We are sisters...

Hip hip horray! This weekend marked the First Annual (hopefully) Lillywhite Girls Weekend. My mom, 3 sisters, and 2 sister-in-laws, and I stayed in Salt Lake for the weekend--no kids, no hubbies, just a lot of food, fun and shopping.
I was a little nervous to leave Ethan for 5 days but he did great, thanks to his amazing dad and some good friends. Instead of bawling the moment he saw me come off the airplane because he missed his mom who he's typically glued to, he glanced at me and went back to reading his book. I picked him up and hugged him, but he just gave me a quick smile and turned back to Brian asking him to finish reading the book to him. What a silly boy! It's great, he has seemed much more comfortable playing by himself since I've been back. I guess I'll have to leave more often ;)
It seemed to be a great refresher for me to get back into being a stay at home mom (I did really miss B & E), Brian learned a lot ("we've had lots of fun, but I've learned a lot--taking care of Ethan all day is HARD work!"), and Ethan seems to be happier and not as clingy. Yes, I think I'll have to do this yearly.

Can you guess who are the sisters and who are sisters-in-law? Probably not...
L-R: Carmelle (sister), Alyssa (sister), Mom, Kaitlin (sister), Lindsey Kay (SIL), me, and Lindsey Marie (SIL)

And the final answer is...

It's a BOY!
It's true, Ethan gets a little brother to get into trouble with! What am I going to do surrounded by all these boys? I'm really excited, it will be fun to have these kids be friends and it fits perfectly into our budget--same season as Ethan, so we're set supplies and clothes!
I'm still feeling good at 19 weeks, I never got sick, but crash for the night at about 7 or 8 if I can't squeeze in a short nap during Ethan's naptime. No longer do I hear Brian question if I'm really pregnant. Apparently the previous ultrasounds, pregnancy test, tiredness, heartburn, and constant hunger weren't enough to convince him. He wanted to see a belly or sickness (I haven't been eager to do either). Now that I can't button my jeans and am about to bust out the maternity clothes, he's fully convinced. Let the games begin! And the name picking too :)

Surprise Piano Recital

This weekend we visited Brian's parents for a surprise piano recital. Brian's mom has taught piano for 26 years and usually puts on an April recital, but because of health issues with her cancer this year, she had to forgo her beloved annual recital.
As a surprise, some of her good friends arranged for some of her piano students, past and present, to learn a recital piece to perform for Eileen in a surprise recital. It was great! The heartwarming night made us all cry. The students worked so hard and were so cute in playing their pieces. Many of the songs were by beginning students and were only a couple lines long.
As the last performance, Brian played an amazing song to pay a tribute to his mother who taught him piano and gave him a love of playing. Grandma and Grandpa wanted to hear it, so here it is. (sorry about the horrible camera work, I blame it on my crying child, being mesmerized by the piece and not paying attention, and holding the camera with my arms resting on my prego tummy while breathing in and out)

Enjoy! (it's quite amazing, I can't even figure out how to play a hymn without messing up)

Mini Iron Chef

Typically dinner prep goes like this:
1. Mom stands in the kitchen trying to cook dinner while little Ethan cries, screams, and whines to be picked up.
2. Within 2 minutes, mom picks chubby up and proceeds to try to prepare the meal one-handed.
3. Within another 2 minutes, mom puts down the rascal because, frankly, if trying to cut up veggies and meat on the cutting board while holding a toddler isn't impossible, it's at least quite dangerous.
4. Repeat steps 1-2
5. Put down Ethan because stirring food on the stove is, as before, if not impossible then dangerous while carrying a munchkin.
6. Repeat steps 1-2.


Now:
1. Put Ethan on chair near me in kitchen
2. Let me him go hog-wild "cooking" with me (pulling everything out of a drawer and pretending to mix things together.
3. Periodically, I will make sure he feels important by letting him "pour" something in or at least hold some of the ingredients (for example, today while making enchiladas, he taste-tested each tortilla so they each had bites taken out of them).



For the past few weeks, Ethan has LOVED it when it's time to make dinner now. Phew, no more near cut off fingers or burned off hands from Ethan reaching down to "help" me as I held him.

Of course, a few days ago, he pulled the onions I had just chopped on the cutting board over to him. I knew it was a strong onion since typically cutting them doesn't bother me, but this one really made my eyes sting. I watched to see what he would do. He picked up a handful, took a bite, then took another bite, and another, and got a new chunk to munch on.
Feeling disgusted, I gave him a slice of apple I was now slicing. A bite of that and he spit the apple out. He's quite the picky boy, but maybe I'm just feeding him the wrong things. Maybe I should go against my instincts and feed him what sounds the worst.

Do You Have It?

Paraskevidekatriaphobia


According to one study: Hospital admissions increased 52% on Friday the 13th.
Authors conclude: "Friday the thirteenth is unlucky for some. Staying home is recommended."

Though I may contributing to this statistic (not an admission, but a dr. appt. and ultrasound at the hospital, whoopie!, I get to say hello to little munchkin), I will not be staying home. We will be celebrating the onset of...........

SPRING BREAK!

Food Storage

Saturday I took a LONG list to Walmart. My parents gave us money to get started on our 3-month food supply for Christmas, and it took me a while to figure out what we would need. I have no idea if this is even close to the right amount of food, but it's a start. 2 1/2 overflowing carts later, I came home with all this. The checkers at the store thought I was completely nuts, and I was questioning that myself as I put cases upon cases into my cart.



A huge concern about getting started on our food storage was the latter part: Storage. We love our apartment but that is definitely an area it is lacking. I didn't think there was ANYWHERE we could store anything else unless we made a mountain of canned goods, covered it with a tablecloth and called it our coffee table. Luckily, we didn't need to do that. I was able to clear everything we had out of our "pantry" closet (none of it was food). We'd be using it as a regular storage closet since it was the only one we have. I was able to get rid of some things, and creatively move the others. And... I got ALL (almost) of the food storage into the pantry! Of course, it's full to the brim and it'll be a pain to try to add anymore or actually try to get anything out, but we did it!

Since I mainly focused on getting everyday-type foods, now I feel more ready to move on to bulk food storage items like dried foods and grains.

Ethan was also a big help. As soon as the groceries were brought in and he saw all the cans, he searched through the kitchen drawers until he found both our can openers and proceeded to try to figure how the heck his mom opens the cans. I had no idea he'd ever noticed me using one.

My TIPS:
1. Set a goal, whether it is how much to spend initially or how much to get by a certain date.
2. Find good resources. My favorites were http://foodstoragemadeeasy.net/ (GREAT spreadsheets to help get a reliable count of what you need) and http://everydayfoodstorage.net/ (nice handouts, recipes, and tutorials).

My QUESTION:
1. How can I rotate my food and ensure that I am not just using up my food storage? I really hope my grocery bills don't start dropping because I'm using food storage and not replacing it, but I also don't really want to tally each tiny thing I take from the pantry each time I use something.

Coming Fall 2009

A Teeny Weeny Cheney!

A.K.A.: The Bean

E.T.A: September 21


I've been feeling great, I feel so blessed not to get sick with pregnancy. Of course, I've had little things like heartburn, needing to snack all the time and being extra tired, but what kind of a person would complain about having to eat and sleep more? I love good excuses like that :)

I've been terrible at blogging lately, but I couldn't stand posting anything but this exciting news! So, now that the secret's out, I'll try to be better at getting more posts on.