Good Riddance

I am so so SO glad January is over.  Halle-freakin-lujah.  Now if we can just get rid of these lingering colds everything will be great.  Staying in for weeks on end is enough to drive a girl insane.
We got absolutely pounded by snow this week--and I loved it!  Especially now that I've got a big ol' SUV with 4 wheel drive, it's even fun to drive in.

The kids enjoying the snow, albeit powdery snow (aka crappy snow that won't make a snowman).

Even though I love the snow, this has been on constant rotation in my car.  It makes me feel like I'm driving around in Hawaii again, and also takes me back to my high school days when No Doubt was a staple in my music stash.  

Are you excited for the Super Bowl?  I'm excited for the food. Awhile back I accidentally bought 2 pounds of Velveeta cheese because I thought I needed it for a soup recipe.  Well I didn't use it and have wondered how on earth to use it ever since--I'm not really a Velveeta kinda girl--but now that the big game is here, this chili dip is calling my name!  Also I'm making these Oreo Chocolate Chip Peanut Butter Bars from Picky Palate.  Can you say yum?  

One last thing...this little collection of What Not To Wear Gif's is my favorite....oh I love those two!

Fresh

Well it's been two months since I last blogged.  I don't know what it is lately but when I go to click on blogger I have this "ick" reaction.  But be assured we had a great holiday and even though January is being its usual cruel self to us, we are doing OK.   We've spent the last week cooped up at home, all of us sick (me even in bed for 2 days which is realllly hard with kids) and miserable.  But I think we are finally on the upswing.
(Oh and we woke up this morning to no water.  So double yay! Fortunately my handy hubby figured it out--our water meter was completely frozen--and fixed it within an hour.  It's hard to go without water even that long!)
So our big news is that sometime before Halloween we found out that I am pregnant.  Baby #3! And I know, I know, remember that post about me not wanting more kids?  Well I just couldn't shake the feeling we were supposed to have another one.  As much as I fought it I just felt like I needed one more.  And I know why I put it off for awhile.  Because everyone acted like if I have a 3rd child, I had to have a 4th.  Because you can't have an odd number of kids!  What about when you go to Disneyland?!  Who is going to sit by themselves on the rides??!?!
Well I finally came to the conclusion that I am not planning my life around a freakin trip to Disneyland.  I'll have 3 kids and everything will be fine.  After all, I grew up the oldest of 3 kids, and no, my life wasn't torn apart every time we went to Disneyland.
So there is no pressure to have 4.  None at all.
Aaaaaaaanyway we found out a couple of weeks ago that it is a boy and I am soooo happy.  Because holy lands, is my daughter hard.  Last night we had scones for dessert and she ran to her room BAWLING because hers didn't have enough butter on it.  We just stared at each other like,  "What just happened?" She is the only girl I can handle.
Baby boy is due the end of May.  And I already feel HUGE.  You know those darling girls that get pregnant and look like they have a little basketball stuck under their shirt?  Yeah that is so NOT me.  I am a beast when I am pregnant.  A huge, fat, ugly, hormonal beast.  So here goes! Another four months until I feel human again!

Man, I sound so maternal.

Because I hate photo-less posts, here are some from our Christmas.

Oh and my brother got home from Afghanistan, safe and sound!  It is such a relief.  I just wish his home wasn't across the Pacific!  Can't wait to see him in March when they come out here.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Just a quick post to say how excited I am for this weekend.  It is one of my favorite holidays, and also means that the Christmas season is upon us.  Today I am making all of my pie crusts and tomorrow I will do 2 pumpkin pies, an apple pie, and yam souffle for our dinner at my mom and dad's house.
Then onto shopping for 24 hours with my sister in-law.  It seriously ticks me off that stores now open on Thanksgiving--I can't even relax and enjoy the post dinner bloat/nap.  But we brave the crowds anyway.  Black Friday seriously brings out the crazies (I guess including me), but we have so much fun and I seriously get soooo much done.  As in pretty much all of my Christmas shopping.  I hope I get all I want--even though I NEVER do. I'll never forget last year when I was trying to get a kitchen for my daughter and the crowd literally was like a pack of wildebeests going after the kill.  It was one of the scariest moments of my life.  So I never go for the big ticket items on these sales.  It's just not worth the possibility of being trampled.
And on that note, I hope you all have a safe, enjoyable holiday!

Photo via.  I printed this out and have it in my kitchen.  Isn't it cute?

Weird Food Habits

This week we had Kraft Macaroni and Cheese for dinner...not once but twice.  How pathetic are we?  And I don't know about you but I cannot eat mac and cheese without mixing ketchup with it (only kraft though, not the homemade kind).  I thought this was normal, but the reaction from my hubby told me it was in fact not normal.  But you should try it, the ketchup makes it tangy.
Another one I used to LOVE as a kid is grilled cheese in the waffle iron topped with strawberry jam.  Yes, you heard right.  Grilled cheese and jam. (I only had grape on hand--which I do not recommend.  It has to be strawberry or raspberry.)  And grilling it in the waffle iron gives it the holes to hold lots of jam. Try it you will not be disappointed.

So that got me wondering, do you have any weird food habits?  

Why Do I Blog?

Awhile ago I was reading a blog post (surprise surprise, I can't remember where I was reading) that asked readers if they tell people in the "regular world" that they have a blog.  My answer, for some odd reason, was a big fat NO.  I just feel like either you are a blogger/blog reader person or you are not.  Most of the people in my life are not.  So I'm not really out there sharing that I have a blog.  In fact one of my sister in laws almost pokes fun of me and asks me if I'm going to blog about something.  (Maybe I will.  Sheesh.)  Do you share your blog with others?  I guess most of it boils down to the fact that I'm a tad embarrassed about my blog.  I'm not inventive, or creative, and have no real pizzazz for writing.  But I know one thing for sure: I enjoy it.  I enjoy connecting with others while I'm at home making peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and diffusing toddler arguments in my sweats pants.  And while I don't have a huge readership, and just in general have no real direction in this blogging world, I'm going to keep doing it.  It's fun.  And it can be done in glorious gray sweat pants.

Also, I think I am finally out of my post-vacation rut.  It has literally taken me months to get over this post-paradise depression.  In fact when we got home, we were so down, we tried to see if we could swing another trip out there before the year was through.  It didn't happen, but that's ok.  We'll survive.  And plan a new trip somewhere else. :)

What to do With All of That Halloween Candy

We had a great Halloween, and as usual my kids got tons of candy.  And guess what do we do with all of it?  Make a Christmas countdown chain!  We did this last year, and I cannot for the life of me remember where I got the idea.  But it cut our Halloween stash down so much that I knew it would be something we do year after year.  And the kids loved doing the countdown each day in December.

Just start by rolling out a reallllly long piece of saran wrap, add pieces of candy, wrap them and tie a ribbon in between.

I just did it for the month of December (25 pieces), and it cut my kids Halloween candy stash down to 7 pieces each.  Now that I can handle.

And of course, save the best for last:

A New Look and Our Halloween

Before I talk about Halloween, have you seen the new blog?  It is amazing!  Colleen of Paisley Boulevard did a redesign for me and I love it!  Don't you? :)  I cannot thank her enough for all of the time she spent on this little tiny blog and want her to know how grateful I am for it!

What a great October we had!  First up was the pumpkin patch a few weeks ago to pick out our pumpkins.

Next up was the Halloween party last Saturday.  I did my old standby vampire costume, and my hubby was a Peruvian since he had a few authentic pieces--but I didn't get a picture of him.

Scary!  The hubs ended up winning both the chili contest and the pumpkin carving contest.  I might have to post the chili recipe here some day, it really is delicious.  And here is the winning pumpkin:

Along with our other non award-winning pumpkins:

Trick or treating with the kids is always fun.  They both get so excited and their excitement is infectious.  Every time Bud got a new piece of candy he'd say his bucket was getting heavy, or that he was getting "lots and lots" of candy.  Here's our kitty and football player:

Hope you all had a great Halloween!