There Are No Words...

As I sit here at 5:13 a.m. wondering if my little one is up for the day, I find myself browsing through pictures as I often do. This time, I am overcome with emotion. There are no words to describe how blessed I am. I have everything in life that one could possibly want....a wonderful husband to share my life with (who just happens to be my best friend), and two of the most BEAUTIFUL little girls in the world. Is this how I thought my life would turn out? Nope, not even a little bit! If you would have asked me five years ago if I could see myself as a SAHM with 2 children, you probably wouldn't have gotten much of a response....except a chuckle and a quick no. I was going to be the career woman...taking long vacations with her husband to exoctic places. I thought by now I'd be well into my Masters degree....working my way up the corporate ladder, and enjoying my freedom....and money for that matter! So, where am I today? I barely have my Bachelors degree. The most exoctic place I've seen is Las Vegas, and that was two and a half years ago. Vacations are a distant memory. My career has been left in the dust and pushed in the corner of my mind, being replaced by a new dream...and I wouldn't change a second of my life for anything. After all, who can say they are married to their best friend and the best daddy in the world.....

And who can say they have the two most beautiful girls in the world...

I CAN!!!!!   So, THANK YOU God for your divine intervention.....

and the realization and fulfillment of new dreams. There are no words to describe how blessed I feel.

Happy Birthday, Daddy!

Justin's birthday was this last Wednesday, and I felt especially grateful for my awesome family this day. Spending the day with Kendra preparing for daddy to come home from work was so wonderful! We made cards, then a cake, then I prepared green bean dumpling soup for supper! I would like to point out that we made this cake completely from scratch, frosting and all. First time I have EVER made a cake without using cake mix! You can tell in the pictures that Kendra loved licking the beaters.

 

 

 

Pumpkin Patch!

This year we once again visited the Cottage Lane pumpkin patch in Ellis. It was much more fun this year and the corn maze was open (last year it was destroyed by wind) and Kendra was old enough to enjoy pretty much everything they had to offer. Of course, picking pumpkins was quite the ordeal. Kendra's was easy enough, but she sure struggled finding the PERFECT pumpkin for her little sis. She also fell off the zip line....fortunately, the man running it was helping her so he caught her as soon as she let go. Here are some pictures for your viewing pleasure! Sorry, none of AJ, she slept in her Moby the whole time!

 

 

Waiting in line for the zip line.

 

Right before she let go.

 

Cherry soda on the way home...gotta love it!

Yum!

This will hopefully be the first post of many today! I'm a little behind. Last week, Alexis had her 4 month check up. We were shocked to learn that she only weighs 13 lbs 11 oz and is 24 inches long! This puts her in the 50th percentile for her weight, and 75th percentile for height! When Kendra was 4 months old, she weighed 15 lbs 8 oz and was 26 inches long....and off the charts! What a difference! Our pediatrician was very pleased with her development and gave us the green light to start introducing fruits and vegetables. This is one of my favorite parts of having a baby around. We decided to start with carrots, and in my new frugal fashion, I am making my own baby food. It goes a little something like this:

First, you have to steam the veggies so they are nice and tender.

Then, you run them through the food masher thingie until they are the desired consistency and texture. I ran them through twice and added some water to them the second time to make them a bit smoother.

And finally, put them in some containers for storage. I love these containers...all they are is glorified ice cube trays, but the work very well. Each evening, I pop one out and pop it in the microwave for 20 seconds or so and it's so convenient!

She didn't like the carrots much. I finally had to mix them with her cereal to get her to eat them. However, she loves peas. We started them this week and after the first bite, she would get so excited and kick her legs and giggle until I gave her more! I LOVE this stage!

Vote for Kendra!

So, everyone needs to go vote for Kendra in the Gap Casting Call!!! We think she's beautiful enough to win. Of course, we're just a smidge biased. You can vote once a day....tell your friends!
http://family.go.com/gapcastingcall/entries/singe252/

Rock Chalk Jayhawk!

This past weekend, Justin and I had the privilege of attending the KU/Iowa St. game in Lawrence with some friends. We had a great time! We're already trying to plan when we can attend another!

 

 

This is the first game I've ever been to, other than high school and Fort Hays. It was so awesome! It was a little chilly, but it didn't start to get real bad until the 4th quarter when the wind picked up. Obviously, we toughed it out and had a great time!

Wordless Wednesday

 

These Are A Few of Our Favorite Things

One of the things we love to do in our house is play dress up. I've been known to pull out old bridesmaid dresses and play the Queen while Kendra runs around in princess costumes playing the Princess. Kendra also loves to pull out her Halloween costume from last year and run around growling (she was a dinosaur last year). Alexis is not immune to these activities and has recently gotten in on the action!


PS This was supposed to be a Wordless Wednesday post, but I forgot. Next week hopefully I'll remember.

Surprise!!!

Or not. If you know me very well at all, you know that I CAN NOT plan anything for Justin. I always tell him what he's getting for Christmas (usually by making him open is presents early), etc. Well, the same is true for his birthday, and this year is no exception. I have been planning a surprise party for him for about a month now. I bought invitations, snuck around to get addresses, and even handed out invitations when him and I went places, all without him knowing. I thought for sure he had seen me hand them out, or had heard me talking about it with the would be guests. Well, it's no longer a surprise. I'm me, and me being me, opened my mouth. I have this worry that even though I invited around 30 people, and even more by e-mail/verbal invite, no one will show. Horrid flashbacks of our attempted Halloween party keep going through my mind. This fear got the best of me last night. I was being quiet, which is somewhat unusual, and Justin kept asking me what was wrong. I denied that anything was wrong for a bit, but I broke down. My defenses were down, I was down, and I caved. I told him. I told him about the party and about my fears. I told him about all my plans and how I had been sneaking the invites, hiding food that was to be prepared, and how his dad was going to get him out of the house. So, in true Janae fashion, I ruined the surprise. The party will still be a blast, and I'm hopeful that more people will actually come this time. I'm actually quite proud that I was able to keep it from him for a month. I mean, really, I'm the girl that shows up with his Christmas present in the trunk, vowing to not say a word, only to pull in the driveway and drag him out of the house to see it. I'm the girl that last Christmas, stuffed stockings 2 weeks early, and then begged him to empty his a day later. I'm that girl. After I told him, I laid in bed and thought about how the events of the evening unfolded. I remember that one of the things on my list is to surprise Justin. This made me regret telling him...but only for a split second, because I then remembered that I have already surprised him! That's right, my big mouth self surprised Justin. Here's the story. Last audit season was hard on me, being pregnant and all. One evening, my grandma offered to keep Kendra, so I took her up on it. Justin was in Goodland, and I decided to drive down and see him. So, after work, I dropped Kendra off, filled the tank with gas, and headed out. I called one of his co-workers and got his room number. I talked to him on the phone as if it were any normal day. I was even on the phone with him when I pulled into the hotel parking lot. So, I told him I had another call, hung up, and ventured up to his room...and he truly was surprised to see me. Mark that one off the list. So, even though this surprise is ruined, I have proven that I can do it...as long as I don't plan ahead too much!!

PS - He had a pretty good idea what was going on. He saw me talking to people after he would walk away, and over heard a potential guest on Saturday talking to me. So, see, it's not all my fault!

Just Call Me Susie

Okay, I'm not good with clever titles. Someone needs to give a creative blog titling class...and I need to take it. Anyway, I digress...

Since I'm no longer working outside the home, I have a little (very little!) time on my hands, so I've decided to use more creative ways to do things. The first thing I decided to do was to make a "Moby" wrap. I have wanted one for a couple months, but couldn't bring myself to drop $40 on a piece of fabric that I didn't know if I would even like. So, I made one. Actually, I made 2. I bought 6 yards of fabric at Wal-Mart and cut it in half. Alexis and I LOVE it. I keep one in the house and one in my car. My back is also thanking me...those car seats are HEAVY, and I don't lug it around any more! Here's a picture of Alexis and I enjoying the wrap...she's snoozing away happily and on this particular day I was doing laundry while she snoozed!

Speaking of laundry, another thing my new frugal self decided to do was make laundry soap. It's inexpensive, and it didn't sound like it was too difficult, so I decided to try it. It only takes 3 ingredients:

1 cup of Borax

1 cup of washing soda

2 cups of Fels Naptha

You have to grate the Fels Naptha, and I did it using the small side of a hand grater. This is what it looked like.

Then, I simply dumped all of the ingredients into a container (I used an old butter container...see, creative ideas...one less butter container in the landfill and one less container I have to buy!) and stirred.

I use approximately 2 tbsp. per load. I figured up how much money I'd be saving by doing this, and by my calculations, I'm saving $0.25 every load of laundry I do...which is about $182 per year. Not a lot, but with as little time as it took, it's worth it to me. I've also read that you can use different kinds of soaps, such as Ivory. I love the smell of Ivory, so when the Fels Naptha is gone, I may try that. Next on my list....baby food!