And me, I'm using this time to slowwwwwly ease my way into working from home.
Monday, April 23, 2012
Playtime
It's so much colder today than it has been. Charlotte and I are hibernating in lounge clothes, and after a weekend packed with Grandaddy and Mimi snuggles, the little one is trying to catch up on sleep. We spent some time in the Funky Farmyard playing, and I swear when I walked 15 feet away to tend the fire, she was wide awake. When I walked the 15 feet back, I noticed this:
Someone fell asleep during playtime.
And me, I'm using this time to slowwwwwly ease my way into working from home.
And me, I'm using this time to slowwwwwly ease my way into working from home.
Monday, April 16, 2012
An adventure.
On Friday, the park we usually walk in was overrun by kids. Since I'd forgotten Gus' leash, I decided to head to a state forest that's not too far away.
Gus was anxious to get going.
I strapped a sleeping Charlotte into her wrap and we set forth. The section I walked through is so different from my usual surroundings that I felt like I was in a book. With elves.
Doesn't that seem elven? Makes me think of ROUS. Quick, what does that stand for?*
The woods changed quickly, though, back to the typical hardwood forest, and pretty soon I was on a trail that had obviously not seen much use. It was at this point that I started to consider simply retracing my steps, as I had completely lost track of which direction I was headed in. The only thing that kept me going was knowing that walking out, the sun had been on my right, so in theory to get back to the car, the sun should be on my left. Thank you various hunting magazines that taught me the basics of navigation.
Charlotte, meanwhile, slept on, oblivious to my mounting concern that we would be eaten by a cougar.
Eventually, I happened upon this:
And I was joyful. I knew our sojourn was nearly over. All I had to do was walk to the top of that hill and hang a right, and then go up another hill.
Next time, I'm taking a map.
*rodents of unusual size, from The Princess Bride.
The woods changed quickly, though, back to the typical hardwood forest, and pretty soon I was on a trail that had obviously not seen much use. It was at this point that I started to consider simply retracing my steps, as I had completely lost track of which direction I was headed in. The only thing that kept me going was knowing that walking out, the sun had been on my right, so in theory to get back to the car, the sun should be on my left. Thank you various hunting magazines that taught me the basics of navigation.
Charlotte, meanwhile, slept on, oblivious to my mounting concern that we would be eaten by a cougar.
Eventually, I happened upon this:
Next time, I'm taking a map.
*rodents of unusual size, from The Princess Bride.
Friday, April 13, 2012
Nursery alphabet wall
Like oh-so-many of my plans, the decoration of the nursery got quickly derailed. As they say, the path to hell is paved with good intentions. My pathway has very many pavers, indeed! I am fo' sho' an idea person. I am less good with follow-through. Love me, love my half-finished everything.
Anyways, the nursery.
One major part of my idea for the nursery was an alphabet wall. I am cheap, though, and paying for individual letters did not appeal to me. When Jo-Ann's had a big sale on scrapbooking paper in January, I stockpiled about 35 pieces of 12x12 paper in a wide variety of patterns and colors. I had this vague idea that I could print out the alphabet in a big font, and use them as stencils. I wanted the letters to have a little depth, so I decided to use foam board to make them slightly 3D (ok, M told me that was the best way). One day, in a fit of motivation, I determined what order I wanted the papers to go in, and labelled them.
And there I stopped. I still had to decide on a font, print out the letters, cut out the letters, somehow adhere them to the foamboard, cut the foamboard, determine the spacing, and hang them on the wall.
And then my brother visited. He decided on a font and a size for me. I tried printing them but evidently I need to re-install the printer driver (or maybe just that update my computer keeps bugging me about?), so M printed them out. Then my in-laws visited. And somehow, this happened:
Yes, that would be my dear husband and his father cutting out letters. After much deliberation, they decided to cut the letters out of the paper first, then glue them to the foam board, then cut them out of the foam board.
This is the letter-gluing process. M used his engineering skillz to fit all the letters (and an ampersand!) onto one and a half sheets of foam board, leaving me with two spare sheets and a new board on Pinterest.
This was my view from the chair-and-a-half. I was nursing Charlotte. That was my excuse for not helping. That, and cooking dinner.
Let's recap. Thus far, I have managed to not actually do more than one or two steps of the entire process. I'm hoping to successfully complete the entire project by only personally completing three steps. Here is my third step:
Please excuse the very strange lighting. Charlotte's nursery is doubling as my seed-starting room for now; the grow light is illuminating the leftmost letters. And is it me, or is the S upside down?
Hopefully I can convince M to hang the letters this weekend. I will feign incompetence and a general inability to hang things in a straight line. Do not speak of my devious plans!
Anyways, the nursery.
One major part of my idea for the nursery was an alphabet wall. I am cheap, though, and paying for individual letters did not appeal to me. When Jo-Ann's had a big sale on scrapbooking paper in January, I stockpiled about 35 pieces of 12x12 paper in a wide variety of patterns and colors. I had this vague idea that I could print out the alphabet in a big font, and use them as stencils. I wanted the letters to have a little depth, so I decided to use foam board to make them slightly 3D (ok, M told me that was the best way). One day, in a fit of motivation, I determined what order I wanted the papers to go in, and labelled them.
And there I stopped. I still had to decide on a font, print out the letters, cut out the letters, somehow adhere them to the foamboard, cut the foamboard, determine the spacing, and hang them on the wall.
And then my brother visited. He decided on a font and a size for me. I tried printing them but evidently I need to re-install the printer driver (or maybe just that update my computer keeps bugging me about?), so M printed them out. Then my in-laws visited. And somehow, this happened:
Yes, that would be my dear husband and his father cutting out letters. After much deliberation, they decided to cut the letters out of the paper first, then glue them to the foam board, then cut them out of the foam board.
This is the letter-gluing process. M used his engineering skillz to fit all the letters (and an ampersand!) onto one and a half sheets of foam board, leaving me with two spare sheets and a new board on Pinterest.
This was my view from the chair-and-a-half. I was nursing Charlotte. That was my excuse for not helping. That, and cooking dinner.
Let's recap. Thus far, I have managed to not actually do more than one or two steps of the entire process. I'm hoping to successfully complete the entire project by only personally completing three steps. Here is my third step:
Please excuse the very strange lighting. Charlotte's nursery is doubling as my seed-starting room for now; the grow light is illuminating the leftmost letters. And is it me, or is the S upside down?
Hopefully I can convince M to hang the letters this weekend. I will feign incompetence and a general inability to hang things in a straight line. Do not speak of my devious plans!
Thursday, April 12, 2012
11.5 hours = 690 minutes of...
...sleep!
Holy smokes Charlotte slept for 11.5 hours last night. I want to shout this from the rooftops. But, since I'm scared of heights and our roof has a very steep pitch
clearly shouting from up there is out of the question.
So instead, I'll just crow about it on the interwebs. And stare adoringly at my darling child and hope for a repeat performance tonight!
I'm also hoping that this borrowed swing will keep her entertained while mama spends time crowing.
Holy smokes Charlotte slept for 11.5 hours last night. I want to shout this from the rooftops. But, since I'm scared of heights and our roof has a very steep pitch
clearly shouting from up there is out of the question.
So instead, I'll just crow about it on the interwebs. And stare adoringly at my darling child and hope for a repeat performance tonight!
Hiking, Baby! (Hiking Baby!)
God I love punctuation. Both of those are true: Hiking Baby went Hiking, Baby!
I'm trying to walk more. Sometimes, I succeed. Other times, I succumb to the siren song of sweet snuggles (apparently I also love alliteration). This week, I decided I'd try to get up to the woods every day. No way was I taking a stroller down those paths, though. So, Charlotte enjoyed the woods from on high:
I am sporting a stylish Army green fleece of M's. I never thought I'd say this, but boy am I glad he has 15,000 jackets, because they zip over me and the baby and there's always 14,999 going unworn at any given time, giving me pick of the litter.
Charlotte fell asleep with the first 20 minutes of our first three walks of the week. That enabled me to take ridiculous pictures of neat plants:
Soon to head out on our fourth walk. There's one trail left to do...
I'm trying to walk more. Sometimes, I succeed. Other times, I succumb to the siren song of sweet snuggles (apparently I also love alliteration). This week, I decided I'd try to get up to the woods every day. No way was I taking a stroller down those paths, though. So, Charlotte enjoyed the woods from on high:
Charlotte fell asleep with the first 20 minutes of our first three walks of the week. That enabled me to take ridiculous pictures of neat plants:
Friday, March 30, 2012
A soupy mess
It's not 75 degrees in March anymore, but it's still super sunny and nice out (who ever thought DC Joie would think 44 degrees was nice out?). The second half of my strenuous hill walk, I was filled with anticipation - I was going to have such a good lunch.
It doesn't look like much, but this soup, which was supposed to be southwestern chicken tacos from the crockpot except I added broth when I shouldn't have, was absolutely delicious for dinner last night. Especially with some Tostitos on the side.
So imagine my sadness when I opened the bag of chips and this is all I found:
I mean, talk about your portion control!
And, in case you want a really delicious and stupidly simple recipe, here's how I made the soup (which can also be used, drained, as taco or quesadilla filling):
Place the following in a large-ish slow cooker
See? Stupidly easy. And it's a total freezer/pantry meal that literally requires no preparation.
It doesn't look like much, but this soup, which was supposed to be southwestern chicken tacos from the crockpot except I added broth when I shouldn't have, was absolutely delicious for dinner last night. Especially with some Tostitos on the side.
So imagine my sadness when I opened the bag of chips and this is all I found:
I mean, talk about your portion control!
And, in case you want a really delicious and stupidly simple recipe, here's how I made the soup (which can also be used, drained, as taco or quesadilla filling):
Place the following in a large-ish slow cooker
- frozen chicken breasts (I used 2, which is plenty for several meals)
- small bag frozen corn
- 2 cans black beans
- 1 can chicken broth (I used some brown turkey stock I made last year)
- 1 jar salsa (highly recommend Pace's Garlic & Lime Verde Restaurant Style)
- 1 packet Goya Sazon, sin achiote
See? Stupidly easy. And it's a total freezer/pantry meal that literally requires no preparation.
Tuesday, March 27, 2012
Taco pizza.
Charlotte is going through a fussy stage, so today I've been wearing her so that she'll sleep. I sat down to my lunch of (super delicious homemade taco) pizza and thought, man, it'd be funny if I blogged about how I never realized what a messy eater I was until I started eating and baby wearing.
And then I looked down.
True story.
True story.
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