Three years...

Yesterday was three years since I took my last dose of chemo. I can't believe that it's been that long, but also it feels like it's been a lot longer. I'm very happy with my life right now...

... We are living in a great place, surrounded by trees and flowers, and great neighbors. There are lots of great trails around that we like to take walks on. It's pretty great.
... I have two amazing boys that I get to spend my days with, and one little guy on the way. A dream I didn't know would be possible after this whole cancer ordeal.
... I'm back around my family and my in laws and it's been great to spend more time with them and have our boy play with his cousins again.
... I'm planting my garden for a second year in a row. Something that I had always wanted to do but never really got the chance before last year.
... I've been able to spend time with some of my best friends from forever ago, and am making new friends in our little town here.

Life has moved on from cancer and it's been nice to make new memories and move farther away from this. It's still there, it's a part of who I've become, but I no longer feel like people need to know that I had cancer. If it comes up, it comes up, but it's not a defining part of me.

Life is good. It's not perfect. There are a few things going on in my life right now that make me really sad and have been hard for me to deal with, but that is life sometimes. I'm learning that there are lots of things that are not in my control that I can't fix. One would think I would have learned that already going through cancer in my twenties... but apparently not ;). I just need to focus on being good and loving to others and be grateful for what I have.

Sorry about the horrible editing of this picture... I have no clue what I'm doing. It got bad and I couldn't get it back...

As far as cancer stuff goes... I'm now more than halfway through my remission. I go and see my oncologist every 6 months for blood tests and a physical exam. I'm done for now with CT scans and am suppose to have a chest x-ray this next week. However, with little brother cooking away in there I wont be doing an x-ray until after the baby is born. I check myself periodically for lumps and bump in my neck, armpit, area to see if I find anything... but nothing has come up! I'm super grateful that things are going well with this!

Lets talk about the hair for a minute shall we? I have not cut my hair since I took a picture last year. I think I've trimmed my bangs twice but now I'm letting them grow out too. I desperately need my hair trimmed, but just have been avoiding it. I'm super partial to my hair now and I love that it is getting long again! It's been fun curling it up. I wish the curl would last more than a day but my hair is so fine and blonde, it just doesn't hold curl for more than a day. I use this method to curl my hair and it works great! I've been trying to be better to my hair and have gone from washing it everyday to every other day. The days I don't wash, I curl. I think I want to grow it another 6 inches or so, I've never had hair that long! It's been fun to have my hair long again and it's hard for me to even remember being bald. Don't get me wrong, I remember it, but it just feels like that was so long ago.

So... it's super awkward to take pictures of yourself. I always end up taking a bazillion pictures and hate most of them ;). I just feel super big right now, and I look at pics of me and think, "is that really what I look like?" I finally figured out if I put my arms the way they are above that you can't see my chunky arms... true story. So it's a trick! Ha! Probably didn't fool anyone though! It's for a good cause right? I will hopefully slim back down when I'm breast feeding in 5 short months. That's the best weight loss tool I've ever found for myself, and I'm hoping it works again!

Anyway... here are some of the out-takes of our little photo shoot yesterday...
 

He really is such a cute helper.

Mid-self timer make out session over here (not instigated by me... and yes I still kiss my five year old on the lips).

 

He felt like Michelangelo needed some pictures after we were done, and I was eating my lunch. Fun times!

 

march...

Happy Easter everyone!
We had a great day, relaxing, visiting family, wayyyyyyy too much sugar.
I need to remember to veto 90% of the sugar next Easter.
Ridiculous!
I can't believe March is already over! Here are some of our highlights of the month...

+++++++

We signed our little dude up for kindergarten for the coming year.
He's so excited, and I am too... for him.
He's ready.
I decided to do afternoon kindergarten and hope that it works out well for us.
I'm just not a morning person, and with a new baby coming at the same time...
It just felt like the best way for me to get a breather in the afternoon.

+++++++

I got to see the baby again this week.
He is growing strong and doing great.
Baby is measuring 1/2 a week behind from crown to rump...
and 1/2 week ahead on femur length.
Long legs... sounds about right!
Still a boy... doc made sure to check.

+++++++

Spring is finally showing up around here.
We planted our cold weather garden last week.
Still no plants coming up, but there are pretty daffodils around the house which I LOVE!
I found some ranunculus bulbs that I can't wait to get in the ground.
They are my favorite flower.
I saw some for sale at Trader Joe's this week and it made me smile.

+++++++

Speaking of spring, I've got spring cleaning fever.
On Friday I vacuumed out both cars and wiped everything inside down.
On the list for this week: wash windows, wipe down walls, vacuum all the cracks and corners in the house...
It's nice to be feeling better so I can get some stuff done!
This last week I packed up all my regular clothes and pulled out the maternity.
Still wearing and buttoning up my pre-preggo pants.
That will probably end this next week ;).

+++++++

I haven't worked on any projects for the past 4 months.
So not like me.
I've decided to get going again, get creating.
I miss it.
We need a good quilt for our living room to cuddle up to while watching movies.
I've been drooling over some lovely Herringbone quilts.
Such as here, here, and here.
Now to pick out fabrics and colors and get it started!

+++++++

My preggo anxiety is running high (anyone have any good natural solutions for this?) Please share...
There is lots happening in the next few weeks that I feel I need to get past before I will start to feel better.
My last chemo anniversary is tomorrow.
Then I will pass my 21 week mark in 3 weeks (that's when my water broke last time).
Our "big" ultrasound for the baby is coming right up (as opposed to the "little" ultrasounds I get every time I go in the office, I guess).
And in 6 weeks will be Clayton's birth/death day.

Sigh...

I wish that old dates could come and go without haunting me. Eventually I'm sure they will.
So I will acknowledge them and get past them and focus on the happy new dates that come into my life.
We're going to go to one of my favorite restaurants after the ultrasound to celebrate this new baby.
Something fun to look forward to.
Other than the beautiful things going on outside right now.

+++++++

Speaking of beautiful things outside...
I miss driving from Nevada to Utah this time of year.
I love seeing all the baby animals out in the fields.
Maybe I need to plan a little getaway so I can see baby lambs again.
'Cause there is nothing cuter than a baby lamb... seriously.

Ground Hog's Day... Meg style...

"Well my dear... there it is. You've popped another subchorionic hemorrhage."

It was the second ultrasound I had with my midwife since discovering I was pregnant. At 5 1/2 weeks I started spotting. Great, after all this waiting and work I'm going to miscarry this baby, I thought. But it came and went... and came again. One thing that I have learned in my experience with bleeding in early pregnancy is that there isn't much that can be done. So instead of rushing in to see what was going on, I waited to see what happened. After a whole week and a half I went in at 7 weeks to see my midwife. At that point I figured I wasn't having a miscarriage but I was worried about having another ectopic. The ultrasound showed that I had one tiny little baby growing in my uterus, no ectopic. But still no sign as to why I was bleeding. My midwife wanted me to come back in a week to check things out and see how the baby was doing. So there I was, at 8 weeks being told the news... another subchorionic hemorrhage.

This is what happened when I was pregnant with Clayton. This is the reason why we lost our second baby. From what I understand it is bleeding that happens between the placenta and the uterine wall. If the bleed or clot gets large enough it can cause the placenta to tear or tear away from the uterine wall. They usually clear up on their own and aren't a big deal. But sometimes they don't heal, they get worse, and can cause major problems. Such as losing a baby.

"You know what this means. No exercise, no heavy lifting, and no sex." She said as she made an X with her fingers. "Be sure to tell your husband." I really wanted my last appointment with my midwife to be different. She no longer follows pregnant patients, just helps them get pregnant and passes them onto someone else. After all, this woman had given us a gift that we were not able to give ourselves. She was able to figure out what we needed to do to have another baby. But all I could think of was how I had already buried a baby because of one of these... and I wasn't able to give her the thanks that she deserved. I couldn't stop looking at the black hole residing right next to my baby.

I've been told many times by multiple doctors that this is something that happens totally randomly. It is not because of the structure of my uterus, or because of anything that I did or didn't do. It just happens sometimes. It's very rare for it to happen in subsequent pregnancies.

I was pretty upset by this news. I understand that it is rare to lose a baby from this. But I've been in that "rare" category before. I went out to the car where my husband was waiting and told him the news. He was quiet for a minute and said, "Well, I guess we should sign up for Netflix again." And that we did ;).

As the snow piled up around my house this winter, I sat inside and hibernated on my couch. Can you believe that in all the snow we got I did not shovel any snow? My poor husband, his winter consisted of working long hours at his job, and then coming home to shovel piles and piles of snow while his wife sat on the couch and watched two seasons of Sister Wives... and then some. It just wasn't worth the risk... nothing was.

Thankfully, my bleeding never got as bad this time as it had with Clayton. I bled until about week 11 and then it stopped. I've now had 5 whole weeks without any spotting or bleeding. With Clayton I started bleeding at 8 weeks and bled until he was born at 21 weeks (sorry if you didn't want to read about bleeding today, I'm trying to keep it tame). I'm feeling very blessed. I'm still not doing anything too strenuous, but I have started going on walks now that the days are so lovely around here. And I'm planning on starting up some prenatal yoga so that I can move my body again.

I sort of feel like I'm living in the twilight zone... or ground hog's day. My due date with this baby is 2 weeks before I was due with Clayton, and then I end up with the same problem that I had with Clayton... and they are both little boys. I feel like I am living through the same situation again. I'm not sure why this has happened the way that it has, but I do know a few things...

 I know that I am thrilled to be pregnant. I'm so excited to be having a little boy. I'm grateful to be at 16 weeks right now and will most likely be holding my breath until this baby gets here. That I will be able to breath, sleep, relax a little better once I make it to 24 weeks which is the time that babies can be viable if they are born at that point. That it is hard to be pregnant again after losing a baby. That every single thing makes me super anxious and doubtful that this is really going to happen. That even though I am overjoyed that this is finally happening for us, I am terrified.

"Everything is going to be okay" was shouted in my dream. I keep repeating that in my head. Half the battle was getting pregnant, but half the battle is also being pregnant. I knew it would be hard to be pregnant again after what happened last time, but I've been a little surprised as to how hard it has been. Things that I haven't thought about in the 4 years that have passed since I was in this situation with Clayton have been brought right to the surface. Hard, scary, terrifying things. But also peace. I felt peace when I had that tiny boy, and I feel peace now. I just don't always understand what peace means, and that scares me (does that even make sense?). Maybe I've needed a year and a half of believing that everything would be okay, set on repeat in my mind, to make it through this time.

So, that's how things have been going. I've been really hesitant to talk about being pregnant because I have had such mixed emotions about it with everything that's been going on. But one thing that my sister in law pointed out to me is that even if things weren't to work out (which they are by the way, they are going to be just fine) I need support from my friends and family. And I am so grateful to have such great support. That after talking about wanting another baby for so long, people are understanding that I am suddenly scared out of my mind.

I have rockstar friends. Seriously, I don't know how I got so lucky. I have awesome girls who are keeping tabs on me and checking up on me all the time who truly get it. And they mean the world to me (if you think I'm talking about YOU then I probably am). And I am grateful to be going through this journey with each of them as they show me what support, patience, friendship, and love really means.

And the payoff is going to be when after four crazy hard years, we are all going to meet a miracle boy who is going to finally be in my arms, and fill this hole in my heart.

Everything is going to be okay...

The hotel room...

About 1 1/2 years ago I had a dream... This dream came just after I had my one year post chemo appointment with my oncologist. I had one question on my mind that I had been scared to ask for a while... when would I be able to try and have more babies? My husband and son were in the room with me when I asked him this question that had been burning in my mind. He took a look at my boy and said, "He needs siblings doesn't he? Your scan was clean, there is no need to wait anymore."

We were elated and planned to start with my next cycle. Before that happened is when I had a dream that left a big impression on me. 

I was in what I thought was a hotel room. It was a place that I didn't recognize, and it was small. There was a living area with a couch and a bedroom behind it. On the opposite side of the rooms there was a small kitchen and a bathroom. In this dream I walked though the living area and past the kitchen into the bathroom. There was a small mirrored cabinet above the sink that I opened and pulled out a pregnancy test. The test was positive. As soon as I registered what this meant I heard a loud, booming voice say, "Everything is going to be alright." The voice was so loud that I woke up startled. 5 AM.

I'm going to find out I'm pregnant when I'm in a hotel room, I thought... and for some reason, I need to know that everything is going to be okay. Why would I need to know right off the bat that everything was going to be okay? What was going to happen?

Month after month went by. No positive tests, and no hotel rooms. We had a family camp out and my sister in law had stayed in a hotel with her twin boys. I stopped by there on my way out to take a shower before driving home. But it wasn't the right time of the month, and the layout was all wrong. This was not my hotel room.

Then we moved back to Utah. I thought we might get a hotel room on our way back to Utah but we ended up doing the whole drive in one day. No hotel.

One weekend about 10 months after this dream... Trent's grandma told us that she had reserved a condo down in St. George that was not going to be occupied for a week. We decided to go down with Trent's sister and her kids for a little getaway. I knew this was finally going to be it! I was 5 days late for my period. I was never on time... but 5 days late was a lot. It was a time-share condo that was sure to have a living area and a small kitchen. I truly believed that this was going to be "the hotel" that I had seen in my dream. I was eager the whole drive to see what awaited me when we got there.

We walked in the door... living area, kitchen, bedroom, bathroom. This was going to be it! I just knew it! That is until 10 minutes after we got there, "it" happened. I was devastated. So disappointed.This perfect hotel room was not my hotel.

I started to second guess this dream. Was it really a premonition as to what was to come? Or was it just a stupid dream? A dream that meant nothing. I started to really hate this dream. It haunted me. I thought about writing down every little last detail that I could remember and light the paper on fire. Watch it burn to ashes and disappear so that it would go away. But I couldn't. It was the only thing that I had that led me to believe that someday I would find out I was going to have a baby. Even if it did turn out to be a stupid dream that meant nothing, it was all I had to hold onto at times.

One year after I had the dream we moved, into a tiny little pioneer house. One day I walked through the living room, past the kitchen and into the bathroom to get something out of the old medicine cabinet. Then it hit me, like deja vu. This was the hotel room. This is what I had seen in my dream. I hadn't recognized it before, and it was such a small area I was sure that it was a hotel. But it was this house. This told me a few things. One, that we were right where we needed to be at this time in our lives... and two, that I would find out I was pregnant while living in this house.

The day was December 24th. I woke up early to get ready to meet two of my best friends from high school for our traditional Christmas Eve breakfast. The boys were both asleep. I was 3 days late after one month of trying a new to me fertility medication, among other things to try and get pregnant. Surely it was way too soon to test for pregnancy, but I had a spare test tucked away... why not? I took the test and then put it up in the medicine cabinet in case one of the boys woke up and came into the bathroom and saw it. I was too nervous to look at it, so I went into my room to finish getting dressed. Then I walked through the living room, past the kitchen, into the bathroom... and opened the medicine cabinet.

There it was. The faintest little pink line. It had worked! I was pregnant. The best Christmas present I could have ever dreamed of.

There was no loud, booming voice... telling me that everything was going to be okay. But I didn't need the voice, I already knew that this too was part of the message. The dream had really become a reality, and I felt peace believing that whatever was going to happen in the next few months... everything was going to be okay.

But what was it? What was going to happen that I needed to know for the last 1 1/2 years, that everything was going to be okay?

It was only a week and a half of pregnancy bliss until I started to understand what this message meant...

Black bean pizza...

This is my last bean post... promise! And it's a bit of a strange one, so I'm sure only the true bean lovers out there will try it out. But it's good! And it makes me feel better about eating pizza...

This pizza is patterned after California Pizza Kitchen's tostada pizza. Once cooked it can be topped with shredded lettuce, salsa, pico de gallo, or just dipped in ranch dressing. I like it just plain as well. Here is our version of a black bean pizza...

Ingredients
Pizza dough
1 1/2 cups black beans
1 chicken breast grilled and cut into bite sized pieces
8 ounces mozzarella cheese
Parmesan cheese and garlic salt

1- Prepare your choice of pizza dough (I've put my pizza dough recipe at the bottom of the post) on a pizza stone or whatever baking dish you would like.

2- Spread about 1 1/2 cups of black beans onto your dough. Make sure they are drained and rinsed and patted dry. There is no sauce, this is your sauce.

3- Add cooked chicken.

4- Spread shredded cheese on top. I also like to season my pizza, I like to think of it as the "secret pizza ingredient". I shake Parmesan cheese on top as well as some garlic powder to add a little additional flavor.You could do Italian seasoning as well if you would like.

5- Have oven pre-heated to 450 degrees. Cook for about 15 minutes or until cheese is melted and crust is starting to brown.

Again, you can serve it with some mexi toppings on top, or just eat it plain like this! Both ways are great!

Pizza Dough

4 cups flour (I use spelt, it makes a great dough!)

2 tsp yeast

3/4 tsp salt

11 oz hot water

3 TBSP oil

Mix 3 cups flour with the rest of the ingredients. Mix with an electric mixer on high for 3 minutes. Using a wooden spoon stir in as much of the remaining flour as you can. 

Turn dough out onto a lightly floured surface. Knead dough until it is smooth and elastic. Divide into to balls and let sit for 10 minutes to rise. Roll out dough or freeze in a freezer bag until ready to use.

In other news...

I have one more bean recipe that I want to share... but in the meantime I felt like sharing something else instead tonight...

WE'RE GOING TO HAVE A BABY!!!

We are expecting a baby BOY at the end of the summer!! I'm due August 30th and am 14 weeks right now, and starting to look a little "questionable, so I thought it would be a good time to share our news. I'm still in a little shock that we already know it's a boy, but I guess it's just more time to prepare right? 

We are all over the moon excited about this. Especially little Spiderman there, who really wanted to have a little brother. I'm just feeling super grateful and blessed that our fertility efforts worked, and that we are finally going to be having another baby. 

I'm also excited to share this news with all of you!! So many of you have been so incredibly supportive to our family over the past few years. It feels good to finally have some great news to share with everyone!!

And now that I'm out of my first trimester coma... hopefully I will be around this space more!

Bean and cheese burrito + tacos...

Can't really talk about beans without talking about taco's/burrito's now can we? We eat some form of taco's every single week. We love them! You can stuff them full of super yummy, healthy stuff. And ours almost always contain black beans.

A quick and easy lunch that I've been making lately are bean and cheese burritos. They are really simple and take very little prep.

Ingredients:
corn tortillas
black beans
cheese
1 tomato
 cilantro
lemon/lime juice, pepper, garlic powder to taste
hot sauce (I like Tapatio)

1- Warm up corn tortilla's in a pan or on a griddle with some cooking spray/EVOO (I usually do 3 if it's just me eating them).
2- When your tortillas are slightly brown on both sides and warm, spoon some black beans on them and put some cheese on top. Melt for 30 seconds in the microwave.
3- I like to add some veggies here, so I just make a simple pico de gallo to go with. Dice up one tomato in little pieces. Dice up a few sprigs of cilantro. Mix together with a little lime/lemon juice, garlic powder, and pepper. Put a few spoonfuls on top of your beans and melted cheese. If you like hot sauce or salsa, add that too.
4- That's it! Fold in half and enjoy! Super easy, healthy lunch. When using corn tortillas these are low glycemic and will keep your blood sugar at a steady level.

Here are some other taco recipes that we do that you might want to try...

Quinoa and Black Bean Tacos. These are my all time favorite recipe!!! I'm serious! I love these! They are so yummy, so healthy, and vegetarian because quinoa is a complete protein. I recently shared this recipe with my sister in law and she loved them! If you have been wanting to try out quinoa or use it already give this one a try. (I already blogged this one a while back, find the post here).

GOOP Shrimp Tacos. This is the recipe that really turned me onto taco's way back when. It's from Gwenyth Paldrow's blog and they are so yummy. I like how she makes her beans, warming them up on the stove with a clove of garlic and a few sprigs of cilantro. If you're feeling like shrimp, give this a try.

Fish Tacos. Sorry, no pic for this one. My husband likes to fish and so we use the trout that he catches for fish tacos a lot of the time. Or you could just grill up whatever fish you have on hand. We do grilled fish, shredded cabbage, black beans, pico de gallo, some feta cheese, and hot sauce. And they are so YUMMY!!! Okay... can you tell I'm obsessed with tacos.

One fun tip when making tacos. Put a griddle right on the kitchen table if you have the room, and warm up your tortillas right there when you are making them. It's fun, you always have a warm, fresh tortilla, and it adds to the ambiance of the meal.

** Also, you might notice that I don't add onions to any of this stuff. If you like onions, by all means onion them up! I just think they are disgusting and refuse to put onions in anything that I make. My poor husband... he loves them. But I can't even kiss him if he's had onions... and I can always tell ;).

What kind of taco's do you love?

White bean chili...

 I love this soup! And I am not a soup person. This is a keeper for sure. I got this recipe from my friend Emily while we lived in Las Vegas. One day we were taking about recipes and I said something along the lines of, "You know it will be a good recipe when it starts with: put olive oil in the pan... then add garlic." Her eyes got big and she said, "Ohhh... I have a recipe you need to try. You're going to love this!" And she was right! I do love it! We make this one a lot. I've taken this to family parties, church parties, and I always have people asking me for the recipe. This one has been a life saver to me lately because it's a low GI meal, no grains to battle with here. It is good though with some crusty bread... not going to lie. 

Ingredients:

1-2 chicken breasts shredded

1 medium onion chopped (or not…I hate onions so I omit this step)

1 2/3 tsp. garlic powder

1 Tbsp. olive oil

3 cans Great Northern Beans – drained and rinsed (or if using precooked I do 4 cups)

1 14.5 oz can chicken broth

1 small can diced green chilies

1 tsp. salt

1 tsp. dried oregano

½ tsp. black pepper

¼ tsp. cayenne pepper (I use half this amount)

1 tsp. ground cumin

-          Cook chicken in pan with onion, garlic powder, and olive oil. Then shred chicken, put it back in the pan.

-          Add drained and rinsed beans and the remainder of the ingredients. Bring to a boil if cooking on stove and boil for 5 minutes.

-          Reduce to simmer for 30 minutes while covered.

-          If cooking in a crock pot just put all ingredients in and cook for 4 hours

-          Just before serving add 1/2 cup (or a few scoops) sour cream or cream. Stir well and serve immediately.

-          Double recipe for 8-10 people.

** These are also good as left overs. Something I like to do is eat it the next day as lettuce wraps. Easy on the "juice" but spoon the bean mixture into lettuce leafs and enjoy!

 

Black and white enchiladas...

This is one of my favorite meals! They are a healthy-ish enchilada (depends on how much cheese you put on top I guess)... not full of cream of whatever. Just beans, chicken, and chili's.

Ingredients:
1 cup cooked black beans (if using canned, drain and rinse well)
1 cup cooked white great northern beans
1-2 chicken breasts cooked and cut into bite sized pieces
1 can diced green chili's with the juice
dash of salt, pepper, and garlic powder
corn or white tortillas
1 can green or red enchilada sauce (I like the green with this one)
shredded cheese for the top

1- Once your chicken is cooked, add beans, chicken and chili's to a pan. Season with pepper, salt, and garlic powder (just a little of each). Cook for about 5 minutes on medium heat to combine all the ingredients together.

2- Prepare a 9 x 13 baking dish with cooking spray. Grab yourself a tortilla and fill the center with a few spoonful's of filling as shown in picture below. Now, if you are using corn tortillas warm them in the microwave or on a pan before using. I prefer this meal with flour tortillas, but have been using corn lately because it's a low GI grain and fits my diet. So if you use corn, prepare them before filling them.Once tortillas are filled, roll them and place them in the baking dish.

3- Continue filling tortillas until your pan is full or you are out of tortilla's and filling. I usually fill one large pan using about 10 flour tortillas (I made a little extra with this). Corn are much smaller and you can make a lot more.

4- Cover tortillas with enchilada sauce and cheese.

5- Bake at 350 degrees for about 20 minutes or until cheese is melted and the edges of the tortillas are starting to get brown and crunchy. Let sit for 5 minutes before serving to cool off a bit.

These are really yummy as left overs too so I usually make more than we can eat in a sitting and save them for lunches. This recipe is easy to adjust for a larger group. Instead of one cup of each bean do 1 1/2 or 2. I'm not really exact on my measurements of everything. I prefer to cook without measuring things if I can get away with it. This is one recipe that it's easy to do that.

This recipe is also very versatile. I like using just black beans with red enchilada sauce, or I will mix the black and white like this for variety. Serve with a side salad for a healthy dinner!

Beans...

 Let's talk about beans shall we? I don't post recipes up here very often, but a few people have been asking me about my bean recipes lately so I figured this would be a good way to share those. So for today I want to share how I cook my beans at home, and then the rest of the week (and probably into next week) I will share a different bean recipe that we love.

We eat a lot of beans around here. Beans are so good for you, and super tasty. There are lots of things you can do with beans. They are inexpensive and easy to make. We mostly eat black beans and white great northern beans... so those are what my recipes call for. One thing that beans are known for and good for is their fiber content. For example, one cup of black beans has 19 grams of fiber in it! That's huge! So unless you are munching on fruits and veggies all day long to get your fiber, you really should be eating beans when you can.

**Little disclaimer time here... I feel silly even saying this, but I think I need to address the whole "you eat beans you get gas" issue here. I just have to say that I have not noticed that we are a super gassy family or anything. I really don't think that eating beans causes you to have more of that going on. That is unless your body is not used to eating them and then you might have an adjustment period.We eat beans a few times a week usually, and we don't have problems with it... at least anymore than I already have living with two boys mind you. Anyway... if you stay away from beans because you are worried about this I say... you just need to eat more beans. Regularly... okay, on with our bean topic. 

I used to buy beans in the cans at the store but soon found that it was much easier and less expensive in the long run to cook hard beans at home. I usually will do a batch of beans on a Sunday night when we are running low and don't have anything else going on. I don't soak my beans over night, it only takes me about 1 hour 40 minutes start to finish to cook a whole batch of beans. I can't remember where I first read about this bean cooking method from, but here is what I do.

1- Get a big pot. Fill it half full of beans (or however many cups you want to do... and bag of hard beans, doesn't have to be exact measurements here). I usually fill my pot halfway because they will double in size and you need to put lots of water in there too.

2- Fill pot with water, covering beans by about 1-2 inches.

3- Put on stove on high and bring beans to a boil. Boil for 15 minutes.

4- Once 15 minutes is up, drain your beans and rinse with water (I've heard this helps with the gassiness factor too by the way).

5- Put beans back in pot and cover with water again, covering beans by 1-2 inches of water.

6- Bring beans to a boil and once boiling, cook for 1 hour and 15 minutes on medium/low (I still like mine to have a little boil going on, but you don't need it to be on high still). KEEP AN EYE ON YOUR BEANS... meaning don't let the water run out and burn your beans. If the water starts to get low add more water. Also, I've noticed that while cooking white beans they don't need this long, so check them after 1 hour.

7- When the time is up, check beans to make sure they are firm but soft... not soggy and mushy. Drain about half of the water, leaving water in the bottom section of your beans (I hope that makes sense).

8- Now I like to season my beans. I add 1 TBSP of cumin, garlic powder, and chili powder to the beans. Stir in and let sit until beans cool down and can soak in the seasoning (I usually leave them 30 mins to 1 hour).

9- When beans are cooled, put them in freezer safe Tupperware containers and put them in the freezer or refrigerator for future use. I only put the beans we will use in the next few days in the fridge, and freeze the rest.

Pretty simple I think! If I need to use beans for a meal I will just move a container into the fridge and let it thaw out in there. I like that cooking them this way doesn't take too much time, and I'm able to control the salt content in our beans which is important for health reasons. And they really are super tasty with the seasonings.

Tomorrow... my favorite black and white enchiladas. Yum!

Wendover + a memorial...

We went out to Wendover last night to celebrate the would be 61st birthday of my mother in law. She passed away 11 years ago to lung cancer and left behind a great legacy with her 11 children.

She loved doing things with her family. One of the things that she loved to do was drive out to Wendover and eat at the seafood buffet. This was actually the last outing that she did with her family before she passed away. They had gone out to the buffet on a Friday night, and she died a day and a half later on Sunday morning. One of her kids said last night that it was a good example of who their mom was, that even though she was feeling awful and was so close to dying she still wanted to go and have a good time with her kids.

Trent and I sent out a text to all his siblings a few weeks ago with the idea to go to the buffet for her birthday and all of her kids but one (who lives far, far away) were able to come! One had to drive a crossed the state to be there and another flew in from Colorado... but they made it. I think that's amazing!  So 16 of us piled in vans and made it out to the buffet.

I'm so grateful for this family. I'm grateful that I get to be a part of it. Something that I really love and appreciate about my in laws is that even though they are all soooooo different, have very different personalities, beliefs, ideals about life, priorities... the still get along and love each other. I think it's a rare thing for 11 siblings to still be all friends, and to be accepting and loving of each other even though they have grown up and changed as adults. They have taught me a lot about love and acceptance, and have been great examples to me on this. Sure they argue and fight and butt heads from time to time... but they forgive and that is a true gift.

 Here are the boys... minus my husband who had already disappeared to go gambling...

 The girls... seven sisters plus me!

Here are my 7 sister in laws, minus Sarah who couldn't come. I love these girls. I'm so grateful for them. They have been good friends to me and I appreciate that. There are times that it's been hard for me to hang out with these girls... I'm just going to come out and be honest and say that I'm not perfect and I have a hard time being around girls swimming in babies sometimes. And well... I married into the most fertile family in the world (aside from the Duggars... seriously!). In the past 3 1/2 years since we've lost Clayton there have been 10 babies born in Trents family with a set of twins and a set of triplets in there. That's a lot of babies!!! I know that there have been times when I have not been a real peach to be around, and I appreciate that they have been patient with me, and understanding and have waited for me to come around on my terms. I love them, and all their babies, and I'm grateful that they are in my life. These girls have become my best friends and I am happy to be a part of their lives.

I have to say that the few hours we spent in the casino made me not miss this side of Vegas very much ;). Funny that anytime we went to a movie, bowling, out to a good restaurant we had to go through a casino. It was just a part of life out there, and one that I am fine without! But we did have fun playing the penny slots, and only lost $3 total by the time we made it out the door. I think that's pretty good odds!

Someone got a little lucky with this roll... oh the excitement!

It was a really fun night with my in laws! Trent's mom passed away after we had been on two dates, so I never met her. But even though I've never met her I feel like I have a good idea of who she is, what she was like, what was important in her life. I think that when the day comes that I get to meet her that I will recognize her and know her, because I've spent my life with her awesome kids! She has left a piece of her with each of her children and they are beautiful people each in their own way.

Wood + White Entertainment Center...

 We finally finished up the project that we've been working on for the past 3+ months. Our TV stand is done!!! We finished it on Monday and I'm still giddy about having it in the living room...

Really, it's better than I thought it would be. It's always scary (for me anyway) to build something yourself. We are amatures at this for sure, but it turned out so great!

I'm still a little shocked that Trent agreed that we could do the white frame with the different colored wood doors. We have very, very different tastes in style. He likes natural colored wood, and is one of those people who thinks it's a sin to paint over nice wood. When I first showed him a picture of what I really wanted (similar to this) he said no way! So when I brought it up again when we got serious about building something and he said, "Sure, why not" I was really surprised. I kept asking if he was sure he was okay with it... and he said he was. So we drew out our plans and made it happen.

We wanted it to be very simple. Two opened slots at the top for the DVD player and current VCR we have (hoping to swap that out for something to play games on at some point here). We also wanted closed cabinets with space to store toys/blankets/games and some hidden drawers for DVD's. 

We've been going out to his dad's about once a week for the past 3 months to work on it. It took longer than I thought it would, but part of what's nice about building things with Trent's dad is that we get to spend lots of good quality time with him.

Trent cut the wood for the cabinet doors and brought them home for me to stain. Can I just say how much I love staining wood? It's kind of an addiction for me. I love it! I love taking something that I sort of like and making it into something I love with just a little stain. I went with Jacobean for the dark, Early American for the lighter brown, and made a homemade stain of steel wool soaked in vinegar for the gray/barn wood color (what I did was put a steel wool pad in a glass bottle and covered it in white vinegar for 24 hours. Then I took out the pad, wrung it out a little, and rubbed the pad onto the wood). 

Let me just show you how cool the vinegar stain turned out. These two panels are both stained with that, but they are two totally different colors because of the type of wood that was used. The wood on the left is a soft pine and the wood on the right is a hard maple. The hardwood came out GRAY! And the soft wood a light/dark brown. It was an awesome science experiment! Pretty sure this is my new favorite stain.

Simple knobs (that can be tied together for future baby-proofing)...

Simple hinges... I really think it's the simplicity of it all that makes it so pretty to me.

Here is our inside storage area.

I still need to fill in those spaces, once the boy decides to quit playing hide and seek in them...

I'm just so happy with how it turned out. We really needed to have some good functional furniture in our livingroom. It's nice to have something that looks great and provides storage that we really need.

 I love working on projects like this with my husband. Building something out of nothing for our family to enjoy.

Valentines...

I'm sticking to my guns about no resolutions this year... but that doesn't mean that I don't have goals I would like to accomplish. I really would like to do a better job at decorating for the holidays... no pressure though! Just one thing/month/holiday at a time and see how it goes, right?

I realized over Christmas that part of the reason I have a hard time decorating for holiday's is because I don't have a lot of flat surface space to decorate on. I really only have this one little window seal.

So I think I need to work on more flat spaces, but until then I will try to fill the window seal up!

I made this heart garland with the boy a few years ago. It's simply just felt hearts all sewn in a row.

We made a few conversation hearts (idea from here) to go by our hugs and kisses block that we have.

I try to plant paper whites in the winter. It's something that my mother in law did and so I try to do it to remind my husband of his mom. We had to go to 4 nurseries to find paper white bulbs this year, but we found some and they are beautiful!!

 The arrow print is from this lovely blog, and I love how simple it is. I know that my yellow honeycomb vase isn't very Valentine-y, but I love it anyway. Plus it matches the centers of my pretty flowers.

I've wanted to make this burlap banner ever since I spied it in the background here.  I think it turned out super cute!

Burlap + typewriter font + sweet little heart... love it!

I feel like I've redeemed myself a little bit from my failed Halloween attempts. It feels good in here right now...

White daisies...

When I was a senior in high school I was competing to be the Sterling Scholar in Dance at my school. It was between me and one other girl, and I really wanted to win this. I started thinking about this when I was a sophomore and wanted it so badly. I worked hard on my application, I choreographed my solo routine, this was what I had wanted more than anything at that time in my life. It would look great on my college applications. It would be a complete honor to me to have been chosen and receive this scholarship.

The girl that I was competing against for this was either my good friend or my arch nemeses (it really depended on the day). We were neck in neck so to speak as to who would win the award. We were both on Dance Company, Drill Team, and had danced together for all of our high school days. I remember that I was sitting in my English class when the intercom squeaked on and they were going to announce to the school all of the Sterling Scholar winners for that year.

My name was not called.

I lost. I was not chosen to be the dance Sterling Scholar.

I found out later that the judges were having a hard time deciding who to give the award to. What their final decision came down to was that her GPA was 0.01 points higher than mine. So she won.

I was devastated. I had worked so hard and long for this. I felt like I deserved this award. I sat there in class trying to hold myself together as I felt the pain of the loss. The bell rang and it was lunch time. I knew that once lunch ended the next class was dance and I would have to face her... the girl who had won what I had wanted so badly.

I thought about what I should do. Should I get in my car and drive home and avoid her all together? Should I go but ignore her and be smug? Or should I congratulate her?

I didn't go to lunch that day. Instead I walked across the street to the grocery store and I bought a bouquet of white daisies. I came back to school and I found her sitting by her locker eating lunch. I gave her the flowers and a big hug and told her congratulations. It hurt. I was very happy for her but very sad for me that I was not the one chosen for this. I felt (a little bit) better after this. I was grateful that even though I was so upset about losing, that I was able to think of her and to congratulate her and celebrate her victory with her, even though it was hard for me.

That was 12 years ago. In my adult life I have found that there have been many situations where I've needed to give hugs and congratulations and pass out some white daisies so to speak. Times where I have longed for something so badly, but it doesn't happen for me.

I found myself this week in yet another situation... where it was necessary to put on a smile, say congratulations, give a hug (and an imaginary bouquet of white daisies) and then go along my way. It hurts. It never gets easier, but I know that it is necessary. I gave my congratulations and hug to my dear friend who knew that what she had just told me was a shock and must have hurt. It was a shock to her as well, something that she was not planning either. "Thanks for being brave, I'm trying to be brave too, " she said as our parting words.

As I got into my car I let myself feel the pain. I try to hold it together in front of people but I never deny myself the right to work through my emotions when I feel them. I offered up a prayer of sorts to my Heavenly Father,  Why? Really? Is this some kind of a joke? Why her and not me? Why never me?

As soon as I had offered up the prayer I received my answer. It wasn't the answer that I was expecting, rather it was the answer to a prayer that I had uttered 12 years before.

Why her Heavenly Father? Why not me? I worked so hard for this! Why not me?

This is why. This is why she won and not you.

I had not thought of this situation in years and years yet suddenly it was fresh in my mind. Life moved on from high school and it really didn't matter that I was not chosen to be the Sterling Scholar for Dance. Or did it?

It suddenly made perfect sense to me. This is why I was not chosen for that award. My life has gone in a way that there have been many opportunities where I have had to be told no. Not now. Nope. It's not your turn. And pass out bouquet after bouquet of daisies. I needed to learn back then how to be this type of person. How to be happy for others even when they have what you long to have. This is why.

I was suddenly filled with gratitude for not winning the scholarship I so longed for in high school. I realized that I had won a far greater prize, I had learned a lesson that day at lunch time in a crowded hallway with a simple bouquet of daisies that I have had to use over and over again. Had I won that award, it would have really done nothing that remarkable for my adult life.

But not winning, has made all the difference in the world.

Post written November 2012

Snow!!!

 Sorry if you've already seen these pictures on Facebook/Instagram, I know I'm being repetitive... but I just can't even believe all of this snow!!!

On Thursday it was a beautiful WARM (44 degrees) day with a blue sky! But the news kept saying that a big winter storm would hit by 3 PM. Sure enough, 3 PM came and the flakes started to fall. All night it snowed and when we woke up the next morning it was a winter wonderland out there!

 I measured the snow that had collected on top of our garbage cans... 21 inches! That's nuts! I don't remember ever getting that much snow in one day before! When I was little I remember it snowing a lot and we were out of school, but that was a long long time ago.

I braved it to get a shot of the root cellar, buried in snow! Up to my knees...

But it didn't stop there! It kept on coming down and by the next morning we had 9 more inches!!!

So yes, we are currently hibernating in this snowy cold place. We live right up by the mountain so I think we get more snow than other parts of Utah does. It's been so long since I've been around snow like this. Part of me is missing Hawaii/Vegas right now and that warm winters that I had gotten used to. But another part of me is like a giddy little kid, sitting by the window for hours watching the snow! It's been fun to see our little boy and the snow. I had forgotten that he has not lived around snow his whole life, so this is a different kind of winter for him. We were here last year but it was a really mild winter and we didn't get much snow at all.