The City Is Growing On Me

It's true, I am starting to enjoy the city.  I enjoy taking the subway in, walking around, grabbing a bite to eat. The other day we realized how we are becoming more of a city family when we asked Munchkie if she wanted to go to Subway with her Daddy.  She said yes and started to get ready to leave, then she asked, are we going to take the red one or the blue one?  It was then that we realized that we meant "Do you want to get a sandwich at Subway with Daddy?" and she thought we meant "Do you want to go somewhere on the subway with Daddy?"  We go on the subway so much that she just assumed that's where they were going. 

There are several things that we've learned about living in a city that we just never thought about before.  Some of these include-

• Boots- a good pair of boots is absolutely essential.  When the rain comes down, when the snow piles up, your feet need to be protected.
• Dressing in layers- because you have to peel them off and on as you sit on a crowded bus with the heat blasting or walk several blocks through  buildings that become a wind tunnel.
• A solid stroller- we destroyed a few before we realized this. Wheels popping off as you go over a bumpy sidewalk is not the most pleasant way to learn this.
• Patience- you can't do anything or get anywhere fast.  I heard someone one day on the bus in a southern drawl tell another rider that she thought that you had to be laid back in the south, but living here has taught her patience.
• You can find just about anything you could possibly want.  When a recipe calls for something interesting, or you think that there is something odd you want, you can find it somewhere in the city.

 Tonight I went into our little neighborhood shopping area to do my weekly shopping.  Some friends down the street from us have told me that they do all of their shopping in our neighborhood stores and I was always so amazed by this.  Tonight, I could completely understand how.  I went into our Middle Eastern store- Bob's Pita Bakery which sells a lot more than just pita, it is stock full of produce.  Good looking produce.  Really cheap produce.  I was in fruit and vegetable heaven.  I just kept telling myself, do not go crazy, you only have so much room in that ridiculously small fridge. I was able to get all this sink full of produce (those twelve lemons at the regular grocery store would have alone been $6), fresh herbs, tahini paste, coconut and ginger root for under $50, that to me is amazing!  This store is small, two people can't pass each other in the two aisles. I walked in and out of several stores finding a "welcome to the neighborhood" (which secretly means, sorry you live below a toddler, a dog and a Kinect) gift basket for the girl who just moved in underneath us.  We have a wine store, cheese store with all kinds of delicious things, several bakeries, a cafe, ice cream store, meat shop, Italian deli, thrift store, unique gift shops, among several other little places - all in a couple block area. I was able to put together a nice little gift basket of local treats, including a few take out menus of course! 

Needless to say, it may be a slow process, but I am starting to enjoy my new life.  I just wish that it wasn't so lonely, building up a new life in a new city. 

Successful Saturday

I had one of those fantastically successful and productive Saturdays.  The ones that don't stress you out, but the ones that you go to bed and think, oh now that is how I like to spend my day. 

We started off by going to the super cute coffee shop and walking to the farmer's market.  At the farmer's market we found all kinds of goodies.  I just love the farmer's market so much.  I must have walked up and down the aisle at least 5 times surveying each booth's wares.  The first purchase I made was a little jar of eczema cream for poor Munchkie's face.  She started with these patches of eczema this summer and I was so excited to find something natural to try on them.  We are planning on making some tomato sauce with the tomatoes and basil to freeze and slightly replenish our frozen sauce.  The kale will make great kale chips for some healthy snacks and the peppers never made it past the raw stage because we snack on them like apples.  The delicious yellow honey tomatoes.  Oh they're gone.  Have been since an hour after we got home.  Now that is what a tomato is supposed to taste like!

 On the way from the coffee shop to the farmer's market we passed by a tag sale that had a few items that caught our eye.  The first was a dog kennel.  Both of our dogs' kennels were in bad shape and we recently bought a new one at Walmart for one of them, but couldn't handle paying the price for a second kennel.  The kennel at the tag sale was much better quality than the cheapest ones at Walmart and she accepted our offer of $5.  Amazing!  As we were walking away we both stopped and saw this trunk.  Oh my goodness.  We both turned and looked at each other and said, "I've always wanted a trunk."  The seller finally accepted our offer of $21 after some negotiating.  I can not wait to fix it up a little bit.  What perfect storage!  It's not too big and can hold all kinds of things inside of it.  With a little refinishing, paint and new hardware, I think this can be a very beautiful piece that will find the perfect place in our new home.  I was so excited after this find that I wanted to go look at some things for our new apartment.  We went to Ikea to get some ideas on making small spaces work.  Then  I went to JoAnn Fabrics to look at a few things, Home Depot for paint samples and found a great deal on a mirror at Goodwill for another project.  I really enjoyed the time with my family, but also a few hours by myself meandering through stores thinking and creating in my head.

The perfect ending for our day was a date night after Munchkie went to bed.  We had wanted to spend one last date night out while we still had people around us that we knew.  Unfortunately our plans slightly fell through and so we spent the date night in our own living room with Munchkie sound asleep upstairs.  Some Thai take out, a few candles and a movie really made it feel like a date night.  We had a good time together talking and enjoying each other's company without thinking about all the things that needed to be done around the house.  We were able to truly focus on each other.  I look forward to date nights and believe that they are an essential part in a healthy relationship.  Even though we spend quite a few nights together in our living room, it's completely different when you have a mindset of sharing a date night together.  You are able to mentally push all other things aside and truly focus your energy and attention towards the person you love.  It makes a huge difference to feel special and loved as you do during these times.


And so, after a movie, dinner, creative thinking trip, tag sale, farmer's market and coffee shop I had an incredibly productive and perfect day. 

Spring Cleaning

This weekend we took advantage of the Gap Get & Give discount and did some shopping to update our wardrobes (it's amazing the freedom you feel to have a monthly car payment off your shoulders!).  Since most of my clothes were bought off a clearance rack, therefore awkwardly fitting or just plain didn't fit at all, I needed to add some pieces to my limited clothing selection.  Munchkie's Daddy and I are looking forward to a trip we are taking in May for our anniversary (five years already!) so we also had to make sure we had appropriate clothing for the dress requirements and extreme heat of a Riveria Maya resort.

We first headed to the aquarium to let Munchkie have some fun and tire out.  Then we headed to the outlets for some serious shopping.  After several hours pouring over racks and revisiting dressing rooms we finally arrived home with our purchases.  I, of course always have to analyze the things I spend my money on and so laid out all of my clothes to make sure that they all had my approval for a second time.

Then I explained to Munchkie's Daddy the importance of cleaning out our closets, that we have clothes we haven't worn in a long time. One of my favorite blogs, and the one that introduced me into the world of blogging, SimpleMom.net, is having a several week serious of cleaning out your home.  This past week's was the closet and I realized that our closets do need some attention.  Although I have taken several garbage bags of clothes to various clothing drop boxes over the past several months, I still have clothes that I go to put on and realize that they are no where near fitting me anymore.  Time to free up the oh-so-precious-and-quite-limited closet space.  So after standing in our closets throwing clothes behind us, my pile looked something like this.

How does one even have space to hold all of these misfitted articles of clothing?  We have had our bed raised so we could fit storage containers underneath our bed and that is where most of my clothes have been stored.  This is an especially bad place to keep them because it's out of sight, out of mind.  Thankfully I had brought it down to two tubs previous to this extreme clean so there wasn't nearly as much to go through.  I had to tell myself as I pulled each article out to examine.

When did you last wear this?  How do you feel while wearing it?  Does it flatter you?  Is it even in the right size? 

If it didn't pass these questions.  Behind me it went.  It took several minutes to muster up the courage to throw some of them behind me.  It's a little piece of history that's being discarded and thrown out of your life.  There were several times when I knew something needed to go, but couldn't do it, so I would hold it up for Munchkie's Daddy and say "What do you think of this?"  Each time hoping that he would say, "Oh I love that, don't throw it away."  Those words never came out of his mouth.  I think once he did say "Well that is a nice dress" and it wasn't even something I wanted to keep.  Haha!  By the time I was finished with this closet massacre my closet looked quite bare and I wished that I would have looked a little harder while I had that coupon available.  It is actually kind of fun to shop for clothes now that I can get normal sizes.  I don't have to be embarrassed by how I look in something or what size I have to find.  I've been dreading it for so many years now that I go in, get down to business, and get out before many tears were shed.

This is now every article of clothing that I own.  Other than socks, underwear, etc.  I have the above tub of Tshirts, pj pants and hoodies that will go back under my bed.  The pair of capris will hang right there on my closet door.  Those are my next motivator.  I bought them because I can button them, but they definitely aren't comfortable or well fitting yet.  I need something to look at and to motivate me to not late night binge or unnecessarily carb load due to stress induced cravings and moments of lost self control.  I hope that these capris are just the motivation that I need.  Although, it would be better to hang them from the pantry or refrigerator, I will have to settle with my closet door.    

After our cleaning time we filled three trash bags full of clothes.  I will need to finish up all of our laundry so I can pull out the items I have been wearing that I shouldn't be.  Such as the burnt orange XXXL top that looks hideous.  Needless to say, it makes me feel very good to have a closet with some nice looking items in it.  It is cleaned out and organized just the way I like it.  I can go up into our room and sigh, because it's not an overwhelming mess or a job too big for me to tackle.  It's already taken care of.  And I can pull any item out of my closet and feel confident wearing it.  No more hours spent trying on and then discarding clothes in front of the mirror attempting to find something in my closet that is wearable.

Came across this

www.vitalicious.com

The other day I took Munchkie to Target to get her picture taken and forgot to grab anything to eat on our rush out the door.  When we got to Target I wanted to find something to eat that I wouldn't have to feel guilty about (and there wasn't a Starbucks inside, what Target doesn't have a Starbucks these days???).  Walking past the frozen foods to get to the portrait studio I saw these muffin tops that I had glanced at before when buying things from the frozen natural food section before.  I thought I would give them a try and see how they were.  I have to say that I was pretty impressed.  

I grabbed the CranBran and when I flipped the box over I could read, understand and even pronounce every single ingredient (Water, whole wheat flour, organic sugar, egg whites, whole wheat flakes, cranberries, molasses powder, soy bran, oat fiber, wheat protein isolate, oat bran, inulin, leavening (potassium bicarbonate, sodium acid pyrophosphate, monocalcium phosphate), wheat gluten, fruitrim (grapejuice, brown rice), acacia gum, natural flavor, sea salt, cinnamon, xanthan gum, lecithin, vitamin A, vitamin B6, vitamin B12, vitamin C, vitamin D, vitamin E, folic acid, iron, biotin, zinc) .  Amazing.  That is really hard to find on the backside of a box these days, which is why I usually tend to stay away from boxed foods.  The nutrition facts weren't that bad either.

They really filled me up and tasted pretty good too.  I can remember my mom bringing home foods from the health food store in town when I was little and it was disgusting flavored cardboard.  Things have come a long way.  I might actually keep some of these in my freezer for the day I run out of Homemade Granola Bars and don't have time to make more.  There are also a lot of different options if you look at their website at www.vitalicious.com.  When you look at their website on the side is a little walking man and it says that it only takes 13 minutes of walking to walk off one of their 100 calorie vitatop muffins.  That definitely eliminates any guilt you might have.  Thirteen minutes is nothing!

I hope you enjoy them as much as I did.

Good food Good friends

When you have kids, sometimes Ikea is a huge adventure.

This weekend we had some college friends come and visit with their dog and one-year-old son. I was reminded again of how great it is to have life long friends. There are some friends that you know no matter how far apart, no matter how life turns out or how long you go in between calls, you will always be friends. It's good for me to have these kinds of friends because I'm not so great at keeping in regular touch with people, even if I am living a town over.

While our friends were here we wanted to give them the full east coast experience (as we do with all first time visitors), however with two kids sleeping/napping schedules, we didn't really get to go out and see much. So we mostly just had food that is more available on the east coast. Isn't that what people enjoy the most? I know I do!

We made lobster rolls on fresh bread, pulled some soup from the freezer and threw together a salad. I happened to think it was delicious.

Our friends appeared to have enjoyed it as well.

Lobster Rolls

1-2 pounds fresh/defrosted frozen lobster (can use smaller amount of lobster and add shrimp or scallops as well)

4 cloves fresh garlic

1/2 tablespoon butter

2-3 tablespoons melted butter

1. First I sauteed the garlic in the pan with the 1/2 tablespoon of butter on medium heat.
2. Then I added the lobster, don't put too much in the pan, only enough to cover the bottom.
3. The lobster only takes a couple minutes to cook.  You do NOT  want to overcook it!  You'll know when the lobster is done because instead of being "squishy slimy" it will feel firm when cooking utensil is pressed on it.
4. When the lobster was finished cooking there was quite a bit of water in the pan that came from the lobster.  I dumped this out and then melted the additional butter in the pan.  Then I poured the butter over the top of the lobster in a bowl.
5. We were pulling the rolls from the oven just as the butter was melting, talk about perfect timing. The rolls are cut like a hotdog bun (which can be used as well) and the lobster placed inside.  You can also slice the buns and "toast" them, cut side down, in a pan with a teaspoon or so of melted butter if you want.

 Rolls

2 cups flour
1 1/2 teaspoons active dry yeast
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon sugar
7/8 cup water

1. Put all ingredients in a breadmaker and put on dough setting, or take out before it starts to bake if you don't have a dough setting.
2. If you don't have a breadmaker, mix together until forms a dough.  Let rise for 45 minutes.  Knead.
3. At this point form the dough into the shape you want and place on the pan you will be cooking it on.
4. Let rise for 30 minutes.
5. Preheat oven to 450 degrees.
6. Bake for 12-15 minutes.

Good friends and good food are just what we needed to take our mind off of the anxiety of waiting for answers to the uncertainty of our future.  A little break to enjoy being in the moment and not to worry about the future was much appreciated.

Bop the Bunny meets The Big Girl

So I was beyond excited when Munchkie successfully used the Elmo potty.  I spoke with her teachers at daycare and they said that potty training at daycare starts with her being able to pull her own pants and diaper off. She is perfectly capable of taking her pjs off, and yesterday her poopy diaper (that was a fun mess).  I decided before I showed her how to take her clothes and diaper off, I needed to make sure that she is really going to potty train.

My goal was have Munchkie potty trained and pacifier free by her second birthday.  I realized that if she became potty trained, she might regress if the pacifier was taken away.  So even though I need to jump on the chance to stop having to change diapers, I want to make sure that it's for real.

So we went on quite an expedition today to get to a Build-A-Bear Workshop (obviously I pay such good attention at the mall closest to us that I didn't realize there wasn't one and had to ask where there was a Build-A-Bear).  Several years ago I had read in a magazine a suggestion of using Build-A-Bear to wean off of pacifiers and I always wanted to use it when I had a child of my own.  However, I realized that it was basically going cold turkey, so we are also going to incorporate the technique that my own parents used on me.  Each night they would cut little pieces off of my pacifier, and I am going to do the same with Munchkie.  Tonight Munchkie cried for a few minutes, but fell asleep after just a few minutes of crying (could have been that she didn't take any nap today) and hopefully will stay asleep.

Since I'm working the next four days in a row, and I don't really remember the last time I worked days, I hope that Munchkie sleeps through the night pacifier free.  Next week we will go hardcore into potty training.  Because in a month from tomorrow, she will be two.  How did this happen??? 

Stuffing her bops into the bunny.

Using the peddle to add the stuffing.

Deciding that it's perfectly stuffed.

Hugs for Bop the Bunny while enjoying Big Girl Smoothies.

Bop the Bunny takes her place in Munchkie's crib with a bop in each extremity.

It's true, I really am a Mom

Today I was heading to the store and had to run another errand which took me in a different way than I usually go.  I drove by this natural foods store that had been recommended so I thought I would stop in.

I walked in and looked right, then left for the grocery carts.  I spotted these frames that you put the grocery baskets in and that's it.  A couple years ago I would be annoyed that the baskets were small, but now I'm wondering where am I supposed to put my child?  So Munchkie had to walk along with me holding my hand.

The next thing I noticed was that the aisles were very narrow.  For most people they would be frustrated that the aisles are narrow because that means difficulty maneuvering the cart.  However I learned that when the aisles are narrow, this means an 18-month-old can very easily grab things off of the shelves.  So I walked around the store measuring it up, scoping out their inventory and prices while constantly saying "No touching" "No put that back" "Mommy said no touching" "No no no" "Stay here with Mommy."  Yikes!  I have become the mothers I always felt sorry for and prayed "please God don't let me turn into them!"

Another observation I made was how colorful food packaging is.  It is very attractive to a young child, even when the contents are wheat berries.  My very observant toddler kept saying "Oh!", pointing and telling me what she recognized (dogs, apples, flowers, yummies).  These food industry people really know how to market!  When you are determining which fight is worth fighting for, you end up with things like $1.29 gluten free honey oatmeal animal cookies because there are "yi-yons raaaaar" (lions rooooar) on them in bright colors so that you don't have to buy the $4.99/lb tomatoes.

By the time we got to the cash register, I was exhausted from using one hand to control Munchkie, the other to hold the very few items I was purchasing while trying to protect the shelved items and prevent near catastrophe from occurring in the grocery store.  So I just couldn't handle saying "No" one more time while trying to pay, put my items in a bag and get out of the store.  I sure hope those check out line cookies were the battle worth loosing. 

Who am I and what have I become?  I guess it's true, I really am a Mom.