It's amazing!

My kitchen is actually clean. I have never been an extremely clean person. I like a clean bathroom and kitchen, but after that as long as it doesn't get too bad, I don't care. Post-Carter my standards have been lowered/changed. Now the priorities are making sure anything at a level he can grab is clean, and as long as I can feed him or bath him in a sanitory manner, I'm probably okay with it.
My new cleaning plan is that I need to spend one hour a day working on the room of the day. Sunday= Kitchen. Once that room is clean, I need to try to get one load of laundry started and neaten up the rooms from earlier in the week. After that, I am free to use nap time for my own interests. Today/Day one is a success. My kitchen is cleaner than it's been in a long time. Tomorrow will be bathroom day, Tuesday=Dining room, Wed.= our bedroom, Thursday= Carter's room, Friday= Living Room/Family Room, Sat.= A little bit of straightening and a break!

Lack of Blogging

I feel bad for not blogging very much lately. I feel like I'm in somewhat of a funk. I have crafter's ADD and haven't finished anything in forever (which needs to change!). I need to figure out what I need to do to get inspired again.

Some quick blogging

We've been busy lately!
Last Wed. we went to 4th grade track and field day at my mom's school. Carter, being the class mascot wore his Zepher shirt so that we matched the kids. The kids adored him!
Saterday I went garage saleing with Stef. It was a complete failure. I'm not sure if people just don't have sales on Memorial weekend, but every sale we went to was full of junk. Kind of a bummer that we didn't find any deals, but it was still nice to chat and be child-free for a couple hours.
Sunday we had a BBQ with my mom's side of the family. My parents, being the indulgent grandparents, had picked up a water table for Carter to play with that they had seen that morning in the Target ad.
Monday we worked on planting all of the vegetables for the garden.

Carter's latest game

He love to take all the food off the shelves he can reach in the pantry. It's a good thing we switched all the things he could get into trouble with to the higher shelves.
The other funny thing he's been doing lately is taking an unopened bottle of cooking oil and crawling with it. I'll have to get pictures of it sometime. Yesterday I found the bottle next the couch.
Who needs toys when you have kitchen cabinets?

Blueberry Muffins!

I've been in the mood for blueberry muffins lately. When I saw fresh blueberries at the groccery store last night , I knew I wanted to try to make them from scratch.
I found this one on allrecipes.com.

Blueberry Muffins II "Low-cholesterol muffins."

PREP TIME 10 Min
COOK TIME 20 Min
READY IN 30 Min
Original recipe yield 1 dozen

INGREDIENTS (Nutrition)
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 cup fresh blueberries
1 egg white
1 tablespoon vegetable oil
1/2 cup skim milk
2 tablespoons margarine, melted
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup white sugar

DIRECTIONS
Preheat oven to 400 degrees F (205 degrees C). Use vegetable oil spray to grease 12-cup muffin tin. Set aside.
Mix 1/4 cup of the flour with the blueberries. Set aside. Beat egg white and 1 tablespoon oil lightly in bowl. Stir in milk and melted margarine or oil.
In separate bowl, mix together flour, baking powder, salt, and sugar. Sift dry ingredient mixture over egg white mixture. Stir just long enough to moisten flour. The batter will look lumpy. DO NOT OVERMIX. Fold in blueberries. Fill each tin two-thirds full with batter. Bake in preheated oven 20-25 minutes or until golden brown.


They turned out pretty good. The only thing I might add would be a tiny bit of sugar on the tops.

And because I need to post more pictures

a cute one of Carter in his buddy Cole's adorable orange chair. I can't believe this time last year I was hugely pregnant!

What a day!

Today we were busy! First we stopped by my uncle's house to see the progress. It looks amazing! (If you know anyone in the market for a house in Minneapolis, let me know. If we could afford to move at this point, I would be so interested!)
Then we did a quick pit stuff for lunch at Arby's. Carter loves regular roast beef sandwiches just like his mommy and daddy.
Next we paid off my car loan. We are now officially car loan free. It feels good! $600+ a month (between both payments) of pressure is now off our backs.
Next we did a little shopping at Mall of America. This may be TMI for some people, but until today I had not purchased a bra post baby. For many women, an increased breast size is a positive benefit of having a baby that tends to go away after you stop breast feeding. For me, not really the case. Since breast feeding only lasted the first 6 weeks for us, my ladies should have returned to their previous size almost 10 months ago. I am still one size up from my "normal" size. This is an issue because it puts me into all the frumpy old lady bras. The majority of the bras at Victoria's Secret and Gap body do not even come in my size. Very depressing. I keep hoping that maybe in some twist of fate I will go down a size with all of my exercising. Anyways, enough about my breasts.
In other news, a couple of my friends are going to 5K with me in July. I'm thrilled I have people to make me accountable for my running!
Minus feeling really crappy, today was a great day!

Progress

I completed Week One, day 3 of Couch to 5K. I'm still not in great shape, but I can already see an improvement since my first day. I'm now looking for 5Ks in MN for late June/early July so that I have the proper motivation not to quit.
I'm booking it on my new quilt project. Hopefully the blocks will be complete tonight or tomorrow so I can show pictures. There are a few things I'd do differently next time, but overall I love it!
Carter and Tim went to get an oil change in Tim's car, so I've had an hour of free time. It's been fabulous!

And it continues

I started an additional quilt. This one I am planning for a baby gift. I have 10/42 squares completely done and the other 32 started. I'm hoping to have the other 32 squares done in the next 3 days, so that I can get it to get it toegther by next weekend to give as a gift. I can't wait to show pictures. I love it already.
In Carter news, he has been a teething and allergy crabby mess. He screams about 50% of the time he's awake these days. While I love him dearly, it's hard to be patient when he can't tell you what's wrong. It almost makes Tim not having any hours for work this week worth it. The bright side of a crabby teething Carter is that he sometimes takes longer naps. I'm finally starting to make progress in the massive amount of housework that needs to be done.

I think I have a problem

I started two more quilts. I need to learn how to finish some of these projects! The one is a 9-patch quilt that I'm doing with a quilt-a-long. I started two weeks after everyone else, so I have some catching up to do! My goal for the weekend is to get atleast one of my started projects finished, and do an extra 9-patch block each day. It's an ambitious goal!

Random Conversation

Tonight at the post office automated postage machine:
Middle aged guy: Whoa! You've got a lot of packages to mail.
Me: Yup. I can stop for a minute so you can do yours.
He proceeds to ask me about if I'm ebaying, ect. Very long conversation for someone I don't know.
He finishes his postage, puts his package in the mail box and starts walking to the door. I start working on my next package. He comes back to look for his recipt.
Middle aged guy: Whoa, did you see my receipt?
Me: Nope, sorry.
Him: Oh whoops! I guess it's in my wallet. That's what happens when you have a couple beers before going to the post office.

Is it strange to anyone else that he went to the post office buzzed? If you have time for several beers are your postal needs really that urgent?

The end?

This week is the end of two of our activities until fall. We had our last ECFE class on Tuesday. I was really sad for it to be over because Carter loved it. On the very bright side, our group is trying to set up summer playdates during what was our classtime on Tuesdays. We're psyched!
Thursday is also our last MOPS until Sept. I'll miss it over the summer.

Mother's Day

I can't believe it's Monday already! I had a great first mother's day (minus the 4 times Carter was up during the night). We were up around 7am since that's when Carter decided he was not going back to bed. Tim and Carter were really thoughtful about the gifts they picked out. I recieved a one month membership to the community center, childcare passes to use for Carter while I work out, a book on learning to quilt, and a giftcard to JoAnn Fabric. Great stuff!
Tim had to work, so Carter and I went over to brunch at my aunt and uncle's house. The food was great and Carter had a good time chasing after my two cousins: Joe (age 4)and Aiden (age 3).

Quick Birthday Presents

We have Cole's 2nd birthday party today (one of my best friend's son and Carter's buddy). I whipped up a few quick birthday presents last night after Carter went to bed and this morning during nap. I think they turned out pretty cute!

And done!

My course work is complete minus dropping off one form later today. Needless to say, I'm thrilled! I went garage saleing this morning. The first three houses were a bust, but the fourth scored some good deals.
Tim, Carter, and I ran errands this morning before Tim had to go to work. Our first stop was Fleet Farm. My favorite part about going there is asking Tim if we need (insert random farming item here). Todays favorites include sheep milk replacer and cow taggers. I'm pretty sure I will never have any need for 99% of what they sell. Our next stop was Lowe's to get the baby gates we finally decided on. Of course we get them both home and one is missing pieces, and we don't think it'll work for us. Back to the drawing board. I so wish we could move to a more child friendly house! Some day!

Freedom!

I finished my two papers last night and am now waiting from the people from my group presentation to decide if we need to make some changes. So only one more project left until I have freedom!
One of my goals for the month of May is to ebay or donate all of the clothes that I will no longer wear (which happens to be a lot post-baby). Carter likes to help with this.
Today is Carter's 10 month birthday. This is what happens when Mommy leaves the patio door open.

Picture Update

Weekend update!

I'm so behind in all of my crafting. So many projects are waiting for me half done. After Wednesday night, I should have the time/energy to start working on them since I will done by my three classes. I can't wait! And I should be done until July!
We kept pretty busy on Sat. and Sunday. Saturday Carter and I went over to check out the progress on my uncle's house. It's looking beautiful! If you're in the market for a house in Minneapolis, let me know. The new colors are very pottery barn-esque and really give the house some personality.
I picked up lunch from McDonalds on the way there so we could lunch with my parents and grandma. Carter loves to share chicken nuggets and fries with me. Later we had dinner with my parents and watched "Marley and Me" (Very cute, but be ready to cry!)
Sunday Carter and I hung out until Tim got home from work at 2pm. We then went over to my parents house to work on the gardens and have dinner. Carter had salmon for the first time and loved it (which is funny since I hate it!). He also played in the grass for the first time. He was very hesitent at first (a rare thing for Carter), but then became more and more brave about crawling on it. I'll post pictures later. They turned out great!

Friday!

Yesterday was another hit. I found one great sale in Lino Lakes that I bought a ton of stuff at. Then I headed over to White Bear Lake for a huge neighborhood sale there. I was finding kids' clothes for $.50 an item that looked almost brand new.
Tim got off early from work, so we headed over to my grandparents' house so that he could do their yardwork and Carter and I could visit with them. They adore Carter! Afterwards we went out to dinner with them at D'Amicos. It was the first time we took Carter someplace and had to feed him a dinner that wasn't a bottle. Overall it was successful. I think it would have been better if I would have brought Carter's booster seat instead of using the high chairs because he was so interested in trying to grab plates, glasses, people's food, ect.