Just want to share

I just want to pass this on because it's been such a sweet experience for us.

A couple months ago, George brought  a magna doodle into his room to play with. The next morning I found he had left me a cute little drawing on it. He kept leaving us drawings every day so we started leaving drawings back. George said he ran out of ideas so he started leaving us notes on his magna doodle.Usually sweet love notes, or something having to do with our day. Even though technically the magna doodle is Ben's, Ben liked the idea and started leaving us notes on papers. Now I have to admit, little kid notes are so hard for me because I want to keep every single one and I know I just can't, so after a couple weeks, we bought another magna doodle so Ben could leave his own notes to us. I feel like now I can have the memory of sweet interchanges without feeling like I'm drowning in papers I don't want to throw away. Now every night before we go to bed, we go into the big boys room, find their notes or drawings and write back to them. It's one of the highlights of our day.

Another idea someone shared at book club last night is she puts a notebook under her kids' pillows and writes questions in them for the kids to answer. Just any little questions like, "who's your best friend?" or "what made you happy today?" I thought that was a great idea, and what I'm thinking is maybe when they're little we can use magna doodles and as they get older, we can move up to the notebook, or maybe I'll just do both :)

 I love the idea of keeping an open line of communication out there, and having a place to express our love in a sweet way. So now you know.

Healthy food for kids...

This post is for my sister-in-law...She and I have talked a few times about how to provide good, healthy snacks for our children. She just recently posted on her blog about it, and I just wanted to add one idea: presentation.

I believe strongly in "if you offer it, they will eat it." Not immediately and not every time, but in general. Of course, the sooner you start your kids eating healthy food, the better. I've found that my kids are much more willing to eat what I offer if it is presented in a fun way. Dan was my inspiration for this, since every meal or snack he ever makes for me is a work of art... a few examples of his work: (he doesn't always use the same plate, it just so happened those were the pictures I had :) )

So one day I was setting out some veggies for the kids and to make it more fun, made this guy:

The boys LOVED him and he was devoured in about a minute. Dan is still the master, but I'm slowly learning :) It really does make mealtime more fun, and gives me a chance to be creative, when sometimes meal preparation can seem so mundane. The end.

cooking again!

Well, folks, the day has finally come. I finally ran out of all the freezer meals and easy dinners that I saved for myself for after Jack was born. Now I have to start cooking again for real! 

A co-worker of my husbands passed along a bunch of food network magazines that she wasn't going to use, and they have a section in them called "Weeknight cooking." The recipes are generally not terribly complicated, and I thought they would work well for me to ease me back in to cooking.

I don't really have time to type out the whole recipe, so I just took a picture of it. These were very tasty and a great way to get the kids to eat zucchini! I used 1/2 lb of  (grass-fed) beef and sauteed all the onions, since I knew none of the kids would put fresh onions on top. I also used a 14.5 oz. can of tomatoes and green chiles, and taco seasoning instead of the chipotle chile powder.  YUM!

Birth Story

I actually really enjoy reading other people's birth stories, so I'm going to type this while it's still fresh in my mind. Just skip to the end for pictures if you don't like this kind of thing :)

June 23- Dan and I went out to dinner together to celebrate our 10th wedding anniversary. We went to a steakhouse in Porter called The Hofbrau and our waitress was quite talkative. She asked me when I was due and I told her June 27. She said I had "the glow" and that I would deliver sooner, and she seemed pretty confident about it.(I just laughed to myself thinking "I just took a shower and put lotion on my face, that's what you're seeing") She even told us we had to come back and tell her if I delivered in the next couple days. Her next few comments were about how she "walked one of her babies out" when she wanted to deliver. She walked for a few hours straight and delivered that night. Dan and I just kind of laughed and told her I had never had a baby come before its due date, but we'd come back and tell her if it did. After dinner we decided to go to Target to get the last few things we needed before baby, and joked that I could "walk him out" while we were there. We had a fun time picking out some things and ended up walking for about 2 hours. I had a few harder-than-normal contractions while we were there, but they were few and far between. So we went out for frozen yogurt afterward then headed home. I took the babysitter home at about 11, and we went to bed by about 12. I had a couple more of the "harder" contractions before I got in bed, and I told Dan to take a picture of my belly because I wouldn't be surprised if these contractions turned more regular.

June 24- I had kind of a restless sleep until about 2:30am when I woke up to another of the contractions, which still wasn't very painful. I tried to go back to sleep but by about 3:30 I noticed they were starting to get closer together. I started timing them and they were 7 minutes apart. I woke up Dan and we had a little laugh about our prophetic waitress... At 4am I decided to call my mom and get her to come over, just in case things started progressing. By the time she got here at 5, I was in bad shape. They were about 4 minutes apart and more painful than any other labor I can remember. I hadn't planned on getting an epidural this time (I had done 2 with and 2 without) but I was tired and figured I had nothing to prove, so I decided that I would ask for one when we got to the hospital. We arrived at 5:30 and the nurses took their sweet time with me. The nurse checked me and I was 4 cm, which really put her in slow motion. I guess she figured she had plenty of time... I was starting to shake at the pain of each contraction, which I knew from the past meant I was getting close and tried to communicate that to the nurse. By 6:30 we were still filling out paperwork and she had just drawn the blood they needed for whatever labs they needed to get an epidural. Now, I am usually pretty tough about pain and such, but I have admit, by this point, my silent suffering had turned into some whimpering. I was just really sad. Suddenly I had a really strong urge to push and couldn't stop it, and my water broke. I told the nurses my water broke and one of them decided to finally check me again. Of course I was 10cm and the baby's head was starting to come out. They figured this would be a good time to FINALLY CALL THE DOCTOR who was at home sleeping in bed. They asked me if I wanted something through the IV for the pain and I said yes, although I should have known better. The drug they gave me made me sleepy between contractions, but really did nothing for the pain. I had probably 5 more contractions and they told me every time to resist the urge to push. My sister pointed out that at this point I should have kicked them in the teeth and said, "Resist the urge to scream," but I digress.... (p.s. I have decided that any nurse who tells someone to resist the urge to push had earned themselves a one way ticket to you-know-where). With every one of those contractions I resisted as long as I could and gave in a little at the end. The doctor finally got there and the first thing he said was for me to resist the urge to push (he earned his ticket...). I watched him suit up and put his gloves on and as soon as I could tell he was in position I just gave in to the urge. That's all it took and baby was out in one push. It had taken the doctor 7 minutes to get to the hospital. It was a wild night. It was frustrating, but in a way I'm happy with how it went. Fast and Furious. And I have never felt better after a delivery. I don't know if it's because I didn't have to push much or because I was in better shape this time, but I really almost feel like nothing happened (although my jelly belly reminds me...) (sidenote: I weighed 14 pounds less at this delivery than at my first. Bam!)

So there you go. And of course it all feels totally worth it when a guy like this comes out:

Of course then we had to name him, which is a whole other post entirely. :) we finally settled on 

Jack Leon Prince.

Aaaaaand I can't resist saying that we hit the "jackpot."

 OOOHHH how I love all these boys! 

Reason #962 I'm glad my Mom taught me how to sew

I really, really hate hospitals. When I had George I stayed the full 2 or three days (I don't remember how long) and wore the hospital gowns the whole time because I didn't know you didn't have to! For every baby after that I have sewed myself a hospital nightgown that I could wear after delivery. It makes me feel halfway human while I'm there. So this time I was thinking of what to make when I saw these designer hospital gowns on babycenter.com:

These gowns were over $100 dollars. I saw some others for around $50-$75. I have always made mine white so I could bleach them if anything got on them, but nothing ever got on them so I decided this time I would go for some color! I could have tried harder to find cheaper material, but I saw this in hobby lobby the other day while I was there with the boys and thought it looked bright and fun. So here's my "designer hospital gown" for less than $15 total. 

Now time for baby to come :)

Oh, and we might even have a name picked out for him :D

be careful what you wish for....

i am 37 1/2 weeks pregnant. every time i am pregnant i get to a point where i kind of want to just stop going out in public. i just start to hate to be seen. like in jane austen novels when they go into "confinement." i always kind of think that would be a good idea. obviously nothing like that ever happens, but the idea has always appealed to me :)

the boys and i enjoyed riding our bikes to and from school almost every day last school year. i am happy to report i made it to the end of the school year with our bike rides, but just barely. it was REALLY starting to get hard to pull the little boys in the trailer and carry the bun in the oven. i was kind of looking to the end of the school year as the effective end of my bike riding until after baby. (can i admit that it crushed my spirit a little to give it up, even for a few weeks??) and in a way i was looking forward to the end of the school year so i could keep a low profile and not "be seen" as much.

well, like the title of this post, be careful what you wish for. 

a couple weeks ago sam got a little throwing up and fever illness that was really very mild and lasted about 36 hours. about 5 days later, down went ben. 5 days later, george was down, and 5 days later, henry. henry's was a little more severe than the others, lasting loner and causing him a little more pain. but last tuesday, henry seemed to be all better. yay! we'd gone through the whole cycle and were ready to enjoy some summer fun. but wait.... 

tuesday afternoon, sam started running a fever. wednesday, ben had a fever and sam threw up on me, then began the problems with the "other end". thursday, friday, ben and sam had diarrhea so bad i kept debating whether to take them to the ER (ben would not admit until friday that there was anything wrong with him). saturday morning, ben and sam had perked up a bit, but still were not functioning properly. by saturday afternoon, both of them were actually hungry and wanting to eat, although still lethargic, sunken, and sad. 

there was a little pool party we were invited to saturday night and i felt bad for poor george (who had remarked several times that "this summer vacation isn't going so well..") and henry who had both been well all week but had been forced to stay in quarantine because the rest of us couldn't leave the house. so i let dan take the two of them to the party and i stayed home and ran the infirmary. well not long after they left, dan came home and said that henry had THROWN UP AT THE PARTY!!!! ooooh. my. goodness. it was all i could do to hold back tears. 

so here we go again. a few more days of "confinement."

Black bean soup

I made this soup tonight thinking I would double it and freeze the rest for after baby comes. Not so!! I doubled it, but  it was a surprise hit! George and Ben each had 4 helpings and I maybe have enough left for 2 bowls!!! 
Notes: I did not use any sausage, so I put it in parenthesis. I ended up adding more broth and water because it needed more liquid. I served it with rice, sour cream, cheese, and tortilla chips. Below is the original recipe, which I then doubled.

Black Bean Soup
Makes: 6 servings
Yield: about 7 1/2 cups

Prep: 1 hr 30 minsCook: 1 hr 15 minsStand: 6 hrs to 8 hrs(soak) overnight

ingredients

• 1
  cup dry black beans
• 2
  cups chicken broth
• 2
  cups water
• 1
  cup chopped onion (1 large)
• 1
  cup chopped celery (2 stalks)
• 1
  teaspoon ground coriander
• 1/4
  teaspoon salt
• 1/8 - 1/4
  teaspoon crushed red pepper
• 4
  cloves garlic, minced
  
  
  3 tbsp dry sherry (optional)
  
  
• (8
  ounces cooked, smoked turkey sausage or Polish sausage, chopped)
• Dairy sour cream or shredded Monterey Jack cheese (optional)
• Snipped fresh cilantro (optional)

directions

1.Rinse beans. In a large saucepan or Dutch oven combine beans and 6 cups water. Bring to boiling; reduce heat. Simmer for 2 minutes. Remove from heat. Cover and let stand for 1 hour. (Or, place beans in water in pan. Cover and let soak in a cool place for 6 to 8 hours or overnight.) Drain and rinse beans.

2.Return beans to saucepan. Stir in chicken broth, water, onion, celery, coriander, salt, crushed red pepper, (sherry), and garlic. Bring to boiling; reduce heat. Simmer, covered, for 1 to 1 12 hours or until beans are tender.

3.If desired, mash beans slightly. Stir in sausage; heat through. If desired, serve topped with sour cream, cheese, and cilantro.

4.Makes 6 servings (about 7 1/2 cups)

from the test kitchen

• Equipment Slow-cooker directions:Prepare as above through Step 1. In a 3 12- or 4-quart slow cooker combine chicken broth, water, onion, celery, coriander, salt, cayenne pepper, and garlic. Stir in beans. Cover and cook on high-heat setting for 5 to 6 hours. If desired, mash beans slightly. Stir in sausage. Cover and cook for 30 minutes more.
• Variation Shortcut Black Bean Soup with Sausage:Prepare as above, except omit dry black beans and the 6 cups soaking water. Decrease chicken broth to 1 1/2 cups. Rinse and drain two 15-ounce cans black beans. In a large saucepan combine beans, broth, water, onion, celery, coriander, salt, cayenne pepper, and garlic. Bring to boiling; reduce heat. Simmer, covered, about 15 minutes or until vegetables are tender. Stir in sausage; heat through. Makes 4 servings (6 1/2 cups).Nutrition Facts per 1 1/2 cups: 268 cal., 8 g total fat (2 g sat. fat), 1,421 mg sodium, 35g carbo., 11g dietary fiber, 25 g protein.Daily Values: 1% vit. A, 8% vit. C, 13% calcium, 19% iron.Exchanges: 1 Vegetable, 2 Starch, 2 Lean Meat

nutrition facts (Black Bean Soup with Sausage)

• Servings Per Recipe 6,
 
• Calories 198,
 
• Protein (gm) 14,
 
• Carbohydrate (gm) 24,
 
• Fat, total (gm) 6,
 
• Cholesterol (mg) 29,
 
• Saturated fat (gm) 2,
 
• Monosaturated fat (gm) 2,
• Polyunsaturated fat (gm) 2,
 
• Dietary Fiber, total (gm) 6,
 
• Sugar, total (gm) 1,
 
• Vitamin A (IU) 49,
 
• Vitamin C (mg) 3,
 
• Thiamin (mg) 0,
 
• Riboflavin (mg) 0,
 
• Niacin (mg) 1,
 
• Pyridoxine (Vit. B6) (mg) 0,
 
• Folate (µg) 12,
 
• Sodium (mg) 682,
 
• Potassium (mg) 603,
 
• Calcium (DV %) 81,
 
• Iron (DV %) 2,
 
• Vegetables () 1,
 
• Starch () 2,
 
• Lean Meat () 1,
 
• Percent Daily Values are based on a 2,000 calorie diet