2 Kids

Having two kids is amazing.

Seriously.

I am so thankful that God graced me with two healthy, beautiful children. Everyday is a blessing.

Some days are awful, I cry and want to tear my hair out... but still a blessing.

I feel extra lucky to have one of each, a girl and boy. It was exactly what I wanted. I really wanted Clara to be a girl. I still remember Mike making fun of me, telling me how awful I was going to feel if it was a boy. I pretended like with Hudson I didn't care, which is true to an extant. I really would have been happy with a girl... but when they said boy I had this wave of happiness rush over me. I cried! I didn't realize how badly I wanted a boy. How badly I wanted to give my husband a son (even though he really didn't care.)

So here I am, 28 with two kids. Crazy right?

What may be crazier is I know we aren't done... there will be another baby, maybe two eventually. Not anytime soon, but in the future. In a perfect world I would love another girl then boy. I want Clara to have a sister badly. I think Mike feels the same way about Hud, wanting him to have a brother.

My sister is my best friend. There is seriously nothing I won't talk to her about or call her out on (just ask her or my brother for that matter!) I want that for Clara. I know Mike's best friend is his brother, and I am sure he wants that for Hudson. Not to say that Clara and Hudson won't be best friends... there is just no denying it is slightly different.

Just for fun...

Me and Tone-Dog

Clara and The Hud-Man

Pinterest Part 2

So I figured it was worth pointing out again that my last post on this blog was a year ago in January 2011. Funny enough it was a post telling people how amazing Pinterest is.

I'm not going to say I was way ahead of everyone else on this trend, but... :)

Anyways, here I am a year later still totally obsessed with Pinterest. It is by far the best addiction ever!

The following groups of people would especially find a use and interest in Pinterest...

- Pregnant people - Tons of nursery ideas!

- Photographers - The photo ideas and camera tutorials are awesome!

- Parents - Endless things to do with your kids including crafts, learning projects, room ideas.

- People who eat food - I don't even know how to describe the endless recipes and food ideas. Amazing.

Here are a few examples to give you an idea of what it is all about.

- Home crafts; you can make a customized dry erase calendar using scrapbook paper and a picture frame. Why buy it when you can waste time and money to make it!

- I found this on Pinterest over the summer and I kid you not, it changed my life... the Sock Bun.

- Check out Hudson's Halloween costume for 2016.

- Apple Nachos! How delicious and (relatively) healthy! Plus you will totally impress your friends with your creativity! (unless of course your friends are like mine and they will totally call you out and immediately recognize it from your Pinterest board :)

So basically everyone should be on Pinterest wasting their time with me :)

New Year's Resolutions

Now that we have discussed what happened last year, time to discuss this year. I generally don't believe in new year's resolutions because the idea of just deciding to do something new or different for a whole year is so unattainable to me.

The difference for me is that having a baby and holidays came in one big lump. I had Hudson November 17th, and then the holiday season directly following. New Years for me is not the start of the new year, but the end of the holiday season. Time to get life back in order.

Facebook is nice. People get to see pictures of all the fun exciting things going on in your life. You get to tell everyone what you are up to by the minute. We all brag a little about how great things are going, or the cool things we are doing.

Posts like...

"Wow my kids are so awesome. My 3 day old baby sleeps through the night, and my 2 year old is already potty trained and reading Dr. Seuss. I have the most handsome, awesome, smart, funny husband. Tonight we are going out for a fabulous, amazing dinner where I will no doubt consume 2 bottles of very expensive wine!!! I am soooo lucky."

People rarely post....

"Today I want to shut myself in the closet. One of my kids is apparently deaf because she doesn't listen to a word I say, and the other has been crying for about 32 hours straight. I haven't showered in days, and there is no food in the house to cook for my stupid husband, who will be home late again unless he wants chicken nuggets and mac & cheese.... maybe I will at least change my pajamas."

That being said my life is far from as organized and relaxed as my Facebook may lead someone to believe! Life in our house has been out of control and it is time to get life back to normal. I feel like I let a lot of things get away from me because I was using being pregnant as an excuse. Then when I was no longer pregnant I legitimately had to deal with the craziness of a newborn baby, a 21 month old, the holidays, and life in general. I am pretty sure regardless of the New Year, 6 weeks post baby I would have this mentality :)

No more excuses!

So a few things I would like to get into the habit of doing...

-See my friends. I have been the worst friend for the last month! I need to start having some regular girl dates!

-Dinners. I want to get into the habit of planning my dinners for the week, shopping only for those things, and following through with it! Whenever I do this I feel so satisfied and proud of myself. In my mind having dinner under control equals being a super wife.

-Cleaning. I should clean more. I should clean better. I need to be better at the little things like dusting, baseboards, vacuuming the couch.

-Me time. I love to craft and sew but seem to have zero time to do it. Now i'm not going to kid myself that I am going to find the time to do it. I do however think that if I get everything else under control, my down time with the kids will at least give me the opportunity to do more of the things i enjoy around the house.

Alright that is enough of that!

Here is a nice little treat to hold you over until tomorrow, the Hud-man smiling!

NaBloPoMo

::This is NOT a New Years resolution!!::

...because no one actually keeps those :) I saw on a friends blog that January is National Blog Posting Month (NaBloPoMo.) Basically it is a blogging challenge to post everyday for the month of January. I thought to myself, hey I have a blog... a poor, lonely, neglected blog. So I figured what better opportunity to jump back into things then this!

It appears my last post was in January of 2011, oh my how things have changed since then. We will start off with a small year in review.

-Clara turned 1 on Valentines Day.

- ...about 4 weeks later we found out we were expecting baby #2!

- In May we took a week long vacation to Arizona. Such a gorgeous place... why do I live in Michigan?

- The summer flew by, with us trying to spend time up north...

- When we were home Mike was busy campaigning for his second term on City Council... which he won by the most votes making him Mayor Pro Tem!

- Last but certainly not least our most notable event of 2011 was the arrival of our little guy, Hudson Michael, who was born on November 17th. He was kind enough to let his daddy get through all the craziness of the election, but was no so nice to his dear mother having made me wait almost an extra 2 weeks! Totally worth the wait though!

Well by the grace of God we made it through another year! I can't wait to see what 2012 has in store! (SPOILER ALERT - it does NOT include another baby :)

My New Obsession!

PINTEREST!!!

If you haven't seen or heard about Pinterest you don't know what you are missing! Pinterest is a website that compiles interesting web pages, pictures, blogs and then gives you the ability to "repin" them to personalized categories. When someone finds something crafty or of "interest" they "pin" it to the website, hence the name Pinterest.

As a member you then can make your own boards where you can file and catogorize your finds. Then friends can follow you and see all of your great finds and if they choose to they can repin them!

I know it may sound slightly confusing and I am sure I didn't do it justice with my explanation but it is extremely addicting. I can search through pages and blogs all night.

One of my favorite things to check out is all the really great creative things people do with food. By this I don't just mean your everyday recipes, they are much more interesting then that.

Tonight I made on of my favorite dinners stolen from a friends blog, and for dessert I made Cookies & Cream Cheesecake Cupcakes.

You make your cheesecake filling, add in some crumbled cookies, and instead of using a crushed cookie or grahm cracker crust you put a full oreo at the the bottom of your muffin tin.

They are the perfect size for a quick treat and super yummy. Mikey said the cookie was a little soft but i absolutely loved it. It wasn't soggy, but I enjoy my oreos dipped in milk so it was the perfect consistency for me. I could eat a hundred of them but thankfully I halved the recipe and I am bringing half of what I made over to my friend tomorrow morning :)

I have a ton of projects and food trials coming up thanks to Pinterest.com so hopefully I can really get back into the swing of things!

For the time being pinterest membership is by invite only and if you are interested I would be more than happy to email one along :)

Secret Post!

Ok it is not really secret but I don't plan to post this on facebook.

I know I haven't updated in a while but I don't really want to post just for the heck of it. While I know all my friends find my life super fascinating (finger-in-mouth making gag gesture) I just don't really think its worth it to tell you about how I did laundry and cleaned the bathroom.

I have some great projects coming up, it mostly is just a matter of finding time to do them. I got lots of moola in the form of gift cards for Joann's so I am hoping to do some cool things. I recently purchased this book I have had my eye on forever about embroidery and I am kinda messing around with that at the moment.

Tiny's 1st bday is coming up so I have been throwing some idea's around about that. I know that when she is older the Valentines thing is going to get old quickly so I am thinking of really doing up the vday theme for her first. Not that she will remember!

Here's to hoping I have something worth sharing soon!

Trying to get back into things.

I hate to be that person but I am so thankful Christmas is over! I took down the tree and decorations today and it finally feels like life can get back to normal. Don't get me wrong, we had a great Christmas and Santa was very, very good to us all, but it is nice to be rid of the extra clutter that comes with the season. Also this year I learned a very important lesson, don't buy your kid more toys than you have room for! I am still looking for homes for all the stuff Tiny got!

Now on to the meat and potatoes of my post... or at least the potatoes!

I was at Homegoods about two weeks ago checking out the gourmet food aisle where I came upon some good finds. You can find some great sauces or glazes if you look hard. I picked up some Spicy Ketchup, at the time I had no idea what I was going to do with it but knew something would come up.

I opened the fridge looking for a quick snack and found nothing, I closed the fridge and noticed a bag of russet potatoes and somehow instantly thought of my ketchup and decided to make some homemade french fries.

They were amazing! The perfect fry. I like mine with a little crunch and these had it! This isn't anything more than a brag post. I have no real tutorial, or skill. I cut two potatoes, tossed in olive oil, spread it out on a pan and lighted dusted salt and garlic salt. Cooked at 450 for 30 minutes and that was it! I had a quick delicious treat. I fed most of them to my dogs which I know sounds awful but it was better them eat fries than me!

My plan is to try some different dipping sauces because I think this would make a great appetizer or snack food. I am thinking of putting them out for Tiny's bday party (which is only about 6 weeks away!!!!)