Zoo weather...

Today, the 29th of December, we got to go to the zoo. We had light jackets on and it was just absolutely perfect weather! I am so glad that God blessed us with this weather today. We were really able to have a wonderful time seeing God's beautiful creations, playing with friends and for me getting to visit with another mom! :)

Here are a few pictures...

Teacher gifts...

I have really enjoyed being the mother of a student this year! It has been fun getting to know Ian's teachers and just seeing how much Ian has learned and grown since starting school has been great.

With it being Christmas time I wanted to get the teachers a gift that they would actually like and be able to use. Not something that would be re-gifted as a dirty Santa gift. So we got his two main teachers gift certificates to a salon and spa place and the sub teacher some lotion and chocolates.

I did, however want to have Ian be a part of the gift. So instead of him making something or picking something out I did an interview with him about his teachers! It was so fun doing the interview. His answers were great. Then I had him put his hand print on them. You know the teachers may not keep it but I know they got a kick out of his answers too and really making them smile was the whole point!

Wow, I have gone a long time...

I just realized it has been a while since I have posted anything on here! I want to say that nothing much is going on around here, but I don't think that would be true. I am an early shopper so I have been ready for Christmas for a while now! I actually wish this week would go by fast because I love...LOVE...to watch people open there presents! As I have mentioned before, my love language is gifts, so seriously love to see the joy they bring people! Also, I haven't seen my Brother and his family for a while, so I am looking forward to seeing them!

I guess I will just post a few pictures of the past few weeks. I can't think of much else to write! Catch me on my weight loss blog if you get a chance.

Let's get together...

I think I mentioned in my last post just how close the ornaments are on our tree. Ian seems to continue to want to move them all to the same spot, thinking that Owen will not be able to get to them. :) He cracks me up! Here is a picture of where he seems to is the perfect spot for all the ornaments, well at least several of them!

It's begining to look a lot like Christmas...

We got our Christmas tree decorated this weekend! It was so fun this year because Ian was old enough to help. He seemed to have fun and loves to look at the ornaments that are on the tree. I tried to tell him a little about each of the "special" ones and now he will show me the "special" ones. Like the ornament we got our first year of marriage, and the Elvis ornament that my college roommate gave me.

It was also fun to tell him why we celebrate Christmas. How it is Jesus' birthday and about what the star on the top of the tree means.

Our ornaments are close together and the back part doesn't even have any on it, but I don't care! It was so much fun and great family time and wonderful memories were made. I look forward to when both boys can help!

unrealistic expectations

As a women, I tend to have unrealistic expectations about pretty much everything! I was just talking to some friends about how when I was in high school I was "in love" with so many guys. I thought I knew what love was back then, but I just don't know how you can know what it is until you are married.

Which brings me to my subject of today. Marriage. I am realizing why people are getting divorced right and left. They have unrealistic expectations of what marriage is.

Some things they think marriage should be or provide:

1. never being lonely
2. forgetting your past hurts/heartbreaks
3. breakfast in bed and s*x all the time

Those are only a few things that I can think of. I know that so many people believe these will be true, but let me tell you people, it is not. I am married with two kids and I have days where I feel lonely. I love my husband so much and I know he loves me, but I am still hacked at the guy who just stopped calling me, I am glad we didn't end up together, but still would have preferred he ended it in a better way. I am pretty sure the only times I have had breakfast in bed were when I was on bed rest and I am not even going to address the other issue. ;)

I am so glad that Justin and I had an amazing newly wed class at our church to go to. It was what I believe helped build our foundation for a good marriage. Now will we have hard times, yes, but because of that foundation we will make it. God taught us so much in that class.

I don't want to discourage people from getting married. I think it is so great and I couldn't imagine my life with out Justin in it as my husband. I just think people need to be aware that it takes work, don't give up the first time things don't go your way, in fact don't give up the 100th time things don't go your way. If you need counseling then get it. It is important to fight for that love that you know you once had.

I hope this made sense. It sounded so good when I "typed" it up in my head, but it never comes out the same when I type it up in real life.

I hate being sick, but more than that, I hate it when one of my boys is sick...on a weekend...on the Sunday we are scheduled to teach in preschool.

Yeah, Ian is sick again. Woke him up this morning, which should have been my first clue that something was wrong because he usually wakes us up, and he had thrown up in bed. Then continued to throw up all through the morning. At this point (11:45ish) he seems to finally be keeping down his water, which is good. Hopefully we won't have to go to the doctor or hospital. I was worried at first since he wasn't keeping his water down that we would have to go get an IV or something. Hopefully we can just let it ride out and he will be better soon.

Just keep us in your prayers. I felt a little flash back to when he was sick for two weeks with diarrhea. I started crying and just felt like I was about to have an anxiety attack. After going to my counselor a few weeks ago I realized that I felt like I was a bad mom since I couldn't help him through all of that. I just want to be a good mom and take care of my kids. They mean the world to me!

On a completely unrelated note, Owen is already turning into a computer nerd ;) I love it though! Maybe he will invent something that people can't live with out and make all sorts of money so Justin and I will be taken care of in our old age. :) Or maybe he won't, I will love him no matter what!

Cars...

Yesterday, Ian, Owen and I got the opportunity to see Lighting McQueen and Mater from Cars! It was really fun. We even got a goody bag afterwards! Here are a few pictures. They didn't turn out very good, not sure why. But they took some so I can go online and look at them from there. If I figure out the link I will show it to you guys too!

Snickerdoodle cookies...

I do love snickerdoodle cookies. But I have to be honest, the first time I heard of them I thought they would have snickers in them.

Happy Halloween...

Owen in his first costume of the night. He was an octopus, but I decided he would get to hot in that costume so I changed him to a cowboy for the evening. (the octopus costume was a hand me down from Ian)

Ian the pirate and Owen the cowboy getting ready to go trick or treating in my mom and step dad's neighborhood!

They really liked watching the kids come up to the door. Ian liked all the fun costumes!

squash recipe...

I'm not sure what inspired me to cook squash today, but I did! I guess I knew that it was going to go bad soon. Whatever the reason I am glad that I did! Here is what I did...

Cut squash up in slices (however thick is up to you). I put them in a little bit of buttermilk (mainly because I had some and didn't want it to go to waist like it usually does), coat them well. Then I dipped them in some parmesan cheese (I used shredded, but I guess you could use grated too). Then sprinkled a little rosemary on the entire pan. I highly recommend using fresh rosemary over dried rosemary, I think the texture is much better fresh. Bake at 425 for 15 minutes, I put it on broil for the last minute and a half. Take out and enjoy! I did!

I paired it with some strawberries and a piece of garlic toast! Turned out to be a lovely meal!

A reminder is sometimes needed...

My sweet friend emailed me today this link to a video by Steven Curtis Chapman. I have really been depressed as of late and this was just the reminder I needed to do everything I do for the glory of God. I hope it encourages you too!

a little too much to drink...

I guess this monkey puppet had a little too much to drink :) (I swear I didn't pose it that way, one of the kids through it in the pack n' play. I know your next question is "why is the potty chair in your pack n' play?" The answer is: we have a 1 year old who likes to play with it while it is not in use.)

Fun food day...

I declared today to be fun food day! We had our friends Misti (aka: Teetee) and Calvin over for lunch and play time.

I made hot dogs with spaghetti pulled through them (they looked cool, but the kids preferred the hot dogs with out the spaghetti). It was easy to make, you just push uncooked spaghetti noodles through a piece of hot dog then cook them like you would normally.

We had cheese in the shape of a teddy bear and alligator (all though the boys thought it was a dinosaur). This is pretty self explanatory, but just in case I will tell you that I took a cookie cutter and cut out shapes in sandwich cheese. :)

Last we had apple mouths (not sure if that is the official name but I will call them that). That is apples with a little bit of peanut butter and then mini marshmallows in the middle! I think that was my favorite part of lunch.

At nap time Ian prayed and thanked God for fun food day! That just made my day! Here are some pictures of our food from today and a few silly photos of me and the boys with our cheese goatees. :)

The boys were using the cheese slices as phones. Since it was fun food day I allowed it. :)

Dinner and dancing...

Last night I had a date! I was so happy when he asked me, it came out of nowhere. It happened on the way to school, the most amazing, cute and cool three year old asked me to go on a date with him! :)

Ian is just so cute when it comes to wanting to go on dates with me. Yesterday on the way to school he said "but mommy, we didn't go on a date." I was like "I know, we are on our way to school" and that is when he asked if we could go on a date. I checked with Justin (my awesome hubs) and he said yes!

Ian and I headed to IHOP for dinner. I love when he chooses IHOP because not only does he eat free, but I love breakfast for dinner! They seated us in a section where we were the only ones there. So when Ian asked me to do ring around the roses and to dance I said yes! It was so much fun. There is nothing better than having dinner and some dancing with your three year old! Loved it.

After dinner we, of course, headed to Target. Looked at toys and TVs and had a great time! He wanted to listen to the CD sampler, but it was broken. :( He was bummed, seeing how that is one of his favorite things to do.

Oh, I should mention that he used the potty at IHOP!!! I was so proud of him!

Over all it was a great night!

I love this kid!! This isn't from our date, but I thought I would share this picture of him eating Nutella and pretzels. :) A kid after my own heart!

Potty training...

It has finally begun at our house! I didn't think Ian would ever want to use the potty. In fact I have asked him several times if he wants to use the potty or wear big boy underwear and he says "No, I'm okay".

Things just changed yesterday! He was in my bathroom when he saw the crayola banks (piggy banks in the shape of crayons) that I had hidden in my closet. Oops, I guess that wasn't a great hiding spot, but who cares. Ian wanted to get them out and I told him that he had to start using the potty in order to get them. I explained how we would make a chart and he could put stickers on it and once he went a certain amount of times he would get prizes (the crayon banks). To my surprise he said he wanted to go potty in the frog potty!

Seriously, I was SO shocked! I thought he would end up wearing diapers till he was 16. :)

He has now gone 4 times in the potty! He has to go 7 times before he gets one of his prizes. He is also getting a few skittles each time he goes. I remembered my sister did something like that too and it seems to work.

We went and got him pull ups and some more big boy underwear yesterday. I told him that his teacher will tell me if he goes potty at school today and if he does then he will get a sticker and skittles when he gets home. He seemed okay with that.

I just hope this works! I would love to have him potty trained! Just in case it doesn't work, leave me a comment on what worked for you! I would love to have more ideas.

Googly eyes, I just like to say it...

I love googly eyes, don't you? Ian says it in the absolute cutest way. It makes me want to record him saying googly eyes just so I can share it with you all!

I recently joined Pinterest. I know you are probably wondering "what does that have to do with googly eyes?", well you are about to find out!



I found the cutest little table decoration on there! Someone had pinned it on there board so I did too and decided to make it. It cost me $2 to make this craft! I got the googly eyes at Dollar Tree and a styrofoam pumpkin there as well! Just glue the eyes all over the pumpkin and you're done! Isn't that cute? I love it.

Now the question is, what else can I do with googly eyes? They are so much fun! Do you have any craft ideas for googly eyes?

Okay, I gave in and had Ian say it for the video. :)

cookies and company...

Let me first start by saying we are done with the sickness that Ian had! Two weeks it lasted. I know our entire family is so happy that it is done and over with!

Which brings me to our company. Justin's parent's, sister and Aunt are here for a visit! We are having a good time. The boys are doing really good with them. On Saturday we went to the outlet mall and shopped and then had lunch at Smashburger (of course)! They were so sweet and bought the boys lots of clothes! Yesterday we met them at church and then had lunch at Johnnies (mmm!) The rain made for a good setting to have naps, so the boys and I headed home to lay down. Today we are planning on going to Mardel, which I am very excited about because we haven't been there in a while!

So we took this family picture at church on Sunday. I planned ahead and fixed my hair and of course the one time I have a good hair day, Ian is right in front of my face so you can't tell. Oh well.

The boys in their matching PJ's that his family got him! Yes, Ian is playing with an iPhone, Grandpa was letting him watch videos.

Owen turned 15 months on the 8th! He is getting so big and just walks all over the place. I just love watching him grow! See his one month picture here.



Last night I made cookies (I kind of bribed Ian while getting his hair cut. I told him if he would just let me cut it I would make cookies). They were good, at least I thought so. I found the recipe on one of my friends Pinterest boards. It was a Pioneer Woman recipe (I will share it below, it's easy as 1,2,3).

Nutella Cookie recipe (Found here at Pioneer Woman)

• 1 cup Nutella
• ½ cups Sugar
• 1 cup All-purpose Flour
• 1 whole Egg
• 1/2 cup peanut butter chips (not on the original recipe)
  
• 1/2 cup marshmallows (Not on the original recipe, I actually will leave these out the next time I make them, they didn't really add anything to the cookies)

Preheat oven to 350 F.

Blend all ingredients together well. Form into 1″ balls. Place on a cookie sheet. Press down firmly with the bottom of a glass. Bake 7-8 minutes or until set. Cool.

eating at home...

Hi, my name is Jessica and I am an eater outer.

I joke with that line, but really I am. Back in the day, before kids, I used to call Justin when ever I thought I would be eating out, just to make sure he was okay with it. After all it was our money, not just mine. I'm not sure when it happened, but at some point after we began to have kids I stopped asking him if it was okay to eat out during the week or I would call him while en route to the place I would be eating. Either way not good.

I think for some reason I justified going out for lunch because it got me out of the house and as so many stay at home mom's/wives know, getting out is a huge boost to moral (at least to mine anyways).

To make this quick, Justin pointed out that we could save money if I wouldn't eat out so much during the week. He is a great husband and said it in a very nice way. It got me to thinking that I really do need to stop eating out during the week. Every now and then isn't bad, but I was doing it everyday, sometimes for breakfast and lunch!

Now my new rule is if it costs more than $2 then I need to seek Justin's approval. I told him that it is okay if he says no. Now we have gone three days with no eating out for breakfast or lunch! Part of that is because the boys are sick, but I was really tempted to pack the boys up today and get something from McDonald's. I resisted though. It helped that my friend Misti brought me a Diet Dr. Pepper! :)

What are ways that you save money?

Meant to be...

The other night Justin, my number 1 hot husband, and I got to take a much needed date night! It was really more of a date afternoon/evening.

We started out by going to the outlet mall and eating linner or should I say dunch? You know kind of like brunch but putting lunch and dinner together. It was like 3:30. Anyways, my favorite hamburger place is there, Smashburger, so we ate there. Then we decided to go look around places we don't usually get to enjoy going to with kids. It was nice! We went to Best Buy, Ulta, Walmart and last but not least Office Depot.

While I was checking out at Office Depot Justin was off looking at some more "toys" they had at the other register. When the guy told me my total was $19.81, I said "that was a good year." He kind of looked at me like I was weird, which I am so no insults there. ;) When Justin came over I told him what our total was and get this, he said "that was a good year." We were SO meant to be together!

We finished our evening with some ice cream from Cold Stone. It was delish! Over all we had a wonderful night! So thankful for date nights

Never would have thought...

The last week and a half has been crazy around our house. It started out with Ian getting sick. I'm talking throw up in the bed and in the car. YUCK. Then it turned to diarrhea, again not fun and a big YUCK! We thought he was getting over it, but Sunday morning I was hit with a huge wave of gross when I opened Ian's door. I had to take him directly to the bathtub and clean him up.

To make a long story longer and a little more graphic, Ian has continued to have this sickness. We took him to the doctor and they said he was hydrated and that he should get over it soon. Well since he didn't I called back and they said we could do some tests on his stool. That brings us to today.

Today was a day full of poop. There I said it. It is really the only way to describe my day. It started out with Owen, yep Owen has it now. Owen was covered in poop, his crib was covered in it too, dolls, sheets, EVERYTHING!!!

So I cleaned him up in the bathtub, which let me just say is much harder to do with a one year old than with a three year old. With Ian he understood what needed to be done, Owen not so much. He wanted out so bad and was shivering. I felt so bad for him.

After that I got Ian changed (yep, nasty diaper). Then I realized that Owen had "stuff" under his nails. Never thought I would be cutting my sons nails because there was poop under them.

Now then back to Ian. His doctor had told us they could do a test, but we had to collect his stool (like how I keep changing how I say poop?). Never in my life did I think I would be scooping poop out of my sons diaper with a tongue depressor. Let me just tell you that I never, NEVER want to do that again! YUCK! But I sure hope they figure out why he still has this nasty sickness. :( Poor kid.

Somewhere in the midst of all of this I washed sheets and dolls and drove madly to the doctor's office and to the Lab to drop off his samples for them to test.

So there you go. The day of poop. Hoping it is over and that it never happens again. I know what you are thinking, you are completely jealous of my day. Right? No? Oh well I can dream that someone is jealous of my day of poop.

Twinkle, Twinkle little star...

These boots were made for walking...

Owen has started to walk! I am so excited. So far he just takes a few steps to something he can hold on to, however this morning he actually took about 10 steps to no where! I was able to get him on camera finally taking a few steps. He won't do it if he knows I am filming though, so that is why it is his back side. :)

sick, sick and more sick...

Our house has been hit. Hit with the sick bug. The crazy thing is, is that it just doesn't seem to go away! Poor Ian has been sick since last Friday. Tummy issues. :(

I got it one day, but I think it is hitting kids harder for some reason. Although, I will say that it is taking its toll on me too. I am used to being able to get out of the house and do things and I haven't been able to do that since Sunday! Last night I got out and got us dinner, but for some reason it just isn't the same as getting out during the day. Getting out at night takes away my time from Justin.

Anyways, just needed to vent a little bit. My attitude isn't very good this morning. I need to get moving so perhaps I will start to feel better (attitude that is).

free printables...

I found a super cute blog called Sweet Blessings. It is so fun and cute! I absolutely love it. She has these really cute printables that are free! FREE I tell you! I printed one and put it in a frame that I had purchased at a garage sale a while back. What do you think?

Some videos you might enjoy...

Ian turned 3 today...

Can you believe my baby is 3? I can't! He just gets funnier and funnier everyday! I love him so much and am so proud of the little boy he is becoming. We spent some time outside today and enjoyed the nice weather. Then we finished up with him having a car shaped sandwich with a candle in it!

Speical Agent Oso birthday party...

Today we celebrated Ian's 3rd birthday! Of course he doesn't actually turn 3 until the 18th, however we have several friends that have his same birthday or close to it so we opted to celebrate early rather than compete for times on the actual day.

My awesome husband made the invitations! He is awesome! What, I said that already? Well it needs to be mentioned twice. Here are the invitations that he made, Special Agent Oso was our theme!

The cake was made by none other than Lacye's Cakery and Cookies. The cake was YUMMY! I am realizing that the more people you invite to the party the less cake you take home. So, um, yeah some of Ian's friends have got to go, I want more of her cake left over! Just kidding, but it is that good. And isn't the art on it amazing too? Yep it is!

Here are a few more pictures from his party. We are so blessed to be able to have had it at our church. We had lots of fun and are so blessed by all of our friends and family.

lessons being learned...

Today we went and visited a little girl at the hospital. She was so cute and sweet. She acted as though she had known us forever. I hadn't seen her since she was just a baby and now she is 4 1/2.

Anyways, not really the point of the story.

On our way we stopped at Starbucks to get LG's (this is the little girls name and no, it doesn't stand for little girl) mom an apple cider. Ian kept saying how much he likes starbucks, like he goes there all the time or something. He then asked if he could have a drink of the apple cider and I told him no it is for our friend. This led to a huge crying fest and fit throwing fest. Not a fun ride to the hospital.

Fast forward to when Justin got home and we were telling him about our day. I was explaining to Justin the story about the apple cider fit and Ian spoke up and said "yeah, I cried and screamed" Justin then asked him "was that right or wrong?" and Ian said "wrong".

The point of this story is that lessons are being learned. Some times it just takes a few tears (both his and mine) to get it through to him!

My baby is 14 months old...

Owen is 14 months old today! I can't believe how much he has changed. He now has 5 teeth, which explains a lot about the way he has been acting lately. :)

I also had to share this picture. I just think it is so cute. Owen looking up at Daddy and Daddy looking down at Owen. Heart warming!

Picture post...

This is Ian at age 17 months.

This is Owen at age 14 months

Ian and Owen playing catch.

We bought a Leapster LeapPad at a garage sale last summer and Ian seems to really like it!

Ian's "first" day of school. I forgot my camera on his real first day of school so I told him we would pretend that his second day was really his first. :) Because that is the kind of mom I am.

Our friends Lindsey and Kyle invited us over to their neighborhood swimming pool a few weeks ago. Of course now they have moved and we will miss them a lot!