Noah Has Arrived!

Okay, so this is WAY late but what can I say? I hit a wall in my last month of pregnancy and I just went into hybernation. That is until my mom came and then I was out doing everything I could do to try to go into labor. I ended up asking to be enduced because I just couldn't take it anymore. I swelled up like a blue whale those last three weeks. It wasn't pretty. Noah finally made his debut on March 9th at 8:56pm. He weighed in at 7lbs 15oz and was 21.5 inches long.

I'm not going to share any stories to try to scare other women or sing songs about my battle wounds to et some kind of sympathy. I will tell you that I had a 12 hour labor, 3 of which were spent pushing. Noah did get stuck because he was turned sideways but a merciful God and a helpful hint from my first labor and delivery nurse allowed me to dodge the c-section bullet and Noah made it out just fine. Pushing was more intense than I thought it would be and I was completely exhausted but 2 days after giving birth it was all a distant memory and I was ready to do it all over again.

Isaac and I are adjusting to being proud parents and life is returning to our normal hectic schedule. Unfortunately my blog and etsy shop were temporary casualties of the birthing process, but I'm bringing them back to life starting today!

Finishing Noah's Nursery

Well, I decided that it was time to finish up Noah's nursery. We are down to the final month countdown so I don't want to be caught off-guard should he arrive a little earlier than expected. Isaac helped me put together the swing and I put together the bouncer last night. Let me just say that those things are not so easy to assemble. I could barely get the covers to go over the frames. I'm afraid the seams might pull apart they are stretched so tightly!

We also put his bedding on his crib and I went through the closet and pulled out all the blankets, bibs, socks, and clothes that still needed to be washed. The real time killer of this task was sitting down to take all the tags off of the clothes and socks. I bet that took me a good hour. I've been running loads since late last night and I have two more left before all his things will be ready for him. The next project will be sterilizing all this bottle nipples and pacifiers. Probably not going to happen today, but hopefully some time this week.

Today, I'm going out with my friend Sarah to finish buying up what supplies we don't have but still need. My second baby shower on Saturday was a lot of fun and I ended up getting quite a bit of what was left on our "still need" list. I just have things like batteries for all the equipment, breast feeding supplies, a Bumbo, baby gates, etc to pick up today. None of the fun stuff. The real challenge will be not buying him any more clothes! Babies R Us is having a big sale right now and in their ad there are at least two things that I really want to get for Noah. They have a onesie that says "Handsome" on it and I think I might just have to buy it. We could also end up at the outlet mall at some point today if I'm not too exhausted and my giant swollen feet aren't killing me too badly.

Speaking of swollen feet, if it wasn't so sick I would take a picture and let you all see the glory that comes with the last month of pregnancy. I haven't had too much of a swelling problem until the last few days. Isaac said that my feet look like the Nutty Professor movie where he changes from thin to like 400lbs. Ah, that's love. The most annoying thing about it is that because they are so swollen they itch like crazy and then off course if you touch them they are painful because my cells are probably on the verge of bursting! So if Noah wanted to come a week or so early and save me from the swelling, I would love him all the more.

Wednesday out dresser for the nursery comes and then I should have the whole thing complete and the long awaited and promised pictures up for all to see!

Great Free Printable Coupon Site

So one of our New Year's resolutions was to come up with a budget and stick to it. In order to stick to my designated grocery amount, I realized that I needed to start using coupons. My mom sent me a link to a website called couponmom.com that has a lot of printable grocery store coupons. I used the website to find several coupons that I could use when I went to the grocery store earlier this week. The site even has a free ebook called Cut Your Grocery Bill in Half that gives you some helpful hints about how to maximize your coupons.

Another cool thing on the site is that you can look up any of the grocery store sales for your state or area. So essentially you can find which stores have the best prices on what items and then if you have a coupon for that item the price is even better! I'm loving this site and will definitely be checking it before every grocery trip from here on out. I hope that you enjoy it as well and save a little of that hard earned money.

Stamps For Sale

I've been cleaning today and I decided to clean out all my stamps and get rid of the ones that I'm no longer using. I have quite a few Close To My Heart clear My Acrylix stamp sets that I would like to sell. I've listed if they are new and their condition if they are used. If you are interested in purchasing any of the stamp sets, please leave a comment with your email and which set(s) you would like and I'll email you. Some of the sets are retired so I can send you a scan of the set if you'd like.

To view most of the stamp sets go here and type the set's name into the Find Items box on the left-hand side.

Stamps For Sale
B Sets
Baby Accessories (new) $11
Little License (new) $11
Reminders (new) x2 $11 each
Swirl Stroke Lowercase (a few letters used) $9
Baby Accessories (used) $7
Baby Blocks (new) x2 $11 each
Alfresco (lightly used) $9
Blossom Blocks (one lightly stained) $9
Fall Leaves (2 lightly used) $9
Love Is (lightly used) $9

C Sets
Birthday Celebration (used) $10
Le Chic (lightly stained) $12
Accents, Etc (one lightly stained) $12
Let’s Shop (lightly stained) $12
Floral Charms (lightly stained) $12
Smitten (used) $10
Goodness of Life (new) $15
Simple Blossoms (used) $10
Totem Carvings (new) $15
Swirl Stroke Caps (used) $10
Kissy Fish (one lightly stained) $12
Bow-Wow (lightly stained) $12

D Sets
Doodle Alphabet (new) x2 $18 each
Doodle Alphabet (a few lightly stained) $15
Treasure Life (new) x2 $18 each
Happy Haunting (new) $18
Delightful Alphabet (new) $18
Wedding (lightly stained) $15
Elegant Script (lightly stained) x2 $15 each
Seasonal Celebration (used) $12
Small Pleasures (lightly stained) $15
Card Sentiments (used) $12
Eastertime (new) $18
Friendship Flowers (lightly stained) $15
Life’s Creation (2 lightly stained) $15
It’s A Party (lightly stained) $15
Love Tags (lightly stained) $15
Magical Season (1 lightly stained) $15

A Bad Dream?

Yesterday started out so nicely. I was feeling very motivated to work on some new designs and products for my etsy shop and to work on our family budget with Isaac. I worked the morning away and before I knew it, Isaac was up.

I was upstairs calculating our expenses so far this month when I heard his phone ring. About 10 minutes later he came up the stairs and said that he had something to tell me that I probably wasn't going to like. He had just received a call from his First SGT and Isaac was put on a list to be mobilized to Iraq. At first, I don't think I really believed him. I knew that some of his soldiers were going because he had received an email on Friday that 8 of his lower ranking soldiers were being called up to join another unit. However, they didn't request anyone with a ranking as high as Isaac's so we thought he was safe. Well, for one reason or another, there are a lot of soldiers in his platoon that don't qualify to be deployed (because they are terrible soldiers that never get there paperwork and tests done on time and generally just suck at life) so they decided to take Isaac since they didn't have the number of lower ranking soldiers that had been requested.

Then he told me that he'll have to start flying to Texas in February to do his monthly battle assembly with the new unit. That's when I started to freak out. The March battle assembly is the weekend that Noah is supposed to be born and Isaac was going to just make it up later in the month. I don't know if he'll be able to do that now or not. I cannot have our first child without my husband present. I just can't do it and at this point I started crying. He continued to tell me that he would have to go from training in June and July and then his deployment would start in September. He'll miss Noah's first everything, first Thanksgiving, first Christmas, first birthday. Plus, I'll be essentially a single mom for a year. I don't want to be a single mom. That's why I waited to have children until I was married and we were settled. I mean, by the time Isaac comes back, Noah will have no idea who he is. How heartbreaking is it that my son will not know who his father is?

I realize that we are not the first and will not be the last family to go through this situation. I know that many women have given birth while their husbands were in Iraq either watching on a web-cam or not present at all. I know there are countless fathers who have missed years of their young childrens' lives but I just don't want to be one of those women.

And I'm just so irritated at the recruiter who got Isaac into this unit with all his promises that the unit wouldn't deploy, but if it did they would only deploy to Hawaii to replace the full time Army there. In all his scare tactics about not going into the IRR because you'll be mobilized so join this Reserve Unit so you'll be safe, he never once mentioned that you can still be mobilized if any bigger company requests soldiers from your unit. AND we got screwed out of the $10,000 bonus for signing a 3 year contract because the guy wrote it 3 days short of the full 3 year period. So Isaac didn't get a cent for this.

I just feel like this is all one really bad dream and that when Isaac wakes up this morning he'll come downstairs and not know what I'm talking about.

It's Good To Be Home

On Friday, Isaac and I headed to my parents' house in Indiana for my baby shower. My aunt Robin threw the shower for me and it was good to see so many people that I haven't seen in months and even years. My childhood best friend and her mom came and I was so happy to see them. I haven't seen her mom in probably 8 years and it had been a year and a half since I had seen Ashlee herself. It's funny how you can get together with old friends and once you get talking it doesn't seem like you've ever been apart.

Here are a couple of pictures from my shower:
Wow, not a flattering picture of me but the only one I have so please don't poke your eyes out!
A beautiful blanket that my grandma made for Noah.One of my aunts gave me some tights for Noah to wear. I'm not thinking I'm putting tights anywhere near my son, unless he chooses to do ballet or something.

I received lots of fun things at the shower and I also received a lot of gift cards so I can't wait to go out and get the rest of the things I need with those.

Yesterday I was thinking about the few big things that I still needed to purchase and I wasn't sure where I was going to get the money to pay for them. One of the items was $500 and the other was around $280. I was listening to some pod casts from Crown Financial Ministries and just deciding that I would have to do without the one item and I'd just have to trust that God would provide us with the finances to purchase the other. Just as I was thinking that, my mom called me and told me that someone had given her a check for me covering the cost of both those items! I couldn't believe it and I know it was from the Lord. How good is He to his children?! We feel so blessed and now I know that we'll be completely ready for Noah. I'm so relieved that I can just relax for these last 6 weeks and not stress over anything.

Noah's Bathroom

We sort of have this monkey theme going on for Noah, with his jungle bedroom decor and his cute monkey coat and onesies from Gymboree. So my mom found this really cute monkey shower curtain and accessories at Kohls a few weekends ago and she decided to buy them for the bathroom that is attached to his room. She ended up having to order everything online because her store only had a few things left so I just got the package in the mail yesterday.

Last night I set up everything that she sent and I think it looks super cute. It at least looks better than it did before because we only have a white plastic liner hanging for the shower curtain. We didn't want to buy shower curtains for all of the bathrooms when we only use the shower in our bedroom for the most part.

So here are pictures of the bathroom:

And I promise to get some pictures of his nursery up soon. I have one project to finish before I start snapping pictures!

Cleaning Like A Mad Woman

I realize that I have neglected my blog this past week but I just got into this crazy cleaning and I've only now somewhat come out of it. I think it was a combination of being tired of the clutter and watching too many cleaning/organization shows on tv. I just got fed up and decided to start cleaning, but not just cleaning, really DEEP cleaning.

I took my entire kitchen apart and cleaned ever surface. I even dismantled my refridgerator and cleaned every shelf, drawer, and the entire inside. Then I scrubbed the floor by hand to make sure that I got it really clean. My hands were so swollen by the end of the night that Isaac was horrified to look at them.

The next day I worked on bathrooms. I scrubbed all the sinks, toilets, and showers. I have four bathrooms so this was no small job. I didn't get to scrub the floors in there yet but it's still on the list. I might do that later tonight.

On Saturday I cleaned up our bedroom. It was really dusty and our dresser was MIA for all the clutter. It's sort of a dumping ground for anything that enters the room and I was so sick of it. It took me about 2 hours to sort through all the junk and get it into the correct places and then I dusted everything. I don't think Isaac appreciated that I was doing it while he was still asleep but when you feel like cleaning, it's time to clean! Then I did all the laundry and washed all our bedding. The room looks so clean and relaxing now. It's so nice.

Then Saturday night I spent like 4 hours in Noah's room going through things. The closet was so unorganized and packed full of things and it was driving me nuts. I also had this huge pile of things that was just taking up the corner next to the crib. I went through all the clothes that I have for him so far and hung only the 0-6 month sizes and packed all the rest into plastic tubs. I have a whole tub full of 6-12 month clothing and the kid isn't even here yet! Then I gathered all the blankets that I have for him and filled another entire tub! Several of the blankets are my old baby blankets though so I don't feel too guilty about the number of blankets he has, but let's just say he doesn't need any more. I moved the changing table up from the basement into his bedroom and then loaded all the diapers and wipes that we have onto that and proceded to fit everything that was outside the closet into the closet. It looks amazing. I should have taken a before and after picture now that I think of it so you could truly appreciate the change that took place.

Yesterday I paid the price for my crazy cleaning. My back was killing me! I didn't sleep well at all the night before, just tossing and turning. So I took a break yesterday and will continue to work at a slower pace the rest of the week. I still need to shampoo carpets and a few other things and then I'll be squeeky clean. It will be fabulous!

I think my mom is worried that I might go into labor now because she kept telling me that this is what people do the day before they pop their kid out. However, this had nothing to do with being pregnant and everything to do with being frustrated.

Finally, a few cute pictures of Bella and Copper playing together and hiding from the madness.

New Albums

I have finally started working on some new chipboard albums for my etsy shop and I'm really excited to see how they turn out. I've got one almost finished and I'm hoping to have it finished tomorrow. I'm using this really cool retro bird paper called A Little Birdie Told Me by Paper Shoebox. I've had it for a few months now and I'm just getting around to using it.

I also added a few Valentine's themed cards to my shop today. I really love the mini notecards. They are probably one of my most favorite cards I've ever made. The sewing ended up being way harder and taking way longer than I thought it would. Free hand sewing hearts = not easy.

I also got this really cute picture of Copper last night that I thought I'd share. My mom bought him this giant monkey toy that has all these different squeakers when we were home for Christmas. He absolutely love it and I caught him cuddling up with the monkey late last night. Too cute.

Finances For A New Year

So my husband and I decided that we'd really like to start tracking our finances this year. We found ourselves asking where all our money went far too often these past few months. I have really been dreading actually taking a look though and digging down into where we spend our money.

Yesterday I decided to take the plunge and I went onto Crown Financial's website and found some very useful worksheets. I have their book and I thik I read the whole thing a few years ago but I never really got down deep into our spending and doing a budget. I just took away lessons on how to pay down your debt and applied those to our lives. Things were different back then though. We didn't really worry about our finances because Isaac was in the military and I was also working full time. Now that I'm not working and we don't get extra housing allowance, tings are much tighter. We actually need to be tracking where every penny goes. Especially with Noah arriving soon.

One of the major questions I was having was how much of your income should be spent on what. Like how much should we be spending on food? What percentage of our income should pay for our housing? I had been very frustrated because I had never been able to find something that actually gave you an idea until I found this sheet. They actually have them for lots of different scenarios, like single with x amount of kids or married with x amount of kids or widow, etc. I was thrilled to have found this and sat down to see how we measured up last night. It seems that our percentages are much different than theirs. We spend more on our total housing than they suggest and we also spend way more on our debt (student loans) than they suggest.

After looking at this I was just frustrated. It's hard to face the fact that you're overspending and spending on things that aren't really needed. Since I stay at home the only time I really get out of the house right now is when I need to go to the store. So buying for me is my way out of the house. Nevertheless, I am committed to tracking our expenses this month and to really getting an honest look at what we doing with our money. I know that I need to come up with a strict budget for our family, especially if I'm going to continue to stay home with Noah. I have to learn to live and spend on just one income. This should be interesting!

Hooked Studios Skincare

If you're like me, you're always looking for a good line a skincare. I have combination skin and it seems that I'm always bouncing from one line of products to the next hoping it will due what I want. Out of her own frustration, my friend Jill recently launched her own line of skincare and has been getting great reviews. She sells the line here on etsy. I wanted to help her get the word out about her new product so I thought I'd share a little information about her and her product.

I've been researching all-natural skincare for quite awhile now, thanks in part to my frustration with conventional products' effectiveness. I recently created a cleanser/mask that has been incredibly successful here in Minneapolis. It has been featured in two local publications' Holiday Gift Guides, and will be entering more local stores soon! I'm just grateful it seems to be working as well for so many others as it has been for me.

Hooked Studios Skincare works for any skintype; is completely organic; fragrance-free; shrinks appearance of pores; clears up acne; softens and tightens skin; and is a generally soothing product--great for winter. Here is a little more information that she sent me about the skincare that contains a list of ingredients and what they do for your skin.

Hooked Studios Skincare is made of all-natural, fresh, organic ingredients. Each ingredient is selected based on its time-tested history of proven results. Natural skincare has existed for centuries; our skincare hearkens back to a simpler era when chemicals didn’t undermine the terrific results nature alone can bring out. We bear in mind that your skin is your body’s largest organ and that products applied to the skin absorb readily into the bloodstream. This means the healthy food choices you make daily are being negated by any chemicals you choose to put on your skin. We’re here to remedy that and make you look and feel amazing in the process.

Ingredients and Their Functions

Ground Oats
-softens skin
-absorbs excess oil
-possesses soothing, anti-inflammatory properties
- is found in several commercial skin care products, but often combined with harsh, unnatural ingredients

Garbanzo Powder
-popular exfoliant in several parts of the world
-cleanses skin
-tightens skin
-neutralizes oiliness
-helps treat acne

Turmeric Spice
-aids in remodeling of damaged skin
-accelerates wound healing
-treats inflamed skin
-is associated with aiding in melanoma prevention
-leaves skin with subtle, sun-kissed glow
-natural antiseptic and antibacterial agent which disinfects the skin
-used for centuries in Chinese Medicine to treat depression

Ground Flax Seeds
-rich in Omega-3 and Omega-6 essential fatty acids
-improves symptoms of acne, psoriasis, eczema, and dry skin
-aids in healing scars and abrasions
-possesses anti-inflammatory properties

I hope that you'll give it a try and definitely come back to let everyone know what your experience was!

Noah's First Pictures

We went to a specialist today to check on a spot that had been showing up in Noah's heart on the last two ultrasounds. Thankfully, it is nothing more than a thickened spot in the muscle and he is perfectly fine. During the ultrasound the technician asked up if we had any 3D pictures yet and, since we didn't, she took a few for us.

He has his hands crossed under his chin so in some of the pictures his right hand is over part of his face. It looks like he's going to have Isaac's nose and my mouth in more ways than one. He was constantly opening and closing his mouth and sticking his tongue out so it's quite possible he'll have a lot to say.

I didn't think I wanted to do a 3D ultrasound because I wanted his face to be a surprise but I think it'll still be a surprise because while you can get some idea of what he looks like, it's not the same as seeing him in person or in an actual picture.

Back Home

Isaac and I returned home from our trip to Indiana late last night and I must say that I'm glad to be home. It was such a quick trip as we were only there for three days. It's hard to believe in just two and a half weeks we'll be doing the trip all over again for my baby shower!We had a great time being home with family and Christmas was good. The only annoying part was listening to extended family members tell me how big I looked and say how gigantic they thought I'd be the next time they see me. They seriously must not think before they talk. All I could do was roll my eyes and bite my tongue. I don't think that I'm a particularly large pregnant person but maybe I have a distorted view of myself.

My mom and I did a lot of shopping for nothing while I was home which is the best. I love to just go out looking for nothing and see what you find. I did find some great books and Half Priced Books to teach me how to knit, crochet, and do applique. I've been wanting to learn how to do those for awhile now and I finally decided to take the plunge. Isaac doesn't seem too thrilled at the prospect of me picking up a few more hobbies but oh well. I also really want to learn how to make my own jewelry but I haven't found a book that has anything like the style I'm interested in so that's still on the back burner.

I was practicing my crocheting technique on the car ride home but I became a bit confused on the conversion between the rows and so I think I'm going to have to look for a video on youtube or something to show me. On one page of the book it says to hook through the loop just like you normally would but then on the next page it says for row two you want to hook under both loops to turn the chain so I'm not sure which to do. Then do I continue to hook under both loops every time I turn the chain or is that only for the second row? You're probably confused just from reading that!

Anyway, today has been lots of cleaning and putting things back away. I have a lot of organizing to do in my craft room since it looks like a nuclear bomb went off in the Christmas rush and I also need to sit down and start organizing my business paperwork for taxes and such.

Almost Feeling Like Christmas

I've been having the winter blues the last two weeks. The sun has not been out and it has just been raining for days. So I sort of crawled into a little hole and have not really been participating in life. Well, today the sun is shining and I've decided to come out of my hole and get things done.

Over the weekend we had dinner with our friends Sarah and Aaron and then went to a Christmas light display at a local park. The decorations were nice and it was a very large park. It was quite cold though and the wind was not very kind to my face. It was so cold in fact that we bought hot cocoa while we were there and it was cool enough to drink within 30 seconds. They had a really cool display that had the lights coordinated with the music playing so we decided to stop and take a quick picture since I don't have any pictures of us together lately.


Isaac and I have been talking about taking a Christmas photograph for like two weeks now and we finally decided to get it taken today. So before he went to work we sat down and took a few snapshots for the dogs. I don't have a lot of pictures of me pregnant but this one turned out well and I think that we should at least have one to show Noah some day.

I'm busy working on scrapbooking the rest of our ultrasound pictures today and getting things ready to head home to Indiana on Wednesday. My mom says they're going to be having a winter mix of ice and rain Wednesday. Perfect traveling weather, yuck.

Thai Cashew Chicken Recipe

So today I thought I'd share with you the Thai Cashew Chicken recipe that I made for our friends over the weekend.

1 Tbs olive oil
1 large yellow onion, sliced thinly
1 of each: yellow, orange, and red pepper
3 Tbs ketchup
1 Tbs soy sauce
1/3 cup chicken broth
1 tsp white sugar
1 tsp thai garlic chili paste (or hot pepper sauce) or more to taste
3 boneless, skinless chicken breast halves
3 Tbs. creamy peanut butter
1/2 cup cashews
Jasmine rice

Heat oil in skillet
Cook onions and peppers until they start to get tender
Mix in ketchup, soy sauce, chicken broth, sugar, chili paste, and peanut butter
Add chicken to skillet and continue to cook and stir for 10 minutes
Mix in cashews before serving over Jasmine rice

A few things you want to keep in mind:
-You only want to cook the onions and peppers until they are starting to get soft. If you cook them until they are completely soft they will be a mushy mess by the time the chicken has been cooked.
-You also want to get the chicken breast in as soon after adding the sauce ingredients as possible or your sauce will dry out before your chicken is done. This happened to me and I ended up having to add more chicken broth to thin it out and I lost some of the flavor because of that.
-Make sure that you slice your chicken breast very thinly so that it will cook relatively quickly.
-Cooking this mixture is done best in a wok at a high temperature but you can do it in a regular pan if that's all you have. Might be a bit messier.
-If you're not a big pepper fan, you may want to use only half of each of the peppers as it is a lot of peppers and onions.

Give it a try and enjoy!

A Busy Little Weekend

Wow, this weekend really flew by for me! I can't believe that it's already Monday, sigh. Friday was kind of a bust for me as far as getting any work done. I had my Keepers Of The Home Bible study group on Friday morning and they wanted me to do some Christmas cards with them. So I brought all my stuff and they each made 5 cards. Normally, we meet at 9:30 and we're done by 11:00. Not so this time. We didn't even get started until nearly 11:00 and the little boys (3 of them in the 2's) were going bonkers. It was so hard to concentrate on the Bible study portion. In fact, I would say I was totally distracted. Thank goodness I won't be having triplets! So the meeting lasted until nearly 1:00. I came home and Isaac wanted to go get some Five Guys hamburgers for lunch so we went back out and did that and then it was time for him to go to work. Then my friend Sarah called and asked me to go Christmas shopping with her so I did and we were out until about 7:00 or so and I was completely pooped. I did however get a fabulous maternity coat at Target for $60. I am thrilled with it because now my coat isn't hanging open and I'm not freezing to death! This is my coat.

Then on Saturday we had Sarah and her husband over for dinner at 5:00. I made Thai Cashew Chicken with sticky rice. I had never made it before but I think it came out alright. There weren't any leftovers so I guess that's always a good sign. I got the recipe from a friend and there are a few tweeks I'll make to it but all in all it was good and very simple. After dinner, we went to their house to meet their new puppy, Maggie. She's a yellow lab puppy and super cute. I think Isaac wanted to steal her. He kept saying how he wished we had Copper when he was a puppy over and over again. But just for the record, we are at our dog capacity. Three dogs and a baby equal my hands being very full!

Then Sunday we did our normal church thing and went and had lunch at the mall afterwards. We decided to redo our Christmas tree because it was looking pretty pathetic and I hated the decorations we had for it. Not to those that move to Hawaii without Christmas decorations, there is a limited supply for the island so get them early. Don't be like us and wait until December only to find that there is little to no selection left. We bought the only things we could find and I've pretty much always hated them. Anyway, Isaac has been on this kick about wanting modern blue lights for the tree, yadda yadda, so I finally gave in. We went to several different store and got blue lights and all these silver and blue decorations for the tree. It took forever to get it together last night but we did it and I really like it. The only thing we don't have is a star because we couldn't find one we liked. I'll have to keep looking. Here's our tree.

The Best Little Camera Ever!

One of the things that my mom and I did while she was here was to go shopping on Black Friday. We didn't drop any major money or really buy all that much but we just went out to have fun together. There were a few electronics that we knew we wanted to buy and so that's mainly what we were looking for.

I have been wanting to get a small point and shoot digital camera for awhile now, since the flash is broken on our big point and shoot camera. The last time we went to DC and took pictures at the museums, nothing turned out because we didn't have a flash. It was very upsetting and disappointing. So I had been doing some research and reading what types of cameras people recommended and I found that overall people really liked the Canon Powershots. A few things that I required from the camera were that it has a fast click to capture time, a macro setting, and various settings for action shots, night shots, etc. So I started looking into the Canon Powershots and reading customer reviews on them. I was shocked to find that most of the $200-$300 Powershots have no settings on them. They are just auto. So that was discouraging.

Then I happened onto a few recommenations for the Canon Powershot A590 IS. I looked it up and found that it had all the features that I was looking for but the one complaint from people was that the body of the camera felt cheap. I picked out about 3 Powershots that I thought I'd like to try out and then started scouring through the ads. To my surprise, there were 3 stores that had the A590 IS on sale and it was very inexpensive. I have to admit that I started to think this wasn't going to be a good camera because it was only $135. I've never spent that little on a camera before. So we went out and I ended up purchasing the camera with the intent to try it out and if I didn't like it, to return it.
Well, I'm happy to report that this little camera is the best digital camera I've ever owned! I love it! It turns on SUPER fast and the click to capture time is almost INSTANT. Not only does it have all the other features I was looking for but it also has a setting for children and pets. Perfect! Now, I will say that the body of the camera is plastic, but that's something that I'm willing to compromise on. After all, the last camera I bought was about $250 and has a great heavy frame and I've hated it since about a month after we got it. It never worked right so word to the wise, never buy the display because it's the last one they have! So in the end I'm willing to have a lighter body casing on a fabulous camera then a heavy metal casing on a sucky camera.

If you're looking for a great little digital camera this year, I would say to try this one out. You can always take it back if you don't like it, but I have a feeling you'll be keeping it!

A Great Thanksgiving

I had a wonderful Thanksgiving visit with my mom and brother and we got so much accomplished while they were here. It really was a great time and I'm so glad that they were able to make it out here on Tuesday night, even if it was a little later than planned. We needed every day that they were here.

My mom and I cooked Thanksgiving dinner and it was super yummy. We tried out a brined turkey recipe this year that we hadn't done before and it turned out really well. The turkey was very moist and the meat had a sweetness to it from the brine. We made mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes, green beans, rolls, pumpkin pie, and peacan pie. Here's a quick picture of our spread and below that is the recipe for the turkey brine.

Brined Turkey Breast
16 cups of water
2 cups sugar
2 cups coarse salt
5 gloves of garlic, crushed
1 Tbsp pickling spices

Combine ingredients and bring to a boil. Reduce heat and simmer until sugar and salt dissolve. Cool to room temperature. Poor brine over breast and refrigerate, loosely covered, overnight.

We also worked on getting Noah's nursery put together and I think that it's looking great. We put up the border around the room and did it at a chairrail height. It helps to break up the whiteness of the walls. I figure this will be easier to remove from the walls than having to completely repaint when and if we move again. We also hung a curtain rod and put up the window vallences and I'm working on a project to hang above his crib that will have his name on it. We got all the bedding out and put in on the crib to see how everything looks together and it's super cute. I'll post pictures once I get the room finished.

My etsy shop has been quite busy lately and I have to say that I am very thankful for that. I'm quickly approaching the milestone of 200 sales and I'm hoping that I'll hit that before the end of the year. I would just be thrilled. Over the weekend I added a whole new line of Amy Butler tins into my store and I'm excited to see how people like them. Today is another busy day so I'd better be off and start working on my to-do list. Ah, the never ending list.