Fun in the Kitchen

Yesterday Charlie and I decided to bake cranberry bread and muffins. After I'd found my recipe card and spread nearly all of the ingredients all over my single square foot of counter space, I realized that we didn't have eggs. Aargh. When I explained to Charlie, she kindly replied, "It's okay, Mommy, I'll be all right." What a sweetheart.

As it turns out, last night happened to be our pick-up date for our farm order . We order raw milk and organic meat and eggs and a few other things every other week from an Amish farm in Pennsylvania, and then they are delivered to a host house nearby in Alexandria. So, at last, we had eggs. Charlie and I then began our baking venture again. Here is Charlie "helping":

And here are our muffins:

Here is a picture of Judah, just because I don't think there are enough of him here yet. "Say 'hi' to the camera, Sweetie!"

Snow!!!

This morning while I was lying in bed with Judah and doing my best to doze while nursing, I was startled by an ecstatic Charlie shouting, "Mommy!! It's snowing! The ground is all covered up with snow!" So I slid out of bed, careful not to disturb the sleeping Judah, said goodbye to my husband, Paul, who was on his way out the door to walk through the snow to catch his bus to Metro, and then hurried through my morning routine so that we could all eventually have some fun outside. Once Charlie finished her breakfast (mashed sweet potatoes) and Judah was awake and nursed (again), I started the 20-minute chore of bundling them up.

Judah required fresh diaper, diaper cover, socks, Baby Legs, reconstituted wool longies (a gift from my crunchy friend Joy), t-shirt, long-sleeved thermal shirt, sweater, and hat. Charlie wore about as many layers, but my favorite part of her outfit was her best friend Henry. Henry goes almost everywhere with Charlie, and today was no exception; he was bundled inside the front of her sweater much like Judah was nestled into his Ergo on the front of me.

So, we made it outside. I must confess that on the front end of taking on the task of dressing the kids and heading out in the cold, I actually debated whether to just chuck it all and stay in. Most of my motivation came from the fact that I have a blog on which to post any photos I take. Granted, I have one "follower," the famous Joy to whom I often refer. So, Joy, this is for you. :) We ended up having a really great time, and I'm glad we got out to enjoy the beauty of such a rare snow.

Business Venture

So, I'm learning to sew, right? And my first project was to create fabric reusable gift bags for Christmas. Well, I decided to make a few reusable fabric gift bags for any occasion and then list them on Etsy.com. My store name is "Joyful Gifts," and you can find my bags at http://www.joyfulgifts.etsy.com/. I love etsy--everything is either handmade or vintage. Here are some of my handmade gift bags:

Things I Never Thought I'd Say

A long time ago, I started listening to the ridiculous things I was saying to my daughter as she grew. Eventually, I got around to keeping a list of "Things I Never Thought I'd Say." And then at some point, I extended an invitation to mom and dad friends for things they never thought THEY'd say. We parents do a lot of recording the funny stuff that comes out of our kids' mouths, but have you ever stopped to listen to yourself?

Here's what we have so far:

• No, we don't want to eat the poopoo snakes.
• Get your hands out of your pants and eat your cereal.
• Hold on to your pee pee. I'm tired of cleaning pee off of everything.
• That's okay, honey. Thanks for helping, but Mommy can wipe her own bottom.
• Well, Momma is driving so wipe your boogy on your pants.
• (Saying to the professor): excuse me a moment, I need to use the potty.
• No, Mommy doesn’t want to see how big your penis can get.
• Please don't pull on Mommy's pubic hair to get yourself up off the ground (said while changing clothes).
• Hand the poopy to Mommy.
• Mommy told you to stop hitting her booby with the duck. Now you have to leave the bathroom and let Mommy take a bath.
• Stop hitting me with your fork.
• Books do not go in the refrigerator.
• Who stuffed toilet paper down the sink drain?
• Stop wrapping your brother in tape.
• Bye-bye, poopoo!
• Don’t headbutt the baby.
• Don’t shoot the baby.
• Can you please just eat your boogers?
• No, please don't tear off my mole.
• That's enough with the acrobatic nursing; you're hurting my boobies.
• Get your shoe out of your mouth.
• Can you hold on a second? I think Clara has poop on her hand.
• Stop drinking out of the pirate’s head!
• Please stop dropping banana into Mommy’s shirt.
• That was so funny that if I hadn't been doing my pelvic floor exercises, I would have peed in my pants.
• I can't understand you while you're holding your tongue.
• I've told you I'm busy! I can't come eat you right now; you'll have to occupy yourself some other way until I am done!
• If you fling your panties around one more time and hit your food with them, you’re going to be put in timeout.
• No, I don’t want to suck on your fingers anymore.

Learning all kinds of things!

So, I'm learning to blog as well as learning to sew. For my first sewing project, I decided to make reusable Christmas gift bags. I love the idea of reusable packaging. I think that wrapping paper, though potentially beautiful, is the biggest waste. We are doing our best in this household to conserve, and I thought it would be an easy enough experiment--sewing straight lines, right? So I found some really cute Christmas fabrics at a great deal and decided to get a head start on next year. Here are a few of the results.

Once I felt comfortable with my new Kenmore sewing machine that my wonderful husband gave me for my birthday, I decided to try something a little more challenging--curtains for the kids' room. Charlie helped me pick out the fabric, and they were done by the end of the day! What do you think?

Ballerina Charlie

Our friend, Joy, bought Charlie this beautiful hand-made tutu for Christmas, which Charlie absolutely adores. The thing is, she KNOWS how pretty she is.

Since we live in the DC metro area, there's not much going on here in the Callahan household today. We're watching the Inauguration on TV and taking fun pictures of Charlie in her very pink and very fluffy tutu.