Nothing says "We're having a boy" quite like creme brulee

So, today was ultra sound day. And low and behold, we're having a boy! Every thing looked good during the ultrasound, he has all his hands, fingers, toes and internal organs. Anyway, we decided to come home and have creme brulee because nothing could be more fitting, right?

Ok, so I really don't think there was any connection between our finding out that we're having a boy and the fact that we made creme brulee other than it happened to occur on the same day.

Anyway, here's a picture of our creme brulee. It turned out quite well, especially for a first attempt.


Sabrina's become quite the cook since we got married. (Notice the creme brulee). However, she still hasn't quite mastered the frozen pizza.
It's a hard one, but under my tutelage, one day I'm sure she'll master it.

A Devalued Prime Minister of a Devalued Government

I actually wasn't going to post for a few days. I am trying to spend less time on the Internet and more time on other pursuits, but so far, not so good. Anyway, this speech was just too good to not post. It was given by Daniel Hannan, a member of the European Parliament, yesterday, in direct response to a speech about the economic crisis by Britain's Prime Minister, Gordon Brown. It's quite eloquent, and as far as I am concerned, he may have well stood in front of the US Congress and said something quite similar to our previous and current presidents, as well as the Senate Majority Leader, the Speaker of the House, Ben Bernanke and any elected official that has voted in favor of taking us further away from a free market system (that's a lot of politicians too because this stuff hasn't just been happening for the past year or two, or even the last few decades. We're talking a looooong time of terrible economic and monetary policy). Anyway, I'll let this speech speak for itself. This is really for the 4 of you readers who will actually read the thing all the way through ;)

A Devalued Prime Minister of a Devalued Government

"Prime Minister, I see you’ve already mastered the essential craft of this Parliament – that being to say one thing in this chamber, and a very different thing to your home electorate. You’ve spoken here about free trade, and amen to that; who would have guessed, listening to you just now, that you were the author of the phrase ‘British Jobs for British Workers’, and that you have subsidized – where you have not nationalized outright – swathes of our economy, including the car industry and many of the banks.

"Perhaps you would have more moral authority in this house if your actions matched your words. Perhaps you would have more legitimacy in the councils of the world if the United Kingdom were not going into this recession in the worst condition of any G20 country.

"The truth, Prime Minister, is that you have run out of our money. The country as a whole is now in negative equity. Every British child is born owing around £20,000. Servicing the interest on that debt is going to cost more than educating the child.

"Now once again today you tried to spread the blame around, you spoke about an international recession; an international crisis. Well, it is true that we are all sailing together into the squall – but not every vessel in the convoy is in the same dilapidated condition. Other ships used the good years to caulk their hulls and clear up their rigging – in other words, to pay off debt – but you used the good years to raise borrowing yet further. As a consequence, under your captaincy, our hull is pressed deep into the water line, under the accumulated weight of your debt. We are now running a deficit that touches almost 10% of GDP – an unbelievable figure. More than Pakistan, more than Hungary – countries where the IMF has already been called in.

"Now, it’s not that you’re not apologizing – like everyone else, I’ve long accepted that you’re pathologically incapable of accepting responsibility for these things – it’s that you’re carrying on, willfully worsening the situation, wantonly spending what little we have left. Last year, in the last twelve months, 125,000 private sector jobs have been lost – and yet you’ve created 30,000 public sector jobs. Prime Minister you cannot go on forever squeezing the productive bit of the economy in order to fund an unprecedented engorging of the unproductive bit.

"You cannot spend your way out of recession or borrow your way out of debt. And when you repeat, in that wooden and perfunctory way, that our situation is better than others, that we’re well place to weather the storm, I have to tell you, you sound like a Brezhnev-era Apparatchik giving the party line. You know, and we know, and you know that we know that it’s nonsense. Everyone knows that Britain is the worst placed to go into these hard times. The IMF has said so. The European Commission has said so. The markets have said so, which is why our currency has devalued by 30% – and soon the voters, too, will get their chance to say so.

"They can see what the markets have already seen: that you are a devalued Prime Minister, of a devalued Government."

Highly Excellent

Man, you readers are so fabulous. Every time we solicit advice we get so much. Thank you! I love reading opinions and advice. The jury is still out on the pet, but you'll definitely know if we end up with one.

Anyway, on to this post...When I make something new for dinner I always ask Brett what he thinks of it. I like to figure out what works for him and what doesn't. He's not afraid of being honest with me, which I appreciate, so I can improve. I have noticed, though, that there are a lot of foods / dishes that I absolutely love and don't really appeal to him all that much. Don't get me wrong, he'll eat almost anything I cook, but it's not always something he hopes I'll make again. Of course, this works both ways because there are some recipes he loves that I would be fine never eating again. I am sure this is quite common as we all have different tastes. I don't think we've found too many dishes that we both just absolutely love, so I just make a mix of things I really like, he really likes, and Adie really likes (although one day she'll eat something and the next day she won't so that's a hard thing to pin down).

Usually, when I ask Brett if he likes the dinner he says, "It's good, but if you did...I'd like it better," which means, upon improvement, he could really, really like it, or he responds, "It's fine," which means he probably would prefer not to have it again. Last night, however, I made some beef quesadillas with left-over shredded roast beef and when I asked what he thought he said it was "highly excellent." This kind of response is so rare that it has merited its own blog post. Not only that, but I thought it was highly excellent too (and I am not super big into beef). Yes, I know beef quesadillas don't really fall into the meat sparingly or non-cheese categories I am striving for, but we're taking baby steps and I have done a lot better, for the most part (just keep me away from Cadbury Mini Eggs, those cursed things!). For the record, Adie wouldn't touch hers, so I am not sure if she'd really like it or not, but since she's 2 I am not ruling it out for her yet.

I was going to post the recipe, but I am pretty sure most people can figure out a quesadilla. I put lots of meat and cheese (cheddar and monterey jack blend), as well as diced tomatoes and green onion on Brett's. I put a lot less meat and cheese (part skim mozzarella), with diced green onion (I don't like tomatoes too much) on mine, and then inserted lots of shredded cabbage after cooking into mine. I heated and browned them in a skillet with Pam until they were ooey gooey and beautifully brown. I cut them into wedges and served them with sour cream as a dip. I am sure you could also use salsa and guac as dip too. Anyway, they were super easy and super good, highly excellent, you might say.

Pet(s) or No Pet(s), That is the Question

Now that we have a house the question of whether or not to get a pet continues to come up. We both had dogs growing up and loved it. We think it would be a great thing for our family to have a pet of some sort, namely a dog or cat (or both), because we thought it was great having them as children. We're both more dog people, but we can enjoy a cat too and can see the pros to going that direction rather than a dog. We can't decide for sure though if we want to make that commitment, or which animal to choose. That's where you come in, dear reader. What would you suggest? And please, if you hate pets, don't be shy in saying so, and your reasons why. We want all the feedback we can get.

I am not going to list the reasons why we'd like one, except to say, we think they'd be fun for us and our kids, and they are a natural form of pest control. Some reasons why we're hesitant are:

-We have a small backyard and it's not going to have any grass, not ideal for either kids or pets.

-We have to make sure to keep our pets very contained in our small backyard because we live very near wilderness area (reservation) with coyotes, who, we've been told on many occasions, will make domestic pets their meal. Trying to contain a cat, in general, can be very difficult. I'd hate for it to escape and be found by a coyote.

-If we had a dog, it would have to live inside most of the time (which is not Brett's preference), or our small backyard, or we can, of course, take it on a walk, or to the dog run nearby. The walk and dog run aren't a problem in our current weather, but come May - Sept, and I am pretty sure the only time of day that will be even possible will be way too early for my taste or pretty late at night. That worries me because dogs need to get out and get their exercise and they don't have air-conditioned gyms like us.

-We have a new leather sofa that we could see getting very damaged by pets with their claws, slobber, etc. I know we can train some animals to stay off the sofa, but even until they are trained, or if they want to be naughty, they can do some damage. (We do have a lifetime warranty on our sofa to get it repaired from pretty much anything a child or pet would do, so that's a bonus, but we'd hate to have to do that very often).

-Dogs bark and annoy some neighbors, and many people are afraid of dogs so you have to be careful to put the dog away with many people.

-Many people, including my mom, are allergic to cats. I would hate for us to create an environment in our home where some people couldn't come because of cat hair. I don't know how much exposure one has to have to a cat before it affects them, but I don't want to make my mom's, or anyone else's visits, uncomfortable.

-You have to figure out how they will be taken care of if you leave on vacation. A cat is easier in this department. You can leave it for a few days in the house with plenty of food, water and a litter box and it will do just fine. A dog really can't be left like that unless you want your house destroyed. I don't know if we want to have to find pet sitters, or take them to pet hotels, every time we leave town. We leave town pretty frequently.

-More mouths to feed. Sure, they don't eat a lot (well, I suppose it depends on the size) but it's still something to consider. As many of you who read my blog often will know, I am very uncertain of the future. I think our country could be in some big time economic problems in the near future (way bigger problems than we are currently seeing) so taking on responsibility to feed another mouth is something I will consider. And, just for the record, I am not hoping I am right about a complete economic collapse. I just see it as a major possibility and am trying to plan our lives accordingly.

-Not all pets are amicable to young children. We'll have at least 2 young children in our home in a few months, and quite possibly more in the not so distant future. I am not sure I want to referee kids and pets all day. I do recognize there are quite a few dogs and cats that are great with children, but not all of them are.

With that lengthy list I am sure many of you are wondering why we are still even considering owning a pet. Even with all those cons, we think they are very worthwhile. We just aren't sure the timing is right. Maybe it would be better when we have older children and a house with more land and less coyotes lurking nearby. That being said, if it were up to you, would you:

1. Get a dog
2. Get a cat
3. Get neither
4. Get both
5. Other.

I am interested to hear what you think on this issue.

The Luck of the Irish

Oh yeah, and Happy St. Patrick's Day! I like this holiday. It's a good solid one that doesn't stress me out. We'll just wear some green (which is my favorite color, another reason to like this holiday) and I might trying making something with cabbage for dinner. I hope you all have a wonderful celebration.

Adie-isms

Adie is saying new words all the time and can repeat pretty much any word you ask her to, if she's in the mood. That doesn't mean she uses the proper word for everything. My current favorites are her words for food and water. She refuses to say the word "food", but says "eat" as a noun, and for "water" she says "ahhh", like the kind of ahhh you say after you've drank a refreshing glass of water. Obviously, she gets the connection, but she won't say the proper words. It makes me laugh. The other thing she does that makes me laugh is sometimes, instead of just saying "yes" in answer to a question, she'll enthusiastically say "yeah, yep, yes!" Language development is one of the most entertaining things to observe.

RAID

This is a geeky question for all you nerds out there that read our blog. (I've also made sure that I'm posting as myself right now so as to not confuse anyone. Yes, it was me, not Sabrina, that posted about march madness.)

I'm in the early stages of deciding what to make our next computer. I'd really like to give it RAID 5 for backup purposes. I'd also like it to house all of our media, including photos, videos, etc. While I'd like it to have RAID 5, I would prefer to not be running the OS on the RAID array. My biggest concern for this is to make it fast and efficient, with the ability to back up as much data as possible. Is it possible to run a RAID 5 array and a non RAID hard drive off the same motherboard? I'm also hoping to make this run relatively "green" to keep energy consumption down. There are some programs out there to make home media available remotely that I plan on looking into because I would like having access to it away from home. That's a whole other consideration though.

It'll be a while before anything happens on this, but I'm just starting to look around now. Oh, and of course I'd like to be as cheap as possible. If you got to this point and you've understood everything I've said so far, you're doing good. Feel free to comment if you've got some insight.

Tourney Time Thoughts

It's tourney time. Totally looking forward to it again. Just a couple of quick thoughts.

- I'm highly contemplating trying to build one of these. We have free basic analog cable with the company we get our internet from. But our TV tuner supports HD. The games will look a lot better in HD. There are very few compelling reasons for HD (in my opinion). Sports is one of them.

- Utah got too high of a seed. Well, I wouldn't say that as much if SDSU got in. I think Chris Hill sold the MWC out so that Utah could get a higher seed. (Well, maybe not, but if Sabrina's going to talk on here about her conspiracy theories...)

- In some ways I would have preferred BYU get a lower seed like a 12 seed. It'll be hard for BYU to upset Conneticut if/when they beat Texas A&M. I swear this thing is rigged. How can BYU get the same seed with the same opponent 2 years in a row? Someone who's reading this, what are the statistical odds of that happening?

I love the madness, even if it is rigged.

Is it Acceptable to Wear a Burka to Church?

I am thinking about not leaving the house for a few days, but I would really like to attend church. Maybe I should wear a burka. Do you think that would be appropriate? Why, you ask, would I want to stay in the house or wear a burka if going in public? I woke up this morning with a fun surprise, a cold sore. I get them on occasion. I am never thrilled about it, but it's life for me. I've had them since I was like 3. They are highly contagious and some children of a family that was babysitting me passed them along, so I am told. Anyway, I put some little topical ointment on, since that's about the only thing I can do for it while pregnant, and went on my merry way.

When I arrived home from the park today, I noticed my crop had grown, not to 2 or even 3, but the current cold sore count is up to 5. I have never had so many at one time. I've had maybe 2 at a time, but 5! This pregnancy is doing super funky things to me. I don't really want to leave the house with 1 cold sore, but I do, and I deal with it. I am not sure, once these puppies start scabbing over, I will be in any sort of mindset to want to step foot in public, hence the burka idea. "O the vainness...of men!" If I am able to get past my cold sore self esteem problems, maybe I'll post a picture or two at the height of the cold sore glory, so all of you interested in medical issues can use me as a case study or something.

I Hate My Guts!

It's 9:15 and the little chica is still sleeping. Wahoo! We don't have to mention that she refused to go to sleep last night until about 10:30 pm, but we'll take the sleeping in. It gives me a little time to myself. Anyway...I have long thought the school yard phrase, "I hate your guts!" was a funny one. Number one, don't we each just have one gut (anyone who knows more about anatomy can correct me if I'm wrong on that)? Number two, why hate someone's digestive track (unless, perhaps, they throw up all over you, or something)? It would seem more appropriate just to hate the individual, but maybe hating "guts" is less mean. However, I digress again, as this is not the point of my post or said title.

I actually do kind of hate my gut right now. I have long recognized that my digestive track doesn't always function as a normal one ought to. I have never had serious problems, but little things here and there, of which I'll spare you the details, have made me sure I am not "regular" as they like to call it. There are many in my family who struggle with different types of gut issues, so this is not surprising to me. However, until recently, I still pretty much ate whatever I wanted and didn't worry about it. I like healthy foods, such as veggies, fruits, whole grains, etc, but I also indulge often in chocolate, refined sugar, ample amounts of cheese. You get the point.

Events of the last few days, again of which I'll spare you the details, have led me to the point where I know I need to change my habits fairly drastically. Surprisingly, many of these "events" aren't things that seem to have anything to do with the digestive track. However, I've been really into reading about homeopathy and natural remedies lately, which has been fascinating, enlightening and has really highlighted to me the fact that many of my little health issues can be attributed to problems in my gut. So many medicines and allopathic remedies are geared more toward fixing symptoms, rather than really getting down to the root cause. I think my gut is the root cause of many of my woes, so it's time to make some changes.

I sound all gung-ho, right? Well, I am anxious to get things cleared up, and don't worry, there is nothing seriously wrong with me, just a lot of little things I'd like to take care of. I am also anxious to find ways to be more healthy. However, a lot of these recommended changes are extremely difficult for me. I am sure some people wouldn't even flinch, but man, I love my food. Some of things I need to avoid eating are ALL refined sugars, milk products, including yogurt and my favorite - cheese, and bread products with yeast. Can I just say that all of those are main staples in my diet? I know it's sad that refined sugar is a staple in my diet, but let's be honest here. I hardly know what to eat or where to begin. I have tried soy milk in the past, but I can't deal with its after taste. I currently have a box of Rice Dream in the fridge, but still can't bring myself to try it. Pregnancy isn't a good time to be experimenting with foods you aren't used to. Also, I cook with a lot of cheese. Maybe I'm not creative enough, but when all else fails, just put some cheese on it. There are a few things I couldn't eat without cheese, like eggs. I am also trying to cut down on my meat consumption, which is something I've been doing for awhile (mostly substituted with cheese, mind you). I'm trying the eat meat sparingly thing.

So, I know my posts always end up being long and I bet most people don't finish them, but if you've gotten to this point and have any good suggestions on ways to make this easier, good recipes that are basically vegan, etc. I'd love to hear about it. I really want to perservere through this and make these changes because I think my body is just more sensitive to a lot of foods that others can eat without problems. I think it will be worth it in the end but will require some stamina and creativity. So, please, help!

Follow-up on Big Love Controversy

Thank you to everyone who sent me the official church statement on the Big Love controversy. Here it is in case anyone hasn't heard about it yet and would like to read it. Basically, I read that the Church is taking no official stance on the issue and has not asked any member of the church to take any action. They have said people can make personal decisions to boycott, etc. as they feel it's appropriate. However, they aren't concerned. I wasn't really concerned about it making a huge impact on people's testimonies, or potential testimonies, but I wanted to let HBO know they were being disrespectful and to ask them to consider that before airing the show. In any case, I just want to clear the air to make sure everyone knows there is no official church measure being taken regarding this issue. I personally don't think it will be a bad thing if HBO receives a few strongly-worded emails from individuals, but the Church will continue to move forward no matter what HBO does. So, as you were!

If You Haven't Heard By Now...

We just received the following email from Brett's brother. It got my blood boiling. No, I am seriously ticked and you better believe I emailed HBO. I urge you to do the same, even if you are not LDS. It is one thing to poke fun of a culture. It is quite another to publicly desecrate something a religion or culture values as sacred. Just because I don't believe in other religions doesn't mean I can't respect their right to hold certain things sacred. Tell HBO to have the decency to do the same. I am afraid our country will pay if things like this are tolerated.

"Many of you may have heard of HBO's television show, Big Love. It came out a couple of years ago, and it shows polygamous families. When it first came out, the church came out with a strong statement against Big Love and Polygamy. You can see the statement here:

http://www.newsroom.lds.org/ldsnewsroom/eng/commentary/church-responds-to-questions-on-hbo-s-big-love

However, as if the polygamy weren't bad enough, HBO has taken their unscrupulousness to new heights.
On Sunday, March 15, 2009, HBO will be airing a segment of their Big Love series titled Goin' to the Chapel. In this segment, they will be showing individuals dressed in full temple clothing (you can see the picture right in the TV guideitself), and they are planning on sending secret cameras in to the temple to show the inside of the temple itself.
You can see the advertisement here (on page 48):

http://www.tvguidemagsales.com/WeeklyIssues/TVG030909.pdf

Please help stop HBO from airing such an offensive show! You can go to the link below to submit a comment to HBO.

http://www.hbo.com/apps/submitinfo/contactus/submit.do?title=GeneralInformation&questiontype=generalInformation&questiontype=general

It's imperative that we get as many people to voice their complaints as possible before HBO airs the show. Please pass this information on to as many people as you can!

If you are not a member of the LDS church, we invite you to learn about our church and our temples from a true source: www.mormon.org.

"Who shall ascend into the hill of the Lord? Or who shall stand in his holy place? He that hath clean hands, and a pure heart" --Psalm 24: 3-4"

Inflation

I now have a 20 minute to and from work. My drive into work is often filled thoughts of what I need to accomplish for the day and trying to plan out my day. My drive home however, is often filled with a jumble of thoughts about a variety of different topics. On my mind the last few days has been inflation, the semantics behind it, and why people need to understand it. This post is written to be as interesting and as easy to follow as possible.

Inflation is often described as the cost of items going up. The candy bar that cost my parents a nickle, and used to cost me 50 cents, now costs 80 cents at the vending machine at work. Did the value of that candy bar actually increase 16 fold? In a word, no.

Let's take a simple example, maybe... a shoe box. We'll even put shoes in it. Let's say this shoebox/shoe combo can be purchased today for $10. Next year, the same shoebox/shoe combo can be purchased for $12. So, did we have 20% inflation? In a word, maybe.

It behooves us to decide what we actually mean by inflation. To do so, we're going to introduce a third object of value to the above hypothetical situation. In case you missed it, the two objects of value in the example were not the shoebox and the shoe. The two objects were the shoebox/shoe combo and the dollars you were willing to trade for the shoe/shoebox. Our third object is nothing more than a datum of value. Today object 3 has a value of $10. Next year object 3 have a value of $10 from today and and subsequently the same value as the shoe/shoebox from today. This is an important distinction.

Next year however, a shoe/shoebox combo costs $12. One of two things has happened. Possibly both. The value of the shoe/shoebox combo has risen in relation to object 3, or the value of the money used to buy the shoe/shoebox combo has decreased, thus requiring more of it. This is where the semantics of inflation comes in.

Inflation is the change in value of the money, not the products.

This post is not here to debate whether or not inflation is good, but what inflation is. I welcome any thoughts supporting or opposing to what I have posted here.

Today's Funny

From xkcd.com:
Took me a second, but I think it's hilarious. If you don't get it, don't worry, it's nerd humor.

Random Pictures

So, occasionally I actually just sit down and browse through our vast library of pictures. I often find random pictures that show off what we're up to that I've not blogged yet. So here's a small collection for everyone.

Here's Adie with her friend Ethan before we left Provo. Ahh, those were the good old days.


IKEA furniture. Build it yourself. Adie loved being dad's helper on this one.


This was our move to Arizona. I don't know how well you can see (you might have to click on this picture) but the back seat of the car is full (just enough room for the car seat), and the trunk is full. The rear of our car is riding 2-3 inches lower than the front.


Adie, just chillin.

What Does Your Child's Behavior Say About You?

Should I be concerned that almost every time Adie plays with her dolls these days she's reprimanding them and telling them no in a stern voice? Furthermore, whenever I am getting all uppity about something I am passionate about (usually some sort of current event or political situation), she'll start babbling in a really excited, yet serious voice, and waving her hands all over the place. I think she's doing an impression of me, and probably a pretty good job of it. What does this behavior of her's tell me about myself?

Arachnophobia

I just went outside to our backyard to measure the dimensions so we could start a little landscape planning. I had Adie come out with a few toys so she could get some play time in while I worked. I began measuring the patio and the measuring tape seemed to have awoken a sleeping black widow that was hiding just underneath a small lip near the base of our house. I immediately shooed Adie back inside and called for our first pest control service. They are coming tomorrow at 3 pm. I am so arachnophobic. I can't get the creepy crawly feeling out of me. I keep thinking I am going to see black widows pop out all over our house. Ahhhh! We found out just after we moved out of Provo that the new tenants in our apartment found a black widow the day they moved in. We had never seen one, or I think all our neighbors would have heard me scream bloody murder. They are so disturbing to me. I was even going to post a picture of a black widow with this post to make it a little more interesting, but I couldn't bring myself to put it up. The image kept creeping me out too much. That is one of the main down sides to little to no snow - more nasty creepy crawlies living around you (although I do realize black widows live in colder climates too, but lots of other things, like scorpions don't).

A Breakthrough Day

Today was such an awesome day. We had multiple breakthroughs. First, I have felt as normal as ever today. I actually felt pretty good all weekend, but today, I really felt good, after only 7.5 hours of sleep. Usually, with this pregnancy, less than 8 or 9 hours is killer for me. I think it's almost safe to say I am on to the feel good phase of pregnancy. Hallelujah!

The next breakthrough is probably my favorite. Adie only had one incident the whole day where she didn't use the potty to go to the bathroom. I said in a previous post that I am being as laid back as I can about the potty training thing. Well, last week, whenever I asked Adie if she wanted / needed to use the potty she almost always said no. However, while we were on vacation over the weekend, it's like something clicked. I would go to the bathroom, or she'd see a toilet, and ask to go to the bathroom. I wasn't even going to attempt any training over the weekend, but she took the lead. I think that's maybe what she wanted all along. Anyway, today, she kept indicating she needed to use the potty, or she'd use it any time it was offered to her. The only time she had a miss is after I had put her down for her nap. She had gone before I put her down, so I didn't worry about it, but I put on a pull-up just in case. I left her to fall asleep, and then the dirty deed was done. However, I am thoroughly convinced that had I been around she would have told me she needed to go and she could have gone the entire day without any soiled under garments. I have no idea how permanent this is so I am not going to declare her fully potty trained by a long shot, but wow, this is a huge step in the right direction and a lot sooner than I expected it. Yay!

My final breakthrough was actually something I realized a few weeks ago, but I am now seeing the results and am going to officially call it a breakthrough. As many of you readers know, I struggled with acne for a while, and it didn't respond to any treatment I tried. It became especially severe right after Adie was born. After weaning her, I took some fairly potent medication that really helped and I discontinued it last summer to start using milder medication in preparation for hopefully welcoming another child into the world. Upon becoming pregnant, I continued mild medication and it seemed to be keeping everything under control, until a few weeks ago. All of the sudden some acne started coming on, more than I had since I weaned Adie. I wondered why it decided to pop up all the sudden, and I decided to see if anything had changed that could have caused it. That's when I figured it out. I had been a slacker about taking my prenatal vitamins and only a few weeks before had been taking them regularly. I did a quick internet search to see if prenatal vitamins were the cause of anyone else's acne. As it turns out, I found a lot of people attributing them to acne. I decided to stop taking them and see if it would help clear up my acne. Sure as shootin', here I am a few weeks later with my skin clear again and the only change I made was stopping the prenatals. I am pretty much 100% certain that is what caused my horrible acne from my last pregnancy and post pregnancy. I do admit, I didn't have the clearest face before I got pregnant with Adie, but part of that I think was untreated problems that arose from living in Puerto Rico. My skin didn't react well to the humidity. (I never struggled with acne as an adolescent. It basically appeared on my mission). I never got it fully treated after my mission because I got married so soon after returning and didn't want to take any serious medications because of the complications that can happen if you do become pregnant. Anyway, really long story short, I think a major factor in my acne problems is prenatal vitamins, so I don't take them and I try to eat lots of fruits and veggies, and foods high in folic acid, iron and calcium. It turns out there are a lot of fortified cereals that help out with that.

So, it's really been quite a good day. Let's hope this good streak continues!

Weekend trip

I really dig this every other Friday off thing. This weekend we took off for Yuma and San Diego. Sabrina's grandparents are snowbirds in Yuma. We drove out on Friday and spent some time with them. That night we spent the night at the home of Sabrina's mom's cousin in the largest house I've ever stepped foot inside. It was around 10,000 sq ft. I believe that the kitchen and great room (two story) was bigger than our house. The ceilings on the first floor were all 12 feet high (I think, though they might have been 14) and the second story ceilings were all 10 feet high. They do have 6 kids, each of them having their own large (read at least as large as our new master bedroom) and attached bath. They have a guest room w/ attached bath, master with the most incredible bathroom in the world (Sabrina's words), a third floor gym, a theater, a ... (you get the picture). They were quite generous though and very kind to us.

The next day we packed up and headed into San Diego to visit my aunt and uncle. We spent some time on the beach, ate some excellent food, watched the sunset on the beach, and went to the temple. Neither of us had ever been to the San Diego Temple before, so it was a nice trip. My aunt and uncle took good care of Adie for us. Their grandkids don't live nearby so they took the opportunity to treat Adie like one. Adie loved all the attention she got this weekend including from them and from Sabrina's grandparents.

Sunday we made it to church and ate more excellent food (my aunt is a fabulous cook) and headed home. After a quick (or not so quick) stop in Yuma, we trekked on back, finally arriving home just after midnight. It was worth it though. We did forget to bring any camera besides the one on Sabrina's cell phone. Only two of the beach pictures came out at all, and the quality is definitely that of a cell phone, but it's something. Enjoy.

Couponing - Not My Favorite

Alright, all you couponing readers out there (and I know there are a lot of you), how in the world do you not hate it? What am I doing wrong? I feel like I spent 2 hours this morning ruffling through store ads and signing up for way too many couponing sites and downloading all sorts of coupon printer programs, only to save a few dollars. I was in such an irritable mood by the end of it, I could barely stand being in the grocery store. It drove me absolutely nuts. The whole process was so time consuming and I just know I am going to be bombarded with more spam in my inbox even though I opted out of everything I could.

Don't get me wrong, I am all about saving money and being frugal. I really enjoyed using My Food Storage Deals in Utah because that is how I like to shop - buy a lot of the things that are on a massive sale. I would just look at the best deals for each store and decide which store had the most things I needed at the best prices. Sometimes I'd go to more than one store, but only if there were a large number of items at more than one store. Otherwise, the gas, time and hassle it took to go to multiple stores wasn't worth it to me. I try to employ this technique here as best I can, scanning all the ads and buying bulk of what's on a really good sale because I have a pretty good idea of what a decent price is for most things I buy. In any case, I decided today to not be lazy about the couponing thing. I've clipped coupons out of the paper in the past, but I often forgot to bring them and often, I could buy the generic brand for less than the name brand with the coupon anyway, so it stopped being worth my time. However, I have heard so many people talk about the amazing deals they get with their coupons, especially online, so I thought I'd try it out. All I did was get frustrated, although I was happy with my $2 off Pull-ups coupon. Most of my savings came in the form of just buying all the things that were on for a really good sale, none of which I saw any coupons for. Maybe it's just a quality of life issue for me. Some people get really excited about massive amounts of savings at the grocery store and the makes their quality of life better. For me, I need convenience (am I a child of the I want it now generation or what?) and not spending hours planning meals and shopping. I can handle some of that, because I think it really can save you money, but I have a threshold that is apparently pretty short. Anyway, do any of you do this speedily, or do you just have more patience than me in planning your shopping so as to maximize your use of coupons. Please do share your secrets.

On a completely unrelated note, we had a really wonderful weekend, which I don't feel like posting about right now because it will be really long. Hopefully, it will rise to the top of my priority list soon.