Of Crockpots, Washing Machines and Taxes

Last Thursday I declared the week of the crockpot and what a week it was!!! I loved cooking in the crockpot every day. It was so less time consuming than standing over the stove and oven for a while. I will summarize just a little on each meal:
Crockpot Spaghetti: Sorry, but it was nasty! I would have been better off buying a jar of Ragu and mixing it in with some meat! I won't try this one again, but that's okay.
Basil Chicken: This was so easy to make and it was delicious! It turned out to have somewhat of a lemony flavor. Danny asked me to serve this one again and soon!
Chicken Breasts Supreme: This was as easy as the Basil Chicken and as good. This will be another meal soon as well.
Yankee Pot Roast: I liked this a lot, but it turned out really watery and the carrots did not get completely done in the alotted time. This was frustrating for me because the carrots are my favorite part. I had to cook it about 4 hours longer than instructed. I might try this one again but I will have to play with the cooking instructions!
I will have a couple of crockpot meals this week, but we have such a hectic schedule that only two nights this week we will be able to have classes together. I don't like this, but it is for a good reason. Danny has some classes that he needs to take and it is time...I am going to miss him this next week...it seems like he will hardly be around!

Well, it has happened! Old Faithful, our washing machine, has croaked. She was a good girl for 17 years until her insides gave out. She became leaky and non-agitating, and her motor just quit. Well, as sad as I am, her replacement will arrive sometime tomorrow. I am excited because I enjoy doing the laundry as long as I don't have to put it away. I will wash/dry/fold all day if I have to, and Danny is kind enough to do the carrying up and down the stairs and more likely than not, it is Danny who puts the clothes away [thank you, honey!!!]. So, I can't wait to use our new gadget. The scary thing is, they say these things go in threes, so I have been watching my freezer and refrigerator diligently and praying they don't conk out on us too!

T'is the season to do your taxes! Guess what?!?! I finished mine last night!!! When you file taxes, if you do not have a lot of extra stuff, but just basic filing, I truly recommend hrblock.com because I have used them the past three years and they make filing state and federal taxes a breeze. More power to you if you can do them on your own...you are more skilled than I! Anyway, hrblock.com walks you through step by step and exxplains things to you thoroughly as you go along. It really is simple to file this way. I am glad we are done, and all I can say is: "I love refunds!!!". I know, getting a refund means you loan money to the government interest free for a year, but I have always enjoyed getting a lump sum refund because it actually makes me feel like I have some money... Happy Tax Season!!!

Prayer Request

I believe greatly in the power of prayer. I believe that God hears the prayers of His children and that is why when someone asks me to pray for them, I tell them I will, then I do. I write down the request in a journal [I am not always the best record keeper], and try to remember them in prayer. Because I believe in the power of prayer, I also do not hesitate to share prayer requests with others. Having said that, I would like to ask for prayer for my mom. She has been having some health issues and recently had a cat scan that showed a mass in her small intestines. The doctors can not give her information as to its' malignancy, etc., until more tests are done, so please pray for her as she seeks more information regarding her health. Mom's words to me tonight were: "I serve and awesome God. I don't know if it is my time to go or not, but I know I serve an awesome God." Thanks you for praying for her with me!

Can't really think of a title...

This week has really been "blah" so far. Poor Josiah is cutting all four of his two year molars at the same time, which is making him crankier than ever. The bad part is, the crankier he is, the crankier I am. I have been trying to maintain an upbeat attitude and trying to help Josiah by doing all sorts of things like stopping anything and everything and only spending time with him. Also, I have been going around the house singing all of his favorite songs and letting him watch all of his favorite videos. None of this is working! He has been following me around the house begging for "gook" [milk!] all day long. I generally give him about 20-24 ozs of milk a day with water mixed in between. He has been screaming and throwing his cup when I give him water or when I tell him that he can not have any milk. So, the scenario is something like this:
Josiah: "Need gook, momma! Pease! Need gook, now. Oh momma, need some gook? Just a little gook, pease?"
Momma: "Honey, you just had milk and you can not have any more right now [at which point he starts screaming and stomping his feet, and perfecting the sign for "please"]."
Josiah then carries on his hissy fit, is warned that he needs to stop and obey mommy, at which point he doesn't, then is therefore disciplined.
This is the viscious cycle we have been through the entire day for the past two days, only occasionally he will substitute the phrase "I'm so hungy, momma!", instead of "gook". This has been the way my last two days have gone...the entire day! Okay, so I ask myself, is this just molar problems, or is this the infamous terrible twos coming to haunt me? I am so stressed out!

Meanwhile, little Bethany is just taking it all in stride. The only thing going on with the little sugar is a pretty bad case of thrush. Poor thing, her mouth looks terrible and she has these terrible white blisters all over the outside and inside of her little lips! She doesn't complain much, though, but doesn't want to nurse much either.

On the up side, even thought Josiah has been having a couple of really bad days, he has shown me that he is a great big brother and that he is going to be really sweet to his little sister most of the time. Most of the day, little Bethany is either in my arms, in her portable crib on the floor or in her portable swing on the floor. She was crying this morning in her crib, and I was on the phone with the insurance company, and I saw Josiah get down on his knees beside her bed and take her hand and say, "Let's pray!", then he has proceeded to say a few uncomprehendable words, then a hearty amen. Another time he was down on the floor by her bed and he was saying, "Oh, baby! Are you hungy? It's okay, don't cry.". This warmed my heart. Josiah also has asked several times, "Can I hold her?", and has helped me pat her back to burp her. He often tells her he loves her and kisses her a lot. He also loves to share his toys with her, but she is not too fond of this yet! :-)

Well, I guess I am just venting and ranting...it always feels good to write things down and get them off your mind. If you think of us, please pray that this new way of handling our days may be brighter int he future!

Just call me GRACE

I am not the most graceful of people. I tend to trip, lose my balance and even fall a good bit of the time. It is so annoying! When I get frustrated or mad, this tendency is even worse. Well, this morning around 4am, I got up to check on the baby because normally she would have woken up to eat before then. I found her peacefully sleeping away. She was so beautiful! I decided to let her sleep. Well, I looked down and saw a blanket had fallen in the floor and I thought I should pick it up before I slipped on it. I leaned over and the blood rush and half-asleepness took over! I left my dresser drawer open just a little bit the night before. Well I lost my balance and fell face first into my stupid dresser drawer, then all the way down I went! I cut my knee and hand pretty bad and I was afraid to touch my head for fear that I gashed it open, but thankfully, there was no blood there, but you can see a visible bruise on my scalp! My right arm is pretty sore and I have a headache and a little bitty blood blister on my left thumb...I don't know what I did in the fall to get that, but it hurts! It could have been much worse. Since Danny works over night, he told me he was going to wake me up when he got home to make sure I was okay. I was feeding the baby when he came to bed, so I am sure he was relieved to see that!

Menu Planning

I declare this week of menu plans to be:

THE WEEK OF THE CROCKPOT

So, I do my menu planning on a bit of a different schedule than most. Most people work Monday-Sunday, or beginning of the week to the end, but I usually go from Friday-Thursday and do all of my grocery shopping on Thursdays. I do my shopping on Thursdays because Danny is off of work, and I actually like going to the grocery store with him. We make a great team! Plus, I hate going by myself, and there is not enough money in this country that you could pay me to go alone but with my two kids. We would do without before that happened! Danny sent me a cool website about a week or so ago and it had hundreds and hundreds of crockpot recipes. The website is www.50plusfriends.com/cookbook . I have gone through a lot of the recipes and printed some out and here are the recipes I will be trying this week - all in the crockpot!!!

Friday: Crockpot Spaghetti : www.50plusfriends.com/cookbook/spagsauce1.html

Salad

Saturday: Basil Chicken: www.50plusfriends.com/cookbook/crockpot/basilchk.html

Brown Rice

Creamed Spinach

Sunday: We declare this bi-weekly fend for yourself dinner

Monday: Chicken Breasts Supreme: www.50plusfriends.com/cookbook/crockpot/cbs.html

Parmesan Broccoli

Tuesday: We always go out to eat after weigh-in

Wednesday: Yankee Pot Roast and Vegetables: www.50plusfriends.com/cookbook/crockpot/yankptrst.html

Thursday: We declare this bi-weekly fend for yourself dinner

We have two days a week where we fend for ourselves for dinner because our schedules clash. Danny works overnight and sleeps late on Sundays and Thursdays because of work, so we can't have dinner at the same time.

So there you have it! I have never made crockpot meals every day for a week, but I hope this proves to be a very time-saving endeavor...I'll let you know!

Weigh-In Tuesday, Week 4

YAY! Down 1 more pound. Slowly but surely, this tortoise will win the race! The only problem is, I did not reach all of my goals that I set for last week. So, here they are again:

• Track the foods I eat and their points value
  
• Find the time and place to work in some more exercise [any advice here would be great!]
  
• Simply eat better

Okay, so I might have reached one goal. I did simply eat better. I made a conscious effort to go for wiser food choices even when unwise choices were right in front of me. I will not even go into the Chik-fil-A icecream saga, but will only say, pray for me that I might be able to resist temptation in this area. Icecream isn't even one of my favorite foods, plus it is freezing outside, so who would want icecream in this weather?!? So these goals will be added to my goals for this week which are:

• Be a better encouragement to my DH, by example and with my words
• Don't eat out again until next Tuesday night

More next week, and thanks for your prayers!

Dr. Herbert Whitley

For some reason, when Bethany was referred to pediatric cardiologist, Herbert Whitley, I thought his name sounded good for a fictional character in a little kids book. Well, Dr. Whitley was a very kind doctor and was good to my baby girl this morning. Apparently I met Dr. Whitley in the hospital when he checked Bethany out originally...I did??? He remembered me, but alas, I did not remember him. He said I was pretty drugged up...how embarrassing!

Well, the good news is that the three holes found in Bethany's heart after she was born have closed! Praise the Lord! The doctor said that everything looked great and sounded great and that we have no more need of him. The bad news is that Bethany was so upset at having to be undressed in front of him, she screamed all of the way out to the car, and it was sooo cold here this morning that her little tear drops froze on her cheek! I kid you not! I wish I had my camera! Poor little darling! Well, we got home got her hooked up to the thing she wanted most...food, and she calmed right down and smiled a bunch at me later. I do not think she will hold it against me in the long run!

What's cooking at the Hodges???

Wednesday nights we generally get together with the folks from church and go to the nursing home to sing to some elderly members, but it was so cold tonight, and Josiah was running a fever, so we decided to stay home. I was in the pantry and saw a box of Oat Bran muffins and was overcome with the urge to cook a bunch of stuff tonight. Danny and I have been cooking up a storm. Danny has done most of the extra hardwork as I have had to stop and feed the baby, but we made 4 different egg casseroles. I made two little ones for Josiah that have ham and cheese in them. Mine has cheese and ground turkey meat. Danny made his probably the best out of all of ours! To his, we added peppers, onions, tomatoes, mushrooms, bacon and cheese. I wish I liked all of this stuff, because his looked great! We also made a bunch of whole wheat pancakes [4" around is 1 pt per pancake!]. I also cooked a crockpot of black beans yesterday, a crockpot of pinto beans today, and Danny cooked up some ground meat to go into spaghetti sauce. The only thing we didn't end up cooking was the oat bran muffins...my inspiration!

Let me back track to Monday...

Monday I took DD, Bethany, to her 1 month check up [what?!?! she's 1 month old?!?!]. My little girl was a trooper! She is doing well in all areas and is not putting on a lot of weight, but she has put on some height! My little girl is 24 inches long! Her little pants I had on her today look like baby capris! Okay, back to her weight...she has not made it back up to her birth weight yet, and these were words I dreaded hearing, because I knew the song and dance...the doctor and nurse were going to go on and on and on about how I must not be making enough milk, how I need to supplement, and how we must get the baby's weight up. Well, I went in with confidence and would not let them tell me I wasn't making enough milk or that I needed to switch to formula, etc. I think these doctors and nurses prey on the mothers who seem unsure of themselves and less confident! Not a word at all was said to me about formula this visit. Of course, it would be great if she was back up to her birth weight, but she is close enough, and she has put on over a pound since leaving the hospital [born 8'7", lost down to 7'3", now weighs 8'5"] so I think they were pleased. Anyway, a heart murmur was not at all detected, yet a follow up appointment with the cardiologist is still in order. If you recall, Bethany had three little holes in her heart that had not closed after she was born, and she had a pretty bad heart murmur the first day after she was born, but it has not been heard again since then. All in all, we had a great check up, so we will now just wait and see what the cardiologist says.

Weigh-In Tuesday

This week marked my second week back on Weight Watchers. We always go every Tuesday night and weigh in, hoping the scale shows some results. I was not good this week. I realized that Chick-fil-A's ice cream mix that I love is back, so I can't tell you exactly how many ice creams I ate this week [their ice cream is about the only kind I even like!], and where am I supposed to find time to exercise? Before DS and DD, every morning before work, I would get up and hit the gym at 5:30am for 1 1/2 hours! Now, my only exercise is chasing my DS around the house and doing squats when I lean down to pick up my DD...don't think I am kidding!!! Well, I was prepared to have to answer for my bad week of eating, but, the Lord is good. Despite all of the bad that is in me, I was still blessed to be able to drop 1.4 lbs. This has greatly motivated me! My goals for this upcoming week are:

• Track the foods I eat and their points value
• Find the time and place to work in some more exercise [any advice here would be great!]
• Simply eat better

I will let you know next Tuesday how things go. BTW, my gorgeous husband lost 1.0 too! Our main goal, above all else, is to lose SOMETHING each week, no matter how big or small. This goal was achieved!

Out and About...almost by myself

Wednesday night my DH was off of work. I told him the next day I was going to go off by myself for a little while and just get away. He was very cooperative and encouraging. So, Thursday, I go off, almost by myself, gotta take DD because she is attached at the...well, you know...and I was almost bored out of my mind! I didn't have a wired, almost two year old, yelling, screaming or running around like a chicken with his head cut off, and I didn't have my DH with me, so I was totally out of my element! So, where did I go? I went to the children's consignment store and bought a couple of needed items for boths of the kids wardrobe's, then went next door to Michael's just to look around for a few things, then to Walmart. How lame is all of that? Well, I think it is pretty lame if I do say so myself. You would think that I could come up with some more interesting things to do on one of my first trips out by myself since my DD was born. Well, my whole point of telling you all of this is to tell you how off kilter I really was this day. Boy, was I in another planet or what??? I have a good example for you...

After leaving Michael's, the wind was blowing so hard and it had become VERY cold. I rushed out to the wagon, got the baby in the car, broke down the stroller, lifted it into the back of the wagon and went and jumped in the car. I leaned over, put my keys in the ignition...might as well warm the car up, right? So, I get the heat going and I was flipping the radio stations back and forth trying to see if there was something good on. I pulled down my mirror a couple of times to check my make up and hair. I think to myself, "Good grief! What is taking my DH so long!" I sit there for a few more minutes, and wonder again..."Where is he?" About that time, I realize my stupidity...and I then got out of the passenger side of the car, got back into the driver's seat and went on my way! Boy, did I feel like a dork! Well, this just goes to show you how little I leave the house by myself! Maybe it's because I really need the supervision...

My DH Rocks!!!

Sunday afternoon/evening was rough. Josiah totally ransacked the living room and dining room while Bethany wanted to nurse all evening [a growth spurt, I guess!]. By the time bedtime was near, I didn't even make Josiah clean up his toys for the evening like we habitually do, I just told him to go upstairs, it was time for bed. Well, I didn't get around the picking up the toys either, or clearing the dinner table, or doing the dishes. Do you ever just have one of those days? Well, I left it all and told myself I would clean it up in the morning. Well, the morning sun arose and I came downstairs and saw the kitchen, dining room and living room had been cleaned and straightened up. I later told my husband thank you for cleaning up and told him I was sorry for us just leaving it that way. He said that he came home and all he wanted to do was sit on the computer for a couple of hours and then come to bed. He then said that he thought about how I must feel at the end of the day and how I still do things around the house even when I didn't want to, and the thought inspired him to take a few minutes and straighten up for me. It made a major difference in my day! My DH totally rocks!!! [BTW, he does this kind of stuff for me all of the time...I think he really loves me!]

January 6, 2008

Tuesdays are WW [Weight Watchers] meeting days. We packed ourselves up with our two kiddos and booked it on up to the meeting site and sat wondered how going anywhere with our kids will ever seem normal again. There we were, Josiah was spitting up [yes, he is almost two and still does that!!!] and in my haste to make it somewhere on time, I forgot the baby wipes, so Danny took Josiah, ran next door, bought some wipes and came back. Josiah is learning more and more to be more vocal at the most inappropriate times, so we spent a lot of our time telling him he needed to use his inside voice and whisper...didn't work, though! Sigh! Well, the good news is, even though we couldn't hear most of what was going on during the meeting, at least I can report that we BOTH lost some weight! YAY!!! I won't report Danny's figures because I haven't checked with him yet, but as for me, I am below a certain number that I am really excited about, and I lost 2.6 lbs this past week. I think that is a good start back, if I do say so myself!

So, enough about that...I have been lacking energy as far as normal cleaning/straightening up around the house goes, so when I get in this kind of rut, what do I do? I go to the bookstore and read organizing books. Boy are they motivating! Have you ever tried it? So, I did that tonight and came home with all sorts of ideas, got out my family notebook when I got home and made plans and came up with a game plan to try from now on as far as keeping my house in order. I am excited to say I will start tomorrow and try to make my new plans a habit. If you have been having trouble with things around the house, try researching organization and cleaning tips and motivate yourself!

I must get an early start in the morning so ta-ta for now!

Happy New Year!!!

So, I really did nothing exciting to bring in the New Year last night. We went to a funeral home to be with friends who were mourning the death of their mother, we almost creamed a couple of deer, Danny headed off to work at 11:30 and I was feeding Bethany as the clock struck midnight. I did spend a lot of time yesterday contemplating 2008, it's ups and downs, and what I would like to be different in 2009. I came up with a lot of things...I will spare you and only share a few of my "resolutions".

• Be diligent in my Bible reading
• Memorize the book of James
• Open my home to others more
• Lose weight [there's good news here...Danny and I joined Weight Watchers again this past Tuesday night! I have lost 70 lbs with Weight Watchers before and I am ready to do it again!!!]
• Be more active
• Follow my weekly menu plan [I am a real good planner, but I never seem to follow through!]
• Have nightly devotions as a family
• Eat out WAY less than last year
• Dinner at home with the family
• Get down in the floor and play with Josiah a lot more often
• Go to more church meetings/singings/gatherings

Okay, so these are just a few things and maybe as the year goes on I will elaborate more, but for now, these are priority issues for me and my family. So, how did you spend your New Year and did you make any resolutions you want to share???

May the Lord graciously see you through this year as He has for 2008!