Making a Switch

I've been working on this for a while now, and just finished it last night.  I now have a new blog address which I will be using exclusively.  The address is:

http://sugaredpills.blogspot.com/

I transferred everything from this blog, so you can see all my old posts and revel in the intricacies of my rather uninteresting life (if you are into that sort of thing.)  I explain why in the new blog, if you want to go and read it.  Sorry if this is annoying to those who have to change links and such.  I hope you can find it in your hearts to forgive me :)
Farewell sunandmooncritchfield- hello sugaredpills!

Haircuts, Easter and a Couple of Goals

Mina got her very first haircut a couple of weeks ago...yes her very first.  Long overdue?  Maybe, but we finally got it cut, and she did really well.  She was really nervous at first, and was fighting us putting on the cover.  She has only seen me cut Ryan's hair with a buzzer, so I can't blame her for being a little apprehensive. But once it started she cheered up and had fun I think.  She likes her new hair, especially the bangs, because her hair doesn't get in her face as much.  :)

 I think this is where she first looked in the mirror and realized that she looked cute!

 Big cheesy grin for the camera.
I actually got a haircut too, but I haven't taken any good pics.  I am in my robe right now, so you will just have to wait.

We had a great Easter.  I think my little darlings were the cutest by far.  I was proud of my little girl.  Whenever we would ask her why we celebrate Easter she would say "Because Jesus was resurrected,  and he died for us so we can go to heaven."

We had a fun Egg Hunt at my parents with tons of great prizes.  I got a new advent calendar for Christmas that I am really excited about.  Mina, as always, had a lot of fun playing with her cousins.

Jonny is getting even better at his army crawl.  He can get all around, and quickly too.  He has started doing a little real crawling too, and it is so much fun to watch him try.  He discovered Mina's tunnel the other day, and went right through!

 I try to take Mina to the park as often as I can.  Now that Jonny is getting older it is a little easier, and they like to swing together.

 I have completed a few goals too!

#87- Re-read all of the Harry Potter books.

I just finished reading the last book.  I sure do love those stories.  JK Rowling has a great imaginative mind.  It's too bad the movies couldn't be more true to the books.  I like the movies, all except the last one.  They really messed with the ending.  I didn't approve. :(
But the books are great, and inspiring in a way.  I love to read.

#70- Learn to knit.

Thanks to You Tube I was able to figure it out, and I officially know how to knit.

My first try was the blue one, it turned out ok, I gave it to Mina to play with- you'd think it was the best toy ever the way she plays with it.  Now I am working on the pink think- it will probably only take me about 10 years to make a scarf for Mina right?  I know the basic stitch now though, and I am happy I learned.  I just need to get faster.

29- Make Baklava
Baklava has always been one of Ryan's favorite desserts.  He always orders it at restaurants when they have it, and I have wanted to make it for a while.  I was nervous to try it because it is a little different, and ethnic desserts can be hard to get right.  I found an Alton Brown recipe and he made it seem pretty simple so I figured I would give it a try.  Ryan and I made it together last night for our "Date Night In" that we have been trying to do weekly.
It was fun, and it turned out pretty good. 

 This post has been in production for almost two weeks now, and since I started it Jonny has started crawling for real!

He still flops onto his belly quite a bit, but he is getting better everyday.  He has taken to crawling up to me and headbutting me repetitively while crying until I pick him up.  Gotta love it when they are mobile!  He is also pulling himself up onto his knees, so I know that pretty soon he is gonna start with stairs.  (time to get a gate)

Left 4 Dead 2

#57- Beat all of the levels on Left 4 Dead 2
I did it :)
This game is intense, and creepy.  It's most fun to play with other people, but now that I have beat all of the levels myself, I am more useful in a team.  Should be helpful on Saturday when we have our Left 4 Dead party :)

Half Way mini Re-write and Army Crawls

I am officially half way through the 1001 days for my 101 goals, and I am not quite half way through the goals, but pretty close.   I look back and see all that has changed in my life since I started this and think that 500 days is a really long time.  I wasn't pregnant yet with Jonny and now he is 7 months old.  Change is the only true constant, and I often considered that about halfway through this time I would review the list of goals and see if things had changed enough to make me reconsider some of them.  That time has come, and I do want to reconsider a few.  Because I did succeed in the "Buy a House" goal, money is a little tighter then it was before.  (Houses are expensive- not just to buy, but to maintain and fix up etc.)  So, though they are still things that I want to accomplish at some point in my life, I feel that I need to abandon the two potentially most expensive goals- which are:

35-Take Ryan to Crater Lake.
38-Visit an Eastern State.

Being that I accidentally had one too many goals on my list any ways (91 ended up being typed twice) I really only need to come up with one new goal, and that is:
-Successfully make my own Whole Wheat Sourdough bread.

I'm excited about this one, I'm going to make my own "sour" and everything.  We'll see how it goes.  Wish me luck.

In other news, Jonny has succeeded in an army crawl!

 It has been a lot of fun to watch this develop.  He has wanted to be able to move around for a long time, and his efforts started with this:

Which he still does a lot, so I know a real crawl is going to come soon.  He can move pretty good with his army crawl though, I watched him move about 6 feet this afternoon to get to a balloon.
His smiles and his laugh are the best in the world.

 He is a delight most of the time, except when it comes to sleeping.  He fights it!  Usually he will nurse before bed, fall asleep and take a nap, but if he wakes up when I put him down he will just wail until he falls asleep, and no rocking, singing or soothing does the slightest good.  I think he is going to be a tantrum thrower when he gets older.  Also, he likes to wake up really early in the morning crying.  I know he is still tired, but he won't go back to sleep, and it messes up his whole day.  Ugh.  Otherwise he is the sweetest little baby in the whole world.  So I guess you take what you can get.

He has also started eating cheerios, pinching them in his little fingers and aiming for his mouth, mostly missing, but occasionally sweet success! Mina has also rediscovered cheerios, and she wants some every time he is eating them.

 

I tried to get them both looking cute in the same pic, but what can you do?

They like eating their cheerios together.   Mina has even taken to picking up the ones he drops for him.  She is a sweet heart.  The more I spend time with other peoples kids, the more I appreciate my own.  She is really well behaved, mellow, and polite.  I love my little girl.

For some reason, every picture I have of her this month is at the table.  I need to pull my camera out more.  I have some good cell phone pics, so I should upload some of those soon.

My goals are coming along.  I have been working on a few, but only have one to report on which is:

1- Make a Ribbon Sponge Cake (a successful one)

and here it is.

The Ribbon sponge is just the outside part, and I did a Strawberry Bavarian Cream in the middle for a filling.  The cake wasn't quite as hard as I had anticipated, but it did take a lot of time, and completely wrecked my kitchen.  My ultimate review is that while it is pretty cool to look at, I'm not sure it is worth it in the long run.  Taste is the true test in any food, and it was good, but not great.  I would consider doing it again for a special occasion, but it won't be a frequent thing.  It is always fun to try new things, and I want to try a rainbow variety, or maybe checkerboard someday.

The end.

Pulled Pork and Memphis Barbecue

My husband served his mission for the LDS church in Tennessee and Arkanasas- and mostly in the Memphis area of Tennessee.  He often talks about some of the fabulous Memphis barbecue that he had while he was there, and complains about all of the barbecue that he has here.  I admit that I have never been a "barbecue" fan.  I don't like barbecue sauce.  I have never enjoyed a meal at any "barbecue" restaurant, and I usually avoid the food genre entirely.  There is one barbecue sauce that I have tried that I do enjoy called Miss Essie's and oddly enough it is made right here in Utah.  It is supposedly a Tennessee recipe, and both Ryan and I like it, but it is hard to find at the grocery store, and is never cheap when you do find it.  These are the reasons why two of my goals were:

#79- Make a really yummy barbecue sauce that reminds Ryan of his mission.
#92- Make pulled pork (implementing above mentioned barbecue sauce)

This past weekend I decided to tackle these two together.  I found a few recipes that looked interesting and dove in.  Here is the link if you are interested http://www.kansas.com/2011/06/29/1913011/memphis-style-pulled-pork-a-hit.html

While cooking the barbecue sauce Ryan mentioned that it smelled like Memphis, which made me smile.  The sauce, while good, wasn't for me.  I followed the recipe from the link above, except that I added liquid smoke to it.  Ryan liked it, and said it was very much like the sauces he had in restaurants in Memphis.  I did mark it off my list, as it did remind him of his mission, and he liked it, but I still feel like I have some work to do on that.  I need to get my hands on Miss Essies recipe.

The pulled pork, however, was delightful.  I did the dry rub from the recipe, let it sit over night and then cooked it in a heavy, lidded pan with some more liquid smoke for 5 hours.  It literally fell apart when it was done and tasted so good.  I didn't put sauce on it, or even want it in a bun- I just ate it- with some coleslaw on the side.  Yum.  Ryan liked it so much he said it might be his next birthday dinner request, which is saying a lot.  I have found myself craving it as well.  It might become a staple. 

 Hello again- check out my cute kids!  Little Jonny is growing up so fast.  

He is now six months old, sitting up, 

eating baby food like he is starving to death, and trying really hard to get up on all fours.  I can hardly believe it.  He is a smiley little boy and we love him so much.  

 Mina is growing up at well, not so much physically.  I don't think she has gained a pound in a long time but check this out...

If you can see the orange in between her name written in black, you can see that it says Mina- my awesome little girl wrote her name!!!  It was a very proud Mommy moment.  She did it completely by herself, I was amazed.  She hasn't written anything else, and she still gets nervous most of the time and asks for help, but still, how cool is that!? 

We went to the park the other day and I put Jonny in the swing- he thought that was pretty cool.  Mina did too once she got over the fact that she wasn't in it.  She then was proud of herself for being in the big girl swing. 

I was able to do a few more goals in the past month, and here they are:


9- Make a really good Pot Roast. 
       - So a "really good" pot roast is relative, but I did make a pot roast, and though maybe it wasn't perfect it was pretty good, and all those involved in the eating process agreed that I could check it off my list- so there you have it!
 
21- Play 1 hour straight with my daughter every day for a week.
         - I am not very good at playing with young children.  You know how some people seem to have that gift that children just love everything they do.  I don't have that.  Most of the time I think I am going to have fun with Mina, I start playing and she looks at me like I am really stupid.  Nevertheless, I was determined to make it a point to really play with her.  I did it by playing with the Alphabet.  We learned about the letters together, talked about words that started with those letters and then reading books and looking for those letters.  Sure it was educational play, but it worked and she keeps asking to learn about more letters, so I think she liked it.  Go me!
 
33- Finish my Bear Lake Shell Frame.
           - Last year I gathered a whole bunch of shells on the beach at Bear Lake, and I wanted to glue them onto a frame.  I did it just a couple of days ago and I think it turned out really good.  Now I need to get some fun Bear Lake pictures in it and then I will post a picture!
 
53- Exercise every weekday for two weeks (at least 20 minutes) 
            - It was an awesome week- I lost a couple of pounds and started fitting into my non-maternity jeans again.  Awesome!  Now to keep it up :)
 
97- Go Snowshoeing
                  - I made this a part of my excercise week.  My dad and I went snowshoeing together and it was a lot of fun.  I had only ever been snowshoeing once, and it was probably 15 years ago or so, and it wasn't for very long.  

I love hiking/snowshoeing with my Papa, some of my happiest memories of my childhood are being with him up in the mountains.  

So another five down- and a whole lot more to go.  I also realized after the last time I posted that I accidentally have 91 in there twice- which means I have 102 goals instead of 101.  This may prove to my advantage since there are some in there I am worried about completing.  I have a little buffer now.  We'll see what happens though, maybe I will get all 102. 

Last but not least- check out my vampire baby...

 Until next time....
 

Lots of updates.

Thanks to everyone who commented on my last post- it is nice to know I have a few readers out there.  Thanks for giving in to my insecurity :)

After my last post I realized that I am a little behind on my list of goals, theoretically I should be doing one every 10 days, but with the amount that I have left, it is more like one every 8 days, so in the past couple weeks I have tried to get several done.

This little princess is officially potty trained! 

She has been wearing underwear for nearly two weeks now with no accidents, and I am singing hallelujah about it.  #23- Potty train Mina is now checked off the list.

And # 26- Make Mina a sweater dress.  This was an idea I got off of some random blog while I was writing my list of 101 goals.  It was to take an old sweater and remake it into a toddler sweater dress.  I thought it would be fun.  I got a sweater from my mom (she wanted to get rid of some) and made this.  There is just one problem.

 

It turned out way too big.  I am not a seamstress, and despite my best efforts ( this was actually attempt #2) it really didn't turn out very well.  Oh well, I did it, and maybe it will fit her better next fall?

Next is #56 - Beat all the levels on "Left 4 Dead"

I like to play video games.  I don't get a whole lot of opportunity, having two kids and all, but it is fun sometimes.  Left 4 Dead is a great game, but pretty challenging.  You tend to get killed pretty easily if you aren't careful.  I pride myself in knowing that I beat the last level, even after Ryan told me it was impossible to do it alone :)

 Then # 91- Make Mussaman Curry. (thanks to Trina for the awesome pic) It was good.  I did it from scratch- keffir lime leaves, lemongrass, galangal, ginger, garlic, chilies- all those wonderful Thai flavors that make me so happy.  It turned out pretty darn good, when I do it again, I will add more of the curry paste that I made- 

more flavor=better!

I also made Apple Butter.  Goal #93.  I have always been curious about this stuff, so I gave it a try.  I did a crock-pot version because who has time to stir a pot for 5 hours?  5 lbs of apples peeled and shredded, with sugar and spices into a crock pot for 12 hours- stirring occasionally (with the lid slightly ajar). It turned out really good, pretty much like apple jam, it is quite tasty on toast. 

5 more down, and 64 to go- I need to get hauling!  I am working on some of the longer term ones- reading Harry Potter (I'm onto the 4th book tomorrow) and pull-ups.  

In other news...

 

Jonny is adorable, as always.  He is rolling all around now, and playing with toys.  His favorite thing right now I think is peekaboo, it always makes him happy.  He is full of smiles, and just loves having attention.  He also adores being tossed in the air by his daddy.

I love his chunky legs!

We were at the grocery store the other day and Mina spied some purple kale.  She liked that it was purple and wanted me to buy it and bring it home.  I figured why not?  So we brought it home, I washed it, and we just started munching.  She loved it!  I love that my girl loves her vegetables. Oh, and by the way, baked kale with sesame oil and salt is AMAZING!

Jonny is eating rice cereal now.  He was showing interest in food, so I gave it a try.  This was the first time, and it isn't a great picture, but he is really getting into it now.  I am exciting to try something new in a few days!

Mina could be a super-model.

And she loves to run.

The end.