Oikology 101

Merry Christmas!!

noreply@blogger.com (Carrie) — Sat, 24 Dec 2011 15:00:00 +0000

From our family to yours! Oooh, I forgot how long it's been since I've posted a picture of the kids. Mr. Peanut had to get glasses! Funny enough, he could have gotten a monacle (just like the actual Mr. Peanut), considering he has Anisometropic Amblyopia, which means he has diminished vision in one eye. Funny that I've never thought of that before! He does excellent with them. Most of the time...

Christmas Card Holder "Tree"

noreply@blogger.com (Carrie) — Wed, 21 Dec 2011 17:00:00 +0000

For years now, I've been receiving Christmas cards and had no idea what to do with them. Put them on the fridge? Clutter City! Stick them to the wall? No thank you, I prefer not to repaint each year. So mostly, I just show them to the fam and then they sit in a pile for a loooooooong time because I can't.get.myself to throw them away!!

I knew this year was the year I was going to do something about it! I started looking on the interwebz and happened upon a simple cardboard triangle, covered with fleece and ribbon to make a memo board. Never being the one to do things simply, I talked to J-dub the Hub and came up with a plan.

He cut a simple triangle out of a 2'x4' piece of pressboard. I covered it with an identical size layer of quilt batting and then a layer of fleece that overlapped enough to pull it around and staple it to the back of the board.

I ran to Joann Fabrics to buy ribbon and happened upon THE MOST ADORABLE trim in the whole entire planet--little Christmas light bulbs!! It was actually 100% what I had hoped for, but didn't actually think existed!

I grabbed another two pieces of trim because they were adorable and I would find a use for them someday--stockings and gingerbread men--and meant to grab plain green rick rack (forgot it), and upholstery tacks (Hallelujah! I remembered those).

I realized when I got home that I was missing the green rick rack, which I was going to use along the sides and bottom of the "tree." Listen folks, I know myself. If I had waited to get this done until I went back to get the green rick rack, it wouldn't have gotten done. Period. So I made the decision to use the super cute (and much more expensive) stockings and gingerbread men just along the two longer sides of the triangle.

I pinned the two sides of the triangle (hereafter called the RRR because both trim had red rick rack) to the fleece and J-dub the hub and I started the light bulb trim on the bottom. After folding the ribbon on the trim, we pounded an upholstery tack (using a tack hammer--imagine that) through the light bulb trim and the RRR. Then we put the lightbulb trim at an angle that looked good and tacked it down on the other side to the RRR. We measured up 12 inches from the trim on the OTHER side and cut, folded, and tacked the ribbon. We repeated the same process until we got to the top of the tree. We decided to leave some room at the top so we wouldn't be crowding the cards.

To finish it, we pounded in a tack at the edge of each point and stapled the RRR behind the board.

We think it turned out great!! BRING ON THE CHRISTMAS CARDS PEOPLE!!

Haven't Ordered Your Cards Yet?

noreply@blogger.com (Carrie) — Tue, 20 Dec 2011 03:31:00 +0000

LUCKY YOU!!

This year, I was thrilled to be asked to partner with Shutterfly for my Holiday Cards. Unfortunately, my procrastination got the better of me and I didn't notice I hadn't received the proper codes for the promotion until a few weeks ago. AFTER I had already ordered my cards. :( Woh-woh...

Then, to add insult to injury, I couldn't get my blog to work properly. If you hadn't noticed, this blog is looking a little wonky. With all the Christmas activities, I don't have another 12 hours to spend trying to get it to function properly, since that's about how much time I spent last week just trying to get my column over there ----------> back over there ----------> from clear underneath all my posts. Grrrrrr...

On to better topics!

I have these hot codes that I'd love to give to three of you for 25 FREE 5x7 flat or folded cards (standard shipping is only $5.99)! It's a little late, but don't let that stop you! Shutterfly has an AMAZING selection of New Year's Cards!! Why not distinguish yourself from all the others by sending your cards after all the hustle and bustle is done??

How about something simple and bright?

Maybe you want something more traditional?

This one's my personal favorite!

And here's a really cool idea--2011 highlights!

To enter to win a set of 25 5x7 cards (shipping is $5.99 for standard shipping and they may take up to 10 business days to receive, but if you're doing New Year's Cards--who cares??), just leave a comment on this post. Please leave me your email (in long format ie YourEmailAddress at YahooGmailorWhateverelseyouuse dot com) if your Google profile doesn't link to your email so I can get in touch with you to give you your code! Contest will end 12/21 at 12:00 a.m. EST and winners will be notified 12/22. The codes expire on 12/31/2011, so if you win, be sure to get back to me immediately!

GOOD LUCK!!

Circus Birthday Party Overview

noreply@blogger.com (Carrie) — Sun, 09 Oct 2011 03:25:00 +0000

Presenting--the greatest show on Earth--Midget & Peanut's Circus Birthday Party!!I had so much fun planning this party! I searched all over the web for ideas that I could incorporate on a small-ish budget, even though I knew the party was going to be the largest I'd thrown since our wedding.

The first thing I did was create a board on Pinterest, just to keep my visual ideas in one place. I resisted Pinterest for a while because I really didn't want another thing that I had to feel guilty about not keeping up with, but once I got in there and started working with it, it became a great tool that I've used for several other things. I set up a non-personal account, so I can share eye-candy with y'all, but I just set it up, so it's completely blank right now. However, you are welcome to follow me if you'd like! Just click here to get to my Pinterest page.

The next thing I did was to search out a printable party pack that would work for both the turdlets in both graphics and color scheme. I searched on Etsy and found an affordable and, most importantly, ADORABLE pack from Dimpleprints. They were super fast and awesome to work with, plus the pack I received included SO much stuff! Invitation, thank you, party hats, cupcake toppers, every sign imagineable (and some I hadn't thought of), and so much more! Be on the lookout for all the matching goodies throughout the pictures in this series.

So as not to overwhelm you with pictures and information, I'll be doing three more posts about the Circus Birthday Party. Look for posts on Activities, Food, and Sweets & Favors. Better yet, subscribe or sign up for emails (to the left of this post) and get updates right in your feeder or inbox!!

For now, I'll leave you with two pictures of my adorable munchkins. I sure do have cute kids!!

Happy Birthday Midget and Peanut!!!

noreply@blogger.com (Carrie) — Tue, 06 Sep 2011 23:16:00 +0000

I am just so amazed at how quickly this year has flown by! My baby girl turns 4 in just a few days and my baby boy turned one a few days ago.

J-dub the hub and I took the turdlets to a small circus a few months ago and Midget was enthralled with the whole experience! She laughed at the clown, ooooooed over the lions and tigers, squealed with excitement to get her face painted, and almost peed herself when she got to ride an elephant!! So, we are having a circus birthday party this weekend and I decided to do their birthday pictures in the same theme.

For the tutu, I followed the directions here and it turned out beautiful! It's so simple if you get the tulle spools. They can be found for less than $2 per spool on ebay. I cut the tulle in about 30 minutes and tied the tutu while I was catching up on some Dexter. Oh, I love that show...

The tie was made using this tutorial, although I made the tie pattern quite a bit skinnier.

The diaper cover was made using the tutorial and pattern found here. Just a piece of advice--do NOT sew the waist and legs up until you try them on your little one. I had to rip out the waist AND one of the legs. Because I was being impatient and wanted to finish. That's why...

I made the suspenders from ribbon and mitten clip clips (does that make any sense?). I thought I had four clips so I would've just made the traditional X in the back, but it turned out I only had three, so I had to improvise. I used an orange hair band and looped it.... I can't really explain it, so here's a picture of it.

I think my two clowns are the cutest!! Stay tuned for Birthday Party Pictures!!

Thai Friday

noreply@blogger.com (Carrie) — Wed, 17 Aug 2011 01:33:00 +0000

First things first. My baby is broken. Not Midget or Peanut, but my beloved DSLR. For some reason, it just pooped out in the middle of our vacation in Montana. I guess it just couldn't handle the utter gorgeousness of my home state. But I prefer to blame it on the hubby, since he was taking pictures of me being a total bad*ss on a jetski when the camera died. Yeah. I'm awesome like that...

So, not like you're used to super awesome pictures on this blog, but you can expect some super crummy pictures for at least the next few weeks. I'm just praying that my camera is back before the turdlets' birthday party, which is in less than a month.

Anyway, remember my little bitty Thai Container Garden? Well, this is what it looks like now!

Thanks to our lovely plant-sitting neighbors, the container didn't die while I was gone for almost two months. As a thank you, I planted them their own Thai container. I ended up removing two pepper plants from this one, so one went into the garden and one went into their pot, I separated one of the Thai basil, and then transplanted the lemongrass that I propagated. Their container looks lovely as well, and I am a bit surprised that all of their plants thrived after such a brutal transplanting and the fact that I rooted out their lemongrass!

First order of business was to snip all the basil flowers. The flowers smell lovely and I'm thinking it will make fabulous Thai Basil Flower Vinegar. I'm steeping most of the flowers in plain white vinegar for a few weeks and will report back to you whether or not it was a successful endeavor. I'm thinking it will make a neat gift for friends.

I'd like to take a quick second to brag about my first garden harvest of the season.

Isn't it gorgeous?? Grape tomatoes (the orange ones were an awesome surprise), cubanelle peppers, banana peppers, red bell pepper, crookneck squash, a better boy tomato, and some OBSCENELY large cucumbers. I've since pulled gobs more tomatoes, but the cucumbers are slow to grow after supporting those giants!

Next, it was time to put that gorgeous Thai pot to good use! For dinner on Friday, it was Gai Pad Prik Khing (Chicken and Vegetables in a Chili Ginger Curry) and Som Tam-inspired salad (Green Papaya Salad) made with zucchini instead of green papaya. Just so you know, I'm not attesting to the authenticity of these Thai dishes, but they are DELICIOUS!

The curry recipe is all my own--a mishmash of many recipes I found online and using what I had on hand. The Zucchini Ribbon Salad is from Aarti Party on foodnetwork. I would highly suggest you start with only ONE tablespoon of fish sauce in the salad and then add more to your liking. I really love cooked fish sauce, but raw fish sauce is, well, fishy. Just take a piece of zucchini and dip it in the sauce (before you dump it on all the zucchini) and then add more fish sauce if you want it.

Here's my curry recipe. Have lots of beverage nearby and reserve a bit of chicken and veggies before you add the curry if you have kids. Midget took a bite, said "YUM!" and then spit it out on her plate once the heat hit. Peanut kept shoving it in his mouth, chewing, then crying, then gulping his water. I'm not a two-meal sort of family, but they both got some ham to eat after the hubby pointed out that there are some adults that wouldn't eat my spicey curry.

Wusses...

Gai Pad Prik Khing

2 Tbs Vegetable Oil, divided
1 small Onion
1 Thai Dragon Chili (VERY optional, as the curry paste is quite hot anyway) cut into very fine mince
1 cup diced Zucchini
1 cup diced Eggplant
2 Tbs Fish Sauce
10 oz boneless skinless Chicken Breast, cut into thin strips
2 Tbs Prik Khing Curry Paste (recommended brand Mae Sri)
1 can Light Coconut Milk
Cooked Jasmine Rice

Heat 1 Tbs oil in a large skillet with high sides (at least 4 inches tall) over high heat. Add vegetables and saute for 3-4 minutes. Add fish sauce and then chicken and saute for another 3-4 minutes until chicken is no longer pink. Remove chicken and veggies to a plate and turn heat down to medium-high.

Heat remaining oil in skillet and add curry. Fry curry until fragrant, about 2-3 minutes. Add chicken and veggies back in and stir until coated with curry paste. Stir in can of coconut milk, reduce heat to medium-low and heat through.

Serve over Jasmine Rice.

Has it been that long??

noreply@blogger.com (Carrie) — Fri, 15 Jul 2011 19:48:00 +0000

Wow, this summer has gone by SO fast thus far! We spent the beginning of June in Wisconsin and then my sister flew me and the turdlets out to Montana to spend almost a month. We got back last Friday and then left on Tuesday to go to North Dakota and Montana (again). I'm exhausted and am missing my garden, but it has been so much fun!!

Here's a smattering of the fun we've had so far!

Handmade Baby Gift

noreply@blogger.com (Carrie) — Mon, 30 May 2011 10:56:00 +0000

Here's a baby gift I made for a friend of a friend. I guess you could say I was "commissioned" to make it, as my friend saw Peanut's tag blankie and me using a handmade nursing cover and she asked me to make her friend one of each. My first paid project! :) It includes a nursing cover, burp cloth, and tag blankie.

I've made several nursing covers just by using an existing cover I have as a guide, but there are several good tutorials out there like this one by made by the mama monster and this one by Sew Much Ado, so I won't bore you with another tutorial full of my blather. The burp cloth is just an inexpensive Gerber cloth diaper with two little strips of material sewn on. I bought a big pack of the diapers (maybe 10 or 12) and have doled them out one or two at a time for baby gifts. I've also appliqued on the diapers when the material has cute little scenes, but this particular crabby fabric was just little squares and wouldn't have looked quite right.

All in all, I spent under $20 (including several inexpensive spools of ribbon for the blankie, the cost of the diaper, and a few bucks to mail it to my friend) for a practical handmade gift that any nursing mom-to-be will love!

Thai Container Garden

noreply@blogger.com (Carrie) — Thu, 12 May 2011 14:04:00 +0000

I'm SO geeked about this container! Seriously, could I be any more of a garden nerd?? I loooooooooooooooooooooooove Thai food, but I don't like the 20 minute drive each way to the Asian market every time I want to make it. So I started thinking about what I could grow at home and began the hunt for what would grow well in my climate and how easy it would be to find.

I decided on Thai Basil (yummy anise flavored basil), Thai chilis, and Lemongrass. They all require full sun, which they will happily drink up out on our deck. All of these plants would grow well inside your home if you have a nice sunny spot, but I have the kidlets and the wieners, both of which are not conducive to growing plants indoors without spilled containers and/or plucked leaves and/or chewed up plants which results in a very angry Mommy...

Thai Basil, also known as Siam Queen Basil, is easy to find. I saw seeds at Lowe's, but you can also buy it online at amazon and burpee. You can start it easily from seed, but I took the easy way out and bought two plants.

Thai Chili seeds are also fairly easy to find, but for many of us, it is getting to be a bit late to start peppers from seed. Your best bet is to find plants. You can order them on amazon or burpee, but you can also just go to your closest asian market and pick up some dried Thai chilis and use the seeds from those! You'll want to sow your pepper plants indoors, unless you live in the Southern United States. My container has four thai dragon chili plants in it right now, but I will most likely remove one plant (and maybe even two) depending on how they fill out.

In searching online, I found that you can actually propagate lemongrass at home! Just buy some lemongrass and cut off most of the top woody portion and plop it in some water. Mine didn't quite grow as fast as was shown on the link, but I suspect the lemongrass I bought wasn't very fresh. It still isn't ready to transplant after three weeks, so I was thrilled to find a plant at a local store!

Stay tuned for delicious Thai recipes in 45-70 days! " )

Midget and Peanut

noreply@blogger.com (Carrie) — Tue, 03 May 2011 00:46:00 +0000

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAACK!! Can someone please slow time down a little bit for me? These kids are growing too, too fast!! Here's a few pictures from a recent photoshoot. I know everyone thinks their kids are cute, and I'm no exception! I think Peanut looks especially dapper in his little old man hat... Love that sweet boy!

Handmade Twirly Skirt Set

noreply@blogger.com (Carrie) — Wed, 13 Apr 2011 18:35:00 +0000

I decided to try my hand at my first piece of clothing for our little neighbor girl's birthday! I've done mostly craft sewing and feel like I have a pretty good feel for it, but sewing clothing is an entirely different matter to me. It has to fit. That's kind of important... I used a tutorial from House on Hill Road. The photos are great and it turned out super cute.

I bought twice the amount of fabric needed, just in case, and I guess it was a good move. It took me two skirts to get it right, but at least this way Midget will have a cute little skirt to wear also. Who cares if her bottom hem is crooked, the waistband hem is only half the size it's supposed to be, and the seams don't match up??? Ooops...

I also appliqued a t-shirt and made a little headband to match for the birthday girl. While doing the shirt, Midget was running around and wanted to watch and was generally driving me BONKERS! Well, I learned my lesson not to sew with her around when I was half done with the tree trunk and all of its teensy weensy little twists and turns and I realized I HAD SEWN THROUGH BOTH THE FRONT AND BACK OF THE SHIRT! Grrrrrrrr..... I had to sit and rip out each little thread and take care not to poke holes in the t-shirt material. It'll probably fall apart the first time it's washed, but at least she can wear it once. " )

Car Playmat

noreply@blogger.com (Carrie) — Wed, 30 Mar 2011 17:02:00 +0000

I saw this car playmat over a year ago and saved it to my favorites, knowing at some time, I would want to make it. My friend's little boy turned three this month, and seeing his obsession with his cars made it the perfect gift for him!

What is with me and finishing early?? I finished this project fairly early in the evening the night before the party. It completely threw me off my game and I forgot to take pictures of the completed carmat. Then the next day at the party, I left my camera at home and had to have the hostess of the party take pictures of the playmat for me. Thankfully, she wasn't too irritated at me. Well, she didn't say she was...

I actually think the most difficult part of making this playmat was finding cotton car fabric!! What on earth?? I looked all over the internet for fun fabric, scoured JoAnn Fabrics and Hobby Lobby and all I could find was too nursery-like or licensed Cars fabric. I finally settled for flannel, since it was all I could find in brighter colors, though I'm sure my friend will be thanked by the waitress at every restaurant they visit because that flannel will most likely pick up every crumb on their table...

I had some help from two different fabulous Aussies making this project. The original link has great pictures, but is not very specific with measurements. Thankfully, cookyousomenoodles posted some estimated measurements that were SUPER helpful!! Created by Cathy drew out some templates for each of the four sections that were also very helpful. You will just need to email her for the templates. I was feeling lazy and used the templates more for sizing purposes and didn't cut out the templates and then pin and cut the corresponding felt out. It would have looked much neater, I'm sure, but I think it still turned out pretty good!

Dora Cake

noreply@blogger.com (Carrie) — Tue, 15 Mar 2011 00:34:00 +0000

Midget's Bestest Buddy had her 3rd birthday last weekend. For a little something special, I made a Dora cake for her. I swear this was the first cake I've done that I wasn't up until 3 o'clock in the morning! I finished it at 7 p.m. and then sat and wondered what else I could do to keep myself up until all hours of the night...

Taggie Blanket (Tag Blankie) Tutorial

noreply@blogger.com (Carrie) — Tue, 01 Mar 2011 03:46:00 +0000

I know I could completely get away with not telling you all how long ago I talked about doing a taggie blanket tutorial here. But, I'm just not that kind of girl. I prefer to berate myself publicly, even though it doesn't seem to help me in any way... It was almost two years ago. eeeeeeeek. How on earth does time fly like that?? I finally am getting around to it now.

To be fair, I haven't made a blankie in that long and last week, I noticed Peanut mesmerized at the tag on a stuffed monkey. Since poor Midget never got one, I decided to rip a tag blankie out for Peanut to try to make up for his second child photo syndrome. Surprisingly, I remembered that I said I was going to do a photo tutorial on here. Funny, since I can't seem to remember to put on my undies some days...

First, gather your materials.
Two 14 x 14 inch squares of fabric: I prefer fleece and flannel because they are fairly easy to sew and nice and soft, but you can use whatever material floats your boat.
Sixteen 6 inch long lengths of ribbon: I like to use varying textures, colors and widths of ribbon. You can coordinate them with your fabric or just use whatever you have on hand.
Coordinating Thread: I didn't worry too much about this because my non-patterned flannel fabric was light colored, so I used white thread. If you use a darker colored solid panel, you'll want to coordinate your thread.
Empty cellophane candy bags (Optional): I sewed in some crinkly panels, but once I realized I wouldn't be able to bring Peanut's tag blankie to church, I was sad I'd done it. : (

Here's my two fabric squares.

First, I sewed in the crinkly panels. I just took two empty candy bags (by the way, I LOOOOOOOOVE Everlasting Gobstopper Heartbreakers and wish they made them all year long but it's probably a good thing they don't because I'd have broken teeth and lots of cavities and I'd never look good in that strapless bridesmaid dress I have to wear in November) and cut off the end pieces and opened them up and cut them a little bit bigger than where I wanted to sew them onto and zipped around them. If your fabric has a right and wrong side, you would want these on the wrong side of the fabric. Midget was insistent her hand be in this picture. Silly girl!

Here's a front view of the fleece with the two crinkly panels sewn in.

Now it's time to pin on your ribbons! You'll be putting four ribbons on each side. Fold each ribbon in half and match up the raw edges of the ribbon to the edge of your fabric. The loop should be in the middle. Take your ruler out and lay it next to your material (if your fabric has a right and wrong side, you'll want the right side up) with the 0 at the end of the fabric. Place the middle of each of your four ribbons at 3 1/2 inches, 6 inches, 8 1/2 inches, and 11 inches on each side. Here is my blankie all pinned up.

Here's a step that isn't 100% necessary, but after making several blankies, I realized it makes everything a billion times easier than just pinning the ribbons on and sewing the two fabric squares together with the ribbons pinned inside. You don't have to worry about your ribbons being crooked, or poking the crud out of yourself trying to remove your pins by sticking your hand in the little opening, and it triple reinforces the ribbons, so (hopefully) your little one will have a harder time ripping the ribbons out of the blanket! Take a nice long stitch (I had my stitch length at 3 because some of my ribbons were only 1/8 inch wide) and sew just along the ribbons at 1/4 inch. Lift up your presser foot after you sew through each ribbon and put it down before the next ribbon. You can see the extra thread on my picture below. Clip your threads and proceed to the next step.

Next, put your other piece of material directly on top of your ribbons, making a ribbon sandwich. If your fabrics have right and wrong sides, match up the right sides.

Now pin your sandwich together and sew a 1/2 inch seam allowance around the outside, leaving a 3 inch opening for turning. I used a stitch length of 3, but you may need to vary yours depending on the fabric you choose. Remember, the thinner the fabric, the lower the stitch length. If you use cotton and flannel, you'll probably want to do a stitch length of 2.

Clip your corners about 1/8 inch from the corner so you'll have nice sharp corners. Clip off your threads.

Turn the entire thing inside out and poke out your corners. I use a chopstick to make nice square corners.

Tuck your opening inside and pin it closed. Sew 1/8 inch seam around the entire blankie (I used a stitch length of 2). TA-DAAAAAAAAAA!! Tag Blankie!!

Peanut immediately fell in love with it. Not as much as I'm in love with his utter gorgeousness...

Midget's New Haircut

noreply@blogger.com (Carrie) — Fri, 18 Feb 2011 20:55:00 +0000

Midget got a sassy new haircut! She was twirling her hair so hard she was yanking chunks out of it on a daily basis. I'd go into her room and find perfect little circles of hair laying by her bed. So we took a few last pictures of the ponies and went to chop it off. She had fun doing some silly faces, but she was all business when she was modeling her new haircut for me.

Birthday Beer Can Chicken

noreply@blogger.com (Carrie) — Wed, 26 Jan 2011 01:24:00 +0000

There's something decidedly obscene about Beer Can Chicken. I can't help but guffaw every time I look at that poor chicken with a beer can shoved up its hoohah... *snort*

However, the moist deliciousness of the chicken is enough to overlook how weird it looks to have a chicken sitting straight up in your oven.

Today is Jdub-the-hub's birthday. He had to be out of town for work today, so we celebrated this weekend. The menu was fantastically trailer-trash, if I do say so myself. Yuengling Chicken, Dijon Roasted Potatoes, Peas, homemade vanilla ice cream, and.....

wait for it....

TWINKIES! Yes, my husband requeted Twinkies instead of birthday cake. The ease factor of making the cake for him--rip open box, rip open plastic, set twinkies on plate, and insert candles--was fantastic.

Beer Can Chicken

4 lb Chicken, washed and thoroughly dried
1 Tbs Kosher Salt
1 Tbs Dark Brown Sugar
1 Tbs Smoked Paprika
2 tsp Black Pepper
1 can of Beer

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees.

Make rub by mixing salt, brown sugar, paprika, and pepper together in a small bowl and set aside. Be sure chicken is completely dry on the outside or your rub won't stick to the chicken. Sprinkle about 1/3 of the rub inside the chicken and then cover the rest of the bird with the rub.

Open your beer can and drink about 1/3 of it. Yummmmmmy. We used Yuengling and it was AMAZING!!

Now comes the fun part. Stick that chicken on top of the beer can with the legs and the beer can acting as a tripod. Giggle a little, then bend the wings back so it looks like the chicken is crossing its arms behind it's non-existent head.

Roast for 1 to 1 1/2 hours or until a thermometer stuck into the chicken's thigh reads 165.

Go turn on some Nascar (just kidding hubby), cut your hair into a mullet, and ENJOY!

Midge sure loves her Daddy. And so do I.

Ooops

noreply@blogger.com (Carrie) — Fri, 07 Jan 2011 03:48:00 +0000

I meant to wish you a Merry Christmas...

I meant to wish you a Happy New Year...

But instead, I've been enjoying time with this little stinker...

Who is obviously growing WAY too fast!

Need a Quick Present Idea??

noreply@blogger.com (Carrie) — Wed, 22 Dec 2010 18:44:00 +0000

These Hot/Cold Therapy Packs are quick and inexpensive!! I made three in less than 30 minutes for less than $2.00 each!

Gingerbread Midge

noreply@blogger.com (Carrie) — Tue, 07 Dec 2010 20:31:00 +0000

Have I mentioned that Midget started preschool? She goes two days a week for two and a half hours and let me just tell you--we BOTH love it! She is really enjoying the constant stimulation and I am reeeeeeeeeeeeally enjoying not having to be the one stimulating her little brain for a few hours!! She is such a vivacious and curious little girl, but if she doesn't have something that is keeping her attention, she sure can be a naughty little terd.

In November, we purchased a new book from Scholastic through school--"The Gingerbread Man." In the middle of the month, she did a wishbone with her Daddy and her wish was for Gingerbread (so sweet). Midget's Auntie bought her a HUGE gingerbread man pan for Christmas last year, so after she won, I pulled out the pan and made the gingerbread recipe on the back of the book. She thought it was pretty neat that we decorated it like the gingerbread man in the book!

Her preschool had a Gingerbread House float in our town's Holiday Parade this year and all the kids were encouraged to dress as an elf or a gingerbread man. I knew right away that I could make a Gingerbread Girl costume pretty easily, but wasn't quite sure how to do it. I just made her lay down on a piece of 72" brown felt and traced around her with chalk. Then I put a GIANT bowl over where her head was and traced... that (so it would be cartoon-ish) and free handed the rest. I sewed the bow first all by itself, then sewed the details on the front piece of the costume, attached the bow to the front piece, and then sewed the front and back piece together--leaving the armpit area unsewn. If I'd had more time, I would have just measured out two 3-4 inch strips to sew under the arms and along the skirt area so there would be room for movement. I also ended up sewing a little dart under the chin so I could make sure the head stood up on its own.

It's a bit rough, but I learned some good lessons, like you need to leave room for the arms to move (imagine that) and don't cut the giant rick-rack because it frays like crazy.

It took about three hours from start to finish and the materials were less than ten dollars. I used one yard of 72" brown felt, two yards of white giant rick-rack, one sheet of hot pink felt, one sheet of yellow felt, and one sheet of light pink felt.

People at the parade loved it, but more importantly, Midget adored it! Can't you just see the excitement in her eyes??

Homemade Cranberry Sauce

noreply@blogger.com (Carrie) — Tue, 23 Nov 2010 21:07:00 +0000

Here's a quick pic of Peanut rockin' a wifebeater. Isn't he just adorable?? I fall more and more in love with him everyday. He'll be THREE months old this weekend. Wow... I'm speechless. Okay, not really. Like that would EVER happen.

I'm normally a pretty adventurous cook, but when it comes to Turkey Day, I don't experiment much. I made that mistake once and the results were so disasterous I have blocked the details out completely. All I remember was the horrified look on my husband's face when he tasted the gravy and the silence that continued for the remainder of the meal. After the shock wore off and he was able to speak again, he asked if I could just do traditional Thanksgiving every year.

A large part of my husband's job is talking to farmers all over the country. A great perk is that he often comes home with large amounts of free fruits and vegetables. When he showed up with TEN pounds of cranberries a few weeks ago, I knew right away what I would use part of the cranberries for--Cranberry Sauce! And no, not the kind that goes sssllluuuurrrrrp when it comes out of the can and keeps the can shape, although I totally dig that stuff too.

When I posted to my blog a few years ago about fresh cranberries, I was surprised to see how many people hadn't made anything with fresh cranberries or even eaten anything made with fresh cranberries! We always had fresh cranberry sauce with our Thanksgiving dinners. But I grew up in Montana and everyone knows Montanans are weird...except me. I am blissfully normal. Yeah, that was a lie.

Once you see how fast and easy it is, you'll wonder why you've never made it before. But the real payoff will come when you taste it! Homemade Cranberry Sauce has a fresher and tangier taste and a MUCH better texture than that gelatinous cranberry goop from the can! Plus, when you make your own, you control the sugar. You can make it as sweet or as tart as you want!

Lots of people like to fancy up their cranberry sauce with oranges or pecans or crazy spices, but I am a purist. Well, not really, I just like cranberry sauce to taste like cranberries. I've made Cranberry Chutney before and that was AMAZING, but it just didn't have the zing and bite of plain old cranberry sauce.

There are three ingredients to make this folks! THREE!! How much easier can a recipe get? I'll tell you--not much!! Take a look at this stuff and tell me it doesn't look 100 times better than the canned stuff!

Homemade Cranberry Sauce

1 cup water
12 oz (3 cups) fresh cranberries (most bags sold in the store are 12 oz--look for them in the produce section)
1/2 - 3/4 c sugar or sugar substitute (I used Splenda, but you could also use frozen grape juice concentrate)

Rinse and pick through your cranberries. Most bags are fairly clean, with just the occasional leaf or stem. Be sure to look for soft or mushy berries. Your cranberries should be firm and smooth, just like my abs. *snort* Set them aside.

In a pot with tall sides, bring the water to a boil over medium-high heat. Dump in the cranberries. Be sure to take a cool picture.

You'll begin to hear popping, but don't worry, your kids aren't stepping on the bubble wrap from their Christmas presents you ordered online and stashed in the closet. It's just the cranberries exploding as they cook. Stir occasionally and cook for 10 minutes or until the berries get to the point where a spoon pulled through leaves a line that doesn't fill itself in.

Turn off the heat and immediately add 1/2 cup of your sweetener.

Stir to combine and add more sweetener if you desire. Be careful tasting the sauce--it is HOT! Although, if you need me to tell you that, maybe you shouldn't be using a stove...

VOILA! You are done! Now you can chortle at all your city friends when they say they've never had fresh cranberries! If your friends tell you you've suddenly become snobby, you can blame it on me. Go ahead! I can take it!

This recipe will make approximately 1 pint. I doubled it and canned the remainder. Well, I actually quadrupled it because I did two double batches. Remember--I had ten pounds of those little suckers! I also made Cranberry Breakfast Bread, which is deeee-licious and you MUST make it! Unless you want to weigh less than 689,114,285 pounds like me. You could also try my Cranberry Salsa.

To can the sauce, process pint jars for 15 minutes and quarts for 20. For altitudes above 3,000 feet, process 20 for pints and 30 for quarts. Above 6,000 feet (Hello Rocky Mountain-ers--I was TOTALLY kidding about that Montana thing--sort of), 25 for pints and 35 for quarts.

Hubby, Midget, Peanut, the Wieners, my sexy pants with the extra elastic, and I will be heading to my Sister-in-law's house for Thanksgiving and several pints of cranberry sauce will be making the trip also. I don't expect any of it to return with us, except maybe on a shirt of mine...

Turkey Day Fun!

noreply@blogger.com (Carrie) — Sun, 21 Nov 2010 01:18:00 +0000

I'm finally starting to feel human again! Now that Peanut is on a schedule, I have a little bit of time every now and then. Midget is at such a fun age. She loves reading and doing crafts and is very into imaginative play. I've had fun the last few days looking for fun ideas for Thanksgiving.

When I saw this in Family Fun Magazine, I knew I had to do it. Theirs looks a little bit cuter, but it calls for stuffing and hand-stitching. I took the easy way out and didn't stuff it and machine-sewed it. I still think my finished set below is pretty cute and will be a fun way to teach about a few less common vegetables in play sets like turnips and acorn squash. It was super easy to do! I made it in about two hours.
Want to make your own? Templates for the cornucopia and veggies are available on Family Fun's website at the link above.

We took a quick food craft over to a friend's house this weekend. Midget was much more interested in eating the cookies and candy than making anything with it, but she finally took a few seconds off of her own gobbling to make a cute little gobbler. You'll need golden oreos, rolo candies, chocolate chips, and candy corn to make these. You may want to swap out a little bit of white frosting tinted red for the red decorator's gel that I used to avoid looking like your turkey's head was already cut off and reattached...

Thankfully, her little buddy let me take a picture of his turkey cookie when it was done, because Midge tossed hers in her mouth the second it was completed.

The Princess and the Peapod

noreply@blogger.com (Carrie) — Sat, 06 Nov 2010 22:06:00 +0000

I've been less than energetic lately, so when Halloween started getting closer and the creative juices weren't flowing, I decided to take the easy way out. Midget's Auntie sent her a gorgeous princess dress-up outfit for her birthday, so TA-DAAA--Princess! On a whim, I had purchased an infant Peapod costume for a dollar last year, so TA-DAAAAA--Peapod!

Someday, my energy and creativity shall return to me. I hope...

Happy 3rd Birthday Midget!

noreply@blogger.com (Carrie) — Thu, 30 Sep 2010 02:59:00 +0000

Since Mister Peanut arrived only two weeks prior to Midget's birthday (and was actually due only a week before), we decided to have a very low-key celebration for her birthday. No guests, one present, and just a boxed cake mix. But you know me, I can't control my insanity, so I had to do at least one crazy thing!

Midget has been very into Yo Gabba Gabba lately, and since she had asked for a blue cake, I decided to make her a Toodee Cake. I figured I could freehand it simply on a round cake. It wasn't my finest piece of work, but it still turned out pretty cute. As you can see from her reaction, Midget thought it was pretty cool!

Here's a little eye candy of Mister Peanut. I can't believe how fast he's growing! I swear his little fingers fattened up during the day yesterday. He woke up with skinny fingers and went to bed with little chubby nubs!!

Welcome Peanut

noreply@blogger.com (Carrie) — Sun, 19 Sep 2010 10:09:00 +0000

Isn't he the cutest little Peanut you've ever seen??

I have to admit--boys are harder. Not just in the "peeing on Mommy is fun every time she opens my diaper" way, but also in the non-froofy non-flowery newborn picture ideas that aren't sports-related sort of way. I had the photo session all planned out for our second little girl that I was convinced we were having, but when little "Mister" Peanut entered the world, I was stumped! I decided to hop on to Etsy to try to get some inspiration. After lots of searching, I ran across what are called baby cocoons. PERFECT!! If I could find one I liked in a tan sort of color, it would look like Peanut was a little peanut!

I finally found the perfect one at Becky's Baby Crochet and decided to email her on Labor Day to see if it was going to be possible to get the cocoon in time for the appointment I'd already set up for Friday. She was quick to respond, was SUPER nice, and told me it would be no problem to get it to me on time, even with the holiday! To my photographer friends, you MUST go look at her adorable photography props!! I was more than pleased with my purchase and stunned at the amazing service she delivered!

Now, on to the birth story! I had a follow-up appointment with my OB on Friday morning, August 27th, to once again check my blood pressure and to see if I had progressed at all. I had been checking it at home and I knew they weren't going to like it, but I wasn't sure what my Doc would want to do. My OB practice is made up of seven doctors and you choose a primary, but you see all the other docs throughout your pregnancy because whoever is on call at the hospital when you deliver is who delivers your baby. I love all the doctors in the practice and the way it works is really nice, but you do get differing opinions from different doctors sometimes.

My bp was pretty high when the nurse took it and I went in to change and wait for my primary OB. When he checked, I hadn't made much progress from when I was discharged on Tuesday, but I asked him to strip my membranes and he agreed it would be good to try to move things along. He decided to set up my induction for a week later, my due date, just in case I didn't deliver before then. He left the room and I could hear him on the phone, calling the hospital to schedule the induction. He stopped right in the middle of his sentence and said, "Is this her blood pressure TODAY???" The nurse said yes and I heard him say, "Never mind," to the person he was speaking to on the phone. The door opened and he told me to go to the hospital because I needed to have the baby soon. It wasn't an emergency, but there was no sense it waiting until it became an emergency.

We took our time getting to the hospital, as I already know that induction is not usually a zip-a-dee-doo-dah super-fast process. Around 1 p.m., I asked the hubby to drop me off at the hospital and spend the day with Midget and take her to our neighbor's house around 7 p.m. and then I'd let him know what he needed to do once I had a better handle on what was going on.

They decided to use a Foley Bulb Catheter to help me dilate. I'd never heard of it, but they insert the catheter behind the cervix wall and then use saline to inflate it. When it has done its job, it simply comes out. They inflated it and hoped that it would get me to 4 cm in about nine hours. At the three hour mark, they checked and I was at my goal mark, all with relatively little pain. At one point, I even began to have regular contractions at about 5-6 minutes apart. I told my husband to stay at home, but to remain on standby.

Unfortunately, they didn't establish well, so the docs went back to the drawing board and decided that I needed to start pitocin. I'd heard such awful things about pitocin, so I was hoping to avoid it, but that wasn't going to be the case. At 11:30 p.m., they started the pitocin and I expected things to just happen instantly, but they didn't. I told hubby to catch some sleep and that I'd call him again when things looked like they were going to start moving along.

I was still sleeping quite well and they were increasing up the pitocin about every 30 minutes, but I wasn't really getting much further along. At 3 a.m., they decided to break my bag of waters and continue increasing the pitocin. About two hours later, things really started moving along. I called my husband and asked him to head down.

At about 5:30 a.m., I was at 6 cm and was finally beginning to have some fairly painful contractions, but they were manageable. An hour later, that all changed, when I began to have some weird kind of nerve pain that felt like FIRE shooting down the front of my right leg. I could handle the contractions, but the nerve pain was unbearable!! I tried every position and birthing prop in the known universe, but wasn't getting any relief. The doctor said most likely, the baby was somehow pushing on a nerve. Around 7:30, I asked for an epidural.

Thankfully, the anesthesiologist was in the next room and came over within a few minutes. They decided on an Intrathecal epidural (sort of a combination spinal tap/epidural), since I was already at 8 cm. It was unbelievable how fast it worked and how WELL it worked! Within seconds, the nerve pain was starting to fade. At this point, all I wanted to do was sleep, but the baby had other plans.

The doctor checked me right after the epidural and said, "WOW! You are fully dilated and ready to push!" I barely heard this between my snores, but I was glad the last two cm went in just a few minutes.

Less than thirty minutes later, they were all yelling out, "It's a boy!!" and my first response was, "Are you sure??" When they turned him around, sure enough, there were his little baby bits!!

Speaking of baby bits, Peanut was getting his first bath at the hospital when Midget walked in to meet him for the first time. She asked Daddy to pick her up and right away said, "LOOK!! He has a BIG pee-pee and I have a LITTLE pee-pee!" Silly girl!

Midget is completely enamored with her baby brother! She can't quit smooching on him and even three weeks later, asks to hold him at least 9 million times a day! She's relatively gentle and has only attempted to throw him once. She was holding him when her favorite tv show (Phineas and Ferb--yes, she's a strange 3 year old girl) ended and she was displeased so she literally started to "throw" a tantrum. Thankfully, we were sitting on the bed and I was right next to her, so Peanut was fine.

Peanut is doing really well. He is nursing like a champ and is the NOISIEST eater I've ever heard. The little porkpie has already gained over a pound from his birthweight and he's only three weeks old. He's a pretty good sleeper, usually going from 11:30-ish to 5:00-ish at night, so I don't feel like a total zombie. This kid is also a champion pooper! I can't believe how many diapers he goes through in a day. Every time I change him, he poops again thirty seconds later... *le sigh*

IT'S A.....

noreply@blogger.com (Carrie) — Thu, 09 Sep 2010 14:55:00 +0000

BOY!!!

08/28/2010
8:06 a.m.
7 lbs. 9 oz.
19 3/4 in.

To say I was surprised was a HUGE understatement. I would have bet a million dollars I was having another girl! More pictures and birth story to come next week. I'm just a little slow at everything right now... Everyone's adjusting well and doing great!