1st Cereal

Jake had his first rice cereal a few days ago. It was a fun little event. I introduced him to the spoon a little while back--let him play with it, chew on it, and would sometimes give him gripe water with one. I did this so he wouldn't be shocked by both a spoon and cereal at the same time, plus he was more prepared to open wide for the spoon. His first go at rice cereal wasn't bad or really good either. His second time to have it he opened up for it and by the third time it was like I couldn't get it in his mouth fast enough. Anyway, here are some pics from his first time:

"This looks like fun, mom! What are we going to do?"

 "Oh.... that's not what I was expecting..."

 "Yeah, that stuff was gross."

 (As I'm holding another spoonful off camera) "Wait, you want me to do that again?"

Like, I said... he's pretty happy eating the rice cereal now. I am going to try him on some green beans next, then maybe some squash and then some sweet potatoes. I don't want to start him on fruits until he tries the veggies first. From what I've read it seems that starting the least sweet things first will lessen the chance of rejection. I mean, would you want to go from bananas and apples to green beans and squash? Yeah, I didn't really think so.

25

Bryce and I both turn 25 today. Yes, for those of you who didn't know, my husband and I share the same birthday. Its kind of weird, but kind of cool at the same time. Last night we went to dinner with my best friends, Kileen and her husband and Jessica. It was delicious (fried pickles at Texas Roadhouse made my day). After dinner we came home, watched our backed up DVR, and played some xBox before bed. I had rehearsal today for a few hours today and we are now going to run some errands, do some fun shopping and go to dinner, just the two of us. We are still trying to decide where. 25 is a big number and this will be a big year for us. Just a few things coming up:

• I am finishing my master's degree and giving my final required recital
• Baby Nielson is coming this July
• Our 5th anniversary this June

Freezer Meals

Does anyone do freezer meals? I have been doing a little research on freezer meals (often referred to as once a month cooking) and I think its a great idea. By NO means do I want to cook just once a month, but I would like to make and freeze 3 meals a week. I teach until 8 pm twice a week and would like to have one extra meal hanging out for the night I just don't feel like cooking. So, for those of you that do freezer cooking, I have a few questions:

• Do you have any favorite freezer meal recipes? 
• Are there any ingredients/meals that don't freeze well?
• How do you wrap your freezer meals so that they don't get freezer burn? 
• What day (or days...or time of day) do you find easiest to cook your meals? 

Thanks ahead of time for any advice you have for me! Hope everyone had a good weekend.

Saving

I started couponing. (Is that a real word?) Anyway, I got the paper and cut out all the coupons that I would use. Then I perused the ads to figure out what to buy now and where. So today I went to Smith's, Rite Aid, and Walgreens to get all my stuff. I saved more than I spent everywhere I went (by a LOT). My favorite deal was 10 for $10 on Colgate toothpaste at Smith's (which you don't have to buy 10 to get the deal, btw) and then I had a coupon for 75c off and another for 50c off Colgate toothpaste. So I got 2 regular-sized tubes of toothpaste for 75c. They are normally $2.50 a piece. Now THAT is a deal.

Also, we are trying to work on our grocery budget. To do this, we are writing out a weekly menu and planning it around what we already have. I found a great website where you can enter ingredients in and it will give you a list of recipes that use your ingredients. We have planned most of this week's meals needing no extra groceries. I am hoping that we don't have to buy more than $50 in groceries before going to Houston in 2 weeks. Here's hoping...

100

This is my 100th post!! So I would like to take the time to tell you 100 things I love/am grateful for.

1. Husband
2. My Mom
3. My Dad
4. In-laws
5. 2 Best Friends
6. Music
7. School
8. A Job (that I LOVE)
9. Sister
10. Brothers- and Sisters-in-law
11. The Gospel
12. My Cats
13. Health
14. The Temple
15. The Savior
16. All of my music friends that help grad school be bearable
17. My Teachers
18. Scholarships
19. Government Grants
20. A nice house to live in
21. Clothes on my back
22. Food on my table
23. Shoes on my feet
24. The Bible
25. The Book of Mormon
26. Living Prophets today
27. The gym
28. Hugs
29. Kisses
30. Unconditional Love
31. Crafts
32. A creative mind
33. Missed opportunities that help lead to better opportunities
34. Utah's love for community theater (which has allowed me 2 operatic roles outside of school this summer)
35. Opera
36. The Armed Forces that keep our country safe
37. Freedom
38. Christmas
39. Friendly neighbors (finally!)
40. 2 Cars, even though Bryce and I mostly share just 1
41. The Internet
42. Halloween
43. Setting Goals
44. Making Lists
45. Airplanes (even though my recent experiences with flying/purchasing tickets may have made me feel otherwise)
46. 4th of July 
47. Decorating
48. Teapots
49. TV--specifically some of my favorite TV shows, including:
50. Friends
51. Gossip Girl
52. Grey's Anatomy
53. and Anything on Bravo
54. Ikea (especially since we are still poor college students)
55. Bubble Baths
56. Massages
57. Manicures/Pedicures (and a mother-in-law who loves to get them when she visits)
58. Air conditioning during the hot summer months
59. Snow
60. That I can help others be better at something
61. Blogging/Reading others' blogs
62. Easter 
63. Chocolate
64. Thanksgiving
65. Movie marathons curled up on the couch
66. TV season marathons with Jess
67. Shopping
68. Hope/Planning for the future
69. Traveling 
70. Having to get up really early for something exciting
71. Staying up way too late
72. Talking on the phone to people I can't see often
73. Curiosity (especially from my cats)
74. Hobbies
75. Reconnecting with long lost friends
76. Facebook
77. A washer and dryer in my house
78. Watching sports on TV
79. Going to a baseball game
80. Babies (no experience with my own yet, but one day)
81. Being a girl
82. Lace, Ruffles, and Pearls
83. Video games to keep my husband occupied when I need to get something done
84. Having a really clean house (it doesn't happen often, but it feels so good when it does)
85. Generosity of others
86. Camping
87. Finding new craft ideas online
88. Playing games
89. InStyle magazine that comes in the mail once a month 
90. The Ensign
91. Real Simple magazine that also comes in the mail once a month
92. The Classical Singer website and all of the useful information it contains (including auditions)
93. A computer
94. Houston (which Bryce and I both miss terribly, although I don't know if we'll be saying that after we go home for 2 weeks in August)
95. Dreams
96. Funny Stories
97. Celebrity Gossip
98. Dancing
99. My iPod 
100. Sleep

Ewww

I don't understand why. They had pickle and mustard flavors too... ewww

Smoothies

So, I have not set my sleeping habits yet (dang addicting Olympics). But, I have been writing up weekly menus before I do my grocery shopping. This way we have no excuse to eat out. I rarely have time in the morning to eat breakfast, so I usually end up grabbing a granola bar and going. This does not hold me over until lunch. Eating breakfast also helps jumpstart your metabolism for the day. I was searching online for healthy, filling, quick breakfasts and the #1 result was smoothies. I bought some orange juice, soy protein powder and frozen fruit. I used my full-sized blender to make one or 2 smoothies last week, but my blender is a pain to clean. So I was searching online for the Magic Bullet, because I've heard its amazing... until I found out it was $60. Not exactly what I was hoping to spend. As I was doing my grocery shopping last night, I decided to check out the blender aisle, when I found this:

The Bella Cucina Rocket Blender. It is basically the exact same thing as the Magic Bullet, but 1/2 the price. So, I called Bryce up and had him look it up online for the reviews. It only got 3 out of 5 stars, but so did the Magic Bullet. Most of the bad reviews are just complaints after people try to chop big chunks of ice (you need to have smaller pieces) or make salsa (makes it too fine). I tried it out this morning, for my daily smoothie and it worked like a charm. I didn't put any ice in mine since I was using frozen fruit, but there were no chunks left. My favorite part is that it comes with 5 cups, so even if I don't do dishes one or two days, all I have to do is hand wash the blade and I'm ready to go for the next day. Plus, it only took about 5 minutes total to make. Now on to my fitness goals...

Habits

I have set many goals for myself this year, as you may remember. This semester has started off crazy and, needless to say, I have not gotten a jump start on really any of my goals. I was informed by a pre-med student in the group voice class I teach that studies have shown that it takes 2 weeks to form sleeping patterns (ie, going to bed at the same time every night and waking up at the same time every day, thus getting more restful sleep). I researched a little online and found that it takes an average of 21 days to form a habit, such as working out, eating healthy, daily chores, studying, etc. 21 days (3 weeks) seems like a long time, but I am determined to make some good habits for myself. My school schedule is set, so why can't I make an effort to form habits that will help me reach my goals? So, here's the plan for my habit-making:

1. Go to bed at 11:30 pm every night and wake up at 7:30 am every morning.
2. Work out 5 days a week. I have not completely decided what days these will be, but right now I'm thinking M-Th and Saturday mornings.
3. Make lunch at home and take it to school with me. This is ultimately about not eating fast food because I forgot or didn't have enough time to make a lunch.
4. Stick strictly to my school schedule. I have times set aside for practicing and studying, but rarely use them. I need to stick to them so that I don't have to do any of that at home.

These 4 are all I'm going to worry about for now. It is going to take some strict effort on my part to stick to this plan, so I don't want to overwhelm myself by adding in more things. I will update with how things are going. Wish me luck!

Note to self...

no matter how skinny you feel on any particular day, never, I mean NEVER change into your skinny jeans to look cute for a night out... and then go to Rodizio Grill (or any other Brazilian all-you-can-eat type place). Everything is so delicious, I had to try it all, which meant by the time we were leaving, I felt like I was going to pop. Needless to say, I unbuttoned those skinny jeans as soon as we got to the car. It was a WONDERFUL birthday dinner with the hubby.