Random Thoughts, Observations, and Happenings

Power washing the deck is way more fun (and effective) if you actually turn the power washer on.

Apparently Cupcake has selective door opening skills.  She was supposed to be napping, but instead she decided to open her closet door, go inside the closet, close the door, and then scream when she couldn’t get out.  There is now a childproof knob on her closet door.

Forgetting to buy ice cream when I went to the grocery store earlier in the week was a BIG mistake!

Taking a dachshund and a toddler to the vet to drop off a fecal sample, get a blood draw and buy a 50 pound bag of dog food is not as easy as one might think.  The toddler wasn’t wearing any shoes.

Stuffing your Cosmic Brownie wrapper down your shirt does not fool the dog.  He will still whine at you until you either throw it away or give it to him.

If you power wash half of your huge deck your arm will not stop vibrating for at least 10 minutes afterward.

My SUV fits on hubby’s side of the garage.  This is handy when his car is being serviced, my side of the garage has a dresser in it, and there is a storm overhead that might bring with it tornadoes and hail.

If the toddler is going to fall asleep in the car every time we go for a 20 minute drive I’m going to assume she’s not ready to give up her nap and I will continue to fight this battle.

We went to pick a present for a friend out of her birthday bucket at a local store and I totally peeked at Cupcake’s birthday bucket to see what was left.

I started another blog post almost a week ago, but I’m too lazy to edit the pictures for it.  How can one be too lazy to sit at the computer and edit pictures, yet not too lazy to sit at the computer and browse Pinterest?

I wonder if the Dairy Queen is open for the season, yet?

I bought a headboard from a consignment store with no idea how I was going to get it home.  My tape measure keychain broke, so I wasn’t sure it would fit in my car. Heck, I’m not entirely sure it will fit the bed frame!

I don’t think I feel the baby moving, yet.  Does this mean this child will be calmer than my first?  At this point in my pregnancy with Cupcake she was already beating the crap out of my insides.

Cupcake’s birthday party is at our house in just over 3 weeks and I still need to paint the deck, plan a menu, finish the guest room, get rid of all the junk in the front room, assemble her present and figure out where the heck everyone is going to sit.  (And kindly ask Mother Nature not to rain on her party this year!)

A Day in the Life: The Last Day of April

Apparently my alarm was set for 6:30.  I don’t remember setting it that early, but it starting pounding at the door and yelling my name around that time.  The good news is she wanted to snuggle.  So we sleepily moseyed back to my bed and got our snuggle on for a good 45 minutes.  And then we giggled for a good 10 minutes and eventually made our way downstairs for breakfast.

We had almost no milk in the house, so hubby wasn’t allowed to have cereal for breakfast.  That left enough milk for Cupcake to have some in her cup and in both of our bowls of cereal.  We opened a new box of Kashi Triple Berry Crunch.  I approve!  Cupcake also had some applesauce and I had some OJ.  We got a little bit of play time in before we had to get ready for Stroller Strength class.

I totally overdressed for Stroller Strength.  By the second lap around the park (1/2 mile) I had to take my jacket off.  It got warm fast.  We worked on legs and of course did cardio.  I ran (at my 4 month pregnant pace) and I’m sure I’m going to feel it later.  The kids had a great time playing on the playground after class.  I forgot my phone in the car so I couldn’t take a picture of her in her cute new, wide legged jeans going down the slide.  She also had a great time pushing around a dump truck she stole from the older boys (they weren’t actually playing with it, so………).

We stayed at the playground for an hour, so my plan to get groceries was out the window because it was now lunch time (and I forgot my coupons anyway).  Back home I made Cupcake a peanut butter and jelly, served up with some raisins and pasta salad.  I had leftover pulled pork and pasta salad.  She ate maybe half her sandwich before the neighbor came over with her daughter (who’s almost 5).  The kids played.  Moms chatted.  I gave away an Amish Friendship Bread starter (woo hoo!  now I only have to make one!!) and then I kicked them out because it was naptime.  Oh, and I was supposed to put the chicken in the Crockpot at noon, but I got distracted by the company.

I had intended to put a coat of paint on the dresser but Cupcake was not cooperating with the nap, I still needed to fine tune my grocery list (yeah, I was going to go to the store underprepared) and get a shower.  I sent her back to bed twice before I got in the shower.  I again sent her back to bed once I was done showering.  It sounded like she got the hint, so I headed down to the basement to hem the neighbor’s new curtain (the main reason for her visit earlier).  She brought it to me like this.

Smart girl!  She has no sewing experience, so I was impressed with her method of marking the desired length.

I got to try out a new method for ensuring even hems!

I listened to the buzz of my sewing machine, while watching some Samantha Who? on Netflix, and listening to the silence on the baby monitor.

Success!!

OK, so the silence on the baby monitor was not a toddler sleeping like I thought.  She discovered how to escape from her bedroom!! As I was coming up the stairs I could smell Old Spice and was quite nervous about what I would find when I got to the top of the stairs.  I found a toddler saying “uh, oh, blankie” and discovered said blankie covered in bits of a blue, smelly gel in daddy’s bathroom.  At first I thought it was shaving gel, but I didn’t really have time to investigate.  I quickly looked for the source of the blue gel, but had to move along.  The hubs was walking in the door and I had a dentist appointment to get to.  (Turns out it was deodorant.  She apparently thought it was fun to tear it up into chunks.)

No cavities!!  A little bit of pregnancy induced gingivitis, but that’s pretty normal.  It’s actually not too bad (I think it’s less than what I had with Corinne) which is probably due to the fact that I brush and floss a million times a day thanks to my Invisalign trays.

A quick to the grocery followed my dentist appointment.  We didn’t have enough milk to make dinner so it couldn’t wait.  At least it was a quick trip because I was toddler free!  And I didn’t forget my soda on the bottom of the cart! (I don’t buy soda, like ever, except when I have a party coming up that I tend to leave my soda on the cart when I put it in the cart return.)

I came home to discover a toddler sitting on top of a daddy who was laying on the couch. They were watching Dora the Explorer.  Cupcake was so entranced she didn’t notice me come in the house, which means she didn’t get off her daddy, which resulted in me lugging the groceries in by myself.

Time to make dinner.  Chicken and Dumplings.  I used this recipe.  It was fantastic!  Cupcake asked for seconds!  (Luckily my chicken was cooked at a reasonable time, since I forgot to put it in the crockpot when I originally planned.)

Hubby’s car needed to be dropped of at Mazda as it will be in for a few days of repair.  She who did not nap fell asleep on the 10 minute drive there and back.  (If she’s going to fall asleep during a quick car ride I’m going to assume she still needs the afternoon nap that she has been fighting so hard the last 2 weeks!)

Cupcake continued to destroy the house.

Hubby mowed the lawn.  Momma did the dishes.

Off to bed for the little one.

Back to the kitchen for the momma.  It was day 10 of my Amish Friendship Bread adventure, so it was baking day.

It doesn’t look very appetizing right now, but I can assure you it tastes fantastic! (I don’t know why they call it bread……clearly it’s so sugary it’s cake!)  Have you ever had this stuff?  OMG! I love it!  I’m always afraid to give all my starters away because it’s so good, but my thighs really don’t need a loaf every 10 days!

While the bread baked momma cleaned.

This guy helped.

See I told you so!

I enjoyed the smell and sounds of rain and the cleanliness of my kitchen and living room before heading up to my comfy bed with my chic lit.

The day ended with one tired momma who hoped that the alarm was set for at least 7:00!

If You’re Wondering

If a bedroom can be painted in a toddler’s naptime.  The answer is yes!  After Cupcake slept in (only because she stayed up 2 hours past her bedtime the night before at the babysitter’s house) we rushed off to her last tumble bunnies class until the fall.  I decided it was best to take the summer off since we usually have a lot going on.  It kind of breaks my heart that we won’t go next week because she absolutely LOVES her gymnastics class!  But we’ll do fun things in it’s place!  After class we headed over to the mall with some friends.  We had a $20 off a $40 purchase coupon to use at Old Navy!  My intent was to buy some new maternity jeans since the ones from my pregnancy with her are WAY too big and I don’t anticipate my thighs growing enough to fit them.  (I started this pregnancy 2 sizes smaller!)  Yeah, I didn’t find any pants for myself.  But I found a few cute things for Cupcake and a few cute things for baby #2 (if it’s a boy).  I did get myself a pair of gaucho pants, though.  Because that’s what every short girl needs to wear.  After we shopped it was off to the play area to let the kids burn off more energy.  And I wasn’t in a hurry to get home because the hubs might have been sleeping (he’s working 3rd shift these days).  Cupcake insisted on wearing the new slippers I bought at Old Navy even though they are two sizes to big.  I took a picture of her on my phone sliding off the back end of the play car (which she did about 20 times), but I don’t know how to get it off my phone and on here, so here’s the link.  After playtime it was back home for nap time!

I was pleasantly surprised to find that hubby had cleaned out the office earlier in the day.  I vacuumed. And I painted. I started by cutting in.  Here you can see a corner and around the closet door.

I checked the time and saw that I had at least 45 minutes before naptime was over, so I thought I’d get rolling.

I was actually surprised at how quickly this went.  This is the only room in the house I haven’t painted already since we moved in over 7 years ago.  40 minutes later I had blue walls!  The blue walls really made the beige trim look pink!  Ewww!!  Don’t worry.  The trim will get painted, too.

I did some cleaning up.  Had a snack. And cleared out my Google Reader while I waited for Cupcake to wake up from her nap.  Post nap we made a trip to the grocery store.  And in a very uncharacteristic manner we returned home and ate processed food for dinner.

I don’t typically serve chicken nuggets in this house.  I don’t typically have chicken nuggets in the house.  But hubs is working 3rd shift, I hadn’t really planned dinner, and a friend of mine recently moved and brought me all her frozen food before she left.  The chicken nuggets were in that stash.  Cupcake immediately dived into the sweet potato fries, but as soon as I offered her a chicken nugget the screaming ensued, the plate was pushed away and she was done eating!  Apparently I won’t be serving chicken nuggets again!

In her raging state Cupcake demanded that we go outside after dinner.  It wasn’t even 50 degrees out there.  Nope, no outside play!

How about we play with your new slippers?  Yep, those are fun!

We played with our flash cards.  First we went through the letters and pictures.  Then we drove over them with cars.

We moved on to blocks.  She only wanted to play with the m block.  Her favorite picture is that of a mouse.

Soon it was time to head upstairs to get ready for bed.  We had to head up a little early because this was waiting for me.

Unfortunately for me the laundry hadn’t put itself away, yet.  And there wasn’t a night time diaper ready for me.  So I put diapers away first.  And then I started working on the clothes.  Cupcake loves when I put laundry away.  She can hardly wait for me to empty the basket………….so she can get in it.

With a sleeping toddler it was back to the office/guest room for me.  A second coat of paint, rocking out to the CAKE station on Pandora, and hoping the neighbors aren’t watching me  through the big window that has the blinds up so I don’t accidentally paint them.

And then the worst part…….

Cleaning up……but I treated myself with some ice cream when I was done.  And a blog post. And now I am off to read some Catching Fire and sleep.