Quick Takes V. 26

1. We're alive! Things have been crazy these last few weeks, but today I finally have some time to get online. The baby is doing well and so am I. I'll be 34 weeks tomorrow. I definitely feel and look pregnant, but can't complain.

2.The main reason we've been busy has been our house. For the last six weeks we've been getting it ready to go on the market. Finally last Friday it officially went up for sale. It is such a relief to have all of that work behind us (I can't wait to share pictures!). Now I feel like we can focus on getting ready for the baby. But before we can devote all of our energy to that we have to show the house and get it sold.

3. Showing the house doesn't seem so bad. But it takes a surprising amount of work to keep it looking in tip-top shape for each showing. Plus, we have to leave the house for each showing and take the kittehs with us. They are not amused and already starting to resist. I must say, though, that I'm thankful that our house has so much interest (4 so far, 3 in the next 24 hours), so I feel like I really can't complain.

4. So, where do we go during these showings? Well, it depends on the time of day. Right now, I'm at the library. I usually come here if it's close to the time my husband gets off work (trying to be efficeint and what not now that we're a one-car familia). This morning we went to the farm market. Yesterday, we went to the cemetary across the street. Yeah. It was kinda weird but it was shady and quiet. I can only imagine what the people (all two of them) who saw us there thought. "Hmm, weird woman with cages in her car...."

5. One of the crazy baby-related things we've been dealing with has been switching doctors. I started off with a nurse midwife that I liked, but she had some crazy hospital politics swirling around her. Thus, we decided to switch to an ob/gyn who was open to a natural labor (which isn't very common around here) and worked at a hospital that wasn't as political. Well. It turns out she isn't so open to natural labor and that hospital is longer allowing patients to have labor support (i.e. doulas)! So, we're in the process of transferring to another midwife over in Florida, where we are planning a home birth at my mom's house. Craziness. But I think this option is the best fit with the most manageable downsides out of the options currently available this late in the game. It's what I had originally wanted but didn't think I could have, so it's worked out.

6. I finally got my baby registry completed! We I decided to register at Target and Amazon. Target was a bit of a bust since most of the stuff I want they don't sell in store, which was my whole reason for registering with them in the first place. So, my Amazon list is far more extensive, but it still has quite a few things left off. Like cloth diapers. There are so many options! I can't decide which brand or style to get, so I've been leaning towards trying out a starter pack with multiple brands and styles so that I can get a better feel for what would work for us. Any suggestions?   

7.  Locally grown strawberries are at their peak! Any recipe suggestions? Assuming they last that long....

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Fresh Ham

My mom doesn't like having ham on Easter. For whatever reason, she just doesn't see it as being "special" enough for the celebration at hand. That doesn't mean we don't have ham. In fact, we typically have a traditional spiral ham with a turkey. We skipped the turkey this year, and instead had a fresh ham from the hog we butchered a couple weeks prior. 

I don't think I've ever had a fresh ham. It's something that I've seen in the meat department, but I was never quite sure what people did with it. Honestly, I just figured that they cured it and made something similar to what you can buy. But I've learned that fresh ham doesn't have to be like the cured ham you buy at the store.  I'm sure it can be, but most of the recipes I sifted through online treated it more like a pork roast, using savory ingredients instead of sweet. So that's the approach we took with our ham. And we liked it. We were all leery about having a fresh ham, especially from a wild hog, but it was flavorful and I'd be lying if I didn't say the crispy bits of fat weren't amazing.  

Fresh Ham with Green Herb Paste

adapted from Martha Stewart

1 head of garlic

1/3 cup fresh rosemary needles

1/3 cup fresh oregano

1/4 cup olive oil

5 - 7 lb fresh ham

Rosemary springs (I saved the tops of my fresh rosemary)

Garlic cloves (I sliced the thicker pieces of garlic for convenience)

2 cups white wine

Preheat oven to 325. 

Combine ingredients in a food processor or blender until combined.  

Place the ham in a large pan, fat-side up. With a sharp knife score the ham, making a diamond pattern. At the intersections alternate between inserting rosemary sprigs and cloves of garlic. You might have to deepen some of the slits to get the garlic in. Rub about a third of the herb paste over the ham. Sprinkle with salt and pepper. (I did this all the night before, so that it would be one less thing to do in the morning).

If you refrigerate the ham, let it sit at room temperature for about 30 minutes before placing it in the oven. 

Place the ham in the oven and cook for an hour. Pour half of the wine over the ham. Coat with half of the remaining herb paste. Return ham to the oven for another hour. Pour the remaining wine over the ham and coat with the remaining herb paste. Return to oven for another hour. The ham is ready when the internal temp is between 145 and 155. For me this was at about the three hour mark. 

Remove the ham from the pan and let it rest. Put the roasting pan on the stove and deglaze the pan with 1/2 cup water. Scrape up all the yummy browned bits while the liquid reduces. Once the liquid has reduced by half remove it from the stove and serve it with the ham. 

Gardening Fail

About a month ago I finally got our tomatoes in the ground. According to our local gardening expert the first week of March is the time to plant them so that they have plenty of time to grow and produce before the sweltering heat and humidity arrive. So, that's just what I did.

If you walk outside, this is what my tomato box looks like today. There's not a single tomato; all I'm left with are a bunch of weeds. I'm not sure what happened. All I know is that none of my tomato plants survived. Now I'm just hoping that a couple of the plants I gave my family survive.

Seven Quick Takes V. 25

1. Hey! So it looks like this is my week for Quick Takes being that it's Procrastinator's Week and I seem to always be one of the last to post, assuming I post of course (which is a whole other story).

2. Remember when I mentioned having trouble downloading pictures from my phone (Android) to my Picasa web album? Well, I'm still having trouble so I Googled it and found out that it's not just me. It's Picasa. It looks like to upload to Picasa you have to use a third party app now. Right now I'm using Picasa Tool, which isn't too terrible, although it does have ads.

3. I haven't checked my blog reader in about a month, which is crazy because I used to check it Monday through Friday. I keep wondering what happened to all the pregnant bloggers I follow and can't wait to check on how they and their babies are doing.

4. My mom and I went to a local baby store a couple of weeks ago and I got to take advantage of the "stork" parking. It was neat but I think my mom got a bigger kick out of it then I did.

Does anyone have any recommendations for baby registries? The lovely women I volunteer with are going to be throwing me a shower in May and they keep asking where I'm registered. Currently I'm not registered anywhere and just have an idea of what we'd like in my head. I'm not sure how internet savvy they are (most of them are 55+), so I'd like to have an internet option along with a physical store. 

5. So, what's been keeping me away from my beloved internet? My house, of course. We were gifted money for our down payment, but we never quite felt at ease with that so we've always intended to pay it back. And now that that relationship has gone south we feel it's best to pay it back ASAP. I have no way of getting that money quickly other then to sell our house, so that's what we're doing and I'm happy about it. But it's a lot of work. Currently we're in the process of remodeling the last few rooms. 

Right now we're working on re-tiling the master bath, which means everything is covered in dust.

6. This weekend we're having my family over to help do some more work around the house. We're hoping to get the front yard re-landscaped, the stucco repaired, and the tile in the master bath and closet finished. At a minimum. 

7. I haven't figured out what causes my cats to beg for food, especially when it's something like coconut flakes. The way they're looking at my husband, you'd think he's eating something they love...but he's not. He offered them some but they weren't really interested

For more Quick Takes, join Jen at Conversion Diary.

28 Weeks

To say the past few weeks have been crazy around here would be an understatement. This last week has been hectic enough that I felt pretty lucky if I had the time to check my email. Actually, two weeks ago I spent the week with my family and had a pretty good time while the husband was away. But since he's been back we've been busy working on the house.

It's been a couple of months since we've had a big project around the house, but with three rooms left to do we had to start back up because we're selling our house. I know. Who plans on putting their house on the market six weeks before their first baby is due? That would be us. I've never felt like there was so much going on at one time as I do now. We weren't planning on selling anytime soon but there's been plenty of extended family drama that we decided this would be the best option for all involved.

In other news, the baby is doing well. I'm feeling very pregnant. We found out that our original birth plan isn't going to work out unless we make lots of changes, so I've been looking into other options on that front. Our insurance is pretty crazy so that doesn't make things any easier either. I know what I'd like to do (home birth or birthing center), but it's at least 20 times more expensive then what our insurance covers (hospital birth). So we'll see.

- - -

Mass was packed yesterday. As we were looking for parking (which never happens) I realized why - the Easter egg hunt was after the Mass we were attending. We both completely forgot about that. But it was fine even if there were more people then usual. 

I can't believe Lent is almost over and Easter is almost here! I feel like I've been a bit of a slacker this Lent or maybe what I choose to do just wasn't what I needed. I don't know. I'm ready for Easter but I'm not as excited as I know I should be. 

Linking up to Fine Linen and Purple for What I Wore Sunday

Sweater: Target

Cami: Shade Maternity

Skirt: Ann Taylor LOFT

Tights: Target

Boots: ?

Seven Quick Takes V. 24

1. I never leave the house in sweats or workout clothes, but this past week I've done it twice - within twelve hours of each other and the baby isn't even here!

2. The first time was Monday evening. We were on our way to get gas when we got a phone call from our local farm market asking if we wanted a wild hog. There's a big problem with the wild hog population out here, so they have to trap and kill them if they want to grow anything (apparently they like fresh veggies too). We said yes, so my husband went and picked it up while I finished dinner. We soon realized that we'd need a large cooler and lots of ice, so off I went to Wally World to pick those things up. The hog has been on ice all week and we get to butcher him this weekend.

3. The second time was Tuesday morning. I got a text from my poor husband saying he had gotten into an accident in the parking lot at the bus stop. Thankfully he was fine as was the other person involved. But our poor van (yes, van) was not. In fact, it's now considered totaled and the insurance adjuster will be here in an hour to take it away.

4. My parent's gave us the van last May and after fixing it up, we've enjoyed having it as our second car. It's been surprisingly versatile and reliable, so we're actually going to miss it. But my car loving husband will have fun finding us a replacement.

5. For some reason I have not been able to stay up to date on my blog reading and that really bothers me for some reason. I'm actually staying busy doing necessary stuff around the house, so that means I have less time for blog reading. I think it irritates me because I kinda feel like it's one more thing that I have to do and cross off my list.

6. The sunrise on Wednesday morning was exceptionally beautiful. And I was going to post a picture of it but it seems like it got lost somewhere between uploading it from my phone and my online album.

7. My poor mother-in-law's cat, Chocolate, isn't doing well. She's about 15 years old and she's really sick. She's been doing well, but it seems lately that her body is just shutting down. She's been in the family for a long time, so this is going to be hard for my MIL. A quick prayer would be appreciated if you're the praying type.

Long overdue

I have fairly basic sewing skills, so I usually don't start any projects that are too advanced. And I usually finish or attempt to finish every project I start. But there is one project in particular that I just haven't finished. It's a quilt that my dad and I started when I was in middle school. I don't remember whose idea it was to start the project or even why we started in the first place. I don't remember picking out material or even working on it. I do remember why we stopped; we ran out of material and never could find the pattern again. I actually spent years looking for it each time I went into a new Wal-Mart, even when I reached the point that the pattern was something that I only vaguely remembered. The intention to finish has always been there, but neither one of us has done much about it. It has come up in conversation occasionally, but it was always ended with the remainder that we needed more fabric. 

This quilt has moved across the United States first with my parents and then later with me. I honestly don't know when it came into my possession, but in all the time I've owned it I had never once unfolded it. Yesterday, however, I finally unfolded it. It's actually further along then I thought it was. All this time I've been thinking that we were missing a square or two which was keeping us from finishing, but we aren't. I've never made a quilt before, but I don't think I have to much to do (or at least the part I was dreading is already completed). Although, I'm not sure if we washed the material before we started working on it, so I feel like I should do that but I'm afraid of the can of worms that might open. 

In the weeks that I've been pregnant, especially after my dad got sick, it's been on my heart to finish this quit. So I'm really going to try and get this finished before the baby gets here. I'm thinking it will make a good Father's Day gift for my dad.