Is this spring?

I feel like spring is taunting me. We went outside today and enjoyed being without winter coats. Let's hope it lasts!

Misfit deer

Today, after a busy morning, both the girls were down for naps, and our backyard was a haven for deer. I had to gasp when I saw a three-legged on though. Poor little guy! A whole group of them settled down under the big tree in the back, and a bunch of them were snoozing. Then I saw the buck come around, and I realized that he only had one antler. I guess our yard is the oasis for misfit deer.

And then the girls did this all evening. It was an eventful day.

We had our ultrasound, and...

There's no need to buy anything BLUE for this house, because we will be inundated with PINK for the rest of our lives. Not only will Brett and I be outnumbered by our children, but we will be outnumbered by girls. All girls. Wow. We got some good pictures and a video from the lab, but I couldn't get anything scanned or make a video clip. So here are some shots I took on my phone from my laptop.

 

Face

 

Yawning

Finding her thumb

She's doing well so far! The doctor said she's actually a few days ahead of schedule. The placenta is smack dab in front which makes be a little nervous due to the whole two-previous-c-section-scars thing. That also explains why I haven't really felt anything big yet, since there's the equivalent of a big pillow between baby and outside world. She was breech for the whole ultrasound, and no matter what the tech or I did, we couldn't get her to move. No really good profile pictures as a result.

I guess I'm doing well too. Still bustling around like normal, but I'm getting a little more tired that I was before. Guess that's 20 weeks for you. I'm still sleeping partially on my stomach, which is WEIRD because I was totally body-pillowing it up by this time with the girls. It's getting harder to lean over and put the girls' shoes on too. And my grand total for weight gain is only 8 lbs. YES! I hope it stays that way, but with my appetite as of late, I don't think it will. Warm weather can come at any time. I'm ready to go for walks outside!

Brett left for work this evening and will come home Friday afternoon, if all goes well. No big plans this week. I'm considering self-quarantining all of us here at home after hearing about all the people with the stomach flu. UGH! There's nothing worse than the stomach flu. So now every time I hear Sophia whine or cough in her room in the middle of the night, I'm going to thinking she's getting sick. The whole thought of it makes me shudder. You don't know real parenthood until you've dealt with it, right?

Hey, it's OK...February 12, 2011

The past few week's adventures included birthday parties, lots of cooking, library time, laundry that never ended, ice that never ended, snow that never ended, sparkly fingernails, and uncomfortable sleeping. Living the life with these awesome ladies.

Hey, it ok...

...to be extremely thankful for nice strangers. I took the girls to the grocery store today with my not-so-long list and stack of coupons. We were there WAY too long. Each kiddo had their own meltdown. There was screaming coming from the little car attached to the front of the cart. I was so thankful to get out of there, and thanks to the checkout lady who gave my girls suckers, I was able to enjoy a blissfully quiet ride home.

...to want to squeeze Claire every time she says Sophia's name. It's the best. She calls her Foofee, which I think is some version of Sophie. It's pretty darn cute. Claire will walk around the house looking for Sophia and yell, "Foofee!" And when she finds her, she says, "There she is!" She also totally tattles on her too. The other day, Claire ran to me, saying some version of, "Foofee. No! Book. Ouchy!" Apparently, Sophia took her book. I totally got it.

...to break Suppinger tradition and find out the sex of Musick baby #3. For once, we aren't moving while I'm pregnant, so I have time to get a room ready and prep and wash clothes, whether they be pink or blue. And besides, if this kiddo is a boy, I should totally be hitting up sales from last winter's clothes. I'm tired of unisex clothing and toys.

...to want just ONE night where I can sleep and not wake up for ANYTHING. Claire had a bad cough last week, so I was up with her for about 3 nights. Now Sophia has started randomly screaming in the middle of the night. Not sure if she's awake or not, but it happens 3-4 times every night. You don't want to ignore it because what if one of those screams is something really awful? Add in the constant nightly bathroom trips for myself, and all I really want to do is SLEEP. I guess I'm being prepped for a newborn. Again.

...to wonder if Brett could apply for Canadian citizenship since he's spent more time there in the past 2 weeks than he has at home. Free healthcare? I'm game.

...to want to bake everything is this cookbook that I found at the library, which is simply titled, "Baking." Yeah. I even bought bread flour, people.

...to hate February with a passion. How can a month so short feel so insanely long?

...to focus on the light at the end of the tunnel. The weather is supposed to be warmer by the end of this week, and let me tell you, if the temp gets anywhere close to 50 degrees, we are bundling up and going to the park. Brett also has vacation at the end of March, and we are packing up and going to Florida. I hope it all works out. He's a frequent traveler at a lot of hotels and has earned a free stay at a Hilton anywhere in the country. Free hotel? Anywhere? Let's go someplace warm. Free flight? Let's go someplace not-to-far-away so the girls (and us) won't go bonkers on an airplane. We're thinking Fort Lauderdale or Tampa.

...to have an unhealthy addiction (as of right now) to the following: orange juice, banana bread, granola, meat (in any form), and The Food Network (which causes a lot of the before-mentioned cravings).

Homemade with love

The snowstorm and ice from last week allowed me to do some sewing and prep everything for the taxes. It's good to know that you can get something accomplished when the weather is so terrible. Now this week, we've had some frigid temperatures. So cold, in fact, that when I took the girls to storytime, Sophia walked in to the library, yelling, "Mommy, it's too cold! I can't breathe!" Always drama.

So we've tried to stay in and avoid the cold. In that time, I was able to applique and embroider some little onesies for Valentine's Day for the smallest kiddos at our playgroup. I love to embroider by hand. It's like meditation for me. And the onesies turned out really cute. We packaged up some little bags of M&Ms and boxes of conversation hearts for the older kids, and we made some of the heart-shaped double chocolate cookies (from this post) for the adults to take home. Goodies all around.

I also decided to whip up some broccoli cheese soup this week. The craving was bad, so I even bought name brand cheese at the local Walmart. Name brand is almost unheard of around here! I thought I'd be ambitious and make the soup without a recipe. I figured I had made it enough times that I could figure it out. Ultimate success. This is THE BEST broccoli cheese soup. Like, it's as good as the Panera broccoli cheese soup, which I know well, since that was all I could eat (and keep down) when I was pregnant with Sophia. I'm going to share the recipe with you. Make it. You'll love it!

BROCCOLI CHEESE SOUP

1 small onion, minced
olive oil, drizzle
half of a family-size bag of frozen broccoli cuts
3 cups chicken broth
3 carrots, shaved
5 cups 2% milk
4 cups American/Cheddar shredded cheese blend
1/4 cup flour, sifted
salt and pepper to taste

Drizzle olive oil in a large dutch oven. Heat minced onion over medium heat until they are transparent.
Turn the heat to medium-high. Add half of a family-sized bag of frozen broccoli cuts and 3 cups of chicken broth. (I made the chicken broth with hot water and chicken bouillon.) Simmer broccoli until very tender, 15-20 minutes.
Add shaved carrots, and simmer for 2-3 minutes.
Add 5 cups of 2% milk and heat to a simmer. Add cheese one cup at a time and whisk until melted.
Sift flour over soup a little at a time, whisking between each addition to ensure no lumps. Simmer until thick. If too thick, add more milk.
Salt and pepper to taste.

Ice, ice, ice, and a little creative time

What a week! Brett just got home tonight, but this is what he had to deal with before he could even start the drive back to our house. Thank goodness for other people in the employee parking lot, or Brett, along with some others, would have never been able to get out of their parking spots. We're thankful that other people were kind enough to lend a hand, and that Brett was there to push other people out of their spots.

Some odd ice wind off the back spoiler on the trunk.

Over an inch of ice on the front of the car.

 

And a broken ice scraper to boot.

And this is what I got to do while the kiddos were sacked out. Claire slept from 2:30 until 6 today. WHOAH! She's had a cold and hasn't been sleeping well, so I think it finally caught up to her. Sophia even slept for a while too. It was nice to have a silent house and a little creative time.

This is insane

Is anyone else REALLY ready for spring? I mean desperate for spring? Like, I'd move south for February if I knew someone down there? Ugh...

This weather is insane. We've had almost 3 inches of ice here, according to the local weather. I wouldn't know personally because I don't dare go outside. There were pictures online of people in Indy ice skating on their driveways. And now the wind is picking up and blowing the snow everywhere. I think I would rather deal with the two feet of snow that people are getting in Chicago. Did you see this video? Seriously. Take a second to look at it.

Lightning in Chicago

And this was just too funny not to share.

So we'll be staying inside today...again. Thankfully, no one is sick, though Claire was dealing with some major sinus drainage last night, and we were up quite a bit. Naps today, please. And laundry. And cleaning out the fridge. Thrilling, I know. Brett is still stuck in Moncton, New Brunswick. Who knows when he'll get home. And it really stinks because he was supposed to have five days off in a row, and now he's going to spend most of that time camped out in a hotel.

No more baking for a few days! We have some major sweets going on in this house right now! The girls and I made double chocolate chip cookies last night, which are AMAZING. They are as big as your head! The recipe said it only made 12 cookies, but I got 16 out of the dough. Here's the recipe if you want to bake while you're stuck inside today!

GIANT DOUBLE CHOCOLATE COOKIES
from Annie's Eats

Yield: 12 very large cookies 

Ingredients:

1 cup (2 sticks) cold, unsalted butter, cubed
1¼ cup sugar
2 large eggs
½ cup dark cocoa powder
2¼ cups all-purpose flour
¼ tsp. coarse salt
1 tsp. baking powder
2½ cups semi-sweet chocolate chips 

Directions:

Preheat the oven to 350˚ F.  Line baking sheets with parchment paper or silicone baking mats.  In the bowl of an electric mixer, combine the butter and sugar.  Beat together on medium-high speed until light and fluffy, 2-3 minutes.  Blend in the eggs one at a time, scraping down the bowl as needed.  Mix in the cocoa powder until well blended.  Add the flour, salt and baking powder to the bowl and mix on low speed just until incorporated.  Fold in the chocolate chips with a spatula. Transfer the dough to a work surface and knead briefly by hand to be sure the ingredients are well combined.

Divide the dough into 4 ounce portions (or divide into 12 equal pieces).  Roll each portion of dough into a ball and flatten just slightly into a disc.  Place on the prepared baking sheets, a few inches apart.  Bake 16-20 minutes.  Let cool on the baking sheets 5-10 minutes, then transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.