Easy, easy dinner

It's so easy, when I sat down to enjoy it, I felt like I had barely done anything at all and Seth loved it.

Thank you Martha.

Sauteed Chicken in Mustard-Cream Sauce

Serves 4

• 4 boneless, skinless chicken breasts (6 ounces each)
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 teaspoon pepper
• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• 1/4 cup dry white wine, or chicken broth
• 1/2 cup heavy cream
• 2 tablespoons Dijon mustard
• 1 teaspoon dried tarragon (or 1 tablespoon chopped fresh)

Directions

1. Sprinkle chicken breasts with salt and pepper. In a large skillet, heat oil over medium-high heat. Add chicken; saute until cooked through, 10 to 12 minutes, turning once. Transfer to a plate; keep warm.
2. Pour wine into hot skillet; cook, stirring, until reduced by half, about 1 minute. Whisk in cream, mustard, and tarragon. Cook, whisking, until thickened, about 2 minutes.
3. Pour any accumulated chicken juices into sauce. Right before serving, drizzle cream sauce over chicken.

I served it with rice and fresh broccoli, but in the future I would probably do a pasta instead.

23 Weeks

Here are me and little meeper girl at almost 23 weeks. Special thanks to my favorite Kristen and making these side shots so much easier (not taking a picture of yourself really makes it feel less awkward).

Baby girl is getting so big and some recent developments include being able to see her little kicks now on the outside.

Everyone keeps asking about names, I hate to disappoint, but I have a feeling she won't have an official name until she goes home from the hospital. I really want to see her first before we decide. Picking a name is such a big deal, that seeing her sweet face would just make the decision so much easier.

"Can I please talk to the manager?"

Apparently I have a reputation that precedes itself when it comes to talking to managers about various customer service issues. But for a rare occasion, this particular situation resulted in a very favorable outcome.

After buying our house last March we set to work remodeling bathrooms, decorating, and buying furniture, when push came to shove the line item in our house budget that took the hit was the dining room set. We figured we could get by with an inexpensive set from JCPenney and save ourselves some money. At first we were happy with the set and then about 6 months ago, screws started coming loose, spindles started to pop out and before long, one of our guests sat in the chair and it completely collapsed. I thought that it was a fluke and there couldn't be any way that 2 more chairs would follow suit in the same fashion. Before long another chair was entirely demolished by another guest and not too long after that another chair started to show the tell tale signs of decline and we retired it from the dining room table.

All of this happening over a year after we bought the set, I thought all was lost and we were just going to have to bite the bullet and fork over the money for a quality set of chairs to replace these sad pieces. I called Penneys and talked to a representative who then sent me on to customer relations. I called back a week later to follow up on the case and sure enough, they were willing to replace the chairs. I pushed back and told them I didn't want them to send new chairs that would just fall apart again (according to online reviews this had happened to other customers). A few days later, I was happy to hear back that they would fully refund us, in cash, what we paid for the chairs and barstools in our kitchen.

The Lord provides! And we are now on a hunt for new dining room chairs and matching barstools. And I figure, over hundreds of dollars later, there is no harm in asking, whats the worst they can tell you?

Grapefruits

Every time I finish off a grapefruit and squeeze out the remaining juice its always gives me such a feeling of satisfaction and the taste of it reminds me of trips to Florida and visits with my Grandma Kay. They had trees in the backyard to pick from and yesterday at the store I finally found grapefruits big enough to match the size of the ones we used to have.

As I sat here today eating it, it made me think of my Grandma, of the special memories spent with her, talking about jazz, education, stories, and life. These were some of my most cherished memories. And today I miss her, its been two years since she has been gone and I wish I could pick up the phone after thinking of her and say hi and tell her she is going to be the great grandma to a sweet baby girl. But oh how sweet that makes heaven. That Lord willing, someday she will know this sweet baby who we eagerly await the arrival of and that she can hear the wonderful stories Grandma told me and maybe even share a grapefruit together.

That would be sweet.

According to Anonymous

"You don't look really look pregnant. You just look like you have been eating too many cookies."

Wasn't really sure if I should understand that to be that she was telling me that I am so small but I look like I have a little pudge or what?

Pregnancy brings out all the good material I guess.

It's a girl!

And I'm not sure you could find two more excited parents. We were so happy when we found out and it has only increased our excitement to meet her. Still deciding on names, but in the meantime, she has already been accumulating a closet full of super cute clothes for her to wear.

In other baby developments, people are finally starting to tell me that I'm showing. Now I really feel like I'm having a baby? But all that to say, I am grateful to still be comfortably wearing my own pants and haven't quite crossed over to the maternity world yet. I figure I will make up for lost time with my size in trimester 3.

Also, she is moving around a ton and last week Seth got to feel her kick for the first time. I think that made his whole week, aside from finding out it was a girl. All in all, feeling pretty good, and already can't wait for November to be here.

"little little meeper"

5 Weeks, before sickness really set in.

12 weeks, finally starting to feel better. Not quite showing.

16 weeks on the beach at Cape May. Showing a tiny bit at this point.

Almost 20 weeks. Still wearing my pants and finally showing a little bump, but not big enough to have that "I am pregnant and that is why I have this gut" kind of look. (I have to say these pictures are terrible looking. Is there really an attractive way to do this?)

We are counting down the days until boy or girl and in the meantime Little Meeper is kicking up a storm. I'm convinced their acrobatic skills start in the womb. It's really the sweetest thing and its just that little reminder that they are in there growing more and more by the day. New life is such a gift from God.