Month: October 2012

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Our week in pictures.

First off, here’s a photo I forgot to add to last week’s photo recap:

Charlotte’s 2 month appointment. She weighs 10 lbs 1 oz now and regularly sleeps 5 or 6 hours each night. She also got 3 shots during this visit and the tears and cries nearly ripped my heart out – but we survived and I’m sure she’s forgotten all about it. I just kept telling myself “All babies go through this… You did and you don’t even remember it”!

As far as this week goes, we have been quite busy!

Charlotte spent quite a bit of time working on her head control and baby push ups.

and she’s been concentrating so hard to try and figure out how to work her arms and hands to get those toys that are so far away.

We had a lunch date with Chris, my friend Tiffany, and her son Hunter, then went to pick up our race packets for the Wicked 10k


The convention center had some spooky decorations in preparation for the race.

“Charlotte, don’t you know better than to visit a haunted house alone”?

Just kidding, I’m pretty sure Charlotte inherited my scaredy-cat genes so she probably won’t be visiting haunted houses anytime soon. I’ve never been a fan of scary things, so I will probably try to protect her from them as well; but this scary backdrop at the race pick-up location + her gummy smile was just too good of a photo op to pass up.

Tiffany and I finished our first 10k the next day! Our time was 1:26:19. I am so proud of us.

We had intended to push Charlotte and Hunter in strollers, but decided to leave them at home with their daddies just in case Sandy decided to dump rain on us early. Tiffany made our awesome tutus which were fairly practical for running in (and SO glittery – I’m pretty sure we left a fabulous trail of glitter throughout the race course). Some of the other costumes were not so practical, but very entertaining. I wish I had had my camera there to capture some of the creativity: hamster in a cage, telephone booth (life size!), redneck treadmill (beer can hanging from a baseball cap), Mario, Luigi, Peach, and Yoshi in their karts plus a baby in a stroller as the giant bullet, about 12 ‘chickens running with their heads cut off’ (that one took me a bit to figure out…but awesome), Rick from The Walking Dead, Granny in a wheelchair, Captain Planet and all his comrades,  and on and on. It was so much fun and having all the costumes to look at really helped the miles pass.

Later that evening was a co-worker friend’s wedding. I was very relieved that I fit into my ‘wedding’ dresses (I only have two, and another one of my coworker friends got married last weekend so I was very glad that they both fit)! It was such a mad rush to get Charlotte over to my parent’s house after the race then come back and change and make it to the ceremony that I even forgot to put on my wedding rings – oops!

Hurricane Sandy threatened rain all day on Saturday but it didn’t actually start raining until after the race, so that was a blessing.

Sunday morning at church Charlotte and I snuggled up and worked the computer/powerpoint while Chris and the worship band practiced. I’m fairly certain I heard running water and leaky drips in the walls and in the ceiling (something that has definitely happened before in this building) – but we were just happy to be there and the worship was awesome. Charlotte loves the drums and of course loves to hear her daddy play his guitar.

Sunday evenings we typically have small group but instead of continuing on in studying Matthew we decided to enjoy a meal together and some games. It’s always a good time with our group, and with each laugh my abdominals reminded me of my triumphant 10k finish the day before – ouch!

Charlotte loves Kallie and gave us so many giggles that night. Also, during Whits and Wagers my lack of knowledge about all things trivia became abundantly clear.

Today we hunkered down inside while Sandy pounded the east coast. Our neighborhood doesn’t flood so we weren’t ‘stuck’, but still decided to stay in and have a snuggle day. Thank you God for protecting our friends and family during this storm that had the power to do so much more damage.

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Big brother Baxter

All day yesterday Baxter moped around the house. He would flop himself down at my feet and let out a big sigh, or just sit and stare at me with sad doggy eyes. I actually texted Chris at work to ask if he had fed Baxter before leaving for work because I thought for sure Baxter was trying to communicate something important to me! “Baxter, bark twice if your daddy didn’t feed you today”! No response, he just sat and stared. Didn’t even play with his toys!

Today it finally dawned on me that in all the hullaboo surrounding our new family addition (Charlotte, of course) I forgot about our first born dog’s birthday! Baxter turned 2 yesterday – EEK! I feel bad that we let it pass by, but he knows we love him regardless. Extra apple slices for you today buddy!

You can read about last year’s celebration HERE and about how Baxter dog became a member of the family HERE.

Baxter is a very good dog. I can’t say that he meets all of my ‘dog requirements’ (If you’re really nosy, they are listed in the link above) but he certainly tries and by the time he started barking and shedding a bit I was already hooked – there was no going back.

Baxter is a very good big brother to Charlotte. Very protective and super calm around her, though he  is always on high alert and nervous that every squirrel, mail man, and leaf blowing by is trying to break into our house and he must bark loud enough to alert everyone on the street.

“What’s that smell? I thought I was the only mess maker in the house”.

 

Happy Birthday Baxter – We are so glad you’re part of our family!

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DIY {Princess Tiara}

I remember using this technique for a Miss America halloween costume I made when I was younger.

Supplies:

– Headband (I used a narrow one, but a wide headband would work fine for a giant crown)

– Tinfoil (I used maybe a foot, if that)

– Inspiration photo

 

First,  I went on the interwebs to find my inspiration piece.

This one looked nice and gaudy and seemed simply enough to replicate.

Tear a few 2 inch-ish wide strips of tinfoil and begin wrapping the headband. There really is no technique – just wrap the tinfoil at an angle so you can keep it sort of smooth, but you can’t really mess it up. Be sure to wrap the tinfoil with the shiny side OUT throughout this project – you want your crown to be as blingy as possible!

It took me only one of the long strips to wrap the entire headband. It should look something like this when you’re done:

Once you have your headband wrapped, take the remaining strips of tinfoil and begin twisting them into long strands. Again, there’s really no technique to this, just begin rolling and twisting at an angle to get your pieces nice and long.

 

After I made a few I lined them up by order of size because the design on my inspiration tiara had larger pieces in the middle and they got smaller as they moved out towards the sides. Begin shaping some pieces and attaching them to your headband – tiara base.

I just wrapped the ends of each tinfoil strand around the headband and then wrapped another small piece of tinfoil around the wrapped ends to secure. I might add some glue later and smooth out some of the ‘joints’, but it’s fairly sturdy as it is.

OOOWeeeeee, that’s FANCY!

Then, give yourself some giant poufy hair worthy of a princess and pop on your fab tiara. TADA!!!

Yes I am still in my jammies – don’t hate. I’m jus sayin’.

 

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Lessons in the kitchen {Cajun Chicken Pasta}

This recipe is awesome: Cajun Chicken Pasta.

It’s one of The Pioneer Woman’s “Tasty Kitchen” recipes and can be found HERE. The photo above is hers too {gotta give credit where credit is due!} I made this for dinner last night and learned a few things along the way.

1. My 2 month old can sleep through not one, but TWO smoke alarms going off in the house. Didn’t even stir.I actually had to hover and look for breathing after I took care of the ‘smoke’ situation because she was in such a deep sleep.

2. White wine vinegar is NOT the same as white wine {even though they share 2/3 of the same words!!!} – who knew?!

Just sayin’.