You've Gotta Try This...

First off, we’ve gotta talk something about Kale.

I’d never had this green before, but recently I saw a recipe for kale chips on Pintrest (dude, if you aren’t pinning yet, get your bootay on over there!) and decided to give it a try. Dang! CPT Fromage and I haven’t bought a bag of potato chips in a month, which is huge for a couple that was going through something like 3 bags a week before this discovery. Besides the fact that this is the tastiest snack ever, kale is also a “super food” and, obviously, much healthier than the deep fried stuff we were buying before.

Super easy. Preheat your oven to 350 degrees, wash and dry your bunch of kale and tear into smallish-mediumish pieces – about the size of a potato chip. Drizzle with olive oil (I use extra light extra virgin) and sprinkle with salt (We’ve been enjoying Pink Himalayan Sea Salt, but use whatever you prefer). Spread onto a baking sheet in a single layer and bake for 16-18 minutes. Pull those bad boys out when the edges start to get brown and enjoy!

Are you back from your snack? You’re welcome!

On to some lame sauce news. My bestie in the whole wide world lost her baby last week. She was almost 32 weeks and we were so excited about raising our little boys together. She’s in the less than 1% of moms who suffer this tragedy so late in the process and my heart is broken for her and her husband. Life just isn’t fair. At all. In the midst of it all, I feel a little bad being happy about how well our little man is doing, but I’m relieved to say Baby Fromage is growing big and strong (he’s measuring about a week ahead, going to be tall like his daddy I suppose!) and it looks like the down syndrome and/or heart problem the doctors were concerned about are worries of the past.  

So good stuff since my last (forever ago) post… Kale chips, a healthy baby and we’ve made it a whole month without getting shanked out here (because, dude, if I’m ever going to get shanked, it’s going to be in this town!)

It’s a….

Wonderful baby boy!

We really had no idea what to expect, but we were wary of the Combat Arms Curse. It’s a phenomenon among Combat Arms Officers, they only have little girls. Dude, it’s weird, but it’s a rarity to meet one of those daddies with a boy. Of course, the less superstitious fact is that CPT Fromage’s family has only had 1 natural born girl in the last 100+ years, so on that hand the odds were in our favor for a little man. I guess genetics paired with the fact that CPT Fromage is in the middle of a branch transfer out of Combat Arms blessed us with the boy we deep down both wanted. (We totally would have been thrilled for a girl too, but we’ve both always dreamed of having a boy)

Hooray for tiny ties, sweet little sweater vests and 3-piece suits for 3-year-olds! I feel like I’m the only woman in the world who thinks shopping for boy clothes is more fun than buying for little girls, but dang, they make some sharp outfits for little fellas!

Our little man doesn’t have a name just yet but he does have a crib, a decent supply of diapers and a closet full of second-hand clothes (neither CPT Fromage or I can justify spending $10+ on a single outfit when we can pick them up gently used for a tenth of the price… They’re just going to get spit up and pooped on anyway). CPT Fromage is already an involved dad and has bought
some handsome outfits for our little man (A great husband and a great dad-to-be! What a lucky family we are!)

It’s obviously a lot of fun baby shopping (except when it hits the checking account!), but nothing compares to how exciting it is feeling him kick, hearing his tiny heartbeat or saying hello via ultrasound. We still have 21 more weeks ‘til we get to meet our little guy and I’m hopelessly in
love already!

That Went Well…

Pardon my absence. Moving chaos, you know…

The packers messing up all of my organizing was nothing compared to what was to come!

A U-Haul a size too small (note: a king size mattress won’t fit in the 14 foot truck) was the first crisis, perhaps prepping us for the one to follow…

Our apartment is significantly smaller than the display unit we were shown a few months ago. So much smaller that I’m surprised we can even fit said mattress in the master bedroom. Nothing else fits with it! Goodbye, dresser and nightstand, I’ll miss having drawers…

“Hello, Storage Facility? I’ll need to upgrade to a larger unit please, for all of our furniture that we anticipating using, but now can’t…” (Thank God they had a size up coming available the next day)

The movers went to drop off all of our extra things in our newly-upgraded unit on Saturday, but of course, there was a problem with our security code, and, because how else would this go down but on a weekend, when no one was in the office. CPT Fromage had fun dealing with that.
I wasn’t dealing with any moving chaos because I was in the hospital.

There’s no more convenient time to be admitted for vomiting up blood than during a move to a town where you don’t know a soul. Three long days later I was discharged and spent my second night in our new home.

Of course, once I got home, we found out our air conditioning unit wasn’t installed properly so we spent a fun day in the 90+ degree heat! What’s with this spring weather?! Shout out to our awesome maintenance guy who spent the whole day, plus some, getting us cooled off.

I’m not sure what’s coming next, but hopefully the next few weeks are filled with nothing more than unpacking, settling in and relaxing.

On a more fun note… I was sent for an ultrasound while I was laid up, and we got a great view of Baby Fromage’s little baby parts! We’ve been buying… Blue? Pink? Hmmm… Check back! :)