Miss Trouble

These photos are about a month old. I just realized with with her not sleeping all this time I barely took any photos of Anya in the last few weeks... Here she is, pretending to be your typical 4 month old baby.

There's nothing like retail therapy

The last couple of weeks have been rough (or should I say 'months'?) with Anya's sleep getting progressively worse each day. I think I hit my breaking point last week when I told Mark that I didn't care about money, I wanted Amby bed NOW, because it was probably the only thing we hadn't tried with Anya to help her to sleep better. Well, he did that and more :)

I cautiously asked him after we finished shopping at Costco, if he would take me to a thrift store to get 'a few things'. It was getting late and more shopping would mean another hour or more at the store. But surprisingly Mark said 'yes'. I say 'surprisingly', because you have to know what it's like to take all 4 munchkins to the store wondering who's going to run out of patience first. Usually it's a tie between Mark and Elijah (men *sigh*), followed closely by Maya and Anya. Me? I just go into stress mode as soon as we enter the store, waiting for the 'bomb' to explode at any moment.

The shopping was good, I found a few things for myself and girls, after which I realized how little non-grocery shopping I've done this summer (I think Anya has been wearing the same 3 onesies for the first 4.5 months of her life). Mark found several books for kids and he was especially proud by his almost-new-and-still-shiny "My Friend Rabbit" find :)

So we left the store with 3 bags full of stuff, and the most fun part is that we barely spent $60 on everything! There's nothing like some retail therapy without any guilty feelings afterwards :)












And because I love my new skirt so much :)

new look

ain't my husband a genius? :) a few minor changes will be added later...

Gotta cheat sometimes...

Mark posted a summary of what we've been up to lately, and I'll settle with posting a link to that post on our other blog.(did I just use the word 'post' 3 times?)

...um..... my mind went completely blank while I was trying to put into words how tired I am for blogging these days and how increasingly poorly A has been sleeping. Sorry, brain, for the overload... I won't try to do any thinking until I give you at least 2 hours of uninterrupted sleep.

Better than Olympics

Ever heard of Paul Hunt? Neither did I, until last week when I accidentally came across several old recordings of his performances. Even turns out he lived(lives?) in UT. But that's about it, couldn't find anything else through Google, not even on Wikipedia. Too bad, I'd love to have better quality videos of his stunts! Imagine an Olympic gymnast with a smiley face on his/her bottom? Gold medal guaranteed!

Here are two of my favorites, more can be found on YouTube:

Secret garden

Looks like it, doesn't it? Too bad it's not ours... Our friends let us pick their apricots a few weeks ago and it looked almost magical after the rain. They let us come while they were gone and even left ladder and bags for us! Unfortunately they showed up at home too soon... Ha! Just kidding :)

Maya and Elijah found a snail and called it their 'pet'. There's only one way they could come up with that, from watching "Signing Times" too many times ;)

What bed sheets are good for...

Baby slings! We bought a set of delicious 100% organic cotton bedding at Target a while ago, and I happened to fall in love with the soft silky feel of that fabric, not to mention the gorgeous blue color! We never use flat sheets that come with such sets, so that's a huge piece of organic cotton waiting to be sewn into something! Perfect length for a ring sling and wide enough for 2 or 3 slings. I ended up making the P-Sling style shoulder, since that's my favorite brand comfort wise. My sling turned out to be just as comfortable, and for a fraction of P-Sling price!

I think Anya likes it too :)

A note to myself

Since I have hard time writing down the recipes I find online, and always end up with gazillion tabs in my browser open for days in a row, I figured it would be easier to post some links, as a reminder to myself of things I want to try making this week :)

Sun Dried Tomato Hummus Made it! YUM!!!

Zuchinni Hummus

Carrot Soup

Ginger Carrot Dip (will need to experiment with modifying the recipe)

The Birth Survey is born!

Now this is pretty much a dream come true :)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
An announcement from the Coalition for Improving Maternity Services:

The Birth Survey is Now Available!

For years, consumers have enthusiastically shared online reviews of movies, restaurants, products and services, but readily available information about maternity care providers and birth settings was nearly unattainable-no longer. As part of the Transparency in Maternity Care Project, CIMS developed The Birth Survey as an online resource for sharing consumer reviews of doctors, midwives, hospitals, and birth centers, learning about the choices and birth experiences of others, and viewing data on hospital and birth center standard practices and intervention rates. The Birth Survey is now accessible online nationwide in the United States.

Help spread the word about The Birth Survey!

Send e-mails to your contacts encouraging them to take the survey, or learn about the project, through our "Invite a Friend" email tool. Invite your friends with a personalized message!

Post web banners and buttons to The Birth Survey on your personal or organizational websites, or link to www.TheBirthSurvey.com in your email signature and on your website.

Distribute postcards inviting women to take The Birth Survey. Download the cards or order preprinted cards.

Mama's lunch

Another one of my favorite lunches, although lately I've been using whole wheat tortillas instead of bread, or just skip wheat stuff all together and use red/green lettuce leaves instead :)

For toppings I use:

hummus (love to combine regular and spicy hummus from Costco)
basil pesto
leafy greens
avocado
cucumbers
tomatoes
marinated artichoke hearts
graded carrots
oven roasted bell peppers

the genius of such meal is that you can use any of the above mentioned ingredients and it will taste good no matter what! Same meal, endless combinations :)

Out of the cave... Internet is working again!

I seriously was starting to go crazy with almost a whole week of no internet, thanks to amazingly slow AT&T taking their sweet time to disconnect and doing all things backwards as per their usual. Well, CIAO AT&T! Welcome back, Quest! Hope you don't screw things up as often as your competition did.

And because this video makes me insanely happy and I feel like dancing to celebrate my reconnection to the world outside of our house, watch Matt dancing again!


Where the Hell is Matt? (2008) from Matthew Harding on Vimeo.