Wednesday, June 11, 2008
Tuesday, June 10, 2008
Mama Loves a Good Excuse to Go to Target, Part 2
Livers' love affair with lamps sent us back to Target again. This time she decided that the wall lamp was a jungle gym, and she nearly ripped it completely out of the drywall by trying to hang on it. Luckily all that was needed were some drywall screws to secure the lamp in place, but it came pretty close to being a lost cause. We didn't actually go to Target for those. We went to Home Depot. But since the two are so close, I figured we could just stop on in and see what was happening.
Seriously, it would behoove me to find a part-time job so that I could finance my habit. I at least walked in with a list of things I needed, and I did a decent job of sticking to it. Of course I just HAD to get Livers some clothes, because it's approximately the temperature of the sun here, and Target has some cutie things for little girls. I also had to replace a rug in my office. I should have foreseen that black dogs who go outside a lot to play + cream shag rug = ground in, dog-shaped dirt marks everywhere. I did good. They actually had the same rug...in black. So I got it. Now you have to look really hard to FIND the dogs on the rug. I also got Livers a couple of bathing suits. One of them actually has blow-up floats in it along with SPF 50, a necessity for my milky-skinned little lady. I tried to find beer there for J, but they didn't have any. I found that weird, since they have a HUGE wine selection. By the time we were done erranding I was too flippin' hot to pick up his Sammy Adams. It was 11:45 and already 95 degrees, and the glasses, once again, would NOT stay on my nose to save my life. I really must look like a nerd. At least I don't wear the mom jeans.
After lunch I put up the reinforcers for the lamp. Livers was still in her high chair watching me (the best place, seeing as she would be all over me trying to get to the lamp), and she wanted out bad. She started fussing, which is annoying enough except I dropped a screw behind our sectional sofa, which is about near impossible to move. I swear kids have a radar for knowing when you're frustrated, because that's when they turn it up a couple dozen notches. She kept fussing and fussing, and I got madder and madder trying to fish out this stupid screw, until finally I said "Livers, SHUT UP!!!!" Of course all that served to do was make her scream louder and me feel like complete crap. I had promised myself that I would NEVER tell her to shut up, even if she really needed to, and I only made it 17 months. I felt like such a terrible parent. I'm promising myself now that I will not do this again and will ask God for massive amounts of help in keeping my temper and patience in check, because trust me, it is a struggle sometimes.
That is pretty much it for the day's events. It was all mundane from there. Tomorrow we're going to the lake for the first time, which ought to be an experience and a headache. Any suggestions on keeping a VERY active toddler out of trouble near a large body of water???
Seriously, it would behoove me to find a part-time job so that I could finance my habit. I at least walked in with a list of things I needed, and I did a decent job of sticking to it. Of course I just HAD to get Livers some clothes, because it's approximately the temperature of the sun here, and Target has some cutie things for little girls. I also had to replace a rug in my office. I should have foreseen that black dogs who go outside a lot to play + cream shag rug = ground in, dog-shaped dirt marks everywhere. I did good. They actually had the same rug...in black. So I got it. Now you have to look really hard to FIND the dogs on the rug. I also got Livers a couple of bathing suits. One of them actually has blow-up floats in it along with SPF 50, a necessity for my milky-skinned little lady. I tried to find beer there for J, but they didn't have any. I found that weird, since they have a HUGE wine selection. By the time we were done erranding I was too flippin' hot to pick up his Sammy Adams. It was 11:45 and already 95 degrees, and the glasses, once again, would NOT stay on my nose to save my life. I really must look like a nerd. At least I don't wear the mom jeans.
After lunch I put up the reinforcers for the lamp. Livers was still in her high chair watching me (the best place, seeing as she would be all over me trying to get to the lamp), and she wanted out bad. She started fussing, which is annoying enough except I dropped a screw behind our sectional sofa, which is about near impossible to move. I swear kids have a radar for knowing when you're frustrated, because that's when they turn it up a couple dozen notches. She kept fussing and fussing, and I got madder and madder trying to fish out this stupid screw, until finally I said "Livers, SHUT UP!!!!" Of course all that served to do was make her scream louder and me feel like complete crap. I had promised myself that I would NEVER tell her to shut up, even if she really needed to, and I only made it 17 months. I felt like such a terrible parent. I'm promising myself now that I will not do this again and will ask God for massive amounts of help in keeping my temper and patience in check, because trust me, it is a struggle sometimes.
That is pretty much it for the day's events. It was all mundane from there. Tomorrow we're going to the lake for the first time, which ought to be an experience and a headache. Any suggestions on keeping a VERY active toddler out of trouble near a large body of water???
Democracy at Work
It was Primary Day today . Usually I could care less about the smaller elections, but this time I felt compelled to vote. Not because I felt strongly about any particular candidate or issue, but because I have an extreme dislike for one candidate in particular. We'll call him Billy Ray.
B. R. has to be the world's most obnoxious politician, at least as far as his campaign strategy is concerned. (I have also been told that he is as much a douche bag in person as he is in campaigning.) He hits you from every single possible front imaginable. He puts up his signs EVERYWHERE. He calls your house. Literally. He figured out that a lot of phones now utilize a service that will prevent telemarketers and the like from actually reaching your house, and to make sure his message is heard he actually will send an automated "Vote for me!" message FROM HIS OWN HOME NUMBER so that the spam blockers on phones don't filter it out. (And they are so long that the answering machines that pick it up actually cut off BEFORE he finishes his message.) He sends out a BAZILLION mailers. Once again, no joke. Friday and Saturday ALONE I received 10. TEN. WTH? He sent 5 to my husband and 5 to my maiden name, which for some reason the Powers That Be have not figured out to be invalid. That doesn't count the dozens that I received in the past month or so. I was so annoyed on Saturday that I contemplated writing "return to sender" on every single mailer.
So today at 10 o'clock, before a trip to Target (another story), I trekked to my voting location and happily cast my vote for whoever was voting against him. I didn't care who it was, as long as B. R. didn't get it.
Unfortunately, at last check, it was indicated that Billy Ray won the primary. And since he is, I believe, running unopposed in November, I WILL be writing-in my 17-month-old daughter's name on the ballot.
B. R. 3000, Livers 1.
B. R. has to be the world's most obnoxious politician, at least as far as his campaign strategy is concerned. (I have also been told that he is as much a douche bag in person as he is in campaigning.) He hits you from every single possible front imaginable. He puts up his signs EVERYWHERE. He calls your house. Literally. He figured out that a lot of phones now utilize a service that will prevent telemarketers and the like from actually reaching your house, and to make sure his message is heard he actually will send an automated "Vote for me!" message FROM HIS OWN HOME NUMBER so that the spam blockers on phones don't filter it out. (And they are so long that the answering machines that pick it up actually cut off BEFORE he finishes his message.) He sends out a BAZILLION mailers. Once again, no joke. Friday and Saturday ALONE I received 10. TEN. WTH? He sent 5 to my husband and 5 to my maiden name, which for some reason the Powers That Be have not figured out to be invalid. That doesn't count the dozens that I received in the past month or so. I was so annoyed on Saturday that I contemplated writing "return to sender" on every single mailer.
So today at 10 o'clock, before a trip to Target (another story), I trekked to my voting location and happily cast my vote for whoever was voting against him. I didn't care who it was, as long as B. R. didn't get it.
Unfortunately, at last check, it was indicated that Billy Ray won the primary. And since he is, I believe, running unopposed in November, I WILL be writing-in my 17-month-old daughter's name on the ballot.
B. R. 3000, Livers 1.
Monday, June 9, 2008
Menu Plan Monday - June 9
Happy very late Monday, everyone! Here's my menu for the week. Kinda slack this weekend, so we have a few repeats early in the week. Enjoy!- Monday: leftover Cheesy Rice and Beans (totally recommend this; very easy to to and quite yummy; to make it better, add some sour cream and Texas Pete...and Fritos, or so the Husband says)
- Tuesday: Beef Tenderloin with potatoes and carrots
- Wednesday: Lamb Burgers and Rice
- To make the burgers, buy lamb shoulder meat and grind it in a food processor with fresh cilantro, garam masala, turmeric, ground ginger (fresh, if available), ground coriander, salt pepper--amounts to taste.
- For the rice, prepare as package suggests, but then add tomato paste and fresh cilantro to give it flavor.
- Thursday: Fettuccine pasta with marinara sauce and sauteed fresh zucchini and squash
- Friday: eat out
- Saturday: Shake and Bake Chicken with Mac-N-Cheese and frozen veggies
- Sunday: 15-bean soup (Cajun)
- You can find these in the dry bean section. Just buy the ingredients listed.
- When I made this last I soaked the beans for almost 16 hours--8 hours longer than I should have--but it turned out great. Jeremy said it was more like refried bean soup because of the texture, and as a result we put some sour cream, cheese and Texas Pete in it. It turned out great, and could be eaten with tortilla chips.
Sunday, June 8, 2008
Such a Perfect Day
Just a perfect day
Drink sangria in the park
And then later, when it gets dark, we'll go home
Just a perfect day
Feed animals in the zoo
Then later a movie too, and then home
- Lou Reed, "Perfect Day"
That's what I would consider Friday. It started like most any other day, except that J was sleeping abnormally late. I figured he was sleeping in because he'd come home late from watching the NBA Finals, but to my surprise it was more than that. He was actually going to take the entire day off from work. No working from home, no going in after lunch. Just fun and relaxation. I said we HAVE to do something fun and take advantage of it, so I suggested we deal with the heat and go to the zoo. He hates the heat as much as I do, but he agreed to do it so we could get Livers out of the house and show her the animals. She's at the age where she's starting to understand them, so we thought it would be a good experience.
It was truly hot as blazes at the zoo. The high that day was around 97 and it was humid too. One saving grace was that the majority of the zoo is fairly shaded, so that provided a little relief. Not enough, though, to keep me from pushing my glasses back up my nose 500 times like some sort of pimpled nerd. (I was so sweaty they wouldn't stay on my face. Yuck.) It was quite the educational experience at the zoo, too.
We got to see an elephant eat its poop (click on the picture to see that it really is eating its poop);
two turtles going at it;
a baby orangutan playing in a box and falling out, to which Livers said "uh oh", making the crowd laugh;
and a goat sleeping on top of a rock. Hot as it was, it was good times.
We then ate at a good pizza place called Bellacino's. It's annoying these days to go out to eat, because we have to choose restaurants that are #1 kid friendly, and #2 have food that Livers will actually EAT. She's a self-imposed vegetarian, so that cuts down on options. (Seriously, if she actually TASTES meat I get really excited. She has the best meat-dar of anyone I've ever known. (Meat-dar is like gay-dar, except for meat.) She won't even sample it, usually. She'll just fling it.) Anyway, back to the point, she LOVES pizza. Like, ridiculously loves. Mention it and she gets really excited. (Same thing with peanut butter.) Seeing as this was a pizza establishment, we knew we'd be safe. And we were. The little munchkin ate 3/4ths of an 8 inch pizza. I STRUGGLED to eat all of mine. I bet she would've eaten it all if J hadn't eaten the first slice waiting for his food.
After gorging ourselves on pizza and subs we came home. On the way, though, I took this picture. Ridiculous. It's supposed to actually be 82 degrees later in the week. I've never been more excited to see that number!
Once we got home we all took a family nap. Except me, because for some insane reason I can't nap to save my life because my bladder comes out of dormancy and wakes me up every 15 minutes. I'd think I was pregnant if I knew I wasn't and that it's been happening for MONTHS. To cap off the wonderful day we went browsing at Books A Million and Best Buy (with a brief layover in Target; very brief because my husband does NOT share my devotion to this store).
The rest of the weekend was pretty nice, too. J helped some friends move into their new house, and we ate dinner over there. Livers really enjoyed running around. They have an open floor plan, and she took full advantage of it by running 1000 laps around their furniture and trying to get into every box they had out. Unfortunately she's now got another bad case of diaper rash, so that's no fun. It was really sad watching her take a bath last night, because it hurt her so bad she didn't want to sit down in the tub. :(
Today was laid back but productive. We went to Mass in the morning, which is always an interesting experience because Livers will NOT sit still. At least they have a crying room. I got all my laundry done for the week, which will lighten things up for me considerably. I hate laundry. Not so much the doing of it as the putting it away. That's why it will sometimes take a solid week for it to make it from the laundry room to the bedroom where it belongs. Oops.
I hope everyone had good weekends, too, and that you have wonderful weeks ahead! Stay cool!
Drink sangria in the park
And then later, when it gets dark, we'll go home
Just a perfect day
Feed animals in the zoo
Then later a movie too, and then home
- Lou Reed, "Perfect Day"
That's what I would consider Friday. It started like most any other day, except that J was sleeping abnormally late. I figured he was sleeping in because he'd come home late from watching the NBA Finals, but to my surprise it was more than that. He was actually going to take the entire day off from work. No working from home, no going in after lunch. Just fun and relaxation. I said we HAVE to do something fun and take advantage of it, so I suggested we deal with the heat and go to the zoo. He hates the heat as much as I do, but he agreed to do it so we could get Livers out of the house and show her the animals. She's at the age where she's starting to understand them, so we thought it would be a good experience.
It was truly hot as blazes at the zoo. The high that day was around 97 and it was humid too. One saving grace was that the majority of the zoo is fairly shaded, so that provided a little relief. Not enough, though, to keep me from pushing my glasses back up my nose 500 times like some sort of pimpled nerd. (I was so sweaty they wouldn't stay on my face. Yuck.) It was quite the educational experience at the zoo, too.
We got to see an elephant eat its poop (click on the picture to see that it really is eating its poop);
two turtles going at it;
a baby orangutan playing in a box and falling out, to which Livers said "uh oh", making the crowd laugh;
and a goat sleeping on top of a rock. Hot as it was, it was good times.We then ate at a good pizza place called Bellacino's. It's annoying these days to go out to eat, because we have to choose restaurants that are #1 kid friendly, and #2 have food that Livers will actually EAT. She's a self-imposed vegetarian, so that cuts down on options. (Seriously, if she actually TASTES meat I get really excited. She has the best meat-dar of anyone I've ever known. (Meat-dar is like gay-dar, except for meat.) She won't even sample it, usually. She'll just fling it.) Anyway, back to the point, she LOVES pizza. Like, ridiculously loves. Mention it and she gets really excited. (Same thing with peanut butter.) Seeing as this was a pizza establishment, we knew we'd be safe. And we were. The little munchkin ate 3/4ths of an 8 inch pizza. I STRUGGLED to eat all of mine. I bet she would've eaten it all if J hadn't eaten the first slice waiting for his food.
After gorging ourselves on pizza and subs we came home. On the way, though, I took this picture. Ridiculous. It's supposed to actually be 82 degrees later in the week. I've never been more excited to see that number!
Once we got home we all took a family nap. Except me, because for some insane reason I can't nap to save my life because my bladder comes out of dormancy and wakes me up every 15 minutes. I'd think I was pregnant if I knew I wasn't and that it's been happening for MONTHS. To cap off the wonderful day we went browsing at Books A Million and Best Buy (with a brief layover in Target; very brief because my husband does NOT share my devotion to this store).
The rest of the weekend was pretty nice, too. J helped some friends move into their new house, and we ate dinner over there. Livers really enjoyed running around. They have an open floor plan, and she took full advantage of it by running 1000 laps around their furniture and trying to get into every box they had out. Unfortunately she's now got another bad case of diaper rash, so that's no fun. It was really sad watching her take a bath last night, because it hurt her so bad she didn't want to sit down in the tub. :(
Today was laid back but productive. We went to Mass in the morning, which is always an interesting experience because Livers will NOT sit still. At least they have a crying room. I got all my laundry done for the week, which will lighten things up for me considerably. I hate laundry. Not so much the doing of it as the putting it away. That's why it will sometimes take a solid week for it to make it from the laundry room to the bedroom where it belongs. Oops.
I hope everyone had good weekends, too, and that you have wonderful weeks ahead! Stay cool!
Friday, June 6, 2008
Friday Foto Finish Fiesta
I love to take pictures, especially of my daughter, Livers. Here are a few of my favorites from the past week or so.
Livers trying to get the "ball" at the bottom of the laundry basket. She thinks all circles are balls or balloons.
I hope to get a new camera soon. My camera is almost four years old, and it is incredibly slow. And since the majority of my pictures are of my very active 17-month-old, they oftentimes turn out a wee bit blurry. If you have any suggestions, I'd be more than happy to hear them!
(As a note, I'm thinking of a Panasonic Lumix. It has 10 MP and 7x OPTICAL ZOOM--sweet!!!)
http://carriestuckmann.blogspot.com/
Livers trying to get the "ball" at the bottom of the laundry basket. She thinks all circles are balls or balloons.
Livers with a post lunch mohawk. When you ask her to smile, she always turns her head to the side.
Our first Mother/Daughter pedis. :)
Such a good little mommy!
Snuggled up with my animals and blankies.
Sittin' with my cutie daddy :)
I hope to get a new camera soon. My camera is almost four years old, and it is incredibly slow. And since the majority of my pictures are of my very active 17-month-old, they oftentimes turn out a wee bit blurry. If you have any suggestions, I'd be more than happy to hear them!
(As a note, I'm thinking of a Panasonic Lumix. It has 10 MP and 7x OPTICAL ZOOM--sweet!!!)
http://carriestuckmann.blogspot.com/
Thursday, June 5, 2008
Thursday 13 - 13 Things I'm Thankful For
This will be late getting out tonight, but I felt compelled to write this before I went to bed.
13 THINGS THAT I'M THANKFUL FOR:
13 THINGS THAT I'M THANKFUL FOR:
- A husband who loves me for who I am, no matter what stupid/naive/childish/thoughtless things I do/say.
- A healthy, beautiful, sweet daughter, and her little baby voice, kisses, soft skin, lavendar-scented (peanut butter and banana covered) hair, hugs, laughter, everything. She has taught me to love on a whole other level.
- A supportive and loving family
- Two sweet puppies whose personalities are completely in sync with my husband and I; it's like God specifically made Molly for J and Lacey for me
- The ability and opportunity to be a stay-at-home-mom
- A roof over my head that doesn't leak and a warm bed to sleep in
- Financial stability in times of financial insecurity worldwide
- A space in my house that is completely my own
- My health
- The beauty of the world around me: the setting sun, a striking rainbow, the roaring oceans, everything!
- Being able to spend time with the friends and family I love. Honestly, if I'm with them, it doesn't matter where I am, I'm going to be happy.
- The forgiveness of God when I think/do/say things that I shouldn't
- The promise of heaven when I leave this earth if I believe in Him
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Posts
