100 Things About Me

1. I was born in Northeast Ohio but now live in San Diego, CA.
2. I married my first boyfriend.
3. I have been in love with giraffes since I was a little girl. They became my favorite animal because they were tall like me.
4. I am incredibly smart but almost failed high school because I refused to do the homework.
5. My favorite television shows are The West Wing and Star Trek: Deep Space 9.
6. If I could afford it, I'd buy a house on the beach.
7. I learned most of my life lessons by watching my younger sister.
8. My older daughter and my mother have the same name, but my mother is named after my daughter instead of vice versa.
9. I have had one email address for over a decade and I still use it regularly.
10. I can't sleep unless it's very dark and very quiet.
11. I lived in the same house for 18 years when I was growing up. I finally moved when the rest of my family did.
12. I can play the violin and the piano, but neither very well.
13. The highest grade I ever received in handwriting was a "B" and that was only once during the 3rd grade.
14. My parents bought their first computer when I was 1. Since then I've never lived without a computer.
15. I have been to over 30 states, but the only countries I've visited are Canada and Mexico.
16. I love shoes but I have a hard time finding cute ones in my size.
17. I have a weird obsession with the numbers 2, 9 and 11.
18. I don't drink coffee or alcohol. I don't like the taste of either one.
19. I have only lived in 4 cities in my entire life, but I've had 8 addresses.
20. I got saved when I was 6 years old.
21. My escape fantasy has me living a life similar to Carrie Bradshaw, except less men.
22. I have only attended one semester of college.
23. I love books and read almost constantly.
24. My mom is one of my heroes.
25. My biggest goal is to write a best selling book.
26. I'm 5'9", the exact same height as my husband.
27. I have a dream house in my head and will one day own it.
28. Despite living in California for 8 years, I have never been to Central or Northern California. Nor Oregon or Washington.
29. I live across the street from a Christian bookstore and refuse to go in. I know once I do, I'll be there constantly buying stuff.
30. I miss the grocery store I shopped at before we moved. I knew where everything was and it had the nicest people.
31. I read Post Secret every week.
32. I finally bought my first little black dress in December of 2010. I bought it off the Internet, using a gift card. It fit perfectly and looked amazing on me.
33. I don't bake as much as I'd like because I'm afraid I would eat it all if I did.
34. My favorite drink from Starbucks is a hot green tea. I confuse the poor people when I order it because it's literally just hot water and a Tazo tea bag. They keep wanting to make it iced or add flavoring to it.
35. I insisted on buying a hot water kettle when I got married and I refuse to take it off my stove, even if I don't use it all the time. I do it because my mother and grandmother both do.
36. Less than 10 friends from my middle and high school years ever saw my house and less than 5 saw the inside because I went through an open enrollment program and lived on the other side of the county.
37. I cannot take a shower that is less than 20 minutes long unless I am absolutely forced to and timed.
38. I did three years of community theater when I was a kid.
39. My dream college is a very small art college in New York City. Unless they start offering online classes, I'll probably never attend there.
40. My first choice for an online only education is Harvard. I'll probably never go there either.
41. My first two cars were both Chevy Cavaliers.
42. My kids were born 2 years, 9 days and 1 hour and 11 minutes apart. I didn't plan it (they were both born in the middle of the night) but it fits perfectly with my number obsession.
43. I love sci-fi, mystery, romance and fantasy novels.
44. Most of the books I read are borrowed from my mom.
45. When I was little, my parents bought my sister and I a bunk bed set. One of the beds still resides in my mom's spare room, over 20 years later. For two years, my daughter used it as her bed.
46. My parents almost named me Rachel, but changed it within weeks of my birth because my mom knew too many other new babies named Rachel.
47. When I was sixteen, my lifelong ambition was to live in a huge house in the middle of the country with 3 boys and a husband who worked a solid white collar job. I currently live in a suburb of San Diego with my 2 girls and a husband who works in a machine shop. I wouldn't trade my current life for my dream life for any amount of money.
48. The first meal I ever cooked for Dave was hamburgers. We had a friend over and I badly undercooked them. Our friend ate them anyway without complaint, I only found out when Dave told me later on.
49. Dave proposed to me while we were watching the DVD for the first season of Pimp My Ride. I didn't realize until after I accepted that he was asking for real and not as a hypothetical question.
50. The only jewelry I wear on a regular basis are my wedding and engagement rings.
51. I bite my fingernails.
52. In the 2nd grade I won 2nd place for my grade level for a city-wide writing contest. I got to attend this big event which included meeting several authors and illustrators. One of the illustrators signed a book and I kept it until my kids finally destroyed it a few years ago.
53. I had chronic ear infections when I was little, so I had to get tubes put in my ears, but only one removed. The other fell out on its own.
54. My last date with Dave was to a SuperCross event. It was freezing cold and poured down rain. I had a blast.
55. I have no fashion sense or sense of color. Because of that I wear a lot of black and very neutral makeup.
56. I was one of the biggest dorks in my high school.
57. My favorite color has been blue since forever and all four of us have blue eyes.
58. I have never owned a bikini but I want to in the next 2 years and I want to look good in it.
59. With few exceptions, I always like the book more than the movie.
60. In high school, I wrote my senior English paper on "The Chronicles of Narnia". I failed it, but only because I didn't turn it in until 3 months after it was due and only then because the school threatened to not let me graduate. My teacher told me if I had turned it in on time, I would have gotten an A on it. The worst part was that I had done most of it long before the deadline, I just didn't write the references or turn it in.
61. My least favorite chore is dishes, followed by laundry.
62. I never had a date for my high school dances. Instead, I went with my friends, who all paired up. I always planned to cover my portion, but every time the guys would chip in and get me flowers and pay for my dinner. It meant so much to me that they were willing to do that.
63. I cannot stand tuna fish.
64. If I had my way, I'd make steak and potatoes at least once a week and I'd never cook rice again.
65. I stopped making tacos for dinner because I kept getting grease on my shirts when I fried the tortilla shells.
66. One of my goals in life is to make flour tortillas as well as Dave's grandmother.
67. Officially I have more step cousins than I do biological cousins but except for 2, I've never known my life without any of my cousins and I treat all of them (including those 2) equally and with a lot of love.
68. I did shot put and discus in middle school but stopped in high school when they required I stay for the whole meet and always ride back on the bus. Because I lived so far away, it wasn't practical for me to stay.
69. I had the best English/drama teacher ever in high school. He taught there when my dad attended 30 years before me and still teaches there, 10 years after I graduated.
70. The only bone I've ever broken was the tip of my finger. I was 2 and my cousin, the same age, helped me.
71. I am currently (early 2011) at my highest weight ever. It beats my previous high, when I was 9 months pregnant with Beautiful G, by 10 lbs.
72. Every time I hear about how much God loves me (and other people) I end up crying. This includes almost every single Veggie Tales show/movie.
73. I would eat pizza, burgers and Mexican food every day if I could get away with it. I'd also never cook again.
74. I deal with my kids a lot better one-on-one than I do when they are together.
75. I never got any wisdom teeth.
76. My name is Jacqui, pronounced like "Jackie" but without any Ks or Es. It's a nickname, but one I've had since birth. Because of it I put "Jackie" as a preppy name but would never consider myself preppy.
77. If given a choice between hot weather and cold, I pick hot every time.
78. My favorite soda is Diet Coke, not because it's calorie free but because I like the taste and have since I was a kid.
79. I hope that my daughters don't go through the same issues I went through when I was a teenager.
80. My dream house has two floors, 4 bedrooms (one as an office for me to write), a huge kitchen, huge backyard and a 3 or 4 car garage. The backyard is so the girls can play with space and the garage is so Dave can work on cars. The house would be mostly hardwood floors.
81. I am a bad driver.
82. One of my biggest guilty pleasures is boy bands from the late 90's.
83. I am a night owl but everyone else in my family is an early bird.
84. Every year I get together with my mom and grandma and we bake Christmas cookies. It's one of my favorite days of the year.
85. I know exactly how many days in between Christmas and my birthday.
86. I want to get a degree in Creative Writing, even though I know it's generally considered a useless degree.
87. Despite the fact that I've been using the Internet for almost 20 years, I don't know how to do coding or html at all.
88. I know a lot of useless facts.
89. Listening to P.O.D. makes me sleepy.
90. When I was 16, I hurt my foot on the beach while on vacation. We never found out exactly what happened, but I spent 3 months on crutches and had physical therapy for my foot.
91. I rarely celebrate Valentine's Day
92. My first job was as a file clerk in a title insurance company as a high school student. I worked there for 3 years and worked up to a full time position typing titles. Even though it's been almost a decade since I worked in the field, I still the occasional call from temp agencies offering me a position in a title company.
93. My favorite movies are You've Got Mail, She's All That and 10 Things I Hate About You.
94. My phone has become command central for my life and sometimes I worry about that.
95. My wedding dress was made by my mom, using the pattern she used to make her wedding dress.
96. I sleep with a little pillow in my arms. It drives Dave crazy.
97. I constantly forget to turn off lights when I leave a room and it drives Dave crazy. The girls are now picking up my bad habit.
98. I don't have cable and don't miss it.
99. Dave refuses to play board games with me. This is because the first board game we ever played was Boggle and I slaughtered him.
100. I just finished this thing and I'm still not sure it truly conveys who I am or why I'm running this blog. I'm a happy, Christian Stay At Home Mom who can't cook or clean very well. I'm running this blog so I can get better at that and so much more and I want to share the knowledge I have (and the mishaps).