3.27.2013
Beyond Tired
I dont know what was up with Davz yesterday but she would not go to sleep. She screamed and screamed in her crib. When i decided to go check on her she had scooted all over the crib. silly girl. I got her out and thought I could offer her some sweet potatoes. In the process of getting the food thawed and warmed I started to hear heavy breathing. I turned to look at Daveney and yes she fell asleep in her high chair. Too precious. I then transferred her to her crib.
3.26.2013
Fire Alarm and Emergency Preparedness
Yesterday Robert and I were home and we heard someone else's fire alarm going off in the building. We noticed that the alarm wasnt stopping. We thought how strange that was and then the entire buildings siren went off. They were so so loud. Daveney was asleep only 40 min when this happened it scared her to death. She didnt cry but her eyes and facial expression made us really worried for her. We left our apartment and we could smell and see smoke in the hall.
Many of the residents were waiting outside (snowing) looking puzzled trying to find out if someone knew why the alarm had gone off. Everyone said it wasnt them. Which we thought was strange because we had heard someones alarm going off.
Luckily we had friends that lived a couple buildings down so we headed over there to seek warmth. Robert left Davz and I to stay warm while he went back to our building to see what had happened. by the time he returned there were two fire engines, some police and other officials there. It seemed like it took them a long time to arrive. Robert called saying we could come back home.
Our neighbor that lives below us had just returned from a vacation and she turned up her furnace really high. Supposedly the the drastic change in temperature caused the furnace to overheat and set on fire. One of the blessings we received was that the sprinkler in the furnace cupboard went off and calmed the fire. A firefighter told me that if the sprinkler had not extinguished the fire it would have been our apartment that would have been burt and in flames. The furnace is right next to the front door so the flames from her furnace would have reached our furnace (which would have blown up) and then our only exit would have been blocked by fire, we would have been trapped in our home.
Our apartment smelled like smoke for the rest of the day. But that was not that bad, considering that all of our family was safe and sound.
Well, after all of that commotion it was time to start making dinner. I went to the faucet to fill a pot with water to boil and to our surprise the water had been turned off. I called the management and asked how much longer it would be. they said only 3 more hours. bummer. I didnt know what else to cook for dinner. I really needed water, especially for thawing our baby's milk that we keep frozen. When a little worry was about to hit me like a falling mountain on my head i remembered when my mom came to help us with daveney when she was born. We had just used up a gallon of bleach and i was about to throw away the bottle.
My mom knew and taught me that i could reuse the bottle to store water as food storage. BRILLIANT! So i went to the laundry room to find it and there it was, just waiting to be used. When i opened the bottle i smelled the water to make sure it was alright. I didnt smell a thing, not even bleach. I felt good about using the water. So dinner went on and I was able to feed our baby too.
My testimony has increased in having food storage. I am grateful for my mom who has taken the time to learn how to properly store food and water. And Im so glad that she saw an opportunity to help us grow our little food storage. I feel that this lesson has come to us in just the right time. Just the other day I was telling my friends how i thought it would be too expensive to start a food storage now and that i especially did not want to move it when when it was time to move again. it just seemed like a lot of "storage" and space taken up. I am humbled and now feel more than ever to start our little storage. though it might be small i know it will add up over time and that it will become great.
How blessed we are to have great council from our prophet and leaders to be prepared. My new hobby with be learning about Emergency preparedness. I dont want my family to suffer for my not listening to the prophets of God.
Many of the residents were waiting outside (snowing) looking puzzled trying to find out if someone knew why the alarm had gone off. Everyone said it wasnt them. Which we thought was strange because we had heard someones alarm going off.
Luckily we had friends that lived a couple buildings down so we headed over there to seek warmth. Robert left Davz and I to stay warm while he went back to our building to see what had happened. by the time he returned there were two fire engines, some police and other officials there. It seemed like it took them a long time to arrive. Robert called saying we could come back home.
Our neighbor that lives below us had just returned from a vacation and she turned up her furnace really high. Supposedly the the drastic change in temperature caused the furnace to overheat and set on fire. One of the blessings we received was that the sprinkler in the furnace cupboard went off and calmed the fire. A firefighter told me that if the sprinkler had not extinguished the fire it would have been our apartment that would have been burt and in flames. The furnace is right next to the front door so the flames from her furnace would have reached our furnace (which would have blown up) and then our only exit would have been blocked by fire, we would have been trapped in our home.
Our apartment smelled like smoke for the rest of the day. But that was not that bad, considering that all of our family was safe and sound.
Well, after all of that commotion it was time to start making dinner. I went to the faucet to fill a pot with water to boil and to our surprise the water had been turned off. I called the management and asked how much longer it would be. they said only 3 more hours. bummer. I didnt know what else to cook for dinner. I really needed water, especially for thawing our baby's milk that we keep frozen. When a little worry was about to hit me like a falling mountain on my head i remembered when my mom came to help us with daveney when she was born. We had just used up a gallon of bleach and i was about to throw away the bottle.
My testimony has increased in having food storage. I am grateful for my mom who has taken the time to learn how to properly store food and water. And Im so glad that she saw an opportunity to help us grow our little food storage. I feel that this lesson has come to us in just the right time. Just the other day I was telling my friends how i thought it would be too expensive to start a food storage now and that i especially did not want to move it when when it was time to move again. it just seemed like a lot of "storage" and space taken up. I am humbled and now feel more than ever to start our little storage. though it might be small i know it will add up over time and that it will become great.
How blessed we are to have great council from our prophet and leaders to be prepared. My new hobby with be learning about Emergency preparedness. I dont want my family to suffer for my not listening to the prophets of God.
3.25.2013
Making Baby Food
I dont know why this is such a big deal to me but it is! We are so excited to start solids! Happy 6 months Daveney. So today I made sweet potatoes and apples (applesauce) with the ease of my blendtec. Im still learning i didnt add enough water to the potatoes so they were super think but i figured that i can add the water when i feed it to her. the apples were a better process for me. i added tons more water so it turned out to be the perfect consistancy. I dont have enough ice cube trays but its all good because once they freeze i just dump the cubes into ziplock bags and continue freezing until its time to eat. So the left over applesauce i will refrigerate until it has a slot in the ice cube tray. this was so fun and im excited to expand our menu. Im thinking my next two choices will be avocado and banana mainly because they require no cooking. :)
3.23.2013
Family Birthday Board
3.21.2013
Dishwasher Diving Results...and More.
so my cleaning experiment worked wonders now my dishes are clean clean clean!!! im so happy.
the last two days i had a flu bug of some sort and it was terrible. the worst part about it is that daveney got so frustrated with me cuz i wasnt as energetic or fun during the day. poor girl. but i woke up this morning feeling much better. soooooo knowing that i will be having a yw presidency meeting in my home tomorrow morning i knew i had to clean and sterilize my apartment. so as soon as i woke up i went to work. vacuuming, sweeping, laundry, lysoling all the light switches and door knobs and dresser handles, and anywhere i could think that our hands touch, computers, chairs etc etc etc.
well i looked into the fridge and noticed that there was some spilt milk all dried up so i took everything out of my fridge and beautified all the drawers and racks. then our oven was calling my name....pinterest here i come.
our apartment has rules about cleaning the oven. there is actually a nice little "clean" button on my oven but they dont want us to use it (somehow it breaks the oven...what?) also they said that we cant use "oven cleaner sprays." so i learned that i could sprinkle baking soda and spray vinegar (which = acid) all over the inside of my oven and let it sit for 2 hours..POW! that magic works. thank you pinterest. while wiping that black stuff out of my oven i looked up and notice that the vents under the microwave above the stove top were DIS-GUS-TING !!! luckily there were cleaning instructions stickered right next to the vents: Warm water and dish washer detergent.soak. sweet.
i was starting to think that robert and i might not be as clean as we think we are...WRONG. im realizing that all this yuck is also from previous dwellers of this place. this makes me think that home ownership (one day) might be more work than i thought it could be. i need to make a chart or calendar of things that need to be cleaned on a monthly or quarterly or semi-anual basis. things sure can build up. whew!
i dont know why i get on these super extreme cleaning crazes. its like im early nesting or something...hurry up baby haha
the last two days i had a flu bug of some sort and it was terrible. the worst part about it is that daveney got so frustrated with me cuz i wasnt as energetic or fun during the day. poor girl. but i woke up this morning feeling much better. soooooo knowing that i will be having a yw presidency meeting in my home tomorrow morning i knew i had to clean and sterilize my apartment. so as soon as i woke up i went to work. vacuuming, sweeping, laundry, lysoling all the light switches and door knobs and dresser handles, and anywhere i could think that our hands touch, computers, chairs etc etc etc.
well i looked into the fridge and noticed that there was some spilt milk all dried up so i took everything out of my fridge and beautified all the drawers and racks. then our oven was calling my name....pinterest here i come.
our apartment has rules about cleaning the oven. there is actually a nice little "clean" button on my oven but they dont want us to use it (somehow it breaks the oven...what?) also they said that we cant use "oven cleaner sprays." so i learned that i could sprinkle baking soda and spray vinegar (which = acid) all over the inside of my oven and let it sit for 2 hours..POW! that magic works. thank you pinterest. while wiping that black stuff out of my oven i looked up and notice that the vents under the microwave above the stove top were DIS-GUS-TING !!! luckily there were cleaning instructions stickered right next to the vents: Warm water and dish washer detergent.soak. sweet.
i was starting to think that robert and i might not be as clean as we think we are...WRONG. im realizing that all this yuck is also from previous dwellers of this place. this makes me think that home ownership (one day) might be more work than i thought it could be. i need to make a chart or calendar of things that need to be cleaned on a monthly or quarterly or semi-anual basis. things sure can build up. whew!
i dont know why i get on these super extreme cleaning crazes. its like im early nesting or something...hurry up baby haha
3.13.2013
Diving into the Dishwasher
So that last two cycles of washing our dishes in the dishwasher ive noticed that my dishes were not that clean. And i have little tolerance for "broken" appliances. I need them to work at all times. This may be because as a homemaker I feel that the tasks I perform must get done and get done well. I don't need my family to get sick because my dishes cant be properly washed even in a dishwasher. So I took it upon myself to clean our dishwasher.
I went onto pinterest and looked on my "cleaning craze" board and found my dishwasher cleaning pin. I did the first three steps and wow did I find some crazy and nasty things in my dishwasher. When I did step 2 I found a ton of that paper that is wrapped around sticks of butter (super weird) and huge pieces of broken glass, a ton of hair and just icky, black, gross caked stuff in all the crevices. I went at it with a toothpick over the trash can first and then with a toothbrush after being soaked in hot water and vinegar.
Once I completed all three steps I put everything back together (it was very very easy by the way) and thought it would be wise to run the dishwasher once with soap and vinegar without any dishes. My dishwasher sounded more quiet and I could tell that water was actually being sprayed around in there. So the test will be tonight to see how our dishes turn out in our newly cleaned dishwasher.
3.11.2013
Church Canceled
It was daylight savings and I received a text message around 9am (yep we were still in bed asleep it would have been 8am) telling me that there would be no church today. I told Robert and he stood up and said, "I've got to look outside!" Sure enough there was a winter storm. At times the snow was flying horizontally because the wind was so strong. So we had church at home. I played some hymns on the piano as prelude music, then robert conducted. We did it all: The opening hymn, prayer, sacrament hymn (without the sacrament), a "talk" by myself, the intermediate hymn, then a "talk by Robert, then a closing hymn and prayer. It was great! Then we went to lds.org and watched Joseph Smith: The Prophet of the Restoration. It really brought the spirit in our home. It was a lovely sabbath. Then Daveney asked if she could have some piano lessons so we granted her wish.
What to do about the Carpet
So we have a high chair to get Daveney ready for eating some yummy food. However, our dining area has carpet flooring. Now having little experience with feeding food to babies I can only assume that it will be a big mess. From friends I've heard it gets all over baby, even mama, and of course the floor. My really good friend Marisa has this plastic covering the area under her son's high chair. She said she got it at a home improvement store. So off to Lowes I went. First guy I asked knew exactly what I was talking about (thank goodness, cuz I for sure didn't) This plastic stretches and has an adhesive side to it so it doesn't move around. And supposedly it's easy to take off as well. Here are the results.
3.07.2013
Baby #2 on the Way
WHAT?! is the typical reaction we get when telling people we are expecting our second baby, this usually includes jaws dropping, eyes popping, gasping, covering of mouth, trying to gain composure, and the question, "are you serious?!" or the ordinary "WOW" etc.
We have many friends that are also expecting their second child, one of which is my good friend Alicia. I've been reading her blog and I wanted to copy one of her posts, it goes a little something like this: Here I will answer some questions that most of you are probably too polite (or shocked or nervous) to ask, but you're curious about anyway:
1. No, we did not plan this pregnancy.
It was a surprise to us as well. In fact some days I think Robert just might faint at the thought of it. During Christmas break in Washington State I started getting extra tired (Robert once told me that I wasn't being any fun because I was going to bed at 6pm every night (hahahaha)) also Daveney was wanting to nurse every 45 minutes. After a crazy mood swing and serious craving for a good burger (huh?) on my part, Robert and I began to joke with one another that I was pregnant. We would laugh but give each other this look of "brace yourself it might be true." As soon as we returned home from our fun vacation I took the test and immediately it was positive. We have decided that this is what Heavenly Father wants and we are welcoming this baby with happy, giddy, anxious arms just like we did with Daveney. We are so stoked for our growing family and couldn't be happier.
2. Daveney will be 11 months old when the baby comes.
I guess when I start thinking about it I didn't know exactly how far apart I wanted our children to be, but I think I wanted them to be at least a year and a half apart. My feelings were like, we will follow the Spirit and we will know when it is time to have our next and the next and so on. So, for the rest of our lives for one month every year we will be able to say that we have two 2 year olds or we have two 5 year olds. Some people say, "Oh it will be like having twins." Honestly though, if I was mother of twins I don't think I could say that anyone knows what its truly like to have twins except another mother who actually had twins...so, close but no cigar. It will be a crazy, fun adventure as we raise two babies, two toddlers, etc at once.
3. Im not that nervous about having another one...yet.
-Most moms get really nervous or anxious about having two children. The whole thought of being out numbered by yourself, or not loving number two as much as you love number one. For me those things do not seem to worry or bother me.
-Im not sure exactly when it will settle in or even hit me that I might be nervous to have a second baby.
-I know that I will run on little sleep, assuming that most of the time they will not be on the same sleep schedules, this task seems a little more tricky to me.
-Im not worried about the diaper thing. I know most people are able to get their first child potty trained before second child comes along. But we have cloth diapers so we wont be in a pinch for money (in this area) or always running to the store to buy more diapers.
-I know people think we/I are/am crazy. But this is too exciting for me to get stressed or worked up over.
4. I'm super excited to go through the infant stage again.
I feel like since I was just there it will be easy to recall the little things. I think I will also be more relaxed and not so worried about every stinkin little thing (we will see). A plus about having the babies so close in age is that Daveney will have no idea that she was even an "only child" for a little while. My mom has told me stories of how I treated my sister when she came, a famous line from my 2 yr old self, "mom put her back where she came from!" yep I was brutal, I even shoved a pillow in her face to suffocate her, luckily my mom came to the rescue, and boy am I grateful because she is my best friend now.
5. This pregnancy has been pretty similar to my first pregnancy.
My 1st pregnancy I had only 2 days of that deathly nausea. This time around I had about 2 weeks of very mild nausea it was mainly during our Christmas break. I have never thrown up in either of my pregnancies. (I know I know I am so so so so so blessed, believe me I count that blessing). My first trimester the first time around i would sleep anywhere from 12-14 hours at night and then sometimes even take a nap during the day ranging form 1-3 hours. HA! not so simple this time because I get the beautiful, smiling Daveney to play with. However, that has not stopped me from taking naps, I try to take one a day during one of Daveney's three naps she takes a day. I also try to go to bed the minute I lay her down for the night. I feel bad for Robert during my 1st trimesters. Im usually nonexistent and non-coherent, meaning that sometimes I wouldnt even have dinner prepared and Im always in bed early while he stays up studying or finding something to do and Im so incredibly tired that he cant even have a normal conversation with me...I really do feel sorry for him during those first 12 weeks. Second trimester a piece of cake, and third trimester just large large large. So far so good, 2nd trimester is treating me well.
6. Yes, we are kind of hoping for another girl.
Mainly because we already have pink pink pink. So we wouldn't need to go buy clothes or blankets. I think it would be fun for the sisters to be so close in age and then they could tell sister secrets and go do girly things and stick up for one another. However, if it is a boy we will be thrilled as well. We would have both genders and that would balance things out in the home lol.
Random Facts:
Due: August 27th
Weeks: 15 wks and 2 days
Gender Reveal: Sometime during the 2nd week of April, probably April 12th.
Disclaimer: this is all my point of view of everything about pregnancy #2. Im pretty sure Robert might have his own view of it as well....maybe I'll be able to get him to write his thoughts.
(Ultrasound taken at 7 wks 6 days)
1. No, we did not plan this pregnancy.
It was a surprise to us as well. In fact some days I think Robert just might faint at the thought of it. During Christmas break in Washington State I started getting extra tired (Robert once told me that I wasn't being any fun because I was going to bed at 6pm every night (hahahaha)) also Daveney was wanting to nurse every 45 minutes. After a crazy mood swing and serious craving for a good burger (huh?) on my part, Robert and I began to joke with one another that I was pregnant. We would laugh but give each other this look of "brace yourself it might be true." As soon as we returned home from our fun vacation I took the test and immediately it was positive. We have decided that this is what Heavenly Father wants and we are welcoming this baby with happy, giddy, anxious arms just like we did with Daveney. We are so stoked for our growing family and couldn't be happier.
2. Daveney will be 11 months old when the baby comes.
I guess when I start thinking about it I didn't know exactly how far apart I wanted our children to be, but I think I wanted them to be at least a year and a half apart. My feelings were like, we will follow the Spirit and we will know when it is time to have our next and the next and so on. So, for the rest of our lives for one month every year we will be able to say that we have two 2 year olds or we have two 5 year olds. Some people say, "Oh it will be like having twins." Honestly though, if I was mother of twins I don't think I could say that anyone knows what its truly like to have twins except another mother who actually had twins...so, close but no cigar. It will be a crazy, fun adventure as we raise two babies, two toddlers, etc at once.
3. Im not that nervous about having another one...yet.
-Most moms get really nervous or anxious about having two children. The whole thought of being out numbered by yourself, or not loving number two as much as you love number one. For me those things do not seem to worry or bother me.
-Im not sure exactly when it will settle in or even hit me that I might be nervous to have a second baby.
-I know that I will run on little sleep, assuming that most of the time they will not be on the same sleep schedules, this task seems a little more tricky to me.
-Im not worried about the diaper thing. I know most people are able to get their first child potty trained before second child comes along. But we have cloth diapers so we wont be in a pinch for money (in this area) or always running to the store to buy more diapers.
-I know people think we/I are/am crazy. But this is too exciting for me to get stressed or worked up over.
4. I'm super excited to go through the infant stage again.
I feel like since I was just there it will be easy to recall the little things. I think I will also be more relaxed and not so worried about every stinkin little thing (we will see). A plus about having the babies so close in age is that Daveney will have no idea that she was even an "only child" for a little while. My mom has told me stories of how I treated my sister when she came, a famous line from my 2 yr old self, "mom put her back where she came from!" yep I was brutal, I even shoved a pillow in her face to suffocate her, luckily my mom came to the rescue, and boy am I grateful because she is my best friend now.
5. This pregnancy has been pretty similar to my first pregnancy.
My 1st pregnancy I had only 2 days of that deathly nausea. This time around I had about 2 weeks of very mild nausea it was mainly during our Christmas break. I have never thrown up in either of my pregnancies. (I know I know I am so so so so so blessed, believe me I count that blessing). My first trimester the first time around i would sleep anywhere from 12-14 hours at night and then sometimes even take a nap during the day ranging form 1-3 hours. HA! not so simple this time because I get the beautiful, smiling Daveney to play with. However, that has not stopped me from taking naps, I try to take one a day during one of Daveney's three naps she takes a day. I also try to go to bed the minute I lay her down for the night. I feel bad for Robert during my 1st trimesters. Im usually nonexistent and non-coherent, meaning that sometimes I wouldnt even have dinner prepared and Im always in bed early while he stays up studying or finding something to do and Im so incredibly tired that he cant even have a normal conversation with me...I really do feel sorry for him during those first 12 weeks. Second trimester a piece of cake, and third trimester just large large large. So far so good, 2nd trimester is treating me well.
6. Yes, we are kind of hoping for another girl.
Mainly because we already have pink pink pink. So we wouldn't need to go buy clothes or blankets. I think it would be fun for the sisters to be so close in age and then they could tell sister secrets and go do girly things and stick up for one another. However, if it is a boy we will be thrilled as well. We would have both genders and that would balance things out in the home lol.
Random Facts:
Due: August 27th
Weeks: 15 wks and 2 days
Gender Reveal: Sometime during the 2nd week of April, probably April 12th.
Disclaimer: this is all my point of view of everything about pregnancy #2. Im pretty sure Robert might have his own view of it as well....maybe I'll be able to get him to write his thoughts.
Our Growing Girl
She can't sit up on her own yet but she does really well with a little help. So we have invested in our first booster high chair. We are practicing for the big day at the end of the month to start solid foods.
Also, we no longer use the infant car seat. Having her fall asleep in it is bittersweet because her head falls down like in the pic so I feel bad that she might be uncomfortable, but the silence in the car is priceless.
My New Kitchen Appliance
The Blendtec
I have been eyeing this baby for a year or two. This blender can make soup, bread dough, grind wheat, ice cream, baby food, smoothies, dips, dressings, and more. I have been reading through the book gradually and learning more about all of its fancy tricks. What I'm most excited about is making Daveney's baby food. EEEEeee! I'm totally geeking out about it.
Current Project: Glass Jars
Well I don't know exactly when I decided to stop throwing away our glass jars but once I did decide that my cupboards started filling up with jars. Im not sure what I want to do with them yet (I guess I'll have to get on pintrest ...darn). I counted 29 jars in total.
But what I did know was that I had to get the stickers/labels and all the sticky ooey gooey stuff off of them sometime. Well for whatever reason I randomly chose today to do it. I felt like doing the weird shaped ones first (about 11).
So I went to youtube to watch videos on how to get rid of that gook off my jars. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zrWWuxMsg-E Most of the jars cooperated nicely using that techique, but not all.
So after doing the 11 jars I was done for the day haha.
If you have had any experience doing this and used a different technique I'd love to know what you did. I might try a different way some other day for the other 18 jars.
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