What the Devil?

OK- as promised, here’s the first installment of my dairy free (well…almost) week. My goal is to find healthy, dairy free foods that actually taste good because 1) I like to eat good food and 2) Big Mister, who not only loves my cooking but is also a Dairy King himself, pouted and said, “Don’t punish me just because you can’t eat dairy anymore!” Uh, HELLO Honey! This is for the benefit of your son! So, if mama can’t have cheese, ain’t NOBODY gonna have cheese!

First up this week is actually something that I did not make for dinner, was not from Cooking Light, and was not necessarily something I’d brand as “healthy.” BUT! It was dairy free and delicious, so I could eat it to my heart’s content- clogged arteries and chunky thighs notwithstanding.

Turns out I was invited to a potluck brunch Tuesday. Look at me- already making friends and all. *aww shucks*

The hostess, as well as some of the attendees, attend the Friday Fibre Friends meeting- basically a knit and crochet group of women who can’t spell “fiber” that meets on Fridays. Yes- I searched out all things yarny when I found out we were moving here and attended my first meeting the first Friday I was here- jetlagged and all. Don’t get between me and my fibre, yo. (HAHA! My MS Word is obviously smart American and is giving me the red squiggly line under “fibre” because EVEN A COMPUTER PROGRAM KNOWS IT’S SPELLED F-I-B-E-R!)

Anywho, my contribution to the potluck was Deviled Eggs. I LURVE Deviled Eggs and I usually always make them if there’s a potluck we are attending. My Mister loves them, too, so I knew I had to make a few extra otherwise he’d be upset that I made his food for people other than him and that goes against our marriage vows. And, of course he’d know that I made Deviled Eggs for someone else because it made our house smell of boiled eggs which, if you have never smelled boiled eggs before, well…they smell like farts. Like the really bad ones from your old Uncle Charlie who you are pretty sure ate nothing but cabbage, beans, and rotted road kill.

Actual phone conversation with My Mister:

Me: I made Deviled Eggs for the brunch and now our whole house smells like farts.

Mister: What else is new?

Thanks a lot, Uncle Charlie.

Even though I have made these quite a few times, it’s been a while since I made them last and needed to look up the recipe to refresh my memory. And that was roadblock number one. I don’t know if I mentioned this, but I MOVED TO THE OTHER SIDE OF THE WORLD and do not have access to my household goods, including my cookbooks. Yes- I mailed my yarn, but my cookbooks were much lower on the totem pole of important things in our lives. What good is food if you don’t have your yarn? EXACTLY. There would be no point in living anymore.

Well, considering we live in an amazing time in history where we can access just about any information ever conceived by the quick click of a button, I thought- no biggie! I’ll just google the recipe. It’s from the Betty Crocker cookbook- the red checkered one. “Betty Crocker Deviled Eggs” goes into my google bar and the extremely simple recipe comes back. Right?

WRONG!

They had 300 thousand bazillion recipes for deviled eggs, but not MY recipe for deviled eggs. WTHemorrhoid?!? GAH!

So, I had to reconstruct the recipe from memory. All of the other recipes I saw had quite a few ingredients like relish and eye of newt. The recipe I use is basically just mayo, mustard, and vinegar and they are FABULOUS.

So, I know I have the right ingredients, but I’m not completely sure about the quantities EXCEPT! I remembered that both the mustard and the vinegar were 1 teaspoon each. I just couldn’t remember how many eggs with which that corresponded (but I think it may have been 6), or the amount of mayo needed. Oh well!

The keys to the tastiest farts you'll ever eat

I used:
10 hardboiled eggs (it's best if you don't count them in my pictures. Just take my word for it.)
5 Tbs. Mayo (they don't have Kraft mayo- theirs is a little more translucent, so the filling was...different than I remember it.)
1.5 tsp yellow mustard (they do have French's Mustard. Score one for the Australians.)
1.5 tsp white vinegar
salt and pepper to taste (though I think I put a tad too much salt in mine.)
paprika sprinkled on top. (Gots to have the paprika)


Remove the yolks from the eggs and mash them up with all the ingredients except for the paprika. Place the mixture in a zip-top plastic bag for easy piping. Just snip off a small corner and pipe away.

Yep...ten eggs. Ten whole eggs.

Unfortunately I also don't have my pretty little Deviled Egg platter, so I had to do the best with what I have.

Hmm...not quite there. And there's a funky one in there somewhere

STOP WITH THE COUNTING ALREADY!

I covered them with plastic wrap, but to protect them from getting smooshed from the wrap, I used toothpicks to keep it aloft. Oh wait. No I didn't because I don't have any toothpicks.

Give me some duct tape and a knife and I'll out MacGyver MacGyver

I used plastic tie wraps that came with some freaky freezer bags they have here. I guess they don't do zip top freezer bags- just sandwich bags. Silly Australians.

So, my brunch went well, but unfortunately my eggs were the only non-dairy fare available except for some tasty butternut squash soup. Since I'm breastfeeding and thus need to eat a metric ton every half hour to keep up my milk production, and since I didn't cheat and snack on any of my eggs prior to arriving (you didn't count, right?), I ended up eating a quesadilla and some quiche. One of them has cheese IN ITS FREAKIN' NAME! It should be called the Devil and not my delicious eggs! Stupid satanic cheese.

So, hopefully next week will be my first truly, absolutely, no excuses dairy free week.

Oh, and My Mister did want the leftovers....but then he didn't eat them because he's some germaphobe freak and saw my twisty ties in the eggs and questioned their food grade safety and then said something about not trusting the Chinese. Don't worry- I hid the aluminum foil so he can't wear his hat tonight.

(ETA: HAHAHA! My Mister just read my blog and said, "You're not being fair or specific! I don't know what were their manufacturing conditions!" The aluminum is FAR FAR AWAY!)

Resting and Planning and Thinking

My Mister, whom I love very, very much, has been driving me crazy with all of the exploring he wants to do in our new town. Yes, honey, we have a car and can go out and about now, but that doesn't mean we HAVE to. It's not like we're moving back next month and need to cram in every single touristy thing there is to do RIGHT NOW. Just calm the heck down already!

I’m ready to stab people in the throat and tear my hair out (which doesn’t need much coaxing to leave its follicles- the whole postpartum balding season is upon me) to get some much needed R&R and the weekends are my only time to take advantage of having someone to watch Little Mister so I can go to the bathroom to, oh I don’t know- pee? read? sleep? without yelling, “IT’S OK! MAMA JUST NEEDS TO WIPE AND SHE’LL BE RIGHT THERE HONEY!” making an even better impression on my new neighbors. The only way I can make myself and possibly all Americans look worse in their eyes is if I marched down the streets draped in an American flag while chanting, “We’re Number One! You’re Number Two! Australia is a dumb hunk of poo! SanDimasHighSchoolFootballRULES!”

Anywho, Big Mister could sense that I could use some extra sleep- he’s good at reading my extremely subtle hints of gently snarling, hissing and spitting randomly throughout the day- so he offered to take Little Mister on a walk Saturday morning so that I could sleep-in a little. Even though it was only an extra hour (though it felt like 2 minutes), I so appreciated those precious minutes alone. On a bed. All by myself. (!!) He also eased off of the, "Oooo OOOOO! Let's do this and go there and wake up early and put the baby in the car seat so we can go and drive now that we have a car and we can do things that are not sleeping!" Yeah....I really needed the break. It helped take the edge off- now I only want to poke people in the throats with a dull stick.

I used this restful weekend to start my normalization process. Well…”normal” is relative. Considering the whole “dairy free” issue has been weighing heavily on my mind for a while, I’ve got to start a whole new normal- and I mean more than a life without cheese, although that does play a big part. You see, I tend to fly by the seat of my pants when it comes to meal planning since I tend to have a stock of ingredients necessary for the meals I generally rotate through. Unfortunately, many of these meals do have dairy in them one way or another so I need to rethink my meal planning. Gah. “Thinking.” Totally overrated.

So, now it’s time to emulate my favorite Belgian detective and start working out those little grey cells again by putting on my Nutritionist cap at home and start planning healthy meals that are dairy free for me to make throughout the week. It’s always been my goal to actually make a meal plan for the week, go grocery shopping on the weekend, and then stick to my meal plan so that I don’t have any extra food to throw away at the end of the week. Unfortunately, the reality is that I suck at it. The whole sticking to plans thing. Since it’s just been Big Mister and me for so long, if we wanted to eat out (read: me no wanty cooky), we could just hop in the car and go wherever our taste buds took us. Now…it’s not that simple anymore. Now I start freaking out if we are out past 7pm since that means Little Mister’s new sleep schedule will be thrown out of whack and how the heck will we ever get to sleep a full night again if he never establishes a good sleeping pattern and why the heck are we eating out just so that I can be tempted by that glorious cheese that I can’t eat anymore but, hey- what’s one teensy little bite, right? OH NO! Little Mister has blood in his stools again! DARN YOU CHEESE YOU EVIL TEMPTRESS!!! (And, sadly, yes- this has happened since I apparently have the willpower of popcorn fart when it comes to cheese.)

However, now that I’m a mom, I’ve found that I’ve somehow inherited the Mommy Superpowers that allow me to clean the kitchen, eat breakfast, start a load of laundry, and catch up with my Twittering (tweets? Tweeps? Tweeterers?) all before Little Mister wakes up. Normally I’d be zonked out in Drool Land until 10am if I had a day off, as well as NOT CLEANING MY HOUSE so this transformation has been extraordinary. So, I put my newfound superpowers to work this restful weekend and I actually planned out the meals for the week. Dairy free meals! Without cheese! And we went grocery shopping this weekend so I have food for all of the meals I planned so that we don’t have to eat out and I won’t be tempted by that cheese. (Weeeelllll…..even the best laid plans aren’t fool proof….as I found out yesterday. More on that tomorrow.)

So. Here’s what I’m gonna do. Every Sunday, I’ll post what my weekly meal plans are. They’ll either be brand new recipes I’ve never tried before, stuff from my normal rotation that happen to be dairy free, or new creations that I throw together. I’ll provide the links to the recipes if available online, too. That being said, many of the things I make originate from Cooking Light magazine. If you do not have a subscription to this wonderful resource, I highly recommend it. Their recipes are amazing and they have so many good health tips and information. I LOVE Cooking Light!

If you have any dairy-free meals you'd like to share, PLEASE LET ME KNOW!!  For reals. I'm sure other readers wouldn't mind some new recipes- I know I wouldn't- and I'd love to hear from ya!

Since I've already started my meal planning this week, I'm going to finish out this week- blog wise- commenting on some the things I've made so far- starting tomorrow. Gotta give myself some goals to work towards now that I'm a SAHM and not out in the workplace anymore. As much as I'd like to just sit and eat tea and crumpets all day (which are VERY GOOD, btw!), I do need to get a move on and start the whole pregnancy weight loss plan in earnest now, starting with planning healthy meals.

Right now, I've got to head to bed. Strange- most of you are just now waking up....to begin the day that has just ended for me. I'm talking to y'all from the future! ooooEEEEEoooooooooo!

Catch ya on the flip side.

Perfect Storm

It seems like the Perfect Storm has occurred for me in the last couple days. A really wonderful Perfect Storm full of snuggles, feedings, sleeping, and baby poop.

Yes, Little Mister has been going through a growth spurt and I’ve basically been held prisoner in my bedroom for the past couple days. Now, up until this point, I would have been filled with anxiety and counting the minutes on the clock until he finished eating. HURRY LITTLE BABY! Eat! Eat! EAT!! Up until this point, I’ve unfortunately not been able to enjoy the whole breastfeeding/bonding experience to its fullest since I’ve had something or other to accomplish RIGHT NOW and a tiny little baby takes too long to gulp, slurp, and motorboat his way to fullness.

I’ve been on-the-go non-stop for the last few months and, truth be told, I’m a little concerned how hard I’m going to crash once I’m able to process everything that I’ve been going through. I’ve been putting it off- mainly because I’ve not had the time to truly think and process and OH.MY.LANTA! I’M A MOM NOW!

Since moving here 3 weeks ago, we’ve had to do the normal things you have to do when you move to another country- get a local driver’s license, get a local bank account, get a new vehicle, have a heart attack due to sticker shock since everything out here is SO VERY EXPENSIVE, and walk, walk, walk everywhere since you do not have a car and then you are stuck walking in a strange city when your very hungry little baby needs to eat RIGHT NOW and you don’t have the privacy of your own car with tinted windows and a sun shade and your dearly beloved Boppy with you so you can feed him properly so he cries and cries and your heart breaks and you yell and cry at your husband, “WHY DID YOU DO THIS TO US???” even though you know he’s been through so very much himself and his heart breaks hearing his son cry and seeing his wife have a meltdown and he wishes he could just fix it RIGHT NOW.

*HUGE inhale*

No. It’s not been an easy transition for me. Not into motherhood, nor as an ex-pat. Although, I do think the transition into motherhood would have been much easier (MUCH!) had the whole moving-to-the-other-side-of-the-world thing did not happen AT THE SAME TIME. (When the opportunity first came up and we knew we’d be most likely be moving with a 2-month old, we thought, Crikey! Sounds good to me, mate! And we danced a dance of joy and threw shrimps on the barbie. And then the reality slowly sunk in as I started getting bigger and bigger and the pain became unmanageable and the baby just WOULD NOT BE BORN no matter how much I begged and pleaded and cried and bribed him with candy.)

When Little Mister started having blood in his stools and I couldn’t just jump in my own car and take him to his pediatrician or even to an urgent care center, I seriously thought my heart was going to break in two and would never mend due to all of the shoving aside of thoughts and emotions I’ve been shoving down deeper and deeper until I started becoming a walking zombie- emotionless and simply going through the daily motions of life- and I can’t even have the comforts of cheese to help me cope! I do not like this version of me. Not at all, Sam I am. It reminds me too much of the “me” I was last year when I wouldn’t- couldn’t- process my first pregnancy…and loss. Even to this day, I have a difficult time saying the “m” word.

Heck. It’s not been a tough couple months. It’s been a tough couple years, really.

My creativity has both waxed and waned during these times. Sometimes I’ll have a creative frenzy where the most beautiful creations and colors will rush through my mind. Other times the colors are muted and the creativity just won’t come. Sometimes I escape in my books- living vicariously through the lives brought forth in the pages before me. Recently, my creative juices have been flowing (I’m being published!!!!) and I’m happy about that. Yet I felt guilty when I would pick up my hooks knowing that I had SO MUCH to do to get ready to move and shouldn’t I be enjoying this time with my baby a little more since that’s what everybody tells me to do? “Enjoy this time- they grow so fast.”

But I couldn’t enjoy it. I wanted to very very badly to just hold my baby and love him and kiss his huge (HUGE!) cheeks and smell him- even when he’s smelly- and kiss that gummy mouth of his and snort him like a new skein of wool and I COULDN’T.

Instead I had to pass him off to my mom during the first week of his life since I knew it would be a very long time before she would see her first grandchild again. I had to put him in his car seat so he could sleep instead of lying down with him or letting him fall asleep on me anytime he wanted to just so I could get something done RIGHT NOW. I had to watch the clock and think, “Why aren’t you done eating yet?!? Don’t you know I have things I need to do RIGHT NOW and you are eating and eating and eating and I love you but you need to HURRY!”

Hurry! Hurry! HURRRRRRRY!!!

This brings me to the last couple of days. We finally have a vehicle so I don’t have to walk 45 minutes into town and 45 minutes back to run errands. We have our bank account and driver’s license. We don’t have all our stuff here yet, and that’s good. It means I don’t have to rush unpacking. I’ve been able to stay home and b-r-e-a-t-h-e and NOT in a hurried way that causes hyperventilation. And, best of all, this is the time that Little Mister has decided to go through a growth spurt.

He’s needed me every hour or so to feed him and gets cranky when I’m not with him. I’ve been able to sleep-in with him in the morning- having him nestled in the crook of my arm which is a perfect position for me to kiss his little head. Ok. So he’s sprayed me with fountains of poop which was really gross and did cause me to HURRY to get it all off me. BUT then we were able to snuggle again so he could eat (again!) and then I was able to nap with him because all of that eating and growing makes a baby very sleepy. And I didn’t need to HURRY and get up, leaving him in the bed alone, so that I could get Something Really Important done RIGHT NOW. I’ve been able to just stare at him and think- Oh.My.Lanta. This is my son and I love him.

And I thank My Mister for “doing this to me.”

Pardon Me- Do You Have Any Grey Poop-on You?

Wow. So, I’m pretty sure Little Mister is going through a growth spurt right now. Either that or he’s been possessed by some all-you-can-eat-boobie-buffet spirit today. Last night he was waking to eat every hour or so*. Well, it’s not really “waking” when all you do is turn toward the food source with your mouth gaping wide open and paw at your mom’s nursing tank while grunting in your sleep. At least he’s finally figured out that I’m the one to paw at and not just any body part he may be facing. (My Mister has been startled awake a few times by Little Mister trying to nurse on his arm. Makes me giggle just thinking about it.) I try to appease the little guy before he does wake up and start wailing his, “GIVE ME FOOD NOW!” battle cry. Also, I feel a little guilty hearing his loud, slightly labored breathing as I remember that I should have removed his boogers before going to bed so he could actually breathe at night. (Am I the only one who goes “fishing” with a tightly rolled tissue for his snot instead of using the booger-sucker-bulb? Maybe I shouldn’t put this out there for all to see, but I must admit I get a little thrill when I notice there’s a little bat in the cave that needs to be removed. OH GOODY! A booger for me to fetch! It’s a sickness, I know.)

Anywho, the real problem with eating all night long- other than ensuring your mother does not sleep AT.ALL. during the night thus making her slightly delirious in the morning. So delirious she does strange things such as not quite make eye contact as she’s stalking your nose mucus as soon as you wake. Maybe if you LET YOUR MOM SLEEP, she wouldn’t be chasing you with rolled up tissue so much. Just a thought.

Ahem. As I was saying, the real problem with eating all night long is that all that milk will eventually need to come out. Just in case you are not sure where I’m going with this, that milk comes out as poop. LOTS AND LOTS OF POOP.

Oh dear God- the amount of poop that comes out of such a little person. *shudder*  Now, I’m not a diaper expert or anything, but I’m pretty sure that when there is more poop on me than what is trapped in the diaper, that is called a DIAPER FAIL. I might as well have stuck a paper towel on his butt. A wet one with a large hole in it. 

There I was, lovingly holding Little Mister on my lap while we watched Murder She Wrote when all of a sudden I heard the telltale grunts and then felt the bubbly farts letting me know that his food finally finished cooking. Then the wet warmth on my lap let me know that this loving moment would not end well for me. Sure enough, a large, wet, yellow spot started growing on my pajama bottoms- and then made a run for it down my leg while shouting, “FREEEEEEDOM!!!” When the second wave of bubbly farts started its world tour, I realized I may need to incinerate Little Mister’s pajamas because there’s not enough water in the world to wash out all that poop. 

I quickly put him on the changing pad on the floor and started ripping off his clothes so that he wouldn’t marinate in that yellow brew and then bravely went for the diaper.  It was once I took off the diaper that I realized that the Poop World Tour included a trip all the way up his back and down his legs. Seriously- what was the point of putting a diaper on him at all?? It was only by the grace of God that I was able to put a new diaper on him at that moment because it was precisely at that moment that I also noticed that I had a huge poop stain on my nursing tank, as well. 

Now, I’m pretty sure this isn’t the professional mother’s way of handling things like this, but I’m still new at this game, so cut me some slack. I was totally grossed out by this point and could only think, “GET IT OFF OF ME! GET IT OFF OF ME!!” There may have been some slight screaming of, “EEEWWWWWWW!” as I jumped off the floor and started striping on my way to the laundry room. I didn’t even care (or notice) that my blinds were open and that my new neighbors may have gotten a little bit of a show from the new Yank next door. (So glad to do America proud, y’all.)

I continued on my way to the shower since I knew I had poop on my stomach, arms, and legs and that baby wipes just weren’t going to cut it. Once I was showered and feces free again, I put on some clean clothes, sighed in relief, and then it was at this point that I realized I LEFT MY BABY ALL ALONE ON THE LIVING ROOM FLOOR. You can see now why I’m glad I put that diaper on him when I did. I almost left a deadly weapon of poop destruction unsupervised on my living room floor. Whew. Barely dodged the “Bad Mother Award.”

After looking around to see if my new neighbors saw what I did and were now calling CPS, I wrestled with what I should do next – take him a bath or stick a cork in his butt? I finally thought it was only fair to bathe him since I was clean and, besides, the built up pressure from a corked butt could result in one of us losing an eye. 

By the time he was fresh, clean, and poop free, he let me know it was time to replenish his ammunition stores. The other thing about this particular growth spurt is that, besides being really cranky today, he only wanted to nurse while lying down in bed. This was fine by me since I figured I could catch some much needed sleep. So, down we went. He started eating as I lovingly looked down at him wondering how anything so perfect could be mine. And that’s when the bubbly farts started again. *HUGE SIGH* This time instead of striping myself, I had to strip the bed. What made this worse is the fact that I had just washed the sheets yesterday. So much for getting some sleep today. Anyone have a snotty nose that needs to be cleaned??

* He’s actually been eating like that all day long. I had to cancel my much needed chiropractic appointment this afternoon because I’m pretty sure it’s not easy to adjust a woman with a cranky, slightly smelly baby grafted to her bosom.

Hurry Up and Relax!

A Gold Star goes to Jen who correctly guessed that we have landed Down Under. (There were a few others that got back to me on Rav and FB who also correctly guessed. Glad to know my initial hint wasn’t a complete fail. ;) ). I have always wanted to live in Australia and My Mister and I were lucky enough to visit about 10 years ago, so this is a dream come true. However, these last couple weeks here haven’t exactly been the stuff that dreams are made of.  Thankfully, as of yesterday, we finally got some wheels! WOOT! That is definitely going to make things a little easier now.

As excited as I am to finally have a car again, I must say I’m enjoying the irony that today is the first day that there is nothing for me to do that requires a vehicle. I get to stay home and just….take it easy. Quite a foreign concept for me as of late. After all I’ve had to go through to get this car, it’s a little anticlimactic, actually. I feel like I should make up an urgent crisis that requires me to urgently jump in the car and fix it. Urgently. Instead I have time to just FINALLY relax and do nothing but enjoy spending time with Little Mister, watch TV without guilt, even crochet or read with impunity. And yet I feel antsy about it! My body is so tense and at the ready to pounce on the next crisis that appears. I am a puma! Do not mess with me! Hi YA! (Pumas know karate, right?)

Even while I was crocheting this past week, I felt like I had to make that hook fly and hurry, hurry, HURRY! for some unknown reason. And I feel super guilty for purposefully putting Little Mister in his swing in front of the TV and willing him to fall asleep so that I could have a few moments to myself to type up this blog post. My precious baby boy is going to have ADHD and a below average IQ because I let the TV babysit him for a few minutes. (How he can fall asleep watching MacGyver, I’ll never know. All that resourceful and mullet-y goodness on screen? HELLO!)  I don’t know if this is normal “mommy guilt” or the result of the months of stress I’ve been through.  Whatever the reason, I blame My Mister for it. Teehee!

Anywho, as I mentioned, we needed some coasters. Every time we put our drinks on our table without a coaster, my eyes would twitch a little and my hooks would fly even faster. So I went through my temporary mini (but slightly huge-ish) stash and pulled out some wools and cranked these babies out.

Wool Doodles

It was nice to have small projects to just doodle with. That purple one was the first time I crocheted in a spiral. I kept looking up free patterns on how to do it but couldn’t get the concept, so I just tried it on my own in a way that made sense to me and, what do you know? It worked! I think a video is in my near future... I've got some ideas for the star pattern and the blue/grey pinwheel pattern, as well...

Another thing we need are placemats. (Again with the eye twitching! HURRY UP HOOKS SO WE CAN EAT!) I started them with white as the main color since I have a lot of white thread. (It was for a different project that I started- a curtain- but that is for a different post.)

Pretty Pastels

But I just wasn't feeling it. So I started over in black. (EEK! Must hurry! The table is NAKED!)

Pretty Placemat.

Oh yeah baby! Black really made the colors pop! Unfortunately, I ran out of black as I was doing the border. Argh.  I only had the one ball of thread and I had already used some of it for Little Mister's Sock Monkey hat, but I ordered some online (the yarn supply here is woefully sad!) but unfortunately won't receive it until the 28th. Argh again. Perhaps my eye twitch is here to stay. *sigh*

The funny thing about this is that I absolutely love it and I'm planning on making a set of 4- each with a different color sequence. However, My Mister just isn't feeling it as a placemat. He doesn't think they are manly enough to put his food on. (Yes, he seriously said that. Yeah. I don't know, either.) However, I put it over our couch pillow and he really liked it. Huh. Go figure. So, in order to keep harmony in our new house, and to prevent an un-manly dining experience, my placemats are going to end up as pillows.

In the meantime, we'll have to do without placemats (or, heaven forbid, actually go buy some) until my thread arrives. I have another idea for placemats, actually. I'm thinking of doing a Southwest theme for this house, so.....we'll see where that leads.

So, for now, I'll try to be zen about it all and actually enjoy having nothing to do for once. I have to do it RIGHT NOW before the baby wakes up and ruins my MacGyver ogling.  Hellllloooooo mullet!