Luck of the Irish

We had a great St. Patrick's Day here...how about all of you? I had the day off so I got to spend lots of time with JJ and it was a gorgeous day. Oh, and we watched lots of basketball! It really is one of the best days of the year. Beer, corned beef, and basketball. Yes, please!

Here's my little leprechaun...

I started preparing for the holiday last weekend. I bought a 7 lb. brisket and brined it for 4 days. Making your own corned beef is 100x better than buying the packaged one from the store. It's SUPER easy too. It's beer, water, salt, sugar and pickling spices. Then it sits in your fridge for 4 days. The only strange thing is it doesn't come out red, it comes out looking like brisket! Imagine that. I then split it in half and made it two ways. The traditional boiled method with cabbage, potatoes and carrots. The other half got slathered in cloves, hot mustard and brown sugar. Then it got put in the oven for 2 hours and folks, this is the way to make corned beef. It's really wonderful. Tender and flavorful. I sauteed cabbage and onion to go with it.

I used the recipes found here:

http://simplyrecipes.com/recipes/corned_beef_and_cabbage

Ok, it isn't pretty, but damn it tastes good!

Now I'm off to make corned beef hash. MMMMM good. But first, it's time to lower the crib mattress. Someone learned another trick this week...

Lift off!

Ok, folks...we have a crawler! An honest to god crawler. First there was the rocking (humping?) motion. Then it was almost a marine crawl...a dragging of the legs type thing. Now, a real crawl! JJ is on the move...so, watch out world!



As the end of the video demonstrates, child proofing has become a new priority. He can find everything. Especially wires that he can choke himself with. That seems to be a speciality. I swear those wires didn't even exist a month ago, now they are everywhere! *sigh*

So what else is going on. Hmmmm. I've been meaning to post for ages. I'm like a broken record on that, right? If only I could stop this break neck pace at work which results in me coming home so spent. I have energy to be with my little man for a few hours and that's about it. Oh and laundry. I swear, it's my new hobby. Can one baby really create this much laundry? I dream about getting a professional launderer one day. Launderer? You know what I mean...

I promise to do a St. Patrick's day post. PROMISE! I have my corned beef brining right now, so we're doing it up all homemade style this year! CAN NOT WAIT! Plus, JJ has not one, but two outfits. So necessary.

I'm going to de-wire my apartment now! Look for an update on Thursday :)