Working Mom

Sometimes I feel the little guilty pangs of being a working mom. I don't work that much - two 4-hour mornings each week. Cohen goes to a friend's house one day a week. The other day, he comes with me. It has worked out so far and I really enjoy working - I get out of the house a little bit and I get a small break from being a mom. However, the past couple of weeks have been a little off. I've been taking Cohen into work with me more and more. Here are the differences I've noticed. 1) I don't get as much work done. Working with a toddler around is difficult. I'm not an effective nor efficient employee and I hate that! 2) I'm not a nice mom when Cohen is at work with me. I'm always worried that something is going to break or that he is going to fall or blah, blah, blah. 3) I allow Cohen to get away with things at work that I wouldn't let him get away with at home. For example, he watches a movie on the dvd player about 80% of the time that he is at work with me. That's a lot. Also, he eats the ENTIRE TIME we are there. My kid eats a lot of food anyway, but we usually stick to some sort of schedule: breakfast, snack time, lunch, snack time, dinner. At work it is snack time all of the time. Soon, he'll be coming into work with me every day, because my friends are moving. This means that my break from being a mom goes out the window - I'll just be going from "regular mom" to "mean mom" depending on whether or not I work that day. It shouldn't be like that. I don't know if there is a solution. Maybe I needed to vent. Maybe I needed to put my "feel sorry for me" vibe out into the web universe (like it is even a valid problem - there are so many other things for people to worry about). Maybe I need a change.

We're moving...again.

I think Mark and I can start to list "moving" under the hobbies/talents section of our resumes. We're doing it again. We're moving to a different neighborhood. Ballard will be so great for us. I can walk to the store/beach/park/library/doctor/little downtown shopping area/post office/etc without having to climb any killer hills. Mark will still use the same bus line. We get to stay in the same church ward. It'll be great!

One downside is that the apartment is a bit smaller than the one we are living in. So, we are downsizing. One thing we've been working on lately is our storage. Have you ever used Space Bags??? They are the best! Our baby clothes used to take up 4 storage boxes. I shrunk the clothes in two space bags and cut the storage in half!!! Yesterday I worked on the burp cloths and baby toys. I went from this:

To this:

However, after I got done vacuuming out all of the air I noticed a buzzing sound. I kept looking around my apartment for what it might be... It turned out to be the vibrating teether. I had to open the bag and dig it out.

We're really excited about the move. Come visit us after we get settled!

This is incredible!!!

Click on this: This Young House

Then look at this: Wedding Album

I want to be them.

Who says you can't eat really good food while on Weight Watchers?? Not me!

Mark was gone tonight. He cooks really good meals. However, when he is not home, I usually make breakfast for dinner. Tonight I had my favorite omelet and a BLT. I made the omelet without feta cheese this time. It really doesn't need the cheese - it is flavorful enough. The BLT was made with Orowheat's new sandwich rounds (1 point for two slices), turkey bacon (1 point for two slices), lettuce from our garden and tomatoes. It was GOOD! My whole meal was only 5 points. Whoo hoo!

Body Change

I'm going to become a P90x missionary. I LOVE IT! Mark and I are on week 5 and I feel like my body is someone else's body. Before we started the program, I was scared. I had watched a couple of the workouts beforehand and they freaked me out. They were so intense and LONG! However, now I look forward to working out. I feel so great when I'm done each day. I've never felt that way after a workout. I feel exhilarated. Don't get me wrong - the workouts are hard with a capital H. The thing that I like about them is that they go at a slow pace. Even during Plyometrics where we jump around for an hour, it's doable because the pace isn't crazy. Today I did yoga for an hour and a half. I tried to do it this morning while Cohen was playing, but he was having a bad day and I had to stop every 5 seconds. So I quit after 20 minutes and did it during his nap. It is exactly what I needed. In the middle during the worst pose, I thought, "This is SO hard, but I feel great." Kind of like I'm finally using the body that Heavenly Father gave me. I'm breathing better, I'm more flexible, I am MUCH stronger and I just plain feel good.

Do P90x...it will change your life.

Gross Times Infinity!

This was another birthday present:

This is why I needed it:

Left: used one time
Right: brand new

I'm a fan of my new mop!!

The Queen Doesn't Cook #11

I got a new cook book for my birthday. The idea is that you put veggie puree into recipes. Supposedly you are not supposed to be able to taste the puree - very sneaky. I, of course, want Cohen to eat veggies the regular way. But let's face it - sometimes he just won't. So, when he refuses, I can at least be assured that he got some from the main course.

As many of you know, I am unable to do anything half-way. So, today I blocked out 2 hours of my morning to make puree. I planned to only make two different veggies. However, it went so fast that I ended up making four. Why did it take me so long when Cohen was a baby????

This is going to be tonight's dinner...yummy!

Next week - tofu nuggets.
(It sounds nasty, but the picture actually looks really tasty!)