Supper This Week

Monday:  "Pasta with Broccoli and Sausage with a Riccotta Surprise" (A Rachael Ray dish which will be an experiment!)
Tuesday:  Salmon and Rice
Wednesday:  {Thai}
Thursday:  Chicken Marsala and Cacio e Pepe
Friday:  Black Beans and Rice
Saturday:  Grilled Chicken and Mashed Potatoes
Sunday:  We're helping with a college lunch at church, so I'm making lasagne and brownies!

We never made beans last week because John took us to Moe's!  That's always a fun treat!  So, they're on the menu again for this week, once I do major grocery shopping on Thursday and get everything we need.  :)

On English Muffins

 During pregnancy, I generally try to follow the Brewer pregnancy diet, because it's much easier than trying to count grams of protein, calcium and iron!  One of the diet's recommendations is that I eat two eggs each day . . . easy, I love eggs!  Still, five months of only a few different preparations can get a little bit old.  So, I decided that poached eggs on English muffins sounded scrumptious, and set about learning how to make my own English muffins and poach my own eggs!  I've seen my mother do both years ago, but until a few days ago I had never tried either myself.  

So, I found recipes for English muffins in both Joy of Cooking and More With Less Cookbook and ended up following the latter, which was easier to understand.  I did add part whole-wheat flour, though, and I think I was a tad short on yeast.  They came out ok for my first try, but I think I need to keep working on them!  They still don't have all those delightful nooks and crannies like the ones you can buy at the store!

And yesterday morning, I turned to Betty Crocker for help with poaching eggs for the first time.  I thought they were quite delicious (my sweetie thought they were somewhat better than Mushroom Moussaka, but still toward that end of the spectrum!).  Since we have so many homemade English muffins now, I ate poached eggs again today for lunch, and will probably continue doing so for a while!  

While we're talking about muffins, perhaps you'd like a recent picture of our little baking muffin . . . 

22 weeks!

Adventures in Up-cycling

Thinking about Gemma's fall wardrobe has spurred me on not just to do some thrifting, but some sewing, too.  :)  There are some fun tutorials I've been excited to try, and have finally gotten around to doing!  So far, it seems like tutorial-sewing is much more fun than sewing from a pattern, not only because they're usually free :), but also they have such great pictures!  And, I suppose in order for a tutorial really to work without a pattern, it can't be that complicated to begin with . . . 

Source: rufflesandstuff.com via Gretchen on Pinterest

I really liked this jersey-skirt tutorial from Ruffles and Stuff, so I decided to make Gemma little bubble skirt from one of John's old tee-shirts!  This shirt was in near-perfect condition but he hadn't worn it in our entire three years of marriage.  (Don't worry . . . I got his permission first!)

You might notice that the shirt is missing a sleeve . . . that's because I used it for something else that I never got around to blogging about.  Maybe someday.  :)  But for now, here's the finished product:

It seemed silly to cut into the body of the shirt in order to get a large rectangle when I was just going to put a seam back in it, so I modifed the directions a bit in order to avoid that seam.  This complicated matters a bit . . . but it eventually turned out.  The major problem is that since my old, old Singer doesn't zig-zag, the seam to attach the skirt to its waist-band rather undermined the stretchiness of the waistband.  Oh well.  Gemma can still wear it, but it won't stretch over her bulky cloth diapers, so I have to put it on before her diaper.  

Source: cally-cruze.blogspot.com via Gretchen on Pinterest

My next little project was these easy-peasy baby legs!  Skirts and baby legs . . . aren't they a fun combination for fall?  I actually picked up the green and gray knee socks from Target back in April when they were on a St. Patrick's Day clearance for $1.25, and then I bought the polka dotted ones more recently for the same clearance price.  

In case you didn't look at the tutorial, all you really have to do is cut off the feet and do a zig-zag around the raw edge while you stretch the fabric to bring it to a finished, curly look.  I experimented with the foot-ends of the socks trying to see if I could achieve the same effect with my straight stitch, but it didn't work.  I just ended up folding the edges under and stretching the fabric while I hemmed them.  

You can see that the hems aren't perfect . . . but they're good enough.  :)

Gemma loves these!  Well, she loves dress-up and pink, anyway, and she likes wearing the baby legs on her arms, too.  :)  They were so easy and fun to make that I picked up a pair of striped knee socks, too, and made Gemma a third pair.  And then I decided that I should stop.  :)

It turns out that not only are funky knee socks on clearance at Target right now, but brightly colored jersey-knit bubble skirts for toddlers are, too.  Yes, and they're only $1.50 right now.  At least Gemma's skirt was free?  And, despite the brightly colored baby-legs, I still haven't bought into the trend of dressing my children or myself in neon and sequins.  Whoa, boy.  Every time I walk into Gap, I just gravitate toward the baby clothes because that's the only section where the colors aren't shocking and overwhelming!  Grey is a bit more subdued.

Supper This Week

I never got around to posting this yesterday . . . oops.  ;)

Monday:  Mushroom Moussaka (from the Moosewood Cookbook)
Tuesday:  Salmon and Rice
Wednesday:  {Thai}
Thursday:  Not-Sagna Pasta Toss (from Rachael Ray's Express Lane Meals)
Friday:  Hamburgers with Sweet Potato Fries (and I want to make English muffins from scratch for the hamburgers and for eating with my eggs this week!  This will be an experiment!)
Saturday:  Black Beans and Rice
Sunday:  TBD . . . probably grilled chicken

So.  We've already had the mushroom moussaka.  It took me hours to make, and when it was all said and done, I was wondering why I had decided to do that to my husband.  I love eggplant, but he doesn't . . . and to make matters worse, this was a vegetarian version which basically loaded up the red sauce with mushrooms instead of ground beef.  Sorry, sweetie . . .

At least on Thursday we're having one of his favorite meals ever.  :)  And I'm really excited to try making English muffins!  I think I'm going to use the recipe from More With Less.  They always look so good at the store, but then I read the label and want to faint . . .

Green is in

 . . . that is, in the smoothies this season!  It's time for our annual summer smoothie post, and this year I have a sipping partner:

It started when she was interested in my smoothie, so I let her have a sip, and she quickly monopolized the glass!  So, now I fill up her straw cup with her own.  

Since that picture was taken, however, my sweetie and I have watched two documentaries, Fat, Sick and Nearly Dead, and Forks over Knives.  (Both are available on Netflix, which is how we watched them.)  I came away with the conclusion that at the very least, we should be eating more vegetables.  And so green is in!

The first time, I threw in a bunch of spinach leaves, but now kale is on the weekly shopping list and I appreciate its milder taste.  Besides that, lately I've simply been throwing a frozen banana, strawberries (or a peach or other berries), a big scoop of plain yoghurt, half a dozen ice cubes, about a tablespoon of coconut oil and enough fruit juice to make it blend nicely into our ordinary old blender, and they come out so yummy!    I guess they've gotten quite a bit fancier since last year and especially the year before!

We're Halfway There

20 weeks!

With this pregnancy already half-over, it seems like it's time for a bit of an update!  

Overall, I've felt great since the early weeks.  There was one rough weekend of up-chucking, but since then everything has been pretty smooth.  The hatred of onions marking both my previous pregnancies hasn't returned, and I'm so thankful that I've been able to enjoy the pregnancy-heightened-sense-of-smell for the most part!  It has made it easier both for cooking and changing stinky diapers, and I'm so thankful.

It was also quite fun to feel movement from earlier on this time!  There were some tap-taps that I debated about around 11 weeks, but at 15 weeks they started becoming regular and unmistakable.  

I was very tired, especially during the first trimester.  I don't think my energy has come back quite like it did the last time, either.  But even though I have an active toddler to take care of, she takes good naps in the afternoons, and I've been able to nap when I've needed to, also.  The house is not cleaned quite as often or as thoroughly as it used to be. but that's the way it has to be for now.

Last week, I knit our new daughter her own hat!  

It's from the same pattern I used last year for some gift hats and then for Gemma, and I love it.  :)  I was also really happy to use some more of the hand-dyed Merino superwash that I bought last summer.  It's such pretty yarn, and I love that our little girl gets a hat from it, too!  (I think there's enough left for one more hat, in fact!)  The only thing I'm not crazy about is how the yarn starts to stripe toward the crown . . . oh well.  I decided to leave off the tie-strings for now.

In many ways, finding out that we're having another girl has been a bit relieving.  I won't need to adjust the nursery other than adding a little floor-bed for Gemma, and she and her baby sister already have matching pink gingham crib sheets.  :)  I was looking forward to making some baby boy gowns from John's cast-off tees, so that's a project that will have to wait, but there are plenty of others to tide me over in the mean time. Christmas baby does need her own special quilt.  :)  And I do want to start on some Christmas gifts, too!

20 Months Old

Happy 20 months to our little sweetheart!  She delights us every day with her energy and joyfulness.

Lately, there has been a lot of dancing, hide and seek, and helping in the kitchen.  We discovered recently that she loves to dance to her Judy Rogers album Teach Me While My Heart is Tender.  (This is basically the old Why Can't I see God? tape plus selections from Go to the Ant and another tape we didn't have growing up . . . and I can see why . . . hearing Judy Rogers trying to rap is kind of terrifying.)  She had heard this album before, but I'd usually played it in the car.  Now when she hears it, her little feet immediately start moving!  I think her favorite song is Isabel is a Pig!  I'll have to find a video of it soon.  :)

A few months ago, we started visiting a different, older library branch which has lots of great summer programs.  For the past few weeks, we've been going to the "Movement and Music" class for toddlers, followed by "Dream Big Story Time" half an hour later.  Gemma loves the socialization, and there is plenty of opportunity for it . . . usually the room is filled with 20-40 toddlers and their mommies!  She also loves checking out new books every week, even though she's too distracted by the library itself to read them until we get home.  Gemma frequently brings Daddy or Mommy a book, saying, "eh, eh!"  

Dress-up is still a favorite.  :)

And the play-area at the mall . . .

Gemma now says at least four words very clearly:  Daddy, Mommy, eye, and ball, all in context (though sometimes "Daddy" gets a bit misapplied.)

Here she is cooking some triscuit soup.  :)  Gemma's third grandma gave her the apron, which has a cute print on one side and is red on the back--just like Mommy's.  She loves wearing it.  :)  

She's also growing more independent!  When I tell her that we're going down to the living room for dinner, she goes to get her bumbo and brings it over near the coffee table.  It's a big, bulky load for a little girl!  She can also wipe her own face and does her best to wipe her own tray when she's done!

Where's the baby???

There she is!

Supper this week

Monday:  Refried Bean Enchiladas
Tuesday:  Pancit
Wednesday:  {Thai}
Thursday:  Pizza (mushroom and pepper for me, pepperoni on John's half, and I may finally try this crust recipe)
Friday:  Salmon & Rice
Saturday:  Chicken Marsala with Cacio e Pepe
Sunday:  Chicken Fajitas

The pancit got moved to this week because we didn't end up having the pancit last week.  I was tired and just made some pasta with jarred sauce and threw some sausage in it.  The crock pot macaroni and cheese was a mixed success; John actually loved it but I wasn't as thrilled.  I think I prefer recipes where the noodles are pre-cooked.  And yesterday afternoon, we had honey baked chicken over brown rice.  :)

Getting Ready for Fall

It's the time of year when I start to get excited about fall.  :)  This year, I think I'm just going to let myself go with it!  We had giant apple pancake for breakfast this week, and I'm starting to think about Gemma's fall wardrobe.  :)

Yesterday, I found these items at a children's consignment shop.  No . . . they weren't exactly thrift store prices . . . the three things came to about $20 total.  I had about $6.50 in credit there, though, so it ended up being closer to $14.  And they are really nice . . . a BumGenius pocket diaper, Laura Ashley blouse, and Children's Place jeans.  :)  Aunt Heidi first bought Gemma Grace some of their jeans last year, and I love how they put ruffles at the bottoms of the little girl jeans!  Now Gemma will have two pairs of jeans for this fall.  Don't the colors all look pretty together, too?

And the blouse . . . it's just beautiful.  Such a nice, soft cotton.  It has a little button at the neck and big sashes to tie at the back.  It still had its tags, too!

Then we played a little dress-up this morning with her Easter bonnet and her new blouse.  "What are these tags, Mom?"  :)

Gemma's First Haircut

When Gemma Grace was born with a full head of hair, everyone said that it would fall right out . . . except for John's side of the family.  All of the babies in his family are born with hair, and seem to keep it.  :)  This was an entirely new phenomenon to me, who was reportedly bald for the better part of my early years.  

If Gemma had been a boy, she would have needed a haircut from birth!  The little bits in back already stretched down over her neck!  Her hair could hold a bow from very early on, and the daily hairbows started around five months old when they were necessary to keep her hair out of her eyes.  We finally attempted pig tails for the first time at ten months.  Her hair did rub off in places along the sides and back, but the majority of it just grew longer, thicker, curlier, and lighter.  

It has been a bit uneven in the back for a while.  Sometimes it curls up enough to hide the unevenness, but I did want to trim it eventually . . . and yesterday was the day!

Before shots!

All combed out straight . . . 

And after shots!  

Of course it's not perfect . . . 

First hair clippings, saved in an envelope. 

And here it is dry!  

Thankfully the curls aren't completely gone, and it is much more even now!