the first season started off with a bang with a hilarious opening song about the dream of the 90′s…people do buy & sell used cd’s here…people really like stuff when it has a bird on it!…and our employment rate here reveals how young people come to retire, and just maybe work in a coffee shop for a few hours a week and live in a house with 10 other people.

but it just got better, when they posted a ‘redux’ to the dream of the 90′s…the 1890′s that is. i love that i can think of friends (and ourselves) during most of the snippets in this song. so i just had to share.

to be completely ironic, we don’t even get the channel that this show airs on (ifc), but the 1st season is on instant netflix, and they post most of the clips (which are often better than the whole show, since it has a snl sketch type feel) online. hopefully it’s good for a laugh this thursday morning.

this week has been pretty uneventful. which is a nice break after holiday traveling, and also nice to allow us to get some important things done…like getting the car emissions test, a windshield replaced, new wiper blades (are you sensing a theme here?)…yes, we hope to sell our car and trade for a different one. but most of the days and nights it’s been mellow.

- this is what the girls look like about 21 out of the 24 hours a day…

- i am trying to better plan my time. i know i previously mentioned about being more on top of meal time. i also just visually wanted to see how the time is allocated on off days, work days, and days wil is at work and i am at home (supposedly getting things done). so i laid it all out and tacked it to my closet door. i don’t think i gave myself any unreasonable goals, and there are definitely lots of open spaces, but if i can just hit some of the hours i set aside for certain things, i think i’ll feel better about my days.

- i may not be craving pickles and ice cream, but this week has been all about smoothies. remember when we picked an insane amount of blueberries? lucky for me i froze most of them (and other farm berries), and then forgot about them in our deep freezer until we moved this past month. today it was greek yogurt, blueberries, raspberries, strawberries, banana, apple, flax seeds and honey. the crazy thing? i didn’t like smoothies before pregnancy…now it’s the highlight of my day!

- last night, i probably had plenty of other more important things to do, but instead i made a little coat for the dog’s sock monkey. ridiculous, i know. i promise, it was purely for longevity, as the sock monkey is ava’s current favorite toy, but the main part of the body had a bunch of holes in the weave letting out stuffing…this way the jacket stays on and covers all his injuries! (goodness, i want to find out what we’re having soon, so i can make baby things instead of messing around with dog toys!)

i’m off to work the next couple nights and the week will begin again…have a great weekend.

last night i cooked a really nice dinner for him. it was definitely more than the usual affair and kept me occupied all day. the vintage linens and my handed down china made an appearance.

i set up a bar (for him only of course), as he was recently gifted the supplies for a dirty martini; and this man loves a dirty martini.

we dined on a couple courses…i can’t really take credit for the recipes themselves as i spent the days prior poring over old food & wine and bon appetit magazines for inspiration. i really wanted this dinner to be special, while taking into account what i can and can’t eat right now. we went with an apple, watercress & endive salad with a french shallot vinaigrette for our first course. and for dinner we had an herbed salmon over a vegetable quinoa pilaf, topped with a spiced creamy sauce.

i forgot to take pictures of the rest of the meal, but i hope that means we just enjoyed the food and the conversation too much to be distracted by anything else.

dessert was a skillet apple and pear crumble with whipped cream. i took this picture this morning, and it looks like somebody dug into it for a little more last night after i went to bed…

i think the one thing i took away from this meal was not necessarily guilt for not making him dinner more consistently (there was a little bit of that), but opening my eyes to how much he appreciates it when it’s done for him. he loves cooking, so much that he’s doing it on a day to day basis. but i often fail to recognize that when he comes home from being on the line for 10 hours, he certainly doesn’t want to ‘whip something up’ for himself or the two of us.

i regained a new sense of motivation on having dinner ready for him, when i can. because i love him, because i want to serve him, and because he appreciates it when i do. and when it all boils down, i’m not cooking for a chef every night…he’s just my husband, who’ll enjoy crazy gourmet things off a fine menu with a fancy glass of wine, all the way down to a plate of mac and cheese with hamburger and a pbr.

this past week in efforts of being better at forecasting our days together, i made ‘whiteboards’ for our kitchen. taking the picture out, i wrapped a textured neutral fabric around the matting/cardboard, and have written out our upcoming days on the front of the glass. we can hopefully plan meals and know what social/work things are ahead of us that week. (the other is to track pregnancy food & info each week)

here’s to being more purposeful with my time and serving my husband better along the way. and making him dinner a bit more frequently. ; )

(linked with life made lovely & miscellany monday)

well, believe me, we are just as eager, if not more, than friends and strangers to know what we are having…but we still have a few weeks till we hear “it’s a ___!”

in addition to everyone’s questions (and guesses), people have mentioned some of the old wives tales of predicting what’s cooking inside. so i’ve had fun researching and reading as many of them as i can.

• if you are carrying low it’s a boy, and high a girl
• if the baby’s heart rate is higher than 140 beats per minute, it’s a girl; lower, a boy
• if you are craving sweets, it’s a girl; sour and/or salty, a boy
• according to an ancient chinese chart, you’ll be having a boy or a girl based on your age and the month at the time of conception
• this one i had never heard of, and seems a bit insane to me, but pee in a cup, mix in a tablespoon of drano (of all things!) and watch what color it turns…green a girl, blue a boy
• numerous number tricks…adding the age you were at conception plus the number of the due date month and odd or even says what it is. also if your age at conception and the year of conception are both odd or both even it’s a girl, if one’s odd and one even it’s a boy. i heard other variations of ages, months, odds, evens, and then some more!
• do girls steal their mother’s beauty? if the mother is glowing, radiant, beautiful hair, etc, it’s a boy. and on the flipside, if the mother is breaking out, lackluster hair, etc, it’s a girl. wait, i thought all pregnant women were beautiful?!?!?
• if you hang your wedding ring over your belly, and if it swings back and forth it’s a girl; swings in a circle, a boy (also heard about using a pencil and holding it over your wrist)
• if you had bad morning sickness in the beginning (or throughout), it’s a girl; little to no sickness, a boy
• is dad putting on weight during the pregnancy? if so, it’s a girl; if not, a boy
• set a key in front of your belly…ask an unsuspecting friend to pick it up…if they grab the skinny part, it’s a girl; they grab the round part, a boy

to say the least, a lot of these gave me a good laugh. some are a little insane, and some seem to contradict themselves. a couple of these, within minutes of typing one of them, i’d read another version on a different pregnancy website telling me opposite results. ha!

one thing’s for sure, they are all correct in predicting 50% of the time! i think i’ll hold off on doing some of these…i’m happy for either a boy or a girl. a couple of the quizzes and tests i’ve done have already given me conflicting answers. and i don’t plan on buying any drano any time soon.

only time will tell!! any moms out there do any of these with accuracy during your pregnancies?

this year feels different. we’re not expecting it to float along in the same manner as the one before. in fact, we know it will look very differently. and so, it is a year to look ahead at what’s to come and work towards that. seeing a few others online take a different approach to the usual ‘resolutions’, it really hit me to do the same. a list of goals. a simple bucket list. a couple items that are a slight change in the way we live, mixed in with a few things i hope for us to accomplish and enjoy not just in january.

this year, my heart is seeking authentic community, memorable experiences, and leaps of faith.

1. use the horner bible reading program (pdf here and online versions here)

2. take the trailer out 4 times this camping season

3. be purposeful in inviting more friends over to our place more frequently

4. attempt a natural birth with wil at my side

5. find a home we’d be happy to live in for at least 5 years, and lord willing, buy it!

6. reach 75 sales in my etsy shop by its 1 year anniversary

7. participate in at least 3 local street fairs with life at the table

8. commit to a community group

9. take pictures with my holga, high school 35mm and polaroid

10. enjoy as much simple time outside when the weather permits…walking, laying on a blanket with a new baby, tinkering in a (hopeful) future yard

11. learn to can as much as we can! (pun intended)

12. savor each step of the process. more specifically, document as much as i can the rest of this pregnancy and the beginning moments of the baby’s new life. don’t miss a moment.

health and happiness to you this year. pray that god blesses you abundantly!

the next couple days were a whirlwind, as christmas day was a huge day of family in and out of the house all day for morning presents, a visit at another grandma’s, and then a huge christmas dinner with a surprise announcement that the very next day, wil’s dad and long time girlfriend would be getting married there in the house. although it wasn’t a surprise for us (wil was asked to cook the food and me help his sister decorate), it still was a crazy night and following day! after running around the house between decorating and being wil’s sous chef, come dinnertime, it just felt too rich to me to really enjoy. and by the time guests arrived for the cocktail party and the ceremony, i wasn’t feeling so hot. and as perfect timing would have it, right when us kids were supposed to go up and light candles, i headed the opposite direction to the bathroom to begin a lovely night with the flu.

this is now the 3rd out of 4 years that i have gotten the flu…different people, different homes, even different states…but with no immune system because of being pregnant, there was no avoiding it when little nephew josiah got it the night before. thankfully i don’t think i ever had a fever, but i was concerned about our chicky as i lost so many nutrients, fluids and pounds in such a short time!

almost sounds like we need to go nowhere and see no one next year…’quarantine christmas 2012′ has a nice ring to it, right?

either way, i missed the rest of the ceremony and the entire night of party that took place on the main floor below (which, as an introvert, was a teeny bit of relief to not have to socialize with a ton of people i didn’t know. terrible, yes, i am). also, feeling so awful the next day, we packed up and headed home a day early. it seemed worth it to make the trek then and have a day at home in our own bed before returning to work, versus wil sitting at his dad’s house doing nothing, checking on me every couple hours, only for us to leave the next day anyway.

i am thankful it didn’t come any earlier and ruin the holidays for everyone else. i am thankful for my phone allowing me to watch videos and read blog posts while sick in bed…although i am so sorry i never responded to everyone’s christmas wishes to me! yes, it’s great having google reader on my phone, but it’s so one-way that i don’t get a chance to comment back! and also i am so thankful for wil taking such care of me, and sacrificing so much for me. for making the entire drive, most of it in the dark with me as a terrible passenger, by himself at the wheel. and even eating his last chance of in-n-out inside by himself because i knew i couldn’t walk in the restaurant, nor could i smell it in the car…

here’s for a better next couple days and for a great 2012!