My brain is all clenchy and my eyes are hurty and I just want to crawl into a dark hole and cry. But my job allows no time off so I'll just whine instead. My migraines have changed their patterns after each baby and I am not liking this new schedule. Every month, along with my joyous cycle, I get to suffer from a migraine for 3 days. And the nausea is overwhelming. Just yuck.
We had a showing today so we all spent the entire morning cleaning and organizing things to show the house and rushed out the door. We found out immediately afterwards that the people thought it was too small and they have 5 kids. I fail to understand how a person can look at a real estate listing and not know immediately that the square footage is to small for a family with 5 kids. You should know how large your current home is and whether or not you need something bigger. Tip of the day: be an educated home buyer. Watch HGTV for a full weekend. Look at every listing in your town. Do drive bys in the neighborhood of anything that catches your eye. Do this at different times of the day and different days of the week. Know what square footage you need and don't look at anything smaller unless your realtor knows that there is something wrong with the listing.
Can I answer any real estate questions for you? I consider myself a very educated home buyer and would love to help you to be the same. Is anyone looking right now? I love the search for a new home but trying to sell is my least favorite thing in the world. I do wish that I hadn't even looked at new houses until we had sold this one but even knowing now that I feel that way, I probably won't do anything different in the future. It's too much fun and everyone always wants to skip to the fun part.
Saturday, August 16, 2014
Friday, August 15, 2014
All I do is feed people
I'm in a place where I feel like all I ever do is feed people or think about what to feed people or shop for food to feed people. It is never ending and takes up all of my time.
We're currently on the market trying to sell our house. I love this house for many reasons but it just isn't working for our family right now and we need something bigger. We've been on the market for about 2 months with no real interest yet so I'd love any prayers or good vibes you have to send the right people our way. I know there's someone out there that is perfect for this house.
And finally, my tip of the day! Hopefully this will be a new thing that I can keep up with. My big girls are back to school as of Wednesday and while it is nice to have more time to focus on my little ones, the early mornings are not my favorite. In order to help with packing lunches, my goal this year is to stay one day ahead whenever possible. So when I'm making lunch for W and myself on Monday, I will make extra for the big girls lunch on Tuesday. This works really well for sandwiches because you can freeze them and then they will stay cold until lunch time. It also works well because I already have all the stuff out and have a knife dirty and it's easy enough to just make 3 of whatever W is having. I want to get some metal thermoses for them so that I can start packing some warm items but that can wait until the weather cools off a little. It's pretty hot in the south in August so they don't really need a warm lunch anyways.
What school lunch tips do you have? Thankfully the older two don't have any food sensitivities or allergies so I don't have to get too creative to get them a balanced lunch but I would love some ideas for getting veggies in at lunch time. They are tired of sugar snap peas, carrots, and bell peppers. Silly girls!
~Heather Tull
We're currently on the market trying to sell our house. I love this house for many reasons but it just isn't working for our family right now and we need something bigger. We've been on the market for about 2 months with no real interest yet so I'd love any prayers or good vibes you have to send the right people our way. I know there's someone out there that is perfect for this house.
And finally, my tip of the day! Hopefully this will be a new thing that I can keep up with. My big girls are back to school as of Wednesday and while it is nice to have more time to focus on my little ones, the early mornings are not my favorite. In order to help with packing lunches, my goal this year is to stay one day ahead whenever possible. So when I'm making lunch for W and myself on Monday, I will make extra for the big girls lunch on Tuesday. This works really well for sandwiches because you can freeze them and then they will stay cold until lunch time. It also works well because I already have all the stuff out and have a knife dirty and it's easy enough to just make 3 of whatever W is having. I want to get some metal thermoses for them so that I can start packing some warm items but that can wait until the weather cools off a little. It's pretty hot in the south in August so they don't really need a warm lunch anyways.
What school lunch tips do you have? Thankfully the older two don't have any food sensitivities or allergies so I don't have to get too creative to get them a balanced lunch but I would love some ideas for getting veggies in at lunch time. They are tired of sugar snap peas, carrots, and bell peppers. Silly girls!
~Heather Tull
Monday, March 3, 2014
Accidental Cavegirl
I've decided to start chronicling our journey through food sensitivities and a modified paleo diet in another space so this page can remain dedicated to my diy projects and crafty things. That space is going to be for those who are interested in a new way of looking at food or who are struggling with food sensitivities in themselves or a family member. Baby B and I would love to have you check out our new digs at An Accidental Cavegirl but make sure to stay tuned here for me to finally get my act together and tell you about the projects I've been working on. I miss you guys!
Thursday, January 16, 2014
Bean burgers, yum!
Sometimes you don't have everything you need to complete a recipe. Like the main ingredient. Sometimes this happens several times a week. You know, to some people. Certainly not me...
I had pinned a recipe for black bean burgers but my pin mysteriously disappeared so I ended up googling black bean burgers to find a recipe. It was less than 15 minutes to supper time, I already had tater tots in the oven, and my baby was screaming her head off so I choose the quickest one I could find. I went to the pantry where I the cans of beans seem to multiply daily and of course, not a single can of black beans to be found. But because I half-ass my meals like I do pretty much everything else, I soldiered on with some navy beans because they were the can in my hand at the time.
Now, I sort of followed the recipe I had looked up but altered it enough that I feel safe saying this is my very own recipe (ha! Almost like I know what I'm doing or something) and I'm going to share it with you because my 10 year old ate THREE patties. We ate them with forks and ketchup because we didn't have any bread or hamburger buns. We had hamburger buns but someone in this house doesn't realize that I only buy buns when I have a plan for them and always eats them before I can get to that meal. Also, not very good at laundry sorting. He makes me crazy. Any ways, here's my recipe.
1 can navy beans, rinsed and drained
1 can red kidney beans, rinsed and drained
half a yellow onion
half a green pepper
1 1/2 teaspoons minced garlic
1 egg
1 tbsp chili powder (I used less b/c of the small ones)
1 tsp cumin
1 tsp salt
1 tsp Frank's wing sauce (I'm obsessed with this stuff, use more if you like it hot)
1 cup panko
Preheat oven to 375F. In a medium bowl, mash the navy beans well with a fork. Add kidney beans and mash not quite as much (because they are harder and you are lazy). Whiz up the onion and green pepper in the food processor. Add them to the beans, throw in everything else and mix well. Form into patties (or balls that you toss on the pan and then smoosh) and bake on a baking sheet for 10 minutes per side. At the end you can broil for a few minutes to add a little color if you would like. This made 7 for me but I wasn't being careful about making evenly sized patties or trying to make them fit on a bun.
I think this would work with any kind of beans you have on hand. I thought about brushing them with egg to get some more color on the outside but then I didn't want to deviate quite that much so I didn't. Try it and let me know if it works or if it makes them gross and weird. This doesn't taste anything like a hamburger but my kids liked them. They added cheese and the 5 year threw some tots on top, which was genius! With the recipe as listed it was a little spicy but nothing they complained about so if you actually enjoy spicy food (I don't) you would want to up the heat factor.
Go forth and eat beans. Don't blame me if you end up accidentally giving your spouse the dutch oven effect.
I had pinned a recipe for black bean burgers but my pin mysteriously disappeared so I ended up googling black bean burgers to find a recipe. It was less than 15 minutes to supper time, I already had tater tots in the oven, and my baby was screaming her head off so I choose the quickest one I could find. I went to the pantry where I the cans of beans seem to multiply daily and of course, not a single can of black beans to be found. But because I half-ass my meals like I do pretty much everything else, I soldiered on with some navy beans because they were the can in my hand at the time.
Now, I sort of followed the recipe I had looked up but altered it enough that I feel safe saying this is my very own recipe (ha! Almost like I know what I'm doing or something) and I'm going to share it with you because my 10 year old ate THREE patties. We ate them with forks and ketchup because we didn't have any bread or hamburger buns. We had hamburger buns but someone in this house doesn't realize that I only buy buns when I have a plan for them and always eats them before I can get to that meal. Also, not very good at laundry sorting. He makes me crazy. Any ways, here's my recipe.
1 can navy beans, rinsed and drained
1 can red kidney beans, rinsed and drained
half a yellow onion
half a green pepper
1 1/2 teaspoons minced garlic
1 egg
1 tbsp chili powder (I used less b/c of the small ones)
1 tsp cumin
1 tsp salt
1 tsp Frank's wing sauce (I'm obsessed with this stuff, use more if you like it hot)
1 cup panko
Preheat oven to 375F. In a medium bowl, mash the navy beans well with a fork. Add kidney beans and mash not quite as much (because they are harder and you are lazy). Whiz up the onion and green pepper in the food processor. Add them to the beans, throw in everything else and mix well. Form into patties (or balls that you toss on the pan and then smoosh) and bake on a baking sheet for 10 minutes per side. At the end you can broil for a few minutes to add a little color if you would like. This made 7 for me but I wasn't being careful about making evenly sized patties or trying to make them fit on a bun.
I think this would work with any kind of beans you have on hand. I thought about brushing them with egg to get some more color on the outside but then I didn't want to deviate quite that much so I didn't. Try it and let me know if it works or if it makes them gross and weird. This doesn't taste anything like a hamburger but my kids liked them. They added cheese and the 5 year threw some tots on top, which was genius! With the recipe as listed it was a little spicy but nothing they complained about so if you actually enjoy spicy food (I don't) you would want to up the heat factor.
Go forth and eat beans. Don't blame me if you end up accidentally giving your spouse the dutch oven effect.
Monday, January 6, 2014
6 weeks
Soooo, it's been awhile. We have a baby yo! A real live, cranky ass baby making our lives all kinds of difficult. She's beautiful and healthy and I feel horrible for complaining but this child is what one might call high needs. We're not sure if she has a food sensitivity like big sister W or if she's just not happy with her lot in life. Either way, we do a lot of bouncing and rocking and even more breastfeeding. That all leaves very little time for DIY and home renovation. But never fear! I still have two furniture builds to show off and we're hopefully going to start searching for our next house soon so that means I need to get my butt in gear and get this house ready to sell. I also have a giant hole in the wall that needs to get a bifold door installed so you can watch me struggle through that. But here is the reason for my radio silence.
Her arrival neccesitated some room switching. We currently have three bedrooms for our four girls so someone has to share. Baby B is still sleeping in our room but I wanted to make all the transitions before her arrival so that the older girls could adjust without blaming this new kid for disrupting their lives.
It was decided that our five year old would share a room with our two year old and that the baby would have her own room but all the toys in the nursery are for everyone. All the girls spend a lot more time playing in there now than they ever did before, which is just par for the course with these contrary ladies. This room sharing meant mama needed to build some bunk beds. I'll get into that project a little more next time but it was my first major solo project and it's still standing so I'm pretty proud.
The girls are doing really well sharing a room but closet space is lacking a little. So of course mama thought 'I can fix that' and out came the Sawzall and crowbar and now there's a big hole in the wall. The projects just never end because I never finish one before starting another. I can't wait to share more pictures and projects with you soon!
But right now my thoughts are trending more towards food and babies and so shall this little blog of mine until Baby B is big enough to give me the time to work on my projects again. I'm itching to stain some cupboards and build some stools but I'm struggling to shower on a regular basis so extra things will have to wait. I'm off the watch Season 3 of Breaking Bad while the whole country flips out about being so frickin' cold. Ta!
It was decided that our five year old would share a room with our two year old and that the baby would have her own room but all the toys in the nursery are for everyone. All the girls spend a lot more time playing in there now than they ever did before, which is just par for the course with these contrary ladies. This room sharing meant mama needed to build some bunk beds. I'll get into that project a little more next time but it was my first major solo project and it's still standing so I'm pretty proud.
The girls are doing really well sharing a room but closet space is lacking a little. So of course mama thought 'I can fix that' and out came the Sawzall and crowbar and now there's a big hole in the wall. The projects just never end because I never finish one before starting another. I can't wait to share more pictures and projects with you soon!
But right now my thoughts are trending more towards food and babies and so shall this little blog of mine until Baby B is big enough to give me the time to work on my projects again. I'm itching to stain some cupboards and build some stools but I'm struggling to shower on a regular basis so extra things will have to wait. I'm off the watch Season 3 of Breaking Bad while the whole country flips out about being so frickin' cold. Ta!
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