Exercise Bootcamp Begins!

So there's a girl in my ward that teaches at an exercise bootcamp and her sister heads up the whole bootcamp organization. Well, I found out they were starting a new session in September so I decided to sign up. It's at 5:15 am - 6:15 am every Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday for 5 weeks (early, I know!!!). It's perfect timing since Ry's jobs aren't out of town right now so he'll be home in the mornings in case Ethan needs him. E usually doesn't wake up until 7 so it shouldn't be a big deal and I may even be able to get ready by myself in the morning before Ethan wakes up!

Anyway...Saturday we had our inital bootcamp meeting. We started out getting weighed, measured, and then hooked up to electrodes for body fat and I have to say I was worse than I thought. Yikes! I definitely have my work cut out for me. After we all got measured we met our coaches and went over some info. They want us to eat 200 calories 1/2-1 hour before camp so that means that I need to wake up around 4:15-4:45 just so I can eat for bootcamp!!! We need to workout 2-3 times per week for at least 30-45 minutes in addition to our bootcamp workouts. Since nutrition goes hand in hand with exercise, we have a registered dietician that works with us during the camp. We have a speical calorie counter website that we document all our meals and turn in our food and exercise journal every Monday. We also have "bootcamp buddies" that we help each other stay motivated and be sure we're both doing the program. Well, if either of us don't turn in our homework then we both have to run laps after camp. Our coaches basically told us that it's pretty normal to throw up after workouts the first week since our bodies aren't used to working out that hard. Just about that time I was thinking, "What have I signed up for?!" I'm hoping I won't die and that I'll at least be able to function during the day. We'll see. At least there are a few other girls in my ward that will be suffering with me. Our first workout starts on Tuesday so I'm going to enjoy my last two days of lazy, unsore moments. Wish me luck!

Baby Swim Lessons to the Extreme!

My Aunt Leslie sent me an e-mail with this link last night. It's about teaching your infant or toddler to survive if they ever fell into a pool or any other "aquatic environment." At first I was totally anxious watching the baby in the pool, but what if that ever happened to Ethan? Oh my goodness! I wish he knew how to do that. Go check out the opening video and tell me what you think.

New Blog on the Sidebar

Here's a new website that is fun to visit. Check it out, it's called Mod Mom.

Recipe Box Tip

Here is my cooking tip for the day. Do you have a recipe box? Is it jammed with random papers and recipe cards, disorganized, and just annoying to look through? My recipe box was like that and so was my mom's. My mom had over 25 years of recipes that she collected. Her box was bursting at the seams with recipes and it took forever to find what you were looking for. Her recipe box was so full that it spilled over into her main cookbook. She had random recipe cards and newspaper clippings stuck inside her book. One day I decided to do something about it and came up with this great idea. I started going through our boxes with my mom and we organized them by category and then we threw out anything that wasn't good or something we wouldn't even make. Then I went through and typed up every card, paper, napkin, or clipping that had a recipe on it. So after about a month of typing everyday I organized everything into sections and then printed off 2 copies, one for me and one for my mom. I used the clear sheet protectors to put the pages in so we could easily add more pages and change around the order. Plus, it makes it more conducive for cooking since you can wipe your pages off.
I put everything in a 3 ring binder with pockets and wrapped it up for her birthday last year. My mom still has her box with all the original recipes in her cookbook cupboard, but I made a more user friendly version of all our favorite recipes which ended up being a little over 100 pages!!! Of course I benefited from all this since I got a copy too and I use it all the time. I also love the fact that my cookbook is also on my computer so when a friend needs a recipe I can just copy and paste it into an e-mail and send it out. I also get a lot of recipes from the Internet so I can just print it off and add it to my book or just paste it to a new document and add any other new recipes that I have. Anyway...I hope this tip helps and go out there and get that box organized!!!

Skillet Lasagna Recipe

This recipe is for Lori since she's been wanting good recipes with cheap and simple ingredients so here it is. Of course it is from America's Test Kitchen website so you know it's good. I especially love to use fresh basil from my garden! I made it one night with Kaitlyn when our husbands weren't home and I think she'll vouch for me that it's a good recipe.

Skillet Lasagna
1 28 oz can diced tomatoes
Water enough to make four cups combined with tomatoes
1 TBLS olive oil
1 medium onion minced
Table salt
3 medium cloves garlic, minced
1/8 tsp red pepper flakes
1 pound ground beef (I like Italian sausage)
10 curly edged lasagna noodles, broken into 2 inch lengths
1 can tomato sauce
1/2 cup grated Parmesan cheese, plus 2 additional TBLS
Ground black pepper
1 c. ricotta cheese
3 TBL chopped fresh basil

1. Pour tomatoes with their juices into 1 quart liquid measuring cup. Add water until mixture measures 1 quart
2. Heat oil in large skillet over medium heat until shimmering. Add onion and 1/2 tsp salt and cook until onion begins to brown, about 5 minutes. Stir in garlic and pepper flakes and cook until fragrant, about 30 seconds. Add ground meat and cook, breaking apart meat, until no longer pink, about 4 minutes
3. Scatter pasta over meat but do not stir. Pour diced tomatoes with juices and tomato sauce over pasta. Cover and bring to simmer. Reduce heat to medium-low and simmer, stirring occasionally, until past is tender, about 20 minutes.
4. Remove skillet from heat and stir in 1/2 cup Parmesan. Season with salt and pepper. Dot with heaping TBLS ricotta, cover and let stand off heat for 5 minutes. Sprinkle with basil and remaining 2 TBLS Parmesan. Serve.

The first time you make this it may take you a little over 45 minutes to do it all, but I've got it down to a science now and I can make it in about 30. This is also a great meal for leftovers.

Look What I Can Do!!!

Here is a video clip of Ethan doing his morning flashcards. Right now we're learning to identify all sorts of things. Whenever he sees something he always wants to know what it is, what noise it makes, and what you call it. Then whenever he sees that thing again he'll repeat what he learns. It's so funny. I'll be in the store and not even notice something and then all of a sudden he'll start naming things and pointing or making noises. It is so cute! I picked up some flashcards that teach kids their letters since they have great pictures of simple things that Ethan can learn.

He has loved all the praise and "choo choo" stickers that he gets when he's finished. Check out the video of "flashcard time." He was making a cheesy face in front of the camera since he thought I was taking his picture. My favorite thing he does is when we get to the frog picture and he does his "ribbet" sound. So funny! Anyway...I am so proud of Ethan these days. He has really been learning a lot and you can tell that he truly pays attention to everything around him even if I don't know it. He's so smart and so sweet. I love my little Ethan! I can't even believe he will be 2 soon!

Labor Day Weekend

Sorry that this post is a little late. With all the blog slurping, it's been hard to do other stuff on the computer. So here's what we did this weekend... Ry's parents invited the whole family over to have a "Night of Alaska" since they just got back from there last week. All the kids swam and the guys had swim contests. Ethan has been loving his floaties lately. He can totally swim around the whole pool without anyone holding him (he has someone with him in the pool at all times though). He does so well and has even started putting his face in the water to blow bubbles. Way to go Ethan!


After all the swimming festivities, we all got to eat Alaskan Halibut with all the fixings. Yummy! And Grandma made salmon shaped sugar cookies for all the kids to decorate. Papa helped Ethan decorate his all fancy and then he shoved it all in his mouth and asked for more.
While the kids watched a movie about Alaska, I got to check out Suzy's digital scrap booking stuff. Oh my gosh how cute!!! Maybe someday, maybe someday.

Monday we all went down to my parents for the holiday. My mom and I hit the Labor Day sales with Ethan while the guys watched football. I found some super cute shoes for the Fall and I am so excited to wear them! We all met up later at Toys-r-us to let Ethan wander the store. I wanted to see what kinds of things interested him so I could get some birthday ideas. I loved to see what he picked. First he hung around the trains and made all the train noises. Then he just wandered around a few of the shelves randomly pushing buttons to see what stuff did. Then when he headed down the boy aisles he immediately fell in love with all the Home Depot pretend play stuff. There was a whole workbench that he really liked, a chain saw, and a drill. Help us all! Last of all and his most favorite was a trike. He sort of understood the pedals, but it had an attachment that let you push AND steer him. Some of the trikes there only let you push, not steer. I can just picture him cruising around the neighborhood on a little red trike. How cute would that be! Anyway...after the toy store we had a big cookout and then Ethan donned the floaties once again to swim in the pool. I am so surprised how much the little guy gets around the pool. He seriously swam the whole pool length by himself and then propelled his little body back to me. It's incredible. Good thing it tires him out for a great nap, right?! Yeah, in the car...booo. He did got to bed early. Thank goodness.

And Baby Makes 3 is on the Press!

I finished everything up on my blog book and sent it to the printers to finish it up. I am so excited! I ended up with a little over 200 pages and it cost me $50! Wow! I never thought I could scrapbook for that cheap! I have no idea how long it actually takes to print the whole thing and be sent to me, but I will be anxiously waiting for it. I'll let you guys how it all turns out.

Slurping and Photography

Okay so I have basically finished my book now! It's taken up some of my weekend, but nothing too overwhelming. It is so amazing to me that I could basically scrapbook Ethan's first 2 years in 2 days. Yeah!!! My Aunt Suzy was showing me some pretty sweet digital scrap booking stuff yesterday so maybe I'll dabble in that too sometime. What too fun! I think I'm going to order my book tomorrow once I finish my final little touches.

By the way...I can't believe I haven't posted this yet, but I'm adding a new link to my sidebar. It's my cousin Toni's photography website. She is way awesome at what she does and if you're in the area she'd love some business. I think we're going to try to do some head shots for my profile picture sometime soon so I don't continue to look like a geek on my blog. So check out Toni's site! You'll love it!

A Short Break

I'm just taking a quick break from my "slurping" to let you guys know how much I love it! I already have 150 pages done. Only 50 more to go!!! After that I need to do my cover, spell check, and do any little final touches that I want. I'm expecting that I'll be done by the time Labor Day weekend is over. I hope! I am so excited to see how this will all turn out.

SLURP!

Can anyone hear some slurping going on? I can! Just so you know I'm going to be taking a slight break from blogging so I can slurp my blog i.e. get it ready to be published. Right now I'm looking at 300 pages of major editing to do so it's going to take me quite awhile, but it's so worth it. Now I don't have to feel guilty about not being the "scrapbooker" type. I can have my own piece of pride and joy to make up and print out. Yeah! Anyway...if you'd like to do some slurping of your own go to Blurb and download some free software and start today! This is seriously going to take me forever! let me know what you think.

Done!

I just finished New Moon last night so now I'm waiting for Eclipse from the library. I'm second on the list for it so meanwhile I think I may start The Secret Life of Bees while I wait. We'll see if I can even get started since I'm going nuts around here with YW stuff and a child that will not take his nap. Guess what I figured out...Ethan never slept in his crib yesterday for his nap. He climbed out of his crib and then slept on the floor. And you know he's done it again today. I think it's time to say good bye to the crib. It's pointless to keep putting him back in when he just wants out. I don't know how this bed thing will work, but we'll just have to see. He may be wandering aimlessly in his room for awhile, but he'll eventually figure out that the nice soft cushiony thing in the corner is where he needs to sleep.

Ethan Goes To School...not really, but we'll pretend

With all the kids going to school, I got the "school bug" and decided to start working with Ethan on some "school" type things. Thanks to some great tips from my friend Hilary, she suggested some great things to do with Ethan at his age. So I headed out to Target and Mardel to pick up some educational things. I picked up a coloring book and fat crayons, play doh with cookie cutters, fingerpaints, different types of flashcards, yarn and cereal, and all sorts of other fun things. So each morning I set aside some time to have "school time" with Ethan. We started on Monday and so far it has gone really well. He loves the activities and all the praise and attention. Monday we did flashcards, coloring, and reading time.


Tuesday was flashcards, fingerpaints, and fun snacks.


Today was a playday with lots of our friends. He tried to work on his sharing skills, but it's still a work in progress. Tomorrow I think we're going to go to the library and pick up some new books and go to storytime and then maybe we'll try a craft of some sort. If you have any great craft ideas for 2 year olds pass them my way.

Update on the Binky

Last night Ry got home around 6:45 so he took over while I did some much needed grocery shopping...alone. Yeah! I love going to the grocery store and I love going alone since I can take my time and really think about what I'm going to get. This time it was a pretty big trip since I was stocking up on things like potatoes, rice, water, milk, and freezer items. My cart was almost overflowing by the time I left and of course I ended up with one of those carts that automatically drives sideways when it's weighed down by anything. Geez! By the time I got home Ry had Ethan in bed and Ethan was kind of whining, but once the groceries were all put away, he was totally asleep. Now it's nap time and he cried a little bit in the beginning, but it's 1:30 and I don't hear a peep. Could it be true?! Yesterday, after I let him out of his room, he immediately asked for juice and I told him, "little boys that don't take their naps, don't get juice." He didn't ask for it again until Ryan got home and I told Ryan to tell him the same thing. He also asked to go out in our inflatable pool(that's a whole other blog entry) and I told him, "little boys that don't take their naps, don't go out in the pool." He seemed to understand. So the poor boy got water in his sippy cup and Legos to play with for the rest of the night. If he sleeps really well then we're going to have a pool party in the backyard. Yeah!

What's On My Menu?

I'd like to thank Amandafor her request about my weekly menu plan. I never knew if anyone would really want to hear me blog about what I cook for my family so now I think I'll blog about it every week. Thanks Amanda! Okay, so I'm big on making meals for my family, but there is a huge misconception that you have to cook every night in order to do that. Not the case my friends! I basically cook 3 times a week. That's it. I have gotten my family used to the idea that left overs can be good or I disguise the left overs...evil laugh. Basically since I have a family of 2 adults and a small child, I make a recipe that is enough for 4-5 adults. That way I have enough for left overs the next day and I'm not wondering what we're having. I cook on Sundays (big Sunday meal), Tuesdays, and Thursdays. That way I don't have to cook on Monday which is my big cleaning day, Wednesday which is Young Women's, or Friday/Saturday (my nights off). It works out great. Here's an example of what I like to do. I'll make a big roast on Sunday with all the trimmings. Then for leftovers I'll shred the meat and do tacos, BBQ sandwiches, or just plain roast again. Depends on what people want. Another quick tip is to buy a bunch of fresh rotisserie chickens, pick all the meat off, put it in freezer bags and put it in the freezer for all sorts of meals like enchiladas, tacos, any soups that call for cooked chicken, chicken salad, etc. It makes things really quick and easy. Anyway...for this week we are having:
Tuesday: Pork tenderloin with roasted red potatoes and green beans
Wednesday: shredded pork tacos with Spanish rice
Thursday: Oven BBQ Chicken with twice baked potatoes and corn
Friday: shredded BBQ chicken sandwiches
Saturday: night off
Sunday: Pasta Bolognese (fancy word for a nice meat sauce) with garlic bread and salad
Well, I hope this helps with some ideas of things to make. If you'd like any of my recipes feel free to request any.

I do have to recommend my favorite cookbook of all time. !America's Test Kitchen!!! It is the best ever! You can seriously never go wrong when you make ANYTHING out of there. So go buy it! Your husband and children will thank you. This is the exact one that I have right now and I LOVE LOVE LOVE it! If I tell Ry that I made something out of it then he automatically drools. My Chicken with Bacon, Rosemary, and Lemon recipe came out of there. The best!

P.S.

It is now 4:00 and he never went to sleep.

What Have I Done?

So Ethan has been off his binkies during the day for a long time, but he's always had it at nap time and bedtime. I've always justified not taking it away...oh, I can't because we're about to go Florida, he's sick, he's teething, we're leaving him to go to Mexico, he's sick, he's teething...etc. Well, I've justified enough and I decided today would be the end of binkies for good. Plus, it's more about whether or not I can handle it than it is with him. I know eventually he'll be fine it just takes a lot of patience on my part in the beginning. Well, I took his 2 binkies and cut of the ends so I wouldn't be tempted to give in. I handed him his binky and all he did was walk around saying, "Uh oh, broken." It didn't really bother him, but now it's nap time and he hasn't gone to sleep yet. I usually put him down around 1 and now it's 2:40 and he's still in his room awake. He has been climbing out of his crib for about 2 1/2 weeks now so I've got that going on too. He's mad since he doesn't have his binky so he'll throw out all his blankets and his pillow, climb out, and then knock on the door and whine to let him out. I just keep scooping him up and putting him back in his crib and telling him in my authoritative voice to stay in bed and go to sleep. Mondays are always my cleaning day so I've been cleaning away and going to his room to put in back in his crib for the past hour and a half. Oh the joy! I have prepared for the worst, but it really doesn't help much. He is super stubborn and won't give it up. What have I done?

Daddio 100

My dad partcipated in the Witchita Falls Hotter N' Hell Hundred (HHH) mile bike race this weekend. HHH is one of the oldest and largest cycling events in the nation. Over 11,000 cyclists from around the globe partcipated this year and one of those lucky ones was my dad. He's always loved biking and being fit, but a few months back he invested in a nice bike with all the trimmings like clip in shoes and such. One of the guys in his ward introduced him to the idea of trying out HHH so he figured he'd try. The race started at 7:00 am, but his particular race block started a little later, but he completed the entire race in about 8 hours. The main goal that he had was to make it to Hell's gate by 12:30 (the 60 mile mark)because if you didn't then they'd close off the route. Well, he didn't call my mom until he got to the 85 mile mark and told her to come meet him at the finish line at around 3:15. He made it! The entire race! After many shots of pickle juice (ewww!), gatorade and fruit. He started cramping up pretty bad around the 80 mile mark so the last half of the race was pretty brutal, but he's feeling pretty good today so no harm done. He even said he'd love to do it again sometime. He's hoping to do it with my brother when he gets home from his mission. I guess Randall should do a few extra laps on his bike while he's out tracting. Anyway...here are some pictures of my dad's big day! I sent my mom with a mission to being my blog correspondant and get some good bloggable material. Maybe I'll have her as a guest blogger sometime.

Here's my dad at the starting line.

Riding along on the race route


After the race, Way to go!!!

Lucha Libre!!!

While Ryan and I were in Cancun we picked up a Luchador mask for our little cousins since they love Nacho Libre so much. I guess it ended up being a huge hit with the boys. They love to put on the mask and then jump off the stairs doing Nacho moves like "Eagle powers" and such. Last weekend we had Lucha Libre going on in the Elmer home. Well, Ethan put on the mask and started jumping off the stairs, it looked like so much fun that Daddy did it too. I swear the whole time this was going on I was laughing so hard that I started crying. Classic fun! I told Toni that I will be putting these pictures on Ethan's wedding video someday

Baby-sitting 101

Thursday night I had my little cousin and 2 of her friends (they're all 11 years old, so cute!) come over to my house for a little baby-sitting course. I got a little video from the library and prepared a folder of information all about baby-sitting. We went over safety, baby-sitting manners, basic care, first aid & CPR, caring through the ages, and age appropriate activities. I think overall the girls enjoyed it, although they were a little freaked out by the first aid stuff. The thought of children choking kind of scared them. They had lots of great questions and you could tell the wheels were just turning in their heads. We went over how to properly diaper a young child, but unfortunately Ethan wasn't around so I used the only baby doll we had. The baby was super small and the diapers were huge so we basically diapered the entire baby. The girls did a great job! FYI the picture was taken after Ethan had taken the baby's diaper off and then tried to put it back on again. That's why it looks so weird. So to all you Elmers out there...you will greatly benefit from this superb baby-sitting course. We only train the best!