that it might motivate me to go at some point.  Instead I just put a blanket on to cover my cold legs/feet and didn't go at all.  Haha.

I just ordered a couple new pairs of running shoes the end of last week because I'm currently wearing what used to be my running shoes as my every-day shoes AND my running shoes.  No bueno.  I've been saving up money from babysitting to go toward my shoes, and I thought I was going to have enough after babysitting on Friday, so I ordered them on Thursday night.  Then I got a call on Friday morning that the woman had to cancel since her kiddo was sick.  So, now I've ordered a couple of pairs of shoes that I technically don't have the money for yet.  Hopefully I will by the end of the week since I'm working like 52 bazillion hours. (ok, technically it's about 53 hours if everything goes through like it should).  Then I need to save up for my race(s), contact lenses, dentist visits, blah, blah.  Ok, I should go to sleep now.  G'night!

Ummmmmmmm

So, I haven't blogged in a while.  In fact, my blogs have become more and more scarce.  I feel like I don't even know what to write about anymore.  Are there any of you out there that still read my blog?  If so, what would you like to hear about?  I suppose I could write a blog about Amy's wedding that we attended this weekend (which was lovely).

Thoughts?