Bump Day: 13 weeks

Hey friends! Today marks the start of my 13^th week of pregnancy. Most people think 13 is an unlucky number, but not this girl. As someone who identifies herself as having rotten luck, I’ve sort of adopted it as a suitable insignia. I even went so far as to voluntarily choose it as my soccer number in college. And now it’s fitting that our wee baby will be born in 2013.  

Further proof that 13 is a good number:  this is the first week that I’ve had a consistently visible baby bump. So from now on (well until around October 23^rd, Lord Willing), Wednesday will be known on the blog as ‘Bump Day’ (cute word play blatantly stolen from my friend Pam). Last week we had our 12 week ultrasound and were given 5 photos of the jellybean from various angles. Here is an inside peek: 

Kinda looks like Jonathan, dontcha think?

And here is an outside peek:

 PS. How badly do I need a tan? Yikes.

Weekly Pinterest Project: Pulled Pork Sammiches

Last week I was struck with a craving for messy, juicy, bar-b-quey, pulled pork sandwiches. I’d heard a rumor that these could easily be made with a jar of BBQ sauce and a slow cooker, so I set out to find a simple recipe on Pinterest. My searchings for ‘easy pulled pork crock pot recipes’ all yielded results requiring me to make my BBQ sauce from scratch. Ain’t nobody got time for that. 

Then I found this pin, which had basic directions, but wasn’t actually linked to a more detailed recipe. 

The general instructions were included in the caption beneath. This was the recipe I had to work with: "EASIEST BBQ PULLED PORK-pour your favorite bbq sauce in the bottom of crock pot, add a little onion (opt), rub seasoning salt on our pork loin and place it in crock pot. I added a little water. Pour a little bbq sauce on top of loin and cook on low 6-8 hrs. Remove meat and place in lg. bowl, use 2 forks to shred and then place it back in crock pot and add more bbq sauce. Cook another 15-30 min. Absolutely the easiest way to make pulled pork! "

I was a tad nervous to try to new dish with such round-about, non-specific instructions, but was tempted by the simplicity. 

This was my first time ever cooking a pork dish, so I was a little lost on the meat aisle. Jonathan had requested Pork Loin since it’s the least fatty cut, but the closest I could find was Pork Loin Joint. 

It had quite a load of fat on the surface, which was in direct contradiction to my sweet hubby’s request, so I spent a solid 30 minutes trimming the fatty parts off of the loin. Now, my food aversions have improved greatly over the past week, but I’m still not in a place where I enjoy being intimately involved with a piece of raw meat. 

Once I managed to substantially de-fat the pork loin, I poured about half a bottle of BBQ sauce into the bottom of the crock pot and added ¼ cup of onions. I then rubbed the pork down with salt, pepper, and Tony’s (also not a pleasant prego experience) before placing it into the slow cooker. I added another ½ cup of BBQ sauce on top of the pork loin, and also added about ¼ cup of water. 

Then I let it cook covered on low for 5 hours and high for 1 hour. It could easily cook on low for 7-8 hours if you need to leave it all day. After about 6 hours of cooking, I separated the pork and shredded it before placing it back into the pot and stirring it into the sauce, making sure each morsel was coated with heavenly goodness. 

I let it marinate on low for another 30 minutes before diving in. I like my pulled pork on a hamburger bun with cheese and mustard, which is just how Jonathan likes his as well. 

It was another Jonathan approved recipe, one which he even ate a third helping of. I was especially pleased that he mentioned how lean the meat was, assuring me that my highly uncomfortable 30 minute raw meat session was not in vain.   

And even though I got the smallest loin cut I could find, there was still plenty left over…well until Jonathan tripped over Samson and accidently dropped the leftovers, at which point last night's dinner quickly became dog food. Samson and Bailey were also big fans of the pulled pork experiment. Sam ended up with quite a bit of it on his back, which Bailey was courteous enough to lick clean for him. Having two dogs finally paid off! 

Now, pre-pregnancy, I was not a big fan of pork (hence me being a pork cooking virgin before this), but with my recent disgust with poultry, I’ve had to substitute with the other white meat. Now that my aversion to chicken has been significantly reduced, I think I’ll try a similar version of this recipe with chicken breasts. I found an actual recipe here, though it calls for the making of your own BBQ sauce as well. Don't these people know that you can buy this stuff ready-made??? (You can take the girl out of America, but you can't take the America out of the girl....)

Now I realize that most of my pinterest projects lately have been recipes, but I’m ready to get my craft on. We decided on a theme for the nursery and I’d love to make some homemade things to decorate the room with. The theme is the sky and we hope to fill it with clouds, hot air balloons, stars, and sunshine. For instance, how adorable is this cloud mobile: 

(Original Source)

If that's not worth having a baby for, I don't know what is.

I could either spend a whole lot of money on etsy or I could use my position as ex-pat housewife to make some of these items myself. If you see any crafting projects along these lines, please let me know. And if you wanna come over and join me for a cuppa and some crafting, you’re welcome to join!

Monday Montage

Sorry for the lack of blogging lately. I’ve figured out that blogging takes up about an hour and a half each day, which is about the same amount of time that napping takes. The days you get a blog post are the days I don’t get a nap, and well, lately napping has been winning out. The other hours of my day have been filled with tons of productive activities, hence the need for some mid-day shut eye. Here’s a glimpse of what I’ve been up to over the past few days. 

1) Getting an inside peek at our little jelly bean. 

2) Spending sunny mornings at the park. 

3) Catching up on The Amazing Race while Bailey catches up on her beauty sleep. 

4) Picking out a color scheme for the nursery. 

I think we're sold on seaglass as the main color with a pastel accent pallet.

(source)

5) Staying in and ordering Chinese. 

Hulu has every single season of Amazing Race ever, y’all. Jonathan and I have a lot of work to do to catch up.  We can't be bothered with making our own food...

6) Maternity clothes shopping. 

Proof that I do, occasionally, leave the house. 

7) Planning the nitty gritty details of our Gender Reveal Party. Invites? Menu? Revealing mechanism? I just can’t decide between balloons or cupcakes as our medium to announce if we’re having a boy or a girl. 

(Original Source)

(original source)

Thoughts? 

8) Nesting. First order of business, organize the junk room so that we can move my office and vanity in there, thereby emptying out the nursery so we can start on our masterpiece. We went to Costco and bought some storage racks which have helped us to declutter the room a bit. 

Also, it helped us to take an inventory of things we’re running low on so that we can stock up on our upcoming trip to the States. Once baby is born, I doubt we’ll be visiting America quite as often, so we have to make sure we’re stocked with all the necessities. Jonathan mentioned that we’re running low on Rotel. 

That’s true. We only have 54 cans left.    

Weekly Pinterest Project: Quinoa Chili Frito Pie

Hello readers! As of today I am officially in my second trimester, and it’s true what they say: I feel loads better already. Well at least as far as the nausea and fatigue go. However, my appetite and energy seems to have come at the price of a pretty nasty sinus infection, so I’m still spending most of my time ‘resting.’ 

Good thing we just subscribed to HuluPlus through AppleTV and now have innumerable American TV shows at our fingertips. Just in time too, since I just polished off Season 10 of Friends this morning. 

How I've been spending my time: cuddled up with Bailey on the couch, watching Nashville.

But even though I’m spending most of my time housebound, I’m happy to be able to restart some of my house-wifely obligations again. I’ve been able to get back to cleaning pretty regularly and last night I even dared to try a new recipe…with chicken. That’s a big step in pregnancy, y’all.   

I haven’t touched chicken unless it came in Chicken McNugget form in over a month due to pretty severe food aversions to poultry. But when my friend Vicki was kind enough to spoil me with Fritos last week, I knew I had to use the luxury on something worthwhile: Frito Pie. 

I found this recipe on Pinterest for Quinoa and Chicken Chili and decided to give it a whirl. 

Original Source

I’m a big fan of any recipe that requires a crock pot and several canned goods, especially these days. This recipe is pretty simple and mega-delicious; plus the chicken and quinoa pack a protein punch that I’ve been lacking so far in my carboholic pregnancy. Now I still haven’t been able to handle raw chicken, so I took the extra precaution of using frozen chicken breasts so that I could just close my eyes and pretend they were blocks of ice.    

I adapted the recipe from this source. I stuck pretty close to the original recipe but, as per usual, added some Tony’s and Taco seasoning for a bit of extra flavor. What you do is, gather all of your ingredients: 

1 cup of rinsed, uncooked quinoa (rinsing takes some of the bitterness out)

2-3 chicken breasts

2 cans of stewed tomatoes
3 cups of chicken broth/stock

1 can of Rotel

2 cans of rinsed and drained black beans

1 can of drained corn

Put all the ingredients into your slow cooker and add seasonings: 

1 teaspoon of chili powder

2 teaspoons of cumin

2 teaspoons of red pepper

1 tablespoon of Tony’s 

1 ½ tablespoons of Taco Seasoning. 

You can cook on Low for 6-8 hours or on High for 4-7 hours. Before serving, separate the chicken and shred it with two forks before stirring it back into the chili and mixing it all together. 

Serve with cheese, sour cream, avocados, Fritos, whatever strikes your fancy. I’m personally partial to the Fritos and cheese, but that’s just me. 

The recipe was a big hit with Jonathan, so much so that he requested I get up with him at 6:30 AM to pack it in his lunch. And since I’m not quite back to being that good of a wife yet, I went ahead last night and packed him a Tupperware full of chili and a ziplock full of Doritos. I’m not sharing my Fritos… I'll never be that good of a wife.