Story time with Daddy

Every evening (well, that's the goal) Mike reads A.T. a bedtime story and then mommy futily tries to settle Alan down for bed.

Mommys Helper

I was folding laundry the other day and A.T. crawled over to help me.

He's such a sweet helper, but not very good at folding ;)

Growing so fast

When I was pregnant with Alan all I could envision was the newborn and little baby stage. Beyond 3 months just felt like years away. When I'd see a highchair or walking toy I just thought: "Man, we have a while 'til then." I guess I did have "a while" in some sense, but where did the time go?! It's just flown, really, it has.

Today Mike and I were enjoying watching A.T. pull up on the couch and reach for something on it while maintaining his balance. I couldn't help but ask Mike how we got here so fast, how is our little boy moving all over the place, sitting in a highchair, and pulling up on everything?

I've really loved this whole experience so much, oh of course there are hard days, but really they're a drop in the bucket compared to all the joy and sweetness that surrounds me daily with this little boy!

Speaking of highchairs, some very generous friends of ours gave us their old highchair and it's exactly what I wanted! It's a mahogany Jenny Lind. We picked it up today after Mass and I've (or should I say A.T.?) used it twice already. It's a great success as i finally get to eat dinner without my plate being pulled off or my food mangled :)

Thanks y'all, we really appreciate it!

Look at that moss!

On our outing yesterday we saw this beautiful Spanish moss hanging from the trees. With the sun shining through it was especially beautiful.

Family Walk

After our baking frenzy here today we took a walk, about a 2.5 mile one. It was a beautiful day, clear, sunny with a mild breeze and 65 degrees out.

Here's our view for the first mile.

White Bread

I was a little bored today so I decided to venture into the world of bread making. I started with a simple white bread from the Fanny Farmer Cook book. It came out a lot better than I was expecting. Here is a picture of the results:

I know it is not the best picture, but maybe some day I will have an iphone.

-Mike

Crepes for breakfast

The crepes we had for breakfast yesterday were great. Here's the recipe I got from Julia Child's "The Way to Cook":

1 C flour, preferably instant blending
2/3 C water
2/3 C milk (I recommend whole milk)
1/4 tsp salt
3 Tb melted butter
3 large eggs

Mix all the ingredients together, let rest 10 mins.
Heat skillet on medium until water droplets dance on pan. Butter thoroughly and drizzle batter in, tilting pan to spread batter.

You can make the crepes as thick or thin as you like, I prefer them thin.

A non-stick skillet is nest but you can use a regular one and just lather it with butter every time.

If you use regular flour then the batter needs to rest two hours.

Fill crepes with powdered sugar, jam, jelly, honey, or nutella--whatever you want.

Bon apetit!

The Swamp

Look at these roots, they're all knobby like that because they used to be underwater.

The three of us took a walk this evening to one of the islands in the lake and that's where these roots are.

Nibbling on Solids

We bought some Gerber baby melt in your mouth baby puffs for A.T. Of course this doesn't take away from his breastfeeding, it's just something safe he can nibble on because he's fascinated with putting anything in his mouth.

I love seeing his fat little dimpled hands grasp the treats (about the size of cheerios) and attempt to get them in his mouth. In one photo below he looks like he's trying to put his fist in his mouth but he's actually trying to put food in. He's still learning that he needs to let go of the food completely in order to eat it.

I love watching him grow and learn these things, it's so sweet and cute. We love you big boy!

Great grocery finds and a cooking tip

Our grocery stores around here have a fairly large and substantial Mexican food selection with one of the best parts being their spice collection. Small and large quantities of various spices, including rosemary, are available for mere pennies. I desperately needed more rosemary as I use for my pasta sauce, pizza sauce, grilled chicken sandwiches, and potatoes all of which we've had recently. So I grabbed the cheapest non-organic (that's always cheaper) jar they had. McCormick's Rosemary was $5.99 for 1 oz. "Oh well," I thought, "that's one more good reason to get my herb garden started now." (yes, it's planting season down here) Then a few aisles later I came upon the Mexican spice shelf and what do you know, they had .5 oz of Rosemary going for $0.79! I was ecstatic! So I bought one because I want to make sure it's the real deal before I invest in anymore. I'll update y'all on that.

Next great find (maybe this is normal but I'd never noticed it) is that our Winn-Dixie had the quick dissolve flour. It sounds terrible, doesn't it, like some shortcut TV would have promoted in the 50's when American women stopped cooking so well and sought speed and ease over quality and time proven methods.
Well, guess who recommended it? My gastronomic hero: Julia Child, I love everything about that women! She said it's best for crepe batter because you won't get any lumps. Makes sense. So I bought it and made the batter tonight. Tomorrow's breakfast will be some savory crepes!

Recipe to follow.

My View

A.T. looking out on the lake this afternoon. He makes ordinary walks so much sweeter.

Mattress Shopping

Well, we bit the bullet and got a new mattress. Neither one of us were sleeping well on our huber springy, soft, dip-in-the-center mattress and it only seemed to be irritating Mike's back more, so we just decided we better act now.

We went to three different stores in town and each one was better than the last. It went from bad to good to great. It was actually rather comical, the sales lady at the first place was so...how do I say this...funny. She approached us and asked what we were looking for, we told her mattresses and she just stood there chewing gum, didn't say anything, didn't explain any differences, didn't ask anymore questions. We went from mattress to mattress but soon left, unimpressed with the selection and the service.

The next place the lady was better, more helpful and not so strange in the way she hovered over us, but still lacked some mattress knowledge we were seeking.

The last place blew us out of the water! The selection was great and much bigger than the previous two combined. The sales man was extremely knowledgeable and helpful, he explained the different types, asked about our preference (soft, med, or firm), price range, size and other things. He had cut outs for each mattress so you could actually see what was inside and therefore understand what he was talking about. After he went over everything he walked away so we could try them out without having him hover over us.

Not only was the sales experience great but the mattresses were amazing. We bought a king size Jamison. There was one Jamison that was around 4k that we tried out just for fun, I swear, I've never felt a bed so perfect in every way like that one. Maybe in 15-20 years when we need to get a new bed we'll splurge on that one. It was incredible. If anyone of you reading this are planning on spending that kind of money on a mattress, get the best Jamison. I can't remember its exact name unfortunately.

So all three of us tried out the bed and loved it. I think Alan's only bed preference is that he be right next to me and also able to spread out and take up 2/3 of the bed if he wishes, he's not as concerned with sinking issues, so he was happy with our choice.

On a funnier note, fortunately the salesman and his wife (who's pregnant with their third) co-sleep so when I asked if there was a person limit for the warranty he wasn't too freaked out when I quickly explained that the other sleeper(s) would be children. It sounded very funny at first and Mike gave this look of "What are you saying?!" haha!

So, congrats if you got this far. Aren't blogs awesome? You can read about something as mundane as our mattress shopping experience. Your life has been enriched ;)

* I was not paid or perked for this positive review, all opinions are entirely my own.

Cooking

I've gotten into cooking much more now that I don't work outside the home. It was so hard to make a meal, let alone, meal plan when I was getting home around 6pm.

Now I make my week menu before I shop and then know just what to do everyday. I've gotten in the habit of looking ahead on the menu to make sure the meat is defrosted (as I often freeze lots of it when I get home from the store). I try to cook one new recipe a week and I have to say, I'm pretty proud of my accomplishment there! I've been pretty good about it. I really do enjoy cooking, at least most of the time. Yes, I love nights when Mike makes dinner but I also enjoy making some favorite dish of ours or introducing a new one.

Last night we roasted pork ribs on the grill. I marinated them for about 4 hours in a Jack Daniel's BBQ sauce. I also made French fries--from scratch. They are really quite easy.

Here are some pics from dinner:

Gator Island

Across from our house is a little island in the lake. The park built a bridge to it and soon people will be able to camp there and have breakfast with the sunning gators ;)

A.T. and I checked out the island about 6 weeks ago and here are the photos from our little stroll.

I love this kid's zest for life--look at that smile!