Catching Up and Marching On

Happy March, everyone! Honestly, February was not my best month, so I'm looking forward to a much better one this time around. So moving on from my major lack of posts last week, we're on a roll with two in the first two days of March! Let's play catch up...

My parents came to visit for a few days last week and got to join us at a My Gym class!

I took advantage of my mom's presence and had her help me buy a ton of wine at BevMo (5 cent sale for the win!). Terry and I are helping to organize a big reunion for a range of years from our college summer job, and I got to be in charge of alcohol. We hit up Costco for beer and came in under budget for everything, so then we bought more. :-) 

Speaking of beer, I took my parents to True Food Kitchen, one of my favorite restaurants, and tried this organic Pilsner. It was delicious and tasted like Prague. :-) (I only had sips of beer while in Europe last time because I was pregnant, but I got the idea and loved them all!)

This weekend I completed a full-body strength workout, and it felt fantastic! I wrote "30 minutes," but I was way too optimistic. Reality: I did it twice through, but 20 minutes is better than nothing! It was tough and my hamstrings were nice and sore the next day.

My friend's mom is becoming an amazing photographer and asked if Marshall could model for her, so we went out on Saturday morning for a little photo shoot. I took this glamour shot on my phone. Hers are better.

Saturday night Marshall got to hang out with Jenn and Justin while Terry and I attended an awards dinner (my stud of a husband got an award with his team at work!). We had fun dressing up and hanging out with adults and pretending we weren't too tired to stay up past ten. I even got all fancy with my hair and tried a side ponytail.

Turns out side ponytails are SUPER in right now, because I saw about thirty others at the party. Oh, well. At least I'm up with the trendy kids (er, engineers and engineers' wives).

Saturday night was Marshall's first time being babysat with non-family, and he did great! (Unless Jenn is lying, but I'll take her word for it.) We had no sleeping option for him, though, so on Friday we went shopping for a travel crib. We never bought a play yard, even though it seems like everyone has one, because I couldn't figure out what we would use it for. Well, once Marshall grew out of his co-sleeper, we decided we wanted something he would fit in for at least another year. The Pack 'n' Plays seemed so little, and since Marshall is a pretty tall kid, we decided on the Joovy Room^2. It's huge and simple and exactly what we needed. The Pack 'n' Play would have been great if we needed more bells and whistles, because they have options for changing stations for newborns or little napping cocoons, but with our small house we never needed an extra spot like that. So I think this option will work great for when we go places where Marshall will need to sleep, and it should work for at least a year or two!

Oh and here's a photo from the dinner we attended:

(Blurry, because hotel lighting is less than awesome.)

Yesterday I had meal-planning block, so we made it a super quick grocery trip, but I think we'll still eat well for a few days. Bananas, milk, salsa, bell peppers, canned tomatoes, spinach, frozen broccoli and peas, Ak-Mak crackers, tea, heavy cream, and tortillas.

Our only planned meals this week:

Sunday: blueberry pancakes, veggie chicken quesadillas, tomato bisque

Monday: leftover blueberry pancakes, leftover bisque, chicken legs with this quinoa squash pilaf my mom suggested from Trader Joe's (frozen section)

Tuesday: leftover veggies from Sunday with eggs, out to lunch, leftover chicken and pilaf

Wednesday: who knows? 

We'll figure it out as the week moves along.

And now for some miscellaneous photos:

Scout is not allowed on the kitchen counters (pretty much our only no-cat zone), but sometimes when I feed Marshall he climbs up there because he knows I can't do anything about it until I'm done feeding the baby. Such a butthead.

On Friday I got to be the one to take Marshall into the pool for swim class. It was SO fun! I was nervous (Terry was a competitive swimmer and even taught little kids, so he's more confident with dunking an infant in the water than I am), but we did well. Pre-class family selfie!

Marshall now grabs the cart like this pretty much every time we go shopping.

We got a travel high chair like this one and practiced with it at home. It attaches to a regular chair and holds him up. So funny!

And that's it for today! Hope your March is off to a fantastic start. I'm determined to make this month a great one!!!

When was the last time you went to a fancy party? 

What's your favorite beer or wine? Beer: Beach House Amber from Strand Brewing Company. Wine: Frank Family Zinfandel (red) or Alpha Omega Chardonnay (white), but I'll take champagne over those any time, probably J Vineyards.