This is how my day has gone so far this morning: I wake up to the sound of babies crying and know they need attention. I go into their bedroom and they both smile, happy to see me, cuz they both wanna be changed and fed and play with their Mommy. Aila was crying the hardest, so I get her up first and start changing her, and she's immediately happy, hugging me, babbling.... meanwhile, Weston sees that I've got his sister and not him, and he starts complaining to let me know he does not appreciate it. I'm trying to change Aila's diaper, but looking over my shoulder to speak lovingly to Weston, so he doesn't feel left out. As soon as I can get Aila changed, I put her in the living room over the gate where she's safe till I can get Weston changed. When I put her down, she thinks I've abandoned her and screams and throws herself down in the floor. I'm telling her "It's ok! I'm coming right back!" As I go get Weston to change his diaper. He's thrilled to be picked up and is hugging my neck and babbling to me, all while Aila is now wailing in the living room, cuz she's abandoned.
When HIS diaper's done, I put him down in the living room also so I can start making the sippy cups of warm formula. Weston goes straight away to play with his favorite toy, pushing the same button over and over and over and over and over.... but Aila stands at the gate nearest the kitchen and wails at me about how hungry she is. So I heat the first batch of formula, pour it in a sippy cup, and hand it over the gate to Aila. She is, after all, wailing and Weston is busy with his toy. And it's gonna take me a grand total of about 30 seconds to make the other sippy cup. Now she's happy and drinking away at her warm milk, while I run off to make Weston's. I get about 3 steps towards the kitchen when I hear banshee style screaming....I turn around and Weston has already crawled over to where Aila stands, holding her sippy cup up in the air in a vain attempt to keep it away from her brother, who's got her by a good 5 pounds and at least 2 inches of height. He's DETERMINED to get the milk, and he's shaking he wants it soooo badly. He's crying too, and reaching and pulling on her to get it, and she's SCREAMING cuz he's bullying it away from her. I tell him "no" and to wait, and make sure Aila has the cup, and then RACE to finish making his. He's screaming the "it's not fair!!!" Scream. At 11 months old, they don't really understand "wait a minute" or "I can't fix them both at once." They just think "Mommy fed the other one while she's making me starve!" No matter how fast I go or who I take care of first, I always, ALWAYS feel guilty.
Finally I get Weston's cup of milk in his hands, and he chugs it, till it's gone in like, 2 seconds, and then he immediately begins pulling Aila's out of her hands again. She looks at me like "Do you SEE what he's doing?!" I fix him a second cup of milk and then make them little bowls of cheerios and graham crackers to munch on. I put the bowls in front of each of them, and their milk in front of each of them, saying who's they are as I set them down. "This is Weston's food, and Weston's milk. THIS is Aila's food, and Aila's milk." I breathe a sigh that finally the fighting will end because their needs have been met. Weston takes his own bowl and turns it upside down, and then jerks Aila's bowl away from in front of her and begins eating. ARRRRGH!!!!!
Right NOW at this very instant, they are happily playing together. He's pushing THAT SAME BUTTON on the toy and she's dancing to the music of it, and they're grinning at each other. But any second now, ANY SECOND...he'll touch something she wants or she'll touch something he wants or he'll pull her hair or she'll poke him in the eye or they'll both decide they want me to hold them and then not want to share my lap or SOMETHING, and they'll be mad at each other and fighting again.
I LOVE having twins, I really do, and I am thankful every day that I had them and that they're healthy and beautiful. But this is the worst part about having twins... the sibling rivalry, the fighting. And I'm gonna be caught in the middle of a constant battle between these two for the next 20 or so years of my life. It's gonna be grrreeeeaat.
Wednesday, September 26, 2012
Sunday, September 23, 2012
In Which I Say "Embrace Your Quirks!"
OK, I just saw online where Jewel (the singer) had her teeth "fixed." This infuriates me, and I'll tell you why. I LOVE QUIRKINESS. I love uniqueness, variety, however you wanna say it. I think sameness is boring and highly unoriginal.
Now, if you've got, say, a serious jaw problem that makes it difficult to eat, or, for instance, teeth like my nieces cousin Masamichi, who had teeth the size of the state of Texas (I can say this because he lives in Japan and will never see this.) In cases like those, you should get your teeth fixed. If there's something so wrong with your teeth or your nose or whatever that it makes it difficult for health reasons or because it's so hideous, you can't take the emotional scarring...then get it fixed. But if you've got something cute and different and a little bit odd about you, it makes you YOU, so leave it alone!
My husband and my daughter Brenna both have the same crooked tooth in exactly the same spot. I think it's adorable! My mother and most of the members of my family on her side have slightly crisscrossed front teeth. One of my cousins has them and I think it makes her even more beautiful than she already is! I got braces when I was a teen, supposedly to keep my teeth perfectly straight. It didn't work, they moved back to pretty much where they were. My bottom middle two lean in towards each-other, my top middles have made an attempt at crossing like my mom's, but not quite made it. And on one of my bottom middle teeth, there's a little yellow/orangey spot, something about a high fever when I was little or something. For my entire life, people have thought it was a little piece of Dorito. I used to freak out about it. Now, I don't give a rat's hiney. And I know if they ever found me dead, they wouldn't even need dental records. Just open my mouth and look for the "Dorito." It's MY tiny Dorito-looking thing on my tooth, and therefore, I love it. SO THERE!
My first boyfriend ever had a big ol nose. It wasn't so much that it was huge, exactly, but more that it had one of those hook-looking things at the bridge. He HATED it. I loved it. A gazillion years later, I got to see his baby girl, and she has the same nose. It's adorable even on a little girl!
My sister had a mole taken off her nose when she was a teen. To this day, I miss it! It was just tiny, and it didn't take over her face or anything. Just a tiny little place that made her HER. It's supposed to be there, and it still mildly bothers me that it isn't.
I have a friend who's got a very small gap between his two front teeth. It's cute, it makes his smile unique. We argue over whether or not this is an "imperfection" (his words) or a special thing that makes him unique (my words.) If anybody doubts that a gap in one's front teeth can be absolutely adorable, they need to see my cousin Claire. She's 6, she has a gap, and she's perfect in every way.
It just seems like these days, people get everything "fixed" till everyone looks the same. If you read entertainment magazines (which we all know I do, see entry number 2!) you will notice that almost all young starlets look alike. It's very hard to tell who is who. I hate the overprocessed, bleached hair, braces (or caps) tiny noses, perfect skin, boob-job, botoxed looking pictures of all these people who look exactly the same.
What I love are celebrities who have something a little weird and quirky about them that they keep. I love Meghan Fox's weird fingers, Lilly Collin's huge eyebrows, Padma Lakshmi's arm scar, Anna Paquin's tooth gap, Owen Wilson's nose that's been broken a zillion times, and I USED to love Jewel Kilcher's crooked teeth. Now, she looks like everybody else. In MY mind, she just lost about 50 cool points.
Now, if you've got, say, a serious jaw problem that makes it difficult to eat, or, for instance, teeth like my nieces cousin Masamichi, who had teeth the size of the state of Texas (I can say this because he lives in Japan and will never see this.) In cases like those, you should get your teeth fixed. If there's something so wrong with your teeth or your nose or whatever that it makes it difficult for health reasons or because it's so hideous, you can't take the emotional scarring...then get it fixed. But if you've got something cute and different and a little bit odd about you, it makes you YOU, so leave it alone!
My husband and my daughter Brenna both have the same crooked tooth in exactly the same spot. I think it's adorable! My mother and most of the members of my family on her side have slightly crisscrossed front teeth. One of my cousins has them and I think it makes her even more beautiful than she already is! I got braces when I was a teen, supposedly to keep my teeth perfectly straight. It didn't work, they moved back to pretty much where they were. My bottom middle two lean in towards each-other, my top middles have made an attempt at crossing like my mom's, but not quite made it. And on one of my bottom middle teeth, there's a little yellow/orangey spot, something about a high fever when I was little or something. For my entire life, people have thought it was a little piece of Dorito. I used to freak out about it. Now, I don't give a rat's hiney. And I know if they ever found me dead, they wouldn't even need dental records. Just open my mouth and look for the "Dorito." It's MY tiny Dorito-looking thing on my tooth, and therefore, I love it. SO THERE!
My first boyfriend ever had a big ol nose. It wasn't so much that it was huge, exactly, but more that it had one of those hook-looking things at the bridge. He HATED it. I loved it. A gazillion years later, I got to see his baby girl, and she has the same nose. It's adorable even on a little girl!
My sister had a mole taken off her nose when she was a teen. To this day, I miss it! It was just tiny, and it didn't take over her face or anything. Just a tiny little place that made her HER. It's supposed to be there, and it still mildly bothers me that it isn't.
I have a friend who's got a very small gap between his two front teeth. It's cute, it makes his smile unique. We argue over whether or not this is an "imperfection" (his words) or a special thing that makes him unique (my words.) If anybody doubts that a gap in one's front teeth can be absolutely adorable, they need to see my cousin Claire. She's 6, she has a gap, and she's perfect in every way.
It just seems like these days, people get everything "fixed" till everyone looks the same. If you read entertainment magazines (which we all know I do, see entry number 2!) you will notice that almost all young starlets look alike. It's very hard to tell who is who. I hate the overprocessed, bleached hair, braces (or caps) tiny noses, perfect skin, boob-job, botoxed looking pictures of all these people who look exactly the same.
What I love are celebrities who have something a little weird and quirky about them that they keep. I love Meghan Fox's weird fingers, Lilly Collin's huge eyebrows, Padma Lakshmi's arm scar, Anna Paquin's tooth gap, Owen Wilson's nose that's been broken a zillion times, and I USED to love Jewel Kilcher's crooked teeth. Now, she looks like everybody else. In MY mind, she just lost about 50 cool points.
Wednesday, September 19, 2012
In Which People Always Leave
So I'm 41, as has already been mentioned, and it seems like by now I'd have had enough life experience with love and loss to not be as affected/effected (can someone please for once and for all teach me how to do that properly!) by it. Unfortunately it seems to be one of those things that doesn't go away with age and experience. In fact, I'm fairly certain that it gets worse.
When you're a kid, you are born with a family and you soon start making friends, and you just kind of assume that things will stay just as they are forever. That your mom and dad will always be there, that your next door neighbor will be your best friend for life, that your grandparents will always be around, etc... Then you get a little older, and your grandparents start dying of horrible illnesses, or you move across town and you lose touch with your best friend, or your mom dies suddenly and there's nothing you can do to stop it. Or, as in my case, all of the above. (On a happy side note, SOMETIMES, 25 years later you find your old bff on facebook and get reaquainted, and that's nice!) But it's a sad, sad fact of life that you don't get to "keep" people, no matter how much you love them, for various and assorted reasons, and you must always be prepared for the fact that someone you care about and is central to your universe today might disappear completely from your life tomorrow, leaving a big, gaping hole in your world.
There's all different kinds of leaving, and they all suck. There's the death one, which of course is indescribably horrible, and I used to think it was the worst way to lose a person from your life, but I've discovered that is wrong.
The WORST way, from my own experience, anyhow, is when you lose someone because they turn their back on our beliefs. When someone you love is out there, living and breathing, but they can't be a part of your life anymore, THAT is the worst. I have googled my own relatives to find out what they're up to. I've made packets of pictures that I want to send, and then not sent them. I've written letters I never mailed. I've sat with my mouse hovering over the "buy now" button on websites where a loved one's art was on sale, but didn't push it. Just the unbearable longing to have a connection with someone who has broken that connection through their own choices. Man, that's miserable.
Even when you lose someone for a GOOD reason, it still hurts. If, say, your brother or a very good friend of yours goes to serve at Bethel. You know, on one hand, that it's a good thing, even maybe a great thing. But selfishly, it's still a loss. When a Simon & Garfunkel song comes on the radio and you're being Garfunkel but you have no one to be Simon, it still stinks, no matter WHY they're not there. And when something is funny at the meeting and you instinctively look around to make a face at the person you always used to make faces with, but they aren't there, it's a bad feeling, no matter the reason. You're SUPPOSED to be all encouraging and supportive and say "What you're doing is great!" and "Keep it up!" When what you really want to say is "I WANT MY PERSON BACK, DADGUMMIT!"
And so, although some of the people I'm thinking of will never read this at all, I just want to say a little something to each of the people I'm thinking of that I miss and have a hole in my life about right now, and if they happen to read it, they will know exactly who they are.
I miss braiding your insanely beautiful hair in teensy little braids to make yiggy-yoggies.
I miss calling you Tiny Squatchie and hearing your squeaky little voice.
I miss you mooning me and watching you eat a case of clementines all at once.
I miss watching your nostrils flare and you barely bump your teeth up and down on food you can't stand.
I miss being out in service with you and trying not to scream when the mouse was running around your bible study's living room.
They have that stupid phrase, I don't know who made it up, "It's better to have loved and lost than to have never loved at all." I think it's better to have loved and kept! Somebody ought to put that on a bumper sticker!
When you're a kid, you are born with a family and you soon start making friends, and you just kind of assume that things will stay just as they are forever. That your mom and dad will always be there, that your next door neighbor will be your best friend for life, that your grandparents will always be around, etc... Then you get a little older, and your grandparents start dying of horrible illnesses, or you move across town and you lose touch with your best friend, or your mom dies suddenly and there's nothing you can do to stop it. Or, as in my case, all of the above. (On a happy side note, SOMETIMES, 25 years later you find your old bff on facebook and get reaquainted, and that's nice!) But it's a sad, sad fact of life that you don't get to "keep" people, no matter how much you love them, for various and assorted reasons, and you must always be prepared for the fact that someone you care about and is central to your universe today might disappear completely from your life tomorrow, leaving a big, gaping hole in your world.
There's all different kinds of leaving, and they all suck. There's the death one, which of course is indescribably horrible, and I used to think it was the worst way to lose a person from your life, but I've discovered that is wrong.
The WORST way, from my own experience, anyhow, is when you lose someone because they turn their back on our beliefs. When someone you love is out there, living and breathing, but they can't be a part of your life anymore, THAT is the worst. I have googled my own relatives to find out what they're up to. I've made packets of pictures that I want to send, and then not sent them. I've written letters I never mailed. I've sat with my mouse hovering over the "buy now" button on websites where a loved one's art was on sale, but didn't push it. Just the unbearable longing to have a connection with someone who has broken that connection through their own choices. Man, that's miserable.
Even when you lose someone for a GOOD reason, it still hurts. If, say, your brother or a very good friend of yours goes to serve at Bethel. You know, on one hand, that it's a good thing, even maybe a great thing. But selfishly, it's still a loss. When a Simon & Garfunkel song comes on the radio and you're being Garfunkel but you have no one to be Simon, it still stinks, no matter WHY they're not there. And when something is funny at the meeting and you instinctively look around to make a face at the person you always used to make faces with, but they aren't there, it's a bad feeling, no matter the reason. You're SUPPOSED to be all encouraging and supportive and say "What you're doing is great!" and "Keep it up!" When what you really want to say is "I WANT MY PERSON BACK, DADGUMMIT!"
And so, although some of the people I'm thinking of will never read this at all, I just want to say a little something to each of the people I'm thinking of that I miss and have a hole in my life about right now, and if they happen to read it, they will know exactly who they are.
I miss braiding your insanely beautiful hair in teensy little braids to make yiggy-yoggies.
I miss calling you Tiny Squatchie and hearing your squeaky little voice.
I miss you mooning me and watching you eat a case of clementines all at once.
I miss watching your nostrils flare and you barely bump your teeth up and down on food you can't stand.
I miss being out in service with you and trying not to scream when the mouse was running around your bible study's living room.
They have that stupid phrase, I don't know who made it up, "It's better to have loved and lost than to have never loved at all." I think it's better to have loved and kept! Somebody ought to put that on a bumper sticker!
Tuesday, September 18, 2012
In Which I Have a Pet Peeve
Ok, I've got a pet peeve and I'm just gonna announce it here an now.
You know how sometimes people will post status updates on Facebook and stuff and it'll just say something so vague and mysterious, and you have NO idea what they're talking about? Something like "So miserable...." And you're like "WHAT is so miserable? Your life? The weather? WHAT?!" You don't know if you should call the police cuz someone's suicidal, or just skip over it. If you're supposed to ASK what they're talking about, or if you do if they'll be mad atcha for being nosy. Or something like "I can't take it anymore." What does that MEAN? If I do nothing, are they gonna find you dead by suicide later and say "This person was clearly despondent and had posted that they couldn't take it on facebook minutes before she/he took her own life, but no one responded." Or do you mean "I can't take IT anymore," "IT" being the amoxicillain the Dr. put you on but you realized you were allergic to it, so you can't take it anymore, and you're gonna switch to a z-pack?
Or how about the ones that are saying something ugly and rude about someone, but you don't know who, (or whom, as the case may be) so you assume it's yourself. Like "You are getting on my last nerve!" And I'm reading thinking "Who? ME? I'm getting on your last nerve? What'd I do?" Like, who are you aiming this at and if you've really got a problem with them, why don't you just TELL THEM instead of posting mysterious, ominious-sounding status updates on social media???
Even ones that sound somewhat positive but are just vague get on my nerves. Things like "I have almost achieved the most important thing in my life." I'm like "oooookaaaay, so what the heck IS it? And how did you accomplish it? How am I supposed to say 'Yay you!' if I have not a clue to what you are referring?"
So anyway, that's my pet peeve. I think I'll go change my facebook status to "You are violating my number one pet peeve." And just wait and see what kind of response I get!
You know how sometimes people will post status updates on Facebook and stuff and it'll just say something so vague and mysterious, and you have NO idea what they're talking about? Something like "So miserable...." And you're like "WHAT is so miserable? Your life? The weather? WHAT?!" You don't know if you should call the police cuz someone's suicidal, or just skip over it. If you're supposed to ASK what they're talking about, or if you do if they'll be mad atcha for being nosy. Or something like "I can't take it anymore." What does that MEAN? If I do nothing, are they gonna find you dead by suicide later and say "This person was clearly despondent and had posted that they couldn't take it on facebook minutes before she/he took her own life, but no one responded." Or do you mean "I can't take IT anymore," "IT" being the amoxicillain the Dr. put you on but you realized you were allergic to it, so you can't take it anymore, and you're gonna switch to a z-pack?
Or how about the ones that are saying something ugly and rude about someone, but you don't know who, (or whom, as the case may be) so you assume it's yourself. Like "You are getting on my last nerve!" And I'm reading thinking "Who? ME? I'm getting on your last nerve? What'd I do?" Like, who are you aiming this at and if you've really got a problem with them, why don't you just TELL THEM instead of posting mysterious, ominious-sounding status updates on social media???
Even ones that sound somewhat positive but are just vague get on my nerves. Things like "I have almost achieved the most important thing in my life." I'm like "oooookaaaay, so what the heck IS it? And how did you accomplish it? How am I supposed to say 'Yay you!' if I have not a clue to what you are referring?"
So anyway, that's my pet peeve. I think I'll go change my facebook status to "You are violating my number one pet peeve." And just wait and see what kind of response I get!
Monday, September 17, 2012
In Which I Fall In Love With Trader Joe's
As you guys know, I've been on my trying-to-be-healthy, no-sugar-no-white-flour-no-red-meat diet for the past 10 days or so (7 lbs lost, it's slow going!) I'm trying not to care about the losing weight, and care instead about the important things; feeling better, having more energy, having a more stable mood that isn't affected or effected (depending on how one spells it in this case, and I can never get it right!) by my sugar levels, trying to make sure I don't get real diabetes since I had the gestational kind and it was miserable, etc... However, I'm not gonna lie to you guys, I CARE about the weight part! Way more than I would like to admit. But I DO feel way better and have more energy and all that other lah-di-dah stuff, so I'm trying to be happy about that for the time being. ANYHOO...
While in Durham back in the summer I made a little trip to the Chapel Hill Trader Joe's, had heard about it from friends and family for years and really, really wanted to try it. Found a lot of good stuff there and so when I got home, I searched and found out there's one in North Charlotte, so I've been going there ever since, and I luuuuvvvvv it!
For one thing, it makes it so much easier on a person like me who's trying to eat healthy and gets bored eating the same things. How many times can a person have brown rice as their side item in a week? And if you look at Walmart or Food Lion or other stores like that, they HAVE the stranger, more organic type whole-grain stuff, but it's all ridiculously overpriced. Also, I just love to use strange food ingredients, and it's the same thing with those type items. At regular grocery stores, you pay through the nose for them. So I just thought I would share some of my favorite purchases from Trader Joe's, in case anyone wants to hitch a ride with me next time I go.
First of all, I was, as I said, so sick of brown rice. Well, at Trader Joe's, they have quinoa that isn't priced ridiculously high. (Quinoa is it's own protein source, so if you're trying not to eat as much meat, like me, it's perfect. Just add veggies and you have a meal!) They also have whole wheat cous-cous, and Israeli cous-cous, which is the puffy pearl-shaped kind, and it's yummy. Aila likes to eat it one little pearl at a time! This last trip, I found "Harvest Grains Blend," which has Israeli cous-cous, orzo, baby garbanzo beans, and red quinoa. It's so good! It only takes 10-15 minutes to cook, and it has a neat kinda crunchy texture cuz it has all the different things in it. I love it.
I also found red split-lentils. I know lentils are supposed to be really good for your digestive system, but I was never a fan of them when my mom made them when I was younger. But these looked pretty, and I decided to try it. There's a recipe on the back that you can make, using chicken broth and sherry, but I skipped the sherry. I cooked them with chicken broth and leeks. (I also found frozen leeks, quite cheap, in a bag in the frozen foods section!) You thaw the leeks for a few minutes, add a little olive oil to your pan, add the leeks and sautee, add the lentils and sautee, then add chicken broth, cover and simmer for about 10 minutes, and voila! They're delicious! The twins both loved them and so did I. I served them with the harvest blend stuff and it was delicious together.
Their frozen foods section is great. You can get frozen leeks (as mentioned) for cheap. Also, frozen whole green beans (they call them haricots vert cuz they're being all french and fancy and whatnot!) And something else I love, something they call "melange a trois" which is just a kinky way of saying it's green, orange, and red peppers cut up and frozen. If you wanna give ANYTHING flavor, throw some melange a trois and some frozen leeks in with it. It makes everything better and more flavorful.
They have all the sauces I love really cheap. Mango chutney I LOVE and it cost a small fortune in a regular store. It's a couple of dollars at TJ's! Throw that stuff on some chicken and bake it, and YUM! Also, Thai sweet chili sauce, and Thai Lemon Curry sauce (the babies loved that on whole wheat pasta with some veggies mixed in.) All kinds of interesting sauces to add kick to whatever you're making.
Then there's the boxed stuff. Their "Joe's O's" which are just Cheerios really, are 1.99 a box. They have a selection of fruit/cereal bars called "A Blueberry Walked Into A Bar" or "A Strawberry Walked Into A Bar" or whatever fruit the bar is made of, they have about 5 flavors. Dalton and the babies eat them every day. They're low fat, made with organic grains, and they're only 2 bucks a box, cheaper than Nutri-grain bars at Walmart.
Brenna's favorites are the spinach-artichoke dip, the mediterranean hummus, and the multi-grain crackers. I particularly love the greek yogurt, the asparagus/mushroom stir fry, and the sesame sticks. And Dalton loves their crumpets, which he of course discovered and freaked out about cuz he's all into London and stuff, and he thinks eating crumpets make him British.
The bananas are always 19 cents a pound, unless you get the organic ones, which are 29 cents a pound. You can't beat that!
So anyway, that's my little free advertisement for Trader Joe's. I have kinda fallen in love with that place. Also, the cashiers there are pretty funny. One told me the other day that at night, when I crave chocolate, if I eat baby carrots, the sweetness will make me stop craving chocolate. HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH!!!! That was the best joke I've heard in weeks!
While in Durham back in the summer I made a little trip to the Chapel Hill Trader Joe's, had heard about it from friends and family for years and really, really wanted to try it. Found a lot of good stuff there and so when I got home, I searched and found out there's one in North Charlotte, so I've been going there ever since, and I luuuuvvvvv it!
For one thing, it makes it so much easier on a person like me who's trying to eat healthy and gets bored eating the same things. How many times can a person have brown rice as their side item in a week? And if you look at Walmart or Food Lion or other stores like that, they HAVE the stranger, more organic type whole-grain stuff, but it's all ridiculously overpriced. Also, I just love to use strange food ingredients, and it's the same thing with those type items. At regular grocery stores, you pay through the nose for them. So I just thought I would share some of my favorite purchases from Trader Joe's, in case anyone wants to hitch a ride with me next time I go.
First of all, I was, as I said, so sick of brown rice. Well, at Trader Joe's, they have quinoa that isn't priced ridiculously high. (Quinoa is it's own protein source, so if you're trying not to eat as much meat, like me, it's perfect. Just add veggies and you have a meal!) They also have whole wheat cous-cous, and Israeli cous-cous, which is the puffy pearl-shaped kind, and it's yummy. Aila likes to eat it one little pearl at a time! This last trip, I found "Harvest Grains Blend," which has Israeli cous-cous, orzo, baby garbanzo beans, and red quinoa. It's so good! It only takes 10-15 minutes to cook, and it has a neat kinda crunchy texture cuz it has all the different things in it. I love it.
I also found red split-lentils. I know lentils are supposed to be really good for your digestive system, but I was never a fan of them when my mom made them when I was younger. But these looked pretty, and I decided to try it. There's a recipe on the back that you can make, using chicken broth and sherry, but I skipped the sherry. I cooked them with chicken broth and leeks. (I also found frozen leeks, quite cheap, in a bag in the frozen foods section!) You thaw the leeks for a few minutes, add a little olive oil to your pan, add the leeks and sautee, add the lentils and sautee, then add chicken broth, cover and simmer for about 10 minutes, and voila! They're delicious! The twins both loved them and so did I. I served them with the harvest blend stuff and it was delicious together.
Their frozen foods section is great. You can get frozen leeks (as mentioned) for cheap. Also, frozen whole green beans (they call them haricots vert cuz they're being all french and fancy and whatnot!) And something else I love, something they call "melange a trois" which is just a kinky way of saying it's green, orange, and red peppers cut up and frozen. If you wanna give ANYTHING flavor, throw some melange a trois and some frozen leeks in with it. It makes everything better and more flavorful.
They have all the sauces I love really cheap. Mango chutney I LOVE and it cost a small fortune in a regular store. It's a couple of dollars at TJ's! Throw that stuff on some chicken and bake it, and YUM! Also, Thai sweet chili sauce, and Thai Lemon Curry sauce (the babies loved that on whole wheat pasta with some veggies mixed in.) All kinds of interesting sauces to add kick to whatever you're making.
Then there's the boxed stuff. Their "Joe's O's" which are just Cheerios really, are 1.99 a box. They have a selection of fruit/cereal bars called "A Blueberry Walked Into A Bar" or "A Strawberry Walked Into A Bar" or whatever fruit the bar is made of, they have about 5 flavors. Dalton and the babies eat them every day. They're low fat, made with organic grains, and they're only 2 bucks a box, cheaper than Nutri-grain bars at Walmart.
Brenna's favorites are the spinach-artichoke dip, the mediterranean hummus, and the multi-grain crackers. I particularly love the greek yogurt, the asparagus/mushroom stir fry, and the sesame sticks. And Dalton loves their crumpets, which he of course discovered and freaked out about cuz he's all into London and stuff, and he thinks eating crumpets make him British.
The bananas are always 19 cents a pound, unless you get the organic ones, which are 29 cents a pound. You can't beat that!
So anyway, that's my little free advertisement for Trader Joe's. I have kinda fallen in love with that place. Also, the cashiers there are pretty funny. One told me the other day that at night, when I crave chocolate, if I eat baby carrots, the sweetness will make me stop craving chocolate. HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH!!!! That was the best joke I've heard in weeks!
Sunday, September 16, 2012
In Which I Have A Good Day (So far)
Woke up this morning early, since I finally went to bed on time last night. The windows were open, the house was cool and filled with fresh air, and outside it was still mostly dark, both because it was early and because it was raining. I cuddled up for warmth to my hubby's furry chest, and we snuggled and talked. Soon we heard the babies in their room, talking to each-other in their cribs, and Weston shaking his crib like he always does to make it squeak. We went in and were greeted by two huge smiles and baby hugs.
All four of us cuddled up on the couch for bottle time, and soon we were joined by our 8 yr old, and also the cat. Everyone wanted to get in on the cuddle time, except for the teenager, who's still asleep now at 11:15!
When the babies finished their bottles, they wanted to do their favorite activites. For Aila, this means practicing walking. For Weston, it means harrassing the cat. Dalton, the 8 yr old, went over to the computer to play a game, and the twins had to follow him and dance for awhile to the music of the game.
Everyone was starting to get hungry, so I made blueberry pancakes with big fat juicy fresh blueberries. Everyone (except me, cuz I'm sticking like glue to my no-sugar no white flour diet) ate their fill of pancakes, the babies exclaiming "MMMmmm!" With every bite.
Hubby put the babies to bed for naptime while I cleaned up from breakfast and started making dinner for later, and my special health-food stuff. Lemon chicken, quinoa and pearl couscous salad, red lentils with leeks. The whole house smells like yummy food. The cool, rainy air is still blowing in through the open windows, the babies are napping peacefully.
Some days are just miserable and hard from start to finish. And some days, some days are just like this.
All four of us cuddled up on the couch for bottle time, and soon we were joined by our 8 yr old, and also the cat. Everyone wanted to get in on the cuddle time, except for the teenager, who's still asleep now at 11:15!
When the babies finished their bottles, they wanted to do their favorite activites. For Aila, this means practicing walking. For Weston, it means harrassing the cat. Dalton, the 8 yr old, went over to the computer to play a game, and the twins had to follow him and dance for awhile to the music of the game.
Everyone was starting to get hungry, so I made blueberry pancakes with big fat juicy fresh blueberries. Everyone (except me, cuz I'm sticking like glue to my no-sugar no white flour diet) ate their fill of pancakes, the babies exclaiming "MMMmmm!" With every bite.
Hubby put the babies to bed for naptime while I cleaned up from breakfast and started making dinner for later, and my special health-food stuff. Lemon chicken, quinoa and pearl couscous salad, red lentils with leeks. The whole house smells like yummy food. The cool, rainy air is still blowing in through the open windows, the babies are napping peacefully.
Some days are just miserable and hard from start to finish. And some days, some days are just like this.
Thursday, September 13, 2012
In Which My Baby Girl Becomes A Woman Overnight
Tomorrow, my 16 year old daughter has her first ever job interview. As her mother, when she got the call for the interview, my reaction was twofold. First, "Yaaay!" and then "Waaaah!" It is the same reaction I had when she turned 16, when she started driving, when she got her first period, when she started walking, when she gave up her sippy cup.... Oh my goodness, people told me it went by fast, but I had no idea till it happened to me!
I was 25 when I had her, and I had wanted a baby for SO long, which seems funny, looking back, because now 25 seems kinda young to me to be having children. Brenna herself says "25 is gonna be my baby-making age." She's got so much of her life planned out in her optimistic little head, and I hope it turns out the way she wants it to.
She came out of me with sass and spunk, and did everything too early. She smiled before the books and Dr. said she should be able to smile, and she talked (oh man, did she talk!) in complex sentences way, waaaay early. When she was about Aila and Weston's age (close to a year) she knew the names of all our friends and acquaintances. When she was about one and a half, she informed our neighbor over the backyard fence that she had had a great day with Mommy, because "We found shoes on clearance, half off, and Mommy loves half off!"
Her grin always included her crinkling up her nose in a very mischievous looking sort-of way. No one could ever be sweeter than her when she was sweet, and no one could ever be as rotten when she was rotten, which was often. She exhausted me and amused me. She was a pain in my butt, and my best friend.
I blinked and she was starting school, and cracking up her teachers, and making new friends. Her kindergarden teacher told me she intentionally sat her next to an extremely shy, repressed little boy, who was mute because of severe neglect he had suffered at home. Brenna taught him to talk.
When the kids won awards each month for displaying certain qualities, Brenna won for "uniqueness." I laughed my butt off about it, and called her "freak of the month!"
Next thing I know, she's in middle school, then high school.... and she went from being the one I needed help with to the one helping me with her little brothers and sister. She's a junior in high school now, about to be inducted in the National Honor Society. And she's gonna interview for a job tomorrow. And if she gets that job, she'll just be one step closer to leaving me one day. It has gone by WAY too fast. I'm so glad I have Dalton and the twins to keep me busy with kids, cuz otherwise the thought of the empty-nest thing coming up in a few years would just suffocate me.
My parents laughed when her personality began to show and she was so much like I had been, because they had put that curse on me that most parents do, "I hope one day you have a daughter and she's JUST LIKE YOU, and then you'll know how we feel!" Well, their curse came true, and it's been hard, and it's been wonderful, and I DO have a better idea of how my parents felt, raising me.
So now, I curse my daughter, "I hope one day you have a daughter and she's JUST LIKE YOU!" Only, I don't mean it as a curse to Brenna, I mean it as a blessing to me! Because when she's old enough to have children, I will miss my firstborn baby girl so much, and the best thing I could hope for is that she has me a grandchild one day, who is just like her.
I was 25 when I had her, and I had wanted a baby for SO long, which seems funny, looking back, because now 25 seems kinda young to me to be having children. Brenna herself says "25 is gonna be my baby-making age." She's got so much of her life planned out in her optimistic little head, and I hope it turns out the way she wants it to.
She came out of me with sass and spunk, and did everything too early. She smiled before the books and Dr. said she should be able to smile, and she talked (oh man, did she talk!) in complex sentences way, waaaay early. When she was about Aila and Weston's age (close to a year) she knew the names of all our friends and acquaintances. When she was about one and a half, she informed our neighbor over the backyard fence that she had had a great day with Mommy, because "We found shoes on clearance, half off, and Mommy loves half off!"
Her grin always included her crinkling up her nose in a very mischievous looking sort-of way. No one could ever be sweeter than her when she was sweet, and no one could ever be as rotten when she was rotten, which was often. She exhausted me and amused me. She was a pain in my butt, and my best friend.
I blinked and she was starting school, and cracking up her teachers, and making new friends. Her kindergarden teacher told me she intentionally sat her next to an extremely shy, repressed little boy, who was mute because of severe neglect he had suffered at home. Brenna taught him to talk.
When the kids won awards each month for displaying certain qualities, Brenna won for "uniqueness." I laughed my butt off about it, and called her "freak of the month!"
Next thing I know, she's in middle school, then high school.... and she went from being the one I needed help with to the one helping me with her little brothers and sister. She's a junior in high school now, about to be inducted in the National Honor Society. And she's gonna interview for a job tomorrow. And if she gets that job, she'll just be one step closer to leaving me one day. It has gone by WAY too fast. I'm so glad I have Dalton and the twins to keep me busy with kids, cuz otherwise the thought of the empty-nest thing coming up in a few years would just suffocate me.
My parents laughed when her personality began to show and she was so much like I had been, because they had put that curse on me that most parents do, "I hope one day you have a daughter and she's JUST LIKE YOU, and then you'll know how we feel!" Well, their curse came true, and it's been hard, and it's been wonderful, and I DO have a better idea of how my parents felt, raising me.
So now, I curse my daughter, "I hope one day you have a daughter and she's JUST LIKE YOU!" Only, I don't mean it as a curse to Brenna, I mean it as a blessing to me! Because when she's old enough to have children, I will miss my firstborn baby girl so much, and the best thing I could hope for is that she has me a grandchild one day, who is just like her.
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