{Weekend Recap} Making History

Last weekend started with a movie and a bottle of wine Friday night for the husband and I. It'd been a long day, really a typical day, but I was so worn out and needed to recharge a little. Getting out of the house wasn't an option since we had no childcare available, so we opted for a movie night-in. It was going to be complete with popcorn and cokes, but ended up being accompanied by chocolate and wine. Not a bad swap, in my opinion. ;)

Saturday morning the babies slept until 8:30am, which was really nice. Because the rest of the day I was pretty much working constantly to clean up parts of the house and prep everything the quad squad would need from 4pm after. Two of the babies, Logan and Trystan, had already developed runny noses and I knew colds for the entire crew were imminent. But the husband and I had plans to join friends for a concert by 5pm and my friend Jo Ann, her husband and daughter had graciously agreed to come baby sit as well as feed the kids dinner and put them to bed. No small feat for quad parents and definitely a bigger one for babysitters! (I have to note that Jo Ann is one of those really special people that totally "gets" me and my schedule, she does great with my kids, who all love her, and she's so trustworthy and reliable. Seriously, everyone needs a Jo Ann in their life!)

I ran laundry and set out clean pajamas, medications for the two sick babies, put clean sheets on all their beds and put away toys from nap time, laid out sleep sacks in each kid's crib, prepped dinner for the kids, set out all necessary dinner supplies, filled sippys with milk, cleaned up the play room, wrote out a note for dinner and bed times as well as other pertinent details, pre-made their snacks and got everyone up from naps, bathed and diapered before we left. I even set out wine glasses for Jo Ann and her husband because I always want people to know they can take time to relax while at our house! I don't want folks to have a stressful, overwhelming experience when they're left in charge of our crew. Though I was pretty tired by the time we got in the car, I was happy to leave for awhile as Jo Ann ushered us out and made us promise to take our time and enjoy.

Which we did! It was history in the making, as the performers mentioned several times during the concert. It was the first-ever Eli Young Band House Party at the Texas Rangers Ballpark in Arlington, which also marked the first-ever stand alone concert at the ballpark. Thousands of people attended, all dressed in our best jeans and cowboy boots. I sloshed back plenty of beer and just about spit some out when Pat Green made a surprise appearance for a song with the Eli Young Band! As some of you may know, the husband and I are avid Texas Country fans and we love both Pat Green and Roger Creager. Other performers for the night included Easton Corbin, Thompson Square and the Josh Abbott Band. Even Lucy Hale from the TV show Pretty Little Liars sang a duet with Eli Young. It was really neat when the band played a song and asked everyone to pull out their cell phones as lights, made for a cool photo. Definitely a fun night! All went well with the babies while we were gone, too, so it was a successful evening all the way around.

Our break was over when we woke up Sunday morning to four very sick babies. There was a lot of TLC doled out throughout the day, poor things have runny noses left and right. It's hard work keeping up with all four being sick at the same time, I just sort of have to gear myself up for the ensuing week of illness.

To top it off, our dryer wasn't working so I hadn't been able to do laundry in a couple days and now I had dirty sheets and clothes I needed to wash and sanitize. Fortunately, the husband found a washer and dryer on Craigslist for not much more than it was going to cost to fix the one we had (also Craigslist purchases from years ago), so he picked them up during the babies' nap time. The kid's Aunt Sabrina came over to help wipe noses and dole out Pedialyte for a couple hours so the husband was able to install said washer and dryer while I prepped dinner for the quads and made my Tuscan soup. Done and done!

Although it was meant to be a day to sort of recuperate from the past week, we ended up working hard from start to finish. The husband spread out some work he had to get done on the dining room table after the babies were in bed and I was starting to feel bad with allergies and nausea, so I went to bed soon after.

Monday was a little better since my nanny came for a couple hours in the morning (traditionally, she's with us Monday and Friday mornings) and I managed to get in a workout at the gym, pick up and drop off dry cleaning, we took the babies out for a walk, bathed them all and fed them lunch and had them in bed for naps by 12:30pm. Then my mother-in-law came that afternoon to watch the girls while I took Harrison to his last follow-up appointment with his urologist. He had his circumcision done a few months ago and got a great report and we're happy to close out that chapter of his health care. He went with me to Stein Mart afterward and got lots of admiring glances and compliments for being so adorable and well behaved!

Our night ended with Pei Wei for dinner, which the babies ate too, they had noodles and teryaki chicken! And of course the adults had wine...who couldn't use more wine? Plus it was another night of work for the husband and a movie on the couch for me. Even though the kiddos are sick, Kailey's still managed to be particularly entertaining lately and all four were thrilled to have daddy's undivided attention in the play room before bed. :)

Up next: our system for taking care of four sick babies at once!

{Quad Squad} Easy Button Sandwiches

So I totally have to give credit to a triplet mom friend of mine for this idea, it's been huge for my crew! Make your typical PB&J sandwiches and use an apple corer to punch "sandwich holes" in the bread.

Ta-dah! Easy, mess-free mini bites.

For their sandwiches lately, I've been doing peanut butter and honey. They seem to like those a little better than jelly lately, but we'll revisit the jelly soon. And since they're all sick at the moment, I gave them a special treat for lunch and made sandwich buttons with Trader Joe's cookie butter (yeah, it's really like butter made out of cookies!) and some local honey. I've heard that locally-made honey contains great properties for fighting allergies and colds as they're geared toward area-specific allergens. Can't hurt!

It's the easiest lunch ever, and we've been using these for when we're out during lunchtime, like play dates at the mall. A little diced cheese, snack pouches of applesauce and honey grahams and a canister of milk and we're good to go! Another triplet mom also shared that you can soften apples for eating by soaking apple slices in cold water for a couple hours. I'll be trying that next!

What's your favorite toddler-friendly food tip?

{Five Things} New Purchases!

Today, my Five Things is all about fashion! I don't have many opportunities these days to go clothes shopping, plus I'm still adjusting to my new body shape and size post-quadruplets and post-surgery (an update on that soon!). So I was excited to get out for a brief stint a few mornings ago while my nanny held down the fort at home with the kiddos. First I went to Carter's and loaded up on the most adorable outfits and holiday clothes for the quads, I can't wait to share those with you! Everything was on sale from 40-70% off, which made for some great deals. Then I went next door and perused Old Navy and was excited to find several things—also all on sale for 30% off. And I recently ordered some Nordic leggings from Dillards online and can't wait to try them out. They should be here soon.

1. Gray polka dot oxford shirt, Old Navy

2. Black polka dot embellished cardigan, Old Navy

3. Rockstar Super Skinny Jeans, Old Navy

4. Honeycomb-knit sweater in sea salt, Old Navy

5. Poof Nordic-print leggings, Dillards

What looks are you loving lately?

{Style File} Eggplant jeans, anyone?

I told y'all about my obsession with black tops and pants for outfits lately, and I'm loving my faux leather top from Target. For a bit of added color I'd thought it'd be perfect to pair with eggplant-colored skinny jeans. 

(And yes, my photos really are taken at night because I was really going somewhere and I really wanted to capture a moment when I really wasn't wearing yoga pants for the 345832046704597th time. True story.)

infinity scarf: express (old) / necklace: random european store overseas

top: target / jeans: dl 1961 / boots: langford market / handbag: coach

Do you wear eggplant jeans? What's your favorite color to mix it up?

{My Recipes} Rustic Skillet Pork Chops

Sometimes there just must be butter. A good amount of butter.

I had some bone-in pork chops that the husband had thrown into the cart last time we were at Costco. It's notoriously difficult for me to cook pork chops without drying them out and making them too tough, since I'd always err on the side of caution and be sure the meat is fully done. I usually avoid bone-in chops because they're even more challenging. But this time I wanted a dinner that was rustic, old-fashioned almost. So naturally it called for butter and a cast iron skillet over an open flame...of my gas stovetop. Ha.

What you need:

4 tbsp butter

Minced onion

Ground sea salt

Ground black pepper

6 bone-in pork chops

Heat the oven to 350F. Add 2 pats of butter (2 tbsp) to cast iron skillet and heat over medium-high heat on stove top. Once it's hot, place two pork chops in the pan. Sprinkle the tops with minced onion, salt and pepper. Flip when the white opaqueness begins to come up the side of the chops. Season the other side.

Add more butter if melted butter in skillet becomes sparse. Once all your chops have been cooked on either side, place them on a large foil-lined cookie sheet and bake in the 350F oven for 5-6 minutes. When cooked through (pork should reach 140 to 160 degrees F internal temperature), place on serving dish and let rest.

To complement the pork, I chopped up some fresh zucchini and yellow squash and threw them into the cast iron skillet. I only added a little salt and pepper and let them soak up the flavor already in the pan.

Meanwhile, I cooked three sweet potatoes in my microwave then mashed them up with some more butter, brown sugar and cinnamon to taste. Totally reminds me of Thanksgiving! 

It was a nice hearty meal and the husband loved the flavor of the pork chops and marveled over how tender they were. Ha! Plus the kids ate everything I made plus some cheese and fruit for their dinner. Success!

Happy eating :)