Quick Takes (2)

link

--- 1 ---

So I wrote this post about meal planning and how I grocery shop once a month (on or after payday).  Well, tomorrow's payday which means grocery day.  However, in the meantime we're out of pretty much everything including milk and bread.  So when I realized today that I was finishing up the milk (we have cereal just about every day), I started thinking about breakfast tomorrow.  So I ran across this recipe for blueberry muffins.  I had to search for a dairy free recipe since I am out of those items.  And I had frozen blueberries, and some comments said it mattered, but I thawed them out and it was fine.  It uses orange juice... sounded weird.   They were amazingly delicious and I WILL be making them again soon!  And I could use just about any fruit I have on  hand.

--- 2 ---

Our leaves are changing!  We have lots of pretty trees and they're starting to fall!  Anna, Luke and I sat outside and ate played with leaves for a while today!  A few more weeks and we're going to have our raking work cut out for us!  Anna will love it!

--- 3 ---

I like to watch Ext.reme Coup.oning.  It intrigues me big time...  And it's now my mission to figure out how to get toilet paper for free... That seems to be one thing all of those people have in common!  And toothpaste.  However, I did get bbq sauce free earlier this summer.  It was on sale for 79 cents and I had a $1 off coupon!  I was pretty excited.  I usually save 10-20% of my grocery bill with coupons, but I'd love to save more! 

--- 4 ---

Anna's pulling up on everything.  She can't quite get to standing yet, but she gets up on one foot and one knee.  And today she was playing with a toy in the middle of the floor, got up on both feet and lifted one hand and looked like she was just going to stand!  Slow down baby girl!

--- 5 ---

We went to the pumpkin farm for the first time this year!  Anna enjoyed it, despite getting a little nibble from a goat!  She loved the jumpy pillow and the straw.  We'll definitely have to make it out there again!

--- 6 ---

I love fall.  I love decorating for fall and dressing for fall and eating for fall.  There's something about it that shouts "family" to me and I just love that.  We have a parish weenie roast coming up and I'm really looking forward to that!  I could wear sweatshirts and jeans year round (if the weater would cooperate that is).  I LOVE apples and all things apple.  I'm going to get lots of apples at the store tomorrow and make homemade applesauce and homemade apple butter.  And of course apple crisp and apple pie and apple ice cream and the list goes on... It's hands down my favorite season! 

--- 7 ---

I need to be more intentional about getting out of the house with the two babies a few days a week.  On weeks when we take walks or go to the park or go visit Luke's mom or whatever, we all have better days, take better naps, and get more done.  Sometimes crankiness creeps in by the end of the week and I think we just get bored doing the same thing every single day.  They like to be social once in a while.  I just need to mix it up, maybe throw in some art projects.  And I miss seeing all of my fellow B-N Catholic SAHM's and their kiddos... 

For more Quick Takes, visit Conversion Diary!

7 months, 100 years, and a Godson

7 MONTHS

Our sweet Anna is 7 months old today!  I can't believe she's that old already!  I just watch her everyday and wonder how I got so lucky to be her mom.  She's unbelievably sweet and has taken to giving hugs to anyone who holds her.  She gives a hug and then wants mom back.  She's crawling everywhere, she's gotten fast, fast, fast and since it's not good enough to just crawl, she's started pulling up on everything.  She has yet to understand that in order to stay up, she has to keep holding on... So she falls a lot, but she's tough and usually just picks back up and keeps going!

Her favorite things are mama and dada and she talks about us frequently all day long!  She loves her giraffe and tends to have one with her at all times.  She's a big fan of cold teethers, although she has yet to cut any teeth.  She loves sitting under her jumparoo and playing with the toys from underneath.  She loves being outside and she loves finding cords in our house.  She especially loves drawers, and anything with a handle and she LOVES to eat!  She's eating all kinds of things now and is great at chewing up chunks (even without any chompers!).  She loves knocking over towers too.

Basically she's one big ball of fun!  She's so busy all of the time and definitely crashes for naptime and nighttime.  It's hard work playing all day!  We just love her to pieces and can't imagine our lives without her!  Happy 7 months to my sweet girl!

100 Years

And a very happy birthday to my great-grandma!  She is 100 years old today.  Quite the milestone I'd say!  We're excited to go celebrate her birthday on Saturday!  She's overcome a lot in her life, including lots of knee replacements and cancer as well as standing up for her rights as a woman when she was young.  She raised 3 kids, has 5 grandchildren, 10 great-grandchildren, and 2 great-great-grandchildren!  We have always enjoyed our time visiting great-grandma Maize, she always had many stories to tell (often more than once :-)) and she was always giving me things of hers that have my birthstone in them, since we have the same one.  She always loved to quilt and has many beautiful crocheted and quilted pieces amongst the family.  I'm so blessed to have so many grandparents alive!

I stole this from my dad, but it's interesting to think about.  Here are a few things that were not around or prevalent when she was born: Refrigeration, Cars, Air travel, light bulbs, the telephone, electricity was a new concept. World War I had not occurred yet.  She lived through a lot in history, its amazing that all of that happened in one person's lifetime!  And sadly, as old as she is, even my great-grandma hasn't seen the Cubs win a World Series...

I've posted this picture before, but there's 5 generations here.  My grandma, my great-grandma, myself and Anna, my dad!

Godson

Our Godson was born last night (I think it was last night, it could've been this morning though, I found out this morning).  Theodore Justinian Joachim B. was 7lbs 12oz and is adorable!  We can't wait to go see them in 3 weeks for his Baptism!  Check out Justine's blog to read about their journey!  We're so excited he's here, he is so loved!

In the last 7 days, we have 5 friends who have had babies!  It's quite amazing really!  September is the best month for birthdays! :-)

Quick Takes (1)

Well, I haven't ever done Quick Takes before, but I enjoy reading other people's.  And after I wrote this post, I realized it was random and a little all over.  So here are my first Quick Takes!

It's been a very exciting week around here.

1.     It all began with a birthday party for a very special little boy.  If you haven't read about James' birth and (what we believe to be a miraculous) healing, head on over to Bonnie's blog and read about it.  His healing is being investigated for the cause for Archbishop Fulton Sheen's canonization.  Read about it here.  We were glad to be able to celebrate with their family and friends on his first birthday.  He's an adorable and very loved little boy with no lasting effects from his traumatic entry into the world!

2.     We then went to a wedding of two friends that evening!  We had a blast celebrating with friends and we're so happy for this beautiful, holy couple!

3.     Monday was Anna's Adoption Finalization.  A day we've been waiting for a long time!

4.     Tuesday was my birthday!  Anna and Jeremy brough me breakfast in bed!  And  I spent the day relaxing, playing with the babies, and trying to catch up on laundry from a weekend of being gone!  My parents took me out shopping to get some new clothes (which I desperately needed) and some for Anna too, because we just can't resist the baby girl clothes! 

5.     Also on Tuesday, our very close friends had their baby!  David was Jeremy's best man in our wedding and they've been friends since 1st grade.  They just moved out to Pittsburg while he pursues his Doctorate in Scripture after living here for a year.  Matthias Joseph was born Tuesday weighing in at an impressive 10lbs, 2oz at almost 42 weeks.  We are so happy for them, he is absolutely beautiful and we cannot wait to go visit them in a few weeks!!!  I seriously cannot get there fast enough to kiss those chubby cheeks of his!!  And I'm so excited that we now share a birthday!  He's got the best birthday ever :-)

6.     Tonight we're celebrating birthdays with my family, mine and my soon-to-be brother-in-laws which was yesterday.  We're also trying on our bridesmades dresses to get them altered (and hem mine about 40 inches as usual). Then tomorrow we're having a bridal shower/bachelorette party for my sister (I can't believe one of my sisters is getting married in just under a month!!).  And then I think the chaos dies down for a few weeks until the wedding!  And I tried on Anna's flower girl dress today.  Oh. My. Goodness!  How adorable can one baby get!  She's gonna be pretty cute!  I'm a bridesmaid, Jeremy is a groomsmen, and Anna's the flowergirl, so we'll all match and we get to carry her down the aisle!  We're so excited! 

7.      And we're eagerly awaiting the birth of another baby.  Our good friends Jon and Justine are due to have their baby boy here very soon.  We can't wait to meet him!  He's also our Godson, so we're super excited for his baptism soon after he's born!!! 
         Random story about these two little baby boys and their parents and us...  We've spent the past two New Year's with David and Stephanie and Jon and Justine.   For the past two New Years, the three of us couples were all in the midst of trying to grow our families through children.  We were pursuing adoption after infertility, and the other two couples had been TTC since their weddings as well with Jon and Justine suffering a miscarriage not too long before.   This past New Years, the men were playing Wii in the basement and the women were upstairs discussing the challenges of infertility and at the same time glad that we were able to talk about it with other people who were going through it themselves.   We prayed that by the next New Years celebration, we'd all have a child.  (We were identified by the birthmom at this point, and were still waiting for the baby to be born in early Feb.)
         Shortly after that, Stephanie found out she was pregnant.  Beginning of February, Justine found out she was pregnant.  We then suffered our adoption fall through and although we were over the moon excited for our friends, we were sad that we had not yet been blessed with a child.  Until early March, that is.  It's amazing that in just 3 short months, we all had been blessed with children. 
         Let me tell you, this New Years is something to celebrate for sure.  I doubt we'll be able to stay up as late and we definitely won't have the luxury of sitting down just to chat, but it will be joyous and fun and it will be fun to raise our kids together.  Despite the geographical distance between the three of us, we're very close friends and will always remain that way.  We're truly blessed to have shared this journey with these two couples and we can't wait to see our families expand and grow closer.

FINALIZATION!!!

It's done, it's final!  Anna is forever and for always ours!  We've always known it in our hearts, but now we can see it on paper.  Nothing has changed and everything has changed.  We love her so much!  What a wonderful blessing in our lives! 

Here's the strawberry cake with vanilla icing that I made for Anna's Adoption Day!  I can't wait to eat it tonight!  And I'll probably give her a little bit too!

Right after the hearing.  The judge was signing the Adoption Finalization papers!  And since it's a small world, my parents knew our lawyer, and we went to school (she was one year younger) with the judge's daughter!

Nana, daddy, mommy, Anna, grandma, and grandpa.  Papa was taking care of his dad, so he was unable to be there, but with us in spirit!

She's so happy to be adopted (despite the frowny face...)

And right afterwards, we walked across the street to a local bakery and had some treats.  She got a taste of a pumpkin roll and blueberry muffin and enjoyed showing off her sippy cup skills to her grandparents. 

We're going to get our family pictures taken in about an hour (it finally stopped raining and hopefully will stay dry...).  Then we're going out for dinner with our families!  What a fantastic reason to celebrate, we are so blessed and so thankful for all of the prayers and support.  We are so lucky to get to raise the most beautiful girl!  She's such a joy!!

Bath, Bears, and Crawling

Anna LOVES bathtime!  Especially the part where she gets to play with her daddy!  She doesn't so much like the combing out of the hair part!

Daddy and Anna ready for the first Bears game of the season!  Grandpa got her the Cutler jersey!

Ready for the game in her football stance!  I wish we could take credit for the appropriate pose, but she does it all the time!

Always ready to eat!

Snuggling with Mama when she didn't feel well.  She doesn't handle drastic weather changes very well...  Neither do her mom or dad...

6 months old and she figured out crawling.  She's very determined!  This was short distance, the next video she goes across the room!  It's easier for her if she doesn't have pants on to slip on the carpet... Although she's had to get good at it with pants on this week, it's been chilly!

Rainy Day

There's something about a cool rainy day... They're nice once in a while, especially when rain is scarce around these parts right now.  But they just don't make for the best of moods (in babies either, I've found out today).  And I'm thinking instead of...

- making dinner

- picking up toys

- cleaning the bathroom

- vacuuming the carpet

- doing the dishes

- rotating the laundry

- sweeping the floor

... i'm gonna just take a nap!


It probably doesn't help that I'm ready for this week to be over because next week is a big week!  Monday is Anna's adoption!  And Tuesday is my 26th birthday!  I'm so not patient!

Rundown

Well, we've had a busy, but very fun week here at our house.  Here's the rundown:

Friday-Sunday: 
We went to visit with our good friends Jon and Justine!  We stayed with them for the weekend and then went to their baby shower cookout on Sunday!  It was great to see them and so fun to celebrate the upcoming birth of their son (our Godson)!  Anna also started crawling while we were there, she'd been close, but she did it for the first time Saturday night before bed.

Monday: 
We hung out as a family.  We lounged around, took a walk in the park, and just spent some time enjoying our little family.  We then had my parents and sister and her fiance over for a cookout.  It was really nice!

Tuesday:
Back to work!  The little guy I watch has finally adjusted to being here every day and boy is he fun!  Him and Anna talk and play all day long and I LOVE to watch them play!  I also love to play with them!  Anna was very proud of herself for finally being able to crawl after him.  She's slow, but watch out, she's determined!  RCIA started back up Tuesday evening.  It's going to be a fun year, so far we have around 7 candidates, but that can change at any point. 

Anna also had her 6 month check-up.  She's now 17.6 pounds, 26 inches long and the exact same percentiles that she was at 4 months.  75% for weight, 55%  for height.  The doctor was quite impressed with her develoment and said she's a picture of health!  Yay Anna!  Her shots didn't really bother her this time either, so all was good!

Wednesday and Thursday:
Well, pretty normal days but busy in the sense that I take care of two babies all day... And now that they're moving, they're into everything!  I cleaned the house during naptime on Thursday and feel caught up now.  Then I went out for Mom's Night Out which we do monthly.  I've left Anna with Jeremy for the last 3 months or so, but always after she fell asleep.  Last night I left before bedtime and she did great!  That's the first time I've left her that she hasn't spent the whole time screaming.  It was nice to get out and know that she was smiling and snuggling with daddy!

Friday:
Luke left early today to spend the afternoon with his mom and Anna's taking a fantastic nap so I'm enjoying some much needed relax time.  Catching up on blogs, shows that I've DVR'd and a short nap!  Tonight we're going to do some furniture moving in the basement, have waffles for dinner, and watch a movie, since we have a free rental.



This weekend we've got a birthday party a little guy who I took care of at daycare and lives a few houses down.  He was extremely attached to me whne he was in the infant room at daycare and we see them all of the time since we live so close!  He always invites us to his birthday parties and I can't belive he's already turning 3!  Quick funny story about him, my mom and I worked in the same room at the daycare.  So one day his mom, sister and him stopped by as they were taking a walk and my mom happened to be here.  He said, "Oh, look, it's the other Ms. Karen!" referring to my mom... Since then he's asked about the "other Ms. Karen" every time he sees me!  Hmmm, think we look/sound alike?

Then we have my sister's bridal shower on Sunday and the first Bears game!  Anna has a jersey that's a little big, but it will work and Jeremy cannot wait!! 

And I love this weather, please stay like this for a long time!  Fall is my favorite time of year and 60s-70s are absolutely wonderful!

Giraffe... *Updated*

Has anyone seen this giraffe? 

What I really mean is we definitely need another one.  Because she only sleeps like this:

And it's becoming a little stinky...  Because naptime and bedtime are the only chances to get laundry done... And unless that giraffe is tucked in that little baby's arm, I don't get naptime or bedtime...  So here lies my cyclical problem.  Oh yeah, and if we lose it, I fear we're doomed, no other toy, animal, book, blanket, etc... does the trick.

It seems as though this giraffe never existed, no matter how many google searches I do for Cart.er's giraffe, I'm never lead to this particular giraffe.  I've tried asking the lady who gave it to us... no response.  I've checked all of the stores in town (and some other towns when we've been travelling) with no luck whatsoever!  And it's NOT the musical one.  They have one now that looks just like it, but it's bigger and plays music.  Ours does not, it's just soft...

So here's my plea for anyone who spots this small (~8 inches tall) very yellow with green and orange spots giraffe!  It's cute and Anna loves it!  She rubs it and chews on it to go to sleep and if she wakes up and can't find it, she becomes very upset!  She said goodbye to the paci months ago and replaced it with something that I can't figure out how to get two of...


**And blogger is still messing up my photos... Boo...


**Update: So 2 hours after I posted this my hubby found this priceless giraffe on Ama.zon.  Apparently it's a Car.ter's Bean Bag, not a stuffed giraffe like I was searching for... Silly me for searching the wrong thing!  You can bet I'll be purchasing one or two of them!

Meal Planning

The last few months, I've been trying to be better about making healthy, intentional meals.  When we first got Anna, we were eating a lot of freezer meals that I'd made previously as well as eating out or at our parents' homes.  We were trying to adjust to life with a newborn and I had little time for meal planning or cooking or even thinking about it!  Now that life has settled into a routine, I knew I had to readdress the issue of meals.

You see, I love to cook.  I hate to clean up...  I like my kitchen to be spotless and when I cook I often feel like it explodes and I'm left with a giant mess to clean up.  Dishes are my least favorite chore, they seem to never stop coming!  So I needed to devise some way to enjoy cooking dinner for my family, save us money on groceries, incorporate food for Anna, and make minimal mess!

So meal planning was my solution.  You might be thinking "duh" but it's something that overwhelmed me.  Why would I decide what I'm going to have for dinner 3 weeks from now?  That seems crazy, how do I gather all of those ingredients? 

So here's what I do.  It works and I like it. A lot.


- We grocery shop once a month, on or around payday.  Aside from the short trips for milk, we try to stay away from the grocery store.  The longer I'm in there, the more I pick up, and the more money we spend.

- A few days before the big grocery shopping event I make a menu.  I have a few cookbooks, including one that my mom and I have compiled of family recipes.  I try to find recipes that have similar ingredients, and I also try to find ones with ingredients that are on sale that week.  For instance, if one thing uses pork, I buy pork chops in bulk (on sale) and find other recipes that utilize pork in a different way.  This may sound like our meals are boring, but I make sure I'm creative to avoid that.  When I find a recipe, I write it down on the calendar and I write down where the recipe was from, what page it's on, and then add the ingredients to my grocery list.  I throw in a few leftover days on the weekends usually (although Jeremy likes leftovers for lunches) and Fridays are homemade pizza days and I account for any days I don't need to make dinner (this month there were a lot!).

- An organized list is key to my system.  So I use excel.  I sort everything by group (I know the aisles in the grocery store so they're pretty much sorted by aisle).  As I find recipes and add them to the calendar, I add the ingredients (that I don't already have on hand) to the list.  This organized list has saved me from forgetting things and being all over the store at any given time.

- All month I've cut coupons from the paper and online sources (our printer's out of ink at the moment, so my coupon supply was down this month) and I sort the coupons by section (the same as my list sections).

- I match my coupons to my list and put them in an envelop.  With my list, my coupons, my list manager (Jer), and my grabber-off-the-shelfer (Anna :-)) safely tucked in the Mei Tai, we head to the stores.  We go to Sa.m's Club first and pick up the things we need in bulk.  This saves us a lot of money (especially on formula).  Then we go to Meij.er.  After a long evening of shopping and countless people telling us how adorable our baby is and countless people laughing at how loud she is, we check out and head home.

- When we get home, we put it all away and I begin making meals.  We went grocery shopping last night, so I made meals today during naptimes.  I prep and/or freeze whatever I can.  For instance, today I made: chili, lasagna soup, prepped pork chops for a maple pork chop recipe, pureed peas, sweet potatoes, pears, avocado, squash and bananas for Anna, chopped veggies for minestrone and corn chowder (apparently I was in a soup mood, I'm ready for fall...) and pesto. 

- Each day I look at the next day's menu, being sure to set out anything from the freezer I need, and meal time is easy peasy!

And that is how I make a big mess all at once and my kitchen is clean for the rest of the month!  And my family's eating healthy!  And my baby girl always has homemade food on hand!