And Happy Birthday Dad! See you at DQ! (and class beforehand too)
I am letting some Rhodes freezer yeast rolls rise right now. It sounded like an easy and yummy contribution to tomorrow's dinner. But since we need to leave at 8-9 am tomorrow, and the rolls have a minimum 3-hour-rise, I am making them today. I was going to make 2 loaves of banana bread, one for Dad, one for tomorrow, but Handsome did too good of a job helping clean up in the kitchen and threw the bananas away last night. :( I told him that banana bread is best when the bananas are squishier than you would like to eat, so ask before throwing them away next time. He didn't know that before. He started to joke I could pull them out of the garbage, but that is just too gross! I will have to think of something else...
Tomorrow we head northeast! Up to the dry, cold Yakima Valley. Wonder if Multnomah Falls is icy this year. Last year, after he proposed, we might have tried to hike it, except they were closing off the trail and sending in paramedics to get someone who'd fallen and broken their bone. :( I will have to check the forecast for our drive. It got down to 19 degrees overnight at his folks' place last time. brrr! Jonathan will need bundled like a little es-ki-mo. No mukluks, though. ;)
Have safe travels and no cooking mishaps this holiday!
Good luck with your cooking and enjoy your new family :). I can just picture the Gorge. I bet the falls will be awesome looking. Safe travels and Happy Thanksgiving!
haha, my husband has done that before too!
I like that picture!
Why didn't I think of Rhodes?? I decided I would make the yeast roll mix we bought at a flour mill back in May....I hope they turn out.
I am looking forward to this weekend with my in-laws. I'm one of the blessed who has a kind, supportive MIL who likes me and is glad I married her son. So going up there is always nice. :) We will miss the parade since we will be in the car, but oh well.
Last night we got to hang out at D-house again, which was fun. :) Ashley took some family pictures of us, which is great because we don't really have any. Baby was tired, though, so he looks serious in them all, lol. He really does like us!
My Vaccine Book extra is still available for sale.
I have a bunch of family/baby related books to read now. yay Amazon! I am trying to plug through them during Jonathan's down time. Which has been a lot the last few days. I think Mom is right, I think he is going through a growth spurt. He is reeeeally sleepy. He even got himself back to sleep after waking when I put him in the bouncer so I could shower. I was impressed, since he usually doesn't go back down easily if his nap is cut short, much less do it by himself. Yay baby! He is growing and changing so fast! It is really cool, and kinda sad. He went through his littlest clothes so fast! He is already too long for his 0-3 month Gerber onesies. :( His legs are still too short for 3 month pants, though. He is built like his dad, haha. normal legs on a long torso. Hopefully we won't end up having as hard of a time finding shirts for him as we have for Bob.
So to begin this week of thanks, what are 5 of the things you love about your child(ren), husband/wife, and/or our country?
I will do mine:
child- * when he grins while I sing to him * how peaceful he looks in his sleep * he acts like me and looks like his dad a bit * he gives me loving looks and touches as I feed him, like he is grateful * he hugs me as he falls asleep sometimes
husband- * he works hard to provide for us * he loves Jonathan and helps with him and plays with him * he is funny and has a great laugh when he really thinks something is funny * he wears yummy smelling cologne * he is smart, so we can talk deeply about interesting things
country- * I am not afraid of the police * I am expected to be treated with respect as a woman * citizens have some level of say in the government * we've been richly blessed by God with prosperity far beyond our needs * my husband leads our family, not the government (example: we can choose how many children to have, unlike the Chinese, and even how to school them)
aawww, you guys look very happy and I love Jonathan's outfit! Meredith is still in a bigger shirt than pants which makes it hard to buy outfits, I usually have to buy seperates so I can get the smaller pants.
children-they all love God,and have obeyed His call,they are all loving to others,they all make me laugh,they all are good friends, they all give me great joy and great hugs and noisy raspberry kisses :) Husband- works hard and never complains so I can stay home to raise kids,loves me deeply,loves God more deeply sings beautiful love songs and silly made up songs,built me a house on a hill, was/is an involved dad,crazy enough to love me! country-free to worship as we please, free to come and go as we please, vast diversity of people and places, and as she said, so very grateful to our veterans who have given their lives to protect and prosper our country
Ethan always seems to be in a serious mood during picture time too! Very good pictures! It is difficult sometimes not to be sad how much they've grown.
child: he sleeps at least 8 hours straight every night :-D, sweetest smiles and expressions, loves to cuddle when I feed him, makes my life so much more meaningful, patient with me as I learn to juggle everything as a new mom
husband: has great strengths that I wish I had, provider for our family, always in a good mood, extremely patient with ME beyond words, loving-sweet personality
country: blessed with the freedom to worship, free enterprise & homeschool.
That's how I feel too!
When they get to about the 3 month mark they really start getting more interactive. Ethan LOVES watching other kids, it's so adorable.
It isn't super easy to get stuff done yet, but it is getting better! Piles and baskets of clean and somewhat folded laundry is better than dirty laundry, right? lol. I would have gotten more done, but Jonathan was in a funk yesterday. He normally follows the same patterns more or less each day, but yesterday was a bit off. He didn't act very hungry when he woke up, not for a while. He did that today too, though he ate a bit before falling asleep. It is weird. Maybe we are doing a feeding closer to waketime than before, or he's slowly spacing out his meals. Either way, it kind of changed how he was for the rest of the day. We will see how he acts today and if I can finish stuff up.
I finally got some of the wedding pictures printed! Six weeks before our anniversary, haha. I just decided what I want to do for him as a gift for our anniversary. I'll write it in black, and you can highlight it if you want to see, that way he won't accidentally see it. I am going to write out 366 (this year was a leap year) reasons I love being with him, both serious ones and funny little reasons. I am thinking I will either put it into a booklet, a flip calendar, or little tags on a ring (like flashcards) so he can look at one a day for the next year and any other year in the future. I need to get that list started. 366 isn't too many, but it is a lot to think of, format, and make sure they don't repeat! So there's my idea. I think I will actually get this project done, since I can do it when sitting down with the baby. :) I still don't know what we are doing on the day of the anniversary, it kind of depends on how Jonathan is at being without us at 3 months old and thus if we take him along on a fun date or leave him with Nana and do something sweet and romantic. Being New Year's Day makes a difference too. Some places will be busier, some may be closed, some may have special fun stuff going on.
I wonder if I will get the rehearsal/wedding/reception pictures scrapbooked by our first anniversary. And then add the honeymoon to the end of it. I wonder if I will have the maternity/baby pictures scrapbooked by his 1st birthday! Scrapbooks are a great idea, but hard for the busy idealist to actually make. Hmm, fold laundry/scrapbook? Which is more important? haha. No wonder they never get done.
Well, he's sleeping, so I had better accomplish something.
I scrap-booked Brian & my love story this past year. I started with me going to Florida College and ended at our wedding. All the pictures are in there, I just need to write and decorate each page. I have plenty of pens & punch-out letters that you can use too. I wish I had done more of a "theme" (like all black & white pages or something) because every page is a different color - but I don't have the time or energy to re-do it real nice. I was on a tight budget so most of my supplies can from Wal*Mart... But I hope I can make it look pretty. I want our kids & grand kids to read it someday. :)
We should have a weekend get-together where we get our "Love Story" scrapbooks done together. You take Dobby's hungry fussy moments and I'll take Dobby's dirty fussy moments and we'll get it done. How are the quality of the prints from your printer?
I also want to make a scrapbook of my cats (Bison, Phoebe, and Lady) and their story and them growing up. I think I'm going to use my black & white paper idea for that scrapbook, because my cats are black & white so it will be more cohesive. :) But I need to order prints first. Maybe I'll do that today.
Sound like fun? I'll be up there this weekend (Saturday/Sunday) but I don't know how much time I'll have to focus on scrapbooking. Maybe a long weekend in December would be good. I can come up on a Saturday and then we can work on the books on Sunday & Monday unless you have quiet family time on Sunday. You game?
I'm doing all my scrapbooking digitally, not only is it cheaper (I get everything free online), faster and easier, but I can do it while I'm nursing. Otherwise I don't think it would ever get done!
it is fun!! I didn't add any oils this time justbc I couldn't get to the whole food store. But I plan on trying it. ?ion.....does the oil mix well in the detgerent...at what point when making the detgerent do I add the oil?
That's one new thing I want to try this year - a sweet potato casserole. I don't like the canned stuff with marshmallows on it. I found a recipe here on pleo and some on allrecipes.com. Do you have a tried and true one that you like?
There are various programs you can use for digiscraping. I bought mine, MemoryMixer, at Hobby Lobby with a 40% coupon which made it around $20. You can use photoshop if you have it though. I don't and it is too expensive to buy.
I really like my program, it is very easy to use and basic. I can do just about anything except for a couple of things that you would be able to do with photoshop (templates, curved text and cropping out an image-image lifting). There are two websites I go to everyday and I get free stuff pretty much everyday. There is so much out there to buy as well, but free works for me!
My favorite way to scrap is quick pages. They are already put together pages so you just add your picture and a quote or some text if you like. Just about all of mine lately have been made this way :-D
You can print them out in various sizes. I have not printed out any for scrapbook keeping yet, but have printed some for picture frames for around the house and gifts. I love them! When I'm ready to print I think I'll do it at shutterfly.com. It will make it about 50 cents a page to print on quality scrapbook paper. Now how can you make a scrap page for less than that? (considering your images are free :-)
There is a group on here, digiscrappers. You can find a lot of info and advice on there as well. Feel free to ask me anything you want to know about it :-)
Is Jonathan a big finger sucker too? Ethan has really gotten into his the past 3 weeks :-)
Almost 7 weeks now? You are getting to the easier stage! At least it was for me though. Breastfeeding and his sleeping finally got so much better at that time. A big relief.
I heard on the news last night that they found a dead person just off of a walking trail a few blocks from our house. A person walking the trail saw a shoe with a human foot in it off to the side and called police. I find this kinda freaky because I was thinking about using that walking trail sometime as part of my PP exercise plan. They don't know why the person died yet, hopefully it isn't a homicide. Here is the story.
Since that was kind of a morbid paragraph, I will put something really dumb that comes from the mind of a tired new mom to balance things out. I call it JONATHAN!!!
Jonathan was a man... he was a...baby man... maybe he was just a baby...but still, he was JONATHAN!!! ... JONATHAN!!! Poopinating all the diapers, burpinating all the onesies, burpinating all the blankets, and all the cotton BURPCLOTHS!!! ... COTTON BURPCLOTHS!!! ... and Jonathan screams in the NIGHT!!!!
This is what happens to a mother's brain for a while. You find humor in the crazy stuff, and will do ridiculous things to make your baby smile. Like parodying Trogdor, and singing crazy songs. I hadn't sung "Who did swallow Jonah?" for years! I find myself needing my old Wee Sing stuff, I am running out of repertoire (sp?). New moms, be forewarned, lol.
Was that the trail behind the Catholic retreat place? If so...stay far away from there. It looks so pretty and inviting, but I used to work near there and can tell you some SCARY stories. That is true for a lot of the wooded trails around Beaverton. Not to be ventured into alone!
I saw that on the news! Don't go walking alone ANYWHERE! I have a solution, but it has to wait until Christmas to play out. Keep you and our little man safe at HOME!! I'll see if Jordan can burn you a CD after we get our computer back. We're waiting on a new motherboard.
Solution: A second hand Treadmill and Step Aerobics to your favorite music. I'd probably weigh twice as much without mine. Let's hope they find the bad guy quickly.
Thank you so much for that comment. It is challenging to find modest clothing for girls--I'm so thankful that they understand modesty. I made all their clothing when they were younger...as a matter of fact the littler girls are wearing dresses I made years ago--we all had matching dresses--I'm so glad I have a picture, they were my favorite. I made all the matching dress pictures on the blog. I know you sew so I thought you'd appreciate this.
I just stopped making all their clothing a few years back. We can find long skirts at some stores and mix and match with shirts--opened up their wardrobe a lot. Now the girls wear my normal size (my-after-I-lose-my-baby-weight-size)--so they are always taking my stuff ;). When I can finally fit into it again, I plan to reclaim it...
;) We are probably more stringent because I grew up with the bikini-on-the-beach and daisy-duke-shorts crowd ... I did not even know one person who was interested in modesty! Can you imagine? We had quite a few changes to make when we were converted!
This weekend we went to the funeral, and afterward to Bob's folks' place. It was a good weekend overall, with Jonathan being an angel in the car for so long. He did fuss a lot Saturday night because of how long he slept in the car and all the stimulation of the new people and places, but that was understandable. Grandma Mo wanted to keep Jonathan until Thanksgiving, she enjoyed him so much! He liked her too. And he loves Grandma Sherry too. She is really enjoying her first grandson, just like someone else I know. :) We visited Sunnyside this time, which was nice. They were saying how they liked hearing a baby cry again (they are a small group with no tiny ones), much to my chagrin. I took him out quickly, and they thought it was cute, but I always feel bad that it distracts people.
Monday we went to the pediatrician. The office girl had scheduled us at the wrong time, though, so it didn't correspond with normal well-baby timing. So we will do a longer appointment in a couple weeks. They weighed him, and bare naked he is 10lbs 8.4oz. After the appointment, we went to the grocery store. Freddys doesn't have carseat-friendly carts, and I had forgotten my sling, so it was tricky. But Jonathan was good! I will just use my sling next time. I watched Nanny McPhee after that, and liked it pretty well, though there's one scene I am not sure how to classify.
Today was my final PP midwife appointment. Mom came with me to help me for the day. The other couple in our childbirth class was there to say hi since they took the adjacent appointment, and even had a gift for Jonathan! They are so sweet, as is their little girl Anais! We had a nice relaxed visit with the midwives, then went to IHOP. Yum! They have lots of yummy pancake deals going on now. Then we got home and Mom napped with Jonathan, watching him so I could sew on the diapers for a while. :) It was nice to have help with Bob working late.
I got my Amazon order today, and accidentally had ordered 2 copies of The Vaccine Book by Dr. Robert Sears. I'd like to sell the extra, if anyone is interested. I think it was just over $11. lemme know if you are!
The baby is beautiful and she is healthy and we are estatic. Not sure how else to word it. :) How do you pronounce "Anais"?? ;) I'm glad the car trip was good for all of you!
The inner Bob. It's a beautiful thing.
:)