Thursday, November 30, 2017

Olive & Fletcher

It's been a few months since I've posted kid updates so I thought today was the perfect time before everything gets crazy with the holidays.  I don't have traditional baby books for my kids.  I kept calendars for them documenting their first year of life.  I wrote down all of their firsts and a fun fact about something they were doing each day. 

After that the only updates I've documented are on my blog.  Thank heavens!  I don't have a great memory so I love looking back at my archives to see what the kids were doing at certain milestones.

The kids have become the best buddies and really enjoy being around each other 99% of the time.  It's sweet to see them become friends and love playing together.





Fletcher 20 Months
28.5 lbs
33.75 tall
Wearing 2T/3T clothes
still topping the charts

Favorite Foods: bananas, fruit pouches, string cheese, turkey sausage, peas, cucumbers, smoothies, rolls, dry cereal, goldfish, pizza, crackers, applesauce, oatmeal, yogurt, rice, chocolate, dum dums, chips & salsa, hummus, balsamic dressing, ketchup, honey mustard.... kid loves food :)

Words:
yellow
no
sissy
mom
dad
tree
airplane
thank you
no thank you
please
boo boo
owww
hot
yee haw
cheese
jesus
amen

Fletcher is super friendly and loving.  He waves hi and bye to everyone we see when we are out and about.  His smile is contagious.  He loves giving hugs and he's really tender hearted.  If you tell him no or reprimand him, he'll cry and give you a hug.  He's a mama's boy, but his big sister is his best buddy.  He lights up when he sees her.

He sleeps 12-13 hours a night and a 2 hour afternoon nap if we're at home.  If we're traveling all bets are off.  He started loving his jellycat puppy when I took his bottle away at 18 months.  He was so mad that he quit drinking milk for about 6 weeks.  He finally waved the white flag and will drink milk again.

He is a daredevil.  Fletcher is always jumping off things, running into things and I've debated having him wear a helmet. He got his first goose egg at Thanksgiving.  I rarely take my eyes off of him.  He loves the bath tub.  He's had many hair cuts so far.  










Olive 4.5 Years Old

Olive is LOVING school.  She is learning so much - math, new words, writing, songs, social skills and independence.  She really loves watching silly movies, playing with her toys and has a great imagination.  She's always making up songs and putting on concerts for us.  She's super fussy about her clothes and shoes so when we find things she deems comfortable it's exciting.

She loves helping around the house most of the time.  She'll surprise me and clean things up on her own.  She loves praise and appreciates a good compliment.  She's working hard to make friends.  Olive loves going to science class, story time, doing crafts and playing with friends.

Favorite foods: carrot sticks, cucumbers, extra sharp cheddar cheese, pretzels, noodles, ketchup and mustard sandwiches, smoothies, monster cookies, 

My favorite way to document Olive is the #oholive moments.  I keep a running list of funny things she says on my phone so I don't forget them.  Here's my current favorites:

#oholive

She asked for a smoothie so I told her to get out all of the ingredients.  She pulled everything out of the freezer/cabinet and said, Sometimes It's really hard to be a kid!!

We told Olive we were going to get a Christmas tree.  
I CANNOT wait to see The North Pole!!

White we were Christmas shopping with my mom I reminded Olive to look with her eyes and not with her hands.  A few minutes later she spotted my mom picking up items to check their price.  Olive said, Mimi, Remember look with your eyes and not with your hands!!  

Mom, Please sleep your eyes.
She wanted me to close my eyes so I couldn't see what she was doing.

While performing a concert she asked for song requests.  I suggested some Christmas music.  She said, Sorry, I only sing songs that people don't know.

She woke up with a smile and said Last night I was dreaming about candy and loving you!

I had to get a blue shot today.
blue shot = flu shot

Hey Mom, Can you give me a little caboost up to the slide?
caboost = boost

Jimmy Johns sounds really delicious today.
Remember when you had baby Fletcher and Daddy and I brought you Jimmy Johns?
How about you have another baby so we can have Jimmy Johns again?
I told her we could just go there without having another baby.
She said, Nope.  I'd like a baby sister this time.

Olive gave her pregnant aunt a big hug.  Then she stepped back and said
Awwww I can see the baby's nose!!
Her belly button was poking out and Olive mistook it for the baby's nose.
We all died laughing.

I wonder what God is up to today??
as she hands me our devotional to read one morning

A boy told me he liked my lunch box.
I told him I was not going to marry him.

This boy keeps talking to me at school.
He must love me (eye roll)







Wednesday, November 29, 2017

Our Christmas Traditions

We're in full on Christmas mode at our house now that it's almost December.  I'm working to finish decorating our house today, blasting Christmas music and DVRing all the Christmas movies for my family.  I can't wait to start watching the classics and the Hallmark movies in the evenings.

I am excited to share with you our favorite Christmas reads this month.  We have a fun collection of Christmas kid books that I only put out for December.  I rotate our books to keep the kids interested and excited about the new material. 

My kids are getting Fa La La by Leslie Patricelli (TJ Maxx) and A Very Merry Christmas Prayer (Walmart).  Patricelli is one of our favorite authors so I know my kids will love that one.  I read the Christmas prayer book already and it was really cute.  I'd HIGHLY recommend reading any kid books because some of them are not great.  The cover might be cute, but the story is not.  Do a quick skim and you'll thank yourself later!!

If you're looking for more Christmas book ideas here are 25 Christmas Books we really enjoy!


We're doing our annual NORTH POLE BREAKFAST tomorrow.  It's our 4 year to do the breakfast on December 1st and spoiler alert I'm fixing a super easy breakfast for the kids because it's a school day.  We give the kids Christmas pjs, a Christmas book, an ornament for their tree and a festive meal.

The Kindness Elves were a fun thing to do for the holidays.  This year I think we'll just try to do spontaneous kind acts throughout the month instead of having the elves arrive with a list.

These are some of my favorite Homemade Christmas Ornaments we've done in the past.  I'm hoping to do a hand or foot print ornament with the kids and maybe one more.

Kevin usually requests Chocolate Dipped Pretzels for his coworkers.  They're one of my favorite treats!


December (Hope) To Do List:
There's no pressure to cross everything off our list, 
just a bunch of things we love doing if we can.

Get a Real Christmas Tree
Small Trees for the kid's bedrooms
Mail Out Photo Christmas Cards
Gingerbread House Decorating Party
St Nick's Day 
Mouse House Christmas
Christmas Parade
Christmas Parties
Olive's Christmas Program
Brunch with Santa & His Reindeer
Christmas Light Walk with Hot Chocolate
Duplo Christmas Party
Make Ornaments
Bake Christmas Cookies for Friends
Watch Christmas movies
Cousin Christmas Exchange
Christmas Eve Service
Spend Christmas with our Families
Write Thank You Notes


What fun traditions do you do with your family for December??

Tuesday, November 28, 2017

November JOY

November is one of my favorite months... Fall, football, my birthday, Thanksgiving, Thanksgiving break, holidays, etc.  It's just such a nice time of year.

Here's a little recap of the joyful moments from November.

I forgot to buy everything I needed to make my Thanksgiving pies so we headed to Meijer on the day before Thanksgiving.  We really had a fun time.  The kids had colored their ornaments for the tree so we hung those up and they were THRILLED to ride Sandy together.  I think Olive is smiling really big because Fletcher didn't head butt her this time.

My MIL brought me a delicious homemade birthday cake.  The kids loved helping put on the candles.  Olive said that all of my candles made a big fire on my cake.  That's the truth of getting older!  We did some gardening, shopping and enjoyed her visit.  I've never planted bulbs before so I'm excited to see them come up in the Spring.



We had our first Friendsgiving with a new group of friends. It was tons of fun and tons of kids!  We all enjoyed ourselves.  My kids and husband had the week off so we did several fun things with our more flexible schedule.

My sister came to visit for my birthday.  I forgot to get a picture with her, but we had a great time.  We ate, the kids played and the day flew by.


We had a great Thanksgiving.  I made turkey cinnamon rolls - so easy and so delicious!!  My kids loved watching the Thanksgiving Day parade.  Is it just me or did there used to be more balloons in the parade??  It felt like a lot of singing and performing and less balloons this year.

 I made pies for my family gathering.

We got on the road and headed south for Thanksgiving lunch.  The kids napped on the way down and we showed up just in time for lunch with Kevin's family.  We enjoyed our afternoon and headed to my sister's house for dinner.  Living 2 hours from our families is so handy!




Fletcher is an AMAZING 12-13 hour sleeper and 2 hour napper at home.  However, when we travel he rebels.  He is slow to fall asleep and then wakes up frequently.  He also woke up in the 6:00am hour which about killed me.  Good thing he's so cute :)

We met friends for a birthday breakfast!!  My kids think McDonalds is the coolest place bc we almost never go there :)

 We braved the crowds and did some mall shopping on Black Friday.  It was fun because we were only out for about an hour.  We all ended up with new shoes.  Spoiler alert: Olive didn't go home with these, but she LOVED trying them on.  I'm waiting on some new Lucky booties to arrive in the mail this week.

Fletcher got a GIANT goose egg after a fun game of chase.  He went head first into some kitchen cabinets and I'm just thankful it wasn't worse.  He's got a very colorful bruise on his forehead now.

We hung out with my parents and did a little shopping with my mom.  Olive was being a little too hands on with the things at Marshalls.  I kept reminding her to look with her EYES and not with her HANDS.  Fast forward a few minutes and she sees my mom checking out something breakable.  She says, Remember Mimi.  Look with your EYES and not with your HANDS!  hahaha  We laughed about that and then told her that rule was mostly for kids.


Tell me something that brought you joy this month!



I wanted to tell you about a fun photo challenge I'm co-hosting for the month of December.
It's super easy to participate and the daily prompts are really fun!
It'll be a great way to document the holidays.
Be sure to use the hashtag #2017CHRISTMASMOMENTS



I'm hosting with some of my favorite friends!
Our hosts include WhitneyBethJessEmilyDanielle, Emily and Whitney.


It's time to link up with my favorite Tuesday Talk Ladies and Beth for her Joy Link Up
Join us with a fun post.


Monday, November 27, 2017

Roasted Veggie Frittata

Happy Monday, friends!

Hope you had a very happy Thanksgiving this year.  We had a great time with our family & friends.  We went on a little road trip, packed in a ton of fun and are happy to be home today.

Instead of doing my usual monthly recipe round up, I'm just going to share ONE delicious recipe with you.

I've been feeling extra compelled to stock my fridge with healthy food options and plan healthy meals for my family.  They eat what I prepare, snack on what I snack on and so it's important for me to plan healthy things so we don't eat junk all the time.

I made up a new recipe that is sooooo goooood!  I have some friends (Hi Jo & Hilari!!) that always make these delicious egg dishes and I had to jump on board.  I couldn't wait to share it with you today.  We've been enjoying it ALL month long.

Roasted Vegggie Frittata



 I've made a few different varieties so I'll start with my favorite version.

3 Chopped, diced, peeled sweet potatoes
1 Sweet peppers
1/4 chopped Purple Onion
1 Carrot
handful Broccoli
handful Cauliflower
9 eggs
2 T milk
Turkey Sausage Crumbles
Feta cheese
salt pepper
olive oil
Montreal Steak Seasoning
*Feel free to customize this recipe to your taste!

Chop everything into bite sized pieces.
Drizzle with olive oil and seasonings.
Bake at 400 for 20-30 minutes.
Check on things at 20 minutes and remove the veggies that are done.
Put the baking sheet back in to let the broccoli and sweet potatoes cook longer.


Layer all the veggies in a greased baking dish.





Sprinkle cheese on top.

Whisk together eggs and milk until they're scrambled.
Pour on top of the veggie/cheeses.

Bake at 350 for at least 30 minutes, but it could take closer to 40 minutes until everything is set and browned.

Cut and serve!!  So good and it reheats so well for lunches throughout the week.  I've loved making this at the beginning of the week and reheating it all week long for lunch.

Another frittata version...
I left out the sweet potatoes and I missed them.  It was fine, but the sweet potatoes just add the perfect sweetness and helped keep me fuller longer.


I've also started prepping all of our fruits and veggies over the weekend so we are ready for healthy snacks and foods all week long.

Washed the apples so they were ready to grab and go in the fridge.

Peeled and cut carrots.

Roasted veggies for an easy side.


How do you get your family to eat more fruits and veggies?
I'd love to hear your recipes or routines to make it happen.


I'm linking up with my favorite cooking lady today
and we're all sharing our best recipes from the month.

Linking up with Southern Plate


Whitney @ Come Home for Comfort

Head over to their blogs to see what delicious meals they are sharing this month!
 We've also started a Pinterest Board called
New Recipes We've Tried and Loved!
Be sure to check it out and get some great ideas for meals at your house.