1st Steal for October

Can I get a woohoo? I'm still on a high from yesterday. Total bill $5.62. Exciting! Just had to share.

You at 9 months

Here's your life at 9 months:

You weigh 16lbs and are 28 Inches long.

You are in the 3rd percentile in weight and 25th percentile in height and head circumference.

You have just started eating three meals a day. We added breakfast to the mix. Some of the new things that you tried this month are: egg yolk, cheese, broccoli, potato, pluots, and beets (gross!),

Your sleep schedule is pretty much the same as last month. You go to bed at 7 and wake up about 5:30 am to eat. You then go back to bed for about an hour or an hour and a ½. You are taking two naps a day. One nap is about a little over an hour and the other nap tends to be a little over two hours.

You wear 3-6 month pants and 6 months onesies. You are wearing 6-9 month sleepers. You went up a size in everything.

You wear a size 3 diaper. You wear Huggies overnight and Pampers/Huggies during the day.

Your hair has grown in. We just got you baby hair gel to get your mohawk going again.

You still love the water. We have to watch you really close during bathtime. You will turn to your belly, teeth on the tub and grab the shower curtain.

You are still doing the army crawl, but you are super fast. One second, I'll see you in the living room and the next time I look you are in the kitchen. You "mop" the kitchen floor for me all the time! lol

You said "dada" and it made your Daddy happy. I'm still waiting for you to say "mama".

You just pulled up for the first time (09/30)! I was so proud. I know it will be any day now that you figure out how to do that in your crib.

You are still a happy baby. We get comments all the time about how happy you are. Even though you are happy most of the time you have started to show a bit of a temper. When you get mad, you arch your back and start crying/screaming.

You still love the kitty. I have to watch you because you try to put his tail in your mouth.

Pictures of you during the last month:

Above picture taken on the day you first said "dada" (09/23).

Eating broccoli.

1st trip to St. Louis Zoo (09/25).

Had to get a picture of us with our rain boots.

You love to take Daddy's glasses off. It cracks me up!

1st time you pulled up by yourself (09/29).

Thank Grandma for your shirt.

You were sick with pneumonia and would only sleep close to me.

Super Yummy Sandwiches (Go Martha, Go Martha, Go Martha...Go..Go)

I've been on a kick for quite awhile to try two new meals a week. I've been bookmarking everything that I want to try in all of our cookbooks. Once I try the recipe, I write my notes down (what I like, didn't like, what I added, etc.) in the book. If it is a good recipe, then I write down the recipe in my handwritten recipe book. Once I finish going through one of the recipe books, I'm going to pass it on. Pay it forward. Hmm, does "Pay it forward" make sense? Well anyways, I hope you get the idea. Who wants to be the recipient of my first cookbook?

So, back to the yummy new sandwiches that we tried. The first one is from Martha. In her magazine, she had a page all about gourmet grilled cheeses. Yummy! We tried the one in the top/center of the picture.

Grilled cheese with bacon, avocado, tomato and honey mustard. So simple, yet so amazing. Probably the best sandwich that I've ever had at home. Prep/Cook time: 10 min (You have to love that).

On to number 2: Grilled Chicken Sliders. I loved these! Grilled chicken on buns with a kiwi/honey/mint mixture and apple slices. Sooooo good. I'm glad I have leftovers for lunch today.

Coconut Almond Macaroons (thank you Martha!). If you eat them expecting a cookie, then you will be disappointed. They are airy and chewy. I'm not sure I can compare them to anything. They didn't quite turn out like the picture but they were still good. Really easy to make as well. Prep/Cook time: 12 min.

I don't usually end up adding everything that I tried to my "good" recipe book, but all of these were good. I'll have to remember this when I have a few bad ones in a row.

Me...in September

I thought I would just blog a bit about myself and what has been going on for me in the last month.

I'm getting in a rhythm of staying home with Greyson and, to my surprise, I enjoy it most days. As most of you know, I tend to be anal about things and I am really enjoying keeping Greyson on a schedule. I like knowing what he ate, when he slept and what he did all day. We stay at home most of the time. When we want to get out of the house we go grocery shopping or go on walks around the neighborhood. I recently joined a Moms group. So far, I've met two young moms and we are going to start doing play dates at each others' houses every other week.

I love that our house stays so much cleaner now that I'm home. I have a schedule of what to do each day and it seems to help.

Here is what I do:

Daily: Make bed and pickup kitchen and living room

Monday: Clean Bathrooms

Tuesday: General Cleanup

Wednesday: Dust and Vacuum

Thursday: Laundry

Friday: Kitchen

Every other week is deep clean week. It works for me. =)

Every day, I devote about two hours to photography. I read tutorials, watch videos on YouTube, search Flickr, and work on business papers. Right now, I'm in the middle of writing my business plan and getting a model release form together. After the business plan is done, my next step is to get Dad to help me with all the tax stuff. I have briefly looked in to that portion of things and have decided that it is way over my head. I guess I'm going to have to "hire" an accountant.

I ordered business cards a few weeks' ago and got them yesterday. I'm not crazy about the quality of them (probably because I got them for free - just had to pay $3.99 for shipping), but I may be able to doctor them up a bit. We will see. I also received 5 8X10's of my photos in the mail from WHCC (professional photo lab for photographers). You chose 5 photos and they will print and ship them for free so that you can see the quality of the printer, how your monitor calibration is set, etc. I'm super happy with the quality of the prints and even happier that my photos look great in print.

I had my first paying session last week. It was a maternity shoot - my first ever! I'm not ecstatic with how the session turned out, but I do feel like I got some good shots. I think it will be a learning process each time.

I started my photography class last Wednesday. It is every Wednesday for six weeks and it is for three hours. Every week, we have a homework assignment and this first one I'm not liking. I have to take 12 pictures of one object with 12 different angles shot at all the same settings. I can't get motivated to actually take the pictures, because it just sounds soooooo boring.

I've been scrapbooking a bit as well. I think that my creative juices from photography are helping with me being motivated to scrapbook. Here are my latest pages:

Journaling says: I've gained 8 pounds! I eat ice cream all the time (just about every night). I'm always "looking" at all the cute baby things online and trying to talk Luke into buying some of them. =)
Journaling says: On August 5, 2009 we had our first ultrasound. They said, "Surprise! It's a Boy!"
Journaling says: We went to see the Chiefs play the Chargers at Arrowhead on 12/14/2008. When we got there it was in the mid 40's (perfect weather). The weather dropped throughout the game. By the 4th quarter, it was in the teens. Brr!! Good thing the game was exciting. We all froze, but had fun. The Chiefs lost. =( 22-21. So Close!

and finally... a not so yummy meal

I decided last week that I would bust out one of the cookbooks that I got Luke last year for Christmas. The cookbook has really nice stuff in it, but also has high priced ingredients. The really nice dishes and high priced ingredients go hand and hand with lots of time to cook (hence - Luke was volunteered to make it).

Honeycomb Cannelloni. The title is very deceiving. It doesn't sound hard to make at all.

We went to Hyvee and got all the ingredients (after searching forever for them). I wasn't too keen on the ingredient list since it called for anchovies.

Luke got to work chopping all the veggies. It took quite awhile because there were so many.

He got to stage two of the dish (after about an hour of chopping veggies) and realized that we didn't have enough noodles. Back to Hyvee.

He got home and then finished lining the pot with the noodles. The creme fraiche went on top of the noodles. He made his own creme fraiche recipe, because the one in the book required you do it 24 hours in advance.

The dish was not bad, but definitely not good enough to make again. Plus, I couldn't get over the yucky fish in it.

Better luck next time, babe!

You at 8 months

Here's your life at 8 months:

You weigh 15 lbs 13 oz and are 27.75 Inches long.

You wouldn’t know it by looking at you, but you love to eat. You are eating two regular meals a day and still nursing for 4-5 times. You love butternut squash, apples mixed with bananas and most other fruits. Your not so crazy about sweet potatoes or zucchini.

Your sleep schedule is almost perfect. You go to bed at 7 and wake up about 5:30 am to eat. You then go back to bed for about an hour or an hour and a ½. You are taking two naps a day. One nap is about a little over an hour and the other nap tends to be a little over two hours.

You wear 0-3 pants/shorts and 3-6 months onesies. You have just started to wear 6 month sleepers.

You wear a size 3 diaper, but that is just because we ran out of size 2. Daddy laughs at me because I won’t buy anymore size 2, because I have a huge stockpile of size 3.

You still have your Mohawk but it is not as pronounced as it was. Your hair is definitely getting thicker and longer. We haven’t cut it yet, but we keep thinking that you need a trim.

You love bathtime. We do baths every night and we have to draw the shower curtain halfway across the tub so that you don’t get the whole floor wet. You just splash and splash.

You still love being on your stomach. You can do the army crawl and spin around. I know it's going to be any day now where I look at you one second and then the next second you are in the other room.

You can sit up like a champ.

You smile all the time and every time we go somewhere someone always comments on how cute you are.

You love the kitty and he is starting to get used to you. Sometimes the kitty will even let you pet him.

Pictures of you during the last month:

1st time eating cereal puffs and you hated it!

Daddy let you get messy while eating cherries.

I dressed you in this after bath time because I wanted to get a picture of you in it.

LOL : You tried to eat the stick at the park and Daddy was taking it from you.

Swinging in the backyard.

Walking on the MKT Trail.

Walking on the MKT trail.

Walking on the MKT Trail.

Love you more and more everyday.

Money Saving - Penny Pincher =-)

It's been a week or two since I have been to Gerbes with my coupons. I was being lazy, so I had to make myself get the coupons together the other day. I was super excited after my coupons came off my total bill. $2.83 for three boxes of pasta, a box of butter, a bag of chocolate chips and a box of pudding. I was on a high all day. I saved 75% ( I love how the receipts say how much you save)!

So, I was slacking in taking my coupons to the grocery store, but I was doing good in other areas. I sold about $75 of stuff on Craigslist in the last few weeks and I've made about $14 in the last month doing online surveys.

In an earlier blog (maybe June), I had mentioned that I was going to try to go through the whole year without buying deodorant, shampoo, conditioner and body wash. Well, I think I may extend that to never buying those products. I have a huge stockpile due to all the samples that I have been getting through the mail.

Let me know if you want to jump aboard the money-saving penny pincher train. Choo-Choo!!