Yummy Rolls like Grandma's

1/4 C warm water
1/4 C butter, melted
1 C warm milk
1 egg
1 T honey
1/2 t salt
4 C bread flour (or 4 C all-purpose flour and 4 T gluten flour) plus or minus to right consistency of dough
1 package yeast (a little less than a T)

Dissolve yeast and honey in warm water and let proof while combining flour, salt, milk, butter, and egg. Once yeast mixture is foamy, add to flour mixture. Knead until elastic.
Let rise in greased bowl covered with saran wrap in warm place until doubled in size (about 1 hour). Punch down and form into nice round mound. Divide into 16 sections and roll each section into a ball. Place in greased 9x13 pan. Cover and let rise until double in size (about 45 min). Bake at 350 for about 15 minutes, or until golden on top.

Creamy Potato Chicken Soup

5 red potatoes, cubed
3 carrots, peeled and sliced thinly
3 stalks celery, chopped thinly
1 onion, chopped
2 cloves garlic, minced
1/4 cup olive oil
1 tsp salt
1 tsp ground black pepper
1 head cauliflower, in small pieces
6 cups chicken broth (3 1/2 14 oz cans)
2 cups milk
2 chicken breasts, cooked and shredded
8 oz pepper jack cheese, shredded

Preheat oven to 425. Put potato cubes in one layer on a lightly greased cooking sheet. Bake for 30 mins, or until tender.
While the potatoes are baking, heat olive oil in large pot. Add in carrots, celery, onions, garlic, salt, and pepper. Cook on medium high until softened, about 10 minutes.
Add in chicken broth, milk, and cauliflower. Bring to a boil and cook on medium until cauliflower is softened, about 10 minutes.
Puree mixture with immersion blender.
Add in chicken, potatoes, and cheese. Stir until cheese is melted.
Serve hot.
(Optional: crumble bacon on top of served soup...I forgot to cook the bacon, I'd advise cooking it earlier in the day and refrigerating.)

Pumpkin Cherry Oat Muffins

1 cup oats, ground (I use a food processor)
1 cup all purpose flour
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp baking soda
1/2 cup butter or margerine, softened
1 cup brown sugar
1 cup sour cream
2 eggs
1/2 cup pumpkin puree
3/4 cup dried cherries

Preheat oven to 400 F and line or grease muffin pan.
Cream together butter and sugar. Add in sour cream, eggs, and pumpkin and mix well.
Add in all dry ingredients except cherries and stir until combined.
Spoon into muffin pan. Each should be pretty full.
Bake for 20 minutes.
Makes 12 muffins.

Out Sick

This week I was supposed to be packing up stuff that we don't use very often so we can start moving in a week. Turns out I've spent the whole week in bed. Ok, that's a bit of an exaggeration, but only a bit. Thursday afternoon (last week) I started getting that weird feeling in my nose/throat that signaled the oncoming cold. I thought, "oh man, not another cold, i've only been over my previous one for a week...how annoying." Friday I woke up to a huge sinus headache. I mean I hurt from my teeth, through my sinuses, and my eyes, all the way back through my head and down my neck and shoulders. Neither ibuprofen nor tylenol made a dent in the pain. Friday night I woke up in the middle of the night and the left side of my head felt normal and the right side of my head still had the full pain. It is so strange to have half a headache.
Unfortunately Joshua has it, too. He has been a trooper though and hasn't been as terrible as he could be through this. Most of the day he hangs out with me in bed (watching Cars, Thomas, or Chuck the truck and friends [that's not what it is really called...can't think of the name right now]) or sitting in my lap playing with my phone. He still runs around part of the day playing with his cars, train, fire truck, and dump trucks though, too. I just watch him and wonder where he gets all that energy from.
So sinus pressure, post nasal drip, sore throat, and it also comes with a lack of appetite. I struggle to force myself to eat 2 meals per day. Joshua's been a peach about eating, too. If I can get him to eat more than a half banana, two yogurts, and some juice for the whole day, I consider it a good day. I mean full-on tantrums when it's meal time. He eats better for Dave, but Dave just can't be home for all the meals of the day. A couple days I filled his sippy with half eggnog, half milk, hoping he'd get some extra protein and calories from that.
Every night I think that I will feel better in the morning. Here's another night of hoping that's true!

Face update

Remember when I posted all that very interesting stuff about my face? Well, I've been keeping up pretty well with that routine. (Apricot Scrub in the morning shower, mary kay wash in the evening, MK day and night solution respectively, MK moisturizer)
Well, it hasn't been helping. I think a month is long enough to tell whether it will work. So, I got this idea from pinterest.
It goes against all my previous ideas on how to clean a face, but it makes sense. Oil disolving oil--heard that before. Also makes sense that your face would become dependent on moisturizers and produce more oil than necessary. It's like how your lips get dependent on chap stick. I bought some castor oil today and I already have tons of olive oil, so tonight will be my first oil cleansing experience. :)

Bear Lake Weekend

Dave told me to keep Friday and Saturday open on my birthday weekend, but he wasn't going to tell me what we were doing. He was super excited about it. He was most excited because he was able to keep it secret. He's not good at keeping something secret. I almost always know what my birthday and Christmas presents are well before Christmas. It's not like he tells me what they are, he just happens to ask little questions about it the month before hand.
He was pretty good this time. I didn't know until the day we were leaving.
Anyway, we went up to our time share at Bear Lake. We went there two years ago for our anniversary. Apparently the first weekend in May up at Bear Lake when it is snowing isn't as pleasant. None of the stores were open. I was also morning sick then, too. This time was a lot more pleasant. It was a little chilly, but since it was a little bit after the busy season, things were still open and there weren't any crowds. The beach wasn't completely empty like the first time, but it was warm enough to go swimming.
We drove up there Friday, stopped in Logan for groceries.
Saturday morning we drove to Paris, ID and stood outside the tabernacle. Then we drove through the wildlife preserve to look for birds. I think most of them had flown south for the Winter already. We only saw a few ducks.
Then we played at the beach for a while.

That evening we went out for dinner at a little place called Cooper's. It was a cute little restaurant and the food was decently priced for a good amount. I got a chicken breast and a trout. We got Joshua a spaghetti.

Sunday morning we got up early, packed up the car, rode our bikes up the bike path a bit, then strapped the bikes back on the car and drove to Logan.
We stopped to visit Daniel at USU for a little while. We were able to drive past the Brigham City Temple and then rushed home, changed our clothes, dropped Joshua off at Dave's parents and then attended the last session of the Brigham City Temple dedication.
My favorite part of the whole weekend was that we got to spend uninterrupted time together as a family for the whole weekend. It was a wonderful birthday present.

Some reasons why I am excited to move

#1 on my list: de-junking!
Our own laundry room with our own washer and dryer
Redecorating each room
Space in the office room for my craft supplies and (not-yet-purchased) sewing desk
Gas fireplace
Joshua's room won't share a wall with our bathroom

I'm so proud of myself today

For so many reasons:

1. I went to the gym this morning after having been sick for 2 weeks (sick child = no child care = can't go to the gym). I swam 6 lengths breast stroke, 4 lengths freestyle, 4 lengths back stroke, and 4 more lengths breast stroke. Now before you are impressed, it's only a 25 M pool. Nothing like swimming laps to remind yourself how completely out of shape you are.
2. I started a Feel Great in 8 Challenge today and only slipped up twice.
3. I went to Hobby Lobby, complained to a manager about my faulty cut of fabric from Saturday and was able to exchange it for the correct length, even though it had been cut in half.
4. I called like 10 HVAC repair places to compare prices and availability. First of all, me calling somewhere is just an achievement in itself, but 10 places! I was very professional and grown up about it, too. I had all my questions ready and well phrased before hand and only stumbled through it once when I was caught off guard by a message machine. 
5. I scheduled our 5 furnaces and 1 boiler to have tune-ups. (2 where we live now, 3 and 1 in our new house!)
6. I got messages from 2 of the units in the house saying that the heating wasn't working. So I headed over there in the evening when they'd be for sure home and here are the sub-bullets for my accomplishments there:

• I went in the basement (oh so creepy and spider-filled = gets its own bullet point)
• I found the light switch in the basement (again, creepy, gets its own bullet point)
• I went in the room in the basement with the boiler in it (even creepier with no windows and a dangling bulb from the ceiling...yes, you're imagining the creepiest darkest room in a spider infested basement...you are correct...no wait, there are rooms past that room that are even creepier. I didn't go in those, just shone a flashlight in them)
• I inspected the boiler to see what the problem was...it just looks like a box with a bunch of tubes coming out of it with little pressure gauges on them. Yeah, I had no idea. But there was a little green light! Green lights are good. Found out that they were using the thermostat for the fireplace instead of the heater thermostat - showed them how to use it. FIXED! woohoo! (yes, I'm claiming credit for this one because I was in the basement 2 times solely for this...)
• The water in the kitchen only comes out cold. I figured it was pipe issues that needed a plumber to fix it, but I figured I'd take a look in the basement (again!) to see if I could see something with my completely untrained eyes. Turns out the pilot light for their water heater was out. I read the instructions and lit the pilot light by. my. self. 
• Side note - now that I think of it, I bet the gas fireplace wasn't working for the same reason. Now that I know how to light a pilot light, maybe I can fix that, too!!!

Snuggles

At about lunchtime today, Joshua went in to visit Dave who was in bed (he is nocturnal on Thursdays). Josh was in there talking to him about everything he could think of. Then he turned over and went to sleep. So adorable. I would have taken a picture, but I didn't want to wake him up. So today he took his nap in our bed. I don't blame him, it's pretty much the most comfortable bed in the world.

Chicken Salad

1 can canned chicken
1 handful red grapes, quartered
1/2 apple, chopped
1 handful frozen peas
1 lime yogurt
(Optionals that I didn't have on hand and so didn't use: celery, diced; cashews, chopped)

Serve on croissants.

Crock pot "fauxtissery" chicken

This is adapted from O.B.B.
1 whole chicken
1/4 C butter, divided
1 lemon, sliced
fresh rosemary
fresh sage
fresh thyme
4-5 cloves garlic, halved
season salt to taste
4-6 slices bread
poultry seasoning
celery salt
3 crumpled balls of aluminum foil or rack for crock pot

Remove chicken instructions (giblets), rinse chicken and pat dry with paper towels. Put little pats of 1/8 C. butter, garlic, fresh rosemary, sage, and thyme under skin of chicken (I only did the breast side). Butter bread slices and sprinkle with celery salt and poultry seasoning. Cut into 1/2" squares and stuff into chicken cavities, stitch closed. Rub season salt into skin of chicken on all sides. Place chicken, breast up on 3 balls of foil in crock pot to keep it off the bottom of the pot. Top with slices of lemon. Cook on high or low until done. (I'm hoping it will be done on high after 5 hours. Check with meat thermometer for done-ness.)

Gravy:
Use chicken drippings for gravy. Add a little milk and whisk flour or corn starch in to thicken.

Serve with potatoes or rice or quinoa or polenta.

Hot Water...

...is a funny book written by P. G. Wodehouse. It is also something we currently don't have at our house right now.
Clarification: I mean our current residence, not our new house. Although if I were still talking about the book, it is at neither. Clear as mud?
Thursday there was plenty of hot water. So hot I almost scalded my hands. Friday morning the best we could get was room-temperature water. So I went down and turned the water heater up. Hours later, still no hot water.
Turns out the water heater needed to be replaced. By then it was Friday evening and the plumber requested we do it Saturday (today) morning since it had been a long day for them.
First thing this morning, they came and replaced the water heater. I waited half an hour and turned on the hot water...and nothing...no water.
I found the plumber investigating stuff outside still and turns out that when the hot water is turned on, the downstairs kitchen floods. Awesome.
So, I showered at the neighbor's house because we wont have any hot water til at least Monday.
All in all, this is our first major problem after living here for 4 years. Not too shabby for how old the house is (abt. 90 years).
If you see me at church tomorrow and I stink...now you know why. ;)

Explanation

Dave suggested I keep a log of the recipes I use/create since I can never seem to make the same thing twice. It's mostly for my record keeping, but feel free to try them out yourself. Just note that the measurements are usually estimates.

Reboot update

I guess it's a good thing I've been too busy to post updates.
I have been waking up at 7 all week, but not necessarily because of my schedule...it's more because Joshua decided suddenly that 7 is the best time in the world to wake up. Boo. The whole idea was to be up before Joshua to have some quiet time to eat, read my scriptures, and get ready for the gym. Now 7am - 8am (sometimes 8:30) consists of me waking up to screaming and pounding on the door to his room, or his persistent "mom, mom, mom, mom, mom, mom, mom, mom.....mom, mom, mom?" (usually the former) until I let him out of his room and then I hand him a banana, throw him in our bed, turn on Cars, and sleep through as much of the movie as possible.
I have been doing great at exercising though, as my sore muscles will tell you. Last week and this week I have exercised 4 of 6 days planned: a mix of swimming, running, stationary bike, road bike with trailer, and weights.
I hope to do some water running next week, which I haven't done since high school XC. I'm super excited!
Joshua has been doing great at the gym child care, and I have loved being able to shower and dress in peace, even if it is in a tiny shower in a locker room.
I still need to work on other aspects of my new schedule, but I didn't really expect to master it in 1 or even 2 weeks. It shall always be a work in progress.

Lasagne

1 lb ground beef, browned with
1 small onion, chopped
3 - 4 cloves garlic
1 1/2 jars spaghetti sauce (or make your own)
Mix 3 above ingredients for marinara sauce layers.
16 oz + cottage cheese
2 eggs
Food process 2 above ingredients for cheese sauce layer
Shredded zucchini
Shredded cheese of choice
Sliced fresh tomatoes
1 1/2 boxes lasagne noodles

Layer as follows in largest pyrex dish:
Small layer marinara sauce (enough to cover bottom of pan so noodles don't stick)
Noodles
Cheese sauce (1/2 of it)
Zucchini
Marinara sauce (1/3 of it)
Noodles
Cheese sauce (rest of it)
Zucchini
Marinara sauce (half of remaining)
Noodles
Marinara sauce (rest of it)
Sliced tomatoes
Shredded cheese

Cover with aluminum (seal as well as possible) and bake at 350 for 1 hour. Uncover and bake another 10 minutes. Let sit 15 - 20 minutes before serving.

Butterscotch oatmeal chocolate chip cookies

1 c butter
3/4 c sugar
3/4 c brown sugar
1 t vanilla
Cream 4 above ingredients together, then add
2 eggs (I think....?)
2 1/4 heaping c flour
1 c regular oats
1 t salt
1 t baking soda
1 c butterscotch chips
1 c chocolate chips
1 small pkg butterscotch pudding mix

Bake at 375 for 10 - 13 min.

Alfredo lemon pepper chicken fettuccini

Alfredo sauce
3/8 c butter
1 1/3 c heavy cream
2 small cloves garlic
2 c parmesan
(Source: all recipes...link later)
Chicken
1 1/2 lb chicken cubed
1 t lemon zest
1 t lemon juice
1 t fresh ground pepper
2 T olive oil

Pasta al dente

Reboot day 6 and summary

Changing your schedule from laziness most of the day to include daily exercise and chores is mentally and physically exhausting. Mentally because you have to hype yourself up to do the chores you don't want to do. Physically because it's like getting in shape...no, it IS getting in shape.
Going from no exercise (physically and mentally) to some exercise, even if it just a little is tiring on your body, especially the first week. It doesn't help if you change your sleep time, too.
But, also like getting in shape, your body will adjust and you will get more energy. So they say at least. I'll let you know. ;)
I'm so tired I'll probably go to bed shortly after Joshua does tonight.

Reboot Day 4

Despite yesterday's late start, we made it to the gym, got a few things done. Dave had a schedule change and ended up with the night off so we had dinner together, played with Joshua at the park.
I'm definitely still behind in my chores scheduled out for the week, but the house looks better already with the things I have been able to get done this week.
Tomorrow I'm having a quilt tying party to tie one of my quilts tomorrow, so I have to finish up with the chores I wasn't able to accomplish during the week. I'm thinking I need this kind of motivation regularly. Maybe have people over every other week, possibly every week?
Right, well, off to do more chores before Joshua wakes up! Update on today will be posted later tonight.

2012 City Services Fair

On Monday, our city had a free fair to showcase all the city services. There were firetrucks, fire demonstrations, fire hoses you could spray, police cars, an airplane, a helicopter, bucket trucks, little fishing games, candy, otter pops, and lots of open parking lot roped off for running around.
Joshua and I went and we had a blast! I thought it was going to be super crowded so I showed up right when it started and it was pretty empty. It stayed pretty empty probably because the weather looked like it would turn nasty, and it actually did...at about 6. So we got a good 2 hours of play time in. Here are some pictures from the event (a select few...the rest are on my fb):

 Checking out the police booth. He was not a fan of McGruff the crime dog.

 Hat's off to you!

 Little Fireman Joshua

 Impressive fire department demonstration. Note the menacing skies in the background!

 Fireman Joshua on the firetruck

 Checking out the helicopter

 Looking at all the neat stuff in the helicopter

 Spraying some buckets painted with flames with the fire hose

 Pretending to fly an airplane together.

 Pilot and co-pilot...and best friends

 Ready to go up in the bucket truck!

 Up we go!

 Higher and Higher! (Don't worry, we definitely went all the way up, and I was clutching the side and Joshua very tightly...oh it was so high)

 Fireman friends!

More from the airplane. When he was by himself, he hated it, but with Henry, he loved it!

Reboot Day 3/New House Stuff: PICTURES!

Ha! Today was a bust.
I couldn't sleep til after 1am this morning, and so when 7am rolled around I felt like I had been hit by a truck. I let Panda out (who woke me by wandering around and shaking her collar, who needs an alarm clock!?) and flopped back in bed until Joshua got up at 8. We watched Cars in bed for another hour or so, then eventually rolled out of bed, and got ready for the day. Ran a few errands, had lunch, did some business at the bank for like 2 hours, then went home for naptime.
There's something up with Joshua and naps. We put him down for a nap at 3pm and he played in his room for about 45 minutes, ended up falling asleep in the middle of the floor, and only slept for about half an hour. Boo. Hiss.
I only got half of one chore done today: Vacuuming carpets. I didn't even get to that til Joshua's bedtime. Luckily I already did the dusting chore yesterday. Tomorrow will be a better day!
On to house stuff:
There are 24 windows needing to be replaced. 2 need to be done more urgently (one is broken, one has a gap at the top between the glass and the frame).
Last week at an expo, I signed up for Sears to come and bid out new windows on our new, very old, house. (Did I mention it was built in 1898?)  Let me just say that their bid had 5 digits, and the first one wasn't a 1: $XX,XXX. Yikes...we could buy another house with that amount if we had it, which we don't.
Today Dave had another company come and do another bid on the windows, and I really liked it a lot better. It was literally 1/3 of the price Sears offered.
We're going to get references of previous jobs done by this company, and then get another bid by another company, possibly 2 more, just to be sure.
It's exciting to be looking into improvements like this for our very own house! It's definitely nerve wracking though. We need to look over our budget, but the salesman made some very valid points:

• He offered to pay/waive the lead paint fee for the windows (close to $1000)
• They offer 0% financing up to 4 years (we'd just do 2 years)
• If we book it now, we could get it done before winter and save hugely on heating costs, not to mention not having to have gaping holes in our walls during the cold of winter

So what I'm thinking is that either we could save like $300ish/month for 2 years and do it then, all-the-while throwing most of our heating/cooling money out the window, literally. Or we could do it now and pay the $300ish/month with 0% interest to the company who does it...what do you think? 

Anyway, I have some pictures of the inside of the apartment we'll be living in. Do you want to see them!? Of course you do!

 Looking into the living room from the east porch. The front bathroom is to the left, the northeast and northwest bedrooms are to the right, the kitchen is straight through, the laundry room beyond that.

 Looking into the living room from the northeast bedroom/office. Why, yes, that is a gas fireplace, thermostat controlled with a fan. ;)

 Front bathroom with claw-foot tub.

 Other angle of front bathroom.

 Northeast bedroom/office from the living room. (Note: Joshua's head at bottom of picture)

 Northwest bedroom from living room.

 Southwest bedroom from laundry room.

 Laundry room. We have since put in a 220 line for the dryer and fixed the valves for the washer hookups (they were leaking).

 Laundry room from driveway. Back bathroom down little hallway to the left. Another outside door straight down hallway. I'll probably put a clothes line out that door between the two buildings. I'm so excited to have a clothes line!

 Back bathroom. Clawfoot tub, teeny toilet.

 Back bathroom, other angle. Tiny vanity, tiny mirror, tiny window.

 Southwest bedroom again, north half.

 Southwest bedroom again, south half.

 Dining area. Door leads to laundry room. Kitchen off to right. I forgot to take a picture of it because the tenants were cleaning it as I took pictures.

View of front door from living room.

So there it is...except the kitchen. I'll have to post that another time. We got it rented out for til December after a hullabaloo with the tenants we thought were staying til December bailing, not having a place to go, their moms calling me (oh the drama!), etc. and then we will move in in December! :)

Reboot Day 2

Joshua had his first day at the gym child care, and he did great! I had my first shower at the gym and I forgot my face lotion and my deodorant and my flip flops (ew stinky-armpit-Sarah walking around on slimy floors!). But, we made it, I worked out, we ran errands, and then went home for lunch.
Then...bum bum bummmmmmm...
It was nap time. Joshua was cranky and tired. I was getting there, too. So I put Joshua down for a nap, then went to lie down, myself, for a half an hour before getting up to do chores while Joshua was still sleeping. That's what my schedule says to do, and that was the plan. Apparently Joshua is against the schedule and the plan, because he ended up just playing in his room for an hour...not napping! I luckily drifted off a little bit, so I eventually got him up and did chores with him awake. Of course that means everything took a lot longer to do, but I got the kitchen and living areas vacuumed and mopped, and DUSTED! Oh man, our piano looks so much better without crap piled all over it and covered in dust.

Ok, dusting wasn't supposed to happen until tomorrow, but it was just so much easier to do it as I vacuumed. I'd just switch attachments when I got to an area needing it. (Note: To my parents and Chelsea, currently grimacing over me using the vacuum attachment to dust the piano...I didn't...I used a swiffer sweeper pad towel thing...To Alex: the piano misses you)
I've been scribbling all over the chore chart I made, and next week there will be some rearrangements (like I won't have "trash to curb" on Tuesday, because I need to put it out there Monday evening because our garbage pickup is at like 6am Tuesday...durrrr). I'll post about all the rearrangements later in the week when I get it all figured out.
Then, after dinner, we went and played outside. I mean, I shoveled dirt into the wheel barrow, while Joshua ran around like crazy.
I discovered THE best time to clean the bathroom: During bathtime! I cleaned the toilet today during Joshua's bath, and it didn't matter that he was sloshing water everywhere, because I was, too. I'm a big fan of this. Huge fan...give it a try.
And...now I'm late for bedtime. Goodnight!!!

Reboot Day 1

Last night Dave and I ended up sitting up talking until after midnight (1), and so 7am came sooner than hoped once we did fall asleep. But I kicked myself out of bed at 7am 7:15am ;) and got up to eat breakfast and read some scriptures. Then I went to the gym, leaving Joshua behind because he wasn't up yet, and Dave got a decent amount of sleep so he was ok getting up with him when he did get up (2)...which means I didn't get to do any dishes while he was eating breakfast...(3) I forgot we had a 9:00am appointment at our new house for a measurement and bid on the fence we need to put up for the dogs (4), so at the gym I only rode a stationary bike for 10 minutes, stretched for 10 minutes, and went home to shower (5). Then we headed to the new house for the appointment and fixed a few things and ran some errands until noon. I was starving, and so was Joshua, so I went home with Joshua, leaving  Dave at the house to finish fixing some things, and made lunch. Then Joshua was super cranky (he fell on his face down a cement stair at the house) so I put him down for his nap a little earlier than planned (6)...and I was exhausted, so I took a nap for half an hour an hour, too. After nap I folded laundry while Joshua played, made Dave some lunch, ironed Dave's shirt, packed Dave a dinner, skyped my parents, and folded some more laundry. Then, at 4pm, we headed over for a fun city fair at the mall with all the firetrucks, police cars, parks & recreation, utilities, etc. booths where we played for well over 2 hours! (time flew!) until it started thundering (glorious!) and wind...ing? and then raining. (Post to come on that when I get more pictures from a friend...)

We had dinner a little late (7), which I just grabbed out of the fridge (mac & cheese for Joshua, and I'm still not hungry yet...) (8). Then Joshua and I played for a while in his room, cleaned up his toys, changed his sheets (he drew on them with dry erase markers...bah!), and he went to bed. That brings us to now. I'm collecting myself after a long day, getting ready to finish up the last 2 hours strong.
If you're still there, props. So, if you noticed my counting, 8 things didn't really stick to my planned schedule, but I'm ok with it. It was the first attempt. I'm not going to get frustrated with everything not going as planned. It's the first week. I'm expecting it will take probably 2 weeks to get into the swing of things. The first week will be adjusting, and the second week will be practicing, and then hopefully the third week will make it into habit. I do like how this schedule is semi-flexible. With two or three big chunks of time during the day left open to be used as needed, it allows for things to "come up" without throwing off my whole day.
Well, in order for chores to go well, I need to do some chores from last week (laundry, ironing) and some chores from today (dishes, vacuuming, mopping), see this post if you're interested in my planned chores.

Life Reboot plan

This morning I brainstormed some more on our lovely white board. Here's a picture of it, then I've copied it out below so you can actually read it:

Monday:
Empty Trash
Vacuum hard floor
Mop kitchen
Clean BR Sink
Groceries

Tuesday:
Mop hardwood
Clean toilet
Run dishwasher
Trash to curb

Wednesday:
Mop bathroom
Dusting
Vacuum carpets

Thursday:
Vacuum/mop kitchen
Clean shower/tub
Run dishwasher

Friday:
Wash laundry
Clean bathroom sink
Hand wash dishes

Saturday:
Fold laundry
Ironing
Run dishwasher
Work on calling

Sunday:
Plan menu/week

Daily Schedule:
7:00 am – up!
Breakfast
Scriptures
?am – Joshua up
Breakfast -> unload/load dishwasher
Dress
Dress and pack for gym
(clean clothes, small towel, big towel, shower stuff, brush, deodorant)
At gym – workout, stretch, shower
Joshua snack
} – About 2 hours for options**
Noon – Lunch
12:30pm – Clean up toys
1:00pm – Joshua naptime
->do chores
2:30pm – Prepare Dave’s meals
3:00pm – Joshua snack
} – About 2 hours for options**
Prepare dinner
6:00pm – Dinner
6:30pm – outside time (work on yard)
7:30/45pm – Bath, clean up toys, pjs, etc.
8:00pm – Joshua bed
1 hour sewing
1 hour bookkeeping/organizing (every other day)
10:00pm – Clean up kitchen
Night routine
10:30pm – Bed

**Options:
Chores
Deep cleaning
Errands
Outing
Organizing
Walk dogs
Just play

Life Re-boot

Lately this is how most of my days go:
Get woken up for Joshua (way too early for the time I went to bed the night before)
Stumble around bleary-eyed to get him and myself breakfast
Try to snooze on his bed while he plays with toys for a little while
Give up trying to snooze
Do random things around the house
Lunch
Naptime for Joshua, sometimes naptime for me
Shower and get dressed for the day
Do random things until 3pm
Iron a shirt for Dave for work
Run some errands maybe
Dinner
Maybe do something out in the front yard
Watch the clock tick slowly until 8
Get Joshua in bed
Relax, do a chore or two, maybe some work
Get distracted and end up on the internet for a few hours, probably watching Netflix
Go to bed way too late

You can see that it needs some change. I've decided to give my life a re-boot. Our house is a stinky, dusty mess, we're always grumpy, none of us eat well, Joshua gets whiny and throws more tantrums, and I try to bury myself in projects.
I did some brainstorming tonight and here is what I came up with:


Chores needing to be done regularly:
Dishwasher
Hand dishes
Clean kitchen
Laundry
Folding Laundry
Ironing
Vacuum Hard Floors
Vacuum Carpets
Mop Kitchen
Mop Hardwood
Mop Bathroom
Clean Toilet
Clean Sink
Clean Shower
Empty Garbages/Recycling
Dusting


Things needing to be added to life:
Chores regularly done
Study Scriptures
Exercise
Walk dogs
Go to bed earlier
Limit fast-food intake
Scheduled meals

Things I'd like to do for a set amount of time daily (instead of long amounts of time sporadically):

Sewing

Bookkeeping

Go through and organize stuff

Deep cleaning

Things I need to work on regularly but only weekly:
Budget/Finances
Getting pictures up at church

What I'm thinking is that I can set the chores to specific days and hold myself to getting them done that day. The only one that has been consistent is laundry. It has to be consistent because I only have 7 sets of underwear. Maybe I should hide half of our dishes so I have to do them more often...I can't think of ways to make the rest of the chores mandatory.

I'm going to pull out my large wall calendar tomorrow morning and schedule out the chores and put together a daily schedule. I'll post when I get it figured out.

Because you care

Lately my skin had been teenager-acne-bad. It's gross. So I decided to take action. I have more than a life's supply of skin care products from my Mary Kay days (shameless plug...buy them from me at cost! I just want to get rid of them!). I've started a new face routine.
In the morning when I shower (let's be honest...it's usually not morning anymore when I get around to showering) I use st. Ive's apricot scrub with blackhead control. Then, after my shower, every other day I use the MK face mask on the T zone and then use MK day solution and a tiny bit of MK moisturizer. Then, if I have any raging zits (these days it's more like "many") I put on the MK acne cream.
At night before bed I wash my face with MK 3-in-1 cleanser, put on MK night solution, and again the optional acne cream on zits.
Honestly, MK spouts that foundation is a vital part of skin care, but it seems to make my acne worse when I wear it. I'll only put on makeup if I'm feeling extra zitty and don't feel comfortable going out in public without it.
It seems to be helping, but another wave of raging hormones are due in the next few weeks, so we'll see if my face survives.
Now you know.

Training mom

When I tell our dogs to do something, like "out" or "go away" or "leave it" and they look at me like I'm speaking a foreign language, I add a clap to the command to let them know that I mean it.
Today Joshua wanted to get up on the bed to watch a show (which I wasn't allowing because he had already watched Kung Fu Panda today) he kept saying "upf" "upf" (he adds a fricative to all his plosives) and then he looked at me and said "upf!" and then clapped his hands at me.

Our Dogs

We have two dogs. One is a 2-year-old, dark honey colored pitt bull mix (possibly rhodesian ridge back, maybe greyhound), and the other is a 10 month old black lab mix (probably border collie - she has similar white patches). The brown one we call Monkey and the black one we call Panda. Yes, we aim to confuse our children as much as possible in the early years.
Tonight I was getting rather fed up with Monkey pacing and Panda licking my fingers. They both have other annoying traits, too. However, when I was in, brushing my teeth, I heard a noise from the hallway that sounded almost like my phone vibrating except my phone was in on the bed. I opened the door and Monkey started barking at the window directly across from the bathroom.
There was some creeper looking in our window!
No, actually, the reflection of me coming out of the bathroom was "looking in the window." That is why Monkey was only growling while I was in the bathroom (door partially closed) and why she barked when I started coming out.
Well, I was sure glad to know that if there were to be a creeper looking in the window, Monkey would have my back. Panda was just chilling, but ready to join in the fight if needed.

Outside Pictures of New House

Here are pictures of the 4plex that we bought! We only have the pictures of the inside that the appraiser took because all 4 units are occupied currently. I won't be posting any of those for the privacy of the tenants. Here are some outside pictures I took today though! I'll post pictures of our apartment when we move in (December, pictures posted in January after we're all moved in). 

 East side of main house with Joshua and Daniel on the steps. Left door goes to upstairs apartment (2 bedroom, 1 bathroom). Right door goes to main floor apartment (3 bedroom, 2 bathroom) where we will be living.

 South side of main house. 3 car garage with each stall closed off so rentable to tenants. 

 Other side of driveway. I'm planning on ripping out those bushes and plant grapes along that fence. 

 A small area on the west side of the main house. I'm planning on this being the vegetable garden area. I'm thinking raised beds with paths between them and a main path along the house because tenants will need to walk there to the garage. 

 Same area, view from the other side of it. 

 Between the two houses to the back area. (Scaffolding from the painting we had to do to get our FHA loan.)

 Both houses from the north side. 

 The second house from the north side. It's not terribly interesting, just a square. (Two apartments, 1 bedroom, 1 bathroom each.)

 Main house from the north. Separate entrance for the office area (3rd bedroom). 

 Main house with second house in the background from the north-east. We'll probably fence off the north side of the house for our dogs. 

The rest of the front yard. We're going to cut down the large tree down by the driveway because we don't want its roots ruining our nice new driveway, and the needles are also killing the grass. The two closer trees will probably go at some point, too, because they're a very messy kind of tree - there are seed pods everywhere.