K-Park Football Game!

Friday night Joanna and I had a special treat!  We went with the Vandenberge’s to the last regular Kingwood Park game.  And it was gloriously chilly – wahoo!

Last week I bought a fleecy sweatshirt for Joanna and some jeans, because she didn’t have anything; I’m glad I did!  We also took the tags off the hat and gloves we bought last year on clearance.

Serious face:

Silly pose face:

Sweet friends – sorry Anna that your eyes are wonky in the picture.  :)

The big girls wanted to hug on Parker the Panther whenever “he” came by!

Lisa took the girls down when the drums were going down to march – Anton’s got to love his 3, 4, and 5 year old fan club!

Sitting with Mr. Tony:

Hugging on that panther some more.

The drum line plays down front in the third quarter.  The girls loved dancing to it!

You can kind of get an idea of Joanna’s moves here:

She also had some crazy head-banger moves going on.  It was hilarious.

Still watching, with a little boy who was sitting near us.

We had a great time!  Thank you Daddy for staying at home with the little ones!  I think next year will be a fun age for everybody to come.  Though, we’ll probably be hitting a KHS game, since Anton will have graduated.  Gotta support my alma mater!

Costume Parade and Party at School

Joanna wore her “Southern Belle” costume to school last Thursday for the costume parade!

Is she so super-precious, or what?!

There she is lined up with her class:

Here she’s telling someone what her costume is.

The class and teachers lined up after they got their loot!

My friend Candice was taking pictures with her fancy one and got at least one great one of Joanna, so I’ll have to post those when I steal them from Candice!

I loved peeking in and watching the class.

Party time!

My wonderful mother was on call that day, but still came over to watch the little ones while I took Joanna to school and stayed for a bit.  I wouldn’t have minded the little ones coming; I just didn’t want to mess with James’ nap if I could help it!

Baby Sheep

So I’ll catch up on all my posts for the week in order (later), but I wanted to post about James’ sheep costume, which turned out really cute I think!

On Thursday Joanna’s school had a costume parade.  She was a “Southern Belle,” but a couple of people commented that she looked like Little Bo Peep.  I got to thinking that might really be fun, especially if she had her little lost sheep.  Enter James.

I love when they’re little and you get to pick the costumes.  :)

I searched on Pinterest how to make a sheep costume, and came up with a few similar instructions.  So I went for it.

And I only had to buy cotton balls and felt.  James had a black-sleeved shirt, and he borrowed Natalie’s black tights from last year.  :)

I happened to have a white onesie in the next size up that had seen better days, so I cut off the sleeves, and glued the raw edges inside with craft glue.  Then I glued just over 300 cotton balls to the onesie.

I also managed to find a white baby hat that could still be crammed onto James’ head.  I cut out some sheep ears from black felt and white felt and glued them on.  Matt had the brilliant idea to stitch them on as well, so they’d be harder to yank off.  :)  Then I covered the hat with another 100 or so cotton balls.  I ended up using somewhere between 400-500 (4-5 bags) of cotton balls.  James is a cotton picker, so I’ve had to replace a few since the first wearing.  :)

If it was a bit cooler, he’d be very comfortable – those cotton balls add a lot of warmth!

Here he is with his Bo Peep, and of course, a cowgirl.

My Monday

Lisa texted me this morning at 7am asking if she could pick up Joanna at 7:30, bring her along to the vet in town to drop off Junior, then take the big girls to school.

Ummm… okay!

So I think that was fun for Joanna, and it did the very important task of reminding me that Joanna had school today.  I think I’m still not used to school on Mondays.  I was planning to take James for his well-check lab work while my mom watched the girls.  Glad I wasn’t in the middle of that and remember that I usually pick up Anna and take the big girls to school on Mondays.

Anyway, James was up super early this morning, so I let him have an early morning nap before I took him to the lab.  My mom came over and watched Natalie and then also Ray for a few minutes until I got back.  James did so good getting his blood drawn!  He sure didn’t like it, but I was so proud of him.

I snapped a couple pictures of his bandage before we got in the car.  It was in shreds on the seat before we got home!

In other news…

I can’t believe I didn’t take a single picture (though I still can of the finished product I suppose) of the apple butter I made today!  I’ve never made or even eaten apple butter, but I really wanted to try it out!  I cooked three quarts of applesauce yesterday, and put it in the crockpot this morning to cook down all day.  It didn’t get as thick and reduce as much as I thought in my head it would, but it is very tasty!  I served some at home group this evening, and several people either lied to me or also believe it’s good!  I put it in little jars which I’ll freeze since I didn’t feel like processing them in the canner.  I spread some fresh, warm apple butter on a slice of warm fresh bread.  Mmmmmmmm…

And now I’m going to bed.  James has been getting up soooo early, and I need my beauty rest!

James’ 12 month check-up!

On Friday the girls and I took James for his one year check-up with Dr. Harper. 

His stats are written below in brown crayon, except he’s actually 28 and 7/8in long; I didn’t remember when I wrote it down.  (And I’m kind of thinking that the height limit on his car seat is 29 inches.  Umm… I should probably check that out.)

Joanna wanted to write James’ name so I spelled it for her.

Wahoo!!  I’m thinking we need to work on M, but I’m still so proud of her!

And of course we had to take two trips to the bathroom while we were waiting.

I’m not sure, but I think this may be the first time I’ve had to strap a kid in to one of those things.  :)

Dr. Harper proclaimed James “practically perfect!”  Well, he may have said something more along the lines of “clean bill of health,” but we all know what he really meant.

For grins, here are links to the girls’ one year check-up blog posts.  Joanna weighed less.  Natalie weighed more.  :)

Joanna February 2008

Natalie January 2010

James had three shots, given by our friend Pam, who’s a nurse at the office.  She told him not to hold it against her when she sees him at church.  :)  Because of our insurance we have to use the lab not conveniently located at the doctor’s office, so he hasn’t had his blood work done yet.  Matt tried to take him Saturday morning, but there were nine thousand people there, and I have never been to a slower medical establishment in my life than the LabCorp in Kingwood.  Just sayin’.  My wonderful mother is going to come over in the morning and watch the girls so hopefully I can get James in for the lab work and back home before his morning nap.  I like delusions; they make me happy.  I really want to avoid going with all the children.  Really.  A lot.

Anyway… after the appointment we had a quick bite at Culver’s because A.) we’d never been there before and B.) it was noon and we were hungry.  YUM!  Then we went to Wal-Mart.  Then we came home.  The end.  :)

(And yup, James’ car seat requirements are 29 inches or less.  That gives me 1/8in amount of time to find a new car seat plan.)  :)

The Little Bed

I took down the toddler bed today.  It was about three years ago that I put it up for my barely 18 month old Joanna.  Natalie hasn't been sleeping in it lately, opting instead to sleep with her big sis in the daybed.  I decided to take it apart to store it so they'd have some floor space in the bedroom.  There's a trundle under the daybed if they decide one twin bed is too small for two little girls.  I LOVE how they share the bed though.  It's so precious.  And they've really been sleeping well that way -- yay!

I’d have been really sad to put it away if I didn’t know I’d be getting it back out sometime in the next year for James.  :)  As it was, I still felt very nostalgic.  It seems milestone-y in some way. 

So, of course, I blog.

James’ Birthday Party!

My mom helped a lot on party day.  She picked up the flowers, loaned me some cooling racks, and came early to play with the kiddos.

I sent Matt to pick up all four kiddos from school.  Thankfully, Lisa helped him by grabbing the girls and bringing them to the hallway where he picked up the boys.  The kids are really spread all over the church grounds, and it’s hard to get them all!

They played outside while I finished up things inside.  Tuesday was THE MOST GORGEOUS DAY.  It was clear and cool and crisp and PERFECT!

Here is James enjoying some food at his party.  He’s a goldfish-aholic.  It’s hard to get him to eat anything else when there’s goldfish around! 

Some friends:  Ray is keeping up with Logan at the train table.

Mmmmm… chocolate milk! (And more friends in the background)

Because it was a “come and go” party, we sort of did things all haphazardly through the evening.  :)  Opening a present…

Drinking some cow’s milk.  It’s much more fun from a paper straw!

Round one of “Happy Birthday.”  I kind of jammed the candle into a pumpkin cookie.  I would have liked to have had a teeny candle, but oh well!  The girls helped him blow it out again.

(as you can see, it was getting too dark for natural light pictures, and the flash wasn’t on – oops!)

Mmmm… cookie!

He liked it.

And the next one too.  :)

More presents!

He really liked reading the cards.  He’s so advanced.  :)

James got so many wonderful toys and books from his friends!  He (and his sisters) have had so much fun playing this week!

And I think someone else opened every single package – I didn’t have to battle with a single twist tie or whatever.  Wahoo!!!

Another cookie!

Joanna stole Christiana’s Ipod as soon as she came over, and the girls watched some of Tangled on it.  They’d played a lot and were tired!

I’m not sure I noticed anyone taking pictures, but if anyone has any pics from the party they’d like to send over, I’d love it!  I just didn’t take very many (so unlike me!).  We had lots of wonderful family and friends there – such a blessing!

Up next… the 12 month well-check!

Getting Ready for the Par-tay!

While the kids were at school, Matt and I were busy turning the house into an autumnal cookie paradise.  (Really that’s just fancy for saying “clean and picked up.”)

All the decorations were inspired by the invitation, which the wonderful Amy Beasley created:

Here’s my cookie table:

I found some ribbon in the perfect colors (and splurged on it) to wrap around the cookie containers.  I mostly used what I had for the containers (jars, vases, cake stand), but I also bought three jars that I knew I’d be able to use to store other ingredients and baked goods once the party was over.  I’m going to link to all the cookie recipes online.  You can just click the name of the cookie and it will take you there!

Pictured above are the white chocolate pumpkin spice cookies, peanut butter cookies (from the BHG cookbook), and Oreos (from Nabisco).

There were oatmeal chocolate chip cookies, peanut butter cookies with Hershey kisses, and no bake cookies.

And there were Sugar cookies, Snickerdoodles, and Chocolate Chip cookies.  Yummy!

Just for kicks, I included an ingredients list on the cookie labels.  I pretty much made the recipes as they are on the links, except I always subbed freshly ground whole wheat flour for all-purpose flour, and I used sucanat or turbinado for the white sugar.  And I hope it goes without saying that I would never ever ever ever use margarine.  Ever.

My mom picked up some colorful flowers to use in the décor.  I also used some pumpkins (which I plan to bake soon!) and gourds.

Amy also designed some labels for our “milk bottles” (Starbucks Frappuccino bottles).

I ordered some paper straws from Etsy in the same orange and green.

I put some ingredients in jars just for fun (sucanat, chocolate chips, wheat berries).

I printed some of our pumpkin patch pictures to hang up.

I covered the door out to the laundry room with pretty paper and put 13 pictures of James up – one for each month plus the day he was born.  I stole this idea from Amy; she always does that for her girls’ birthdays on their office door.  I love it!

More labels for the milk…

And the homemade chocolate syrup.  This stuff is good.  :)

Some yummy snacks…

A basket of napkins, which almost no one used.  My mom says people were scared of them?

I made some pom poms, which are still up.  I think they’re pretty.  :)

Dinner:  sandwiches, veggies, and fruit.  Light and yummy!

Peanut butter and homemade peach jam – yum!

I was very excited that it was, for the most part, a pretty “green” party.  There really was nothing to generate trash.  That made me happy.  :)