Bringing domesticity back to this blog: Roasted chicken and popping out

Ever since Fall began I've been craving comfort foods.  Fortunately, since my iron infusions kicked in I've had a little more energy to cook these meals since it's tough to find good, homey take out meals (hmmm... Jen and Carrie- maybe there's another business idea? ;)).  Over the past couple weeks I've enjoyed pot roast made by Carrie and made meatballs and sauce a la Mere, savory beef stew and a couple of roasted chickens.  Since chicken is on sale this month at Whole Foods, I went for chicken again with a nice, hefty five-pounder to roast up with some root veggies obtained at the Brookline Farmer's Market.  When all was nicely browned, tender and safely cooked through, I removed the chicken and veggies from the pan, added a little flour as a thickening agent followed by some chicken broth, apple cider and mead along with fresh thyme and bay leaves (don't worry- I boiled as much of the alcohol out of the mead as possible!).  What resulted was a tasty, rich brown au jus that Andy and I smothered over the chicken, squash, potatoes, carrots and onions.  She was one hell of a bird and we enjoyed every bite!  We didn't get a pic of the finished plate, but here's one Andy took of me taking the bird out of the oven:

Again, if you could ignore the double chin as well as the messy kitchen and apron that would be greatly appreciated ;).

Since I feel like I've popped out a good deal more this week, here's a pic that shows the belly at 25 weeks and 5 days (I'm feeling a little uncomfortable posting all these photos of myself, but I guess what you're really looking at is Sprout?):

In this one, if you could try to ignore the fact that I'm wearing the same socks that I was in last week's photo, that would be great too...  Thanks so much in advance.