almost crawling

I think Kevin could crawl if the idea occurred to him. When he is about to use something to stand up, like a chair or table or my legs, he will do a few real crawl "steps" to get himself close enough (as opposed to army crawling, which he does amazingly well right now). So it seems like he's got the muscles to do it. He's just so fast at army crawling that it hasn't occurred to him that he could crawl and be even faster. Not that there's any rush--because I'm pretty sure he will be whizzing across the room as soon as he's got it down, and then no more rest for me.

It has become impossible to keep Kevin in one place during church. Yesterday during Sunday School and Relief Society I had to just let him go. Several people laughed and commented about how fast he is. And he's still just army crawling! What will it be like when he's crawling for real, or when he's walking?

Kevin and food

I've been noticing some interesting changes in Kevin's eating habits lately. He has really increased the solid foods in the last couple of months and eats about half table food, half breastmilk, leaning towards more table food. I was really struggling with breastfeeding for a while there. Before Kevin was born I always thought I would be the mom who loved nursing her children and that it would be an amazing experience. After all, my mom breastfed six kids and I had the right attitude, so of course I was going to love it and have no problems, right? Well, what I didn't expect was that I would have such an active, curious, wiggly baby. He just has to move and grab things, even when he's eating. So feedings were becoming stressful and not so fun for me because the entire time he was shoving his heel into my arm as hard as he could, or yanking my hair, or scratching whatever skin was in his reach. And then he got teeth and decided biting was fun, and I disagreed. To solve the biting problem, I decided that if he bit me I would put him down and ignore him even if he cried so that he would realize that if he was going to bite he wouldn't get to keep nursing. The first couple of times he just crawled away and played, but the third time he wasn't done and he was really sad. I let him cry for several minutes and didn't give him any attention, and then after a while I picked him up, explained that he couldn't bite me because it hurts, and gave him some extra attention and nursed him again. I was dreading having to do it a few more times before he started to get the idea, but the problem has pretty much disappeared since then. I guess he learned his lesson. He continued to increase the amount of solid foods he ate, especially foods he can pick up and eat himself. He loves that. And then within the last week he has started to come to me begging to nurse at times when he normally doesn't eat, especially when he's getting close to bedtime. I think that means that he's starting to value the snuggle aspect of it more. A result of this is that he is much calmer during all of his feedings, and it has become more enjoyable for me again.

what to do with a whole chicken

I've learned a lot about cooking since Ryan and I got married. I'm amazed at the things that intimidated me when we were first married. I was a nervous wreck the first time I bought a can of kidney beans and a can of tomatoes so that I could make this taco bean soup recipe that I thought sounded good. I had never bought those before, so for some reason it was scary. (Now I stock up every time tomatoes go on sale, and I freeze big batches of beans [cooked from scratch] in the freezer so I can make quick bean dishes a couple of times a week--I've come a long way.) I'm a lot more confident about my cooking skills now, and I'm not scared to try most recipes anymore.

Anyway, one thing that I have learned to do is to cook large quantities of meat in the crockpot (like roasts or whole chickens) and then use it for several meals. For some reason that used to be soooo intimidating to me, but it's actually pretty easy after you've done it a couple of times. My chickens aren't works of art like some people's are, but they still taste good and the meat is nice and tender.

1. Thaw out the meat if it is frozen (in the fridge--it takes a day or two).
2. Take it out of the packaging, rinse it, and put it in the crockpot. You can add a little water, but you will get a lot of liquid just from the meat cooking.
   
3. Add spices if you want. Bouillon, garlic, onions, salt, pepper, and special seasonings like Prime Rib Rub all work well. You can also add vegetables like carrots and potatoes, which adds flavor and also makes this a really nice meal if you throw in salad and bread (meaning as part of the meal--I wouldn't advise putting lettuce in the crockpot . . . (-; ).
   
4. Cover the crockpot and let the meat cook for several hours. I use a thermometer to check if it is done.

In other words, put a hunk of meat in the crockpot and cook it for a while. How hard is that? I don't know why it was so scary. I think I thought that since whole chickens and roasts were nice meals, they must involve some complicated, fancy stuff.

After the meat is cooked, you can use the broth and meat for lots of things. I let it all cool down a bit, and then I take all the meat off of the bones and put it in a container in the fridge. Over the next few days I can use that meat for soup, sandwiches, enchiladas, chimichangas, stir-fries, etc. Then I drain the liquid (this is the stock or broth). A colander works fine, but if you don't want the floating fat and such you can use an old pair of nylons to make the broth nice and clear (I keep a pair in the kitchen and just cut off and throw away the part that got dirty). If you put the broth in the fridge overnight, it will become like chicken/beef jello and the fat will float to the top, so you can easily scrape the fat off with a spoon. Then you can use the broth for soup or stir-fry or any recipe that calls for broth.

A word about bouillon and broth: they are the same thing!
1 bouillon cube + 1 cup water=1 tsp. bouillon + 1 cup water =1 cup stock or broth
When I realized that, my world of cooking grew by leaps and bounds. Maybe everyone else knew that, but somehow I missed that helpful bit of information. I think I figured it out by reading the family cookbook. Now I can make really delicious soups and lots of other things. Chicken soup is just several cups of chicken broth with vegetables, chicken, barley, noodles, spices, or whatever you want to add. For some reason that used to be such a mystery to me.

Anyway, I hope I'm not the only one who was intimidated by cooking whole chickens and roasts. I still haven't tried making a roast or a whole chicken in the oven, though--I'm afraid it would be dry or burned, so I haven't dared to do it.

100 things to do

In honor of this being my 100th post, I thought I'd write down all 100 things that I wanted to do this week and didn't, or wished I could do but couldn't.

But then I realized that this is actually only my 97th post (I have a few forgotten drafts from a long time ago that I never got around to publishing). Plus, it's not healthy or productive to put that much energy into thinking about what you haven't accomplished. So I decided not to do it.

I've realized in the last week or so that I've developed an interesting bad habit. I think I've been doing it for a couple of months. Here's the bad habit: At the end of the day--every day--I start thinking about all the things I wanted to accomplish that day and didn't accomplish, and I start feeling really depressed because I didn't get anything done. But one day this week I started doing that, and then I stopped and realized that I actually had done quite a bit, which led me to realize that I do the same thing every day even though most days I do get quite a few things done. The whole time I was thinking it was just that I felt guilty because I'm so lazy, and that wasn't true. I guess Satan's getting smarter, because it didn't occur to me that he'd get me down with a trick like that. So now I'm working on breaking the habit. It's kind of hard. I know there are a few things I could change to manage my time better, but I still need to give myself credit for doing a pretty good job of fulfilling all my responsibilities.

When I explained this to Ryan, he said, "Mm-hmm!" Meaning, "That's what I've been trying to tell you all along."

play date

On Thursday Kevin's friend Joseph came to play for about an hour while Joseph's mom did some other things. It was fun to watch them play. Kevin was so delighted to have another little person around. We should have friends over more often.

They were doing something really cute, so I whipped out the camera, and then of course one of them said, "Look, she's got the camera!" and the other replied, "Get her!" I barely got away alive, and I can't even remember what the cute thing was that they were doing. This is all I was able to capture, just before the attack.


Kevin was interested in pretty much everything Joseph was doing. I'm afraid Joseph didn't appreciate having someone in such close proximity.

my little helper

Kevin has learned to pull himself up to a standing position, and he is using his skills to help me out.

He washes the dishes (spit-shine?) . . .



and takes the trash out (of the trash can, that is).



He would also love to clean the toilet, but I won't let him.