Well that worked wonderfully.

Today's pinspired is:

Make Your Own Photo Canvas

I don't know how many of you know but my husband is a very talented photographer and graphic designer. We've agreed that if we ever sell this house and get to move elsewhere (we've been trying for over a year and a half now with little success) that we will decorate our next home with his photography. I love it and he likes to have his work displayed. So when I found this I thought it would be fun to try with some of Jay's pics. And my favorite part is that it is super easy.

The worst part was buying Mod Podge which is very expensive. But I had a Michael's 50% off coupon so it was all good. The canvas isn't terribly cheap either but it was on sale. I got a two pack for 4 dollars. I got my 8x10 prints from Snapfish.

Then all you do is paint your canvas with Modpodge, then stick your photo to it, paint over it with the Mod Podge, let it dry and then paint the edges of your canvas. I went with black. I think they turned out fabulously. My only disappointment was that right after one of mine dried, it fell of the shelf and directly onto one of my daughter's toys and busted a hole in it. It's on the fall picture if you look closely. But I decided to keep it anyway.

I only wonder what I'm going to do with these once I get tired of them. I'd like to do a whole display like four or five of my little girl... but then what do I do with them. I have such a problem throwing photos away and even more problem throwing photos that I've put work into away. Oh well I'll worry about that later for now, I give this pinspired moment a thumbs up.

I can't believe that worked. Yum.

So today's pinspired project is this:

Easy homemade ice cream without a machine.

I was suspicious about this. 3 measly ingredients... no rock salt. How in the world is that going to make decent ice cream? But I got to say it does. It's good stuff. It's terribly rich and probably horrible for you but is really really yummy.

The instructions call for Heavy cream and a can of sweetened condensed milk. I used the low fat kind of sweetened condensed milk. I don't think there is a low fat form of heavy cream. I think it has it's name heavy for a reason. But I could be wrong. And then it says you can mix in whatever fixings you'd like. I went with crushed up mini oreos.

All you gotta do is whip the cream to stiff peaks
see aren't you proud to know that I the non-culinary knew what stiff peaks were and how to get them. I did listen to my mother a little bit after all. I can even prove it see:


Then you just mix in the sweetened condensed milk, and whatever candy or add in you want and stick that puppy in the freezer till it hardens.

Here's what it looked like after I stirred it, right before putting it in to freeze.


I took the first spoonful and I was shocked at how creamy and good it tasted. Mixed with those oreos it serious tasted just like a Hershey's Cookies and Cream candy bar only colder. Delicious. It is a bit rich though. You really can't or shouldn't eat more than one scoop. When Jay tried it, he asked me if it had cream cheese in it somewhere because it tasted so rich.

I give this one a thumbs up, it's a keeper and pretty cheap to make.

Meh cookies

Today's Pinspired are Cookies imprinted with stamps.





When I followed the link this appears to have been in Country Living Magazine at some point. I have to say I was a bit disappointed by my results. Again let me display my disclaimer:

My posts in here are just how things turn out when I try them. I am not terribly domestic or detail oriented, so this does not mean it will be how it will turn out if you try it. I encourage you to try stuff you find out there for yourselves. This is just my little blog of how things are turning out for me.

I wonder if it would be different with homemade cookie dough...I used a store bought roll that I sliced so I had lovely little uniform cookies. Then I broke out my two stamps that I have held onto in my craft box for years but have never used for anything...until now. On one stamp were the words HAPPY BIRTHDAY, the other stamp is a dog. I tried the Happy Birthday stamp first. I floured it lightly so it wouldn't stick to the dough... but I still ended up having a hard time making it legible in the dough. I think I ate about 3 cookie dough slices (because if you mess up you have to eat it to hid the evidence right?) before I switched stamps. The doggie stamp did much better in the dough as you can see here:


My stamps


Stamp in the dough.

What I hadn't accounted for is how much the cookies stretch and move while baking. The one Happy Birthday one I did well, was completely illegible when baked so I didn't even take a pic of it (and it's eaten now). You had to look at the doggie one in the right light to be able to tell anything was on there. This picture was made without the flash and up close to the cookie. If you are standing above the cookies in a well lit room I doubt you'd notice anything was on them.


My conclusion on this pinspiration: It's a lot of work to get those stamps into the cookies without messing them up, too much work for them not to show up really well. I'll stick to decorating my cookies in another manner. However if I ever make my great grandmother's teacake recipe again I might try this method again.. those are thicker cookies, maybe they'd do better.. however I think I'll find a prettier stamp.

Very first post

*Disclaimer: My posts in here are just how things turn out when I try them. I am not terribly domestic or detail oriented, so this does not mean it will be how it will turn out if you try it. I encourage you to try stuff you find out there for yourselves. This is just my little blog of how things are turning out for me.
For my very first post in this newly revived blog (see I'm already doing better than the last time I tried to revive it) I will show the results of making these:


Aren't they pretty? I thought these would be great for a snack for K or perhaps for a party. So I wanted to try them out. I needed oranges for the peals later to clean the garbage disposal anyway and I had several boxes of jello in the cupboard so I bought a couple and tried it out.

First off, one orange didn't make it to the filling with jello stage. I first tried to eat it like I did as a kid, sucking out the juice and then eating the pulp while turning the orange inside out. I don't know if it has to do with the fruit not exactly being in season right now (it's August afterall) or if I have just forgot the proper way to do that, but the first orange half split down the middle when I tried to turn it inside out to get the pulp off. The second half I ate with a spoon. That worked much better. Then I split the other orange with my daughter by scraping all the pulp out with the spoon then putting it in a bowl.

Then I filled it with my jello mixture. That was not easy. Orange cups do not want to stay standing straight up when filling them. Might want to try setting them in cupcake pan next time to fill them. Then moving them from the counter to the fridge was a little precarious too. Jello un-firmed is splashy. I used cherry jello btw. I ended up with this:

and when I sliced it, it looked like this:

Not bad, My jello didn't seem to congeal as well in these as I had wanted it to. But it still looked really neat. To get the picture at the beginning of the post, you'd have to eat a lot of oranges. But it would still look cool. So I rate this pinspired moment as "Doable", messy but also quite fun.

Third time's a charm right?

So this is may third attempt at a blog. Lets face it I'm not really bloggy material. I'm a bit too ADD. I get distracted by shiny things and often get distracted after I've started a blog and then forget about it for insane amounts of time until I lose readers completely. But I have noticed something I'm doing pretty consistently now. And that is playing with Pinterest.com -I love that site. It's like a virtual idea board with lots and lots of little pins and you can steal things from other people and it's well organized and I won't forget where I put it. I've been trying all kinds of stuff from there.

And that's when I had this idea.

You see so many beautiful pictures of ideas on there but then don't you wonder what it will look like if I tweek it this way or that, or what will it look like simply when I try my non-domestic hand at it? So far I've been fairly pleased. So I think I'll start this blog and post pictures of my versions and opinions of things I've tried that I've found on pinterest. Goodness knows my normal life isn't blog worthy and who knows maybe I'll even get pinned with some of the ideas of my own that I'll post on here, or ones that were inspired by something I saw on there but did not follow directions for (heck I may pin myself just for shameless publicity and curiosity to see if anyone would repin something I came up with).

Resurrection

I actually have a recipe that I have never tried called Resurrection cake. That would have been apt to do for today since I'm reviving an old blog to do this. However I don't have the ingredients for it. So for tonight since it is late I will simply tell you what I fixed and what I learned from it.

But first let me tell you that even after nearly 9 years of marriage I am still learning to cook. That is the reason for this blog. Well it and one other but I'll get to that in another post. I'm trying to become a better cook or at least have a more diverse menu to offer my family without having to go on the "Worst Cooks in America" show in FoodNetwork. I have lots of kitchen disaster stories which I will likely share over time, but my mother did try to teach me to cook - it is just that I didn't pay attention when it counted.

That is not to say that I don't cook for my family. I do. However we stick to the things I do well, which is about 12 dishes served over and over again. But there are gazillions of recipes out there and I have at least 3 or four dozen that I've torn out of magazines or gleaned off the internet that I have never once tried. So this is the year. And here's where you will read about it when I fix it.

This will also be a blog where I review children's books but we'll save that for the next post.

Tonight let me tell you that I fixed Meatloaf (which I have fixed before, but this time used as substitution) and I tried a new recipe called Roasted Winter Vegetables.

Which consisted of cutting up bits of sweet potato, parsnip, and butternut squash, tossing it with olive oil and thyme and roasting it.

This was my first time to ever try a parsnip.

Tonight's Lessons Learned should be labeled "Accept no substitutes" because that is the majority of what I learned tonight.

1. Do not try to substitute ground turkey when making meat loaf - or at least not my mom's recipe for meatloaf. You end up with a very bland meatloaf where the ketchup on top is the best part. Blech.

2. Do not substitute ground thyme for fresh - even if you can't find it at the grocery. The roasted veggies would have been better with just salt and pepper rather than the ground thyme.

3. One parsnip, One butternut squash, and one sweet potato cut up and roasted makes enough to feed about 6 people.

4. Parsnips taste quite a bit like carrots when roasted.

A farmwife MEME

A lot has changed since I last blogged here. For one, my baby is a toddler now. Secondly we have our house on the market trying to move back to a city rather than a town between two cities (if that makes sense). So my answers have changed a bit from what my answers would have been a year ago. But since Farmwife says she'd cry if no one played and I love a good MEME I'm playing:

#1 Do you have a daily cleaning routine? Not normally, I tend to be a do it when it looks like it needs to be done kind of girl. However with trying to sell the house I pick up toys, and vacuum daily and make sure all the dishes are washed as soon as we are done eating off them now in order to be ready in case of a showing.

#2 Do you cook on a regular basis? Yes, on a fairly regular basis. I make a menu once every two weeks, go to the store and get those items and I cook dinner for us at least 6 out of 7 days a week unless there is a special occasion. However every other Tuesday we do dine with my in-laws.

#3 Do you wear aprons? No. I do not. But I have several that were given to me when my grandmother died and I can't bear to part with them because I remember her wearing them. She loved to cook. I sadly, do not.

#4 Do you make the beds everyday Not before we were trying to sell the house. I'm an early riser, husband is a wait-til-the-absolute-last-second-I-can kind of riser. So he was always still in the bed when the notion would strike me. However, now that we are trying to sell it is his responsibility to make sure it gets done after he gets up. I just go in and straighten it. Don't know why it didn't occur to me long before hand to have him take that on as chore.

#5 Not truly a house work question, but it will still fit: What do you call the three meals you eat a day? we are breakfast, lunch and dinner people. Although I have called it supper on occasions. And my family calls a meal between lunch and dinner (where you missed lunch but it's too early for dinner) Scrunch which is a combination of lunch and supper. I don't know if I picked up "dinner" from Jay or what. Here's our discussion question along the same lines. Describe what is called a Pig-in-a-blanket. Is it a sausage wrapped in a pancake? or is it a weenie wrapped in a biscuit? Is it an appropriate meal to eat for dinner?

6# How many loads of laundry do you wash in a week? I hope no one will think me scuzzy for this but I do about 5-6 loads a week. And a lot of times I will wait till the weekend to do all of them. Unless something smells or we run out of something.


7# What is your least favorite chore? Hands down, cleaning the bathrooms.

8# What's your favorite chore? I honestly don't mind laundry one little bit. And I love dusting. Farmwife, if we lived closer we could just switch off for those things.

9# Do you keep a company ready house (or attempt to) or go for that comfortably lived in look or could you be on your own Hoarding: Buried Alive episode on TLC? Mine is that comfortable lived in look most of the time. Or at least that's what I think of it. I'm sure there are some who would think that it's awful

10# I once heard on the radio that 90% of women clean house like their mothers. Do you? Yes. For the most part, though I'm not as detail oriented as she is. And I don't clean if the exterminator is coming like she does, but I do try to tidy as I go like she did and do employ the "blitz" cleaning method she would use at times.

11# (For the mothers out there) Do you expect your children to help out around the house? To what extent?
Well it's tricky right now. I do expect it. But she's 20 months old there isn't just a whole lot she can do yet. She does help me unload the silverware from the dishwasher (after I've removed any knives) and she pulls the laundry out of the drier for me to fold and cleans the lint trap for me. And she's expected to at least pick up some of her toys when we're trying to clean up. So I guess the answer is yes. But really she's so eager to do things like a big girl right now there is no struggle to get her to do those things, I don't know how it will go when there is a struggle. I know I'll expect some (because I want her to have a healthy work ethic) but I believe other things will go by the way side just to avoid the argument.

Just so you know

Not that anyone has check here in ages since I haven't written anything in over a year. But if you do happen to stop by please note that there is a new blog
zanndoodles.blogspot.com
it's completely doodle related - keeping up and getting back in the swing of things through Illustration Friday. But My personal life sneaks in there too.

Fun stuff

I have a new internet addiction that I feel compelled to share. I re-discovered and am loving facebook. So easy to quickly keep up with so many old friends and just get snipets of their lives without having to write long amounts. All the fun of reuniting without the awkward silences. I've found friends ranging from preschool to recent. So... if you have a facebook account or just want to see what all the fuss is about.. I recommend it and invite you to find me there as well. you can search by address - and I'm zannhu at hot mail dot com.

okay so it took a while but....
Our daughter was born on August 7th at 5:29 pm. She weighed in at 7lbs 12 oz and was 21 1/4 inches long. She's doing great and we are beginning to get adjusted. It's a big adjustment for us. Can't believe I haven't made it back here to state that before now. But I'm a little bleery-eyed. All posts about her can be found at livejournal - http://zannli.livejournal.com to be specific (again let me know if you wish to be friended to see the non-public posts). I still read all the blogs in my side bar here, but I can really only keep up with and update one place any more... so this blog is pretty much retired as I'm sure you've guessed by my long absence.

However I may still post something here or there if I ever think of anything.
all the best,
z

Most likely sometime tomorrow, so I am told by my doctors, I will be a mom.
That will be weird.

The lottery is more green--- sorta

Yeah... it's been a while. But I made it back before Did, did. :P

I'm just not good at the whole blogging thing. I read them frequently but I just don't feel like I have much to contribute myself. Pregnancy is going well. It's been a relatively easy one so far. I'm a bit fearful that it will get really hard come delivery time... because it almost seems to have been tooo easy. We're getting to the short days now and I'm beginning to get nervous. Today I learned to install and uninstall a car seat from either of our cars. I also made a decision on a pediatrician. I spend a lot of time feeling tired.

But other than that, it's pretty much business as usual around here.
I did try an experiment over this summer that I thought I'd tell you all about.
Upon receiving a Publisher's clearing house sweepstakes form ... I got to wondering... which has better odds - that or the lottery? I think the odds are about the same for either. But I went ahead out of curiosity and entered publishers. A few weeks later I got another entry form - a follow-up to the first, of course to confirm your entry you had to hunt through all the junky product stickers to find the "address confirmation" sticker or what have you and send it back. Obviously they want to get as many views of their advertised products as possible... but I'll admit, I kinda enjoyed going on the little scavenger hunt to find them. So I confirmed my address with that little sticker and sent it back... Then I just got curious... just how many of these things will they send before the actual give-away date?

Turns out if you keep sending in the various confirmations, and decisions (do I want the millions as a lump sum or a several payments? Let me find that sticker...) you end up receiving/returning around 8 things before the give-away date. Each with it's stack of advertisements with stickers and little "someone in your town is definitely going to win at least $10" statements. And they are full color too.. I can't imagine how much they spend on that crap. How many trees they kill.

I would have thought that it would be cheaper to enter a sweepstakes than to spend money on the lottery with about the same odds of winning. And I still believe that as far as online sweepstakes go as long as you don't mind getting plenty of junk mail or weeding through advertisements. But as far as Publisher's goes... I gotta say the lottery is actually a better deal. They don't kill nearly as many trees for the little single ticket that you get and in the end you pay less. Because if you sent all 8 entries back that are telling you that you are "this close" to winning - You've spent over $3.00 in postage. I don't care how much fun the little scavenger hunt for the stickers is... it's just not worth it. I was just rather staggered by that after my experiment ended. I didn't send all 8 back by the way. Though I'll admit to sending some for curiosity/boredom's sake.

Just to make it clear... I'm not advocating the lottery or sweepstakes here. I just got curious. And I figure someone out here in cyberspace may have been curious about that too... so if you are that person.. I hope I just saved you $3.

Mother's Day

It's been a muli-emotional day for me.
I'll blame the hormones.
As I sat in church this morning I cried at everyone's mention of mom's and their rolls.

I miss my mom. I wish she lived closer. I'm happy I have a good mother-in-law who lives semi-close. But still nothing beats your very own mom. And my mom rocks. Let me just tell you. I may not have thought so at one time. But really she does. I really hope to be a lot like her some day.

I remember last year at this time, feeling that terrible longing to be a mom, only to find out two weeks later that I was expecting and then only five weeks after that, that all was lost and I was right back to the longing again. Have I ever mentioned that I can cry on cue? It was always one of my greatest assets when performed in theater. The secret is to be able to recall something particularly painful and relive those memories. Much like it is good to keep a happy thought to focus on if you need to lift your spirits, it is handy to keep a sad thought on hand if you ever want to bring forth real tears on cue. I've had several sad thoughts to refer to over the years, and that quickly became one of them.

But this year I'm well on my way to being a real mom. And I'm scared. I don't know what I'm doing. I'm assured by many that, that is a common feeling and that no one really knows.. we all just do the best we can. It's one of those learn as you go kinda jobs. But I'm one of those people who likes to know what I'm doing. I like to have a plan. I still get completely overwhelmed and want to hyperventilate walking into BabysRUs or Target because of all the stuff and not knowing what's really necessary and what isn't and some of the stuff I don't even know what it does or how it works and soooo many choices and opinions it is mind numbing. But I keep reassuring myself that people with less life experience than me, have done the job and I can do it too. And no matter how much I dread spit up and stomach viruses... if I can clean up after the dog, and still enjoy having her, I can totally do the same with this kid. After all, I already love her enough to worry all the time that something is going to go horribly wrong and I'll lose her. God has gotten a lot of panic prayers from me over this pregnancy.

But I was happy to receive a mother's day hug from my husband this morning (though he swears up and down that it doesn't count until the baby is actually here) and a DQ blizzard. And I'm thankful for every kick that I feel - though there could be more of them to ease my mind, but then she'd probably have to be kicking every 5 minutes or so and then I'd probably be complaining. And I'm thankful that I think we've finally come up with a name for her other than "Bob". But no one gets to know it until after she's born.... we don't need any feedback changing our minds on this after how much it took to reach the decision.

Oh! And a very happy mother's day to all of you. Whether you're a mom to your own or community mom (one who loves on other people's kids).

Thank You Easter Bunny, Bahck, Bahck!

Okay I don't know if anyone besides me and my family remember that Cadburry commercial from way back.. but we quote it all the time whenever some one does something nice for us. And someone has indeed done something nice for me.

A couple of days ago a little package arrived in our mail. Real mail!!! not bills! Not junk, real mail! I was excited just by the package. But even more excited when I opened it.

Oh Farmwife how you brightened my day. The same day I found out I was going to have to pay 400 dollars to get my car fixed. But a bright piece of cloth with little taggies on it just chased away a bit of those blues.

Isn't it gorgeous. I seriously think you could make a career out of selling these and those headbands. Ever considered setting up shop on Etsy.com?

I find it wonderfully fun that I got a Tag Blanket from a friend I got to know and love in a group that we referred to as TAG. It just seems very appropriate :)

I'm just sorry it has taken me so long to get up the thank you. But I blame it on forgetting my camera.



Have you ever noticed how hard it is to spell the sound a chicken makes?

Thank you all for you input on the naming thing. I'm glad I'm not alone in having it be a struggle. DH and I are now emailing back and forth as per Sarah's suggestion. We tend to make some of our best decisions that way.. might as well try it out for names too.

Things continue to plug along here. I'm enjoying the spring weather but not my allergies that come along with it. We got the furniture for the little girl's room now.. all we need is a mattress and she'll at least have a place to sleep and some clothes to where. I'm looking forward to a weekend with no commitments :)

Oh look, I'm still alive.

I really never meant to go this long without posting or replying for that matter. I really am still reading your blogs. I just do it in little burst here and there. Some how spring has brought lots of busy-ness - and tiredness for that matter.

But because I want to make sure I don't abandon my blog all together, I want to make a post of things I've learned recently. That way you at least know I'm still living... and learning.

- I recently learned that if you put cucumbers on your $5 footlong Subway sandwich.. and eat one half and then save the other half for the next day. The other half that you saved will be really nasty. In fact, the cucumbers will actually liquify the white American cheese. Ewwwww.

- Dairy Queen's Tin Roof blizzards, are not at all like the Tin Roofs my inlaws introduced me to and that I love (vanilla icecream w/chocolate sauce and spanish peanuts) - the DQ version has chocholate covered peanuts and brownie pieces... it is however quite tastey despite not being the same.

- Did you know that if you are going on a walk and want to protect yourself from stray attack dogs... it is better to grab a large umbrella rather than a large walking stick. The umbrella when opened will startle and aggressive dog, make you look bigger (a trick many animals use in nature), and also help protect more of your extrimities than a stick will. I learned that from my girl scout leader co worker. I thought that was really interesting.

- Did you know Jerry Springer had a political career before becoming the king of trash tv? I learned that this week from NPR.

- I also learned that Priceline's cancellation insurance is not worth the money. Because you can only cancel if someone dies or if you have a doctor's excuse. How crappy.

- I'm in the process of learning that "pregnancy brain" really does exist. It is not just an excuse (as I brazenly, always thought) - or it could just be that things are so busy right now that I'm scattered and can't keep track of everything that I normally do.

- I've learned that rooms look a lot smaller once you actually put stuff in them. This I've learned before, but somehow always seem to forget.

- I've learned that there is just nothing much I can do with my hair. There are only just a few lengths that don't turn it into a fro, or bozo hair. It is a fine line to tread... I really wish I could find a new style... one that's easy to deal with... but looks different. My hair is naturally curly and brown.... got any suggestions?

- I've also learned that coming up with a name is not an easy task. We may never actually agree on any names. Those we do agree on are already taken by other friends' children or people we know. Or they sound really weird with our last name. This poor child may be called Bob just for lack of anything that her parents can agree on. We have decided to withhold names until the kid is born... even if we finally come to an agreement... because we don't want anyone's opinion to throw us back into a quandary.

Today is 20wk ultrasound day, and one of the rare days that I will post personal stuff in this blog. Any guesses anyone?

I know some won't guess without a belly picture.. so if you must have one there is one here

Now I also have a question for you mama's out there. I've posted this once before at the other place.. but all input is helpful. Feel free to also post even if you aren't a mom. Not trying to leave anyone out. It's just the nature of the question.


So what have you found to be "must haves" or the greatest helps in caring for an infant. We are a bit over whelmed by all the "Stuff" out there and would just like to know other people's opinions.

EDITED TO INFORM: We Are Having A GIRL

WWHLR: How to fold t-shirts so that the logos show. Fascinating little technique I found here on the internet. I may never fold shirts the old way again.

Now... on to other matters.
I have been sharing odds and end things that I am learning. It is time for my dear friends on Blogger to share their wealth of knowledge. So occasionally I will be asking a question that I am curious about. If your read this blog and my journal you may see these questions twice, but if you only ready here it will be a whole new question to you. But I like getting a wide variety of answers. So now on to my question:

What are your dinner staples? You know the things you fix on a regular basis. The stuff you nearly always buy the ingredients for just to have on hand. The stuff that you whip together when you don't feel like following a recipe or don't have a lot of time. That's the stuff I'm talking about. The stuff you eat often.

For us those would be:
Spaghetti
Chicken Tacos
Chicken Provolone
Grilled Cheese Sandwiches
Baked Potatoes
Chicken and Stovetop
RiceARoni
Fish Sticks
Ham Steaks
Crock Pot Roast & veggies

All of course paired with a fruit or vegetable. I just got curious what other people fix for dinner, while I was fixing one of our tried and true the other night.

And another thing:
I just found out about this reading another blog. I'm a weenier ahem, winner. Thanks to Mommyof4LittlePeople.

And now I shall spread the love.
See here's how it works
The rules for the “You Make My Day” award are to re-present it to 10 people whose blogs bring you happiness and inspiration and make you feel happy about blog land. Let them know through email or by posting a comment on their blog so they can pass it on.
And since I have a rather small number of blogs that I'm able to keep up with over here and some of that small number has already been nominated by other people.. I'm able to give away awards without feeling bad because frankly, you all make my day whenever I'm able to make it over to blogger.

Put on your best red-carpet smile... here we go:

1. I nominate A BOOKWORM because you keep me in the library loop and you've always made my day anyway.

2. ART, because you always have a song in your heart that carries you through even rough times and I find that inspiring and happy.

3. NAN, formerly known as CATE IMAGINES. For being the fun grandmother who just makes me smile because you just exude youth yourself.

4. EMILY - You, much like farmwife, have a great turn of phrase and crack me up on a regular basis.

5. INKLING - I don't often post to your blog, but I do read it and you are ever willing to reach out and ever diligent... you inspire.

6. LAUREN - Your picture posts are always fun and you've gotten me using toilet paper for things I would never have thought I would before :P

7. MADRETZ - Because you are just plain crafty and cool. And your pictures... wow. I get to visit whole new places through your blog.

8. Sarah - another girl with a fun turn of phrase and not afraid to show frustration. I respect... plus you have almost... almost.. gotten me to want a gingerbread latte

9. RAGGED - you just rock... you are so masterful with your needles and so good and writing in a travel journal style. Much like Madretz you let me visit places I may never get to go, through your blog.

9 1/2. MOMTO4LITTLEPEOPLE - It is so great to be reconnected with you. I enjoy hearing about all your happenings... I think I just may have missed you :D

9. GRACE - Lady, you amaze me. You have such joy even during pain... and that is something, plus your kids are just cute.

10. And of course FARMWIFE I wouldn't be on blogger if it were not for you. Plus your comparisons of your children to various figures in history and literature crack me up.

10 1/2. QUEEN MOTHER - I just really enjoy your posts. You are a lot of fun and the little stories about Farmwife, Princess and Bubba are all fun to read for me.

And you can ask any little kid... halve count. They totally do. What you are seeing are actually 10 entries not 12.

And I would have voted for DID, SILAS and GIRL but they have all but quit posting... no guilt though.. no guilt.

WWHLL: I am not an affectionate person

Okay, that's not really true. I'm quite affectionate. I'm just not big on pet names. Since we are still at that point where we don't know what we are having (hopefully human, but maybe a guinea pig... you just never know :P) I hate not having something to call the baby I just don't like saying "it". I always thought that I would give him/her a sweet little in-womb name like many of my friends did, like "our sweetpea" or "peanut","bean", "pumpkin", "honeybun" or "sweetheart" or something...and I don't find anything wrong with those names... but I just have to admit to myself that, that just isn't me. I can't do it. The words won't roll off my tongue. They feel uncomfortable in my mouth.

I'm the girl who actually hates the word "precious." It's like nails on a chalk board to me. I don't really have a good reason why I feel that way toward that word, other than it is often said very insincerely. And it seems that I don't mind it in certain contexts... like "more precious than rubies" that doesn't bother me at all. But "isn't that precious" just makes me tense up. Maybe it's only when it is said with kind of a sing-song sound in the voice... I don't know. I do know that seeing Lord of the Rings didn't help with my feelings toward the word though because now I any time I hear it, I just hear Gollum's voice saying it.

I quit reading a book my mother gave me on the proper nutrition for pregnancy due to it referring to you child as "your sweet baby" all the time. It just got a little too annoying. Plus the book just seemed to talk baby-talk to the mothers... and that disturbed me.

I've been pondering these aversions lately. Maybe I'm just still too much of a tomboy to enjoy them? Maybe they feel too much like being talked down to or talking down to someone else to me? I don't know.. I've just never liked ootsy cutesy terms.. I'm just weird that way I guess. I have often threatened physical violence to anyone other than my daddy if they ever dared call me "Suzy". My DH isn't even allowed to call me Suzy. (I guess "daddy" might count as an ootsy cutesy term if you are a stickler... but I think all parents in the south are referred to as daddy and mama... so I don't really count it)

I wasn't even into cute names when I was tiny. When my mother suggested that I name my baby dolly "Daisy" or "Lilly" or something like that... I told her "No, name him Bob". And Bob he was in his little yellow daisy patterned dress for the next 5 or more years.

So I guess with my past history it shouldn't be surprising that I wouldn't be able to to come up with a cute/affectionate name that seemed to me to fit this yet undermined gender person that I'm growing in there. But I have caught myself talking to the little one. And I believe I have found the term I am comfortable with. Until gender and names are decided or we see what personality this little person has... the baby will be called Little Person. Just like I call it, when I talk to him or her now. LP for short.

Oh.. and the other think I've learned this week is that I keep changing my letters.
So just for anyone's piece of mine here is a key to what I'm saying in my subject lines:

WWHLL = What We Have Learned Lately
WWHLTW= What We Have Learned This Week
WWHLT = What We Have Learned Today
WWHLR = What We Have Learned Recently

WWHLTW
Never ask what kind of cheese a Mexican restaurant is serving. Being new to this whole pregnancy thing and overwhelmed by all the things you aren't suppose to do or eat. I just wanted to make sure the queso was pasteurized. That's all. Just wanted to know if it was. I had asked around on my journal (not at the restaurant) and got mixed ideas about it. Some thought it might be goat cheese, others were pretty sure it is processed white American cheese. I decided to give it a chance anyway since DH loves Mexican food and I was craving some nachos and just ask to make sure.

So I asked our waiter what kind of cheese it was. He said he didn't know. Then said he thought it might be American. I said good thinking "okay good it's processed therefore pasteurized" then he said, "but I don't know it could be Mexican. So obviously we were having a bit of difficulty understanding each other. So I asked if he knew if it was pasteurized or not- since that is really what I was trying to find out. And that is where I messed up. Apparently he was unfamiliar with that term. He started telling me how the health inspector was there ever month and they always passed. I apologize and tell him I'm not questioning that the food is safe.. I just want to know if the cheese is pasteurized. It's very good cheese, I think we get it from Scisco truck he says. I thank him, tell him I'm sorry again and just order the nachos anyway. I'm pretty sure from all that, that it is indeed processed cheese and therefore pasteurized.

But I think I unintentionally seemed like I was insulting his country by asking. *Sigh* I really didn't mean it that way. I just wanted to know if it was pasteurized.

WWHLR
No matter what the lady giving free samples at Kroger says and no matter how frugal I'm feeling at the time. I should never buy an 8lb ham "that freezes well" for just Jay and myself. What a mess that was over the weekend. First I had to cook it for about 3 hours. That was no problem really but the slicing.... wow. What a mess. We have a very small amount of work space in our kitchen. An 8 lb. ham on a cutting board takes up all of it. The dog did enjoy licking the bottom of the cabinets where ham juice ran down as I was cutting. But ewwww. So after slicing the enormous ham. I then had to clean the kitchen thoroughly. And I now have enough ham in the freezer to feed a small army. And what is worse, due to smelling the hammy smell for that amount of time, and being pregnant... I now have absolutely no desire to eat the ham that I worked so hard on. I'm hoping the desire comes back soon. I'm thankful that Easter comes early this year. Perhaps we'll have everyone we know come over and eat ham from our freezer that day. I'm pretty sure it will keep two months in the freezer. Must be sure to look that up.