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ways my kid is cracking me up lately

August 27th, 2008 @ 10:22 pm | Comments (8)

She has started to dance. Twirling in circles and pointing her fingers up and waving them around and swaying her shoulders back and forth. The freaking cutest thing EVER.

She says ‘uh-oh’ about everything. Mommy dropping things, her dropping things, yesterday during the shark-chase scene of The Little Mermaid. Sometimes it makes sense when she says it, sometimes it doesn’t. For example, she says it while I’m putting her in her carseat (??) But sometimes it’s helpful: she said it at Target when she dropped the blanket I was letting her play with, and I didn’t even see that I was about to leave it behind.

She totally grins at me after she farts.

So far this week, twice she has come up to me and said ‘Poop!’ and made the sign for poop. And both times? There was poop. I’m totally buying a potty chair soon.

She loves putting clothes on- any clothes. The other day I was folding laundry and she decided it would be fun to wear my underpants on her head. And she likes to wear our socks.

Most days, I don’t even know Dan is home until I hear her squeal: “DADDY!” when she sees him through the window. The girl looooves her Daddy.

Dan started saying “1-2-3!” and then letting her jump down the steps. So now she says ‘TOOO, THREEE!’ when she wants us to do it. And she’s been doing this for a while, but she loves when we let her sit on our bellies and bounce her around, singing ‘She’ll Be Comin’ Round the Mountain’. So now she’ll pull us down to the floor, saying ‘SHEEE BEE!’

Things I DON’T find so amusing? The waking up at least once a night, the waking up REALLY SUPER early, the clingy fussiness and tantrums. Those I can do without. So I’ll just keep focusing on all the cute things.

Filed under family, kids, Maggie, motherhood, photos

good and bad: this week so far

August 26th, 2008 @ 10:05 pm | Comments (4)

Inspired by Janet’s Love and Hate Fridays.

good: Maggie slept till 9:30 yesterday!

bad: Maggie woke up at 6am this morning.

good: I got a lot of work done in the morning because she took a very early nap (8:30!!!), so we were able to take the afternoon off and have some fun.

bad: I found out today that the 3-in-1 convertible crib we bought her when I was pregnant has been discontinued, so we cannot purchase the conversion kit. I am REALLY MAD that we didn’t order the parts back then (my only excuse is that I was as big as a house and could think of nothing except for ice cream and getting that baby OUT.)

good: We had lunch with Dan and his work friends.

bad: Maggie got macaroni and cheese all over her shirt (not a REALLY bad thing, but definitely not a good one)

good: We visited a friend of mine (an old co-worker) I hadn’t seen in a while.

bad: She’s going through a divorce with 2 kids and it’s just a crappy, crappy situation.

good: Our fridge is now stocked with food from the grocery store.

bad: Maggie was soooo tired at the store and almost fell asleep a few times.

good: She took a 2nd nap when we got home.

bad: That nap lasted until 5:30, which pushed her bedtime back by an hour. That’s a BIG HOUR IN OUR LIVES.

good: Maggie played outside with Dan after dinner while I cleaned up and then caught up on some work (See above, Taking The Afternoon Off!) At one point, she pulled her stroller out and tried climbing in it- a sign that apparently meant Hey Dad! Let’s go for a walk! So they did.

bad: My house is piled in clutter, and my cleaning lady is coming tomorrow. I have to clean up a LOT of crap before I go to bed so the poor woman can actually see the floors and counters to clean them.

good: My cleaning lady is coming tomorrow!! Have I mentioned that I LOVE HER and she’s my new BFF? She has been doing an awesome job. (unlike the last people.)

bad: I have to go to a Real Job tomorrow- my once-per-month contract job. Stupid business casual. I wanna wear my pajamas!

good: We’re finally going to be able to ADD to our savings account this month, rather than SUBTRACT which is what we’ve been doing for the last year in order to pay of our student loans.

bad: I also need to go and pack Maggie’s lunch for daycare tomorrow. Crap.

good: This weekend we’re going on the boat again with Dan’s dad on Saturday and then to a party with some college friends and all of our kids on Sunday. Another busy weekend! But: IT’S A THREE DAY WEEKEND.

bad: It’s only Tuesday and I’m already talking about the weekend.

Filed under family, kids, life, Maggie, motherhood, random

corn and ice cream.

August 25th, 2008 @ 8:44 pm | Comments (7)

Yesterday we made an exception to our ‘Doing Nothing This Weekend’ plan and headed to my parents for the afternoon. There was free (yummy!) food involved, so who were we to say no? Plus, we always have a fun time over there. It wasn’t just the food.

It was a hot afternoon, so we brought Maggie’s bathing suit so she could splash around in the pool. And splash she did.

Maggie had her first corn on cob!

Then after dinner, we had ice cream cones for dessert. Maggie had never had an actual cone- a few tastes from ours but never one to hold in her hands and eat by herself. But she had a grand time with it, and it was fun watching my sister cringe at the sticky mess that was made.

So you see: sometimes not sticking to the Loser Weekend plan ends up being a good thing.

Filed under family, kids, life, Maggie, motherhood, photos, videos

way to confuse your kid, Dad.

August 24th, 2008 @ 9:27 am | Comments (4)

Last night we had a rare family moment. All three of us, playing on the floor together. Usually we Monster-Wrangle (our term for keeping an eye on Maggie) in shifts, because one of us always has something to do- cleaning up the kitchen, making a phone call, getting a shower, etc. But last night, we were done with dinner and waiting for the Steeler game to start, so we were having a nice Family Time in the living room.

Dan started reading one of Maggie’s books and the first page is a gorilla. As he was reading, he took certain… licenses with the text, comparing Mommy with a gorilla. He then pointed to the picture of the gorilla and said ‘Look Maggie- MOMMY!’ A few minutes later, she pointed to it herself and said ‘Mommy!’ Everyone had a good laugh and it was forgotten.

Until just a few minutes ago, when Maggie opened the book to the gorilla page, pointed to it and said, ‘MOMMY!’

Help me.

Filed under Dan, family, kids, life, Maggie, marriage, motherhood

recipe: Sun-dried Tomato Cream Sauce Pasta with Chicken

August 23rd, 2008 @ 11:16 pm | Comments (11)

One of my favorite favorite cooking blogs is Ree’s. The recipes simple and easy-to-follow, and actually include ingredients that I’ve HEARD OF and can FIND AT THE STORE, both steps that are very important, obviously. (Nothing like reading a recipe and going ‘What the heck is that? What aisle would that be in? Do they even SELL that at my Giant Eagle?’) And I can’t tell you how many times I have found myself laughing at her posts- anytime you can blend humor with cooking? You become my hero.

And the pictures she takes of the food while she’s cooking are just amazing. I love how it tells a story of the cooking process, rather than just listing the ingredients and listing the steps. So while I was cooking dinner the other night, I was inspired and thought ‘Hey! I’m gonna give that a shot!’ Now, my pictures aren’t nearly as awesome as Ree’s, and I don’t claim to be Expert In The Kitchen. But I can tell you one thing: I don’t know HOW she does this a few times a week. It was hard to take pictures of every step! I kept getting all wrapped up in the cooking process (and also taking breaks to wrangle a certain 16-month-old who kept wandering into the kitchen while I was working- didn’t she know Sesame Street was on TV?? GO WATCH ELMO, YOU LOVE ELMO!) But, it was fun. And yummy.

The dinner I made was actually a combination of a recipe from Ree’s blog with another recipe I had for Sun-dried Tomato Cream sauce with Chicken. The sun-dried tomato recipe was less pasta-y and more just bake the chicken breasts in the sauce and serve over pasta if desired. But I thought I’d mix it up and combine the 2 recipes to include the sun-dried tomatoes in the other sauce and see how it worked. Verdict? OH MY LORD, SO GOOD.

Sun-dried Tomato Cream Sauce Pasta with Chicken
Makes: A CRAPLOAD. Seriously- Dan and I each had some for dinner, plus Maggie, and I had some for lunch yesterday and today, and there’s still probably 3 good helpings left. So it easily feeds 6 people.

Ingredients
1 box of short pasta (penne, rotini, etc)
3 boneless, skinless chicken breasts
1 small onion
minced garlic (as much as you like!)
olive oil
butter (just a little bit)
1 cup heavy cream
8 oz tomato sauce
1 bay leaf
1-2 cups sun dried tomatoes, chopped
1 cup chopped basil
salt & pepper to taste

Okay, here we go!

Chop an onion and throw it in a saucepan with some olive oil and butter. (I don’t know how much, just ’some’. heh.) Also- don’t forget the garlic! (I used minced jarred stuff because Me = Lazy Cheater.)

Cook until soft, and then add the tomato sauce.

Oops. I’m a very messy cook.

Add the heavy cream- mix well. MMM, look how yummy!

Throw in a bay leaf too (not sure the point of this, but it was in the other recipe so I added it.) Next up, the sun-dried tomatoes.

I just got a small jar of them and then chopped them up a bit. I forgot to take a picture of how small I chopped them (see above, 16-month-old Wrangling.) so I tried to demonstrate here:

After it was all over, I decided that I should have made them a bit smaller. Note for next time.

You’re going to want to let the sauce simmer for a good 20-30 minutes. So while that’s going, get some water boiling for the pasta. I usually add some salt to the water (just a little bit though, don’t go crazy!)

Next up, the chicken. You could always leave this out and use some sort of veggies instead, or use shrimp (as in Ree’s recipe) But I’m not a seafood eater, so I use chicken. Slice the chicken into strips.

Then throw them into a skillet with some olive oil. Oh- AND GARLIC. You can add a bit of black pepper here too.

Whoops! Water’s boiling! Better get the pasta in!

I used rotini pasta because, well, that’s just what was in the cupboard. Someone wasn’t paying attention when she made the grocery list last week. Usually I would use penne, but really I guess it’s just a personal preference.

Okay while that’s all going, we can chop the basil. Question: Is there anything that smells better than fresh basil? MMMM.

Now, here is where I will admit something: I have no idea if I chop my basil correctly. The term is ‘chiffonade’ and I have yet to determine if that’s just a fancy term for ‘chop it up into long strip-like pieces’ or if there’s a reason for it having a fancy French name. Basically, I just roll them up and chop away.

Sure smells good though.

Let’s check on that chicken.

And the sauce? Looks good- give it a stir every once in a while.

While I was waiting, I thought I’d chop some veggies and lettuce for a salad. I chopped and chopped and chopped lettuce for like AN HOUR, I swear.

Or not. heh.

Oooh the pasta’s done! Time to drain it.

Let’s add some pepper and the basil to the sauce now.

Warning- don’t move to fast here or you’ll drop the spoon and get sauce all over your shirt and the floor. I’m just sayin’.

New spoon! Stirring the sauce!

Let’s take out that bay leaf now. (Seriously, does this actually do anything or is it just another reason for me to spend $3 at the grocery store?)

Okay, so the pasta is ready, sauce is done, chicken is cooked. Let’s mix it all together!

mmmmmm… excuse me while I drool.

Top it with some grated parmesan cheese and a salad and you’ve got a yummy dinner.

That phone there? That was from The Husband calling to say he was going to be late getting home from work. Again. After I slaved ALL DAY (or 40 minutes) making him this delicious meal. Bah.

At least Maggie and I enjoyed it.

Filed under photos, recipes

new for Friday!

August 22nd, 2008 @ 4:00 pm | Comments (19)

If you’re reading this in a generic feed reader- click on over! There’s a new look! I’ve had this one on my hard drive for something like 2 months, but I just didn’t have the time or motivation to get the darn thing completed. I finished it up last night and thought I’d take a break this fine Friday afternoon and just PUT IT UP, ALREADY. It’s quite a change from the pink, I know. But it’s almost fall so I wanted something fall-like, and at least there’s flowers on it, so it’s still a bit girly :)

Do you know what we’re doing this weekend? (I mean, other than my having dinner with the lovely Burgh Mom ladies tonight?) NOTHING. ABSO-FREAKING-LUTELY NOTHING. After way too many weekends in a row of Doing Things, this weekend, we are staying home. A ‘Weekend de Loser’, we like to call them. This one is long overdue, and we are going to enjoy it.

I might shower tomorrow. MIGHT. But I’m definitely putting my pajamas right back on.

Filed under family, life, web geek

warning: girly hairstyle talk ahead. boys, proceed with caution!

August 21st, 2008 @ 12:04 pm | Comments (14)

I am incredibly late on writing about this, but these last 7-10 days have been, in a word, INSANE. And every time I got on the computer and thought ‘Hey, I should write that post about my haircut!’, I got distracted by other things, like real work and Twitter and Facebook and basically anything to avoid putting coherent thoughts together. But! Today I’m getting my crap together. See? I can do it!

Last Saturday (as in, 2 Saturdays ago) I got my hair cut. I went to a new place this time, so I was a little nervous. I came armed with pictures and examples of what I was looking for. And I have to say- I was a little disappointed when I left.

It’s not a terrible cut, and I certainly don’t hate it… at least not now. It has grown on me in the last week (HA! No pun intended.) and I think I’m finally okay with it. It’s still not exactly what I had in mind, but it will work, I think. (Thankfully, my hair grows REALLY fast so if I ever do get a heinous haircut, I can just wait a few weeks and it will be totally different. So there’s that.)

Anyway. So I spent last week doing some experiments with my new haircut, trying to learn the best way to style it, how to blow-dry it, etc. because my usual ‘Just use a big round brush and blow hot air on your head and Voila! You’re good to go!’ method was failing miserably.

Here’s a picture from Day 1:

What I do not like about it: HELLO CAROL BRADY (which was so ironic since I had JUST read about a similar dilemma that Emily was having and I was all ‘oh, I hope that NEVER happens to me!‘) It totally feels very 70s-pseudo-mulletish to me. And living in Pittsburgh, I see my share of mullets even now and I DO NOT WANT ANYTHING EVEN REMOTELY CLOSE TO ONE. It’s like Mullet-Paranoia or something. It’s just too short on top, and the difference in length between the top layer and the bottom is like 4 inches! And since my hair can never decide if it wants to be straight or wavy, it just naturally does this flipping-out thing- which I like, as long as the top layer is long enough to ‘cover up’ and kind of weigh down the bottom layer. But this? Not so much.

I don’t think the problem was really anything the stylist did either (other than maybe cutting the top layer a *little bit* too short) My hair just has a lot of volume, which while I realize some people would KILL for that problem, it is a problem with this cut because as soon as I dry it, the whole top part of my head kind of poofs up and becomes a big helmet, and I look like a mushroom. Not exactly what I’m going for.

What I do like: I love the side-swept bangs. Especially when I pull my hair back into a ponytail (which, let’s face it- is pretty much EVERY DAY. heh) And I like the overall length. So I didn’t want to go back and get it fixed, because I knew the only solution would be to cut the bottom layer shorter… and I didn’t really want to go shorter. (See above: THE NEED FOR PUTTING HAIR IN PONYTAIL.)

The next day, I decided hey, let’s just go with the flippy-ness and see what happens! We were only going out to Costco and Target, so if I looked like a goofball, whatever, right? The day before, I had tried to dry it UNDER, which made it kind of flat but flippy, almost feathered (1985 called! They want their hairstyle back!) So maybe if I purposely flipped the bottom ends out, it would actually work nicely. And it did… kinda.

Again- I really like the bangs. And it is Flippy. The problem? I don’t really WANT it to be so Flippy. (I’m going to start capitalizing the word ‘Flippy’ because it seems awfully important all of a sudden.) One of the example pictures I took with me when I got the cut was this one of Casey (Hi Casey! Hope you don’t think I’m a stalker for printing out your picture and taking it with me to the salon!) I love the straightness and texture of her hair (though I’m not brave enough to try the color yet, even though I LOVE IT!!) And I suppose I could get it to look KIND OF like that if I used a flat iron. But I am horribly klutzy with the flat iron I have, and I have never been patient enough or talented enough or SOMETHING to get it to work properly. And I actually think might be too big for me, I think I need a narrower one, maybe I’ll have more control or something?

Anyway. So the final test I did- I dried my hair as straight as I could just using a brush. And the results? Acceptable.

(Also, do you like my new glasses? They’re not crazily-different than my old ones, but they’re less rounded and more oblong, and also not covered in little scratches so hey! I can see through them!)

Much less flip, more texture. Much less Carol Brady, which is always good. I’m still thinking about getting a new flat iron just to try it. But at least I can live with the cut until it grows a bit, and then maybe I’ll go and get the layers evened out a bit.

You can see from some of my pictures from last weekend how the hair works ‘In Real Life’, as opposed to when I’m posing dorkily in front of our bathroom mirror. heh.

I think Maggie’s hair is WAY cuter than mine, but maybe I’m just being self-critical? ;)

Filed under life, photos, she's a weird one

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