It's OVER!!!

Our dreaded, crazy fall has finally come to an end. Not that our lives are calm, by any means, just calmER. Scott finished taking part IV of the national chiropractic boards on Saturday. I'm not sure why there are four parts, why they are taken months apart, why they are so dang expensive, and why they have to take them in the midst of school with all of their other tests/clinic work. But, I guess that's the way it is. Between part III boards, seminars, and part IV, Scott has been gone every weekend but 2 since August. That wouldn't be such a huge deal if I didn't work every weekend. It meant lots of babysitters (thank you, thank you, thank you to everyone who helped us out!) and very little sleep for me.

I am so exited to have Scott home on the weekends, so exited that he has one less thing to study for, and really exited to get more than 3-4 hours of sleep.

Update on the crib tent: LOVING IT!!!

Princess Bed

After climbing out of her crib for the first time last week, we've deliberated quite a bit about just what to do with our monkey of a child. Scott tried several times on Saturday night to get her to stay in her crib, to no avail. She spent that night and Sunday night in our bed. I love to snuggle and nap with Madeline from time to time, but I prefer it to be on my terms, not on hers. Our queen is just not big enough for all three of us. By Monday morning, we decided a crib tent was the way to go for our family. Don't judge - everyone's situation is different. Madeline's sleep is crucial for all three of us.

We went out Monday afternoon in search of a crib tent, only to find that they are not to be found in DFW. Apparently, you have to order them online. I wish I'd have known that! I needed one THAT day. The earliest I could get it from Amazon was Wednesday. So, we decided to go with Plan B on Monday night and see if we could get her to sleep in her crib with the siderail lowered (to lessen the chance of injury since she was actually LAUNCHING herself from the crib and landing flat on her back). She figured out in about 5 minutes how to kick the side rail just so, so that it would fall completely off. We tried the "silent return to sleep" method where you walk your child back to bed without looking at their face or talking to them. It was a battle of wills, and she won. I silently led her back to bed over 600 times in a three hour period before I was sick of keeping track. By the time I got to the door of her room after putting her down, she was already out of bed. I only had time to make a talley mark on my little paper, and turn around to put her back to bed. The last straw was at 9:45pm when she started crawling out of her room and laughing, thinking this whole thing was just a fun game. I was completely exhausted. I pulled out the futon in her room, put her in her bed, and we slept. Well, she slept in her bed until she fell out 5 times during the first hour, and then she slept with me.

I was on the computer ordering the crib tent by 6:45 Tuesday morning, with one day shipping. I again had to sleep in her room Tuesday night, and was really getting sick of that hard futon mattress.

Unfortunately the tent didn't arrive until after she went to bed Wednesday night. I guess the UPS guy couldn't find it in his truck until all of his other deliveries were done. Madeline woke up at 9:30pm and wouldn't go back to bed, so we put the tent on that night. We made a big deal about it and called it her princess bed. I had shown her pictures online of beds with canopies, and told her she would be getting one for her crib. She was really, really exited - until I closed the zipper. Not wanting it to be a bad experience for her the first night, when she was already a little out of sorts, I slept in her room again, but made her sleep with the crib tent zippered shut.

The next morning, we decorated the princess bed with flowers and ribbons. We pretended we were camping and ate marshmallows in it. We showed it off to friends. I talked to her several times during the day about what was going to happen that night. I geared myself up for lots and lots of crying.

I put her to bed an hour ago. She cried for two minutes.

Crib tents are awesome.

Halloween

We didnt' participate in many Halloween festivities this year, but we did attend our ward's annual Harvest Carnival. Madeline dressed up as a "flower fairy" this year, thanks to one of my co-workers who lent us this adorable costume.

We decided against trick-or-treating on Saturday due to scheduling conflicts. I also wanted to get Madeline in bed early - she hadn't been sleeping well since our vacation. I guess I should have had Scott take her, because when I called home from work at 8:30pm she was prancing around the house in her costume. Scott couldn't get her to stay in her crib, so she got to stay up. She thought she was the queen of the house.

I guess as a good culmination to my weekly chili challenge, my chili won first place in our ward chili cook-off. The recipe was adapted from my Uncle Delwyn's chili. He made it for a family reunion that I didn't attend. I guess several family members asked for the recipe because it was so good, so he emailed it out to all of us. I made it last year and it was excellent. I made a few changes to it last week which I think made it even better. Try it out!

Allison's Version of Uncle Delwyn's Chili

1 lb ground beef, browned

1 lb Jimmy Dean sausage, browned

1 onion, chopped

4 stalks of celery, finely chopped

4 cloves of garlic, minced

1 28 oz. can diced tomatoes

2 cans kidney beans, drained

1 can black beans, drained

1 15 oz can tomato sauce

4 green onions, chopped

1 green pepper, broiled until skin blisters and begins to blacken, seeded and chopped

1 red pepper, same process as green pepper

1 chipotle pepper in adobo sauce, seeded and chopped

1/3 cup brown sugar

1 Tbsp chili powder

1 tsp cumin

2 bay leaves, remove before serving

salt and pepper to taste

Put all of the ingredients in a crock pot if you have all day, or in a stock pot if you don't have as long. Cook until it tastes good.