A fun visit from cousins

What a busy week we've had! We had a fun visit from Mark's sister and her family. Thursday morning Mark's mom and I 'babysat' for two of the cousins while the rest of the family had an appointment in town. We had a fun morning! It sure was different to have three kids instead of one!

Here's the latest James & Ricky Friday photo...yes, our living room is almost always that messy these days. Oh, and the empty oatmeal container to his right has been a great toy--he loves to chew on it (of course) and dump things out of it!

Here's James playing with, or at least next to, his cousin Jason. Jason is exactly two years older than James, so we get all of his hand-me-downs. Thanks Jason!

We started off the morning with some sugary cereal with marshmallows. I never eat cereal--but I did Thursday morning! And no, Andrea, I didn't pick out all of the marshmallows first. I know, it's hard to believe. The kids were pretty excited about the cereal!

After James' nap, we went on a walk! I'm glad we had two strollers, as the park was five blocks or so away. It was a beautiful day for it!

Look at this big boy!

I was surprised at how hard it was to get all three kids to be looking in the direction of the camera. This was the best of four or five attempts!

Sarah was so sweet with James. He wasn't sure what to think about all the loving from her, but she was very gentle with him. At one point she even picked him up and hauled him into the kitchen where we were getting lunch ready--they might be a little too small for that yet! :)

Girly Weekend and Mother's Day

What a wonderful girly weekend with friends! We talked, shopped, ate, went to the same coffee shop twice and stayed in a nice hotel. It was a great get-away and we can't wait to do it again! James did really well with just Mark. I was so excited to see them when I got home on Mother's Day morning before church!

Playing Catch

If Mark has anything to do with it, our son is going to be athletic! He 'taught' him how to play catch. Sometimes he just giggles the whole time, thinking it's the greatest game ever!

This weekend is my big Girls' Get-away Weekend! Several girlfriends of mine are coming into town and we're staying in a hotel Saturday night after shopping and catching up all afternoon. It'll be my first night away from James and Mark's first night 'on-duty' by himself! I'll let you know how it goes...

Needed: Baby-proofing

This little boy is starting to get into everything. Although he doesn't do much more than 'bunny hop' forward right now, he does slide and scoot backward pretty efficiently to get into and under all sorts of things. I've found him underneath our coffee table several times. He seems to gravitate toward paper, coupons, and magazines! He just loves the crinkly sound they make. I don't think crumpling paper is so bad for him; it's the eating of paper that I'd like to avoid...so I'm going to be working on baby-proofing some things in the next few weeks.

One piece of exciting news in our home is James' new tooth! His first! It just 'popped' out on Saturday. It's nearly impossible to see it, because he's always playing with it with his tongue. And it's pretty short still. But we can feel it with our fingers and it comes in a little more each day. Other than that, there's not much else going on here. We're really enjoying getting out for walks in the stroller most week days.

Rockin' and a Rollin'

On Sunday our church celebrated its 20th birthday with a party in the park! It was windy but God blessed the event by preventing any storms or rain all day! It was a fun day but we were totally exhausted at the end of it. Here's James with 'Aunt' Andrea.
You may notice James' little tongue sticking out. He's been discovering it recently, twisting and rolling it in his mouth. It's funny to watch. Mark has also taught him to 'Give me 5'. He's pretty sure James understands and gives him a five whenever he sticks out his palm.

James was a total trooper and took one nap in his stroller while I walked him around the parking lot and took the other nap during a concert on Mark's lap.

Wait! This isn't James! This adorable little bundle of cuteness is Elianna, the daughter my friends Kristen and Ricky. Isn't she beautiful? James had his first official playdate yesterday...with two baby girls. Actually, it was a more of a mommy playdate. The other sweet baby girl was baby Ellie, Allison and Chris' daughter. I didn't get a picture of her because she's a super napper and was still sleeping when I had my camera out!

I've been teasing Kristen since she found out she was having a girl that James might just marry her some day and that she'd better pick a name that sounds great with James' last name. I just had to get a picture of the two of them together, just in case they really do get married some day. Wouldn't it be great to have this in their wedding slideshow? (Mark thinks I'm getting carried away with comments like this....I'm sort of teasing) James was really interested in her but wanted to touch her--he's not too gentle and wants to put everything in his mouth, so we tried to keep that from happening! Later he touched her hair. It was the cutest thing in the world. Doesn't he look like a giant next to her?

James is making a little progress on gettng around, but mostly just rockin' and rollin'. :)

A few 'keepers'

It's Thursday night. On Thursday nights I get free time (after 7pm, that is). Mark is meeting with the guys at a coffee shop and I'm at home by myself. I just spent the last hour or so perusing food blogs. It reminded me that it has been a while since I've shared any recipes. Okay, I realize that the majority of you check the blog to see cute pictures of James' little face, but I think one or two of you have mentioned recipes I've posted before. So here are a few 'keepers' that I've tried recently. I've found a pizza dough recipe that is so easy and quick. You don't have to wait for this one to rise at all. Just mix all the ingredients in your mixer and press onto a pan, top with toppings and bake! Woo hoo! I substitute whole wheat flour for 1/2c to 1c of the flour. Oh, and here's a really delicious pizza sauce. I know, it's so much easier to buy it, but I ended up buying about 15 cans of tomato sauce (I use it instead of the tomato paste the recipe calls for) on sale....so I've been making my own sauce. It's really good and has a little zing to it. (I omit the anchovy paste....sorry, Grandma!)
Kung Pao Chicken....you can actually make this stuff at home? Yes, you can! I was pretty surprised at how delicious this was. And Mark is pretty crazy about it, too. You do have to hunt down sesame oil and rice wine vinegar (not ingredients I had on hand, anyway) but it is worth it! Once you have the ingredients chopped up, this comes together pretty quickly, too! Just make sure to have sticky rice made in advance...This recipe was immediately added to our 'list' of go-to recipes.

These were called "Super Power Muffins" by the person who posted them on a blog. I call them Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Banana Muffins. I can't even bring myself to admit how many I've eaten in the past four days. There's something about peanut butter in a muffin that is really genius, if you ask me. They also contain whole wheat (healthy), applesauce (healthy), and brown sugar (hmmm...delicious). I've heard they freeze well, too. Here's the recipe. You have to scroll a third of the way down the page to find them in the comment section.

Let's see. These are pulled pork sandwiches on homemade hamburger buns. The pork...well, it's a long story. In short, I got a huge cut of pork on sale (of course) and made pork tacos and then had a few pounds of shredded pork leftover. So I heated it up with BBQ sauce. The buns--it was a cold blustery day (just a few weeks ago) and I was avoiding a trip to the grocery store, so I decided to make hamburger buns. I wasn't sure if that was a lazy move or not. I'm so glad I tried them. They are outstanding! I'll make them again! They 'stand up' to the meat, too. You know, they don't wobble around and get mushy and soggy. And they freeze great! Here's the recipe.
Oh, and the mac and cheese recipe was new, too, but I wasn't terribly impressed. Good, but not a 'keeper'.

Okay, this one is definitely a keeper, too. :) This picture is for anybody that was disappointed that I was posting recipes again and hoped to see James.

James & Ricky - 7 Months

James is seven months old now. I wanted to take his picture sitting up next t0 Ricky the Raccoon to commemorate this 'birthday'. It took three times as many tries as what I've posted here to get him and Ricky facing me...phew!'Oh, you wanted him to be sitting up next to me?...oops'

'Let's see here.....I'd better check things out....eyes, nose, mouth....yep, they're all there'

'I'm getting very bored. Hmm...I want to play with that toy.'

'This bunny is tasty!'

'Okay, if I pose for you, will you stopping taking pictures?'

On another note, James has slept all the way through the night (well, til 6:00 or 6:30) the past few nights. This is major news!! I'm trying not to have t0o high of expectations...but wouldn't it be great if he kept it up?

Finally, a video to finish things off. The other night we had sticky rice with some kung pao chicken I'd made. In order to buy a few extra minutes without him getting fussy for more asparagus puree and yogurt (which he'd already finished), we thought we'd let him experiment with sticky rice. This is really his first attempt to self-feed. I'm sure he didn't eat more than three or four grains of rice. You just should have seen him afterward. Covered in rice.