Bumpin’ Along

Hello my friends! 

How are you? I’m just bumpin’ along over here… almost 22 weeks now!

I feel like the weeks are going more quickly than they were during my first pregnancy (probably because I’m way less hyper focused on it, because, toddler), but at the same time the overall number of weeks seems lower than it should be, you know?! I feel like mentally I should already be 30 weeks, not 22. 🙂 

Running no longer feels good but walks do, so the bump and I have been taking lots of walks. Fresh air always turns my day around, as does some sunshine, even if it’s cold out! I’m already getting to the point where tying my shoes is getting super uncomfortable and I’m like, yikes, I’m just over halfway and tying my shoes is already hard, uh oh… 

Anyway! We had another weekend where we stayed home and did lots of house projects! (In case you missed it, go check out the super cute reading nook Matt created for Riese in our playroom last weekend.)

This weekend’s big project was closets. We are slowly starting to turn our guest room into baby #2’s room, and part of that was upgrading both the closet in the future baby’s room as well as the closet in Riese’s room to allow for more storage. Both of their rooms are pretty small, so this will be helpful so we don’t need a big dresser in the mix! 

Matt did baby #2’s room last weekend as a test run, and this weekend he tackled Riese’s. Here’s the before – just one bar + a shelf, so lots of wasted space:

Here’s the during – thankfully Riese doesn’t nap anymore so we didn’t have to worry about her room being a work zone for most of the day! 

Another during – walls repainted (he used the lavender paint we had leftover from her walls and didn’t worry about making it perfect, we figured you can barely see the wall anyway once the shelves and clothes are in there) and anchors installed:

And here’s the after! We designed it with a mix of shelves, drawers, and hanging space. The baby’s room is similar but we don’t have such a long hanging area since his clothes will be teeny for awhile. 

The closets are made using Elfa, The Container Store’s closet organizing hardware (affiliate link). It’s nice because it’s all really easily changed, so we can move things down or up, remove drawers or shelves entirely, etc., as their clothing gets bigger and the closet needs change. And their online design website was really easy to use – we just measured the closets and then popped the details in to plan the closets and order everything online!

As for food this weekend, Riese was pumped because she helped Matt made some yummy banana blueberry pancakes:

I threw some frozen wild blueberries in the batter and they turned it purple, which was very exciting because that’s Riese’s favorite color. We turned hers into fun shapes after cooking with cookie cutters… and Matt and I enjoyed ours as regular circles. 😉 

I’m still in need of two full breakfasts these days – always a more sweet breakfast first thing, like oatmeal or pancakes, and then something savory around 10 a.m., usually involving eggs. 

I’ve been doing lots of avocado toast and also egg wraps. I need to make more of my make ahead freezer breakfast burritos, I miss having those on hand! 

For lunch this weekend I had this grain salad bowl twice – it was so big there was plenty for the next day, too! It had spinach and romaine, red pepper, quinoa, feta, raw broccoli, chickpeas, red onion, and a homemade balsamic vinaigrette. 

We’ve been enjoying lots of yummy meals via my ongoing sponsor Blue Apron lately, too! One of our recent dinner faves was this Sheet Pan Cilantro Chicken with Shawarma Spiced Vegetables and Tahini Sauce. 

Aren’t sheet pan meals the best? I love that once you get everything prepped and into the oven, the rest of the meal is totally hands off. 

This dinner was from the new wellness plan that Blue Apron launched this month for the new year; there are 4 wellness-focused recipes on the menu per week in January, and 3 per week in February and March.

All the Blue Apron wellness meals feature a fiber-rich carbohydrate, healthy fats, and a lean protein, and the meals are creative and unique with lots of superfoods and flavor – no bland steamed veggies here! 

Give Blue Apron a shot yourself: here’s my affiliate link for $60 off over your first 3 boxes.

Let me know which your favorite meals are! I’m especially excited about trying the Mexican Turkey Meatballs with Brown rice and Pepitas coming up the week of January 25th!

Have a nice Martin Luther King, Jr. day, my friends; here are 9 lesser-known MLK, Jr. quotes to make you think.

I’ll be back on Wednesday with some new recipe inspiration for you! Just an FYI that I know obviously Wednesday is Inauguration Day but the post will be pre-written/pre-published and will not mention anything about it. DC is pretty much entirely locked down already so I’m hoping the day will go smoothly, unlike the madness a couple weeks ago…