Oh What Joy

I love crossing things off my to-do lists . . . especially things that have been on there a really long time.  After nearly 2 years, I finally finished Sophia's baby quilt.  Good thing she hasn't completely outgrown it, right?

No More Excuses

Our church highly recommends/encourages/commands us to have food storage.  It used to be that the standard was a 1-year food supply, but lately, they've encouraged people to do at least a 3-mon supply.  This is better than nothing and easier than a 1-year supply.  I've always known I should have food on hand, and this was reinforced when the power went out for 3 days last winter, but still, I've neglected to have a supply of food available.  Oh sure, I've bought a few extra cans here and there, but that would probably last us a week or so . . . of eating beans and tomatoes.  My excuses for not having a supply of food on hand include:

• We don't eat the types of foods that most people have in their food storage, so how would we rotate our food storage if we didn't eat it?
• We don't have the money - storing food can be expensive.
• We don't have room.  (We can't use that excuse anymore, we have way more storage in our new house than we currently need.)

But last Saturday, I attended a Relief Society event where one of the mini-lessons was on food storage.  A few of the things that were mentioned really stuck with me and have motivated me to get started on our food storage before it's too late.

• I don't want to go hungry in case of an emergency (natural, financial, etc), but I'd hate to see my children go hungry and have to tell them there was nothing to eat.  Now that I have children, this reason might be the biggest motivator of all.
• Getting food storage together can cost less than $1 a day.  We generally have $30 extra each month I could use on food storage.
• Creating menus makes it easier to know how much of each food item you really need.  I don't know why I haven't heard/thought of this before.  This kind of thing is right down my alley.  I plan meals all the time for normal day to day; I could certainly do it to help start our food supply.

So I've completed the first step in my food storage goals:  I've planned 7 meals that we could eat for a week.  

Next steps:  Write down the ingredients for each meal, multiply the quantities by 12 (for 12 weeks (3 months) of eating those meals).  And then start shopping - a little at a time, so that it doesn't put us in debt.

Things that made me smile today

• Both girls went down quickly and quietly for long naps!  I got a nap, cleaned the bathrooms, read my scriptures and even had a few minutes to update my blog.
• The Christmas Cactus is blooming . . . and not with just one blossom, but dozens.  I've never seen it so filled with blossoms.  There's even a double-header growing - I can't wait to see that open up.

• Amelia loves riding her bike and wanted me to take her picture.  Big smiles make me happy.

• Sophia likes riding bikes too, but this is what she did when I told her to smile.  It just cracks me up!

Random Updates

• I was hoping that now that Amelia is 3, I could get rid of her binkie.  I wouldn't mind it so much, since she only uses it at nap time and bedtime, but she loses it in the middle of the night and wakes me up to find it for her.  That's what I mind . . . it's all about me, right?  ;)
• I tried not giving the binkie to Amelia one day during nap time.  Amelia didn't cry, but she didn't sleep either.  She didn't know what to do with herself; she doesn't know how to get herself to sleep without her binkie.  I decided that at this point, I'd rather have her sleep than not have her binkie.
• We're 2 1/2 months into having church at 11am.  I hate it; it really messes up naps and eating.  I'm not sure that I'll like the 1pm time slot any better with young kids, but I'll deal with that next year.  However, regardless of the church time, I'm glad I have the opportunity to go to church and get spiritually recharged every week.
• I've been trying to buy clothes for me online to prevent the need for shopping in stores with kids.  So far, I've spent almost as much in shipping as I have for the products because I keep sending them back.  I just can't seem to find shirts that fit right - they're all made for bigger and bustier women.  Where do flat-chested, skinny women shop?  The little girl's department?
• I'm not sure what has happened with Sophia and Amelia lately, but neither of them have been sleeping well, which means I'm not sleeping well and am back in the "sleep deprived" state of being.  It also means that one of the girls ends up in our bed almost every night and the other one ends up in the spare bed with either Ken or I.
• Yesterday I sang with our choir in church.  Amelia wanted to come up with me and stood quietly next to me with her arms folded while we sang.  It was so cute.  She loves to sing; hopefully some day she'll want to join me in the choir.
• I got an interesting phone call last week.  One of my former managers called to offer me a job.  I was very flattered, but working full-time with an hour commute each way certainly isn't for me right now.  I told them that if I could work part-time (max 10 hrs/week) from home, I might be interested.
• Ken works out in the yard as often as he can and keeps telling me that the flower beds are waiting for my attention.  I finally had a chance to start tackling one of the beds and just wanted to rip everything out and start over; it's a mess of too many different types of plants and none of them look great.  Ken says to wait another month or so to see what it looks like when things are growing . . . but I can't imagine it's going to look any better.
• We only lived in AZ for 3 years, but I loved those 3 years of not having to change our clocks back and forth for daylight savings time.  I miss that.
• This blog seems a bit on the whining/complaining side - sorry - life is good . . . I'm just tired.

Amelia's 3rd Birthday

Amelia turned 3 years old yesterday!  When I asked her what she wanted for her birthday, she said "lots and lots of balloons" and "lots and lots of cake".  So, we blew up 30+ balloons and bought a Costco cake (that serves 48 when we only needed a cake that served about 10).  I put up decorations the night before, so that when she woke up, she'd see all of the balloons, but by morning, half of them had fallen down.  And within an hour of waking up, Amelia had pulled (or requested) the rest of them down!  She didn't seem to mind that we put some of them back up, just as long as we didn't put them where she didn't want them.  Amelia definitely wants/needs things her way . . . or else!  Amelia loves to take pictures with the camera (if she was a bit older, I'd probably buy one for her) and took pictures of Ken and I in our party hats (excuse the "just woke up" look), putting back up decorations, and balloons.

Then I took a picture of Amelia with one of her balloons, at her request, and this is what she did.  (BTW - she's not wearing a party dress; she's wearing her dress from church on Sunday, that she slept in.)

Ken took the day off and helped me as we hosted a small birthday party for Amelia and a few of her friends.  We kept it simple - 3 friends, minimal games, lots of snacks and plenty of time to just run around and play.  Amelia is coloring while she waits for her friends to come.

Amelia gets scared when people sing Happy Birthday (I blame it on the fireworks/loud noise fear from July), so we skipped the singing as you can see in the video.  I especially like how the party hat gets involved ;)

 Birthday Party Friends eating cake

Some of her favorite birthday presents included a Circus Tent . . .

 a tunnel . . .

an umbrella and flashlight (that doesn't require batteries - that's my favorite).  Overall I think Amelia had a good time.   But I've come to the conclusion that even though I love celebrating birthdays, I don't think we'll be having a party every year - it's too exhausting.

Happy Birthday Amelia! 

New/ Revised Hair Cut

Ever since my bad haircut back in November, my hair has been a work in progress.  Today it progressed a little more toward the good.  The good?  At least I don't look like I have a mullet anymore and my bangs aren't sticking out at all directions.  The bad?  It requires a flat iron.  I'm a pretty low maintenance hair girl, so to buy and use a flat iron is making me stretch.  My hair still isn't quite where I'd like it, but it's getting closer, so we'll just keep hoping and waiting for it to grow more.  Oh, and the flat iron I bought today?  Part of the instructions said "do not use while sleeping".  And since I am exhausted and needed a nap, I figured I better use the flat iron BEFORE I took my nap, instead of during it, like I had planned ;)  Oh, and I took the picture (even though it's not a great one - of me OR my hair) before my nap, just in case I can't get it to look descent after my nap.

Sharing

My girls love to share with me . . . important things, like soggy bites of sandwiches, sticky lollipops, smooshed treats.  I read an article lately about why toddlers do that - apparently it's an expression of love.  In the past, I've politely declined or pretended to take a bite, but it always seemed to make Amelia so sad.  And now I know why, and so I've been trying to eat their offerings, even if it's not quite in the form I would like it.

Switching gears:  In the last month or so, I've noticed an increase in my symptoms from eating the foods that I am allergic too.  So I have decided to completely stop eating wheat, oats, and peanuts for the next 2-3 weeks to see if that relieves the symptoms.  I'm hoping I'm not allergic to anything else.

The hardest part of this experiment?  My lovely daughters are like little temptresses . . . but in a very loving way.   They still want to share their sandwiches, crackers, pretzels, cereal, quesadillas - all those lovely foods that contain wheat and oats.  And since I've been trying to go 100% wheat-free, etc. it is harder than normal to turn down their generosity.   But since they don't understand "allergy", I'm back to pretending or politely declining their generosity.  That works for Sophia, but Amelia isn't buying it.  Hopefully I can go back to "cheating" on my allergy foods soon.