Monday Musings

1) It's a gorgeous day here and I just have to say for the umpteenth time that I love, love, love fall. I actually like winter, too - staying bundled up, drinking hot chocolate (and the seasonal Peppermint Mocha at Starbucks! ), walking in the snow - I love it!

2) I think I met a new friend today - at Meijer! When I go grocery shopping during the week, it's almost always either retirees or SAHMs shopping, and the other moms and I usually smile or comment on the other's cute child. Well, I chatted briefly (in the pasta aisle! ) with this girl, and then she ended up being behind me at the check-out. We discovered that her son is only 3 days older than Grant! She lives in the area, so we exchanged numbers and will hopefully get together soon. She was just super nice to chat with, and it was fun to have babies so close in age. And, she had cute jeans on. I told her such, and we chatted fashion for a bit.

3) Speaking of jeans, I got this fabulous pair of jeans from the Gap a couple of weeks ago when I was shopping with my SIL. They were a tad too long, though. I noticed that my dry cleaners does alterations, so for SIX DOLLARS they're hemming my jeans! I think that's SO worth it! I can pick them up tomorrow and I'm eager to see what they look like.

4) Tomorrow is baby-food making day in this household. I bought the book Superfoods at Babies R Us the other day, and I love it! Just gives lots of fun ideas for baby and toddler foods. Grant pretty much eats what we eat now, but he still needs his own foods for when he's hungry before we eat, or if we're having non-baby-friendly food. So, I'm excited to try out some new recipes for Grant. I tried a new one last week - Baby Tex Mex - and he LOVED it. :)

5) Church was AWESOME yesterday. Just awesome. Several new families came, and all of the signs and banners Matt had done looked just great.

6) I'll close with a couple pictures of Grant's new bath tub. :)

3.25

I just did 3.25 miles on the treadmill, which is the farthest I have ever run in my life! I did it in 40:40, which is a 12:30 min/mile. I know I'm s-l-o-w, but, hey, I'm on the treadmill!


And, here's a big You Can Do It! cheer for my father, who's just starting to use the treadmill! Go Dad Go! GOOOO DAD!

Dinner

Matt's leading a Bible Study at butler with a few college seniors who are involved with Campus Crusade, and we had them over for dinner tonight. It was fun, and made me reminiscent of our college days. One of the guys clearly needed a girlfriend to, ahem, smooth out his rough edges! They were all really nice, though - and I chuckled at the end of the evening - one of the guys told me I had a "lovely" house - I think his mom told him to always tell a woman that!

One more mom post -

I just learned a new word, and it totally applies to my mom. Sometimes when I'm talking to her, she'll give only half-replies, and I'll ask her if she's surfing the web, which she usually is.

So, she's a snurfer! A snurfer is someone who's surfing the web when they should be on the phone!

Do you snurf? I do, occasionally.

Missing My Mom!

My mother has been gone for the weekend, and I've realized just how often I need her for something. Probably 1/2 a dozen times over the past several days I've thought, "oh, I'll call my mom". Such as -

"Remind me how you smash a garlic clove?"
"Should I undercook pasta that will be added to soup?"
"How do I clean dog puke out of the carpet?"
"How do I cook a turkey in a turkey bag?"
"What's your chili recipe?"
"Should curtains be floor length or just window length?

Not surprisingly, a lot of my questions have to do with cooking. I would consider myself pretty comfortable in my kitchen, but often need reassurance or quick advice from my mother.

So, how in the world would I live with out my mom? Maybe I'd then have to look something up in a cookbook?

October 15th

October is Infant and Pregnancy Loss Remembrance Month, with the 15th being the special day of memorials. My heart is thinking and praying for all my friends who have lost babies - may you find hope and comfort in the ever-new mercies of our Lord.

I'm sure this is not entirely theologically accurate, but my heart pictures all of our babies playing up in heaven together - walking - crawling, perhaps - on those streets of gold, spared from the pain of this world.

The Pumpkin Patch!

We had a wonderful fall morning here in the midwest. And, isn't the midwest just a great place to live? I love, love, love fall! We went to a local pumpkin patch/apple orchard with some neighbors, and had a wonderful morning. We picked out pumpkins, tasted apples, drank warm cider, and ate an elephant ear. (Yeah, elephant ears aren't really related to the orchard, but who can resist a warm elephant ear? )

Here are some pictures - there are a lot, but it's my blog!

Balancing on the pumpkins -



Matt was excited about the old Massey Ferguson they were using for hay rides.













Don't you love his expression here?





Here's the wife of the couple that we went with - i think it's cute that Grant's looking at their youngest son. :)



I love this family picture!



Another cute, yet close-up, family shot! Matt took it himself, just holding his arm out.







And, Grant's hair after we took the hat off.

Some New Pictures...

On my birthday...



Grant's general reaction to peas...



Some cute ones from tonight...

Found it!

Grant took a shorter-than-usual morning nap this morning, which was fine, because I wanted to go to the mall. So, I loaded the Boy up and headed to the mall to spend some birthday money. I went to the Bobbi Brown counter, where they're always super-helpful, and got some new eye-makeup (their long-wearing cream shadow) and some ink eyeliner. It looked great, and I was excited to have new makeup!

So, I continued browsing through the mall, and after leaving Gymboree, I realized that I didn't have my Sak's bag any more (that had my make-up!) Uggh!! So, I proceeded to trace my steps through the entire mall, and spent about a half and hour asking all the stores I had been in if anyone had turned in my bag. I was almost in tears by the end, because I wanted my birthday makeup!

But, I went back into Gymboree, and lo and behold, there was my bag, sitting right next to the plaid shirts I was looking at! Whew!! So, glad I found it, but it sure made me panic!!!

Ignoring the Thought...and the Heat...

Whew - just got off the treadmill. 2 miles at my fastest pace ever - an average 13:53/mile. I know, I know, it's not fast, but for me, it's decent.

I was talking to my mom the other day, telling her that for the first several minutes running, I'm thinking to myself "this is dumb, why am I doing this? Just stop." She told me that her trainer at the Y said that almost all runners have that issue, and just to ignore the the thoughts, unless you're in pain. So, I did my best to ignore the thoughts, even though they got quite loud!

And, I did the best to ignore the heat. It was *hot* in our guest bedroom, where our treadmill is. uggh! I'm dying for fall weather for a variety of reasons, primarily to be able to wear my new fall clothes! I'm also ready for fall weather, though, so I can run outside and not die from heat exhaustion!

But, at least I ran!

Lethal Mint Chocolate Cake with Chocolate Ganache

That's the recipe I made for my birthday cake. Basically a dark chocolate cake, with a thin layer of peppermint buttercream frosting between the layers, and a chocolate ganache on the outside. I love ganache because it gets hard as it cools, so there's this fabulous layer of chocolate on the outside. It was outstanding, if I do say so myself! ;-)

A few pictures of the process -





And of the clean-up (my least favorite part of baking!) -

Happy Birthday, Anna!

Here are some pictures from my birthday. They're actually from Saturday night, when i finished baking the cake. Now, I hadn't taken a shower, because I had been cleaning and baking all day, so be forewarned!!

And, doesn't Grant look so BIG in the pictures? He gets bigger every day, it seems.

Happy Birthday, Lizzie!

Happy 2nd Birthday to Lizzie!

Almost 2 years ago I had convinced Matt to go to the humane society in Iowa to look at a black lab. We decided that the black lab would be too big for an indoor dog,and on the way out Matt said he had to go to the restroom before we left.

Well, 2 years later he jokes that it was that bathroom visit that did us in! Because, while he was in the bathroom, I discovered the puppy room!! (How had I missed that previously??) Well, I stood in the door way and staring back at me was this wonderfully cute black fur ball that immediately came over to me. My heart was instantly gone! Matt came out of the bathroom and saw me holding her, and just smiled and asked how we started the adoption process. :-)

So, for those of you that haven't met her, Lizzie is a wonderfully smart family pet. She's loving, playful, full of energy and personality. She's a barker and we affectionately call her Guard Dog Lizzie. She sheds a whole other dog every-other-day, but we still love her (and have a good vacuum! )! She's playful and is a terrific running partner. In total, just a wonderful family pet.

Here's a walk down puppy hood lane in honor of the dog's birthday.

This is a picture from my cell phone, when we first adopted her from the humane society.



A Few more of her puppy years: