Sunday, May 29, 2011

Tortillas

For years I've been trying over and over to make homemade tortillas with very little success. They always turned out like a big cracker. It was quite depressing as tortillas is my all time favorite comfort food. I remember eating my nana's homemade tortillas as a young child. So delicious. Then my friend Elaine sent me this link that described in detail how to make tortillas. From what I understand, though, the link isn't working :( I did print it out and will scan and upload it when I return from camping. As long as I give them credit I'm not violating any copyright laws, right? The basic recipe goes something like this:

2 cups of flour
1/2 teaspoon of salt
3 tablespoons of lard
2/3 cup of water.

Mix flour and salt together. Melt lard in water, and slowly pour into flour mixture. Knead a few times. Dough should not be wet, but not be dry. If wet add more flour, if dry add more water. Allow to rest for 1 hour. Separate into balls, cover with a damp cloth and allow to rest for 10 to 30 minutes. Very simple. In fact, this was written up by memory because it's very easy to remember!

****EDIT - I recently began becoming annoyed because the dough was getting a little dried out in it's resting times, making it harder to roll out and leaving dry spots. I added a little oil to the bowl during the first rest and rolled the tortilla dough in it, coating it completely. Just enough oil to coat it. This drastically improved the tortillas. They were much easier to roll out and I was able to make much much larger tortillas without issue. They were also paper thin, and puffed up twice as much as the tortillas previously. I'm annoyed I didn't consider this earlier as I do this with bread all the time. Small adjustment but definitely worth it!

I wanted to make 4 batches of this to take with us camping. The kids love homemade tortillas and it's a very clean snack. At first I just quadrupled the recipe and had Chris pour the lard water for me since my arms can't really pour such a heavy amount. I instructed him to pour slowly but he didn't listen. The dough turned out awful. It had the consistency of gooey mashed potatoes. I added more flour but it was beyond saving. I fired Chris and decided to just make 4 small batches. It's very quick to make so it wasn't a big deal. But take note - Pour the lard water SLOWLY. I made this in Betsy using just my dough hook, and it turned out perfect.

This is about halfway through cooking. My balls waiting for me. If you make them too big they are difficult to keep round, and to transfer to the skillet. I made mine big this time. Next time I'll probably go smaller.

All rolled out and waiting to put on the skillet

Not very round, but working on that! Place on skillet, once it puffs up a little flip it over.

Cook on this side about 30 seconds and then flip BACK over to the first side. So the first side will get cooked twice.

Once it puffs up again remove it from the skillet and place in a towel to keep warm.

These are very soft and pliable. They don't crack at all when rolled.

All rolled up

And as it unrolls you can see, no cracks, not tears. Very soft and absolutely delicious!

Saturday, May 28, 2011

Gratitude

I have found myself being more negative than I like lately. We have a small (large?) family crisis situation that we are dealing with that is too personal to put out there on the internet and it's wearing me down. I have this rule where I will never speak ill of my husband or my children on the internet, even to vent. Once something is out there, it's out there and I don't want to sour anyones perceptions of my family because of the way *I* see things. The crisis wouldn't require me to say anything negative, but it does involve one of my children and would speak about them in a manner that is too personal and sensitive to put into cyberspace. I hope you'll forgive me for being vague. Perhaps, when we are through to the other side, I may tell his or her story. It may give hope or validation to someone else, but right now it would merely come off as negative or hopeless. So... through all this rambling, I DO have a point.

It's time for me to remind myself of all the great things I have, and to focus on that for a while.

I have an amazing husband. He isn't perfect, no one is, but he is perfect for me. He gets my quirks, he makes me laugh, he handles my explosive emotional outbursts with little anger or frustration. He tries very hard to understand my limitations and not to throw them in my face, or make me feel bad for them. He's a great father to our children. He changes diapers, a lot! He plays with the kids constantly, whether its giving them piggy back rides, or stacking blocks with Charlie. He tries very hard to provide for us, which allows me to be a stay at home mom, and he tries to give us the things we WANT in addition to the things we NEED. I could go on for days, but the point is... I am very lucky. After 8 years together I am still very much in love.

I have amazing kids. They play well together, they are smart, thoughtful and polite. Oh so well behaved for the most part. We get complimented nearly every time we go out on how well they walk with us, sit still, have table manners, ect. You can see the waitress and manager at a restaurant cringe when we walk in, and after a while they come over and compliment us and tell us how strange it is to see well behaved kids. This is such a boost to our parenting. We, like all parents, have doubts that we are raising children who will ADD to society, and times like that is validation that we are. I don't think we are strict, but we are strict when it comes to behaviour and manners. Our kids walk single file out of a restaurant with their hands "Cupped" (folded, so they don't touch anything). Sounds extreme, but with a large amount of kids you need to have them organized when walking. Anyway, they are loving, brilliant, smart, and just amazing little things. And they are alive. Reading stories of babies who weren't as lucky was the inspiration for this blog. I have never had to experience the loss of a child. A miscarriage, yes, and that was painful enough. I can't imagine....

I have a home, its not ours, but we still have a place to live (thank you military!). We have plenty of food on the table, great health insurance that allows us to get the care we need at no out of pocket cost. We are able to donate, every year, money, items, and time to those who are less fortunate.

One thing I struggle to be grateful for is my health. It's very easy to throw myself a pity party. Tonight we went to see the traveling Broadway show of "Wicked". I teared up more than a few times and not because the show was sad, but because I miss the theater so much. I didn't realize how much I missed it. Theater was my life before I met Chris. I lived, breathed, and ate theater. I was supposed to go to College and major in acting. I got into an acting program that only accepts 25 students a year. I was planning on making a career out of acting. Then I met Chris and I knew my place in the world was with him. I figured I'd still do local theater but then we got pregnant. I figured that once we were done having kids I'd do it again. And then I was diagnosed with EDS. I limp when I walk, my arms randomly stop working, my elbow is permanently bent and doesn't work anymore. There is no way I could be on stage again. My body has ruined that dream of mine. I've had to alter other dreams in the past because of one thing or another but this has been the hardest for me to swallow. I love the theater! I love the thrill of being on stage, the audience reaction, just for a moment being someone else. I love the family unity you get with the other cast and stage members. There is such a rush and such a sense of belonging that isn't matched elsewhere. And thats over for me.

So I do struggle with remaining grateful that my health is what it is. I try to remind myself that it could be worse. I could be in a wheelchair instead of limping. I could have no arms instead of arms that work some of the time. I could have something fatal that makes it so I won't see my babies grow up. There are plenty of reasons to be grateful for my health, I just need to remind myself of them.

And of course, no gratitude post would be complete without a shout out to my friends.

Sandra is one of those rare people you meet that you automatically feel a connection with. We've been friends nearly 6 years. We have never had a fight, we've never been secretly jealous of each other, or unhappy for the other one. We drifted apart a few years back because of a horrible other person, but once that was cleared up it was as if no time had past. She has one of the rare distinctions of being labeled one of my best friends. I don't let too many people get close to me. She is definitely one of the few.

Laura is a friendship that I am so grateful still exists and is so strong even over many miles of separation. Same horrible person nearly destroyed that friendship, but in the end made it a million times stronger. Laura is pure "Christian". Her life revolves around her relationship with her God. Some may think this hinders our friendship as my religion does not share the same God. It doesn't. We are both strong in our faiths, and respectful of the others. I can have lengthy conversations with her about religion and neither of feels offended or preached at or as if we have to defend ourselves. Her and her husband are the Guardians in lieu of our brood. We made this decision years ago and every interaction with them solidifies our decision.

And Elaine...oh Elaine. Elaine is my sister from another Mister. She is seriously my other half. We only met a few months ago but we are definitely Kindred Spirits. Sandra introduced us (another point for Sandra!) and we hit it off immediately as if we've known each other forever. She is absolutely amazing. There are a few things we differ on, such as religion (she is Christian and I am not), she is more relaxed on her position of circing while I am not, ect. She's my liberal, crunchy friend. Love her! She is one I know I'll be sitting in our old lady rockers still chatting non stop.

I have many more amazing friends I'm grateful for - these three have just been there a lot of me recently, and on my mind. I am very lucky to have friends scattered all over the country so I'm never very far from someone.

This upcoming week while on vacation I am going to try to start each day with gratitude on my mind and keep it as we spend some much needed family time together.

**This is a blog hop!

Wednesday, May 25, 2011

Kitchen switch-a-roo

Today I completely switched around my kitchen, also known as "driving my husband completely banana's". Chris HATES change and complains about it incessantly. However, the next time I change it around he'll complain that he wants it back the way before - which he also complained about.

My kitchen appears to have a bit of cabinet space, but it's an illusion. The cabinets are shaped funky, there are weird dividers that make it difficult to store things effectively, and we just seem to have never enough space. I hate things on my counter, so even the toaster is stored in a cabinet (this habit I picked up from my mother-in-law!). The only thing allowed on my counter is Betsy, my new mixer. Ain't she beautiful!

Anyway, Chris was flying late tonight and most of the times this means an easy going evening. Chris is leaving soonish for 5+ months and so we are now transitioning back into "getting on with life when Daddy is gone" phase. We've been very lucky for the past 3 years Chris has been on a special duty assignment that has kept him from deploying and in the past year hasn't even gone on a TDY because of my surgeries but thats all about to change. He'll be back to being gone 6-9 months out of the year soon and so we are preparing for that.

My plan is to accent my kitchen and dining area with Polka Dots. I love Polka Dots! For now, I'm just cleaning it up and trying to find new space for my new gadgets. Such as this beauty I've been lusting after for a while

Chris jokes that I'm a disgrace. He bought me the iPad2 for our anniversary and I was disappointed because I wanted Betsy. After a few months I decided, with his blessing, to sell the iPad to get what I really wanted. This was also on sale for about $60 less than usual so I had to jump on it. This may deserve a name in the future. I get very sad when food spoils or gets freezer burn.

In my already cramped kitchen I had no room for all my new gadgets.

I decided to start in the dreaded tupperware cabinet. This cabinet is scary. We have so much tupperware, but we can never find anything. I swear there is a land out there where tupperware lids and socks are partying together.

See how scary it is? Also, see that annoying divider that makes it difficult to get anything LARGE into or out of that cabinet? So frustrating! I wanted to separate our tupperware from the cutting boards since we use the cutting boards very frequently and it's very hard to pull them out without a bunch of tupperware raining down with it. We have this drawer that we store the placemats and cloth napkins in


Which is the perfect size for the cutting boards, and it's located right next to the stove so it makes it very convenient. So now I had to relocate the placemats (I'm planning to buy or make some beautiful polka dot placemats!) Back when we bought our couches we also bought a coffee table that was entirely too large. We recently moved it behind the couches as more surface space in the dining room, and it has drawers and a shelf that would work for the napkins and placemats.


And now our four cutting boards are located in a much nicer spot

For our tupperware, there wasn't a single cabinet that would work well, so I was reduced to buying an additional storage unit. I am not pleased by this, and although it works well it is very bulky and ugly. I'm hoping to find a better solution, but for now this is where our tupperware is


I have yet to find "green" tupperware. If anyone knows of any please let me know!

Now I needed to move my pots and pans into my new empty tupperware cabinet. This is my awful pots and pans cabinet. It makes it very hard to pull anything out without something falling on your foot because of the weird half shelf. These poor pots and pans were gifted to Chris and I on Anthony's first Christmas by my parents. They are great pots and pans but they are nearing their life span. We are looking into upgrading to stainless steel, one pot and pan at a time as they are insanely expensive!


And this is my plates, casserole dish, bowls, and the rest of pans cabinet. Annoying.

And this is my new pots and pans cabinet in my old tupperware cabinet (Are you keeping this straight? lol).


And in my old pots and pans cabinet is where my new food saver is stored, as well as Betsy's attachments!


Thats my extra mixing bowl, my ice cream maker attachment and my bin of other attachments. On the top, weird half shelf perfectly fits my food saver and storage bags. The ice cream maker can and should be stored in the freezer, so this is the picture after I realized that

Now I need something to fill that gap!

I forgot to take a picture of my cup cabinet prior to emptying it out, but I thought it would be best to put the cups over where the plates and bowls were now that I took out most of the pans.


We have more plates and bowls than that, they were all in the dishwasher.

I needed to move the cleaners from their lower cabinet because Charlie kept getting into it. So they went into the old cup cabinet.

Here is Anastasia taking the cleaner out and handing it to me to put up top.
This is another weirdly shaped cabinet. It goes way towards the back but it makes it hard to get to the stuff back there without practically climbing into the cabinet.


Cleaners are one of my few non-"green" things, my OCD makes it hard for me to trust that something is clean without harsh cleaners. I'm working on it.

Here they are crammed in the new cabinet. This had three shelves in it, but I had to remove one and change the height of the other one in order to fit anything into it. The shelves, prior, could hardly fit anything that was remotely tall. See my inventory sheet? (My computer just turned off and I thought I lost this post! I was about to throw my hands up and laugh/cry).


I forgot to take a picture of the after cleaner cabinet. It now stores the huge pots I couldn't get past the weird divider, and the kids cups. It drives me crazy to hear 20 times a day times 3 kids "Can I have a cup!" so I thought it would be the most logical thing to put the kids cups where the kids can reach them. I now fear I will be washing every kids cup every single day, but at least they can reach them.

Around this time we had a mini-family crisis and the rest of the kitchen switch-a-roo had to be put on hold. Hopefully I'll find time soon to finish it. I only have a few more cabinets to go through.

So far I've made muffins, tortillas, and pancakes with Betsy. The pancakes were for dinner tonight, and they were super simple to make and much less messy than usual.


These are some pictures of the Bear eating pancakes. We've had such a hard time getting him to eat that I was so happy he ate some pancake! He is nursing about 18 hours a day at the moment, and it's driving me bananas. Hopefully he'll be able to eat more food soon!

Sunday, May 22, 2011

I got my Mixer!

For years I have been lusting after a KitchenAid Mixer. I tried, for a long time, to be as self sufficient as possible. Then I was diagnosed with Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome and I had to stop doing a lot of self reliant activities - such as bread making. I loved making bread, and I was really darn good at it too! I loved making something from scratch, kneading life into it, and feeding it to my family. My arms are useless for kneading dough now, but I refused to buy a bread maker. It felt like cheating to me.

My friend Elaine brought over her KitchenAid a while back and made pizza dough in it. It was so similar to hand making it except the KitchenAid kneaded for her. I lusted after it even harder than before. With a family as large as mine, though, a 4.5 qt Mixer was not going to suffice. I needed at least a 6 qt, and a 7 qt would be even nicer. The 7 qts are so hard to come by so I settled for a 6 qt and today my lovely husband went out with the two younger kids and returned with this:

Ain't she beautiful? I've named her Betsy. All the best tools in my house have names. He bought me a few extra attachments too, and right now if you buy a mixer you can get the Ice Cream maker attachment for free! So that should be coming to me in a few weeks time!

I am so excited to make bread again and am already planning on making me tortillas tomorrow. I shall update with pictures, recipes, and results! I'm so excited!

And since he left with the two younger ones I managed to have a few hours to clean uninterrupted. My room is well on it's way to being complete!

Wednesday, May 18, 2011

Coupons galore! Day (lost track) of 60/300!

Today was the first day in a while that I felt well enough to do much of anything. Unfortunately, Charlie Bear didn't get the memo that we were supposed to be feeling better. He's been sick for nearly 2 weeks now, running a fever off and on. I swear it's due to those blasted shots. I wish I could convince Chris to fore go them. However, thats a post for another day :)

A while ago I asked Chris to rearrange furniture for me. He hates doing this, but he does it without too much complaint. I am a truly lucky gal!

I could have sworn I posted a picture of my desk area, but I can't find it. So this is what my desk area looked like, and what people saw when first entering my home:



This is a major work in progress. It was all neat and organized but the kids kept messing with everything and it became a disaster area. The blinds are all broken thanks to 4 kids and a dog, and will be taken down as soon as we buy some curtains. The desk is going to get a paint job - the wood will become black colored and the white grout with also be colored black. The silver filing cabinet will be spray painted white and green to match the other set of white and green drawers. The more I thought on it, though, the more I hated this being in the living room. So now our living room looks like this:


So much more welcoming, and homey! The blue recliner rocker makes for a great little reading area. A few more items await this room before it's finished. There are going to be baskets on the Entertainment Center, curtains are going to be hung (and blinds taken down), some writing is going on the wall, ect. I think it will look fantastic when it's done!

This means that my desk had to go somewhere, and since our house isn't very large there was only one place for it to go. My room. Ugh, I hate having non-bedroom stuff in there but with 4 kids it's the only place that things can go if you don't want it messed with. It has a lot of work that needs to be done, as I've been to sick to do anything. It currently looks like this


See how back logged I am with my coupons? I'm trying to organize my inserts and needed floor space to do it. However, I haven't finished and it looks ridiculous.


This weekend my goal is to get my room back in shape. I won't be able to paint the desk just yet, but it will be soon! I also plan to hang shelves and a homemade sign of some sort. Still trying to think of just what I want it to say. I was thinking, "A Day in the Life of a Freg" but we'll see.

I've been using the coupon binder method for my coupons, and I love it.

Basically I have picture inserts that are labeled alphabetically and color coded. Colors are for food, and white is for toiletries and non-food items. I love this system, it is very easy to find exactly the coupon I'm looking for. HOWEVER, and it's a BIG however, it is very time consuming to keep up with. It can easily take a few hours a week just to keep it up. So each week I fell behind and behind until I was left with the mess you just witnessed. So now I'm doing a combined method. I still use my lovely binder for loose coupons, printables, ect. But now I use the insert method for most of it.


My files are labeled with the three major coupon inserts and then there is the Misc for the various other inserts I get. Then I take each weekly inserts, staple the like pages together (I buy 2-5 papers a week), and file them in a file folder with that weeks date on it. This way when they all expire I can just tack another sticker with a new date over the last one. Then the file folders are filed in order of date. Since I use "The Grocery Game" it tells me which insert the coupon I need is in and it takes just a moment to find it. I have a mini-coupon binder I take with me into stores that has a place for each store, their coupons, the ones I end up not using, ECB's, ect. Once I am finally done organizing it I will cut my coupon clipping and organizing time from a few hours to a few minutes.

And finally... I have inspired Chris to clean and organize too. I threatened to do his office space for him and so this weekend he began on it.


It looks awful, but I assure you this is much better than it was. This is the one room of the house I refuse to clean at all and so it is very much a scary scary mess. Hopefully this is finished this weekend too!


Tuesday, May 17, 2011

Still overcoming....

I'm finally on the mend from whatever it is that has been plaguing me. I was actually able to clean a little today! I'm still not 100% better, but I'm getting there. Tomorrow I'll be posting a proper update, pictures and all.

Friday, May 13, 2011

Spoons


I was planning to post this last night, but Blogger was down so it's worth posting tonight.

This is an article that my friend showed me a few years ago after I was diagnosed with Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome. "The Spoon Theory" has resonated deeply with me ever since. I don't blame people for not understanding what it's like to be me. How can someone who is healthy, and normal, and has loads of energy, who doesn't wake up to dislocated limbs, or complete loss of joints understand what someone who DOES have all those things feels like? It took my own husband reading my MRI scans to actually grasp that I wasn't "putting on" or exaggerating how bad it was. It took some of my doctors over a year to take me seriously about the pain. So I don't get offended that someone doesn't understand. I have no idea what it's like to live with Cancer or a terminal illness, they have no idea what its like to live with EDS. Even though the spoon theory was written for Lupus it still applies for EDS and most other chronic conditions.

I have a finite amount of spoons. Some days I have more, some days I have less. Some days I barely have any at all, and other days I have nearly as much as a normal person. Some times I borrow spoons and then I'm short the rest of the week as I recover, sometimes my pain meds gives me a few spoons and sometimes it takes away a few.

Yesterday was one of my lowest spoon days. The whole house has been sick with a cold/tummy bug. It has completely wiped me out. Especially because Charlie has been hit hard and only wants me and my nursies all day, and all night. And I mean all night. Sleeping in 10 min. increments when you are sick yourself is a recipe for disaster. I am not a TV watcher. I watch maybe one show a day, unless Chris and I watch a bit at night while we unwind, but yesterday I couldn't find the strength to even get up off the couch. Having OCD on top of this drains my spoons even faster. My OCD causes my anxiety and stress to go way up when my house is cluttered, dirty, or chaotic. So I sat on the couch and thought of the laundry piling up, the carpets that needed to be vacuumed, the kids that should be interacted with, and it drained me further and further.

As soon as Chris got home I had to leave. I couldn't stand to be in the house for another second. I had no energy, and I actually sat in the car and cried for a few minutes because I wasn't sure I could even leave! I figured I'd go to Target, and then to dinner, and hopefully relax and recoup. I love Target. I was in Target for less than 10 minutes because I could hardly walk. I knew it was time to leave when a sales associate came over and took my basket from me saying it looked as if I was going to keel over. Times like that are quite embarrassing for me. How do you explain to stranger that you have an "invisible illness" and it's not that you are weak, or whatever may be running through your head? Sometimes I feel I need a sign, "Yes, I'm young. Yes, I LOOK fine. Looks can be deceiving. I am sick."

I went to my favorite Mongolian BBQ restaurant after that and for the next few hours I had great girl time with my Best Friend, Sandra. I didn't have to walk, I didn't have to put on, I didn't have to make excuses. It was absolutely exactly what I needed. The best part was returning home to see my husband had done all the things around the house that I couldn't!

Today I'm still wiped out, but I have more spoons than I did yesterday. I'm hoping that as the days go on this week I'll have more spoons, and on the days where I don't I know I've got an amazing support system to help me out.

Thursday, May 12, 2011

No dead, just sick

I have fallen off everything as I've been nearly too sick to stand since Mothers Day. Every time I stand up I get lightheaded. This has put a huge damper on my organization, but today I feel semi-alive again and therefore back on track. Post coming tonight!

Sunday, May 8, 2011

Day - Mothers day weekend

This weekend I hit a wall. My house is a complete disaster area. My OCD ensures that if my house is a chaotic mess so is my mood. My anxiety has been through the roof, and therefore it's been hard to get up and get it done - which just makes it this never ending circle of messiness! Friday I had enough! I was so beyond stressed out and I was being the mother I swore I'd never be. So Friday evening I went out to dinner with some girlfriends and it was exactly what I needed. On Saturday we watched my best friends kids so there wasn't much in the way of cleaning that happened - although all the kids got the playroom back clean! Woohoo! And today the kids insisted I not clean at all so I insisted we get out of the house so I could stop looking at the mess. We went shopping, I bought some nice new bras (I hate bra shopping with a passion. Do you know how hard it is to find a 32G?), and then we went out to eat dinner. I made Chris rearrange some furniture first and I'm hoping to get my office corner completed here soon. I need some paint first. Pictures off all the craziness coming soon.

Thursday, May 5, 2011

Day 18!

I've slowed my productivity waaaay down. I have been feeling so run down since my sunburn happened. It's actually taken a lot out of me. I've also decreased my meds quite a bit and that is making my EDS feel much worse, which doesn't inspire me to get up and clean and purge. But - I am still trucking along. One project a day. I don't think I'll stay within my "300" part of my challenge, but will definitely complete this in 60 days. Even though we are leaving in three weeks for a week long vacation!

My friend Kim suggested labeling my diaper bins with luggage tags. What an amazingly simple idea! I had never thought of using luggage tags! I will definitely keep that in mind for future label ideas. I didn't have any luggage tags, however, so I had to pull out one of my favorite home items - Meet "Lenny" my Laminator. Yes, he is so amazing he deserves a name.
Chris bought me Lenny when we were homeschooling. He has helped me create Christmas presents, games for the kids, and LABELS!


I simply used Word and their "insert a shape" option and made myself 10 labels. I even "Chrisified" them.


Chris claims he can't remember that the smallest prefolds we have are Preemie sized (they are blue), and that the smalls are green, and that the largest we own are medium prefolds and they don't have a colored stitching. So, on the labels I put the color of the stitching on them. I called my Preemie prefolds "Newborn" but its the same thing. "Blue" is for the color of stitching. These were printed on colored cardstock, printed, laminated, cut out, and I used a hole punch and tied them on with yard.

Originally I was going to have some system for shapes/colors but sometimes I really need to let things just be so the placement was pretty random. I'm quite proud of myself because of that.

Wednesday, May 4, 2011

Day - Get back on track!

My house was destroyed this weekend as 13 little, adorable, children ran through it for two days. I have only half-heartedly tried to get it back in shape, but today I did a good portion of it. I figured we would clean for 45 minutes and thats what we did. Amazing what a little family can accomplish in 45 minutes.

This was what my garage sale money went to


This is the new bin for my diapers. All of my diapers, minus the pile I'm giving away to friends, fit in here! I was surprised! Chris doesn't like the set up as much because he can't easily see what he wants - but I was tired of seeing the diapers spilling out all of the time. The little basket on top was given to me at Anastasia's baby shower! It holds the diaper accessories, such as snappi's, pins, diaper cream, and baby powder. I have to have everything in order. It took me a long time to figure out a way to make the colors work. There is a pattern there.

Here's Chris helping me set up for the yard sale


And my sunburned face. It got much worse after this picture was taken. My whole face blistered up. After a full day with neosporin on my face it is beginning to heal and most of the blisters popped.


MAJOR raccoon eyes! See how messy this room is? It needs a good cleaning. This room is the scariest of them all.


And this is the man who makes it all work in our house. We've been married 7 years now!


And just to show the rest of them off....

The Bear

Anastasia


Anthony


David


And.... Jovi!