Bzzzz...here that? That is me, busy as a bee!

Nesting? You can call it that if you want to, but I really don't think it is.\

In my mind, nesting would be a total overhaul of my entire attitude (i.e. not wanting to lay on the couch and clean my baseboards instead...not gonna happen)  Never the less I have still been extremely busy these last two days cooking it away in my kitchen.  Just slap my butt and call me Betty Crocker!

If I wasn't pregnant, I probably wouldn't have put so much hard work into preparing meals in anticipation of Neil's arrival.  But alas, I am pregnant, and this baby is coming like a freight train that I can't stop.  Having some meals ready to go in the freezer made me feel like I wasn't going to leave Matt with a total crap shoot when it comes to cooking supper for me.

So what did I cook?  I will break it down for you, that way you can also appreciate my hard work.

Taco Soup (3 meals)

Broccoli Cheddar Soup (2 meals)

Creamy Potato Soup (2 meals)

Chicken Spaghetti (1 mean)

Turkey Burgers (6 patties/2 meals)

Mama's BBQ Chicken (2 complete slow-cooker meals)

Apple Pie Porkchops (1 complete slow-cooker meal)

Chicken Pot Pie Muffins (18 individual pot pies)

Blueberry Muffins (2 dz)

Sausage and Cheese Muffins (dz)

Cream Cheese Sausage Balls (2 dz)

Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough (2 dz)

In addition to these complete meals, I also prepared the following that can just be pulled from the freezer to use in things like: casseroles, nachos, hamburger helper, pizzas, spaghetti, breakfast burritos, etc...

Cooked Ground Beef ( 4, 1 lb servings)

Shredded Chicken (5, 3 cup servings)

Crumbled Sausage (2, 1 lb servings)

Food

More Food

OMG, and more soupy food!

Man, that feels good to type it all out and see that for at least a few weeks/months, Matt and I will have some easy, go to things in the freezer to make supper easy and we can spend that time loving on our little biscuit to come. 

I also wanted to take a moment to have my own little PSA:

If you love to use your slow-cooker, then you need to perk up your ears and listen to what I have to say!

Run, don't walk, to the nearest store and buy yourself some slow cooker liners.  I swear that if God had decided not to rest on that seventh day, he would have gone ahead and given these little puppies to the world. 

I used my slow cooker for several of the things above and I never had to wash it.  Did you hear that?  What do I hate more than cleaning the toilets?  Cleaning my slow cooker after I have slow cooked in it all. day. long.  I just pop in one of these bad boys, cook cook cook away, and trash it when I am done.  So nice.  

You can thank me later.

All Retro Laminate Furniture Goes to Heaven

I am retro laminate furniture's dream.  Nuff said.

I would love to buy new furniture every year.  I love furniture and I wish that I had the financial means to switch things in my house out for new stuff whenever the mood strikes me.  Unfortunately, the Langfords live on planet Earth, and I pretty sure the selfish people that lived here before us cut down that blasted money tree and took it with them.   Trust me I have looked everywhere for it, even under the deck.  So for now, Matt and I are stuck with our perfectly fine old furniture.

That brings to me to the point of this tale, which I will sing to you in the tune of Will Smith's "Fresh Prince of Belair"

This is a story all about how

Our furniture got painted and tricked out now

I'd like to take a minute...tell a story to you

About how our old furniture became brand new.

Out in East Sunrise born and raised

was a boy called Matt who played most of his days

Running around, his parents said

We should buy Matt a dresser and a bed.

Twenty years later who would have known

Matt and I would still be giving that furniture a home.

Laminate, Brass, Retro and Gold

The only thing it lacked was a nice coat of mold.

So I...grabbed up a brush and a can full of paint

All that hard work, I felt like a Saint.

Now as it sits so new in the room

I can definitely say it is no longer doomed.

Two decades later you can't even tell

that his laminate furniture was headed to hell.

Good intentions and a sweet little wife

To that old furniture she gave new life.

Okay, so was that rocking rhyme a complete waste of time or pure genius?
Don't answer that!

Before:

Anyway, I finally finished giving Matt's 20+ year old bedroom set a make over so we could continue using it in our guest bedroom.  I think it has come a long way from where it started, and I will feel comfortable giving it a home for at least another 2.5 years, or until I find that blasted money tree.

After:

Much better!

Reality Check In A Bag

A friend asked me what I was doing today and told me, "I am packing my hospital bag."  I immediately thought, 'yeah, I should probably get on that'.  Seeing as how Neil could decide to make his appearance at any point.  I might only be 35 weeks, but as sure as I get comfortable with the idea of him coming is 5 weeks, he will decide to debut tonight as soon as my head hits the pillow.  No bueno.  I am ready to meet him, but not tonight.  K? Matt is out of town.  Thanks!

That brings me to my hospital bag.  Nothing brings a dose of reality like having to pack a bag to take to the hospital in case of labor, not imaginary labor, but actual pushing a baby out of your body labor.  Whoa Nelly!  I will spare you all of the not so blog friendly things that have to go into your "reality bag" and share with you what I wish was going into my hospital bag.  In theory ALL of these things would make me feel better during and after delivery.

And those are just to name a few.

This whole experience is really making me examine was is going to happen to my body in the aftermath of having a child.  Again, I will spare you the details because I think typing it out would make me blush.  However, I am a firm believer that if teenagers, male and female, knew all of the gory details about childbirth...they would definitely think twice about playing seven minutes in heaven...if you know what I mean.

So to all of the parents of teenagers out there, Halloween is coming up and kids always like a good horror story, why not really freak them out and tell them about Labor and Delivery!

Consider that my PSA for the week.

If the road to hell is paved with good intentions then my blog must be located next door

Because trust me...I have had all sorts of good intentions and have they got me anywhere?  Absolutely not, unless you consider somewhere to be the recliner in front of the T.V.  It is kind of like when you work all day long to get all of your clothes washed and dried but you don't put any of the away...they just sit there and before to long you realize it is easier to just pull what you need out of the huge pile o' clothes than it is to blog fold them.  Eventually though you have to blog fold them.  Bad analogy?  Okay give me a break, I am a little rusty at this.  Actually, I was gone so long that blogger changed somethings, enough things to freak me out and keep me from blogging, so technically it is bloggers fault.  Email them your complaints.

I want to tell you about all about what has gone on in the last month or so.

For starters, Matt, Duece, and I moved across the country.  Yes, that would be the second time in 6 months.  We made the trek from Sierra Vista, AZ and now call Clarksville, TN "home".  It was a fairly uneventful 1600 mile move that took us four days.  It was interested traveling that far while pregnant, but both dad, baby, and I survived.  It was in no small part thanks to my mom who spent her labor day weekend riding with a whiny pregnant woman eating slim jims.

Did we have a home when we got to TN? Absolutely not...we like to keep things interesting.   It isn't as bad as it sounds though because we found a house in a great neighborhood fairly quickly.  Although after seeing the first 10 or so houses on our list I did cry.  In my defense I didn't think a neighborhood in which all of the following could be seen was an appropriate place for a baby to be raised:
1.  Cars on blocks
2.  Men with no shirts, saggy pants, and tattooed tears on their faces
3.  All of the neighbors being allergic to yardwork
4.  Rabid dogs
Agree or disagree?  I thought you would see it my way.

In addition to moving we had to actually MOVE, which meant boxes, all 500 of them.  Actually it was more like 280 (that is not a lie).  280 boxes do not put themselves away.  Isn't the Army supposed to help you unpack?  Well, funny you should ask.  Yes, they are supposed to help us unpack if we request it, but apparently Diamond (again, I can't make this stuff up) decided that he had other things to be doing other than his job.  So Matt and I had to find a place to put all of the crap that I swear multiplies when you put it in a cardboard box with the same ferocity that gremlins multiply when you get them wet.

We are all officially settled in though.  Just this weekend, a full month after moving in, I made the guest room inhabitable and finished setting up little baby Neil's nursery.

On the pregnancy front there is one big development.  My belly button.  It is loosing it's battle.  The sad thing is that there really isn't anything I can do to help it.  I feel like God did bless me with an extraordinarily deep button, so in the best case scenario it will just be come flush with the rest of my skin and I won't be stuck with an awful outie for a few weeks.  No offense to anyone with an outie, but that just isn't for me.

I will be 35 weeks on Monday which means 5 weeks until my due date.
*Commence Freak Out*
HOLY SHITAKE...I just realized that as I typed it.  If the thought of being a parent in 5 weeks or less doesn't really freak you the freak out, then I don't know what will.  Technically we are ready for him.  And by technically I mean his room is ready, the stroller is put together, the car seat is installed, and we really really want to see and hold him.  But holy hannah...we are gonna have a baby!
*End Freak Out*

See, that happens to me every couple of days.  That may or may not include me crying hysterically to Matt that I have no idea what I am going to do.  If that did hypothetically happen, Matt would do a great job of telling me not to freak out.  I like to think that I am doing the freaking out right now so I can be calm when D-day (delivery day) gets here.

More on our impending parenthood later....

So there you have it folks, the last couple of weeks in a nutshell.  Now I have "work" to do, those cookies aren't going to eat themselves.