move = bittersweet

the moving truck has already been packed and unpacked. i'll admit i completely lost it when it came in the driveway and when it pulled out. have you ever felt excited, anxious, sad, scared, happy and depressed all at the same time? that's how i'm feeling right now. i feel almost paralyzed. silly though cause its just a move a few hours away and people move everyday right?

i have a high school friend moving to another country as a missionary with three kids - if she can do that then why am i being such a putz about moving just a hundred miles away? reality is i am scared. i am getting out of my comfort zone. i am worried about my kids. i know it will all be ok but i am worried - worried we are taking them from their friends and family. are we being selfish or are we doing what is right for our family? my head knows we are but my heart - not so much. i know even three months from now it will be better but for now don't expect me to be the least bit "with it" cause it won't be happening.

this was only half of the stuff and minus furniture

eating healthier

I have decided I want my family to start eating lighter, healthier foods. I don't like the feeling when I eat too much or just really heavy foods. My 2 youngest love veggies so going that route should not be an issue. The oldest is not a fan so much of anything but sweets. Convincing her will take some trickery. I follow tons of blogs and one that I follow is Kraftfoods.com. Last week they posted a blog on zucchini "fries" with lemon aioli as a healthy foods idea. They looked awesome so I knew I had to try them.

There are only 4 ingredients. Zucchini, chicken flavored shake n bake, egg and parmesan cheese.

Cut your zucchini up into "fries". The smaller ones tasted better so cut on the thin side.

Before you put the "fries" in the egg wash go ahead and get your breading mix together. Open up one pouch of shake n bake and put in the bag provided. Add to it approximately 1/4 cup of parmesan cheese. I think we added more but if you aren't a fan just add less.

Next put your "fries" in the egg wash and then into the shake n bake bag. It is recommended that you do this multiple times. Be very careful that the "fries" are not too moist. By the third time the shake n bake would not stick to the zucchini.

Overall the family really enjoyed these. They are best right out of the oven and thin. I think next time I will put the zucchini in salt water and see if that helps with moisture because getting the shake n bake to stick was frustrating. We made a simple remoulade sauce to dip them in so we didn't make the lemon aioli but if you want the recipe you can get it here

oooooh, under the boardwalk, down by the sea, yeah on a blanket with my baby is where i'll be?

it's vacation time! every memorial weekend we take a trip with my sister and her family and my bff that i have known almost my whole life (i know i was under 1 when we met). this year with our new addition it brings the grand total to 8 kiddos under 10. the ages are 1,2,3,4,5,6,8,9!! i know we are crazy. but i keep saying we are making memories, right?

saving cents

With the new baby on the way, it is going to be important for our family to become more 'cent'sible when it comes to purchasing things. I have started reading blogs on using coupons and shopping sensibly. I wish there was a workshop available that teaches you specifically how to be super successful with this. I know it takes work and coupon clipping is a start but I have heard some amazing stories of how women have spent next to nothing or received money back when shopping. I want to be THAT woman. So this is my new quest - hopefully I can get a group together and we can compare savings and have some accountability with spending.

On another note, I signed up for a 5k that will be in a few weeks. Hope I can make it and everyone is not waiting on me to finish. E really wants to run it with her dad and I just don't think she can do 3 miles at his pace so I want to be her fallback but I can't even see my feet anymore so not sure how it is going to play out. Wish me luck!!