It's the last day of the month and I haven't blogged twice yet. I can relate this to visiting teaching. It seems like the end of the month always comes so quickly, and I am scrambling. (Which is why the 3 people I visit got something dropped off at their houses yesterday.)
I have often heard others refer to "nesting" while pregnant. I think this is starting to happen to me. Lately, I have been really into getting our house spic and span and ready. I feel EXTREMELY busy, but I think that is related to the fact that I just got back from an 8 day vacation to Spokane and our laundry/bills/chores are never-ending.
The first thing we recently did to our house is add curtains to our living room. Wow, if I had known what a difference this would make, I would have done it months ago. We put sheers up almost immediately, but now with curtains on-top of that it feels so homey and we actually have privacy. I don't see when someone is walking by on the trail outside. I have tried taking pictures, but most look tacky and cheap. In person, you'll see that they actually look quite elegant. (Well, as elegant as Walmart can get.)
While I was away on a girls' weekend, I left Andrew a long list of various paint jobs to do throughout the house. He spent several hours and applied numerous coats of paint, but we still have quite a ways to go. I'm thinking we'll do some painting this weekend... (He doesn't know that yet :))
Lately people have been asking me a lot how the nursery is coming and what furniture and baby accessories I have. This question has actually been a bit stressful to me because until this past week, we really had nothing. While in Spokane, my sister-n-laws threw me a surprise baby shower. I got SO many adorable little baby boy clothes and it made me so excited! At the shower, we made some onesies. Check them out below:
I thought of a great answer to "how is the nursery coming?" Black Friday deals! We decided to wait and see if any of the items we wanted went on sale and sure enough, our carseat and stroller did. We purchased them and got over $100 off. The carseat and stroller arrived yesterday and I was giddy and made us open them immediately. In fact, the stroller and carseat are still out in our living room cluttering up the space, but I love to look at them and imagine a little (let's be real.. big) baby boy in them. (I think my neat freak self will come out later this evening and put them away.)
I know we still have plenty of time to finish getting everything ready, but I can hardly wait! I wish we could fast forward time, but I'm sure it will be here soon enough. Here's to blogging before December 31st next month!
Recently someone asked us about good local restaurants near us in Pleasant Grove. I was kind of embarrassed when I didn't have a response. When we get something for dinner, we typically just stick with pizza. If we actually go to a restaurant, we have our "usuals" and don't ever really branch out. These places are typically chains that you can find in many cities. Yes, Cafe Rio and Red Robin are both on the list.
As I've been thinking about why we don't branch out a couple of things have come to mind. First of all, I don't like to spend money on food I can't guarantee that I will like. Secondly, when we have branched out (which is extremely rare), I usually find myself disappointed and mad at myself for choosing that place.
Lately I have been into "Cupcake Wars." One of the winners of "Cupcake Wars" is from Pleasant Grove and has a store within 5 minutes of our house. We were recently at a party and someone there heard we were from Pleasant Grove. Their first question was, having you been to Cravings? They couldn't say enough about how amazing this place was.
After that, I looked into "Cravings" some more and I found out that there are twin sisters who went on cupcake wars together. One owns the cupcake place, and one owns a bistro. Usually when it's date night and my turn to decide, we get pizza or cafe rio and watch our favorite T.V. show which to be honest is getting old. This week date night was different. I think Andrew was pleasantly surprised when I told him I wanted to eat dinner at Cravings Bistro and then top it off with a cupcake at Cravings Alisha's Cupcakes.
I tried to document the occasion with pictures, but daylight savings kind of ruined that idea. It was black outside when we ate dinner. I tried to take pictures inside of each of the places, but they were crowded and even with a flash the quality was poor. I didn't even attempt a picture of us. I have had a miserable cold and you can still tell I've blown my nose too much when you look at my face. The pictures were a bust. You'll have to go for yourself to see.
One thing I noticed when looking up the Cravings Bistro menu online is that the menu said that if you order a grilled cheese, expect at least 15 minutes for it to cook. At the actual restaurant, we counted 3 signs talking about how long it would take and that this isn't a fast food place. I read some reviews online, and that was the one negative comment I consistently noticed.
I decided to order the Thanksgiving grilled cheese. It had green beans in it, potatoes, turkey, stuffing, and probably more. It was delicious. It even had a cranberry dipping sauce, but who likes that? I felt a little stupid because when I ordered the Thanksgiving Dinner, I was expecting a Thanksgiving meal with mashed potatoes and gravy. I was shocked to see it was a sandwich. Andrew ordered the Philly Cheesesteak grilled cheese and before our food came I made him promise to give me a taste before devouring his.
We shared fries between the two of us and I actually liked the fry sauce which is rare. Usually I can only taste the mayo in fry sauce which makes me want to gag. We were both happy with our meals and jumped in the car to head to get our cupcakes. I had looked at the menu beforehand and was looking forward to a Reeses Peanut Butter Cup Cupcake, but there wasn't one.
The Better Than....(This is really what it's called) Cupcake was out of this world though and left me very satisfied. Andrew got a banana cheesecake cupcake (which of course I tried) and it was a big hit. We noticed 15 people at the cupcake place who were also with us at the Bistro. It seems like my "creative" date idea is common.
For our date "activity" I told Andrew I wanted to hang curtains. So practical and I blame pregnancy and nesting. I am sick of just having sheers in our living room though especially when it is so dark at night. I feel like our neighbors can see everything we are doing. The curtains look quite nice. Pictures to come.
I will branch out more now when it comes to restaurants. In fact, we both want to go back to Cravings which is an excellent sign. I will use my resources (internet reviews) before suggesting a new place, but I already have 2 more local places on my "want to try" list.
