What's cookin'?

Now that I'm feeling better I'm back in the kitchen and experimenting with new recipes...

Sunday we tried this Beef Chorizo Nachos recipe(I didn't use any chorizo) from Sunset Magazine.

I love cooking, I only wish that I had more time to indulge. Another favorite of mine from Sunset is their Edamame Wonton recipe (I added chicken).

I think next time I have extra funds and extra time (ha ha ha) culinary classes will be a pastime that I take up. Josh and I love watching Top Chef (on Thursdays after Survivor because Wednesdays at 10 is too late for us), if we had a bigger kitchen I think we'd start having quick fire challenges in our house to decide who cooks dinner.

Discussions about names

I'd like to share another recent memorable conversation. I thought now that we've got a date for the next ultrasound it might be a good time to discuss names. The following took place about two weeks ago between Josh and I.

Josh: "Where did this 50,000 baby names book come from?"

Jen: "Oh, my mom thought it would be helpful so she let me borrow it."

Josh: "Helpful for what? We already decided baby names."

Jen: "Josh, you can't be serious we talked about names years ago, before we were even married. It was hypothetical now we're talking about a living being."

Josh: "Do you like the names we talked about?"

Jen: "Yes..."

Josh: "Well then what's to discuss?"

Jen: "Josh, I think we should at least talk about it."

Josh: "When I go to a restaurant, I look at the menu, decide what I want and then stop looking."

Jen: "Ok, for the sake of arguement I'll follow your analogy. You haven't even looked at the menu! "

I'm happy to report that I had a captive and cooperative audience for name discussion. (of course being stuck in the car on a seven hour road trip really helped)

One crazy weekend

Our weekend can be summed up like this. Concord - Crestline, Crestline - Rancho Cucamonga, Rancho - Temecula, Temecula-Crestline, Crestline - Fallbrook, Fallbrook - Crestline, Crestline - Concord. Whew, I'm tired are you?

We had a lovely weekend in southern California visiting Josh's parents (Janice was my road trip buddy down to LA, bless her for flying up just to keep me company driving down to Southern California as Josh left early to be part of the wedding festivities). We got to celebrate a wedding for a very dear friend of ours and his lovely new bride, Liza.

Lola got spoiled at Gary & Janice's spending the day chasing squirrels, walking around the lake and snuggling with Gary & Janice.

Baby Smith has transitioned from Plum to Peach and now Lemon. We continue to pray for healthy development. I added a poll to the blog, you can cast your vote for what you think baby Smith will be. The determining ultrasound is on May 20 and yes that means we will be finding out if the baby cooperates.

Musings from the past two months

Josh and I found out in February that we were going to have a baby. I woke Josh up around 2am to tell him. He was in a deep sleep so it took a few minutes to register what I had said to him, when it did he sat bolt up right "Holy ...." Needless to say neither of us really went back to sleep that night. A few hours later as we were still awake we had this "WHAT NOW?" moment of panic, I've been told there will be many more of those to come.

It worked out that we were able to tell both sets of parents in person. Lola really did the telling. She sported a homemade shirt saying "I'm going to be a BIG sister." We're not really dog clothes type of people but it was pretty funny.

For those of you wondering, I have battled mild morning sickness usually culminating in a Saturday morning throw up. Lola is intensely curious about this whole thing and follows me into the bathroom. The first time she got her face right up next to mine as I got a little splash back and shouted for Josh to get the dog and bring me a towel. The next time it happened Brieanne and Brandon were over visiting. Josh had just finished painting our front door and as I ran upstairs I heard Josh calling after me (he had no idea what was going on) "How does the door look? Jen, what do you think of the door?" To which my sister responded, "I don't think she really cares about the door right now."

One of my favorite reactions to the news was my sister. Here is an abbreviated version of our email conversation. * Note: she is the first person we told.

Me: "can you keep a secret?"
B: "Yes."
Me: "I'm pregnant."
B: "Shut up, are you kidding?"
B: "Hello, write me back. Are you joking?"
* I'm furiously typing a response but I guess I can't keep up with bullet finger Brieanne.
B: "Well, if you are check out (insert list of like three or four baby websites here)."
Me, finally: "I'm completely serious but you can't tell anybody yet."
B: "When are you telling?"
Me: "April."
B: "APRIL?"
B: "is it April yet?" * note, this was back in February.
B: "When are you due?"
Me: "October."
B: "if the baby is born on mine and Brandon's anniversary might I suggest Brandianne or Brieandon as the name."
B: "is it April yet?"