Falling Behind

Swinging with Daddy at the park:
Windy day with Aunt Lynsey:

Swimming at a friend's pool:

Lily loves to be tossed in the air:

And she loves smelling pretty flowers:

I know I'm 2 weeks overdue on recipes and food storage updates, but dang-it I don't want to go to the effort :) I will probably find the time here in the next week to post the last two weeks and next weeks menu. But much more excitingly... I went to our OB on Wednesday and we are dilated to 4 cm. Baby James isn't scheduled to join our family until June 16th, but he may make an early entrance. I would be thrilled if he showed up this week (and more specifically this weekend) so I'm doing everything in my power to get the contractions going: chores, walking, more chores, running up and down the stairs, "special time" with the hubs ;) etc, etc... Lily's final days were very similar to this - we were dilated to a 4 on a Thursday, false labor on Friday night, water breaking Saturday night. I'm feeling fairly calm about it all, because it seems so familiar. If any of you are inclined to pray, please pray that Baby James decides to join our family when my doctor is in town and on-call. Hopefully I'll have more updates (and recipes) posted soon.

Happy Birthday to My Studly!

Today is Michael's 28th birthday *trumpets sounding*! Being the neglectful (read "pregnant and absent-minded") wife that I am, I had planned out our 6 week menu without thoughtfully considering Mike's birthday dinner. A few days ago, he looked at the menu and said "Oh, we're having mini-meatloaves for my birthday?", and I said something like "Um, yeah". Yesterday I realized I could be flexible so I texted and asked what he'd like for his birthday dinner and dessert if he could have ANYTHING. He was very specific in what he asked for:

Herb-Glazed Pork Roast (I normally make this for Easter dinner)
Homemade Stuffing (his mama's recipe)
Pavlova (a Russian meringue)

I think this menu was meant-to-be! I had all but 4 ingredients on hand and had even just gotten my Food Network magazine (thanks Dane!) with a great pavlova recipe in it. I did most of the prep-work last night, but I better go get the pork roasting :)

Food Storage Round Up : Week Three

We have had a rough week, so I'm a few days late posting this weeks menu. Lily got roseola and my pregnancy nausea has returned with a vengeance. Happy Mother's Day to me! Because we weren't feeling well during the week, I ended up making soup and sandwiches from "tilapia night" on. Those meals I planned but didn't make are going to help me have some flexibility when something doesn't sound good to me. On a more positive note, I've now gone a week without "real" milk! I've totally weaned myself off of mixing whole milk with reconstituted powdered milk, and I think that until I run out of powdered milk or need whole milk for baby James, I won't be buying milk for myself. However, my sister is coming to visit me next week and for her sake, I'll buy a gallon of milk while she's here. I'm currently making my 2nd batch of yogurt and am excited to see if it turns out as well as it did last time.

Our tentative menu for this week was:

Crockpot Asian Peanut Butter Pork
Burritos (although in reality I'll probably just do the "brown beef, add seasoning packet" kind of burritos because I'm not sure I feel up to a big amount of cooking this week)
Fankuuchens (I don't know how this is really supposed to be spelled)
Mini-Meatloaves
Chicken Lo Mein
BBQ Curried Chicken

Happy cooking this week, and I hope you have more energy and less sickness than our family has had!

The Post That Time Forgot

I've had to go and post-date this (in April 2011) because I typed this out, and forgot to publish it. Let's blame James for this, because in May I was heavily pregnant, and since then I've been extremely sleep deprived. Until this week! *Hooray* James has slept 12 hours through the night for the past two nights! More on that next... But now, on to The Post That Time Forgot:

I love watching the shows like "Hoarders:Buried Alive" or "Hoarders:I Love Stuff More Than I Love My Family" - totally like a train wreck, I can't look away. A part of me justifies watching the carnage because I'm checking myself for warning signs; have I let stuff creep into every nook of my house? Do we have things that we don't use taking up space in our garage? I've recently noticed that I have a problem. No, I'm not a hoarder. In fact, I throw things away on such a regular basis that I'm finding myself kicking my butt two weeks after throwing something out (or giving it to Goodwill) because NOW I need it! I'd have a dozen examples, but my memory is horrible, so let me just give you the two most recent examples.

1. After my 1st pregnancy, I didn't fit into any of my t-shirts (thanks, big boobs!). I folded them into a box to use as fabric for baby pants, maternity panels, rags, etc... Now that I'm looking for that box (18 months later) I'm realizing I must have given it away when we moved down to Houston. Awesome, Jessi, great job there.

2. Also a sewing example - my mom gave me several boxes of fabric, which I went through and made her a quilt out of.I had tons of fabric left over - scraps and smaller pieces which would be perfect for making another quilt out of. And now that I've found another quilt pattern that I'd like to try, where are those scraps? Hmm, in Butte, at the Goodwill. Because, again, I am a genius and gave them away to get rid of the "clutter". I would kick myself in the head if I were flexible enough.

Maybe I need to become a hoarder.

Park Day!

It's been awhile since I've remembered to pull the camera out and document Lily's jump into toddlerhood. We went to the park today and I think I got quite a few good pictures. Good thing, since her melt-down on the way home would have eradicated the happy memories from my brain :)

Lily with her friend Ellie:

Running for the tree:

Not sitting very lady-like in her dress:

Plotting a theft of grapes from Jonas:

Deciding she wants to swing:

"Wheeeee!"

Stumbling through the woodchips:

Food Storage Round Up : Week Two

Our first week went by pretty successfully! We had homemade yogurt for breakfast, reconstituted dry milk with meals (at least I did - Mike's not really into dairy), and homemade brownies because I was feeling deprived. I think we all got enough healthy food to eat, but I had to make a few changes to my "No buying anything" strategy. Mike is working on his health, and his doctor told him to have a salad for lunch every day. I went to Costco and bought him a couple big tubs of spring mix lettuce so he won't have to take leftovers to work. I think that his health is worth breaking my rules :)

On to our menu for this week!

Cranberry Beef
Chicken Tamale Casserole
Crepes with "Blintz"
Tilapia with Alfredo Sauce
Masman or Panang Curry (we're going to have Masman)
Teriyaki Chicken

This week I have a bunch of pears about to go bad, so I'm making my Aunt Jackie's delicious Pear Pie. (I bought the pears before I started my food storage journey, which is why they're almost bad!) I'm going to go searching for a pie crust recipe so I can surprise Mike with it tonight!

UPDATE: I found a pie crust recipe that I LOVE LOVE LOVE and so did Mike!