#28 and #39

The other day Jenn posted about how soon her 101 in 1001 list is coming to an end. That made me realize how close mine is to the end as well! Mine ends August 31, so I need to get on some of this stuff!

Stephen was happy to oblige me with #28 - Watch the Lord of the Rings series and actually give it a chance. We finally marked that off the list this weekend. I did give it a chance. I am still not a fan. Alas.

#39 - Make homemade spaghetti sauce is blogged about on my recipe blog.

There are several things that are in progress right now - mainly trying to make fluffy yeast rolls. I can make great tasting yeast rolls, but they aren't pull-apart fluffy like at Golden Corral or Ryan's. That's what I'm going for. I'm also planning on finishing up a couple of my other ones this summer - reading a series, finishing my Bible, and working at Habitat for Humanity. I am going to copy Jenn though - if anyone has any ideas that could help me complete one of my goals, I would love some help! You can find my list on the side of my blog, with the items crossed off that I have already completed. I do realize some just won't be completed this time around - I can't ride a mechanical bull or donate plasma for example, but there are some that are still within reach.

Accomplished Day

Have you ever had one of those days where you got so much done and you're so proud of yourself... but then you think, why don't I get this much done every day?? Well, I know each new day brings new circumstances so you can't expect too much out of yourself. For example, thanks to fabulous babysitters (mom and dad, a whole gaggle of Talberts), I was able to work Monday, Tuesday, AND Wednesday which is a real rarity. So yesterday was the first day I was going to be at home all day in several days. This is what I was able to get done yesterday:

• listed one item on eBay
• sold one item on eBay
• folded Bri's laundry
• folded one load of our laundry
• washed dishes (x2)
• made sweet tea
• made squash for Bri
• went to the post office to ship some things
• went to the bank to make two deposits (one regular, one toward our Savings Goal for 2010 - I still need to blog about that)
• went to Harris Teeter
• went to Walgreens
• made barbecue chicken, boiled squash and fried squash for dinner
• more dishes
• cleaned/swept/sanitized kitchen
• made another batch of baby wipes
• got some of my grocery rebates ready to mail in
  
• and got in a few hours of work from home as well!

It may not seem like a lot to some people but that's a big day for me! This morning I woke up to the tune of Brianna jabbering away. I remember rolling my eyes, thinking how early it was. Imagine my surprise when I walked into the kitchen and saw that it was... 9:00?!?!? Holy cow! I guess I really needed to sleep!

Okay, so before I forget, I also need to write down another milestone Brianna has reached. Wednesday night at church we were playing with her in the fellowship hall. She was holding Jan's hands and walking to Stephen. Jan suddenly let go of her hands, and Brianna walked three steps without realizing it! From then on she gripped Jan much more tightly, haha! We really aren't in a hurry for her to start walking but I don't think it will be long before she figures it out. Stephen said he can't wait to see the look on her face when she realizes what she can do on her own. He really wants to see her "first" steps, and he probably will if she does them at home because I don't do anything during the day to help her practice walking. Although she did randomly stand by herself the other day when we were home by ourselves. I turned around and she was just standing there; had gotten up from sitting position by herself. So I guess she could walk by herself as well if she wants to!

Okay this is all the blogging time I have for today!

Week Two of Food Co-op and Other Misc.

This week was our second delivery of the food co-op we joined for the summer. Stephen was definitely not thrilled with our last delivery - he ate the carrots and strawberries with glee but only ate the tomatoes and lettuce in tacos. I wasn't discouraged; after all, I froze whatever Brianna and I didn't eat from the box.

Yesterday's box was much more thrilling to him! Included in this box: carrots, lettuce, strawberries, sweet potatoes, tomatoes, bok choy, squash, and peaches!


The carrots look much more lively this week, and that squash won't last for long. The peaches are perfect for his lunches, and I'm just glad they were able to squeeze out a couple more sweet potatoes in this season! He can't pronounce bok choy so I highly doubt he'll even try it, but I'm certainly willing to throw it in a few recipes. I love a cooking challenge!

This is all the blogging I'm going to do for now - I'm on a cleaning streak in the house while Brianna is napping, and I don't want to take a break for too long. I do want to blog very soon about some incredible things that have been happening with Fed By Faith - got to share it with everyone!!

Translators Apply Within

Brianna decided to have a sit-down with us a couple of nights ago. I'm not sure if these are her complaints or demands.

As you can see, she had to pull some socks out of our laundry before she could begin.

Anyway, if anyone knows what she's talking about... please, let us know!!

Goals

Okay, I didn't know whether to post this here or my other blog, so I finally made the decision to post the exact same thing on each blog. After all, both blogs are about reaching goals, trying new things, and being frugal, so I couldn't decide.

This month I decided to make some simple goals for the month of May. I didn't decide to do this until May 10th, so I made them kind of small to start with, because what's the fun of having goals if you don't reach them?

Before we begin, please take note of the absolutely ADORABLE baby on the fridge! That's my scrumptious niece Claire!

Okay, moving on.


My grocery budget, as usual is $100. I'm sneaking up on the number but hope I can still get it under the wire. I love trying new recipes, so I added that I want to try six new recipes this month. I've tried four so far and have two(ish) weeks left, so that should be easy. Although I'm not eating with mom and dad next week so that will throw me off some! I want five books read and GONE out of this house, never to be heard from again. I've sent two to one of Granny's friends, Dottie, and I'm not actually sure I'll make it to five. But I'm darn sure gonna try! I wanted to sell $5 worth of items on eBay. To me that's a huge accomplishment because I have been really slack in the eBay department lately. I'm trying to get back on track. So far it's not going so well. And then my small project that I chose was to clean out our silverware drawer. Somehow in the past few months our silverware drawer has become a junk drawer. Observe:


There are coupons, register rewards, reminders, ziploc bags... but mainly coupons. Clipped, unclipped, expired, you name it.


Voila! Now our silverware drawer simply holds silverware, my receipts for the current month (in the blue box), Fed By Faith donation money, and the coupons I am using this week for Super Doubles. All the items in the drawer were successfully PUT AWAY, not just moved! Now I can cross off one thing of my list! Yes!

So Mature

She despises her sippy cups (we're still transitioning) but she'll drink from a cup by herself?

Yesterday as I was feeding her lunch, instead of pointing to this cup (graciously donated to us by Renee!), she simply picked it up by the handle, sipped from it, put it down, and pointed back to her food. I love it because when I try to have her drink from a cup I can never see the liquid, so it either spills or I end up drowning her. This way, she determines how much she is getting. I guess it makes her feel grown up. Works for me!

Now if she would do that with her sippy cup instead of pointing at me to hold it for her....

A Box, a Virus, and a Baby

Okay, first of all, I remembered something I forgot to blog about. If you're a reader of my frugal blog, you know that we joined a food co-op this year. Basically, we pay less than $200 to get fresh fruit and vegetables from local farms every other week. We chose to do every other week not knowing how much food was coming (and me knowing how picky Stephen is about his fruits and vegetables.) Now don't get me wrong, he eats fruits and veggies all day long. But he likes specific ones. It's hard to get him to try a new one. I'm not sure how I convinced him to try asparagus when we got married but now he'd eat it every night if we could have it.

ANYWAY. First pickup was Wednesday for us! Included in our box: carrots, lettuce, strawberries, tomatoes, sweet potatoes, and onions.


My plan of action? So far the carrots and one tomato have been going in salads made with Stephen's aunt Leanne's lettuce from her garden. The strawberries have been in Stephen's lunch and they're my dessert at night. The sweet potatoes will be pureed and frozen for Brianna. The onions will be chopped and frozen for future consumption. The rest of the tomatoes and lettuce will be used for tacos Saturday night.

(The salad has been a great addition to lasagna leftovers! Topped with $0.25 turkey bacon of course!)

Actually, I really would love to save an onion for this incredible spinach salad recipe I found, but I want to use spinach from the box too, and since we didn't get any, I don't want the onion to go bad before we get any spinach.

Anyway. Again. Next on the agenda. What is wrong with this picture?


Our child who once had pure ivory skin now has freckles! Yesterday I noticed a rash starting to appear on Brianna's entire body. I mean, under her hair, on the bottoms of her feet, EVERYWHERE! It didn't seem to bother her so I wasn't very worried, although I did call the doctor's office to see if they thought it was an allergic reaction and if they thought I could still take her to church nursery. The nurse's informal diagnosis was that it might be due to her taking amoxicillin for the first time, to take her off of that and give her a 1/2 teaspoon of Benadryl and see if that did the trick. She didn't think there would be any problem taking her to nursery.

Fortunately, between Stephen and I, the decision was made to keep her home. I really didn't want to be the cause of some epidemic outbreak at church. Good thing too, because she skipped her nap (morning and afternoon!) so she was ready for bed in the middle of when we would normally be at church!! She slept long and hard last night, and when she woke up this morning... the spots were still there, redder, and REALLY standing out!! Bless her heart, she looked awful! But she was her normal cheerful self still. Luckily the doctor's office opened in ten minutes, so I called and made an early morning appointment. Turns out we were right to keep her home from church. She has Roseola, which is an extremely common childhood illness. The doctor said most kids get it before they enter kindergarten because your immune system doesn't build up against for the first three years of life or something. She has an extremely mild case. Many children who get it have a sudden fever of 103 or higher which can cause a febrile seizure, and then the rash appears. Bri never had a fever that we know of, just the rash. There is no treatment except waiting it out, and the rash should go away within three days or less. As far as viruses go, this one is an easy fix! And thank God the only symptoms are fever and rash, and the rash is not known to cause any pain or itching. Brianna certainly hasn't shown any signs of not feeling well. If she had to get any illness I'm glad it's this one!

Okay... last but not least, we have found out what Baby Talbert is! I would post a picture but they're all quite inappropriate. Let me see... we got:

• two shots between the legs
• 1 shot of the face staring right at us (FREAKY!!!)
• 1 shot of a hand
• 1 profile
• 2 shots of feet

The hand picture is really the only good one. But all that matters is that we saw what was or was not between the legs right?

Well, there is something there. IT'S A BOY! We can actually produce boys in our family! It's a miracle! Now we just have to find out what Jenn and Matt are having, which will be very soon!!

Oh, and if anyone wants a pink stroller, we won't be needing it anymore.



(Just kidding - you never know when another girl will come along for us!)

P.S. Let it be known publicly that Gail was correct about Baby T. being a boy :)

You Decide

It's been so long since I've blogged that I can't even remember what I'm supposed to blog about.

Well, first of all, last weekend was our annual girls trip! Two years ago Jenn and I flew mom to New York for her first time. SO MUCH FUN!! Last year I was seven-ish months pregnant and Jenn was four-ish months pregnant, so we toned the trip down a bit and went to Greenville. We still had a BLAST! This year, with me being a pregnant (again) mother of a 1-year old and Jenn being a pregnant (again) mother of a 10-month old, we had to tone down even more.... hence, Chapel Hill!! Admittedly, Chapel Hill is one of our favorite places to go, whether it's to walk or shop or just drive. And speaking for myself, I didn't care where we went as long as I could put on my makeup without 27 inches of whine clinging to me.

Okay, she's not always like that. But there have been enough mornings that that has happened that I couldn't wait to put on my makeup by myself! And wake up on my own! (Although I did still wake up at 7:07... I guess my body is so used to the 7am wakeup call now.)

We spent Friday night in Mooresville, thrift shopping on the drive up, eating at Cracker Barrel, and marveling at our hotel. One time forever ago, in Boone, Jenn and I stayed in a Country Inn & Suites. It was so incredible that I always try to stay in one wherever we vacation. This one did not disappoint - none of them have! Chocolate chip cookies in the lobby, a fireplace (for five months ago, you know), a lending library (borrow a book and return it the next time you stay at a Country Inn & Suites!!), huge rooms, entire hotel non-smoking, and a delicious variety for our complimentary breakfast! I always give them rave reviews and this time signed up for the "points plus" membership. I figure if we're going to stay at these every chance we get anyway, might as well start racking up some points!!

I guess that's enough about the hotel.

We shopped till we dropped Friday night - literally in Jenn's case. Mom and I, the book addicts we are, stayed up until well after 11pm reading. The next morning, after stuffing ourselves silly at breakfast, we headed off to Chapel Hill. We went straight for the Farmer's Market and thrift stores! I got several shirts that will mask as maternity shirts for the summer, cute shorts (I only own one pair!! Thanks Jenn for finding them for only $2.00!!), yet another incredible pair of 7 For All Mankind jeans from Plato's Closet (I am addicted to finding these now!), books which I did not need to buy, and several household items I needed like tupperware and a thermos for Stephen's lunch. I also got some groceries from Whole Foods and Trader Joe's since we don't have those around here.

That's probably enough. The best parts were the conversation and company, anyway. And those conversations are not going to be disclosed here.

Next on the blog agenda. As you know, we are having another bebe. The time has come - already - to find out if it's a boy or a girl! Tomorrow is our appointment. I believe with Brianna I talked about this day for weeks ahead of time. We made a pool at work, I put a poll on the blog, I talked on Facebook about it forever, I did several scientific tests to confirm the gender. But this baby? I've had to be reminded constantly of the appointment. There is just too much going on to remember a doctor's appointment!

Sorry, Second Baby. You have the Curse. But guess what? I had the Curse too, and I turned out mostly normal! Anything not normal about me is not from the Curse I'm sure.

Anyway... super fast informal poll. What do you think the baby is?? Twenty thousand points to whoever is right!

P.S. I have no feelings whatsoever. I was positive that Brianna was a boy, and we can all see how right I was about that.

Saturday, Part 3

Yes, I am just now blogging about the last part of Saturday, April 24. No, my life isn't busy at all.

When we left our story, we had just gotten home from the shaving ceremony. We had to leave early because we had VERY special guests arriving from out of town! Brianna's Nenah and Papa were coming! These are her great-grandparents who she has seen only a couple of times before. They were coming to celebrate her birthday!

Brianna gladly opened her birthday present from Nenah and Papa which turned out to be the fanciest dress I have ever seen for a little girl! It is gorgeous and Nenah also bought her socks and shoes! Sad to say I did not take any pictures because I was helping Brianna open her present. We did eat cookie cake for dessert and then ordered pizza for dinner (we had our priorities straight!!) and I got a few pictures of that. Bri's family from GA really decorated the dining room!!











These pictures were from our video camera, and I'm not sure why they're so dark and blurry. We're going to have to check the settings on there. A few days later, Brianna got a big package in the mail. What could it be!?!?

What does the card say??

It's from the Georgia gang!! Her birthday presents arrived!

She loved the card because of all the glitter! (just like her mama)

Enough chit-chat, what's in here??

Personally designed by... well, you can figure that out!

A pool float! We're going to need this at the beach this summer!!

As soon as she saw the corner of this, she knew what it was:

2 Veggietales and a Bug Rangers!!

Look at my new outfit!

I love my new books!!

Thank you to everyone who made her birthday fabulous!! We've set mighty high standards for the next years!!