Diary of a hungry pregnant woman

With #2, as with Liam, I only had about 3 weeks during which I felt seriously putrid. Even so, we spent several months (at least 2 or 3) subsisting on little more than canned soup and grilled cheese sandwiches and the original Shake 'n' Bake chicken dinner. I had a thing against both meat and vegetables that lasted much longer than 3 weeks, which didn't make for some very interesting dinners. (In case it isn't already obvious... Chad does not enjoy cooking very much.)

Now that the first trimester is safely behind me and I am feeling much better, I have become an eating machine. Sometimes this isn't good (such as when Chad brings home the industrial-sized carton of bite-sized Halloween chocolate bars, and I can't stay out of them), but sometimes it is: several weeks ago I checked several Rachael Ray cookbooks out of the library, and since then I have been cooking my way through a new recipe in 365: No Repeats every night. I am late jumping on the Rachael Ray bandwagon, but now I am firmly there. She is not the healthiest cook in the world, so there are some recipes I am trying to resist, but there is enough material in this one book alone to keep us going for a long time. Last night we had chicken breasts stuffed with goat cheese and spinach, finished with a pan sauce of thyme, onions, red peppers and lemon. Tonight it was a southwest pasta that was basically homemade macaroni and cheese with lots of cheddar, chili powder, coriander, cumin and jalapenos to kick it up a notch. It's like going out to a restaurant every night. These are all half-hour recipes: very feasible to pull off, and Liam really enjoys watching them come together from a vantage point on the island.

Last night after Liam was in bed I went down to the library to try to renew the books (including several board books of his, especially one featuring a little boy wearing rubber boots that he just adores), when I discovered to my horror that someone has requested my beloved 365 and I will have to take it back next week after all. I don't plan to go down without a fight; I will be photocopying the bejeesus out of that book this week, and the next patron in line to get it shouldn't be surprised if it's a little late coming back.