Month: June 2009

Weekend Wrap-Up

Posted on by — 2 Comments ↓

For the first time in several months, we headed up to Massachusetts to visit my family this weekend! Actually it was the first time I’ve gone anywhere (besides doctors’ offices) since coming home with the baby. Needless to say it was much-needed and I had a great time hanging out with family and friends. Laura did well on the drive up, sleeping the whole way. That was a relief! When we got to my parents’ house my friend Jenn visited for a bit and then my sister-in-law Kathy came by. She, my mom, and I all were going to my cousin Angie’s baby shower in the afternoon. So I had a nice long visit with  Kathy and we all got to eat yummy food at the shower. I especially loved Angie’s grandmother’s “Cheesy Potatoes.” Oh my goodness — I wonder if she would part with the recipe! So yummy. The cake was adorable (as well as delicious). Don’t you agree?

After the shower we just hung out at my parents’ house for a while. Drew enjoyed looking through my Dad’s tool catalogs and shopping at his favorite store (Ocean State Job Lot) where he was psyched to have found a little tent package on sale. He wants to try taking the boys camping this year. At any rate, we didn’t see my brother this time because he was fishing in Rhode Island. Crazy boy had to get up at 3 a.m. to get down on the water, but at least he caught something — a 36-inch bass! Still, that’s mighty early.

Dad grilled steaks for dinner and we enjoyed them with salad, baked potatoes, and corn on the cob. Basically my all-time favorite dinner! We then got all the kids in their PJs and headed home around 7. It was a long day, but a good one. I’m hoping to go back for a longer visit next month, but this time I just wasn’t up for packing for everyone. Hope you all had great weekends too!

CSA 2009: Third Share

Posted on by — 6 Comments ↓

CSA 2009 - Third Share
It’s so striking to me how much changes in two weeks! I was really surprised by the variety in this week’s farm share. Things are really starting to rev up! We got:

  • 2 heads of lettuce
  • a small amount of basil
  • bok choy
  • cabbage
  • radishes
  • spinach
  • mixed Asian greens
  • PYO (pick-your-own) sugar snap peas
  • broccoli

Oh, the peas are so good! I was really happy that Drew took the time to get some (he knows how much I love them). Those will probably be devoured as a snack between today and tomorrow. The bok choy… Oy. Still have last week’s and still at a loss. I did find a bok choy salad recipe that I’m going to try. Basically it sounds like the Asian cole slaw I often make, but using the bok choy instead of cabbage. I’ll do that either tonight or tomorrow. With the broccoli I plan on making a broccoli and chick pea salad. The basil with be used maybe for a margarita pizza. Cabbage… lots of ideas, but nothing concrete yet. Cabbage is one of my favorite veggies! Maybe I’ll do some lazy golumpkis next week. The rest will go into salads. I never know what to do with the asian greens, so we usually just eat them raw. We’re not huge stir-fry fans here, so… salad it is! (And the kalanchoe is obviously not from the CSA – it’s the plant Drew brought to me in the hospital after having Laura!)

~ simple pleasures ~

Posted on by — 1 Comment ↓

simple pleasures ~ chocolate sundae :-)Right now I’m enjoying that yummy chocolate sundae! Drew was sweet to save the last of the chocolate chip ice cream for me to have tonight. I’ve not been out of the house (except for 4 doctor’s appointments) since coming home from the hospital and honestly I’m pretty happy this way, LOL! I’d just as soon enjoy my own little sundae here in the den, rather than go out.

The boys are being (relatively) quiet, which is nice. The plumber is here putting in the baseboards (I think) upstairs, so they are getting to stay up late tonight. They’re relaxing on the couch under a quilt, watching the Clone Wars show on Cartoon Network. As long as they’re chilling out, I’ll let them indulge too 😉

Just a couple more days of dealing with all of our stuff crowded into the dining room and hallways. This weekend we should be able to start moving things back upstairs. Let me tell you — I can’t wait to sleep in my own bed again! Prior to having the baby we were sleeping on the boys’ mattresses on the floor (they have been happy sharing the Aero bed). And since coming home from the hospital, I’ve pretty much camped out in the recliner because with my pulled muscle and all, it was impossible to get up from a laying-down position. But now that I’m doing better the recliner is starting to get very old, LOL! I can’t wait to curl up in our king-sized bed, under some fresh sheets, and… well, let’s be honest here. I don’t expect to get much sleep, but at least I’ll be comfy 😉

Happy Father’s Day!

Posted on by — 1 Comment ↓

Dad & MeA very happy father’s day to my daddy! Yes, that would be me and him, waaaay back when. I wish I could be spending the day with him, but a call will have to suffice for now. I’ll see him next Saturday, though :-). I also kind of lamed out on Father’s Day for Drew this year, but he understands. In a couple weeks we’ll so something special for him. In the meantime, the boys made him cards and #1 Dad buttons. I had originally looked at new grills and at pressure washers for him (he was eyeing them at Home Depot one day), but I think we’ll wait until the end of the season and get a new grill as a belated gift. Ours really has seen better days.

Drew wanted to cook a big breakfast, though, so he dug out the waffle iron and made waffles, bacon, and fruit for all of us. (He loves to cook and has been enjoying the last couple weeks of me not cooking.) We don’t have any big plans for the day. He’s actually working his tail off clearing out the rest of the upstairs furniture so that we can have our carpeting installed on Thursday — yay! The guys are here to paint today, and soon, oh so soon, my house will be back in order. I can’t wait!

Rain, Rain, Go Away

Posted on by — 2 Comments ↓

Seriously, I have had enough of the rain. It’s so dreary out 🙁 I’m glad I didn’t shell out for new outdoor furniture this year — we wouldn’t even have a chance to use it! Hopefully July will be a nicer month. The kids are getting stir-crazy. At least Jake is still in school for another week, so that gives him something to do. Their last day is next Wednesday, and the following week his camps start. I hope he has good weather for them. What fun is summer camp if you can’t swim or play games outside?

Sorry, I guess I am just really cranky. And I see how stressed out Drew is trying to do everything and that just makes me feel worse. Of course, he said that I’d better just stay put because if I have another setback that’s just going to drag it out even longer. Again I find myself wishing that I was able to have delivered my babies like a normal woman instead of having to have a c-section. And of course I know that I *am* normal and plenty of women have c-sections, but it still sucks and is not my ideal. If I didn’t have to have the c-section I’d be up and around. Oh well, no use thinking about things you have no control over and can’t change, right? I swear I’d be in a better mood if the sun was shining!

TV Time

Posted on by — 3 Comments ↓

I’ve watched more TV in the last two weeks than Ii have all year, I think. In the comments of an earlier entry, Sara asked if I’ve been watching the show “Say Yes to the Dress” and I’ve caught several episodes! It’s so fun seeing all the wedding gowns. I’ve also (embarassingly) seen most of the season of “Real Housewives of New Jersey” as well as tons of cooking shows and infomercials. I’ve also seen some clever commercials. Last night there was one for some variety of yellow pages. The husband comes home, thrilled that he got a job at a plant that makes explosives. The wife asks if he’s working at a desk or on the field. When he replies that he’s working in the field where they test everything, she immediately turns to the yellow pages where she hopes to find a company that will offer her the best term life insurance rates. It’s funnier than I describe it, trust me! I also love the Heineken ad with the people in the back of a cab and the fun cabbie who turns up the radio and starts singing along to that Biz Markie song, “Just a Friend.” It totally takes me back to college and living in Boston afterwards! The one for some juice is good too — a guy and girl are on an escalator and she says, “I think you’re the father of one of my kids.” Shocked, he makes mention of spring break in Cancun. Of course, after drinking the juice he realizes that she’s his child’s teacher. Again, I’m not explaining it well, but it’s pretty clever. Hey, I gotta take whatever entertainment I can get, LO!L

Shoulda Known!

Posted on by — 3 Comments ↓

I should have known that since I had such an easy pregnancy, things were bound to go awry after I had the baby. Thankfully, my pulled muscle is finally feeling better. Yesterday I could walk without pain, and it was so wonderful! Drew is still confining me to bed rest (well, recliner rest, really, LOL!) until at least tomorrow, just to be extra careful. However, yesterday I noticed a little blood oozing from a portion of my c-section incision. Just what I need, right? Sigh… so I was able to get a late appointment at my OB’s office for them to look at it and sure enough, it’s slightly infected. Luckily, a simple antibiotic should take care of it, but still… so frustrating.

In other news, I haven’t been posting any photos of the upstairs (obviously) because I’m convinced that going upstairs on Saturday to look at a paint color is what did me in, so no stairs for me until I am sure I am better. However, today they are putting color on the walls! A beautiful blue in Jake’s room, a deep red in Noah’s room, light purple in Laura’s room, and a sandy grey-brown in our room. Also, our carpet is in, so we just need to call to arrange for installation. Hopefully by the end of next week we can start moving furniture back! We thought of puttin a TV wall mount in our room, but we have so much extra space now, we can put it on a side table or something.

The kids are great! Laura loves that I’m confined to a chair because she’s basically spending all her time in my arms, LOL! Jake and Noah are good and looking forward to summer 🙂

Hope all is well with you! I am so behind in blog reading –I’m afraid to log into Google Reader! Hopefully I’ll be back on track soon!

That’s about it for now. Hope you all are doing well!

When It Rains, It Pours

Posted on by — 3 Comments ↓

And pour it did off and on this weekend! In addition to the dreary weather, I went ahead and managed to severly pull a muscle in my right groin area. Starting Saturday morning I felt a burning pain in my thigh as well as pain in my groin area, under my inscision. It was tolerable, though, until Saturday evening. I stood up and tried to walk to the bathroom and Good Lord — the pain was so unbearable that I screamed out and started crying. Immediately I called the on-call doctor and got a great midwife who took her time listening to me. (Often I find that on-call doctors tend to rush you.) At any rate, I gave her a detailed description of the pain, where it was, that there was no redness or swelling, and that I think I had pulled something getting out of bed the other night. She said that she was pretty sure I pulled a muscle or ligament because it did not sound like a clot or infection. I was told to take my 800 mg. of Iburprofin every 6 hours (it acts as an anti-inflammatory) and to basically put myself on bedrest for the next 24-48 hours.

Yesterday was awful and depressing. I spent the whole day watching crappy TV, catching up on “indulgent” shows like that Duggar show (I still remember thinking it was weird when they were looking at steel buildings for their house when they built it, LOL!), and wedding dress shows, and I even watched “The Real Housewives of New Jersey” at some point. Crap TV that I never watch! (Good thing I didn’t cancel the DirecTV before I had the baby!)

Thank God, I am feeling better this morning. I was able to stand and take some small steps without pain. Even now, I’m 20 minutes away from my next round of pain meds and I have to say that I’m feeling all right. But don’t worry — there is no way I am overdoing it again. All week I am forcing myself to do nothing (which is so freaking hard!), but it’s worth it so that I heal up and don’t go through this again. I’m just glad to be feeling better, slowly but surely!

Neat Gadget

Posted on by — 2 Comments ↓

I am *so* not a gadget girl, but I love this little digital keychain that Drew gave me for Mother’s Day! It’s small, but holds a bunch of photos and with the baby here, everyone always wants to see pictures so this will be a great way to have some with me all the time. I wasn’t sure if these keychains come with compact flash cards, but mine did so for now I’ll use that one. I think I can always use one with more memory later if I want to store more pics, but this should be good. Now if only I can get a photo of Miss Laura with her eyes open! She just doesn’t want to cooperate, LOL!

CSA 2009: Share #2

Posted on by — 3 Comments ↓

CSA 2009: Second share

Since I can’t drive, Drew was on farm share duty this week (he even took the photo for me!). We got two heads of lettuce, mixed greens, arugula, spinach, kale, bok choy, and turnips. I’ve convinced Drew to try roasting some of the kale to have with tonight’s dinner. Usually he makes a soup with kale, beef, mushrooms, and feta but I want to try something new. Since he’s doing the cooking these days, I had to convince him 😉 I’m not sure how much longer I can take this “not doing anything” stuff, so in the next couple of days I’m planning on easing back into cooking a little bit. I won’t be standing for hours on end or doing any cooking marathons, but I think one dinner will be good for me. I plan on making some cream of spinach soup, along with a new batch of artisan bread. We can add a side salad and I think that will be such a yummy dinner. The bok choy… I don’t know. We never got around to using what we had from our last share. Still have to figure out a good use for it. The turnips will go sliced raw into salads or on sandwiches, or roasted along with a protein for dinner. (The option to the turnips was kohlrabi, which I would have totally grabbed but Drew didn’t know what to do with it. Hopefully next time it’ll be there again. Last spring I was making a delicious carrot-kohlrabi slaw.)

I’ve been watching a lot of Food Network, as well as going through my cooking magazines and tagging recipes I want to try. Hopefully between nursing, healthy eating, and exercise (once I’m given the OK) the pounds will peel off pretty quick. I’ve seen a lot of diet pill ads and infomercials late at night lately, and while pills like Apidexin might be the choice for some, for me I’d rather keep it as natural as possible. I got my stitch out today and at the doctor I found out that I’ve lost 8 lbs. since last Wednesday. I have 15 lbs. to go to reach my pre-pregnancy weight and 27 lbs. until my official goal weight from back when I started South Beach a couple years ago. I’ve learned a lot about nutrition over the last couple years and my eating habits have greatly improved, so I’m feeling pretty good about my goals. Plus, I find it’s easier to lose weight in the summer, with the abundance of fresh produce. We’ll see how it goes.