Archive for January, 2010

1. Wouldn’t it be easy to take a nap instead of working out .
2. My coffee is tasting better than ever!
3. I love the taste of creme brulee creamer.
4. I really should be working out in the living room.
5. The first thing we’re going to do is finish this .
6. My coffee maker goes drip, drip, drip; before I can have any cofee.
7. And as for the weekend, tonight I’m looking forward to having mom over for a visit and dinner, tomorrow my plans include spending the day with my girl because her daddy has to work and Sunday, I want to do whatever…as long as it’s with Lloyd and Lauryn!

*Can you tell there are two things on my mind this morning…..coffee and working out *

This week we finally eliminated the bottle   Yay!!!  I thought Lauryn would have a much harder time with it than she has so far.  She was all about having a baba before bed time and she seems to be doing quite well without it.  No more baba’s….Yay!!!  She’s been drinking from sippy cups for a while but still wanted that baba in the evening.  We still need to work on drinking from a regular cup, she just doesn’t have it down yet but we’re getting there too!

Here’s a picture I took the night Lloyd came back from his snowmobiling trip:

She was so happy her daddy was home! I don’t think I’ve ever seen her smile quite like that and she stayed that way for hours!!! So precious!

Ever since I got Lauryn that personalized jewelry box for Christmas, I’ve been checking out other ideas I can give for other occasions and for other people. I just love the idea of giving a personalized gift. I feel like the blankets I crochet are somewhat personalized but they take so long and sometimes my hands aren’t up to getting them done in time to give and there are a ton of really neat gifts out there. Lloyd’s birthday is coming up in March and I’m trying to figure out something for him….we’ll have to see what I can come up with

This is from the Fix-It and Forget-It Recipes for Entertaining cookbook that I got.  It was really good but a tad to salty for my taste.  My mom and Lloyd thought it was great but I’ll probably make it without the salt next time or cut back on the beef bouillon since that’s salty too.  I’m just not a big fan of the stuff!  Anyway, here’s the recipe:

1 onion, chopped

1 TB butter

3-4 lbs beef roast, cubed

1 tsp. salt

1/4 tsp. pepper

2 c. water

3 beef bouillon cubes

1/2 c flour

*Saute onion in skillet in butter until brown.  Place onion in slow cooker, but reserve drippings.

*Brown roast in skillet in drippings.  Add meat to slow cooker, again reserve drippings.

*Combine salt, pepper, water, bouillon and flour.  Add to meat drippings.  Cook until thickened.  Pour over meat.

*Cover and cook on low 6-8 hours.

*Serve over noodles.

I made my very first homemade apple pie this past Sunday. It turned out so great! Many thank you’s to my friend Kristin for sharing the recipe with me

Here’s the recipe:

Crust:

2 1/2 c. flour

1 c. unsalted butter (2 sticks) very cold and cubed

1 tsp. salt

1 tsp. sugar

4-8 TB ice water

Pie Filling:

1/2 c. sugar

1/4 c. flour

3/4 tsp. cinnamon

1/4 tsp. nutmeg

dash of salt

6 c. thinly sliced apples

2 TB butter

*In a medium bowl, mix flour, salt and sugar.  Cut in butter, using two knives or a pastry blender, until butter/flour particles are pea sized.  *Sprinkle with water 1 TB at a time until all flour is moist and pastry almost cleans the side of the bowl – add more if needed. *Gather into a ball, divide in half.  Shape and flatten into round on floured surface; you should be able to see bits of butter.  Wrap and refrigerate 1 hour or until pastry is pliable. *On a lightly floured surface, with a floured rolling pin, roll one half  into 2″ larger than  pie plate.  Transfer to plate.

*In a large bowl, mix sugar, flour, cinnamon, nutmeg and salt.  Stir in apples.  Spoon into crust and add 2 TB butter on top.

*Trim pastry 1/2″ from plate.

Roll out other pastry.  Place on top, trim edge, seal/fold and flute edge.  Brush with water and sprinkle with sugar.  Cover edge with foil.  Bake 40-50 minutes at 350 degrees.  Remove foil for the last 15 minutes.  Pie is done when crust is golden and juices are bubbling.

*Note*  I totally forgot about putting foil around the edge until the pie was almost done and it still turned out great

It’s going to be very busy in our world in the next few months..at least! With buying another rental that needs to be fixed up a little and getting the new office up and running, I’m wondering how much Lloyd and I will actually see each other! I’ve been trying to come up with ideas to help him. Ideas for advertising and getting his name out there. There’s always the signs to put out in yards and point of purchase displays but I’m trying to come up with other innovative ways to help advertise. I guess once he gets everything up and running we’ll have to just take it from there. It is all very exciting!

What a long weekend it was without Lloyd here.  He left very early Thursday morning to go on his family’s annual snowmobiling trip and he got home today around 4:30.  We all missed him so much!  I’m glad he had fun and I do believe that spending a little time apart is good for a couple but man, it was hard!  Lauryn and I had a busy weekend though so that helped. I am so glad he’s home! It was hard to sleep at night without him next to me!

Tonight I made my very first apple pie from scratch   It turned out so good!  The crust was really flaky and yummy!  Lloyd really liked it and I was surprised that making the crust wasn’t as much work as I thought it would be.  I’ve made pies before but I’ve always used the pre-made crusts because I thought making one from scratch would be too hard.  Lloyd just might be getting pie all of the time now

I’ve been thinking a lot about my physical appearance lately and how I’m trying to make the changes that I can.  I’m working on the weight issue, which is something that doesn’t cost a lot to work on but there are other things that I would love to change but can’t because it would cost too much.  The main thing I would love to fix would be my teeth.  For years it didn’t bother me that they were a little crooked but the older I get, the more I wish they were nicer.  I’ve been curious about lumineers and was trying to find out more about how that all works.  I came across dental implants Plano which doesn’t apply to me since I’m not missing any teeth but it’s all pretty fascinating what they can do to make your smile nicer.  Some days, I feel like I’ve had this smile for a long time now and it’s really not that bad and other days I think I should start saving to get the problems fixed.

This morning Lauryn woke up very early…much earlier than her Mama was ready for   When she took her nap, I took one too!  It was just what I needed!

We don’t have any big plans this weekend.  Just laundry and hanging out.  Lloyd might spend some time working in the basement though.  He’s been dealing with some wires, getting nails out of the studs – the previous owner was all about overkill with nails everywhere – and he mentioned changing the air filter in the furnace. I think we’re both just chilling this weekend because we’ll both be busy next weekend.

Dinner and dessert turned out great last night. I’ll post the recipes for them later. Those cake balls are very yummy and very addictive!

When We Was Fab

Welcome to Saturday: 9 . What we’ve committed to our readers is that we will post 9 questions every Saturday. Sometimes the post will have a theme, and at other times the questions will be totally unrelated. Those weeks we do “random questions,” so-to-speak. We encourage you to visit other participants posts and leave a comment. Because we don’t have any rules, it is your choice. We hate rules. We love memes, however, and here is today’s meme!

Saturday 9: When We Was Fab

1. Is there a blog as far as its appearance goes that you think is the most fabulous?  I really like Jodi’s @ My Life As Mama Jodi

2. Do you like the look and the contents of your blogs?  I LOVE how my blog looks…thank you very much Stacie @ Super Mommy To The Rescue

3. Have you ever thought what would happen to your blog in case you died?  No.

4. Has any particular blogger had a great impact on how you set up and write your blog?  Jodi

5. Would you want a fellow blogger to give you suggestions or criticism of what you write?  Since I mostly write about my life and my family, I probably wouldn’t take any criticism well.  I’m always open to suggestions though.

6. Is the number of visitors each day to your blog important to you?  Not really.   I do like when I have comments or when friends and family tell me they read about this or that on my blog though.

7. What percentage of your readers do you think actual comment?  Hmm…70%???

8. Do you have a favorite blogger who does the memes that you participate in?  There are a lot of  bloggers who do the same memes as I do.  Cary @ Life As Wife, Mom and Employee and Jodi @ My Life As Mama Jodi are my favorites

9. How often do you update your blog/site and why?  Pretty much daily…sometimes a few times a day.  It depends on what I’ve got to say, if something special has happened or if I have assignments.

I’m really looking forward to tomorrow. My mom is coming over for dinner, I’m trying out two new recipes and then the weekend will be here and that means Lloyd will be home too That probably sounds like he’s been away or something, which he hasn’t, it’s just that now that the holidays are over, I am really missing him during the week. We’re back to our normal schedule now but during the holidays he was home for four day weekends and we got to spend so much time together. I’ll really be missing him next weekend because he’ll be going on the annual family snowmobiling trip up north with his family. All the guys in his family go every year. He’ll be leaving either late Wednesday or early Thursday and won’t be home until Sunday night. That’s going to be a long weekend without him! My mom and I have plans for a couple of those days those so that should help pass the time

I’m kind of having fun looking into different options for losing weight. There are a couple of dance/workout dvd’s I’m thinking about trying and that new Shake Weight looks silly and fun! Whatever I can find to be the best fat burner but that doesn’t take a ton of time would be great! I have to do what I can during Lauryn’s naps and they seem to be getting shorter and shorter these days! If I do go the dance dvd route, I bet she’d be interested in that…..even if it is just watching her mama make a fool of herself trying to dance

As I mentioned in my previous post, I want to to a little researching into ways to help me boost my weight loss. I’ve checked into a few sites, such as www.bestdietsupplements.org and I’m still looking to see if there’s anything that I feel would be right for me. I’m feeling really good about the way things are going so far and I want to lose weight and tone up in the most healthy way possible but I am also interested in finding natural ways to help me along. We’ll see