I’ve started making stockings, based off this lovely new pattern by Crabapple Hill. The first stocking I made was for myself, and I made it super long. (Bad photo. Taken with iphone in bad lighting. Ignore the ugly wall!)

However, when finished, the largest size is only about 5 inches wide. That doesn’t make for a very stuffable stocking, unless you’re sticking with candy and little bitty things, but as it’s for me, I don’t mind too much. The next stocking is for Cherry*, my beloved little spitfire, and I’ve widened the pattern up by an inch on either side in hopes of getting a more usable stocking for Santa Claus. We’ll see. I have 3 more to make after that (at least) – for Zack*, Mom, and Dad. I’d like to make an extra, just to have on hand, too. But we’ll see how much time I have as they require embroidery and such.

Otherwise, my crafting has been narrowed down to hurried Thanksgiving papercrafts like printing out this lovely art print to frame (I still need a frame…) and making these fortune cookies for our plates this year. I’d love, however, to make the following items from pinterest, too, especially the paper bag turkey for the kids’ table!

Amy was a difficult baby. She was colicky, and cried all the time, at home, at daycare, everywhere. She was with me for close to six weeks, and I have to say, I wasn’t terribly sad to see her go. I thought it would be easier to attach, but perhaps Amy and I just didn’t click, or perhaps it was the fact that I knew exactly  how long she’d be in my house.

I spent a month and a half after she left wondering whether it was at all normal to fail to attach to a very fussy 4 month old child, despite rocking her to sleep every single night. Then I spent a while combing through profiles of adoptable kids online.

Then I got another call – for two siblings, an 18 month old toddler boy named Zac* and a 3 year old girl named Cherry*. For reasons unknown (perhaps because I am a masochist?) I said ‘yes, bring it on’.

Zac is an adorable little monkey of a boy who, at 18 months, had not yet spoken a word, and could barely crawl, let alone walk. Mostly, he got around on his elbows doing an army mud crawl, dragging his legs behind him. He was only 18 pounds – mind you, Amy, at 4 months, was 14 pounds – fit into one of Amy’s leftover 6mo sized jumpers the day I brought him home wearing nothing but a diaper. He was a sad baby, and did little but screech to make his needs known. He’d cry hysterically if I put him in his crib, but he’d stop immediately if I walked out and shut the door. I suspect the poor thing spent far too much time in his crib or car seat.

Cherry was almost four, going on fourteen. She’s smart, witty, sarcastic, cheerful, sneaky, helpful, and mouthy as hell. The first two weeks she was honeymooning, helpful, always doing what I said, pleasing as could be. Then she got comfortable, realized she was staying a while, and her ugly came out. Tantrums, kicking, screaming, raging tantrums… Backtalk, lots of it. Unexpected spurts of rage. Extreme bossiness. This is a child who never had limits set, and who doesn’t particularly like them to be set now. I spent one very long two or three hours doing the Supernanny bedtime technique of escorting her (carrying her limp, screaming body) back to bed every 2 minutes while she raged. I can’t count the number of times I almost gave in and bribed her with something. But I didn’t. And I’ve never had to do anything quite like it again. Score one for supernanny.

She also didn’t seem to know how to play – not by herself, not with toys. She was used to roughhousing with her brothers (they have two older siblings who are not in my home) and bossing them around, and mothering Zac.

I’ve had them three months. It seems like forever. It seems like barely any time at all.

Zac learned to crawl and walk holding onto things, and can stand unaided for a good twenty or thirty seconds before he realizes what he’s doing and hurriedly sits down. He can race up and down the steps like crazy. He eats everything in sight still, and can only say a mangled version of the word ‘mama’ and something that sounds like ‘hey!’ At first, I didn’t think he even understood me when I’d tell him things, but he understands a lot now, and can follow some instructions. He’s a very happy baby!

Cherry has been learning limits. She’s learning to obey on the threat of time out (or the threat of an enraged mother hauling her smart ass to bed early). She’s learning colors, shapes, and counting. She’s learned to play – with toys! – by herself for short periods of time. She’s learned to recognize her name when it’s written. She’s still very helpful, very cute, and very charming. And very mouthy. I suspect that isn’t going to change.

For all the trouble, I’m in love with them both.

*Note: Names changed for privacy. Photos of the children are not allowed, sadly, or I’d have a million.

I’m on a strict budget this month, because… well, I’m broke, that’s why! So I planned this week’s menu around things I had most ingredients for… and still managed to spend $54 at the grocery today. How is that, anyway?

Here’s the menu:

Monday (today!)
Lunch: Rotisserie chicken from the store and chips (real healthy, right?)
Dinner:  Tuna & Noodles

Tuesday
Lunch: Sandwich at work
Dinner: Corned Beef & Potatoes

Wednesday
Lunch: Frozen dinner at work
Dinner: leftovers

Thursday
Lunch: Sandwich at work
Dinner: leftovers

Friday
Lunch: Frozen dinner at work
Dinner: Tater Tot Casserole

Saturday
Lunch: Leftovers at work
Dinner: Spaghetti & meat sauce, with leftover hamburger from Friday

Sunday
Lunch: Macaroni and Cheese
Dinner: Deep Fried Breaded Prawns & Sweet & Spicy Sweet Potato Fries (both freezer items, no recipe)

Ingredients:

• 2 pounds ground beef
• 1 can cream of mushroom soup
• 1 can cream of chicken soup
• 1 small can of peas, or similar volume of frozen peas (1 cup?)
• 1 medium onion, chopped
• 1 tablespoon minced garlic (or 1-2 cloves)
• 1/2 cup milk (or so)
• 1 bag of frozen tater tots (the large bag of store brand ones are the perfect size)
• Shredded cheese (to taste)

Instructions:
Preheat oven to 350. Cook hamburger with chopped onion and garlic until no longer pink on stovetop. Add in canned soups and milk to meat. If too thick, add more milk – you want it slightly saucy! Then add in frozen peas and mix together. Pour into a 13×9 inch pan or two 8×8 inch pans. Top with tater tots – you can line them up in neat rows if you’re somewhat OCD like I am, or you can just throw them on all haphazardly if you like.

Bake for 20-30 minutes, until bubbly and tater tots are browned. Add shredded cheese and put back in oven until melted. Serve hot!

If making in two 8×8 inch pans, it’s easy to line one with foil and freeze it instead of baking it right away. Great to have one of these in the freezer for later!

Using the crockpot is my favorite way to cook corned beef – because it’s super easy! However, start early, because it’s best if it’s in the pot for at least 10 hours – and 12 is better yet!

Ingredients:
1 corned beef – including spice packet
1-2 onions – yellow is best
water
cabbage (optional)

Instructions:
Trim excess fat from the meat. Place corned beef into crockpot and sprinkle spice packet around it. Quarter or slice onions (thick slices!) and place in pot around the beef. Add enough water to entirely submerge beef. Turn on crockpot to low and cook for 10-12 hours. To add cabbage, place it in pot on top of roast during last half hour of cooking, or until done to your tastes.

Serve and enjoy! This makes great sandwiches and hash the next day too!

Okay, not really a secret, but it is behind closed doors! I’ve started a bunch of seeds for my garden this year, and because the cats love fresh greens (crazy veggie-eating carnivores!) I’ve hidden them in a spare room and shut the door to keep the beasts out! I’m hoping they survive until I plant them, because yesterday I forgot to turn their little lights on. They were looking a bit sad this morning, but they perked up again tonight! Yay!

I have two trays of seedlings started – the first was almost two weeks ago, and look at them grow! Some of them are huge already!

The second tray, barely visible, was just started on Monday, and they’re just starting to sprout now – barely, and it wasn’t worth taking a photo of. I have to say, the soil mix on the tray to the right is an organic mix, and it’s much MUCH nicer than the stuff on the left, which is traditional jiffy starter mix. Blah! You can get the organic ones at Target. I recommend. They’re only a couple bucks more expensive, if that, than the nonorganic Jiffy one picked up at Walmart.

I bought a variety of seeds, but many of them are to be planted outside after it warms up – you don’t transplant carrots, for example. So the two trays here are only the seeds I intend to transplant later – things like lettuce heads, sunflowers, “exotic love flowers” (google it! awesome!), melons, bell peppers, lemongrass… and recently, a few cucumbers, catnip, basils, and more flowers!

Are you feeling the spring fever  yet? Here in Montana we’re still getting skiffs of snow and may yet have another big dump of several inches in April, but spring fever has hit me hard! I can’t wait to get my new garden started!

What about you?

And busy I’ve been! I’ve been working on a couple special projects for a friend as a very very belated Christmas gift, and once she has received them and I can no longer ruin the surprise if she was to check my blog, I will post lovely pictures! They’re going out in the mail on Monday, and she should have them, with luck, by the middle of the week. Then, pictures!!

Also, I interviewed for a fantastic new position at work, because mine is stressing me out like crazy, and… I GOT IT! Hallelujah! I’ve been offered a very nice increase in salary and while my hours will be slightly worse, they’re not too much different than I’m working now. That starts the 11th, and while it seems forever in the future, the way time’s just zooming by right now, I’ll probably look back and go: Wait! Not ready yet!

On top of it all, I’ve been getting over a massive bout of allergies, and while I’m still a bit stuffy, I can breathe without drugging myself up with Afrin. That’s good, right?

I also celebrated my 29th birthday, not with a big bash or anything, but with a quiet dinner with a friend and then a family dinner the next night. 29. Man. How did that happen? Hard to believe I’m not so young anymore! And while I’ve been joking continually that it’s my last birthday ever, because next year, I’ll be 29 again, just like millions of other women who say they’re 29 all the time, I’m not really freaking out about it.

Randomly, I’ve been getting some comments on a post from last year about a giveaway I hosted for the Ultimate Blog Party back in 2010. I hope they realized it was a year ago. *lol* But it’s time for another round of Blog Partying this year, so I’ve uploaded the badge in the sidebar. You can join too! It’s hosted by 5 Minutes for Mom but it’s not solely for moms! I hope to see you there! There are prizes! PRIZES!!

In other news, I’m also joining an Organize-athon, because right now, I really need some organization. Join us at Get Organized Wizard.com! It starts tomorrow, so you don’t have much time to get in on it! There are prizes here too! I love prizes. I’ve never won any, but I love them, just the same.

Mary Jane’s Farm – I have loved the magazine, lusted after the books, and have finally joined their forums. All that’s really left is for me to join their official sisterhood so I can earn badges, girl scout style, for doing awesome farmgirl deeds. Check it out!

My Square Foot Garden – A lovely site on square foot gardening, an intensive gardening method that uses less space to grow more!

Swap.com – One of the hottest places on the internet to swap books, movies, games, and music. They are hoping to expand to other things, too. There is a nominal charge per item to keep the site running, and you pay postage to send your items to someone else, but it’s still far cheaper than buying new books!

Swap-Bot – You can involve yourself in a lot of hosted swaps here – from postcards to stickers, letters to crafts, and much, much more! Host your own swap, or join someone else’s. There is a bit of a swapping ‘culture’ here, and the site includes a rating system built in so swap participants can rate one another.

The Pioneer Woman Cooks – Only my favorite food blogger. Her recipes are amazing, and she’s hilarious, too!

Apartment Therapy – I may not be living in an apartment anymore, but it’s a great inspiration and resource for anyone with a home!

Reusable bags not only meet my standards, but exceed them in just about every way. They’re far stronger than any plastic or paper sack you’ll meet at the average grocery store. And typically, they’re larger, so you can cram more stuff in them, making for less trips from the car into the house. They don’t cut into your hands, and the ones I like, you can sling them over your shoulder, so you can carry your drink, purse, keys, and/or child in hand as you lug your weekly haul. Perfect.

In addition, I don’t have to find a home for a million plastic sacks. Some people claim to use them as trash can liners. Good for them. I can’t find ones without a million tiny holes in them to make that worth a damn. If I’m going to line my trashcan, I’m going to buy quality plastic to do so, not cheap holey bags from the supermarket.

The one downside to using reusable bags, of course, is that you have to remember to take them with you. I didn’t do this often, until just a couple years ago, when I bought three GIANT bags at target. Two of them folded up into neat little squares, and the third was a huge canvas bag I could toss those into. Perfect. Then I just stored them by the door with my keys, and every time I’d leave to buy groceries, I’d take them with me. Easy.

But you have to have a system.

Unfortunately, my system has broken down, because two of my three bags have utterly disappeared. I don’t know where to, or why, but I can’t find them. So I’m on the hunt for more, but Target hasn’t sold the ones I like for many months. (Either that, or they’re sold /out/.)

So I dug out a tote bag pattern I’d purchased months ago, See & Sew B5413, which looked cute and lovely and large. It’s not. Not really any of the three, and it’s no fun to sew, either, despite the “Yes! It’s easy!” label on the front. (No, it’s not. I spent hours on this thing, fiddling around with storebought bias binding until I had a bag in hand.)

Just one, out of some material I already had. Here’s the result.

It’s semi-cute, but not the size, shape, or usefulness I was going for. However, it’ll work to tote things around to work and back in, and to haul some packages to the post office, etc. Just…  less useful on the grocery shopping end of things.

I’m still on the hunt for better totes, but I think I have another pattern or two stored up in my supplies. Otherwise, I’ve found a prospects online, such as this Reusable Tote, this big bag, or maybe this one, or this folding bag, or this pillowcase bag.

Check out these links, or search “shopping bag pattern” for a thousand more ideas. Maybe you like the standard plastic bag design and want to replicate it in fabric – it’s out there! Or maybe you want to make some small produce bags (also on my list of things to do!). Whatever style of bag you want, the internet probably has it – if not for free, then for sale.

Next up on plans? Another bag, and a special surprise for a friend!

No, Bentley. Even with those beautiful puppy dog eyes, the surprise is not for you.

It might be because it’s darned chilly in here, and because I’m tired and in need of something hot and sweet. But it looks good. Too bad I have no chocolate or cocoa powder. Bah.

Yesterday, I took my cat Felony (yes. felony.) to the vet because I had a deep suspicion she had a urinary tract infection. If you’ve never had a cat with one of these before,  you might wonder how I came to this theory, but if you have ever had a cat with this problem, you know that one of the first and most awful symptoms is the refusal to pee in the box. In fact, cats with UTIs will often pee right in front of your very eyes just to let you know how unhappy they are.

Yes, she named me Felony. That's how badass I am.

Yeah. Peeing on the floor of the new house. Love it. So anyway, $250 later, they’ve done bloodwork (rather against my will, but they connived permission out of me like every good scam artist) and the requested urinalysis, and yes indeed, my pretty old girl has a UTI. For the first time ever, they gave her a big fat shot of antibiotics instead of a little bottle filled with pink goo.

All I can say is THANK THE GODS. Stuffing that crap down this cat’s throat is dangerous to my health and sanity. This way, the one big shot lasts for 2 weeks and I have no chance to screw it all up by missing doses. Yay.

Of course, in 10 days, they want her back for a second exam, her yearly shots, and… a dental cleaning. I’m gonna have to turn them down there. That’s another $250 I do not have. Heck, if I had money for dental cleanings I’d get one myself. Right?

Next up, passed the initial phone interview for a job I want. Next up? The real live thing. Yikes. I should mention:  I hate interviews. Nothing like being scrutinized carefully for faults.

In other news, this New Hampshire senator makes me very very angry. And it’s one of the reasons I no longer routinely read the news. The news made me angry, or upset, or anxious, or depressed. There’s never anything good in the news, or if there is, you have to wade through a pile of utter misery to get to it. If you’re anxious and unhappy and angry with the world… I recommend you stop reading the news so often. Your heart will thank you.

Last up, my latest project, the Life is Beautiful quilt/ block of the month program kits. I started in January, but have yet to finish even a single block. Of course, you try finding time to embroider when you have to move. Really now.

Hopefully, I will finish with this one soon and can start the next! Only 39522874289 embroidered circles to go!