Flat folds and Pockets and Turkey Legs

I got a box of goodies from a friend yesterday.  In it were a few different styles of all in one cloth diapers, inserts, two sizes of wet bags (one for the diaper bag and one to hang on the door), and the weirdest thing I never would've thought of that makes fabulous sense!  It's a sprayer attachment for the toilet.  It's like a hand-held bidet, but another marketed use for it is to spray out dirty cloth diapers into the toilet so you can just flush it instead of rising it down the sink or tub.  What an idea??  

Today, since we got our last refund from the electric folks (we're going into a trial billing phase while they re-evaluate usage, which means no extra checks... boo, BUT!  It also means no bills, so I can keep the house as cool as I want it this summer at least), I went to Hobby Lobby and Wal-mart in hopes of scoring some fabric to attempt my own diaper covers at the very least.  I'd like to line them, and have a few all-in-ones, too, especially since my friend was nice enough to send me the three different ones she uses as visual aids for assembling them.  

I've also been looking at flat folds, because they are supposed to be much easier to get clean, more versatile in sizing, and in purpose of application.  A flat fold is just a square of fabric between 24 and 27 inches that's folded creatively to make a diaper.  

http://fernandfaerie.com/sewing_flats.html has pictures and instructions of how to do the origami fold

http://pepperplaceblog.blogspot.com/2010/08/how-to-fold-flat-using-jo-fold.html shows something called a Jo fold.  

There are others, but they tend to get more complicated from there.  I could do either one of these two in my sleep, which is a high probability, unless I find a good deal on PUL somewhere.  I was going to get some at Hobby Lobby today, but for the price, even with a 40% off coupon, I wanted to at least be able to get colors I like.  B had the cute idea of making black ones and embroidering Jolly Rogers on them.  I can't put a Jolly Roger on pastel green or baby blue.  It's just... well, it's just not right.  That'd be damn near sacrilegious.  It's $10 a yard at Fabric.com, which is so far the only place I've found black PUL.  If my measurements are right, I'd only need around 2.5 yards to make several covers, and if I wanted to line them, an equal amount of lining material, but the lining material won't be $10 a yard.  JoAnn's has an annual Black Friday sale of $1/yd flannel, which would be perfect, since flannel is snuggly soft and absorbent.  If I line them, I might as well get a bit more fabric and do an insert to make an all in one.  Then I'd have options:  it could be used as a cover for a flat fold, or with the flat fold and the insert for double absorbency, or with just the insert as an all in one.  

I did get 4 yards of 90" wide muslin material for $1.37/yd at Wal-mart today.  If I make the diapers 24" square that gives me 21 diapers for under $25.  I will probably still buy disposables for road trips, but a small pack of disposables here and there won't break the bank.  

Now, since most of this day was spent at an OB appointment and the store, I think I better get off my butt and get something constructive done... like figure out dinner.  I haven't forgotten about the turkey leg recipe, either!  

(Yes, actually I did... but I remembered!  That's the point.)

Basically, I used the same recipe as Pioneer Woman's Caveman Pops, but instead of using the spice blend she used, I used Tony Chachere's Creole Seasoning.  Also, she mentions that she pours her brine over ice, but says you can just cool it in the fridge.  Well, I chose to cool mine in the fridge, and it turned out WAY salty.  I mean WAY salty.  So, I think that when she poured hers over ice it diluted the brine to a degree that is not accounted for in her recipe.  I would either tone down the salt in the brine, or use a seasoning mix that has no additional salt in it (which Tony Chachere's does) to make it less salty.  One last note - her cooking times are short.  I have a regular gas oven, no convection or anything fancy.  I don't know if she has a convection oven or not, but her cooking time did not bring my turkey legs up to temperature or get them done all the way to the bone.  If you're like me and paranoid about the doneness of your poultry, I'd add another 15-20 minutes of cook time onto the second cooking phase at 300degrees, or maybe increase the temperature to 350.  

B loved them, but agreed they were on the salty side, so next time I try these, I'm going to have to take that into account.  But, a pack of three cost around $4, so for $8 I had enough turkey legs for three meals for the two of us.  I froze the other 4 for reheating later.  My December freezer is getting nicely stocked, so hopefully I won't have to cook much at all for the first few weeks after Little B gets here.  

Home again, home again, jiggity jog

Nearly another month has passed.  I've been told that I am not nearly as much fun to blog-stalk these days as I used to be.  It seems like there's so much going on that I don't have time to blog as much lately.

Since I last checked in, my neighbor and I rescued a kitten.

This is Bird on the day she came home with me.  My friend called me about a kitten stuck in a barricade in the commissary parking lot, so of course I had to go see if I could help.  Now, guess who's peeping from behind my computer monitor thinking hard about attacking my moving fingers?

Yup.

Bird.  The little heathen is so much fun.  I haven't had a kitten around in way too long, and this one is so full of personality and stinking CUTE that I can't help but laugh at her.  B says that she's been beneficial in helping keep my pregnancy induced insanity at a lower over-all level than he seems to think it would've been had I not wound up with a gray fluffy ball of adorable to keep me smiling.

What a life, huh?

Also, we went back for our anatomy and development ultrasound.

Apparently it "looks like a boy".  I sure hope "looks like" actually proves to be "boy", because my sister-in-law conspired with my step-mom to put together a baby-Q (southern adaptation of the baby shower that doesn't require stupid shower games and has no gender restrictions) the weekend we made the trek to go visit family. We made out like bandits, and B was hard pressed to figure out how to cram everything in our little car for the 1,000 mile trip back home.

Thanks to the same friend who instigated the rescuing of Bird, we already had a crib, rocker, ottoman, and changing table.  B's sister gave us some other major purchases that are only a few years old from when she had her last boy, including a walker, swing, and pack n play.  She also found some play mat thingies, a baby bath, a whole bunch of waterproof bedding thingies (I hesitate to call them mattress pads, because they'e not.  They're not fitted or, in most cases, the actual size of the mattress.  You just put them under the area where the baby sleeps to help protect the mattress.)

We came home with a TON of adorable clothes, too.  If the kid needs any clothes before he's 7-9 mos old, I'll be amazed.  I have one drawer full of nothing but NB size stuff, another drawer full of 3-6 mo, and another drawer full of 6-12 mo.  There was even a little pair of shoes with paw prints on the soles.  I did say I was hoping for a puppy....

We only just got back late last week, and we decided "vacation" was going to continue until B had to report back in on Monday morning.  Yesterday was spent running around doing necessary shopping.  I used up almost all of our perishables before we left, so we were in need of restocking.  Today has been spent attempting to coax some order out of the chaos my living room has become (that's naturally where everything got offloaded to when we emptied the car), doing laundry, cleaning up the kitchen after a weekend spent being a complete and utter slacker, and trying REALLY hard to not to curl up on the couch with the kitten and take a nap (read sleep all day).

I'm trying a new recipe for dinner tonight:  roasted turkey legs.  I've roasted and baked turkey legs before, but I've never bothered to brine them.  Today, I decided I would get started early enough where they could brine before I have to put them in the oven.  If it turns out tasty (and if I don't forget) I'll blog it later.

Speaking of forgetting, does this "baby brain" thing every let up?  I forget the proper names of things, forget what I walked into a room for, forget where the kitten is when shes Sitting In My LAP!  It's kind of scary.  There's also this thing of the swelling of the feet that's irritating the crap out of me, although at least I knew about that.  I didn't know that my ribs would start to feel like they're coming unhinged.  Every time I sneeze, have to climb up on anything that requires me to pull with my upper body, cough, or otherwise jostle my ribs around, they ache like I've bruised them.  Even laying on my side has become interesting, because after a while they start to feel like the pressure is causing them to pull loose and squish.  Ribs do not squish.  Otherwise, aside from still being moody (though hopefully not as moody as the first three months), I still have an amazing lack of discomfort or anything that I would translate into such and attribute solely to pregnancy.  My sciatica has been acting up a bit more often lately, but I had that before, so it's nothing new.  Ditto with the heart burn, so I'm not really feel terribly put out or put upon, yet.  I have to throw the "yet" in there, because I've been told it will get more intrusive and interesting with progression.  Yay...

I am still of the unshakable opinion (while I am in my right mind, when I'm moody I have a slightly less stellar opinion, though even when I'm moody I admit that he's wonderful) that I have the BESTEST husband EVAR, because he puts up with me really, really, really, REALLY well.  Even I don't like dealing with me some days, but he just rolls with it.  We have that same running argument that all couples have (at least I think they do?) where "I love you" is answered with "I love you more" and then countered with "nuh-uh, I love you more."  The argument was ongoing and eternally undecided until recently.  I have started conceding that yes, he must love me more, because there's no way in hell I'd put up with the moody, unstable behaviors that he has nearly as well as he has.  So I do believe that he must love me more, and a good thing, too.  He's also way more patient than I am, and a good deal more understanding.

I love him lotses.