We have been busy making so many things here. I think my kids are at the most fun age for Christmas. They are so excited about every single aspect of Christmas, particularly the gift-giving one. Noah brings me his toys all day long, wanting me to help him wrap them for Emma and Allie, and Emma is hard at work pretty much every spare minute, making cards, ornaments, and presents for everyone she can think of.One of the things we have made so far is marshmallows. I made simple little baskets for Noah's teachers with hot chocolate, candy canes, and the marshmallows.They were really fun to make, and I think they turned out pretty well. Just one more reason to have more hot chocolate around here!

It is cold, cold, cold here! We had some snow Saturday night and yesterday morning the kids insisted on going outside to play. I think it took about an hour to drag all the snow stuff out and bundle everyone up. Allie took the longest because she slapped on a hat and some ski pants and insisted she was ready to go, refusing to put on anything else for quite some time.Once they got outside, I think they lasted about three minutes. I snapped this picture of Noah through the window, safe inside the warm house. Doesn't it look miserable out there?!

This year I participated in the the same ornament swap that I done for the last five (or is it six?) years. I almost opted out this time, mostly because I don't do much crafting these days and I didn't know if I'd have the time, but now that it's over I'm glad I did it and I'm already thinking about what I can make for next year's swap.

I made these little cupcake ornaments, and I think they turned out pretty well. I had an extra one that I made for myself, but I ended up giving it to someone else. I'd like to have one to keep, but I'm pretty sick of making cupcakes, so I don't know if that will happen!As always, I got some pretty adorable stuff in return. It's always fun to hang the new ornaments on the tree.Since I was already doing the ornament swap, I went ahead and did another swap that included making something for four other friends. I made them each a set of four cloth napkins.In exchange, I received a Christmas plate, two knitted washcloths, a hanging kitchen towel, and a decorated canvas that is now hanging in our living room.For both of these swaps, I am happy to say that I used only items that I already had in my basement. My goal was to not buy anything new, and it isn't as fun as going to pick out new fabric, etc., but I did it. There is so much fabric, yarn, and other random crafty stuff in my basement that I could probably do swaps for several years and still never have to buy anything new!

Last week I was reading through some of my old blog posts, and feeling sorry that I haven't blogged nearly as often in the last two years. I am feeling a little more inspired after reading old posts, so now I'm going to try to blog at least once a week. In the past I always tried to have pretty pictures on here, but now it seems like whenever I take pictures with the intent of using them in the blog, it just doesn't ever happen. The pictures sit in my camera for weeks and never see the light of day. So, I am hopefully going to be blogging more, but be warned that most pictures will likely be those of the crappy cell phone variety. Since I can take those and immediately email them to myself, I am much more likely to actually blog about them!

Christmas season is officially in progress around here! We had promised the kids we would put up our tree the weekend after Thanksgiving, and they were seriously beside themselves with excitement. I wanted to put up the little tree again, but I was outvoted 4-1. Sunday afternoon, we set up the tree and then immediately discovered that very few of last year's lights still worked (doesn't that always happen?) so we had to pause work on the tree for a run to the store. One store turned into two and then it was time for dinner and then we remembered that Emma still had homework to do, and before we knew it, it was time for the kids to go to bed.

They were pretty upset so we let them each pick out four ornaments to hang on the tree, with a promise that we'd finish the tree as soon as Emma got home from school on Monday, along with some hot chocolate and gingersnap cookies. We still had the cookies left from when I made them for Thanksgiving, but I immediately regretted offering up the hot chocolate. We don't ever have hot chocolate here, and I don't even really like it much, so I wasn't relishing the idea of a trip to the store just to get some.When I talked to my mom the next morning, she suggested I make it from scratch. Ah-ha! Why didn't I think of that, or even realize it was possible? So that afternoon, we had a fun time decorating the tree while munching on cookies and drinking some really really delicious hot chocolate. (It probably didn't hurt that I added some Bailey's to mine!) It was so easy to make, and so much tastier, that I will certainly not ever use the powdered stuff again. I actually made some more that night after the kids were in bed, just for Steve and myself. Yum!

Now that the tree is up, I am glad we ended up going with the bigger one. It hasn't been knocked over yet, although we've has several ornament casualties already. I thought I put all the breakable stuff at the top, but apparently the kiddos can find a way to break even non-breakable things!

And this is totally unrelated, but I got some new slippers and I am so in love with them. If you see me this winter, you can probably expect me to be wearing these slippers (and likely drinking hot chocolate as well)!

Wow, I can't believe how much time has passed since I've updated here. It seems like our weeks are just flying by these days. Some random stuff...
~ For awhile I've been wanting to take turns with Steve, taking our kids on "dates" for some one-on-one time. Yesterday Emma and I went on our first date. We spent the afternoon at a Ceramics and Coffee Shop place, just painting, drinking delicious drinks, and chatting. It was really pleasant, and I'm already trying to think something fun for Noah and me for next time. I've already penciled Noah and Steve's date in for November, just to make sure we don't let another month slip by without a date.~ I love love love fall, and lately I've been going a little nuts cooking fall-type things. Towards the end of last week, I planned our menu for the weekend and didn't even realize until I was getting ready to make dinner Sunday night that pretty much our entire diet over the weekend had consisted of some type of fall vegetable. Friday night we had chicken enchiladas with pumpkin cream sauce, Saturday morning we had pumpkin quinoa parfaits, Saturday for dinner we had butternut squash bisque (which went so perfectly with these garlic knot rolls), Sunday I made roasted vegetable dip for snacking during the football game, and then for dinner we had pumpkin rigatoni. Isn't that ridiculous? I told you I went a little overboard, and it was even enough for Steve to make up a silly little song about all the members of our family turning into various types of squash. I haven't been taking too many food pictures lately, but I did snap one of the vegetables for the dip before I roasted them. They were so pretty, I just couldn't help myself. (Emma said, "Mommy, it seems weird that you like to take pictures of vegetables!") Also, the picture above isn't really the pumpkin quinoa parfait. It's actually a spiced quinoa apple pie parfait that I had a few weeks ago, but maybe if you squint, you can tell yourself it's the pumpkin one.
~ Since my children have started nursing a little less, I have noticed that those lovely old calories aren't burning quite as fast as they used to. Some of my clothes weren't fitting right (or at all) and I really didn't want to start going down that road. I had heard about the 30 Day Shred from a few people so, thinking that I could manage anything for only twenty minutes a day, I decided to give it a try. I started it on October 1st, so I am just about finished with my thirty days. I am happy to report that, even though the difference probably isn't noticeable to anyone else, my clothes that were previously a tad snug are now much more wearable. Woo! I keep flexing for Steve and he acts like he can't see my new rippling muscles (ha!), but I think maybe he is just jealous!

~ I just baked some cookies and cream cheesecake bars to take to Emma's school tomorrow for a teacher lunch, and I am so really really happy that tomorrow morning I get to cut them into bars before I take them to school. That means I can keep one (or two or five). They are cooling in the kitchen right now and I can barely control myself.

~ I started this post Sunday night and now it's Tuesday night. Ah well, better late than never, right?

Noah started preschool yesterday, and it was apparently a huge success. This morning he was looking for his backpack before he even got dressed, and he started to cry when I told him that there was no preschool today.He was SO excited yesterday morning that I think it was killing him to have to wait until 9:30 to go. He wore his backpack for an hour before it was even time to leave, and he must have asked me how much longer about fifty times.When we walked in the classroom, his teacher greeted him and in response he said, "I'm excited to be at school!" He walked over to a shelf full of toys and sat down without even a backward glance at us. Steve asked if he wanted some good-bye hugs and kisses, and he just sort of shrugged and said no. Allie was a little too insistent for that, and after several shrieks of, "Kiss! KISS! KISS!", Noah finally looked up from the toys to give her a kiss.Of course, that still wasn't quite enough and she had to give him several hugs before we actually left. Luckily, she spent most of the time he was there taking a long nap, so she didn't even really have time to miss him. I did miss him though, and was glad when he happily jumped up and ran to me for a hug as soon as I picked him up.

Ever since we've started trying trying to drastically cut down on our eating out habits, I've really been missing going out to breakfast. We used to go out pretty much every Saturday and Sunday morning, and starting our weekend mornings at home is just not the same.

I did, however, discover a nifty little trick that helps me feel somewhat better about the whole thing. I really love cinnamon rolls - and really, who doesn't? - but they're kind of a hassle to make and then there are always so many that everyone gets sick of them before we eventually have to throw some out. Well, awhile back I read a blog entry about freezing cinnamon rolls and it was such a great idea that I can't believe I had never heard of it before.
The kids and I made a triple batch of cinnamon rolls, which they all thought was a lot of fun. They like to knead and roll the dough, and also add huge amounts of flour to it as soon as my back is turned.
Once we had cut all the rolls, we froze them separately on a cookie sheet, then bagged them. We ended up with four one-gallon freezer bags full!Now, once a week, either on Friday or Saturday night, I get about eight of them out of the freezer. I place them in a round pan and cover it with saran wrap, then go to bed. They thaw and rise during the night and we wake up to perfectly risen cinnamon rolls, just ready to be popped in the oven. Making the icing takes about one minute, so it's pretty much the easiest breakfast ever. I still miss going to Mimi's Cafe for their awesome Egg's Benedict, but these cinnamon rolls help me not miss it quite so much.
Another quick, and similar, note - I also discovered this works with pizza crust. Probably everybody else in the world has been doing this for years, but I am still pretty excited about my ability to make a bunch of pizza crust all at once and freeze the dough in single pizza portions. I take the ball of frozen dough out of the freezer around noon on the day we are going to eat it, and by dinner time, it's thawed and risen and ready to go. We have been having pizza a LOT lately because of this, but no one around here is complaining. Last night's pizza - eggplant and goat cheese - might have been the best ever. Yum!

We've had our dog, Jose, for over eight years now. We got him before we were married and we absolutely adored him. He dropped down on the totem pole once we started having kids, obviously, but we still liked him and he's always been a good family dog. He eats every single speck of food as soon as it touches the floor, and considering the amount of food that falls on the floor around here, this is my favorite quality of his. Nevertheless, there are still times when I occasionally wish we didn't have a dog, like when he refuses to go outside during a thunderstorm and instead pees on the floor. Grrr.

So last week we noticed that he was squinting with his left eye. He didn't seem to be acting any differently so we just sort of ignored it. On Thursday I noticed that he eye was looking kind of cloudy, but my grandmas were coming in to visit that night so I figured we'd just take him to the vet after the weekend. Well, by Saturday it was looking really bad so we decided we had to take him to the vet. On the way there he had his head hanging out the window in the wind, which was apparently a huge mistake because afterward it looked so terrible that I couldn't even really stomach looking at it. I felt pretty embarrassed walking into the vet with a dog who looked like he'd been totally neglected. The vet said it was so bad that she didn't even know how to treat it, so she referred us to a dog ophthalmologist, and called him in after hours so he would be there when we got there.

On the way there, I told Steve we should probably discuss what we would do if it was going to cost like $1000 or something. We have both said in the past that we would not pay more than $500 for our dog, so I figured we should make sure we were still on the same page, although I wasn't sure what page I was really on anymore. Steve shrugged that off, saying it was not going to cost very much because Jose probably just needed some eyedrops.

So, we got there and before the doctor did the exam, he wanted to let us know about pricing up front. He quickly looked at the eye, but didn't do an actual thorough exam. Since it was after hours, the exam alone was going to be $350. He said it was an ulcer on the cornea and we could try to treat it with medicine, which would cost $600. He thought it was too late for medicine anyway though, and said our best option was to have surgery, which costs $2000! We were completely stunned. The doctor left to give us a few minutes to talk it over and decide what we wanted to do.

The rational part of me was saying that we couldn't spend that much, while the rest of me watched Emma cry and ask if Jose was going to be okay, then noticed that Steve (who I have only seen tear up twice in ten years) was wiping away tears. Then I looked at that darn dog and he was looking up at me, wagging his tail, as if to say, "Hey, we're friends, right?" Basically the options were either put him to sleep or spend a total of $2500 to make him better. I told Steve that they were both terrible options and I didn't want to pick either one, so he could decide and whatever he chose would be fine with me. He said he just wouldn't feel right picking money over Jose, and also that it seemed cruel to kill an otherwise healthy dog just because he has an injured eye. I said okay, and we called the doctor back in and told him to go ahead and do the surgery.

We picked him up a few hours later and as we were driving him home, we both said we were sure we made the right decision. We have to take him back four more times for check-ups, but he is apparently going to be okay. They gave us a ton of medicine - three kinds of pills and three kinds of drops - that I have to give him multiple times each day. The drops need to be at least five minutes apart so it's not like I can just put them all in at once, which means my new full time job is to administer medicine to our dog. I made myself a chart to keep track of it. Also, the first day when he was really groggy from the surgery, I was surprised at how well he handled the drops. He hardly moved when I would put them in, but now that he is much more perky, he hates the drops so it's like a mini wrestling match every time I have to put them in. I will be so glad when I can stop!What a lucky dog. I hope he appreciates this!

Noah ran around the corner into the kitchen, covered with marker, and exclaimed "I'm a wolf!"

We have some pretty big news around here. It appears as though Noah has weaned. I was ready for him to be finished, and although he really adored nursing, it went surprisingly smoothly and actually even happened mostly by accident. I am feeling really good about it all.

Several months ago I started limiting him to nursing five times a day: during the night, when waking up in the morning, before and after nap, and before bed. I liked that he wasn't nursing all day long anymore, but that didn't stop him from asking all day long, and he'd get pretty upset and whiny when he wanted to nurse but couldn't. I got pretty tired of that after a month or two, so we moved it to just once a day - before his nap. That seemed to help, and it worked perfectly because it gave him time to wind down and then (hopefully) fall asleep quickly. He still asked often, and I always said, "We can nurse before your nap, but I'd love to cuddle with you now," so we spent a lot of time cuddling on the couch and that seemed to satisfy him.

He will be starting preschool this fall, two days a week for four hours a day, and he won't be able to take naps on the days he has school. I figured we would just give up naps all together then instead of trying to get him to nap some days and some days not. A couple weeks ago, though, he started taking forever to fall asleep for naps, and then forever to fall asleep at night. Instead of forcing it for the next few weeks, I decided we'd just go ahead and stop with the naps now. It wasn't until after I made that decision and even told him he didn't have to take naps anymore that I thought about nursing. With no nap, there was no opportunity to nurse, although I didn't mention that to him.Every morning before we get out of bed, he asks to nurse. I always suggest we cuddle instead, and every single day he says, "But can I nurse before my nap?" and I tell him he can. Sometimes in the afternoon if he seems tired I will ask him if he wants to take a nap, and he always says no.

I think it's been about a week now since he last nursed. It's almost like he weaned and never even really noticed. This is so opposite of my experience with Emma that I'm still a little incredulous. I think the best part of this is that there is no door slamming shut; I never had to say there is absolutely no more nursing. So, if on some random day in a few days or weeks or months he decides he wants to take a nap and nurse first, no big deal.

He is really into cuddling now and asks to cuddle several times a day. Yesterday we were laying on the couch together and he said, "We sure do like to cuddle together, don't we, Mommy?" And of course, he is absolutely right.He is pretty sensitive to things that are "scary". Last time we went to the library, he picked out a book that involves a truck going into a spooky junkyard. It's a little too much for him to sit next to me and look at the pictures of the spooky junkyard, so he always hops down on the floor and covers his eyes until that part is over.

Awhile back there was an amazing deal on Groupon for a photographer, and since the family picture we currently have displayed in our living room doesn't even include Noah or Allie, I happily bought it.

I should point out that, even though our picture is so out of date, that is not because we haven't had any others taken in the meantime. Last December we had a family picture taken by Olan Mills for our church directory. They turned out really, truly horrendous, but that didn't stop us from purchasing $156 worth of the photographs. (Steve can't say no to anyone who is trying to sell him something.) Allie's nose was running, Emma's hair looked dirty, Noah was grimacing in every photo, my hair was in my face, and Steve was doing some weird winking thing. Don't ask me how we all managed to look so terrible at one time, but rest assured that when those photographs arrived in the mail, I stuck them under a pile of stuff in my closet, never to see the light of day again.

Then, in April my whole family stood together in my parent's yard and I used a tripod and remote to get some shots of all of us. I also took a couple of my own family at the time, but none of those are anything that I'm willing to display on my wall, either.

So, when I saw the Groupon, I jumped at it. I was pretty excited, but the whole thing seemed a little jinxed from the start because we were doing an outside shoot and it was pouring rain. The photographer suggested we go under a bridge in the west bottoms, and under there we managed to stay at least 90% dry. Another strike against us was that Allie was a little sick, and consequently not feeling very cheery, but we hoped she could muster up a few smiles anyway.

In spite of the rain and the sick baby, things weren't going too terribly, until I noticed that we were standing by what is a local haunted house during Halloween season. I stupidly pointed out a werewolf figure in the window, which freaked Noah out enough that he refused to smile after that as well. I mean really, have you ever seen a more somber trio of children?
Zero smiles from those three, until I realized that Allie seemed to be chewing on something. Since there was nothing around us but a bunch of pigeon poop, I didn't know what could be in her mouth. I asked her to open up and show me. She promptly spit out a little glob of pigeon poop, much to the amusement of her siblings. Gag! At least that was the closest we got to having all the kids not look completely miserable.
And once again, there is not a single picture of the five of us that I think is worthy of actually being displayed in our house. We have tons of just the kids, but for now Steve and I will have to be content having only our wedding pictures on the walls.

Remember how I was recently complaining about how I have no recycling in my area? Well, my friend Jaime informed me that there is a place about twenty minutes away where I can take all our stuff to be recycled. I am so excited about this that it might even be a little ridiculous. Upon hearing this great news, I immediately went out and got some bins to set up our own little recycling center in our garage. Today we made our first drop-off trip to the recycling center, so hurray, we are officially no longer loading up the landfills with our recyclable items!When I was taking this picture of our little recycling center, I opened the garage door to let in more light. Just as I was squatting there in my garage, taking pictures of our trash, the mail carrier walked right by the garage. If it had been our regular mail lady, I would have just told her what I was doing, but this was a guy I didn't know. He looked at me and said, "Um...hello..." and I felt silly enough that all I said before he walked away was, "Uh..." Pretty smooth.

In other news, today is Steve's and my seventh anniversary. Last weekend my family was joking about the seven year itch, but luckily I don't feel that in the least. Seven years seems like almost nothing in a whole lifetime, and I am happy that I have so much time left to spend with Steve. Some lovely flowers were delivered for me today, and although they were a very sweet gesture, they aren't the best part. Steve has many months worth of expenses built up at work for which he needs to be reimbursed, and I've been bugging him forever to run them through. He's in the living room, working on that right now. :)One more noteworthy thing...poor Emma has been sick with a fever, and today she started throwing up. Throughout her life up until this point, she has been terrible at puking into a bowl, or the toilet, or trash can, or anywhere where it is a slightly less disgusting mess than all over the floor or furniture. Even if someone was trying desperately to shove a bowl in front of her, she'd turn her head and throw up, thus completely avoiding the bowl. Anyway, the reason this is noteworthy is that she has finally developed the art not spewing vomit all over the place ever time she throws up! Three times today, she has managed to warn me that she is going to throw up, and then make it all the way back to the bathroom in time. Amazing. While I am certainly sorry that she's sick, this makes a huge difference in the misery level of having a sick kid.

I always wait until pretty much the last possible minute to get gas. I figure that when my gas light goes on, I still have at least 35 miles left in my tank. In fifteen years of driving, I have never run out of gas. That is, until last week.

The kids and I were going out to lunch, and my gas light came on right before we got to the restaurant. After we ate, I had to run Emma to summer camp, which was probably a good twenty miles away from the restaurant. Once I had dropped her off, I drove past a couple gas stations in Kansas in order to get to a gas station in Missouri, where gas is cheaper. Just as I was pulling into QuikTrip, my car died. I felt pretty silly, sitting there completely blocking traffic into the parking lot. Luckily, several strong and helpful bystanders helped push my car up to one of the pumps. Embarrassing, but certainly not the hassle it could have been, had I been any farther away. I was sort of surprised that I had run out of gas, but I just chalked it up to waiting too long and resolved to get gas in a more timely manner from there on out.

Fast forward to today. This morning when I was running errands, I noticed that my gas was getting pretty low. We were all getting hungry for lunch so I headed home, but resolved to get gas later that afternoon on my way to pick Emma up from camp, in order to avoid another embarrassing experience running out of gas. I was totally patting myself on the back for planning to get gas before my gas light was even on. When we went to get Emma, in addition to getting gas, I had to run by my brother's house (which is about a mile past the gas station) and drop off a vase of roses as a congratulatory surprise for my sister-in-law, who is taking the bar exam this week. The gas gauge was low but not too low and the light was still not even on and I had plenty of time, so I decided to pass the gas station and drop off the flowers first. As I was sitting at the stoplight next to the same QuikTrip where I previously ran out of gas, in my attempt to drive past it and on to my brother's house, my car died. Wonderful. The light turned green and I was just sitting there, completely blocking the lane and feeling helpless and ridiculous. Could I possibly have run out of gas again? Luckily, I was on a slight hill, so I shifted into neutral and sort of coasted off to the side and partway into an empty parking lot that is across the street from the gas station. Being slightly distracted, I momentarily took my hand off the vase, causing it to immediately fall and empty itself all over the floor of my car. Lovely.

I was hoping that I was really just out of gas instead of something worse being wrong, but it seemed weird because, like I said, my gauge showed that I still had plenty of gas to be driving around. There was only one way to find out so I unbuckled Noah and Allie and carried them across the busy street to QT. I bought a small (and ridiculously expensive) one gallon gas can then went outside to fill it up. I was nervous that Allie and Noah would be trying to run around the bustling parking lot while I was filling up the can, and in my haste to get it done and make sure they were safe at the same time, I managed to spray huge amounts of gas all over myself and them. Nice. Because of that, and because I was trying to hold on to the kids at the same time, I ended up not filling the can all the way, because how much gas do I really need to drive across the street anyway?

Thinking that the ordeal was almost over, I carried Allie and the gas can and held Noah's hand while we again crossed the busy street with no crosswalk in the sweltering heat, and hoping that no one I knew was driving by. I buckled the kids back into their seats, poured the small amount of gas into the tank, and was ready to go. The car started, drove about two feet, and died again! GAH! Apparently driving across the street uses more gas than I thought. I think because I was parked on a hill that my gas tank was tilted in such a way that that gas I put in did me absolutely no good. So. Unbuckled kids, schlepped back across busy hot street again, put more gas in stupid small gas can without dousing anyone in the process this time, and trudged back across the same darn intersection again. I know I was hot and sweaty from the heat, but I think humiliation played a big part as well.

Finally it worked and I was able to drive across the street to fill up. Hooray! After all this, I have come to a pretty obvious conclusion: my gas gauge is broken.

I am glad that I left early enough that I was still not late to pick up Emma, even after all the gas shenanigans. I am also happy that it happened right across the street from the gas station instead of somewhere farther away, which would have been much more unfortunate, especially considering that Steve was in Tulsa at the time, and therefore pretty useless in such situations. The kiddos were in good spirits, despite the fact that they were also hot and sweaty, so overall I guess I should be thankful that the whole experience wasn't much worse than it actually was!
P.S. I think I have a number of run-on sentences in this post, so well done if you read it all and understood what I was trying to say.

Sometime in May, I decided we should institute a No-Buy June. Other than our mortgage, we don't have any debt to worry about, but I figured there is nothing wrong with trying to be a little more mindful of our spending - eating out, in particular. We eat out a ridiculous amount. We've attempted to cut back in that area a few times in the past, but we never really stuck with it for any amount of time. So, I figured the best way to really make a change was to go cold turkey: absolutely no purchases other than groceries, gas, and bills for an entire month. (This was mostly for me and the kids because Steve wasn't willing to stop going out for lunch every day. I suppose he was still sacrificing by not going out in the evenings or on weekends, but since he was still eating out five times a week, he wasn't experiencing nearly the same level of deprivation as I was!)

To go with the money-saving theme of the month, I decided to read The Total Money Makeover. I had never read any of Dave Ramsey's books before, but I know a lot of people like him so I thought I'd give it a shot. I actually found it really interesting, and I sort of had this epiphany that I should start trying to live a more frugal life. For continuing encouragement, I added some interesting personal finance blogs to my Google Reader and soon was on my way to living a more thrifty lifestyle. Woo hoo!

A lucky bonus is that being thrifty often goes hand in hand with being more eco-friendly, and I am certainly all for that. I'm continuing to try to make small changes that will save a little money and help us be more green as well, and there are several about which I am particularly excited.

All the pants Steve wears to work need to be dry cleaned, so we get at least one big plastic dry cleaning bag every week. I have always wished there was some way to avoid using/wasting those bags, but couldn't come up with anything, so into the trash they went. BUT, I recently read a suggestion somewhere on a blog to use them as trash bags. Genius! I tie a hole in the top of the bag, flip it upside down, and voila! It doesn't hold as much trash as a regular bag, but otherwise works great. I snapped this picture of my first dry-cleaning-bag-as-trash-bag experiment.
(As a side note, this picture reminds me of something else. We don't have curbside recycling here - despite my calling the city and the trash pickup providers numerous times to harass them about it - and it bugs me. I bring our paper and glass to other places to be recycled, but does anyone know where I can take cans and plastic? Am I just out of luck with those?)

Another thing I have started to do a little differently is the way I'm setting the thermostat. We've always kept it on 73 because that's where we thought it needed to be for us to be comfortable. I started to bump it up, one degree at a time. Turns out, we are just as comfortable at 75! Seventy-six is pushing it, but I am happy that we made a change of two degrees. Also, I started closing the blinds and setting the temperature even a few degrees higher if we are going to be gone a long time. Now it seems wasteful to me that I wasn't doing those things all along!

This post is getting long, so I'm just going to mention one more thing. Several weeks ago we were pretty much at the end of a tube of toothpaste. Emma couldn't get any more out on her own and since it was basically gone, I was about to toss it in the trash. Before I could, my new little thrifty alarm went off in my head, and I got out a new tube for every one else, but set the almost empty one aside for myself. Every time I brushed my teeth, I squished and squeezed that tube until I got some toothpaste out. After awhile, I had to set my toothbrush down and maneuver the tube with both hands to get every single last bit of toothpaste out. It kind of became a silly little game - how long could I possibly keep using that toothpaste? And guess what? I used it for over two weeks before I was finally satisfied that every bit of toothpaste was out. Yay!

I was going to talk about my experience trying out coupons too, but this post is already too long so I'll save that for another day. I'm sure you are on the edge of your seats!

I've sort of been missing this little old blog lately. There are a lot of things that we do that I'd like to share, and intend to, but then a week goes by and another week passes and I never get around to posting it. Before I know it, it's three weeks later and whatever it was doesn't seem nearly as interesting anymore.

I've also realized that when I'm not posting regularly on this blog, I don't take nearly as many pictures. Because I want to have a lot of pictures to remember these years when my kids are little, and also because I want (and need) to practice taking pictures anyway, I'm going to attempt to reinstate the blog in an effort to motivate myself do these things.
Last night Steve and I had a date night (!) and to get the ball rolling, I used my phone to snap a few pictures during the evening. We went to The Drop for drinks and amazing bruschetta, and then onto Pierponts for dinner. Seriously delicious.
We both had our phones with us, of course, and while we weren't talking on them or browsing the internet independent of each other, it is amusing to me how often we pulled them out to look on the internet to answer some random question. It sort of seems like speculation, at least about past events, is obsolete. For any question that arose in our conversation, we knew the answer in seconds. No need to wonder how many kids the average family had in 1950 (3.37) or how old Jonathan Lipnicki is now (19) or which movie won best picture in 1997 (Titanic)... Pretty crazy, I think.

This last weekend was pretty big for me. I had my first night away, without any children, in over six years! For Christmas this year, all the women on my dad's side of the family gave my grandma a special Ladies' Weekend trip to Rocheport, MO. From the beginning, I was planning to take Allie along. Even though I knew our activities weren't going to be very kid-friendly and there certainly weren't going to be any other kids there, I didn't think we were ready to be apart overnight. Even though I have nightweaned her and Noah several times, they are sneaky and they always manage to somehow un-nightwean themselves. So, the main reason I didn't want to leave Allie was because I was worried she'd be crying for me in the night and poor Steve would be up all night with an inconsolable baby. Also, I've never been away from her for more than three hours, so being gone for over 24 hours seemed like too big of a step.

The more I thought about it, however, the more it seemed like taking care of Allie for the whole trip would be sort of annoying, while everyone else got to relax and chat and not worry about toddlers breaking antiques and spilling wine and disrupting meals. I brought that up to Steve, and he said I should just leave Allie at home because he was sure they would all be fine. I mulled it over for weeks, going back and forth many times, but in the end I really did leave her at home!The trip was filled with shopping, good food, fun conversation, and lots of wine. We all had such a lovely time on the little vacation, and it sounds like Steve and the kids had a fine time as well. There was ZERO housework done and they ate out for every single meal, but that was A-okay with me as long as everyone was happy. I was gone for a little over 24 hours, and even though I was enjoying myself while I was away, I was so happy to be back to my little nurslings because by that time I felt like I was on the verge of exploding.
The women on the trip all made mementos for each other, which I was sort of reluctant to do at first because I thought I didn't have the time, but in the end I think it was a great, fun idea. In the picture above, we are all wearing matching aprons made by my cousin. I decided to make little bird ornaments for people to hang in their kitchens or wherever for a little bit of cheerfulness. I thought they turned out pretty well.So, I'd say the trip was a complete success and now I know I have the freedom to do something else like that in the future. Steve may be sorry he ever agreed to this!

Sunday was my birthday, but before I tell you what we did, I want to share another story with you. This happened toward the end of last summer, when I wasn't blogging, so I never wrote about it here, but I'm going to copy and paste from a scrapbook page I made about our near-death experience interesting excursion.We decided to spend a beautiful Saturday going to Lawrence for a family bike ride. Steve looked online to find a good trail, and saw a scenic nine mile loop right along the river that was ideal for “cyclists of all skill levels”. Perfect. After eating lunch in downtown Lawrence, we drove to the beginning of the trail. All we could see was a teeny dirt path leading into the woods, but there was a biker actually coming out of the woods at that moment, so we loaded everyone onto the bikes and set off into the woods. Right away, I was leery. The “bike trail” was crisscrossed with large tree roots, there were many very steep and curvy hills, most of the trail was sand or mud. As I saw Steve disappear around a hairpin turn with my babies in the trailer, flying through the air and bouncing off tree roots, I started to suspect that perhaps we weren’t on the right trail. Because I had to get off my bike several times to walk it up or down a hill, I soon lost Steve and the kids. When Allie and I caught up to them, he was perched at the top of a precipice, clearly ready to continue risking the lives of my children. I implored him to turn back but he went on ahead. When I saw the trailer starting to slide sideways off the cliff, my heart jumped, and I insisted we all turn back. Steve made fun of me for being a wimp, but I was just happy to make it out of the woods with all of my family members alive.
We decided to safely bike on the roads for a bit, and headed back in the direction of a park we’d seen on the way in. After playing for awhile at a second park, we noticed several people walking and biking nearby. So many people passed by, in fact, that we figured they must be on some sort of trail. We got back on the bikes and went over to try to take the trail back to our car. Once we were on the flat, wide, smooth, scenic trail, it became very obvious to us that THIS was the trail we were supposed to be on in the first place. NOT that insanely dangerous “River Ridge” trail. The last part of our trip was so pleasant that we are determined to go back to Lawrence soon and actually ride the nine mile loop. We did lose the flag off the trailer somewhere on River Ridge, and Emma complained for awhile about the sand that had flown in her eyes, but in the end we all made it home safely, and with a good story to tell.

So on Sunday, we finally did go back to Lawrence to ride the pretty trail along the river. A certain little girl has just woken from her nap, however, so I will have to save that post for another day. :)

My parents got a new horse a few months ago - in October, I think - and as recently as Easter, the kids were riding her and my dad pointed out that she was starting to get pretty fat. We all wondered if maybe she was pregnant, but I didn't hear much about it after that. Then, about four weeks ago, a farrier came to put shoes on the horses and asked my dad when she was due! My dad had a vet come out, who looked her over and said he thought she was due any day. Since horses apparently usually give birth during the night, my dad started setting his alarm for 2:00 a.m. every morning to check on Kate (the momma horse).

A couple weeks went by, and no foal yet, so my dad starting thinking maybe they should have the vet come out again. Early last Wednesday morning when his alarm went off, my dad checked in the barn and saw Kate standing there, still very much pregnant. The next morning at 7:00, he went down to the barn and there was the foal! She was already completely dry, and was standing up and even walking around.
I wanted to take the kids to go see her when she was still so little, so I called Emma's school to tell them she would be gone the rest of the week and we drove to my parents' house. We stayed there for a few days and had a lovely time, as always.The little filly was just the cutest thing ever. Kate used to eat about half a bale of hay every day, but now she is eating a whole bale plus some high-nutrient grain all the time, and I can see why - this baby nursed a ton. I can certainly sympathize with that!
The kids and I feel so lucky that we were able to see little Skipper when she was just a few hours old, and we're looking forward to watching her grow!

I am starting a new project that may very well take me years and years to complete, but I am pretty excited about it. I've always loved hexagon quilts, specifically the Grandmother's Flower Garden design. Despite that terrible name, and the fact that the entire thing has to be hand pieced, I have started one of these quilts. So far I have thirty hexagons down, and only 1,894 to go. Of course, then I have to hand sew them all together, so if you check back at this blog in about twenty years, you may see the finished quilt. Maybe.Since Emma was about ten months old, I have tried on several occasions to leave my children at a gym child care center so I could go to an aerobics class or something and work out in total freedom for an hour. It has always been a complete failure. The last time I tried was in November, when I left Noah and Allie. The both ran in happily without a second glance in my direction, so I left and went to my Zumba class. About ten minutes later, one of the child care workers came in to the class and waved me over, then told me that Noah and Allie were having a hard time. I left immediately and went back to the kids' room, where I saw both of my children sitting pitifully next to each other on the floor, covered in snot and tears and wailing like their world was ending. So, I gave up on that for awhile. Until today, that is. We tried it again, and Allie started crying pretty hard when I left, but I stood outside the door for a minute or two until I heard her stop crying. I waited a couple minutes more and when it seemed like all was well, I went to my class. The class was great, and it was a whole forty-five minutes in when the lady appeared at the door, holding Allie, and motioned for me to come over. Sigh. BUT, Allie appeared to be fine and the lady assured me that both kids were playing happily and I only needed to leave because Noah had wet his pants. Hurray! So, even though I had to leave a little early this time, I think next time it will work great, as long as I remind Noah to go potty beforehand. Yay for freedom!

We are heading to St. Louis tomorrow to celebrate Easter with my family. I am very much looking forward to it, especially because my brother - who has been in South Korea for the last year - is going to be home and I can't wait to see him. It's going to be a great weekend! I'm sure these three rascals will join me in wishing you a very happy Easter as well!