Long time, no update. Life has just been so very busy lately, I really haven't had time to take many pictures or update this blog. Also, there's this little thing called Pinterest that seems to take up a lot of my internet time lately. Check it out - it is seriously the most amazing website in the world. I am getting so many home improvement and craft ideas from it, it's ridiculous.
We made it through the sickies, and Raegan is fully recovered. Right now she is absolutely loving puzzles and reading. Neither are new things, but she is just full on, gung ho into doing both as!much!as!possible! right now. Before that, we were in a coloring and playdough phase. She still wants to do both, but it's not a daily thing like it was in October. Her favorite books right now are her toddler Bible (hand-me-down from Zane) and all the books from the Llama Llama series. Raegan is so amazingly smart. She has her Llama Llama books memorized, and I only brought the Misses Mama one home a week and a half ago. If you start reading and pause halfway through a phrase, she will finish just about every line of the book. She still loves singing and sings ABCs and Twinkle Twinkle to us frequently. She's also started singing "Bringing Home a Baby Bumblebee." It's quite darling to hear her say, "Ouch, stung me!" at the end.
She's still counting to 13, then skipping up to 18. She names capital E and A now, and she's starting to be able to retell stories from what she did during the day, with some prompting to get her started. At child care, they work on spelling their names, and if you start "R-A-E" she will say, "G-A-N, that spells Raegan!" When you ask her to spell her name without getting her started, she says, "A-O-C-N-O-P-N-O-P, that spells Raegan". Love it!
Besides Pinterest, I've been keeping busy with some projects around the house. Luke put the railing on the front porch a couple weeks ago, and I've just finished painting it all a beautiful bright white. The cold weather kind of slowed down getting that done sooner. After I finish this post, I'm going to go touch up the paint on the east wall of our bedroom. I have a couple shelves and pictures I want to hang in there, then I'm going to post pictures of what a drastic change we made. We also finally weatherproofed/stained our back deck, and my front flower garden is all cleaned out and ready for winter. I've actually been very productive over the last two or three weekends, which I'm very proud of myself for. No more wasting away naptime on the internet for me! (Well, not ALL of naptime at least!)
Zane will be 13 in another week and a half. I cannot believe that he is that old. A teenager.... oh boy! For the most part, he's pretty helpful and kind, although he does have his moments of teen angst, obviously. We got his report card a few weeks back and he had 5 A's and 2 B's. Woo hoo! His first band concert of 7th grade will be coming up next month, so I'll have video and maybe some decent pictures to post from that. The lighting in the auditorium always makes for crappy pictures. Zane has gone through another growth spurt recently that has made it necessary for us to buy him new clothes.... again! He's now wearing jeans from the men's department and he's got at least a good two inches in height on me now. Our grocery bill is also showing the effects of his growth spurt. I'm going to have to start shopping in bulk at Sam's for more food here pretty soon.
So that's about all in our neck of the woods. I'm off to finish our bedroom. Pictures to come! :)
Showing posts with label websites. Show all posts
Showing posts with label websites. Show all posts
Sunday, November 13, 2011
Friday, April 1, 2011
Geek
Okay, this might seem kind of silly, but I'm still excited about it.
I found the USDA's Cost of Food at Home chart through one of the blogs I read. Basically, you can look at what the average cost for a week or month of food to feed a family of 2 or 4 is currently (well, as of February of this year). You can also look at the average individual costs for each family member by age. It divides the figures into "Thrifty Plan", "Low Cost Plan", "Moderate Cost Plan" and "Liberal Plan" so that you can see where your average grocery spending falls. I would take it to mean the cost of groceries (minus household supplies) plus eating out. You can check it the February 2011 chart here if you are interested.
So for my family, if we stick to our monthly budget (which we have been for almost two months now, some weeks with money to spare), we only spend $27 more a month than the "Thrifty Plan". It might be silly, but I'm pretty pleased about that. It's nice to see that all of my hard work is for something, you know. :)
Also interesting to me was looking at home much the cost of food has risen over the last ten years. Ten years ago, the "Thrifty Plan" for a family of four (in the older child category) was $445.40 a month. Today, in that same category, it's $603.10. Even just going back five years, the cost for a family of four then was $519.00. Yeesh.
***Edited to add: Well, in looking at one of the older charts, apparently this chart covers food that is "purchased at stores and prepared at home". So basically, we go waaaaaaaaaay under the monthly amount for the specific ages of our family members, because my figure included our fast food/restaurant money. Even better!
I found the USDA's Cost of Food at Home chart through one of the blogs I read. Basically, you can look at what the average cost for a week or month of food to feed a family of 2 or 4 is currently (well, as of February of this year). You can also look at the average individual costs for each family member by age. It divides the figures into "Thrifty Plan", "Low Cost Plan", "Moderate Cost Plan" and "Liberal Plan" so that you can see where your average grocery spending falls. I would take it to mean the cost of groceries (minus household supplies) plus eating out. You can check it the February 2011 chart here if you are interested.
So for my family, if we stick to our monthly budget (which we have been for almost two months now, some weeks with money to spare), we only spend $27 more a month than the "Thrifty Plan". It might be silly, but I'm pretty pleased about that. It's nice to see that all of my hard work is for something, you know. :)
Also interesting to me was looking at home much the cost of food has risen over the last ten years. Ten years ago, the "Thrifty Plan" for a family of four (in the older child category) was $445.40 a month. Today, in that same category, it's $603.10. Even just going back five years, the cost for a family of four then was $519.00. Yeesh.
***Edited to add: Well, in looking at one of the older charts, apparently this chart covers food that is "purchased at stores and prepared at home". So basically, we go waaaaaaaaaay under the monthly amount for the specific ages of our family members, because my figure included our fast food/restaurant money. Even better!
Tuesday, January 4, 2011
I got an award! :)
I'm being lazy (or I could be positive and say that I'm just caught up in going back to work after a long break) so I haven't really figured out my picture loading situation yet. Apparently my choices are either purchase more room or delete pictures off my blog. I have some pictures I want to post, so I guess I better figure it out pretty soon....
So in the mean time, a post that doesn't require me to have media storage space on Blogger. I got an blogger award! I feel like I'm a real blogger that a lot of people read, or something. :) Samantha over at A Bad Romance gave the Honest Scrap award to me.So here's how it works. I have to give five facts about myself, then pick five bloggers who I feel write from the heart to pass the award on to.
My facts are as follows:
1. I hate writing with pencils. If I do write with a pencil, it needs to be perfectly sharp. Writing with a dull pencil literally makes me want saw my fingers off. Ew, I'm shuddering just thinking about it.
2. Okay, one more fact to illustrate the fact that I am obviously a freak. I hate hair. I think hair is disgusting. Not hair, like on your head hair. Loose hair. I gag (not for drama, I seriously cannot control it) everytime I see loose hair. There was a squirrels' nest outside on our playground at work last month and it had fur and hair and leaves and I just about lost my mind.
3. I love reading the Harry Potter series. (Hmmm, to some people I'm probably still highlighting the fact that I'm a freak. lol) I've read the whole series through multiple times, and my favorites (Goblet of Fire and Deathly Hallows) too many to count. I only discovered this series in 2006, so I was too late for all but the last book release, but Zane and I still enjoyed that one by going to the midnight release of the book with him dressed up as Ron. It was awesome.
4. One of my big dreams is to open my own bakery/catering business/mail order food business someday. I love to bake SO much, and I would love to be able to do it for a living. When we lived in Manhattan I sold baked goods at the farmer's market there for a while, but there were a coupe big baking booths that made it hard for me to get going.
5. And since this is for being someone who blogs from the heart, I feel like I should toss in a serious one. I have polycystic ovarian syndrome, also known as PCOS. It's actually a pretty common thing in women, and I know several women that have it to varying degrees. Because of my PCOS, Luke and I had to seek out fertility treatment to get pregnant. We were absolutely blessed by God in that it only took us 7 months (with 4 months assisted by a specialist) to get pregnant, but for some women it takes years, or it never happens. We were also very blessed to not have to go very far up the ladder of treatment options, so it did not cost us nearly as much as it does some people. I've been thinking about blogging about it sometime soon, but for now you can click on the link I provided if you don't know very much about it. You probably know at least one woman who has some degree of PCOS.
Okay, now for the people I nominate:
1. Claire at Claire Emma Miller. This isn't actually the blog of hers that I read where she calls it like she sees it, but I'm linking that one so you can check out the fabulous crafts that she does.
2. Tabatha at Onederful Tabatha blogs about being okay with doing things by herself, and not feeling like she always has to surround herself with people. It's a good concept!
3. My mom Ruth at For Here We Have No Continuing City. She writes from the heart (just like everything she does) but mainly I'm doing this so she will update her blog already!
4. Olivia at Olivia's Family Blog. I admire what a wonderful job she does as a stay-at-home mom to four children. Talk about strength!
5. Beth at Baby Song's First Blog. Again, not the blog of hers I read where she's real, but I don't want to link to her private blog without her permission so there you have it.
My facts are as follows:
1. I hate writing with pencils. If I do write with a pencil, it needs to be perfectly sharp. Writing with a dull pencil literally makes me want saw my fingers off. Ew, I'm shuddering just thinking about it.
2. Okay, one more fact to illustrate the fact that I am obviously a freak. I hate hair. I think hair is disgusting. Not hair, like on your head hair. Loose hair. I gag (not for drama, I seriously cannot control it) everytime I see loose hair. There was a squirrels' nest outside on our playground at work last month and it had fur and hair and leaves and I just about lost my mind.
3. I love reading the Harry Potter series. (Hmmm, to some people I'm probably still highlighting the fact that I'm a freak. lol) I've read the whole series through multiple times, and my favorites (Goblet of Fire and Deathly Hallows) too many to count. I only discovered this series in 2006, so I was too late for all but the last book release, but Zane and I still enjoyed that one by going to the midnight release of the book with him dressed up as Ron. It was awesome.
4. One of my big dreams is to open my own bakery/catering business/mail order food business someday. I love to bake SO much, and I would love to be able to do it for a living. When we lived in Manhattan I sold baked goods at the farmer's market there for a while, but there were a coupe big baking booths that made it hard for me to get going.
5. And since this is for being someone who blogs from the heart, I feel like I should toss in a serious one. I have polycystic ovarian syndrome, also known as PCOS. It's actually a pretty common thing in women, and I know several women that have it to varying degrees. Because of my PCOS, Luke and I had to seek out fertility treatment to get pregnant. We were absolutely blessed by God in that it only took us 7 months (with 4 months assisted by a specialist) to get pregnant, but for some women it takes years, or it never happens. We were also very blessed to not have to go very far up the ladder of treatment options, so it did not cost us nearly as much as it does some people. I've been thinking about blogging about it sometime soon, but for now you can click on the link I provided if you don't know very much about it. You probably know at least one woman who has some degree of PCOS.
Okay, now for the people I nominate:
1. Claire at Claire Emma Miller. This isn't actually the blog of hers that I read where she calls it like she sees it, but I'm linking that one so you can check out the fabulous crafts that she does.
2. Tabatha at Onederful Tabatha blogs about being okay with doing things by herself, and not feeling like she always has to surround herself with people. It's a good concept!
3. My mom Ruth at For Here We Have No Continuing City. She writes from the heart (just like everything she does) but mainly I'm doing this so she will update her blog already!
4. Olivia at Olivia's Family Blog. I admire what a wonderful job she does as a stay-at-home mom to four children. Talk about strength!
5. Beth at Baby Song's First Blog. Again, not the blog of hers I read where she's real, but I don't want to link to her private blog without her permission so there you have it.
Wednesday, December 29, 2010
A Call for Action
I read this post last week, and I cannot get it out of my mind. My heart goes out to this woman and her children for everything they've gone through in the last couple months. I cannot even imagine how she is feeling, and I know that it's only through God's grace and strength that she is continuing on. If you read the post from Pennies on a Platter you will see that there is a way that you can help the King family, other than just through your prayers (although those are powerful too!) Please consider visiting Pennies on a Platter daily throughout the month of January, so that money from your click will go to the King family. I'll be posting this on my Facebook wall also, in the hopes that I can convince as many people as possible to help. If you feel so inclined, think about doing the same, and mentioning this family and their plight to as many people as you can.
Saturday, October 23, 2010
My sides, they hurt!
You may notice that I've added a sidebar on the right side of my blog, that lists the most recent entry to the blogs I like to read the most. I'm going to be adding a new one that I found tonight, because it is absolutely hysterical. Like, I-can't-drink-anything-while-I-read-it-because-I'll-totally-end-up-spraying-it-all-over-my-computer-hysterical. In particular, check out this post about trying to juggle everything and be an adult. (There is some swearing, if that bothers you.)
Friday, May 28, 2010
Poop!
This post over at Dooce** made me think of Raegan. Except for the eating pizza part, because solids are somewhat abhorrant to her still. Still. Mom, read it, and tell me does that not sound like many poop-splosions you've had this last year?
**She does swear in her blog, so if that bothers you, just pass on the link.
**She does swear in her blog, so if that bothers you, just pass on the link.
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