Rock a Bye, Sweet Baby Jane

Every so often I catch a a little glimpse of the sweet baby girl I know on camera, and I am amazed at how beautiful she really is. The recollection that she is here through Kris and I is amazing, and I love how she calls me mama. Too bad you can see all the bumps on her forehead :)

Miss Mechanical

During our trip in NY, Marin received a new name, Miss Mechanical. Although, I have always known Marin to prefer adult toys rather than baby toys, it was my parents that dubbed her with the descriptive title. She will spend hours (in baby time, so really more like 20 minutes) trying to figure out how to take things apart and put them back together. I wish though that I had more unbreakable things for her to tinker with. She is more and more like her daddy everyday, it just makes me laugh. We are also thinking she is on her way to being a "lefty". Marin tends to favor her left hand quite a bit, boy, chalk another one up for daddy then!

I have reason to gloat for a moment, Since the beginning of August, I have lost 10 pounds! Hooray! I am very excited about that, and I am almost able to fit into my pre-pregnancy jeans, another 10 pounds to go though. These next few days are going to be a bit rough, I have my big weigh in on Saturday and the pot is around 5 or 600 dollars! So I need to reeeeeally cut back on ANY food intake this week to bring home the bacon. The winnings of course will go to our Paris trip, which, I am still SO STOKED about. Ah, can't wait.

A Few Little Details

Now that I have a few extra minutes, I can fill you in on a few details of our NY trip, it was so much fun! I think for this post, I'll just do a day by day log, that way it's easier to follow:

Tuesday (10/6): Fly out to NY, arrive in the evening. Mom, dad and my sister Tabitha were a t the airport to greet us. We then went to the Carousel mall for a quick bite to eat. Marin rode the carousel and thought it was so fun! I also needed to buy a jacket as I left mine on the plane, oh well!

Wednesday: Drove up to Skaneatlas for lunch at The Sherwood Inn and to walk around the town. It was a little on the cold side, but nice to get some fresh air!

Thursday: Trip to Frog Pond in Bainbridge, a farmers market with tons of great fresh fruits, veggies and some barnyard animals. Then home to make dinner for the missionaries, we had chicken cordon bleu and apple crisp.

Friday, Saturday and Sunday: Trip to Hollenbecks where they make their own apple cider and fresh donuts, visit with Marin's Great-grandma, church at the Greene Branch to catch up with some old friends.

Monday: Drive through Ithaca to visit Jacob at Scout camp where he works and was getting an award for leadership training that day, it was COLD by the lake, brrrr! Home to make some half moon cookies.

Tuesday, Wednesday: Tabitha left :( Dinner with the family, spend some time at the house.

Wednesday: Trip up to Cortland for dinner.

Thursday: Cortland again, lunch with my friends JoAnn, an old co-worker and one of my best friends ever, she is so great, I miss her! Visit with my friend LeAnn afterwards and head to Applebees for a birthday dinner for a friend.

Friday: Lunch with some friends from high school, I actually had a great time and it was cool to see they had both grown up and were doing so well.

Saturday: Dinner with some old friends from the Greene Branch, Laurena and Becca. Laurena sent me home with some chocolates she had made, she's in culinary school to be a pastry chef, I'm so proud of her!

Sunday: Church at the Cortland Ward, then a stop by the Cortland Hospital, my old workplace to see a few other old co-workers. By this time Marin and I were SOOO ready to be done driving all over the place and seeing people, poor girl was not used to being in a car seat so much. We had a family over for a little bit to visit and I made some more half moon cookies.

Monday: Took my folks out to lunch and packed up and headed home.

Phew! It was a long trip, and Marin and I are so glad we could go, but we are happy to be home, we spent all day yesterday and will spend most of the day today at home. I did have a policy meeting last night and I have a YW activity at my house tonight. We are making dinner and homemade bread, so I need to get moving!

I also have some more exciting news! No, not that. Guess who's going to PARIS!!!! We have FINALLY bought the tickets!!! Kris found a good deal and so I told him to buy them now or we are never going to make it out there. You know how things go, you get busy with life, have another baby, and end up not going until you're kids are out of the house. I am SOOO EXCITED! Paris has been my dream city since I was a little girl and my amazing husband is making my dreams come true. We will be in Paris for my birthday next year, April 30th. I cannot WAIT! I need to get a ticker to put up on the blog so I can count down the days!

Well, I need to be off and get ready for this evening, have a great one!

Home Again!

Marin and I have made it back alive! Oh my, I have learned a few things about traveling with an infant, and here they are:
1. BE NICE to the flight attendants, they can make your trip a little more cozy
2. For the love of Mike, if you can afford it, BUY AN EXTRA SEAT! (more later)
3. Be prepared to see a mullet or two, even reverse mullets on your travels, huh.
4. Take some Benadryl for your kiddo. Yeah I know, I did it!

Our trip back was....long. Our flight to Cleveland was pretty good. Once we got to Cleveland, I found our flight had been delayed another hour, so I fed Marin a quick dinner, which she didn't really want and sat down outside the gate to give her a bottle. As I sat there, I watched this man directly across from me 2 aisles over start to have a seizure. So I sat there wondering when I needed to go offer my assistance, and when his wife lowered him to the floor, I sighed and went over to help. Not that I didn't want to help, but I was so tired! So we rolled him to his side and put some oxygen on him and waited until the paramedics came to cart him away. Then when we finally boarded, people were taking so long to put their carry-on's away, the stewardess had to hurry people along numerous times. When we got to the runway, the captain announced we were going BACK to the gate, apparently a first class genius didn't like the fact his footbal team was losing and needed to be escorted off the plane. Marin did surprisingly well and slept for a larg portion of the trip, but I was sitting next to a baby-phobic guy who flinched anytime her little fingertip grazed his sleeve. Ahhh well. we made it home, about 2 and a half hours late, but home alive! Ok, I have a policy meeting to prep for tonight, so I will talk more about our trip later!

Ok, I have a TON of pictures! I figured the best way was a slideshow, so enjoy!

How to eat out and lose weight...

This is really quite a simple way to lose weight:

Step one: Have a baby

Step two: Bring said baby with you to your favorite restaurant, making sure to schedule the meal at prime nap time.

Step three: Order your meal and try desperately to feed your little one first (being the good and selfless mother that you are), and while squishing your squirmy child as they try to wriggle off your lap, aim your loaded fork at your mouth and hope it has a safe landing...

Step four: Finish your meal after four bites and seven laps around the restaurant with a child that refuses to sit still and must go up and down the steps 30 times with her new found balloon in hand.

See? Easy! And all you needed to do was have a baby. Yeah right. Ugh. Marin yesterday was a nightmare at lunch and dinner, I can't even bring myself to expound on the topic. I will say though, that her inclement behavior allowed me to eliminate quite a few calories from two of my meals yesterday.

My trip here in NY is coming to a close, and as nice as it's been to be home, I miss my husband. He is a great guy and I would like to think he misses us too... It will be nice to be home so I can get Marin back to her naps and her own food and her own bed. I have eaten out so many times since I've been here, and while it's been fun, it hasn't been figure friendly. Even though I have tried to run or do pilates, I still need to get back to the gym. I think I need a 2 week detox diet or something!

Today I had lunch with a couple of girls I went to high school with, and it was....surprisingly nice! Not that I expected it to be bad, but we had a really good time! It was fun to chat with them and talk about what they have been up to. My friend Crystal is also a nurse and works in the NICU there, and my friend Laura is a stay at home mom. So cool! As a nice bonus, we got to see a guy we went to high school with working as one of the well-fed waiters. I am not a mean person, but he wasn't the nicest guy in high school, and it's good to see some good 'ol karma hard at work, haha!

Tomorrow night I have dinner with some old church friends, and hopefully that will go well, Marin has gotten to the point where she doesn't even want to put her jacket on because she knows that means she has to sit in her carseat, poor thing.

Ok, I made a delicious spinach gratin for dinner tonight, so I am sharing the recipe on my sidebar, check it out, Marin ate it, as did my little brother Matthew! And THAT is saying something. Pictures are coming when I get home, promise! And I get home late Monday night by the way!

Burnt Nuts

It seems as though every time I try to toast nuts, I always burn them! There is something about toasted nuts that I love, and so if I have a chance to toast them, I will. The only problem is that just about every time, I will end up burning them, so I need to makes sure I take out twice as many nuts as I need, as I already know the first batch is, essentially, already in the garbage can. I did this for a dessert my mom was making the other night, and just rolled my eyes and shook my head when I smelled those poor little pecans, blistering away in the toaster. It's a shame, they didn't really stand a chance.

As you may have guessed, I've been at my parents home in NY since last Tuesday and have been soaking in all the overcast, chilly weather I can get. I have until Monday before I leave and my schedule is still just as packed! My sister Tabitha flew up from Georgia the same Tuesday I flew in, and our family has spent the week scampering about the countryside visiting family and going here and there. She left early this morning, and now I need to get to work visiting my friends that have clamored to see me and Marin. Boy! It's a lot of work trying fit everyone in!

Although i don't have any pics to post right now, I have TONS to post when I get home, we have some really great pictures of our family, Marin in the leaves, a 4 generation photo, Marin in the pumpkins, Skaneatlas, Marin in the air...., you get the idea, lots of pictures. And you know, I had my hair done a few days before I came out, and it really shows in the pictures, I look pretty good!

I will say, it's always funny to come home and see what has changed and what has remained ever the same. It's odd to look at the bronze, eagle-with-constitution-in-claw light switch cover and think that it's been there since I was a little toot, crazy! And walking around the streets of my hometown, I remember how small and insignificant I used to feel, and now after living in Las Vegas, I almost feel too....fancy (?) for it all? Like I need to dress down and ruffle my hair a bit to fit in. I hope that doesn't make me sound pretentious!

Kris had his Jeep trip with his dad and LOVED it! Of course I missed not being able to talk to him, but he enjoyed every minute of his Jeep-time. It was so good for him to get a break from it all, I wish he could have taken more time off!

Well, I need to be off, I have some phone calls to make, but I promise, when I return, I will post the many pictures of our adventures in NY, have a great one!

Final Preparations

Marin and I are getting ready to ship out tomorrow morning for the chilly East Coast! And in preparation, I have of course been thinking about when I need to buy some benadryl so I can have a sleeping baby on the plane ride (trust me, she'll need it). I've also been thinking about packing, and thinking about printing off my tickets.... I know, I'm really a last minute kind of girl. And somehow, the radio station in my car has been tuned into country music, wierd, I know. And last night, coming home from work, they had the good stuff on, Garth Brooks, Alabama (one of my favorites), some stuff from a few years ago. So, tonight I'll be packing and sleeping for the trip, wish me luck!

So Ready to GO!

I guess the title has more than one meaning for me. I worked yesterday (in special care, blech), and the day was good, normal, everyone was happy. Then the head-honcho director pulled me aside to give an update on a policy I have been working on for quite some time, and it all hit the fan and splattered EVERYWHERE! Now, in order to understand why the night ended up the way it did, you need to understand, well, we'll call her Miss Honcho. Miss Honcho speaks in a tight lipped British accent and, in essence, is great at being an administrator as she never really gives you answers, just beats around the bush and looks at you like YOU are the idiot. I can ask ANYONE I work with, and they will tell you the same thing. Well, this conversation that should have taken 10 minutes MAX, ended up taking almost an hour and I got back to chaos and really angry parents (rightfully so). I was already frustrated and crying, and finding out how angry these parents were made me even more upset that they walked away with a horrible impression of what kind of nurse I am. I came home feeling absolutely horrible and frustrated and came to a realization that I keep trying to change the world, in the wrong way. I want so badly to FIX things (the nature of the beast, I guess) and last night was another sign that the place I need to be "fixing" things and REALLY making a difference, is in my home, with my family. I do love the independence of having a job, but it's not where I need to be expending all of my energy. While I would love to say that I will be able to stay home with Marin now, it is still a ways off in the future. I have always known it's where I need to be, I guess I just needed a reminder.

One of those days

Yesterday I had kind of a full schedule, and for some reason, it was so hard to. . . just. . . get stuff done! You KNOW you've had those days! I bundled up Marin yesterday morning to take her for a long-hard walk (for my workout) and decided at the last minute to stop at an inactive neighbors house and ask if she wanted to come. She is almost ready to have her second baby and has a 2 year old little boy, her husband takes their only car to work and she has no option to drive anywhere, you get the picture. So we ended up just walking around the complex inside the gates and then I invited her in so the kids could play for a little bit. They ended up staying or an hour and a half! I don't think she wanted to go home, poor girl! So I was rushing to take a shower and get Marin ready and out the door quickly. We made it to DI (Deseret Industries) so I could grab some winter clothes for Marin for our NY trip and at the checkout, the nice but chatty checkout lady ended up unpacking the clothes 3 times because she couldn't figure out what she rung up, THEN she brought over an associate to help her and THEY proceeded to unpack the bags ANOTHER 3 times! Oh my gosh! I was in line for 20 minutes! About as long as I took to pick out the clothes. So I rushed to the car (I had somewhere to be by 4) and made a split second decision to turn left as I tried to beat the yellow light that put me on the wrong side of town and in the middle of every school zone with a 15 MPH cop-laden district on the East side. Ahhhh! Then of course I caught all of the red lights (a few of them twice) and called Kris in a panic because I didn't know where I was and how to get to Costco. Kris, having an internal compass, directed me to a familiar street, onto which I needed to turn right but caught it just as the oncoming traffic got the green....grrr. Well, I made it to Costco, flew to the back to grab a cake and running down the aisles to find the items on my coupon list and Kris called me and told me he was there too, for lunch! I never pass up an opportunity to see my hunny, but I was running waaaay late and while we dawdled in the store, I was getting more and more antsy and Marin was getting more and more anxious as she was about 45 minutes overdue for her bottle. Finally we checked out and headed to drop off the cake and ice cream and Marin is crying in the back because she's thirsty (I KNEW I should have brought a bottle!) and I'm still hitting the red lights. I was supposed to drop off the cake by 4, but I didn't make it until 5 if that tells you how late I was. But we made it home and Marin had her bottle and dinner and she was a happy girl. Phew!

I did get some of the cutest things for Marin though, I'll have to post some pics later. We got her a few pairs of footie pajamas, she was DESPERATELY in need of pajamas.

Ok, picture time!


I taught Marin how to say "Hiiii-YAA!" and karate chop her little block tower, it's pretty cute, so this top picture is the up swing. . .

"Hiiii-YA!" ....and this one is the downswing. She is so funny!

Marin with her shopping cart. She also has a bunch of stuffed veggies that she takes in and out of the cart.

Going shopping mama!

What's for dinner mommy? Can I have some yet?

Oh, another story. I have always made my bread on my Pampered Chef baking stone which I have had for. . . heck, six years! I LOVE my baking stone. Well, there was a little mis-hap in the kitchen (we won't say who was involved. . . . ) and my baking stone split in two. I was so sad! I have made so many loaves of bread on that stone, and it was dark and seasoned around the edges, I was very proud of that stone. Ahhh well, all good things must come to and end, right? Kris was a sweetie and got me a new one. It has A LOT of seasoning that needs to be done, it's pretty white.

My old friend, split right in two.

And my new albino friend, now with handles. I think I would have preferred one without, but I guess it's all that Pampered Chef has now. We have LOTS of baking to do!

Have a great day!