Back to Normal

**I want to preface this post by saying that I write a lot of posts that are REALLY boring to everybody else, but I want to remember the details, so I blog about it, and this is one of those posts. It's all about our sick week last week. The next time we get sick, I want to be able to look back and think "well, at least we'r e not as sick as we were that week". The next time Greg doesn't take out the trash, I can look back at this post and know "well, at least when Carter and I were both throwing up, he stayed up for basically 6 hours cleaning everything up, changing pjs, changing sheets, etc."**

Things are finally getting back to normal around here. Last week was really rough, it all started Sunday night around 10:00 when Evan started crying. I went in to check on him and found that he'd thrown up. I quickly bathed him and put on fresh pjs while Greg changed the sheets. We put him back to bed and a few minutes later he started crying again and had thrown up again. 3 hours later, several pajama changes and crib sheet changes later, he was finally done throwing up, although it took him even longer than that to fall back into a deep sleep. I stayed up and rocked him and checked on him while Greg slept and he got up with the boys in the morning while I slept in. I'm so glad Greg has a flexible schedule that allows for things like this.
Evan woke up happy and seemed fine. He didn't have as much of an appetite as he normally does, but other than that, he seemed fine. So, Greg went on to work. Both boys played great that day and acted fine, but as the day progressed I started to get a sore throat and feel achy. When Greg came home, he took both boys out so I could take a nap. The next day I was worse, body aches, tired, chills, etc. So, Greg took off work and kept the boys for me while I rested most of the day.
That night, about 11:00, Carter woke up crying, Greg went to check on him and he had thrown up. I got up and bathed Carter, and put him in fresh pajamas while Greg changed his sheets. I started to feel sick and then I threw up. I thought it might just be from cleaning up Carter, so I didn't think anything of it. Carter threw up again and I then I did also. I started to feel so sick to my stomach that I could barely move without gagging. Greg ended up taking care of Carter until about 2:30 when he finally quit throwing up and went to sleep. I just laid in bed, trying not to move and trying not to throw up. My stomach hurt so bad and I was so miserable. About 3-4, I ran to the bathroom, but didn't make it in time and threw up all over the bathroom. Greg got up and cleaned the bathroom and helped me back in bed. I ended up throwing up again before I finally fell asleep.
When the boys woke up that morning about 7:30, I couldn't even get out of bed. I felt worse than I've ever felt. Poor Greg had been up all night cleaning up and helping me and Carter and then he started to feel bad, but since I couldn't get out of bed, he got up with the boys. He ended up calling someone to come over and stay with the boys since I wasn't able to help and he was feeling worse and worse. She kept the boys from about 11-2 in the basement so we could sleep. I honestly don't know what we would have done without her help. When she left, I went downstairs to see if I could help with the boys, but was feeling so awful. My doctor called me in something for the nausea, so we decided to go to Target. I drove there and Greg ran in while I stayed in the car with the boys. Just sitting in the car was more than I could handle and Greg had to drive back. We were in bad shape. We made it through the rest of the afternoon and put the boys to bed early. I slept on the couch while Greg watched some tv and then we went to bed about 7:30.
Thursday, Greg was feeling much better. I was still feeling awful, but not nearly as bad as Wednesday. My mom was came up from Georgia, she already had a trip planned to come stay with us for 2 weeks, so we thought it was perfect timing, since we needed some help. It was so nice Friday and Saturday when I was still on the mend to have an extra pair of hands to help with everything.
 But, unfortunately, my mom caught the same thing we had. She started feeling a little rough on Sunday and now she's where we were last Wednesday. I feel awful that she caught it. We've been careful with washing hands and everything, but if the boys are carrying it and you're around them--you will catch it, apparently. Poor Mamaw. :(
 Apparently, what we had is going around the whole county, so a lot of people are feeling like we did.

 Oh, and on top of getting sick, Carter got his top two canine teeth in last week. Of course.

Luckily, I am 100% again (except I've lost my voice for some reason, so I sound awful--but feel fine). It's also supposed to be unseasonably warm today--a high of 67, so after the boys wake up from their nap, I'm going to take them to Yoder's to pet the animals and eat some lunch, then maybe to a park to run off some energy, then hopefully, they'll take a second nap this afternoon. Greg is working late (until 6) for the next two weeks, so it'll just be us until bathtime.

Here's some pictures I took last week. I didn't take many, and the ones I did take were from my phone.

The boys playing in the basement

Both boys love blocks that snap together.

I love watching them play.

Carter with his little people cars. It's blurry, but he was looking at the camera and smiling, so I had to post it.

Evan and Carter both decided they wanted to climb up and stand on this chair. Always climbing somthing, and they are definitely "monkey see, monkey do" about everything!!

I love that they are sitting next to each other on the floor, they look so cute!!

I'm so glad it's supposed to be warmer out today. I'm looking forward to spring and summer. Warm weather, sunny days, and no more colds for awhile!!

Project 365 Week 4

Last week was rough. Everybody in the house was sick, I didn't even get a picture for January 25th. I'm really disappointed, but the last thing I was thinking about that day was getting a picture. I'll do a recap of last week, but here's the pictures for week 4 of Project 365.

It was cold and icy, I wish I was able to get a picture that truly showed how icy it was out.

Buffalo Chicken Salad. Greg and I have this for dinner several nights a week. and we have been since October. We're addicted. They're so good!!

The boys playing in the basement. I moved the date stamp so you could see that Evan was licking his toys. Crazy boy.

This was taken about 8 or 9 in the morning. This is how foggy it was. You can't see anything past our deck. It was so weird.

The boys never sit this close without rough housing. It was so cute to see them sitting side by side, nice and calm.

Storytime with Mamaw.

Stuffed Peppers

A few years ago, I tried a very basic and simple stuffed peppers recipe that I got out of a Weight Watchers cooking magazine. The magazine was called something like "5 ingredients or less and ready in 15 minutes or less" so it was good, but a little plain. I recently found a stuffed peppers recipe on Pinterest that looked good and decided to try it. After I printed it out and was going over the ingredients, I noticed it was missing some things that I wanted, so I decided to do something I NEVER do, I decided to just add the things I like from both recipes to create my own recipe. . I always go by a recipe and use the exact measurments. I thought they turned out really good, especially the filling. I didn't precook the peppers and they ended up being little overwhelming, so next time, we'll precook them so they're soft and not as strong tasting.

Stuffed Green Peppers

Ingredients

4 large green peppers

1 onion, chopped

1 lb hot italian sausage

1/2 jar of spaghetti sauce or marinara

2 bags of 10 minute rice

1/2 tsp oregano

1/2 cup parmesan cheese

mozzerella cheese

Preheat the oven to 375. Cook rice according to directions. Trim the bottom of the bell peppers so they have a flat surface to stand on, and hollow the insides out. Take the extra bell pepper you have from cutting the tops off, the onion, and the italian sausage and cook in a pan until sausage is browned. Add sausage mixture to bowl. Add rice, oregano, parmesan cheese, and marinara sauce. Mix well. Add mixture to peppers. You'll have extra, I used a 9x13 baking dish, so I would have room to cook the extra filling. Bake for 30 minutes. Remove from oven and add mozzerella cheese to the top of each pepper and the extra filling. Cook for an extra 10-15 minutes or until cheese is melted.



Week Recap

As you saw from the pictures I used for my project 365, last week was rough, but we did do a lot of fun things also. Tuesday night I had my Mom's Night Out with MOPs and we had craft night. We made these fun, fleece scarves and sat around and talked. Wednesday we had a playdate with the little girl next door. That was the first day of the boys officially being on one nap a day. Thursday, we had a MOPs playgroup in the morning and a pizza making party playdate that afternoon. Friday, we ran some errands and took it easy. We rented "Rise of the Apes" to watch that night, and I really liked it. Greg and I have been renting a lot of comedies lately, most of them not being very good, so a drama was a nice change of pace.

I didn't get a lot of picture last week, but here's Carter after the pizza making playdate. Greg and Evan were at the gym, and after I got home, I decided to add a couple more toppings to the pizza. Carter was my little helper. He helped put toppings on and he taste tested the toppings to make sure they were good.

Then, he decided it was fun to throw the toppings on the floor.

Saturday, we took the boys to Chik-Fil-A in the pj's for free breakfast. Our Chik-Fil-A does family activities a lot and it was a fun excuse to get out of the house. We came back to the house to let the boys play a little bit, then headed out to the gym. After working out, we came home, fed the boys lunch and put them down for their one nap. It's a bit of an adjustement going from two naps to one, for them and us. After they woke up, we ran to Sam's Club and came home and I made stuffed green peppers, I thought they turned out great and I'll post the recipe here in a couple of days. After the boys went to bed, we watched the movie "Courageous". I've been wanting to see it since it came out in theaters. I thought it was really good but it had some really sad parts.

Evan and Greg in the morning. Evan never sits on our laps for more than a few seconds and he sat with Greg for a long time, I had to get a picture.

The boys at Chik-Fil-A, enjoying their free chicken mini's.

I couldn't get this picture to turn right.

It was really dreary the entire day. There was hardly anybody out. Greg had to get his haircut on the way home, the boys and I waited in the warm car.

Waiting on daddy.

Ice on the trees.

Today, we woke up, got ready, went out to breakfast, and then to church. We've really wanted to try some churches around here to find one that works for us so we can start going every Sunday. Now that the boys are on one nap a day and don't mind if we leave them in the nursery, we've started our search again. The church we went to this morning actually has a few different locations, so we're going to try out a different location next Sunday. The service and environment was more Greg's cup of tea, it  had a more contemporary feel with a christian pop band and laid back atmosphere. I prefer a more tradtional service, but I'm just happy to be going to church. I completely forgot to take pictures, but the boys looked cute in their khaki's and polo shirts and Greg even wore a tie. The boys are napping now, and when they wake up, we're hoping to get to the gym again. I'm making grilled southwest chicken wraps for dinner and if they turn out good, I'll post the recipe here.

I hope everybody is having a good weekend.

Project 365 Week 3

This week has been exhausting, I didn't do very good with my project 365. I took a picture every day, but they weren't good pictures. Hopefully, I'll do better nextw eek.

We hit some really good sales and stocked up on coffee for my Keurig. This raspberry chocolate flavor is a seasonal flavor and I got the last two boxes Target had. Kohl's was already sold out.

Carter throwing a tantrum. It's been that kind of week, you'll see from the other pictures.

This is the day that I read up on aperature and tried out some new settings on my camera.

I think the boys look so handsome in their polo shirts, this is an instagram picture from my iphone.

Yes, this is gross, but it's the ONLY picture I took for the entire day. I was trying to get a picture of his black eye. The snot does help convey how my week was going.

I got out some stuff to donate to a yard sale at the church and the boppies were some of the items that I was donating. Evan decided to make himself comfortable. I thought he look so cute.

And this picture pretty much sums up the ENTIRE week. It's been a rough one. Some days are just going to be harder than others and this week was full of them. I'm SO happy that it's the weekend and I'm able to recharge a little bit.

Menu

In trying to keep up with my goal to plan my menu for the week and shop efficiently, I've been looking through my recipes trying to decide what to make for next week. I finally picked out the recipes I wanted to make, a mix of new recipes and some tried and true classics. The boys and I are going to do our weekly grocery shopping tomorrow morning while Greg is at work for the first time. We normally do our grocery shopping on weekends, but we've been skipping the morning nap the past couple of days (which is why I haven't posted in a few days) and we need things to do in the morning to keep us busy. I'll post a recap of our week soon, but for now here's our menu for the week.

Friday

Salsa Chicken

Source: chefmommy-brandao.blogspot.com via Samantha on Pinterest

Saturday

Stuffed Green Peppers

Source: kalynskitchen.com via Samantha on Pinterest

Sunday

Crispy Southwest Chicken Wraps

Source: melskitchencafe.com via Samantha on Pinterest

Monday

Leftovers

Tuesday

Creamy Italian Chicken

Source: the-girl-who-ate-everything.com via Samantha on Pinterest

Wednesday

Poppyseed Chicken

Thursday

Homemade Pizza (bbq chicken and tomato basil)

Source: scissorsandspatulas.com via Samantha on Pinterest

Friday

Crockpot Chicken and Dressing

Source: mangiodasola.com via Samantha on Pinterest

It's been an exhausting week here, I'm hoping to post a recap of the week tomorrow or Friday. I hope everybody is having a great week.

Weekend Recap & Jalapeno Popper Chicken

Greg got off work on Friday at 9:30 and had Monday off, a 3 and 1/2 day weekend and I have no idea where it went. It seemed to go by so fast and we didn't really do much. Friday we went to lunch at Panera and then the gym. Saturday we took the boys to get their hair cut. This was Evan's 4th or 5th haircut and Carter's 2nd. We hit up some good sales. Sunday morning, we went grocery shopping, Greg took the boys to the gym and I met a friend for lunch. We ended up sitting and talking for 3 hours and it was so nice to have that adult time. Monday, I cleaned house, we went to lunch, and ran some errands. It was so cold this weekend, so we couldn't really do anything outside.

Here's some pictures of our weekend.

Snip-It's has a Melissa and Doug train table that the boys love playing on while we're there. It was pretty busy and we ended up having to wait a little bit (we usually don't have to wait at all) and the boys played good the whole time.

Evan before the hair cut.

 

 The boys woke up early on Sunday and so we decided to go ahead and get our grocery shopping over with. This is what time we were loaded in the car and on our way to Kroger. Way too early!

The boys at Lowe's on Monday. You can see their fresh haircuts.

 Harris Teeter had boxes of Keurig coffee on sale for 4.99!!! I was so excited.

These pictures are all out of order, but here's Carter climbing his piano.

And here's Carter throwing a tantrum. The transition from two naps a day to one nap is not easy and makes for some fussy babies.

I've been trying to sit down and read my Nikon D60 for Dummies, but it's hard to get motivated to sit down and tackle that big book. I found this photography course on a girls' blog where she's writing about a new thing each week. She breaks down the basics and makes them so easy to understand. This weeks' course was on Aperture. So, she gives her readers an "assignment" to try at home to learn more and see how it works on their camera. I took several pictures using different settings, the first one is on the lowest aperture and the second one is on the highest. I'm looking forward to next week's course.

Notice the difference in the backgrounds? Too bad there's not a camera setting that hides the mess on my counters.

And for dinner on Saturday we had one of my favorite dishes, Jalapeno Popper Chicken. Taking this picture is what made me go online to look for information on taking better pictures. The lighting is horrible and it looks like crap. But, the chicken tasted so good and I like to have a picture to go with the recipe. (that's corn and macaroni in the background, it's not one big huge yellow side dish)

Jalapeno Popper Stuffed Chicken

1 8-ounce package cream cheese, softened
1/2 cup shredded cheddar cheese
2 jalapeno peppers, seeded and minced
4 strips of bacon, diced
4 (6 ounce) skinless, boneless chicken breast halves
1 cup seasoned bread crumbs (I used regular bread crumbs and seasoned them with salt, pepper, garlic powder and onion powder)
1. Cook the bacon in a skillet over medium heat until crispy. Drain on paper towels. (I used microwavable bacon--easier and tastes just as good)

2. Stir together the cream cheese, cheddar cheese, bacon, and jalapenos in a small bowl.

3. Cut a pocket horizontally through the thickest side of each chicken breast, and fill with 1/4 of the cheese mixture. Secure with toothpicks.

4. The original recipe says to fry chicken in a pan, but I just bake mine in the oven at 350 for 30-40 minutes.