Thursday, March 22, 2012

Day to Day norm?

First of all, our good friend (and when I say good, I mean the person that gets our children if God forbid something happens to us and my family can't take them good) is deploying today.  Keep him in your prayers, thoughts, whatever you do please!


I made a couple of things last night that I first want to share.  I found these recipes on Pinterest (where else? :)) and they turned out really well.  The first is homemade chocolate syrup, found here: http://tinyurl.com/7rjnhsh.  Jefferson drank two glasses of chocolate milk and I had it on ice cream with strawberries (we obviously have not started counting points again...).  It was really easy and is really good, without high fructose corn syrup.  Easy and good enough my mom said she may make it for my dad to use.  :)


The next thing I made were Easter Egg Nests for Dori's springtime school program.  That recipe can be found here: http://tinyurl.com/6pn6wht.  They were super easy and really good.  I'm pretty sure there weren't any left when we left the reception today (though i'm not sure there was much left :)) and I'm not going to lie, I liked it when I heard people say they were cute and picked one up to eat.  :)  I also brought one to the homebound student I'm working with right now and she told me it was really good and I should become a chef.  Pretty high remarks from a high school freshman! :)  I did make a couple of changes.  I used my small Pampered Chef scoop to drop them on a cookie sheet, made them into the nests, but did not wait until they were cool to put the jelly beans in them.  I pushed them in while they were hot and the stickiness of the coconut held the jelly beans in them.  


The salsa chicken I talked about a couple of posts ago was pretty good, but I overcooked it.  I cooked it like I normally do stuff in the crockpot and not just for 4 hours.  Next time i'm going to shoot for 4 hours. :)


I apparently need to stay off of pinterest....I also made this skirt http://tinyurl.com/7g8775o.  The tutorial made it very easy and the girls skirts are really cute.  The only thing I changed between Dori's and Ginny's is that I did not add an inch of elastic past Ginny's waist size because I did that with Dori's and it fell off of her.  I was a little upset with myself that right after I finished her skirt I had to then immediately take it in.  Here's Dori's:



Please excuse Dori's shirt choice.  She was wearing jean shorts when she tried it on.  :)

Here's Ginny's:


We got Dori's daisy sticker and calendar for the upcoming school year.  Super excited about that!  I also met a friend of ours yesterday at the quilting store for her to pick out fabric for pillowcase dresses I'm making for her to give as a shower gift.  They are going to be incredibly cute!  So many things to do like always!  :)  

We're going to be able to actually put in a garden this year, which i'm really excited about for the fresh vegetables, and by we I mean the girls and I.  Many thanks to Kate and Brian for buying a house that won't hold their garden bed! :)  I had just told Anna Mae I didn't know what we were going to do for a garden then Kate needed someone to take hers!  Yay for fresh (and cheap!) food!

It has been a full week this week!  We went to the park with Richelle, Laura, Elly, and Emery on Monday, typical Tuesday of dropping Dori off at school, going to Beebs' for playtime, going to gymnastics for Ginny, then back to pick up Dori.  Wednesday I was that lady that took two of her kids to the gun store to get Jefferson's gun worked on plus running errands, then today we had music class and Dori's spring program.  My mom came up for that and is staying until tomorrow.  And she wonders why the laundry is piled almost to the ceiling! :)  Easter egg hunt at the NoVA Greens this weekend but my sister and her family are coming to stay at our house, then Easter Egg hunt at my parents the following weekend.  Hope we don't have to hitchhike because we run out of gas!  Since I have pictures of Dori and Ginny, i'm going to add a picture of Amelia with Richelle at the park.  That girls LOVES to swing!  :)   Apparently i'll have to add one later...the picture won't upload!  :)

Happy birthday Grace!! :)


Until next time!




Wednesday, March 14, 2012

I'm baaccckkkk!

I'm baaaccckk!  :)  It hasn't been 1 1/2 years this time!  


The girls and I went to Grace's birthday party today at Beebs', which is always a good time.  Dori had a tough time deciding whether she wanted to go to Beebs' or to stay at school for stay day, but cupcakes and Grace won out.  :)  Plus I know Danielle has some wonderful pictures from today that I can't wait to see!


Dinner is cooking as I type, while i'm working in the crock pot.  We're trying a new recipe (thanks Pinterest and Danielle!).  It smelled absolutely wonderful when I left for work, so hopefully it tastes as good as it smells.  The recipe can be found here: http://tinyurl.com/6ofvdn2.  I'll let you know how it is! (and if the girls ate it! :))  Though with Dori at gymnastics this afternoon, she'll usually eat well when she gets home.  I guess an hour and fifteen minutes of gymnastics will do that to a girl.  Now how to convince Jefferson to go to Boyer's for ice cream after dinner....


Boyer's is this wonderful local ice cream shop on Patterson that is super yummy!  Check them out....http://tinyurl.com/7wg2vo2.


Outback is running a coupon right now for $10 off 2 entrees if you like them on Facebook.  Get 2 sirloin meals and basically you get one free.  Totally worth it for Outback, but don't forget to tip your server on the full amount of your check, not just the discounted amount.  


We are in the process of getting Dori's tuition money together for St. Catherine's in the fall.  One, I am super excited she'll be attending there this fall, but two, really, how is she going into Kindergarten?  I look at the girls and cannot believe how old and big they're getting.  


I am excited we're back to having nice weather.  I was able to walk with Anna Mae and Claire this morning while Dori was at school.  It was nice to get out and get some exercise and have adult conversation, though it seems recently I've had more adult conversation than normal since Danielle is in town and we have been able to get together. 


Speaking of conversations, I am not the type of person to not be able to just drop things.  I want to know why something happens, even if I think I know the reason.  Ever have a person just fall out of your life and disappear?  I feel like i'm a good person and a good friend, so when this happens I always wonder what I could have done differently.  This has happened a couple of times in the past few years and I just wonder what happened.  


Until next time.... :)

Monday, March 12, 2012

A New Life for the Blog??

Let me begin by saying I have been wishy washy on starting this back up.  There have been many times that I decided I wanted to blog just because, but never sat down and did it.  Now i'm sitting, as I usually do while working.  My student, whom I am really enjoying working with, is taking a test, so I have a little while.  


I started this in August of 2010, then got pregnant with our 3rd child and never came back to it, for a number of reasons.  That one was a rough pregnancy.  I was sick through the entire thing, with a few days of not being sick around the 28 week mark.  I was then put on bed rest for high blood pressure.  Thank God my mom is retired and could take the girls to their house and keep them while I was on bed rest.  Fast forward 9 months and Amelia is healthy, happy, and lively.  She tried to keep up with her sisters.  Its only a matter of time before she lets go and is running.  She won't let go yet, but practically runs when holding on to something.  


I don't know what the point of this blog will be but a mish mosh of my life.  Maybe this will be therapeutic somehow?  :)  We shall see.  


We're taking the girls to see NC State women's gymnastics this Friday at William and Mary and i'm super excited.  I told them about it this afternoon and you should have seen their faces light up.  Maybe this will light the fire under Dori that sometimes things are hard and you have to work for them?  She has been wanting to go back to her previous gymnastics class because its easier, however when its easy for her she's bored and does what she wants to.  Not exactly a way to get ahead.  I know she's only 4, but some things need to be instilled in them early and a good work ethic I believe is one.  I will not be a parent, however, that makes my child continue something they truly dislike.  If she makes the team and doesn't want to do it, then so be it.  She can try something else.  


Ginny is taking a dance and gymnastics combo class and loves every minute of it.  We get to spend more time together because Dori has preschool 3 mornings a week, so when I drop her off, its just Ginny, Amelia, and I.  


Amelia is 9 months old and moving along.  She finally cut the latest two teeth and now has 6.  She's calling her dada which he eats up and happy as a lark, unless she's hungry.  


Ever feel like you don't have enough time to do what you need to, let alone what you want to?  My house is not ever the cleanest around, but I have 3 happy healthy kids, a happy, wonderful husband, so what else do you need?  I try to remind myself of that when I'm freaking out about the house being dirty or a lack of funds. 

So, that's just it.  I don't even have anything fun and exciting to post for dinner because I don't have any idea what we're having yet.  I'll figure it out when I get home from Target, which is where i'm going when I get off work as soon as my student is done with her test.  My goal is to get back on and stay on weight watchers and to be able to exercise more.  Since daylight savings time is here again, I can exercise once I get off of work since Jefferson will be at home with the kids, then he can go while I cook dinner.  Sounds like a great plan right? Well, we'll see.  I have a lot of great "on paper" plans.  :)  


Plans for the evening....help J finish his application for school, make some towels, maybe make a table runner for a gift.  :)  We shall see.  I'll let you know when I make something fun and exciting for dinner as its usually on the healthy side and quick.  Until then...