Five Minute Friday: Loud

  • Posted on March 23, 2012 at 10:24 am

On Fridays, Gypsy Mama holds a blog carnival where we all stop and write for five minutes – no editing, no over-thinking, just write.  Care to join us?

This week’s topic is: Loud

The kids are so loud – all the time, it seems.  Loud when they are angry, because I’m not giving in to their whims, or because the other is not sharing, loud when they have a new bump or scrape or owwie – but also loud when they are happy, playing together.  Brianna loves to make Benjamin laugh, usually involving some form of yelling.  Benjamin loves to yell, just to get Brianna (and the rest of us) to look at him.  And while, at the end of a long day at work, the LOUD can grate on me and I count the minutes until bedtime and quiet and peacefulness – so many things happen in the loud that I would hate to miss.  Like Benjamin’s smile of triumph when he jumps out of the playhouse and says “Boo!”, or Brianna’s laughter as they chase each other up and down the hall… like Benjamin surprising us all by counting to ten yesterday, or Brianna telling me I’m her “favorite princess”… like Brianna’s stubborn mornings, just like her daddy, or the look on Benjamin’s face when he wants a banana.

If I can live in the loud, these are the things i can see – and they certainly are worth every minute of loud, no matter how long my day was.

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WFMW: Easy Lunch Boxes

  • Posted on March 21, 2012 at 10:27 am

I have been trying to pack lunches every day for a couple of reasons – one, it save a ton of money, as the cafe in my building is not cheap, and two, I can plan ahead to make healthy eating choices (at least in theory).  So – I’m a big fan of leftovers for lunches, because leftovers are essentially “free” (basically because I have no idea how to cook for the number of people in our family) and because they are yummy.

But.  Packaging them can be a pain in the behind. And getting all the parts together to make a meal – veggies, starches, and protein – is difficult, since there may be more of one left from a meal than others (I’m looking at you, veggies).

I looked everywhere around town for divided containers that I could pack in my lunch box – I have a Tupperware one, but it’s a little bigger than what I need – but I could not find anything, anywhere.

And then. Then I discovered the world of Bento boxes, and all the little pieces and parts that go with them.  I knew that would be perfect for me – except for keeping up with the pieces.  And also, they tend to be a little expensive.  So I decided to shop around.

I found these on Amazon:

EasyLunchboxes 3-compartment Bento Lunch Box Containers

Ah. Mazing. It was totally, exactly what I needed.  The three compartments are the perfect size for meals, and the big section is even big enough for a sandwich.  The middle section is the perfect size for a single serving Mott’s applesauce. The whole thing is freezer/microwave/dishwasher safe.  I pack traditional leftover-type lunches in these, but they would totally work for cute bento lunches as well.

They are not leak-proof, and if you turn them on their side they will leak any liquids in there. FYI.  But – one of the reviewers on Amazon said you could use Press’n'seal wrap on the sections to stop this – haven’t needed it, so I haven’t tried it.  For your standard veggies/casseroles/etc, I haven’t had a problem yet.

See how cute my lunches are, even without heart shaped boiled eggs and dinosaur shaped sandwiches?

Tater-tot casserole, green beans, and applesauce

Meatloaf, mashed potatoes, and peas

Easy Lunch Boxes work for me :)

You can find more Works For Me Wednesday post over at We Are THAT Family.

Just so you know – No one paid me to give my opinions, and I didn’t get any free stuff.  BUT – the link to the lunch boxes is an Amazon Affiliate link.

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MPM: What we’re eating this week

  • Posted on March 19, 2012 at 11:08 am

So my standard meal planning method is to use sticky-notes on my calendar.  Which is effective, but the last couple of weeks have been rough and I haven’t been sticking to it as much as I should have. So this one’s for accountability, and maybe I’ll stick to it this time :-)

Monday: Fish sticks, Mac’n'cheese, and green beans. (My kids will think I’m the bet mom ever! But really I just need something I can cook quickly because I forgot to defrost anything for today…)

Tuesday: BBQ Chicken quarters (in the slow cooker), baked beans, corn

Wednesday: Eat at Sam’s Club (we live it up around here).

Thursday: Mini-meatloaves, mashed potatoes, peas

Friday: Sandwiches or leftovers – I have a party to attend! So dinner will be short and sweet, minimal cooking.

Saturday: Hamburgers, homemade fries.

Sunday: Frozen pizza

Breakfasts for me will be instant breakfast, or an English muffin with peanut butter. The kids eat breakfast at daycare, and Chad will stick to granola bars or pop-tarts.

Lunches are leftovers or sandwiches, depending on what we have.

For more Menu Plan Monday posts, head over to OrgJunkie!

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7 Quick Takes

  • Posted on March 16, 2012 at 12:26 pm

— 1 —

My children are amazing, and also drive me crazy on a regular basis.  But its the growing up part that getting to me this week – preparing for a yard sale, and going through all the baby things we don’t need anymore with a 19-month-old and a three-year-old.  I cried at the idea of selling the crib bedding, even though we’re set to pack up the crib (for good) here pretty soon.  It’ll be the first time in 3 years with no baby in the house, and that makes me a little sad.

But no sad enough to seek out another :-) This mama knows she has all she can handle at the moment (and sometimes more).

— 2 —

Speaking of growing up, Brianna spent her first diaper-and-pullup-free overnight last night.  And woke up with dry sheets.  I know there will be accidents along the way, but there is light at the end of the diaper tunnel and I can see it! Another year or two and we’ll be done for good! And yes, I might cry a little over that one, too.

— 3 —

I need more sleep. Which might explain the crying, lol.  But no, seriously, the sleep. I think I’ve averaged less than 6 hours a night this week and it’s not working for me.  Only tremendous amounts of caffeine is keeping me upright and functioning. Which is not good for a variety of reasons.

— 4 —

Like my weight.  My caffeine of choice is Mt. Dew. Not diet. I started tracking calories again, and like a third of what I’m taking in is SODA. Which is unacceptable. And probably why I can’t seem to lose this baby weight (is it still baby weight after a year and a half?).

— 5 —

So I’m guessing my goal for next week will be to make getting a good amount of sleep a priority.  Somehow without dropping the ball on housecleaning, spending time with my kids, work, or spending time with my husband. (It seems like I can only maintain 1 or 2 of these things at a time…)  Not sure how I’m oging to manage this, but I guess starting with a firm 10pm bedtime would be a start.

— 6 —

Exercise.  I can’t even begin where to fit this in, and yet I NEED to.  My weight it stupid crazy, and I feel tired and weak and lazy.  The Xbox is down, so no Zumba for me – and I don’t want to pay for it, so no gym.  I need to either fire up my dance workout dvds, start couch25k, or buy a bike (um, more money).  And yet.  The time thing.  I am so frustrated by this – again, I’m not sure what to sacrifice to find this time. Sleep is not an option, per takes 3 and 5, so what else has room to give?

— 7 —

And I supose that is the plight of the modern working mommy. If anyone knows any great ways to sleep and/or workout while cooking dinner or cleaning house, apparently I need them :-)

For more Quick Takes, visit Conversion Diary!

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Five Minute Friday: Brave

  • Posted on March 16, 2012 at 10:03 am

On Fridays, Gypsy Mama holds a blog carnival where we all stop and write for five minutes – no editing, no over-thinking, just write.  Care to join us?

This week’s topic is: Brave

I don’t think I am brave.  I dodge conflict like a pro, waiting until things are almost unfixable (or worse) before dealing with them.  I often still sleep with the baby monitors on. I avoid any kind of situation that could lead to confrontation.

But I also avoid deep friendships. Too often, starting a new friendship requires me to put myself out there and be brave, and all too often I shy away from that – because it might hurt. Or because i might fail. Because I’m not brave enough. What if they don’t like me? What if I’m all awkward and dumb? What if… I don’t even know. Too much worry.  Not enough bravery.

Six years in this town, and I still feel like I haven’t put down roots.  Because I’m not putting myself out there. I need to be brave – I need to actively seek out good friends and good situations.  And I need to be brave, and try new things.  But it’s hard. I need to stop whining! And do it!

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WFMW: Laundry

  • Posted on March 14, 2012 at 8:38 am

Works for Me Wednesday!

I am caught up on laundry.  This fact is in and of itself amazing.

See, I tried this thing, a while back, were I did a load of laundry every day.  And it worked! And I was caught up! and it was amazing! And I looked like this:

Doing the Laundry

(image courtesy of Hyperbole and a Half)

 And THEN.  I ran out of laundry. I mean, it was all clean! And there was no “one load” to do! For several days! So after practically spraining my shoulder because I was patting myself on the back so hard…. I promptly stopped doing laundry.  Until we were all out of socks and underwear. And then only washed the bare minimum to get by.

But. In my quest to minimize the STUFF in our house (OMGoodness, the STUFF), I culled down the kids clothes.  Like, a lot. Brianna helped with her clothes (to pick out ones she would wear, because trying to get a 3-year-old to wear something they don’t like is not on my top ten list of things to do every morning), and I culled down to like, just over two weeks worth of clothes each.

Amazingly, this means when they are all clean, all the clothes fit in the drawers.  I KNOW!

And now, I have to do the kid’s laundry once a week or so. Which is fine, it all fits in one load, or I can separate the darks and lights and put it with the grown-up’s laundry.  Total? about two loads a week of clothes.  Which gives me a day to wash towels, a day to wash sheets, and some slacker days (Huzzah!). AND…. I have to fold it and put it away, because people will run out of clothes otherwise. It’s amazing how much gets done when it’s a necessity.

Now I’m culling my clothes, in prep for a yard sale this weekend.

Laundry today or naked tomorrow – it works for me!

(For more Works For Me Wednesdays, visit Kristin at We Are THAT Family)

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In the middle of the crazy / God your love is so amazing

  • Posted on March 13, 2012 at 8:09 am

Man, I love me some Mandisa. I mean, seriously. I can’t think of a song of hers I don’t like at this point, and she certainly has a way of coming up with lyrics that reach my right where I am.  Like last week.

It was amazingly crazy.  Monday, I went to work, but came home before lunch because I was sick.  To be fair, I had been getting sick since Friday or so, but refused to admit it, and decided to CLEAN ALL THE THINGS!!! over the weekend. Note to future self: do not clean all the things when you are getting sick.  Maybe just clean some of them, ok? So yeah, pretty much spent the day in bed.

Anyway.  Tuesday, I worked from home, still sick.  Wednesday I was feeling better, but was taking a vacation day so that Brianna could have her ear tubes removed…  except she was sick (not the same thing I had, naturally).  So we came home with her, and spent the day pushing fluids and tylenol and motrin and let me tell you, it was not awesome.

Thursday, she seemed better, so I sent her to school (um, bad mommy?).  She promptly threw up all over the place, and started running a fever, so I raced home again. And stayed home the day with her, trying to work, but not really succeeding.  Friday, Chad stayed home with still-sick Brianna as I frantically tried to get a weeks worth of work done in a day (fail).

There was a lot of crazy. And there were times that I was totally lost in it, overwhelmed and not sure I would survive.  But. There were also times, the times I made it a point to count my blessings and remember to trust God, that I knew that everything would work out.  And you know what? It did.  Brianna’s surgery will be rescheduled, possibly the same day as Benjamin’s ear tube placement (if he needs it).  My work will get done.  The house is actually a little cleaner today than it was last week (Chad helped a lot).  Somehow I’m caught up on laundry.  Slowly, I’m starting to see that it really does all work out (very slowly.  I’m stubborn).

So yeah.  The Lord really met me in the madness this past week, and I’m very thankful.

I never liked Mondays or bad news
Or breakin’ in new shoes
And mornings when I can’t find my phone
Nobody likes traffic or short nights
Or situps or long flights
But sometimes that’s just the way it goes
It’s funny what you use to help me grow…

So I’ll learn to love these days
Life along the way
In the middle of the crazy
God your love is so amazing
Through the ups and downs
You’re the only hope I’ve found
Lord you meet me in the madness

I’ll learn to love these days
I’ll learn to love these days

I can see a silver linin‘
When the sun’s not shinin’
Even when you choose to bring the rain
Oh, but I’m trustin your leadin’
‘Cause your Lord of all my joy and all my pain

So I’ll learn to love these days
Life along the way
In the middle of the crazy
God, your love is so amazing
Through the ups and downs
You’re the only hope I’ve found
Lord you meet me in the madness

I’ll learn to love these days
I’ll learn to love these days

I could wait the hundred years
You gave me here the days when you near
The days when I was out there
Lookin’ for what comes next
Oh, cause every minute,every hour, everyday
Is such a gift and I can say
I’m thankful for each day

So I’ll learn to love these days
Life along the way
In the middle of the crazy
God, your love is so amazing
Through the ups and downs
You’re the only hope I’ve found
Lord you meet me in the madness

I’ll learn to love these days
I’ll learn to love these days

~These Days, Mandisa

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Starting over…

  • Posted on March 12, 2012 at 10:46 am

So I stopped writing here. I could say that it was because I have no time, or because there’s not much to say, and either would be true enough I suppose.  But the truth is, I started feeling kind of weighed down by the baggage my blog was carrying – I have been blogging (off and on – more off than on recently) for almost 10 years, and the entire backlog of that was in these archives.

I’ve changed a lot as a person in the last 10 years, for better or worse.  And I started thinking maybe I do’t need to drag around 10 years of my past history all the time.  Plus, I tend to write more when things are bad or I’m upset (free therapy!), and so a great deal of my archives is full of negativity.  Drama.  Nightmares.  Angst.

So.  I set all my old posts, before today, to Private.  I couldn’t bring myself to delete them (yes, I have trouble getting rid of things – that’s a post for another day).  But I feel like I’m starting over, with a clean blog slate.

I am not promising to write every day, or every week, or anything I can’t live up to.  I’m just hoping this is a step in the right direction, a step towards getting back into writing.  I may be playing with layout in the next few months, as well as trying to find my voice again.  Bear with me?

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