It's a Spring Thing!

A Jake Collage

2012-02-09T05:00:00.000-06:00

What could be better on a Thursday morning than a Jake Collage?????

These are all from his newborn shoot, taken by the fabulous Kristy Silbernagel. I might have to make another collage, because there were about 80 pictures that didn't make it into this collage. Maybe I'll do a weekly collage until we use them all up ;)

Did you also see the new "Jake" section the side of the page (if you are reading on my actual blog)? Those are from Kristy, too. She's awesome :) I could stare at these pictures forever.

Well, Hello There...

2012-02-07T05:00:00.000-06:00

-----

Our announcement. Loves it :)

Jake: 1 Month!

2012-02-04T19:45:00.001-06:00

The Jakester is 1 month old! Hard to believe a month has passed already. Hard to believe I have to go back to work in just about another month.

His grandmother gave him a giant stuffed animal teddy bear that we will use in his monthly pictures to show how much he has grown. When he took his newborn pictures a few days after his birth, he looked like this...

Just a few short weeks later, the little baby was looking more like this...

Bigger, more alert... less sleepy! Still with plenty of hair (does not appear to be falling out).

Of course, posing a 1 month old is not easy-- we got that shot after many that looked like this...

At his 1 month appointment, he tipped the scales at 11 pounds (from 8lbs 13oz at birth) and 22.5 inches (from 21 inches at birth). Everything looked great! The only bad part was when he got a shot-- he did not like that very much!

He's a great baby-- he actually sleeps pretty well (a dream come true for me). He eats every 4 hours. And during the first leg of the night, he sleeps between 5.5 to 6 hrs straight! He loves to swing and sit in his bouncy chair. And we recently got some Baby Einstein DVDs, and while I don't think he can really see them yet, he does love to listen to them. They drive me crazy, but if it keeps the baby happy, I'm down :)

What a great month it's been! I look forward to doing this again next month (but please, Baby Jake, don't grow up too fast!!).

A Few Firsts

2012-01-31T05:00:00.000-06:00

First Car Ride

Heading home from the hospital. This did not start off well... we had the car seat base installed, but we had to adjust the straps on the spot, and we really didn't know what we were doing. He was screaming, and I was desperately trying to get it together so we could leave. Now that I actually know how to work the seat, I know it should have been very simple. Oh well! He quieted down as soon as we got on the interstate. And he has slept every single car ride since then.

First Doctor's Appointment

At just one week old! He did well-- weight and everything looked great. He didn't so much like having his clothes removed (it was a little cold in that exam room), but as you can see here, it was nothing worth staying awake for!

First Bottle

His dad finally got to give him a bottle when he was a week old! It was nice for Chris to get to be involved in that aspect of his life. Now it's a little ritual each evening-- Chris feeds him the last bottle of the night and puts him to bed. That way, I get a little time to myself and can usually get to bed a little sooner.

First Modeling Gig

If you are on Facebook, you may have seen some of his beautiful newborn pictures, taken by the wonderfully talented Kristy Silbernagel Photography. Jake was sooooo good the whole day-- he just slept and slept and let us pose him and dress him and undress him. And if you click that link, you'll find the cutest little baby with a full head of hair as her "enter site" button!!

We'll be back with more firsts-- baths, etc. So stay tuned!!

Jake's Birth Story

2012-01-29T17:25:00.003-06:00

I decided to write down Jake's birth story so I don't forget the details. It all happened so fast-- I have barely told the story, and I don't want to forget in the years to come! This is long-- so don't feel bad if you don't read it :) There are also no pictures at the beginning of the story, because I was too miserable to take pictures!

I was due to be induced on January 5. I was to show up to the hospital late in the night on January 4, and in the wee hours of January 5, they would begin the process to put me into labor.

I had a plan. I liked the plan. No surprises. My doctor repeatedly told me that Jake was very comfortable where he was and would need some urging to change his situation. So you can imagine my surprise when I woke up at 3:00am on January 2 feeling what I knew were contractions, and not the Braxton Hicks ones I had felt often the previous weeks/months. But I knew I was not in real labor, because that was not going to happen until January 5 :)

At first they were mild and far apart-- I was able to sleep a little bit. Then I woke up and got started on my to do list. We were both off of work that day for the New Years holiday. We had some last minute house and baby things to accomplish since Chris was home. So we did-- we assembled the glider and the swing. I cleaned out the closet under our stairs. We installed car seat bases and made sure his clothes were packed. I even cooked dinner.

The contractions kept coming, and some made me stop what I was doing, but they were still sporadic. By dinner time, I was getting uncomfortable. And I kept thinking that I was not going to enjoy the next few days until I got to the hospital to be induced if I was going to have contractions the whole time!

By the time we went to sleep, we decided that Chris would sleep in the guest bedroom & I would sleep in our room. The reason for this was that I was going to be up and down all night dealing with the contractions. I planned to try to sleep between them, but Chris had to go to work the next day. I didn't want to bother him, and he didn't want to bother me (with his snoring).

By 11pm, I was getting pretty miserable. Up, down, up, down. I couldn't even nod off between contractions. But I was timing them in my head and they weren't long enough to be "real labor"-- or so I thought. I guess the pain was making me lose track of my "1 Mississippis." I was Googling "signs of labor" and "contraction lengths" on my phone between them.

Chris came to check on me around 11:30, and I assured him that I was fine and that the baby was not coming any time soon. Around midnight, I decided to download a contraction timer. I had read that if you have more than 4 in one hour, you need to head to the hospital. Well, I had 4 in about 10 minutes. They were each a minute long and two minutes apart. But I was still not convinced that this was really it.

I woke Chris up around 12:15, explaining that I was still not sure what was happening but that I couldn't sleep and hopefully if we went to the hospital, they'd give me something for the pain before sending me back home. So we grabbed our just packed bags, laptops, pillows, cameras, and chargers (charging everything was on the to-do list for later in the week), and jumped in the car.

We got to the hospital in no time. We left all of our belongings in the car, just so we wouldn't look foolish if they sent us right home. We entered through the Emergency Room, and I explained that I thought I was in labor. And then they had me sit at the desk and fill out forms. And answer questions. And show proof of insurance. I answered their questions between contractions, when I could catch my breath. Finally, after what felt like an eternity, they had me checked in and a nurse took me up to Labor & Delivery.

The L&D nurse told me right away that I was 5cm dilated and wouldn't be going anywhere any time soon. They said the baby would be here by breakfast. She told me that no one ever makes it to 5cm before coming to the hospital for the first pregnancy. She said I was a tough cookie-- and I immediately thought of my mom, who always tells me I don't have a high tolerance for pain :) I always disagree... I guess now we can put that argument to rest. Anyway, the next words out of her mouth were that I could get the epidural any time I wanted. That seemed like the perfect moment!

In a matter of minutes, the anesthesiologist arrived, the epidural went in, and the pain subsided. All the aches and pains of the last few months vanished in a matter of seconds. It was heavenly. My mood immediately lightened. It was the middle of the night, but I was no longer tired. I was happy, almost giddy. Chris passed out on the visitor sofa/bed. I tried to sleep but had so much running through my head. Fortunately Nick at Night was playing a marathon of The Nanny, so Fran kept me company until I fell asleep.

When it was a decent time of the morning that I thought my friends would be waking up, I started texting and Google chatting. Thankfully, people started responding, because The Nanny had turned into Family Matters, and that show is just not as funny as I once thought it was. Jake was being non-cooperative, so I kind of stalled out at 9cm. My water wouldn't break, and he was turned the wrong way. So rather than the baby arriving at breakfast, I waited for my doctor to arrive to move the process along. But I didn't care how long it took at that point-- I was feeling goooood. A little hungry, but still goooood.

So the anticipated arrival time changed from "around breakfast" to "around lunchtime." Some nurses swept in and prepared the room for the delivery.

And around lunchtime, the doctor arrived, gave Jake a little turn around, and within minutes, he was here. He was screaming and swollen and still the most beautiful little baby I had ever seen. I admit-- I got a little emotional when they held him up to show me.

Chris was running around the room, taking pictures and doing all his dad jobs, such as cutting the umbilical cord. I was just taking it all in-- still feeling no pain and in disbelief that my plan had turned in to me having the baby on my baby sister's birthday!

Our immediate family and Jake's godparents came in the room as soon as they got him all cleaned up. Everyone was taking pictures-- it looked like a true paparazzi event. After about an hour, they took him to be cleaned up and weighed and checked out. When they brought him back to me, he had the cutest baby mohawk I had ever seen...

We stayed in the hospital until Friday. Jake spent some time under the bili light, because his levels were a little high. It was sad to let him go, but it allowed us to get some rest. They brought him in every few hours when he was hungry, and he looked so cute-- with his little leads and stickers on his body.

He loved being under the light-- it was warm and he got to snooze a lot.

Well, I still can't believe he's here. Though being pregnant seems like a lifetime ago. I was pretty uncomfortable by the end of the pregnancy, but I really did love being pregnant. But now I love having this sweet baby here with us. He's growing fast-- I'm trying to savor every moment. I've been taking lots of pictures and hopefully I will get my act together and get some posts up more often :) But at least I got this birth story written down so we can tell it and embarrass him one day when he brings a girl over!

Visitors!

2012-01-17T06:00:00.000-06:00

Baby Jake has had a lot of visitors, both in the hospital & at home. We have tried to keep up with taking photos of each person that comes to visit, but I know we missed a few :( He loves when people visit because they hold him and love on him the whole time-- he's going to be a spoiled little dude.

Here are some of the friends & family that have stopped by to meet him...

Friends, cousins, aunts, uncle, grandmothers, and even his Great Grandmother!

One Year Ago

2012-01-15T16:06:00.001-06:00

My, how things change in a year! One year ago today, we welcomed this guy into our family:

To celebrate the anniversary of his adoption/busting out of the pound, we gave him a big rawhide bone.

And made him sit for what felt like an eternity (to him) while I snapped pictures. He looked really pitiful, but we persevered...

For the blog, of course!

Just about a year later, we welcomed the newest member of our family. And Harry has been such a good big brother. He's very curious and concerned (especially when the baby cries), but he's been very well behaved overall. Even when Jake was lying in the bed, just inches away from Harry. Harry got close, but not so close that he would get in trouble....

I'm not touching him...

Lots of changes (and some chaos) in the last year, but we wouldn't trade them for anything :)

Christmas Eve: Is "Simple" in my Vocabulary??

2012-01-10T06:00:00.000-06:00

In trying to keep my holidays simple, I had to come up with a menu for my Christmas Eve party that would not require long hours over the stove. Typically, this is my big show-- I save recipes all year long and choose the best ones for this party. I spend days cooking. And I love every minute of it. This year, that was just not an option. So I needed to plan this out well-- cooking some things ahead of time and then choosing easy to prepare dishes for the day of.

I made Shrimp Etouffee the week before Christmas Eve & froze it. Same with the Spinach & Artichoke Dip. Both froze beautifully. We had Shrimp Marsala pasta leftover from the Christmas gathering the night before, so I served that too. Obviously that was simple-- just reheat :) It was delicious. It came from The Ridge Bistro in Harahan, LA. Everything there is wonderful.

My friend Elizabeth showed me this cute way to serve one of my favorites: Cream Cheese with Pepper Jelly. You cut the cream cheese rectangle diagonally & place the halves as shown below. I made a little trunk out of some leftover cream cheese from another recipe.

I had a honey glazed ham for sandwiches-- always easy and a big hit!

Not pictured are some sausages wrapped in puff pastry-- the easiest thing ever to make but always the crowd favorite!

So I was pretty tired even after setting up my "simple" Christmas Eve party. A better option would have been to cater the whole thing but where's the fun in that? All I know is that it's over, I survived, and all of our guests had a good time :)

Nursery Reveal!

2012-01-07T14:16:00.000-06:00

Finally... the nursery! I was hoping to get a rug installed before posting these pictures, but that didn't happen so I figured it's time to show you where Jake will be sleeping!

First, a few overall shots. This is the smallest bedroom in our house. It also has two doors for some reason. And a big closet, and a window. All this adds up to not a whole lot of wall space for furniture. The door in this first picture is near our den.

Just to the other side of the changing table is another door that leads to the hallway, near the bathroom. The other door you see is the long, reach in closet.

And on the next wall is the big window.

So now that you have your bearings straight, we can zoom in for some more detail :)

Let's start at the changing table. This was the very first thing I bought for the room. It's from Ikea's Hemnes collection. They call it white, but I had seen it in the store & knew it was more of a cream color, which is what I wanted. It's perfect-- the drawers are huge, deep, and wide. They hold soooo much stuff. And I don't like the look of open changing tables-- I'd rather hide the junk :) We mounted a changing pad to the top using the straps that came with the pad.

I got the wooden organizer from Pottery Barn Kids-- not sure how practical it is, but it's cute :)

The maps were a must have for our baby's room-- Chris loves maps. He made me promise to incorporate a map into the design. I found this one on Etsy and had the files printed by my favorite photographer on foam standouts.

The knobs that come with the dresser were a little mature for a baby's room, so I sought out some painted knobs on Etsy. Well, they were very expensive and I figured I'd try my hand at painting some myself. So I bought inexpensive wooden knobs at Home Depot and followed this tutorial. I think the grand total was $11 or something.

The crib is from Target: Graco Lauren Classic Convertible Crib in Walnut. I don't plan to use it as anything other than a crib (we have bedroom sets already), so I felt good about the quality and price.

The quilt and bed skirt are from Pottery Barn Kids. I am in love with both. They came out around November and though I had planned on a different quilt, I immediately switched gears and had to have this one. Thankfully, Jake's godmother scooped one up for us before they totally ran out of them everywhere!! It's not even on their website anymore.

The big bear is a gift from Jake's grandmother. We're going to take a picture with him every so often to see how he grows.

The pictures above the crib are prints that show his favorite teams-- the Saints & Tulane. The Saints print is from Etsy. The Tulane print is from a calendar of vintage Tulane football programs.

Moving along to the glider, you can see the chevron curtains. I made them from fabric purchased here. It's Premier Prints ZigZag in Village Blue/Natural. The mobile was made by me (and blogged about here). The side table is from the bedroom set we originally had in this room. The glider was a gift from Jake's two grandmothers and is the Shermag Espresso with Beige Glider/Ottoman, purchased at Target. It's heavenly. The pillow is the ABC Decorative Pillow from Pottery Barn Kids. The lamp shade & base were on clearance at World Market.

And that brings us to the closet. I just had to share because I feel like it's such a beautiful, organized site to behold, full of cute, tiny baby things. We built the shelving unit to the left. In the center is the chest of drawers that went with the bedroom set originally in this room. We have some hanging space on top and below the shelf to the right of the dresser (though boys don't have much that requires hanging). I got the brown baskets on the left from Michael's, and the large white basket is from PB Kids. The round basket on the shelf to the right is from Target. I know this space will evolve, and I think we maximized usefulness while not installing anything too permanent.

The print to the left of the closet is also from Etsy. It says "bonjour" in the coastline of Jake's home state. So cute!!

So that's the nursery! It was fun putting it together. And one day, I'll update the pictures with the rug. And toys on the ground. And such.

He's Here! Meet Jake!

2012-01-04T22:00:00.000-06:00

Meet Jake Armand Spring.

This little cutie decided to come a little early-- on January 3. I was going to be induced on the evening of January 4, but Jake couldn't wait. He nearly killed me all day on the 2nd and until around 12:00am on the 3rd, when I realized Chris and I needed to grab those bags and head over to the hospital.

He made his big debut at 12:57pm. He weighed in at 8 pounds 14 ounces-- pretty solid! He is 21 inches long.

Here are a few of his very first pictures...

And look at all of that black hair! His daddy is quite proud of that.

We are doing great and enjoying the little man. He's perfect and sweet and so far sleeping and eating great!

Sweet Baby Jake :) And he shares a birthday with his Aunt Katherine!! She came by to meet him and celebrate this special date!

Christmas with the Graham Family

2012-01-04T06:00:00.000-06:00

We celebrated Christmas with my mom's side of the family on Christmas Eve Eve. As always, it was a crazy, chaotic, loud time. Per tradition, the kids opened their gifts in age order, from youngest to oldest. Even our baby got a few goodies from his big cousins and aunts!

His football stud cousin gave him some football socks and his first football. He'll be using all of this stuff at future Tulane games when we go to cheer Anthony on!!

His aunt gave him a set of Peepee Teepees, the need for which greatly concerned Chris.

Everyone seemed to love their gifts...

Charles can't wait to pick some cranberries...

(Doesn't he look like he belongs in the Ocean Spray commercial??)

Andrew got this golf bag thing, which we mistook for a fanny pack.

Which Katherine then modeled for us...

Work it, Aunt Kacki!!

Katherine's tall boots were the highlight of the night. Especially when my uncle, the medical doctor, tried them on...

After a few minutes, he got his sea legs and was able to really rock the boots...

...and the orange hat and the Saints scarf!

Ah, family. Gotta love 'em :)

Christmas Tablescape: Simply Done

2012-01-02T06:00:00.000-06:00

I had to keep it simple when it came to my Christmas decor this year. I didn't do a ton of decorating, but I still wanted the house to look a little bit festive! I put out the basics and set my dining room table like I always do-- I wish I could keep my dining room table set year round. I just love the way it looks. But it's impractical and I'd be too nervous that something would break!

Anyway, I went with a red & gold look this year. This was mostly due to the fact that my niece Amanda brought us this gorgeous red & gold table runner from her trip to China. I had been hoping for an opportunity to use it & Christmas just seemed perfect!

I didn't buy anything new this year-- just used chargers, ornaments, and decorations I already had. I love the way it turned out.

I made a simple centerpiece of randomness that I had stashed away in my Christmas decoration boxes...

We didn't even get a tree... it just seemed like too much work to put it up and then take it down when we will have a baby to take care of very soon! Instead, we used our little fake tree and put all the presents around it...

Still felt festive :)

Favorite Things

2011-12-31T12:34:00.002-06:00

Each year, a few of my girlfriends and I get together for a little Christmas party. This year, Rebecca hosted the party and had a great idea that she found in blogland-- a Favorite Things party. I'm sure you've seen Oprah giving away her favorite things on her show-- a car! A Trip! Etc! Well, at our party, we each brought a favorite thing to share with the other attendees. We set a limit of a few dollars-- we don't have Oprah's funds or sponsorships! It was such a hit and waaay better than Kris Kringles or Dirty Santas!

We all tried to be pretty dramatic & excited when we unveiled our favorite thing...

Maybe it was the pregnant woman in my, but my favorite thing was Krispy Kreme doughnuts-- I don't really eat a lot of sweets (I bake them but typically pass on eating them), but I do love me some doughnuts!! So I got each of them a half dozen of my favorites-- the plain glaze, glaze with chocolate, and glaze with chocolate and sprinkles. I don't venture out much past those :)

In the end, we each left with a good haul-- Doughnuts from me, Bath & Body Works Coconut Lime Verbena Hand Soap from Kristin (b/c she loves the scent, the beach, and Bath & Body Works), Travel Sized versions of Rebecca's must have toiletries, ornaments from Meg, office supplies and a list of Kristi's favorite books, and a gift card to Jen's favorite lunch spot-- Caffe Caffe!

Combine the gifts and the company with the delicious Mexican food we ordered from Felipe's, and, well... this was a great night :) As you know, Mexican food is another of my favorite things :)

Happy Harry

2011-12-29T05:00:00.000-06:00

Harry had a little play date with his friend Parma. Parma's daddy had to come over to help Chris dig fence post holes. Chris did the multi-sit that we came to love during Harry's birthday party. Chris snapped a few pictures, and I just love this one, because they are so focused on the treat. I just love their faces!

As I've mentioned before, the measure of how much fun Harry has is in how tired and how much he limps afterward...well, I was doing some cooking after Parma left & glanced over to find that spoiled dog relaxing on his ottoman... on a pillow! He's such a ridiculous dog!

But oh so cute!

Good Tidings & Treats

2011-12-27T05:00:00.000-06:00

I usually like to make sugar cookies for our friends and co-workers during the Holidays. The problem is that they take a loooong time and involve a lot of back ache. That's on a normal day. Factor in the huge belly and ongoing back problems I am enjoying these days, and well... not gonna happen this year! I figured I'd get a pass. But then, the more I thought about it, I don't want a pass! I don't think I can handle a pass. I need to bake and to give away my baked stuff during the holidays. So I did something much less labor intensive, but still festive.

I went the chocolate route. I decided to make these Salted Caramel Chocolate Bars that my friend Rebecca had made a few times. They are fabulous.

It was worth it to make these just for this picture that I took that makes me feel like a legit food blogger. Is this not the fanciest picture ever???

I also made some chocolates using some candy molds that I have. I kicked them up a notch with pretty sprinkles :)

I had these little green papers and that cute stamp that I used to package them right up.

Then I took all of these delicious treats and piled them into boxes for us to take to work.

Much easier than Sugar Cookies, but still pretty, I think :)

Merry Christmas 2011!

2011-12-25T05:00:00.000-06:00

Merry Christmas!

Here's our Christmas Card!

Hope it's a wonderful day!!

Family Shower

2011-12-23T05:00:00.000-06:00

We are so lucky to have such wonderful family and friends that threw us another baby shower. I think we're all ready for our baby's arrival. We got some good loot!!

Here I am with all of the grandmothers! On the left is Chris' mom. To my right is my Mom & my grandmother.

These ladies are some of Jake's aunts and also the wonderful hostesses of the shower. They did such a great job!

And this is my bestie, Rebecca. She drove me and took the pictures (except this one) and is all around a great friend :)

And lastly, this is such a cute arrangement that my sister made... it's a vase and all of the flowers are washcloths and socks. So cute & practical! I looooove me a good practical gift!

So thanks to everyone for a wonderful shower. We feel so good and prepared for this baby's arrival...whenever that may be!!

Got Belly?

2011-12-21T05:00:00.000-06:00

No updated baby pictures, but I can show you the belly. It's...large... to say the least!

This was taken this past weekend, at just over 36 weeks. But what's even stranger is this picture that Chris took next, from a different angle.

Wow...makes me wonder how I can remain upright with all that going on in the front!

My doctor does not think this large child is coming anytime soon. We shall see!

Party Pics

2011-12-19T06:00:00.000-06:00

I know it's a bit belated, but these pictures from Harry's Birthday Party nearly got forgotten on the memory card in the old camera. Thankfully, I remembered and now you can all see the festive fun Harry had on his first birthday!

Of course there was cake.

This is a Banana Honey Cake, a recipe I found online (Recipe from here). I pasted the whole recipe below. To me, it was like not sweet banana bread that also didn't rise, so it was quite dense. To the dogs, it was heaven and they couldn't get enough. Dogs are weird. Yes, I realize this judgement is coming from someone who baked a cake for her dog :)

I also made some dog treats. These were cheese and chicken flavored. I also pasted this recipe below (from here). These tasted like flour and not much more, but again, the dogs dug them. We sent a few home with our party guests. I keep them in the freezer, though, because with no preservatives, these suckers will mold after a few days.

Harry had a few friends come over. We held up treats and got them all to sit at the same time. They really respected the giant belly.

The measure of a good time had by Harry is how long he is tired and limps after an activity. Well, he must have had the time of his life, because that dog could not move for days.

We had a great first birthday with Harry-- unfortunately with all the changes coming around here, it might be his only birthday party! So I'm glad we did it right :)

Banana Honey Cake

2 cups water
2 bananas
1/8 teaspoon vanilla
3 cups whole wheat flour
1/2 tablespoon baking powder
1 egg
2 tablespoons of honey

Preheat oven to 350. In a bowl combine water, bananas, vanilla, egg and honey. Then add whole wheat flour and baking powder. Mix well. Pour mixture into a 8-inch cake pan sprayed with a nonstick spray. Bake for 1 hour to 1 hour 15 minutes or until toothpick inserted in center comes out dry.

Cinnamon Frosting:

In a mixer, combine the following:

12 ounces non-fat cream cheese (room temp)
2 teaspoons cinnamon
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 teaspoon honey

You can pipe different designs on top by using the carob frosting for color contrast. To make carob frosting, replace cinnamon with the same amount of carob powder.

Cheese Flavored Dog Biscuits

1 cup rolled oats
1/3 cup margarine
1 cup boiling water
1 cup cornmeal
1 tb. Sugar
1 to 2 tsp. chicken or beef flavored instant bouillon
cup milk
4 oz. (1 cup) shredded cheddar cheese
1 egg, beaten
2 to 3 cups all-purpose OR whole wheat flour

Heat oven to 325 degrees. Grease cookie sheets. In large bowl, combine rolled oats, margarine and boiling water; let stand 10 minutes. Stir in cornmeal, sugar, bouillon, milk, cheese and egg; mix well. Lightly spoon flour into measuring cup; level off. Add flour 1 cup at a time, mixing well after each addition to form stiff dough.

On floured surface, knead in remaining flour until dough is smooth and no longer sticky, 3 t 4 minutes. Roll or pat out dough to inch thickness, cut with bone shaped cookie cutter. Place 1 inch apart on greased cookie sheets. Bake at 325 degrees for 35 to 45 minutes or until golden brown. Cool completely. Store loosely covered. Makes 3 dozen large dog biscuits or 8 dozen small dog biscuits.

Cat Naps

2011-12-10T06:00:00.000-06:00

We set up a glider in the nursery, and aside from being a wonderfully comfortable spot to rest, it is also the new favorite sleep spot for the cats. I've seen one or the other in there just about every day. I had to put a blanket over the cushions to keep them free of fur and claw marks.

Just the other day, however, I saw something this...

And I thought that was very cute and harmless (terrible picture...taken with phone...sorry!).

But then I got home from work a few days ago, and saw something that both made me laugh and infuriated me at the same time.

This.

(Extra bad picture from my phone)

Yes, both of these stupid cats IN the crib. IN the crib whose bedding I just washed and setup. So I did what any rational person would do-- I grabbed my phone, snapped a quick picture, and then made a ruckus so they would run away. Now I have to keep the nursery door closed until I figure out a way to keep the cats from taking it over.

I hope this kid does not have allergies!

One last cat/nursery related pic-- Chris snapped this a few weeks ago of Chloe enjoying the baby's sling. She fell asleep and was so happy in there! Are these cats ridiculous or what?!

Phone Photos

2011-12-08T06:00:00.000-06:00

My phone camera is with me all the time, so it captures some of the best moments. I was just flipping through them on my phone & thought it was time to share some of these one pic wonders :)

Let's start right here. I'm sure this looks like ordinary bread pudding to you. But this is far from ordinary. This is Krispie Kreme bread pudding. Yes, made with doughnuts instead of bread. Heaven on a cast iron plate. It can be yours at the new Walk On's on Poydras St. in New Orleans. Don't forget to also try the onion rings. Amazing.

In other food related news, this is Chris & Annie shucking oysters at a party a few weeks ago. They were enjoyed raw & charbroiled. I ate the charbroiled variety and also my other favorite delicacy-- crackers dipped in cocktail sauce. Mmmmm.

Moving right along to our new empty lot... which is a little less empty with the addition of these 10 pallets of sod. It's looking good-- but I haven't snapped an after picture :) Notice Chris standing in the background for scale! That's a lot of grass!!

Tore through all four seasons of Mad Men on Netflix. I was really sad for it to end! But fortunately I don't have to wait too long for the new season. I really enjoyed it, and especially enjoyed the Draper dining room table-- a Duncan Phyfe just like ours! Our chairs are a little different, but pretty similar! Ours was Chris' grandmother's. If it's good enough for the Drapers, it's good enough for the Springs!

Visited the Richmond Airport & enjoyed the flight information screens created by my talented husband :) If you are lucky enough to visit Richmond or Austin, you can thank Chris for helping you locate your gate or baggage!

It was a rough season for Tulane football, but isn't my cousin rocking his uniform??? Woohoo! Go Anthony! Roll Wave!

These are the awesome favors that Rebecca made for my shower. A giant marshmallow, hershey bar, and graham crackers with a little tag that says "Thank you for coming. Please have s'more." Sooo cute!!

And last but not least, we have a cute cat named Thaddeus lounging in the strip of sunlight from the open windows in the nursery. I love how the cats randomly find the little slivers of sunlight to lay in.

And that's it for now! I'll be back later once I take some more random pics with my phone :)

Crib Mobile: My Way!

2011-12-06T06:00:00.000-06:00

So I saw this mobile on Etsy...

I really liked it... I liked the look, but I wasn't sure the felt was the right look for the nursery. And I wasn't sure the $74 pricetag was right for the budget :) We needed something slightly less pricey, of the do it yourself variety!

So I started researching some fabric birds that I could make. I found these...

Loves it!

Next step: fabric. I needed a bunch of coordinating fabrics, so I figured a charm pack would solve that problem. This is the one I chose:

And then I got to work. Sewed a few birds. Got a branch from Uncle Hank. Put it all together, and voila...

Yay! I love it. It is hanging above the glider (we have pictures hanging above the crib). And it was waaaay less than the 'spensive one on Etsy!!!

So there's a sneak peak of the nursery-- you can see the mobile & the curtains. One of these days, I'll get it all finished and show you the whole thing!

Sleepy Pup

2011-12-04T06:00:00.000-06:00

We snapped a few more of the sleepy pup. Harry loooooves to sleep. And he's so cute while he's doing it :)

And he totally didn't seem to mind the camera being shoved in his face while he caught some zzzzzs.

And he's pretty cute when he wakes up too :)

Looking so serious!

Don't Make Me Beg...

2011-12-01T15:27:00.001-06:00

Ok, I'll beg :)

Please please please don't forget about the Holiday Marketplace! Tomorrow night from 6-9pm. Get your shopping done!! Or at least started! We'll have some delicious holiday sweets and champagne punch to get you in the Christmas spirit :)

Here are the details! Mark your calendar! Please come so Rebecca & I don't look like losers with no friends!!!

We Welcome December...with a Photo Shoot!

2011-12-01T06:00:00.000-06:00

Happy December! Christmas came a little early for us... we got a new laptop & camera in preparation for the other Christmas gift we're expecting in a few weeks. Of course, as soon as they came in, Chris & I got to work snapping away at our favorite subjects... the animals. It was a beautiful day, and they were lounging around outside in the backyard.

Mr. Thaddeus, keeping watch over the backyard from the safety of the window sill (where Harry can't get him).

Chloe girl in the large flower pot.

Harry Boy, relaxing in the grass, surprisingly not terrorizing cats at the moment!

The new toys are fun :) We're trying to get some practice in for our next favorite subject!!

Back in 2-D

2011-11-29T06:00:00.000-06:00

We had another ultrasound at around 32 weeks, this time at my doctor's office (the 3-D one was just for fun, not really for diagnostics). It was pretty quick-- just to make sure he's comfortable in there. He's getting a little too big to fit nicely on the screen! But I figured I'd share this most recent sneak peak...

That's the big boy... still measuring very much ahead, but who knows what that means! Maybe he'll come early? Maybe he'll just keep getting ginormous? Only time will tell if he will be a Christmas, New Years, or mid-January baby!

Everything looks great so far. They estimated he weighed about 5 lbs 4 oz at 31 weeks 5 days -- still about 2.5 weeks ahead of schedule (same date as the 3-D ultrasound showed). He was sucking on that wrist when the ultrasound started-- some babies come out with blisters or callouses on their hands from that! I wouldn't doubt if he did!

Here's my latest picture... 33 weeks! Not long to go!

We can't wait to meet him-- just a few more weeks to go! The nursery is approaching completion, but it's not ready for the big blog debut yet :) Anyway, I'm getting a new camera so I want to wait to take the pictures with that :)

Ribbon Blanket

2011-11-27T08:08:00.000-06:00

My friend Emily has a new baby, Elizabeth Jean.

She was born just a few weeks ago. I wanted to make something for her, and I had just the perfect idea! I purchased a charm pack for a project in our nursery:

So cute right? But half of the charm pack was a little girly for me to use. So I saved those pieces and set out to make a gift for Elizabeth.

I did a little research & found this tutorial on Moda Bake Shop for a Ribbon Blanket. I got the rest of the materials that I needed (batting, backing material, and ribbons), and got to work.

When I got all done, I packaged it up to ship to Seattle. But not before snapping a few photos of the finished product!

Once the blanket was already in the mail, I looked at the photos and realized I had threads and other mess polluting the pictures-- but the blanket was long gone, so this is the best I can do :)

Oh well... you get the idea... a cute little quilted ribbon blanket for a baby girl.

This baby girl, to be exact:

Congrats John & Em on your new baby :)

Giving Thanks

2011-11-24T06:00:00.000-06:00

From here.

We have so much to be thankful for, as always. Especially this year- it's been a big year for us! A new baby on the way, a puppy baby that we are crazy about, and even a big purchase of the lot next to our home. We are so blessed, and we try to remind each other how lucky we are. I hope you are feeling blessed this year, too.

From here.

Hope you have a wonderful Thanksgiving filled with family, friends, and some dern good food. I plan to stuff myself (which isn't hard these days-- not much room left in there for the good stuff!).

Oh the Places He's Gone!

2011-11-23T06:00:00.000-06:00

Now that my traveling days are behind me until at least a little while after this baby is born, I thought I'd sum up how much traveling this little guy has done already. He's traveled more in his short life than Chris has traveled in the last 2 years! Some for work, some for fun. But I'm definitely glad to be settled down for a few weeks :)

He's been to ten states besides his native Louisiana. Ten! He's already more than 1/5 through his eventual goal of visiting all 50 states!

He's been on 24 flights! Too bad he couldn't start his frequent flier miles in utero. The first time I saw my stomach moving on it's own due to his kicking was on one of the flights. He always gets active just as the plane gets fired up.

He's been to Chipotle five times! Not too shabby. He loves it..trust me :)

He's been to the Atlantic Ocean, Pacific Ocean, and Gulf of Mexico.

He's spent at least a night in four different time zones: Central, Eastern, Pacific, and Alaskan.

Let's pretend the airport trains count, so we can say he's traveled by car, by boat, by plane, and by train.

Yes, this little guy has had a busy few months!!

1st Birthday Photo Shoot

2011-11-21T06:00:00.000-06:00

Harry just turned one-- so naturally we needed a big boy photo shoot to celebrate :)

He graduated from his first level of dog training. Though he already knew it, this is him demonstrating his "sit."

He can also do dead... we rolls over on his side and puts his arms in the air. He is too stout to lay flat on his back-- it takes a lot of effort to get that far over. Sometimes he does it, but this is usually as good as it gets.

He's good at "down," because he is lazy and sits like this most of the time.

Yes, this is a big puppy!! Doesn't he look so grown up???

Sweet dog.

This is my favorite picture from the photo shoot :) His ears are perked up, because I called his name in that certain pitch that lets him know I'm about to say something awesome, like "do you want to eat?" or "do you want to go on a walk?"

Happy Birthday, Harry!

2011-11-17T05:00:00.000-06:00

Well, guys, it's Harry's 1st Birthday!! We know his actual birthday, because she was born at the shelter. It's hard to believe he is only a year old-- he's so big and so cute and so grown up already :)

Let's take a walk down memory lane...

This was the very first time I held the little guy, still at the shelter. I can't believe how tiny he was!! He was about 2 months old.

Here he is about a month later-- 3 months old. Getting bigger!!

This is in May... six months old! His first swim!

And here is just a few days ago... almost one!

He's still so good. We've been going to dog training, and he's learning some new commands and how to "loose leash walk," which he is no good at. He's the best dog ever pretty much. We heart him so much.

So Harry, wittle pup... HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!!!!!

Mark Your Calendars: Holiday Marketplace!

2011-11-15T06:00:00.000-06:00

Rebecca & I are hosting a Holiday Marketplace at her home on Friday, December 2. If you haven't been to one of these, you should plan to attend & get some of your Christmas shopping done! We'll have lots of talented ladies selling their stuff-- from jewelry to handbags to crafts for home, baby, and you!!

Take a look at the flier below & feel free to pass it around!!

Hope to see you there!

Work Shower!

2011-11-14T06:00:00.000-06:00

If life weren't changing & crazy enough already, I'm also changing jobs! I'll still be working for the same company, just in a new position & in a new location. The timing is a little nuts, but I'm very excited about the opportunity. My current work friends threw me a surprise shower a few days ago before I left on my new adventure. I was so busy with a big event we were having at work that I didn't even notice anyone passing around a card or discussing it. I was disappointed with myself! I'm nosy & chatty at work :) I like to know what's going on!!

They know me well-- they know I don't care for cake, so they got me an ice cream cake from Baskin Robbins-- in cookie dough, nonetheless! Mmmm...it was fabulous.

What a cute setup!!

They even had these little favor boxes with pillow mints for everyone... seriously, it was a pretty fancy work shower!!!

And they made me a diaper cake! There are 89 diapers (I didn't count-- they told me so!) in this cake! I love a good, practical decoration :) It's so pretty that I hate to take it apart, but I will eventually. For now, I'm showing it off as is in the nursery!

They all put in and got me a bunch of great gifts-- but my favorite was one of my most wanted registry items-- the Beeba baby food maker! I'm soooo excited for this kid to start eating baby food so I can use it!

Thanks to all involved with this shower! I feel so loved and blessed to have such great friends. I will miss my work friends so much-- fortunately I'll only be a few minutes away & will hopefully be stopping by to visit often!

Baby in 3D!

2011-11-11T06:00:00.000-06:00

Happy 11/11/11!!

Our little baby is growing like a weed. We had a 3D/4D ultrasound done at my uncle's office, and we got to see just how big this little man is getting. We hadn't had an ultrasound since around 19 weeks-- these were done at 30 weeks. After having so many til that point, those 11 weeks have felt like forever!

He spent the whole time chewing on his wrist. But he looked so sweet :) It was such a relief to see that everything looked great. They check his heartbeat at each doctor visit, and all the kicking and moving made me feel like everything is good, but there is nothing quite like seeing him with my own eyes to put my mind at rest.

She poked & prodded & tried to get him to move that arm. We got a few glimpses of his little chin.

We did find out that he is a big boy! He was measuring 32 weeks, rather than his actual 30 weeks. His weight was estimated at almost 4.5 lbs-- my "What to Expect" app said he should be around 3 lbs. I love a good, fat baby!!

I know these pictures are sometimes kind of weird looking... but it was cool to see what he will look like. I'm curious how they will compare when he actually gets here.

And if he's just as addicted to that wrist as he is right now!!

Friendly Shower

2011-11-09T06:00:00.000-06:00

My amazing friends threw an amazing shower with all my girlfriends. It was so cute. Rebecca hosted and chose a woodlands creature theme...so freaking cute. Lots of birds (I've got a thing for birds). It was such a great afternoon-- and great to see some of my girls that I don't get to see very often!

Unfortunately, we didn't really take any pictures until the very end. While everyone was cleaning up and loading up the gifts, my friend Kristy snapped a few pics of the stragglers.

These onesies & bibs came from my friend Laurin. She had them all monogrammed-- so cute!!!

And here I am with Kristy (the photographer) and Laurin (the onesie monogrammer).

And here's Maddie and her best friend Bella.

Here I am with the Hostess with the Mostess. She threw an amazing shower :) What a great BFF!!

...With my mom & sister...

And the grandmas! And Chris...jumping in the background. Because that's what he does.

My MCA friends who stuck around for the cleaning up :)

With my baby dad.

Modeling a bib that I made :)

We got a good haul! We are so lucky to have such wonderful friends! And you get a little sneak peak at the nursery-- or at least at one tiny part of it :):)

Thanks to everyone who helped make my shower so wonderful. It was a good time, and we feel so loved by your generosity. Our baby is one lucky kid!

Holiday Shopping: My Sweet NOLA

2011-11-07T06:30:00.000-06:00

Well, we've been at it again. Making sweets. But this time, these are not made in the kitchen. Rebecca & I have been busy sewing up a storm & have made some awesome handmade treats just in time for your holiday gift giving!

Take a look at our site: http://www.mysweetnola.com

We've got bibs & burp cloths, kitchen towels, and scarves! And we do custom orders-- just email us with your ideas & I'm sure we can make it happen!

Progress

2011-11-05T06:00:00.000-05:00

Let's see how things are progressing...

Yes, I am getting quite large. I don't think I have gained much besides in the belly area. Shoes are still fitting. I don't think my face looks puffy yet or anything. But the belly is big. But that's ok-- I am working on a big ol, sleepy, happy baby. We've been having lots of talks, the baby & I, about what is expected once he arrives :) A girl can dream , right?

Po-Boy Good/Overpriced Art Bad

2011-11-03T06:00:00.000-05:00

Bec & I went to Sucre to celebrate a particularly successful shopping trip. I talked her into ordering the Ice Cream Po Boy with me. She obliged, and I just had to share the splendidness of this beast:

We chose Butter Pecan, Rocher Chocolate, and Banana Pudding ice creams. They are topped with cream & inserted into a pastry bun. With strawberry & chocolate drizzled. And what appeared to be small pieces of chocolate sprinkled on. Yes, please.

While at Sucre, I saw a painting on the wall that I thought would be an awesome addition to the nursery.

So I noted the artist's name (Alex Beard) & found out that a photocopy of this print could be mine for the bargain price of $1000. What?! That's insane. You can get a Blue Dog print for $20, and I've never even heard of this guy! It's not even an original, but it is a signed & numbered photocopy. Ugh. I was so disappointed, but now I have decided that I don't need this guy's overpriced photocopy artwork anyway. My nursery will rock without this print :) You just wait, Alex Beard. You just wait!

Spooktacular Day!

2011-10-31T19:43:00.000-05:00

It's been a while! Things have been great around here. We're getting the nursery ready. We're getting the house ready. And we've been enjoying the last few months of just "us" since that's all about to change!

I'm now 29 weeks-- just 11 to go. It's flying by! I've had a bunch of checkups and everything is great. We'll be having some ultrasound fun coming up in the next few weeks, which means I'll have something to post on here :)

In the meantime, you'll have to settle for this Halloween Greeting from the both of us:

Hope you have a Happy Halloween! We're chillaxing at home...blogging, handing out candy, and eating candy corn :)

Of Bikes, Beverages, and Sleeping Babes

2011-09-21T06:00:00.000-05:00

I know these are long overdue, but I saw them on my phone and they made me think of vacation & smile. So I decided to post them.

We had so many people in Kiawah. And bikes are pretty much the way to go to get around the island. We had bikes, bikes, and more bikes.

Bikes as far as the eye could see.

That is not a park or the beach or a bike parking lot. That is our driveway. And this is only SOME of the bikes we had. We had to tag them to keep the ownership straight. We lost, stole, and borrowed bikes all week long.

We also had beverages by the case-full. When the boxes were empty, we'd throw them down these stairs to the basement/garage door for breaking down & recycling. This was one random day-- guess we were particularly thirsty. We replicated this pile several times over.

And this is a sleeping monster. Who rolled off of her air mattress and onto the floor, and just slept like that for the rest of the night.

And speaking of this sleeping babe-- just wanted to wish her mom (my sister Jacie) a Happy Birthday! Hope it's a great day!

Da Saints

2011-09-19T21:58:00.003-05:00

The Saints played a big game this weekend... against Da Bears. We hate the Bears. They were nasty nasty to us back in 2007 when we traveled up there for da Playoffs. They made signs like this:

This time, they came to our home & we wanted blood.

And we got it! The Saints killed them.

We made their quarterback pout. Chris snapped this picture with 1:14 left in the game. Poor Cutler sitting all alone.

I didn't go to the game-- I stayed home and enjoyed a glorious Sunday doing laundry, cooking, and cleaning. Chores are so much more fun when your team is whooping up on someone you strongly dislike.

Harry stayed home with me (no dogs in the Dome). He sported his Saints bandana!

The game was so uneventful, however, that he spent the whole second half doing this...

Winning ain't easy.

Catnap

2011-09-17T06:56:00.000-05:00

I'm sure you think we've forgotten about the poor cats. We haven't. They just aren't as into us as the dog is :) They don't come running, tail a-wagging when we get home. In fact, most of the time it's as if we are interrupting their relaxation. But they still curl up in unexpected places, looking all peaceful and cute.

And getting their fur all over my clean laundry.

Cats.

On This Day

2011-09-15T06:51:00.000-05:00

This guy...

... would like to wish his

Aunt Rebecca a Happy 30th Birthday!!!!

And Happy Anniversary to my Mom & Dad!!

32 years (if my math is correct!)

Tis the Season!

2011-09-14T07:42:00.004-05:00

Football season, that is! I already told you about our kickoff of Tulane Football. But we have been enjoying a little Saints football, too. We watched the season opener against the Packers on the side of our house. It's now our favorite way to enjoy nighttime football games :) Though the Saints did not win, it was a great game, down to the last second. We were proud Who Dats that night!

I made some Black & Gold cake balls for the occasion.

I got the sprinkles somewhere online for when we were in the Super Bowl. They are so cute & fancy-- like black and gold glitter. Or black and gold fish food flakes. (That's really what they remind me of). Either way, they make the cake balls yummmmmmmmmmmm.

Best part of having people over? Harry goes crazy, then passes out for three days afterward. It's great.

Half Baked

2011-09-12T21:54:00.000-05:00

Well, we're more than halfway through! Our baby will be here before we know it. Don't worry... I've started the planning :) I've got the room cleared and have even done a few projects in there. I'll show you soon-- but not til we get a little further along in the process :) I have to build the suspense after all!

But what I can show you is how we've been growing. The little babe is getting big! He's nearly a pound and can do all kinds of tricks. When I was at the doctor a few weeks ago, he was yawning with one hand over his mouth. The ultrasound tech said it looked like he was trying to suck his thumb. I haven't seen him since, but I'm sure he's figured that out by now-- and he's also figured out what feels like some kind of gymnastics or martial arts :)

We caught him in mid-yawn that day.

Everything was looking good. Last time, you got a wave out of him. This time, a foot...

And I'm growing steadily (trying to keep it steady!). I've been doing pretty well-- not splurging too much & trying to workout three times per week. It's not easy to stay motivated, but I know it will be worth it.

I did not realize the pulling going on when I chose to wear this shirt out to dinner. Hmmm. I noticed that I took a picture at 11 weeks wearing the same shirt. So let's see how much things have changed since then... (as always please excuse the cell phone camera pics).

Yowza. I think this green t-shirt will need to migrate down to the spare bedroom closet, along with the other too-small-to-wear-right-now cast offs :) Whatdya think???

Beach Memories

2011-09-09T06:00:00.000-05:00

I never did finish telling you guys about the third leg of our Mega Trip this summer. After Alaksa and Seattle, we flew alllll the way across the country to South Carolina to go to one of our favorite destinations-- Kiawah Island. Kiawah is amazing. It's a resort island, with bike trails, beaches, and gorgeous houses. My Aunt & Uncle hosted our whole family for a whole week (we had over 30 people!). It was fabulous.

And as you can see, it was quite beautiful. So for an entire week, I did nothing but sleep, eat, ride my bike, and lay on the beach. And we did a few other things-- shopping, kayaking, etc. But mostly the sleeping and eating and laying on the beach :)

This was my view.

And that was where I sat. All. Week. Long.

I think I got 10+ hours of sleep every single night I was there. That is what vacation is all about to me :)

Except one morning. One morning I woke up before it was even daylight. You see, Kiawah is a wildlife refuge and home to many sea turtles. There is a Turtle Patrol that monitors the nests of the turtles and makes sure that the mommas don't lay their eggs where they are likely to get trampled on. If you befriend the Turtle Patrol, they can tell you when the nests are likely to hatch, and you can wake up early and watch the baby turtles as they march to the ocean.

I had never seen the baby turtles. Once, I saw the Turtle Patrol moving a nest that was too far into the beach. But I just knew this trip was my big chance! So one morning, our favorite Turtle Patrol liason, Aunt Cindy, got us all up to go see this particular nest hatch. And after all my years in Kiawah, I finally saw the baby turtles!!!

If this turtle is a boy, he will never again return to land. If it's a girl, she will come back in 20 years to nest, and she will only nest on Kiawah Island. Isn't that amazing??? It was so cute-- I got kind of emotional! The walk to the water is a huge strengthening exercise for these guys and increases their chance of survival in the ocean.

And here's the group that Aunt Cindy rounded up to see this spectacular event!!

What a fun trip :)

Game On!

2011-09-07T07:47:00.000-05:00

It was a rainy weekend here in New Orleans.

photo from Nola.com

This was a bummer. Not just because it was a four day weekend (I actually didn't mind the tropical storm, because I knew it would encourage me to get stuff done in the house). The real bummer was that our family had planned a big tailgate for the first Tulane game vs. Southeastern this past Saturday, and TS Lee was trying to ruin our fun!!

The reason for the tailgate?

#28 Bronzo. That's my cousin! He's playing for Tulane this year!! And a lot of our friends and family wanted to come see his first game.

So we did what good New Orleanians do-- we had a hurricane party of sorts. The good thing about tailgating at the Dome is that you can go down one level in the garage & be covered. We had lots of food (lots. really, lots.) and lots of friends of family, despite the rain.

It was such a fun time, and the best part is... the Wave won!! And the other best part is that Clark (the son of our friends Craig & Emily and our son's future best friend and baseball teammate) got to go to his first Tulane game!

Which he obviously loved!!!

Puppy Face

2011-08-28T06:23:00.003-05:00

Every morning, I wake up to this face.

And I kiss this snout.

Who would have thunk I'd be so in love with a dog?!

Thanks, Chris, for the pics of the pup.

The Big Baby

2011-08-26T05:57:00.002-05:00

I haven't gone all new-baby crazy and forgotten about the big baby in the house. The sweet pup is still winning us over every day. He's getting so big. And he's so good. And we just love him.

And do you know what he loves? The pool. We don't have a real pool, but on July 4th, my friend Megan brought over a baby pool for her girls to play in. The kids played all day. Then all of a sudden, Harry got in. Slowly at first, but he totally loved it.

Megan graciously left the pool with us, and it's now Harry's favorite evening activity. He tries to eat the water. Then he gets scared and jumps out. It's the cutest thing you will ever see.

And you will see it.

Now:

I die.

Blue Icing Must Mean...

2011-08-24T05:42:00.002-05:00

It's a boy! I know you already know this. But keep on reading.

No part of me thought I was waiting until the delivery room to find out the sex of the baby. I'm controlling and a planner-- I needed to know asap! Fortunately I got my opportunity earlier than most-- at just over 15 weeks. The way I figure it is that, yes, it would be a surprise to find out when the baby is born, but it was still a great surprise to find out when we did :) And to further the suspense, I decided to torture our family & a few friends and make them come over to our house that night to find out.

But I made it fun by serving cupcakes filled with icing. The icing inside was dyed blue. They did not know that until they bit in.

As each person walked in the door, I greeted them with a cupcake. They were instructed to bite in and move on to the kitchen, so as not to ruin the surprise for the next visitors :) It was a fun way to celebrate and we got to show off the ultrasound pictures and such.

Here are a few peeps just after they found out the news! (If your picture is not shown below -- Kristin Tschirn -- it's because you had a mouthful of cupcake when I snapped & I thought you might kill me. I have to take extra precautions these days as I am with child).

I know I have said it before, we are so excited that the icing was blue!

Ch-ch-changes

2011-08-22T06:33:00.004-05:00

Since this blog documents my life, and since I will continue to use it as a scrapbook for the baby, I figured I'd share some progression photos from this whole crazy process. Lots of changes going on, and it's amazing what the female body can do!

The plus side to having difficulties getting pregnant is that once you finally do, you get lots of extra peeks at the baby-- pretty much weekly from the time it is 6 weeks old.

Here's the little guy, getting less blob-like and more baby-like :)

And while he's been doing all of that growing, so have I!

I'm so glad I took that 4 week picture. This will serve as a reminder of where I need to get back to after this is all over! Wow.. I thought I was fat back then. Let's see if I ever look like that again!!!

Stay tuned for more pictures.

Seattle = Chipotle X 2

2011-08-20T06:57:00.001-05:00

We had a whirlwind visit to Seattle in between Alaska & South Carolina. We spend about 40 hours visiting Emily, though I was sick for most of the time. I got a bad cold/sinus/nastiness in Alaska, so most of my time in Seattle was spent sleeping. But I did manage to squeeze in two visits to my favorite eating establishment.

Yes, I have a problem. I not only ate the exact same thing twice in 40 hours, but I'm also blogging about it. It's a thing.

Hands down best two meals of the entire trip. Thanks, Em, for hosting us!!! We had a fun, quick visit :)

I don't know...Alaska!

2011-08-18T06:24:00.002-05:00

Soooo much has happened in the last few months. Chris & I spent the better part of July traveling from coast to coast. Literally. We went to Alaska, Seattle, and South Carolina. See, I'm not exaggerating!

So Alaska. Chris' sister Karen, her husband Mark, and our nephew Hayes all moved up to Anchorage in January. So we knew that one of our summertime destinations would have to be Alaska. Within minutes of arriving, we immediately spotted this guy in their backyard.

That's a moose. And it's big. And it's just grazing in their yard. Nuts.

The next morning we woke up early and got loaded up in this RV.

Once in the RV, we headed down to Homer, AK. The picture above was actually taken at an RV park in Homer. This was a first for all of us-- but being in the RV (parked) was kind of fun. Not so much fun when the thing was driving and I was sitting in the back. Felt like a bad boat ride. Also, there were bad boat rides, but we'll get into that later :)

Life in the RV was fun. We did crazy things like cook our food over a fire...

And checked out awesome scenery like this:

The next day, we drove down to the Homer Spit, which is a narrow piece of land that juts out into the Kachemak Bay. So there was water on both sides-- a great place to spend a night! We woke up the next morning and caught a water taxi to an island (can't remember the name) for a brisk morning hike.

Water taxi = cold ride.

The hike led us to this glacier.

Yeah, that was just an excuse to post a super cute picture of Hayes. Can you believe how big he has gotten????? I want to kiss that little face!

Chris was able to catch a piece of the floating glacier ice. He was quite proud to be holding ice that was likely 2000 years old.

Also on the hike: lots and lots of bear poop. Huge fresh piles. I was not so much bothered by it because it was gross, but more because it indicated that actual, big bears were nearby. Fortunately the poop is as close as we got to an actual bear. I was scared.

We ended the hike with a beautiful view of the bay (?). I pretty much didn't know where we were the whole time :) But it was nice to just not worry about that stuff for a while.

The end of our hike led us to this beautiful view of the bay, which we enjoyed while waiting for our water taxi to pick us up.

Our next stop was Seward, Alaska, another coastal town. We stayed right on the water once again.

One day while in Seward, we took this awesome Kenai Fiords National Park boat tour. It was great-- while we were in the fiords. In the open water of the Gulf of Alaska, however, sea sickness sunk in. This is an ongoing problem of mine, and let me just summarize this story by saying that this was by far my worst experience! I think I'm done with large boats (though I think I'd be ok on a very large cruise ship).

Despite the ill feelings, I saw a lot of awesome wild life and it was definitely worth it. This is another glacier that we saw...

Yes, these are my terrible pictures. I blame the camera-- my stupid point and shoot has crapped out, I think. This is Mark, taking pictures with his fancy camera:

My pictures look terrible. Meanwhile, he was getting shots like this:

That's from the boat tour! We really saw that. Amazing.

I think I covered most of the high points. So now I'll just leave you with a few shots of Hayes in his favorite spot on the RV--- on the dashboard!

It was a great trip. And it was especially great getting to spend time with this guy & his parents :):)

Oh Boy!

2011-08-16T21:23:00.000-05:00

I have so much to tell you! We traveled. I cooked. We've done some stuff around the house. But what you really need to know is that we've been working on our biggest project yet: a baby!

This was a long project in the making. It did not go quite as easily or quickly as we always imagined it would. But we're in the game now and we're so extra excited because of the mess we've been through. We can't wait to meet our little guy. Yes, that's right... a boy! We definitely wanted a boy, but to be honest, I know nothing about them. I'm much more comfortable with girls, but I really wanted a boy. I think we can handle this...right???

So how are we looking these days? Well, he's looking like this:

And I'm looking like this:

So far, I've been feeling good and getting excited. We're getting things done around the house so I can focus on the big project: his room! You know my brain is spinning with ideas, but I will not allow myself to really work on it until I get my to do list done!

I'll try to keep you posted with regular updates up until the big day: January 13. That means I'm 18 weeks right now. But for now, I'll leave you with this picture of the wee little one waving to all my blog readers (if in fact there is anyone still reading here).

What do to with those Extra Veggies

2011-07-13T08:06:00.001-05:00

I had some squash & zucchini that were nearing their useful life. I just couldn't fit them into any of my upcoming menus. So I decided to make them into a...dessert??? Perhaps you already know of the wonders of zucchini bread? I have loved it for many years. So I found a recipe for Zucchini Muffins. Chris was a skeptic, until they came out of the oven. They remind me of fall, but work so well for summer, when all of these delicious veggies are cheap cheap in the grocery.

I ended up using one zucchini & one yellow squash. And the results were great.

Try this recipe: http://simplyrecipes.com/recipes/zucchini_muffins/.

I only wish I had some raisins or something to add to it... would have been great. Do you see the cute green flecks in the picture above? Mmmmmm.

Not too sweet-- definitely can be enjoyed as both a breakfast/brunch treat or as an after dinner dessert.

Loves it.

My Two Favorite Kids

2011-07-11T06:12:00.001-05:00

Enough said.

Flashback: Mel & Greer's Wedding

2011-07-07T06:14:00.002-05:00

I blogged about the pre-Wedding events, but not the actual wedding. I really didn't have many pictures from the night of. A camera didn't really fit in my bridesmaids dress :) But I have managed to scrape together a few pictures that I can share with you. Some of them I stole off of Facebook, so they are not going to look great on here. But you will get the idea :)

The happy couple, enjoying their first dance.

The bridesmaids, in our J Crew Silk Taffeta dresses. Everyone was assigned a color & we could pick whichever dress we wanted in that color.

The MCA girls! I look like a giant. This was a theme throughout the night. I need some taller friends.

The Clique with Rig! We take this same picture at each clique member's wedding!

The Just Married Bikes!

The Prathers...riding off into the night on their bikes.

And the most recent bride in our group... sporting the bridal white baseball cap :)

A Side of Club Sandwich

2011-07-05T06:00:00.001-05:00

There is a story that we laugh at all the time. It's from the college years... after a particularly late night out, Chris & some friends went to a late night New Orleans favorite: The Trolley Stop. Chris is a hearty eater, as my blog readers all know well. He's even worse late night. So on this particular night, Chris ordered some kind of huge omelet, with a side of Club Sandwich. We can't order/eat/be around a club sandwich without making a joke about this night.

I am not a club sandwich eater or orderer. I guess there is almost always something on the menu I'd rather eat than a club sandwich. But we had some bacon that I did not want to waste, so I asked Chris for some suggestions as to what he would want to eat that included bacon. And of course, he said Club Sandwich.

I knew immediately I'd be going all out with this club sandwich. It would have to be cut into triangles. With toothpicks. And deli pickles on the side! And all arranged with the chips in the middle!

Sure this was probably one of the least complicated meals I have ever made. But the presentation of it made me so excited that I had to snap a picture of it. It just reminds me of Summer.

A Flashback - Easter 2011

2011-07-01T06:46:00.004-05:00

I know this is long overdue...but when you quit blogging for a few weeks/months, you tend to miss out on some stuff :) I had good intentions... I took pictures along the way of stuff I did. I planned to blog. I just didn't. But since I have the pictures, I figured I'd post them anyway :)

So this is my Easter table setting. I hosted Easter brunch for both Chris & my families. The food was good, but what I was so smitten with was my centerpiece for my dining room table. I was on a serious budget of $0. I wanted to use pretty much only things I had and maybe grab a few flowers. This is what I came up with:

I found vases and bowls in cream colors around my house. My teal cake stand made the perfect pedastal for a little vase and a sort of nest looking ensemble consisting of some shredded gift basket paper. The little birds are salt shakers. I bought hydrangeas in cream to go with the simple, crisp color scheme. And just added a few malted milk eggs for a dash of color.

I was pretty pleased with this simple, cheap, arrangement. I loved it so much I actually left most of it in place (minus the flowers & candy obviously) until just last week. So maybe that wasn't because I loved it and more because I'm lazy at times :)

Cookie Quest

2011-06-29T06:30:00.002-05:00

It's been a while since I made sugar cookies-- I'm thinking Christmas time, but I could be mistaken. The planners of my friend Emily's shower were looking for someone to make some as favors, and I offered. I knew it would be a challenge... baby shower shapes are more intricate than a candy cane or a fish, as I had previously done. But I'm always up for a challenge :) Though I had no backup plan-- so my plan was just to work slowly and make sure they didn't look terrible.

The results ended up being pretty good, I think. I did a TON of research on different cookie designs. I bought the Wilton Baby Theme Cookie Cutters & went to work.

The baby carriages & onesies seemed to be the simplest (other options were a teddy bear & rocking horse-- neither were even options for me). I actually got the design of the carriage from the Wilton cookie cutter box itself. And the onesies, well, I kind of combined a few different designs I saw to come up with my design-- my theory was that I could handle straight lines. And that was about it.

I packaged each cookie in a little bag with a ribbon. They set them out all over the cake table. It was such a cute shower (the food was amazing). I'm so excited for Em & John, and I was so happy to get to contribute in a small way to the shower!!!

Brunch for Dinner

2011-06-27T17:02:00.002-05:00

I get a few magazines, most of which I could care less if they come each month. They make for good reading and I do enjoy getting them, but they don't make me want to sit right down and read them. Except Cooking Light. This is the one magazine I tend to read from cover to cover, and it rarely ends up in the pile of unread. Some months, it seems like every recipe is screaming out for me to cook. The July 2011 issue was definitely one of those months.

There were so many things I wanted to make. As soon as I saw the recipe for Summer Squash, Bacon, and Mozzarella Quiche, I knew I had to make it. If you know me, you know brunch is not my strongpoint. I mean, I can whip up a nice brunch if I'm having people over, but on a weekly basis, I don't like to be awake and especially not slaving away in the kitchen in order to serve brunch for Chris & me. So we'd have to have this for dinner. It's the only way it would ever been enjoyed in our home :)

So mine isn't nearly as pretty as the one in the picture in the magazine. But it really tasted good. And I love summer vegetables & have been adding them to all kinds of stuff (enchiladas, spaghetti sauces, etc.). So this was a great way to incorporate some veggies AND it has Chris' number 1 favorite ingredient of all time: bacon. A win-win as far as I'm concerned.

The only problem with Quiche for dinner is that it's not quite heavy enough. Going on the brunch theme, I sought out another recipe to accompany this one. What I found was fab: Shrimp & Grits Casserole (from Cooking Light!). I was skeptical at first (I'm from New Orleans, this is Cooking Light, and there is no gravy to be found in this recipe). But as much as I loved the quiche, I think this really stole the show.

So it may not look all that great in the picture, but trust me... it's a recipe you'll want to try.

Get to the Point

2011-05-16T20:35:00.001-05:00

We spent a relaxing weekend in Point Clear (on Mobile Bay). Rebecca's husband's family has a great house that we sometimes use. We brought the boy pup. He loved it. He got to take his first swim.

Here he is gearing up:

And here he is swimming with his dad:

And then he made my life and swam to me.

OMG. So freaking cute. Then he let us know that while he was tolerating the swimming, he was not quite comfortable with the whole water thing. And he climbed up to my head.

So we got him back on dry land and gave him a drink to ease his stress.

Bella got jealous and needed a sip too. Turns out dogs like the Abita Strawberry.

Yes, we are 30 or nearly 30 and still think it's funny to take pictures of dogs licking the foam out of the beer bottle. I hope we never grow up.

We basically did a lot of this...

It was a gorgeous weekend. I mean, gorgeous. The air was cool. The sky was sunny. There was a great breeze. Your drink didn't even get hot from sitting out. Gorgeous.

We had a great time-- pets and pet owners. The dogs bonded. Also, they fought. And they did what dogs do. We had three in attendance. Here they are with their respective owners.

Buddies... well, most of the time. Wilbur took advantage of Harry's hound nose, and each time Harry would dig up something awesome (bones, seaweed, etc.), all 125 lbs of Wilbur would run up and grab it from him. Harry is very sweet and obliged his large friend. Sweet...or smart. Don't mess with the big dog.

Ok, well, I was going to wrap up this post, but I know you want to see just one more picture of that cute guy. So here ya go!

Thanks to Mel J for taking the pictures!!!

Harry Time

2011-05-12T07:57:00.000-05:00

I know... you miss seeing this sweet guy. I feel your pain (not really-- I get to see him everyday). So I busted out the old Polaroid camera & got a few shots of him.

Aww that sweet face.

Just want to kiss that nose. In fact, I do. Every time I see him.

We have a safety first policy in our house. So Harry's getting ready-- just in case the rising river floods us yet again...

At least this guy will be able to float.

Phone Dump

2011-04-22T06:05:00.006-05:00

Like most people, I use my phone camera to document the day to day things, when I don't have a real camera handy. Some of the best moments end up being captured on my not so great phone camera. I figured I'd dump a few recent good ones on here...

My two boys crashed on the sofa, after a long day of... whatever they were doing!!

Chris & my Aunt Cheryl during a Mardi Gras parade-- I think that may be the Carmelettes behind them!!

Harry on his first visit to City Park!

Laurin & I in the photobooth at our friend Scott's wedding. It's not that she wasn't trying to make a different face in each picture, it's just that she couldn't hold it long enough & would erupt into laughter before the picture took. At least I look awesome. Haha, kidding Millie.

This is a tree on Tulane's campus, near St. Charles Avenue that is just covered in beads. The students must have bombed this tree each night as they walked home from the streetcar line after the parades.

Rehearsal Dinner Winner

2011-04-20T06:38:00.005-05:00

Mel & Greer's rehearsal dinner was held at the famous Dooky Chase restaurant. The restaurant's founder, Ms. Leah Chase, was the inspiration for Princess Tiana in Disney's The Princess & the Frog. Though the restaurant has been around for decades, neither Chris nor I had ever dined there. So we were quite excited to try it out! At the beginning of the dinner, Leah Chase got on the microphone & introduced herself & described all the food she'd prepared for the night.

Now, I'll be honest-- this restaurant is not in the best neighborhood. In fact, it's in a pretty bad neighborhood. We were able to park in the restaurant's parking lot, and that was helpful.

But inside, it's a beautiful facility. And the food was excellent.

Here are some of the Mr. Cliquers waiting for the show to begin.

Ms. Chase had a beautiful spread awaiting us.

Starting with the famous fried chicken, and going clockwise, we have fruit, jambalaya, green beans, crawfish etouffee, spinach, baked fish, and in the center, macaroni & cheese.

And here was my partner in crime-- Adam & I maneuvered to the front of the line, just behind the bride & groom.

Everyone had a great time. There were some really nice toasts. It was a nice, laid back night before the craziness of the wedding day!!

Lucky Truck

2011-04-18T06:33:00.002-05:00

This is the Zapp's Firetruck

That Mel J's bridal party rode

Through the French Quarter, on the eve of her wedding. It was the French Quarter Fest parade, after all.

Tasked with throwing chips, they took their jobs quite seriously. Each party member was decked out in a ceremonial bridal bead and Zapp's hat, complete with veil.

People on the streets asked if we were all getting married. We explained that we were sister wives. And that the one in the big hat was the new one. Welcome Sister Wife Mel J.

We had a good time. And at the end of the parade, we were hot and stinky. But still managed to eek out one last picture.

Because that's how we roll.

Arkansas Arrival

2011-04-15T17:04:00.001-05:00

Though my job is based in New Orleans, my area of responsibility is mostly Texas & Arkansas. This affords me the opportunity to visit some less traveled areas of these states. A few weeks ago, I re-visited a charming town in Arkansas, just north of the Louisiana border, called El Dorado.

I mentioned during my last visit that I had read a Southern Living article about this town. I visited most of the landmarks mentioned in the article, but was unable to stay at the downtown hotel called the Union Square Guest Quarters. When work brought me to El Dorado once again, I made sure to book a room at the famed hotel.

And let me tell you-- it did not disappoint. It was like the cutest bed & breakfast you have ever seen in your life. The entire facility was spotless. The rooms are all completely different but full of Southern charm. And the El Dorado downtown is quite cute-- with a few restaurants and such for your evening entertainment.

I snapped a few pictures of my room before I settled in & messed it up.

An entire wall of exposed brick and super high ceilings. Loved the long curtains.

The bathroom was so charming. They had this vanity area, a shower/toilet to the left, and a closet to the right.

It was just such a nice, different experience. Typically on business travels, I always stay in the business hotels-- Holiday Inn Express, etc. What a nice break.

Oh, and did I mention the other best thing about my trip to Arkansas?

Trust me...it was no Chipotle. But it was the closest thing possible-- Moe's Southwestern Grill. I got their rice bowl, with pork and all the fixins. Pros for Moe's: Awesome veggies for the burritos and queso. Cons: it's not Chipotle & doesn't come close. But it was good enough for me to eat TWICE during my 4 day visit :)

This Post is Bananas! B-A-N-A-N-A-S!

2011-04-15T16:57:00.001-05:00

I love bananas. They might be my favorite fruit. But I only like them when they are green or black. In between, I have no use for them. When they have a touch of green, they are perfection. I could eat 10 in a row. When they turn yellow with brown spots... blech. But then something happens as they turn from brown to black-- they become a sugary, sweet, delicious ingredient for baked treats.

Chris feels the same way, so we often have rotting bananas on our countertop. Once they are good and ripe, I add them to my stash of blackened bananas in my freezer.

This is a fairly new method of mine. I first discovered that by putting the ripe, peeled bananas in the fridge, the shelf life was significantly extended. But I was still on a time crunch to use them, and sometimes they would still go to waste. Then I realized I could freeze them & have them available at any time. Perfection!

I keep a close eye on my nearing-perfect-ripedness bananas. Like this guy-- he's not quite ready.

Come back and see me when you have no more yellow left on you, son!

I just scoop out what I need (I almost always add more banana than the recipe calls for-- the more banana, the sweeter the treat!). Thaw it out in the microwave, and you have...

Ready to be used in whatever I am baking!

In this case, I needed to use some marshmallows in my pantry. So I googled "banana" + "marshmallows" and came up with this recipe.

Banana Marshmallow Squares

Ingredients:

1 box yellow cake mix

1 stick butter, softened (I just stick the whole stick, wrapper & all, in the microwave & nuke it for a minute or so)

2 eggs

3-1/2 cups mini marshmallows (use extra if you have them)

1-3 oz box instant vanilla pudding

1 cup ripe banana (or a little more)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease a 9x13 cake pan.

Mix cake mix, butter, and eggs for 2 minutes. Spread half of the dough mixture into bottom of greased pan. Note: I tried greasing a spatula with cooking spray, but the best method proved to be spreading it with wet hands.

Melt marshmallows in a double boiler or in microwave. I went with the microwave method. It took less than 1 minute & they were perfectly melted, but make sure you watch them closely if you go this route!!

Mix banana and pudding mix into melted marshmallows.

Let me tell you-- this looked great! But I know the way to my husband's heart is chocolate. So I threw in some chocolate chips...

And I have no regrets about doing that. I think it made this delicious dessert even better.

Pause now for a moment & take a picture of your favorite helper.

My little helper is always right by my feet when I cook, just praying a tiny morsel of something...anything...will fall to the floor.

Moving on... Spread filling over dough in pan. Then top with "crumbles" of the remaining dough.

The dough is not crumbly. That's just how they phrased it in the recipe. This dough is sticky-- kind of like canned biscuit dough. So wet your hands, and just kind of plop it down on top of the filling. You can see how crazy looking mine was. Yet it baked up beautifully...

That was 350 degrees for about 34 minutes-- I had to peek a few times. The top was turning brown but wasn't cooked. In the end, it baked up perfectly-- the edges are a little darker but that is mostly from the marshmallow.

You must let this cool completely. I almost never let anything cool as it should, but in this case, you absolutely can't cut it until it all sets up. I let it cool overnight & in the morning, it sliced beautifully.

And it tastes delicious!!!!

Birthday Flashback

2011-04-13T06:55:00.001-05:00

I considered not posting these pictures at all. I lost my camera charger for a while & couldn't get the pictures off. But when I finally went back & looked at them...well, they are just too good to pass up. So even if they are three months old, I think they are worth posting :)

I had an amazing 30th birthday party thrown by my best friend in the whole world, Mrs. Rebecca Miller. Seriously, it was fabulous. So many people that I love were in attendance. The night was perfect. I am truly lucky to have such wonderful friends and family. And I'm especially lucky to have such fun on-camera personalities in my life.

My mother-in-law gave me this beautiful painted wine glass & these "30" glasses which I sported throughout the night.

This is about as good as it gets when Chris & I try to take a picture together. If you have tips as to how to get him to smile and have it look natural, I'm all ears. (Love you, dear!) (I know you only look at the pictures so you won't see this!)

My wittle mommy. They made me squat down so I wouldn't look like such a giant next to her.

And of course my wittle daddy was there too. He was having so much fun, he didn't want to leave.

All my high school friends & their men.

This sexy beast looks drunk with love as I kiss his cheek. Wrong Mel, buddy. He got married to La Otra Melanie just the other night (post on that one to follow, I promise!).

This sexy beast was striking poses for the camera, as I struck poses in the background.

Note: I took none of these pictures. I asked my awesome friends to document this momentous occasion & I think we can all agree they did a great job!!

Anyway, these are the boots on the outside of their jeans-wearing guests. It's a fab look for men.

This one makes no sense, but I love it. Please notice the random finger pointing by me, the belly rubbing by Chris, and the sexy cheek bones on Kristy.

Everything about this picture is right. The fact that it was taken in the bathroom is part of that equation.

I was very "on" as far as my poses went. Megan & Kristy were not so quick on the draw.

But all the Shuttle Sisters really brought it for this super cute pictures. Love you, sistas. Glad you all made the ridiculously long drive over :)

If you noticed the first photo in this post, there were some awesome 3 and 0 ice cubes made by the lovely, now Mrs. Melanie Johanson Prather. Somehow we got the plan in mind to put them in our mouths & take a picture. After many, many takes, most of which looked like this....

... we finally nailed it! For just one glorious second, we had this:

30's been good to me so far. Thanks to all who celebrated with me on this great night. It was fun to revisit the memories as I wrote this post.

Love you all :)

Not Quite Back...

2011-04-11T21:28:00.000-05:00

But figured I'd post some pics of the puppy baby. These are a few weeks old, so of course he looks completely different-- growing like a weed.

He's still a great puppy-- sleeping through the night. He has not made a peep, not even once, during the night. He is also fully potty trained, which is a huge relief. We got him a doggie door as his reward :)

He has the sweetest face, and I just love to kiss all over it :)

He's a sweet, almost-5-month-year-old puppy. He can sit, stay, shake, and lay down. I love him :)

Update on the Harry Boy

2011-03-11T06:28:00.001-06:00

I can't believe how fast Harry is growing. Each day when I get home from work, I think he looks bigger than when I left that morning. He's more than doubled his size since we got him, less than two months ago. But he's still a great puppy.

He knows how to sit when he's getting a treat. And we put the treat right up to his nose and tell him to stay. And he does. Until we say "ok, get it!"

And he's super good at night. That was one of my biggest fears. I just can't stress how happy I am that he sleeps through the night (now without any bathroom breaks). I need my sleep. I'm an 8+ hours a night kind of girl.

And he loves snuggling up with his aunts, as evidenced in these pictures.

I just can't believe how big he is getting. But then I see a picture like this...

And all of a sudden, next to Wilbur (Mel's dog), Harry seems so teeny tiny.

Let Them Eat Cupcakes

2011-03-07T06:59:00.001-06:00

I know what you're thinking... I read the post about Mel's bridal shower, but I'm wondering why they did not have cake for that poor girl. Rest assured, we had cake. Lots of it. I just wanted to give it a post all of it's own for two reasons:
1. That post was long enough, so I thought the addition of a recipe would make it ridiculously long.
2. I'm quite proud of the cupcakes (we didn't have an actual cake-- cupcakes are all the rage, dontcha know?) and wanted to showcase them in a post of their own. It's my blog. I get to decide things like that :)

It all started when I saw these adorable paper cupcake liners on E-bay. My head started spinning & I was instantly in love. You see, typically cupcake liners get all greasy when you bake them & they become kind of translucent & don't look as pretty as they did in the store. But not only are these grease-proof, they are dark brown. I figured they would not become translucent.

Then I learned the number one best trick ever to perfect cupcakes. Now, I'm a smart girl. I realize that for perfect cupcakes that are all the same size, using some sort of measuring device would help. But the problem is that the batter sticks to the sides & doesn't fall evenly into the cupcake tin. Enter the ice cream scoop. I'm talking a normal sized scoop with the lever that you press to release the ice cream-- or in this case, batter. I filled each cupcake with one full scoop & every single cupcake was perfection.

So we had two types of cupcakes-- all packaged in these beautiful brown parchment liners (which you could make yourself but I am lazy & just bought them off of ebay. Plus, I don't know where to find brown parchment paper). So the two types were: wedding cake (left) and chocolate (right).

For the wedding cake cupcakes, I used this recipe from Recipe Girl. I made the Wilton Buttercream that I know & love. Each perfectly sized cupcake baked up just right & I swirled on a nice bit of buttercream (using my gi-normous start shaped Wilton tip-- don't know the number, but it's huge), being careful not to touch the edges, because that's how the fancy cupcake shops do it :) After that, I shaved white chocolate with my potato peeler & sprinkled it on top.

Here's a tip when shaving white chocolate... the shaves got longer & curlier as the white chocolate warmed in my hand. So next time, I might warm it up in my hands a bit before shaving it.

For the chocolate, I used a box of milk chocolate cake, not doctored up at all.

I used the leftover regular buttercrem & mixed in some melted semi-sweet chocolate to make chocolate buttercream. My plan was to put a raspberry on the top, but by the next day, the frosting had set & the raspberry looked ridiculous. But they were pretty just plain. Maybe next time, I'd shave chocolate on the tops of these too.

Two people asked where we ordered them from, and I just about died of excitement. I think cupcakes, in these liners, are my new thing :)

Shower Power!

2011-03-04T06:41:00.002-06:00

Mel is getting married in just a few weeks! It was finally time to have her Bridal Shower. I had the distinct honor of hosting it at my house. We had sooooo much fun-- probably the most fun bridal shower ever. The food was great. The drinks were great. The company was great. Just a great day :)

Let's start with the food. Mmmmm. The food. We catered most of it from a local grocery (Langentein's, for the locals).

I made the pink tablecloths out of clearance fabric from Hancock fabric. This is definitely the way to go-- tablecloths = expensive. Clearance fabric = cheap. It's super easy to sew a hem-- or you could use stich witchery and go for a no-sew option. I chose to sew it, because stich witchery doesn't hold up well in the dryer & I wanted to wash & reuse the tablecloths.

Mel loves flowers. And birds. So the whole theme was flowers & birds. I know that's not a theme. But I don't know what else to call it.

Each of the wine bottles on the table served as vases and were filled with flowers that we purchased at Sam's. Seriously, you can't beat their flower prices and selection. At each food station, we put a wine bottle with a label of what the food was.

We had finger sandwiches-- one tray of meat & one of salad sandwiches.

Another passion of Mel's is smoked salmon. So we ordered Smoked Salmon dip from Langensteins. We also had their famous Better Cheddar dip. This was served with crackers & pita chips. Both dips were quite amazing.

The chafing dish held Crawfish Pasta, a recipe from Elizabeth's Edible Experience. This was quite delicious, but I didn't get a picture of it.

We had a fruit and cheese tray from Langenstein's. I don't know if this picture portrays just how large this tray is. This tray was PACKED with fruit & cheese. This is the large. Probably the small would have been more than enough!

We also had the same crawfish & green onion sausage that I blogged about for my Christmas Eve Party. It was so easy and such a big hit that I thought it would be a great addition to the menu!

We served champagne and had peach juice (left) and orange juice (right) to mix with it. We also had fresh strawberries and raspberries. We also had punch, but I apparently failed to get a picture of that :)

It was a gorgeous day, so we set up tables outside for the guests to enjoy the sunshine.

More wine bottles and flowers made perfect centerpieces.

The shower was a display shower. Guests were invited to bring their gift unwrapped, that way Melanie could spend more time mingling and enjoying her guests than opening gifts. We displayed them on a table near the front door.

We labeled each gift as the guests came in. Once the shower was over, we made a list of each gift & who it was from before loading them into the car. That way, if the tags fell off, she'd still know who to thank.

Note: that white tablecloth is actually a $4.00 plain white flat sheet from Wal Mart. I'm all into the creative/cheap table cloth options these days :)

We took some group shots, but I'll just post a few on here. You know, the ones that I am in, basically :)

Here are members of the wedding party who were in attendance...

The Clique with our beloved Rig (center) who brought us all together on Student Council senior year of high school. She's also an avid blog reader. Hey Rig!!! I posted this picture, because I knew she would be sad if I didn't. I posted it even though I look like a smiling giant who is too close to the camera in it. Rig, you owe me :)

This is Mel with her mom (left) and her soon-to-be mother-in-law (right).

Sorry, Mother Cliquers-- the pictures we took did not come out at all, so I couldn't post them :(

So it was a great day-- beautiful weather, and I think everyone had a really good time. I would definitely say this was a successful shower :)

Two-Fer

2011-03-02T06:55:00.004-06:00

Say you're having two parties really close together. Or even if you are having one & going to another. I have the perfect two-fer for your party dish needs. Because one dish produces some leftovers. Leftovers that are too expensive & tasty to throw away. So you will want to make the second dish using those leftovers & then you have two dips in one :)

First dip.

Mini Stuffed Artichokes. I blogged about these for my Christmas Eve Party. Delicious. But a bit wasteful because you pull the inside layers out of the artichoke hearts.

I made about 50 or so artichokes, so I had a significant amount of delicious artichokey heart goodness left over. So I googled. And came up with a way to use them.

Second Dip.

Three Cheese Hot Artichoke Dip.

The recipe is from here. But you already have the artichoke, parmesan, and green onion from the stuffed artichokes. So with a little cream cheese, mayonnaise, and mozzarella, you've got yourself a whole nother dip! And trust me when I say, you cannot taste even a hint of mayonaise once this baby is in the oven. But if mayo scares you, just use Greek yogurt or sour cream-- I use them all interchangeably and have never had a problem.

So there you have it-- two for the price of one. Or something.

Christmas Eve (A Few Months Late)

2011-02-28T06:34:00.002-06:00

Wow. I'm seriously behind. I have so much to blog about. I thought about skipping the old posts, but then I figured you were all waiting to hear about things such as my Christmas Eve Party menu or my birthday party. So I guess I better catch you up.

Christmas Eve went swimmingly. I loved my choices. I was off the whole week before the party, so I was super prepared & there was no stress. Our tradition is that my family comes over to open gifts before the party. Then Chris' family & our friends come over for eating and drinking. Well, we're learning & refining the tradition each year, and this year was no exception-- all of the food was ready, in disposable pans, to be heated & then placed on serving trays just before the party guests arrived. Only problem: my family was starving & I wouldn't let them eat til everyone got there. We decided that for Christmas Eve 2011, we will order some sandwiches or something so we can snack between gift opening & the official party start. But I loved having everything ready to pop in the oven, so I'll definitely go that route again!

Now for the food-- since that's what you want to see right??? I had the table set very simply-- as I shared before Christmas. I used all white plates (except for the silver chafing dishes). The empty spot with the place mat was for my mother-in-law's spectacular meatballs.

Here's what I made...

Mmmmm.... Pioneer Woman's French Onion Soup Stuffed Mushrooms. Super easy to make and very delicious. And very cheap. I love finding less expensive, delicious appetizers that I can make over & over again.

These were little toasts with mustard, Crawfish & Green Onion Sausage, and Swiss Cheese. Yes, I said Crawfish & Green Onion Sausage. It's amazing. I just cut the sausage, browned it a bit, and then assembled the little stacks. They were a huge hit. I bought the sausage at Rare Cuts but have also seen it at Langensteins.

Mini crawfish pies. I actually made the filling around Thanksgiving & froze it. I bought little pastry shells (very cheap at Wal Mart) and threw these guys together. Delish.

This was my biggie-- I made grits (chafing dish on top) and shrimp gravy. The grits were just Quaker grits, mixed with large amounts of heavy cream to keep them creamy all night long. It worked beautifully & Chris said they were the most delicious grits he has ever eaten... now we enjoy grits all the time with cream in it (not large amounts-- I reserve large amounts of fattening things for parties). The gravy was from here.

Lastly, I made mini stuffed artichokes. These are sooooooo much easier to make than a real whole stuffed artichoke. I got the recipe from a friend, so I'll post it below.

I was very pleased with the menu. It came together nicely & I thought it had a nice New Orleans theme. I had no leftovers, so I guess that was a good sign :)

Mini Stuffed Artichoke

3 to 4 cans of artichoke hearts (Large size 5 -7 count)

1/2 c. olive oil

2 lbs. onions, chopped

1 bunch shallots

1/2 bunch parsley

4 cloves garlic

1 tsp celery salt

1 tsp crushed red pepper

1 lb Parmesan cheese

1 tsp. baking soda

1 1/2 c. bread crumbs

1 lemon

1 tbsp cooking oil

Drain hearts. Remove center artichoke leaves with small spoon to make room for stuffing. In pan fry in olive oil until brown: onions, shallots, parsley, garlic, and celery salt. Add red peppers and cheese and baking soda. Stir til stringy. Remove from heat. Add 1 cup of bread crumbs and mix. Let cool. Add salt.

Stuff hearts. Sprinkle with remaining bread crumbs and lemon juice. Pour olive oil over stuffed hearts.

Heat in covered pan or dish for 10 minutes at 350 degrees.

Birthday Baking

2011-02-25T10:47:00.000-06:00

Today is Chris' 32nd Birthday!! Happy Birthday, Love :)

Each year, Chris' birthday gift is ridiculous amounts of food followed by something that I baked for him. You see, I bake a lot, but Chris complains that it's never for him. He never gets a whole cake just for himself (it's a rough life). So for his birthday, he gets to pick & I make whatever he wants.

This year, he wanted Chocolate Cake. He specified chocolate cake with lots of chocolate. He also wanted Chocolate Chip Cookies. Done.

So I made him a chocolate cake, with chocolate buttercream frosting in between layers. And a poured chocolatey fudge frosting on the outside.

This picture was taken before the outside chocolate set. I needed to get to sleep :) It might not be the prettiest cake, but it sure is chocolatey :) And since it's only staying inside our house, it's fine!

And his second request was for chocolate chip cookies. As I was making them, he came into the kitchen & said, "Wow! They're from scratch?!" I kind of had my feelings hurt... did he think he birthday cookies would come from a tube?! I use doctored up cake mixes, but hardly anything else we eat is from a mix. I take pride that I mainly shop only the perimeter of the grocery store. Anyway, I used the directions on the side of the Hershey Chocolate Chips bag, and they were fabulous.

So Happy Birthday Chris!

And to my readers (If anyone is still reading since I've been a terrible blogger)-- I'm going to whip up a few posts, but I can't promise I'm fully back from hiatus. I have been quite busy & not had the energy to blog! But I'm trying & still thinking about the blog constantly :)

Racey Behavior

2011-02-07T06:40:00.002-06:00

I finally got to try something I'd been wanting to do for a long time! Chris & I went with some friends-- these guys--

To the Fairgrounds to see the horse races! It was Starlight Racing-- and though it was cold, you can see we kept the spirits flowing to stay warm :)

I didn't bet on any of the races, but Chris & Adam did. With minimal success. But we still had fun.

It's amazing how fast they go!

Even on multi-burst, my camera could barely capture it.

Hayes Turned 2!

2011-02-05T07:30:00.002-06:00

Hayes recently celebrated his 2nd Birthday! I had the honor & privilege of making the cake for the big celebration. I went with a dinosaur theme-- because it's cute and he likes dinosaurs :) And it's muuuuuuch easier to make a cake that has a theme.

I used cookie cutters & fondant to make the letters on top & the dinosaurs on the bottom.

I also made him a little smash cake so he could go to town on it.

I don't have any good pictures from the party, but I think the cake was enjoyed by all-- definitely by Hayes & his grandma :)

I loved the inside of the cake-- I layered chocolate & white cake, but decided to mix up the layers... made for a pretty presentation when it was cut:

I tried a new technique on the cakes-- when they were straight out of the oven, I covered them with a clean dish towel & pressed down the risen part on the top. I kept pressing until it was nice & flat. You can see by this picture that it definitely worked-- I had nice even cake tops and didn't have to cut them at all. This preserves the nice crust that the cake has out of the oven & makes it soooooo much easier to ice! Loves it :)

Dear Broccolini

2011-02-03T06:14:00.002-06:00

Dear Broccolini,

We met you by accident. I asked Chris to pick up some broccoli on his way home. He brought you home instead. He didn't notice that you were not broccoli at all...

I was intrigued. You look like broccoli. But you came in a bunch of stalks, instead of just one. Almost like asparagus. You smell like broccoli.

Eat you for dinner, we will. I heated up some olive oil. I tossed you in. Added some salt & pepper. A little extra olive oil at the end. Delish.

Broccolini, you are a friend of mine.

Regards,

Melanie

Harry's First Day

2011-02-01T10:11:00.000-06:00

Harry had lots of visitors on his first day with us. Everyone wanted to come out and meet the little cutie pie. Now that we know him a little better, we realize how overwhelmed he must have been, because he was so quiet and not nearly as playful as he is now.

This was love at first sight at the shelter. Harry was very excited to come home with his new Mommy & his Auntie Becky.

Once we got home, the visitors started streaming in. Harry's two big cousins, Amanda & Ashley, came by...

His little cousins were represented too...

He also had aunts and friends and family visit!!

I look at these pictures, and in just a matter of weeks, he has grown so much!! He looks so tiny here! It's really amazing. He's still so good... sleeping through the night, respecting his crate. Not messing in his crate. Rarely messing indoors. Learning to fetch. Loving his treats. Giving kisses. Wagging his tail. He's a cute, sweet puppy :) We are lucky!

Thirty.

2011-01-20T12:47:00.001-06:00

I've just entered the fourth decade of my life. Thanks for all of the birthday wishes. Unfortunately, I was under the weather for the big day (and the day before). The plus side was that I got the day off of work that I had been wanting to take off for my big day. The downside is that I slept through most of it. And couldn't enjoy my birthday dinner. And I didn't get to go to a restaurant. But it wasn't all bad-- I got to visit with the puppy. And I lost three pounds :) And I'm raring to go for my big birthday bash this weekend!!!

So, Happy Birthday to ME! The newest member of the 30-something club :)

Monday Addition

2011-01-17T10:48:00.000-06:00

Meet the newest addition to our family:

His name is Harry. We adopted him from the animal shelter on Saturday morning. It was a total surprise to Chris, who has been begging for a dog for basically his whole life. I told him I was going shopping, and Bec & I drove to Slidell (about 30 mins away) and found our new little baby!!

I walked into the house and asked Chris to come see what I got from the mall. He saw the puppy. His eyes lit up and his heart started to melt :) I assured him it was his for keeps. We are in love with the sweet baby.

So far so good-- I'm a nervous wreck about my house being a wreck. I don't do well with messes. But he's so little and sweet and hasn't gotten into any trouble at all. The past two nights have been great-- he sleeps most of the night, barely cries, and has managed to wait til Chris takes him out every few hours to do his thing. We'll see if this behavior continues.

He's a Catahoula/Bassett Hound mix. I will post more pictures-- but he has a sweet little face and long body, like a hound. I just wanted to get this one up so everyone can meet the little guy.

As for the cats-- they are adjusting in their own way-- Chloe is intrigued. She wants to be friends with him, but she doesn't trust him yet. Thaddeus won't even look at him. He barely comes downstairs. But he doesn't seem terrified-- it will just take him a little longer :) I'm sure one day we will find them all three snuggling together :)

Welcome to the family, Harry The Dog Spring!!!

Birthday Bet

2011-01-14T07:33:00.003-06:00

Little Kacki had a big birthday this year! She turned TWENTY ONE. I was off on her birthday (January 3), so we decided to hit up Harrah's Casino to make it official.

Katherine was convinced that you get a free spin on your birthday. I had no idea what she was talking about, but she believed. We visited customer service for clarification, and it turns out-- you DO get a free spin on your birthday!

Spin it away Kacki!!

Good spin, girl!!

You won two free buffets (breakfast or lunch only, please). Congrats! Now pose with that slot machine!

Woo! Loves that Harrahs and the free spin on your birthday thing!!!

Sign Language

2011-01-12T07:19:00.002-06:00

I mentioned (or did I?) the other night that I went to the Chinese Buffet (East Buffet in Metairie-- my new favorite destination!).. I posted this picture that I took of Mel & Hobbs during our third hour of dining fun at the buffet. Yes, third hour.

Anyway, during a trip to the ladies room, I spotted the second most amazing posted sign I have ever seen. Yes, I said second most amazing. Don't worry, I plan to show the first as well!

So for the second most amazing sign, I present...

Loves it!

Now, for the much anticipated first best sign.

That is from our trip a few months ago to Gulf Shores. This was posted above a trash can at the condo. This has not been doctored in any way. This is a legit sign!!

Like This and Like That

2011-01-10T20:17:00.000-06:00

I was supposed to be doing this...

But instead, I was doing this.

Because where I was, was full of this.

It was coming down like this.

It was really beautiful, all of this.

But I'm glad to be back home, playing with that little guy for a few days. I got called up for a few days to help with the storm response for the ice storms in Northern Mississippi. Luckily, I wasn't needed for very long, and I got to come on home today!!

Sharing Soda

2011-01-07T21:25:00.001-06:00

At the buffet!

Published with Blogger-droid v1.4.9

Hayes, Meet Laurin

2010-12-29T06:58:00.002-06:00

Poor Laurin. Her head is on a stick. She gets dragged all over the city & country. But Laurin got lucky a few days ago-- She met Hayes. And Hayes looooooved her!

He carried her around. He kissed her.

He even fed her some of his breakfast.

She was such a sweet friend to him-- and a great babysitter. But for some reason her 2-D, cardboard mind felt it appropriate to allow him to play in a cardboard box.

No worries... he loved that too :)

Solo Sweets

2010-12-27T06:50:00.003-06:00

I helped my sister out by preparing some teacher gifts for Maddie to bring to her last day of school. Last year, we gave Christmas Cookies. I was headed along that same path this year, until I stumbled upon my new favorite baking blog: Our Best Bites. These ladies love to bake things in individual jars. And I don't know why, but I am a sucker for these personalized treats.

So when I saw their Peppermint Fudge Cupcake Jars... I was sold. I ordered the jars on Amazon.com (Walmart was sold out). And I got to work.

Once I corrected a minor mistake (forgot to add the sugar... seriously), I was on my way. Chocolate cupcakes, peppermint chocolate ganache, and the most delicious cupcake frosting I have ever tasted. With a drop of peppermint flavoring in there too.

All baked up in these individual jars.

Then I printed their labels for the top, and we were good to go!!

What a sweet treat. Wouldn't it make a great party favor? I love this idea! I will be doing this again!!

Merry Christmas! Love, The Springs

2010-12-25T07:00:00.002-06:00

Hope your Holidays are filled with warmth, friends, family... and maybe a few goodies under the tree!!!

Family Frame Christmas Card

Get custom photo Christmas cards online at Shutterfly.com.

View the entire collection of cards.

Tablescape 2k10

2010-12-23T07:06:00.002-06:00

I went with a totally simpler theme this year. I found some cute paper giftbox ornaments while at Ikea in October. And I realized I had actual real holly growing in front of my house that was dying to be incorporated in my tablescape.

So I went with a simple red/white theme. I love it. Much simpler than last year... but still elegant :) I actually did everything simpler this year-- I only put up about 1/3 of my decorations. Maybe less. I was feeling lazy, I guess.

I clipped a little extra holly to put on each place setting. Yes, I realize holly is toxic. I don't plan to actually eat at this set table :) And I sprayed cat repellent (bitter spray that you buy at PetSmart) to keep the cats from snacking on the plants-- they actually prefer the fake/painted sticks for some reason).

So that's my tablescape! Stay tuned to see how this will be transformed into a buffet for my annual Christmas Eve Party!!

Recipe Reward

2010-12-22T14:13:00.002-06:00

A few weeks ago, Elizabeth & I baked the winning recipe from my contest! I had never eaten pumpkin bread before, but I was super impressed with this recipe! Chris devoured the loaf I took home. I brought a second loaf over to a tree trimming party. And Elizabeth kept the third loaf-- yes, this recipe made THREE entire loaves!

Elizabeth blogged about our cooking of this recipe just a few days ago. We had a great time cooking and visiting with her new baby.

Thanks to April for contributing such a great, different recipe for us to try!!!! Have you spent that gift card yet???

Enjoy!!

Cookie Clues

2010-12-21T22:50:00.000-06:00

Like last year, I have been busy cranking out the Christmas cookies for various gifts and parties. I stumbled across two tips that made my life a heckuva lot easier this year, and I wanted to make sure I passed them onto you!!

Numero Uno.

Saran Wrap. Wax Paper is OUT. Saran Wrap is IN! Lots of people are talking about rolling out dough between two pieces of wax/parchment paper in lieu of sprinkling flour all over your work surface. But I'm here to tell you that Saran Wrap is even better.

Seriously, just sandwich the dough between two pieces of saran wrap. I use the real stuff. The store brand gets all funkified. It might be in my head, but I also use the real kind of garbage bags.

Anyway. Do what I just said, and then step away.

Do you see that? See how smooth that is? The saran wrap is still on there, but the dough is perfectly smooth. It also gets the dough to a great consistency. And this smoothness translates to less peaks on top of your cookies, which translates to smooth shiny icing surfaces.

Next, just press out your shape with the cookie cutter...

And voila! Perfectly shaped, flat, smooth cookies. With little mess!

So I failed to take a picture at the end of the decorating. I'm currently working on another batch, so I will try to get pictures of those guys :)

Numero Dos.

Parchment Paper. I bake lots of stuff on parchment paper. But I never bothered with the sugar cookies. But O. M. G. It makes all the difference in the world! First of all, one sheet per pan can be reused over and over while you are baking a big batch. When the cookies are done baking and ready to be transfered to the cooling rack, the parchment paper allows you to easily lift them. I made around 100 cookies and had no casualties due to being stuck to the pan.

So go ahead & try it. I might buy stock in Parchment paper & bake everything on it from here on out.

Added bonus: the pans don't get oily. Just rinse & put them away!

How I Quit Cable & Lived To Tell About It

2010-12-10T06:11:00.002-06:00

We did it! Chris had this great idea and we've been talking about it for a while, and we finally quit cable. As in, cable no longer comes to our house. We haven't jumped off the deep end or anything. In fact, it's quite the opposite. We can watch all the TV we want way more efficiently now. And, ya know, efficiency is kind of my thing!

You see, we quit cable, and picked up Netflix & Hulu Plus. With Netflix, for $9.99 per month, we get movies by mail and through the internet/Playstation 3. With Hulu Plus, for $7.99 per month, we get all of the tv programming we could ever want through Internet and the PS3. It's not only current episodes, but entire seasons of many of our favorite shows. And we get free, over-the-air HD for all of our local networks. And we still have Cox for Internet & Phone, so we have access to ESPN3 for our sports watching needs, which is basically a free, on demand streaming of all games on any ESPN channel.

If you've lost track, that's $17.98 per month. Regular Hulu is free, so your total cost could be $9.99 per month, if you went with regular Hulu-- still great, but with less content. With one digital cable box plus dvr, digital cable, and HBO, we were paying over $100.00 per month for something we used for an hour or two per day. Now we get any show we want, any time. And we get the satisfaction of knowing we're kicking the cable company's butt!

The beauty of this whole deal is the PS3. If you have one (or an XBox), or are interested in one, you should really look into this. Netflix & Hulu Plus stream right to the console, so you scroll through the menus easily with the remote control. The PS3 is also a Blu Ray player, so the Netflix movies we get through the mail are Blue Ray.

So we've been cable-free for a few weeks now, and I honestly haven't missed it. We're going to apply the savings from the first few months & purchase a second PS3 for ease of use in our upstairs television. This is nice, but not necessary-- any computer or laptop can do the trick. We just want the second blue ray player. And I think you would be surprised at the number of totally free, over the air, HD channels you get on the TV! Now we watch our version of cable from our computers, phones, tvs.... everywhere! The possibilities are limitless.

So in conclusion,

even though...

Now THAT is some crazy math!!

You Had to See This Coming!

2010-12-08T06:57:00.003-06:00

Remember how the completion of Maddie's doll dress led to widespread jealousy amongst kitties?

Well, you can believe that the minute I finished assembling the doll bed, it immediately became a cat bed.

In fact, I stepped away from the bed, sat on the sofa, and immediately positioned my phone camera to capture what I knew was about to go down.

And it only took about 3 minutes.

Wait for it....wait for it....

What a fool!

Build-a-Bed

2010-12-06T06:37:00.003-06:00

I hinted (or flat out stated) in a previous post that a doll bed was in the works for Maddie. Besides an iPod Touch & a Nintendo DS (she's six...and obviously dreaming), the very next things on her list are stuff for her American Girl Doll.

The doll beds sold by American Girl are around $100. Actually more than the doll itself. So that was a big negative on that one. But I figured I could come up with something. So I dug around, and what do you know... Ana White to the rescue. Except this post came too late. One day too late. I had just given up on decent plans for a doll bed and decided to purchase one off of Ebay.

To be honest, this was probably a blessing in disguise. I worked on it while Chris was recovering from his surgery. It took four screws into pre-drilled holes. The manufacturers did a great job. It was very nicely made. Had I tried to build it myself, I would not have started, as Chris would just now be able to handle power tools. Instead, I'm done and already blogging about it!

And I think she will love it. I even made some bedding -- a mattress, sheets, a blanket, and a pillow.

And it's done. And probably in total cost less than the shipping from American Girl :)

Tryde & True

2010-12-04T06:15:00.003-06:00

I professed my distaste for my coffee table once or twice. And then I sold it.

And then my living room had no coffee table for many months.

And now it does. Have a coffee table. Again.

And I love it.

And I built it. Myself. With a teeny bit of sawing help from Chris.

And then I painted it.

It's not perfect-- I used inexpensive wood. And I'm still learning. But it's a heckuva lot better than the old ones. And the invisible one.

I used plans from Ana-White (formerly Knock off Wood), of course. My favorite site. It's the Tryde table. Inspired by the Hyde Table from Pottery Barn. I wanted turned legs because they suit my style a little better. I improvised the plans just a bit, but it was pretty easy.

Here's the PB one:

Covetous Chloe

2010-12-02T07:10:00.003-06:00

It's not that she doesn't love Maddie. She does. She loves being picked up and dragged around the house by her younger cousin.

I think it has more to do that Chloe is a princess. And as such, she found herself quite jealous of the princess dress I sewed for Maddie for Christmas.

So she decided to try the crown on. The dress was not her style.

But the crown; well, she loved the crown.

And the photoshoot :)