Our garden and other weekend fun

Yesterday was a big day. I needed to get a taillight and headlight replaced on my car, and I'd called the Kia dealership for an estimate, but the dealership is far away and our local Kwik Kar is, well, local. So we dropped the car off there. Not only did they have it fixed within the hour (before we finished running errands), but they also fixed both the headlight and the taillight for less than the price that the dealership had quoted me to repair just the headlight. I love it when things work out like that!

We ran up to Dallas to pick up some firewood (found it free on Craigslist - if you haven't gotten into the habit of checking out your local Craigslist, I highly recommend it, you can find a ton of good stuff for free or cheap if you just keep an eye out). Then we went to Home Depot to pick up the rest of our supplies for our square foot garden. By that time, it was lunchtime and we were hungry, so we went to Chapps Cafe for a hamburger. It looks to be largely a north Texas thing, but if you're ever in the area, it's worth finding one and giving it a try. I love Chapps - I give them full credit for convincing my son that there are better chicken strips to be had than Chicken McNuggets! LOL Any restaurant that he'll choose over McDonald's gets high marks from me, and they make a fine hamburger to boot.

After lunch, it was home to garden! Brian had already made our garden box and the square foot grid for it, so all he had to do was mix up our dirt, put it in the box, and then we were ready to plant.

Here's our box with dirt in it, waiting for good things to grow there:



Here's our box with plants and seeds:



We're growing two kinds of lettuces (Bibb and a salad mix), four kinds of peppers (mild jalapeno, hot garden salsa, orange bell, and Cubanelle), two kinds of tomatoes (Roma and Celebrity), yellow squash, zucchini, sugar snap peas, green beans, golden beets, onions (two squares), and cucumbers. I hope our little garden does well! Brian also got really motivated and built a compost bin yesterday.

And today we gave church a miss. Brian woke up running fever, with a head full of multicolored snot, and basically feeling like a train hit him. Bless his heart, he looks awful. I've been puny for the past few days, and I'm still not 100%, but I'm doing better at this point than he is. He's been sleeping for most of the day.

I think most of my problem is allergies. When Julian and I went out to the store this afternoon, I realized my car was just yellow from the pollen. Ugh. Only a month until I can take my Allegra, only a month until I can take my Allegra....

In other fun, Julian is out of his Vyvanse. He's happy as can be, but Lord have mercy, he's wearing me out. When we went to get a refill on Saturday, the pharmacist said he couldn't fill it due to errors on the prescription form and due to the date of the prescription being written incorrectly and then marked over to change it. We're hoping to pick up a new prescription on Monday and get it filled Monday evening, so Julian should be back on the Vyvanse by Tuesday. I'm just vexed that the doctor's office wrote the prescription out with errors, and vexed with myself for waiting until the last minute to get a new one, and vexed that this is a prescription that they just will not call in - we have to go by and pick up the written form every month. School should be interesting tomorrow. I just hope he doesn't have a completely rotten day, because if he does, it won't be like it's entirely bad behavior on his part. We'll see.

Earth mother

You know, I don't think I'm really suited for corporate America. I grew up in the country, and I like being outside when I've got something to do there. Now that I'm married to a man who also likes the outdoors, we're doing some more outdoorsy-type things. He's planted a couple of trees in the yard, a red oak and a fig, and we're watching them grow. I was out watering them today and it occurred to me that I'd be much happier if I weren't having to schlep to work in the big city, if I could do something from home and tend to our growing things (kids and trees alike). We're planting a garden this year, too, and that will be both food and science experiment - Julian is already excited about the prospect of watching our plants grow (although we'll see how excited he is when he gets to go out and pull weeds! LOL). I like to cook. I like to be outside when I get a chance. Why, then, can't I figure out some way that I could be home doing the things I like more often, instead of sitting behind a desk wishing nine hours of my life away every day?

In other news, I'm now 35 weeks and 1 day pregnant. My c-section has been moved to April 17, so I'll be able to make it to J's school program on April 16. This makes me happy. I didn't figure it would be a real good start to his relationship with his brother for me to have to tell him, "sorry, sweetie, I'll miss your program and art show because I'll be in the hospital bringing your brother into the world!" I know the time will come where he'll have to learn that mama will now be dividing time and attention between two boys instead of giving it all to just the one, but I didn't figure right off the bat was the time he *had* to learn that particular lesson.

I've been home sick the past couple of days. I don't know if it's a cold or a sinus infection - the doctor said it was too early to tell, and I can't really take much in the way of good meds, so I've just been drinking lots of fluids and trying to rest. Julian stayed home with me today, too. I figured we could both use a rest. Of course, the day we *could* sleep in, naturally he was awake at the crack of dawn, wanting to know when I was going to get out of bed. Still, it beats being at the office. I don't feel great just yet, but I guess I feel better than I did yesterday. I'm not perky, but I'm not sure if that's from the crud or just from being hugely pregnant.

Oh, please, just shoot me now.

Today I'm 34 weeks, 6 days pregnant. I'm big as a house, I hurt in strange places, I'm tired, I'm cranky, and now I'm sick to boot. Yep, that's right. My right ear is so clogged that I can hear my breathing echoing. My eyes itch like mad. My head is full of snot. My nose runs and clogs at the same time. Tomorrow, I'm staying home. I'll try to get in to see the doctor, too, because I'm not sure if this is allergies or sinus infection or what, but I think I need something stronger than Tylenol Allergy and Sinus to kick it. And I am not going to muddle through a few days, or a week, or longer, waiting for it to release its grip. Thus far, it looks like I'll be at work for the duration, and if I have to be at work, I certainly don't have to be there feeling pregnancy miserable and sick on top of it.

Grump, grump, whine, whine. Does anyone have the phone number for Roto-Rooter? Maybe they can help unclog my stuffy head.

Menu Plan Monday - March 16-22

Another Monday is upon us, and I've managed to do a menu plan for three weeks in a row! Woo hoo! Without further ado, here's this week's plan - you may notice that I've got some recipes I've listed in the past two weeks listed again here, and that's due to changes made on the fly. What's a plan for if not to deviate from occasionally?

Monday: Cheesecake Factory - dinner out with friends

Tuesday: Fish fry! Brian is picking up dinner, 'cause it's on sale.

Wednesday: Homemade pizzas

Thursday: Grilled steak, Crash Hot Potatoes, green salad, Yummy Delightful Mystery Rolls

Friday: Julie’s Crock Pot Korma, Curried Sweet Potatoes in Coconut Milk

Saturday: Pastitsio, Broccoli Ritz Cracker Casserole (Recipezaar), garlic bread

Sunday: Spaghetti squash, meat sauce, Balsamic and Brown Sugar Roasted Carrots , bread of some kind

Pumpkin Bread/Pumpkin Muffins

This is a recipe I got from my friend Annmarie. I made pumpkin bread for Christmas, and it was so good, I'm making pumpkin muffins now just because I want to.

15 oz. can pumpkin
4 eggs
1/2 cup vegetable oil
1/2 cup applesauce
2 cups sugar
3 1/2 cups flour
2 tsp. baking soda
1 1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp cinnamon
splash of vanilla
1/4 tsp pumpkin spice
1 cup mini chocolate chips
1 tsp nutmeg
1/4 tsp ginger

In large bowl, mix together pumpkin, eggs, applesauce, oil, sugar until well blended.

In separate bowl, mix together flour, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, etc.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease and flour (7 x 3) loaf pans

Stir dry ingredients into the pumpkin mixture until just blended.

Bake for about an hour or until toothpick tested.

Per Annmarie, muffins take about 30-40 minutes to bake.

Recipes I want to save

In doing the menu plan thing, I'm coming across a lot of recipes I'd like to hang on to. For now, I'm just posting links here so I can go back to them later, and hopefully save them in a more organized fashion! I'll probably keep adding to this as I find more recipes along the way.


Blueberry Wild Rice and Butternut Squash
Tuna, Macaroni and Cheese Casserole
1929 Depression Casserole
Crockpot Country Ribs with Mashed Potatoes
Spaghetti Squash and Chicken Bake
Texas Cowboy's Pie
Crockpot Stuffed Bell Peppers
Chocolate Chip Muffins (can make a big batch and freeze)
Giant Breakfast Cookies
Cuban Black Beans and Rice
Breakfast Burritos to Go
Pasta Carbonara
Chicken Spaghetti
BBQ Chicken and Cornbread Casserole (crockpot)
Mexican Chicken Skillet
Ginger Sweet Potato Chicken Bake
Ham and Potato Pockets (OAMC)
Chicken Ziti
Slow Cooker Apricot Chicken
Beef and Black Bean Burritos
Slow Cooker Curried Coconut Chicken
BBQ Chicken Pizza
Crockpot Country Ribs with Mashed Potatoes
Chicken Wraps with Balsam-melized Onions

Menu Plan Monday - March 9-15

Another week of menu planning, woo hoo! Last week went well - we made a few changes on the fly, but nothing that required extra grocery shopping, and we certainly had lots of leftovers during the week to take for lunch! We had to package some things up and freeze them for later use, we had such an abundance of food.

So without further ado, here's this week's menu plan (published a day late, but better late than never, yes?):

Monday - Spaghetti squash with meat sauce, garlic bread
Tuesday - Delicious Chicken Pot Pie, green salad
Wednesday - Sweet and Sour Hawaiian Beef Crockpot, The Best Southern Green Beans
Thursday - Cabbage with Meat Sauce, Redstone Restaurant Famous Cornbread with Maple Butter
Friday - Clean out the fridge, it's leftover night!
Saturday - Dinner out!
Sunday - Sweet and Sour Meatballs, Balsamic and Brown Sugar Roasted Carrots

Forty-three days and counting.

Well, one more appointment down as of yesterday afternoon. I'm feeling fat and rather uncomfortable, but my blood pressure is hangin' in there and doing OK. Rhys' heartbeat was about 144 BPM, so apparently he's doing all right, too. My next appointment is March 17, and after that, I expect I'll be moving to seeing my doc once every week.

And don't get me wrong, I'm glad my blood pressure is staying steady and glad both Rhys and I are healthy - I'm very, very thankful for those things. But today, I would have paid money to stay home. I hit snooze twice before I ever heard my alarm, and I was draggin'-butt tired. I hurt, and Rhys was squirmy as all get out this morning, which was slightly uncomfortable and made it hard to concentrate on work. The afternoon just got worse, too. My hips were hurting, I was having one of my random itchy spells (no rash or anything, so it's not anything that can be actually treated, I just use lots of moisturizer and wait for it to pass), hungry but unable to decide what might actually taste good if I were to eat it, and I just wanted to go home. I wanted to not be at work. I wanted to not be answering the phone and responding to e-mails and trying to make my brain work in a logical and coherent fashion. Blech. And I warned Brian that it's going to get worse before it gets better. LOL

Forty-three days to go....

Menu Plan Monday - March 2-8

I'm posting this early Monday morning, since I can't do it from work! Here's this week's menu plan - we're trying lots of new things this time around. Head on over to Organizing Junkie to check out other menu plans and recipe ideas.

Monday - Fish fry! Fried fish, French fries, hush puppies
Tuesday - Smoked chicken (Brian will be using his new smoker!), calabacitas, baked potatoes
Wednesday - Slow Cooker Sloppy Joes, sweet potato fries
Thursday - Breakfast for dinner - pancakes and bacon
Friday - Dinner out!
Saturday - Cabbage with Meat Sauce, Redstone Famous Cornbread with Maple Butter (Recipezaar)
Sunday - Oregano-Lemon Chicken, Mushroom/Red Pepper/Onion Saute, Buttered Wine Rice

Angel Biscuits

This is a recipe my mother used to make when I was growing up. It makes some tasty biscuits, and it's good for once-a-month/bulk cooking, as they can be rolled out and cut and then frozen unbaked.

5 cups all-purpose flour
5 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
5 tablespoons sugar
1 cup shortening
2 cups buttermilk
1 package yeast
1/4 cup warm water

Dissolve yeast in water and set aside. Sift all dry ingredients and cut in shortening. Add buttermilk and yeast and mix well. Pour onto floured board and knead. Then roll out to 1/4 or 1/2 inch thickness and cut. Put into greased baking pan and let rise to double size (about 1 1/2 hours).

Bake at 400 degrees for 15 minutes.

This dough will keep in a refrigerator for a week if covered tightly. Also, after cutting the biscuits out, they can be frozen on the pan and then placed in a plastic bag. They will not stick together. Take out as many as necessary and let them rise from one to two hours. Then bake.

Oregano-Lemon Chicken

Another for the menu plan.

4 chicken leg quarters (3 1/2 pounds)
3 T. lemon juice
2 T. honey
1 T. olive oil
3 garlic cloves, minced
2-4 tsp. dried oregano

With a sharp knife, cut leg quarters at the joints if desired. Place chicken in a greased 13" x 9" baking dish. Combine the lemon juice, honey, oil, garlic, and oregano; spoon over chicken.

Bake, uncovered, at 375 degrees for 45 minutes or until a meat thermometer reads 180 degrees and chicken juices run clear, basting occasionally with pan juices.

Cabbage with Meat Sauce

I guess this is sort of like an unrolled cabbage roll. We'll be trying it as part of our menu plan for the upcoming week.

1 pound bulk pork sausage
1 green pepper, chopped
1 C. chopped onion
1 C. tomato juice
1 14.5-oz. can diced tomatoes, undrained
2 tsp. dried oregano
1/4 tsp. salt
Pepper to taste
1/4 C. butter
1 medium head cabbage, thinly sliced

In a skillet, cook sausage, green pepper and onion until the sausage is browned; drain. Stir in the tomato juice, tomatoes, oregano, salt and pepper; simmer for 1 hour. Melt butter in a Dutch oven; saute cabbage over medium heat until tender, about 15 minutes. Transfer to a serving platter and top with the meat sauce.

NOTE: I always make big batches of homemade meat sauce and I plan to use that for this recipe. If the one that's posted doesn't sound good, feel free to improvise!

Sweet and Sour Meatballs

This recipe comes from the Better Homes & Gardens Fast Fix Family Food cookbook.

1 20-ounce can pineapple chunks
3/4 C. maple syrup or maple-flavor syrup
1/2 C. cider vinegar
1 12- to 16-oz. package frozen cooked meatballs
2 medium sweet red peppers
1/4 C. cold water
2 T. cornstarch
1/2 tsp. salt
2 C. hot cooked Asian noodles or rice

Drain pineapple; reserve liquid. In a large saucepan, stir together pineapple liquid, syrup, and vinegar. Add meatballs. Bring to boiling; reduce heat. Simmer, covered, for 15 minutes.

Remove seeds from sweet peppers and cut into 3/4-inch pieces. Add to meatballs. Simmer, covered, for 5 minutes.

In a bowl, stir together water, cornstarch and salt until smooth. Stir into meatball mixture. Cook and stir 1 to 2 minutes or until thickened and bubbly. Stir in pineapple chunks; heat through.

Serve over hot cooked noodles or rice.

Makes 4 servings.

Well, good grief.

Nearly a month since I've blogged. That just won't do. The problem that needed money thrown at it got resolved, and hopefully will be fine going forward. J's sleep issues have gotten a bit better, but now I'm to the point in my pregnancy where I wake up a zillion times a night to go to the bathroom or change positions or just for the heck of it, so I'm still not getting any decent sleep most nights.

And the baby has a name and a birthdate! His name will be Rhys Daniel, and his birthday will be April 16 - my c-section is scheduled for 7:30 AM, so barring some emergency that morning, I'll be first up for the day. I like that. Of course, I had a co-worker tell me this week that she doesn't think I'll make it to April 16. Not sure why she thinks that - I'm not that big (other co-workers have only recently started to comment on me having a belly, to which I think, well, gee, I'm only 32 weeks and change, I should look pregnant by now!), and Julian certainly didn't come out until the doctor made him come out, so I've got zero reason to think Rhys will come early. We'll see, I guess.

Brian's mom came this week - the two of them painted the nursery on Thursday (and it looks amazing! I'm now wanting to paint every room in my house! LOL), and she and I cleaned (REALLY cleaned) the kitchen and guest bathroom yesterday. I was wiped right out. Good thing I took the day off work yesterday, as just the act of getting to and from work and making it through the day (even with a desk job) seems to suck all of the energy right out of me. I want my pregnancy to be as healthy as possible, but right now, if my doc were to tell me I had to be home for a few weeks before Rhys gets here, I wouldn't be averse to that at all. I just feel better when I'm at home, even if I'm more physically active.

And it could happen that he'll tell me to stay home. A few days before my last appointment, I checked my blood pressure using a co-worker's monitor that she keeps at the office. It was 156/95. Yikes. With Julian, my blood pressure jumped up at about 36 1/2 weeks to the point where my doc did tell me to stop working and rest at home (not full-out bedrest, but he made it clear I wasn't to do much of anything strenuous). So I saw that reading and thought, well, crap, here we go again. Only it was a good bit earlier than 36 1/2 weeks. I called the doc's office, and the nurse said I'd be OK monitoring it as long as I wasn't having headaches or vision changes (which I wasn't). So I got my own monitor and went in for my appointment the following Tuesday. Every time I checked before that appointment, and every time I've checked since then, it's been fine - the highest has been something like 132/83, and it's been as low as 116/74. My doc told me to just keep an eye on it and make notes of my readings for my chart, and we'll see what happens. So far, so good. But like I said, some days I'd welcome two or three or four weeks at home before the baby gets here (assuming it wasn't a serious issue that kept me from working)! LOL

Brian's job is going well. Such an answer to prayer! He won't technically start earning paid time off until May, but they've already said they've got no problem with him taking a day or two off when the baby is born.

Julian is doing pretty well, too. He just finished up the fourth six weeks of the school year with an S in conduct. Woo hoo! What a change from the early part of the year, when he got notes sent home more often than not. He's doing a lot better academically, too, which just makes my heart happy. He's up to the last first-grade reading level, and right about where he should be in math.

Not having access to my bloggy resources at work, and then having issues trying to get my wireless internet set up at home, has thrown me off with my menu planning. We've still managed to be pretty frugal and not buy a whole lot of groceries and cook using what we have on hand, but it bugs me trying to think of something that day when I know I can do better planning ahead. So I'm trying now to do meal plans for two weeks at a time. I'll be working on that today and tomorrow, and hopefully getting all my coupons in order, too.

My next appointment is this Tuesday - I'm in the every-two-weeks category now. We'll see how things are going then!

Boy, do I have a lot to write.

Not right now, though. I can't get to my blog at work anymore, and time at home is often hard to come by, but I will update at some point.

And dang it, I was going to do another menu plan this week. I like menu planning. Alas, Monday has come and gone and I didn't get it posted. Maybe next week I'll get it posted on Sunday night.

Things are tiring. Julian is having sleep issues these days, not sure why. My ex is a hot mess and I'm not sure what to think of some things. We've had a little drama of our own that I won't go into right now - it can be resolved, it just needs money thrown at it, and I'm trying to come up with said money now. And I'm nearly 29 weeks pregnant, and we still have so much to do to get ready for the baby's arrival.

Can I just go back to bed?

Menu Plan Monday, first edition!

Yep, I'm finally trying to get into menu planning! I'm starting off simple, and just doing a plan for dinner, since that seems to be our most hectic meal of the day. Breakfast is always something quick like cereal, and lunch, Julian eats at school, and Brian and I usually bring leftovers. So here it is, my first menu plan:

Monday - "if you can catch it, you can eat it" (tonight I'm going to work on preparing some stuff ahead - meant to do it this weekend, but it didn't happen, so dinner tonight is something quick and easy)

Tuesday - Smoked sausage with peppers and onions served over rice

Wednesday - sandwiches/snacks (Brian has choir practice, and he leaves for it not too long after I get in from work and gets back late enough that we don't want to wait until then for dinner, so sandwiches/snacks it is)

Thursday - Spaghetti squash with meat sauce; salad; ciabatta bread

Friday - It's payday, we're eating dinner out!

Saturday - Curried pork with rice

Sunday - Fun with leftovers!

Pregnancy update

I'm 25 weeks, one day today. That means we've got less than four months left - YIKES! So much to do, so little time!

And good grief, I'm tired. I wake up tired, even if I don't wake up at night. When I get home, it's all I can do to manage dinner (and yes, Brian helps with cooking and/or clean-up) and bath for Julian (it doesn't help that my freakishly night-owl child doesn't give it up and sleep until 10:00 or later pretty much every night), and then drag myself to bed. This is like the first tri tiredness on steroids. I can't decide if it's just part of being 40 and pregnant, or if I may be anemic. I remember being horribly tired with Julian at about this same point in the pregnancy, and it turned out I was anemic. I'm going to ask my doc about checking my iron levels, because it would be very uncool if I took to falling asleep at my desk at work every day. It's not like that could go unnoticed in a cube farm.

Nearly three hours later...

Brian has called saying he's on his way home. Finally! The locksmith got lost twice on his way out there (this place really is in the middle of nowhere). Now if I could just find the wrapping paper. It's official, I suck at Christmas this year. Oh, and the one present that didn't get here? It's one of three things Julian actually wrote on his Christmas list (and the other two are coming from grandparents, not from Santa, so they won't be here tomorrow morning, either - we aren't even seeing Brian's parents until sometime in January, so it will be a good long while before he gets at least one of the three things on his list). I. Suck. At least the tree is up and stockings are hung.

Ho ho ho?

Brian called shortly after I got home. The key to my car, which he has there in the middle of nowhere east Texas, was locked in the trunk. There's not a spare there with him, and the odds of getting a locksmith out at this time on Christmas Eve were pretty much nonexistent. So he said he could either wait until Friday to come home, or he could break a window to get into the car, and get the key out of the trunk that way. Or I could drive three, four hours to get him tonight, and then three, four hours back, and then try to do Christmas tomorrow when we're all worn out, and then go back again on Saturday with Julian in tow, which just wouldn't be practical at all. And of course that would have meant spending God knows how much to get the window fixed. Of course I want him home, but I don't want to spend a bunch of money repairing the car window. And it's MY car. My baby. I didn't want a window smashed out. So much for that Christmas cheer I had going on, and I figured, there goes Brian's paycheck that he's bringing home. I was not a happy camper.

Then Brian called back - he did get hold of a locksmith. It will cost $60-100, but it's cheaper than a new window. God bless the locksmith who's working the late afternoon of Christmas Eve, and that was quite a relief! He'll be a bit later getting home, but I can handle that.

And now the fun continues. After getting not a lot of sleep last night, Julian spent the day at Kevin's. I told him he could open one present when he got home. He opened the one, and started crying and saying he didn't want that one. I really wish I could have some spiked eggnog right about now. *sigh* Ho ho ho?

Oh, and one of Julian's Christmas presents didn't arrive on time. It was supposed to get here today, and it's one he really, really wanted. I'm bummed.

What color Christmas lights are you?

Pilfered from Jenn at I Hate Whine.

You are Multicolored Lights

Your holidays are a time for cheer and excitement. You love so much about the holidays, and everyone perks up a little from your happiness. You try to be grateful for what you have this time of the year. Even if things have been tough, you can't help but be joyful.

What Color Christmas Lights Are You?