The Tutu and the Garage

The title will make sense in a minute. First, a random picture of Carrie taking care of her babies. She pushed them around the house in her stroller, after I helped her buckle them in of course.
.
.
She had her 15 month checkup yesterday and here's her stats:
Weight: 19 lbs, 4 oz .... 4th percentile
Height: 30 1/4 inches .... 40th percentile
.
Drumroll... I finished the tutu for Carrie. Be warned, it's pretty over-the-top, but she loves it. She wore it around all morning just playing. She was sad to take it off so we could get in the car for yet another neighborhood get-together. This time we had 12 moms and 24 kids (all under school age) just hanging out, and eating lunch and birthday cake. It was fun :)
.
.
.
Of course, her favorite playplace, the pantry... The sad face is because I found her and she knows I'm going to make her get out.
.
.
Onto the garage. Our house did not have an automatic garage door opener when we moved in. So for the last several weeks, we've been parking in the driveway. Luckily, we have a crazy long driveway, so it hasn't been so bad. This last weekend though, my dad (with a little help from Justin and even less help from me) installed the automatic opener! Yeah!!
.
It's been awesome to be able to park easily in the garage for the last few days. And just in time for the heat to come! I am loving having the van in a cool place, (cooler than the driveway at least).
.
And lucky us, we can fit both of our cars in the garage! It's not full of junk! Imagine that, a two car garage that actually holds two cars!
.
.
Not only does it hold both the cars, it also holds our new deep freeze chest freezer. It is currently filled with 18 pints of strawberry jam and a few homemade freezer meals that I'm sure will come in handy on a day that I don't want to cook dinner.
.
.
A follow-up on my craft projects, I finished Carrie's "big girl room" curtains. Seriously the easiest curtains ever. Hem all four sides and sew a strip of fabric along the back to put the curtain rod through. Scrunch it, and tah-dah! Done! I worked a little on the bedskirt, but I didn't take a picture of it because it's still just strips of fabric... not much to look at.
.
.
.
Well it's about time to go finish making dinner. (The potatoes are the easiest and have been baking themselves for the last 25 minutes. It already smells yummy.)

My New Friends are SEW Nice

The day after I posted last week, I was invited to go to a girl's house in the ward where some of the young moms were gathering that day. They had started a sewing project together and were going to finish it. We were there from 9am to 2:30pm. (Carrie even took a nap in their pack'n'play) Throughout the day there were 10 moms and about 15 kids there all just playing and hanging out. It was crazy, but it was sooooo much fun! I got to meet the young moms in my neighborhood and now they know who I am, and I'll be invited whenever they get together to hang out next. I took along my sewing machine and made my kitchen curtain.
. .
What do you think? Right now it's stuck up with thumb tacks while I "test it out". Should it stay?...
.
I almost hate to admit, but I've become a Hobby Lobby frequent flier. I entered a Hobby Lobby for the first time not even two months ago while I was thinking, "Hmmm, I have a new house to decorate, what should I do?" And now it's become the best store ever. The proof, today I bought fabric for family room curtains (right) and fabric for a bedskirt and curtains in Carrie's "big girl" room (left)... I am very excited though for the tutu I'm going to attempt to make.
..
While I've been busy being so crafty, I've neglected the dishes in my kitchen sink. I guess I better get off the computer and go take care of some stuff ;) Until next time!

Strawberry Frenzy!

Carrie just might turn into a strawberry soon. It's her new favorite food. She usually gobbles them up faster than I can cut them up onto her high chair tray.
.
Strawberries are now fully in season and at their cheapest price (yipee), so it's time to make Strawberry freezer jam!
.
.
I blogged last year about my first time helping my mom make jam. This year, since we moved 45 minutes away from my parents, I decided to make it all by myself. My mom said, "It's easy, the recipe is right on the box of pectin (the stuff that makes jam jel-up)"
.
So I bought 8 pounds of strawberries and sugar and pectin to go with it. By the way, I discovered 8 pounds is WAY too much for our little family so I will likely be giving away jars of jam as presents for a little while.
.
I read the recipe and cut up, chopped up and measured the right amount of strawberries and sugar into the bowl. I apparently missed the real "directions" though because I dumped the pectin powder right in and mixed it up too. You're supposed to mix it with water and boil it so it gets syrupy before you add it to the fruit. Oops...
.
I thought I'd ruined a whole batch of jam (which luckily was only 1/2 of my strawberries). I called my mom who helped me find the "troubleshooting" section on the recipe and hopefully I fixed it. My 6 jars of "maybe" jam are sitting on the counter jelling-up as we speak. I'll report next time if it worked. Meanwhile, I still have tons of strawberries left and more jam to make.
.
And per request, a picture of our under-cabinet lights. Tah-dah! (Thanks again dad, they look great!)
.
.
Earlier this morning, I heard Carrie rustling around in the kitchen. Turns out, she had figured out how to slide open the pantry door and was going grocery shopping with her stroller!
.
.
.
.
Rice, beans, mustard, ranch, peanuts and vanilla snackpacks huh? Interesting combo... I wonder what she's making for dinner tonight?...

Not Quite Bon Bons

I had a friend (who works full time) ask me "What do you do all day when you stay at home? Don't you get bored?" In answer to that question, here has been my day so far.
.
-Woke up when Carrie did; 5:50... yuck.
.
-Get breakfast for both of us.
.
-Get both of us cleaned up and ready for the day, which probably takes twice as long as it should because I spend so much time trying to keep Carrie from pulling everything out of the bathroom cupboards or drawers.
.
-Assemble the lists for the day (to-do and to-buy)
.
-Trek out to Wal-Mart *Side note: I'm SUPER proud of myself today. I planned out a week's worth of dinner menus and only bought the things on my list. I didn't put ONE thing in my basket that wasn't on my list. This is a huge accomplishment for me!
.
-Back home and unload groceries while Carrie is whining because she's beyond ready for a nap.
.
-Give Carrie a snack and put her down for a nap
.
-Gaze longingly at the cookies sitting on the counter, but hold my resolve and think, "when I cross some things off the to-do list I'll feel better about eating them, like I've earned it"
.
-Unload the dishwasher and load the few things that have already been dirtied and left in the sink
.
-Clean the bathrooms (and wash my hands)
.
-Treat myself :) Sit down with some delicious homemade oreos and milk and watch a movie I Tivo'd on Lifetime last week. Ahhh......
.
-Movie finished just in time to hear Carrie squeel something that means "Mommy, I'm awake! And hungry!"
.
-Lunchtime for everyone!
.
-Clean up and send my little baby doll to play with her toys
.
-Give a hug because she fell off her scooter toy, even though she didn't really get hurt
.
-Sit down to blog all my crazy random thoughts. Except I really must be going now because Carrie keeps pushing buttons on the printer; making copies and scanning blank pages etc, and is trying to crawl under the desk to the power strip and shut the entire computer system down.
.
.
MY LIFE AS A STAY-AT-HOME MOM. I LOVE IT!! And no, I don't get bored :)

Greer Look-alike Meter

MyHeritage: Family tree - Genealogy - Celebrity - Collage - Morph

No Pictures, Sorry

I guess I haven't gotten my camera out lately. So here's a boring post of things we've done lately:
.
*We got a few more random straggler boxes unpacked and found the salt and pepper shakers in a box filled with lotions and shampoos...???
.
*My awesome dad installed some under-cabinet lights for us in the kitchen. I guess I'll have to try to get a picture of that.
.
*Tried AGAIN to get the sprinkler fixed. Not yet... Still working on it.
.
*Painted the "Extra" upstairs bedroom that will be Carrie's whenever we have another baby.
.
*I vacuumed the house for the first time yesterday. (A little gross that we lived here for 2 weeks before I "got around to it", I know) It takes a LONG time! This house is WAY bigger than anywhere we've ever lived before!
.
*I went to 2 baby showers, one of which I kicked booty at the "melted candy bar in the diaper" game and I ate an entire jar of chicken and broth baby food in about 15 seconds. Gross, but I was sweetly rewarded :)
.
*Taught our first Primary lesson and we all (us and the kids) survived. One of our neighbors and new friends took Carrie to Sunday School and RS/Priesthood for us.
.
I am very excited to meet some of the other young moms in the neighborhood that I was told hang out with each other and do things with the kids almost every day. Awesome!
.
I don't know if I already posted this, but the weekend we moved in, we bought a 2003 Dodge Grand Caravan because we sold our Jeep. So I am officially a "real" mom. Minivian, mortgage, super cute kid; check, check and check :)

Exhausted

Man, we're tired around here. Justin gets up at 4:30 every day to go to work and lately while we've been piecing the house together we've been getting to bed late (and when I say late I mean 9:30 or 10. We're old, I know).
.
Carrie decided that 6:45 was a good time to get up this morning. Ugh.
.
Some picture proof of our general tiredness around here. This is Carrie eating dinner last night.
.
.
Justin is quite the hard working trooper though. As soon as he came home from work today he set up the TV/DVD/Wii in the loft and moved straight on to the front yard sprinklers.
.
The front yard is landscaped, but has been totally neglected and is overrun with weeds. One of the sprinklers is broken and shoots straight up. He made a trip to the hardware store and got to work digging in the mud. Carrie was actually down for her afternoon nap so I went outside to help. I ended up pulling weeds (and scratching up my hands).
.
Well the darn sprinkler was NOT cooperating so I ended up in the mud too trying to help. After about an hour, no progress and the sun going down, we gave up for the day. I was so wiped out we had hot dogs and cold cereal for dinner... Now it's only 7:45 and I am beyond ready for bed.
.
I guess I'll sacrifice a little sleep to watch the Coyotes Hockey game for a little while first ;)

Feeling More Like Home

It's been one week and our house is starting to feel like home. Carrie already knows where everything is. For example, last night I said, "It's time to go take a bath", and she went right over to the stairs, crawled up and went around the corner to her bathroom. I was so proud :) The downstairs is pretty much done, yeah! The upstairs still has a few boxes lying around, mostly in our room, (and the "extra" bedroom which has become the catch-all for the random stuff that doesn't really have a place. Things are looking really good. I love it! Anyways, more pictures. Enjoy! Come visit and see it in person!
.
.
.
Carrie's "toy corner" in the Family Room. It's just the right size for her.
.
This picture is mostly to show the decorative plates above the cabinets. Curtains to come soon ( I hope)
.
A completely random picture of Carrie. She's had juice before, but this is the first time I gave her a juice box instead of in a sippy cup and she loved it! She slurped it dry!

Getting Settled In

Whew! Moving weekend is over! Now instead of my apartment being a tornado, my HOUSE is a tornado, but it's spread out in much more space so it doesn't feel too bad. We had a TON of help unpacking our moving truck. One of the guys from our new ward who came to help said he counted 24 people... Wow... I have a feeling this ward is going to be AWESOME!
.
And a super humongous THANKS to my parents and siblings for all the help loading and unloading and painting and setting up and cleaning and unpacking and organizing... Etc...
.
Here's the "progress" so far.
.

Easter Diva

Since Easter fell on Conference Sunday this year, my mom bought Carrie some Easter pajamas instead of an Easter dress. We moved all day Saturday, but went back to Mesa that night for Justin and the boys in my family to go to Priesthood Session and for the girls to go out to dinner. We ended up sleeping at my parents house Saturday and Sunday night. Mostly to avoid the driving back and forth for Easter/Conference Sunday. The Easter Bunny actually did show up Sunday morning with a few presents and a LOT of candy. Yummy!
.
.
Now onto the title of this post. Carrie is very much ALL girl! She loves necklaces, bracelets, sunglasses, purses etc. (Notice the connect-a-rings she is wearing as bracelets in the picture above). It's so dang cute, I snapped a couple of pictures.
.
Pictures of the house to come soon!
.

Can't Think of a Title

My brain is gone. My apartment is a tornado. We're half moving tomorrow and mostly moving on Saturday. Everything is a stressful mess... I want to go to bed, but there's too much to do.

Anyways, the real reason for this post is these awesomely adorable pictures of Carrie. Enjoy. My next post may be a few days longer wait than usual while I'm trying to unpack and find sanity in the new house!!