Hmmm

I've have felt in a bit of a slump lately. I've thought it was just that I was tired or uninspired, but I'm starting to think that it is just plain laziness. Just make a decision already! The main question that I've struggled with is what to do professionally when I grow up, oh wait, thats passed already...ok, when I'm done rearing children. It has been a constant thought running in the back of my brain.

I've never had a huge passion to become a, fill in the blank here, but I have had a few things that have been stuck in my brain for most of my adult life. No. 1: study history and do what with it, I don't know. No. 2: become a high school counselor so that I can help kids set goals up for themselves once they graduate. No. 3: become a small business owner...coffee shop, bakery?? I don't know.

Now, it is not at all lost on me that I should have started working towards one of these three options long before the ripe old age of 31. However, that is where I am and there's nothing to be done about it now. I just have to decide and do it.

Hmmm...

The Great Escape!

Sydney's plan was apparently to back up slowly out of the living room on her stomach. Since she refuses to spend much of her time on her stomach to work on crawling, this was a slow process...

Morning Walks

Sydney now enjoys morning laps around our ottoman. She is getting quite good at it too! We might have an early walker on our hands. I guess it's time for those baby gates.

Btw, her hair is always like that in the morning now too. Time for some product to tame that beast (some plaster perhaps)?!?! Nah, I like the crazy too much :)

New Treasures

Syd clutching a packet of Forget-Me-Not seeds. I can only assume that once she starts popping those seeds, I will open her diaper to find a beautiful bouquet of blue flowers, right??

Good morning my Sunshine.

Playing with my sweet girl on a cold and rainy Monday.

Bon Appétit!

I have a couple of new recipes to add to the blog this week.  We tried several new recipes these last two weeks, but we really enjoyed the Marinated Portobello "Burger" and the Panko Crusted Chicken Stuffed with Ricotta, Spinach, Tomatoes and Basil.

Both recipes were fairly easy, but the Marinated Portobello "Burger" was a nice quick meal with minimal mess to clean up!  I've always loved portobello mushrooms, but I've never cooked with them because I thought it might be too tricky to match some of the awesome "burgers" I've enjoyed at restaurants.  The marinade in this recipe is so simple and it was perfect!  It really made the meal.  The only thing that I would do differently is the bun.  I could not find ciabatta bread at my local grocery store so I just used some other bun that was available.  Big mistake.  I think a ciabatta bun would maximize this sandwich's flavor because the soft, sponge-like bread would soak up the marinade and the pesto while the crusty outside would give it a great crunch!

Marinated Portobello "Burger"

Moving on to the Chicken dish, this recipe did take a little longer, but it was much easier than I originally thought it might be.  The "stuffing" is just a simple, quick mix and it adds a nice change up for your standard chicken dish.  I did think that the tomato flavor was lost a bit in the ricotta though.  Next time I think I will use sun-dried tomatoes instead.  It won't take many of those guys and it will add a nice punch of sweetness to counter the ricotta!  Bon Appétit!

Panko Crusted Chicken Stuffed with Ricotta, Spinach, Tomatoes & Basil

Exhale.

It seems as though things around here have been in constant motion during the last couple weeks.  To name a few:  house and yard work, getting the RV running so my dad can get it back to MI, keeping up with the house and keeping the baby, who may or may not be teething, happy.  Well, last night I was feeling very cranky and I realized that I need to just stop...

Breathe in, breathe out

There are things that I have to do during my day (i.e. baby related things), but there are also things that I don't have to do during my day: leaning, laundry, working out.  I am starting to feel as though I am constantly trying to get something done around the house.  How is it still always a mess?...

Breathing, breathing, breathing

I realize that I am my own worst critic when it comes to how the house looks, but I'm not sure that I have enough energy or time to keep up that inner monologue where I'm listing off things that I need to do.  As far as running, I always feel better when I get a run in while Syd is sleeping, but I need to find some balance there too because I am lacking energy and motivation currently.

Even as I am writing this, I am feeling overwhelmed with stress about getting stuff done and worrying that I'm missing important things while stressing about the other stuff...

Breathe in

My dad took off today with what will hopefully be a successful trip back home, the house isn't going to go anywhere for a day and the library books that are due back today will just have to wait...

Breathe out

Changing out of my pajamas or not changing out of my pajamas today...

Deep breathe

Looking forward to be being a couch potato with my best friend tonight...

Getting better...breathing


Counting my blessings and trying to live in the moment...

Exhale

Running On Empty

Whew.  It has been a long week and it is only Tuesday.  We worked our tails off all weekend staining our deck.  My hand has just recently relaxed out of the position that it was in while holding a paint brush.  I am still walking like a 90 year old because I was hunched over too long, but not to fear, I think that my nightly liquid yoga treatments (a/k/a wine) are slowly doing the trick!  On the up side, the deck looks amazing!  It looks brand new, which gives Eric and I quite a feeling of accomplishment.  Other than that, our weekend was full of cleaning.  We had an appointment to have our house appraised today because we are refinancing (interest rates are off the hook right now!).  I don't know about you, but if I have someone coming to my house with a clipboard and camera the crazy comes flying right out of me.  So after a few days of nonstop cleaning I noticed today that I kept saying to myself, wow, you know it's bad when...

• You have to use a vacuum to dust out our bathtub (don't judge me, we never use it)
• Your excitement of the day comes when you warm up coffee that has been sitting out for 8 hours
• You put on your pajamas at 5:30 p.m.
• You decide to put off trying the new recipe for dinner tonight because you are too tired and the thought of having to read a recipe makes you want to throw up
• You want to cry simply because your baby sneezes mid-meal with a mouth full of yams that are now spread all over your freshly vacuumed/mopped kitchen floor

End rant.  

Yes, it has been a long week already, but on the plus side, the house is now spic and span and just in time for our guests this week!  My dad and his best bud Ben are coming out for a few days.  We are looking forward to the brief visit and Sydney loves seeing the grandparents.  

Speaking of Syd, she is still out of this world incredible (in case you were wondering).  Every week is so awesome with her because she is just growing like the cutest fricking weed you've ever seen.  She loves to run around the house with us holding her tiny, little hands.  She thinks it's hysterical and it is my mission in life to get a laugh out of her whenever I can.

Sydney has also been getting really good with her sleep patterns.  I remember not too long ago when I was sure that she was never going to get into any sort of recognizable routine, but I think we are almost there.  She's slept through the night a handful of times already and when she does get up it is usually around 4 or 5 in the morning and she wants to eat and then go back to sleep (at least for a little bit).  I'm pretty happy about that progress.  Also, she is also up to 16.5 lbs!  That is a pound and a half in the last month!  Apparently we are feeding her enough.  We are still, however, on the lookout for teeth.  We have excessive drooling and crankitude (don't look it up, it is my word), but no teeth to show for it yet.  And although I am pretty sure we've been saying that she has been teething since she was about 4 months old, I am almost sure of it this time!

All and all, things are great (sleepy, but great)!

Rainy, Cold Weekend

Rainy and cold pretty much sums up the weekend that we had here in Colorado.  I'm not complaining though!  Eric had last Friday off and so we had three full days of just hanging out as a family.  We barely went anywhere and we didn't really work on any projects either.

Sydney loves being able to see her dad throughout the daytime.  Unfortunately, Sydney has been cranky from about 4-7 p.m. lately and that is when Eric usually gets to see during the work week.  She loves to dance with him and they have some really deep conversations.  Those conversation usually consist of Dada, baba, and screeching, but it is adorable!

The one project that I did undertake this weekend is my bi-weekly menu calendar.

One errand that I absolutely detest is grocery shopping.  I dislike everything about it.  I hate coming up with meals that we haven't had twenty times that month already, I hate writing up the list that inevitably has things missing and I hate dragging out the baby in between feeding and naps to get the groceries.  Not to mention, it never fails that the day of the week that I have to go out to get groceries because I have absolutely nothing left in the house to feed us for dinner, it is cold and gross outside.

Soooooo...I had been finding a ton of new recipes on Pinterest (http://pinterest.com/) and so I thought that there was no reason why I shouldn't write up a grocery list for two weeks worth of dinners so that I don't have to run this errand quite as often.  First, however, I would have to get more organized.  I've had this old whiteboard calendar up in our office for forever and I thought it would work well and help me get things a little more under control.

I have to say, I think it has been quite successful in a couple of different ways.  For one, I am cutting my runs to the grocery store in half (for the most part) and secondly, we are trying a ton of great new recipes (and some duds).  It has been a great change of pace mixing it up a little with all the new recipes and we are saving money by not going out to eat.  Going out to eat isn't a great option for us being that Sydney goes to sleep at 7 p.m. every night, but also, making ends meet on a one paycheck budget is not easy.  It has been quite an adjustment and the more organized and prepared I am with dinners, the less likely it is that we'll have to spend extra money going out or ordering in.  Eating in is not always the funnest, but at the moment it makes the most sense for us.

So this weekend, it was time to finish up the menu calendar for April by coming up with a couple more weeks worth of dinners.  We don't always eat these dinners on the day that I post them originally, but we will have ingredients for two weeks worth of recipes regardless of whether or not we move things around.  We also end up having leftovers which is a plus because I can bump a planned dinner (something that will keep in the fridge or pantry for a while) and then we end up having an extra meal in the house if we are ever in a bind.

Well, that was my uneventful weekend.  I hope you all had something fun or relaxing going on too!  Happy Monday :)

Bon Appétit!

As of lately I have become completely obsessed with Pinterest.  At least in regards to finding new recipes.  I have recently started planning out a two week menu on a whiteboard calendar in my office (that way, in theory at least, I only have to go to the grocery store twice a month).  I would say that 90-95 percent of the recipes for those meals come from Pinterest.

For the longest time (ages 18-25) I didn't really cook and then for the longest time after that (ages 26-30) I cooked, but they were pretty boring, safe recipes.  I am really trying to expand my culinary horizons and Pinterest has become a great asset in doing so.  The fact that I am preparing so many new recipes every week is something that I pretty excited about!

Below is the first recipe that I am going to stick on the blog, but certainly not the last.  It is a Tomato Risotto With Portobello Mushroom dish.  My lovely sister-in-law, Melissa, originally pinned this herself on Pinterest.  I owe her big time because it has turned out to be a favorite and it will be a regular around here from now on.  

Tomato Risotto With Portobello Mushroom

Please ignore the picture, I took it with my phone because I was too lazy to mess with getting the camera out.  As it was we didn't eat until 9 p.m.  That leads me to a tip regarding this recipe: leave yourself plenty of time.  If you are unfamiliar with cooking risotto, you might not realize that it takes some time.  You need to add stock to the risotto, 2/3 cup at a time, until the rice has absorbed roughly 4 cups worth.  While you are waiting in between adding the stock you need to continuously stir the risotto.  I found out that it is this stirring that eventually causes the rice to release the starch that adds to the creamy sauce.

As you can see from the picture, we just paired it with a simple salad and called it good!  If you are interested in the recipe, just click on the link directly above the picture.  Bon Appétit! 

This Just In: Easter Bunny Spotted In Littleton!

Wait, no.  That's just Sydney!

We had a great Easter with our sweet little girl and the Webbers!  I think fun was had by all, even though Bro was feeling under the weather :(  Hailey and I got good reviews on our Easter meal and we all had a nice day!  It was so much fun doing this with a little one of our own this year.  I am really excited for future holidays when she actually understands what she's doing and can run around on her own with bunny ears on!  Here are some action shots from our weekend!

Maddie and Brodie did most of the egg coloring,  but Syd got in there for an egg or two :) 

Deep Thoughts on Easter Egg Colors with Madalyn Nickole Webber.

I think Big Cheese, I mean Sydney, enjoyed her Easter experience!

Say what??

Time for the hunt!

 And a family shot!

Our Life According to Syd...

One of the reasons that I put off starting this blog so long is that I was afraid I wouldn't have time to keep up with it being that our daily schedule around here is pretty loose. As much as I try (and I try a lot) I can't seem to get Sydney on the same schedule everyday. It varies quite a bit depending on what time she wakes in the morning which is dependent on how she slept or didn't sleep during the night. With all that said, I am trying to get into a rhythm with our days and weeks. It will probably take a while for the blog to catch its stride while we tweak it and get into the hang of things.

I am getting really excited about documenting our daily life, especially those monumental days that come with raising a baby! Sydney is nearly 7 and a half months already. Everyone says that you should really try to live in the moment and try not to miss anything because it'll go so fast. Well, I think I've been pretty good about trying to make the most of every second I get with her while she is a baby and I still find that it is flying by. I don't like it one bit, but I try to remember that the older she gets the more she is developing and learning. For instance, Syd is currently standing up on her own at her little play station. She also just started moving around it on her own. Watching her "work the switchboard" as we call it is the best. She's pulling the levers and pushing the buttons and it is amazing to watch. She has this adorable look of concentration and you know that she is figuring something out on her own.

We are so looking forward to Spring in the Roberts' house! Poor Sydney has been cooped up in this house with her barely sane mom for too long. I can't wait to get out on the trails around our house with her. She's getting used to taking walks with me and the dogs and I think she really likes it. We have big plans of working outside in the garden and sitting out in the backyard with a picnic and we can't wait! We have slowly been introducing grass to Syd's tiny toes and I think she's a fan. We want to get the most out of this summer as a family and take advantage of everything Colorado has to offer!

So. Let's see. My life in the last couple of years...hmmm, where to start. 2009. Since 2009 Eric and I have moved from California to Colorado, (via Alaska, see Harvey the RV blog for more on that), got married in Ann Arbor, MI, moved to Florida for 4 months, launched Juno (Eric, not me), drove back to Colorado and had a baby (me, not Eric). Yawn. Needless to say things have been crazy! Good crazy, but crazy nonetheless. Our life is an adventure and I have a suspicion that it's about to get a whole lot crazier. If you have any desire to share in the crazy, please come along for the ride. I'll be talking about everything from my family to cooking to house work to traveling to... Stayed tuned.