The Snowy Day

Happy Thanksgiving & 33/52

Yesterday was a busy & lovely day. I was able to set all of my name cards, and I even made a few extras to say Happy Thanksgiving.

21 weeks and counting...

Daddy carving the turkey and Fischer "helping" carve the turkey...

Hazen trying to reach the chocolate bells mom bought for a little treat. The boys devoured most of them before the guests even arrived!

YUM YUM Kristi gave me a recipe for this yummy dessert.

Have you ever used lists on a scrapbook page? If you haven't you should! I know years from now I will enjoy looking back at my lists lists lists!

Hippopotamus Yogurt & Hippopotamus Cereal

Fischer and Hazen have been using their imaginations all morning. They just morphed from rhinos into hippopotamuses.
Fischer said, "I just dropped my hippopotamus baby off (Hazen was laying on my bed making funny baby noises) at hippopotamus g'mas house so I can buy some hippopotamus yogurt & hippopotamus cereal. I needed to drop him off because he was driving me nuts. He kept going Waaa Waaa so I dropped him off at G'mas." :)
Goldfish were the hippopotamus vitamins... they are still sitting on my carpet. I think I vaccuum up goldfish as least twice a day.

The boys have also been pretending that my bread/pizza dough rollers are combines. We saw lots of combines on our trip last week with Kristi and Corbin to see her folks.

Fischer and Hazen have also been "reading" to each other. A few of their favorites right now are Pit Pat and Big Red Barn. It amazes me that even at their age they can memorize stories and then "read" them to each other without me.

Also Chris and I caught Hazy quietly feeding his elmo baby goldfish yesterday. He was sitting on the black bean bag ( a favorite to sit on upstairs by the fire).

I love to look up and find Fischer looking at books quietly. He is getting old enough to be able to sit STILL for long periods of time.
I'm also amazed at how long Fish and Haz can play together downstairs. It used to be constant crying and fighting. I think Hazen is getting old enough that he can join in the imaginary games too. I love to hear them having visits and planning out their next imaginary game.

Last night we watched the boys downstairs do "ski jumping" tricks off of their slide. I think Dad and I were having more fun then the boys. It was pretty hysterical to watch them try to land some of their tricks. I brought Hazy's birthday slide in for the winter. Thank goodness for basements! I think it might be a little crowded upstairs for the slide.

I'm feeling a little lost right now without my camera. I left it at Kristi's folks on accident. Luckily, Kristi brought it back with her. I am going to meet her today to pick it up. I plan to take lots of everyday pictures the rest of this week.

We are having Thanksgiving at our house this year. I am really looking forward to it. I have been planning/cleaning all week. I even printed out little name cards from Adobe Photoshop for everyones plates today!!! :) I will post pictures once I have my camera. I better get busy again, but did not want to forget all the happenings this week.

A few things I don't want to forget...

Fischer sayings

"Mom, we should buy a March Tool and squirt it all around and make it March so we can get the baby out."

"Mom, when I eat snow my gum gets hard. I don't know why?!"

"Hey Amelia lets have a visit."

Even When

Today (and everyday) I am thankful for these two. Even when they are fighting, whining, talking back, spilling food all over the floor, continually creating a mess, stealing my scrapbooking tape and pulling the entire roll out all over my upstairs, keeping me up at night, wetting the bed, and being demanding.

Even then (especially then) I am thankful to have them in my life.

Home

The boys wanted to see my heart that I drew in the snow.

At first they thought they would try to see it by going outside.

Brrrrrr

Fischer said, "I can see the heart just fine in my warm house!"




This is not such a good idea.

Winter Wonderland & Comfort Food

I'm suppose to have a Stampin Up Party tomorrow. Hmmmm? I'm hoping at least the people from nearby can come. It sure is pretty outside right now. I might even unthaw my other macaroni and cheese pan today. It seems like a perfect day for hot chocolate & yummy comfort food!

As I look out my sliding glass doors, I can see our electric fence doing a little jig because of the weight of the snow. I can't believe that it is not windy! It feels like Steamboat...with all of this puffy snow on everything.

Berry Coffee Cake by Alison From This Front Porch

You can find her blog listed in my blogroll!

So easy and soooo good.
We enjoyed this coffee cake after meeting on Wednesday night & for breakfast on Thursday. Everyone loved it.

Macaroni and Cheese by Tracey Allbright

2 1/2 cups macaroni noodles (I've used big and small macaroni noodles.)

4 T of butter
4 T of flour

2 cups of milk (we use non-fat)

1 t salt

1 t sugar

1/2 pound processed cheese (velveeta) cubed

2/3 cup sour cream (light or fat free is fine)

1 1/3 cup cottage cheese (light or fat free is fine)

2 cups sharp chedder grated

1 1/2 cup soft bread crumbs

2 tsp butter

paprika sprinkles

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

2. Cook and drain macaroni and place in a 2 1/2 quart casserole dish.

3. Melt butter over heat in medium saucepan; stir in flour and mix well. Add milk and cook over medium heat, stirring constantly until it thickens. This part takes some time-so be ready to stand at the stove for awhile-it is well worth the effort! Add salt, sugar, and processed cheese; mix well

4. Mix sour cream and cottage cheese into sauce and pour over macaroni; mix well.


5. Sprinkle grated cheese and bread crumbs over top. (Makes it extra special with the bread crumbs.) Dot with butter and sprinkle with paprika. May be frozen at this point.

6. Bake in preheated oven at 350 for 45-50 minutes. Serves 6. Makes great left overs!

I actually doubled the recipe, and made two pans of macaroni so I could freeze one pan. It is so nice. I just think if I am going to make the mess I might as well double it so we can enjoy it some other time! You know for that night when you don't feel like making a huge mess and cooking.

Dennis the Menace

I think this may be what the artist for Dennis the Menace had in mind when he was trying to create the stereotypical boy!
Bed Head (love the one little spike sticking up!)
Scab under his nose from falling
Milk Moustache
Food bits on face from breakfast...:)

Who could resist this face?

"Mom, can we please have an ice cream sandwich?"

It would not have been a problem except is was 8:12AM.
Who lets their children have ice cream sandwiches that early?
I did. I definitely (there is that word again :)) could not resist the expression on either Fischer or Hazen's face.
***The boys were awake at 6AM, and they had eaten breakfast. So 8AM is a long time after, right?!? :)

32/52

This picture makes me laugh. I had my window open, and Hazy J on my lap. You can tell by my hair that the wind was blowing.

I love that you can imagine Hazy's little expression just from the wrinkles on his forehead. The boys love to ride up front with me when we are on the dirt roads.
I know I will miss this when they are too big to sit on my lap!

Definitely

Wow I have been spelling this word wrong here lately!
I kept spelling it definately.

I'm sorry but does anyone else have trouble sometimes with the way words look.

Definitely Definitely Definitely

It just does not look right to me. Oh well. I guess we all had a little spelling lesson today.

Yes I know weird things bug me. :)

A picture of baby #3

Fischer cooked me a really nice meal last night. As he was bringing it to me he said, "Okay Mom I cooked a really good dinner for you, now don't fuss about it."
I think he has heard this a few times before. :)


This is exactly what I see when the boys are jumping on the old couch downstairs. They love it!

I promised to post a picture of baby #3. I hope you can sort of tell that it is a little baby. Ultrasounds are hard to see sometimes. Don't you just love my Thomas magnet?!?

I am definitely the mother of little boys under the age of 4.

Happy Fall & Owls

Hope everyone is having a Happy Fall! I can't believe Thanksgiving is almost here.

I've always had a theme for every baby. Owls are baby #3's theme. I found these really cute owls on a digi sight. The owl above is part of the set. Hope you enjoy.

I think they are so cute...and very boy!!! I'm going to decorate with Orange, Green and Blue.

A Note to baby #3 & a quick trip to Uncle Jeff and Aunt Lisa's house

The night before we left to see Jeff and Lisa, our Gymboree package arrived. The boys had to try all of their new clothes on.

We were able to make a quick visit to see Melody and Amy while we were there. Lisa and Carly were there for lunch too. The boys were able to help collect eggs.

Fischer was very proud to be holding the egg bucket.

Melody had to teach Fischer not to just drop the eggs in the bucket. He accidentally broke two, but then he got the hang of it. Luckily, he had a patient teacher named Amy. :)

We went to visit the new baby kitties.

The boys also attended preschool at Aunt Lisa's house. They loved it!

We were even able to fingerpaint.

Eventually finger painting became body painting with my boys...

We had to rush to the bathtub after this.

Preschool would not be complete without snacktime...

Our baby is a....

BOY! He was hiccuping during the ultrasound which was pretty cute to see. He was also very active. :)
Everything looks great. We are all happy that he is healthy.
Thanks to all of you for thinking of us yesterday, and sorry that I didn't post sooner. We came to see Chris's brother for a few days. The boys are enjoying playing with their cousins. I will post some pictures of the baby as soon as I get home.

A Big Day Tomorrow & Attitude

Hazy kept saying "put eggies on beddy" during breakfast today. :)

We have our 20 week ultrasound tomorrow. It will be so fun to see the baby. I've been feeling lots of kicks lately, which is a good sign.

The boys keep talking about being able to see the baby!

Do you think that the baby is a boy or girl?

Just a thought today as I sit here typing too. We will always encounter offensive people.

People who try to bring you down or that try to make you feel miserable. I think it may be mostly because they are miserable themselves.

We have a choice each day about the attitude we have about the day ahead. I too often allow miserable people to rule my attitude. I allow them to have power over my happiness. So today I want to say don't let it happen. I'm having a lovely day by choice...I hope you can do the same!

Here is a lovely quote to go along with this thought

The longer I live, the more I realize the impact of attitude on life. Attitude, to me, is more important than facts. It is more important than the past, the education, the money, than circumstances, than failure, than successes, than what other people think or say or do. It is more important than appearance, giftedness or skill. It will make or break a company...a church...a home. The remarkable thing is we have a choice everyday regarding the attitude we will embrace for that day. We cannot change our past...we cannot change the fact that people will act in a certain way. We cannot change the inevitable. The only thing we can do is play on the one string we have, and that is our attitude. I am convinced that life is 10% what happens to me and 90% of how I react to it. And so it is with you...we are in charge of our Attitudes.

Charles Swindoll

Our Halloween Night

The boys this morning before meeting. Apples are really popular right now!

Fischer was a bow hunter this year. He loved trick or treating. We went to only a couple of houses, but it was special for him anyway.

He would say "Trick or Treat Please" at each house we stopped at...

Hazy was Mr. Fixit. He loved trick or treating too. He just repeated everything that brother said.