Anxiously Tranquille

Baked Mac and Cheese

2012-02-12T08:33:00.001-07:00

I have tried a ton of mac and cheese recipes. Even Alton Brown's recipe didn't quite do it for me. This is my favorite so far. I got it from my friend Jonda at Verite. I love it because the cheese sauce is done in the same amount of time it takes to boil the noodles. I have learned to measure the milk and grate the cheese before starting though.

1/4 c butter
1/4 c Flour
1/4 teaspoon ground mustard (I usually add more)
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon pepper (I add more. I like pepper)
1/4 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce (I usually just add a splash and whatever goes in goes in.)
2 cups milk
2 cups sharp cheddar or blend of cheeses

Melt butter over low heat. Stir in flour, salt, pepper, mustard and Worcestershire sauce. Cook over low heat until smooth and bubbly (mine is usually slightly browned too). Remove from heat (or not. I usually don't). Stir in a small amount of milk and whisk until smooth, then stir in a little more and a little more. Go slow with the milk. It makes a difference in the smoothness of the sauce later. Heat to boiling, stirring constantly (or at least frequently). Keep stirring/boiling for about a minute. Remove from heat. Wait a minute so the milk cools some, otherwise the cheese will break. Add cheese slowly so it all melts.

Add 2 cups (about half a pound) cooked macaroni to cheese sauce. Pour into casserole dish and top with bread crumbs. Bake 20-25 minutes at 350 or until bubbly and browned. (I baked mine for about 15 minutes, then broiled the last minute or so to get a good brown top. It was already pretty hot anyway and this was just the right amount of time to thicken up a bit more.)

Now, I've only made this recipe once baked. Usually I make it stovetop. For that, I halve the recipe- so 2 T butter, 2 T flour, and 1 cup milk. I usually leave the seasonings the same and cheese I add to taste. Cook as directed, then add more milk until it is the right consistency for stovetop mac and cheese (however loose or thick you like it.) Dress the macaroni and serve. I still usually use 1/2 pound of pasta, but the kids actually really like this, so they eat a lot.

Now, whatever you do, don't do like I did the only time I baked it. I asked Alann for a box of macaroni from the basement. He tossed up a box I did not recognize. I think it got left behind from my mother-in-law when she moved. When I cooked it, it tasted VERY strongly of old wheat. I was hoping the cheese would cover it up. Nope. I also extremely oversalted the pasta water, so not only was it really old, but really salty too. So it ended up being rather gross. The cheese sauce is good, the technique is good. Just don't use really salty old pasta.

2012 goals

2012-02-05T20:34:00.000-07:00

I hate making goals because I hate seeing the failure when Idon’t accomplish them. But I know it’s important to keep trying.

Personal Goals:

1 ) Health-Despite being pregnant, I would like to keep myhealth up. I mentioned in my post about last year’s goals that I feel so muchbetter now than I ever have, and that’s because I am making my health apriority. I am finally motivated to exercise for health sake, rather than for anumber sake. Because honestly, that never really motivated me anyway. So myhealth goals for the year are:

a. run a 5k- probablyafter the baby. There’s a 5k for the Wentzville firefighters out here inOctober. I almost signed up for it this year, but ended up being sick thatweekend anyway. I believe it’s for breast cancer awareness. If I feel supermotivated, I may do one before the baby, but I honestly get really hot when Irun. I prefer to run outside, so even though it’s been in the 30s or 40s in themornings, I’ve been out there running. And It’s great. I finally found a pairof pants on clearance, so I am wearing those and a light jacket and if the sunis out, I end up taking the jacket off before my run is over. I imagine runninga 5k anywhere from May to September will be miserable for me, especially beingin my third trimester. But now I’ve put it out there, so I better make ithappen, right?

b. keep running. At my very first appointment for thispregnancy, the nurse practitioner that I met with was concerned about myrunning. She said I should just walk. The other OBs I’ve seen haven’t beenconcerned. So I want to keep running as much as I can. I said before that somedays are REALLY hard. I go as much as I can, and I’m okay with that. I know Iam out there doing something, and that’s better than anything else.

c. eat healthy. This one is really hard for me during andafter a pregnancy. Fast food sounds SO good ALL THE TIME when I am pregnant.It’s ridiculous. Add to that the sudden ravenous hunger strikes and you can seewhere I may have issues. I try to keep a granola bar in my purse or car all thetime for when I am out, and in general I try to plan outings to occur beforelunchtime, but it’s a big weakness for me. And we can’t afford it either. I’vehad so many stomach issues with this kid. The first few weeks, fresh fruits andveggies were the only things that tasted good to me. Then it was processedfoods. Then everything I ate for lunch made me sick. Now, I seem to be okaywith most things, but definitely craving seafood a lot. And focusing onproviding lots of fruits and veggies to my kids is important to me too.

2) Blog more. I know. I’ve said it before. But I get reallydiscouraged when I sit down to blog for “15 minutes” and it takes me 45 minutesto write the post and then I want to add pictures and blogger won’t addpictures and ugh. Right now I’m having to add pictures to blogger by usingpicasa because it won’t upload any photos for me. It’s frustrating.

3) Pictures. Continuing to take photos of my kids isimportant to me. I love looking through them and remembering how they havechanged. I tend to pick my favorites and save them separately and when I see afree prints code somewhere, I get prints made. It works pretty well. I rarelyspend any money on printing them. I did okay last year, but I want to dobetter.

4) Journal. Still something I struggle with. I want towrite, but I have a hard time. As long as I can keep up wit hthe kids, I guessI’ll be okay for now.

5) Scripture study. This is one place that I feel I am doingreally well in, but can always improve. What helped me this year was printing a calendar all on one page and Imark off every day that I read. It’s really good for me to see what I am doing.I like the record. I tend not to read on weekends, which needs to change. Sothat’s my goal. I want to read every day. My mini goals for this are: read theBook of Mormon by Easter and read the Gospels (aka Life of Christ) by Easter.Can I do it? I hope so.

6) Prayer. This is another area I struggle with. It’s sohard for me to say a morning prayer. Unless I am able to get up before the kidsevery day, I just don’t have any me time until they go down for naps. So I amgoing to try to make morning prayers happen.

Family goals: These are my goals for our family. Alanngenerally supports me and trusts me to show the kids the way.

Where we are doing good: prayers. We switched a while ago tomaking our breakfast prayer more of a family prayer. We are usually togetherfor breakfast, so it made sense. That has definitely been a good change in ourlives. We almost always pray before eating- assuming I get everyone’s food onthe table before the kids finish their meals anyway. That’s mostly a lunchproblem. We often have different lunches because we are eating leftovers. So bethe time I sit down, they are done. But Claire is asking to pray more and Alexis asking to pray, though he doesn’t really talk. He just folds his arms andbows his head and mumbles while I tell him what to say. And the kids rarely let us go to bed withoutsaying prayers. If we do, it’s because they fell asleep in the car orsomething.

FHE- Okay, seriously, this year, we are going to do it.Claire is definitely old enough to sit through 10-15 minutes. I think I willjust go through the nursery manual for FHE or something.

Scriptures- also something we need to work on. I’ve gotanother calendar just for family scripture study to mark the days we read. AndI really want this to work. I don’t care if the kids just run around while weread. I want to be reading.

Preschool for the kids- Alex is now at the age where hemight enjoy some more learning type stuff. I do try to get the educationalstuff out – the play doh, the finger paints, the beans (for scooping, pouring,making a general mess). We color. But I feel like so many of my days are spentdoing anything other than interacting with my kids. They love to play together,which is great, but I also need to spend more time playing with them and teachingthem. I’m not sure how I am going to tackle this one yet. I’ve still got theother program I was thinking of using for Claire. I can use it for both ofthem. It’s really still the preparation that bogs me down. He’s too young tounderstand a workbook. I think Claire may be as well. I just worry. I read afew parenting magazine and they all say kids in preschool do better in regularschool. They tend to graduate from college and get advanced education, which issomething I want for my kids. (Hopefully something with a little more use thanmy college degree, but if it makes them happy…) There are desperately fewpreschool programs here in town. The ones I’ve seen are $70 a month or more fora 3 year old class and there is no public preschool. And she wouldn’t be ableto enroll until August anyway. Part of me says just find a good curriculum, buyit outright, use it with all the kids, and save lots of preschool moneys. But the other part of me says “we don’t havethe money and you won’t follow through anyway”. I really admire those women whohomeschool their kids from scratch and piece together a curriculum and get justthe books they want. But honestly, if I were to homeschool, I could not do itthat way. I would have to buy a curriculum. So I don’t really know where to gofrom here. This is one of those ephemeral goals that may or may not be met.

Temple/Date Night- we do fairly well and get out about every3 months. It’s pretty difficult to find a sitter here. I’ve got one that isn’ttoo far away and drives her own car, and the kids know her because she is oneof the sitters at bible study, but she isn’t always available and Alann and Iare so last-minute planners. That’s myown fault I know. Temple is also hardbecause they do the youth temple night the same night as the adults, so we can’treally go then because we have no sitter. But I want to work on it.

Less yelling/stress/fighting in the house. I’m not reallysure how to work this one. I’m working on my part of it, but the kids aregetting to the age where they are fighting over things now. Alex cries prettyoften- probably 10 or more times a day. I’m trying to not be so quick tocomfort him so that he learns to comfort himself and so they can learn to workthings out themselves. Mostly I try to step in before someone loses an eye.

Phoenix 2012 pt 3.

2012-01-31T19:54:00.000-07:00

Wednesday was a bit of a chill day. Nana brought lunch overand he played with her for a while, then we just hung out. We needed a day homeafter all of the craziness.

Thursday we went out to Scottsdale to have lunch with AuntTeene. We ended up at Sweet Tomatoes which was nice because the kids eat freethere. It was also nice to go out and not eat something greasy. I’m afraid tosee what the scale has to say about my vacation. I can already see it in mybelly. Yikes.

Friday we went down to Mesa again. Yes, I know, we were outthere a lot. This time we went to a park to meet up with our friends from MOwho moved to AZ a few months ago. The whole way there, Claire was asking if itwas the choo choo park. I kept telling her no it wasn’t, then we get there andthere is a big train engine in the middle of the park. IT used to be a displaybut it was closed off. As we approached the train (which was the mainattraction as we waited for our friends), I notice a few cats hanging around.Then a few more. Then a few more. By the time we get to the train, I’ve countedat least 15. And then I realize, someone, who has a key to the train display,is FEEDING the cats. Seriously? Feral cats are a PROBLEM people. So Clairecalled it the “cat choo choo”. Other than that, it was an okay park. Megan andBrittany showed up and we played on the playground and caught up on life. Imiss our weekly playdates that’s for sure. Then we went across the street tothe Temple. Claire has been begging me every time we go by it to go inside. Sothis time, we went into the visitor’s center and walked all around the grounds.Claire fell and scraped her elbow so we had to find a bandaid. But overall itwas a good experience. We sat and listened to the Jesus statue talk. There’s agiant statue of Jesus in the visitor’s center that the kids were just in aweof. They were sitting and we were talking about it a little bit and one of themissionaries turned it on. It has a little speech about who Jesus is. We alsoate a picnic on the grass and then it was unfortunately time to say goodbye. Clairewanted to go with Megan, but we couldn’t do that. So we headed home.

Friday night, everyone came over for dinner. That was a lotof fun. Amy and I made dinner together and teene came over and Nana and Jim cameover. We all visited together and hung out for a while. Alex refused to eat hisdinner, both at dinner and later for a snack, so I put him to bed hungry. It’stough love, but sometimes, you just have to do it. He had ample time and offersof dinner. He made a choice. He cried a few times during the night, and Clairestarted coughing and getting the plague, but overall it worked out.

Saturday Amy, Teene and I went to the zoo, with the kids ofcourse. We walked all over and saw pretty much all the animals, except the dumbones like the snakes and monkeys. I’m just not a fan of them. I never reallyhave been. Alex was waving bye bye and blowing kisses to all the animals as wemoved to a new one. Claire really enjoyed hanging out with her aunts andgetting to leave my side during an outing. Several times she ran off with oneof them. After the zoo, we ate a picnic lunch. We drove home for super-latenaps. While Alex and Amy were napping, Claire and I ran to Walgreens. Amy wasstarting to feel sick and Claire and Alex were fighting something, so we loadedup on zinc and Vitamin C. I ended upbuying some Zarbee’s Cough suppressant and immune booster. Basically, it’sseveral kinds of honey and vitamin c and zinc. I bought it because Claire hashad a dry cough and I’ve been giving her honey which helps some (as I’ve heardit does) and I was hoping the C and Zinc would help too. I’m very impressed. Ifthey actually had colds, they never developed. It could have been just drynoses and different stuff in the air, but they’ve been acting like they weregetting colds. They still have runny noses, but have been sleeping pretty wellso that helps. I will definitely try this stuff again next time they get sick.We had dinner with Amy and went to bed.

Sunday, we went to church again. I wasn’t sure if we weregoing to stay for nursery since the kids were kind of sick. Alex refused to goto nursery. Down right would not go in the room. So he went with me to SundaySchool and then Relief Society. He asked to go in there for a few minutes, thenClaire came to go potty a bit later and when I took her back he was standing inthe middle of the room crying. So I took him with me again. He was pretty laidback. He colored and snacked and just hung out with me. After naps, we wentback to the Woods for dinner. It was pretty hectic. The missionaries were over,plus two other families. Alex dropped my water, Claire dropped her milk, then Ispilled water on myself later. We were a mess! We did get to hang out with theWoods a bit after all the craziness died down.

Monday we went to hang out with Mom for a while in themorning and for lunch. We fed the horse and then Claire wanted to feed thechickens. She said she wanted to bring them home with her, that the black andwhite one was her favorite. It was a barred rock, which happens to be myfavorite too. She fed the chickens a bunch of bread. Apparently later, Mom wentback outside and both the horse and the chickens came running over. When Momtold them that Claire was gone, they all shuffled away downheartedly. Claireloves to feed the horse. She asked almost every day. Alex decided he was ahorse and his favorite snack has become raw carrots. Monday night we went backto the Woods’ house for dinner and Family home Evening. I wasn’t really surewhat I wanted to make for dinner, I didn’t have any plans, Teene was workinglate, so it worked out perfectly. We had a good time over there. Angeliqueplayed with the kids and then we had a good lesson. The kids had a blastplaying with Grandpa Rick too. They obviously have missed Daddy, because evenAlex is willing to let men he doesn’t really know play with him and hug him,which is unusual. It was a late night, but lots of fun.

Tuesday morning started with a bath for the kids, and thefloor. They usually get a bath Monday night, but since it was late, theydidn’t. Then we went to see my Grandma with Nana. Claire and Alex had a goodtime and I think Grandma had a good time watching them. There was anunfortunate tragedy though. The kids were pulling toys out of their backpacksand playing with them and then leaving them. I was trying to pick them up asthey discarded them. When we left, I didn’t double check just to make sure wehad everything. I commented on it to Mom on the way home. But I thought I haddone a good job. Later, as we were packing up the kids toys, we realized thatone of Claire’s ponies was missing. I kept hoping that we were just missing itsomewhere, but we looked all over the house and car and didn’t find it. Someonelooked at Grandma’s house and didn’t find it. Since then, Claire has beentelling everyone about her missing pony. I told Claire that aunt Teene wouldlook for it, because it’s in her area. Aunt Teene came over for dinner and atthe end of the night, Teene told Claire that she was going home. Claire said“No, I don’t want you to go home.” Teene asked why and Claire said “Because youneed go Grandma’s house and find my pony!” Later Claire walked Teene to the carand told her again to find her pony. As Teene pulled away, she yelled again“bye bye, love you, see you later, Find my pony!” This has been tragic for her.It took a long time for me to convince her that someone would find the pony andNana would mail it to us. Hopefully we can find it.

After visiting with Grandma, we went to lunch and met withAunt Teene. After dropping Nana off at home, we drove over to check out the newPhoenix Temple site. It’s just a hole in the ground. We didn’t even get out. Iwas hoping it was farther along. But maybe next time there will be something tosee. Claire was very excited to go see another temple. That makes me happy. Shetold me at the Mesa Temple that she needs to go to the temple, but first sheneeds “flowers and a dress and flowers and stuff.” We spent the rest of the daypacking and getting ready to go. Aunt Amy came home and the kids were goingnuts. They were way excited to see her and wouldn’t leave her alone. They madeher read a book for bedtime and kept running around her and screaming at her.It made me laugh.

Wednesday, we went to the airport. The kids were pretty wellbehaved. Alex was very tired. Every time he calmed down, Claire started actingup again. They were quite happy to be home. They rediscovered all their toys.They had to touch everything. Claire said “look my strollers. Wow cool.” It waslike Christmas. They also pet Mama Kitty for a good long time and wanted to godown to see the dogs. It was pretty funny. They both refused to go to bed.Claire came down because she had a booger in her nose. Alex kept trying to sayhe was hungry or needed juice. I think he really just missed sleeping withClaire. They ended up sleeping in the same room pretty well. He went in to giveher another kiss after we read books.

Overall, we had a fun trip, but we are so glad to be home.Two weeks is just about the right amount of time. Maybe 10 or 12 days would bebetter. But that’s fine. I’m just glad that we got to go visit. I know the kidswill be quite bored now that they don’t have Jade (the dog) to harass, or theiraunts hanging around to play with them, or horses or chickens to feed or Nanato hang out with.

Phoenix 2012 pt 2

2012-01-22T23:40:00.000-07:00

Saturday the 14th was a fun day. The kids, Aunt Amy, and Aunt Teene and I all went to the "choo choo park" as Claire keeps calling it. She apparently loved it. There was a narrow gauge train to ride and a merry-go-round and some fun playgrounds. First thing we had to ride the train and then we rode the merry-go-round. The kids spent a good hour running around playing on the playgrounds too. They really enjoyed it. Claire has been asking all week to go back to the choo choo park. I told her if we have time we will. So far, it hasn't happened.

We had a decent lunch at 5&Diner. It was nowhere near as good as it used to be. Or it could have been because it was a different location. The fries were a touch burned, the kids' chicken nuggets were overdone. And the server was WAY slow. Afterwards we came home and had naps.

Sunday was good for a Sunday. This is the first time we've visited that we've actually stayed for more than just Sacrament meeting. And that is since we've had kids! But neither of the kids needed morning naps or anything, so I stayed. At first, I was bummed. We got to church and sat in the "normal" spot. The Woods have sat in the same place since I started going to church. But they never showed up. So I struggled through Sacrament alone. Halfway through, one lady behind us offered to hold Alex, who of course would have nothing to do with her. Then another lady moved up from the row behind us to act as a barrier so they would quit escaping. Overall, it wasn't too bad of a meeting. I wasn't sure we were going to stay for Nursery (which is honestly how I think of church right now- Sacrament and Nursery (aka free time!)). But the kids really wanted to stay, so I dropped them off at Nursery and headed over to Sunday School. A few minutes into Sunday School, Veda walked in, and didn't see me. Someone had sat down and was being friendly with me, so I just stayed where I was and didn't move. But the lady next to me made a comment and Veda turned around and saw me and insisted I come over and sit next to her. They had gotten there late so they sat in the back and hadn't seen me. In the middle of Sunday School, Claire came in to go potty. I helped her then sent her back. In the middle of Relief Society, Claire came to go potty again. She refuses to let the teachers help her go potty. She always wants me. Maybe when we get home she will let her regular teacher help her. I can hope. Anyway, when I took Claire back to Nursery, Alex saw me and started throwing a big fit. Apparently, the first time I brought Claire back he also threw a fit. So the second time I just took him with me. For the most part, he has a really hard time with being separated from me. A lot of the time, I try to just let him deal with it. I know that's the only way that he will get over it. (When we started going to Bible study, he cried EVERY week for 2 months. He would stop after a few minutes of course, but I remember the day he just waved good bye and happily went his way.) But I also know that he has been dealing with a lot of new stuff lately. I'm sure he doesn't remember the last time he was here, so the house is new to him, being around his aunts and Nana are both pretty new to him. He saw Amy in December, but he was still a little apprehensive when he saw her again. So I took him with me back to Relief Society. He sat on my lap and had a snack and was perfectly happy so it wasn't really a hassle at all.
After naps, we headed back to the Woods' house for dinner. It was nice to catch up. The kids had a fun time playing with Angelique. They went to bed late of course. But it's hard for me to leave when I only get to see them a few times a year.
Monday was a holiday, so Aunt Teene was off work. We saw Nana for a bit and then went down to Teene's house to visit. We played at a park and then had lunch together.
Tuesday morning was exciting for me. I am FREE! I finally got my bottom permanent retained taken off my teeth. The thing has been bugging me for a year or more. I can't floss behind it, food gets stuck. It was just a nightmare. And no dentist would take it off, even though they all commented on it and how I needed to take better care of it or see an orthodontist. So I went to see the orthodontist that put it on. He tried to lecture me about how I was making a mistake, but that's ok. I know that it was better. I would rather have clean crooked teeth than straight cavity-filled teeth. I'm still getting used to the change. After 10 years of always having this thing in my mouth, the feel of my own teeth is strange. But I'm happy with it.
Tuesday, we spent all day in Mesa. We went to Teene's house and then we went over to a children's museum. It was okay. I'm just glad it was free thanks to our Magic House membership. It was small and the kids had a lot of fun, but we were pretty bored. They had a small area for young kids with a kid-sized house and some big blocks to play with. Afterward, we had a picnic lunch and then played at a park with Uncle John and Aunt Teene. Alex decided that John was an ok guy and let him hold him and play with him. Teene lives in the flight path for the airport, so there are a LOT of airplanes. Alex noticed them while he was swinging, and then just wanted to be held and watch the airplanes go by. Every time one went by, he clapped and said "another!" Luckily, he only had to wait another 30 seconds or so for another one to come by. We went to have naps at Teene's house. After naps, we had dinner together and then headed home. It was a fun day.

Phoenix Vacation pt 1

2012-01-17T21:24:00.001-07:00

I haven't posted my goals for this year yet, but I wanted to blog about my vacation a bit first. I have them written, just not posted.
Anyway, last Wednesday the 11th we flew out of St. Louis to Phoenix. Probably the best part of my day was driving to the airport. Claire was being a chatter-box as usual, just talking about everything and anything. She was obviously seriously excited. At one point Alann said to her "Claire, can you just be quiet for two minutes? Just stop talking for two minutes?" (Trust me, I have this thought and have asked the same question often.) She got quiet for about 2 seconds and then said in a really quiet voice "But I need to talk." We bought started laughing. Yes my dear, you do seem to need to talk. That's okay, we love you anyway. Alann was kind enough to devote part of his day to sitting in the airport with us while we waited for our flight. It makes it easier when he can do that. I can go to the bathroom or take the kids to the bathroom or to get drinks without lugging all the extra stuff with me. Our flight was rather uneventful. The kids were pretty well behaved. The stewardess even let it slide that they were seated next to each other and sharing a seat belt for take off. Technically, Alex was supposed to be in my lap. I've had other people yell at me before if one of them isn't cooperating. We got in pretty late and just worked on getting dinner and getting the kids settled in.
Thursday I got up and ran! yay me! I was feeling pretty awesome. Aunt Amy was home with us for part of the day. We did some grocery shopping and got lunch together. Aunt Teene came over and hung out with us for part of the day and we had a good time. Naps were ridiculous. Claire was the amazing rubber band kid. I swear she peed like 5 times in an hour long period.
Friday was a laid-back day. We visited with Nana and tried valiantly to get schedules back on track. The kids have been a little crazy because we either haven't been home or people have been here during bedtime and so they won't go to bed on time. Plus it's a different bed and they are sharing a room. They seem to have gotten it together though. Naps are still difficult but they are going to bed at the same time pretty easily. Claire actually took a nap on Friday, she was so exhausted from everything. But other times they just talk to each other despite Alex's obvious need for sleep. So she usually gets removed so he can go to sleep. I don't mind them talking to each other and comforting each other, but they need to be sleeping! The first night Claire did have issues with Alex waking up. She came stumbling out of her room crying when he woke up crying. It was pretty sad. And she didn't really understand where I was in relation to her so she didn't know where to go. But we got it under control and they are sleeping through each other's noises now. I suppose it's just like when you get married. It takes a while to adjust to having someone else making noise and moving around while you are sleeping, but you get used to it. Speaking of sleep, I have not been sleeping well at all. I need to go to bed now so I can maybe get some sleep tonight. I hope. I want to run tomorrow, but in true pregnant while visiting fashion, my ankles are swollen and sore, so that's probably not a good idea.

felt, glue, ouch, repeat

2012-01-06T10:00:00.000-07:00

Okay, let's try this again Blogger. And try not to eat my pictures, mmkay??

Here are the finished products for my kids' Christmas presents this year. Alex got a car mat and Claire got a pony mat. So far, Alex doesn't really get the car mat, but it has been in Claire's room since Christmas. She loves it. She also really likes her pony mat. Let's talk about that first.
The pony mat is made out of felt that is hot glued together. In order to make it, I looked at the animated version of the house I wanted to create, then drew it out, then cut it out of felt, then glued it together. It was quite the process, but luckily, the ones I really dreaded ended up not being so hard. For my inspiration pieces, check out my pinterest board.

The entire mat. Sorry it's sideways. Serious blogger issues here. I'll explain each section below.

From left (and upside down to boot!): the "ever-free forest", Fluttershy's house, Rarity's dress boutique/house.

Apple Jack's house and orchard.

The pink house is Sugar Cube Corner. It's a bakeshop and Pinkie Pie lives upstairs. The tree is Twilight's library. The other building is the Town Hall. The big whitish rectangle is the town square, with the fountain, apple cart, food cart, and flower cart. You can see them better down below. MY favorite is the soap box. =)

To the right is the rest of Apple Jack's farm. The pink building with the bathtub is supposed to be the spa, and the green building with the "what the heck is that?" sign (thanks Alann!) is the restaurant. That's supposed to be a clover. You try cutting a clover out of less than 1 sq inch of felt. The food cart has carrots, hay, and oats. The flower cart just has random flower shapes. I think the little green one is a cactus.

This is Rainbow Dash's house. It's one of my favorites. I was a little concerned about trying to make it because of the rainbow, but then I remembered I had pipe cleaners in the colors of the rainbows. So the big rainbow is actually pipe cleaners.

This is Canterlot. It's very simplified, but it was small and supposedly far away, so I did what I could.

And now for Alex's Mat. His was finished back in October actually. It was a lot easier than Claire's because the shapes are much simpler, and I had a lot of inspiration to follow.

The whole mat. I realized I cut off the train track at the bottom of the mat.

Here you can kind of see the train track. (That blob in the corner is Claire's dress. She was "helping". There will be more of that.) From left bottom: the red building is a warehouse, above that is a gas station. The blue building is a school (see the bell?) and the apple building is a grocery store. The white/blue building with the clock is the town hall.

The town hall again, the fire station (I still need to color in the dog's spots) and the brown church.

Here's the farm (and Claire's dress again). The bottom is fruit trees, then carrots, tomatoes, and corn, and on top is a chicken and her chicks.

The purple one is the library. Look at it upside down. The orange building is the ice cream shop and hamburger place. A swimming pool and the temple on the top corner. Next to the temple is a slide and swing set. they didn't come through very well. Then a blue house.

The green and cream house is one of my favorites. Another purple house. The construction site was pretty fun to build. The pink one is a hospital and the blue one is the police station. And the wrench is the mechanics. In the corner is the center fountain.

So those are all my interpretations of the buildings as I was making them. I'm sure Alex will come up with new uses for some of them as he plays with the mat and the cars. I am overall very pleased with how they all came out.

Backpack Backpack. I'm the backpack loaded up...

2012-01-05T10:00:00.000-07:00

I've been thinking about making a backpack for Alex for a while. We have one. It's rather small. It's actually a backpack/leash. I've only used the leash part once or twice with Claire. Surprisingly, in public, she is mostly tame and listens and stays near me. Last time we flew was March 2010. Alex wasn't even a year old and wasn't walking yet. But Claire carried her little black backpack that had a few toys in it and used it a little bit on the airplane. Mostly, I carried it for her (to be expected). Lately, Alex has been getting upset when Claire has something he doesn't. Sometimes, we share. Sometimes I just make them deal with it. But I knew eventually we would need two little backpacks. So I had some fabric picked out and a pattern printed, then got busy with other things. Well when our trip to Phoenix came up, I wanted to finish the backpack if possible. And I knew Claire would get upset if I made Alex one and not her. Since she's been into Dora lately, I made her a purple backpack. I had another fabric picked out, but then we got hte Dora doll and I knew we needed the matching backpack. Since I had purple fabric on hand, it wasn't an issue. As Claire pointed out to me, the backpack doesn't have a mouth. But she seems to like it. We had to make a map, and then her little Dora doll needed a backpack too, because it didn't come with one. And a small map. But now everyone has a map. Except Alex, which Claire tells me he needs one. I started with Claire's and worked out all the kinks, since hers was rather simple and I had plenty of scrap purple fabric in case of mistakes.

Claire's backpack from the front. The red is a ribbon to help open the zipper.

Dora's matching backpack


Alex's backpack. I LOVE how it turned out.

I had two very small strips of this airplane fabric. It's actually from a baby blanket I made for my professor when I was in school. I've been holding onto these two 5" scraps for years. But I finally figured out a great use for them. I love the vintage look and the old-time airplanes. I just think they scream BOY! So I had to work very carefully. I very specifically centered this red airplane for the pocket. Luckily, it didn't take nearly as long to make Alex's backpack since I had figured out most of it for Claire's. The straps were really the worst part. They gave me the most trouble, just because I've never made a backpack before and had to figure out how to set up the straps so they worked right.

This is the top zipper of the backpack. I'm quite proud of how it turned out. I got the airplanes lined up perfectly and it only took two tries. =)

And the straps. Again, I had to carefully position the pattern to get the airplanes.

Overall I am quite pleased with how these turned out. I especially love that I was able to start and finish them both in less than a week, as long as you don't count that 3 months the fabric and pattern sat in my room. =)
I'm really hoping these work out. They look a little large in the photos, but they really fit the kids well. I'm hoping to put all the toys and maybe snacks for the kids in their backpacks for the flight, that way my bag is free for oh I don't know...my stuff?? In a way, I'm really looking forward to this flight/trip. I'm actually contemplating NOT taking the double stroller. I haven't decided on that yet though. I may chicken out and take it "just in case". But we haven't really used it in a while. Alex and Claire are pretty good about walking wherever we go, and we don't have any long excursions planned that I know of. It's not THAT far from the gate to the planes in St Louis. It's just Phoenix that might be trouble.

2011 Goal recap.

2012-01-01T14:45:00.000-07:00

Time for my annual checkup on goals.

Personal goals: 1) Blog more- nope. Total fail. I’ve blogged even less.

2) Lose 30 pounds. Okay, I never reached 140 (my goal from last year) or 150- my “easy” weight, but I did hit 159 before we decided it was time to try for another baby. And I’m okay with that. I feel a lot better about my health in general this year. I took up running in May and have run pretty consistently 3 times a week since then, minus when I’ve been sick (aka the never ending cold that lasted for 6 weeks). I realized one night at church for an activity that I felt great. I needed something from the opposite end of the building that I was on. I ran to the other end of the building and back without feeling winded. I also did a few rounds of P90X with Alann. That was not fun, but it was nice at the same time. I enjoyed spending time with him in the mornings and also lost some good inches in places. I still am a pretty slow runner and I haven’t done over 2 miles, but it seemed like every time I was ready to go for 3 miles, something happened- I would get sick or injured and need to take a week off. Now that I’m pregnant, I’m still out there running, but I’m also having a LOT more harder days, and I’m okay with that too. I understand that just being pregnant is difficult. As my professor said one time to make someone back off her “I’m giving life here!” I can’t expect everything. I’m happy for a relatively easy pregnancy with few negative effects. The few I have I will deal with.

3) Keep a journal. I’m doing okay at the kids’ journals. I write in them every few months or so. I don’t keep a personal journal though.

4) Learn to make soap. Woohoo! I did this one. And I love it! Some ladies at Relief Society knew I was interested in learning and asked if I would teach a class. So I had to learn so I could teach it. I’ve really enjoyed it. I make my own shampoo now, my own facial soap, and fabulous body soap. I like the whole process. And it’s fun to think “I did this!”

5) Finish old projects before starting new ones- This is forever my weak point. I operate best under deadlines, so whichever project is most important for a date I do first. This year I have finished several old projects- Alann’s quilt for one. But I have picked up several new ones. I have a problem with wanting to do stuff, then not getting around to it. I’ve got several skirts to make for myself that I’m not bothering with now that I am pregnant. I’ll do it next year. I am still working on Claire’s quiet book. But I have several pages done that I just need to buttonhole to put in the book. And my new machine does automatic one step button holes! I’m way excited to try it out. That will make things much easier. That’s the step I dread the most for some reason. I’m planning on taking the QB with me to Phoenix so I can work on it when I have time. I have lots of hand work to do with it.

6) Lumped in there was being more intentional with Claire. I was not too good about that. I have a program, but it involves printing and preparation and I just don’t want to do that kind of stuff. My time is so limited sans kiddos that I want to do something that I like. I do have a workbook for her. We just haven't looked at it yet.

Religious goals:

1) Scriptures- I wanted to read the book of Mormon and bible. I did finish the book of Mormon and started the Bible at the beginning of the Old Testament. I’m following the chronological breakdown I found for reading the whole thing in a year. I’m on day..90? In my defense, I didn’t start until May. That doesn’t make it much better does it? Well, I’ve been reading it along with a commentary Alann has that has been really helpful. I feel like while I may not be as far along as I want, I have made significant progress and I really understand what I have read. I’m in Joshua I think. And then, in the beginning of December, I changed my mind. I decided for Christmas I wanted to read the birth of Christ. After I did that, I thought “wouldn’t it be awesome to read Christ’s whole life before Easter?” So that’s what I’m working on now. I’ve got Alann’s New Testament commentary that actually has the scriptures in it, so it’s just one book, instead of my scriptures and the commentary. It’s been really nice. Again, I feel like I’m really understanding it. And it’s something I’ve never done. I think. And now our Stake President wants us to read the book of Mormon before Easter as well. So I’m dedicating myself to reading more. I’ll be spending about 20 minutes on the Bible and about 20 on the Book of Mormon every day. That’s my plan.

2) Personal Progress- nope. Didn’t even do one thing. Yikes.

3) Temple- we went a few times this year. But nowhere near the goal.

4) FHE- nope.

Business

The business really fell by the wayside. I’ve still made sales, and I did that craft show, but in general, it hasn’t been a priority.I had a "real" job for a few months, then Alann hired me to write the blog for his business. So my free time has been had by a job of some sort at least a few times a week. When I sit down for some me time, sewing for the business isn't something I wanted to do.

House goals:

1) Schedule. I’ve kept up with my schedule fairly decently. The house stays pretty nice I think. It’s not as deeply cleaned as I would like sometimes, but it’s all I can do keeping up with 3 floors, 2 kids, 2 dogs, and a cat. I have done pretty good about keeping the kitchen clean most of the time. I would say 25 days out of the month, I go to bed with a clean kitchen. It helps that Alann is home in the evenings and is willing to help out. It makes it much easier. And I am also motivated by the fact that it is so much easier in the morning to start with a clean slate- clean counters, clean dishwasher, etc.

2) House binder- I tried the binder. It didn’t work. I switched to a clipboard and that worked better. I have everything I need on one sheet on the front of the clipboard. The cleaning schedule and space for notes and appointments. I keep the meal plan on the fridge.

3) Finances- bills get paid. I’m still not keeping up as much as I would like or should, but the bills get paid.

So that’s my recap. I’ll post my goals for the new year separately.

Some recap photos

2011-12-24T21:43:00.000-07:00

Aunt Amy and the kiddos. This was the day she left. Alex wouldn't go near her until this day.

Visiting with Cousin Brooklyn. Alex- 18 months, Claire 33 months, Brooklyn- 24 months.

Practicing our serious faces. Can you tell where they get it from?

playing the water table at the children's museum.

"I'm serious about these snacks. Don't take them."

Stephanie, Andrew, Alex, Addison, me and Claire.

A quick recap

2011-12-21T15:38:00.002-07:00

We've had so much going on lately with lots of visitors.
The Sunday before Thanksgiving, we had Craig and Sarah and Brooklyn drop in for a quick visit. Claire loved playing with Brooky.
For Thanksgiving, we had the missionaries over and Alann's boss and his family. It was a lot of fun. We smoked the turkey and the kids actually ate dinner with us this time. Last year they slept through it. We had some fun times hanging out with Mike and Tracy and Claire had fun playing with their kids.
Entirely too quickly after that, Mark and Debbie came to visit. We had a quick visit to Indianapolis to visit Alann's grandparents and we met up with Steph and Danny and their kids. Alann tried to take us to Chicago instead of Indianapolis, but we made it there eventually. Claire had a good time playing with Andrew, though I'm not sure he enjoyed it as much as she did. We went to the children's museum again and the kids had so much fun they were exhausted by the time we left. We drove home Sunday and Grandma and Grandpa stayed for the rest of the week and the kids just loved it. First thing in the morning, Claire would come see me and then immediately go downstairs to find Grandma and Grandpa.
While we had free babysitters, Alann and I decided to go on an anniversary overnight. We booked a hotel room in St. Louis and had a fun time. Our hotel was connected to a casino, so we spent some time over there. We came out about even. Alann was definitely the better player than me. The worst part was the smoke. Ugh. It was so thick in there. It was gross. I haven't had that much secondhand smoke in a LONG time. Then the next morning we ate at Cracker Barrel for breakfast and they had a smoking section too. It was awful. I hadn't worn my coat to the casino since everything was indoors, but I wore it to Cracker Barrel and it smelled awful too. I thought St. Louis had passed a new ordinance banning smoking but apparently we were in the wrong county or something.
After Grandma and Grandpa left, a short week later we had a visit from Aunt Amy. Claire was again so excited. She loves going to the airport. Every time we go, she reminds me that she doesn't have her suitcase. Then we have to talk about how we don't have tickets and can't get on the plane. Anyway, we didn't do anything too exciting while she was here, but we did make cookies. Claire keeps talking about that. Alex warmed up to Amy eventually, though he still wouldn't let her hold him. The day after she left, Claire painted her another picture to take home with her. She didn't quite understand that she wasn't coming back to our house.
I did get to book some tickets to Arizona. We are very excited. It's funny. I booked them so close to the travel dates that Southwest sent their normal "your trip is right around the corner" email the same day I booked them. I made the mistake of telling Claire as soon as I booked them. She has been asking constantly about going to see Aunt Amy and flying on the airplane. So I took a calendar and drew on the day that we are flying a little airplane. And I tried to explain that each day was a square and we would mark one off every day. She colored on all the days. So I took a highlighter and colored today. I told her when we colored the plane, we could go. She took the highlighter when I wasn't looking and colored the airplane. Then she tells me that we can't get on the airplane without our suitcases and we haven't packed our suitcases. Luckily, we can't get on the airplane at night, so she quits asking when the sun goes down. I tried to tell her we had to open presents first. She told me we didn't need presents. Oh the things she comes up with sometimes. She does tell me what we need to pack though- her panties, clothes, jammies, and snacks. We've got the important stuff covered.
So now we have Christmas coming up, and then we are going to Phoenix for a few weeks in January. I don't think I blogged about this. A few months ago I wanted to book tickets to Phoenix. Southwest was having a decent sale. I looked at Christmas or January flights and it just didn't work out. I almost forgot about the sale, got up to book flights, and my credit card wouldn't go through, despite having space. I was so upset. I prayed about it and it still didn't work. I took it as a sign that I must not be meant to go. It was really depressing. But I trusted that the Lord would take care of us no matter what. I got an email last week that Southwest was having a 50% off sale. I didn't book it. Then I got another 50% off sale notice this week. After talking to Alann, we decided that it must be right. I booked the flights for me and the kids. (Ok, kid. I only have to pay for Claire right now.) For $300, I got the same flights that would have cost me almost $700. I am quite grateful. We haven't been out to visit since March. I'm definitely looking forward, even if it's very quickly coming up.
Now that the kids' Christmas presents are taken care of, I'm hoping to make them some backpacks for the flight. Claire has one, but it's very small. It's actually a harness disguised as a backpack. But I can't fit too much stuff in it. Every time we fly I try to, but it just doesn't hold enough toys to keep her occupied. So I'm hoping I can get some backpacks made for them before the flight. It shouldn't be too difficult, I hope. I already had a backpack for alex planned, so I've got the pattern and all the hard thinking stuff done. It's just finding the time to actually make them.

Grr

2011-12-20T15:02:00.002-07:00

I'm having a rather frustrating and depressing day. It started with a yucky night's sleep on the rock that is my bed. Every time I'm pregnant, my bed suddenly becomes much firmer. I'm not sure how that happens. It goes away when the baby is born though. (I never expected "the bed gets hard" to be a pregnancy symptom.) Then I had a really sad dream about Alann deciding to marry someone else but he offered to stay married to me for a while too. I ended up going and getting a divorce paper (which was unrealistically one page that you filed at the local office like a driver's license). And it just made me really sad when I woke up. Then it was rainy and cold and dark for the second day in a row. And I had to take Amy to the airport so she could go home. Though Claire assures me we will go back to the airport tomorrow to pick her up again. Then since it was nasty out, we stopped at the mall on our way home. They have an indoor play area that the kids like. First we had to go potty, then we saw Santa (didn't pose for pictures, Claire just wanted to see what was in the "house"). Claire waved shyly and Alex didn't even look at him. Then we went to play and after just a few minutes, they decided they were done. So we went to get lunch and Claire couldn't decide what she wanted. We ended up getting some hotdogs and Alex kept getting up and running away from the table. We went and saw Santa again and then rode the escalators. Then I made the bad choice of taking them in the candy store. They were grabbing everything of course. I don't know what I was thinking. But I really wanted gummy bears. I was exhausted driving home and Claire was arguing about Alex having the dinosaur and how it was her dinosaur and she put it in the car and she needed it, then she started grabbing his blanket which really upset him. Finally I just turned on the music and tried to drown them out. They took naps and I tried to get some sewing done for Alex's car mat and BOTH of my machines are acting up. i just wanted to sew on a binding to keep the edges neat. But apparently the machines don't like it. So I have to either try to deal with it or figure out something else. Maybe I can glue the binding on? But I have given up. I don't have high hopes for the rest of the day. So that's my rant for the day. Alex is up so I should go get him out of his room.

Update- the day continued to go according to the precedent set by the morning. The kids FINALLY went to sleep after 9pm, which is late for them. They were ridiculously wound up for some reason. But there was a good point that made the day. Southwest was having a one-day 50% off sale! They had a similar sale last week and I said no, I shouldn't. But after talking to Alann, we decided that it was okay. Fares were only $68 one way each person. If I had booked the same flights back when my credit card wouldn't go through, it would have cost me almost $700. This cost me only $300. I'm excited. We get to go see our AZ family for the first time in almost a year. Yay!

Early pregnancy musings

2011-11-05T16:25:00.001-06:00

12/3- Now that I've announced my pregnancy, I can post about it. These are thoughts I had about my pregnancy early on. Right now, I feel mostly okay. I'm still having pretty consistent "afternoon sickness" which includes nausea, extreme tiredness, and lately anyway, a raging headache. The headache is relentless. Nothing seems to help it. Water, tylenol, food, sleeping- nothing helps. But otherwise decent enough. My stomach is definitely sticking out now. And I'm pretty sure I'm feeling the baby move, which seems early, but is also pretty normal. I've been running again and feeling pretty good about it.

10/19- really starting to feel nauseous now. I'm hoping it only lasts a week or so. It seems like it cut in half from Claire to Alex. With Claire it was about 4 weeks, with Alex about 2. So one week? I hope so. I've also been so ridiculously TIRED! And I can't sleep.
10/27- nausea is still on and off. Right now, I'm fighting the cold that never ends and can't take any medicine for it. And I'm starving.
10/31- So far I haven't gained any weight but my belly is starting to stick out. My pants don't fit as well. The doctor says its normal for the third to show sooner. I have to admit its a little depressing to see all my hard work of losing weight going away. I've worked so hard this year to lose the 15 pounds. But I know its for a good cause. And it's not like I didn't know I was planning on having another kid. I know being lower to start will be easier to lose after. And its health not just weight that's an issue. I wasn't really happy at my higher weight. When I started running in May, I couldn't run more than a few steps without being winded. At church last month (not on a Sunday), I needed something on the other side of the building very quickly. So I jogged from one end to the other and wasn't winded when I got back. That was a major accomplishment for me. Now I just wish I could run again. It's been two weeks thanks to this darn cold/cough.
11/5- I just want one afternoon where I don't feel like I got hit by a truck. I don't know if it's the baby or the cold or both. But from about 1pm to about 4pm or whenever Alex gets up from his nap, I am just useless. I'm nauseous and tired. But when the boy gets up, it's time for me to get going. Claire can be fairly independent while I nap on the couch. I usually get woken up every 15 minutes or so with "mom?" and then help her with whatever and go back to sleep. She has been very understanding that mommy doesn't feel good.

"I'm so happy!"

2011-11-02T17:50:00.001-06:00

On the way to the sitter's today, Claire saw that I had brought her blanket. She said "Mom, my blanket!" I said "Yes Claire, I thought you might want it, so I grabbed it for you." She said "Thank you Mom! I'm so happy you got my blanket!" I had to laugh. She has never used the phrase "I'm so happy" before.

Alex on the other hand was not thrilled about my leaving him at the sitter's. I thought he would be over this by now. That he would realize that I am coming back for him. But every time I leave him somewhere, he starts crying. Today, it was as soon as we walked into their house. This morning at Bible Study, he started crying as soon as we walked into the building. At nursery on Sunday, he sat on my lap and moaned for about 5 minutes, then I handed him off and left and he cried for I kid you not 5 seconds. I know he will calm down pretty quickly. I usually just treat it like a band-aid: rip him off and leave quickly. But it's making me a little anxious. I worry that people will think I'm a bad mom for leaving a crying one year old.

My silly kids

2011-10-30T21:32:00.001-06:00

So, Claire is very insistent that she is a "big girl". Any time we ask her if she is any other adjective, she says no, I big girl. We can't call her baby girl, silly, funny, or anything else. She always corrects us. It's pretty silly. So tonight, she was pretty adamant about not going to bed. I started making cookies with the kids before bed, but it got so useless that I ended up just doing one tray, which we ate almost all of before they went to bed. I threw the rest of the dough in the fridge and got back to it after they went to bed. So I was working on that when she got up to ask for a snack. She wanted to "help mom?" She asked very nicely. But I most definitely did not want help, so she had to be content to watch. While we were finishing up, she asked what I was going to do. I said I would make the cookies and then I wanted her to go to bed so I could finish my movie. She started naming all the things big girls do- make cookies, watch movies, watch TV. It was pretty funny. So she went back to bed and came back down a bit later while we were watching our movie. She came over and said "Mom, I big girl. Big girls watch movie." I said no dear and took her back to bed. As we were walking up the stairs, she was telling me again about what big girls do. The fun part was that she was naming them off and counting on her fingers at the same time. According to Claire, big girls "watch TV, watch movie, eat cookie, no go bed". She is always surprising me with what she comes up with.
Her other new phrases are "favorite", "I love (insert whatever we are talking about)", and "what do?" As in, what are you doing. The last one drives me nuts. She asks constantly. Sometimes she asks multiple times in a few minutes, while we are still doing the same thing. I understand she is just trying to gather information and learn about the world, but it makes me a little crazy some days. I guess I should just be grateful she hasn't learned "why" yet. The "I Love" makes me laugh because she says it about anything. The other day we were talking about the park and she said "I love big parks. I love little parks. I love the park. I love play". I also enjoy the way she says "Little". She can't say it very well, so it usually comes out as "wee". And to make her point completely clear, she usually crouches down and makes herself little and makes a little circle with her hands.
Claire has learned to pedal her tricycle. She loves to do that. The kids usually go out on the porch and ride the scooty car or the tricycle or the bike up and down and up and down. They love it.
Alex on the other hand seems to refuse to talk. He is picking up some words, but not too many. He did learn to sign "Blues Clues" with his hands up by his face and he says "boo". That seems to be his favorite TV show right now. He always asks for it when Claire asks for TV. And Alann taught him to say "oh man" like Swiper in Dora. And he tries to snap his fingers. It's pretty cute. He's starting to get into trains. We have some wooden trains that you can build up with blocks. He gets it out almost every day.
He also has become quite adamant about sitting on the potty. He wants to sit on it every time Claire does. He still hasn't done anything on it, but I'm not about to discourage it.
Alex is still sleeping in his crib. But whenever I put him to bed, I ask him which bed he wants to sleep in, the big boy bed or the crib. He asks for the big boy bed, and lays in it for a bit, then asks for the crib. We are up to about a second laying in the big boy bed. Today he let me cover him with his blanket as if I were putting him to sleep. Someday soon maybe he will switch. I can only hope. I want him to switch to his big bed so he can get used to sleeping in it so we can move him in with Claire at some point. I want him to be comfortable with it first. But sometimes I wonder. If I just took away the crib, would he adjust? If I just put the big bed in Claire's room, would he choose to sleep there? I never know how the boy is going to react. The other day he was doing something I told him not to. So I put him on time out. He did it again. So I put him on time out. He did it again and put himself on timeout. I don't know if he thought it was a game or what. Sometimes when I discipline him, he just screams like Mommy broke his little heart. And other times he is just fine with it. I guess it's just part of being 18 months. It's so hard to believe that he is really almost 18 months old. I think about when we moved here last year, he was such a tiny baby. It amazing how much they change in such a short time. Both him and Claire have really blossomed lately. It's getting to be a bit more fun. We can do things like fingerpaint and all color together. I'm enjoying it.

Craft show and the never ending cold

2011-10-27T20:39:00.002-06:00

The craft show is over thankfully. I've learned a few things. I actually was ready the Friday before the show, thanks to Alann watching the kids for me a few days in the two weeks I had to prepare. I also think it was partly because I told myself that I wouldn't work on Sundays, and I didn't work on either Sunday before the show. It was hard resisting the temptation to just do a little bit, but I had made that deal and wanted to stick with it. I also didn't need to work the Saturday before the show, which was good since Alann ended up going somewhere for Provident and I was feeling cruddy.
I didn't end up taking any pictures, even though I brought my camera. Silly me, I know. But my 8 foot table ended up being full. I had 89 burp cloths (that I made over the course of that two weeks, I'll have you know), 30 blankets (most of those were already made), some soap and shampoo, body lotion, hand lotion, lip balms, and a few foot scrubs and random other things.
I got there and brought all my stuff in and started setting up. The lady to my right was some fancy foot ingredient consultant (like avon for Vanilla extract) and the lady to my left hadn't set up yet. So I set up my table and I kept hearing the lady on the left talking to people and saying she was waiting for her helper who had the tablecloth. She finally showed up and they started setting up. And I realized that they were selling heavily scented hand and foot lotions and scrubs. (Beauti-control is the company. Think Pampered Chef meets Bath and Body Works.) Suddenly, I wasn't so sure about myself. It seemed a little unfair that my natural lotions were right next to their stuff. I felt like surely they would end up with more customers than me. But it actually worked out in my favor at one point. They had a few ladies who were looking at their stuff and decided it was too expensive and came over to my table. They saw my handmade foot scrub and each bought a jar immediately. Our tables weren't really spaced apart, so I could hear their conversation with the other ladies and each other. That sale made me laugh.
I did learn a few things about craft fairs, at least in our area. For one, I sold more soap to men than women. I was surprised. I really thought women would be more inclined to buy it, but I heard more than once "oh I like my stuff to smell". I can understand. I like smelly stuff too sometimes. But so much of the smelly stuff overwhelms me these days. I walked down the candle aisle in Target the other day and started sneezing. These kindly older gentlemen that bought my soap all asked "is this lye soap?" And then we would have a conversation about how their moms used to make it when they were growing up and it's so much better than the commercial stuff.
Secondly, I learned that if there is one item that bugs you and you think you want to make it, you should probably make it. I ran low on supplies while making my lotions and decided to nix the foot lotion I was planning on making. I could have made it, but it would have meant reformulating and I didn't think I had the time or the energy to reformulate and test it. And sure enough, someone came by and asked about it. That was annoying.
Third, don't put all the inventory out. Its overwhelming. If things are all the same, just put a few out.
Fourth, if at all possible, get a spotter and or bring a book. I was SO bored. I sat there for 7 hours with just one break when Alann and the kids came by after church. For the most part, there were always people there, but there were a few hour-long stretches when it was almost entirely dead.
Fifth- make the deal right then. I could have made a $40 deal and instead I held out for $45 and lost it.
Sixth- the thing you think will sell the best probably won't. I figured that the lip balms would sell the best. Everyone loves lip balms. They are easy to buy and were pretty cheap. I sold like 3. I was pretty disappointed.
All in all, I did pretty well. I wanted to earn my $20 table fee back, which I did, and I wanted to make 12 sales. I made 18. I chose 12 as my goal because that was 1% of the sales to the dinner last year. I figured that was realistic and it was. I made about $100 and that makes me happy. It will pay my Cap one card for a few months anyway. I would love to toss the whole amount on there at once, but I probably shouldn't. Now comes the hard part- listing everything on Etsy that didn't sell so I can sell it. Or finding another craft show to do.

As for the never-ending cold. It's never ending! I had a sore throat and slightly runny nose for about 2 weeks. I was doing the nasal rinses once or twice a day and thought I had the thing licked. Then last Wednesday morning I woke up coughing. Since then, it's just gotten worse. My voice comes and goes. My breathing comes and goes. The coughing and the coughing stuff up comes and goes. I just feel like crap in general- on and off headaches and just feeling exhausted. I can't tell if I am getting better or worse. I had a doctor's appointment on Monday and she said my lungs sounded fine. I'm supposed to go back next week if it isn't better. I feel like my coughing fits are more violent but less frequent, and definitely drier, but I don't know if that's a good sign or not. My chest hurts and my throat hurts from all the coughing. I'm really just ready to be done with it. It's impeding my grand plans to get my craft show wrapped up and the in-laws bedroom cleaned up which became my impromptu craft studio since I could shut out the children.

Some more Claire milestones

2011-10-15T15:43:00.001-06:00

I did forget a few things.
Claire is officially not taking naps anymore. I put her in her room everyday for an hour or so, but 6 days of the week, she just doesn't sleep. She plays and has a good time and mostly stays in her room. I made her some special naptime toys too. She has some pom-poms, some pipe cleaners, some chain-together jewelry (something I found at the dollar store) and some wooden blocks and some containers to put and take the stuff out of. She really likes playing with it. Now I just need to make sure I change it up often enough to keep her interested. She also usually takes some ponies or barbies with her, so she has someone to talk to.
She is also officially potty-trained. She does really well peeing on the potty. For the most part, she refuses to poop on it, but most of the time she poops in her naptime pull-up, so it's an okay compromise. The trick was that I finally just washed my hands of it all.I put her in panties and told her she was in charge of keeping them dry. She peed on herself a few times and came crying to me and I said "well Claire, who's job is it to keep them dry?" She cleaned up the mess and got herself new clothes (with my supervision of course) and then started using the potty pretty regularly. She even gets up from doing things and goes to the potty. I ask if she needs to go before we leave the house, but I don't force it. I ask if it's been a while, but for the most part, she just goes when she needs to go, which is surprisingly few times a day. Like 4. Apparently, the child has a giant bladder (I am not surprised by this actually). I accept that places have public restrooms, and we've even made a pit stop at the gas station once, and that works for me. Much better than trying to force the kid to go potty.
This is what I really don't get though. She can pull her pants down, sit on the kiddy potty, go pee, wipe, empty the kiddy potty (much against my advice, warnings, threatenings and general angst), rinse it out, put it back together, but cannot for the life of her figure out how to put her pants back on. Seriously. That's like the easiest thing in my opinion. But she just can't or won't do it. Whatever. At least I'm only going through one pull-up and one nighttime diaper a day with her now. It's SO nice to only have one kid in diapers. I'm really hoping Alex potty trains soon. He often goes in the potty with Claire when she says she has to go.