Go Steelers!

Just in case any of you didn't know, we are Steelers fans here at the homeplace.

We're having all sorts of fun food and Steelers paraphenalia on Sunday, including watching a History of the Steelers DVD and dressing in black and gold. (Not for church. At least not me. But even the baby has a Steelers jersey. I mean even the unborn baby.)

If you're not here with us Sunday, you really ought to be--- I don't know where there will be a house outside Pittsburgh that will follow the game with more angst and emotional involvement.

OK, Miss Boo needs to be put to bed something awful-- she just woke up in bed by herself and is offended about it.

See you after the game!

Breanna

The Church Year for Protestants

I have been reading a very interesting book over the last couple of days-- one of those books that, although I'm almost finished with it, I've already decided I'm going to start over again as soon as I read the last page. It's called Keeping House: The Litany of Everyday Life by Margaret Kim Peterson.

It's about what the author calls the "theology of housekeeping". She points out that a surprising amount of the Bible deals with what might be considered cosmic housework-- feeding the five thousand, the building and furnishing of heavenly houses, etc.--but the point I liked the best was that whatever Christ's command to feed the hungry and clothe the naked means, it also applies to the people living in our own houses. Therefore, every time we cook dinner or do the laundry, we are fulfilling part of the Gospel. Gives you a new inspiration to get the laundry folded, doesn't it?

She also compares the rhythm of household work to the rhythm of the Church Year, or the annual cycle of fasts and feasts that is observed by liturgical denominations and mostly not known/paid attention to by "evangelical" denominations. That is, we celebrate Christmas and Easter, but wouldn't know what Maundy Thursday was on a multiple choice quiz. Here is a Church Year chart, for those of you who don't have the nifty church history book I do:

"Season after Pentecost" is generally called "Ordinary Time" but this chart is different for some reason.

I have been thinking that there might be several advantages to following the Church Year, although of course it's not written anywhere in Scripture and so it's one of those optional things like whether or not to have an electric bass during the worship service. What I mean is that if you follow the Church Year at home, you have the experience of each day meaning something and reminding you of something about heaven-- you are feasting to celebrate one of Christ's victories or to anticipate the final one, or you are fasting to remember His sacrifice or because you miss Him in a way that won't be alleviated until you're in His physical presence at the end of time. You are constantly reminded that life has a spiritual dimension as well as a physical one.

Personally I think it might be kind of nice, not to do in any strict way, but to keep in mind generally... perhaps to change the colors of the centerpiece on the table to match the color of the part of the Church Year, or change the types of meals we fix to fit the fast/feast/ordinary season. To add onto your Bible study jubilant or mourning or steady psalms (there are some--how about the psalm where David compares himself to a weaned child?).

A lot of us do it anyway in a way; we cook special meals at Easter and Christmas and don't even remember that they are formally feasts; we know we're supposed to think a little somberly on Good Friday about the crucifixion; we sometimes put an Advent wreath on our tables.

What would constitute observance of the Church Year would be different (and optional) for everyone, just as observance of what a lot of evangelicals call "devotions" looks a lot different from the formal church practice of praying at certain pre-set hours. The point is to pray; the point of observing the Church Year would be to remember we're citizens of a different kingdom that runs on different time.

What say you? Is there a way that our homes can be distinctly Christian homes that doesn't just involve the hanging of certain plaques and the fact that we play Christian radio instead of the top 40 (if we do--I am a Christian radio heathen, I don't really like Christian music radio, but that's another post...)? Biblically a Christian home will look different because Christians look different. Our spiritual reality should be present in our physical reality, even if it's just praying before meals, but could it be more than just praying before meals?

I don't know if observing the Church Year is the best way to incorporate an awareness of the Kingdom into daily life, but it might be an interesting thing to try.

Happy Sunday,

Breanna

Coming Out of the Closet

No-- not that way. But I'm coming out about the reason I've been cheerfully trying to make sure everyone I know understands how to cook dried beans. First, because I'm garralous, a helpful anecdote.

So there was this nurse I worked with in a job which shall remain nameless in case anyone at that hospital reads this blog someday. She was...abrasive. She didn't mean to be, I think, but gosh. Paint came off the walls when she walked into the room, but not because she charmed it off. Anyhow, this nurse revealed her vulnerable side once when asking how to make a dish that called for cornmeal. Was that the same thing that came in the Jiffy corn muffin mix? Noooo, said the nurses's lounge, after taking this in. That was corn muffin mix. Cornmeal came by itself in a bag, in the baking aisle, and made many things besides corn muffins. This, along with the fact that a girl I was at university with asked the class in all seriousness if anyone had a recipe for tuna salad, because she wanted to make it, made me understand a shocking thing about America:

Nobody knows how to cook. (Present company excepted... if I know you. If you are a random stranger, you might want to keep reading.) In normal circumstances this would be deplorable, but not actually dangerous unless we're talking contaminated peanut butter or raw eggs. However, these are not normal circumstances. Even Oprah knows this.

This is my "coming out" moment: I think the economy's going to get worse before it gets better, regardless of Mr. Obama's best efforts. I don't think you can fix the kind of recession we're in, and in private I have even been bandying about the word "depression." As in "like the 1930s, only nobody knows how to cook."

Why is it a big deal if nobody knows how to cook? Well, to put it simply, if everyone is living tighter then nobody can afford to pay people to cook for them. I don't just mean McDonald's, but also Keebler. I know people who think that beans only come in cans, pre-cooked. What's dangerous about this is that if food budgets become straitened, people will have to fall back on inexpensive food like dry beans (1/4 the price of canned, at my supermarket), rice, and cornmeal--which are some of the things the government hands out to folks who get commodities, by the way-- and they will have no idea what to do with it. They'll maybe ruin a good bit of it. And then they'll either eat vile food or go hungry.

I hope I'm wrong and that everything will get better later this year. It would still be good to know how to cook, though, just to be able to keep more of your money. Wouldn't it be better to know how to make your own delectable pot roast from tasty Montana beef, instead of defrosting an icky one from Swanson that may have been slaughtered in Portugal for all you know?

So do this for me, to make me feel better about all of you in These Trying Times: just learn to make a good beans and rice dish from dry components. One you really like. The internet is full of recipies; check out my sidebar link to The Hillbilly Housewife and Frugal Abundance (under Frugal Food Storage) for a lot of bean recipies. I particularly like Frugal Abundance's "Family Favorite Pinto Beans" which cook overnight in the crockpot, no soaking. Leave out the spices and you have a whole bunch of beans you can flavor up in various ways-- do two portions of them as baked beans; then two portions as spicy Mexican beans; then refry some; then use some plain in a green salad with vinegrette...

(I really like beans. Sorry.)

Anyway. I also have these same feelings about mending but I won't make you learn to darn socks and set patches until after the bean project. Just start on something, please. Even if the stimulus works, you'll be glad you did.

Happy beaning,

Breanna

P.S.

If you throw out the water you soak the dry beans in, and then rinse them after they're cooked but before you season them, most of the flatulence-inducing stuff gets rinsed away. Also try eating pineapple with them. Also, the more you eat beans, the more favorable your gut bacteria gets to be to digest the bean enzymes. Maybe yogurt would help. Or just live with people who think gas is funny, like I do.

Milestones

We had a minor breakthrough today. Pretend if you will this is not the scene of toy carnage-- as in fact it is not; this is a milestone.
Can you guess what it is?
Note the socks placed with wild abandon.
That's right-- while I made 2 pizzas and 4 loaves of bread, Miss Boo played happily by herself. I remember when she thought I ceased to exist whenever I went around the corner and immediately (and loudly) mourned my destruction, and now she scarcely noticed I was in the kitchen for an hour and she was in the living room. I was starting to get all sniffly about it until I sat down to type this and both she and the dog immediately demanded to sit on my lap. So I guess she does still need me. (The dog can just live with the floor.)

In case you're wondering, my hand is fine. I iced it yesterday and the Husband kindly took over getting Miss Boo to sleep (and ACED the job, she slept all night) so I could play Warhammer Online and get my mind off it. It's only a minor annoyance today.

Well, time for Miss Boo's nap and she needs me to rock her, apparently, so we'll get to it.

Cheers,

Breanna

You Know You Have Mommy Brain When...

1. You try to put wood in the stove with one hand because the other arm is cradling a sleeping baby that you do not want to wake up by putting her in a crib.

2. Because you are pregnant, you burn your hand on the stove (of course) and have to shove the rest of the log in with one foot.

3. You go upstairs to ice your hand.

4. You realize what you are icing it with is the dealie that came with the formula samples, designed to keep bottles cold in the diaper bag.

(5. You catch yourself actually typing words like "dealie".)

But she didn't wake up!

Breanna

A Cute Post

Miss Boo is figuring out spoons and yogurt. She never had the fancy fruited yogurt until yesterday, when Mommy finally got pregnancy-tired enough to say, "nobody else makes their own yogurt, why don't I just buy some at Costco for Pete's sake?" So I did, and she ate half a cup. (What's wrong with homemade yogurt and jam, I ask you?) Anyway we're still working on the spoon thing. Sometimes fingers are easier.

Eventually we figure out how to dip the spoon in the yogurt and get it to the mouth with some yogurt still on it.

Very complicated, this. Daddy was quite proud. (I didn't post the whole sequence of pictures you took, Daddy, because Blogger only lets me put up a certain number at a time.)

As well, I had the Husband take a belly shot of me last night and I have come to the conclusion that maybe I actually AM nine feet wide and I just was in denial about it. But I will tell you that I don't really have a double chin-- the picture just makes me look like I do.

That's a bunch of Boychild, right there. You have to understand that Miss Boo was insisting on sitting on the person of one or the other parent when we were trying to take the picture, so it would have been a better picture otherwise.

It's been very cold here lately, -9 F right now (-11 when the Husband got up, and for some bizzare reason the temp will drop when the sun comes up), which has an unexpected effect on housekeeping. I mean sure, you'd expect to cook more soup and make sure the fluffy blankies are on the beds as a housekeeper, but what you wouldn't expect is how stuffy rooms get when you can't make any excuse to open a window for twenty minutes in the morning. I can only justify it if we have the woodstove roaring and the gas furnace turned nearly off; this morning the Husband didn't have enough thawed firewood to start a fire so unless I can get one going when the wood is thawed, the baby's room is going to continue to smell like the overnight diaper pail and our room is going to continue to smell like... breathing the same air all night. (Eeeeeeeeeew.) One can only hope that it's only pregancy-nosed ladies like myself who can smell these unique smells.

I went to the thrift store yesterday--because I am cheap, you should know this-- and went trolling through their baby section because there's a stupid law coming into effect in February which will take all the children's things out of thrift stores for a while. (It will be illegal to sell any children's product--including t-shirts-- that you can't prove is lead-free. This applies to used merchandise as well as new, therefore thrift stores have to landfill all their kids' stuff because they can't afford to test it. That's right, the gov'mint wants us all to have mercury in our CFL light bulbs, but an untested Elmo shirt is too risky.) Anyway, I got a whole bunch of newborn-sized onsies, outfits, and jammies for Boychild and three new books for Miss Boo for $7. So I felt pretty good about myself.

I get this way toward the end of pregnancy, where I sort of look at the house and go "nothing's ready! we're all going to be naked and starving!" Which isn't true, of course, but I feel better with some blue onesies in the drawer.

Well, I think Miss Boo needs a diaper. Either that or she's doing a really good impression of an outhouse. I'd better close for today. :)

Cheers,

Breanna

Advertising

First of all, I know I am overdue for a belly picture. At a week shy of 7 months, my belly is present in a room before I am, and I know you all want to see my impression of a watermellon (don't you?) so I will get a picture up tomorrow. Would have been today, but the picture the Husband took of me last night in my nightie made me shriek and delete it instantly. (I'm not REALLY nine feet wide.)

And now, onto the blog post. I've been thinking about writing this post for a while, but was at a loss how to do it without sounding... snotty. So I thought I would begin with an illustration, so at least I won't feel like I'm being snotty alone. The incident I shall describe is a conglomeration of things that have actually happened to me, albeit fictionalized slightly to protect the well-intentioned.

Imagine, if you will, that you are in a group of people, mostly Christians, who are touring a natural history museum of some sort. There is a young tour guide employee of the museum who is reading off prepared cards, and it is clearly this guide's third day because he forgets where the bathrooms are and runs into the vending machine while trying to guide you to the Siberian tiger exhibit. In the course of your tour, you eventually end up in a presentation room where the guide must continue reading off his cards during a slide presentation. The cards are sprinkled with phrases like "adaptations" and "hundreds of millions of years ago" and "Darwin discovered". Halfway through the presentation, the guide asks if there are any questions.

A Member of your Group (who I shall describe in a moment) raises his or her hand and says something along the lines of: "Well, we think God created the world. We don't think it took hundreds of millions of years."

In the awkward silence following, while the guide turns magenta, do you think:

1) "I'm so glad he/she said something, the hundreds of millions of years was really bugging me."
2) "What a wonderful witness for Christianity."
3) *Cringe* "That poor tour guide kid."

I admit I thought #3. Especially since the kid had to go back to reading his cards for the rest of the presentation, and every time they said "hundreds of millions of years" he stuttered and turned beet red again, while a Member of the Group sat with folded arms, the words "tsk tsk" written all over his/her face. If you suggest later it might not have been appropriate, they will say "Are you ashamed of the Gospel?"

No, I'm ashamed of you.

These are the folks who speak up in your university class with the professor who is a notorious atheist, because...well, he says things that might be construed as hostile to religion! (Gasp!) Not that they say anything sensical, they just contradict the professor, who proceeds to politely destroy everything they said. These are the folks who have convictions about wearing t-shirts with logos or animated characters on them, because The Simpsons contains some "worldly themes." These are the folks who send you earnest email forwards about abortion and what happens during a late-term abortion and asking you to sign an email petition. (Because everyone knows email petitions work wonders on Capitol Hill.) You can't SAY anything to them, because they're so sincere, but they're terrible advertising for Christianity.

I don't say this just because they're dorks, although they are; they generally have convictions about which hairstyles are worldly or not and sometimes feel that one shouldn't watch sports because of the advertising, which means they're really difficult to engage in a conversation that isn't about the Left Behind series. Mainly they're terrible advertising because they give Christians a name for being harmless, not very coherent, eccentrics.

Now in one sense we're supposed to be severely weird to the world around us-- Christ warned that we'd be persecuted and frequently murdered for the faith-- but we're supposed to be weird by doing things like loving our enemies, staying faithful to our spouses, and giving our money away. Our belief system is supposed to be so disturbing the the world precisely because it is logical, coherent, and reasonable to accept. I'd like to suggest that it's not really loving unbelievers when we allow them to hold the notion that Christianity is a funny thing that eccentrics get passionate about, like glider-building or composting sewage.

So since no one can say it to their face, I'm going to talk to the Member of the Group via cyberspace and also to myself, when I'm guilty of this: just stop for a minute before you say anything, and check and see if the Holy Spirit is really telling you to talk. If you're talking mainly because you feel insulted or offended about something, that's probably not a good enough reason. If you don't have a cogent argument in mind but just "feel that you should say something" that's probably not good enough either. If you can't express love to the people you're talking to ("well I just think you're wrong"), then don't say anything. Stop and think a minute. God can convict them without you. Don't get extrabibilical convictions mixed up in things that the Bible is clear on. If you are going to say something about Creation, or abortion, don't mix in the general notion that society is going to pot these days. Don't frame your debate on emotion. Comb your hair. Don't act so dang afraid of the unsaved.

All of which doesn't mean that you get to mumble something noncommital if they ask you what your opinion is. But let's face it: how often do they have to ask?

Now that was harsh, I know. And I'm sure I fall into Dorkification more than I know, being as I don't watch much TV, find a lot of clothing trends repellent, and love to talk too much. But I always found it encouraging when I was at university and my fellow students would engage me after lectures to ask me questions, because they knew I was "religious" but also "smart". And realizing that what most of them knew about the Bible and Christianity could be fit into an eyedropper, one had to be very basic, understanding, and non-reactionary in conversation.

Dorks of the world, take heart. I know that your intentions are in the right place, that you really want to serve the Lord. You may just have to consider whether serving the Lord means watching a ball game or two with Larry from work.

Phew, enough serious posting already. We'll have cute posts the rest of the week.

Until later,

Breanna

This is Mainly For Mom

...because now they're at it with laundry! Seriously! The ladies who menu the way I do have now started talking laundry. I like this blog.

Go here and check out their brilliant discussion of laundry and clothes. I have just been thinking that it's time to go through Miss Boo's dresser again and pull out all the clothes that are too small for her. *Sigh* my dresser needs it too, but I keep changing sizes every few weeks.... it'd be nice if you had a standard pregnancy size the way you can have a standard non-pregnant size. Oh well.

And I second the thing about getting the good socks. :)

Cheers,

Breanna

Baby Eye Candy Time

There haven't been many picture of Miss Boo, so here are some that show what we've been doing this week. Milk break...

Helping Mama dust the table...

More milk....

Mom, wasn't I involved with this nursing coverup at some point? Don't I seem to remember something involving me and you and this thing? Why don't we use it anymore? Huh? Huh?

(Because, thank the Lord, we've been weaned for almost three weeks and we are hoping desperately that we won't remember the concept of nursing by the time Boychild arrives.)

I made a list the other day of everything I need to accomplish by the time Boychild arrives, including getting another carseat and more than three boy-colored onesies, and got overwhelmed for just a minute. How did I not know when I was pregnant with Miss Boo how much easier I had it, able to do whatever I wanted whenever I wanted?

She's trying to pull all the bookmarks out of my book right now and shaking my end table/wooden TV tray, so I had better go and corral her. :)

Hope you're all having a fabulous day,

Breanna

Sickies

So Miss Boo and I have been under the weather yesterday and this morning-- drippy noses mainly, but I'm letting posting go in favor of accomplishing a few more important things in life like washing stinky sheets (from both of us trying to sleep on them more than usual) and making bread.

Be back tomorrow!

Breanna

P.S. After I said no one would care what Mrs. Obama wore, did you see that she dared to wear my great-aunt's chenille bedspread to the inaugural balls? Poor thing, would've thought they had more money to spend on the gown than that...

Inauguration is Hard to Spell

...so am I the only one who's noticed that we're taking PEBO's (he'll only be PEBO for a few more hours, then he'll turn into P-BO) inauguration a lot more excitedly than we have any inauguration since, like, Kennedy or something? I mean I guess in one sense I can understand, because it's historic and all that, but they've been counting down to it (with a ticker!) for over a week on the morning news show I usually have on during Miss Boo's breakfast. They give the Oscars and the Olympics a ticker, for Pete's sake. Does this take away some of the solemnity the occasion deserves?

(Incidentally, I'm not being rude calling him P-BO; I called our soon-to-be-former president Dubya and I wasn't doing it snidely, it's just shorter.)

My point is that I haven't seen the media get this excited over something not involving the kidnapping of a little white girl in a long time. Perhaps this means they will subject his policies to substantial investigative rigor.

(*Snort cough giggle*, sorry.)

Well, well, as I say about the Oscars and the Olympics, at least after today the dang ticker will go away. Remember to pray for P-BO this morning, it's your duty. And pray for all of us to refrain from thinking unconstitutional thoughts because we've been goaded by tickers and Mrs. P-BO's clothes all week and we just want them to stop already because Mrs. P-BO isn't Jackie Kennedy (thank goodness) and nobody will care what she wears and can't you leave the poor lady alone already, you can tell you make her nervous because she keeps changing her hair and THEY CAN CHOOSE WHATEVER DANG KIND OF PUPPY THEY WANT, LEAVE ME ALONE WITH YOUR STUPID FLUFF STORIES!!!!!

*Pant, pant, phew.*

Ok, ready to get back to life as usual with a real sitting president again? Great, me too.

Happy Inaugurating,

Breanna

Superbowl Here We Come

I don't know if you know this, but generally in households of mixed beliefs the wife ends up doing whatever the husband believes. This is the Creation order apparently, because I can tell you I've converted. I ordered my Troy Paulomaulo (strike that, Polamalu, thanks Steve) jersey last night before the game was even over, just so I wouldn't feel left out from this group:
She was, I think, explaining what she thought Mike Tomlin ought to have done. It was a tense game there for a little bit, and everybody felt bad for the Baltimore player who got hurt:

But we celebrated very enthusiastically and confused the dog, and I had a comfortable back for the first time in days becaue the Husband insisted on buying me a recliner yesterday.

(Really!)

It's not as extravagant as it seems because 1) we had a gift certificate for Costco that the Husband won at work and 2) we bought the chair at Costco so it ended costing us $37. For a wonderful, comfortable, leather recliner that will be oh-so-nice for those nights when we are trying to rock two Little People to sleep at the same time. (Please, Lord, let them go to sleep at the same time.)

In conclusion, you all (the fam, not random weird strangers who might be reading this) are invited to a superbowl party at our house. We're already sketching out menus and the Husband has declared that we have to get the good beer, since it's the Steelers.... so consider yourselves invited. :)

Go Steelers!

Breanna

I found a blog that plans menus my way!

My geeky way! With worksheets and charts!

(An excuse to buy binders and pens!!!)

I know I'm a dork. But go here and look at their "Happy Home" sidebar if menuing has confused you. They're decent writers, too. :)

Cheers,

Breanna

My Top Ten Things You Shouldn't Say to a Pregnant Woman

Specifically, a pregnant woman who is also holding a child under two years old.

10. "Yep, breastfeeding isn't a form of birth control."

9. "How far apart will the babies be? Wow, you're going to be busy."

8. (As the pregnant woman is checking out at the grocery store) "I/my daughter/sister/neighbor/girlfriend only gained 15 pounds when she was pregnant. Just had no appetite."

7. "You're probably having a boy because you're carrying so WIDE ACROSS."

6. "You know it hurts worse the second time."

5. "Oh, you think you don't want pain medication now, heh heh..."

4. "How far along are you?" (Pause.) "Gosh, you're awfully small/big for being that far along, aren't you?"

3. "I was in labor for forty-seven hours and then I had to have an emergency c-section and I had to be in the hospital for sixteen days and then I had postpartum depression and it was the worst time in my life and I just wanted to sleep for days but the baby had colic and..."

2. "I didn't even know I was in labor until it was time to push."

1. "You know, my first baby slept through the night when he was six weeks old."

'Nuff said! :D

Breanna

These Mashed Potatoes Are So Creamy

Ok, so when I set up this blog I seriously considered a running sidebar feature that was to be titled: "Movie Quotes Only My Sister Will Get" but that seemed like it would take too much explanation in a post for a running feature. And only my sister would get it.

But because movie quotes have been so appropriate for so many things lately, I thought I'd run a little post about them. See, you may not know this, but the title of the post is actually a quote from the movie "While You Were Sleeping" with Sandra Bullock and Bill Pullman. My sister (and my whole family) and I use movie quotes as a sort of shorthand for commenting on daily life.

For instance, the quote above happens during a scene that is so typical of a big family dinner table-- there are four conversations happening, everyone taking part a little in each, and the mother happily commenting to herself on the mashed potatoes, trying to compliment the daughter who mashed them. Thus, "These mashed potatoes are so creamy" is shorthand in my family for "everyone is talking at once"-- especially if followed by the next line from the movie, which was "I never said Ceaser Romaro was Spanish, I said Ceaser Romaro was tall!"

Of course everyone uses Monty Python quotes as shorthand; my husband sums up all my research into healthy pregnancy and birth as "avoiding the 'machine that goes ping!''

All of which is to say, I am debuting the "Movie Quotes Only My Sister Will Get" sidebar feature anyway, because I like movie quotes and because it will be a fun thing for the fam. (Who are, I am fairly sure, the only folks reading this blog anyway.)

Enjoy!

Breanna

Naps

(No, he isn't really supposed to be on the couch, but I left him there because he will whine when he's rousted and possibly wake up Miss Boo, and also because his gross dog snores lulled her into this state:)

So it's naptime...for everyone except me. When I lay down, Boychild tends to wake up and start practicing for the World Cup. He's getting pretty good, too; you can see the kicks from the outside now.

(He's saying hi to you in Morse code right now, since I'm resting with my feet up as I type this.)

I thought of several things I could blog about today--the vaccine/anti-vaccine argument I read on another blog, how the media only notices things that happen in New York (like plane wrecks), etc.-- but you've had two ranty posts already this week so I decided to do a sleeping baby post instead. :) You're welcome.

In updates on the monthly shopping situation, it still seems to be working well, with a couple of side benefits I didn't expect. 1) I now know we drink a gallon of milk per week now that Miss Boo has to have 3 cups of milk per day (that's 3 of her sippy cups, not 3 cups English measure) and I have to drink milk for Boychild's sake; and 2) we apparently eat 10 lbs of cheddar a month because the 5 lb block I bought at the beginning of the month is gone and it's only the 16th. This second statistic astonished me, since this has to be mainly the Husband and I-- Miss Boo could conceivably eat half a pound of cheese a month but I really doubt it. This could be why, in spite of the fact that the Husband can't drink milk because of his kidneys and I don't like milk, we have excellent bones. Hum de hum. I don't know whether I should try to change our cheese consumption or not.

Anyway, hope you're all having a great day wherever you are.

Cheers,

Breanna

15 Weeks and Counting

...until Boychild makes his scheduled arrival. :) Just thought you all might want to know.

Happy days,

Breanna

My Ladies's Bible Study is Worried

"What are you doing, Mr. President? Working on your speech?"
"No, I'm practicing my A's." (Shows clipboard of handwriting homework.) "Aren't those nice?"

--Hot Shots, Part Deux

I feel obliged to report on the weather at the upcoming presidential inauguration, given that it beat out a war in Gaza, the Russian gas crisis, the recession/depression, and a pilot who tried to fake his own death as the top story on all the major news outlets I consulted today. Apparently it will be cold at the inauguration. If you are in Washington I guess you should wear your warm jammies.

I suppose PEBO (that's President Elect Barack Obama for those of you who are new) can't help the fact that the media is swooning over him like teenage girls at a Johnny Depp movie; it's reasonable that they all feel better about the world now that he's in charge of it. Good for them.

My ladies's Bible Study, on the other hand, is fairly sure that PEBO is actually going to rip off a mask and show himself to be Jimmy Carter, cryogenically frozen and replaced by a cardigan-wearing cyborg all these years. Good for them; I couldn't get quite as worked up about things as they did this afternoon, bless 'em, and I tried to encourage them some that the best and worst of politicians end up not so much changing the world as... well, practicing their A's.

So pray for PEBO and his administration (it's a duty in Scripture, you know) not to get chilly fingers during the inauguration, and to perhaps actually glean some spiritual insight from the prayers. (And pray for Rick Warren while you're at it, that no one whacks him.) And then, let's all get on with our lives. There isn't really THAT much else we can do, is there?

Cheerio,

Breanna

P.S.
Can you tell I'm sick of political news?

"My Husband Doesn't Eat Casseroles" and Other Excuses

First, the baby eye candy that was promised for yesterday (but didn't get posted to yesterday on account of me having a midwife visit and a ton of shopping to get to):

Eat something off the floor? Why mama, why would you think I would eat something off the floor? What makes you think I have anything in my mouth at this moment? Paddy always looks at me that way...

I'm afraid there's something dreadfully wrong with your patella. We'll need to do a check of your reflex. Just relax, this won't hurt a bit.

See, told you it wouldn't hurt a bit.

On to the topic of the post. I was having a discussion with a friend about budgets, because I'm a budget geek, and because my friend and her husband would really like to buy a house. Here is the way the conversation went:

Her: You spend how much per week on groceries?

Me (meekly): $60, but that includes paper towels, dishsoap, etc. and I'm hoping to do better soon. Hopefully once I get this once a month shopping thing down. (I hadn't started my Grand Experiment in monthly shopping at that time. It's working out well except I think I underestimated our milk consumption.)

Her: Oh, well, see we couldn't do that because (husband who shall remain nameles) doesn't like casseroles.

Me (a bit incredulous and leaving aside the missing logical connection): Any casseroles?

Her: No, he doesn't like any foods that touch.

Me: Foods that touch...

Her: You know, foods with things mixed up in other things.

Me: So he doesn't like chicken soup? Or lasagna? Or tacos? (Choosing three things that people usually like.)

Her: Well, I guess he likes some things that touch, but only really specific ones. He only likes Campbell's Chicken Soup, not other chicken soups.

We went on in this vein for a while before I gave up debunking each individual objection and pointed out that you can, in fact, be frugal with your grocery budget without making a single casserole. It will be a lot less tasty to have the components of a casserole seperately, and you'll be eating a lot of un-jazzed-up rice and beans, but hey, it is possible.

What we came down to was that my friend and her husband just liked eating the way they were eating, and they wanted to continue to do so more than they wanted to save money on their grocery budget. Which isn't evil. I suspect my friend felt compelled to offer the ol' Casserole Exemption because she thought I of the lentils might be judging her budgetary choices.

I actually wasn't; I think it's perfectly permissable to spend your money in the ways that are important to you (always assuming you pay your bills and are not in debt, of course). For instance, I've had one manicure/pedicure in my life and am not interested in paying $40 per week to have this done regularly. I'd rather have the money to spend on books, or something for the house. But for some women, their mani/pedi is important. Whatever warms your lava lamp; that's why it's called "discretionary spending". What is not okay, in my book (though I currently lack the power to make a citizen's arrest over this), is offering an excuse to cover "I just want to."

This isn't just because it's dishonest. It actually can harm you later on. If you tell enough people that you can't save money on your grocery budget because your husband won't eat casseroles, or because you have to buy organic food to prevent your children becoming fleshy-headed mutants, or because you don't have time to cook, you will come to believe these things. Then along comes a time like this one we are in, where folks are losing their jobs right and left and the price of milk keeps going up. You are going to believe your own hype and not know how to change your habits in order to save money, because you HAVE to get expensive groceries. Or you're going to be miserable, eating the components of your casserole seperately.

Might I suggest that honesty will serve us better. If we know that the only reason we HAVE to get Campbell's Chicken Soup is because we like it, then we will be free to make our own chicken soup out of leftover chicken scraps when suddenly it becomes less attractive to pay $2 per can for soup. Maybe we won't like our homemade soup as well, but we can eat it because all along we've been classifying Campbell's as a luxury, not a necessity. (And maybe we'll get better at making homemade soup.)

Which brings me to my last point. It did just occur to me (although I didn't say it) in the conversation with my friend: Maybe the casserole-hating husband has just always had really bad casseroles? There are good cooks and bad cooks in the world, and some casseroles are horrid. Practice makes perfect. If you don't like something once (casseroles, doing your own nails, buying secondhand clothes) don't count out the entire category.

All of which is meant to be a parable of sorts for the mindset I think will help us through the Dark Days Ahead. Much of how our lives go in this economy will be determined by whether or not we have the attitude that enables us to make the correct choices. Those choices will be different for everyone; if you'd rather live on nothing but lentils and water while continuing to get your mani/pedis, more power to you-- but it will be your choice, not the necessity you're forced into.

In conclusion, just a warning to all my current and future children and/or people who might be eating by me in the future: I don't want to hear any whining about food touching other food, or I'll pull out that gross Momism about it all going to the same place, ok? And then I'll make you have another serving of the casserole.

Bon appetit,

Breanna

A Short Note

...to let you know we're all alive.

The Husband has been working 14 hour days this week through no fault of his own, to keep the state in cement; therefore I have been working 14 hour days this week to keep Miss Boo from building a rocket out of things she finds in my kitchen drawer and her blocks. Thusly, I have had little time for blogging.

And now, blissfully, it is Saturday, and we are lazily discussing the relative merits of bacon and eggs, waffles, or coffee cake. So this is all you get for now-- I'll post a cute post with pictures next week.

Ciao bella,

Breanna

Helpful Miss Boo

So here is a video of Miss Boo helping in the kitchen. This is one of two drawers she can open, and as you can see the concept of "clean washcloth" is one that I am redefining.

I had a breakthrough yesterday. I'm not sure why I never thought of this before, except that I was silly enough to keep trying to do something by myself without asking the Lord for help. I finally got to the point in my (rushed Mom-style) prayers where I said, "Ok, Lord, if you want me to read the Bible every day you've just got to show me how to do it, that's all, because I can't concentrate AT ALL on the Bible when I have to keep Miss Boo from chopping her fingers off all the time."

I often think that God has a quiet chuckle at me, the way I do when Miss Boo gets her head stuck between the lamp and the chair...again. The next morning as I sat down to eat eggs with Miss Boo eating eggs in her high chair, and I thought about reading one of my pregnancy books while I ate.

"Well," said a little thought from the Lord. "If you can read a pregnancy book, why can't you read the Bible again?"

"Duh," I said, aloud, because although the Lord doesn't speak audibly to me sometimes these things just require the verbal equivalent of a forehead slap. "Sorry."

So I offer this idea to any mothers of small children who might be reading: wait until the kiddo is busily engaged smearing egg yolk in their hair, and read your portion of Scripture then, in between cooking the egg and scraping it off the ceiling.

Now if I could just find a way to keep Miss Boo from scaling any obstacle to pull the DVDs off their shelf...

Cheers,

Breanna

So I had a dream...

...that I had the baby (in a cafeteria for some reason) and the baby was a girl. Do you think that means anything?

As I recall I dreamed that Miss Boo was a boy several times so maybe I work by opposites. Just thought I'd post this in case I turn out to be psychic. :)

Hm!
Breanna

We Are Not Alone

This is not a new picture of Miss Boo but I just think she looks cute helping me knit. :) She's been helping me all day, including swiping the face-washing washcloth off her highchair back and washing the trashcan on the sly while I loaded the dishwasher this morning.

So... there are a few blogs I read for various reasons whose politics/religion clash drastically with my own. I was amused while reading the comments section of one of them to run across something I thought was endemic only in Christian circles: lamenting the fact that tax dollars are used to fund something that one regards as immoral. The issue in question? Folks were getting all het up over whether food stamp recipients should be allowed to purchase ice cream, Twinkies, and conventionally raised red meat with the food stamps. Not quite the same as whether tax dollars should be used to fund abortion, but heavens to Patsy, from the amount of vitriol and emotion dredged up by the topic you'd think it was.

Now please don't think I'm arguing for the nutritive qualities of Twinkies. What really intrigued me was that something I'd always thought of as the province of Christians--worrying over something we have little control over, like disbursement of tax money--turns out to really be something that most people in our society do. But because I hang around few non-Christians who are comfortable enough with me to rant, I hadn't heard it from an atheist perspective before.

My Dad has talked about this before; when I graduated from college I mentioned how it would be much cooler if we could walk out to a song from a particular movie soundtrack instead of the very very very boring "Pomp and Circumstance" (any song written specifically for a graduation is going to be boring or unbelievably schmaltzy). Dad pointed out that it was the aging alumni committee who arranged the program, and that they, being roughly fifty years older than me, would not see the merits of a movie soundtrack theme. He then expanded on this idea to point out that while the Church thinks that they are the only ones to struggle with relevance to the postmodern set, apparently alumni committees have the same problem.

All of which is a roundabout way of saying, things are more encouraging than we often think they are. As Christians we can look at the darkness in the world and get discouraged. Worse, we think that as Christians we're working under some kind of severe disadvantage. We castigate ourselves for not being relevant enough, personal enough, or consisent enough--all of which may be concerns--but then we add to it by assuming atheists have none of these problems. (They do. And they whine about them as frequently as we do.) Of course this is backward thinking; as Christians we have a huge advantage. It's called the power of the Living God.

I'm all for relevance and all, but really I think as long as we attempt to incorporate the Gospel in our everyday lives, whether we have church in a cathedral, a coffee house, or a shoe factory will be extraneous. What the Bible actually asks us to do as the expression of our salvation is remarkably simple--instructions like fear God, honor the king, pay our taxes, take care of widows and orphans, do our work honestly and well. It's when we get into the realm of slogans and titles that we get into trouble; that's also the time when we start focusing on what we're doing instead of what God's doing.

This is not to say that we shouldn't be willing to change when God tells us to. However, the stodgy church which sings nothing but hymns is as much a straw man for evangelicals as the fat-cat corporate executive is for extreme environmentalists. Do we really think the problem is that our style is not right?


Ultimately the test will be whether or not we are actually obedient to the commands of Scripture. I could care less whether you are wearing a suit, tattoos, or both; if you are obedient to Scripture, you'll attract people and find yourself evangelizing. If you are disobedient, all the how-to-be-missional classes in the world are not going to help.

So be like I was-- encouraged and also a little chastised. Encouraged that all you need to be is obedient. Chastised for thinking that your personal spin on the Gospel really mattered that much. And then go and do what you know God has been telling you to do all along.

Cheers,

Breanna

The Shopping Trip

Here is what Miss Boo and the Husband did while I ventured out into subzero weather to purchase my groceries:

(To be fair, I'm pretty sure she was more active than this part of the time. And it was only -9. But still, that is subzero.)

The grand total for my shopping trip (2 stores, 1 1/2 hours) was $220, and some cents. This comes in $20 under budget for what I shoot for every month from the grocery store (not counting beef, and I usually come in over budget so it's a bigger savings than that.) I should mention that the menu posted below isn't particularly frugal; I'm helped by having a lot of beef stored. If I had to buy all the meat to use in meals this month, I'd have less meat in the meals and more beans, pasta, and lentils (for instance I'd go half-and-half lentils and beef in my spaghetti sauce, and the cowboy beans would have less beef in them). Counting in the amortized cost of the beef, the total for this month's food would be $320. I haven't figured out how much I save by only having to use 25% of the gas I'd normally use for the month's shopping, but I'm sure that adds to savings.

OK, enough menuing. I'll report periodically this month to see if things work as well as I anticipate.

For dinner tonight, by the way, we had homemade pepperoni, spinach, and black olive pizza and green salad with homemade dressing. (Get the big pepperoni and the big shredded mozzarella from Costco and you can have homemade pizza for MONTHS for about $14.) Very yummy, and for dessert there are the chocolate chip cookies I made this afternoon. I'm just a ball o' fire on days when I can con the Husband into Child Patrol. :D

Have a great day,

Breanna

Monthly Menu Plan & Shopping

Here is my menu for the month:

Breakfasts (3 choices - some might like more, but we are pretty stick-in-the-mud):
Cold cereal
Hot cereal
Eggs & toast

For the Husband: pumpkin/zucchini bread added to above, since his needs to be fast/portable.

Lunches:
Leftovers
Sandwiches (egg, tuna, PB&J)

Snacks (Miss Boo needs snacks, and I do too while I'm el preggo):
Cookies (homemade) & milk
Cheese & crackers
Graham crackers & milk
Pumpkin/zucchini bread & milk

Dinners: - a selection of 30 items. I'll list ours, but I think everyone's would be different since not everyone, for instance, likes lentils as much as we do. Also, these aren't in any kind of order. This is just the order I thought of them. We obviously won't have soup two nights in a row. Here goes:

1. Chicken enchiladas, salad
2. Meatloaf, potatoes, carrots
3. Tuna casserole, peas
4. Spagetti, salad, bread
5. Pizza, salad
6. Tacos and fixin's
7. Salmon fillets & rice, green beans
8. Chicken soup
9. Potato soup
10. Pot roast & potato, roast vegetables
11. Steak & salad, potato
12. Meatballs & noodles, peas
13. Schnitzel, green beans, noodles
14. Lentil-veggie stew, bread
15. Roast chicken & fixings
16. Beef stir-fry, rice
17. Saurkraut & keilbasa, potatoes
18. Beanie-weenies, salad, cornbread
19. Chicken curry, rice
20. Beef stew, biscuts
21. Biscuts & gravy, vegetable of choice
22. Beef stroganoff, salad
23. Pork roast, potatoes, veg
24. BBQ pork sandwiches, salad
25. Sloppy joes, salad
26. Oven fried chicken, potatoes, salad
27. Bean & bacon soup, bread
28. Salmon patties, collard greens, rice
29.Fish & chips, veg of choice
30. Chili & cornbread
31. Cowboy beans & rice, greens, squash (31 days in January)

So there's my menu. My shopping list I will post when I have data on how much it it will cost to buy the groceries. I have an advantage in that I have a freezer full of local beef that we bought in December (& some veggies I grew last summer), and also I have a pantry I've been stocking with canned vegetables and fruit for the past few months. The plan is to bake all our bread/goodies, which won't be a big change ( or hassle, I have a bread machine). I'm also going to try a plan of shifting from fresh produce at the start of the month to frozen/canned stuff at the end. We'll see how we do.

Hope this is helpful to someone or at least entertaining. :D I have fun watching other people's frugal experiments but then I'm a nerd.

Alrighty then, off to the store with us.

Breanna

New Year Frugal

Here is Miss Boo's interpretation of "don't poke the doggie's ears":
And "Don't touch DVDs" (that's our DVD-holder/TV stand on her left):

So we have been having an active and challenging (and cold) day today. In fact, it's one of those unfairly cold days. It was 26 F outside when I got up; by 10am it was 16 F, at noon it was 11 F, and now at quarter to 2pm it's 6 F. Just doesn't seem fair, somehow.

Anyhow, because of my pessimistic side I've been expecting the economic woes of the country to continue into the new year, so I am experimenting with Once-A-Month Grocery Shopping. This involves esoteric skills like freezing milk and defrosting fruit, but I think I can do it. :) I made up a menu plan today for the next month, so we'll see how I do (and what I spend). The whole idea is to spend less than I would weekly shopping, which seems to be a given since it should cut down on impulse purchasing by 75% (if there's 75% less chance to have impulses). So, because I am boring and I get a kick out of this stuff, I'll be posting my menu plan and such in a separate post and then I'll let you know how much I ended up spending on groceries. Before I was spending about $60 per week, which is really too much for two people and a baby.

OK, so, moving on-- Miss Boo is pulling all the towels and washcloths out of my kitchen drawers and carrying them down the hallway, so I'd better get on that. It's also her naptime... and mine. :D

Yrs. etc.,

Breanna

Happy New Year!

From our very own New Year's Baby... May the Lord care for us this year as He has in years past, to the glory of His name.

Have a great New Year, everybody,

Breanna