Archive for » July, 2008 «

Final Meals

18 Jul 2008 by

Twelve days until Adam’s surgery! If you knew you’d be on a liquid to mushy diet for a few months, what would ask for your final meals? Well, here is the meal countdown of my beloved.

  • Homemade Pizza Rolls
  • Fried Shrimp (for Fridays)
  • Burgers
  • Pot Roast w/ mashed potatoes
  • Chili Dogs
  • Whataburger
  • A Chipotle burrito
  • Brats (so I got him Beer Brats and he might have some Cheddar Beer Chips left if he doesn’t finish the last of the 6 bags I bought him a week ago)
  • Ham and twice baked potatoes
  • Steak ‘n Shake (This is reserved for the night before his surgery)
  • For dessert he’s requested: Brownie a la mode, Chocolate Chip cookies, and Tiramisu

I have a couple of days that are empty on the meal plan. Any suggestions?

Category: Family  5 Comments

Vespa Mileage

16 Jul 2008 by

I’d never thought I’d love the Vespa as much as Adam especially when he would spend hours on the weekends trying to make the thing work.  But I do!  Not for the same reasons. (Sorry, Dear.) For purely financial reason, that’s been a great investment.

So I did the cost analysis on the scooter vs the Scion for Adam’s work commute. The Scion is getting about28 miles per gallon.  Adam says the Vespa is getting about 50 miles per gallon.  Theoretically, in a months time, the Scion would used around $54 while the Vespa would use $8.  The Vespa is using more like $15/month.  That’s still $39 we’re saving in gas each month.

Category: Budgeting  3 Comments

Life Changes Update

13 Jul 2008 by

Thank you all for you prayers and well wishes. Sharon and I have decided to pursue the start-up opportunity. While initially it would have been a paycut, the offer has since been extended to match my current salary. The start-up is so fresh that all it has right now is a name. The documents are in the works for incorporation. As of now we have secured enough work for the next six months and more clients are signing up. It’s a bit of a risk as you can imagine, but what job isn’t? My family’s needs are met, I’ll be given part ownership, and we have an excellent leadership team. This is probably the best opportunity I can ask for if I ever wanted to get on the ground floor of something. In about a month’s time we’ll have an opening press release so I’ll have more information for you then.

This week I begin my series of appointments with the surgeon and hospital in preparation for my surgery. I came across this video the other day on YouTube. The guy had undergone the same procedure to correct his underbite (I have an overbite). At one point you’ll notice he’s wearing a Boilermakers shirt. Good sign!

Category: Family, Work  2 Comments

Home Barber

10 Jul 2008 by

So for about 4 years now, I have been practically begging Adam to let me cut his hair.  Four years!  Ever since I started cutting the kids’ hair, every time we’d go to get Adam’s hair cut, I’d watch very closely.  Really, it didn’t look THAT hard.  My mom used to do my hair until I moved out of the house and went to college!

So after 4 years of begging, he finally let me do it… about 2 months ago.  I didn’t do any research. I just cut his hair off the cuff.  It wasn’t until he started using terms like, “rounding the edges”,” texturing”, and “blending,”  that I realized there’s more to cutting hair than simply being scissor happy.  But gracious as my beloved is, he let me cut his hair anyway, and it came out good enough.

After the fact, I got smart and decided to “google” these terms.  And behold, I came across Expert Village! Score!  A video on how to cut men’s hair!  Once again I ask, What did we ever do without the internet!  Thanks to the video and the fact that my husband’s bushy hair is forgiving of my learning curve, I cut his hair again this morning saving us $15.  Much much better!

Category: Budgeting  4 Comments

Storing up for the Winter

09 Jul 2008 by

I don’t know about you, but I’m irate at the rising cost of just about EVERYTHING!   Gas, food, electricity!  Also with Adam’s job situation, I’ve been looking for ways to tighten the budget.  I run a pretty tight budget to begin with and it’s been a challenge to tighten it even more.

This summer I have really been trying to streamline our grocery budget.  Locally the big supermarket here is HEB.  I’m the type of shopper that only buys produce and meat that is on sale.  I really love HEB, but their “sale” prices aren’t cutting it for our growing family and most of the stuff they have on sale is processed food–which I don’t buy.  Of course there are the super Wal-marts and Targets, but I’m not a big shopper at either of those.  But I did find another little local gem for produce: Sun Harvest.  They have great produce and great sales–and their ads are online too!  And by great sales, I mean you can get great fruits and vegetables for less than $1 a pound.  I can’t remember the last time I got anything for less than a $1 a pound at HEB.  Their sale prices are usually $0.50 less than the same item at HEB.  I picked up some ears of corn last week 4 for $1 and froze them (with some help from Mom Gretencord).  The zucchini was on sale last week($0.77/ lb) and I used those for Adam’s zucchini soup.   It’s not too out of our way for us either because it’s very close to our parish.  Between our weekly Holy Hour on Wednesdays (their double ad day) and Mass on Saturdays, we can easily stock up on good sale items and store up for the winter!

Category: Budgeting  Leave a Comment

Soup’s on!

09 Jul 2008 by

Three weeks until Adam’s surgery. I know he’s not looking forward to the liquid diet. So I’ve been looking for and cooking up some yummy pureed soups since Saturday. So far we have a little less than a quarter of the deep freeze filled with:

  • Lentil Soup
  • Split Pea Soup
  • Zucchini Soup
  • Tomato Basil Soup
  • Butternut Squash-Apple Soup

I still need to whip up some potato soup and carrot soup. Although these are basic recipes, I found them to be very flavorful and am excited to add them to the “Friday Soup” recipes. To make sure Adam doesn’t wither away, I’ll add cream, powdered milk, wheat germ, baby cereal, and/or a protein powder when I serve it up. I don’t have much experience with protein powders, so if any of you can offer some tips, please do. Also, if you know of any good pureed soups, please let me know. Adam’s going to need variety.

Also in anticipation, I bought 2 gallons of Blue Bell ice cream that I found on sale for milkshakes. Although they said he would, I don’t see my hubby getting tired of milk shakes. In a couple of weeks, I’ll whip up a batch of whole milk yogurt to add to fruit smoothies.

Fourth of July brought some good sales on meat. So I also cooked up and froze about 20 lbs meat including: ham, and chicken and pork fajitas. The ham (and probably the chicken) I could easily grind up and add to a couple of the soups. Everything else I pull out as needed at the end of the day for a quick easy dinner for us. Something tells me I might need that for the first two weeks after his surgery.

Category: Events, Family  3 Comments

World Youth Day

08 Jul 2008 by

Pope Benedict has decreed a plenary indulgence to WYD participants and to those who cannot attend but pray for the “spiritual goals of the meeting and its happy outcome.”

The Partial Indulgence is granted to the faithful, wherever they are during the above-mentioned meeting, if, at least with a contrite spirit, they will raise their prayer to God the Holy Spirit, so that young people are drawn to charity and given the strength to proclaim the Gospel with their life.

So that all the faithful may more easily obtain these heavenly gifts, priests who have received legitimate approval to hear sacramental confessions, should welcome them with a ready and generous spirit and suggest public prayers to the faithful, for the success of the same World Youth Day.

We have at least one friend, Zvezdana, who will be going–our prayers are with you Zvez!

One of the many wonderful things about this WYD is that the relics of Blessed Pier Giorgio Frassati will be on display for pilgrims to venerate.

Blessed Pier Giorgio Frassati, pray for us!

Category: Faith  Leave a Comment

4th Fun

05 Jul 2008 by

 Experiencing life through our children is so interesting and sweet.

So yesterday, the highlight of the day (at least for me) was visiting the Dobsons in the hospital and holding baby Nate.  He is SO adorable.  The last time I held a day old baby when I wasn’t recovering from childbirth was Clare–almost three years ago.  Nate is so tiny and so light!  Alexis and Ryan were looking great as new parents too.  After I held him, Therese wanted a turn.  That motherly instinct coming out in her so young.  She was so calm, gentle and sweet with Nate.  Her practice with Gianna really showed.  And Fulton…well, Fulton is all boy…at least he wasn’t opening and closing the doors the WHOLE time like he was when I was in the hospital with Gianna.  His interest in Nate lasted maybe 20 seconds.

The next fun event was going to watch the fireworks in Cedar Park.  Being the homebody introvert that I am, I don’t like crowds and I hate going places where finding a parking spot is nearly impossible.  But we ventured out anyway.  This is the first time we’ve taken them since Therese was 6 months old (barring their Aunt Mary’s graduation fireworks at the farm in Indiana).  The kids were pretty excited.  And parking and finding a place to watch took hardly any time at all.  The wonder and amazement and questions about fireworks we got was pretty fun–yeah, explaining where the come from to a 4 year old!  When they finally started Fulton couldn’t contain himself as he practically yell, “YEAH!!!” after EVERY firework for the first 5 minutes or so.  Cute.  By 10 minutes, he and Therese were pretty silent.  And by 15 minutes when the fireworks started getting loud, Fulton’s ‘yeah’s had turned into, “Don’t like it!”  And this morning when I asked them what their favorite part of the fireworks show was…”We didn’t like it, Mommy.  It was too loud.”

Category: Family, Friends  Leave a Comment

Life Changes

04 Jul 2008 by

My Work

As most of you know, my company is closing down. Many of the employees – myself included – were fortunate enough to have received this news well in advance before our respective roll-off dates and will receive a decent exit package should we stay on to the end. All our clients have been notified and we are working to bring all existing projects to a successful completion.

So what’s next?

I have been blessed to have numerous opportunities presented to me in the last few weeks. Friends and colleagues have shared my resume and have written very kind recommendations for me on LinkedIn which have contributed to my present situation: I have three offers on the table.

This is a very good thing and very humbling, but it is also very challenging. In past similar situations it was always clear what choice I should make – either because I only had one choice or there was a clear-cut winner. This time it is not so easy. Each offer has their strong points and their weaknesses. To quickly summarize them:

  1. Senior Flash Developer with a local competitor of my current company
  2. Senior Interactive Developer with an online gaming company
  3. Director of Technology with a start-up

I’m sure you can guess what are the pros and cons to each. Some good news is that each of these are 1) located in Austin so thankfully we don’t have to consider moving and 2) are flexible on a mid-August start date. This permits me to stay on at my current position until my roll-off date and then proceed to take care of…

My Health

After nearly two years of splint therapy and orthodontics I will finally be undergoing orthognathic surgery at the end of the month. I’ll spare you all the gory details (visit the link for that) but I will tell you that I’ll be in the hospital for a couple days and recovering at home for at least two weeks. For about six weeks Gianna and I will be on the same meal plan (liquid and soft foods), which will make things a bit easier for Sharon. My wonderful bride is already preparing a list of delicious new soups to try. In the meantime, I need to start packing on the pounds because I know the ones I have won’t stay around for long. Bring on the cakes, cookies, donuts, and burgers! :)

Category: Family, Work  6 Comments

Congrats to the Dobsons!

03 Jul 2008 by

Alexis and Ryan were blessed with their first child yesterday…little Nathan James.  I must say, Alexis, is quite the journalist and I know quite of few people including myself have been stalking their blog daily for news of their little miracle. We are so blessed to have their friendship and thankful for God’s promises fulfilled in their lives.

I am coordinating a meal ministry for them.  So if some of you cross readers would like take these wonderful new parents a meal in the next few weeks, let me know and I can send you the pass codes to their CareCalendar.  By the way, I’m a total fan of the CareCalendar and recommend it to anyone who is in need of meals or other help during a life changing event such as (but not limited to) having a baby.

Category: Friends  One Comment
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