Toy Organization - Whiskey Tango Foxtrot

I don't like "stuff" out and all around. It seriously irritates the crap out of me when I find toy parts that don't belong with other toy parts. Maybe it's the OCD in me? I'm not sure but I do know this - do you remember when you were little and you pulled out a game only to find that pieces were missing so you had to scavenge around your house to play? Well, Bimmer Man doesn't put all the pieces back to toys and it seriously irritates me. I'm planning on moving two toy bins out of the living so stuff like that can't happen anymore (Oh, and getting rid of as many small plastic things that just don't fit with anything we have, things that don't get played with, and putting pieces back to the toys that they belong to).

Currently there are white Sterilite bins in my Amazon cart but I can't quite bring myself to buy them yet. I've got half my yarn organized into a bookshelf, 5 plastic storage bins that I need to either get rid of or fill up with toys to put into a rotation OR I need to figure out how to organize my clothes by season so I can store stuff properly.

But with all the toys that we have and another child on the way, I have a feeling that we'll probably acquire more toys. Since I'm more into the educational toys instead of the "one-time use" toys, I'm sure at some point I'll need to have a serious toy purge (in about 4 years!).

On my list of things to do in the basement is get everything on a shelf (a motto that I found - everything has a place, everything in its place), get everything a basket, make everything easy to see AND play with (because otherwise it never gets played with). To do that, we're going to need bookcases (which in the grand scheme of things is in the plan), to get bookshelves we need to get the walls drywalled, to get the walls finished we need to pull out the old carpet, and the list goes on.

These things will not be finished this year.

And that's ok for now, but that means that I need to figure out how to organize on the cheap and get stuff into its "spot" so that we have a relatively organized house by the beginning of May.

I've started small - bins for accessories for the red storage shelf in the front hall along with a bin for all correspondence stuff (like thank you cards, greeting cards, stamps, etc...), a bin for cleaning stuff in the master bathroom, and a large bin for Barbie stuff.

Next I'm going to have Bimmer Man take the rod out of the front closet so I can install 2 rows of trim so I can put up hooks instead of hanging jackets on hangers and The Monkey can hang up her own crap.

We'll see what gets accomplished this weekend.

Nutella Cookie Recipe

Ugh. We've been eating so much sugar lately it's absolutely ridiculous. I normally don't eat this much sugar and there's usually no way that I even think about giving The Monkey this much sugar. But being pregnant and sometimes having weird cravings, it's sort of normal to have some sort of something with sugar in this house. And that absolutely needs to change at some point this week - it's soon to be spring and I'm so anxious for fresh berries and fruits that it's driving me nuts! I really just want to eat raspberries. That's all. FRESH PICKED RASPBERRIES. But I suppose I can settle for cane sugar, raw honey, agave, and whatever other sweet items I can get my hands on. But goodness gracious, we haven't eaten this much sugar in FOREVER. 

In fact, I rarely even let The Monkey eat macaroni and cheese (because OMG, if you've ever seen the CRAP macaroni and cheese that restaurants serve, you'd never leave the fucking toilet, I swear - literally AND figuratively - which somehow every time we go to a restaurant my mother-in-law insists on macaroni and cheese for The Monkey and every time there's major digestive issues, so we don't do macaroni and cheese anymore at restaurants at all. Future parents - take note, please!!! Oh, not to mention that all three of us have some sort of issues with either lactose or dairy products which means that in our house, we've cut down on dairy quite a bit!). 

Anyway, after all of our unhealthy sugar addictions, I still make some sort of "treat" at least once per week - but really it's just baking something so that The Monkey can practice measuring, dumping, cracking eggs and baking with me, and the treat is usually some type of chocolate chip cookie OR tossing ingredients into the bread machine for a french loaf or a regular sandwich bread, on weeks where it seems we're eating poorly are the weeks where I make bread instead of cookies.

But then I came upon a recipe for peanut butter chippers and didn't have peanut butter. So I swapped out the peanut butter for Nutella and added in the Nutella at the very end...because I forgot to add it in to the batter at the beginning. Sometimes mistakes turn out great!

Recipe:

Nutella Cookies

6 TBSP Butter

1/2 cup sugar

1/2 cup packed brown sugar

1 egg

1tsp vanilla extract

1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour

1/2 tsp baking soda

1/4 tsp salt

1 cup milk chocolate chips

1/4 cup Nutella

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. 

In a bowl or mixer cream together the butter and sugars until light and fluffy. Beat in egg and vanilla.

In a separate bowl, combine flour, baking soda, and salt. Slowly add dry ingredients to the wet ingredients.

Fold in chocolate chips.

Fold in Nutella. Yes, that's correct, I didn't actually mix it into the batter at the beginning!

Use a tablespoon to drop batter onto a cookie sheet or an ice cream scoop.

Bake for 11-14 minutes until edges are JUST golden. Let cool two minutes on cookie sheet then remove to let cool fully on racks. 

Store in airtight container for up to 5 days. 

Junk Mail And Wine Clubs

Do you ever get a great piece of junk mail and think "I AM GOING TO SIGN UP FOR THAT SHIT" every once in awhile?

Well, that happened to me today.

I've been ordering a few items off of Zulily lately (and even if you're not a parent there's TONS of women's clothes, shoes, and home items but I mostly order kid crap) and in the packaging when the items come (and NOT in a timely manner, I do have to say - some items have taken WEEKS to ship!!) there's a $100 wine voucher for nakedwines.com.

So today I looked at the website. I added cases of wines to the cart.

And then I almost hit myself on the head with a baseball bat.

I can't drink until May and even then I won't have time nor will I actually want to because taking care of a newborn and drinking alcohol is not smart. So clicked on the "X" and closed the webpage.

OMG.

It was just like the freaking bagel coupon that came in the mail a week ago to Einstein Bro. Bagels. I really wanted a bagel so I kept the coupon but guess what...THERE'S NO EINSTEIN NEAR OUR HOUSE.

So after a week those coupons went into the recycling.

And this wine voucher...it's going into the garbage too. I'm not joining a wine club for $40 per month plus paying another $100 for a case of wine on top of that. I'm going to be honest - I'll totally forget to order after the third month which is exactly what I'm sure the company wants me to do anyway.

I'll just go to the France 44 liquor store and demand that someone put together a random case of wine for me and BAM. I'll drink it later this year. I think we get like $5 off for every $75 we spend anyway for belonging to their club anyway. And I also think they do a discount if you buy wine by the case.

So moral of the story...stop opening the crap junk mail and just recycle it.

Time For A New Tattoo

Well, this June anyway, I can't right now since I'm knocked up. I'm planning on getting a new tattoo.

I asked Bimmer Man if it's ok - because quite frankly, it represents him and I wanted to know if it would be ok to get something permanent on my body.

He sort of looked at me with a blank stare and said, "OK."

I'm pretty sure I threw him for a loop. And we've been together for so long that he's pretty great at being able to predict me.

In any case...

Since my wedding rings keep going missing and somehow get misplaced I'm going to get my wedding ring tattooed onto my finger.

I know. I know.

Or at least I think I know what you're thinking.

DON'T DO IT.

But yes, people, I'm going to do it.

And eventually I'll get The Monkey's birthday and Baby Chewy's birthday dates (I have a plan for those, but I wanted to make sure I was finished having children first).

And I want something to symbolize the Earth too and my love of nature and gardening but I don't know quite yet. There's a lot of plants that I love but not one that seriously stands out enough to me yet to really represent anything.

So far I'm just thinking a linking infinity symbol for the drawing on my finger, nothing too crazy, nothing too out there, nothing with hearts, nothing with a date, nothing that's solid black. Bimmer Man said that a tattoo on his finger wouldn't go over well at work so he's not getting one and that's absolutely fine with me - and plus he LOVES his ring. I don't think he'd give it up for the world. Since my child is my boss, I asked her if I could get a drawing on my finger and she said yes, so it's an approved workplace item.

So this June I'm getting a tattoo.

Now I just need to find a tattoo parlor with child care.

It's Monday

And Pi Day!

Today The Monkey has requested Turkey Pot Pi(e) and a Chocolate Pi(e) for dessert.

Hope you have Pi(e) that is awesome too!

Less Than 8 Weeks

Shit.

There's less than 8 weeks until this next kid comes.

To be quite honest, I'm not freaking out like I was with The Monkey. I'm not stressed out about it. I'm not worried. We've been through the newborn phase before so I need to stock coffee in the cabinet.

I JUST WANT TO FUCKING BEND OVER AND TOUCH MY TOES WITHOUT A FREAKING KID IN THE WAY.

That's really what it comes down to.

The heartburn is awful, the awkwardness of standing up/sitting down is really getting to me because I'm so used to just being able to be NORMAL.

But this is also probably the last child I will birth SO I'm trying to enjoy kicks to my kidney, accidentally cutting the blood supply from my legs (this is why you don't sleep on your back when you're pregnant, the baby ends up against your spine and leaning against weird veins and BAM, suddenly your legs are tingling, your left arm is tingling and you're panicking that you're dying, which you're not, you just need to roll over), and the weird maternity pants that NEVER seem to fit right (either too big or too small and you always feel like people can see the stupid stretch band part).

I can't wait to get rid of my maternity clothes. I'm going to freaking jump for joy. I've only gained 12 pounds so as long as I don't shove food into my gullet for two I should only gain 8-10 more pounds. After baby and placenta leave my body, I should be close to 15 pounds lighter from the hospital and then pee out everything else plus getting to walk and exercise over the summer should mean that I don't have as much to lose as with The Monkey. Which is awesome.

Truth be told, if The Monkey's pregnancy was as easy as this one, I'd probably have 11 kids. Why? Because only 18 weeks of morning sickness really isn't all that bad compared to the 28 weeks of morning sickness with The Monkey. Bimmer Man would probably disagree but only because he had to learn how to solo parent as I threw up on the weekends. I solo parent on a daily basis so I really had no sympathy (and I tossed my cookies plenty of times watching The Monkey all.by.myself too).

So all in all, I've puked for a total of 46 weeks. That is almost one full year of vomiting due to pregnancy. Disgusting.

I'm pretty much one of those women where pregnancy sucks and it's a means to an end which requires some serious thought if we ever decide to do it again (I'm pretty sure I would, as long as it's only 18 weeks of puking).

I'm also ready to see what this kid looks like. If he was going to be a girl, I suppose I'd have some idea of what she would look like - probably more like my dad's family to start with (round face, very Finnish eyebrows) and also exactly like Bimmer Man. A boy though...I'm not sure!

We have everything we need except for diaper cream and a sound machine but both of those can be purchased on Amazon so whatever...

LESS THAN 8 WEEKS. WOO HOO!!!!!

Ha! Ha! Ha! So True.

As I've gotten older, this means so much more. I laugh every time I see it. 

(And I'm not being passive-aggressive, I just don't care about what people think anymore).