Food, Food, Food...and getting ready for baby!

Laurel has always been a picky eater.  In the last couple weeks, we've actually expanded what she will eat--she now eats pasta!  Right now she mostly likes pasta with marinara sauce...and lots of parmesan cheese (does she really like the pasta, or is it just a good vehicle for the cheese?).

Eat pasta!

 She is also on a big oatmeal kick.  She a little picky--she doesn't like the real stuff, just instant oatmeal--but she asks for oatmeal for about every meal now, even more than she asks for yogurt!

The other morning Laurel did not want to put down the bear, so he helped her eat her oatmeal.

 Laurel is a happy kid with a silly side and a great sense of humor.  She can now count to 10, speaks in sentences (sometimes), and copies everything we do!  She found a really old calculator, and uses it as her phone, and to "check email."

Hi Uncle Jim!  How ya doin'?  I like Dora!

Cheese!

 I'm now at 34 weeks pregnant, and feeling tired, crappy, uncomfortable, and ready to be done.  However, I know that the longer the baby is in, the healthier it will be, so I'm ready to deal with this for about 5 more weeks...unless I happen to go into labor early, in which case I will not complain!

Anyway, I take care of Laurel all day, but by the evening I am usually very tired and spend a lot of time sitting.  Scott is wonderful and does a great job playing with Laurel--she likes to fly around the house, to throw balls, and this new game: sit on dad's face.

I made ham balls for supper on Saturday, and decided to buy extra meat and make a giant double batch so I could put some in the freezer.  I managed to get a pan for supper, plus enough for 2 more pans.  And we had lots of leftovers.  I froze the extra on the pan, then put them in freezer bags, so all I'll have to do is dump them in a pan, make the sauce, and bake!  Yum!

One of my goals for this year is to use less processed food.  I made chicken enchiladas for supper earlier this week, and made the enchilada sauce from scratch.  It was tasty!  Of course, the sauce used canned tomato sauce, and I still used store bought salsa and store bought tortillas, but it is one step.  Hopefully some day in the future I will grow lots of tomatoes and can my own sauce.  And I do know how to make my own tortillas, and they are delicious...but I am just too tired to do that right now.

We've hung up the decorations in the baby's room, and I've packed a hospital bag for me and an overnight bag for Laurel, for when the baby comes.  I have a number of meals in the freezer, and am working on getting Scott to think about baby names (his decision making process is slower than mine, so I'm waiting patiently for him to come up with a few names he really likes for both boys and girls.  He might wait until the day we go to the hospital to really think about it...).  We bought a double stroller so that I will be able to go on walks with both kids and work on getting back into shape after this baby is born, and it's been sitting in the box in the basement for about a week.  I finally took it out and put it all together today.  Laurel likes it!

You can put the baby seat either in the front or in the back, and put Laurel in the other seat.  You can also take out the back seat and use it as a jump seat where an older child can stand or sit facing backwards.  Very versatile!