Juicy Juicy.

We kicked off one of my 2014 goals early a few days ago. We cleared out the grocery store of produce, brought it home and Dan juiced his heart away. We decided to juice 1-2 times a week and freeze it into our baby food trays so that we can thaw a few each day to throw into the blender to make smoothies. So far we've been filling the smoothies with the juice (mainly carrots) + kale + a little honey + a banana + berries and sometimes plain greek yogurt. We've been having the babies drink these with one of their meals and I'm so thankful Jackson is finally, finally getting the servings of vegetables he needs. 

Happy NEW Year! As I mentioned here yesterday, I have re-kicked off my new year beginning today! So, it's only appropriate that I review my goals from last year before setting my sights high for 2011...


Half-way through 2010 I renewed my goals here: 2nd Half of 2010 Goals. Here are those goals along with my personal (and slightly subjective) recap of how I did:


1. Sign up for & run a race: COMPLETE! I ran a 5K with my colleagues in October. It was not pretty, but that's okay.  

2. Find a regular volunteering opportunity at church: Incomplete. I'll need to put this one on my 2011 list. Work + baby + everything else meant not enough time over the past few months. 

3. Establish a monthly date day/night with Dan: Semi-complete. We managed to squeeze a few dates in, but not on a monthly basis; more like on an every other monthly basis. Luckily for Christmas we received a couple of date nights (a cooking class and a gift certificate to our favorite winery!). 

4. Save X amount of $ for our home addition: COMPLETE! We are right on track for our financial goals. 

5. Finish our home addition plans and begin construction: Semi-Complete. The home plans are 95% finished, but because it took a lot longer for the architect to finish them we had to push construction back until spring. 

6. Create and finish our will- Incomplete. Totally my fault with no good excuse. I just haven't taken the time to go get it notarized. 

7. Update our family master plan: Complete!
 
8. Simplify all aspects of our life: Semi-Complete. We made a lot of great progress in this area, but I think this is an ongoing goal that will need to continue into 2011. Some of the improvements made this year were getting rid of cable TV, wireless internet (so that we don't end up sitting on our laptops around the house), giving away a LOT of kitchen appliances and tools that we rarely if ever used, cleaning and organizing the basement (still some to be done there), etc. 


More to come later on 2011 goals. For now JP and I are off to the grocery store. It is one of his favorite places to go because he gets so much attention. That little flirt. He totally eats up all the attention and ignores me the entire time we are shopping...

friday night follies

It's friday night which makes me very happy- but what is even BETTER is that it's the start to my holiday vacation! As of this evening I do not have to work for almost 2 and a half weeks. That is crazy fabulous! I so need this break. I am beyond burnt out of the whole work routine, the balancing act that never feels balanced, of not spending enough time with Jackson, of the work itself... of it all, really, so cheers to CHRISTMAS and the break from work that comes along with it. 


You may have noticed a slightly different layout on the blog- if you look above this post you'll now notice links to a few different pages, most of which used to be located elsewhere, but there is one new page entitled "mileage" - check it out :)... this page represents a lot to me and I'm pretty excited (and sore) from it.


Those are my two quick updates for tonight... now it's time to go and watch a movie with Dan. That is if i can get him to sit still long enough. For some reason he thought it would be a good idea to brew coffee at 8:30pm while I was working out and is on a complete caffeine kick. I also just told him he is never allowed to shop online while caffeinated again... when I came up from downstairs his fingers were clicking like crazy on Amazon. Some of the items on their way beyond the Christmas gifts that were needed? An automatic toothbrush, ice skates, $15 worth of kitchen sponges, a flashlight for my key chain ... and he requested marshmallow guns which I kindly denied. Finally, I'll leave you with this photo of Jackson. This is how he now prefers to sit in his high chair at all times...

Dinner with Jackson: Week 36

welcome to your weekly dinner date with my handsome little man.

tonight you are having applesauce and gluten-free banana bread.

highlights of tonight's meal includes showing off your new "give me a high five" trick, showing us how much it really ticks you off when we try to hold your hand to pray (he gets mad every single night at this) and watching your mother who should never be shown on film for so many reasons.


PS: As you will see from my less-than-stellar appearance, I did run AND survive the 5K race today! To most my time would appear to be ridiculously slow, but overall I am quite happy with it considering I haven't ran in so long. Now I have a base to go from- and lets be honest it can only improve from here!

True Stories

True Story, I am running a 5K with my 400 of my coworkers tomorrow, but haven't ran more than a mile since I became pregnant with Jackson. That was 1.5 years ago if you're counting.


True Story, I had fried ice cream for the first time in my life tonight. It was delish. 


True Story, I also had a white peppermint mocha from Starbucks today. It was like heaven in my mouth. Clearly I am having a very unhealthy day. Which is probably why I feel so gross. The mocha was totally worth it.


True Story, Dan and I started a system where we each get "allowances" every week. I think I would be perfectly happy spending my entire allowance on Starbucks. (I'll write more on this "allowance" system later this week. It also involves the true story that our family budget excel sheet now is up to 8 workbooks and I love each and every one of them dearly.)


True Story, JP started wearing his winter PJ's this week. You know, the ones with the little footies. Babies in footy PJs are probably one of the cutest things ever. 


True Story, Dan showed me this website -here- this guy bought a McDonald's burger in 1996 and takes a photo of the same burger every 6 months. It still looks the same. It is still in tact. People feed their kids McDonalds every day. Tell me what is wrong with this picture!


True Story, last night I walked into the living room and clearly Dan has somewhat lost his mind. He had the TV on. Since we turned off all cable the TV just picks up a few very random stations. He must have been desperate. This is what he was watching: (PS: sorry for the shaky camera but I was literally on the ground shaking I was laughing so hard).  (PSS: Also note that he had his popcorn and everything in hand, like he was watching some fabulous movie or something!)

10 Random Updates

1. JP seems to be getting somewhat better. We found out at the DR that he has a virus that has given him a high fever and blisters in his throat. In other words, he has been in a lot of pain. Poor thing. He went to Nanna's today so I could catch up on some work and his fever seems to be gone- praying that is stays away. If it doesn't he has to go back to the DR tomorrow. 


2. Despite the sickness he has had pockets of a lot of energy and has developed a couple of new tricks. He likes to now sit on the hardwood floors and push himself backwards around the room. This entertained him for at least 15 minutes yesterday. Probably the only 15 minutes I wasn't holding him. He is also crawling in spurts- he still realizes that army-crawling is so much faster for him at this point, so he will crawl on all fours for a few steps and then says forget that I'm doing this my way! And for some reason the only way I could get him to laugh yesterday was by throwing a baseball into the air and saying "ball" when I caught it... he was laughing so hard that he was literally laying on the ground with his face in the rug cracking up. Hilarious. 


3. I am WAY behind in work. It is overwhelming actually. And is going to put somewhat of a damper on this weekend... 


4. Sammy had a vet appointment early this morning for his annual shots. For some reason it is actually harder to watch him get shots than it is to watch JP get them. I have no idea why. This doesn't make sense to me either. 


5. I started a new book this week- "Make the Right Choice" by Joel Zeff. So far, so good. And by "so far" I mean the 3 pages I have had a chance to read. 


6. JP and I went to the library earlier this week. I am so anxious for him to be to the stage where we get to go to reading time there, so I thought we would try on our own. We sat in the children's section and I read him books. It was more like I was reading to myself because he found it far more entertaining to climb on the bookshelves. So, we picked up books in Spanish to read at home along with a couple of CDs to listen to in the car. 


7. The weather continues to be absolutely perfect. Fall at its finest. 


8. LOVE this bible verse that I came across this week: "Am I now trying to win the approval of men.. or of God?" Galatians 1:10 - I've been trying to keep that in mind each day this week. 


9. I signed up for a 5K run at work a few months ago thinking that at this point I would be running longer distances again. Yeah right. JP and I rock the walks, but I doubt we have ran more than a mile at once. The 5K at work is this coming Thursday. Needless to say I am not prepared! Lets hope I don't come in last place in front of all my colleagues :) 


10. 64 days until Christmas. YES- the countdown is ON!

Nothing great has been & nothing great can be accomplished without passion. -G.W.F. Hegel

Greetings Friends!


It has been a few weeks since I set in stone my '2nd Half of 2010' Goals, so I thought today might be a good day to re-visit those and to review my progress so far. I always find that when I'm feeling a little 'stalled' or not moving forward on all cylinders, I can usually perk myself up pretty quickly by reminding myself of my priorities.


1. Sign up for & run a race (5 or 10k): IN PROGRESS: I have researched some potential races, but I just need to sign up and more importantly run more often so I'm not "that lady" who finishes the race last.
 
2. Find a regular volunteering opportunity at church: IN PROGRESS: Last week I attended a mandatory training class for anyone who will be volunteering with children. This week I will be volunteering 2 evenings at Vacation Bible School and then am hoping to find a regular Sunday to volunteer each month in the nursery during church services. 

3. Establish a monthly date day/night with Dan: IN PROGRESS: We are planning a Saturday to go canoeing hopefully later this month. The biggest challenge is finding a weekend that we are: 1. available and 2. where we have plenty of time that weekend to spend one-on-one time with Jackson since we'll have to give up an afternoon of JP-time and 3. Finding someone to keep the little man. Thankfully, we have the last part taken care of as my cousin Sara said she would keep him for the afternoon while we go (thanks, Honorary Aunt Sara!). Further, we have our canoe trip purchased since it was the Groupon deal of the day last week so we got 50% off!

4. Save X amount of $ for our home addition: IN PROGRESS- we are right on track for this one!

5. Finish our home addition plans and begin construction: IN PROGRESS- we are making a lot of great progress in this area. We met with an architect and contractor last week and walked them around our home to share with them our plans. The architect came back Friday evening and Dan helped her take all of the measurements she needs to model our home in CAD. We are meeting with her via phone tonight to go over next steps!

6. Create and finish our will (sorry, a little morbid and slightly depressing, but must be prepared now that we have a little guy who depends on us): IN PROGRESS: We have had the discussions needed to be had to fill out the document, the document is completed, but now we need to make time to get the needed signatures and authorization. 

7. Update our family master plan: COMPLETED!

8. Simplify all aspects of our life (everything from our material possessions to our routines): IN PROGRESS: Dan has been doing a great job of cleaning out some of his junk possessions from his workshop areas outside. I worked on cleaning out our kitchen cabinets this weekend and made a lot of progress- we had so much stuff that we never used- totally wasteful, so I have a huge pile that I need to take to Good Will.


There is still a lot to accomplish, but I feel good about the progress we have made in just a couple of weeks! One big area that I need to revamp already is my exercise plan- the going-to-the-gym-at-work is just not working, I'll post more on that later this week along with a new plan- suggestions are welcome!!

{Homemade Baby Food} Sweet Potatoes!

Last night I set out to make sweet potato baby food and I was pleasantly surprised to realize how easy it was. The avocados and bananas had been easy too, but I had done them on a much smaller scale and there is no "cooking" involved with those- you just puree the fresh produce. The sweet potatoes went a little something like this:

First, I washed and poked holes in 3 sweet potatoes 

then placed them in a 375 degree oven for 45 minutes. 

Once finished baking, I set them out to cool.

Then, I simply peeled off the skin- it came right off, no tools necessary!

All 3 potatoes were pureed in the food processor.

 Check out the color! I love it. 

I added approximately 3/4 of a cup of water to thin it out a little.

 Time to fill up the freezer trays!

 Time for the verdict- he loved it!

This is his "give me more" face. 

 Could those eyes get any bigger?

I think the degree to which Jackson likes a certain food indirectly correlates with the amount on his face!

A little nutritional info on sweet potatoes! (thanks to WholesomeBabyFood.Com)

Sweet Potatoes (1 medium baked) 

VITAMINS: Vitamin A - 24,877 mg Vitamin C - 28.0 mg Pantothenic Acid - .74 mg Niacin - .69 mg Folate - 26.2 mcg Contains some other vitamins in small amounts.

MINERALS: Potassium - 273 mg Phosphorus - 29.5 mg Magnesium - 13.5 mg Calcium - 6.2 mg Sodium - 11.0 mg Iron - .55 mg Selenium - .5 mg Manganese - .6 mg Zinc - .3 mg