weekend update

Sometimes being married means you come home and see your husband has purchased something for the house:

not that it can't be useful tho...

This week had a couple food fails in it:

this was a crockpot coconut quinoa that was super blah

these were 'black bean noodles' found at Aldi and made into a coconut curry (am I sensing a coconut curry theme!?!) with peppers, but the noodles altho full of protein were the consistency of rubber bands and pretty much tasted like it too

Some good things this weekend:

pancakes for family breakfast (altho a fail compared to my dad's delicious pancakes)

I keep buying fruit at the beginning of the week for Doug's lunches, but then it's never ripe until the weekend! So we had fresh pineapple. And the bananas got too ripe again, which I don't mind because then I make another loaf of the vegan banana bread, so good!

Also new spring kitchen towels :)

This evening we are going to a friend's for a visit for her bday, then Doug is having his friends over for a bonfire. We don't have superbowl plans so looking forward to just a day home relaxing.

And of course, some pics of August:

When he doesn't have one and/or both hands in his mouth he is now taking a binky. I like the binky, I also like he can use his hands when the binky falls out so he won't be one of those babies who screams when it falls out hopefully

Doug likes this cheap mustache one, I prefer the expensive organic rubber one haha

this 'sunny day family walk' was very short-lived, too cold!

cutie pie!

life lately

Made a tasty dinner last night, bad picture though. Veggie burgers, side of roasted potatoes, and spicy acorn squash.

After dinner we ate some brownies and ice cream, listened to Christmas music and decorated the tree.

I'm almost done with my Christmas shopping! It's been really fun this year.

So there is a woman I used to work with at my old hospital job and she keeps sending me random gifts for August! It's super kind and generous, altho also a bit strange as I wasn't that close to her. I don't know, maybe she just loves babies and her love language is gift giving! Those little Santa feet are so fun.

Another gift he received were these fun books from my friend Missouri Jill. Moby Dick and Les Miserables, the second one has one page English/ one page French. Pretty cool, except I have no idea how to pronounce the French side!

I saw this one day and was laughing so hard:

Haha! So true! I'm always asking Doug to help me with something.

My brother and his family are coming to town in T- 1 week, so excited! I'm so happy I have this time off to enjoy it and really treasure the family time. It will be the first time they meet him and he meets his cousins, fun!

And now for a stream of August pictures:

blue eyes for now!

I find myself just wanting to remember every detail about him. I love his baby soft hair. It's so short on top and like an inch long in the back. A little mullet already! And it's always all mussed up when he's done nursing or sleeping. So precious.

sweet little baby

he liked his bath bucket more this time

in the family rocker, me and my siblings were all rocked in this chair, and now I get to rock my own baby.

I thought it was so sweet he was blowing bubbles, only later did I realize he had his first cold :( although he seems much better now! Praise God. Even a little cold made me so worried. He looks super blonde in this picture.

such a sweetie.

Spicy Vegan Potato Curry recipe

This recipe is too good not to share!

They said my hemoglobin was low at one of my doctor's appointments so I was searching for iron rich foods and recipes and came upon this gem.

Yes, it will make your house smell like curry for 3 days at least, but it is super tasty.

70% the daily iron requirement!

I make it with frozen (not canned) peas. This time I added a zucchini from a friend's garden, but think I preferred it without actually. We had it with a side of beans from mom's garden and it was wonderful.

Easter and other happenings

Doug and I had a nice Easter. We saw my parents on Saturday and then Sunday went to Doug's parents church. To me it's just not Easter unless someone says, "He is risen" and someone answers back, "He is risen indeed." So true! So I appreciated that at their more traditional church. Then we went out to lunch with them. Although I do not like going out to restaurants on holidays. I feel bad that if I wasn't there, maybe those people could shut down and be with their own families. I guess Doug's mom doesn't like to cook anymore, and Doug asked me on like Friday if I wanted to host. Ummm.. no. So out we went. The day was sunny and nice so in the afternoon Doug, his brother and I went on a nice bike ride.

Doug has been hard at work insulating our attic. He's been crawling around up there pulling down old gross blankets and weird Christmas santa stuff he found up there. Our attic doesn't have enough insulation. Thanks for noticing home inspector! Fail. Anyway, so we are getting an electrician to check out this burnt looking spot where there is a ceiling fan in the room below, and Doug bought $800 worth of pink fluff to put down. Should be helpful in the long run. And he's had to go around the whole house installing these soffit vents that do something.

I married such a hard worker. Seriously one of those days I was taking a 2 hour nap while he worked!

And then he goes out and buys me this:

mmm... I stretched that puppy out a few days

Lastly I was bitter when Doug's friend got him this quesadilla maker, why not just make them on the stovetop I thought?! An extra appliance to store in a tiny kitchen, but I used it the other day

mmm.. melty cheesy goodness. Stay on my tortilla cheesy river!

making stuff

Was in a bit of a mood to get back on track with making healthy meals last week.

I bought one of those veggie spiralizer things and made some zucchini noodles

sauteed with some olive oil, salt and pepper and garlic powder. It really shrinks down, that was one zucchini, enough for dinner for 2 but no leftovers.

Made a tomato lentil sauce from the oh she glows cookbook to go on top

it was good

That same night I baked lemon chia seed muffins for work snacks and made that delicious toasted coconut almond granola. Doug's been eating it like crazy even tho he "hates nuts".

I've also been working on our 'family yearbook' for 2015 and finally finished it and ordered it. So excited! A nice neat way to keep track of our life together.

And I made another bib, this one for my cousin who's baby shower is on my work weekend (of course). I think it's a fun print because it's so cute, and she actually used to have a pet hedgehog!

This morning Doug and I slept in, I made breakfast

turkey bacon, eggs with gouda, and roasted potatoes, mmmm

A guy came to check the furnace (a - ok), talked to my brother while walking on treadmill, went to work for 1/2 hour to learn about strokes, and now back at home and about to work again on our bedroom trim. Wish us luck!

recent eats

I love these crockpot refried beans!

It's so awesome to make something so easy and cheap and to have your husband request that you make it every week.

little does he know onions are blended into the beans, muah ha ha haaaa!

We picked up these tasty chili-lime tortilla chips, topped with the beans, cheese, avo slices and blob of light sour cream, so tasty!

Another good meal was this stir fry.

I just have to accept that I'm not good at making stir-fry sauce. Tear. The bottle of House of Tsang Spicy Szechuan is by far my favorite. It's like $3.50 a bottle, but that will get you 2 batches of stir-fry, it's probably worth it for amazing taste every time.

I pan fried a little tofu. After eating at Pei-Wei last week I wanted to attempt my own tofu. They must deep fry theirs because it was so good. The box of tofu says to press it between 2 plates to get the moisture out, yeah right, like a drop or two! I ended up pressing it between my hands and almost wringing it out like a sponge. Doug said he liked it better than last time, but it was like a 2 on a 0-10 Pei-Wei deliciousness tofu scale. Once again my dream to work part time as a cook at a delicious stir-fry place is stoked, I'll learn the tricks and then be off to my own kitchen!

Meh.

So tomorrow is Jill's big day! Doug and I are trying to put up our bedroom crown molding this morning before I head down to her bachelorette girl's happy hour and sleepover. I'm excited and so happy for her.

We picked up the crown molding last night after my shift and good thing Doug happened to look up a youtube how-to, apparently we bought one that has to be put in on an angle! Otherwise we would have just put it flat against the wall like the bathroom trim. Good thing he saw that! Alright, off to help...

latest eats

I was a bit more on top of my game last week and I prepped a couple meals for when I was going to be working this week. I made these tasty lentil sloppy joes

And I also made this spicy bean bowl. It was pretty good.

Also I finally worked up the nerve to go ask my neighbor if I could pick some of her apples.

Success! Thank you!

I peeled them all, found no worms I'm happy to report and made a very tasty applesauce.

Yesterday at work I actually had a 'good' day. Wow, it only took 7 months! I must be getting a little better at task management, I still need to study up on some stuff I forgot, but it was a good day. Then came home and Doug had got pizza and that DVD Spy from redbox. Yay! The movie was runny (altho waaaaay too many F bombs). But it was a nice relaxing evening.

Today, sadly, one of my cousin's got divorced. I've kind of been trying to help her through this for over a year now and her court date happened to be on a day I (and Doug) were off. So we went down and sat there with her for support. I feel so sad for her. I can see how faithful God has been to her so far, and I continue to pray for complete healing for her heart. I know He can.

It feels like it was a pretty heavy day and I'd like to stay home and relax, but we already had plans with Doug's parents to take us out to dinner for our anniversary. So, I guess sometimes you just roll with it. The rest of the weekend is pretty low key for us, and we are looking forward to it.

mini camping trip wknd update

Doug and I went "away" Friday/Saturday. But not too far.

why do 2 people going for one night need so much stuff?!

say hello to my little friend

the view from the back tent window

the view from the tent door, mom and dad's house!

I will definitely be returning to Ma and Pa's Campgrounds. The showers were hot, they even threw in a dinner on the grill and a pancakes breakfast! :)

It was just good to go away for a night.

The next morning Doug worked with Dad on some wood project he's trying and I made salsa and canned with mom.

That little mix made quite tasty salsa!

I also signed up for my RN -> BSN program, sigh, and started looking at the program/classes/homework online. After that we headed to a nearby town to see a hot air balloon festival. I think it wasn't really happening for several hours and it was starting to rain so we headed back home.

We were hungry so we stopped and got Thai to celebrate Doug's spontaneous raise he got at work, yay!

We ran a couple errands together and then settled in for a redbox. September is such a daddy's girl!

This morning was a new church, stillll hunting. And a friend's surprise birthday party. Then house cleaning/laundry for me, and Doug mowed and has been working in the crawl. He sanded the mud in the bathroom for a while, but we think we're going to hire his friend to do it, it's just not worth us being frustrated about it every day!

Yesterday we picked up this birdbath. We were at Meijer and they had stuff 50% off, the sticker said it was $29.99, so I thought, yeah I'd spend $15 on that. But then Doug checked out and it rang up as $29.99 and said it had been $59.99. Heeeeeyy! Shouldn't the tag say $59.99?? So I've got it set up, we'll see if the birds even come, or maybe I should just call and ask, I don't know. That's annoying though.

And in other news my new bible came!

Half.com had said it was in "good" condition so might have highlighting/marks, but it is perfect, and hardcover, and all for just $7.

Right now I've got another Sweet Corn and Zucchini Pie in the oven for dinner and baking a batch of Toasted Almond Coconut Granola. Mmmmm

this time with added green peppers from mom's garden

It's the best!

We've got a half work week ahead and then heading out of state for a friend's wedding!