Rainy Days

The last few days have been rainy. I actually haven’t had many rainy days with a baby that likes to play outside. Now that Jif is old enough to play outside he gets a little stir crazy inside. He has toys but he gets really tired of them. What do you do with your kids on rainy days? We took a walk outside with the umbrella but he was more interested in the umbrella than the rain. We read some books, played with toys, and threw some tantrums. He just likes to explore, can you blame him?

What are you going to be for Halloween? We found Jif’s costume. It is a black sweat suit with white bones on it. It was only $7 at babies r us. I think that a skeleton is a great costume for him. I mean, have you seen him lately? He’s practically dwindling away in the 95th percentile.

My husband has been super busy lately. Studying long hours, often studying from 8 am to 8 pm. Lately that even includes Saturdays. Sometimes it’s hard to be going through the first semester of law school. I hear that it gets better from here. How do we cope? Smoothie nights. Every night after we put Jif to bed we make smoothies out of whatever fresh fruit, yogurt, and ice that we have in our house and we read together, or watch a show on the computer, or just talk. It is a great way to wind down and I find that my husband looks forward to it every night. He says that smoothie night helps prevent him from getting burned out. Smoothies used to be my favorite food. Growing up I never really liked sugary fatty foods. I hated frosting. That all changed when I got pregnant with Jif. The only thing that didn’t make me throw up was sugary fatty foods. Now, in memory of my pregnancy, I love sweets: even frosting. I think that I liked myself better when I hated frosting because now I can’t get enough of it. Smoothie night helps, I can trick myself into eating something healthy for dessert.

Despite my out of control cravings for junk food, I am actually doing pretty well on the “biggest loser challenge”. I bought a Jillean Michaels dvd and it is tough. I do the 50 minute dvd every day and I am 10 pounds lighter than my pre-pregnancy weight and I am losing the extra stomach that lingered from my pregnancy. I still don’t know what to do about the stretch marks. I don’t recommend having a 10 pound baby, but I guess it’s better than a 4 pound baby.

So today I am going to a luau. I need to bring a dessert. Should I make coconut cream cake or what my mother-in-law calls “Mormon crack”? Mormon crack is yummy butterscotchy peanut butter bars. They are delicious, but then so is the coconut cream cake.

http://docs.google.com/View?id=dfm5prnb_0gjf28dq9

Here is the link to a delicious recipe of Aunt Shawn’s Coconut Cream Cake