• Bryler’s Pajamas Meltdown

    09Mar
    Categories: Bedtime, Bryler Firsts, Bryler Sayings Comments: 0

    Saturday night.  We took the kids to Israel’s birthday party at 3:00 so they didn’t get a nap.  When they don’t get a nap, we try to get them to bed at 7:00 instead of 8:00.  It was about 7:10 when I told Bryler to go get his pajamas on.  Bryler is really stepping up his defiance lately, and the lack of sleep didn’t help.  He told me, “No!”  First, I gently reminded him that he cannot tell me no or he will get a spanking and told him he could have a second chance.  He started down the hallway toward his bedroom, but he yelled, “No!” again.  Well, I can’t let him get away with it, so I followed him to his room and told him that he would have to get a spanking because he told me no, and he yelled, “No!” and I spanked him and told him that if he kept telling me no he’d have to keep getting spankings.  I walked away and he yelled after me, “NO!”  He got another spanking.  I walked away and he yelled after me, “NO!”  He got another spanking. Then he is screaming, “I don’t want to put my pajamas on!”  A little reassurance to anyone who might think I’m beating the boy… these were not hard spankings and he had two layers on clothes on his bottom… Regardless, I figure that the spankings aren’t making him any less defiant and so I have to try something else.  I go and grab his toothbrush and brush his teeth as he’s crying/screaming (I only go to the trouble because I know that’s he’s had plenty of sugar at the birthday party) and then  I put him straight in the bed and tell him that since he doesn’t want to put his pajamas on, he doesn’t get to have pajamas that night.  And I tell him that when he throws a fit, he does not win.  And I turn on his white noise maker, turn off the light, shut the door, and walk away.

    He was so mad after that.  Mad, I think, because he was determined to get his way and me walking away was like taking away his control.  But his determination was still as strong as ever.  He screamed for 45 minutes, “Pajamas!!!…. Pajamas!!… I want pajamas!…. etc”  It was extremely painful for me, but I knew that he’d have to learn that he would not win by throwing a tantrum.  I went to see him two or three times to try to calm him down after long stretches of trying unsuccessfully to ignore him.  The first time, I tried to distract him.  It worked at first.  I asked him if he wanted me to pray for him and he stopped saying pajamas long enough to tell me yes.  I told him that if he said pajamas again, I would go back out.   So I prayed with him (as I always do) and when I was done, I asked him if he wanted to pray (as I always do) and he said, “No, I want pajamas.”  I said goodnight, kissed him on the head, and left him.  I didn’t act angry or anything, but I left because I told him I would.

    This made him really angry and he screamed even worse.  And now he was screaming, “Pray!  I want to pray!… Pajamas!… Pajamas!… I want pajamas!”  He was about to make himself sick he was screaming and crying so much, pausing every now and then to hack and cough up phlegm.    And after 40 minutes of this, we are really losing our patience and Husband went back spanked him because we just aren’t sure that he should be allowed to lay there and throw tantrums like that, and seriously, he had to go to sleep!  After 5 more minutes of it, I went back there planning to spank him again, but I saw that he was really on the brink of falling asleep.  He was pitiful…  eyes all swollen from crying and he could barely keep them open because he was so sleepy.  Right at the door, I thought I heard him say he was afraid, so I asked him, “Did you say that you are afraid?”  He said, “No, I said I want to pray.”  But he at least said it nicely and I thought it might serve as a good distraction, so I said, “Ok, you can pray,” and he actually grinned just a little bit and he prayed a sleepy, “Thank you for my drums.”  And then we went through our normal nighttime routine of “Night-night, I love you”.  And I didn’t hear another peep out of him.

    I was exhausted and worried that I had not handled it well, but we did our best and didn’t give in on the pajamas and I guess that’s the important thing.   After a few hours, we put a pullup and sweat pants on him, but in the morning he asked me how the sweatpants got there so he hadn’t even woken up enough to remember it.

    He didn’t complain about putting pajamas on the next night.

  • Bryler’s Preschool Meltdown

    06Mar
    Categories: Bryler Sayings, Preschool Comments: 0

    I dropped the kids off at preschool on Tuesday and they were fine.  They actually had a good morning.  Off to work, I go. It was a terribly busy morning and I was in the middle of training the new employee on payroll when I got a call from the school at around 9:30 AM.  It was Bryler’s teacher and she said that he wasn’t acting himself and they were afraid he was sick.  He had had two bowel movements already that morning and would not eat his snack and was just crying and wasn’t communicating with them.  I asked if he had a fever and she said he didn’t, but he just wasn’t acting himself.  She went and got him on the phone so I could try to talk with him, but he would barely talk to me and all I know is that when I asked him if he needed to go to the doctor, the teacher got back on and said, “Well, I don’t know what you said to him, but he’s shaking his head ‘no’.”

    I wasn’t able to leave work and Bryler is way too emotional when he sees me at school so I knew that I wouldn’t be able to leave him there no matter what the true problem was, so I called Husband.  He was in the middle of something important at work and couldn’t leave right away.  After about a half hour, I called the teacher back and she said that he wasn’t any better.  Bryler was still upset and didn’t want to play or anything.  So Husband went down to the school to see what he could find out.  We figured he either had gas pain or they didn’t wipe his bo-bo well enough and it was hurting and he was embarrassed to tell the teacher.  Bryler’s skin is so sensitive that if you don’t get all the poop off, it chaps and burns and then we have to clean it up (which hurts) and douse him in Desitin (which really works great).

    So Husband gets there and the class is playing in the gym and all the kids are playing with balls and stuff, but Bryler is just sitting in the teacher’s lap all sad-faced.  Husband takes Bryler out in the hallway to talk to him in private.  Husband said that it was really painful trying to get Bryler to talk to him.  He wasn’t crying, but he wouldn’t SAY anything.  Husband asked him if he wanted to go to the doctor. He said “No.”  He asked him if he wanted to stay at school.  He said, “No.”  Was he sick, “No.”  Was his bo-bo hurting, “No.” etc, etc.  Finally, he said something like, “Bryler, what is wrong?  You have to tell me what’s wrong.”  Bryler said, timidly, “I don’t WANT a snack.”  Husband said, “Bryler, you don’t have to have a snack if you don’t want one.”  And that was it.  He was all better and wanted to go back in the gym and play, and he was fine for the rest of the day.

    He didn’t WANT A SNACK!?!

    The only thing I can figure out is that maybe the teachers’ reaction to him not wanting a snack made him feel like he was in trouble.  Not that they did anything wrong at all, but we know from experience that Bryler is a picky eater and hates to try new things.  And we make him take a bite of stuff every now and you’d think we were asking him to eat the worst thing in the world!  I’m talking about making him eat a 2 cm piece of a cracker or a piece of cereal, not okra or brussel sprouts.  So I think that he may have misinterpreted their concern for him with being upset with him for not wanting to eat his snack.  I’m really surprised that he kept being upset about it for so long because he’s that’s not normal for him, but that’s all we can figure out at this point.

    The good thing about it was that Husband was able to go back to work.  I was really proud of Husband for how he handled it and that he didn’t give Bryler the option of going home, because we definitely don’t want him to think that he can go home if he gets upset about something.  And although it was frustrating trying to get it out of him, he was able to figure it out in the end and fixed the problem.  And I know that I wouldn’t have been able to leave him there, bouncing off to go play like he did.

    We tried to talk to Bryler later that evening, that he needed to TALK to his teachers and to us so we would know what the problem was and could help him.  I don’t know if he really got it, but we tried.

    So that was Bryler’s meltdown at school.  Full of surprises lately, that boy.

  • Pregnancy Sleep

    02Mar
    Categories: Pregnancy Comments: 1

    So, most of you have probably heard of (or experienced) the problems that pregnant women have sleeping, especially as they get HUGE.  I remember having a hard time getting comfortable in my third trimester with Kelby and Bryler and having trouble getting out of the bed to go pee several times a night.  Husband used to literally push me out of the bed.  I also remember that I seriously considered buying a pregnancy sleep pillow that helps support the belly, but I was cheap and just used regular pillows instead.  And I always slept better on the couch.

    So far, though, this pregnancy has been different.  I have been sleeping great!  I believe that the difference has been the 3-inch memory foam mattress pad we bought about 2 years ago.  It supports and gives at the same time.  It sounds like a commercial, but that’s the best way I can describe it.  I have no trouble getting comfortable at night and I sleep until I have to pee and then I get back in the bed and go right back to sleep.  And maybe it’s just skill from experience, but I roll right out of the bed with no trouble.  I’m thinking that maybe the memory foam prevents me from sinking down into a hole and it’s not a problem to roll over or roll all the way out.

    For months, I’ve been waking up around 12:30 AM every night and then I sleep until my alarm goes off at 5:30 AM.  I use this opportunity to take my thyroid medicine, which has to be taken on an empty stomach, and to get Bryler up to pee, although Husband has been beating me to it so I get to crawl back in bed quicker those nights.  One night last week, I slept through the whole night and I was so surprised when I woke up in the morning.  But that has been the only time I’ve done that since July!

    Baby moves like all the time, but even that doesn’t wake me up.  I think I’ve gotten so used to it that I just tune it out and sleep right through it.

    But there have been a few added discomforts with my third trimester.  The past few nights, I’ve been getting up twice or even three times per night to pee.  And when I get up, I have sciatica (cramps) in my butt or hip so I have to limp to the bathroom.  Still, not a big deal.  It hasn’t kept me from sleeping.  My biggest obstacle to sleep right now is that I usually can’t get seem to get in bed before 11 PM.  Just too much that I want to get done and I’ve had more energy that I’ve had earlier in my pregnancy.  Maybe it’s the “nesting” instinct coming on.

    Anyway, I just thank God for blessing me with sleep during this pregnancy.  I don’t take it for granted.

  • Birthdays… Turning 34, 5, and 3

    24Feb
    Categories: Bryler Sayings, Kelby Sayings, Preschool Comments: 2

    My birthday is January 21st and 7 days later is Kelby and Brylers’ birthday.  Needless to say, it was another busy month.  Here’s how we celebrated…

    A few days before my birthday, Husband asked me if I could get off work early on my birthday, but he wouldn’t tell me where we were going.  So on my birthday, he had made arrangements for his mom to keep the kids, picked me up at work, and took me to the Melting Pot.  (He said that they were disappointed because they wanted to celebrate my birthday with me.  How sweet!)  He actually gave me the choice between Ye Old Steakhouse (which I love) and the Melting Pot, but I picked the Melting Pot because we had never been there before and we don’t get opportunities like this very often.

    The Melting Pot is a fondue restaurant and a quite expensive one.  We spent 15 minutes trying to find a place to park and ended up paying $6 to park in the closest parking lot (Ugh!).  Anyway, we go in and are seated at a little booth with a hot plate thingy built into the table.  Of course, the fondue pot went on the hot plate and we dipped and cooked our food with skewers there.  The waitress was our “chef”, mixing the cheese & fondue right there at the table and preparing our salads and “ingredients” (veggies, meat, batter, seasoning dips), etc.  The meal took two hours, but it didn’t feel like it.  We started with the cheese fondue with bread and veggies to dip.  Then we had a salad.  Husband’s Caesar salad was the best he’d ever had.  I had a bite of it.  It had sweetened sunflower seeds that were super yummy!  Next, was the main course.  We ordered the option with steak and lobster tails.  (We’d never had lobster before, and neither of us cared for it.)  The main course was our least favorite in terms of taste.  I missed the baked potato with my steak bites.  : )  Then we had the dessert.  It was chocolate/peanut butter fondue and a bunch of different things to dip in it.  Yummy!  I would have enjoyed it more if I hadn’t been so full already.  I left so stuffed I was uncomfortable.  If we go back, we’ll probably skip the main course and still be plenty full.  All-in-all, it was a really fun experience and I’m glad we went.

    We had our first birthday celebration for the kids on Jan 17 because Uncle Lee was off for MLK Day and was able to come in town and attend Layla’s birthday party on Saturday, Jan 16.  Layla’s birthday is Jan 5 and the party was scheduled for the 9th, but it snowed so they postponed it to Jan 16.  Layla’s party was fun and Kelby especially enjoyed it because she got to deliver all the presents to Layla and then she got to dress up in one of Layla’s new Tinkerbell costumes.  We also had Lance’s white chicken chili – Yum!

    We celebrated Kelby and Bryler’s birthday the next day with Lee after church at Lori & Lance’s house.  He brought them each an ice cream cake and a gift.  They thought this was great!  It was even more special, I think, because it was an early birthday celebration that they hadn’t expected.  Lee gave Kelby a music box with a ballerina doing a pirouette and she was very impressed with it.  The next day, she carried it with her everywhere.

    With Kelby and Bryler’s birthday on the same day, the logistics were a little bit problematic to work out.  Kelby wanted her own birthday party.  I could understand that.  I mean, most kids get to have their own day.  And she wanted a surprise party.  Kelby is all about surprises.  For instance, last night, I asked her if she was excited about going to Granda’s house tomorrow and she said, “Don’t tell me about it.  I want it to be a surprise.”  Of course, I told her that she couldn’t have a surprise party if she asked for one because then it wouldn’t be a surprise.  I gave her a few suggestions and she chose to go to the Children’s Museum with just Layla and her best friend at school, Alex.  This worked in our favor because I told her that this was her special thing for her birthday and that she would have another birthday party with Bryler with the family the following week, but we actually planned a surprise birthday party right after the Children’s Museum at our house.

    So I planned it all out for the Saturday before their birthday, Jan 23, and got everyone coordinated for the surprise party.  And then nothing turned out like I’d planned.  First of all, I just assumed that the Children’s Museum would be open at 4:00 on a Saturday, but we called on our way there and found out that they closed at 4:00.  So we quickly changed it to the Museum of Science & Energy.  Kelby’s wasn’t terribly disappointed.  She had been to the Science museum and liked it and had never been to the Children’s Museum.  Thankfully, we didn’t have any trouble contacting Lori and Alex’s dad to change the plans.

    We caught the end of the hair-raising demonstration at the Museum, and Alex and Kelby both got their hair raised by the electricity ball thingy and the rest of us enjoyed watching them.  As we left the auditorium, Kelby and Alex were holding hands, and Layla and Bryler were holding hands, and it was super cute! We spent about 45 minutes at the Museum and I think they all enjoyed it.

    The biggest surprise for me was Bryler’s reaction to Alex.  Sure, Kelby loves Alex, but Bryler acted like Alex was his best friend, too.  Maybe it’s because Alex is short for his age and the same height as Bryler and Layla.  Bryler doesn’t normally go out of his way to be friendly to other kids, at least not from what I’ve seen.  I knew he’d made some friends at preschool and often talks about his friend Jenna (His face lights up when he says, “I played with Jenna.  I love her.”)  But I just wasn’t prepared for him to welcome Alex so warmly.  It opened my eyes to an aspect of his personality that I hadn’t seen before.  Quite welcoming and generous and not a bit self-conscious.

    So the museum actually turned out quite well.  But during it, Granda had planned to decorate our house for the surprise party but the combination lock on our garage door wasn’t working so she couldn’t get in our house.  Time for plan B.  Lori offered to take Kelby home with her and Layla while we picked up Little Caesar’s Pizza and then went home to decorate.  So that turned out fine.  We had plenty of time to decorate and Granda brought the cake over.  It was a ballerina and butterfly birthday party.  Kelby loves to dance and we got her a new ballerina outfit for her birthday and planned to sign her up for a ballet class.  So Granda made her a ballerina cake with a ballerina Barbi on top.  It was really impressive.  (Unfortunately, Bryler shook the table on accident and make the ballerina fall off.  Granda held it up while we sang Happy Birthday.  Kelby didn’t seem to notice.)

    My parents arrived with a veggie Pizza Hut pizza a few minutes before Kelby arrived.  Husband went out to meet them in the driveway and took Kelby up to the shed to burn something on the burn pile while the rest of us regrouped and got ready to jump out and yell surprise.  Kelby asked about why there were cars there (she recognized whose cars they were) and he gave some flippant answer and quickly redirected her attention to other things.  After about 10 minutes of last-minute preparations, I went out and told them that it was time to come in and then we all waited at the front door and yelled “Surprise!” and “Happy Birthday!” as she opened the door.  She really was shocked and surprised.  I think she was a little confused at first, but then she was really pleased when she figured it out.  It was priceless!  She really enjoyed herself and still talks about her surprise birthday party.  After opening presents, Kelby and Layla danced for us in their ballerina outfits.  Thankfully, Plan B on the birthday party worked out just fine.

    On their actual birthday, which was on a Thursday, I took Kelby a cookie cake for a birthday party at her preschool.  Her birthday didn’t fall on a school day last year, so this was her first preschool birthday party.  Unfortunately, I had double-scheduled my lunch for that day and wasn’t able to stay for the party, but she was happy to see me and I got to take a few pictures of her with the cake and with her friends while they finished up their lunches (it was a pizza day).

    I’ve learned from experience that Bryler falls apart when he sees me in the middle of the school day and I’m not there to pick him up — very clingy and cries when I leave, etc.  So I felt that it would be better to let him celebrate his birthday at preschool without me.  I sent mini chocolate chip muffins for the class.  I left them with his teacher that morning.  I really missed seeing him when I went to the preschool to drop off Kelby’s cookie cake, but they weren’t in their classroom when I went by, which was probably a good thing because I would’ve been tempted to stop.

    After work, I picked up a Beta fish as a little surprise present for Kelby and Bryler.  We let Bryler name him, but he couldn’t remember the names he made up and he finally settled on Bluey Fish (because he is blue), which I think was Kelby’s idea.  They liked him that first day, but the fish hasn’t been a big hit.  Maybe it’s because we have to keep him in the foyer because our gas heater is in there and it’s the warmest room in the house.  Maybe they will take more interest in him when it’s warmer and we can move him back to the kitchen or dining room where they’ll see him more.

    The following Saturday was Bryler’s birthday party.  It snowed the night before and the roads were covered, but Bryler was really excited about his birthday party and didn’t want to wait so we decided to go ahead with it anyway.  Granda and Big Dad live on the same street as us, so we felt pretty sure that they could still make it.  Lori & Lance have a really steep driveway and weren’t able to come.  I told my parents who live about 20 minutes away that we didn’t expect them to try to come, but they came anyway despite the snowy roads, which was a nice surprise.

    The party was a train and cars theme.  We had quesadillas and lentils for lunch.  Granda made Bryler a chocolate train cake and one of the train cars was carrying a car.  It was really cool.  Bryler loved it but wasn’t convinced that it was a cake until we put candles in it and cut it up to eat.  It turned out to be a fun party and you could tell that Bryler enjoyed it, so we were happy that we’d gone ahead with the party.  Kelby told me she was “a little jealous” during Bryler’s party, but we talked to her about it and she was a good sport.

    I love the way Bryler shows us how old he is, holding up his thumb, pointer, and middle fingers and saying “I’m free!”

    I know I’ve left out a lot of details, but it’s been a month since all this happened and it’s already getting fuzzy.  Good thing I took plenty of pictures and video!

  • Pregnancy – 29 Weeks & Counting!

    21Feb
    Categories: Pregnancy, Work Comments: 2

    I figured out yesterday that I was 29 weeks pregnant, with 11 weeks remaining assuming I go full term.  I had not kept track of which week I was in and had a vague impression that I was probably close to the beginning of the third trimester.  It actually took me a little while to figure out which week I was in.  First I tried to find something on the Internet that would automatically calculate the week based on my due date, but I couldn’t find anything.  They apparently all assumed that you already know which week you were in.  So I finally just counted forward from 20 weeks, which I knew was the week of Christmas and the week that I had the ultrasound to reveal the sex of the baby.  I also labeled each week on my Google calendar so I can now count down the weeks without losing track again!

    So at 29 weeks, I have gain about 26 lbs.  According to most Internet sites, you are supposed to gain between 25-35 lbs for the whole pregnancy.  I was a little bit worried about my weight gain and when I asked the nurse practitioner about it last week, she said, “Well, I just hope you don’t continue gaining at this rate on the back side of your pregnancy.”  Hmmm… that didn’t sound good.  She encouraged me to cut back on the tea I had been craving and to try to substitute it with water and stuff like that.

    Since then, I have tried to avoid snacking so much between meals and cut out most of the candy and tea and donuts that I would normally avoid when I wasn’t pregnant anyway.  Being pregnant, I had felt justified in eating whenever I felt like it, but it was leading to bad habits.  Husband was concerned that I was going to starve the baby, but I assured him that I am still eating plenty.

    My main purpose in figuring out which week I was in was so that I could compare my weight gain to my prior pregnancies.  I kept track of my weight gain for both Kelby and Bryler.  I had gained 40 lbs with Kelby and 49 lbs with Bryler.  Thankfully, I had been able to lose it all within the year following.  I am basically on the same track as I was with Bryler, which made me feel a little bit better… at least I hadn’t gained more!

    People still say that I am small and that “it’s all baby”.  I guess that’s comforting (at least they’re not say, “Wow, you’re huge!”), but I know better.  I can feel the weight and I can see how much wider my hips are.

    Entering the third trimester, I still feel good enough to say that I know that I am greatly blessed to have such an easy pregnancy.  I am still sleeping very well at night — even better than I did with my other pregnancies.  At the same time, it is getting more uncomfortable.  My feet are starting to swell some and they start hurting if I’m on my feet for too long.  My back aches at times, and I have terrible posture.  It gets harder and harder to find clothes that are comfortable enough to wear all day long and look decent.  The Braxton Hicks contractions have become stronger and are verging on painful, and they come much more frequently if I am exerting myself in any way, such as playing basketball with Bryler (kiddie balls, of course) or mopping the floor.  I’ve had a cough for almost 4 weeks now.  That has certainly not been pleasant.  Sometimes when I cough, I pee on myself just a bit.  (No laughing, please.)  I haven’t been exercising because of my cough, which is probably another factor for the weight gain.  The cough is finally going away, so I plan to start working out again this week.  I’m hoping I won’t be hindered by Braxton Hicks contractions too much.  The doctor told me to ease up on the exercise if it was causing me to have contractions.  We’ll have to see how that goes.

    Little boy moves a lot!  After having 2 kids and being able to tune out distractions when I need to, I am pretty good at ignoring the belly gyrations, but sometimes I am just amazed at the activity going on in there.

    This week, Husband and I have been researching a replacement vehicle for the Scion.  I spent several hours making a spreadsheet to compare the top-rated vehicles that will accommodate 3 car seats.  The spreadsheet compares their lifetime prices including the cost of fuel based on the vehicle’s MPG over 160,000 miles.  You’d think that a car with great gas mileage would be much less costly over 160,000 miles, but the biggest factor is the purchase price.  For instance, a hybrid is usually still more expensive than non-hybrids because their purchase price is more than the cost savings on the fuel.  We’ve made some great progress in narrowing down the choices, but we haven’t come to a decision yet.  It will still be a very difficult decision.  For instance, is it worth spending a few thousand more to get a van that has more room and will be much easier to get the kids in and out of every day?  Or should we get a car, tough it out, and save a few thousand dollars?  We also need to find out how much we can get for the Scion.  We’d like to start by seeing how much CarMax will give us for it.  We may do that next weekend.

    I also made a list of the baby items that we need that we gave away when we thought we were going to stop after 2 kids.  I was a little bit worried before I did the inventory, but there are only a few things.  Most of the important stuff we gave to Granda or Lori and we’ve gotten most of it back.  I had kept a few things, too, like the breast pump and the baby monitors.

    Although I don’t have a definite maternity leave plan for work, I was able to hire another accountant who started work last week so I can start getting her trained before the baby arrives.  I am really relieved about that!

    So, we are finally making progress toward preparing for the little guy to arrive.  I am feeling more ready emotionally and mentally as well.  I’m starting to have the desires that all pregnant mothers want to have before the baby is born… like wanting to see him and hold him and smell him and feeling the excitement of having a new baby arrive.  I’ll admit that those feelings have been late to arrive in this pregnancy, but they are coming, much to my relief!  I have been trusting God that this is in His plan, and I am feeling more and more confident as the days move on.  It is funny how these feelings have come at the same time that the pregnancy is becoming more uncomfortable.  My attitude of “Keep the baby in the belly — He’s much less trouble in there!” is turning into “Get the baby out — it’s time to meet my new special little guy!”

  • The Meatloaf Experiment

    19Feb
    Categories: Bryler Sayings, Pregnancy Comments: 1

    So, as you know, I’ve been craving meatloaf.  I found a recipe on the web that sounded really good, bought the ingredients, and I then endeavored to “cook”.  This was last Saturday. The meatloaf takes over an hour to make, so for me that was a big deal.  I am not a cook.  I really don’t mind the actual cooking activity.  I just don’t like to spend time on it.  It just takes too long to cook.  There are too many other things in my life that I’d rather spend time on.  So we usually “fix” dinner rather than “cook”.  That means that we make sandwiches or heat up something frozen or from a can or make quesadillas or egg-izza (basically an omelet), and we even make pasta sometimes although we usually use the sauce out of a jar.  Every once in a while, maybe once every three months, I fix something in the crock pot.  We sometimes cook chili or spaghetti, but the hardest part of that is browning the meat, so we can do that pretty quickly.  Our typical meal can be “fixed” in 15 minutes or less.  Another reason I do not like to cook is because I hate to spend so much time on it and then end up not liking what I’ve cooked, which is usually what happens when I try something new.  And the cleanup effort after “fixing” meals is much quicker than cleanup after “cooking”.

    The result of my meatloaf?  It was actually very successful.  Probably turned out to be exactly what it was supposed to be (despite the fact that I realized I forgot the salt after 5 minutes of cooking and then pulled it all back out of the pan and mixed in the salt before putting it back in the oven).  Husband, who was not the least bit interested in having meatloaf… he loved it!  He was really surprised.  Bryler raved about it as well.  He was so cute, saying all the rewarding things that cooks would love to hear… “Umm!  Yummy!  It’s good!  May I have more, please?…”  Kelby, more of a bread girl, started out liking it, but after a few bites, she didn’t want any more of it.  No real surprise there.

    And me?  Well, it just didn’t hit the spot for me.  It wasn’t that I didn’t like it at all, but it was definitely not what I was craving.  I was looking for something that tasted like… you know… MEAT… like a thick juicy hamburger with the tomato-y sauce on top.  Although this meatloaf was really really moist, the consistency was not like a burger.  It was a mixture of sirloin meat with crackers and breadcrumbs (of course), so it was more on the mushy side than I was expecting.  It also was seasoned with Worcestershire sauce.  And although I actually like that flavor fairly well, it totally masked the basic MEAT taste, which is what I was craving.

    So.  I’m over it.  I am no longer craving meatloaf.  I have decided that I now crave chopped steak — basically, a plain old hamburger on a plate.  We plan to take Granda out to eat for her birthday soon, so I’ll probably try to find that on the menu.

    But here’s the meatloaf recipe in case you want to try it out.  Like I said, Husband and Bryler really loved it.  If you make it, I’d love to hear how you liked it–please post me a comment!

    Meatloaf Recipe adapted from http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/The-Best-Meatloaf-Ive-Ever-Made/Detail.aspx

    Ingredients

    • 1 tsp onion powder
    • 1/2 tsp garlic powder
    • 1 1/2 teaspoons salt
    • 1 1/2 teaspoons freshly ground black pepper (I forgot to add this, but I didn’t miss it)
    • 2 pounds extra-lean ground beef (I used ground sirloin)
    • 1 cup Italian breadcrumbs
    • 7 buttery round crackers, crushed
    • 1 egg, lightly beaten
    • 3 1/2 tablespoons sour cream
    • 1 1/2 tablespoons Worcestershire sauce
    • 1 (15 ounce) can tomato sauce, divide in half
    • 3 tablespoons ketchup
    • 2 slices of bread to help soak up the grease (I used the heels)

    Directions

    1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C).
    2. In a large bowl, mix together all the ingredients except for half of the can of tomato sauce.  Set the rest of the tomato sauce aside for later.
    3. Put two slices of bread in bottom of a 5×9 loaf pan.  The bread will soak up some of the grease and will not be eaten.
    4. Transfer the mixture to the pan on top of the bread.  It will fill the pan completely.
    5. Bake uncovered in the preheated oven 40 minutes.
    6. While you’re waiting, mix the remaining tomato sauce and ketchup in a small bowl or in the can.
    7. Increase oven temperature to 400 degrees F (200 degrees C), and continue baking 15 minutes, to an internal temperature of 160 degrees F (70 degrees C).
    8. Pour over the top of the meatloaf, and continue baking 10 minutes. (If the internal temperature is not 160 degrees, turn up the oven to 425.)

    Approximate Nutritional Information Per Serving

    Calories: 213 | Total Fat: 11.6g | Cholesterol: 78mg

    Prep Time:
    15 Min
    Cook Time:
    1 Hr 10 Min
    Ready In:
    1 Hr 25 Min

  • House

    17Feb
    Categories: House Comments: 1

    We continue to have frustrations with our house due to insulation issues, mildew, leaks, etc.  It doesn’t look likely that we could keep the roof of the sunroom and turn that area into some extra rooms with a permanent foundation as we had hoped.  It looks more likely to be a tear-down and restart for that part of the house.  So we started looking to see if there were houses for sale in the area.  There really wasn’t anything.

    Then we found out that the owners of the house that we had our eye on down the street were wanting to sell their house and build a smaller one if Grandmother would sell them some of her land, so we went and looked at the house.  It was truly a beautiful home and very large!  But it wasn’t perfect and the price they were asking for it really required it to be perfect for us to consider it.  We could buy some land and build a house for less.  So, we started thinking in that direction.  We found some land in the area that might be a possibility.  A 20-acre tract about 10 minutes from our house with a possible homesite overlooking a beautiful pond looked especially promising.  We even bought a book about building houses.

    But with Kelby going to Kindergarten this Fall, we started thinking about schools and we wanted to be really sure that we wanted to stay in this area permanently before we went to all the trouble and expense of building a house.  What we’ve heard about the local school system doesn’t make us feel really good about it.  We know that we’ll probably stay here until our youngest is ready for Kindergarten because we’ll want to continue to have Granda watch the kids.  That would be about 5 more years, at which time Kelby will be 10 years old and in the 5th grade.  If we are still unhappy with the school system by then, we may decide to move.  So maybe it would be better if we made our current house work for us for 5 more years.  So that brings us back to dealing with this house, which we don’t look forward to.  If we decide to stay here and don’t do a major renovation, we would get bunk beds and have Kelby and Bryler share a room.  And then maybe the boys could share a room when Kelby got a little bit older and needed more privacy.  We actually started to buy them bunk beds for their birthday, but we decided to wait until we had made a decision about the house first because we know that the baby will be in a bassinet in our room for a few months so there was no reason to rush to have an empty baby room.

    Right now, we’re in waiting mode… waiting on God to push us in a direction.

  • The Danger of Pullups

    13Feb
    Categories: Ideas, Potty Comments: 0

    Do not – I repeat – Do Not – put pullups in the washing machine!  I did a load of clothes and was met with a huge mess!  Do you know what’s in pull-ups?  Actually, they also put them in regular diapers.  It’s some type of little gel balls.  They fill with water (or pee) and expand into a jelly-ball mess.  Here’s the story:

    A few weeks ago, I was trying to teach Bryler to get up by himself with an alarm clock and to dress himself.  He still doesn’t wake up at night when he has to pee, so he wears a pull-up at night.  Well, I didn’t realize that when he got dressed by himself and very responsibly put his pajamas in the hamper, he was putting his pullups in the hamper, too.  I dumped the hamper in the washer without thinking twice.  It turns out that there were two pullups in that load of laundry.  As soon as I pulled out the first few pieces of clothing, there were gel balls falling off and all over the floor.   I knew I’d have to vacuum anyway, so I thought I’d just shake the rest of the clothes out and vacuum it all up at once.  So that’s what I did.  After shaking off most of the balls, the clothes were still nasty, so they went back in the washer and I ran another load.  After that, they came out looking just fine.

    Well, it turns out that it wasn’t such a great idea.  I never thought about the fact that the gel balls were semi-liquid and I had used a regular vacuum cleaner, not a wet-dry vac, and I failed to immediately empty the vacuum of the balls.  When I told Husband about what I’d done to clean up the mess, he was not very happy.  Iit wasn’t an easy job of emptying the vacuum cleaner.  After a few days, the closet where we kept the vacuum cleaner started smelling nasty and we finally figured out that it was the vacuum cleaner.  There was no way we could completely clean out the gel from the vacuum, so we ended up getting rid of it and buying a new one.  We really weren’t very pleased with our old one because the belt kept coming off of it, but it is still a shame that I pretty much killed it the rest of the way.

    So, if you ever accidentally have this happen to you, do not do what I did!  I did some research and the best thing to do is leave all the clothes in the washer, add an entire container of table salt, and re-wash.  They say that salt will chemically break the bonds holding the gel together, causing it to dissolve and be washed away harmlessly.  If you don’t have salt handy, just keep rewashing because the gel eventually dissolves in an abundance of water.

  • Alarm Clocks

    12Feb
    Categories: Bryler Firsts, Bryler Sayings, Ideas Comments: 2

    Mornings.  Mornings were painful.  It somehow took 45 minutes from the time I went to wake them up until we were driving away and the kids were grumpy and hungry, and I was frustrated.  Getting them to WAKE UP and get out of bed took a little while.  Picking out clothes took forever.  Getting them to go to the potty and all the bags organized was another issue.  Don’t even talk to me about breakfast.  That ended up being a last minute grab of breakfast bars and nuking some bacon and having them eat in the car.  And then I am annoyed at the huge mess of crumbs in my car!

    A few weeks ago, I decided things needed to change.  First of all, I started training Bryler to get up by himself in the morning.  Another reason for this is because he still does not get up to go potty by himself.  Ever.  He doesn’t get up by himself at all after he goes to sleep.  He’s gotten in trouble a few times for getting up when he’s supposed to be trying to GO to sleep, but never after he’s gone to sleep.  I still go wake him up every night around midnight to take him to the potty.  So it would be nice if he would get himself up to pee at least, so I thought that if he started getting used to getting up by himself in the morning, it wouldn’t be such a big deal to get up and pee by himself.

    He’s been using the noisemaker that I got for Christmas a year ago as background noise to sleep to.  It makes all different kinds of sounds, but he usually uses the white noise or the waterfall.  It also has a radio on it, which he likes to listen to sometimes.  Then I realized that it is also an alarm clock.  So I moved the noisemaker/alarm clock to where he could reach it and set the alarm to go off with the radio. I told him what it was and what would happen and that he was a big boy and could turn it off all by himself, etc.

    The first few days of using the alarm clock were pretty entertaining.  Bryler hated it.  The radio would start playing and he would lay in the bed and cry and yell at it, “No!…  Stop it!…  Be quiet!…”  I would open his door and tell him that he’d have to get up and turn it off.  So, eventually, he would get up and turn it off and then he’d get right back in bed.  I thought he was going to be a tough cookie to crack, but after about a week, he quit fussing at it and would just lay there trying to ignore it until I’d come open his door and tell him to get up and DO NOT get back in the bed.  Eventually, he’d do it.  After about another week, all I’d have to do is open his door and he’d get up within about 5 minutes and sometimes he would even go pee-pee by himself before coming to find me!  I think we’re making major progress!  He still doesn’t like to get up and dress himself without assistance.  I think he’s done that maybe once.  That will be my next project.  And he still does not wake up to go potty at night.

    Kelby has been waking up to an alarm clock radio for quite a while now.  She was using an alarm clock that Husband and I used before we got the kind that illuminates the time on the ceiling.  It’s probably about 10 years old and is nothing special and the radio reception never worked very well from where we had to put it so she could reach it.  For her birthday, I thought she’d like to have her own alarm clock.  Interestingly, we couldn’t find many cute alarm clocks for kids.  I finally found one that was a nightlight alarm clock that looked pretty cool.  It turned out to be  a really neat nightlight that gradually changes colors every few seconds.  But it isn’t a radio.  I just beeps.  I think she likes the nightlight, but she doesn’t like the beeping.  But she hasn’t been complaining about it recently and she does get up to turn it off better than she did the radio, which is the whole point in having an alarm clock, right? So I think it is a keeper.  But, same as Bryler, she has not been good about putting on her clothes.  The rule is that she’s not supposed to come out of her room until she’s dressed.  We’ve been doing really well about laying out their clothes the night before, so there really is no excuse except that they just don’t like doing it.

    The mornings have been going much better now that they are getting themselves up and the clothes are already picked out.  I make sure to have their lunches and backpacks put together before they wake up.  Sometimes I make muffins or bacon.  I usually end up dressing them, but they haven’t been so grumpy and have been able to eat breakfast while watching a little bit of Handy Manny on TV before we leave.

    I still haven’t quite figured out how to get them to go down the stairs and into the car quickly.  That really shouldn’t take 5 minutes, especially since I’m the one carrying all the bags!

  • Meatloaf!

    10Feb
    Categories: Pregnancy Comments: 2

    My new craving is meatloaf.  Yesterday, I was driving down the road listening to podcasts on my PSP and somebody mentioned meatloaf, and I thought, I’ve GOT to have some meatloaf!

    I tried to make meatloaf once in my early years of marriage and it was awful and I’ve never tried it since then.  But I’m going to take another stab at it.  I found a recipe on the Internet that looks interesting.  Of course, we don’t have any ingredients for making meatloaf and we typically do grocery shopping on Saturday mornings, so this will have to wait.  I just keep thinking about it.  Pregnancy cravings are funny like that.

    I think I mentioned before that I had been craving V-8 juice.  That craving is long gone.  It stopped all of a sudden and I ended up having to throw the rest of it away.  My other cravings have been olives and spinach with vinegar.  I’ve also enjoyed pizza, especially veggie pizza.  Those haven’t been constant cravings, but they crop up every now and then.  I’ve resisted buying olives because I don’t normally like them and I just know that as soon as a buy a bottle, I will no longer be interested in them.  I just eat them whenever I’ve got free access to them.  I have indulged in the spinach quite a bit, though.  I get the small cans and eat the whole thing in one sitting.  The baby really likes spinach!

    Oh, yeah, and ice tea!  I’ve made more iced tea in the last two weeks than I normally do in 6 months!  Lovin’ that tea!

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