Favorite Podcasts

 Hello People!

I've made a list of blog ideas because like I said in my last post, I'm trying to post more even if it truly doesn't matter lol.

I have a podcast going in my ear about 5-6 hours of my work day because I'm just emailing and entering orders and quotes. I do find that I'm forgetting to turn it back on after answering the phone more often but I digress. So, with that being said, here are my current favorite podcasts.

1) Hey Riddle Riddle

HRR is a riddle/puzzle/improv comedy podcast that my friend, Van, turned me on to and I cannot thank her enough. The hosts are Adal Rifai, John Patrick Coan and my best friend (I wish) Erin Keif. They all met in the Chicago Improv scene but Erin has since moved to Los Angeles. They're ridiculously funny and punny but also be warned they get pretty raunchy sometimes. I also joined their patreon because I truly couldn't get enough and $5/month? Worth it. 

2) Bananas

Bananas is a strange news, comedy podcast hosted by Kurt Braunohler (banana boy #1) and Scotty Landes (banana boy #2). For those of you who do not know, Kurt is a comedian and actor and Scotty is a tv and movie writer. I love them both and every episode they end up going on tangents about stories that have to do with what they're discussing and I'm completely drawn into their shenanigans and past lives and just know I'm inviting them both to my wedding whenever that happens lol.

3) Do You Need A Ride?

DYNAR is a comedy podcast hosted by Karen Kilgariff and Chris Fairbanks who are both Los Angeles comedians. The initial idea of their podcast was they would drive around Los Angeles and give their actor and comedian friends rides to and from the airport or home or their gig. They stopped driving to and from LAX because it was getting to be too much and then covid happened but they're still so much fun to listen to and I fell in love with Chris because of DYNAR. 

4) A Beautiful Mess Podcast

The A Beautiful Mess Podcast is hosted by the two founders of the 'A Beautiful Mess' empire, sisters, Elsie Larson and Emma Chapman. The podcast goes into mostly home and lifestyle discussions like their blog does. They talk about secrets of their successful businesses and their hobbies, tips for renovating homes (they've both done a few) and they also discuss books and their children and their lives growing up. Honestly it's my go to podcast when I just need to unwind from the negativity and just need positivity. 

5) My Favorite Murder

I feel like if you listen to podcasts and haven't heard of My Favorite Murder, you must listen to some real outlandish types or maybe only one because I think I'd be wrong if I said this wasn't the most popular true crime podcast. To be fair, it's a true crime comedy podcast but that makes it so much better and palatable. Karen Kilgariff and Georgia Hardstark host this monumental podcast in which they tell each other (and us) stories of murders, cults, survival stories (my favorite) and sometimes just strange phenomena. They have such a big following that they read a lot of their listener stories, to which I've written in a few times and still have yet to have one read which is one of my all time goals, but they're truly the most entertaining and sometimes jaw dropping situations people have been in. I've had to stop and go back and listen to certain episodes multiple times because the stories they tell just have my jaw completely on the floor of how crazy and incredible they are. I have joined their fan cult just to be able to get more of Karen and Georgia. I am a murderino. 

If you need a new podcast to get yourself into, hopefully you'll listen to one of these favorites of mine! You can tell I love the exactly right network as three of their podcasts are mentioned here lol. Also, if you didn't know I did used to have a podcast with my friend Mollie called Break Time with Myia & Mollie which I don't believe you can listen to anymore but it was 14 episodes of us just shooting the shit and I loved doing it. 

xxoo,

Myia

Home Reno '22

 Hello People!

This year Travis and I have saved up enough to do a few projects around the house and I thought I'd share with you what our plans are!

We are finally doing our driveway, and Travis is the most excited about it. We planned on doing it last year but as I stated in a previous post, our refrigerator decided to die and we needed that more than a smooth driving surface I guess lol.

So! We currently have a partially concrete - partially gravel driveway. It was definitely all concrete at one point in time, I'm assuming sometime in the 80's maybe? The back half is all gravel which is where it pools all of the water by the garage and where the basketball hoop is. Then it kind of transitions into cracked and bumpy concrete the rest of the way to the sidewalk. It is the worst to snow blow so Travis usually ends up just shoveling because it's not worth it.

 We're planning on sticking with concrete even though it is more expensive in the beginning, it won't need much upkeep versus black top. We got an estimate about a year ago for about five thousand, which totally sucks to spend that much on something that isn't super exciting but it has to be done. Fingers crossed something else doesn't break or happen!

Another to do is installing new flooring on the main level which includes the kitchen, dining and living room. We have the flooring we're going to be installing in the half-bath and entryway already so it'll be a nice cohesive space. 

The flooring is Traffic Master hand-scraped Saratoga Hickory. It's a nice deep color that we love and goes well with nearly everything else in the house. Eventually we will also be putting it upstairs but we have big plans for that space and will have to save up quite a bit to do so.

Along with the flooring we plan to redo our stairs. We will be removing the gross shag carpet and the overly painted railing. We've already painted the stairwell and the upstairs hallway a nice gray color versus the pale shiny yellow it was when we moved in. The color we chose is Dolphin Fin (personally I would've just named it Dol-Fin, Behr really missed their opportunity). 

The stairs will have similar colored treads and I think we're keeping the risers white. I would think we might put a runner down as well because of Archie but we haven't decided on that yet. The railings we're planning on going with would be something similar to our deck railing in our back yard, you can kind of see it in the driveway photo above, simple wood railing with black cylindrical poles for the balustrade. Not sure on the baluster yet but most likely something dark wood toned that ties into our trim. 

We would also like to redo our pantry and bar area. The bar area looks perfectly fine on the surface but underneath where everything is stored is basically an unfinished hole with doors. The pantry I think was put together as an, "oh shit we need a pantry" solution. It's currently under our stairs to the second level and the shelves are way too deep to even reach everything inside. The shelves are also just OS board with shelf liners stuck on top. We are thinking about putting in drawers for the lower levels to be able to reach everything in the far back areas and do some shallower shelving for the top. There is also no light inside so that will be added as well. 

Just so dark and not great. I'm glad we have these storage areas but they're just not practical or nice to look at. So we're planning on installing lights, new shelving/drawers and stemware brackets (which I bought a long time ago anticipating this project) and new doors. 

We are also planning on finishing painting the outside window trim, I think I have about 3-4 windows left, and staining our deck and front steps. Let's hope the weather is stable enough for us to do so. 

I'll be buying our flooring soon so stay tuned!

xoxo,

Myia

2022: Be Nice to Me

 

Hi All!

Haven't had much of a drive to come on here in the past year.

Truly because not much has happened to me for me to need or want to document it but believe it or not, things have still happened lol.

I'm not sure what flipped on in my mind but I have hope for 2022 being pretty decent. 

Here's a recap of what happened in 2021:

January-March: I started taking Archie on more walks around town because I knew I needed to get him and myself into a more active routine. I tried dieting but when I didn't see much of a result I figured it didn't work and stopped caring about it. I went shopping with my friend, May, and had dinner with her and Sam. Travis and I stayed inside most of the time since it be cold and ordered from a few places in town we usually wouldn't go to. Our refrigerator went out around this time and we had finally had enough money saved to get our driveway done but we definitely needed a refrigerator more than a driveway, sadly.

April: The snow melted and I hated how our patio/deck looked so we got new furniture and lights for out there which made me love it so much and I spent A LOT of time out there the summer of '21. We had planned on staining the deck and putting up a pergola but every chance we had it rained or we couldn't decide on what to do.

May: We added a bit more curb appeal to our front walk way with some new plants and grasses. We put in a new door and window in our main floor powder room and it was an improvement we needed for sure. In late May, we went to Milwaukee for my 28th birthday and stayed at a fancy hotel and spent too much on food and drinks. We went to Ikea for Travis' first time and unfortunately didn't buy anything because we didn't have any money lol.

June-August: This summer was mostly spent at home lounging. We rode our bikes a lot more and even went to and around Lake Wazeecha, about 12 miles, which is a lot for me. I spent some much needed time with family in Big Eau Pleine again and had a nice visit from my Aunt. 

September-October: We had a picnic with Travis' family and then went on our yearly camping trip. It was later in the season so there weren't that many other campers in the park. We only stayed for a day because it was supposed to rain the morning we were leaving so we left in the middle of the night. The Sunday after we went to the Packers-Steelers game at Lambeau and had the most amazing seats ever, 35 yard line, front row, right behind the Steeler's D-Line bench! The next day, my mom and I went up north to have some fun craft time with the Timmerman ladies. We made wreaths and yarn sticks lol. Mid-October I went to my first work trip and stayed in a hotel alone for the first time which felt super weird but I spent most of the time with all of the people at the training anyway. 

November: Luckily throughout the entire year neither Travis or myself contracted Covid or if we did, we didn't notice and hopefully didn't pass it on to anyone we came in contact with. I know I hate hearing about it but my GOD I just want it to go away. We tested negative before we went to Thanksgiving at my Aunt's in Madison or as they call it, Steins-giving, since we all drink out of ornate steins they've collected over the years. My parents joined us for the first time this year.

 December: Earlier in the month we visited my brother and his family in Hudson for Christmas. We ate in a heated green house downtown which was super cool and played new board games I got for Christmas. Check out Hues and Cues, its harder than it looks! Travis' Birthday was also just a nice day at home and I got him a cake from Carlo's Bakery this year. The next weekend we were supposed to go back West to have Travis' family Christmas but it snowed so much that we didn't want to chance driving in it. The Tuesday before the holidays I stopped by my Grandparents house to give them our grandchildren gift to them and well wishes since I wasn't going to be seeing them on Christmas this year. Christmas Eve I went ice skating with my boss and her family and then we spent the evening at my parent's house (I got rollerblades!) and we said our goodbyes since they were going to be leaving the next Monday. Christmas day was spent at home just Travis and I, the way we like it. We were both spoiled rotten. Later that day my friend Van came up! She was originally supposed to come up that Wednesday but stupid Covid ruined all of our plans! New Years Eve was spent at home while Travis worked until 10; we watched a bit of the ball drop but it wasn't much to write home about, kind of a lame holiday in my opinion! 

That's all I can remember based off of pictures and Instagram posts since I stopped writing in my Journal. 

This year we're looking forward to finally doing our driveway!!! It's not the most glamorous thing to spend a ton of money on but Travis is really excited to not have to shovel/snow blow our shitty bumpy/half gravel driveway for another winter and be able to play basketball properly as well. I'm just excited to rollerblade on it lol.

We're also planning on doing a few more renovations such as the main level flooring and the stairs. I want to paint the upstairs hallway and finally hang our portraits I did a few years ago. I think we'll finally finish staining the deck and the front porch as well. 

Travis and I talk about another doggo but we'll see what this year brings on. 

April, I have plans for a girls trip to the Mall of America since we freaking love shopping and later in the month,Van might visit again too! No big birthday plans as of yet and no big travel plans either. I hope we can get to Lake Michigan this summer and I'd like to cross off carnival ride on my summer to-do list along with swim or water park.

Hopefully I take photos and actually remember to write down things that happened or things I'm doing even if they're just everyday occurrences. I'm also trying to take more photos on my Instax mini11 and so far this year I've taken one photo of Travis and I after we got home from watching Spiderman: No Way Home. Keep an eye on my Instagram since that's where I post more regularly in stories. 

Stay tuned!

xxoo,

Myia