Tidbits

Things have been busy-- a fairly mundane busyness, with no single item seeming like it deserved it's own blog post, but with enough going on to keep me from writing anything more meaningful than a description of the busyness.  I try to save you from those kinds of posts whenever possible, but nearly a week has gone by and I have to write something. Landon is taking his nap, JP just got up from his nap and is sitting on the couch with Claire watching football while she chews industriously on a small stuffed duck.  I am still in pj's at 2:30 pm, a rare case of sartorial weakness that is a direct result of Claire's refusal to sleep much of last night (and the 5 prior).  But I will at least throw on jeans with my sweatshirt before we head to Costco later today. I still have standards.

But before we leave the house for our one and only outing of the day (it's raining, or we would at least also include a walk or SOMETHING), here's what's happened this week:

• Claire has 2 teeth!  The growing of them was by far the worst thing that had ever happened to her in her life and she shared her feelings, loudly, with all of us all of throughout Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday nights.
• Then Claire got some shots, a fever, and bad case of runny nose hacking cough allergitis.  These sniffling, coughing, gagging good times have been shared with us all of Thursday, Friday, and Saturday nights.  She likes to share her feelings. Thank god she's usually happy.
• I got 4 fillings on Thursday and my gums still hurt where I got shot up with a particularly brutal stab of Novocaine.  I hadn't had a cavity in years and years but suddenly had 2 at my last check-up.  I need to ease up on the candy.  Luckily, cookies don't cause cavities, or so I tried to explain to JP when he glared at me as I polished one off while describing my painful 2 hours spent in the dentist chair.
• I made this soup for dinner last night.  As per the reviews, I increased the chicken broth, added diced onion, carrot, celery, and garlic, used 1/2 cup of flour and skim milk instead of cream for the roux and it was amazing.  Just like the creamy chicken and wild rice soup at Panera.  I want to make it once a week until it gets winter is over.
• Due to budgetary limitations imposed by having a second child in daycare, we have almost completely stopped eating out.  I missed it at first, but have to admit we are saving a ton of money (and probably a ton of calories) by making nearly all our meals at home.  Thank goodness for the internet and places like foodnetwork.com, allrecipes.com, and Tasty Kitchen (via the Pioneer Woman) - I'm finding some delicious things.  Next up for the week is Shepherd's Pie, Chicken Tacos, and one of our new favorites, Lamb Gyro Meatballs.
• I'm working on a pro-bono police brutality case at work.  I'm glad to be involved, and the upcoming depositions are going to be interesting, as well as a learning experience, but on my gosh this case makes me so mad!  The story is so awful that money doesn't seem like nearly enough to make things right.  I see red every time I read the pleadings. I wish more creative equitable remedies were a possibility.  
• I've decided to properly decorate my office.  I already had some picture frames on the shelves and my diplomas on the wall, but I spend a lot of time there, and after 2.5 years, it should be homier.  I bought a lamp on clearance at target (I don't like overhead lights, but lately it's been too gray outside to keep them off) and am ordering some beautiful art prints in February as my birthday present.  I can't wait to frame them and get them on my walls.   
• Landon has started wearing his cowboy boots everywhere.  He calls them his "howdy boots."  Cracks me up.
• JP and I have switched places on the family planning front.  I've decided 2 is perfect; he's certain we need 3.  In a different life I think I'd have 4, but in this one, these 2 that I have seem just right. 
• This poster made me laugh:  (really, all the demotivational posters on that site are pretty funny)

Well that's my so little to say! I hope you're all having a wonderful weekend and I will strive for better content next week, hopefully including a post about my very favorite shoes, which I think I have to retire, and one about this corporette post on lawyer moms and planning for babies. As always, if there's anything you want to hear about, feel free to leave a comment on any post or the FAQ page. Sometimes I do better when I have a prompt rather than trying to pull something from my tired, mom of a teething baby brain (which this post probably proves; bullet points always mean I'm scraping the bottom of the blog posting barrel).