Cousins Easter Egg Hunt!

Make a scrapbook - it's easy!

Chikalada Pasta

This is one of my favorite dishes! It's really called Chicken Enchilada Pasta, but this is the way it came out when M said it tonight. I thought it was cute enough to stick.

Chickilada Pasta

cook some spaghetti noodles (or any kind of pasta really)
--enough to cover the bottom of the casserole dish.
When you are finished cooking and draining, add a smidge of olive oil to keep them from sticking.

Boil a chicken breast or two for about 20 minutes, then cut into bite sized pieces. (I usually boil a whole bunch and do all this cutting and boiling at once and then freeze the rest for any recipe that calls for bite size chicken).

Place the chicken on top of the noodles.
(Optional-but I love it!) Place a few jalapeno pepper slices around the chicken.

Now for the sauce (which is basically a gravy)!
in a saucepan, melt a stick of butter.
when it is melted, add in a hair less than 1/2 cup of flour.
stir immediately, making sure there aren't any clumps.
While this is cooking (for a minimum of 4 minutes), microwave to boiling 2 cups of chicken bouillion.
Stir the butter flour mixture, and then pour the bouillion quickly into the saucepan (after it has cooked for at least 4 minutes.)
stir rapidly as it will quickly begin to thicken.
turn down to low to medium and add seasonings to taste. Salt, Pepper, garlic powder, onion powder, cumin, and jalapenos and/or jalapeno juices.

Pour this sauce over the casserole dish evenly and add cheese on top.

Bake for 15-20 minutes @ 350 degrees.

Found a Quote I Love

"Be True to Who You Are and the Family Name You Bear."

What a day it was yesterday! We were very productive around here! And on palm Sunday! Wouldn't they have thrown us in jail back in biblical days! how dare we be so productive! Still our Sabbath proved to fall on Saturday this week.


After naptime we found hubs hard at work recreating a table for my sewing projects. He's so sweet! He seems to be really supportive of all my TeederToddler projects. He's even remaking an old table we had in order that I might have a place to sew besides the dining room table and half of baby boys space! Hopefully we can get it organized enough in here before baby comes! We'd like to feel as though we fit in here! So much to do and time is fleeting.


M dressed herself. We didn't go anyway for conventional "church" but she picked out a sunday dress and shoes and all just to go outside and play. She is so cute and as girlie as they get! When she saw her daddy working outside, she wanted to help! So she gave it her best go.

Up to No Good

Me and my serger! Ah. We were the best of friends, we are the worst of enemies! No seriously, check out my post over at TeederToddlers for more of that story. But it seems that my serger needs a name cause I personify her quite a bit. Let's see...Ah, perfect. My serger, Suri, will have to go to the Dr. first thing this week cause her mother/owner--me--can't seem to take care of her properly and she is a bit over sensitive as I hear most of her species are. So, Suri the serger will be staying in the serger hospital overnite a day or two till her timing is realigned!



I pulled and prodded as you are not to do with a serger and managed to bend a needle in a big way! Then I proceeded to change it and restring Suri several times just to be sure and yet...alas, she will not loop. not even a little. And after further investigation, it appears that the needles are rubbing into the loopers and some other bit I have no idea what its name is, so...it is beyond my scope of fixing. Metal on metal is definitely a shop kind of thing, at least for now!



Still, I am forging ahead on new projects! check out my latest over ollie at teedertoddlers! AND I posted a pick of my latest diaper wreath that was delivered as a present at the shower I attended today! That turned out great and is a really unique gift if you'd like to order one!

New 6/9 month outfit @ TeederToddlers

Projects have begun! check out TeederToddlers.blogspot.com for the latest!

Priceless

Yesterday was Priceless.
-Dropped car off at the garage next door at the crack of dawn for some brake work. (expecting a charge from $150-$600)
-Rode to Mom to mom with SIL and cuz and M of course
-had interesting theological discussion in group. Very fulfilling for me as deep thought is somewhat hard to come by in the stay at home mom world
-had lunch with SIL, cuz, and M
-M went easily down for her nap
-checked in with parentals
-after nap had a snack (jello!) and walked next door to check on our car
-it was done and the bill was fantastic ($161.50!)
-since it was in the 70's, checked in on hubs to see if he was coming home for sup (was having a computer meltdown day at work). and he wasn't, so M and I decided to go to the park.
-Park was closed for maintenance, bummer, so M says lets go to the zoo!
-Why not? don't know if it'll be open since it is after 4:30pm at this point, but there is a fabulous park in front of the zoo if it is closed.
-zoo is closed but park is in full swing! M plays and plays!
-m is a big girl and goes potty, no accidents!
-time for sup and since we are so close to downtown westside we head there and park in the lot behind hub office (its the cheapest).
-we get out the stroller and decide on either pizza or soup.
-m says soup, cheesy, or potato.
-we locate Atlanta Bread Co. and she decides no soup, but p,b,and j is perfect. She eats a good bit of her sandwich, her entire bag of chips and all but one bite of her pickle!
-she goes potty again like a big girl! no accidents!
-i have one of my fave sandwiches too
-off to Marble Slab for some ice cream!
-M wants pink ice cream but no strawberries...not sure if that exists. Sure enough they have pink bubble gum ice cream.
-she samples, she like, I buy her a cone with sprinkles on top.
-we are both in heaven.
-back to our car, pay the parking lady, and head for home as the sun has now officially set.
-its 8:30 when we hit the bath together (as hubs is still working bless his heart)
-by 9:30 she is almost out cold.
-call sis and have a long overdue fun chat (50 min!)
-go to bed
-hubs finally gets home around 12:30 poor guy!

I spent a total of $19 on M and me. Cash from craigslist sale. I loved every minute of my date. And I realized, I don't do this enough. I left the dirty dishes in the sink, I left the huge pile of clean clothes unfolded, and we did spontaneous things. And she was delightful. It was a glimpse into my big girl's life. I wondered if my mom must have felt these same things with me sometimes as I grew. I cherished every minute of the night. All the "I love yous" that she lavished on me. I think we both felt so special! I to her and she to me. I felt special to God that He would allow me such a privilege! Priceless day!

Productivity

Well, I was sluggish yesterday...that is true. But even still, I was a bit productive. Did a good bit of dishes, worked on the laundry, hung and put up all of M's clothes and straightened her room. I decluttered our very small hall. In fact, some of the decluttering led to craigslist, and thus today I will have made a quick $35.00 (most likely to pay for dinner tonight with hubs).

I picked up my check, made a deposit, ran an errand for mom, and got our free monday night redbox movie. AND...I got a decent nap in there. M got to play outside a bit, which thrilled my soul seeing as it was perfect yesterday! We (me and M) even walked over to the neighbors at DeYoung's Garage yesterday to do some checking on some brake work that we needed done. That will have to wait till Friday...or maybe I can squeeze it in tomorrow. we'll see.

Today has been far more productive than I would have expected. I dropped M off at schoo, caught up with a friend via telephone (been meaning to do this for awhile), made a quick stop at starbucks (most recent craving), stopped at Goodwill and hit the motherload for my teeder toddler projects and on half off! I came home and did some more laundry, ate lunch, caught up with parentals, met a craiglister, straightened the living room since k and SIL are coming over to watch M while we attend birthing class. The bathroom is straight, finished ALL the laundry! Now I have to work on dishes and folding the clean clothes. There is a permanent (or so it seems) pile of stuff next to the back door that is for ebay, garage sale, and/or goodwill! Can't wait till that is gone!

Gotta get M in a minute, but I'm going to keep goingsince I seem to be on a roll. I'm less sluggish today and no nap! maybe that exhaustion had more to do with daylight savings time?! We shall see. In the mean time. I'm determined to get to a point on this housework that leaves me sanity to work on TeederToddlers. Got a big project up my sleeve that I hope proves to be profitable! Fuller schedule than usual for this stay at home mom! I'll post when I can.

Third Trimester?!

Seriously...I'm going to be 25 wks. tomorrow, and I'm already feeling the tug of the exhaustion that comes with the third trimester! Not yet! I was feeling so good! I felt it yesterday. One day is no big deal, but I feel it really bad today and I've remembered to take my vitamins and such. Of course M had a little rough night last night. She had some nightmare or something. At any rate she was scared and called for me in the middle of the night. I had to deal with that. I laid down in her bed for a while, but that never works for long cause she wasn't sleeping and neither was I, so I tucked her in again and tried to go back to sleep. Couldn't get comfortable. tried various things and finally went back to sleep. That doesn't help my sluggishness! I'm going to try to be at least a little bit productive today. I've got quite a bit of work to do. We'll just see how far I get. Not going to make a list, cause I think I would get depressed.

Chester the Third

So you know how they say that Cats have 9 lives...well, I now know that mice have at least 3 lives. Only time will tell as for the remainder of his little lives. We had a visit from Chester again last night. After two previous times, I was actually better able to sleep, but he did wake me up a good 3 times. No we are not extremely dirty people, though J swears we have too many crumbs around here from our toddling eater. We are in a very evolving spot.

The first mouse came after they cleared the lot to build the CVS diagonally across the street. The second visitor came the very morning they drove the house off of the lot across the street. Now they have begun construction on a huge "lot" and are in the process of moving two more houses (already drove one off). They are clearing the area and preparing to build a whole bunch of townhomes. And we got a visitor. We have packets under the house and plugged up the only "hole" we knew of. Still, he came, he visited, he died...and all that for some peanut butter (on the trap of course).

Hope that is the end of chester!

TeederToddlers Official Blog

Well, its a start. TeederToddlers has an official blog site and email address. http://teedertoddlers.blogspot.com and teedertoddlers@gmail.com These are your ways of contacting us on questions about our latest creations and such. Enjoy. And seriously, the only way we can help you is if you contact us. Go ahead. leave comments, email with questions. This is only the beginning.

I'm posting.

I'm posting though sometimes I feel like I've got nothing to post about. J was out of town last week all week so I was worn out and didn't feel much like blogging. This week we are working off the illness that M got at school last Thursday. Yippee. I almost kept her home today, but she isn't contagious and seemed alright, so I sent her. I had tons of things to do today anyway..

It is only 10:30am. I've barely been out and about for more than an hour and I already got a huge portion of my list complete. I returned our free redbox movie from yesterday, I ran to the bank to finally take care of all that. I went to pay rent and visit with the landlord. she is an older woman who loves to chat...so that usually takes a while. I have an appt. with a kids consignment place at 10:45 but gotta wait for mom and dad to get here to help with the loading and such since it is heavy things we are checking out today. can't do any of that heavy lifting while i'm pregnant.

I have even called to schedule my doula appt. and childbirthing classes. we are all signed up and ready except for paying. now I just need to organize child care for M for the next 8 tues. nights. guess that'll be date night for us for a while.

Things are moving along...trying to figure out what to do with our housing situation. feeling a bit cramped here, but know that we could make it work if we have to. Dreary day, supposed to get several thunderboomers as M would say. can't believe I'm actually being productive on such a day as this! Amazing.

On Napping

This is a quote or such from the back of Celestial Seasonings box. Seriously dorky I know, but I kept it for a long time maybe cause I agreed with it and/or because it justifies one of my favorite things...a nap.

"When we were young, the 'tall' ones told us when to slow down. When the demands of the world became too great, their powers of reasoning proved maddeningly accurate. 'I think someone's tired,' they observed. And off for a nap we went. Ten minutes later, our dreaming faces had put us back in good favor with our exasperated parents. When we woke, the world somehow made sense again. What kind of truth might a napping child impart to us? Now we are the tall ones, living in a complicated world with no one to tell us when to slow down. The slumbering little one knows the value of not having the last word, of accepting a minor defeat. It's so simple. Miss out on something. Put yourself back in your own good favor. The world will wait."

Single Mom and Snow

Seriously, it snowed this morning. Some people didn't even realize it that's how little it is, but I had flurries on my car and grill (and no it wasn't frost--i do know the difference) Last week it nearly peaked at 70 degrees and this morning we had snow flurries! Ugh. I'm officially ready for spring.

And...I'm officially ready for hubs to come home. I'm a single mom for the week. Luckily I only have one child though she is 2 1/2 and one on the way. I've tried to be remotely productive, but I have low motivation. I swear if I don't get ALL the dishes done and ALL the laundry put away before J comes home I may check myself into the mental institution.

On a good note, M didn't have any accidents today and was in two situations where she had to go while in the car. She held it till we got to a potty. AND she gave me warning! That was amazing! She even went #2 by herself twice! So victory there.

On napping however, for about a week or more she has been having a really difficult time with naps. This is fairly new. We have a serious routine around here...I'm careful about the sugar intake anywhere near naptime, and still...she gets bout 45min. to 30min. by the time she goes to sleep. Hoping this is just a phase.

Well, Friday and Saturday have come and I'm finally going to post this which I began probably on Wednesday. M is sick (and napping of course cause she needs the rest). Going to the Dr. today. Poor girl. I need more sleep myself, but at least I'm getting my massage today. Ah!

Nanny-Nanny-Boo-Boo

We have officially named our little boy on the way! And..................We're not telling yet! That's so mean I know. There is just always such a stink with certain people over something that is our choice anyway that it's easier to wait and announce it once the ink has dried on the birth certificate. If I choose to tell earlier it will be at my discretion. (Our discretion really).

My M has returned from the mother ship, at least for this lovely valentine's day...Of course tonight should be interesting considering the amount of sugar she has taken in! We shall see, but so far, so good.

Met with a doula today. Glad I'm choosing to do that. Seriously worth the money.

Getting ready for a yard sale tomorrow. Ookie! You would not believe the amount of things I save! Actually most of you are probably more like me than you would like to admit. And I am always cleaning out, but alas. still plenty to sell.

We celebrated Valentine's day as a family this morning! That was really awesome! I mean it. A lovely little memory I will enjoy for the remainder of my memory's existence. We splurged (which won't happen for a long time to come)and actually bought real Hallmark cards at the Hallmark store! I know. I'm officially crazy! I was costly let me tell you, but M really enjoyed picking them out for each person. She loved hers from her dad so much that she took it to school and held onto it at least half the day her teachers said. It had glitter and disney princesses on it. Daddy's and daughters are great!

Got to split lunch with Mom at Brickstreet from my Valentine's Day treat and J got me a Starbucks card. That was perfect! I didn't ask for it and didn't even think of it, but it really is perfect. I have trouble splurging like that on myself, but I do love my Starbucks! I wanted to get him a specific something that will sound ridiculous to anyone else, but J would've loved it! I wanted to get him one of those shower curtain rods that is curved for extra room. Thought they ran around $25...nope. They are more like $40. Then add in tax. So I didn't get it. I did howver find him a hilarious book about "How Babies Are Made" Seriously amusing. He will enjoy that too. Gotta go through garage sale stuff and make sup. More later.

The Child Formerly Known As...

Anyone who doesn't believe in original sin doesn't have children.

Anyone who doesn't believe in original sin should have been a fly in my diaper bag all day. Now, to date, my child is generally a fairly well behaved child. I'm beginning to think that my family was part of some kind of awful experiment by the aliens to see how aliens and humans interact, because that surely wasn't my M...that must've been an alien trapped in her body...a pod person.

Granted maybe she feels a bit like I do that we (she and I)have had more than our usual fill of eachother in the last two weeks, cause I know that especially after today I could use, I mean really use, a break.

She was uncooperative most of the day. Purposefully choosing to not listen, obviously ignore, roll/avert eyes, attempt to distract, and just about anything she could do to be frustrating, disobedient, and whiny. At least the potty thing went well most of the day, so I can't complain about that.

Sweet girl woke up from nap time and stayed till about supper. Then I was convinced that maybe I did carry twins the last time I was pregnant cause this child looked just like mine, but was absolutely undisciplined!

Now you know as her mom I'm totally going to spend the rest of the night trying to figure out what I did to contribute and overanalyze how this happened and what I ought to have done to get different outcomes. The truth is. I felt frustrated and angry a good bit of the day because I couldn't make her obey.

HOW MANY TIMES DO I THINK GOD FEELS THIS WAY ABOUT ME! ABOUT US!

Ah, we do learn alot from our children.

Tomorrow is Another Day

Bout half-way through the day I was feeling like the above statement...praying that God would indeed give me another day to make up for the slow going, one step behind kinda day I was having. But it got better.

Here goes:

7:30am--wake up feeling cruddy (still)

Wake M up who is officially sound asleep. This never goes well cause she is usually quite cranky in such scenarios. This was a medium cranky episode (whew). She goes to the potty and her diaper was dry (yahoo!). Then she whines and fusses cause she wants to put on a diaper. I didn't cave. She wore the panties.

7:46am--get M some rice milk and convince her that she needn't watch a movie at this time. No desire for breakfast and barely drinks any milk. I hop in the shower, get ready...slowly, and go to get M ready (granted by this time it's closer to 8:30am).

Argue over which potty she's going to go pee pee in...leave her on one only to come back and find that she has hiked herself up onto mine is going potty! Hey, I'm confused but proud. Finally get her dressed...ask her to finish watching some Disney thing while I get her lunch ready...and her bag ready...and my bag ready.

By the time we get out the door it is pushing 9:30am. I've cut her bologna into hearts, cupids, and other various shapes. Realize I don't have any juice left, so make up an on the go drink and poor it into two sippy cups. Whew. Grab a snack for myself since I'm getting my hair done and sometimes that takes awhile.

As we are locking up the house, M says that her tummy is rumbling and that must mean she's hungry. I feel bad and convince her to have my granola bar. She doesn't think she will, but she really likes it. We make it to school, tell her teachers she hasn't had an accident in 4 days, so I don't expect any problems, but I'll be at the salon. I hope upon hopes she is still in the same outfit when I pick her up, but I don't really expect her to be.

I'm gone...and running late...and still have to stop at the bank. I have to do it on the way cause that's how I'm paying the tip. I call a friend to assure her that I haven't forgotten about her, just been sick. Love credit unions cause I was out of deposit slips but I still needed to deposit some and keep some. So the guy just asks and then takes care of it for me! Yeah. That's service!

I pull up for my hair appt. just a mere one minute late! hallelujah. Getting your hair done is always fun. And she threw in an eyebrow wax for the heck of it (mainly cause I've purposely neglected to keep mine up since they needed some adjusting). I still got out of there in under 2 hours.

Met mom for lunch...perfect. I was in the mood for Schlotzkys and she was right there. Splurged on the caffeine and had Cherry Coke (love it). Then went home to wrap b-day present for M's friend's party. Called Sarah to let her know that I (which means she) will not be at Mom to mom tomorrow cause I'm still not up to par. Talked longer than we should but enjoyed it. Didn't nap and did a mediocre job at wrapping that present. Went to get M.

M was still in her same outfit, had had no accidents, and took a nap! Which is huge since she didn't nap at all yesterday! We went to the elmo b-day party. Got two requests for the "Overhauls". M gets a little overloaded in that type of environment, but she had fun. We got a pic with Elmo and a cute video I'll post later. Cake was good too, but M didn't want any. She'd already had cupcakes and suckers...

We came home, M wanted to watch Pocahontas (which is like her new favorite) so I let her so that I could doze a minute and then start on dinner and dishes. Didn't want to, but I did and now I'm glad. Dinner was delish! M ate sooooooooo much brocolli! She thought it was sooooo good! Hilarious! And fantastic really. Made Chicken Enchilada Pasta (one of my faves), and broccoli and sweet tea! Even Hubs enjoyed it all.

Potty time comes after dinner always in our house till we get it down (the #2 I mean). We had a little resistence, but I didn't cave. She did it and was greatly relieved and had energy like you wouldn't believe after that. Nani came by with a special prize for her perfect potty day and all ended well that started off sloppy! Thank goodness I didn't have to wait till tomorrow to redeem my motherhood abilities! What a day. And I'm still up.

DIY

Seriously...Here are the bow pics for the birthday project. Please enjoy laughing along with me as I try to figure this creation out!

See the previous post for the frontal pic of these "overhauls". Here is the frou frou on the back. So now to make a matching bow!

I actually downloaded and printed, read and followed directions to make this bow. besides the fact that it's too big, it looks a mess! Buh...so I decide to give it a go without the instructions. I eyeball it if you will. And I'm relieved to have this as the outcome!

TeederToddlers

My mom and I are working on a new project. We are making and recreating boutique clothing for toddlers. We've only just begun and right now we are only doing girls clothing sizes 2-5...and it is fun. Not to mention that M is the beneficiary of all the demo model clothes (the ones we work with first to get them just right). Then she gets to be our little model/walking advertisement! There is one more outfit that is complete minus the monogram so I will post it later. But the scoop is that we will have an Etsy store/site very shortly (Thanks itsamomthing for that tip) and you and anyone you tip off can go, search, browse, shop...


Here's the scoop. TeederToddlers is our name. We make clothing for toddler girls sizes 2-5. Our goal is to make one style of clothing per week/one pattern if you will. We will make only one item in each size (unless there is a special request for twins), and that is it. The next week will be a whole new item. The purpose here is to keep things very original. The quality will be high, and the demand great because THERE ARE SO FEW THAT ARE ALIKE! If there happens to be a particular pattern and/or fabric that is extremely popular, then you can expect to see it reappear in the following month's picks. But the goal will be to keep things unique and individual AND high quality, made in America! Can't wait to publish the post that says that we are up and running.



THIS IS THE PREVIEW! Here are the items (minus the one in need of monogramming) that we have experimented with so far.


This is a birthday present for one of M's classmates! It comes with a matching hairbow and there are a few cute embellishments on the back as well, but I've maxed out my pics for this post. Will post the hair bow pics next cause it was a funny experiment.

Baby Boy Pics

Finally scanned these in...Thanks Mom and SIL! If you know what you're looking at you'll notice the boy parts to be very obvious! The two middle ones are face pics 3D and the last is just a pic of his hand spread out. Very cute to me the mom.

Update! We had a great potty day with M. She didn't have any accidents. In fact just before dinner she went potty all by herself and then called us from the toilet. That was funny. We celebrated by going to Ruby Tuesdays and ordering dessert. Keep in my mind I am pregnant as well!

I did the sinus flush last night. No idea if I did it right, but after a great deal of dosing off and on and big nap this afternoon I feel a good bit better! Still going to repeat flush and tea tonight.

Went to Earth Fare last night. We decided to do meats and dairy's all organic to reduce the amount of hormones and antibiotics that we put into our bodies. I've heard to many tales of early (and I mean really early) periods in young gals most likely due to the hormones in most meat and dairy. Not to mention I think M may be allergic to dairy or milk or something that causes a lot of her bathroom woes. So, I went and only got the things that fall in those categories and some of the other things that I needed for treating my current illness. I spent more than my usual $50/wk. Thank goodness this was the first trip the the grocery for me this week. It was $63. And that's not too bad considering I bought more than enough meat for at least 2-4 weeks. We'll see. I guess I'll have to do some budget adjustment for this new Whole Food type adventure. Any tips? Everything else is going to be bought somewhere else. I've read enough about pesticides and such and fruit to know that in general if you wash fruit you are rid a good majority of these things away. I just want to rid of hormones and antibiotics for now. When we get rich or something then maybe I'll be able to afford all whole food all the time.