Thursday, January 29, 2009

Sorry

Heya. Sorry it's been so long since I've been on here. I think a lot about blogging and what I could talk about, but I never have the time to see it through. I'm busy all day long with the kids, and then Scott hogs the computer at night. So quickly, a list of things I've been meaning to blog about:

My new clean house.



My photo shoot.



My growing bento knowledge (garnered from many a bento mistake).



Fifi's 2nd birthday.



And Fifi's potty training. Bleh.

Eventually. Eventually.

Thursday, January 15, 2009

My Second Bentos

My daughter and my husband enjoyed their bentos today. However, both of them left one thing - the celery. Tsk tsk. If it's green, they won't touch the stuff.

Here are the pictures of tomorrow's lunches. I'm still getting the hang of this, so they don't look just right, but I'll learn. I need to find new colours, so they look more appetizing and pretty.


Fifi's Top Tier: apricots, grapes, blueberries, mandarin and a white chocolate ball (handmade by her Auntie Katie!)
Bottom Tier: jaffa cakes, celery with peanut butter, cheese, pretzels and sausages.


Scott's Top Tier: rice and chicken madras (leftover from dinner tonight)
Bottom Tier: mandarin, grapes, monkey nuts and naan bread.

The boxes are microwavable, in case you're wondering. Scott was.

I can't wait to get mine in the post. I've got ideas for more bentos, which I'll put into action next week. Think star-shaped sandwiches, mini-steak pies, mini-quiches, teeny-tiny homemade chocolate chip cookies... I'll have my mom's help next week too BECAUSE SHE ARRIVES ON SUNDAY!!

My First Bentos

I got Scott and Fifi bento boxes for Christmas. Scott goes back to work today, so I decided it was time to get started.

I'm new at this so it probably took me longer to fill these boxes than is average. I bought loads of small bento-sized foods this week and have lots of ideas, but the boxes really are very small, so some things didn't fit like I thought they would.

I'm also new to the asthetic side of bentos. Fifi's looks better than Scott's, but then again, I don't think Scott wants 'cute' lunches. His mates would probably taunt him mercilessly if I were to cutesy it up too much.

Here's Fifi's first bento lunch:



Top tier - pancake stars, grapes, blueberries and apricots
Bottom tier - sausages, celery, carrots and cheese



And Scott's first bento lunch:



Top tier - carrots, celery, naan bread and sausages
Bottom tier - pancakes, blueberries, monkey nuts and apricots
In tub - BBQ sauce for sausages



I realised though that I really need one for myself. It's all well and good feeding my family, but if I don't feed myself, I'm not feeding Lolly either. So Scott graciously bought me my own bento from eBay.



I think it's very cute.

Will hopefully keep this up. And post more pictures.

But for those of you who don't care about bento-related topics, here are some pictures of my princesses. (Lolly doesn't feature in them as much as Fifi. Sorry. Will remedy that soon.)

Monday, January 12, 2009

Domestic Goddess....

You know what's changing my domestic life?

Motivated Moms.

This chore planner is the best thing I've ever come across in the chore-planning world. When I've tried to make my own planners, or when I've used a ready-made one, I find that the daily projects are too big - like 'clean kitchen' or 'clean bathrooms'. Those kind of jobs take a block of time to do and therefore never get done. But the Motivated Moms chore planner is brilliant. The daily jobs are jobs that just need to be done daily, but if you don't get around to them, it's not the end of the world. But they're mostly things you can do in a jiffy, like wipe bathroom sinks. That takes no longer than a minute, and I can do it after washing my hands after using the loo! Then each day of the week has a few odd jobs to do, like 'clean the middle shelf of the refrigerator' or 'water indoor plants'. Things I can totally do! And things I'd never get done if I'd had the job 'clean kitchen' in front of me.

I feel like bit by bit my house is getting clean. It's not always tidy, but when you look at my stove, it's been scrubbed! Inside my fridge is getting spotless! My kitchen sink is nearly always empty now!

The best thing about this checklist is that it has tick boxes. You get to tick off the jobs as you do them. I love ticking boxes, and I hate seeing boxes unticked, which motivates me to get more done. But there's no guilt when some of the jobs are left undone, because you know that job will creep back up in a week or two. I feel so... motivated! I'm on the third week of the calendar. I feel like this one might last.

It's $8 to buy the planner for the year, which comes to about £4 or £5. No biggie. Especially not for how good it's making me feel.

Also making me feel good about my house are the essential oils I purchased (www.justessentialoils.co.uk) and have been using in the laundry. My house smells like eucalyptus currently and will probably smell like tea tree when I put the load of nappies up to dry. Mmm. I put some grapefruit in my bath this morning too and that helped wake me right up from my slumber state. I think I'll use a drop in my iron too. I wonder if Scott would be opposed to smelling like ginger at work?

Friday, January 09, 2009

Getting On With It.

The past couple of days have been slightly better. I'm still finding it hard, and that's with Scott still home, but we'll get there. According to everyone else anyway.

I don't have much to update on. I'm sort of just going one day at a time. Not doing much really. Tomorrow is Fifi's friend Cillian's birthday party. That should be a good time. Fi tends to be very well-behaved around others. It's just when we are on our own she decides to go crazy!

I took Lolly shopping today. I've been trying to find something nice to buy myself to wear while I work off this baby weight but have had a hard time. I finally found a pair of non-maternity jeans in a real shop (not Primark) for £7. They look really good on me. The down side? They are 3 sizes bigger than I wore before I got pregnant. Scott keeps reminding me that's normal, but I really had to psyche myself out to buy them. At least they look good. And don't have elastic panels.

As usual though, I found more things for the girls than for myself. Fifi is sporting her new pajamas as we speak. She needed some long-legged pjs to keep her warm and tops that weren't covered in weetabix stains.

Anyway, just wanted to let you all know I'm doing okay. Or at least I will do okay.

Oh, by the way, am I the only one who thinks the Edinburgh Post-Natal Depression Scale is kinda a load of crap? Not that I've got PND, but if I did, would the EPDS actually reveal it?

Tuesday, January 06, 2009