what I buy at Costco and Trader Joe’s

I know I can’t be the only one who is curious about how other people live — whether it’s how they schedule their day, what makeup they wear, what TV shows they watch, etc. I’m sharing what I buy at Costco and Trader Joe’s because I’m hoping you’ll tell me what one (or five, or ten) thing is missing from my list that I absolutely must try.

I do most of my shopping at Giant Eagle, which is close enough to our house that I occasionally walk there. I usually go two times a week, for around 5-20 minutes of actual shopping time. I write my list according to where things are in the store. I always use a basket when I’m doing my weekly shopping. It helps me to stick to my list, and I move faster when I’m desperate to relieve my tired arm! Plus, I have enough items in my pantry and freezer that I tend to only need produce, meat and dairy products.

A sample shopping list might look like: salad, green beans, bag of baby potatoes, an onion, apples, grapes, deli meat, chicken breasts, milk, eggs, cheese.

Costco and Trader Joe’s build up my pantry and freezer.

Costco

I don’t go to Costco very often, since there are only two of us. (I’m grateful to have a free membership through my dad’s company.) I store the bulk items in our laundry room and I freeze whatever bread products we aren’t using that week. 

I mostly go for specific food items, but I occasionally browse the center area and the small kitchen appliances section. I’ve bought socks, flip flops, towels, a rice cooker, splatter screens, a beach chair...and maybe two or three times a year I’ll stock up on movie passes, toothbrushes, shampoo, and baking goods (I love their bulk spices and salt and pepper grinders.) These are the things I most consistently purchase:

• naan
• rotisserie chicken
• frozen meatballs
• paper products (tissues, TP and paper towels)
• dog treats
• black beans
• tomato sauce
• Kirkland tuna
• rice 
• coffee

Trader Joe’s

Our closest TJ’s is about 25 minutes away, but I’ve actually never been to it! I always go to the one in Springfield, VA, which is right by my parent’s house. I’m there every two months or so.

• flowers
• wine
• whole wheat slims (for Andy’s lunches)
• reduced guilt chunky guacamole
• tomato and roasted red pepper soup (The BEST pre-made tomato soup. Don’t get the low sodium version.)
• jalapeño refried beans
• feta dressing
• sriracha bbq sauce
• mandarin orange chicken (I serve it over rice)
• chicken burgers (Great with guac)
• pork potstickers (Served over rice — and I like to make a little sauce with brown sugar, soy sauce and sriracha. It’s spicy and a little sauce goes a long way) 
• chicken tamales
• dark chocolate peanut butter cups
• cookie butter
• maple leaf cookies
• iced cranberry pistachio biscotti (seasonal)
• frozen almond croissants

What else should I try? 

cabin weekend and homemade thyme rolls

Last Friday we met my parents at the cabin for the weekend. I made chicken tikka masala for dinner and we read, played Pinochle and watched “Big Hero 6.” The temperature dropped to the low sixties and we had the windows open when we went to bed. It was gloriously chilly. I woke up to the sound of rain and Andy’s soft snoring, and I burrowed back under a quilt and fell back asleep.

The cabin is my very favorite place to sleep in.

Sometimes, if you’re very good, your mom or dad will creep up the stairs and bring you a little “taster” of bacon. And if you like, you can take a mug of coffee into bed with you and spend the morning reading and staring out the window.

Once you’re finally out of bed, you can read on the screened-in porch for a bit. You can have a snack, then climb in the clawfoot tub and read some more. And if your nightmare comes true and you realize you didn’t bring enough books, you can dip into the basket of James Herriot books and old Martha Stewart Living magazines that permanently reside next to the couch.

CAN I JUST LIVE THERE, PLEASE?

As lovely as summertime is, it’s a bit sucky that I finally got over the hump of Jane’s anniversary only to face another anniversary: the death of our son, John. Two years on Monday. Blegh. It’s frustrating to be in a complete state of bliss and then suddenly crying, or simply feeling blue. A few days ago my body started freaking out. I was dry heaving, my head was killing me and the area around my incision was hurting. (It rarely ever hurts anymore.) It’s amazing how our bodies react to stress and pain.

A lesson on grief: there will, eventually, be good days. Followed by hard days. Followed by numb days.

This week has flown by. I’ve been spending hours each day working on my first paid design job (!!!), catching up on lessons and assignments for my design class and trying (but failing) to keep the house in order. I’m having one of those seasons of being completely uninspired in the kitchen, but Andy is usually able to get me out of my rut by suggesting I try to copycat a dish we’ve had at a restaurant. (Like Old Bay wings.) On Wednesday Andy cooked me up a fabulous ribeye that he seasoned with salt, pepper and fresh thyme. He remembered a restaurant we went to in Culpeper, VA, back when we thought we were going to move there. The restaurant, called “It’s About Thyme,” had rolls with...you guessed it...thyme!

how many times (get it?) am I going to write the word ‘thyme’ AHHHHH I need more coffee.

ANYWAY, long story short, I made homemade thyme rolls last night! I hardly ever bake, so I was thrilled when the rolls came out looking just like they do in the picture. They were incredible! I cut the recipe in half, because I knew we were going to eat all of the rolls that night. You can’t not eat all the bread when it’s hot out of the oven!

No-Knead Thyme Dinner Rolls from Alexandra Cooks

I served the rolls with heated up tomato and roasted red pepper soup from Trader Joe’s and a salad with goat cheese, walnuts and dried cherries. I would be perfectly content to have that meal every week!

I'm working on a post of my favorite things to buy from Trader Joe’s and Costco. Stay tuned!

around here

While I’ve had my fair share of hard days over the past two weeks, I’ve also made some fun memories and taken every opportunity I can to breathe deep and let myself be. To push the constant stream of “this time last year” thoughts to the back of my head and choose to focus on whatever is in front of me: a good book, a patch of sun, a furry pup, an article I need to turn in.

Two weekends ago my sisters and I tried on mom’s dresses from when she was in her late teens/early twenties. We did a little impromptu fashion show for my parents. I actually wore that dress with the animal print skirt to one of my bridal showers!

Doesn’t the pink and gold dress look so Betty Draper? I really hope I have an event I can wear that dress to someday.

I also went to yoga in the park for the first time, bought new running shoes (that I actually run in, whaaat who am I), enjoyed a sweet sibling dinner date with my brother, started an online interior design course, read two books (“The Likeness” and “The Last Letter From Your Lover”), hosted some friends for brunch, participated in a team trivia night for the first time and went on a date with my guy.

A few weeks ago I thought about throwing out all of the cards people sent after John and Jane died. I’ll never read them again, I thought. They’re just taking up space. But something made me wait. A few days ago, on the anniversary of the day I held my stillborn Janie Lou, I took out my “Jane” box and read through every single note. It was a bittersweet activity, and by the end of it I was completely wrecked from crying. I’m glad I did it, though.

This weekend we have a combined cookout with our small group and our old small group, and then Sunday we’re heading to Winchester to hang out with dear friends visiting from Florida and Andy’s family.  I can hardly wait!

beach trip ‘15

I broke my two-month break from fast food with breakfast from Taco Bell on our drive to the Outer Banks. And I liked it.

from Twiddy’s website

Last week we headed to Corolla, N.C. to spend the week with my family — my parents, my older sister Katie and her husband Todd, and my older brother John-Michael and his wife Sky. JM and Sky live in South Korea and we usually only see them once a year. I loved chatting on the beach with Sky and screaming “it’s a big one!” with my brother as we ducked under waves like we did when we were kids.

We also had the pups with us — our dog, Casey, and my parent’s dog, Ellie. They happily spent the week chasing sand crabs, kissing squealing children, running into the water and flopping down under the umbrella for a snooze.

My little companion. I love her so!

I re-discovered my love for tennis last week. I don’t remember playing legit tennis since I took lessons when I was twelve. Our house was steps away from a tennis court, and we all had a blast hitting around and playing doubles. We laughed over how one of our rackets is so old it was made in West Germany!

Andy told me on the drive down that he was going to take me out one evening for a date. We went to The Crafty Cow for dinner (Jeopardy was on!) and played mini golf afterwards. I’m still thinking about the loaded tots we had... they had grits on them, of all things! But they were fabulous.

I was pregnant with Jane when we were at the beach last year, and the week after our vacation was when she died. I was understandably a little nervous about how I’d do on vacation this year, considering. I set as much of my grief aside as I could and chose to focus on the many blessings I do have. Now that I’m home, much of what I pushed deep down has come up and I know I have to let myself process these feelings, as painful as they are. There really isn’t an easy time of year anymore, because every season is tied up with different emotions and memories, but summer is especially hard.

God has answered and continues to answer my prayers for moments of relief from my sorrow. I’m grateful our beach trip was one I truly enjoyed, and that the following months hold cookouts, reunions with dear friends, new design projects and lots of summer reading.

the decision to be faithful

I’m torn between two very strong feelings: that God is calling me to shine a light on my grief (however ugly it is) and that it hurts too much to sit and dwell and reflect and re-hash.

A month or so ago I listened to a sermon by Andy Stanley, and he said something I can’t get out of my head. He said, "You have no idea what or who hangs in the balance of your decision to remain faithful when everything around you says "Be faithless." You have no idea what God might be up to through your faithfulness when everything around you says, 'There's no point...”

Then, a few days ago, I listened to a sermon by my sister-in-law about God’s purpose for us and why we need to embrace the gifts He has given us. She talks about our place in the body of Christ — how we might think of our role as unimportant, but that truly the body is made stronger and better when we take our role seriously and use it to serve Christ and others. She said, "It’s the enemy’s greatest fear that you guys are walking in the plans that God has for your life.”

Do you think God might be trying to tell me something?

Part of the struggle with sharing my grief is that I don’t want to be that person who is allowed to suffer so that her suffering might be used for God’s glory. I don’t want losing two babies so I can witness to others to be God’s plan for my life. You might think that’s fair, or you might think I’m being terribly selfish or terribly un-Christian. But the thing is, now that it’s happened (my losses), I DO want to bring God glory through my suffering and how I choose to share about my grief. I just wish the losses had never happened in the first place. I wish there was some guarantee that my grief is over — that I won’t lose anything else. I thought John was it, and then I lost Jane. The fear doesn’t come from what’s already happened as much as from wondering if this is my lot. I wonder what else I will be asked to give, or how long I will be asked to wait.

I wonder what hangs in the balance of my decision to be faithful.

I wonder what being faithful is supposed to look like for me. Does it look like telling the story of my hurting, slowly healing heart, even though I desperately wish I didn’t have this story to tell? Does it look like listing out my sufferings like Paul, so I can point to the list and say, Hey, all these terrible things happened to me. Did you hear me the first time? I’ll tell you again. I suffered. I suffered. I suffered. One thing has never changed: God is present, God is good and God is working in my life.

I had a great Saturday. I started the day off with a run (!!!), attended a “packing party” where I ate delicious scones and coffee and boxed a million DVDs while chatting with a friend, snuggled my pup and read a good book on the deck. I took a fabulous shower and was excited about our plans to go out that evening with a group of friends. I started to dry my hair, and then, out of the blue, I started sobbing. Loud, gasping sobs. I grabbed a pillow and screamed into it, laying sideways across the bed and thinking, whaaaat the heck?

It’s simply always there. The cost of being sad all the time is that it’s miserable to be sad all the time. The cost of setting grief aside for a bit is that it eventually bubbles out of you and you do yourself a disservice by not letting yourself feel.

I miss them.

I gave myself five minutes to cry. Then, I pulled it together, put on my makeup and went to dinner. I had a wonderful time. I can look back on that day and think, the old Laura is coming back. I can see the “new” Laura is present in the story, too... the Laura who cries out of the blue sometimes, who misses her babies and often feels very alone. The Laura who would really like for God to send a baby to her doorstep, preferably with a note that says, John and Jane are waiting for you. Here is a little one to hold. You get to keep this one.

The Laura who never thought the decision to be faithful would look like this.

design by Mary Hairston
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