Half Baked

With fall comes cooler weather, thicker clothes, and a constant craving of warm, comforting foods. Apparently, we want those comfort foods for a reason.

Fortunately for O, this time of year brings out my inner baker. Since the love of his life (other than frogs), is anything sweet (thank goodness we kept him sugar free for his first year, huh?), he is really enjoying this.

Today we made pumpkin cookies.

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They are super simple,

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Next week we are going to make candy corn rice krispy treats and bread. My goal of this week is to make all of our bread from scratch. We will see if I can resist the temptation of the sliced loaf bread at the grocery store tomorrow...

Turning Leaves

As self employed people, we rarely follow the "rules" of holidays and vacations. When we travel, it normally isn't based on any specific dates, we just take off. Until now. O is in school so we have limits on our time, oh no!

This week was fall break and we took advantage of it by traveling to the mountains of North Georgia. We stayed in a wonderful cabin that came complete with it's own "playground", creek filled with fish, and a pasture full of cows with moos so deep they would cause me to jump out of my skin every single time I heard one. I was a bit jumpy in those woods.

Anyway, we had a great time on this trip. It's so nice to live so close to the mountains. We went to an apple festival, picked apples at an orchard, sifted for gold and gems, attended Oktoberfest, fished, made pumpkin crafts, and rested. A- getaway ( would have been an A=) if not for my skittishness in the woods.


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Greek Out

Yesterday we went to the Greek Festival.

I am so excited that fall is here! We are finally settling in to our new city and new routine and getting ready to enjoy all the fun that comes with the changing of the seasons. Lined up for this weekend, Greek Festival & Braves Game!

New Words!

E said mama yesterday! We were sitting at chik fila and he looked right at me and said mamammama!It only took him 9 months and a few days to work that one up! Of course i am following Dada and Yay... (O said mama first, followed by elmo and rob (the cat)). I am baffled as to how he is suddenly 9 months old. It is unbelivable that planning his first birthday party has already moved into my subconcious thinking...They sure do grow up fast.

Oh New Year

I don't usually make new year's resolutions. Not real ones anyway. This year is different...just in case that is the reason I never get anything done, I am making a few.
-One is to keep up with this blog. With Anna's assistance, I plan to keep this one!
-Another is to move to Atlanta.
-Getting O accepted into a part time preschool is a huge goal that looms before us. Open houses at these schools begin at the end of this month.
Those are my resolutions in a nutshell.
Now I must go to bed b/c it is very late and my little E wakes very early so he and I can watch the sun come up then he loves to go right back to bed when O wakes up.

more things to not forget

*O calls fuzz or anything he finds on the floor "bumbles." We have no idea where bumbles originated but we've picked it up as well. His brother, the little vaccuum cleaner, LOVES to find and eat bumbles.
*E is starting to babble a lot. He has been saying da da for quite some time but nothing else of substance but we think a language explosion is just around the corner. When we read to him, he talks up a storm! He's not walking yet but is starting to play around with his balance and stand alone for longer periods.

Welcome 2009

We rang in the new year in Anniston, with "unlce" jeremy. We woke up on New Year's Day and headed to Atlanta. We have plans to move to Atlanta as soon as our house sells or if we decide to rent our house out, whichever comes first. This was just a short trip to refamiliarize us with the areas we like, and to drive by pote

ntial preschools for O to see where they were located in relation to certain neighborhoods. This week was also spent working...a lot. We are trying to create a bigger online business presence and things are working well but that is creating lots of package stuffing to mail things out.O & E spent most of their week playing with their new Christmas toys. We need a larger house to house them all! O's current favorites are his bicycle, new and more exciting train tracks for his train table, and his plasma car! E's favorites are his sing along stage, his moving red train, and his stacking bugs!

O has also started wearing hats alllllllllll the time. He keeps finding funny hats and each one creates a different job for him. He has his conductor hat, his engineer hat (can you tell he's a train fan?), his pilot hat, his fireman hat, and his ambulance driver hat.That's about it for this week!

things i don't want to forget!

*Owen can't say the "f" sound so we get to hear about how he wants some WATTLES for breakfast. Soap is called Toamy (instead of foamy, which is what Uncle taught him soap was called)

*He calls his nose "nariz" which is spanish for nose and anything that is inside his nose is also called a nariz. He also wears pantalones instead of pants. 

*Evan's teethers are known as "no teeth" to Owen. He hands him a no teeth to help him grow his teeth. He started calling them that when his daddy told him evan has no teeth. 

* He says EEEEEBBBBAAAAAANNNN when he catches evan playing with his favorite toys. (he can't say v either, it comes out as b) I need to get a video of this one, it's hilarious. 

life's a beach

Hello from Panama City Beach! We are just finishing up a really wonderful and relaxing fall vacation. This was Evan's first time to see the ocean and he seemed to be very impressed. He really loved the sand, it was so tasty! Owen had such a great time we are thinking he may have some beach bum in his blood. He drove his cars through the sand, made tunnels, and overcame his fear of seashells. yes, fear of seashells! For some reason when we first arrived, he wanted nothing to do with them. The best he could do is try to bury them by sprinkling sand on them from afar. By tonight though, he was a pro. once he braved picking up one, he was a shell picking machine. He loved to find them and toss them out into the sea.

A few weeks ago, we took a trip to Houston for our nephew Garett's first birthday. this was Evan's first plane ride and Owen's first one since he turned two! We had a nice visit and got to go to the zoo. Owen got his pockets stuffed full of nickels from his grandpa and he had fun jingling when he walked.

Well, i need to sign off, the dryer buzzer just went off! Yes, doing laundry at the beach! What fun. :)

quick update- we found a tiny front tooth on evan 2 days ago! 

owen is now in big boy underwear!  he picked it out himself, thomas train of course. :)

well baby visit today:

Owen: 28 lbs, 36 inches tall (1 polio vaccine)

Evan: 15.3 lbs.,  26 inches long (1 DTaP vaccine) 

As I mentioned earlier, we started Evan on solid foods but we have stopped for a while and decided to hold off until closer to 6 months...it just doesn't feel right yet!

weekend recap

This weekend we struggled to find things to do...and  I am happy to report, we succeeded!

Friday night we took the boys to the Alabama State Fair. It was the first time at a fair for both of them.  Owen was too short to ride any rides, thankfully. Hahaa, the rides were rusty and squeaky and nothing short of terrifying. The carnival culture isn't quite as exciting as I remember from my childhood. We did get to pick up ducks and fish for sharks so that saved the night. We also ate our obligatory corn dogs on the way out. 

Today, we went to a reallllly boring folk music festival in Leeds. Granted, we got there an hour before they were to close but I'm fairly certain it would have been a snooze anyway. After that we stopped at a monster playground and Owen went down a giant silver slide. He's growing up too fast and I just can't keep up! we topped off the night with owen's favorite, PJ Changs, outside on the deck overlooking the mountains of birmingham. 

Solid Foods

We had been wanting to hold off until 5.5 months to start solid foods but Evan convinced us he was ready now. He has perfect head control, can sit up unsupported, and is very interested in our food. All criteria are met so we began. We gave him rice cereal a couple of times last week and he loved it. Tonight he tried peas. Owen fed him!  (unfortunately we don't have pictures b/c it took all four of us to have owen safely feed him) He gobbled it right up. Tomorrow we are going to stock up on some veggies and freeze enough for the next few weeks.  We are in no hurry since it's supposed to be more about practice until he's closer to a year old, that's when it will become more of a nutritional need. 

We have a crawler! Evan started crawling officially last week when we were cabin-ing in the smokey mountains.  ). Of course along with the crawling comes trying to sit up and he gets it sometimes but sometimes his legs get stuck halfway between and we have to rescue him. If he rolls over in his sleep, he instantly wakes up and is on his knees and crawling around. This is causing us some looooong and tiring night b/c he gets frusterated but as with everything, he'll outgrow it soon.  He is growing up so incredibly fast...he'll be 5 months old in 2 days. 

Owen is going through a Mr. Independent phase again. He seems to go in and out of these phases and they vary in intensity, depending on how bored he is. His favorite toys right now are his train table and water table and he loves to be outside. We all went on an adventure to Ruffner Mountain this morning and walked a rugged trail through the woods. I wore Evan and Owen walked part of the time (over the bridges and on the flat parts) but on the rocky hills, he rode on Starbuck's shoulders. We got lots of exercise, lots of mosquito bites, and had lots of fun. 

Now we are waiting on Uncle Jeremy to stop by on his way back from the Republican National Convention. he covered both conventions this year and he said the difference between the two was stark. We are planning on voting absentee and heading to the beach for the election b/c it's going to be a long, hard day to watch, might as well be somewhere fun. 

It's Potty Time!

This has been a fun week. Yesterday we took Owen (and evan!) to the Early Works Museum with cousin Lauren. They get along soooo well, they take after their mamas. They will be laughing hysterically over nothing in no time at all. They got to build things with blocks. play with ducks in a giant tub of water, and make pretend food in the most gigantic and heavy (DANGEROUS!) cast iron skillets and bowls. It was a nice day and I look forward to getting them together again soon. 

In other news, Owen started potty training himself last Saturday! This is something he is doing completely on his own terms. He started saying "go pee pee" and the rest is history. Starbuck took him to the bathroom, he sat down on his potty and did what he needed to do. He's done it several times a day since then. We never ask him if he needs to go, he tells us. Apparently he thinks potty training before 2 is the thing to do. 

For the last several days Owen has been asking about New Orleans. Apparently he had a great time the last time we were there. We are due for another trip so we may just grant his wish and head there next week. 

First we have to get through this weekend. We are attempting to have a yard sale Saturday morning. We'll see how well that goes, with us having to get up at the crack of dawn...

Wow, it's been a long time! I'm going to try, yet again, to keep up with this thing. 

We did indeed have a baby and HE is a beautiful baby boy! I will try to write up Evan's birth story in the very near future but for the moment, I will talk about what the boys are up to these days. 

Evan is now almost 2.5 months old, where has the time gone?!  He rolled over for the first time (from tummy to back) the day before he turned 2 months. He has been smiling since 3 weeks and is trying really hard to reach for things.  He has a great punch and is good at knocking things around on his playmats. 

Owen is still as charming as ever. Last week he started his first Art and gym classes. He made a rainmaker and a Papa G replica in art class and got to climb like a monkey in gym class. He now knows all of his shapes, even the tricky ones like pentagon and octagon. 

We spent father's day weekend in North Alabama with mimi and papa. We took the boys to Russell Cave (Russell Cabes in Owen-speak) in Bridgeport and got them some National Park Passports, which we hope to fill up with stamps over the years. 

Today Anna and her mom drove up to visit. She's visiting her family in south alabama for the week...it was so nice to see them for a little while, i miss her sooo much!

I'm really, really going to try to start working on this blog more frequently so I can actually share it with family and make it worth stopping by! 

37 weeks

The time for new baby's arrival is drawing near! As of tomorrow i will officially be 37 weeks, which means baby will be here in 5 weeks at the absolute latest...but I am highly doubting we will last that long! I have been carrying this baby as low as I thought possible but sometime during the night last night, baby turned into position and i am fairly sure his/her head is engaged. I have never felt pressure like this before! I am having trouble walking and waddling is the best I can do! This has overall been another extremely easy pregnancy and I feel very fortunate to be reaching the highly uncomfortable stage at such a late date.

Owen is now 19 months old and still talking up a storm! He is quickly learning his alphabet. His favorite letters are o, i, and d. He loves to recognize letters on billboards or anywhere he sees them and he fascianates us! If we had known how much he would love letters, we would have introduced them to him earlier! We have some magnetic letters that starbuck showed him and within a matter of minutes, he has already learned 3 letters. Now he knows almost all of them. Amazing!

January Cold

Recovering from our trip to denver has included recovering from colds. Our whole house has been sick. This is Owen's very first cold/cough and it's been unbearable! He is so pitiful with his runny nose and hacky cough. We are very fortunate to have made it almost 18 months without ever dealing with this so i can't complain too much. We took him to the dr on wednesday and she daiagnosed him with the crud. Only in alabama! He's not acting sick other than the congestion, he still moves at lightening speed.

Quick owen milestones update: He is 1.5 years old today. He is getting great about leading us around by the hand and he is learning soooooo much every day. He can put on his own shoes and socks, shirts over the head, and pants on the legs (but can't pull them up or get his arms throug yet). He wants to feed himself all the time now and has no interest in any food if we try to feed it to him. We are definitely entering the terrible twos and the battle of wills early but i think we're all going to make it through just fine. :)

Oh! We opened the store on Tuesday! It's been a slow week as to be expected but the people who stop in all buy and love everything! We are very excited about it and will start advertising when we feel everything is up to par and exactly how we want it. Babies (owen included) cry when they have to leave the store, so that is a great sign of how much fun stuff we have.

Hmmm...kitchen news. We ordered our cabinets earlier this month and they should be in in a couple of weeks. We bought a new dishwasher last night. We still need to get the microwave, sink, and tile for the backsplash then we'll be set. We will only be w/out use of our kitchen for about 2 weeks, the time between the cabinets and the countertop to come in.

Enough of this boring post!

One last thing: Tomorrow will mark 31 weeks in this pregnancy. WHERE is the time going!?! According to our latest updates, baby should weigh around 3.5 lbs and be @ 18 inches long. He/she kicks like a madman/woman all day and all night so I can believe they are getting that big but it's still hard to comprehend. Owen will be a big brother before we know it.

Just wanted to stop in and record a quick Owen update.

We took him to the pediatrician for his 15 month checkup at 16 months. Oops! He is way ahead on his milestones (imitating adults, stacking blocks and putting shapes through holes) and weighs 24 lbs (so lean!) and is 33.5 inches long. He's still a tall one!

Right now he has a phrase "chi-chi-tie" that we are clueless about. He says it all the time and we just can't figure out what he is saying.

He is so happy loving the Christmas trees and Santas (tantas) and Snowmen (noman) that are everywhere. He met Santa last week and was very aprehensive but very brave and didn't shed a tear. Poor Santa, basically every toddler he met screamed at him. This afternoon we're going to the Heart of Dixie Railroad for a ride on the Santa Express so he will get to meet Santa again. Hopefully he will handle it well since it's on one of his favorite things, a train!