This Is Me Challenge - Part 1

Here we go ladies and gentlemen! I'm jumping on the Blogging Bandwagon and I'll start with this. :)

Your birth and family:  

*What is your full name and how did you get that name?  Do you have any nicknames?

Stefanie Mae - I was named Stefanie after the actress Stefanie Powers. Mae was my grandmothers middle name passed to my mother and now to me. I've passed it on to one of my furbabies so far but someday if I have a little girl you better believe it will be passed to the next generation.

*What are your parent's names?

My parents are Bill & Deb and they're the best parents in the world. :)

*What is the date of your birth?  Where were you born?  What are some of the circumstances (when your mom went in to labor, how long, her doctor, your dad fainting, etc.) of your birth?

I was born on June 28th of 1986. My mom was 2 weeks late even though I was her 2nd child. My Great Grandma told her this was going happen so I would be born on her birthday but my mom told her she was nuts. She was like a 2nd mother to my mom and sure enough...she was right. Mom called her after I was born and told her that she had a birthday present but she would have to come to the hospital to meet her. They shared some tears on the phone and she came later that day to meet me. She is the one who started the middle name Mae so she is pretty special. I was also stubborn (imagine that) and decided not to breathe when I was born so most of my newborn photos feature some pretty purple or blue limbs until later in the day. 

*What are your sibling's names and ages? 

I have 2 brothers, Mike is 3 years older than me (29) and Nic is 3 years younger than me (23.)

*How was your relationship with your siblings and parents?

We are a VERY close family....some people think we're weird...I'll explain. Growing up I didn't want anything to do with my family. I was always upset with my parents and my brothers and I wanted nothing more than to be on the other side of the wall from each other. We grew up driving on family vacations for 2 weeks or so. We would get in the car and drive for 8 hours a day until we got to our destination. I got to see some pretty amazing things from these trips but 2 weeks in a vehicle with your family would wear on anyone. Anyways....back to being a close family...my family didn't get really close until we moved out (sounds backwards right?) My older brother moved out and bought a house about a block and a half from my parents and 3 years later I bought a house a half a block from my parents. My mom's parents live just 3 blocks away so people always laugh that we're taking over the neighborhood. We're in the middle of a house swap now so my older brother and his new wife will be moving out of the area but my little brother is buying his house and moving out of my parents house. My brothers are my best friends and my parents are my rocks. I don't know what I would do without my family. 

*What are some lessons you learned from you parents?

I learned my go go go lifestyle and inability to say no from BOTH of my parents. I grew up with my dad being involved in tons of thing and ALWAYS being busy. It seems like in the last 5 years the tables have turned and now my mom is the busy one. She is involved in nearly every Czech organization in Nebraska and never slows down. My husband thinks I'm crazy for this lifestyle but it's what I've always seen and lived. 

*How did you help in your home?  

Honestly? I didn't....I was not a very nice kid and did as little as possible to help out. 

  

Growing up, early years: 

*Where did you grow up?  Describe it.

I grew up a half a block from where I live now in Lincoln, NE. We had a nice house in a small development on the Southwest Side of town. We used to be the last house in the area and now the neighborhood extends 30 or more blocks past our house. 

*What was your earliest memory?

I remember leaving kindergarten early because I had the chicken pox. I got in the truck and remember my classmates waving to me as I left. I cried because I loved school and didn't want to have to go. 

*What games did you play as a child?

I was always playing house and school...either way I was always in charge! :) 

*Where did you go to school?

I actually went to 3 different elementary schools. Not because we moved but because the first one was only K-2nd, the second one I went to 3rd grade, and then the third one was built so I went there from 4th-6th.

*Who were your friends?

I always had a lot of acquaintances but only a few close friends. I hated to see anyone excluded so I tried to make friends with everyone. Sometimes this seemed to bite me in the butt. My friends in the neighborhood were my closest friends and I remain friends with them today. Lyndie was the first friend I remember and there are lots of photos of us being goofy and crazy together from age 3 and on. She moved to Grand Island when were in elementary school and we used to get together in the summers and stay with each other. 

*Who were your favorite teachers and why?
My favorite teacher in elementary school was Mrs. Olson. I still keep in touch with her today on Facebook. She inspired me to use my voice (ok...I was already pretty good at that but she inspired me to use it to SING!) 

*What were your chores? 

Again...I was terrible with this and didn't help around the house at all! :( Mom even cleaned my room...sorry mom! 

This was kind of fun to share and there is lots more if you check the list. I won't bore you anymore but check back later for the next part in this series!

Stefanie Husak

Pug-sessed

Or Three!!

I have a confession to make...I LOVE puggies...and it may be to the point of obsession!! :) We got our first smashed face sweetheart named Prissy when I was a little girl and unfortunately she only lived 3 years before we had to put her to sleep due to kidney failure. I got pug fever back then and it only grew from there. We grew to love our next pug Winston a few years later and adored his laid back with no care in the world attitude. After 11 years, he made the trip to heaven just about a year ago.

On my way home with my 10 week old baby girl!!

My first baby came to me in 2007. I had found an ad in the newspaper for fawn and all black pugs and called to see if they had an all black little girl and unfortunately they had already promised her to someone else. The breeder told me that if the man who was supposed to pick her up on his way through Nebraska didn't happen to call her that Friday she would call me. I really didn't expect to hear from her but that Friday evening as I was telling my friend Danielle and her pug Brinkley that I just might be a pug owner soon I got a call. The next day I was on my way to pick up my sweet Daisy Mae. I even had to get permission from my younger brother to skip out on his graduation ceremony so I could go get her. Luckily he is a pug lover and told me to go for it! He was the first one in my family to see and hold my baby girl. She is a chubby girl with lots of attitude, she will make it known when she is not happy.  Every time I try to leave the house she pulls on my pant legs to keep me from going. When Brad and I first started dating she even peed in his shoe when he spend the night...she didn't like that daddy was getting all of mommy's attention instead of her.

Snuggled up in my new home!

Next came my feisty girl. I was thinking that Daisy would be much happier with a friend when she was around 1 year old and had my heart on getting a Shih-Tzu. I started watching the newspaper and found an ad for a 1 year old black pug that was house trained. I called to find out more and found out that their little girl Snickers was a fire ball  and they were nervous that she would jump up on one of their daycare kids and knock them over. The next day I was picking her up to bring her home but I didn't expect what would happen next. Daisy and her were both very used to being only children and when they got together I thought there were going to try to kill each other. My mom agreed to keep her for a few weeks and see if they would adjust and a month and a half later our Lilly Ann moved in with me full time and joined our little family. She is our vocal pug who spends lots of time yelling at a random blade of grass that upsets her down by the fence in our yard. Ok...maybe not but we're not really sure what she's actually barking at down there sometimes. It is obvious that red vehicles at the fence or dogs on TV are her real arch nemesis. While she has a lot to bark about she is the first one to snuggle up for a good belly rub anytime you're up for it.

Our little man is getting style lessons from his sisters!!

Last but certainly not least is the man of the house...SORRY BRAD! ;) I had started the pug fever for my friend Jess back in college when she met Winston and she got her first little man Dodge soon after. We lost touch for several years beyond the occasional Facebook post but her puggly little family continued to grow just like mine. :) She began to foster pugs when she moved back to Nebraska and we started talking again. We had a few pug parties at my house and had a grand time seeing her babies and meeting her fosters when she brought Ceaser over. He was an all black pug but about twice the size of our girls. He fit in with our girls and after a few tears I convinced Brad to let him stay overnight....just overnight! You know where this is going....we both fell in love and by the time I was supposed to give him back we had a chat and decided to let this little man join our family. Our Maxwell Nova has been an interesting addition to the family. HAHA! He played his daddy to make him think that he was going to be man's best friend but now we see he is a TOTAL momma's boy! He is always making us laugh when he chases his tail and learns patience when we make him wait to eat his food.

Is this how it's gonna be?!?!

I think I'm done for a while! :-D We're trying to figure out where a child is going to fit in this house but I guess we will figure it out when it's time! That will be another blog for another day!

Stefanie Husak

Live from My Mac

Well...I've officially given in! :) If you would have talked to me 3 years ago and told me I would own a Mac computer I would have politely laughed in your face and told you that you were crazy. Along with this snow storm that is apparently going to be the end of the world...I have....yes ladies and gentlemen...purchased a Mac.

My conversion process started in May when our church advertised a God Story during the service. You had to write a "God Story" to our pastor and tell him about how God was working in your life. I wrote about how Brad and I were going through some difficult times with losing his dad and we fell into the church family at Christ Lutheran Church. I'm not sure how we would have handled things if we hadn't found our church home at that time and I wrote all about it. A few weeks later (the week I was to graduate from Southeast Community College) I got an email from our pastor with the title "iPad." Well the names of everyone who had written a "God Story" were thrown into a hat and I won an iPad. I stood up at my desk and had a small melt down because I was so excited. It was like a graduation present from God. HAHA!

I thought that I would try this thing out but really wasn't expecting to use it too much. Well...I was hooked. I used it all the time and started thinking how great it would be to have a Mac computer, iPhone, and the whole shebang.

A few weeks ago I fell asleep with my iPad on my stomach and woke up to the sound of it falling to the ground. I assumed everything was fine because it fell in my bedroom from the bed onto the carpet but when I picked it up later it had fallen on my remote...still not so bad but with my luck it had to be worse. It fell on the remote right on the side where the volume up and down buttons are and dented the case. The buttons were stuck so after a few weeks of ignoring it and pretending I didn't have it (so I could calm down a bit) I found a way to override the buttons on the side and am now able to work with it without a huge change. While I love my iPad I type a lot, run a few websites, and keep in touch with my Scentsy team so having nothing but the iPad wasn't really an option. My laptop has been starting to act up and I've just dealt with it but last night it just gave up...FRUSTRATING! Of course this isn't the most convenient time with school full time but with working at Best Buy I purchased an open item computer and got a good deal. I also got the coverage so I don't have to worry about dropping it or my dogs ruining the thing. Hopefully I can get everything transferred over from my old computer and I'll be set.

For anyone else transitioning from a PC to a Mac I'll let you in on a little secret that our Apple rep at Best Buy told me about...go to this link and you will find a document about "On Windows I used to..." and the Apple process of doing the same thing. (I'm sure this will be my lifeline for a while!!): http://support.apple.com/kb/HT2514 

I'll let you know how it's going in a few weeks! (Maybe just maybe I'll get a snow day tomorrow to be able to learn more and practice on it!)

Stefanie Husak

Meet the Hubby

Well I guess you should meet the man that made me Mrs. Husak to learn about our household. :) So blog-friends meet Brad!

 

Since he's not a blogger...I'm going to interview him and post his responses...this could get interesting ladies and gentlemen.

 

Tell us about yourself Brad:

Well, I'm over worked and under paid, over screwed and under sexed, and everything I eat turns to crap. (**Note from Stefanie: I warned you guys!!!**) I always tell my wife she works me like a rented mule but she says she wouldn't work someone elses mule this hard!

 

Tell us about your childhood:

My family didn't have a lot of money but I learned to appreciate things more becuase of it. I was taught at an early age not to feel sorry for yourself, if you look around you will always find someone who has it worse. I grew up in Columbus, NE as the only child of Joe & Charlotte Husak. My dad was my best friend and it was very tough to lose him this April but we know he's watching over us every day. Mom still lives in Columbus with their dog Buffy and calls often to make sure we know she cares and worries bout us. I learned to play the accordion at age 12 and this became a big part of my life in later years.

 

What do you do for work?

I maintain all of Garner Industries mold tooling. I have my degree in Machine Tool from SCC in Milford and also serve on their advisory board.

 

 

 

So back to this accordion thing?

I started playing because my uncle had an accordion and I thought that it would be fun to learn. My dad helped me get my first accordion and start lessons and later on her basically managed my band by putting together jobs and musicians. I know I couldn't have done it myself! I met Stefanie at a Czech event and started teaching her accordion. This is how we spent time and got to know eachother before we stared dating.

 

Anything else you want to share with the people of Blog-Land?

While things are busy and sometimes stressful I know that the Husak Household will be full of love and we will keep you posted as our household grows! ;)

 

Brad & Stefanie Husak

Ready to Read

I'm getting ready to head to Wisconsin tomorrow and I really should be studying for the 2 tests I have tomorrow but instead I'm stressing over the things that need to be done and the things I want to be done before I go. I am so thankful for my parents being 1/2 block away so I don't have to stress about my babies being taken care of but in pulling books out to decide what I'm going to read while we're on the road for 8 hours I found this issue a little harder than I thought...I HAVE SO MANY BOOKS I HAVEN'T READ!!! I am seriously shocked.

When I worked in a call center I read all the time between calls and went through several books per month so when I saw a bargain on books (keep in mind this is BEFORE I owned any sort of e-reader) I would buy a couple to add to my collection. Tonight in going through my "new books to be read" boxes I found 50 books that I haven't read...now remember...this is pre-e-reader books so let's add another 15 to that list.

What I'm trying to tell you is it's time to get busy and get to reading!!! That means yet another goal for the year. I would like to read a minimum of one book each month this year but will be much happier if I achieve more than that. I know I can't set aside a ton of time but I'm going to try to start taking a book to school and instead of sitting in the break room over lunch and looking at Facebook on my phone I will take a book and bury my nose in it. :) I'll share with you as I get through some and let you know how they are. After I get through these 65...I would love to get suggestions from all of you. Here is a photo of some of the books as I took them out of the boxes on my living room floor. It is truly a mess of different styles of books (fiction, non-fiction, self help, business training, etc.) and different styles of writing (from J.K. Rowling to Jodi Piccoult) but I'm looking forward to a lot of diversity in my upcoming reading months!

On the way to Wisconsin my friend Denise and I have decided to read the same books so we can chit chat about what's going on in them so I'll be starting off this adventure with "Safe Haven" by Nicholas Sparks and "The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo" by Stieg Larsson.

Does anyone else have an addiction to buying books even when you don't need a new one?! I didn't realize quite how bad it was until just now!

Stefanie Husak

13 in 13 and I'm Just Getting Started!

Goals, yes I have a lot of them...some may say too many. One thing I'm guilty of when setting goals is to be to general and not set a goal that I can track or give myself too many excuses to get away with not achieving my goals. An example you ask....how about "I'm going to get healthy and lose weight in 2013!" Yea, I've set this goal for probably 5 years in a row but guess what...I haven't lost a whole lot of weight. I've lost a few pounds here and there but nothing that was noticeable to me. What does get healthy mean? Taking a vitamin, not drinking soda, no alcohol, it means so so so many things. What about lose weight? Is that 1lb, 2lbs, 10lbs, or 50lbs.

It all hit me when I saw our family Christmas picture from 2012 and I realized how big I looked. It totally bummed me out, I knew I looked better this year than I had the hear before but I wanted to keep it going. I knew I had to do things different than I had in the past and rather than setting a goal of losing weight or working out I set a goal to track my calories. Knowing myself I knew that just being aware of what I was eating and how many calories everything was would make me really THINK before I ate something but giving myself some freedom would keep me going. Last time I had lost weight I had done Weight Watchers and just kept track of everything I ate...self awareness sucks...I mean works! HAHA! You don't realize how much that Jr Cheeseburger will take you back or that extra helping of mashed potatoes? Yupp...don't need it! If you're interested in joining me in this adventure and need a motivation buddy be sure to download the MyFitnessPal app on your phone or get online and set one up. My username is SHusak.

Another thing that we have done this week and I hope to keep up with is to use e-Mealz. Since life is really busy I don't have time to plan a week full of healthy meals (and you can only eat so many frozen dinners before you're ready to throw in the towel) this is always an awesome option for us. You get a grocery list and a meal plan for 7 meals. We shop together and I send Brad on little missions to get me things but the list is even broken down into produce, dairy, meats, etc. I may not make the meals every evening but I make a few on some days and don't cook on other days. The meals take less than an hour (and usually less than a half an hour) to prepare and cook. Depending on which option you choose there are meal plans for 2 or meal plans for 6. We do the meal plans for 6 and have intentions to freeze some of the food to pull out if we have a few days between me cooking the next set of meals. Brad LOVES when I'm cooking like this and I agree that it's a nice change to have options for lunch and dinner that don't include meals from a box or a drive-thru. Plus I know that each meal makes 6 portions and they have side dishes to balance the meal so I pre-portion the meals so I'm not tempted to eat too much.

So far since I started tracking on January 6th I've only missed 2 days of logging my meals and I've lost 13lbs in 2013 so far! (So far being the important part.) I'm gonna keep working on it and make myself proud when I look at my 2013 Christmas picture compared to 2012! I know that once we have kids this will only get harder and I want to do this and look good for ME.

Stefanie Husak

Here We Go Again!

Well...here we go again! :) I've decided to try to start blogging again. I have a lot going on in life and a lot of goals for this year. I'm hoping that maybe...just maybe...sharing with the world will help to keep me on track!

I called the blog "Husak Household" because as you all know...I got married in September and well that's my new name...don't wear it out! ;) I figure for now I can update you on what is going on and SOMEDAY (emphasis on the SOMEDAY) when we have a family to update you on this will be our family blog to keep you updated on everything going on in our lives.

I'm currently in cosmetology school and planning to do esthetics when I am done. I'm also working part time and selling all 3 Scentsy Family products. As you would expect I'm still involved in many Czech organizations so to say the least....I'm busy. We're trying to enjoy married life in the few minutes we get to see each other. I'll write more soon!

Stefanie Husak