Meal Plan Monday

Sam's starting to make the 4pm-5pm nap a regular occurance which means that I finally get to start cooking real food again. Add in a small unexpected windfall last week that I used to stock my freezer with meat and it all adds up to a meal plan that I'm looking forward to.

Monday:
Pineapple mustard chicken, cauliflower gratin, rice

Tuesday:
Chicken parmesan, rotini, brocolli


Wednesday:
Crockpot bbq meatballs, herb and garlic potato wedges, roasted carrots

Thursday:
Cheeseburgers, sweet potato fries

Friday:
Melissa's french toast, bacon, fruit salad

Saturday:
Baked spaghetti, salad

Sunday:
Bbq chicken, cauliflower gratin, herb and garlic potato wedges

Need dinner ideas? Hop over to OrgJunkie's Menu Plan Monday to see what everyone else is cooking.

It's ok, I didn't need that ear anyway.

It's been 28 days since I last had full hearing out of my left ear. The flu turned into a horrible sinus infection turned into a clogged ear and here we are, 28 days later. I had the Dr check it when I had Sam there last week and it's not infected so I'm just supposed to wait it out and see what happens. So what I thought was a minor cold has turned into a 6 week extravaganza of coughing, sneezing, fevers, snot and hearing loss. If this is a sign of what the cold and flu season is going to be then, forget it. We're not leaving the house and no one is coming in until spring.

All that time inside will come in handy since we're on day 10 of potty training. Colin seems to have picked it up fairly quickly, we haven't had more than one accident a day since the second day and we've had a few days with none at all. He is still in diapers for bed though, he's not even close to being ready for nighttime training yet.

Sam had her 4 month check-up last week. She's now weighing in at 16lbs even and 25 inches long and wearing 6 month clothes. She's an expert roller and her favourite thing in the world is to lie on a blanket on the floor. Colin's favourite thing is to lie beside her and laugh at her so she laughs back. If I ever wonder why I chose to have a second baby, this is why. No matter how bad the day is, seeing them lying there together can always make me smile.

What doesn't always make me smile however, is my darling girl and her desire to crawl. So far she can get up on her hands and knees and rock back and forth, I anticipate crawling by the beginning of December. While I do appreciate her determination I'm not nearly as fond of the idea of a baby who crawls before 6 months.

Wish me luck, it could get crazy around here soon....

Now with 100% more baby and 300% more laundry!

It's hard to believe the last time I wrote was before Christmas. So much has happened since then. We moved, Colin turned two, mom got married, Derek lost his job and was home with us for 3 months before starting a new one last week and most importantly, our family is now complete. Samantha Rowan Katherine was born June 14th at 1:24pm, 8lbs 8oz and looking just like her brother and her Auntie Jo. Nursing has been a struggle, small baby and big boobs, but we're getting there. At this point her diet is about 65% formula and 35% breastmilk but some is better than none right?

So now that we've come out of the new baby haze I've got a few projects to start. The first is the FLYlady system. Since Sam was born I realized my old cleaning system of just doing it during naptime and after Colin was in bed was just not working anymore, leaving me running around until 11pm at night trying to get the house presentable. It's only day 3 but I like that she eases you into it slowly rather than trying to do it all on the first day.

The second is a home preschool program for the boys. My friend Melissa sent me tons of good info and links and I'm just starting to plan it all out. I'm going to try to make it Thomas themed as much as possible, Colin will pay attention to anything if it's even remotely connected to Thomas.

One thing I've been thinking of lately is what I want to do when the kids are in school full time (so not for 4 more years). As much as I would love to be a full time SAHM forever we could really use the extra money a job would bring. One option I am considering is going back to school to get my ECE diploma. Doing that would allow me to start an actual home daycare and if the home preschool thing works out then I could use that as a selling point. Then again I'm also thinking it would be nice to have something PT outside of the house where I would get to talk to adults again. Oh well, I've got 4 more years to figure it out.

Midwife appointment and Christmas

I had the first appointment with the midwife this afternoon. I can already tell that this is going to be a complete change from the OB care I had with Colin, and I'm so looking forward to it. It was so nice to have a conversation about my plans for delivery and to be treated like an intelligent adult who knows her own body.

I left Colin home with Derek and went to the appointment by myself so after I took advantage of the time alone to get a bit of Christmas shopping done. All that's left is to pop by Old Navy and grab two more gifts and then by Canadian Tire for some outdoor decorating stuff. Everything else is done, including stockings, and about 90% of it has already been wrapped. It looks like I might actually achieve my goal of not setting foot in a mall during the entire month of December.

OMG!

I seriously overestimated how much food we were going to eat last week. Add in a couple of spur of the moment dinners elsewhere (once at my Mom's once at my sister's) and you've got almost a whole week's worth of leftovers and uneaten meals to take care of.


Tuesday
pizza

Wednesday
bbq pork sandwiches, red pepper strips with dip

Thursday
turkey and rice soup with homemade bread

Friday
pork and baked beans, Caesar salad

Saturday
spaghetti, Caesar salad

Sunday
leftover turkey and rice soup with homemade dinner rolls

Monday
western omelets, fruit salad, toast

To see what everyone else is having for dinner this week, go over to Orgjunkie.

In other news, since Derek had the day off today I decided he should spend the day at home with Colin and I headed over to my sister's, sans baby. I think I spend so much time in Babyville that I forget that my niece and nephew aren't babies anymore. Right now, they're upstairs playing in the playroom by themselves. I'm just not used to not having to always be right there with them. It's 6:30 at night and I'm having quiet time. This concept is completely foreign to me, but I like it.

Bagels!

Ever since we discovered Colin's red dye allergy I've become a label reading maniac. I don't think I ever realized just how many foods have artificial colouring in them. Of course, most labels will just say "colour" and won't tell you WHAT colours they used so we've had to take out so many things. The upside to this is that it's got me cooking from scratch again. Tonight it was blueberry bagels.

I use this recipe that I got from the lovely 4Hats. I've made the recipe as is and it's fantastic but this time I decided to substitute 1c. of frozen blueberries for the raisins.

The dough

Letting them rise

Boiling

The finished product

I don't know if it's the lighting in my kitchen or something with my camera, but these pictures don't do justice to the colour of the finished bagels. They are a really rich indigo/violet with dark navy pieces of blueberry throughout. They're not nearly as perfect looking as store bought bagels but they taste amazing and as an added bonus my kitchen now smells like cinnamon and blueberries.